{exo} When Daybreak Comes
title: When Daybreak Comes
pairing(s): Kai/D.O., side! Sehun/Tao
rating: PG-13
word count: 6898
summary: Jongin likes to think that Kyungsoo cares. Well maybe he does-a little too much.
warnings: possible character death
a/n: originally written for 3daysofkaisoo. i will try to finish writing all of my other pending fics bcs i have noticed that our fic comm is starting to drown in cobwebs from being left untouched for almost a whole month ;;o;;
It was in the war. Jongin didn’t have much of a choice. Kyungsoo did.
Well, not really. Because how could he have refused?
“Please,” the man shivers in his seat-not from the cold, but from the consequences he knows he will suffer just because he’d been part of the enemy’s alliance. “I have a family waiting for me. I have a wife and two kids who rely on me. I don’t want them to be burdened.” His voice trembles, not because he fears for his life, but because he fears for the people he’s left behind and might not see ever again.
Prisoners of war that have been detained in their camp because they’ve been at the wrong place, at the wrong time, and probably did the wrong move by not guarding themselves well-these are the people that Jongin is always sent to execute. These are the people who, Jongin knows, have so much left to do in their lives, but wouldn’t get to finish.
Jongin flips the silver coin - a face on one side and a crown on the other; a token of the faction he was on, given by a daughter of one of its veterans. He catches it mid-air with his open palm and slaps it over the back of his left wrist. It gleams back at him as if it knows what should be done all along. Heads. Death. Just as he’d been told to do so.
He would have gone and granted the man mercy and spared the man’s life even if it meant he had to defy direct orders from authorities, but fate itself dictates that this isn’t the guy’s lucky day (actually none of the ones assigned to him ever seemed to be lucky enough. Or was the coin just that biased that it would rather have the heads of the enemies laid out than show mercy to a faction that opposes them?). So he picks up the metal baseball bat and aims straight for the blindfolded man’s head, accuracy dead-on and movement quick so as not to make more fuss over everything.
The man’s frantic pleas are replaced by the sound of bones breaking as the crunch of metal hitting home echoes around the room. Blood splatters over Jongin’s face as the man’s head hangs low right after the blow, life gone and the tension coming from the ropes binding him the only thing preventing him from falling off the chair. He wipes a hand over his face. Messy, messy, he thinks, trying to set his mind as apathetic so he wouldn’t hear the man’s voice in his head, pleading for him to help. Always messy.
He wipes the blood-covered hand on his pant leg, the red liquid coming off but leaving a stain. I’m a soldier, dammit. Why am I the one carrying out torture orders for the guerillas. He huffs, but his hands are shaking. Even if he’s alone, he’s developed the habit of lying to himself and pretending to be tough. He knows this should end because he just couldn’t take it anymore, but he couldn’t just strut up and complain that he doesn’t like torturing people from the enemy’s side just to get information and then kill them if they turn out to be insignificant. What if that’d get him to be the one left sitting on that iron chair instead of the other way around?
He leaves the dark room stinking of blood and misery, contrition reeking in his pores. He feels sorry for the man, but maybe he should’ve acted on it. He should have at least consoled the guy before he died, because it felt like the right thing to do, even if the fact remained that they were on opposite sides of the war.
But he didn’t, because all he feels right now is the wrenching in his gut at the thought of having to kill another man in battle tomorrow, or maybe getting killed himself in return. The guilt crawls under his skin, settling in his bones, not intending to leave.
The blood of the man he has killed leaves droplets on the floor, leaving marks there, haunting him in his dreams.
⌛
“Life here in the military isn’t exactly as exciting as I thought it would be. Every day, our lives are on the line, not knowing whether we’ll be able to wake up alive the next day, or go back to camp in one piece.” The letter begins.
“Today, I killed another man,” Jongin writes. “I’m used to it, but I don’t think I will ever come in terms with it. Killing someone in the middle of battle is different, because things are happening too quickly for you to know who you killed-or to even start feeling the guilt.” His handwriting is still cramped and messy just like how it was back in high school, but he never got to get further than a year in college because of the war. “I’m just following orders because I don’t want to bear the brunt of my superiors, but I still feel guilty because I killed someone who doesn’t even seem to have done anything wrong. At least, that’s how I see it.”
“Tell me Kyungsoo, is it bad to want to save yourself?”
⌛
Kyungsoo cocks his head to the side, rereading what he has written so far. Dissatisfied, he crumples the paper and throws it in the general direction of the trash bin. It hits the lid of the bin and falls back on the floor, not being close enough to the center to fall in.
He takes out a blank sheet of paper and tries to write again, going for a gentler approach. He isn’t sure how to respond to a letter from a man who just killed someone-someone who he might’ve known or will get to know at some point, but would never find out.
“Don’t blame yourself for something you have no control over.” Comes out of the tip of his pen, and everything else follows suit, each word falling right into place, stringing themselves together and piecing out as much of the idea Kyungsoo wants to convey-what he thinks Jongin wants to hear. Even though technically, Jongin isn’t the first person he has written to, the sentences just do not take form in his mind immediately and it takes him several crumpled papers and loads of ink to get the flow going completely and write out a decent letter. He isn’t really that good with words, but he hopes that Jongin wouldn’t mind. This is, after all, is something that he doesn’t completely favor. Yet he isn’t exactly in the position to clamor for anything, because it’s not like he’s doing out of his own volition.
It was during the war. Jongin knew what to do-what had to be done. Kyungsoo just wasn’t sure.
Jongin usually keeps to himself, shoulders hunched and looking dead tired, as if he’s carrying the burden of the whole world on his back. But when a notice from the government arrived one day, announcing that those soldiers without families may sign up for a pen pal system to have someone to talk to about their worries in the camp and release their anxieties, Sehun convinces Jongin to join. He wouldn’t have anything to lose by signing up anyway, right?
He doesn’t know what force pushed him to tell Jongin to do it, but thinking about it know, he supposes it’s because he believes that it is, after all, the only way Jongin could feel connected to the outside world - to some person that isn’t constantly involved in a game with death. If he was in Jongin’s position, he thinks he would’ve done the same way, anyway. Maybe it was to fight off the frustrations of having to fight a constant battle for an ideology you’re not exactly even involved in, with people you don’t even know - people who might have families and friends waiting for them back home, but would never even get a decent burial until the end of everything. Or maybe even never.
Or maybe it was because he craved for the comforting words of someone who would care.
Now, a month after Jongin has started sending letters to a person whose identity he has no idea of, Sehun notices that he seems to look forward to a tomorrow-if there is a tomorrow waiting for them. He is also aware that Jongin is being ordered to carry out executioner duties, and if he’s used to seeing Jongin crumbling down when he thinks his roommates are asleep, now, the other man seems to be slightly at ease. Maybe it’s because he has someone to talk out his anxieties to.
Even if Sehun notices these changes in Jongin’s behavior after his friend signed up for the pen pal system, he doesn’t say anything about it.
Sehun doesn’t say anything either when he sees Jongin lining up in front of a big, red drop box with the other soldiers who signed up for the pen pal system-soldiers who, just like him, doesn’t have anyone waiting for them back home; soldiers who could die at any instant, yet not have anyone but the people they met at the barracks to mourn for them and remember their names-not because he doesn’t care or that he isn’t the least bit curious as to who Jongin has been writing to for a few months now, but because he wants to give Jongin a little privacy of his own and to latch on to something and keep him from falling out.
Jongin’s lips quirk up to a half smile after dropping in the white envelope he’s been holding, but it barely lasts a second before he schools his expression back to being closed up that Sehun barely even noticed that it was there. It isn’t the first time Sehun has seen Jongin smile, but it only happens every now and then that Sehun somehow forgets that the smile looked good on him-a lot better than the usual blank look on his face- but he wouldn’t dare say it. Even though he’s been friends with Jongin ever since their first day in training camp-back when the consequences of the reality they’re living in still hasn’t completely sunk in yet-there are limits to every friendship, and he knows they hadn’t been friends for that long to be able to spill out every secret they have. He still isn’t ready to try to overstep that boundary yet.
