[Oneshot] Just A Typical Love Story
Just A Typical Love Story | Het!KyuMin | Romance, angst, supernatural | PG-13 (An answer to a bet between me, vin11lover and casanova7 )
They were never old, because they loved each other.
*
It started like what a typical love story would start: a determined young boy saw a shy young girl on his yearly school festival; he was helping his class with the food stall they came up with, and she was the customer who came with her friends with a soft pink dress and a ponytailed jet black hair, and he fell in love at first sight. The kind of love where your heart beats turned into such a mess, and your breathings could be heard even when you tried to slow it down once your eyes fell onto each other. The kind of love that came without a warning; a night before you were still thinking of the homework that you still didn't finish, yet the nights after that you even drew the face you missed on every page of your workbooks.
The night the festival ended, Cho Kyuhyun walked back to his house with a beautiful face filling every part of his mind. He wanted to walk a straight line, for he was afraid people would think that he was drunk, but he couldn’t. Because in his mind, he was taking the beautiful girl to a silent dance floor, and a gorgeous piece of music played once they stepped in. He remembered how wonderful her smile was, so in his imagination, he made sure that the girl was always smiling. But then he stopped, because he knew an imagination wouldn’t be an imagination if all that he had was a smile taken from a glance of her face. He wanted to see that face again.
When he opened the front gate of his house, a beautiful woman, probably in her mid 20s was standing near a lamp pole, just a few metres away from him. Kyuhyun always hated that pole, because whenever he saw a person walked near it, his shadow would always make Kyuhyun mistaken it for another person. He wanted to ask the lady why she was there, but he got a beautiful face to be dreamt of tonight, so he shrugged his shoulders and walked inside.
“Wait!” he turned around, hands on the metal gate. He stretched his neck to see the person who was calling for him. It was the beautiful lady. She walked away from the pole, and towards him, her figure disappeared for a while before appeared right back before his eyes. Kyuhyun was stunned by the woman who was smiling in front of him.
Her eyes possessed the colour of almond; her nose was tiny as it fit her beautifully small face. Her lips were gorgeously carved, that Kyuhyun thought that it was a pair of the most perfect lips he ever saw in this world. Her skin, even though the lighting was bad that night, Kyuhyun swear her skin was too perfect to be lain on a human’s body. It was as pure as milk, and if he needs to put another word to it, he would say fluff was the perfect word. In a simple yet complicated word, she was sinfully beautiful.
“Can I help you, noona?” she smiled again, and as if he was hypnotized, Kyuhyun just let the woman took his hands and took him away from the gate of his house.
-
“My name is Sungmin. Lee Sungmin. I am twenty-two years old. You?” she spoke as her left hand hushed away her dark hair that fell on her forehead as the wind blew. The cold night was nothing to Kyuhyun when he saw the mesmerizing view in front of him. Her face was so beautiful under the yellow neon light that showered the bench they were sitting at.
“I - I’m Cho Kyuhyun. I’m sixteen years old.”
She chuckled and pulled Kyuhyun closer to her body. She cupped both of Kyuhyun’s cheeks, and smiled. Kyuhyun wanted to push away those cold hands, but instead, he saw her sad and glassy eyes, so he cancelled his intention earlier. He didn't want to make the woman to be any sadder.
“So this is how you look like when you’re sixteen, Kyunnie. You’re just the same.”
-
Kyuhyun didn't get a slightest clue of what was the woman’s intention last night. All that he remembered was how the woman story-tell him a love story of a man and a woman. It was a typical love story; the couple met during their school time and fell in love. They had three children together, fought a few times, but consoled each other after that, watched their children grew up, celebrated their retirements together with their family that had grew in numbers, lived a happy old life, walking under the canopy trees, hand in hand, shoulder to shoulder, and died without regrets.
It was a common love story, a common yet beautifully ended love story, that he couldn’t help it but to let out a shed of tear. Quickly he brushed it away when Sungmin looked at him. “Aww, don't cry. They were happy, you should feel grateful for them.”
