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Sanctuaries had always felt irreparably odd to Seungmin.
Just as many things that existed within a time and a space in someone’s mind in order to recoil recollections of a better time. Seungmin had never understood it.
The journal he’d scribble passing thoughts and day-to-day musings on had felt like nothing but a weight of paper and a tattered hardback cover. A collection of words made up of preestablished letters; it’d never felt as authentic and lively as people seemed to often describe to him.
The antique vase his mother would grow specific gardenias for with every passing tuft that drooped too low. It’d been nothing but a pot constructed and decorated through intricate craftsmanship and the simple insolence of significance with passing time. He hadn’t understood it, no, but whenever his mother had requested he replace the water he did so with a sincere nod and a quick trek.
Seungmin hadn’t understood, but he tried his best to. Tried his best to articulate how people could form attachments to the materialistic existence of something, even if he saw nothing past its surface-level understanding.
It’d been his downfall in and out of his English A class, and it would be his downfall when his friend, Jisung, explained how his middle school sketchbook had been lost to the configuration of realms existing past the corporal world, and how that had deeply saddened him.
‘My art was bad, but the point is that it was my initial benchmark before finally improving and developing, and now I feel like I’ve lost that part of myself.’ Was what he’d said.
And sure, Seungmin sat with his thoughts a lot, he’d attempted to understand and decipher the matter in his own time. But with every trailing thought, he’d be drawn back into the very same position, sketching up the same conclusions as before.
It felt somewhat akin to the feeling of attempting to decipher whether the moon was fine as it was, because it was all they’d ever had to look out for during night-time. No one liked the idea of living in total darkness, but no one knew exactly what it would feel like.
Then, came the period instigated by trial and error. Seungmin tried to remember any places from his own childhood that could’ve held a semblance of significance. He’d even begun shortlisting a number of places, all of which he hadn’t breathed within in years, some in an entire decade.
Although muddled and short, the list had now consisted of:
The old Mermaid’s Den waterpark was first on the list. Seungmin remembers the cold of resilient water splattering over his face amidst a nearby, childish brawl. He remembers splices of dreary sunlight peaking through fissures in the domed ceiling of the only attraction he could bear sitting by. He remembers the mermaid statues that he’d sit by and make up names, lives, and stories for.
But ultimately, the waterpark had gone bankrupt, the last traces of its existence residing in the form of its current, dreadfully abandoned state. Seungmin doesn’t think it’ll be a good idea to trespass over its grounds, nor did he think he’d like to walk around empty, dusty pools, or visit mermaids whose paint had likely been chipping, leaving behind worn-down version of themselves.
Next on the list is the treasured Kang farmhouse. Seungmin remembers the Kang family fondly, although they’d only resided within his life for a tiny measure of time; one spring and one summer, around 11 years back. When Seungmin’s toothy grin still made his eyes squint at either side, one more than the other, when his ruffled hair remained laden with dirt, scattered petals, and hay.
For some time, his mother would coerce him to visit the farmhouse, along with his older sister and his aunt. The Kang’s readily provided them with a space to stay, for as long as they’d help around with errands and important farm duties. It’d worn him down a bit, surely, but uplifted him all the same. He’d even given the chickens names, despite the fact that his aunt had warned him not to get attached. He’d been too busy ruffling Simon’s feathers to hear, though.
The trifling benightment of passing time only truly obstructed him when his aunt had muttered for him to get his things packed before sundown. He’d done so, without question, as he’d always done, but a dim tugged at his heart and a dew fell over his filtered eyes. He does remember feeling quite thrilled that they’d gotten to leave with homemade chocolate, almonds, and a basket of his mother’s favourite flowers: Gardenias.
As joyous as he remembers the experience to be, Seungmin doesn’t believe he’d be able to rekindle the same amount of elation now that he’d found the prospect of waking up when the sun had barely been up for long, quite dull. Plus, his spring break would end the following week.
Thankfully, the list trails on to the next place.
Greentail Park. A sprawling, hallowed chunk of land with crinkling grass, sturdy slides, and painted benches. An overpass upheld by a mound of stories; some embarrassing, others rewarding, most just alright.
