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It was snowing like this the day the House of Mirrors burned down to muddy embers. A sorry sight, for the mansion that had hosted such a great ancestral family blew away in less than a few, bright hours. The end of a few generations’ efforts.
Yoo Joonghyuk looks at the broken planks hiding the trapdoor at what once was the center of a studio. The ceiling had caved in long ago, and now everything is a mix of blacks and whites. Remnants of the fire are still scattered around the room, the charcoal pieces mixed in with the glass of the windows. He kicks a black stake away from the iron door, and ignores the dull thud it makes against the snow.
Today he has brought canned tomatoes and a pack of what he guesses are string beans. No meat is necessary; it’s already inside the bunker.
He fishes out a key from his coat’s pockets and crouches down towards the door. With a loud click, the locks snap open. Gently, he removes the black dust and the snow piled on top, moving the planks sideways to give him enough space to lift the metal plate. After scanning the perimeter with a quick twist of the head, he pushes himself inside the hole, and closes the door above his head.
“I’m back,” he murmurs as he steps down the metallic ladder. A grunt greets him from the darkness.
Once he reaches the bottom, he turns toward the unkempt bed and the man staring at him on top of it. Their eyes meet. He holds the gaze before giving a brief nod.
“Is stew okay for tonight?” he asks while he opens his coat. From the insides, he produces the can of tomatoes and the tied bunch of wilted beans, along with a packet of what seem to be yellowed pages.
The other squints his eyes in a rapid frown before muttering a small, “yes.” Yoo Joonghyuk nods again.
He places everything in a neat row on top of a table, careful not to spill any drops of water over the paper. He had gone to great lengths to buy those journals; best not to waste his time due to a few seconds’ distraction.
Done, he moves back to take off his coat, and specks of grey fly off his shoulders, dropping silently over the wet floor. The blizzard outside is expected to be a long one. Strong, too. He relays his thoughts to the other, who stares blankly at him before spitting out a laugh.
“Well, not like I’m going anywhere.”
“Yes.” The immediate reply. Yoo Joonghyuk’s eyes fix on the other’s before he slowly adds, “It’s too dangerous outside.”
A few seconds pass by before the man snorts and turns to look at the table.
Meanwhile, Yoo Joonghyuk has already gotten rid of the coat and is brushing back his hair, matted down by the cold weather. He reasons that he might need to find a hat the next time he goes out. With ease, he places the sword that hangs from his waist on top of a tall cabinet, out of reach from the scrawny man's hands.
After changing into a pair of slippers and mopping the floor the best he can, Yoo Joonghyuk walks towards the small stove at the corner of the bunker, ready to begin making dinner preparations for the night.
From a small fridge, he takes out a wrapped bag and empties the contents on a cutting board. The meat slushes a little against the wood; it’s still moist with blood. He begins to trim the fat, plucking the white strings and sticky clusters to put aside for later. Then, once the meat is clean enough, he swiftly chops up the round and cubes it into small bite-sized pieces, perfect to fit into the cup of the spoon. He wouldn’t want to risk the man choking on the food, afterall.
“Saw anyone?”
“No.”
“Not even a dog?”
“No.”
“What about any monster? Did you kill any of them today?”
“No.”
“Must have been a very boring trip, then.”
Yoo Joonghyuk grunts in agreement. He wipes the blade with a piece of cloth and scrapes the meat chunks inside a hot pot, alongside a chopped up carrot, an onion, and some chili paste. The stew was going to taste probably marginally okay if not bland today; but so be it. The trip back took long enough, surely the other wouldn’t fault him if he were to rush dinner.
He turns to grab the can of tomatoes and the beans and finds the man holding them in his hands.
“Here,” he says, and holds them out for him to reach. The pale hands contrast starkly against the red of the can.
For a moment, Yoo Joonghyuk wonders if he should buy a pair of handcuffs. But the thought doesn’t last long—they are not necessary. He has the man right where he wants him to be. He takes the can and the beans and turns again.
After emptying the can and placing beans inside, he fills the pot with water from a PET bottle and raises the flame to high.
Quickly, the smell of tomato sauce fills the small room. He asks for the other to set the table as he stirs a ladle into the stew and rises it to his lips. A slight grimace passes over his face. As he had thought, it was only passable enough.
“Pass me the bowls.”
Ceramic clatters behind him, and soon two white bowls are presented to him. This time, it’s white over white. Maybe he ought to add more meat dishes to the man’s diet; the man’s hands are looking too pale over the smooth glaze. He ladles the stew into the bowls and watches as the other walks back to the table.
They eat quietly, one intent on observing the other, the other focused on ignoring the obvious stare. There isn’t much to exchange—this is just routine.
The man’s pinkish lips have started to turn red by the heat, and they pucker slightly to blow off some steam from the spoonful of stew. Yoo Joonghyuk watches on as he takes another bite, his cheeks moving up and down slowly, so full that it reminds him of a pet hamster. It’s clear that he’s having difficulties eating—the tomato is the predominant flavor in the bowl and, judging by the man’s reticence when bringing the spoon to his mouth, it’s not a favourite of his, not even when cooked. Still, he continues to eat until there is nothing more left in the bowl.
“I’ve found you something,” he says after the table is cleaned from the dinnerware. He moves the yellowed out journals next to the man’s side. “They were in one of the raided houses.”
The man raises an eyebrow at his words, but seems interested enough to move his hands over the floral covers. He quickly flips through them, observing the filled pages moving side to side. Some of them are spotted with brown, others crinkled by humidity. Finally, he tosses them on the table and sighs.
“A raided house… must have been an old one,” he says. He drums his fingers over the paper covers, staring intently at the taller man. “So old to have journals from almost forty years ago. Thanks, anyways.”
Yoo Joonghyuk says nothing. He just nods and stands up, his face blank. The other falls silent, too.
Then, they go quickly through the motions: changing into their pajamas, brushing their teeth in the small bathroom stall, and drinking a cup of water at the kitchen sink. They have followed the same schedule for the past months, and they move from one station to the other with ease. Even the man’s shallow sigh before climbing into bed is the same as every other night. Soon, the lights are turned off, and Yoo Joonghyuk joins the other man already laying down.
He lays still, his eyes facing the dark ceiling, and focuses on the steady breathing next to his. He wonders what dish he should make tomorrow. Maybe bulgogi. The bed shakes a little as the other settles under the covers.
“Goodnight.”
He doesn’t answer back, although he wants to.
*
He can’t fall asleep. While Kim Dokja’s breathing has already settled down into a deep sleep, he is still staring at the same spot on the ceiling. His head turns slightly to look at the man beside him.
Recently, Yoo Joonghyuk has found himself thinking about it too much.
Kim Dokja’s hands, that is.
Not that ever was anything remotely fascinating about the scrawny man’s hands, but still. His eyes can’t stop settling down on the long fingers, the round nails and uneven skin tone. Unknown to him, his gaze falls from the man’s unremarkable face to the white extremities.
They are not beautiful—Yoo Joonghyuk can admit that much. He has seen better (his fellow coworkers’ at the company), held better (his sister’s, which fit into his own like mittens), and broke better (a few bastards here and there). But Kim Dokja’s hands are Kim Dokja’s, so in their own, uncharming way, they are the most precious hands he has ever held.
His own tremble at the idea of holding them again against his sides. He knows that it wouldn’t be enough.
Sometimes, Yoo Joonghyuk thinks how easy it’d be to break the phalanges, to splice in two halves the fingernails and then swallow them whole in a single movement of his throat.
He gulps.
Kim Dokja’s hands are still there, grabbing at the grey sheets in their sleep. They are still there, but what if something were to cut them off? With a well-drawn arch, his blade would sweep through the middle, severing the tissue between the wrists until the radius and the ulna would be visible through the redness.
Then what? Yoo Joonghyuk closes his eyes. Would he feel hurt? Would he feel betrayed? He had promised not to hurt him. That he wanted to keep him safe. That he would have provided for the both of them, so he just needed to stay put and not to leave him. He needed him, just like Kim Dokja needed him.
He murmurs a few words and clenches his eyes. The hunger is still there, scratching at his belly and throat, but he can’t allow it to seep through. He can’t let it devour Kim Dokja. There needs to be another method.
*
“That will be 20,000 won.”
Yoo Joonghyuk hands the bills to the cashier as he picks up the grocery bag.
Every time it’s a hassle to come to this area of the city; the subway line is one of the slowest, and to reach this specific 7-eleven mart is also a fifteen minutes walk from the nearest station. This is something that he wouldn’t have bothered with up to two years ago, but now it’s different. Maybe he had grown sentimental over the months, and missed the familiar sight of Kim Dokja shopping for groceries before walking back home. Distractly, he retraces the steps of the man who used to come here up until a year ago and now can’t. He stops at the exit of the store.
Outside, the snow continues to pile over the open umbrellas, coating the people in icy cold powder. It’s quite cold for being January, and probably he won’t have too many occasions to move around for quite some time. Although he knows he needs to stock up on food before the big snowstorm reaches the country, he hesitates to be away too often from the bunker. Kim Dokja wouldn’t like it, and buying too many things at once would definitely attract another round of questions from the man himself. He sighs. He’ll need to figure another solution. With a quick movement of the hand, a black umbrella pops open above his head, and he begins to trek back to the subway station.
There aren’t a lot of people in the streets today—the incoming blizzard must have put them off from staying outside—but Yoo Joonghyuk prefers it to be so; he can create the illusion that it’s a world filled with nothing else but silence, whose only purpose is to serve as a backdrop for his and Kim Dokja’s lives. He really wishes it was as such; he wouldn’t need to worry about Kim Dokja disappearing from his sight, then.
