Chapter Text
The same day Namjoon shaves his head, he finds himself throwing up in a dingy club bathroom, tears stinging his eyes and blurring his vision, when he looks up and sees the words written on the wall, The Words, surrounded by a halo of too-bright light, almost like some misguided, too-late guardian spirit is trying to help him turn his life around.
In this setting, the words are just as beautiful as a hopeless romantic, even a jaded one, would expect.
If he’d been a little more sober, guard up, maybe he would have dismissed them as trite, but something in the easy, unassuming rhythm pierces his tender heart like an arrow, gets right into him with its smuggled-in sentiment, stinging him before he can close his heart against it.
I want something real
But ‘forever’ is a sandcastle
Collapsing with the gentlest wave
The castles we built together
While dreaming of forever
We’re the ones who let them wash away
Amid the scrawls of marker graffiti and scratched-in curse words on the red tile wall, that single stanza is like a block of clean moonlight, a little window among the chaos, small crowded lines squeezed close together in white paint pen. Namjoon can tell whoever put it there tried to write neatly, but he can also see the places at the end of each line where the characters run together, a quickness in the hand that the writer couldn’t quite suppress.
“What the fuck.” It occurs to him that the tears he thought were just a momentary physical symptom are actually rolling down his face now, as he kneels on the dirty floor like a supplicant praying to a god he doesn’t believe in.
He thinks he’s heard the words on the wall somewhere before. Are they from a song, or a book he read a long time ago?
It’s something about that metaphor. Maybe he really has heard it before, or maybe the words are just so apt for his life right now that it feels like his own secret fears spoken back to him. He’s well aware that his own sandcastles are currently collapsing around him, his whole life descending into an undignified shambles, and maybe that’s why it’s hitting him like this, but—
He doesn’t remember the last time a line of writing made him cry. Can’t even remember the last time he felt truly moved by any words, whether his own or someone else’s. He almost forgot how much he loves that feeling, how much he used to chase it, reading or writing ravenously all night, unable to put down his book or his pen, chasing that full-body emotional high that only the right words in the right order could draw out of him, like a complicated combination lock finally cracking him open and letting him feel something real.
I want something real.
That’s all he used to want, too. Now he doesn’t know what he wants anymore.
A stable, stress-free career? Critical acclaim? The respect of his peers? Or maybe, pathetically, just to have someone to come home to at night?
Like some kind of natural disaster, he’s losing it all, watching the foundational pillars of his life fall in slow dominos. Like they really were no more than sandcastles waiting to be washed away by the waves of his own disillusionment.
Whatever they built together, Iseul and he, must have been left to wash away a while ago, and he didn’t even realize it. He thought they were building something real together, reaching the next step in life hand in hand like clearing levels in a video game.
When he thinks about it that way, he feels so stupid. Treating his longest relationship like a static achievement that would keep growing simply by its own inertia, requiring nothing more to maintain it. His relationship with her, his connections in the writing world, his passion for writing in general— like each one was a checkbox on a to-do list instead of something he was meant to cultivate, something that was supposed to give his life meaning.
When did he stop caring about everything that used to be so important to him?
Namjoon at age twenty would have scoffed. His life now would have been incomprehensible to him then— the Namjoon of now, about to turn thirty with a broken-off engagement, a stalled writing career he can’t convince himself to care about, and nothing left that he even wants to say enough to motivate him to write.
He runs his hand over the back of his head, feeling the warmth of his own skin through the prickles of his freshly shaved hair. He doesn’t know why he did it, really. He wonders if that’s a cliche too: a desperate man too old for a quarter-life crisis and too young for a mid-life one, shaving off all his hair and getting drunk off his ass, crying in the bathroom of a gay bar that as a shy too-in-his-head bisexual, he’d never had the guts to enter before now.
He used to think of himself as precocious, hungry for experiences beyond his years, but now he’s wondering if he’s actually a late bloomer, if he put off all the wrong things. If he should have made this decision when he was still the right person, before everything went wrong.
He imagines telling that younger version of himself that he stopped writing poetry because it didn’t sell and wasn’t going to lead to the next big break in his career, that he started writing dense queer philosophical novels with surreal meandering plots that dreamed of being poetry instead, that he mostly lost touch with all the other writers that meant anything to him, the artists he used to look up to the most who disappeared into obscurity while his star kept rising and rising, rising until it lost all meaning, until he couldn’t see the point anymore.
That’s what he’s doing, kneeling on the floor feeling apologetic to his past self and regretting the long chain of seemingly sensible decisions that brought him here, when someone pounds on the bathroom door, and he remembers that he’s in public, at a dive bar, apparently following the reckless impulse to meet and bond with other queer people outside the stifling, narrow high-art world he’s let himself get trapped in, but actually ended up crying on the floor in the bathroom after reading a random snatch of poetry or lyrics or whatever on the wall, a missive that could have been sent directly from his past self to the Namjoon of here and now, the Namjoon who let his entire life get fucked up because he gave up on everything that ever mattered to him.
“Namjoon-ah. I know you’re in there.” Even muffled by the locked door, there’s no mistaking the bright voice of his oldest hyung, the only person who’s never abandoned him, even when he sold out on his own dreams.
On second thought, maybe he’s being a little melodramatic right now.
“Seokjin-hyung?” Even when he stands to opens the door, voice bleary, head spinning, to find the exact person he expected to see on the other side, it doesn’t feel real, somehow. His eyes go a little out of focus trying to take him in, his uncommonly beautiful hyung, long shining black hair, sparkly gold eyeshadow left over from the drag show he probably just came from, vaguely imperious expression that’s not quite a frown, not quite a pout. He looks so like himself that Namjoon kind of wants to cry again. He missed him. “Did I summon you in my hour of need?”
“In a manner of speaking.” He tilts his head, glossy hair spilling elegantly over his shoulder, revealing the distractingly statuesque column of his neck. “Namjoon-ah, I live above this bar, you know. You posted a thirst trap with your head shaved and your location on, and I came to find you before you hurt yourself too badly. Yeonjun-ah told me a beautiful man with a shaved head like a dandelion was back here crying and throwing up, and I knew it had to be you.”
“You live here?” Namjoon feels slow and silly, like Seokjin is telling one of his long elaborate jokes with an incomprehensible punchline and acting like it should make sense.
