From: Taehyun, received 22:30

-          How did it go, hyung? Did you like her?           

He swipes the text away without a reply, clearing of his notifications and he chucks the device almost irritably onto the living room couch. Minho couldn’t remember if that was the third girl, or the fourth. He was so sure to be as frank about it, but Taehyun seemed to ignore his reluctance and Minho knew that these set ups were merely just helpless apologies.

Not that Taehyun needed to apologize or owed him one for that matter. It wasn’t his fault that you were with him in Costa that evening and Minho couldn’t just walk past a long time friend he hadn’t seen in a while.

“How long have you been in Seoul?” Minho grins into the hug, thumping the youngest a little too hard on the shoulder.

“A few weeks, but I’m back for good. We should catch up, hyung.”Besides the ridiculous bleached hair, Taehyun still looked the same.

The two grew close in art school, Taehyun being his junior who was fond of conversations that took Minho a while to understand. He’d come to admire this complexity of his, finding a friend he could confide in to see things in a whole different, out of the norm, perspective.

“Yeah, but looks like I caught you in bad timing.” Minho couldn’t pretend that he hadn’t interfered with a possible date, his eyes drifting to the woman listening in by Taehyun’s side.

“I’m not his date, girlfriend or whatever.”You laugh softly, hiding an amused smile as you look down when you shuffle up to your feet, “And you should stay, I was just leaving anyway.”

He wanted to object, feeling guilty for making you leave but his brain was too occupied in taking in the sight of you who was now inches from where he stood.

“Already?”

“Yah –I’ve seen you so much this week, I’m about to pull my hair out.” You sigh with a subtle roll of your eyes.

Minho finds himself staring, smiling absently at the interaction between two seemingly close friends. He wondered if you knew Taehyun before he did, or why he’d never mentioned you or seen you around before. Minho wasn’t exactly on good terms with his memory, but he most definitely wouldn’t have forgotten you.

“Just say you want to work on that damn story.”Taehyun quips, shooting you an accusing eye from over the table.

“Like I said, pull my hair out.” You let out a hearty laugh, one that Minho didn’t know he would remember years later as you bid him goodbye with a gentle nod.

It certainly wasn’t his fault when things ended.

Taehyun had always known the pretty ones. Sure they were fun, but he hated himself for picking up a gross habit, always comparing every little, unnecessary thing about them to you.

But they weren’t unnecessary, he realized. If they weren’t it wouldn’t haunt him this gravely.

So you’re an artist? –she had asked in the midst of his daydream of you, further buried into his own guilt for not remembering her name. His eyes shifted quietly from the moment she sat down to a date he never agreed to. Minho noted how she doesn’t have her hair the way you do, how you would never choose that shade of lipstick and how she smelled too sweet, different to the subtle softness that you would leave lingering on his bed sheets.

Like past lovers, they were always too focused, too attentive on him as if he was a centre piece. With you he’d come to learn that he won’t always come first, that the princess somewhere in that fiction worn mind of yours needed to save a kingdom from an army of dragons. There would always be a story, a poem that robbed you of your attention from him.

But you didn’t hesitate to leave love-struck reminders scattered around his place, be it stamped behind a fridge magnet or scribbled on the edges of his many sketchbooks. For someone who dreamt of words, you preferred to keep it silenced only coming to spill it out on paper when you needed to. More often than not it would clear him of his own vocabulary, completely thrown by how words could affect him that way.  

Yeah, I am, was his nonchalant reply and she reacted with an ‘oh!’ that sounded too prepared.  Of course he heard it all before, Taehyun must have given her a heads up and he could only smile through what seemed like a leaflet reading of Renoir’s biography.

You were never shy in being hell bent clueless when it comes to his profession and he didn’t mind gloating his way through just to see the awe twinkling in your eyes. It was funny how it was you that seemed alive at the mention of something he loves.

“It’s all just… lines.” Minho holds back a smile seeing the look of confusion on your face as continue to stare awkwardly at Pollock’s piece.

“Do you like it?”

“Am I supposed to?” You tip your head to face him and he chuckles, reaching out to soften the frown of your brows with his thumb. “I don’t get it. But I understand why you don’t have to understand it, you know what I mean?”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s supposed to make you feel.”

He couldn’t help but fall into a smitten grin because you were right; at least that was how he saw it too. Despite doing two different things, him an artist and you a writer; the both of you did it for the same reasons.

“What do you think of this one?”He tugs you further along the gallery and points out to a different painting.

“Don’t you think you should be asking someone else? I’m a writer, not an artist, Minho.” He studies you from the side as you mutter the protest yet still deeply entranced by the artwork before you. 

“Writers are artists too.”

“I can’t draw to save my life.” You responded by scoffing a laugh, one that he couldn’t join into this time.

“Doesn’t matter –you create things, you make people feel. Take out all the other technical and that’s the only thing that matters.”

It’s been a year since you left and he still hated coming home to an empty house. The boxes that lined the hallway made everything seemed emptier for a whole different reason and he sighs inwardly at the thought of packing up the last few things before he finally moves out. Starting over was what he had in mind but to find your things lying around in hidden corners of his place only made it easier said than done.

Some were little things that most would pay no mind to like bobby pins and random packs of heart shaped post it notes. Some were slightly more sentimental like the t-shirt you sleep in folded at the bottom of his drawer, wrinkled from the pile of his own and smelled of him and no longer you.    

