Chanel's Fics

Carry Me Home - Taoris

CARRY ME HOME // PART 2

Now I know that I'm not

All that you got

I guess that I

I just thought maybe we could find new ways to fall apart

Fun, “We Are Young”

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Kris walks in on him crying silently into the crumpled sheets one night. He leans against the doorway and watches, expressionless, as Zitao squeaks and scrambles up into a sitting position.

“I’m sorry,” he breathes, clutching at his face in fright. He digs his fingernails into his skin when he sees Kris’s eyebrow twitch.

“I’m so, so sorry,” he whispers, squeezing his eyes shut.

Kris walks towards him, the floorboards shaking slightly with each footstep, and Zitao quivers.

“Get up,” Kris says coldly, and Zitao makes haste to do so.

He watches silently as Kris yanks the sheets from the bed, jerky and methodical, stuffing the crumpled fabric haphazardly underneath one arm. He strips the pillowcases too. Zitao chews nervously on the inside of his cheek and watches as Kris bundles up the sheets and walks out the door. And a few minutes later he hears the tell-tale slam of the dumpster lid closing.

Kris doesn’t come back immediately. Zitao hears him walk to the bathroom and turn on the water. He remembers the way Kris likes to wash his hands, slow and meticulous, scrubbing vigorously and scraping the non-existent filth out from underneath his fingernails. The water turns off after thirty seconds; the towel ring squeaks. Zitao swallows anxiously when he hears his footsteps approaching again.

Kris is carrying a pile of folded fabric when he steps through the door. He tosses the spare sheets at Zitao, and they hit him square in the face. Zitao yelps.

“Next time,” Kris says, brushing a speck of nonexistent dust off his T-shirt, “don’t do it on the bed.”

He walks away without another glance. Zitao bites his lip, clutching the folded cloth to his chest.

I’m crying because of you, he wants to say.

But he doesn’t.

\\\

They go to the club more often now that Chanyeol is no longer a “factor of distraction”, as Zitao secretly calls Kris’s affairs. Zitao doesn’t know why Kris orders him to come too; sometimes he wonders why he follows. But the escape is welcome, if brief. And so tonight Zitao weaves through the hot dense air of Two Moons and dances to Kris’s music. Kris smolders on the stage, rapping at the speed of a Shanghai subway, and Zitao moves his body to the rhythm of Kris’s words. And it’s here that he feels in control just briefly, control over his own body, the way he can make himself move in any way he wants. The control is disorienting, intoxicating, and he thinks now that maybe he can understand Kris, maybe a little.

He stops dancing automatically when Kris steps down from the mike, shrinking into the nearest wall. Kris struts easily through the blasting music and psychedelic lights, struts like he owns the place – well, he almost does. He sweeps his eyes up and down the bouncing bodies, looking, as Zitao now knows, for new prey. Kris saunters over to the bar, where an unfamiliar pair is lounging. Zitao inspects them surreptitiously. The boy has pretty cat eyes and wavy blonde hair; the girl, a short black pixie and muscular arms. Both of them look gorgeous. Zitao wonders which way they swing. It’s hard to tell, even considering the boy’s unusually feminine attire; Two Moons attracts birds of all feathers, after all. They greet Kris with an easy familiarity: work friends, perhaps? Zitao sees Kris smirk and drape an arm over each of them, bending over to whisper something in the blonde boy’s ear.