Chapter Text
I. SUMMER FEVER DREAM
“Never step into a fairy ring,” Granny had once said, “or else it will bring you bad luck.”
Granny was an old spinster but Hyunjin knew to never question her wisdom. Ever since he could remember, Hyunjin had been told all his life that fairy rings brought nothing but misfortune. He was instructed to immediately evade them if he just so happened to stumble upon them. There were no known survivors among Moondew Valley who lived to tell the story of what catastrophes fairy rings entailed for the ignorant.
At first, Hyunjin had been dubious like any other twelve year old who began to find skepticism in the fables that adults used to scare children into behaving, but he knew better than to doubt the words of Granny. She lived far longer than Hyunjin has and knew more than he could ever comprehend, and he’d always been a docile child, so Hyunjin did as he was told.
But one day, when he found a boy sunbathing within a fairy ring beneath an old rowan tree, Hyunjin halted in his tracks behind the shrubs of rhododendrons, letting the four-leaf clovers he plucked out of boredom flutter to the ground between his fingers.
The boy looked almost intangible; the outline of his figure was softened by the bright chords of sunlight. Above him, the sun hung like an opal stone speckled with gold, and for a moment, Hyunjin thought a trick had been played on his squinting eyes when he saw the sky waver -- like the boy who laid upon the earth was a magnet that lured in the rays of the sun.
Hyunjin was seconds away from running back down the trail he had come from to return to the cottage, but seeing the stranger lay in the fairy ring so ignorantly left a ladder of goosebumps along his back. Hyunjin at least had Granny to tell him these things, but maybe the boy didn’t. Maybe the boy was like Changbin, who often fluctuated between living in the attic of the town’s church or in the basement of his foster folks.
With a sudden sense of responsibility, but mostly out of an attempt at heroism, Hyunjin pivoted in his path and trekked towards the boy instead. He kept his distance from the fairy ring and called out, “Hey! You’re not supposed to be in there!”
The boy snapped his head over at Hyunjin. He looked young, with his baby cheeks and eyes resembling that of an innocent lamb. “Huh? Be in what?”
“In the fairy rings,” Hyunjin elaborated with a frown. “You should know they bring bad luck! Danger, even. No one ever comes back from a fairy ring. Something always happens to them, so you should get out of it before bad luck gets to you too.”
The boy guffawed. He sat up from his lounge with blades of grass stuck in the tufts of his dark hair and asked incredulously, “Now, who told you that lie?”
Hyunjin blinked. He expected more of a terrified reaction that an amused one. Something about the boy was definitely not right. “It’s not a lie. My granny doesn’t lie, so you’re the one who’s lying.”
“Am not!”
“Am too!”
The boy clicked his tongue and shook his head in resignation. He crossed his legs in the fairy ring and folded his arms against his chest. His eyes glowed the colour of topazes against the sun. “Moondew has it all wrong. Fairy rings aren’t evil. They’re magical.”
“Magical?” Hyunjin eyed the ring of mushrooms suspiciously.
“Mhm. It’s obvious, don’t you think? It’s all in the name. This is where the fairies live. I was waiting for them, but now I don’t think they’re gonna come anymore because you interrupted me. They don’t like intruders.” The boy sulked. “Thanks a lot, by the way.”
Hyunjin might have felt an inkling of guilt if he weren’t too hung up on the fact that the boy was talking about creatures of all things. God, he should’ve booked it home the moment he saw him. “Are you crazy? Fairies don’t exist.”
“They do! And I can prove it to you,” he said, patting the space between him. “The fairies do like extra company. Maybe they’ll change their mind!”
“You want me to come in there?”
“Of course. Where else?”
Hyunjin promptly declined by sitting down on the grass outside of the fairy ring. “No! I rather live the rest of my life happily and full of luck!”
The boy frowned, but then his eyes zeroed in on the object in his hands. He pointed at it and asked, “What’s that?”
Hyunjin blinked down at the four-leaf clovers he still had in his hand. Most of them had flown away when he loosened his grip on them earlier prior to approaching the boy, but some of them still stuck to the balminess of his palm. “They’re four-leaf clovers. You -- you don’t know about them?” When the boy shook his head, Hyunjin lifted one up for him to see it clearly. “They’re super rare and supposed to bring good luck.”
“Perfect!” The boy exclaimed. “Then they can defend you against the 'bad luck', right? That means you’ll be fine even if you step in. Now, if I’m gonna prove to you that they exist, you’re gonna have to sit here beside me.”
“Um. I don’t know -- “
He said in a sing-song voice, “The fairies are waiting!”
Hyunjin hesitated for a moment. The kid was nuts. He had to be. Hyunjin’s never saw him before either, which was strange, because Moondew Valley was barely populated and everyone knew each other. Even the people from the neighbouring seaside town knew everybody that inhabited Moondew.
But past all the eccentricity, there was something familiar about the boy. Hyunjin couldn’t quite place why or what it was. Though his mind was against stepping into the fairy ring, his heart was being pulled towards it, and Hyunjin couldn’t ignore the nimbus-like gravitation.
Hyunjin looked down at the four-leaf clovers in his hands. Taking a deep inhale, he slowly approached the fairy ring, eyeing the arc of mushrooms dubiously before taking a hesitant step in. Nothing changed. The air, the sky, the sun -- everything remained the same.
“See?’ The boy snickered as he patted at the space between him for Hyunjin to sit. “Moondew’s been feeding you a bunch of false truths.”
“Where are the fairies?” Hyunjin frowned, looking around.
“We have to wait! They show up at a certain time when the sky collides with the earth.”
Hyunjin slanted him a puzzled look. He finally took a seat beside the boy and crossed his legs. Their knees bumped together. “You don’t look that much younger than me, but you sound really smart. Do you go to a special school?”
He blinked. “School?”
“Aw man, please tell me you know what that is too.”
“Oh. Oh. Yes, school! Of course I have school, but I’m homeschooled,” he said with a vehement nod before sticking his hand out. “I’m Jisung. I live at the end of the lane with my papa. We run the Han’s farm.”
Hyunjin had never heard of the Han’s farm. He didn’t even know such a family farm existed. The only families in Moondew he was most acquainted with that ran farms were the Kim’s and Yang’s. He frowned, confused, but decided to forgo the questioning. His eyes flickered down to Jisung’s extended hand and he sheepishly shook it. “I’m Hyunjin.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Hyunjin. Isn’t it super cool that our first memory together will be with the fairies?”
“I guess so,” he said with half the excitement as Jisung had. Then, he glanced down at the clovers still sticking to his hands and an idea sprung into his head. “Hey, um. I actually have a curfew, so I can’t stay too long, but maybe we can use these as an offering for the fairies so they’ll show up faster. Would that work?” Enticement, his granny had once said to him, when she put out a dish of milk for the stray black cat that often visited their cottage.
Jisung beamed, the stars in his eyes progressively becoming larger by the second. “I never thought about that before. That’s actually a good idea. Fairies can be a little greedy so I bet they’ll appreciate it!”
He sounded so genuinely in awe that it had Hyunjin feel embarrassed. He placed the bundle of clovers down and spread them around the ring of mushrooms, making sure to distribute them evenly. Afterwards, once they were done, they laid down on the grass and waited patiently for the fairies.
They lounged beneath the sun’s smile, half shielded by the large tapestry of shrubs twined with vermillion berries from the rowan tree that protected their eyes. The grass underneath him felt cool and prickly, and Hyunjin could have fallen asleep from the cozy warmth the sun brought upon them if it weren’t for Jisung being a chatterbox.
Hyunjin listened to him talk about all sorts of things: first, of his age (they were the same age) and then mainly of the fairies -- debunking the popular belief of how they were altruistic beings when, in reality, they were gnarly and vicious. They were like flies, but tinier and gold and deposited dust everywhere they went. But most importantly, they were loyal companions to the sun.