For a brief moment, he imagines Kim Dokja’s hand secured in his own, the lithe fingers set ablush by the cold wind. He’d hold them against his lips, hoping to warm them up with his breath, and Kim Dokja would bloom like a rose casted in white before taking them away telling him to “stop, it’s embarrassing.” It’d be just the two of them, and the lights of the street lamps would zero on them like the main protagonists of the final act.
His lips twitch faintly at the thought. If only it really was the end of the world.
Soon, he’s walking over to the train platform, stopping at the bench where the man used to sit whenever he waited for his train. He sits down, and ignores the wet and cold metal that has already seen its fair share of snowy coats. Like the streets outside, the station is semi-empty too, and he seems to be one of the few passengers going towards the outskirts of the city. He rubs his thumb over the smooth handle of the umbrella, and munches over his lower lip.
That morning he had woken up to Kim Dokja leaning into his chest, the small crown of his head settled just underneath his chin as if waiting to be kissed. The man seemed unaware of it, and had probably moved in his sleep. Still, he felt pleasure pool at his stomach at the idea of the man finally trusting him enough, if only unconsciously. Furtively, he had lowered his head until the thin hair began to tickle his nose and gave a deep inhale.
Warm and clean, Kim Dokja smelled of sleep and cotton and, to his greatest pleasure, of Yoo Joonghyuk himself. He basked in the sensation, and tried to ignore when his stomach began to growl. Still, when the smaller man had begun to show the first signs of waking up, he had let him go and watched over from the other side of the bed, feigning ignorance of the event taking place at all. If only Kim Dokja started to be more open with him...
The incoming train’s announcement croaks around the station, distracting him from the warm memory. He raises his head to look at the approaching cars, and notices that number 3807 was going to arrive at any moment. Quickly, he stands up and walks before the platform screen doors, dragging the tip of his umbrella against the spotless floor.
As the train finally halts to a stop, his feet take him to his usual seat.
“The doors are closing. The doors are closing.”
He leans his head back and breathes out a sigh. Only half an hour left before he can see him again.
*
He is chopping up some eggplants when hears the other say, “I’d like to go out.” His back freezes for a moment before he resumes to slide the knife over the soft vegetables.
“It’s too dangerous.”
“But each time you’re still back here, and in one piece.”
He frowns as a small spider peeks out from one of the eggplants’ caps. He squashes it with his thumb, dragging the brittle corpse across the board.
“I can protect myself. But I can’t protect us both if we are to go together,” he calmly replies back. “You don’t know how to use a sword, and we don’t even have any firearms.” He can hear the other exhale.
“If you were to teach me, then—”
“No.”
The knife goes still against the board. Yoo Joonghyuk is looking up at the wall, his eyes not seeing the concrete in front of him. “No,” he repeats again, and turns to look at Kim Dokja.
Yoo Joonghyuk knows that Kim Dokja wants to leave. He wants to escape from him, to abandon him, again, like the first time he finally had the man for himself and no other. But he can’t. He can’t allow it—will never allow it. He’d kill the man himself before anyone would take him away from him.
It’s an impasse, one they are both familiar with. The other’s eyes burn into his, the deep black reflecting back nothing but the dim light above them. Yoo Joonghyuk would like them to reflect only his face, someday. He waits for the other to say something else. As usual, Kim Dokja is the one to relent.
“You don’t even use it…” Kim Dokja’s eyes shift to the scabbard placed high above the cupboard. It’s immaculate, like always. The only sign of use is the worn off leather tab that keeps the sword sheathed and secure.
Yoo Joonghyuk follows his gaze. He knows that he has a habit of running his thumb over the tab when going out—probably to keep himself from running his thumb over the smaller man’s eyes whenever he is in his company. He murmurs a “you don’t need to know,” and returns to cut the rest of the eggplants.
*
He has an epiphany as he is rummaging through the pile of used objects at the Dongmyo flea market. Although it’s a place filled with old grannies and shrewd sellers, once or twice he encounters a couple looking for matching sets for their homes. They are loud and young, and their overly sweet display of romance irks his nerves. He glares at one of them when they bump into him, and ignores their whispers as he continues to stack books at his side—a gift for Kim Dokja.
Usually, he would have already started to head back at the first sign of too many couples littering the streets of the market, but his attention gets caught in one in particular.
It’s a young woman and a tall man, perhaps an athlete or a military graduate. They had approached the stall he was rummaging at a while ago, but he had been so immersed in his search for Kim Dokja’s books that he really didn’t want to move for them. However, he now finds himself lifting his head, peeking at them as they laugh with one another.
He sees the man lifting his hand towards the woman, brushing away some of the snow fallen on top of her beret. Both of them are smiling, and they huddle closer to lean into each other. It’s a warm sight, and his fingers twitch lightly as they share a brief kiss.
Kim Dokja would never allow it. Not now, at least. But… Inadvertently, his eyes fall onto the couple’s fingers interlaced with one another and he hears something click in his mind.
He places the order the same afternoon.
*
Yoo Joonghyuk knows that he is sleeping. He knows because the studio he’s currently standing before has already burned down to ashes, with no trace left of the expensive cabinets and paintings that are currently decorating the room. His head instinctively turns to the window.
Kim Dokja is looking outside, the grey suit draped over his lanky body in an awkward manner, the tailoring one that is found in mass made pieces. He seems to be staring intently at the snowstorm raging outside, his eyes set on the frosted trees scattered around the landscape. A pair of relaxed brows is framing his face, and his body seems to merge with the wall he’s leaning onto.
He continues to observe the man as he drags his fingers to his eyebags, a tick he had noticed in the last few weeks before the event. He must have been self-conscious of them back then, he reasons. Not like they had posed a flaw to the man’s face; instead, they even might have enhanced it.
Yoo Joonghyuk remembers thinking, “he’s here.” But of course he knew—afterall, he had gone to the party solely for that reason alone. Slowly, he approaches the man, careful not to attract too much attention to his movements. The red carpet muffles his steps, and the loud chatter that comes from the other parts of the house help to lessen his presence. Soon, he’s within arm reach. He clears his throat.
The other jumps at the sound and flusteredly spits out a cuss. Thankfully he wasn’t holding on to any glass—it would’ve already spilled on the floor otherwise. He quickly turns around to face his awaiting stare.
“I’m—I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize you were here,” he apologizes as his eyes race to the sides, his face turned from pale in a fraction of a second. He’s clearly nervous, but Yoo Joonghyuk spies a little of interest in his movements.
He’s glad.
He hums briefly before tilting his head to the side. “What are you doing?”
Kim Dokja drags his fingers through his bangs before he shrugs and folds his arms around his chest.
“Oh, nothing. Just wanted some quiet from the party…” he trails off. His eyes are still moving around, bouncing off the paintings on the wall; but then he looks up at the man and smiles. “Also, congratulations.”
Yoo Joonghyuk nods as he accepts the man’s words. His right hand twitches as he looks at the other’s tousled bangs and the arched up lips, and fantasizes how soft it would feel to brush away the loose strands. He looks outside.
“First time coming here?”
The window pane reflects back the other’s head bobbing, the pale white of the man’s neck merging into the snowy fields outside. Kim Dokja’s muffled voice soon follows.
“I usually don’t go to the company’s parties… I didn’t know they reserved the House of Mirrors.”
“They usually don’t. But this time it was an exception,” Yoo Joonghyuk murmurs as he traces the man’s reflection with his eyes. Again, Kim Dokja has brought his fingers to his dark circles, the thin skin sinking at the push of his fingertips. “Probably a favor from the director’s friend.” He returns to look at Kim Dokja, who smiles awkwardly when caught staring at him.
“What?” he asks.
“I’m sorry, it’s just… It feels kind of surreal to speak with you,” he says. “I didn’t know that you’d be attending today, so I’m quite surprised. But well, today’s party was for you so—”
“No, you’re right. I never attend these types of things, but this time I also made an exception,” he rebukes, and a thin grin stretches over his lips.
The other flushes a little at his words and mumbles a small “I see” before turning to look outside. They remain quiet for a moment before he hears the other say, “It seems that we will be here for a while.”
Yoo Joonghyuk turns his head as well. The snow has powdered the trees completely, and the lawn’s gravel has already disappeared underneath the thick coating of frost. From the studio’s windows, he can see some guests outside struggling to keep their umbrella over their heads before giving up and turning back towards the villa.
“Maybe it’ll lessen in an hour or so,” he comments, even though he doesn’t care for it. He knows that it won’t.
“Maybe,” the other echoes.
An awkward silence stretches between them as they both stare outside. Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t mind it— it allows him more time to be in company of the man and to bask in the subtle fragrance that envelops his garments—but Kim Dokja continues to shift his weight over his legs and tap his right feet on the carpet, his discomfort clearly visible. Yoo Joonghyuk is about to call out to him when the man turns to him.
“Oh, right. Are the rumors true?”
He frowns. This wasn’t part of his memories. Carefully, he asks, “What rumors?”
“About the House of Mirrors—that the owner is a paranoid man who even built a bunker in his own home.” Kim Dokja’s eyes probe at him, a curious light flashing behind them.
Although he finds the question weird, he replies, “I haven’t met him, but from what the director says about him, it’s very likely that he does have one. Why?”
“Nothing. It’s just that one of my friends says that she has seen it, but I guess that I didn’t really believe her… She’s an author, you see.”
Yoo Joonghyuk clenches his fists before forcing himself to relax his hold.
