Whispers and Promises VI
Title: Whispers and Promises VI
Author: 79_percent
Rating: PG-13
Form: Chaptered
Fandom: TVXQ
Pairing: JaeHo
Genre: Drama, Fluff, Angst
Whispers and Promises
VI. Fallen Whispers
“Yah, hyung, catch!”
When he got no response, not even a grumbled “yes”, JunSu looked down from his perch on the tree. YunHo was sitting down at its foot, staring blankly into the general direction of the crowded beach, taking in the light mixture of different azure of the ocean and the sky. For a moment, JunSu grabbed a strong hold at the nearest purchase he could reach to steady himself and turned at the direction where his hyung was gazing at. There was nothing special; only people in different shades of swimwear and the sea in different hues of blue.
“Yu~~unHo~~o-hyung~!” JunSu called again, this time in a sing-song voice, hoping to get some attention from the dazed boy. He felt his arms ache from holding the large palm leaf he had plucked. Why he had to be the one up there anyway, he grumbled.
When only a soft sigh was heard, JunSu exhaled deeply. What could make the other boy so out-of-focus? It was so uncharacteristic of YunHo-hyung to be so dazed that if he did not know better, he would have thought that the other was lovesick. Then again, he thought quietly to himself, he would not know what YunHo had in his mind when he had such a blank expression etched on his well-sculpted face.
He let his muse recede, fixing his eyes on the palm leaf half-plucked out of the stem. He gave the forlorn-looking boy beneath the tree a short glance before tearing the green leaf out with all his might and let it fall to the ground.
It was just fate that JunSu had miscalculated the size of the large leaf and threw it a little too near to the other figure. And it was fate at work again that YunHo chose that very moment to look up when he finally heard someone calling him. Expecting a soft rustle, needless to say, the loud smack that resulted made the surprised blonde look down, widening his liquid brown eyes in shock at what he saw. Instead of having his hyung sitting on the ground and the large leaf he had dropped lying safely by his side, JunSu had his hyung sitting on the ground with his face tilted up, the front half of the palm leaf covering his face.
YunHo blinked when he felt something hit his face and almost immediately his vision was obscured by dark emerald. A loud gasp, followed by the quiet sound of someone jumping off the tree entered his hearing before JunSu’s voice wafted in the air.
“You okay, hyung?” The blonde asked timidly, cocking his head in concern.
“Is that a new way to call me?” YunHo retorted back balefully, feeling a slight tingling sensation on the right side of his face. The bruise he had below his cheekbone from the accident in their last game of beach volleyball had subsided but the soreness returned when the leaf hit him there.
JunSu’s signature laugh was heard as the other scratched his head sheepishly. “It was an accident!” He defended himself.
Removing the leaf from his face, YunHo took a good look at JunSu’s adorable expression and felt himself frown.
“What’s wrong?” He asked, probing slightly with that innocent query.
“No, hyung,” JunSu whined, diverting the conversation topic. “What’s wrong?” When YunHo only faked a confused look, JunSu sighed, taking his spot beside the other and sat on the ground, Indian-style.
“You look weird,” he pointed out bluntly; a serious air appeared around his concerned demeanour, a small frown graced his angelic features. “What are you thinking about?”
“Nothing...”
“YunHo-hyung!” JunSu almost screamed in exasperation, making YunHo alert with the urgent tone tinting that voice. “Come on, spill! I know I’m not as good a listener as...” The blonde fumbled. “Well... You-know-who, but it’s not healthy to keep it all inside.” JunSu sighed when his plea seemed to fall on deaf ears and YunHo made no attempt to reveal his trouble.
“I’m alright,” YunHo started; he suddenly found a bizarre amusement in one patch of grass beneath him. “It’s just that...”
He licked his dry lips.
That...
YunHo looked up to see his friend waiting patiently for him to continue.
That nothing.
He honestly had no idea what exactly was bothering him. It seemed like he had so many things swimming in his mind that he could not focus on just one. So many things were screaming within his conscious, trying to attract his attention, that slowly, he found all of them blending with the pristine white walls of his cerebral space. Nothing was put under scrutiny anymore and yet he knew something was brewing.
Oh. That and the fact that he had not seen JaeJoong for the past two nights worried him. YunHo rolled his eyes as he found him contradicting himself.
JunSu, who caught that small gesture, could only raise an eyebrow in confusion. When YunHo turned to give him a long questioning look that scared him, the blonde involuntarily backed away and uttered a wary “what?”
“You know of the story of the origin of the sacred lagoon, right?”
