Archive of Our Own

Funerals have never made much sense to Taehyun.

Having to pay thousands of dollars to throw someone in a fancy box, and then throw said box into the ground is pretty fucking stupid if you ask him. No one has, but he's still made sure to express his opinion whenever he can. It has caused many arguments with his parents - usually ending with his mother crying and his father yelling.

Last night, he wrapped a rough hand around Taehyun's wrist, leaving finger shaped bruises on the skin. “Enough, enough!”

When Taehyun dies, he doesn't want a funeral. He wants his body to be tossed into the woods like it's nothing more than an old piece of furniture, discarded after it has served its purpose. He wants the deer and the squirrels to feed off his flesh and wants the buzzards to pick at his organs. Whatever is left of him after that will nourish the soil beneath him. He once saw an article about green burials, but it still costs money. It's still stupid.

“You can't just be dumped in some trees, Tyun,” Taea had told him. She was combing through his hair with jerky hands. “That's illegal.”

“All laws have loopholes.”

Taea smiled. “Well, if there is one, leave it to you to discover it. Who knows.”

That's what Taehyun liked about his sister. She never laughed at him. She never tried to argue - well, most of the time she didn't. There were times she had a temper. Mostly during the height of her illness. Taehyun didn't pity her though. He argued right back.

She had told Taehyun that's what she liked about him - he didn't give a fuck if she was sick. He didn't treat her like she was fragile, like everyone else around her.

Her casket is decorated with pink fabric on the inside. Her favorite color was purple, not pink, but nobody listened to him.

Her lying there, discolored skin paper thin and stretched over her bony frame, hands crossed on her chest as if in prayer, makes Taehyun feel sick. She's going to be stuck in this box for the rest of this world's existence. She's claustrophobic. She has always been claustrophobic, their parents know that. She could never stand elevators or tunnels.

A steady stream of tears pour down his face. It gets so cold in the winter. It gets so cold.

“Oh, honey.”

Taehyun jerks away from his mother's touch like it burns. 

“She's claustrophobic,” he says.

“She's going to be okay - she's no longer physically with us, you know that, don't you, honey?”

God, does Taehyun know. He knows. It's been four days since her death, ten since she fell unconscious, and he's felt every second of it. Every breath he's taken since then has been heavy with the absence of his sister.

“Her favorite color was purple,” he cries, legs giving out beneath him. His knees hit the hard wooden floor of the funeral parlor. “Purple.”

“We put purple bows in her hair.”

But she hated wearing bows.

Taehyun gasps. He wonders why he's the only one that notices how thick the air has gotten in this room, how each breath is more suffocating rather than nourishing. He feels like he's dying. His parents’ only remaining child, and soon, he will be dead as well. No one seems to be upset by this. They look at his crumpled form on the floor as if he's nothing more than a cockroach that slithered in through the cracks of the floorboards.

Someone step on him then. Step on him, and end this suffering. 

His father is the only one to make a move. It motivates Taehyun to get up. That's one shoe he does not want to be squashed under, because he knows his father will only prolong the pain, not end it. 

He shoves his way out the room, and out the funeral parlor, and into the street.

The good thing about living in a small town is how close everything is to each other. Taehyun can walk three blocks and be at home. He can walk up the street and be downtown - which consists of little more than rotting, abandoned businesses and overpriced boutique shops. Or, he can walk straight into the patch of woods that's on the other side of the road, opposite the parlor. 

That's what he chooses.

There's a creek in the center of those woods. Before Taea became sick, and his father became angry all the time, the three of them would often go fishing together. They never kept what they caught. It was just for fun. Taehyun was fascinated with the bait - a plastic container full of live, wriggling worms. He'd pierce their bodies through the hook and wonder how they didn't immediately die.

He pricked his thumb one time. The bead of blood sat so perfectly atop his skin. 

Taehyun sniffs. He wipes a hand against his snotty nose, and then wipes it on the stupid slacks his mother made him wear. He jerks the bow tie around his neck off and tosses it into a tree. It hangs perfectly off a branch.

Maybe one day that could be him. Hanging perfectly. His corpse would turn into a bird feeder.

This end of the creek is quite shallow. The cold water wraps around Taehyun's bare ankles like icy claws, a shiver running up his spine. It gets so cold in the winter. Taea will surely freeze. All she's wearing is a thin blouse and her favorite pair of bootcut jeans.

No - Taea, as Taehyun knows her, is gone. She's vanished into nothingness. Her memories, thoughts, and feelings completely wiped out the moment she took her last breath and all that's left is her vessel. She won't give a shit about being cold or confined to a box. She's no longer.

How did she get so lucky? 

Taehyun looks up. The warmth of the sun on his face should be comforting, but all it does is remind him that he's still above the ground and living. She's not. Everyone wishes it had been him. Including himself.

Taehyun does not consider himself sad for thinking like this. Not when it is simply just a fact. 

He sighs. His feet are numb. 

He heads back towards the creek bank. It isn't terribly steep, but it requires some climbing. But numb feet aren't good for that, Taehyun realizes belatedly. He misjudges a step. He slips, falling forward, and he wonders if it's finally his turn.

There's a burst of pain as his head strikes against one of the rocks along the bank. Everything goes dark.

Something runs across Taehyun's face. It's soft and ticklish, his nose prickling as if he's about to sneeze. It then brushes across his eyelids, then his lips, then back to his nose.

Taehyun twitches. His eyes flutter open, squinting against the sunlight shining down on him before it's overshadowed by the face of an unfamiliar boy, his own eyes wide and lips parted in surprise.

The boy has pale hair - the palest hair Taehyun has ever seen. It seems to glow in the sunlight. In his hand, he holds a blue bird's feather. 

“Hey,” the boy speaks. “Are you okay?”

“Did I die?”

The boy's breath hitches. “I don't think so.”

Taehyun has an embarrassing thought, one he'd never voice out loud - if he isn't dead, then why is there an angel looking down on him? That's the only explanation as to why this boy's hair is glowing, why his eyes are so kind, why he takes Taehyun's hand and helps him sit up. He can't imagine such a human being existing.

“You're bleeding.”

When Taehyun brushes his fingers against his forehead, they come back red and sticky. 

“Hold on - I have a paper towel,” the boy says. Taehyun blinks and watches as he runs just a few feet away, where a blanket is laid out. A lunchbox, a handheld gaming console, and a stuffed penguin toy sits on the blanket. 

Taehyun swears he hadn't noticed any of it before he fell. “Were you there the whole time?” he asks when the boy returns, after grabbing a paper towel out of the lunchbox.

He nods, sheepishly. “Yeah but…I don't think you saw me. You seemed upset. I was going to try to sneak away, but then you fell. You might need to get it checked out.”

“I'll be fine.”

If there's any internal swelling or bleeding, then maybe Taehyun will simply pass in his sleep. That wouldn't be too bad.

The boy hums. He leans over and gently begins to dab at the wound. It stings, but Taehyun doesn't flinch. 

“It's not too bad, actually, now that the blood's been wiped away. It'll probably just scab over!”

He smiles.

“Want something to eat?”

Somehow, Taehyun ends up on the blanket, nibbling on half of a turkey sandwich and picking at a Tupperware container full of red grapes. He prefers the green ones. Or, even better, muscadines. There's a vine of them somewhere on the other side of the creek. Whenever he and Taea became tired of fishing, they'd wade through the water and go pick a basket full to take home. Then they'd sit on the porch swing and eat them, making sure to spit the seeds out over the railing. 

Taehyun doesn’t think he could stand to eat them now. It wouldn't be the same.

“I'm Kai.”

Taehyun looks over at the boy. Kai. 

“Taehyun.”

“That's a nice name.”

“It's pretty common.”

Kai giggles. “Well, it can still be nice,” he says, “even if it is common. Though you're the first Taehyun I've met, personally. I bet I'm the first Kai you've ever met too.”

“Yeah, you are,” Taehyun agrees, and he finds himself smiling despite the fact… despite the fact he shouldn't be. He shouldn't be smiling, because Taea is dead, but Kai's own smile is infectious. Taehyun starts laughing. Kai follows, giggles turning into wheezing as they both laugh at absolutely nothing. 

Taea would want Taehyun to laugh.

She always used to say he's too serious. Too cynical. Especially as he's gotten older. Taehyun doesn't think so - he is simply factual. He has no control over whether those facts are too cynical or not.

As their laughter dies down, Taehyun picks up one of the grapes, squishing it between his thumb and forefinger and watching as the juice stains his skin purple. Similar to the bruises around his wrist. Similar to the purple bow in her hair.

