love you later | yeonbin ✓

005

"He's so-" Soobin snaps and lets out a groan. "Infuriating."

He's sitting in a small alcove of Yeonjun's little cottage, telephone pressed tightly against his ear. His chest is heaving with anger, blunt fingernails scratching over the seams of the baggy pants he's wearing.

"He can't be that bad, Soobin," Beomgyu says. "He did take you in and offer to help you, despite how long it's taking."

Soobin doesn't want to admit it, but he knows Beomgyu is right. Somehow, the seasons have started to bleed together, the cold of the winter slowly seeping away to make space for the early bloom of spring. The Lunar New Year came and passed in quiet solitude. It was the first time Soobin hadn't gone home to see his family in ages, and everything about it felt wrong. When Yeonjun had pushed the door open that cold January evening, neither of them had known how long they would be stuck together. Soobin had expected to be on the other side of the country for two, maybe three weeks. Without many words, Yeonjun had led him to a small spare bedroom on the first floor, had shown him the telephone - an old thing with a cord - so Soobin could notify his friends and family he was safe because the mobile reception was bad out here. It meant that he had very little company other than Yeonjun, and it slowly drove him insane.

Yeonjun was cold and stand-offish, seemed to delight in giving Soobin the most ridiculous things to take care of around the place. He fulfilled all the tasks without any complaints though, because, for one, his parents had raised him right, but aside from that, he was stubborn and didn't want to give Yeonjun the satisfaction of giving in. So he toughed it out, thinking it would only take him a couple of weeks before his problems were resolved and he got to go home again. At some point though, he started to suspect that the universe really must not be on his side because two weeks turned into three turned into four, and then somehow months had passed and the first bit of greenery started to peek through the soil. Apparently, cutting non-manifested strings was harder than either of them had expected, and Yeonjun was stuck inside his study for most of his free time when he didn't have other things to take care of.

"I know," Soobin grumbles, thinking of how dark the circles underneath Yeonjun's eyes had been this morning. Sometimes he would fall asleep perched over his books before he could make it to bed. "But he's still an ass. Last week, he made me wipe down the floors, only to step back inside with muddy shoes, and yesterday he sent me up the hill to grab some herbs or something that he needed, only to tell me I went to the wrong one and that all I'd gotten him were some useless weeds. I swear he does this on purpose just to rile me up."

"Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't, but he's still doing you a massive favor," Taehyun says. "Just try to help him out a bit. I'm sure you're going to figure things out, and then before you know it, you'll be back with us."

"Don't you think I've tried?" Soobin exclaims exasperatedly, voice getting just a little bit too loud. "He doesn't want my help. It's like no matter what I do, it isn't enough. I've offered to help him sort through his books and all he says is that he doesn't want my clumsy hands touching them. I mean what the hell? What does he think I'm gonna do? Rip out the pages?"

"They're probably very precious to him," Beomgyu says.

"Okay, so what? My time is very precious to me too, but you don't see me throwing a fit that he's taking too much of it."

It was a petty thing to say, and Soobin knows it isn't right. He's the one who asked for this, practically begged Yeonjun for help, and it's not that he's ungrateful. He just feels useless most of the time, feels like he's a burden more than anything else, and it's a cruel reminder when that is the one feeling he is trying to escape in the first place.

"Soobin?" Yeonjun calls out from somewhere downstairs.

Soobin lets out a deep sigh at the tone of his voice. "Gotta go. His highness probably has another ridiculous job for me to do. I'll call you soon."