that part was yours, but it just might be ours (4/4)
( previous parts )
part 1 | part 2 | part 3
40’s
When it ends, the day is as beautiful as it should be. The sun is out and the flowers are in bloom. It’s not too cold or hot out-the weather absolutely perfect for a nice walk or a picnic at the park. He awakes on the day with a smile on his face, limbs still a bit heavy from sleep but alert nonetheless as the sun flittered through the curtains he’d left partially open on the night before. The day felt like a new beginning, though to what he still wasn’t sure of.
His conscience kicks in and hisses in his ear. Who wakes up happy after another night of sleeping away from one’s wife? He could imagine a tiny version of his arrogant 30-year old self glaring at him on his shoulder. The version of himself from years before that had chosen this path because he thought he was mature enough to know better.
He doesn’t, of course, and he’s starting to think he’ll never be mature enough to actually know.
Changmin has taken to sleeping in a lonely single bed in the last few months, moving a few of his belongings from the master bedroom to the little cabinet they kept in the guestroom. It wasn’t that he’d been banished from his wife’s side. On the contrary he and Qian had been trying to work things out for close to a year and a half now and would try to end each day in the same bed. It wasn’t entirely his or her fault that his body would refuse to sleep next to her warm body. Changmin would lay awake for hours after they’d shut the lights before giving up and tiptoeing out of the room and collapsing elsewhere. He sleeps better alone now than he ever has before and it’d been too long since he’s wanted to this much.
Rubbing a hand over his eyes, Changmin sits up and squints at the sun streaming into his window. He has to review his associate’s research on a corporate case by eleven AM today and yet he doesn’t feel inclined to move out of bed. A quick glance at the watch he’d left on the nightstand tells him he has an hour and a half to get ready and drive to work but he feels no rush at all. As it goes, Changmin doesn’t feel as urgent to go to work as he used to. He tries not to think that it started around the same time his marriage began to lose its shiny luster.
(He tries even harder to think if it actually did shine the way he remembers thinking it did. Even that was neither his fault or hers.)
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@IAmImYoona followed by @CMSHIM218
@IAmImYoona Landed in Netherlands for a conference on the apparent fiscal crisis looming over the global economy. Not entirely sure if I should be here.
@IAmImYoona I don’t know much about these kinds of things. I read but I’m not the radical politically opinionated person most of my peers paint me as.
@IAmImYoona But… I wouldn’t change a thing though. About my life.
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“Would you come back early tonight?” Qian asks him after setting a plate of bacon and eggs in front of in on the kitchen table. She’s biting her lip the way she used to during their Law classes: eyes down, cheeks slightly flushed and with her bottom lip being chewed against the top row of her teeth. Changmin feels a wave of affection go through him when he sees her like this, looking younger than he actually feels. He’ll always think of her as beautiful inside and out, even with barely noticeable crows’ feet lining the edges of her eyes and the quiet tension in her tone.
His gaze on her softens and she catches him doing with a look that makes him want to simultaneously laugh and frown at the same time. He schools his features though, giving her a small smile just as Qian manages not to roll her eyes, and returns his grin with one of her own. She gets why he’s not so surprised by her sudden inquiry. Of course she understands. The smile fills her gorgeous face and in that moment Changmin recognizes her then as Victoria Song-his best friend from Law School. She gets it because they are friends first and always. And it’s this thought that shutters him back to reality and to really listen to her next words.
“I think it’s time we talked.”
“Alright,” He nods, spearing his eggs into his mouth and looking at her thoughtfully. Changmin has expected as much, after all a talk was overdue. Months overdue even. They shouldn’t have to be at this standstill any longer. He waits another beat before adding, “What’s for dinner?”
And Vic-Qian laughs and shakes her head, the slight tension in the moment disappearing quickly as it had come. He’d always been good at diffusing an argument, it was no wonder it would be even easier when there was none to go on. She rests her on her palm, her elbows hitting the wood of the table with a barely audible tap as she watches him eat his breakfast. It’s so easy really, to be domestic with her. His wife. Victoria.
“Sweet and sour pork,” she answers, grinning as Changmin grunts appreciatively. “I’ll make sure to make extra helpings. I think we’ll need a few bowls after tonight.”
