(for carrotclarinets) paperback romance ✸ part 2 of 2
❊ for: carrotclarinets
❊ title: paperback romance
The ship of dreams, the headlines say, unsinkable even by God. It all didn't matter to Kyungsoo though - made of titanium or made of paper, a boat was a boat and this one was sailing him to a slow death, choked by a band of gold around his ring finger.
The air singes his skin with sea-salt and the dread that when this ship docks in America, his time will be up.
Hustle and bustle, they are led to a walkway - a plank really - bridging the port and the ship with his fiancée leading at the front, gazing across the crowd, waving, crying, bidding the passengers farewell and his face doesn't break into any emotion. Sculpted from cold marble, Kyungsoo thinks, even the winter sun's afraid of a touch.
"Bring them up to our room. Be careful," Chanyeol - who else could it be - says to the more-suitcase-than-man man. "They're worth more than six of you."
The tower of suitcases runs off into the crowd of tycoons and family made of pearls and small talk. Chanyeol has Kyungsoo's hand in his, strong but not crushing, and it gets a few looks but they avert their eyes upon Chanyeol's hard set confidence and hand-embroided waistcoat of china blue. This man was more than old money, he had wealth written into his genetic makeup, son of one of the richest men in the Northern Hemisphere. Look at him wrong and he could run your company into the dust by the end of the week. For someone like him it didn't matter that he had a male lover.
It was the only reason why Kyungsoo was still invited to dinners by the in, why he's still considered part of the in. Chanyeol was the lifeboat keeping him afloat in these shark infested waters. His own personal fortune is a small shiny rock compared to Chanyeol's treasure trove.
Once upon a time they were in love, a real summer romance of secret meetings and fist fights against everyone who spat on what they were, but when they finally got the peace they had wanted, It's impossible to win a fight against the watering down of time, against the realisation that love is not enough.
Of course Chanyeol still loves him. Kyungsoo who's been with him for over a decade, unchanging, unyielding, small enough to fit in his arms and knows his place as the dutiful wife figure. Maybe that's why he proposed, and Kyungsoo said yes because otherwise he would sink to the bottom of the ocean.
Not that any of this matters. Life's not spectacular, not in the least bit, but it's fair.
Their room is a low ceiling vastness of red satin and Kyungsoo's paintings bringing some ease to the eyes. Chanyeol shakes his head as he paces the room, "I swear I never will understand your affinity for art. Why don't you take lessons and then we can milk a few dollars out of that."
"Just because I'm no good at art," Kyungsoo says, tracing the brass frame of a Monet he won in an auction, "doesn't mean I can't appreciate it. Just as how you don't understand the meaning of art but you still choose to say your opinion."
Chanyeol makes an unimpressed hum. "Honey, Paris has made you- how do I say this?"
"Outspoken?”
"Frank." Chanyeol decides, and Kyungsoo can feel his gaze on him but Kyungsoo knows it doesn't really see him. By the next hour Chanyeol won't even have remembered this conversation, too used to Kyungsoo's quiet presence and perfectly timed nods of approval.
"I'm going outside," Kyungsoo says. The air is thin. Chanyeol's already making his way to the other room, probably in search of a waiter for a cup of tea.
-
The ship sets sail with a jolt and thirty-three hundred lives sealed aboard. The passengers spread themselves across the deck, feeling the wind blow through them like a field of wheat, though it's mainly the lower class that enjoys this little pleasure. The top deck belonging to the upper class is near empty, most likely they're all inside un-packing their expensive clothes to fill the wardrobes and preparing for lunch. Even Kyungsoo feels a tug to the dining hall; meals have become a social necessity.
His eyes scans the horizon, the blue on blue and the fireball blazing in the sky, the people laughing and pointing at things in the ocean, himself becoming less and less of a person and more of film camera, absorbing light and spitting out a prettier, picturesque version of everything. At the bow of the ship are a pair of boys or men or both, arms spread like wings and throwing their heads back, as if they're swallowing the sky.
Kyungsoo wishes he could join them, wishes the ship wasn't stupidly sectioned off and the bottom deck wasn't lower-class lava. He imagines himself there, sixteen and free again, and the ship hurtles on into the open sea - indestructible and not looking back.
-
Chanyeol only takes walks outside in between meals to get his daily dose of sun, so Kyungsoo joins him because he tries to spend his time on deck as much as he can, and they are meant to be engaged, so for appearances sake, if anything.
"I picture a house," Chanyeol says, squinting into the sunlight, "with a big garden and a pond with koi and roses lining the hedge. That's what I hope we'll find in America."
"Who's going to take care of it?" Kyungsoo asks.
"You are, of course. You'll be in charge of it all. Sure I'll hire a few gardeners but I don't trust anyone would be able to see my vision as you do."
Kyungsoo smiles, more reflex than feeling. "That sounds nice. But I'd prefer to sit inside in the library and read."
"You can't possibly want to read for the rest of your life. And you would get pale."
Kyungsoo has a business degree but his life has already been settled by their engagement. If something is going to happen with absolute certainty, hasn't it already happened? "I love to read, you know that."
"And collect odd pieces of art."
"Art is subjective."
"Honey." Chanyeol shakes his head. He's always shaking his head at Kyungsoo lately. "Art is for those who don't believe in aspirations. I know you have aspirations, marrying me being one, for example. Hopefully running a branch of my company in the near future is another."
Kyungsoo's fist clenches against his thigh, but his face is calm, not even a ripple of annoyance. They have reached the curve of the deck facing the bow of the ship, the bottom deck now emptier than when Kyungsoo saw it last. All around is the noise of the ship and distant, indistinct chatter.
"My goodness it's freezing out here," Chanyeol says despite his wool coat and the sun leaning all over him. "We should head inside, don't want to catch a cold and ruin our journey."
"I think I'll stay outside for a while. I'll be sure to join you for tea later."
Chanyeol sighs but doesn't comment, simply leans in and kisses Kyungsoo gently on the forehead. Then he's gone, and Kyungsoo lets out a ragged breath. He wants to curse at the air but only then does he feel a prickling on his left cheek, like it's being grazed by a pair of eyes.
His eyes dart quickly to the bottom deck to hunt out the perpetrator and doesn't expect to find him so quickly and so obviously. Kyungsoo has to avert his gaze back onto the ruler-drawn horizon. In his head: young man, very young, in a clean but loose and worn out brown coat, pretty boy looks that would make him popular with the girls if he were still attending school, a longing but not asking gaze at Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo checks again, and the man notices that he is no longer admiring in secret. They both look away as if burned, but the tingling feeling in Kyungsoo’s cheeks is still there, possibly a blush now but this is so inappropriate - Kyungsoo's engaged, for goodness sake, to a handsome wealthy man and now is not the time for giggly teenage romance.
Maybe he's overreacting. He checks one last time and yes the man's looking and smirking and that pushes Kyungsoo to his limit. He gives the man an incredulous look, gets a shrug in reply, shakes his own head, the smirk deepens, like passing notes under the desk.
I'm sorry, pretty boy, but I'm a bird in a cage you can't put your hands on.
Somehow, like a radio in his head, just admiring the pretty view.
Kyungsoo pushes himself off the railing, burying the urge to look back at the man deep deep deep inside, and spins on his heels to leave. Chanyeol and his penned out future is waiting inside for him.
-
Their lives cross the next chilly night, the propellers churning the sea water - drowning out any fireworks that could have exploded when their eyes met. He already knows the man's name, and the cigarette burning low in between his fingers, and the crumpled sketch of Kyungsoo in his coat's pocket, and the certainty that this is it. Marriage itself isn't the killer; love is.
But for those who want the whole story -
Kyungsoo is running through the deck and he hopes that the night's dark enough so those who see him don't see the tears streaked down his face. He hates people seeing him cry.
He doesn't know where he's running to until he sees the white metal railing spanning itself across the edge of the light from the lonely orange lamp, and he feels it slam into his stomach as his head lurches over, staring into the frothy waters of the night ocean and wondering why he's the tragic young man that is given the complete opposite of those boys transforming to eagles at the bow of the ship the afternoon they had set sail, swallowing the endless blue sky. Instead he's being swallowed by the night.
"Hey." Someone calls from behind him tentatively. Kyungsoo's grip is glued to the railing but he straightens himself out and faces the voice, and of course, congratulations whoever wrote the plot, it's the man he had a conversation with through eye contact yesterday afternoon. He's in the same clothes, hair ruffled by the wind, an arm half extended out.
So the solution to Kyungsoo's marital dilemma is to throw in a second love interest.
"Leave me alone," Kyungsoo manages to rasp out. A stranger catching him in this state of lost-love; no matter what timeline it's always the same story.
"I will after I make sure you'll be alright, sir." The man keeps by the orange light of the lamp and he's keeping with the nonchalant attitude by lighting a cigarette, but Kyungsoo makes out the tension in his shoulders and those eyes that do not, will not stray from Kyungsoo.
"I'm fine. It's not I'm like hanging off the back of the boat."
"I agree with you, sir, but I've seen many people lean over the rails and accidentally slip, or were pushed."
"Are you an expert in deaths on ships or something?"
"Nope, just ships. It's how I get around." Then a smile that can't help but look like a smirk on the man's face.
"Like a stowaway?" Kyungsoo's grip on the railing loosens with each word and he sniffs away his tears.
"We can't all be princes."
The man has his hand extended now and Kyungsoo scowls, pressing himself against the railing. "If you think that by chatting me up and playing the gallant hero you'll get me into bed at the end of the night, you're terribly mistaken."
The man looks amusedly shocked, this fuckboy. "Caught me." Chuckles, but shakes his head and exhales a puff of smoke. God, the smell cuts to him even in the icy air. "But honestly, that wasn't my intention at all, sir. When you see someone in possible danger, you help, or at least that's what my mama taught me. I would never disrespect you like that."
"I don't believe you."
The man puffs out another stream of white smoke. "Alright then, believe this. I was on a ship cruising the Atlantic a few weeks ago, and I fell deeply in love with a beautiful girl. You should've seen me, I was ready to drop everything in my life for her. But she was in love with someone else - a wealthy lad with estates bigger than any I've ever heard of." The man steps forward and leans against the railing with Kyungsoo, half a metre and worlds between them. "Everyone called him a prince. She did as well, and she loved him just as much as I loved her, maybe even more. But love…" The stars above blink, confused.
"Love is unforgiving." Kyungsoo finishes.
The man takes one last drag of his cigarette and throws it into the sea. "He fell in love with someone else, a princess of all people." They both stare into the distance and Kyungsoo knows, he's never before been sure of anything in his life, they're looking at the same scene. "She threw herself into the sea, would rather drown in the ocean than watch the love of her life be happy with another."
Of all the things to say running through Kyungsoo's head, he settles with, "I'm sorry.”
