Incompleteness of You (2/2); R; Dongwoo/Hoya

[deasyellow]

Howon knows he’s being unfair, as he rejects the thirtieth-or-so call from Dongwoo on day three, but then Dongwoo is perfect and gorgeous and he makes Howon’s heart ache and he’s leaving, so he throws his phone onto his bed and tries to concentrate on the math equation in front of him instead.

On day four, Howon doesn’t expect to see Dongwoo standing beside the door to his usual practice room, especially at night when he has just finished dancing for seven straight hours. He’s tired to the bone and all he wants is his fluffy bed and his sleep. His eyes close even when he’s putting his clothes on after a shower, when one of his friends pats his shoulder.

Howon turns and there’s Dongwoo at the door, thick clothes even though it’s July, a crooked beanie on his head. His friend shrugs and leaves to clean up the room. Howon stares.

“Yah,” he says, and his friend turns to face him, eyes curious. “Why did you let him in?”

His friend narrows his eyes. “He looks sick, Howon,” he deadpans, “he’s wearing those thick clothes in the middle of July, for god's sake, and he still looks like he’s going to die from the cold. What do you expect me to do, tell him to stay outside until you come out?” His friend rolls his eyes. “I doubt you will even come out now, let alone if I tell him to wait.”

And Howon instantly feels bad, he really does, but he really cannot handle being alone with Dongwoo. At least not now. Dongwoo turns and brightens up immediately when he sees Howon, and his smile makes him raise an arm unconsciously, waving weakly.

“Just talk,” his friend dismisses him, as if he understands, and Howon glares at him.

The journey home is quiet, and Howon’s palms are sweaty, because it’s July and it’s summer and it’s hot at night (or maybe because it's Dongwoo and they're closer than they've been in a while), and he stares at the back of Dongwoo’s beanie and wonders if his hands are cold. Dongwoo is staring at the road outside, his mouth slightly open in awe, because even though he lives in Seoul, Howon is pretty sure he can count with his hands the number of times Dongwoo's used public transportation ever since he'd started living in the hospital, and at night, no less. Howon smiles as the light from the city swirl around in Dongwoo’s eyes, bright pink and lime green, mint blue and neon yellow, childlike and happy and innocent, and Howon wants to throw up from the guilt at the pit of his stomach.

Dongwoo suddenly flinches, and he turns to Howon in a second, who quickly averts his gaze to the back of the driver’s seat. “Yah, Howon,” Dongwoo calls, and he pretends he has just realized that Dongwoo’s sitting a couple of seats in front of him, eyebrows raised. “Hasn’t our stop passed already?”

Howon blinks. He looks outside then, and recognizes the billboard that is four stops away from his usual one. He groans, before he presses the alight button.

Dongwoo scrambles to his feet, following Howon quietly as they stand side-by-side, hovering over the door, the air in the four-centimeter-gap between their arms heavy with awkwardness. Howon gulps.

“Um,” he says, but then the tires make a terrible screeching sound and the bus stops and Dongwoo loses his balance. That, or his fingers around the pole give up under his weight, because Howon can see him grit his teeth before he even reaches Howon’s arm.

They stand there for seconds, a minute, a minute and a half, Dongwoo’s head against his shoulder and his fingers around Dongwoo’s elbow and it feels weird, foreign, but the driver clears his throat and Dongwoo straightens himself. “Whoops,” he chuckles, before he hops off the bus. Howon doesn’t say anything, merely taps his card as he bows to the driver.

They don’t talk for the first ten minutes. Howon can see from the corner of his eyes that Dongwoo keeps rubbing his wrist softly, his breaths heavy and thick, and even though it’s July, Dongwoo’s lips look paler than ever under the streetlights they pass. Howon wants to tell him that they can stop if he’s tired, that they can walk slower, but every time he turns, Dongwoo grins a big grin and his eyes tell Howon that he’s fine, so he turns away again after he gives him a small smile each time.

It’s when they pass the thirty-second streetlight on minute twelve that Dongwoo’s legs shake and he trips over nothing.

Howon doesn’t see it coming, so he doesn’t have the time to catch him, and he can hear the vein in his neck pop as he abruptly turns to face Dongwoo. “What the fuck,” he says, and bends down to take Dongwoo’s hand. “Are you-“

His hands are cold, trembling, and Howon can see a big bruise on his wrist, blue and purple and bright and it makes his eyes hurt. Howon looks up at him with a frown.

“What is this?”

Dongwoo winces when Howon traces a finger over the bruise. “Nothing,” he offers, trying to pull his hand away from Howon’s grip, but he looks too tired to even try.

It breaks something inside Howon. “You should have said something,” he mumbles quietly, and it sounds a little like an apology, so Dongwoo laughs.