“I’m not crying. There were dusts poking my eyes.”
Sungmin giggled, and Kyuhyun found that the giggles sounded familiar. He couldn’t remember where he heard the same giggles, so he shrugged and kept on listening to Sungmin.
“You met someone today, don't you? Was she beautiful?” Kyuhyun widened his eyes, and there was a faint pink line tainted his cheeks.
“I’m... why should I tell you all that? Are you my stalker or something?” his eyes squinted, his suspicion grew on Sungmin. But the beautiful woman wasn’t answering, so Kyuhyun stopped pretending to be mad, and sighed.
“She was so beautiful, that I couldn’t help but to stare at her until she disappeared from my sight.”
“Why didn't you chase her?”
Kyuhyun didn’t answer the question. Instead, he looked into Sungmin’s eyes with an unbelievable face. “NO WAY! What I’m going to say to her when I got her anyway? Hi I’m Cho Kyuhyun and I like you?”
“That’s not a bad start. Why don't you try it tomorrow? I’m sure she’s waiting for you to tell her the same thing too.”
Sungmin giggled again, and Kyuhyun sighed for the umpteenth time since she first opened up about the girl he met.
“Like you know what she’ll think of me. Stop guessing about other’s feelings.”
“I’m not guessing it. I just knew.” She rubbed Kyuhyun’s left cheek, and disappeared. Vanished, as if the cold wind blew her away like small particles of dust got blown on a windy day. And Kyuhyun was stunned, again.
-
His love life wasn’t hard. Because the next morning, when he was still thinking about the beautiful woman’s name who disappeared before his eyes and made his creep out all night, the girl he was dreaming about was standing near his school gate. Her uniform showed that she was from the girls’ school next to his. Kyuhyun wanted to run away, because he feared that his heart might burst right away when he saw the girl walked towards him with a smile that seemed so familiar.
“Hi. Urm, I guess you don't remember who I am.”
“No, I do. Can I know your name?”
“Eh? For what?”
“Because I like you.”
And he wondered just how thankful he was to the lady last night.
-
The next few years in high school, and a few more years in college, Kyuhyun had witnessed his friends kept changing their partners, breaking up, crying over a girl, or a man. He even nodded when his roommate, Lee Donghae told him that he had changed his sexual preference, just because he was in love with a delicate young boy who loved to dance named Lee Hyukjae. But all these years, he wondered how the hell he can survive being with his girlfriend since middle school.
“Are you still in love with me?” his girlfriend asked one day, while they were having their lunch together. She was wearing a gorgeous plain blue long skirt, and a white blouse, a simple combination yet too beautiful to Kyuhyun’s eyes.
“Yes of course. Why are you asking that out of the blue?” she pursed her lips, and leaned her head on his shoulder. “You know, we’ve been together more than five years. People said love can die after the first three years of marriage.”
Kyuhyun choked, and coughed. His girlfriend scrunched her brows, and hit his chest multiple times, when he caught her hands, and pulled her face closer. There were tears pooling underneath her eyes. “Don't cry baby. I’m not going to die of choking.”
“Idiot! That’s not the reason!”
He cuddled her tight when she tried to stand up and kissed her neck. Slowly, she surrendered and fell back into his lap. “Don't be mad when I tell you this.”
“What?” she mumbled as her face was buried inside Kyuhyun’s chest. He could feel the tears flowing down the front of his shirt.
“I’ve tried so many times to reason why I am still in love with you. I’ve tried to think that it was only because I’m a good person who doesn't want to hurt any woman’s heart. But no, I’m not being nice with any woman, but just you. I’ve tried to not to call you or to answer your calls sometimes, but then I’ll be so worried when you didn't call. I’ve tried to say harsh words to you, to see whether you just a masochist who’s in love with someone like me, but I guess the fact that I feel like killing myself every time I make you cry reveals that I’m the real masochist for falling in love with you.”
