for every fallen man
for every fallen man
→ minho/krystal
→ 1,963 words
→ soulmates are souls, obviously.
and you stood on top of the world
and you let the fog consume you:
nobody interrupted
falling falling
faster
we won’t forget you
Maybe Jessica’s right, she’s gone crazy - American mental ward crazy, no, Russian mental ward crazy. But Krystal doesn’t know Russian. Hopefully, they know English. She’s really craving for pizza right now. Oh, wait, that’s Italian.
“Hey...” -He blinks-“You’re dead.”
Or she’s... dead, of course that’s also a possibility. Everything is a blur right now. “Right,” Krystal nods and chews on the inside of her mouth for a feeling or at least, something familiar. But nothing comes afterwards, not even the metallic taste of her blood on her tongue. He beckons her to follow him so she dismisses the thought completely. Death, fine, she can deal with that.
“I like you. You don’t ask irritating questions.” He says evenly, not even looking back to check if she’s following him.
“What’s your name?”
“I take back what I said.”
He looks back and smirks cockily at her for no reason; maybe he finds it appropriate. She, on the other hand, finds this quite amusing. Some stranger with equally intimidating wit tells her she’s dead and leaves out other details.
“Whatever,” She snaps back in English when he turns away. He pauses so Krystal backs away. “It’s Minho. Will you shut up now?”
“Will you?”
Minho scoffs and starts walking again. One step back, one step forward. None of that complicated tango.
They walk in silence because he insists that she should shut up. Krystal does. As for Minho (if that’s really his name), he just guides their way through.
Upon realization, it feels like she’s walking on sand. Her feet sink deep into something warm and grainy but never deep enough to eat her up and disappear away from that jerk in front of her. It tickles the sole of her feet and sometimes it burns her but she just keeps on following Minho. A little prick shouldn’t hurt so much.
They’re walking a little too much now. Krystal is tempted to ask if Minho knows where the subway is, just for the fun of it but he speaks first. “I heard Satan’s got big plans for you. Have fun there, huh?”
“If I knew better, you’re probably Satan or one of his demon helpers.”
“But you don’t know better.”
“Do you?”
Minho winks at her. “In here, I do, princess.”
“Then are we there yet?”
He doesn’t answer. No one answers the question that actually matter, or to Krystal anyway. So she pauses and folds her arms in front of her chest, stubborn to take a step further. Minho probably heard her impatient ‘hmph’ or the loud thud she tried on making on the warm sandy surface when she stopped in her tracks. His head tilts a bit from side to side and he forces a smile on his face. But it’s better than any of his biting remarks about death and demons and whatever shit Krystal doesn’t want to listen through. Who are you and where are we going? Simple, yet remained unanswered.
“Chance. Singular. Use it well.” He looks down and drags her closer to him.
She blinks and bites back tears. Jessica is singing some song about a break-up. That one break-up that screws you over and draws you near the edge. Krystal doesn’t know why she’s crying in the first place. It’s just Jessica. Just some bitch who calls herself Krystal’s sister. Just some bitch who stole all the love her parents could have given her. Just some bitch who’ll cry to her younger sister’s coffin, begging her dead body back to life. Krystal brings the back of her hand to her face and wipes her tears away in a jerky movement. No, she isn’t dead. Otherwise, why is she standing in front of her sister now?
Minho takes a deep breath. “To be honest, I hate reunions. They just make you miss people more, and once you do, you don’t stop.”
“You can’t,” He takes a seat, unaffected, eyes fixated on her singer-slash-bartender sister.
Krystal never really bothered listening to Jessica sing. She does it all the time - in the shower, before going to bed, when she’s teasing and ticking people off (Tiffany), while making her favourite tuna sandwich, so most of the time Krystal ignored that simple action or hated it with burning passion. Today, those feelings are washed away like words written dangerously close to the shore. Her voices cracks and tears spill out from her closed eyelids. Krystal knows how Jessica hated looking and feeling weak and vulnerable. Though unspoken, the younger one knows when to hold back and let Jessica stumble back to bed alone, driven weak by someone-something she wouldn’t talk about. Today feels wrong in so many right ways - she wants to engulf her in a big crushing hug to stop her from crying because I hate seeing you like this too, unni, stop fucking crying.