Taehyun looks in the direction he came from. He has to go back. He has to watch his sister, in that stupid box, be thrown into the dirt forever. He bites down on his lip to keep himself from bawling again. The taste of blood blooms on his tongue. Stupid canines. 

“I gotta go, Kai.”

Kai's smile falls. 

“Oh, okay. See you later.”

As Taehyun walks away, he turns around to wave goodbye one more time. Kai doesn't see. He's got the penguin squeezed tight in his arms, face buried into its fluff. Taehyun's chest aches. His steps falter. But eventually, he turns back around, and heads towards his sister's funeral.

No one asks about the wound on his forehead. Not a single person.

Taehyun doesn't believe in smartphones. Despite the majority of his peers receiving their first one by middle school, he's never had one. A rectangular piece of soul-sucking plastic, designed to feed off of the insecure, vulnerable minds of people his age. Along with social media. He can't think of anything worse. 

He was so disappointed when Taea got her first phone, and even more so when he walked in on her trying to learn some tiktok dance challenge. They're not even real dances. Just a bunch of hand gestures and hip swaying.

“Relax, Tyun. You should join me. Have fun.” 

“I would rather fucking die.”

“As someone who is in the process of dying, no you wouldn't.”

Despite her begging, she never could convince Taehyun to bite the bullet and ask their parents for a phone. Not for him to get social media, or to download any of the mindless app store games littered with microtransactions. But for them to have another method of communication. Especially during her final weeks, when she became nonverbal. 

And then Kai comes along.

One day, he simply says, “If you gave me your number we could coordinate our hangouts a bit better!”

It's been three weeks, and they've only been capable of meeting a handful of times because they can never seem to get the timing right. Taehyun has taken many walks to the creek - after school, and on Saturdays mostly - only to find Kai not there. Kai reports similar. 

The times they have managed to meet each other have been… fun, Taehyun supposes. Understanding exactly what fun is something he's always had difficulty with. Probably because his idea of fun is usually different from others. As a child, he thinks he found fun in activities like organizing the fridge or folding laundry. His mother certainly enjoyed him for it.

Kai always brings his lunchbox, usually consisting of sandwiches and fruit, sometimes cookies or potato chips, and his penguin. Lily, he calls her. 

“My dad got her for me from the gift shop at the zoo,” he told Taehyun. “She's my best friend.”

Taehyun struggles to understand how an inanimate object can evoke companionship. Usually, he would say something like this out loud, but the way Kai looks at the toy with such genuine adoration makes Taehyun hold his tongue. Maybe he doesn't have to understand. If it makes sense to Kai, then that's all that matters.

“Taehyun-ah?”

Taehun blinks. Oh, he'd completely forgotten to answer Kai.

“I don't have a phone.”

“Oh, okay.”

Kai looks away, towards the creek. Taehyun follows his gaze, but he doesn't see anything other than the slight movement of fish and the ripples in the water as the wind blows. Summer is almost here. 

“You really don't?” Kai asks, quietly. “You promise?”

“No?” Taehyun responds, frankly confused as hell as to why Kai is responding like this. “Why am I promising?”

Kai grabs Lily, hugging her to his chest.

“I was just making sure! I don't know if - if maybe you just told me that so you wouldn't have to give me your number. Which is fine! I'm just being stupid, that's all. I'm so silly sometimes. I'm working on it. I'm trying not to be so silly…”

Kai smacks a palm against his forehead. Once, twice, then a third time.

Taehyun frowns. “Don't do that, you'll hurt yourself.”

“Oh, you're right. Sorry.”

But Kai only does it again and again. Taehyun grabs Kai's wrist - very gently, nothing like how his father had grasped his own - and pulls his arm down. He can't stand seeing Kai upset like this. Especially because he feels like it's his fault.

“I'm gonna get a phone, and you'll be the only person to have my number,” Taehyun assures, “and we can text each other, but I'm not downloading tiktok.”

“I don't have tiktok either.”

“Good.”

Kai's smile is almost as blinding as his hair that glows in the sunlight. His roots are coming in.

Taehyun is about to voice this when he's knocked over by a sudden force - that force being a gleeful Kai tackling him to the ground. Taehyun is older by six months, but Kai is bigger, and his frame easily swallows Taehyun's. It reminds Taehyun of when a predator pounces on their unassuming little prey in those nature documentaries. His mother enjoys watching those even though they make her cry.

Taehyun isn't sure why that's the comparison his mind goes to. Or why it makes his stomach feel a bit fuzzy.

Usually, Taehyun hates summer. He enjoys the structure that school gives and having a set routine. Doing pretty much the same thing everyday brings him comfort. During summer, waking up and having the freedom to do anything he'd like is too… daunting. He hates having to find things to occupy himself with. That, and he dislikes how much time he spends at home, having to be in his parents’ company.

It was easier when Taea was here. She would often help keep him busy, though sometimes, she'd be off doing her own thing with her friends.

Taehyun has gotten a few summer jobs before, and that helped the most. Employers loved him because he was willing to work whenever they wanted him to.

This summer is different. He has Kai.

As much as Taehyun hates to admit it, it turns out having a phone and being able to keep up with each other is helpful. They can plan their hangouts with ease, and still text in between. Taehyun even downloads one of the games Kai likes to play. Only because Kai promised him there weren't many microtransactions. It turns out to be… fun.

They spend nearly every day by the creek.

Kai shows Taehyun more games on his handheld console. They wade through the water and splash each other. They go pick the muscadines off the vine. Picking them without Taea doesn't bring Taehyun as much sadness as he thought it would. Instead, he laughs as Kai's face pinches up after he tries his very first one.

“I don't think I like these.”

“More for me then.”

They sit on the edge of the bank and soak their feet in the water, the little minnows swimming around their toes, as Taehyun eats his muscadines and Kai plays his game. Lily sits in between them.

It's one Saturday morning when Taehyun heads to the creek. He's lathered himself in sunscreen and has brought the bottle along so Kai can put some on too. He claimed they didn't have any back at his house. Sun protection is too important to skip. Especially when one spends as much time outside as they do.

Through the trees, there's a barely visible path now from the amount of times he's walked the same route to their spot. Taehyun follows it.

Kai isn't here yet. It's odd, because he usually is. He likes to get here early so he can set the blanket up.

Taehyun sits on the bank. 

He waits.

He keeps checking his phone for the time. Kai is ten minutes, then twenty minutes, then thirty minutes late.

Taehyun tugs on the grass, ripping the blades out of the soil. He's trying to ignore himself. The way his chest is tightening, and his stomach is hurting, and how his mind is buzzing. Racecar thoughts. That's what he and Taea used to call them, whenever he would think too fast.

Where are you?

Taehyun sends the text and waits for the little checkmark to pop up and let him know Kai has looked at it. Kai always reads his texts instantaneously, because he's always at home and he's rarely doing anything special. That's what Kai himself told him.

Several minutes pass, and Kai still hasn't read it. 

“Slam the brakes,” Taea used to say. “Slam the brakes, and take a breath.”

But she's not here anymore. She's fucking dead.

What if Kai is dead too, and that's why he's not here or answering Taehyun's message?

Kai is dead. Kai is dead. Taehyun shakes his head. No, no, he can't be. Kai is too… Kai is too young, and he's too perfect, and he's too nice, and he's too happy to die. 

Taehyun had thought the same about his sister, too.

Answer me, Kai

Are you ignoring me?

Are you dead? 

It's been an entire hour. The ground around Taehyun is almost bare now from the amount of grass he's pulled at, throwing the handfuls into the creek. He decides to leave. He's done enough waiting around. Taehyun can't stand the thought of staying another minute. Kai is dead.

Taehyun's face is so warm. So wet. He can barely see as he makes his way out the woods and across the street, back towards where his neighborhood is. There's the squealing of tires and a blowing horn - he didn't even see that car, had walked right out in front of it, but why should he care? Let them hit him. Let his brains paint the asphalt, let every bone in his body shatter. He'd have to be scraped up like a bug off a windshield. A stain would remain until the rain eventually washed it away. Everyone who drove this street would have to see it.

“Honey, what's wrong?”

His mother is in her chair, shitty daytime television playing as she does a crossword puzzle. Taehyun goes straight to his room.

He checks his phone one more time. Nothing.

