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"Someone will remember us, I say, even in another time."
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[FILL] between horror and acceptance
(Anonymous) 2022-12-26 09:49 pm (UTC)(link)Major Tags: grief, implied character death
Additional Tags: amnesia, resurrection (or is it), open ended/ambiguous, liminal space of a difficult conversation, dealing with grief, letting go/moving on, idolverse, fantastical/supernatural elements,
Permission to remix: Yes
a/n: op i feel like this is very much not what you were aiming for but i hope you can still enjoy! wc: 1.3k. i apologize for any errors, this is very lightly edited.
***
The next time Jihoon sees Soonyoung, it’s five months after his dead body was found, mangled and roughly deposited under a nondescript bridge.
The world screeches to a halt around Jihoon. Water roars in his ears. Something screams in the back of his mind. He feels like the one drowning.
Soonyoung leans casually against the jamb of the door to Jihoon’s apartment building, teeth wearing down another one of his nails. Jihoon unsticks his limbs and forces himself to walk.
There are three steps leading up to the door. They feel like three miles. His feet come to a stop in front of Soonyoung. Jihoon wills himself to look at Soonyoung’s face. It’s perfect, beautiful, the same familiar shape. Absolutely no sign of damage or death. Nausea racks his stomach.
He meets Soonyoung’s eyes, brown and bright, but utterly devoid of recognition. Dread drowns his lungs.
“Annyeong,” Soonyoung greets, an upward lilt at the end of the greeting, as if he’s compelled to speak in banmal, but he’s not sure why. “Do you live here?”
Jihoon gulps in air. He feels fuzzy, detached. A hand hovers near his arm. Jihoon wishes, vehemently and suddenly, that Soonyoung weren’t here.
“Soonyoung-ah,” he croaks out at last, pushing past the quiver in his lips, “H-how?”
Soonyoung tilts his head, a smile half-hung on his face. HIs eyes are quizzical. “Do I know you?” Jihoon’s stomach sinks. His breath comes out shaky. Soonyoung’s concern bleeds from his eyes.
“Maybe you should go in,” Soonyoung suggests quietly. He reaches for Jihoon, who slaps his hands away. Soonyoung shrinks. “I was just asking for your keys.”
Pulling in another breath, Jihoon nods. He doesn't know if he should apologize. A part of his brain says that he’s hurt Soonyoung. Another part argues that this is a stranger. He pulls out his keys and aims the one for the front door at the keyhole. His hand shakes, and the metal scrapes noisily. Soonyoung takes the key gently from him.
“Let me,” he says softly. “You don’t look well.” Wildly, Jihoon wants to laugh. No, of course he’s not well. He saw the love of his life dead on the news months ago. And now he’s back in front of Jihoon, in perfect health and with absolutely no recollection, it seems, of what happened. But before he can gather the strength to snort, or do something normal, Soonyoung’s pushing the door open.
Soonyoung leads him to the elevator like he’s the one on the verge of death. Jihoon tugs his elbow away once they reach the elevator doors. Pretends he doesn’t notice Soonyoung’s wince. He jabs his finger into the up button like it’s some sort of silent, tactile defense to whatever mean things Soonyoung must be thinking about him.
They wait in silence. Jihoon wonders if Soonyoung has any intention of coming up with, and then adamantly refuses to consider which option he himself would prefer.
The door opens. Jihoon steps in. Soonyoung follows. Oh. Well. Jihoon positions himself in a corner and wraps arms around himself, feeling less disoriented but no less confused, and horrified. How the hell is this happening?
“What floor?” Soonyoung asks a moment later, when the elevator doesn't move. The back of Jihoon’s neck burns from sudden embarrassment.
“Seventeen,” he mutters. Soonyoung turns to press the button, but not before Jihoon catches his furrowed brows, as though the word rings some bell that’s long been gathering dust. Jihoon wonders how the members would react if he told them.
They’d probably stare at him in horror. Are you crazy? Chan might say. Seokmin might frown and catch him later, his disbelief always the quickest to cave. After all, he’d cried the most when the news headline numbed them all with shock and grief, hoping that this might have just been a nightmare.
The door slides open and Jihoon reawakens in this new nightmare. Soonyoung gestures for him to go first.
Jihoon’s shoes click against the tiles as he walks. Soonyoung’s makes no noise.
