Chapter Text
· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·
SNAPSHOT: He’s waking up. He hasn’t seen how long we’ve been waiting for him to wake up. He’s happy though and that, for now, is enough. Hospital food is god awful.
Growing up, Mark Lee was taught to be polite– or rather, you know, not stare at someone when they’re clearly sleeping. He was also taught to cover his sneezes and fear the knuckles that would go into his back if he were caught slouching in front of his computer. Not that the latter helped his posture at all, but still all that is just details. But not staring at someone sleeping, he’s sure that was a thing. And yet, he can’t help it.
Yuta’s just so calm. There’s something soothing about seeing his chest move up and down slowly. The rhythm is so nice, it almost matches the beeping of the jarring monitor if it weren’t so off and starting to pick up in its speed. And it’s just nice to see Yuta so peaceful, when he’s clearly never that peaceful. Mark’s probably never seen him so peaceful in his entire life and Mark’s known Yuta for, like, a really long time. It’s like looking at a person who isn’t real. Because Mark clearly recognizes the worn out band tee, the one with the band that he still doesn’t remember the name to and the band that Yuta doesn’t even listen to but it’s the one they found at a thrift store and it’s a steal, dearest Markie. That’s all that matters, plus it makes me look cool, right? And yeah, yeah it does.
Yuta’s hair’s gotten so long too. Mark wishes he were close enough to just run his fingers through Yuta’s bangs. He’s never done this. Yuta’s never been this deep in sleep. And maybe he won’t be mad if Mark just tries. Or maybe he won’t put him in a headlock once he wakes, ‘cause Mark has run-fingers-through-hair privileges, doesn’t he? Mark forgets, for a second, that he can’t actually reach Yuta and he extends his fingers out– trying to reach out.
That’s when Yuta wakes. Mark’s not sure what wakes him, but he does wake. It’s amazing. Mark thought he’d be asleep forever.
“Markie?” Yuta furrows his brows, clearly just as amazed as Mark. Mark kinda furrows his brows though because duh. Who do you think I am? But maybe now’s not a good time to sass the guy because Yuta gets up, probably a little too fast. He wonders if Yuta’s head is spinning, kind of like how Mark’s is right now.
“Yeah,” Mark finally answers and Yuta takes the two steps to stand over Mark. And it’s funny, maybe they work on the same wavelength but the first thing Yuta does when he gets near is run his long slender fingers through Mark’s hair. They’re so cold, but it’s so soothing that Mark doesn’t really mind. Although maybe the quick beeping next to him is a dead giveaway: Curse His Stupid Heart.
“Oh my god, Mark,” Yuta smiles, jabbing his thumb at one of the buttons next to the remote-thing next to Mark’s bed. Mark follows Yuta’s fingers to see it’s the ‘Nurse-Come-Here-Right-Now’ button. Or whatever. “Hi, baby.”
“Hi,” Mark says and it’s still so embarrassing to be called baby. That’s so embarrassing. Mark’s cheeks heat up just at the thought and that stupid monitor keeps going off. Yuta doesn’t seem to notice though because he’s pulling up that chair he was sleeping in and pulls it closer to Mark’s bed. Yuta’s fingers are squeezing Mark’s now and Mark squeezes back, hoping that they don’t let go of him, “It’s cold.”
“Is it?” Yuta asks, running his hand over Mark’s bangs again, “We can ask for another blanket! God, you had me so fucking scared you idiot.”
“It’s not nice to call people names,” Mark huffs.
Yuta smiles and reaches out to squeeze Mark’s cheeks together, “Well, you sure do look like one, don’t you?”
Mark frowns as soon as Yuta lets him go and he can’t help but notice that Yuta’s free hand is still tightly hanging onto Mark’s hand. It shouldn’t make him this excited to be held and babied but there goes that stupid heart monitor again, only this time Yuta looks up at it and squints at Mark. It looks like he’s about to ask if Mark’s okay, but the nurse saves him from that awful conversation of haha, dude, nah, must be broken.
The nurse comes in quickly and just as nervously as Yuta had approached, which doesn’t really faze Mark until the nurse reaches out to place the cold back of his hand against Mark’s forehead, “How are you feeling?”
