It was at times like this that Hikaru questioned his age. Was he 26? Or 6? Why was his father always so protective of him—Wait a minute...His eyes widened.
"How are you here? What are you doing here?" Hikaru shot back with his own questions. He gasped, remembering their conversation together. "You said you would only reach Korea in a few days! I was going to pick you up at the airport!"
He gaped at the older man. He couldn't believe him. He really could not believe him. Then his eyes narrowed. "You...You wanted to talk to my members behind my back, didn't you?"
He should have known.
His father looked a little sheepish, he shrugged. "There's a tracker app on your phone. You're hopeless at directions, I was afraid you would get lost in Korea so I installed it." Hikaru blinked.
He glanced down to his phone swiping through the hundreds of apps before finding one that seemed more unfamiliar. Damn it. He shot his father a glare as he quickly deleted the app.
So if he went to a brothel or a love hotel his dad would know? Hikaru shook his head, grimacing at the thought. Not that he would go to one anytime soon. But this was an infringement of his privacy!
"I'm fine! I can use my GPS! And my manager knows that I'm here!" Hikaru snapped. Then he frowned, thinking back to his father's words. "Why did you want to meet my best friends?" He asked again, his brows furrowing together. Not to forget meeting them in secret while lying to him.
Hikaru's frown deepened. He didn't want them to be bothered by his problems. Didn't want Minjae, with his broken heart and wrecked body and sadness to have to talk to his father about marriage. Didn't want his friends to have to confront inner demons with talks of a lover or a soulmate.
Those were taboo words in IDOL. They did not mention them unless they needed to.
His father chuckled nervously. "Just wanted to ask them about your wellbeing is all and to convince them to get you to start datin—" His father stopped mid-speech, his eyes drifting to something behind Hikaru.
"Hello," his angel's voice trailed from behind him in his language and Hikaru froze, his heart thundering harder within his chest at the sound. He almost forgot about her.
His mind had been such a mess in her presence that having an excuse to switch his thoughts to something else had consumed him. He watched as his father bowed back to her looking embarrassed. He glanced up at Hikaru.
"Who is this?" His father asked softly, his eyes round with his shock.
Hikaru knew what he saw. A girl. Young, exotic, sweet. Beautiful, his mind supplied. Exquisite, it said. Ethereal, it completed. Hikaru could see her stepping forward from the corner of his eyes. Her fingers moved to touch his palm.
The feeling that coursed through him was immediate.
The world drowned out and all he could feel was her skin on his. The rush of warmth was nothing like he had ever experienced before.
It felt like a gush of floodwater from a broken dam...like the raging seas, a storm surge from a cyclone...like the brush of the vibrating sound over his skin at a concert, loud and all-consuming. It thrummed with the beat of his heart.
It was a jolt of heat that poured deep into his chest and swelled. It filled a part of him he had forgotten was cold. A part of him that had hurt for so long that he no longer cried from the pain. A part of him that had been torn out of his chest, a gaping hole that he had forgotten was there.
It soothed and it healed, and it filled that hole with warm syrupy heat that burned deep within him. It—
Hikaru jumped, his eyes widening as he flinched from her touch, his lips parted in shock. The heat vanished and the cold returned, slowly, steadily. His body burned for her touch, for her skin. He swallowed thickly. What was that?
She looked equally stunned. Her eyes wide as she watched him and then she fibbed a giggle, her hands slipping away from his to rest on his covered arm. Even clothed, he could now feel it. The phantom thrum of her touch, of her soul.
"Oops electricity?"
She furrowed her brows looking up at him for help in her Japanese. Her accent was cute and the low pitch leaned towards a more English like pronunciation than a Korean one. He was too distracted to decipher which country she seemed to be from.
"Static charge," he breathed out the Japanese word, suddenly looking at her in a whole new light. There was something about her touch that told him that she was more than just another crush. "This..." He exhaled, his eyes unable to leave hers.
God, she was so beautiful, more beautiful than anything he'd ever set his eyes on. While her features weren't perfectly symmetrical and she was not built to look like the models on the magazine, he fell for those eyes, those plump, juicy lips. Those peachy-pink cheeks.
"This is Momo," he said softly, his voice was gentle with his adoration. She broke away from his gaze to greet his father with a soft smile. And he finally noticed the dusting of red over her cheeks.
"Are you his girlfriend?" His father was direct and straight to the point. He didn't know what answer she would give him. Hikaru fumbled as his heart raced, wild in its confines.
"Dad!" Hikaru burst out in warning.
"Yes, yes I am," she answered his father's question quickly, easily and her answer stole his breath away.
