SeungRi’s the kind of person that doesn’t take things for granted. The kind of person who notices every little detail. The kind of person who appreciates the things he’s been given.

Or so he thinks.

SeungRi walks out from his studio, the familiar tingling in his fingers ebbing a bit now that he’s packed up his paints and brushes, now that he’s finally finished the painting he’s been slaving over for months now. Colours, his painting is filled with them, each one bringing on a life of its own. Pink for softness, yellow for joy, blue for coolness, and purple for vibrancy.

And his red, his precious red that he associates with blood and roses and the packaging on his cup noodles that he eats much too often to be healthy.

In fact, SeungRi’s so preoccupied with the next project he wants to start beginning to take shape in the back of his mind that he doesn’t even remember to look both ways like his mother always told him to.

There’s a screech and a gasp, and then the asphalt is splattered with the red SeungRi loves so much.

The next time SeungRi wakes up, he realizes he can’t see colours anymore.

---

“You have a stain on your shirt.”

SeungRi meets a man at work one day doesn’t take hints and doesn’t seem to know how to keep his incessant curiosity to himself.

He keeps pushing and pushing and SeungRi flushes and twists the rag round and round in his hands, trying his best to answer without actually answering at all. The minutes stretch on and yet this stranger doesn’t seem to want to let his question go.

“I can’t see colours,” he admits finally, closing his eyes in shame, not wanting to meet the stranger’s eyes because he knows all he’ll see is confusion, pity, or revulsion. “I didn’t know there was a stain on my shirt.” He keeps the expletives out of his sentence because he quite likes his job, but they’re there in his bitter tone and the way SeungRi glares at the spot on the counter he’s trying to clean that won’t come off.

“So you’re colour-blind.”

The man says it carelessly, like he really is just curious. Something like wonder flutters in SeungRi’s chest and he chances a glance up, meeting the stranger’s soft eyes that watch him with a slightly interested look on his face. Wholly unthreatening. SeungRi suddenly finds it a bit easier to breathe.

“Not really. Colour-blind people inherit it. And they can see colours, despite the name. Just differently.”

“And with you?”

“I don’t see them at all,” SeungRi says flatly. “Not anymore.” He looks down at his hands, at their offensive shade of gray, and then down at his shirt, a shade of black. His stomach turns and he feels sick, like he does every time he thinks about his affliction enough to actually notice it.

The man is silent for a while that SeungRi thinks he’s dropped the subject, SeungRi ignores the frustration at yet another conversation that is given up when the subject of his disability comes up.  But then the stranger speaks up, and his question is simple.

“Why?”

---

SeungRi finds out that the stranger’s name is JiYong, and that he’s an aspiring musician ‘just waiting to be discovered’, as he puts it. He finds out that JiYong plays five different instruments and has a nice singing voice, that he likes peaches over oranges, and that he wears different socks to bed just because he can.

SeungRi clocks out for the day and leaves the cafe, wrapping his scarf around him hastily as he jogs towards the bus station nearby (they wouldn’t let him drive when they realized he couldn’t see red from green). He’s just finished tying the knot when someone tugs at one end of the scarf and almost chokes him.

“I’ll drive you home.”

SeungRi finds out that JiYong drives an old, beat-up Chevy that desperately needed a paint job (and a new bumper and three hubcaps). He finds out that JiYong likes his coffee with lots of milk and no sugar, and that’s he’s got a bit of sweet tooth. He finds out that JiYong’s curiosity, though it hasn’t got him killed yet, has gotten him into more trouble than the answer was probably worth.

He also finds out that no matter how many times SeungRi tries to push JiYong away (as if he needed any more complications in his life) JiYong will just keep coming back with a wide smile, a new song, and a coffee order.

“What are you doing tonight?”

“Sleeping.”

“No, that’s too boring. Let’s go play.”

SeungRi really, really doesn’t want to play, he really, really doesn’t want to follow along half-heartedly as JiYong drags him through the crowded marketplace, pointing out all his favourite street-side vendors, and SeungRi really, really doesn’t want to try the spicy fishcake JiYong’s trying to shove into his mouth. But apparently what SeungRi wants doesn’t add up to much in JiYong’s world.

