Work Text:
My Dear Pink Bunny,
I am no longer sick but sometimes, Daddy still makes sad faces. The amusement park is my most favorite place in this world, because it is where we met, and also, when Daddy paints other people, he would always smile and laugh with them. I wish you would come back there and give him a lollipop, maybe that would make him happy. I miss you, the others are not as friendly and nice as you. Where are you now, my Dear Pink Bunny? It’s been many years but I will always wait for you.
Love, Park Nayeon
Gyeongseok flinched as the phantom wound throbbed, one hand automatically flying to his left side. The sudden action caused his paint brush to graze the canvass, on somewhere it wasn’t supposed to be.
He cursed, both at his stupidity and the fact that she still looked beautiful even with a smudge of blue covering her nose. If she was alive, Gyeongseok would’ve wiped it away himself, and maybe they would share a laugh on the mess it would leave behind. He wondered, would he become a hopelessly in love dumbass and just stare at her until the paint irritates her skin, or would he run around in panic to fuss over her?
The answer he deduced: Cho Hyunju would’ve turned him into a blubbering idiot either way.
And Gyeongseok would’ve looked forward to himself melting into a puddle of mush day by day because of her.
It was better than losing himself as he tried to chase a dream that would never become a reality.
Because she was dead, along with everything else in that wretched island. He desperately hoped and prayed that with her selflessness, she would atleast be spared.
Sometimes, Gyeongseok blamed himself for being so out of it back then.
After being exposed to the devilry happening behind the scenes, there was no way he wouldn’t warn the rest of the participants. He should’ve begged the mysterious guard who rescued him. He should’ve gone back for everyone, gone back to the games where he could keep a close eye on Hyunju.
Maybe then, he would be able to save her from whatever killed her.
He still couldn’t move on, not knowing how she died. She could’ve been caught in that blast, perished in a game or murdered by one of the players, he would never know. Questions made him toss and turn at nights, about her or about the rest of the people he had gotten to know.
Gyeongseok couldn’t get a closure, as much as he couldn’t get his shit together.
With a heavy sigh, Gyeongseok lifted the ruined artwork off the easel. He carried the canvass to a smaller room where it joined the rest of his botched works, all of them bearing Hyunju’s face.
“I’m so sorry.” He had no broken body to say that to, only damaged paintings.
My Dear Pink Bunny,
Daddy’s been going out to meet a lot of ladies. I didn’t like much of them but there were others who are kind like you. I like those who gave me candies and chocolates. He said that he’s going to date again, I don’t really understand but he was excited everytime he goes out, like I’m always excited when I see this cute boy in my class.
So I guess, Daddy’s having crushes? Why are there so many of them? When I asked Daddy, he said that so I could have a lot of new mommies to choose from.
I told him I already have a Mommy in heaven and he said, ‘yes, you only had one Mommy, and I only had one woman who I wanted to be your Mommy.’
Sorry if there are a lot of ‘mommies’, my Dear Pink Bunny! Do you have a mommy too? Where is she? I hope you’re with her or else she’d be sad!
Love,
Park Nayeon
When the grief was too vivid and the ‘what if’ scenarios burned more painfully in his chest, Gyeongseok would go out to try and seek relief from other people. If he would date and sleep with women, he would go for the well-built ones with shoulder-length hair and straight bangs.
Sometimes, they weren’t enough. Gyeongseok had gone as far as inflicting his fucked up fantasy on transgender women he found on dating apps.
After the act, deep shame would engulf him, eventually settling on the pit of his stomach where it would stir uncomfortably for a long time, eating him up from the inside, until his desperate need to have and to hold the closest thing he could pretend as Hyunju rears up again.
This was when he hated himself the most.
Trying to bring her back through his paintings wasn’t enough, now he had to manifest her through other people too?
He would try, believe him, he would always try to escalate his hookups into a proper relationship. Some of them he even brought home and introduce to Nayeon but in the end, both guilt and shame overwhelmed him.
Making them his girlfriends weren’t so different from using them for sex, especially if Gyeonseok’s fully aware that his heart still belonged to no one but the dead lady he knew for a few days.
Sick. He’s fucking sick in the head.
He needed to stop. He needed to think. But for now, he needed a drink.
Gyeonseok scrolled his contacts, fingers eventually landing on the name he’s searching for. He’s not going to drink here. He’s not going to taint his and Nayeon’s home with the smell of alcohol. He would never dirty her safe space with his fuck ups.
Hwang Junho answered on the third ring. It used to be on the sixth, when he was still taking care of his adopted infant daughter. Now that the little lady has grown into a toddler, he and his boyfriend Kim had more time for other things.
Gyeongseok’s stupid ass is other things.
“Hey, I’m a mess right now, I kept thinking about her and maybe getting my ass drunk in some bar is a good idea. Are you and Kim free to look after Nayeon for maybe three hours? Or four, because I’m a messed up fuckwaffle.”
Junho wasn’t even finished saying ‘hello’.
Silence stretched on both lines, like that time when he passionately asked his brother Inho ‘Why?!’ and he ignored him like he was the least interesting part of the wall.
Finally, the ex-detective found his words. “Are you sure you’re not already drunk? I may not be a cop anymore but I could still have you arrested if you’re drinking with Nayeon still in there.”
After he was saved by them, Gyeongseok had formed a friendship with Junho and the mercenary he was with. They knew each other long enough now to know that Junho’s threat wasn’t serious.
The same couldn’t be said for Gyeongseok’s long term case of heartbreak.
