Recapitulation
Pairing: Changmin/Yoochun
Genre: Romance, Drama, Angst
Rating: PG-13
Summary: He is Yoochun but he is also not Yoochun. After getting him back, Changmin must deal with the consequences of being forgotten
Changmin checks his phone, fumbling around to pass time as he waits for the go signal. Jaejoong is seated at the back of the car, tapping his fingers against his lap as he concentrates. Usually as the head of the family, Changmin wouldn’t be here doing a mission but he could be spontaneous if he wanted to.
“Boss, has it been a while since you’ve done this?” Minho, the teenage boy asks him curiously and he smirks in response “That doesn’t mean I’m rusty.”
The other men have practically rendered the grounds of the estate to a death zone, caught unaware and unarmed the takeover was too easy. Changmin walks towards the last building with Jaejoong behind him, gun out as he strides inside.
“We found Junsu, his area is secluded enough that it was hard to trace him.” Jaejoong reports, showing various pictures to Changmin and the others in the family. “His house is near the ports where the weapos exchanges happen.” He shows another picture of the ships as Junsu is seen talking on the phone by the docks. Blissfully unaware.
“He rose too quickly now his demise is faster.” Heechul just laughs and Changmin nods his head in agreement. “Not fast enough.” Flipping through the other reports of Junsu’s victims Changmin can’t help but be annoyed. “He’s targeted of our warehouses and killed enough subordinates to get cocky.” Heechul flippantly says eyeing number of hits they had taken.
“I want him out.” Heechul glares looking over the other members, raising his hand to start a vote. The whole table waves at him making him smile, “Alright. Get rid of him, no traces behind. We want all the stolen goods back.” Changmin looks over Jaejoong who nods at him.
“I think I want to join this mission.”
The both of them move without sound though really it didn’t matter, everyone else was either dead or getting there. No would help the soon dead man. Jaejoong thinks this was overdone but with Changmin’s thirst for bloodbath everyone could only obey. He sighs heavily and prays this would be quick but he knows enough to understand it was wishful thinking.
They slide the door open to find Junsu on the bed, rather naked obviously busy with his wife who seems to be pliant under him. Jaejoong doesn’t miss a millisecond to shoot hitting the shoulder, the man slumping and gasping as he turns to look.
“What the!” Junsu shouts seeing the two men in front of him, he tries to reach for the call button. “That’s useless. Everyone else is dead.” Changmin informs him coldly, watching the color drain from Junsu’s face. “You’re going to die now.”
Not wanting to go down without a fight, Junsu grabs the man under him “Be useful for once.” Spatting as he makes a shield out of his wife, the man not even reacting as he is twisted - robe falling off one shoulder as he looks into the two intruders.
Jaejoong gasps and as he sees the face, quickly looking at Changmin who sees stunned as well, “Yoochun?” Mouthing the name he hasn’t had the courage to say out loud in two years. Confused, Changmin lowers his gun not knowing what to do. He’s supposed to be dead.
A shot permeates the room and Jaejoong squabbles to return fire but can’t get his aim, scared to hit this person who looks exactly like Yoochun. “Boss!” Jaejoong shouts, trying to snap Changmin out of it but he can see his eyes focusing on only one thing-one person.
Jaejoong shoots again, hitting Junsu’s arm, gun falling on the floor, as his arm is rendered useless. All the while Yoochun remains still, Junsu’s blood coating his robe. He makes one last attempt to use him as a wall between the bullets but Changmin finally aims at his head.
Junsu falls backwards, trying to grab unto something but only manages to pull down the clothe barely on his wife’s shoulders. He is silent, just stares at him as he lays dead before looking at the two men who have now killed his husband.
“Yoochun?” Changmin tries again, slowly walking towards him but he feigns no recognition to the name. He merely looks at tall man as he sits on the pool of his husband’s blood. Changmin kneels down to meet his eyes, not minding his nearly naked state nor afraid of being killed.
The dark scar on his chest evident as Changmin stares at it that mark, there was no denying this was his Yoochun. His Yoochun was alive and in front of him but how can that be? Yoochun only looks at his him with empty eyes, reaching out to his bloodstained clothes. His eyes roll back and Changmin catches him in his arms. What the fuck is going on?!
“Do you really think it’s him?” Jaejoong asks his boss, sipping the black coffee as they both wait for Yunho to come in. “You saw the same mark on his chest as I did. You know very well what that means.” Changmin answers, voice on the edge. “We’re just making sure with a DNA test but I know, I know it’s my Yoochun.”
Yoochun wakes up to a white room, a hospital he concludes, IVs connected to him and a warm blanket. There’s no one in the room and he looks outside the window briefly wondering what day it is but thinks it’s rather inconsequential. The door opens and Yoochun recognizes the tall man- it’s the man who killed his husband enter the room.
“How are you feeling?” The tall man asks him and he stares ahead not looking into those eyes. Changmin takes the seat by the couch unnerved by the coldness but he really can’t gauge anything. “Yoochun?” He tries again, he doesn’t know what to say but he desperately need him to look at him again. Yoochun only clenches at the blanket before he coldly turns to him,
“Who’s Yoochun? Who are you?”
Yunho arrives with an envelope, a look on his face not reassuring them both. He sits on the table and takes out papers to show the both of them, “I checked with his mom and the DNAs match. It’s Yoochun.” The news not really making the three of them happy just more questions in their minds.
“I don’t know what happened between the time we thought he was dead in the attack between now that caused him to loose his memories but all I can say is this is Yoochun.” Leaning back to stare at the word “MATCH” on the test. “We did a full test on him, no external injury- he did have scarring on his head from stitches and judging from how old they look that it fits in the timeline of when he disappeared.”
“So you’re saying he may have gotten hit in the head and now he has amnesia?” Jaejoong asks Yunho, reading all the other tests that didn’t help with anything. “It’s just the hypothesis I could come up with, there is nothing else aside from that hit on the head.” Yunho looks at Changmin, it’s obvious the news doesn’t hit him well.
Dealing with having the lover you thought was dead come back to you not knowing you was something he couldn’t even fathom.
Changmin knocks at the door to his room, it used to be their room he waits for a reply but gets nothing so he enters. Yoochun is sitting on the work desk looking at the framed picture. He knows that picture well, it was of them years ago. He wants Yoochun to remember but seeing the empty look in his eyes, Changmin knows there is no recognition.
“Your mother and brother is coming to see you.” He informs Yoochun who only tilts his head- still no reaction. “As soon as the DNA test was confirmed they wanted to see you.” The smaller man just nods still looking at the picture. “What are their names?” His voice just above a whisper, Changmin gives him a small smile and moves to the bookshelf, he gets another album to show Yoochun, opening the pages to show the man his family.
“Changmin-ah, this is Yoochun!” His mother tells him, he sees a lanky boy with glasses look at him unsurely. He turns to his mother again and she only nudges him, “Why don’t you show him around while your dad and I talk to the Parks?” leaving the two teenagers as adults enter the formal dining hall.
He hears them throw around the word marriage before he leaves in disgust, not wanting any part of it. The boy called Yoochun follows him and he doesn’t acknowledge him. What was he supposed to do with the other boy? He didn’t know but all he knew is that he felt stuffy in the house.
He reaches the back of the garden with Yoochun still shadowing him, the boy still not saying a word. “Don’t you have anything else to do?” He mocks, throwing a rock at him annoyed. Yoochun only frowns, “Well you’re supposed to show me around!”
“Fuck that. I don’t want to.” Stomping as he walks away only for him to get followed. “You don’t really have a choice. You’ll have to get used to me somehow.” Yoochun explains, not giving into Changmin’s tantrums and scowls.
They reach the hidden wall of leaves and Changmin opens the gate to a small park, Yoochun looks around in amazement not expecting to see an amazing place behind the walls. He simply thought it was the end of the estate but it was obviously not the case.
“Our parents are having a meeting about us, doesn’t that bother you?” Changmin asks grabbing a baseball bat as he takes out his frustration. Yoochun sits by the swing, letting his feet dangle as he swings up high. Changmin thinks it’s childish but doesn’t voice out that part.
“Not really.” Yoochun sing-songs, carefree as he goes higher and higher. Changmin can’t believe the nonchalance. “There’s no use trying be angry at something I can’t control. I just roll with it.” The reasoning doesn’t sit well with him, chain mid swing as he tries to stop Yoochun.
“What if I hate you?” Grabbing the links as he stares at the Yoochun. “What if I hate YOU?” he teases but Changmin doesn’t find it funny. Yoochun only smiles at him, dimple showing “Ah, I guess I better get used to your grouchiness, huh?”
Changmin gets flabbergasted, sputtering cusses at him as he lets go of the swing. “Minnie-yah!” He calls, already forming a nickname for his future husband who’s features turn angry yet again.
“But what if you like me?”
Jaejoong walks around the estate with Yoochun, the past months had been surreal. He knows how it’s taking a toll on Changmin who tries not to show it. Yoochun walks ahead of him, “You seem to know your way around well.” Jaejoong comments making the brunette stop and look at him.
