Work Text:
[Kim Dokja, meet me at the bridge.]
It’s a late afternoon on a cool autumn day when Kim Dokja receives the unexpected text. Staunchly ignoring the faint ache that prickles still at the familiarity of the message, even months later, he picks up his phone.
[Why?]
[Don't question it and just come, alright?]
[?????]
[Just get your ass here right this instant or so help me god!]
“This is an intervention.”
Over the edge of his scarf, Kim Dokja squints warily at the speaker. He almost ended up not coming, purely out of spite, but curiosity got the better of him, and he found himself slipping on his coat and scarf, despite all his misgivings about returning to this particular location.
He had barely set foot onto the bridge when Han Sooyoung, who was waiting for him, shoved herself into his personal space and made that abrupt declaration, punctuated with a finger jabbed into his chest.
An intervention...?
He watches her scowling face in confusion and decides to tread forward with caution. “An intervention for what, exactly?”
Han Sooyoung's scowl deepens and he barely manages to hold back a wince as she presses down harder with her fingertip.
“For your moping. At first, we decided to leave it alone, because you are both adult men who can think for yourselves and make your own choices, which we were going to respect, even if we didn’t understand them. But it’s been 9 months now and you are still so depressing that it’s making not just me, but everyone else—including Kim Namwoon, Kim Namwoon—depressed.”
Ah.
It was that kind of intervention.
Nine months ago, he and Yoo Joonghyuk had ended their one year relationship on the eve of their anniversary. In the following weeks, Kim Dokja had thrown himself into his work with intensity and fended off almost every conversation about the matter as if his life depended on it.
Fortunately, his friends had seemed to respect his desire to work through the breakup on his own and backed off after he assured them that he would reach out if he ever needed someone to talk to.
In the end, he never ended up reaching out to any of them, unless you counted that one embarrassing night where he broke down in Jung Heewon's bar and cried all over the counter top she had just finished wiping.
He’s still feigning amnesia and Jung Heewon has yet to call him out for it.
Unfortunately, it seems like his luck had finally run out.
He is about to interject something before she can continue, but she slaps a hand over his mouth. He attempts to pull her hand off, but she bares her teeth, glaring him into submission.
“No. You can argue with me all you want after, but you’re going to listen to everything I have to say first. The two of you had your chance to fix your shit, and you missed it, so now we’re intervening.”
Kim Dokja bats at her hand again and this time, she grudgingly relents. He takes a moment to gather his thoughts before speaking.
“Look, Han Sooyoung. I appreciate everyone’s concern about my well being, I really do. However, like you said, it’s already been months. Of course, it was painful at first and it’s still painful now, but I’m starting to move on. So I’m fine, honestly.”
A vein pops up on the side of Han Sooyoung’s temple and Kim Dokja is suddenly struck with the fear that she’s about to launch her phone at his head.
Before he can backpedal and beg for his life, her stare drops downwards. Then, her eyebrow flies up so fast it's almost a miracle that she doesn’t sprain something in her face. Scoffing almost derisively, she points at something below his neck.
“If you’re so fine with it, why are you still wearing that?”
Kim Dokja freezes.
Sometime during the confrontation, he had subconsciously raised a hand to his chest and dislodged his scarf, revealing the chain hanging around his neck. In his fingers, he was clutching an inconspicuous silver ring looped through the thin metal. They twitch reflexively, but he pushes down the urge to tug the snowy white ends of his scarf over the damning evidence.
There was no point in trying to hide it now, so he forces his hand to open and slowly lowers it down to hang by his side, letting the ring hang in full view. Kim Dokja is almost afraid to meet the stare that is boring into the side of his face, and tries, but fails, to find the proper words for an explanation.
After a few moments of silence, he finally steels himself and looks up to see that a considering expression has replaced Han Sooyoung’s scowl.
“You know, Kim Dokja. I met Lee Seolhwa the other day.” She eyes him with an unreadable look. "She told me some very interesting things. Especially about that guy in particular.”
She pauses for a bit, as if gauging his reaction, before continuing. “It isn't my place to relay what she said to you, but I honestly think you should talk to him. And I mean really talk to him. None of that evading bullshit you’re so fond of doing.”
At that, Han Sooyoung stops and looks at him expectantly. He looks back at her, without a word. The silence between them stretches and eventually, she sighs and lets her gaze drift off to the side.
The sun has lowered considerably by now, touching the horizon and setting the river aglow. Before she leaves, she raises a hand and gently lays it on his shoulder.
“At least consider it. Please."
And with that, she brushes past him and disappears into the early evening crowd. For a long time, Kim Dokja doesn't move, standing rooted in the spot she left him in.
He considers.
The autumn leaves cover the bridge in a blanket of vibrant golds and reds. At the center, a lone man stands, eyes closed, head tilted back slightly towards the sky. One hand is slipped into his pocket, while the other hangs at his side, phone gripped loosely between his fingers.
It is early in the evening still, and people wander the streets, their individual worlds turning steadily on their axes.
At the foot of the bridge, another man has stopped in his headlong charge down the path. To him, his entire world had just come to a complete halt before his eyes.
For a moment, he pauses to catch his breath.
Then, he steps onto the bridge and the world begins to move once again.
With his heart in his throat, he opens his mouth and calls out to the man.
“Kim Dokja.”
That voice. Oh, how he had missed that voice and its low, rough tones that poured over his aching heart and lit up his darkest nights, smoothing over the sharp edges of a grim past and anchoring him in the safety of the present.
Just like that, with a simple utterance of his name, a missing piece of his soul slots back into place. It’s rusty and jagged, scraping away at his heart as it settles, but still. Still, he feels like the gaping hole in his chest is finally starting to heal on its own.
Kim Dokja takes a deep breath and opens his eyes.
The man standing before him is dressed completely in black, from head to toe. His hair falls messily into his eyes and he seems to be breathing faster than usual. His expression is as stoic as ever, but when their eyes meet, there is something shining in those dark, obsidian eyes, as the latter’s gaze roves over him, taking in the sight of Kim Dokja in the exact same way that Kim Dokja was doing to him.
Distantly, a small part of Kim Dokja wonders if he had run all the way here to meet him, and the corners of his lips quirk up in fond exasperation.
A slow and beating warmth—something akin to hope, almost—is unfurling itself from where it had been slumbering for a very long time, deep within his chest.
Maybe, just maybe, they would be okay.
“Hello, Yoo Joonghyuk.”