However, Hyunjin was finally lulled to sleep by Jisung’s voice at some point of their conversation. He’d woken up blearily to a sky that was all pink and blues, cascading into a coral red faraway in the horizon where the yolk-like sun was slowly descending behind the rolling hills. Realization dawned on him and Hyunjin sat up, eyes wide.
“Oh hiya, you’re awake now,” Jisung greeted cheerfully with a smile as he plucked the twig out of Hyunjin’s hair. They were still side by side in the fairy ring. The setting sun’s warm hues licked across his freckled face, making the rings in his eyes flicker like the goldenrod flowers his granny kept in their garden.
“Did I -- how long was I out?”
“I dunno. Maybe a few hours? You missed the fairies, by the way,” Jisung sighed, patting Hyunjin on the shoulder as consolation. “I didn’t wake you up because you were sleeping like a baby. I must have put you to sleep with all my talking, huh?”
“No!” he exclaimed, shaking his head. A leaf fell onto his shoulder and he flicked it away. “I liked hearing you talk. I just have trouble sleeping at night so I’m always tired.”
Jisung blinked. “Oh. Okay.”
“I’m sorry I fell asleep,” he said sheepishly, and noticed how the four-leaf clovers were all gone. “But next time I promise I won’t fall asleep. I’ll even hunt down more clovers too so we can offer them to the fairies. I still need to see them with my own eyes to believe in them, after all.”
“Whoa. Really?”
“Really.” Hyunjin nodded as confirmation. He grinned as Jisung whooped in enthusiasm, and they locked pinky fingers to seal the deal.
They parted ways at the forked path. Jisung went off towards the end of the lane while Hyunjin passed by Seungmin’s house, greeting the younger boy with a shout. Seungmin sprung from the porch of his bungalow house and waved at him until Hyunjin feared his shoulder would pop out of place.
Hyunjin liked going to the Kim’s house. They were a small but rowdy family and Hyunjin always felt welcomed and accepted into their home. Hyunjin’s cottage house was too quiet, and sometimes, he felt a little lonely.
Granny was the quiet type. She preferred to knit, read, collect fine china, and decorate the cottage with indoor plants that made Hyunjin grow used to the earthy scent always permeating the halls. Rather than socialize with the rest of the folks in all of Moondew, she’d listen to Chopin’s Nocturnes on her old gramophone, and the both of them would solve large puzzles together on the large rug resembling blue and white pottery.
But Hyunjin supposed he didn’t mind, in the end. Her quiet affection made Hyunjin feel warm too.
Later that night, Hyunjin went to bed with his head in a pool of moonlight. He didn’t sleep until the sun began to rise, and he dreamt of a memory that unraveled an overwhelming sense of misplaced familiarity.
Playground shenanigans were orbiting around him. Kids were building castles in the sand box with lime green buckets and a pail of water they’ve fetched from a nearby water fountain. A circuit of laughter rang in an exchange of hide-and-seek, and then there was the wailing of a child who’d fallen during a game of hopscotch. But in the midst of all the chaos, Hyunjin had noticed a boy on the swings, fervently swinging back and forth in accordance with his kicking legs.
Hyunjin was curious, because he swung high and fast, relentless and free, as though he was aiming for the sky.
He went down the slide, feet hitting the sand that molded beneath his feet as he stood up. The sun in the distance seemed to have risen higher, hotter, and heavier on his back. When Hyunjin stopped in the middle of his short journey, the boy met Hyunjin’s eyes -- dark and familiar but bright like river gold.
The boy swung higher until he merged with the sun that burned behind him. Hyunjin squinted against the harsh sunlight, but for a second that he was able to witness, Hyunjin swore that the boy and the sun had become one. His figure melted into the centerpiece of the burning star as though he was made to belong there.
But then the swing came back down and he was no longer there.
Hyunjin opened his eyes to the early skylight spilling softly into his room. He rubbed at the crusts of his eyes and slowly sat up. It was a strange and fuzzy dream, and the details were beginning to ebb into forgetfulness, but he knew one thing for certain.
The boy who’d been swallowed whole by the sun, was Jisung.
🌣
It became an unspoken routine, after, to hunt down four-leaf clovers and meet Jisung at the fairy ring everyday.
Hyunjin would wake up at six in the morning and lend a hand in preparing breakfast and lunch. Depending on the day’s menu, there would be freshly made scones with apricot jam gifted by the Kim’s. Cubes of sugar and cream in the teas. Then, lunch would be something light, like an easy combo of club sandwiches or congee with youtiao. Afterwards, they would make blancmange and put it in the freezer to cool so that they could eat it in the evening, and Hyunjin would be shooed off when his Granny began to make her famous sweet rice dessert.
He would spend the next hour tending the garden in the back of their cottage. His granny grew an assortment of vibrant flowers, as well as fruits and vegetables that curled vines over the wooden support blocks he’d assembled to keep them upright. He’d sip on the pink lemonade his granny made as a refreshment, and at noon, his granny went to town for groceries and bargain-priced vegetables at the market. She always brought back an abundance of unusual spices and herbs, but Hyunjin never knew what they were for.
Once he was done with all his chores, Hyunjin would go on his journey to collect four-leaf clovers around the fields. He walked past their shed where they kept their gardening tools, and past the Yang’s where he saw the only son smudge dirt onto his cheeks by accident. Hyunjin waved at him, and Jeongin waved back with an oblong grin.
The sunlight was more powerful as the season deepened, drying up the air. His eyes travelled across the grass, tip toeing into his neighbour’s property in order to scope for any four-leaf clovers. He climbed over the fences of the Jeon farm, getting distracted by watching them groom the animals. He saw Mr. Jeon brush the fine hairs of the horse by the stables and his oldest son was carrying stainless steel milk cans from the barn.
Hyunjin went on his merry way back to the tarmac road. He collected as many clovers as he could before he arrived at the meadows, eyes tracing the large entity of the billowing rowan tree. He spotted Jisung sitting within the fairy ring with his head tilted skyward and his eyes closed. He donned denim overalls that looked too big for his thin frame; the sleeves of his plaid shirt still drooped despite being rolled up to the elbows.
He perked up at the sound of footsteps. Jisung looked up at Hyunjin with a warm, broad smile, and exclaimed, “You’re here!”
“I really hope you’re wearing a lot of sunscreen,” Hyunjin said as a greeting, sitting down beside him and spreading the four-leaf clovers around the arc of red-capped mushrooms. It was muscle memory, at this point.
“What? Sunscreen?”
“Yeah, like. SPF? You know, to protect your skin from the sun?”
Jisung narrowed his eyes and hummed. “What an odd creation.”
There were times Jisung spoke with an oddly urbane parlance that Hyunjin debated whether or not to dig at. He was younger in all physical aspects, but there seemed to be an old soul stuck inside of him. Or maybe he was just really, really smart and weird.
But then again, that was how people viewed Hyunjin in school, too. He should know better than to judge someone’s way of speaking when he was subject to that by his classmates.
Frowning, he shook the thoughts away, and asked, “So are we gonna see the fairies today? We’ve been doing this for almost a week and they’ve never showed up. I’m starting to think they’re not even real at all.”
“Hey, you gotta believe in them in order to see them!” Jisung nudged him with an arm. “Keep your faith in them big and strong and they’ll show up for sure. They should be here during the golden hour.”
“Really?” Hyunjin eyed him, doubtful.
“Trust me.” A pause. “Bro.”
Hyunjin snorted and covered his mouth. Jisung blinked at him. Hyunjin could feel his chest hurt from holding in his laughter, before he finally gave in and started giggling into arms. “Okay, bro.”
Jisung looked confused but he joined in anyway, and they laid there laughing together underneath the rowan tree with dappled sunlight prancing across the grass. After their laughter died down, Hyunjin picked at the grass cushioned beneath them.
