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Daegal noses at the edge of the coffee table, nails clicking softly on the hardwood as she circles before settling at Jisung’s feet. The TV plays quietly in the background, some variety show rerun neither of them is really watching. Half-empty takeout boxes litter the table. It’s one of those rare nights off where Jisung had just… shown up, arms full of snacks and an excuse about wanting to see Daegal.
Chenle sits cross-legged on the couch, picking at a stray grain of rice stuck to the corner of the container. Jisung’s on the rug, knees drawn up, hands twisted together in his lap. His leg bounces once, twice, then stills.
“Chenle,” he says finally, voice low. “Can we talk?”
Chenle glances down, expecting another joke, another question about schedules or choreography. But Jisung isn’t smiling. His fingers are white-knuckled where they’re wrung together.
“Sure,” Chenle says cautiously, setting the rice down. “What’s up?”
Jisung draws in a shaky breath. His eyes flicker up, then away. “I… I’ve liked you for a long time.” The words come out haltingly, like they’ve been rehearsed in the dark. “Not just as a friend. More than that.”
For a heartbeat, Chenle thinks the room tilts. His throat goes dry. The sound of Daegal’s collar jingling as she shifts seems suddenly too loud. He stares at Jisung—at the eager, terrified face looking up at him—and his mind blanks.
“I…” Chenle starts, but the rest won’t come. He works his tongue against the roof of his mouth, trying to shape something that won’t hurt. Everything feels like it’s collapsing inward, like a stage light bursting above him. “You know we can’t,” he says finally, the words tasting like ash. “You know nothing can come out of this.”
He sees the exact second the words land. Jisung’s expression crumples, a small, contained devastation, like a house folding in on itself. His shoulders hunch, and he drops his gaze to the rug, blinking hard.
“I love you, Jisung,” Chenle blurts, desperation rising as though he can pull the words back and rearrange them. “You’re my best friend.”
Jisung’s laugh is brittle, a ghost of what it usually is. “Yeah,” he says softly. “I know.”
Daegal shifts again, pressing her warm little body against Jisung’s knee as if she senses the shift in the room. Chenle reaches out, wanting to bridge the space between them, but his hand stops short. The air is heavy with everything unsaid.
He’s not sure which hurts more: Jisung’s confession or the look on his face now, something fragile and closing off at the same time. Chenle swallows, the taste of guilt sharp at the back of his throat, and wonders if this is the moment he’s been trying to avoid all along.
"I'm sorry," Chenle says, and the words feel inadequate, like trying to patch a dam with tissue paper. He watches Jisung's fingers loosen and tighten against his knees, a nervous rhythm that makes Chenle's chest ache. "I didn't mean for it to come out like that."
Jisung shakes his head without looking up. "No, it's—it's okay. I knew what you were going to say. I just had to... I had to try." His voice cracks on the last word, and Chenle feels something twist behind his ribs.
The takeout containers sit between them like a wall. The smell of cooling noodles and sauce turns slightly sour in the warm air. Chenle wants to reach across the space, wants to touch Jisung's shoulder or his hand, wants to do something to ease the tension pulling his friend's frame tight, but every gesture feels loaded now. Even the impulse to comfort carries weight it didn't have ten minutes ago.
"You're still my best friend," Chenle tries again, softer this time. "That doesn't change."
Jisung's mouth curves into something that might be a smile if you weren't looking closely. "Yeah. Of course." He scratches behind Daegal's ears, and she leans into the touch, tail thumping against the floor. "I should probably go."
"You don't have to—"
"I think I do." Jisung pushes himself up from the rug, movements careful and deliberate. He's not looking at Chenle, hasn't looked at him since the words left Chenle's mouth. "I just... I need some space to figure this out. You know?"
Chenle nods even though Jisung isn't watching him do it. His throat feels tight. "Okay. Yeah. Take whatever time you need."
Jisung gathers his jacket from the back of a chair, fingers fumbling with the fabric. At the door, he pauses with his hand on the handle. For a second, Chenle thinks he might turn around, might say something else, but he just pulls the door open and steps through it.
The sound of it closing echoes in the suddenly too-quiet apartment.
Chenle sits in the aftermath, staring at the abandoned takeout containers and Jisung's impression still pressed into the rug. Daegal pads over and jumps onto the couch beside him, settling her warm weight against his thigh. He runs his fingers through her fur and tries to understand the hollow feeling expanding in his chest.
Days blend together in the aftermath. Weeks pass, maybe. Chenle stops counting.
The confession hangs between them like a ghost, visible only in the careful way Jisung now orbits around him—never too close, never alone if he can help it. The easy texts stop coming. The late-night calls vanish. When they're together in the practice room, Jisung's smile is polite, distant, nothing like the unguarded grin Chenle once knew by heart.
It shouldn't hurt this much. Chenle got what he wanted: clarity, boundaries, the preservation of their friendship in its most public-facing form. They still stand next to each other during shoots. They still laugh at the same jokes during interviews. But something essential has disappeared.
Suddenly Jisung is everywhere with everyone except him. He sits with Mark during lunch breaks, discussing music production. He stays late with Jeno to perfect dance sequences. He and Renjun go shopping for clothes. Even Jaemin gets midnight snack runs and whispered conversations.