Yoochun wonders for a brief moment, “Actually, I don’t but it seems my feet remember where we’re going.” It occurs to him that he hasn’t gone to that side of the house but it seems his body knows where it is. Jaejoong looks at him strangely, “That is something.”
Changmin is waiting in the veranda, this house usually not occupied except when there were guests. There are several houses in the lot and sometimes he liked going to them just for the novelty. He looks up to see Jaejoong and Yoochun, eyes lingering on the latter before he turns away.
Jaejoong motions for him to sit down and he does so hesitantly. Living with Changmin hasn’t made it easier to be with him. He knows his old self and this man used to be lovers but now there are no more but strangers. Yoochun doesn’t know what to take from it but is thankful that Changmin doesn’t push him to be anything more than what he is now.
Silence falls on them but Jaejoong notes how uncomfortable his boss still is with Yoochun, years ago these two would be laughing but now it seems only the quiet lies between them. Changmin picks at his food, wary of the distance and he wishes it wasn’t like that.
The helper arrives with the drinks, Yoochun thanks her and she smiles. Immediately Yoochun gets the coffee drip transferring it to the glass with ice. He pours some of the condensed milk then stirs it with the spoon, when the two are well mixed he gives it to Changmin who only stares at him.
Yoochun is startled with himself, panicking when Changmin stares at him far longer than he’s accustomed. “You used to do that all the time.” He quietly says, “thank you.” voice faraway as he remembers. Yoochun bites his lip embarrassed not knowing what had gotten over him.
Jaejoong only stares at the exchange musing how some things work out the way they do while grasping the meaning of the small action.
“He really isn’t remembering anything is he.” Yoochun’s mother states, it’s not a question anymore but rather a sad observation. Yoochun is out with Jaejoong and Minho, Changmin thinking the man needed a different kind of environment. Changmin looks at his mother-in-law, can he call him that and agrees with her statement.
“Would you like for me to move him back to your place?” Knowing how she must have missed his son. The agony they all went through when they thought he had died two years ago still fresh on his mind. He didn’t mean for him to keep Yoochun to himself but she acquiesced to his wishes.
She looks at one of the pictures displayed in Changmin’s office, her old Yoochun smiling and how she almost never saw it on this new Yoochun and yet they were somehow still the same person. “You know, I do miss him but you are a big part of his life, I have to admit maybe even a bigger part of his life than me.”
“You two have been inseparable since you were thirteen, the first time you met. Well it was mostly Yoochun following you around really.” Laughing at the memory of yesteryears. “He never really took no for an answer.” Changmin supplies and the two of them smile knowing it well.
“I think it would be better if he was with you unless- you can’t handle it anymore. I won’t take it against you.” She knows it’s not the ideal situation, Yoochun as he is now barely had any rapport with Changmin. Yoochun barely knew her either and was in no better position herself. “It’s difficult, I know him as someone else and he doesn’t know us at all.”
“If you feel that you can’t handle the burden anymore, it will be okay, Changmin. I don’t doubt the love you have for my son -“ Her voice cracks as she thinks of his son as foreigner to both of them now. “I know you’re hurting as I am. I know it pains to look at him and have emptiness look back at you. Sometimes, I try so hard to look for the traces of his old self in his eyes and he tells me he’s sorry whenever he catches me gazing too long”
Changmin only hugs her, this woman he considered his own mother, understanding her fully. Years ago when their families merged he thought he and Yoochun would only be am arranged relationship. He thought they would only be nothing but a signed contract yet that was not how it turned out.
He loved Yoochun and Yoochun loved him back.
He was a fool into thinking he could have everything but fate played with the both of them it seemed. “No, he is never a burden. I’ll take care of him. I always will.” Changmin promised Yoochun and even if he can’t remember it, he’ll remember for the both of them.
Yoochun waits in traffic, hands tapping to the music playing as he tries to alleviate boredom. He takes out his phone and speeds dial Changmin, switching to the Bluetooth in his radio. “Babe! Don’t forget you have your suit fitting tomorrow.” His fiancé only grumbles, “It’s only like thirty minutes don’t be such a grouch.” Laughing as Changmin groans at him even more.
“Where are you anyway?” Changmin ask, motioning for Jaejooong to write down the tailor appointment for tomorrow. “I’m on my way to the florist, we’re going to pick the pick the set up for the venue.” His voice excited and Changmin knows Yoochun will most likely go overboard with decorating. “It’s a garden wedding already, what more do you need?”
Jaejoong laughs beside him, the sarcasm dripping from his voice. “This is such a waste of time and resources. We could just sign the papers that we’re married and that’s it why the big fiasco?”Jaejoong makes a face at him signaling that it was the wrong thing to say but he doesn’t really care anymore.
“But Minnie-yah, you promised me I get to decide. I don’t want to just sign the papers. You’re such a boring old fart.” Teasing him in the way only he gets to, smiling at how he imagines Changmin’s face sours at his insults. “The wedding is only a month away so bare with me besides you got to decide our honeymoon so don’t complain too much!”
“Blah blah blah” Changmin mouths but agrees regardless, “Yay, thanks Minnie. Anyway, I’ll see you for dinner, okay? Love you!” Ending the call as he parks in front of the building, grabbing his bag as he walks inside.
Changmin presses Yoochun’s number for the umpteenth time- annoyed that he wasn’t picking up. He was supposed to be home an hour ago but he still hasn’t arrived. He tries to make another call but it goes straight to voicemail again. He was about to leave a message when Minho bursts inside the room.
“Boss, there’s been an ambush! Yoochun-hyung is-“ Minho doesn’t get to finish the sentence and Changmin is already running outside, phone calling Jaejoong and his other men. He feels himself growing cold, panic setting in as he goes to the florist’s shop. His breath speeding up as he gets closer but only sees a cloud of dark smoke, heart dropping as he sees how thick it is.
He stands outside the building-or what used to be the building-, it’s flattened to the ground. The sirens blasting around him fall on deaf ears. Everything turns gray and he feels time slowing as he looks around for any sign of Yoochun. He doesn’t feel it when his men, grab him pulling him to the side as small explosions rock the area.
“No survivors.” He hears the police and firefighters say, taping the area as the investigation begins. He wants to shout at them, tell him his fiancé is there they better move but everything is burned down. Changmin spots the half of Yoochun’s car plate on the ground, sides singed and he runs to get it, tears falling on steel as the embers die on his feet.
Jaejoong catches him, as he shouts, trying desperately to hold him up but he can’t. He can’t do this. He doesn’t want to. He wants Yoochun. He needs Yoochun .He has to be with Yoochun. But all his ears can hear is “I’m sorry.” as Jaejoong clutches on to him, “I’m sorry Changmin, I’m so sorry.”
He steps into the garden, the dried leaves scattered on the floor crunching beneath his boots as he walks further. It had been years since he last stepped into this place, unable to enter it. Not wanting to face the emptiness that would greet him. A place once only tied to happiness only burning a whole in his heart.
A figure is seated on the swing and Changmin recognizes Yoochun, it feels familiar but he dismisses the feeling away. “You found it.” Standing in front of the swing like he used to do a million times before as Yoochun swayed on the children’s equipment.
“Is this your secret place?” He asks, looking around. Changmin sits on the other swing beside him, “This used to be our place.” Staring at the old abandoned tree house, it was Yoochun’s idea to put one in there. They used to hide in the tree house and read comics; sometimes they swapped collectible cards but most importantly it was where their first kissed. He smiles at that memory but it feels bitter.
Yoochun hides his face, “I don’t remember, I’m sorry. I just found myself here.” Feeling shy around Changmin, he wasn’t scared of him but his heart always fluttered with him around. My heart knows him. “You don’t have to say you’re sorry, as I said it’s our place.” Yoochun looks away from him again and Changmin hates it.
“You never look at me.” He muses out loud making Yoochun snap his head at him. “You just make me nervous sometimes.” Changmin says sorry, his frustration hiding his sadness. The sound of the creaking swing is the only thing that drowns out his longing.
“I met Junsu at the hospital.” Yoochun starts, tone mellow as he recounts. “I woke up and I didn’t understand what was happening. He called me Micky and he seemed to know me.” He remembers not knowing his name but there he was a person who appeared to recognize him.
“Micky was your alias to protect your identity.” Changmin supplies. They all had code names, he was Max and Jaejoong was Hero. They all traversed around with normal citizens with those names. Changmin thinks of how Junsu might have recognized him.
Yoochun nods, making sense of it. “No identity, nothing. I was scared but he said he’d take care of it. I clung to him like a crutch, like a lost child.”
“He said we worked together but of course I couldn’t remember a thing so I believed everything.” Changmin nods not interrupting. Junsu had seen Yoochun before from a meeting back then, he didn’t know his connection to Changmin. Sometimes Yoochun would go with Jaejoong to small check-ins with the businesses so some men recognized him but didn’t know who exactly he was.
