Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Guanheng hears the security panel of the front door as he sits down on the couch waiting for Xuxi to arrive. Bella is waiting for him as well, sitting right in front of the door and patiently laying her head on her front legs as she stares at the door. It is nearly 2am, and they were already waiting all night for Xuxi to come home. Guanheng had even set aside some dinner for him to eat, but he guesses that he might not be hungry anymore considering how late it is now.

Slowly after several minutes pass the door opens itself, showing a very tired Xuxi walking inside the dorm not even looking at Bella, who directly stands up and happily wags her tail, as he messily throws his shoes to the side and shambles to his room. He doesn’t even spare a glance as he just wants to fall into his bed. She stops as soon as she realizes he didn’t see her. Guanheng watches him with wide open eyes; he feels very sorry for him. It seems as if every day it worsens the nearer the SuperM comeback gets. Ten seems to be tired, too. But Xuxi is a different way of tired — as if all of his energy just got drained out of him. He also has the most murderous schedule this time leaving him with 4 hours sleep per night.

Guanheng wishes he could do something to take all this work away from him, helping him breathe again. It seems to be unfair that he still has so much work to do after working his ass off with WayV’s comeback and getting nearly nothing back while being in SuperM. He knows that Xuxi loves being an Idol, but how the management is handling his schedule so far is taking a toll on him.

Quietly the door of Xuxi’s and Sicheng’s door closes and Guanheng wonders if he should follow him to make sure he’s alright. He knows that Sicheng must be sleeping very deeply already, so Xuxi might feel lonely if he’s the only one awake. There might be a lot on his mind after such a long day. That’s why Guanheng considers visiting him tonight.

Swiftly Guanheng chooses to look after Xuxi tonight even though he didn’t see him and Bella as he walked inside earlier. He concludes that he’s just too tired to notice them. It isn't his fault. So he stands up, taking Bella in his arms as she stares sulking at the door in which Xuxi just disappeared, and makes his way to Xuxi’s room.

At first, he just listens if there are any sounds other than Sicheng’s soft snoring, making sure that he doesn’t wake Xuxi up if he’s already fast asleep. Because he doesn’t hear his snores yet, he opens the door and directly locks eyes with a slightly startled and very exhausted looking Xuxi that must have heard the loud door knob.

Guanheng then quietly closes the door behind him as he shuffles inside the room and sits down beside him proceeding to lay Bella on the bed. She instantly walks beside him cuddling up next to his torso to feel at ease again. Guanheng looks fondly at them as he lays next to them to face Xuxi.

Xuxi stares at him, too.

“She has been waiting for you all night.” Guanheng says softly, caressing Bella's ear. He doesn’t want to sound judgmental.

The other starts to caress her, too.

“You should be sleeping already, baby. So you’ll stay healthy and become a big girl.” Even though he tries to sound like he’s scolding her a bit, Guanheng can hear the loving undertone. 

Then he looks at Guanheng again. “Did I wake you up? I thought I was quiet.” The corners of his mouth twitch a bit, but his eyes still look empty and drained.

“No, I’ve been waiting for you.”

Xuxi widely opens his eyes, feeling sorry for making Guanheng wait that long.

“You didn’t have to wait for me. You know that I’ll be back in the middle of the night.” Xuxi remarked, looking concerned. He is okay with himself not sleeping until ungodly hours, but he wants Guanheng to have a healthy amount of sleep when he doesn’t have a tight schedule like he does.

“It doesn’t matter to me. I missed you. I could even wait longer if I needed to.” Guanheng whispers inching forward and wrapping his arms towards Xuxi’s torso trying not to wake Bella up by accidentally crushing her, who has already fallen asleep in the meantime.

“I wish you didn’t need to work so much. You look so tired.”

“The comeback will be over soon and then I will have more time for you both.”

Xuxi smiled again, placing a small kiss on Guanheng’s forehead. He really misses being with them, but he can’t help it; he also loves his job and being with his sunbaes. So he would take every chance he could get to work as an idol.

