The sunlight refracts on his face, casting deep shadows of his eyelashes. He looks peaceful, a hand under his head and the other draped around Sunggyu, slackened by sleep. It’s a picture-perfect moment, he thinks.

His breath falls evenly and Sunggyu finds himself counting them silently, as if humming a familiar tune. The creases in his eyelids remind him of the crisp leaves of autumn. He loves this man so much. So, so much.

Before Sunggyu can reach his phone that’s blaring out the ungodly alarm tune on the bedside table, he stirs, a tiny frown appearing between his brows to indicate wakefulness. Pulling the blanket higher above his shoulder, he finally opens his eyes, heavy with sleep, and offers a small smile.

“Good morning.”

“Happy birthday, my love.”

His smile widens, happier, as his arm caresses Sunggyu’s back, pulling him closer.

“Thank you.”

A painful lump forms in Sunggyu’s throat. Biting his lips, he holds back tears. Shuffling closer to him, he plants a kiss on the corner of his lips. He had planned it as a peck but his hand grabs his chin, keeping him a bit longer. 

“I love you.”

“I love you too,” he hates that his voice breaks, that he sounds pathetic. That the happiness in his eyes stops short at Sunggyu’s stiff chest. “With all my heart.” His body trembles.

Shutting his eyes contently, he smiles again. Like the sun. Like cocoa on a wintery evening. Like marshmallows that singe prettily. 

Sunggyu’s hands grow numb.

8th February. The weather forecast says it will be sunny all day, with a hint of cloud around the afternoon. 

It’s Woohyun’s birthday today.

 

It’s also the day Woohyun dies.

 

 

-

 

 

Love isn’t perfect, Sunggyu has realized that. He’s had his fair share of heartbreaks. Or rather, relationships that just haven’t worked out. 

He and Woohyun have their own problems too. Woohyun snores too loud when he is tired. He takes off his socks anywhere and everywhere; as a result, he almost always loses one of a pair. When he runs out of paired ones, he steals Sunggyu’s perfectly matched and neatly folded socks from the drawer. After Sunggyu had locked them away, he would choose the two most closely matching socks and wear them like it isn’t a crime against humanity.

So no, they are not perfect.

When they’re mad, they say hurtful things just to spite the other. They are too proud to apologise first. They create white lies to avoid each other’s friends that they don’t like. Like Woohyun is most definitely jealous of Taekwoon, his oldest friend, even though he pretends to be cool about it. Sunggyu hasn’t told him that he and Dongwoo used to date and even though Dongwoo’s the one who had introduced him to Woohyun, it’s just awkward for them now.

Woohyun has a pathological need to be liked and Sunggyu has control issues.

Flawed, so very human. Frail, like humans. 

Maybe that’s why death comes so easy to them. 

Them, he says. If there’s one thing he’s realised about a person dying, it is that they don’t die alone. In Woohyun’s case, he takes a part of Sunggyu with him, leaving behind a less-than-human version.

An empty shell.

And the worst part, or maybe the only part that he can take comfort from, is, Woohyun has no idea.

 

 

 

-

 

 

The first time was the hardest. 

 

They had planned to drive down to Busan for Woohyun’s birthday. It was Woohyun’s idea - the thought of driving for 4 hours filled Sunggyu with dread. But since it was his birthday, he couldn’t say no. 

Once they got out of Seoul and took the highways lined by green fields and open skies, it wasn’t too bad. In fact, Sunggyu was starting to enjoy himself. The air felt lighter. He could convince himself that this was a healing experience. 

The car smelled of Woohyun’s musky perfume and it reminded him of the first time they met, when the only question he had asked him was which brand he used. Woohyun had been too frivolous for his taste, too flirty, too boisterous. If Doongwoo hadn’t dragged him along, he wouldn’t have met him a second time. But the second had become a third and a fourth and somehow, it didn’t matter anymore that the waitresses all giggled and Woohyun replied with a wink. Taekwoon joked that Woohyun is exactly the guy he said he would never date. 

