WEEPING WILLOWS [sebaek | chanbaek]

OUT OF THE BLUE

'The pens now write the grief like never before and the lips they mourn more than they speak. Broken hearts and lonely souls keep wandering under the sunset seeking the warmth they don't even recognize. My heart has grown heavy watching them, and my soul has gone numb from feeling them. My mind has turned old, tired of everything around, tired of waiting for tomorrow to come by and by. It's been the same day for ages while the date kept changing on and on.'

Baekhyun closed his notebook and took a bite of his lunch. He was sitting alone in his office cafeteria watching the nothingness on the other side of the glass wall.

"Have you heard Sehun's music?"

"Of course, of course. It was damn good."

He happened to hear girls behind his table speak.

"I heard a few cafes playing it too."

"It's gonna blow up for sure."

Soon a few more girls joined the other girls for lunch.

"Keep it down if that psychopath hears it, we'll be fired too."

"You think Chanyeol fired Sehun." the girl who spoke tried to suppress her laugh, "Sehunnie hasn't returned to the company for months now, how can that psychopath fire him."

"Yes, yes, it's more like Sehun fired this company." the whole gang laughed.

"It's like that phrase, Dad went to get a pack of cigarettes and never came back." Everyone chuckled.

"Yeah. Sehun went to get some coffee and never came back." they all laughed even louder.

Baekhyun hasn't seen Sehun since the day they accidentally met in the cafe, so he was a little curious and listened to their whole conversation.

He then took out his phone to search for Sehun's song that they were talking about. It was indeed a hit he could see from the views on it. Closing his eyes, he heard the music drop in his ears. Less than a minute and he took his earphones off, "too loud, not something I can like." He silently continued with his lunch.

"I can't believe that bastard did that." Chanyeol was furiously shouting on his phone when Baekhyun entered his cabin, he gestured Baekhyun to take his seat and continued talking "I didn't even know he has been running a freaking YouTube channel all these years. We need to correct loopholes in the employee contract to avoid other employees repeating this sick behavior."

"He made it big with his own hard work. Why are you so mad tho." thinking to himself, Baekhyun stared at the loud mess.

"I don't get this DMCA-free hype at all. He's not at all accepting to sell the rights at any cost, I don't get it, is he thinking he's some kind of divine creature by letting everyone use the music for free," he was roaring on the phone and the loudness was making Baekhyun's head spin, "Yeah, yeah, I'll take care of it, and you, try to divert the internet traffic to negative articles and make sure every positive article about him uses our company's name as his huge support." He added.

"How low must people go before their conscience could question them!" he sighed out of habit but Chanyeol glared at him immediately.

"What? Are you hurt that I'm cursing that bastard?" As soon as Chanyeol ended his call he took his anger out on Baekhyun.

"Eh?" Baekhyun was really confused.

"Don't act innocent. You must be as happy as a dog with two tails. Now that he's famous you can use him too, right?" Chanyeol's words were so hurtful that Baekhyun couldn't even bring himself to open his mouth in his own defense. "Had you not helped him on that night we could've got him in our grip. It's all blown up, now go milk the cow you saved." Chanyeol's anger seemed out of control.

"I'm here to submit the lyrics you asked me to correct." Baekhyun wasn't capable of taking in any more of that nuisance, "I'll keep them here-"

"Fuck these depressing songs," Before Baekhyun could place his papers on the table, Chanyeol grabbed them and threw them in the air. "Have you ever written anything good? I was wrong to think you got the potential, hell with this same sad shit that-"

"I'll come back some other time." swallowing the pain, Baekhyun struggled to let the words come out of his mouth.

He then quietly collected the fallen papers and left his cabin. Walking on the small office aisles his vision slowly became unclear with the tears filling his eyes but he fought them; not letting even a single drop fall out until he was at his usual place on top of the building.

And once he was alone, he let them free. Tears rolling down carrying the agony with them silently.

He took out his vape and inhaled, allowing the smoke to escape through his nostrils while the stream of warmth continued to run down his cheeks as he stared at the blue without any emotion on his face.

"You got a way with words. Will you work for me?"

"Good job."

"You are the kindest guy I've ever met."

"If no one listens to your songs, I'll do it."

"At least you got one fan for sure."

"Everyone would fall for a guy like you, I'm no different."

"I think you should smile a little more."

"Don't act immature. You think I would believe that you followed me without seeing any gains for you?"

"Rewrite them all."

"You won't be going solo anymore; you have to work in teams from now on."

"Don't put up your kind-man act again, not in front of me at least."

"You only act calm and quiet because you are afraid people will find out you are not that good of a person if you let them get close to you."

"Nobody can be your true friend except me."

"I was wrong to think you got the potential."

All those words that Chanyeol told him in seven years of their friendship; if that's what they call it, kept ringing in his head while his eyes stayed wet all this time.

The season did its thing, and it started raining out of blue. Finally, when heavy water drops began to hit him over and over again, he started to feel the pain. He smashed down the smoking device and screamed aloud letting out the torment of a thousand years, literally, to a point where his voice went crooked in no time. But the dense showers overpowered his voice, making him break down and weep louder and louder for as long as he could.