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Crystal snow coats the window pane as it trickles down from gloomy clouds. You wake to find once bare branches and dry roads, heavy and wet with layers of snow. The untreated snow trails fill you with emptiness as the world feels vacant, uninhabited. You’ve been up for hours, watching the sunrise while teacup after teacup nurses your unruly heart. With every inhale and exhale, your lungs only feel further restricted by your rib cage. Bones under flesh, mind over heart, all you feel is pain.
The six fragments of a letter rest before you on the kitchen table. You drag your gaze away from the frost framed window and read through the paragraphs. You’ve read each horizontally ripped piece a dozen times, trying to fully process the beautifully written sentences. The sender remains anonymous, but you have a good guess on who might be the voice behind this confession. You know his handwriting, know it well enough to be able to deny the obvious possibility that, after two years of silence, the letter carries more than just simple ‘how are you doings.’ With only one more piece left, confirming his identity, you have already gathered that it’s a love letter.
The first little piece of the letter is dated the day you met Jungkook two years ago. The suspected writer seems to have written it prior to realizing that you’ve already met someone. He seems to be more concerned with the fact that too much time has passed to stay within an arm’s length reach of each other, rather than the presence of someone else in your heart. Rereading the final sentence, you can’t deny hearing your heart whisper his name.
I love you; I’ve loved you the moment you spilled blueberry yogurt on my white sweater and tried to convince me a bird knocked you over and made you do it.
You can’t believe he still remembers that. It’s not like you have forgotten it, but you just didn’t think he’d remember that day. It wasn’t exactly the first time you’ve met or even saw each other. It was just the first moment the two of you ever exchanged some words.
It was about three months into your first year of university. Late for your philosophers of literature class, you had rushed through the courtyard with your breakfast, a thing of blueberry yogurt, in your hands. Instead of waiting to get into class to enjoy your yogurt, you decided to open it on your way there. This wouldn’t have been such an issue if you didn’t have two books tucked under your arm and your bag falling off your shoulder. Struggling to peel off the lid while juggling so much, you pulled too hard on the flap and spilled the purple tinted yogurt all over someone’s sweater as you round the corner.
“Shit,” he hissed as he held the hem of his sweater.
You gasped, bringing a hand to your lips. “Fuck, I’m so sorry.”
A first glance, you didn’t really recognize him. But, as you continued to look between him and the new yogurt stain on his sweater, you started to realize who he was. He was in a couple of your classes, always happening to seat a row in front of you. His wardrobe always mirrored that of a twentieth century poet, but his answers were never that dated. His insights drove the lecture and most times you wondered why he wasn’t the one teaching the class since what he had to say seemed more reasonable and accurate than whatever the professor brought to the table.
“It-”
“I didn’t mean to do that, I swear! It just… um… it was a bird. Yeah! This stupid bird knocked over my hand,” you lied, avoiding his gaze as you spun this grand tale of how bird are just flying rats and cannot be trusted. “But, you know what? It happened and I’m gonna fix it. I’ll clean it right now, okay? Just stay still,” you said as you dug into your bag for a tissue. You fumbled with your books under your arm and the half empty yogurt container in your hand as you rummaged your free hand around in your bag.
“I can just-”
“Hold these!” You ordered, shoving your books into his hands. You placed the yogurt container on top of the books then turned back to your bag. “Don’t let the books touch the yogurt,” you muttered as you pulled out more books and shoved them in his hands to hold.
He sighed, sarcastically replying, “no, because that would just be a disaster.”
You didn’t know he was being sarcastic then. You remember that all you could think in that moment was that you had to clean his cable-knit sweater. It looked so pretty and, from what you saw of his torso, it fit him all too well. It would’ve been a shame to see it ruined.
Finally finding a tiny pack of tissues, you pulled it out and set your bag down. You tried your best to wipe it all off, but all you ended up doing was rub the yogurt into his sweater, further ruining the fabric. When you ran out of tissues, you finally took a step back to examine your process. Immediately, you noticed that you managed to spread the stain rather than fix it.
You curled your lips in and hesitantly nodded. “Looks brand new,” you lied before tossing the tissues in the garbage beside you. Meeting his unimpressed eyes, you flashed him a nervous smile and hoped you looked sorry enough to let this all slide.
“So let me get this straight,” he started. “Some bird happened to see you opening a pack of yogurt and decided to specifically attack you. It knocked over your hand just as you were opening it and made you spill it all over me?”
The unamused tone of his voice gave you goosebumps. You shifted your weight from foot to foot and nervously asked, “any that’s hard to believe because…?”
His gaze flickered to a glare. You flashed him that anxious smile once more as he began handing your books back. He took the yogurt pack and tipped it up to you. “I’m taking this as compensation.”
“I suppose that’s fair,” you sighed. “I think it’s important for you to know though that I am not in alliance with the flying rats.”
“You mean the birds?”
“Same thing,” you brushed him off. “I, for one, prefer sea animals.”