He knows who the man is talking about. He has seen her come to the company to wait for him, the black hair styled neatly around her face, the skin white as snow. The ant. He’d observed her pulling the man’s arm, the petite hands wrapped around his back when leaving him. He had wanted to trash those limbs and hang her mauled body from the pole in front of Kim Dokja’s apartment, but had ultimately refrained himself from doing so. Maybe he should’ve.
“And where do you think it might be?” he asks, his voice lowered to a somber tone.
The other stares at him before a grin crosses over his lips.
“Oh, you know. We might as well be standing on top of it.”
*
Yoo Joonghyuk wakes up and his pillow is drenched into a soggy mess. It has been a while since he last dreamt of that party, and as soon as he can tear open his eyes he moves them on top of the man’s figure laying next to him.
Did he know? Or was it just part of the strange dream? Did his memories get twisted by some chance?
He brings his scarred hand next to the sleeping man’s face and slowly traces his fingertips over the dark eye bags, the softness almost consuming. He’s still here. Kim Dokja is still with him. His shoulders relax, and a small smile stretches over his lips.
Not like he could do anything about it, now.
Again, his eyes fall onto the white hands clenching at the sheets and he thinks how they will soon be perfect and his in each and every way.
With a start, he stands up and walks to the bathroom, eager to wash away the sweat from last night’s sleep. The water that hits his body is cold, almost to a freezing point, but he doesn’t mind it that much. The little hot water they have is reserved for Kim Dokja’s use only. He’s out in less than five minutes.
The sound of running water ends up waking the other, whose quiet feet patter reaches Yoo Joonghyuk’s ears.
“You moved a lot during your sleep,” he hears the man say, followed by the clatter of porcelain on a wooden surface. There’s a pause, and a sigh. “Anything you might want to share?”
Yoo Joonghyuk runs a towel over his face as he exits the bathroom, his hair still wet from the brief shower. He stops to look at the man sitting at the table.
Although Kim Dokja looks sleepy with his hair mussed up, his shoulders are stiff, and his grip on the teacup betrays that he’s keeping track of his position. Yoo Joonghyuk hesitates before walking around the man’s back and then sitting in front of him.
“I need to do another round today,” he says, pointedly ignoring the other’s question.
Kim Dokja nods and brings the teacup to his lips. “Of course you do.”
“I’ll try to be back as soon as I can,” he continues.
“Mmm.”
They’re both silent, and what would have been a quiet sipping in other circumstances has turned out to resemble loud gulping. Yoo Joonghyuk watches as the other’s throat constricts and then releases, moving up and down with each sip he takes. Part of him would like to place his lips on top of it just once, but knows better than to act on those impulses. Maybe once when he’s asleep.
The gaze he’s giving the other man would be considered outright rude, but Kim Dokja doesn’t seem to be bothered by it until he places the teacup down.
“It’s soon going to be one year, isn’t it?” he says, and a sardonic smile slowly begins to stretch over his lips. His grin grows further when Yoo Joonghyuk remains silent and adds, “What? Starting to regret it?”
“Never.”
“Thought so.” Kim Dokja moves his finger over the rim of the teacup, dragging his nail over the thin wall. He taps them for a few seconds and then stops, a sigh escaping from his lips. “That long, uh…”
Yoo Joonghyuk frowns. There’s a distant look painted over the smaller man’s eyes that Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t like, and he’s tempted to startle the man just so he’d pay attention to him again. He never liked when the other man seemed trapped in his own head; mostly because he never cared to share with him what he was thinking about.
After what feels like an eternity to Yoo Joonghyuk, Kim Dokja shakes off the previous look and returns to look at him.
“Anyways. Mind finding me a new pair of pajamas? Or something for winter. The cold is starting to seep in,” he says, pointing in the direction of the trapdoor.
Yoo Joonghyuk nods his head and licks his lips, pleased at the other’s attention back on him. “Sure.”
“And maybe some thick socks.”
He nods again.
Satisfied, Kim Dokja stretches his arms and sinks further into the chair, his hair falling on top of his eyes. Yoo Joonghyuk almost raises his hand to brush them away but hesitates. Instead, he stands up.
Yesterday he had received a notification that the package had finally arrived, and he’s excited to see how the order had turned out. Originally, he had intended to go back to the apartment to retrieve it and be back as soon as possible, but it was going to take longer than planned if he needed to get Kim Dokja’s things too. He’ll probably need to take the express train when he comes back, too.
He begins to dress himself, slipping onto the familiar holster around his waist and securing it to his thigh straps. Done, he puts on his booths and black coat, pulling the collar high enough to cover his neck.
“Also, I need some aspirin. The ones in the cabinet have expired long ago.”
“Yes.”
He reaches for the sword on top of the cupboard and slips it inside the holster. Kim Dokja is already looking elsewhere, his head tilted to the side.
“I’ll be going, then,” he murmurs before climbing on top of the stairs, the scabbard clattering against his thigh with each step he takes.
As soon as he’s outside, he breathes in the cold air and coughs. It smells like ice and dust. Quickly, he locks the trapdoor behind him and pushes the planks back on top of it, as well as adding a thick coating of snow. He steps aside.
With long steps, he walks away from the center of the burned down room, and climbs over the various brick and charred sticks cluttered around the way. Often, he has to lower his head when met with a caved in ceiling or grate, and has to push aside stray planks that threaten to slide down and impale him on the spot. While he has walked the same path for almost a year now, he has made sure that no curious bystander would be able to tell—it wouldn’t do if anyone got too close to their home.
Eventually he reaches the edge of the house, where a pile of bricks rest against a water tank. The buckles of his belt ring as he undoes them and in a few, quick movements he is free from the holster. Unceremoniously, he drops everything inside the water tank before he screws on the lid and begins to head towards the main road.
*
It takes a long while before he arrives at the nearest station, and even longer before he gets back to his older place. The familiar beep sound as he slides the magnetic card against the door and in seconds he’s inside.
A dark hall greets him, but there is no familiar voice to welcome him back. Instead, the black emptiness is almost nauseating, something so vile that he almost shivers in disgust when he first steps over the threshold. There is nothing that can define this place as ‘safe’ and ‘home,’ and Yoo Joonghyuk has to refrain himself from dropping everything and running back to Kim Dokja’s side.
He frowns when he doesn’t see the package anywhere near the entrance. He was sure he had told the landlady to leave everything at the front...
Quickly, he scans for a cardboard box, eager to get this over with as soon as he can. He finds it on top of the table, with a handwritten note placed on top of it.
‘Hey brother, this is your cutest little sister! I just wanted to check on you, it’s been a while since we’ve seen each other and you never answer the phone so... How are you? I found this at the entrance and placed it inside. I hope it’s okay. Anyways, I know you’re not going like it, but it’s almost been a year since the fire and, you’know. Maybe you should talk about it with someone? The pretty lady at the office told me that you’re not working for RMT anymore. So. You know that you can always count on me, right? Talk to you soon.’
Yoo Joonghyuk rubs his thumb over the childish writing and sighs. He still knows how to feel sorry, and knowing that Yoo Mia is worried about him places another burden on his mind.
He knows, yet. He bites his lips.
He can’t afford to slip up now. Not after everything they went through. Kim Dokja has become far too important for anything to get in their way, and he suspects that once Yoo Mia discovers what happened to the man she wasn’t going to stay silent about it either. He can’t let her see him, nor anyone for that matter. With another sigh, he crumples up the note and throws it inside the trash can.
Swiftly, he runs a knife along the taped edges of the package and turns it upside down to empty its contents.
Among the crumpled papers, a black box peeks out, and Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t hesitate to grab it. The black velvet feels soft under his hands, and Yoo Joonghyuk imagines how well the contents would fit Kim Dokja’s frame. Satisfied, he places the box inside his coat and turns around to close the door behind him.
*
That night he dreams of Kim Dokja and himself standing side to side with their fingers intertwined with one another.
He wakes up crying afterwards, but can’t remember the last part of the dream.
*
“No.”
“No?”
Kim Dokja is frowning at the velvet box, his disgust clearly painted on his face. He has thrown it away, far away from him, but the black box still holds his gaze even if it lays still on the smooth floor. Maybe he thinks that it’s better to stare at that instead of... him.
Yoo Joonghyuk’s vision trembles. Perhaps he’s in shock—he really hadn’t expected the other to react so violently. What did go wrong? Did he perhaps dislike the color? Or was it the design? Maybe he liked silver instead of gold—
Slowly, he crouches down to pick up the box and replaces it on the table next to the other’s glass.
“Why not.” His voice comes out dry and, once he swallows, he tastes something bitter coating his tongue. “Did you not like it?”
Kim Dokja refuses to look at him. He has folded his arms around his waist, and stored his hands away from his sight in a poor attempt of showing as little skin as possible. It’s annoying, so annoying, but Yoo Joonghyuk is trying to give him some time to come around the idea before he prods at him again.
“Why not? Did you prefer something else—”
“I’m not playing this game.”
Kim Dokja’s answer stuns him silent. Game? Did he perhaps think that this was a joke?
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.” Kim Dokja inhales before exhaling deeply. “Did you think I’d really be happy to say yes?”
No. But he had hoped. That maybe, after a year together, he could have allowed him to be closer, to be more than just silent companions who share the same living space. His stomach twists uncomfortably.
“Yes,” he lies through his teeth.
The other man stares at him before a sneer flashes over his face. Then, he starts laughing, the high pitched sound coming hashly out of his lips.
“Yes? Do you honestly believe that? That I’d be happy to be here—and with you, of all people!—playing pretend, as if I really trusted you enough to not kill me in my sleep once you finally snap back to reality? That I’d really be happy to be with you? Are you that delusional, or did you really think I’d give in so soon?”
Soon, however, his laugh gets caught in his throat and he halts to a full stop. “I wish I hadn’t trusted you back then.”
