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There are ink blotches all over his fingers, trickling down to his wrist just above the small tattoo that’s been immortalized in his skin for years. Thin lines make a figure of a falling leaf. Jeongguk curses under his breath. The whisper is sharp enough to elicit a glance from the person next to him. He takes a quick glance and smiles sheepishly in apology. Deeming that Jeongguk wouldn’t keep still anymore, the person excuses herself and walks out of the library.
Jeongguk ceases to care about other people’s perception of him, but dejection is a trained reaction that drenches his muscles in cold water. He mutters another apology under his breath as he rummages through the dozens of things in his bag (there are three bottles of ylang ylang essential oils inside which baffle him too). The tissues he neatly folded and kept inside a sealed plastic are somehow everywhere, crumpled and torn from the motion and disruptions on the way, probably.
When he pulls the wrinkled tissue out, the ink has settled on his skin like a temporary brand. Dry and stubborn to wipe. He clicks his tongue bitterly, thinking of all the things that have gone wrong in just the first—he checks the watch on his left wrist—four hours of his day. His faulty coffee machine somehow managed to brew a lukewarm espresso that tastes foul, sour and under-extracted. It makes him grimace, spitting the darkened liquid down the drain. The aftertaste leaves an entirely bitter feeling on his taste buds when he realizes the date, a number that wouldn’t matter to anyone else in this city other than two people separated by ego and stop signs.
He knows Taehyung lives a few blocks away from his—their (if he can even call it that anymore)—apartment. It didn’t take long for him to find out where the other lives, not when a big chunk of him still belongs to Taehyung. And it didn’t take long for him to find out Taehyung is holding hands with another man just under a month after their separation.
People, he realizes, crave the company of others to fill in the silence even when there’s a raging war inside their heads. It doesn’t escape him that Taehyung was the one that always graced the quiet in his life with vibrancy. Now, he’s in the arms of someone else while Jeongguk is in the public library trying to jot down his thoughts into something more comprehensive. It might be a little weird for him to spend a majority of his waking moment (when he isn’t working) in the library actively journaling his thoughts like a broken-hearted teenager.
But that’s the thing he realizes as of late; he didn’t let himself mourn enough for the great loss. He named their breakup that, because in his mind it’s the only loss significant enough for him to feel in his bones. The cold creeps like a ghost at night, often cocooning him with the reminder that the bed’s too big to be occupied by one person. Is it pathetic to feel lonesome even after a few months?
People, he realizes, don’t belong to other people. Intimacy only makes them dependent, an intricate affinity far from ownership. No, what they had wasn’t possession, it was a fellow feeling that makes him feel like he’s found a place to rest after a long time searching. Sometimes, he flips through his journal entry in moments of pity, as a reminder of a profound love that slips from his fingers like sand in an hourglass.
Jeongguk hadn’t had a pen explosion for years. The last time was a drunken shenanigan; a memory he subdued deep into the crevices of his mind. In fact, he didn’t even remember who started the foolish bet of microwaving a ballpoint. The night was a blur of scalding hot liquid fire on ice chugged down his throat like a rushed communion. He felt warm inside and even more so when Taehyung placed his hand on his cheek. It’s a different kind of flush then, one that only comes out when a crush pays special attention to you.
They weren’t a thing yet; still skirting around each other on eggshells like two orbiting planets in the vast universe. He remembers Taehyung leaning close, heat from his breath tingling his skin before he pressed a soft kiss in the corner of his lip. He could vaguely hear their friends giggling and shouts of surprise around them as the ink paints the inside of the microwave a gooey black.
Back then, he lived in the moments of affection they shared, in the quiet murmurs even when they’re alone in the room, in the warm embrace after hours of classes and nights of deadlines. It was the easiest thing to love Taehyung, far more doable than it is to live after Taehyung, his sweetheart of two years.
Jeongguk groans at the impending headache he could feel coming with all these trips he takes in his head. It doesn’t help that Yoongi asked for a rain check tonight. He’s not a bitter or petty man by default, but he can be a sour patch when his ex takes his friends’ time. Shrugging it off, he dumps all of his things into his bag and walks out.
