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Eight minutes before showtime finds Felix tucked away in a mostly hidden corner, cycling through his vocal exercises and trying to regulate his breathing. He’s mostly managed to do so when Chan finds him.
Anticipating the leader voice, Felix raises a hand to stave it off before it even starts. “I know, I know— nearly time to go. I’ll be ready, I promise.”
“Actually,” Chan says, raising an eyebrow, “I was going to show you a very important video. But hey, if you don’t wanna see a cute little kitten cuddling her puppy best friend, then I’ll leave you to it, no worries!” He looks so pleased at having subverted Felix’s expectations, and Felix doesn’t know whether to roll his eyes or kiss the stupid smug look off his face.
What he actually does is make grabby hands and say, “Give them to me,” and Chan settles next to him so they can both watch his phone screen as the video plays. It’s a short clip, but as it starts over, Felix’s heart stops pounding and his ribs stop feeling quite so tight, which he knows was Chan’s goal in the first place. After all this time, he knows what Felix needs.
“You were right,” Felix says on the third loop. “That was definitely very important.”
“I know, right?” Chan then lowers the phone so he can peer at Felix closely. “How you doing, then? All good?” The dark eyeshadow he favors for the stage always makes him look so intense, but even the stylist noonas can’t hide the way Chan softens for Felix sometimes, like cotton candy on his tongue. It grounds Felix, to see the way this man cares for him.
“All good,” he replies, a bit too late, but Chan smiles anyway.
“Alright then. Six minutes. Meet you up there.” There’s a pause where Chan would normally kiss him — on the cheek, the mouth, anywhere he could reach — but it’s too close to showtime and they can’t risk ruining their carefully applied makeup, so all Felix gets is a hand on his elbow and a quick ear rub. As Chan disappears off to do a last-minute check on all the boys, Felix takes a final deep breath.
All good. Time to conquer that stage.
Hours later, in the dwindling minutes of their final show in Seoul, Felix is decidedly not all good.
He doesn’t know how he ended up here, bawling his eyes out on what, on all accounts, has been a good night. The team’s performance has been electric; there were no major mess-ups. All those grueling rehearsals and late-night recording sessions have paid off, and they’ve produced something they can truly be proud of.
And yet, Felix can’t stop crying.
Part of it is the fact that they have done so well. These past few nights, as he’s listened to the members each give their speeches, Felix has been so proud of them he feels like he’ll burst, pieces of him floating away in the clouds of confetti that close every show.
But there are other feelings stored up under Felix’s sternum that have burst like a dam, and sometime between the middle of Chan’s speech and the beginning of Changbin’s, Felix becomes a complete and utter mess. One moment he is bent over, crying into a neon green towel — it feels almost as absurd as he’s sure it looks — and the next, he is swept up in a pair of strong arms. Familiar arms. Exactly what Felix needs, once more.
At first, Felix stands there, trying to stay strong under the weight of so many eyes on them. Here is not the place for Chan to hold him like a lover, the way he might when they’re alone. The way he has after the previous nights’ shows, away from the hot stage lights and the swiveling cameras. But their contact doesn’t break; Chan keeps rubbing his back, keeps pulling Felix closer. He’s saying things into Felix’s ear, surely sweet words that Felix has no ability to comprehend right now. The only thing he manages to catch is I got you, and it’s that paired with the comforting sound of Chan speaking, like the rumble of the ocean crashing against the shore, that leads Felix to finally sink into him completely.
“There you go,” Chan says, while Felix clings to him like a drowning man to his steady anchor. He digs his fingers into Chan’s skin, warm and bared for him. Changbin is still talking, and the fans are reacting, but all Felix can focus on is this: the heat of Chan’s body, the fading notes of spiced cologne mixed with hairspray and clean sweat. Felix can almost taste it, pressing his face into Chan’s neck when it feels like it’s not enough.
Throughout it all, he can’t stop sobbing, blubbering mostly nonsense into Chan’s ear. There’s so much he wants to say, so many words he owes to Chan — to all of them — but the only thing he can manage, over and over, is sorry sorry sorry.