Jongin walks over to where Sehun is standing, and the latter finds a question hanging at the tip of his tongue, but swallows it back again. He doesn’t know how Jongin would react, but he isn’t brave enough to risk it. He isn’t ready to lose Jongin yet; not when the person whose arms he could find comfort in is miles away from him.
“Let’s eat, I’m hungry.” Is the first thing that comes out of Jongin’s mouth, but nothing follows after that. Sehun gives him a short nod, and they head to the area’s canteen, side by side, with one of them hopeful in getting a message back a week from now and the other hoping to rekindle a lost connection.
⌛
That night, Sehun hides under the comfort of his blanket sheets, a flashlight in one hand and a pen on the other. He might as well write to Zitao, given that every day might be his last chance to contact the guy.
“It’s been two years since I last heard your voice or heard any news about you, but I hope you’re still doing well. You sound like an annoying old lady, but I must admit, I kind of miss hearing your voice every morning. Even if it’s really annoying.” Frankly, he’s never the romantic type, so he kind of sucks at this, but what the hell, he just wants to write to Zitao.
The letters strain away from the imaginary lines he’s set on the paper, but he’s not much to worry about margins and geometry when he’s writing, anyway. Zitao will understand. Either way, he’s not one to judge, since writes like this too. “I’m sorry that I’m only writing to you just now. I know we haven’t talked to each other in a while after I left town for training camp, but I’d like you to know that now I’m actually here, in the middle of war, it doesn’t seem all that great, after all.”
“I won’t lie to you and say everything’s fine here, because it’s not. Every day, I fear that I may be the next one to fall and never be able to get up, just like the fallen comrades I’ve last seen on the battlefield. I’m not sure if I will get to live after this, but just so you know, the promise still stands.” His hand is shaking while he writes the word “promise”, and he purses his lips to stop himself from suddenly bursting out crying. Dammit Jongin, this is your fault. You’re the reason why I’m writing this letter in the first place. He thinks, before finishing up his letter.
“And try to water the plants. They won’t harm you if you don’t try to wushu them every time you get near them. I’m trying to grow a garden for my mom. She told me she’ll come by once I got back. Don’t turn the apartment into a shithole, okay?”
⌛
“It’s just a job,”Kyungsoo argues with himself for the nth time that month. “Why can’t you just write what you mean and mean what you write?”
But of course he can’t, because writing what he means would insinuate that he might end up disrespecting the person he’s writing to, and meaning what he writes would suggest that he actually cares. He just isn’t about that prepared to choose either of the two.
Kyungsoo ruffles his hair in frustration and slumps over his desk, wanting to give up on the task at hand. He isn’t entirely new to this, since his mother used to write to soldiers too, back when he and his brother were still little kids and their father had been nowhere to be found (he’s thought back then that his mother had been writing to those men to get rid of that feeling of sadness she’s been keeping to herself and a means of trying to cope up with the exasperation from the sudden disappearance of her husband, but it was only when he started writing himself that he found out the entirety of it). But that didn’t mean that he had a flair for writing like she did - he was no poet, neither lyricist, nor writer, and each sentence he writes sounds bland and boring to his own ears that he wishes he could just stop and drop everything in an instant.
But he couldn’t.
He shouldn’t.
This is his job, now. His employers would most definitely not be impressed, and he couldn’t bear to lose a source of income, much less a shelter to ensure his safety in the war. His mother had long gone passed away, and his brother had disappeared after a few years into the military, so it’s not like he has to mind someone’s safety other than his own.
Jongin seems like an interesting person enough that Kyungsoo still finds himself able to write back, and it would be unfair to him if Kyungsoo just suddenly stops writing; it’s just that now that the surface has been scratched, there’s nothing more left beneath it to dig up; to keep things interesting and the stories flowing. Now, more than ever, he feels writing more of as an obligation than anything else.
So he decides to scratch up everything he’s written thus far and start anew. It’s a bold approach, and one that branches out to a road quite different from the ones that they usually traverse, but he wants to try it out.
So he takes out a new sheet of paper, and tries again.
“Hey Jongin,” he writes tentatively. “I haven’t told you this before, but I sing in a band. Well, used to, since the bars have closed and we don’t have any gigs going on right now.” He corrects. He just hopes Jongin finds this interesting of a topic enough to not cut him off.
⌛
“I used to sing for the school choir, but then I got bored because all they knew how to sing were songs even older than my grandmother. So I tried out joining my friend’s band. He’d been bugging me for ages to join them, anyway.”
Jongin’s eyebrows perk up in interest when he reads Kyungsoo’s newest letter. It’s usually him who initiates talks about his own life, expecting Kyungsoo to follow through and write back with stories that he himself experienced, or maybe even just random bursts of thought he’s been having lately. But what he usually gets are replies wherein he feels like he’s writing to an advice column in the newspaper.
Nevertheless, he kept writing, knowing that Kyungsoo was real, and that he was someone Jongin could write to in the absence of his family, or anyone special in his life that he’s left back home. In a way, Kyungsoo had been the person Jongin looked forward to meeting when he’s gotten back.
What intrigues him more is that Kyungsoo’s choice of topic is quite a match with his own interest.
Jongin sits on his cot and writes back, more enthused than ever. Sehun looks on and sees in his peripheral vision the older man grinning while writing, and he wonders how the guy could still write with much fervor and enthusiasm just after they almost ended up getting killed from a landmine planted near the enemy’s base.The worst they got from it were scratches and burn marks, but it could have been a close call. They could have been dead.
Their sides troops are currently advancing, having had breached a large part of the enemy’s camp, but they still have to wait in their new barracks, where they’ve been relocated to be able to close in on the enemy better.
Sehun sighs and goes back to staring at the ceiling. If it was in his case, he would’ve given up already. Well, not exactly, but he’s thinking it’s most likely to happen, mostly because Zitao hasn’t written back even if he’s sent in his letter three weeks ago. And he hasn’t tried sending in a new one, either. But maybe the letter hasn’t arrived yet. Or maybe Zitao wasn’t home when the letter arrived, and the neighbors forgot to give him. Their neighbor, after all, was an old man who always forgot what he did almost a minute later. Or maybe Zitao tucked the letter away to safety and simply forgot to rummage through and actually get to read the letter.
Or maybe he burned it, a voice nagged in the back of Sehun’s mind. Maybe he just hated you so much for running away like that and leaving him for the army without saying anything.
Sehun buries his face in a pillow in frustration, Jongin’s light humming currently the only sound disturbing his thoughts of what Zitao could have done to the letter he’s sent. In the next cot, Minseok suddenly shifts in his position, making the bed creak and ending up facing Sehun’s side of the bed. He looks like a peaceful child this way, Sehun thinks, and he knows he’d much rather have it that way rather than seeing his hyungs (or any other soldier, for that matter) writhing in pain or dying in the most agonizing way on the battlefield. On the last bed, the one by the window, Chanyeol scratches his face and opens his mouth, only to start snoring a bit too loudly.
He quickly forgets his worries over Zitao, because right now, there are much more lives that matters to him, and he doesn’t want to lose them just yet, even though he deems the life of the person he’s left back home more important than his own. He falls asleep immersed in his thoughts, with worry lining his face.
⌛
“Come home safely. I’ll be waiting for you.” Had been the only sentences written in the letter he receives from Zitao. It had almost been two months, and it’s the only thing he gets as a consolation for what he’s sent beforehand. If you don’t include his postscript notation of “The garden looks ugly. There are shrubs growing, and I don’t want to die yet. Clear it when you get home.”
