Work Text:
︵⊹︵⏜︵୨୧︵⏜︵⊹︵
Borrowed Time
︶⊹︶⏝︶୨୧︶⏝︶⊹︶
The air in the Wat was a dense, hot mass that clung to his throat. The smell of incense, that sweet, woody aroma that used to bring him peace, now saturated his lungs to the point of nausea. Jimmy stood rigid as a statue in front of Sea's portrait.
The photograph looked back at him with an eternal smile, captured in a moment of light that no longer existed. Jimmy's eyes, swollen from so much crying and empty of any spark of life, had given up. The swelling weighed heavily on his eyelids, blurring his vision until the funeral portrait became a white, fuzzy smudge, the only thing his pupils refused to leave.
He wore the traditional black suit. When he tried to remember, the trail of his memories cut off abruptly. He didn't know who had dressed him, he didn't remember the car ride, or how his feet had carried him to that altar of white flowers. It was as if his body were operating on inertia, a biological machine moving forward while his mind remained trapped in the past.
Around him, the world was fading. The rhythmic, monotone murmur of the monks chanting the sutras was white noise, a static buzz filling the gap where Sea's voice used to live. It was the sound of emptiness.
He felt intermittent pressure. The hands of his friends Junior, Book, maybe some of his GMMTV brothers rested on his shoulder in a desperate attempt to anchor him to the earth. But Jimmy felt neither the warmth of their skin nor the weight of their comfort.
His existence had frozen into a still image that replayed in a loop behind his retinas: the glare of the wet asphalt under the streetlights, the smell of burning rubber, and the sudden silence that followed the crash. For the rest of those present, life continued between prayers and mourning; for Jimmy, the clock of the universe had broken forever in that exact second when Sea's hand stopped squeezing his.
———・୨ Day 5 ୧・———
Time had become a viscous, shapeless substance. Jimmy sat on the edge of the sofa, his back hunched, as if the air weighed several tons on his shoulders. In front of him, the television screen was a huge rectangle of black glass, a dead mirror reflecting his own gaunt reflection. He didn't know if it was two in the afternoon or four in the morning.
The sound of keys in the lock shattered the deathly silence of the apartment. He heard the door open and his sister's hesitant footsteps, but Jimmy didn't even blink. His eyes remained fixed on the black void of the television.
"Jimmy…" her voice sounded small, heavy with a compassion that stung his skin. "How are you?"
It took him several seconds to answer. His own voice sounded strange to him, as if it didn't belong to him, a dry vibration coming from somewhere deep inside his throat.
"I’m."
Just that. Existing was an exhausting task from which he could not resign.
"Have you eaten anything today?" she asked, approaching carefully, like someone afraid to startle a wounded animal.
"Yes."
He was lying. Or perhaps not. He truly didn't remember the last time he had tasted anything. Hunger had disappeared, replaced by a knot in his stomach that wouldn't let anything pass except the necessary air to keep from suffocating. But answering yes was the fastest way to make her stop asking.
"I brought some things…" she paused, desperately searching for a way to connect with him. "Do you want… us to watch a movie together? Like before."
"I want you to leave."
The words came out cold, sharp, without a drop of emotion. Jimmy knew he was being unfair, that she was only trying to pick up the pieces of what was left of him. But the presence of anyone else only served to remind him with unbearable cruelty that the space beside him was empty. That the only laughter that used to fill that living room had been extinguished forever. Having his sister there was like trying to heal a hemorrhage with a piece of paper: useless.
"Jimmy… please," she whispered, and he could hear her voice cracking.
"Go home," he repeated, clenching his fists over his knees. His knuckles were white.
His sister stood still for a moment, holding back the urge to burst into tears in front of him. She knew it wasn't her brother speaking, but the pain devouring him from the inside.
"I'm leaving food for you in the fridge. There’s enough for several days. Have some dinner, okay? Please, do it for me," she said in a thin thread of a voice. "I’ll come back tomorrow. I’m not going to leave you alone."
She approached slowly and wrapped him in a hug. Jimmy remained rigid, his arms hanging at his sides like a rag doll. There was no response, no gesture, no sigh. He was a present body with an absent soul.
"I love you," she whispered against his cheek, before letting him go with infinite sadness.
