Chapter Text
There’s a wind coming through the door, pulling loose strands of Min’s hair towards the vortex. Heart in his throat, he sees the front porch of his house in Powell Lake, the sky pale pink with the coming dawn. It’s home . He almost thought he’d never see it again.
And yet…
“So are you leaving or what?” The sharp voice echoes through the castle hall. “I’m sick of long goodbyes.”
“Knock it off, Morgan,” Kez says, but not harshly. “As if abrupt goodbyes aren’t just as bad.” She floats over Min’s shoulder, tilts towards him with peering eyes. “Talk to me, man. You look like you’re overthinking again.”
“It’s nothing bad,” he assures her. It takes him a moment to collect his sprawling thoughts into a parcel, something he can hand to her in a way she’ll understand. He’s had to practice a lot of this on the train. “I’ve been waiting for this for — I don’t even know how long it’s been. And now that it’s here, I’m thinking, oh, the hard part actually starts now. Because I’m supposed to have become a better version of myself, and now I have to go prove it. Fix the rest of my life. Is it weird that I’m a little scared?”
Kez hums. “Nah, not really.”
“You are far from the first passenger to express this feeling,” Morgan drawls, only slightly condescending.
As Min stares down at the glowing [0] on his palm, Kez floats into his hand, obscuring the number. “Besides, you told me yourself, you were a nervous wreck before you came on the train! But look at you now!” (“Still a nervous wreck,” Min deadpans, which Kez ignores.) “You’ve got stuff to look forward to! Freedom! The open road! No more boring finance! No more pretending to be polite to racist customers at the diner! Making music! Maybe even,” and here she wiggles her eyebrows with a conspiratorial glint in her beady eyes, “making sweet, sweet music with a special someone? ”
Min bites down his protests, knowing he’ll only fumble his words. He has realized several things about himself on this train, and unfortunately, he’d had this particular epiphany out loud. In front of Kez. In the middle of a completely unrelated tirade about his best friend being an inconsiderate idiot. She’s refused to let him forget it ever since.
(Does it make it better or worse that she’s sincerely so enthusiastic about it? That she’s convinced everything will work out perfectly if he just, what, goes up to Ryan with flowers and chocolates? After all this time?)
Still. The chance of seeing Ryan again… no matter how that goes… yeah, that starts to tip the scales, to outweigh the overthought fear.
Finally, he tells Kez: “I hope so.” Looking up to the door again, he squares his shoulders. “You know what, I think I’m ready now.”
“Woo, yeah!” Kez flies up to kiss him on the cheek, gives him a sparkling thumbs up.
“Oh, you’re actually going now? I thought I’d try for a nap while you two were nattering on,” Morgan makes an exaggerated yawn. “Well, let’s hope the next passenger who comes through is as barely tolerable as you were.”
“That means she’ll miss you, Min!”
“It means,” Morgan snips, “that I’ll miss having a guest who insisted on cooking and cleaning for themself instead of being waited on hand and foot, because it allowed me to get some peace and quiet by pretending they didn’t exist.”
“You’re welcome,” Min-Gi says, and Morgan groans. He turns to Kez, her eyes shining up at him as he strokes her head with a gentle hand. “Goodbye, Kez. Thanks for everything.”
As Min crosses the threshold of light, calling out his farewells, he hears Kez laugh, “ Go get him, loverboy! ”
He’s stammering too hard to reply before the vortex pulls him through.
Time passes in a blur once he’s back on Earth. Min can’t shake the feeling he’s playing his life in fast-forward, catching up to the present. .
After three months— involving two parents and a tearful reunion (including learning that he was missing for nearly three years, which he’s still not-quite processing), five weeks of half-true explanations and hard conversations and preparations, and eight weeks of rental cars and bus-hopping all the way across Canada, and then over the border— Min-Gi finds himself on the opposite coast of the continent, in Utica, New York.
The show’s set to begin in fifteen minutes. The audience is being ushered out of the lobby, down the corridors towards the main stage. Min-Gi is just one of many in the flow of the crowd, but with the way he’s sweating, he might as well be under a spotlight.
There’s something funny about being in a place so old-fashioned and elegant, when the showgoers waiting inside are dressed in distressed leather and steel spikes, patched-over denim, torn stockings, heels and the like. Meanwhile, Min wears a white button-up shirt and black trousers, his travel bag slung over his shoulder. He spent over an hour in the bus station bathroom agonizing over what to wear tonight, and in the end, this is as close as he could get to not looking like a stuffy, sheltered small-town guy.
But it’s not like he isn’t trying! He didn’t iron his clothes before he got dressed, so they’re all wrinkled! And he’s got two buttons left undone instead of buttoning his shirt all the way up to his collar. He even rolled his sleeves up! This all counts as cool and casual, right…?
(He nearly did pick up flowers. Weren’t you supposed to bring flowers to congratulate someone on their performance? Or was that just for opera and ballet stars? And then he remembered he was a grown-ass adult going to his estranged best friend’s rock concert, and did the mental equivalent of smacking his hands away from the idea. Kez must surely be laughing at him now, wherever she is.)
This theater is nice, though it’s not the kind of vibe he’d expect Ryan to go for: an old movie palace that’s been converted into a music venue, gaudy and baroque, with painted ceilings and faux-marble pillars accented by gilded, curling, sculpted flourishes. Red velvet curtains line the hall, and red carpets upon the floors, leading up a grand staircase. Then again, Ryan always did love dramatics. Or, then again, maybe Ryan’s tastes have evolved. Min can’t assume these things. Not when he hasn’t seen his best friend in three years— four, really, when he counts the months after Ryan first left Powell Lake, before Min got kidnapped by a magitech murder train.
...Does Ryan even think of Min as his best friend anymore?
Does he think about Min at all?
Min catches a conversation between a pair of friends just ahead of him.
“—nightclub near campus when I was at Cleveland State,” says a girl with bleached, ice white hair in a neon purple jacket. “Where’d you first hear him?”
“Wicker Park in Chicago,” her tattooed-over companion replies. “Thought his energy was deadly , so I went to another show in Logan Square the next night.”
Neon-Purple girl hums in agreement. “He’s got a good stage presence. Loads of charisma. And so intense , and brooding...”
Behind them, Min-Gi nearly chokes. Ryan? Brooding? Since when? How? Sure, it’s been years and people change, but— Ryan once got his mouth stuck shut because he wanted to see if he could shove an entire bag of gummy bears into his mouth and melt them with his spit into one giant blob. (He wanted to sculpt the blob into a giant mega-gummy bear. Obviously, it didn’t work).
“Makes sense, considering how depressing most of his songs are,” her companion chimes.
“Depressing? I think they’re really deep.”
“You can be depressing and deep, man. I mean, the lyrics are all breakup songs or groveling songs, even if there’s always a wicked tune to go with it.”
“Oooh, I’ve got a theory about that,” says a new voice, a girl in a halter-neck dress sidling up to the other two. “I’ve been listening to his cassettes over the years, yeah? Got friends in Manitoba who heard him when he was still getting started. And it’s not as obvious now, ‘cause he plays both his new and old songs together. But the old songs are written different than the new ones.”
Neon-Purple and Tattoo are both leaning in now, interested.
“So,” Halter-Neck says, “the songs from when he first started, they’re all fuck-you songs, yeah?” This gets a laugh from the other two. “All transparent metaphors for ‘I’m glad you’re gone, I’m so much better off now, look at me go, blah blah.’ It’s typical male musician bullshit, it’s so clear— he had a string of girlfriends who all dumped his ass, and he wrote those songs because he’s bitter . Just hopping from fling to fling and getting all overwrought and petty when it’s over.”
Min snorts, despite himself. He’s heard those early songs— Ryan had sent a cassette to his parents, though it arrived shortly after Min disappeared. (Min has been listening to it on his walkman on the journey here.) A few of those songs were originally melodies the two of them had workshopped together, and that was sweet in its familiarity, but then there were new ones, just as angsty and melodramatic as Halter-Neck describes.
She goes on. “But then , after a while, he drops that whole vibe completely. None of the songs he’s written in the last couple of years are as angry or self-righteous. It’s all regret, taking things for granted, wishing you could change the past, self-deprecation under a layer of tragic irony, that sorta thing.”
“Groveling,” Tattoos says, with a cheerful tilt of their head.
“ Exactly . You see where I’m going with this?” Halter-Neck wiggles her eyebrows, excitement building. Her voice drops to a stage-whisper. “He’s singing about the one that got away . After all those meaningless relationships, he let something special slip out of his grasp, and he only realized what he’d lost once it was gone.”
“ Oh, ” Neon-Purple says, a hand over her heart. “When you listen to his new songs now… it’s all in the subtext, he’s pleading with her to forgive him, begging her to come back and tell him what he’s got to do to make it up to her… That’s so romantic .” (“Or pathetic,” Tattoos says brightly.) “And so sad .”