Taehyun is mature. He's cool. He's composed. He wants to go into the bathroom and bash his head into the porcelain sink, but instead, he climbs into bed, sticks his head inside his pillowcase, and screams.

taehyun please don't be mad

i’m okay

please forgive me i'm sorry

Taehyun doesn't actually see the texts until three days later. He turned his phone off and shoved it underneath his mattress to prevent himself from checking it every other minute. He knew phones are evil. He fucking knew it.

Hiding his phone doesn't stop him from thinking about Kai every waking moment, though. 

All Taehyun can do is picture Kai in the most horrendous of scenarios. Like he does with himself, except he doesn't gain pleasure from doing it with Kai. Kai doesn't deserve to die, period, but especially in a gruesome fashion. Gutted and left to hang by a serial killer. Burned alive in a house fire. Beheaded in a freak car accident. Taehyun walks to the funeral parlor and asks if they will be burying a Kai anytime soon, and he's told they're not allowed to give out that kind of information.

He doesn't even know Kai's last name. Doesn't know his parents, or where he lives. Just Kai.

When Taehyun eventually gathers the courage to open his phone, he's met with those texts and about twenty more, begging for his forgiveness.

And then suddenly, everything is okay. Because Kai is alive. 

A euphoric wave crashes over Taehyun, relief coursing through every vein and blood vessel as he quickly types out a response to Kai - who is very much alive. And not dead.

They meet again that afternoon.

When Taehyun steps into their usual spot, and sees Kai standing there, hands clutching Lily, he can't help but to run towards him. He crashes into him and they tumble onto the ground - but Taehyun makes sure to have a protective hand guarding Kai's head before they make impact.

“I missed you.”

Taehyun doesn't know where the words come from. They don't sound like something he'd say. 

Typically, to Taehyun's knowledge, when you tell someone you miss them, they're supposed to return the words. But all Kai does is blink up at him. “Sorry,” he apologizes. “I wasn't feeling well.”

“Were you sick?”

“Not exactly.”

Taehyun sits up. His chest feels funny as he looks down at Kai. Almost as if he's going into cardiac arrest. If he was to keel over and die right now, at least he'd be going happy, which is something he never thought would be possible.

Kai's roots are only getting worse. He needs to either bleach his hair again, or go back to natural. Taehyun loves the way his pale hair glows, but he also wouldn't mind seeing his natural color for the first time. Taehyun reaches out to brush a few of the stray strands from Kai's eyes, but Kai leans away.

“It's alright,” he says, softly, shaking his head. It only causes more strands to fall into his face.

Taehyun ignores the hurt that erupts in him at the rejection. “Where's your lunch?”

“At home,” Kai answers. “I was kinda wondering…if we could hang out at my house.”

“Your house?”

Kai nods. “If you want to.”

Kai ends up living a lot further than Taehyun is expecting. They cross the railroad tracks to the other side of town, venturing into a neighborhood that Taehyun's father likes to describe as rough. 

All of the houses down here are decades old with chipped paint and rusted mailboxes. Kids run barefoot in the yard. Malnourished dogs bark on chains. They walk past a basketball court overgrown with weeds, though some teens their age are still playing a game despite the foliage. They pause and watch as they go by.

Taehyun stares back. He recognizes a few of them. 

“Hey, Kai,” one calls. “Who's that?”

Yeonjun. He graduated a couple years ago. 

“My friend, Taehyun.”

“Ah, okay.”

They go back to playing. Kai smiles and says to Taehyun, “Yeonjun's my neighbor.”

“Why was he being nosy?”

“He just checks on me. That's all.”

Eventually, they come up on a row of trailers. Kai's is the second one. Painted orange with a front porch, an artificial wreath hanging on the door, its ribbon faded from the sun. Otherwise, there's not much going on outside. 

Inside, it's cluttered. It's almost like an organized sort of chaos. Pictures littering the walls, shelves full of different knick knacks and such. Two mismatched couches and an armchair with stuffing falling out of it. A grey faced cat lays curled up in the chair. It blinks sleepily when Kai runs his fingers along its head as they pass by it.

The vinyl flooring is peeling, and it creaks as they walk across it, so badly Taehyun fears they'll fall right through. As they walk through the kitchen to get to Kai's bedroom, Taehyun notices the cabinets have no doors.

Taehyun never would have imagined that this is the kind of place that Kai lives in. He supposes it's not bad. It's just not what he expected.

But Kai's bedroom does feel a lot more like him. He has a mountain of plush toys stacked in the corner next to his bed. He has posters of his favorite cartoons - or, anime, as he insists on calling them, though Taehyun doesn't see how they're any different than cartoons - hanging on his wall. He has a desk with a fairly nice computer, one with rainbow keyboard lights. 

Sitting on the desk, a framed picture of three children captures Taehyun's eye. He picks it up.

The little boy in the center is obviously Kai. There's an older girl to his left, a younger one to his right, and they all look near identical.

“My sisters,” Kai says, smiling at the photo with a heart shaped grin. “They're visiting our dad in Chicago for the summer.”

“Why didn't you?”

“Well…it's just, it's just how it is,” he stammers. His hand begins to move in an odd motion, flicking his fingers against each other as he rambles. “I see him at Christmas. Sometimes I do visit during the summer too! Not this summer, though. But he sends me money all the time, and he paid for my computer. He's the best.”

Kai tries to laugh, but it dies out quickly. He takes the picture out of Taehyun's hands and lays it face down on the desk.

“Wanna watch TV? I can microwave popcorn perfectly. Every kernel pops.”

Taehyun blinks. He has so many questions he could ask. But he doesn't like the way Kai's face is distorted, his smile more like a thinly veiled grimace, his eyes shaking as they look down at Taehyun.

So all he says is, “Sure. We can watch TV.”

Taehyun misses the creek. The walk to Kai's house is so long, his feet are always burning by the time he arrives. He does know how to drive, and once he considers asking his mother for her car, but he quickly decides against it. He's not afraid of her answer. She would say yes. He just finds it difficult to talk to either of his parents unless it's absolutely necessary.

Before her health got too bad, Taea would take them on car rides. They'd head out into the country and drive down the dirt roads. Nothing but trees and fields on either side, pitch black at night due to the lack of humans and buildings. The stars shine exceptionally bright out there, though. She would get scared sometimes. Not Taehyun. He enjoyed the nothingness.

“It's like the perfect place for someone to hide a body,” she shuddered.

It made Taehyun smile. If he was to be murdered, and his corpse thrown out here for no one to find, would that really be so bad? His whereabouts would remain a mystery. Lost until the end of time. Either that, or his sun-bleached bones and scattered clothing would be discovered decades later.

Maybe he could take Kai on a drive. He could just grab the keys from his mother's purse and take off.

Hanging out at Kai's house isn't too bad. As long as they stay in his bedroom. It's easily the nicest room in the place.

They spend a lot of time on the computer, or in bed watching television. They watch a few of Kai's favorite animes, and Taehyun has to admit, he enjoys them more than what he thought he would. They are different from cartoons. 

Kai gives him a tour of his binder full of Pokémon cards, and names each and every one of the fifty-seven plush toys he has. Taehyun hopes he doesn't expect him to remember them all.

He shows him games on his handheld console, which he'd try before when they were meeting up at the creek, but Taehyun didn't show much interest.

“What's the goal?” Taehyun asks after Kai has gone on a fifteen minute monologue about some farming simulation game.

“You can kinda make your own goal,” Kai explains. “Like you can focus on your farm, or go in the mines, find someone to marry… I'm working on restoring the community center.”

Taehyun finds a game without a clearly set goal to be absolutely pointless. Kai shoves the console in his hands.

“I started a new save file so you can try it out!”

Taehyun bites his tongue. Kai's eyes are too sparkly to say no to. 

They lay back against the abundance of pillows on his bed. Kai scoots close, tucked against Taehyun's side, but Taehyun isn't expecting it when Kai lays his head against his shoulder. Taehyun's breath hitches. His chest feels constricted. His stomach tingles. But it all feels…pleasant. Warm. Taehyun doesn't mind these sensations, despite the fact he doesn't understand why they're occurring.

Kai helps him out for a while. Teaches him how to use the controls and gives him pieces of advice here and there. 

Surprisingly, it's fun.

Taehyun gets lost in the game. He didn't expect to enjoy the farming aspect as much as he does. There's satisfaction in watering the crops each day and watching them grow. Even better once they're ready to harvest and sell.

Kai's gone quiet. He's asleep. Taehyun can feel his breathing, steady and even, tickling the side of his neck. His arm is thrown across Taehyun's chest. It's a bit uncomfortable, but Taehyun can't bring himself to move.