“Eating our problems away,” He quips and feels a little guilty for the flash of pain in her eyes as he stands up to grab his coat and bag. Neither of them had thought their vows meant for any of this but it’s happening all the same. The pain in her eyes that mirrors his tells him so.
Qian kisses him on the cheek, swift, sweet and chaste and steps back as he opens the door. Changmin pauses just to look back at her and opens his mouth to say-“I’ll be back by 5.”
It isn’t want he means to tell her but she gets that. His best friend knows him better than he knows himself.
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@IAmImYoona I need 8k more words and I am done! #pushforvacation #NatGeo
@IAmImYoona I graduated with a degree on Anthropology and a minor in Journalism. It fits me, no?
||+||+||+||
He leans back on his seat and reaches for his phone, tapping on a few apps before settling on one that reminds him that it’ll be the 30th of May very, very soon and Changmin feels his insides churn at the thought. The feeling isn’t entirely unpleasant but it’s still there despite his best intentions to dampen it over the years. It makes him feel full and starved at the same time, aggravated and calm-about 20 in a 42-year old’s body.
He sighs, rubbing his fingers against his forehead. Almost a decade and a half later and he still feels a little useless by the churn in his gut. But it doesn’t stop him from looking for ways to feel it over and over again.
He hasn’t spoken to her in years. She had politely refused his invitation and set off to travel the world to study and write. He only knows enough about her through news articles and Social Media-the latter of which forced to him by their common friends thinking it wouldn’t be awkward to follow your ex on Twitter because you’re married Changmin, that ship has sailed and sunk.
Except it hasn’t and probably won’t ever. Because he keeps it docked in the dark recesses of his mind when he’s feeling particularly lonely and bereft. Because he can’t help himself when it comes to her and everyone (Qian, their friends, himself) knows it.
Because Shim Changmin is a fucking masochist when it comes to Im Yoona and it’s so fucked up.
“You’re an idiot, Shim,” he chastises himself and tosses the phone to across the wood, sending it bouncing almost off the desk and to land very close to the edge. He stares at the gadget for a full minute, whether willing it to ring or not was hardly something he wanted to acknowledge, before standing up to go about his day. Qian wants him home by five for dinner and to talk and he was going to do just that because he loves her, his frie-wife.
Changmin practically runs away when it pings, shutting the door behind him before he surrenders to impulse to check and succumb to that stomach-churning feeling again.
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@IAmImYoona Home in a few weeks! Can’t wait!
@IAmImYoona There are faces that I miss. You know who you are!
@IAmImYoona Korea, wait for me!
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His marriage dissolves over sweet and sour pork, special fried rice and five bottles of Soju.
Qian grins at him from her seat on one side of the couch, her feet up and under her as he nurses to his Soju bottle at the other end. Their talk tonight had been eye-opening and sweet, not bitter in the way the movies make it out to be. They spoke like adults, mature and reasonable-pointing out the pros and cons and listing resources and making plans. They talked like they used to-good friends figuring out what to do after a project ends. Qian has always been a go-getter and she knows what she wants out of life same as he. She has a plan already and a place to go. There was no need to divide assets or squabble for things that don’t mean as much as the value of their friendship.
As far as they are concerned, their separation is a win, not a loss. They know each other better than to feel used by each other’s flaws-her insecurity, his too idyllic ambitions, the lackluster of their emotions to name a few-and lash out. There was no need for screaming or tears or broken plates littered on the kitchen floor.
Shim Changmin and Song Qian are friends first and always. That bit isn’t about to change just because their marriage has reached its end. They won’t let it change.
“It’s weird, isn’t it? To break up and feel oddly refreshed by it?” Qian speaks up after she finishes her own bottle, setting it down on the table. “I mean, it’s probably because we didn’t really argue. Which is odd, to be honest, knowing we’re lawyers and arguing is what we do.”
“We knew what we wanted and reached a settlement. It’s the cleanest divorce in the history of the World.”
They laugh together at that, feeling lighter than ever now that the silent tension from the morning and the past few months was gone.
“Maybe next time you decide to get married, you won’t be such a tightass.”
Changmin snorts, ignoring the lump in his throat as she throws him a look that tells him just how well she knows him more than a friend should. He settles for a snarky response, deflecting the underlying notion of her statement with an easy smirk. “I resent that. I am ‘set in my ways’. It has nothing to do with my ass or of it being tight.”
