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"Will you hold my hand?"
Jimin paused in the doorway. "What?"
"Hold my hand. Please?" The boy with the vanilla smile asked, still crouched amongst morning glories and fluttering quicksilver butterflies.
Jimin looked up. The sun was barely dipping into the horizon, splashing purple and orange and pink and red and soft, soft blue onto the clouds and sky. "It's not even dark yet. What are you afraid of?"
The boy's lips pulled into a vanilla crescent, his irises dark and bittersweet and filled with a sadness that made Jimin want to hold him and kiss his eyelids until it was gone. "I'm afraid of drifting away, of course."
Jimin's heart dropped. "You realize I can't help you with that."
"Of course you can." He stood up, brushing petals and butterflies off his lap, and walked two, three steps towards where Jimin was standing. "You're still a little bit alive, aren't you? You haven't given up yet. There's someone back there, waiting for you, isn't there?"
Jimin closed his eyes, a hot tear burning a single path down his cheek. "There's someone I came for. I can't seem to find him, though."
Or rather, he doesn't seem to remember me, he bit back.
"Let's find him, then," the boy said, reaching out and swiping a thumb at the tear that was still halfway down Jimin's face. "It's a win-win situation. As long as we hold hands."
Jimin sighed. "Alright, then," he murmured, reaching out and slipping his fingers between the other's. "Let's go find him."
What he didn't say was that they already had.
"Is it always a sunset here?" The boy - Jungkook - asked, swinging their hands in time with their footsteps. "I mean, it's pretty, but it's getting kind of tiring."
Jimin blinked at him, confused. "You mean, your sky's the same as mine?"
It was Jungkook's turn to look confused. "We're supposed to have different skies?"
"The sky we see reflects the time of day when we died," Jimin explained. "You do know you're dead, right?"
"Of course I do. I mean, when I woke up with blood all over me and didn't feel pain, it was pretty obvious."
Jimin dropped his hand.
"Hey!" Jungkook said, immediately reaching out and intertwining their fingers back together. "No letting go, remember?"
"Sorry," Jimin mumbled, blinking hard to suppress the memories. His world spun, a haze of purple-orange sky and glaring white lights, hospital beds and morning glories and quicksilver butterflies and tubes everywhere, so many tubes it seemed like the figure lying on the bed was more machine than human. The way he held his cold hand until the very last beep of the monitor, how he screamed at the doctors to fix him, bring him back even though the nurses had already told him it wasn't possible-
"Are you okay?"
Just like that, the hospital snapped away and was replaced by a sickeningly familiar almost-sunset. Jimin started to nod, then realized that tears were coursing down his cheeks. He shook his head.
Next thing he knew, Jungkook's arms were around him and his nose was buried in the spot where Jungkook's neck curved into his shoulder, and he could smell the familiar scent of early morning kisses and perfectly brewed coffee that he used to love so much, that used to be in the sheets and pillows and in both their closets because Jimin always liked Jungkook's clothes better than his.
It was all so nostalgic that he wanted to pull away, but then he noticed that Jungkook's hand was still holding his.
"Do you remember me?" Jimin asked to the only other person in his world, sitting on the uppermost branch of the tallest tree in the park, swinging his legs carelessly because he knew he couldn't fall.
Jungkook smiled, but didn't answer. His voice had disappeared only a few days ago.
It happened so suddenly, it was almost cruel.
They were taking one of their many walks in the park, all the butterflies swarming to Jungkook in bursts and flitters of color like they usually did, when all of a sudden, Jimin's hands were closed around empty air. He looked up, alarmed, to find that Jungkook was dissolving, skin and eyes and smile melting into hazes of warm color, hair and warmth and glow breaking into shards of glass and fading into the forever-sunset air. Jimin reached out, out, out - trying to grab whatever of him he could, but everything slid through his fingers like water and drifted away into the orange, pink, purple, soft soft blue sky.
But I didn't let go, Jimin wanted to scream. I didn't let go of your hand.
A small 4 by 4 polaroid fluttered to the ground, of a sunset and Jimin and Jungkook, arms around each other, lips pressed together, hearts and souls and fingers intertwined, back when Jungkook still remembered him, back when Jungkook wasn't so afraid of drifing away, back when they were both still alive and there was no possibility of anyone fading away in an empty heartbeat.
And written, on the bottom and signed with two different names, were three words.
Never let go.