He held him tightly.

Whispering a quieter serenade than a distant songbird was the cool and dry breeze trickling from a tiny crack in the window. The room was painted blue with dark shadows, but welcomed a touch of silver through translucent curtains. A completely different world from the crisp white and pale sunlight of the day surrounded Tao and Sehun. They accepted the darkness like the long and intoxicatingly sweet kisses they gave each other.

Sehun closed his eyes.

The deepening day catalysed their romance. It wasn’t long before casually talking turned into Tao leaning onto Sehun’s forehead; Sehun listening to his breath as Tao revealed his plans for the future; their hands intertwining and swinging back and forth; their lips getting close enough to kiss; their clothes joining the carpeted floor with Sehun’s dirty laundry. As it got darker, they got closer to the truth; they said and did everything they ever wanted to say and do.

Tao absorbed the warmth of his skin.

In the almost pitch-black box, moonlight somehow skimmed the surface of their faces. Sehun’s was pale and clear. His expression softened. His low, sinister eyebrows relaxed. His lips curled into a blissful smile.

Sehun clung to him for dear life.

The only source of warmth in the raw autumn air was the man fondling the back of his head. Pressing his lips against Tao’s felt like the only right thing to do. He was guided in the blinding blackness by the warmth of this person’s every touch, which felt almost as gut-twisting and surreal as the words I love you.

On a slowly rocking boat, they drifted away to the serenade.

--

“I hate rainy days,” Kris announced to the world, his head pressed against the window.

Tao tapped aggressively at the keys, spewing out the sloppy last 200 words of his report.

“How can anyone like an ugly, gray day like this? Rainy days are so depressing. Plans are always cancelled… Your clothes get ruined...” He drew a frowning face on the pane.

“Well,” Tao muttered. He held the thought while his eyes squinted at his computer screen in deep focus. Then his tensed shoulders fell and he turned to Kris. “For people like me, it’s a good excuse to stay inside and not have to see anyone.”

Kris exhaled. “Is that how you spent the past three years without me?”

Tao chuckled. Realizing he didn’t know how to end his report, he shut his laptop and pushed it aside. He moved from the edge of his small bed to the opposite corner, where Kris knelt. He was taken aback at how much his friend still looked like the gangly, naive elementary school boy he once was. Not much had changed aside from his height shooting up and his face thinning out. Kris’s deep brown eyes stayed curiously fixed on the shaking trees outside the window of Tao’s room. The view was even more unpleasant than usual with the dismally murky sky casting its shadow of gloom all over campus.

“I hated those years. Let’s never talk about them again.”

“Seriously?” Kris finally turned his head, looking incredulous. He waited to see if Tao was joking.

Tao’s eyebrows collapsed into a frown.

“You really missed me that much?” Kris smiled and poked his friend’s cheek. “You little nerd. I missed you too.”

“Did you?”

“Of course! What, do you think I enjoyed going to the arcade all by myself every Friday?”

“You might want to rethink who the real nerd is here.”

“Hey!” Kris laughed and jabbed Tao with his elbow. They were now facing each other, cross-legged, just like whenever they would hang out in the field behind their high school. Kris’s smile was the brightest thing in the room.

“At least we can be nerds together now,” said Kris. “God, I’m so happy.”

Tao managed a tiny smile. Looking down at Kris’s tan and slender hands, he thought about how he had never actually held them before. During all those years of silly dreams about it and his heart pounding at the thought of it, never had it once occurred to him that he could just do it. It wouldn’t be strange to Kris at all, as they had no problems with being physically affectionate. But the barrier between Kris’s blithe unawareness and Tao’s burning feelings was too terrifying to break. Tao had spent the better part of his teenage years imagining and fearing the consequences of trying to express his feelings.

But now was a time of reconciliation. The past three weeks had been a restorative time for their fractured relationship. Although they both eased comfortably back into their camaraderie, Tao constantly felt the need to show that Kris still mattered to him. That the years of lost time between them weren’t years of neglect. That he was still the most important person in Tao’s life.

