Sunshine

Today….clear, open skies.

Sunshine

No clouds…..not even a stray cotton ball rebelliously cruising the abyss of blue.

Only sunshine. That temperate kind of sunshine. Sunshine that doesn’t beat down the angry heat of midsummer, or wave that the life out of every unfortunate organism braving to leave home. Mild light and warmth that the skin les in greedily. A forgiving breeze that dries the so-so amount of beaded sweat on one’s temples.

The weatherman predicted right. His charts, his red, orange, and yellow CGI graphic, his assuring smile. This time he is right. He is usually more wrong than right, which buries me under a mound of dread and irritation though it isn’t his fault; these feelings of betrayal, deception-they should be burdened to the meteorologists..

But today, I am only allowed relief. I am myself.

Sunshine.

Jinki sits before me spreading peanut butter and jelly on crackers. He hums along with the music video on TV, his eyes smiling cheerfully down at his labor of love. Upon his occasional glance up at me, however, I am spoiled: A crooked flash of teeth like a spell, a spell that has dizzied me since the beginning, and those crescents set above his offset nose. I have gotten used to mapping his face when there is sunshine, so I always have fresh imagery for times of grey.

Sunshine. I like the way it curiously cups my cheek, pinching its way through the hanging blinds of the sliding door that leads to the balcony. Jinki has a green finger so a dozen or so pots sit dangerously on the ledge. He says he feels so empowered by the sun. It does more than just recharge the batteries, so much more. Often, on days like these, he undresses and lies out there with his plants. Sometimes I join him-whether to humor him or because I should take advantage of being around him like this while I can, I can never decipher.

Today is our day off. We are sealed inside our cocoon, the possibilities endless. Morning still crawls on red knees. Time has decided the sun has no need to rush this day; its ascent into the sky is intoxicated…just for us.

Shaking my head teasingly, I spoon more fruit into my mouth. Then, on impulse, use the utensil to catapult a piece of strawberry in his direction. He whines emptily and swats at me, like I know he would do. But the next time around, he lunges, catches the tangerine piece with his mouth smugly, prompting me to shout goal and pump my fists.

Sunshine and laughter. Hand in hand they go. I soak in both. He’s tickled by my enthusiasm, as always, freely scolding me and snorting at the same time.

We feed the other, watch a movie, and I watch him paint.  Enjoy a parade in the inner city and argue over something trite-all under the generous sun.  Later, before a nap, he sighs, tired, form half-covered in bed, his dark hair mussed artistically. My body is still hot from making love and I’m only thinking about coercing him into doing it again after we sleep-until I hear that sigh, and  attentively look back at him from my trek to the bathroom.

“We should open all the windows, Jonghyun,” he says coyly, flashing his pretty overbite. “Let the fresh air in…it’ll be a shame to waste the day.”

I smile in submission.

Sunshine.

His element.

My sanctuary.

****

Tomorrow is overcast, the weatherman predicts. Expect heavy showers and a bit of a gale. Thunder and lightning around noon.

He is right.

A storm.

A dark shadow cloaking the land, shielding us from a realm of blue. The clouds alliance themselves with each other and declare a cold war. Rumbling, pregnant, sinister.

My hand tightens uncomfortably around the moderately warm mug handle. Cloudy, with a chance of storms. I missed the news the night before but the morning brings upon me a numbness I can barely function with. I didn’t need to see the news to know there is no sunshine today, but I turn on the TV anyway. I want to shove those words back down the innocent man’s throat.

No sunshine.

No Jinki. He’s already gone. Long gone.

Ain’t no sunshine and he’s gone, I correct in my mind.

Because just like me, he isn’t himself on a day like this.

I sip my coffee, submersed in the wide echo of the apartment. It’s much bigger when it storms, a lot less like the dream I’m used to. Degrees lower, blacker, greyer. Nothing like the dim remnants of yesterdays where Jinki and I were kings;  wherein we inhaled basil-scented wealth and caught precious shafts of golden light with our tongues.

Finishing my oppressive breakfast, I darn a poncho and fruitlessly try to protect his plants with a giant sheet of tarp. Delicately, so I don’t knock any off the ledge, but quickly because the wind is feistier than I thought. After a while, though. I give up and curse myself for doing things the hard way. The pots crowd the dining room table moments later.

I’m shaking even after a hot shower. If anything had happened to his children, I’d have taken into consideration sticking around for the real storm, as cruel as it seems.

I think the rain is calling murder

In comparison to that piteous hurricane…no, I feel I am safe. I can stand more against that than the other half of me crouching on the rooftops, right now.