“Suuuure…” She tells him with a giggle, drawing the word out before popping a piece of pork smothered in sauce into her mouth. The sauce drips and stains her chin that he almost chokes on his Soju as a laugh bubbles from his throat. This time she doesn’t pretend to not roll her eyes and does, smacking him with a throw pillow, “Oh fuck off, Shim. It’s not like you’re a clean eater!”
“I, at least, don’t drip sauce all over myself, Vic.” Changmin points out, waving at two distinct drops on her green blouse. The nickname flows out of his mouth smooth and easy. Like always and Qian doesn’t mind at all. “I’m not five like some people I know…”
“You act like one though!” Qian sing-songs and it’s his turn to roll his eyes skyward.
The dinner ends well with another kiss on his cheek and no pretense of sleeping in the same bed. She reminds him to pick up an application for Divorce on his way to the Justice Department the next day and to take out the trash before he goes to sleep. It’s still so domestic that he can’t help but to reach out and plant a kiss on her forehead.
“Thanks, Qian,” he tells her softly, his lips still on the skin of her forehead. He isn’t sure why he’s so grateful but he is and he knows she feels the same way. “I wouldn’t trade our years for the world, I want you to know that.”
Her eyes are soft when she looks up at him and when she nods, and says “I know” before wrapping her arms around his waist and holding him tight he knows that he means every word and that this is goodbye. He sleeps the best that night, sinking into the sheets of their guest bedroom’s single bed.
They were the lucky ones to escape unscathed.
||+||+||+||
@IAmImYoona I AM HOME!!!
@IAmImYoona And just in time for the BIG 4-0! Who’s excited?! …NOT ME!
@IAmImYoona But I am happy to be home!
||+||+||+||
He’s been officially divorced for a month and half when he gets the tweet and seriously considers moving to Alaska. His body thrums in excitement even as the panic takes over and his stomach drops from under him while his heart twists in his chest. Changmin’s acknowledged the churning as a visceral emotion at this point that only manifests itself when the topic of Im Yoona comes up. And when his cellphone pings and he reads the message, he wonders if he’ll survive feeling this way tenfold in her presence.
The tweet is simple, clean-cut. But it feels awkward all the same.
@IAmImYoona Let’s go out for my birthday tonight! My treat! I think. Don’t order so much! @SeoJuHyun @LeeDongHae @SummerChoi @choikyuhyun @CMSHIM218
He feels like more of an afterthought when he reads the message over. Tagged only for the sake of tagging. He feels a smidge of jealousy run through him when he sees a friend of hers from work, Lee Donghae, reply immediately with an enthusiastic “Sure thing! See you soon, beautiful @IAmImYoona”.
Changmin knows he’s screwed when he realizes he’s tapped on the guy’s profile and has been glaring at his display picture for longer than he should. He bites back a pained laugh at how ridiculous it is for him to feel so… betrayed by her. He hasn’t seen her in years and neither of them has reached out to each other until now. It shouldn’t matter that he isn’t the first one she mentions anymore. It’s been over for years. You’ve been married and divorced and she’s been off in God knows where doing whatever it was she does without a word since. It’s not worth feeling awful for. Not worth the jealousy or the time-
He presses the back button and finds himself staring at her name next, her picture grinning up at him innocently. His body thrums again, the churning sensation picking up to a rhythm he’s not sure why he knows. It makes him shake, dizzy.
He doesn’t like it. (Even though he does.) He shouldn’t. (But he feels it anyway.)
His thumb pushes the Reply button resolutely and types “Can’t. Have work. Happy Birthday.”-short and clean-cut.
Over, it’s been over since forever.
But he wavers at the last minute and discards the message in the next. Cops out after another and tosses his phone into the cabinet of his office desk.
Changmin won’t go. He won’t let himself.
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@CMSHIM218 @IAmImYoona I have work. Sorry.
@IAmImYoona @CMSHIM218 Oh. Okay.
@IAmImYoona @CMSHIM218 If you change your mind, we’ll be easy to find.
