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“How are you feeling?” Sehun asks, sliding onto the barstool at Jongdae’s right. It’s the question he’s been dying to ask but pushing off the whole night, toptoeing around Jongdae’s state like he’s afraid if he probes at the wrong time or wrong angle his friend might crumble and turn to dust.
Still, the question, when asked aloud and then honestly to himself, has Jongdae feeling like he might just throw up all over the bar. He swirls his whisky in his glass, lips pressed tight. Words sit heavily at the base of his throat, not yet ready to be spoken.
He takes too long to answer, so Sehun sighs, and leans in closer, pressing one large hand over Jongdae’s shoulder, rubbing gently as if there’s any hope left at finding comfort.
Three weeks ago Jongdae called off his wedding.
It had been only a few hours before the ceremony when he made the call to Kyungsoo, his best man. The rest of the morning had passed by as a blur; his mother called, his fiancee broke down and left, and disappointment seemed to dominate every face he passed, every voice he spoke to like a waking anxiety-fuelled nightmare.
It had taken days for him to come to, and by then Sehun had joined Kyungsoo in helping Jongdae pack up cardboard boxes of all his belongings.
The whisky stings his throat as he sips it—no ice, just liquor. Right now, he drinks for the burn rather than the buzz. He doesn’t want to forget; he wants to mourn. He’s sick of apathy, if only he could just feel...
He can’t say that to Sehun, though, can’t tell him that if he’s already derailed his life he might as well crash. His friend will only frown, and he’ll have to endure another face of disappointment.
Besides, he’s sure Sehun can see for himself that he’s a wreck. The lack of sleep alone is painted all over his face for anyone to see, vervain bruises blooming from his eye sockets.
“Listen, Hyung, I know we already talked about this, but I want you to know that we support you and…”
Sehun’s voice fades out, not because Jongdae chooses to stop listening, but because he catches a flash of something from the other side of the bar. Dark hair, darker eyes, sharp teeth and a hungry grin. A wolf, Jongdae thinks, as recognition washes over him.
A face he hasn’t seen in almost a decade.
Byun Baekhyun.
A few moments after noticing him pass before Baekhyun looks up, eyes glinting, cocksure smile pressed into his face like it's his default expression. He catches Jongdae’s gaze and his grin grows wider. He is the one who gets up first, circles the bar to claim the empty seat to Jongdae’s left.
“Well, well, well,” Baekhyun chuckles, voice lower and huskier than Jongdae remembers. Has time changed the man, or the memory? “If it isn’t Kim and Oh.”
Jongdae doesn’t have to look back over to see Sehun roll his eyes. Sehun had always been fond of Baekhyun, if Jongdae could recall. Most of their cohort had been; he’d had his own devoted following of students who wanted to be just like him, aloof, desirable, unattached, and unrestrained.
The years have been kind to Baekhyun. He hasn’t changed much in appearance; his face a little less round, his frame a little less narrow. Jongdae glances at his hands, checking if anything else has changed. Baekhyun’s fingers are bare.
“Hyung,” Sehun whines. “Not tonight.” He wants Baekhyun to back off, slip away back into some unlit corner and bother some curious stranger instead. Jongdae focusses on nothing other than how he can see the sharp point of Baekhyun’s canines. It's been awhile since he’s felt this—danger.
Baekhyun leans onto the counter, face pressed into his palm. His grin recedes into a smile too slight to dissect.
“You look like shit,” he finally voices.
Sehun chokes next to him, and Jongdae laughs. It starts as a chuckle but the bluntness of Baekhyun’s plainspoken comment draws out a laughter that doesn’t die down, not until there’s tears in the corners of his eyes and he can feel Sehun tugging on his sleeve with concern like he’s worried Jongdae is possibly crying.
Somehow, his chest feels a little bit lighter; Jongdae exhales what air he has left in his lungs. He can’t remember the last time someone spoke to him without fearing he’d shatter.
Maybe Baekhyun doesn’t care about how people react to what he has to say, or maybe he could tell that Jongdae was desperate for honesty.
