Chapter Text
Im Changkyun always thought there was no such thing as luck. Every time something bad had happened to him, he had blamed it on destiny and had tried to overcome it. He usually acted quickly when a problematic situation appeared in front of his eyes but, at that moment, he just couldn’t. He couldn’t see anything positive after his boyfriend shamelessly cheated on him and put resistance when he tried to kick him out of their shared apartment. “I didn’t cheat on you, I swear!” he repeated, begging on his knees for him to let him stay. Changkyun stared at him emotionless because breaking down would make him look weak and he didn’t want that. After a few attempts of pushing his now ex-boyfriend away, he gave up and packed his stuff.
“The apartment is all yours” Changkyun put on his long coat, his beanie and his scarf, slamming the door behind his back. The hallways’ lights were already on, indicating it was dark outside. The weather was extremely cold, the city was covered in snow. Winter was Changkyun’s favorite season but not if he had to call his friends in the middle of the street because he had nowhere to go. His brunette bangs were getting a little long and the snowflakes got attached to them as they fell from the sky, painting the city even more in a bright tone of white. Changkyun sneezed, tightening his hold on his suitcase while he tried to dial his best friend’s number. He forgot his gloves hanging from the bedroom’s chair and his hands were trembling violently.
As he waited for him to answer, he started moving slowly through the sidewalk, not wishing to freeze to death. He was tired that night, tired of his job, tired of his life in general and he wanted everything to get better soon. Brooklyn looked dark and sad in his perspective and his mind started contemplating if he should move to New Jersey or something to change his environment a little.
That morning, he went to his job with a smile on his face but didn’t find anything good to keep that smile for. Changkyun didn’t have a good day and, for the first time, he blamed it on his luck. He was a reporter and his boss sent him to do a note about a murder. He did it all the time but it didn’t go well that day. First of all, he fell down after slipping up with the frozen ground, hitting his back harshly. Second of all, the camera man wasn’t filming when he started reporting and he had to do it all over again. And third, he spilled his coffee all over his clothes, burning his legs a bit. Changkyun thought his day couldn’t get worse until he returned home and found his boyfriend organizing their bedroom after having sex with some stranger he didn’t get to see. He couldn’t take the image out of his mind: the messy sheets - almost touching the carpeted floor -, his boyfriend’s half-naked state and his neck full of hickeys. Changkyun shook his head at the memory and a voice interrupted his deep thoughts. “What do you want? I’m busy” and that was his best friend, Joshua. The sweet angel Joshua Hong.
“What a nice way of greeting your best friend” Changkyun sarcastically replied, still walking slowly through the sidewalk. He was heading to Joshua’s apartment, even if the man didn’t let him stay yet. “Josh, listen, I... I need a place to stay” he started massaging his temple with his fingers, feeling his head aching. Changkyun hated asking for favors but he had no other option that night.
“Are you serious, bro? What did Caleb do this time?” Joshua asked and Changkyun could hear him typing in his computer. The man was a doctor in one of those huge hospitals and he was writing a book so he worked till late every night. “Don’t tell me he wore your precious clothes and left them on the floor because I won’t let you stay! You have to be a patient person and accept your boyfriend the way he is” Joshua begun scolding the brunette but he wasn’t in the mood for that so he decided to speak quickly.
“He cheated on me, please let me stay there” Changkyun said and his best friend shut up. The reporter heard a long sigh coming from the other line so he started thinking about a plan B. Maybe it was a bad idea leaving the apartment at night; he could have stayed sleeping on the couch for once.
“Fine, come fast before you freeze out there” Joshua gave in and Changkyun thanked him before ending the call. He pocketed his cellphone and picked up his pace, dragging his enormous suitcase through the white snow covering the ground.
Two days after the little incident Changkyun felt as if he was hit by a truck. His back hurt a lot, his eyes were red and puffy due to all the crying he did after he realized what had happened to him - he tried his best to be strong but after a while he just couldn’t take it anymore -, and his head ached, not letting him concentrate in his job. The brunette was sitting on Joshua’s couch, trying to type something but his cellphone kept on vibrating on top of the coffee table. Caleb’s name could be read on the shiny screen and Changkyun was contemplating the idea of throwing the device to the garbage can before he did something stupid like answering his calls. Their relationship lasted 4 years and it was weird not to have him around. Changkyun stared at his phone for long minutes, thinking if he should erase every little trace of his ex-boyfriend not to have any reminders.
“Don’t you think it would be better if you two talked about it?” Joshua appeared out of nowhere, letting himself fall on the couch with two cups of coffee in his hands. He handed one to Changkyun and started drinking, waiting for an answer. The brunette didn’t say anything, he suddenly felt like a fool. Was it wrong to end his long term relationship there because his boyfriend shamelessly cheated on him? Changkyun was a little confused after Joshua asked him that question because he loved Caleb but what if he cheated more than once and he was too blind to notice? “You know, it’s Saturday... you could be cuddling with Caleb in your bed instead of sitting on my couch typing something you don’t even need to do right now” Joshua made things even harder after saying that but Changkyun didn’t want to surrender. Caleb cheated on him, he deserved to suffer. The brunette stared at the cup of coffee in his hands for a few seconds but then left it on the coffee table and grabbed his cellphone. “That’s right” Joshua patted Changkyun’s back but his smile dropped when he turned off the device and left it on the sofa’s cushion. “No, that’s not right” the other sighed. “Fine, do whatever you want” Joshua turned on the TV and stayed in silence after that.
“Don’t worry, I’m already searching for a place to live and I’ll go visit some apartments in the afternoon” Changkyun spoke in a low voice, showing Joshua the pictures of the few places with a reasonable rent he found.