“I’m happy, too,” replied Tao, sincere, feeling warm and whole. He took Kris’s hand and his thumb across the knuckles.

Kris smiled, but he looked down and his hand slowly retreated. Tao refused to let go.

“What, are you afraid of a little hand-holding?” Tao said playfully.

Kris’s mouth opened, but no words came out. His hand twitched, but didn’t try to escape anymore.

“Ayyy, Kris! Why so serious?”

Kris’s face froze.

“Hello? Earth to Kris?”

“I’m only serious if you’re serious,” Kris breathed. He his lips nervously.

“What?”

“Do you like me, Tao?”

“What?”

“No way...” Kris scanned Tao’s face while a wry smile grew on his. The soft beat of rain was replaced by a tenacious silence that only worsened the terror engulfing Tao’s chest. “You do.”

. No. This isn’t happening.

Why was he grinning? The expression on Kris’s face must have meant that he thought this was hilarious, embarrassing, ridiculous. Now unable to breathe, Tao quietly sunk into the deep sea of shame he’d been avoiding for so, so long. He was ready to die right there in his cold, gray, substandard room. But then, Kris gripped Tao’s hand back.

“Oh, thank god,” said Kris.

--

A soft hand glided against his cheek and he kissed it good morning.

The fuzzy tune of millions of splashes against his window summoned a smile on his face.

Sehun held on so tightly, as if he might lose the precious person he was holding.

Eyes barely open, he breathed into the fresh locks of dark hair beneath his nose.

“Morning, Sehun,” said Jin.

His heart dropped and hit him hard in the chest.

He held her tighter, chin rested on her shoulder. The tiny drops on the window blurred away and the sound of rain became painful. A stinging warmth rose in his throat.

“Sehun?”

Wherever Tao was, he wanted to be there. He imagined inhaling Tao’s faint, minty scent, redolent of every pure and happy moment he’d ever lived. He imagined a blanket of gold morning sunlight caressing the slender figure of the boy who wasn’t in his arms. He imagined his life-- which was being out of his breath by a bitter and deceitful grayness-- returning to him like a feverish, wet wave hitting a shore and fizzling out into a soft whisper that sounded just like the first time Tao said “I love you”.

He cried until he couldn’t breathe.

The clock on the wall ticked too many times for Sehun to count. But with each second that trudged by, Sehun wished desperately for another chance to see Tao and say those same words, again and again and ten thousand more times.

--

“I LOVE YOU THIIIIIIS MUCH!”

Tao’s arms stretched out, revealing his impressive wingspan and severe intoxication. He wobbled on the arm of a park bench where lay an equally inebriated Sehun. The act of balancing a beer can on his forehead was much more interesting to Sehun than his boyfriend’s confession of love. To Sehun’s chagrin, the empty can tumbled off his head.

“Hey, punk! You’re distracting me!!” Sehun shouted back at Tao.

“I’m sorry I love you so much,” Tao giggled.

“Idiot.”

“HEY! Don't call me that. Show your elder some respect.”

Sehun rose from the bench to examine Tao’s face in the darkness. The dark circles under his eyes were still visible, but his overgrown hair covered his eyebrows, making him expressionless.

“Do you really mean it?” asked Sehun.

“Mean what?”

“You love me THAAAAAT much?”

Tao burped in Sehun’s face. Sehun smacked him over the head. They both laughed.

“I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it, .”

“I know that,” said Sehun, trying to sound aloof. He still wanted to know for sure, though.

“...”

“Prove it, Tao. Say it to me.”

“I already did!”

“Noooo, you said it to the world. You never said it directly to me.”

“...This guy is serious. Look at him! He’s no joke!”

Tao stood up on the bench again and shouted in the darkness, “HEY EVERYONE, THIS GUY IS DEAD SERIOUS!! HE WANTS ME TO CONFESS!!”

