Jongdae is independent. He is calm, though not necessarily collected. 

It's been a couple of months since he's seen Kyungsoo, and sometimes he remembers that he's forgotten him. 

He usually forgets that he always remembers Kyungsoo though.

The weather is getting colder, and Jongdae is forgetting, but he remembered his scarf. He remembers that there is an old scarf in the forgotten bag found in a forgotten box last night. The goose bumps on his neck and his tensed shoulders remind him that it's about time to wrap that old darling around himself.

He pulls it out, and as it settles like a snake around his neck, the faint perfume slithers up the walls of his nose. That time, that world, serpentine, seizes his mind. He feels like a rodent, its last futile breath forced from it.

Shall he stop this suffering? He shalt surely die if he stops. He doesn't want to forget.

He trembles, his breaths smoking the air with heavy clouds. Fumbling for his phone, he runs inside his mind to a forgotten phone number.

He remembers, and dials like a starving beggar.

The beeps are much more ritardando than his racing inside, and his makes him want to scream out loud. He doesn't though, not out loud.

He ends the call when he knows the please-leave-a-message is coming because Kyungsoo doesn't have a personal voicemail. He doesn't want to hear a past Kyungsoo and feel like crying. He doesn't want to leave a message. He wants Kyungsoo now, the now Kyungsoo. 

But the now Jongdae is still independent, and stays calm. He pockets his phone and finds a seat.

When he no longer feels like crying, and when he has put the past Kyungsoo back into oblivion (because the now Kyungsoo doesn't exist in his world, so the counterpart is no longer practical), he tries to collect what he can of himself, and gets off the park bench. He thinks he should not collect the scarf in place of a piece of sanity, but he knows that the broken sanity left in him would appreciate the scarf more tonight when he feels like being strangled by past.

The scarf at the bottom of his bag and his neck cold and his shoulders tensed as he walks among independent men, Jongdae forgets once again.