Tomorrow, Today

He was the best shot in his squadron and soon was promoted to a sniper. Just as they were about to be deployed abroad for a routine tour, chaos broke out at the border and their team was chosen to be sent in as reinforcements. That meant Hongjoong spent most of his time in a guard tower, his rifle aimed at a wired fence and forested terrain that separated his own nation from their neighbours.

His superiors hadn’t told them much about what exactly was going on, the news channels not offering any more information than they already knew. A few soldiers had been found dead near the border while out on their night duty. The bordering nation had good relations with Hongjoong’s own so the attacks made no sense. The neighbouring army had taken no responsibility for the action, pinning it on non-state actors.

Tension was high at the historically peaceful site and it had put the two allied nations at odds with each other. Hongjoong should have cared about it all, but he just resented the fact that the time he could have been spending abroad was wasted away in isolation. The person nearest to him was a guard tower over, who he could only talk to through a walkie-talkie and even that was restricted given the high alert status they were in.

And so days turned into weeks, every evening he’d swap in for his squadron mate for his shift, sitting alone for hours with a small pack of rations till mid morning, when he’d get to retire to his tent for some sleep.

There was no movement once the reinforcements came, so they thought that either the enemy had been scared away or was waiting. An offensive operation was being discussed with the armed forces of the neighbouring nation to try to root out the people behind the attacks. Hongjoong continued to not care, and wished for the crisis to come to some sort of end so that he could be doing anything else but this.

It all changed one night, though. About a month into their mission, Hongjoong had been trying to pick something to eat when he heard the fence rattle. He quickly sat up, using his binoculars to figure out where the sound was coming from, but everything had fallen silent once again.

He tried to look for the guards that were out on patrol and saw one of them fallen on the ground and the other seemingly floating in the air. Throwing his binoculars down, Hongjoong aimed his rifle at the man, the scope focusing on the soldier whose feet were off the ground, head tilted to one side and no one around him.

Hongjoong tried to think of something to do. His instinct was to signal to the guard in the other post but he didn’t have the time, so he imagined what a man would look like if he were holding the soldier up and took his shot. Immediately the man fell to the ground and the fence rattled, then there was silence.

Scrambling for his walkie-talkie, he called to the other guard but there was no response from him. He couldn’t just sit there, so he rushed down from his post, looking for someone to report to, but everyone had fallen into a deep slumber that he couldn’t wake them up from. The camp looked dead except for him.

Reaching for the handgun on his side, Hongjoong slowly made his way to the fence. The first soldier he saw seemed untouched, but clearly dead. His body lay limp with no pulse or breath. He crawled his way over to the other guard, whose limbs were twisted from the fall. His head lay turned to one side, neck covered in blood pouring out of two big punctures in the skin.

He was so shocked by the sight that he barely had the time to react to the sound of the fence rattling again, and everything went black.

When he came to his senses, he found himself sitting in a seemingly endless room. The decor looked nothing like what was local to either his nation or the one neighbouring it, as if he’d been teleported halfway across the world. Large windows decorated the room but they painted pitch black, the only light coming from large crystal chandeliers that nursed candles that shed flickering light onto impeccably polished marble floors.

Hongjoong’s head hurt and he could barely move, his hands and feet bound to the chair he was seated on. He was still in his fatigues, seemingly unharmed. “You’re awake?” A deep voice called out from behind him. He jerked in his chair as he tried to turn behind to see who it was but the high backed chair meant he had a limited range of view.

Footsteps echoed through the space as the person crept up to him, growing louder as they grew closer. And then he saw him, and Hongjoong felt his breath stop.

The man in front of him was almost paper white with how pale his skin was. He was dressed in the most extravagant suit Hongjoong had ever seen, covered in gems that glittered with every movement. He looked like royalty, with a face to match. Sharp eyes paired with soft lips and the gentlest of smiles.

“I’m Yeosang,” he said, and that’s when Hongjoong noticed the two sharp canines in the man’s mouth. He racked his brain for an explanation. This had to be a joke. Maybe he had fallen asleep at his post and he was dreaming.

But the ice cold touch of the man’s hands on his skin couldn’t have been a dream, that much Hongjoong knew. “What’s your name?”

“Hongjoong,” he managed while flexing his ankles carefully, trying to find a way to escape his binds.

“You saw me there, didn’t you?”

“Not really,” he said, confused.

“What do you mean?”

“I heard the fence rattle and I saw one of our men floating above the ground so I tried to shoot whatever was behind it. But I saw nothing there.”

“Interesting,” the man muttered. “You should have been asleep. Why weren’t you?”

“How would I know? And who are you? Where am I?”

“Oh, naive humans. You’re endlessly fascinated by us but you don’t know who we are?”

“That’s not possible.”

“But it is.” The man clapped his hands and a man walked into the room, smiling at Hongjoong before standing still and tilting his head. The man in the suit stood behind him, shot Hongjoong a wink and sunk his teeth into the man’s neck.

Hongjoong didn’t know if he felt horrified or fascinated at the sight, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of it. For minutes the three of them stood there quietly as blood pooled around the man’s teeth and his eyes glowed.

Finally, the pulled his teeth out and wiped them clean with his tongue. The man who came in gave a little bow and walked away the way he’d come in.

“I’m Prince Yeosang. I rule a world very different from your own.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Don’t worry your little head about it,” he said. Hongjoong should have felt patronised but the tone was so polite he couldn’t feel angry at all.

“What we need to figure out is what to do with you.”

“Do I have to ask or will you just explain it anyways?”

“Oh shush. Your world and mine live in the same place, and the same time, just one can’t see the other. We didn’t even know the other existed for millennia but a few centuries ago, my kind figured out how to get to yours. It didn’t go well. We became addicted to feeding on you and it threatened to destroy the barriers between our worlds, and with it, your entire kind. There were a lot of fights amongst us on what we should do, and the side that wished for a peaceful coexistence won, but we had changed too much in that time.

We needed your kind to survive, so in a way we’d found our own destruction in finding you. So we started picking up a person here or there, just enough to sustain us. We kept them here, so that we wouldn’t have to keep going there. But that wasn’t enough. We realised that your kind wasn’t enough to keep us alive, but that each of us needed a specific one, one that had been changed by us all that time ago, the way you had changed us.”

“And what if you didn’t find that person?”

“We’d keep feeding on others, but we’d need more and more, and eventually it wouldn’t be enough and we’d fade. But if we found the right one, they’d change us as much as we changed them so we’d both stay alive as long as we were together.”

“So you were out there looking for your one?”

“Pretty much. I’ve looked far and wide and I’m fading fast. If I don’t find someone, then this world will go without an heir, and that could destroy the peace that’s held my world from ravaging yours.”

“Okay, so you need to find your blood soulmate or whatever. But what does that have to do with me?”

“Finding the one isn’t easy for us. There are billions of your kind out there. The only way to find out is by marking someone. If they’re the one, they’ll live.”

“So you go around killing people till you find this one?”

“No, not like that. We can catch a sense of them, but we can’t know exactly who it is. So it sometimes takes a few casualties. Fortunately your kind kills enough of your own that you hardly notice it.

Anyways, there’s a legend, that for sometimes, the connection between one of your kind and one of my kind is so close, that the barrier between starts to falter. My power can knock your people out because you have no immunity to it.”

“But I was awake,” Hongjoong mumbled. “Wait, so am I your blood soulmate?”

“If the legend is right, then you are.”

“What do you mean if it’s right?”

Yeosang shrugged. “It’s only happened a handful of times.”