-
The hardest thing to navigate through the breakup was pretending to be normal again. They belong to the same group of friends, which means they know Taehyung’s worst sleeping habit and probably the size of Jeongguk’s junk too. It didn’t bother him then but it does now when Yoongi, once again, canceled on him for the second time in a row.
“I’m sorry, Gguk. I forgot to tell you I couldn’t come today.”
Truthfully, he doesn’t know why he’s this upset. He was never bothered when Jimin or Yoongi bailed on him to go to Taehyung’s, because at the end of the day it’s for the same stupid reason again and again. Jeongguk stirs the sugar in his tea loudly, letting the sharp clanks of the spoon and the cup echo to the phone. “It’s fine. What is this? The fourth split? The fifth one? He breaks up so often I lose count of the tallies.”
Yoongi doesn’t immediately respond. Jeongguk occupies the silence by sipping his tea and turning up the volume of his television. They have a routine, Yoongi and Jeongguk. Every Saturday is spent watching movies (or rewatching Star Wars), but it’s two weeks in a row that Yoongi fails to show up. Maybe he’s not upset at Yoongi but at the situation for cornering him like this.
“You’re keeping track?” comes Yoongi’s voice, laced with a hint of concern and perhaps pity too.
He feels like a deflated balloon, once filled with hope and the same thing that fills him now seeps out, leaving him exhausted and sore like an open wound. Maybe he is an open wound walking.
Jeongguk swallows the boulder in his throat. How does he tell Yoongi that this place feels like a cage rather than a home on days where he’s alone? “No, Yoongi, I’m not. I just find it hard sometimes that my friends have to divide their time between me and him.” It fucking kills me when he gets hurt. I know how to love him right.
Anger doesn’t come to him immediately. He filters his emotions like he’s separating the colored shirt from the white ones in his laundry basket. It’s torture. It’s slow-brewed suffocation that makes him sit and stare at the bright lights at night from his room and think of the familiar weight on top of him when he sleeps. Now it’s replaced with sleep paralysis demons and the ghost of his love that leaves tracks of habitation in the paint splattered on the wooden floor.
He fills the deafening silence, the static tune from his speakers and the faint rustling he can hear from Yoongi’s end with a sigh. Of all their friends, Yoongi’s the one he goes to the most even before he and Taehyung got together.
“I’m not choosing him over you. He just—he’s in a bad place. You’re in a bad place. I’m being there for both of you in my terms. I’m your friend but he’s my friend too.” Yoongi’s voice feels muted in his ears. Like the words float from one ear and out the next. “I wouldn’t have to choose if both of you would just talk, actually.”
“You think I haven’t tried?” Jeongguk paces the space between the sofa and the low table back and forth. “It’s been six months and it still feels like shit when I see him with someone else. Am I-” he pauses to hold his breath. This is an admission he’s kept to himself all this time, but it’s one that eats him from the inside out like a moth in the dark. “Am I not enough? I tried to keep it together, you know I did. I smile at him and whoever he brings to our dinners. I’m civil. I keep it together when his man of the month is all smiles yet doesn’t know Taehyung can’t fucking handle spice. I duck my head when they’re huddled up together. I give him space even when he’s the one that left a big, giant space in his wake when he walked out. Yoongi, I loved him silently even when he asked me to stop. So tell me. Tell me, am I not enough?”
The words are cruel even to his own ears. Strains his throat with the way it pierces out of his chest and into the receiver. Makes his eyes water with the weight of doubt and uncertainty. There’s so much of Taehyung everywhere. It’s like the proof of his existence has carved itself into Jeongguk’s space, permeated his closet and settled in his blanket like an eternal reminder. If the body replaces every cell and skin every seven years, Jeongguk would find a way to keep the pieces Taehyung has touched hidden from the process.
There’s a faint gasp in the background that stops the onset of waterworks from his eyes. But before he could, Yoongi replies, “Of course you are.” but even as the words are spoken with sincerity, it feels like a sentence spoken in vain, in hopes of reassuring someone with man-made facts that are subjective. It sounds empty.
