#askingtherfa1k

The ballad stops and V kisses your hand and looks at you like you have painted the stars in the sky for him.

You’re both laughing – carelessly, joyfully – leaning close together, your hands still in his. Sharing a private joke, maybe.

Saeran can’t remember the last time he was told a joke. Can’t remember the last time he laughed. His throat constricts and he coughs, trying to loosen the vice that has wrapped itself around it.

It is not the first time he is shockingly jealous of V, but it is the first time that it shakes him this much.

The flickering chandeliers and the clinking of champagne glasses suddenly becomes too much. He turns away, exits the ballroom through the French doors.

He can’t let himself get caught in the memories. When he gets caught in them, he obsesses, and when he obsesses, his thoughts start to spiral down, down, down – until there is nothing.

Nothing –

He stumbles through the empty hallways, the columns are tall and the walls so white and bright that it hurts his eyes– if he looks closely enough, he can see a filthy red rug, the faint silhouette of black robes surrounding him. Screaming.

He blinks and he’s staring into white marble again.

He keeps going.

Eventually, he finds himself outside, where he walks under an archway woven with purple wisterias and into an open space where the floor is cobblestone and he is surrounded by hedges and flowering trees. The sky is dark but sparkling with stars and he feels like he can finally breathe.

No one else is here, but the music of the string instruments carries over from the open windows in the ballroom. The sweet sound is softened by the breeze, the singing cicadas, the trickling of water from a garden fountain.

There is something eerily familiar about this place, as if he’s been here before, once upon a dream.

“Saeran!”

That voice, his name; time has passed, and he hasn’t forgotten the first time you called it when you followed him into Mint Eye, the first time you whispered it against his hair when he was forced to take the potion and he couldn’t stop weeping into your lap.

Or the first time you sobbed it when you clutched his broken hands and begged him to leave with you.

He hears the hurried footsteps on cobblestone and he turns, meets glossy eyes framed by black lashes that blink up at him.

Awe. Shock. Euphoria.

Saeran isn’t sure what he is feeling when you catch yourself against the flowered archway, exhilarated from chasing after him. His own heart is pounding so loud he’s sure you can hear it, but he finds he can’t look away from you.

The bottom of your gown is muddy, your hair wild in waves and flowing down your back.

You look like a princess, he thinks. Like magic.

There is almost an unnatural, otherworldly glow about you – lovely eyes, pretty mouth, kissed by the moonlight and butterfly wings.

“Hi Saeran,” you whisper – honeyed, sweet.

Looking at your beauty up close like this, it’s easier to remember the disgusting burn marks that now cover half of his body. The scars that prevent him from looking at his reflection with anything but revulsion.

He turns away from you but you lunge forward, stumbling into his back and catching his hand in yours; he gasps at the contact, tries not to marvel at the softness of it.

“Go back to the party,” he pleads, his voice is raspy. He feels as if he is going to cry and he does not want you see. “Please.”

“Why won’t you look at me?” You draw nearer, stand right in front of him so that he has no other choice but to.

And he does, prepares himself for the look of revulsion that he’s become so used to receiving from others. But your expression – soft, adoring – does not change.

“Saeran,” you frown, your tone sad and disapproving, “you are thinking badly of yourself. I can see it on your face. Why?” You reach out to touch him, trailing a fingertip down his jaw and his body shivers.

Heat rises to his cheeks in shame. “The scars are ugly. I – I didn’t want you to see them.”

“Nothing about you has ever been ugly, Saeran.” Your eyes are honest, and he wants to believe you.

The wind catches your hair and drags it over your eyes and he has to fight against the urge to lift his hand up and brush it away. Struggles against the desire to press his body against yours, bury his face in your neck and hope you will hold him the way you used to.

He looks up at you, hopes he doesn’t look as haunted as he feels. “Why are you so kind to me? Even after everything that I have done?”

You reach up, place your palm on his right cheek and lean forward, press a kiss against the marred flesh that remains of his left one. He feels teardrops, cold and small on his face – yours or his, he’s not sure.

“Is it not obvious?” your voice is soft, questioning. “I loved you, Saeran.”

“Are you saying these things because you’re angry at V?” His chest heaves, an underlying tone of panic laced in his voice. He feels inexplicably light-headed and tears of frustration are gathering in his eyes but he forces himself to blink them away.