“And?”

“They’re all gone because of unrelated reasons.”

“Unrelated reasons?”

“That’s not the concern here. If you’re my one, you can save your realm and my own.”

“And if I’m not, I die.”

“I’m sorry, I know it’s a lot. But what other choice do I have?”

“If I agree to this, and I am your blood soulmate, then will I have to stay here for the rest of eternity?”

“You don’t have to, we just keep you here for your own safety. You can go back, I can come visit you for feeding when I need it, if you’d like. Our bond doesn’t have to be anything more than that.”

“Okay…” Hongjoong trailed off. He didn’t know what to do. He wanted to call the man in front of him a lunatic and run off, but somewhere deep down he knew he wasn’t lying. That this was the truth and he had to decide what to do.

At the end of the day, Hongjoong was a military man, and if there’s one thing he’d accepted when he’d joined the army, was that there would come a time when he’d have to lay his life down for his people. He never actually thought that day would come, but it had, and he wasn’t going to hesitate.

“You can do it.” Hongjoong said.

“What?” Yeosang asked, surprised.

“You can mark me. I can’t allow my people to get hurt.”

“You’re a very brave man, Hongjoong.”

“Or foolish, the line between the two is quite thin. Now can you please untie me?”

“Oh of course, my apologies.” Yeosang waved a hand and the restraints around Hongjoong fell on their own. He looked at them with wonder for a moment. He knew he was in for something weird but it was still odd to actually see it.

“How do we do this?”

“You just tilt your head to the side, I’ll do the rest.”

Hongjoong stood up and stretched a bit, trying to get some feeling back into his limbs. Looking Yeosang properly in the eye felt odd. Just moments before he’d towered over him, but now he felt like just a guy, a really pretty one at that. He’s about to either kill you or make you immortal, Hongjoong thought as he turned around to face away from Yeosang.

“Try to relax, this might hurt.”

“I might not last long enough to feel it,” Hongjoong couldn’t help but quip.

“Quiet, you’ll be alright.” He waited for the pain, but it never came. “I can’t do it.”

“What do you mean?”

Yeosang stepped away, looking away. “I don’t know. No one’s ever willingly offered themselves to me before, knowing that it could take their life. Every time I’ve done it, it’s been against your kind’s will, and I let myself believe it was for a good reason. But now I don’t know if I can think of it like that.”

Hongjoong was taken aback, “But it’s for both of our safety, isn’t it?”

“Part of it, yes, but I can’t lie and say that I didn’t do it selfishly even once. I don’t want to fade, not for my kind, but for myself.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that, all of us want to live.”

“But you don’t.”

“Oh I do, but sometimes you have to accept that there’s more important things than that,” Hongjoong said. A part of him was sad that they’d met under such circumstances. There was a part of him that wanted to know Yeosang better, maybe find what’s hidden inside him.

“Your kind is fascinating.”

“We’re just human. Now get it on with, hopefully it’ll save more than the both of us.”

Cold fingers grazed his neck gently as his head was pushed to the side so that his cheek touched his shoulder. Soft lips brushed against his neck and Hongjoong felt a shiver run down his spine. A sharp pinch made him flinch but then it was all gone. He felt himself relax, his limbs go loose, and his fear drain away. He didn’t know how long he felt like that before he blacked out again.

When he woke up, he was back in his post, curled on the floor with his rations next to him and his rifle aimed out as usual. Hongjoong sat up quickly, checking his surroundings. Everything seemed to be fine. Maybe he did just fall asleep the night before and dreamt it all.

But he remembered firing his rifle. He looked at the bolt of the gun and placed his hand on the lever, taking a deep breath as he pulled it back.

Mingyu had seen all sorts of customers over the years, from melancholic drunks to drinks-after-work types, one drink to one more drink and then one more. He had never expected to see the human incarnation of a fire ball to turn up at his bar and drink coke with the passion of a raging alcoholic, though.

“Don’t know, chief, but that doesn’t seem like a good choice for his teeth or his kidneys,” Wonwoo said as he worked on refilling the customer’s drink.

“I mean we aren’t good for anyone’s liver. At least it’s better than alcohol?” Mingyu’s eyes landed on the customer every now and then. Despite his short stature, he guessed not an inch over five foot six, the man commanded quite the presence.

No one dared to sit by him, seeing his face and just finding someplace else. It was a quiet bar, meant more for professional gatherings and semi-formal dates, not usually greeted by angry solo drinkers, which is what made the man stand out so much.

That or how attractive the man was.

Mingyu didn’t like to use him owning a bar as an opportunity to eye good looking people but he couldn’t always help himself. The man at his bar was undeniably handsome, probably one of his best till date. With his short cropped hair, smudged eye shadow and bright red leather jacket, he looked a lot like a pop star.

It went on for hours, and Mingyu found himself more and more concerned. The man kept sitting there, his head bent low, asking for one coke zero after the next. They would soon start running low on their stock at the rate the man was going. Fortunately they were nearing closing time and the bar had mostly cleared out.

“Sir?” Mingyu asked carefully.

“Another one, please,” the man said, not even looking up.

“I think that’s enough, sir.”

“You’re cutting me off coke zero?”

“No sir, we’re about to close.”

The man finally looked up at Mingyu, having to crane his neck up to meet his eyes, “Where am I supposed to find more coke at this hour?”

“A convenience store, I presume?” Mingyu felt more confused than he had ever felt before in his life.

“Checked every single one in the area, none of them have it in stock for some reason. I’ll just have one more and leave.”

“I’m sorry sir, it’s really late. We have to close right now.”

“Can’t you close while I drink the last one?” The man asked, a sad pout of his face. He was far too attractive for Mingyu to say no to.

“Alright, I guess.” He filled the man’s glass one more time and got his staff to start cleaning up the place. The customer seemed reluctant to finish his drink to the point where there was still some left in his glass by the time everyone had left, leaving Mingyu waiting for him. “You done, sir?”

“Yeah, just a second.” He downed what was left and handed Mingyu his glass and credit card. He quickly rung him up and headed inside to wash up. He thought about the customer and laughed to himself, not knowing what to make of him.

When he was out, the customer was still sitting at the bar, scrolling through his phone.

“You haven’t left yet?”

“What do you think I waited this long for?” The man asked with a smirk

“What do you mean?” Mingyu asked.

“And I thought hot people being dumb was a myth.” The man got up from his seat and stood close to Mingyu. He barely came up to Mingyu’s shoulder but his eyes more than made up for his stature. “Lee Jihoon.”

“Excuse me?”

“Do you need a special invitation to give me your name?”

“Kim Mingyu.”

“So, Mingyu, how about you walk me home?”

“What?”

“Are you straight?”

“No?”

“Then?”

“What was with all the coke zero?”

“I enjoy feeding my vices,” He said, a smirk on his face. “One for coke, the other for handsome men.”

Six months prior

The day was cold enough that Yugyeom had to pull out his thickest jacket. Dusting it off took a while, he had an impressive tolerance for the cold so it got little use. Donning it, he bid his dog a quick goodbye in the form of a pat on its head before heading off in his beat up Volvo.

His new job at the National Intelligence Service was proving to be nothing short of trouble. He hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep in weeks, images of his investigation victims haunting him. His “perfect empathy” had always been there, but it became an asset when he got into law enforcement and made a bit of a name for himself.

That’s when he met Lim Jaebeom, director of the Behavioural Science Unit and the reason behind Yugyeom’s torment. He had heard of Yugyeom’s skill of being able to perfectly recreate the happenings at a crime scene and recruited him to consult for a few minor cases.

