Never let go
It’s one week off from five years when you sign the lease. You think it must be either fate or a heavy dose of irony at work, but either way, the results are the same, and that night you sit in your new apartment on the bare floorboards (as there’s nothing else to sit on yet) and feel the low throbbing ache that’s existed for those five years swell into a stab of loss and loneliness.
That weekend, Yoochun calls for your weekly chat, and asks about your new place.
“It’s in our old neighborhood.” You tell him, and you can practically hear his eyebrows rising.
“Really? Anywhere near our apartment?” He asks you, and you laugh depreciatively - the sound hollow. Yoochun puts it down to the tinnyness of distance, but you know.
“Yeah. Yeah. Real close.” You say back, looking at the corner of the room that used to be his bed and wishing that you could cry.
It takes you two months to furnish the place with even the bare essentials. You tell yourself, and everyone else, it’s because you don’t have the time, and that you want everything to be perfect. Inside, you know though. You do want it to be perfect, but it’s never going to be, because even if you did manage to find almost an exact replica of your couch and the kitchen table you never much liked in the first place - there’s still only one bed in the bedroom, and all the rooms echo emptiness.
Dinner with Min is somewhat stilted - and he knows there’s something up. He comforts you the best way he can, and you end up almost getting kicked out of the restaurant because of both of your threats to start throwing food at one another. When you part, he hugs you tight and promises that you’ll have lunch soon. His embrace is warm and smells familiar, and you almost want to curl up into it and beg him not to leave you alone again. But, as always, you give him a smile and a kiss on the cheek and the two of you part ways, back to your own lives which are so obviously separate now.
On Tuesday you sit on the floor of the kitchen, and listen to music from your battered iPod, wondering where the time has gone to when your manager calls and reminds you that you have prep that night for your concerts.
The meeting is not so long as you might have feared, and everything’s pretty basic. There’s none of the rigmarole that comes with an internationally renowned boy band that needs pyrotechnics and lights and costumes and such things. Things are far simpler for you now - a choice you made right from the end, and one that you’re glad you chose. You can’t imagine still living that life anymore. Not as one.
The concerts are still sold out, but the audience is more subdued- even more so then usual. Maybe they can tell your own melancholy through your songs, maybe it’s just the vibe of the whole night, but they seem to enjoy it, and that’s all that matters. You sing for them now, because you can’t sing for yourself anymore.
After the third night, in a small concert hall with a string quartet behind you, you get another call, and a long conversation in Japanese ensues. They still want you to go back there, but you say no. Your manager frowns and shakes your head, but you just shrug at him. You go home, and it’s empty, but it’s still home because the memories are all you have left.
Yoochun asks again if you’re going to come visit him, and you promise you will. You’ve been promising him that for years though, so the conversation moves on easily from that point, and your laugh fills up the spaces for a little while, until the call ends and you’re alone again.
You watch old clips on your TV, and wonder at the clothes and hair, refreshing your memory that never did fade the way it should to make way for the present. You listen to Junsu’s new CD, and wonder if it’s the same for him still… if he even has time to think, with no one to ground him and stop him from working too hard. His voice is just as beautiful, but he looks tired to you when you see him in the magazines or on the television. Then again, you look tired to yourself when you see yourself in the mirror every morning.
At night you leave the TV on in the living room, the murmur dampened by the distance so that it almost resembles light snoring. But it’s never quite right, and you end up sitting in your bed with your head tucked into your knees, hugging the tattered, silly soft toy to your chest, looking out the huge windows onto Seoul and thinking of what was.
You keep wishing, everyday, that you would hear a knock on the door, and open it to find him there. But it’s a fruitless wish, because he doesn’t know you’re there, and even if he did, he would never come. Maybe for him it was just business, maybe just a bit of fun and silliness. You’ll never know, because you never had the guts to ask, and then he was gone and everything was too late. Life moved on, and now you don’t even know where he is. Nobody does. After you were all pulled apart, he disappeared, and you wanted to cry into the sheets that still smelled like him, and into Bambi, that he left behind as carelessly as he left you. It’s been five years, but it’s not enough. Yoochun says time heals all, but you’re not sure it does.
You can’t move on. You can’t, because you’ve never let go.