It’s loud and noisy and people are always pushing into SeungRi’s way. There’s so much happening all at once and SeungRi remembers exactly why he never went out anymore.  Fear, suspicion, it all blurred together when he couldn’t discern one shade of black from another. Cringing into JiYong’s side without thinking reminds him why he’s avoided socialising. But the excitement is infectious, and SeungRi hopes for just a moment.

Beside him, JiYong chatters like he always does, completely unconcerned about monopolizing the conversation since he knows SeungRi won’t respond most of the time anyway. He talks about his music, about getting scuffs on his new shoes, about how dry the chicken he had last night for dinner was. Useless trivialities that JiYong feels the need to share and SeungRi had no choice but to hear.

That night, SeungRi goes home holding a 3ft plush animal (which he immediately cans the moment he steps through the door) and snack wrappers shoved into his pockets. His ears still ring a bit and his clothes reek of street food. He’s exhausted from traipsing all over town, trying to keep up with JiYong.

For the first time since the accident, SeungRi dreams in colour.

---

When SeungRi wakes up the next morning, the last of his dream fades from the back of his eyelids and he’s met with the same ing shades of gray as always. He’s stunned for a moment before reality sets in and a crushing wave of grief consumes him, frustration and loss mingling together until they’re one emotion, threatening to suffocate him. He tries to close his eyes, concentrate as hard as he can, but no matter how hard he tries the colour he experienced for such a short amount of time escapes him. Pain rips through him like it did when he first woke up, the shock of losing his sight

He yells in anger, it coming out as half a sob, and he throws himself out of bed in a blind fury, stumbling over tossed covers that wrap around his legs.

He lands on the dresser painfully, beating the wood with his fists, blinded by tears and choking on sobs, before reaching out to topple it over, the contents spilling out onto the floor, clothes that all looked the ing same, everything in ing shades.

His eyes are squeezed shut, there are drills driving into his skull, crushing loss and pain, and SeungRi wishes he couldn’t see at all, that anything was better than the disappointment that shreds his guts. Tears spill over the edge and onto his hands. Maybe death would be better than this.

 He grabs the lamp on the bedside table and shrieks, throwing it with all his might across the room, where it shatters against the bookcase, pieces of porcelain and glass spraying everywhere.

SeungRi doesn’t stop until every single piece of furniture is broken, broken like he is, and he sinks onto the floor littered with debris and ignores the rip of his skin as he sits on broken bits of glass, metal, and wood. His room looks like a tornado hit it and SeungRi didn’t want anything less. He doesn’t like it, but he’ll indulge just this once and will watch as his world breaks down in front of him again.

Months and years it took for SeungRi to get used to living like this, living like he was normal when he wasn’t. Living like he was still the same arrogant kid who liked what his paintbrush did when he dipped it in paint when that kid had been lost along with those pretty colours he used to love. Living like he was whole when half of him had died that day on the street. He’d think about it sometimes, reminding himself that his eyes used to be chocolate brown, remembering going to the beach that one time when both his parents were still alive and seeing the blue ocean for himself. Lights a candle when the power goes out and watches the flame and tells himself that it should be yellow. But by now those words, blue, brown, yellow, are just words.

Sitting there against a broken bookcase, staring at his bloodied hands that should look red, having his colour stolen from him by waking up, SeungRi’s feels just as hopeless and powerless and just so goddamn tired as he did back then when he realized he’d never paint again.

---

SeungRi goes to work two days later and lies to his boss about falling down the stairs, showing him the bandages on his arms and smiles sheepishly. His boss nods and s a mop into his hands and walks away without saying anything more. That SeungRi’s never missed a day of work before probably explained it, but SeungRi likes to think his boss likes him more than the other employees.

His day goes by like normal, SeungRi working doubly hard, trying to lose himself in the mindless chores and tasks he’s been performing for the past two years. He smiles when he greets customers; he cleans the counters religiously, and works through his lunch hour without being asked to. His shift is almost over when he realizes he’s being spoken to.

“What happened to your hand?”

SeungRi looks up from the display of cupcakes he’s setting up and sees—who else?—JiYong, sitting with his legs crossed under the table, a pencil in one hand and the daily crossword in the other, staring back at him with eyes that are half-asleep and half-curious.