Yugyeom had wondered why he had been called for it, because the cases were easy to solve, there was no way Jaebeom hadn't figured them out on his own. Well, if there's one thing Yugyeom has learned about himself, it's that he's bad at seeing things coming his way.

They didn't cross paths again for years. Yugyeom had quit the police and joined the NIS training academy as a professor. Jaebeom had dropped by one of his lectures where he offered, more like forced upon, Yugyeom a job as a profiler for a high profile case he was working on.

And that was what led him to his predicament where he's spending one of the coldest days of the year at the NIS building instead of being at home with his dog. Jaebeom wanted him to stick around after they solved the first case and it wasn't like Yugyeom had a choice. What Jaebeom wanted, he got.

“So, what does it look like?” The Director asked, having handed Yugyeom a dossier full of photos of their latest case.

“An act of justice.” Yugyeom closed his eyes and tried to concentrate but it wasn't working. “I'll need to see the scene for more, the photos don’t give me a sense of the space.”

“Well we’re basically snowed in at this point so try harder. We don't know if or when he’s going to strike again so we need to figure this out quick,” Jaebeom snapped. Yugyeom could feel a headache radiating its way up the back of his skull. Realising that his presence was probably not helping, Jaebeom left him alone to brood in his office, promising to return soon.

Sighing, Yugyeom went back to examining the photos to better understand the geography of the house so that he could piece the series of events together. Closing his eyes, he tried to picture himself in the room, turning back time on the elements around him till he was envisioning the moments before the act took place.

He found himself across from Mrs Yoo, sitting on a plush sofa in her living room. Looking down, he saw a revolver in his right hand, a glass of wine in the other. The way Mrs Yoo’s eyes shone looking at him, it had to be motherly, a mix of care, kindness and fear. She was afraid of what he had become, knowing full well that it was her fault.

Yugyeom spun the wine in his hands gently before breathing its aroma in and taking a small sip, setting the glass carefully on the side table after.

“I despise the gentleness in Mrs Yoo’s eyes. They remind me of too much pain. I left because of those eyes, because of the pity that drips from them. I need those eyes to stop staring at me, I need everyone to stop looking at me.” Yugyeom examines the gun in his hand and raises it to be level with Mrs Yoo’s head.

“I stare straight into Mrs Yoo’s eyes as she trembles in fear in front of me. She’s begging for a forgiveness she knows I can’t afford. It takes a single shot to pierce right through her left eye and end both of our misery.”

Yugyeom sighs as he opens his eyes, rubbing his face with his hands as he tries to calm his breathing. He calls Jaebeom and the staff back into the room before asking, “Does Mrs Yoo have any kids on the record, someone old enough to own a firearm?”

Youngjae, a member of the forensic team, looked through the file in his hand before replying, “Yeah, a son. He’s 25, works at a tech firm on the other side of the country. We looked into him, he doesn’t seem to have been in the area on the day of the incident.”

“Look into him again just in case,” Jaebeom said before turning to Yugyeom, “Any other possible leads?”

“Maybe an illegitimate child? It’s someone who looked up to her as a mother figure but felt betrayed. Someone into their adulthood with years to have ruminated on their feelings on Mrs Yoo and turned it into a carefully plotted murder.”

“Look into the shooting ranges nearby, see if you can link any of their regulars near the area.” Jaebeom added, pointing at the image of Mrs Yoo’s body and how cleanly the bullet had hit her eye. “Too good of a shot for an amateur.”

Yugyeom stood there, eyes wide open, feeling rattled. Doing this was hard enough when he was at the crime scene but having to construct everything just out of photos drained him of everything. He slumped into the nearest chair and let his head roll back as he tried to calm himself down. Jaebeom gave him a pat on the shoulder before leaving him alone in the lab.

It had taken him a long time to learn the best way to come down from his “sessions” without having a panic attack or scaring those around him. Some space and a series of breathing exercises were what he finally settled on, concentrating on a spot on the ceiling to keep himself focused. He was just about done when a knock on the lab door pulled him out of his head.

“Mr Kim?” The man asked. He was dressed to the nines in a three piece suit, hair perfectly styled, eyes sharp as he watched Yugyeom.

Nodding, Yugyeom stood up. “And you would be?”

“Park Jinyoung. Jaebeom’s an old friend, he wanted my help with the case.”

“You don’t look like law enforcement.”

“Oh no, these hands weren’t meant for firearms.” Jinyoung said, holding them up. “People used to say they’d be good for paintbrushes but I drifted towards scalpels first, then towards people’s minds.”

“Psychiatrist for such a low priority case?”

Jinyoung pressed a hand thoughtfully to his chin, “Would you be here if it was low priority?”

“This is not the only case of its kind, is it?” Yugyeom asked, running his hands through his hair exasperatedly.

“Fifth one in a row. Each in a different state along the east coast, all women in their late forties or early fifties. No seeming connections between them.” Jinyoung walked across the room to a table piled high with files before pulling a thin one out. “This is everything that could be found in common. We don’t even know if it’s one killer or multiple different ones.”

“And why didn’t Jaebeom tell me any of this?” Yugyeom felt anger simmer inside him. Jaebeom had done this too many times for him to be surprised but it didn’t affect him any less.

“Too many theories floating around the office. He wanted a fresh perspective.” The table was now littered with tens of photos, each one different in setting but the same in execution. “What you saw was the first one that happened three months ago. That’s why he wanted you here, because there’s no crime scene to see.”

“When was the last one?”

“Last week. Each murder has had between two and three weeks between them. Jaebeom was hoping to catch the next one before it happened but he wasn’t getting anywhere.”

“What’s your theory, Doctor?”

Jinyoung rifled through the pictures to find one of each victim, photographed from a similar angle, that of the chair opposite to where the women sat. “Odds say it was all the same killer, but it feels too intimate for that. How many years does a young boy spend at home? How many of those would he have to build a bond that burned him when it got cut?”

“They all knew each other. They planned this together. They all had to be good enough shots to hit exactly the eye from a decent distance and also have the resources to clean up after themselves.”

“Maybe the reason why Jaebeom couldn’t understand it was because he kept looking outside for answers.”

Watching cops getting arrested would never stop being unnerving to Yugyeom. After confirming the details with Jinyoung they both went to Jaebeom with their findings. It wasn’t an easy search but since they knew the killers would be inside the law enforcement system, they had enough connections.

“All foster children, brought into seemingly perfect households.” Yugyeom said as he read over the final report. He sat in Jinyoung’s office across from the man himself, a glass of scotch in his hand. “Abused for being troubled, sent to police academies to learn discipline.”

“It’s not incredibly difficult to find those of a similar disposition once inside. The cruelty of the academy breeds resentment and the resources to get away with one’s darkest desires.”

“Why left eyes though?”

Jinyoung stood up from his seat and walked over to one of the bookshelves that lined his walls. He pulled one out and handed it to Yugyeom. “Any luck reading Chinese?”

Yugyeom chuckled and flipped through the book. “My mom had one of these, she tried to get me to read it but I was never any good.”

“It’s a common text around these parts, stories, traditions and superstitions. It has a part on the twitching of eyes. Left eyes signify life in women.”

“A bit on the nose, don’t you think?”

“Maybe, but revenge blinds. It can never be measured, for it always has alterior motives.” Jinyoung took a long whiff of his wine before sipping it. “The best poet loves poetry for it’s own sake.”

“Well, glad this lot weren’t poets.” Yugyeom said.