“Upstairs, sweetheart. Not in this bar.” Seokjin is twinkling at him in that way that’s not really a smile, but still makes Namjoon feel warm on the inside, and also babied a little bit, but in a good, safe way.
“Hyung.” The words come out slow, dropping heavily into the hot beer-stale air. “I think I fucked up my whole entire life.”
“Nope. That’s exactly what we’re not doing.” Seokjin puts his hand on Namjoon’s shoulder, voice and gesture brisk in that no-nonsense way Namjoon loves, except Namjoon is kind of unsteady right now so he ends up falling forward onto him, chin coming to rest on his shoulder. The fabric of Seokjin’s sweater feels soft and cozy, and he can’t help nuzzling it a little with his cheek.
“Hmm.” Seokjin clasps his hands around Namjoon’s ribcage and gives an experimental tug, which actually makes Namjoon giggle a little because it tickles. “No, I don’t think so. Too heavy. Ok, change of plans, we’re going to the basement.”
“The basement?” Seokjin’s shoulder is very comfortable, but now they’re moving, the narrow dark hallway of the bar spinning in a slightly more acceptable way than the bathroom was, because it’s not as bright. He feels like his feet are hitting the floor much harder than Seokjin’s are, somehow, but he doesn’t know how to do anything about it.
“Yes, the basement. I love you, Joon-ah, but I’m not dragging you up three flights of stairs right now.”
Namjoon accepts this, the idea of going to the basement, even though it doesn’t make any sense to him, because he trusts Seokjin and he doesn’t really think he can walk by himself right now, anyway.
He has a vivid image suddenly of himself, heading home after this, the endless bus ride from this raucous neighborhood full of life to the quiet district he lives in, his house sitting empty and dark, even the dog gone, because the dog always liked Iseul better.
“She took him, hyung. She took Pompom.” At some point, he started crying again, but he doesn’t think it’s because of the dog, not really. His sadness is gargantuan, the size of the moon, the size of a moonlit verse on the bathroom wall, the size of The Words, words big enough to stand the height of his soul, to let him stand in judgment of himself.
“You never even liked that dog. Think about it this way, now you can get a different dog, one that likes you better.”
“Oh, hyung, it’s not about the dog.” Namjoon falls sideways and crashes into the side of the staircase, smashing his arm against the railing but somehow miraculously staying upright. When did they get on the stairs?
Namjoon feels a sharp tug at the back of his shirt collar, and then his arm settles around Seokjin’s shoulders. “Here, here, hold onto me, ok, Namjoon-ah? I can’t let you die in this state, it’s too pathetic.”
“That’s what I think too, hyung.” Rather than getting offended, Namjoon feels weirdly comforted that they’re on the same page about this. He definitely doesn’t want to die like this, at his absolute lowest point.
Does that mean there’s still hope for him? It does, doesn’t it?
“Hyung, do you think I can make- can I make new sandcastles, hyung?”
They stumble down the last few stairs through a looming doorway, into more darkness that leaves Namjoon reeling for a moment, free-falling inside his head, like his brain has come loose and turned into a balloon bouncing around the ceiling of an empty room.
“You can make whatever you want, sweetheart.” Seokjin gives the back of his head a fond rub, static tension between the palm of his hand and the fresh stubble of Namjoon’s silvery new buzz cut. What had Seokjin said? Like a dandelion. Maybe now he can grant wishes. He likes that idea.
Can someone whose life is as fucked up as Namjoon’s really hope to grant any wishes, though?
And what if— “Hyung. But what if I build them and they just fall over again? What if there’s no- no true thing in life, no sure thing—”
Seokjin is manhandling him down into what seems to be an old armchair, the back and arms dusty and plush. Namjoon lets his head drop back against the softness, the prickles of his hair catching against the fuzzy fabric. This room is so dark, full of people and noise and the familiar scent of beer, but why is it so dark? It’s like a bar with the lights off.
“Hopeful thoughts.” He taps Namjoon’s forehead lightly with his finger, moving his hand with a sort of flourish, like a fairy godmother granting a wish. “That’s why we’re down here. Hopeful thoughts.”
The moment Seokjin finishes speaking, the dark room fills with light, the wall opposite Namjoon flooding with a brilliant image.
Quiet music, traditional strings plucked, and a pale star-like shape, soft focus, colors gently resolving into a sunrise-petaled lotus flower adrift on a pond, hands reaching to cup it tenderly, hands that are the same shade of blushing pearl-pink as the flower.
Words slip across the screen, white handwriting on a soft lens flare, water and dancing rainbows forming the backdrop for the title, easing it into the senses without breaking from the atmosphere. It comes in a quick certain scrawl, an invisible hand dashing off the words:
SDL Collective Presents
A Gloss Film
A Gloss film. There’s something delightfully tactile about the phrase, something smooth and bright and inviting, like the light on water in the opening sequence.
The image cuts from the title, gentle music abruptly dropping away to ambient noise, the familiar street sounds of Seoul, rush of traffic and distant chatter. A young man is on screen, turned in profile, quietly laughing at someone off camera. His loose white shirt captures the light and reflects it up softly onto the warm skin of his face, the wild brown curls of his hair. He seems a little too beautiful to be an ordinary person, but he’s also sitting on a rooftop at golden hour, which is its own type of beauty.
The camera cuts smoothly between two young men on the roof as they weave through lines of white laundry hanging in the wind, both of them beautiful in the late afternoon light, glowing like golden gods as they play with each other, peeking out from behind the waving white fabric and laughing. Namjoon can’t think of another word for what they’re doing, other than play. There’s something clearly flirtatious in it, but also a guileless innocence at the same time. It fills him with a strange contradictory ache, an envious longing but also a fragile happiness, that they have something so tender, that such a sweet moment was caught on camera for him to see.
At intervals between shots of the men in the beautiful rooftop tableau, superimposed over their soft laughter, full screen shots of more handwritten text appear against simple backgrounds of stray cut flowers or open windows.
For some reason
we’ve drifted apart
The words intensify the nervous ache in Namjoon’s chest, the knowing sense that what the men onscreen share must be fragile, easily lost. Love like that is always hard to hold onto.