“It’s really nothing,” Dongwoo answers genuinely, soft and reassuring, and Howon can see that he’s already forgiven. He hates that Dongwoo is too nice, that Dongwoo is not selfish, that he is an asshole, but Howon smiles back.

Howon ends up giving Dongwoo a piggyback ride all the way home (ignoring Dongwoo’s cries of I can walk just fine, Howon-ah for the whole fifteen minutes), and even though his back is sticky and his hips feel like they're going to snap, the seconds Dongwoo’s fingers linger longer than they’re supposed to be when he wipes the sweat from Howon’s eyebrows are worth it. Howon makes sure that Dongwoo’s parents give him an ice-pack to ease the dull pain from the swollen bruise, and when he waves and walks back home, he feels lighter.

from: Dongwoo-hyung
to: howonnie
20:12
Are we cool now?

from: howonnie
to: Dongwoo-hyung
20:12
When are we not?

from: Dongwoo-hyung
to: howonnie
20:14
Okay, just checking.

from: Dongwoo-hyung
to: howonnie
23:43
Will you see me off tomorrow?

from: howonnie
to: Dongwoo-hyung
23:43
Sure.

Dongwoo brings up The List when Hoya’s studying beside his bed while he’s eating his lunch three days after that.

“I have two more to go,” he says, chewing the tip of his spoon as his eyes scan the words on the paper in his hand. Howon has stopped trying to take a peek, because even when he does, he cannot read the scrawny handwriting, so he looks up from his History textbook and hums at Dongwoo.

“What,” Howon asks, and Dongwoo turns to him, a teasing grin on his lips. He doesn’t feel good.

“Don’t worry,” Dongwoo laughs, as if he can already read Howon’s mind (and maybe he can, merely by reading his expression, which is probably the same for Howon), and throws the spoon to him. “It’s not that extreme or anything. This one is normal enough.”

“Define ‘normal enough’,” Howon narrows his eyes, because he has known Dongwoo since forever and he has already understood the meaning of ‘normal’ for Dongwoo, which is nowhere near normal.

Dongwoo looks offended. “’Normal enough’ is normal enough, what do you want me to define?”

Howon shrugs. “You think riding a motorbike is normal, hyung.”

“It is, okay,” Dongwoo folds his arms over his chest, looks insanely proud of the memories. Howon rolls his eyes. “What, every boy should ride a bike at least once in their lives, shouldn’t they?”

“Well,” Howon shrugs, because he doesn’t think he can handle Dongwoo’s apology if he reminds him that they got into an accident and Howon now has a big ugly scar behind his shoulder thanks to the damn motorbike. “Okay then. So,” he changes the topic, “what is it?”

Despite all his protests and arguments about how ridiculous Dongwoo is being, about how he’s too sane to obediently abide by his wishes, about how he’s ‘going to be killed by your parents and the nurses and when you realize this is stupid it will all be too late’, Howon ends up sneaking Dongwoo out of the hospital on a Saturday, a week after he watches Dongwoo writhing helplessly as the nurses around him soothe him with sweet lies, as the doctors increase the dosage of the medicine he's taking, as that little bit more of his energy gets sucked away. Howon eyes him with a frown through the mirror as Dongwoo looks around the dance practice room excitedly, a little jumpy and much too enthusiastic, but he immediately grins when Dongwoo catches his gaze.

“Wow,” Dongwoo says, his eyes bright, and Howon laughs at him.

It’s been a while since Howon last danced, because even though it’s one of the habits he can’t drop, he prioritizes Dongwoo just a little bit more. But Howon is thankful that his body doesn’t forget any of the moves and routines, and now Howon is bending Dongwoo’s arm a little to the left, and he hits Dongwoo’s thigh for being bent too far too the right. Dongwoo follows without a word, panting slightly, but his eyes are determined and Howon doesn’t stop him.

Dongwoo, it turns out, is not a bad dancer. In fact, he'd be as good as Howon if he actually had the stamina, and Howon is really confident about his dancing. Dongwoo’s movements, like his personality, are a lot softer and less sharp than Howon’s. He smoothens the edges that Howon adds into the choreography, his body flowing way too gracefully for a hip hop dance, but Howon thinks it’s still more perfect than any of the dancers he has ever seen. It might be just him being biased, yes, but he can’t deny that Dongwoo does have the talent.

“You’re cut out for this,” Howon voices out his thoughts when the song changes into a slower one. “You’re really talented.”

Dongwoo’s smile is brighter than the lamp, and Howon can’t help but to fall into soft laughter.

No one sees it coming, to be perfectly honest. One second Howon is playing around with the recorder, trying to find a fitting song, another dance he wants to teach to Dongwoo, and Dongwoo is behind him, experimenting with his body, keeps moving along with the disjointed lyrics and tunes, and the time passes like that.