Yet they had managed to stay together for 2 years, lived together for almost half of it. There were things he would like to change, of course, but not today, not now. Not on his birthday, while Woohyun was humming to the radio, one hand against the steering wheel and the other loosely wrapped around Sunggyu’s, resting in his lap. This bit…was perfect.

Moments like this gave him time to reflect on what they have. Even if they fought or argued, or got mad or frustrated, Woohyun would curl into his back every night like nothing happened. Even if they didn’t apologize first, Sunggyu would find a way to talk about something. And the happiness, the small happiness, the safety in the warmth of Woohyun’s body, the security in which he tethered his hand to his, the reassurance of waking up to at least one person loving him, outweighed everything else. 

It isn’t a perfect circle but they’re complete. 

“Go on, sleep,” Woohyun told him, rubbing circles on his palm with his thumb. “I’ll wake you up when we’re closer to the rest station.”

Sleep-deprived from the early morning start, Sunggyu had obliged, closing his eyes against the sun. 

It wasn’t Woohyun’s voice that woke him up, it was a sensation in the pit of his stomach, a deep pull, followed by an urgent tug. Goosebumps erupted on his arms. But it was too quick, quicker than milliseconds. He heard the tires screeching, the deafening thump, the sound of the earth breaking into pieces. 

It was pain like he had never felt before, his skin being sliced into thin wafers, his bones collapsing under the force of collision, his spine shattering under the shock. Before he lost consciousness, he didn’t manage to open his eyes. 

He didn’t get to see Woohyun alive one last time.

 

 

 

-

 

 

He didn’t attend Woohyun’s funeral. Even his parents were there, Woohyun’s mother had asked him to be there with tears in her eyes. But he couldn’t bring himself to go. He just sat on their bed - his bed now - dressed in a formal black suit and black tie, trying to collect the courage to face it all.

How do I do this without you?

The funeral was the finale, end of mourning for the person you loved so desperately, a permission to move on and leave that person deep within memories. But Sunggyu was not done. Sunggyu has been rudely halved, a chunk of him scooped out unceremoniously. It’s like Sunggyu is blind and the universe had taken his white stick out of his hand and pushed him towards an obstacle field, ready to laugh every time he fell.

Maybe if he didn’t go to the funeral, the world wouldn’t move on without Woohyun. But that didn’t happen.

Everywhere he went, there was nothing different. Nothing changed, now that Woohyun was gone. The world didn’t stop on its axis, the sun didn’t hang its head low, the air didn’t still. Birds still sang and traffic lights still changed their colours from red, to yellow, to green. It was pathetic, how Woohyun could well have not existed to begin with. 

Every morning, he thought he would wake up from this nightmare. But he never did.

 

 

 

–

 

 

 

Until he did.

 

One morning, Sunggyu wakes up just as tired and listless as he had been before he went to sleep. Ever since Woohyun…even since that day, each day merged into another without any individuality, like the waves in an ocean that come one after another, crash onto the sand, and vanish. He doesn’t know what time it is, what day, what month…he doesn’t need to.

Time is an absurd concept if he has nothing to look forward to.

Yawning, he sits up, leaning his back against the headboard of the bed, pulling the blanket up to under his chin. The wind is chilly, especially in the mornings. It feels like winter but it probably isn’t. A noise catches his attention, coming from the kitchen. He is so used to the silence of his lonely apartment that it holds his curiosity, unlike everything else these days. As he is trying to decide if he should go and look for the source of the noise or just let whatever burglar that has broken into his flat take whatever they want, he hears hurried footsteps.

The figure that comes through the door carrying a tray laden with food causes the hair on his body to stand up. His heart jumps, forming a lump in his throat. As the shock permeates through his body, he tries to say something, make a sound, any sound, but nothing comes out. 

