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They’re here for paperclips, not books, but if there are books Chanyeol will always find them. He’s like a bloodhound. Or one of those pigs that sniffs out truffles. Cuter, maybe.
Instead of complaining about the holdup, Sehun folds his arms across his chest and waits for Chanyeol to notice. He juts his hip out to emphasise how impatiently he’s waiting. The curve of his waist makes him thinks better of it, straightening and leaning back against the peeling doorway of the stationary store instead. Too much hip.
Too much exaggerated impatience, if Sehun is honest. Sehun’s at that sickening stage where he likes going anywhere that Chanyeol wants to go, even if he ensures Chanyeol doesn’t know that. Often he does the opposite; a groan and an eyeroll as though he’d rather do anything than follow Chanyeol on errands or hang out after classes. It’s just how Sehun is, without really intending to be. The more he likes Chanyeol the more satisfying it is to be chased when he withdraws.
Sehun has liked Chanyeol from a distance since term started; he’s unsure why Chanyeol has taken to him in return. It’s annoying, and Sehun’s glad for it. That’s how Sehun knows he really likes Chanyeol. If it weren’t for Chanyeol’s interference he’d have dropped out already, but unfortunately Chanyeol sees potential in him. Chanyeol believes in Sehun, however little Sehun is willing to show there’s something to believe in. Sehun’s sulked, he’s lied that music was just the preferable option to convenience store night shifts. He almost convinces himself with the act of his self-doubt being apathy.
Unfortunately Chanyeol can read Sehun like a book. Chanyeol really doesn’t need any more books.
Paperclips to hold together their loose leaf work from today is the only reason they came down into the station basement rather than approaching from the entrance. Sehun attempted to stuff his into his bag, like it even mattered, but Chanyeol slipped it into a plastic folder that’s been clutched under his arm ever since. The stationary store is stifling and musty, but if Chanyeol is bothered he hasn’t shown any sign.
Away from the new department built onto the university and a handful of office blocks, modernisation hasn’t yet reached Sehun’s local subway. The basement is a hot, dusty, windy tunnel leading to a handful of stores with ceilings so low it gives Sehun the impending feeling of a headache. The edges of the walls are lined with drains and yellow bricks that have greyed. Chanyeol is 5 subway stops west; Sehun is 1 stop east that he could walk quicker, if he didn’t look forward to hanging around on the platform with Chanyeol every day.
Chanyeol isn’t familiar with the area and Sehun feels awkward whenever he brings up his own knowledge of it. Sometimes Sehun inexplicably feels awkward about talking at all, like since the last time he’ll have forgotten how to do it correctly. Not much is in this direction, anyway. No one ever really comes here unless it’s for a specific reason or they live in the rain-stained apartment blocks patched up with tiling. He’s tagged along on Chanyeol’s journey home a handful of times because Chanyeol knows good places to nurse drinks and do homework, or to stay late and eat, or just to wander before heading home. 12 minutes by subway is far enough to be in the kind of area that people travel away to just to be somewhere better.
Sehun watches Chanyeol’s large hand sweeping across book spines with a deft, light touch and wonders why he always feels kind of lame in comparison. Chanyeol is a loser. He’s noisy and clumsy and the buzzed back and sides makes his ears stick out of his hair. There’s still a clear drip shaped stain on the back of his neck from when he last dyed it red. Chanyeol’s forearm flexes and Sehun looks up at the low ceiling.
It’s actually a complete coincidence that Sehun’s hair is similar. Two years ago long hair had been in fashion. He had a cheap binder that fastened with a thick strip of velcro down the side back then. Having his hair buzzed like every other remotely fashionable guy just before classes began had been frightening and exhilarating, and then stupid Chanyeol showed up the exact same without even reconsidering because of his ears.
Anyway. “Hyung, we—” Sehun lifts his head to find that while he’s been feeling the soft length of stubble behind his ear Chanyeol has gone to pay. Well, good. Another day nearly over, another soon to start.
The rumble of a train passing sways long grey strings of dust hanging from the ceiling.
There’s an order to how Sehun needs to confess to Chanyeol. The first stage may well negate the need for the second one. Slow days of classes pass without him building up courage or finding words to explain. (Sorry we’re not actually bros, Chanyeol, but is that better? Because I like you, but it’s not like it has to be gay now you know, but do you feel weird about me pretending to be like you? I’d be happy if you still saw me as a man. But if you like me too, it doesn’t have to be gay. Unless you’d be ok with that. I’m sorry for asking you to be ok with so many things when it’s not like I’m even fun to be around.)
