#srry!

that’s quick to shut him up, only the crunch of him chomping on the carrot stick and the sound of your own chuckle between the three of you. the squeak of the library door opening causes all of you to look, your neck craning back to see seonghwa walking through with two boys from your 4th period class.

your eyes meet and he only does his usual greeting to you, a simple head nod with the smallest of polite smiles on his face before he quickly looks away. you let out a sigh, turning around to see the two boys looking at you carefully.

“still not saying a word?”

“no,” you sigh. 

because the only time you managed to have a conversation with him was by catching him after your class the third day back at school. he’d been avoiding you like the plague and you suppose you understood that maybe he felt embarrassed about his drunken night and confessions. 

but you didn’t want him to feel like he couldn’t talk to you or that you were weirded out. so that’s why you watched the clock and got your books away before the bell, springing up from your seat when it rang reminding you of the other times you had to plan out a way to catch him before he bolted out. 

“seonghwa,” you said, voice quiet but strong as he stiffens upon hearing it. he turns to look at you and tries to smile but it falls flat, his eyes and entire body deflating slightly. 

“hey, y/n.”

the bustling of other students surrounds you as their feet scuffle and backpacks zip close, only a few people straying behind to wait for their friends or talk to the teacher. you two hold a tense eye contact, both of you unsure and guarded but for very different reasons. 

you don’t know if you’re making things harder for him while he doesn’t know if you’re completely perturbed by the shit he pulled last week. because he thinks if there’s two people more disturbed by it than him, it’s you and yeosang. 

“you’ve been avoiding me,” is all you say. because before that night, you guys were kind of back to normal. smiling and laughing and actually talking to one another. 

“and you know why,” he mumbles, leaning his arm on the desk as he looks up at you. 

“seonghwa, it’s fine,” you tell him softly. 

“it’s not,” he says, a humorless laugh leaving his mouth. “i don’t even remember what i said to you but i know it had to be-”

“nothing. it was nothing and nobody’s mad at you,” you tell him in an attempt to make him feel better.

“it wasn’t nothing, y/n,” he snaps, your eyes widening at his unusually harsh tone. and he knows you’re only trying to make him feel less embarrassed and ashamed but it only makes him feel worse. 

you hold your breath as you see him exhale one of his own, running his hand through his hair before he shakes his head. “i’m sorry,” he grunts lowly, “i’m just..i shouldn’t have done that.”

“and i shouldn’t have done a lot of things, either,” you tell him quietly, “i know...that that was kind of my fault.”

his adams apple bobs as he swallows, not even realizing the room has emptied out and people are waiting outside. he can only feel the thick tension between you two, your desperate attempt to make him feel better and make things between you guys normal again while he’s desperate to run away and just forget everything. 

but even after everything, he’s desperate to tell you nothing’s your fault. that you didn’t do anything wrong and there’s no fault to put on anyone. but then the more he thinks about it, the more he thinks maybe placing the blame on you would make you feel better.

ask why you kissed yeosang when you knew he liked you. ask why you kept it a secret for those weeks after even though you both knew it was wrong. ask why the hell you chose yeosang but still insist on talking to him. 

but he knows that’s not in his nature. he couldn’t ever put the blame on you when he sees how much it’s hurt you, how much you’ve cried and gone back and forth with yourself. it’s why he says:

“nothing was your fault,” he tells you. “i got drunk and said shit i shouldn’t have.”

“then why have you been avoiding me?” you ask softly. “yeosang said you haven’t really talked to him either.”

seonghwa swallows down the lump in his throat, his resolve to stay polite and good quickly leaving him. he shoots up from his desk and slugs his bag over his shoulder. he knows you mean well but he’s still sensitive and upset and the way he’s feeling hounded by you right now is making his skin prickle. 

“why are you attacking me, y/n?” 

his voice is such a short snap that it makes you draw back in offense; you were just trying to talk and make him feel better. 

“attacking you?” you ask, “i’m just...i’m just trying to tell you we’re okay. that nothing has to be...weird now.”

air blows out of his nose and he can’t bring himself to look at your face, his head turned back to look out in the hallway. he sees a few younger kids waiting for them to leave, like their able to sense the tense atmosphere and stay far away. 

it’s why he turns back and forces himself to look in your eyes, already feeling like an asshole when he sees the hurt and confusion swirling in yours. but for once in his life, he can’t bring himself to care that much. you say you guys are okay, but that’s not the case. he knows it, you know it, everyone probably knows it. 

but because he needs to get away before he becomes a person that he isn’t at his core, he nods his head at you.

“you’re right. we’re okay. nothing’s weird,” he says, his voice soft but not with the warm sincerity you’ve grown to know. “i gotta get to class, y/n. i’ll see you around.”

