Wooyoung came here to die.    

He spent the afternoon cleaning his house earlier, sweeping the front porch from fallen leaves. Red, brown and gold, all dry and fragile and crushable.  He’s done the laundry, staring blankly at the machine as it spins with a low constant hum he’s familiar with. There’s no smell of disinfectant this time, no white sheets stained with vomit or tears. There’re only his clothes. Only him.  He ironed, took care of the dishes, scrubbed the bathroom floor and tub for the nth time only stopping when his fingers stung and burn so much from the cleaning product but at least it’s something he knew how to deal with.  He put his best shirt on and wrote a goodbye letter which he placed on his kitchen table; somebody’s bound to find it, all their friends have keys to the house.  His dog howls in protest when he hugged her for the last time, wooyoung unleashed her, storing her collar and making sure she has enough food and water  until someone comes for her. Wooyoung has made a decision-- a poor one, perhaps, but one he won’t even be alive to regret.

So he drives his old truck along the bumpy road, leaving his small farm behind, corn fields stretching out on both side of the narrow path as the afternoon sun is dying slowly around him.  He stops near the abandoned train station, no one ever go here, no one ever comes around anymore since they built a new station few miles from here and it’s very fitting, wooyoung thinks. It’s far enough from anyone to find him too quickly but not too far if they gathered up a search party, which he knows Taecyeon will once he found his letter; perks of being friends with the sheriff of the town.

It starts raining when he kills the engine, and wooyoung has a fleeting idea that he should call Minjun, or Taecyeon, tell them to get him out of here, out of his own thoughts, punch him back to sanity before he gets to pull any deadly trigger. Wooyoung shakes his head and shuts his eyes, this is what he came to do, his breaths are shallow but he’s trying to take them deeper, calming his nerves, inhale, exhale, good, come on wooyoung, he whispers to himself. He’s terrified, but anything is better than waking up choking on your own tears every morning, the empty silence resonating throughout the house is slowly eating into his own heart, and still not enough to numb the pain, not enough to drown the ghosts of memories.

He’s giving up. He can’t do this anymore.

It’s a downpour now, raindrops falling relentlessly on his windshield and wooyoung steels himself, reaches toward his glove compartment with trembling, yet determined fingers. His hand is halfway to the dashboard when there’s rapping against his window--desperate, maybe that’s why he stops, hand suspending midair  from cutting off his own lifeline because desperation? Wooyoung knows him like an old friend. But to see it on someone else’s eyes that are not his, not with that same haunting grief, is something entirely new.

Wooyoung came here to die. But he supposed he could wait just a little more.

~

He says his name is Junho, and he’s been running along the train tracks for hours but hasn't seen a soul until he sees wooyoung’s headlights through the darkness and rain.  “This station is abandoned, didn't anyone told you?”  wooyoung says to the drenched man, reaching over to shake the handle of his passenger door because his truck is old, and it needs a good pull before the door would lock.

“No, I hitched a ride on a freight train,” junho answers, voice shivering slightly, a drop of rain slides from his sideburn to the sharp hinge of his jaw , gliding slowly down his chin before dropping on his soaked pants.  He doesn’t lean back after buckling his seatbelt on, his fingers on his lap, his knees pressing together.

Junho is dressed like he’s about to come to a wedding, his shoes not the kind to wear on muddy grassy ground, and wooyoung recognizes an expensive suit when he sees one. But there’re missing upper buttons on his dress shirt and the stitches on his shoulder seam coming undone as though someone has tried yanking his sleeve off with force.

Wooyoung has questions, but decides it’s best to keep it to himself. So he nods ,and get the small pouch with a towel inside that he keeps in the glove compartment. It has a strange scent, wooyoung tried to use fabric freshener to win over the sharp disinfectant smell and ends up having a very minty very lavender scent instead. Nichkhun never complained about it though, he usually just gave one of his amused smile while wooyoung wipes the cold sweat on his forehead; looking out the window again to enjoy the scenery,  the smile never left his face no matter how weak he gets as the days progressed.

“ thank you.” junho says when wooyoung hands him the small towel, his eyes fixating on something inside the compartment before using the towel to dry his face.