SeungRi flushes, feels the faint warmth in his cheeks, and hates himself for the way his body reacts towards this JiYong. He averts his eyes, busies himself with another cupcake, and mentally wills himself to just ignore him. SeungRi doesn’t want anything to do with him anymore, because when he’s around JiYong, SeungRi’s different. Different in a scary way, in a way SeungRi’s not completely comfortable with.

With JiYong, SeungRi answers (sometimes) when JiYong asks him questions—questions that are rude and intruding and totally socially unacceptable that JiYong asks anyway and SeungRi answers too. SeungRi leaves work and goes out at night to a market with JiYong even though he hadn’t been out in months and didn’t start to hyperventilate when people stare at him for standing just a little too close to JiYong.

SeungRi goes home at night and dreams in colours, and that was what made JiYong dangerous the most.

Yet SeungRi finds himself answering JiYong anyway, even if it’s all lies. Somehow, SeungRi knows that JiYong doesn’t believe him.

Routine and half-lies continue on like always, though SeungRi is careful now, careful to take medications before he goes to bed, careful to wake up at exactly 6AM, careful not to reveal quite so much to JiYong.

---

But since when do SeungRi’s plans ever go the way they’re supposed to?

---

“So what’d you do before you worked here?”

JiYong said this though a mouthful of chocolate chip muffin to SeungRi, who was slumped over in his chair and resting his head on the table, completely exhausted. He’d run out of sleeping medication last night and hadn’t chanced sleep. His new bookcase was supposed to be coming in the mail that day.

SeungRi lifted his head from the table with a yawn, peering at JiYong through sleepy eyes. “What makes you think I ever worked somewhere else?”

It was 2 in the afternoon and the cafe was otherwise empty, so SeungRi had taken the liberty of plopping himself down at JiYong’s table for a break and a nap. JiYong had, strangely, grinned when he looked up from his newspaper comics to see SeungRi’s sleeping face lying a few centimetres away from some of his muffin’s crumbs.

“Oh, please. No one wants to work at a cafe. The only people who work as baristas are people who dropped out of high school, people who have nowhere else to go, and people in fanfiction.  I’m guessing you’re number two.”

SeungRi raised an eyebrow at JiYong, who just smiled back, and shrugged. “Yeah, so I didn’t always work here. I didn’t really have a job before.”

“So what’d you do?” JiYong finishes the last of his muffin and starts on the cup of espresso. With the amount of baked goods that JiYong consumed with his daily visits, he was fast on his way to diabetes, even if he looked a little bit too thin.

SeungRi hesitates a bit for answering, because he doesn’t like being reminded of his past profession. But he knows JiYong will never let it go, especially if he knows SeungRi’s uncomfortable with the subject.

“I was an artist.”

“Oh.”

JiYong puts his coffee cup down and contemplates SeungRi, who’s rather wide awake now and staring at the little cracks in the table, avoiding his eyes.

“Do you miss it?”

“What?”

“Do you miss it? Being an artist? Painting and whatnot?”

SeungRi smiles briefly. Painting and whatnot. “Yeah, sometimes. For the most part I try not to think about it.”

“Why not? Didn’t you like being an artist?”

“Oh yeah. I loved it. Drawing, painting, everything about it. Even when I was a kid, I’d always be doodling in my book instead of paying attention to the teacher. I was obsessed with it really. I was lucky enough to be talented enough that people actually liked my work, too. It was so easy, all I had to do all day with paint and draw and there were all these pretty colours and...”

SeungRi trails off, blushing when he realizes he’s been rambling on. JiYong just looks at him, looking absolutely riveted. SeungRi doesn’t think he’s spoken this much since... Well, since before the accident, really. And he hadn’t even really said that much at all.

It was odd, how a few questions from JiYong and SeungRi was spilling out his whole life story, when he’d refused to even speak to his family at all since the accident.

“...And?”

“And now I can’t. I can’t paint anymore, not when I can’t see the colours. That’s all that really ever mattered, at least to me. So I stopped doing it, got a job here. End of story.”

“Ah, it’s not the end of the story, SeungRi! Always the beginning, remember that.”

