Chapter Text
Chan is pacing, he doesn’t know what to do. He wants to comfort Felix so bad, but the boy probably hates his guts and wants him dead—Chan should’ve just waited.
He was just so scared when Felix was always having these crashes, he didn’t know how to help—he just wanted to know how to help. Instead of asking Felix himself, he used Google who possibly made the other Australian uncomfortable and now he’s fucked.
So fucking fucked, and he hates the fact he is. He regrets opening his mouth, he regrets even showing Felix the site. Chan should’ve fucking waited, but he didn’t and now Felix is mad at him.
Felix on the other hand is not calm whatsoever, he hasn’t had a bad meltdown like this in ages, not probably since he was at least thirteen or fourteen. He didn’t calm down for three hours, he probably won’t for a few more hours than that, possibly four or five because everything is just crashing down and no one to build it back up.
Chan’s not here to build it back up, and it hurts. Felix feels stupid, so fucking stupid. His pillow makes it hard to breathe, but he can’t part with it, which makes him feel a bit grounded and safe.
Chan can’t take hearing his sobs anymore, he physically can’t. It’s eating him up so bad inside and out, he rips his headphones off, walking towards Felix’s room. Everything is sounding him not to do this, that it’ll make it worse, but he doesn’t care.
He’d rather let Felix be mad at him then just let him cry and hear him cry his eyes out, make himself pass out, possibly sick. Chan doesn’t even knock, he’s opening the door still as quietly as he can without letting it make a sound, Felix’s sobbing crushes his heart.
He’s rushing to Felix, keeping tabs on what he’s doing just so he could comfort better. Right now, the Australian is sobbing, rubbing his hands on one of his soft blankets, a white one with yellow cats in it, almost rocking himself on a pattern to soothe himself.
“Hey, hey, Lixie,” Chan whispers as he rushes as quietly as he could to Felix, his whispers soft and comforting. The leaders hand ghosting on the other’s back, anxious on what to do. “Can Channie-hyung touch you? Is that okay?”
Felix nods, still crying. His hand meets Felix’s hot back from his breathing which alarms him, and now Chan can see him rubbing his face on a pillow to almost seem like it limits the sound of his cries.
“Hey, Lix, let’s not do that okay?” He’s guiding Felix to get out from the pillow, basically smothering him now, getting on the bed on a quick thought to guide his flaming back to meet Chan’s chest. He can feel him melting under his touch, calming his tension and upsetting feeling with just the leader’s touch like magic.
Chan’s slowly and softly rubbing one of Felix’s shoulders as he lightly tilts them side to side to help soothe the Australian more. Felix’s heat on his back slowly cools along with his sobs and his hands rubbing on his blanket beneath them both.
It’s quiet almost besides Felix’s hiccups from his harsh crying and his sniffling. Chan’s rubbing on his arm slowly got slower as he didn’t want to trigger Felix nor want to talk about anything right now, just calm the boy down and make him feel safe.
Felix didn’t completely calm down until Changbin and Jisung made their appearance known with their loud laughter of probably something Jisung showed the rapper. A whine escapes Felix, and he’s cuddling up on Chan to hide the noise, or at least try.
Chan hushes him softly, bringing a hesitant hand to Felix’s head, feeling the warmth, he curses. He should’ve known Felix would come down with something with his almost daily crying and ignorance of health, he should’ve known that, but he acted like an idiot.
“Could you tell me what’s wrong? Or at least try so I can help?” Chan tries, but he really didn’t want to deal with the guilt of another sobbing Felix.
“You.” Felix mumbled, it’s almost unavailable to hear. Chan swallows hard, and now he feels like crying, he’s so guilty.
“I shouldn’t have just jumped into conclusions or anything without asking you. There isn’t an excuse for it, I’m really sorry, Felix,” Chan’s heart is racing, his throat feels raw—almost like it’s been hollowed out. “I’m really sorry.”
He expects Felix to rightfully shut him out, yell at him, punch his chest in anger for doing something so invasive, wrong, stupid—Felix doesn’t. He’s curling like a little cat on Chan’s chest, one of them directly where the leader’s heart is slowly calming down.
“It's okay, I’m…I’m not mad,” Felix is slowly losing energy to talk, Chan frowns. Felix should be mad at him, he ruined the Australian’s trust in him over the older being worried about him.
Chan bites his tongue on saying Felix should be mad, but instead lets the conversation die, still comforting Felix, still rocking Felix and him, and still trying to calm his heart. The younger Australian stays like that, curled into Chan like a cat, falling asleep from the rocking and Chan’s slowly calming heartbeat.
Chan decided to properly talk to Felix when he woke up, for now, decided to give him space, knowing if he woke up with the leader in bed with him while he’s rightfully angry at him and not in a headspace of exhaustion, he would be upset.
“Goodnight, Lixie,” Chan mumbled, covering Felix up just like he remembered, making sure it was right three separate times before exiting the room, making eye contact with Changbin who was in the bathroom drying his face.
“Hey, Channie,” Changbin smiles, shutting the bathroom light off. “You alright? You look upset.”
“I’m alright. Get some good rest, okay?” Chan smiles back, and Changbin steals uneasy glances at Chan—basically unsure of what the leader is telling, but he forfeits any chance of investigating by going to his room to probably sleep or watch a show.
