Salty Sweet

{Chapter 4}

Sicheng picked up his phone and scrolled through his recent texts.
Mom
Qian Kun
Mr. Ling
Huang Zitao
Wu Yifan
Lee Taeyong

They hadn't talked in months. In fact, Taeyong didn't even know Sicheng was back in China. Sicheng tapped Taeyong's chat. He sent a little "hi", not expecting a reply.

Not a second later, his phone buzzed.

"Hey"

"How've you been?"

"Good. Lots of training."

"Oh yeah haha"

"How about you?"

"Pretty good. I'm back in China."

"What? Since when?"

"Three months ago."

"Oh"

"Yeah"

"Hey I gotta go. My instructor is calling me back over. Ttyl?"

"Yeah. Ttyl."

Nothing for hours. Hours became days. Days became weeks. Sicheng had completely given up on what was once the purest love on the planet. He wasn't going to hang around at home all day, getting his hopes up waiting for a reply.

He had a date to catch. Sicheng pulled a nice sweater over his head and a pair of black jeans. It was nothing big. Just a coffee shop date. He had met the guy at school. They were in the same grade and took a lot of classes together. Plus, they were both honors students. Though they had a lot in common, they didn't really have a lot to talk about. Their interests were just too different. One's settling on the academic end of the spectrum, the other's stood somewhere along the lines of adventurousness. The only reason he had accepted was because Sicheng thought the guy was kind of cute.

"So what do you do in your free time?" Sicheng asked before taking a sip of his coffee.

"Oh, I don't have a lot of free time. I have so many extra classes I'm taking this year. I used to watch anime a lot, though." There was hope just yet.

"Oh really? What did you watch?" Sicheng began to lightly drum his fingers against the table top.

"Mostly Deathnote, Once Piece, and Tokyo Ghoul."

"Oh cool." Was all he said.

The conversation dragged on like this for the next hour or so before Sicheng made up an excuse to leave. He said he had an appointment. His date offered him a ride, but was turned down. It would just be faster if he took a cab. Or so he said.

Sicheng stood up from the table. "I had a good time." He plastered a smile on his face. He tried so hard to make it not look like a cringe.

"Me too. Maybe we can do this again?"

"Hopefully!" If there was one thing Sicheng was used to, it would be faking optimism.

As he made his way to the trash can, he suddenly thought of Taeyong. How he missed their dates. How they used to go to aquariums and planetariums. How there fingers always found a way to intertwine on their own, like magnets.

His eyes began to tear up at the thought of the past. The nostalgia was too great. Maybe he would walk home instead. Just as he exited the door, he heard a voice behind him.

"Sicheng?" He let the tears carve their trails down his cheeks as he let his shoulders sag with relief and happiness.

Sicheng thought he would never hear that voice again unless it was on the tv. He thought he would never hear the voice of his once lover again unless it was through his phone from past voicemails. He thought he would never hear that voice again unless it was from videos he had sent. Sicheng never thought he would hear the voice of Lee Taeyong ever again. And yet here he was.