“seonghwa,” you breathe out. but he pushes past you and out of the classroom, the people waiting outside immediately filing in and taking their seats. 

that was the last time you’d talk to him and it was almost a month ago. you’ll see each other and nod or wave or attempt to smile but everything feels so forced and fake that it makes your stomach sink. 

“it’s like after the move night,” you tell the two boys looking at you curiously. “we were finally becoming friends again, kind of, and then that call changed everything.”

yunho and mingi look at you then toward seonghwa, who’s walking through the library and looking everywhere but their corner. their hearts hurt for him, knowing how hard these past months have been for everyone but especially him. and they know you mean well but expecting him to be friends with you is a little...unrealistic right now.

“he’ll be friends with you when he’s ready,” mingi tells you, gently but firmly the way he always does. “it’s not that easy, y/n. think about if you felt the way you do about yeosang but he rejected you. and then try to imagine if he kept insisting you guys could be friends.”

you let out a sigh, knowing he has a point and is absolutely correct. but it still hurts your heart because you do love seonghwa and his friendship and everything he has to offer as a person. 

but if he needs you to wait, you’ll wait. because you don’t wanna lose your first friend here over something as silly as a drunken night. 

“did seonghwa talk to you today?” yeosang asks as you plop down in his car, leaning over to place a peck on his cheek before throwing your bag onto the floor. 

“nope,” you say, a frown on your face before you ask him the same. 

“not really,” yeosang says, shaking his head as he holds his palm up for you to take. “just his usual safe bullshit.” 

him and seonghwa are in a similar spot that they were in after the movie night fight, tip toeing around each other and using their other friends as buffers. it’s not as bad, since they’re able to be in the same room as each other, but it’s still not their usual friendship; it’s why yeosang’s decided that today he’s had enough. he misses his friend and they have to talk it out again.

“that’s why i’m going to his house later tonight,” he continues. 

“oh?” you squeak, playing with his fingers as he starts to drive off. 

“yeah, i don’t know if he wants me to like...talk to him about that night?” yeosang questions, wondering if his friend is thinking he’s harboring ill feelings about the whole thing. because he was at first, but it hadn’t had anything to do with seonghwa. it was his own insecurities and stupid brain concocting a bunch of a bullshit. “but i have to go over there. last time it went well and he definitely wanted to punch me in the face back then. so this time should be fine.”

you giggle at his comment, nodding your head before looking over at him again. “maybe let him get one in this time. for fun.”

his eyes roll toward you and your teeth dig into your bottom lip as you smile, your eyes lighting up when he says if that were the case, you’d be the one taking care of him afterward. you peck him on the lips and then do it again when you’re in front of your house, wishing him good luck and reminding him not to be an asshole later. 

“i don’t know where you get this impression that i’m ever an asshole.”

his cute boyish chuckle rings through his open window after you slam the door at his comment, blushing and waving him off when he screams out the three words you’re still getting shy and giddy hearing.

yeosang waits until dinnertime to go over to seonghwa’s, texting the boy that he’s bringing chinese food and to have the door open for him. he doesn’t get an answer but knows the boy saw it when he gets there twenty minutes later, walking into the house and hearing the tv on in the living room. 

he sees seonghwa laid out on the couch, passing right by the kitchen counter and missing the passport papers and boarding school pamphlet laid out for everyone to see. but it appears his house is empty again, everything spotless and untouched like a soul hasn’t lived here in months. 

“hey,” is all he says, placing the food on the coffee table before plopping down on the couch. 

“hey,” seonghwa says, eyeing the plastic bag before looking at the boy. “thanks for the food, though it didn’t seem like i had much of a choice.”

“you turning down a free meal now, you fuck?”

seonghwa smirks at the boy, fishing in the bag for a plastic fork before throwing one at yeosang. “don’t get shit on the couch. my mom will-” the words die in his throat when he realizes even if something did get on them, he could probably buy a new couch and have it shipped to his home before anyone  noticed. “actually, it doesn’t even matter.”

“i won’t,” yeosang says, popping open his container before shoving a piece of sesame chicken in his mouth. the boys eat in a relative silence, a stray comment about the tv show and the sounds of their chewing filling the room. 

“how long have your parents been gone?” yeosang finds himself asking, fishing around his bowl as he successfully avoids the pieces of broccoli. 

“don’t know, maybe since november. hadn’t talked to them in a while.”

yeosang’s eyes widen, placing his sock-covered foot on the table and smirking when seonghwa smacks his foot down immediately. “hwa, what the fuck, you’ve been here alone for almost five months?” 

the boy only shrugs in response, stuffing his mouth with a dumpling as he mumbles “i guess.”

