There is a large area that is neither quite a room nor a hallway; it seems to be an indoor plaza of sorts, with a small bar to one side for coffee.

There is nothing about it that diffused the slightly unsettling feeling of clinical retraction. The extremely pale shade of white that all the walls had been painted, the dim sheen of the grey tiled floors, the spotless and pristine look of every chrome handrail. There’s nothing warm about this building – not the colors, or the atmosphere, not even the pretty brunette at the desk with red lipstick who flirts too much with him. Nothing here is warm except him.

He’s wearing white-washed denim jeans and a dark blue sweater that’s too long for him in the sleeve. His hair is still a little damp from his morning shower, still a warm brown color, tufting in little curls. He’s on a white chair at a white table, with some dishes in front of him. A white ceramic mug that stopped creating steam a while back, and a white ceramic plate with two crust corners left on it sit beside a white ceramic vase with a single long-stemmed violet in it. He’s sitting back with his arms folded, looking out the window.

The window pane is most of the wall, with a few white beams in between to stabilize the structure. Outside the day is grey and dim: not raining or misty, but dull. The sun hasn’t come out, leaving even the new spring grass stems seem boring, fading into the background.

He stops, mid-stride, just in the doorway, under the low timber, staring at the boy in the chair.

For a moment, he stares in wonder. The boys is beautiful, the only warmth in the whole building. Never mind that he’s like a personal star, his very own sunbeam. He radiates a warm kind of glow, a passionate golden tint that knocks the breath out of his surveyor. 

And then he breathes again. He bravely takes another step as he inhales, and another as he exhales. He just walks and breathes, until he’s at the table. He simply takes the seat across from the boy, entirely silent, incapable of tearing his eyes from the boy’s face even once.

The boy turns, watches him, but not with too much curiosity. More like the way you would observe a passing fly; unimportant, but interesting enough to survey for a few moments.

“Hello,” Seungcheol says, and his voice sounds rough, like sandpaper. So he clears his throat, and tries again. “Hello.”

The boy looks him up and down slowly, weighing his options.

There are days that the boy speaks. There are days that the boy cries. There are days that the boy remains silent.

Today, he leans in a little to rest his arms on the edge of the table, and speaks. “Hello.”

Seungcheol sighs, but he’s not sure whether it’s relief or trepidation. When the boy doesn’t speak, it’s awkward and uncomfortable, but at least he isn’t forced to converse. But then, his voice is so sweet, so poignant and glorious and warm, God, he’s so warm, Seungcheol believes every moment he doesn’t speak takes away from the world. “I’m Seungcheol.”

The boy stares at him for a while, processing that information. “Hello, Seungcheol,” he says at length, allowing his mouth to fall closed for a while. He looks down, and chuckles in self-deprivation for a moment. “I’m sorry,” he says, and the words have a light tone and a bitter meaning. “I can’t tell you who I am.”

The words hang in the air for a moment. Just, a moment.

“That’s alright,” Seungcheol says softly. “I can.”

The boy blinks twice. “You can?”

Seungcheol nods once. “You were in a train accident. You lost all your memory before the crash.”

The boy lets out one derisive chuckle at the information, turning his head to look out at the grass again. “Yeah. That’s what my nurse told me this morning, too. I guess it’s true.”

Seungcheol can only nod twice, looking down to disguise his feelings.

“It’s got a name, right?”

“You have amnesia.” Seungcheol nods once in affirmation.

The boy looks at him. “So, you know me?”

“I have hyperthymesia,” Seungcheol answers. “You, you’ve forgotten everything. Me… I remember everything. I can’t forget. I couldn’t forget you, even if I wanted to, even for a split second.”

The boy considers it, staring at the cold, milky remains of his coffee in the cup. “That doesn’t sound too bad,” he eventually admits, his voice low and soft, as if part of him doesn’t want to be heard. “Remembering. Knowing.”

Seungcheol gives him an unstable smile for a moment. “There are cons. My head is filled with memories. Every single day of my life, I remember it. I remember the license plate of my dad’s first car, the feeling of my first bike’s handle bar grips. I remember the devastation of being bullied in school as fresh as if it were yesterday, and I can’t escape it, either. So I just… concentrate on good memories. But that doesn’t always work. Sometimes… remembering is painful.”

The boy nods, and they both look out at the garden for a while. The silence doesn’t disturb either of them, leaving them each to their own thoughts.

“Tell me a memory,” the boy says, and his voice is as soft as the feathers of an angel’s wing. It’s not a command, it’s a request – one uttered so gently, it wouldn’t have surprised anybody if it hadn’t been heard.

