SH 2013: for pinkjuliette
For: pinkjuliette
From: Your Secret Santa
Title: Birdsong
Rating: PG
Pairing(s)/Focus: Suho-centric, slight Suho/D.O
Length: 4,344 words
Summary: "I like beautiful melodies telling me terrible things." - Tom Waits
Warnings: Implied kidnapping, child abuse, suicide attempts, supernatural phenomena.
Notes: No notes.
Joonmyun wipes the sweat off of his brow as he straightens up, huffing. Moving into a new house was pretty hard work, especially when you were moving into the cool countryside where air conditioning was still a novelty that only the town hall owned.
Not that Joonmyun minded that much, honestly. It was a literal breath of fresh air to be in the countryside. The silence would probably take some time getting used to but even after only a few hours here, he could already tell that he would come to enjoy his new home.
He grabs a glass of water from the dining table he’s already set up in the kitchen, thankful for the little pleasures in life such as running water. He’d never thought he would see the day that he’d coo in relief over the fact that his tap was working and functional. One learned new things about oneself all the time, it seemed.
The water somehow tastes sweeter here than it did back in the city. Joonmyun can’t figure out whether to pin it on the better, cleaner air or if it was merely a psychological taste lingering in his mouth that made water taste so bland in the past. He smiles to himself, shaking his head, as he sets the glass down.
He’s getting ready to carry his single mattress over to the bed frame when he hears a sound coming from outside his house. At first, it’s sharp and shrill. It startles Joonmyun from his work and his mattress falls with a thunk. At least he manages to pull his hands away before his fingers get crushed underneath the mass of bed.
He frowns, not so much displeased as he is confused. He remembers the realtor telling him that his particular house in the village was a fair distance away from the next nearest house. It sat at the edge of the forest and was quite isolated. For a second, it almost sounds like a cellphone ringing indistinctly but Joonmyun knows he sold his cellphone away and no one else should be within the vicinity of his home.
Curious, because the sound could quite possibly be a majestic and beautiful animal, he sets the mattress aside and wipes his hands on his pants while making his way out of the house. He closes the door by habit, ingrained in him from years of city life worrying about a burglary.
The sight that greets him as he leaves his house is one that he’s seen before and still it manages to take his breath away. Green foliage as far as the eye could see, flora and fauna prospering, a picture out of a postcard right before him. Joonmyun takes in the view, momentarily forgetting about the sound, until he hears it again.
Out of his house, it’s a little clearer. It no longer sounds like a muffled cellphone. Rather, it sounds more like a whistle. There’s a tune to it, like a song, but he can’t make it out properly yet. Against what might be his better judgement, Joonmyun follows the sound. It leads him right to the point where his backyard turns into the forest, the line between human civilisation and a world he’s never explored before.
The first step Joonmyun takes is tentative and in awe. It may not mean much for most of the villagers here and he didn’t know if his friends and family back in the city would be able to appreciate the value of it, but it’s a keenly unique experience for him.
All at once, the reality of having moved to a place so close to nature sinks in onto Joonmyun and he follows the sound, the song, dazed. He instinctively stays on a straight path, glancing back every few paces to make sure he can still see his way out, but he marvels at what surrounds him.
He feels oversensitive. After all, it’s not as if he’s deep enough into the forest to really be full immersed, yet like this, he feels like a child wading into the sea for the first time. When Joonmyun goes deep enough into the forest that he starts to worry about getting lost, the song that he hears finally becomes clear.
It is a birdsong. And it sounds as though it has suddenly come right next to him. In a moment of silliness, he turns to look at his shoulder, expecting a bird to be perched there. However, there is nothing. It’s not a surprise, though Joonmyun feels quite disappointed anyway.
“As if there’d be a bird,” he mumbles sarcastically. While he was most tempted to take a look around, it didn’t feel like the best of ideas. In the back of his mind, he nagged at himself that he had a half-unpacked house and even if no one was coming around any soon to take a look it was not the kind of place he would want to live in.
And so Joonmyun makes his way back home carefully, the birdsong lingering in the distance again, niggling its way into his mind. The unpacking of his house takes the rest of the day and by the end of it all, when the last belonging he owns is finally set in its rightful place, he falls asleep on his couch with a blanket draped over himself.
He has an oddly unrestful sleep that night.
The next morning when Joonmyun wakes up, after rolling off of the couch unintentionally, he only makes the effort to brush his teeth and pull on a cardigan. The morning air is unexpectedly chilly as he steps out into his backyard. He smiles at his picturesque surroundings. It’s a good day, he thinks to himself, something he hasn’t had in a while.
He rubs the ache in his neck from falling asleep in the wrong place. Despite the peace of the morning and how happy he feels, he can’t help but think of how he can’t remember his dreams of the night before. Joonmyun has always remembered fractions of his dreams, if not a sizable chunk of it. Not being able to remember kind of throws him off.
His smile falters a little at the conscious thought of that, running a hand through his messy bed hair. He takes a stroll along the edge of the forest and directs himself away from things that don’t really matter anyway; so what if he didn’t dream last night? Joonmyun plays a sort of game with himself. Dancing an invisible tango with the forest itself, if you would.