Guanheng knows that Xuxi doesn’t want to argue about whether he is working too much or not, that’s why he doesn’t respond to Guanheng’s exact statement and closes his eyes. He also knows that the other doesn't have the strength to talk about it, he is way too weary to answer.

“I just wish you wouldn’t be so hard on yourself. You’re overusing your strength. As much as we wish that we have inhumanly much power, we don’t have it. You just end up hurting yourself.”

Xuxi doesn’t answer anymore, but Guanheng knows he heard him; so he just drops the topic for tonight and slowly lets himself fall asleep.

Guanheng stirs in his sleep as he hears a lot of noises in the dorm followed by arguing and the cluttering of a wardrobe. He then opens his eyes to see a very distressed looking Bella cowering in his arm, probably being scared of the noises. Eventually he realizes that Xuxi already stood up and maybe already has to go to a photo shoot or something. The worst scenario would be that he forgot to wake up on time — which he unfortunately did.

The voices are mixing together, but Guanheng believes he hears Ten, Xuxi and their manager’s voices. But their manager doesn’t seem to sound too happy.

“I told you to be ready to go by 6. Why do we have 6:30 now and you just woke up? Hurry up and take this more seriously!”

Guanheng contemplates if he should walk out of the room and greet their manager or act like he didn’t hear them. Only then he realizes that he shouldn’t be coming out of a room, he doesn’t live in. It shouldn’t be a big problem that they suddenly sleep in different rooms for a night, but their manager has already caught him more than twice. It’s getting more suspicious the more they are found sleeping together let alone sleep in the same bed. That’s why they usually lock the door, scared of their manager coming unannounced in their room. 

Additionally, he also doesn’t want to be part of the chaos which plays outside the room. It would be okay if only Xuxi, Ten and their manager are involved. Who knows if their manager would get angry at him too if he starts interfering? Guanheng noticed that he has been very easy to anger this month; so he doesn’t want to take chances.

After several minutes the noises die down with a slam of the door and Bella begins to calm down until she falls asleep again. Being overwhelmed with the lack of sleep Guanheng got in the past few hours -- he doesn't even know the exact time he fell asleep -- he also drifts back to sleep.

When he wakes up the second time this morning the room is brightly painted with sun rays reflecting from the walls, which wake him up in the first place. He realizes that Bella already left the bed — probably wanting to eat her breakfast — and chooses to stand up too and search for the others.

His members are already halfway through their breakfast as Guanheng opens the bedroom’s door and looks at them. He sees Kun, Yangyang, Sicheng and Dejun. So he infers that Ten and Xuxi are still having their schedule. Maybe they’ll be gone for the whole day again.

Kun gives him a small and warm morning smile and calls him to the table to eat with them.

“It was pretty loud when Ten and Xuxi left this morning” He then remarks. “When did Xuxi come home last night?”

“Between 2 and 3 am, I think.” Guanheng says, sighing. He approximately got 3 hours of sleep.

“I can’t believe they are letting him go to his schedule with maybe 4 hours of time at the dorm to sleep. Are they insane?” Yangyang mumbles mostly talking to his cornflakes as he’s too tired to fully function yet. He must have stayed up all night playing video games telling how he looks.

“Even Ten gets more than 4 hours of a break during the night. The person who manages his time schedule must truly hate Xuxi to give him this much.”

Guanheng just hums not knowing what he should tell them and starts to eat. He knows they can’t help him.

When Xuxi arrives that night late again Ten and their manager have to carry him to his bed. He is way too tired to walk on his own and Ten tells his worried group members, which all watched Xuxi being carried with big eyes, that he fainted during dance practice; so the doctor has ordered him to rest for the next one to two days — advisable even more.

Guanheng doesn’t know if he should be relieved or more worried than he already is. He knows that it was just a question of time until Xuxi would collapse. But he didn’t wish it would be so soon. He is grateful that Xuxi gets rest now -- yet at what cost? The knowing fact that this most likely will happen again creeps at the back of his mind, and he is terrified of that thought. But he tries to push it away; only the present and his recovery are important now.

