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The first time Mark visits the graveyard it's raining. He curses under his breath, then shakes his head hoping no one heard him as he makes his way down the alley the paper in his hand described.
No, stop, that wasn't Mark’s first time at a graveyard but it was the first time relevant to this particular story.
And well, the alley he was walking down that particular evening was the right one only in his imagination as he has gotten “Rick” mixed up with “Dick” because of the pouring rain that had made the ink bleed through the paper and made the words unreadable.
Honestly, it's hard to blame Mark in this situation because who puts the “Dick” on a tombstone instead of the whole name. Apparently, Mrs Kim as it turned out later.
Okay, now back to the story.
Mark still has a hard time comprehending why on earth someone would order a flower bouquet to a graveyard instead of taking it there themselves but an order is an order and unfortunately for him, his boss said they deliver everywhere in the city.
He frowns down at the grave and sees a barely visible “2010” on it. For a decently recent grave, this one is deserted, the once white stone now gray because of the rain and dirt. It's also empty, no sign of any flowers nearby and for a moment Mark wonders if that's why the customer chose the delivery instead of making the trip themselves. They could simply be too far away.
Mark leans down and places a bouquet of sunflowers on the grave gently. His hand lingers on the cool and wet stone for a second as he wonders if he should just get up and leave as fast as he can considering the fog that's risen from the ground during his short stay at the graveyard making it so much spookier than it needed to be.
And then, it happens.
A hand flies out of the ground and catches Mark’s wrist in a light grip.
Mark, as one would expect, lets out a loud shrieking noise and immediately mumbles an apology. He is at a graveyard after all and if nothing else, the poor souls here deserve to rest.
Well, it seems someone disagrees with Mark’s way of thinking because just after a second of the hand’s appearance, another one joins in and Mark can do nothing more than watch in horror as a figure slowly raises from the dirt next to the grave he’s just put the flowers on.
Mark isn't sure what he expected zombies to look like but what he sees isn't anywhere close for sure. Well, okay, maybe he did have a few unrealistic expectations of ugly, greenish looking humans with half of their limbs falling off, surely fueled by all the horror movies Jeno made him watch.
The zombie currently standing before him is anything but green and ugly. It also has all of its limbs in the right places, not even a finger threatening to fall off.
For a moment they simply stand there, none of them moving and Mark takes this time to force his brain to analyze this situation using logic. Like most things Mark tells his brain to do, it doesn't work. Instead, he notices all the things that sure as hell won’t help him escape being eaten alive by a very cute zombie.
Yeah, I think you can already see the fault in Mark’s train of thought.
Still, the fact that the zombie before Mark is cute can’t really be disputed. He’s slim, a little bit shorter than Mark, with skin so pale it’s almost translucent but Mark suspects that part can be blamed on the fact that the younger is, well, dead. Has been for the last (here Mark steals a glance at the tombstone again and it earns him an eyebrow raise) ten years. That’s a long time to be dead and if you asked Mark he would say the other looks exceptionally good considering the circumstances. Although, Mark suspects he would look amazing in any circumstances.
Did Mark mention he’s gay?
“What are you looking at? Never seen a dead person before?”
Mark almost jumps out of his skin and he can only partly blame it on how sudden the words are. The other part is on him for getting so mesmerized by a zombie of all things.
Mark takes a second too long to answer because he wonders how is it possible that the other’s vocal cords still work after such a long time.
The other eyebrow joins its sister and now instead of unimpressed the other looks unimpressed and surprised.
The only thing he’s missing now is crossed arms. Well, never mind that, Mark thinks as the zombie lifts his arms and crosses them over his chest.
Check mate. The only thing left to do is for Mark to finally open his mouth and let words spill like waterfalls so he does.
“Technically no, I’ve seen my grandma at her funeral but, well, she was more, yknow,” here Mark waves his hands around like he’s trying to get rid of a very annoying mosquito. “dead.”
Mark doesn't know what he expected but it surely wasn’t a sharp and short laugh and yet that's exactly what he gets. The corners of his mouth lift involuntary, too. Surely, if the other was planning on consuming his brain he would have skipped small talk.
“I can assure you I’m as dead as your grandma was. I just woke up for my everyday hour of fun, is all,” the other, Donghyuck, says. Now that the initial shock melts away Mark is able to read the letters on the tombstone and he almost facepalms himself here and there because how did he get it that wrong? He’s a disgrace and should never be trusted even with delivering flowers to a dead person. Never mind the living.
Mark has no answer to that so he shifts his gaze to the bouquet of sunflowers still laying on Donghyuck’s grave. He wonders how inappropriate it would be for him to take the flowers, put them on the right grave and then sprint away like his life depended on it.
Well, one thing is pretty clear already. Mark cannot ever set foot in this particular cemetery even if his own future husband requests to be buried here. Then again, Mark wonders if contradicting someone's dying wish would get him in trouble with yet another zombie. Better to never get married and test this theory.
