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It was a never ending routine for Jihoon, walking on a treadmill and seeing facades on his screen like they were his reality. There was no way out in the world filled with walls of black he was trapped in. Sometimes, he yearned for the sky he could barely remember when he was five. It was all blurry to him now, constantly waiting for the day when he could finally escape the shackles of his captors. Sacrificed by his own family at the tender age of ten in order to gain constant benefits and a monthly pay for their son’s efforts in a government program he had no knowledge of at that time, Park Jihoon lived in a constant maze with no way out.
His screen would dictate that it was another day, but he’d never really feel it. Waking up and sleeping was just another robotic routine he had gotten used to. The merits on his screen read “10,656,258 g” but it really meant nothing to him. They’d be subtracted to his meals or his fleeting mode of entertainment when he isn’t made into the government’s guinea pig but they’d never be his ticket out of the place.
Their work was pretty simple. Everyday, they would walk on treadmills and gain gold coins once they reach a certain meter. Everyone of them had avatars that closely resembled them except they looked like matryoshka dolls but with limbs, legs and a variety of skin color. They could take a break during lunch time, stop for a couple of minutes to rest if they wanted to and watch whatever they wanted (given that it would be deducted from their earned merits). Sometimes, people who yearned to get out of the treadmill used their gold coins to change occupations but it needed a considerably huge amount. Changing occupations would mean a better life or a less physical job but it still never gave them their freedom. They were still other people’s entertainment, may it be the elites or their fellow guinea pigs. The only way out was to escape but that required a whole lot of thinking, planning and a huge load of consequences carried on their back so no one ever bothered.
Jihoon walked beside a guy whose smile greeted him every morning, a mute named Daniel. At the age of fourteen, Daniel joined them in the program, the only boy who had a brighter demeanor amidst their depressing setting. Jihoon found it odd how for years, Daniel seemed to always muster up a smile even when the people around him weren’t always welcoming of it.
‘Good morning Jihoon,” a message from Daniel popped up on his screen. Ever since they started working next to each other, Daniel never failed to greet him everyday.
Of course, out of courtesy, Jihoon would return the favor, ‘Good morning Daniel’
He and Daniel were the top earning walkers in their facility so subtracting a few gold coins for their exchanges in greeting was never really heavy on their part.
Jihoon thought that they would only limit themselves to shallow “good morning”s until one day, he receives a paper crane on his treadmill. Immediately, he kept it in his pocket, afraid that their wardens might see it. He wasn’t sure why he took it when he knew he would get in trouble. To his side, he sees Daniel’s gaze on him, a gaze that took longer than usual which filled questions in Jihoon’s head. No doubt, it was from him. He had seen Daniel learn how to fold paper cranes a couple of times a few weeks back before a warden confiscated his pads of paper. Why was he risking himself yet again?
At lunchtime, Daniel sits with him on his usual table. It was the first time any of them actually initiated to go further than just their usual morning greeting. Jihoon opened the paper crane in front of Daniel who looked suspiciously eager. “You know you’re getting me into trouble,” he whispered, afraid that any wardens nearby might hear him.
But there was merely silence and a grin Daniel never seemed to get rid of. There was something scribbled on the paper, Daniel’s messy handwriting on the yellow sheet.
“Can you spend my birthday with me?”
It didn’t make sense to Jihoon why Daniel would want to spend his birthday with him when all they did was just work next to each other. He hesitated, thinking about the merits Daniel would lose if he used them to take a break from their shift. It would cost 50,000 gold coins for him and Jihoon.
Seeing the latter’s reluctance, Daniel quickly typed a message on his communicator, a device he used to type in in order to communicate with the people around. It was free for the people with disability since it didn’t require actually sending messages to over devices.
Don’t worry about the expenses, I’ll take care of it
“When’s your birthday?”
Daniel typed his reply again, Tomorrow
“Why me?”
With that question, Daniel paused for a moment. He was typing but Jihoon could sense from across the table that Daniel had been forming and erasing his sentences a couple of time before he showed his answer.
Because I’ve always wanted to spend my birthday with someone and out of all the people I’ve interacted here, I think I find you the most interesting.