The others nod in agreement, and then they’re talking about other topics, less important things not related to Ryan.
But Min lingers on this thread. It’s never seriously occurred to him that Ryan might fall for… well, anybody. Whenever Ryan talked about being rock stars, living the dream, the places they’d see on the road, he never brought up girls except as an offhand matter of fact. Like, grass is green, water is wet, chicks love rock stars. It was a given, so why bother dwelling on it.
...It’s fine, if Ryan is in love with someone. Min-Gi isn’t entitled to him. He’s never had a solid, for-sure reason to think that maybe— nope, nope, this isn’t the time to unpack this. If there’s still any place in Ryan’s life left for him at all, then that’s already more than he could realistically expect. It would be enough, just to be near him again.
A traitorous part of his mind stays wondering, though. What would it be like, to see Ryan in love? Min can’t quite picture it. Not because Ryan’s lacking in feeling— it’s the other way around. Ryan overflows with feeling. He’s always been full of fire, and when he’s really enthusiastic, the warmth in his eyes is more nourishing than the sun. But that was when it was just him and Min. So… how would he act, how much more radiant could he be, with someone he actually loved?
Min-Gi thinks he’d like to see that. Even if it wasn’t meant for him.
He enters the performance hall. The audience section is an open-spaced ground floor in front of the stage. Which is good, he likes being able to move freely, just in case he needs to find the exit quickly… even if it’s a bit harder to get around when the place is so packed . There’s a lot of people here. Like, over three hundred. Maybe four hundred? Maybe more than that… Min’s too overwhelmed to be sure.
The size of the audience shouldn’t be a surprise; Min knew Ryan’s career was going well. At least, it’s going well according to the local-specific magazines and college newspapers he’s picked up while tracing Ryan’s trail from town to town. And the live sessions he’s managed to catch on the radio, when Ryan plays at stations across Canada and the American Midwest, promoting his next tour stops. And the posters he’s seen around Utica— and Toronto, and Montreal, and Chicago, and Detroit, and the Twin Cities. And all the conversations he’s overheard from music scene aficionados, like the one he heard just now…
Anyway, although Ryan hasn’t officially broken into the music industry yet, he’s clearly been prolific. Clearly built a reputation for himself. More than one reviewer has expressed bafflement that no record label has signed him on yet— although the fact that his music isn’t widely available for sale is apparently appealing to the punks and hipsters that make up his core audience.
If Min gets the chance to talk to him… when Min tells him what’s been on his mind… will Ryan still care? Or will he think Min-Gi’s just coming back to ride on his coattails, now that Ryan’s found success alone? No, no, he shouldn’t think like this— he can’t assume, he needs to talk —
Something strikes him from behind. Min goes cold as he whips around, raising his arms to shield his face, when he sees—
A giggling couple, already tipsy and stumbling around in each other's arms. They didn’t mean to hit him, they only barely bumped into him. They didn’t even notice— they’re already moving on— not even caring as Min stands shock-still, forcing every muscle (first the shoulders, then back, then hands and fingers and jaw, focus, focus ) to unclench, one by one.
After another minute, he’s back to normal. A slightly strained normal. Ugh .
Min-Gi has been in a train dimension for nearly three years without any human contact, and he was already skittish in crowds before that. Even with that in mind, he couldn’t have anticipated just how bad his anxiety had gotten until he began to re-enter society. But he’s got to get over it if he wants to be a performer. And he wants to. So. He’s dealing with it. Trying to deal with it.
He moves towards the back, away from the stage lights and the crowds into the comfort of the shadows, and counts his breaths until the curtain rises.
Spotlights pierce the darkness, beams of red and gold and violet light roving through the theater.
On the distant stage, Ryan is a sharp-angled shadow. He’s dressed less flashy than Min would expect: black shirt, black jeans, laced boots and a red bomber jacket. His head is bowed, guitar in his hands. Min can’t see his face at all.
Without a word, he raises his right hand, bringing it down on the strings like a hammer to the anvil, striking up sparks, forging the melody. No preamble about it; he launches straight into a heavy, relentless riff and begins to sing.
“ Between the glass and the shattered lights, I thought I nearly saw you… ”
Whoa. His voice is… wow. Min suddenly understands what that girl earlier meant by intense .
Ryan bites out each word like he’s tearing into its throat. With the guitar thrumming under him like a heartbeat, the music flows fresh and hot as blood. And the lyrics…
“ Hollow cities and roads to nowhere,
It’s a universe of silence
Hate me, haunt me, I don’t care
If I can make you hear me
If somewhere you…”
When they were younger, there’d always been a little bit of goofiness to Ryan’s lyrics. Sometimes in a self-aware way, sometimes not, but Ryan was always having a private joke with himself when he was songwriting. That was the feeling Min had, anyway.
“ Destiny
A sense of irony
The rest gets taken by the currents
Time never forgives or flinches… ”
It’s clear that for Ryan, three years later, music is no laughing matter.
As the show goes on, song by song, Min-Gi can’t help but list the new things about Ryan.
His hair’s longer, for one. As Min cautiously pulls himself away from the back wall, moving towards the crowded heart of the audience, he can see the long, low ponytail swishing back and forth as Ryan sings. The dark strands brushing over his face.
Ryan doesn’t dance or jump around the stage, not in the bouncy, giddy way he did when they played together in their bedrooms. Ryan moves like a knife twists. He swings back and forth on the pivot of his ankle, slams his free foot down to punctuate his strums. Stalks across the stage, back and forth, skinny legs in sharp, controlled lines of motion. Lunges his whole body forward on a bent knee, hair shadowing his eyes, bowing down so low he’s nearly face-to-face with some of the closer members of the audience, singing right at them , before rearing back up so fast you could almost imagine a whip cracking.
Min swallows.
It becomes increasingly clear that Ryan is… really, really skilled at what he does. He was already passionate, and determined, and he was pretty good at it. After three years as a working musician, however, he’s much more than just good . By now, Min’s gotten close enough to the stage that he can see the way Ryan’s hands move so fluidly up and down the neck of the instrument, like water pouring down the strings. He makes intricate melodies look natural, with the way his bony-knuckled fingers dance along the frets. His guitar moves with him like a fifth limb.
Ryan’s voice is stronger , too. Some songs, he keeps it soft, a slow but driven beat. Others, he growls and rages and roars but even at his most intense, even when his voice is rumbling and ragged, there’s a discipline to it. Like his voice is an instrument, fine-tuning to the timbre he needs for each song. Min can tell that it’s intentional— no matter what tone or texture Ryan sings in, his words and melody are always concentrated, articulate, powerful. He knows what he’s doing.
The only time Ryan turns the intensity down is between songs, when he’s taking a moment to banter with the audience as he flexes his shoulders and arms. In these interludes, especially whenever he barks out a laugh at his own joke, he seems a little younger. Closer to the Ryan that Min knows.
“Alright, Utica, you’ve been great this week,” Ryan is saying, glance sweeping across the room. “But tonight’s my last show for you, and then I’ll be back out on the open road.” He pushes his glasses back into place. Min-Gi’s close enough now that he can see that it’s the same red aviator frames he wore when they were eighteen.
It’s odd. Even though Ryan sounds so casual, chatting with the audience like they’re all acquaintances, he tends to keep his eyes down, fiddling with the mic or cracking his knuckles. Like his mind’s elsewhere.
Moon-pale beams shine down on the stage, circling the crowd.
Ryan continues, “Since I’m about to play the last song of my last set for you all, how about I make it something special? This tune’s brand new. Hope you like it.”
He smiles, but does the crook of his mouth seem to sag? Min-Gi moves closer, closer still, no longer aware of himself. When the music begins, he’s swept up in the tide.
“They warned Orpheus when he tried to cheat hell
Don’t waver, don’t doubt, don’t ever look back
This feels like the cooldown song for a setlist full of headbangers. Ryan plucks at the strings in a flow of arpeggios, slow but not quite sad, not quite brooding. Just… thoughtful.
But he lost his love, so now everyone tells it like,
Don’t look back, don’t regret, just stick to the track
Lilting and plaintive, it’s almost like a serenade. His voice is really pretty… but there’s still a hint of that inner strength, an undercurrent of intensity building below the melody.
But this isn’t a myth and that isn’t your moral
You should have turned back… You should have turned back…”
Greek legends? Min never took Ryan for having that kind of interest in literary influences. Even with his admittedly prodigious musical development, his current songwriting style, based on all the other songs, still seems to focus on imagery and emotionally-laden sensations just as much as he did in high school. Albeit in a more poetic, abstract form.
…Man. Min really hopes he’ll get the chance to ask Ryan more about his writing process soon.
Pressing even further forward, Min’s starting to notice the people pushing into his space, the contact of unfamiliar skin and clothes. It’s not a great feeling; it makes his skin crawl. But he can’t bring himself to draw back. Not when he can finally see every line that etches into Ryan’s face, every stretch of veins in his hands, his wrists, his throat bobbing as he pours every last inch of physical effort into this song.