The sentence stabs at Yoo Joonghyuk, puncturing his lungs and depriving him of his breath. He knows that the other man isn’t joking, that he meant every word he said and more—and this only makes it scarier. Because if he hadn’t trusted him back then… Acid mounts in the back of his throat, and his vision blacks out for a second. When he comes to, his hands are around Kim Dokja’s collar.
There’s rage. Pure, unadulterated rage.
“Why won’t you just fucking understand! Why won’t you just fucking understand that I just want to protect you!”
The scream that tears from his throat is so loud that it seems to have come out from a dying animal instead of a man. He knows that he might look more beast than human at the moment, a deranged beast one at that, but he doesn’t care. The rage and desperation he’s feeling is enough to not make him see straight.
“You could have died out there! You could have died, and you would've left me with nothing! Nothing!”
He searches for the other eyes, and trembles when he sees the pure indifference reflected in them. Kim Dokja is looking up at him like a flea, something so small and so commonly found in nature that it’d be too much of a hassle to give it more than a fraction of interest. Belatedly, he also realizes that he has brought a hand over his, and his nails are digging into his skin.
“Let go.”
Almost mechanically, Yoo Joonghyuk’s hold on the other’s collar relaxes and his hands fall to his sides. The raging fire in him dies in a matter of seconds. Absentmindedly, he mutters a few words while he keeps staring at the other man’s hand, the fingers so white and thin they could break in two if he really tried. They look so empty, so, so empty…
“I’ll be going to bed, then,” Kim Dokja exhales as he massages his temples, “God knows I don’t fuking need this today.”
At his prolonged silence, the other man starts to stand up from his seat when Yoo Joonghyuk gravitates towards his shoulders and pushes him down once again.
“Wear it,” he demands. His hands clench tighter on his shoulders. He swallows before he repeats it. “Wear it.”
It’s a desperate request, and one that he knows might get denied even more harshly than before. Still, he needs to—
“I’d rather have my hands chopped and force-fed them to me at dinner,” Kim Dokja spits out, and shrugs off his hold.
There’s a crash, and they both look down at the floor. There’s broken glass everywhere, and the little pieces have been strewn around their feet like a field of crystal rocks.
“Fuck,” Kim Dokja says and strides out of the room.
Yoo Joonghyuk is left staring at the floor before he sighs and crouches down. He ignores the cuts opening on his hands as he picks up the leftover pieces, and dreams of another reality.
*
Once, he tried to kiss the man.
He had looked at his sleeping face, the slightly chapped lips that exhaled softly into the night. The quivering lashes, the moles on his neck.
“Kim Dokja…” he whispered.
Kim Dokja had seemed so out of reach, so away from him. He slept soundly, indifferent to his call, as if the man beside him had merged with the black night and the dust of this place. A sense of urgency washed over his back, and his heart sank to the pits of his stomach.
Not thinking, he had dived his head, pushing his lips against the other’s. They were warm, and smelled lightly of mint toothpaste. Hesitantly, he pushed the tip of his tongue outside, licking at warm flesh underneath.
Yoo Joonghyuk had really wanted to devour him then.
When he rose his head, two pools of black reflected back into his own. He smiled and ran his thumb over the paper-thin eye bags, the sensation in his stomach long gone.
“Mine.”
*
The morning after the proposal Kim Dokja is quiet.
There is a mild tension in the air, and Yoo Joonghyuk knows better to leave him alone before attempting again. Although the rejection of the previous night had shaken him badly, once he woke up he realized that it didn’t really matter. The man didn’t really have a choice, afterall, and soon he’d be able to see that.
He lazily observes Kim Dokja, who is laying in bed and reading one of the journals he had previously found thrifting around the Dongmyo area.
Despite living together for almost an entire year, the black eyebags are still there, and once in a while the man raises his hand to his face to poke at the puffy skin. Yoo Joonghyuk wonders if the habit will ever leave, but it’s not like he has any say in it. It’s endearing, in a way, and it’s so Kim Dokja that he might miss it if the man will ever cease to do it. As if sensing his stare, the man throws him a hard glance before returning to his book. He chuckles.
Kim Dokja is… difficult. Selfish, even, and also too stubborn to really understand that everything he’s doing is doing for him—for them. He doesn’t understand why he’s going to such great lengths to hide him from the world, and might even resent him for that. But it’s quiet moments like this that make Yoo Joonghyuk appreciate even more the man he has chosen to be his lifetime companion.
Kim Dokja is a man that demands so little of him, that isn’t bothered when he spends afternoon after afternoon just staring at the small lips or the curve of his neck, and doesn’t care if he isn’t good with words or if the best compliment he can give is that he “smells good.” Safe for a few exceptions, Kim Dokja never screams at him, and treats him like a decent human being; he’s perfect in his imperfections.
And of course, he can’t help but want more.
His entire being just screams at him whenever he’s near the man, to make him his until nothing is left of what was once known as Kim Dokja. He wants to consume him, to keep him safe and within his embrace until there is no distinction between Yoo Joonghyuk and Kim Dokja. The proposal was just another step towards that final act.
As the pages crinkle under the man’s finger, Yoo Joonghyuk closes his eyes to savor the gentle sound, and slowly the rejection of the previous night begins to dissipate from his thoughts.
A cough grabs his attention, and he looks surprised at the man on the bed.
“I’m almost done with this.”
Kim Dokja’s voice echoes in the stillness of the room. He’s frowning, and his lips are slanted downwards in a manner that emphasizes the fullness of his cheeks. Yoo Joonghyuk would love to bite them until they draw blood, but instead he just titles his head.
“Do you want me to look for more of them?” he asks cautiously. He hadn’t expected the man’s attempt to strike a conversation—usually he would’ve given him the silent treatment all day—but it's a welcome surprise nonetheless. He shifts his weight on the chair so that he’s facing directly towards the bed.
Kim Dokja seems to be still engrossed in the reading, and gives a small hum of approval in reply.
“It wouldn’t be a problem for you, right? Surely ransacking another house should pose no problem to the great scavenger,” he says. Then, he shrugs and adds, “Or you could just order them off eBay.”
Yoo Joonghyuk sits still for a moment and chuckles.
“Delivery services don’t exist anymore.”
“Sure, let’s go with that.”
They’re both silent for a while when Kim Dokja speaks up again. “I’ve never asked you, but do they still hurt?”
He frowns.
“Your hands,” the man specifies.
“Ah,” he lets out. His hands, uh? He looks down at his hands scarred over by the fire, the skin so contracted and dark that highlights every nerve and vein. He shakes his head. “No, not anymore. They do ache sometimes, like when it’s too cold.”
Or when I crave to touch you.
Kim Dokja nods as he flips another page. “I see… there’s some aspirin if you want to take one.”
Instinctively, he clenches his fingers before releasing the tension trapped between them. No, today it wasn’t bad at all. He hesitates before he shakes his head.
“It’s not bad enough today,” he answers the man, but promises to himself to take one before going to sleep. Who knew when Kim Dokja’s indifference would return.
As he stands up, the velvet box catches his eyes. After yesterday’s rejection it had been placed at the center of the table, untouched by both of them. Its presence looms over both of their heads like an unwanted ghost, and he is sure that Kim Dokja is doing his best to ignore it or even trying to will it into disappearing. Without thinking, the words fly out from his mouth.
“I’d just like you to consider it.”
He can see the other flinch from the corner of his eye.
“I refuse,” Kim Dokja says, and Yoo Joonghyuk sees him clenching his fingers around his book. He’s nervous, but he still won’t give in. Maybe he needed to take another approach.
“But it’d make me happy,” he says. “It’d also be easier for the both of us.”
Kim Dokja gives out a dry chuckle before he replies, “What about my own happiness? Did you consider that?”
He has to bite back his tongue from growling at the man. Why was it always so difficult to make the man see reason? His voice takes a sharper edge.
“I could always force you to accept it.”
At that, Kim Dokja lowers the book to glare at him. His eyes are hard, and his frown harsh on his lips.
“But you still didn’t.”
“But I could. And you know it.”
Again, they are at stalemate. And again, Kim Dokja will have to be the one to give in. There was no other option for him. He bites his lips as he waits for the other’s response.
“...I’ll think about it,” the man finally concedes, and turns back to look at the yellowed pages.
Yoo Joonghyuk cannot suppress the smile forming at his lips.
Afterwards, they spend the rest of the day quietly, with Kim Dokja continuing to read the journals while Yoo Joonghyuk prepares dinner. He makes a kimchi soup, along with some dumplings that he carefully places on top of Kim Dokja’s pile whenever he finishes one. It wasn’t a yes, not yet, but Yoo Joonghyuk is patient and knows that it won’t be long before the man will accept him as his.
*
The smell of smoke is what wakes him up, and he knows that he’s back at the night the fire broke out. With a start, he jumps out of the bed and carefully opens the door to look outside the room.
It’s red and black, and it’s so hot that for a moment Yoo Joonghyuk thinks his face has been dosed with rubbing alcohol. Some doors have already been charred black, and smoke is building up so quickly in the halls that everything appears to be engulfed in a cloud of black dust. Judging from the force of the flames, it’s already too late. He curses.
Kim Dokja. Kim Dokja was in the building.
Although he doesn’t understand why he’s back, the mere thought of Kim Dokja burning alive sends a chill down his spine and drives his limbs to shake in fear. He bites his lips.
Kim Dokja. He needs to get to Kim Dokja.