"Me too." The man pushes himself off the rail and returns back into the glow of the lamp. "But don't take it as a pity story. What I'm trying to say is, which I really should've said to begin with, don't jump for love. It's not worth it."
Kyungsoo weighs his options, considers which is more dangerous: the long fall off the precipice of his life into the abyss or the twenty metre drop into the below-zero waters, sliced to chunks by propellers.
Somehow he knows he's already chosen his path. "Kyungsoo," he says, taking a step away from the rail and into the orange light, which doesn't really provide any warmth but it feels like coming home. "My name is Kyungsoo."
This close, the man looks so much more like his age, every emotion through Kyungsoo's camera lens eyes captured with absolute clarity. He smiles victoriously, but respectfully takes a step back to give Kyungsoo his space. "I'm Jongin, or Kai, depends on who you ask."
"And which do you prefer?"
"For you - Jongin."
Kyungsoo rubs his hands together and blows hot air onto them so they feel more like hands and less like ice cubes. "Okay, Jongin comma Kai." he gives him, Jongin, a small smile like they're sharing a big secret. "Now that that you've got me-"
The ship jolts and hurtles them out onto the deck, Kyungsoo letting out a surprised shout, slamming into the railing and nearly toppling over if not for Jongin's body knocking into him, sandwiching him in place before the ship can jolt anymore and Kyungsoo would disappear overboard. Kyungsoo's heart racing as if he had fallen, Jongin's shocked face revealing that he had thought he had lost Kyungsoo to the waters.
Before Kyungsoo could find his voice amongst the floodwater of blood rushing through his ears, a panicked shout pierces through the white noise. Jongin has a tight grip on the railing and around Kyungsoo's shivering waist.
"Kyungsoo!" A familiar voice, as if muffled through a wall. "Kyungsoo!"
He only realises too late that it's Chanyeol with their butler, in their search for Kyungsoo who had excused himself from supper over fifteen minutes ago, leaving his coat behind. The search party catches Kyungsoo locked in Jongin's protective embrace pushed against the back of the ship, Kyungsoo's face drained of blood from his close brush with death.
There is no positive spin to this.
"Get your hands off him, you filthy beggar!" Chanyeol growls out before he rips Jongin away from Kyungsoo and the rail.
"No sir, you've got the wrong idea-"
“Like hell I do.” Underneath Chanyeol's thick black scarf Kyungsoo knows his veins are jumping out of his neck. "I know assault when I see it, and if you speak another word I will throw you overboard."
Their butler, Jongdae, gently ushers Kyungsoo back into the light of the lamp, drapes his white coat over his shaking shoulders. His mind is six feet from the waters along with his voice and any form of comprehension, just watches a string of words fall out of Chanyeol's mouth but not hearing a sound.
"I swear, Kyungsoo and I were not-"
"I do not want to hear my fiancée's name spoken with that dirty mouth-"
"If you would just listen, sir-"
Chanyeol's arm tenses and Kyungsoo knows what's going to happen next, has already seen this scene played out so many times with just them two alone in mid-argument, and through his haze he is quick enough to grab onto Chanyeol's arm before it turns into a punch straight to the jaw. "Chanyeol, stop." His whisper is the loudest thing they've heard all night. "We were just talking when the ship jolted, and we lost our balance. That's all."
Jongin looks at him worriedly but Kyungsoo keeps his eyes trained on Chanyeol. One look at the other man and Chanyeol would be able to tell instantly what was going on through Kyungsoo's eyes.
"That's all?" Chanyeol doesn't want to believe it, the conflict clear in his furrowed brow, but why would his dear Kyungsoo lie?
"That's all." Kyungsoo nods, pulling his coat to keep out the creeping chill. "If it wasn't for him I would have gone overboard."
"Ah." Chanyeol rubs his hands, the punch probably still running through them. "So he's a saviour of sorts."
"Yes, so it would be kind of you if you stopped harassing him. In fact, invite him for dinner sometime."
"Dinner." Their playing field, the ultimate gift someone like them could offer - social advancement, "Alright." Then Chanyeol turns to Jongin who seemed to have shrunk in the realisation of their blatant separate social standing. "I apologize for my behaviour. My fiancée seems to be eager for you to join us for dinner. Come to the dining hall tomorrow, 8 am." Kyungsoo knows this is the last thing Chanyeol wants to do right now but the cold is beginning to settle over them and the quickest way to get inside is to surrender to whatever would give a little to everyone but not enough to have them begging for more.
Jongin is searching Kyungsoo's face for an answer, and honestly Kyungsoo doesn't want Jongin anywhere near their poisonous lifestyle, but above everything - the icy night, the future husband who's mind is wandering back to the warmth of first class accommodation, his own heart no longer in his chest but in the hands of a possible stowaway who hasn't yet learn to smile properly, Kyungsoo desperately wants to see Jongin again.
So he nods imperceptibly, and something like relief spreads across Jongin's face. "Yes sir, it would be an honour."
They don't stay a moment longer. Chanyeol puts an arm around Kyungsoo who still hasn’t stopped shivering, and the last thing he says to Jongin wavers and splits in the air.
"Don't forget the dress code."
-
After breakfast the next day Chanyeol is very reluctant on letting Kyungsoo wander off on his own, last night's events still fresh in the room. But both of them aren't used to being together for the whole day, clashing interests, Chanyeol needing solitude to sort through his paperwork, Kyungsoo getting bored just hovering behind his fiancée. But one kiss on Chanyeol's cheek and it's persuasive enough for the grip to loosen.
What does it feel like to be so sure of a love that a kiss is enough? For Kyungsoo he needs more than that, though what exactly 'more' he is yet to know.
Immediately, when he smells the sea and feels the sunshine, his feet take themselves up to the top deck and to the point where he's facing the bow of the ship directly, and the crowd mingles and crosses each other below him; the first time he had seen Jongin, and possibly the first time Jongin had seen him.
Something nudges his shoulder, quick and silent. Kyungsoo whips his head to see a paper plane falling by his feet.
It's made out of yellowed art stock and he unfolds it (as he unfolds his smile which he's tried so hard to suppress), to find a carelessly sketched portrait of him leaning on the railing with the sun in his eyes, details captured right down to the scrunch of his nose and the ring on his hand.
Signed Kai.
Another paper plane hits him on his hip and almost slips between the rails if Kyungsoo were not quick enough to snatch it, cradling it in his palms and eagerly unfolding the brown paper. This time it's a sketch of him on this exact spot from a few days ago, and Kyungsoo can remember Jongin sitting by the bench on the lower deck, imagines him watching Kyungsoo look out over the horizon and wishing for a taste of that blue sky.
"Come down, I have more." His voice sounds different when it's not shrouded by smoke and reminiscence. Jongin stands before him on the deck below, seeming to appear out of a daydream.
Kyungsoo leans over the railing eagerly and hangs his arms over, portraits in hand. "You're an artist?"
Jongin shrugs, looks down at his worn boots and back up at Kyungsoo with the corners of his mouth shyly turned upwards. Quieter - "Come down."
If something is going to happen with the utmost certainty, has it not already happened?
-
Jongin's portfolio is a black leather folder that looks like it had suffered through warfare and survived, tucked inside are sheets upon sheets of portraits- of people, places, visions, memories. And Kyungsoo at the very top of the pile, looking sad, pondering, studying his hands, studying the scenery.
"Flattering." Kyungsoo muses - never been a muse before. If these were put on auction he'd fight tooth and nail for the winning bid. "A little bit creepy."
"Not the usual response I get but I'll take it."
"Oh.” Kyungsoo lifts an eyebrow, fingers absentmindedly tracing a sketch of his own hands clasped together, ring glimmering in the sunlight. "So you regularly court your love interests though multitudes of portraits?"
Jongin bumps his shoulders against Kyungsoo's. "Not intentionally. Sometimes I can't help it."
"I'm jealous now, I thought I was the only one."
"Well you shouldn't be. They're not the ones I'm desperate to immortalise on paper right now."
Kyungsoo wants to ask where he learned to speak like this, which lucky girl or boy first taught him that phrase. Chanyeol's grip on his wrist flashes through his mind and he gulps the question back down. It doesn't slip Jongin's magnifying gaze, and his face looks like it wants an answer but is too afraid to ask.
"I have a fiancée." Said matter-of-fact, like reading aloud from the papers.
"I remember his name. Chanyeol." It sounds terribly out of place on his tongue. Kyungsoo wants to kiss it away. "Kyungsoo, is he always like that?"
"He wasn't always like that." The memories seem dusty but Kyungsoo's sure it wasn't too long ago when he could say it was love. "When we had met in prep school things were much different-"
"No.” Jongin’s voice is different, lighter, as if from a great distance away. "I mean in reality."
Reality. Cue the screen going to black, commercial break, the audience stretches and chatter erupts. Kyungsoo's pulled back into the back, back, back, into the twenty-four-seven convenience store across his bookstore, stubborn winter's night a sharp bite on the fogged windows, a storybook character by his side, their stomachs pumped with MSG noodles. How long have they been sitting here?
"We should head back to the store." Kyungsoo pushes himself up and he feels like he doesn't belong in his own body. Woozy, the world rotates and then reverses, he stumbles back and an arm comes up to steady him. It only makes him sicker that the touch feels so familiar. "We should really head back." Maybe bringing Jongin out of the bookstore was a bad decision, solidifying him into the fabric of this world. Want only leads to more want.
-
Back at the bookstore, clock in at midnight on the dot. The witching hour. Kyungsoo checks around the place to find nothing amok, nothing stolen (who in this world is depraved enough to steal books?), everything in its place save for perhaps a Prince missing from his storybook kingdom.
"Are we going to finish the story?” asks the Prince himself, all princely airs gone in the face of Kyungsoo's closed off expression. There are so many things running through his head but, after the night of masquerading as pre-established characters, it suddenly doesn't feel so comfortable for Kyungsoo to speak about them in his world.
So he nods, easing Jongin's shoulders a bit, runs to the back room for his laptop and brings the movie up from the depths of the internet. The bookstore and the night will still be here when they get back.
Leaning against the railing, Kyungsoo traces the waves on the ocean whilst Jongin traces his outline with a charcoal pencil. It's a beautiful day to be outside, and the people on deck agree so, strolling with their kids in hand and laughter in their bellies.
"He's not like that," Kyungsoo, the real one, says. "Chanyeol is the complete opposite, actually. He's not manipulative, never serious, is nice and funny and the perfect gentleman. It was so easy to love him."
"I was worried for a moment. If he was like that in your world I would find him and kick his ass."
Please let that be the character speaking, not the Prince. And yet at the same time, please let it be Jongin's true words. Is this love or is Kyungsoo just following the script?
"What are you thinking about?" Jongin asks, a furrow to his brow. The sea breeze keeps blowing strands of hair into his eyes so he has to keep brushing it away, his forehead now streaked with charcoal.