One second Howon is grinning, and the next Dongwoo falls to the ground.

There’s an agonizing crack in the air, and Howon is too shocked to let his reflexes kick in. He only moves when he hears Dongwoo groan, choked, and he moves so fast he’s pretty sure the world’s axis moved under his feet, if only for that one moment.

There’s blood. A lot of it. On the floor, pooling around his knees, seeping into his pants, on Dongwoo’s shirt, and Dongwoo’s face, and he screams in his head.

“Fuck,” he says aloud, now alarmed, and he takes off his shirt to press it to Dongwoo’s nose. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“I’m fine,” Dongwoo says through Howon’s shirt, unclear and weird and it sounds like he's speaking from inside a bubble, and the blood flows so, so fast that Howon’s blue t-shirt turns a dark shade of red in no time, muted, but dangerous all the same (like they always were). “It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay,” Howon snaps, pushing Dongwoo onto his back in a harsh movement. Dongwoo’s back hits the floor with a painful thunk, and he looks taken aback, but he lets Howon remove the ruined piece of cloth and replace it with a clean towel from his bag beside them. “It’s not fucking okay, hyung, and it will never be, so stop pretending like it is. Stop, just,” Howon runs his hand through his hair, fingers against wet strands, and he wants to rip them off. “Just shut up.”

Dongwoo does as he’s told. He looks up, eyes fixated on Howon’s frustrated expression, but Howon refuses to let him see the tears pooling at the corner of his eyes.

But Dongwoo knows, of course. He hates that part about Dongwoo; that he’s always been so knowing about Howon, that he knows what to do and what to say and Howon hates it when he feels like an open book, so transparent. Dongwoo runs a finger against Howon’s furrowed eyebrow. “Don’t be mad,” he says quietly, his voice muffled, and Howon thinks Dongwoo is stupid.

“I’m not mad,” Howon says, and he’s telling the truth.

“Don’t be sorry either,” Dongwoo insists, pushing his head backwards with a finger (with so little force), and Howon lets out a chuckle. He reaches up to link his hand with Dongwoo’s, long fingers intertwining.

It looks imperfect, but Howon likes it. “Can’t help it,” he mumbles against Dongwoo’s skin, throbbing and hot and he knows that it must have hurt, but he doesn’t bring it up. Dongwoo moves and tries to kick him.

“You worry too much,” Dongwoo accuses. Howon simply buries his face in Dongwoo’s wide palm.

It’s quiet for a moment, and there’s his breathing, harsh and strong and worried, and there’s Dongwoo’s, soft and weak and tired, and it reminds Howon of how fragile Dongwoo is. How different they are. How short the time they have.

“Howon,” he suddenly hears Dongwoo’s voice, and it’s way too close to be comfortable, and when he opens his eyes, Dongwoo is there. His face looks messed up and there’s a trail of dry blood all over his mouth and nose and cheeks, but Howon thinks he can’t be more beautiful than he is now. “Howon,” Dongwoo says again, and a second later, he leans in.

Dongwoo’s tongue tastes like copper, maybe a mix of blood and the drugs he's administered in the hospital, and there’s a desperate fist gripping the front of his shirt. The kiss is quick and short, but it leaves Howon wanting and breathless and it’s all kind of wrong, but right. Dongwoo’s eyes look deep. Howon wonders if they are always that deep.

Tick, tock, tick, tock. “We should probably go home,” Dongwoo breaks the silence, “it’s almost midnight,” and Howon simply nods and rubs his nose. The stench of blood is too strong for his liking, but he doesn’t even let Dongwoo argue as he quietly cleans the stains on the floor.

Dongwoo doesn’t say anything as he slips into the hospital elevator. He looks at Howon like he wants to say something; he doesn’t though, so Howon gives him a little wave and smiles. Dongwoo smiles back but his eyes are sad, remains sad even after the elevator doors close with a ding.

Howon presses his forehead against the cool metal, silently cursing himself. His tongue tastes weird, and he spits into the dustbin beside him.

It’s the last time Howon sees Dongwoo outside his room.

Dongwoo is almost never around when Howon comes now. He spends all his time sleeping, and even though the doctors and the nurses and their families have warned him, he cannot, and will never, get used to it. He is used to Dongwoo’s laughter along the corridor, used to Dongwoo being excited and jumpy when he brings up stories about school, used to Dongwoo whining about being older and not being able to help Howon with his homework. He’s not used to Dongwoo’s slow and forced breathing, not used to Dongwoo’s eyes moving under his eyelids, as if he wants to wake up but cannot.

Howon’s not sure how he feels about it, but there’s this pang in his heart, and it hurts. He wants to throw something at the nurses who come and go to administer drugs to Dongwoo (more and more and more). He never does.

Instead he holds Dongwoo’s hand, and presses his lips shut.