But we, we
we decided not to blame each other
The scene changes to a different pair of men, cooking a big meal in a kitchen, moving from the stove to the counter and back, going around each other with the familiar ease and grace of people who know each other well and do this often. Almost like a dance. From their body language they must be joking with each other, or talking loudly, but their voices are drowned out by the quick sprightly soundtrack of a piano playing lightly and rapidly, rising and falling like flowing water or laughter. It’s cozy and it makes Namjoon feel at home, feel safe. One of the men has his back to the camera, standing at the stove, a mane of shoulder-length dark hair hiding his face completely, but Namjoon can tell from the way his shoulders shake that he’s laughing.
We said that
nothing could ever tear us apart
The image transitions smoothly again, three men this time, two of them leaning close over an old piano, like they’re listening deeply and speaking into each other’s ears. Both have long dark hair, and one of them is the man from the kitchen, his back to the camera again, head bowed, one hand sliding lightly along the piano keys, picking out an easy tune while he talks, stroking and dancing over the keys with strong fingers.
Namjoon is definitely drunk but he thinks there’s something sensual about it, something strangely intimate, even in the way the third man in the room watches them fondly from off to the side, smiling to himself and pausing in scrolling on his phone to snap a quick photo of them, like it’s second nature.
There’s an ease between them all that defies the heavy-hearted words, that makes Namjoon question who exactly they’re referring to when the next stanza comes on screen.
I can’t help but fear
that we’ll keep growing further apart
The next shot is a close-up, hands on shoulders, dappled sunlight sliding over golden skin. A strong-looking hand with a few small scattered tattoos is squeezing and massaging someone else’s neck and shoulder, as the sun and shade of trees overhead trace a hypnotic pattern over their skin. It’s visually arresting, the entire frame filled with rhythm and light, though not overwhelmingly.
The scene cuts to another closeup, the man with the curly hair from the laundry scene, lying down with his eyes closed, head resting on someone’s lap. The lap owner’s lean, graceful fingers comb through his hair, gently playing with the windblown curls, hand moving absently but still careful not to catch or tangle. From the expression on the resting man’s face, he must be asleep, or incredibly relaxed. His face is still, utterly smooth, no trace of tension at his brow.
The image changes again, another close-up of hands, this time cutting and sanding wood. There’s something relaxing about this scene too, the deliberate rhythmic energy, the careful sure movements. It’s as though somehow, Namjoon can tell this person who is so careful with his hands is that careful in all aspects of life, whether with other things or other people.
The words don’t intrude as a separate shot this time, simply writing onto the screen over the footage of the carefully working hands.
Even if the world doesn’t go our way
even if we fall apart
The camera is pulling back ever so slowly, bit by bit allowing more into the frame. Namjoon can’t see enough yet to know what’s being made out of wood, whether something small or a small part of something big.
Abruptly, the scene changes again, sea and sky, whoever’s holding the camera standing so close to the water that the shore isn’t visible in frame. It’s disorienting, and also a little magical. The camera is moving more, obviously handheld as the person filming walks toward where a group of men are playing and laughing in the surf, splashing and dodging, embodying the essence of a carefree trip to the beach with friends. Namjoon recognizes them all from their brief appearances throughout the film, though the long-haired man at the piano is missing, the same one from the kitchen who didn’t show his face. Namjoon senses instinctively that he must be the one behind the camera.
Something about the way he watches them, his friends, the way the camera lazily tracks their movement imparts a warmth, a gentle anticipation of what they’ll each do next, like he knows their rhythm as well as his own breath.
Then, the camera moves slowly upward, leaving sea behind and filling the frame with sky, sun flaring in, halation turning the image warm and hazy as seagulls drift overhead. The words come in, pale over the bright sky, hard to see if not for the swooping path of the seagulls tracing behind them.
If I just wait a little longer
maybe we’ll meet again
The camera slowly spins back down to earth, tracking blurrily past a bright flash of horizon, coming to rest pointed toward the wet sand. The edge of a wave slides in diagonally across the frame, softening the delicate tracks of a gull that trail through the sand, wearing the little fan-shaped marks away into faint blurred impressions, then into nothing.
Time may be a wave
washing everything away with the tide
The laughter and shouting grow distant under the soft swell of piano music and the ambient sound of waves, as though the men offscreen are moving further away from the bearer of the camera.
Even still
when you remember
don’t forget to come find me
The image stays fixed, edge of the waves sweeping slowly on and offscreen, sounds of the seagulls and distant laughter just audible over the constant shush of the sea, but Namjoon can’t really see the credits roll on screen through his tears.
He’s crying again, to his own surprise. He feels good, like something frozen in him has finally melted, has finally found the flame it was yearning for.
The lights go up a little, not much, just enough to see. He was so taken by the world of the film that he completely forgot he was sitting in a sweaty basement full of men, queer men all around him sipping beer and colorful cocktails, leaning toward each other and starting to talk again in earnest now that the— short film? shared hallucination?— is over.
He remembers, hazily, that he’s here in this basement having this experience because Seokjin brought him down here, that he somehow knew this would happen and brought Namjoon to see it.
“Hyung, what? What- how..”
“Movie night, first Tuesday of the month. I thought it would be up your alley.” Seokjin throws back a swig from the bottle in his hand, which Namjoon belatedly realizes is a Milkis. “Namjoon-ah, please tell me you’re not crying again.”
Namjoon wipes his face in the most surreptitious way he can while Seokjin is just staring flatly at him, drumming his fingers on the bottle in his hand. Condensation slides down the side, small pearls shimmering in the dim light, catching the pale color of the bottle’s contents reflected through the glass.
This is what he’s been reduced to, in his sad drunken state, producing inane poetry about a Milkis bottle.
He laughs. It’s funny, somehow, more funny than sad. It makes him feel open, inhabited, by the spirit of something greater than himself, a grand artistic calling that he hasn’t felt connected to in a long time.
The Words awoke something in him, started a breaking-open process that was taken all the way by the words in the film, the poetry darting in and out of warm tender images, the intimacy hidden in the corners of each frame, passed like a whisper wrapped in a soft trill of piano keys from the men onscreen to the men sitting here in the audience, on a Tuesday night in a crowded bar during the worst crisis of Namjoon’s life so far.
“Hyung, I miss feeling like that. I miss having friendships like that, and having something to say, something real-”
“Excuse me? Friendships like what? I’m an amazing friend. I’m the best friend you’ve got.”