"Nothing." Kyungsoo mumbles by instinct, then, "I don't think you'll like this story very much. It's very-"
"Shut up. What did I say about spoilers?” Jongin looks so deeply concentrated at his portrait that the Titanic could crash and burn right now but it wouldn't stop him from trying to get Kyungsoo's lips right, or the cast of his eyelashes on his cheekbones. Kyungsoo wishes his mind was that clear and simple.
"Fine, fine."
Now, back to the story.
-
Kyungsoo sneaks out one of Chanyeol's forgotten evening suits and loafers for Jongin to wear to the dinner, the elder having to leave Jongin's tiny cabin before he can see the end product to meet Chanyeol back in their own suite. Before he had closed the door, Kyungsoo lingered by the frame to watch Jongin wage a struggle against his hair, slicking it with Kyungsoo's expensive gel he took from his room, Kyungsoo not noticing he was smiling until it was pointed out.
"Don't laugh," Jongin had said. "I'm used to my hair running wild and free."
This dinner didn't deserve Jongin's presence at all; Kyungsoo wanted the man all to himself, to stargaze on the top deck, to freeze themselves in the process, to sit in this tiny cabin with four other inmates and talk about their days, to breathe.
At the suite, Kyungsoo walks in on Chanyeol getting himself ready calmly and with an experienced hand, fixing his hair back and buttoning his cuff links, darker than onyx. "Where have you been, honey? Dinner starts in twenty minutes and you're not even dressed."
"I'm sorry, I lost track of time." Laid out on the bed is a pressed black suit Kyungsoo swears he's never seen in his life. "What's this?"
Chanyeol turns away from dressing table mirror. "Oh, yes, that's for you. I needed your suit to match the gift I was going to give you.”
"Gift?"
"Never mind that." Chanyeol waves his hand. "Put it on. We've lost a bit of time with your delay. And your, uh, friend, is joining us tonight, isn't he? Wouldn't want to be terrible hosts and arrive late now."
At the mention of Jongin, Kyungsoo's heart swells against his ribs and he hastily puts on the suit and feels its heaviness weigh his shoulders down. The silk is cold to the touch, but it is beautiful. Chanyeol approves, Kyungsoo can see it all over his face. He takes a step forward and Kyungsoo thinks he's going to kiss him, but instead takes a hold of both his hands, small in the cavern of Chanyeol's palms.
"I know we're due to marry in the Spring, and lord knows how many gifts I've already spoiled you with, but." Out slips a tiny wooden box from Chanyeol's pocket, an engagement ring box.
"Chanyeol, we're already engaged." Kyungsoo's throat tightens up. Every time he's reminded of their relationship the band of gold chokes him harder and harder.
"I know, I know. But while we were passing through your art auctions I saw this." Chanyeol opens the box, and nestled inside is a ring with a blue diamond larger than any Kyungsoo has ever seen in his life - as glittery and heartfelt as a teardrop. "I know that the past few days there's been a distance between us, and I hate that we've become that way, Kyungsoo. I want you to spend the rest of your life with me."
Kyungsoo doesn't know what to say so he doesn't say a word, lets Chanyeol slip another ring onto his finger, stacked on the already expensive engagement ring, and this isn't how he wanted the night to go at all. His left hand probably cost more than all the tickets of the bottom deck combined. Chanyeol takes the silence as emotionally stunned and bends his head down to kiss Kyungsoo softly on the lips.
Why does it taste like rust? He's tired of muttering the same prison sentence over and over.
The walk to the dining hall proves Kyungsoo's new suit to be horrible at keeping out the cold. When they step through the doors, the hall has already started it's nightly festivities - elegant chamber music by a string quartet floating over the high class food and even higher class conversation, circles of people greeting each other whilst at the same time tearing at each other’s eyes, tables of social class, the largest of all in the middle awaiting Chanyeol and his company.
It's the same every night, except everyone just puts on a new dress.
Chanyeol is swept up in the tide of it all, loosening his grip around Kyungsoo's waist and then slipping away with a business laugh and comment about the weather and the stock market with other aristocrats and they all blend into one another with the same pearly smile and shallow interests and Kyungsoo hates it all wants to run back to the back of the ship-
"Good evening, Mr Do." That voice, Kyungsoo could recognize it in a dream, in a different life. He turns around and has to take a step back, blinking away the disbelief because Jongin doesn't look like his Jongin anymore, but a Jongin that could pass off as one of them.
"Jongin!" Kyungsoo gasps.
"That's my name." Jongin smirks. "Are you blushing, Mr Do? Is it possible that I am making Do Kyungsoo's cheeks go red?"
Kyungsoo laughs, patting his cheeks down. Now the entire first class will know he has a crush on a handsome stowaway because of his cheeks. "Come on, let's get to dinner before my body does even more stupid things like kiss you on impulse or something."
Jongin pouts. "So you're not going to kiss me? I worked so hard on my hair."
This dinner might be harder than Kyungsoo had anticipated.
-
There was nothing for Kyungsoo to be worried about because Jongin is a natural, and the crowd adores him. He talks about ships, about the places he's been, about the Princes and Princesses he's met, and despite the fact that only Kyungsoo can see the moral in each story they're still entertaining tales. By the end of the night, he's pretty sure he's not the only in love with Jongin.
"I'm never inviting you over for dinner ever again," Kyungsoo whispers to Jongin in between courses and conversation. "Stop being so damn charming."
"I am what am I." Jongin shrugs. "But I've got my eyes set only on you."
"I'm gonna puke." Kyungsoo gags, but he can't stop smiling, and their knees bump underneath the table and Kyungsoo's never felt so obvious in love before but Jongin makes it seem so easy.
The night's final checkpoint rolls over: the men gets up to have a cigar and whisky in the lounge, Chanyeol included. Kyungsoo always sits out because he would always be too tired by the end of dinner, and would retire to their suite with a good book.
Chanyeol leers at Jongin as he gives Kyungsoo a kiss, square on the lips and a bit more open than usual, and Kyungsoo sees the set in Jongin's jaw.
Jongin bids Kyungsoo a farewell but a note slipped into his coat pocket tells Kyungsoo to meet him outside the glass doors, away from the sharp gaze of aristocracy. When Kyungsoo escapes the post-meal chatter of the women by feigning exhaustion, his feet quickly take him to the meeting spot, stomach churning with nerves and that warm, full feeling of being completely infatuated with someone else.
Jongin is leaning on the railing with his gaze on the stars when they meet.
"Jongin, what-"
Jongin pushes him hard against the wall behind them, Jongin suddenly everywhere and kissing him, hard as a punch, kissing away the rest of the sentence and kissing shamelessly. It's their first kiss but it doesn't feel like it, it feels like it's meant to be.
Jongin pulls back when their lungs dry up and their pants turn into smoke in the chill. Jongin has his head in the crook of Kyungsoo's shoulder. "I hated seeing him kiss you like that. I wanted to rip his hands off of you." He growls into Kyungsoo's neck.
Jongin, his mind reels. Jongin, his lips tingle. Jongin, his chest aches. "Kiss me again."
Jongin blows a large bout of air into Kyungsoo's shoulder, a laugh, maybe. He places a cold hand on one of Kyungsoo's cheeks, leans in to capture Kyungsoo's lips in another kiss, slower, gentler, fiancée and future out of mind. Just them, in the quiet of the night, love not a word but the way their lips fit and mould.
"Kyungsoo." In between kisses, breathless from the beauty of it. "I really, really, really, like this story."
Oh, Kyungsoo finally understands, so this is what the blue sky tastes like.
-
It takes another day of Kyungsoo disappearing from the suite and returning with the wind in his hair and a glow in his eyes for Chanyeol to be certain. Time was never on Kyungsoo's side anyway, so when he returns that evening to the suite and finds Chanyeol back earlier than usual, no longer pacing but still as a statue and his arms crossed, a solemn air in the room, Jongin shuffling nervously next to him, Kyungsoo gets a glimpse of how the story is going to end. Not all of them are going to come out of this alive.
"Kyungsoo." Both of them say at the same time, one cold and one warm. Kyungsoo keeps his eyes on Chanyeol's tense form, counting down to the moment he snaps.
"I knew the moment I saw you two together." Chanyeol says without an inflection to his voice. "How long did you think this could last, Kyungsoo? Did you think I would not notice my fiancée," he's shouting now, "having an affair with a flea-ridden scumbag?"
He's cornered with only the door behind him as an escape, but where would he run? Once word gets out that Chanyeol's already scorned male lover has gone against the very hand that protects him, protects his reputation, his life is done for.
And he would never leave Jongin, not here, not anywhere.
"Chanyeol." Kyungsoo shakes, vision unnaturally clear and sharp. "This is between us, leave Jongin out of it."
"You made him involved the moment you spread your legs for him."
The words feel like a slap. "Please, let him go. I'll do anything."
Chanyeol advances towards him, growing bigger and darker with each prowl. "Really now, honey? You've only just realized that you belonged to me? Only when I become a threat to your social acceptance?" His glare is furious but he has the upper hand.
"Anything. Let him go."
"You know he's only in it for the money. It was only a matter of time before your engagement rings disappear, and probably with him soon after."
Finally, Jongin takes a step forward, anger bursting at his seams. "You son of a-"
The room shakes, paintings crashing to the carpet and Kyungsoo staggering backwards trying to catch his balance. An eerie silence follows, broken only by a rush of what's going on from outside.
Something pulls at Kyungsoo's gut, like heavy dose of foreshadowing and a vision clouded by water, and he grabs at Jongin's arm and pulls with all his strength to get both of them outside and running down the hallway. They hear Chanyeol's furious yell by the time they turn the corner, dodging curious passengers wondering about the turbulence.
"Where are we going?" Jongin pants, his long clumsy legs having trouble keeping up with Kyungsoo's desperate ones.
"We need to get on deck, now." The ship is sinking, and there's not enough lifeboats to save even half of the three-thousand passengers. Reality Kyungsoo flickers with the character like a flame. He needs to save them. He needs Jongin to live. He needs-
The ending. They're just living a story, and the ending is the price Kyungsoo has to pay for stealing more time for himself to spend with Jongin, the character Jongin, the one who has to love because that's how the story is told. No, Kyungsoo grapples with the plot line, no no no. This is the Jongin he wants to live with forever. He doesn't want this story to end, wants the night to go on until they both forget where they came from and what they have to go back to.
-to get on a lifeboat before the rest of the ship realizes the coffin they are doomed to. The hallways thicken with people and crew workers handing out life jackets, and Jongin doesn't realize what's happening until they burst into the winter night and Kyungsoo leads him straight to a lifeboat, still overturned.
"The ship is sinking," Jongin mutters, gaping at him.