“You should come over sometime, if you want,” Hyunjin offered quietly. His heart was pounding in his ears. “My granny makes some kickass porridge. We eat it with blackberry jam all the time and it’s really good. I -- we have a garden too, if you like flowers. But I think everyone likes flowers. My granny grew a big squash and showed it off to our neighbours the other day. It was huge. Jeongin didn’t like it though. He ran away from me when I chased him with it. Um. What was I saying again?”
Jisung looked pleased at the idea and unfazed at his rambling. “Whoa, I'd love to come. I’ve never been to someone else’s house before! Would your parents mind, though?”
“Oh, I don’t have any,” Hyunjin said casually. “I’ve been living with my granny for as long as I can remember. She said she found me all alone in a forest one day as a wee little baby, all wrapped up in a blanket while bawling my eyes off. I think it’s ‘cause I pooped my pants. I wasn’t even wearing a diaper.” He shuddered.
“What an odd way to give up a baby,” Jisung said with a frown.
Hyunjin couldn’t help but laugh.
They were quiet for a moment. Hyunjin turned to look at Jisung, who was looking up at the sky through the gaps of the tapering leaves hanging above them. “How about you? You said you run a farm with your dad, right?”
Jisung hummed. His eyes wandered to the side. “Yeah, just me and papa. He works as a fishmonger in town, too.”
“Really? How can just the two of you manage a farm? That’s so much work.”
“We have help.” Jisung was plucking at a purple coneflower and twisting its stem. He doesn’t give Hyunjin another chance to answer when he gasps out loud. “Hey! Why don’t we make flower crowns?”
Jisung didn’t seem to want to talk about it, so Hyunjin shook away the urge to pry. Off to another task, Hyunjin picked at a variety of wildflowers he could find within the vicinity without having his whole body out of the fairy ring. Most of the flowers he found were black-eyed Susans and cornflowers, although he noticed a summer’s pheasant-eye near the trunk base of the rowan tree. It was mostly Jisung doing the making while Hyunjin did the collecting.
He piled them all together for Jisung as he intertwined the vines. It was a flimsy little thing, slightly wilted from the lack of sturdiness in its structure, but the dainty flowers that filled the spaces in between rendered it a delicate headpiece.
“Uhh. Wait, not on me!” Hyunjin leaned back when Jisung reached out towards him with the flower crown in hand. “I don’t think I should really wear that.”
“What? Why not?”
Hyunjin shrunk a bit, fiddling with the blades of grass. “It -- I don’t know. It probably wouldn’t suit me? I mean, all the boys in my school are always saying how these things are for girls only and I -- you know. I shouldn’t do it or else they’ll --”
“What?” Jisung squawked in disbelief. “That’s a bunch of crockshit!”
Hyunjin pointed at him, agape. “You swore.”
“Who cares!”
“I do!” Hyunjin huffed. “I’m older than you! I’m supposed to say crockshit. Where’d you learn to say that anyways?”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter.” Jisung waved at it dismissively. “What’s so girly about a flower crown? Flower crowns are pretty and you’re pretty! Put two and two together and you get the prettiest thing in the world, so what’s the problem?”
Hyunjin blinked. It took a moment for Hyunjin to fully wrap his head around the fact that Jisung had called him pretty of all things. He’d never been called pretty before. Embarrassed, his face grew hot and he felt like he was a piece of wheat bread being toasted into oblivion.
“You’re prettier,” he blurted.
“Stop that.” Jisung shoved at his shoulder. “Accept it, Hyunjin. You’re pretty and those boys are just jealous. I mean, look at your little dots.” He reached forward to gently poke at the mole underneath his eye and the one on his cheek. “They’re so cool! Like stars in a peach sky.”
Hyunjin groaned and covered his face. Compliments were always a weird and uncomfortable thing for him. He never knew how to react to them. But when he felt something drop on the top of his head, he peeked through his fingers to find Jisung grinning at him with arms akimbo. Hyunjin gently touched at the petals of the wildflowers that had been braided into a crown.
“There you go,” Jisung said with a proud look on his face. “A king ready for his throne!”
Hyunjin screwed his face up in confusion. “A king? But what would I be the king of?”
“You would be the king of the fairy ring!” Jisung proclaimed as he swept his arms in a grand, wide arc. “The lover of the sun.”
The sun was burning bright in the distance. Liquid gold collided with lilac mountains. Hyunjin stared at Jisung and the wondrous look in his eyes, and asked, “What about you, then? What would you be the king of?”
Jisung shrugged. “Some princes don’t become kings.”
“You could be mine,” Hyunjin rushed out, then waved his hands frantically at his slip. “I mean -- my king. You could be my king. We’d be kings together. That’d be pretty neat, wouldn’t it?”
Jisung blinked in mild surprise. He was looking at Hyunjin as though he was a different person, as though he saw him as someone else. But there was fondness in the smooth laugh lines of his face, round cheeks tinted a dusty pink that resembled the blushing hues of the sky.
“Okay,” Jisung said, smiling, “I’ll be your king.”
Soft, orange light scattered across the sky, illuminating their faces in the shape of an hourglass. It looked like a landscape right out of an oil painting, and at that very moment, Hyunjin felt calm and unbothered, detached from his problems as though it had been plucked right out of his psyche and was left hanging in the air.
Hyunjin closed his eyes and listened to his breathing, and Jisung’s breathing -- the gentle rise and fall of their chests in tandem. The grass underneath him brushed against his skin, making him itch.
And then something brushed against his cheek -- soft and willowy, like a butterfly’s wing. And again, it fluttered against his cheek, down to his jaw, then around his ear.
“Hyunjin.”
Hyunjin opened his eyes, and his breath hitched. He stared at this -- this thing, this tiny little thing that was floating in the space between his crossed eyes. The tiny, winged creature was glowing and scattering gold dust after its wake whenever its wings fluttered gently in the air. Hyunjin couldn’t make out the details of it for it was too small, but it was real, and it was right in front of him looking like the size of his fingernail.
He realized there were more than just one. Hyunjin looked around slowly, finding a few, glowing creatures flying around him. They were like fireflies that shimmered stardust. They were humming, too -- a meld of dulcet, unfamiliar sounds, or voices, that sounded almost digital and far away from his ears. It reminded Hyunjin of those mystical narrators of a fantasy game.
“They’re real,” Hyunjin whispered, staring at Jisung in awe who was full-on grinning at him with a fairy perched on his nose. You’re real.
“Told you,” Jisung chuckled, then winced as he flicked the fairy on his nose off. The fairy flitted away in a parabolic curve. “Ow! You kicked me.” He aggressively motioned at the winged creatures. “See what I mean? They may look like they’re innocent but they’re totally vicious.”
“Well, I think they’re nice.” Hyunjin didn’t exactly see the viciousness. The fairies flew around him and left behind a gentle whorl of wind that tickled his face. He felt himself smiling as a fairy pranced around in the air in front of him, and another one played with the curls of his hair. “But, um. Why are they all coming to me?”
All of the fairies had fluttered towards Hyunjin. He was completely surrounded by fairies while Jisung was left all alone. A mountain of plaited voices grew demandingly in his ears, becoming more jarring than pleasant, and he was half-tempted to cover his ears when he caught the bewildered look across Jisung’s face. His eyes were wide, unreadable, mouth hung agape.
And then a simple: “Oh.”
“Oh? What oh?” Hyunjin frowned as the voices grew louder and harsher. Hyunjin swatted the fairies away, but golden dust fell onto his clothes and he hurriedly swept them away, only to have his hands become swathed in them. “Jisung?”
