It was a good fine day in the summer, five years ago. It was nicely warm and not uncomfortably hot either. The sky was clear and blue. Scattered and dispersed clouds in the sky often gave shade from the blaring sun above that day.

The sea breeze that constantly blew from the beach nearby was cooling and the smell of sea salt in the air reminded everyone of how blissful it was.

Everything seemed all too perfect and earlier that afternoon. Chanyeol had just won the Japan National Go Tournament for the second year in a row, where he locked his opponent into conceding on the third round on the third day of the tournament.

That year’s match was hosted and took place in the city of Shimoda, a primarily resort and coastal city that was of course by the sea.

That year, Chanyeol had driven three hours from Tokyo with his mother and sister to attend the match in Shimoda- instead of taking the train to the tournament location like he did every year.

Following Chanyeol’s victory in the Japan National Go Tournament the previous year at the age of twenty-four, Chanyeol made history by becoming the youngest and the first foreigner to win Japan’s most prestigious Go tournament.

Chanyeol began competing in the yearly national tournament since the age of seventeen but he never won the tournament and only managed to come in as far as the second or third place in the finals in the past few years.

Chanyeol’s mother and sister often expressed their interest in accompanying and attending his matches to support him, but he would politely turn them down every year because he didn’t want them to see him lose.

Chanyeol held great pride for himself when it came to Go.

This time, especially after last year’s victory, Chanyeol was extremely confident in winning and he was the first to extend the invitation for his mother and sister to attend that year’s tournament.

Chanyeol’s mother and sister took the entire week off to fly to Japan and attend Chanyeol’s match this time.

And like Chanyeol thought he would win, he did win that year’s tournament indeed.

Chanyeol could still remember how happy he felt when he saw the smiling faces of his mother and sister when they were told that Chanyeol had won.

Chanyeol could still remember the voice of his mentor congratulating him over the phone all the way from Tokyo.

Chanyeol could still remember the weight of Mr. Fujiwara’s hand on his shoulder while cheering on Chanyeol’s victory.

Chanyeol had made them proud and that was what he was truly after above all the fame and victory.

After the match, Chanyeol thanked them all in his victory speech and stayed behind to answer questions from journalists, reporters and Go enthusiasts alike. Chanyeol obliged when asked for pictures and he smiled wide in all of them.

Even though Chanyeol won again in the years to come, it was the last time that Chanyeol would ever hold a victory speech and stayed behind after a tournament

ended.

On the journey home that evening from Shimoda and back to Tokyo, the car drove along a road that cut through the side of a mountain over a deep ravine.

The sun had not set yet at that time. Visibility was good but strong crosswinds and bad navigation caused the car to skid off the road and plunge head-on into the forest-covered ravine below.

Chanyeol’s sister was driving and his mother was in the front passenger seat. Chanyeol sat in the rear passenger seat and he was the only one who was pulled out of the wreckage- alive and in one piece.

Chanyeol woke up in the hospital a day later, where he asked for his mother and sister. Instead, he was brought down to the morgue and told to identify their bodies so the proper arrangements and procedure could be carried out.

Now, Chanyeol barely remembered the whole thing except for how empty he felt and how cold it was in that hospital morgue.

Chanyeol, Sungjin, and Junmyeon were chief mourners at the funeral, but Chanyeol could only sit down in silence, still in shock, while holding up a framed portrait of his mother during the procession. Everything else was done by his father and brother-in-law.

Chanyeol expected to be sad and in grief but he only felt unexplainably empty at that time. Chanyeol could not cry and he had a hard time believing if all of this was even real. Because none of it felt real.  

When the funeral procession ended at the crematory and when Chanyeol saw their caskets being loaded into the furnace, Chanyeol immediately felt the rush of emotions surging through him all at once.

It was too many emotions for one man and Chanyeol broke down, crying and sobbing uncontrollably. Chanyeol begged his father and Junmyeon to stop the cremation process, in denial that his mother and sister had passed.

As much as it hurt everyone there to hear Chanyeol’s anguish, there was nothing that could be done.

After half of the ashes were buried in their home in South Korea, the other half was brought to Japan and scattered into the sea by the coast of Shimoda as it was the last place they visited before their deaths.

During the ceremony, everyone was stunned when Chanyeol told Junmyeon that he didn’t need to do so because they were still alive and that they would come to visit him in the summer next year for sure.

They never came of course.

What was denial that everyone believed to be out of immense grief and guilt, eventually turned into a false belief and a drastic personality change caused by the lasting damage from the accident.

On some days, Chanyeol would mourn their deaths and on other days, he would talk about how he would spend the days when his mother and sister came over to visit him.

Now, five years later and going into six years in the coming summer, Chanyeol wouldn’t say that he had gotten over everything. But he did indeed found something else that he could look forward to, something else that could put a smile on his face again and something else he loved.

