t w o

She struggled in the other person's hold, her small hands clawing at the arm around her waist, trying to get herself free. It had only been seconds--a minute at most--but it felt like an eternity to her, trapped and terrified. She continued in her attempts to scream until she felt a pair of warm lips on the side of her neck. Wait a minute, she thought to herself. I know those lips. 

Before she could say anything, heart still racing madly from her initial shock, the person behind her said into the exposed skin of her neck, "What are you doing out here, all by yourself, huh?" His voice was an attempt at sounding raspy and menacing, but it came out sounding as more amused than anything else. It was a voice she recognized from countless television interviews she saw, and several radio interviews she listened to. A voice that slammed her and her band constantly in the public eye, and a voice she only heard telling her sweet things when they were alone. 

He loosened his arm from around her waist, but kept it in its place, just barely giving her enough time to turn around to face him. The hand that had gone to cover her mouth fell to his side.

A smile appeared on her lips once her moment of fear dissipated, though it was replaced in an instant by a look that was laced with annoyance at him. Balling her small hand into a fist, she hit him in the chest. Hard.

He winced, rubbing the sore spot with his hand. But even so, a chuckle escaped from his lips.

"Why'd you do that, jagiya?" He asked her with a groan and a grin evident on his face.

"Me?" She gasped, appalled at his words. "You were the one who nearly gave me a heart attack. Why'd you do that?" She asked him, poking him in the chest with her index finger each time a word left her mouth.

"It was just a joke." He replied to her, grabbing her wrist to keep her from poking him any further.

Sun jutted out her bottom lip into a pout. "Its three in the morning, those kinds of jokes aren't funny right now, Yixing. I really thought I was going to get kidnapped, killed, and stuffed into a sewer canal or something." She pulled her wrist from his grip and got a hold of his hand, bringing it to her chest, "My heart's still beating hard like a drum, feel it." She said to him, letting out a slightly shaky breath from her lips.

"So pessimistic." He commented before pulling her into his embrace, his arms finding their way around her waist. As he placed his chin atop her head, he added with a sigh, "I guess you're right. I'm sorry."

"Of course I'm right." She argued, wrapping her slender arms around him. It was nice--she thought--having him for warmth if only for a couple of minutes whenever their schedules weren't too crazy. But she knew that with him being an SM idol, they would never be able to be together in public. The media, their agencies, and even their own groups would tear them apart. There was too much deeply rooted hatred between SM Entertainment and Pledis.

Sun didn't care about that. All she knew was that what she felt for Yixing was real, and the thought of losing him was one she could not bear.

They were silent in their embrace for a few minutes until they pulled away from each other. Yixing took her hand in his and led her a few feet off, past a little road next to a bridge that went over the river. They were too much in the darkness--their meeting place under the bridge--and he wanted to find some moonlight to grace her face even better. Across the road was a park with benches and he led her to one of them. She walked hesitantly at first--she didn't want anyone to see them--but she trusted him enough to follow him there. It was three in the morning anyway, and most people were asleep at that time.

They sat on the park bench, with Sun cuddling close to her boyfriend, and he commented on something he had seen that day. "I saw you and your group on Idol Pop with the rest of my band mates this afternoon."

"What did you think?" She asked him, curious, her dark eyes trained across the road towards the river.

They had filmed the episode about a month prior and it had just aired that afternoon. In the show, they had been interviews, and participated in several games afterwards. The MC's hadn't missed the opportunity to ask them questions about their so called male counterparts. It was almost like they purposefully did it--despite knowing neither group liked to hear about the comparisons--just to generate negative reactions from them. It always seemed to work. While Sun was secretly dating Lay of EXO, she absolutely loathed his band mates. In her eyes, they were all jerks, about as pleasant as a cup of coffee with salt instead of sugar.

"Your comments used to piss me off, back when I hated you." He admitted to her. "Now they kind of just amuse me because I know you don't mean them. My group members on the other hand absolutely hate you."

Sun snorted in amusement. "I totally mean those comments."

"Mean." He chuckled.

If she was being honest, he was at least certain that she didn't mean the comments about him. 

"I hate EXO and SM Entertainment." She added, as though he didn't already know it.

He retaliated, "I hate Baby Lips and Pledis Entertainment."

"But there is one exception to my hatred." She told him with a playful smirk, pulling away just enough so that she could look up into his dark brown eyes that appeared even darker in the moonlight. 

"Mhm?" He hummed, planting a quick peck on her lips. "Who might that be?"

"Byun Baekhyun." She stated, her voice unapologetic and unfaltering. In an attempt to mess with him, she had blurted out the first EXO band member's name that popped into her mind--the first name that wasn't Yixing.