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It’s past one in the morning when Changmin finds himself in front of an old bar a little ways from their old University. It’s the first place he thinks of when he thinks of Yoona. It’s close to any place that means something to them: An old bookshop where they browsed for copies of Shakespearean plays he still doesn’t get but knows she loves. A flower shop who sells the peonies he got her on Valentines’ once, even when they’re not in season. A café where they had fought and talked and made up at countless times before they actually ended. He even spots the neon lights of the motel they’d first had sex in when they were a couple a few blocks away, blinking “Vacancy” in large neon-green capital letters.
He blushes when the memory of that night comes to him but he pushes it away. He was there because it’s her birthday. He was there to see her, even though he would rather she doesn’t see him. Because it’s her, Im Yoona, and the visceral sensation in his body won’t let him sleep still unless he gives into it one last time.
The door swings open to the establishment and Changmin lets himself walk in. The club is actually a little empty tonight with only a few patrons sitting by the bar and a few couples dancing to a jazz song on the floor. He feels her close even before he spots her sitting by herself at a table, nursing one of those fruity drinks that had more juice than alcohol in it to be called a proper cocktail. She’s as beautiful as he remembers, maybe even more, with her skin still luminescent even under the dim Technicolor lights of the bar. Her long hair is tied back at her nape with a few tendrils free around her face, her pink lips plump and soft as she presses them together, deep in thought, and trails her fingers down the neck of her glass. He feels a shiver go through him even as his brow furrows, squinting at her from the door-Alone? Really? The party ended that early?
Changmin waits to see if anyone would come to sit by her. If Sooyoung or Seohyun or any of the people she invited in her tweet will suddenly show up, coming from the bathroom or out of thin air. He even waits to see if the guy Donghae is anywhere but Changmin knows he probably isn’t, because no one he recognizes is at the bar and Yoona is still alone.
“Alone on the Big 4-0, huh?” He mutters under his breath, his stance relaxing as he heaves a deep breath. He wishes he didn’t feel so fucking relieved to know she is alone because she shouldn’t be on her birthday. But he is, even as he considers leaving without a word.
But he won’t. Changmin sighs as he pulls out his phone to tap on the screen and then wait. One second passes then two, three and then-ping!
@CMSHIM218 @IAmImYoona The Big 4-0’s an important one. Why are you alone?
Yoona’s head turns up and out to the door, her mouth dropping open as her eyes widens in surprise. Changmin can’t help the smile that blossoms on his face when she rubs at her eyes like a child. He doesn’t even notice the churning in his gut as he waves at her from the door and waits as she slips off her stool and moves towards him. Her eyes are still wide in disbelief as she inches closer and closer.
“Chang-” She doesn’t even get the syllables of his name out before she crushes herself into him, arms tight across his chest as her nose burrows against his throat.
His stomach lifts instead of dropping and churning turns into a flutter as he returns her embrace. His body thrums along the length of hers and their hearts beating in sync.
And though he knows it’s over-that it’s been over since forever, he also knows that it’s not.
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@CMSHIM218 @IAmImYoona Happy Birthday.
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They end up fucking against their motel room door the second they get through, limbs entwined so tight it was a wonder that they managed to slip pieces of clothing down enough for him to penetrate and for her to latch on to him with all her might. They’re older now and less limber than they used to be but somehow they manage it-rutting against the wood of their door with an ardor of hormonally-charged teenagers.
Her fingernails claw at him as he pounds into her, dragging the cloth of his shirt up and under her clenched fists while she moans and pitches her hips up to meet his thrusts. The rhythm they set is brutal, years of pain and silence bursting free with every punishing blow.
(Thrust) How could you leave me? (Thrust) How could you get married? (Thrust) Why didn’t you call? (Thrust) Why didn’t you reach out me? (Thrust) I needed you but you wanted something more. (Thrust) I wanted you. (Thrust) I wasn’t ready. (Thrust) I was a fool. (Thrust) So was I. (Thrust) I miss you. (Thrust) I love you.
The dam breaks when their orgasms hit, tears coming unbidden as Changmin presses deep into one final thrust. They slump against each other, cheeks wet as their lips meet-tasting the regret of years lost in each other’s kiss.
“You’re married,” she whimpers a beat later, after Changmin stumbles them into bed and undresses them. She’s shaking with emotion when he moves to cover her with his body, fingers clasped around his biceps, her thighs cradling him close. His heart aches as she sobs, more fragile now than he’s ever seen her. “We shouldn’t have-You’re married.”