Jongdae remembers Byun Baekhyun mostly as a series of concepts. Success. Noncommitment. Fun. Representative of the ideal man in college, giving little and receiving a lot. However, Jongdae had almost forgotten how perceptive Baekhyun is—or had been. Maybe his most impressive but understated trait from back then had been his cleverness.
They had been friends, in some convoluted you-know-him-and-so-we-know-each-other type of way. Had that lasted for months, years? Looking at Baekhyun, Jongdae doesn’t feel like he’s seated next to a stranger in the form of a former acquaintance. Subconsciously, he finds he’s leaned in closer, caught in Baekhyun’s orbit. Has that happened to him before?
When Baekhyun excuses himself to smoke, Jongdae asks to join. He leaves Sehun behind to follow Baekhyun down the narrow staircase to the street outside. The city lights are brighter than the nonexistent bar lights, and Jongdae accepts a cigarette from Baekhyun’s offering hands and lights it, comforted again by the burn. He hasn’t smoked in years, doesn’t remember why he ever stopped as the nicotine hits his system. (A flash of an argument, Jongdae being told to quit, a vow to change.)
But Baekhyun looks unchanged, like no one has ever pressed him to and succeeded. He’s alone at a bar on a Saturday night, clearly searching for company to take home. He hasn’t given into the pressure that Jongdae has felt weighing him down year after year, until he woke up the morning of his wedding, and decided that he had to pull the plug before he drowned.
He has everything that Jongdae has lost, and Jongdae wonders if maybe it isn’t too late for him.
What ever happened between them anyways? He wonders as he takes his last drag. Weren’t they close, once?
Baekhyun smiles at him, and maybe because of the smoke but it's warmer than the expression he’d caught on his face earlier.
Something stirs in the back of his brain—some repressed memory of that same smile from years ago.
A voice whispers in his ear that he’s making a mistake, a voice of reason or of past-Jongdae, but he ignores it. Past-Jongdae knew nothing, anyways, same as Jongdae now. He’s only here now because of his own flaws.
They head back inside, but not before Jongdae saves Baekhyun’s number into his phone, writing over his old contact information.
**
The same nightmare repeats. He walks down the aisle passing by faceless guests to greet his faceless bride. The bowtie around his neck is too tight, he can’t breathe.
Hands undo the tie, his jacket, his dress shirt.
Someone approaches. This figure isn’t faceless.
Jongdae wakes up. Tonight he doesn’t die at the altar.
**
Jongdae goes out with Baekhyun again next Saturday. Sehun is against it, claims that Baekhyun is a bad influence, but Jongdae can’t figure out why. Jongdae clearly never had his life put together in the way he thought, so who is he to judge Baekhyun. Baekhyun works freelance on his own schedule, he still lives in a studio, he drives the same car he’s been driving since Jongdae first knew him. And yet, Jongdae’s never met anyone their age who isn’t weighted down under expectations and concerned with failure. Baekhyun carries himself like he’s light itself, and Jongdae is tired of failing, of disappointing, and Baekhyun offers him respite.
He doesn’t look at Jongdae like he’s crazy—or with pity—for throwing what he had away. He doesn’t dwell on what has happened or what should happen. When Jongdae sits beside him, their shoulders touching as they drink, he’s only concerned with now.
It's so easy to be around Baekhyun that Jongdae can’t stop wondering why their friendship ever ended. Baekhyun is persistent but not reckless; he has matured in his own ways, too, and Jongdae wishes he had been around to see it.
Together, in smoking bars, where the air is so thick he can barely even see the exit, Jongdae thinks about what his life was supposed to look like, and the point where everything went wrong. What had he always been so afraid of, anyways?
**
There’s a pair of lips against his neck. They leave a trail of wet kisses, and they give no sign of stopping.
This is his first night without the wedding nightmare, and it presents a new dream for him.
Except, the lips are familiar, so he’s sure this is a memory.
Jongdae wakes up alone, wishing he was able to remember.
He should remember, though, he should. It troubles him that he draws a blank, and that the more he replays it in his head the dream becomes less and less vivid.
He falls back asleep, his sleep dreamless.
**
Two months since the day he was meant to walk the aisle Baekhyun takes him out for barbecue. They order too much meat for the two of them, but force themselves to finish it anyway, washing down the grease with soju.