"There aren't enough lifeboats. No one saw use in them because this ship was built to be unsinkable. Soon the deck is going to be flooded with people and we need to be the first on these to survive-"
The world tilts on its axis. Kyungsoo grabs for the railing just as Jongin does, and everything is happening too soon and the ship isn't supposed to break and sink until at least an hour later. What's happening? Why is time going at twice the speed? The deck's still empty, they can still get on a lifeboat and live-
Kyungsoo's changing the plot, altering the ending so they both survive, fuck, the plot must be orientating itself to whatever he's doing to fulfil the already decided finale.
Vertigo, the ship rocks and begins to split in half, passengers pouring out of the stairwells onto the deck and attaching to the white railings.
"Kyungsoo!" Jongin shouts over the screams and wood snapping in half, "we need to get the lifeboats the right way up!"
Plot be damned, no one can take his love away, not when they've only started.
Letting go of the railing is a near impossible task when the ground keeps getting steeper and steeper, but a few people overhear Jongin and together, one hand hanging on for dear life and the other lifting the edges of a lifeboat, they manage to upturn one. The sound of wood snapping and metal bending has gotten louder than the screams.
"How do we get it off the ship?" Kyungsoo shouts.
Jongin analyses the drop into the ocean, flicks his head back to the lifeboat. "We just have to throw it off and hopes it lands the right way up."
"And how do we get on?"
Jongin bites his lips and shakes his head at Kyungsoo. "I don't know. Let's focus on getting the boat off first-"
The Titanic splits, the sound of a thousand screams and groaning metal shaking Kyungsoo to the core. The back of the ship drowns in the sea and the front half watches in horror as they are pulled vertically. People start to fall one by one down the deck, a straight fall into the icy black waters. The lifeboat, tied to the railing, hangs severely. They're running out of time.
"Jongin, I don't think this is going to work-"
"It has to. This lifeboat is our only hope for survival."
"How?" Kyungsoo wants to shout, but it only comes out as a cry.
"I do not know, but we have to try." The wind threads into Jongin's hair, the sea salt whipping it into a frenzy. His eyes harden, chin lifts, jaw sets. Suddenly before him, Prince Kai emerges out of the young poor stowaway, experiencing his second ship wreck. He looks at Kyungsoo and it's the same way he's always looked at him, when they first met eyes on the deck, when they exchanged looks over the dinner table.
Now they are both fighting against the ending. A Prince and a book keeper.
The plot retaliates. Kyungsoo's fingers slip off one by one and he feels gravity clutching onto him. Jongin grabs onto him before he can fall, but now only Jongin's one tight grip is holding them in place.
"Just hold on to me." Jongin huffs, face squeezed in strain.
They stay that way for a long time, Jongin hanging by a thread and Kyungsoo's rings slicing into their grip. The ship plunges into the ocean agonizingly slow, the screams break off one by one until everyone who's alive is either hanging on muttering quiet prayers, staring at the vast night sky. Kyungsoo doesn't speak; Jongin focuses all his energy in holding onto the white railing; from now the sliver of hope for survival gleams.
The black waters crawl up with each breath they take.
"Kyungsoo." Jongin gasps out. "I'm sorry. I don't think I can hold on much longer."
"Just a little bit longer.” Kyungsoo replies. The water is still far enough for the impact to hurt. "We'll both make it. We'll both survive."
"My arm-" Jongin's voice clips, and all the air rushes to Kyungsoo's stomach as Jongin's fingers give way and they free fall into the North Atlantic Ocean, piercing the water with a yell and the shock erases Kyungsoo's mind to black.
When he comes to, all he can think of is cold. An incomprehensible cold, like water past freezing point but refusing to solidify. His body jerks, more awake than he's ever been in his life, and he breaks out of the surface, lungs expanding for air.
"Jongin!" He shouts over the others trying to find a familiar face, "Jongin!"
No one calls his name in reply. Dread pulses through him like short, electric shocks. His heart thrashes wildly in its cage.
And then- "Kyungsoo!" Jongin's voice comes from somewhere to his right. "Kyungsoo, I'm over here!"
The water pinches his skin as he tries to follow Jongin's voice, but everyone is shouting at the same time and grabbing a hold onto one another to stay afloat. In the rush of things Kyungsoo forgot to grab them life jackets.
Someone, Jongin, grabs a hold of his waist and pulls him in. It's easier to shout than to speak because the shivering takes control over everything.
A piece of wood, a broken door, a floating trunk, Kyungsoo's eyes desperately search the dark surroundings for a sign of anything they can hold onto. He wants to tell Jongin to do the same but his teeth are chattering uncontrollably, no sound but hums and grumbles managing to get through.
Among the fury of people splashing to stay afloat and pieces of small debris, he sees half a door bobbing this way and that, big enough for one person. His arms slip around Jongin's trembling waist underneath the water and pull him to it, pushing him on top.
"No." Jongin trembles. "Y-you go."
"Jongin." Kyungsoo does his best to voice. "Go now."
Jongin gets on reluctantly, but hisses the instant his body is completely out of the water. "It's c-colder."
Kyungsoo puts his arms on the door and leans his head down, watching Jongin curl into himself on the door and breathing shallowly, chest rising up and down and up and down.
Heavy silence. What's left of the Titanic is engulfed by the ocean in one gulp. The water gets so cold that Kyungsoo's body ceases to feel it, only the numb sensation of where his limbs should be. His vision blurs, Jongin's pale face illuminated by the moon - the only thing tethering him to this world.
"Jongin." he isn't sure which one he's calling - the Prince or the stowaway or the mystery tycoon or the Red Queen or the vampire. They're all the same, aren't they? "Jongin."
"Kyungsoo." this is a different Jongin speaking, someone much more vulnerable, someone he's never heard before but he can recognise the voice even in death. "Kyungsoo, I love you."
"I love you too, God I love you," he whispers, taking shaky breaths. Please don't take him away from me, Kyungsoo begs, I love him. It's always been him. In every story, in any character, it's always been him.
In reality, the bookstore, the endless winter-spring night, it will always be him.
He gets another ten minutes, chattering his teeth and eyes fervently trying to soak in Jongin's face, regal and defying even on the brink of hypothermia. Ten minutes before the plot returns to reap what is due.
The first to go is Kyungsoo's sense of touch, his body warming up from his toes up his legs, across his hips, up his chest into his heart still insistent on beating. Then the noise disappears, falling away to a distant ringing in his ears, then nothing. Last, his vision fades, the image of Jongin seared into the back of his eyelids, wherever your mind goes when you die.
Somewhere, in a distant universe, someone is calling his name, and he's never heard his name sound so beautiful before.
The bookstore is still when he returns. The laptop burns against his thigh, credits rolling. Kyungsoo wriggles his toes and is relieved to feel them still there, warm in his shoes. "Jongin," he sighs, the name feeling a whole lot different on his tongue than it did at the start of the night. "Jongin, we're alive."
The credits continue to roll, playing for nobody to hear.
"Jongin?"
Kyungsoo looks beside him and finds the space empty. He gets up, peeks over the bookshelves, at the counter, even runs to glass windows to check the convenience store; empty. No sign of the wind swept hair or the caramel skin or the prince attire. His stomach knots.
He doesn't know what to do. "Jongin?" he calls out again. "Jongin? Jongin!" His throat tightens and his sobs rock the air. The books stay quiet, so much more smaller when their stories are trapped in between the covers.
Kyungsoo runs to the children's section and pulls out The Little Mermaid. He flips through the pages, "Jongin, come back. Don't leave me, don't-" The pages refuse to pull him in. "Jongin, I learnt my lesson. I get it. The ending doesn't matter, it's about the story. Please come back, please please please." He breaks down completely, "god I love you. I love you so much and you can't be gone, not yet, not until we're old and we're reading to our grandchildren and we argue about which part of the book is better-"
Nothing haunts like a memory. The Little Mermaid turns over to the beginning, where the prince is saved by the Little Mermaid, and she heaves him up the shore, looks at him as if he's the most beautiful thing the earth has ever created, knows that she would give up anything just to spend another hour with him.
Wiping away his tears and running nose, Kyungsoo flips to the very first page. Jongin, his mind moans. He'll try again, but this time every word is as precious as a miracle.
"Far out in the ocean the water is as blue as the petals of the loveliest cornflower..."
The morning clocks in at three a.m. His shift is over.
-
The bookstore by the bend doesn't close until the early morning, though management might change that because customers cut off at around eleven, but it's in constantly in an immaculate state and the graveyard shift worker spares no effort taking care of the place, making sure each and every book is in order and crease free, so the hours stay as it is.
Kyungsoo comes into the store five minutes before ten to find the place looking like a crime scene- books all over the floor, stacked on top of each other in the shelves, coffee cups slotted in with them.
He has his work cut out for him, but who else is going to take care of this place if he isn't going to? Your love is your responsibility.
First he gathers all the strewn books on the floor into a neat pile, than organizes them by title, and so on and so on. He takes his time, a whole five hours spans before him like a great chasm.
He's sorting a particularly nasty sandwich of adult contemporary and cooking books when a draft caresses his cheeks, alerting to a customer in the store. Kyungsoo stands on his tip toes to look over the shelf, but he sees no head of hair or hears any footsteps.
Creepy. Such a shame Kyungsoo isn't afraid of ghosts.
But just to make sure, Kyungsoo walks out of the shelves and into the open space separating the counter and the books, and there is someone else in the store: a little girl in a pink princess dress, trying to peek over the counter.
"Excuse me, princess," Kyungsoo say, smiling, "how may I be of service?"
The girl turns around - she can't be older than five - and curtsies. "Hello, I'm looking for a book."
"You've come to the right place. What book are you looking for, your highness?"
The little girl smiles, blushing a little, "it's about a mermaid loves a prince, but he's human so they can't be together."
"Ah," Kyungsoo's smile widens, "The Little Mermaid?"
"Yes!"
"And do you remember how it ends?"
"Uhh," she scratches her head, "no. My cousin read it to me but I don't remember."
"No worries, your highness, come right this way."
Kyungsoo takes out both versions and lays them on the floor. They plop themselves down on the bean bag and impromptu story time begins, Kyungsoo getting into character and playing out each scene, watching in delight as the little girl laughs and claps her hands.
Another draft ruffles him, this time followed by heavy footsteps and heavy panting. "There you are!" Kyungsoo freezes at the voice.
The little girl turns her head and her eyes sparkle, "Jongin! I found the book you wanted!"
Kyungsoo sees the scene in frames, meets the stranger puffed out at the glass door, the wind still in his hair, eyes wide with relief and laughter, a smile that can't help becoming a smirk, the feeling deep in his gut that this is it.
"I'm really sorry about my little cousin," Jongin, this world's Jongin, apologizes as he gets his breathing under control. "I keep losing her 'cause she's so small." Their eyes lock in on each other and maybe there's no spark of recognition on Jongin's part, and maybe he doesn't know how this story is going to end but he doesn't care. The night's just started.