“I’m okay,” Mark says, although there’s a tinge of lying going on there. The nurse nods, however, and starts all the procedures of checking blood pressure, temperature, asking of pain from 1 to 10. Mark thinks it’s all normal stuff up until the doctor– or seemingly the doctor– comes in with a clipboard. She’s smiling and it’s at least good to know she’s not here to deliver the news that he needs to go into some surgery room.
“Hey kiddo, how are we feeling?”
Mark shrugs, “I’m doing okay.”
“Yeah?”
Yuta’s hand has been removed already so Mark feels some fear when she doesn’t immediately believe him. She seems to take Mark’s answers very lightly, but Mark wouldn’t know that for sure. What makes him think she’s not believing him though is that she’s writing a few things down and Yuta’s lips are pursed.
“He recognizes me,” Yuta says, although it only earns a glance from the doctor.
She smiles at Mark but it’s only half-inviting now. There’s something that Yuta and she know. Mark wishes he was in the loop for this. “I know this may seem a little weird to ask you, but can you state your name?”
“Mark Lee?” Mark says, looking over at Yuta who also smiles in that forced pressed lips way. It’s signaling to Mark that this was good. At least Mark thinks that’s what he’s trying to say.
“Good, do you know his name?” The doctor points over at Yuta.
Mark can’t help but scoff a little when he says “That’s Yuta.”
“See.” Yuta looks over at the doctor.
“Great, Mark,” The doctor says as she’s writing something down, “Can you tell me your age?”
Here Mark stumbles a little. It’s just that age is such a complicated thing. One minute you’re seventeen and kicking sand on a school trip and the next you’re twenty-one and running through college aimlessly trying to graduate and hope that graduating is enough. Then you’re thirty and aimlessly trying to get married. Thirty-five and wanting to be satisfied with your job. Fifty and did you have kids? Do you have grandkids? Mark hopes not. But, no, not yet. He’s not there yet. He wants to relay all of this to the doctor, but even as it’s playing in his head he knows how it sounds so he smiles and goes, “Sorry, my head’s just hurting.”
“That’s okay, Mark, I understand. What about answering what year we are in right now?”
Time’s such a complicated thing. One second you’re having lunch with Yuta at the old diner you two always go to and the next you’re in a hospital bed. That was yesterday, right?
· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·
SNAPSHOT: He’s finally back home. He’s a little disoriented. It’s nothing we can’t handle though. I hope he doesn’t realize how many people are crying behind closed doors.
Mark spends a while in the hospital after he’s woken up from his deep sleep, which from what he has heard from Yuta and the doctors– had been a scary amount of time. They don’t want to overwhelm him with too much information after he’s sustained a really bad head injury, but from what Mark has gathered– something hit his head at a tremendous speed with a tremendous force, that now Mark has lost quite a bit of his memories. The only person and relationship he seems to completely remember is his relationship with Yuta. He seemingly remembers, honestly, more about Yuta than he does his own life.
The doctors and nurses reassure him that this is normal, but they still run a few scans that make Mark feel really claustrophobic. They make sure the rest of his body doesn’t have any more injuries and that he’s able to function properly without the need of nurses or Yuta, himself. He’s still a little shaky, but it’s more-so the trauma from his accident. He’s told he’s extremely lucky to be alive right now, because had the car accident been worse, he might not have survived. No one has to tell Mark to know that Yuta had to have left work once he found out. He’s still wearing his name tag from work and from where Mark is sitting, he can tell the pin is hanging on for dear life.
Mark isn’t told a lot of details about the other car, but Yuta tells him that they’re actually fine. Mark shouldn’t worry about them. And in all the years that Mark has known Yuta, Yuta’s never once been known to lie to Mark. So he stops asking questions and lets Yuta kiss at his cheeks and forehead. Seconds later, Yuta’s taking out clothes for Mark to change into and again he’s reassured that home will be a lot better than these bland four walls.
The transition from hospital bed to Yuta’s car is a rough one, mostly because there’s a lot of paperwork that needs to be processed before Yuta’s allowed to scurry off with his new patient. Yuta’s not happy throughout and Mark can tell because all his tell-tale habits are coming out one by one:
He bites his nails
He scratches the back of his head
He sighs a billion times
He gives monosyllabic responses (yes, no, sure, nope, ‘kay)
What he doesn’t say with his words, Yuta says through his silence. And Mark finds it amusing. He gets someone to get Mark a wheelchair to sit on which is nice, but the whole time they wait for the nurses to give the ‘okay’ Yuta’s also googling places to eat, places that deliver food, how long process times take. He makes a small comment about how long it’s taking and Mark breathes out a laugh, which for a brief moment makes Yuta smile. He’s glad, then, that Yuta isn’t completely different from what Mark can remember.