“I’m not,” He tells her, cupping her face in his hands. He pulls her in and kisses her soul deep, letting her taste the desire, longing and love in him. They break apart, their mouths a hair’s breadth of each other as he repeats, “I’m not married. Not anymore.”
A flash of light from a passing car hits their window, illuminating the length of their bodies from either end quickly before sinking them back into the dark. The neon-green sign is still on and it paints their room in an odd hue as they continue to drink each other in. This time, when he sinks himself inside of her, it is slow and soft. Cathartic.
It’s home.
MID-40’s
“Slow down, please!” Yoona pleads desperately, stepping on the hem of her white dress, “Why do you always have to walk so fast?”
He inwardly rolls his eyes and offers his hand, chuckling as she begrudgingly takes it. “I should be asking why you don’t walk faster. Not the other way around, Yoona.”
“It’s hard to walk around in a dress this long, okay?” She sighs, “You don’t have that kind of problem in suits, do you?”
“Didn’t I tell you that you didn’t need to put on that damned dre -“
Yoona shushes him, pressing her finger to his lips, “We’ve been over this last night and this morning and less than an hour ago. I’m not going to have the same argument with you again, for the fourth time.”
Changmin doesn’t enjoy being told what to do but he lets this one slide. After all, it isn’t every day that he’ll get to marry the woman he’s spend half his life loving and the other half regretting. He thinks a part of him has always known it’s going to be Yoona. He’s married once before; settled down, build a home and now he’s about to do it all over again with her. The only difference is that Changmin can picture it all, mostly because he’s spent nights sleeping with ‘what if’s under his pillow.
“Now that we’re actually here,” Yoona starts, still holding up the skirt of her dress, “It actually feels so… pointless.”
They’re standing at the bottom of the steps, hands and fingers intertwined. Changmin’s not sure whose hand is clammy at this point but he knows that after what she’s said, he’s about to break into a full blown sweat.
“Don’t you want to do this anymore?” He gulps, trying to hide his uneasiness, “Get married?”
She swivels around to face him, her lips parted in shock at the question before curving into a small smile. “Do you even have to ask? I’ve always wanted to be the girl at the end of the aisle on your big day.”
Relieved, he asks, “Then why did you just say that it’s pointless?”
“Because it is,” Yoona shrugs, “We’ve known each other for a lifetime - I know you better than anyone else, you know me better than anyone else. We have Jongmin - for God’s sake, we have actually have a baby together. I bore a child in my womb and carried it for nine months! I let you rub my feet and shower me with sex! I’ll never love anyone like I love you - ever…”
“But?”
“No buts,” she corrects without missing a beat and squeezes his hand in reassurance, “I just don’t know why we need a piece of paper and a ring to confirm that we’re destined to be together.”
“Destined?” He quirks a brow, “You actually believe in all that?”
“It will probably sound stupid to you but…” Yoona glances at him from the corner of her eyes then rests firmly on the pavement beneath her cream colored heels, “When we were kids, I used to think that the gangly boy I met in the Supermart was ‘The One’ - like it proved something that you kept on finding those lollipops I hid around the playground.” She waves it off and begins to sputter, “I know, I know, really silly -“
“That was you?”
He’s unexpectedly not surprised by this. Of course, he didn’t know it was her but how could it be anybody else? Then he laughs - loud and carefree and the most joyous of laughs. Changmin can’t say he’ll ever be a believer in fate or destiny because that’s just him a skeptic and an unbeliever but if he’s ever supposedly tied down to anyone for life, he hopes it’s her. He always did.
She nods. “Now you’re going to make fun of me.”
“Why would I? I really liked those lollipops, even if they did give me cavities.” Changmin jokes, not being to hold in his smile at the shocked look on her face that he chooses not tease her like she’d anticipated, “So… what? Did you want to walk around, telling people that we’re not married but we’re living one address and raising a child together?”
“I don’t know. Not exactly that but, kinda?” Her brows furrow and she gives him a wry, helpless look, “This is probably the most casual wedding ceremony in history but it just still feels so overdone, like… like we’re trying to prove something to everyone else in there.”