It’s two weeks later that Howon sees Dongwoo’s eyes again. They have lost almost all of their sparkle, but there are little twinkles here and tiny shimmers there, and everything seems okay again.

Howon wonders when Dongwoo started to matter this much.

Dongwoo is drifting asleep, eyes not really open even as the television is loud and bright, but the moment Howon slides the door open he raises his eyebrow and smiles. It's weak, but it's a smile all the same. It makes Howon want to cry.

“Hey,” Dongwoo mumbles.

Howon grins and drops his bag by the doorway, leans against the edge of Dongwoo’s bed. “How are you feeling?”

“Sleepy,” he admits, rather guiltily, and Howon gets it.

“You can sleep if you want,” he allows himself to say, even though he wants Dongwoo to jump up from his bed and force him to take him to the beach or the park or anywhere else but here. (Howon's selfish, he knows.) He brushes a hand against Dongwoo’s calf under the sheets. “I don’t mind.”

Dongwoo makes a noise of protest. “I do,” he whispers, and suddenly Howon realizes that maybe that’s as loud as Dongwoo can be now. A whisper. “We haven’t hung out since forever.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Howon answers, softly, because his normal voice is too loud in this room too small for them. He feels suffocated, and starts wondering if Dongwoo has ever felt this way. Maybe always. Maybe never. Maybe he shouldn’t even think about it. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Dongwoo laughs, low and quiet, and says, “I am, though.”

And it feels like a ton of bricks are raining down on him, because suddenly he cannot breathe, and his eyes water, and there’s a throbbing pain at the back of his throat. The air feels too heavy against his skin, and Dongwoo’s eyes are dimming. He wonders how he looks like right now, because he can no longer see his reflection in his best friend’s eyes.

“You’re slipping away,” Howon says, chokes, because there’s water bubbling up in his throat, and it’s sickening. It’s the last thing he wants to say to Dongwoo, but he has no idea what to say. What to do.

What do people do when someone they love are leaving?

Dongwoo blinks twice, before he smiles. It looks genuine enough that Howon doesn’t have the heart to tell him that he wants to break down and cry and never look at the light again. It’s funny, he thinks, because he’s not the one dying.

Dying.

“I know,” Dongwoo answers, and Howon almost misses it.

“Do you want to know what the last on the list is?”

Howon knows from the way Dongwoo slurs that he’s almost asleep again, that the drug or his exhaustion's finally begun to kick in, so he doesn’t pay much attention, but-- Howon suddenly remembers the crumpled paper that Dongwoo has never shown him, and suddenly his ears perk up, and he is pretty sure that Dongwoo doesn’t even know what he’s talking about, so he lets him. “What is it,” he asks, fingers light (desperate) against Dongwoo’s upper arm.

Dongwoo moves to catch Howon’s fingers. When they touch, it’s electricity, and Howon shivers as Dongwoo says, “To fall in love.”

Howon tightens his fingers around Dongwoo’s, taken aback, but Dongwoo’s breathing becomes a steady, slow rhythm and he has fallen asleep. Howon stares at Dongwoo’s sleeping figure with a frown, doesn’t move until a nurse comes in and tells him that the visiting hour for friends are over.

Howon stays for the night. It’s the first time in months, and he forgets the code number that he needs in order for the elevator to work after midnight, the one that Dongwoo gave him when he first snuck in during his second year of middle school. In the end though, he manages to press the right numbers after the fourth try, and when he puts the duffel bag quietly under Dongwoo’s bed, the older boy stirs; Howon knows he’s awake.

“Hello, intruder,” Dongwoo’s quiet voice reaches him. He doesn’t seem surprised (he knows him like he’s the back of his hand, that bastard), and somehow it sounds louder at night. Howon doesn’t want the morning to come.

“Shut up,” Howon says, and pushes him aside to make room for him. Dongwoo giggles like a child, but it comes to a sudden stop. Howon pauses. “What’s wrong?”

Dongwoo is quiet for ten seconds (he counts) before he laughs, tiredly, sadly, “I can’t move my arms.”

It’s silent. The night air blows gently against the curtains (Howon wonders why the windows are not closed), and Howon cannot hear Dongwoo’s breathing. His own breathing. It’s calming, in a sense, but his mind freaks out and he wants to scream and leave and just run away again, but he looks at Dongwoo’s eyes and its dimmed glimmer in the dark and he huffs, slowly moves to Dongwoo’s side and slips his hands under Dongwoo’s neck and knees to shift him aside. Howon feels skin, heat, bones, and Dongwoo is way too light to be normal. He tries not to think about it.

They still don’t talk even when Howon forces himself under the sheet, the bed creaking slightly under their weight. Dongwoo breathes against his shoulder.

“You got taller,” he says, and he phrases it as if it’s a question.