“assholes,” yeosang grumbles, shaking his head before the last part of his sentence rings in his head. “but you’ve talked to them recently, then?” 

the boy only answers with a short “yeah,” but yeosang doesn’t find anything about it suspicious. after all, they’re always a little short and cryptic when it comes to issues with their parents. 

they finish eating as they watch tv, yeosang laying back on the couch with a grunt when his stomach feels like it’s about to explode. seonghwa wipes his mouth with a napkin before picking up the food, humming when the boy laid out thanks him quietly.

seonghwa dumps the food in the trash before eyeing the papers on the table, his gaze roaming to yeosang before back on the counter with a sigh. he licks at his lips questioningly, the short phone call with his father replaying in his mind.

“looks like we’ll be here for a few more months,” his dad told him firmly. it’s the first thing he said after saying hi, not a ‘how are you?’ or ‘have you been eating?’ just a pleasant reminder that he’ll be alone in his huge house for a bit longer. 

“oh,” is all he managed to get out. and whether his dad heard the disappointment in his voice or not, the next sentence that left his mouth throughly shocked him. 

“i know it’s your senior year but we figured we’d ask. would you wanna go to school here?”

his eyes widened at first, his immediate instinct to say absolutely not and enjoy the life of being a teenager whose parents are abroad in france. but he can’t even lie that the thought of getting away could be just what he needs right now. because his life hasn’t felt right for the past few months. 

and he’s not only thinking about the whole thing with you and yeosang. he’s considering how much he’s hated being alone here, how he’s so sick of the empty house and not hearing from his parents for weeks. how he no longer wants to bother his friends with his weepy nonsense while they’re trying to enjoy their last moments of high school.

but does he really wanna do that? does he want to leave his friends and school and move to a country where he doesn’t know anybody? 

“i-i...” he stutters, unsure of how exactly how to answer. but with his son not immediately blurting out the word ‘no,’ the man offers him time to think about it, informing him of the name and telling him to print out the brochure on the school’s website. 

“it’s a great school, seonghwa. it’d be a good opportunity and my colleague’s son goes there. but we’re not gonna force you, it’s all up to you.”

that conversation was a little over a week ago and seonghwa had still been going back and forth with himself, every night going going over the pros and cons in his head. because while a part of him thinks it’d be good for him, another part of him isn’t sure. 

but then when he pads his way back over to the living room and see’s yeosang sitting up with a serious expression, his brain pushes all of that out of his mind. he knew the boy had ulterior motives for coming over and now he thinks he’s about to get his ass handed to him. 

“you know we gotta talk about it,” is all his friend says, placing his foot on his knee as the boy looks at him. “stop looking like i’m gonna punch you in the face.”

seonghwa lets out a snort, rolling his eyes as he plops back down on the couch. “you probably deserve to,” the boy mumbles. 

there’s a few beats of silence before he hears, “you’re fucking joking, right?” seonghwa’s head snaps up immediately, raising an eyebrow as his friend just looks at him in disbelief. “you’re too good a guy, seonghwa, i swear to fuck.”

the boy only lets out a humorless laugh and shakes his head, looking away for a moment before back at his friend. “how do you figure? i called your girlfriend in a drunken fit and confessed all of my feelings to her.”

“she said you couldn’t remember anything,” he says. tone not accusing nor angry.

“i don’t,” seonghwa says, “but i know that’s what happened.”

yeosang looks at his friend and can see the inner turmoil he’s feeling, wishing the boy wasn’t always so hard on himself. he puts aside his own shit all the time to spare others and it’s something yeosang wishes he could do so easily.

“okay. so what?” yeosang says. seonghwa raises an eyebrow as he looks at his friend in confusion. did he not just hear him say he told his girlfriend he had feelings for her? not like he didn’t already know...but still.

“seonghwa, we all already fuckin’ knew that. we also know i was wrong in the first place for kissing her when i knew you liked her.” the boy pops his neck to the side, remembering the blow out fight they had in the basement that felt like it was, both somehow, yesterday and a year ago. 

“but i know also you’d never do anything. you’re my best friend and you’re just too fucking good.”

seonghwa looks at yeosang and swallows the lump in his throat, shaking his head at the boy. he doesn’t feel like he’s good, he doesn’t like that he put you in that position in the first place and he doesn’t like that he couldn’t put his feelings aside for his best friend’s girlfriend, no matter how sneakily you guys started.

“you’re also a fuckin’ pussy so...”

seonghwa rolls his eyes and kicks the boy roughly in the leg, smirking in satisfaction when yeosang lets out a pained groan. “you’re such a dick.” and just like a dick would, he only laughs before his face turns serious again. 

“i’m serious, though, seonghwa,” yeosang says, “neither of us are mad or uncomfortable or any of that bullshit. we did have a fight that night but it’s because i was being a bitch.” 

seonghwa raises his eyebrow at that tid bit of information; he didn’t know about that. 