“Happy birthday, Sunggyu!” The smile on Woohyun’s face is familiar, he could trace every line, his dimples, follow along the dips with his eyes closed. Recently, he has seen that smile only in pictures and videos. 

It doesn’t seem like a dream. Everything is too real. Woohyun looks alive, more alive than him. 

“What?” Woohyun raises an eyebrow, although his smile is just as warm. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

The lump in his throat tightens and his stomach knots. He is frozen, stuck to the bed, his limbs paretic. 

“Happy birthday,” Woohyun repeats. He is close now, too close. He leans down and plants a soft kiss on the forehead.

That’s when Sunggyu breaks. The touch of Woohyun’s lips, the temporary warmth, the shine in his eyes. He breaks completely. He pulls him closer urgently, not caring that the tray of food in his hand wobbles dangerously and kisses him deeply. 

This is his Woohyun. He doesn’t know how it’s possible, whether he is dead or asleep or in a lab somewhere - he doesn’t care. As long as he has Woohyun, he doesn’t care. 

“Slow down,” Woohyun giggles against his mouth but he doesn’t. He possibly couldn’t. Not when Woohyun is right here, in front of him, when he thought he’d never see him again.

“You’re alive,” he finally says when he is too out of breath to kiss him.

“What do you mean I’m alive?” Woohyun laughs. It’s crazy how he smells exactly like spring. “You weren’t trying to kill me, were you?”

 

 

 

–

 

 

 

 

No, that, the second time is the hardest.

 

He acts crazy for the first few weeks, not letting Woohyun go anywhere. He would just sit with him, follow him around their apartment, watching him. Woohyun is surprised, but every time he asks, he pleads with him. There is no point telling him the truth - you died, on your birthday. They buried you, they held a funeral for you. I mourned you for almost 3 months. Then you came back. I won’t ever let you go, again.

But after a while, Woohyun leaves. To go to work. To go to the gym. To go to shops. He does normal things, like every other person out there. But he returns home at night, settles down next to Sunggyu, wraps his strong arms around him and pats his back softly in reassurance. 

Everything almost returns to normal. Almost.

That is until it’s 8th February again. Sunggyu spends the night before sleepless, watching the moonlight filter in through the blinds and hit the perfect angles of Woohyun’s face. He is so caught up in his thoughts that he barely does anything to celebrate Woohyun’s birthday. Today, he doesn’t let Woohyun go out. Not today. They spend the day inside, and order takeaway for meals.

It happens in the most unexpected way.

Woohyun is halfway through his gourmet pasta when he chokes.

At first Sunggyu is just patting his back, but he knows something is not right. Woohyun’s lips are swollen, he is clutching at his throat and saying he can’t breathe. His voice subsides and there is a horrible straggling noise coming from his throat while his lips turn blue and the colour drains from his face. 

In agony, Woohyun falls to the floor and Sunggyu manages to dial 119 somehow, screaming their address down the phone, all the while trying to hold Woohyun. 

No, no, this can’t be happening again.

“You won’t leave me, you promised,” he whispers in Woohyun’s ear as he writhes around.

And he could swear that Woohyun’s eyes flicker with guilt. There were tears in his eyes and he could swear they were for him.

Woohyun stops struggling and grows listless. Realizing he is not breathing anymore, he starts CPR, willing his heart to restart with every chest compression. No, please, no.

By the time the paramedics have pulled him off of Woohyun’s chest, he is inconsolable. He lurches back towards Woohyun, falling on his lifeless chest.

“I’m sorry,” someone whispers. He could swear it was Woohyun.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

Miracles never happen twice.

 

He knows that for a fact. So he doesn’t go to the funeral. But this time, he doesn’t lose count of the days. No, he counts down every second, every minute, to 28th April.