“Are those for me?” Donghyuck’s voice pulls Mark out of the river of thoughts he would rather not have and he would probably thank the younger, yes he can do basic math and the other was younger when he died and Mark decides it counts, if not for the fact that Donghyuck’s gaze is on the flowers. His eyebrows are showing only surprise now.
And, hold on, is that a smirk on his lips!?
Mark is so, so screwed.
“Actually—” he starts to say in a lame attempt to save his face and maybe the flowers too. Donghyuck doesn't let him finish.
“Sunflowers mean pure love,” the younger leans down and picks up the flowers, something like happiness lighting up his eyes before disappearing as quickly as it appeared, making Mark feel conflicted.
On one hand, he can’t afford to lose the flowers, no lie good enough to explain why he left the bouquet at the wrong grave. On the other hand, the look in Donghyuck’s eyes makes him want to do it anyway.
And then Donghyuck’s expression turns to teasing and Mark changes his mind. He needs to get the flowers back, no matter what.
“Is that what you feel for me? You certainly look too young to be one of my many admirers in high school.”
Mark summons his best judging expression and glares.
“Keep dreaming,” he deadpans.
Donghyuck snorts.
“Sure, sure,” he says to Mark’s turned back.
This whole thing is so insane that by the time Mark reaches the graveyard’s exit he’s almost ready to believe it never happened.
Almost.
Because when he turns around Donghyuck is still there, a pale figure against the incoming darkness.
Mark sighs, knowing full well this isn’t the last time they meet.
xxx
The second time Mark visits the graveyard he knows he’s totally screwed.
“I can’t believe I’m here again and I can’t believe I paid for this with my own money,” he mumbles to the bouquet of coral roses in his hands. This time he’s checked the flower meaning before carefully selecting a few to bring to Donghyuck’s grave.
He wanted to make sure he didn’t accidentally confess his nonexisting love to the younger again.
From the slightly amused look on Donghyuck’s face, Mark can tell the internet hasn’t failed him.
“Friendship,” Donghyuck accepts the flowers and runs his fingers down the thorns before placing the bouquet on the grave. “I didn’t think you would come back.”
“I’m surprised too,” Mark says. It’s a small lie but Donghyuck doesn’t have to know it.
He doesn’t have to know that Mark wants to keep coming back as long as Donghyuck doesn’t find a way to gather a bouquet of butterfly weed, forcing Mark to let him go.
Donghyuck smiles and makes space for him to sit down too.
Somehow one time becomes three, four and then Mark loses count.
He’s never been good at math.
He finds that he doesn’t really mind this, even if all his family probably wonders how to cut him out of their will when he leaves the house once again to visit the graveyard.
He finds he doesn’t really mind anything as long as Donghyuck keeps looking at him like he’s something worth leaving his coffin for. Quite literally.
It makes him wonder…
“So,” Mark starts, not sure even after months how to ask questions so that Donghyuck won’t shut him out. “Why are you the only dead person who isn’t, well, nicely laying in their grave? It seems like it must be nice judging from how this place isn’t the second most busy place in town. I don’t think that even with all the dead people doing a party it could get busier than the school.”
Donghyuck bursts into laughter. Mark gives himself a mental high five.
“I like my walks,” Donghyuck’s tone tells Mark there’s more to it but he decides not to push. “If I could spend all my time wandering, I would. But usually, there are people in the graveyard visiting their family and friends and if there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s that death is something we shouldn’t mess with. Like you said, dead things should stay dead and for the most part, it is that way. I think most people never really wake up from being dead. Even when the weather is perfect for a walk.”
“Why are you awake then?” Mark asks in a soft voice.
“I have claustrophobia. I guess it somehow disturbed my forever rest.”
The silence that settles between them isn’t exactly awkward but the sadness in Donghyuck’s eyes makes Mark want to shatter it all the same.
“Hey,” he says to get the younger’s attention. “It’s fine. You don’t have to hide underground when I’m here.”
Donghyuck’s gaze snaps to him and the younger stares at him in silence for a moment.
It’s not that hard to put the pieces together. After all, there’s always been a story whispered in the darkness of school trips back when Mark was in high school, a tale about a student who collapsed under the weight of expectations, shattering not only him but also his family who have never recovered from it. And while normally Mark would feel compassion for them, looking at Donghyuck’s empty grave, no sights of candles or flowers anywhere since the first time Mark visited months ago, it’s not the case here. Mark can’t help but resent them a little bit for the sad look on Donghyuck’s face when he talks about families and friends visiting other graves.
“Thank you.”
Donghyuck gets up and comes closer, his fingers brushing against Mark’s hesitantly.
“Don’t leave,” Donghyuck’s voice has a vulnerability to it that Mark has never heard before and he pauses, heart in his throat and pulse-quickening. He's almost sure the other can feel it under his fingertips.
