深淵

(i liked you better when you were silent.)

jun ran his fingers through white locks, twirling and playing with it. he didn’t care to listen, but didn’t care enough to stop his (acquaintance) friend from talking either. mental health was never brought up as an issue in his family. if you were sick in the head, you denied and repressed it all. 

if it was really bad, you’d sleep for sixteen hours straight, wake up. slap yourself in the fucking face and go to church smiling like the heartless, brainless wax figure you were. that’s what jun was taught to do anyway. his mother dealt with her unhappy marriage with gambling. his father with endless nights in love hotels. his brother? he’s unsure.

“thanks for the advice, but as a celebrity, especially in korea. you can’t just come out and say that you suffer from mental health issues.” 

“if not a career killer, it would at least still be be detrimental to my future works.” 

he doesn’t care about the money, it’s the fame that he likes so much. sin of pride incarnate. “it’s not easy, you know.” being dashing and charming all the time. “living without privacy.” 

his fingers hit the table, the metal ring clanking the wooden surface a bit too loud. his eyes veer towards the window, then back at baekhyun. he has no issue telling the truth. “before i got out, i rode along the river styx for a dante’s inferno type of tour. it was cool, hot, all sorts of humid. i sought some sort of pleasure seeing others suffer pain. i’m a bit of a sadist, you see. oh, right. i digress.” 

“i thought you might be interested in something i saw. your soul was wandering along a layer in hell.” 

“looked a bit drugged out. exhausted. an expression of agony without a body to feel.” 

they sit on opposite sides of each other at the wooden table, presented with half opened bags of chips, fruits and a semblance of palm prints dragged across the table.jun’s eyes trail along the condensed droplets as they slither their way down the old mug. he sits in silence, sipping softly on old barley tea. time: six thirty-four. the sun has long risen, but its light has long been drowned out by the fog of summer rain. 

“how long have we known each other?” 

best friends, but there’s more to it than he’s eager to openly admit. jun cracks open the pomegranate with both thumbs. the juice drips down his palm and wrist like ichor. he doesn’t hesitate to lap it up clean; tongue and lips stained red like the bruises on his neck and the boy’s waist. 

“how long will we stay like this?” 

minjun’s eyes peer out the glass panel into the bamboo fence. beyond their hostel lies the curling branches of yakushima, the island that inspired princess mononoke. “i worry sometimes.” his words are cut short. 

“that i’m not healthy for you.” beyond physicality.

jun exhales. the humidity of japanese summers tire him. inhale. repeat.

“he’s a bad boy. he’s aloof. apathetic.” he wipes the sheen of sweat off his neck with the stained tshirt. his eyes are half-lidded, staring at his own reflection in the cup of tea. “that’s what they say about me in the gossip magazines.”

“how did i preserve my sanity?” 

“being insane is a start.”

there are long pauses between each sentence spoken. his eyes follow the tan coloured foam bubbling over the warm cup of coffee. jun takes a brief moment on whether or not he wants his usual bitter black brew, or to spill three pods of cream in to have that warm latte brown he finds so comforting. the black mirror inside the white mug reflects his cold, sullen face. he decides to go for a little cream with a cube of sugar. 

the initial taste is a bit too sweet, but he pretends to enjoy it anyway because he misses anything that isn’t raw filet fish and half ravaged unknown meat. any human luxury.

“the long, freezing nights were harsh, but at least there was water everywhere i went. water is a means for me to look at myself.” narcissistic beauty. “and seeing myself kept me somewhat motivated to go on.” 

“it did suck without people praising me though. me. me! kil minjun, a man to be worshipped, is a fucking pariah in that dimension.” his fingers curl around the handle of the mug. he pulls it to his lips, blowing the smoke away slowly before he gets nauseated from drinking too much milk and sugar at once. “i missed attention.” 

only half truth. “actually. false. to be completely frank,” he rambles on. “i’m embarrassed to admit this,” he takes a gulp of the sweet coffee. “in my solitude, i thought of all the people that somewhat made a difference in my life. made a little social bucket list, a little promise to myself, in a sense, to see them again if i do make it out. one and two are fine. three, the ice sculptor is now dead. four, my younger brother refuses to see me. fifth on the list, you’re quite lucky i had a sense of urgency to see you, mister byun.” 