When they’re finally inside Yuta’s car, Yuta goes on a spiel about music and how maybe that will trigger some of the memories back so he plays some old songs he thinks Mark will like. And Yuta’s not wrong, they are, in fact, songs that Mark does like. But they aren’t songs Mark remembers. Mark doesn’t have the heart to say that, but Yuta seems to know, if only because Mark doesn’t sing along to some of the lyrics. The ride after that is quiet and only the bass and guitar-filled songs are filling the air, but Mark prefers it that way for now. He feels exhausted.
Now, if you never shoot, you’ll never know. And if you never eat, you’ll never grow.
Mark only knows they’ve “arrived” to Yuta’s apartment when Yuta stops the car. Mark pays more attention now and tries to find familiar aspects of the complex, maybe something that he’ll distinctly remember like a dog or a person walking by that Mark should know. He feels disappointed when he doesn’t remember, but he also doesn’t say so.
“You know you really fucking scared me there, Markie,” Yuta says, bringing back Mark’s attention to Yuta. Mark doesn’t know what to say to that. “You’re not allowed to do that to me again, you understand?”
Mark nods and Yuta kisses his forehead, so Mark knows he’s doing something right. Yuta must sense that because he gently caresses the back of Mark’s head and says, “Just one step at a time okay?”
It’s momentarily reassuring to know Yuta is there, holding his hand. The moment does go away, however, when they’re making their way into the apartment. Because Mark knows he lives there. It’s something that comes to him by habit, he knows he is safe there or that this is a sanctuary of sorts. He feels it in himself that he’s been there countless times that he should know exactly where to go, but he finds himself following Yuta mindlessly like he’s disassociating from the body that knows this place from habit. It takes Yuta a bit to realize that Mark doesn’t know where he is because Mark doesn’t say that nor does he desire to ask. He simply takes a seat on the couch and melts into that comfort.
“Should I give you a tour of the place?”
“No. This is fine.”
· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·
SNAPSHOT: He’s dreamy. It’s not unlike him to be dreamy. Still, I hope he’s coming back soon.
Mark wakes up in their bed. Or, at least, he chooses to believe it’s their bed. Mark can’t remember that exactly. There’s no indication that Yuta has even slept here so there is a thought of doubt that runs through Mark’s head. But he’s drowsy and sleepy and wanting to stay in that fetal position he’d been sleeping in. The headache he had when he’d arrived from the hospital is gone, so that’s good at least. He also cannot hear a single bit of noise so he decides that whether or not he’s tired, he should go investigate to see where Yuta has gone.
He’s consoled by the fact that there are, in fact, pictures and photo frames of Yuta and Mark around the walls and furniture. He doesn’t look too closely but he recognizes Yuta anywhere. Still, the real-life Yuta is not in that room. Nor is he in the living room. A bathroom. The really clean kitchen. He starts to worry that maybe something has happened or that there is something inherently wrong with this place because Mark doesn’t feel at ease.
He registers the sound of keys at the front door, but once again, feels like he is dissociating. He’s too late to react when the door swings open and reveals a Yuta holding a cup holder with two coffees and a brown paper bag held between Yuta’s teeth. They make eye contact and Mark’s heart must have sank and then risen because his senses are very sensitive to the door that shuts loudly behind Yuta.
“Sorry,” Yuta mumbles, still hanging on to that bag. Mark reaches out to help and Yuta smiles, “Morning, baby.”
Mark’s never known Yuta to be a morning person so the view of him with coffee so early in the morning is disorienting, “What are you doing?”
“Breakfast,” Yuta unhelpfully responds. “For you.”
“Don’t you, like, hate breakfast?”
“Mark, how could you say that? I love breakfast.” Yuta jokes, shaking what appears to be his coffee order in hand. He also takes the other coffee and hands it to him, “I just couldn’t sleep so I figured this is the only time I would be awake early enough to get breakfast. And then I thought– well I have to feed Mark too, right?”