He heard her footsteps fade and the click of the door closing. Silence once again. Jimmy fixed his gaze back on the black screen.
———・୨ Day 13 ୧・———
The silence of the apartment was so heavy that Jimmy began to hear the faint hum of the refrigerator. He got up from the sofa with clumsy movements, feeling his limbs weigh heavy. His muscles, weakened from the lack of nutrition, protested with a slight tremor.
He walked toward the kitchen, dragging his feet across the floor. He stopped in front of the fridge, observing the magnets Sea had hung there—travel souvenirs, silly photos of both of them laughing—but he quickly looked away.
He opened the fridge door. The cold, white light bothered him, forcing him to narrow his eyes. «Should I eat?» He asked himself the question mechanically, like someone consulting an instruction manual for a machine they no longer care to fix.
He wasn't hungry.
"When was the last time...?" he whispered to himself, but he couldn't finish the sentence.
He reached for one of the tupperware containers his sister had left so insistently. Upon opening the lid, the sharp, sour smell of spoiled food hit him full force. Grayish mold had taken over the edges, spreading like a disease over what was once a dinner prepared with love. Jimmy observed it with an icy indifference.
He closed the lid without any kind of expression.
He simply walked to the trash can and let the container drop with a dull thud. "Trash with trash," he thought with a bitterness that didn't even reach his lips.
He closed the fridge, rejecting the idea of looking for anything else. He went over to the sink and filled a glass with tap water. The liquid was cold and slid down his throat like a stream of ice, reminding him that his body was still alive.
«Unfortunately,» he thought.
He drank with his gaze lost on the white wall in front of him, swallowing the water as if it were a bitter medicine. That was enough. The knot in his stomach tightened a bit more, erasing any trace of physical need.
He left the half-filled glass on the counter and returned to the darkness of the living room, wrapped once again by that silence which, far from being peace, was a constant scream of absence.
———・୨ Day 32 ୧・———
The steam from the water didn't even fog the glass, but it took Jimmy several minutes to gather the necessary courage to lift his head. When he finally did, the bathroom mirror returned an image that sent a shiver down his spine. That man was not him. That was a stranger, a specter inhabiting the remains of who he used to be.
The weight loss was more than obvious. A neglected, uneven beard darkened his face, giving him a sullen look. But the worst part was his eyes: sunken in their sockets, surrounded by dark circles, of a purple shade similar to an old bruise.
He passed a trembling hand over his face, feeling the roughness and coldness of his own skin. When he closed his eyelids, the real world disappeared and the cold returned. Everything repeated over and over again.
"If only I had stayed in my seat…" he whispered, and his own voice, cracked and weak, bounced off the bathroom tiles. "If only it had been me who died…"
He rested his hands on the sink, bowing his head as the air escaped his lungs. A thought, rhythmic and cruel, began to hammer in his mind like a mantra of torture.
«It's my fault, it's my fault, it's my fault…»
He repeated it in silence, then in a whisper, until the words lost their meaning and simply became the beating of his heart. Every inch of his pain had someone responsible: himself. If he hadn't been cold, if he hadn't accepted that switch, if he had stayed in his seat… Sea would be alive.
He groped his way toward the bedroom, as if the simple act of moving robbed him of the little energy he had left. He let himself fall onto the bed like dead weight. His hands searched under the pillow until they found Sea's linen shirt.
He curled into a ball around the garment, clutching it against his chest with desperate strength. He buried his face in it, inhaling so hard his temples hurt, searching for that scent of him.
But there was nothing.
Time, relentless and ruthless, had taken the smell away. The last physical trace of Sea had evaporated, leaving him alone with the memory of a warmth he would never feel again.
He wept then, with a dry, muffled groan that was lost in the loneliness of the room.
———・୨ Day 59 ୧・———
Jimmy's sister had moved in with him a week ago, settling into the guest room, worried about Jimmy's physical and mental health; sometimes he heard her crying softly through the walls, terrified by the ghost her brother had become.
Jimmy opened the pill bottle he had procured for himself, using his medical knowledge and his contacts. They were white, small, promising an oblivion that never quite became total. He swallowed one with a bit of water and closed his eyes, waiting for the void to claim him.
But that night, destiny had other plans.
