Chapter VIII

“Of course I’ll hurt you. Of course you’ll hurt me.

Of course we will hurt each other.

But this is the very condition of existence.

To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter.”

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

If Seunghyun could picture the next days beside Jiyong, he would use the word intermittence. Jiyong could be found shifting between two states: one, that did not last long, where his eyes beamed with lucidity and he would recognize Seunghyun, as Lee Seunghyun; in those moments both could speak about minuscule scraps of their lives and Seunghyun would dare to push some parts of himself towards Jiyong, one by one, little by little. The other one, longer and unpredictable, was all about indifference or lying. Jiyong would use him to relieve his mind and thoughts or would ignore him completely, walking absently through the house with his shoulders fallen and his gaze lost in painful flashbacks.

And Seunghyun would do nothing but stay there waiting; sometimes guiding Jiyong towards himself, other times hidden behind the tempest inside the mind of that man and sometimes attacked by his cruelty and demons.

Night was the most frightful, the worst part of that staging; enveloped in that foreign fragrance he had to resist the sensations of that thin, intoxicating body surrounding his waist, the ups and downs of his chest synchronizing with his own, those fingers clinging to his skin and those lips murmuring little words about love and tender, all whilst reminding himself all those thing were not meant for him. Those nights, inside the calm of the darkness, Seunghyun almost regretted his decisions. But the thought of leaving, abandoning that broken man appeared impossible, and he ended up pushing Jiyong’s body closer to his and clung onto that tiny hope increasing inside his head of being, one day, something else than a supplanter for those almond eyes.

Jiyong seemed to have awakened lucidly that morning, staring at Seunghyun as if his past wasn’t chasing him, with a sense of dry respect. As every other morning Seunghyun prepared their breakfast and placed the plates over the counter in front of Jiyong’s sleepy figure. He sat himself and stared back at Jiyong expecting for him to say or do something.

“Today Lee Soo Hyuk will come to pick me up for work,” commented Jiyong with null interest, without averting his eyes from the food as only to say something.

“Who?”

“The man that came the other day,” explained Jiyong frowning.

Seunghyun merely emitted a sound similar to “Oh” and nodded with his head, his eyebrows twisted in displeasure.

“Who is he?” asked Seunghyun after a moment of silence trying to sound uninterested.

“Soo Hyuk? CHOI Company’s vicepresident,”

Again Seunghyun only nodded with his head and let the rest of words lie inside his mind. It made sense now, the way that man had came before as if he had the right to condemn Jiyong; but though he wanted to know more about that man he chose to change the subject of his interrogations for Jiyong looked open to give some answers.

“Can I ask you something?” he said placing his fork over the table. Jiyong tensed his shoulders. “I mean, you actually owe me an explanation,” added Seunghyun to ease the weird atmosphere that suddenly arose between both.

Jiyong lifted his eyes and looked back at him with a merge between annoyance and curiosity.

At the lack of responsiveness Seunghyun asked, “Why did you drive to the bridge the other night?”

Jiyong drew a faint smile over his lips and looked at the distance. Seunghyun watched him in silence, admiring not the man with the smile but the man debating with his own, right behind.

“Please,” he begged and stretched his arm, in an attempt to touch the other’s pale hand.

“They shed his ashes there,” whispered Jiyong, without breaking loose of the contact between their hands.

“They?”

“His parents. Seunghyun hated the idea of being buried,” he answered and the subtle smile grew stronger on his face, “He used to say he did not want to occupy a space on earth that could be used for something else.”

“I guess he had a point there… You go there regularly?”

Jiyong shook and lowered his head.

Seunghyun, worried to be touching  stringsthat were too vulnerable, lifted his body and took his plate, now empty, to the sink. With his back turned he ventured to ask,

“Did something happen between his parents and you?”

“Nothing.”

“Oh, I thought…” but his mind was interrupted by the silhouette of Jiyong next to him, placing his own plate in the sink and looking sternly at Seunghyun before stressing his answer,

“Nothing,” and he left.

Seunghyun smiled with sadness and nodded as he always did when reaching that point where he wasn’t allowed to trespass beyond. That was Jiyong, an intermittent light beam, a teeny moment of truth between lies, which Seunghyun had grown to be accustomed to. Patience, he said to himself. Patience, was that thing he never was given and refused to deny to the man now next to him.

He knew it, or at least he believed, men, things, hearts needed time and he knew patience meant not to be passive but to act with the correct timing, with the right choice of words, actions and particularly with the right feelings. Patience, he repeated for himself and took Jiyong’s empty plate.

Half an hour after, a sound Seunghyun had never heard before resounded inside the house. Seunghyun, who was seated over the window’s sill with a coffee mug between his hands, stood up and walked to the library where the sound was coming from. A phone. But before he could reach the door, a rush of someone passed him and blocked his steps.

