xliv. Her, Him, Them, End

Sungyeol wasn’t looking for comfort. He hadn’t set out for the past three nights for something as consolable as another living being’s sympathy. He certainly didn’t think he could find it at the bottom of a glass of alcohol either. But he still visited all the best drinking spots in the area. 

He’d go, order a glass of water, watch, and think.

He didn’t feel like getting legally drunk anymore. By himself, without her, it was much harder to do so. His natural tolerance was high to begin with. He thought himself unable to feel high from anything but her right now. 

Honestly, he was phasing things out for himself. He was trying to figure things out on his own. He’d much rather he did so sober. He’d much rather avoid the contact high that was her appearance then: the woman whose name he didn’t remember, with hair colored brown and with eyes a darker, dirtier shade. 

She stumbled in through the front door, a blue satchel in her hand, light pink high heels causing her to teeter this way and that. Her baby blue dress settled on her curves like a thick blanket, only her thin shoulders, arms, and calves peeking out from beneath it. Greeting him with an intoxicating, “Hello there. What a pleasure it is to meet your acquaintance. Care to come closer?”

He was walking over to her before he knew it, daring to do so, abandoning his dark corner of the bar for the stool beside where she now sat at the counter instead. She was a familiar face in an almost unfamiliar country. Since he couldn’t come up with any cons for approaching her — never mind the fact that there were certainly no pros either — he welcomed his newfound, sober impulsivity. 

He had settled in next to her, glass of water in hand, seemingly without a hitch. She didn’t notice him in the least. With a flushed face, drooping eyes, and loose lips, she slurred out Italian as though it were the only language she knew. “Mi scusi,” her tongue conducted a dance across her lips, her hand unfolding outwards to catch the bartender’s attention. She ordered a beer, her voice a whisper, as though she conveyed to the older man a secret no one else was supposed to know.

Sungyeol decided to break his silence as the bartender proceeded to fill her order, the cons once more nonexistent.

“Tae?” He questioned, unable to remember the following syllable as he peered into her eyes which fluttered beneath thick, brown bangs. 

She recognized him. He could tell from the way her pupils contracted to the smile her pink-stained lips curved into, “Mr. Tall, Dark, and Handsome.”

“Great. You’re drunk.” He knew it was obvious, but he still said it. He filled the closing distance between them with words. He didn’t know how else to properly handle the weight that was her glossy stare. 

“True,” she nodded so painfully slow he wanted to reach out and aid her in committing the action. So achingly slow, he wanted to reach out and touch her. Conducting a symphony with one digit, she sang out, “But, I’m a graceful drunk.”

“What are you even doing here, of all places?” He gestured around them with his hand, though he meant more generally than just this one bar, in this one corner of Italy.

“I’m stuck here for,” she counted on her fingers, an act that took longer than it should have, “three months?”

“What for?”

“Suspension,” she answered, gratefully taking her drink from the bartender with a smile that looked like she was laughing. Like she was laughing at the very notion of crying. 

“For what?” He questioned, having only that — only questions.

“For being what I am.” She took a sip. A long one at that. Searching for something in a place he had previously ruled out. “What we are.”

“What do you mean by –”

“Ssh,” she put her hand to his mouth, irritating him and yet shutting him up nevertheless, “you talk too much.” 

He wretched his face from her grip, the breath he had momentarily lost, that she had stolen with her heated palm, returning, “I haven’t said more than ten sentences –”

“Ssh,” she mushed his face with her hand again.

And when he escaped her for the second time, when he opened his mouth to speak for the third time, she did something for the first time of many. 

Pale fingers reached out for his jacket, folding into him, pulling him towards her. She kissed him, her lips melting against his own. She tasted like strong alcohol. She smelled like bitter chocolate. She felt like she would never break. So, he held onto her, anchoring himself to her sturdy hull. 

Her name is Kim Taeyeon. She is twenty-three years old as of this year; approximately five years older than him. She’s an Enforcer, rank EN00, who was sent to Italy — where she grew up — for a transgression she never elaborated upon to him. She doesn’t get drunk easily, though that night she did. She likes to put up walls, to hang fancy words said with fancier tones from one to the next, to pretend away the seriousness of her life. Maybe that’s why she acted the way she did. 

But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t know how to take things seriously. That doesn’t mean she didn’t greet Giuseppe, as Sungyeol brought her half-conscious body in through the front door, with the most cordial of manners. She knows where she stands in her imperfect world, with her imperfect walls.

She’s an actress at her core, a perfect performer of the role she’s been given. 

She was a contradiction in and of itself.

As the two of them sat on the cold, tiled floor in the bathroom, wrapped up in a thick blanket thicker than her baby blue dress, she whispered sweet nothings to him. Candy-like words filled with empty promises of “forever.” She puked three times that night.

He traced circles on her back with his hand. 

Her hot skin leaned into his touch.

They were both sick of “forever.”

Him, her, them.