As soon as the drug took effect, the world changed. He was no longer in his cold bed; the smell of leather upholstery and pine air freshener flooded his senses. The vibration of the engine under his feet was real. They were in the minivan, returning from a Fan Meeting that had been a resounding success.
Jimmy remembered the euphoria in his chest and the unshakeable decision to confess to Sea, that very night upon arriving home, that he loved him beyond any contract or fiction, and that he wanted them to be a real couple.
It was cold. The air conditioning in the minivan that day was higher than usual. Jimmy shivered.
"Hia, you're cold. Let's switch places, less air gets here."
Sea's voice. So sweet, so alive, so full of that selfless concern that always defined him.
Jimmy, in his conscious state within the dream, tried to scream. His mind screamed: "No! Stay there! For the love of everything, don't move!", but his mouth was sealed by time.
Because that was no ordinary dream. It was the memory of that fateful night.
His body, like a puppet directed by the past, stood up with a grateful smile.
He saw Sea settle next to the window, the most exposed spot, the place destiny had marked.
A few minutes later, Jimmy, in an act of affection, reached out and clutched Sea's hand. He squeezed it with a strength that sought to tell him just how much he loved him.
Sea looked at him looking puzzled, with that characteristic tilt of his head, but he didn't let go of his grip. On the contrary, he interlaced his fingers with Jimmy's and gave him a tender smile, one of those that lit up even the darkest corners.
"Hey… is something wrong?" Sea said in a teasing voice.
And then, hell.
The world turned white. The flash of the truck's headlights wasn't a light; it was an invasion that reflected for an eternal second in Sea's pupils. Then, the deafening screech of brakes on the wet asphalt. Time slowed down so Jimmy could hear every crunch: the glass shattering into a thousand bloody diamonds, the metal of the chassis twisting as if it were paper, and the brutal impact of the truck ramming the side where Sea had just sat down.
Jimmy felt Sea's hand. He felt how, in a microsecond, the pressure disappeared. Sea's fingers relaxed, slipping through his own, losing their strength, losing their warmth, becoming an inert mass while red began to splatter everything.
"SEA!!"
The scream tore through the apartment's silence. Jimmy sat up in bed with a start, lungs collapsed and his face bathed in icy sweat. His hands desperately searched for Sea's touch on the sheets, but they only found emptiness. The air refused to enter; his throat was closed tight with horror. He wept with violent spasms that made his ribs ache, while the echo of twisting metal kept resonating in his ears like a sentence.
He was alive.
He was alive, and Sea was not.
That was his one true punishment.
———・୨ Day 60 ୧・———
In the morning, Jimmy dressed mechanically. He chose a black shirt, the darkest one he could find. He didn't look in the mirror that day.
He walked into the living room, where the calendar on the wall seemed to throb with a sinister light of its own. There it was. A large red cross crossed out that day, marked with a violence that had almost torn the paper. It wasn't just a date; it was his exit contract, the final point of a story that had no more pages left.
He returned to his nightstand with slow steps. On the wood rested a small glass vial, barely larger than a thumb, but heavy enough to contain everything he needed. He picked it up with trembling fingers and, without allowing himself to hesitate for a single second, slid it into the bottom of his pocket.
When he reached the entrance, the sound of hurried footsteps stopped him. His sister came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron, her face lit up by a spark of hope upon seeing him dressed to go out.
"Jimmy… are you going out?" she asked, with a mixture of surprise and fear, as if she dreaded he would vanish if he crossed the threshold.
"Yes…" Jimmy avoided her gaze, concentrating on the doorknob. "I have to go to a meeting that I can no longer postpone. I've been summoned… it's urgent."
"Be careful, okay?" she whispered, taking a couple of steps closer. "Don't push yourself too hard. If you don't feel well, come back home. I’ll be here waiting for you. I’ll have dinner ready."
Jimmy finally looked up and met her eyes. An unbearable knot formed in his throat as he realized that, in his plan, there was no longer a "coming back home." That was the last time he would see the face of the person who had cared for him most during his shipwreck. Guilt hit him with the force of a tide, making him feel like the most horrible person on the planet for the void he was about to leave behind.
Without saying a word, he took a step forward and wrapped her in a hug. It was a different hug than those of recent months; it wasn't the embrace of an inert body, but a desperate, tight one, as if he were trying to ask for forgiveness through the pressure of his arms.