And that something was the person standing in front of him, bathing under the glowing moonlight that poured inside the modest apartment through the glass windows and doors.

Chanyeol did not fail to see and realize what he had now, but he did feel overwhelming like he was drowning and struggling within the depths of the murky water that was his life.

Chanyeol felt weighed down, heavy and struggling to just try and breathe. Chanyeol wondered if he would ever even resurface.

“Chanyeol,” Kyungsoo called, reaching out an arm to Chanyeol but pulling it back before he even touched Chanyeol.

As if his trance was broken, Chanyeol arose when he heard his name called out by the voice he had come to love to hear the most.

Chanyeol glanced over his shoulder to see Kyungsoo standing behind him under the illumination of the soft moonlight seeping in through the windows.

Kyungsoo was equally as quiet too. Kyungsoo was no mind reader but it didn’t take a genius either to know how much Chanyeol was in silent pain and suffering at that moment.

“Do you want to sit down?” Kyungsoo softly asked, motioning to the couch in the living room that was pushed up against the wall to create more space in the already small apartment.

Chanyeol did not verbally answer the question but Kyungsoo took it as a yes when Chanyeol walked over on the wooden floorboards to the couch in long strides before plopping himself down on the cushions that made up the couch.

Chanyeol had yet to take off his shoes and coat even though he had been inside for a while now. While Kyungsoo would have fussed about people wearing shoes in his apartment, he let it slide this time.

Besides, it was very much like of the current Chanyeol to forget to take off his shoes when inside. It was one of the little quirks that made Chanyeol unique, that might have or might not have contributed to the factors that led to Kyungsoo falling for him.

Kyungsoo chose to not bug Chanyeol about taking off his coat too either. That wasn’t important at that moment.

Kyungsoo joined Chanyeol on the couch very soon after Chanyeol had sat down. Kyungsoo sat on the other end of his brown couch from Chanyeol, leaving at least a few feet of space between them. Kyungsoo was very comfortable with Chanyeol and had no qualms regarding

Chanyeol rested his forearm on the armrests, with his fingernails unconsciously lightly digging into the fabric that made up the couch. Kyungsoo noticed this but Chanyeol surely didn’t.

Kyungsoo liked this particular type and brand of couch, which came with thick and deep cushions that allowed a person to sink into it when sitting down- that being one of the main reasons why he had bought it in the first place.

But right now, Kyungsoo only felt smaller as if the couch was swallowing him whole, especially with how his weight made him sink so much into the cushion. Kyungsoo not only felt small in the presence of Chanyeol whom he always admired- but also rather helpless.

Kyungsoo could feel Chanyeol’s anguish and sadness, acting like a sponge that absorbed the emotions of those around him. Kyungsoo wanted to help to do anything he could to relief Chanyeol from the torment, but he found himself unable to say or do anything to help ease Chanyeol.

Kyungsoo just felt like he had to say or do something for Chanyeol, but all that happened was nothing but utter silence between the both of them as they sat on that brown couch in the dimly lit apartment’s living room space, illuminated from the moonlight that came in through the glass windows.

Kyungsoo never felt or heard silence as much as this before, despite how much of an oxymoron it all sounded. Kyungsoo felt that maybe that statement itself was an exaggeration but it certainly felt surreal when Kyungsoo realized that there was still a lot more to Chanyeol which he had yet to learn and understand.

Kyungsoo attributed it to the distance and long separation between them all these years. But at least, Kyungsoo reveled in the fact that he was at least doing something about it now.

Kyungsoo tried hard as he may push the intrusive thoughts aside, to be the first one to break the dead silence between himself and Chanyeol. While they may have shared many conversations and words with each other, there was a noticeable tension in the air surrounding them this time that made even the simplest of words hard to say between two people who were very used to each other.

“Chanyeol…” Kyungsoo called out again, his voice trailing off.

Chanyeol, whose hand was still digging into the fabric of the couch as his head was turned to look out of the window instead, only made a slight noise to acknowledge that he had indeed heard Kyungsoo calling out to him.

Kyungsoo was glad enough that Chanyeol heard him, glad that Chanyeol wasn’t drifting off and lost in a haze like he had the tendency to do so. Not that Kyungsoo had any problem with that, he just didn’t know what it would take to be able to drag Chanyeol back away from that haze.

“Do you want to talk about it? I’m here to listen,” Kyungsoo offered, moving ever so slightly on the couch, putting himself just a little bit closer to Chanyeol on the other end. Kyungsoo quickly backpedaled, “-or if you don’t want to, then that’s fine too. I’m here for you.”

Chanyeol moved his head slowly and rather stiffly, averting his gaze from the window at the side of the couch to the blank wall and space across from where he was seated.

It was dark in the apartment still and the moon orbiting in the night sky had shifted from its previous position, now illuminating the apartment with its soft glow from a different angle.

Kyungsoo started wondering why