Seokjin sets down his bottle and raises his eyebrows like he’s about to do that thing where he gets all red and talks really fast, which makes Namjoon even less inclined to disagree with him, even if what he said weren’t true, which it sort of is.
“Yes, you are, hyung. You’re the best friend. I’m not the best friend though, I’m terrible. That’s the problem. I’ve forgotten how to feel anything, how to feel everything. I want-” He isn’t able to finish this thought, because in his eagerness he leans too far forward and ends up lurching out of his chair and onto the small side table between them that looks cute but does absolutely nothing to stop his momentum, and before he can get his balance the entire table flips over with a loud crash, sending a few empties and the rest of Seokjin’s Milkis flying.
Somehow in his struggle to regain his balance, one of Namjoon’s legs ends up tangled with the legs of the table, which impedes his ability to get up right away. “Shit, sorry hyung, I’m not even that drunk anymore, I just got dizzy for a second, sorry-”
Seokjin is kneeling in front of him and placing a quelling hand on Namjoon’s shoulder, like he’s trying to encourage him to hold still, then with his other hand he calmly removes the silly little end table from Namjoon’s leg like a magic trick. “You’re ok, Namjoon-ah. I think it’s time to go upstairs now.”
A new voice intrudes from somewhere above their heads. “Oh, shit? Is he gonna black out, Jin-hyung? Want me to call-”
“No need to call anyone, Gyu-ah. But I think we’d all appreciate your help getting him up to my place, if you’re not too busy.”
“I think I’m ok— oh, wait-” Namjoon overbalances again in his haste to stand up and show that he’s fine to walk, and falls over a little onto Seokjin, who doesn’t say anything, just lets out a sort of half-grunt-half-sigh, and puts his arm around Namjoon’s shoulders to steady them.
Standing next to them is a tall kid in his early twenties with a cute shag haircut, wearing a blindingly white tee shirt and holding an armful of empty glasses, staring at them wide-eyed with a funny frozen look on his face like he wants to laugh but is trying hard not to.
“Sorry, yeah, I can help you, just give me a sec to put these down. I just didn’t know Kim Namjoon partied like that— I mean, sorry, no offense, Namjoon-ssi.”
It vaguely occurs to him to wonder how this random gay bar employee he’s never met knows his name, much less his partying habits, but it feels like it’s all part of the strange fever dream of this evening, the way everything seems to be converging around him, the universe opening a new door that he just needs to get up the guts to walk through.
“It’s ok. I’m not partying, I’m mourning the death of my old self. But it’s fine. I have nothing else to lose. I’m going to stop being so scared all the time. I’m gonna build new sandcastles.”
“Oh.” In the middle of unloading the empty glasses, the kid drops the rest of them with a clatter and quickly claps his hand over his mouth, half-covering a wild expression that flashes across his face. He quickly regains his composure, moving his hand and clearing his throat delicately. “That sounds pretty fucking cool, to be honest. I’ll help you guys get home if you explain it some more on the way?”
“We’d appreciate that ever so much, Beomgyu-yah.” Seokjin’s voice against Namjoon’s ear is as dry as it ever gets.
Despite the nature of the situation, Namjoon truly doesn’t feel embarrassed, even by this young, much cooler than him, ostensibly queer man’s obvious fight not to laugh at Namjoon’s half-drunk attempt to explain himself. A couple weeks ago this would have been one of the most mortifying things he could imagine, but he seems to have entered a pathetic state of grace, like he really was cracked open by those words, The Words, and is now in the vulnerable fledgling stages of being reborn without any shame. I’m too young yet to know shame. Give me a few days, he thinks, wildly.
Beomgyu comes on Namjoon’s other side to help him walk, which is unnecessary but must make them all look pretty dramatic, because someone claps and cheers for them ironically as they leave the room.
“It wasn’t that bad, was it, hyung? How bad was that?”
“You’re fine, Namjoon-ah. It’s simply time for hyung’s beauty sleep.” Seokjin’s tone is brisk and firm, and if the kid who works at the bar disagrees he doesn’t say anything, just gives Namjoon’s shoulder an affectionate pat, a little like Namjoon’s a dog that he wants to get to know better.
They’re out of the basement and climbing the stairs now, and there are no more distractions, Namjoon’s mind quietly flooding with the images and sounds of the short film, this time interwoven with The Words on the bathroom wall.
They practically sing in their simplicity. That’s the way to a person’s heart, he thinks. But ‘forever’ is a sandcastle. Poetry, words stripped down to their barest essence. Don’t forget to come find me. Honest and unafraid, nothing standing in the way of that raw emotion. Not Namjoon’s own writing, dense, crowded, incomprehensible, a book the size of a brick. What on earth has he been doing?
“I’ve put myself in a cage of my own making.” He tries the words out loud, and they sound a little more bitter than he’d hoped, and also a little slurred, numb-tongued and drunk.
“Word,” Beomgyu says, and helpfully steers Namjoon away from the wall in front of them at the turn of the stairs.
He tries again. “Poetry is the soundtrack of the universe, and the lyrics are stuck in my heart like a song.”
“Whoa.” Beomgyu leans forward and peers into Namjoon’s face, like he’s waiting for some kind of slow-motion explosion. “Should I take a voice note? Is he gonna start riffing?”
Seokjin maneuvers them around the second floor railing, almost cheerful now that they’re well out of the crowd downstairs. “I’m sure he’ll keep going tomorrow when he’s sober. He’s absolutely full of words, trust me.”
Namjoon considers that. “I haven’t been full in a long time, but I think I could be again.” How long has he been making do with spiritual scraps, leaving his own heart hungry and unfed? And how many people in his life suffered from it?
He thinks again of the man in the film, his face turned away, who he suspects is also the man behind the camera. The writer of those words, deceptively simple yet so singular, just like The Words on the wall. Would he have been open to them if not for The Words and the way they struck into him so suddenly, so completely? Would he have otherwise found it all too easy to scoff at the soft sentiment, the lack of narrative, the deceptive simplicity of the film?
He thinks he might have. It’s strangely horrifying, to find himself abruptly so incredulous of his past self and his insufferable opinions, so far divided from the person he was just a few days ago, maybe even a few hours ago. But he can see clearly that there’s no going back.
“I’m sorry, hyung. I’m going to be a better human from now on. I’ll try harder.”