“How could it possibly be the beginning when I’ve lost the one thing I loved most in my life? I lost my passion, my art, my creative expression!” SeungRi frowned and leaned back against the back of the chair, throwing his hands in the air in frustration. “So now I’m stuck here in a dead end job, serving people who could give jack about my paintings, barely getting by, and being perpetually unhappy. Not exactly my definition of a beginning, JiYong.”

JiYong looks insulted and vaguely hurt. “You don’t mind me, though.” It’s a question, or more like a nervous guess.

SeungRi studies JiYong for a moment, coming down from his previous anger, and he’s surprised when he finds that, no, he doesn’t mind JiYong at all, for some obscure reason, he doesn’t. And he tells JiYong so.

JiYong grins and downs the rest of his coffee before picking up his newspaper and racing out of the coffee shop with barely a farewell.

SeungRi refills his medications after work that day.

---

JiYong doesn’t show up again until three days later when SeungRi’s half-sure he’s not coming back again. But JiYong does, like he always does, and he’s back with that grin of his and his hands free of any of the junk he usually brings around with him. He stays long enough for his usual order of coffee before he barges past SeungRi into the administrative offices behind the cafe and walks right into his manager’s room and locks it behind him.

SeungRi doesn’t quite have the nerve to bang on his boss’ door and demand for JiYong to come out, so he settles for hovering anxiously behind it, trying to hear what was happening. 

By the time JiYong finally leaves the manager’s office, he looked positively delighted at the furious scowl on SeungRi’s face.

“Lighten up, coffee boy! No need for your moping and today, no, it’s my day today and you’re going to be happy for it!” JiYong smiles at SeungRi and wraps an arm around his shoulders, much to SeungRi’s immediate surprise and slight discomfort.

“What are you talking about? And what were you doing in my manager’s office?” hissed SeungRi, reluctantly following along with JiYong as he pulled them towards the door. “And where are we going?”

JiYong turns to look at SeungRi seriously. “SeungRi, it’s my birthday today. Therefore, I get what I want today. Starting with your jacket. Where is it?”

SeungRi stares blankly at JiYong. “I didn’t know it was your birthday.”

“Well, you wouldn’t, would you? I never told you. But I told you now, so go get your jacket! We’re going out!”

 “Wait, I can’t leave, I’m working—”

“Honestly, SeungRi, what do you think I talked to your manager for? I played the birthday card on him, too!”

It takes an extreme amount of threatening, whining, coddling, and begging on JiYong’s part, but eventually SeungRi is seated, albeit somewhat sulkily, in the front seat of JiYong’s beat up car.

It isn’t until they’re speeding down the highway (JiYong never had been the safest of drivers) that SeungRi stops sulking long enough to ask a question.

“So where are we going?”

JiYong his head and turns to look at SeungRi consideringly. Then he shrugs, “You said something to me a few days ago that really bothered me.”

“What?”

“You said you’d lost your art. Creative expression. That really bothered me.”

SeungRi frowns and wonders what he did wrong. He tries apologizing, but JiYong just shakes his head at him.

“I’m not upset at you, SeungRi. I’m upset that you lost your passion, your beauty.  I don’t know how you do it, live without it. I think I’d rather die than lose my music. So, since you’ve lost your beauty, I’ve decided to spend today sharing mine.”

---

JiYong drives into the parking lot and tugs at SeungRi until he gets out as well, and together they head into the CD store. By the way the employees there greet JiYong, it’s clear to SeungRi that JiYong is something of a regular. JiYong picks up a basket and heads towards a particular section.

“Pop music?” SeungRi raises an eyebrow. “I didn’t figure you to be the type.”

JiYong shrugs. “Not me. But maybe you. Who knows?” He proceeds to take a copy of every CD available, throwing them into the basket at random. Soon, his basket is close to overfilling. It’s at this point that SeungRi realizes JiYong means to buy them all.

“Woah, woah, woah!” SeungRi shouts, grabbing JiYong’s hand from picking up another CD. “Don’t tell me you’re getting all of these? Because if you are, don’t. I don’t want you wasting so much money on things I may not even like! And I know you’re not exactly well-off.”