"It's alright," Kyungsoo waves him over, "we were just in the middle of a story. Care to join us?"
❊ title: paperback romance
The ship of dreams, the headlines say, unsinkable even by God. It all didn't matter to Kyungsoo though - made of titanium or made of paper, a boat was a boat and this one was sailing him to a slow death, choked by a band of gold around his ring finger.
The air singes his skin with sea-salt and the dread that when this ship docks in America, his time will be up.
Hustle and bustle, they are led to a walkway - a plank really - bridging the port and the ship with his fiancée leading at the front, gazing across the crowd, waving, crying, bidding the passengers farewell and his face doesn't break into any emotion. Sculpted from cold marble, Kyungsoo thinks, even the winter sun's afraid of a touch.
"Bring them up to our room. Be careful," Chanyeol - who else could it be - says to the more-suitcase-than-man man. "They're worth more than six of you."
The tower of suitcases runs off into the crowd of tycoons and family made of pearls and small talk. Chanyeol has Kyungsoo's hand in his, strong but not crushing, and it gets a few looks but they avert their eyes upon Chanyeol's hard set confidence and hand-embroided waistcoat of china blue. This man was more than old money, he had wealth written into his genetic makeup, son of one of the richest men in the Northern Hemisphere. Look at him wrong and he could run your company into the dust by the end of the week. For someone like him it didn't matter that he had a male lover.
It was the only reason why Kyungsoo was still invited to dinners by the in, why he's still considered part of the in. Chanyeol was the lifeboat keeping him afloat in these shark infested waters. His own personal fortune is a small shiny rock compared to Chanyeol's treasure trove.
Once upon a time they were in love, a real summer romance of secret meetings and fist fights against everyone who spat on what they were, but when they finally got the peace they had wanted, It's impossible to win a fight against the watering down of time, against the realisation that love is not enough.
Of course Chanyeol still loves him. Kyungsoo who's been with him for over a decade, unchanging, unyielding, small enough to fit in his arms and knows his place as the dutiful wife figure. Maybe that's why he proposed, and Kyungsoo said yes because otherwise he would sink to the bottom of the ocean.
Not that any of this matters. Life's not spectacular, not in the least bit, but it's fair.
Their room is a low ceiling vastness of red satin and Kyungsoo's paintings bringing some ease to the eyes. Chanyeol shakes his head as he paces the room, "I swear I never will understand your affinity for art. Why don't you take lessons and then we can milk a few dollars out of that."
"Just because I'm no good at art," Kyungsoo says, tracing the brass frame of a Monet he won in an auction, "doesn't mean I can't appreciate it. Just as how you don't understand the meaning of art but you still choose to say your opinion."
Chanyeol makes an unimpressed hum. "Honey, Paris has made you- how do I say this?"
"Outspoken?”
"Frank." Chanyeol decides, and Kyungsoo can feel his gaze on him but Kyungsoo knows it doesn't really see him. By the next hour Chanyeol won't even have remembered this conversation, too used to Kyungsoo's quiet presence and perfectly timed nods of approval.
"I'm going outside," Kyungsoo says. The air is thin. Chanyeol's already making his way to the other room, probably in search of a waiter for a cup of tea.
-
The ship sets sail with a jolt and thirty-three hundred lives sealed aboard. The passengers spread themselves across the deck, feeling the wind blow through them like a field of wheat, though it's mainly the lower class that enjoys this little pleasure. The top deck belonging to the upper class is near empty, most likely they're all inside un-packing their expensive clothes to fill the wardrobes and preparing for lunch. Even Kyungsoo feels a tug to the dining hall; meals have become a social necessity.
His eyes scans the horizon, the blue on blue and the fireball blazing in the sky, the people laughing and pointing at things in the ocean, himself becoming less and less of a person and more of film camera, absorbing light and spitting out a prettier, picturesque version of everything. At the bow of the ship are a pair of boys or men or both, arms spread like wings and throwing their heads back, as if they're swallowing the sky.
Kyungsoo wishes he could join them, wishes the ship wasn't stupidly sectioned off and the bottom deck wasn't lower-class lava. He imagines himself there, sixteen and free again, and the ship hurtles on into the open sea - indestructible and not looking back.
-
Chanyeol only takes walks outside in between meals to get his daily dose of sun, so Kyungsoo joins him because he tries to spend his time on deck as much as he can, and they are meant to be engaged, so for appearances sake, if anything.
"I picture a house," Chanyeol says, squinting into the sunlight, "with a big garden and a pond with koi and roses lining the hedge. That's what I hope we'll find in America."
"Who's going to take care of it?" Kyungsoo asks.
"You are, of course. You'll be in charge of it all. Sure I'll hire a few gardeners but I don't trust anyone would be able to see my vision as you do."
Kyungsoo smiles, more reflex than feeling. "That sounds nice. But I'd prefer to sit inside in the library and read."
"You can't possibly want to read for the rest of your life. And you would get pale."
Kyungsoo has a business degree but his life has already been settled by their engagement. If something is going to happen with absolute certainty, hasn't it already happened? "I love to read, you know that."
"And collect odd pieces of art."
"Art is subjective."
"Honey." Chanyeol shakes his head. He's always shaking his head at Kyungsoo lately. "Art is for those who don't believe in aspirations. I know you have aspirations, marrying me being one, for example. Hopefully running a branch of my company in the near future is another."
Kyungsoo's fist clenches against his thigh, but his face is calm, not even a ripple of annoyance. They have reached the curve of the deck facing the bow of the ship, the bottom deck now emptier than when Kyungsoo saw it last. All around is the noise of the ship and distant, indistinct chatter.
"My goodness it's freezing out here," Chanyeol says despite his wool coat and the sun leaning all over him. "We should head inside, don't want to catch a cold and ruin our journey."
"I think I'll stay outside for a while. I'll be sure to join you for tea later."
Chanyeol sighs but doesn't comment, simply leans in and kisses Kyungsoo gently on the forehead. Then he's gone, and Kyungsoo lets out a ragged breath. He wants to curse at the air but only then does he feel a prickling on his left cheek, like it's being grazed by a pair of eyes.
His eyes dart quickly to the bottom deck to hunt out the perpetrator and doesn't expect to find him so quickly and so obviously. Kyungsoo has to avert his gaze back onto the ruler-drawn horizon. In his head: young man, very young, in a clean but loose and worn out brown coat, pretty boy looks that would make him popular with the girls if he were still attending school, a longing but not asking gaze at Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo checks again, and the man notices that he is no longer admiring in secret. They both look away as if burned, but the tingling feeling in Kyungsoo’s cheeks is still there, possibly a blush now but this is so inappropriate - Kyungsoo's engaged, for goodness sake, to a handsome wealthy man and now is not the time for giggly teenage romance.
Maybe he's overreacting. He checks one last time and yes the man's looking and smirking and that pushes Kyungsoo to his limit. He gives the man an incredulous look, gets a shrug in reply, shakes his own head, the smirk deepens, like passing notes under the desk.
I'm sorry, pretty boy, but I'm a bird in a cage you can't put your hands on.
Somehow, like a radio in his head, just admiring the pretty view.
Kyungsoo pushes himself off the railing, burying the urge to look back at the man deep deep deep inside, and spins on his heels to leave. Chanyeol and his penned out future is waiting inside for him.
-
Their lives cross the next chilly night, the propellers churning the sea water - drowning out any fireworks that could have exploded when their eyes met. He already knows the man's name, and the cigarette burning low in between his fingers, and the crumpled sketch of Kyungsoo in his coat's pocket, and the certainty that this is it. Marriage itself isn't the killer; love is.
But for those who want the whole story -
Kyungsoo is running through the deck and he hopes that the night's dark enough so those who see him don't see the tears streaked down his face. He hates people seeing him cry.
He doesn't know where he's running to until he sees the white metal railing spanning itself across the edge of the light from the lonely orange lamp, and he feels it slam into his stomach as his head lurches over, staring into the frothy waters of the night ocean and wondering why he's the tragic young man that is given the complete opposite of those boys transforming to eagles at the bow of the ship the afternoon they had set sail, swallowing the endless blue sky. Instead he's being swallowed by the night.
"Hey." Someone calls from behind him tentatively. Kyungsoo's grip is glued to the railing but he straightens himself out and faces the voice, and of course, congratulations whoever wrote the plot, it's the man he had a conversation with through eye contact yesterday afternoon. He's in the same clothes, hair ruffled by the wind, an arm half extended out.
So the solution to Kyungsoo's marital dilemma is to throw in a second love interest.
"Leave me alone," Kyungsoo manages to rasp out. A stranger catching him in this state of lost-love; no matter what timeline it's always the same story.
"I will after I make sure you'll be alright, sir." The man keeps by the orange light of the lamp and he's keeping with the nonchalant attitude by lighting a cigarette, but Kyungsoo makes out the tension in his shoulders and those eyes that do not, will not stray from Kyungsoo.
"I'm fine. It's not I'm like hanging off the back of the boat."
"I agree with you, sir, but I've seen many people lean over the rails and accidentally slip, or were pushed."
"Are you an expert in deaths on ships or something?"
"Nope, just ships. It's how I get around." Then a smile that can't help but look like a smirk on the man's face.
"Like a stowaway?" Kyungsoo's grip on the railing loosens with each word and he sniffs away his tears.
"We can't all be princes."
The man has his hand extended now and Kyungsoo scowls, pressing himself against the railing. "If you think that by chatting me up and playing the gallant hero you'll get me into bed at the end of the night, you're terribly mistaken."
The man looks amusedly shocked, this fuckboy. "Caught me." Chuckles, but shakes his head and exhales a puff of smoke. God, the smell cuts to him even in the icy air. "But honestly, that wasn't my intention at all, sir. When you see someone in possible danger, you help, or at least that's what my mama taught me. I would never disrespect you like that."
"I don't believe you."
The man puffs out another stream of white smoke. "Alright then, believe this. I was on a ship cruising the Atlantic a few weeks ago, and I fell deeply in love with a beautiful girl. You should've seen me, I was ready to drop everything in my life for her. But she was in love with someone else - a wealthy lad with estates bigger than any I've ever heard of." The man steps forward and leans against the railing with Kyungsoo, half a metre and worlds between them. "Everyone called him a prince. She did as well, and she loved him just as much as I loved her, maybe even more. But love…" The stars above blink, confused.
"Love is unforgiving." Kyungsoo finishes.
The man takes one last drag of his cigarette and throws it into the sea. "He fell in love with someone else, a princess of all people." They both stare into the distance and Kyungsoo knows, he's never before been sure of anything in his life, they're looking at the same scene. "She threw herself into the sea, would rather drown in the ocean than watch the love of her life be happy with another."
Of all the things to say running through Kyungsoo's head, he settles with, "I'm sorry.”
"Me too." The man pushes himself off the rail and returns back into the glow of the lamp. "But don't take it as a pity story. What I'm trying to say is, which I really should've said to begin with, don't jump for love. It's not worth it."