 “Were you heading anywhere particular?”  wooyoung closes the glove compartment slowly,  the glint of steel catching his eyes briefly, like a promise waiting to be fulfilled.

There’s a pause before junho answers, like he’s trying to figure it out as well , “ you can just drop me off on the nearest bus stop, “ he says.

And wooyoung does exactly what junho asked him to do. He drops him off on the edge of town, the street light above the resting place flickers as junho steps out from his car.

“ here, take this. you’ll catch pneumonia that way.” Wooyoung takes his jacket off and hands it to junho through the open window; at least his jacket will do someone some good this way. He donated most of nichkhun’s clothes to the Salvation Army; he knows nichkhun would like that. Maybe he should rewrite his letter and tell his friends to do the same with his.

 “ thankyou again, I would've freeze to death if you hadn't helped me. you're a life saver.” Junho gives wooyoung a lopsided grin. His half wet hair sticking on every direction and the gratitude in his face is so blatantly apparent.

Wooyoung nods, doesn’t bother to think about the irony of it all. He went out to take a life, and yet he ends up saving one. But the night is young, and the .357 tucked inside his glove compartment is still there, safe in its holster. Wooyoung bids junho goodbye and drives home, after all, he has something important to do.

~

The letter he written stares at him, wooyoung’s not entirely sure what he wrote before, thankyou for everything? goodbye for now? Give everything to charity and please take care of baekku for me? Something like that. The .357 he took from his truck sits quietly beside it on their dining table. Taecyeon gave it to him a few years ago as birthday gift. Nichkhun hated it, have had arguments with Taecyeon about it, but wooyoung would rather settle with a disgruntled nichkhun in the morning than having all their chickens stolen by foxes. He wasn’t going to hurt them anyway; he’s just planning to scare them away.

He’s not planning to scare any foxes away right now.

But something doesn’t feel right, wooyoung tilts his head aside and looks morosely at the carpet, he’s going to make a mess if he uses a pistol here, and the carpet is so hard to clean. Wooyoung goes to the bathroom and takes one canister from the medical cabinet. The doctor gave this to help nichkhun sleep, and wooyoung has spent countless hours in front of his aged computer to study everything there is its to know about it, this and all of the pills nichkhun need to take daily. He knows the correct dosages, knows what will happen if he surpasses the lethal amount, and it sounds nice, the thought of sleeping, he doesn’t even need to wake up again.

There’s a knock on his door when he opens the canister, so he closes it again and slips it into his pocket, he’s not expecting anyone to come over but then there’s Taecyeon standing in front of his door. And behind him, a pair of small eyes peeks to wooyoung before a hand is waving to him, followed by a shy grin.

“ hei, it’s me again. Hope you’re not tired of me yet.” Junho takes a step and stands next to Taecyeon, his grin widening.

“ there’s a landslide up at 45. No bus coming or going for a while, minjun’s inn is full and this one says he knows you?” Taecyeon scratches his head.

“ please tell him that you know me, or I have to sleep at the sherrif’s office.” Junho pleads, he’s smiling but wooyoung sees the distress in his eyes. not so much like the desperation he saw when they first met but wooyoung finds himself nodding anyway.

“ it’s okay I know him.” he says to taecyeon.

Junho falls asleep the second his head touches wooyoung’s couch. He’s snoring softly, and it feels different for wooyoung, to hear these sounds that aren’t coming from him , the pull and release of junho’s breath occupying the space where silence used to linger. Wooyoung reaches down his pajama’s pocket and sets nichkhun’s pills on the night stand, only blinking once before sleep comes to him.

~

“…and I told him, no, hyung that’s not how you make the chicken cross the street, that’s not even the point of the joke. But this guy is persistent, and by now—“

Junho is loud.

He laughs wholeheartedly on his own jokes, and he talks with his hand. They’re shooting up to the sky, moving on his sides, pushing his fringe back, and doing it again when it keeps falling over his forehead as he tells his stories to wooyoung.  He doesn’t tell wooyoung about what happened the other night, though, why he was hitching a ride on a freight train, where he was actually going, what was it he’s going away from, and wooyoung doesn’t push him. He offers to refill junho’s mug instead,  trying not to dwell on how the same red mug was held by a different hand years ago.

