Guess What? We’re brothers!

2. Help your brother's boat across, and your own will reach the shore - Hindu Proverb

Luhan is the first one to reach the Incheon Airport the day of their flight to America, and Kris stands by his side with his big luggage in one hand and the other supportively patting his back the whole waiting time. To say that Luhan has never travelled or done anything without Kris in years would be enough to explain his tensed nerves, but the fact that he will be together with four strangers who have turned out to be his half-brothers does even more. 

He has the expression of a kicked puppy, resting against Kris’ side with his cheek on his big arm as he waits for the others to show up. The incredible sum of money waiting for him, for some reasons, doesn’t manage to distract him. 

Sehun is next, greeting Luhan and his secretary with a frowned expression before he introduces the tall boy with wide ears and gummy smile standing besides him. 

“Luhan, isn’t it? This is Park Chanyeol, my boyfriend.” he says, and the two shake hands, Luhan politely smiling at the two boys before he makes to introduce Kris as well but Sehun interrupts “Is he your boyfriend? Wow, Chanyeol, he’s even taller than you.”

“I noticed.” Chanyeol says with a slightly frightened voice. Luhan and Kris fall silent meanwhile, sharing a quick look before bursting out laughing  gracelessly. 

“He’s not my boyfriend, he’s my secretary.” 

“Yes, I’m definitely not his boyfriend.” 

“Wow, okay.” Sehun shrugs “It wasn’t like it would be so strange, you are hugging, in case you haven’t noticed.”

Kris and Luhan look at each other again, noticing their closeness just then and moving away with embarrassed coughs. The sight makes Sehun giggle, then he asks, “Secretary, eh? You must be one big name Luhan.. can I call you hyung?” 

Luhan smiles, slightly flattered. “Sure. You’re nineteen, aren’t you? So young.” 

“And too tall for his age.” 

Baekhyun pops out from nowhere, a judging look on his face as he observes Sehun’s taller figure before he raises a brow at Chanyeol. “Are you my brother, too?” 

Chanyeol smiles sheepishly while Baekhyun proceeds with asking Kris the same question only to receive an amused laugh from Luhan. “What? Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised anymore.” 

“Right but no,” Sehun shrugs in his direction, a hand wrapped around Chanyeol’s arm “He’s Chanyeol, my boyfriend, and that’s.. Luhan-hyung’s secretary.” 

Luhan nods, introducing Kris who has the look of someone who would like to be anywhere but there, and Baekhyun hums in understanding. “Hot secretary you have there, Luhan-hyung.”

“Uhm, thank you?” 

Baekhyn grins at the sight of Kris blushing. He looks around quickly then, questioning expression on as he notices the absence of the remaining two, “Where are chicken legs and satan dwarf?” 

“Oh my god, have you given us nicknames already?” Luhan widens his eyes in shock, because surely Junmyeon and Kyungsoo’s nicknames didn’t sound nice at all. Baekhyun waves him off with a laugh, while Sehun eyes him wearily at the possibility.

“Don’t worry, yours is nice. You’re pretty and cool, little deer.”

“Little deer?” Luhan repeats, horrified.

“And what’s mine?” Sehun investigates, receiving a little annoyed look from Baekhyun. 

“I still don’t know. You’re too.. flawless, it gets on my nerves.”

Sehun grins happily despite the ‘gets on my nerves’ part, and giggles more as Chanyeol wraps him up into a back-hug and says, dreamily “He is, right? My baby is flawless.”

Baekhyun makes a very disgusted face, while Luhan and Kris blush at the sight of different people walking around sending the couple dazed looks. 

“Thank God the big Yoda won’t be with us during this journey, I can’t stand cheesy couples, no offense. Anyway, satan dwarf seemed like a precise person, he was supposed to arrive before me.”

To hide a laugh, Luhan literally hides behind Kris who, meanwhile, is standing there cluelessly and thinking that those people could definitely be Luhan’s brothers because they were strange as hell. Sehun scoffs in Baekhyun’s direction, offended, while Chanyeol blushes.

“Actually, Chanyeol is coming along, too. We just bought his ticket.”

“What?”