“Hey, that wasn’t my point... I don’t mind you staying here” Joshua tried his best to sound convincing but Changkyun knew he wasn’t the best company at that moment and he seriously needed to be alone. Locking himself in his own little world was his way of getting over bad things and he didn’t want it to be different that time. “You can stay as long as you want, I have enough space for the two of us” Joshua continued, handing him the cup of coffee once again. “Drink, it’ll get cold” he ordered and Changkyun complied, drinking a bit of hot coffee. “I just think Caleb must be sorry and this is the first time he does something like that” his best friend wouldn’t shut up and he knew he was trying to help but it wasn’t.
“How do you know?” Changkyun raised a brow and Joshua opened his mouth to then close it again because he didn’t know what to say. “Caleb loved to party before we met and he even told me he used to let strangers fuck him before we started dating” he confessed something he’d been saving to himself for a long time and Joshua dropped his jaw. “I trusted him because he told me he changed but maybe he never changed” Changkyun growled, massaging his temple.
“I guess you have a point” Joshua slid his hand through the brunette’s back and caressed it softly. “Okay, go take a shower and get dressed” the man said. “We’ll go have lunch together and then I’ll go with you to the places you want to see” he smiled and Changkyun chuckled, shaking his head in disbelief. “Go” Joshua pushed him after carefully placing his computer on the couch and he had no other option than to follow his friend’s orders.
It was a good thing Joshua pushed him to go out, he managed to forget about Caleb for a few hours and he signed a contract with one of the places they visited. It was a productive afternoon and he didn’t turn on his cellphone in the entire day. When the night came he turned the device on and found almost 40 missed calls and at least 15 messages from Caleb, saying he made a mistake and that they should at least talk. Changkyun sighed while staring at the guests bedroom’s ceiling that night and he decided to send him a message so he could go and pick some of his things up. He only took the essential the night before and he needed all his things to decorate his new apartment. After typing a quick text message, he left his phone on the nightstand and fell asleep.
A month later, Changkyun was sitting on his bed, checking some mails out when Caleb suddenly spoke to him via Facebook. ‘Annoying’ he thought, closing the window before opening some things his boss sent him. The old man wanted him to read a bunch of new stories and cases before Wednesday arrived and he didn’t feel like it. Changkyun saved everything in his computer before closing the e-mail application. He also considered deleting his Facebook account so Caleb couldn’t talk to him anymore but he needed it. His lifetime friends were there and he had so many memories and pictures. Changkyun roamed around the page and rolled his eyes when he saw a photo of his ex-boyfriend hugging some other man. “Should I stop following him?” he asked in a whisper, clicking the button but stopping midway because he suddenly had a better idea. “I’ll block him” he smiled and quickly blocked Caleb before he could talk to him more through the chat window.
Changkyun felt a relieved after that because his ex-boyfriend had been annoying him constantly after the afternoon he went to pick his things up from their shared apartment. They had talked about the issue and Caleb had confessed everything. The latter had thought Changkyun would had forgave him after he had told him the whole truth but he had been wrong. The brunette had found more reasons to think their relationship had been a mistake after that and he had ended up telling Caleb to fuck off. That apparently had hit him hard because he hadn’t stopped sending messages and updating stupid statuses, saying how sad and sorry he felt.
After blocking him, he decided to eliminate some people too. His Facebook page was old, he couldn’t recall the exact moment he created it and he had lots of weird people he didn’t even know. When he was younger, he used to accept everyone and it would be good to clean up a little. Changkyun clicked on his friends, scrolling down and reading their names to select the ones he would eliminate. He made sure none of Caleb’s friends remained there and, when he was reaching the end, he found someone familiar. “Yoo Kihyun” he read and tried to remember who that guy was. In his profile picture, there was a man in his twenties with black hair and a dog in his arms. Changkyun stared at him for a few seconds and gasped when he finally remembered. “He was the weird South Korean boy who spoke to me years ago because he wanted to learn English” Changkyun chuckled, clicking the message button to check on their old conversations. Kihyun was lucky Changkyun spoke Korean too and they could manage to actually talk at first.
The brunette spent almost two hours reading their messages and laughing out loud and a crazy idea came to his mind. ‘Will it be weird if I talked to him?’ he thought, moving his fingers from one side to the other around his keyboard.“Oh, fuck it” he said and quickly typed something, sending it right away. It wouldn’t harm anyone if he talked to a stranger to have some fun. He hoped the other was awake because he couldn’t remember their time difference.
Hi! How are you? Long time no talk
I was eliminating some people and I suddenly found you
Who are you?
Wait! I know who you are! My English teacher!
I’m fine, you? I guess you could ask me for lessons this time because I’m an expert :P
I can see you’ve gotten better xD
I’m fine too, doing nothing in my apartment
How lucky! I’m working since it’s Monday here
In case you forgot it’s 11am here
You are right! 14 more hours, I totally forgot after all these years
If you are busy or you really don’t feel like talking to me because
I’m being annoying, just tell me. I just thought it would be fun
And I have nothing to do xD
Changkyun lied because he had things to do but he just didn’t feel like doing them. He remembered Kihyun as a person he could relax with and it would help to get distracted for a while. His friends were having dinner with their families or going to sleep because they all worked the next day but Changkyun wanted to stay awake for a few more hours. Kihyun’s last reply was taking longer than the others and the brunette was starting to suspect he wouldn’t chat with him anymore.
Let’s talk, I need someone to practice my English with :P
Changkyun smiled when he read those words and laid back comfortably on his pillow to keep on talking.