“You weren’t gonna get me anything!” Mark frowns, and he doesn’t know where this need to be pouty comes from but he huffs and watches as Yuta’s familiar cat-like smile spreads across his face. It’s like facing a mocking face, one that you know will make fun of you or play with you and yet not scary enough to make you run away.
“I’m glad you still remember how to be a brat.”
“It’s a natural talent,” Mark sits down, although a little embarrassed now that he did pout.
“Besides, your family’s coming over so we have to be on our best behavior.”
“Wait, what?” Mark feels the crack in his own voice when he says this, he self-consciously brings his fingers to his throat.
“Yeah, they weren’t at the hospital because we didn’t want to overwhelm you, but they’ve been wanting to see you since I told them you woke up.”
Family is not something you easily forget, which is why he figures it wasn’t easy to forget Yuta. He hasn’t had the time to really think about his family nor the space to wonder if he even remembers his family the way he thinks he does. He knows what they look like, or thinks he does, and he imagines that it would be similar to looking at Yuta. He’d face them and all those memories would come back. He’d eventually remember what it was like to feel hugged by his mom or how his brother physically cringes at anything that requires physical affection. He’s sure that it will feel fine and that it won’t be like how it was when he first saw this apartment. Or when he woke up only minutes ago: Disassociated and lightheaded.
He imagines that if he did feel that way, that he’d be letting his family down. Most importantly, he’d be letting his mom down. How dare he remember his boyfriend clearly and not his mom? Not his dad or brother? Maybe the fear of that failure or that disappointment is what has his heart racing and spacing out right there in that living room.
“Markie?”
Yuta’s voice brings Mark back, returning him to the physical realm because his soul had already been down a highway running 100mph. Yuta’s never been this patient, but Mark, still, appreciates the patience he’s awarded with now.
“I can help with remembering,” Yuta says, setting down his coffee on the coffee table, rising from here he had been sitting on the couch and seemingly floating around thor apartment until he finds the metal box he was looking for, “Just remember that I know everything about you. I’m basically your very own sim card.”
· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·
SNAPSHOT: He asks a lot of questions, that’s good. I think.
I can’t tell if it’s because of the amnesia, or because of your age but regardless you’re making me feel really old right now. A sim card is like one of those– uhh. You know when we were kids, a whole lot younger than we are now. And when we had those janky phones, the flip phones. And sometimes that phone would break, so we’d get a new phone. But we’d take the chip out of the old one and put it into the new one so it would keep all your shit, all of it. Your contacts, your photos, everything. Well, that’s what I am now. To you. I’ve stored all there is to know about you so your new body can function like the old you, but better. Definitely better. I’m glad you’re here.
Yuta has kept a box of trash, is Mark’s first thought when he brings out this large-ish metal box from his room. Upon closer look though, Mark realizes that it’s actually rather sweet. Yuta has kept photographs, polaroids, undeveloped film, shoelaces, old portable CD players, and old notebooks that all belonged to Mark. And Yuta. Belong to them.
At first the box is daunting, he feels like he’s trying to remember things too fast and perhaps take a crash course on How-To-Be-Mark-Lee-101. He has to crash two decades of his life into a couple hours before his parents show up and that’s a really anxious feeling. But Yuta tells him not to do that to himself or Mark will lose himself pretty easily. He lets him take the CD player and the old photos from when Mark was younger and the rest he keeps in the box. He promises Mark that he’ll get through the rest of the box eventually but not all in one day.
Mark thinks it’s unfair, but one step at a time is helpful. It’s doable. So, Yuta makes sure the batteries on the CD player work and he checks to see what CD is inside. He decides it’s good and then places the headphones on Mark’s head. He plays the CD player and Mark gives the thumbs up that the sound is working. Mark listens for the music and doesn’t recognize it, he knows it can’t be the first time he’s listening to this song but it feels like it. It sounds old, but catchy. There’s a vague recognition of the singer, but Mark’s memories are not associating anything with the staccato. The music must be loud enough for Yuta to hear because he’s bobbing his head along with the beat. He scribbles something down on a sticky note and sticks it onto the CD player.
Your dad really likes this CD. You do too.