JunSu gave a meek nod, suddenly realising where the question was directed towards. “Only a little, though. You want to know?” He asked. When given a confirmative signal by the older boy, JunSu began his narration.
“Once upon a time, there was a couple who was so in love with each other that they vowed to stay together forever.” JunSu deliberately ignored the raise of eyebrow granted to him when he used the phrase ‘once upon a time’. “But somehow their love was so forbidden that it’s opposed by everyone else.”
“Why?” He heard YunHo ask.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. All I know is that they were shunned.”
When YunHo only gave a slight gesture for him to go on, JunSu continued. “They had braved all the condescending eyes and remarks but one fine day, they quarrelled. It was a misunderstanding, but still, they quarrelled.”
“The next day, the guy, who wasn’t a native, was forced to leave by the villagers. The girl who got to know about his departure was devastated. She waited for the guy to come back. She waited and waited and waited until one day she was forced to marry. On the same day, she heard of the guy’s marriage in mainland. Unable to take the shock, she went bonkers and jumped off that cliff.” He paused to point at the cliff in the far west. “It was believed that her spirit haunts this place, still waiting for her love to come back. The end.”
“I thought the guy died?” YunHo asked.
“Died? I only heard that he left. Only the girl died,” JunSu answered, slightly frowning. “Where did you hear that from?”
“Ah, no one... I just thought so.”
“But it doesn’t make a difference does it? In both cases the guy left the girl and the girl killed herself.”
YunHo bit his lips, nodding in thought. Even if JunSu had put his words in a more crude way than how JaeJoong had recounted his, and even if the two accounts had inconsistent details, basically the gist behind the story was the same. Two met, two fell in love, two fought because of a misunderstanding and then two separated. Even if he was reluctant to acknowledge, he could not help but admit that the story was on the same tangent with what he was facing there and then.
“Kinda like you, huh?” JunSu remarked gently, his assertion a bull’s eye. “Minus the dead part, of course.”
When YunHo did not make any counter-attack, the blonde braved himself to touch the forbidden topic, putting himself at gun-point. “They’re cousins, hyung,” he started. “Even if they were holding hands, that does not mean that they’re going out. You two still love each other as much as before, I believe that.”
This time he was rewarded with YunHo rolling his eyes, glaring at the blonde who immediately retreated when pinned under those eyes.
“Okay, okay,” JunSu pouted, before standing up to retrieve the leaves needed for decorating the party later that night. “I won’t say anything.”
That night he found himself subconsciously going back to the same beach he had frequented for the past week. It was part of their tradition on the island to have parties that lasted for seven nights for the annual summer festival, and the rest of the islanders were having great fun, indulging themselves in the various performances and events. Even with the week-long party going on in his resort, however, YunHo just could not find the desire in him to just sit down and enjoy life. It was not that he deliberately wanted to be a party-pooper, but there was something nagging in his mind that made him all fidgety. He was so restless he thought if he stayed in the room for a while longer, his friends would notice his uneasiness and he would ruin their fun.
He was not sure why he was worrying so much about his “missing” friend either, but the fact that his friend had not been there for three straight nights was making him really vexed. JaeJoong did not look like he was lying when he said he had been there waiting for his Estelle to come back each night; he said he was used to waiting alone but that he was glad he had “company” now.
‘Even if I’m used to loneliness,’ JaeJoong had said to him one night with that charming smile of his after they knew each other. ‘It’s nice to have you here.’
How could someone who sounded that sincere be a liar?
YunHo began to sigh again. He would not deny that he had grown some kind of attachment with JaeJoong; something special that blossomed in his heart, between them as friends. It seemed like they were able to relate to each other even if they barely got acquainted during those night rendezvous. Somehow, there was something so enchanting that drew them together, binding them in the strong tie of friendship.
He always felt fondness towards the other boy who he regarded as a brother, something akin to love even. He felt safe around the charming character. Even when he was faced with his dilemma. Safe, and consoled, comforted. Like he had admitted much earlier, JaeJoong always had this subtle way to worm himself into his heart that still boggled his mind even till now. Without his realisation, he had gradually grown so attached to JaeJoong’s companionship now that the latter was not there, his anxiety and worry for the other boy heightened.
He tried to convince himself that nothing bad happened to his friend, that he might just be held by some affairs, that he was just unable to get out of home for some unexplainable reason. Those thoughts, however, brought more negative consideration to his already bothered mind. Perhaps JaeJoong had committed himself into some unsolvable trouble, or he needed some kind of help, or something really awful cropped up and he could not detach himself from it. As his mind began to ponder more possibilities to explain JaeJoong’s absence, he found the urge to look for the other boy swelling rapidly.