Typical, Sehun thinks. Well, at least he doesn’t have to worry about Zitao still being mad at him when he gets back. If he gets back, that is. The thought haunts him, so he tries to not think about what tomorrow had in store for them instead and closes his eyes, lulling himself to sleep despite the discomfort he feels hearing Jongin’s pen scratching over paper as the man writes to his pen pal.
⌛
“I had a hobby before, back when I was still at the orphanage,” Jongin’s letter begins, and Kyungsoo’s eyebrows raise themselves involuntarily, intrigued with where this will lead to. “I used to dance.”
Oh, so he’s a dancer, Kyungsoo nods, impressed. He hasn’t given it much thought before, but he really wants to see Jongin, even if it meant they could only know each other by sending in pictures of themselves. It would be easier to have a face associated with a name, after all. But he doesn’t have the courage to ask, so he doesn’t bring it up.
“I remember that in your letter, you said that music gave you the chance to express what you actually wanted to say through the words of other people. For me, music gave me the chance to express the words I want to say through actions-through dancing.”
Without meaning to, Jongin finds himself pouring out his innermost thoughts and ideas to Kyungsoo, and he’s jittery, not knowing if the other would respond negatively. Yet he’s hoping for the opposite to happen when he finally receives a letter from the older man a few weeks earlier than expected. He mentally pats himself on the back, because with the letter came every ounce and shred of some of Kyungsoo’s thoughts that he claims he hasn’t told anyone yet.
“I don’t know if I should tell you this, but… I’ve never been fond of talking to people. They could go approach me and talk on and on for hours, and I won’t even be paying attention. And the truth is, that’s what I’ve first thought with you, too. But as time came by, I found myself wanting to write to you more, wanting to hear from you more.”
Kyungsoo is embarrassed to even check what he’s written and he folds the paper immediately, inserting it in a white envelope quickly so he wouldn’t have to see it and get flustered all over again because he might change his mind and chuck it out or rewrite what he’s already written. He sends it with a thoughtful smile on his face, blush creeping into his cheeks and the sides of his ears. “Now we’re even.”
Jongin doesn’t tell a single soul either that he’s really happy reading Kyungsoo’s letter, even if he accidentally broke his arm from a bad fall in one of the open pits in the battle field a while ago. He wouldn’t lie and say that it doesn’t hurt, but it’ll heal in its own time. While as for the letter… he doesn’t know when Kyungsoo will send in another letter again, so he basks in the glory of the current letter he’s received, hoping for a miracle to happen so that they could see each other.
⌛
Jongin is surprised to receive a package this time and not just the usual letter in an envelope. There’s a smile on his face that everyone notices, and for once, he’s aware that the atmosphere isn’t as tense as it is in the battlefield or whenever they take in a prisoner, the other soldiers teasing him about it while they tear open the letters and packages sent to them by their families, some by their own pen pals. Chanyeol prods him to no end, asking him what it’s for; Minseok, who doesn’t always talk unless important or when he’s talked to gives him an encouraging pat on the back like a father would do to his son. Even Sehun pokes him about it-Sehun, who he knows cares, but doesn’t prod most of the time-asking what the package contained.
“I haven’t opened it yet.” He blinks, unsure of what to expect from the package Kyungsoo sent him. Is it food? Is it a pile of his pictures? Jongin hopes that it’s the latter.
“Well you should,” Sehun shrugs. “It’s about time the two of you went farther than just writing boring letters to each other.” He adds in a grumble, but Jongin hears him anyway.
Jongin goes back to their quarters; he’s alone, given that everyone is still in the lunch area, boasting about their families and tearing open more packages. It’s rare that the atmosphere is this happy, given that the sides are both currently in mixed states of tension as the war seems to come to its climax. But he lets it be, since he doesn’t think he has a proper say in whether when a person should be happy.
He sits down on the cot nearest the door - his assigned bed space - and takes considerable care in opening the box, not wanting the contents to be ruined. He gently opens it to find a cd case inside, one without a cover or a label. The plain black case stares back at him for a moment, daring him to open it and listen to what the cd has in store for him. So he does just that, deciding it would be better to find out what’s in the cd before reading the letter accompanying the package, where Kyungsoo would’ve surely told him what it was.
Taking out the Walkman he’s brought along but barely even touched, he pops in the cd and puts on the earphones before pressing play.
The track is one that he’s always heard playing on the radio before, but the voice singing it is unfamiliar. It gives off that feeling of gentleness and frailty to it - like milk mixed with honey-and Jongin is reminded of a time when everything was alright, when it was just one of those lazy Sunday mornings where he could sleep in late because it’s raining and there’s no class, the pitter-patter on the rooftop and the smell of petrichor permeating the air, calming and soothing. His ears welcome the sound of the voice, relaxing and just generally addictive that he wants to hear more of it.
The track comes to an end and the cd halts to a stop, and somehow Jongin is disappointed, because that voice was something he would like to keep hearing and not the screams of pain of people dying, the sounds of bullets hitting home and the battle cries of soldiers who have nothing left but their wills to live.
Nevertheless, he opens the letter, replaying the song while he begins reading. His eyes stop at the second paragraph.
“I’ve sent in a demo of one of the songs I used to sing because you keep on teasing me that I can’t. it’s not much, but I hope it’s not disappointing (hey, my voice isn’t that bad!)”
Jongin’s heart starts beating frantically. That’s Kyungsoo singing?Clearly, Kyungsoo had been right; more than right, even. Now, more than ever, he’s even a lot more curious of what the other man looks like. But it would seem demanding to ask for a picture. He doesn’t want to scare off the other by being too straightforward and rash.
“By the way, who’s your favorite singer? You only gave me a list of songs you liked before, but I’m still curious.”
Jongin smiles to himself. I don’t really have a favorite singer, but you know what? Your voice is my favorite melody.
⌛
“Back when I was at the orphanage, one of the workers who first taught me how to dance gave me a coin. She told me that if I ever was in the middle of indecision, I should just flip it, because then I would know what to do. I really wanted to see you badly, so I flipped the coin. And it said no, but I’m asking you, anyway.”
“Because even before I knew what the answer was, I realized that whatever the decision was, I wanted to know you. So if this is all over and I survive, can I see you?”
Kyungsoo catches himself smiling involuntarily and stops, eyes going wide in realization. No, this can’t be it. This shouldn’t be it. But he just might be falling for someone he hasn’t even met yet.
(Or come to think of it, maybe he might even have fallen for Jongin already)
It was in the war. Jongin didn’t have anything left to lose but his life. Kyungsoo had everything to consider.
“Men, fall back!” their troop’s captain orders, motioning his hand for them to retreat. Jongin looks around frantically, trying to fight his way through the haze and the confusion of bodies running around and the ones lying dead on the ground. He catches sight of Minseok’s small figure, neck bleeding from getting grazed by a shot but otherwise okay. Chanyeol and Sehun are nowhere to be found.
The truth is, Jongin joined the military because he believed nothing was waiting for him back at the orphanage. He’s been of age when he left for training camp and it was his decision to make and nobody asked him to leave, but surely, there was nothing left to do there now that he’s all grown up, right?
“But serving in the military is a dangerous thing.”his noona-his most trusted friend and confidant back in the orphanage had said when he told her what he wanted to do. “But anything I say wouldn’t change your mind, wouldn’t it?” And she’d been right, of course, even though Jongin doesn’t like to admit it. He’s lost in touch with her after that.
But now, in the midst of all the screaming, he remembers how he has often disregarded the thought of death ever coming to him. Because surely, he would never truly die, right?
How ignorant he had been to think of that.
He sees Sehun limping towards him, panic written all over the younger man’s face. He squeezes through the group of soldiers who stopped midway and turned to shoot, rebelling on their own to show their own resistance. If they were going to die today, wouldn’t it have been better if they died putting up a fight?
