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The soft morning light falls limply across fluttering eyelashes. When Dokja wakes up, he’s almost lulled back to sleep by the songs the birds are singing right outside his room’s window. The day starts with the serene tinges of white and blue, unmixing yet scattered all over the sky peeking through the curtains.
The digital alarm clock on his bedside table shows that Dokja has half an hour left to prepare for school, so he rubs his eyes and stretches his arms, letting out a groan.
Refreshed, when Dokja makes his way to the kitchen, he spots the breakfast placed on the wooden table. The delicious scent of omurice fills his nostrils just a second after he enters.
“Oh, Dokja,” he hears someone say, and turns his head to the familiar voice. “That’s rare. You’re awake already?” Sookyung asks, ruffling his bed hair.
Dokja juts his bottom lip out into a pout and grumbles back, “Good morning.”
Sookyung lets out a small laugh, her lips curling into a wide smile. “Breakfast’s ready. Come on, eat up.”
Taking a seat across from his mother, Dokja looks at the omurice in front of him with a starry-eyed look. The sight is salivating, and when he pops a cut piece of omurice into his mouth, the flavors melt on his tongue.
Sookyung watches him with thinly veiled fondness, affection spilling from her irises. Prodding the rice on her own plate with her spoon, she speaks up, “Your Godparents are visiting soon.”
Dokja’s cheeks are full of food. “Uncle Hades and Aunt Persephone?” he asks, words slightly muffled.
Sookyung chuckles and scolds him lightly, “Don’t talk with your mouth full, Dokja. Swallow it down first. Really, you’re already fifteen years old and you still eat this sloppy.” She yanks a tissue from the small box in the middle of the table and wipes the stains around Dokja’s mouth. “What am I going to do with you?” she murmurs. The gentle smile on her face easily betrays her words.
Dokja offers her a mischievous, yet grateful smile. “Sorry, Mother,” he laughs. “The food’s just really good.”
Sookyung hums. “Why don’t you play with the other kids in the neighborhood?”
Dokja arches a brow, swallowing his food. “What about school?”
“I’m in a good mood today,” she says, grin getting wider. “Why don’t you skip school for the day?”
Dokja eyes her suspiciously, perturbed by the rare offer his mother’s giving him. Usually, she’d be strict, making sure that Dokja went to school early, always punctual.
“...Is it because today’s my birthday?”
“My son really does know me best. How did you know?”
Dokja frowns playfully, eliciting a laugh from Sookyung.
“Gilyoung-ie and Yoosung-ie are already outside,” she says. “Their moms said they’re threatening to cry if they don’t get to play with you. Why don’t you go play with them?”
Bobbing his head up and down, Dokja stuffs his cheeks with the omurice his mother had generously prepared.
“It’s my turn to play with hyung!”
“You played with him yesterday! It’s my turn today!”
Biyoo blinks, crawling to Dokja. She shoots him the cutest smile, stretches her arms out, and babbles out a happy, “Bah!”
Dokja sighs, understanding her request. He lifts Biyoo up, letting her place her chubby, soft chin on his shoulder. The infant lets out a pleased giggle, and Dokja finds his gaze getting drawn back to the ongoing fight between Yoosung and Gilyoung.
Beside him, Sangah pipes up, “Dokja, aren’t you going to break their fight up?”
There’s a fond smile on his lips even as he seemingly looks at them disapprovingly.
“No,” he answers. “I have my hands full with Biyoo already,” he jokes, patting Biyoo’s back softly. Biyoo lets out a happy noise, but her energy dwindles to a stop when her eyes slowly close. Dokja cradles her gently, stroking her back until she’s lulled to a peaceful sleep.
Sangah lets out a light laugh upon seeing Biyoo’s quick retreat to her little dreamland.
“You always manage to put Biyoo to sleep,” she points out, “even when Biyoo’s own parents can’t. Don’t tell me you’re secretly a Biyoo tamer, Dokja?”
Dokja lets out a light laugh. “Maybe. By the way, are you skipping school today, too, Sangah?”