 

6 days, 17 hours

 

3 days, 12 hours, 29 minutes

 

2 days, 6 hours, 25 minutes, 36 seconds

 

16 hours, 14 minutes, 56 seconds…

 

He doesn’t know when he falls asleep but he wakes up alone. He searches the entire house, calling Woohyun’s name. No response. 

Miracles only happen once. 

He collapses on the bed, closing his eyes, welcoming the darkness. Woohyun’s gone this time, truly gone. He couldn’t save him, he couldn’t protect him. It was his one last chance.

The sound of his phone ringing causes him to open his eyes. People have given up calling him. At first they all called him, his friends, Woohyun’s friends, Woohyun’s parents even. Now only his mum calls him - half the time he doesn’t pick up. He has nothing to say. Woohyun has taken all his words with him.

He picks up the phone - he wants to tell his mother how Woohyun has truly abandoned him this time. The name of the person calling lights up on the screen and his heart stands still. 

It’s Woohyun.

“H-hello?” His voice is barely audible. 

“Happy birthday, my love.” Even before he said a word, just from the sound of the first breath, he knew it was Woohyun.

“Woohyun, Woohyun, Woohyun, I love you!”

“I know.” A smile that he can picture clearly. “I love you too. My flight reaches at 5pm. Wait for your present, okay?”

His head is spinning and he thinks he will be sick. “I will.”

 

 

–

 

 

 

First time, he had accepted it.

 

Second time, he prayed for it.

 

But the third time…it destroyed him.

 

Sunggyu books a hotel next to a hospital for Woohyun’s birthday. An odd choice, Woohyun thinks. But there are forces at work here that he can’t control and all he can do is prepare his best. This time, he won’t let anyone take Woohyun away from him.

By midday, Woohyun thinks Sunggyu should be in the hospital because of how paranoid he is acting. He doesn’t know how to explain it to him, so he just asks him to trust him.

“I’m doing this for you,” he lies.

He’s doing this for himself. He can’t lose Woohyun a third time. 

The fire alarm goes off just a little after they cut the cake, but the harsh noise is nothing compared to the way his heart beats in a frenzy against his rib cage. He grabs Woohyun and pushes him through the door first. There are people screaming, chaos everywhere, the air is thick with smoke. They run down the stairs when they’re stopped by a woman with her mascara running. She is pleading with everyone, thick smoke coming out of the room they are stood near. Something about her son still being in the room.

“No one is helping him!” she cries, but it does nothing to Sunggyu. He pushes Woohyun towards the stairs.

But Woohyun doesn’t move.

And then he does something that stops his heart. He runs towards the room, filled with smog and fire.

“No!” Sunggyu isn’t sure if he actually vocalizes the word or if it dies within him, just the way he knows Woohyun would. He lurches towards him but there are disembodied arms that appear through the smoke and hold him back. “No, I can’t let him die, not again!”

He isn’t sure if his strength fails him or if there are too many people holding onto him. 

Woohyun has to be the hero, that’s one of the things he hates about him. Loves about him. Loves him. 

At the mortuary, he meets the woman again. She looks like a statue, her eyes red, tear marks streaked across her cheeks. 

They stare at each other for a very long time, without saying a word. He finally turns his back on him, to leave.

 

 

 

–

 

 

 

The fourth time, he was a child waking up to an apocalyptic world.

 

It’s cruel humour, watching him swim in an ocean of quicksand. It’s a matter of time. He quits his job. His colleagues ask him what’s wrong with him. His friends ask him why he’s acting like the world has gone mad. Woohyun kisses him and tells him whatever it is, they will get through it together.

“You don’t understand, you have no idea…”

“Then help me understand instead of acting like I don’t deserve the truth!”

“You won’t understand-”

Affronted, Woohyun storms off.

But he can’t bring himself to tell him, like he can’t trust him with the secret. Because it’s one thing for Woohyun to know that he’s going to die but it’s another to know that he will leave Sunggyu behind. For the fourth time.

It’s another thing to know that no matter how hard he tries, he can never save him. 