Taehyun looks over at Kai, as best as he can in his position. He looks serene. He looks like an angel. Just as he did that very first day, when he saved Taehyun's life.

That's what he did. He saved Taehyun.

Taehyun's chest aches. It hurts.

He pauses the game and sets the console aside. At the movement, Kai stirs, but he doesn't wake. He just presses himself closer, somehow, nuzzling his face into Taehyun's neck. He lets out a little hum. Taehyun's pulse is racing, blood rushing through his ears. They are as close as they can possibly get - in this position, anyway - yet something in Taehyun's mind is craving more. All of him wants all of Kai.

His head is spinning. He doesn't understand.

All he knows is that when he lays his hand on top of Kai's, the one that's currently splayed across Taehyun's chest, it feels right. Like this is how life is supposed to be. Taehyun could lay here for an eternity and not feel the need to get up. Not as long as he has Kai right next to him.

Then the door opens.

Taehyun has never met Kai's mother before, because she's always gone. She works a lot - that's what Kai said.

She stands in the doorway now. She's small. Not like Kai at all. He must get his height from his father. Her hair is so long it brushes her bottom. It would be pretty, if only it wasn't so thin. Her lipstick is bright red and the foundation on her face doesn't match the skin tone on her neck. Her eyes narrow as they rake over Taehyun.

Taehyun freezes. Somehow, the tiny woman manages to evoke more fear in him than his father does. He feels like he's done something wrong, though he doesn't understand exactly what that could be.

Kai wakes. Taehyun can feel his eyelashes fluttering against his neck. 

He sits up with a gasp. Taehyun could cry at the loss of contact. “Mom?” 

Immediately, her gaze softens, her lips twitching into the slightest of smiles.

“Just checking on you.”

“Yeah, we're playing video games!” Kai squeaks. “Just video games. That's it.”

“Okay, that's fine, baby. Have fun. I'll leave you two some pizza money on the kitchen counter, okay?”

Both Kai and Taehyun nod. Some of the fear Taehyun was just feeling a moment ago has dissipated. She seems… nice. The real kind of nice, not glaringly fake like his own mother - whose tone always carries a tinge of sarcasm no matter what she says.

Kai's mother shuts the door, leaving the two of them once again.

“We should - we should watch TV,” Kai mumbles, reaching over to his bedside table for the remote control. “I don't wanna fall asleep again.”

“Okay.”

Taehyun tries to mask his disappointment. He wouldn't mind if they did curl up together, in a more comfortable position, and take a nap. He wants that warmth again. 

He wants it so badly. 

Taea loved thrifting. She often dragged Taehyun along, as it is the only kind of shopping he doesn't mind doing. He finds modern shopping culture to be a wasteful indulgence. Most of the things people buy are unnecessary. He likes the recycling aspect of thrifting - though sometimes,he struggles to understand why on earth anyone would want some of the items that's for sale.

Taea would buy what she often called trinkets. Little ceramic figures of cats or frogs, carved wooden boxes, various pieces of broken jewelry. To do nothing with but to collect and display. 

Taehyun sometimes bought clothing or shoes, if there were any that he liked and were in his size, which he thinks are much more practical purchases. 

She'd thrifted him a little palm-sized garden gnome for his seventeenth birthday this year. 

“I know you'll think it's stupid,” she said, “but there was something about it that made me think of you.”

It still sits on Taehyun's windowsill.

Kai, however, looks at the plush toys. There's a shelf of them sandwiched between a rack of children's shoes and a bin of fifty cent pairs of socks. Taehyun's never been in this section before. Taea wasn't into plush toys.

“It's so cute.” Kai picks up a doll, crocheted by hand, wearing pigtails and a long dress. “Lily might get jealous if I bring another girl around, though.”

He giggles at his little joke. Taehyun looks down at Lily, who Kai is making him hold as he looks through the shelf. Her lifeless eyes made of little black beads stare back at him.

“Lily is an inanimate object and can't feel jealousy, Kai.”

“I know, but…” Kai sighs. “No, you're right. I might get the doll, but should I also get this dragon as well? It's so cool. There's a stain on its tail, but maybe I can get it off if I soak it in the tub for a while…or maybe I can get this little doggy, it's pretty cute…”

The sound of someone calling Taehyun's name interrupts his rambling.

They both turn around to look. Taehyun blinks in surprise when he realizes it's Beomgyu, who waves at him enthusiastically.

Beomgyu is the only other person Taehyun considered a friend at one point. They ate lunch together at school and shared a seat on the bus. Then during Beomgyu's freshman year, he grew his hair out. Dyed blonde streaks into it. Started wearing makeup. He got a new set of friends. He's never been mean to Taehyun, but he's never made a point to be friends again, either.

In Beomgyu's other hand, the one that's not waving, he clutches the hand of Soobin. His boyfriend. 

“That boy needs to be in church,” Taehyun's mother had said about Beomgyu once. “I knew there was a reason I didn't like you hanging out with him, honey.”

The two of them graduated this year. Taehyun is surprised to see them - or Beomgyu at least, because he was under the impression Beomgyu was going to be moving away now that he's of age.

Beomgyu bounds over to him, dragging Soobin along.

“Taehyun-ah!” he greets. “Nice to see you again.”

“Yes.”

“I'm really sorry about Taea.”

“It's alright.”

“I would have come to the funeral, but I wasn't in town.” Beomgyu reaches out, briefly brushes his fingers along Taehyun's shoulder. “Sorry.”

“It's okay.”

One night, on one of their drives down a dirt road, Taehyun asked her, “What do you think about Beomgyu liking a boy?”

Taehyun's throat goes dry at the memory. Why had he asked her that? He remembers looking out the window as he asked, too shy to meet her eyes, though it was too pitch black to see anyway.

“People like who they like,” she answered. “What do you think? You're not bigoted, are you?”

Taehyun sneered. “No.” He really wasn't. He didn't care. 

“Who's this, Tyun?”

Beomgyu gestures towards Kai, who presses himself shyly against Taehyun's side, fingers fidgeting with the hem of the flannel Taehyun is wearing.

“Kai,” Taehyun responds. “My friend.”

Soobin grins and points at Kai. “Hey, I really like your shirt.”

Kai beams, his eyes brightening as he looks down at himself. “Oh, thanks. Isn't Gojo the coolest ever?”

Beomgyu scoffs, rolling his eyes. “Nerds.”

Kai immediately deflates, pulling his bottom lip between his teeth as he looks toward the ground. Taehyun knows Beomgyu is being playful - that's just how he is. He doesn't mean to be malicious. But seeing Kai's reaction triggers something in Taehyun, and suddenly, he's seized by a flash of anger.

“No, he's right,” he snaps, taking a step forward in order to shield Kai away. “Gojo is the coolest ever.”

Beomgyu blinks. “You watch that stuff now?”

“Yeah, I love it. They're more than just cartoons. They're animated works of art that only an elite few will understand. Kai happens to be one of them.” Taehyun puffs his chest. “His hyperfixation on anime is just one of many reasons why he is a superior human being.”

There's a long, silent pause.

Beomgyu scratches the back of his neck. Soobin's mouth twitches as if he's holding back a smile.

“Okay,” Beomgyu finally speaks. “Well, it was nice to meet you, Kai. We'll catch you guys later, then.”

Taehyun watches as the two of them leave. Beomgyu leans in and whispers something into Soobin's ear, but Taehyun can't hear what's said. He hates that it bothers him. He almost calls for them to come back, for Beomgyu to say whatever it is to his face instead, but he stops himself. It's not really worth it.

“Taehyun,” Kai says, tugging on his sleeve. “That was really sweet of you. You really meant everything you said?”

“Yeah, why wouldn't I?”

Kai shrugs. He looks down at the doll he still holds, smoothing a hand down her dress. It's purple.

“I…”

Kai trails off. Taehyun waits patiently, but he doesn't finish his sentence. He just turns back towards the shelf and places the doll back in her original spot.

“Kai?” Taehyun prompts.

Kai shakes his head.

Quite suddenly, he pushes past Taehyun and sprints down the aisle, tumbling over his own feet as he does, and disappears out of sight. The jingling of the bell that hangs on the door to the shop follows, signaling Kai's exit. Taehyun is quick to follow.

He's confused. He's so confused. Upsetting Kai is something Taehyun would never do intentionally. He runs the words he said through his mind several times, trying to find what he said wrong, but there's nothing that jumps out to him - and Kai himself just called him sweet. 

Taehyun has never been called sweet before.

