Song: Daydream By Super Junior

Pairing: Xiuchen

Word Count: ~450

Suggested By: ILoveMinAndMin

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I cover my ears and I can hear him.  I thought I had forgotten the sound of his voice, but there it is, telling me not to worry, telling me to laugh, telling me he loves me… telling me goodbye.

I shut my eyes, and I can see him.  I can see the way he looked when we met for the first time, when everything was filled with possibility, and for the last, when he was telling me that we should stop, before things went too far, before it would hurt too much to let go.

I should have told him then that it was too late.  It already hurt too much, but as those words cut through my skin like ice, all I could do was sit in silence because they meant it wasn’t too late for him to leave me, and that meant I couldn’t stop him. 

I had to let him go.  That’s what he wanted. 

I can still see how he looked as he sat there waiting for me to say anything.  All I did was nod and say okay, and walk away.  I wouldn’t let Chen see me cry, not then. 

It would be my last gift to him, not allowing him to see my tears.

Chen never came back to my apartment to collect the things he left there. 

I’ve never managed to throw any of it away, not yet. 

Instead, on days like today, on days where it gets just a little too hard, I find myself pulling out the shirts he left hung in the corner of my closet and clenching them in my fists, trying to breathe in a scent that has long since faded, trying to touch a person that has long since gone.

It’s not healthy. 

I know. 

I should stop.

I know.

But I can’t.

Not yet.

Because, the memories linger.  The feelings don’t fade, and the promises that we made haunt me in my dreams because perhaps we never said forever, but I thought that’s what we had agreed to.  What we were working towards.

Clearly though, I was the only one that thought that way.

Ring

I sigh and drop the shirt to the floor to go answer my apartment door.  It’s time to resurface from the past that I embraced in the darkness of my closet.

But… I do not resurface.

Instead, I am greeted at my door by a ghost from my past that looks just as haunted as me.

And he steps through doorway whispering my name like he never has before.

“Minseok.”

And his hand is on my face, as I learn that, perhaps, it wasn’t only too late for me. 

Perhaps, it was too late for us both.

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It’s still the 20^th but yeah, little later post today.  The parents who I see about the same number of times a year as I have fingers on my hand were in town till this morning so I was busy <3 I'll be late tmr too since I'm still working on getting everything back on schedule ;-)