A few of Sehun’s fantasies about his best friend are the bedroom kind, but most are that he understands everything and smiles and those make Sehun blush harder with humiliation than any imagined kissing could. Sehun pulls his bag up from between his feet and swings it across one shoulder. He can just wind around the storefronts until Chanyeol catches up.
“Oh,” comes a voice from beside him, then the gentlest tap to his arm, “Sehunnie? Sorry, I kept waiting to be sure it was you.”
Sehun turns and his heart jolts in his constricted chest.
“Kim Junmyeon,” Kim Junmyeon says brightly, prodding a finger under his chin, “It was a few years ago, you might not..”
“No—” Sehun flushes from his ears to the base of his throat. He coughs into his hand, acutely aware that his tone lightened in surprise. “Hyung, of course,” he says, then gawps. Not only because it has been a good three years since they’ve seen each other. Junmyeon was cheeky and sweetly good humoured, but he’d still been in charge and looked serious far beyond his age. Now he’s bleach blonde and in jeans with larger rips than even the fashion students Sehun sees around wear. His hair is also buzzed short, stark black strips to offset the white.
“Look at you,” Junmyeon gasps, holding Sehun by his wrists as he takes in his height. His short hair, the soft patchy wisps on his upper lip. The curves he lacks and muscle he’s gained.
Sehun is scarlet, equally mortified and elated to be recognised by someone who knew him as a teen. “You— uhm.” Sehun gently extracts himself from Junmyeon’s hold, which involves brushing the back of his hand, which makes blood pound hot in Sehun’s temples. He likes to keep his body to himself; even a grip slightly above his cuffs feels invasive. “You know I always said I wanted to be like you, hyung,” he says at lack of anything else to explain why he isn’t who he was.
Back then Sehun really had wanted to be like Junmyeon, in temperament at least. He was an underachiever sitting through summer classes and Junmyeon was there to assist. Junmyeon wore a blazer with a shiny badge pinned to it and never took it off despite the heat. He kept things in order, offered help where he could, and most likely got some kind of extra credits for it. Junmyeon acted like he was ten years older than Sehun, not three, and it was kind of endearing. Being like Junmyeon — driven, smart, on track — had seemed like it would make everything easier.
Unfortunately Sehun was naturally none of those things, and everything he wasn’t dragged down his ambitions to be better. Maybe he could have succeeded if he hadn’t wanted so much to fade into the background. Sehun had been a caricature of a girl in school; handsome enough to make the real girls giggle together in their cloud of sweet perfume, awkward around boys that seemed comparably shorter by the day. Boys were far worse. Sehun wanted to fit in with them, kiss them, be recognised as one of them, stop feeling disgusted by them.
A week into that summer Sehun hid against a shady wall, book balanced on bony knees and long socks pushed down to get some cool air. Junmyeon in his square-shouldered blazer soon tracked Sehun down, sat and wouldn’t leave. Sehun didn’t care, but it was reflexively embarrassing when Junmyeon noticed unshaven skin.
“That’s impressive.”
Sehun smacked his prodding hand away. Junmyeon grinned and tugged up the leg of his neatly pressed pants to reveal a marble smooth shin. It had probably been waxed, and he’d probably have been punched for it by now if it weren’t for the authoritative protection his badge gave him. He was odd and unlike the boys Sehun aspired to, and he was kind and always had a smile, no matter how Sehun scowled and skived. Over summer 2011 Sehun found someone who could speak the same language, but found themselves in comfortable silence more often than not.
“Good thing you weren’t like me! You’d still be all the way down here.” Junmyeon’s grin is peachy and brighter than when he’d been stuck in that blazer. It’s still as understanding. It’s safe, same as it was back when Sehun had no words for what he felt and Junmyeon delighted in being entrusted with his anxious muttering. “Goodness, Sehun,” Junmyeon fusses over him like a distant auntie, vigorously patting his forearm like he’d love to rearrange Sehun’s hair and straighten his collar, too, “You’ve grown so much.”
“You remembered my name,” Sehun realises with a sour curl in his sinus, “The name I told you I wanted.”
Junmyeon’s smile hangs open. “That is what you’re still using?” There’s doubt for the first time, dimming the shine in his eyes. 2011 feels like a decade ago. Their phones all do entirely new, unimaginable things now. Sehun feels as though he’s been Sehun far longer than he has.