And by in there, Yoona means behind that door and inside the church. They’re close friends and families and somehow Changmin can’t help but think that Yoona’s right, maybe they’re doing this for all the wrong reasons. He can remember the proposal like it was yesterday but he can’t remember who set up the reception or decided on the location. If he was being honest, he doesn’t remember much of the past couple of months before this very day. It’s gone by in an exhausting blur of preparations alongside celebrations.
“I mean, look at me,” she lets out an exasperated laugh and does a spin around, “This dress - it’s not me! I feel so done up and I smell like cookie dough and my hair -“
“Your hair,” he interrupts, pulling her in by the waist so he could brush that dangling curl out of her face, “Your hair looks fine, you smell good enough to eat and it’s nice to see you dressed up for me just this once.”
Yoona flushes a little when he leans even closer to nuzzle her throat, looking away and out to their surroundings. “I - people are staring, Changmin -“
“I don’t care if people start whipping out their phones and take videos,” He laughs, ruffling up her hair, “That’s what people do when a bride and a groom stands bickering outside the church in the cold one minute and then gets up close and personal the next.”
She lets out an annoyed huff and pushes at his chest, stepping away enough (but not too far from his reach) to pat her dress down. Her hand comes up to check on her hair and she frowns, muttering, “Great, now I’m going to have to walk in there with messy hair.”
“I thought you said this is pointless anyway?” Changmin asks, smirking.
“Yeah, well,” Yoona says haughtily, “Doesn’t mean I want to get killed by Qian-who was so sweet to book me that frou-frou hair appointment and all-I mean, the girl probably knows Karate!”
“The Chinese Martial Arts is called Kung-fu but that’s not the point!”
“Yes, it is! And if not, I bet she’ll sic Zhoumi at me!”
Changmin takes a breath in exasperation and pulls away completely, hands at his sides. He fidgets on his feet, anxious in a way he hasn’t felt in a very, very long time. “So what do you want to do then?”
She glances away at the sudden tired tone of his voice, chewing on her bottom lip before finally asking back, “What do you want to do?”
The love of her life shrugs, ducking his head shyly. “Is it cliché to say ‘whatever makes you happy’?”
Yoona smiles so warmly at his response that for a second, Changmin forgets that it’s the middle of winter. She seems to do that to him, makes him forget everything else around him and just feel happy that she’s there in the moment with him. And he hopes that it will be the same for Jongmin, that his mother will be his source happiness even at his worst times. What he’s said is cliché but is not a lie. Yoona has made him as happy as any man can ever be and he can only hope to make up for the lost times by doing the same.
“Yes,” Yoona admits with a bit of amusement, “Is it cliché to say that I’m happy just to be with you?”
It takes a minute for him to reply and she giggles, “I love you with or without the marriage license. You do know that right?”
“I think so,” She says cheekily, “But since we’re here, I guess one of those wouldn’t hurt and Jongmin wouldn’t have to worry about being asked about his parents when he gets to school.”
“Why is it so hard to marry you?” Changmin asks and picks her up, chuckling at her protests as she yelps and kicks around in his arm, “Just remember that you did this to yourself.”
“Me?!” She yells, attempting to smack him on the arm and failing miserably, “You’re carrying the bride - me, into the church and you say I did this to myself! Maybe I should ask Qian to sic Zhoumi on you! God, I swear when Jongmin’s old enough, I’ll let him know that his poor mother sacrificed herself to marry a lunatic like you -“
Changmin tightens his hold on her as he bursts through the door and says loud enough for all to hear, “And I’ll let him know that his mother loves a lunatic like me. Your argument is overruled, wifey. Let’s get married.”
AFTER
“Mom really does make the weirdest requests, doesn’t she?”
He laughs despite himself, rubbing the sole of one his shoes into the dirt as he swings lightly to and fro. It’s a beautiful day out at the park where it all began. The sun is out and high in the sky; its rays just warm enough to energize and not scald like it has in the past weeks before today. It should be a little odd for a midsummer day to be so perfectly temperate but he’s always known that good things always happen here when one needs it to be and he isn’t wrong now as he hadn’t been when he was eight.