With that held in his determination, YunHo adjusted his jacket and embarked on his mission. It was only then, just as he made half a turn, as he made his first step, when he realised how little he actually know of JaeJoong.
He did not know where he stayed, nor did he know what the other boy could be doing. To be honest, he only knew JaeJoong’s name. The other did not cite much about his personal life, he noticed. The onyx-haired boy with liquid brown eyes never brought up anything about the people around him, with whom he interacted daily or where he actually lived. He only talked about Estelle, and that was basically it. In short, now that he thought about it, JaeJoong never mentioned about himself.
All of a sudden, the sophomore was terrified by the lack of information. He found that he had been assuming he knew JaeJoong well all these while, even regarding the other as a close friend, but there and then, he was forced to realise that, after all, they only know each other for only a week. At the abrupt awareness, YunHo found his apprehension skyrocketing; he felt the strong need to look for him, to see him in flesh, to ensure that his friend was doing just fine and that nothing ghastly had befell him.
When he thought of their last meeting, the fear in him intensified in tandem with his concern. The way JaeJoong seemed to blend so much with the starless backdrop and the nagging feeling he felt that night were giving him his jitters. He had always been sensitive towards some things in life, and he hated the fact that, there and then, he felt a fervent ominous foreboding that he might just lose something close to his heart.
He heard himself curse under his breath, quickly making his way across the beach. He had absolutely no clue as to where he was headed, but somehow he just felt the need to look for his friend. Even if it was just to still his anxiety, he felt that he needed to do something about it.
“Ah! There he is! YunHo!!”
YunHo turned to the voice and for a moment, he looked lost when he caught sight of his three friends running towards him.
“What are you doing here, hyung?” ChangMin asked.
“Yeah, come on, let’s go back to the party” YooChun grinned, pulling his arms, dragging him back to the resort.
“YooChun arranged this next item especially for you, hyung,” JunSu added.
“But-“
He found that he had no room to argue when the trio were so bent on taking him back. Even if he knew he would not be enjoying the performance to the fullest, he just could not find it in him to refuse them. Torn between his halved heart, YunHo only gave a resigned sigh, letting himself get hauled back to the hall. He threw the empty beach another long, hopeful glance, but when all that greeted him was that same span of golden yellow, he felt his spirit sink.
Where was he?
"Whispers and Promises"
Part VI
-end-
Author: 79_percent
Rating: PG-13
Form: Chaptered
Fandom: TVXQ
Pairing: JaeHo
Genre: Drama, Fluff, Angst
Whispers and Promises
VI. Fallen Whispers
“Yah, hyung, catch!”
When he got no response, not even a grumbled “yes”, JunSu looked down from his perch on the tree. YunHo was sitting down at its foot, staring blankly into the general direction of the crowded beach, taking in the light mixture of different azure of the ocean and the sky. For a moment, JunSu grabbed a strong hold at the nearest purchase he could reach to steady himself and turned at the direction where his hyung was gazing at. There was nothing special; only people in different shades of swimwear and the sea in different hues of blue.
“Yu~~unHo~~o-hyung~!” JunSu called again, this time in a sing-song voice, hoping to get some attention from the dazed boy. He felt his arms ache from holding the large palm leaf he had plucked. Why he had to be the one up there anyway, he grumbled.
When only a soft sigh was heard, JunSu exhaled deeply. What could make the other boy so out-of-focus? It was so uncharacteristic of YunHo-hyung to be so dazed that if he did not know better, he would have thought that the other was lovesick. Then again, he thought quietly to himself, he would not know what YunHo had in his mind when he had such a blank expression etched on his well-sculpted face.
He let his muse recede, fixing his eyes on the palm leaf half-plucked out of the stem. He gave the forlorn-looking boy beneath the tree a short glance before tearing the green leaf out with all his might and let it fall to the ground.
It was just fate that JunSu had miscalculated the size of the large leaf and threw it a little too near to the other figure. And it was fate at work again that YunHo chose that very moment to look up when he finally heard someone calling him. Expecting a soft rustle, needless to say, the loud smack that resulted made the surprised blonde look down, widening his liquid brown eyes in shock at what he saw. Instead of having his hyung sitting on the ground and the large leaf he had dropped lying safely by his side, JunSu had his hyung sitting on the ground with his face tilted up, the front half of the palm leaf covering his face.
YunHo blinked when he felt something hit his face and almost immediately his vision was obscured by dark emerald. A loud gasp, followed by the quiet sound of someone jumping off the tree entered his hearing before JunSu’s voice wafted in the air.
“You okay, hyung?” The blonde asked timidly, cocking his head in concern.
