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Each summer feels like it’s competing with the one before. The heat inside the vehicle must be unbearable — the freeway for this leg of their journey offers no shade, so, Jeonghan presses down on the accelerator, going well above the speed limit.
Next to him, Seokmin is fiddling with the controls on the dashboard, but the air conditioning vents only regurgitate warm air onto their faces. He curses softly, and rolls down the window. Jeonghan watches him in his periphery, how he leans his head on the edge, letting the wind push his too-long fringe out of his eyes.
“Told you not to wear that jacket,” Jeonghan says.
Jeonghan can see the way Seokmin pouts in the side mirror.
“Should’ve warned me about your shit A/C instead,” Seokmin mutters. But Seokmin shrugs off his denim jacket anyway. The stretched out collar of his white t-shirt runs smoothly around his collarbones, like seafoam perling on gilded sand and Jeonghan has to pull his eyes back onto the road and focus on the white lines instead.
They’re a few hours into the drive down to Daegu when Seokmin speaks again, rubbing the exhaustion out of his eyes and stretching his hands over his head. “I gotta take a piss,” he says, at the end of a yawn.
The car’s running low on gas too, so Jeonghan pulls over at the nearest gas station. It’s mostly vacant, with one man dozing off on a chair in the corner. Jeonghan cruises around to the nearest petrol pump, and Seokmin throws open the door, almost tumbling out before the car slows to a stop in his haste.
Jeonghan watches him walk away in the rearview mirror. The small white lettering on it spells: objects in the mirror appear closer than they appear, falling flat and ugly like the punch line of a bad joke. Jeonghan groans, letting his head fall back on the headrest, and digs the heel of his palms into his eyes.
Any other day, this journey would be something that Jeonghan cherished. Road trips with Seokmin were always fun, because he’s the most talkative human Jeonghan knows and has the ability to segue between topics so seamlessly that it should qualify as a talent, or a competitive sport.
But this time is different. This time, Seokmin can barely look him in the eyes. Each attempt Jeonghan had made to corner Seokmin between his lectures so they could talk about what had happened over the weekend, so they prevent exactly this from happening — making the journey down to meet Seungcheol and Jihoon, feel like pulling teeth had been futile. It shouldn’t have been humanely possible to evade Jeonghan so well, and it probably speaks about how rusty Jeonghan had gotten over the last few decades, but Seokmin had succeeded in doing just that.
When Seokmin returns he tosses Jeonghan a foil packet, and he used to joke about how if he didn’t know any better he’d think Jeonghan was sipping on a capri sun, but today, Seokmin says nothing.
The silence drives something sharp between Jeonghan’s ribs.
They lean against the hood of the car, now parked at the edge of a run down gas station, and watch the cars whizz by.
Seokmin bites into a doughnut, long fingers squelching the oily bread between his fingers.
Jeonghan watches the motion, the points his knuckles make under his skin — the unblemished insides of his wrist — the veins that push against the soft skin. He thinks about what it’s like to be held by those hands — to have Seokmin reach out and touch him — like he had done a few days ago.
Jeonghan doesn’t dream anymore, but each time he closes his eyes at sundown he thinks about how Seokmin had pressed himself up along Jeonghan, while they were both caged in by booming music that leaked into the kitchen at some party they had stumbled into.
Jeonghan remembers how Seokmin had slid his hand up Jeonghan’s throat, thumb pressing into where his pulse used to be.
Jeonghan shakes the memories out of his head and pushes away, crumpling up the empty foil packet and tossing it in the trash. It arcs through the air with a small sound and falls into the bin placed at the opposite end of the station with a loud clang.
Next to him, Seokmin scoffs. “Show off,” he mutters under his breath before getting back into the passenger seat.
It’s not exactly the same as their usual banter, but it’s progress. Jeonghan smiles to himself.
But once they’re back on the road, the silence inside the car sets Jeonghan’s teeth on edge, so he reaches over to get his phone and flips through his spotify till he lands on the song he wants and presses play.
It’s alternative rock — reminiscent of the early 2000s punk rock scene — some indie band Seokmin’s been obsessed with. Jeonghan’s pretty sure he’s got a crush on one of the soloists named Joshua.