JiYong just smiles. “Relax, SeungRi. I rarely ever get the chance to do something for someone else—or the inclination to, for that matter— so just go along with it, okay? For me?”

SeungRi shakes his head and pouts. “It’s your birthday. I should be buying things for you.”

“SeungRi, there’s nothing I would have wanted more for my birthday than to be able to spend it with you,” said JiYong gently, looking at SeungRi with nothing but earnestness in his eyes.

SeungRi blushes and looks away. “Why? I’m nothing special. At least, not in a good way. I can’t even see.”

SeungRi feels fingers on his chin and lets his head get turned so that he’s looking into JiYong’s eyes, gray eyes that carry a hint of frustration and tenderness. Inexplicably, in that moment, SeungRi thinks that he would trade his life just to see what colour JiYong’s eyes really were just for a second.

“That’s what makes you special, SeungRi. In a good way. You’re able to see past all the flashy distractions and right to the very core of things. You looked at me and didn’t see a freak with electric blue hair and red coloured contacts,” he said, motioning towards his hair and eyes. SeungRi stared at JiYong, trying to imagine it.

“You saw just another guy who probably drank too much coffee and ate too many sweets, a guy who actually didn’t have any friends, a guy who’d tell another guy he had a stain on his shirt just to strike up a conversation just because he’s lonely. Now, you may not have chosen to lose your ability to see colours, but you did, and that’s what brought you to me. And that, SeungRi, is why I’d rather your company today than any material wealth the richest man on Earth could have gotten me.”

With that said, JiYong let go of SeungRi abruptly and turned, whistling, to pick out a few more CDs. SeungRi just watched him, stunned at his sudden confession, beginning to see JiYong in a different light. How ironic that JiYong’s efforts to get people’s attention were the one thing that SeungRi couldn’t see, yet here they were anyway. He doesn’t complain when JiYong grabs his arm cheerfully and drags him to the register and waits an absurdly long time as JiYong pays for his 37 CDs.

“I have a CD player at my house,” SeungRi offered. “You already know where I live.”

JiYong grins, remembering the night that they’d gone out to the market together all those weeks ago. “Your house it is.”

---

“Oh God, I don’t think I can take another cutesy song,” moaned SeungRi, rolling over on his bed to shove his head underneath his pillow. “I think it’s safe to say, JiYong, that I am not into the whole pop music scene.”

JiYong smirked and chucked a CD case at SeungRi’s , laughing when SeungRi yelped in surprise. “Hey, it’s not that bad.”

SeungRi’s head poked out from under the pillow. “Not that bad? You’ve got be joking me!”

JiYong shrugs. “Music is music. I mean, I’m not going to listen to it myself, but considering it’s supposed to be pop music I guess it’s good. You don’t look at a sculpture and hate it because you prefer paintings, right?”

“Well, if said sculpture spent 3 and a half minutes crooning at me about broken hearts and the one that got away, then yes, I would.”

“At least they’re pretty,” replied JiYong, flipping through one of the photobooks that came with the CD. “Boys and girls included.”

“I suppose,” dismisses SeungRi. “I’m not exactly into the whole flower-boy/girl thing anyway.”

JiYong quirks an eyebrow at SeungRi. “Oh? So what are you into?”

SeungRi’s cheeks heat up. “I don’t know, I don’t really think about it. I guess I’m more interested in their personalities than their looks,” concluded SeungRi. JiYong stares hard at him for a moment, enough to make SeungRi feel self-conscious, before he nods and looks away.

“Another CD? Look, this one has nine girls!”

“Oh God, no.” SeungRi shuddered, ignoring JiYong laughing at him.

“Good, I was getting kinda bored with it too,” declared JiYong, getting up and checking his watch. “Oh! And right on time! We need to leave now to get to your next form of auditory art!” JiYong leads SeungRi down the stairs and out the door, pushing him into the car good-naturedly.

“Wait, where are we going?”

“Well, since pop wasn’t your thing, maybe orchestra is! We’re going to the opera, SeungRi!”

“Are you serious?!”

---

“Did you get new furniture?” whispered JiYong as they settled into their seats. The show was supposed to start in a few minutes and they’d managed to buy the last few remaining tickets. Apparently, this show was very popular.

“What?” asked SeungRi, disconcerted by the random question.