Junsu was just starting out as an informant and sometimes delivery boy. He got to the good graces of one of their smaller partners and possibly overtook him that’s why he got into the business. Changmin could only piece together possible scenarios but it wasn’t important now, he was six feet under ground, rotting dead.
“He was there when I was recuperating and one thing led to another. He asked me to live with him once I got out and having no other person there I accepted.” Yoochun remembers going out of the hospital and to Junsu’s house and recalls the trepidation, it was his gut telling him of the danger but he hid it.
“We got married after a few months, you could say now it was a sham marriage- there was barely any ceremony. I thought everything would be okay but it wasn’t.”
Changmin clenches his jaw at that, hating how Junsu manipulated Yoochun. “It was good for a few months, he provided for me but he got extremely controlling and paranoid. Wouldn’t allow me near his work at all. He always said he had to hide me because people were going to take advantage of me and hurt me.”
“Isn’t that ironic?” He tries to joke but there is nothing light about the conversation. He continues on as Changmin looks at him. “As his business grew the more obsessed he became. He used to tell me not to leave him, beg me not to but the next day point a gun at me accusing me of being a snitch.”
“I didn’t understand, we kept moving from place to place and I felt we were being hunted. We settled at the last place finally. He said no one could find us there and when I asked who but he would tell me to shut up, hit me if I asked too many questions.”
Junsu wasn’t able to plan his schemes well enough to cover his tracks; dealing with the wrong crowd made him a target. He ticked off too many people including them. “He did plenty wrong.” Changmin answers for Yoochun, “It caught up to him.”
“He would force himself on me, I used to fight him off but he always overpowered me. He would say I was his alone and I had no rights of my own. I learned that if I don’t try and stop him it would go by quicker so stopped trying.”
Changmin grits his teeth, if he could kill the man again he would over and over again. He hates himself for not finding Junsu sooner as well, if he could have rescued his Yoochun sooner. Yoochun sufferings were his agony, if he could only carry his pain so that he wouldn’t have to.
“When you came and killed him, I felt no remorse anymore. At that point death seemed the most inviting.” His tears falling as he remembers all the pain, the uncertainty and darkness. Changmin reaches up to wipe it away, his warm fingers caressing his cheek. The touch so gentle unlike anything he’s experienced with Junsu.
Changmin kneels down, holding his hands as he shakes. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there sooner. You went through hell and I can’t forgive myself for it.” Yoochun only shakes his head, “But you came for me, someone was there for me and I didn’t know. Even without knowing, you still came.”
Yoochun let’s Changmin’s head rest on his lap, in a way comforting him. Him telling his story lifted some of the burdens from his shoulders. Changmin cries in his lap, the first time he lets himself cry since he found him again. He cries for the lost time, the lost innocence but of all he cries for Yoochun.
The sound of laughter echoes through the veranda, Yoohwan recounting a story to his mom and brother. Yoochun covers his mouth, “Was I really that bad?” giggling as his younger brother tells him of the dog incident when they were children. It’s a warm scene and Changmin relaxes just a little bit when he watches them from inside the house.
Jaejoong looks at the family outside longingly, “How are you coping?” asking their leader. The laughter and hushed whispering tickle his ears. Changmin only looks at Jaejoong, he may not be blood related but they were brothers nonetheless. “It’s hard.” He says honestly, no use lying.
“Yoochun is Yoochun but at the same time he’s not. He’s alive, he’s in front of me, I can touch him and yet it’s not him.”
“I feel like I’m grieving for a person who is still alive.”
Jaejoong makes sense of it, he too felt the loss but only a fraction of what Changmin is going through. Yoochun was his friend but Changmin was his soul mate, his lover, and his best friend, his everything. He was speaking in past tense like he was gone but at the same time that’s what it felt like.
“Changmin, what if. . . his memories don’t come back?” Not wanting to ask that question but he knew it was something that could happen as well. There were no guarantees, no magical pill that could make him remember.
Even if Yoochun spent time with Changmin it seemed that it did nothing to trigger his memories. True sometimes Yoochun did something that seemed like the old Yoochun would but it was mostly habitual things that didn’t hold meaning anymore.
“I’ve been preparing for that but it’s hard to reconcile it happening. I can tell this Yoochun is different from the one we know, from the one I loved but he’s still there somehow.”
He looks just in time for Yoochun to glance at him through the window and give him a shy smile. Changmin eye’s crinkle, “I know I can’t just tell him to do this or that just because he used to do it but-“
“But you miss him.” Jaejoong finishes for him, taking the edge out of Changmin’s voice. “He is Yoochun and he is not Yoochun anymore. He is simply this.”
Unable to sleep Yoochun slips off to the piano room, letting his hands glide through the keys. His feelings guiding him as he plays song after song, his mind blank as he pours all his thoughts through the music.
Changmin stands by the door watching him, the music echoing to his room peaking his curiosity. “My body seems to remember things my mind can’t.” Yoochun says out loud but not missing any note. Instantly feeling when Changmin started watching him, an unexplained connection he had with the man.
Changmin sits beside him and Yoochun watches him as he starts to play a song as well. He doesn’t recognize the melody itself but closes his eyes to feel the music. Without realizing he starts playing as well, a duet.
They’re unusually close, his body leaning towards the taller man and for the first time not shying away from him. Changmin doesn’t react but relaxes to their closeness, a feeling he’s been aching for. They both continue playing, he trips over a couple of notes and Yoochun fixes his fingers from time to time.
For the first time in a long time they are comfortable with another, Yoochun’s smile radiating and Changmin laughing at them both. His heart feeling light just being with Yoochun and having him smile because of him, Changmin knows this is his favorite place.
Yoochun plays last note and nudges Changmin to press the last chords guiding his fingers, he does so sloppily and he gets a smile for his effort. Their undeniably close, shoulder-to-shoulder, knees touching and Yoochun’s head leaning heavily on his neck. Their hands still tangled together, Changmin feels soft lips on his.
The kiss is delicate and gentle, everything Yoochun is now- there’s trepidation but desire, timidness but longing. Changmin leans into the kiss, encouraging- hands on his face and neck as he deepens their kiss. Feverish, Yoochun pulls him in bending, his elbows hitting and clattering the ivory keys, Changmin following as he leans back to the bench. Body on Yoochun as the man under him claws at his shirt, opening his mouth to let taste more of Changmin.
When hands skim his stomach, Yoochun snaps out of his stupor- pushing Changmin off him. Breathing heavily, lips debauched not knowing what came over him, terror suddenly overwhelming him. Changmin stares at him not moving seeing the flashes of emotions in his eyes, swallows as Yoochun scurries away leaving him alone in the dark room.
His fingers tracing his lips, still tingling from the contact, fingers warm from the skin but his affections denied.
Sitting with Jaejoong still makes Yoochun uneasy; he thinks maybe his past self would have been best friends with this man. He has an icy stare and even colder aura about him, knows from Changmin’s stories as well as the members that it was only a façade. “You seem distant lately.” He was also blunt but his honestly was something Yoochun appreciated with him.
He only makes a noise to acknowledge the question, “With Changmin I meant.” Of course he knew whom Jaejoong was talking about. He doesn’t respond and the other man thankfully drops the subject.
“I had a question. If I may.” Yoochun picks another topic, the pale man quirking his eyebrow. Yoochun holds the left side of his chest; “There’s a mark on my chest. I didn’t want to ask about it but it’s been bothering me.”
“Ah, I was wondering when you’d ask that. I thought you’d ask Changmin about it though.” The mention of the man’s name makes Yoochun flinch but Jaejoong pretends not to notice. “It’s a marriage mark.” Putting out his phone, “This is Changmin’s family crest. As the head of his family he is given the marking of his choosing to represent it.”
Yoochun stares at it, it looks similar to the mark on his chest but there were some slight variations to it. “As he was to be married to you and coming from another family he merged the two of symbols together.” Swiping the screen to show the symbol of the Parks to Yoochun.
“It means the two of you are the head of a new family.” Yoochun nods, “So do you have it too since you’re part of the family?” Jaejoong smiles but shakes his head, keeping his phone in his bag. “No, only the pure ones are given the markings and the head. Most of us get a tattoo to show our affiliation and loyalty but not all.” Pulling his shirtsleeve up to reveal a faint tattoo.
“It’s mostly a tradition that isn’t thoroughly implemented, Changmin just wanted it cause you had tattoos on you and he wanted something you both shared that showed you were life partners.” Laughing at how petty Changmin could be but also a closeted romantic.
“Is that so?” Yoochun gnaws his lip, interested. Jaejoong laughs at him “God, that kid sometimes is a dolt. He said he couldn’t believe you had multiple tattoos yet are easily spooked so he wanted to show he could take pain as well.” Yoochun scratches his head at the logic, not imagining it fully but admits it would be so comical.