"I love you so much," he whispered into her ear, his voice broken by a truth she couldn't possibly imagine.
His sister, moved to tears because these were the first words of genuine affection she had heard in two months, buried her head in his shoulder and squeezed the hug with all her strength, feeling that, perhaps, her brother was coming back.
"I love you more, Jimmy. Much more. Come back soon, okay?"
Jimmy didn't answer. He couldn't lie to her anymore. He released himself from her arms with a painful gentleness, slung his backpack over his shoulder, and walked out into the hallway without looking back.
———・୨ ✦ ୧・———
Jimmy walked through the hallways of the company with his head down, hiding his gaunt face behind a mask he could barely sustain. Every step reminded him of Sea: that corner where they used to rehearse scripts, the coffee machine where Sea always asked him for a sip of his americano, the poster from their last series that still hung on one of the walls.
He entered the director's office with his soul armored. The air conditioning was on too high. The director was not alone; three executives in dark suits flanked him, sitting like judges before a court.
They greeted each other with formality. Jimmy sat down.
"Well, Jimmy," the director began, interlacing his fingers over the mahogany table. "I suppose you already know why we've gathered today. A reasonable amount of time has passed..."
Jimmy stared at him. His sunken eyes showed no fear, only an absolute indifference that seemed to make those present uncomfortable.
"Jimmy, everyone here understands your pain. It was a horrible tragedy," the director continued with a rehearsed empathy, empty of real weight. "But the industry doesn't stop for anyone. The public misses you, the sponsors are pressing, and we have time slots to fill. We've spent weeks analyzing profiles and... we have selected a new partner for your next project. A very talented young man who fits your image perfectly."
The world seemed to stop. Jimmy felt a violent wave of nausea, a taste of bile and bitterness rising up his throat.
"What... what did you say?" his voice came out like a dangerous whisper.
"A new partn—"
"A new partner?!" Jimmy erupted, springing to his feet. The chair hit the floor with a loud crash that made the executives jump. "There is no one else! My partner is Sea! My life is Sea! If it's not with him, there is no acting, there are no cameras, there is nothing! How dare you try to replace him as if he were a spare part?!"
The director sighed, recovering his cold and authoritative tone. He opened a leather folder and slid several documents across the table.
"Jimmy, be reasonable. You're a professional. Look at these figures," he said, pointing to some graphs. "The financial losses from the cancellation of recent events and the series hiatus are astronomical. The investors are demanding compliance with the exclusivity and performance clauses. According to your contract, the company has the right to assign you a new partner if the previous one is permanently incapacitated. If you refuse to work, you will not only face a lawsuit that will ruin your career, but you will have to return every single penny of the production advances."
Jimmy looked at the papers. Numbers, percentages, money... all of it seemed so insignificant, so tiny compared to the void he felt. Those men were trying to put a price tag on his mourning, trying to buy his loyalty with legal threats while Sea's body was still warm beneath the earth.
A fire he hadn't felt in months burned in his chest. He reached for his neck, violently ripped off the official ID badge hanging there, and threw it onto the financial documents. The plastic hit the table with a sharp, definitive thud.
"You can shove your contract clauses, your financial losses, and your new talent right where the sun don't shine," Jimmy said with a terrifying calmness. "I don't give a shit about the money. I don't give a shit about this company."
He leaned over the table, looking the director straight in the eye.
"I quit. Not just the series, but all of this. If you want to sue me, go ahead. Fuck you."
Without waiting for a response, Jimmy turned around and walked out of the office. His steps were quick, determined. There were no more doubts. The red mark on the calendar was calling him, and now, after seeing the filth of that place, he was more convinced than ever that this world no longer had a place for him.
Jimmy crossed the threshold of the building's exit and the humid heat of Bangkok hit him like a slap. He didn't stop to cover himself. There was no sign of the sunglasses or the cap he always used to protect his privacy; at that moment, the concept of "fame" felt alien to him.
"It's Jimmy!" a girl's shout pierced the air.
In a matter of seconds, the surroundings changed. The frantic clicks of mobile phone cameras and the flash of lenses began exploding before his eyes like bad-taste fireworks. Fans surrounded him, stretching out hands that sought to touch him, record him, possess a piece of his mourning. The questions piled up: "How are you?", "Are you coming back?", "Is it true about the new partner?", "Do you miss Sea?".