Hurriedly, he runs out of the room and dashes into the hall, running towards the lower floor where he had left the other a few hours earlier. He can’t see well, the smoke is getting too thick, but he knows his way around the house and manages not to stumble over the railings of the stairs. His skin has also started to itch, and he can feel the searing hot flames licking at his heels as if mocking him of his desperation. For a moment, he imagines them catching up to him and devouring him before he can get to Kim Dokja’s door.
“Kim Dokja… Kim Dokja…”
In his heat, the rooms begin to blur together, and he finds himself moving past paintings and trophies and bouquets and other doors that merge together into one long hallway filled with smoke and golden plaques.
He then finds himself standing before the man’s room.
The pristine white has been covered by dark ash, and raw wood has begun to peek through the layer of paint. Remarkably, the door seems to be the most intact out of the bunch he had zoomed past to reach Kim Dokja’s room. He slams his body against it.
Kim Dokja is still sleeping. Ignorant of the world coming down around him, the man’s gentle breathing is like an oasis in an hellish desert, and Yoo Joonghyuk would love nothing more but to continue watching him as he sleeps the fire away. He almost regrets what he’s going to do to the man the next instant.
“What the—”
“Kim Dokja.”
He grabs the other’s arm and pulls him against his chest, the warm body reassuring him that the other is still alive, that the fire hadn’t gotten to him yet. He trembles a little before he turns away.
“There’s a fire, we need to get out,” he explains, and doesn’t pay attention to the still dazed look the man has painted over his face. “Hurry.”
“How did you get—”
“Hurry!” With a firm shake of his shoulders, he makes the man stand up and tells him to cover his nose and mouth with a cloth. “This way!” he shouts as he drags the man behind him, trying to shield him from the licking flames with his own body.
The hall seems to stretch through time and space, and Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t know if they will ever reach the end of it before the fire catches up with them. Kim Dokja has also started to cough, and his body slumps against his when a strong coughing fit rakes through his body. Yoo Joonghyuk worries if he inhaled too much smoke already.
They flinch when they hear a loud boom shaking the house to its core. There’s no time to waste; sooner of later the fire will reach its climax. After what feels like an eternity, they reach the end of the hall and step into the entrance of the house. They hesitate.
It’s hell. Even to Yoo Joonghyuk, it’s a difficult sight to stomach. People are crying and screaming, and the House of Mirrors has begun to crash down on its guests, who scream in agony at the flash of burning pain. The prior party decorations are up in flames, and the big bouquets adorning the floors have begun to crumble and wither with each passing second. Even the paintings on the walls are not left unscathed, the canvas giving way to the flames and turning to flying embers.
He’s about to run towards the entrance door when he hears a shout behind him. He freezes.
Kim Dokja is bleeding. There is a burning stake buried on his side, and his white shirt is quickly turning red by how much blood is pouring out.
The scream tears naturally from his mouth.
“No!” he shouts, and catches the man who is slowly collapsing under his own weight. Instinctively, his hands wrap around the burning steak and he tries to pull. The smell of burning meat becomes stronger.
This didn’t happen, this didn’t happen, so why is he—
“N-No, Kim Dokja… Kim Dokja…” he stutters, and his hands switch to pressing down on the wound. “Don’t you dare… Don’t you fucking dare!”
Kim Dokja lays still, his chest heaving pathetically. He’s under shock, and his hands have started to turn stiff. The stake is still there, and everytime he takes a breath it digs deeper into his stomach.
“L-let me go…”
He’s moaning, and his eyes have started to water.
“N-no, you can’t… You can’t! You’re mine. You’re mine! I won’t let you abandon me again! You’re—”
“Yoo Joonghyuk…”
“No!”
He lifts his head up to look at the other’s eyes, and his breath catches in his throat. In a trance, he drags his thumb over the puffy skin under the man’s eyes and stares right at the pitch black darkness.
The world comes to a close.
*
Once again, Yoo Joonghyuk wakes up to find himself buried in sweat and cold shivers. He gasps, and clenches his hands against chest.
“Are you okay?”
With the tail of his eye, he spies Kim Dokja’s pale hand hovering next to his face. Feverishly, he grabs it and holds it close to his cheek, the pale skin soothing the fire inside.
“Alive, alive, alive…” he mutters under his breath, kissing and biting at the white flesh. He doesn’t care how his facade is crumbling, how he’s showing a pathetic sight to the other man. He needs Kim Dokja to stay put and let him do whatever he needs to feel like the other is there with him, and not a ghost in a man’s dream.
The other man doesn’t say anything, probably aware of the other’s state and needs. Instead, he sighs and relaxes back onto the cushions, wincing as the other’s teeth continue to sink into his skin.
Finally, after what seems to feel like an eternity, Yoo Joonghyuk calms down and lets go of the other man’s hand.
“Sorry,” he apologizes, refusing to look at the other’s face.
“No harm done” is the man’s reply.
He knows that he looks like a mess; Kim Dokja must be thinking that he has finally gone crazy or worse. He wants to bring his hands to his face to hide the absolutely disgusting expression he’s showing at the moment, but refuses to give in to his shame more than he has done so already. Instead, he lets out a choked moan and bites his fingers.
He feels movement beside him and grabs the other man’s arm.
“Where are you going?” he asks, trying not to sound like a petulant child.
“I’m just going to grab you some aspirin,” Kim Dokja replies tiredly. His eyebags are even worse than usual, and he’s staring down at him impatiently. He adds, “You really need one.”
He scrutinizes the man’s eyes before he slowly lets go of his arm.
“Hurry.”
There’s the sound of a cabinet opening and paper being ripped open. The next thing he knows Kim Dokja is back with a glass of water, the contents already dissolved and fizzing away.
“Here,” the man gestures, and brings the glass closer to his face.
Yoo Joonghyuk attaches himself to it, and quickly gulps down the liquid until there’s no drop left behind. He reasons that he must have been more dehydrated than he had thought. He gives the glass back to Kim Dokja and lowers himself back against the pillows.
Once the man returns and settles back inside, he lets a few seconds pass before he speaks again.
“You won’t wear it, right?” he says, conviction dripping from his words. He knows that he won’t. Not now, at least.
However, the man surprises him when he opens his mouth.
“You know, I’ve always found it strange how easily you found me that night. Like you were waiting for me to open the door.” Kim Dokja glances back at him before returning to stare at the ceiling. “I wonder if it really was a coincidence.”
*
He dreams of the fire, again. However, this time he’s standing before Kim Dokja’s door until he hears the door click open.
“What the—”
“Kim Dokja.”
The man is dressed in a simple shirt, and there are slippers at his feet. His hair is ruffled, most likely as he has just awakened him in the middle of the night. He’s squinting his eyes when he blinks in realization at the guest he has in front of him.
Yoo Joonghyuk looks down at the other man and smiles. “There’s a fire, we need to get out. Hurry.”
At his words, the man frowns and opens his mouth.
“How did you get—”
“Hurry!”
He doesn’t let him finish. He grabs the other man’s arm and pulls him toward his chest, unconcerned with the worried look the other gives him as he takes him out of the room. As they rush through the hall, the smell of smoke begins to pervade their nostrils and forces Kim Dokja to come to full attention now that he has realized the gravity of the situation.
“W-wait, how did you know where I was?” he tries to ask again as he struggles to breath through the cloth Yoo Joonghyuk had given him when they left.
“To the entrance.” He ignores the other’s question and continues to drag him on.
He guides him expertly, knowing where to turn and where to take a break to catch a breather. Pieces of burning furniture lay and messily around the floor, and at times he has to spur the man to grab onto him when they impede the passage. When they find a large cabinet, Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t hesitate to kick it away to let them through, and ignores the various trophies clattering down and breaking apart as if mere trinkets. There's not much time left, and he won’t let things end like the other time.
They reach the entrance, and everything is like the last dream. There are groups of people scattered around the room, and screaming fills the air along with the fiery smoke. Some people are laying down and clutching at their throats, while others have already been buried under falling debris and are now calling for help. It’s hell on earth, and the stench of burning flesh and air fills the atmosphere.
He can feel the other man shake, and without thinking he slams his hand against the back of his neck. The other faints immediately.
He showed him too much. Kim Dokja saw too much, and he will never be the same after the fire. He panics.
With a quick move, he holsters the man on top of his shoulder and walks toward the opposite direction of the entrance and into the studio. He closes the door behind him and sighs.
The studio is like how it was left hours ago, save for the smoke that is quickly filtering through the gaps of the door.
He gently lays down Kim Dokja on a nearby couch and walks toward the edge of the carpet covering the center of the floor. With a harsh tug, he unveils the metal trapdoor hiding underneath and gets to work.
The safest place right now is the bunker. There is no other choice, there is no time, and Kim Dokja could die there and now if he didn’t do something. He scavenges the room for the key, and turns inside out the drawers of the desk.
“Where’s the key… fuck,” he curses and continues to turn the studio upsidedown. He can smell the fire burning faster, and smoke is filtering through the door at a quicker pace than before. Part of him begins to worry.
He doesn’t understand why the key is nowhere to be found. According to his memories, the key should have been inside the left drawer of the desk under a stack of letters and pens. One might have missed it at first, but the shape was so unusual that it was impossible not to notice it after a second glance. So why wasn’t it there? Did he mistake the place?
“Fuck, fuck!”
There really is no time to waste. They could be burning alive in a matter of minutes if he doesn’t do something, now. Yoo Joonghyuk throws another glance at Kim Dokja and curses again. The key, the key…
He’s pacing back and forth when a thought hits him. He stops. Hesitantly, he touches his pants’ back pocket and chuckles. Of course. Of course.
This was a dream, afterall.
Swiftly, he extracts the key from his pockets and walks back to the trapdoor, twisting and turning the small metal piece. With a soft click, the locks give way and he cranks open the door.