“Don’t apologize to me, Namjoon-ah. Nobody tries harder than you.”
Namjoon is assailed by a rush of fondness— That’s Seokjin for you. He manages to say the sweetest things while somehow simultaneously sounding like he’s roasting you.
“Trying hard in all the wrong ways, maybe. Banging my head against a wall that was never going to break.”
On his other side, Beomgyu is patting him again, expressing sympathy without words. It’s sweet. Everyone around him right now is so sweet, and kind, and caring. Namjoon is so lucky, really, to have found himself here.
It feels somehow fateful. He can’t help picturing it, sandcastles on the beach, painstakingly built up and treasured, all worn smooth and featureless by the waves, trailing down into the water grain by grain until they’re gone. Not a dramatic destruction, a lightning-struck tower— but a slow sure melting away, an inexorable succumbing to the waves of inertia and indifference.
“I think he’s a genius.”
Beomgyu looks at him again, startled, as Seokjin shoulders the door to the third floor open.
“I have to know who he is. I have to talk to him. I want to know what he thinks about everything.”
“Uhhh. Oh, you mean Gloss?”
Gloss? Oh, right. A Gloss Film. Belatedly, in his slow, clogged memory, it occurs to him that the writer of The Words and the filmmaker-poet-woodworker are probably, most likely, not the same person. But if this is all some kind of fate, then maybe, somehow, he does mean Gloss.
“I knew you’d love it,” Seokjin says matter-of-factly, flinging the door to his apartment open, now completely in his element. It’s a vast concrete-walled jumble of open space, massive windows slicing across the far wall, the city lights blaring in like they belong here. Namjoon closes his eyes and lets himself be poured onto the couch, which is miraculously long enough for all of him.
“Yes. Gloss. Do you know who he is? How I can find him?”
“I have his email!” Beomgyu whips a phone out of his back pocket, eyes alight like he holds the secrets of the universe in his hand. He does, in a way, Namjoon thinks sentimentally.
Namjoon is abruptly, rudely reminded that he is in fact drunk, as he extracts his phone from his pocket to save the precious contact information in Beomgyu’s possession and fails the first couple tries at unlocking his phone.
“I’ve never met him but he’s like, legendary. Everyone I know wishes they were in the collective, but you have to be super talented-”
“The collective?” Namjoon’s heartbeat quickens as he finally succeeds in getting his phone open. SDL Collective. Some kind of group for filmmakers or artists? It’s hard to suppress the romantic images flooding his mind, influenced by the dreamy golden hour world of the film, and his own distant dreams from his early twenties, dreams of what it would be like to be an artist, a real artist with friends as close as family who had all devoted themselves to putting something beautiful and real out into the world, to leaving this place better than they found it.
He saves the email in a blur, in a rush of sentiment, under Gloss ??? warrior poet and decisively locks his phone, just sober enough to know he’s too drunk to compose a worthy message.
He wakes up a minute or perhaps hours later to find Seokjin, perched on the couch by his feet in a plush bathrobe, playing a game on his Switch and looking incredibly well-moisturized.
“Hyung?”
There’s a weird taste in his mouth, and his body feels squished and half-melted, like a candy forgotten in a back pocket. “Where’s..”
“Beomgyu-yah? At home, probably. You passed out right in the middle of explaining the motif of the disappearing artist to him. He was incredibly disappointed, you’re going to have to tell him the rest later.”
Namjoon doesn’t remember talking about anything like that, but he does sort of remember those thoughts swirling around inside his head, a man with his back to the camera, hair lightly stirring in the breeze from an open window— wait. That wasn’t in the film, was it?
A presence and an absence at once, a mysterious man filling the frame with other people’s voices and his own words, unspoken but still so resonant, so unforgettable.
“What time is it?”
Seokjin makes a grumpy little noise at his game, and half glances at his phone. “3:47.”
“Too early for sunrise.” Namjoon has a funny feeling that this dawn will be different from the others, that when he gets to the other side of this strange endless evening he really will be reborn, as long as he isn’t too afraid to finish what he’s started.
Not too afraid to cautiously, foolhardily, with his heart on his sleeve, gather a handful of sand and start to pile it up into something new.
🦔
Twelve hours later, after he’s slept through half the day, sheepishly eaten a hearty home-cooked lunch with Seokjin, and finally taken the bus home, so hungover that he feels strangely disembodied, he’s seated in front of his laptop, at his desk where he does his writing, and he finally has something to say, so much to say in fact that he’s having trouble staying coherent.
At the risk of sounding like a crazed fanboy, I have to acknowledge that you must get letters like this all the time. By letters like this, I mean people who see one of your films and feel like a door has opened inside them, or many doors have opened all around them, reopening the lucky viewer to all the life they’ve been missing, all the inscrutable little moments of beauty that were lost to them in the half-life they’ve lived for too long.
It had started to rain in the early morning, right around the time when he finally fell asleep, and the half-cloudy, fresh blue midday light in the puddles on the ground between the bus stop and his home had felt like windows to a new place, a different person reflected in every one. Someone lighter, someone who could laugh with uncomplicated good will at the center of a party, or walk down the sidewalk holding a small child’s hand, smiling gently, serene and confident like the woman walking across the street from him in that moment.
The closer he got to his house, the more these felt like glimpses of alternate universes, places where he’d made different choices, had already worked to become a better version of himself.
Excuse me for being so forward, for reading so much into something that may feel so natural to you, but that strikes me as rare and extraordinary, so much so that I can’t help but thank you for it: if I had to distill it to a single word (clearly a failed errand so far), it would be tenderness.
The bitter truth that came into focus a little sharper today as he sobered up is that he really thought he had been working on it, maturing the right way, becoming a better version of himself, when he was actually sinking, going the wrong way entirely, pretending to be someone he wasn’t, and giving everyone around him a poor facsimile of a person, all the while acting like they should not only be fine with it, but treat it like it was the greatest gift he could give them.
A few weeks ago, he really believed he was going to get married. By this time next year, he could have been a married man, maybe starting to talk about having a child, with someone who is now completely gone from his life. Empty house, full of his books and his own bad decisions.