Maybe Beomgyu upset Kai more than Taehyun had realized. Taehyun would hate to, but if he has to fight Beomgyu - he will. He could probably take down his boyfriend too, despite his freakish height. Taehyun took boxing lessons in middle school.

He finds Kai outside. He's stood in front of the shop, arm thrown over his eyes and teeth gritted as his breathing comes out in frantic huffs. 

Taehyun is immediately thrown into a panic of his own. “Kai, what's wrong?” 

He reaches a hand out, but he doesn't quite make it to Kai's shoulder. Instead, it just uselessly shakes in midair. 

Kai shudders. His eyes are red and wet when he pulls his arm away.

“No-thing,” he hiccups, trying his best to keep his tears at bay. “Nothing. I'm just being silly, that's it.”

He smacks his palm against his cheek, then his forehead, as he did that day at the creek. 

“Stop.” Taehyun's own palm is sweating as he grabs Kai's arm, maybe a bit harsher than he intends to, but he can't stand it. He can't stomach standing here and watching Kai hurt himself. 

“Let go of me,” Kai demands.

“Promise you'll stop then.”

“Fucking now.”

He yanks his arm away, and Taehyun is so stunned by the tone of Kai's voice he just lets him. He has never heard Kai swear or speak in such a hateful way. 

That's what it feels like right now. Like he hates Taehyun. Just like how everyone else does. 

The thought immediately has him spiraling. 

“I'm sorry, Kai,” he says, despite not knowing what it is he's apologizing for. It doesn't matter. He just doesn't want Kai to hate him. “You can hit me instead.”

Kai chokes, eyes growing wide and hands clenching into fists. For a moment, Taehyun really thinks Kai is going to hit him - sucker punch him between the eyes, break his nose and bruise his face up real good. Taehyun welcomes it. 

But Kai only shakes his head. 

“I have to go,” he mumbles.

And so he leaves. And Taehyun lets him.

sorry taehyun

just stay at home ok?

i dont feel well

When Taehyun gets the texts that night, he chucks his phone at the wall. The screen splinters, forming a web of cracked glass, but it remains lit. He leaves it laying on the floor.

A moment later, there's a quiet knock at his bedroom door.

“Taehyun, are you alright in there?” His mother calls. Taehyun doesn't answer. She doesn't persist. He hears the clacking of her heels as she walks away. 

He could be laying dead, and she wouldn't know. She wouldn't care.

The graveyard Taea is buried is nestled on a dead-end street, accompanied by a little holiness church. Once, when the two of them were very small, Taehyun remembers attending vacation Bible school there. They painted and decorated hollowed out gourds and took them home to be birdfeeders. 

The plot their parents purchased is in the far back corner. Despite Taehyun only coming here once, he finds it easily.

The three person headstone is made of shiny black granite, slanting up towards the sky. Her name is engraved in the middle. Their parents’ are on either side. The only difference being their death dates are incomplete - and Taehyun wonders how long for. How long will they be on this side of the Earth, how long will they outlive their daughter?

“Honey, we didn't include you because you'll grow up to marry and have a family of your own,” his mother explained, though Taehyun hadn't asked. 

How did they know that, though? They couldn't be certain their son would live a long, healthy life or do any of the shit she was talking about. Their daughter hadn't. 

Taehyun could die. 

He doesn't care, though. He's still gungho on being tossed into the woods. He also thinks being thrown into the sea wouldn't be too bad, either. His horribly bloated, disfigured body could wash up on a shore miles away and ruin someone's entire life.

The thought of him prematurely dying and his parents being forced to buy a separate headstone for him is funny. People roaming the place would stop and stare, blinking in confusion when they notice the lone son. 

His parents approach at a more leisurely pace. It had been insisted - by Taehyun's mother, mostly - that they come out here as a family. She holds a bouquet of artificial flowers in one hand. With the other, she points at various plots and calls out people she used to know. Mostly old people from church. His father grunts in response. He's clearly disinterested, yet she keeps talking.

“Move, son, the ground still hasn't settled yet. Have you lost your damn mind?”

The grass is still very much patchy, sprigs of greenery peeking through here and there, but it seems stable enough. Taehyun steps back anyway.

His mother places the flowers in the built-in vase that sits in the middle of the headstone.

She sniffs. Her mascara is already running. “My little girl. We sure do miss you.”

“She was a good one,” his father agrees, though he doesn't cry. He never does.

“Say something to your sister, honey.”

The two of them look over at Taehyun expectedly. He shuffles on his feet, deeply uncomfortable at being put on the spot. Say what, exactly, and why? It's not like she's going to be able to hear it. It's not like it matters.

“I don't know.”

His father frowns. “Just anything. Something nice.”

His mother places a hand on Taehyun's arm. The skin underneath her touch seems to burn. “Say ‘I love you’, honey.”

Taehyun doesn't think they ever said anything like that to each other even when Taea was alive. She would have wrinkled her nose and gagged. Either that, or press her palm to his forehead to make sure he wasn't suffering from fever induced delirium. Of course, that doesn't mean they didn't love each other. It just didn't really have to be said. 

There's even less reason to say it now that she's dead. She can't hear him.

They're taking his silence as defiance. His father's face grows red, the color on his plump cheeks causing him to resemble a tomato. His mother's eyes continue to water. Mascara runs down her face in black streaks. Taehyun thinks they both look fucking stupid. He questions how these two people created someone as good as his sister.

He doesn't ask the same about himself. It makes sense that he is a product of the couple standing in front of him. He's just as rotten as they are. Spoiled to the core.

Later on, curled up in the comfort of his own bed, Taehyun listens as they speak.

“I don't know where we went wrong with him.”

There's a brief pause. Taehyun pictures his mother taking a puff from her cigarette. He knows his father is pacing. He can hear the heavy thud of his boots with every step. “I don't think it's our fault, love. He's always been an odd one. Maybe if we take him to church more -”

“No, no. I won't have him embarrassing me.”

“Okay, it was just a suggestion,” his mother sighs. “Though they all already saw his ways at the funeral.”

“A real shame he is.”

Taehyun tunes them out after that. He stares at his phone, still laying on the floor, and considers picking it up. 

Instead, he gets out of bed. He leaves his bedroom as quietly as he can manage, drifting down the hallway like a ghost. 

Taehyun doesn't believe in ghosts, because he doesn't believe in souls. A person does not come from a soul - they come from the brain. Once your mind is gone, so is the person. This is a fact. A fact he had a particularly hard time accepting when it became evident that Taea was dying. She liked to joke about haunting him.

Taehyun does not have to be dead to haunt people. He's already a ghost in life. That's how it's always been. Silently hovering around other people - people who either never acknowledge his existence, or treat him like an anomaly once they do notice him. 

In elementary school, he was once left behind in his classroom while everyone went out for recess. When they returned, his teacher exclaimed, “Oh, I'm so sorry, Taehyun! I forgot you were there.”

“It's okay.” His little wobbly voice is still fresh in his mind. He had been frightened sitting in a dark classroom all alone. 

The doorknob to Taea's bedroom creaks as Taehyun turns it, but thankfully, his parents don't seem to hear.

He slips in. It's the first time he's been in her room since her death, and everything is exactly as she left it. Her dirty laundry still in a small pile by her wall mirror, her vanity table filled with nail polishes and eyeshadow palettes. Her purple floral bedsheets and her mushroom shaped lamp.

Two weeks before her final hospitalization, Taehyun walked in on her crying.

“You have to learn how to knock,” she snapped at him.

The hurt must have shown on Taehyun's face. She only hugged him as she cried harder. Tentatively, Taehyun managed to pat her back in what he hoped was a comforting way. He had been taller than her for two years now, ever since his growth spurt during his freshman year.

“You have to learn,” she eventually said, “how to live without me, Tyun. I'm sorry.”

“It's okay,” he whispered.

Though it really wasn't, and never has been.

It takes four days, but Taehyun gathers enough guts to pick his phone off of the floor. It's dead. When he plugs it in to charge, he's not surprised to see that he has no new notifications or messages. 

Kai hates him just like everyone else does. It's whatever. 

Taehyun has dissected every second of what happened at the thrift shop, and he still cannot make any sense of it. It's unnerving. Everything in life - from what people do and say, to events that unfold and take place - has an explanation. Nothing happens without motivation. Taehyun's conclusion that Kai hates him is only a partial explanation. Now he's just trying to figure out why.

Taehyun is going a bit crazy. He can admit that. Sitting in bed for six hours straight and reliving what happened in a continuous loop isn't something a sane person would do.