“Dumbass.” Someone smacks his head, clicking their tongue. Dokja shoots an offended glare at the perpetrator, Han Sooyoung. “There’s no school today, didn’t your mother get the email? Something about the school getting rebuilt for a few weeks,” she says.
“Thanks. But I would’ve appreciated it if you told me that without smacking my head,” Dokja taunts.
Sooyoung rolls her eyes, a lopsided grin on her lips. “You really think little miss perfect, Yoo Sangah, the class president, would skip school?” she side-eyes the other girl, obviously taunting her.
“Han Sooyoung,” Sangah glowers, “what are you doing here?”
Sooyoung blinks innocently at her. “Why, can’t I be here? I live in this neighborhood too, class prez.”
Dokja sighs, and decides to tune out the rest of their bickering. He can feel Biyoo drooling on his shoulder and schools his expression into an impassive one, lips pressed into a thin line. Next to him, Sangah and Sooyoung are fighting, throwing insults that are barely safe for the younger kids to hear. In front of him, Gilyoung and Yoosung are practically brawling each — wait, does Yoosung have Gilyoung in a chokehold —
In the blink of an eye, someone pries the two kids away from each other, holding them by the collars of their shirts.
“Heewon noona—!”
“Heewon unnie—!”
“Both of you. Stop fighting,” Heewon scolds, sighing, “you’re going to wake Biyoo up.”
The trio’s eyes immediately dart to the toddler in Dokja’s arms, and, as if to prove Heewon’s words, Biyoo shifts, making a small noise of displeasure. Sangah and Sooyoung freeze in place, also stopping to throw a glance at Biyoo. Heewon gently lets go of Gilyoung and Yoosung, who have taken to rushing to Dokja’s legs and peering up at the sleeping baby.
“How long has she been asleep?” someone pipes in from behind Heewon.
Dokja meets Hyunsung’s eyes, and offers him a polite smile as a greeting. Hyunsung gives a small bow in response, greeting him back.
“Not long,” Dokja answers. “But I think my arm’s about to fall asleep if I keep on carrying her any longer,” he laments, sounding half-dead at the end.
Sangah shoots him a concerned look. “I can hold her for the meantime, Dokja,” she offers. “I’m good at handling children.”
“You’re so going to drop her.”
“Shut up, Han Sooyoung.”
“I’ll carry her!” someone else chimes in, marching towards Dokja with the grace of an elephant.
“Jihye…” Dokja mumbles, warily holding Biyoo closer.
Jihye stretches her arms out, making grabby hands at Biyoo.
“Give her to me! I can carry her!” she exclaims, grinning.
Dokja stiffens. “I’m afraid… uh…”
“You’re not strong enough to do that, kid,” Heewon deadpans. “You’re still too young.”
“What!” Jihye yells. “I’m stronger than Dokja oppa, though? Look how scrawny he is compared to me! And I’m still shorter than him!”
His mouth subconsciously twitches. Dokja feels his patience waver.
Sangah sighs, watching the events unfolding at the sidelines and hurriedly takes Biyoo from Dokja, heaving her up with her arms. Biyoo lets out a small whine, but doesn’t stir awake.
“I’ll carry her,” she finalizes. “Oh, right. Heewon, didn’t you have something to say?”
“Must be hard being the neighborhood’s parents’ messenger,” Sooyoung teases, cackling lightly. “80% of the time you find us, it’s to deliver a message. What are you, a mailman?”
If looks could kill, Sooyoung would be a thousand meters below the ground right now.
“Anyway,” Heewon clicks her tongue. “Sookyung ahjumma told everyone to come to her house. Says she has some treats for everyone.”
“Treats?” the kids chorus, intrigued.
“Does she have lemon-flavored candy?” Sooyoung helpfully adds.
“I didn’t know we had any snacks or candies left in the house,” Dokja mumbles.
“Maybe ahjumma bought it recently?” Sangah supplies.
Their attention is turned back to Heewon when she clears her throat, coughing into her fist.