His eyes snapped back to look at her, lips trembling with his emotions. He didn't know why he felt so happy—No, no. He knew. His messy mind untangled, the string of his thoughts unfurling before him.
He couldn't hear their conversation, the one between his father and her. He couldn't even register it. His mind was full, full with the thoughts of her as he thought about her skin on his own.
Had he been dreaming? Should he touch her again just to be sure? As the hands of the clock moved with the beat of his heart, his mind flashed to their encounters, their interactions.
The way the air seemed to shift when their eyes met. The way the world dulled into a blur when he watched her. The way her very existence had called to him and haunted his mind. She had called him.
Was this a dream? His eyes moved to meet hers again. He didn't want to wake up. He didn't. His eyes welled up, wet with tears that he blinked away. He needed confirmation. He needed to ask her.
"Hikaru?" His angel broke him out of his thoughts and for the first time in six years he felt lighter, he felt whole. He felt...He felt happy. He smiled, his expression tender as he looked at her in a whole new light.
"Nothing," he grinned, his eyes teary.
His father watched him giving him a concerned look and Hikaru shook his head. Hikaru resisted the urge to reach for her hand, resisted the urge to press her into his embrace and hold her forever.
If he took her hand now, he knew tears might flow. He knew he would start to cry and he would kiss her fingers as if she were his goddess from the heavens.
He didn't want to be alone anymore and he wouldn't be.
"What do you like about Hikaru?" He was shaken from his thoughts by questions that pertained more strongly to him. Hikaru glanced at her, curious of her answer. She cleared her throat, meeting his eye.
"The sound of his laughter," she said, deep in thought.
Hikaru flushed, thinking about his own laughter. Its squeakiness and high pitched nature was nothing like the laughter of adult males and his friends teased him for it. But it seemed that she liked it.
"Maybe...The colour of his cheeks." He burned brighter, resisting the urge to try to cool his reddening cheeks. Goddamnit. He hated his cheeks.
"And your dislikes?" His father pressed.
"Dad!" Hikaru wailed, absolutely horrified. She snorted giving him a cheeky grin, the glint in her eye was mischievous and it made his heart pound in his chest. Hikaru was going to die from a heart attack. He knew it, he knew he would.
"I'm not sure yet. I haven't found anything to dislike, but I'll get back to you when I do." She said those words in slightly broken Japanese but Hikaru didn't care.
He found it cute. The way she tried to speak with his father. It was endearing. Cute and adorable like everything else about her. Like the scrunch of her nose, the soft specks of scars on her cheeks, the line at the centre of her lips. The creases above her beautiful eyes.
"Cheeky," Hikaru grumbled. Inside, he soared.
"Anything for you darling," her smile widened, as she openly flirted with him.
Hikaru stumbled. He was sweating from the heat. Boiling in a vat of his feelings, his mind burning with her attacks. He opened his mouth trying to say something but failed to do so, unable to make a cheeky comeback. It was unlike him, not to joke, not to make stupid teases. But Hikaru seemed to lose that ability with her.
His father relaxed, his eyes glittering with his amusement. "It seems I've intruded on you two for too long." He rose and Hikaru stood quickly.
"Wait, Dad. I'll send you back. I have a car parked nearby."
"It's fine. My hotel is just around the block. I'll text you once I reach it." His father waved him off.
Hikaru glanced at him, feeling confused. There was a look in his father's eyes. The shimmer of memory, the dance of recognition and understanding, the burn of sadness. His father stepped forward, leaning to whisper into his ear.
"Hikaru-kun, call me later. After you ask," his father murmured.
Hikaru flushed. His eyes were round as he met the gaze of his father. He knew? He could see it too? His father beamed, the smile a little bitter and yet proud. "I'll see you soon."
Hikaru stood, staring into the distance until he couldn't see the silhouette of his father. He never imagined for this day to come, for this to be possible.
"Hikaru?" She asked. He broke.
"When were you going to tell me?" He breathed, fingers trembling as he watched her. The soft orange light in the tent turned her skin a golden peach.
"Tell you what?" She faltered, pressing her fingers to her lips. He noticed now that her eyes spoke to him. They pleaded to him, burning with an inner flame of yearning and need.
The look in her eyes was more than just lust, there was a certain amount of adoration, tenderness and love. She looked at him as if he were the most precious thing in the world. She looked at him—
—Like how one soulmate would to another.
"Take my hand." He said, he pleaded. He begged. "Take my hand and tell me, tell me what you feel."
His heart stopped as he became incapable of breathing.
"Take my hand," he repeated, licking his lips to wet them. "And tell me what you are to me."
Please.
His eyes burned, wet with tears that tinged at the back of his throat.
Please.
Please, tell me you are mine for I have waited alone in this darkness for far too long.