While doing his laundry, Taehyun finds a slip of paper in one of his pants pockets. It's torn and soft around the edges now, the writing faded. 

Kai's phone number. Written all the way back when Taehyun first bought his phone.

What Taehyun could do - he could crawl inside the washing machine. Figure out how to start it somehow, let his lungs fill with soap or swallow a sock, let it suffocate him. His parents - no, his mother, because his father doesn't do laundry - would open the machine to a nasty surprise. 

That's a death that could make national news. Teenage boy drowns in washing machine. Most likely, his parents would become suspects because Taehyun actually being able to start the machine from the inside is an impossible feat. He wouldn't mind that. Their mugshots would be comedy.

Taehyun throws the paper away. Instead of dying, he takes a walk. 

It's Saturday. There's plenty of cars uptown, mostly parked in front of the few restaurants on Main Street. The overpriced boutique shops are already closed for the day. The seafood spot across the railroad tracks is especially busy, and Taehyun can smell the grease in the air even from where he's standing on the other end of the street. It's been a while since he had fried fish.

The diner right where Taehyun is standing is bustling too, but it usually is. It's one of the last places remaining where you can get a hot dog for less than two bucks. 

Taehyun sits down on the bench outside the diner and just observes. His stomach rumbles, but he'd rather die than actually go into one of these establishments.

Kai had wanted to go in and eat burgers one time, but Taehyun told him no. They placed a to go order instead and ate in the basketball court by his house. Maybe that's why Kai hates him.

A group of people spills out of the building. Fellow teenagers, and Taehyun recognizes almost all of them. He shrinks back, though there's no need. Ghosts usually aren't visible. They walk by him, laughing and chatting amongst themselves. One guy tosses his drink onto the pavement. The lid pops open and liquid splashes onto Taehyun's shoes.

“Tyun?”

Taehyun looks up, blinking as he comes face to face with none other than Beomgyu. 

He's wearing green eyeshadow that glitters underneath the lights of the lampposts that line the street. He has an oversized sports jacket draped over his shoulders - Soobin's, it must be. Beomgyu doesn't play sports. 

“I'm glad I could run into you again before I left town,” Beomgyu says. He gestures towards the diner. “Are you going in?”

Taehyun shakes his head.

Beomgyu bites down on his bottom lip, swaying back and forth on his feet. “Well, I just… I wanted to apologize. I didn't intend to upset you or your friend. I call Soobin a nerd all the time. I wasn't being mean, I promise.”

“I know.” 

“So we're cool?”

Taehyun shrugs. He looks down. Whatever the liquid in that cup was, it was sticky. He's gonna have to wipe his shoes down really well when he gets home. 

He expects Beomgyu to be deterred by his lack of response, to walk away and leave him alone, but instead, Beomgyu sits down next to him.

His fingers brush against Taehyun's. “I know why you got defensive.”

Taehyun blinks. “Because I'm not letting anyone be rude to Kai,” he states. Even if Kai hates him now - and his chest tightens painfully at the reminder - Taehyun would make sure no one bothers him. No one.

Beomgyu smiles. “Why is that?” he asks. “Tyun, I'm just saying - I think you really like him.”

Taehyun sucks in a breath, his entire body going rigid as he allows the words to sink in. He isn't stupid. He knows what Beomgyu is implying.

“No, I do not,” he hisses, jerking his hand away from Beomgyu's touch. “Don't say that.”

“It isn't a bad thing.”

“I didn't say it was.”

“Then why are you denying it?”

“Because he hates me,” Taehyun snaps.

The mugginess of the warm, summer night is suddenly all too suffocating. The light from the lampposts has gotten so much brighter, blinding Taehyun as he turns his head and tries to rapidly blink away the sudden moisture that's threatening to overflow. 

He doesn't know why he actually just said that out loud. 

Beomgyu scoffs. “No way. He was looking at you all starry eyed when you were jumping down my throat,” he says. “His knight in shining armor.”

“That's stupid,” Taehyun mumbles, trying to wipe his eyes as discreetly as he can manage. He'd be lying if he said Beomgyu's words don't intrigue him even just a little bit, though. 

Beomgyu's response is cut off by the diner door opening once again, Soobin stepping out with a grease stained paper bag. He gives Taehyun a smile - a polite one. One that doesn't quite reach his eyes.

Beomgyu stands, slipping his hand into Soobin's. Soobin has monster sized hands, Taehyun realizes, engulfing Beomgyu's own. Something looks very… safe about it. Soobin looking down at Beomgyu, giving him a genuine smile, dimples on full display. He presses his shoulder against Beomgyu's. 

Quite suddenly, Beomgyu shoots up on his tiptoes, planting a kiss against Soobin's mouth. 

He isn't expecting it, the little surprised noise he lets out smothered by Beomgyu's lips on his, but he quickly sinks into it. 

Taehyun gulps. He should look away.

He doesn't. No matter how hard he tries, he can't stop looking. Can't stop taking in every little detail. The way their noses knock together, how Beomgyu brings a hand up to cup Soobin's neck, the pleased hum Soobin emits when Beomgyu's tongue pushes past his lips.

When they pull apart, Soobin looks down at Beomgyu with flushed cheeks and a soft smile. 

“What was that for?” he asks.

Beomgyu shrugs. “Just because I'm happy to have you.”

“O-oh.” Soobin couldn't turn any redder. 

That night in the car, after he'd asked Taea what she thought about Beomgyu liking boys, she questioned him in return. “Why did you ask?”

Taehyun shrugged. He kept his eyes glued to the window. They were passing a wide open field then, and he could see the illuminated eyes of a herd of deer out in the distance. They seemed to stare right back at him.

“I know you hate sappy shit,” she said, “so I'll just say this once, and we can move on… but I want you to know that you can tell me anything.”

“Okay.”

Swallowing back the lump in his throat, Taehyun jumps up off the bench and leaves, ignoring Beomgyu as he yells, “Good luck!”

Walking through Kai's neighborhood in the dark is a bit intimidating, Taehyun will admit. 

It's much quieter at night. Every now and then, a dog chained in someone's yard may jump up at the sight of him and bark maniacally, but it settles as soon as he passes by. The only human Taehyun sees is an elderly woman sitting on her front porch, a mason jar of iced tea in her hands as she rocks. Her eyes narrow as he walks by. Taehyun looks the other way.

Kai's trailer is almost completely dark. The only light spills out of his bedroom window. 

There is a brief wave of anger that courses through Taehyun. Kai is here. Here, living as he usually does, without Taehyun. Without speaking to him. Without seeing him. Like Taehyun doesn't mean anything at all to him.

And maybe he doesn't. 

Maybe Taehyun should just turn around and go home. Finish smashing his phone into bits. Never return to this side of town. Start his senior year in three weeks. Graduate school, and then… and then he doesn't know what the fuck he's going to do. 

But Taehyun continues to approach the trailer with careful, calculated steps. He walks up to Kai's bedroom and peers into the window on tiptoes - he can't see much at all through the closed blinds. He can't hear anything, either.

“You look like a weirdo, creeping around like that.”

With a gasp, Taehyun jolts, whipping his head around to see Yeonjun standing on the doorstep of the trailer next door - his own home, presumably. He holds a cigarette in hand. It dangles lazily in between his fingers. 

He chuckles. “Didn't mean to scare you.”

“Fuck you.”

Yeonjun only continues to cackle. It sounds too loud in the stillness of the neighborhood surrounding them. Stupidly, Taehyun feels the hairs on the back of his neck standing straight up. He shouldn't be as frightened as he is.

“Kai's inside,” Yeonjun supplies once he's finished laughing. “He's been in for days now. I've only caught his shadow through the window.”

Taehyun's chest burns. “Who's the creep now?”

“Fair point. I just try to keep an eye on him.”

That's what Kai said the day Taehyun visited his house for the first time - that Yeonjun likes to check on him. Taehyun hadn't asked for him to go into detail, and honestly, had completely forgotten about Yeonjun's existence until now. 

“Why?” Taehyun can't help but ask.

Yeonjun takes a long drag from his cigarette. The ashes fall to the ground, briefly emitting an orange glow in the grass before fading away into nothing.

“He's alone a lot,” he finally replies. “His mom works like, constantly. You know, he hung out with me quite a bit until you came along. I've barely seen him this summer.”

Yeonjun sighs. “I'm glad, though,” he mumbles so quietly that Taehyun can't be certain that the words are actually meant for him to hear. “Glad he has someone.”

Taehyun has many questions - countless, even - but he decides on asking, “What kind of moments?”

“He can get upset sometimes.”