But Seungcheol holds a finger up, near the glass of the window anyway. “A good memory was yesterday. Right there on the lawn, a big fat brown rabbit lay in the grass with her white tummy up towards the heavens, and munched on a big yellow daffodil.” The sense of peace in the memory hangs heavy in the air as Seungcheol’s finger sinks again. “You liked her. You named her Helena. You wanted to go out to meet her, but we both agreed she’d have hopped away too quickly for you to catch her. She disappeared in that hedge right there. She had such a big belly, she was probably pregnant. She had big long ears, but they weren’t floppy, and her fur was very lightly flecked with dark brown spots. You said she looked warm. I agreed.” He pauses again, shorter this time. “We spent hours watching Helena.”

The boy exhales slowly, allowing his breath to create a small, hazy circle on the glass that soon retracts and fades into nothing. “You were here yesterday?”

“Yes. So were you.”

“…I see.”

“I’m going to grab a cup of coffee. Would you like one?”

The boy looks up as Seungcheol stood and shook his head a little, pointing. “I’ve already had one today. I’m good.”

Seungcheol nods and shuffles to the coffee bar, pouring himself an espresso before returning to where the boy is perched on his chair, trying to remember a brown rabbit on a green lawn.

“If you and I were here yesterday…” There’s trepidation in his voice, and the gap he leaves without his voice seems to reverberate in the air between them. As if he knows he has to ask, but he’s afraid to know what the answer is. “…then I don’t remember that. How long have I been here?”

Seungcheol’s expression melts into a very loving, warm smile. “A while, but not too long. We’re still young.”

“…do you live here? In this building? With… me?”

“No.”

“But you came here yesterday, and today.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“To see you.”

“Do you come every day?”

He just nods.

The boy stares at the window, jaw locking. “There’s no need to do that,” he says stubbornly, a bitter, lonely edge to the tone. “I won’t remember it anyway. When I go to sleep, I won’t remember you.”

Seungcheol’s smile turns watery. “But I’ll remember you. I’ll remember everything about you. If you want me to, I’ll tell you all about it. We’ll make memories, and I’ll tell you all about them.”

At this, the boy softens slightly. “Did we know each other very well? Before?”

“Yes,” the simple answer comes.

“Are we brothers?”

“No. We promised each other long ago we’d be brothers, but somewhere along the way, that changed. We’re… lovers.”

The boy’s mouth turns into a gentle, straight line. “Lovers. That’s… nice. To know that I had a lover, once.”

“I’m still here,” Seungcheol reminds him.

“But I don’t know you.”

“Knowing and remembering are two different things.” Seungcheol stirs his coffee with a plastic rod quietly.

The boy takes a deep, shaky breath, hands becoming fists. “I forget everything, every day. You remember everything, every day. That must be… horrible. Awful. Painful. For lovers, to go through.”

“That’s alright,” Seungcheol smiles. “As long as you’re here, it’s worth while.”

The boy looks up, with a half-smile pasted across his face. “Are we that great of a couple?”

Now Seungcheol’s eyes are shining and his grin is wider than it’s been in a while. “We’re the best. Always have been. Always will.”

The boy grins to himself, looking out at the lawn. “Can I hear about it?”

“Hm?”

“Will you tell me? About… always have been. About how we were, as a couple. I’d like to hear about those memories.”

Seungcheol sits at the table, and tells him. He talks through the morning and at lunch, allowing his lover to experience his whole life again through Seungcheol’s eyes. He leaves no single detail out, and forgets not a single detail about how the only boy he’d ever loved smiles and grins and is happy to hear it.

They talk through the afternoon, dinner, and the evening – until it’s time for the amnesiac to go to bed, and Seungcheol to go home.

Seungcheol turns up the collar on his winter coat, digging his hands deep into the pockets before he leaves to cross the street and unlock the front door of his apartment.

The new girl turns to the brunette at the desk in question.

“That’s Choi Seungcheol. His boyfriend was in a train accident, and now he can’t remember much more than twenty hours’ worth of memories. But Seungcheol can remember anything. He comes here every day, he’s been here every single day since the day they brought his boyfriend here. Comes and sits, and talks, I guess.”

“…how long has he been doing that?”

The brunette smiles – the sentiment behind it is so soft that the red on her lips seems more romantic than bright, and her eyeliner seems to gloss her eyes instead of tightline them. “Longer than any of us have ever been here. More than sixty years.”

The new girl pauses at that.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Caitlin.”

“Yeah, see you tomorrow, Alex.” The new girl closes out the windows on her desktop, thinking about that. Tomorrow, she thinks, I’ll make sure to greet Mr. Seungcheol.

The next day, Mr. Seungcheol doesn’t visit his boyfriend. Mr. Seungcheol passed away in his sleep, at the ripe age of ninety-two.

But his boyfriend doesn’t know. He never finds out, never misses Seungcheol. He doesn’t remember that there’s something to miss.

His boyfriend sits in a chair, and stares at the lawn.

The End.