All The Colors Of You || Bang Chan

Chapter Seventeen - Perrie

The car drives across the city into a much greener part, until it stops at the entrance to a garden area.
There's a gate, wide and meticulously crafted, surrounded by plush, green hedges on both sides.
We get out of the car, and the security man carries my bag as we walk through the gate.

"I'm sorry, I didn't even ask your name," I say to the man.
He chuckles and answers, "The name's Duke."
Duke leads me past a small wooden house with a open front-side window, nods to the lady inside, and ushers me onto one of the wide paths farther into the rows and rows of square-cut gardens.
We pass the hedges and it feels like walking the spirals of a labyrinth.
Every path looks like the next, we round endless corners until i don't even know where we came from. Every now and then, the ways split into two or three new ones, but Duke knows exactly where he's going.

We pass a few gates with number plates on them until we come to a halt in front of number 801.
Duke opens it, but I've already spied over the hedges.
The garden behind the gate is hardly more than a meadow and a few fruit trees.
But I can see from the entrance that the boys put out a few blankets right in the middle. There are camping chairs, pillows, a sun umbrella.
We step through and Duke raises his hand to his lips.
He whistles, a short and loud noise that reaches all the way across the meadow.

The boys, up until now busy with themselves, turn towards us with surprised faces.
Chan is the first to get up off the blanket, cleaning his hands by patting his own shorts.
Lee Know, who stood by a small barbecue grill on the other side of the blankets, turns with a pair of tongs in his hand. He's wearing an apron the color of peaches.
Felix, Hyunjin, and Jeongin are the first to get moving. They run towards us with smiles on their faces.
"Perrie," Felix's voice is shaky from running, "You're finally here! Hey Duke, good to see you!"

They hug me.
As we slowly walk closer, Jisung and Changbin come towards us. Changbin and I are the same height, but when he hugs me I still feel tiny.
He's really packed on some muscles over the past two years.
Finally, Chan stands across from me.
I swallow thickly and look up at him.
What do I do?
How do I greet him?
Has he told the boys about us kissing?
Would it be weird for us to kiss hello? We're not a couple, we've kissed one single time. Does that mean anything at all in the grand scheme of things?

Before I can overthink it, I lean in and stand on my toes.
I gently but quickly press my lips to Chan's cheek, holding myself steady by placing a hand on his shoulder.
The moment lasts not more than a few seconds  but time seems to slow.
Chan has a hand on my waist and I can feel him freeze for just a heartbeat, as if I took him by surprise.
But then, that warm smile of his spreads on his face and he winks at me.
Then he turns to Duke and holds out his hand towards him.

"Thank you so much for this, Duke," he says to him and Duke hugs him sideways.
The closet of a man laughs joyfully and Chan takes my bag from him, throwing it over his shoulder.
Then he takes my hand into his and I wave goodbye to Duke.
Chan pulls me to the blankets.
The ground here is soft and supple, and I really want to take off my shoes to feel the freshness of the grass.
"What is this?" I look around the garden. "Where are we?"

"It's a garden we rented for the day," Chan says, "We come here a lot, whenever we want to be outside in the sun. It's private, so it's perfect when you want to have some time away from cameras and fans and so on."
"Oh?"
I look at him with a teasing smile and raise an eyebrow suggesting.
"Good to know," I murmur into his direction and Chan blushes. I giggle even though my own words surprise me a little.
I always feel so daring around Chan. He brings out a new side of me.
When we get to the blankets, Seungmin hands me a bottle of strawberry fizzy water and a cookie.

"I brought some things from home," I say and take a bite from the cookie.
I take my bag from Chan and pull out the - compared to the other stuff pretty sad looking - grapes.
Then I take out the playing cards and my sketchbooks and pens.
"Thank you for inviting me. I'm so happy to be here," I say and try to sound as earnest as I feel.
Minho turns from the grill, holding a piece of chicken in the tongs.
"Are you hungry? We are making sandwiches and chicken wings . We also have snacks in that basket."

"Here, sit."
Chan sits down on the blanket between Felix and Jisung.
I sit across from them, between Hyunjin and Seungmin, taking a soft pillow into my lap. I squeeze it with both my fingers and watch as it puffs back into its normal shape.
There are magazines here already. A sketchbook that isn't mine lays beside Hyunjin's legs. There's a ukulele in the grass. Three baskets stacked on top of each other.

I point at the sketchbook.
"Is that yours, Hyunjin?"
He looks up at me and smiles shyly.
"Yes," he reaches for it and hands it to me with an eager look on his face.
"Our Hyunjinnie is actually a painter as well," Chan says and nods proudly.
"So I've heard," I take the sketchbook and open it carefully, "Your fans go crazy for your paintings. I've seen some of what you posted over the years, your work is really good. You've grown so much!"
"Thank you," Hyunjin squints his eyes as he grins happily, scratching the back of his neck.

His sketchbook is so him.
There are a lot of pages with finished drawings in oil crayons or colored pencil. They show people in love.
It's something I've seen someone online point out, actually. Hyunjin mostly paints people in love, symbols of love, and where love can be found.
His drawings show bouquets of flowers, hands touching faces, people sharing a kiss or embracing with both arms. It's evident that what he cares most about in the world is love.

His technique is not perfectly accurate or developed, but I don't mind it. The drawings are almost blurry, as if I am watching these sketched out scenes through a milky window.
They're romantic, innocent.
They're probably just like him, if we're being honest.

When I look up, I meet Chan's eyes. He's looking at me with his face all open and calm, like he's lost in his own thoughts.
When he notices me holding his stare, he blinks and shakes his head to regain focus, and then he smiles at me.
And there is so much joy in his smile, so much warmth and life.
There is peace here, I realize, for him and the boys. This is a refuge. A place they keep secret from others on the outside, where they feel safe to be themselves, where they can be unfiltered and natural - and yet they decided to let me in just like that.

And in that exact moment, the thought rushes through my mind that it could be like this forever.
Just him and I hanging with friends like normal people do. Spending time in the sun, enjoying each other's company, falling like normal people do.