Tears and water.
“heartbroken?”
the night is pleasantly cool and the sky is clear; a vast stretch of duke blue, dotted with tiny white stars. his legs are gently swaying in the water, splashing miniscule drops of chlorinated liquid onto his pressed pants.
“not really, but yeah. yeah, sort of.”
hara tucks a lock of her bistre hair (the color is startlingly dark and rich, adding ten years to her age but he dismisses it because she’s just tired) behind her ear as she proceeds to bend down and sit herself next to him. gentle plops are heard as she dips her legs into the swimming pool.
“uee is popular, you know. everybody wants a piece of her and she has to play hard to get sometimes. maybe you’re just not her type.” seunghyun snorts as she offers him words of comfort, because he knows just how hard she laughed when he was shedding pathetic tears over being crowned king earlier.
he mutters a subdued yeah, yeah, whatever. he pulls his legs out of the water and tucks them under him, although they’re wet. his shirt sleeves are folded to his elbows and his tuxedo jacket lies in a lonely heap next to him, along with his shoes.
“you didn’t even change out of your suit," hara notes, mentally cringing. making conversation with seunghyun - seungri - has never been this hard before.
(maybe because before, he was just a sheer splinter of her yellowed past; she could easily forget seunghyun just as easily as she carved him into her heart. but a mere three hours ago, when he battled the huge lump in his throat as he choked out a speech, she realized that he’s never really changed.
he shed tears for her when she left, too, which is why she just laughed when he was half-sobbing earlier, because if she didn’t, her wound will split open again and there’s nobody around to fix it.)
his eyes are hollow, and hara decides that in no way could this entire robot act be just because of uee. “what else is wrong, seunghyun-ah?” she’s taking a chance that’s larger than life; she calls him seunghyun and crosses her fingers that he still remembers who he was when he was hers.
“nothing is, but everything is, hara-yah.”
hara-yah, and strange pins prick the insides of her eyelids, suffocating her chest.
“do you - do you miss me, seunghyun?”
the words come out fast and sudden that even hara finds herself astonished. she diverts the direction of her eyes, from his face to the reflection in the water (there are chances she shouldn’t take and one she just did; she doesn’t know if he’ll accept it), fingers clutching the side of the pool nervously.
seunghyun doesn’t appear as stunned. “of course, hara-yah."
her vision glazes over and she struggles to see through the mist of water. a sudden rush of unsaid emotions fills her body completely, and she just jumps.
“goo hara!"
she sinks deeper into the water, enjoying the short moment of calm she’ll have to give up in just a few more moments (everything is slipping through her bony fingers: her band mates, her career, her heart and him - though he already has) but she decides that if she could, she’ll stay there forever.
there’s an abrupt touch around her upper forearms and she finds herself being yanked, up, up, up.
“what the hell was that?” shrieks seunghyun, energy and fire blown into his eyes as he shakes her impatiently. she pants, “i just wanted a swim. i just needed a swim. just needed it.” her eyes are still so cold as he drags her toward the side of the pool.
they both lie on the tiles, chest rising and falling simultaneously, clothes soaked to their skins and hair matted. seunghyun feels more than a little lost but hara feels so whole and so complete even as she shivers in her thin long-sleeved t-shirt.
he is choking; choking on air, on life and that thing she has for him and he doesn’t think it’s love anymore if it ever was. “what’s all this, hara-yah?” he murmurs, the syllables breaking as he attempts to regain his breathing.
“i don’t know, seunghyun-ah. i feel okay, though.”
she doesn’t and he knows but if she says she is, then she is.
nobody questions their entrance into their respective hotel suites. minho just blinks at the drenched figure and burrows deeper into his blanket.
hara returns and immediately heads to the bathroom. although she hears whimpers and screams and weeping, uee just focuses her attention on the screen of her laptop and keeps her mouth shut because she doubts it’s any of her business.