Jimmy felt the air turn solid. Panic, a black beast clawing at his throat, forced him to start running. He pushed through the crowd, ignoring the shouts, running through alleyways, fleeing from there. His lungs burned and his legs shook, but he kept going until he ran into a gray brick wall. A dead end.
The echo of the approaching crowd's footsteps resonated off the walls. Jimmy closed his eyes, pressing his hand against his pocket, feeling the small glass vial against his leg. He was cornered.
Suddenly, a sudden coldness ran down his arm. A slender but firm hand grabbed him by his jacket and pulled him with supernatural strength toward a wooden door that he could swear wasn't there a second ago.
The noise of the city vanished instantly.
Jimmy stumbled and fell to his knees on a tiled floor he knew well. Looking up, his heart stopped. He was surrounded by hanging ferns, tall glassware, and a golden light filtered through the large windows. The smell of freshly brewed coffee and damp earth enveloped him.
"No... this isn't possible," he whispered.
It was the greenhouse. The café where he and Sea had recorded scenes for Vice Versa. But that place was miles away. Besides, something was wrong: the corners of the room blurred into a thick, white mist, as if the place weren't entirely there.
"Am I... dead?" he asked the emptiness, his voice barely a thread of hope.
"Not yet… though that was your plan for today, wasn't it, Jimmy?"
Sitting in a chair was a figure. It was neither a man nor a woman; it was a presence dressed in clothes that seemed made of shadows and light.
Jimmy backed away, hitting a wooden table.
"Who are you? What is this place?"
"Someone who detests unfair endings," the figure responded, standing up and walking with silent elegance toward him. "Someone who has seen your calendar, Jimmy. And the vial you carry in your pocket."
Jimmy froze, in shock. That entity knew what was in his heart and what he intended to do after the meeting.
"What do you want from me?" he asked, with a mixture of distrust and a desperation so vast that his chest ached. "If you've come to stop me, you're wasting your time. I have nothing left."
"Come now, don't be like that… I'm not against you, Jimmy…" the figure made a brief pause. "If you could return to the past... if you could change the order of the factors... what would you do?"
Jimmy looked at the presence. He didn't need to think about it.
"I would save him," he said with a firmness he hadn't possessed in months. "I would stay in that damn seat. I would give every second of my existence just to see him breathe one more time… But that's impossible."
"And what if I told you that it is possible? I have come to offer you a second chance. A crack in the glass of time."
Jimmy looked at the entity, distrustful yet desperate.
"What do you want in return? My soul? My career? Do you want me to never see the light again? Ask me for anything."
The figure drew closer until it stopped in front of him and reached a hand out toward his head. Its expression softened with something resembling pity.
"I don't want anything from you, little doctor. I think… you have already paid enough. The pain of these two months has been a price no mortal should have to pay twice. I only want to see if this time... you will stay in your seat. If you are capable of holding the weight of destiny."
The figure gently touched Jimmy's forehead with the tip of a finger.
"Go back, Jimmy. And this time, don't let go of his hand."
A brilliant white flash exploded in the greenhouse. Jimmy felt his body disintegrate, time rewinding like a video tape rewinding at full speed.
———・୨ ✦ ୧・———
The minivan's engine vibrated beneath his feet. The smell of worn leather and dampness permeated his senses. And then, he felt it: the cold. That freezing air conditioning licking the skin of his arms, the very same that in his other life had been the herald of death.
"Hia, you're cold. Let's switch places, less air gets here."
Sea's voice reached his ears like a melody from a forgotten world. Jimmy turned his head slowly, fearing that if he moved too fast, the vision would shatter like glass. But Sea was there. Radiant, his skin full of life and his eyes bright with tiredness after the fan meeting, holding out that hand that Jimmy had seen grow cold in his own.
Jimmy felt a knot in his throat, his eyes starting to fill with tears. By instinct, Sea made a move to get up to yield his spot, but Jimmy reacted with force. His fingers closed over Sea's arm, pulling him back down until he was seated again.
"No, Sea. Stay where you are. Don't move."
His voice sounded raspy, almost unrecognizable. Jimmy breathed heavily, the air entering his lungs in spasms. Seeing the confusion on Sea's face, Jimmy couldn't contain it any longer; hot, real tears began to roll down his cheeks.