“I just don’t know what to do.” Jeongguk sighs, feeling embarrassment creep on his face for the outburst. “It’s like I haven’t talked about him for a long time. But it doesn’t mean I’ve moved on. Hell, Yoongi, how do you move on from the only person you love?”
Yoongi chuckles. It sounds almost forceful and bitter. “You don’t, kid.”
Jeongguk was twenty-three when his boyfriend broke up with him. In two days, he’ll be twenty-four with the same heartache in his chest.
-
There’s a tradition in their group when the clock strikes twelve on someone’s birthday. Jeongguk lays awake with his eyes closed, the breathing exercise he religiously does every night is playing on his laptop next to him. It’s the only time he has to himself during the weekdays, away from the conflicting thoughts and expectations to reach at work. His lungs expand as he breathes in, the only weight in his ribcage that he can bear, and it returns to its default state when he exhales.
Breathe in.
Hold.
Breathe out.
Repeat. Expand. Constrict. Repeat.
The motion almost lulls him to sleep, but the state of lethargy his mind swirls to places he doesn’t dare reach during the day; to teasing remarks and changing light bulbs without folding stairs. He doesn’t have it in himself to come clean to Yoongi. About his inability to let go, about the universe and the hands of fate that Taehyung likes to talk about at night and how it relates to them. About how it feels to love Taehyung right and the wrongs it takes to make it right. He keeps breathing in and out even when the video ends and what’s left is his heaving lungs in the silence.
When Taehyung was still here, he was the music that filled the moment’s silence. All the things he did made sounds. The noises that Jeongguk realized too late formed a harmony that made life bearable. The keys jiggled when Taehyung was right in front of the door, fumbling with his three sets of keys—one for their place, another for his studio and his parents' house—making sounds that messed with the flow of words, thoughts and syntaxes in his head. Jeongguk was used to fingers pausing their movements on his keyboard, halting his train of sentences as Taehyung arrived and pressed a firm kiss to his forehead. Welcome home, he used to say. How was your day? He used to ask.
Summer slipped them like borrowed time running to catch a moving train. All Jeongguk knows is writing and juggling office work. All Taehyung knows is painting Jeongguk’s best angles. He briefly wonders if their end started when Jeongguk would lock himself in the study room, with work drowning his lifeline and leaving Taehyung to sleep and wake to an empty bed. He wonders if it will hurt less if he doesn’t have the phantom weight of a silver ring on top of his bookshelf.
There are a lot of things in his life that refuse to go right, always bending and breaking before it stands upright. He spent a majority of his time writing about them in his free time, scoffing at himself when he realizes that he could pour out thousands of words on paper but these words leave him when it mattered most.
“I think we should call it quits.” The corners of his eyes are red. Jeongguk knows it’s his habit when he cries, he rubs at his eyes like it’s the most disgraceful thing. It claws at his heart, the awareness that Taehyung has been neck-deep in his misery without Jeongguk’s knowledge.
“But we’re fine. We are fine, right?”
Taehyung tries to crack a smile, but it comes out as a sob. Each cry rattles his bones like he’s laying down all his cards with no expectations. They’ve been each other’s homes for years. Jeongguk exhales a shaky breath, “Taehyung,” he starts, not knowing where the words will go from there, but Taehyung’s name falls from his lips like an act of worship even in this desperation. “I’m sorry. I’ll do better, I can—I can love you right.”
Taehyung scoffs.“What’s the point of loving me right when you’re never there?”
Six months and Jeongguk still regrets not fighting harder. Six months and Jeongguk couldn’t help but think that Taehyung brought the sun with him when he walked out the door. It’s a muted blue now. Engulfing him like a suffocating embrace that lacks the warmth he needs.
When the doorbell rings twice, Jeongguk blinks his eyes open.
Adjusting his eyes to the light, he checks his phone for the time and chuckles. What’s the use of twenty-four’s clean slate when he can’t bring himself to close the last chapter? As bitter as he is, he isn’t one to let his friends down or refuse entrance when they’ve obviously made time to surprise him.
It’s a little childish if he thinks about it—midnight birthday surprises—but he clings to these traditions for a sense of normalcy. For him to pretend that everything is okay and they’re all a good, solid group of friends.