He weaves his way through his path in a zig-zag pattern, going extremely close to the forest itself and then darting away. It’s a childish and cheesy thing to do, but there’s no one around to judge Joonmyun or to stop him so he does what he likes. Or that’s what he thinks until he walks right into someone else.
Joonmyun gasps rather dramatically, but he doesn’t feel embarrassed because in his defense he’d been told that no one else would ever come near his house unless invited to. The stranger in front of him looks equally surprised, eyes wide, albeit his response is a lot less audible.
It’s a young teenager, Joonmyun thinks to himself as he stares. He isn’t sure how to go about the situation, frankly. Does he yell like a cranky old man for the boy, a handful of years younger than him, to get off of his property? It’s not his style to be so unfriendly though. Instead, he lets a smile grace his features and he relaxes.
“Hello, are you one of the villagers?” he asks and prides himself for managing to pull it off without a suspicious tone. The teenager continues to look surprised, eyeballs popping out at Joonmyun, and he takes a rather long time to respond.
“I- yeah… I am,” the guilt in the teenager’s tone sounds alarms in Joonmyun’s head.
“You sounded kind of uncertain there, you sure you’re not just a trespasser?” Joonmyun jokes in return, because it’s easier to smooth over uncomfortable situations with something funny. He’s had enough experience of this in the city and he hopes it will work here in the countryside. Some things were constant, humans were humans, it’ll work, he tells himself.
“No! I’m not!” the teenager sounds a little outraged and Joonmyun resists the urge to laugh. It’s cute. “I’m just… I snuck out of my house,” the teenager starts to explain, “I’m not supposed to be out. Please don’t tell anyone! The village is pretty small and if anyone finds out, it’ll get back to my house. Please don’t tell anyone you saw me here today,” the teenager’s pleas are earnest and Joonmyun thinks he understands the need for a little freedom.
He bought a house in the countryside just to be free.
“Of course, I won’t tell anyone,” he promises sincerely. It wouldn’t hurt anyone not to know that the teenager was wandering around as long as nothing bad happened. He tells himself he’ll only alert the villagers if the boy gets hurt or if the boy does something wrong. “My name is Joonmyun,” he introduces himself, “I just moved here yesterday, actually.”
The teenager’s expression doesn’t shift from eye popping surprise. Joonmyun is beginning to think that it might be a default sort of thing. Kind of like the way everyone thinks Joonmyun is a nice guy who can do no wrong when they see his face. Which is true, in a way. He doesn’t want to dwell on that too much.
“I’m Kyungsoo, I’ve been living around here for a couple of years,” the boy offers right back and Joonmyun feels like he’s earned trust. He hasn’t quite felt that way in a while now and that puts a wide smile across his face. He thinks that the village is really great after all. No amount of inconveniences from lack of technology will convince him otherwise.
“Hey Kyungsoo, would you like to hang out?” Joonmyun asks; it’s never been a hobby of his to hang out with teenagers. It painted the wrong image back in the city, but here in the countryside where no one has to know about anything, the question is exhilarating and he can only hope he receives a positive response.
The slow nod of Kyungsoo’s head has Joonmyun over the moon.
“Sure, why not?”
Joonmyun plops himself down on his bed, stretching lazily like a cat over his sheets. It had been a fun day with Kyungsoo. Past the initial embarrassment that had kicked in upon his realisation that he had basically been in his pyjamas, rolled right out of bed, the two of them had managed to explore a bit of the forest together - which really was just Kyungsoo guiding him around.
He hadn’t expected to be able to hold a proper conversation with Kyungsoo, seeing the fact that they were about 5 years apart by estimation, but it had been unexpectedly easy. The younger male didn’t seem like a teenager when he spoke and he was full of witty comments and sharp insight. Joonmyun can’t remember the last time he’d had so much fun hanging out with a friend.
A glance at his clock tells him that it’s only ten, nightfall. In the past, Joonmyun would still probably be neck deep in trying to finish up the work that had accumulated day after day. Now, he’s fully fed himself a hearty dinner, taken a nice long shower and was snuggling up in bed. The weather was pleasant enough, a light drizzle had begun to fall in the early evening, and the air was cool so that he didn’t sweat.
All in all, a satisfactory day he would be pleased to have repeatedly. His mind drifts from conscious thoughts to the realm of flashing trains of thought passing through his head. He doesn’t latch onto any one fixed thought. He lets himself suspend in the center of his mind with everything whizzing around him. He would’ve fallen asleep in that manner: if not for a sudden familiar song.
He blinks drowsily as he pushes himself up into a half sitting position. He hadn’t heard the birdsong all day and he’d thought, perhaps the bird had flown off to a different part of the forest. He wasn’t an expert on birds, but he’d thought they would usually sing through the day or at a specific time of the day. It’s a lot clearer tonight than it was the night before. Joonmyun almost thinks it might be right outside his window.
He means to move to go look for the source of the birdsong, but a wave of sleepiness washes over him. He barely manages to keep his eyes half-open for another minute more before he falls right asleep. It seems as though he might have a peaceful night after a long day, but Joonmyun tosses and turns in bed the whole time.