It feels like wooyoung has gone through longer than that, that the months and the days somehow stretches lazily, the hours dragging slower with each minutes draining him from the inside, along with it is his will to repeat another day without nichkhun by his side. Wooyoung feels his life is withering away, but see that’s what happens when you take the sun away; everything else just wilt, and dies. Wooyoung is no exception, and  nichkhun has been his own sun for as long as he can remembers.

“ wooyoung, are you okay?” junho asks.

it takes wooyoung a moment before he lift up his face and forces a smile to junho, “ im fine.” 

Junho looks at him like he knows better, and wooyoung turns his focus on making another mug of hot chocolate, sprinkling some cinnamon and stirring it to the shape of eight methodically. Some memories are haunting, they latches so tightly on to him that it suffocates him,  leaves him fighting for air and he just need a moment, a time out, a break--whatever, because the walls are crumbling around him, has never stopped crumbling since nichkhun died.

“hey,” wooyoung opens his eyes when junho places a palm on his shoulder, doesn’t remember when exactly he closes them or how long junho’s been standing beside him “ it’s okay if you’re not. No one is okay all the time.” his voice careful, but then he’s grinning. Junho still has sleep in his eyes and his hair still sticks to every different direction although thoroughly dried now. He looks hopeful, and so young, his smile b with life. Wooyoung can’t remember the last time he looked in the mirror and finds hope looking back at him.

~

Taecyeon comes over a few days later and tells them that the road is clear, that the buses are coming and going as scheduled again, so if Junho want to leave, he can go whenever.

Junho doesn’t.

Wooyoung doesn’t ask why.

~

“ eww, wooyoung,  it got chicken poop on it!” Junho shrieks, cursing loudly when some of the hen runs out of the coop, feathers all puffed and ruffled.

“ don’t shout, you’re scaring them.” Wooyoung mutters, checking the cables to make sure the heat lamp works; it’s getting colder as winter approaches and the last thing wooyoung want is his chickens freezing to death. “-- and those are eggs, of course it got poop on them, we’ll clean them later.”

Junho steps out of the chicken coop, puffing away a stray feather that lands on his hair. He has a basket of eggs in his right hand, wooyoung considers that an achievement on its own. “ Ugh, these things smells nasty.” He made a face which wooyoung can’t help but smiles at.

“ some of the hens are brooding, and their droppings  stinks more when that happens, that’s why we have to clean them.” Wooyoung moves to get the basket from junho. “ you could wait in the house if you want to, though.” He offers, looking at the breadth of Junho’s shoulder as the latter washes his hand albeit wearing gloves the entire time.

Junho has been--,and wooyoung is not exaggerating, a big help around the farm since he’s been here. He helped wooyoung with the fences, although his smooth fingers and finely clipped nails show clearly that these are not the sort of things he used of doing. He had blisters on his palm after, and wooyoung tends it while Junho tells one of his jokes, something about an baby elephant and a cheetah,  and wooyoung chuckles, if not from the joke it’s from the expression on junho’s face as he tells them. The smell of disinfectant still makes his stomach churn, but junho is loud enough to distract him of anything else but his stories, and wooyoung welcomes that.

“Let’s do something tonight. “ Junho says, wiping an egg carefully with dry cloth, showing wooyoung that he actually listened when wooyoung explained about cleaning and sanitizing eggs, the importance of keeping the bloom intact, and not just wrestling baekku playfully on the carpet the other night.

“Define something.”  wooyoung places an egg carefully.

“ I have an idea.” Junho grins, and by this time wooyoung can already recognize the glint in junho’s eyes, it means he’s about to do something crazy--has done things that are crazy, like jumping off the dock at the small lake just a mile from the farm because he feels like swimming, which wooyoung has no objection before junho thinks dragging wooyoung down the water with him was a great idea. They’re lucky they didn’t catch any cold because of it. wooyoung hates to be sick.

“ you have an idea?” wooyoung nods, feigning interest before he continues, “ may god have mercy on our soul.”