In the rain.

Or rather, the Jinki I am unfamiliar with. My other half doesn’t exist, not even until the drizzles fade away and the smell of wet grass is overwhelming. He doesn’t breathe with me until the sun peeks out from behind its curtains. There doesn’t have to be rainbow; that’s just pretentious anyway.

Just as long as there is sunshine, and the rain clears.

I think the rain is calling murder.

His mother’s words. Her nostrils would lift, to fit in the scent of incoming rain, her shoulders practically sagging from biometric pressure.  Before she entrusted her son in my care, my love, I used to always hear her whisper these words. I didn’t understand them as much as I didn’t understand why Jinki would disappear when the sky fogged over. Why the leaves of the herbs in his mother’s garden seemed to wilt and cry. Why so, when they should have had nothing but praise for the natural phenomena that would quench their thirsts soon?

Basil haunts my consciousness to this day. I used to stand there for hours, in that garden, and let myself get totally drenched, lost in unyielding thought.

All until a dusk when the rain had subsided, and a continuous leak of deep red pitter pattered near my shoes. Originating from a portly hand that the red didn’t biologically belong to, I knew right away without careful assessment. Dripping, dropping, like the rainwater from the trees.

That scent of replenishment intermingled with rust metal. Instability. Old death.  Infinities of evil that suffocated me as a mere man made of flesh and bone, I felt.

Jinki’s body was stationed next to mine. He heaved, he breathed. He was alive but I had no  earthly idea what kind of stranger had decided to join me in the garden. Jinki, where was he? I had thought in a sort of frantic calm, my heart racing.

For a while his body grunted next to me. I allowed it to, too upset to admonish whoever he was for trespassing-let alone look at him. Eventually he walked away and left me alone again.

I figured it out that day. A day I’d never be ready for, no matter how inquisitive I was.

Only now, I am thankful. My heart is heavy, yet I have been given the chance to do what I can. I am stapled to this wonder, Jinki. I have often thought about leaving, I have torn myself apart countless times for the souls lost. Leaving…well, is impossible. That window has shut. Blocking out the fresh air, the sunlight of freedom I’d roll around in without him. But why opt to leave for better pastures when said pastures would only produce rolling thunder and sheets of rain- after a short amount of time? Why leave the better part of hell for a place so equivalent? Where the hell was I going to go with half of myself intact, the other half weeping back in the apartment, his paintings of us strewn all over the floor, misery moving in tasting prey?

Not far, that’s where.

It isn’t so bad once you get used to it. I keep a keen eye on the news, am sensitive to Jinki’s mood. If he is himself, my radiant Jinki, before it rains, I know he will leave. My heart breaks the most if it’s the opposite, because that means he stays home, and I have to cower on the bed surrounded by the wards and charms his mother passed onto me. Listening to him howl, the distorted sounds of the illusion of my lover. I longer kid myself into thinking he doesn’t know any better. That he rams himself into the enchanted door because he can’t stand not to be near me, that he is ignorant to the fact that if he’s let in, the book closes on me forever.

I know better. I hate that I do.

That isn’t Jinki a-knocking at Jinki and I’s bedroom door. Sobbing terribly into my hands, as I await for the rain to stop, I remember this to keep claim on my sanity. The man next to me in the portrait on the nightstand, the man who basks out in the sun with his plants, the man that spoils me with the smile of his eyes, his sweet mouth…I’m his. I am here for him. I endure and I enslave myself to rain because of the intermittent sunshine.

The door clicks open. Disturbs me from the itchy, mundane task of arranging and rearranging books on the shelves in the living room.

Jinki’s body strides in, tracking in mud.

The echo of a woman’s piercing scream shrouds this moment from reality. Hers. Many more.

I think the rain is calling murder, bright orange eyes rasp to me, losing their edge even as he glides past me. For it is almost evening. The rain is but a trickle now. Soon, Jinki will be reborn, and I will only have to go him. Or let him come to me.

In my patience, I start tea, a smile of grim content lacing my lips. The hiss of the teapot, soon, drowns out-obliterates-the screams.  I throw pre-sliced biscuits in the oven and set the table, making sure to place a jar of jelly, butter knife, and saucer where Jinki will sit in welcome.

“Dammit Jonghyun, why’d you let me sleep for so-ooo you baking something? What’s the occasion? And-oh. Haha, again? Alright fine, but mark my words next time we will eat a proper dinner. I like you better when you have teeth, you know.”

Sunshine, I grin after turning around to his voice and nut brown eyes; shushing him with a kiss. Sunshine anew.

His element

My sanctuary.

FIN