Joonmyun stands in front of two shelves of snacks. He’s currently contemplating between a box of butter cookies and some Ghana chocolate pies. He rubs his eyes tiredly as he clings onto his shopping basket. The decision is tough and he’s stuck; it also doesn’t help that he’s been having terrible sleep lately.
In the end, he chooses one small box of butter cookies and a loose packet of the Ghana chocolate pie. He’s never been a great fan of excessive amounts of chocolate. He’d much prefer to stuff himself on butter cookies and milk, but compromise is a good thing. That’s what he tells himself. He wishes he could come to some compromise with himself about his sleep too.
If he isn’t having the most unrestful sleep by tossing and turning in bed, always intermittently waking up through the night, then he’s having a solid night’s sleep constantly filled with nightmares like flashes of memories from someone else’s life. It’s been creeping him out too much, but he doesn’t know how to confide in anyone.
He hasn’t even been able to confide in Kyungsoo about the dreams. Joonmyun has grown a lot closer to the teenager in the past few weeks that he’s moved into his new home and subsequently met said boy, but it’s not as if it’s easy for a grown man like him to admit that his dreams have been scaring him.
Joonmyun meets Kyungsoo almost every day. It’s a routine to wake up in the morning and either meet Kyungsoo outside of his house or find the younger male cheekily lounging on his couch. Joonmyun has kept to leaving his house unlocked because of the one day that Kyungsoo had ended up outside of his house soaking wet from the early morning rain.
The two of them have become quite close friends, sharing pretty much everything under the sun about their opinions, but they’ve both been tight lipped about their pasts, their origins and things about others besides just them. It’s a weird tight rope walk that Joonmyun has found themselves on and they’re grabbing each other’s hands tight to avoid falling alone.
He carries his basket of groceries to the cashier of the local supermarket the village has. It’s the one and only and the old man who runs it is kind. Joonmyun likes the people of his village. There’s only one grumpy old person out of the whole place and Joonmyun doesn’t even see him often. Whenever he hangs out in the main town area, he feels loved by all the elderly.
The only little problem he has is that everyone he looks at, he wonders if they are Kyungsoo’s grandparents or parents. It’s taken him a lot of effort not to be overly curious and not to blow his newfound best friend’s cover. He doesn’t want to end up losing the trust that Kyungsoo had given to him the first day they met. It’s an odd feeling to want to protect someone else.
“Still sticking by your little house alone, Joonmyun?” the owner of the supermarket asks as he checks the items out. Joonmyun forces a small smile on his face, a little unnatural as he gives a noncommittal shrug. He doesn’t want to lie to these kind old people and he can’t exactly tell them the truth. It would tear him up inside if he cared less about them and Kyungsoo, but he does care a lot, so he bears with it a lot more.
“Thank you for the groceries,” he gives as a flimsy avoidance of a reply and ducks out of the store. Joonmyun thinks about how nice it’ll be to have a cup of milk and butter cookies once he gets home. He spots a couple of pigeons hanging around outside the supermarket, maybe waiting for scraps. He thinks of the birdsong he keeps hearing outside of his house. It’s both irritating but also strangely addictive. He scrunches his nose and shakes his head, walking back towards home.
“Hyung,” Joonmyun isn’t at all shocked to find Kyungsoo perched at the dining table of his house anymore. He might have screamed and fallen over the first time it happened, but he’s accepted that Kyungsoo has become a somewhat constant fixture in his house now that he never locks his door anymore.
He sets the groceries down with a roll of his eyes and a small wave as Kyungsoo starts digging through the bags of things. Joonmyun bites back a smile when the teenager goes for the Ghana chocolate pie. A good compromise he’d made at the store, he mentally applauds himself as he fills his refrigerator with eggs, vegetables and some fresh meat.
“I just bought that, you know,” Joonmyun pretends to sound miffed as he watches Kyungsoo chomp down on the chocolate pie, bits of the dark sweet smearing on the corner of lips. He loads the carton of milk in the refrigerator and pulls out the orange juice, opting to enjoy his butter cookies later in the evening with a blanket maybe.
“I love you, hyung,” Kyungsoo merely chimes in response with a mischievous grin and Joonmyun ignores the little loop his stomach does. He pours two cups of juice and sets them on the table, storing the carton back in the refrigerator. His teenaged companion goes for one of the cups and his brain mentally provides him with that reminder that he’s done a good job, because Kyungsoo dislikes milk. He ignores himself.
“You’ve got chocolate all over yourself like a little kid,” he points out as he reaches over to wipe off the mess with a tissue. Kyungsoo pauses mid-bite and pulls away, cheeks flushing. He takes the tissue out of Joonmyun’s hand and cleans himself up.
“Thanks, hyung,” the endearment is usually affectionate and sweet with Kyungsoo, but there are times when Joonmyun feels as though it’s being used as a buffer to put some sort of distance between the two of them. Like right now, when his brain is telling him to lean in and give Kyungsoo a light peck on the cheek, it serves as a reminder that relationships are not one-sided and he cannot just do what he wants to.