“Did you get new furniture? I noticed that all of your things in your bedroom looked brand new. Unless you’re one of those people who are complete neat-freaks.”

“Oh. Yeah, I did,” replied SeungRi uncomfortably.

“Why?”

“Uh...” SeungRi looked away, biting his lip, remembering the devastated state that his room had been in after he’d lost it. “I guess I decided everything was getting a bit old.”

“You guess?” asked JiYong doubtfully.

SeungRi only nodded, pressing a finger to his lips to stop JiYong from asking anymore questions, relieved when the lights dimmed, signalling the beginning of the show.

---

“Wow. That was... interesting,” SeungRi managed, getting up from his seat, his joints cracking like an old person’s.

“You didn’t like it?” JiYong asked,

“Well, I liked it more than the pop music. But no, not really.” SeungRi shrugged and looked at JiYong apologetically.

“I guess my plan isn’t going so well.”

“I’m sorry—”

“No worries, SeungRi,” said JiYong brightly, reaching out to take his hand and lead him out of the theatre. “I have one more chance tonight. But first, let’s go out to eat. I haven’t had anything since that cookie I bought at the cafe. Pizza alright?”

“Whatever you want, it’s your birthday,” shrugged SeungRi. “But it’s on me this time—no arguments! You’ve paid for everything today, so it’s my turn to treat you. Especially since it’s your birthday!”

“Fine, fine. I know the perfect place, too!”

They get to the pizzeria at 7 and wile an hour away munching on pizza (with extra cheese and bacon), SeungRi laughing at JiYong’s jokes, JiYong telling story after story of his infamous high school days, and SeungRi feeling happier than he has been in ages. For the first time in a while, SeungRi doesn’t feel the need to keep to himself, doesn’t care about people staring at them laughing loudly together, doesn’t mind it when JiYong teases him about the sauce he has on his chin.

For the first time in a while, SeungRi feels normal.

---

“This is your place?”

“Yup.”

SeungRi walks into the small apartment and is immediately confronted with a mess of papers, music books, and instrument cases. Containers of take-out food litter the place in regular intervals and a small laptop peeks out from under a pile of newspapers on the couch.

“Nice.”

“Thanks.”

SeungRi grins and shakes his head. He wasn’t exactly surprised, knowing JiYong. SeungRi makes room on the couch and sits down (until he realizes he’s just sat on three dominoes and a few jacks) as JiYong goes to the next room looking for something.

“Alright, here goes my last chance,” calls JiYong, emerging from the other room with a thick music book in one hand and a guitar in the other. “You didn’t like the pop music or the orchestral music either. Let’s see if you’re into my music.”

SeungRi smiles. “I already know I like your music. I’ve heard a few of your songs already, remember?”

JiYong shakes his head at SeungRi. “I know you like my music, but I wanna know if you love it. If you can love it as much as you used to love your painting. Besides, this isn’t like any of my other songs. This one’s special.”

“How so?”

“I wrote this one for you.”

SeungRi blushes furiously at this and suddenly can’t quite meet JiYong’s eyes anymore. “For me?”

“Yep. Took me the longest time to finish, too. I’ve been working on it ever since I met you. But I finally perfected it yesterday. Even though it’s my birthday, this is my gift to you, if only for being my friend when no one else would.”

“You know, I wish I’d thought to get you something as well, as I could say the same thing about you... minus the part about it being my birthday.”

“I guess we were kinda meant for each other, huh?”

“I guess we kinda are.”

JiYong starts playing then, strumming his fingers expertly on the guitar. The song he plays is nothing like SeungRi’s ever heard before, yet it somehow reminded him of something at the same time. The chords JiYong plays fit at exactly the right moment, the melody sweet in SeungRi’s ears, and when JiYong starts singing, SeungRi thinks it’s absolutely perfect.

Sitting there, listening to JiYong’s song, watching his eyebrows crease in concentration as he plays, immersing himself in the music, SeungRi can almost see what it was that JiYong loved so much about music, how it could express exactly the right feelings with a simple three-note chord, how it could move him in ways he didn’t know was possible. The song is almost hypnotizing, in that SeungRi could close his eyes and lose himself completely in the song.