“I have to,” he answers, voice quiet like he too would rather stay here, at the graveyard covered in fog than return to his warm room.
He's beginning to understand that maybe it's the truth.
“I know, it's just…” Donghyuck's eyes look past Mark's shoulder and he instinctively checks but there's nothing there. “You’ll be back, right? You won't leave forever.”
Mark can feel his walls crumble and he almost gives in, almost promises the other to live with him underground in the small coffin which Donghyuck hates so much.
Instead, he turns their hands around and wraps his fingers around Donghyuck's cold wrist, and squeezes.
“I promise,” he says.
Donghyuck nods and lets him go.
xxx
Mark doesn’t know how many times he’s visited the graveyard by the time he gets the big news.
“I’m moving to Daegu,'“ he tells Donghyuck on one sunny day, the knuckles of his hands white from how hard he’s squeezing the bouquet of violets. For once, he thinks he’s completely missed with the flower meaning judging by the look on Donghyuck’s face.
Tranquility, my ass.
“Ah,” Donghyuck looks down at the flowers and gives Mark a small smile. “Is this your farewell gift? I thought that by now you’d have fallen for my charms and brought me red roses or sunflowers again.”
Mark doesn’t tell Donghyuck how his fingers lingered above the delicate petals of the sunflowers in the flower shop this morning before he decided it would be too cruel to end things like this.
Except maybe, if it’s possible, Mark might get another chance at buying them and mean it this time.
The thought is so wild he hasn’t entertained it up until this very moment.
“It doesn’t have to be a farewell unless you want it to be,” he says carefully, not sure if he hasn’t read too much into the past few months. “Or it has to be, I don’t know if you’re bound to your grave or—”
One second Mark is standing, flowers in his hands, the second there’s Donghyuck in his arms, the violets completely crushed between their bodies.
Maybe the lack of tranquility isn’t such a bad idea, Mark decides as Donghyuck finally lets him go.
“Bound, my ass,” Donghyuck tries to sound wounded but Mark isn’t fooled. “I could have left and scared half of the town shitless a long time ago.”
Mark snorts.
“I don’t doubt that.”
Donghyuck crosses his arms over his chest and finally, finally, gives Mark a bright smile.
“I’ll need clothes, a phone, and a ton of foundation. I need to cover everything,” Donghyuck gestures at his skin and Mark tries hard not to think about all of that white skin hiding under Donghyuck’s old t-shirt.
“I hope you know you’re agreeing to run away with a broke florist.”
Donghyuck raises his eyebrows, pretending this is news to him.
“If we run out of money for my make up I can always find myself some nice coffin in the local graveyard.”
Mark rolls his eyes but smiles.
“Tomorrow then.”
And then, he leaves.
xxx
The last time Mark visits the graveyard is no accident. The sun is shining brightly as he sings under his breath and laughs at how inappropriate this all is.
No one should be this happy at a graveyard and yet…
Well, technically this isn't his last time here but it is the last time that's relevant to this story.
Mark doesn't even need to glance at the gravestones he's passing to know where to take a turn and he smiles slightly at the “Rick” who has helped him get to the point he's at in some way.
Donghyuck waits at him at the end of the alley, his feet nervously tapping an unknown rhythm at his own tombstone.
“Hey,” Mark says, his smile growing bigger as the tapping stops and the other turns to him.
“You’re late,” Donghyuck points out and Mark has enough decency to not ask how the other knows that. He’s pretty sure the dead don't own watches.
“Sorry,” he answers instead and scratches at the back of his neck. “I wasn't sure which foundation would fit your complexion best.”
Donghyuck rolls his eyes but the slight unease Mark saw in his eyes just a moment ago disappears.
“I also brought you this,” he says under his breath and pulls his hands from behind his back.
Donghyuck’s eyes grow comically large and Mark is sure that if the other had any blood left in him he would blush.
“Pure love,” Donghyuck gently takes the sunflowers from Mark’s trembling fingers.
Mark hands him the shopping bag too.
Donghyuck barely glances at it, his eyes still on Mark’s face.
“I mean it you know,” the older finally says after a long pause. Before, he's been scared of this, the words about the sunflowers reminding him of Donghyuck at the tip of his tongue. In the end, he decides the truth is what he wants to give the other.
Donghyuck laughs and reaches down behind the tombstone with his own name and “2010” on it.
“Daises,” he says as he pulls out the said flowers. His bouquet is smaller, some of the white petals damp and brown with mud. Mark can’t look away from them. “Loyal love.”
For a moment all they do is stare at each other.
“I mean it too, you know,” Donghyuck whispers.
Mark smiles.
“I know,” he says and reaches out a hand.
Donghyuck grabs it without hesitation.
Sunflowers mix with the daisies.
They never look back.