I said I’ve been living a half-life, but somehow it was the life I chose, a series of small decisions that crushed me into a smaller and smaller space, boxing me into something with hard edges, a thing that couldn’t feel the softness of life anymore. I want to say that I think your film rounded those edges, has started to smooth me into something that could appreciate life again. So thank you for showing so much of the tenderness in little moments, for showing the sincere love that lives in small things. That love felt quiet and loud all at once, shy and also so brazen that I couldn’t look away. It’s how I long to feel when I encounter a piece of art in any medium, it’s what I’ve been missing without even realizing it, until your film opened my eyes.
He feels awakened by the call to something greater, not just to make better art but to live a more honest life. He feels caught in a spotlight, like the beam of the projector in the basement of that bar somehow caught his own soul in its bright image, holding him aloft and filling him with light.
I need to ask you kind of a stupid question, a question I’m afraid to ask: how do you live? How can you live knowing that love is so fragile, that even the people who should understand us the most can disappear so easily, amongst the wreckage where poetry has died and love’s been buried, in a place that seemed right before you arrived, but feels wrong once you finally get there?
🦔
After writing the email to Gloss in a fever dream, Namjoon spends an uncomfortable few days coming to terms with the reality of his life, and how ill-fitting the world he surrounded himself with really is to his true nature.
The darkest, most pessimistic part of him whispers that maybe he doesn’t belong anywhere, maybe he was always destined to be some kind of outcast, either on the fringes longing to be recognized or trapped in the center of a shape he’s had to contort himself to fit.
The email he sent in a sober yet still altered brain state was almost more of a challenge to himself, a promise to embark on a new life, than it was an attempt at communication, or so he’s telling himself, since he didn’t get a response. Not that he expects a response. That’s life on the fringes, he tells himself. You won’t always get a response if you’re not careful to package yourself neatly and tastefully, refusing to say anything too raw or real to avoid offending anyone.
He tries writing a letter to Iseul that he decides not to send because it feels too honest, too selfish, and she doesn’t deserve that. I don’t know if I miss you or if I miss myself.
He writes another email, to tell his publisher he’s not writing a novel anymore, not anytime soon, and to stop inviting him to all the parties and glorified networking events that are supposed to “keep his name out there” while he tortures himself with not writing, because he’s actually writing poetry again, maybe accompanied by a photo series.
The words burn him to type, like his fingers are live wires on the keyboard, conducting the birth of a new dream from his frightened little brain out into the world, the first flutter of manifestation. His publisher writes back, probably well-meaning, still understandably incredulous: do you even take photos??
All he can say is, I don’t know. Not yet. Maybe I want to.
He feels terrified and excited. He couldn’t bring himself to say something so grandiose as I want to make a film, or I want to write a song that’s an ode to the music of the universe, or hardest of all to admit even to himself, I want to be part of something again, something bigger than just myself. I want to be a beautiful stranger to someone, to be a part of someone else’s story, to see myself from their own sincere and generous point of view. I want to participate, I want to give myself over, to be part of something real and also greater than real, something both truly alive and larger than life.
🦔
Namjoon is lying in the park beneath the trees, light flashing hazily through the shifting leaves as he composes something halfway between a poem and a song, something that fills his mind up with light and makes him ache for a way to let it free, when his phone makes a little ding.
He ignores it for exactly 32 minutes, despite the fact that he’d put his phone in do not disturb, which means the notification must be one of the rare exceptions he’d set that he knew he’d want to see no matter what he was doing, a fact his brain has conveniently forgotten while in the throes of creation— as a result, he doesn’t see the email that shifts his entire life on its axis until about half an hour after it arrives, after munching on a late-afternoon hotteok and stopping to pet a friendly dog on his winding way home from the park.
It’s not until he throws away the paper from the hotteok and reaches for the phone in his back pocket, an instinctive move now that his hands are empty, that the shape of the day suddenly changes. He sees, there amidst the spam and miscellaneous newsletters, a return message with the subject line Re: Rare tenderness and light at Bar Nap Star from the email address [email protected].
In Namjoon’s chest his heart stops, then quickens, knocking around in his ribs with uncomfortable intensity.
Kim Namjoon. First of all, you seem to be under the impression that I “must get letters like this all the time.” I can’t tell if this is supposed to be a joke or if you’re just very humble. Looking at the photo on your publisher’s website, you must not be too vain, otherwise you’d have wanted to use a picture with your eyes open, so I guess humble is a possibility. Was it fun working with SoYoon? I’ve loved her photography for a long time. She’s good at catching people off guard. I can’t tell if you’re about to laugh or cry.
A weird rush of embarrassment courses through Namjoon as he pictures his official author photo, the one with his eyes squeezed shut, lips pursed in what could be the start of a smile or a grimace, captured in the moment of some incipient intense emotion. The expression emphasized his dimples, which at the time Iseul had said made him look cute, and had been the deciding factor for him even though it wasn’t a typical polished author photo. Now he just feels vaguely mortified somehow, knowing that Gloss, his new idol and the inspiration for this new phase of his life, has seen it. His hair is still long and dark in it, hanging over his brow a little like the floppy ears of a friendly dog. To Namjoon’s eyes now, he looks strangely innocent in it. He’s not sure if that picture is even who he is anymore.
I like that, to be honest. It’s not quite what I’d expect. You look like you’d have been my favorite professor in college, but I still would have pretended to hate you. I’ve always assumed most literary celebrities were pain in the ass nepo babies with overinflated egos, but maybe you’re different.
Namjoon closes his eyes and goes to lean against the closest tree. He suddenly feels dizzy and light-headed, like fireworks are exploding in his brain. He might be about to pass out from embarrassment, which has never happened to him before. He doesn’t know why it’s so shocking to be perceived in this way. You look like you’d have been my favorite professor in college. He had felt, foolishly, that Gloss must be his peer, had wanted to treat him as such, even to look up to him, without considering how getting a gushing email from a stranger who’s also somewhat famous might feel. Maybe it was even naive of him, to think Gloss wouldn’t recognize his name, or at least look him up to find out more about him, after receiving an email like that. But maybe you’re different. Maybe he should feel flattered.
I’m flattered that you found so much that spoke to you in "don’t forget to come find me." Whatever you may have assumed, I really don’t get emails like the one you sent. Mostly emails from people wanting to work with me, or wanting something from me, which I’m sure you can relate to. I suppose since you ended your letter with a question, I should try to answer it, though I want to be clear I don’t think I’m especially qualified to answer it. Not anymore so than you, whatever you may think.
