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Matalino si Chanhee, alam niya ‘yan sa sarili niya. He always finds a way to deal with situations that call for solutions, his brain working twice as hard when problems arise even beyond his control; in other words, he is always one step ahead of everything and everyone. Sometimes, even himself. He takes pride in that fact, revels in his quick wit and ability to put up a strong and controlled front.
So, why is he, in all of his naked glory, wrapped in a measly corduroy jacket on an aggravatingly handsome man’s bed at two in the morning?
This is the most vulnerable Chanhee has ever been—touched in a way that made his stable bones shake, held in a way that burned his skin to an addicting heat, and looked at in a way that dumbed his otherwise smart brain. Matalino si Chanhee, alam niya ‘yan.
Pero kung si Hyunjae ang katapat, mapapadalawang-isip siya ng ‘di oras.
Dressed in nothing but his boxers, the older brunette lays against the headboard with white sheets draped over the middle of his torso with a cigarette in one hand and Chanhee’s hand in the other. He is a sight to behold, Chanhee knows. He deems himself lucky to be one of the people who gets to see Hyunjae this way, kahit kinailangan niya pang ibigay ang katawan niya para lang dito.
Was it a fair trade? Of course not. Chanhee knew that. But god forbid Chanhee knew anything, right? What good is his intelligence if he allows a man like Hyunjae to cloud his head like some kind of virus that seeps into every crevice of his skull once he so much as looks in his direction?
Kung ano ang kinatalino niya, ‘yun din ang kinatanga niya.
“Ano ba tayo, Jae?” Chanhee asks, voice soft and barely audible but Hyunjae catches it, even takes his sickeningly sweet time to answer. The younger of the two watches as the latter takes a long drag from his cigarette, eyes closing for a moment and eyelashes laying long and pretty against the top of his cheeks. May rason ba’t ang hina ni Chanhee pagdating sa kaniya, and that might just be a part of it.
He is bright and dignified, and Hyunjae is pretty with a foul mouth and a knack for breaking him down into tiny pieces on the ground. He is pretty when he talks, pretty when he laughs, pretty when he presses kisses on Chanhee’s neck, pretty when he whispers empty promises that he’s definitely told other people as well, pretty when he succeeds in making Chanhee believe in him like he’s some kind of god who’s supposed to be worshipped; pretty in everything he does—
“Hindi ko alam,” Hyunjae finally answers. “Friends who fuck?”
—including breaking Chanhee into a million pieces.
A couple of minutes of silence and that’s all he answers. Chanhee almost demands a gun to his head. Because they are not “friends who fuck”, not when they’ve only fucked once—not when they’ve only fucked now. What were they, then, before Chanhee agreed to let Hyunjae make a mess of him? Just friends?
That would be hard to believe because friends don’t promise each other the world in between kisses that feel apocalyptic.
“Tanginang sagot ‘yan,” Chanhee replies, chuckling partly in frustration and mostly in disbelief. Hyunjae doesn’t flinch, instead, he looks at the younger boy and shakes his head. “Edi ano gusto mong sagutin ko?”
‘Anything!’ Chanhee almost screams at him. ‘Anything but an answer that hurts! Anything but an answer that you and I both know isn’t true!’
But he tucks those words into a little folder in his brain, making them an addition to all the other words he should’ve said to Hyunjae but didn’t. At this point, he’s collected enough to write a book that will have the older boy on his knees by the first page. What an exhilarating thought, that is; the high and mighty Lee Hyunjae on his knees instead of him.
He wouldn’t survive a day.
“So, ano? Naglolokohan lang tayo rito, gano’n?”
Chanhee hates how he sounds like a kid—hates how speaking to Hyunjae reduces him to a frustrated, babbling, fragile mess that needs, needs, and needs. Opposite him is an equally frustrated man who sighs, “Oh, tanong na naman.” as if he has the right to be frustrated. As if he’s the one waiting for answers that won’t ever see the light of day.
“You know what,” Chanhee says, standing to take off the corduroy jacket that isn’t his and start putting his clothes back on. He’s almost there, stepping towards gluing back together whatever pieces of himself that Hyunjae has cluttered, cleaning up the mess as he always does—until he feels a cold hand grab his.
Suddenly, his words are back in his throat again, swallowing them into the depths of his stomach along with the clarity that had occupied his head just a second ago. His knees grow weak and he, once again, loses the ability to think.
“I like you, Chanhee,” Hyunjae says in a voice so gentle that it’s practically unrecognizable. “If gusto mong umalis, I won’t stop you. But what we have is special, don’t you think?”
He continues to speak, guiding Chanhee back down on the bed. The latter lets him.
“And it’s not like ganito na lang tayo forever,” Hyunjae whispers, “I just need time, okay? Swerte ko nga sa’yo, eh. I’ve never met anyone like you. Ngayon ko lang naramdaman yung ganito,”
Chanhee softens, listening to Hyunjae whisper the sweetest things to him like gospel. He forgets that this man is far from being an angel.
“If you’re sure about ending this, I’ll let you go. But I just want you to know,” the older brunette looks into Chanhee’s eyes, seeing nothing but his reflection in them. “I have never felt anything like this for anyone else,”
The latter closes his eyes, feeling himself slip into the mess once again.
“Ikaw lang.”
Hook, line, and sinker.
Hyunjae doesn’t need to say anything else, he knows he doesn’t need to say anything else. He watches as the younger puts the corduroy jacket back on, resuming his position on the bed like nothing happened.
Matalino siya, ‘di ba?
It is now three in the morning.
Matalino siya, hindi ba?
Chanhee wonders if he’ll ever find a way out of this mess.