Till The Last Rose Dies

[Chapter 2]

Minhwan felt his cellphone vibrating. He took it out of his pocket and saw the incoming message from Wonbin. Naturally, a smile formed on his lips. He pressed the ‘read’ button almost immediately.

‘I ran out of battery,’ the message said, ‘our date is brought forward. Please meet me at FT Café, 1pm. I’ll wait for you. <3, Binnie.’

Minhwan was surprised to receive that text from Wonbin.

“Brought forward? Then what are we going to do tomorrow then? It’s Valentine’s Day tomorrow, for God’s sake.” Minhwan smiled, “But that means I get to spend more time with him...”

Minhwan opened his cupboard and put on a shirt that says ‘SURPRISE’. He went to his dressing table and looked at the roses. His smile faded a little. “Only one rose looks presentable, the others wilted already.” Nevertheless, he took the last remaining rose and hurried to FT Café.

Said boy reached at 12.30pm, half an hour earlier.

“Good,” he said to himself, “He’s not here yet. I’ll surprise him.”

Minhwan sat at a table nearest to the transparent glass window. In that way, he’d be able to see Wonbin when he reached. In less than five minutes, Minhwan saw a familiar figure walking towards the café, holding a similar bunch of roses.

Minhwan smiled unconsciously. “Seems like he’s early as well.”

Wonbin was about to reach when an old grandmother was struggling while carrying a box. Wonbin, as kind hearted as he was, placed the bouquet of roses safely on the floor near the side so that no one would accidentally trample on his flowers, and helped the old lady to carry the box into her nearby car.

Wonbin smiled after his tiny mission was accomplished, and turned to collect his flowers. But to his horror, he saw a dog biting the purple wrapper of the bouquet, dragging the flowers along with it. Wonbin yelled furiously at the dog, demanding it to give him back his flowers.

He chased the stray animal across the road, and to his relief the dog wasn’t interested in the flower anymore. The dog left the damaged bouquet and ran away, avoiding the blood-boiling Wonbin. Wonbin picked up the flowers, and sighed. Minhwan saw this incident from the café and laughed to himself.

Wonbin had those roses safe in his arms right now, but he wasn’t satisfied of how it looked currently. He was frustrated and kept on mumbling to himself as he tried to rearrange the roses to make it look more presentable. Minhwan saw the cute act from his lover and decided to run over to Wonbin and surprise him. He took his remaining rose and went out of the café.

He prepared his aegyo act for Wonbin, but when he saw a glimpse of a sports car speeding from one end of the road, his smile vanished immediately. Instead, he opened up his lungs to scream the warning to Wonbin, but the loud screeching of the car was much louder then Minhwan’s voice.

“HYUUUUUUNG!”

Minhwan jolted and sat up on his bed, shivering. “H-Hyung… Hyung…” He kept on repeating those words.

“Minhwan!”

He heard a familiar voice calling his name.

“Minhwan,” Seunghyun called out louder, his hands holding Minhwan’s trembling arms, “Minhwan, what happened? What happened to you? Are you alright? Gosh,” he wiped Minhwan’s forehead, “You’re sweating a lot.”

Minhwan felt himself being pulled, and the next thing he knew, Seunghyun had his arms around him. He could hear Seunghyun’s heartbeat very clearly in the embrace. Though it was fast, from what Minhwan could tell the older boy was really worried, the constant heartbeat was comforting and he relaxed while listening to it. When his breathing calmed down, he asked Seunghyun for the date.

“13th of February. Why?”

Minhwan didn’t answer. He felt his eyes tearing and his figure started shivering again, he did his best to blink off the tears.

It’s the same date as my dream again… The same as three years ago…

Seunghyun didn’t say anything. When he felt Minhwan’s body started shaking, he tightened his arms around him, whispering comforting words to the boy, till the shivering ended gradually. Just when he thought Minhwan was asleep, he heard the boy asking him a question.

“Seunghyun?”

“I’m not asleep,” Seunghyun said.

Minhwan asked him in a much softer manner, “Are you still in love with me?”

Seunghyun didn’t know how to respond to Minhwan. He looked at the boy in his arms, and memories from a year ago came back, flooding his mind.

“Sorry, Seunghyun,” Minhwan said, giving back the roses to Seunghyun, “But I can’t accept your love.”

“Why?” Seunghyun asked, feeling hurt from the rejection, “Why?” He asked again and again. He knew from the look that Minhwan was giving him all the time. He could feel that Minhwan likes him as well. So why wouldn’t he accept him? Why wouldn’t he accept his love?

Minhwan’s fingers curled around Seunghyun’s shirt, grabbing it tightly. Seunghyun was brought back to reality. He realized a small part of his shirt was wet.

Minhwan, don’t cry…

“Seunghyun,” Minhwan said, his voice almost inaudible, “I’m not worth it.”

The older boy was confused. “What?”

“Don’t ever fall in love with me,” Minhwan said in words of whisper, “I’m not worth it.”

Seunghyun sat there on his bed, paralyzed upon hearing Minhwan’s words as he kept repeating it.

Don’t ever fall in love with me…

Never ever…

TBC