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Taeyong is in his room, except that it isn’t really his room. He’s asleep, bundled up in bed, except that he’s awake and standing tall and hopeful. He takes a moment to gather his bearings, like he does when he wakes up after a thick sleep he doesn’t remember falling into. He is inside of a clone of his own room, cleaner than he’d left it and with the walls painted a brighter shade of eggshell, and instead of the rain falling heavy outside that was forecast for the entire week, the sun shines brightly through the window, splitting through the glass and reflecting in beams across his walls and dresser, which is built in oak rather than walnut.
The entire room holds Taeyong tenderly in its width, like the palm of a gently cupped hand. It feels like morning, though it seems he’s been standing here watching the world turn until afternoon. He turns on his heel and walks through the glittery openness of the room to his bedroom door, who’s handle is crystal and ornately decorated. The light of the sun splits through it too, painting an iridescent pink-red splash on Taeyong’s hand as he reaches to turn the knob.
The hall lights are off, but the shape of a window on the far end of the hallway is framed on the hardwood floor in warm light. The glitter which hung in the air in his room is out here too, tiny particles of gold haze. There is the smell of something cooking floating lazily from the kitchen. Warm and cold smell different, and while this is most definitely warm, it is still as refreshing as cold. It is something Taeyong loves, even if he can’t name it now. It’s in no hurry, and Taeyong realizes neither is he. (There’s something he doesn’t need to do today, something that is everything every other day—he can’t catalogue them now, but they go something like this: breathe, think, work.) He lets his eyes slip shut, following the warm, refreshing scent by muscle memory. His feet pad against the hardwood; it’s not cold despite being barefoot and there’s a surprising amount of give with each step he takes. The movement is mechanical, memorized from hundreds of trials, and yet it feels purposeful and sure, like wading with dust and debris in a path straight to the sun.
Behind his eyelids, Taeyong sees everything and nothing all at once. The span of the universe, the cycle of life, the mother cradling her baby with open, boundless adoration and the baby knowing nothing but the comfort of clinging to its giver. He sees the beginning, the end, everything in between. The smell gets warmer, fresher. His shirt sleeve brushes against a door frame, and Taeyong opens his eyes. He's in the kitchen, and the back door is open, letting in a pleasant outside breeze through the thin screen door. A tiny television crackles on the counter as it plays all good news. The old oven squeaks open.
Taeyong's mouth waters, legs (healthy, awake legs) guiding him in the direction of the oven and the countertop above it on their own accord. A tuft of tawny brown hair pops up, a man made of gold following with a baking sheet of soft pink held in his hands. Somewhere far off and fuzzy, Taeyong questions the lack of oven gloves and panic.
The man of gold smiles, oozing slow like caramel and even further slowing Taeyong down. He feels himself mirror the smile, relaxed as anyone with no responsibilities for the day, and no expectations eliciting unnecessary responsibility. Taeyong’s shoulders are weightless, the span of home around him is open, unclouded.
Silky sandy hair sticks out in different directions. The tray is placed on the stove burners atop the oven. Taeyong reaches for it, again of his body’s own accord. The soft pink moves further away.
Not ready, he is told, either by the radiant man holding it or by his own vague rationality. Caramel smile (with white, white teeth) meets a baby button nose meets a few dotted freckles, and on top there are two eyes, just like Taeyong has, but smaller, shaped like mischief and love. They look lighter too, maybe in the line of the midday sun, and deeper if it’s possible. Two deep pools of honey, and Taeyong wants to drink and drink and know they’ll never run out. He knows the depth of the honey pools more intimately than he knows his own height. (There are two vertical tally measurements, one hardly taller than the other, marked on the kitchen doorway, the same one this shirt brushed against, but his narrative denies its existence. There is only a golden man and a soft pink smell.)
Another smell, thicker and yet less heady, wafts through the air. It’s sweet, and it isn’t warm this time, but it’s still refreshing. It's even softer pink.
Taeyong stands, now in the middle of the kitchen just as he did in his not room and in between the room and the hallway. Life moves around him—or, he supposes, it doesn’t. Maybe, just this once, life stays still and time and space are the only things to keep moving. Or maybe time and space slow, like long legs wading through molasses.
All Taeyong knows is that his eyes are closed but the smell of soft pink and softer pink get closer, and when he opens them, summer skin is reaching toward him. Pink and pink rest in his palm as a coveted invitation, which Taeyong greedily accepts.
His teeth crunch through soft pink and then they chew, his tongue is coated in softer pink, sweet and floral and comforting. For a moment, rather than amber, Taeyong sees the world in rose. Something brings him back to amber and those white, white teeth. He wonders if it wasn’t smell or memory that brought him here at all, but instead the sun leaving hints like a scavenger hunt. The prism of the doorknob, the sunlit hardwood floor of the hallway, the birds risen and chirping through the back door.
