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the color pink looks the best on the sky, a hue of the softest looking afternoon colors; the blue fading into the yellow and yellow into the pink. the peachy air just above the sun kissing the sea on the horizon.
nostalgia fills jeongguk, the kind of feeling which leaves you short of breath, mind hazy with memories of the long gone past; eyes glossy with unshed tears; ears plugged and unable to take in the words directed at him. no sound goes past them but the quiet splashing of the waves licking the shore.
it takes jeongguk several minutes to get back to the reality. seokjin’s laugh reaches his ears from where the older is pointing at a very wet looking yoongi. the younger of the two roommates murmurs out swear words at the eldest, his lithe body soaked in the salty water up to his chest.
jeongguk content with his spot on the towels they spread out, watching his hyungs play around with the waves, twin grins adorning their pale faces. he can’t help the endeared smile pulling at the corners of his mouth.
the sky is the prettiest jeongguk has seen in a while, still not having the courage to cross the french door opening up to his balcony, their balcony. ever since the day he woke up in the said balcony and found his lover of three years long gone, even the thought of being on the place brings the anxiety buried deep in his belly thumbling up to his throat.
(he knows he doesn't have much to lose anymore—nothing other than his two hyungs who still stick around and decided to take his side on the matter at hand, unlike his other older friends who were reluctant to take sides, instead faded from his life day by day— but still the anxiety burns so close to his already aching heart with the thought of finding them gone as well if he were to ever step on the damn balcony, as much as he knows how ridiculous that worry of his is.)
the thought of leaving everything behind and moving back to busan flashes through his mind, the same thought he keeps coming back to lately. he gazes upon his hyungs strolling towards him, hairs stuck to their foreheads and long sleeved shirt sticking in places. he returns the smile the eldest looks at him with, and decides to stick around for a while longer for the sake of them.
“yah, jeonggukah, you should have seen the look yoongi had when i threw him in the water! like a damn kitty forced into a bath—“
“what kitty?!” yoongi growls, the smile he tries to suppress giving him away.
“the tiniest but also the scariest kitten to ever exist!!” cooes seokjin, with his brows furrowed and lips jutted out, giving him the look of a fish.
“yah—“
jeongguk's quiet chuckles fills the air, stopping the both of them amidst their bickering. two sets of eyes turns to him, seokjin’s comically round-like ones about to pop out of their places. he freezes on spot, not knowing what he did wrong until a mirroring grin creeps on yoongi’s face, his gums showing.
“yah-“ seokjin lets out, face melting into one of his softer smiles, eyes glossy with sudden tears.
“i haven’t heard that laugh in so long,”
---
apparently, jeongguk looking like a kicked puppy and yoongi pouting for the whole talk he gave seokjin ( a goddamn presentation is what it is, seokjin is sure; with how jeongguk quietly nodded with every listed out reason as to why he had to take a week off of work to drive them to busan so they could all have an impromptu vacation in the middle of march) is enough to convince the eldest into giving up work and using up his precious days off.
it is to have a quiet and relaxing time together, hyungie, yoongi whines, jeongguk mirroring the pout the second eldest has sitting on his pretty pink lips. just for the three of us.
and seokjin gives in without a second thought, 'cuz why not? it is the two of his favorite dongsaengs.
so it is how the trio find themselves back in jeongguk’s family house. his mother feeds them a good amount of homemade food that leaves the three of them too full to even move from the place they have taken on the couch, all piled on top of each other. his father takes them to hiking, allowing them a breather from the darkest and dirtier air of the city.
and unsurprisingly, it's his older brother who realizes the state he is in, after catching him heaving out blood tinted rose petals in the bathroom upstairs. it takes them an ungodly amount of crying and begging to convince him to not tell their parents.
and it is how the following days pass, three of them spending time going all around the city while jeongguk wheezes through the vine sitting inside his chest, breathes shakily through pain every awake moment and heaves out love tainted silky hearts.
---
by the time their last day at the town comes, jeongguk has managed to not think about the past and the bright smile that adorned almost every memory he has of this town, every other second. instead, he focuses on the present, on how his hyungs smile so brightly, on how their ears seem to confess of their true feelings while their faces hold a simple smile, eyes running away from each other to not let it all show, hands chasing each other whenever they walk side by side. he thinks that at least they have matched feelings in a world so harsh, that at least they have found each other.
he is smiling endeared with the both of them, as his eyes swim through the shore, eyes taking up the beauty with all its glory incase he won't be able to remain on this world long enough to see it again. it is the color of the sky that has jeongguk feeling the lax he has felt since such a long time ago. he thinks at the moment that maybe, maybe he can manage things. maybe he can learn to live with the pain patched deep into his chest. maybe he can guide himself on the way to let go; of the past, of the pain, of his love.
then a familiar face catches his eyes, attention drawing to the face he hasn’t seen in so long. the now-black locks framing his thinner face, an oversized shirt all too familiar, one that he has been missing for the majority of the last year; and eyes the most vulnerable they have been since a long time, directed at him with a gaze so strong.
jeongguk's breath catches in his throat, a wheezy sound going past his constricted windpipe. suddenly the feeling hits him, pain roaring through his belly all the way up to his lungs.
he feels the bile rising his throat, the burning he hasn’t felt much in the past couple of days coming back with so much more intensity. it burns and burns and his knees wooble underneath his weight. he doesn't hear the sound of his body hitting on the hard ground through the thumping in his ears. colors swim in his vision as he clenches a hand around his pectoral, hand unable to take the pain out.
through his blurry sight, he makes out seokjins face in front of his, warm hands and equally soft embrace taking him in. he sees his mouth moving but can't make out the words past the ringing in his ears. the darkness takes over the flurry of colors.
he lets it go.