Kyungsoo weighs his options, considers which is more dangerous: the long fall off the precipice of his life into the abyss or the twenty metre drop into the below-zero waters, sliced to chunks by propellers.
Somehow he knows he's already chosen his path. "Kyungsoo," he says, taking a step away from the rail and into the orange light, which doesn't really provide any warmth but it feels like coming home. "My name is Kyungsoo."
This close, the man looks so much more like his age, every emotion through Kyungsoo's camera lens eyes captured with absolute clarity. He smiles victoriously, but respectfully takes a step back to give Kyungsoo his space. "I'm Jongin, or Kai, depends on who you ask."
"And which do you prefer?"
"For you - Jongin."
Kyungsoo rubs his hands together and blows hot air onto them so they feel more like hands and less like ice cubes. "Okay, Jongin comma Kai." he gives him, Jongin, a small smile like they're sharing a big secret. "Now that that you've got me-"
The ship jolts and hurtles them out onto the deck, Kyungsoo letting out a surprised shout, slamming into the railing and nearly toppling over if not for Jongin's body knocking into him, sandwiching him in place before the ship can jolt anymore and Kyungsoo would disappear overboard. Kyungsoo's heart racing as if he had fallen, Jongin's shocked face revealing that he had thought he had lost Kyungsoo to the waters.
Before Kyungsoo could find his voice amongst the floodwater of blood rushing through his ears, a panicked shout pierces through the white noise. Jongin has a tight grip on the railing and around Kyungsoo's shivering waist.
"Kyungsoo!" A familiar voice, as if muffled through a wall. "Kyungsoo!"
He only realises too late that it's Chanyeol with their butler, in their search for Kyungsoo who had excused himself from supper over fifteen minutes ago, leaving his coat behind. The search party catches Kyungsoo locked in Jongin's protective embrace pushed against the back of the ship, Kyungsoo's face drained of blood from his close brush with death.
There is no positive spin to this.
"Get your hands off him, you filthy beggar!" Chanyeol growls out before he rips Jongin away from Kyungsoo and the rail.
"No sir, you've got the wrong idea-"
“Like hell I do.” Underneath Chanyeol's thick black scarf Kyungsoo knows his veins are jumping out of his neck. "I know assault when I see it, and if you speak another word I will throw you overboard."
Their butler, Jongdae, gently ushers Kyungsoo back into the light of the lamp, drapes his white coat over his shaking shoulders. His mind is six feet from the waters along with his voice and any form of comprehension, just watches a string of words fall out of Chanyeol's mouth but not hearing a sound.
"I swear, Kyungsoo and I were not-"
"I do not want to hear my fiancée's name spoken with that dirty mouth-"
"If you would just listen, sir-"
Chanyeol's arm tenses and Kyungsoo knows what's going to happen next, has already seen this scene played out so many times with just them two alone in mid-argument, and through his haze he is quick enough to grab onto Chanyeol's arm before it turns into a punch straight to the jaw. "Chanyeol, stop." His whisper is the loudest thing they've heard all night. "We were just talking when the ship jolted, and we lost our balance. That's all."
Jongin looks at him worriedly but Kyungsoo keeps his eyes trained on Chanyeol. One look at the other man and Chanyeol would be able to tell instantly what was going on through Kyungsoo's eyes.
"That's all?" Chanyeol doesn't want to believe it, the conflict clear in his furrowed brow, but why would his dear Kyungsoo lie?
"That's all." Kyungsoo nods, pulling his coat to keep out the creeping chill. "If it wasn't for him I would have gone overboard."
"Ah." Chanyeol rubs his hands, the punch probably still running through them. "So he's a saviour of sorts."
"Yes, so it would be kind of you if you stopped harassing him. In fact, invite him for dinner sometime."
"Dinner." Their playing field, the ultimate gift someone like them could offer - social advancement, "Alright." Then Chanyeol turns to Jongin who seemed to have shrunk in the realisation of their blatant separate social standing. "I apologize for my behaviour. My fiancée seems to be eager for you to join us for dinner. Come to the dining hall tomorrow, 8 am." Kyungsoo knows this is the last thing Chanyeol wants to do right now but the cold is beginning to settle over them and the quickest way to get inside is to surrender to whatever would give a little to everyone but not enough to have them begging for more.
Jongin is searching Kyungsoo's face for an answer, and honestly Kyungsoo doesn't want Jongin anywhere near their poisonous lifestyle, but above everything - the icy night, the future husband who's mind is wandering back to the warmth of first class accommodation, his own heart no longer in his chest but in the hands of a possible stowaway who hasn't yet learn to smile properly, Kyungsoo desperately wants to see Jongin again.
So he nods imperceptibly, and something like relief spreads across Jongin's face. "Yes sir, it would be an honour."
They don't stay a moment longer. Chanyeol puts an arm around Kyungsoo who still hasn’t stopped shivering, and the last thing he says to Jongin wavers and splits in the air.
"Don't forget the dress code."
-
After breakfast the next day Chanyeol is very reluctant on letting Kyungsoo wander off on his own, last night's events still fresh in the room. But both of them aren't used to being together for the whole day, clashing interests, Chanyeol needing solitude to sort through his paperwork, Kyungsoo getting bored just hovering behind his fiancée. But one kiss on Chanyeol's cheek and it's persuasive enough for the grip to loosen.
What does it feel like to be so sure of a love that a kiss is enough? For Kyungsoo he needs more than that, though what exactly 'more' he is yet to know.
Immediately, when he smells the sea and feels the sunshine, his feet take themselves up to the top deck and to the point where he's facing the bow of the ship directly, and the crowd mingles and crosses each other below him; the first time he had seen Jongin, and possibly the first time Jongin had seen him.
Something nudges his shoulder, quick and silent. Kyungsoo whips his head to see a paper plane falling by his feet.
It's made out of yellowed art stock and he unfolds it (as he unfolds his smile which he's tried so hard to suppress), to find a carelessly sketched portrait of him leaning on the railing with the sun in his eyes, details captured right down to the scrunch of his nose and the ring on his hand.
Signed Kai.
Another paper plane hits him on his hip and almost slips between the rails if Kyungsoo were not quick enough to snatch it, cradling it in his palms and eagerly unfolding the brown paper. This time it's a sketch of him on this exact spot from a few days ago, and Kyungsoo can remember Jongin sitting by the bench on the lower deck, imagines him watching Kyungsoo look out over the horizon and wishing for a taste of that blue sky.
"Come down, I have more." His voice sounds different when it's not shrouded by smoke and reminiscence. Jongin stands before him on the deck below, seeming to appear out of a daydream.
Kyungsoo leans over the railing eagerly and hangs his arms over, portraits in hand. "You're an artist?"
Jongin shrugs, looks down at his worn boots and back up at Kyungsoo with the corners of his mouth shyly turned upwards. Quieter - "Come down."
If something is going to happen with the utmost certainty, has it not already happened?
-
Jongin's portfolio is a black leather folder that looks like it had suffered through warfare and survived, tucked inside are sheets upon sheets of portraits- of people, places, visions, memories. And Kyungsoo at the very top of the pile, looking sad, pondering, studying his hands, studying the scenery.
"Flattering." Kyungsoo muses - never been a muse before. If these were put on auction he'd fight tooth and nail for the winning bid. "A little bit creepy."
"Not the usual response I get but I'll take it."
"Oh.” Kyungsoo lifts an eyebrow, fingers absentmindedly tracing a sketch of his own hands clasped together, ring glimmering in the sunlight. "So you regularly court your love interests though multitudes of portraits?"
Jongin bumps his shoulders against Kyungsoo's. "Not intentionally. Sometimes I can't help it."
"I'm jealous now, I thought I was the only one."
"Well you shouldn't be. They're not the ones I'm desperate to immortalise on paper right now."
Kyungsoo wants to ask where he learned to speak like this, which lucky girl or boy first taught him that phrase. Chanyeol's grip on his wrist flashes through his mind and he gulps the question back down. It doesn't slip Jongin's magnifying gaze, and his face looks like it wants an answer but is too afraid to ask.
"I have a fiancée." Said matter-of-fact, like reading aloud from the papers.
"I remember his name. Chanyeol." It sounds terribly out of place on his tongue. Kyungsoo wants to kiss it away. "Kyungsoo, is he always like that?"
"He wasn't always like that." The memories seem dusty but Kyungsoo's sure it wasn't too long ago when he could say it was love. "When we had met in prep school things were much different-"
"No.” Jongin’s voice is different, lighter, as if from a great distance away. "I mean in reality."
Reality. Cue the screen going to black, commercial break, the audience stretches and chatter erupts. Kyungsoo's pulled back into the back, back, back, into the twenty-four-seven convenience store across his bookstore, stubborn winter's night a sharp bite on the fogged windows, a storybook character by his side, their stomachs pumped with MSG noodles. How long have they been sitting here?
"We should head back to the store." Kyungsoo pushes himself up and he feels like he doesn't belong in his own body. Woozy, the world rotates and then reverses, he stumbles back and an arm comes up to steady him. It only makes him sicker that the touch feels so familiar. "We should really head back." Maybe bringing Jongin out of the bookstore was a bad decision, solidifying him into the fabric of this world. Want only leads to more want.
-
Back at the bookstore, clock in at midnight on the dot. The witching hour. Kyungsoo checks around the place to find nothing amok, nothing stolen (who in this world is depraved enough to steal books?), everything in its place save for perhaps a Prince missing from his storybook kingdom.
"Are we going to finish the story?” asks the Prince himself, all princely airs gone in the face of Kyungsoo's closed off expression. There are so many things running through his head but, after the night of masquerading as pre-established characters, it suddenly doesn't feel so comfortable for Kyungsoo to speak about them in his world.
So he nods, easing Jongin's shoulders a bit, runs to the back room for his laptop and brings the movie up from the depths of the internet. The bookstore and the night will still be here when they get back.
Leaning against the railing, Kyungsoo traces the waves on the ocean whilst Jongin traces his outline with a charcoal pencil. It's a beautiful day to be outside, and the people on deck agree so, strolling with their kids in hand and laughter in their bellies.
"He's not like that," Kyungsoo, the real one, says. "Chanyeol is the complete opposite, actually. He's not manipulative, never serious, is nice and funny and the perfect gentleman. It was so easy to love him."
"I was worried for a moment. If he was like that in your world I would find him and kick his ass."
Please let that be the character speaking, not the Prince. And yet at the same time, please let it be Jongin's true words. Is this love or is Kyungsoo just following the script?
"What are you thinking about?" Jongin asks, a furrow to his brow. The sea breeze keeps blowing strands of hair into his eyes so he has to keep brushing it away, his forehead now streaked with charcoal.
