...in which there never was anything to forgive

Woohyun/Sungjong

5505 words

inspired by: > click <

dedicated to HiNataLi

It wasn't always like that.

It was never like that and just the mere irony of it all made Sungjong laugh at his own misfortune. Never had he thought he would sit at rock hard cold floor, having his back pressed against thick metal bars along with a back of someone else.Never had he thought that everything they had been through together would lead them to... well, everything.

So much had happened in such a short period of time, Sungjong couldn't even understand how it was possible for so many things to happen practically at the same time. He never even thought of such consequences; he never thought that oceans of blood, betrayal and even a murder; cold-blooded murder would come in between and separate him from the very person sitting behind him.

However there were times when Sungjong and the very person behind the bars were happy together.

But those times were long gone, were they not?

Never in his life Sungjong had the opportunity to choose; it almost was as if his life's scenario was given far before he was even born. Never he had the opportunity to choose school he would like to go to, job he would like to do. Not even things he wanted to remember and those he wanted to erase; his mind nor his heart would let him forget and move on.

And so there he was. Sitting on cold, tiled floor, staring into the darkness ahead of him with his back pressed against the back of someone he still stubbornly loved even though he had told himself countless times that he would move on, that he would forget about the other, that he wouldn't love him anymore. Oh, how wrong he was.

He would never expect himself to end at such place; being supposed to watch over someone trapped behind the bars. To watch over someone who hurt him so much yet still meant whole world to him...

He stretched his own arm in front of himself letting the dim light of the moon going through the dirty barred window fall on his skin, giving it quite mysterious, magical appearance. And he wondered if there was something that could make the both of them go back to the past and change everything. Perhaps it would have been better if they had never met. Perhaps nothing would have happened and they would have lived their own lives without even knowing about the existence of one another.

Wouldn't that have been better?

No one would have to come to any harm; everyone would have been happier. Only if they had never met...

Or was that just something that didn't depend on the two of them?

Yet only silence responded to Sungjong's quiet pondering as he knew that there was not a thing either of them had to say about the situation they somehow found themselves in. He knew that there were no more words meant to be spoken between them and he almost felt like drowning in that somewhat deafening, non-existing sound that lingered all around them. It was strange, the air; it was as if heavy, trying the crush the poor boy's shoulders.

But he did not want to leave.

He wanted answers even when knowing no one could provide him those.

Why had Fate chosen that life for him? Was he really that bad of a person in his previous life to deserve to suffer like that? Why was there no one to answer him?

"Remember our first meeting?” came a sudden question.

Upon hearing the voice from the other side of the barred wall which came so suddenly, Sungjong stiffened. It sounded as melodious as ever, just like he remembered, as if nothing had ever happened between the two of them.

"Yeah." was the boy's quiet, yet clearly hearable answer.

And a string of memories suddenly peered from the darkest corner of his weary mind.

In Sungjong's overly big eyes toys never were anything special. At least not for him. However when he got a little model of a car for his fourth birthday, he always had it with him. And kindergarten was not an exception.

It was a day just like any other. His mother took him to the kindergarten smiling at him and making up serious answers to his somewhat cute, silly questions. And even though children do not usually bring toys to the kindergarten, Sungjong himself somehow managed to persuade the teacher there to let him have his car with him. 

Once he was done thanking the woman for letting him keep his precious toy, he waved to his mother and ran away to the rest of the kids to show them his car. He noticed the woman talking with the teacher even a while later, but paid no big attention to it, they’d always talked like that from time to time.

Nevertheless ,whenSungjong was busy showing little Myungsoo his car, he didn’t even notice that the boy was not listening to him at all. Instead of that he was looking somewhere over Sungjong’s shoulder with terror in his eyes.

“Hey, Jongie…” he tugged on Sungjong’s sleeve interrupting his very serious speech. “Let’s go somewhere else.”

“Why?” Sungjong asked, not sounding exactly interested.

“Howon is coming here…”

“So? I’m not scared of him.” Sungjong pouted, continuing to play with his toy.By the corner of his eye he noticed Myungsoo backing away with few other kids.

Soon there was a shadow coming over his head. Turning around, Sungjong immediately recognised the very said boy; none other than Lee Howon who was well known for often bullying children smaller than he was.

“Say, little boy, could you borrow me that car of yours?” he asked sweetly.

“Why?” Sungjong asked after a while of hesitation. “There are many of other cars here.” he added then, pointing all around himself.

“But I like the one you have.” Hoya replied. “Come on, just for a while.” he pressed on, quickly snatching the toy from Sungjong’s unsuspecting hands.

“Give it back!” Sungjong shouted, trying to reach the taller boy’s hands.

Apparently liking the boy’s cries, Howon kept the car away from his hands and slightly amused watched his useless attempts on retrieving the toy.His amusement was quite short lived as there soon came another boy to the scene, getting the car from Howon’s hands immediately.

“Hey!” Howon screeched, turning around just to regret his actions right away as he recognised the boy. He left the room right away, leaving the kids alone.

Recognising the boy who just saved his day as none other than Nam Woohyun, Sungjong’s eyes lit up immediately as Woohyun was also known as the one who bullied the bullies.

“Here.” Woohyun handed Sungjong the toy, grinning cheekily.

“Thank you, hyung!”

