Chapter Text
It’s funny how when you are so in love, you tend to disregard other people’s opinions about your relationship, mostly because why should they care so much about your relationship? They can only see and only have heard what others tell them – they don’t know anything. It’s still funny how the person Kyungsoo thought would never hurt him, hurt him in the most horrible way ever.
A lot of people – mainly his close friends – had told him that it was a very bad idea, in some way or another, when Kyungsoo announced the news to them. “He is bad news,” they said. “He never takes any relationships he has ever been in seriously,” they would text him a couple of photos. “You are going to regret this, Do Kyungsoo,” they constantly tell him. At that time, Kyungsoo didn’t understand why his friends were fabricating lies just so Kyungsoo would cut the connections with his boyfriend. He thought his friends were being too overbearing even though he understands perfectly well the reason behind why they constantly keep nagging him: it comes in the form of one Park Chanyeol.
If anyone had asked Kyungsoo before, he would probably have answered something along the lines of this: “Chanyeol, he is not a bad person, at least not like how everyone is painting him to be.” But that’s only if someone had asked him for none of them ever did. They made up assumptions and wild scenarios about how Park Chanyeol is and they often disregarded his opinions because they said “you have had a crush on him since your second last year of middle school – you’re probably blinded by your crush.”
Kyungsoo would like to disagree with them though. While it is true that Kyungsoo has been harbouring a crush on Chanyeol since he was in his second year of middle school, Kyungsoo does not think he is biased. Kyungsoo liked to think that it’s because of his crush that he observes Chanyeol a lot more – at least more than others tended to do – whenever he can that is; Kyungsoo is aware of the tiniest things that Chanyeol does. Like that one time, one of Chanyeol’s friends – Oh Sehun – had forgotten to bring his wallet so Chanyeol simply took out his credit card, handed it to Oh Sehun and told him to buy food for himself. The reason as to why Kyungsoo knows this is because the restaurant that Sehun had coincidentally went to happened to be his family’s and Kyungsoo had been the one manning the register at that time. (He doesn’t do it anymore though – he has now taken to learning the recipes that has been passed down to them).
Everyone had been more than surprised when news about Park Chanyeol accepting Do Kyungsoo’s confession spread like wildfire throughout the school. Almost everyone in the school gave him various looks varying from pity to disappointment to jealousy but none gave him any congratulatory pat on his back for they all had thought of the same thing: Do Kyungsoo is just going to be another name to add to Park Chanyeol’s endless list of ‘used to’. But Kyungsoo didn’t care about them, nor their opinions – he was happy and very much in love with Park Chanyeol. It also did not matter what others thought because they do not know Kyungsoo personally and even those that Kyungsoo thought had known him personally did not even know him at all when they showed their true colours: they turned their backs against him. Kyungsoo had only felt slightly upset because perhaps they only wanted to be with him for his brains. (Kyungsoo is really smart and he is nice to everyone that asks for his help).
But now looking back at those memories, Kyungsoo feels slightly regretful for not heeding at least some of them. They have been together for two years now – Park Chanyeol and Do Kyungsoo have lasted over 3 days (which was the shortest amount Chanyeol has ever hung out with anyone, period) and they quickly became old news. People began to think that Kyungsoo has managed to tame the wild beast and left their relationship alone. Two years of nothing but stagnant happiness. Chanyeol had accepted Kyungsoo’s confession back when they were in their last year of middle school and have since then been dating. It didn’t always used to be this bad: their relationship. At least Kyungsoo didn’t think so. But lately, it’s seems to just be spiraling out of control. Kyungsoo has always tried his hardest to ignore it – that sinking feeling whenever he sees Chanyeol – but it is starting to eat him up from the inside. Kyungsoo thinks because he has been bottling this up for the longest time, he is starting to lose sight of what is important to him.
Kyungsoo can’t even turn to the friends he used to have because all of them left him for they did not want to be associated with someone who is in a relationship with Park Chanyeol and even his current friends right now are all busy with their own problems that Kyungsoo does not want to bother him with his own problems. So Kyungsoo doesn’t really have anyone to talk to about the conflicting feelings he has.
In the two years they have been together, Chanyeol has never really said “I love you too” back at Kyungsoo. His replies mostly consisted of a “me too” or the occasional “yeah” whenever Kyungsoo gathers the courage to tell his boyfriend. Kyungsoo used to feel disappointed and sad whenever Chanyeol does that but now, he just shrugs it off and tell himself that he doesn’t need to hear Chanyeol say those words to him. They were just in fact words – Kyungsoo knows that Chanyeol likes him enough to at least stay with him for two years, which is again longer than most of Chanyeol’s relationship. That has to account for something right?
(But still, there are nights when Kyungsoo’s brain just would not shut up with the ‘what if’s. What if Chanyeol only accepted him out of pity? Chanyeol only knew him as that kid who is smart – but kept to himself – and other than that, Chanyeol did not even realise that Kyungsoo is mostly in his classes. What if this entire relationship is or had been a bet on his part? That is what Kyungsoo fears the most because Kyungsoo honestly does not think he can recover from that.
Though there are times when his mind would just replay all the nicest things Chanyeol has ever done for him.
Kyungsoo had off-handedly mentioned that he wanted to go to Namsan Tower because despite living in Seoul most of his life, he has never been there and the next day, right after classes ended, Chanyeol had brought him over to Namsan Tower.
Although if anyone had asked Kyungsoo, he honestly did not think Chanyeol had been listening to him because Chanyeol only gave him half-hearted responses and sometimes acted as if Kyungsoo wasn’t even talking at all. So Kyungsoo had been really surprised to know that Chanyeol is listening to him.
Or like that one time when Kyungsoo had fallen sick – he rarely gets sick but when he does, Kyungsoo becomes so weak he barely even leaves his one-room apartment – and the next time he wakes up, he spies a tray of warm juk, a glass of water and a few pills. Kyungsoo surmises it might have been Chanyeol who had come in to his house because there were a few (rare) messages from Chanyeol asking why he was absent from school and why Kyungsoo wasn’t replying. He must have put two and two together.
In all honesty, Kyungsoo is just so confused and he really doesn’t know what to do. He doesn’t think Chanyeol is bad but at the same time, the way he hurts Kyungsoo is starting to really take a toll on him and they are graduating soon as well. So what should he do? Should he follow his heart and chase after his dream or should he just stop trying altogether because it’s really starting to hurt him too much?).