ii.

ashes to ashes to ashes

***

The sky is the colour of the sea's stomach, rippling a mosaic of blue as it presides over Kangjoon, enveloping his world. It all seems so big, the world, and sometimes his mind spaces out, trying to wrap its arms around the concept. He's sitting on the bench under a tree in a white, non-uniform shirt, with a few minutes to spare before lunch, thinking he'll have to wait them out to see his friends. But just as he thinks that, Suzy comes into Kangjoon's vision, an unexpected pop of pressed Monday whites.

"Aren't you supposed to be in class?" Kangjoon replies, wondering if his watch is slow.

"My—well, yours, too—maths teacher always lets us out early," Suzy explains, an odd expression settling on her features. "Remember?"

"No..." Kangjoon says slowly.

"They let you out of the hospital," Suzy observes belatedly. "But..." unconsciously, her hand rises towards her temple.

"Yeah." Kangjoon senses the words in her silence. "They fixed up the cut on my head and everything, but there's something wrong with my memory. Everything is..." He blinks, the bright glare of the sky overwhelming for a moment. "... hazy," he finishes.

"Yeah, your mom told me a little bit about the memory loss." Suzy's eyes narrow, struggling to grapple with his reality. "I don't really understand it all, though. What's it like?"

"I woke up and I thought it was January." Kangjoon shoves his hands into his pockets. "Yesterday, I remembered a little more, like the swimming carnival in February and what I did for my birthday the next month. It's coming back. Slowly."

"But in the meantime, you have gaps in your memory," Suzy concludes.

"Yeah." His brow furrows deeply. "I remember people. Most of the ones who matter, anyway. Like there's you, Krystal and Seulgi; Luna, Daehyun, Kai, and all the other guys. And Minah. I want to see her," he says suddenly.

Suzy bites her lip. "I'm not sure that would be a good idea."

Kangjoon stares in mild alarm. "Why? Did I tell her that I liked her and it ruined our friendship?"

"Uh..." Suzy resists the urge to wince. "You two just broke up."

"What?"

"Yeah, like last week," Suzy says. "You... don't remember that?"

He shakes his head, looking down, stunned, at the ground. "I don't even remember dating her. I thought we were just friends."

You're not even that anymore, Suzy thinks with pity as she takes in the confused set of his shoulders, imagining the mess inside his mind right now; a tangle of then and now and nothing in between to connect the two.

***

Seulgi returns from a gruelling English class to Wendy gesticulating wildly to their group of friends, the lot of them scattered in a loose circle on the grassy square. "... And she just guessed immediately who I liked," Wendy is saying. "Of course, I didn't admit it— Oh, hey, Seulgi!"

"You like someone? Who?" Seulgi gasps in an undertone by way of greeting. "Or is this about your thing with Taemin?"

No one else has posed these questions to Wendy yet, but it goes without saying that between girls, secret crushes remain secret unless it has been established that their secrets are yours; if their secrets are revealed, so will yours, and if they are not, then yours will remain in the dark, too.

Wendy angles herself ever so slightly away from everyone else and towards Seulgi. No one even bats an eyelash; Bomi continues her chat with Hayoung and Luna about their plans for the weekend, and as usual, Irene and Jieun are laughing about something. Jinri is nowhere to be seen. "My thing with Taemin is pretty much dead," Wendy tells Seulgi quietly.

"Oh." Seulgi tries for sympathy dipped in a note of sadness, but finds it beyond her taste, considering how she hadn't really taken to Taemin, and the whole thing with him and Wendy had completely bewildered her, anyway. "So who is it?"

Lowering her voice even more, Wendy says, "Daehyun."

"Dae... hyun," Seulgi repeats slowly, allowing the words to sink in. She cranes her neck to look at her friends over on the other side of the grass and concrete strip, eventually finding Daehyun, the only blonde head amongst the gaggle of boys. Turning back to Wendy, Seulgi doesn't know what to say. "Oh," ends up escaping again by default.