When Jongin finally reaches Sehun, he pulls in the younger to go with the crowd of soldiers that are still retreating, positioning his rifle in front of him. This, he decides, is how he will make his last stand, too.
Sehun screams for him to move back, but he doesn’t hear it over the rattling of guns and the explosion of grenades. He doesn’t even remember how the war started, or why he’s defending the side he’s defending right now, but all he thinks is that he has people he wanted to protect, and really, that was all that mattered.
He knows he will be one of the fallen anytime soon, but he presses on, thinking of the people he wants to protect the most that when the moment does come, he still gasps out loud in surprise.
Jongin falls on his back, the impact of the bullet piercing his chest too much of a force to fight against. His lungs are burning, and he wheezes, struggling to keep his breaths even. He couldn’t breathe, and if he could even manage to steal in breaths at all, he ends up gasping.
People say that when you die, you remember all the best moments in your life. But for him, it hadn’t been like that-all he sees flashing before him are the moments that could have been; meeting Kyungsoo for the first time, wearing a black suit with a matching tie in some fancy restaurant with gaudy ornaments and flashy garnishes on their food. Or it could be in a café, and he’s wearing his usual shirt over denim pants, and it would be on a Sunday morning, where dusk is yet to come. Kyungsoo remains a faceless shadow in his mind, but he thinks it’s okay, because it’s more than he could ask for.
There he is, faced with the reality that no, he isn’t immortal, and that time is quickly slipping through his fingers, with each inhale having the possibility of being his last. His vision is getting blurry and his thoughts are beginning to cloud up, but there is one name that doesn’t leave his lips, barely a whisper in the air: Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo, Kyungsoo, Kyungsoo. His mind repeats.
I want to see you. His heartbeat is starting to slow down.
I need to see you. The words are caught up in his throat, and it dies out as his eyes begin to close.
I want to live.
⌛
Kyungsoo doesn’t receive a letter on the day he expects, so he waits. And waits, and waits and waits… Until one day he wakes up to see that he’s got something in his mailbox, which has been empty for days (or has it been weeks? Kyungsoo has lost count, absorbed in the hours the clock shows; absorbed in the numbers the hour hand points to; absorbed in the passing minutes that he hasn’t gotten a reply from Jongin).
It’s an envelope that’s different from the one he usually receives and it doesn’t have the familiar stamp on it, nor the childish scrawls Jongin writes on the back. It has a red wax seal stamped over to close it, and Kyungsoo just grows even more dubious, because it’s definitely from the government and not Jongin. There’s that nagging feeling at the back of his mind that something’s wrong, and the blood on his veins run cold, dread seeping through every fiber. Nonetheless, he opens the envelope with careful fingers, cautious not to make any tears on the envelope.
There is nothing but a red card inside.
Kyungsoo falls on his knees, at the edge of a breakdown. The back of his throat hurts from the things that he thought he still has time to say, the end of his tongue burning from the things that had passed and what could have been.
But in the end, the only thing left is the sting in his eyes from the tears left unshed.
⌛
The day after that, Kyungsoo receives a letter from the government relieving him of his job of writing to Jongin. His pay, as the letter had said, would be sent in before the end of the month, and without any deduction since he’s fulfilled his duties well.
And Kyungsoo thinks, screw it, screw it all, because all he wants is to know that the red card had been sent because of a mistake, and that Jongin was alive.
It was during the war. Jongin doesn’t really know what’s happening. Kyungsoo’s just thankful.
Jongin wakes up to the feeling of isolation, trapped in a room of pure white walls stripped bare except for a wall clock, telling him that it’s 2:30. Whether it’s early morning or afternoon, he isn’t sure, because the curtains are drawn closed, none of the lights from outside filtering in, if ever there were any.
He glances down on where he’s lying down and notices that a translucent, plastic tube is connected to his arm. He’s in a hospital. He’s awake. He’s alive. He wants to ask how, but he isn’t one to complain.
When a nurse arrives to check on his vitals when the hospital staff has been notified that he’s finally awake, she tells him that he was more dead than alive by the time he’s been sent in, and that he was lucky to have survived the shot, given that the bullet was almost near his heart.
He clears his throat, unsure of his voice from the days he was unconscious. “Can I ask...about the war?” his voice comes out raspy, but it could have been worse. “What’s happening now, out there?”
He isn’t disappointed because she brings him good news: news not about the sorrow of the war, but about its end, and how the two countries have finally settled on an agreement. The nurse sees him smile for the first time in the whole month he’s been admitted in the hospital, and she thinks that his smile was nice - filled with hope and something more lying beneath.
“Wait, have you heard from anyone from my troop? Kim Minseok, Oh Sehun, and Park Chanyeol. Are they alright?” he asks in a hurry, remembering the time when he’s lost consciousness.
The nurse looks at him a bit fondly, as if he were her son all along. “Kim Minseok is in the next room and is still recovering from his wounds. Oh Sehun, on the other hand… His leg has been fractured, but he’s recovering. Park Chanyeol is-“
She doesn’t get to finish what she’s saying when the door slides open, and Jongin is assaulted with a back-breaking hug. “Jongin! I thought you were dead!” Chanyeol bawls, and Jongin could feel moisture clinging into his back.
“Chanyeol, let him go. You’re the one who’s going to end up killing him.” Minseok scolds, shaking the tall guy’s shoulders. “Sorry about that, he’s just a mess, really.” Minseok tells him, and then adds in a voice that’s barely a whisper, “We were all worried that you wouldn’t wake up.”
Jongin is about to respond that they shouldn’t have worried, when Sehun comes limping into the room, a crutch by his side to aid him. “Hyung, you dolt! Why’d you have to be such a hero and try to take the bullet, huh?” he says, as if he could read Jongin’s mind. “Of course we’d be worried!”
“And Minseok-hyung, I told you to wait for me!” he whines. “You know I couldn’t keep up with you guys!” Same old Sehun, always complaining. Jongin hides his mirth behind his hands. This is how he remembers them from training camp, back in the days when the pressure of trying to stay alive hasn’t cracked down on them yet.
“Ah, sorry about that, Sehun. Chanyeol was just too eager to get in here, and I had to do damage control before he ends up ruining anything.” Minseok apologizes.
Jongin smiles even further, because even though it had been a long and hard path they’ve traveled through, things seem to be falling in their right places.
Later, when the three have left to go back to their respective rooms in the hospital with promises of coming back to visit him the next day, he asks the nurse for a pen and a piece of paper, requesting the letter he almost took hours to finish to be sent to an address he’s been writing to all along.
After that, all he could do is wait.
It was during the war. Jongin had no one waiting for him back home.
Well, maybe except for one.
Kyungsoo checks the address scrawled on the piece of paper in childish, cramped handwriting and looks back at the signboard of the coffee shop. He feels an uncomfortable fluttering in his stomach, and he looks at his watch for the nth time that day just to remind himself that he’s just on time and that he’s not messing up anything.
He enters the shop, the smell of caffeine overwhelming his senses. He looks around and spots a man sitting by the window on a table meant for two, arms crossed over his chest as he seems to be waiting for someone.
The man is handsome-beautiful even-that Kyungsoo isn’t sure if he’s human. His mousy brown hair is left long, the sides grown past his ears. He looks as if his he’s been through extensive physical activities, for his well-defined biceps shape through his short sleeves. A silver coin is lying on the table in front of him, the sunlight peeking through the window reflected on it, causing it to look like it’s blinking back at Kyungsoo.
Jongin, his mind automatically tells him. Even if they haven’t seen each other yet, something just pulls him towards the man, telling him that this is the person he’s been writing to; this is the person who was supposed to be a tough, ruthless soldier, but actually has a soft spot; this is the man that was supposed to be dead, but he hoped wasn’t; this is the man that he would’ve wanted to have known earlier on.He takes a breath and takes short, calculated steps towards the man.