“Is that a new way to call me?” YunHo retorted back balefully, feeling a slight tingling sensation on the right side of his face. The bruise he had below his cheekbone from the accident in their last game of beach volleyball had subsided but the soreness returned when the leaf hit him there.
JunSu’s signature laugh was heard as the other scratched his head sheepishly. “It was an accident!” He defended himself.
Removing the leaf from his face, YunHo took a good look at JunSu’s adorable expression and felt himself frown.
“What’s wrong?” He asked, probing slightly with that innocent query.
“No, hyung,” JunSu whined, diverting the conversation topic. “What’s wrong?” When YunHo only faked a confused look, JunSu sighed, taking his spot beside the other and sat on the ground, Indian-style.
“You look weird,” he pointed out bluntly; a serious air appeared around his concerned demeanour, a small frown graced his angelic features. “What are you thinking about?”
“Nothing...”
“YunHo-hyung!” JunSu almost screamed in exasperation, making YunHo alert with the urgent tone tinting that voice. “Come on, spill! I know I’m not as good a listener as...” The blonde fumbled. “Well... You-know-who, but it’s not healthy to keep it all inside.” JunSu sighed when his plea seemed to fall on deaf ears and YunHo made no attempt to reveal his trouble.
“I’m alright,” YunHo started; he suddenly found a bizarre amusement in one patch of grass beneath him. “It’s just that...”
He licked his dry lips.
That...
YunHo looked up to see his friend waiting patiently for him to continue.
That nothing.
He honestly had no idea what exactly was bothering him. It seemed like he had so many things swimming in his mind that he could not focus on just one. So many things were screaming within his conscious, trying to attract his attention, that slowly, he found all of them blending with the pristine white walls of his cerebral space. Nothing was put under scrutiny anymore and yet he knew something was brewing.
Oh. That and the fact that he had not seen JaeJoong for the past two nights worried him. YunHo rolled his eyes as he found him contradicting himself.
JunSu, who caught that small gesture, could only raise an eyebrow in confusion. When YunHo turned to give him a long questioning look that scared him, the blonde involuntarily backed away and uttered a wary “what?”
“You know of the story of the origin of the sacred lagoon, right?”
JunSu gave a meek nod, suddenly realising where the question was directed towards. “Only a little, though. You want to know?” He asked. When given a confirmative signal by the older boy, JunSu began his narration.
“Once upon a time, there was a couple who was so in love with each other that they vowed to stay together forever.” JunSu deliberately ignored the raise of eyebrow granted to him when he used the phrase ‘once upon a time’. “But somehow their love was so forbidden that it’s opposed by everyone else.”
“Why?” He heard YunHo ask.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. All I know is that they were shunned.”
When YunHo only gave a slight gesture for him to go on, JunSu continued. “They had braved all the condescending eyes and remarks but one fine day, they quarrelled. It was a misunderstanding, but still, they quarrelled.”
“The next day, the guy, who wasn’t a native, was forced to leave by the villagers. The girl who got to know about his departure was devastated. She waited for the guy to come back. She waited and waited and waited until one day she was forced to marry. On the same day, she heard of the guy’s marriage in mainland. Unable to take the shock, she went bonkers and jumped off that cliff.” He paused to point at the cliff in the far west. “It was believed that her spirit haunts this place, still waiting for her love to come back. The end.”
“I thought the guy died?” YunHo asked.
“Died? I only heard that he left. Only the girl died,” JunSu answered, slightly frowning. “Where did you hear that from?”
“Ah, no one... I just thought so.”
“But it doesn’t make a difference does it? In both cases the guy left the girl and the girl killed herself.”
YunHo bit his lips, nodding in thought. Even if JunSu had put his words in a more crude way than how JaeJoong had recounted his, and even if the two accounts had inconsistent details, basically the gist behind the story was the same. Two met, two fell in love, two fought because of a misunderstanding and then two separated. Even if he was reluctant to acknowledge, he could not help but admit that the story was on the same tangent with what he was facing there and then.
“Kinda like you, huh?” JunSu remarked gently, his assertion a bull’s eye. “Minus the dead part, of course.”
When YunHo did not make any counter-attack, the blonde braved himself to touch the forbidden topic, putting himself at gun-point. “They’re cousins, hyung,” he started. “Even if they were holding hands, that does not mean that they’re going out. You two still love each other as much as before, I believe that.”
This time he was rewarded with YunHo rolling his eyes, glaring at the blonde who immediately retreated when pinned under those eyes.
“Okay, okay,” JunSu pouted, before standing up to retrieve the leaves needed for decorating the party later that night. “I won’t say anything.”