“HEY! Get down here, you turd.” Sehun tugged on Tao’s arm and he fell hard onto the bench, right next to Sehun. Sehun cupped Tao’s cheeks and pulled him close. “Say it to me. Now.”

“Okay. Ahem. Sehun is the supreme ruler, champion of all champions, master of all video games. I am a mere peasant and I shall bow at his feet.”

“No, not that.” Sehun laughed, but was losing his patience. He needed to hear those words, that painful confession that lingered at the edge of his own lips. The possibility of that sweet phrase falling into his ears was becoming too tantalizing.

Tao’s breath reeked of alcohol. His mouth hung open in dazed bewilderment and intoxication. Sehun could make out the faint lines of Tao’s features; the glow of distant streetlights unmasked the darkness and made it even more terrifying for Sehun to hear what he knew he needed to hear. However, the clumsy and beautiful face before him became tame again. Whatever was left of Sehun’s nerves fell to the ground along with all the empty cans of beer. He inhaled Tao’s mixed scent of booze and sweat and mint cologne and exhaled it all into the dry spring air.

“Sehun.”

“Yeah?”

 

“I love you.”

--

The very last of his material belongings lie in a pile in front of his bed like a piece of pitiful art in a bare museum. An unopened pack of cigarettes, a crumpled tube of toothpaste, a pair of keys, a leather journal and a white polaroid camera. Everything else that used to sit in the cold and dusty bedroom is stowed away in cardboard boxes and suitcases. In its emptiness, the room expands and now seems too big for only one boy to sleep in.

Sehun thinks he feels a vibration under his feet as he steps onto the cold, hardwood floor. But the apartment is undoubtedly void of human life. He sneaks into the tiny bathroom beside his closet and is caught off guard by the pimply, scowling boy standing in the mirror. The boy’s hair has no definitive shape anymore; a few tufts of dark brown stick out in every direction, but a flat fringe covers his forehead and clings to his low eyebrows. He has the same dark circles that surround Tao’s eyes naturally, but his are an ugly effect of sleep deprivation. A dirty, gray band t-shirt adorned with sweat and food stains completes the look of total apathy that the boy wears effortlessly. Sehun scratches his nose. The boy scratches his, too.

Above the mirror, the last functioning light bulb flickers. Sehun looks down at the counter, finding mouthwash stains hidden in the marble. Those’ll probably stay there forever.

--

“I’ll probably stay here forever," he declared more casually than a remark about the weather, which was more chilly than the usual autumn evening.

“Freaking freeloader,” Sehun hissed into Tao’s ear while still staring at the TV screen. “If you wanna stay here, you’d better start paying rent.” He tapped aggressively on the attack button, slowly killing Tao’s avatar.

“HA!” Tao escaped the attack and struck back with more force until Sehun’s life bar reduced to nothing. “K.O.!”

Sehun tossed his controller onto the floor like the good sport he was.

“First of all, it, loser.” Tao fell back into the couch cushions, hands behind his head in cocky satisfaction. “Second, did you just ask me to move in with you?”

“Did I?”

“Don’t answer my question with a question.”

Sehun chuckled. He pulled his feet up on the couch and turned to face Tao. Sehun deeply cherished the times when Tao had his bangs pinned back with a barrette. His dewy complexion was outlined with fine, imperceptible hairs with glowed white thanks to the cloudy sunlight embellishing the living room. Tao’s eyebrows and the corners of his mouth rose simultaneously. Sehun was certain he didn’t know how perfect he was at that moment.

“Yeah,” breathed Sehun. “I did.”

Tao’s smile widened into a grin. He stretched out his arms and fell on top of Sehun, who shrieked while tumbling onto the couch. Sehun bit his bottom lip, closed his eyes and chuckled. His eyes opened very slowly, taking in a little more crisp light and a little more of the clear-faced boy above him. His hand rose to touch Tao’s cheek before Tao leaned down to kiss him. It was the softest kiss he’d received in the last five months. It was the only kind of kiss he wanted for the rest of his life.