Jinyoung laughed and raised his glass. “To amateurs, then.” Yugyeom grinned and raised his own glass. “Could I tempt you to dinner with me this weekend? Something celebratory for our accomplishment.”

“Will you tell me which wine I should bring so that I don’t pick the wrong one?”

“Find a good Chianti. Saturday, eight o’clock. I’ll have my assistant deliver you a formal invite.”

Yugyeom felt woefully underdressed when Jinyoung opened the door, dressed in another perfectly tailored three piece suit with a tastefully patterned tie. He wished he had taken his blazer to wear over his full sleeve shirt rolled up to the elbows and slacks.

“I hope this will do,” He said, extending the bottle of wine.

Jinyoung barely glanced at the label before clicking his tongue. Yugyeom felt a shiver down his spine, a sudden fear of disappointing the doctor gripping him. Jinyoung’s eyebrows furrowed for a second before they softened into a teasing smile.

“This will do perfectly. Please, come in.” Jinyoung stepped away and Yugyeom was met with an extravagant living room, decorated with utmost care. The doctor seemed like a man of exquisite taste and wealth, unafraid of indulging in the luxuries of life.

Jinyoung led him to the dining room, where a long glass topped table took up much of the space. It was decorated with an elaborate flower and fruit arrangement in the centre, with two places set up, one at the head of the table, and one to its right.

“Please take a seat,” Jinyoung said before disappearing into the kitchen. He returned with a decanter of wine in one hand and two plates artfully balanced on the other, one on his palm and the other on his wrist. With a flourish, he filled both of their glasses before setting a plate in front of Yugyeom and one in his own place before sitting down. “Stuffed Roast Heart with Devilled Kidneys and Garlic Liver Paté.”

Yugyeom stared at the food in wonder, not having seen such a beautifully plated dish before. “What is it that you can’t do, Doctor?”

“You flatter me too much, I’m merely a man of a few interests.”

“This is the most delicious thing I’ve ever eaten, Doctor. I don’t think this comes just from being a hobbyist.”

Jinyoung smiled and sipped his wine before answering, “I started cooking for my sister young, then it became a passion, if you will.”

“Well I do hope we work together more often in the future if it means you’ll call me over for dinner every time.”

“It would be an absolute pleasure,” Jinyoung said before holding his glass up for a toast. “To Lim Jaebom, an eternal friend and pain.”

“To Jaebeom indeed.”

The joy of the night together was quickly sobered in the morning when Yugyeom woke up to Jaebeom calling him early in the morning.

“Dr Park will be picking you up soon, we need you two here stat.”

He barely had the time to get himself out of bed and dressed before Jinyoung showed up, looking as classy as ever, dressed slightly down in a shirt with no tie and a sport coat. “Did you eat anything?” Jinyoung asked as they got into the car.

“Nope, Jaebeom called me ten minutes ago,” said Yugyeom. “Also why’re you here? I could have gone myself.”

“I offered since your house was on the way.” Jinyoung paused for a second, glancing at Yugyeom before continuing, “And Jaebeom thought it’d be best if I was with you at the scene.”

Lim Jaebeom was hard headed, short tempered, rude, but he was also almost always right. Yugyeom was glad he had Jinyoung with him when he arrived at the scene. There was a small group of officers standing outside the local art museum looking rather green and it made sense as they stepped in.

The hall was large, lined with paintings along the walls. The centre of it featured only two pieces, well three now. Between the two displays, like a sculpture, stood a body. It was stripped naked, posed like a ballet dancer, one leg slightly raised, arms up in the air, held up by red ropes that hung from the ceiling. The body was so carefully positioned that it only rested on the ground by the toes of one foot.

Most notably, though, what captured the eye first was the fact that the corpse’s chest was cut open, split down the middle and flayed open, the ribs slightly pried apart to show a hole in the middle, filled with a small bouquet of flowers where the heart should have been.

“Okay after last night’s dinner this is probably not the best thing to happen,” Yugyeom mumbled, feeling light headed. “Sure you’re not serving up human hearts are you, Doctor?”

“Only the finest beef, Mr Kim. I can put you through to my butcher if you’d wish to confirm.” They both laughed a little to ease the tension but the glares from those around quieted them quickly.

Jaebeom stormed in immediately after, his voice loud and frustrated. “Get to work, the two of you. I need this sorted out and fast.”

“Any other similar cases anytime recently that you’d like to tell me about?” Yugyeom asked, trying his best to not sound accusatory.

“With parts of the body missing? Yes. With this level of… what do I even call it? Craftsmanship? Not so much.”

Jinyoung interjected before things had the chance to go awry. “Noted, Jaebeom. Lets just work with the assumption that this is a one off thing first, then we’ll try connecting the dots.”

Jaebeom nodded before leaving the two to examine the body. Youngjae stayed with them to brief them about the latest developments. “Jeong Jisub, 42. Luxury car salesman. Unmarried and orphaned. Wasn’t very well known even to his own neighbours and not well liked by those who did recognise him.”

“Unlikable doesn’t mean having enemies,” Yugyeom mumbled. “This doesn’t feel personal.”

“What, flowers are impersonal now?”

“What Mr Kim is trying to say, Mr Choi,” Jinyoung answered, addressing Youngjae, “Is that while the gesture of the flowers and the body may be symbolic and personal, the murder itself. or at least the choice of victim doesn’t feel so.”

Yugyeom nodded, adding, “There was a lot of care put into the act of rigging up the body, but it was the same to the killer as making a sculpture. The marble itself is immaterial to obtaining the final outcome.” He walked around the body, examining every minor detail. “Check the back, the kidneys should also be missing. This isn’t just art, it’s a message.” He turned to Jinyoung, “Doctor, you’re sure this wasn’t you, right?”

Jinyoung put up his hands, wrists pressed together. “You’ve caught me officer, take me away.” His tone was light and teasing, matching Yugyeom’s.

“Why kidneys?” Youngjae asked as he looked at the back of the body and noticed the small sutures present there that corresponded with where the organs would be present. The killer had carefully cut open the back to extract them and stitched it back up almost imperceptibly.

“Two organs of humanity, two organs of love,” Jinyoung said after a minute of pondering. “The Egyptians left the heart and kidneys inside when mummifying their corpses and many traditions considered the kidneys the locus of affection.”

“The flowers, what do they signify?” Yugyeom asked Youngjae.

The forensic analyst looked down at his file before answering, “All imply something along the lines of romantic interest, infatuation, crushes.”

“Our killer seems to have fallen in love.”

“Why ballet? Why the flowers of infatuation but organs of love?” Yugyeom wondered out loud as he once again sat at Jinyoung’s side at his dining table. Jinyoung had offered to cook lunch since they’d wrapped up early and Jaebeom wouldn’t be available to talk to till the next day.

“Some things, emotions, people are both delicate and sturdy at once. They’re fragile, easily disturbed, hurt, broken, but if nurtured correctly, they blossom powerfully, often dangerously.” Yugyeom felt Jinyoung staring into his soul as he spoke those words.

“Wait a minute—” He started, getting up from his seat abruptly. “You’re not here for Jaebeom or the cases are you?”

“Mr Kim, please, we can talk this out cordially—”

“No, you’re not getting into my head anymore. We’re done.”

“Yugyeom, Jaebeom asked me to do it out of concern for your well being. He told me about the dark places you retreat to after the cases. How the darkness from the killers’ minds seeps into your own and haunts you. How you lose yourself in the process.” Jinyoung’s eyes looked pleading as he spoke, “I want to help you.”