Jongdae leans back in his seat, eyeing the way Baekhyun drums his fingers on the table and licks his lips, habits that he hasn’t grown out of. There are more of Baekhyun's habits that Jongdae slowly recalls as they rekindle their friendship. Focussing on Baekhyun becomes the best distraction, studying him and feeling rewarded each time an act feels familiar, comforting—almost reassuring.
“You haven’t asked any questions,” he states as he finishes his glass. He pours another for himself, and for Baekhyun. It's now after midnight and Jongdae will have to call a cab home, back to his new apartment in a part of town he’s not yet charted out. He’s in no hurry to leave.
“What would I need to ask?” Is Baekhyun’s reply.
Jongdae chews the inside of his cheek. “I don’t know. What happened, I guess?”
Baekhyun shrugs. “Do I need to know the details? You needed something and you found it, right? That’s why we’re here?”
“What if I want you to know?”
He’s frustrated and he doesn’t know why, why what he doesn’t want to even think about is what he needs Baekhyun to know. He’s convinced of it, and he’s flooding with an indescribable urgency, as if he’ll overflow and drown anyways unless he makes sure Baekhyun understands.
“So, tell me, Jongdae.”
His stomach is tight, but he trusts Baekhyun. That’s why he wants to tell him, he reasons, because he trusts him.
“I called off my wedding. I left my fiancee the same day. I ruined our life together, and now my family is mad at me, and all my friends think there’s something seriously wrong with me.”
Baekhyun licks his lips again. Maybe it's the leftover grease, but they glisten.
“Why?”
“Why did I do it?” Jongdae doesn’t know if he can explain.
“No, why did you feel the need to tell me?”
“I’m not sure…” Baekhyun’s reappearance isn’t like his other friendships, and Jongdae lacks the ability to describe what he needs from him. He’s only vaguely sure that there’s something.
“I won’t presume to know, but I think there’s a reason, Jongdae. When you have the courage to remember, come tell me.”
**
He dreams of hot kisses and touches and warmth. Hungering to fill more fire into his belly, he reaches out, seeking more. In a dream it's easy to take and take and take and not ask questions. Not ask if this is allowed.
When he wakes up there’s a bitter taste lingering on his tongue. It is becoming more challenging to keep the walls up, to push those unsavory thoughts far away.
What makes his stomach churn is not that they’re there—they’ve always been there—but the fact that he’s no longer inclined to resist.
**
It becomes harder and harder to get a hold of Baekhyun. It frustrates him how Baekhyun leaves his messages unanswered, doesn’t pick up when he calls. Months of having no one but Baekhyun to distract him from the downward spiral that his life has become makes his absence more than just noticeable, it stings, and Jongdae, wearied and worn thin, loses his usual firm grasp on his temper.
When the glass hits the wall it shatters, and Jongdae is jealous. He's never been allowed to fall apart like that.
He dials Baekhyun again. And then again. And again. He leaves a voice message, and then he calls him again—
“What the hell is your problem?” Baekhyun’s voice is gruff, like he’d been sleeping. “Jongdae, it’s three in the fucking morning!”
At the sound of his voice Jongdae’s anger fizzles out. He doesn’t even remember why he'd called; was he mad at Baekhyun? Was he going to tell him off?
“Baekhyun…”Jongdae starts, not really sure what will come out of his mouth next. There's something trapped, and it's starting to leak out. “Can I come over—see you?”
“Now?” Baekhyun asks, incredulous. “At three in the fucking morning?”
A lump has formed in Jongdae’s throat—how long has it been there? Unlike his dream, there’s no tie around his neck.
He takes a deep breath: “Please?”
There’s silence on the other side, shuffling, maybe the sound of Baekhyun exhaling, frustrated, upset.
“Okay, fine, come.”
Jongdae calls a taxi and reads out an address he’s only ever been outside of. No one greets him at the building entrance, but the outside door is unlocked so Jongdae makes his way to the elevator on his own.
He knocks on the door and Baekhyun answers, and Jongdae’s chest squeezes, because in just a few weeks, days, he’s missed that face, those perceptive dark eyes, those…
Baekhyun pulls him inside and drags them both to the bedroom, where only the bedside lamp is lit. His hair is disheveled from sleep, and his face too looks softer, rounder, reminds Jongdae of how he’d look when they’d been younger, less miserable. Well, maybe Jongdae has always been miserable.