After reading the text, Jihoon gave Daniel one skeptical look. Even if he had been standing next to Daniel for years, they don’t really know that much about each other. Sure, Daniel was the most optimistic fellow he’s ever encountered in their miserable little world but it wasn’t enough to convince him to spend one day together and endanger himself of getting punished for whatever might happen if they were alone together. There were policies on social interactions, there were restrictions on infatuation and Jihoon didn’t want to endanger himself with the consequences when he’s worked so hard to keep himself out of trouble. But Daniel’s eyes glued on him intently looked like he was pleading, deprived of anything good in a situation that was forced upon them. So in the end, Jihoon asked for more time to think about it before leaving.
That night, Jihoon pondered on Daniel’s request. The walls of his room flashed a scenery of grassy fields with an artificial sound of nature mixed with an uptempo piano piece playing in the background. He moved his arm back and forth as he swiped through different settings on his screen, getting sick of the bright greens that were starting to make his eyes hurt. The screen shifted into a projection of stars, the evening sky surrounded him, stars of different kinds floating in various directions around the walls of his room. The music shifted into a slower tempo lulling Jihoon as he rested flat on his bed, pointing at each constellation he saw. First was Orion, the constellation of the greek hunter. His finger points the star on its heel, Rigel, a white-blue star that twinkled as it hovered over the others. Next was the star at the top corner of the pattern, the red star-Betelgeuise. It was a new hobby Jihoon had picked up a year ago. His fascination stemmed from his lingering desire to look at the real thing again, to have the cool evening air wash over his face and to try and grasp the actual thing with a true image rather than just another artificial setting on screen. He went through the entire zodiac, memorizing each line and each star as much as he could.
Then, a pop-up message from someone blocked his view of the next set of stars that hovered above him. The rectangular block flashed “A message from Daniel” and Jihoon’s heart raced. It struck him as odd how this adamant Daniel was to spend his birthday with Jihoon when they barely knew each other. Jihoon was just another hopeless face amongst the sea of hopeless faces he saw around their facility. Daniel was bright, too bright for someone who had been shackled in an artificial world that was too bleak. He thrusted his finger forward up in the air, flicking the open button on the screen to view Daniel’s message.
From: Daniel
Hi, I’m sorry for bothering you. I just wanted to know if you’ve made up your mind yet so I can pay for your leave beforehand.
His eyes went back and forth with each word in the message, his mind still completely indecisive about the whole request. Amidst growing in a very cold and heartless environment, Jihoon somehow managed to keep his conscience intact and it was the only thing that was keeping him from rejecting Daniel without a second thought (it was also the bane of his empty existence somehow). With a deep sigh, he typed in his message on a projection of a blue keyboard extended in front of him by the screen above him. The technology inside the facility was advanced, a whole new world compared to the previous life he lived. As time passed, he was impressed with how the technology he was exposed to seemed more like magic than anything else (black magic, maybe, but still magic, nonetheless). Jihoon’s fingers always made its way back to the backspace key as he pondered on his decision and what he should reply back to Daniel. Eventually, he managed to just type a quick one sentence reply before sending it and hoped for the best.
From: Jihoon
Okay, I’ll accompany you on your birthday.
Meeting Daniel to celebrate his birthday was more nerve-wracking than when Jihoon first stepped into the facility. It was like he was about to collapse due to anxiety. He still wasn’t sure what Daniel’s intentions were and his mind still whirled with questions. He waited at a table in their cafeteria, feeling the curious gazes of others who wondered why he wasn’t in his post. Jihoon tried to avoid them, shifting uncomfortably in his seat as he wished for them to just go away and leave him alone. Even if he had been staying here for so long, he never really interacted with anyone in the facility. He was always the quiet boy, only speaking when someone initiated a conversation first but never replying more than one or two sentences before shutting himself out again.
Daniel was taking his sweet time, it was already eight in the morning and usually their call time was at seven-thirty. He probably took the opportunity to sleep in since he was on leave. A few minutes later, the guy arrives with an apologetic smile and a necklace around his neck with a circular pendant hanging on his chest that looked like a mini speaker. He opened his mouth, forming words while his pendant spoke.
“I’m sorry I’m late. I decided to buy this for myself.”