The knowing look on Minho’s eyes says otherwise (“Stop. Don’t. No.”), and then he leans away, eyes wandering around a boundary that doesn’t exist in this world. She balls her hands into fists and fights the urgency to go closer her weakling of a sister. Jessica’s song ends and Jinki’s arms are always there to hold her tight and support her in countless embrace that keeps her alive in much more ways Krystal can do. Except that’s the ironic thing really, Krystal can’t do anything now. She is afraid too, about the thought of her dying and the thought of her soul sauntering near her weakling of a sister and nearly love of her life, Lee Jinki.
“Bring me to your boss now, Satan or who ever.” She finds his wrist and tugs on it cowardly.
“You’re so gullible.”
“Will you shut up?”
He lets her cry invisible tears - because they don’t stain her cheeks anymore and all the more because she’s not there. They both don’t belong in this world anymore. Minho and Krystal dissolve into nothing but merely lost souls looking for a way out of heaven that has no dimensions.
“Have I mentioned that I hate reunions?” Minho stands up and drapes an arm over her shoulder and closes in on the space between them. “But they’re not entirely bad. I’m sure Jessica has got more guts to her than what she puts up now. They’ll get over your death pretty soon, you don’t look that important anyway, midget.”
“Just because you’re a freaking giant doesn’t mean that everyone else is a midget!” She muffles her sobs on the thin layer of clothing he has on. “Jessi doesn’t forget easily so I know she’ll cry a lot. But she’s strong. She’s pretty strong, I tell you.” Krystal inches closer. And cowardly, Minho blocks her view of Jessica and Jinki (nearly love of her life, Jinki) with his other arm, now fully embracing her in a loose awkward hug.
“You shouldn’t forget about them either. But you could learn to forget and throw away the bad things, Krystal. Things...people that really hurt you, forget about them.”
That had been the first and only normal conversation the two shared. It felt odd from both sides, especially in such a more-than-friendly position. What is done is done, Minho muses.
Krystal walks in on her mother crying over a framed photo of her and even though obviously fighting tears; her father’s face reflected despair and longing. Yet again on the verge of tears, Krystal turns away from the scene and walks towards her room. Krystal takes her time to walk around their house, her school, her favourite mall, the play ground near Sunyoung and Jinri’s shared apartment. She misses them. And often Krystal would abruptly fall into these random states of quiet depression thinking of people and things (even events) that she should forget; Minho wonders just as often if there’s such a thing as a ghost manhole, because she seems to fall a lot on those on their walk around her neighbourhood. She would pause and sob silently then go back to how she is. During those times, Minho would hold her hand; hold it closely and tightly. Krystal doesn’t budge or give him a weird look - so he doesn’t move away.
Minho concludes that Krystal is the weirdest girl he’s ever met, not that he has met a lot of girls already. Because that’s not the case at all. Actually the point is that, even though Krystal seems to shift emotions frequently, she’s not so bad. She’s pretty and she’s honest. Krystal just cries a lot - about a boy named Jinki with a smile that overlooks all bad things and arms that bring warmth and certainty; a boy whose smile is not for her anymore, a boy whose arms are holding another person.
Krystal could say that she’s happy for them. But then she’d be lying. Minho could say he’s worried, but for sure, Krystal wouldn’t even turn a cheek to take a listen.
His mind and his mouth aren’t connected when he’s with her and Minho always finds himself spitting some babble he never could have imagined to come from his own mouth but he still strikes up a conversation with Krystal. “Do you have anywhere else to visit?”
“Isn’t this like teasing us? Or torturing us? Why do we even have to look back at everything we’ve left behind?”
“I don’t know.”
“I wouldn’t have gone if I knew what this really is.”
He takes a deep breath and repeats his question. “Do you have anywhere else to visit?”