Three knocks on the front door make him falter in his steps. His friends always said that Taehyung was always waiting for him to make the move back then. Betrayal is what he feels as hope expands his chest like a hot air balloon. Betrayal at himself for allowing something as fickle as three knocks to make him stumble.
Three knocks that always mean more to him than they did to anyone else. A secret language of theirs back when Taehyung would sneak into his dorm room at night. Three knocks mean Taehyung is home with Jeongguk’s favorite tteok from down the street. Three knocks.
He throws on the shirt he tossed on the couch with quiet steps. His heart is beating erratically, like a caged bird fighting to fly out into its rightful owner. When he peeps through the small hole, closing his right eye to see clearly.
Taehyung’s hand is balled in a fist, suspended mid-air as if he’s contemplating to knock or leave. There’s a small chocolate cake balanced on his other hand with the candles alight. It casts a shadow of regret over Taehyung’s face, of (what he hopes is) yearning and saturated love.
His fingers tremble when it meets the dangling key plugged into the door. In just a turn, the door will be unlocked. It means the days that blend into weeks and turn to months would all accumulate to this moment, to the cold, harsh reality that it took them falling apart in the worst ways to come together.
Jeongguk feels like he’s back in his third year of university again. And just like the Jeongguk then, he opens the door for Taehyung to come in.
All this time he feels the distance between them expanding into cities and continents. Unreachable as opposed to the usual stretch of arm he does in the mornings to Taehyung’s side of the bed. Six months have passed. The effort it took for him not to crumble apart means brushing off the vacancy in his chest and pretending he’s fine. He hasn’t been fine in a while.
And now that Taehyung is in front of him, he still feels lightyears away. He wonders what it will take to reach his shores again.
“Happy birthday,” Taehyung whispers, holding the cake with both of his hands and extending his arms to Jeongguk. Just like him, Taehyung trembles just as hard.
The candles flicker with the force of Jeongguk’s exhale which makes them chuckle. In his head, he mentally curses the breathing exercises for not doing shit. He still can’t control his lungs, not when Taehyung always takes his breath away, snatching control from Jeongguk’s grasp in the only way he can. In the only way Jeongguk will allow someone to. Someone like Taehyung. Someone he loves.
The wax drips down the candles in large droplets. Transparent until it reaches the top frosting of the cake. It solidifies as it touches the surface, some of the wax returning back to the candle like it’s always meant to be. Some things melt away to come back to where they belong, some melt to take on a new form. Jeongguk understands now. Understands that the Taehyung in front of him is different from his Taehyung. This version of him is apart from the Jeongguk that Taehyung knows. Yet all their shades always find a way of coming back together. Like a full circle.
Jeongguk steps aside, pulling open the door with him to make way for Taehyung.
“Can you blow the candles first, please?” Taehyung chews his bottom lip. His nerves must’ve taken over him too.
Jeongguk nods and does as he’s told to. He knows that birthday wishes are sacred—a once-in-a-year magic reserved for the person that grows older—but he finds his mind empty as he blows the candles. Old habits die hard, they said, and it’s true. Jeongguk reaches up to tug Taehyung’s bottom lip free from in between his teeth with a brush of his thumb. Second nature.
“Thank you, Tae.” He doesn’t know if he could still call him that. If he has lost the right to call him with this name and can only resort to a simple Taehyung. But with the way the frost melts in Taehyung’s eyes to make way for spring, he knows it’s the right move. “Come in. I’ll make tea.”
-
While Jeongguk prepares the peppermint tea, his body moves on autopilot to scoop two spoonfuls of sugar into Taehyung's cup. There’s still the same loaded silence in the apartment, much more constricting now that Taehyung is here. Yet Jeongguk feels more at ease as he navigates his way in the kitchen. If he closes his eyes, he could pretend that everything is as it was. He used to feel skittish, not used to people staring at him for too long. But now he relishes in the gaze he feels on his back, Taehyung’s eyes watching his every move.
The gears must be spinning in his head as fast as it is in Jeongguk’s. Maybe he’ll mess around with Taehyung a little bit.