“Oh, and here’s Kyungsoo.” Luhan adds then, a little smile on his face as he spots the thin boy walking in their direction with scared wide eyes and a little trolley in hand.

“Hi.” greets Kyungsoo, wearily as he studies Chanyeol and Kris’ figures with an arched brow, and his words meet a grin from Baekhyun and a little nod from Sehun. Luhan comes out from his safe shelter behind Kris to answer the greeting with a friendly smile. 

“Hi, Kyungsoo. How are you?” 

Kyungsoo stares at him, taken aback for a moment, and his eyes are so big Luhan feels unable to stop himself from smiling even more. The strange cycle makes them both fall down into a bashful silence, and Kyungsoo only ends up answering the older’s question with a sheepish grin. 

“You didn’t ask me how I was.” Baekhyun points out as he observes the two, hands on his hips, and Sehun smirks.

“The old hyung has his bias already?”

“Oh shut up you,” Baekhyun glares at him “You’re taking your big puppy along.”

Sehun shrugs nonchalantly. “So what?” 

“Well, no one told me we could bring someone along!”

To that, Luhan slightly widens his eyes and makes a quick 180° degrees turn around to face Kris with his best lovely deer face he can afford.

“See? You can come, too. Let’s go buy you a ticket.”

Kris waves him off with an annoyed look, the eyes now set on him making him go on fire. He keeps his tone low and bored, “Don’t start this again. We’ve got work to do.”

Luhan pouts, rolling his eyes briefly before going back to face his.. brothers, plus the tall boy stuck to Sehun like a shadow, with his arms childishly crossing at his chest. 

As Sehun and Baekhyun start a little argument regarding Baekhyun’s unkind nickname for the poor, lost Chanyeol, Kyungsoo stands there with judging eyes while keeping on sending glances to his watch, to try figuring out why Junmyeon hasn’t shown up yet. He then sees Chanyeol - that apparently was the tall boy’s name - carefully sneaking away from Sehun and Baekhyun’s eyes to go poking Luhan’s arm bashfully. 

“You look like the normal one, here.” Chanyeol says, making Luhan giggle “Shouldn’t we like.. separate them?”

“Why.” Kyungsoo shrugs, shutting his eyes closed calmly “If they kill each other, that means more inheritance for the remaining of us.” 

Chanyeol stares, astonished and honestly, kind of relieved his Sehun hasn’t heard those words. As Luhan lets out a low chuckle, he pouts “That’s pretty evil, you know?” 

Kyungsoo shrugs again, then finally sees Junmyeon appearing into view. He doesn’t know if he should be relieved or terrified, because that meant they could finally prepare for the flight, and the flight meant a week together with those people, but also meant a week before his life could change forever. Before he can decide his feelings toward the whole issue, however, a little figure suddenly running to Junmyeon’s side while shouting a loud ‘Appa’ that leads half the airport to turn their heads to the scene makes him freeze.

Junmyeon greets them all with a bashful grin, touching his neck as he apologizes for the delay with too many pairs of eyes staring at him. “I just had to go picking Tao up and yeah, sorry everyone.”

The kid besides him who, apparently, goes by the name of Tao, beams at the others’ direction and starts waving his hand energetically. He is young and kind of cute, with charming eyes and a shy yet friendly smile plastered on his little face. 

“Hi, uncles! Wow, there is so many of you!”

Sehun exchanges a look with Baekhyun just as Kyungsoo arches a judging brow, while Chanyeol and Luhan immediately go to their knees in front of the kid to shake his hand and ruffle his hair with unnaturally beaming eyes.

“Hi, Tao, I’m uncle Chanyeol.”

“Ya, big Yoda, you’re not his uncle.” intervenes Baekhyun, and Chanyeol ignores him with a gummy smile going to make Tao even happier.

“I will be a better uncle for you than those two.” he adds, finger pointed to Baekhyun and Sehun who, at first, fake offense, but eventually have to agree. 

Luhan pats the kid’s cheek as he offers a kind smile. “I’m uncle Luhan, Tao. Nice to meet you.”

“Wow.” Tao beams as he nods in Luhan’s direction “You are so pretty! I’m so happy to have a pretty relative.”