Krystal shakes her head.
“Then we should go back.”
She sighs and looks down. “Why?” It only takes a single breath to ask and million years of wait for the answer to come. Krystal blinks - their hands are still linked.
Minho places his hand by her chin and lifts her head up, revealing tear-stained cheeks and plump lips. But he gazes at her eyes instead, red and swollen from crying. “Soulmates. We’re that.”
“What proof have you got?”
“What proof are you asking for?” He lightly drags a finger over Krystal lips, delighted she’s not rejecting the gesture.
Krystal turns quiet - then she presses her lips on Minho’s with the slightest of pressures, like she’s afraid he’ll crumble into pieces or scare the boy away because of her abrupt actions. Her eyes flutter open to his dark eyes but he soon closes it shut as he deepens their kiss.
She breaks the kiss and catches her breath. There isn’t anything extraordinary about it. But she takes the throbbing in her chest as a sign. Soon enough, she brings a hand to her chest and feels it beating - her heart. It throws her out of loop. Krystal gazes into Minho’s eyes again and she briefly decides that she has given him her heart - all of it. Or has it always been his?
Minho frowns and nudges her shoulder. She smiles because he looks extremely worried. “Did you wait for long?”
“It was worth it - you were worth every single second of it.”
“Did you die from bipolar disorder? Earlier you seemed annoyed by my presence. Now, you suddenly love me.... soulmate.” Krystal cocks a brow and gives him a weird look.
“I thought maybe you did.” That earns him a hard slap on the head.
“But thank you for waiting, for being here.” Krystal whispers, like she’s embarrassed just by the thought of saying those words.
“You’re welcome, I guess. So, uhm, where do you wanna go?” He asks, scratching the back of his head.
“Are we allowed in heaven?”
“I need to call St. Peter and ask if they’ll grant us permission. They’re very picky there.” Minho laughs and drags on Krystal’s arm as he starts walking again. Krystal laughs a bit too.
Krystal settles that heaven is with Minho instead.
→ minho/krystal
→ 1,963 words
→ soulmates are souls, obviously.
and you stood on top of the world
and you let the fog consume you:
nobody interrupted
falling falling
faster
we won’t forget you
Maybe Jessica’s right, she’s gone crazy - American mental ward crazy, no, Russian mental ward crazy. But Krystal doesn’t know Russian. Hopefully, they know English. She’s really craving for pizza right now. Oh, wait, that’s Italian.
“Hey...” -He blinks-“You’re dead.”
Or she’s... dead, of course that’s also a possibility. Everything is a blur right now. “Right,” Krystal nods and chews on the inside of her mouth for a feeling or at least, something familiar. But nothing comes afterwards, not even the metallic taste of her blood on her tongue. He beckons her to follow him so she dismisses the thought completely. Death, fine, she can deal with that.
“I like you. You don’t ask irritating questions.” He says evenly, not even looking back to check if she’s following him.
“What’s your name?”
“I take back what I said.”
He looks back and smirks cockily at her for no reason; maybe he finds it appropriate. She, on the other hand, finds this quite amusing. Some stranger with equally intimidating wit tells her she’s dead and leaves out other details.
“Whatever,” She snaps back in English when he turns away. He pauses so Krystal backs away. “It’s Minho. Will you shut up now?”
“Will you?”
Minho scoffs and starts walking again. One step back, one step forward. None of that complicated tango.
They walk in silence because he insists that she should shut up. Krystal does. As for Minho (if that’s really his name), he just guides their way through.
Upon realization, it feels like she’s walking on sand. Her feet sink deep into something warm and grainy but never deep enough to eat her up and disappear away from that jerk in front of her. It tickles the sole of her feet and sometimes it burns her but she just keeps on following Minho. A little prick shouldn’t hurt so much.
They’re walking a little too much now. Krystal is tempted to ask if Minho knows where the subway is, just for the fun of it but he speaks first. “I heard Satan’s got big plans for you. Have fun there, huh?”
