Remnants;

I guess this is how it always ends.

Hollow. Barren. Cut right off at the head; nothing left but the memories and the wound that will never, truly heal. I should have expected it. I let my fingers run across the wet bark. It was rough, hoarse against the soft tips of my fingers but I relished the feeling. I missed it, the days where I’d scrap my hands on the strong wood, careless to the pain. It hadn’t mattered. Nothing really did when you were just a child.

Nothing but happiness.

I never realized how futile life was, that we spend our lives seeking pleasure but never actually grasp it when it rears its head. We’re too wedged in life, in the spectacles and hurdles, that we can’t even enjoy the simple things.

Like a childhood tree house that was the home of our first love and all the memories we created back then.

And now it was gone.

A tremor ran up my spine as the rain continued to fall around me. I could barely see it, I wouldn’t have known it was there if it wasn’t for the gentle dribble it made in the background, and the chill it brought to my body. I could never remember it raining at the tree house; it had always been sunny and bright.

‘Yasmine.’

My eyes flew shut, trying to block out the voice the echoed in the rain. Of all the times he could have come, why did it have to be the one-day I’d be here? Carefully I concealed all the emotion on my face, leaving it blank. My legs stretched out, ignored the slight twinge in my stomach. When I was on my feet I turned to face him.

Tall, broad shoulders, his face shadowed by the big, black umbrella he held in lean hands that I knew would be rough with callouses. He hadn’t shaved again, I don’t know why I picked it up but he hadn’t. He always forgot to shave when it was before 7. One of the things you got to know about someone when you’d been married nine years.

My fingers tightened on my umbrella, as if it would be some sort of shield between us. ‘Sunggyu.’ I replied, trying to keep my tone steady. His face remained similar to mine. Blank.

‘They cut it down?’ he remarked, taking slow steps forward while looking at the large stump that was between us. I shrugged, ‘Yeah. Ironic.’

I praised myself silently. That was it. Keep it cold. Detached. Short. Don’t say more then you need to and you’ll be out of here before you know it. Before he can make you cry again.

By then he was across from me, still avoiding my eyes as he kicked the stump softly. I couldn’t hide the scowl that appeared over my face. I wanted to tell him not to kick it, but I figured that would only make him realize how much it still meant to me.

‘I always wanted to take my kid here too,’ he said quietly, almost to himself. My heart tightened almost to the point I felt like I couldn't breath.  It’s ok. It’ll be fine.  Maybe he realized what he said because he turned to me quickly, free hand raised in innocence, ‘I-I’m sorry…’

I didn’t say anything; just let my umbrella lower to hide my face that I was sure was tightened with pain. I heard him sigh, knew that he’d have touched his nose gently, he always did that when he was flustered, ‘I mean, it’s wasn’t your fault…’

Oh, how awkward the man I’d married was. ‘No, it wasn’t my fault at all, Sunggyu.’ My words were bitter and spat into the air. I’d lost my cool; he always did this to me.

‘It happened years ago, Yas.’ How I wanted to punch him, right in that handsome face. Maybe I could give him a black eye, actually make it so he couldn’t see for once, not that anyone would be able to tell the difference.

‘Don’t think I’ve forgotten.’

Maybe he’d realized that he should keep his mouth closed about the topic because he changed it, casually pulling it in a completely different direction, on the outside at least. ‘You cut your hair.’

‘Weren’t you the one who said you should cut your hair if your life is devastated? A sort of moving on tradition?’ The sentence was layered with different personal connotations that only the two of us would really understand. It probably made it worse for him, knowing it was his fault I was this way.

‘Is that what our divorce was to you? A devastation?’ His tone was bordering on harsh but I let it slide, instead I met his eyes coldly.

‘That’s what I’d call our marriage, actually.’

His jaw tightened, lips pursing together in warning, ‘What happened to us then?

A bitter laugh flew from my lips. ‘Oh, lets see. You got drunk. You were speeding. You ran a red. You hit a car. I became infertile. You found another woman. You filed a divorce.’ I listed off my points on my fingers, never making eye contact with him but emphasizing every ‘you.’

He was silent for a moment; eye looking past my head in what resembled regret, or maybe just guilt. ‘You wouldn’t even talk to me anymore.’ He said quietly, sadness lingering on the words, ‘You cut me out.’

‘I cut everyone out, Gyu. I was shattered and you never helped me pick up the pieces.’ I wasn’t angry anymore; it wasn’t because those feelings weren’t still strong, if anything I still wanted to slap him. No, now I just didn’t have the energy. I’d been broken long ago.

His eyes fell away from me, looking down at the tree trunk. Mine followed. I wondered how long ago it was chopped down. The tree use to stand tall, a beautiful tree house that, in all its genius, resembled a real house rather than a little hide away for children. We’d had Sunggyu’s Dad to thank for that. He’d been a builder, until he’d died, and a damn good one at that. He’d even built a little porch to sit on and nailed in stairs down the trunk of the tree. One old stair was still stuck on the outside, the nails rusted.

I missed it. I missed it terribly.

‘I never wanted this,’ his voice interrupted me, not letting me reminisce in happy memories, instead pulling me back to the present when everything had fallen apart. I met his eyes, not even bothering to hide the sadness anymore.

‘You never paused to think that neither did I?’

A sighed fell out of his lip and I knew it was coming to an end. Even then I couldn’t help but wish the reason he’d come to the old tree house was because he still loved me, that maybe he hadn’t given up. But, looking into his eyes in the moments before he said his final goodbyes, I knew that there was nothing left between us. Nothing but memories and old scars.

‘I loved you, Yas.’ His voice was barely above a whisper but I heard it like it was spoken right next to me. What a typically Sunggyu way of saying goodbye, ripping me apart as much as he could first.

‘I guess I loved you more.’

And that was how he left me. In that very place where we’d first met, only two kids and a tree house. He walked away, with only my own goodbyes, the image of tears spilling unwillingly down my face and the memories of first love, where we were hidden from the world terrors, by a small little tree house that held happier days. 

Chapter Character; 
             Infinite's Sunggyu