“She told us to go there ASAP,” she says, enunciating the last word. Her eyes shift to Dokja, then, and she backtracks. “But,” she begins, “since Yoo Joonghyuk isn’t here, could you go fetch him, Dokja? That person only listens to you.”
“Just like Biyoo,” Sooyoung muses.
Dokja rubs his neck awkwardly, ignoring Sooyoung. “...I don’t have a choice, do I?”
Heewon grins. It’s all the answer he needs to sigh, turn around, and sprint to find Joonghyuk.
“There you are, you bastard.”
Joonghyuk looks up from the console in his hands. He spares the intruder one quick glance and returns to his game, mashing buttons with scary precision and power.
Under the dappled light, behind the wall of vines that have grown several feet along the fences of some random neighbor’s house, Joonghyuk continues to ignore Dokja. Dokja sighs and takes a seat next to him, cheek propped atop his fist. He leans closer to Joonghyuk, head lolling onto the teen’s shoulder, and watches the game he’s professionally clearing on the console.
“How are you so good at games?” he mumbles, brows pinched together. “Good grades, good looks, good gaming skills… that’s unfair, Joonghyuk-ah.”
Joonghyuk grumbles out something he can’t quite hear, but since Dokja is Dokja and Joonghyuk is Joonghyuk, Dokja knows what he had said, clear as day: “Shut up, Kim Dokja.”
Dokja grins. Joonghyuk can feel the warmth form on Dokja’s lips, burning at his side like a tender flame, and tsks.
“What do you want?” Joonghyuk asks right after he finishes his game, getting straight to the point. A large text, LEVEL COMPLETED, pops out, the flurry of bright colors landing flatly as a blanket of light across the sharp lines of Joonghyuk’s profile. Tapping it away quickly, he turns his head to Dokja. If Dokja notices him sucking in a breath upon meeting his eyes, he doesn’t point it out.
Instead, Dokja tilts his head slightly, curiously looking at Joonghyuk, prodding his cheek with a finger.
“My mother told me to fetch you,” he answers. “Fetch you, like I’m some sort of dog and you’re a wooden stick,” he snorts.
Joonghyuk’s frown deepens. “You’re the stick between the two of us.”
Dokja hums, continuing to poke the other teen’s cheek. “And you’re the dog? Because you’re a bi—”
“Kim Dokja.”
He raises his arms in mock surrender, immediately giving up. “Alright, alright,” he concedes. “Anyway, my mother invited everyone over to give out some treats. That includes you, Joonghyuk-ah.”
Joonghyuk arches a brow. “Treats?”
Dokja grins. “Maybe there’s some of Minyoung ahjumma’s dumplings — the ones you like so much.”
“Murim dumplings.”
“Yeah, that one.”
Joonghyuk abruptly stands up, pushing Dokja off of his shoulder. “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go.”
“You— nevermind.” Dokja shakes his head and heaves out a sigh, jumping to his feet.
There’s the smallest of smiles gracing Joonghyuk’s face, and the morning light would be a fool if it didn’t trace that slight curve. Dokja finds himself speechless, heart caught in his throat, and blinks away the flush riding up his neck.
“You go in first, Kim Dokja.”
Dokja shoots Joonghyuk a curious look.
“What, so you can use me as a meat shield? Are you afraid that something’s gonna pop out and scare you?”
Joonghyuk scoffs and refuses to answer him, so Dokja begrudgingly moves forward and twists the doorknob. He pushes the door open, a slight creak sounding from the action, and just as the door is about to completely open —
“Happy 15th birthday, Dokja!”
— streaks of confetti, along with the blinding smiles of his family and friends, greet him.
Dokja blinks once. Then twice. Then thrice.
When he forces his mouth open, the only thing that comes out is a flabbergasted, “Uh.”
Someone smacks him on the back of his head. Blinking, Dokja registers the perpetrator to be Joonghyuk, whose face fashions the softest smile he’s ever seen the teen wear.
“Happy birthday, you fool,” he says, warmth seeping through each of his words like the soft sunlight of dawn; hues of dusk, an unprecedented warmth.