“ Yaahhh!!!” Junho shoves him, but his face is playful and he’s laughing. And wooyoung finds himself laughing with him.

The idea is for them to have dinner outside. And while wooyoung thinks about going to the small Italian restaurant up town for the sake of junho’s request, that in all is not what junho had in mind. Junho insist on handling the dinner menu for tonight, wearing the apron wooyoung never bothers to wear and chats throughout the preparation, not allowing wooyoung to lend a hand in anything.

So wooyoung sits tight on his stool and watches Junho, talking and stirring and flipping, his cheeks flushed and he’s grinning. He’s always grinning, as if staying in wooyoung’s farm is the best thing that ever happened to him.  Sometimes wooyoung wonders what junho does for a living. Maybe he’s a chef, and he’s bragging his skills right now, but then the way he manhandles the vegetables makes wooyoung second doubt his own guess. Maybe he works in an office, small cubicles in a tall skyscraper, glass windows and employee cards. Wooyoung wonders what life must’ve be like living in the big city, it’s something he really can’t imagine doing, not having able to look at the horizon at sunset, or walk between the cornfields, or something as simple taking a swim in a lake. Maybe junho is part of a secret gangster society, that he’s running away from a mission gone wrong, but then the way he plays with baekku cancels that thought entirely, Junho is kind and gentle with animals, he’s kind and gentle with him too. Still, Junho haven’t told wooyoung anything about who he is or where he came from, but neither has wooyoung. They know each other only as junho, and as wooyoung, no baggage of memories or history between them and wooyoung is content leaving it as that. Everyone has secrets, and not all secrets are for sharing, wooyoung understands that entirely.

Junho’s idea is for them to have dinner out in the open. And by in the open, he means by the lake. So they bring blankets and place the food into a picnic basket along with some candles and flashlights. Wooyoung leading them on the small path that’s familiar, they walk passed the cornfields,  Junho’s holding his hand like his life depends on it, stumbling and only once—slipping and falling on his . But he’s determined, wooyoung will give him that, and junho’s enthusiasm is contagious, they’re chit-chating along the way until they reach the lake.

The moon is up and the stars are there, they spread the blanket on the small dock and have their dinner, the waters calm and so is wooyoung. Junho’s cooking turns out terrible, but wooyoung’s not complaining; junho is all smiles, more than usual wooyoung’s just glad he’s having a good time. The last time wooyoung did this, this , packing dinner and enjoying it under the stars, is when nichkhun still has his health, they still have their life, and wooyoung is madly in love.

He has none of that right now, but they’re lying on their backs, arms tucked under their heads and junho is halfway into another story, one where he spent two weeks in Africa, and he’s half whispering, voice low and steady, and yet somehow he’s still loud, like everything else drowns under his voice. It’s soothing, to listen to junho while looking up the stars above, lets junho’s stories takes him anywhere and everywhere in the world. Wooyoung wonders if that’s how he’ll end up too, a story junho would tell to someone else in his distant life.  Just another character he came across in one of his journeys.

“ hey , let’s go swimming.” Junho says after a few minutes of silence.

Wooyoung hums, “ you just did a few days ago, and if the water is cold in broad day light , how cold do you think it would be in night time. We’ll freeze to death.” He dismisses the idea.

But junho is stubborn, so when wooyoung feels a light kick to his foot, junho’s sitting up and slipping out of his jacket, tugging his shirt over his head after, it doesn’t come as a surprise to him. “ oh come on, it’s not going to be any warmer anyway.” 

“ that’s because winter is coming, I don’t—“

Junho throws his shirt on wooyoung’s face and grins, pulling his jeans—pulling wooyoung’s jeans that wooyoung lends him and stripping out of his boxers before wooyoung can give a proper protest, he jumps into the water immediately, dives in and surfaces a second later. “ the water’s f-f-finee.., don’t be a ch-ch-chickennnnn..”  junho stutters from the cold and wooyoung lets out a quiet laugh.

“ you’re crazy you know that?”

“ so i’ve been t-t-told , now g-get d-down here.”