"Hia? You're pale... and you're crying. What's wrong? Do you feel sick?" Sea reached out his hand, truly worried by Jimmy's state of panic.
"Don't move. Please, Sea, for the love of everything, don't move from there," Jimmy pleaded, his voice breaking. He reached out his own hand and gripped Sea's, interlacing their fingers with an almost painful urgency. He needed to feel his pulse.
He looked at the digital clock on the dashboard. The red numbers advanced relentlessly.
«Less than a minute left…»
Outside the window, the rain began to intensify, hitting the glass with the same cadence as last time. The truck was near.
«I don't care about dying for Sea… but I have to try to change destiny…»
"P'Pha, turn around!" Jimmy shouted toward the driver's seat, breaking the silence of the vehicle.
"What's wrong, Jimmy? We're almost at the main intersection, there are barely a few kilometers left until your houses…" the driver responded through the rearview mirror, puzzled.
"I left something... something very important in the dressing room. An object I cannot lose. We must go back and pick it up right now!" Jimmy improvised, searching for any excuse to divert their trajectory from the collision point.
"But…"
"Turn around! Right now!" he shouted again at the man's hesitation.
"Jimmy, it's late, the traffic heading back is terrible at this hour with the rain..."
"I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE TRAFFIC! TURN THE FUCKING CAR AROUND NOW!" Jimmy's scream filled the cabin, loaded with a desperation so raw that Sea jumped. He had never seen him like this. He had never seen him lose his composure in that way.
The driver, frightened by the actor's outburst of violence, slammed on the brakes. The tires screeched on the wet asphalt. With a sharp turn of the steering wheel, he executed a dangerous 180-degree U-turn, just a few meters before entering the fateful intersection.
Jimmy pressed himself against the side window, his heart hammering against his ribs. And then, he saw it.
From the opposite direction, a heavy-tonnage truck lost control. The aquaplaning turned it into an unstoppable projectile. It flew past at full speed, roaring like an iron beast, right through the lane where they would have been just seconds later. The crash was deafening: the metal twisting, the impact against the median, the sound of the truck overturning and scraping along the asphalt amidst sparks and smoke.
The minivan braked hard a second time. A deathly silence descended over them, broken only by the sound of the rain and the windshield wipers. Sea looked through the rear window, his pupils dilated and his face white as paper, processing the magnitude of the disaster they had just escaped by a breath.
"Hia..." Sea whispered, his voice trembling. "We... we would have been killed. If we hadn't turned around..."
«Worse… only you would have died… and I would have stayed here to die inside for the rest of my eternity,» Jimmy thought, as his soul returned to his body.
Unable to contain himself for another second, Jimmy threw himself onto Sea. He wrapped his arms around him in a desperate embrace, almost violent from the need for contact. He hid his face in the crook of Sea's neck, inhaling his scent, feeling the wild beating of his heart against his chest.
He was alive.
When Jimmy finally loosened the embrace, his hands remained gripped to Sea's shoulders, as if he feared the laws of physics would claim him back to that gray reality.
Sea looked at him with a mixture of tenderness and fear; he had never seen his "Hia" like this, so broken and, at the same time, so present.
"Hia?" Sea whispered, searching for his eyes. "You're shaking... You're acting very strange. Are you sure you're okay? If you want, I can tell P’Pha to take us to the hospital. The scare was just too much and you... it looks like you've seen a ghost."
"No. No hospitals," Jimmy responded immediately, with an urgency that admitted no rebuttal. He just needed to be with him. "I just want to go home. Come with me, Sea. Stay with me tonight. Please, don't leave me alone today."
Sea nodded in silence.
After a brief and confused chat with the driver, whom Jimmy convinced that the "forgotten object" didn't matter as much as getting back safely, the minivan dropped them off in front of Jimmy's building.
Upon crossing the apartment threshold, Jimmy did not turn on the main lights. He stood for a moment in the gloom, breathing in the living room air. The place felt strangely pure, almost sacred. There was no trace of the smell of spoiled food, nor the dust accumulated from neglect, nor that deathly silence that had driven him crazy in his "other life." The apartment was a home once more, simply because the sound of Sea's footsteps resonated against the walls.