“We have to leave.” Jisung snatched Hyunjin by the wrist and frantically dragged him out of the fairy ring. As soon as they stepped out of the circle, the waterfall of magical voices dispersed into the calm silence of the countryside. The fairies were gone. The sun had set, leaving behind a belt of venus to set aglow in the sky. Hyunjin looked down at his hands, blinked, and the golden dust was gone, as though nothing had happened. His clothes were fairy-dust free.
“What was that all about?” Hyunjin asked, looking at Jisung, but Jisung was already looking far away. His eyes had glazed over. “Are you okay, Jisung?”
He let go of Hyunjin’s wrist. Shadows fell upon his face. “I -- I have to leave. I, um. I have to leave. I’m sorry. I just remembered that papa is going to take me to town with him tomorrow and stay at an inn there, so I won’t be here for a bit. I don’t know when I’ll be back, but I’ll find you when I return, okay?”
“Okay,” Hyunjin said quietly, slowly, caught off guard at the late notice. He couldn’t judge, though. Hyunjin was pretty forgetful too. “But you look really pale. I can take you back to my place. Granny has some remedies you could take to feel better. Are you -- “
“I’m fine, don’t worry about me! But I have to go now. I’ll see you soon, Hyunjin.” Jisung gave him a quick wave. Before Hyunjin could return the gesture, Jisung had already sprinted off down the lane. He didn’t know if it was the sun playing tricks on him, but the hazy glow of the sunset seemed to have wrapped Jisung up in a halo, making him seem transparent and almost ghost-like.
Hyunjin wasn’t sure what to think of what happened. It had been fun but then it had taken an unexpected solemn turn. The fairies acted weird too, but the fact that fairies truly existed left Hyunjin buzzing with leftover energy and astonishment as he walked back home, his flower crown in hand.
His granny seemed surprised at his glowing expression, but her lips curled into a gentle smile as she set the dinner table with food. Once Hyunjin got washed up and had placed the flower crown in his room up on his shelf, they had honey-glazed potatoes and braised peas alongside steamed rice. Then, they had sweet blancmange with raspberries for dessert.
Hyunjin was sure that if he were to mention fairies, his granny would absolutely be livid. She’d probably backhand him across the head and he wouldn’t hear the end of it for the night. So, he opted to ask her a question that's been in the back of his mind. “Granny, do you know about the Han family?”
She looked up at him from her plate, narrowing her eyes. “The who, now?”
“The Han’s,” Hyunjin repeated.
“The Han’s?”
“Yeah! Like, the family that lives at the end of the lane? They own a farm. I mean, it’s just father and son, but they have help managing it.”
“Have you been up late reading too many novels again?” His grandma sighed. “I swear, you and your imagination be makin’ up the strangest of things. Nobody lives at the end of the lane anymore, boy. It’s abandoned property. No one has set a foot down on that land since the year of nineteen fifty.”
Something heavy stuck in his chest. “I -- what?”
That had to be a mistake. Jisung wouldn’t lie to him. He didn’t lie about the fairies, so he wouldn’t lie to Hyunjin about his family and where he lived, would he? Hyunjin wished he could march right down to the end of the lane to make sure everything was real, that he wasn’t being lied to, but he was tied down by a curfew and Jisung was gone for an unknown amount of time.
Or maybe that was a lie too.
“Close your mouth or else all the flies will end up flying down your throat,” his grandma tapped his jaw and he immediately closed his mouth. She resumed back to her dessert, leaving Hyunjin baffled in his seat. He didn’t want to waste the food, so he managed to finish the blancmange despite having lost his appetite.
He retired to bed later that night. Sleepless nights come and go incessantly, so he often stayed up late underneath the blanket with a book in hand. It was only when the sun began to rise did Hyunjin find his eyes became heavy.
However, as he leaned his back against the wall by his bed and stared out the window, he watched the stars laid out like tessellations across the night sky flicker like a dim flame of a candle, burning until there was nothing left.
🌣
Changbin was a friend from school, but they didn’t grow close until Hyunjin witnessed him getting locked out of the basement of his house. Hyunjin never pried and only offered him a home to stay in so he had more options to choose from other than the church attic.
Changbin looked broody and small, but he was one of the nicest kids Hyunjin has ever met. There was a healing cut across his nose plastered with a teddy bear bandage, but that was from falling off of his bike and not out of a fight -- contrary to most of Moondew’s belief. He was only a year older but he was smarter than any other thirteen year old, which was why he decided to confide in him about Jisung when Changbin came by to visit the cottage with a bag full of candy.
“Jisung?” Changbin frowned, rolling the lollipop around in his mouth. “Never heard of him.”
“Not even around town?”
“Nuh-uh. Everyone’s too busy preparing for the upcoming farmer’s market so I haven’t heard any new gossip. I saw Seungmin running around town square with a bag full of apples when I was looking out the window yesterday. Has anyone ever told him he really looks like a puppy?” He puffed up his cheeks and pried his eyes open wider to mimic doe eyes. “Like, his face just does that.”
“Yeah, I do,” Hyunjin mumbled, more so distracted by the fact no one but Hyunjin knew Jisung. “Do you think I’m just going crazy?”
Changbin sighed. He threw an arm around his shoulder and knocked their heads together. “I know crazy, Hyunjinie. I know it very well. In fact, I live with crazy half of the time, and I can tell you with full confidence that you are not crazy.”
Hyunjin looked up at Changbin and the steadfast belief in his eyes. Hyunjin sniffled and ducked his head down. “Thanks.”
“Mhm.” He popped the lollipop out of his mouth. “I mean, I think I can understand this Jisung of yours. I don’t like telling people where I live because it’s kinda embarrassing. Maybe it’s the same for him too, you know, or maybe he feels pressured to not say anything about home. Parents, you know? Okay, maybe you don’t -- sorry -- but like. You know. Parents.”
Hyunjin nodded, patting him on the arm. “No offense taken. But I think you’re right. I should just be supportive and loyal and then he’ll become comfy enough to tell me things. I should respect his privacy!”
“Exactly. There ya go.”
“Thanks, Binnie,” Hyunjin said, grinning ear-to-ear. “Wanna go catch grasshoppers, now? You can sleepover too. Granny might need some extra hands to do the dishes.”
Changbin pointed at him with his lollipop, a twinkle in his eye. “Thought you’d never ask.”
Time passed and dissolved into a formless shape like the rain. Jisung had been gone for almost three weeks now, but Hyunjin tried not to worry. He went through his usual routine everyday and focused more on school while trying to ignore the boys in his grade. He bought a bunch of secondhand books at the town’s bookstore after he saved up enough money to splurge. He caught grasshoppers and chased dragonflies with Changbin and Seungmin and, at times, with Jeongin if he wasn't busy on the farm.
Most of the time, though, when Hyunjin was alone, he’d linger by the fairy ring and wait until the sun skimmed the earth. He waited until he had only five minutes left before his curfew, hoping Jisung would show up. And everyday he’d trudge home from the fairy ring feeling a bit lonelier than before.
Another week passed. Jisung didn’t return yet.
One day, his grandmother had taken him to a sunflower maze managed by the Lee’s so she could exchange herbs and oils with the family. Hiding behind the legs of Mr. Lee whose face was obscured by a baseball cap was their filial son, Minho.
Hyunjin never talked to him before. He’d never seen him around Moondew other than in the walls of his home. Granny had talked a bit about Minho -- how he was just two years older and was homeschooled by his mother who moonlighted as a kindergarten teacher when she wasn’t managing the maze. Granny had called him a shy little thing, but when he looked into Minho’s unwavering gaze as he walked past his house, Hyunjin might have thought otherwise.
While Granny did her usual bargaining thing with the Lee family, Hyunjin went to the maze. Sweat rolled down his forehead in the sweltering heat, his hair feeling sticky underneath his straw hat. No matter how little he wore, it did nothing to help him from the humidity, but Hyunjin supposed the maze proved to be useful; the sunflowers, towering in its vibrant beauty, had cast canopies of shade over him.
