So this is how we lived. Our lives are captured in mason jars and fairy lights, bright in misery, loud in happiness, this is how we lived. Young and reckless, stupid and careless. Our mistakes are nothing more than scribbles from the past. This is life. C’est la vie.

Wheein lies in her hospital bed, tries to sleep while the nurse besides her plays Bejeweled. This was an accident. (Eighteen tylenol pills and two dayquil pills later, he told her that it wouldn’t kill her.)

She presses her fingers to her hair, coughs up the rest of her misery into the air. The nurse continues to play and when five am becomes seven am, she only quietly stares out the window. She is left alone. No one is by her side this first night. The hospital is a miserable place. Her fingers grasp onto the covers hard. Her painted smile disappears and she remembers why she’s here again.

She would never be perfect and no matter how close she would be, her mother would remind her otherwise. But she never cared for such things. She never cared about perfection. So why did it matter?  

Nothing would ever be enough. The mist from the roof covers the sky. Seven in the morning becomes seven thirty and when the nurses change shifts, Wheein smiles at the woman with the pink hair, tells her a story, and pretends that the night before doesn’t happen. No one would ever stay with her. Wheein learned that at twelve in the morning when she sits in her bed for the first time, when they attach an IV to her right arm, she understands that she would spend eternity alone. On the first night, no one stays, and she scoffs. Suicidal and depressed, loneliness is more of a best friend than any human companion. Misery loves company. And as the fog disappears, Wheein’s last bit of interest does as well.

“What do you know about the term c’est la vie?”

Completely oblivious of anyone else’s presence, we tie our fingers around Latin phrases that no one remembers. We remember our lungs being on fire. We tell the world we’re fine. Every little fall is another time to get back up. We live by the whispers, carpe diem, carpe diem. Seize the day, boys, seize the day.

Kibum stares blankly when his best friend slams the door behind him. He catches his best friend kissing another person. He finds Jinki’s fingers grabbing onto someone else’s face. He finds him in the act. Jinki craves for love, desperation, romance, he wants the world and will do anything to take it. That’s why Kibum gave up on his love months ago. Jinki can’t commit as much as he’d like to believe. He’s so busy being something to someone that when Kibum wants him, he disappears. He gives flowers, he tells him compliments, but Kibum doesn’t forget, and he’s too proud, but he knows who gave up first.  

That’s why they didn't work out. When Jinki kissed him, Jinki could taste another person’s lips on his. He could feel someone else’s body on his. It’s one date after another date. Jinki tries to do something, anything, but even Kibum can’t seem to find the resolution in it all. He still tries. He still believes.

“I can’t do this anymore.”

When he watches Jinki tell him why he does all of it. He goes cold. When he whispers all Kibum’s inabilities into his ears, when he tells him that he feels loved by someone else, that he is forgiven, Kibum can feel the bile in his throat claw its way up and out of his mouth.

“He forgives me even though we cry for weeks.”

“I always thought we were friends with benefits.”

“I love him.”

Kibum wants to tear his limbs out of his sockets. He wants to gouge out his eyes, throw them into a jar, and beg that he loves him again. He’s a mess and Jinki continues to press on without second thought. Kibum allows him to continue. It’s confusion and the fire inside flares up. There would be no more late night Running Man episodes, there would be no more random dancing in the car, there would be no more singing, Kibum would never again be able to rely on him, he would never get an immediate response from him again.

And it hangs on his tongue. It stays there. It becomes the only thing he remembers. Jinki knows nothing about love. So when Kibum watches him speak and speak so freely about romance, his insides burn. He speaks so easily about love even though they were “something” for three weeks.

“There’s no regret or bitterness, what a great guy.”

Kibum snaps then. He tells him to get out of his apartment. He tells him then that he knows nothing. He tells him that this, whatever this is, is dangerous, and seeing a future in someone is a mistake. There is no future. There is only a present time, and Kibum wants to take his heart, take it out of its chambers and leave it to rot. Jinki doesn’t care if he’s breaking Kibum’s heart. He doesn’t even care if he has something to say. Jinki continues to be the wall that doesn’t do anything for him.