Yugyeom chuckled bitterly, “Help me or Jaebeom?”

“You, Yugyeom. All Jaebeom needs is a report saying that you’re fit enough for duty. I have that prepared here,” Jinyoung left the dining room for a moment before returning with a file. “You have the choice now. Tell me to stop and I’ll tell Jaebeom that my work is done.”

“Tuesdays.” Yugyeom mumbled into his drink.

“Pardon me?”

Grabbing his jacket, Yugeom moved to leave the room but turned just as he was about to step out, “Sessions on Tuesdays, I get off work early.”

It was difficult for Yugyeom to look Jinyoung or Jaebeom in the eye without getting angry knowing what they were doing to him, but the case forced them into the same room, the body on a table in front of them, pictures of the crime scene scattered on the one on the side.

“Yugyeom, what did you see yesterday?” Jaebeom asked.

Closing his eyes, Yugyeom envisioned himself back in the art gallery, the body that was once hung in front of him now lying on the floor next to him, not yet rigged up.

“I never saw Mr Jeong as a person. His life was worth less than an insect crushed under my foot. His death was quick and painless. I would have dragged it longer if I’d so desired, but I had other priorities. This display was everything. I needed it to be perfect.

“I spent hours making sure the pose was correct, rigging ropes carefully to hold the body in place. I placed the flowers in last, the finishing touch to a labour of love. A proposal, a request for courtship, proof of the power and devotion I held in my hands.”

Moments of silence ticked by as Yugyeom collected his thoughts. “It’s a letter, Jaebeom. The killer wanted someone in particular to see this, someone who’d understand what it meant. He wanted them to know what he was capable of.”

“Who in the world would appreciate a dead body with missing organs as a letter? Another killer? Don’t tell me we have two killers to deal with.”

“You said there were other cases with organs missing, right?” Jinyoung asked. Jaebeom nodded and handed him a case file.

“Twelve deaths over two years. All of them displayed one way or the other, clearly meant to be found. They were all far more detached than this one, though, more a show of ruthlessness than art.” Jaebeom thought for a moment before adding, “Don’t tell me our new killer is in love with our old one, that might just make me quit. I’ve worked tirelessly to catch the ‘Butcher’ as we call him, I don’t have time for another one.”

“I don’t think these are two killers, Jaebeom,” Jinyoung said, and Yugyeom nodded in assent. “I think the Butcher met someone who softened him.”

“All of these cases show someone with expertise with bodies, a doctor, nurse or mortician of some kind. One with a build large enough to carry them around and access to medical supplies and some sort of space to do the dissection,” Yugyeom noted, rifling through the photos.

“What does he do with the organs? And it's not just organs, some of them have flesh missing. Sometimes just sections, other times an entire limb,” asked Jaebeom.

Everyone turned to Jinyoung as the resident doctor, “Surgical trophies, maybe? He could be keeping them as a personal collection, a piece of every person he’s killed.” Turning to Youngjae who was working on the body he asked, “Anything in common between all the victims?”

“Nothing we could figure out. The gender division is pretty even, ages stick between eighteen and fifty. Some had families, others no one. They feel extremely random, half the victims originally from different parts of the country but all of them turned up in the general area of this city and two over.”

“I need time to think, Jaebeom. Start your search with medical professionals in the area, I’ll give you more details as soon as I can.”

Despite Yugyeom’s wishes, he ended up in Jinyoung’s office that evening. The scotch in his hand was the only thing keeping him sane, especially as he sat facing the doctor.

“I want this to be a place where you can be honest, Yugyeom. I am contractually obliged to not utter a word outside these walls. You can tell me whatever’s on your mind. I’m not here to judge, but listen.”

“You’ve lied to me before, why should I trust you?”

“Lies of omission are not the same, are they? But I’m not here to defend that. I’m sorry, I wasn’t able to figure out a better way for you to open up to me, but it was still wrong of me to. Would you be open to starting fresh?”

Yugyeom thought for a second before nodding. He pushed himself off his chair and started strolling around the office. The space was large, with a tall ceiling and a staircase leading up to a mezzanine lined with bookshelves end to end. Ladders rested against the bookcases on both floors, allowing access to the books stored up high.

Stopping by the nearest ladder, Yugyeom turned his back to it, resting a leg on the lowest step and leaning back against it. “This killer,” he started, “he makes me feel so many emotions.”

Jinyoung sat silently, his eyes expectant, waiting for Yugyeom to open up to him.

“I’m equal parts horrified and fascinated by him.” Yugyeom sighed and took a large swig of his drink. “I don’t know why I’m saying this but for a moment it felt like that letter was for me.”

Crossing one leg on top of the other, Jinyoung raised an eyebrow, “And why did it feel like that?”

“Jaebeom said that the person the Butcher is in love with, has to be a killer or someone who understands his work. Looking at the body, I could feel the emotions the Butcher put into it, I could understand the effort he went into to put it up there. It just felt like it was made for me, then. Like he knew I’d see it, that I’d understand him because that’s my job. To put myself into the heads of those who kill and find them inside there. Not see them as cold blooded killers but as people with motivations, desires, wants, needs. Maybe he hoped I’d see beyond the body, the murder, and see him in his art.”

Jinyoung stood up and joined Yugyeom near the ladder, standing close enough that Yugyeom got a strong whiff of the doctor’s perfume, a classy, masculine scent, much like the man himself. “What did you see of him?”

The image of the killer in Yugyeom’s head was blurry at best, but seeing the body, it felt like Yugyeom knew him. “A strong, skilled man. A bit traditional, trying to prove himself as the provider and caretaker but not one to be held down by norms. He kills not for lowly reasons of revenge but because he merely can. He sees his work as art, even when its cold and lifeless, he still wants it to be a spectacle.” Yugyeom stopped for a moment, arranging his thoughts. “He’s playing god.”

Those words hung between the two of them as they took them in. “What does that mean, Yugyeom? What does it mean to the killer?”

“He sees himself as above man. He wasn’t decorating the body, he was elevating it. He wants the person he likes to see what he’s capable of, how he can make something as repulsive as a dead body to art that moves.”

“Then why the trophies? Wouldn't that be uplifting the remnants of the murders a bit too much?” Jinyoung asked, pushing Yugyeom to think harder. “What could he be doing with the organs that would put himself above them?”

“I don’t know,” Yugyeom admitted. “That’s the one thing that doesn’t make sense. But I think they have something to do with the confession too.”

“Do you think that person will like it? Will they accept the courtship?”

“I do.”

Yugyeom tried his best to explain everything they’ve figured out to Jaebeom without the detail of how he saw a little too much in the Butcher’s work. It didn’t help narrow their search much but helped them build a more detailed profile of the killer. This left Yugyeom and Jinyoung free till more evidence came up while Jaebeom’s team worked on finding suspects.

“I’m heading back to the training centre, I’ve missed too many lectures,” Yugyeom said as they wrapped up their meeting.

“I’ll see you on Tuesday then,” Jinyoung said with a soft smile. They walked out of the building together and Jinyoung helped Yugyeom get into his car before waving him off.

For the first time in two weeks Yugyeom felt himself breathe. He was, even if temporarily, free of the cases and everything related to them. Driving had always been a comforting activity for Yugyeom, giving him the space and time to think for himself. He had two hours before his lecture so he decided to just use the time driving around town and maybe grab something to eat.

As he drove, he let his thoughts wander, but it kept coming back to case. There had to be something that he was missing. The question the doctor asked still bugged him. What was the Butcher doing with the organs and flesh? Surgical trophies make sense but doesn’t explain all the cases. What would he do with chunks of meat from the back, on either side of the spine?