"I'm not sure about it, though," Wendy is quick to say. "He just seems like a really nice guy and—"

"It's okay, you don't have to explain it to me," Seulgi waves her off with a tight smile. While she loves Wendy and she has no qualms with her friend liking Daehyun in particular, the issue in itself lies in the fact that Seulgi is fiercely protective of the group of boys that Daehyun is part of; she prefers to keep some friends separate. The only other girls Seulgi will share domains with are Krystal and Suzy. "So, do you two speak often?"

"Not really," Wendy says. "Sometimes we talk during musical practice, but otherwise, we don't really make much conversation. It's probably all for nothing, anyway, since he's liked Jiyoung for ages now..."

"He doesn't," Seulgi blurts out, instantly regretting it. "I mean, he's trying to get over her. At least that's what he told me."

"Oh, I see," Wendy says, and though her expression doesn't change, the tell-tale loosening of the set of her shoulders betrays a different story. She smiles at Seulgi. "I guess we'll see how things go."

"Yeah." Seulgi returns her smile. "We'll see."

***

It's often mistakenly thought that girls gossip more than guys, but the reality is that talking about other people is something guys know how to do better than anyone else. Today's chemistry topic is supposed to be hydrocarbon bonds (and for the majority of the class, it is), but the focus of the back of the room is on Joy and Zelo, one of the more prominent couples in the grade below.

"I still can't believe how Zelo managed to land himself that," Yun exclaims in grudging awe, turning his phone around to reveal a photo saved from one of Joy's online social accounts.

"Who?" Sehun asks, leaning over for a look. "Oh, Joy? Yeah, she's pretty hot."

"D'you reckon he gets any?" Yun wonders. Sehun and Kai snicker at the thought, and Seulgi sits at the edge of the group, internally disapproving.

"Maybe he's a really nice guy," she says; not to stick up for Zelo or Joy, but to disperse any thoughts that he had 'landed' her as if she was a prize of some sort.

"Yeah, he's a good lad," Yun says. "But you know, if they ever broke up..."

"You'd be swooping in, wouldn't you?" Sehun smirks.

The conversation evaporates into laughs and jabs at other girls, and through it all, Kai doesn't extend his efforts beyond a grunt. Seulgi looks for a moment at Yun and Sehun huddled over the former's phone, then at Kai, and wonders if there are actually boys who are different.

***

It's been ten minutes since class started and Jinri is still in the toilet.

"Hey, Bomi, has Jinri gotten back yet?" Seulgi calls over a monster pair of plastic safety goggles wobbling on her nose.

"Jinri?" Bomi's forehead crinkles as she shakes her head. Her arms cradle beakers and electronic scales. "I haven't even seen her today. Where is she supposed to be getting back from?"

"I'll tell you later," Seulgi says, but she is already turning away. Biology today is a flurry of lab coats and conversations bouncing off the walls thanks to the terrible acoustics of the room, so Seulgi slips out easily without garnering attention.

She heads for the toilet block, slipping into the vacant toilet room beside the occupied one. There's a certain appeal to these toilets, which are separated by solid walls instead of mere cubicle divides and therefore afford more privacy. But privacy in general shares two sides of the coin, and as Seulgi locks the door behind her, she's seeing the dark side of things as her ears prick.

Next door, there's the horribly familiar sound of gagging and splashes, and just as Seulgi is thinking no, no, no, she shouldn't be hearing this again (especially now that it's not from herself), there comes the sound of Jinri's unmistakable cough.

Seulgi squeezes her eyes shut, pressing her thumbs to the bridge of her nose. The day this would happen has always been a 'when' not an 'if', but it still hurts that she had been right. She had suspected, had waited, ever since Wendy's disintegration. Seulgi's breaths come out shallow and through her mind a slideshow flicks, a messy collage of Jinri's gloomy face and her coming to Biology late every lesson, complaining about how she feels sick.

"Well, of course you do," Seulgi murmurs under her breath, wincing as Jinri continues hacking up her life from her lungs. Standing and flushing the toilet even though the cover has remained down the whole time, Seulgi leaves before Jinri does. It's beginning to wear her down, this cold war.

"Did you find her?" Bomi asks, worry pending on her brow, when Seulgi returns.

"Yeah," Seulgi says. "She's in the bathroom."

"Still in there?" Bomi frowns now when Seulgi nods. "She's been there a long time."

