He is so beautiful.

To say that he had finally gotten over me and what was left of our relationship must be an understatement. He is practically glowing.

Then again, it had been more than a year since we broke up. One year and eleven months, seven hundred and ten days, to be exact. How and why I remember all these, I do not know.

I stare, transfixed, at the screen of my Macbook, my eyes unable to move away from his smile in the picture that showed up on my Facebook news feed. It was so natural, so confident, so… Jinki. He looks so absolutely radiant; I start to feel a dull pang of jealousy in my chest. Is he really doing so well without me?

I know from his Twitter that he went back to school last night for an alumni gathering with his basketball team mates. There in the picture, on his left and right, are his friends and team mates Jonghyun and Minho, both grinning away just as brightly as he is. They must have bugged him for the picture; I know how much they look up to him because he is so likeable and so good at the sport too.

I see that he had let his hair grow out now. It was pulled back in a ponytail that was slightly longer than what I was used to seeing, his hair just a tad messy after their game. I used to always pick on that little ponytail he would have whenever his hair grew too long. I would say that it looks weird and that I don’t really like it. When he was out with me, he would put his hair down, just because he knows I like it better that way.

I should have taken note of all these little things he did for me while he was still mine.

Now that I’m looking at him in this picture, I wonder why I ever picked on that though. Why did I do that? It actually does look great on him. He looks like he even lost some weight, and not in an unhealthy way. He looks fitter, his arms that are exposed from his black wifebeater more toned, and his face just a little less chubby than before.

He is so beautiful.

Jinki was the one who asked for the breakup, but I moved on faster than he did. Or so I thought. It will be two years in just a couple of weeks.

I stared at his picture some more, and then I realised.

I miss him.

***

In the first few months after he put an end to our almost-two-year relationship (well, one year and eight months, six hundred and sixteen days, to be exact), I wasn’t Kim Kibum. I didn’t want to talk to anybody more than was necessay, I didn’t want to see him laughing with his friends in the cafeteria, I didn’t want to hear about how well he did and how amazing his score was in his tournament. Everything hurt, and it was a chore to even make myself smile. My friends said that I exuded some kind of aura that depressed the mood of the party whenever I was around. Well, I really couldn’t help it.

If his breakup letter spanning two pages was any indication, Jinki didn’t want it any more than I did but he said that he couldn’t stand the pain anymore. The pain I was bringing him, the problems in our relationship that I honestly never understood. So, I let him go.

It hurt, I still love him, I wanted him back but my pride got the better of me. Some months after the breakup, one night, Jinki broke his resolve and asked for me back.

I remember telling him that I thought this was for the better. Funny why I thought I had the right to refuse him, when clearly, he was the one who dumped me. Why did I say no?

At the end of our conversation, he asked me, as if in a final attempt to salvage matters, “Do you still love me?”

I told him I only loved him like a friend now, not in that way anymore.  

The next day, in the cafeteria, I saw him crying. His friend, Joon, was holding out a pack of tissues to him, which he hurriedly took and pressed to his eyes before others could notice his tears.  As Joon patted his shoulder comfortingly, he sobbed quietly into the piece of tissue.

It took me tremendous effort to not run to him and hold him in my arms, tell him that I’m sorry and that I still love him. And yes, can we please be ‘we’ again, just like before? I knew that I had the entire power to take everything back, reverse the breakup. I knew he was just waiting for me to say it. Yet I tried to convince myself that this was for the better and I would be better off without him picking those fights with me, fights that I never knew the reason for. It was what I truly believed in at that time.

As time passed, I allowed myself to be swept into the whirlwind of academic preparations for our college entrance exams. I thought about him less and less. I observed him less in school too. I lived my own life without him. Yes, I flirted around with other people, but it was just playing, nothing serious. I wasn’t intending to move into another relationship so soon. It was too much trouble.

Sometimes when I happened to read his tweets, or his blog posts, I could see that he was clearly not over us. But all his pain wasn’t enough to bring me back, because I thought I was happy the way I am. Alone, and without him being clingy and needy all the time.

When we graduated, he gave me a letter filled with his heartfelt thoughts about us, how he hasn’t been able to move on. I know what he was thinking, I could read between his words and sentences that he only needed me to say it, and we would be together as one again. I was moved, really, but I took no action to reconcile our relationship. I only thanked him for giving me those memories that made up the happiest years of my life.

Now, when I think back to it, I still don’t know why I didn’t jump at the opportunity he presented to me to make things right again. Why did I throw away all these chances that he kept giving to me for us to restore things back to normal?

It’s because I thought I was over him. I thought my life was better like this.

Jinki still texted me from time to time then. Sometimes we would agree to meet for dinner or perhaps a movie, but I was never the one to initiate our interactions. At that point in time, I thought I was so over him that I didn’t even care what he thought about me, about us anymore. I got a job, met up with my friends, did the healthy amount of flirting with both the men and the ladies, and basically, tried to live life the way I always wanted to.

I thought I was happy.

But then as the days and months went on, and I heard less and less from him, I began to wonder about him. His tweets were no longer so sad, there were tons of pictures of him out and having fun with his friends that appeared on his Facebook, and I noticed that he dressed better, looked better and probably felt better as well.

It also became painfully obvious that he was talking about his friend Jonghyun way too much. Where they went today, what he said that was funny and what they should do together next time. He even listed Jonghyun as one of his favourite people in the world in one of his tweets. Needless to say, I was not part of that list.

 I could see them having late night conversations on Twitter which would almost always end with Jinki saying “Check your phone, I texted you! Let’s continue our conversation there.” making me wonder what it was that they were talking about that could not be tweeted. I began to wonder if there was something more going on between them.

Somehow, I was aware that I was upset he wasn’t talking about me anymore.

I tried my best to weave my way back into his life. I know that I didn’t deserve to, but I really didn’t want to just lose him and let us fade away to mere strangers. I took note of (okay fine, I stalked) his Twitter and Facebook profile pages for any updates. I asked him out for dinners on the weekends, or if he would like to just catch up over a cup of coffee. Well, he rarely ever agrees to them. As all the time passed, the knowledge I have of his life dwindled to a shameful extent.

It’s not that I didn’t have friends or my own share of fun, because I do. But I just didn’t know why things seemed to have turned around for the both of us. I thought I was so over him.

And now, one year and eleven months, seven hundred and ten days after our breakup, I sit here in front of my Macbook, staring at his infinitely charming smile, thinking about how this beautiful man used to be so crazy over me, so solely mine.

Somehow, I think he wouldn’t even care to know about that anymore.

My heart feels so empty, so hollow. If only he still cares.

Jinki, I miss you.

A.N.: So, this is stemmed from... me trying and failing to complete the next chapter of Lucky, and I just needed to write something else to get the mess out of my system before I could continue with that. This is random, inspired by nothing (almost) and just...a little slip-shot on my part :/

This is the first time I am writing in first-person, and this is Kibum's POV. If response is promising I might do Jinki's POV, and maybe a little more just to tie up the loose ends between them, something like a bonus? Well, it's still too early to say anything about this.

For readers of Lucky: I am so sorry! I know I haven't surfaced for more than one month (worst author out there, I know), and to be honest, the next chapter is nowhere near done. It's going to be really long which is why it is taking me so much patience and effort to get through to make sure it doesn't . Please just wait awhile more for me! >< 

Comment/subscribe if you want to know Jinki's side of the story ;)