“So?” Kyuhyun slid his fingers in between his girlfriend’s, and sniffed her strawberry fragranced hair. It was the same scent since the last few years of their love, and he still couldn’t help but to like it more each day.
“Let’s just accept the fact that we’re just meant to be together for all these years, and stop asking whether I still love you or not, shall we? Because even if we parted one day - not that I wished for it - if we did, I will still have you in my heart.”
“Liar.”
“No I’m not. Because I’m the one who chose to love you.”
-
When he sent his girlfriend back to her house that day, he saw the same woman who vanished in front of him a few years ago.
“Hi. We meet again.” he greeted her, and she smiled, but this time, she seemed so weak. And even if it had been a few years, he still remembered how young the lady was instead of the one in front of him. “Hi. Care to have a walk with me?”
“Sure.” He took her hand, as if it was a natural thing to do, and took her to the nearest park. “Your name is Sungmin right? I’ve been trying to recall it since the last time we met, but failed. Why now I wonder?”
“I wonder about it either. So, you took my advice, didn't you?” Kyuhyun nodded, and smile while looking into the now a slightly old woman’s face. She seemed tired, but satisfied. Her black jet hair was woven with a few white hairs that could be clearly seen when she tied her hair up like that.
“Mind if I ask you something?”
“No, please do.” Sungmin smiled, and somehow, there’s the same familiarity again. As if he actually had been watching the same smile every day in his life. He just couldn’t remember when, or whose smile it was.
“You’re only twenty-seven this year, if I’m not mistaken. Right? But what’s with this...”
“Look?” chuckled, she closed her eyes. “I’m actually thirty-seven this year.”
“What? How come?” she touched Kyuhyun’s cheek, and he wondered if she really liked that part of his face.
“Urm. Time travelling? I’m special you know.” She laughed, as if she was trying to make that as a joke, but Kyuhyun put up a serious face.
“Really?”
Sungmin smiled weakly, and palmed his right hand with both her hands. “Stop thinking about me. I’m just a nobody; it’s you who is important right now.”
Kyuhyun was still puzzled by her words, when she pulled him close and kissed his forehead.
“Don't you understand her question earlier today? She’s waiting for you to ask her.”
“Ask her for what? I don't understand...”
“For a hand in marriage, that’s what it is. No woman wants to be left hanging in a relationship like this for that long. Don't you love her?”
“I do, I love her so much that sometimes I don't know if I’m able to love someone like this ever again.”
“Then do what you’re supposed to do.”
And again, she vanished like a mist, but Kyuhyun wasn’t thinking about her this time.
-
He could still remember how the tears of joy came out from his girlfriend’s eyes when he knelt in front of her and opened the velvet box with the cheapest diamond ring he could find after their graduation ceremony. He could still taste the sweet kisses they had when he lifted her into their newlywed house that he bought with a year of saving and a few bank loans.
“I want three kids.” His wife told him one morning, while playing with his long fingers and tickling his forearms. He kissed her beautifully exposed nape and naked back, her skin was as soft as silk and gorgeous as milk should be. There’s no need for a strawberry scent anymore, because Kyuhyun finally realized, that the scent he loved wasn’t the shampoo that she used, it was her natural body scent itself. ‘Just how beautiful my wife can be?’ he wondered.
“And I want to walk together with you, having your wrinkled hand inside mine, when we passed under the old canopy trees at the park where we first date. I want to count the old lines that appear on your forehead every year, and make fun of it.”
“As if you won't grow old, malady.” He kissed his wife’s talkative lips, and silent her for a while, before letting her continue her dreams.
“I won’t. If I will be loved by you like this every day, I promise you, darling, I won't grow old.”
-
It was on their third year of marriage, that they received the news.
“I’m sorry, I wish I can say this in a better way, but it is impossible for Ms. Cho to get pregnant.” And he wasn’t listening when the doctor was telling them on how her uterus was infected, and will have to be taken out from her body. Because his eyes were fixed on how calm his wife was when she got the bad news. After the long explanation was done, they bowed to the doctor and walked out of his room.