Sea set his backpack on the sofa with a slow movement and turned around, determined to get answers.
"Hia, you're really scaring me a bit…" Sea said, his voice soft but firm. "Ever since you stopped us from switching seats in the van, you've been acting very strange…"
Jimmy took a step toward him, closing the distance.
"Listen to me carefully," Jimmy interrupted him, his voice vibrating from the deepest part of his chest. "I'm not going to give you explanations you wouldn't understand, Sea. Don't ask me for logic, because there isn't any. I only know that today... today I have been born again. And I'm not going to waste another single second of this life running from the truth."
Jimmy extended his hands and took Sea's face. His fingers, still slightly cold, rested on his cheeks. His thumbs caressed Sea's soft skin, tracing the outline of his jaw slowly.
«God… how I’ve missed you. You have no idea how much…» Jimmy thought, his chest about to burst.
"I’ve spent too much time running from what I feel," Jimmy continued, his eyes locked onto Sea's. "I've lived terrified of what people would say, of company contracts, of the future... of the constant fear that if I made one wrong move, I would ruin what we have. I worried so much about losing you in the future that I forgot to love you in the present."
"Hia…" Sea whispered, and Jimmy could feel his partner's heart accelerating beneath his touch—a living, frantic percussion.
"I love you, Sea," Jimmy let out, without hesitation. "I don't love you as a co-worker, or as a close friend. I love you in a way that burns my chest, that steals my breath. I love you so much that I would rather the whole world be erased than spend another minute without you knowing it. I am never running from this again. I don't care about the company, I don't care about the series. I only care about you."
Sea stood frozen, his breath hitching, seeing a desperate truth in Jimmy's eyes.
Seeing that Sea remained silent, with wide eyes and suspended breath, Jimmy felt a lash of fear. The panic of having forced things made him back take a mental step back. Slowly, he began to lower his hands from his cheeks, feeling that the weight of his confession was perhaps too much for this Sea who, unlike him, had not lived through two months of agony.
"Hia... I..." Sea whispered, his voice cracking.
"I'm sorry," Jimmy interrupted, looking away with a sad smile. "You don't have to answer me right now if you don't want to. I don't want to pressure you… I completely understand if you don't…"
"Hia, listen to me." Sea stopped him, catching Jimmy's hands before they finished dropping. "Don't you dare apologize. I’ve been keeping this in for so long... so much time trying to be the 'perfect partner,' the ideal friend, while dying inside every time you looked at me with that affection I didn't know how to interpret. I thought I was the only one who felt that time froze when we were together."
Sea took a resolute step, eliminating the last remaining space between their bodies. His hands moved firmly up Jimmy's shoulders until they interlaced behind his neck, forcing him to hold his gaze.
"I love you, Jimmy," Sea whispered, and his words were the balm that finally closed Jimmy's invisible wounds. "It has always been you. In any life, on any path... I would always choose you. A thousand times over."
Jimmy didn't wait another single second. He wrapped his arms around Sea's waist, pulling him close as if his life depended on that contact. He leaned down and kissed him.
It was a kiss that seemed to last an eternity, one of those that only exist in period movies. Slow, deep, and loaded with desperate gratitude. There was no rush, only the tender exploration of two lips that had sought each other for years in the silence.
Pulling apart barely a few millimeters, they stayed forehead to forehead, sharing the same warm air.
"Sea... stay. Spend the night here with me," Jimmy whispered against his lips, his soft voice caressing Sea's senses while his hand moved down to lose itself in the curve of his back. "I don't want there to be a single centimeter of distance between us today…"
Sea let out a soft laugh—a melody Jimmy would never take for granted again. He gave him a playful tap on the tip of his nose, trying to dissipate the intensity of the moment a bit.
"Wow, Mr. Jitaraphol has suddenly become very direct, hasn't he?" Sea joked, his eyes bright. "What happened to that reserved, professional man who always measures his words?"
Jimmy laughed too, and it was a sound born from the depths of his soul, his first genuine laugh in a very long time.
"That man stayed in another world, Sea. Now I'm just a man who knows what he wants... and I want you, in every possible way that exists."
Sea sighed, surrendering completely, and snuggled against his chest, hiding his face in the crook of his neck.