That’s when it hit him. Yugyeom slammed the brakes on his car and pressed his head into the steering wheel. Angry horns from behind got him to snap out for a second and he pulled the car up by the side of the road and let the world stop around him.

Meat. Of course he saw the victims as less than himself. He saw them as pigs, animals meant to be grown just enough to be killed and taken apart for personal enjoyment. Yugyeom felt himself getting sick as he thought of the Butcher, of himself in the killer’s mind, eating his spoils.

He needed Jinyoung to know when he’d realised. He couldn’t deal with the thoughts alone and so he turned the car back around and drove to the doctor’s house.

Ringing the bell didn’t reward him with an answer. The door didn’t open regardless of how long he waited. That meant that either the doctor was still at his office or Yugyeom would have to wait a while for him to return from wherever he was. Just as he was about to turn away to try the office, he felt the impulse to try turning the knob on the door and he saw the door open under his fingers.

A flash of panic swept through him as he wondered if the doctor was in trouble. He didn’t seem the type to just leave his front door open. Reaching to his side, Yugyeom pulled out the gun that he’d been allowed to keep now that he was back in service. He tiptoed through the ground floor and found nothing. The house was seemingly empty.

He was about to climb the stairs to the first floor when he heard a sound. Footsteps from somewhere below him. Searching around the house, he tried to find where the way to the basement could be, till he found a door in the kitchen that looked like any other cabinet door. It led him down a set of steps to a metal room, designed much like the forensic lab at the NIS.

Turning the corner into the room, Yugyeom held his gun up but felt his grip loosening at the sight in front of him.

On a metal table lay Lim Jaebeom, very clearly dead. “Took you long enough,” A familiar voice called from behind him, forcing Yugyeom further into the room to turn to face it.

He should have known it was Jinyoung all along. It was way too obvious and that’s exactly why he missed it. “Why?” was the only thing Yugyeom could think of asking.

“You already know, Yugyeom. You explained it all to me yourself yesterday.” Jinyoung walked closer to Yugyeom despite the gun pointed squarely at his chest.

“And you thought I’d like all of this? That I’d say yes?” Yugyeom’s hands were shaking as he tried to hold his ground.

Jinyoung reached out to wrap his hand around the barrel of the gun and push Yugyeom’s arms down and out of the way. He used his other hand to grip the side of Yugyeom’s face. “I think you already have,” he whispered.

“No! I’m not a monster like you!” Yugyeom shouted as he pulled himself free of Jinyoung’s grip.

“Am I a monster? You’ve seen the inside of my head. You’ve seen what’s there. Can you look at all of that and still call me a monster?”

“Why kill Jaebeom though, I thought he was your friend!”

Jinyoung glanced at the body with a look of inconvenience, not regret. “An unfortunate casualty. I needed insurance, Yugyeom. I’m a simple man, if I can’t have what I want, I’ll burn it all down.” He looked at Yugyeom thoughtfully before continuing, “You know what I’m capable of. Walk out of here and you get framed for the murder of not only Lim Jaebeom but of all the Butcher’s victims. A perfect liar, who had access to everything he needed to carry his killings out, with medic training from his days with the police. No one would believe your innocence, I’ve made sure of that.”

Or you can stay with me. We put Jaebeom’s body up together, a proof of our courtship and then we run away. I have enough money for us to settle down anywhere in the world and never be bothered again.” He once again held Yugyeom’s face, who was shaken to his bones as he processed everything Jinyoung was saying. “You see me for who I am, not for who you want me to be. Stay, please.”

Yugyeom felt his knees weakening as a flood of emotions washed over him. He realised that some part of him had known since he saw the Butcher’s victim for the first time. He knew it was Jinyoung, that it was meant for him, and that he’d accepted the courtship.

“You knew that I wouldn’t be able to say no to you, insurance or not,” Yugyeom said.

“I had to cut off the ropes that held you here. Jaebeom would have tracked you down wherever you were if I’d left him alive.” Jinyoung held Yugyeom as he broke down and fell to his knees, finally giving himself entirely to Jinyoung.

“I’ll stay, I’ll see you for who you are,” Yugyeom whispered, “If you promise to hold dear the darkness in me too.”

The line of his exes was long, most relationships ending with his boyfriends realising that he just didn’t feel the same way that they did. Maybe a lifetime’s worth of love wasn’t meant for him, he thought.

Finding people wasn't difficult for him, neither was making them stay. The same couldn't be said for his own heart. It made him want to stop looking for people altogether, but the loneliness was too crippling.

"I wish I'd never met you," Jongho had cried the day things ended.

Yunho had left without as much of a note, not that Hongjoong was surprised after the year and change they spent together.

Dating Yeosang was fun for about the first month, then it started getting bad, then progressively worse.

San and Wooyoung felt like but a distant memory, fun while it lasted. They had sought him out to join their relationship but all he did was remind him why they were better off together.

A sigh left Seonghwa's lips as he watched his best friend sulk in the corner of his cafe, at a table unofficially reserved for him. "Your dull face is going to drive all the customers away." He said as he placed Hongjoong's tea in front of him.

"Leave me alone, I'm grieving," Hongjoong muttered.

Seonghwa sat down in front of his friend and asked, "Grieving what, Joong? We've been over this so many times."

"I'm grieving my sorry ass." It had been months since San and Wooyoung broke up with him but it still stung somewhere deep down. He couldn't blame them, he would have done the same if he was in their place, but he didn't know how to fix things. "Am I just aro, Hwa?"

"You know that's a question only you can answer." Hongjoong groaned and covered his face with his hands. "If you're asking me if I think you're aro, then no. What you had with Yeonjun in high school felt too real to be anything short of love to me."

Hongjoong had to agree. Choi Yeonjun was the only person who Hongjoong had actually, legitimately loved in his life. They never dated, conservative school and all, but still, they shared something special. Once Hongjoong graduated, though, they naturally drifted apart and that was the end of it.

Sometimes he tries to psychoanalyse himself and wonders if that incident left him irrevocably scarred or something. But he didn’t really feel different. Maybe it was about finding the right person, he thought. But that made him feel worse because what were the chances that he’d find “the right one”?

He groaned into his tea, making Seonghwa ruffle his hair comfortingly before getting back to his work. Hongjoong just wanted to not be and feel alone, but he couldn’t tell if that was in his stars for him.

Mingi happened by a sheer stroke of luck. Hongjoong gets chills when he thinks about it, how easy it would have been for him to miss him entirely. Hongjoong had decided to take an impromptu vacation, taking a week off work and booking the first flight out of the country he could find.

It happened to be a ticket to Japan he could barely afford but he had had a terrible month at work and everything was just going wrong so he threw all his critical thinking skills out of the window and was left with eight hours to pack and no return ticket booked.

Despite the time and the immediacy of his plan, he almost missed his flight because he fell asleep in the middle of sorting out his clothes out while lounging on his bed. He hadn’t prebooked his seat so he got the only free one remaining on the flight, which happened to be between a teenager who wasn’t able to get a seat with his mother and an old man who was snoring loud enough for Hongjoong to still hear it through his headphones.

He wanted to curse his fate when a tall man came walking towards him, and for a moment Hongjoong felt frozen in place. The man was really attractive, like absurdly so. His seat also happened to be next to the teenager’s mother’s. He very politely agreed to swap seats with her son and there he was, sitting next to Hongjoong looking like he just walked off a runway.