He was frustrated, so frustrated but he knew that his wife wasn’t any better than him. But his wife had always been so strong, and never wants to share what she feels, that sometimes he felt as if he wanted to tear open her heart and see what she had been hiding inside there.
“I guess, my list of dreams won't be complete, darling.” And Kyuhyun hugged her tight. “You still have me. You still have me, and I still need you. Won’t that be enough, sweetheart?”
“Yes, that’s all I need.”
-
That’s all they need. Kyuhyun needs her, and she needs him. There’s nothing more thrilled than coming home every day and guessing what dish would be on the table. There’s nothing more beautiful than helping her doing the house chores on holidays, and resting on the wooden bench in the backyard, watching her beautiful figure dancing behind the white bed sheet as she was trying to hang them perfectly. Going on vacations, talking about the latest movies, reminiscing their dating days, it was all a part of their life.
They never mentioned of the dream of having children anymore. It was kept shut inside their deepest part of heart. They continued to live as if there was nothing happened before. Like there was no tear shed and no dreadful nights that witnessed his wife crying under her blanket, mumbling what a useless wife she is if she couldn’t bore a child for her own husband. Kyuhyun was afraid to leave her alone at night, because she might do something stupid in the early few months after they got the bad news.
Kyuhyun had always imagined a married life would be this way, that’s why he never sighed about a single thing that made him feels tired. He was always sure that he will always love his wife no matter how long it will take. He knew the fact that it would be impossible for him to not to make her cry, but he also learned various ways to cheer her up again. He didn't know why, but he just couldn’t stop loving his wife.
His love never needs an excuse. It just happened. Because love can't be forced.
And just like that, they had spent their life together, longer than Kyuhyun expected. They had been fighting over the smallest things, and laughed when they realized about it. they had been crying silently in the nights when they thought of no one is going to take care of them when they grew older, and consoled each other saying that they were meant to have each other. They had took millions of pictures together, shared millions of kisses, thousands of hugs and cuddles, an infinity of ‘I love you’ and ‘I love you too’, counting the lines that started to drawn on their faces. Just like what his wife had listed as one of her dreams of marriage.
When they finally weren’t able to walk as fast as they used to, or work as they used to, a walk under the canopy trees at the park where they had their first date was a must to be done every day. and on one fine day, a really fine day, where the birds were all chirping, and the wind was gently blowing, while his wife was resting her head on his shoulder as she said she wanted to take a short nap, the woman appeared again in front of his eyes.
But this woman, this woman was wearing the same outfit as his wife did at that time. This woman was having the same white hair, with the same wrinkles that he counted every day since they were young.
“Sungmin? What are you doing standing over there? Didn't you tell me you want to sleep?” she stood next to him, and palmed his face gently. And the familiarity came again.
“I’ve always worried since I knew that I couldn’t give you children. Worried that you are not actually in love with me. Worried that you will leave me. And when I’m too worried, I often travel back into the past in my sleep, searching for you to make sure how deep your love for me.”
Kyuhyun chuckled. “Silly, you worried for useless things. That is so like you.” Sungmin smiled, and rubbed her thumbs onto Kyuhyun’s temples. “I know. I am silly. Silly for not being satisfied of having you in my life. But now I am satisfied. Because no matter how far I travelled in my sleep nowadays, I would always come back to the present days, and saw every single thing that we’ve done together. Yes darling, I’m satisfied.”
She kissed him, and disappeared. Kyuhyun’s eyes fluttered closed, and as he opened them again, he saw Sungmin was still sleeping by his side. She was still the same, except for the fact that she was in her soft pink dress, with her black jet hair ponytailed, and her hand was entangled with his. Only then he realized that he too, was in his middle school uniform; the clothes that they wore the first time they fell in love.
They were never old.
-
Cho Kyuhyun died at the age of seventy-two, so did Lee Sungmin, his wife. They were found breathless, hand in hand, on a bench in the park where they had their first date, many years ago. This typical love story ends with a normal ending.