Mark does like it. He especially likes the guitar. Yuta helpfully writes under the previous note Don’t Stop Me Now - Queen. Mark nods and holds both parts of his headphones closer to his ears so he can enjoy the sound more. Yuta is thumbing through all the pictures, hand picking which to show Mark and which to not. Mark doesn’t ask about the ones he doesn’t give him, but feels a lot of fondness in his heart when he’s going through the photos Yuta does give him.
They’re all mostly of Mark’s childhood. He finds them cute, even if he can’t remember them. But there’s solace in the fact that no one, no one remembers what they were like when they were babies. The common person doesn’t start forming long lasting memories until they’re two! And that’s the common person! All the photos of his mom holding him up by swings, pictures of him and his brother on a playground– he doesn’t have to remember all those. It’s physically impossible and it makes him feel just a tad bit better.
He can at least see through the pictures the type of parents he had. Caring. Loving. Obviously loving if they took so many photos of Mark at such a young age. His father’s always laughing in photos, so he can tell that his dad is funny. His mom seems warm, there’s even photos of his parents together. Posing. Laughing. It’s nice. There’s a moment where he wonders if they were always like that. It’d be impossible to capture one’s day to day with a camera.
“Do they love each other?” Mark asks out loud when one of the songs die down in his ears. Yuta looks up from where he’s staring at one of Mark’s family pictures for too long, he seems confused. Mark lowers the volume before the songs start up again.
“Yes,” Yuta says, but Mark doesn’t believe that completely, “Well– they’re not perfect, Markie, no one is.”
“So, did we love each other?”
“That’s different. We’re different.” Yuta seems a little offended Mark even asks. And in different circumstances, he’s sure he would have been offended too. Yuta starts playing with the rings on his fingers, still staring down at the photos he’s going through. He picks one out and hands it to Mark. It’s Yuta and Mark. Only much younger.
They’d met when Yuta had recently arrived in Korea. Yuta had been sent to his older sister who had lived there by now for a while. Mark had arrived with his family only mere months before. When they met, both of them could barely communicate with each other. Yuta had only now started learning the language and Mark had only been taught very basic greetings from his parents. But they somehow managed.
Yuta tells people that they only got along because Mark had a good music taste, but Mark’s sure that it wasn’t actually that. He vaguely remembers playing soccer with Yuta after school and walking home together while practicing their broken Korean with one another. Somewhere along the way, Yuta had been adopted by Mark’s parents and well everything after that would eventually fall into place. Eventually, little Mark Lee would realize that the little pitter-patter he felt in his chest whenever Yuta gave him half a moment’s attention wasn’t just excitement, or flattery. Eventually he’d realize there was something more, but that didn’t come for a long time after their first meeting.
In this photo that Yuta keeps though, they’re both in school uniforms. Yuta’s uniform is a mess, loose, a couple buttons are missing and Mark’s is ironed, clean, sleeves rolled up evenly. They’re eating the lunch his mom prepared and that’s something that comes back to him easily.
The evenings after school, when he would head straight home. Have some fresh meals prepared by his mom with his best friend Yuta, who still could only say a few words but had learned “tasty” and “thank you” right away specifically for moments like these. And he remembers his dad coming home, exhausted. He remembers his brother studying late at night, cramming all his studies if there was an exam. He remembers what it felt like to get a hug from his mom before he’d run out and cram himself. These moments he could not forget, because there were moments where he had to prove to everyone– to his family, to himself, to his friends back in Canada. He had to study and get into a nice school to prove that this move had been worth it. That losing friends and moving away from people he’d loved had been worth it.
That was something he had struggled with when he turned eighteen, because Mark could have gone anywhere. His original plan had been to study really hard, to prove to his parents that he was responsible enough to return back to Canada for university. He could have gone elsewhere too. Could have gone to the states, done some soul searching. Could have gone anywhere where he understood the language, really. But when he met Yuta, became best friends with Yuta, it was hard to imagine what it would be like to lose another friend– two times over.
Mark never showed Yuta the acceptance letter he got. It’d been the one secret Mark held with his parents that Yuta didn’t know. Mark resents his younger self only a little bit for having kept that secret for so long.
· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·
SNAPSHOT: He’s always looking at windows. I hope he’s looking for his friends.