Taeyong licks his lips of the pinkness coating them. Another, he chooses. He reaches for another. The man of gold doesn’t eat. He watches attentively as Taeyong does, though, until he can no longer stand the thought of another. His hand reaches out again, but he brings it back.
Will you go back to bed? he’s asked, not by the golden man or even by himself. It isn’t a question he can hear, rather a series of thoughts. Go back to the room, stay in the kitchen, take a shower. After that—fall asleep, make lunch, play games.
There’s another set after that, and then another, and then another, and they go on for so long that they become less of a conscious thought and more of a stream of possibilities. It’s been a long time since Taeyong has been able to recognize such a long list of things he can do without organizing, analyzing, and reorganizing each one.
To bed, he decides, and follows his feet there. There is a warmth against his back the entire way. He doesn’t look over his shoulder; he knows what he’ll see.
Everything is just the way Taeyong left it, except brighter, edged in a softer, warmer light. This time, the light splits through the doorknob onto his hand in purple. Instead of time and space moving through molasses alone, Taeyong has joined them in wading through the hazy goldenness of the apartment.
“Will you wake up?” he hears, clear through the soft white noise in his ears. He doesn’t answer, can’t answer, content as he wraps someone else’s hug around himself.
Will he wake up? Taeyong doesn’t close his eyes. Everything is too good to let go of. Everything is beautiful and carefree and it feels fleeting so he keeps his eyes open.
The world has shifted when Taeyong sees it again. It’s grey-blue in his room, and the air inside is dull and clear. He hears the telltale pattering of rain against the window, slow and sporadic but nothing else if not persistent. There is a heap of clean laundry piled on the desk chair asking him to be put away in the walnut dresser tomorrow instead of today; Taeyong concedes. This is the cold, dreary reality of wakefulness.
There’s a familiar warmth against his back. Taeyong doesn’t have to look to know that it’s Donghyuck, arm slung around Taeyong’s middle and face pressed next to his shoulder blade. He doesn’t have to look to know he’s deeply asleep, most likely the result of staying up too late doing everything and nothing—thinking about too much in the shower, daydreaming, eyes wide on the bathroom floor when he could be dreaming behind his closed eyes. Taeyong cautiously turns toward him.
Donghyuck’s face is so relaxed in his sleep, scrunching up against itself. His body is boneless in a way that makes Taeyong think of melted caramel. He ruffles his unkempt, honey brown hair and lays a careful kiss high on his cheekbone.
Taeyong gets out of bed, and the world is dreary, but not so much as he thought yesterday. The window is speckled with raindrops, but the sun breaks softly through parted clouds like syrup seeping through cracks. The air is crisp and dry but to think about it, it feels fresh rather than sad. When Taeyong reaches for the crystal doorknob, it reflects pearly white-blue onto his hand.
The stiff floorboards groan under Taeyong’s feet, and the hallway is dim, and the curtains are drawn over the window. The kitchen is completely silent, the alive hum of the fridge the only tell that anyone’s been in here before.
On the countertop above the oven sits a slim cardboard container. As Taeyong’s feet lead him to it he sees a layer of cellophane over the top of the package, displaying a row of strawberry macarons. His mouth turns up into a smile on its own, and he feels giddy as he toys with the white ribbon stuck onto the corner of the box.
Taeyong slips the package open and takes a sweet for himself. On the counter beside it is a note scrawled messily on a sheet of lined paper torn haphazardly from a notebook.
It isn’t much but I hope it can make you smile.
The weather has been so poor lately it makes me feel sorry.. Sorry for so many things.. If it clears up soon we should have a day by the lake like we used to. I think I could use something like that right now, and I know you miss it.
The meal you left for me last night was the most delicious yet. How do you always know..? Sometimes it feels like you watch me in my dreams... I dreamt that I was a child again and my mom made me my favorite meal.. I come home and it’s exactly what you prepared. Did I tell you I’m off work tonight? I want to make you dinner this time, okay?
It’s rainy so you should let yourself rest. Don’t be too hard on yourself. You’re doing well.. I have to remind myself of that too sometimes. You’re allowed to go easy on yourself. If you won’t, then at least let me take care of you. Eat until your heart’s content.
P.S. Will you come back to bed?
Smiling, eyes tingling with the threat of tears, Taeyong holds the note against his heart and keeps it as a promise. The sunlight is always closer than it seems. Taeyong decides to let himself accept that fact as he takes another macaron to eat and enjoy.
He folds the opening of the box inside itself, and delicately tucks the note back underneath. And then, Taeyong chooses to go back to bed, and allows himself to be selfish as he blankets himself in the warmth he finds there.