But Cho Kyuhyun cried for it once.
-End-
They were never old, because they loved each other.
*
It started like what a typical love story would start: a determined young boy saw a shy young girl on his yearly school festival; he was helping his class with the food stall they came up with, and she was the customer who came with her friends with a soft pink dress and a ponytailed jet black hair, and he fell in love at first sight. The kind of love where your heart beats turned into such a mess, and your breathings could be heard even when you tried to slow it down once your eyes fell onto each other. The kind of love that came without a warning; a night before you were still thinking of the homework that you still didn't finish, yet the nights after that you even drew the face you missed on every page of your workbooks.
The night the festival ended, Cho Kyuhyun walked back to his house with a beautiful face filling every part of his mind. He wanted to walk a straight line, for he was afraid people would think that he was drunk, but he couldn’t. Because in his mind, he was taking the beautiful girl to a silent dance floor, and a gorgeous piece of music played once they stepped in. He remembered how wonderful her smile was, so in his imagination, he made sure that the girl was always smiling. But then he stopped, because he knew an imagination wouldn’t be an imagination if all that he had was a smile taken from a glance of her face. He wanted to see that face again.
When he opened the front gate of his house, a beautiful woman, probably in her mid 20s was standing near a lamp pole, just a few metres away from him. Kyuhyun always hated that pole, because whenever he saw a person walked near it, his shadow would always make Kyuhyun mistaken it for another person. He wanted to ask the lady why she was there, but he got a beautiful face to be dreamt of tonight, so he shrugged his shoulders and walked inside.
“Wait!” he turned around, hands on the metal gate. He stretched his neck to see the person who was calling for him. It was the beautiful lady. She walked away from the pole, and towards him, her figure disappeared for a while before appeared right back before his eyes. Kyuhyun was stunned by the woman who was smiling in front of him.
Her eyes possessed the colour of almond; her nose was tiny as it fit her beautifully small face. Her lips were gorgeously carved, that Kyuhyun thought that it was a pair of the most perfect lips he ever saw in this world. Her skin, even though the lighting was bad that night, Kyuhyun swear her skin was too perfect to be lain on a human’s body. It was as pure as milk, and if he needs to put another word to it, he would say fluff was the perfect word. In a simple yet complicated word, she was sinfully beautiful.
“Can I help you, noona?” she smiled again, and as if he was hypnotized, Kyuhyun just let the woman took his hands and took him away from the gate of his house.
-
“My name is Sungmin. Lee Sungmin. I am twenty-two years old. You?” she spoke as her left hand hushed away her dark hair that fell on her forehead as the wind blew. The cold night was nothing to Kyuhyun when he saw the mesmerizing view in front of him. Her face was so beautiful under the yellow neon light that showered the bench they were sitting at.
“I - I’m Cho Kyuhyun. I’m sixteen years old.”
She chuckled and pulled Kyuhyun closer to her body. She cupped both of Kyuhyun’s cheeks, and smiled. Kyuhyun wanted to push away those cold hands, but instead, he saw her sad and glassy eyes, so he cancelled his intention earlier. He didn't want to make the woman to be any sadder.
“So this is how you look like when you’re sixteen, Kyunnie. You’re just the same.”
-
Kyuhyun didn't get a slightest clue of what was the woman’s intention last night. All that he remembered was how the woman story-tell him a love story of a man and a woman. It was a typical love story; the couple met during their school time and fell in love. They had three children together, fought a few times, but consoled each other after that, watched their children grew up, celebrated their retirements together with their family that had grew in numbers, lived a happy old life, walking under the canopy trees, hand in hand, shoulder to shoulder, and died without regrets.
It was a common love story, a common yet beautifully ended love story, that he couldn’t help it but to let out a shed of tear. Quickly he brushed it away when Sungmin looked at him. “Aww, don't cry. They were happy, you should feel grateful for them.”
“I’m not crying. There were dusts poking my eyes.”