Here we go.
pairing(s): Kai/D.O., side! Sehun/Tao
rating: PG-13
word count: 6898
summary: Jongin likes to think that Kyungsoo cares. Well maybe he does-a little too much.
warnings: possible character death
a/n: originally written for 3daysofkaisoo. i will try to finish writing all of my other pending fics bcs i have noticed that our fic comm is starting to drown in cobwebs from being left untouched for almost a whole month ;;o;;
It was in the war. Jongin didn’t have much of a choice. Kyungsoo did.
Well, not really. Because how could he have refused?
“Please,” the man shivers in his seat-not from the cold, but from the consequences he knows he will suffer just because he’d been part of the enemy’s alliance. “I have a family waiting for me. I have a wife and two kids who rely on me. I don’t want them to be burdened.” His voice trembles, not because he fears for his life, but because he fears for the people he’s left behind and might not see ever again.
Prisoners of war that have been detained in their camp because they’ve been at the wrong place, at the wrong time, and probably did the wrong move by not guarding themselves well-these are the people that Jongin is always sent to execute. These are the people who, Jongin knows, have so much left to do in their lives, but wouldn’t get to finish.
Jongin flips the silver coin - a face on one side and a crown on the other; a token of the faction he was on, given by a daughter of one of its veterans. He catches it mid-air with his open palm and slaps it over the back of his left wrist. It gleams back at him as if it knows what should be done all along. Heads. Death. Just as he’d been told to do so.
He would have gone and granted the man mercy and spared the man’s life even if it meant he had to defy direct orders from authorities, but fate itself dictates that this isn’t the guy’s lucky day (actually none of the ones assigned to him ever seemed to be lucky enough. Or was the coin just that biased that it would rather have the heads of the enemies laid out than show mercy to a faction that opposes them?). So he picks up the metal baseball bat and aims straight for the blindfolded man’s head, accuracy dead-on and movement quick so as not to make more fuss over everything.
The man’s frantic pleas are replaced by the sound of bones breaking as the crunch of metal hitting home echoes around the room. Blood splatters over Jongin’s face as the man’s head hangs low right after the blow, life gone and the tension coming from the ropes binding him the only thing preventing him from falling off the chair. He wipes a hand over his face. Messy, messy, he thinks, trying to set his mind as apathetic so he wouldn’t hear the man’s voice in his head, pleading for him to help. Always messy.
He wipes the blood-covered hand on his pant leg, the red liquid coming off but leaving a stain. I’m a soldier, dammit. Why am I the one carrying out torture orders for the guerillas. He huffs, but his hands are shaking. Even if he’s alone, he’s developed the habit of lying to himself and pretending to be tough. He knows this should end because he just couldn’t take it anymore, but he couldn’t just strut up and complain that he doesn’t like torturing people from the enemy’s side just to get information and then kill them if they turn out to be insignificant. What if that’d get him to be the one left sitting on that iron chair instead of the other way around?
He leaves the dark room stinking of blood and misery, contrition reeking in his pores. He feels sorry for the man, but maybe he should’ve acted on it. He should have at least consoled the guy before he died, because it felt like the right thing to do, even if the fact remained that they were on opposite sides of the war.
But he didn’t, because all he feels right now is the wrenching in his gut at the thought of having to kill another man in battle tomorrow, or maybe getting killed himself in return. The guilt crawls under his skin, settling in his bones, not intending to leave.
The blood of the man he has killed leaves droplets on the floor, leaving marks there, haunting him in his dreams.
⌛
“Life here in the military isn’t exactly as exciting as I thought it would be. Every day, our lives are on the line, not knowing whether we’ll be able to wake up alive the next day, or go back to camp in one piece.” The letter begins.
“Today, I killed another man,” Jongin writes. “I’m used to it, but I don’t think I will ever come in terms with it. Killing someone in the middle of battle is different, because things are happening too quickly for you to know who you killed-or to even start feeling the guilt.” His handwriting is still cramped and messy just like how it was back in high school, but he never got to get further than a year in college because of the war. “I’m just following orders because I don’t want to bear the brunt of my superiors, but I still feel guilty because I killed someone who doesn’t even seem to have done anything wrong. At least, that’s how I see it.”
“Tell me Kyungsoo, is it bad to want to save yourself?”
⌛
Kyungsoo cocks his head to the side, rereading what he has written so far. Dissatisfied, he crumples the paper and throws it in the general direction of the trash bin. It hits the lid of the bin and falls back on the floor, not being close enough to the center to fall in.
He takes out a blank sheet of paper and tries to write again, going for a gentler approach. He isn’t sure how to respond to a letter from a man who just killed someone-someone who he might’ve known or will get to know at some point, but would never find out.
“Don’t blame yourself for something you have no control over.” Comes out of the tip of his pen, and everything else follows suit, each word falling right into place, stringing themselves together and piecing out as much of the idea Kyungsoo wants to convey-what he thinks Jongin wants to hear. Even though technically, Jongin isn’t the first person he has written to, the sentences just do not take form in his mind immediately and it takes him several crumpled papers and loads of ink to get the flow going completely and write out a decent letter. He isn’t really that good with words, but he hopes that Jongin wouldn’t mind. This is, after all, is something that he doesn’t completely favor. Yet he isn’t exactly in the position to clamor for anything, because it’s not like he’s doing out of his own volition.
It was during the war. Jongin knew what to do-what had to be done. Kyungsoo just wasn’t sure.
Jongin usually keeps to himself, shoulders hunched and looking dead tired, as if he’s carrying the burden of the whole world on his back. But when a notice from the government arrived one day, announcing that those soldiers without families may sign up for a pen pal system to have someone to talk to about their worries in the camp and release their anxieties, Sehun convinces Jongin to join. He wouldn’t have anything to lose by signing up anyway, right?
He doesn’t know what force pushed him to tell Jongin to do it, but thinking about it know, he supposes it’s because he believes that it is, after all, the only way Jongin could feel connected to the outside world - to some person that isn’t constantly involved in a game with death. If he was in Jongin’s position, he thinks he would’ve done the same way, anyway. Maybe it was to fight off the frustrations of having to fight a constant battle for an ideology you’re not exactly even involved in, with people you don’t even know - people who might have families and friends waiting for them back home, but would never even get a decent burial until the end of everything. Or maybe even never.
Or maybe it was because he craved for the comforting words of someone who would care.
Now, a month after Jongin has started sending letters to a person whose identity he has no idea of, Sehun notices that he seems to look forward to a tomorrow-if there is a tomorrow waiting for them. He is also aware that Jongin is being ordered to carry out executioner duties, and if he’s used to seeing Jongin crumbling down when he thinks his roommates are asleep, now, the other man seems to be slightly at ease. Maybe it’s because he has someone to talk out his anxieties to.
Even if Sehun notices these changes in Jongin’s behavior after his friend signed up for the pen pal system, he doesn’t say anything about it.
Sehun doesn’t say anything either when he sees Jongin lining up in front of a big, red drop box with the other soldiers who signed up for the pen pal system-soldiers who, just like him, doesn’t have anyone waiting for them back home; soldiers who could die at any instant, yet not have anyone but the people they met at the barracks to mourn for them and remember their names-not because he doesn’t care or that he isn’t the least bit curious as to who Jongin has been writing to for a few months now, but because he wants to give Jongin a little privacy of his own and to latch on to something and keep him from falling out.
Jongin’s lips quirk up to a half smile after dropping in the white envelope he’s been holding, but it barely lasts a second before he schools his expression back to being closed up that Sehun barely even noticed that it was there. It isn’t the first time Sehun has seen Jongin smile, but it only happens every now and then that Sehun somehow forgets that the smile looked good on him-a lot better than the usual blank look on his face- but he wouldn’t dare say it. Even though he’s been friends with Jongin ever since their first day in training camp-back when the consequences of the reality they’re living in still hasn’t completely sunk in yet-there are limits to every friendship, and he knows they hadn’t been friends for that long to be able to spill out every secret they have. He still isn’t ready to try to overstep that boundary yet.