A rush of cold air brushes against his face, and he exhales in relief. A safe haven.
He picks up Kim Dokja and then sighs. Soon, everything was going to be how it was supposed to be from the start. With that last thought in mind, he tightens his hold around the man and lets himself drop, closing the trapdoor above him.
It’s dark, and cold.
But it’s so, so quiet and, for a moment, he thinks that there is only him and Kim Dokja left. Yoo Joonghyuk takes another breath and shoves his face against the other’s chest. It’s still beating. Kim Dokja is still alive. And now, once and for all, he’s safe from the world.
*
Kim Dokja didn’t believe it, at first. He had stared at him, the black ash still dusted on top of his face, and murmured, “I need to check it.” Yoo Joonghyuk looked at him with a somber look before shaking his head. “Impossible.” He then added that if he didn’t want himself to get killed, he would have needed to stay put and let him do the rounds.
The next time, Kim Dokja had waited for him to be asleep before thrusting a knife to his throat and rasping out “open the fucking door.” Unfortunately for him, Yoo Joonghyuk had been still awake, and grabbed the knife right out of the other’s hands before knocking him unconscious. He then tied him to the bed, the laces of his booths digging into the other’s skin, and kept watch until the other returned to his senses.
The third and final time Kim Dokja tried to leave, Yoo Joonghyuk had been more prepared. He had let the man play him, curious to see how far he would've made it. He knew better than anyone else that it hurt more to see hope being snatched away right at one’s fingertips. Once the smaller man had almost made it to the top of the stairs, Yoo Joonghyuk had grabbed him by the back of his shirt and pulled him down, letting the man fall with a loud thud. He then began his assault, battering the man down until Kim Dokja pissed himself and began to cry out for mercy. Yoo Joonghyuk rested above the shivering man’s frame before he exhaled and crouched down.
“They have all died.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“It’s hell outside.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“The world has—”
“—how could anyone believe that bullshit!”
Kim Dokja screamed. A thin layer of redness spread from his cheeks to his neck, like a shawl wrapped around his skin. Yoo Joonghyuk ached to run his fingers through it.
“I just want to protect you,” he croaked. He then added, “I need to protect you.”
The other man looked at him strangely.
“You’re crazy.”
From then on, Kim Dokja’s attempts to escape stopped altogether. Although he still didn’t believe that the world had ended and that the fire had been the first sign of the apocalypse—it was impossible for him to do so—he accepted nonetheless that he couldn’t go against Yoo Joonghyuk wishes to protect him.
And so their days together began in earnest.
*
After his return from his trip to the Dongmyo flea market, Yoo Joonghyuk begins to notice a change in Kim Dokja.
He’s more relaxed around him, like something has been taken off his chest or that he has come to a resolution. He doubts that it’s the proposal—afterall, that had shaken the man pretty badly—but he also doesn’t know what else could have spurred on this change. Distantly, he thinks about his breakdown of the past night, but he doesn’t believe that could’ve been enough to elicit this reaction in the man. It’s strange, but part of him wants to believe that Kim Dokja has finally noticed his efforts.
He also begins to notice a change in himself.
He’s more lethargic, and at times he thinks he can hear his ears ring whenever he steps outside the bunker. Kim Dokja tells him that it could be the onset of a fever, since he was always drenched in snow whenever he came back from his rounds, and recommends him to take something before going to sleep. Although he doesn’t feel like he’s getting sick, he basks in the man’s attention and heedes each and every of his words, conscious that Kim Dokja could retract this small act of interest whenever he so pleases.
“Are you sure that it’s not a fever?”
“No, I’d know if it were,” he replies once again, even though his limbs are feeling like they are falling off his torso. The kitchen knife in his hands thuds heavily against the cutting board, and he knows that the other man can hear it from their bed.
“....Okay, if you say so. Just take an aspirin, I don’t want to catch anything you’re carrying,” Kim Dokja mumbles before the sound of flipping pages resumes.
He nods and returns his attention back to the radish laying still on the board. Today he wanted to make japchae and fried chicken, but they had run out of ingredients for it and so he resolved to just make ginseng chicken soup with a side of radish salad. The other man had tried to help, but he had preferred him to relax instead.
He is deboning the boiled chicken when he hears Kim Dokja sighing loudly.
“I wish I could’ve read the last of Han Sooyoung’s works,” Kim Dokja mumbles. “She told me she was sure that was going to be a bestseller. Well, not like any of her works wasn’t, but… I was excited for that one.”
At the mention of the rat’s name Yoo Joonghyuk’s jaws tighten and the chicken bone breaks between his fingers. It had been a while since he last heard of that name, and hearing it again dropping from Kim Dokja’s mouth in particular is as unpleasant as he would have imagined. Distantly, the memory of a past dream resurfaces, and wonders if he’ll never be free from that woman. He really should’ve killed her when he had the chance. He swallows loudly before he turns to face the man.
“She’s dead.”
A lie, but how much he wanted that to be true.
“...I know.”
The tapping sound of Kim Dokja’s fingers fills the room, the rhythm slightly grating on his ears. He has abandoned the book he was reading, and now it rests awkwardly over his stomach like a second blanket made of paper. “At least she didn’t have to live through this,” he finishes.
Yoo Joonghyuk doesn’t know what to say to that. Instead, he stares at the man before he chooses to clean his hands and walk over to their bed. The frame creaks when he sits down.
“Kim Dokja.” His voice deepens. “You were very lucky to have survived. Lucky that I was there to help you—that I am here to help you. We were both very lucky.” He hesitates before he brushes his thumb against the other’s black circles. “Your friend, Han Sooyoung,” he forces himself to say that name, “Don’t you think that she’d be happy that you survived? That you had someone that cares about you, that helped you when no one else could?”
Kim Dokja swallows and closes his eyes.
“Yes, she would’ve.” His voice is trembling.
“Just imagine the pain she must have gone through when she died. There are monsters out there, Kim Dokja. Maybe she was eaten alive, or maybe worse. You don’t want to die like that, do you, Kim Dokja? To be eaten alive by some monster?”
“...No, I don’t.” Kim Dokja’s voice has been reduced to a whisper.
“Your friend wouldn’t have been able to protect you. Nobody would have been able to protect you. ” Only me. Only I am strong enough to protect us both. To protect the existence that is Kim Dokja. He gazes into the other’s eyes as he continues, “I want you to be safe. Don’t you want that too?”
There’s a small pause before the smaller man gives an almost imperceptible nod. He brushes a loose strand from the other’s eyes.
“Thank you, Kim Dokja.”
“Thank you,” he echoes back, and leans his cheek into Yoo Joonghyuk’s palm.
His heart skips a beat.
*
When the lights turn off, Yoo Joonghyuk attempts to do something he has never done before in this past year. It’s a bit of a gamble, he knows, but he still wants to try it. He needs to try it. He steals a glance at Kim Dokja.
He’s not asleep yet. He gulps.
Hesitantly, he stretches his arm until he feels the back of his hand touching the other’s. When the other doesn’t react, he then lets his fingers slip between the gaps of the other and sighs.
It’s warm, and in a corner of his mind he thinks he can feel the other man’s heartbeat under his fingertips. Alive, and tantalizing.
He falls asleep with Kim Dokja’s hand secured in his own.
*
Bit by bit, Kim Dokja lets him touch him more.
But it’s never enough.
*
He decides to take Kim Dokja out of the bunker.
The decision is spontaneous, as if his heart had decided that it was time to finally end the stalemate they had been stuck in-between since the night of the proposal. Kim Dokja’s recent actions made him believe so—the man was ready too.
Of course, Kim Dokja had doubted him at first. After a year spent inside, it was difficult for him to believe that he would’ve let the man step outside the bunker.
“I’m not letting you go,” he adds for good measure, “but I think you deserve to know. To see it, with your own eyes.”
He dresses Kim Dokja in a thick coat, a pure white as opposed to his black one. He wants them to match, like the couple’s outfits he had often seen the people wear in the city, and once he sees the outfit swallowing the man’s smaller frame a smile forms on his lips. Carefully, he buttons up the coat, letting his hands rest a moment too long on the buttons near the man’s clavicole.
“You won’t be cold, right?” he asks, questioning if he should’ve bought a thicker coat. The man hadn’t stepped outside in so long; the sudden temperature drop might affect him drastically.
“I’ll be fine,” the other answers, his hands fidgeting with the tied buttons.
Yoo Joonghyuk nods and turns towards the ladder.
“Then, I’ll be opening it.”
He makes his way at the top of the entrance, his booths shuffling against the metal steps and ringing in the quietness. As he approaches the top, he can hear the wind above howl, and he prepares himself to be hit by the awaiting blizzard that is surely raging above.
At his firm push, the trapdoor groans above him and bolts open. The rays of light blind him for a second, and he has to blink away the dizziness that is suddenly enveloping his body. With a final shake, he steps out and shivers, the bitter cold infiltrating even in-between the layers of clothing. He turns toward the bottom of the hole.
“Come here,” he calls, and he stretches his arm towards the wide-eyed man.
Kim Dokja just stares at him.
“Kim Dokja, come here,” he demands.
There’s some hesitation, again, but then Kim Dokja takes his hand and steps out from the hole and into the light.
He can hear the other man gasps.
There’s white, and there’s black, and then there’s them.
As the February snow continues to fall at their feet, it mixes with the black dust lying underneath, mudding the rim of their coats and creating a grey slush around their booths. It penetrates skin deep, even reaching their bones, and casts a white and black spell all around them. It’s beautiful.
A wail rings around the burned down room.