"Alright... I'll stay. Anyway, I don't think I could go anywhere even if I wanted to. My legs feel like jelly after that kiss."
Jimmy smiled, kissed the crown of his head, and taking him by the hand, guided him slowly toward the warmth of the bedroom. But as they crossed in front of the kitchen, Jimmy couldn't help but look over his shoulder. His eyes sought the calendar on the wall.
He saw it.
In the square representing two months ahead, the red X that symbolized his end glowed for a second with an almost electric intensity, like a final spark of a reality refusing to die. Jimmy held the gaze, defying destiny.
Under his fixed gaze, the crimson color began to pale. It turned to a faint pink, almost transparent, and then, as if an invisible, merciful hand were erasing the trace of blood and pain, the mark disappeared completely. The paper became pure white again, a blank canvas waiting to be written on anew.
Jimmy squeezed his grip on Sea's hand a little tighter, feeling his warm, living fingers interlaced with his own.
«I'm not going to waste it. No matter what comes, no matter how many problems there are... this time, we are going to live it all.»
———・୨ Epilogue ୧・———
Mimi, Jimmy's sister, finished adjusting her necklace in front of the mirror. The apartment was quiet. Suddenly, her phone vibrated on the dresser. Seeing the name on the screen, “Jimmuuuu 🐻💜”, an automatic smile lit up her face, though a small prickle of strangeness ran through her chest; her brother didn't usually call at this hour.
«How strange… he’s usually working at this hour…»
"Tell meee!" she answered energetically, trying to pass her good mood through the line.
On the other end, there was only silence for a few seconds. A dense silence, loaded with an emotional static she couldn't quite identify.
"Mimi… do you have… do you have a minute?" Jimmy's voice sounded small, with a raspy texture, as if he were holding back a tide.
"As many as you want for you, you know that," she responded, softening her tone and sitting on the edge of the bed. Her sisterly instinct went on alert. "Is something wrong?"
She heard her brother inhale deeply, a breath that left his lungs in a shaky sigh, almost a muffled sob.
"I'm so sorry," he said finally. His voice broke on the last syllable.
"Eh? Hey, Jimmy, what's wrong? Why are you sorry?" she asked, frowning, genuinely confused and worried.
"For being selfish," he continued, and Mimi could hear the crying flowing freely now. "For having hurt you so much, for locking myself in my own pain and leaving you to carry my pieces… for being a coward and thinking about giving up when you were right there, holding me up. I'm sorry, I'm truly sorry."
Mimi froze. She didn't understand what he was talking about; to her, Jimmy was still the same hard-working, affectionate brother as always, a bit stressed from work, but nothing more.
"Jimmy, I don't know what you're talking about, sweetheart," she told him with infinite tenderness, while her own eyes began to water from the intensity in her brother's voice. "You haven't done anything wrong. You're the best brother anyone could ever have. Are you okay? Did something happen at work? You know you can count on me for whatever you need, whatever it is. Always."
"I know it very well… I know it all too well," Jimmy responded, and the image of her hugging him in that empty apartment, receiving no response, flashed through his mind like lightning. "I promise you I'm going to be a better brother. I'm going to be present, I'm going to truly live. I love you very much, Mimi… So much…"
The tears prevented him from continuing.
"I love you more, so much more," she answered, letting herself be carried away by the emotion, her heart tightening. "We'll always be together, taking care of each other… remember? That's what we promised each other when we were little."
"Yes…" Jimmy sniffed, recovering his composure a bit. "And I swear I will never, ever break that promise again."
"A-again?" she asked, confused.
But Jimmy changed the subject.
"I love you, Mimi. Thanks for everything. I need to hang up now… I'm heading into work… and Sea is waiting for me," Jimmy said.
"Alright… I love you, Jimmu."
Mimi hung up the phone and stared at the device for a few moments. She didn't understand the urgency of that call, but she felt that something had healed in the air, as if a knot she didn't know existed had finally untied.
On the other side of the city, Jimmy tucked his mobile into his pocket and wiped away his last tears. He looked beside him, where Sea was waiting for him with a curious smile and a water bottle in his hand.
"Everything good?"
"It is now."
Jimmy took his hand, interlacing their fingers tightly, and they walked together toward the recording set. The future was blank, and for the first time, he wasn't afraid to write on it.
THE END.