Chan goes to his own room, sighing as he goes back to his computer, his mind yells not to work, that he doesn’t need to work on their much needed break, but if he stops this grind of working, who knows if he will get back into it.
So, he opens up his laptop to get to work, slipping on headphones to make and tweak a few tracks. He slowly works himself into overdrive, not realizing he had fallen asleep until he felt someone lightly shake him, the bright sun blaring into his eyes when freshly opened.
“Ow, fuck.” He mutters, blinking to turn his head away from the blaring sun, to be met with a very familiar yellow hoodie—his hoodie he left in Felix’s room—with matching sunshine socks—Felix. Guess the boy beat him to talking first. “Oh! Morning, Felix.”
“I—Uhm, just want to apologize for just bolting instead of talking to you yesterday,” Felix begins, even though Chan is still trying to take in his surroundings. Chan opens up his mouth to protest, but Felix shakes his head. “I should’ve come clean weeks ago, but I was ashamed—I am ashamed. No one is supposed to witness when I’m like that, I promised to myself I wouldn’t, especially you. I am autistic, you were right, I was just so scared of what you and the other members would think if one of their members are autistic—“
“Hey.” Chan cuts him off, way out of his chair now, softly holding the other’s shoulders, waiting to take them off the second he becomes discomforted. “Don’t be scared, I will always support and love you regardless if you are autistic or not, you are still my Lixie.”
“But—“
“Nuh uh, no buts, I mean it, Lix,” Chan frowns as he sees Felix fumbling with his hands. “You are still my Lixie , my home .”
“I—I’m—“
Chan brings him into a hug, and it breaks Felix. He’s sobbing again, holding onto Chan so tight he’s scared he might hurt him even with the strength difference, it shocks the older that the Australian is crying.
“Hey, it’s okay,” Chan muttered, rocking him and Felix slightly in a sense of comfort for the other (and to not make Chan cry himself). “Nothing would make me see you differently, not even you being autistic, I promise. You don’t need to immediately be okay with me making you feel unsafe, I realize now there’s no excuse behind me doing research without talking to you first and making you uncomfortable, I’m sorry, Felix. I’m really sorry.”
“It’s okay, hyung. I promise,” Felix says, taking a deep breath of the other’s lingering cologne. “If you didn’t bring it up for me, I don’t think I would’ve been able to do it on my own.”
“I love you, Lix. Thank you for trusting me with this, I’m so proud of you.”
“I love you too, Channie-hyung.” Felix squeezes Chan a bit before turning towards his abandoned computer, laughing a little. “Fell asleep working, huh?”
“Guess so. I was worried about you, I wanted to stay, but I didn’t want to make the situation worse,” Chan explains, not laughing at all. Felix scoffs. “Lix, you didn’t seem to be in a good headspace.”
Felix stays quiet before breathing out a quiet “ oh .” He didn’t know what to say, he’s never heard someone tell him that after his meltdowns, he didn’t think of them like that.
“You were really out of it, Felix. You went non-verbal or were close,” Chan continued, watching as Felix slipped out of his hold. “I was scared, Felix. I was scared I did that.”
“Chan…” Felix starts or tries before Chan shakes his head, he can see the leader trying to hold himself together and not seem like his mind isn’t screaming at him that it was all his fault. “It…It happens with all my bad meltdowns, it wasn’t your fault.”
Chan wants to battle it out, arguing it is his fault. If he just minded his business and waited for Felix to come to him, this conversation wouldn’t exist, it would’ve just stayed as a silly what if.
“You were crying for so long and… and I’m supposed to pretend that…that I wasn’t the cause of that?” Chan’s voice wavered and Felix didn't know what to do, what to say. Every sentence he builds in his head, every single one just doesn’t seem right. “You…You know it’s my fault, Felix. Please don’t lie to save me, please don’t lie and say you aren’t mad at me.”
“Hyung…” Felix trails, at a loss. He doesn’t know what to do, what to say. The man can see the battle Chan is going through with his emotions, trying not to cry, trying not to make this more difficult. “It’s not…It’s not your fault, I’m just…I’m not used to people caring about me being autistic in a way of helping and understanding . I’m not…I’m not used to people like you in my life, who…who actually want to help me.”
Felix feels anxiety tighten in his stomach as he continues, “It’s not your fault that I’m not used to this, it’s not your fault that I was crying over my actions. Please don’t blame yourself, Chan. I promise I’m not mad, I was in the moment, but…but then I realized you just want to help me, be there for me and I wasn’t used to it so I freaked out.”
“Lix..” Felix can feel himself wanting to cry at how much Chan is beating himself up on wanting to help him, thinking he did something wrong.
“You did nothing wrong for wanting to help me, Chan, okay? I promise,” Felix watches as the older man comes closer to hug him, but pauses before he can allow his hands to meet Felix’s— his —sweatshirt.
He meets him the rest of the way, hugging him. “Lix—“ Chan’s trying but Felix doesn’t let him.
“I mean it. Just because I was angry for a few seconds doesn’t mean you did something wrong, okay?” Chan just nods where his chin lays on the other’s shoulder as Felix softly rubs his back. “This is a huge step for me, Chan. I told someone—you—about being autistic, this is huge to me. Next could be the others and…and I won’t have to worry because you’ll be there to support and help me when I need it.”
“Thank you for trusting me, Felix. Thank you,” Chan said, his voice more stable now. Felix just hums, hugging Chan a bit harder, in his own comfort that everything will be okay.