Namjoon’s face feels hot, his whole head feels like a match that’s just been struck. Gloss has gifted him something unawares, however small— the title. don’t forget to come find me. He remembers that was the last line on screen. Almost like a secret message, or a taunt, given the sly tone of his email at first. Namjoon had found him, and despite the prickly first impression, he can feel that same current of underlying gentleness flowing through his words, the same one he’d felt in the film, especially once he began to address the sentiments in Namjoon’s own email.
How do I live? Well, life is full of struggle and shit, which I gather you’re aware from the letter you sent. But that’s not all it is, right? I’m not going to feed you some bullshit about needing to go through suffering to fully appreciate the beauty in life, or something. Going though shit doesn’t necessarily make you stronger either. It depends on what you take away from it, and what you do next. Sometimes when the world hits you, you have to hit back, and if you can pick yourself up enough to survive, you get to decide what story to tell. If you admit how bad it was, people will see into you like you’re made of glass, and they might look at you like you’re a beast in a zoo, and that can be tough on its own. But if you do admit it, and make it into a story, make it into a myth meant to be passed on, maybe at least one other person will know, and won’t have to suffer the way you did.
I’m telling you this like you don’t know, but I think you do. I think it can be easy to lose sight of the things you know deep down, when you’re in the midst of something terrible, whatever it is. There’s no shame in that. Sometimes I think that’s all adulthood is. The slow death of the heart making it harder and harder to hold onto your dreams.
The truth is that I can’t tell you how to live, and if I did, you should tell me to fuck off. Live however you need to until it gets easier.
Feel free to write again if you want. I want to know where you go once you leave the wreckage.
When Namjoon comes back to himself, he realizes he’s standing still and sweating in the sunlight, rooted to the spot like a tree while people move past him on the sidewalk. Thankfully, he’s not crying.
He feels like the match that struck, the spark that started in him when he saw that short film, has finally been fanned into a flame. He feels raging, victorious, a strange mix of exhilaration and anger, a strong desire to prove himself.
Feel free to write again if you want. I want to know where you go once you leave the wreckage.
Gloss wants to know where he’s going. And suddenly he feels like a weight is lifted, like all the baggage he needs to carry to get to wherever he’s going has magically become light.
Maybe that feeling, that peculiar mix of intensity and gentleness, is rubbing off on him from Gloss’s letter. Namjoon has always been porous in that way, hungry for knowledge and understanding, hungry for the words and feelings of others. At his lowest, it makes him feel like nothing more than a vessel to be filled, but right now, it feels beautiful.
Painful, too, but worthwhile. You should tell me to fuck off. Live however you need to until it gets easier.
He wants to laugh out loud at the idea of him telling Gloss to fuck off. There’s absolutely no chance of that, not now that he feels like he’s gotten exactly what he wanted. Maybe it’s a little pathetic— does he need attention this badly? But who cares, if Gloss is willing to give it, if he’s deemed Namjoon worthy of his words? Live however you need to until it gets easier.
Feel free to write again if you want.
He does laugh out loud then, as he turns around to walk home, and he doesn’t care if a few people look at him funny.
🦔
I have to admit that I looked you up right away. I don’t know why I didn’t before, but I think I wasn’t quite sure you were real, and not just a wild figment of my imagination that I needed to invent in my direst hour of need. I know this is silly of me, the whole idea of writing to a stranger like that in the first place was probably a fool’s errand, but it’s brought me to you so I can’t help but be grateful. I’m rambling, but maybe it’s only your gracious nature that I have to be grateful for, so thank you for answering me.
I couldn’t find a photo of you to ruthlessly psychoanalyze in the same way that you did mine, which I forgive you for, by the way— I guess I opened myself up to it when I made so many assumptions in my letter, and when I said so many deeply personal things, forgetting that I’m not as invisible as I sometimes feel.
The truth is, I’ve spent years in a world of cutthroat creativity, competing with my peers for institutional approval and the same few prestigious awards, as though they’re the only people whose voices matter, these few writers who the literary world has deemed the most worthy of attention and longevity, who also happen to look good on a magazine cover.
I could never really see myself as one of them. I’ve always been part of a scene of some kind, though I could never convince myself to be at the center of it, like I’m some kind of representative who could speak for anyone. I’m aware it’s especially ridiculous for a writer to think this way, that he can’t speak for anyone. Maybe that’s why no matter where I go, I’m destined to always end up on the fringes. I can’t fully fit the stereotype of any of my identities, so I’m afraid to own any of them fully. If I do then everyone will see what an impostor I am.
Anyway, the most important thing, which I’ve been holding back out of fear of embarrassment (though it’s far too late for that), is that in trying to find out more about you, I found more of your films.
I wanted to save some for a rainy day, work my way through them slowly so I could fully appreciate each one, but instead I consumed them, over and over, making them the visual soundtrack of my days. You create them with so much more than words, and I wish I could respond in a way more all-encompassing, but for now I’ll have to settle for words…
🪷
It takes more than one person to make a film, usually. That’s what I love about it. It’s by nature a collaborative art. I’m not telling you that to neg your writing, by the way. You could say it’s more impressive, what you do, crafting entire worlds with words out of everything in your head.
But maybe that’s a little bit of a myth, too. I’m sure you have an editor, and readers who give you feedback, and people who touch your mind in big and small ways that change your writing without you even realizing it.
I guess what I mean is, you’re part of an artistic community, even if you don’t recognize it. Even if it’s a small one.
🦔
You keep seeing through me, and I don’t know if I should be more embarrassed or thankful. I’m not sure if I should apologize, because you never hinted that it might be necessary, and I don’t want to belabor it. I can’t regret blundering into your inbox in a state of hungover euphoria, but I can at the very least try to be more self-aware.
Your words made me realize that I’ve been doing the exact thing I claim to abhor all along, which is to place myself at the egotistical center of artistic endeavors over which I’m obliged to be the main focus and the sole dictator of the outcome. Maybe this is the real reason I’ve gotten so sick of it, of writing in general. I can’t live like that anymore, only taking from people for the purpose of feeding the mindless machine of my creativity.
On a positive note, I think this is another reason why I love your films, what I’ve seen of them so far. They’re the opposite of that. So curious, so malleable, so open to suggestion. The way I feel now, and the way I want to be in what I create.