He’d spent a good amount of time deliberating over it, remembering how he’d take refuge behind one of the playground sets, just next to where he’d climb up and across from where most kids would scurry in and chase after one another. A splice of sun peaked through gaps in its colourful meshing, mirroring itself upon his scrunched-up figure in one corner, drawing a net over his face.
He’d squint, but still find himself indulging in the outpours of sunlight that readily drew itself into a horizon, pinning itself over him with its vivacity.
It’d been his best bet, he realises, his best option out of all the other ones staring up at him through filtered orifices and dull eyes.
Greentail Park. It’d felt weird to type the words out, he thinks, to envision himself away from the image of his younger self, drawing over the letters from its sign at the entrance gates with his fingers before being scurried away by his mother, who’d mutter an apology to the security guard standing idly by.
He typed it out, yes, but each press felt heavier than the last, and each progressive move less fulfilling. Then the rest was just static. The sound of his laptop fanning against his hardwood desk and nothing else. Just a moment of deliberation.
He hits the enter key.
And whilst he hadn’t expected his short-tempered charade to have to amount to any definite preparation, his eyes welter with brightened puzzlement, when images of the park pop up.
The same sign, albeit polished to absolute perfection, the same attractions, the same sand pits, monkey bars, slides, tunnels. Again, it’d just existed so much more vibrantly than he remembered.
And then, and as his mind falters to register, the stretch of carpeted grass encasing the length of an entire section riddled with trees, drooping branches, and feathery leaves.
It’d looked so vivid. Surely, he didn’t have to immediately arrive at the ultimate conclusion that the park had gotten its authentic, yellowing and drying at the edges, grass, replaced for faux carpets.
They could’ve just gotten exponentially better at tending to their tattered greens, to mowing it with established consistency.
It’d been the first time Seungmin would opt to discard logistical approaches for a hearty one. For one that felt it’d be abundantly better to imagine his child self’s favourite park as having remained just as he’d left it.
But, then he realises with a finality, just as he did with most things. It was a park.
Subject to change, especially when under a microscopic lens, it was needed.
Seungmin had known, even then, that it hadn’t been perfect. It’d been rough, seamlessly hardened, but it felt immaculately exact in its purpose, and in fulfilment of it.
It’s all that he can do not bury the thought under a blind eye whilst the last seams of a downturned sun gleams at him through the gaps of the open entrance gate. The sign stares back at him, its text revitalized under a new font, new colors, and a new sheen that had never existed for as long as he remembered tracing his fingers along the creaky wood.
Just ahead of him is miles of land obscured and filtered by a shadow that hadn’t lingered within the space before, hadn’t hung over him through extrinsic acquittal. He’d detested every moment leading up to the travel, and now that he’d actually found himself standing at the forefront of his childish reveries, he begins to wonder how it was that he used to live exempt from the overthinking, the fretting, and the plaguing contemplations.
It’d been just as tricky to stick to places as it had been to remember what it’d been like to think as a child would.
Still, he’s managed to subconsciously coerce himself forward just far enough to pass by a few, wandering souls, the only indication of the fact that he hadn’t actually been wandering around an abandoned dreamscape.
There’s a rippling sensation raking through the entirety of his being as each foot is placed after the other in his silent stroll. A shadowed, enlightened vision in the swaying winds. His eyes watch, with eclipsed dismay, as his past collides with the present.
As the grass turns from yellow to green, the skies from grey to blue, the dusky dew in the air from invigorating to stifling.
It’s almost as if with every familiar spot he walks by, observing every trace of, he’s glancing back at his younger self doing the very same. It’s only when he stops by that infamous slide, in all its red and yellow glory, that he feels like a kid again.
Giddy with the rising anticipation of peering into its enclosed space, of gripping onto the rubber wrapped over the steel bars upholding its sturdy ladder.
He feels his heart twist in its patchy, paradoxical patterns once he’s finally arrived at the base of the structure. It’s much shorter than he remembers, so much smaller. For that small puncture of time, it feels foreign, but only for the fact that he stands at its forefront and doesn’t have to feel wary of its, once petrifying, height up. In fact, he needn’t strain himself in order to peak right in, to peel away the edges of curiosity that remained brimming within his chest as he initially approached.