--

He slams the cleaning spray bottle onto the counter. Every last stain has been erased from every last corner of the bathroom. Sehun is sweating in spite of the low temperature. Using the same rag with which he wiped down the mirror, he blots the sweat off his forehead.

The light continues to flicker, more aggressively than before.

--

“I told you! It has nothing to do with him.”

“You know what, Sehun? I believe you. I know it has nothing to do with Kris. Because nothing is wrong with me reuniting with my best friend of six years.”

“...”

“But I think there’s something wrong with you.”

Sehun put his phone down. He hated the way Tao’s voice stung in his ear. He tried to loosen his throat with deep breaths, but that only made his eyes water more.

He put the phone back to his ear.

“Just come back home. Please,” he whispered weakly.

“I’m not doing anything until you tell me what the hell is up with you.”

“Tao, it’s none of your--”

“Don’t say that!” Tao’s voice trembled. It was obvious now that he was crying. “It is my business. I have the right to know what’s going on with you. I’m supposed to know!”

Sehun rubbed the back of his neck and let the tears fall. “I don’t know...I don’t know what I should tell you.”

“THE TRUTH, YOU IDIOT!!”

He was shaking in sobs. The mattress creaking and the cars rushing outside and the static from his broken radio were all muted. Every sound in his world was muted and replaced by the horrible noise of his lungs gasping for air and his body drowning in saltwater and trembling in shivers of agony.

“I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…”

“For what?”

“I’M JUST SORRY, OKAY?! DO I NEED TO TELL YOU WHY?!”

“YES.”

“Then stop avoiding me. Come over and I’ll tell you.”

bleep.

Silence.

The phone slipped out of Sehun’s shaking hand. He felt like his body actually froze. As though he would never be able to move from the foot of his bed, where he sat, legs apart and dizzy head hanging and ringing with the last few words he had just said.

Come over and I’ll tell you.

He waited, ready to confess.

He lay in bed, awake through the night, listening for the soft click of keys in the door.

Tao never came back.

--

His left hand grips the wheel. His right hand grips the shirt fabric on his chest. He is driving in a tunnel of pitch black with nothing more visible than the puddle of white headlight before him that is uselessly small and irritating. He thanks the darkness once again from bringing all of life’s most important questions to mind, keeping him awake for the last three and a half hours. Either snoring or breathing too heavily in the passenger seat is his blissful partner, who sleeps through the most painful part of the ride.

--

“You’re not the only one who has it”

Tao swayed his lanky arms in the air to the beat. The music buzzed in his ears and flooded his brain, letting him think of nothing as he watched a drunk Sehun wail on the floor. The younger boy’s eyes were completely shut; he was stupidly absorbed in the moment, like a veteran rock star performing his last song of the night, sweating profusely and wilting to the floor but thriving on the screams and chants of his adoring fans. Though in this room, there was only one fan. Jin had passed out in an uncomfortable position at the end of the couch, her round face squished into an accordion against the cushion. Tao’s upperclassman friend and study pal from school, named Junmyeon, sat on the adjacent sofa with a bottle of liquor in his hand and a tiny smirk on his face, unabashed by the egregious display of Sehun practically crying on the floor. Two of Sehun’s coworkers had fled about an hour earlier, but Tao hadn’t the chance to socialize with the quiet and inseparable couple. It was an unimpressive group of people, now reduced to three exhausted people forced into a marathon of sub-par singing by a piss-drunk Sehun.

“I’m not the only one who has it / It’s the thing everyone can have”

But Tao wasn’t suffering. He tried singing along for the first verse, but gave up on the song he’d never even heard before. It was a beautiful song, notwithstanding the weak, scratchy voice tonelessly screaming its lyrics in this karaoke room. At some point in his inebriated haze, Tao had an world-altering realization. His entire self was blown out of importance; he could feel himself being hurled off the face of the earth and disappearing into the starry universe, all the while watching from afar the most blinding and sickening and breathtaking and absolutely perfect being in all existence.