Chenle's phone stays silent. The notification light that used to blink with Jisung's random thoughts at 3 AM remains dark.
Chenle can't help but get upset. He used to get all of that—late night ramen sessions, whispered jokes, casual closeness—and Jisung used to text him at three in the morning about the most random things, like a weird-shaped cloud he saw, a song that reminded him of Chenle, a dream where they were both pirates sailing paper boats. They'd call each other just to breathe on the line while working on separate things, existing together in comfortable silence.
Now his phone stays silent. No "you up?" texts. No silly selfies with Jisung's face squished against the camera. No invitations to grab food or play games or do absolutely nothing together.
Chenle rolls onto his side, pulling his blanket tighter around himself. The worst part is knowing this shift is mainly his fault. He's the one who said they can't. He's the one who pushed Jisung away when he was at his most vulnerable. Knowing that doesn't stop the bitterness from rising in his throat like bile.
It’s hard knowing whatever’s shifted between them is mainly due to Chenle’s own actions and responses, but that knowledge does little to soften the sting.
Did Jisung only ever treat him kindly because he was interested in him? Did all those small attentions—the way he’d laugh a little too loudly at Chenle’s jokes, the way he’d offer to carry his bag or fetch him water—mean nothing if they weren’t returned?
Chenle feels a tight coil of guilt and bitterness twisting in his chest. Was that love for him as a friend, or love with strings attached; conditional and dependent on Chenle feeling the same? The thought claws at him. Their friendship, the one thing he’d always trusted as solid and untouchable, feels suddenly fragile. Chenle wants to scream at the unfairness of it, the unfairness of feeling so small when he was the one who set the rules, who drew the line, who told Jisung they couldn’t cross it.
Even if Jisung still cared, the way he smiles, the way he moves, the spaces he fills with other people, all of it seems tainted by what could have been. Chenle’s stomach churns with resentment, a bitter mix of self-reproach and envy, because no one else’s laughter or attention could fill the void left by Jisung’s absence.
Beneath it all, there’s a quiet, stubborn ache of longing. He misses the comfort, the unthinking closeness, the simple certainty that he was seen in the way Jisung had always looked at him. The ache is sharp, impossible to soothe, and he realizes that no matter how he spins it, he’s lost something irretrievable. The one person who made him feel effortless warmth and belonging has become untouchable, and Chenle doesn’t know how to reclaim even a fraction of it.
Chenle spots Jisung's favorite hoodie draped over the back of a chair in Jaemin’s hotel room after a live. The gray fabric is worn at the cuffs; it’s a detail he knows because he's seen Jisung fiddle with those threads a hundred times during breaks. He reaches for his phone without thinking.
You left your hoodie, he types, then deletes it, types again: Your gray hoodie's in my room if you're looking for it. I found it and brought it w me. He hesitates before adding a casual thumbs-up emoji and hitting send.
The message sits unread for hours. Chenle checks his phone when he leaves to grab something to eat with some of the staff. The single gray checkmark mocks him. By evening, when he's back at the hotel room scrolling mindlessly through his feed, the message finally shows as read. No response comes.
"Whatever," he mutters to his empty room, tossing his phone onto the bed. "Not like it's important."
But it is, somehow. It's the kind of nothing-message Jisung would have replied to instantly before, probably with some silly emoji or even just a simple thanks.
The next morning, Chenle catches Renjun on his way out of his room, eating a granola bar with one hand while scrolling through his phone with the other.
"Hey," Chenle says, aiming for casual. "You want to try that new barbecue place tonight? I heard Jisung mentioned wanting to go there too. Maybe we could all—"
"Oh," Renjun looks up, mouth twisting apologetically. "Jisung's actually going to that photography exhibition with Jaemin tonight. They've had it planned for a while."
"Photography exhibition? He never mentioned that."
Renjun shrugs, returning to his phone. "Yeah, I think it's some artist Jaemin's into. Jisung seemed pretty excited about it yesterday."
Yesterday. When Jisung had been in the same room as Chenle for three hours checking the concert venue they’d be performing in and hadn't said more than a polite "excuse me" when reaching past him for a water bottle.
"Right," Chenle says, his voice tight. "Cool."
He tries to push it down, to ignore the hot spike of frustration that rises each time he realizes he's been excluded from yet another part of Jisung's life. After all, what right does he have to be upset? He's the one who set the boundaries. He's the one who said they couldn't cross that line.
It doesn't stop the hurt from festering, doesn't ease the tightness in his chest when he sees Jisung's name pop up in the group chat—never in their private messages anymore—announcing plans he's made without Chenle.
It shouldn't matter. It's just small changes, tiny shifts in their dynamic. But they're piling up, day after day, until Chenle can feel the weight of them crushing something vital inside him. He wants to grab Jisung by the shoulders and demand answers: When did we stop being friends? When did you decide I didn't deserve even basic communication? When did everyone else become more important than me?
But he doesn't. He smiles through concerts, laughs at the right moments during group dinners, goes on live with Jisung and another member whenever it’s been too long, pretends he doesn't notice when Jisung subtly shifts away whenever Chenle sits too close.