“she cares about you seonghwa. probably more than she’ll ever admit to me,” he continues to say. “because she was going no matter what i said. she didn’t want you being there drunk and upset.”

and even though seonghwa knows you’d do that for anyone, it does make him happy to know you were gonna be there for him no matter what. because you’re his friend and even if that’s all you see him as, it’s still someone in his life that’s there for him. that should make him want to stay and finish the year out where he grew up. 

but...

“i’m going to france,” he blurts out. 

a dead silence hangs between the two boys, yeosang staring at his friend in immense confusion; that was the last thing he was expecting him to say. what does he mean he’s going to france? 

“what?”

and it’s like saying it aloud has finally made the decision final. he thinks he even knew that’s what he wanted, what he needed, the second he got off the phone with his dad that night. that even though he’s almost an adult, he needs his parents around for guidance and support and can’t be in this house for days at a time with just his own thoughts. 

“my dad told me about a school there,” he finally tells the boy, now wishing he would’ve told him sooner by the look on yeosang’s face. “said it’s a good opportunity and asked if i wanted to go.”

“and you said yes?” yeosang asks in bewilderment, trying to keep his composure and voice calm. but what the fuck, “it’s our senior year, seonghwa. we’re supposed to be graduating in like four months.”

“yeah and no one would even be here to see me graduate, yeosang. they’re gonna be there for god knows how much longer.”

“so?” yeosang asks, knowing he might have a tiny point but not wanting to see it. because his brain can’t stop connecting all of this to the drama that’s been happening this whole entire school year and now he thinks he might be feeling the crushing guilt you’ve been experiencing. 

seonghwa lets out a small chuckle at his friend, shaking his head as he looks over the boy. “so i want my parents to see me graduate. and if that means going to france, then that’s that.”

“thats bullshit, seonghwa, and you know it,” he says. “this is because of y/n, isn’t it?”

seonghwa swallows the obvious elephant in the room. because, yeah okay, he can totally see why he thinks that. he’ll even admit it may be playing a role in this. but even without all the drama, he might’ve considered this opportunity. 

“no,” seonghwa says firmly. 

“don’t fucking lie to me,” yeosang spits back immediately. 

seonghwa rolls his eyes at the boy’s temper, his tongue poking at the inside of his cheek before he throws his arm’s up in defense. “okay, it might have a little bit to do with-”

“fuck, seonghwa,” yeosang groans, getting up from his spot on the couch and pacing around the large living room. he allows his friend the time to process this, watching silently as the boy walks around the room and goes through the motions of allowing the information to sink in.

“if your feelings for her were this strong, you should’ve-”

“it’s not only because of you and her, yeosang, don’t think so highly of yourselves,” seonghwa says, surprising yeosang and causing a smirk to quirk at his lips despite the situation. it even causes him to settle ever so slightly, still feeling a pit in his stomach about his best friend really considering leaving just months before their senior year is over.

he lets out a sigh looking at the boy, not seeing an ounce of hatred or envy in his eyes. just an open honesty that causes yeosang to plop back down on the couch. 

“so, paris?” he finally asks as he looks at seonghwa. 

“i...i think so, yeah,” the boy responds, smiling sadly at his friend. he never would’ve thought in a million years that they’d be having this conversation. that seonghwa would actually take his father’s offer and allow him to ship him off to a fancy, school in europe. 

“and it’s really not because of...everything?” yeosang asks, still unconvinced but trying for his friend, and maybe even himself, to believe the alternative. 

“no,” seonghwa says, “i’ve been feeling...lonely, i guess, in this house. they weren’t even around much but when they were it was good, ya know.” yeosang only gives him a sad smile back, shaking his head as he feels his heart sink.

“no, i don’t.”

seonghwa looks down and wants to laugh at the situation. because there’s nothing more pathetic and cliche than sad kids with mansions and black cards. but if seonghwa has parents who are better than most wealthy ones and yeosang has a girlfriend who he’s incredibly lucky to have, then he thinks both of them are gonna be okay.

“not to take one from your book and be a pussy, but i think i’m gonna miss you.”

seonghwa throws his head back in laughter and it’s the first real laugh he thinks he’s had in weeks. but it’s always been like that with yeosang, a balance of teasing and serious that naturally comes after years of friendship. 

“well i’ll be here for another week. cry then you little bitch.”

and now it’s yeosang’s turn to kick seonghwa in the leg, both the boys snorting in laughter as they try to contain their smiles. it feels good for them to be back to normal, turning their attention back to the show before suggesting to put on one of their favorite movies. 

and with something unspoken in the air, yeosang and seonghwa crash on the couch that night because neither of them would ever utter the term slumber party to one another.