“Love…Love…Love…Love”

Sehun clutched the t-shirt at his chest while wailing the last and longest note of the song. His pitch miraculously aligned to the music in the final seconds, creating an ear-splitting, melodious echo that exploded Tao’s heart and then Sehun dropped the mic. His ratty, wet hair stuck to his forehead and sweat dripped down to his agape lips, and he held this exhausted look as he opened his eyes slowly and looked into Tao’s eyes. The purples and reds and greens of the cheap disco lights cast vague shadows around the plump and rouged features of his face. Tao’s arms fell to his sides.

They continued to stare at each other while the TV screen announced the end of their session. The table covered in empty bottles and half-eaten food became an empty space while they wished everything out of existence. They were the only ones left in the world.

--

Tao nudges Kris’s long, sleeping body in the passenger’s seat. “Wake up,” he means to whisper but practically yells instead. “Already…?” Kris croaks, though the ride wasn’t short at all.

They are wading into early morning, trudging through a softening, dark blue sky, dragging their tired lead feet across a gravel road surrounding by dark shadows of shrubs. Tao can hear the clumsy and inconsistent footsteps of Kris, as well as a few distant chirps. These intimate sounds aside, he finds harmony in the vast silence that was nonexistent even in his quietest moments back in the city.

Life would be much easier out here, he thinks whimsically but with the indelible knowledge that this isn’t true, that he really couldn’t survive a week living with millions of insects, and potentially bears, as neighbours. But he also knows the peace of the woods would keep him sane, at least for the weekend. Kris is here, primarily for company but to some extent for protection, so he has little to worry about.

Yes. Kris is here. Nothing to worry about.

Tao feels sharp nails tickle his ankle and in a short gasp his duffel bag is on the ground and his arms are wrapped around Kris’s back, which is broad and shaking with laughter. “S-spider!” Tao mumbles into his shoulder. Breathless, he turns to Kris’s face and catches him trying to stifle a fit of giggles. His eyes are barely open, lined with a crust of sleep, and his laughs are stupid and high-pitched. “It’s gone,” Kris manages to say.

After the heavy breathing subsides, Tao feels his face turn pink. Kris wiggles himself free of the boy’s grasp and picks up the red and black duffel bag with his right hand. In his other hand is the tent bag and his own knapsack, and suddenly Tao feels horrible for always taking advantage of Kris’s strength.

He shudders every few minutes at the thought of that demonic spider while they continue in silence down an uneven path of stone and dirt. This is going to be a very long weekend.

Now regaining his orientation, Kris leads the way, since he knows where they were setting up camp. The path disappears as quickly as the sun rises and soon they are weaving their way through prickly plants and big branches and lush leaves, into an unfamiliar world that thrills and intimidates the skinny and circumspect city boy. Tao proceeds with great caution, his hands instinctively holding his arms in a defensive position and his eyes on his dirtied canvas shoes.

“Here we are!” Kris lets out a satisfied exhalation that almost completely masks the exhaustion Tao knows he felt. The thump of the duffle bag hitting the ground startles Tao, and he realizes that he is becoming increasingly nervous. Though nearly every tree in the forest is visible now that the sky is a milky ocean blue, Tao’s growing apprehension of the unknown creatures that lurk deep within the foliage keeps him on edge.

He looks over at Kris. Clearly, the long nap he had in the car had done him good. His friend’s complexion is impossibly fresh and he wears a blissful smile as he unpacks the pieces of the tent.  His black hair is wet and styled into its usual half-ponytail, but placed in this particular setting, Tao finds him looking quite rustic and adventurous in a majestic, fatherly way. Sweat stains the front of his green tank-top, and Tao the corner of his lip at the way Kris’s chest looks when he is hunched over. He is absolutely hypnotised by Kris’s wilderness persona.