It’d felt foreign, surely, but in the most petrifyingly familiar sense. It’s not like such a notion didn’t have a name or hadn’t been comprehended by anyone before; in fact, that had been the basis of nostalgic musings for many, the exact kind of emotion that struck Jisung that one fateful day when he’d called Seungmin up and relayed his frustrations for having lost his old sketchbook.
And yet, he still finds himself abrasive in the face of the notion, and of the very emotion. Or a disparaged amalgamation of emotions, as it would have more closely resembled.
When his fingers first gain the resilience to brush against the ladder’s safety rubber, clasping over its hardened material, he feels the beginnings of crestfallen obscurity integrate into the filter pressed over his chest. The crash and fall of control feels so imminent that he hasn’t the heart, quite literally, to stop it.
The steel feels weighty under his hold as he finally makes the trifling decision of climbing up, his sneakers following behind much more swiftly than he can remember from the distant past. One after the other, his head wills him to count the seconds before he’s finally landed, as he’d found himself coming up to the habit of doing, again, as a kid.
He’d done more personal reflection and emotional remuneration in the past 30 minutes than he’s ever had to do throughout the course of his life.
The floorboards feel weighty under his feet, and each heavy step forward feels like another retracement, another reminder. His hand hesitantly moves to graze past the colourful interior as he walks by its sturdy walls, pressing over every component with an archaic sense of nostalgia.
There was the word again.
He finally gets to the small bridgeway. A short wooden structure upheld by durable ropes and a childlike charm that wills the functionality of everything. He remembers, shortly, how he’d only ever overcame the fear of walking past it to get to the other side when he’d noticed how the other kids ran past it in huddles amidst their hide and seek games.
By then, it’d become second nature. One that seemed to have upheld its post within his muscle memory, as he follows the same pattern of steps he always had, counting as he went along.
One, two, three, four, five.
He seems to have halted for a concerning amount of time following his precise counts – again, it’d struck him, suddenly, just how long it had been, for it used to take him 10 steps to get to the other side – because a stranger’s voice calls out to him in the enclosed space.
At first, he isn’t sure, even as he finally looks up from his pair of worn sneakers, if they’d addressed the query (or statement, or request, Seungmin isn’t sure because he hadn’t been listening) to him. But then, as becomes obstinately obvious, he realises that they’re the only two within the small structure.
‘Sorry, what?’
‘I said,’ He repeats, a subtle irritation cloaking his soft features that only doesn’t fully reach his eyes because they’re simply too bright ‘you’ve been standing there for so long. You’re blocking away valuable sunlight.’
‘S-sorry?’ Seungmin mutters, again, like an idiot. Nevertheless, he doesn’t relent and moves quickly. He thinks the intersection separating his bashfulness and dumbfounded obliviousness only seems to grow thinner with his instant fascination for the boy.
He’s sat against one prompt corner, positioned with his legs to his chest and a heavy, hardback covered book propped up over his knees. His eyes can barely be registered from the tufts of morning hair strewn over his forehead, unkempt yet ideal in the way he’d been presenting himself.
Still, Seungmin does register them well. They stand out over the indifference in his expression or the crease between his eyebrows.
Again, there’s clear impatience in his tone and the intent is reflected in his eyes, but they still gleam too gently in the distilled air and sun-doused walls.
The boy had grunted with displayed annoyance, but he makes no motion to shoo Seungmin away once he’s propped down against the wall next to him. Not too close, but they’d been within the same vicinity, breathing the same wafts of air.
‘I meant that you were standing in the only direction through which the light peaks out through that hole,’ He points over to the open space just behind the wooden bridgeway, through which Seungmin specifically remembers he used to look out, at the playground’s residents. Really, he did much of what he still liked to do today; people watch.
‘and I need the light to come through there, specifically, because it falls over the pages of my book at just the right angle.’ He raises the book closer within Seungmin’s space for more clarity. The pages he’s shown seem to be detailing the history and functionality of a type of flower. It only displays the scientific name in big, bold writing on the top, over a drawing of the very same, so Seungmin isn’t quite sure how to read it properly, or what to make of it.
