💽 𝔟𝔬𝔫𝔲𝔰 𝔱𝔯𝔞𝔠𝔨𝔰 ::

track 01 > black — g-dragon feat. jennie

track 02 > woo — rihanna 

Black cigarettes. Black ballet shoes. Black heart.

Drinking alone is hard. Reminiscing alone is even harder.

A moment’s sweetness becomes eternally bitter. Even fruit soju begins to taste bitter.

Maybe he is a poster child of wrong choices and bad decisions, lavender bruises and vermillion graffiti his battered body. Silver piercings glint in the late night with each labored movement, sugared poison saturates slowly through his murky thoughts.

They find him unconscious on the practice floor with an empty bottle of painkillers and a spilled over Jinro.

“Being a ballet dancer is really rotten work,” Giselle gossips over biology coursework and color coded notes during monochromatic lecture hall. “I heard he was rushed to the emergency room, they even pumped his stomach!”

It takes every nerve in Karina’s body not to take the nearest taxi to the hospital. Instead, she’s prisoner to the erratic symphony in her ribcage. I should’ve been there. What if he overdosed because of me? No, he always pushes himself too hard when it comes to rehearsals. But still. . . He doesn’t usually mix pills with alcohol. I wonder if he’s alone right now.

Enflamed moths frantically flap their burnt wings in her churning stomach.

“Apparently his health is b-a-d! Jaemin told me how Wendy was crying all night in the waiting room—”

“I can’t listen to this anymore,” Karina breathes out shakily before feigning ignorance, “We have a test to prepare for, remember? Let’s just study.”

(Lee Jeno; snow leopard, crystal-embroidered Gucci mask, menthol tainted kisses, midnight-blanketed expressions, fishnet and glitter masculinity. A mystery that can’t be confined within pain or tamed by love.) When she closes her eyes she can feel him everywhere. Can imagine his heavily guarded eyes illuminated by opalescent moonlight, essence rolling down her sensitive skin like clear glass beads, and his trailing fingers sketching her limbs in detail. Pleasure sweeps through her body like a cool, dulcet breeze remembering his irresistible vulgarity. Stimulating memories filter her mind of their first encounters where she enchanted him with tight sequined dresses, golden smoky makeup, and promiscuous cherry knots. His deep velveteen voice would whisper naughty things, dirty things, and she would flush in anticipation. He’d recite Rimbaud in her ears, call her adorable, and kiss her until her lungs burned.  They would drive up to the highest peak to stargaze and admire Seoul’s rainbow hued nightscape, make out while PARTYNEXTDOOR murmured low on the radio, and pig out on greasy burgers and chocolate milkshakes from the nearest McDonalds. He’d halfheartedly scold her for accidentally dropping ketchup on his canary yellow Air Force sneakers in which she would pout, resulting in him showering her in forgiving kisses and cuddles. Those times soaked in endless laughter and fairytale naivety call out to her in nostalgia. Mirthless eyes opening, Karina glances over at her nightstand where her sleeping pills beckons for usage. It’s so funny, they’re both medicating but still remain damaged in the end.

In the early morning, she witnesses a puffy-eyed, sleep deprived Wendy exiting Jeno’s condo complex from behind a corner where she discreetly hides. Fool, of course she would check up on him. What were you expecting? Surprisingly, neither jealousy nor resentment flow in her chest. She deludes herself into thinking its maturity but in the back of her mind she knows she’s far from it. It’s his sunken cheeks and placid complexion that shocks Karina even more when Jeno opens the door. His sapphire pupils dilate — a graveyard of sledgehammered hearts and shakespearian decadence —, slowly blinking at the bouquet of black roses in her hand to her unexpected presence.

“Um. . . Surprise?” She tries lamely, holding out the bouquet. He seems to have trouble finding the right words but curls a pale hand around the bouquet and steps aside so she could enter the same place she used to deem her second home.

“I thought you wanted nothing to do with me,” He awkwardly shuts the door behind him. Usually seeing him gave her a boost of glorious serotonin but now, now she’s suffocating as a ceramic vase full of cloying black roses come into her view. Of course, Son Wendy knows his favorite flowers too. What part of him doesn’t she know? I memorized every crevice and line of him, remember every secret he told me. But what if she still knows more than me? All his habits, fears, goals?

“Karina?”

She releases a stuttering breath she didn’t know she was holding. Turning around, she meets him with emotional scars, hardwired insecurities, and glassy tears reflected in her onyx eyes. “You need her more than me,” Her trembling voice painfully breaks off towards the end. It’s too much. I can’t take this anymore. Look what you’re putting me through, I’d never do this to you. “I. . . I-I’m not enough for you. Thats why you stay with her, because she’s your safety place.”

“Karina—”

“You never once told me you loved me. And now, you’re so lonely and messed up that you need me by your side again — even though you’re still with her.”

I was the one who overdosed. You need to get out of my system, you’re no good for me, you’re toxic.

“What do you want from me?” She evaporates in a whisper. The way sorrow writes itself so tenderly across his face slashes a knife through her gaping heart. There can’t be two victims. She’s the one bleeding here.

“I want you,” He answers simply. He steps closer. Don’t. His familiar hand entangles through the silkiness of her radiant ebony hair. Please don’t. He softly kisses her forehead with gentle reverence and affection. No, stop it, be strong! Crying harder, she shakes her head against his chest as he hugs her close. “Shh, baby, please don’t cry. Don’t waste no more tears on me.”

She weakly sobs in his embrace anyways. She hates herself for it. Thinks this hell-ish cycle is never going to end—

“I love you.”

Her brain statics.

I love you.

To insanity.

“I love you, Karina,” He mouths against her ear and it has her groveling back.

I love you.

I love you.

In a neon whirlpool.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

Between petals and smoke.

I love you.

I love you, Karina.

Down the rabbit hole.                                                                         

I love you.

In his arms tonight.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you, Karina.

Forever.