A little bit of an awkward silence comes between the both of them and Joonmyun clears his throat stiffly, leaning back into his seat and sipping from his cup of orange juice. He makes a concerted effort to keep his eyes on the rim of his cup, but they dart up few seconds to check on Kyungsoo nonetheless. The younger male finishes his chocolate pie in silence and looks conflicted, though Joonmyun still struggles to differentiate between which part of his expression just looks that way because of how Kyungsoo’s eyes always are.
“The weather is clear today so we can go to the stream I wanted to show you,” is what ends up breaking the silence and it comes from Kyungsoo. He sounds as though the strange moment that had come to pass between them hadn’t really even happened or that he wasn’t bothered by it, so a smile manages to make its way onto Joonmyun’s face again.
“Sure, why not?”
The walk out to the stream is one that passes without notice. Conversation bounces off the both of them smoothly, without them trying, as if there’s so much within them that they feel a compelling need to share between them. Joonmyun knows, for himself, that he has so much he’s always wanted to say but never had the right person to say it to until he’d met Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo navigates them through the forest as though he were the one to map everything out. Joonmyun remains a reverent spectator of the splendour of nature around him as they walk. It distracts him so much that he never once wonders how Kyungsoo knows exactly which tree to turn right at or which patch of moss is the right one to pass over.
When they finally hit the stream, Joonmyun falls silent for a moment and Kyungsoo stays by his side quietly, letting the beauty of everything set in. The clear waters catch his attention first, the way he can look all the way to the bottom and see the aquatic life lolling around as if the rest of the world is a small, unimportant matter. Then the sheer length of the stream itself amazes Joonmyun. It twists and winds into the distance on both ends, farther than his eye can observe.
The calming sound of the water running makes Joonmyun sit down by the stream, on a soft patch of grass, as taken away by nature as he has always been. Kyungsoo comes to rest next to him too and there’s a vague smile on his heart-shaped lips. Joonmyun thinks his chest squirms and a little voice tells him that Kyungsoo looks like the perfect forest nymph, a child of nature, just as beautiful.
“Feels good, doesn’t it?” Kyungsoo asks and Joonmyun has to agree. It’s the same serene feeling that has come to him again and again, after he’d moved here to the countryside. It’s as ever present as the stress of city life, but he doesn’t know how to put a name on it. “I thought of bringing you here today because you’ve been looking kind of high strung,” Kyungsoo adds, somewhat shy and sheepish.
“Oh,” Joonmyun hadn’t expected his inner tensions to be so apparent to a teenaged boy, of all people. “Is that so?” he lets out a little embarrassed laugh; it would be weird to thank Kyungsoo, but then he had to say something and he didn’t know what else to fill the space with.
“What do you dream of, Joonmyun?” Kyungsoo says abruptly, more of a statement than a proper question. He’s surprised by the lack of the usual endearment and the boldness to the way Kyungsoo speaks now; it’s the combination of the two that shuts him up just long enough. Just long enough.
A little boy had strayed a little too far off from the sand box that his mother had allowed him to play in at the park. He’d walked towards a bush that shook unusually, different from the rest, curious, and that had been the start of all his troubles. He shouldn’t have gone to the bushes. He should never have left the sand box at all. A thick darkness covers his eyes after a flashing gleam of metal. It’s too late for regrets; not that he knows that yet.
Joonmyun’s eyes widen as he looks at Kyungsoo. His dreams in such perfect definition and precision.
Pain. A lot of pain. A lot of different kinds of pain. Pain that he wishes he never came to know. Pain he wishes no one else will ever experience. Pain he could’ve stayed safe from if only he had listened to his mother. His voice is raw from all the screaming that no one heard, because if they’d been listening, they would’ve come to help him. They wouldn’t have left him here in such pain. His voice would have compelled them to save him. Anyone who heard would’ve come.
The birdsong that so attracted him and drew him towards it. The birdsong that clung onto him and made him uneasy in his inaction. The birdsong that compelled him.
One day, no more pain. Just a loud heavy thunk and nothing else left. No more, no less. His freedom. Days, days more of darkness, days more of weakness, days more until he finds the strength in himself to stand and be free, to spread his wings. He leaves and the light that finds him, blinds him. He collapses, ungraceful, unsightly, undignified. He crawls, his wings are tattered and torn, he finds what must be a reprieve. But it isn’t. Just pain, more pain, words that pierce through him into his core the way leather belts and burning hot knives could not.
Something his realtor had told him dawns on Joonmyun now, something he had forgotten and not remembered for so long: you are the youngest resident within the village. There are no schools of any kind nearby, so all of the young children leave for the city. All that’s left are their aged parents, only the elderly citizens who aren’t worth anything in the city at all.
The lush green trees, the coolness of isolation, nature as a companion. People rise from ashes, from the earth, from the soil. People must also go back to ashes, to earth, to soil. What a perfect way to die, was it not? And despite it all, a sweet song. A bird, it lands on his shoulder. It sings, it promises and it tells, of all the things.
Joonmyun’s entire body shakes as he listens to the birdsong, loud and clear as day. Kyungsoo smiles softly, reassuringly, taking Joonmyun’s hands into his, lips forming the melody.
A bird, it lands on his shoulder. It sings, it promises and it tells, of all the things.