Jongin walks over to where Sehun is standing, and the latter finds a question hanging at the tip of his tongue, but swallows it back again. He doesn’t know how Jongin would react, but he isn’t brave enough to risk it. He isn’t ready to lose Jongin yet; not when the person whose arms he could find comfort in is miles away from him.
“Let’s eat, I’m hungry.” Is the first thing that comes out of Jongin’s mouth, but nothing follows after that. Sehun gives him a short nod, and they head to the area’s canteen, side by side, with one of them hopeful in getting a message back a week from now and the other hoping to rekindle a lost connection.
⌛
That night, Sehun hides under the comfort of his blanket sheets, a flashlight in one hand and a pen on the other. He might as well write to Zitao, given that every day might be his last chance to contact the guy.
“It’s been two years since I last heard your voice or heard any news about you, but I hope you’re still doing well. You sound like an annoying old lady, but I must admit, I kind of miss hearing your voice every morning. Even if it’s really annoying.” Frankly, he’s never the romantic type, so he kind of sucks at this, but what the hell, he just wants to write to Zitao.
The letters strain away from the imaginary lines he’s set on the paper, but he’s not much to worry about margins and geometry when he’s writing, anyway. Zitao will understand. Either way, he’s not one to judge, since writes like this too. “I’m sorry that I’m only writing to you just now. I know we haven’t talked to each other in a while after I left town for training camp, but I’d like you to know that now I’m actually here, in the middle of war, it doesn’t seem all that great, after all.”
“I won’t lie to you and say everything’s fine here, because it’s not. Every day, I fear that I may be the next one to fall and never be able to get up, just like the fallen comrades I’ve last seen on the battlefield. I’m not sure if I will get to live after this, but just so you know, the promise still stands.” His hand is shaking while he writes the word “promise”, and he purses his lips to stop himself from suddenly bursting out crying. Dammit Jongin, this is your fault. You’re the reason why I’m writing this letter in the first place. He thinks, before finishing up his letter.
“And try to water the plants. They won’t harm you if you don’t try to wushu them every time you get near them. I’m trying to grow a garden for my mom. She told me she’ll come by once I got back. Don’t turn the apartment into a shithole, okay?”
⌛
“It’s just a job,”Kyungsoo argues with himself for the nth time that month. “Why can’t you just write what you mean and mean what you write?”
But of course he can’t, because writing what he means would insinuate that he might end up disrespecting the person he’s writing to, and meaning what he writes would suggest that he actually cares. He just isn’t about that prepared to choose either of the two.
Kyungsoo ruffles his hair in frustration and slumps over his desk, wanting to give up on the task at hand. He isn’t entirely new to this, since his mother used to write to soldiers too, back when he and his brother were still little kids and their father had been nowhere to be found (he’s thought back then that his mother had been writing to those men to get rid of that feeling of sadness she’s been keeping to herself and a means of trying to cope up with the exasperation from the sudden disappearance of her husband, but it was only when he started writing himself that he found out the entirety of it). But that didn’t mean that he had a flair for writing like she did - he was no poet, neither lyricist, nor writer, and each sentence he writes sounds bland and boring to his own ears that he wishes he could just stop and drop everything in an instant.
But he couldn’t.
He shouldn’t.
This is his job, now. His employers would most definitely not be impressed, and he couldn’t bear to lose a source of income, much less a shelter to ensure his safety in the war. His mother had long gone passed away, and his brother had disappeared after a few years into the military, so it’s not like he has to mind someone’s safety other than his own.
Jongin seems like an interesting person enough that Kyungsoo still finds himself able to write back, and it would be unfair to him if Kyungsoo just suddenly stops writing; it’s just that now that the surface has been scratched, there’s nothing more left beneath it to dig up; to keep things interesting and the stories flowing. Now, more than ever, he feels writing more of as an obligation than anything else.
So he decides to scratch up everything he’s written thus far and start anew. It’s a bold approach, and one that branches out to a road quite different from the ones that they usually traverse, but he wants to try it out.
So he takes out a new sheet of paper, and tries again.
“Hey Jongin,” he writes tentatively. “I haven’t told you this before, but I sing in a band. Well, used to, since the bars have closed and we don’t have any gigs going on right now.” He corrects. He just hopes Jongin finds this interesting of a topic enough to not cut him off.
⌛
“I used to sing for the school choir, but then I got bored because all they knew how to sing were songs even older than my grandmother. So I tried out joining my friend’s band. He’d been bugging me for ages to join them, anyway.”
Jongin’s eyebrows perk up in interest when he reads Kyungsoo’s newest letter. It’s usually him who initiates talks about his own life, expecting Kyungsoo to follow through and write back with stories that he himself experienced, or maybe even just random bursts of thought he’s been having lately. But what he usually gets are replies wherein he feels like he’s writing to an advice column in the newspaper.
Nevertheless, he kept writing, knowing that Kyungsoo was real, and that he was someone Jongin could write to in the absence of his family, or anyone special in his life that he’s left back home. In a way, Kyungsoo had been the person Jongin looked forward to meeting when he’s gotten back.
What intrigues him more is that Kyungsoo’s choice of topic is quite a match with his own interest.
Jongin sits on his cot and writes back, more enthused than ever. Sehun looks on and sees in his peripheral vision the older man grinning while writing, and he wonders how the guy could still write with much fervor and enthusiasm just after they almost ended up getting killed from a landmine planted near the enemy’s base.The worst they got from it were scratches and burn marks, but it could have been a close call. They could have been dead.
Their sides troops are currently advancing, having had breached a large part of the enemy’s camp, but they still have to wait in their new barracks, where they’ve been relocated to be able to close in on the enemy better.
Sehun sighs and goes back to staring at the ceiling. If it was in his case, he would’ve given up already. Well, not exactly, but he’s thinking it’s most likely to happen, mostly because Zitao hasn’t written back even if he’s sent in his letter three weeks ago. And he hasn’t tried sending in a new one, either. But maybe the letter hasn’t arrived yet. Or maybe Zitao wasn’t home when the letter arrived, and the neighbors forgot to give him. Their neighbor, after all, was an old man who always forgot what he did almost a minute later. Or maybe Zitao tucked the letter away to safety and simply forgot to rummage through and actually get to read the letter.
Or maybe he burned it, a voice nagged in the back of Sehun’s mind. Maybe he just hated you so much for running away like that and leaving him for the army without saying anything.
Sehun buries his face in a pillow in frustration, Jongin’s light humming currently the only sound disturbing his thoughts of what Zitao could have done to the letter he’s sent. In the next cot, Minseok suddenly shifts in his position, making the bed creak and ending up facing Sehun’s side of the bed. He looks like a peaceful child this way, Sehun thinks, and he knows he’d much rather have it that way rather than seeing his hyungs (or any other soldier, for that matter) writhing in pain or dying in the most agonizing way on the battlefield. On the last bed, the one by the window, Chanyeol scratches his face and opens his mouth, only to start snoring a bit too loudly.
He quickly forgets his worries over Zitao, because right now, there are much more lives that matters to him, and he doesn’t want to lose them just yet, even though he deems the life of the person he’s left back home more important than his own. He falls asleep immersed in his thoughts, with worry lining his face.
⌛
“Come home safely. I’ll be waiting for you.” Had been the only sentences written in the letter he receives from Zitao. It had almost been two months, and it’s the only thing he gets as a consolation for what he’s sent beforehand. If you don’t include his postscript notation of “The garden looks ugly. There are shrubs growing, and I don’t want to die yet. Clear it when you get home.”