“Can I help you?” Jeongguk asks, turning around to lean his back on the counter as he stirs Taehyung’s tea. All the while he’s looking straight at Taehyung. It’s shitty of him, but the faint blush that graces Taehyung’s cheeks makes him feel giddy.
Taehyung shakes his head, eyes staring back, but not quite at him. Rather, it’s somewhere behind him, hovering over a spot next to his face, at his fingers holding the little gold spoon Taehyung loves to use. “No, uh,” Taehyung begins, lips twitching in a valiant attempt to stop himself from smiling. He puffs a sigh as he stands, unwrapping the thin scarf around his neck and tossing it where he sat.
With a white shirt tucked into loose beige pants and thick glasses perched on his nose, Taehyung looks like he has never left. “I wanted to make sure you put precisely two spoons of sugar.”
Jeongguk taps the spoon on the rim of the glass, a clear ringing sound that sharpens the atmosphere of the room. He opens the fridge to take out the half-sliced lime from the small bowl, squeezing a few drops of the juice into the tea.
“And a hint of lime, just the way you like it.” Jeongguk walks over and hands him the cup. Smiling when Taehyung can’t seem to look him in the eyes.
Taehyung blows on the tea, flashing a satisfied smile when he realizes that it’s not hot enough to burn his tongue but warm enough to soothe his throat. “Thank you,” he mutters.
With nothing else to do, he plops down next to Taehyung. The couch sinks under his weight as he spreads his legs more comfortably.
“Good?” Jeongguk asks, cutting a slice of the cake and then dividing it into two.
“Yeah.” Taehyung swallows. He places the cup down on the low table and leans back. “You make the best tea.”
“Of course I do. I’ve known you for years.”
It seems like the wrong thing to say. He realizes it a bit too late after a few seconds of no response from Taehyung, so he braves a glance to his side. A small furrow appears between Taehyung’s eyes, like he’s deep in thought. Then he says, “And you still do after all this time, huh?”
Inhaling from his nose, Jeonggk takes a moment to think of an answer. But Taehyung knows him. Knows what each line in his palm means and the tone changes of his voice. There’s no use in hiding behind a facade anymore.
“I’d like to think so, yeah.”
Taehyung hums, turning his head to face Jeongguk. “You do. You still do, better than anyone else.”
“Then why did you leave?”
“I think,” Taehyung starts and closes his eyes. “It’s the same reason you didn’t stop me.”
“And why didn’t I stop you?” Jeongguk asks, chewing on his cheek.
His eyes, Jeongguk realizes, are wet. “Because we weren’t—we didn’t see eye to eye for a long time, Gguk. It wasn’t healthy for me and you know it.”
Jeongguk lets his head wonder what would guarantee that this wouldn’t end with one of them leaving again. The light in the apartment is dim, a warm yellow that encompasses the entire room. Taehyung’s hair is long now, soft curls that frame his face delicately. His lips are shiny with the amount of time he spends swiping his tongue over it in hopes to hide his nerves. Jeongguk swallows the urge to run his fingers through his soft hair. Taehyung likes—liked—it when Jeongguk did back then.
“Was I too much for you? Back then?” Taehyung asks. There’s fear in his voice. It’s croaked as if he had just swallowed two doses of cough syrup.
Taehyung’s hand is placed on his own lap, the palm facing upwards. It isn’t an invitation for Jeongguk to hold his hands, but he knows Taehyung loves to be held in moments of vulnerability. The touch is warm and almost more intimate than it does when their bodies are tangled in bed. It’s emotionally charged with regret and a longing to come back, to return to where they belong.
He squeezes Taehyung’s hand in reassurance, moves his thumb in slow circles on Taehyung’s skin, careful not to scratch with his nails. It feels natural to be here, like this, skin touching skin.
Exhausted, Jeongguk leaned his head on Taehyung’s shoulder, breathing in the scent of ylang ylang, the one scent that Jeongguk never gets but finds a perfect fit on someone like Taehyung. He makes a small noise at the back of his throat, unable to keep the emotions contained. He doesn’t tighten his hold, and doesn't pull Taehyung closer. He just stays there. Reminiscing the moments where this was his favorite place to be.