Sungmin giggled, and Kyuhyun found that the giggles sounded familiar. He couldn’t remember where he heard the same giggles, so he shrugged and kept on listening to Sungmin.
“You met someone today, don't you? Was she beautiful?” Kyuhyun widened his eyes, and there was a faint pink line tainted his cheeks.
“I’m... why should I tell you all that? Are you my stalker or something?” his eyes squinted, his suspicion grew on Sungmin. But the beautiful woman wasn’t answering, so Kyuhyun stopped pretending to be mad, and sighed.
“She was so beautiful, that I couldn’t help but to stare at her until she disappeared from my sight.”
“Why didn't you chase her?”
Kyuhyun didn’t answer the question. Instead, he looked into Sungmin’s eyes with an unbelievable face. “NO WAY! What I’m going to say to her when I got her anyway? Hi I’m Cho Kyuhyun and I like you?”
“That’s not a bad start. Why don't you try it tomorrow? I’m sure she’s waiting for you to tell her the same thing too.”
Sungmin giggled again, and Kyuhyun sighed for the umpteenth time since she first opened up about the girl he met.
“Like you know what she’ll think of me. Stop guessing about other’s feelings.”
“I’m not guessing it. I just knew.” She rubbed Kyuhyun’s left cheek, and disappeared. Vanished, as if the cold wind blew her away like small particles of dust got blown on a windy day. And Kyuhyun was stunned, again.
-
His love life wasn’t hard. Because the next morning, when he was still thinking about the beautiful woman’s name who disappeared before his eyes and made his creep out all night, the girl he was dreaming about was standing near his school gate. Her uniform showed that she was from the girls’ school next to his. Kyuhyun wanted to run away, because he feared that his heart might burst right away when he saw the girl walked towards him with a smile that seemed so familiar.
“Hi. Urm, I guess you don't remember who I am.”
“No, I do. Can I know your name?”
“Eh? For what?”
“Because I like you.”
And he wondered just how thankful he was to the lady last night.
-
The next few years in high school, and a few more years in college, Kyuhyun had witnessed his friends kept changing their partners, breaking up, crying over a girl, or a man. He even nodded when his roommate, Lee Donghae told him that he had changed his sexual preference, just because he was in love with a delicate young boy who loved to dance named Lee Hyukjae. But all these years, he wondered how the hell he can survive being with his girlfriend since middle school.
“Are you still in love with me?” his girlfriend asked one day, while they were having their lunch together. She was wearing a gorgeous plain blue long skirt, and a white blouse, a simple combination yet too beautiful to Kyuhyun’s eyes.
“Yes of course. Why are you asking that out of the blue?” she pursed her lips, and leaned her head on his shoulder. “You know, we’ve been together more than five years. People said love can die after the first three years of marriage.”
Kyuhyun choked, and coughed. His girlfriend scrunched her brows, and hit his chest multiple times, when he caught her hands, and pulled her face closer. There were tears pooling underneath her eyes. “Don't cry baby. I’m not going to die of choking.”
“Idiot! That’s not the reason!”
He cuddled her tight when she tried to stand up and kissed her neck. Slowly, she surrendered and fell back into his lap. “Don't be mad when I tell you this.”
“What?” she mumbled as her face was buried inside Kyuhyun’s chest. He could feel the tears flowing down the front of his shirt.
“I’ve tried so many times to reason why I am still in love with you. I’ve tried to think that it was only because I’m a good person who doesn't want to hurt any woman’s heart. But no, I’m not being nice with any woman, but just you. I’ve tried to not to call you or to answer your calls sometimes, but then I’ll be so worried when you didn't call. I’ve tried to say harsh words to you, to see whether you just a masochist who’s in love with someone like me, but I guess the fact that I feel like killing myself every time I make you cry reveals that I’m the real masochist for falling in love with you.”
“So?” Kyuhyun slid his fingers in between his girlfriend’s, and sniffed her strawberry fragranced hair. It was the same scent since the last few years of their love, and he still couldn’t help but to like it more each day.