Typical, Sehun thinks. Well, at least he doesn’t have to worry about Zitao still being mad at him when he gets back. If he gets back, that is. The thought haunts him, so he tries to not think about what tomorrow had in store for them instead and closes his eyes, lulling himself to sleep despite the discomfort he feels hearing Jongin’s pen scratching over paper as the man writes to his pen pal.
⌛
“I had a hobby before, back when I was still at the orphanage,” Jongin’s letter begins, and Kyungsoo’s eyebrows raise themselves involuntarily, intrigued with where this will lead to. “I used to dance.”
Oh, so he’s a dancer, Kyungsoo nods, impressed. He hasn’t given it much thought before, but he really wants to see Jongin, even if it meant they could only know each other by sending in pictures of themselves. It would be easier to have a face associated with a name, after all. But he doesn’t have the courage to ask, so he doesn’t bring it up.
“I remember that in your letter, you said that music gave you the chance to express what you actually wanted to say through the words of other people. For me, music gave me the chance to express the words I want to say through actions-through dancing.”
Without meaning to, Jongin finds himself pouring out his innermost thoughts and ideas to Kyungsoo, and he’s jittery, not knowing if the other would respond negatively. Yet he’s hoping for the opposite to happen when he finally receives a letter from the older man a few weeks earlier than expected. He mentally pats himself on the back, because with the letter came every ounce and shred of some of Kyungsoo’s thoughts that he claims he hasn’t told anyone yet.
“I don’t know if I should tell you this, but… I’ve never been fond of talking to people. They could go approach me and talk on and on for hours, and I won’t even be paying attention. And the truth is, that’s what I’ve first thought with you, too. But as time came by, I found myself wanting to write to you more, wanting to hear from you more.”
Kyungsoo is embarrassed to even check what he’s written and he folds the paper immediately, inserting it in a white envelope quickly so he wouldn’t have to see it and get flustered all over again because he might change his mind and chuck it out or rewrite what he’s already written. He sends it with a thoughtful smile on his face, blush creeping into his cheeks and the sides of his ears. “Now we’re even.”
Jongin doesn’t tell a single soul either that he’s really happy reading Kyungsoo’s letter, even if he accidentally broke his arm from a bad fall in one of the open pits in the battle field a while ago. He wouldn’t lie and say that it doesn’t hurt, but it’ll heal in its own time. While as for the letter… he doesn’t know when Kyungsoo will send in another letter again, so he basks in the glory of the current letter he’s received, hoping for a miracle to happen so that they could see each other.
⌛
Jongin is surprised to receive a package this time and not just the usual letter in an envelope. There’s a smile on his face that everyone notices, and for once, he’s aware that the atmosphere isn’t as tense as it is in the battlefield or whenever they take in a prisoner, the other soldiers teasing him about it while they tear open the letters and packages sent to them by their families, some by their own pen pals. Chanyeol prods him to no end, asking him what it’s for; Minseok, who doesn’t always talk unless important or when he’s talked to gives him an encouraging pat on the back like a father would do to his son. Even Sehun pokes him about it-Sehun, who he knows cares, but doesn’t prod most of the time-asking what the package contained.
“I haven’t opened it yet.” He blinks, unsure of what to expect from the package Kyungsoo sent him. Is it food? Is it a pile of his pictures? Jongin hopes that it’s the latter.
“Well you should,” Sehun shrugs. “It’s about time the two of you went farther than just writing boring letters to each other.” He adds in a grumble, but Jongin hears him anyway.
Jongin goes back to their quarters; he’s alone, given that everyone is still in the lunch area, boasting about their families and tearing open more packages. It’s rare that the atmosphere is this happy, given that the sides are both currently in mixed states of tension as the war seems to come to its climax. But he lets it be, since he doesn’t think he has a proper say in whether when a person should be happy.
He sits down on the cot nearest the door - his assigned bed space - and takes considerable care in opening the box, not wanting the contents to be ruined. He gently opens it to find a cd case inside, one without a cover or a label. The plain black case stares back at him for a moment, daring him to open it and listen to what the cd has in store for him. So he does just that, deciding it would be better to find out what’s in the cd before reading the letter accompanying the package, where Kyungsoo would’ve surely told him what it was.
Taking out the Walkman he’s brought along but barely even touched, he pops in the cd and puts on the earphones before pressing play.
The track is one that he’s always heard playing on the radio before, but the voice singing it is unfamiliar. It gives off that feeling of gentleness and frailty to it - like milk mixed with honey-and Jongin is reminded of a time when everything was alright, when it was just one of those lazy Sunday mornings where he could sleep in late because it’s raining and there’s no class, the pitter-patter on the rooftop and the smell of petrichor permeating the air, calming and soothing. His ears welcome the sound of the voice, relaxing and just generally addictive that he wants to hear more of it.
The track comes to an end and the cd halts to a stop, and somehow Jongin is disappointed, because that voice was something he would like to keep hearing and not the screams of pain of people dying, the sounds of bullets hitting home and the battle cries of soldiers who have nothing left but their wills to live.
Nevertheless, he opens the letter, replaying the song while he begins reading. His eyes stop at the second paragraph.
“I’ve sent in a demo of one of the songs I used to sing because you keep on teasing me that I can’t. it’s not much, but I hope it’s not disappointing (hey, my voice isn’t that bad!)”
Jongin’s heart starts beating frantically. That’s Kyungsoo singing?Clearly, Kyungsoo had been right; more than right, even. Now, more than ever, he’s even a lot more curious of what the other man looks like. But it would seem demanding to ask for a picture. He doesn’t want to scare off the other by being too straightforward and rash.
“By the way, who’s your favorite singer? You only gave me a list of songs you liked before, but I’m still curious.”
Jongin smiles to himself. I don’t really have a favorite singer, but you know what? Your voice is my favorite melody.
⌛
“Back when I was at the orphanage, one of the workers who first taught me how to dance gave me a coin. She told me that if I ever was in the middle of indecision, I should just flip it, because then I would know what to do. I really wanted to see you badly, so I flipped the coin. And it said no, but I’m asking you, anyway.”
“Because even before I knew what the answer was, I realized that whatever the decision was, I wanted to know you. So if this is all over and I survive, can I see you?”
Kyungsoo catches himself smiling involuntarily and stops, eyes going wide in realization. No, this can’t be it. This shouldn’t be it. But he just might be falling for someone he hasn’t even met yet.
(Or come to think of it, maybe he might even have fallen for Jongin already)
It was in the war. Jongin didn’t have anything left to lose but his life. Kyungsoo had everything to consider.
“Men, fall back!” their troop’s captain orders, motioning his hand for them to retreat. Jongin looks around frantically, trying to fight his way through the haze and the confusion of bodies running around and the ones lying dead on the ground. He catches sight of Minseok’s small figure, neck bleeding from getting grazed by a shot but otherwise okay. Chanyeol and Sehun are nowhere to be found.
The truth is, Jongin joined the military because he believed nothing was waiting for him back at the orphanage. He’s been of age when he left for training camp and it was his decision to make and nobody asked him to leave, but surely, there was nothing left to do there now that he’s all grown up, right?
“But serving in the military is a dangerous thing.”his noona-his most trusted friend and confidant back in the orphanage had said when he told her what he wanted to do. “But anything I say wouldn’t change your mind, wouldn’t it?” And she’d been right, of course, even though Jongin doesn’t like to admit it. He’s lost in touch with her after that.
But now, in the midst of all the screaming, he remembers how he has often disregarded the thought of death ever coming to him. Because surely, he would never truly die, right?
How ignorant he had been to think of that.
He sees Sehun limping towards him, panic written all over the younger man’s face. He squeezes through the group of soldiers who stopped midway and turned to shoot, rebelling on their own to show their own resistance. If they were going to die today, wouldn’t it have been better if they died putting up a fight?