Like climbing a slab of ice at a perpendicular angle.

So when Woohyun gets electrocuted while trying to fix the kitchen light, Sunggyu knows it’s futile. 

But it makes him try even harder.

 

 

– 

 

 

 

The fifth time, Sunggyu goes to the funeral. Woohyun’s mother hugs him and cries but for some reason, he can’t bring himself to shed a tear. Not in front of these strangers. People who mean nothing now that Woohyun is gone. 

 

A sticky sickness fills his stomach. It’s a mistake, attending the funeral, but he can’t just leave. Not when people stare and whisper behind their hands, then go very quiet when they see him approaching. They nod and pass on their condolences, somehow adding another nail to his coffin. 

One of Woohyun’s students does somewhat of an eulogy but they can barely hear anything above Woohyun’s mother’s cries. She is holding onto Sunggyu’s mum and sister, her cries so loud and repetitive that he just wants them to stop. Woohyun's father weeps quietly, in a withdrawn corner.  

“Rumi said, ‘the wound is the place where the Light enters you’,” the student says, sniffing into a handkerchief. Sunggyu doesn’t know who Rumi is but it’s obvious he has never hurt the way he has. Rumi has no idea. There’s only enamel darkness seeping in through his skin, and Woohyun is the Light that has left him.

“He loved you so much,” Woohyun’s mother tells him when he is saying goodbye. He doesn’t know how to react. Both of their parents have been civil about their relationship, they’ve been lucky that way. 

“I love him too,” he says lamely, but no matter what reply he gives, it won’t match up to how he feels. “I miss him.”

She hugs him and cries again, wetting his shoulder. For a moment, he wants to tell her that he’ll be back. That on the 28th of April, Woohyun will come back to him, kissing the moles on his skin, and every place where Woohyun has kissed him or touched him will remember him until then.

He wonders if she will cry less if she knew, if she’d hurt less. He doesn’t.

So he keeps his silence.  And prays that Woohyun will be back before his tears dry. 

 

 

 

—

 

 

 

The sixth time is a hubbub of moldless moments that don't cohere. 

 

If it’s even possible, every time, he seems to fall in love with Woohyun more and more when all he wants is to let him go.

So this time, he tries breaking up with him. Maybe if he’s not with him, things would be different. It doesn’t hurt him any less to watch the hurt, betrayal, and shock on Woohyun’s face. 

“Go away, and never come back,” he says, although what he really wants to do is beg for another kiss. 

But Woohyun keeps coming back, looking more and more like a wreck every time, lips chapped and hair askew, the collar of his shirt frayed. 

“Please, at least tell me what I did so wrong? What can I do?”

“Nothing, I just don’t love you anymore.” His world collapses as he utters the lie.

“But I love you,” Woohyun says haplessly, like a man who’s given everything he has to offer. 

“It doesn’t matter.”

“I don’t believe that I don’t matter to you. I know you.”

Sunggyu laughs derisively, and he continues to laugh until he realizes he is crying and Woohyun looks both confused and understanding at the same time as he takes a few steps forward and cups his cheek. 

That night, lying beside Woohyun, tired and spent, he realizes that he will love him for the rest of his life, in every other life. And even if he leaves him once, twice, 14 times, every time, he will never stop getting close to him. If he never sees him again and spends the rest of his life missing him, it wouldn’t be worse than not knowing him at all.  

So he will lie here, stop thinking about the bad things, so that he can enjoy the time he has. He will live for Woohyun, live until he takes his last breath, and he will cry for him.  

On the fateful morning, he wakes Woohyun up with a cupcake with a candle stuck into it. 

Woohyun closes his eyes for a moment before blowing the candle.

“What did you wish for?” he asks, curious.

“I’m not supposed to tell you, idiot.”

“But I want to know!”

“I wished for you to always be happy and never be in pain.”