“Let’s just accept the fact that we’re just meant to be together for all these years, and stop asking whether I still love you or not, shall we? Because even if we parted one day - not that I wished for it - if we did, I will still have you in my heart.”
“Liar.”
“No I’m not. Because I’m the one who chose to love you.”
-
When he sent his girlfriend back to her house that day, he saw the same woman who vanished in front of him a few years ago.
“Hi. We meet again.” he greeted her, and she smiled, but this time, she seemed so weak. And even if it had been a few years, he still remembered how young the lady was instead of the one in front of him. “Hi. Care to have a walk with me?”
“Sure.” He took her hand, as if it was a natural thing to do, and took her to the nearest park. “Your name is Sungmin right? I’ve been trying to recall it since the last time we met, but failed. Why now I wonder?”
“I wonder about it either. So, you took my advice, didn't you?” Kyuhyun nodded, and smile while looking into the now a slightly old woman’s face. She seemed tired, but satisfied. Her black jet hair was woven with a few white hairs that could be clearly seen when she tied her hair up like that.
“Mind if I ask you something?”
“No, please do.” Sungmin smiled, and somehow, there’s the same familiarity again. As if he actually had been watching the same smile every day in his life. He just couldn’t remember when, or whose smile it was.
“You’re only twenty-seven this year, if I’m not mistaken. Right? But what’s with this...”
“Look?” chuckled, she closed her eyes. “I’m actually thirty-seven this year.”
“What? How come?” she touched Kyuhyun’s cheek, and he wondered if she really liked that part of his face.
“Urm. Time travelling? I’m special you know.” She laughed, as if she was trying to make that as a joke, but Kyuhyun put up a serious face.
“Really?”
Sungmin smiled weakly, and palmed his right hand with both her hands. “Stop thinking about me. I’m just a nobody; it’s you who is important right now.”
Kyuhyun was still puzzled by her words, when she pulled him close and kissed his forehead.
“Don't you understand her question earlier today? She’s waiting for you to ask her.”
“Ask her for what? I don't understand...”
“For a hand in marriage, that’s what it is. No woman wants to be left hanging in a relationship like this for that long. Don't you love her?”
“I do, I love her so much that sometimes I don't know if I’m able to love someone like this ever again.”
“Then do what you’re supposed to do.”
And again, she vanished like a mist, but Kyuhyun wasn’t thinking about her this time.
-
He could still remember how the tears of joy came out from his girlfriend’s eyes when he knelt in front of her and opened the velvet box with the cheapest diamond ring he could find after their graduation ceremony. He could still taste the sweet kisses they had when he lifted her into their newlywed house that he bought with a year of saving and a few bank loans.
“I want three kids.” His wife told him one morning, while playing with his long fingers and tickling his forearms. He kissed her beautifully exposed nape and naked back, her skin was as soft as silk and gorgeous as milk should be. There’s no need for a strawberry scent anymore, because Kyuhyun finally realized, that the scent he loved wasn’t the shampoo that she used, it was her natural body scent itself. ‘Just how beautiful my wife can be?’ he wondered.
“And I want to walk together with you, having your wrinkled hand inside mine, when we passed under the old canopy trees at the park where we first date. I want to count the old lines that appear on your forehead every year, and make fun of it.”
“As if you won't grow old, malady.” He kissed his wife’s talkative lips, and silent her for a while, before letting her continue her dreams.
“I won’t. If I will be loved by you like this every day, I promise you, darling, I won't grow old.”
-
It was on their third year of marriage, that they received the news.
“I’m sorry, I wish I can say this in a better way, but it is impossible for Ms. Cho to get pregnant.” And he wasn’t listening when the doctor was telling them on how her uterus was infected, and will have to be taken out from her body. Because his eyes were fixed on how calm his wife was when she got the bad news. After the long explanation was done, they bowed to the doctor and walked out of his room.