“Why?” Taehyun asks yet again.

Yeonjun shrugs. “We all have our issues, don't we? Even the best of us,” he says. “He just hasn't been dealt the best cards. Don't tell him I said this, but his dad doesn't want him. He has a hard time accepting that though.”

One final puff of the cigarette. Yeonjun throws the butt onto the ground and stomps on it with a socked foot. 

“Later.” With a salute, he goes back inside.

Taehyun tries to digest Yeonjun's words, feeling even more confused than he had before. He never would have guessed Kai had such problems. His dad allegedly not wanting him is news to Taehyun - sure, Kai has only spoken about him once, but that one time was nothing but positive.

Why wouldn't his dad not want Kai? Taehyun doesn't understand.

He can see how his own father doesn't want him. Fundamentally, Taehyun is not right. He is not a son to be proud of. 

But Kai is different. Kai is joy personified, with all the love in the world to give, good in every sense of the word. No matter how he looks at it, Taehyun cannot see how someone could not want a son like Kai. Maybe even his own father would be much happier if he had him as a son.

Maybe Yeonjun has it all wrong. That has to be it. He doesn't know what he's talking about.

Taehyun stands there at the window for a good few minutes, uncertain on exactly what it is he wants to do or why he came here in the first place. He doesn't know how well Kai would take it if he was to just walk in unannounced.

He really, really doesn't want to upset him again. 

Thankfully, Taehyun is freed from having to make the decision on his own. 

Headlights flash, temporarily blinding him as a car pulls into the yard. A hand shoots up to shield his face, squinting as he watches Kai's mother get out of the passenger side before the car takes off once again. 

She must be getting off of work. Blue polo shirt with the name of a local grocery store printed on the chest, nametag askew and barely hanging on. 

She looks tired. Especially when she notices Taehyun, deep wrinkles forming across her forehead as she frowns.

“What are you doing?”

That's a good question. What is he doing?

When words fail him, Taehyun tries to smile at her instead, pulling his lips back and showing off all thirty-two of his teeth. Just so she knows he's not a threat.

“Are you here for Kai?”

Still smiling, Taehyun nods.

“Come on, then.”

Taehyun steps in behind her. The grey faced cat looks up at them from its spot in the armchair, ears perked up for just a second before it decides they're not worth its attention and lays its head back down again.

Taehyun hears it - the creak of a door swinging open from down the hallway. Hurrying footsteps, the sound of fingernails trailing along the wood panel wall with every step.

Kai appears. He freezes when he sees Taehyun.

Taehyun's jaw drops.

He has finally, finally dyed his hair. No longer is it the palest of blondes, no longer does he have the very obvious dark roots coming in. Kai's hair is a beautiful brown, matching his chocolate eyes. Warm is the first word that comes to Taehyun's mind. As much as the pale hair made him look angelic, Taehyun immediately knows he much prefers the warmth of this color. 

As stupid as it sounds, Taehyun feels as if this is the first time he's really seeing Kai. Maybe not all of him. Not yet. But definitely more than he had been before.

How can Taehyun adequately explain the feeling of the world melting away as they lock eyes with each other? It doesn't make sense how everything seems to cease to exist, how his entire being is reduced to just the two of them. There has to be some sort of scientific explanation - which, then again, maybe there isn't. Maybe what Taehyun is experiencing is pure paranormal. 

That's what it feels like.

For whatever reason, Kai may hate him, but instead of the thought filling Taehyun with soul crushing angst, he is instead hit with a newfound determination to fix whatever went wrong. 

Taehyun would do anything, say anything, mold himself into whatever Kai would like if it meant getting to stay by his side.

Taehyun swallows, his voice shaking as he compliments, “Your hair looks nice.” His feelings being reduced into four simple words, yet he hopes Kai is capable of hearing all that Taehyun is trying to say.

Kai reaches up to pat his own head.

“Thanks.”

His mouth twitches. Not quite a smile, but he seems okay. Much better than the last time they spoke.

“How about we order something to eat? Your friend can stay, baby.”

Taehyun is pulled out of their little bubble, glancing at Kai's mom, who he had completely forgotten had been standing there the entire time. 

He's already blushing, but especially when she gives him a little wink - the tips of his ears burn fiery hot. 

He looks away just as quickly, not wanting to read into whatever she's trying to say to him.

They don't talk about it. Not at first.

They go back to spending time together like they just didn't experience almost a week of no contact. Though, perhaps Kai is a little more reserved than he usually is. A bit more quiet, not as cheery and bright. His spirits have dulled. 

Taehyun hates it. He feels like it's his fault.

He's trying to be better, but it's just hard when he doesn't know exactly what it is that he did wrong. If only he knew, if only Kai would tell him, Taehyun would fix it. He would fix himself. Kai has yet to say anything though, and Taehyun is too afraid to ask. He's so elated over him and Kai speaking again, and he doesn't want to do anything to mess that up.

Taehyun makes an effort to cater towards Kai - something he thought he was doing pretty well before, but this time, he really puts his all into it. 

He asks plenty of questions while they're watching anime. Even if Taehyun already knows the answer, he asks Kai just to see the way his eyes light up at being given a chance to show off his knowledge. 

Taehyun also has Kai write down a list of all his stuffies and the next day, he comes back with all fifty seven memorized after staying up until two in the morning doing so. Kai is especially excited over this. He spends the next couple of hours going over each of their backstories. Taehyun listens attentively and makes sure to absorb as much of the information as possible.

And then, when they go on a walk uptown, intending on stopping at the corner store for ice cream sandwiches, Kai says, rubbing his stomach, “Let's get some burgers from the diner. I'm hungry!”

Taehyun nods. 

“Dine in?” he suggests. 

He would actually rather chew glass than sit down and eat in the restaurant, but the way Kai beams easily has Taehyun pushing his feelings aside.

At least, given it's mid afternoon on a Wednesday, the place isn't too crowded. The 80s rock music playing overhead is a bit too loud, but it's still better than being surrounded by tables full of chattering people. 

And Kai seems happy. He blows into his straw, creating bubbles on the surface of his Coke. 

Taehyun mimics him with his Sprite. They both dissolve into giggles.

Taehyun is getting that feeling again. The music is fading away, the people around them are turning into dust, and all that remains is him and Kai. Despite the fact that Taehyun still doesn't completely understand it, he's kinda growing to like it. Maybe this is how he wants the world to be. Just him and Kai.

“I missed you.”

Only Kai could draw these words from Taehyun. He has never understood the concept of missing someone - other than once Taea died, but that's entirely different - until meeting Kai. 

“Sorry,” Kai responds, looking down at his finger as he traces the grain of the wooden tabletop. 

It's not what Taehyun wants to hear. He wishes for Kai to express that he missed him too.

“It's okay.” 

The waitress sets their food down. The baskets of fries are steaming, burning Taehyun's fingertips as he picks one up and bites into it. He likes the pain that blooms across his tongue. The fry is good too. Not too heavily salted.

When Taehyun looks across the table at Kai, the last thing he expects to see is Kai's face buried into a napkin, shoulders shaking as he cries.

Taehyun's stomach drops. 

“Kai, what's wrong?” he asks. He's afraid to speak, afraid to move, doesn't want to push Kai into getting angry and storming away as he did that day at the thrift shop. 

What has he done wrong? Taehyun can't think of anything, nothing at all. Everything has been going perfectly fine. He's been doing so well. He's tried to keep Kai happy as best as he can, and it has been working - up until this moment.

Other than the sound of Kai's sniffling, it's quiet. Taehyun doesn't know what to do.

“Sorry,” Kai eventually mumbles through hiccuping. “I…”

He trails off, balling up the dirty napkin. He squeezes it tight in his hand, and Taehyun can see his fingernails digging into his palm. He knows it must be painful. Taehyun has to resist the urge to reach over and pry Kai's hand open. He does not want to upset him further.

“I missed you too.”

Taehyun's eyes widen. “You did?”

“I'm trying to be better,” Kai mumbles, wiping at his blotchy face. “I can be so stupid sometimes. I'm trying not to be, but it's hard.”

Taehyun nods like he understands what Kai is saying, but truthfully, he is completely lost. Why does Kai think he should be better? Kai is absolutely perfect just the way he is. Good and pure with a golden heart. Passionate about the things he loves. Open minded about the world and people around him.

Everything Taehyun wishes he could be, he's suddenly realizing.

Taea had a similar zest for life. Especially before getting sick. She always tried her hardest to get Taehyun to follow her lead - to laugh a little more, to find joy in the small things, to not be so cynical all the time. It never worked. 