Howon shrugs. “Maybe,” he answers absentmindedly, distracted by the way Dongwoo’s hair tickles his chin. His arm sneaks its way against Dongwoo’s hips, and he knows that Dongwoo pretends not to notice. “Now sleep.”

“You need to stop growing,” Dongwoo says instead, leaning closer, “this bed will break if you don’t.”

“Don’t worry,” Howon mutters against Dongwoo’s scalp, “I will when I reach twenty.”

Dongwoo hits his chest. “Yeah, well, I won’t-,“ and he stops, because Howon’s fingers on his back suddenly tense, and his heart stops for a second before it continues its slow thump, thump. Dongwoo cranes his neck upwards, searching for Howon’s eyes, gaze forcibly glued to the patch beside the table near the window. He wants to close it.

Dongwoo’s nose touches his jaw. “Howon-ah,” he breathes.

“It’s the drug,” Howon says out of nowhere, and he has no idea why he says it, but he figures he needs to tell Dongwoo that they still have a lot of time. It’s a quiet reassurance, his tone calm, but Howon knows that he needs it more than Dongwoo does.

Dongwoo understands. It annoys Howon, that he’s the one being protected, even when Dongwoo is the one who will crumble if anyone touches him too hard. “Okay,” he says.

“They want you to stop moving,” Howon continues, and he wants to shut, shut, shut his mouth, but he cannot, and his eyes are tearing. “I mean, you’re way too hyperactive to be a patient, so it’s kind of understandable. It will wear off the next morning, and you will be able to-“

“Okay, Howon,” Dongwoo cuts him off, because his lips are shaking now. His body is shaking. Dongwoo can probably feel it, but he doesn’t say anything about it. “Okay,” he repeats instead.

Shut up, Howon thinks. Just, shut up. “I’m sleepy.”

“Hmm,” Dongwoo hums, his lips against the underside of his chin, and Howon shivers. He wants to touch him, but he’s afraid. Of something. Of everything. “Sleep.”

He can’t. “I don’t want to,” he says, and he doesn’t care that he sounds like a ten-year-old, because it'd be easier if they were anyway, because most of ten-year-olds don’t understand what cancer or death or heartbreak means.

Dongwoo laughs. “What do you want to do then?” Dongwoo’s voice can barely be heard, sounds like a scratch against his throat instead, but Howon listens. He listens, and he thinks, and he wants, and doesn’t know what he’s doing, but his fingers reach the waistband of Dongwoo’s pants.

He doesn’t want to ask, but he does. “Can I,” he attempts, and his voice is hoarse, a mixture of lust and desperation and something else he can actually put a name on, and he tries to finish his question.

Dongwoo doesn’t let him though. Dongwoo, beautiful, beautiful, Dongwoo, simply closes his eyes and breathes through his nostrils. His breath hits Howon’s eyes, and it stings, but Howon stares at Dongwoo because Dongwoo is giving him an answer, because Dongwoo knows, because Dongwoo understands, and Howon doesn’t want to admit it but he falls a little bit more in love.

The touch is soft; Howon still doesn’t want to break Dongwoo, but Dongwoo lets out a quiet moan that makes his head light, lighter, and Howon bends down to kiss the corner of his lips. Dongwoo cants his hips forward, heavy and slow and so, so, weak, and Howon doesn’t miss the way his hips give away, his bones creaking.

It scares him, he’s not going to lie, but there’s something in Dongwoo’s eyes, when he opens his eyes to burn Howon’s soul, that keeps him going. Makes him want to keep going.

Howon retracts his hand, and Dongwoo turns so fast their noses bump painfully.

“Don’t do this to me,” Dongwoo says, and it’s the clearest he’s been the entire night, so Howon laughs, because it feels normal, because right then and there it feels like they are just two teenagers, experimenting with each other, playing with fire, being in love, crossing lines, defying norms, and no one’s dying. Because it feels like this is how we’re supposed to be, because Howon wants to say the words I love you so, so badly, and Dongwoo’s fingers encircle his wrist. “Howon,” he warns, and just.

Howon kisses his lips, full and slow and it burns, tingling, fireworks, and Howon knows that Dongwoo doesn’t kiss back not because he doesn’t want to, but because he can’t. Howon feels like he has accomplished something when he understands that when fingers tighten around his wrist, it’s because Dongwoo wants to tell him what Howon wants to tell him.

“I love you,” Howon says, breathes, his cheeks are wet, his lips are salty. “I’m sorry, but I love you.”

Dongwoo looks like he’s going to cry, but he simply leans closer and licks the corner of Howon’s lips. “It’s okay,” Dongwoo whispers, and it sounds like an accusation, but it’s alright. He can handle this.

“It’s okay,” Howon repeats for both of them. “We’re going to be okay.”