“If I knew better, you’re probably Satan or one of his demon helpers.”
“But you don’t know better.”
“Do you?”
Minho winks at her. “In here, I do, princess.”
“Then are we there yet?”
He doesn’t answer. No one answers the question that actually matter, or to Krystal anyway. So she pauses and folds her arms in front of her chest, stubborn to take a step further. Minho probably heard her impatient ‘hmph’ or the loud thud she tried on making on the warm sandy surface when she stopped in her tracks. His head tilts a bit from side to side and he forces a smile on his face. But it’s better than any of his biting remarks about death and demons and whatever shit Krystal doesn’t want to listen through. Who are you and where are we going? Simple, yet remained unanswered.
“Chance. Singular. Use it well.” He looks down and drags her closer to him.
She blinks and bites back tears. Jessica is singing some song about a break-up. That one break-up that screws you over and draws you near the edge. Krystal doesn’t know why she’s crying in the first place. It’s just Jessica. Just some bitch who calls herself Krystal’s sister. Just some bitch who stole all the love her parents could have given her. Just some bitch who’ll cry to her younger sister’s coffin, begging her dead body back to life. Krystal brings the back of her hand to her face and wipes her tears away in a jerky movement. No, she isn’t dead. Otherwise, why is she standing in front of her sister now?
Minho takes a deep breath. “To be honest, I hate reunions. They just make you miss people more, and once you do, you don’t stop.”
“You can’t,” He takes a seat, unaffected, eyes fixated on her singer-slash-bartender sister.
Krystal never really bothered listening to Jessica sing. She does it all the time - in the shower, before going to bed, when she’s teasing and ticking people off (Tiffany), while making her favourite tuna sandwich, so most of the time Krystal ignored that simple action or hated it with burning passion. Today, those feelings are washed away like words written dangerously close to the shore. Her voices cracks and tears spill out from her closed eyelids. Krystal knows how Jessica hated looking and feeling weak and vulnerable. Though unspoken, the younger one knows when to hold back and let Jessica stumble back to bed alone, driven weak by someone-something she wouldn’t talk about. Today feels wrong in so many right ways - she wants to engulf her in a big crushing hug to stop her from crying because I hate seeing you like this too, unni, stop fucking crying.
The knowing look on Minho’s eyes says otherwise (“Stop. Don’t. No.”), and then he leans away, eyes wandering around a boundary that doesn’t exist in this world. She balls her hands into fists and fights the urgency to go closer her weakling of a sister. Jessica’s song ends and Jinki’s arms are always there to hold her tight and support her in countless embrace that keeps her alive in much more ways Krystal can do. Except that’s the ironic thing really, Krystal can’t do anything now. She is afraid too, about the thought of her dying and the thought of her soul sauntering near her weakling of a sister and nearly love of her life, Lee Jinki.
“Bring me to your boss now, Satan or who ever.” She finds his wrist and tugs on it cowardly.
“You’re so gullible.”
“Will you shut up?”
He lets her cry invisible tears - because they don’t stain her cheeks anymore and all the more because she’s not there. They both don’t belong in this world anymore. Minho and Krystal dissolve into nothing but merely lost souls looking for a way out of heaven that has no dimensions.
“Have I mentioned that I hate reunions?” Minho stands up and drapes an arm over her shoulder and closes in on the space between them. “But they’re not entirely bad. I’m sure Jessica has got more guts to her than what she puts up now. They’ll get over your death pretty soon, you don’t look that important anyway, midget.”
“Just because you’re a freaking giant doesn’t mean that everyone else is a midget!” She muffles her sobs on the thin layer of clothing he has on. “Jessi doesn’t forget easily so I know she’ll cry a lot. But she’s strong. She’s pretty strong, I tell you.” Krystal inches closer. And cowardly, Minho blocks her view of Jessica and Jinki (nearly love of her life, Jinki) with his other arm, now fully embracing her in a loose awkward hug.
“You shouldn’t forget about them either. But you could learn to forget and throw away the bad things, Krystal. Things...people that really hurt you, forget about them.”
