The bass throbbed like a second heartbeat beneath the floor.
BC stood center stage, his breath syncing with the rhythm of the crowd — that living, pulsing entity stretching out before him in waves of sound and color.
Lights flashed like falling stars, bathing the arena in bursts of silver and gold.
He knew this routine.
Knew the steps, the notes, the beats where he was supposed to smile, wave, wink.
But tonight —
something was off.
Tonight, there was a thread pulling at him,taut and urgent, threading through the noise and the chaos, leading him somewhere unseen.
He swept his gaze over the crowd—
left to right, front to back—
faces blurring into a river of joy.
And then—
He saw you.
Just a glimpse.
A figure tucked in the ocean of people, still and bright, your face framed in the chaos like the eye of a storm.
A smile that was small, soft, almost unsure.
Eyes that met his for a heartbeat too long.
The world shifted.
The roar of the music faded.
The lights dimmed at the edges.
Time itself slowed, stretched, trembled.
C blinked —
shaken by the sheer rightness of it.
He knew you.
He was sure of it, in a way that made no sense.
You weren't someone he could name.
You weren't someone he had met.
But you were someone his soul recognized.
It was a strange, magnetic thing — like stumbling across a song you didn't remember hearing, but knowing every single word by heart.
He stumbled a step in the choreography, recovering fast enough that no one noticed.
Except maybe you.
Were you smiling a little wider now?
Was it his imagination?
The moment snapped —
the next beat of the song crashing into him like a wave, the lights blinding again, the crowd a blur of faces.
He lost you.
He lost you in an instant.
But the feeling stayed.
Burned.
Branded itself beneath his skin.
He performed the rest of the set like he was moving underwater, every move automatic, every note sung through the hum of a heart that was no longer entirely his own.
When they took their final bow, sweat dripping down his temple, lungs burning with effort and adrenaline, he looked into the crowd one last time.
Searching.
Always searching.
But you were gone.
Or maybe... you had never really been there at all.
⸻
Backstage, as he toweled off and accepted congratulations, he couldn't stop replaying the moment.
Your eyes.
Your smile.
The impossible familiarity of it all.
He laughed with the others, posed for thebehind-the-scenes pictures, did everything expected of him.
But inside?
Inside, he was still standing there.
Still reaching across the distance.
Still wondering if you had seen him, too.
⸻
Second-Person Echo:
You left the concert feeling lightheaded, heart racing for reasons you couldn't explain.
You told yourself it was the music. The lights. The magic of the night.
But somewhere deep inside —
beneath logic, beneath reason —
you knew it was something more.
And when you closed your eyes that night, you dreamed of starlight and a boy you hadn't yet met,
but somehow already missed.
⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾ ⋆⁺₊⋆
He couldn't sleep.
The hotel room was too quiet after the roar of the crowd.
Too still after the rush of adrenaline had bled from his veins, leaving behind only the echo of it — a ghost thudding against his ribs.
Bang Chan lay sprawled on the stiff mattress, one arm draped over his eyes, the other resting uselessly across his chest where the ache still pulsed.
He replayed the moment again and again, as if it might change:
the sweep of lights,
the sea of faces,
the way the world had spun when he saw you.
It didn't make sense.
Nothing made sense anymore.
He told himself it was just exhaustion.
Just the high of the stage, the aftermath of giving everything he had.
But no amount of reason could explain the weight on his chest.
The hollow ache that hummed in his bones.
He turned onto his side, then his stomach, then onto his back again — the sheets tangling around him like chains.
Still no peace.
Still no sleep.
When he finally drifted under, it wasn't gentle.
It was a fall.
A tumble into a dream that already felt half broken.
⸻
The city stretched out beneath him —
a maze of silver mist and flickering lights, pulsing like a heartbeat he couldn't follow.
He stood at the center of it all, barefoot oncold stone, the air heavy with something that tasted like hope and fear all at once.
Somewhere ahead—
he heard it.
Your laugh.
Soft.
Breathless.
Threaded through the mist like a song he had spent lifetimes trying to remember.
He ran toward it.
Through winding alleys made of whispered memories.
Past shadowed figures that never quite became people.
Around corners that looped back on themselves again and again.
Every time he thought he caught a glimpse of you —
a flash of your hair,
the curve of your smile —
you slipped away.
Just out of reach.
Always just out of reach.
Still, he chased.
Because he had no choice.
He needed to find you.
Needed to see you again.
Needed to prove that the moment on stage hadn't been a trick of the light —
that you were real.
The city twisted beneath his feet —
buildings folding in on themselves, stars bleeding down the sky like melting silver.
Dream logic — wild and cruel.
He stumbled.
He fell.
The mist thickened until it clung to him like a second skin.
He could feel you —
so close —
so painfully close.
If he could just take one more step—
reach just a little farther—
⸻
Your laugh —
clear and crystalline —
rang out just beyond the mist.
He turned toward it —
hope a wildfire in his chest —
and everything fractured.
The dream split apart like glass under a hammer.
He woke with a gasp, bolting upright in bed, his heart slamming against his ribs like a caged thing.
Breathless.
Shaking.
Alone.
Only the shadows greeted him.
Only the dark.
And yet—
In the quiet stillness of that hotel room,
he swore he could still hear the ghost of your laughter lingering in the air,
like a promise not yet broken.
⸻
Second-Person Echo:
You slept that night, tangled in your own dreams.
And somewhere inside the weave of your mind —
though you wouldn't remember it upon waking —
you heard a boy calling your name.
You smiled in your sleep without knowing why.
⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾ ⋆⁺₊⋆