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Other Side chp 5 is being written. Had a hard few weeks, but I'm starting to write again, so yeah. Hopefully it'll be up soon.
That weekend, Yoochun calls for your weekly chat, and asks about your new place.
“It’s in our old neighborhood.” You tell him, and you can practically hear his eyebrows rising.
“Really? Anywhere near our apartment?” He asks you, and you laugh depreciatively - the sound hollow. Yoochun puts it down to the tinnyness of distance, but you know.
“Yeah. Yeah. Real close.” You say back, looking at the corner of the room that used to be his bed and wishing that you could cry.
It takes you two months to furnish the place with even the bare essentials. You tell yourself, and everyone else, it’s because you don’t have the time, and that you want everything to be perfect. Inside, you know though. You do want it to be perfect, but it’s never going to be, because even if you did manage to find almost an exact replica of your couch and the kitchen table you never much liked in the first place - there’s still only one bed in the bedroom, and all the rooms echo emptiness.
Dinner with Min is somewhat stilted - and he knows there’s something up. He comforts you the best way he can, and you end up almost getting kicked out of the restaurant because of both of your threats to start throwing food at one another. When you part, he hugs you tight and promises that you’ll have lunch soon. His embrace is warm and smells familiar, and you almost want to curl up into it and beg him not to leave you alone again. But, as always, you give him a smile and a kiss on the cheek and the two of you part ways, back to your own lives which are so obviously separate now.
On Tuesday you sit on the floor of the kitchen, and listen to music from your battered iPod, wondering where the time has gone to when your manager calls and reminds you that you have prep that night for your concerts.
The meeting is not so long as you might have feared, and everything’s pretty basic. There’s none of the rigmarole that comes with an internationally renowned boy band that needs pyrotechnics and lights and costumes and such things. Things are far simpler for you now - a choice you made right from the end, and one that you’re glad you chose. You can’t imagine still living that life anymore. Not as one.
The concerts are still sold out, but the audience is more subdued- even more so then usual. Maybe they can tell your own melancholy through your songs, maybe it’s just the vibe of the whole night, but they seem to enjoy it, and that’s all that matters. You sing for them now, because you can’t sing for yourself anymore.
After the third night, in a small concert hall with a string quartet behind you, you get another call, and a long conversation in Japanese ensues. They still want you to go back there, but you say no. Your manager frowns and shakes your head, but you just shrug at him. You go home, and it’s empty, but it’s still home because the memories are all you have left.
Yoochun asks again if you’re going to come visit him, and you promise you will. You’ve been promising him that for years though, so the conversation moves on easily from that point, and your laugh fills up the spaces for a little while, until the call ends and you’re alone again.
You watch old clips on your TV, and wonder at the clothes and hair, refreshing your memory that never did fade the way it should to make way for the present. You listen to Junsu’s new CD, and wonder if it’s the same for him still… if he even has time to think, with no one to ground him and stop him from working too hard. His voice is just as beautiful, but he looks tired to you when you see him in the magazines or on the television. Then again, you look tired to yourself when you see yourself in the mirror every morning.
At night you leave the TV on in the living room, the murmur dampened by the distance so that it almost resembles light snoring. But it’s never quite right, and you end up sitting in your bed with your head tucked into your knees, hugging the tattered, silly soft toy to your chest, looking out the huge windows onto Seoul and thinking of what was.
You keep wishing, everyday, that you would hear a knock on the door, and open it to find him there. But it’s a fruitless wish, because he doesn’t know you’re there, and even if he did, he would never come. Maybe for him it was just business, maybe just a bit of fun and silliness. You’ll never know, because you never had the guts to ask, and then he was gone and everything was too late. Life moved on, and now you don’t even know where he is. Nobody does. After you were all pulled apart, he disappeared, and you wanted to cry into the sheets that still smelled like him, and into Bambi, that he left behind as carelessly as he left you. It’s been five years, but it’s not enough. Yoochun says time heals all, but you’re not sure it does.
You can’t move on. You can’t, because you’ve never let go.
---------
Other Side chp 5 is being written. Had a hard few weeks, but I'm starting to write again, so yeah. Hopefully it'll be up soon.