“I’m Sehun to everyone now, since I started uni, in the— you don’t have to look so shocked that I’m still in education,” Sehun huffs, “Junmyeon-hyung, did you expect me to fail everything after you graduated?”
Junmyeon shakes his head, creamy white falling across his thick, dark eyebrows. He was good looking in his late teens, but he’s beautiful now. “I like hearing you call me hyung. Suits you better.”
“Anyway,” Sehun says, his heart calmed from hammering to a gentle flutter, “Look at you. What have you been up to? You’re all..not-serious now.”
“Ah, sadly that isn’t true. I’m just fortunate to have a lot of freedom along with it.” Junmyeon delicately parts his curtain of blonde hair with his fingertips, sweeping it out of his eyes with his pinky. He opens his mouth to say more, but his line of vision slips over Sehun’s shoulder. Grasping his hair in his palm, Junmyeon pulls it all back, like it’ll help him see better, then drops it in a fluffier mess than he’d started with.
Chanyeol’s cologne precedes him. It’s warm in the air, and Sehun’s belly heats along with it. “Friend of yours?” Chanyeol says it as though Junmyeon could be an enemy. He’s so stupid and Sehun unbearably wants to kiss him about it.
Unfazed by two people he has to tilt his head right back to look at, Junmyeon lets his affection for Sehun bounce off onto Chanyeol. “Sehunnie will never have mentioned me,” he beams, “I’m from a dark time in his life.”
The small plastic bag Chanyeol is holding is thin and crinkled all over like the palm of a hand, like it’s probably been reused and stored in a bundle for weeks. It rustles noisily as he folds it around its contents so he can stuff it in his pocket. “Yeah? Which one, this guy is so gloomy that could be any point from birth until last week.”
Sehun rolls his eyes. He’s at risk of emotions at having two people who are endeared to him. “Junmyeon-hyung was..uh, my mentor, sort of? Back in highschool.”
“Oh. Woah,” Chanyeol courteously overreacts, spreading his big hands in surprise, “Gotta keep him around, then, I want to hear about it.”
Two pairs of expectant eyes turn on Sehun. The low ceiling seems to bear down even closer. Strange, kind little Junmyeon has always been trustworthy, but it’s still frightening. He could say: ‘Sehun was in skirts when I last saw him’. ‘Did you know Sehun before he was Sehun?’, ‘It’s good to see you accepting Sehun as he is’.
For a brief moment Sehun imagines Junmyeon telling Chanyeol everything for him in that nice patient tone he’d use during class. A shudder rolls through his shoulders. By the time he’s zoned back in the two of them are chatting about bleach and dye. Chanyeol is bending his knees slightly so he doesn’t tower over Junmyeon, and Sehun sighs through a surge of affection. Before he can fret any further Junmyeon waves an apologetic hand.
“I was actually on my way to something, but I’ll give you my kakaotalk ID— maybe another time?”
“Def— yeah,” Sehun fumbles his phone from his back pocket, thumbs in his code and hands it over. He has the peach theme; Junmyeon quirks a smile when he taps the icon and the pink screen opens up. “Yeah. Add yourself and— I have socials and stuff, we can do all that later.”
Junmyeon pouts in concentration as he types on an unfamiliar keyboard. He scrunches his nose, then brightens. “Done! This is so good, Sehunnie. I’m so glad.”
“Yes.” Sehun gives Junmyeon a pat on the arm so awkwardly that Junmyeon giggles.
Chanyeol watches them, placidly swaying side to side.
“You like him?”
“Junmyeon-hyung? Like—”
“Y’know. Like him.” Chanyeol side-eyes Sehun. Since they’ve been on the platform they’ve been shoulder to shoulder, Chanyeol unaware that Sehun is formally mirroring the way he casually stands. “What? I’d be cool with it. If you liked a guy,” he clarifies, which is nice, because Sehun’s ears are buzzing so loudly with white noise it’s almost drowning Chanyeol out, “Nothing wrong with it. You’re just so grouchy, I mean, so I could help you with texts or whatever.”
“Thanks,” Sehun manages eventually. Then, “Why’d you think that? That I like him.”
“You were acting all weird with him. Different weird to how you are with everyone else. Just got a feeling.” Chanyeol exaggerates rubbing his nape. “Are you mad?”
“What? No. Nothing wrong with it,” Sehun echoes, staring at the glossy white wall tiles of the opposite platform. Chanyeol repositions the slippery folder under his arm and nudges Sehun with his elbow and leaves it there, the point of contact growing warm. “I just don’t think you’d be able to tell if I liked someone.”