“No. Never too much,” Jeongguk whispers. The softer they speak, the harder it is to breathe. Just like it did when they part ways, both unable to hold on any longer for the right reasons. “You’re the only one I’ve ever loved. The only one I’ve learned to love. The only one that feels right to love.” His hands are shaking again. Taehyung squeezes him back. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t make enough effort in the end.”
Taehyung visibly winces. “It hurts, Gguk. I’m not going to lie and say I was okay with it. I felt like I had to beg for your attention. It made me feel like I’m… insignificant. I gave you time and all my patience, but the more space I give you the longer it takes for you to come back. It feels like you stopped loving me.” Taehyung tugs his hands away and turns to face him completely. “Did you?”
“Oh God, no.” Jeongguk’s eyes widened. He tries to reach Taehyung’s hands again but stops midway in fear of overstepping. Taehyung senses his hesitation and laces their hands together. “Taehyung,” he says softly, “I love you. I want you. But not like this. Not when you’ve just broken up with another man. What does that make me? A rebound?”
“No, Jeongguk, it makes us look like stupid fools because I’ve never dated anyone after you.” Jeongguk tilts his head in confusion. “Well, I tried. A few times. But it didn’t feel right. None of them felt like they genuinely wanted to know me for… well for me. They just looked for a body to sleep with and I’m not—I’m not like that. You were the last person I’ve kissed, Jeongguk. You were my, well, my person.”
“Really?”
Taehyung nods. He takes a deep breath. “Really.”
Jeongguk fidgets. This time, he’s the one to pull his fingers away. “Sorry, hold on, my palms are sweaty.”
It seems to break the tension that surrounds them, melting away all the doubts and pent-up regrets for something as cliche as a clean slate on his twenty-fourth birthday. Something he didn’t think was possible three hours ago.
“I know, babe.” Taehyung stands up and places both hands on Jeongguk’s cheeks. “It’s one of the things I can’t stand about you but find endearing either way.” Jeongguk comes to life at the touch, loving the attention Taehyung puts on him. It feels possessive to think, but he feels the pieces fall into place when Taehyung is with him again.
When people say that Christmas is the most beautiful time of the year, Jeongguk disagrees. They haven’t seen Taehyung in warm light with a soft, enamored look on his face. They haven’t seen Taehyung in front of Jeongguk like this. They haven’t felt Taehyung’s soft lips on theirs, moving languidly, taking time to memorize the feeling of Jeongguk’s lips on his once more after being barred for so long. They haven’t seen the dazed look in Taehyung’s eyes when Jeongguk pulls back and presses one last kiss on his lips.
They haven’t seen Taehyung in love.
Jeongguk pulls both of Taehyung’s wrists, kissing the back of both hands before leading him to the kitchen.
They move like water flowing down the river, fluid and graceful in the place where they spend a majority of their time and conversations. Jeongguk circles both of his arms around Taehyung from behind, moving and swaying them from side to side to the rhythm of their heart and the static hum of their old fridge. “Dance with me.”
“With what song?” Taehyung laughs, head thrown back to Jeongguk’s shoulder, eyes an equal part wistful and love, swirling in his irises as he clutches Jeongguk’s hands tight with his own.
Jeongguk keeps Taehyung pressed against him with one hand as the other reaches to his back pocket for his phone.
And when the same, familiar song plays from his phone speakers, Taehyung turns around in his hold and gives him a smile.
“You remember?” Taehyung asks, incredulous and touched.
Of course, he wants to say. Everything that makes up Taehyung is theories that Jeongguk absorbs like a sponge. And this, he knows, is what he will continue to do for the rest of his life. One day, when he pops the question and gets down on one knee, it is with this song and in this light and in a moment like this. Not too grand, but intimate and entirely theirs.
“Oh, my love, my darling. I’ve hungered for your touch,” Jeongguk sings, lower than the volume of the song, but loud enough for Taehyung to know he means it.
Again, Taehyung beams. Like flowers that have been tended with care for years and have now learned to bloom with grace.
This, Jeongguk thinks, is my favorite part of loving you.