Kim Dokja has fallen to the ground, and he’s clutching his chest in a desperate attempt to breathe through the sobs. It’s a pitiful sight, and his heart clenches too as the man’s body continues to shake underneath the blizzard.
“Kim Dokja,” he calls. “Kim Dokja.”
He brushes away some of the fallen snow on top of the man’s head.
“It’s okay, Kim Dokja. It’s okay. It wasn’t your fault.”
He crunches down, and lets his black coat merge with the ash and the snow at his feet.
“You are not alone.”
Slowly, he takes out the velvet box from his coat and opens it to reveal a golden band.
“You’ll never be.”
Carefully, he slides the ring around the man’s finger, and observes how well it encircles the white bone. He doesn’t hesitate to bring it closer to his lips to cast a kiss onto the trembling flesh.
“I’ll protect you from everything.”
He wraps his arms around the man and dips his lips until they touch the white throat, the skin so supple and vibrant with life that he almost cries in relief.
“You’re mine, Kim Dokja.”
He ignores the shaking between his arms and sighs in bliss.
*
They make love that night, although Kim Dokja cries for the most part of the act.
*
His fever worsens.
It's a surprising turn for Yoo Joonghyuk, and it catches him off guard. He had been sure his body would’ve held well enough against a mere cold, but these days he finds himself more and more bedridden that he has come to fear that he’d need to go to the hospital. His skin is constantly pierced by cold shivers that feel more like needles than his body’s way of combating the sickness, and more often than not he experiences a dizziness so strong that he has to vomit whenever he eats.
Kim Dokja is always next to him, giving him medicine and talking to him whenever he has trouble sleeping at night. Like a dutiful but inexperienced lover, he tries to make him rice porridge but ends up burning the rice. He still eats it, anyways, and forces himself to swallow down the urge to throw up whenever his tongue catches bits and pieces of the burnt rice.
The dreams of the fire continue, and each of them show him parts that he thinks he has forgotten or doesn’t remember that well. The dreams disorient him, and oftentimes he spends nights without sleep in fear of relieving that night all over again. He doesn’t tell Kim Dokja, but he suspects that the man had caught wind of it. He had always been too smart for his own good.
It’s another morning passed without an ounce of sleep that Kim Dokja tells him that this isn’t working.
“You need to get yourself checked,” he scolds him after he heaves out another moan. His fingers are strangling the white edge of the sink, and he’s trying his best not to vomit his guts out, not again in front of Kim Dokja.
“N-no, there’s no doc—”
“Enough with the bullshit, Yoo Joonghyuk! At this point, I don’t even care,” the other man grinds out, “You need a specialist, there’s no way this is just a small cold.”
Yoo Joonghyuk pants lightly as he continues to shake his head, and manages to utter out, “I—I’m fine. I just need more time, more rest,” before he lowers his head and lets his stomach turn inside out.
There’s a sigh next to his head and he feels Kim Dokja’s hands rubbing circles on his back.
“Well, at least you’re not hungover. Wouldn’t that be fun,” he jokes, “I’d be just like the new recruit that had been left by his coworkers to take care of the old boss.”
He chuckles a little at that, and wipes his face with the nearby wet towel that Kim Dokja had placed next to him “in case you need it.”
After he feels clean enough, he wobbles back to the dining table, refusing Kim Dokja’s help when he almost trips onto his feet.
“Look, you really need to consider it. I’m not a professional, and neither are you. A doctor would be—”
He glares at the man. No, a doctor would mean too many questions, and too many details that he wasn’t comfortable sharing. He'll be fine on his own.
Kim Dokja sighs an “all right, all right” before he turns to walk back towards the bathroom. “At least let me grab you some painkillers,” he says, and it’s soon followed by the creak of the cabinet door opening. There’s some other rustling, and the man appears back with a glass of water and a pill in his hand. He sits down and hands him the glass along with the pill before smiling at him.
The water looks a little milky, and he wonders if it’s his vision or if the pipes need to be cleaned. Probably the latter. Without a second thought, his hands grab the glass and he gulps down the medicine.
“It should start to work soon,” the man says as he leans back into the seat, and YJH just groans as he feels the familiar doozie feeling enveloping his head.
“Thank—”
He lets go of the glass and bends over.
Something is wrong. His stomach is on fire. The urge to vomit is back there, pressing against his throat, and his nose has started to water in an effort to not give in to the pain.
“K-Kim Dokja,” he grunts, the words slurring out from his mouth like watery pearls. He can’t breath. “Kim Dokja!” he tries again.
But the man is in shock.
No, it’s not shock—Kim Dokja is looking down at him with cold indifference, his arms folded together like he’s waiting for the show to be over. He doesn’t appear to be showing an ounce of the careful and loving man he had been talking to two seconds ago.
“Kim Do—”
“You haven't had a seizure yet. How strange.”
Realization dawns on him like a cold shower. Moaning in between breaths, he manages to spit out, “What did you do?”
But Kim dokja refuses to answer him. Instead, he continues to observe him from his position, the fingers at his arms drumming lightly against the white fabric.
“Truly, this took so much longer than planned. Must be your ridiculous body’s tenacity,” he comments, “I guess it was trying to build a resistance but failed.”
Through the pain, his eyes get caught in another missing detail.
“Where’s the ring?” he asks. Then, louder. “Where’s the ring?!”
Once wrapped in a golden band, the man’s white finger now sits free among the others as if mocking him with its nudity. He clenches his teeth.
“Where’s the ring, Kim Dokja?”
He advances towards the man, his hand still clutching at his stomach. The pain is rippling through his entire body now, and saliva has started to pool under his tongue. Meanwhile, Kim Dokja has started to walk towards the kitchen counter, his steps firm over the concrete floor. There’s no hesitation in his movements, and Yoo Joonghyuk has started to realize that he was serious. He wasn’t playing any games.
“I am tired,” the man begins, and stops in front of the knife stand. “Of you, of me, of everything. I just want to leave. Leave, and never go back to this place—this prison.” There’s some rustling, and the sound of metal over metal. “So I just decided to take a chance. I didn’t want to be eaten by a monster, afterall.”
Slowly, the man reveals the knife in his hand.
“Kim Dokja, you sick bast—”
“No, I’m not the sick one here,” Kim Dokja interrupts him. There’s a smile on his face that doesn’t reach his eyes. “You are.”
He lounges forward.
In his brashness, he manages to grab a strip of Kim Dokja’s shirt and doesn’t hesitate to pull the man towards himself, his leg rising in anticipation for the man’s attack. Kim Dokja, however, seems to have expected this action and passes the knife to the other hand to grab his raised leg before kneeing him on his chest.
Saliva splurts from his mouth.
With the corner of his eye he sees Kim Dokja lunging at him again, the knife raised above his head. He feins a kick and lets himself drop a little before punching the man in his stomach. Hastily, he manages to sneak in a blow to the other’s face too, and he can hear a cracking sound under his knuckles. There’s a loud scream, and something warm drips onto his fingers.
Kim Dokja is holding his nose, the blood pouring vividly onto his snow-white face. It’s an impressive sight, and part of Yoo Joonghyuk trembles with excitement.
Again. He wants to see it again.
He launches himself at the man, his eyes locked onto the red painting the white flesh. This time, Kim Dokja steps aside and successfully manages to plunge the knife into his thigh. He suppresses the scream that threatens to leave his mouth and grits his teeth.
“You motherfucker—” Hastily, he throws another punch towards the man’s face, but that too gets blocked by the man’s arms. More, more. He wants to see more—
He’s about to throw another one when his legs give out underneath him.
Belatedly, he realizes that Kim Dokja had kicked him when he was blocking his fist. As he crashes to the ground, his lungs cry out and he feels his body jostling with pain.
“I need—”
He throws up a little in his mouth. The dizziness has returned stronger than ever, and his head is spinning when he feels Kim Dokja climb on top of him, his knees pressing at his flailing arms. He’s trapped.
The man swings the knife again and this time he punctures closer to his pelvis, almost on top of the bone. He screams.
The pain is nothing like the fire of one year ago. It’s blinding, and with each stab that embeds into his flesh there’s a new brust of ice cold awareness that Kim Dokja is doing this to him. He’s trying to kill him.
Another one. And another one.
“I want—”
Quickly, the cuts build upwards towards his stomach, often overlapping with one another. He thinks that something is being pulled out with each stab, and wonders if his intestine has started to pool outside of his body.
“S-stop,” he cries out. “Stop!”
“Did you? Did you stop when I asked you to? Did you?!” Kim Dokja screams as he keeps filetting his body. Blood is covering both of them, and Kim Dokja’s hands have turned as crimson as two roses with how long they have been soaked into the liquid. For a moment, he thinks he can smell their sweet scent too.
For a long while, his body is being rearranged into a different human made of flesh and broken synapses. There’s no end to the pain, and soon Yoo Joonghyuk even loses the strength to call out for mercy. He lets himself be a vessel for the other’s hurt and anger, and just waits for his body to black out.
After a period that seemed to stretch over eternity, he hears a sigh, and the pressure of the other’s body leaves him.
“Kim Dokja…” he coughs. “Kim Dokja, wait…”
Disoriented, he lies still in his own blood before he hears the trapdoor crying out.
He’s leaving. Kim Dokja is leaving.
“Kim Dokja...Kim Dokja!” he calls out. Weakly, he tries to stand up and falls back onto his back. “Kim Dokja!” he calls again.
There are some steps approaching him, and part of his mind hopes that he’s coming back to save him.
“Kim Dokja, please… Come back, come back Kim Dokja…”
However, once the steps come close enough to his head, they stop altogether and there’s no more movement from the other man’s side. He looks up.