The plains were bathed in brilliant sunlight, white and pink clover on the hills, and he weaved through the path. It was a quiet afternoon and realized there was no one else visiting the maze. Hyunjin was the only one here.
The maze seemed like something Jisung would like.
Hyunjin wasn’t sure if it was the summer heat playing games on him, but he noticed something in the corner of his eye. Something rustled and Hyunjin whirled around. He caught the shift of the sturdy stalks and something -- someone -- with a head of brown disappeared through the crowded bed of sunflowers off trail. Hyunjin blinked and rubbed his eyes with the back of his hands. He wished there were people with him he could ask for confirmation that what he just saw was real.
Curiosity churned in his chest -- the same kind of curiosity that once kindled on a midsummer day when he saw a lone boy lying within a fairy ring.
Abandoning his hesitation, Hyunjin stepped over the hedge that divided the sunflowers away from the maze’s pathway. He barged through the stalks of sunflowers in pursuit of the mystery person, carefully pushing aside the sunflowers to allow room for him to pass through. He hadn’t realized how difficult this would be until a sunflower smacked him right in the face.
“Pfft -- ow, geez! Why can’t I be as tall as these sunflowers?” Hyunjin whined as he frantically swatted at his face and his shoulders in fear that bugs might have fallen on him. But then he heard something airy and light to his far left -- a giggle. Hyunjin faltered in his next step.
"Hello?” he tentatively called out.
There was only more rustling. Hyunjin followed the sudden sound of footsteps that appeared near his perimeter. He listened to the other bodily presence among the sibilant buzzing of cicadas and bees. Maybe there had been something odd in the pink lemonade his grandma had made for him in the morning, or maybe he failed to get enough sleep, always turning and writhing around in the dead of the night.
Maybe, Hyunjin thought to himself as his legs took him to the beam of light that peeked between the stalks when he finally reached the end of the league of sunflowers. He pushed past them and squeezed his eyes shut at the sudden swarm of light that overwhelmed him. It’s the heat causing illusions for me.
Maybe it’s --
“You found me,” a voice said.
Hyunjin blinked.
He was no longer in the plains. He found himself in a copper wheat field that reached slightly past his waist. Confused, Hyunjin looked behind him where the maze of sunflowers still stood tall and strong -- yet now, they looked more like a towering wall that stretched infinitely across the distance as though they separated two realms.
He looked back to the front. There was a barn in the distance that Hyunjin had never seen before. A small river along the path of hedgerows flowed all the way through a timberland. It felt like he’d been struck in the head and was dragged into a dream.
“Hyunjin,” the same voice said.
Hyunjin turned around until he came face to face with the boy suddenly standing in front of him. He was enveloped by a sundance; his entire body shimmered with gold dust that fell from his shoulders like sand that got caught between the fabrics of his clothes.
In the distance, the sundogs wavered.
“Jisung?” Hyunjin squeaked.
Jisung grinned, wide and sweet. “I told you I’d find you, didn’t I?”
“I -- what? Where are we? Why are you here? What happened? I was in the maze and then suddenly I’m -- here. What -- when did you even come back? You didn’t tell me you were back! Can you tell me what this place is now? Is this like the whole magic thingy you do with the fairies and stuff?”
“You ask so many questions,” Jisung sighed. He approached Hyunjin until their toes touched and lifted up a hand between them. “Here, I’ll show you.”
Hyunjin darted his eyes between his face and his offered hand. He looked up at the sky and the barn and the sunflowers. “I’m getting scared. This doesn’t feel real. You don’t feel --”
“No, you can’t do that!” Jisung interrupted him almost frantically. “You can’t say that. Please. You have to believe in me. I’ll show you that this is real if you just take my hand. ”
Hyunjin swallowed. He supposed when it came to Jisung, he could always suspend his disbelief. So, he took Jisung’s hand, and tried not to yell when Jisung immediately dragged him down the hill. His hand was warm and soft compared to Hyunjin’s that was sweaty and balmy.
They ran through the copper field as the wind billowed past them. He let Jisung take him through the tall grass that brushed past his skin and left behind an unearthly tingling. There were so many questions he itched to ask, but Hyunjin stuffed the urge down to laugh with Jisung as they danced and pranced around the field with arms opened wide for the sun.
The field seemed eternal when they finally laid down to catch their breaths. They marvelled up at the vanilla sky that reminded Hyunjin of a Claude Monet painting.
Panting, Hyunjin turned his head to look at Jisung, and asked, “Can you tell me what you were doing in town, at least? With your dad?”
“Oh. Papa just went to meet up with some old friends at the saloon that were staying for a few days. My clothes still smell like brine from how we were always near the ocean.” Jisung kept his eyes on the sky, the sunlight blurring his features for a moment.
“Oh. Okay,” he said. He pursed his lips and inhaled a quivering breath of courage. “Then, um. Can I ask why you’re here? I mean -- like, in Moondew. Why not live in the city, or in the actual town?”
“Papa wanted to live in town, but I didn’t. I wanted to live here because I was looking for someone.”
Hyunjin bit his lip, wondering if he should bring up what his granny had said the other day. The house at the end of the lane had been abandoned for a long time. But Hyunjin couldn’t, he can’t, so he pressed on in the same direction of the conversation: “Who were you looking for?”
“An old friend.”
“Did you find them?”
Jisung smiled a bit. It was a small, wistful curve to the edge of his mouth. “Yup, I did. But they don’t remember me anymore.”
“Oh.” Hyunjin looked up at the sky, guilty to have pried. “I’m sorry.”
“What’re you apologizing for? It’s not like it’s your fault!” Jisung waved it off, a big grin back on his face. “It’s not like I can do anything about it. I have to let the universe play out the nature of our fate! Even if they don’t remember me, I’m just happy I found them and that I’m able to be near them. I think that’s enough.”
Hyunjin wondered who his old friend was. Jisung spoke so fondly about them that it shouldn’t have made his heart feel so heavy.
He was startled out of his own thoughts when Jisung jumped right back up to his feet, helping Hyunjin up as well. “Alrighty, let’s continue our adventure!”
After lounging among the bed of tall wheats under the three suns, they ran all the way into the timberlands, skipping over the stones that sat between the rivers as they reached the other side, weaving through the gargantuan trees of yesteryear that stood mute in the summer air. The ground beneath him was lumpy with soil and spongy moss and ancient roots, twisting like snakes that turned to stone.
Jisung grabbed his hand and followed an illuminated path of white and gold that led them to an uncharacteristically large laburnum tree with yellow, silky blossoms that glowed in the heart of the woods.
Hyunjin stared up at it in awe. He could hear a magpie’s song in the distance. Bees zipped around the golden chain tree. With the susurration of the flowing river, the smell of damp moss and crushed leaves, Hyunjin gathered a flimsy bout of courage to muster up the words that have been sitting in the back of his throat for far too long.
“Jisung.” Hyunjin managed to say in between heavy breaths as they stopped before a wooden bridge that was beside the golden chain tree. Jisung turned around and the sunlight hit the side of his face in a hazy glow. “I think I’ve seen you before.”
“You have?”
“We were at the playground. And -- and you just vanished,” Hyunjin said, wringing his hands nervously. “I thought maybe I was imagining things, but you showed up again, and I knew you were real. You’re -- you’re really real, even if it’s hard to believe you are, sometimes.”
Jisung smiled thinly. “I’m real if you believe I’m real.”
“Where did you go that day, Jisung? From the swings -- where did you go?”
“I told you. I was looking for someone.”
Hyunjin stared at him, more perplexed than before. “That doesn’t make any sense. You -- disappeared. Nobody just disappears like that.”
“Everyone disappears at some point, Hyunjin.” Jisung bent down to pluck something out from the ground. Then, he circles a hand over Hyunjin’s wrist, tugging him forward. “It’s only the unlucky ones who come back.”
