Fic YES!
Title: Killing all the butterflies
Pairing: G-ri
Rating: PG
Summary: Lee Seung-ri’s own take on science
A/N: For the second prompt of the competition. I swear that if I had known about the competition sooner, I would have written something decent. And yeah, I’m abstract about prompts and I do expect you to read between the lines. ^^ I’m a shit like that. Also, oxygenlove . You know, so no complaints.
It’s not often that one comes across an unmoving Seung-ri. And if for some reason he is quiet too, it’s probably time to start worrying. The kid has been practically comatose for over fifteen minutes now and Ji-yong doesn’t like it.
“A penny for your thoughts,” he says and drops a tiny coin into Seung-ri’s lap.
“Do you really want to know?”
Ji-yong considers this. Against his better judgment, he says yes.
“I’m thinking about Einstein,” says Seung-ri.
Oh god. Ji-yong cringes and glances at the door, thinking of ways to make a quick escape. Why can’t Seung-ri think of normal things like food and fashion, or even girls. Ji-yong can forgive girls, but Einstein?
“Seung-ri ---”
“Do you think it’s possible to bend time?” Seung-ri hauls his legs up and crosses them, playing with his coin. He lets it fall from knuckle to knuckle before it lands on a cushion with a little thud.
Ji-yong looks at him and tries not to be horrified.
"If the relativity theory is correct - and we all assume that is it, right? - then time is relative to how we experience it and that means it’s not bound to the ticking of the clock… you know?" Seung-ri has that way of looking hopeful that makes Ji-yong feel so bad.
"Like dogs. You know when you come back after two hours of practise and Gaho acts like it’s been two years? Or a goldfish that doesn’t have a concept of time at all. They just forget things and swim around aimlessly, around, around… I’ve been thinking about getting a fish. Or something.” Seung-ri’s smiley eyes become unfocused for a second and Ji-yong catches himself inching backwards.
And then Seung-ri finds his breath. “And… and you know how time passes really quickly when you’re having fun… How it’s so slow when you’re lonely… “ He tilts his chin up and stares right up into Ji-yong’s eyes - there’s no way of leaving now.
“I think that if time is flexible, we should be able to wield it."
Ji-yong gives up. He sprawls out next to the other boy, groaning when his shoulder pops. He is Responsible, so he stays. He loves his Seung-ri.
“Why do you want to bend time?” It sounds like something a person with Regrets would do.
“I don’t want to bend it, exactly. I want to make it stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Going.”
Ji-yong smiles as he turns his lazy body around and props his head on the other boy’s thigh. The coin slides down between the cushions and out of sight. “Seung-ri. That’s just not possible.”
“You’re narrow-minded,” Seung-ri snorts and Ji-yong sighs.
“Why?”
“You were probably born that way.”
“No. No, I mean why do you want to stop time.”
“Oh.” Seung-ri turns his face away and his voice becomes airy and soft. “I don’t know.”
When Seung-ri lies, he looks in four directions all at once. He twists his hands in his lap and tries to look so innocent, failing beautifully when his cheeks start to look like cherries. And if his mouth hadn’t been so dry just now, he would have whistled, too.
“I’m waiting.”
“It’s just.” Seung-ri shifts and Ji-yong’s head bounces around uncomfortably, forcing his neck into a strain.
“Whiplash!” he complains with a smack to Seung-ri’s arm.
“Do you want your coin back?”
“Let’s get back to the time stopping, Seung-ri.”
“Yeah. It’s you.”
Sometimes, with Seung-ri, one has to guess. He talks a lot but he says very little, and it has made Ji-yong into a detective of sorts. “It’s me,” he repeats.
He has done something wrong, hasn’t he.
“I’ve been thinking about chance and risk, too. There’s a difference there. Most of the time it’s just risks because most things end badly, but we really want to be brave so we think of chances instead.”
“You’re being pessimistic,” Ji-yong sighs, only to start purring when Seung-ri’s hand drops onto his head and starts to play with his hair.
“You know how they say the flap of a butterfly’s wings can change everything… I should consider myself lucky and I do, it’s just I can’t control the butterflies and god knows what will happen if they keep flapping their wings about ---”
“Stop talking like a crazy person!”
“… And I’m thinking that if chance and time aren’t on my side this isn’t going to work.”
The penny drops. Not Seung-ri’s penny - that one is safe in the depth of the cushions and will probably never be found again - but the one in Ji-yong’s head when he finally ties the fine threads together into a full scale net.
“I get it.”
“It’s just that things happen and I can’t do so much, because I’m just… you know, me, and I can’t stop time and I can’t kill all the butterflies - and I don’t think I want to because… they’re nice.” Seung-ri’s fingers tighten around a wisp of hair, twirling, twisting. “Time is unsettling because it changes things and I don’t think I like change, most of the time change leads to things that ---”
“Why are you still talking?”
“I can’t stop.”
Ji-yong pushes up into a sitting position and takes his watch from off his wrist. It’s very bling, very Ji-yong. “Here, look,” he says and without so much as batting an eyelid, he smashes the watch against the table top.
It cracks and tiny splinters fly. Seung-ri sits wide-eyed, his arm stuck in the air, frozen in what seems an attempt to stop Ji-yong, but far too late.
“What---”
The watch rests in Ji-yong’s palm face up, the dial hardly visible under the web of white little cracks that springs from the middle. The dial quivers, but it doesn’t move forwards. Ji-yong looks up at his Seung-ri and takes in his stricken look, his strangely round eyes and slack jaw. Even like this, with his wits pulled from him and with his knickers all up in a twist, he’s beautiful. The fact that he’s quiet is just a bonus, really.
Ji-yong smiles. “I’m stopping time,” he says.
End.