“You shouldn’t have told me that,” he smiles drily. “It doesn’t come true if you say it out loud.”

This time, he has decided not to try and stop it. Not like trying to stop it has done any good. So he sits in the kitchen, sipping a cup of tea, when he hears a loud noise from the bathroom where Woohyun is showering. By the time he’s knocked down the door, Woohyun is on the floor, bleeding from a cut on his forehead.

The paramedics arrive within minutes; they take over from him trying to do CPR. They take him away, and when they ask him if he wants to come with them, he shakes his head. 

“I’ll be with you soon, my darling,” he thinks.

It had taken him a long time to come to this, but he has made up his mind. If he can’t make Woohyun stay, he will go with him. A little company wouldn’t hurt. He had tried to analyse what would happen if the both of them were dead, would Woohyun return to a world without Sunggyu? Would they both come back? Would none of them come back? It doesn’t matter.

The future is meaningless.

He had been secretly saving up on over-the-counter medications, harmless, but taken together in large quantities should be enough.

Swallowing the pills is surprisingly easy. He thinks about Woohyun, if his body is cold yet, if the doctors have pronounced him yet.

After he has downed all the tablets, he catches a taxi to the hospital. His insides squirm and he doesn’t know if it’s because he will be seeing Woohyun’s stony pale face or if it’s the drugs taking effect. 

When he gives Woohyun’s name at the reception, they tell him to go to treatment room 21. 

Treatment room?

They must have not had time to move his body yet.

His throat feels on fire and there is a sharp pain in his stomach as he makes his way to treatment room 21 with difficulty. When he opens the door, a nurse who had been doing something in the room turns around to greet him.

“Are you his guardian?” she asks.

“Wha-yes. Can I see him please?”

“Of course,” she chirps. “He’s been put in a medically-induced coma, but he should be fine.”

An ice shard penetrates his insides.

“Fine?”

“Yeah, it’s a bleed in the brain from a malformation of one of his blood vessels. He needs observations but the doctors are sure he will be ok.”

“You mean…he is-he will be alive?” His heart is thrashing in his chest and his mouth feels drier than a desert.

She looks surprised. “Of course! What have you been told?”

A feral pain claws at his abdomen and he falls to the floor, throwing up.

The nurse screams, pushing the emergency button.

“I need help,” he gasps, looking up at her pleadingly. “I took an overdose. You need to save me.” He vomits again, feeling dizzy, a fire in his gullet, like a battering ram against his head. “If Woohyun’s alive-you need to save me. I need to be there-for him,” he manages to say before the darkness overtakes him.

 

 

 

–

 

 

 

Woohyun wakes up, his world hazy. It takes him a moment to adjust.

“Hello Woohyun-ssi, you’re waking up in the intensive care unit,” someone says, their voice soft. “Don’t worry, you’re safe.”

His body feels stiff, his throat sore. 

“Water,” he mumbles.

Someone holds a cup to his lips and he drinks the cold water. It feels like he has starved for a year. 

“What-why am I here?” His voice sounds hoarse. 

“You had a bleed in the brain,” a more authoritative voice says. “Look at me, look into this light-”

The doctor and nurses do some tests, then pronounce him fit. There is a mild pounding in his head by now. A bleed in the brain…what was he doing before that?

“We’ll ask your family to come in now,” the nurse with the soft voice says, combing his hair with her fingers in a motherly way.

The last few days (or is it more than that) are completely dark. The last thing he remembers is waking up on his birthday, Sunggyu smashing a cupcake into his face and then kissing him…

He blushes. It’s been too long since he’s last kissed Sunggyu.

Disappointingly, it’s only his mother and brother who are let in. He is grateful to see them of course, but he was really holding out for a kiss from Sunggyu. They fuss over him, ask him the same questions again and again despite him reassuring them that he feels fine.

“Where’s Sunggyu?” he finally asks.

The changes in their faces are instantaneous. They look at each other, then his mother breaks down into tears.

