Chapter Text
I’d like to start from the very beginning. You, it was you. You were the one I first saw after getting lost with myself, unsure of what I'd come to. I was counting down the days until i’m able to drive a car of my own, counting down the days of me getting my driver’s license. It’s not much, but back then, I was searching for an answer to a question I, myself, didn't know exactly. And mayhaps i was on a search for those two specific things, driving away with no destination in mind, but just to get lost and dispitate through the cold breeze of winter.
My life isn’t as vibrant and colorful as what people have viewed. They always thought abundance of money and power are the answers to every life problem in existence. If you are a son of two successful and influential people, you are an equivalent of a modern day prince. They did not know what I needed the most; time.
And mayhaps that’s why I have grown attached to you on that one afternoon, when the sky was painted with the gradient of black and orange, where the sky was at its most beautiful state and where the sun was peeking between the mountains as if the scene was ripped off from a comic book.
Because you had time, maybe not for me specifically, but at least you were there.
I was going through roads the car’s GPS was not able to detect. I was going through the tightest and rockiest of roads there were and I did not know where I was. It was intentional. Getting lost was not exactly a part of the plan, but it was a circumstance I did not regret.
Finding myself is far more difficult though.
With a deep breath I got myself out of the car, and a grandiose view greeted me in a way that words are incapable of giving justice in describing it. The sun was hugged by orange, red and purple, surrounded by the faded clouds that looked as soft as a warm embrace.
It was a Friday, the first one in december.
And there I saw you, standing alone in front of the cliff, eyes empty and seemingly staring into existence. Your hair was dancing gracefully with the mildly strong wind as some of it brushes the tip of your nose. I took a few steps closer, too close than what I intended to yet you did not bat an eye, still looking at the ground, meters below us.
I could not forget your eyes. I have never seen something so bright on a coming of the night like that.
“What are you doing here?” I said. Maybe it’s because of the way I almost mumbled those words, or maybe it’s because of the wind ringing in your ears, making my voice muffled with it. You did not answer, instead, you still did what you were doing the first time I laid my eyes on you. Or maybe even before I came in the picture.
I saw it. I saw the way your hands were shaking, trembling with a split second of intervals in between. I wondered why you were only wearing a thin shirt with denim pants without any outerwear. It was almost winter yet there you were, standing ever so peacefully, unempathetic of what was around you. Maybe my mind has gone with the wind since i just saw you but i remember unhesitatingly holding your hand and making you share my only hot pack with me.
There you looked back at me — and yes, the vision in me of your shining eyes, slightly painted with orange, those deep black orbs that looked at me before is still vivid in my mind. Everything was in it.
The stars, the moon, the sun, every constellation, the galaxies — the universe and everything in it. I have never once thought how something as small as those little eyes carried a lot of ethereal things in them.
And I swore I had never seen anything so beautiful before.
“Wow, you’re beautiful.” I subconsciously blurted out, which I then realized when your eyebrows were slightly furrowed yet you never uttered a word and a few seconds after, you brought your eyes back at the view in front of us. I was…
In awe. In utter captivation. Not just because of how painstakingly beautiful you looked just standing there as the orange in your face slowly dissolves into silver and black, but because of how your hand fitted in mine like it was made just for me.
The whole night I remained by your side, looking at the twinkling stars above us without a soul uttering a word. It was silent and only the sound of the crickets were heard.
I was undeniably intrigued by you. You. Your voice. How pretty it would sound, especially with your pretty face. Maybe that was why I stayed by your side, I wanted to hear it. I wanted to hear you.
Or maybe it’s just one of the many excuses i have in me yet the real answer is i just wanted to be with you. With no purpose but with tons of reasons.
“Kang Minhee, 20, nice to meet you..” I uttered as I felt the embarrassment creep in me when you looked back with a slight smile, “or not really meet since we haven’t exchanged any words yet, right?” I shook my hand which was in contact with you, as a form of greeting. I felt so stupid, if i’m going to be honest.
Yet I liked it very much how the corners of your mouth curled into a smile, smile lines forming beside them. The universe must’ve loved you so dearly that it placed all the stars in the corners of your smile. “Koo Jungmo, 21.”
A wave of satisfaction flushed in my system when I heard how sweet your voice sounded like. As if my mind was a broken tape, your short words came in repeatedly, my mind full of the thoughts of only you and you at that moment.
“Let’s meet here again. Next week, Friday. Does that sound good?” I remember saying out loud with confidence for a small amount of time. There was no response after the series of words i have spoken, instead you let go of the hot pack in our hands, as you turned your back on me, walking away until i couldn't hear your footsteps anymore.