“Can I help you?” Hongjoong had to take a second to realise he was shamelessly staring at the man next to him.

He shook his head and turned away, grabbing the book he’d stashed away in the seat pocket in front of him to occupy himself. He didn’t bother checking which book it was, just grabbed whatever was on top of his shelf as he was running out of his house. It happened to be his copy of ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’, a well loved one at that, with the spine broken in and the cover chewed up in the corners.

“Oscar Wilde? Good choice,” The man next to him commented.

Hongjoong let himself look at him again before responding, “Yeah I picked this up in high school and fell in love with it.” He reached his hand out to the man. “Hongjoong.”

“Mingi, pleasure to meet you.” The man replied, a bright smile breaking out on his face.

They talked non stop for the two hours of their flight. Things were so comfortable with Mingi. He was warm and immediately disarming. Hongjoong got a good laugh out of the facial expression Mingi made when he told him about how he landed up on that particular flight.

They had exchanged numbers and promises to meet each other over dinner by the time they had collected their bags and headed out to their respective hotels.

Mingi was in Japan on his dream trip, Hongjoong found out. He had originally planned it with his boyfriend but they ended up breaking up before it came to fruition but Mingi wasn’t going to let that get in the way of checking an important item off his bucket list.

“I could accompany you,” Hongjoong offered casually, “If you’d be okay with that, that is. It’s not like I have anything planned anyways.”

“I would love that,” Mingi said immediately. And so it was decided, a last minute vacation had turned into a sight seeing opportunity with an extremely hot man who not only was single, but also into men. Hongjoong knew it probably wasn’t the best idea to try flirt with Mingi not that long after his breakup, but he wouldn’t turn the man down if he wanted to try something,

And try they did. It took three days of them spending basically every waking moment together but they eventually got there. Mingi had invited Hongjoong back to his hotel after a day spent roaming around the fashion district of the city. They were planning to dine at the restaurant but given how exhausted they were, they ended up crashing on Mingi’s bed and ordered room service.

“Are you dating anyone?” Mingi asked out of nowhere, his eyes glued to the television playing some reality show they could barely understand the rules of.

Hongjoong turned to look at Mingi, his face lit by the glow of the screen, highlighting his features in a delectable way. “No,” He said.

“Anyone you like?”

“No.”

“Any on and offs? ‘Maybe-but-not-really?”

“No.”

Mingi took a deep breath before turning to Hongjoong, “Can I kiss you?”

“Oh my god just do it already.” They were rolling on the bed in a tangle of limbs within seconds, soft lips sharing passionate kisses. Hongjoong didn’t realise how much fun just kissing someone could be till Mingi.

Hongjoong didn’t go back to his own hotel that night.

The week felt like a dream that Hongjoong didn’t want to wake up from. Basking in Mingi’s glow felt like a slice of heaven he couldn’t let go of. But time ran out, and suddenly Hongjoong was hit with the reality that they had to go back to their lives, working cities apart with busy schedules and commitments that left them with little time for themselves.

He couldn’t get himself to ask Mingi what they were before leaving. They were supposed to leave on the same flight but Hongjoong had his pulled back last minute and he left without a word.

Hongjoong didn’t know what to do with himself on the flight back to Korea. He knew he was making a mistake, he knew he was running away from something that could maybe work for once, but he didn’t think he had it in him to find out. He was too scared to see something beautiful fall to ruin because his heart would eventually grow bored of that too, and he’d be back at square one, a lot more scarred and no less lonely.

For the next week straight he refused to go anywhere but to work or the local grocers. Seonghwa had to practically break his door down to get him to even say a word to him. “What is up with you, Joong?” He questioned, his voice accusatory. “You leave and come back without a word. I’ve been so worried about you. Couldn’t you have responded to my texts or heck, come to the cafe and showed your face so that I know you’re still alive instead of having to call your coworkers to check in on you?”

Hongjoong sat dazed on his sofa as Seonghwa shouted at him, his face impassive, barely registering that his friend was even there, much less what he was saying. “Hyung,” he said finally when Seonghwa stopped. “Hyung,” he repeated before breaking down in sobs.

He cried like he had never before. Seonghwa rushed to hold him tightly, rocking him gently as he tried to get Hongjoong to calm down but it wasn’t working. Hongjoong was a mess of tears, wails and panicked breaths, barely holding together.

“I’m so scared, hyung,” he muttered over and over again, his voice coming out in a wet warble. Seonghwa held onto Hongjoong tighter, whispering reassurances into his ears. It took a long time for his breathing to even out and his tears to stop but eventually he was lulled into an uneasy rest.

“You should call him, you know?” Seonghwa told him the next morning over breakfast. Hongjoong had broken down once more when he woke up and finally spilled everything.

“I just can’t. He didn’t try to contact me either, and I honestly don’t blame him.”

“The longer you wait, the harder it will get.”

Hongjoong paced around the kitchen, hands wringing nervously, “Hyung, he’s perfect. I can’t watch myself falling out of love with him. Not for him and not for me.”

“Then don’t,” Seonghwa said simply. “Don’t fall out of love with him. Try with everything you have in you. If it still happens, then that’s just what fate has in store for you. But to let go of something so precious for an outcome you don’t know for sure will happen, what a waste.”

Hongjoong didn’t know what to say to that. He stared at his phone as Seonghwa left. A picture of Mingi at one of the shrines they visited together stared back at him. He reached over to turn the screen off.

A week turned into two, then three, and before Hongjoong knew it had been over two months since he’d been back from the trip. He was sure Mingi had forgotten all about him by now. That was at least his hope, because he knew it was more likely that he hated Hongjoong with every fibre of his being for what he did to him.

He was in the middle of walking home when he crossed a boutique with a display of clothes that reminded him a lot of the way Mingi dressed. Stopping in front of the store window, he gazed over the mannequins, memories of their time together flashing in his mind.

The way Mingi had walked around the town in a loud shirt that Hongjoong had happily ripped off his body in the comfort of the new hotel room they had gotten together. He remembered the way Mingi had smiled when Hongjoong took more pictures of him than of the places they were visiting and how those smiles turned warmer when it was just the two of them curled together in their bed, their faces a mere breath away.

On impulse he stepped inside the shop. The counter was empty, the door behind it slightly ajar. Hongjoong found a rack of belts and felt the leather between his fingers. The image of him hastily unbuckling one from Mingi’s waist and throwing away crept on him that he didn’t notice someone step out of the open door and stand behind him.

“How can I help you, sir?” A familiar voice asked and Hongjoong felt his entire body seize up. He couldn’t get himself to move or say a word. “Are you okay, sir?” Mingi’s deep voice asked, and Hongjoong couldn’t muster even a sound as Mingi walked around to face him.

The shock on his face when he recognised Hongjoong was comical. He looked like he had seen a ghost, his lips parted and his voice caught in his throat.

“Mingi,” Hongjoong finally managed to say. And just like that the floodgates fell open. “Mingi, Mingi, Mingi, Mingi,” he chanted, unable to stop himself.

He could barely remember what happened but next thing he knew, Mingi had him wrapped ina crushing hug. “Why did it take so long?” He heard Mingi ask. Hongjoong just held onto him tighter, too afraid to let go.

“Why aren’t you mad at me?” Mingi smiled, taking Hongjoong’s hand into his own, running his thumb over his knuckles.

“No offence but I didn’t expect someone who booked and almost missed a flight to a random country in less than eight hours to be the most well adjusted person out there.” Hongjoong wanted to protest what Mingi was saying but he knew there was no point. “A part of me knew I’d wake up in that bed alone. It also knew that if I tried to get in touch with you, you’d just shut down. So all I could do was wait.”