‘Oh, alright.’ Seungmin finally comes back to reality, feeling his feet shift awkwardly before his eyes blink away for fear of staring while the boy had already been back to peering down at the contents of his book, the same gleam of inquisitiveness in his eyes.
Seungmin hadn’t met anyone remarkably interesting upon first sight, in quite some time. But he also had never truly learned how best to approach a conversation without instigating small talk that no one liked to be a part of.
Thankfully, the boy either reads the stifling silence and interpreted Seungmin’s hesitation through it, or he’d just been bored of his lack of a contribution to the ambience, as he finally raises his head to quip:
‘Well, aren’t you gonna say anything?’
‘Uh, sorry, was I supposed to?’ Seungmin gulps down his miseries, attempting to remember why he’d come here in the first place, if not to find the answer to his stoic interpretations of life.
‘Sure. You could ask for my name? What I’m reading? Why I’m sat up here?’ The boy lists, blinking away some longer strands of hair.
‘Uh, well, what are you reading?’ Seungmin didn’t think he’d like to ask for the boy’s name. At least not just yet, because it’d mean articulating his own introduction, and he didn’t quite feel up for that yet.
‘So glad you asked,’ There’s a twinge of sardonic flair in his tone, but he persists ‘this is a flame lily, or Gloriosa superba if you’re boring. A threateningly beautiful flower, it’s honestly burdensome that I can’t grow one myself.’
‘Why not?’
The boy looks at him for a moment. A few, actually. There’s a sort of jumbled look in his unwavering gape, as if he’s caught between immense confusion and displeasure. ‘It’s extremely poisonous. I thought that was obvious, it literally showcases all the warning signs in appearance alone.’
Seungmin looks back at the page. The flower’s petals curl up frivolously, resembling flames in their stance and appearance. Their stigmas are all splayed outside of the open bud.
Yeah, he supposes it should be more than apparent that the flower wouldn’t be the friendliest in any common situation, but he supposes he’s also not the brightest within ecological understandings and principles.
‘Anyhow,’ The boy continues swiftly ‘I hadn’t even planned on properly reading through this book. Initially, I bookmarked a few sections off of it, so I could refer to them whilst I grow out some new herbs for my garden – rosemary and basil, if you were wondering –, but then I wandered away to the flowering plants section, and you know, I’ve never been the type to consider growing my own flowers, but it seems more manageable now that I have a sufficient amount of–,’ He pauses.
‘I’m rambling.’
Seungmin isn’t good at conversation, to safely reiterate. Still, he attempts to voice out that he’d much prefer to hear him dull away the quiet with something more fascinating than his own hobbies during downtime.
‘It’s alright. I’m listening, so we’re a good…,’
Now, it’s Seungmin’s turn to pause, his words caught within his tongue, trailing along in an embarrassing, jumbled lilt.
‘match?’
Seungmin blinks a few times following his efficiently handpicked phrasing, picking at his lips with his teeth in order to refrain from cussing himself out in front of a half-stranger.
Instead of picking his book up and venturing extremely far away, surprisingly, the boy breaks out of his still façade, leaning forward with his hands over his stomach, a burst of his springy giggles expelling into the open air, frothing with the dew and the heftiness.
Thankfully, the boy finally speaks again, saving Seungmin the chance of making anything out of the sharp nipping in his cheeks.
His voice is still laden with the blight of his previous snicker spree, of which he’s barely recovered from. ‘You’re right. It works out well, doesn’t it? I’m Minho.’
For some reason, Seungmin is thankful Minho doesn’t do the absurdly mindless thing of stretching a hand out following an introduction. He thinks avoiding any physical contact is much more preferable and on par with his ability to remain cordial and indifferent on the surface.
‘Seungmin.’ He answers back simply, to which the boy voices out a tiny hum of comprehension.
They don’t talk much after that, but whenever Seungmin wills himself to make his own way out of the small space following a short stretch of time, after Minho himself leaves, he remembers one of the very few sentences he did utter.
‘If you’d ever like to listen again, you’ll find me at the same place and time.’