It’s hate, and disgust. Kim Dokja’s eyes are a dark empty room that he is facing him head on, with no love stored in any of its corners.
He realizes that Kim Dokja didn’t come back to save him, but to put an end to it all. His heart plummets and he breaks out in a scream.
“N-no! Kim Dokja, you can’t! You can’t! You can’t! Kim Dokja, please!” he thrashes on the floor, his shoulders screaming in pain alongside his throat. “You can’t! I won’t let you! You can’t do this to me! You can’t do this to me!”
He grabs hold of the other man’s pants and pushes himself closer to the man. He gets kicked away, and he feels like he’s no better than a flea-ridden dog in its dying moments.
“Kim Dokja… Kim Dokja!”
In his cry, his eyes get trapped in the other’s empty ones.
“Die for me, Yoo Joonghyuk.”
Everything blacks out.
*
“Yoo Joonghyuk.”
A grunt.
“Yoo Joonghyuk.”
It’s a warm voice. Surely it couldn’t be...
“...Kim Dokja?” he groans, his eyes fluttering open. Was it him?
“Who else.”
He turns to look at the man, his eyes still adjusting to the dim light coming from the ceiling. Kim Dokja is looking down at him, and his eyes are so close to his face that he can count each and every brush of grey speckling his iris. He feels lost in them.
“Still sleepy?”
He nods. Something warm is moving between his hair, and he can’t help but let out a sigh when the man’s fingers skirt across his temples.
“Good. Rest some more.”
His eyelids are fighting to stay open, and he can feel his body falling back to sleep. Little by little, Kim Dokja’s eyes blur to nothingness.
“Goodnight, Yoo Joonghyuk.”
*
He wakes up and Kim Dokja is gone.
The certainty hits him like a bullet, and cuts his heart razor sharp. Kim Dokja escaped, and now he’s somewhere where he can’t protect him, somewhere where he can’t reach him. Kim Dokja escaped, and now he’s back to being alone. He shivers. He feels as if he’s suffocating on his own breath, as if the skin that is containing his soul is on the verge of bursting out.
His mind continues to repeat his name, like he’s a clergy man calling for salvation—and maybe he is. Kim Dokja was his salvation, and now he’s gone.
Again. He needs to find him again.
A round of shivers runs along his spine, and he looks to the side.
There's a cold breeze hitting his face, and from his position he can see that snow has already piled up underneath the trapdoor opening. He’s still on the floor. Maybe he has been asleep for a matter of hours, or maybe a half a day has already passed—it’s difficult to tell in these conditions. In the quietness of the buker, there’s only his breath to keep him company. He groans and tries to stand up.
Immediately, a pang hits him from his side. He looks down.
Dried blood is crusting over a loosely placed gauze, the flimsy piece of fabric holding on precariously to his body. The fibers are swollen with the crimson substance, and the dried gauze resembles more a piece of red seaweed than a piece of cloth; it’s a wonder that he hasn’t died of blood loss yet. With a great effort, he manages to peel the gauze away to reveal several incisions in his abdomen. He coughs.
The man didn't hold back at all. The cuts are scattered around his sides, some overlapping with one another, and thin lines of fresh blood are still trickling from some of the wounds. His shirt has been reduced to strips of fabric, and he can’t distinguish anymore if it’s black or red. He’s a mess, and he might not even make it to the nearest hospital or his apartment for that matter. Honestly, it’s a miracle he has survived long enough to wake up and see the man’s work. He chuckles weakly.
Kim Dokja had surely wanted to kill him. He knows that. The rage, the despair in each of his stabs—that had been real. Not like his quiet act that he had carried for more than a year. Yet. He brings the gauze closer to his eyes and shivers.
Maybe he did succeed, in some ways. Kim Dokja maybe did regard him as something more than his jailor. Because who would attempt to kill another man and then try to patch their wounds right after?
With great effort, he manages to push himself upright and coughs again. He needs to stop the bleeding, and the closest thing he can think of is what Kim Dokja had probably thought too.
“Fuck,” he moans, and steels himself before he stands up.
The sense of vertigo is immediate, and the taste and smell of blood only add to his nausea. Hastily, he throws the used gauze on top of the table and forces himself to swallow down the bile that threatens to leave his throat. He drags his body towards the bathroom.
He’s a mess, and he’s disgusting to look at. Apparently, Kim Dokja had even succeeded in cutting his upper lip, and now the flesh around it has turned a bright pink speckled with red. He turns on the faucet and splashes some cold water on his face, letting the dried blood drip out until the water no longer looks pink.
When he tears off his shirt he shivers and stares at his body. Now that he can take a closer look at the wounds, he’s really surprised that he’s still alive. The man had really poured his heart and soul into him, and the cuts that litter his flesh assume so many various shapes and forms that he thinks he’s staring at a piece of art. Transfixed, he thumbs at one cut and hisses at the pain biting at him. It truly is a marvel.
There’s a blood-stained roll of bandage placed on the cabinet near the sink, and Yoo Joonghyuk thanks that the man at least didn’t think to place it back. Awkwardly, he grabs the roll and wraps the strip around himself, bandaging his entire torso and part of his upper leg. He’ll have to thank Kim Dokja for not cutting his tendons.
Done, he stumbles out of the bathroom and grabs his coat. He doesn’t know how much time has passed since Kim Dokja left, but he knows that his search starts from now. He needs the man to return to him, but chances are that he might die if he doesn’t do something about these wounds first.
He’s about to step onto the ladder when his gaze falls onto the table. Silently, he walks towards it and picks it up before pocketing it inside his coat. That, along with the cuts, had been Kim Dokja’s first gift to him, afterall.
Slowly, he climbs out of the bunker and looks at the sky. It’s dark, and a few stars are shining dimly under the thick blanket of clouds. It’s still snowing.
A bout of nausea hits him and he has to look down.
He stops frequently along his way, the bricks and planks obstructing his path and forcing him to rest whenever he has to move them. It’s an agonizing walk, one that usually just takes him a few minutes but has now turned into one where seconds appear minutes and minutes appear hours.
As he advances, his silhouette begins to merge with the constant flurry of snowflakes, and the black of his coat is quickly overtaken by the white. He winces a little as the slush of wet snow trickles down his neck, and shakes his shoulders to get rid of some of it.
His feet bring him in front of a metal building. There’s no one at the station, and the snow has obscured most of the tracks. He doesn’t even know if the trains are still running in this condition, but he’s already here and can’t go back, not without Kim Dokja.
After bypassing the entrance gates and entering the train tracks, he drags his body to the nearest bench and crashes down. It’s cold, and he shivers continuously as he waits for the first train to arrive.
Bleary eyed, he has to blink several times before the foggy writings on the announcement board turn into clean images and, once he’s able to read, he breathes out a sigh of relief. It’s still the same date, just close to midnight. Kim Dokja mustn’t have made it too far yet. A woman’s mechanical voice rings around the station and he forces himself to look up.
“The train is now approaching. Everyone please step back.”
He waits for the train to come to a complete stop before he rights himself to stand up. His steps thud heavily against the smooth floor, and with each step he feels as if he had a noose around his neck depriving him of his breath.
Finally, the doors open and he steps onto the train carriage. He slumps over the closest seat and coughs.
Everything hurts, and the wounds that had been pierced by the man’s knife are throbbing dully against his side. He’s losing blood, and fast too—the makeshift gauze was never going to be enough to hold everything inside—but he doesn’t feel like he’s on the verge of passing out. There is some lightheadedness, and he has to concentrate to breathe; but it’s manageable for the most part. A weak chuckle manages to escape from his lips.
He did it.
He had finally tasted Kim Dokja like no one else had, got closer to him like no one else had gotten before. After peeling layers upon layers, he had reached the core of Kim Dokja’s essence.
Warmly, his eyes trace the phantom of his figure.
Kim Dokja sitting, Kim Dokja reading. Kim Dokja yawning, Kim Dokja sleeping.
A man so quiet, so awfully private that he had never noticed his lifetime companion shared the same train carriage as his.
They were coworkers, at first. Two not-so-strangers that shared the same morning commute to their company, and that worked in different but close departments. They had never talked before, and he almost never noticed the man’s presence whenever they were at a meeting together. Not until the train accident.
He didn’t recognize Kim Dokja, at first. The black hair, the eyebags, the crinkled suit—everything Kim Dokja looked like was found in thousands of other passengers sharing their same train ride. Overworked and with low self-esteem, the man was a face that could be easily forgotten by everyone around him.
But then the train shook, and the man that had fallen at his feet had been Kim Dokja.
“Are you hurt?” he had asked, and extended his hand to the man.
The other grabbed it and trembled all over before he rose his head.
“Thank you,” he whispered with a weak smile, and then had let go.
He remembers the electric shock that had passed through him back then.
“Oh,” he had thought. “I want him.”
He didn’t know why. The event had almost something akin to banality to it. A coworker that had felt fell on a train, and someone who just happened to know him and help him at his weakest. It was an event so mundane, but so extraordinary in its simplicity that sparked a fuse in Yoo Joonghyuk’s mind.
He became obsessed. Yoo Joonghyuk didn’t even attempt to abade his desire, and began to follow the man, collecting pieces of him and details that he stored in his hands and mind like precious pearls. Kim Dokja had began to infiltrate his every thought, and with that the rash impulse to consume each and every fiber of his being.
“The doors are closing. The doors are closing.”
He turns to look outside the windows and smiles as his stomach begins to twist in hunger.
It’s not over, not yet. Kim Dokja is still waiting for him, somewhere in the city, and he’s sure one day they will meet again like the first time.
He closes his eyes and lets the snow consume him.
“Goodnight, Kim Dokja.”