“The end.”
From: Your Secret Santa
Title: Birdsong
Rating: PG
Pairing(s)/Focus: Suho-centric, slight Suho/D.O
Length: 4,344 words
Summary: "I like beautiful melodies telling me terrible things." - Tom Waits
Warnings: Implied kidnapping, child abuse, suicide attempts, supernatural phenomena.
Notes: No notes.
Joonmyun wipes the sweat off of his brow as he straightens up, huffing. Moving into a new house was pretty hard work, especially when you were moving into the cool countryside where air conditioning was still a novelty that only the town hall owned.
Not that Joonmyun minded that much, honestly. It was a literal breath of fresh air to be in the countryside. The silence would probably take some time getting used to but even after only a few hours here, he could already tell that he would come to enjoy his new home.
He grabs a glass of water from the dining table he’s already set up in the kitchen, thankful for the little pleasures in life such as running water. He’d never thought he would see the day that he’d coo in relief over the fact that his tap was working and functional. One learned new things about oneself all the time, it seemed.
The water somehow tastes sweeter here than it did back in the city. Joonmyun can’t figure out whether to pin it on the better, cleaner air or if it was merely a psychological taste lingering in his mouth that made water taste so bland in the past. He smiles to himself, shaking his head, as he sets the glass down.
He’s getting ready to carry his single mattress over to the bed frame when he hears a sound coming from outside his house. At first, it’s sharp and shrill. It startles Joonmyun from his work and his mattress falls with a thunk. At least he manages to pull his hands away before his fingers get crushed underneath the mass of bed.
He frowns, not so much displeased as he is confused. He remembers the realtor telling him that his particular house in the village was a fair distance away from the next nearest house. It sat at the edge of the forest and was quite isolated. For a second, it almost sounds like a cellphone ringing indistinctly but Joonmyun knows he sold his cellphone away and no one else should be within the vicinity of his home.
Curious, because the sound could quite possibly be a majestic and beautiful animal, he sets the mattress aside and wipes his hands on his pants while making his way out of the house. He closes the door by habit, ingrained in him from years of city life worrying about a burglary.
The sight that greets him as he leaves his house is one that he’s seen before and still it manages to take his breath away. Green foliage as far as the eye could see, flora and fauna prospering, a picture out of a postcard right before him. Joonmyun takes in the view, momentarily forgetting about the sound, until he hears it again.
Out of his house, it’s a little clearer. It no longer sounds like a muffled cellphone. Rather, it sounds more like a whistle. There’s a tune to it, like a song, but he can’t make it out properly yet. Against what might be his better judgement, Joonmyun follows the sound. It leads him right to the point where his backyard turns into the forest, the line between human civilisation and a world he’s never explored before.
The first step Joonmyun takes is tentative and in awe. It may not mean much for most of the villagers here and he didn’t know if his friends and family back in the city would be able to appreciate the value of it, but it’s a keenly unique experience for him.
All at once, the reality of having moved to a place so close to nature sinks in onto Joonmyun and he follows the sound, the song, dazed. He instinctively stays on a straight path, glancing back every few paces to make sure he can still see his way out, but he marvels at what surrounds him.
He feels oversensitive. After all, it’s not as if he’s deep enough into the forest to really be full immersed, yet like this, he feels like a child wading into the sea for the first time. When Joonmyun goes deep enough into the forest that he starts to worry about getting lost, the song that he hears finally becomes clear.
It is a birdsong. And it sounds as though it has suddenly come right next to him. In a moment of silliness, he turns to look at his shoulder, expecting a bird to be perched there. However, there is nothing. It’s not a surprise, though Joonmyun feels quite disappointed anyway.
“As if there’d be a bird,” he mumbles sarcastically. While he was most tempted to take a look around, it didn’t feel like the best of ideas. In the back of his mind, he nagged at himself that he had a half-unpacked house and even if no one was coming around any soon to take a look it was not the kind of place he would want to live in.
And so Joonmyun makes his way back home carefully, the birdsong lingering in the distance again, niggling its way into his mind. The unpacking of his house takes the rest of the day and by the end of it all, when the last belonging he owns is finally set in its rightful place, he falls asleep on his couch with a blanket draped over himself.
He has an oddly unrestful sleep that night.
The next morning when Joonmyun wakes up, after rolling off of the couch unintentionally, he only makes the effort to brush his teeth and pull on a cardigan. The morning air is unexpectedly chilly as he steps out into his backyard. He smiles at his picturesque surroundings. It’s a good day, he thinks to himself, something he hasn’t had in a while.
He rubs the ache in his neck from falling asleep in the wrong place. Despite the peace of the morning and how happy he feels, he can’t help but think of how he can’t remember his dreams of the night before. Joonmyun has always remembered fractions of his dreams, if not a sizable chunk of it. Not being able to remember kind of throws him off.
His smile falters a little at the conscious thought of that, running a hand through his messy bed hair. He takes a stroll along the edge of the forest and directs himself away from things that don’t really matter anyway; so what if he didn’t dream last night? Joonmyun plays a sort of game with himself. Dancing an invisible tango with the forest itself, if you would.
