taste these tears
taste these tears
1134 w, pg-13 (jonghyun-centric, jonghyun/sunny)
au! after she died, he died too.
"You know," Sunny starts with her toes wiggling off the edge of the bed, "Sea otters sleep holding hands with each other, so they don't drift away." And ceremoniously, her hand finds his under the covers. Their fingers clasp together tightly, her own small and soft contrasted to his dry and rough ones. It's because I play guitar so much, because that's what my hands were made for - Jonghyun's normal explanation. But she never seems to mind anyways. He feels himself sink into her bed, weary auburn walls falling on top of them. Sunny still has christmas lights strung up outside the house, and he starts thinking about their last winter together. It's both of their favorite seasons, contradictory to her name, but that's why she likes it. Jonghyun trails back into reality though when she squeezes his hand, waiting for a response. He opens one eye and looks at her.
She's so bright and so lovely, he thinks.
(Bright, lovely, and his - that's what's most important. He constantly wonders how she tripped for someone like him, so stolid and sour, and she explains that she didn't fall in love. Falling was passive as where she wasn't, she rose up to the challenge - and she won.)
"There's honestly no need to hold my hand," Jonghyun insists with his drowsy demeanor. Truth is, he's never been more awake, and Sunny knows it too. He takes in the tired features of her face and her dying blond hair. He remembers not to compliment it, hoping the lack thereof will make it turn brown again. It isn't likely, but Jonghyun isn't one for spurting fallacies just to get a kiss. He can only see the half of her face that isn't buried into the pillow, and he mutters something along the lines of, "Do you wash your pillows often? If mascara rubs against the covers or something -" And she laughs, light and cheery and all there. It's a reminder that she is real, was real, forever will be real enough for him and -
"If I don't hold your hand, I'll drift away."
"I'd never let that happen to you."
Sunny offers a small, sad smile. Now everything starts losing color, like the way it always does. Her shining eyes become dull like the sudden ache in his chest and underneath the sheets he feels the matter once in his hand slowly disintegrate. Jonghyun swallows something down the back of his throat, a sudden burning. He makes sure to look at her before she's gone, long and hard.
"You already have," She whispers like a scream in his ear.
Jonghyun feels stinging in his eyes so he closes them quickly, "I'm sorry."
When Jonghyun wakes up he finds himself where he always is, or has been for the past two months.
He lies flat on his back, recognizing the sheets without floral patterns and the lavender scent. Instead, they're flourished with careless detergents that provide the needs to pass sanitation regulations and barely through the line of physical appeal. The walls are flat and lifeless like everyone that works in this building. He can hear the heel toe steps outside the door, someone screaming down the hall, and someone's heart, soul, something breaking through the thin walls because that's everyone in this place. Jonghyun wishes the bed would eat him up alive, but he remembers that today is his last day here, that after today, he gets to leave.
( "They can help you," Yonghwa had told him. His fingernails dug into the younger boy's shoulder, a reassuring squeeze that left little crescent imprints on his plaid shirt. His voice quivered with that statement, overcompensated with worry and anxiety. Jonghyun could tell there was something wrong, as if he were obsessed or something. That's what everyone thought, but no one actually ever knew.
"They will help you," And it's the fine difference of being able and a guarantee, and Yonghwa provided the guarantee. It was false. )
"The end of your existence meant the end of mine, you know that right?"
"That's not true."
"It is and it will always be."
"Jonghyun, there are beautiful people out there," Sunny whispered, "Don't forget that."
"How do you feel?" Yonghwa asks as they both stand by the edge of a bridge. Jonghyun can feel the wind pushing from behind him. He shrugs his splintered shoulders and looks over at Yonghwa. He looks like he lost a lot of weight, but in return, gained a lot of burdens. Now, Jonghyun can't seem to see anything in him besides brittle bones.
"You're a douchebag," He mutters before he closes his eyes. "Bringing me up to the bridge where we used to sing songs, trying to install a nostalgic feel. But you also know that two months ago that I was on the verge of suicidal, deranged, and that wash of nostalgia for that moment instead of acoustic covers could have easily come instead, and I would have jumped. So that's two months of payment for the psych ward down the toilet for your sorry ass."
"But you didn't jump and I don't think you're going too," Yonghwa insists around a smug smile. His fists are buried into his pockets with anxiety clasped beneath his curled fingers. He's nervous and has a lot of faith, Jonghyun thinks absentmindedly. A lot of faith in him that he didn't have two months ago, because Jonghyun didn't have it either - and they both still feel like like shit, but it's better. It's less lonelier almost, knowing that they're both too hurt to say anything.
"Answer my question Jonghyun. Did they teach you to forget her there?" Yonghwa repeats.
Jonghyun shakes his head in a no slowly, taking a step back. "No, they taught me how to remember her, and I think I'll be better off like that. I won't try so hard to forget because if I forget her then I'll die. I know I will - or maybe something more melodramatic, like vanishing. I'll just become bones, kind of like the rest of the world (you, the once me, everyone) and that's more painful."
"It wasn't your fault, you know. The car crash -"
"She died and I lived .. and then I died too. I'm still dead, but I'm learning how to get past that."
Yonghwa closes his eyes and the moment freezes like clockwork. Jonghyun just takes it in, waiting for the stinging to come. He contemplates telling Yonghwa that he loved her, he truly did, or how sea otters hold hands so they don't drift away, but it's the sudden dull ache that prevents him from saying anything.
"She was a beautiful person," Yonghwa whispers.
Jonghyun nods, "There are beautiful people out there. I haven't forgotten that."