SeungRi thinks he hasn’t heard anything as beautiful in his whole life.

When the song ends, SeungRi opens his eyes and sees JiYong watching him nervously. It’s the first time that SeungRi’s ever seen JiYong look vulnerable.

“So, uh, did you like it?”

“No. I didn’t like it.”

JiYong’s face fell and he looked away from SeungRi. SeungRi only smiles and remembers JiYong’s previous words as he finishes his sentence, “I loved it. As much as I loved my paintings.”

JiYong looks up at SeungRi confused for a second, before his face lights up in a way that steals SeungRi’s breath away. It was a bit worrying, as he’d never really thought of anyone, much less another guy, that way, but with JiYong it seemed so natural. Everything JiYong did was quirky and weird, but it was also, to SeungRi, breathtaking.

SeungRi asks JiYong to play again, anything, and JiYong obliges with a grin, playing song after song, songs that SeungRi’s heard of before and songs SeungRi’s sure JiYong’s never shared with anybody else before. JiYong plays late into the night, and eventually SeungRi nods off on JiYong’s messy couch. JiYong watches SeungRi sleep for a while before going to grab a blanket to drape over him.

He’s sure SeungRi won’t mind sleeping over for the night.

---

SeungRi shudders awake with a gasp, disoriented by the almost pitch black room and unfamiliar setting. Nausea hits him a second later as everything begins to spin and warp. SeungRi feels the last of his dream fading away, taking with it the colour that featured loudly in SeungRi’s dreams.

SeungRi cries out in frustration, sobs racking him uncontrollably as it happens all over again, the same sense of helplessness and defeat that overwhelmed him the last time he dreamed in colour. He curls up on his side and mourns his loss as it eats away at him like acid.

There’s a clatter in the hallway and suddenly the room is plunged in light as JiYong races into the room, scared out of his wits and completely confused. He sees SeungRi  sobbing on the couch and instantly his drowsiness is thrown out the window as he races to SeungRi’s side, shaking him urgently.

And no matter how many times JiYong pleads with SeungRi to please tell me what’s wrong and what can I do to help and what’s going on, SeungRi is locked in his world of suffering. The drills are back and the pain in the backs of SeungRi’s eyes is getting more and more excruciating by the second. Finally, JiYong is able to make out a few words that SeungRi moans inaudibly.

“Home. I want to go home.”

JiYong’s lucky the police weren’t being particularly observant that night as his old Chevy truck races at speeds high enough to be called extremely dangerous. JiYong makes it to SeungRi’s place, shaken and panicking, and barely remembers the hidden key beneath the door mat.

SeungRi’s pale and shaking, and JiYong stays with him the whole night, singing into his ear so that maybe SeungRi will hear him and remember his art.

But JiYong leaves in the morning, when the sun is just rising on the horizon.

---

The next time SeungRi opens his eyes, he’s recovered from his latest attack, and is finally able to think rationally. He’s horrified at his actions, ashamed of what had happened at JiYong’s, and there are still tugs of grief that pull at his heart.

But that isn’t important. It’s not what threatens to send him into another panic attack.

No, because the next time SeungRi opens his eyes everything is blurry, no matter how many times he wipes at his eyes.

---

SeungRi’s foot hits another table leg and pain shoots up his leg. SeungRi curses loudly and rubs at his toes, looking down futilely at nothing but a blurry mess of pain.

He grabs the kettle out from the cupboard, but realizes when he’s pouring water into it that he hasn’t grabbed the kettle after all, and now he’d probably just ruined his toaster. Yelling angrily, SeungRi throws the toaster onto the ground, smashing it into pieces.

For three days, SeungRi has struggled to try and function as normally as possible, which proved to be nearly impossible when he couldn’t distinguish one potentially dangerous item from another. He’d run into more furniture than he thought he even owned, and he’d burned himself badly by turning the wrong faucet while washing his hands.

For three days, SeungRi has stubbornly refused to seek help, convinced that his failing vision was just temporary and would ameliorate as soon as he’d recovered from his fright with the colours. He rubs at his eyes constantly, as if he believes there’s just something caught there, something that makes all lines shapeless and everything out of focus. He denies the possibility of losing his vision.