Howon can tell that Dongwoo doesn’t believe it, even though his smile tells otherwise. There’s hope in his eyes, but they both know it’s pointless. “Sure,” Dongwoo says, but there’s no sound, and Howon cries first.

By the time Howon wakes up, Dongwoo’s still asleep. Thirty eight hours later, Dongwoo is still asleep. Forty hours later, when Howon touches his cheek, Dongwoo opens his eyes, smiles a little, and sleeps again.

Howon stops going to school the day Dongwoo stops opening his eyes for more than thirty minutes at a go, when he starts sleeping for at least one-and-a-half days. It’s sooner than expected, he hears the doctors tell Dongwoo’s parents, but it will happen eventually, so it comes as no surprise. Dongwoo’s mother looks stronger than she usually is, and her husband holds her hand so tight Howon thinks they will both shatter to pieces once he lets go.

Howon’s parents don’t say anything. When Howon comes back after three days straight of staying at the hospital, his mother simply folds more clothes and scolds him for not putting them properly in the laundry basket. He overhears his dad calling the school, and when he meets his younger brother’s eyes, they don't judge him. “Tell Dongwoo-hyung I said hi,” he says, and continues to eat his food. Howon laughs and ruffles his hair.

When Howon sees Dongwoo awake (after four days, and he will probably doze off again in three, two, -) with a doctor smiling down at him, giving him more pills and capsules and things to breathe that little bit more, Howon hopes he has more time to tell Dongwoo than his brother says hi.

Dongwoo’s father pulls him out from the room two weeks later.

Howon has always had so much respect for the man, because he scolds and punishes and treats Dongwoo like he’s a normal boy, and Howon thinks people need strength to do something like that. He follows the man quietly, eyes not leaving his back, and he wonders if he has always been this small. This old.

“Would you like some coffee?” Howon blinks at the man, smiling slowly, before he nods and starts fumbling for money in his pocket. Dongwoo’s father pats his shoulder. “My treat.”

They sit near the vending machine, four rooms away from Dongwoo’s. Howon cannot help it when he sits straighter than usual, ears strained to hear something, anything, because he will never know when the monotonous beeping sound will change. He holds his cup loosely, not really wanting to drink it, but the man beside him eyes him expectantly, so Howon swallows a gulpful of the piping hot coffee.

It’s bitter. It tastes weird. It tastes like shit. He doesn’t say anything, and continues drinking, despite the burn of the roof of his mouth.

“You,” Dongwoo’s father suddenly starts, and Howon stops drinking. “You don’t go to school anymore.”

He clears his throat. “Yes, sir.”

“I wonder why,” Dongwoo’s father asks, not really angry or mad, just curious. He chuckles, before he continues, “High school is important, Howon-ah.”

Howon agrees, but then he thinks he can always solve more equations and questions later, can memorize more textbooks later, because he has no time limit. No definite time limit. He has all the time in the world to look for education, but he doesn’t have the time to listen to Dongwoo’s weakening heartbeat, to run his hand across Dongwoo’s chest and feel the slow bumps, to kiss Dongwoo’s sleeping lips and feel that hot breath against his face. Not for long. Not long enough.

“I,” Howon says, and stops, because he has no idea how to explain it. I love your son, he thinks. I love him, and I want to stay beside him, and I want to be there when he’s gone, even though I really don’t want him to go, and I think I’m going to die when he dies, and it doesn’t make sense, sir, but I just really, really want to be by your son’s side. Does that make sense?

It feels weird. He finally settles for “I know, sir.” Dongwoo’s father doesn’t ask for an explanation, and he can’t even comprehend his own thought. He stares at the bottom of his now-empty cup.

There’s a hand on his shoulder then, a tight grip that almost makes him choke, and when he turns, he sees tears in the man’s eyes. “Thank you,” he says, his lips tremble, but he offers a strong smile. “Thank you for staying, for not leaving. Thank you for being Dongwoo’s friend, even after all this time. Thank you,” he blinks, and there’s a single droplet against his eyelashes, “thank you for loving Dongwoo.”

Howon can feel his chest tighten, his heart almost bursting, and he bites his tongue. He nods, and when Dongwoo’s father pulls him into a loose hug, he crushes his cup. He wonders if Dongwoo knows that there are so, so many people who doesn’t want him to leave.

So many people who love him, even more than Howon’s heart can bear.

Howon does it every night, when the world is sleeping and there are him and Dongwoo and the machines around them, quietly beeping.

“Hyung,” Howon always whispers, kissing the other’s jaw, hushed, hushed, “I love you.

“I really do.

“Hyung.

“I love you.”

Don’t go, is what he always means, but he doesn’t think Dongwoo will be happy to hear it. He pulls their blanket tighter, and sleeps with tears behind his eyelids.

