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mark sat down and passed the beer to haechan, his drinking buddy.
to be honest, mark doesn't even know why haechan drinks, or why he comes with him to his apartment every friday night just to listen to mark's sorrowful cries and calls for the one he loved all his life.
he didn't ask why haechan still stays despite seeing mark wrecked like a ship who crashed into an iceberg and sunk. he didn't ask why haechan still takes care of him despite the storms that he's having right now. he didn't ask why haechan still buys them beer to drink their problems away.
he doesn't know, or at least he refuses to know.
on the other hand, haechan chugs down the bitter liquid until its flavor fills his oral cavity. smiling bitterly as he looked at mark.
he loved mark, that was a fact.
he loved mark despite the chaos, he loved mark despite he loved someone else, and he loved mark because he was mark lee.
mark lee, to haechan, was god's greatest creation. an angel in the shape of his best friend. he'll always be someone to haechan.
and haechan wished that mark lee could've at least felt the same or a portion of what he feels.
but even though he hoped for something that’s so absurd to happen, he knows that one day he needs to stop feeling things for his said best friend.
two years was enough, haechan thought.
two years of pining over someone that's broken, two years of loving someone who loved someone else, two years of chasing someone who doesn't leave the same place but still so far away, and two years of losing chances in a game he knew once he played, he would lose either way.
and haechan never liked losing nor giving up. as someone who got everything by hook or crook and never lost, he hated this situation he has with mark. he never played but already lost.
haechan took a deep breath before facing his best friend, "i'm leaving."
mark chuckled, "it's 11, haech. too early for you to leave."
haechan wanted to smack himself and mark. one, because he expected mark to say something about his announcement, and secondly, because mark is absolutely stupid and drunk.
"i meant that i'm leaving the country." haechan said.
the 4 corners of mark's living room fell down to quietness, he doesn't know how to react or how he supposed to do so. he always cherished haechan's presence in his life, always grateful that someone stayed beside him during his weakest days and when everyone gave up on him.
he doesn't know how to live without the lee haechan in his life, heck, he doesn't know if he'll live without him.
it seemed like the two were each other's oxygen. something that is vital in each other's lives, but one never thought of it until someone says they're leaving.
mark never loved haechan in the 2 years he spent waking up each friday next to him but as he looked at those brown eyes of his looking lovingly at the sky, he thinks of one thing.
he would miss those eyes.
he would miss the person who owns those eyes.
and that broke him, that it sunk into him that he’s going to miss a part of him that he never knew existed for five years.
it broke him how he can’t tell haechan that he wants to try something more than what they had been for the past 5 years.
it broke him how he can’t tell he loved haechan all this time.
and it sunk into him. it sunk into his heart how he was all too late to rush back to haechan's arms again.
"you won't stay tonight?" mark asked, slightly hoping that haechan would.
but haechan felt otherwise, he thinks if he stays for a second, minute, or even an hour alone with mark lee, he would change his decision to leave.
he did hope mark begs him to stay. maybe for a lifetime with him and not just for tonight.
but him hoping is all there ever will be.
"i can't." haechan said, marginally breaking in each syllable.
mark nodded and haechan took the chance to stand up.
"take care, hmm?" mark said.
haechan wanted to cry right there and then, "i will."
and that was enough assurance for mark. that was enough for him to let go of haechan, to let go when he just realized his feelings for him.
he smiled as haechan opened the door, maybe leaving out of the apartment or maybe out of his life forever.
mark can't beg haechan to stay. he can't kneel down to haechan and tell him he loved everything about him all this time.
because he knows that haechan deserves more and he also knows he can never be the more that haechan needs, wants, and deserve.
if only he focused on the people that stayed, not on the people that left. if only he realized what haechan meant to him sooner. if only he looked more closely at the signs that the world gave him. if only mark wasn't late.
but he was late, so damn late that he can't do anything about it.
so mark decides to let go.
even though he never had him in the first place.