“Because he is ugly.” Sehun whispers in Baekhyun’s ear at that, making the older boy burst out into a graceless laugh. Kyungsoo hears them and flashes an annoyed look, while Luhan thanks the little boy with a little smile and then introduces the rest. “Those are Sehun and Baekhyun, he is Kyungsoo.” with a little smile, Luhan invites Kyungsoo to greet the young boy and quickly manages to bring him offering Tao a nod and pat on a shoulder. 

Junmyeon ruffles his boy’s hair and smiles, “I hope you don’t mind, but he’s coming along.”

“Him, too?” Baekhyun snorts “Didn’t you say you couldn’t afford a journey to America?”

“Yes.. so?” 

“Where did you take the money for his ticket?” 

Baekhyun crosses his arms, offended at the fact that he hasn’t thought of taking someone along too but more than everything, weary as Junmyeon blushes. 

“Appa took grandpa’s money to buy my ticket!” Taoo announces, impossibly excited, and leads his father to helplessly cover his mouth with a hand in vain. 

Baekhyun glares. “I knew it. You insisted on taking the money to start spending it already!” 

“I knew we had to give them to Kyungsoo.” mumbles Luhan judgmentally, and Junmyeon rolls his eyes.

“Come on, we’re going to be billionaires in a week, how can a ticket for a poor kid scare you this much?” 

“Well,” intervenes Kyungsoo carefully, going to place himself in front of Junmyeon with a hand stretched “Meanwhile, we need this money for other things so if everyone agrees, I’m taking the box.”

Moving his fingers to mime a ‘Give me’ gesture, Kyungsoo sets severe eyes on the eldest as the other brothers hums in agreement. Tao grins at his father’s sigh as he gives up and gives the younger the famous metallic box. 

“Okay, we should start going then.” Sehun incites then, taking Chanyeol’s hand and introducing him to a very depressed Junmyeon as they start going. Kyungsoo follows quietly with a sad Baekhyun by his side, who is once again lamenting the absence of someone he could have taken along, while Luhan takes a moment to send Kris his last kicked puppy look.

“You sure-“

“Yes.” says Kris, firm “I can’t leave the management to our co-workers, and you know it.”

Luhan pouts, accepting the luggage Kris gives him paired up with a supportive smirk. 

“Come on, enjoy yourself. You could like them eventually.”

“Yeah, I could.” with a little defeated smile, Luhan greets his old friend and starts walking away, too. “I trust you.”

Kris mimes an ‘of course’ and leaves, promising a message to update Luhan about work three times a day. 

On the plane, Junmyeon takes a seat with Tao while Sehun with Chanyeol. Luhan, Kyungsoo and Baekhyun look at each other wearily for a moment before Luhan gently lets the younger sit together, thinking of doing good, and goes taking his seat besides an old man who is snoring already, a few rows back.

“I’ve never taken a flight before.” says Baekhyun, to Kyungsoo principally, but the younger ignores him “I’m pretty nervous.” he then kicks the seat in front of him to get distraction, which he knows is Sehun’s, and then takes a nail file out of his hand-luggage with nonchalance.

Apart from Baekhyun and Sehun’s little arguments here and there, Tao’s whines about the quality of food the hostesses serve mixed with excited screams at the coolness of flying around the globe, the flight is rather calm. 

They are already flying over America when Sehun falls asleep on Chanyeol’s shoulder and Baekhyun starts seeking for further distraction with a silent Kyungsoo. 

“What has your mother said when you asked her about Son Eric? You should have seen mine.. she was mortified. I honestly got a little angry she held this secret for so long, I mean come on.. Well, did you ask her?” as he turns around, only to see Kyungsoo staring at the little window of the plane with headphones on, obviously lost in his own world, he hisses. “What an amazing company.” 

A sudden shake of the plane, however, makes almost everyone jump up from their sleep, and surely from their seats. 

“What the hell?” Junmyeon yells, immediately taking Tao’s hand as the plane shakes again. 

Baekhyun starts shaking Kyungsoo’s calm self with trembling hands. “What, what, what?” 

“Chanyeol, we’re dying.” mumbles Sehun instead, slowly awaking, and Chanyeol hums besides him.

“I’ve always loved you, baby.”

Baekhyun hears them and looks at their seats with shocked horror. “You two are ing insane!”