As soon as the manager leaves, the members just give each other knowing and pitiful glances and keep quiet for the rest of the night. They don’t want to disturb Xuxi. Sicheng even asks Guanheng if he wants to switch rooms for tonight. He is no stranger to Guanheng sleeping in Xuxi’s room, when he’s also in the room. But tonight he wants to give them privacy. He knows that Xuxi doesn’t need him but Guanheng the most now.

So Guanheng agrees. He doesn’t know how he can help him, but he believes that the only support he can give him is by soothing him with his physical attendance by listening and calming.

Xuxi opens his eyes for a split second as he hears the door open too tired to keep them open for longer. He realizes that it’s Guanheng, smiles shortly and looks like he falls asleep again.

Bella makes a run for the still opened door because she woke up by the tumult and hoped for Xuxi to come home. Guanheng grins a bit as she tries to jump on his bed, but fails as she’s too small. He scoops her up and places her next to Xuxi’s sleeping body. Happily she lays herself next to him and cuddles herself in the creek of his side. Guanheng knows that she’s happy as long as she’s by his side, and he thinks it’s precious that Xuxi has somebody who is willing to never leave his side.

He then proceeds to lay next to them on the small bed in hopes that Xuxi might feel safer if he sleeps beside him. Guanheng doesn’t have to lie about enjoying being with his boyfriend knowing he doesn’t have to run after his schedule in a few hours.

“I am sorry for making you worry.”

Guanheng gets startled a bit as he hears Xuxi whisper. He didn’t expect him to be still awake.

“You shouldn’t be sorry for something that isn’t your fault. You’re not the one who gives you an inhuman amount of work.”

“I know. That’s why you shouldn’t worry. There’s nothing you nor me can change about it. So just bear with me until the comeback is over.”

“I wish I could”

After a few minutes of silence — in which Guanheng believed that Xuxi fell asleep — he begins to talk again: “Do you remember when we talked about buying a house and moving in together in a few years?”

Guanheng only hums as he wonders why Xuxi is thinking about this now. The way Xuxi looks, it would be better if he just sleeps. But tonight he doesn’t seem to stop talking. Maybe that’s something that has been going around in his head for a while.

“What else do you imagine the future to be like?”

Guanheng wonders if he should answer or just tell him to go to sleep because he clearly needs it. But he decides against it as he thinks about the smile he could give Xuxi. Maybe talking about the future would make the present more bearable.

“We — in a house — with a bunch of puppies. That would be the dream.” He chuckles as he imagines the chaos so many puppies would bring.

“How many do you want?” Xuxi smiles; eyes still closed.

“As many as we can take care of. We would never get a break, but our house would be so lively and Bella could be their big sister. Our bed would be so big because they all want to lay with us in it.” Guanheng chuckles with dreamy eyes. “And Dejun and Sicheng would want to come over now and then. And our dogs would love them, too.”

“What about Yangyang?”

“Yangyang would be chased by them through the whole house. But I think that would just show how they love him.”

“And Kun and Ten?”

“They won’t visit as much as the others because they would always be on the run visiting country by country while Kun still keeps on working on his music. But they would visit us on the holidays, have grill parties with the others in the summer and reminisce about our youth sharing stories we heard thousands of times before.” Guanheng pauses. Maybe that was a bit too much. “How do you imagine the future?” 

“Choosing our house after we nearly give up, because we can’t find the most perfect one, but we would find it eventually, painting the walls together, crying about the ugly color that doesn’t suit the interior, painting it again, looking for furniture, failing with building it together and having to ask our friends, going grocery shopping together, forgetting half of the things we need, because I would forget to write a list, cooking together and accidentally nearly burning the kitchen off, stargazing and wishing on stars, swimming in the lake nearby, quiet nights with our dogs, romantic movie nights, loud game nights, happy family gatherings, cheerfully garden parties, nostalgic friends reunions, going on journeys and growing old and wrinkly together — and everything with you; crying and fighting as well as loving and caring. I can’t wait to live this life with you” Xuxi says and opens his eyes looking into Guanheng’s sparkling ones.