The melody soars, and the guitar thrums, rushing upwards, air under beating wings. Ryan closes his eyes as he raises his head towards the silver-blue light, his voice in a slow crescendo…
Min, too, feels himself straining forward, lifting his face.
He’s beautiful.
He’s—
A screech of feedback tears through the theater, and Min-Gi can feel the entire audience wincing as one. Even the venue crew, though unseen, seem affected— the spotlights have stopped moving, and there are urgent, hushed questions floating from backstage. As silence falls, it becomes apparent that something is not wrong with the tech. Something is wrong with the performer.
The spotlights have stopped on the crowd, catching Min in the glare, half-blinding him. Above him, Ryan is a haloed shadow, seizing up, frozen between dropping his guitar and clutching it to his chest. His legs are shaking. His jaw hanging open, one syllable drifts out, so quiet the microphone barely picks it up.
“... Min? ”
Min, who only now realizes he’s barely meters away from the stage. Min, who has been shamelessly gazing up at him this whole time, with eyes that must surely be as round as moons, his mind racing with beautiful beautiful beautiful , heart pounding so hard it hurts —
And he is standing in a circle of searing light, and he is closed in by hundreds of unfriendly bodies, and every set of eyes in the room is sliding towards him. An insect pinned under glass.
The whispers begin. A near-thousand white-ringed irises, tracking back and forth in the dark. In the half-light, faces distort and become strange, inhuman. The air of confusion turns to suspicion, to sneering judgment, to warped hostility. Get out. Get out. Get out.
Min has spent far too much time among things that want to kill him, and developed a healthy (maybe) level of paranoia, but he’s still capable of recognizing that he’s not in danger right now. Nobody here wants to hurt him. These are ordinary people who came to see a music show. He’s just in the beginning of a panic attack. He knows that! But it’s not enough to dispel the dread, or the cold sweat, or the conviction that the smothering aura around him is the certain presence of death.
The whispering roars like whitewater rapids. The river rises, blurs his vision. It’s too loud. He can’t ground himself here, he can’t— he needs—
“Whoa— hey!”
“Augh—”
“ Watch it!”
“ MIN!!! ”
Min-Gi doesn’t know how he manages to break out of the crowd, but he’s already out of the stage hall and in the hallway, scuffing the fancy red carpets under his old runners.
I hate this, I hate feeling like this! And worst of all, worst of all, as he wipes his eyes, he knows that this whole situation— I thought I was better now! — it’s just the same as before —
Behind him, the stage doors slam open. Over his shoulder, still sprinting, Min sees Ryan burst through the doors in a leap .
Ryan hits the ground running and books it towards Min with full force. He’s breathing so hard he might as well be spitting fire right now. His eyes are blazing, with, with— Determination? Anticipation? Or, maybe—
Unfortunately, in Min’s panic, his first thought is: Oh, shit, he’s pissed , and he picks up speed as the adrenaline kicks in.
“ STOP! Min! ”
Min can’t stop now, not here, it’s not right here, too bright and too open, and he can’t—
The doors, banging open again. More voices, more footsteps, less urgent but murmuring, confused, buzzing and swarming— no, no, this is the last thing he needs!
He turns the corner of the hallway, spying chandeliers and painted ceilings ahead. He’s almost to the grand staircase— if he can just get down to the lobby, get outside, fresh air, cool night air, and then maybe he can explain—
“ Min— MIN-GI! ” The sound of his name is a breathless cry, breaking on the edge of the G. “ Don’t! DON’T! ” A ragged inhale— he’s much nearer than before— “ PLEASE!”
Min swivels on his heel. Too fast— and too close to the top of the staircase— he’s spinning off balance, falling—
Two hands are clenching the front of his shirt, pulling him back from the brink. What happens next is so fast Min barely sees it: Ryan grabs him by the shoulders with hands like iron clamps, and full-body hauls Min away with surprising speed, moving towards the red velvet curtains along the walls. Ryan shoves him through the drapery, and Min’s back hits the wall with an oof .
They’re in some kind of arched stone alcove, hidden behind the curtains. It’s barely big enough for both of them. Min finds himself slightly curving over Ryan, who is staring up at him with a look that could be mistaken for either “stricken” or “deranged”.
Neither says anything. But then, simultaneously:
“Holy shit, I forgot how tall you were,” Ryan whispers, as Min-Gi gasps out, “You’re stronger than I remember— huh?”
Ryan’s hands are still gripped around his shoulders, too tight. Min doesn’t know how to explain right now that he’s not… good… with being held the wrong way… but maybe Ryan senses his discomfort. With a twitch, the hands uncurl, untense, sliding away.
Outside, several heavy footsteps draw near, dark blurs passing in the sliver of light between the curtains. Ryan’s eyes pierce into Min’s, more striking than ever. (Is he wearing eyeliner? It looks like black eyeliner, with an edge of blue. Huh.) He hisses through clenched teeth— shhh — as his palms crush flat against Min’s chest, pinning him against the wall.
“Lost sight of Akagi,” someone is saying. There’s a buzzing noise— someone’s responding through a walkie-talkie. “Well, I was behind him, but some of the audience members followed us out and got in my way. Over-eager kids, getting curious, you know. Anyway, I can’t see him now.” More buzzing. “Don’t let the crowd get too unruly. We’re already near the end of his time slot, so if he doesn’t come back soon we’ll need to start emptying the theater.”
Another person nearby says, “He’ll have to come back eventually to get his equipment. And his paycheck for tonight.”
A third member of the group snorts, “ If he’s getting his paycheck. What do you think the venue owner will say when she hears about this? Idiot’s getting blacklisted, bare minimum.”
Min’s stomach plummets. He feels sick; guilt does not sit well on top of a panic attack.
At least in this secluded alcove, he can focus on the panic first. Min counts his breaths, in and out, careful to keep his exhalations slow and silent. He notes the cold, smooth marble under his hands (braced against the wall behind him), the soreness in his feet (a familiar ache by now, after all the running he did on the train). The flush he can feel creeping across his face, his ears, over the nape of his neck and down his spine.
The warmth of Ryan’s palms burning Min’s shirt into his skin. Nails painted black, just slightly digging into the fabric, stabbing through to his heart. Eyelashes, thick and dark— they look so much longer with the added makeup. The sweat and the stale cologne Ryan’s wearing, like musty pinewood. How, as Ryan turns his head to warily eye the slim gap in the curtains, the muscles in his neck jump out, so solid you could drag a finger along the line of it.
Min bites the inside of his cheek. He wishes that he could disappear into the darkness.
Minutes pass, and the footsteps drag off, quieting with distance.
“They're gone now. Finally .” Ryan huffs, then turns back to him. “Min... I—”
“—sorry,” Min bursts out, squeezing his eyes shut. “I’m sorry. Sorry. God, I swear, this is not how I wanted this to happen at all , I just— I—” His head hurts, and if not for Ryan’s hands, still shoving him up against the wall, he’d curl up into a ball and wait for the earth to swallow him whole. “Ryan, I’m so sorry!”
“What?” Ryan’s voice sharpens. “Min, what are you apologizing for?”
“ Your show, ” Min moans. “I ruined your show! I didn’t think— I made you mess up in the middle of a performance! And now you’re ditching your set and getting in trouble with the venue because of me —” The words get stuck in his throat, but he chokes out, “This was a horrible idea. I shouldn’t have— I’m so—”
His eyes fly open; he’s been yanked forward. Ryan’s hand is twisting the front of Min’s shirt in a fist.
“ Min, ” Ryan’s voice is dangerously quiet, face bent low in the dark. “Min, oh my god, none of that matters, shut up about the show. I don’t care about the show. I don’t care. I don’t care! Why would any of that be your fault? How could I not follow you? Was I supposed to just watch you leave?” His face twists, wretched and red— but not from anger. “Do you think I could live with myself?”
When Ryan lifts his chin, he’s holding back tears.
“Do you think I could stand it if you ran away from me, again? ”
“...Ryan.“ Min is at a loss. “I… I’m sorry. I wasn’t actually going to leave, I just needed to—”
But Ryan cuts him off with a hard sigh. “I know, okay? I saw your face. I know. I just…” He trails off, eyes dim. He’s breathing unevenly through gritted teeth, blinking hard as the tears well up and threaten to overflow. It’s not really helping, though. He should really just wipe his eyes, but it doesn’t seem like he’s willing to let go of Min long enough to do it.
So, cautiously, Min pushes up the red glasses just enough to brush away the drops beading under those thick black eyelashes. Only for a second. He pulls his hand back quickly, like he’s been caught.
Ryan’s eyes are wide. “Min,” he hiccups. He says it again, “ Min .”
In a voice he hardly recognizes, Min says, “I’m here.”
Ryan’s mouth twists, like it’s got something trapped inside, struggling to come out— and what comes out is a choked, brittle whimper, startling them both.