The old snoring man, meanwhile, has jumped up from his long sleep and is now clinging on Luhan’s arm like an octopus, making Luhan’s already scared self shiver in uncomfortableness and fear even more.

“Don’t worry, Tao.” Junmyeon stutters, eyes wide “It’s.. it’s okay, nothing is happening.”

“Dad.. you’re the scared one.”

“Really, you don’t have to pretend, dad is here.”

Tao snorts, rolling his eyes and trying to free himself from Junmyeon’s tight hold around his little arm. 

A beep then breaks in the fuzz of scared people and the captain’s voice echoes in the plane, calm and composed. The captain talks with nonchalance, saying that the plane has apparently come across an unexpected tempest and will now have to make an emergency landing at the McCarran International Airport in Nevada. 

Needless to say, once the flight safety lands, the amount of traumatized people shaking at the fright of a possible serious incident is way more than the amount of relaxed ones. 

The calm ones being Sehun, Chanyeol, Kyungsoo - he normally looks scared so everyone supposes he is okay - and two drunk boys who were apparently lost enough all through the flight to notice nothing. 

“I’m not doing this ever again.” Baekhyun hisses, still shaking despite Luhan having set by his side with an arm wrapped around his shoulder, trying to comfort him and to comfort himself. 

As Sehun and Tao mock a terrified Junmyeon, with Chanyeol joining the fun despite feeling a little guilty for the elder man, Kyungsoo stares at Baekhyun and then rolls his eyes. “You know, we have to reach Arizona. We have to take another flight.”

“Hell no.” Baekhyun looks up at him horrified and Junmyeon does the same as he hears his words. Kyungsoo sighs patiently, watching as Baekhyun starts whining again while stomp his feet childishly “I want to become a billionaire, I don’t want to die! So no, no flight.” 

“Exactly, how do you think you’ll go back to Korea then? By car?” Sehun pipes in, unperturbed as usual, and Baekhyun glares at him deadly at the mocking in his voice.

Before he can protest, though, a little scream from Tao makes everyone turn their heads to the little boy’s direction and then, following his eyes, they all pale at the sight of Junmyeon with Son Eric’s urn in hands and a firm, fool expression on his face. 

“No flight.” the man states wide-eyed “Or I swear I’ll get rid of these ashes and goodbye to our inheritance.”

“Are you insane?” Sehun asks with a panicked voice “You’re the most disperate among us all, stop saying nonsense.”

Tao snorts from his position and crosses his arms, “And he even wonders why I always threat him to get what I want.” 

“Yeah, I can imagine.” Luhan says, setting careful yet annoyed eyes on Junmyeon and taking a little breath. Years of Kris and him working on whoever they needed for affair has taught him enough to handle the situation. “Hyung, please stop this, it’s stupid. We will rent a car for now, okay? Just stop acting like a fool.”

Junmyeon reasons on his offer for a couple of seconds, then quickly beams. A car sounds okay and from his position, even Baekhyun seems happy at the option. Kyungsoo and Sehun roll their eyes.

“You guys are so boring,” says the youngest “We have to take a flight back to Seoul anyway. It will take us ages to reach Arizona in car!”

“Leave them alone, sweety.” Chanyeol tells him with a gentle smile, posing a kiss on his temple and then shrugging “They are just a little shocked now, try to understand.” 

“Car then, it’s decided.” Junmyeon exclaims immediately, proud of the turn of events, and carefully takes his father’s urn down again “Wow, I managed to take the urn in hands!”

Tao face-palms, just like everyone else apart from Kyungsoo, who just closes his eyes patiently. 

“Appa, you’re embarrassing.”

“Shut up.”

Luhan sighs and besides him, a defeated Kyungsoo thinks aloud, “It’s illegal to commit murder in America, isn’t it?”

“It’s illegal everywhere, Kyungsoo.”

“What a pity.”

-

After a long fight to decide who was supposed to drive around the continent with the 7 seater car they rent with the $5.000 Notary Cha has given them, the choice falls on Chanyeol. 