“But I was so terrible to you, weren’t you hurt?”

“Oh I was plenty hurt, right after my ex too, but I wasn’t mad. I just couldn’t find it in me to be angry with you.”

Hongjoong raised Mingi’s hand to his lips almost reverently and placed a soft kiss on the back of it. “I don’t deserve you,” he whispered.

“I don’t care what you deserve or not, Hongjoong. I want you, if you want me too.” Mingi looked at Hongjoong with such a burning passion that he couldn’t help but speak his heart.

“I want you so bad, Mingi. With every fibre of my being,” he said. “Every time I look at you I had to remind myself that I’m not dreaming. I just wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if I hurt you again.”

“I wouldn’t forgive you either, and it would hurt me a lot if you rejected me right now. So just say yes. What has to happen will happen. Don’t let that stop you from being happy.”

There was not a minute in the time that Kihyun and Hyungwon knew each other that there weren’t bickering over the smallest things imaginable. One was too self absorbed, the other too proud to ever concede anything. Despite the fact that they often said they hated each other, there was something that kept pulling them back together, and once they started, it was as if the rest of the world ceased to exist around them.

So it was both surprising yet unsurprising when Hyungwon offered to let Kihyun move in with him when Minhyuk told him that he was going to move in with Hyunwoo when their lease ended. Their friends joked about having to keep the cops on speed dial in case the two strangled each other to death or something, knowing full well that things were just waiting to go wrong.

Kihyun tip toed around Hyungwon for a bit, seeing that he was the one intruding, but once the comfort set in, the two went back to fighting near constantly. It was only time before the rage and proximity combined turned the lingering sexual tension between then up to eleven. The only way they could get the other to listen to them was by fucking the life out of them.

The sex was amazing, and it kept them coming back for more, even when they felt like they’d reached the end of the wire, that it was time to finally call things off, all it would take was for one of them to grab the other by their neck and smash their lips together, and within minutes they would be falling apart in each other’s arms, bickering long forgotten.

“Why do we do this to ourselves?” Kihyun had asked one night as they lay next to each other, naked and tired, nearly a year after they’d moved in together.

Hyungwon laughed, bringing Kihyun’s thumb up to his lips and biting gently into the skin. “Because we’re both messed up, and there’s no one else who’s going to put up with that.” He mused for a moment before adding, “Also the sex is really good.”

Work went from good to alright to a struggle gradually enough that Jaebeom didn’t even realise he was spending one, two, three more hours at work every night. Every day there would be too many files to go through, too many calls to make, too many meetings to attend, too much to do. The stress was making his hair fall out but he just kept going, hoping that just after this project, the next project, the project after that, things would get better.

His steps went from confident and fast paced to dragging, every movement a struggle against his body telling him to stop, to catch a break, to just give everything up.

“So you’re taking the day off for our anniversary, no?” Mark asked from across the dinner table. They had just gotten out of their last fight which consisted of doors slammed in each other’s faces, leaving late at night and coming back early in the morning without informing the other, and a week of eating meals seperately.

“I told you, I really can’t. This client is too important.” Jaebeom knew that the respite from the fight was short, that they would go back to doing what they were doing by midnight.

Mark sighed, frustrated. “I never ask you for anything, Jaebeom. I just want us to spend one day together. It’s our fifth anniversary, doesn’t that mean something to you?”

Nearly on the verge of tears, Jaebeom tried to hold himself together as he spoke. “I know hyung,” Jaebeom knew him using honorifics on the older would relay to him how serious he was, “But there’s nothing I can do. Even if I asked for a holiday my boss would reject it. I can’t lose this job, it’s everything I have. You know how much I love you but I just can’t do this for you. We can plan something for the weekend after, maybe?”

Mark looked conflicted, understanding his boyfriend on an intellectual level but the primal part of him hurt and torn apart, that his lover couldn’t spare him one day when it mattered the most.

“We both know that you’ll be busy on the weekend too, you don’t have time for me anymore. Not talking to you when you’re home is futile because you never even are. I know your job is hectic and meaningful to you, Jaebeom, but I need to see you, spend time with you, talk to you to be able to be with you. If I’m just seeing you twice a week in our home and we’re fighting for most of it, there’s no point in us going on like this.”

Jaebeom knew what those words meant but he couldn’t accept it. There was no way Mark was implying that, was there? He wouldn’t ever think of such a thing, would he? Mark had been his better half for as long as he could remember. They were practically married, they were ride or die, right?

The world came closing around Jaebeom and he couldn’t hold onto anything by the time he realised. His body shook and his throat closed. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t see, he couldn’t hear. He was trapped and he didn’t know what to do.

He didn’t know how long he sat on the floor of their kitchen, curled in foetal position, with Mark trying to get his breathing to even out. Jaebeom hadn’t had a panic attack in years and it scared both of them.

“Don’t go, don’t go, don’t go,” Jaebeom mumbled over and over again, hands clutching tightly at Mark’s sides. He could see the tears streaming down his lover’s face, and he knew what the expression on his face meant. He knew it was the end and he didn’t know what to do but cry.

Mark left a week later. Jaebeom had just returned from work and he saw the suitcases sitting in the living room. He knew this day was coming for a while, but he still hadn’t entirely processed it. They had spent every evening after that night together, a respectable distance between them as Mark spoke about the end. He wasn’t one to sugar coat, he wouldn’t talk about his day at work and pretend like they weren’t ending the relationship they built brick by brick.

He had stayed a few days longer just to make sure Jaebeom was okay, because even though they weren’t right for each other anymore, Mark still loved him. Still, saying goodbye wasn’t any easier. They hugged each other for what felt like hours, crying quietly into each other’s arms, till Mark had to pull away, his best friend at the door to help him out.

Jaebeom crumbled to the floor the moment the door closed. He slept there that night, waking up well into the afternoon. Emailing his boss an apology, who let him take the rest of the day off, he got to tidying up his house, trying not to cry every time he saw the empty spots where Mark’s things sat.

He knew he should have tried harder, but it was as if his body was working on autopilot and he was just going along on the ride. He knew Mark had every right to leave, that it had been building up for a long time, but it didn’t hurt any less. Jaebeom cried more times that day than he probably had in all of his life.

It was less that two weeks later that he collapsed at work and had to be taken to the hospital. Jaebeom hadn’t been eating, he barely had anything more than coffee to keep himself up and running. His body had finally given in and it took him nearly two days to get back to consciousness. The nurse who looked after him was a woman about his mother’s age, who chided him for being so careless, and convinced him to try therapy out.

Reluctantly, Jaebeom made a visit to the psychiatrist in the hospital where he was admitted, and he had to admit, just talking about what he was going through to someone helped. After he was discharged, he came back once a week, poured his heart out and listened carefully. They put him on some medication and slowly the dark clouds thinned out, sunlight peaking through the cracks.

After one of the sessions, Jaebeom found a man a few years younger than him sitting in the waiting room outside his psychiatrist’s office. He was undeniable pretty, Jaebeom thought, shooting him a quick smile before leaving.

As the weeks passed, he saw the boy over and over again, and they went from friendly waves to small talk between their sessions. Jaebeom found out that the man’s name was Choi Youngjae, that he was only two years younger than him and worked as a piano teacher.

“Hyung, do you want to meet up sometime?” Youngjae asked Jaebeom when the older let him know that his psychiatrist told him he had recovered enough for them to stop the sessions.