Following the arduous installation of their tent and Tao’s meticulous ritual of showering himself with insect repellant, Kris and Tao hike an untouched path of prickly shrubs and muddy streams, spot a black bear (“We have to go Kris we have to go we have to run the hell away right now before it mauls us and its cubs eat our skin and swallow our bones”), find a pleasant spot at the end of a stream and bathe and burn in the blazing August sun while making out, spot another black bear (“I’m going home”), build a fire back at camp to cook the beef they had packed, eat and drink until they nearly explode, and stare dazedly at the darkening sky until it’s spotted with billions of bright, white specks.

--

Sehun’s heart pounds in his ears. He feels his hands numbing, losing grip of the envelope he’d been holding for the past twenty-seven minutes...or is it even still in his hands? He looks down again for the billionth time, not surprised that the twitching letter is still floating between his hollow stomach and the mailbox. His breaths slow and attentive as if they are his last, Sehun pushes the letter forward and slip, into the mailbox it goes. No turning back.

--

“No way. I would never, ever give up this face.” Tao imagines how he must have looked while saying that. In this pale moonlight, probably riveting.

“C’mon. Not even if it meant another thousand years on your life?”

“Kris, an existence is nothing if not a beautiful one. This question is stupid. Besides, do I really want to live a thousand more years? Isn’t, like, the world supposed explode before then, or flood because of climate change or something?”

“Probably,” Kris replies as he flicks a beetle off of his shirt. “But what’s the point if you’re gonna be pessimistic about it? I’d be thrilled to live that long, thrilled. In a thousand years, we’ll be vacationing in space. The human lifespan will increase. The time machine will be invented!”

“Time machine? Where would you wanna go?”

A pause.

“I think you know.”

“Do I?” Tao can hear Kris shuffling uncomfortably.  “Where would you wanna go, Kris?”

“I would just, you know, want to go back…”

“To senior year?”

Tao breathes a short laugh and as he inhales the smoky air, a sad smile creeps upon his face. He isn’t sure what else to say. However, beneath the vast sky of countless burning questions for which the answers are so far out of reach and maybe even nonexistent, Tao instantly decides that the truth is enormously important. If he can’t even say what is on his mind, if he can’t be honest with Kris, whom he trusts more than anyone, then does he even deserve to be this happy?

He waits for Kris to say more, but a strange, flustered silence fills the space between them.

“He sent me a letter,” says Tao.

And without hesitation, he pulls the tightly folded wad of paper out from his back pocket and reads silently, to the stars:

 

Dear Tao,

A whole year has gone by since I last saw you. How have you been? Stressed out? Lonely? In despair? Ha. That’s wishful thinking. Well, life is pretty prosaic on my end right now. If you must know, I’m still living alone. No, she didn’t move in or anything. She’s gone. I ed things up, as usual.

You left your toothbrush here… Jesus, kid. I hope you bought a new one, you filthy brat. Ha ha.

I’m not sure what else to say… Maybe… I’m dying of missing you? That I wake up some mornings and it’s a perfect cloudy day and the rain drums sharply on my window and I’m strangled in my sheets and I can’t breathe? That the café has closed down and was replaced by an electronics store and I walk into it every day, religiously, and try to smell coffee and stand in the exact spot where your table by the window used to be? That I still have a ton of photographs of you and I don’t know what to do with them other than stain them with my tears sometimes? Ugh, what should I say, what should I say...

I’m sorry. That’s all I need to say. And I don’t need your forgiveness, because what I did was totally not forgivable. I just want to know that you read this, and I want, no, NEED you to write back. Please. Just say… something. Say anything. Or even call me if you want. I just want to know you’re listening, that you’re at least a tiny bit human and you still care about that boy you used to love enough to scream it to the world.

I’ll be okay, though. I’m sure I will. I can just live through the pictures from now on.

And please remember: my heart is on this piece of paper, Tao. So handle it with care.

Love,

Sehun

 

 

 

--

 

Thanks for reading!

- Nina