Changmin watches as his son drops a trowel into one of the baskets they’d brought and heaves another basket closer. Jongmin, now in college, picks up one of the ready daisies (“It’s a Leucanthemum vulgare, also known as a Ox-eye daisy. A perennial flowering plant common in Europe and temperate regions in Asia. See, I know these things, Mom.”) he’d bought and bagged an hour ago. He brushes the petals softly after tearing the bag off; placing the flower into one of many holes he’s dug into the dirt. He sprinkles a helping of ashes into the same hole, then a sprinkling of dirt before continuing on with the others in the basket.
Jongmin is smiling as he fills every hole the patch of land is filled with full-bloomed daisies, patting the dirt and ashes down before standing up and reaching for the water spray Changmin holds for him to douse the flowers the way his mother taught him.
“Flowers need baths too, you know,” Changmin recites affectionately, mimicking Yoona’s inflection to a saying of hers to a T.
Jongmin snorts a laugh as he finishes with the water spray, adding to statement with an impression of his own, “Just like Mama and Papa who stinks. Just like Little Jongmin with his quirky little winks.”
He shakes the can a bit to make sure every drop of water is out before dropping back to sit next to Changmin by the swings. Father and son watch as the wind picks up and flutters the flowers into life.
“It’s a really weird request, Dad.” Jongmin says a beat later, turning his head to face his father and watches as Changmin discreetly rubs at his eyes. “Cremation is one thing. But to be buried into the dirt along with daisies at a children’s park is another.”
“We fell in love here.” Changmin reminds him simply, earning a scoff and weak but affectionate roll of his son’s eyes. “It’s appropriate.”
“Still weird.” Jongmin mutters and he doesn’t feel at all inclined to disagree.
Yoona’s passing was a surprise at best, swift and clean and quiet. And while Changmin chooses not to remember much from that day, he does remember kissing her lips as she stretched out beside him on their bed, whispering his love for her and listening to her give hers back. He remembers her eyes closing slowly shut for an afternoon nap, smiling all the way into her dreams. They were happy, in love, together.
A month after bumping her head against a low ceiling during a visit to cover a story on an orphanage in Thailand, she’d died in her sleep beside him. Just as their 20th Spring season as man and wife ended.
Yoona had just turned 73.
Changmin sniffs a little as Jongmin begins to pack up. She’d asked for a cremation in her will, wishing to be buried into the earth with her favorite flower at her favorite place with only her favorite men to say goodbye on a beautiful summer day. As strange as the request was, both he and his son didn’t question it. They spent days planning for the perfect moment to say farewell, organizing a picnic and rearranging schedules. Jongin readily skipped his classes when he’d woken him this morning, ready in under an hour with a sad sort of smile reminiscent of his mother’s.
Jongmin’s voice brings him back. “All set. Ready to go, Dad?”
Changmin shakes his head, digging his shoe into the sand once more. “No, I think I’ll stay awhile.” He says, looking back up to watch the daisies in front of them. He can feel his son nod in understanding without seeing him and smiles, “But you should go ahead. I don’t want you skipping any more classes than absolutely necessary.”
“I don’t know… failing a class might send the love of my life my way.” Jongmin shrugs, hefting the bag of tools and food containers over his shoulder.
This time it’s Changmin who snorts, stifling the boisterous chuckle bubbling in his chest into a short one as he shakes his head in mock-dismay. “Your mother really shouldn’t have told you that.”
“It’s a good story.”
Changmin’s tone softens. “Yeah, it is.”
His son doesn’t say any more after that and instead squeezes his shoulder affectionately before turning away. Leaving him be to spend the day to his preference in peace.
Changmin stays silent for what seems a lifetime on the swing, their memories (from before, after, together, apart, together again) running on loop in his mind’s eye. He isn’t as sad as people thought he is, but he is melancholy. In a soft, grateful way that only few understood.
They were happy, in love and together until they aren’t for the mean time. Because he knows that this isn’t the end. It’s a pause.
It’s only when the sun moves to the east that he stands up, pushing a hand into his pants’ pocket. He pulls out a lollipop wrapped in a too-girly pink wrapper and looks up to the slowly similarly pinking sky.
He sticks the candy into the sand, mouthing the words “I love you”. Then he turns and just barely catches the patch of daisies flutter again with the wind. A pause later and he can almost hear her giggling in his ear.
“Finders, keepers. Losers, weepers.”
Changmin grins.
FIN