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Everyone in the compound – the place Chay now calls home – has a gun. Men, boys, and women carry guns, clean guns and shoot guns whenever they are happy, sad, or bored. When they get together in the courtyard for dinner, they set empty cans and bottles in long lines, and when they knock the last one off, they take shots at sparrows that live in the nests hidden under the roof.
The first time Chay saw an unlucky sparrow drop from the sky, he cried. He couldn’t fall asleep, haunted by the vision of the sparrow’s tiny body, rotting on a dirty dinner-plate. He didn’t dare go looking for it. The next morning, it was gone. The tables were clean, the polished wooden surface gleaming in the sun.
Chay doesn’t cry anymore. After Kim messages him again (a link to the noticeboard of the Music faculty at a university Chay doesn’t recognize: admissions reopened), Chay calls him and, quickly, before he remembers everything else, he asks: “Can you teach me how to shoot a gun?”
Kim doesn’t answer at first. Chay almost hangs up, because he can’t stand the sound of Kim breathing.
Then, Kim says yes.
He texts Chay the details: a driver will pick him up and take him to the hotel where Kim lives. There is an exclusive, members-only shooting range on the second floor underground. Kim will book it for the day. Chay doesn’t respond, but he puts in a reminder on his phone: simply, shooting range.
On his way out, he passes his brother, returning from a visit to the residence of the first family. Porsche always dresses up to meet Mr. Korn, an expensive suit, boat shoes, and a watch like the one Uncle Tee pawned to pay off a lifetime’s debt.
He stops in the middle of the staircase, momentarily forgetting his entourage who are obediently waiting two steps below him.
“Where are you off to,” he asks Chay.
“Practice.”
“You don’t have your guitar.”
“Different practice,” Chay says.
His brother frowns but doesn’t say anything, only flicks him on the forehead. He takes another step and his men come to life, a multiple shadow.
Chay almost wishes his brother would tell him off. If they were still living in their old house, their old lives, Chay would have never been allowed to miss the entrance exams. His brother would carry him to the exam hall himself if he had to, and wait by the door until he made certain that Chay wasn’t throwing his life away. But when Chay told him that he wouldn’t be attending university this fall, Porsche said nothing. He doesn’t ask why Chay never goes to school anymore, only plays video games in his room and wastes Porsche's money at the Siam Department Store. Chay doesn’t know if it’s because Porsche still feels guilty, or if he’s too tired. Whenever he’s not out with the first family, or training with the bodyguards, he’s locked in a dusty study with the family’s accountant, examining spreadsheet after spreadsheet, calling in the men whose accounts don’t add up. Afterwards, he hides himself in the garden and whispers into his phone until he has smoked at least half a pack of cigarettes.
Chay sees Kim at the entrance of the hotel: leaning against the wall, sunglasses on. The outline of his gun visible over his hip. Chay wonders if Kim always had a gun on him when they met.
He follows Kim into the lobby, and the gilded elevator. When the doors close behind them, Kim clears his throat.
“How have you been,” he asks.
Chay glances at the reflection in the mirror: Kim is leaning against the wall opposite to it. Their eyes meet and Chay looks down, flushing. He shrugs. How is he supposed to be? He’s grateful that he’s alive.
He doesn’t look at Kim again and Kim doesn’t say else anything until they get to the shooting range. Kim explains to Chay what kinds of guns there are, which would suit Chay best for the beginning, how to hold a gun and how to stand, where to look when looking at the target. He gives Chay a small handgun. Chay considers its weight in his hands.
“First watch how I do it,” Kim tells him, and Chay does, noting the exaggerated care with which Kim adjusts his stance and his grip on the gun, a model example. Kim fires one, two, three, four times. It is only when he slides off his earmuffs and turns back to Chay that Chay remembers to look at the target.
Perfect, all shots. Chay lets out a quiet gasp, and hates himself for it.
“Your turn,” Kim says.