Chan, of course, says, “What are you sorry for?” and it only makes Felix cry harder, bury himself deeper in the embrace like he’ll disappear if he gets close enough. There’s so much he should apologize for. That he’s still lacking, that he got hurt. That he’s getting snot all over Chan and showing no signs of stopping. That he needs this much comfort, when this should be a happy moment that glows golden in their memories, what they’ve wanted for so long and finally get to have again.
He says none of this out loud, but he doesn’t have to — Chan understands, the way he always does. “Sunshine, you’re so good, alright? Nothing to be sorry for.”
“You h-have to s-say that,” Felix nearly wails, and normally that might make Chan laugh, but tonight it just makes him squeeze Felix tighter. They should stop, probably. Felix should step away and attempt to pull himself together. But it feels too good to let go right now, and Chan doesn’t seem to want to let him go, so Felix stays. The way he always wants to.
At some point, other hands start rubbing Felix’s back, and oh right, other people exist outside of them. Not just other people, but his members. Who also love him. Who also speak words of comfort and encouragement, and oh god, here come the sobs again.
Somewhere to the left of them, Jeongin says, “Hyung, you’re going to make the floor all slippery with those tears,” even as he strokes Felix’s hair. Moments later, Changbin stops his speech to ask, “Baby, why are you crying?” and Felix falls further into Chan while the boys make sympathetic noises.
Underneath it all, Chan murmurs, “I’m here as long as you need me,” and Felix hopes the way he clutches at his shirt conveys his gratitude.
Later, Felix thinks. I’ll thank him properly later.
For now, he just lets himself be held.
When the concert ends and they finally make it off the stage, bone-tired and puffy-faced, Minho shouts, “Yah, member-deul! Make sure you don’t leave anything lying around, the staff have enough to deal with without your gross towels ending up everywhere.” Everyone laughs, hoarse but bright, and Minho gives Felix a quick smile while he squeezes his wrist as if to say, See? You weren’t the only one.
This is the way they take care of each other, the eight of them: kindnesses covered up by jokes and often delivered with touches to soften the blow. Felix loves them so much it hurts.
There’s not a lot to do after the show, thankfully, so they can all decompress for a bit while they wait for the vans to come for them. The beginning of a headache is creeping up Felix’s temple, and he’s wondering whether he can wait until they get home to do something about it when a water bottle appears in front of him.
“Chan-hyung says I’m not allowed to leave you until you drink the whole thing,” Hyunjin says, waiting for Felix to accept the bottle and chug half of it before plopping down next to him. They’re on the ground, which is a bit cold and not exactly comfortable, but Hyunjin is as warm as always, clinging to Felix just the right amount. “You doing okay, Yongboks? You cried an awful lot out there.”
The noise that leaves Felix’s mouth is too shuddery to be called a laugh, but it’s what he intends it to be. “Yeah, yeah, I’m okay. Just a lot of feelings, you know?”
He feels Hyunjin nod, then cling a bit tighter. “You had fun, though, right?”
It’s such a simple question, and it makes Felix feel young, like the kid fresh off the plane from Sydney all those years ago. That kid would have been thrilled beyond belief if he’d known this was waiting for him: a three-night stretch of shows in a city that would become his own as much as the one that raised him; a weekend of riotous colors and joyful screams and breathless tumbling through choreo. It’s everything that kid dreamed of, and Felix is pretty sure he won’t remember a thing.
At the very least, he won’t remember the encore, those last thirty minutes before the spell breaks. It already feels like a kaleidoscope in his head: little jeweled moments fragmented into pictures he can never quite grasp, but it’s beautiful. It’s really beautiful.
“Yeah,” Felix answers honestly, after taking another sip of water. “I had a lot of fun.”
When Chan finds him a little later, Felix has claimed that same corner from before the concert.
“Nearly time to go, little one.” He swipes a thumb under Felix’s right eye, and even though his tear ducts are surely dry as deserts by now, something about the tenderness of it makes Felix wants to cry all over again.