It probably costed a lot, leaving Jihoon to wonder how much gold coins Daniel had left. “Have you eaten already?” Daniel asked him. “We can order food in my room if you like”
Jihoon shook his head, no and replied that he already ate breakfast. Daniel simply nodded and then led Jihoon to the hallway going to his room. All the hallways of the facility looked the same, black and white walls on each corner with advanced sliding doors that only opened through a password and eye inspection. Janitors passed through the walls as well as strict-looking wardens who gave them intimidating glares. Their critical gazes made Jihoon uncomfortable, making him want to make a run for it and proceed to his treadmill. Daniel, on the other hand, noticed Jihoon’s discomfort and slipped his hand on the younger’s squeezing it while looking at him with reassurance. “Relax,” he told Jihoon. “We’ll be fine” . It didn’t really calm him down but he believed in Daniel’s words and opted to look down so as to avoid their stares. Once they stop in front of Daniel’s room, Jihoon was finally relieved of the thought of the wardens no longer staring at him but realized he was encountering a whole new problem. Now, he was in Daniel’s room. He was going to be alone with Daniel. The thought of retreating screamed in his head once more and a little voice in his head kept repeating how much of a bad idea this was. Again, he was inside the room of another stranger and as nice as Daniel looked, he’s lived here long enough to know that looks were deceiving or that if you try to associate with anyone in this monochromatic prison and initiate kindness, it was going to bite you hard in the ass.
“Jihoon?” Daniel probably sensed how jittery Jihoon still was because he looked at him with worry and hugged him close. “You alright there, buddy?”
The hug was sudden and out of shock, Jihoon quickly pushed him away. Still puzzled and completely guarded, Jihoon wasn’t sure how to feel about being touched that intimately. It had been years since anyone hugged him, since he had that kind of close human contact. He had been looking out for himself for so long that having any sort of connection with anyone was as foreign as the sky he yearned for. “I’m-” he felt a little disoriented, heat creeping on his cheeks as he is unable to look at Daniel. “I’m sorry. I just..I don’t like being touched.”
“Oh..” the sound that came out of his pendant was robotic but the disappointment in his face was clear. “I’m sorry too, maybe I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”
“It’s fine,” Jihoon replied. “So.. what do you want us to do?”
Daniel’s room was just like his, bare with only a bed at the center and huge screens that make up the wall. There wasn’t that many things to do there than watch stale entertainment provided by the facility. “I want to just talk to you..” Daniel told him. “Just lie down on the bed and just..” there was a short pause. “Talk”
Talk. The only reason he was inside another person’s room was to converse with him. What was there even to talk about? Who won the last talent show and which contestant had the bad end of the deal? Which show on the screen looked more believable than the rest? Which entertainment was an easier pill to swallow than the rest of the fake garbage their eyes were consuming? There was only so much they could talk about.
“Or maybe you’d rather have me lie down on the floor while you take the bed?” Daniel asked.
Jihoon refused, “No, I’ll take the floor. It’s your birthday, you can take the bed.”
Daniel also shook his head in refusal and decided, “How about we lie down on the bed together? I promise not to touch you.”
There was still a hesitation there. He stared at Daniel as if he was crazy to even ask that of him like Jihoon would comply to it easily. “Look, no one can stay on the floor. It’s cold and not the most comfortable place to lie down on plus I promise on my grave and gold coins that I will never lay a hand on you.” were the words that came out of his pendant while he raised his hand in the air. “I just want to talk, Jihoon.”
“What do you want to talk about?” Jihoon asked.
“A lot of things.” Daniel replied.
“There’s not a lot of things to talk about in this fucked up dungeon we’re trapped in.” His tone was leveled, but there was an obvious bitterness to it in the spaces between each word.
“So tell me about what you like.” Enthusiasm. Jihoon found it odd how Daniel seemed enthused at the possibility of knowing more about Jihoon when there was really nothing special about him at all.
“Not a lot of things.” Jihoon replied.
“Then how about your dreams?” Dreams. Do those even exist in this messed up world?
“It’s hard to have one when you know there’s no way out of this hell hole.” It was the most that Jihoon has ever said to a person here. Only a tiny shard of his bottled up feelings were poured out to Daniel. Oddly enough, it felt a little good to speak his mind. He knows he will regret this later, eyes watching his every move even in the confines of a person’s room. There was no such thing as privacy here. “You’re getting me into trouble, Daniel. I don’t know why you wanted me to spend your birthday with you but if you’re expecting more out of me, you’re going to be disappointed.”
