We sat there all night, you know. Talking about what we dreamt, what we loved, what we were. It was the best night I'd ever spent. And I've had before, so that's saying something. We touched on secrets, love stories, aspirations, inspiration. He was so full of hope that I couldn't keep my eyes away. I remember, he was practically glowing that night. His eyes, his hair. His entire self. So full of excitement for the future, as vibrant as the rainbow in the sky after the flood, so alive. I fell in love with that glow. They say you never really understand a person until you listen to what they have to say at 3am in the morning - listen to their deepest thoughts, darkest secrets. I finally understood what they meant by that. For once, the elusive "they" were right.

He left an impression on me that night, inscribed himself into my every brain cell, my every blood vessel, my heart. His name was written all over me. His face burnt into the retinas of my eye. His glow rendering him nothing but darkness. I remember the words we strung together like pearls in the moonlight, exchanged and lit up with life. I remember everything. Nothing slipped through that night. He closed up the holes in my swiss cheese.

"Hey, Sehun, tell me a secret," I whispered.

We were leaning back, against each other, eyes closed and drifting off into the limbo that exists between the planes of sleep and consciousness, when I broke the silence of the night. The trees weren't even rustling anymore. Everything was still, the lamp above up still faithfully protecting us from the dangerous dark. 

He opened his eyes slowly, looked at me, his dark eyes unreadable in the moonlight.

"I want so spin dreams from silver silk, from black indents on white, from golden pillars of light. I want - I want to capture life as it is, in all its simple brilliance, in all its unadorned perfection, in all its beauty. All its flaws, its vulnerabilities, its - I can't - I want to preserve it, you know what I mean? I want to keep it just the way it is, without any embellishments, any exaggerations, any "improvements". Because life does not need any of that, and I hate it that people can't see that, that they feel the need to make it "better", as if they could. Life should be just the way she is, and people should just accept that. But they don't even know she exists half the time. They don't even know that they're living, they don't even care. I want to show them they're wrong, I want to show them what it means to live. I want to show them all they're missing out on, even though I know they're probably too far gone "living" to care. I want to write. Paint stories of love, of hope, of joy, all encompassed into the warm embrace of Mother Earth, all cradled to her full bosom like the children she loved. I-"

He paused mid-sentence, "But you know what I mean, don't you? I can see it in your eyes," he grinned, his own staring into mine. "They shine like stars in the night."

I loved how he could compare everything beautiful to Nature, it takes a special talent to match beauty with beauty, to match words to beauty in itself is a skill I would love to have, that I would love to hold like a broken bird in my hands. Gently, gently.

"I do."

There was a beat of silence. I continued.

"You're a writer, then."

Sehun remained silent, eyes closed as he tried to put his thoughts into words. "It's... It's more than that. I don't just want to write stories. I want to write life, the way it already is, it's existence. And everything else follows naturally. See, we're all interconnected, correlated. That's where metaphors stem from, except no one really realizes that consciously. But once you grasp that, words follow your command."

I nodded. There was a beat of silence. He continued.

"You know I used to think that life in itself is just a dream. We think we're awake but that's all there is to our existence. A thought. Because maybe we're not, maybe we're all sleeping, all dreaming even as we go to school, or work, even as we love, as we laugh, as she cry. Maybe all this," he gestured around, "all these, isn't real. I used to believe that life was a part of death. In death we dream. In death we live. And the moment we wake up is the moment we die. Now, though, I don't know what to believe. I don't - I can't believe that all these came from a figment of my imagination, I'm not that great. I'm not that beautiful. These feelings, these precious little things that we take for granted all the time, oxygen, soil, water, how can all these be - not real?"

He paused, thinking through his thoughts.

"I guess it all made sense to me, everything fit. Take reincarnation, for example. Different lives, same person. How is that possible? Not unless you think about the possibility that maybe it's just the same person dreaming different dreams. Heaven. Hell. The real world, perhaps. When we wake up, or die, that's where we'll be. And some live through nightmares, some don't. It all fit like a jigsaw puzzle that was meant to be. It kills me how I can't find a flaw to this, because I want to. That's why I want to write it out. Lay out, in black and white, life and dreams, so I can finally decipher this mystery, so I can finally justify to myself that there is more to this than this." He grimaced, his head in his hands, his eyes wild, out of control.

It scared me, that expression. Like something's going to snap. Hesitating for only a moment, I placed a hand on his shoulder. There was nothing else I could've done. Anything I said would've been redundant, anticlimax. His gaze softened. He sat up again, grasping my hand for a moment before letting it slip through his hold, like sand through the crevices between fingers, like water through sand.

"I believe you."

"Thank you."

I thought about what he said for days after, now it's come back to me again. It was an intriguing concept, that life is nothing but a dream. I used to believe something else, but I think for him, he was right. Life was nothing but a dream for him. He dwelled too much in dreams, dreams swallowed him whole. What happens when I wake up? Will I see him again? Or is he too far gone, deep in dream after dream after dream, layered together like stacked sheets of paper? Maybe I should wake up first, wait by his side for him to wake up, look into those eyes again. The ones I fell into when I first saw them. Look into those open eyes, awake and alive.

But first, I must remember. I must.

"Tell me a story, please."

Sehun replied after a moment's delibration. "Love is a reciprocity. It's all about give and take, about need. About seduction, allure, attraction. Opposites. Complements and contrasts. Can you love without wanting anything in return, can love be so pure? Is that kind of love love? I think love, by it's nature, selfish. It needs something in return. It demands it. You tell me the Moon loves the Sun, I disagree. The Moon wants the Sun, simply because she does not and cannot have him. She does not love him. The Sun loves the Earth. Love is like ocean and clouds, an evaporation of seawater and a replenishing of rain. Here's a story about a boy who got lost, who wanted so much and got so little. Here's a story about a girl who loved so much and so hard that she always followed close behind, who fell into the pit of darkness and never came out. Here's an even shorter story, she painted him red with blood. The end."

His voice broke. My heart broke with it.

"You-"

And then we were kissing for real, and he tasted like pain and quixotism, like coffee and dreams, like blackness and something quintessentially male. Our lips moved against each other, and I couldn't draw back. I don't normally kiss strangers I barely know, but this is what he meant, wasn't it? Give and take. Need. Seduction. Allure. Attraction. He was that vast expanse of water, surging and roiling just beneath the calm surface of those eyes, I was the cloud floaring on top, so far yet right there, skimming the surface of the water, understanding little by little, more of him. Paint this moment bright red and dark red, the colour of fresh blood on snow, of age old wine on white marble floor. Paint this moment black and grey and white, a new beginning, a new start, darkness and purity. Innocence and lust. Paint this moment purple, the colour of pale sunrise, of vibrant sunset, of fireworks bursting forth in the night sky.

He was the one to draw back. I remember.

"Look," he said, pointing up. "It's that colour. That pale nothing colour that you love. Of new beginnings. Fresh starts."

I felt disorientated, did I just wake up? I can't - oh! It's morning. When did time pass so quickly? Where did all that time go? 

"I... I have to go."

Flustered, I stood up, until he caught my wrist, almost too late. 

"Don't pull a Cinderella on me," he smiled. "Here."

And so I did walk off with his number inscribed on my brain cells, hoping that it wouldn't fall through my swiss cheese memory, a tiny smile etched on my face, a tiny flower blooming in the garden deep inside me; he broke the back of Winter in me that night.