“I don’t get it.” Hyunjin dug his heels into the ground to stop Jisung from dragging him off. Embarrassingly, he continued on in an almost petulant tone. “Why can’t you be honest with me, Jisung? We’re friends, aren’t we? I don’t understand why you speak in riddles all the time. If fairies are real, then -- then I’m sure I can believe all the other things you’re hiding from me. I can believe you’re magic if you just tell me!”
Jisung grinned but didn’t reply. He took Hyunjin’s wrist, pried his hand open, and placed a cool object onto the center of his palm. Once Jisung’s hand was out of his view, Hyunjin realized that what he gave him was a rock. A very shiny, adularescent rock.
Hyunjin stared at it, then gave him a confused look. “What’s this? Why did you give me a rock?”
“It’s not a rock.” Jisung furrowed his brows, offended. “It’s a moonstone.”
“Where did you get that from?”
Jisung said innocently, “From the ground.”
A beat of silence. Then Hyunjin whipped his head down and felt his eyes bulge. Hyunjin hadn’t noticed them at all, too distracted from the thrill of running through the woods, but there they were growing like wildflowers. There were milky gemstones of pale blues unfurled towards the direction of the sunlight. They even had leaves.
“What the hell?” He felt slightly sick. “What the hell?”
“This forest grows moonstones,” Jisung chirped.
“On no planet do forests grow moonstones!” This kind of phenomenon could only be plausible in fantasy novels, in worlds scourged from vivid remnants of the imagination or in another dimension -- anywhere but the reality Hyunjin lived in. “I’ve gone bonkers, haven’t I? Oh no. Oh noooo.”
Jisung frowned. “You’re not going bonkers.”
“Then who are you? No -- what are you?”
Jisung clamped his mouth shut and his eyes softened. The sun behind him seemed to bellow a resounding brightness that seared into his retinas; Hyunjin squeezed his eyes shut in fear of going blind. The universe was burning and taking Jisung with it.
“I am a creation of both the haunted and the lonely,” Jisung said delicately, and Hyunjin opened his eyes to see him eclipsed in a shadow that brought out the gold of his eyes. “It’s known that all humans were made from the stars, and it just so happened that I was made from the biggest one.”
The forest hummed in a great, pulsing light. Eyes fluttered upon the creaking trees and the river whispered an endless script of moans.
Hyunjin felt his entire face scrunch up in confusion. He was about to open his mouth to curtly ask if that was a subtle way of saying he was a narcissist when Jisung interrupted him quickly with a guilty look. “That’s all I can really say without being too forward. It wouldn’t be right of me to interfere with the fates.” The more he talked, the more everything made no sense. “I’m sorry, Hyunjinnie. But this moonstone will be the token of this summer memory, and one day, you’ll finally understand. Promise me you’ll keep it.”
Hyunjin primed his lips and clutched the moonstone tightly. He wanted to desperately grab Jisung by the shoulders and shake all the answers out of him, but as much as that was tempting, he couldn’t -- not when Jisung looked so distraught by his own, unexplained restrictions. He was trying, at least. That was something.
Heaving a sigh out of resignation, he looked down at the precious stone he held between ginger fingers, and said, “Okay. I promise. But you won’t disappear again, will you?”
Jisung immediately lit up like a comet. “Nope. You’re forever stuck with me. I won’t easily be gotten rid of! I’ll be like a leech, or like a fly! Bzzt bzzt.” He ran his fingers up and down Hyunjin’s arm and he laughed, swatting his clingy hands away.
Though there were so many questions yet to be answered, Hyunjin had hope that he would get his answers one day, even if it won’t be today or tomorrow or in weeks, months, and years. Hyunjin could wait. He was good at waiting.
With Jisung hooking their arms together, they made their way back out of the timberlands. Hyunjin played with the stone in his hand, gaping at its beauty as he lifted it up towards the sky and let the stone reflect off of the sunlight, making it glow and shimmer with what seemed like silver dust.
Hyunjin turned to look at Jisung, wanting to ask if there was a meaning behind a moonstone, when he saw the faraway look in his eyes. To Hyunjin, Jisung looked more and more like a dream every passing day. He was a figure of warm, hazy gold, like light falling upon pines -- a resurrecting kind of beauty. He wondered how a small boy could possess so much more light than the sun.
When they returned to the asphalt road past the sunflowers, the wheat field no longer existed anymore. In fact, he was back on the road with the lemonade stand beside a large truck, and there was only a field of green and slopes of wildflowers and sunsprites in the distance. No barn, no river travelling into the timberlands, no Claude Monet’s vanilla sky hovering above them.
The question was teetering on the tip of his tongue when Jisung smiled and beat him to it. “A sun illusion.”
“A sun what?” Hyunjin puckered his forehead. “Like -- like a mirage?”
Jisung rubbed a hand over his chin. “I guess so? Just like how when you’re stranded in a desert and you’re thirsty, and then you think you see an oasis when it’s not really there -- maybe back there, the sun was lonely. Maybe that’s why it made up a place so that it could spend time with someone it misses even if it was all an illusion.”
“But the sun isn’t alive.” Hyunjin frowned. “So how could it feel lonely?”
“Trust me. The sun is really really, lonely. It’s been lonely for so long.”
Hyunjin didn’t think that was possible, but then again, fairies existed and he just exited a totally magical forest that grew moonstones. Anything could be possible, at this point.
Frowning, he looked down at their feet, where an ant was crawling over the laces of his shoes. “Oh. That’s kind of sad. I hope the sun feels a little less lonely now, then, since we went to play in its mirage.”
He looked up at Jisung when he heard soft laughter. Jisung smiled at him with so much warmth and fondness that Hyunjin had to look away again. “You’re really nice, Hyunjinie. No wonder the stars here adore you so much.”
At Hyunjin’s confused look, Jisung patted him on the back and nudged his cheek against his shoulder. “It’s okay! You’re a smart guy. You read so much so I’m sure you’ll understand one day. You’re gonna put two and two together soon!”
“Don’t patronize me,” Hyunjin mumbled, though not unkindly. He smiled a bit shyly at being called smart so he flicked Jisung on the forehead. “Granny’s got lemonade back home so come over to rehydrate yourself before you go back to your farm, okay? I don’t want you to pass out from the heat.”
He took Jisung’s hand and tugged him down the road, ignoring a pair of eyes following their movements.
Later that evening, after Jisung had returned home and left a dazzling first impression from showering his grandma in compliments about her food, she had stared at the chair Jisung had once occupied. She had on an unreadable, tight-lipped expression.
“He’s my friend I've been telling you all about, Granny. He’s Jisung! He lives at the end of the lane of Moondew Valley,” Hyunjin said. “Do you believe me now?”
Granny sighed, knotting together her wrinkly hands. “I would’ve known if a new family moved into the Valley, silly boy. But he seems like a nice, charming young man. I’m happy to see you two get along. It’s not everyday you bring a friend home aside from that Bin boy.” She stood up, collecting the cups with a smirk. “You should bring him over more often. I could use another pair of hands with the garden.”
“Granny!“
“I’m kidding -- somewhat. Now, stop your yapping and help me with the dishes.”
🌣
Hyunjin ended up bringing Jisung over to their cottage more often.
During the afternoons where the sun was at its peak and they were sweating their brows off, they would retreat back to Hyunjin’s cottage and lounge around in his bedroom instead of staying at the fairy ring. (The fairies were much nicer nowadays; some of them tried to braid Hyunjin’s hair since it was long. Hyunjin still couldn’t understand the language they spoke, but it was nice to listen to.)