“Don’t!” Jiyong said with a heavy breathing, “Never, never answer that phone,” he ordered and that was when Seunghyun accounted that there wasn’t another phone inside the house but that one inside the library. And that puzzled him.

“Got it!” he said, lifting his hands in front of him and stepping backwards. “You could have told me before though. No need to scream.”

“Now you know,” declared Jiyong ignoring Seunghyun words.

The sound of a car parking in front of the house made both men turn his heads and forget that strange moment. Jiyong fixed his clothes and started walking towards the door but not after stressing again,

“Now you know,” in a tone made to be interpreted as a warning.

Lee Soo Hyuk came with the same stoat grin over his face and gave a loathing look towards Seunghyun from the outside of the house. Seunghyun ignored him, his eyes locked onto Jiyong’s steps.

And that’s how another morning ended for him, with the same kind of suspense and weirdness. And that’s how another boring day started for him inside lonely walls and silent places. He would clean the few or inexistent dust over the shelves, bored himself with one of the books in the library about economy and laws, stared at the pictures pasted next to the stairs trying to decipher their secrets or finally, before falling into madness, going out for a walk to a park that Seunghyun had found two blocks away. He would sit over one of those benches with a pencil and a notebook, each in one hand, and draw the people there. One ability he used to cherish back when younger and not until now, with all his free time, had started to explore again.

At six he would return to the house, twenty minutes before Jiyong arrived home. Again with the uncertainty of not knowing what to expect, how to act or who he was going to be in the eyes of that man, which Seunghyun, more like. His heartbeat increasing at the same tempo as the seconds ticking on the clock.

“Hey,” greeted Jiyong when he entered inside the house; eyes tired but real and awaken. And Seunghyun unconsciously let out a sigh of relief.

“Hey,” he answered back, lifting one of his hands. He was lying over one of the big sofas inside the living room. “Want to…?” he suggested, with his head pointing at the sofa in front of him.

Jiyong doubted for an instant but ended nodding and walked towards him. He placed his coat over the back of one of the couches and allowed his body to crumple over its softness.

“I’m tired,” he mumbled as his only answer but his tone did not seem annoyed or anguished.

 “You got a nice park near here, I found it two days ago.”

“Oh? Yes,” Jiyong affirmed.

“I’m starting to find this neighborhood interesting,” declared Seunghyun, taping his knees with his fingers with an awkwardness he could not even explain.

“It’s silent, that’s good for me,” said Jiyong, shrugging his shoulders without much interest and curled over the sofa.

“When I first came I thought it was creepy,” confessed Seunghyun with a hint of a wicked smile on his face.

Jiyong looked at him with sudden interest and returned the same kind of smile. “Me too. Seunghyun chose this neighborhood not me.”

“But it turned out to be a good place after all,” said the supplanter whilst giving a small laugh.

“If you say so,” muttered Jiyong.

Jiyong stood there, his hand drawing lines over the leather of the sofa, his eyes not really focused on something. Seunghyun without any idea of what to say next pulled himself off the couch.

“Want to drink something?” he said already walking to the canteen. Jiyong merely nodded with his head and kept silent, eyes closed.

Seunghyun prepared two glasses of whiskey. Not really sure if that was what Jiyong liked to drink but it was the first bottle at reach. He placed the glasses over the table between them, but did not sit on the coach again, rather he walked towards one of the shelves next to the TV where there were a bunch of disc boxes arranged by what seemed to be dates of release. He swiped a finger over their covers, murmuring their names and titles.

“You mind?” he asked after a moment, pulling out one of the boxes and showing it in the air. Jiyong briefly looked at him and shook his head giving him permission. Seunghyun placed the disc on the player and played on the music that filled every corner of the room.

“Seunghyun hated that one,” Jiyong remembered, pointing out at the player with the hand he was holding his glass of whiskey, the moment the music and the electric guitars started playing; but did not seem annoyed rather pleased by the choice.

“One point less for him,” said Seunghyun frowning jokingly and raised the volume. Politik playing through the walls.

“I told him. –How can you hate Coldplay?- He never really answered. He was like that,” said Jiyong and took a sip of his glass of whiskey. “–He hated things without any good reason.”

“I guess we all do, don’t we?” reasoned Seunghyun still looking at the disc box between his hands and moving his head with the rhythm of the music.

“That one’s not my favorite,” stated Jiyong lifting himself from the sofa and walking towards Seunghyun. He searched between the boxes and took another one, blue cover with a kind of tetris image, “This one is good.”

“X & Y? It might be…” said Seunghyun taking the box and looking at the back, recognizing the songs.

Jiyong nodded and took another one. “This one many people hated it. I never understood why,” he said, showing the Mylo Xyloto album in the air. “They all were stuck in the “They lost their essence”… Bull.”

 "I like that one, too,” murmured Seunghyun and nodded with his head. “I did hear the bad comments.”

“People change, that’s what they never want to understand. They love then they hate. They think they know… they know nothing,” said Jiyong returning to the sofa and falling again over it in a tiresome manner.