That night he found himself subconsciously going back to the same beach he had frequented for the past week. It was part of their tradition on the island to have parties that lasted for seven nights for the annual summer festival, and the rest of the islanders were having great fun, indulging themselves in the various performances and events. Even with the week-long party going on in his resort, however, YunHo just could not find the desire in him to just sit down and enjoy life. It was not that he deliberately wanted to be a party-pooper, but there was something nagging in his mind that made him all fidgety. He was so restless he thought if he stayed in the room for a while longer, his friends would notice his uneasiness and he would ruin their fun.
He was not sure why he was worrying so much about his “missing” friend either, but the fact that his friend had not been there for three straight nights was making him really vexed. JaeJoong did not look like he was lying when he said he had been there waiting for his Estelle to come back each night; he said he was used to waiting alone but that he was glad he had “company” now.
‘Even if I’m used to loneliness,’ JaeJoong had said to him one night with that charming smile of his after they knew each other. ‘It’s nice to have you here.’
How could someone who sounded that sincere be a liar?
YunHo began to sigh again. He would not deny that he had grown some kind of attachment with JaeJoong; something special that blossomed in his heart, between them as friends. It seemed like they were able to relate to each other even if they barely got acquainted during those night rendezvous. Somehow, there was something so enchanting that drew them together, binding them in the strong tie of friendship.
He always felt fondness towards the other boy who he regarded as a brother, something akin to love even. He felt safe around the charming character. Even when he was faced with his dilemma. Safe, and consoled, comforted. Like he had admitted much earlier, JaeJoong always had this subtle way to worm himself into his heart that still boggled his mind even till now. Without his realisation, he had gradually grown so attached to JaeJoong’s companionship now that the latter was not there, his anxiety and worry for the other boy heightened.
He tried to convince himself that nothing bad happened to his friend, that he might just be held by some affairs, that he was just unable to get out of home for some unexplainable reason. Those thoughts, however, brought more negative consideration to his already bothered mind. Perhaps JaeJoong had committed himself into some unsolvable trouble, or he needed some kind of help, or something really awful cropped up and he could not detach himself from it. As his mind began to ponder more possibilities to explain JaeJoong’s absence, he found the urge to look for the other boy swelling rapidly.
With that held in his determination, YunHo adjusted his jacket and embarked on his mission. It was only then, just as he made half a turn, as he made his first step, when he realised how little he actually know of JaeJoong.
He did not know where he stayed, nor did he know what the other boy could be doing. To be honest, he only knew JaeJoong’s name. The other did not cite much about his personal life, he noticed. The onyx-haired boy with liquid brown eyes never brought up anything about the people around him, with whom he interacted daily or where he actually lived. He only talked about Estelle, and that was basically it. In short, now that he thought about it, JaeJoong never mentioned about himself.
All of a sudden, the sophomore was terrified by the lack of information. He found that he had been assuming he knew JaeJoong well all these while, even regarding the other as a close friend, but there and then, he was forced to realise that, after all, they only know each other for only a week. At the abrupt awareness, YunHo found his apprehension skyrocketing; he felt the strong need to look for him, to see him in flesh, to ensure that his friend was doing just fine and that nothing ghastly had befell him.
When he thought of their last meeting, the fear in him intensified in tandem with his concern. The way JaeJoong seemed to blend so much with the starless backdrop and the nagging feeling he felt that night were giving him his jitters. He had always been sensitive towards some things in life, and he hated the fact that, there and then, he felt a fervent ominous foreboding that he might just lose something close to his heart.
He heard himself curse under his breath, quickly making his way across the beach. He had absolutely no clue as to where he was headed, but somehow he just felt the need to look for his friend. Even if it was just to still his anxiety, he felt that he needed to do something about it.
“Ah! There he is! YunHo!!”
YunHo turned to the voice and for a moment, he looked lost when he caught sight of his three friends running towards him.
“What are you doing here, hyung?” ChangMin asked.
“Yeah, come on, let’s go back to the party” YooChun grinned, pulling his arms, dragging him back to the resort.
“YooChun arranged this next item especially for you, hyung,” JunSu added.
“But-“
He found that he had no room to argue when the trio were so bent on taking him back. Even if he knew he would not be enjoying the performance to the fullest, he just could not find it in him to refuse them. Torn between his halved heart, YunHo only gave a resigned sigh, letting himself get hauled back to the hall. He threw the empty beach another long, hopeful glance, but when all that greeted him was that same span of golden yellow, he felt his spirit sink.
Where was he?
"Whispers and Promises"
Part VI
-end-