[2018]

What love is about

When Changmin was asked what love was about, the first thing that came to his mind was a late summer morning in a house by the sea. He was eight at the time, but he had already catched something peculiar and beautiful in the looks his parents exchanged, in the way his father used to wake up hours before them to prepare breakfast or in the smiles his mother used to give him once she woke up to the smell of coffee.
He saw the hint of something he sweared he wanted to experience and treasure for as long as he could.

When Changmin was asked what love was about, the second thing that came to his mind was music. Since he was a child, he had always enjoyed the colorful notes made words in a combination of sounds so appealing. He loved the way singers managed to make people smile and cry through lullabies of feelings revealed from the depths of their souls.
When he discovered that his own voice had something to offer too, Changmin sweared he would have make a living out of it.

When Changmin was asked what love was about, Kim Jaejoong also came to his mind.
Kim Jaejoong wasn’t someone simple to talk about, his psyche was so complexed that Changmin was sure he wasn’t even able to understand it himself. He was a mix of different feelings, contrasted opinions, opposite behaviors. He was a living oxymoron, a hurricane of broken emotions, a storm of happiness and tears that walked into your life and in some ways managed to make you feel addicted to it.
That he was: an addiction.
However, there was one thing Changmin was certain about the guy: love. Love was what Jaejoong lived on, what he breathed, what he gave, what he needed to go on, and that’s why when he was asked about it, he wasn’t surprised at the connection his mind had made.

Kim Jaejoong and love were enemies: they fought badly and hurt each other in places so deep, Changmin was surprised they could actually be reached. Love was Jaejoong’s worst nightmare: it followed him everywhere and tormented him until the guy was left with nothing more to offer.
He lived on love. He needed love.
It was the air he breathed, the food he eated.
And sometimes, unluckily lots of times, love wasn’t kind enough to him the way he was with it. He got destroyed by love, Kim Jaejoong, so many times that Changmin wondered if it was even worth it. He remembered drying away waterfalls of never ending tears to see a smile decorate the guy’s face once again, only to be taken away a while later, defeated by another broken love.

However, Kim Jaejoong and love were lovers too: they cared so much and lost themselves in each other, reaching places so deeply hidden in their souls, Changmin was surprised they could actually be touched.
When Kim Jaejoong fell in love, he fell hard.
And he loved damn hard. He loved with all he had, with every breath his lungs had to offer, with every drop of energy in his veins, with every heartbeat his body managed to give life to.
Kim Jaejoong wasn’t easy to love. He was a burden to carry, a riddle to solve, a challenge to face.
However, for Kim Jaejoong to love was easy. And he showed it in every gesture, in every word, in every look: a reassuring touch on the shoulder, a “fighting” whispered before an important concert, a constant gaze following your every move as to be sure that everything was in the right place.

Changmin was 30 and had experienced love many times during his life.
He loved his family. And Yunho. And his friends.
He loved music. And his fans. And his job.
He loved books too. And their stories. And their lessons.

However there was one thing he still had to experience and it was a love like Jaejoong’s.
A love that made you feel completed. And treasured. And accepted with your imperfections.
A love that left you broken. And lonely. And unable to go on.
A love that made you feel the world in all its colors.

But Changmin was afraid that that kind of love would have never been his; it was a kind of love only someone as wildly broken and fearless as Kim Jaejoong could have ever had the opportunity to feel.