Which is why sometimes, he hated Junho and Kim for having the audacity to flaunt their sweet, loving relationship on his face. But he doesn’t have anywhere else safe to drop Nayeon off.
Plus, playing with Junho’s daughter would definitely make her happy.
“Come on now. The only alcohol I have here is rubbing!”
“Fine, fine—!” Junho cut off with a slight chuckle. “Bring her in and go drown your woes elsewhere.”
My Dear Pink Bunny,
Tonight, Daddy was crying in his room again. I stood outside his door with a glass of milk to cheer him up. He always cried when I was sick but I’m okay now, I can get out of bed and help him. Daddy doesn’t yell at me when I go to his room without telling him so I just opened the door. He smiled when he saw me, I’m so happy I made him smile again!
Because he was happy too, he drank the milk I made for him and gave me a hug. I asked him why he was crying and he said that he was missing someone so much. He said that he always dream of that person and that when he wakes up, it hurts because she’s not real. Maybe he was dreaming of my Mommy in heaven. She was gone when I was still a baby and I only saw her in pictures.
My Dear Pink Bunny, how do I tell my Mommy to stop making Daddy cry?
Love,
Park Nayeon
Dreaming of her had always been a torture, specifically that exact moment where his hazy brain would clear up, and reality would crash down on him like a punch to the gut. Hyunju wasn’t in his arms. He cannot hold Hyunju in his arms, or even touch a part of her. Gyeongseok wasn’t in another country, living in bliss with her and Nayeon, he’s stuck here in his apartment in Bongcheon-dong, all sad and alone in his bed.
He would never know the taste of her kiss. Even in dreams, it was being denied to him. It was cruel and merciful at the same time.
Sometimes, the ‘what if’ questions he would ask in his conscious moments would bleed into his dreams at night. Through the years, he had dreamed of her in several scenarios and places.
What if we got out together?
What if we run and live far away?
What if our souls reincarnated as lovers?
What if I married her in some secret garden with only Nayeon as our witness?
What if the games didn’t exist and we met under normal circumstances?
Different ‘what ifs’, each creating an alternate universe, all the endings are bleak. Because it always ended with Gyeongseok waking up to reality.
The only way he could preserve those dreams? Paint her.
It doesn’t matter if he remembered so little fragments, he would keep painting her and immortalize that version of her in a canvass to the best of his ability.
My Dear Pink Bunny,
The people in the amusement park loved my Daddy’s painting of them. They always said that his works are cute or funny. He makes their heads and ears look too big like a mouse. You should’ve sat down and let Daddy paint you before you left, so that wherever you go, you’ll have something to make you laugh.
I will tell you a secret. Daddy can make beautiful paintings that are not cute or funny. My Dear Pink Bunny, today I went inside the room where Daddy paints. It was full of paintings of this one woman. She's beautiful, but she doesn't look like my Mommy.
She was everywhere. Her face was on all of Daddy’s canvasses in different sizes. Sometimes, she’s wearing a green jacket with the number 120 on her chest, sometimes she’s in a pretty dress standing in front of a sunflower field. I saw one where a hand was putting a flower on her ear and I’m sure that was Daddy’s! Then there was one where she was holding a big gun, but I didn’t feel scared at all, maybe because her smile was so pretty. I thought she looked cool.
Do you think it’s the same woman in my Daddy’s dreams, my Dear Pink Bunny? Then he lied to me when he said she wasn’t real, because she looked so alive in his paintings.
Do you think he loves her? I wonder if my Mommy in heaven is mad at him for that. I hope she isn’t. Daddy and I still loved her even if I didn’t know her much.
My Dear Pink Bunny, tomorrow I will ask Daddy about the woman he loves painting. I know she must be an angel if my Daddy fell in love with her. If she becomes my Mommy#2, I would be happy, like how Uncle Junho’s daughter was happy with Uncle Kim as her Papa#2. They can’t make their own baby, though. But my Daddy and this lady? If they give me a little sister, I would be happy and more happy!!!
Will you come to their wedding?
Love, Park Nayeon
Gyeongseok would rather paint one thing for the rest of his life. There are still so many sides of Hyunju he hadn’t explored, so many shades of color and backgrounds he hadn’t tried out, even though they will all pale in comparison against her beauty.
His paintings, all made with love, precision and determination to remember most of her features, could never compare to the real thing. Gyeongseok could never capture, nor preserve her memory in some plain board and splashes of colors. She deserved a better memorial than his lame attempts but atleast, while he’s inside his art studio, he could pretend that she was alive and beaming at him from inside a canvass.
Gyeonseok relaxed himself against a wall as his eyes roamed the entirety of his studio. By now, it looked more like a gallery with how much artworks of Hyunju were plastered, hanged, and propped up on every surface available. He sighed. He had never been this pathetic before, pining after a woman he barely knew, which had been going on for a few years now.
Why couldn’t he just let go, why?
Maybe it was regret, survivor’s guilt, and the impossibility to seek closure.
Or maybe it was the memory of her smile which turned him stupid on the spot whenever he would see it. Maybe it was the surprise of discovering her fierce side. Maybe it was her unwavering kindness.
Despite the horrors they went through, Hyunju still found it in herself to care about other people. She was more than a pretty face, more than a tough muscle, and more than somebody going against the judgmental world.
Gyeongseok isn’t gonna stop painting her soon.
Because even if it’s him alone, even if it’s going to hurt him, somebody had to remember and honor her. He would never let the memory of Cho Hyunju disappear into nothing.
Not for as long as he lives.