He hasn’t done this for so long wooyoung almost forget how cold skinny dipping in the middle of autumn feels. He curses as he lowers himself slowly into the water while Junho watches with a triumphant grin on his face.

~

When winter finally arrives, wooyoung invites junho to sleep in his bedroom, the only place in the house with a proper working heater.

It is strange at first, to give up nichkhun’s side of the bed to someone else, or waking up at night, looking at his side and the bump under the cover is there again, but is not nichkhun.  Sometimes wooyoung gives junho a light tap over the blanket to remind him who sleeps there, and junho would mumble something for him and wooyoung would feel content.  Other times wooyoung would wake up early, a habit he brushed off from nichkhun, and just stares at a sleeping junho, at the curls of his dark hair framing his face like a halo. Sometimes junho will catch wooyoung looking at him, and he would smile.  Wooyoung doesn’t mean to compare, but it’s inevitable, junho is sleeping on nichkhun’s spot, and smiling to him the way nichkhun used to smile, and it feels so familiar and yet different at the same time. 

One day after his morning rounds, wooyoung walks in on junho in the kitchen with his letter, the one he shoved into one of the kitchen shelve blindly with the gun Taecyeon had given him. Wooyoung expects junho to scold him, the way he does when baekku jumps on him when he’s still asleep,  or look at him differently, or—like Taecyeon and Minjun have tried before, sitting him down and ask him to attend more grief therapy.

Junho does none of it, instead, he folds the letter and place them back in the shelves, and then he offers wooyoung tea and bacon and toast for breakfast. The toast is a bit burnt, so he apologizes and hope wooyoung doesn’t mind.

Later that night, wooyoung tells junho about nichkhun. He tells him about everything, leaving no secrets behind and for once it was wooyoung telling the story while junho listens.  When wooyoung is through, junho pushes himself from the doorjamb where he has been leaning against, climbs the bed, and kisses wooyoung. He doesn’t tell wooyoung that everything’s gonna be okay , doesn’t want to lie, doesn’t  make wooyoung feels more guilty that it’s not.

Junho is loud. But it’s not from his words this time, he’s not making a sound as he kisses wooyoung’s cheeks, planting them as light as butterflies on wooyoung’s eyes and nose and forehead, the press of his hand on wooyoung’s nape gentle and sure. It takes a while but wooyoung is kissing back, his fingers clutching on junho’s elbow as he tilts his head aside and feels the pull of junho’s lips on him. There’s only the sound of their breaths mixing, wooyoung’s breathing out and junho’s breathing in and it makes wooyoung’s insides shiver, because junho is not saying a word, and yet he understands everything junho is saying, loud and clear. Junho pulls wooyoung close under the covers as they sleep and holds him all through the night.

~

Spring comes fast and festive. 

They went to the town’s carnival on Tuesday, where junho gets obsessed over horseshoes pitching and would only stop after he won a large stuffed teddy bear for wooyoung. In return, wooyoung gives junho a gold fish from successfully hooking rubber ducks from a water trough. Junho’s already named the fish goldie by the time wooyoung came back with a purple cotton candy.

“ why purple? it looks synthetic.” Junho inspects the cotton candy.

“ I like it.” Wooyoung shrugs, stuffing a large chunk into his mouth. “ it’s pretty.”

“ I have eaten stranger things. “ junho chuckles in defeat and takes a bite.

They went on a ferris wheel ride, and when they’re at the very top, junho leans in and kisses wooyoung. Junho kisses like he would telling a story, he takes his time , going fast and slow at the right moment.  Wooyoung feels the world around him spinning, it’s a bit scary but also exhilarating and he doesn’t want it to stop, so he holds on junho’s shirt, and kisses back.

On Wednesday night Junho leads wooyoung deep into the cornfields, an old wooly blanket in his hand, spread over cornhusks on the ground, left to dry from last harvest. They made out like teenagers, hands and mouth and him helping junho out of his shirt while junho’s working to undo his fly. When it’s over wooyoung is lying on his back and watching the stars, they’re not panting anymore although the afterglow hasn’t really subsided.

