the one that got away | seongjoong (✓)

• XVII •

the next morning, seonghwa woke up early and called yunho, trying to find out if there was any way for hongjoong to get a break today. he explained how the boy had hurt his ankle, to which yunho sighed.

"he said he was okay..."

"what?"

"he slipped during rehearsal yesterday. he told us all he was okay and his manager cleaned up the water he slipped on, then we carried on. he needs to stop lying like this..."

"do you think you can convince them to give him a break today?"

"i'll try, but i can't promise anything."

"okay... what time does he need to be there if they say no?"

"around 1pm, we have rehearsal at 1:30."

"okay... thanks, yunho."

"of course. thank you for taking care of joong... he really needed you back in his life."

"i'm really happy to be... i missed him."

"i'll let you go for now, yeah? thank you again, you have no idea how much this means to mingi and i that you're there."

"yunho... before you go, how bad was he before we started talking again?"

"really bad... things were going okay, and then this sasaeng attacked him in his apartment and since then... he hasn't been himself. even now he's not, but he's been starting to be more like himself now than he had been."

"shit... okay, thanks. i-i just noticed he wasn't exactly... him. i'll see you soon."

"see you."

the two hung up and seonghwa went back to hongjoong's room, sitting down and beginning to play with the younger's hair.

"you have always been so precious when you sleep..." he whispered. "i'm so sorry that i wasn't there to keep you safe from all the bad in this world... i-i should've kept our promise."

seonghwa spent a bit of time staring down at hongjoong, watching him sleep soundly. a small smile was put on the older's face at this, remembering all the times that the two had spent the night together when they were in a relationship.

to say that he missed hongjoong these past five years wasn't enough. every day he had wished that their paths would cross once again and he would finally get the chance to hold the love of his life in his arms again. he wished he could turn back the clock to when things first turned sour, handle things better. hongjoong deserved better. he didn't deserve to go through the pain of those arguments while being a trainee. seonghwa wanted to take it all back and have things be okay.

but here they were, five years had passed since they had broken up, and it seemed that it was meant for them to find each other again. you know what they say, if you love something, let it go and if it comes back, it was meant to be. seonghwa believed that this was their sign. he believed that they were meant to be. and this time, he wasn't going to let hongjoong go.

hongjoong groaned just slightly, causing seonghwa's smile to widen as he knew this meant the younger was beginning to wake up.

"morning, sleepy," seonghwa said softly.

"mm... morning, hwa."

"sleep good?"

hongjoong nodded, rolling himself over so his head was on seonghwa's chest.

"you know what this reminds me of?" seonghwa asked.

"what?"

"all the nights we spent together in high school."