Although my mind was fixated with the probability that you would not show up the next Friday, i still went there, hands clasped in hope, excitement inside of my car. I had my heart in my hands, held it ever so gently as I walked towards the tree, where a perfect view of the gloaming close of the day. I might have held my heart tighter than I should've, realized that when i saw you there, on the same exact spot just like the first time i saw you, i feel my heart tighten, ache, with a reason I couldn't pinpoint.
The exception was that you were dressed ever so beautifully. Or if there’s an existing word more than that, it would perfectly fit you. I just could not think of anything but beautiful with every moment I looked at you. You were dressed with a black turtleneck, warmed over by a long brown trench coat just a few inches above your ankles partnered by light blue denim pants with white converse sneakers whose shoelaces are lopsidedly tied. It dawned into me how… breathtaking you looked. How breathtaking you are. And I find myself having a hard time to approach you, such beauty, yet I still did because you attracted me in a way a magnet would.
“I didn’t expect you to really come.” I said, eyes pasted on you, your face, how it glowed with orange, gleaming as it mirrored the grand dusk in front of us.
You looked back at me as you lightly smiled once again, just like last Friday. Oh, that made my heart jump for some reason.
“I always come here.” he replies as his gaze goes back in front of them. It makes me wonder how I was so captivated by this. By you. By just a split second of a look from you makes me feel funny and ticklish inside.
“It’s beautiful, right?” you asked with your monotonous voice. You are more beautiful. Even the most beautiful, I wanted to say those words. Was it too early for it?
I nodded. I kept it to myself anyways.
I have never much understood the concept of attachment. How a person would feel so attached to someone although at the end of the day, you only have yourself. Growing up as someone who was lonely, never got someone who at least had the potential of me wanting their presence, i never understood how people feel content when they feel like they belong… they belong somewhere, maybe even someone.
But when i saw you, even for the first second i did, the feeling of belongingness struck inside of me for the first time. It was then the first time, or maybe even the only time I felt the need to belong somewhere, to someone. And that is you, Koo Jungmo. I wanted to be with you, on this cliff every Friday daydown. And maybe even more than that.
I sometimes dream of you. Even when I lie down on my bed, I think of you. When you appear in my dreams, I am too afraid to wake up but when I do, I sigh, afraid that everything will just remain into what it really is. A dream. Yet, I still think of you when I wake up. My every day was you. Could you have felt the same?
Two months would have passed with my every Friday completed with you. It’s as if seeing you at least once a week was a food for my soul, for my heart. My heart, it aches for you whenever I can't see you. Perhaps once a week, a Friday isn’t enough? You are like the blue skies, warm rays of the sun and the lush green of nature, in the way my life is never complete without you.
The household has been so...hectic. Everyone is pressuring me to work hard so i can be worthy of being the only heir of my parents’ company. All these years I have worked hard, without anything lacking in me. Maybe I still was not enough? I talk to several, maybe hundreds of people everyday but none of them compare to a single glance of your smile for a split second.
I found comfort in you. I found out you loved writing songs.
“What are you doing?” i asked as i sat next to you on a big root of the tree where we usually sit. You were scribbling words and sentences my eyes could not decipher from our distance. I scooted over, narrowing our distance. Scooted again until i didn’t realize i was too close to you. You looked at me straight in my eyes. My heart jumped.
Our proximity was very close to the point that I could feel your breathing on my own nose and lips. Contrary to my fast paced heart, you were calm as you stared with those eyes. Those star-like eyes.
And mayhaps you are my shooting star, because you are everything that I could ever ask for.
“I’m writing another song.” you said as you looked back on your notebook, continuing to write lyrics on it.
“Let me hear it.” I uttered softly, voice almost trailing off with hesitation.
You looked at me once again and to my surprise, you opened your mouth, and sang with your very sweet voice. It was nothing like i have heard before, yet everything i ever wanted. Your voice, dragging every word that came out of your mouth was too beautiful to begin with. Your cheeks were varnished by the sunlight with crimson.
Right then and there, I realized. Meeting you was like listening to a song like yours for the very first time and knowing immediately that it would be my favorite.
4 months. I guess what they say about time passing by so fast when you’re with the person you love is really true. You proved it to be true. I like to believe that time isn’t real as every passing second i have spent with you for the past four months felt too short. I remember walking towards the cliff one Friday afternoon, hoping that I would see you once again…. And maybe tell you that I'm leaving soon.
It’s not something I could escape from. Trust me, if I could escape, I would. Yet I can't. My parents wanted me to go abroad so i can learn much more about entrepreneurship and how our business works. My heart felt like a voodoo doll when I heard the news. I wanted to scream with every needle pierced right inside me. The thought of me not seeing your face, being with you for the next years is haunting me.