“Soon we’ll have that. I promise.”

“Soon” Xuxi returns, kissing him.

Chapter Text

The day they announced that WayV would disband was heartbreaking. They had promised each other to spend the night together as the news would spread, sulking about old times as they sat in Kun and Ten’s living room. Of course not continuing to renew their contract was a mutual decision. But still, it was a big and sad change in their life.

Everyone felt like crying, however as soon as Ten started talking about how he got to know each of his members he started breaking out in tears and Kun couldn’t help but pull his boyfriend into a tight hug as he had glassy eyes too. Not as expected, Yangyang was the next one to sob loudly and cry while cursing, that Ten shouldn’t make things more emotional than they already were. Like in old times Yangyang didn’t like to cry in front of people. But today it was okay. It wouldn’t wonder Guanheng if they all would be crying at the end of the day.

To lighten the atmosphere Sicheng changed the subject into something more lightly like happy times like their debut and their first concert. For once Ten stopped crying while he wiped away his tears, smiling and adding another memory that came to his mind.

They truly loved their fans and the memories they’ve made, but they wanted to settle down for once in their life. Being an idol forever was something they never planned to do. Sure, being an idol and making people happy was their dream. But after several years they had achieved their goal and started to have other dreams. Dreams of settling down, building families and having their own life.

Kun and Ten wanted to travel the world while they planned to get married somewhere in secret, hopping from country to country for a year and never feeling like they were bound to a place. With a heavy heart they had decided to do so after they asked Yangyang and Sicheng to look after Louis and Leon. They really wanted to take their cats with them, but they realized that it would be too stressful for them. Travelling was something both wanted the most at the moment, and they told themselves that a year would surely be okay. They were well protected by their former members and the couple wanted to face-time their cats as often as possible.

At the end they all had once chosen to adopt their pets together, but as they moved out of their dorms they had to decide who would take care after whom. Initially Louis and Leon were living with Ten and Kun, while they were visited very often by the other members, as they were bound to them the most. That Bella lived with Guanheng and Xuxi was nearly obvious as they dreamt about living in a big house in the countryside with a lot of dogs, so everyone wanted to grant them their wish. They were the ones who were able to take care of her the best, even though Dejun didn’t want to admit it.

Still, it was a long thought decision they didn’t take lightly.

Even though they moved out their dorms years ago, some of them still lived together because they still felt too lonely to live alone after spending their whole youth together. Dejun was the only one who decided to live on his own followed by secretly moving in together with his now long-term partner last year. Nobody would have been surprised if they wanted to tie the knot soon.

Yangyang and Sicheng lived together too even though Sicheng’s partner sometimes was fed up with Yangyang invading the whole apartment. But they made it work. Guanheng and Xuxi also secretly moved in together in a small apartment far away from downtown Seoul, so it was easier to hide from the public that they still lived together. Also, Bella felt way more at ease as the neighborhood wasn’t as loud and busy as before.

But now that they didn’t extend their group contract Guanheng and Xuxi decided that it was the perfect time to pursue their dream of living together in a big house. It would be farther away from Seoul, and they couldn't visit each other so easily because of that. Yet, Xuxi and Guanheng couldn't wait to move into their own house. And they couldn't wait to let Bella walk around freely in their backyard without worrying too much about her well-being outside.

Dejun suddenly started to reminisce about their first fight and how stupid they were for fighting about such useless things. But it made their bond stronger. As many times they fought, they reconciled and started to understand each other. Sicheng just reminded them of all the dumb things they did together, and they all fell laughingly on the floor. Even though living as an idol and having such a stressful life was a bit too much too often, at the end it was worth it because of the bond and the memories they had made. Not even one of them would exchange those for something else.

The night came to an end as they got more quiet and tear drenched. Their laughing slowly ebbed away and their bodies felt exhausted from all the crying and laughing as they slowly fell asleep on the floor and on the couch feeling like they were able to close this chapter of their lives.