“Don’t sea animals sort of fly too since they’re not touching exactly the ground?”
You paused. Shifting your gaze, you tried to rationalize his words. He made a good point, but you were hell bent on making a better one. “Crabs don’t,” you quickly added. “I love crabs and turtles and other ground-touching sea creatures.”
“Turtles sometimes fly if we’re going with your logi-”
“We can go back and forth all day, but the point is I feel for you because I ,too, hate birds and the things they make us do.”
He sighed, narrowing his eyes on you. He licked his lip then offered the yogurt back to you. You looked between him and the food, raising a brow. “I have a class right now and my professor doesn’t allow food,” he explained.
“But what about your compensation?”
He smirked. “You’re smart. I’m sure you can come up with a way to make it up to me.”
Accepting the yogurt back, you silently thanked him. He only nodded and pulled out a deep blue pen. Opening your Scorates book, he jotted down his name and number on the first page. “Let me know what you come up with,” he smiled.
You twirl the engagement ring as the memory floods your mind once more. It’s been six years. He’s held onto these feelings for six years, only finally making them known to you three months before your wedding. You sent him an invitation thinking you were inviting an old friend. Now, you know you’ve reopened a chapter he has decided to close two years ago.
The part that surprises you, however, is the fact that you don’t regret inviting him, even after knowing how he feels. It should fill you with guilt, with distress, but instead it just makes you crave his presence.
Getting up from your seat, you make your way to the bookshelves in the living. Scouring the shelves, you find the book you’re looking for. You pull out the book on Socrates, flipping to the first page. His name and number stare back at you, and you suddenly have a hankering for blueberry yogurt.
Two sharp knocks rap against the front door. You snap your head towards it, shutting the book. Looking down the hall to your shared room with Jungkook, you find him still fast asleep. A breath you didn’t realize you were holding escapes you. Quickly, you make your way to the door. An envelope falls from the space between the edge of the door and the frame the moment you open it.
Only your name’s scratched on it in deep blue ink. You take a quick scan up and down the hallway of the apartment, but it remains vacant, not even the wet trail of the winter weather is left behind. You pick up the letter and close the door.
Tucking the book under your arm, you open the envelope and pull out the last fragment of the letter. His name greets you with a little heart sketched beside it. The notion almost shatters you. You shakily take your seat at the kitchen table, and slide the last piece into place, taping it with the others.
You sit in Jungkook’s apartment, but you wear Namjoon’s sweater. You have Jungkook’s ring but yearn for Namjoon’s heart. The guilt is starting to creep up on you, prickling your spine with anxious nerves that can’t manage to keep still.
“Did someone knock on the door?” Jungkook sleepily asks as he shuffles out of your shared room.
Moving quicker than you ever have in your life, you fold up the taped up letter and shove it in the book. “Huh?”
Jungkook rests his hands on your shoulders, and kisses the top of your head. “Someone at the door?” he repeats, lips against your hair.
You gulp, slowly melting into his touch. “No.”
He hums, circling around the table to enter the kitchen. “Thought I heard knocking.”
You drum your hands on the table, trying to imitate the knocks left moments ago. He nods his head, flashing you a little smirk. Getting some coffee prepared, he asks, “want some, babe.”
You shake your head and pick up the book, returning it to its place. Turning around, you find Jungkook leaning against the shelf, arms crossed over his chest.
“Go on.”
“What?”
“Tell me what’s got you pouty.”
“I’m not pouty!”
He smirks, gaze flickering from your wide eyes to your pout. He tongues his cheek, cocking a brow as if silently asking you to try again. He could see right through you, this you know all too well. It’s the reason why you stayed as quiet as you could the moment you heard his raspy, morning voice. And it’s also the reason, you don’t lie now; well, don’t completely lie.
“Just thinking about an old friend.”
He curls a loose strand of your hair behind your ear and pushes himself off the shelf. Wrapping his hands around your waist, he gently pulls you close. You can’t help but instantly mold into his frame, leaning your head against his firm chest. Namjoon almost slips right out of your mind, only your eyes fall back on the spine of that book.
But, as Jungkook rests his chin atop your head, you can’t find it in you to reach out for it anymore. Your heart doesn’t yearn for anything more, anything different. The comfort and safety you feel wrapped in Jungkook’s embrace is not something you can easily replace.
“Wanna talk about it?”
You shake your head, and inhale his scent. Your blueberry cravings disappear as your desire for strawberries takes over. Pulling back a bit, you reach up on your toes and pull Jungkook into a hug, settling your chin over his shoulder. He doesn’t think too much of the position change, making himself comfortable against you as well.
From bone to flesh, from mind to heart, all you feel is comfort. Winter letters and missed love confessions linger but you know where your loyalties lie. The possibilities of what could’ve and might’ve will always haunt you but the centainities of the here and now are undeniable. Jeon Jungkook is where you belong. And, as you stare at the crystal snow continuing to fall, you pray that’s where you’ll stay.