“I said matching rings would have been fine but he had to go extreme create that on his chest. You were more of an idiot and got it for yourself as well.” Jaejoong remembers the multitude of curses he uttered as the old traditionalist did it. He wasn’t there but Yoochun recorded some of it for him and they both laughed at it.
“Can you, can you tell me more about Changmin?” Yoochun sheepishly asks, cheeks a bit red as he utters his name. Jaejoong ruffles his hair, laughing as Yoochun tries hard to put it back to order. It feels normal for them for once, “Sure- let me tell you all the craziness.”
Arriving in the house, Yoochun makes a beeline for his room, dropping off his things before heading to the kitchen to eat. He smiles when he thinks of all the stories Jaejoong shared with him, blushing a little at how those thoughts make him giddy. He arrives at the kitchen and Changmin is already waiting for him, unreadable expression on his face. He lets out a shy hello that goes unheard. They eat dinner but Yoochun feels that there is something amiss; Changmin is cold towards him barely looking at him.
He wants to know but stops himself not wanting to overstep. “I had a talk with your mother and we decided you should go stay with them.” Yoochun drops his chopsticks, gawking at Changmin. Was he being forced out? Did Changmin grow tired of taking care of him?
Feeling a lump on his throat at the rejection he tries to control his tears and lips from quivering. “I think it would be best for you to spend time with them. I think they’ll be able to help you more.” So Changmin did feel burdened by his presence, berating himself for not being ideal. “The helpers will assist in you packing.” He informs Yoochun nodding as he leaves the table.
The car comes and Yoochun stares at the room, he wants to say goodbye to Changmin and thank him but his assistant informs him that he had left early. Feeling more dejected than ever he grabs his bag and goes in the car, wiping at his tears that won’t stop falling. He looks at the picture he took from one of the albums and throws it out the window.
When he arrives at the other house, Yoochun can’t seem to call it home his tears have dried but it was still evident on his face. His mother ushers him inside asking him but he doesn’t answer her only shakes his head. She frowns when he offers no explanation but doesn’t push further.
His room was like before, or so his mother said but he had no memory of that so he only nodded. He opens various cabinets and sees notebooks, his old diaries and takes them out. Lying down on his bed he reads them one by one, over and over but he gets angry when he feels nothing, no familiarity.
A soft knock is heard through his door and his mom enters the room, his books back in their places where his old self placed it. He feels he’s invading someone else’s space but it doesn’t make sense because he was still that person. “Are you alright? You’re crying again.” His mother is concerned, he hasn’t been home for a full day and all she’s been getting are tears.
“I don’t know.” Is the most honest answer he can give, “its another change.” expounding. He wants to ask if she was the one who thought of him moving back but he’s scared she might say Changmin made her do it. He decided that he didn’t want to know.
The Yoochun his mother encounters is not like the Yoochun she has come to know. She knew talking to Changmin that this person despite being Yoochun wasn’t exactly him anymore. He told her to treat him as someone else entirely but it was easier said than done. He still did some of the things her son used to but also acted unlike his son at times.
“Did I like it over easy or scrambled?” Yoochun responds when his mother asks how he wanted his eggs. Taken aback she says the old Yoochun didn’t really eat much eggs for breakfast, in fact he was almost always not there for it because he woke up just before lunch. He frowns at that, “But how would you like it?” She tries to backpedal but Yoochun says he doesn’t want it anymore.
The questions kept coming: did he like this one better? What did he prefer? Would your Yoochun do it like this? She could see he was trying hard to fill in the gaps of Yoochun, of himself but at the same time growing frustrated because of it. She asks Changmin if he had ever done that in his presence and he tells him never.
“It’s like he’s becoming obsessed with how he’s supposed to be.” Yoochun’s mother supplies to Changmin seated across from her. “I don’t know what to make of it. I keep telling him it doesn’t matter: to just do what he feels like but he says he has to.” Her worry only escalating as the days go by.
“I don’t want him to feel like he’s not welcomed or that we only want him when he’s like his old self.” She fiddles with napkin, upset. “Maybe you should go talk to him. You were always able to reach him even after we got him back.”
Changmin thinks of it but debates with himself, “He’ll feel like he’s being dictated to more if I intervene.”
Yoochun dials Jaejoong’s number, the man not picking up but he leaves a voice message to call back as soon as he can. It’s been two weeks and he’s at his wit’s end already. Torn between his past and present, he’s tried so hard to remember and be more like who they know but it isn’t coming to him at all. He bites his lips as he rereads his journals from the earliest he can find but as much as he’s almost had it memorized, nothing in him sparks.
“Hey, what is it?” Jaejoong asks, concerned with the tone Yoochun’s voice message had. “I think, I think I miss him.” Yoochun blurts out but if he were truly honest it was the most overwhelming feeling he’s been having.
“Oh, Yoochun-ah.” Frowning but not wanting to sound too desperate he tries to find his voice again. “I’m trying really hard Jaejoong, I’m trying to be just like old Yoochun but it’s not happening.”
“But you don’t need to!” The older man tries to dispel the helplessness his friend was feeling. “If I don’t mom and Changmin won’t like me.” Flipping the pages furiously as he tries to skim through the passages. “If I’m more like my old self, maybe Changmin will see me?” Jaejoong wants to tell him Changmin has always had but Yoochun would not listen.
He ends the call more conflicted than ever, Jaejoong had reassured him that he was enough. He felt like a ghost, a visage of someone else that no one saw and it was hard to explain. It was hard to wrap his mind around it. Taking his phone again he scrolls through Changmin’s number and types in a message.
“Minnie-yah, are you angry at me is that why?” Sending it before he could stop himself he feels exhausted trying to be two people.
The phone rings, startling Yoochun awake not even realizing he had drifted off. Changmin’s name flashes in the screen and he fumbles to answer it. “I’ll never be angry at you.” Is the first thing he hears from Changmin, his voice immediately calming Yoochun. He sniffs through the phone, “I was just concerned with your health and your mother as well, you weren’t getting to spend time with her.”
“I thought being home would do you good.” Reasoning to Yoochun over the phone. He loved Yoochun, even this side of him. Changmin thinks he cannot- not love Yoochun no matter what happened to him. He knows he will still end up falling for him regardless of any consequence. His past, the present and the oncoming future: he will still harbor this love.
“But you’re my home.” Yoochun whimpers, ending the call before Changmin can say anything more. Staring at his phone he tells his driver to head to the Parks, his heart pounding with Yoochun’s last words.
Changmin cradles Yoochun’s face as he kisses him, not wasting words once he comes to close proximity. The small man holding on to him just as desperately, nuzzling at his neck when they break apart.
“My heart always calls for you, my body misses you, screaming for you. My soul, my soul feels like it’s shattering when you’re not with me.”
Changmin kisses him through his tears, his own landing on Yoochun’s face. “I’m here. I’m here.” He reassures Yoochun, eyes boring into him as he promises to stay. “I’m not going anywhere.”
This feels like nothing they’ve ever experienced: like a dream as they both gasp and hold on to one another. Changmin eases into him in slowly, kissing him through it all. His fingers tangling with Yoochun’s as he moves. Following the kisses, hands roaming to the expanse of skin, pulling each other closer.
Yoochun panting against his ear, to take him more, Changmin could cry with just the thought of being with him again. Nothing but the two of them and it all made sense as the haze of euphoria engulfs their being. For a time they’re one again, whole again: complete.
On his chest, Yoochun traces the identical mark Changmin carries his fingers lightly going over the design. “This is our symbol, this is us.” Changmin states tapping the same imprint on Yoochun’s chest, he understands and agrees, feeling the same sentiments. “I loved you then and I love you now.”
“I may not remember how you adored me before or how I loved you in the past but I can tell you that I: this present me feels love for you.”
Jaejoong looks at the boxes piled near Changmin’s room. They’re all marked with labels of different things. Yoochun gathering a box at a time as he tidies it up. “Moving out of your home?” He asks, glancing inside some of the things inside. Yoochun tells him to move it by the bathroom. Whining when he ends up carrying the heavier boxes inside.
“No I’m moving back home.” Yoochun beams at him when he unfolds the empty box. Jaejoong gawks for a second before he laughs, sitting beside Yoochun as they try and organize mountain of belongings.
Jae catches Changmin in the office looking over his laptop. There’s a new picture on the desk, a recent photograph of the two with a new frame. “So, everything better?” Flopping on the chair putting his feet up on the chair across from it.
“I’m at peace.” Changmin informs him as he sips his too strong and yet too sweet Vietnamese iced coffee. “Despite everything, if you think about it - it’s something to love the same person but in a different way and to be loved back in a changed manner.”
“So, I take it that this Yoochun loves you back?” Jaejoong’s toothy grin as he awaits for Changmin to spill the details. “Oh God, romantic Changmin is back.” Jaejoong jokes but he lets it pass even laughing at the jab. “Don’t you read F. Scott Fitzgerald quote?” The segue making his eyes perk up at Changmin.