"Nothing." Kyungsoo mumbles by instinct, then, "I don't think you'll like this story very much. It's very-"
"Shut up. What did I say about spoilers?” Jongin looks so deeply concentrated at his portrait that the Titanic could crash and burn right now but it wouldn't stop him from trying to get Kyungsoo's lips right, or the cast of his eyelashes on his cheekbones. Kyungsoo wishes his mind was that clear and simple.
"Fine, fine."
Now, back to the story.
-
Kyungsoo sneaks out one of Chanyeol's forgotten evening suits and loafers for Jongin to wear to the dinner, the elder having to leave Jongin's tiny cabin before he can see the end product to meet Chanyeol back in their own suite. Before he had closed the door, Kyungsoo lingered by the frame to watch Jongin wage a struggle against his hair, slicking it with Kyungsoo's expensive gel he took from his room, Kyungsoo not noticing he was smiling until it was pointed out.
"Don't laugh," Jongin had said. "I'm used to my hair running wild and free."
This dinner didn't deserve Jongin's presence at all; Kyungsoo wanted the man all to himself, to stargaze on the top deck, to freeze themselves in the process, to sit in this tiny cabin with four other inmates and talk about their days, to breathe.
At the suite, Kyungsoo walks in on Chanyeol getting himself ready calmly and with an experienced hand, fixing his hair back and buttoning his cuff links, darker than onyx. "Where have you been, honey? Dinner starts in twenty minutes and you're not even dressed."
"I'm sorry, I lost track of time." Laid out on the bed is a pressed black suit Kyungsoo swears he's never seen in his life. "What's this?"
Chanyeol turns away from dressing table mirror. "Oh, yes, that's for you. I needed your suit to match the gift I was going to give you.”
"Gift?"
"Never mind that." Chanyeol waves his hand. "Put it on. We've lost a bit of time with your delay. And your, uh, friend, is joining us tonight, isn't he? Wouldn't want to be terrible hosts and arrive late now."
At the mention of Jongin, Kyungsoo's heart swells against his ribs and he hastily puts on the suit and feels its heaviness weigh his shoulders down. The silk is cold to the touch, but it is beautiful. Chanyeol approves, Kyungsoo can see it all over his face. He takes a step forward and Kyungsoo thinks he's going to kiss him, but instead takes a hold of both his hands, small in the cavern of Chanyeol's palms.
"I know we're due to marry in the Spring, and lord knows how many gifts I've already spoiled you with, but." Out slips a tiny wooden box from Chanyeol's pocket, an engagement ring box.
"Chanyeol, we're already engaged." Kyungsoo's throat tightens up. Every time he's reminded of their relationship the band of gold chokes him harder and harder.
"I know, I know. But while we were passing through your art auctions I saw this." Chanyeol opens the box, and nestled inside is a ring with a blue diamond larger than any Kyungsoo has ever seen in his life - as glittery and heartfelt as a teardrop. "I know that the past few days there's been a distance between us, and I hate that we've become that way, Kyungsoo. I want you to spend the rest of your life with me."
Kyungsoo doesn't know what to say so he doesn't say a word, lets Chanyeol slip another ring onto his finger, stacked on the already expensive engagement ring, and this isn't how he wanted the night to go at all. His left hand probably cost more than all the tickets of the bottom deck combined. Chanyeol takes the silence as emotionally stunned and bends his head down to kiss Kyungsoo softly on the lips.
Why does it taste like rust? He's tired of muttering the same prison sentence over and over.
The walk to the dining hall proves Kyungsoo's new suit to be horrible at keeping out the cold. When they step through the doors, the hall has already started it's nightly festivities - elegant chamber music by a string quartet floating over the high class food and even higher class conversation, circles of people greeting each other whilst at the same time tearing at each other’s eyes, tables of social class, the largest of all in the middle awaiting Chanyeol and his company.
It's the same every night, except everyone just puts on a new dress.
Chanyeol is swept up in the tide of it all, loosening his grip around Kyungsoo's waist and then slipping away with a business laugh and comment about the weather and the stock market with other aristocrats and they all blend into one another with the same pearly smile and shallow interests and Kyungsoo hates it all wants to run back to the back of the ship-
"Good evening, Mr Do." That voice, Kyungsoo could recognize it in a dream, in a different life. He turns around and has to take a step back, blinking away the disbelief because Jongin doesn't look like his Jongin anymore, but a Jongin that could pass off as one of them.
"Jongin!" Kyungsoo gasps.
"That's my name." Jongin smirks. "Are you blushing, Mr Do? Is it possible that I am making Do Kyungsoo's cheeks go red?"
Kyungsoo laughs, patting his cheeks down. Now the entire first class will know he has a crush on a handsome stowaway because of his cheeks. "Come on, let's get to dinner before my body does even more stupid things like kiss you on impulse or something."
Jongin pouts. "So you're not going to kiss me? I worked so hard on my hair."
This dinner might be harder than Kyungsoo had anticipated.
-
There was nothing for Kyungsoo to be worried about because Jongin is a natural, and the crowd adores him. He talks about ships, about the places he's been, about the Princes and Princesses he's met, and despite the fact that only Kyungsoo can see the moral in each story they're still entertaining tales. By the end of the night, he's pretty sure he's not the only in love with Jongin.
"I'm never inviting you over for dinner ever again," Kyungsoo whispers to Jongin in between courses and conversation. "Stop being so damn charming."
"I am what am I." Jongin shrugs. "But I've got my eyes set only on you."
"I'm gonna puke." Kyungsoo gags, but he can't stop smiling, and their knees bump underneath the table and Kyungsoo's never felt so obvious in love before but Jongin makes it seem so easy.
The night's final checkpoint rolls over: the men gets up to have a cigar and whisky in the lounge, Chanyeol included. Kyungsoo always sits out because he would always be too tired by the end of dinner, and would retire to their suite with a good book.
Chanyeol leers at Jongin as he gives Kyungsoo a kiss, square on the lips and a bit more open than usual, and Kyungsoo sees the set in Jongin's jaw.
Jongin bids Kyungsoo a farewell but a note slipped into his coat pocket tells Kyungsoo to meet him outside the glass doors, away from the sharp gaze of aristocracy. When Kyungsoo escapes the post-meal chatter of the women by feigning exhaustion, his feet quickly take him to the meeting spot, stomach churning with nerves and that warm, full feeling of being completely infatuated with someone else.
Jongin is leaning on the railing with his gaze on the stars when they meet.
"Jongin, what-"
Jongin pushes him hard against the wall behind them, Jongin suddenly everywhere and kissing him, hard as a punch, kissing away the rest of the sentence and kissing shamelessly. It's their first kiss but it doesn't feel like it, it feels like it's meant to be.
Jongin pulls back when their lungs dry up and their pants turn into smoke in the chill. Jongin has his head in the crook of Kyungsoo's shoulder. "I hated seeing him kiss you like that. I wanted to rip his hands off of you." He growls into Kyungsoo's neck.
Jongin, his mind reels. Jongin, his lips tingle. Jongin, his chest aches. "Kiss me again."
Jongin blows a large bout of air into Kyungsoo's shoulder, a laugh, maybe. He places a cold hand on one of Kyungsoo's cheeks, leans in to capture Kyungsoo's lips in another kiss, slower, gentler, fiancée and future out of mind. Just them, in the quiet of the night, love not a word but the way their lips fit and mould.
"Kyungsoo." In between kisses, breathless from the beauty of it. "I really, really, really, like this story."
Oh, Kyungsoo finally understands, so this is what the blue sky tastes like.
-
It takes another day of Kyungsoo disappearing from the suite and returning with the wind in his hair and a glow in his eyes for Chanyeol to be certain. Time was never on Kyungsoo's side anyway, so when he returns that evening to the suite and finds Chanyeol back earlier than usual, no longer pacing but still as a statue and his arms crossed, a solemn air in the room, Jongin shuffling nervously next to him, Kyungsoo gets a glimpse of how the story is going to end. Not all of them are going to come out of this alive.
"Kyungsoo." Both of them say at the same time, one cold and one warm. Kyungsoo keeps his eyes on Chanyeol's tense form, counting down to the moment he snaps.
"I knew the moment I saw you two together." Chanyeol says without an inflection to his voice. "How long did you think this could last, Kyungsoo? Did you think I would not notice my fiancée," he's shouting now, "having an affair with a flea-ridden scumbag?"
He's cornered with only the door behind him as an escape, but where would he run? Once word gets out that Chanyeol's already scorned male lover has gone against the very hand that protects him, protects his reputation, his life is done for.
And he would never leave Jongin, not here, not anywhere.
"Chanyeol." Kyungsoo shakes, vision unnaturally clear and sharp. "This is between us, leave Jongin out of it."
"You made him involved the moment you spread your legs for him."
The words feel like a slap. "Please, let him go. I'll do anything."
Chanyeol advances towards him, growing bigger and darker with each prowl. "Really now, honey? You've only just realized that you belonged to me? Only when I become a threat to your social acceptance?" His glare is furious but he has the upper hand.
"Anything. Let him go."
"You know he's only in it for the money. It was only a matter of time before your engagement rings disappear, and probably with him soon after."
Finally, Jongin takes a step forward, anger bursting at his seams. "You son of a-"
The room shakes, paintings crashing to the carpet and Kyungsoo staggering backwards trying to catch his balance. An eerie silence follows, broken only by a rush of what's going on from outside.
Something pulls at Kyungsoo's gut, like heavy dose of foreshadowing and a vision clouded by water, and he grabs at Jongin's arm and pulls with all his strength to get both of them outside and running down the hallway. They hear Chanyeol's furious yell by the time they turn the corner, dodging curious passengers wondering about the turbulence.
"Where are we going?" Jongin pants, his long clumsy legs having trouble keeping up with Kyungsoo's desperate ones.
"We need to get on deck, now." The ship is sinking, and there's not enough lifeboats to save even half of the three-thousand passengers. Reality Kyungsoo flickers with the character like a flame. He needs to save them. He needs Jongin to live. He needs-
The ending. They're just living a story, and the ending is the price Kyungsoo has to pay for stealing more time for himself to spend with Jongin, the character Jongin, the one who has to love because that's how the story is told. No, Kyungsoo grapples with the plot line, no no no. This is the Jongin he wants to live with forever. He doesn't want this story to end, wants the night to go on until they both forget where they came from and what they have to go back to.
-to get on a lifeboat before the rest of the ship realizes the coffin they are doomed to. The hallways thicken with people and crew workers handing out life jackets, and Jongin doesn't realize what's happening until they burst into the winter night and Kyungsoo leads him straight to a lifeboat, still overturned.
"The ship is sinking," Jongin mutters, gaping at him.
