𝐇𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐋𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐥𝐞 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬

3

Yeonjun panted heavily while running through every possible place Beomgyu could be at. Their class president, Soobin, saw Beomgyu rushing out of their classroom and got worried, so he told Yeonjun, his only friend, everything. As soon as he heard the news, Yeonjun wasted no time running out looking for Beomgyu.

He had looked everywhere for the past twenty minutes, except for the maple garden and amusement park. When he turned around the corner of the garden, he couldn't hear his most favorite laugh in the world echoing in the barren land today.

As he reached the big maple tree at the centre of the garden, he saw Beomgyu's figure with shoulders hunched down in sadness. He sniffled, quietly complaining to the three kittens, who had developed as adult cats now over the years.

"Beomgyu?" Yeonjun called out, eyes big in worry and heart breaking into a million pieces. He couldn't help himself when Beomgyu turned around with a tear-stained face, dabbing it with his sleeves in a hopeless effort to not show his weak side.

"What happened?" Yeonjun could feel his eyes going glassy as he tightly embraced Beomgyu. Hearing Yeonjun's worry-laced voice, Beomgyu broke into tears again, dampening Yeonjun's shirt.

This felt like home to Beomgyu; in Yeonjun's arms which would protect him at all cost. On second thought, Beomgyu had lost his parents to an accident, the only thing close to home for Beomgyu. How could he know what home feels like?

"I-I had went to enroll in the soccer club today." Beomgyu started with choked up sobs. Yeonjun rubbed his hands on Beomgyu's back, encouraging him to continue.

"They said I'm too girly to play soccer." Beomgyu said.

"Why would they say that?" Yeonjun felt a gush of rage bubbling up inside him.

"Because I'm clingy; too much clingy with you, hyung!" Beomgyu yelled, looking straight into Yeonjun's eyes.

He was unaware of the pain that made Yeonjun go still; his anger diminished and another wave of guilt engulfing him. 'Had he been using his innocent friend's love and intimacy to quench his own one-sided feelings?' - Yeonjun thought. There was a good fraction of possibility that Beomgyu would never return the same feelings but he chose to ignore that. He was selfish for him, for them.

"But we are best friends, right? Best friends are bound to be like this." Yeonjun tried a last pitiful attempt to make Beomgyu understand. "Don't you see them?" He said, pointing to the children walking hand in hand and returning home after school.

"They are elementary school kids! I'm fourteen already!" Beomgyu denied to Yeonjun's words immediately.

"Oh... right." Yeonjun felt a thousand bullets rip through his chest at Beomgyu's words. He was not yet ready to accept the reality yet he had to. He couldn't continue to be selfish anymore.

Slowly retracting his arms, Yeonjun shifted away to a safe distance from Beomgyu.

"Hyung, I-" By the time Beomgyu had realised that his words might have hurt Yeonjun, "No, it's okay, I understand!" he was cut off by Yeonjun who flashed him a smile.

Was it fake? Or was it a pitiful console towards his broken heart? Yeonjun couldn't tell; for all he knew was that their precious friendship, the minimum closure he had with Beomgyu, couldn't be risked over his silly feelings. The innocent sixteen year old was a victim of one-sided love and he had to learn to hide that behind two destructive words, 'Best Friends'.

"Meow!" One of the three cats came running to Yeonjun's feet, meowing and bribing him with cute acts for affection. Animals really were human's best friends, Yeonjun thought. He patted the furball's head while it showed its belly asking for more. It was amusing how just seconds ago Yeonjun was mourning but now he had a bright smile on his face.

Beomgyu couldn't manage to say anything more after the tension created between them. He was happy seeing Yeonjun smile and he was afraid that resurfacing that topic would snatch that beautiful smile off his face.

It was a summer afternoon, exactly 5:53 p.m. as it showed on Beomgyu's wrist watch. A light breeze blew providing a short but much needed break from the scorching heat waves. That dandelion anthers blew and scattered all around Yeonjun and the cat like snowflakes. The sky was a mess of magical golden yellow, orange and purple, as if a painter had messily splattered those colours across his canvas. The maple tree was in its full fledged green form.

Beomgyu gasped at the beautiful sight in front of him. But the most beautiful of all was the boy in front of him, sitting on his knees and playing with the cat, squeaky laughters errupting from him and eyes crinkled in the most adorable way possible. He understood after all these years, why Yeonjun was always jealous of the cats because now Beomgyu was feeling nothing but the same.

'Do you feel your heart beat in a different way for your best friend, Wooyoung?' Beomgyu had once innocently asked his roommate in his orphanage the question that always lingers in the back of his mind. To that, the other boy had eyed him weirdly and mumbled a simple 'no'. Since then, the conflict between his innocent mind and these weird feelings in his heart kept on increasing until today, when he was openly addressed about those by his classmates. The rollercoaster of emotions had embarrassed him and he ran away to his hiding spot, breaking into tears.

Beomgyu hadn't expected Yeonjun to find him. He was too shocked and in the rush of the moment had said some hurtful words. Still, he couldn't deny them. He was afraid it was something more complex than friendship so he had decided to supress it till he could.

"Beomgyu, my dad called. Let's return home." Yeonjun's voice broke Beomgyu's train of thoughts and he looked at his wrist watch again. It showed 5:54 p.m.

"Let's go." Beomgyu got up, dusting his clothes. That day, neither Yeonjun nor Beomgyu dared to hold each other's hands while returning home. A little distance was good for both of them - they thought.

Ahhhh I'm sorry for the angst >=<
What do you think about this episode? Any theories or future speculations? 👀

Love ya,
ddynamitee1