Seulgi nods again, looking away. "I know."

***

"Kangjoon is back!"

The news spreads like spilled bleach, and by the height of the lunch break, almost everyone Kangjoon came to see is there. Seulgi, Bomi, and Jinri are the last to arrive.

A two-person strong circle is knitted tight around Kangjoon, but Seulgi unabashedly elbows her way to Krystal, leaning into her friend's shoulder. Vaguely aware of Kangjoon answering questions and everyone wanting to know how he is, Seulgi asks quietly, "Is he doing okay?"

"Yeah," Krystal tells her. "He just got out of the hospital last night. They fixed up his cuts and bruises and all that, but you know, his memory..."

Seulgi sighs. "Does he remember us all?"

"He doesn't remember Zico— probably because they only just became friends recently," Krystal says. "But he remembers everyone else here. He just doesn't remember things that happened."

"Like what?"

"Like funny moments, fights, sleepovers with the guys. See, look," Krystal says suddenly, pointing towards the centre of the circle, where Chanyeol has his phone aloft, playing a video of Kangjoon dancing in a superman suit. "They've been showing him videos of things they all did together, but he's remembering none of it."

Seulgi feels a pang strike her heartstrings, the same kind of sadness she can hear in Krystal's voice. "I'm scared he won't remember me."

"He will," Krystal assures her. "And if for some reason he doesn't, he will, eventually. Apparently most of his memories will come back. He just needs time."

"What's going on?" a voice demands to know from behind them. Seulgi turns to see Jinri regarding the crowd with confusion. "Why is everyone here, and why," she cranes her neck, "is Kangjoon not in uniform?"

A few people turn and try to explain everything to her, and while their words differ in their detailing, the general message that Kangjoon had been in an accident, had a stint in hospital, and is now out with half his memory shattered, gets through to Jinri. "God, I had no idea," she says, looking around. "How come all of you know about this and I didn't?"

Bomi shrugs. "I heard from Hayoung."

"Suzy told Krystal, who told me," Seulgi says blankly. She wonders why Jinri is acting as though she should have known; it's not like she's all that close to Kangjoon, and no one tells her anything, anyway— not to be mean, but only because the way things work is that if you are supposed to know, then you will, and you won't have to ask.

"...Oh," Jinri says, staring curiously through the gaps in the crowd at Kangjoon. "Still, though, you'd think I would have at least heard. I mean, I've noticed he's been away for a while..."

Seulgi looks at Jinri in disbelief, drowning her words out. She's more than a little annoyed that Jinri cares more about what she knows than whether or not Kangjoon is okay.

"Hey, I'll see you in maths, okay?" Seulgi taps Krystal on the shoulder before she can do or say anything she'll regret later. "I'll talk to Kangjoon another time, when there's less people."

Krystal looks at her for a prolonged second, at the restrained annoyance in Seulgi's expression. Her eyes flick to Jinri, then back again, and she understands. "Sure," she says. "See you there."

***

These days, her relationship with Jinri and Wendy (or rather, their relationship as a trio) is suffering, Seulgi thinks, mostly because of the heightening atmosphere of competition. Wendy is all Jinri has ever wanted to be, and Seulgi knows she was unintentionally a role-model first to both Wendy and Jinri before she became their friend. Some habits die hard.

And then there are things that can't be helped, things that aren't habits and just happen. Things like Seulgi arriving at school to find that no one else is there yet except Jinri. "Let's take a walk," Jinri says, and before the news arrives, Seulgi can already feel the avalanche.

It's been a build up of snow, of resentment towards her from Jinri's end. Every friendship Seulgi enters is more careful than the last, because she finds that somehow no matter how many promises are made, the other person always finds it hard to be her friend because they feel as though they have standards to live up to. Being your friend, Seulgi has been told by people one too many times in the past, makes me feel less about myself. And while she understands the 'It's hard to be your friend because you have everything I want' perspective, she just wants someone to understand that there is also the 'I am your friend for who you are, not for who I am' thought.

At first, things had looked on the up side with Wendy and Jinri. She thought maybe she had found people who would understand, but time breeds familiarity and familiarity brings attention to the little details, and attention brings comparisons.