He weaves his way through his path in a zig-zag pattern, going extremely close to the forest itself and then darting away. It’s a childish and cheesy thing to do, but there’s no one around to judge Joonmyun or to stop him so he does what he likes. Or that’s what he thinks until he walks right into someone else.
Joonmyun gasps rather dramatically, but he doesn’t feel embarrassed because in his defense he’d been told that no one else would ever come near his house unless invited to. The stranger in front of him looks equally surprised, eyes wide, albeit his response is a lot less audible.
It’s a young teenager, Joonmyun thinks to himself as he stares. He isn’t sure how to go about the situation, frankly. Does he yell like a cranky old man for the boy, a handful of years younger than him, to get off of his property? It’s not his style to be so unfriendly though. Instead, he lets a smile grace his features and he relaxes.
“Hello, are you one of the villagers?” he asks and prides himself for managing to pull it off without a suspicious tone. The teenager continues to look surprised, eyeballs popping out at Joonmyun, and he takes a rather long time to respond.
“I- yeah… I am,” the guilt in the teenager’s tone sounds alarms in Joonmyun’s head.
“You sounded kind of uncertain there, you sure you’re not just a trespasser?” Joonmyun jokes in return, because it’s easier to smooth over uncomfortable situations with something funny. He’s had enough experience of this in the city and he hopes it will work here in the countryside. Some things were constant, humans were humans, it’ll work, he tells himself.
“No! I’m not!” the teenager sounds a little outraged and Joonmyun resists the urge to laugh. It’s cute. “I’m just… I snuck out of my house,” the teenager starts to explain, “I’m not supposed to be out. Please don’t tell anyone! The village is pretty small and if anyone finds out, it’ll get back to my house. Please don’t tell anyone you saw me here today,” the teenager’s pleas are earnest and Joonmyun thinks he understands the need for a little freedom.
He bought a house in the countryside just to be free.
“Of course, I won’t tell anyone,” he promises sincerely. It wouldn’t hurt anyone not to know that the teenager was wandering around as long as nothing bad happened. He tells himself he’ll only alert the villagers if the boy gets hurt or if the boy does something wrong. “My name is Joonmyun,” he introduces himself, “I just moved here yesterday, actually.”
The teenager’s expression doesn’t shift from eye popping surprise. Joonmyun is beginning to think that it might be a default sort of thing. Kind of like the way everyone thinks Joonmyun is a nice guy who can do no wrong when they see his face. Which is true, in a way. He doesn’t want to dwell on that too much.
“I’m Kyungsoo, I’ve been living around here for a couple of years,” the boy offers right back and Joonmyun feels like he’s earned trust. He hasn’t quite felt that way in a while now and that puts a wide smile across his face. He thinks that the village is really great after all. No amount of inconveniences from lack of technology will convince him otherwise.
“Hey Kyungsoo, would you like to hang out?” Joonmyun asks; it’s never been a hobby of his to hang out with teenagers. It painted the wrong image back in the city, but here in the countryside where no one has to know about anything, the question is exhilarating and he can only hope he receives a positive response.
The slow nod of Kyungsoo’s head has Joonmyun over the moon.
“Sure, why not?”
Joonmyun plops himself down on his bed, stretching lazily like a cat over his sheets. It had been a fun day with Kyungsoo. Past the initial embarrassment that had kicked in upon his realisation that he had basically been in his pyjamas, rolled right out of bed, the two of them had managed to explore a bit of the forest together - which really was just Kyungsoo guiding him around.
He hadn’t expected to be able to hold a proper conversation with Kyungsoo, seeing the fact that they were about 5 years apart by estimation, but it had been unexpectedly easy. The younger male didn’t seem like a teenager when he spoke and he was full of witty comments and sharp insight. Joonmyun can’t remember the last time he’d had so much fun hanging out with a friend.
A glance at his clock tells him that it’s only ten, nightfall. In the past, Joonmyun would still probably be neck deep in trying to finish up the work that had accumulated day after day. Now, he’s fully fed himself a hearty dinner, taken a nice long shower and was snuggling up in bed. The weather was pleasant enough, a light drizzle had begun to fall in the early evening, and the air was cool so that he didn’t sweat.
All in all, a satisfactory day he would be pleased to have repeatedly. His mind drifts from conscious thoughts to the realm of flashing trains of thought passing through his head. He doesn’t latch onto any one fixed thought. He lets himself suspend in the center of his mind with everything whizzing around him. He would’ve fallen asleep in that manner: if not for a sudden familiar song.
He blinks drowsily as he pushes himself up into a half sitting position. He hadn’t heard the birdsong all day and he’d thought, perhaps the bird had flown off to a different part of the forest. He wasn’t an expert on birds, but he’d thought they would usually sing through the day or at a specific time of the day. It’s a lot clearer tonight than it was the night before. Joonmyun almost thinks it might be right outside his window.
He means to move to go look for the source of the birdsong, but a wave of sleepiness washes over him. He barely manages to keep his eyes half-open for another minute more before he falls right asleep. It seems as though he might have a peaceful night after a long day, but Joonmyun tosses and turns in bed the whole time.