The day when the doctor gathers them all in a room, Howon hopes he’s not there. He watches silently as the doctor goes on and on, explaining all the possibilities, what might and might not happen, what they can expect, but they all end with the same thing, and Howon’s ears turn deaf. He stares at the doctor’s lips, moving, but he cannot hear a thing. He can only hear the rush of his blood, the click of his brain, the crinkling sound of the paper he’s crushing inside his jacket pocket, the-

The doctor’s mouth is half-open when he pushes his chair back, lets it fall to the ground. They pause and watch him, and Howon bows, puts the chair back in place, and turns to leave. He doesn’t close the door.

Unexpectedly, the hand against his shoulder when he almost falls asleep with Dongwoo’s hand in his is Dongwoo’s sister’s. Howon looks up to a pair of gentle eyes and a kind smile, and he can’t remember really talking to her, but somehow he can feel that they are similar. Dongwoo makes them similar. It feels nice, to have someone who can understand you, even when you don’t say anything.

Howon doesn’t say any of this though. He stares at her as if she’s foreign to him (and in a way, she is), and doesn’t move.

“Let’s talk,” she smiles, and it’s not demanding, not really, but Howon stands up almost immediately. She laughs at this. “Always so uptight, Howon,” she shakes her head, grinning, “ever since I knew you as Dongwoo’s best friend.”

Dongwoo’s best friend. It always starts and ends with him. “Is that a good thing,” he asks with a chuckle.

“It is,” she nods, her hand against his elbow, signaling for him to follow her. When Howon closes the door behind him (a quiet beep, beep), “You can control Dongwoo even when we can’t, and you’re the only one he lets into the world, into his heart, into a part of him that even we, his family, can’t reach.” She looks into his eyes, deep and dark and they look like Dongwoo's, and Howon bites his tongue. “It’s a good thing.”

They stand in silence, Howon’s back against the wall, and Dongwoo’s sister looks tired, but she’s smiling and she’s beautiful and she reminds Howon of Dongwoo, which is kind of unfair in Howon’s opinion, because he doesn’t need another reminder that he needs to go on without. He feels stupid.

“I’m not ready to let him go either,” Dongwoo’s sister suddenly says, her smile forced, but her eyes genuine. Howon clenches his teeth. He knows this is coming, of course, and he knows that she’s not lying either because he’s not the only one that finds it hard to move on, to let go. She chuckles, and reaches up to ease his frown. “But don’t you think he’ll feel better if he’s not tied down to that bed anymore?”

Howon bats her hand politely, moves back a little. “How can we be sure that he will?”

“We can’t,” she agrees easily, and Howon raises an eyebrow. She laughs at him. “But we do know that he’s miserable here, don’t we?”

Howon doesn’t answer. Mostly because he knows, but a little part of it is because if he tries to speak, he’s afraid his tears are going to spill over too and it’s not. He can’t let it happen.

Dongwoo’s sister gives him a meaningful look. “Here,” she says, pulling something from the pocket of her jacket, “I have something for you.”

It’s a piece of paper, crumpled and dirty, and from the messy writing on it, Howon can guess what it is immediately. “It’s under his pillow,” she smiles, and thrusts it into his palm. “I thought you might need it,” is all she says before she leaves.

Howon doesn’t unfold the piece of paper until he’s tucked beside Dongwoo’s (smaller and thinner) body at night, his toes curling under Dongwoo’s calf. He can read it now, even without light, and he wonders why he has been so blind.

There are five points written with the same pen, strong and black and sharp, and Howon knows that Dongwoo wrote them together. The ‘Smoke/Drug’ one is crossed repeatedly, reminding Howon of the time the older boy suggests sex. It’s written neatly beside it, and that one is crossed, too.

In fact, everything is already crossed, and Howon can only remember five from Dongwoo’s ramble about the list, but then there’s something else in the end. It’s messier, weaker, and the ink seems like it’s not really seeping through the paper, but it’s there. The sixth in the list. Howon tries to read it, and when he does. When he does.

He laughs. He crumples the paper in his hand and his fist is shaking. Howon pulls Dongwoo closer.

Tell him.

We’re such idiots, Howon thinks, and leans down to kiss Dongwoo’s eyelashes.

I’m not ready to let him go either.

“I love you, you know,” he says, as usual, but now, it has a different meaning. Howon cries harder, and harder, and he can’t feel his fingers as he grips the sheet so tight, and he thinks Dongwoo moves closer but he doesn’t stop sobbing. His kiss against Dongwoo’s neck is salty.

At that moment, for the first time, for the last time, it means, be happy, okay?

(That night, Dongwoo wakes up. It’s probably a dream, but Dongwoo opens his eyes, and there’s Howon and tears and he can feel himself slipping away, a little bit more, a little. It’s like he can count the seconds he has left, and he doesn’t have that many.