“Of course not.” You look up at him sharply. “I have forgiven Jihyun for many things. But I am angry at him; for lying and hiding when his friends needed him. For not answering Saeyoung’s phone calls when he knew he was mourning you. I am angry for the things he allowed to happen to you.”

You stop a few meters from him and give him a humorless, tight-lipped smile.

“I do not know who Jihyun is,” you admit. “I don’t think I have ever known. Earlier, in the ballroom, I told him everything – he has chosen to leave again.”

“But he loves you,” his licks his lips, eyes uncertain, his voice sounds meek even to him. “You love him.”

You shake your head, your answering laugh is warm, without a trace of bitterness that might have been there if he’d said that to you two years ago.

“Saeran, I loved you,” you whisper, heavy teardrops running down to your chin, pooling until they barely hang on. “I loved you so much I thought I would go mad from grief.”

“You…loved me?”

The question seems to hang in the space between you, unbidden.

“I have never stopped.”

He has always loved when the cherry blossoms bloom, when the flowered trees begin to turn pink and some shake loose; when the wind picks them up and blows them everywhere.

That’s what it feels like in his chest. Like it is full of pink petals caught in a spring breeze, spinning wildly out of control. A rainstorm of color.

Saeran cradles your face between his hands; you press your cheek against his palm and run your fingers over the arch of his cheekbones – lightly, lovingly.

“From the very beginning,” he murmurs against your lips. “You have been my entire world.”

Oh, and he recalls clearly, the light of you, the gravity of you; the way your entire being shone and dissolved him into the air when you kissed him in that garden years ago. When you made him believe in magic again.

Since that moment, you have been all he sees when he closes his eyes. Oh, and when your lips meet his, he wonders, if all of this has been one elongated wishful dream.

Eunji had been here since sunrise. She’d been surrounded all day long by friends and vendors—and she’d been smiling and telling people where to go and staring at flowers as if she knew how they were supposed to look. She’d put on a brave face, because it was the right thing to do.

But now the sun was setting and the banquet hall was lit by a thousand glittering candles and she’d escaped, at last, to the little office upstairs to change—and she found that she felt little and lost the way she always used to.

She sat in a metal chair with her legs tucked up to her chest and stared at the pocket mirror she’d propped up on the desk, her mascara wand in her hand. She could still hear voices from downstairs, raised over the sound of the music that had been playing over a bluetooth speaker all day. The string quartet would be arriving soon, and there’d be live music by the time the guests arrived. For now, though, there was another of Yoosung’s playlists blaring through the ballroom—and her friends’ laughter echoed up the stairs.

She felt surrounded and alone all at the same time.

There were a million reasons not to have held a party till now. There was grief and pain—fear and doubt and wounds that still hadn’t healed. Eunji eyed her hair, which had grown huge over the course of the day, and wondered if she was ready for this.

It was too late to change her mind.

“Hey,” said a voice from the top of the stairs. “Hiding?”

Eunji twisted in her chair and smiled. It was Saeran.

“Yeah,” she said. “Wanna join me?”

Saeran gave her the sort of half-smile she’d only recently started seeing and crossed the messy office to lean on the filing cabinets beside her. His feet didn’t make a sound on the hardwood floors.

“Is that what you’re wearing?” He eyed the sweatpants she still hadn’t changed out of disdainfully, and she laughed.

“Check your hair,” she said. “It’s a little bit poofy.”

Saeran snorted and looked away, but he did run a hand through his hair. It was so much softer, nowadays, than it had been when she’d met him—bright red and never quite tamed, just like his brother’s.

“So this is where my family is! Hiding in the attic.” Saeyoung’s voice came before his body—and then he appeared at the top of the stairs, his sleeves rolled up and his eyes glittering behind his slightly-askance glasses. He’d somehow managed to be in everyone’s way all day—but Eunji knew he’d also set up the system for accepting donations within about twenty seconds of arriving.

“It’s not an attic, baby. It’s an office.” Eunji used her foot to spin her chair all the way around and opened her arms for him, and he crossed the room at a run and leapt into her lap. Saeran sighed the way he always did, but Eunji knew most of it was just posturing.