“ what are you thinking?” Junho’s hand is on wooyoung’s stomach, fingers splayed out,  warm and real.

“ nothing.” Wooyoung answers, barely a whisper. And he’s not lying. For the first time ever since he lost nichkhun, he’s not thinking about anything. No hectic thoughts and voices filling his head. Nothing.

Junho rolls on top of him and kisses his chin, “ that’s a good thing?”

“ yeah.” There’s a bruise just under junho’s collarbone and wooyoung brushes over it with his thumb, remembers placing it there just a while ago.

“ yeah?” junho is smiling, leaning down to place his elbows on either side of wooyoung’s head. “ okay.” He hushes, tilting his head and finding wooyoung’s mouth again.

~

All good things come to an end. Wooyoung knows that, knows it since he’s seven and crying with the half torn funpark ticket in his hand. His mother ruffles his hair to comfort him then, saying we can go some other time again. That day wooyoung learned that something good hardly last long.  He got reminded, bitterly, when he found nichkhun, and lost him, only in three years of span. And then again last night, after dinner when he walks in on junho in the living room, his eyes glued to the television, watching some random news with a kind of intensity he never seen on junho before. Wooyoung has gone through this enough to know to trust his feelings, and his feelings are telling him something is not right.

Junho tosses and turns on bed that night and only calms down when wooyoung hugs him, pressing his chest on junho’s back and planting small kisses on his nape. Wooyoung doesn’t know what to offer him, strength? consolation? Peace of mind? All the things junho gives him, all the things he can give junho.

Still, he wakes up to a burdened junho in the morning, he’s smiling at wooyoung but he’s not really smiling.  Junho is wearing the exact same suit he first came here with and wooyoung knows what’s coming. Or going , for that matter.

He drives junho to the bus stop, takes a deep breath and smile. Junho has told him many stories and in all wooyoung has learn that things comes and goes, people, comes and goes, places changes and nothing stays the same. Wooyoung learns to stop fighting it, to cherish the moments when they’re here, and celebrates the time they have together instead of mourning it. A story ending means another story is starting.

“ I won’t be gone for long.” Junho chuckles, awkwardly, his fingers on his lap the same way as when they first met. Junho’s looking at him from the passenger seat, and he looks like he’s about to cry. For all the stories Junho told him, wooyoung knows that there’s something he’s holding back, knows how it pains him to hold it back, the small pauses he takes as he chooses his words, this look of guilt in his eyes when he knows wooyoung knows he’s hiding something.

“ do what you have to do.” Wooyoung tells him. “and come home to me.”

Junho hugs him tighter than ever before and wooyoung hugs him back within an inch of his life. A black shiny sedan comes to get junho and before he climbs into the passenger seat, junho stops to throw a playful wink at wooyoung. Which he fails. Wooyoung laughs.

~

About a year after junho left, wooyoung’s sitting on his couch with baekku sleeping near his feet. It’s another cold autumn, a slight drizzle that goes on a few days now when he hears a knock on his door.

Something’s lodging his throat and wooyoung is blinking back tears as he stand on his doorjamb.  Junho’s taking off the beanie he wears and ruffles his own hair, he’s sniffling and his eyes are red although he’s grinning like mad. " Hey," he says quietly.

“ Hey," wooyoung smiles, "You look good. Your hair--, you changed your hair,” Wooyoung gestures with his hand,  shaky, he’s in the brink of tears yet also is a thread away from bursting into laughter and all of these feelings mixing and expanding and it’s all too much, he thinks his chest is going to explode any minute now. 

“ yeah.” Junho laughs, and cries, running his fingers over his purple hair like he’s not really sure how to do this, and it tugs wooyoung’s heart so hard he stops breathing for a moment. “ it looks synthetic, though.” Junho adds, eyes crinkling in a shy smile.

Wooyoung lets his feet takes him to junho, pulls him into a hug a second later. “ I like it.” he says, cheek pressing on junho’s shoulder, junho wrapping himself to him and it feels like home is home again, “ it’s pretty.”

Wooyoung doesn’t know how long junho will stay this time, how much chance they have, how many years life will give them, but he’s glad he’s finding it out with junho.