‘There are all kinds of love in the world but never the same love twice.’
Genre: Romance, Drama, Angst
Rating: PG-13
Summary: He is Yoochun but he is also not Yoochun. After getting him back, Changmin must deal with the consequences of being forgotten
Changmin checks his phone, fumbling around to pass time as he waits for the go signal. Jaejoong is seated at the back of the car, tapping his fingers against his lap as he concentrates. Usually as the head of the family, Changmin wouldn’t be here doing a mission but he could be spontaneous if he wanted to.
“Boss, has it been a while since you’ve done this?” Minho, the teenage boy asks him curiously and he smirks in response “That doesn’t mean I’m rusty.”
The other men have practically rendered the grounds of the estate to a death zone, caught unaware and unarmed the takeover was too easy. Changmin walks towards the last building with Jaejoong behind him, gun out as he strides inside.
“We found Junsu, his area is secluded enough that it was hard to trace him.” Jaejoong reports, showing various pictures to Changmin and the others in the family. “His house is near the ports where the weapos exchanges happen.” He shows another picture of the ships as Junsu is seen talking on the phone by the docks. Blissfully unaware.
“He rose too quickly now his demise is faster.” Heechul just laughs and Changmin nods his head in agreement. “Not fast enough.” Flipping through the other reports of Junsu’s victims Changmin can’t help but be annoyed. “He’s targeted of our warehouses and killed enough subordinates to get cocky.” Heechul flippantly says eyeing number of hits they had taken.
“I want him out.” Heechul glares looking over the other members, raising his hand to start a vote. The whole table waves at him making him smile, “Alright. Get rid of him, no traces behind. We want all the stolen goods back.” Changmin looks over Jaejoong who nods at him.
“I think I want to join this mission.”
The both of them move without sound though really it didn’t matter, everyone else was either dead or getting there. No would help the soon dead man. Jaejoong thinks this was overdone but with Changmin’s thirst for bloodbath everyone could only obey. He sighs heavily and prays this would be quick but he knows enough to understand it was wishful thinking.
They slide the door open to find Junsu on the bed, rather naked obviously busy with his wife who seems to be pliant under him. Jaejoong doesn’t miss a millisecond to shoot hitting the shoulder, the man slumping and gasping as he turns to look.
“What the!” Junsu shouts seeing the two men in front of him, he tries to reach for the call button. “That’s useless. Everyone else is dead.” Changmin informs him coldly, watching the color drain from Junsu’s face. “You’re going to die now.”
Not wanting to go down without a fight, Junsu grabs the man under him “Be useful for once.” Spatting as he makes a shield out of his wife, the man not even reacting as he is twisted - robe falling off one shoulder as he looks into the two intruders.
Jaejoong gasps and as he sees the face, quickly looking at Changmin who sees stunned as well, “Yoochun?” Mouthing the name he hasn’t had the courage to say out loud in two years. Confused, Changmin lowers his gun not knowing what to do. He’s supposed to be dead.
A shot permeates the room and Jaejoong squabbles to return fire but can’t get his aim, scared to hit this person who looks exactly like Yoochun. “Boss!” Jaejoong shouts, trying to snap Changmin out of it but he can see his eyes focusing on only one thing-one person.
Jaejoong shoots again, hitting Junsu’s arm, gun falling on the floor, as his arm is rendered useless. All the while Yoochun remains still, Junsu’s blood coating his robe. He makes one last attempt to use him as a wall between the bullets but Changmin finally aims at his head.
Junsu falls backwards, trying to grab unto something but only manages to pull down the clothe barely on his wife’s shoulders. He is silent, just stares at him as he lays dead before looking at the two men who have now killed his husband.
“Yoochun?” Changmin tries again, slowly walking towards him but he feigns no recognition to the name. He merely looks at tall man as he sits on the pool of his husband’s blood. Changmin kneels down to meet his eyes, not minding his nearly naked state nor afraid of being killed.
The dark scar on his chest evident as Changmin stares at it that mark, there was no denying this was his Yoochun. His Yoochun was alive and in front of him but how can that be? Yoochun only looks at his him with empty eyes, reaching out to his bloodstained clothes. His eyes roll back and Changmin catches him in his arms. What the fuck is going on?!
“Do you really think it’s him?” Jaejoong asks his boss, sipping the black coffee as they both wait for Yunho to come in. “You saw the same mark on his chest as I did. You know very well what that means.” Changmin answers, voice on the edge. “We’re just making sure with a DNA test but I know, I know it’s my Yoochun.”
Yoochun wakes up to a white room, a hospital he concludes, IVs connected to him and a warm blanket. There’s no one in the room and he looks outside the window briefly wondering what day it is but thinks it’s rather inconsequential. The door opens and Yoochun recognizes the tall man- it’s the man who killed his husband enter the room.
“How are you feeling?” The tall man asks him and he stares ahead not looking into those eyes. Changmin takes the seat by the couch unnerved by the coldness but he really can’t gauge anything. “Yoochun?” He tries again, he doesn’t know what to say but he desperately need him to look at him again. Yoochun only clenches at the blanket before he coldly turns to him,
“Who’s Yoochun? Who are you?”
Yunho arrives with an envelope, a look on his face not reassuring them both. He sits on the table and takes out papers to show the both of them, “I checked with his mom and the DNAs match. It’s Yoochun.” The news not really making the three of them happy just more questions in their minds.
“I don’t know what happened between the time we thought he was dead in the attack between now that caused him to loose his memories but all I can say is this is Yoochun.” Leaning back to stare at the word “MATCH” on the test. “We did a full test on him, no external injury- he did have scarring on his head from stitches and judging from how old they look that it fits in the timeline of when he disappeared.”
“So you’re saying he may have gotten hit in the head and now he has amnesia?” Jaejoong asks Yunho, reading all the other tests that didn’t help with anything. “It’s just the hypothesis I could come up with, there is nothing else aside from that hit on the head.” Yunho looks at Changmin, it’s obvious the news doesn’t hit him well.
Dealing with having the lover you thought was dead come back to you not knowing you was something he couldn’t even fathom.
Changmin knocks at the door to his room, it used to be their room he waits for a reply but gets nothing so he enters. Yoochun is sitting on the work desk looking at the framed picture. He knows that picture well, it was of them years ago. He wants Yoochun to remember but seeing the empty look in his eyes, Changmin knows there is no recognition.
“Your mother and brother is coming to see you.” He informs Yoochun who only tilts his head- still no reaction. “As soon as the DNA test was confirmed they wanted to see you.” The smaller man just nods still looking at the picture. “What are their names?” His voice just above a whisper, Changmin gives him a small smile and moves to the bookshelf, he gets another album to show Yoochun, opening the pages to show the man his family.
“Changmin-ah, this is Yoochun!” His mother tells him, he sees a lanky boy with glasses look at him unsurely. He turns to his mother again and she only nudges him, “Why don’t you show him around while your dad and I talk to the Parks?” leaving the two teenagers as adults enter the formal dining hall.
He hears them throw around the word marriage before he leaves in disgust, not wanting any part of it. The boy called Yoochun follows him and he doesn’t acknowledge him. What was he supposed to do with the other boy? He didn’t know but all he knew is that he felt stuffy in the house.
He reaches the back of the garden with Yoochun still shadowing him, the boy still not saying a word. “Don’t you have anything else to do?” He mocks, throwing a rock at him annoyed. Yoochun only frowns, “Well you’re supposed to show me around!”
“Fuck that. I don’t want to.” Stomping as he walks away only for him to get followed. “You don’t really have a choice. You’ll have to get used to me somehow.” Yoochun explains, not giving into Changmin’s tantrums and scowls.
They reach the hidden wall of leaves and Changmin opens the gate to a small park, Yoochun looks around in amazement not expecting to see an amazing place behind the walls. He simply thought it was the end of the estate but it was obviously not the case.
“Our parents are having a meeting about us, doesn’t that bother you?” Changmin asks grabbing a baseball bat as he takes out his frustration. Yoochun sits by the swing, letting his feet dangle as he swings up high. Changmin thinks it’s childish but doesn’t voice out that part.
“Not really.” Yoochun sing-songs, carefree as he goes higher and higher. Changmin can’t believe the nonchalance. “There’s no use trying be angry at something I can’t control. I just roll with it.” The reasoning doesn’t sit well with him, chain mid swing as he tries to stop Yoochun.
“What if I hate you?” Grabbing the links as he stares at the Yoochun. “What if I hate YOU?” he teases but Changmin doesn’t find it funny. Yoochun only smiles at him, dimple showing “Ah, I guess I better get used to your grouchiness, huh?”
Changmin gets flabbergasted, sputtering cusses at him as he lets go of the swing. “Minnie-yah!” He calls, already forming a nickname for his future husband who’s features turn angry yet again.
“But what if you like me?”
Jaejoong walks around the estate with Yoochun, the past months had been surreal. He knows how it’s taking a toll on Changmin who tries not to show it. Yoochun walks ahead of him, “You seem to know your way around well.” Jaejoong comments making the brunette stop and look at him.