It was a big step to step down on their idol life and to start life, but they didn't think they would ever regret it.

The first day of moving was the noisiest. Guanheng and Xuxi had already painted their interior last week. So they were left with bringing over their stuff and building their furniture together as the next steps.

Not as expected they found the right color right away, and they didn't need to repaint the whole interior walls. Guanheng was relieved that their prediction didn't come true. He didn't think that he had enough sanity to repaint. Painting was a pain in the ass, so doing it again wasn't an option.

He was also happy that Bella was still with Sicheng; so they didn't have to worry about her walking in the paint and leaving paw prints — even though this would have been cute — and taking any screws for the furniture away. Guanheng made a self note that they would maybe make an extra paw wall for her. But as he thought about it, Xuxi already managed to walk in the paint and leave footprints himself, Guanheng surely didn't need two of them. He also realized that trying to scrub the paint stains off wasn't exactly easy. At the end they had to spend 3 hours scrubbing the whole floor clean. Somehow they forgot to put enough covers on the floor and now they had to deal with their forgetfulness.

Moving was a stressful thing — moving with disturbance would be too much. Even though Guanheng loved having Bella around, having her walking around when dangerous items could easily hurt her, wasn't something he wanted to risk.

As the clock ticked 1AM they decided to call it a day and finish with eating a very late dinner. There must be some ramen somewhere in their bags. But as soon as Guanheng opened the kitchen drawer he realized that they didn't even unpack a single one of their pots and pans.

Horror and defeat spread out on his face when he looked at the big boxes he forgot to label yesterday. It would take hours to find what he was searching for.

“Do you happen to remember in which box we put our kitchen stuff?”

After a short pause Xuxi opened his delivery service app and sighed. “What do you want to eat?”

The next days happened to proceed easier even though they managed to lose some screws and spent a lot of their time searching for them. But as soon as the last piece of furniture stood securely and the last thing of their belongings was inside a drawer, they let themselves fall into their bed like wet sacks of rice.

“So how proud are you of us?” Xuxi asked; grinning widely and staring at the wall.

“Besides the screws we had to search, the drawer that nearly fell over and the rug that had the wrong color I think we did perfectly.” Guanheng laughed.

“After all that’s one less problem than yesterday. We should be proud we finished with such a great finale. I could’ve been worse. The drawer could’ve really tripped over, the rug could be one of these ugly green-brown colors and one of us could’ve stepped on a screw.”

Guanheng just rolled his eyes and thought about Bella whom he missed dearly as she couldn’t be with them when there was still too much that could hurt her. But now they were finally able to welcome Bella into their own new home and to throw a house-warming party; and so Guanheng couldn’t wait to show off the home they had built for themselves.

The house-warming was quite peaceful if you refrained from thinking about how Guanheng managed to tip the soup pot over letting the whole floor soak, Bella finding a puddle outside and deciding she needed to mark her home with paw prints and Kun and Ten getting a crisis about leaving their house-warming present at home.

But in other words, it felt very familiar to have this chaotic party with their chaotic friends and family around them knowing they would miss them as they wouldn’t see each other as often anymore because of their distance. 

And at the end of the day, when everyone who wanted to spend the night because their homes were too far away to drive back at night went to sleep, Guanheng and Xuxi fell exhausted into their bed.

“I will miss having them around all the time.”

Xuxi hummed looking at Guanheng. “Me, too. Mostly their chaotic behavior is the thing I will probably miss the most.”

“Don’t act like you and Bella aren’t twice as chaotic as them.”

The other only chuckled. “We’re not that bad. Besides, you have to live with us for a very long time.”

“Oh, how could I forget that.” Guanheng sarcastically replied looking at his ring finger. They weren’t allowed to marry yet. Same-sex-marriages still weren’t a thing. Sure, they could go abroad and marry there. However, for now their promise rings were enough. They had the same meaning for them. It didn’t matter if they had the marriage certificate or not. The words on a paper didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was that they promised each to stay with each other no matter how bad life went. 

This was enough for them.