“It's not gonna kill you to loosen up a bit,” she would tease.

She would have enjoyed Kai. She would have been thrilled Taehyun had a friend. 

“Taehyun?”

Taehyun blinks, pulling himself away from his thoughts. His lashes are a bit damp, he realizes. He hopes Kai pays no attention to it.

“Sometimes you're so quiet,” Kai says. “Sometimes I wish you would say more, just so I know what you're thinking. Like that day in the thrift store. Saying those nice things about me… I had no idea that's how you felt.”

“My mom says when a person doesn't speak, their eyes do. Their actions do. But it can be hard for me to understand body language,” he says, “so I asked her to read you for me.”

Like a deer in highlights, Taehyun is frozen, staring at Kai with wide eyes as Kai runs him over with each and every word he says. 

“She says you like me.”

The words are choked out, getting caught on the fresh tears Kai is starting to shed. 

Something else about his new hair is it makes him look so much younger. Despite the fact Taehyun is only six months older, he feels an intense urge to protect Kai, to shield him away from all the shit in this world. Spend the rest of his life taking care of Kai.

Devote every breath to him.

Taehyun doesn't want to be quiet, not when Kai has just laid himself bare, pretty much begging him to say something. 

It's far from cold in the diner, but Taehyun is shivering. 

Kai has a hand laid on the table. Slowly, Taehyun reaches over and takes it into his own. It's a foreign feeling. He's never held hands with anyone. Sometimes, as kids, his parents would make him and Taea hold hands while taking pictures. 

This is entirely different. As Taehyun's fingers close around Kai's, he feels something akin to a jolt of electricity, shooting up his arm and then down his spine, lighting up every single one of his nerves. Instead of killing him, it rejuvenates, filling him with a life he's never felt before.

He rubs his thumb across Kai's knuckles. 

“You must moisturize often,” Taehyun mumbles. “Your skin is as soft as cotton, as delicate as a butterfly's wing.”

Kai's breath hitches. His hand squeezes around Taehyun's.

“Oh, that's sweet.”

Taehyun smiles, and it's genuine. It doesn't feel like a mask he's slipping on to appease someone else. 

“Kai,” he says. His tongue is heavy, feeling too big for his mouth, his words slurring stupidly as he forces them out. He doesn't want to be quiet.

“I do like you. I love you.”

Kai's grip grows impossibly tight. Taehyun wonders if his fingers will break and his bones will crush, turn into nothing but mere powder. 

That would be okay. Taehyun would look at the injury and cherish the fact it came from Kai.

“I know you don't like me,” he says. “I don't know what I did wrong, but if you tell me, I will fix it. I will be whatever you want and do whatever you'd like. I want my existence to be centered around you, for us -”

Taehyun chokes on his words, letting out a noise of frustration. This is hard. This is impossible. Panicking, he tries to pick up where he dropped off at, but he can't seem to find his train of thought. 

Especially when he looks over at Kai. They lock eyes, and… all Taehyun wants to do is leap across the table and kiss him.  

“Taehyun, you're wrong,” Kai says, shaking his head. “I do like you. I like you so much it scares me. That's why I kept disappearing.”

“My mom,” Kai's voice breaks, thick with emotion, “says I shouldn't listen to my dad. He wants me to stop ‘fucking with’ boys. And I had. I was doing so well - until I met you. I know he's wrong, but sometimes, I start thinking too much.”

“So you haven't done anything wrong,” Kai sniffs, wiping at his eyes. “It's just me. I'm trying to get better.”

Taehyun nods, trying to digest everything Kai has just thrown at him. His head hurts from the abundance of information and the effort he's putting in to organize his thoughts. 

But some of Taehyun's questions are being answered. The puzzle pieces are falling into place.

That day at the thrift shop - he really did nothing wrong. Though relieved, it doesn't make him feel any better. Taehyun hates the fact that Kai was suffering alone, that he felt the need to repress himself, that he let his father get inside his head like that.

But he understands. He really does. Sometimes, it's difficult to stop someone and their words from wriggling deep inside your subconscious, planting seeds that are impossible to keep from growing. Letting them take over you, dictate your actions, influence the very way you exist. 

And then keeping it all to yourself, because it's easier that way.

It's shocking that he and Kai have more in common than what Taehyun thought.

Including the fact that they both like each other. Kai likes Taehyun the same way Taehyun likes Kai. He hadn't used the other word - love - but that's entirely okay with Taehyun. 

He's just happy he doesn't hate him.

The following week, on Kai's birthday, they go to the beach.

Taehyun asks his mother for the keys to her car, and as expected, she hands them over to him with ease. She gives him a smile, reaches up to pat the top of his head, and tells him to have fun.

Kai's mother is a bit more hesitant. She hovers outside the driver's side window, anxiously peering into the car and inspecting the interior, as if to see that everything's in working order. 

“Please take care of my baby,” she tells Taehyun.

The trunk of the car slams shut. Kai had been putting away their packed lunch and beach accessories. 

“Mom, I'll be fine,” he insists.

The two hour drive is spent simply. The radio fills most of the silence, other than an idle comment from Kai here and there. He sits in the passenger seat, arms wrapped around Lily, petting her fluffy little head. Taehyun keeps one hand on the wheel, one hand on Kai's leg. Since holding hands for the first time in the diner last week, physical affection has gotten a lot easier for him.

Kai is still getting used to it. Sometimes, he pushes Taehyun's hand away, or he has to step into a different room and give himself some space. He has reassured Taehyun that he enjoys it - countless times. 

He's just still working through things. That's how he had put it, along with saying it may take him a while to get completely comfortable.

Taehyun doesn’t mind. Not at all.

“Even if it takes an eternity, I will wait for you,” he told Kai. That's something else he's been trying to get better at - verbally expressing his thoughts. Not all of them. Just the most important ones.

The beach is crowded. Of course, all the tourists have flocked to the ocean to enjoy one of the final weekends of the summer. Taehyun supposes he can't get too irritated about it, because they've done the same thing.

And it ends up not mattering. Once the blanket is spread, their food is laid out, and they begin to eat and enjoy each other's company, every single person around them just disappears.

It's just them, Lily, the blazing warmth of the sun and the tropical smell of sunscreen.

“My sisters are coming home Tuesday,” Kai says through a mouthful of his ham sandwich. “I'm so excited for you to meet them. Lea's kinda bossy, so just ignore her, but Hiyyih is usually pretty cool..”

Taehyun smiles as Kai continues to endlessly ramble on about his sisters, before moving onto gushing about the anime they just started the day before, and then getting excited over an upcoming sequel to a video game he played in middle school. 

Taehyun doesn't say much. He still prefers listening, especially with having such a beautiful view in front of him.

Not the ocean. Kai, with his eyes turned golden in the sunlight and his windswept hair. 

That's one thing Taehyun would not say out loud, though. It's a thought he will very much keep to himself.

By the time Kai's rambling slows, late afternoon has rolled around, the beach is a little less crowded. There's not much noise other than a stray seagull and the gentle crashing of the waves. 

Purposefully, Taehyun has kept his hands to himself, not wanting to overload Kai with too much affection.

But now, Kai scoots closer, until their knees knock and their shoulders press together. He leans into Taehyun, taking up much of his personal space - not that Taehyun minds one bit.

He smooths a hand down Kai's back, counting the knots of his spine beneath his fingertips. 

Humming in content, Kai leans his head onto Taehyun's shoulder. His hair tickles.

There's no one on the beach. Only the two of them.

And Lily. She's looking at them with her little black eyes. Taehyun turns her away, facing the ocean instead.

“I love you, too, you know,” Kai whispers, so quietly Taehyun has to strain to hear it.

But he says it. And that's all that matters.

They don't leave the blanket until dusk, carefully walking hand in hand towards the water. 

They stop when it's waist deep, neither one of them keen on going anywhere further now that it's getting dark. The water feels pleasant, still warm from the sun. Nothing like the icy cold of the creek in the woods. 

Taehyun thinks about that day. Running away from Taea's funeral and slipping on those rocks has turned out to be one of the best things that's happened to him. He wants to believe she has something to do with this. Somehow, some way, she orchestrated his and Kai's meeting. 

It's just such a Taea thing to do. She always loved romance. 

Taehyun thought her death was the end of his own life as well. And in a way - yes, without having his sister by his side, a large part of him will never be whole ever again. Something will always be missing.

But it has brought him one thing, and now, Taehyun thinks, maybe his life is far from ending. Maybe it's just beginning.