“Do you have something to say, Jongdae?” Baekhyun asks. He's seated at the edge of his bed, in his sleep clothes, and Jongdae isn't sure he's allowed to come in further, hesitating once he's passed the entrance way. “Or can I fall asleep.”
Baekhyun’s tone is cold, and Jongdae knows he’s pushing it, but he needs to know what’s wrong, why Baekhyun has withdrawn.
“Can you tell me what I did?” He starts. “I just—you know after everything, the only times I’ve felt like myself have been with you.”
“Is that why you called me so late? Because you just wanted to hang out? Am I responsible for that?
“What? No…”
Baekhyun isn't the glowing beacon of confidence that Jongdae has remembered him as. He's not so brilliant now, in the lamp light, eyes facing the bedroom wall ahead of him, so he can longer tell if they even shimmer. “Look, Jongdae, I’m tired. It’s one thing if you wanted to forget and play pretend and ruin your own fucking life, but I don’t need you to involve me. I don’t want to do this twice.”
“Do what twice?”
“This! You wanting something you think you’re better off without. Do you seriously not remember, Jongdae, what it was like back when we were in school? Did you fucking purge it all from your head so it was easier to move on?”
He wants to snap back, to say he has no idea what Baekhyun is talking about, but his recurring dreams come back to the forefront, and ice fills his veins as Baekhyun’s words begin to make sense.
Who did those lips belong to? And why did it all feel so real, like he’d felt it all before?
As soon as he asks himself the question the answer is obvious. It turns to stare him down in the room, no smile present on its lips.
Jongdae knows he’d fucked up, but he’s not sure in what way it matters.
He’d been terrified of what he wanted to the extent he bottled up everything he felt and hoped he could toss it away, but it’d always come back.
There’s no escaping the parts of him that are immutable. There’s only the attempts at covering them up.
So maybe back then Baekhyun and him had been close, closer than he remembered. That’s why Baekhyun had never felt like a stranger.
It also explained why Jongdae had been so drawn in. They’d tiptoed around what it all meant—or at least, Jongdae refused to acknowledge it, but never capable of pulling away. Until graduation, and the pressure to conform had Jongdae inventing ways to create distance, excuses because of course he never wanted to leave, he just had to.
A decade later Jongdae has decided he really, really, really doesn’t give a fuck, because following the rules won’t make you happy. It's better to just break them.
He’s not sure what possesses him to move so abruptly, without speaking his intentions, but he surges across the room to land in Baekhyun’s lap, hands pressed to his jaw so he can hold him and kiss him.
He braces for Baekhyun to throw him off, but instead Baekhyun kisses him back, and it tastes not at all bitter. Hands cradle his hips, and Jongdae wishes it were possible to forgo each milimetre—each individual atom—that keeps them separate, that they could just melt together and become one entity. He could never run from this—not again.
Jongdae pulls away from the sweetness of Baekhyun’s lips before he can be bitten—he remembers.
“Again, Jongdae?” Baekhyun asks him, and he sounds serious. No mirth, no surety, just…the face of a man who looks tired. There’s hurt there too, aged hurt, ten years old. Jongdae isn’t sure how he never noticed it until now, but maybe that too was part of the memories he repressed.
He shakes his head. “No, not like last time. I won’t forget this time. I promise.”
Baekhyun looks conflicted, like he doesn’t believe him, and Jongdae is determined to change that.
It took him ten years and then some to admit to himself what he wanted, it might take some time to prove it, but Jongdae is committed. If Baekhyun doesn’t want that baggage then Jongdae will let him go—he’d rather be here too late than never at all.
But, from the way Baekhyun’s thumb massages into his hip, and the way he bites his lower lip, Jongdae is pretty sure, at least for now, they’re on the same page. They can talk about it tomorrow, or another day, when they’ve slept, and Jongdae’s cleaned up the shards of glass from his bedroom floor.
Tonight it's not a dream, and Jongdae grins as he leans in closer, feeling Baekhyun’s hot breath against his neck, it never has been.