The next thing Min knows, Ryan’s thrown himself into him— face buried in his shoulder, arms squeezing around his chest— and he cries , hard enough to shake them both. The sobs that wrench out of him seem too big to come from someone who barely comes up to Min-Gi’s chin.
Min nearly buckles under the sudden force of this embrace, under the shock of seeing his best friend openly cry— he’s never seen Ryan cry, not since they were really little— and at a loss, he can only repeat, weakly, “I’m here. It’s okay, Ryan, I’m here.”
With a hiccup, the crying quiets. Ryan nudges his face further into Min’s shoulder, his arms tightening. “You are here,” and suddenly he sounds years younger, “aren’t you?”
Min tries to speak, but his voice won’t work. He nods instead, his cheek grazing the soft dark hair.
Ryan freezes, inhaling sharply. “You—” like he’s only now believing it— “You’re here.” He looks up at Min, arms still locked around him. Their faces are so close that Ryan is all Min can see, his big eyes luminescent with wonder, shining through smudged glasses and streams of wet makeup. “Min, Min. Min !” He breaks into breathy, wild laughter. “You’re here, it worked, it worked! ”
Shoving his glasses up to his forehead, Ryan nestles his face into the crook under Min-Gi’s chin and babbles: “I— I was thinking about you— they said you were gone and I was so— I nearly thought— and I kept kicking myself for— but you’re here! It’s really you! You’re really here! I can’t believe it!”
The cold stickiness of tears and mucus on Min’s collarbone is not pleasant, but it’s worth it, just to hear Ryan’s laughter once more after all these years apart. He never wants to live without that sound again.
“I can’t remember the last time I felt like this,” Ryan laughs and laughs, but just as quickly, he’s overwhelmed again by tears, ducking his head as he sobs. But when he peers up at Min again, black streaks of mascara running down his face, he’s got a smile that’s brighter than anything. And he sounds so happy when he hugs Min tighter and says, “I missed you so much, Min. Min! I missed you!”
Min-Gi’s heart has been soldered and strengthened through his time away, but now it breaks: like waves on the shore, like the sun over the horizon. The completion of a cycle, returning home. Circling his arms around his best friend’s back, Min squeezes tight, swaying them both side to side. For all his presence up on stage, Ryan feels so small in his arms, shuddering as Min enfolds him. Was he always so thin?
“Ryan,” comes the first word. All others fall short. “Ryan.”
“Mmph. Min. ” Ryan claws into Min’s back, squeezing him in return.
Even though Min knows he’s holding on too tightly— he can feel Ryan’s bony arms and shoulders folding up in his embrace, and it can’t be comfortable— the long, slow sigh Ryan releases sounds so… satisfied.
Then, a little more clearly, a little more self conscious, Ryan murmurs, “Don’t let go yet, okay? Just for now. I...” He closes his eyes against Min’s clavicle; Min can feel his eyelashes flutter against his skin. “I just…”
“I won’t.” The words take so much strength, and Min’s voice is so weak. “I won’t. I promise.” His hands are pressed flat against Ryan’s back, weaving through the long, fluffy locks of hair that spring up around his fingers. “I don’t want to let go yet either.”
“Okay,” Ryan whispers. “Good. That’s good.”
As the tension leaves Min’s body, as he presses his face into Ryan’s hair, something slides down the bridge of his nose and drips onto the soft black waves.
Min holds on as tightly as he can. “I missed you, too.”
They stay in that alcove until the theater finally empties, a few stragglers milling about in the lobby. Min-Gi reluctantly untangles himself, pushing Ryan away just enough to urge him to go retrieve his equipment from the stage. Ryan seems to agree, but when he moves to leave, he stops.
“Aren’t you coming?”
“Wh— No! Ryan! There’s still people out there!” Min really, really doesn't want to face what’s left of the crowd if he can help it.
“Not that many,” Ryan insists.
“I can just wait here, can’t I?” Min tries. “You can just go without me, and then—”
Ryan scowls, takes one of Min’s clammy hands in his own, and says “I am not going anywhere without you again,” with such intensity that Min fails to think up a rebuttal before Ryan drags them both out from the curtains at once.
...Just to walk straight into a trio of venue staff, ushering a gaggle of patrons towards the staircase.
Nobody says a word. Everybody stares. Min is aware that he and Ryan have emerged from a dark, hidden corner and both of them are a mess , their hair and clothes ruffled all to hell. And on top of that— Min tugs his hand free from Ryan’s, only for Ryan to immediately snatch it back in a death grip. Those bony knuckles crush his fingers hard . To Ryan’s credit, he notices Min’s discomfort, making an apologetic wince as he releases Min’s hand… while moving to clutch the corner of his sleeve instead. Okay. This is fine.
Ryan gets shooed over to the theater’s main office to take a very terse, but blessedly brief phone call from the venue manager. He refuses to go inside the office without Min, until security finally relents enough to let him make the call with the door open so that Min-Gi remains in his line of sight. Despite the angry buzzing on the phone, Ryan leans on the desk, crossing his legs, as cool as a cucumber. Smiling beatifically and winking whenever he catches Min’s eye.
“...I still feel like I should apologize for that,” Min says later, as they exit the building through the side alley. Retrieving Ryan’s equipment didn’t take too long— the venue had its own sound setup, so really they just needed to grab his guitar, his cables and effects phaser, all of which is now packed away securely in his guitar case.
Ryan waves him off. “I told you, I don’t care. It’s nothing I can’t make up by the next show, and I still have most of my paychecks from the previous two nights.” He fidgets with the strap of his guitar case with one hand— the other hand, of course, is still clutching at Min-Gi’s sleeve. “Actually… I’m, uh, not doing so bad on money these days, you know? Just so you know. Just saying.”
“Uh, okay?” Min’s not sure what he’s getting at. “Well, I have no plans of going into finance,” he teases, “like, ever again, so it’s a good thing you can balance a budget on your own.”
“...Wait, you’re not? So then what—” Ryan stops, shaking himself like an overexcited dog, flapping his hands. His hair flops over his face, glasses slightly askew. (Min knows he’s grinning like an idiot, but why is everything that Ryan does so cute ?) “No, no, I meant… um. Hey, are you hungry?”
“Oh, uh, I guess—”
“Great, so you won’t mind if I take you somewhere nice? My treat, obviously,” and there isn’t even a pause long enough for Min to verbally agree before Ryan rattles on, “Is there something you’re in the mood for?”
“Well—”
“Even if it’s past ten o’clock by now, there should still be plenty of options open this late— we can go somewhere really upper scale if you’d like! Don’t worry about it at all, just tell me what you want! I can cover it!”
“That’s—”
“I haven’t really done much sightseeing around town but I know there’s a ramen house that’s open till one in the morning, and a sandwich deli, and a late-night diner, a couple of pizzerias— oh! Do you still like Italian food? I mean, I saw this really ritzy place on the way here, the kind where the waiters wear tuxedos and people chauffeur your cars, maybe—”
“ Ryan. ” Min stops, and Ryan, still rattling off as he walks ahead, doesn’t notice until he’s suddenly yanked back by his grip on Min-Gi’s sleeve. Min raises an eyebrow, more amused than anything else. And fond. So, so fond.
Ryan looks at his boots, sheepish. “Sorry,” he says, tugging on the guitar strap. “Too much? I’m talking all over you, aren’t I.”
Min chuckles, tilting his head to catch Ryan’s eye. “Maybe. But…” Inwardly, he shoves down the impulse to stay quiet, shrug, smile awkwardly, let it pass. Say how you actually feel . “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss it, when I was gone.”
Rolling his eyes, Ryan scoffs, “Gee, thanks.” He probably thinks Min’s joking.
Don’t let him think you’re just joking. “Seriously,” Min says. “I missed talking to you, and I always liked the way you talk, including whenever you go off like a machine gun ‘cause you’ve got a lot to say. Don’t worry about being too much. It’s just good to hear you again.“
Min-Gi is trying to be more open, since the train. No more stonewalling or lashing out, no more expecting people to guess what he’s thinking instead of just telling them. No more taking his relationships for granted— he wants the people he loves to know that he cares. Speaking from the heart, and all.
Obviously that’s easier said than done. It’s still a work in progress, but lately, he finds that once he’s said what’s on his mind… even if it’s a little embarrassing… he feels better. That’s new.
Though in this case, maybe it’s too much, too soon? Ryan is staring at Min like he’s grown a second head. Or like he might cry again. It’s hard to tell— they’re both still red-eyed and hoarse from their earlier sobbing fit. They both look a mess, and that’s not even mentioning the wrinkles and tear stains on their clothes, or the black smears of makeup on Ryan’s face and Min’s neck.