Wordlessly, Chan squirms in next to Felix and arranges them so Felix is half on his lap. It’s impractical — as Chan said, they have to go soon, and it’ll take them more than a moment to untangle from this position. Still, it feels nice, so Felix thinks, Fuck it. He holds out his hand, palm up, and Chan folds his own hand around it, interlacing their fingers.
“Hey… thanks,” Felix says after a beat, because it’s later.
“For?”
Felix snorts. As if he doesn’t know. “Back there, you know.” With his free hand, he makes a vague gesture toward the stage. “The hugs. And everything. You were just…” Felix sighs. There simply aren’t words to express the vastness of what he feels for the person next to him. The person who’s promised to stay by his side and has never once broken that promise. Even before they figured themselves out, Chan has always been there. “You’re just the best.”
Chan nudges his nose against Felix’s jawline. “I made a promise to myself, back then.” Felix must look confused, because Chan goes on. “Just… in Sydney. After my speech. I dunno if you remember but—”
“No, I do,” Felix says, because suddenly it clicks. That moment Chan had been overwhelmed, such a rarity, and Felix had run over to him. Collapsed onto him, really, because what else could he do while Chan cried? He hadn’t even cared that Chan was apologizing for how he’d treated Felix, having long since moved past it. All he’d cared about was holding his friend, someone who had become his family, as he fell apart.
The Chan of today smiles weakly. “I’ve watched the footage, you know.” He breaks off for a moment, and Felix thinks about how the members tease Chan for being so aware of what people say about them: always the first to send a fan-made edit or know a trending hashtag. It’s a leader thing, probably, and it doesn’t stress Chan out the way it used to, although Felix still privately thinks he could use some more distance. Try telling Bang Christopher Chan what to do, though, so Felix lets it be.
When Chan speaks again, he’s avoiding Felix’s eyes. “You needed more from me, didn’t you.”
It’s not a question, and something about the tone makes Felix’s heart twist. “Chris,” he starts. “That was years ago. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does, though,” Chan says, and he sighs, eyes closed as he leans back against the wall. “I promised myself I’d take better care of you. I wasn’t doing that for so long.”
Felix swallows his protest. They’ve discussed this, is the thing. Not long after they fell into each other — after Felix took a chance with I love you and Chan miraculously said it back — they’d talked about it. How Chan thought, for a long time, that he was doing the right thing by keeping Felix at arm’s length.
He didn’t realize Chan was still holding onto that guilt, though. Perhaps he should have. Given the chance, Chan would take on the weight of the world if he thought it would benefit someone he loved.
Foolish boy, Felix thinks, with unbearable fondness. Out loud, he says, “You take great care of me. Of everyone, really, but… yeah. You’re really good to me.”
“I’m trying,” Chan says, and it sounds like a confession. He squeezes Felix’s hand. “Thank you, though. For saying that. Means a lot. I do think I’m doing better now.” It’s more credit than Chan usually gives himself, and Felix resists the urge to give him a good job head pat for his efforts. He settles for raising their joined hands and dropping a kiss on Chan’s wrist; the resulting appreciative hum tells Felix it was the right move.
Some time after that, one of their managers comes to collect them. As Felix predicted, it takes some work to untangle from each other, and even when they manage to stand, Chan refuses to drop his hand, which sends a pleased rush of heat from the back of Felix’s neck all the way to his fingertips.
It occurs to him, as they’re coming out of the building and the vans come into view, that this is the part of the night when they’ll have to split. When Chan will go home to his bed and Felix to his. Normally he’s okay with that. Felix was used to the space between them before they got together, and as much as Felix dreams of spending every night in Chan’s bed, he knows it’s good to maintain some of that space now that they’re together.
Tonight, though, the thought of ungluing himself from Chan’s side, after spending so much time wrapped up in him, makes Felix physically ache.
Chan must sense the shift in him, because he stops. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” Felix says, but it comes out faint. He clears his throat. “Yeah. It’s just…”
Chan follows his gaze to the vans, and his mouth forms a small oh. He adjusts the strap of his backpack and gently pries his hand from Felix’s grip. “I’ll be right back,” he promises when Felix makes a tiny protesting noise.