Because it just isn’t possible. SeungRi can’t be losing his vision because... because he just can’t. After all this time, something like this doesn’t just happen. It doesn’t. He’s already lost his colour; the doctors never said anything about this. He can’tcan’tcan’tcan’t—

But that doesn’t explain SeungRi’s shaking fingers, SeungRi’s blurry sight, SeungRi’s heart racing, SeungRi’s stomach dropping, SeungRi’s sobs, SeungRi’s fear, SeungRi’s panic—

For three days, SeungRi has ignored his ringing telephone and let his answering machine record JiYong’s voice over and over again until his inbox is full and JiYong stops calling. SeungRi doesn’t think he can stand to speak to JiYong, not like this.

It’s on the fourth day that he can’t see three feet in front of him and his legs won’t support him they’re shaking so bad and SeungRi’s never felt more helpless and alone that he decides that his life wasn’t worth living anymore.

It’s also on the fourth day that JiYong gets fed up and drives to SeungRi’s house to demand answers.

---

SeungRi s inside his bedside table’s drawers, his fingers searching for... a particular bottle...

There’s something ramming on his front door, SeungRi can hear it loud and clear, but SeungRi doesn’t really care anymore.

SeungRi’s fingers find what they were looking for, and its weight was comforting in his hand, the rattle of pills a relief. He’d refilled his prescription recently after all. His fingers shake with the effort of opening the safety lid on the tiny bottle. He tries to ignore the steadily rising panic he feels inside.

Something like a small explosion sounds from below and SeungRi doesn’t know that his front door’s just been kicked in.

 However, his hands do quicken their pace and soon enough, SeungRi’s got at least fifteen of the small capsules cupped in his palm. He drops the bottle and reaches out for the glass of water standing on the table. It’s cold and it sloshes over the sides because his hands couldn’t keep steady, but SeungRi doesn’t mind.

Someone’s calling his name, no, yelling his name, and it should have sounded familiar, and even if it hadn’t the voice is calling so desperately, so loudly, that SeungRi should have stopped to listen anyway.

But he doesn’t because it’s his last chance. He raises his hand to his lips and drops the pills into his mouth. The hand with the glass soon follows after. He hesitates for a split-second, his heart pounding in his ears and the back of his neck slick with sweat, but SeungRi’s made a decision—

The door to SeungRi’s room bursts open with a bang, and all of a sudden someone’s yelling, yelling at him, yelling what the are you doing, SeungRi?, yelling, yelling, yelling.

The next thing he knows, someone’s fist slams into SeungRi’s face and SeungRi falls backward, crying out in shock, blind to his assailant. Someone grabs his head and tilts it downward, telling him to spit or I’ll pound your face in, you little er.

So SeungRi spits the half-dissolved sleeping tablets onto the ground before he’s hit with another blow to the face.

It’s when that someone’s tears land on SeungRi’s face and that someone is asking him why, why would you do that, how could you leave me, why, SeungRi, why? that SeungRi realizes that it’s JiYong and that JiYong’s here and then he realizes he can’t see JiYong’s face anymore.

 So SeungRi starts yelling, yelling at JiYong, yelling and struggling to get free because goddamnit, JiYong, just let me die, just let me die, just let me die.

JiYong’s shaking SeungRi, or JiYong’s shaking and holding SeungRi, but SeungRi is being shaken and JiYong is telling him no, screaming at him no, pleading at him no, and demanding at him no. And after all this, why do you want to die?

I’m losing it, losing it all, JiYong, and I can’t, I just can’t lose anymore, SeungRi says, losing his sight, losing his mind, losing everything because it’s SeungRi and SeungRi always loses. I’m going blind.

JiYong sobs, they’re both sobbing, and SeungRi feels kisses raining down on his face, hot, wet raindrops falling on his skin.

JiYong says I don’t care.

AN: Well, here it is! In its 6500 word glory! Sorry if there are any grammar/spelling mistakes in advance.

I usually don't write long!fics (to me, this is extremely long) as I never am able to finish them, but I stuck it out and am quite proud with the result. I don't know if you agree with my style of writing in this one, as it is a bit different. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoy it and please let me know what you thought! :)

Will post epilogue later (when finished, LOL)