Min-Gi coughs. “Anyway, I don’t think I’m up for any fine dining right now. Not sure I could handle the looks we’d get in our, uh… current state. I think I’ve had enough eyes on me tonight. Besides yours, obviously.” He didn’t mean to say that last part out loud. Nevermind. Speaking from the heart was a mistake. Ryan looks like he’s going to faint. Move on, move on — “I could use coffee, or tea, or… Is there a cafe still open around here?”
At that, Ryan seems to regain control of himself. “Oh. Yeah! There’s an all-night coffeehouse not too far from here, it’s this way—” and then he’s tugging Min’s sleeve along.
They make a stop at a phone booth on the way when Min-Gi remembers he needs to call his parents. It was one of the many promises he made to them, before he left home to search for Ryan; otherwise they would never have accepted him leaving so soon after finally returning. (He would have left whether or not they accepted it, but he loves his family, and they’ve been through enough already.)
Ryan lets go of Min’s sleeve, backing a few steps away to give him a bit of privacy. He tries to act casual about it, leaning back against the brick wall of the nearby storefront. Min can tell Ryan is trying.
The call picks up almost immediately despite the late hour. It’s his father.
“It’s good to hear your voice,” his father says, in his eternally moderate tone. But there’s a tinge of something… a little bit of a rush to the beginning of his sentence, a little bit of an exhale at the end. You wouldn’t notice it if you didn’t know him, but Min does. Even though he can tell his dad is relieved , that… still hurts, a little, because that means his father was worried in the first place.
“아빠,” Min says, infusing it with as much warmth as he can, “It’s good to hear you too. I know this is later than usual. I’m sorry I kept you up.”
“No, it’s no trouble,” his father says, and Min can almost see him shaking his head, maybe adjusting his glasses.
They talk about Powell Lake, and his mother’s garden, and how the water’s finally warming up with the summer and people are out at the lakeside. Other little things. Gradually, the last of the tension eases out from his father’s voice. Min listens, but other thoughts pull at him, insistent.
After he came home, and after he’d slept in his bed for a week, his parents had celebrated by hosting a small party. Well, small by Asian standards. Twenty or so neighbors (mostly East Asian, mostly elderly) had stopped by at various times through the evening to bring food, gawk at how tall Min had grown, and (presumably) gather fresh gossip. Min himself only really managed to tolerate this much attention because on a bone-deep level it was impossible to feel threatened by a flock of plastic-sandaled grannies, or the divorced and glamorous aunties from his mom’s book club. Half of them had babysat him at some point.
And while everyone was unquestionably happy to see him again, it didn’t take long for the focus of the conversation to meander away from Min and towards a more chaotic burble of current topics. Especially once someone got out the drinks. So, once he’d eaten, and allowed enough people to poke at his face and call him handsome, Min felt pretty safe excusing himself, nodding in reassurance to his mother before slipping out of the kitchen and silently moving to the stairs.
In his bedroom, he’d opened the window for fresh air. And then he’d smelled cigarettes — only one person could ever convince his father to have a smoke— and he’d heard two voices. His father, idling on the front step with Hiroshi Akagi.
Min hadn’t seen Ryan’s father come in. Of course he wanted to talk to him, ask him if he’d heard anything about Ryan... but… Min had never really figured out how to talk to Ryan’s parents. Mr. Akagi especially. He always seemed to be joking, like Ryan, and always seemed a little bitter, like Ryan was in his less guarded moments. But for Min, Ryan was always warm and approachable, and Mr. Akagi… was not.
Not that he was ever unfriendly to Min. But Min remembered all the times Ryan suddenly asked to sleep over, or made excuses not to go home just yet, or the evenings when he’d suddenly drive up to the Parks’ house, face like thunder, asking Min to hang out, and never saying what brought him there in the first place. Ryan didn’t like to linger on it. But it wasn’t hard to guess, when he was perfectly happy to gripe endlessly about his siblings or his mom, but always avoided the subject of his father. Min knew they’d butted heads more and more throughout high school… and after graduation, the few times he had run into the Akagis, it seemed Hiroshi didn’t like to linger on the subject of Ryan either.
(“It’s because they’re too much alike,” his mother said, once, shaking her head when Min asked her to explain further. “Ryan can tell you, someday. If he wants to.”)
In his bedroom, Min slid down to sit underneath the open window.
“...oh come on, Sung-ho, don’t be so considerate on my behalf,” drawled Hiroshi on the front step. “I’m happy for you. I’m even happy for that blockhead kid of mine, whenever he bothers to call home and hear about it.”
Min’s father chuckled, a puff of cigarette smoke rising into the air. Then, there was silence, and when he spoke again, his voice was… uncharacteristically emotive.
“I keep waiting for a call,” he said. “I know that he’s home now, but I’ve gotten too used to waiting. I stay up at my desk, staring at the phone, waiting for a call. Good news. Bad news. Any news… anything.”
“You know what’s really funny? I think I know the feeling,” Mr. Akagi said, in a way that didn’t make it sound very funny at all.
Min waited under the windowsill, but nobody said anything else after that.
In the present, his father says, “Ah, here’s your mom.” Min pulls his stray thoughts together.
“Min-Gi! Hi, honey.” Her voice is bubbly, a happy hush as familiar as the keys of his mini-synth.
Together, they ask him about Utica, about the weather there, has Min been eating okay, has he been safe? Min answers their questions in as much detail as he can, even the more mundane or repetitive ones. He knows that any extra information about where he’s been and what he’s been up to gives them peace of mind. He just wishes it wasn’t because they’ve had so much practice reviewing his last known whereabouts.
“Ah— Min-Gi, it’s late over there, isn’t it? You’re not out alone at night, are you?”
He bites down the urge to protest that he's a grown man ( of course they have reasons to worry, Min ) and says, “I’m alright, I’m not alone. Actually—” and he’s so instantly giddy to be able to say it— “I finally found Ryan! He’s here with me now. Oh, do you want me to—”
He’s not sure which happens first: that he notices Ryan making an uncomfortable grimace, eyes darting away, or that he hears his mother stumbling over her reply, “Oh, no, that’s alright. I’m just glad you’re not alone.”
“Uh, alright,” Min says.
“Will you be staying in New York for a while?”
“I’m not sure yet,” Min tells her. “But I’ll call you once I know where we’re traveling next.”
In his peripheral vision, Ryan straightens up, ponytail whipping around. Min can feel Ryan’s eyes on him, and realizes: Min had said we’re when he should have said I’m, because he should not assume anything, even if he’s been hoping and dreaming and desperately wondering if— nope, nope, one thing at a time. First he needs to make sure his parents won’t be worried sick over him until the next call.
“You know, everyone keeps talking about how handsome you’ve grown,” his mother muses. “Next time you come home, maybe we should have you meet up with some nice girls, like Lana’s daughter, or—”
“Sounds great sounds good that’s fine just fine okay ,” Min bursts out through a gritted smile. Well, at least he feels slightly less guilty about leaving home so quickly to chase after Ryan.
Once Min stammers his way onto a different subject, they keep talking for a little longer. When his time runs out, he tells them when to expect his next call. Then he says his farewells, and prepares himself for however badly Ryan is going to react.
...But Ryan doesn’t address Min’s slip at all. Ryan walks up to Min all breezy and light, grabs the cuff of his sleeve, and says, “So, yeah, the cafe’s just another block down this street! One of those hipster townhouse places where college students and writers like to hang out.” Waving his free hand around, he rambles on: ”Lots of nice armchairs and weird local art on the walls, but it’s nice! Smells like a library, which probably sounds strange but trust me, you’ll see what I mean…”
Well, if he wants to pretend he didn’t hear what I said … Min tries not to take that as a bad sign, but his stomach is already crushing into itself.
The coffeehouse does smell like a library and Min-Gi cannot for the life of him place how or why; there’s no books or anything that should remind him of such a place. It certainly doesn’t look like a library. It’s too… eclectic. The plaster walls are painted orange and green and purple, the tiles are checkered linoleum, and there is not a single matching set of furniture anywhere in the building.
Ryan insists Min order first. This turns out to be the first step of a cunning setup, a nefarious ploy, because as soon as Min reaches into his bag to grab his wallet, Ryan is already pushing a handful of American bills across the counter.
“That should cover both his and mine,” Ryan tells the barista, making a face like the cat who got the cream. Min stifles a giggle, and Ryan’s grin gets a little wider.
They take their drinks to a table by one of the windows, under a potted palm tree that’s far too overgrown to be a houseplant. There’s no other customers in the room besides a student immersed in their books, headphones leaking electro-noise. The barista’s already ducked into the back of the shop. They can talk privately.
Min sips his chai and debates how to go about this. What to say.
Ultimately, Ryan beats him to it, gripping the handle of his cocoa. “It’s been years. Where have you been, man?”
...The direct route, then. Okay. Min had a cover story ready when he came back to Earth— obviously he wasn’t going to tell anyone he was on a magic hell train— but it’s one thing to lie to his parents (already bad) and another thing to lie to his best friend. Ryan knows secrets that nobody else knows about Min-Gi. The reverse is true as well. But… there’s no way Ryan would believe this.