Now, the three of them are at the edge of a frozen lake, and it feels as though the neat triangle their friendship had once formed is now being forced into another, alien shape, and Seulgi wonders if there was anything any of them could have done to stop this, or if it was doomed to happen from the beginning.

"Seulgi?"

"Hmm?" Seulgi shakes her head, realising she had completely lost the reins over her mind.

"I asked how you were."

"Oh." Seulgi hesitates, wondering if there's a feeling for her thoughts. "Okay, I guess. School is killing me. How about you?"

"About the same." Jinri smiles softly, but beneath it, Seulgi can see more. Once upon a time, she would have known what it was. "Hey, did you know that Wendy likes Daehyun?"

Another hesitation entraps Seulgi, bad feelings beginning to brew. "Uh, yeah..."

"You did?" Jinri sounds kind of bummed out. "Oh. See, remember the same thing happened last year, when Wendy said she liked Kangjoon, even though I liked him first and just didn't tell anyone—"

"Wait, wait," Seulgi interrupts Jinri's sudden tirade. "What do you mean, the 'same thing' happened last year?" Realisation dawns on her. "Do you like Daehyun, too?"

Jinri nods, letting the silence settle. "I don't know if I like him, or if I just like how he's really polite and thoughtful."

For a moment, Seulgi wants to laugh, because firstly, Wendy and Jinri always seem to find themselves liking her friends, and secondly, she's beginning to notice that most of the people who have ever liked Daehyun never seem to be sure about it. "How did you know Wendy likes him?" she asks, changing the subject.

"She told me the other day," Jinri says, looking at her feet. "And I thought, Well, isn't that great, because she's better friends with him than I am, and they actually talk."

"What did you say when she told you?"

"Nothing." Jinri shrugs. "I haven't told her I like him, too. And there isn't really anything else I can do, either. That's the thing. You two are sorted, because you and Kai are actually close friends, and Wendy spends more time with Daehyun than I ever will."

Here come the comparisons, Seulgi thinks, with an edge of bitterness and  tonic of melancholy. Time breeds familiarity and familiarity brings attention to the little details, and attention brings comparisons.

She looks at Jinri and sees first snowballs hurtling down the mountain, the ice beginning to crack. Try as they might to deny or hide or even refuse to acknowledge it, the truth remains that the three of them can't be themselves around each other anymore. The truth is that they are coming to an end.

****

"I forgot it on the table!" Suzy wails.

Today is the big 18 for Myungsoo, and just after she gets to school, Suzy realises that one detail has slipped through the tight threads of her plans.

"What did you forget?" Seulgi leans forward, intrigued. As the only one of them who has a thing with a senior, Suzy is often the subject of many questions and ponderings.

"Myungsoo's birthday card!" Suzy huffs, annoyed with herself. "I have his sweater here, and I got the stereo in his car installed last night when we had dinner at my house. Ugh, I can't believe I forgot!"

"It's okay," Krystal says. "Are you seeing him tonight? Because if you are, you could always give him the card then."

"Yeah," Seulgi adds. "Don't worry, you've already done a lot for him, anyway. Speaking of which, how was dinner?"

"Oh, that," Suzy says distractedly. "It was good, but..."

"But?"

"My brother asked if we were dating, and Myungsoo still didn't get the hint!"

Krystal frowns. "What did he say, exactly?"

Suzy launches into her story with raised, indignant eyebrows. "Well, my brother was smiling at him the whole dinner, and then afterwards, he was like, "So, are you guys dating?" And I thought, Here we go, this is it, because you know, my parents were there and they didn't object when he asked, but then all Myungsoo said was, "We're working on it." What does that even mean?"

"Maybe he doesn't want to put a label on it just yet," Seulgi suggests. "Maybe he's scared of commitment."

"He seems to be fine with it so far," Suzy mutters. "We're practically dating. We act like we are, plus he's met my parents; I've met his. The only thing missing is the part where he actually asks me out."

"It'll happen," Krystal insists. "He likes you, obviously. It's only a matter of time."

Suzy pouts. "It seems like he's fine with making me wait forever."

"Just wait." Seulgi pats her shoulder. "Just wait a little longer. You're luckier than you know."

