Hidden

𝐭𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲

a/n: Considered the year long break taken, if anyone needs a quick recap of the two previous chapters, you can scroll down to the bottom of this one and read it.

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𝐇 𝐈 𝐃 𝐃 𝐄 𝐍

Felix looked at Hyunjin, whose gaze was fixed on the floor. "Hey, how do you feel?", he attempted to ask.
Obviously, he had left the living room as soon as Hyunjin had. Actually, he had tried with all of his strength not to, at least not instantly. It was in vain.
He had almost ran to their room, although quietly.

The other had spaced out.
It was as if he couldn't think of anything but the tons of noises, the chaos, he was hearing in his own head.
Hyunjin felt run over by a succession of anxieties.

A few hours before, Hyunjin was in the kitchen with his friends and their manager. However, it was like he wasn't there. His mind had been somewhere else.
An obscure place from which he could not seem to find a way out.

Having received no reply at all, Felix shortly moved his gaze to the wall, in order to turn on the light.
Even though he didn't mind at all admiring the perfect, albeit troubled, face of his lover enlightened only by the orangish dim light coming from the corridor.
Hyunjin was sat on Felix's bed, to which the freckled boy approached. He tried not to let his concern show as he spoke in the softest tone he could.
"Hyune, will you look at me?"
He kept looking at the other and knelt in front of him as soon as he noticed Hyunjin's shaking hands.

"Don't speak a word if you prefer doing so —
you know how deeply I enjoy your sole company.
But at least look at me, please do."

Perhaps he had let himself be betrayed by his own tone, which had suddenly faltered. Maybe he simply had spoken too slowly. Whatever the reason, it had worked: his gaze was now returned.

"Whatever we've gotten ourselves into, we're in it together, love."

Felix had then placed his hands on the boy's knees and began to caress them slowly.

Hyunjin cleared his throat before finally speaking.
"Lixie..", he placed his hand on Felix's, still kneeling on the cold floor.
"I am listening", the younger readily replied.
"I don't want to keep it a secret anymore. It would be way too painful — and probably useless as for now."
Felix was pleasantly surprised by the decisive tone.
"Is that what you really want, Hyune? You were not cornered by the situation, were you?", Felix sweetly asked, he wished for the same thing.
He had longed for it for the past year, it was now time to come out into the open.
They shouldn't have been so scared — they weren't criminals — and nonetheless they were.

"Yes and no. I never wanted to keep something so beautiful hidden from the rest of the world.
You should know that by now. But we had to."
Hyunjin took a quick break and then added
"Now it is time to face consequences."

At that point Felix was sitting on the bed, next to his lover. He, too, had felt nervous throughout the whole afternoon and later evening but he had tried his best to hide it in order to comfort the older.
The only visible sign of anxiety was his constant playing with his white and blue ring during Hyunjin's speech.

The other had noticed it and had to say something about it. 
"Lixie, as I've just been told: we are in this together."
Now Felix was looking at him and felt a little better.

But it was Hyunjin who retreated to the room first of all, alone. It was always him who sat down and stayed alone with his thoughts that had tormented him until the other arrived. It was him, and in that moment Felix was the one who needed to comfort, not be comforted.