I could hear his cries as I left. I wanted to turn back so badly but I knew that if I turned back I’d only be doing what they wanted me to.  The closer I got to the door the louder I could hear him screaming at me to not leave.  He grabbed onto me trying to pull me back further into the dorm, but I just shrugged him off.  When he spoke it his voice cracked and it broke my heart because he was in this state because of me. I was leaving him behind even after I had promised to be by his side forever.

“Please, don’t leave me. Not now at least. Please… I know you’re not as happy as you could be but you promised to be here until I was ready to go with you.”

                I did promise. I promised to stick around until we would both leave the group together. We were both fed up with the company and how we were being treated. I was done, I couldn’t handle it anymore, but he still held on for a little longer. He said he wasn’t ready yet. We hadn’t mentioned this to the rest of the members, not because we didn’t want to tell them, but because we didn’t want them to be angry at us for leaving without having gone to them in our time of need.

“I know, I know I promised. But right now I just can’t take any more of this. I didn’t even want to become a singer. I never wanted to be put here, I never asked to be placed as the leader, do you know that I do everything and I still get scolded for not being good enough. I’m just so sick and tired of all of this. I can’t handle it. I have my limits and they’ve been reached long ago.  I’ve just stuck around because of you. You made me feel happy but seeing as how you don’t really seem to care about me anymore I guess I have nothing holding me back.”

“Kris, I’m sorry, it was never meant to happen. I swear it just happened, it didn’t mean anything. I know that this isn’t the future you wanted but please just don’t leave me. I need you.  I need you in order to function; I need you in order to feel the least bit happy. Can’t you see that without you I’m nothing? Do you know what they see me as; they see me as a short little ing that can’t take a joke because I never find all the idiotic things that the rest of the members do, funny. I have emotions and I started feeling whole again ever since I’ve been with you.  I can’t do anything without you.”

“Then leave with me Kyungsoo. Leave with me, don’t look back and just go away with me.”

“I… I can’t. This was my dream. I can’t just throw it all away after two years. I trained so hard to just to be here and I’ve given up so much to be where I am.”

“Then stay, just don’t call me if you do. I don’t want to hear from you, I don’t want anything to do with this group. Everyone hates me already. You’ll just be one of the masses. Follow what they want you to do. Be happy singing on an empty stage.”

                I felt his arms drop from his hold on me. I heard him sniffling and I wanted so bad to just turn around and engulf him in my arms but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t do this right now. I picked up my suitcase instead and headed out the door into the hallway. I could hear Kyungsoo crying through the door and my heart ached but I couldn’t go back.

                I haven’t seen any of them since I left the dorm. The lawsuit went by and afterwards I terminated my contract, there was no contact from any of them. I expected at least one of them to try and see if I was okay but nothing. No one tried calling, emailing, or anything. They continued on with their promotions and got a replacement for me. I haven’t seen Kyungsoo since that day. He never showed up to court whenever the members had to attend.

                Sometimes I wonder if I hadn’t found Kyungsoo in bed with Jongin, would we have had that fight. Would I have waited for him to leave the group with me? Would we still be together today? I thought about these things a lot but I see them on shows being extra close. Sometimes they wear matching outfits and they seem so happy. I wonder if they’re actually together or if it’s all just pretend.

“Kevin? Can you come help me?”

“Sure.”

                I’d moved back home. I tried acting like I wanted but it never felt right. I liked acting in itself but I didn’t like going to premiers by myself while all my co-stars had dates with them. I felt alone and so I moved back home. My mom didn’t mind all that much, I helped around the house and did what she asked me to. I got a job working in an office, it wasn’t what I wanted but I at least had a job. Traveling was part of my job and I was okay with it, it wasn’t as tiring going onto a plane as it was back then.

                I’d be leaving for Beijing in a couple days in order to set up an agreement with one of the firms there. I’d been there and back a few times and I was always okay it’s just this one time that made me nervous for no reason. I eventually gave it away to stress. As the day of my flight approached my stuff was packed and I was getting ready to leave but my mom stopped me, like she always did, to hug me and tell me goodbye. Instead of just her usual “be safe” she added in “if you get the chance talk to him” I didn’t know who she was talking about or why she even said it. I simply nodded as if I actually knew what she meant.  When I landed in Beijing there was a ton of people, well more like teenage girls. I didn’t know what was going on until I heard them scream and saw them all run to one of the terminals. I did my best to get away from them but was pulled along with them. I decided to be a bystander and leave the crowd and watch from the outside. Who they were waiting for began to come out and all hell broke loose, there was screaming and shoving and some of the girls were crying and clawing as they screamed out to the artist. I was about to turn and leave when I heard a girl screaming at the top of her lungs “KYUNGSOO – OPPA!!!!!” I turned and I caught a glimpse of them. They all seemed to sparkle and shoved their way through the fans. I saw him. He held onto Kai tightly not wanting to get separated. I saw him look up and I knew he saw me because once his vision caught mine he turned away quickly.