So Min gives him the lie. It’s a carefully-structured one, meant to parallel what actually happened as closely as he can without directly mentioning the magical stuff or the monsters and pocket worlds or the talking objects and animals he met.
“One night, a few years ago, I was walking home from work,” Min-Gi says. It had been a shitty day, and he wasn’t exactly going home , but… that’s a little too heavy to get into right now. “And I was… taken. Kidnapped.” By an interdimensional therapy train. “I think I blacked out. I don’t remember seeing who took me, I just remember falling.”
The next thing Min-Gi knew, he was in a gigantic, labyrinthine library with a glowing number on his palm. He’d found his way out of the maze just to find himself… somewhere that definitely wasn’t Earth. And then after that it seemed that no matter how many doors he went through, people were yelling at him or threatening him or annoyed by him.
But since he can’t tell Ryan that, he says, “I escaped, eventually, but by that point, I was far away from home. My personal belongings were gone, I’d gotten, uh, pretty badly roughed up—” Min had taken some nasty hits along the road in his early months on the train— “and I didn’t really know where I was, or what I was doing, or where I was going… my head was in a fog, and to be honest, those first several months are… kind of a blur.” Also not a lie.
Min stares into his mug. “When I got home, my parents made me get a psych eval, and I told all of this to the psychiatrist, and she said it sounded like I was in a state of dissociation brought on by shock.” Although she’d only had Min’s cover story to go off of, Min does wonder, in hindsight, if that wasn’t actually the case. At the time, that entire first year had felt like one horrible, unending panic attack, to the point that he barely processed anything going on around him. He had been utterly, painfully alone.
In the present, Min adds, “I passed the psych evaluation, by the way. I’m fine now.”
Ryan does not appear to be assured. His knuckles are bone-white, clenched around his mug.
“Anyway…” Min sighs. “For a while I was just drifting from place to place. Or running away from something. Nearly got arrested, like, several times.” Fucking Judge Morpho and all those jerks from the Wild West car. “I ran into some shitty people, and I also met some decent people too. About a year into it I met another drifter, Kez, and she traveled with me while I was trying to make my way back. Then I got badly hurt, and I couldn’t go anywhere for several months while I recovered. But after that I was able to finally catch a train home.”
Silence.
Min swirls the dregs of his chai. “It’s… I know it might not sound like… I know how bad it was for me to disappear like that. I swear, I tried to find a way home over and over, and I tried to find ways to contact…well, anyone, but nothing I did seemed to get through. I would have come back sooner if I could.”
Ryan is taking a long, long sip of his hot chocolate, eyebrows furrowed so deeply they might leave wrinkles. His eyes move towards Min’s neck. Min doesn’t need a mirror to know what Ryan’s looking at. Ryan wouldn’t have been able to see it in the half-dark of the alcove, or the city streets, but here in the warmly-lit coffeehouse it’s much more obvious.
Just under the corner of Min’s jaw, down the side of his neck, are four jagged white crescents gouged into the pale skin. Though they’ve healed over by now, it isn’t hard to imagine the severity of the original wound… or how much worse it could have nearly been.
Ryan sets his mug on the ceramic coaster with a clink . “Well,” he says, “shit.”
Min lets out a burst of laughter, and hopes that it doesn’t seem too self-conscious when he folds his shirt collar up to hide the scars. “Yeah,” he wheezes, “yeah, it really fucking sucked. I can barely remember half of it, and I wish I didn’t remember the rest.” Except the parts with Kez, of course. And maybe a few moments with Morgan, but not that many.
“Then I won’t make you,” Ryan is quick to tell him. “I’m just happy you’re back now.”
“Me too,” Min says. “What about you?”
“What about me?” Ryan leans back, cocking an eyebrow.
“How have you been? Where have you been? What have you been doing?” Of course Min’s been following Ryan’s career as best he can, but none of that is as exciting as hearing it from Ryan himself.
But Ryan shrugs, uncharacteristically modest. “Eh, what’s there to say? I’ve been writing songs, traveling, playing shows. Doing what I gotta to get by.” He runs his finger around the rim of his mug, wiping up flecks of whipped cream. “There’s nothing else worth talking about.”
Min shakes his head, laughing in disbelief. “Dude, it seems like you’re more than getting by. Like, everywhere I’ve asked around, people can’t run out of good things to say about your music. And they’re right! I mean, I know I ruined it at the end—”
“You didn’t ruin anything,” Ryan cuts in, eyes flashing.
“—But I was still there for most of the show, and Ryan, it was unbelievable. You…” Min searches for the right words. “Everything about you. The way you sing, the way you carry yourself, the way you play on stage. It’s all so different, and I mean that in a good way. You’ve grown so much in just a few years. I couldn’t look away.”
There’s a complicated look on Ryan’s face; he turns away slightly, scoffing, but there’s something shy in his expression, as though seeking Min out.
“And I mean that literally, too,” Min adds. “I loved your music so much I had to get closer, I even forgot that I’m terrified of crowds now. I loved all of it. Though I wish I’d at least been able to hear you finish that last song.”
“Oh, that,” Ryan chuckles, pushing a lock of hair behind his ear. When did he turn so red? “Don’t worry about that. You’d already heard enough of it to get the gist, I think. I was feeling really weak when I wrote it. Sappy stuff.”
“Yeah?” Min smiles, leaning forward on his elbows. “Anyway, Mr. ‘nothing else worth talking about,’ don’t tell me you never went to any parties or got up to anything reckless and stupid as soon as you left your parents’ house. Seriously, not one ill-advised prank? Attempted flirting gone wrong? Locking yourself in a stranger’s bathroom and escaping out the window because you broke the toilet handle while there was a line of people waiting outside—”
“ STOP , oh my god,” Ryan protests. “That happened once and nobody recognized me afterward, anyway!”
“Because we weren’t supposed to be there, Ryan! We were sophomores crashing a senior party!”
“I was crashing the party. You were hiding out back because you were too scared to crash the party.”
“Well, that worked out for you, didn’t it? Who else would have seen you in time to catch you when you climbed out the window of the second floor bathroom? ”
“Okay, okay, maybe you’ve got a point,” Ryan groans, covering his face in his hands. “Maybe you’re not entirely wrong.”
“Oh, so you did terrorize another stranger’s bathroom while I was gone—”
“ Not about that. Why do you have to phrase it like that? But—” Ryan peeks between the gap of his fingers, one eye sparking deviously. “I… might have hidden six pounds of raw beef inside a college dean’s 4000-dollar leather couch. As a prank. And also out of spite. But the jackass had it coming, I promise.”
One story leads to another, and another. Ryan eases into his old tendencies for exaggeration and drama, and Min-Gi is happy just to observe: Ryan’s hands animating the action; Ryan’s voice shifting pitch slightly as he imitates different characters; Ryan’s hair and glasses bouncing on his face. It’s no less hypnotizing a performance than his earlier work on stage.
The minutes turn to hours, and the stories turn to less-organized rambling. They find themselves talking about everything that could possibly come to mind just to keep on talking. Well, that’s how it feels to Min, anyway. But, more importantly, it feels good . Talking to Ryan always feels good. It’s a relief this much hasn’t changed.
“I’m just surprised you haven’t been arrested for any of the stunts you got up to,” Min says, as the cafe starts to empty around them, the lone barista cleaning up the counter.
Ryan’s eyes twinkle. “Don’t you mean you’re impressed?”
“Sure,” Min snorts, “I’m very impressed that you didn’t get arrested while I was gone.”
“Psh. You say that like I couldn’t have found a way to get arrested even under your supervision,” Ryan says. “And if I did, I’d just make you post my bail.”
“Wow, and I thought you said you had enough of your own money these days?”
“I am! Thanks for reminding me.” Ryan beams, all sunshine-y and shiteating. “I am so financially secure right now. I’ll have you know, I’m so financially secure, I would even pay you back for posting my bail.”
“Yeah, that’s how you know you’ve made it to the big bucks,” Min scoffs, chin propped up in his palm. “You can actually pay me back now for all the times I covered for you. Like every time you wanted diner fries with milkshakes and forgot your wallet at home.”
“Hey, don’t put words in my mouth!” Ryan grins. But suddenly, his expression stiffens, and he sits up straighter. “Although, if you want , I could make it up to you. Maybe I could take you out for dinner. I mean, more than once, obviously. As many times as it takes to pay you back. That’s probably fair, right?”
“Uh.” Min blinks, not sure where the cadence of the conversation went, or what to make of the gleam in Ryan’s eyes. “No, that’s… fine. I wasn’t seriously going to hold it against you, man.”
Ryan pauses, like a rhythm broken. Then he coughs, and the strange vibes are gone. “Well, uh. Anyway. I think this place closes soon. Let’s talk more outside.”
Grabbing the cuff of Min’s sleeve, Ryan leads them out of the coffeehouse and out to the sidewalk, standing under a streetlamp.
