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The sky is a dreary shade of grey when Jaehyun steps outside, the winter chill biting at his face. It seems to know. It seems to understand.
There’s a part of him that can’t yet, not quite. He reproaches it, this spiral of an ugly, sharp thorn twisting itself in his chest. It’s a constant push-and-pull, a conflict that has raged in his mind for at least the entire past week. Jaehyun knows, and yet at the same time he doesn’t; he shuts it behind a wall; he pretends he knows nothing; he lies to himself that he knows nothing, and it works, temporarily.
People pass him on the streets, faces all blurs he can’t be bothered to separate into individuals. Everything feels strangely calm, strangely normal, like the way a performer’s mind goes blank for those few seconds right before they step onto the stage blasted by bright lights and hundreds, thousands of scrutinizing eyes.
Like that, Jaehyun keeps walking, and his heart keeps beating.
—
> can we talk?
> seriously, this time.
< yeah, sure. when?
> saturday, 3:00 pm.
< where?
> you know where.
…
> are you coming?
< of course.
—
In less than fifteen minutes, Jaehyun stops by the edge of the town park. His eyes don’t need to search far to find what—who—he’s looking for. It’s the same place, always the same place.
At the old park bench, the oldest there, polished a shiny beige aside from the streaks of peeling green left untouched at one side of the structure. No one knows why its paint job had been left unfinished, but it’s a functioning bench all the same, and it’s what matters in the end.
There, windswept hair and starlight eyes, sits the love of his life.
Or, Jaehyun admits to himself with a hint of bitterness, someone who had been the love of his life once.
The thorn in his chest digs deeper.
“You came,” Donghyuck says, standing. He’s beautiful even in this monochrome weather, deep red coat painting a stripe of color across the world around them. Winter, when life shrinks into the ground to hide from the cold that breathes death into everything it touches.
“Of course I came,” Jaehyun answers, tilting his head. “Did you think I wouldn’t?”
Subtly, Donghyuck’s jaw tightens. The smallest of movements, yet Jaehyun is so habitually attuned to every detail of Donghyuck that he notices instantly, and he takes it as a negative.
“I thought,” the other begins, “I thought—after what happened—”
Raised voices and burning tears. Yeah, Jaehyun remembers. “That I would be angry.”
“Are you?”
“No.” Not at Donghyuck, never at Donghyuck. He’s been angry at himself, at the circumstances, at the mishaps and misunderstandings he’d let slip through his fingers without even making an effort to right the wrongs. “I’m sorry, Donghyuck.”
The answering smile is a hollow shell of its usual self. “You don’t need to apologize.” His words, too—so empty and so formal, so out of place.
“But I should,” Jaehyun whispers, almost fearing his words would be lost in the wind. “I messed up.” The self-hatred has riddled him to no end since the day they fought.
“You messed up about as much as I did,” says Donghyuck, the shadow of a laugh in his voice. “I’m sorry, too. We both crossed a line that day.”
There’s no point in denying the truth. “Yeah, we did.” Another I’m sorry dangles at the tip of Jaehyun’s tongue, reared back in before it can spill out a second time.
“Can we…” Donghyuck inhales. “Can we walk for a while?”
“Better than standing here and freezing,” Jaehyun says, attempting to lighten the mood—as much as it’s allowed to be lightened, at least. It works a little; a smile flits across Donghyuck’s face briefly.
They walk. The sky is clouded over and the sun is nowhere in sight, winter coats in browns and blacks and almost-white greys reflecting the dim amber of the streetlights, and they continue without a destination in mind. Donghyuck’s eyes graze over the glow of the shops with the little warmth they provide with their open doors. This is a street they’ve been on countless times. It’s still November, but miniature Christmas trees sparkle in their large glass displays, draped with ornaments and piled with gift boxes at their bases, pretty ribbons and all. Beauty for the holidays.
Light snow has started to fall, little wisps of coldness melting into the sidewalks and paved roads and fur coats. Some land on Donghyuck’s caramel-colored hair, tiny crystals of ice, and he slips his glove off and holds out an upturned hand to catch some in his palm. Jaehyun almost reaches out, almost covers it with his own like it’s second nature, and then he remembers and stops himself.
Donghyuck doesn’t seem to notice. His gaze is everywhere, wide as they peer up into the sky and then around them, cars, bustling crowds, and then they pause on Jaehyun briefly. It drifts away again, distracted by something, and Jaehyun follows.
They’ve reached the bakery—golden lights and the fragrant smell of fresh pastries, once a place they had frequented so often. For a moment, Donghyuck’s gaze is open, relaxed, just a single moment of reminiscence, and Jaehyun’s heart beats traitorously loud at the sight of him looking so familiarly at peace even for a second.
Am I still allowed to look at him like this?
“Jaehyun,” Donghyuck’s voice calls out to him softly, amused. “You’re going to get trampled.” He reaches out and hooks a hand around Jaehyun’s arm, pulls him away from the steady mill of people going in and out of stores. It’s only a split-second, but the action surprises them both.
“Ah—sorry. Old habit,” Donghyuck says awkwardly. His hand disappears from Jaehyun’s arm in an instant.
“It’s fine,” Jaehyun says, the words sticking in his throat. He wants to say that he doesn’t mind, but whether or not he minds isn’t important anymore—they simply can’t keep up, as Donghyuck called it, their old habits if things are changing.