Joonmyun stands in front of two shelves of snacks. He’s currently contemplating between a box of butter cookies and some Ghana chocolate pies. He rubs his eyes tiredly as he clings onto his shopping basket. The decision is tough and he’s stuck; it also doesn’t help that he’s been having terrible sleep lately.
In the end, he chooses one small box of butter cookies and a loose packet of the Ghana chocolate pie. He’s never been a great fan of excessive amounts of chocolate. He’d much prefer to stuff himself on butter cookies and milk, but compromise is a good thing. That’s what he tells himself. He wishes he could come to some compromise with himself about his sleep too.
If he isn’t having the most unrestful sleep by tossing and turning in bed, always intermittently waking up through the night, then he’s having a solid night’s sleep constantly filled with nightmares like flashes of memories from someone else’s life. It’s been creeping him out too much, but he doesn’t know how to confide in anyone.
He hasn’t even been able to confide in Kyungsoo about the dreams. Joonmyun has grown a lot closer to the teenager in the past few weeks that he’s moved into his new home and subsequently met said boy, but it’s not as if it’s easy for a grown man like him to admit that his dreams have been scaring him.
Joonmyun meets Kyungsoo almost every day. It’s a routine to wake up in the morning and either meet Kyungsoo outside of his house or find the younger male cheekily lounging on his couch. Joonmyun has kept to leaving his house unlocked because of the one day that Kyungsoo had ended up outside of his house soaking wet from the early morning rain.
The two of them have become quite close friends, sharing pretty much everything under the sun about their opinions, but they’ve both been tight lipped about their pasts, their origins and things about others besides just them. It’s a weird tight rope walk that Joonmyun has found themselves on and they’re grabbing each other’s hands tight to avoid falling alone.
He carries his basket of groceries to the cashier of the local supermarket the village has. It’s the one and only and the old man who runs it is kind. Joonmyun likes the people of his village. There’s only one grumpy old person out of the whole place and Joonmyun doesn’t even see him often. Whenever he hangs out in the main town area, he feels loved by all the elderly.
The only little problem he has is that everyone he looks at, he wonders if they are Kyungsoo’s grandparents or parents. It’s taken him a lot of effort not to be overly curious and not to blow his newfound best friend’s cover. He doesn’t want to end up losing the trust that Kyungsoo had given to him the first day they met. It’s an odd feeling to want to protect someone else.
“Still sticking by your little house alone, Joonmyun?” the owner of the supermarket asks as he checks the items out. Joonmyun forces a small smile on his face, a little unnatural as he gives a noncommittal shrug. He doesn’t want to lie to these kind old people and he can’t exactly tell them the truth. It would tear him up inside if he cared less about them and Kyungsoo, but he does care a lot, so he bears with it a lot more.
“Thank you for the groceries,” he gives as a flimsy avoidance of a reply and ducks out of the store. Joonmyun thinks about how nice it’ll be to have a cup of milk and butter cookies once he gets home. He spots a couple of pigeons hanging around outside the supermarket, maybe waiting for scraps. He thinks of the birdsong he keeps hearing outside of his house. It’s both irritating but also strangely addictive. He scrunches his nose and shakes his head, walking back towards home.
“Hyung,” Joonmyun isn’t at all shocked to find Kyungsoo perched at the dining table of his house anymore. He might have screamed and fallen over the first time it happened, but he’s accepted that Kyungsoo has become a somewhat constant fixture in his house now that he never locks his door anymore.
He sets the groceries down with a roll of his eyes and a small wave as Kyungsoo starts digging through the bags of things. Joonmyun bites back a smile when the teenager goes for the Ghana chocolate pie. A good compromise he’d made at the store, he mentally applauds himself as he fills his refrigerator with eggs, vegetables and some fresh meat.
“I just bought that, you know,” Joonmyun pretends to sound miffed as he watches Kyungsoo chomp down on the chocolate pie, bits of the dark sweet smearing on the corner of lips. He loads the carton of milk in the refrigerator and pulls out the orange juice, opting to enjoy his butter cookies later in the evening with a blanket maybe.
“I love you, hyung,” Kyungsoo merely chimes in response with a mischievous grin and Joonmyun ignores the little loop his stomach does. He pours two cups of juice and sets them on the table, storing the carton back in the refrigerator. His teenaged companion goes for one of the cups and his brain mentally provides him with that reminder that he’s done a good job, because Kyungsoo dislikes milk. He ignores himself.
“You’ve got chocolate all over yourself like a little kid,” he points out as he reaches over to wipe off the mess with a tissue. Kyungsoo pauses mid-bite and pulls away, cheeks flushing. He takes the tissue out of Joonmyun’s hand and cleans himself up.
“Thanks, hyung,” the endearment is usually affectionate and sweet with Kyungsoo, but there are times when Joonmyun feels as though it’s being used as a buffer to put some sort of distance between the two of them. Like right now, when his brain is telling him to lean in and give Kyungsoo a light peck on the cheek, it serves as a reminder that relationships are not one-sided and he cannot just do what he wants to.