“Um, so.” Ryan breathes out in a rush. He raises his chin, face catching the lime-white light. “So… how long will you be in town? I have a couple of shows coming up next week, but I can cancel them, seriously. I just wanna make sure we can make the most of our time while you’re here.”
He’s still holding Min’s sleeve, twisting the fabric in his grip. Otherwise, he’s the picture of composure, with an easygoing smile.
Once again, Min’s anxiety returns. He knows what he should say. He’s been rehearsing this since before he left the Train. It’s on the tip of his tongue.
But these past few hours, just catching up with Ryan, it’s all felt… surprisingly normal, despite the years apart. It feels easy. Too easy. If Min brings up the Big Thing, the thing he came here for…what if it ruins everything?
Maybe it’s safer to stay like this. To be friends with Ryan from a distance, instead of abruptly forcing himself back into his life completely.
And there’s Ryan, smiling up at Min right now, looking just as cool and confident ( and beautiful… ) as he did onstage, even though his hair’s frizzing up in the humid night, and black and blue tearstains have dried on his cheeks. There’s just an air about him. Something magical.
Really, Ryan must be doing fine on his own— he must have already met tons of talented musicians and potential collaborators on the road. So if he’s still going solo, it’s because he wants to be, right?
What is Min doing here? What did Min think he would find? What could Min ever have to offer him?
“Min? You in there?” Ryan’s eyes are shimmering.
Min stares at him, helpless.
Ryan cocks his head. “I was just asking how long you were gonna stay.” He raises a single perfect eyebrow, fatally charming.
Once Min opens his mouth, his heart leaps out before his brain and blurts: “As long as you want me to.”
Ryan bursts into laughter, and Min wants to shrivel up and die. “Seriously though, how—” But then he looks a little unsure. “I mean— what? Min?”
“I. I…” Well, fuck it, he’s here now. No going back.
He steps back, pulling his sleeve away from Ryan’s grip so he can face him head-on. Ryan looks down at his now-empty hand, eyebrows knitting, then at Min.
“Ryan.” Min begins with fists clenched, and then carefully unclenched, at his sides. “When we were kids, and we talked up all the places we’d go together…” He comes up with empty air, tries again. “I wanted that, too. I didn’t want to leave you alone onstage. I didn’t want to leave you at all. I know how it must have looked, but… I was scared, because you said we were leaving in a week and it was happening all at once, and I couldn’t find the right words, and I didn’t want to break down in front of you, so I ran. But I felt so ashamed. I didn’t know how to make it better and then you were gone— and I—”
The closer he reaches for the memory, the sharper it stings. He’s over this, mostly, there’s just a tender spot that’s always going to be a little sore. But—
Ryan looks like he’s been punched in the gut.
—this isn’t what Min wants to talk about. It’s not the point.
“What I’m trying to say is… I always wanted to go with you. That was never the issue.” Min releases his breath. “I just thought… that since you left, you didn’t need me. Or want me around, not after the way I ditched you. And if that was the case, I didn’t think there was any point in explaining myself. Or hoping things would be different. So… I gave up.”
“Min,” Ryan says.
Min waits, but Ryan doesn’t say any more. So he continues.
“But, y’know, it’s been a few years. With everything that’s happened—” don’t get too heavy, don’t make him feel bad for you, just be honest— “I’ve had time to think about what I want to do with my life.”
“And.” Ryan’s voice cracks on the syllable. He coughs, “And that is?”
“I want to spend it with you ,” Min says. His heart is shaking in his ribcage, either terrified or exhilarated, he can’t tell. But it’s true, it’s true, it’s true . ”Making music. Like we always dreamed of doing.”
Ryan’s eyes are bulging out of his head.
“This isn’t a whim, or some wack reaction to what happened to me,” Min goes on. “I always wanted this, and I’m telling you now. What we had was important to me. So is being a musician. I’m done pretending that I could’ve been happy committing myself to anything or anyone else.”
It’s true, it’s true, it’s true, singing out from the soul, a chest unlocked, a window finally open.
“I know it’s been a long time,” he adds, “and this is absolutely a big thing to bring up when we’ve just met again. But it’s been on my mind. I’d rather talk about this up front, and figure out where we are now. So. Yeah. If you’ll still have me.”
Ryan hasn’t moved. Min prepares himself for the worst. Or, at least, for a very awkward end to this night.
Because Ryan, by all appearances, has moved on. Min kind of figured this would be the case. Frankly, if Ryan decides to tell Min to fuck off for being presumptuous, for trying to insert himself back into his life when Min already had his chance and gave it up, well… Min plans to stand there and let him. He’s had plenty of time on the road to predict all of Ryan's possible rejections. It's gonna hurt, but…
He still needs to ask. He won’t be able to move on unless he makes himself ask. To be honest, the way he wasn’t when things fell apart three years ago.
Still no sign from Ryan. No change in his expression. Although his eyes seem to have gotten even rounder, somehow.
Min keeps his head up. “You don’t have to say yes,” he says, as calmly as possible. “I’m not expecting you to. I’m not going to go to pieces if you say no. I’m still going to be a musician, with or without you. And I won’t stop being your friend, either. But this is what I want.”
Ryan opens his mouth, closes it. He clutches the strap of his guitar. His hair’s coming loose from his ponytail, falling over his face as he stares at his boots.
Quietly, he says: “You… still want to play with me?”
Min’s got a lump in his throat. “Yeah, man.”
At first, Ryan doesn’t move, except to wipe a hand across his eyes.
But when he raises his head, there’s a smile growing there, wide and toothy, like a little kid. “You really want to?”
Oh, it’s impossible not to smile back. Min nods, and butterflies fill his stomach.
Ryan blinks, then begins to laugh, undeniably giddy. “Sorry, you’re asking if I want you to? Do I want you to? ” He’s nodding along with Min, like a bobblehead, hair flying everywhere. “Yes! Yes! Of course I want you to!!!”
He rushes two steps forward to grip both of Min’s sleeves in his hands, bouncing on the toes of his boots. “Are you kidding? Yes! This is great! This is all I’ve ever— as if I’d say no! Min-Gi!!! ”
All the air whooshes out of Min in palpable relief. Well, maybe it’s the relief he’s feeling, or maybe it’s because Ryan is shaking him back and forth so hard Min can’t help but laugh, dizzy and thrilled.
“Fair warning,” he gets out between bursts of laughter, “I’m nowhere near the performer you are.”
“Well, duh,” Ryan scoffs. “I’ve got a head start by over three years.” He releases Min, chuckling. Then he dusts off Min’s shoulders, hands smoothing out the wrinkles on the front of Min’s shirt. “Just stick with me, we’ll make a rock star out of you yet. You’ll see! Min-Gi, this is gonna be amazing!”
He looks up, eyes sparkling, hands on Min’s chest. (This is fine. This is completely fine. Min’s not sweating or having heart palpitations or anything.) But just as quickly, Ryan clears his throat, face red. “...I, uh, no rush though. We can go at your pace. I don’t know if you’d feel ready to play live to hundreds of people yet…”
“Maybe not yet, no,” Min giggles. Why is he giggling. Why is Ryan still touching his chest.
Ryan nods, hair flouncing. “But… we can still practice together, you know? And we could write songs, and travel— I can show you all the stuff I had to learn on the road, there’s a bunch of little things you gotta pick up on when it comes to this scene— you really want this?”
His hands stiffen, like he’s about to pull them away.
“I do,” Min says, unable to keep the smile out of his voice, and not even trying. “Seriously.”
“Oh man. Oh, man,” Ryan says, like Min’s handed him a winning lottery ticket, or a Grammy award. “I— I— ahaha, shit.” He shoves his palms over his eyes, inhaling with a sniff. “It’s uh, getting pretty late, isn’t it? Let’s talk about this more tomorrow. I can’t wait. Where are you staying? I’ll walk you back.”
“I— hadn’t gotten around to booking a room yet,” Min says, rubbing his neck. “I kind of headed straight for your show as soon as I got off the bus.” He’s not going to tell Ryan how long he spent trying to get the right outfit together. And for some reason, Ryan’s smiling even wider now. “I’m sure there’s hotels around here with vacancies, so I should—”
“Stay with me,” Ryan interrupts, bright and earnest, already gripping Min’s sleeve cuff. “I mean, you can stay over with me. Come on!”
Min can barely keep up as Ryan pulls him along, running down the street. Ryan is vibrating with each step he takes, like his bones are made of pogo sticks.
As Ryan leads him across crosswalks, through alleys, past rows and rows of townhouses and apartments, it occurs to Min he has no idea where exactly Ryan’s living. A hotel? A bus? Maybe some kind of trailer?
But in the end, as Ryan brings them to a stop in a fenced-in parking lot, it’s a lot simpler than that. A lot simpler.
Min laughs when he sees it, out of surprise more than anything else. “You’ve still got your dad’s van?”