“This one’s your favourite, right?” Jeonghan asks, glancing at Seokmin out of the corner of his eyes.
“You remembered,” Seokmin says. And the way he says it drives the pain deeper into Jeonghan. Despite the silent treatment Seokmin’s been giving him, Jeonghan can hear that Seokmin’s touched by the fact that Jeonghan remembers.
And that speaks for the kind of person Seokmin is, the fact that he’s still impressed that Jeonghan, the ancient vampire, branded as a possible threat and bio weapon, remembers his favourite song.
It’s the kind of innocence — untouched — that Jeonghan can’t possibly ruin.
It’s why, when Seokmin had kissed him, and all Jeonghan had wanted to do was pull him in, slide his fingers into Seokmin’s fluffy, honey coloured hair and held him closer and devoured him whole, Jeonghan had placed placed his hand on Seokmin’s sternum, feeling his heart tattoo itself onto his palm before shoving him away gently.
“Of course,” Jeonghan whispers. The wind snatches the words right out of his mouth.
After a beat, Seokmin says, “Hyung.” His voice is quiet, but Jeonghan hears how his heart is jackrabbiting inside his ribs.
Jeonghan doesn’t have to see Seokmin’s face to know that the corners of his mouth are curled down, as he tries to pick apart his words.
“Seokmin, about last Saturday,” Jeonghan says. Across from his Seokmin’s pulse starts going crazy. “I’m sorry.”
Seokmin’s head whips around, lightning fast. Jeonghan feels the weight of his stare on the side of his face. “Why are you apologizing?”
“Because you’re hurt,” Jeonghan says. He refuses to look away from the white lines on the road. “Because I hurt you.”
Seokmin’s breath hitches sharply, entirely too loudly, but he doesn’t refute it. “I should be the one apologizing,” he says, instead.
Jeonghan shakes his head. “You didn’t do anything wrong.” He turns to look at Seokmin, and smiles. Seokmin’s eyelashes are heavy, and the cut of his eyes are sharp like glass. If Jeonghan’s skin could give in, and split open, then it might slice him open until he poured himself out right now.
When the silence stretches thin enough to shatter, Seokmin says, “I shouldn’t have done that.”
There’s a selfish part inside Jeonghan, perhaps the only remnant from being human, and it’s glad to have known what Seokmin tastes like, and the weight of his bones pressed to every point of Jeonghan’s.
“Do you regret it?” Jeonghan asks.
“Yes,” Seokmin whispers. Jeonghan’s heart would break, if it could. “Because now I know what it’s like to kiss you, and I know you don’t want anything to do with me, not like that, but I can’t help but keep wanting more.”
The leather of the steering wheel creaks when Jeonghan grips it. He could break it into two — he wants to. He wants to do so many things.
Jeonghan wants to reach out and comfort Seokmin, to be able to kiss him, to belong to someone, after almost over a century of being a wanderer, passing through cities and continents, instead of simply existing.
Seokmin makes him want, and that scares Jeonghan.
This can’t ever work because one day, Seokmin will pass, and Jeonghan will only have a memory to carry with him.
And it wouldn’t be fair to Seokmin.
Human-vampire relationships aren’t unheard of, but it’s rare enough that it would make Seokmin feel out of place.
It’s too heavy of a burden to place on someone as lovely as Seokmin — on this kind, beautiful boy, so full of life, who deserves to hold the sun in the palm of his hand.
“This would never work.”
“Why? Is it so bad— Is it so awful that I love you?”
“You deserve better, Seokmin.”
“That’s not your decision to make!” Seokmin is angry. Jeonghan feels it roll off of him in waves.
“Don’t you feel the same way, at least a little? Look at me, and tell me that you don’t feel the same way, and I’ll drop it. I’ll never bring it up again. But I need to know. Please.” Seokmin’s voice breaks on the last syllable.
Jeonghan wants to cry — he can’t — he just feels like drowning from the inside out.
“I care about you,” Jeonghan says. It’s only one half of the truth — the only thing he can offer Seokmin right now.