Dinner with Mark’s parents goes fine. It isn’t as much of a struggle as Mark had thought it would have been. Yuta thinks that it was a success as well. Mark was able to recognize a lot. His mind isn’t resisting the idea of a mom and dad, nor did it resist the idea that his parents were happy. Genuinely, not just for show.
They somehow end up on the same wavelength as Yuta because they bring a photobook of their own, with photos that Mark doesn’t own in this apartment with Yuta. They’re evidently more embarrassing. There’s some of Mark singing into a broom, and no– he was not a toddler in the photo, he was very much sixteen and sporting a huge zit on the tip of his nose. Yuta finds it endearing. And there’s other photos that even Yuta has trouble knowing what the story behind them is, so it reassures Mark who’s blankly staring at the photos that perhaps the Mark before the accident couldn’t have remembered some of these memories either.
And there’s solace in that, of course. There’s solace in the fact that the average person might not remember memories of themselves, even if they are memories with them in it. Mark’s mom remembers details that his dad struggles to remember, and vice versa. He wonders if his brother had been in town, had he provided with his own set of memories that the other two couldn’t remember. It’s nice, even for a while, to have everyone in a state of limbo over which memory was more correct than the other.
When his parents leave, they let him hold onto the photobook. Perhaps Mark will be able to recreate some of his own memories as well. To what degree those stories will align with the Mark from before, well this Mark doesn’t know.
But days and nights like this one are easy because so many people sit around the table to help Mark piece back together that life from before, the memories from mere days ago that Mark seemingly forgets. His family doesn’t ask about the accident, and Mark is glad they don’t because he doesn’t have a clear memory of that at all either.
Logically, he understands that a car crash must have happened and must have been really bad because the car he had driven on that day is no longer with Yuta and Mark. He presumes that Yuta knows more about that situation, perhaps has been fighting with their car insurance behind closed doors or trying to locate where exactly they had taken it. If Mark had a personal attachment to the vehicle, however, Mark doesn’t remember.
He also logically knows by now that it had been a hit-and-run. He’s overheard Yuta and his mom talk about it in hushed tones and from what Mark has gathered, there’s no way to trace back what exactly happened from the moment Mark sustained his injuries to the point where that passerby had called the ambulance. They know Mark couldn’t have been there for hours, but know that still it had been some time. Yuta must know that Mark had been heading out to do errands because that is the one clear memory has before that foggy mess. He remembers that he was headed to do a grocery run and arrive at his eye doctor appointment as well for a prescription renewal. Now that this whole ordeal had happened, he assumes he still has to go redo that appointment. He hopes that his insurance won’t charge him for missing his appointment, given the circumstances.
It had, honestly, been such a normal day. It just had also been a very unfortunate one.
In the coming days after the first week Mark is back in their apartment and Yuta had been awarded time-off work, he finds that not having Yuta (his very own personal SIM card) around is more difficult than it is without him. He had thought that perhaps with Yuta gone, there would be less smothering and some sort of autonomous feeling that rushes over him once Yuta had gone to work. But it doesn’t feel that way at all.
Instead he’s left on his own and Mark has to figure out what he would have done. He had to figure out who Mark was outside of being Yuta’s boyfriend. Who had Mark Lee been when Yuta was gone? Who had he been when he was away from his parents? Away from his brother? Who was Mark outside of work? Who was he outside of these labels that stick around all over his body, screaming at anyone that passes by.
It’s hard at first, because all Mark knows is Yuta. He has a strong grasp of Yuta’s work schedule or when it’s a good time to send a meme over to Yuta’s phone. And all the things he knows for certain about himself all return to Yuta. He goes through his most played songs on streaming platforms, only to realize his mind can conjure up a specific memory with Yuta for just about any song he plays. Whether it be a song that plays in the background while Yuta cooks, the song that plays when they’re out on their first date, a song that Yuta had shared to him in the first place. It’s all about Yuta. And the apartment just screams at Mark that he is himself, there are hints of himself around the apartment but there’s also hints of Yuta. Everywhere.
The dining table they found on Facebook Marketplace and drove an hour just to pick up and avoid shipping fees. The plates they thrifted. The plants that were dying because neither of them had developed a proper habit of watering them. The clearly divided closets.