That had been the first and only normal conversation the two shared. It felt odd from both sides, especially in such a more-than-friendly position. What is done is done, Minho muses.
Krystal walks in on her mother crying over a framed photo of her and even though obviously fighting tears; her father’s face reflected despair and longing. Yet again on the verge of tears, Krystal turns away from the scene and walks towards her room. Krystal takes her time to walk around their house, her school, her favourite mall, the play ground near Sunyoung and Jinri’s shared apartment. She misses them. And often Krystal would abruptly fall into these random states of quiet depression thinking of people and things (even events) that she should forget; Minho wonders just as often if there’s such a thing as a ghost manhole, because she seems to fall a lot on those on their walk around her neighbourhood. She would pause and sob silently then go back to how she is. During those times, Minho would hold her hand; hold it closely and tightly. Krystal doesn’t budge or give him a weird look - so he doesn’t move away.
Minho concludes that Krystal is the weirdest girl he’s ever met, not that he has met a lot of girls already. Because that’s not the case at all. Actually the point is that, even though Krystal seems to shift emotions frequently, she’s not so bad. She’s pretty and she’s honest. Krystal just cries a lot - about a boy named Jinki with a smile that overlooks all bad things and arms that bring warmth and certainty; a boy whose smile is not for her anymore, a boy whose arms are holding another person.
Krystal could say that she’s happy for them. But then she’d be lying. Minho could say he’s worried, but for sure, Krystal wouldn’t even turn a cheek to take a listen.
His mind and his mouth aren’t connected when he’s with her and Minho always finds himself spitting some babble he never could have imagined to come from his own mouth but he still strikes up a conversation with Krystal. “Do you have anywhere else to visit?”
“Isn’t this like teasing us? Or torturing us? Why do we even have to look back at everything we’ve left behind?”
“I don’t know.”
“I wouldn’t have gone if I knew what this really is.”
He takes a deep breath and repeats his question. “Do you have anywhere else to visit?”
Krystal shakes her head.
“Then we should go back.”
She sighs and looks down. “Why?” It only takes a single breath to ask and million years of wait for the answer to come. Krystal blinks - their hands are still linked.
Minho places his hand by her chin and lifts her head up, revealing tear-stained cheeks and plump lips. But he gazes at her eyes instead, red and swollen from crying. “Soulmates. We’re that.”
“What proof have you got?”
“What proof are you asking for?” He lightly drags a finger over Krystal lips, delighted she’s not rejecting the gesture.
Krystal turns quiet - then she presses her lips on Minho’s with the slightest of pressures, like she’s afraid he’ll crumble into pieces or scare the boy away because of her abrupt actions. Her eyes flutter open to his dark eyes but he soon closes it shut as he deepens their kiss.
She breaks the kiss and catches her breath. There isn’t anything extraordinary about it. But she takes the throbbing in her chest as a sign. Soon enough, she brings a hand to her chest and feels it beating - her heart. It throws her out of loop. Krystal gazes into Minho’s eyes again and she briefly decides that she has given him her heart - all of it. Or has it always been his?
Minho frowns and nudges her shoulder. She smiles because he looks extremely worried. “Did you wait for long?”
“It was worth it - you were worth every single second of it.”
“Did you die from bipolar disorder? Earlier you seemed annoyed by my presence. Now, you suddenly love me.... soulmate.” Krystal cocks a brow and gives him a weird look.
“I thought maybe you did.” That earns him a hard slap on the head.
“But thank you for waiting, for being here.” Krystal whispers, like she’s embarrassed just by the thought of saying those words.
“You’re welcome, I guess. So, uhm, where do you wanna go?” He asks, scratching the back of his head.
“Are we allowed in heaven?”
“I need to call St. Peter and ask if they’ll grant us permission. They’re very picky there.” Minho laughs and drags on Krystal’s arm as he starts walking again. Krystal laughs a bit too.
Krystal settles that heaven is with Minho instead.