Felix watches as Chan has a quick conversation with their managers, who look back at Felix and eventually nod before shooing a grinning Chan back in his direction.
When he’s back in front of Felix, he holds out his hand again. “You wanna spend the night with me?”
A puff of air gushes out of Felix’s mouth. “Yeah,” he says. “I really do.”
Noobody questions Felix’s presence when they clamber into the van together. Hyunjin merely cracks a sleepy eye open and says, “Yayyy, sleepover,” punctuated with a half-hearted fist pump. Changbin ruffles his hair, and Felix is sure Jisung wouldn’t have made a fuss either, if he weren’t completely passed out in the backseat. Even when they make it to the dorm and he startles awake, he just regards Felix with a casual “oh hi, baby,” before stumbling out of the vehicle without another word.
Wherever they go, Chan always takes up the rear, which lately means Felix does, too. They do this now, waiting for the van to empty before they dismount themselves. As they follow everyone into the building, Chan nods toward the elevator. “You wanna shower at yours and come by later?”
It’s not a bad idea, but Felix shakes his head no. “If I do that, I’ll just wanna pass out in my bed. It’s fine, I can survive one night using your terrible shampoo.”
“Hey,” Chan protests weakly, “it’s not that bad.”
Felix bumps their shoulders together. “Nah, it’s not that bad. Smells nice, anyway.”
They decide to shower separately — though Felix feels wrung out like a towel after so much emotion, the temptation of Chan naked and wet in front of him would be too much to pass up, and Felix proclaims that he’s too tired to deal with that. Chan snickers but agrees, and so off Felix goes to shower first, definitely the one to use more hot water between the two of them.
When he makes it back to Chan’s bedroom, he finds his boyfriend sprawled across the bed, face unwashed and fully clothed still. He snorts. “You know, you could’ve washed up while I was showering.”
The answering pout on Chan’s face is frankly ridiculous. “Yeah, but you didn’t want me near you while you were naked, remember?”
“There’s a whole other bathroom down the hall!”
Chan straight up whines in response, eyes squeezed shut and brow furrowed like a disgruntled puppy. “You’re being mean to meee.”
“And you are being so silly,” Felix says through a laugh. The way Chan is lying leaves his ass exposed, and Felix wastes no time landing a playful smack on it. Chan yelps, and Felix laughs harder. “Go shower before you pass out with a face full of makeup.”
Chan grumbles but he obeys. As he leaves the room, Felix calls out, “Don’t forget to double-cleanse!” because Chan’s been whining about his skin lately, and Felix will influence his boyfriend into a proper skincare routine if it kills him. And if they manage that, then he’ll tackle the curls next.
By the time Chan returns, Felix is under the covers and nearly asleep, although he perks right up when he turns to watch Chan peel off the towel and shimmy into pajama shorts. This does not escape Chan’s notice — not that Felix was trying to be subtle — and he shakes his head, amused.
“I thought you were too tired for anything tonight.”
“I am too tired,” Felix says, even as his eyes trace the curve of Chan’s pectorals, “but can’t a guy admire his hot boyfriend without trying to start something?”
“Mmm, a guy can,” Chan muses, crawling into bed now that he’s achieved his preferred bedtime state of near-nudity. “You usually can’t.” When Felix lets out a squawk of indignance, Chan chuckles as he pulls Felix into a cuddle. “Don’t worry, love, I’m not complaining.”
Felix barely manages to grumble, “Better not be,” before Chan presses a sweet kiss to his pouty mouth.
“You’re so cute.” He squishes Felix to his chest. “Even when you’re crying your eyes out, y’know?”
His tone is teasing in a gentle way, but Felix still groans. Can he ever live? “So embarrassing, oh my god. Can’t believe I lost it like that.”
“Hey!” Chan draws back. “Not embarrassing. Never embarrassing. It was an emotional weekend, yeah? We all kinda lost it.”