Junmyeon is immediately discarded as he has to watch over his son, Luhan steps back claiming it’s always Kris who drives him around in Seoul - which is pretty much an excuse, because Luhan loves driving - Kyungsoo and Baekhyun apparently don’t to have their driving licenses yet and Sehun is under-age, so Chanyeol finds himself with keys in hands and a big responsibility over other six people’s lives when he wasn’t even supposed to be there.

He accepts, though, not like he could do otherwise, and is happy to have Sehun taking a seat besides him with a map in hands to guide him. If they ignore Tao and Junmyeon sit behind them and the remaining three at the very back of the car, that could almost pass as the perfect journey Sehun and him have always dreamed of.

“I wanted to sit with Luhan-hyung, though.” Tao protests at one point - and he does whine often, Chanyeol notices - long into the journey already, puffing his cheeks and receiving a glare from Junmyeon and a lovely pinch of cheeks from Luhan himself.

“Stop complaining.” his father scolds.

“I’m bored!”

“You have your phone, don’t you? Play and be quiet.” 

Tao snorts, taking his iPhone 5S out from his little backpack and making Baekhyun widen his eyes from his position. “Isn’t that an iPhone? Seriously, Junmyeon-hyung, didn’t you say you were facing a serious financial crisis?”

“Let me guess,” Sehun pipes in, turning to send Tao a knowing look “Your ‘appa’ bought you that phone with our money.”

Junmyeon pales, “Of course I didn’t! It was his mother’s present.”

“Yes, you did.” Tao unmasks nonchalantly, and his father glares yet swallows as his brothers glare at him instead. 

“I can’t believe it.” Baekhyun says “You practically spent $1000 on your own already!”

“Eldest my .” helps Sehun, and Junmyeon has to accept the critiques with his head going guiltily down. 

To bring some peace in the car at that point, Chanyeol decides to ask the brothers with a positive tone, “So.. what are you all going to do when you get the money?” 

Sehun sends him a bright look, eyes full of love, and leans slightly closer to pose a kiss on his cheek. “We’re gonna live a wonderful life, hyung.”

“Aw, so cute.” Luhan sighs, eyeing the scene with a dreamy expression that has Baekhyun and Kyungsoo snorting loudly. 

“Well, I’ll buy myself a MacBook, first of all.” Baekhyun says then, expression going blank a moment later. Kyungsoo and Luhan send him an expectant look, but he only beams and shrugs eventually “And everything I want, without having to work!”

Kyungsoo sighs at his final ‘Yohoo!’ shaking his head and commenting a low “Idiot” that Baekhyun hears but ignores. Instead, Baekhyun asks him, “And you, shortie?” 

“Ehm, Baekhyun.. you’re not really that much taller than him, you know.” Luhan comments wearily, but Baekhyun once again choses to ignore the words he hears. Sehun and Chanyeol chuckle. 

“I’m just going to put the money on my bank account and let the interests grow.” Kyungsoo explains, before Junmyeon hums and nods in his direction. 

“I’ll use some to re-open my old restaurant and the rest to grow interests. I mean it should be a smart move, a grow of ₩500.000 a month would mean, uhm..” just as he is about to ask Tao for his phone to calculate the sum, Kyungsoo says as quick as a robot “₩6.000.000 a year” 

The car falls silent, even Chanyeol looks at him from the driver mirror.

“You’re scary.” Baekhyun comments honestly “How is it even possible that you’re just a hair-styler with that brain of yours?”

“You would be a perfect business consultant.” Luhan tells him with a little warm smile, before the idea really hits him and he makes sure to keep it safely in the back of his mind. Kyungsoo shrugs.

“I’ve never had enough money to afford college.” 

His sentence makes the call fall silent again, even Baekhyun and Sehun feel extremely sympathetic towards his financial difficulties at hearing such words. It becomes clear, in a moment, that Kyungsoo especially needs his part of the inheritance to change his life 360° degrees. 

“You’ll have what you deserve, now.” Luhan tells him with an arm hesitantly wrapping around his narrowed shoulders and a blinding, warm smile, that brings Kyungsoo to surprisingly let go, leaning closer to let his older brother comfort him. With Luhan, he should be honest, he kind of feels at ease already. 

Tao turns around then, to question Luhan with anticipating eyes. “Pretty uncle, what about you?” 