“The album was refreshing and unexpected, I can say,” stated Seunghyun but wasn’t really sure if they were still talking about the same thing.

“Cheers for that!” said Jiyong with sarcasm, lifting his glass but with his eyes closed, head pulled backwards.

Seungyun plopped again over the sofa, his eyes locked onto the sleepy figure at his side. The curvature of his pale neck, the way his black strands of hair fell over his forehead contrasting with the whiteness of his skin. Some buttons of the collar of his shirt opened carelessly. The Scientist started to play.

Jiyong’s lips were semi opened, his torso moving up and down subtly. His hands placed delicately at each side of his body. His presence hitting with strength inside Seunghyun’s chest, his eyes sliding over Jiyong’s body and figure, captivated by him. His sadness, his mystery already buried inside the supplanter’s mind. Jiyong stirred over the sofa and opened his eyes, as if he felt he was being observed. His eyes found the ones of the supplanter and opened widely the moment he noticed the intensity and the ardor inside those other eyes; the same kind of intensity another pair of eyes used to have when looking at him in the past. Memories, lots of memories boiled inside his head and he felt incapable to avert his eyes.

Seunghyun felt dizzy but similiar to the other man, felt unable to look away. A feeling of longing and desire raced through his muscles and back. The one at the other side appeared as something wonderful to him, and at the same time, cruel. He knew he was reaching dangerous places but did not stop.

Jiyong lifted himself from the sofa, and with slow, seductive steps approached Seunghyun without averting his eyes. When he reached the man, he slipped one leg over Seunghyun’s ones and lay over his lap, while his right hand pushed back Seunghyun chest to the back of the sofa. The supplanter let himself be handled, lost in his own personal desires.

The first contact between his lips was gentle, merely a brush between inflamed skins, but enough to create electrifying sensations at the necks of both men. Seunghyun surrounded Jiyong’s waist and pushed him closer, demanding for more, searching for more. He inhaled the fragrance of the thin man over his legs, intoxicating his senses. Both torsos brushing each other, both lips consuming each other. Jiyong’s hand played with the dark brown strands of Seunghyun’s hair, over his lips.

“My Seunghyun… my Hyun,” moaned Jiyong over the curvature of his lips and Seunghyun felt his heart ache in agonizing pain. The hands that were caressing his chest felt suddenly as if they burned his skin. His body trembled in desire and in cruel acknowledgement. Supplanter, someone shouted those words inside his mind.

Jiyong kept kissing, moving his hips in an agonizing movement over Seunghyun. The last one struggling inside his mind: dignity and desire, both merging into something confusing. He looked at his own hands pushing Jiyong closer; he stared at his own lips opening for Jiyong, asking the man in front of him with strong ardor. He felt betrayed by his own body.

 “I need you, I need you so much Hyun,” said Jiyong now over the skin of his neck, biting and marking sensitive places that made Seunghyun arch his back and moan in pleasure. “My Hyun…” kept repeating Jiyong over and over again.

Seunghyun hands started playing with the buttons of Jiyong’s shirt, revealing unseen skin and satin surfaces. His hands explored that body, that body that was right there in front of him, opened and excited but wasn’t his… not for him. Jiyong’s stare was lost in pleasure and inside his own personal demons.

Sweat, two bodies touching each other; eyes and minds blurred stained by lust, needs and lies. One begging for it to be real, the other begging to escape from reality. Two bodies colliding excited and confused, with a crooked type of love not reciprocated. Seunghyun stared at Jiyong’s gestures and felt guilty, a kind of guiltiness to difficult to swallow and his hands caressed the skin of that overwhelming face. I’m sorry.

“I love you,” whispered Jiyong with an innocent smile, the one Seunghyun every day admired at those photos pasted over the wall. Seunghyun wanted to throw up, to push that body away from him, to protect his own sanity but did nothing but stare, fascinated. “I love you Seunghyun, do you love me?”

And that’s when Jiyong opened his eyes and stared at him. And everything went down. Recognition and rejection filled Jiyong’s eye and a sublte hint of remorse. Their eyes met for a fragment of an instant. One asked for love, the other one refused to give. Jiyong pushed himself off Seunghyun’s body and walked away, hiding his face.

Seunghyun stayed there. His body felt like burning, his hands kept expecting, missing. His soul abide broken. He was consumed: soul and body. He heard Jiyong rushed steps climbing up the stairs and slam his door closed. Just until then he ran to the bathroom and threw everything: pain, guilt, rejection. He crumbled onto the cold floor of the bathroom and cried in silence. Moans without sound, curses not spoken, he drawn without letting anyone know.

“I’m going to hurt you.”

“I’m going to use you.”

“I know.”

“I know… I know,” repeated Seunghyun whilst grabbing his chest in pain. “I know… I must know.”

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Hey there! JessRa here. ^.^ Hope the story is still interesting for you.

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Soundtrack: 

-The Scientist -Coldplay