Sometimes, they would take naps together since Jisung couldn’t sleepover due to a strict curfew. Hyunjin would end up falling asleep with Jisung curled in his arms and the fan blowing gently at them from above. Though Jisung was smaller in frame, he had the aura of someone who was strong and sturdy. Being with Jisung always made him feel at peace. Like Changbin, Jisung wouldn’t hurt him like the other boys at school.
At some point, Hyunjin had suggested introducing Jisung to his friends, but Jisung had vehemently rejected the idea.
“Why not?” Hyunjin frowned. “I promise they’re really nice. Changbin looks scary when you first meet him but he has a bowl cut so that makes him less scary. Seungmin is really nice too. So is Jeongin. I promise they’re not like the boys at my school.”
Jisung shook his head, chewing his lip. “I can’t. I’m not ready yet. I’m not done.”
“Done with what?”
“With a lot of things. Just, not yet, okay?”
Hyunjin tilted his head. He saw the trepidation in Jisung’s eyes and ruffled his hair. “Okay. It’s not a big deal, Jisung. I can wait. I’m good at waiting. Do you -- do you wanna see my favourite book?”
Almost immediately, the nervousness was washed away by pure excitement. Jisung bobbed his head eagerly and Hyunjin grinned before he crawled over to his desk. He grabbed the book and returned back to his spot, handing it to Jisung with clammy hands.
“It’s a kid’s book. I know it’s a little weird but I like it a lot. It makes me happy when I’m feeling sad.”
Most kids in Hyunjin’s grade usually picked on him for reading all the time. He’d read during break, during recess, during lunch, and even during assemblies if he was able to sneak his book into the gymnasium. Reading was fun, but not everyone seemed to feel the same way. He still remembered the day where one of his classmates had snatched his book from his hands during recess, and in front of an audience, ripped it to shreds.
Even though his classmate got in trouble, that didn’t mean it hurt any less nor did it mean Hyunjin could ever talk about how much it hurt him in the first place. He picked up the torn pages and hid it inside his pocket, because feelings were meant to be stowed away and kept locked in a box, right? That’s what adults always did, didn’t they?
But Jisung was smiling. He looked genuinely intrigued at the cover. “The Velveteen Rabbit. It sounds so cool. I’ve never read it before, what’s it about?”
That wasn’t a reaction Hyunjin was expecting, but then again, Jisung was always full of surprises. “It’s about a stuffed rabbit that becomes real through the love of a little boy.”
“Oh, what a pretty story.” Jisung flipped through the pages, ooh-ing and aah-ing at the illustrations. “What a pretty, little rabbit.”
Hyunjin watched the pages flip. His chest felt warm. “When I feel like I’m doing a bad job at being a person, the rabbit in the story reminds me to be myself, and that I’m loved by so many people, like Granny, my friends, and you. And that means I’m -- I’m real. And the boy reminds me to love like how the boy loved his rabbit so much his rabbit became real too.”
Jisung smiled. There was a softness to the tilt of his lips. “What about you? Will you still love your rabbit even if it disappears, one day?”
“But I’d have to stop loving it for it to disappear,” said Hyunjin.
“Maybe it isn’t just love. Maybe it’s also faith. If you stop believing in them, in the realness of them, then they’d fade away too.”
“I guess so.” Hyunjin frowned.
Jisung closed the book and hugged it, before plopping a big, wet smooch onto the cover. Hyunjin gawked, unsure if he should be grossed out at there being mouth germs on his book now. “What a wonderful person you are, Hyunjinie! May the stars stay with you through day and night in the absence of the sun.”
“Huh?”
“So, is this what you wanna do when you grow up? Writing stories and all that?” Jisung barged on. At Hyunjin’s sheepish nod, he beamed and raised the book in his hands over his head. “Wow. I’ll be the first one to buy your book then! You’re gonna take the world by storm and be one of the best authors out there! Your granny is gonna be so proud and so will I!”
He watched the light in Jisung’s eyes gleam with pure faith in him. It was the feeling of a starburst, sweet and a bit sour. Hyunjin ducked his head down and covered his face with an arm, unable to hide the blush that crept up from his toes to his neck to his face and to the tips of his ears. “Stooop.”
“Why? Why?” Jisung poked at Hyunjin’s cheek. “Hey, come on. Don’t be shy.”
“I’m not shy!”
Jisung snorted. Then, he grabbed Hyunjin’s head and yelled out a consecutive list of compliments into his ears, ignoring Hyunjin’s desperate pleas for mercy. Laughing, Jisung flopped onto him and threw an arm over his shoulder to bring him closer to his chest so he could lay his cheek atop of Hyunjin’s head. He felt like a cat trying to snuggle with him. Hyunjin didn’t mind since his grandma wasn’t the cuddling type and he’d always wanted to try and be the little spoon.
“I’ll always believe in you, Hyunjin,” Jisung whispered. “Even if you don’t believe in me anymore, that’s okay, because I’ll do the believing for the both of us.”
Hyunjin glanced up at him, though all he saw was the underside of Jisung’s jaw. “Hannie?”
“I’ll always find you.”
Hyunjin let out a breathy laugh. He’d learn to go along with their nonlinear conversations, even if it was progressively becoming more confusing. “And I’ll find you too.”
“Can you read the story to me?”
Hyunjin grinned. “Okay.”
They spend the rest of the afternoon basking in the little sunspot of his room. He read the words out loud in a soft voice, accompanied by the ricochet of flipping pages, and Hyunjin wondered if he would love Jisung as much as the little boy loved his velveteen rabbit too.
🌣
Come September, the leaves on the trees began to darken. Among the days of playing with scheming fairies, venturing through dreamscapes made by sun illusions, and slowly unravelling the mystery that was Jisung, Hyunjin found an attachment for the serenity of the routine that had become so ingrained into his life. Magic existed in this world and Hyunjin knew of it: the fairy ring, the wheat fields, and their made-up regal statuses were things that were just for the both of them to share and no one else. Even Granny didn’t know.
Though Jisung didn’t talk much about his family and could never stay past sunset, he became more open about his little quirks. Hyunjin stored those little tidbits about him closely to his heart like a prized possession.
Most of all, Hyunjin didn’t want this to end. He wanted to go to the fairy ring everyday without any worries, and talk about quiet nonsense that consisted of wispy dreams and idle things. He wanted this to go on. He wished these adventures would never disappear.
But all good things must come to an end, don’t they?
And it happened like this:
Jisung was at the Lee’s house.
Hyunjin was passing by one day when he saw them. They were talking by the steps to the door, their foreheads almost touching. Jisung seemed to have been whispering something to Minho, whose expression never changed -- not even a single twitch. When he locked eyes with Hyunjin, though, his lips minutely lifted and Hyunjin had run away before he could process what he just saw.
Jisung had never mentioned being friends with the Lee’s only son. When he tried to ask, Jisung had blanched and shut him down immediately, leaving Hyunjin feeling a little unsettled and mostly hurt.
He tried not to dwell on it as much. Jisung had his secrets and all Hyunjin could do was respect them. So he went through the day pretending he never saw them together, that he didn’t see the way Jisung squeezed his eyes shut when he spoke to Minho, or the ghost of a smile on Minho’s face when he saw Hyunjin. He’d always been docile and good at thinking instead of feeling, after all.
Hyunjin never got angry, until one day, his classmates knew just the spot to target him. Then he was stomping to the fairy ring with tears in his eyes he desperately held back, because he wasn’t supposed to cry, because he had to show everyone that just because he didn’t have parents didn’t mean he grew up any different than the rest of them, because he wasn’t a kid anymore and he was a grown-up and he knew how to be grown-up. He knew the difference between make-believe and reality. He knew what happened to other boys who spent too much time with boys.
“Hyunjin?” Jisung looked up at him in concern. “What’s wrong?”
Hyunjin wouldn’t step in the fairy ring. He couldn’t. He can’t anymore. He didn’t want any of his classmates to see him, then make fun of him, then say that he’s weird and crazy for believing in these fantasy stories, because it was true. How did he know any of this was truly real? How did he know he wasn’t being lied to like always?
