S.M. THE BALLAD Vol.2 (에스엠 더 발라드)_숨소리 (BREATH)_Music Video (KOR ver.)

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I knew him since I was a child. I could not have fathomed seeing him gone. We spent the waking, moments of the day till dusk. We played, we laughed and we fought our battles side by side. There were the moments when we were together and those times seemed to pass through as swiftly as water flowing down a river and yet, seemed so still and endless. How I yearn for those early memories to be real once more. For all they are now is nothing more than a bitter sweet calm, before the ravaging storm.

 

 

My sorrows began as I began and I became a man and my mind grew even more. So as I lived day by day, what I felt for her changed at last. For I knew I loved him forever more. Yet to my shame, I was afraid that I would lose our bond. As a child we were friends, unbreakable and solid, but as a lover I knew not.

 

 

So dark and unknown that path may lead it made my courage falter. The terror of what might happen overwhelmed my anticipation and longing for what could be. I lost heart and fled from my desires fearing that it would end what it already had been, until I could no longer run away. The year was fading; one to the next and soon enough we would have to part ways. We lived different lives and different minds; I could not be with him for much longer for adults we will be and even if I wished we did not have the same dream. Thus I waited for a time until the end grew nigh, upon the horizon our last days were set and I knew I had to tell. With what audacity I had left I set out a new day, August 31st, I planned to have my final stand and mustered all my courage the finally declare how I felt about him.

 

 

 

But fate fell cruelly upon my soul and him, just as I was about to utter the words I yearned to say, I lost my resolve to speak. We walked some time until we had to part ways; I said my thanks as he left my side. Upon the city streets in which he would lose his life, a car ran straight and true to break the edict men have made to save the lives that should not have been lost. True and true as fate would have, he walked down its path. In front of my eyes his eleventh hour struck when the car crashed onto his side.

 

 

For one last time I rushed to him like I have so many times before, but none so much as urgent. On the beaten earth where the asphalt ran red with blood, there he lay upon death’s door. I kneeled down and held him in my arms for one last embrace. With his last breaths that he gasped in the twilight of his life, he expressed the emotions I could not. With what little remained of his strength he drew my lips closer to his until they touched. A kiss so delicate that it seemed nothing at all, yet so passionate that when our lips parted it made me feel a yearning I have never felt before. Into my eyes he gazed while his started to fall slowly into the abyss, “Goodbye Baekhyun, I am sorry I could not say it sooner.” With that his final words were said, as a gentle sigh that left his lips. I held his body close to mine and felt his last faint pulse leave his body.

 

 

The funeral took place a week later upon this hill where I now stand. I stood here on this very spot where I watched his casket slide down slowly into the earth. I threw a handful of dirt on the coffin and watched as a person that I had known since birth leave this world into the next. I shed no tears on that day nor any day afterwards. I did not think tears would be enough to express my grief. For a time after that I wandered.

 

 

Years passed and time seemed to be nothing but a blur. I passed college with a degree I no longer knew the reason why I studied it. I woke up every day with nothing to convince myself to stand other than then to simply exist but even that seemed all too pointless. Now the sun is reaching twilight and the scarlet sky grew even darker. The monument of my shame and grief shone red like the blood upon my hands. I drew a pistol from my coat pocket, a Colt 1911 45 caliber I acquired from a gun shop a few weeks ago. I had it cleaned and the rounds I loaded before I left and brought it with me, planning to end all on this day. I drew it slowly towards my right ear, my hand steady and sure without any hesitation and for a moment I waited for a sign, a signal from above maybe, I was still alive for some reason that maybe I had to answer some grander calling…but none came.

 

“Perhaps I would meet you earlier than I thought” I said to myself silently. I closed my eyes as I readied for my death and pulled the trigger.

 

 

Click…

 

 

The sound resonated in my ears and blocked out all other sounds. I knew the gun jammed, yet around me I felt bliss like an enormous weight was lifted from my shoulders. I kept my eyes closed fearing what I would see if I opened them, but through my ears I heard a choir of song so brilliant that It touched my heart until it trembled, I heard the winds of life pass through me and as if a multitude of beings were with me and I felt I was not alone. I heard a voice, a voice I had not heard in such a long time and that I had almost forgotten the sound. At first it seemed so feeble and quiet that I could not understand the words, until it slowly grew in intensity that I was finally able to recognize it, the gentle tone of his speech, the ages past language that he was fond of speaking in, the voice that I heard when I listened to Baekhyun’s last words. I heard a voice and I knew it was him, but I could not. It was as if some force made me quiver if I dared to do so. But I heard him nonetheless; I found solace, in his words which I have not heard in so long. I felt his arms around chest in a tender embrace, his brown hair that I missed ruffling. The veil that forced my eyes closed lifted and I opened them slowly. All around me was a field of white, white so fair nothing humanity can make could produce such an imitation close to it. I grasped his arms on my chest and I turned to face him. He still looked the same as if he were still in high school, his brown hair, his golden framed glasses; the brightness of his eyes which at the moment where tear filled and watering. I ask him with what voice I can muster.

 

“Why are you crying?” he looked at me straight in the eyes as tears ran down his cheek.

 

“Do not die for me; do not feel miserable for my fate for I am with God now. Instead be happy that I lived to  begin with and that I spent my life with you, however little.”he said with such emotion that I was taken aback.

 

Even in death he watched over me and felt my torment, he never really did leave my side. This revelation I had made everything all too clear, he forgives me for what I have done, no, he never really blamed me in the first place. I smiled, truly smiled and looked him in the eyes. I reached out my hand and him gently on his head, caressing his hair between his fingers.

 

“I imagine that my time here is short. So before I go back I would like to finally say it. I…I loved you and I am sorry that I could not tell you. I am sorry that I did not have the strength and courage to tell you. I am sor…” he held his finger on my mouth before I could finish and smiled back at me.

 

“Stop, don’t, I already know.”

 

 

 

I regained consciousness on the hill, still not believing what I had just witnessed. I could not be sure if it was real, but I no longer felt the anguish in my soul. I looked once more upon his grave and saw the pistol laying there, but over it a blue feather lay, not like I have ever seen before. Radiating a magnificent blue luster that made it seemed like diamonds could not compare. I reached for this feather with my hand but the wind blew it into the horizon.

 

“So that is what you want.” I muttered to myself, as I watched the first light dawn brighten the sky in fiery scarlet and for what seemed to be an eternity in darkness I woke up to a new day with hope in my heart and walked away a new man.

 

 

 

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