“But you haven’t disappointed me yet” Daniel told him, his usual grin forming on his lips. The man proceeded to lie down on his own bed and tapped the empty space beside him. There was enough room for Jihoon to lie down on, enough distance so that his arm wouldn’t touch Daniel’s. “Tell me about the stars that you like.”
Of course Daniel knew his affinity for stars. Rather than watching mindless entertainment on his screen, Jihoon would rather watch documentaries on his screen. More informative than any of the people in his row of human lab rats would consume because he thought that if he ever saw one more episode of that stupid talent show or tasteless porn show, his brain would rot. These past few months, he watched more astronomy and mythology episodes to pass time. From the mythical origin of constellations and stars to the different patterns and when one could see them during what time of the year. To him, it was more interesting than seeing anyone suffer by the hands of heartless fuckers with a superiority complex just because they have shitload of money and prestige as high as their egos.
“What’s there to tell? They’re balls of hot gas up in the sky that live longer than generations of humans combined.” Jihoon merely sat down on the space beside Daniel, facing the screen across the side of the bed rather than the man himself. He could feel Daniel shift on the mattress, probably facing him which give Jihoon even more of a reason not to turn back. This was one compromising situation, one that Jihoon had brought upon himself when he agreed to Daniel’s request. He could have said no.
“What do you like about them?” Daniel asked. “If that’s all there is to it, why do you like them so much?”
For someone who finally had the chance to talk a lot, Daniel talked way too much.
“Why is that any of your business anyways, Daniel?” Jihoon tried to make his voice firm- trying to get a message across that Daniel was being too nosy for Jihoon’s liking and it was starting to piss him off.
“Why is it so hard for you to accept that someone actually wants to care about you? About what you like or what you want to do in life. Just why?” The sound coming out of his voice box was robotic but Jihoon could sense the frustration in each word. He finally turned to Daniel and to his surprise, the nonchalance, the enthusiasm, they were all gone. His eyebrows met at the center, his eyes filled with just as much vexation as Jihoon had a while ago but he still looked like he wasn’t ready to back down.
“I told you, you’re going to get us both in trouble. What you’re potentially doing to me, to us, it’s going to get us punished. It’ll be mercy if they actually get us killed.” It really was. Jihoon has heard stories, gossips during lunch hours about lovers being separated, friends who seemed way too close getting tortured with the things they fear the most, and rebels getting treatments worse than death. It was all way too horrifying even if they were all merely hearsay.
“Then let’s run away together.” Daniel was crazy. He really was. To the point that it was pretty amusing to Jihoon. Of all the things he actually proposed, this was the most preposterous one yet.
He couldn’t help but burst out in laughter, the first time he actually laughed in years. “I knew you were an idiot but I never knew you were delusional too. Well, that makes you ten times more of an idiot, I think.”
“I made you smile,” Daniel pointed out, completely astonished at his little victory.
“Yeah well don’t get used to it.” Leave it to Jihoon to actually shut the latter down immediately before he got any weird ideas. To his utter dismay, it was probably just another quick painless pinch to Daniel because somehow he seemed more hopeful than ever.
“Yeah, I guess I won’t” Daniel responded and Jihoon wanted to rip the smile off his face because his reply seemed like a blatant lie. The last thing Jihoon wanted was to give Daniel the satisfaction of doing what the latter asked of him nor give him any sort of hope that they could have any bond after today.
“What’s your favorite constellation, Jihoon?” The question and answer thing was probably not going to stop and remaining quiet would probably resort to more annoying and unnecessary inquisitions so he might as well feed Daniel’s curiosity.