And so I walked, and I saw you. but you were not alone. There was this blonde boy which I don't know the name of. You were hugging him.. Or maybe he was hugging you. I couldn’t remember exactly but what I do remember is your face, eyes closed, lips shut as you rested your head over his shoulder.
It must be nice to hug you like that, I thought.
It was still unknown to me how I felt attached to you for a short while and why would I be jealous of someone I don't know? And the reason is you, someone i barely know yet i feel like i know so much.
And maybe that is the part where I was wrong. In fact, after everything, the reality is that we barely know each other. And maybe that blonde boy is the one who knows you the most, and the best. I wish i would wake up from my imagination because all of these are proven to only be delusions the moment i saw you with him.
Was I too far ahead of myself?
It was the first time I arrived first on the cliff. I did it on purpose, though. Arriving even before afternoon came.
You came into the scene, my eyes were not on you yet from the sound of your footsteps, I already knew it was you.
“I like you.” I blurted out maybe too loud that I should have. I stood up as I looked at you. You were looking at me too, surprisingly with your calm eyes.
I have always admired how you always remained your calm even in flabbergasting situations like this. That is something I could never do.
But what happened afterwards caught me off guard. Really off guard.
You smiled, that smile you only seldom show. You patted my head, me, feeling the slight contact of your palm on my scalp made me shiver inside. It was a small skinship compared to what we have shared before, yet the effect is still the same.
And maybe i should not look at you too much, especially at moments like this, or i won’t be able to take my eyes off of you at all.
“Thank you, Minhee.” You answered, responded, said. I actually don’t know how to describe it since your answer was not related to what i’ve said at all. It left me confused.
Why did you even thank me for liking you? Who wouldn’t? Besides, even in a night like this after a dusk, the moon shining so bright with the sky full of stars, your eyes would still be stealing all of the light.
“That’s it?” I questioned.
You smiled, again. That’s the thing I hate about you. You unknowingly flash your smile at the most ungodly times, not knowing the effect it had on me. It made my heart flutter, maybe even more than that even.
“Don’t you like me back?” i asked, thinking that i should just give my all. After all, i had already started, what’s there to lose if i do?
There was nothing to lose, not even you.
You , all the time sweep me off my feet . Holding hands was my favorite thing to do with you. Your every giggle was music to my ears, especially when you unconsciously sing out of the blue your roughly written song while we walk around a place both of us weren’t familiar with. No one wants to get lost, but I would like, love, to get lost with you.
I have teased you because of the way I was a bit taller than you in each opportunity I could cease, even when you were older than me. You would just show me your sulky face but you had never gotten angry at me for that. It’s just again, one of the many things I admire in you.
We both hardly know each other. There is nothing much to hate nor like you but I hold onto that very reason as to why I still prefered to be by your side.
I wanted to know more of you.
I would be lying if i still didn’t think about that blonde boy from time to time. I don’t even know why I would be jealous of someone I barely know. The memory of you, hugging him was still vivid in my mind, even until now. But I had always shrugged those thoughts as I just tried to enjoy my time with you. I didn’t even try, to be honest. Your presence itself is just enjoyable.
5 months. Next month would be the time I'll leave. I still didn’t have the courage to tell you that. For the past month, honestly, it had just slipped away from my mind. My mind is just you and you only. Maybe I do spend so much of my day just by thinking of you.
“Aren’t you sick of that?” I asked you as you looked at your strawberry ice cream in glee. For the past month, you have always brought a pack whenever we meet.
“I don’t”
“Why?”
“I love it. Of course i wouldn’t get sick of it .”
It hit me, especially when you looked straight into my eyes while saying those words .
A small smudge of the ice cream was on the corner of your lips. “Stay still.”
I scooted over just so I could wipe it off with my handkerchief. Again, your eyes were on me just like those times when you did the same and I would always avert my gaze in embarrassment.
“Stop staring.” I might fall deeper to you.
You chuckled as you rolled your eyes. “Fine,” you said with your smug tone, closing your eyes afterwards.
I loved how annoying you were. How adorably annoying you were. How you would always tease me of how I get cold easily. How you would trace your finger on my freckles, connecting the faint dots on my cheeks as your skin made contact with mine. I liked how it felt but then you had to blow on my face suddenly when I was too caught up in your eyes. You laughed with your annoying one.
I loved the way my head perfectly fits on your shoulder whenever I leaned on it as if the two were made to be together. I sometimes do fall asleep, most probably because of how warm you felt. And how even warmer your voice sounded when you sang me random songs that came up in your head. I honestly think I slept much better, especially because you always had your arm wrapped around my waist.
Maybe you were right. Maybe I did love you, because I was not sick of you . Instead, I wanted more of you.
And the truth is, I have never known love before I met you.
Every friday twilight and you.