🪷
Not to quote your own writing at you like a pretentious prick, but you wrote once that you’re a hostage of life because you’re still chained to something. I remember it because it’s sort of how I think about relationships in general. Not as chains, but as tethers, or long thin threads. Spiderwebs or something. Sticky, but fragile enough to break. I always thought if I had enough connections, I wouldn’t have to worry as much about losing my hold on life, because there would be so many people tethered to me by these thin threads, they’d help keep me here.
I guess there’s no way to be wholly unselfish in this world. It doesn’t bother me as much as it used to, because I know everything is a give and take. Even love.
🦔
Don’t worry. There’s nothing pretentious about it, unless you count the writing itself, and that would be my own fault. I feel like I should say— I don’t know why I always feel the need to tell people this, but I wrote that book when I was very depressed. I think that was the darkest point of my life. It’s kind of strange to look back on it from here, because I think when things started falling apart recently, when my fiancée left and I started hated everything I’d ever written, I thought I might find myself back there again, in those same dark thoughts, in that same oppressive cloud. But I didn’t. This time, it was like a suddenly passing fever, giving way to a hallucination that never ends, and that strange vision became the new shape of my life.
It’s weirdly comforting to know that I changed somehow without realizing it, that even the texture of my loneliness is different now. That it isn’t heavy in the same way it used to be, that it didn’t crush me this time.
I regretted publishing that book for a long time because I thought it wasn’t art. I thought I hadn’t put enough creativity into it, that all I did was siphon off a bunch of unfiltered pain and put it out into the world like poison for others to drink. It surprised me to know that you’ve read it. Unless you’ve just read it recently, in which case I’m curious to know why you chose that one, and not any of the ones with quotes from famous people on the cover.
🪷
Don’t be ridiculous. Everyone has read mono, haven’t they? Everyone I know has. Have you not been on social media in the past six years?
Never mind. I don’t want to encourage you if you haven’t, you’re probably better off.
Just know that I think it means a lot more to a lot of people than you realize, myself included. Don’t sell yourself that short, Kim Namjoon.
🦔
Three weeks and thirty-seven emails later, Namjoon opens the thread with Gloss to see a message that’s nearly empty of words aside from a single question: What do you think? — followed by a link.
It looks like a video link.
Heart trembling in the ends of his fingers, he taps it.
It loads, a private video titled animals of regret pt 3 - rough cut. Namjoon’s pulse quickens. This is an unfinished film, a new installment in Gloss’s animals of regret series, and he trusts Namjoon enough to watch it and give his opinion.
He sits down right where he’s standing, in the entryway of his house, not bothering to move to the couch because he doesn’t want to wait that long, and presses play.
The title, overlaid in white handwritten font, appears over footage, the way he opened the other films in this series too. This time it’s over a nightlife scene, orangey glow of bar windows, streets crowded with blurred movement.
As the title disappears, the scene resolves into one man, leaning against the wall outside of a club. He flicks his cigarette away and grins cheesily, laughing in a way that’s a little self-conscious but still incredibly charming. Namjoon recognizes him as a member of the collective, someone he’s seen in a few of Gloss’s other films, including that first one at the bar. He’s wearing heavy makeup, as though for a performance of some kind, and casually trendy clothes that wouldn’t be out of place in a club. Beneath a silky oversized bomber jacket, he’s wearing a sheer mesh crop top that accentuates his narrow torso as well as a tattoo that wraps around his ribcage. He’s cute in the sort of effortlessly confident, openly queer way that Namjoon admires but has always been a little too uncertain of his own ability to pull off with his own blundering six-foot frame.
The man steps away from the wall, running a hand through his shining dyed-blond hair, and addresses the man behind the camera. Namjoon can tell that his eyes are a little above the eyeline of the frame, like he’s talking directly to Gloss while Gloss points the camera at him to capture the moment.
“Are we starting already? I thought—”
The camera keeps moving closer, closer to the man’s chest, until his face is out of frame and the camera is folded into the soft darkness of a hug. The man Gloss walked up to lets out a delighted laugh, muffled off-camera.
The scene cuts to the interior of a small bar, more of the soft orange light seen from the street, and now the man from outside is on stage. He’s mid-performance, dancing like his body is made of liquid, now in a stage outfit to match the dramatic makeup. The focus is soft, lights sparkling a little too bright, turning the man on stage into an unearthly being. The voices of the crowd are loud, raucous, a mix of inarticulate cheering and wolf whistles.
The scene cuts again, leaving at the height of the performance for something quiet and stark. Namjoon recognizes the rooftop he’s seen in other films. The light is grey, a cloudy day, and the same man is before the camera again, leaning back in a cheap folding chair with his legs up on the barrier around the edge of the roof. His face completely bare of makeup, eyes a little glazed as he gazes offscreen, one of his arms hanging limply into the empty space between the chair and the roof below him.
This is the format Namjoon recognizes from the previous films in the series, questions flashing onscreen in response to the stories the man tells, interspersed with footage of Gloss following him through his days and nights, random little snatches of observation and beauty, and the sense of a hidden story delicately unfolding, a glimpse of a person Namjoon has never met but now wishes he could get to know better.
It runs longer than expected, the way Namjoon’s rambling first drafts often do, and it occurs to him that editing it down to its final form may be a similar process, carving the finished film out of the raw shape of something too big to be contained within the frame.
His mind races with thoughts. He gets up from the floor finally, unfolding his stiff legs, and goes to his desk so he can start writing out his impressions for Gloss while he watches it again.
It’s fascinating to see the way your process interacts with the stories he’s telling, the way both of you tenderly shape this thing created in the space between you, made up of both of your impressions. That’s what the hug at the beginning sets the stage for, I think.
It makes me want to know more, both about how you go about making a film like this, and about his story, his life, where he’s been and where he’s going from here. I can see the connection you’re talking about, soft and strong, invisible yet sticky. I want to learn how to make those types of connections too, not just the ones I’ve made so far. The ones I had to break because I treated them too much like chains.
🦔
The next email is almost as short as the last one Gloss sent, which is kind of comical compared to the three-thousand-word reply Namjoon had sent after watching the rough cut of his film.
All it says is this:
If you want to learn, why don’t you come try it? We’re filming again next Wednesday.
Below that is an address.