Recalling that, Sungjong chuckled to himself. Despite it being so long since then, he still remembered every detail (even that Howon wore purple shirt that day). He still remembered how he had been practically glued to Woohyun ever since as he went everywhere where Woohyun went with few necessary exceptions. But even so, as far as Sungjong knew, Woohyun didn’t mind being followed around all the time. Quite the opposite, actually.

“What do you think Howon does now?” Woohyun asked then, tearing Sungjong apart from his memories.

Sungjong didn’t really feel like talking, but on the other hand there were so many things he wanted to say that he did not even know where to start.Woohyun apparently wanted to talk as the silence was getting too tight. But it still seemed as a dream to Sungjong; a dream from which he had woken up thanks to two simple shots of a gun.

Everything that they had together, it was as if unreal.

“Stealing candies from little kids if not something worse.” came his reply after a while, which had Woohyun’s laughter echoing through the air the following second.

When he was applying for that job, Sungjong never thought of meeting Woohyunright there, because yes, he knew Woohyun was sort of a criminal and that he was supposed to be imprisoned at least until the investigation was over, but there for sure were many prisons in Korea. Nonetheless, it was his first night shift watching over Woohyun  in his custodial cell and seeing him for the first time after such a long period of time and he still remembered how nervous he had been before he came there.

And then, there they were talking so naturally as if nothing had ever happened. He still wanted to talk about stuff that had happened the previous day; all those casual, boring things they used to talk about before. But then again, how could he?

“Yeah, I suppose so…”Woohyun replied, laughter dying down. “I’m sorry.” he added then, the words being barely hearable.

Yet Sungjong still heard everything clearly. Somehow he wanted to say that Woohyun had nothing to be sorry for, which was also partly true, but he remained quiet even so. The sudden awkwardness that formed around them was also Sungjong’s fault. If only he was brave enough to admit certain facts, if only he was brave enough to just throw pride aside and say everything he wanted out loud, everything would be a lot easier for the both of them.

Sungjong was brave, for you not to get it wrong, but never enough. Which was also proved one cloudy day when he had asked Woohyun out.Or more precisely, when he had tried to ask Woohyun out.

Catching the string of memories in his mind again, he slowly flew back to their high school days.

“See you tomorrow!” Sungjong waved to Myungsoo who then set off with someone suspiciously tall Sungjong didn’t know. Nevertheless once Myungsoo and the other guy were out of his sight, Sungjong happily skipped to the school gates where Woohyun was patiently waiting for him.

As planned, they went to the cinema like they did every second Wednesday, which was a weird habit as Myungsoo once commented, and then headed to Woohyun’s place.

“Here.”

“Hot choco, huh? You know me so well, hyung.” Sungjong chirped and carefully took the mug filled with that sweetly smelling liquid from Woohyun’s hand.

“I should, right?” Woohyun chuckled, taking a seat beside the younger.

“It’s terrible how winters get longer each year.” Sungjong complained loudly.  Truth to that, it was nearing to the half of March and it was still occasionally snowing outside.

“Yeah.”Woohyun nodded, taking a sip from his own mug.”Look.” he said abruptly, almost choking on his drink in the process, and pointed at the window. “It’s snowing again.”

“See? I really can’t remember when it was the last time the temperature was higher than ten degrees.”Sungjong whined again, almost angrily gulping half of the mug down.

“Slow down, buddy. It’s called hot chocolate for a reason.” Woohyun warned the younger amusedly once he started to wave his hands around his mouth as it was burning from the inside.

“Shut up.” Sungjong pouted.

Silence fell on them as Woohyun complied for once. It was not one of those awkward pauses that often happened between the two of them though. It was fine. And Sungjong began to think whether he should say the thing he’d been wanting to say for quite some time. His mouth though didn’t seem to listen to his brain as it was most probably wounded from the impact with really hot chocolate and spoke on its own.

“Say, hyung…”he muttered, staring down at the half-empty mug. “Do you like me?”

“Like you? I love you, Jongie.” Woohyun laughed, patting the other’s head.

“I’m being serious.” the younger sighed. “You’re one of those who can choose people to hang out with, yet you’re still out with a nobody like me.”

“You’re not a nobody.” Woohyun protested.

“That’s not the point.” Sungjong stated, apparently getting frustrated. “Nevermind, I wanted this conversation to end differently.”

“How then?”

“Does it matter now?”

“Yeah.”

“Uh… I just…” Sungjong paused, thinking what to say even though the answer was very clear. But as it usually happens when you want to confess, the words got stuck somewhere on their way before being able to get out of the throat. “I just wanted to ask if you would… y-you know…”

“…go out with you?” Woohyun tried to finish, immediately earning a confused stare coming from the widened eyes of the other.

“H-how did you..?”

“Lucky guess?”Woohyun laughed. “I wanted to ask you too, so I guess it was the first thing that came to  my mind.”

“Really? I mean...Wait a second.” he glared.“You’re not messing with me now, are you?” he asked then, getting suddenly suspicious.

“I wouldn’t dare.” Woohyun grinned. “So yes, I’d love to go out with you, Jongie.”

Sungjong had never told the elder how grateful he was all along. There were so many things Woohyun had ever done for him and never asked for anything in return. One of such favours was that Woohyun had never asked about anything Sungjong was uncomfortable with. Such as his family, for example.

Even after all those years, Woohyun knew nothing about Sungjong’s family. Not even the slightest bit of facts. And fortunately for Sungjong, he had never asked.

Fortunately because as time flew, Sungjong found out what all those conversations between his mother and all the teachers meant. He found out that his mother was selling her body just for his sake, even