                It all went by so fast. It hadn’t been even five minutes and they were gone. I stood in the same spot just staring in the direction of where he was. And that’s when it hit me. My mother knew they would be here. She knew but didn’t tell me. I snapped out of my trance when a girl that was screaming earlier walked up to me to ask if I was alright. I said I was and was about to leave when she stopped me.

“I know it’s been quite a while but do you mind if I can get a picture with you? You were my favorite member before… you know.”

                I didn’t know what to say so I just nodded. She smiled at me and got her phone out to take a picture of us. This was the first time anyone had recognized me.  I smiled into to camera and took the picture with her then she looked at it and smiled and thanked me for the picture. I waved goodbye to her and went to grab my luggage and leave the airport. Once I got to my hotel room I called my mom and asked her why she hadn’t told me. Without answering my question she asked in a hurry if I had talked to him. I told her ‘no’ and continued to talk to her about anything for the next hour.

                In the morning I woke up and got ready to go to the meeting I was attending that day. When I walked out of the hotel it was raining and I didn’t have an umbrella with me so I sought out shelter under the entrance canopy until a taxi stopped in front of the hotel. I got in and was on my way to the office building. Once I got inside, I was greeted by warmth and stares. I felt everyone’s eyes land on me but soon diverted from me and they went back to what they were doing. I asked the secretary for help in finding the conference room and she lead the way for me. She knocked and I was let in. I met with the leader of the meeting and we talked for a bit waiting for everyone else to arrive. Soon more and more people began to arrive but the room still was half empty. We heard a stampede of shoes running through the hall and stopping in front of the door. The door opened and I was met with the sight of them.

                They all took their places and the meeting began.  I knew there would be a slight chance that I’d have to work with them at some point since I worked in marketing and design. I never thought it’d actually happen though. But here they were sitting in the same room as me as the meeting went on. The second half of the meeting was directed by me and I talked about what we could do to improve marketing techniques and what would bring in more clientele for the products that EXO would be advertising.  The moment I stood to give my part of the presentation all their eyes went straight to the screen behind me or to the table. None of them looked at me.  I felt a rush of sadness but I shook it off and continued on with my presentation.

                Once the meeting was over everyone stayed back and discussed what they seemed to be the best thing to do and they even got in the impute of the members and what they wanted to do. I excused myself to use the bathroom but I really just wanted to leave the room. I couldn’t take the glares that I was getting. Every single one of them looked at me with so much hatred and disappointment.  I knew that if we were ever to meet again they wouldn’t accept me back as their brother or even as their friend but I left knowing what was going to happen and I thought I could handle it, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t hide all the emotions that I had held back, I couldn’t hold back what I had kept hidden for so long.  As I found the bathrooms I ran into one of the stalled and began to cry. I couldn’t hold it any longer. I didn’t care who heard me. I just let everything that had built up over the past six years pour out.

                I don’t know how long I’d been in there crying but a headache had accumulated and I heard feet scrambling into the bathroom. A few hiccups left my lips and every sound stopped. Steps came towards the stall that I was in and I looked to see the shoes that they were wearing. Whichever member it was, knocked on the door and told me to open the door; from his voice I knew it was Chanyeol. I didn’t move to open the door or anything I just sat in the same spot in the corner of the stall not moving.

“We know you’re in there, Kris, now open up.”

“….”

“Are you just going to leave us like this again, without an explanation? We were all hurt. You know, you weren’t the only one dealing with problems with the company but we dealt with them, you just ran away like a child.”

                I heard him scoff afterwards and it got me angry because they didn’t come to make things better they just came to rub it in that they were just fine without me. I got up knowing I’d have to come out at some point. I opened the stall and I just felt all their eyes judging me. I walked towards the door to just walk away from them, from this.

“Are you just going to run away from this too? You get scared and you run away? What kind of a person are you?”

                I hadn’t lifted my face from the ground but once I did I saw all of them, I saw all their faces change from anger to surprises. They hadn’t expected my face to be puffy and my eyes red from crying.

“What kind of a person am I? I’m someone who’s broken. I run away when I’m scared because I’d rather be slightly broken than be completely shattered. I’m not strong emotionally, I’ve never been strong and seeing you all be happy and rubbing it in that you’re all fine without me breaks me that much more because it meant that I was never a necessity to the group, I’m easily replaceable and no one cares what happens to me. Do you know why I was always laughing and smiling? It’s because I was trying to hide it, I was hiding all of my pain so no one would notice. There were so many times that I just wanted to break down and cry but I kept on smiling in hopes that if I smiled long enough that some form of happiness would follow me but you know what, smiling just made me even sadder. Does that answer it? Are you all happy? Knowing how I escaped but ended up regretting everything that I’d done leading up to me leaving?”

