He thinks he’s gotten pretty cool at acting cool.  (Maybe he should have minored in theater.)  Jinyoung never once suspects, and Mark thinks they’re total bffs.  He feels a little bad about that, because under other circumstances, he could see that being true.

—

It’s been a year, seven months, two weeks, and four days since Jinyoung and Mark started dating.  Not that he’s counting or anything.

He walks into the apartment and sees that Jinyoung has been crying, and the urge to hit whoever caused it is as strong as it had been back in second grade.  But he wills it down instead because Mark is there and there’s a huge grin on his face.  A couple mutual friends are there too (next door neighbors) and he hears congratulations and there’s champagne in those, what are they called again? — oh, yes, flutes.  He had bought them a long time ago for some party but they rarely got used.

“What are we celebrating?”  There’s a hesitance in his voice and a sick feeling of nausea and dread and oh.god.this.is.not.happening that settles deep in the pit of his stomach, all of which cause the contents of his late night dinner to want to make an unwelcome reappearance.

The very moment Jinyoung sees him, Jinyoung’s whole face lights up, and he’s pretty sure the younger man would have run and jumped into his arms and given him a huge hug if his arms hadn’t already been loaded down with books.

So instead, Jinyoung yells, “Jaebum, Jaebummie hyuuuung, my lovely Bummmmmiiiieee,” while taking the books from him and setting them on the nearest available surface, which means he totally ends up dropping them on the floor.  

Before he can even wince because college textbooks are expensive as hell, Jinyoung’s got his face in his hands, squishing his cheeks together, making it almost impossible for him to say anything.  He tries to anyway, and Jinyoung leans forward and places a quick peck to his lips, effectively silencing him.

“I love you!”

He’s a little drunk, Jaebum sees it now in the flushed cheeks and slightly glassy eyes.

No matter how many times Jinyoung says those words to him (sober and completely trashed alike), Jaebum can’t keep his heart from nearly stopping at hearing them.  Jinyoung loves him, but Jinyoung’s not in love with him.  There’s a whole universe of difference that lives between the three extra words of ‘not,’ ‘in,’ and ‘with’.  It’s something Jaebum knows intimately well.

Mark comes up to him, offering a flute of champagne and Jaebum takes it without thinking, staring at the pale amber liquid like it holds all the answers to life’s greatest mysteries.  His mouth feels dry, and despite his already queasy stomach, he takes a long sip.  The bubbles make his nose twitch in reflex, making Jinyoung laugh.

“We’re celebrating.”  Mark brings Jinyoung in his arms and hugs him close.  “Because I asked Jinyoung to marry me and he said yes.”

Jaebum is not sure whose smile is the brightest or the most idiotic looking (aren’t you supposed to grin like an idiot when you’re in love?) and all he can do is murmur a quiet congratulations (it’s automatic, and expected after all) and smile (when did all the muscles in his face become so heavy?).  But inside, inside he feels like crawling into a darkened room and never leaving.

“Jaebum hyung! Hyung.”  Jinyoung’s voice catches, and he sounds worried and that’s just… odd.

“What? Hmm.”  It’s like he’s already in that darkened room, it’s nice in there.  Maybe he really will stay for a while.  He stares blankly at Jinyoung.

“Mark, get me a towel and washcloths; anything I don’t care.  Jason, find the broom and a plastic garbage bag and clean up the mess.  Joshua, in my bathroom, grab a pair of tweezers… I think I left them on the counter, and get the first aid kit and hydrogen peroxide, they should be under the sink.”

Jinyoung gives out orders with military-like precision, never once taking his eyes off of Jaebum, and the others rush to do as he asks.  

“Your hand.”  He gestures and speaks softly to him like he’s a young child in need of soothing, worrying that his friend is going into shock.

Jaebum looks down and is surprised to find multiple shards of champagne glass embedded in the palm of his hand, alcohol and blood mixing together, and it’s really ing weird because he feels nothing at all.

“Oh,” he says simply.  

Jinyoung takes care of him — any traces of not being completely sober gone at the sight of Jaebum bleeding — and leads him to the couch, where the others had placed the supplies he requested.  He disinfects the cuts and picks out all the tiny pieces of glass ever so gently, all the while keeping up a steady stream of mindless chatter, trying to distract Jaebum from what he’s doing to his hand.  

“I don’t think you’ll need to go to the emergency room hyung,” Jinyoung says, as he starts to bandage his hand.  “You really scared me there for a minute.”

He murmurs something unintelligible but Jinyoung doesn’t seem to notice.

“I’ll check and change your bandage daily to make sure there’s no sign of infection or anything, okay?”

The others are somewhere else, it sounds like the kitchen, since he hears voices in that direction.  They left them alone after cleaning up the glass and mess he made.  They know how protective Jinyoung gets over his Jaebum and choose to stay out of the way.

Jaebum thinks to himself that he may be Jinyoung’s, really he’s always been Jinyoung’s since that day they met on the playground, but Jinyoung will never be his.

He doesn’t even realize he’s crying, until he feels his friend’s hand brushing tears away with a gentleness that only makes him want to cry harder.

“Does it hurt that bad?”

Another stupid question, life really is full of them.

He’s not crying because of the pain in his hand, he’s yet to feel anything from breaking the glass of champagne.  How can he when the feeling of his heart breaking into a million little pieces over and over again is so overwhelming and blinding it makes him numb to everything else?

“Does it hurt?” he repeats softly, looking into Jinyoung’s eyes before looking down at his uninjured hand, the one that Jinyoung’s holding in his.  “More than you will ever know.”

FIN

__________

I’m still lacking in a lot of ways as a writer, and sometimes I can’t help but think this story (or anything else I write) could have been better written by someone else.  But overall, I am pretty happy with how this story turned out, and I appreciate all those who left comments and the support.  Thank you and I would love to hear your thoughts on this final chapter.

There’s going to be a companion piece (actually quite probably two companion pieces) to this.  At the start of this, I couldn’t help but think about the infinite possibilities — in the mentions of different universes and realities and circumstances, how things may or may not end up the same, and with that train of thought, I decided why not see where the idea takes me?  In life, we don’t get do-overs and we don’t get to backtrack to see where different paths will take us.  We pick one road, and we go forward.  But this is fiction and this is writing, and that’s the fun and beauty of it.  Imagination and inspiration.  It’s tentatively titled Bleeding Love: Stupid Cliches and within the next few days, I’ll probably put up a story forward and you can subscribe to it maybe if you’d like?  (For the JJ Project lovers, don’t despair…. different universe/different ending?  For the Markjin lovers, honestly it would be amazing if you would keep an open mind and take a chance on the story too.)