“You’re in public,” Saeran said, glowering at them. She smiled and kissed the top of Saeyoung’s head.

“Nobody here but you, and we’re almost related.”

Saeran rolled his eyes. “All the more reason to restrain yourselves.”

“Impossible,” Saeyoung chirped. He wrapped his arms around Eunji’s neck and let her cradle him in her lap—and he was so much larger than she was, but she was used to holding him.

“Both of you,” she said, “need to get ready.”

It was true: after months of putting this monstrous (elegant) party together, the moment had arrived—guests would be showing up, and they’d all be expected to act charming and solicitous.

Eunji didn’t know if she remembered how.

“I’m going,” Saeran said, scooping his neatly-folded clothes off the corner of the desk. “Don’t do anything you’re going to have to apologize for later.”

He disappeared down the little hallway and Saeyoung giggled, clambering out of Eunji’s lap and looking her up and down.

“What do you think we could do in here that we’d owe him an apology for?” he asked, wiggling his eyebrows. Eunji sighed and stood, hooking a finger through his belt loop and pulling him close.

“I can think of about a million things,” she said. “If we only had the time.”

She kissed him and his scarred hands fell to her waist, skimming the sliver of skin that peeked out above her sweatpants.

“Get changed, sweetheart,” she whispered into his lips. “Do it for me.”

He sighed heavily and kissed her once more.

“Your wish is my command, starshine.”

Then he was grabbing his outfit from its hanger on the windowsill and following his brother down the hall, and she was alone again.

She took a long, deep breath. It was now or never.

Eunji ducked behind the desk and cast aside her sweaty setting-up clothes, spritzing herself with perfume and slipping into the silky red jumpsuit she’d bought for this occasion in particular. She tucked her wild hair behind her ears and stepped into heels that were much taller than she was used to and lifted her arms above her head—stretching; soothing; praying for patience.

She still wasn’t really sure what she was scared of.

Eunji checked her reflection one last time and then made her way down the stairs. She’d done well, she thought: the candles made the long hall with its light wood and glimmering surfaces look almost ethereal. There were big flower arrangements in the middle of every table, and the band was starting to set up in a corner. She twisted the engagement ring that sparkled on her left hand round and round—a nervous habit—and then stepped out into the hall, her heels echoing sharply.

Yoosung appeared at her side right away, a pencil stuck behind his ear and a notepad in his hand.

“Oh,” he exclaimed, standing back to take her in. “You look beautiful.”

“Thanks, honey.” Eunji peeked at his pad of paper and smiled proudly: he’d made a list of all the last-minute tasks, and he’d already checked off half of them. Her heart swelled: what had she possibly done to deserve the help and friendship and devotion of people like these?

“Almost time,” he said. Impulsively, Eunji reached over and squeezed his hand.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.” He slipped his notepad into a pocket and looked into her eyes, and she felt a sudden urge to hug him.

“Does it make you feel bad that we’re doing this again?” Eunji asked. She didn’t have to elaborate; she saw in his face that he understood exactly what she meant. They all had wounds, after all—there was still so much healing to be done.

Yoosung hummed thoughtfully.

“A little bit,” he said. “I’m sad and angry and confused when I think about her, and I can’t not think about her today.”

Eunji noticed that he didn’t say her name.

“It feels a little bit like starting a new life,” Eunji said slowly. “Doesn’t it?”

Yoosung nodded.

“It feels like growing up.”

Eunji squeezed his hand tighter, because that was exactly what she’d been thinking.

In the distance, she heard the band starting to warm up: a few wavering notes that lingered in the air. She looked up and made eye contact with Jaehee, who was speaking in hushed tones to a man who seemed to have just delivered several cases of ice.

“I’m gonna rescue Jaehee,” Eunji said. Yoosung grinned.

“Go be valiant.”

Eunji crossed the room and arrived at her friend’s side just as the delivery man was walking away; as soon as he was out of earshot, Jaehee sighed heavily.

“Everything okay?”

“Fine,” Jaehee said. “He’s late, but he’s here.”

Never, Eunji thought. Never in a million lifetimes could she have done this alone.

The band had started playing softly, and Eunji stood at Jaehee’s side, surveying the room. Zen, who’d been speaking to the musicians, spun around and beamed at her.