Shooting a gun is easier than Chay expected. It takes him a while, but after wasting two series, Chay is getting bullets into the target, piercing the ghostly body outlined on the steel sheet. It begins to feel fun, like a game. He feels as if he scored a point with every thud and every tear in the steel. He doesn’t even mind it when Kim tells him to hold off for a moment, and begins to correct his stance, pushing his elbows higher and delicately moving his ankles further apart.
Kim isn’t touching him more than absolutely necessary but it is still, Chay realizes, more than he ever did when they were dating.
Chay looks back at the target. He winces when Kim’s cold rings brush against his skin. He never got used to it.
But then, they were never really dating. Kim was looking for information on his brother and Chay – Chay didn’t know what to do with himself. He had never dated anyone. When Kim kissed him on a cheek, he blacked out, and couldn’t remember it afterwards. One time, he took Kim’s hand when they were walking down the street, because that’s what he thought all couples did, and Kim asked him what he was doing. Chay said, “Can’t I,” and laughed at how cute he sounded, burying his face in Kim’s arm. When Kim didn’t answer, he peeked at him, curious. He wondered if Kim really minded, if he didn’t like it, or if it was because he was a celebrity, and didn’t want the pictures. But looking at Kim’s face, he couldn’t tell.
Chay hates remembering things like that. He hates how pathetic it makes him feel. Kim has apologized to him – he has fought for him, like he would for his family – he is here now, teaching Chay how to shoot, giving him his time and attention – but underneath it all, Chay knows that he’s never had Kim, and was stupid for thinking that he did, and that knowledge sucks everything else in like a vortex, leaving Chay empty and exhausted, unable to accept any act of kindness Kim might offer him now.
“I got it,” he says, and pushes the earmuffs on. Elbows low. Ankles apart. He grips the gun.
They were never dating. They have never done anything Chay and Porsche wouldn’t do. They ate together. Kim watched Chay fry eggs, fascinated as if he had never seen someone do it before in real life. He burnt the water when he made Chay tea. When Chay asked, he bought him crepes from the stand on the street, and fish on the stick, and shaved ice cream. If Chay whined enough, Kim carried him up to his bedroom, and when he moved to go, Chay tickled him until he fell on bed next to him, and cried, pink in the face. They watched TV together. When Kim’s song played in the background of the commercial, Chay laughed, because he couldn’t believe that somebody would hear a song that came from Kim’s heart – that Chay knew in his own heart – and would use it to advertise a jewelry cleaning solution. He’d forgotten that Kim was famous.
When they played together, Chay felt as if their hearts were touching each other. He used to imagine that he knew him, back when he was watching every shaky recording from a meet-and-greet with the fans that he found online, alone in his old house, waiting for his brother to came back from this job or another, but not alone, because with Kim, Kim on his screen, Kim’s warm voice filling the kitchen, Kim’s music in Chay’s hands, in Chay’s heart, in his dreams. In the studio, Chay understood that he’d been wrong. What was true, was there. It was the truest thing in the universe. Truer than gravity. When they were done, they would lie down on the floor and stare at the dark ceiling, too far from the faint lights on the stage.
“It’s been ages since I’ve done this,” Kim said.
“Why?” Chay asked.
Kim didn’t answer.
It was true. It had to be true.
Chay wishes that he didn’t care and shoots. The steel bends. Straight between the eyes. He’s shaking.
“That’s enough,” Kim says.
Chay nods. He looks at Kim, and doesn’t look away. It was true. It doesn’t matter. Kim is a liar. The burden that Porsche has carried since he was made the head of the family, since he first came to work for Kim’s brother – Kim knows it, and worse. Chay will never know everything. But Chay has known him. He heard Kim when he sang. He knew what he felt. When Kim was in pain, Chay felt it. He feels it now. He can’t stop feeling it. But he doesn’t know what to do with it, this feeling. He can’t sing it. It’s not a sidewalk serenade. To say it, he will have to learn a new language. The language of men shooting sparrows. So, he asks:
“Can I come here again?”