Just About Everything He Has

She caught a glimpse of him lifting his face to the sky. His lips were bowed but she could not tell if he was smiling from the distance. Distance. She never knew how sad that word was until Kang Gary. To be so close yet still beyond her reach. Honestly, she didn’t know a lot of things until he came, prowling in her mind slowly but inevitably consuming it all. She raised her eyes to the stars and was almost knocked breathless at how splendid they looked. How insignificant she was under such glory yet it eased her knowing that Gary was under the same blanket of stars. She wondered if he’s counting them or just checking out one. She had already picked out hers, she told herself as her eyes fell on him. The thought brought warmth to her cheeks and she smiled at her cheesiness.

Their eyes locked.

Gary felt a queasiness balling up in his stomach and rolled out to the tips of his limbs. It left a hollow hum in his ears as it reached his head. He wobbled on his weak, weak knees finding her moving to his direction. He retreated onto the plastic chairs and sat to cover how it made him weak just to be looking at her not realising that the empty one beside it was an open invitation. The silence that followed was deafening as Jihyo placed herself next t him, yet somehow even silence was not the same.

Gary swerved his car to its spot before picking up his phone from the dashboard. Donghoon’s name had been popping out of the caller ID since he left his studio. He didn’t pick up because one, he didn’t have those Bluetooth thing to latch around the ear and after the recent development with Jihyo, he’d like to preserve his life as much as he can. And two, he liked to annoy Donghoon like that.

“Give me a break, would you?”

“Hyung!” he started excitedly not the least bit upset that he had to dial 24 times for Gary to finally pick up.

“Spill.”

“Hyung clean up you-“

“I’m getting inside the elevator.” He cut him short with a playful snicker that grew wider at Donghoon’s audible growl.

When the elevator dinged to its destination and the younger started angrily, “That makes you happy, huh?”

“In ways you’ll never understand.” He laughed again, “What do we have?”

“Jongkook hyung’s birthday. Clean up your schedule.”

“Where?”

“Jirin mountain.”

“Mountain? Why does he have to be so picky? Why don’t we just get wasted like normal people?”

“He’s 40 hyung. You’ll understand it when you reach 40.”

“Please kill me before I make diva demands like that.” He twisted the knob of the main door and slipped inside his apartment.

“Diva who?” Jongkook was sitting comfortably in his living room, a foreboding smile playing up his lips.

“Hyung, don’t you have a house?” Gary said after recovering from the initial shock.

“I do. But I love the depressing atmosphere here.” He crossed his legs and spread his arms that were thick enough to cover the rest of the sofa.

Gary plopped down across Jongkook. He truly wished that this hyung would find himself a wife so he wouldn’t have to put up with the annoyance. He remembered his happiness when Donghoon shared his wedding plans. Happy primarily because he got rid of the world’s biggest nuisance. No, he contradicted himself. There’s Gil but he was definitely a close second.

“You’re coming right?”

“Who would dare say otherwise when you look like that?” Gary sighed, put the call on speakers and placed it on the centre table.

“So… I heard you are turning fifty.”

“So… I heard Jihyo went hunting for one drunken bastard the other night.” Jongkook’s remark instantly wiped the smug grin off Gary’s face.

“Ha Donghoon!”

After a few shuffling a sweet voice called from the other line, “Oppa, lower the decibels. Deurim is sleeping.”

“GoEun-ah, first you let him con you into marrying him then now you’re letting him lead you against me?”

GoEun only laughed. “Mianhe ,oppa. Husband runs the house on this one.”

“Tsk, how’s the little nightmare?”

“Bba Bba Bba Bba,” Dream’s happy babble came into to the line.  

“Already sounding like your appa, Deurim-ah. GoEun are you sure about this?”

GoEun laughed and Gary’s heart swelled with both happiness and longing. A family didn’t fit into the life he’s living but he had been thinking more about it lately. He would be 40 soon too and the idea of ‘age is just a number’ didn’t sound as appealing now. Now, he was just lonelier.

“It’s still not too late though. Just saying.”

“Hyung, are you trying to break my family apart?” Haha whined.

“Maybe he’s jealous.” Jongkook commented out of nowhere and silence dropped like a boulder inside the room. Gary met Jongkook’s piercing gaze. Gary then knew that there was more to him being there than just paying him a visit.

“Okay. I have to go.” Haha said quietly as if Gary hadn’t picked up on their scheme yet.

Gary looked around his house. He was suddenly itching to do something familiar but he found it difficult to remember his daily routine because Jongkook always have something to say and this hyung was not known for his subtleties.

“You’re not really here for your birthday, are you?” he managed to keep his peaceful composure but inside there was wrenching in his gut.

Jongkook leaned forward and propped his elbows on his knees. He’s serious about this, Gary thought and held his breath.

“Song Jihyo-“

“Ah, hyung! What about her this time?”

“Why are you fighting it, Gary-ah?”

“What is there to fight hyung? It’s been six years. Even if there was a chance that it would work out, I’m sure it has passed.”

“Who are you trying to convince?”

Gary paused, startled even at how accurate Jongkook’s words were. Who exactly? He probably already knew but he would not dare speak it aloud.

“Finding a girl like her…” Jongkook let out a heavy sigh, “You are one goddam lucky son of a . Don’t you know that?”

He goddam knew that and having someone dare say it brought up the stalking emotions right to the surface. He fell onto the back rest and closed his eyes. There was an unheard emotion clouding in them when he opened them again, staring at the ceiling as if Jongkook was a distant past, “The eyes hurt when the lights are too bright.”

Jongkook fell silent and nodded, agreeing to him for a moment but still not quite, “She chose you.”

“Why would she do that?” Gary finally snapped. Jihyo, the sole reason for his out of control decent couldn’t be in love with him too and he hated how they all made it seem like he couldn’t man up for his own happiness. He had tried for years. Were they blind to that? Sensing the heavy silence he laughed but his laugh resembled something being rip apart. “Stupid girl.”

“The walls you built to keep her out are the same walls that’s keeping you in.” Jongkook had to restrain himself from reaching out to his collar and shake sense into him. It wouldn’t look nice strangling a dongsaeng inside his own home.

“What if I’ll lose her?” Gary buried his face into his hands and added quietly, “Completely.”

“What if you don’t?” he let the question hung there for a while before adding, “In the future, when you look back today and how will you forgive yourself knowing that you didn’t give it a chance? There is nothing more haunting than thoughts of what could have been. If failure doesn’t kill you, regret will.”

“This pressure… like walls that’s closing in on me.” It did look to Jongkook that something was caging him in.

“What do we do with walls that we don’t need?” He bestowed Gary a reassuring smile, “We bring them down. No one is going to talk about how gracefully you let her go but everyone is going to remember how big of an idiot you are for not taking the chance. When a girl like Jihyo falls for you, you don’t sit and think about it. You go out there and make sure she doesn’t go anywhere.”

“I don’t know hyung.” Gary shamelessly let out a whine.

“Don’t lie.” Jongkook voice hardened as if telling off a spoiled child, “You do know. Remember, regret is not pleasant. And if it helps, our Jihyo is most beautiful when she looks at you.”

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