“Get off your ing high horse. Learn how to ing treat people. You piece of !” he yells. Because at the end of the day, Jinki still has his heart despite everything, but now, he has to pick up the fragments that he leaves behind. And for the next couple of weeks, he cries in the corner, wondering why this had to happen.

We know nothing more than what the professors try to preach. The foreigners that stare back at us, they know. They know we don’t belong here. And as xenophobic as they are, we are worse. We may never find the kind of happiness they yearn for. It isn’t normal to be like this. It isn’t normal to chase after adventure as often as we do. We chase after life. We chase after things that don’t matter to others. We fly and crash, too hard, too often, and too quickly.

Wonwoo watches as his parents continue to fight. He sits on the couch while they scream. He’s used to a dysfunctional family. He’s used to his parents never getting along. He’s used to hearing that they’re only together because they have kids. He watches while his sisters are somewhere else, hiding, staying away, this is how he lives. His eyes wander from one parent to the other. Anger brews in the two of them. And Wonwoo, being the big brother, only tells his sisters to go in their room and play with dolls. It’ll stop, he promises, but whenever he looks at the two of them, he knows better. There is no end in sight. The differences will never be compromised. There is no reconciliation. He wishes that it isn't the case, but the out-of-wedlock pregnancy is the reason, and he can’t help but wonder if it is his fault. If only they aborted him then he wouldn’t have to watch this. If only they aborted him, he wouldn’t have to watch the tired looks in his parents. If only he wasn’t born then the world would be okay without him.

Sometimes, he wants to cry, but then his father stares back at him, gives him the look, and he knows better than to cry. Men never cry. It is in their blood. It is always in their blood. Men take care of the family. Men know better than to be emotional like females. And so he covers his emotion with nothing more than roles that he has to play. The strong man on the sideline, the big brother figure for his younger sisters, and the man who knows all the answers to the problems. He never knows all the answers and this game of pretend is starting to take a toll on him. If he ever rips off the mask of his, they find that he's only veins and arteries, fragile bones from the sleepless nights, and the games he play. Is he good or is he bad? Slowly, he closes the door to the outside world and carefully smooths out the edges of his emotions. His eyes glaze over and he stares at the girl in the hospital who stares blankly back at him.

There’s a familiarity in her eyes. He’s accustomed to the gaze. It’s of depression and confusion. But at three, he wonders if she knows the parallelisms between their lives. She waves first. The curiosity takes a hold of him and he waves back. He wonders how lonely she might be to be looking at him as though he’s the most amazing person in the world. He never wanted that, but he's more intrigued by her than she is by him.

“Do you wanna join my club?”

We craved for company. We craved for support. We craved for a home that no one would steal away from us. Our lives were intertwined. Maybe it was God, maybe it was karma, maybe it was the red strings of fate, but we found ourselves next to each other, amazed by how we found people to call home.

Taeyeon believes in serenity and harmony. She knows about hatred and misery.

Instead, her time is wasted on things that matter. Writing letters to people who may never think of her in the same way, she tell tales with her smiles. Her history involves too many traditional college drinking, boys who ed her up, girls who hated her, she who hated them, broken friendships, and reckless emotions that caused the worst decisions. When she left college, she made a choice to never look back. Her childish actions, her freedom, they disappeared as she matured. There are times when she wonders if those people will ever come back, but she reminds herself that it’ll come to haunt her if she does take a few steps back. Her fingers gravitate towards the present, towards a pen and a mug of tea. She erases most of her history. It’s not because she is embarrassed by it all, but it’s because she knows better. There are worse things in life to worry about than the time she lost her ity to a frat boy because she wanted to know if she was aual.

Her insecurities still play a part in her life. She’s afraid of messing up. She’s afraid of trippping and that someone will hate her for the rest of their lives. She’s scared that one wrong word will force her to face consequences. If Jung Sooyeon can leave her life after one incident then anyone else can too. She tiptoes on eggshells day to day, hoping that she’d be perfect enough to understand that not everyone would love her like she did for them. It’s a terrible fate. She stares out the window and smiles. Today, tomorrow, perhaps soon, she’ll be okay. She screams on the inside though.

So this is the story about four people and the creation of the C’est La Vie Club, a safe haven for four strangers.