“I don’t get what you’re trying to prove here,” They were back to square one yet again and he could hear Daniel sighing from behind him. A little part of Jihoon felt guilty. He had never felt guilty for a very long time so it was hard to resist. It was hard to turn away. And that little part of him overpowered the huge wall of apathy he had developed over the years. “I don’t have a favorite constellation. It doesn’t make sense for anyone to have favorite constellation, dumb ass. They’re all just a mass of dots on the sky that twinkle every now and then. But they are pretty. They’re a lot prettier in reality I think. I don’t know. It’s hard to remember. The last evening sky I remember seeing was when I was ten like a couple of days after my birthday when my little brother and I were stargazing in the woods near our house. We didn’t have much. It was probably why my parents gave me up. It was either me or my brother and my brother was too little and they needed children so what better way than to sacrifice their eldest son, right?” He’s never shared his story. Not with anyone in the facility. They’d have a therapist visit them every now and then two years after being thrown into the facility to check if they were mentally stable enough to stay. But Jihoon had never shared the bitterness that he had within him. It was always about his mundane life he was now living, telling the therapist that his past was all just a blur to him after only being exposed to black and white for so long. Ten years old was the minimum age for the government’s program. Most ten year olds end up going insane, throwing tantrums here and there a couple of months after being thrown into their environment. The walls, the isolation, and the fear drove them mad. Jihoon was one of the few that remained from the ones that started at a young age. He was resilient, the people had said. His sanity had earned him a couple of gold coins from the therapist. But the points he had earned over the years never filled the emptiness that soon grew inside of him. A deep abyss that only grew bigger bit by bit everyday.
“It must have hurt, huh? Being sold by your parents” Sympathy. Jihoon had been exposed to an environment where people had been driven past the point of utter delirium and anguish that it was a constant. It would only hurt if you cared and sympathy was a weakness. During his early days, he had been crying silently until he fell asleep, hearing the cries of his peers echoing in his head and how they begged for the wardens to just kill them off than let them rot in their rooms. It was a process- a whole lot of enduring and years of acceptance. Accepting the fact that he was a trapped guinea pig for the rest of his life.
Daniel shifted from his position and sat behind him, wrapping his arms around Jihoon’s body and holding him close. Jihoon squirmed under his touch still uncomfortable at their proximity, “Stop it!” Jihoon exclaimed. “What part of I don’t feel like being touched do you not understand? Stop doing that!”
“It just seemed like you needed it. You’ve been through so much though, I just... you seem pretty lonely. I’m not gonna lie, ever since I was thrown in here, I’ve been pretty lonely too. I’ve seen so many people driven into insanity. The longer they stayed here, the crazier they get. And then there’s you, the boy who has been here the longest. It’s like you’re unfazed through it all, earning the most gold coins but acting the most resilient, the most strong. I’m not going to lie, Jihoon, I think I’m going mad in here. I smile, thinking it would make me feel better, a lot less empty but it’s just..” Daniel leaned against Jihoon’s back, the sadness pouring out of him as he squeezed the younger’s shoulder and poured out the tears he had been holding back for so long. The man eventually broke. Even a man as bright as Daniel had their own limits.
This was probably his.
“It just amazed me how you do it. But I thought you couldn’t just be hollow right? I don’t know. I was interested in you, wondering what your secret was to staying sane in here. Or I just, I needed someone strong enough to see me break down. Someone who doesn’t squint while I just want to cry all of this out. Fuck Jihoon, it’s so fucking hard.”
Of course Jihoon would never squint. He allowed Daniel to stain his shirt with tears as the latter cried to his heart’s content. Maybe he should call the wardens in case Daniel actually threw an even bigger tantrum. He remembered someone sobbing uncontrollably once that they eventually couldn’t stop and had to be taken away immediately. Involvement with any of the experiments was dangerous. It was rule set in stone and what Jihoon’s walls were for but then a blurry memory of his brother came into view. How he would hug his brother when the nightmares haunted him at night. How it would soothe him and reassure him that everything would be alright. The feeling of contact with another person turned from something foreign into something more nostalgic. And after Jihoon ignored all better judgement, he turned to Daniel and pulled the man close to his chest. The whole comforting thing? He was bad at it. He didn’t really know what to say. Jihoon merely rubbed the man’s back, thinking it would probably (hopefully) soothe him. To his relief, Daniel finally calmed down, his cries turning into soft whimpers as he buried his face against Jihoon’s chest. Jihoon raked his fingers through Daniel’s silky hair, rubbing the tips of his fingers against the man’s scalp. It was a gesture he remembered that his mother used to do when he cried, back when his parents weren’t so thirsty for cash and they seemed happier. And somehow it helped. Daniel lifted his head up to meet Jihoon’s gaze, his eyes glassy and red, cheeks stained with salty tears and lips a bit swollen.
“You look ugly when you cry,” Jihoon said. “I think a smile suits you better.”
