where stars land | haobin

seven.

"Hao, let's break up for a while."

Zhanghao chokes on a mouthful of iced coffee, coughing into his hand as he looks up. "What? Why?"

Hanbin smiles, reassuring. "You're going to be gone really soon. I just want to make sure I get used to not having you around so much before you go."

"I don't want to spend my last two weeks here staying away from you," Zhanghao frowns.

Hanbin falls silent, thinking. "What about a two-day trial? If you can't even handle it now while you're still here, imagine how it feels when you're really gone."

"You're right," Zhanghao sighs, slumping back in his chair. "One day."

"Fine, one day."

"Should we fight to make it more believable?"

Hanbin laughs, idly spinning one of the pens in front of him round and round with his free hand. "I guess we already kind of did," he answers.

Zhanghao gives him a withering look. "That wasn't a fight. That was a misunderstanding at best."

"I don't know how to fight with you," Hanbin answers, holding back the urge to reach over and take his hand, as he always does. "We've never fought."

"Forget about fighting," Zhanghao laughs. "Start the timer. For the next twenty-four hours, we're no longer together."

─

Gyuvin and Matthew are an appropriate combination of shock and dismay when they see Hanbin rearranging something in his locker, in the hallway before school starts, without Zhanghao.

"Hanbin-ah, is Hao sick?" Gyuvin asks, bounding up to him with admirable energy considering it's barely eight in the morning. "Isn't he at school today?"

"I don't know," Hanbin says shortly, tone apathetic. "Ask him yourself. It's not my business."

Hanbin brushes past them with an armful of books, not looking back, and Matthew locks eyes with Gyuvin, the same slack-jawed expression painted on their faces.

"Did something happen?" Matthew whispers, as if he's afraid Hanbin can still hear him, though the other boy's figure is already receding down the corridor.

"I don't know," Gyuvin answers. "They've never fought before. Not this bad."

The chiming of the final bell echoes through the now-empty hallway, shocking them out of their trance. "We've got to get to class. Talk later, this is crazy."

Matthew and Gyuvin are the last two to get into the classroom, and it's oddly silent when they enter. There's an aberration in the regularity of their normal seating arrangement; Zhanghao's sitting next to Ricky today, which means Gyuvin's regular seat is occupied. Hanbin notices Matthew coming in from the back door from the corner of his eye and sits up, waving him over to sit in the unusually-empty seat beside him, and Matthew throws Gyuvin frantic looks as he heads over to sit by his best friend.

Matthew moving over has freed up the seat next to Taerae, and Gyuvin happily takes it, setting his bag down on the chair.

"Hey, did something happen with the two of them?" Taerae asks, looking up at him over the rim of his glasses.

Gyuvin sighs comically. "Your guess is as good as mine. I've got no freaking idea, man."

On the other side of the room, Matthew's walking on similar eggshells around his best friend trying to figure out exactly what's going on.

"Hanbin-ah..."

"Hm?" Hanbin looks up from the essay he's in the midst of writing, expression smooth.

"Okay, don't pretend anymore. What's going on with you and Hao?"

"We're just taking a break. Don't worry about it," Hanbin answers, smiling.

"A break? Did you guys fight, or something?"

"Something like that," Hanbin says, picking his pen back up. "It's not a big deal, Seokmae-ya, so don't let it bother you."

Not a big deal? Matthew wants to yell. Literally the biggest deal ever.

By lunchtime, they've recovered from the initial shock enough to start joking about it.

"Pick a side," Gyuvin announces, holding his water-bottle up like a microphone. "Family and friends of Zhanghao to the left, family and friends of Hanbin to the right. That's right, it's total war."

They're sitting separately today, although the tables are right next to each other. Gyuvin seats himself right smack in between both, arms out to each side like a wedding usher. Bewildered, Ricky sets down his tray in the empty seat next to Zhanghao, and Matthew in the place next to Hanbin.

Since they're in two tables today and not one, there's room for twice as many people as usual, so Yujin and Ollie get dragged over from the second-year tables, on top of Taerae and some of the people from the class next door, Junhyeon, Haruto, and the other Hanbin they've all collectively agreed to call by his full name to reduce the confusion when he's around.

If either of them are annoyed by the theatrics of it all, neither of them show it. Hanbin only laughs, pulling out the seat beside him for Seungeon to put his lunch tray down, offering one of his fries.

He finds he's grateful to Gyuvin. As much as he is ridiculous sometimes he's always had good intentions; Hanbin could tell this time he was genuinely trying to lighten the mood so he and Zhanghao wouldn't seem so down, and as far as Hanbin can see, between the new heads obstructing his view of Zhanghao at the other table, it seems to be working.