“Kris, we-“

“My name’s not Kris. Kris died when I left; my name is Yifan or Kevin, but never Kris.”

“Look, we didn’t know. We didn’t know what you were going through, but if you would have just talked to us we would have helped.”

“No, you wouldn’t have. You made fun of me when I cried on the phone for missing my mother who was on the other side of the world. Besides, I was the leader, remember? I was supposed to carry everyone’s problems alongside mine. Don’t ever think that I didn’t care because I did, I cared too much and it broke me.”

                As I said that, I looked directly at Kyungsoo and he looked at me with sadness in his eyes before averting his eyes away from me and looking towards Kai. I turned to leave, leaving them all there like nothing happened. Right before I opened the door I let out a sigh and straightened myself out. I turned to them with a smile on my face, “Thank you for your hard work, I’ll see you at our next meeting.” They all looked at me with shock that I had hidden everything away in just a second and went back to my job. Once I was outside of the door I heard them begin to talk.

“How did he do that?”

“What?”

“Hide everything so well; like he didn’t just have a breakdown five seconds before.”

“Practice. He hid his real feeling from us for so long that it’s probably just second nature to him by now. Hiding away making sure no one notices.”

                I left after that. I went back into the office space to collect my things and leave. As I was leaving the building I was pulled back by someone and turned to find Kyungsoo pulling me. He guided me into a secluded hallway in the building.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m sorry… for what I did.”

“You didn’t do anything.”

“Exactly, I didn’t call to check if you were okay, and when we were supposed to go to court I never showed up. And I tried to forget what we had.”

“I told you not to, remember?”

“I still hurt you. But I swear that that was the only time that Kai and I slept together while we were together.”

“But it wasn’t the last time afterwards, huh?”

                He looked at the floor and began to play with his fingers.

“He asked me to marry him.”

“Congratulations.”

“I said no.”

“Oh. Can I ask why?”

“You. I couldn’t stop thinking about you. I wanted to call you every single day and wanted to run away to go and see you but I couldn’t bring myself to do so. I know it’s been six years but I still think about you. I look back on our last conversation that we had and I regret everything, I should have left with you. Everything felt so empty, and you were right about the empty stage, although I wasn’t alone it still felt so lonely because I couldn’t run to you right afterwards to take you hand on our way back to the waiting room. I thought I could fill that empty void of you with Kai but it just made it worse, because what I did with him caused you to break.”

“I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“Not allowing you to move on when you should’ve been so happy without me.”

“Did you? Did you move on?”

                A smile crossed my lips but I shook my head.

“How could anyone move on from what we had? I loved you so much that every step that I took away from you that day broke my heart even more because I made you cry right before I left and I wanted to turn back, so badly and just pull you into me and make everything better. But I didn’t because I was too scared.”

                I saw a small smile form on his lips as he raised his head and it reached his eyes. He stepped closer to me and looked into my eyes before he started to lean upwards with his eyes dead set on my lips and I got the hint and lowered down to capture his lips in mine. It wasn’t much. Just our lips pressed together. We heard someone calling Kyungsoo’s name and we pulled away. They got closer and we pulled further apart from each other. Kai was who was calling him; he looked at me with some form of disgust in his face but also pity. He grabbed Kyungsoo around the waist and told him that they had to leave.

“Wait. I want to say bye to Kris first.”

                Kai looked at him with a look of astonishment but let out a small “Fine” before releasing him. Kyungsoo walked up to me and instead of just a simple bye like I had expected he took one of the pens from my coat pocket and took hold of my hand before he started writing on me. When he was done he handed me my pen back and I thought he was going to leave but he pulled me down and pecked my lips before scurrying off again. I looked down at my hand and it was his number and his KaKao username. I don’t know why but I felt happy. This wasn’t supposed to happen. We were never meant to meet again and we'd forget about each other and move on. But that didn’t happen.  We did meet again and we didn’t forget about our time together and from the looks of it we never moved on or planned on moving on because I think we just gave each other a second chance at being happy.

A/N: again if you skipped out on reading the foreward this isn't me being insensitive towards the issue of Kris leaving, i wrote this and finished it well over a month before the things with Kris started happening, i just hadn't posted it because i was busy and stuff (graduated from H.S). 

so, with that said i hope that you enjoyed this and don't think to harsh of me for putting this up because i have already waited long enough, to me at least it seems so.