“You transformed!” he called. Eunji laughed.

“So did you.”

Zen came to stand next to her, his hair somehow catching the candlelight just right.

“Nope,” he said. “I always look like this, babe.”

He cast glittering eyes around the room as if looking for someone to back him up—and, as if she knew she was needed, his girlfriend Lea appeared at his side, a little stack of place cards in her hand.

“What did you do to this place while I was changing?” Eunji asked Lea, who smiled and slipped easily into Zen’s arms. He kissed her temple. “It looks a million times better than it did when I went upstairs.”

“Just finishing touches,” Lea said. “Everything always comes together at the last minute.”

It was true, Eunji thought. Her life had been that way too—nothing until suddenly it was something.

Zen whined and pulled Lea against his chest, pleading for attention. She lifted a hand to cup his cheek.

“And Hyun looks very beautiful, which improves the overall atmosphere too,” she said. Eunji laughed and Zen kissed Lea’s cheek.

The front door opened.

Everyone turned; immediately, something seemed to shift—the air went still and quiet.

“Jumin’s here,” Eunji said.

She met his eyes and felt her heart clench. It had been his idea to hold another party—but she understood why he’d stayed away all day.

He was the one who was hurting most of all.

She went to him before she could stop herself, twisting a lock of her hair anxiously around one finger. She still wasn’t quite sure how to talk to him.

“Hello,” Jumin said as she drew near. She could tell he felt strange, too: he stood stiffly, and he didn’t quite meet her eyes. She smiled and hoped that he knew it was genuine.

“I’m glad you’re here,” she said. Jumin cocked his head, still not quite looking at her.

“Of course I’m here.”

Eunji fiddled with her ring again, twisting it round and round.

“I meant that I’m happy to see you,” she said. It was important to be precise with him—to be clear—to say what she really meant. She wasn’t any good at those things.

“Likewise.” Jumin looked out at the elaborately decorated ballroom, and Eunji thought she knew what he was looking for (even though he knew he wouldn’t find it).

“When I was planning everything,” she said softly, “I thought of him.”

Jumin lowered his steely gaze and finally met her eyes. It was this, she thought, that frightened her—that she wouldn’t do justice to the people who should have been here; that she wasn’t good or kind or clever enough to incorporate the people her friends had loved into a night that that was really meant for them.

And Jumin, she thought, was bound to thank her in his usual stoic way and then move on—but instead he lingered.

“You did well,” he said. His voice was lower and weaker than usual, and Eunji could see that the way he was looking at the candles and carefully-arranged flowers had shifted. “He would have appreciated it very much.”

Eunji’s eyes burned. Growing up, she thought. Moving on.

“Thank you, Jumin.” She clasped his hand, and he let her.

Behind her, the music soared. Jaehee appeared quietly at her side—and then Yoosung, his checklist in hand—and then Zen and Lea, his arm tight around her shoulders.

“Is it time?” Yoosung asked, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Eunji smiled at him.

“I’m still missing something important,” she said. Just then, there was breath on the back of her neck and hands on her waist, and she grinned as Saeyoung wrapped himself around her.

“Something important’s here now, babe.”

Eunji swatted at him vaguely and gestured at Saeran, who had appeared behind his brother and was standing at the foot of the stairs, not quite a part of the group.

“I meant him,” she said. “Not you.”

Saeyoung pouted and Saeran took a couple of steps toward the circle, the candlelight making his eyes dance. This was it, Eunji thought: her family; the people she loved.

And she felt the ones who were missing, too—in Yoosung’s eyes and the curious angle of Jumin’s head. There had been so much pain and anger and fear—but Eunji looked at the little group gathered in the candlelight and felt only warmth.

“It’s time,” she said.

It had taken over a year (a lifetime of pain and growth and love) for Eunji to hold a party—and as she looked around at her friends’ faces she felt sure that it would be the last.

This era was coming to a close, she thought—and that was why she had felt so afraid. Eunji hated goodbyes, and that was what this was: a farewell to the things and people that had been lost.

Eunji watched as Yoosung opened the door. The music made her heart feel light, and Saeyoung squeezed her tight and pressed his lips to her ear.

It wasn’t an ending, she thought. Not at all.