She managed to catch him by surprise for a brief instant, and there was a look of shock on his face from her reply. He recovered within moments and offered his response to her teasing words. "You're bent on breaking my heart tonight, eh jagiya? My heart and my bones." He feigned an attempt at sounding offended that she would say that, but he couldn't pull a serious face in front of her. Even after a few years of living in Korea and learning the language, his Korean still had a foreign undertone to it that filled Sun's ears. It was her favorite sound in the whole world.

"Don't pretend like you don't know I'm joking." She said with an amused smile, her eyes sparkled with excitement, just as they did each time she was with him. "Obviously the only one exempt from my EXO hate list is you."

"I consider myself blessed." He grinned, lifting his head up proudly. 

Sun blew him a raspberry.

He quickly made sure to assure her, "I'll make sure to retaliate as soon as we get invited to a show."

She was close to responding when she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. She brought it out and looked at her screen to see a text message from Saris.

saris: its almost 4am! 

saris: how much fresh air do u need?

Sun let out a gasp, barely realizing how late--or early in the morning--it was. The twenty year old maknae of Baby Lips shop up from her spot on the park bench next to her boyfriend. "I need to go." She informed him through rushed words coming from her lips. "My group mates will be worried if I'm not there when they wake up. You know they always worry so much about me because I'm the group's maknae."

Yixing frowned. "Leave already? We just got here."

"I know." Sun heaved a sigh. "But Sairs said she would go search for me if I didn't return quickly, and she takes her responsibility as group leader very seriously." She hated seeing him upset, and she hated even less the fact that it was the first time they actually had time to meet up. They had both been busy during the last few weeks. Yixing had been off in China with his group members from EXO-M doing promos. Sun had been in Korea, but would also be travelling to China for about a month to shoot promos with her group. Even though she was in the sub-group who was the female counterpart to Exo M--according to the media--the two groups made sure they wouldn't coincide in their travels. They competed in everything else, but the one thing they didn't compete in was when they traveled outside of Korea.

It was for the safety of the idols themselves that they refrained from travelling at the same time as the EXO boys, unless it were absolutely necessary. 

"Hm." Was all he said. It had only been about an hour that they got to see each other.

One hour after weeks apart. They had text messages, secret phone calls, and even the rare video chat whenever their group mates weren't looking, but that wasn't the same as having each other in person.

"We'll see each other again." She assured him.

The last thing she wanted was to leave while he was upset. And she understood him, she was upset about it as well. But she also knew that they both had their careers as idols to tend to.

"When, jagiya?" He asked her.

Sun bit down on her lower lip. She didn't have a concrete answer to give him because she herself didn't know when they'd be able to see each other again. It wasn't something that was under her control. But--if only to reassure him--she replied, "As soon as I return from China, we'll see each other again, baobei, I promise."

His expression brightened slightly at her words. 

"I really have to go now." She rushed their goodbye.

Yixing got back on his feet slower than normal, trying to make time to prolong what was coming. He felt like he had seen her, and in the blink of an eye it was time for them to leave, to return to their lives as idols in rival agencies. To a life where they had to pretend like they hated each other. It was difficult to throw dirt on his girlfriend's group--and on her--like there was nothing secretly going on between them. 

He took her by the hand and pulled her into his arms tightly. 

"Take care, jagiya." He whispered a sad goodbye into her hair.

"You too, baobei." She replied, suddenly saddened. The feeling of despondency seeping off him seemed to drench her entirely.

Pulling away almost too slowly and hesitantly, he next cupped her face in his hands and looked into her dark brown eyes before placing a soft kiss on her lips. "I love you." He finished and let her go. Even though he would still be talking to her everyday--through text messages mostly--he couldn't get over each goodbye because he never knew how long it would be before he saw her again. It seemed--of the late--that each time they went longer without seeing each other.

Her lips curled into the smallest smile she could force onto her face and her hand reached to caress the side of his face. "I love you too." She told him, every word held in itself what she felt in her heart as true.

With that, she hurried off into the night, on her way back to the Pledis dorm building. He would wait a few minutes before following down the same path and taking his car back into the city.

-

this one is actually much longer than the first one and its really bothering my ocd, but that's okay. so here's the second chapter for this story *finishing it whilst i listen to mama, exo m version, on repeat. not gonna lie, i like exo k's version, but exo m was my fave version because luhan. im a huge lu han fan.*

anyway, thank you all so much for reading and voting on this story. i hope you're all liking it so far. in the next chaps im really going to play off the fact that exo and baby lips keep being compared to each other so stay tuned for that.

like i mentioned before, if you like super junior, please check out my friend's brandy's http-ryeowook fic "hit me up". its a spin off / prequel to this book ^.^

thank you!

-clary xx