“i’m somewhat unpredictable. spontaneity and chaos make life fun. but for now, for my mental health, i think i’ll stay put in the comforts of my room. i’ll stay around to act in a few movies, disappear when the time calls for it.” 

KIL MINJUN. LVL 11: DIMENSIONAL TRAVELER.

lighter / my  muse  pulls  out  a  lighter  and  lights  it  for  your  muse  to  use  to  light  their  cigarette.

the streets are a turquoise sea, only dimly lit with the faint neon glow. it’s approximately three in the morning. his head aches and his knees are giving into ‘old age’ (as he says it.) jun finds himself crouched down outside of a bar, the heavy bass still thrumming right through his bones. 

“thank you.” there’s a quiet mumble. the blinking orange spark from the lighter finds its way to the tip of his cigarette. his eyes are half lidded, droopy without a will to open. 

“i shouldn’t smoke.” 

it’s not a conversational starter. he’s scolding himself. “but this is for a special occasion.” a lie. the only occasion is that he’s drunk beyond his own conscience’s control. “name? hobby?” drunken jun’s scrambled brain is trying to piece together topics of small talk that he’s always so bad at. he feels like he owes the other for offering a light.

minjun has the cigarette between his lips; the small burn slowly dragging its way through the white paper. he tries to look up, but doing so causes the cig to almost fall through his lips. luckily, he catches it with teeth. “you know. i’ll tell you all my deep dark secrets in return for this ticket to lung cancer.” 

“i fuck  —” hiccup.

“fucking hate odd numbers. they’re so goddamn ugly to look at. the worst fucking number is number 3. a fucking imperfect 8. you know what else.” a small drag follows, smoke rising from his nostrils like tendrils. 

drunk / your muse  takes  care  of  my muse  while  they  are  in  a  drunken  state.

the sour lemon taste of the countless sours cling onto his tongue. the scent of smoke hangs onto him as he pushes wave of people into taxi cabs. minjun hates work parties. it makes him livid, having to put on the fakest smile and use the soft-spoken office voice before pouring the directors alcohol. 

5:21. it’s quiet now without the high pitched whines and film industry politics. time stands still on the pavement in front of the izakaya.

there’s no recollection of him making his way into a cab nor is there any of him giving an address. he wakes up half way through the ride with some drool dripped on his cheek. the sun is up and he curses again. his eyes squint as they arrive at a familiar destination but it’s not his home.

in his drunken state, the person he wanted to see most was jinsun. the bell rings once. he stands slouched against the door before banging on it loud. again and again, he’s lost track of time. 5:43.

“finally, brat.”

jun slurs his speech, stumbling out of his shoes onto the carpet. he trips and falls on both knees. jun glances up, curling a dopey smile at jin. his eyes are bloodshot. his breath reeks of tequila and whatever concoction created through drinking games. with all his strength, he pulls the boy down with him. jun leans in aiming for a kiss but he misses completely. he whispers again, (big brat, come here.)

narcissus. or narcisse, as he’s often referred to.

“i say that line, that irrefutable, beautifully smug line, because it’s branded with me and my social media now. if you google it, you’ll find me on the images.” kil minjun. november 11. irrefutable, beautifully smug. he’ll say it and say it again until miss sylvia plath rolls in her grave from the misuse and abuse of the quote. 

the sky strings along a faint shade of orange and grapefruit. the clouds follow the scale patterns of tuna fish after they’re filet. he starves for food, but the trickster finds teasing his long-lost friend far more appetizing. jun speaks about hell with a sense of urgency. he hated it. and he’d rather talk about himself. 

“i couldn’t have burned in the fifth hell even if i wanted to. it was a bottomless ocean spanned with thin sheets of ice on the surface. the sky coal black.” 

“the nights shrill with screams before easing in a cold silence.” months of solitude. months of continuation in a numb, irritating feeling. his nose was always running. his boots were always drenched. “thought i’d die alone without a goodbye to friends, then one day a portal popped open right in the middle of the fucking water.”