He’s able to get his apartment door open this time and briefly considers slamming the door in Soonyoung’s face, but Soonyoung jams his shoulder against the door like he knew it’d happen. Jihoon jerks back from the door. Soonyoung sidles in.
Jihoon does his best to ignore him, kicking off his shoes and throwing his coat over the back of a chair. Soonyoung hovers nearby, uselessly. Jihoon scrubs his leftover dishes furiously. They say nothing.
Eventually, Jihoon runs out of things to do. He reluctantly joins Soonyoung at the table.
“Why are you here?” Jihoon finally asks.
Soonyoung smiles lightly. It’s cordial. It’s horrific. Soonyoung never smiles at him like that.
“I figured there are some things you’d wanna ask,” he says softly. “Based on how you reacted when you saw…me.”
Fair enough, Jihoon supposes. He looks at this sculpture-Soonyoung in front of him, hair neatly styled, dressed in a black blazer, face calm but cool, devoid of the fire Soonyoung had always carried with him, like an internal hearth, and knows that this is not his Soonyoung.
“Okay,” he says wearily. “Yeah.”
-
“Who was…I before?”
“The love of my life. He died five months ago.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah. How are you here?”
“I don’t know. I woke up under a bridge.”
“Why are you here?”
“I knew I had to come here. I don’t know why.”
“Oh. Okay. Do you remember…anything?”
“No. Can you tell me?”
-
Jihoon talks for much longer than he anticipated. He tells this Soonyoung in front of him about the little things Soonyoung liked to do, the river walk dates and the songwriting sessions, the tiger stuffy collection, the dance studio he opened after disbandment with Chan. He talks about Soonyoung’s ricocheting laughter, the birds that liked to land on his shoulders. He talks about his gentleness, the way he loved Jihoon like everyday was their last.
He recounts the first time Soonyoung asked him out, a brazen two-year old idol, backstage at Inkigayo, when the infamous sandwich was still a thing. They had their first kiss in the dorm shower, both of them giddy on the high of winning another award. He smiles as he talks, and maybe he cries too, but the Soonyoung in front of him sits quietly, listening, and Jihoon keeps talking.
“What was he to you?” This Soonyoung asks, finally, when it’s dark enough that they can see their reflections in the window.
“Everything,” Jihoon answers hoarsely, honestly, scraped raw and hollow, and not just from the talking. “He was the fire to my wood.”
Soonyoung tilts his head. “He burned you out?”
Jihoon huffs a laugh. “Maybe sometimes,” he admits. “But he helped me burn, helped me light the way.”
Soonyoung hums. Jihoon falls silent.
“I’m…sorry,” Soonyoung says after a while, hesitantly. Jihoon looks up, startled. “I’m sorry I’m not your Soonyoung.”
“It’s…” Jihoon trails off, fingers twisting together. It’s not okay, but — “Maybe I needed you more,” he tries. Soonyoung’s the one startled this time.
“What?”
Jihoon breathes in. The horror has receded, leaving behind the dull ache he’s grown used to now. He smiles a little at this Soonyoung.
“Maybe you were what I needed, to begin moving on.” He rolls his head around, hearing the light cracks, tension being let go of. “I think I needed to see him again, but tell someone else everything. Someone who didn’t know him.”
“Perhaps,” Soonyoung agrees. “Maybe you needed to see him to let him go.”
They fall silent again, but this time it feels comfortable. Jihoon feels his eyelids droop. It’s the first time he’s felt properly sleepy since that day.
“Go sleep,” Soonyoung says. Jihoon nods.
-
When he’s drifting in that liminal stage between sleep and wakefulness, Jihoon asks a question into the darkness.
“Are you real?” He croaks, groggy. The question feels too important to wait.
The darkness ripples, then stills.
“Maybe, maybe not.” Soonyoung’s voice is close, gentle. Jihoon misses him in a sudden surge, but it doesn’t overwhelm him. “Did it matter?”
Re: [FILL] between horror and acceptance
personally i am in love with the way you work dialogue. you navigate and use it in a way that adds so much value + the actions that accompany the words make it cut deep so much... and like. i too feel like drowning.... wow TT
i dont really have words to describe this... some kind of lingering emotions that feel muted in some way but so pleasantly really. the grief and horror that accompanies jihoon's emotions... the shell of what once was soonyoung (and jihoon's fear + reactions to it)
and the acceptance. sigh. it feels oddly comforting really. i dont read a lot of these kinds of things (mcd namely) so this... was. yeah. Something for me. thank you for writing <3