“What’s wrong, is he okay?” he panics.

“Woohyun…he-he’s gone,” his brother says, not quite meeting his eyes.

“What do you mean gone?”

“Woohyunnie, I’m sorry, but he’s-he’s not with us anymore.”

The meaning is somehow both clear and unclear.

“That-wha where is he then?”

“He took his own life…”

“No, no, no! You’re lying!” Woohyun tries to cover his ears with his hand but there are lines and wires everywhere and some beeps noisily, causing the nurse to rush over.

“I’m sorry-”

“No, no, you’re wrong!”

“You need to calm down,” the nurse says and he shoots her with the dirtiest look he could muster. She wants him to calm down? She wants him to lie still and shake his head and talk about the weather? Does she know what he has just been told? 

“I want to see him now!” 

He attempts to get out of the bed but more nurses gather and hold him down until he feels his head getting heavier and heavier and he can barely keep his eyes open. But he must keep his eyes open, because Sunggyu will be here any minute and… 

 

 

 

–

 

 

 

Why?

 

Why?

 

They were happy. Yes, they had their problems. Sunggyu was a neat-freak and Woohyun is a free spirit, so they fought about those things. Woohyun didn’t like some of Sunggyu’s friends and vice-versa. 

But they loved each other. And with a hand on his heart, he could say that Sunggyu would never ever want to leave him.

No matter how much he thinks about it, it doesn’t make sense. His parents ask him about it too - ‘was everything okay between you too?’

“Of course it was. As okay as it could be.”

Was it because he hadn’t picked up his phone that time when he was late? Was it because he forgot to do the laundry when it was his turn? Was it because he wore the cardigan given to him by one of his students that Sunggyu didn’t appreciate?

It just doesn’t make sense. 

It’s a gaping question that he feels he should have the answer to but he doesn’t. Because the question shouldn’t exist in the first place. Or at least, Sunggyu should be here to answer it with him.

He sees the looks at the funeral, the questions hidden behind the eyelashes. The question mark that stops on everyone’s lips.

Sunggyu’s parents are more than gracious. They tell him Sunggyu loved him very much. He feels guilt like he’s never known. Maybe decency is stopping them from shouting at him, “We trusted you with our son, he was fine when he was with us, what did you do to him? How did you break him so badly?”

“Are you looking after yourself, Woohyun? You look so thin,” Sunggyu’s sister whispers to him, her dark circles prominent.

“Noona,” he says, gulping down his tears, “I love him so much.”

“I know, and he loves you too. Loved you,” she corrects herself, wiping away a tear. “I told you he was gone, when you were in a coma. I don’t think you remember, but you had tears in your eyes.”

He has no memory of it but now, he wishes he never woke up from the coma. What’s the point?

“Listen, Woohyun, I don’t blame you.”

He looks at her, surprised. 

“I know what you must be thinking, that it’s somehow your fault…but I just know there was a different reason. He was happy, with you.”

Bowing his head, he nods, his eyes filling with tears again. He hadn’t wanted to cry. Not in front of these strangers, now that Sunggyu is gone.

“They called me and I saw him, when they were wheeling him away,” she whispers. “He gained consciousness for a bit.” Her body shakes. With trembling lips, she says, “The only thing he said was…‘Woohyun’s alive, I need to live for him’.”

He digs his nails into his flesh, biting his lips hard enough to draw blood. As the salty taste fills his mouth, he wants to scream. He wants to bang on the coffin until Sunggyu wakes up from his eternal slumber. He wants to tell him he loves him and that he must, he must live on, for him.

 

 

–

 

 

 

Everywhere he goes, Woohyun feels empty. Even among hundreds of people, he feels like the only person on the planet.  