6th month. I cannot believe I have spent half of a year with you. Truth be told, i have never experienced such attachment to anyone ever before. It had to be you and of course I wanted it to be you. You have that driving power that makes me fall in love with you a little bit more every single day.
“I love you, Koo Jungmo. You are my only wish to every shooting star. Please give me your love.” i said with a rather raspy voice. I was scared, to be honest. Scared of your probable rejection, scared of me leaving with a heavy heart.
You looked at me, eyes shining against the gleaming of the blaring sun. You were looking, you had always been looking and I know it.
“Thank you.” ah, just like your answer back then.
I closed my eyes as I felt my throat… tighten and pain crept in as I held back a cry from the back of my eyes. How is this too easy for you when it’s practically swallowing me in pain?
“Is that it? Your answer.. Has it not changed?” eyes desperate, heart beating so fast against my chest. It was almost impossible for me to breathe properly.
But when you held my hand, your warm hand against my cold one as if supernovas were exploding against my skin, the hatred and despise from the back of my mind because of your gullibleness went away with the wind. I am back again at square one, that Friday, first week of December.
“Minhee, you know I can’t..” but why? I wanted to ask, I wanted to get it out from you. It’s so funny how you knew everything about me but you have never once told me anything you have been keeping. I can see it. I can see it in your eyes full of secrets that you want someone to listen, that you want someone to hear you.
I’m here, literally by your side, all ears and all eyes on you. Yet why do you still feel so distant?
“You’re leaving.”
“How did you know?”
“You speak when you’re asleep and you just happened to say it unconsciously when you were sleeping on my shoulder.”
My tears ducts have betrayed me as they fall from my eyes uncontrollably. With my shaking voice, I asked, “since when?”
“Last month.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I almost screamed, letting all of my frustration on you, on everything out.
You did not answer again, just smiled. Just like how you have always done. You smile, and suddenly it’s summer. I feel the warmth take over my whole body because of your smile, just like the warm rays of the sun piercing on my skin. Then you pulled me in an embrace. You are really warm.
I hope you knew that before everything went downfall.
I started sobbing uncontrollably on your shoulder. I know i have always mocked the way i was a tad bit taller than you but for unknown yet sure reasons, your shoulder has always been a perfect source of comfort for me. I would just be happy with me in your arms under the light of the stars that just came into the scene.
You let go, our foreheads slightly clashed together as you looked straight into my eyes. Since when did you have such red eyes and dark bags? How come I have never noticed those before?
There, you crashed your lips on mine. It was only for a second, or two, I could not even remember. I just know it was… magical. It was everything and magical. I felt you put your hand in the pocket of my trench coat. I looked at you in surprise, because of the kiss and because of your sudden gesture.
“Read this when you arrive there, hmm? Promise me you won’t open it anytime before.”
The letter. The very damned letter.
I sometimes wondered if anything, everything would have changed if I didn't keep my promise and read it as soon as I stepped out of your vision that day.
I still hated me back then, when I bid goodbye. Because just when I was about to step into my car, seeing my luggage just by the passenger’s seat, I saw him. The blonde boy. I still hated how i felt mad, infuriated, anger towards you when i saw the boy walk to where i was moments ago.
Why did you have to confuse me?
And maybe yet again, I was too far ahead of myself.
I’m sorry for causing you nothing but pain. I’m sorry for not being enough. Jungmo hyung, you were my first love. I even doubt I would ever find someone like you in a lifetime. I can still remember the first day I ever looked into your eyes and felt my entire world flip. I would hug you for hours, so close until the world is unable to hurt you.
I can still remember your songs, your sweet voice that sang forever. I hated myself for ever doubting your forever.
I have never loved anyone more than I love you.
I kept my promise. There was a period of time where I regret doing so. Keeping the letter by my side, but waiting until i arrive here just so i can read it. Then I realized, it was you who wanted this.
And I would not dare to break your heart just like that even when you were already too far from my reach.
It’s the least that i could do for you.
That day when I read your letter, I was in a car that drove me towards my destination. I reckoned the driver might have spared a glance or two at me because of how hard I cried over a piece of paper. Every now and then i still would think about rebelling against my parents and i should not have gone here.
And maybe.. Maybe you would still be here.
Jungmo hyung, maybe i really should have read the letter sooner. I’m sorry because I'm too late. I’m sorry because I couldn't even get myself to go back to Korea to at least mourn over your body. I am so sorry… for everything.
Tonight, on a Friday night, I look upon the sky through the glass window in my office. I looked at the brightest star, and assumed it was you. It is you, because you shined like no one else. You were looking at me, shining over me just like how you had done before.
Koo Jungmo, the man of many jokes and pranks with a very sweet voice that made me warm all over, beating all of the sunsets combined that we have witnessed together, I love you so much.
Until our next dusk.