Yoochun wonders for a brief moment, “Actually, I don’t but it seems my feet remember where we’re going.” It occurs to him that he hasn’t gone to that side of the house but it seems his body knows where it is. Jaejoong looks at him strangely, “That is something.”
Changmin is waiting in the veranda, this house usually not occupied except when there were guests. There are several houses in the lot and sometimes he liked going to them just for the novelty. He looks up to see Jaejoong and Yoochun, eyes lingering on the latter before he turns away.
Jaejoong motions for him to sit down and he does so hesitantly. Living with Changmin hasn’t made it easier to be with him. He knows his old self and this man used to be lovers but now there are no more but strangers. Yoochun doesn’t know what to take from it but is thankful that Changmin doesn’t push him to be anything more than what he is now.
Silence falls on them but Jaejoong notes how uncomfortable his boss still is with Yoochun, years ago these two would be laughing but now it seems only the quiet lies between them. Changmin picks at his food, wary of the distance and he wishes it wasn’t like that.
The helper arrives with the drinks, Yoochun thanks her and she smiles. Immediately Yoochun gets the coffee drip transferring it to the glass with ice. He pours some of the condensed milk then stirs it with the spoon, when the two are well mixed he gives it to Changmin who only stares at him.
Yoochun is startled with himself, panicking when Changmin stares at him far longer than he’s accustomed. “You used to do that all the time.” He quietly says, “thank you.” voice faraway as he remembers. Yoochun bites his lip embarrassed not knowing what had gotten over him.
Jaejoong only stares at the exchange musing how some things work out the way they do while grasping the meaning of the small action.
“He really isn’t remembering anything is he.” Yoochun’s mother states, it’s not a question anymore but rather a sad observation. Yoochun is out with Jaejoong and Minho, Changmin thinking the man needed a different kind of environment. Changmin looks at his mother-in-law, can he call him that and agrees with her statement.
“Would you like for me to move him back to your place?” Knowing how she must have missed his son. The agony they all went through when they thought he had died two years ago still fresh on his mind. He didn’t mean for him to keep Yoochun to himself but she acquiesced to his wishes.
She looks at one of the pictures displayed in Changmin’s office, her old Yoochun smiling and how she almost never saw it on this new Yoochun and yet they were somehow still the same person. “You know, I do miss him but you are a big part of his life, I have to admit maybe even a bigger part of his life than me.”
“You two have been inseparable since you were thirteen, the first time you met. Well it was mostly Yoochun following you around really.” Laughing at the memory of yesteryears. “He never really took no for an answer.” Changmin supplies and the two of them smile knowing it well.
“I think it would be better if he was with you unless- you can’t handle it anymore. I won’t take it against you.” She knows it’s not the ideal situation, Yoochun as he is now barely had any rapport with Changmin. Yoochun barely knew her either and was in no better position herself. “It’s difficult, I know him as someone else and he doesn’t know us at all.”
“If you feel that you can’t handle the burden anymore, it will be okay, Changmin. I don’t doubt the love you have for my son -“ Her voice cracks as she thinks of his son as foreigner to both of them now. “I know you’re hurting as I am. I know it pains to look at him and have emptiness look back at you. Sometimes, I try so hard to look for the traces of his old self in his eyes and he tells me he’s sorry whenever he catches me gazing too long”
Changmin only hugs her, this woman he considered his own mother, understanding her fully. Years ago when their families merged he thought he and Yoochun would only be am arranged relationship. He thought they would only be nothing but a signed contract yet that was not how it turned out.
He loved Yoochun and Yoochun loved him back.
He was a fool into thinking he could have everything but fate played with the both of them it seemed. “No, he is never a burden. I’ll take care of him. I always will.” Changmin promised Yoochun and even if he can’t remember it, he’ll remember for the both of them.
Yoochun waits in traffic, hands tapping to the music playing as he tries to alleviate boredom. He takes out his phone and speeds dial Changmin, switching to the Bluetooth in his radio. “Babe! Don’t forget you have your suit fitting tomorrow.” His fiancé only grumbles, “It’s only like thirty minutes don’t be such a grouch.” Laughing as Changmin groans at him even more.
“Where are you anyway?” Changmin ask, motioning for Jaejooong to write down the tailor appointment for tomorrow. “I’m on my way to the florist, we’re going to pick the pick the set up for the venue.” His voice excited and Changmin knows Yoochun will most likely go overboard with decorating. “It’s a garden wedding already, what more do you need?”
Jaejoong laughs beside him, the sarcasm dripping from his voice. “This is such a waste of time and resources. We could just sign the papers that we’re married and that’s it why the big fiasco?”Jaejoong makes a face at him signaling that it was the wrong thing to say but he doesn’t really care anymore.
“But Minnie-yah, you promised me I get to decide. I don’t want to just sign the papers. You’re such a boring old fart.” Teasing him in the way only he gets to, smiling at how he imagines Changmin’s face sours at his insults. “The wedding is only a month away so bare with me besides you got to decide our honeymoon so don’t complain too much!”
“Blah blah blah” Changmin mouths but agrees regardless, “Yay, thanks Minnie. Anyway, I’ll see you for dinner, okay? Love you!” Ending the call as he parks in front of the building, grabbing his bag as he walks inside.
Changmin presses Yoochun’s number for the umpteenth time- annoyed that he wasn’t picking up. He was supposed to be home an hour ago but he still hasn’t arrived. He tries to make another call but it goes straight to voicemail again. He was about to leave a message when Minho bursts inside the room.
“Boss, there’s been an ambush! Yoochun-hyung is-“ Minho doesn’t get to finish the sentence and Changmin is already running outside, phone calling Jaejoong and his other men. He feels himself growing cold, panic setting in as he goes to the florist’s shop. His breath speeding up as he gets closer but only sees a cloud of dark smoke, heart dropping as he sees how thick it is.
He stands outside the building-or what used to be the building-, it’s flattened to the ground. The sirens blasting around him fall on deaf ears. Everything turns gray and he feels time slowing as he looks around for any sign of Yoochun. He doesn’t feel it when his men, grab him pulling him to the side as small explosions rock the area.
“No survivors.” He hears the police and firefighters say, taping the area as the investigation begins. He wants to shout at them, tell him his fiancé is there they better move but everything is burned down. Changmin spots the half of Yoochun’s car plate on the ground, sides singed and he runs to get it, tears falling on steel as the embers die on his feet.
Jaejoong catches him, as he shouts, trying desperately to hold him up but he can’t. He can’t do this. He doesn’t want to. He wants Yoochun. He needs Yoochun .He has to be with Yoochun. But all his ears can hear is “I’m sorry.” as Jaejoong clutches on to him, “I’m sorry Changmin, I’m so sorry.”
He steps into the garden, the dried leaves scattered on the floor crunching beneath his boots as he walks further. It had been years since he last stepped into this place, unable to enter it. Not wanting to face the emptiness that would greet him. A place once only tied to happiness only burning a whole in his heart.
A figure is seated on the swing and Changmin recognizes Yoochun, it feels familiar but he dismisses the feeling away. “You found it.” Standing in front of the swing like he used to do a million times before as Yoochun swayed on the children’s equipment.
“Is this your secret place?” He asks, looking around. Changmin sits on the other swing beside him, “This used to be our place.” Staring at the old abandoned tree house, it was Yoochun’s idea to put one in there. They used to hide in the tree house and read comics; sometimes they swapped collectible cards but most importantly it was where their first kissed. He smiles at that memory but it feels bitter.
Yoochun hides his face, “I don’t remember, I’m sorry. I just found myself here.” Feeling shy around Changmin, he wasn’t scared of him but his heart always fluttered with him around. My heart knows him. “You don’t have to say you’re sorry, as I said it’s our place.” Yoochun looks away from him again and Changmin hates it.
“You never look at me.” He muses out loud making Yoochun snap his head at him. “You just make me nervous sometimes.” Changmin says sorry, his frustration hiding his sadness. The sound of the creaking swing is the only thing that drowns out his longing.
“I met Junsu at the hospital.” Yoochun starts, tone mellow as he recounts. “I woke up and I didn’t understand what was happening. He called me Micky and he seemed to know me.” He remembers not knowing his name but there he was a person who appeared to recognize him.
“Micky was your alias to protect your identity.” Changmin supplies. They all had code names, he was Max and Jaejoong was Hero. They all traversed around with normal citizens with those names. Changmin thinks of how Junsu might have recognized him.
Yoochun nods, making sense of it. “No identity, nothing. I was scared but he said he’d take care of it. I clung to him like a crutch, like a lost child.”
“He said we worked together but of course I couldn’t remember a thing so I believed everything.” Changmin nods not interrupting. Junsu had seen Yoochun before from a meeting back then, he didn’t know his connection to Changmin. Sometimes Yoochun would go with Jaejoong to small check-ins with the businesses so some men recognized him but didn’t know who exactly he was.