They continue on their way. There’s an uncomfortable, unfamiliar gap between them, another new line to stay behind. Time passes slowly, quickly; Jaehyun’s not keeping track anymore.
It’s when the cold is finally seeping past layers of clothing that Donghyuck speaks again. “We can’t continue anymore.” There are fewer people here, away from the shops, so they both stop walking. “I think you knew this was coming.”
He has. Jaehyun has known the moment he’d seen Donghyuck’s first text in a week: can we talk? “I did.”
He had thought he would be prepared, even a little, for this. For the deafening thought that has rung continuously in his mind for weeks, possibly even a month.
Their fight hadn’t been the start of this. It has only marked the beginning of the end, and that week—that week had been hell. Thinking, agonizing, stalling.
And finally, Donghyuck had been the one to grasp it first.
“The timing wasn’t right for us. It never was.”
Everything about this hurts. But Jaehyun knows, and he understands, and his mind is clearing.
Donghyuck’s gaze is someplace distant and unreachable, staring off towards the view of the city and into nothing. There is no laughter in him, no radiance, no light. Jaehyun has never seen him so fragile before.
The timing wasn’t right for us. It never was.
“The circumstances,” he says, piecing together a heavy truth little by little. “We ignored them for too long.”
Four years of something beautiful blossoming day by day, a flower reaching towards the sun so desperately, until reality came crashing down on everything. That flower is withered now, a reminder of how cruel the universe can be towards even the smallest, most innocent of things. It’s time to uproot it.
“Were we right?” The question comes out more timid than intended. “For—for choosing this?” Is there a right or wrong for happiness?
“We were stupid,” Donghyuck says. A laugh escapes his lips, brittle and genuine. “But,” and a tear rolls down his cheek now as he smiles, “I don’t regret it. Even if this was a mistake. Right or wrong, I’ll never regret this.”
Jaehyun no longer has the right to touch him, to hug him, but he holds out a hand anyway, a final, tentative action. Donghyuck takes it.
“Did you ever…” Donghyuck trails off, hesitating. “Did you ever wish that maybe, we never should have met? That your life would’ve been better that way?” His eyes glisten with unshed tears, meeting Jaehyun’s with more fear in them than he’s ever seen, and it hits him that this is what Donghyuck is most afraid of.
Not making mistakes, not tumbling headfirst into something that was bound to collapse in the end. Not any of those things. He said “you”—Jaehyun. Donghyuck is afraid of Jaehyun regretting this, regretting them.
“No,” he says, pouring every ounce of conviction into his answer. “Never. Not for as long as I live.” He squeezes Donghyuck’s hand once as if words aren’t enough. “And even if we were never meant to be, it’s the best decision I’ve ever made.”
Still crying, Donghyuck wipes his eyes with his sleeve. The relief shines clear in his eyes. “You made me happier than words can say. I hope you know that, Jung Jaehyun.”
Jaehyun laughs, his throat tightening. “You were the brightest existence in my life, Lee Donghyuck.”
Their paths diverge here. It’s time to let go, truly, time for the string threading their lives together to be snipped.
“Things might be better one day,” Donghyuck says softly, certainly not a promise and certainly not something to hold onto. They both know better. “But don’t wait for me, Jung Jaehyun.” His eyes flash, hard. “Don’t you dare.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.” And Jaehyun means it.
Maybe life will be kinder to them one day, but not today. Maybe not for a long time; maybe not even in this lifetime. This flower has been uprooted and laid gently to rest in the ground. But somewhere, the seeds of the blossom are scattered into the soil, and someday, with the coming and going of rain, sunlight, and just a little bit of luck—one day, another flower will grow, just as beautiful, just as magnificent.
One day, the timing will be right for us.
Right now, they need to move on towards the stretch of their lives paved ahead, and that’s okay.
“So, we’re breaking up,” Donghyuck says, and it stings for both of them; this—the grievous heartbreak—is new and raw and unfamiliar. He laughs wetly, and Jaehyun finds that he’s started to cry, too.
“We’re breaking up,” he confirms. “My tears are going to freeze on my face, oh god.”
Unbidden, he snorts at his own words, and Donghyuck takes a look at him through red-rimmed eyes and dissolves into soft laughter.
People pass them on the streets, passersby to this moment, this decision between the two of them. Things might not be okay at this moment, but they will be. And that’s enough for them.
“So, it’s over.”
“Yeah.”
“I love you. And I’m sorry.”
Painfully bittersweet. Memories—glass carvings and vintage lamps and rosewood floors.
“I love you, too,” Jaehyun says softly. “Don’t be sorry.”
A smile tugs at the corner of Donghyuck’s mouth. “We’ll see each other around, won’t we?”
“Of course.”
“Keep in contact,” Donghyuck says, and he’s stepping away now, and Jaehyun is letting him go.
“You know I will.”
“Goodbye, Jaehyun.”
It aches, still.
“Goodbye, Donghyuck.”
The sky is still grey, and the snow has not let up since it started falling. Everything is as dreary and cold as it was when Jaehyun stepped outside, and his fingertips are numb even from under the wool of his gloves, but somehow, it’s a little less sad, and the sinking weight in his stomach is close to gone. Somehow, he thinks, “it’s okay,” and it feels like a faraway truth, promising that someday, it will be.
Like that, Jaehyun keeps walking, and his heart keeps beating.