“Yeah, but not completely like I did.” Felix traces over one of the flowers on Chan’s bedspread, avoiding any trace of concerned eyes even as they’re smushed together. The bed is really too small for them to be sharing. Felix remembers floating the idea of larger mattresses for the both of them, considering how often they end up sleeping together. But ever-practical Chan had merely shrugged and said, “There’s other things I’d rather save my money for. Besides, don’t you like being practically on top of each other?” And well, Felix could hardly argue with that.
Right now, though, when Felix feels splayed open and vulnerable and a bit like hiding, it’s not exactly convenient.
“Felix,” Chan says, and oh god, the given name, not love or sunshine. This is serious. “You know it’s okay, right? That you were upset?”
“It wasn’t just upset,” Felix mutters, though that was certainly part of it.
“You wanna talk about it?”
He should. He definitely should, Felix knows that. And it’s not that he doesn’t trust Chan with it: the darkest parts of himself, all his doubts and insecurites knotted together so tight in his gut that sometimes Felix is sure that tugging at them will cause him to unravel. It’s just that Felix has a hard time talking about things when he hasn’t figured them out on his own yet. It’s different than Chan’s struggle to open up — that comes from not wanting to burden anyone. And sure, Felix doesn’t want to burden anyone, either. But his problem is more that he doesn’t like to voice things out loud until he has the right words for them. How can he tackle a problem if he’s not even sure what the problem is to begin with?
“Tomorrow,” Felix says, and it’s a promise to himself as much as it is to Chan. “Let’s talk about it tomorrow.”
“You know, any other night, I might not let you off the hook,” Chan says, “but I think we’re both pretty drained, and I want to give you my full attention when you tell me.” He traces a finger over the bridge of Felix’s nose. “But real quick, I just want to say: I love you. I’m proud of you. And I think you’re wonderful no matter what.”
It’s nothing Felix hasn’t heard from him before, yet hearing it now, after everything that’s happened tonight, feels like a balm to the soul. “Right back at you,” Felix says, because if he says anything else, he might start crying again, and he doesn’t want to find out what will happen to his body if he does. Instead, he leans forward and presses his mouth against Chan’s, hoping his kiss will say the things he can’t.
They kiss like that for a while, unhurried and spearmint-sweet from their toothpaste. Eventually, Felix pulls back a bit. He opens his mouth to say something else, maybe to suggest that they actually fall asleep, but as he examines Chan’s bare face, what comes out instead is, “You’re beautiful, you know.”
Immediately, Chan’s features pinch and his tongue clicks incredulously. “Yeah, alright. Says you.”
“I mean it!” Felix says, and tonight of all nights, he needs Chan to listen. To believe him. He lays a hand on Chan’s chest, right over his heart. “Inside and out.” It’s long past midnight, and Felix isn’t good with words at normal human hours, so he knows it’s going to come out clumsy and not nearly enough. But he says it anyway, because it’s important. “Meant it earlier when I said you take good care of me. Dunno what I’d do without you.” He tugs at an errant curl, and the corner of Chan’s mouth quirks up. He does seem to be listening, so Felix keeps going. “My handsome boyfriend with the big, big heart. Thank you.”
“For what, Lix?”
Felix shrugs. “For all of it.” He presses in closer, pulls Chan’s arms more tightly around him. “Being here. Leading us.” He meets Chan’s gaze steadily before adding, “For loving me. For letting me love you.”
Chan’s eyebrows knit together, and he fits a hand against Felix’s cheek. “Oh, baby.” He leans in slowly, waits til Felix’s eyes flutter closed before he kisses his eyelids. They’re still so swollen, but Chan is gentle, soft as a butterfly’s wing. “Always, always. You know that.”
“I do,” Felix whispers, “but I’m grateful anyway.”
They lie there for a while, not quite asleep but listening to each other breathe. In his relatively short life, Felix has been to many places, but nothing has ever felt quite like this: the safety and comfort of Chan’s body curled around his. These days, when he pictures home, it looks a lot like this. The fact that Chan feels the same feels like a gift, even now.
Maybe one day, Felix will be able to communicate it properly, write it into a song the way Chan pretends he hasn’t and say all the beautiful things he feels, in his soul and down to his very bones. For now, he drifts off to dreamland, soothed by the knowledge that he is warm and safe and loved.