***

It was supposed to be Kangjoon's turn to host this weekend, but with the whole shower spectacle and his recovery still underway, the guys end up at Kai's again, sprawled all over the place.

Sungjong and Sehun are on the couch having Rubik's cube races while Taehyung commentates and insults their 'solving styles', Jinyoung has his nose and lanky limbs in the pantry, Baekhyun is in the corner texting Taeyeon (who is away at pony camp or something), Kai is looking for Jinyoung, Chanyeol is blasting music and making as much noise as he can, Daehyun sits in the other corner, watching everyone and taking photos at inopportune moments to send to Seulgi, and Chen is still at work.

"Has anyone seen Jinyoung?" Kai asks, raising his voice to the room.

"No!" Jinyoung yells from beneath the pantry shelf where all the chocolate is kept.

"You're the epitome of stupid, Jinyoung," Sungjong says without taking his eyes off his Rubik's cube.

And all the while, Chanyeol keeps the volume of the party music (that no one else really likes) up at its highest.

At 11, Chen pulls into the driveway with his grandma in the passenger seat ("Thanks, Nan. Have a nice drive home. Remember, you don't actually have to pick me up till tomorrow!") and walks in through the unlocked door to the smell of pizzas in the oven and all the lights in the house still on.

"Eh-hey, he's here!" Chanyeol shouts, thumping Chen on the back.

"Oh, good, can we eat now?" Jinyoung says.

"Shut up, Jinyoung, you already ate my whole pantry," Kai snaps.

"You're just mad I didn't leave any for you, and because tu hai un piccolo pene," Jinyoung shoots back, sinking into one of his Italian tangents that no one understands.

Baekhyun and Daehyun have already silently made their way to the kitchen and removed the pizzas. Sehun prepares the cooling racks and Taehyung gets out the pizza slicer.

"Is there any barbecue sauce?" Jinyoung asks no one in particular.

Sungjong throws the bottle at his face. "I'm surprised you don't already know where it is."

"Well, I did, but this idiot," Jinyoung jabs a finger at Kai, "keeps putting it somewhere different, thinking non sono molto veloce."

"You do know no one understands you half the time, Jinyoung," Taehyung says.

"What of it."

"Okay," Taehyung says, poker-faced.

The nine of them settle in on five pizzas, and the whole affair ends with three photos taken (not very flattering ones of all of them) by Daehyun and added to his Snapchat story, and someone (probably Chen) suggesting chugging down as many bottles of cola as they can until they throw up.

"So, like the milk challenge?" Sehun doesn't look convinced. "Because I did that once and I kind of felt like dying afterwards. I had to swim the next morning, too."

"Yes, but no, Sehun, this is cola, not milk," Chanyeol says, as if he's the stupid one for doubting the cola challenge. "I'm up for it. Who else is?"

In the end, Chanyeol, Chen, Jinyoung and Kai step up to the plate (although Kai ' out' at one litre, as Sungjong says, even though the latter hadn't even attempted it at all). Chanyeol chugs two and a quarter before rushing to the sink to gag, Chen does three, and Jinyoung is still going.

"MY THROAT, MY THROAT," Jinyoung yells eventually, clutching his neck as if it will make the internal burning of his throat go away. "OH GOD, IT'S IN MY NOSE, TOO." Daehyun and Taehyung are pointing their phones at him and videoing the whole thing, while everyone else roars with laughter, heads swinging back and forth like they're at a tennis match. Baekhyun's hands clap stupidly like a seal's.

At 4am, Jinyoung has only just gotten the burn out of his throat, as well as made seven thousand and one trips to the bathroom. Needless to say, he is the most awake out of the nine, and when they all go to sit out on Kai's driveway to watch the sun rise, he is doing caffeine-fuelled cartwheels with his shirt tied around his head.

"You ever wonder if it'll still be like this when Kangjoon comes back?" Daehyun asks everyone as the night splits like a bag of henna, drying into a brilliant shade of orange, swatches of gold beneath the clouds.

"I hope so," Kai says. "Kind of , what happened to him."

"Yeah, but after a while, he'll be alright," Chen says, watching with intrigue at Jinyoung doing cartwheels and feeling a slight urge to do the same.