"There aren't enough lifeboats. No one saw use in them because this ship was built to be unsinkable. Soon the deck is going to be flooded with people and we need to be the first on these to survive-"
The world tilts on its axis. Kyungsoo grabs for the railing just as Jongin does, and everything is happening too soon and the ship isn't supposed to break and sink until at least an hour later. What's happening? Why is time going at twice the speed? The deck's still empty, they can still get on a lifeboat and live-
Kyungsoo's changing the plot, altering the ending so they both survive, fuck, the plot must be orientating itself to whatever he's doing to fulfil the already decided finale.
Vertigo, the ship rocks and begins to split in half, passengers pouring out of the stairwells onto the deck and attaching to the white railings.
"Kyungsoo!" Jongin shouts over the screams and wood snapping in half, "we need to get the lifeboats the right way up!"
Plot be damned, no one can take his love away, not when they've only started.
Letting go of the railing is a near impossible task when the ground keeps getting steeper and steeper, but a few people overhear Jongin and together, one hand hanging on for dear life and the other lifting the edges of a lifeboat, they manage to upturn one. The sound of wood snapping and metal bending has gotten louder than the screams.
"How do we get it off the ship?" Kyungsoo shouts.
Jongin analyses the drop into the ocean, flicks his head back to the lifeboat. "We just have to throw it off and hopes it lands the right way up."
"And how do we get on?"
Jongin bites his lips and shakes his head at Kyungsoo. "I don't know. Let's focus on getting the boat off first-"
The Titanic splits, the sound of a thousand screams and groaning metal shaking Kyungsoo to the core. The back of the ship drowns in the sea and the front half watches in horror as they are pulled vertically. People start to fall one by one down the deck, a straight fall into the icy black waters. The lifeboat, tied to the railing, hangs severely. They're running out of time.
"Jongin, I don't think this is going to work-"
"It has to. This lifeboat is our only hope for survival."
"How?" Kyungsoo wants to shout, but it only comes out as a cry.
"I do not know, but we have to try." The wind threads into Jongin's hair, the sea salt whipping it into a frenzy. His eyes harden, chin lifts, jaw sets. Suddenly before him, Prince Kai emerges out of the young poor stowaway, experiencing his second ship wreck. He looks at Kyungsoo and it's the same way he's always looked at him, when they first met eyes on the deck, when they exchanged looks over the dinner table.
Now they are both fighting against the ending. A Prince and a book keeper.
The plot retaliates. Kyungsoo's fingers slip off one by one and he feels gravity clutching onto him. Jongin grabs onto him before he can fall, but now only Jongin's one tight grip is holding them in place.
"Just hold on to me." Jongin huffs, face squeezed in strain.
They stay that way for a long time, Jongin hanging by a thread and Kyungsoo's rings slicing into their grip. The ship plunges into the ocean agonizingly slow, the screams break off one by one until everyone who's alive is either hanging on muttering quiet prayers, staring at the vast night sky. Kyungsoo doesn't speak; Jongin focuses all his energy in holding onto the white railing; from now the sliver of hope for survival gleams.
The black waters crawl up with each breath they take.
"Kyungsoo." Jongin gasps out. "I'm sorry. I don't think I can hold on much longer."
"Just a little bit longer.” Kyungsoo replies. The water is still far enough for the impact to hurt. "We'll both make it. We'll both survive."
"My arm-" Jongin's voice clips, and all the air rushes to Kyungsoo's stomach as Jongin's fingers give way and they free fall into the North Atlantic Ocean, piercing the water with a yell and the shock erases Kyungsoo's mind to black.
When he comes to, all he can think of is cold. An incomprehensible cold, like water past freezing point but refusing to solidify. His body jerks, more awake than he's ever been in his life, and he breaks out of the surface, lungs expanding for air.
"Jongin!" He shouts over the others trying to find a familiar face, "Jongin!"
No one calls his name in reply. Dread pulses through him like short, electric shocks. His heart thrashes wildly in its cage.
And then- "Kyungsoo!" Jongin's voice comes from somewhere to his right. "Kyungsoo, I'm over here!"
The water pinches his skin as he tries to follow Jongin's voice, but everyone is shouting at the same time and grabbing a hold onto one another to stay afloat. In the rush of things Kyungsoo forgot to grab them life jackets.
Someone, Jongin, grabs a hold of his waist and pulls him in. It's easier to shout than to speak because the shivering takes control over everything.
A piece of wood, a broken door, a floating trunk, Kyungsoo's eyes desperately search the dark surroundings for a sign of anything they can hold onto. He wants to tell Jongin to do the same but his teeth are chattering uncontrollably, no sound but hums and grumbles managing to get through.
Among the fury of people splashing to stay afloat and pieces of small debris, he sees half a door bobbing this way and that, big enough for one person. His arms slip around Jongin's trembling waist underneath the water and pull him to it, pushing him on top.
"No." Jongin trembles. "Y-you go."
"Jongin." Kyungsoo does his best to voice. "Go now."
Jongin gets on reluctantly, but hisses the instant his body is completely out of the water. "It's c-colder."
Kyungsoo puts his arms on the door and leans his head down, watching Jongin curl into himself on the door and breathing shallowly, chest rising up and down and up and down.
Heavy silence. What's left of the Titanic is engulfed by the ocean in one gulp. The water gets so cold that Kyungsoo's body ceases to feel it, only the numb sensation of where his limbs should be. His vision blurs, Jongin's pale face illuminated by the moon - the only thing tethering him to this world.
"Jongin." he isn't sure which one he's calling - the Prince or the stowaway or the mystery tycoon or the Red Queen or the vampire. They're all the same, aren't they? "Jongin."
"Kyungsoo." this is a different Jongin speaking, someone much more vulnerable, someone he's never heard before but he can recognise the voice even in death. "Kyungsoo, I love you."
"I love you too, God I love you," he whispers, taking shaky breaths. Please don't take him away from me, Kyungsoo begs, I love him. It's always been him. In every story, in any character, it's always been him.
In reality, the bookstore, the endless winter-spring night, it will always be him.
He gets another ten minutes, chattering his teeth and eyes fervently trying to soak in Jongin's face, regal and defying even on the brink of hypothermia. Ten minutes before the plot returns to reap what is due.
The first to go is Kyungsoo's sense of touch, his body warming up from his toes up his legs, across his hips, up his chest into his heart still insistent on beating. Then the noise disappears, falling away to a distant ringing in his ears, then nothing. Last, his vision fades, the image of Jongin seared into the back of his eyelids, wherever your mind goes when you die.
Somewhere, in a distant universe, someone is calling his name, and he's never heard his name sound so beautiful before.
The bookstore is still when he returns. The laptop burns against his thigh, credits rolling. Kyungsoo wriggles his toes and is relieved to feel them still there, warm in his shoes. "Jongin," he sighs, the name feeling a whole lot different on his tongue than it did at the start of the night. "Jongin, we're alive."
The credits continue to roll, playing for nobody to hear.
"Jongin?"
Kyungsoo looks beside him and finds the space empty. He gets up, peeks over the bookshelves, at the counter, even runs to glass windows to check the convenience store; empty. No sign of the wind swept hair or the caramel skin or the prince attire. His stomach knots.
He doesn't know what to do. "Jongin?" he calls out again. "Jongin? Jongin!" His throat tightens and his sobs rock the air. The books stay quiet, so much more smaller when their stories are trapped in between the covers.
Kyungsoo runs to the children's section and pulls out The Little Mermaid. He flips through the pages, "Jongin, come back. Don't leave me, don't-" The pages refuse to pull him in. "Jongin, I learnt my lesson. I get it. The ending doesn't matter, it's about the story. Please come back, please please please." He breaks down completely, "god I love you. I love you so much and you can't be gone, not yet, not until we're old and we're reading to our grandchildren and we argue about which part of the book is better-"
Nothing haunts like a memory. The Little Mermaid turns over to the beginning, where the prince is saved by the Little Mermaid, and she heaves him up the shore, looks at him as if he's the most beautiful thing the earth has ever created, knows that she would give up anything just to spend another hour with him.
Wiping away his tears and running nose, Kyungsoo flips to the very first page. Jongin, his mind moans. He'll try again, but this time every word is as precious as a miracle.
"Far out in the ocean the water is as blue as the petals of the loveliest cornflower..."
The morning clocks in at three a.m. His shift is over.
-
The bookstore by the bend doesn't close until the early morning, though management might change that because customers cut off at around eleven, but it's in constantly in an immaculate state and the graveyard shift worker spares no effort taking care of the place, making sure each and every book is in order and crease free, so the hours stay as it is.
Kyungsoo comes into the store five minutes before ten to find the place looking like a crime scene- books all over the floor, stacked on top of each other in the shelves, coffee cups slotted in with them.
He has his work cut out for him, but who else is going to take care of this place if he isn't going to? Your love is your responsibility.
First he gathers all the strewn books on the floor into a neat pile, than organizes them by title, and so on and so on. He takes his time, a whole five hours spans before him like a great chasm.
He's sorting a particularly nasty sandwich of adult contemporary and cooking books when a draft caresses his cheeks, alerting to a customer in the store. Kyungsoo stands on his tip toes to look over the shelf, but he sees no head of hair or hears any footsteps.
Creepy. Such a shame Kyungsoo isn't afraid of ghosts.
But just to make sure, Kyungsoo walks out of the shelves and into the open space separating the counter and the books, and there is someone else in the store: a little girl in a pink princess dress, trying to peek over the counter.
"Excuse me, princess," Kyungsoo say, smiling, "how may I be of service?"
The girl turns around - she can't be older than five - and curtsies. "Hello, I'm looking for a book."
"You've come to the right place. What book are you looking for, your highness?"
The little girl smiles, blushing a little, "it's about a mermaid loves a prince, but he's human so they can't be together."
"Ah," Kyungsoo's smile widens, "The Little Mermaid?"
"Yes!"
"And do you remember how it ends?"
"Uhh," she scratches her head, "no. My cousin read it to me but I don't remember."
"No worries, your highness, come right this way."
Kyungsoo takes out both versions and lays them on the floor. They plop themselves down on the bean bag and impromptu story time begins, Kyungsoo getting into character and playing out each scene, watching in delight as the little girl laughs and claps her hands.
Another draft ruffles him, this time followed by heavy footsteps and heavy panting. "There you are!" Kyungsoo freezes at the voice.
The little girl turns her head and her eyes sparkle, "Jongin! I found the book you wanted!"
Kyungsoo sees the scene in frames, meets the stranger puffed out at the glass door, the wind still in his hair, eyes wide with relief and laughter, a smile that can't help becoming a smirk, the feeling deep in his gut that this is it.
"I'm really sorry about my little cousin," Jongin, this world's Jongin, apologizes as he gets his breathing under control. "I keep losing her 'cause she's so small." Their eyes lock in on each other and maybe there's no spark of recognition on Jongin's part, and maybe he doesn't know how this story is going to end but he doesn't care. The night's just started.
"It's alright," Kyungsoo waves him over, "we were just in the middle of a story. Care to join us?"