“We can be friends without magic,” Hyunjin mumbled, wiping his snotty nose with his sleeve. “We don’t need the fairy rings or the forest or all the other magical things. Can’t we just be friends like normal people?”
Jisung blinked. He stood up from the fairy ring but didn’t attempt to move. “But we’re not normal people, Hyunjin.”
Something inside of him burst open. A flame. A fire. “What? Because I’m an outcast from school? Because I have a granny instead of a mom and dad? Because -- because I believe in fairies and forests and magic? Fine. Okay. You’re right, then. But what’s the point in believing if I don’t even know the truth? What’s the point in doing all of this when I’m never told anything?”
“Hyunjin --”
“No! Don’t tell me it’s because you don’t want to interfere with the fates or whatever, because I’m sick of hearing about it. You lie to me all the time when we’re supposed to be friends. I wait, and I always wait, and I’m good at waiting but I hate it. I hate waiting so much.” Hyunjin was shaking despite the dry, autumn air. “You have so many secrets that I don’t even know you.”
Jisung was looking down at his hands. He looked so scared, all of a sudden. “Hyunjin, you -- you can’t. Wait. Please wait.“
“Granny said that you don’t even live at the end of the lane! It’s been abandoned for a long time and nobody in Moondew has ever heard of you. You -- you’re like a ghost. A ghost that doesn’t even know that it’s dead. So how can I believe in you if I don’t even know you? How do I know you’re real when you hide all the time? But that’s just it, isn’t it? You’re not real. You never were.”
The sun was seized by a shadow. Heavy clouds rumbled and rolled across the sky and covered up the blueness of it. Jisung looked pale within the wilting fairy ring. His aura had dimmed into a wet fragment of what had been there. He looked at Hyunjin with soft, tender eyes, despite melting into what seemed like imminent death. His figure flickered like a disturbed puddle.
Then, he was fading. He was so transparent that Hyunjin could see the rows of houses behind -- no, through him. He was liquid light spilled across the floor, wasted away.
“Please, still love the rabbit,” he whispered.
Hyunjin blinked. Then Jisung was gone.
“Jisung?” He was shaking harder now, but not from anger. He rushed into the fairy ring and wondered if the fairies had kidnapped him, but nothing changed. The cinereal clouds were still travelling to the edge of the earth before he felt the first few raindrops fall onto his nose. When he looked up at the sky, that was when it began to pour.
“Jisung? Where did you go?” he called. He turned around frantically. “Jisung?”
The heat in his chest was replaced by a melancholic blue. Drenched in the rain, Hyunjin stayed in the fairy ring, feeling guilt carve its name onto his pomegranate heart so he could wear this shame forever.
🌣
Hyunjin thought that he’d see Jisung the next day, hoping to apologize and mend things. He’d let his heart speak rather than his head, and that wasn’t who he was. Granny didn’t teach him to take his problems out on people. That was called projecting and he needed to be responsible for hurting someone else’s feelings just because he couldn’t process his own.
But the fairy ring was empty today.
Jisung wasn’t there, even as Hyunjin sat in the circle and waited as the sad sun disappeared behind the mountains; as he waited until a chilly nightfall bestowed upon Moondew. Even the fairies didn’t show up, but Hyunjin had already developed the creeping suspicion that the fairies were connected to Jisung in a mysterious way, so if Jisung didn’t show up, then neither would the fairies.
Hyunjin walked home by himself along the road strewn with moon flowers that unfurled its petals every time he walked past them. The crescent moon hung in the sky like a sharp scythe, like dirty beach sand with footprints on it -- the dim outline of its round shape illuminated by an earthshine.
The moon looked lonely, but at least it had the company of the stars.
🌣
Hyunjin didn’t see Jisung the next day either.
Or the next. Or the next. Or the next.
He stared at the wilted flower crown and the moonstone that sat atop his shelf, and wondered if he’d ruined something that used to make him very, very happy.
🌣
“Who?”
Seungmin stared at him, nonplussed. His cheeks were full of all the strawberries he was cramming into his mouth. It was a funny sight, but Hyunjin felt too much like a broken record to find amusement in it.
“The Han’s,” Hyunjin said. “You know? The father and son living at the end of the lane? Or, um. Just father and son handling some farm. Surely you must have heard of them.”
Seungmin frowned. “Can’t say I’ve heard of them. All I know is that the farm at the end of the lane has been abandoned for a very long -- hey, Yuna! put that down!” He yelled at one of his little sisters who was trying to put a lint roller in her mouth. Seungmin hurriedly went to grab the roller out of her hands and replaced it with a strawberry. “You’re so gross, you know?”
All he received as a response was a stuck-out tongue. Seungmin trudged back towards Hyunjin who was still sulking. “Are you sure he said that he lived at the end of the lane? Maybe he said train? Or he was in pain?”
“I don’t think he was in pain, Seungmin.”
Seungmin shrugged. “Okay, then. Why don’t you go visit him? See it for yourself?”
Hyunjin swallowed. He hated his cowardly heart. “I just -- I’m scared. What if you guys are right? What if it is abandoned, and that all this time maybe everything was all just a lie. I don’t want that. I don’t -- I don’t want to think that our friendship was a lie. I shouldn’t have gotten mad at him in the first place. If I didn’t, then maybe he would still be here.”
“It’s better to know than to sit in the dark about it,” Seungmin said. “It’ll give you a peace of mind afterwards. Some things were meant to happen, you know?”
There was some logic behind his words. Hyunjin nodded along. “Okay. Yeah. I guess you’re right.”
“When am I not?” Seungmin jutted his chin out. His proud expression went slack when he heard a knock on the door, and his grin was replaced with a scowl. “That must be Jeongin. I bet he wants to try and beat me in arm wrestling again after I crushed him yesterday.” At another pound on his door, he yelled over his shoulder, “Alright, stupid! I’m coming!”
When Jeongin bulldozed through, only to fall onto his knees when Seungmin kicked him from behind, Hyunjin laughed into his arm and felt a bit more hopeful.
🌣
The sky was obsidian, streaked with thick, rolling clouds. The sun was nowhere to be seen, but it didn’t deter Hyunjin from making his way to the house at the end of the lane. Past the fairy ring, past the rowan tree, past the Yang’s farm, and past his neighbours of Moondew, Hyunjin ran all the way down the field, skipping over the fences. He ran through the shrubs before he found himself back onto the tarmac path that led to the end of the lane.
He was thrumming with nervous energy. Jisung may have kept a lot of things from him, but Hyunjin needed to see. He needed to see so he could know that all the trust he had in Jisung was not in vain. Impatient, he took all that energy and put it into running. He ran until his chest hurt and legs ache and eyes stung but he was filled with hope and longing and --
Oh.
Hyunjin gasped. He slowed down into wobbly steps before coming to a full stop.
The land looked bleaked. Untouched. The barns and stables were decrepit and ready to fall apart any second, and the vacant house that came along with it was covered in overgrown vines and mold. Hyunjin couldn’t even see half of the house’s structure from all the shrubs and trees that grew closely around the building.
It was empty. It was really, really empty.
Abandoned property.
He walked towards the house, careful not to touch the patinated fences as he walked past. The porch seemed rickety and weak, and Hyunjin didn’t want to sport a sprained ankle when he had to walk all the way back to his cottage, so he stood in front of it instead. The odor of mildew was strong, and Hyunjin wrapped his arms around his waist to keep himself warm when he suddenly felt cold.
Hyunjin licked his lips. He looked at the torn, screen door, and whispered, “Hannie?”
Never step into a fairy ring, or else it will bring you bad luck.
And on that bleak, autumn day, Hyunjin wished he had listened to his grandma after all.