twenty.
lather, rinse, repeatI was lost, not in the literal sense, in which my sense of direction had gone screwed, but mentally, in a way several thousand times worse.
With Himchan at least an hour away and trapped within his own world, it wouldn’t have been right of me to call him. Himchan was busy as he was without me there to make it all the more worse. Hanging up the phone with him, in the end, I couldn't tell him anything.
“You can tell me anything Youngjae.”
I couldn’t. I couldn’t tell him anything.
There were many words itching to burst. I wanted to tell him how sad I was; how lonely I had been when he’d split ways. I wanted to tell him about how I had finally gotten my fairy tale ending, only to have it torn away in one measly go. If it were Himchan, he would have been able to find a way to laugh over it. He would have been able to hook an arm around my shoulder and loosen all the tension and wipe all my tears away.
I was being a selfish bastard, but I wanted him anyways, my brother.
It was cold that day. Maybe it was because I was alone, that the temperature seemed to intensify, but never before, had I ever felt so alone.
But then again, you never had let me be alone before. Dangerous, you called it.
You knew me all too well, Jung Daehyun.
“Youngjae?”
I looked up, and in between my tears, I could make out the silhouette of a far too familiar fit, head stuck out the clear glass door of a nearby convenience store. He seemed to squint my direction, hands cupping over ever like binoculars, as if it would enhance his vision any. Then, after a quick survey of the streets, he made his way toward my, keeping his steps rushed, but in a wary sense – just in case I was too much of a mess to pick up.
“It is you!” I never had understood why Daehyun’s voice pitched whenever he saw me; I hadn’t understood back then, and I had the feeling that I never would. “What’re you doing out here alone?”
Without as much as asking for my consent, he plopped next to me on the bench, grunting a little in the process – as if he relived to finally be sitting down. He then looked over at me, his head slightly cocked in question.
I knew he could see the read lines circling my eyes, the tears that threatened to spill over despite how many times I swiped them away; but he remained oblivious to them, for my sake – I’d like to think.
"Come on, it's getting chilly. Let's go inside."
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