Junsu was just starting out as an informant and sometimes delivery boy. He got to the good graces of one of their smaller partners and possibly overtook him that’s why he got into the business. Changmin could only piece together possible scenarios but it wasn’t important now, he was six feet under ground, rotting dead.
“He was there when I was recuperating and one thing led to another. He asked me to live with him once I got out and having no other person there I accepted.” Yoochun remembers going out of the hospital and to Junsu’s house and recalls the trepidation, it was his gut telling him of the danger but he hid it.
“We got married after a few months, you could say now it was a sham marriage- there was barely any ceremony. I thought everything would be okay but it wasn’t.”
Changmin clenches his jaw at that, hating how Junsu manipulated Yoochun. “It was good for a few months, he provided for me but he got extremely controlling and paranoid. Wouldn’t allow me near his work at all. He always said he had to hide me because people were going to take advantage of me and hurt me.”
“Isn’t that ironic?” He tries to joke but there is nothing light about the conversation. He continues on as Changmin looks at him. “As his business grew the more obsessed he became. He used to tell me not to leave him, beg me not to but the next day point a gun at me accusing me of being a snitch.”
“I didn’t understand, we kept moving from place to place and I felt we were being hunted. We settled at the last place finally. He said no one could find us there and when I asked who but he would tell me to shut up, hit me if I asked too many questions.”
Junsu wasn’t able to plan his schemes well enough to cover his tracks; dealing with the wrong crowd made him a target. He ticked off too many people including them. “He did plenty wrong.” Changmin answers for Yoochun, “It caught up to him.”
“He would force himself on me, I used to fight him off but he always overpowered me. He would say I was his alone and I had no rights of my own. I learned that if I don’t try and stop him it would go by quicker so stopped trying.”
Changmin grits his teeth, if he could kill the man again he would over and over again. He hates himself for not finding Junsu sooner as well, if he could have rescued his Yoochun sooner. Yoochun sufferings were his agony, if he could only carry his pain so that he wouldn’t have to.
“When you came and killed him, I felt no remorse anymore. At that point death seemed the most inviting.” His tears falling as he remembers all the pain, the uncertainty and darkness. Changmin reaches up to wipe it away, his warm fingers caressing his cheek. The touch so gentle unlike anything he’s experienced with Junsu.
Changmin kneels down, holding his hands as he shakes. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there sooner. You went through hell and I can’t forgive myself for it.” Yoochun only shakes his head, “But you came for me, someone was there for me and I didn’t know. Even without knowing, you still came.”
Yoochun let’s Changmin’s head rest on his lap, in a way comforting him. Him telling his story lifted some of the burdens from his shoulders. Changmin cries in his lap, the first time he lets himself cry since he found him again. He cries for the lost time, the lost innocence but of all he cries for Yoochun.
The sound of laughter echoes through the veranda, Yoohwan recounting a story to his mom and brother. Yoochun covers his mouth, “Was I really that bad?” giggling as his younger brother tells him of the dog incident when they were children. It’s a warm scene and Changmin relaxes just a little bit when he watches them from inside the house.
Jaejoong looks at the family outside longingly, “How are you coping?” asking their leader. The laughter and hushed whispering tickle his ears. Changmin only looks at Jaejoong, he may not be blood related but they were brothers nonetheless. “It’s hard.” He says honestly, no use lying.
“Yoochun is Yoochun but at the same time he’s not. He’s alive, he’s in front of me, I can touch him and yet it’s not him.”
“I feel like I’m grieving for a person who is still alive.”
Jaejoong makes sense of it, he too felt the loss but only a fraction of what Changmin is going through. Yoochun was his friend but Changmin was his soul mate, his lover, and his best friend, his everything. He was speaking in past tense like he was gone but at the same time that’s what it felt like.
“Changmin, what if. . . his memories don’t come back?” Not wanting to ask that question but he knew it was something that could happen as well. There were no guarantees, no magical pill that could make him remember.
Even if Yoochun spent time with Changmin it seemed that it did nothing to trigger his memories. True sometimes Yoochun did something that seemed like the old Yoochun would but it was mostly habitual things that didn’t hold meaning anymore.
“I’ve been preparing for that but it’s hard to reconcile it happening. I can tell this Yoochun is different from the one we know, from the one I loved but he’s still there somehow.”
He looks just in time for Yoochun to glance at him through the window and give him a shy smile. Changmin eye’s crinkle, “I know I can’t just tell him to do this or that just because he used to do it but-“
“But you miss him.” Jaejoong finishes for him, taking the edge out of Changmin’s voice. “He is Yoochun and he is not Yoochun anymore. He is simply this.”
Unable to sleep Yoochun slips off to the piano room, letting his hands glide through the keys. His feelings guiding him as he plays song after song, his mind blank as he pours all his thoughts through the music.
Changmin stands by the door watching him, the music echoing to his room peaking his curiosity. “My body seems to remember things my mind can’t.” Yoochun says out loud but not missing any note. Instantly feeling when Changmin started watching him, an unexplained connection he had with the man.
Changmin sits beside him and Yoochun watches him as he starts to play a song as well. He doesn’t recognize the melody itself but closes his eyes to feel the music. Without realizing he starts playing as well, a duet.
They’re unusually close, his body leaning towards the taller man and for the first time not shying away from him. Changmin doesn’t react but relaxes to their closeness, a feeling he’s been aching for. They both continue playing, he trips over a couple of notes and Yoochun fixes his fingers from time to time.
For the first time in a long time they are comfortable with another, Yoochun’s smile radiating and Changmin laughing at them both. His heart feeling light just being with Yoochun and having him smile because of him, Changmin knows this is his favorite place.
Yoochun plays last note and nudges Changmin to press the last chords guiding his fingers, he does so sloppily and he gets a smile for his effort. Their undeniably close, shoulder-to-shoulder, knees touching and Yoochun’s head leaning heavily on his neck. Their hands still tangled together, Changmin feels soft lips on his.
The kiss is delicate and gentle, everything Yoochun is now- there’s trepidation but desire, timidness but longing. Changmin leans into the kiss, encouraging- hands on his face and neck as he deepens their kiss. Feverish, Yoochun pulls him in bending, his elbows hitting and clattering the ivory keys, Changmin following as he leans back to the bench. Body on Yoochun as the man under him claws at his shirt, opening his mouth to let taste more of Changmin.
When hands skim his stomach, Yoochun snaps out of his stupor- pushing Changmin off him. Breathing heavily, lips debauched not knowing what came over him, terror suddenly overwhelming him. Changmin stares at him not moving seeing the flashes of emotions in his eyes, swallows as Yoochun scurries away leaving him alone in the dark room.
His fingers tracing his lips, still tingling from the contact, fingers warm from the skin but his affections denied.
Sitting with Jaejoong still makes Yoochun uneasy; he thinks maybe his past self would have been best friends with this man. He has an icy stare and even colder aura about him, knows from Changmin’s stories as well as the members that it was only a façade. “You seem distant lately.” He was also blunt but his honestly was something Yoochun appreciated with him.
He only makes a noise to acknowledge the question, “With Changmin I meant.” Of course he knew whom Jaejoong was talking about. He doesn’t respond and the other man thankfully drops the subject.
“I had a question. If I may.” Yoochun picks another topic, the pale man quirking his eyebrow. Yoochun holds the left side of his chest; “There’s a mark on my chest. I didn’t want to ask about it but it’s been bothering me.”
“Ah, I was wondering when you’d ask that. I thought you’d ask Changmin about it though.” The mention of the man’s name makes Yoochun flinch but Jaejoong pretends not to notice. “It’s a marriage mark.” Putting out his phone, “This is Changmin’s family crest. As the head of his family he is given the marking of his choosing to represent it.”
Yoochun stares at it, it looks similar to the mark on his chest but there were some slight variations to it. “As he was to be married to you and coming from another family he merged the two of symbols together.” Swiping the screen to show the symbol of the Parks to Yoochun.
“It means the two of you are the head of a new family.” Yoochun nods, “So do you have it too since you’re part of the family?” Jaejoong smiles but shakes his head, keeping his phone in his bag. “No, only the pure ones are given the markings and the head. Most of us get a tattoo to show our affiliation and loyalty but not all.” Pulling his shirtsleeve up to reveal a faint tattoo.
“It’s mostly a tradition that isn’t thoroughly implemented, Changmin just wanted it cause you had tattoos on you and he wanted something you both shared that showed you were life partners.” Laughing at how petty Changmin could be but also a closeted romantic.
“Is that so?” Yoochun gnaws his lip, interested. Jaejoong laughs at him “God, that kid sometimes is a dolt. He said he couldn’t believe you had multiple tattoos yet are easily spooked so he wanted to show he could take pain as well.” Yoochun scratches his head at the logic, not imagining it fully but admits it would be so comical.
