Chapter Text
There’s three things Renjun and Yangyang perpetually disagree upon.
1. Would it be better to be snapped for five years à la Thanos or to survive it? (Because Renjun would rather get snapped and Yangyang wouldn’t. The tragedy of their preferences dawned on them immediately, but with every tragedy comes a comedy: Renjun would be the type to get snapped, knowing his luck.)
2. Who is the better driver between them? (Which is really just a front for the true crux of the matter– who was the fucker responsible for scratching Kun’s SUV three years ago?) (Neither of them owned up to it of course because Renjun did not do it (which doesn’t make sense because Yangyang swears he didn’t do it either!) which meant both of them were subjected to Kun’s wrath i.e. being left on read when they desperately needed his mega-comprehensive mega-study guide… the night before AP week started.)
And last and certainly not least—
3. Did or did not Mark Lee have the hots for Renjun when they were in high school?
The third being the most polarizing, most divisive topic that, for some reason, they always somehow circle back to at any conversation about high school. Because Yangyang wholeheartedly claims that Mark did, in fact, have the hots for Renjun and that Renjun must have purposely ignored the fact because poor Mark’s “longing gaze” has been permanently etched in Yangyang’s memory.
And every single time, without fail:
“But why do you have Mark’s ‘longing gaze’ stuck in your mind?” ‘Longing gaze’ in aggressive air quotes.
“Because I felt so bad for him.” Allegedly, the pain of seeing somebody look so pitiful was so painful to Yangyang that— “I was seriously going to knock some sense into you. Right then and there. No joke, dude.”
It was a funny little thing at first, a funny little recurring bit, but anytime it’s brought up now they’re met with a chorus of tired groans, and even Shotaro politely excuses himself from the conversation until Donghyuck decides to feign being bored to death to which Yangyang would dramatically ask for audience input— “Did or did not Mark Lee have a thing for Renjun?” And the consensus, unchanged since it was first prompted, always unanimous, is this: Mark Lee did not have the hots for Renjun in high school. Renjun would bark out a vindicated laugh and Yangyang, betrayed by his own inquiry, disregards the collective conclusion with a scoff. That is how it never ends.
Whether or not Renjun liked Mark Lee is another story.
If Renjun hypothetically had a crush on Mark he would hypothetically never tell anybody. Because that hypothetical crush would be one of at least a hundred other crushes on Mark Lee— Renjun is not exaggerating— and that’s a fact that makes Renjun feel stupid. Hypothetically.
Nothing against Mark, of course, but after knowing of Mark and knowing about a dozen other people who’ve had a crush on Mark, Renjun hypothesizes that every person who’s liked him has, to varying degrees, genuinely believed that Mark liked them back. “The Mark Lee effect,” Yangyang would dub it, unknowingly dunking on his own freaking argument. Mark is so nice and personable and talks to every person like they’re a good friend which in high school— where every feeling is magnified times ten and nobody has a solid grasp on what love is— is ultimately conducive to a heartthrob status. In Yangyang’s words: “He makes everybody feel special.”
“Yo, I love that song,” Donghyuck would then remark, stirring from his boredom-induced stupor.
To admit to liking Mark, Renjun thinks, means to admit to having deluded yourself into thinking that Mark likes you back and, in more extreme cases, maybe even truly believing that you two are bound to end up together. In short, having a crush on him is like setting yourself up for inevitable heartbreak. (Or, at least, what was considered heartbreak in high school.) So if Renjun had a crush on Mark— again one hundred percent hypothetically and not at all a reflection of happened in real life— he would never tell anybody because that’s like putting a flashing sign on top of his head that reads I’M ABOUT TO GET MY HEART BROKEN AND I LOVE IT.
If he had a crush on Mark, he’d keep his mouth shut about it. He’d keep it to himself and hope it would go away on its own, ride it out as if liking Mark was some sort of rite of passage exclusive to students at their high school. He’d keep it in the glances he’d steal, in his inability to look him in the eye and hold a single conversation without feeling the threat of a blush. He’d keep it sealed away in his heart, even if it insists on being heard at every passing mention of him, and if it can’t be spoken aloud then it needs to reveal itself in the slightest of actions. From his heart, an escaped, endeared smile sent out like a lighthouse signal— not blaringly bright, but a lone, faraway glow across the sea.
All hypothetical by the way.
But whatever. What’s Mark Lee doing in their conversations, anyway. Mark Lee seldom spared Renjun a glance... because he didn’t need to! Which is no big deal, by the way! Renjun totally gets it. Mark Lee moved through life at speeds that, understandably, left no time and room for the likes of him and as Renjun moved on to university and beyond, the same could be said about him to Mark. So there’s no reason as to why the topic should keep coming back.
Every debate with Yangyang is followed by a rush to reality, that they’ve been out of that damn high school for years. There’s irony in how they’ve spent so long trying to get out of that place but everything in that span of four years insists on following them, no matter how much they’ve shaken it out of their system.
He knows they’re all different people now. He knows he’s changed, how could he not? But every time he goes back home, he’s strangely conscious of the fact that, maybe, just maybe, he hadn’t changed all that much.
Renjun thinks about that now, as he stands on this station platform, waiting for the last train ride home. His patience is paper thin, worn out by the freezing cold weather and the fact that he’s missed his first train home by minutes. Maybe he shouldn’t have gone to office hours because then maybe he’d be on that train with Yangyang right now. He figured that maybe third time’s the charm and he’d make sure he's at the station at least an hour early, but maybe he’s destined to be missing trains for as long as he lives. Renjun lets out a gruff snort. It’s funny that he’s in such a rush to get back home considering all his attempts to get out of that town only a few years ago.
He gingerly takes the ticket out of his pocket, as if to wrap his head around the fact he’ll be in town for the first time in months. There’s a sudden, weird flutter in his chest. Nervousness? What’s he got to be nervous about?
Then a particularly strong gust of wind cuts through the station and takes the ticket with it.
Renjun reacts a millisecond too late, a millisecond spent trying to process what had just occurred. Then the panic sets in. He tries to grab the ticket, but it evades his grasp and flies down the station.
Shit. He breaks into a run. Shit, shit, shit. He keeps his eyes zeroed in on the ticket. Fuck shit! He feels like he’s about to throw up his heart. Why the fuck is it going so fast? He’s putting all the energy he's got left in him into getting this fucking piece of paper what the fuck—
He’s lost it. It completely escaped his field of vision.
“I got it! ”
Renjun whips around and his eyes immediately find the ticket in the grip of another. A flood of relief washes over him, adrenaline prickling his cheeks, and he feels like he’s about to pass out.
“Oh my God, thank you so mu—”
But Renjun stops in his tracks. Suddenly, he can’t catch his breath. The tunnel vision fades away and he sees everything.
His savior’s eyes widen and his grin instantly transforms into a shocked ‘O’. And Renjun can feel himself mirroring him for an entirely different reason.
Because Renjun’s heart isn’t as unrelenting as it believes itself to be. Because that smile is still so freaking charming that Renjun far too easily slips back into bad habits, to foolish hoping, second-guessing, asking himself what if Yangyang was right? Because the gaze before him is still so earnest that in knocking the remaining air out of Renjun and taking his defenses with it, Renjun nearly accepts his own secret— that, really, he is just like everybody else.
Because for the first time in years, the lighthouse sends a signal across the sea, flashing in increasingly rapid morse code. Dot dot dot dash dash dash dot dot dot— SOS SOS SOS— his heartbeat can’t keep up.
Maybe, just maybe, he hasn’t changed at all.