It’s hard to find yourself through that. He wonders if he had had that problem before the accident. If he had ever stopped and wondered, Who Am I? Who am I if not Yuta’s boyfriend? But those are still very selfish thoughts that run through his head, possibly even mindless and reasonless. But he does for a brief second wonder if Yuta had ever asked himself that as well. He wonders if any of his friends had asked him, maybe even gotten annoyed. Mark and Yuta. Yuta and Mark. Mark Yuta. Yuta Mark. One cannot be without the other. One cannot exist.
Mark thinks to himself that he perhaps would have been annoyed at himself. It does frighten him to say the least to think of a memory of himself having doubts. Wondering what he’d have to do to find himself again? His intrusive thoughts ask himself if he’d ever thought about being without Yuta. But he has to shake those thoughts away. Seriously. He feels a guilt bubble in his chest just at the thought. Feels even more guilt when he sees how happy Yuta is when he comes home and all he finds is his boyfriend spacing out and staring out a window, like the window holds some sort of sweet sweet escape, but really only had a small reflection of himself staring back.
· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·
SNAPSHOT: We were at a beach here. He’s happy, I hope he doesn’t realize I’m not.
In trying to find himself, Mark believes that Yuta’s metal box is the answer to all of the questions he has. All the photos he’s still yet to see. The CDs he hasn’t heard yet or even the notes that he’s still left unopened. He wonders if Mark had ever kept a box himself, perhaps had a few of Yuta’s old trinkets, a safe of memories for moments just like these.
He looks through all the possible hiding spots he can think of. If he did have a shiny box filled with Yuta’s memories, well, he must have hidden it pretty fucking well because he cannot find one. So, he settles with taking out the metal box he knows Yuta has. Yuta had thought that hiding it in his sock drawer would have been a good idea. Mark wonders if he is the type of person to have so much self-restraint because he can’t imagine trusting himself to not look.
He follows the steps that Yuta had taken when he’d shown Mark the box for the first time. He takes out the CD player, takes out a random CD and pops it in, places the headphones over his head and waits for the music to start. While the player plays some old R&B song Mark is sure is famous, he goes through some of the remaining photos he knows he hasn’t seen.
There’s nothing too scandalous upon first look, really, unless you count their raunchy photo booth prints but Mark doesn’t count those. The majority are really tame, just photos among photos of all their trips throughout the years. He finds it nice to know that they have done so much together even if the person that Yuta has in between his arms feels so foreign to the person that looks at these photos.
He can’t help the small bit of jealousy that rises upon seeing Yuta so happy, seeing solo shots of Yuta smile at the camera and the camera person presumably being Mark. He wishes he could remember that exact moment, relive those memories and make them his own. Photos of nights in bed, pillow forts, evening walks at parks. Trips to foreign countries. Whipped cream on noses. Whipped cream on lips. Photos of matching shoes with no context whatsoever. Photos of drinks that Mark doesn’t remember drinking. And it’s sad because he sees and feels the familiarity of them, knows he should feel joy and nostalgia logically but not feeling that nostalgia at all.
He can’t help but feel like he’s going through something forbidden. Like he’s seeing Yuta with his ex, but that’s him. That’s Mark, Mark knows that.
The love letters don’t help him at all either.
I’d always choose you, Markie. Thank you for choosing me too.
Mark wonders what it’s like to be loved that way as well. To love and be loved so unconditionally. He wonders what it’s like to feel kissed by a love so unconditional. Wonders what it’s like to be afraid of losing someone so dear that it scares you to death. Mark wonders what it’s like to feel hands around his cheeks, but not with worry in his partner’s eyes but just pure and selfless adoration. He wonders what it’s like to fall into a monotonous routine but do so with so much pride and joy that you don’t care how much it annoys your friends. He wonders what it’s like to feel broken at the thought of it not working out. He wonders what it’s like to feel ease; not a single hesitation or doubt. He wonders what it’s like to be the Mark in these pictures, so happy. Laughing ‘till his stomach hurts.
He hopes that the person in these photos feels grateful and appreciative of the love that Yuta has in his eyes. The toothy smile that is so evident in all of these photos. Because the Yuta that Mark has been seeing lately has been too worried, too afraid, too unhappy. And it is possible that his eyes are just deceiving him. He has awful eyesight after all. Fuck, wait– where’s that eye doctor’s phone number?