He was frustrated, so frustrated but he knew that his wife wasn’t any better than him. But his wife had always been so strong, and never wants to share what she feels, that sometimes he felt as if he wanted to tear open her heart and see what she had been hiding inside there.
“I guess, my list of dreams won't be complete, darling.” And Kyuhyun hugged her tight. “You still have me. You still have me, and I still need you. Won’t that be enough, sweetheart?”
“Yes, that’s all I need.”
-
That’s all they need. Kyuhyun needs her, and she needs him. There’s nothing more thrilled than coming home every day and guessing what dish would be on the table. There’s nothing more beautiful than helping her doing the house chores on holidays, and resting on the wooden bench in the backyard, watching her beautiful figure dancing behind the white bed sheet as she was trying to hang them perfectly. Going on vacations, talking about the latest movies, reminiscing their dating days, it was all a part of their life.
They never mentioned of the dream of having children anymore. It was kept shut inside their deepest part of heart. They continued to live as if there was nothing happened before. Like there was no tear shed and no dreadful nights that witnessed his wife crying under her blanket, mumbling what a useless wife she is if she couldn’t bore a child for her own husband. Kyuhyun was afraid to leave her alone at night, because she might do something stupid in the early few months after they got the bad news.
Kyuhyun had always imagined a married life would be this way, that’s why he never sighed about a single thing that made him feels tired. He was always sure that he will always love his wife no matter how long it will take. He knew the fact that it would be impossible for him to not to make her cry, but he also learned various ways to cheer her up again. He didn't know why, but he just couldn’t stop loving his wife.
His love never needs an excuse. It just happened. Because love can't be forced.
And just like that, they had spent their life together, longer than Kyuhyun expected. They had been fighting over the smallest things, and laughed when they realized about it. they had been crying silently in the nights when they thought of no one is going to take care of them when they grew older, and consoled each other saying that they were meant to have each other. They had took millions of pictures together, shared millions of kisses, thousands of hugs and cuddles, an infinity of ‘I love you’ and ‘I love you too’, counting the lines that started to drawn on their faces. Just like what his wife had listed as one of her dreams of marriage.
When they finally weren’t able to walk as fast as they used to, or work as they used to, a walk under the canopy trees at the park where they had their first date was a must to be done every day. and on one fine day, a really fine day, where the birds were all chirping, and the wind was gently blowing, while his wife was resting her head on his shoulder as she said she wanted to take a short nap, the woman appeared again in front of his eyes.
But this woman, this woman was wearing the same outfit as his wife did at that time. This woman was having the same white hair, with the same wrinkles that he counted every day since they were young.
“Sungmin? What are you doing standing over there? Didn't you tell me you want to sleep?” she stood next to him, and palmed his face gently. And the familiarity came again.
“I’ve always worried since I knew that I couldn’t give you children. Worried that you are not actually in love with me. Worried that you will leave me. And when I’m too worried, I often travel back into the past in my sleep, searching for you to make sure how deep your love for me.”
Kyuhyun chuckled. “Silly, you worried for useless things. That is so like you.” Sungmin smiled, and rubbed her thumbs onto Kyuhyun’s temples. “I know. I am silly. Silly for not being satisfied of having you in my life. But now I am satisfied. Because no matter how far I travelled in my sleep nowadays, I would always come back to the present days, and saw every single thing that we’ve done together. Yes darling, I’m satisfied.”
She kissed him, and disappeared. Kyuhyun’s eyes fluttered closed, and as he opened them again, he saw Sungmin was still sleeping by his side. She was still the same, except for the fact that she was in her soft pink dress, with her black jet hair ponytailed, and her hand was entangled with his. Only then he realized that he too, was in his middle school uniform; the clothes that they wore the first time they fell in love.
They were never old.
-
Cho Kyuhyun died at the age of seventy-two, so did Lee Sungmin, his wife. They were found breathless, hand in hand, on a bench in the park where they had their first date, many years ago. This typical love story ends with a normal ending.
But Cho Kyuhyun cried for it once.
-End-