“Howon,” Dongwoo tries, moves his lips, but there’s no sound, and he can feel himself breaking. “Hey, Howon.

“I’m scared,” he traces against Howon’s skin, shapes the words, the feeling, and he wants Howon to understand, he wants Howon to wake up and touch him, but maybe he’s too scared to do it. They’re not brave enough.

“Howon-ah,” he’s desperate now, and he really, really, wants to smile, wants to laugh, wants to be bright again, wants to make Howon smile again, wants to stay, wants to be with him, wants to make his time worth it, wants, wants, wants, but he’s exhausted. He can’t even feel his tongue.

I love you, and he closes his eyes.

He wonders how it feels to be left behind, if it hurts just as much.)

Howon thinks he’s more prepared for this. Howon thinks he’s stronger. Howon thinks he can laugh at Dongwoo, telling him that he will miss him, that he will now have to look for another weird person to tease, that Dongwoo will be able to kiss him back for one last time.

Howon never imagines it to be so, so fast, to be so cold, to be so sickeningly empty. He can feel Dongwoo’s sister slipping her fingers into the spaces between his (spaces only Dongwoo's fingers could ever have filled properly), sobbing into his shoulder, and his mother hugging his other side. The doctor pulls the white sheet over Dongwoo’s face, so calm and gentle and peaceful and dead, and Dongwoo’s mother runs up to his son, a thousand apologies dropping from her lips, and his father presses his hands against his face. Howon wants to throw up.

He wishes he could cry. He wishes he could be angry. He wishes he could feel anything.

Anything.

Any.

Things to Do Before I Die

1. Ride a motorbike (ask Howon to borrow one)

2. Kiss someone random

3. Smoke/Drugs Sex

4. Watch Howon dances

5. Fall in love

Tell him.

Dongwoo's mother cries the hardest yet smiles the brightest, and she hugs Howon so tight and doesn’t let go until he chokes a dry sob into her shoulder. She keeps chanting it’s okay and thank you and we’ll be fine into his ear, and he hugs her back as he tries to breathe, his eyes burning.

Dongwoo’s parents let him stay in Dongwoo’s room after the funeral. The room is quiet, unoccupied for way too long. The bed doesn’t bounce when Howon sits on it, hard and cold and so, so clean. It feels a little bit hollow, even as he scans the room silently, eyeing the stack of CDs beside the unused desk (hip hop CDs he bought for Dongwoo for his birthday last year), the layer of dust clinging to the spines of the books on the shelf (Howon had put them there because Dongwoo complained about him not accompanying him enough whenever he was home), the stars on the dark curtain (they picked them together when they were ten, when Dongwoo’s parents told them he’s going to have his own room, a day before Dongwoo fell from the monkey bars, blood from his nostrils, a broken wrist).

Howon can’t stand it. He can't breathe, feeling as if something was coiling around his heart, strangling it, willing the beating to stop, but the tips of his fingers brush against the edge of the paper in his pocket and he pulls it out, fingers trembling.

You might need it.

Howon smiles at the paper in his hand. “Idiot,” he says, sobs, and he doesn’t even realize it but he finally, finally cries, finally breaks down, right there and then, on Dongwoo’s bed, with Dongwoo’s scent, with his memories, with their memories, and Howon wonders if Dongwoo is smiling right now, wherever he is. He lets out all his frustration, all his yells, all his tears, and he punches Dongwoo’s pillow because I miss you so fucking bad, I want you to be here, I want to be there, because I love you and I want to tell this in person you fucking shithead, I can’t do this anymore.

Dongwoo will probably laugh at him. Dongwoo will probably cry with him. Dongwoo will probably hold him and let him sob all he wants. Dongwoo will probably kiss him with all his might and tell him to stop, because he’s breaking both their hearts. Dongwoo will probably punch him in the face and scold him, because he has told Howon specifically not to cry, because they are guys, and guys shouldn’t cry, no matter what.

Dongwoo, Dongwoo, Dongwoo.

Dongwoo.

He picks a pen from the desk and crosses the last line. “It’s a good thing I know you so well,” Howon whispers, and he knows Dongwoo is listening to him. “It’s a good thing that I can hear you.”

Howon kisses it, and rips it to little pieces.

Tell him.

I love you.

<<

ps: if you manage to read it all and reach this note, then i love you, no matter who you are. i can’t believe i wrote a 13k yadong fic. i can’t believe i wrote 13k. you guys. this thing is all over the place and i hate it with a burning passion (even though i'm insanely proud of this too sobs) so i’m glad i’ve finished it. DONE, I’M TELLING YOU. i can’t even read this without wanting to cry because oh my dear god i wrote a 13k fic and i have no idea what i wrote. so yeah. i hope you enjoy this :’)