Daniel couldn’t help but laugh afterwards, any ounce of sorrow somehow disappearing without a trace. “Your eyes look extra beautiful right now, I don’t know why. It looks brighter than the stars you like so much.”
“You really are going mad,” Jihoon commented flatly which earned another chuckle from Daniel. The man literally laughed at anything.
“It’s true though!” Daniel told him defensively “Maybe it’s because of the tears.”
“It’s definitely because of the tears,” Jihoon agreed.
Then silence.
Silence between the two of them with only the soothing sound of the piano playing in the background that came with the setting of the galaxy. The image of the moon rotated behind Jihoon, it was red, larger than usual, blocking the sun and reflecting its color and making it its own. The glow was reflected on Daniel too, maybe not too much since Jihoon was blocking it but it was enough to grace the contours of his face. Deep brown orbs that usually disappeared intro crescents when Daniel’s grin tried to shine their dim existence. This was definitely a trap, Jihoon thought. He was falling way too much into the hands of a dangerous fate when he’s been trying to avoid it for a very long time. Accepting Daniel’s invite had been his death sentence.
Jihoon never believed in that magnetic pull type of bullshit. The ones where you just instinctively gravitate around one person and they just lure you in with their mere presence. It was all a load of bull. So it didn’t make sense how he was just a few inches away from Daniel somehow. Their foreheads against each other and their noses just bumping. Years of imprisonment must have really drove him mad because the second he’s finally had human contact, Jihoon was already moving way too fast, forgetting all the rules he had laid out for himself. Their lips brush against each other, Jihoon swore he spotted a blurry image of a shooting star appearing behind Daniel and when he closed his eyes, he could feel the heat flowing through his veins. Daniel’s chapped lips devour him, filling the void little by little. Not enough to save him but just enough to relish in their moment. It took Jihoon years to realize that maybe he was longing for more than just a starry sky and beautiful night, he was also yearning for an entity to share it with. Someone he could share it with so that what he had wasn’t just a dream- that what he was experiencing wasn’t merely a dream. Jihoon wondered if he could taste happiness on Daniel’s lips, know how it could simply curve upwards and with such a simple gesture become easily akin to sunshine. He wondered if he could taste the pain he had been keeping in for so long with one swipe from his tongue, the way it danced and swirled against his with the lingering saltiness of his tears.
Yes, he probably has gone mad because this was way too much, way too fast after years of depravity.
But Jihoon wasn’t the only one feeling this way, he could feel Daniel second guess too as he hesitated little by little. They both moved away and avoided each others gazes as the tension of their kiss still lingered between them. “Uhm, that was way too fast,” Jihoon stuttered, breaking the awkward silence. “B-but yeah, happy birthday, I guess.”
For once today, he was glad that Daniel found anything and everything amusing because all he did was chuckle afterwards which made the atmosphere a lot easier to bear for Jihoon. “So I expect this whole thing between us is like a birthday thing?” Daniel asked.
“Birthday thing,” Jihoon repeated, his tone sounding hesitant. It also didn’t help that Daniel looked worried and he was suddenly feeling a little weak inside. If this was what one kiss and one birthday date did to Jihoon, the boy was a goner. The word “no” kept echoing in his head but the craving of wanting something more out of this was starting to get the best of him. Daniel was starting to get the best of him.
With pursed lips and little nod, he replied, “Sure”
And Daniel tackled him into a hug, making him topple over the older boy and wriggling out of his tight hold. “Hey!” Jihoon groaned in protest. “If you don’t let go of me, I’m going to change my mind!” Immediately, Daniel lets him go and Jihoon lies down beside him, facing the stars that twinkled on the screen hovering over them.
It was whole roller coaster ride in that one evening. Everything felt like it had come into play in that short amount of time. Or maybe it felt short because they never really were aware of the time that had passed since they entered Daniel’s room. Baffled and a bit exhausted, Jihoon was trying to comprehend everything that had happened. Maybe it was best if he just thought of it tomorrow. For now, he’ll let it pass.
For now, he’ll let Daniel’s presence consume, imprint a part of him in the wall Jihoon built for himself.
Boldly, the man slipped his hand on Jihoon’s, twining their fingers together as they lay down in silence.
“So, can you now tell me about the stars you like.”