“Yeah, I’m curious, too. You are rich already, aren’t you?” Baekhyun helps, and Luhan blushes slightly.

“I’m not rich.”

“Oh come on, look at your clothes. There’s nothing you’re wearing that isn’t high-fashioned.”

“Well,” Luhan shrugs, a bit uncomfortable. He kind of feels like the bad guy, with a 31-years-old unemployed father and a smart young boy who couldn’t afford college surrounding him with curious eyes “It’s just that.. I run Vogue Korea, you know.. the clothes are presents.” 

Baekhyun and Sehun, but Junmyeon too, send him bewildered looks. Sehun blinks a few times before saying, “That’s why you have a secretary. Really, hyung, you are a big name indeed.”

“Why were you hiding it?” Baekhyun supports the younger’s point with glittering eyes as he scans Luhan’s entire figure “That’s cool as hell. I love your fashion sense.” 

“He works for a fashion magazine, of course he has a good fashion sense.” Sehun hisses, and Baekhyun rolls his eyes.

“You’re pretty rude to be the younger.”

“Yeah, Sehun, you are not even that close to us to be this rude.” Junmyeon observes, although a bit too submissive, and in fact he closes in his shoulders when Sehun turns to glare.

“It’s not my fault you guys are being hard to deal with. I’m the only one who has taken this brother thing seriously, it seems.” 

Chanyeol hums from the driver seat, “No offense everyone, but I would have been happy, if I were you. Sehun is right.”

“Do you think it’s easy to treat strangers like people who should have grown up with you?” Kyungsoo asks, serious, and makes all the others fall in a little, thoughtful silence. 

“Brothers are cool.” Tao observes after a while, sending Junmyeon an annoyed look “I’ve always wanted one but mom and dad never gave me.”

Luhan shrugs. “I’ve always wanted a brother, too.” The little, innocent flush making its way on his pretty face, together with the dreamy and hesitant tone of his voice, bring all the others to surprisingly yet inevitably feel something melting inside them. 

It would have been hard to say it aloud but for all of them, lonely and deprived of any company during their childhood, a brother would have always meant the world. 

Chanyeol feels the atmosphere tensing for a moment and hopes it will help to break the ice among the five brothers but, before he can really feel happy about the slow turning of events, the car suddenly shakes and everyone startles in fright. 

Unexplainably, what seemed like a very cursed travel brings to a flat tire. 

“.” Chanyeol hisses immediately, driving with difficulties until a SOS zone on the highway to check on the punctured rubber while everyone else starts panicking.

“Why the hell are we being so unlucky?” Baekhyun asks, exasperated, when Chanyeol confirms the problem.

“Don’t worry, though.” the tall boy smiles supportively as he goes opening the trunk “We just change the tire and we’re done.”

Sehun follows his boyfriend’s lead to help and leave a dreamy kiss on his lips, absolutely uncaring of the eyes set on them, of the situation.. of Tao staring with eyes wide open as he looks up from his iPhone screen. Chanyeol giggles, stupid in Baekhyun’s eyes, then proceeds with taking the spare tire out from the trunk.

Except there’s no spare tire in the trunk. 

“What the actual hell?” Chanyeol yells, terrified, at the sight of too many luggage from the ones he remembers having put inside at the car rental. He eyes a pink, pastel pink luggage stuck where the spare tire should have been instead, and together with him everyone turns to a mortified Baekhyun without hesitations. 

“What?” the boy blushes until he reaches a bright red on his skin “I can’t go around without my beauty-case, okay?” 

“Beauty-case?” Kyungsoo yells “That thing is bigger than me!”

“Well, doesn’t take much, you know!”

“Byun Baekhyun, I’m so gonna kill you.”

Luhan immediately puts himself between the two arguing brothers, although a bit scared, while Sehun, Chanyeol and Junmyeon start looking around to observe the absolutely nothing surrounding them, an expanse of highway and mountains and red grass being everything they see.

“We’re screwed.” Sehun points out, and although Junmyeon scolds him for the indelicate choice of words in front of his easily impressionable son, he highly agrees. 

They are.  

____

A/N

LOL Junmyeon is bullied everywhere, no matter what xD

What do you all think? Hope I managed to convey the funny feeling of the story ~