Ryan shoves his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched as he strolls up to the double-doors of the trunk. “Well, yeah. If it ain’t broke…” He winces, pulling out his keys. “I mean. It has broke. But then I fixed it. And fixed it again. And… so on.” With a huff, he closes his fist around the door handle. “Look. Maybe it’s not glamorous or whatever you expected. But when you’re traveling alone all the time, it doesn’t really matter how you’re living or where you’re living, okay? It’s just about getting from one point to another. All rock stars get used to this kind of thing. So if you’re thinking—”
Then he catches Min-Gi’s eye— Min looks back at him, patiently— and his shoulders slump. Ryan clears his throat. “Uh, you know what? I can get us a hotel for the night.”
Min shakes his head. “Nah, this is fine.” He puts his hand next to Ryan’s on the door handle. “Isn’t this what we always said we’d do? Live out of your dad’s van?”
Ryan lets out a big whoosh of air. Min smiles at him, and adds, “Besides, I know you’re the rock star here, but I’ve been on the move too, remember? If you can sleep like this, so can I.”
Chuckling, Ryan opens the door an inch. He looks inside, blanches, and shuts the door again. Min-Gi raises an eyebrow, but Ryan doesn’t explain; he does shut the door again when Min tries to open it himself. Then, finally, Ryan sighs and throws it wide open.
It’s… fine. With the look on Ryan’s face, Min thought he’d left a dead body or a pile of old takeout or maybe just like, a lot of trash in the trunk. But there’s nothing like that. There’s… really not much at all.
Like, yes, the basics are there. There’s a mattress, and a blanket, and one pillow. Leaning on one wall of the van, there’s a couple of duffle bags, and a cooler. Ryan quietly slides his guitar case along the other wall, next to a couple of amplifiers and a box full of everything else: assorted cables and pedals and tools, and several weathered notebooks. There’s also just a lot of scraps of paper and balled up notes and broken guitar strings and crumpled cellophane wrappers and loose guitar picks and bolts and screws and pens and pencils laying around on the floor.
Okay, maybe it’s not actually empty, but… well, whatever. Min hops into the van, taking a seat on the edge of the mattress as he unlaces his runners. The thing is, it’s not the mess itself that bothers Min. (It’s the wrong kind of mess, and there should be more of it— Ryan’s been road-tripping in this van for over three years. Shouldn’t he have more… stuff? Not just the essentials?)
The mess seems to bother Ryan, though. Visibly alarmed, as though someone else must have snuck into his van and left trash all over the place, Ryan starts trying to gather it up in his hands before looking around and realizing just how much of it there is. And his gaze moves from the bare mattress, to the single blanket, and then to Min, and he swallows. “Uh, Min, I…”
But Min’s been distracted by signs of life. The ceiling is covered in polaroids and stickers, doodles and postcards, and a few festival posters and illustrated flyers for other bands. It reminds him of Ryan’s old room back in Powell Lake; Ryan had a similar collage on the wall by his bed. He finds his eyes pulled to one group of photos in particular: a trio of polaroids featuring some very impressive synthesizers. They’re all labeled by model in Ryan’s scrawled handwriting— a Memorymoog, an Oberheim OB-Xa, a Prophet 5— these are the kind of synths real musicians have, the kind Min used to read about in magazines but never got to have for himself.
Was Ryan looking at these for any particular reason? Min’s heart is in his throat, but then his thoughts get scattered when he hears the doors lock shut, and Ryan himself sits next to him, unlacing his boots and shoving them aside.
“...I’m used to living alone, so I don’t really keep a lot of extra sheets or anything,” Ryan says, avoiding Min’s eyes. He’s taking his hair out of the ponytail, brushing his fingers through the tangles with nervous energy. “But like, I can get more tomorrow. Or we could still get a room for the night. If you want something more comfortable. That offer’s still on the table.”
Min is already unbuttoning his outer shirt so he can lay back. He finds his eyes following the motions of Ryan’s hands, how they bury deep in the dark, fluffy waves. His own hands begin to feel restless, so he folds his arms and rests them under his head.
“Honestly, this is already ten times better than most of the places I had to sleep in these past few years,” Min says. It really is. It’s enclosed and locked, for one, and there’s a real mattress. He yawns,“So I’m fine.”
Ryan whips his head around, staring at him hard. After a moment, he shoves at Min’s shoulders until Min lifts up enough for Ryan to push the lone pillow under his head. As for himself, he removes his puffy red jacket and bunches it up to use as a makeshift cushion.
Setting his glasses aside, he grabs a towel from somewhere and scrubs the worst of the messy makeup off his face. When he flops back down, face clear, his hair spills loose across the mattress like ink pouring over the fabric.
Ryan mutters, “...should get to be more than ‘fine’.”
Min doesn’t remember falling asleep. As soon as his head hits the pillow, it’s so soft, and he’s safe, and Ryan’s here, and… Min can’t even muster the will to say “thank you” or “goodnight” before he’s out.
The last thing he sees is Ryan’s dark hair so close to his fingertips, and Ryan’s eyes gleaming, full of something indescribable, and it seems like he wants to say something but then…
Ryan can’t sleep. Doesn’t occur to him to try.
How can he? He can’t stop turning over to look at the person beside him, the warm body breathing in and out, alive and real and safe and here , so close Ryan could wrap his arms around him and never, ever let him go. Just the sight of Min makes Ryan’s heart thump so wildly it feels like it’s going to shatter his whole rib cage, and even if it did he’d still be overjoyed.
He hooks two fingers onto the cuff of Min-Gi’s wrinkled white shirt, and wishes he was holding his hand instead.
Min sleeps on his side, facing Ryan. His arms are folded close to his chest, near his heart. But one of his hands has caught a lock of Ryan’s hair, fingers flexing slightly around the black strands. Ryan indulges himself in the idea that maybe, even unconsciously, Min-Gi is trying to hold onto him too.
He scoots himself a little closer. Min-Gi makes a noise, but it doesn’t seem like distress, so Ryan waits, and settles there, his face barely centimeters away from Min’s. They’re not touching, but he can feel the warmth from Min radiating through the bedsheet. It would be really easy if Ryan just stayed there, and maybe he’d wake up and Min would be holding him, and then Ryan could pass it off as just something that happened in their sleep, haha, isn’t it hilarious? Isn’t it a total laugh? Just a joke, duh, because it’s so funny Ryan’s been sleeping alone for so long and hasn’t even tried to change that in years. Just a funny accident. So funny.
Definitely not something Ryan has thought about for three years straight, and definitely not what Ryan is thinking about right now when he looks at Min’s shoulders and notices how they’re wider than his own and, hey, maybe it would be nice, to lean back, slot his own frame to fit alongside Min’s, especially with those arms around him, and just be there, and…
Definitely not.
…Yeah, he’s not fooling anyone.
Man, he needs to get a grip. And soon. He can’t go on like this if Min really is here for the long-term, Ryan might actually die of embarrassment. It’s a miracle that hasn’t already happened multiple times tonight. Shit, Ryan hasn’t cried so hard in years, much less multiple times in a few hours, and Min is a good friend for not complaining about all the drool and snot and runny makeup Ryan dribbled over him.
And he should really scoot away now and give Min his space, but…
Min makes another noise, lips parting as he mumbles in his sleep. It’s hypnotizing. His hands twitch, fingers tangling further with Ryan’s hair.
But up close, Ryan sees something that sobers him.
He’d felt it earlier when he gripped Min’s hand in the theater— Min’s hands are covered in tiny, nearly invisible scars. One of his fingers on his left hand is just slightly crooked; it curls at an odd angle when it twitches. Like it had been broken at some point and then healed back wrong. Min doesn’t seem to notice it, but maybe he’s had enough time to get used to it. That bothers Ryan, almost as much as it bothers him when he looks at the marks on Min’s neck, so close to the vein. What else has Min been through?
Min is so… familiar, and so different. The last time Ryan saw him, they weren’t quite kids and not quite grown ups. Now at twenty-one, Min’s got a definite maturity to his appearance. His face no longer has the slight softness that Ryan always wanted to squish between his hands— not that Ryan doesn’t still want to do that— but it’s still Min's face, open and kind. It’s still Min. He’s just much taller now. And his shoulders are wider. (Ryan knows he’s kind of fixating on that, but. It’s nice. Really nice.)
Is it really because he’s grown so much? Or does he just seem larger, now that he no longer hunches his shoulders inward, now that he stands to his full height without any self-consciousness? Min-Gi carries himself so calmly and walks so lightly, and gives really, really good hugs. When Min held him earlier, Ryan felt surrounded, safe, overwhelmed with something sweeter than homesickness.
He hasn’t felt like that since… since…
How many times has he dreamed some version of tonight’s events? How many times has he woken up alone?
Ryan lays awake, and traces every inch of Min into memory, and hopes and begs and pleads that this dream won’t be gone in the morning, too.