A little bit of an awkward silence comes between the both of them and Joonmyun clears his throat stiffly, leaning back into his seat and sipping from his cup of orange juice. He makes a concerted effort to keep his eyes on the rim of his cup, but they dart up few seconds to check on Kyungsoo nonetheless. The younger male finishes his chocolate pie in silence and looks conflicted, though Joonmyun still struggles to differentiate between which part of his expression just looks that way because of how Kyungsoo’s eyes always are.
“The weather is clear today so we can go to the stream I wanted to show you,” is what ends up breaking the silence and it comes from Kyungsoo. He sounds as though the strange moment that had come to pass between them hadn’t really even happened or that he wasn’t bothered by it, so a smile manages to make its way onto Joonmyun’s face again.
“Sure, why not?”
The walk out to the stream is one that passes without notice. Conversation bounces off the both of them smoothly, without them trying, as if there’s so much within them that they feel a compelling need to share between them. Joonmyun knows, for himself, that he has so much he’s always wanted to say but never had the right person to say it to until he’d met Kyungsoo.
Kyungsoo navigates them through the forest as though he were the one to map everything out. Joonmyun remains a reverent spectator of the splendour of nature around him as they walk. It distracts him so much that he never once wonders how Kyungsoo knows exactly which tree to turn right at or which patch of moss is the right one to pass over.
When they finally hit the stream, Joonmyun falls silent for a moment and Kyungsoo stays by his side quietly, letting the beauty of everything set in. The clear waters catch his attention first, the way he can look all the way to the bottom and see the aquatic life lolling around as if the rest of the world is a small, unimportant matter. Then the sheer length of the stream itself amazes Joonmyun. It twists and winds into the distance on both ends, farther than his eye can observe.
The calming sound of the water running makes Joonmyun sit down by the stream, on a soft patch of grass, as taken away by nature as he has always been. Kyungsoo comes to rest next to him too and there’s a vague smile on his heart-shaped lips. Joonmyun thinks his chest squirms and a little voice tells him that Kyungsoo looks like the perfect forest nymph, a child of nature, just as beautiful.
“Feels good, doesn’t it?” Kyungsoo asks and Joonmyun has to agree. It’s the same serene feeling that has come to him again and again, after he’d moved here to the countryside. It’s as ever present as the stress of city life, but he doesn’t know how to put a name on it. “I thought of bringing you here today because you’ve been looking kind of high strung,” Kyungsoo adds, somewhat shy and sheepish.
“Oh,” Joonmyun hadn’t expected his inner tensions to be so apparent to a teenaged boy, of all people. “Is that so?” he lets out a little embarrassed laugh; it would be weird to thank Kyungsoo, but then he had to say something and he didn’t know what else to fill the space with.
“What do you dream of, Joonmyun?” Kyungsoo says abruptly, more of a statement than a proper question. He’s surprised by the lack of the usual endearment and the boldness to the way Kyungsoo speaks now; it’s the combination of the two that shuts him up just long enough. Just long enough.
A little boy had strayed a little too far off from the sand box that his mother had allowed him to play in at the park. He’d walked towards a bush that shook unusually, different from the rest, curious, and that had been the start of all his troubles. He shouldn’t have gone to the bushes. He should never have left the sand box at all. A thick darkness covers his eyes after a flashing gleam of metal. It’s too late for regrets; not that he knows that yet.
Joonmyun’s eyes widen as he looks at Kyungsoo. His dreams in such perfect definition and precision.
Pain. A lot of pain. A lot of different kinds of pain. Pain that he wishes he never came to know. Pain he wishes no one else will ever experience. Pain he could’ve stayed safe from if only he had listened to his mother. His voice is raw from all the screaming that no one heard, because if they’d been listening, they would’ve come to help him. They wouldn’t have left him here in such pain. His voice would have compelled them to save him. Anyone who heard would’ve come.
The birdsong that so attracted him and drew him towards it. The birdsong that clung onto him and made him uneasy in his inaction. The birdsong that compelled him.
One day, no more pain. Just a loud heavy thunk and nothing else left. No more, no less. His freedom. Days, days more of darkness, days more of weakness, days more until he finds the strength in himself to stand and be free, to spread his wings. He leaves and the light that finds him, blinds him. He collapses, ungraceful, unsightly, undignified. He crawls, his wings are tattered and torn, he finds what must be a reprieve. But it isn’t. Just pain, more pain, words that pierce through him into his core the way leather belts and burning hot knives could not.
Something his realtor had told him dawns on Joonmyun now, something he had forgotten and not remembered for so long: you are the youngest resident within the village. There are no schools of any kind nearby, so all of the young children leave for the city. All that’s left are their aged parents, only the elderly citizens who aren’t worth anything in the city at all.
The lush green trees, the coolness of isolation, nature as a companion. People rise from ashes, from the earth, from the soil. People must also go back to ashes, to earth, to soil. What a perfect way to die, was it not? And despite it all, a sweet song. A bird, it lands on his shoulder. It sings, it promises and it tells, of all the things.
Joonmyun’s entire body shakes as he listens to the birdsong, loud and clear as day. Kyungsoo smiles softly, reassuringly, taking Joonmyun’s hands into his, lips forming the melody.
A bird, it lands on his shoulder. It sings, it promises and it tells, of all the things.
“The end.”