Dokja’s lips twist into a hesitant smile.
“Ack!” He hears Sooyoung let out a noise of panic. “Why are you crying on a good day like this? Hey, Kim Dokja!”
Blinking at her, Dokja brings his hands to his face and belatedly realizes the tears streaming down his cheeks. He tries to wipe them all away, but the tears slip through the gaps between his fingers, trailing down his hands and chin.
“Sorry— I’m just— I—” he trips over his own words, “just— thank you. Thank you guys. So much.”
Sookyung lets out a fond laugh and pats his shoulder. “Hold onto your tears, Dokja. There’s one last person who hasn’t come.”
Her eyes widen, a beautiful smile blooming on her expression, when she spots a figure coming closer to the door, right behind Dokja.
“Oh,” Sookyung lets out a pleased gasp. “He’s already here. Look, say hi to your father, Dokja.”
“...My father?”
Dokja whips his whole body around and a grotesquely familiar figure smiles at him. Sweat beads at his forehead, his forearms, in his clenched fists. The world is spinning all around him, and Dokja can feel his heart beating erratically in his chest; a voice in the back of his head yells at Dokja to run, and run, and run when his eyes land on the bottle in the man’s hand.
“Happy birthday, son,” the man says.
Dokja watches with fear as he raises the empty bottle of alcohol, posing as if he’s about to throw it at the wall the door is latched onto.
“This is my present for you, you ungrateful brat!”
He throws the bottle, and Dokja feels his entire world cave in.
When the bottle hits the wall, the next few seconds play out at a tenth of their normal speed. In slow motion: the bottle explodes into bits and pieces, small streaks and droplets of residue alcohol crashing onto the ground. Dokja’s eyes trace each and every curve and edge of the broken, green-tinted glass, pupils dilating furiously.
Then, in the next second, his breathing regulates, he’s no longer trembling, and the crossed-out face of the man before him violently crumbles into ash.
A bitter smile rises to Dokja’s lips. He forces his eyes into crescents, reminiscent of a peaceful night he can now only vaguely remember. No creases form at the ends of his eyes, the quivering line of his lips a fixed, lonely upwards slant.
“This is a dream, isn’t it?”
The resounding silence he gets back is all the answer that he needs. He throws his head back in a sort of bitter laugh.
“It was nice,” he says. There’s a tinge of disappointment and sorrow in his voice. It's pathetic, longing for a memory that never existed in the first place. Slowly, Dokja opens his mouth, and adds, “Thank you, fourth wall.”
[...] The fourth wall is quiet. After a beat of silence passes, it hesitantly replies, [Hap py Bir t hd ay, Kim Do kja.]
Time had stopped for the people in the illusion. Each person is still, stiff — there’s not a blink nor twitch of their body as the dream breaks into sharp fragments of could-have-beens. Dokja brings a finger closer to one of the fragments, cut out into the shape of a piece similar to that from a broken mirror, and flicks the shard lightly.
Just like that, the illusion collapses, and Dokja finds himself back in a familiar subway train.
The mirage had disappeared. Dokja leans against the cold wall of the subway train, sliding down his back and collapsing onto the floor. It’s freezing — no warmth in his fingertips, nothing surging through his veins. There now laid an untouchable void in the hollow between his ribs; dwindling memories, forgotten dreams — in the icy confines of the subway train, Dokja could feel himself losing himself. Resigning to his fate, he wraps his arms around his own shivering body and smiles wryly.
Peeking through the windows of the train are stars with an artificial shine, shooting him pitiful gazes as cosmos whizz by.
Dokja can only look on at the worlds he can never be a part of, and to the only being that knows of his eternity-long suffering, he whispers, “...Thanks again.”
[...]
The fourth wall goes silent, and an eerie silence creeps up Dokja’s spine. He leans his head against a metal railing, staring blankly at the universes passing by.
This birthday, too, he has no choice but to spend alone.
A tear rolls down his cheek, and Dokja angrily wipes it away. Fuck. Why is he crying? He’s supposed to be used to this.