But the one that got to him the most was the flip book he gifted you to mark your first year together. No one ever disapproved of his gifts, but he gave up wrecking his brain trying to figure out the perfect one for you. It was only natural to assume that you’d be more than happy with a book or two, considering how much time you spend reading, if not more than you do with him. The thing was he wanted it to be different and unsuspecting; something that you wouldn’t expect.

The idea came to him during an impromptu drive, the two of you caught in the breathtaking silence of the golden hour.

 “Describe the sunset for me.” He interrupts, breaking out a smile when he catches the click of your tongue.

“Shh. You’re ruining the moment.”

“Please?”

“Why all of a sudden?”

“Just because.”

There was only silence that coated the space between you and him, and you breathe deeply as you give in to his request.

“Quiet…” You pause before smiling back at him and he swore that he found his own description just then, “…but overwhelmingly spectacular.”   

He’d worked many pieces before but not one was as nerve wrecking as that flip book. It was a watercolour time lapse of a sunset and the first time you saw it, the look on your face was something he would remember for the rest of his life.

The blues of the skyline disappeared to a honey glow of oranges and reds as you flipped through the pages. A smile grew on your lips with each passing page, so infectious that his heart hammered in pure adoration at the sight.

It wasn’t until you came to the last page when you froze a little too long over the closing sentence he had written,

For you

who is just as quiet,

but

overwhelmingly

spectacular.

He remembered swallowing back his heart, frantically thinking that giving you this was a stupid mistake and that he probably should’ve went for a ring or a pair of earrings like any normal person would.

This is beautiful, you breathed out a shaky laugh, biting your lip as you glimpse at him through glassy eyes. Relief flooded his chest and he had his palms cupped over your cheeks, forehead pressed against yours as he laughed along with you.

And so are you, he whispered.

You were a quiet observer, not the type to utter feelings out so openly like he did. But you wrote and you wrote and you wrote. So much so that he would always be on the brink of excitement and fear whenever you come to pick up that pen and spill your words.    

It was after finding you passed out by the dining table in a clutter of your notes, the laptop still on with the latest piece that seemed to bother you the past few months. He was careful not to pry or touch anything since the last time that happened all work was lost and you refused to even look at him for that entire week. Only this time his eyes drifted its way to the dimly lit document and he had always assumed that he plays no part in your work every time you faze out on him, the monotonous tapping of your fingers against the keyboard was the only thing you left him with. Little did he know he was in every syllable and every letter, consuming your every word.

It was flattering at first. How he had that childish smile plastered to his face all morning and all he could do was pin you down with kisses every time he gets the chance to.

“What are you so damn happy about?” You jab an elbow to his side, scowling when he clings onto you once again.

“You wrote about me.” He was sure to rub it in, and he snorts out a laugh seeing the red flushed in your cheeks.

“I did not!”

“Yes, you did.” Minho grins sheepishly, grabbing you quickly when you try to move away.

“That was an invasion of privacy, I’m suing.”

“Sue me all you want but you see the stars in my eyes.”He clamps his teeth to this lip, fighting a rising laugh seeing your eyes widen in embarrassment.

“The only stars you’ll be seeing is when I hit you–”

Unable to contain his feelings for you, he rushes towards you for a crushing hug, his lips tickling the skin of your shoulders and the room swells with the sound of your laughter once again.

It was also what drove the two of you apart.

“If only you take out half –just half the time you spend talking to your damn computer–”

“Don’t even go there, Minho.”

“ –and actually tell me how you feel once in a while. I can’t just figure it out, I can’t be the only one in this.”

“What are you saying? Are you breaking up with me?”

“Maybe we–”

 “If that’s what you want then so be it, Minho.” You cut him off casually, sending a devastated pang to his chest seeing the blatant lack of emotion you chose to display.

“You know damn well that’s not what I want!” He wanted to scream out his frustrations and he did. Minho was way past guarding his pride; he couldn’t care less if he was the only one that seemed emotionally invested. He knew he was desperate and he didn’t care, “It’s you– I want you.”

“Then why would you say that in the first place?” A deep frown creases your expression, “God, you’re so ing confusing!”

“Because it’s not the same for you.”

“That’s a lie.” You gape at him it disbelief, the most he’s gotten out of you by the looks of it. “Anyone that knows me would never say that and out of anyone else, that should be you, Minho.”

You spoke some truth but lately it didn’t feel that way.

“You read and swallow up stories, all these feelings and words that aren’t yours just so you won’t face your own.”

He couldn’t bring himself to look at you, convinced that he would be the one to fall apart and he went on anyway. He needed to.

“But when you do, you turn them away into something else. I thought that after all these years, I would be the one you go to but I guess a blank piece of paper understands you more than I do.” His heart stuttered when his ears perked at your stifled cries and when he glanced your way, you were quick to look away. It hurt how you still wanted to keep it from him even at a time like this.  

“All you have for me are just words, Y/N-ah. Most you don’t even say, not anymore.” He wanted to hold you, have you in his arms, “But words are never enough.”

He wanted you to stay and the question bled through the pleading of his eyes in the way he looked at you. He didn’t need to hear your answer when he woke up the following morning, empty of your presence. The last of your words taped onto the bedside table.

I love you, Minho. Even when I don’t.

//