When Jongin finally reaches Sehun, he pulls in the younger to go with the crowd of soldiers that are still retreating, positioning his rifle in front of him. This, he decides, is how he will make his last stand, too.
Sehun screams for him to move back, but he doesn’t hear it over the rattling of guns and the explosion of grenades. He doesn’t even remember how the war started, or why he’s defending the side he’s defending right now, but all he thinks is that he has people he wanted to protect, and really, that was all that mattered.
He knows he will be one of the fallen anytime soon, but he presses on, thinking of the people he wants to protect the most that when the moment does come, he still gasps out loud in surprise.
Jongin falls on his back, the impact of the bullet piercing his chest too much of a force to fight against. His lungs are burning, and he wheezes, struggling to keep his breaths even. He couldn’t breathe, and if he could even manage to steal in breaths at all, he ends up gasping.
People say that when you die, you remember all the best moments in your life. But for him, it hadn’t been like that-all he sees flashing before him are the moments that could have been; meeting Kyungsoo for the first time, wearing a black suit with a matching tie in some fancy restaurant with gaudy ornaments and flashy garnishes on their food. Or it could be in a café, and he’s wearing his usual shirt over denim pants, and it would be on a Sunday morning, where dusk is yet to come. Kyungsoo remains a faceless shadow in his mind, but he thinks it’s okay, because it’s more than he could ask for.
There he is, faced with the reality that no, he isn’t immortal, and that time is quickly slipping through his fingers, with each inhale having the possibility of being his last. His vision is getting blurry and his thoughts are beginning to cloud up, but there is one name that doesn’t leave his lips, barely a whisper in the air: Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo, Kyungsoo, Kyungsoo. His mind repeats.
I want to see you. His heartbeat is starting to slow down.
I need to see you. The words are caught up in his throat, and it dies out as his eyes begin to close.
I want to live.
⌛
Kyungsoo doesn’t receive a letter on the day he expects, so he waits. And waits, and waits and waits… Until one day he wakes up to see that he’s got something in his mailbox, which has been empty for days (or has it been weeks? Kyungsoo has lost count, absorbed in the hours the clock shows; absorbed in the numbers the hour hand points to; absorbed in the passing minutes that he hasn’t gotten a reply from Jongin).
It’s an envelope that’s different from the one he usually receives and it doesn’t have the familiar stamp on it, nor the childish scrawls Jongin writes on the back. It has a red wax seal stamped over to close it, and Kyungsoo just grows even more dubious, because it’s definitely from the government and not Jongin. There’s that nagging feeling at the back of his mind that something’s wrong, and the blood on his veins run cold, dread seeping through every fiber. Nonetheless, he opens the envelope with careful fingers, cautious not to make any tears on the envelope.
There is nothing but a red card inside.
Kyungsoo falls on his knees, at the edge of a breakdown. The back of his throat hurts from the things that he thought he still has time to say, the end of his tongue burning from the things that had passed and what could have been.
But in the end, the only thing left is the sting in his eyes from the tears left unshed.
⌛
The day after that, Kyungsoo receives a letter from the government relieving him of his job of writing to Jongin. His pay, as the letter had said, would be sent in before the end of the month, and without any deduction since he’s fulfilled his duties well.
And Kyungsoo thinks, screw it, screw it all, because all he wants is to know that the red card had been sent because of a mistake, and that Jongin was alive.
It was during the war. Jongin doesn’t really know what’s happening. Kyungsoo’s just thankful.
Jongin wakes up to the feeling of isolation, trapped in a room of pure white walls stripped bare except for a wall clock, telling him that it’s 2:30. Whether it’s early morning or afternoon, he isn’t sure, because the curtains are drawn closed, none of the lights from outside filtering in, if ever there were any.
He glances down on where he’s lying down and notices that a translucent, plastic tube is connected to his arm. He’s in a hospital. He’s awake. He’s alive. He wants to ask how, but he isn’t one to complain.
When a nurse arrives to check on his vitals when the hospital staff has been notified that he’s finally awake, she tells him that he was more dead than alive by the time he’s been sent in, and that he was lucky to have survived the shot, given that the bullet was almost near his heart.
He clears his throat, unsure of his voice from the days he was unconscious. “Can I ask...about the war?” his voice comes out raspy, but it could have been worse. “What’s happening now, out there?”
He isn’t disappointed because she brings him good news: news not about the sorrow of the war, but about its end, and how the two countries have finally settled on an agreement. The nurse sees him smile for the first time in the whole month he’s been admitted in the hospital, and she thinks that his smile was nice - filled with hope and something more lying beneath.
“Wait, have you heard from anyone from my troop? Kim Minseok, Oh Sehun, and Park Chanyeol. Are they alright?” he asks in a hurry, remembering the time when he’s lost consciousness.
The nurse looks at him a bit fondly, as if he were her son all along. “Kim Minseok is in the next room and is still recovering from his wounds. Oh Sehun, on the other hand… His leg has been fractured, but he’s recovering. Park Chanyeol is-“
She doesn’t get to finish what she’s saying when the door slides open, and Jongin is assaulted with a back-breaking hug. “Jongin! I thought you were dead!” Chanyeol bawls, and Jongin could feel moisture clinging into his back.
“Chanyeol, let him go. You’re the one who’s going to end up killing him.” Minseok scolds, shaking the tall guy’s shoulders. “Sorry about that, he’s just a mess, really.” Minseok tells him, and then adds in a voice that’s barely a whisper, “We were all worried that you wouldn’t wake up.”
Jongin is about to respond that they shouldn’t have worried, when Sehun comes limping into the room, a crutch by his side to aid him. “Hyung, you dolt! Why’d you have to be such a hero and try to take the bullet, huh?” he says, as if he could read Jongin’s mind. “Of course we’d be worried!”
“And Minseok-hyung, I told you to wait for me!” he whines. “You know I couldn’t keep up with you guys!” Same old Sehun, always complaining. Jongin hides his mirth behind his hands. This is how he remembers them from training camp, back in the days when the pressure of trying to stay alive hasn’t cracked down on them yet.
“Ah, sorry about that, Sehun. Chanyeol was just too eager to get in here, and I had to do damage control before he ends up ruining anything.” Minseok apologizes.
Jongin smiles even further, because even though it had been a long and hard path they’ve traveled through, things seem to be falling in their right places.
Later, when the three have left to go back to their respective rooms in the hospital with promises of coming back to visit him the next day, he asks the nurse for a pen and a piece of paper, requesting the letter he almost took hours to finish to be sent to an address he’s been writing to all along.
After that, all he could do is wait.
It was during the war. Jongin had no one waiting for him back home.
Well, maybe except for one.
Kyungsoo checks the address scrawled on the piece of paper in childish, cramped handwriting and looks back at the signboard of the coffee shop. He feels an uncomfortable fluttering in his stomach, and he looks at his watch for the nth time that day just to remind himself that he’s just on time and that he’s not messing up anything.
He enters the shop, the smell of caffeine overwhelming his senses. He looks around and spots a man sitting by the window on a table meant for two, arms crossed over his chest as he seems to be waiting for someone.
The man is handsome-beautiful even-that Kyungsoo isn’t sure if he’s human. His mousy brown hair is left long, the sides grown past his ears. He looks as if his he’s been through extensive physical activities, for his well-defined biceps shape through his short sleeves. A silver coin is lying on the table in front of him, the sunlight peeking through the window reflected on it, causing it to look like it’s blinking back at Kyungsoo.
Jongin, his mind automatically tells him. Even if they haven’t seen each other yet, something just pulls him towards the man, telling him that this is the person he’s been writing to; this is the person who was supposed to be a tough, ruthless soldier, but actually has a soft spot; this is the man that was supposed to be dead, but he hoped wasn’t; this is the man that he would’ve wanted to have known earlier on.He takes a breath and takes short, calculated steps towards the man.
Here we go.