Nothing makes a difference. He wastes so much money on therapy; the therapist teaches him to work through his grief. He does but at the end of the day, he thinks it’s pointless. Because it’s not bereavement, or grief, or survivor’s guilt or any of the words his therapist uses. It’s a big black hole within him, a caved out emptiness of everything unresolved. He is like a child who has been stranded at the train station, with a dog-eared ticket and a promise. But not a single train that passes by stops at that station and no one asks him if he’s lost, if he came with someone.

He doesn’t forget Sunggyu’s birthday; he prepares a bouquet for him. He keeps it by his bedside table, knowing he will watch the leaves and the petals weather and turn sickly gray until they have to be thrown away. 

When he wakes up, the flowers are gone.

For a second, he wonders if he was just drunk and never got the bouquet. No, remembers putting them down exactly where Sunggyu used to put his glass of water on the bedside table. 

Confused, he pads to the kitchen, where the bouquet has been put in a vase with water.

That’s strange, he thinks. Did he do that? He doesn’t remember doing it but then again he doesn’t remember doing a lot of things these days. 

Approaching the flowers, he caresses a leaf, thinking how much Sunggyu would have liked the orchids.

“If it was meant to be a surprise, it didn’t work very well.” His body stiffens. The voice is familiar, too familiar. The one he hears every night in his ears. 

It must be a fantasy but it sounds so real. 

“I still love them though.”

His breath hitches. There is no mistaking the voice. Slowly, he turns around and sees him there, standing, smiling.

The blue hoodie he has washed so much that the colour has started to fade. The basketball shorts Woohyun had spilled sauce on once. Hair combed through, stubble on his chin. 

“S-sunggyu?”

“Yes?” He walks towards him and instantly, he wants to run in the opposite direction. This cannot be real. And yet, he would give anything for it to be real. “Why do you look like that?”

“It’s really you.” The first thing that tells him it’s real is the smell, not of his perfume or his aftershave, the scent of his skin. 

“What do you mean, who else were you expecting?” He frowns, the corners of his lips turning down. 

“No-no one. Sunggyu…” He wraps his arms around him and he feels it, the emptiness being filled, like becoming whole again. 

He had asked for one last miracle. But every day, he had woken up to a cold bed and a tragedy fresh in his mind.

“Sunggyu?”

“What?”

“I’ll never let you leave again.”

“What do you mean, I never left.” Sunggyu looks at him, the frown deepening.

“What is wrong with you today? Are you hungover?”

“It was all a dream,” he mumbles, pulling Sunggyu back into his embrace, finally letting the tears go. “It was all a nightmare.”

“Wha-”

“I love you ok,” he tells him, “that’s all you need to remember. And if you need anything, if you need to talk, or if you…are not happy, you have to talk to me, ok?”

“You’re making no sense,” he grumbles.

“Good, let’s keep it that way.”

 

 

 

–

 

 

 

Sunggyu has a viewing on Woohyun’s birthday but they decide to have dinner together. Woohyun gets to the restaurant first and looks through the wine list to pass time. They can just call a driver to take them home at the end of the night. Or they might not even go home, the restaurant is on the ground floor of a hotel and they could spend the night here. 

Excited, he straightens the tie Sunggyu got him. He has dressed carefully, not just because it’s his birthday and they are on a fancy dinner, but he is thinking of the pictures. Today will go down in history…well, their history. He is going to propose. At first he wondered if he should propose on Sunggyu’s birthday, but he wanted Sunggyu’s day to be special. He doesn’t mind sharing his birthday with their proposal anniversary. It’s double the fun, anyway.

Sunggyu’s late, he wonders if he should go ahead and order. He knows what his boyfriend, soon-to-be fiance, wants. He is about to call a waiter when his phone rings. At first, he thinks it’s Sunggyu but it’s an unknown number. He almost doesn’t pick up but on the last ring, he changes his mind and answers the call. 

“Is that Mr Nam Woohyun?”

“Yes, speaking. Who is this?”

“I’m calling from Seoul University of Hospital. I’m sorry…”