“I said matching rings would have been fine but he had to go extreme create that on his chest. You were more of an idiot and got it for yourself as well.” Jaejoong remembers the multitude of curses he uttered as the old traditionalist did it. He wasn’t there but Yoochun recorded some of it for him and they both laughed at it.
“Can you, can you tell me more about Changmin?” Yoochun sheepishly asks, cheeks a bit red as he utters his name. Jaejoong ruffles his hair, laughing as Yoochun tries hard to put it back to order. It feels normal for them for once, “Sure- let me tell you all the craziness.”
Arriving in the house, Yoochun makes a beeline for his room, dropping off his things before heading to the kitchen to eat. He smiles when he thinks of all the stories Jaejoong shared with him, blushing a little at how those thoughts make him giddy. He arrives at the kitchen and Changmin is already waiting for him, unreadable expression on his face. He lets out a shy hello that goes unheard. They eat dinner but Yoochun feels that there is something amiss; Changmin is cold towards him barely looking at him.
He wants to know but stops himself not wanting to overstep. “I had a talk with your mother and we decided you should go stay with them.” Yoochun drops his chopsticks, gawking at Changmin. Was he being forced out? Did Changmin grow tired of taking care of him?
Feeling a lump on his throat at the rejection he tries to control his tears and lips from quivering. “I think it would be best for you to spend time with them. I think they’ll be able to help you more.” So Changmin did feel burdened by his presence, berating himself for not being ideal. “The helpers will assist in you packing.” He informs Yoochun nodding as he leaves the table.
The car comes and Yoochun stares at the room, he wants to say goodbye to Changmin and thank him but his assistant informs him that he had left early. Feeling more dejected than ever he grabs his bag and goes in the car, wiping at his tears that won’t stop falling. He looks at the picture he took from one of the albums and throws it out the window.
When he arrives at the other house, Yoochun can’t seem to call it home his tears have dried but it was still evident on his face. His mother ushers him inside asking him but he doesn’t answer her only shakes his head. She frowns when he offers no explanation but doesn’t push further.
His room was like before, or so his mother said but he had no memory of that so he only nodded. He opens various cabinets and sees notebooks, his old diaries and takes them out. Lying down on his bed he reads them one by one, over and over but he gets angry when he feels nothing, no familiarity.
A soft knock is heard through his door and his mom enters the room, his books back in their places where his old self placed it. He feels he’s invading someone else’s space but it doesn’t make sense because he was still that person. “Are you alright? You’re crying again.” His mother is concerned, he hasn’t been home for a full day and all she’s been getting are tears.
“I don’t know.” Is the most honest answer he can give, “its another change.” expounding. He wants to ask if she was the one who thought of him moving back but he’s scared she might say Changmin made her do it. He decided that he didn’t want to know.
The Yoochun his mother encounters is not like the Yoochun she has come to know. She knew talking to Changmin that this person despite being Yoochun wasn’t exactly him anymore. He told her to treat him as someone else entirely but it was easier said than done. He still did some of the things her son used to but also acted unlike his son at times.
“Did I like it over easy or scrambled?” Yoochun responds when his mother asks how he wanted his eggs. Taken aback she says the old Yoochun didn’t really eat much eggs for breakfast, in fact he was almost always not there for it because he woke up just before lunch. He frowns at that, “But how would you like it?” She tries to backpedal but Yoochun says he doesn’t want it anymore.
The questions kept coming: did he like this one better? What did he prefer? Would your Yoochun do it like this? She could see he was trying hard to fill in the gaps of Yoochun, of himself but at the same time growing frustrated because of it. She asks Changmin if he had ever done that in his presence and he tells him never.
“It’s like he’s becoming obsessed with how he’s supposed to be.” Yoochun’s mother supplies to Changmin seated across from her. “I don’t know what to make of it. I keep telling him it doesn’t matter: to just do what he feels like but he says he has to.” Her worry only escalating as the days go by.
“I don’t want him to feel like he’s not welcomed or that we only want him when he’s like his old self.” She fiddles with napkin, upset. “Maybe you should go talk to him. You were always able to reach him even after we got him back.”
Changmin thinks of it but debates with himself, “He’ll feel like he’s being dictated to more if I intervene.”
Yoochun dials Jaejoong’s number, the man not picking up but he leaves a voice message to call back as soon as he can. It’s been two weeks and he’s at his wit’s end already. Torn between his past and present, he’s tried so hard to remember and be more like who they know but it isn’t coming to him at all. He bites his lips as he rereads his journals from the earliest he can find but as much as he’s almost had it memorized, nothing in him sparks.
“Hey, what is it?” Jaejoong asks, concerned with the tone Yoochun’s voice message had. “I think, I think I miss him.” Yoochun blurts out but if he were truly honest it was the most overwhelming feeling he’s been having.
“Oh, Yoochun-ah.” Frowning but not wanting to sound too desperate he tries to find his voice again. “I’m trying really hard Jaejoong, I’m trying to be just like old Yoochun but it’s not happening.”
“But you don’t need to!” The older man tries to dispel the helplessness his friend was feeling. “If I don’t mom and Changmin won’t like me.” Flipping the pages furiously as he tries to skim through the passages. “If I’m more like my old self, maybe Changmin will see me?” Jaejoong wants to tell him Changmin has always had but Yoochun would not listen.
He ends the call more conflicted than ever, Jaejoong had reassured him that he was enough. He felt like a ghost, a visage of someone else that no one saw and it was hard to explain. It was hard to wrap his mind around it. Taking his phone again he scrolls through Changmin’s number and types in a message.
“Minnie-yah, are you angry at me is that why?” Sending it before he could stop himself he feels exhausted trying to be two people.
The phone rings, startling Yoochun awake not even realizing he had drifted off. Changmin’s name flashes in the screen and he fumbles to answer it. “I’ll never be angry at you.” Is the first thing he hears from Changmin, his voice immediately calming Yoochun. He sniffs through the phone, “I was just concerned with your health and your mother as well, you weren’t getting to spend time with her.”
“I thought being home would do you good.” Reasoning to Yoochun over the phone. He loved Yoochun, even this side of him. Changmin thinks he cannot- not love Yoochun no matter what happened to him. He knows he will still end up falling for him regardless of any consequence. His past, the present and the oncoming future: he will still harbor this love.
“But you’re my home.” Yoochun whimpers, ending the call before Changmin can say anything more. Staring at his phone he tells his driver to head to the Parks, his heart pounding with Yoochun’s last words.
Changmin cradles Yoochun’s face as he kisses him, not wasting words once he comes to close proximity. The small man holding on to him just as desperately, nuzzling at his neck when they break apart.
“My heart always calls for you, my body misses you, screaming for you. My soul, my soul feels like it’s shattering when you’re not with me.”
Changmin kisses him through his tears, his own landing on Yoochun’s face. “I’m here. I’m here.” He reassures Yoochun, eyes boring into him as he promises to stay. “I’m not going anywhere.”
This feels like nothing they’ve ever experienced: like a dream as they both gasp and hold on to one another. Changmin eases into him in slowly, kissing him through it all. His fingers tangling with Yoochun’s as he moves. Following the kisses, hands roaming to the expanse of skin, pulling each other closer.
Yoochun panting against his ear, to take him more, Changmin could cry with just the thought of being with him again. Nothing but the two of them and it all made sense as the haze of euphoria engulfs their being. For a time they’re one again, whole again: complete.
On his chest, Yoochun traces the identical mark Changmin carries his fingers lightly going over the design. “This is our symbol, this is us.” Changmin states tapping the same imprint on Yoochun’s chest, he understands and agrees, feeling the same sentiments. “I loved you then and I love you now.”
“I may not remember how you adored me before or how I loved you in the past but I can tell you that I: this present me feels love for you.”
Jaejoong looks at the boxes piled near Changmin’s room. They’re all marked with labels of different things. Yoochun gathering a box at a time as he tidies it up. “Moving out of your home?” He asks, glancing inside some of the things inside. Yoochun tells him to move it by the bathroom. Whining when he ends up carrying the heavier boxes inside.
“No I’m moving back home.” Yoochun beams at him when he unfolds the empty box. Jaejoong gawks for a second before he laughs, sitting beside Yoochun as they try and organize mountain of belongings.
Jae catches Changmin in the office looking over his laptop. There’s a new picture on the desk, a recent photograph of the two with a new frame. “So, everything better?” Flopping on the chair putting his feet up on the chair across from it.
“I’m at peace.” Changmin informs him as he sips his too strong and yet too sweet Vietnamese iced coffee. “Despite everything, if you think about it - it’s something to love the same person but in a different way and to be loved back in a changed manner.”
“So, I take it that this Yoochun loves you back?” Jaejoong’s toothy grin as he awaits for Changmin to spill the details. “Oh God, romantic Changmin is back.” Jaejoong jokes but he lets it pass even laughing at the jab. “Don’t you read F. Scott Fitzgerald quote?” The segue making his eyes perk up at Changmin.
‘There are all kinds of love in the world but never the same love twice.’