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―FIRST FLOWER.
JIsung pulls his hand away from Seungmin's hold. The look on Seungmin's face is baffling. He cannot keep his eyes open and watch Seungmin like that.
"I just―'' There is a clear annoyance in Seungmin's face and Jisung is hurt by that. "I just want to know if I still love you that way, Ji." But nothing is more painful than hearing his fiancé declare a love professed years ago now an inkling of doubt running through his head.
JIsung does not want to hurt Seungmin. He does not want to see the tears brimming on the sides of Seungmin's lids, almost mocking him for believing in the magic of love―how can he not when Seungmin is the epitome of romance―all gone with the vengeful words spatted by his fiancé.
JIsung does not want to hurt Seungmin. He does not want to see Seungmin balling his fists in the place where he and Seungmin declared their love for each other over and over again since years ago, enough to plan and curate a wedding. He does not want Seungmin to look at him with pain in his eyes―he never wanted that―but that is exactly what he was seeing.
"We are fucking engaged, Seungmin." His voice is breaking. Maybe it just reflects how broken he is after what Seungmin did to him. Did Seungmin even do anything?
"I know, Ji― I just― Please." Seungmin pleads.
JIsung does not want to hurt Seungmin because seeing Seungmin like that hurts him as well. He loves Seungmin after all.
"Please what, Kim Seungmin?" He challenges Seungmin with his might. Though he seems too frail to even put up a fight, he tries. All, he tries, just to make Seungmin stay. "I will not call the engagement off."
JIsung does not want to hurt Seungmin and for sure Seungmin does not want to hurt him either.
But how can you stop yourself from hurting the person that keeps on hurting you? How can you do the same thing that you have been dying not to feel? How can you try to unlove a person that made you love so hard that you forgot what it is like before everything else?
"Ji, please, I don't want to hurt you." Seungmin looks like he's been through hell but Jisung does not have it in him to care.
He feels something attempting to sear in his chest. He has read this a lot of times, and even sees some of his closest friends undergo the same thing, but feeling it by himself is a totally different thing.
It does not hurt, the thing in his chest. It just knocks. A reminder that something is reality and that he has to live with it―to live with the fact that Seungmin is falling out of love with him.
It flutters in him. Roots claw to his lungs and the itch to cough resurfaces. He looks away from Seungmin and his teary eyes.
"But you're hurting me already." The first petal of his flower lingers in his airpipe. He scowls. "It fucking hurts, Minnie."
What hurts is the look in Seungmin's face when his lips frowned and closed his eyes.
He coughs.
***
There isn't anything that he'd ask from Seungmin. He knows he looks at the guy with heart eyes on―as Felix told him―and dusted cheeks of rosy blush, but he cannot find a reason why can't he just take the leisure of watching the most stunning boy he has ever seen since his college days.
"You do know that you are staring aren't you?" Seungmin looks at him with thin eyes. Jisung doesn't mind it and just smiles while Seungmin shuffles to take his journal with him.
"What's there not to stare at?" He flirts without any warrant of caution. He likes it.
He likes being able to see Seungmin flush and stunned to his feet. Seungmin must be trembling to hold on to his journal, for he drops his pen and almost kicks it towards Jisung's direction.
"You are flirting, Ji." Seungmin looks away, baffled to even catch a glimpse of the toothy grin that spreads on Jisung's face. "You are flirting." And repeats, too self-aware.
Jisung heartily laughs. He pushes himself off the seat to pick up Seungmin's pen and links his arm on Seungmin's. His small palm catching the ridges of Seungmin's elbow, paying no mind to his phone that vibrates in his pocket.
Seungmin lets him.
"I am indeed flirting." He boastily exclaims.
What now if he flirts with his long time partner during college? What now if he suddenly shifts from an idiot who's crazy about other guys' lips and now being crazy about Seungmin's antics? What now if everything has changed, only because Felix had told him?
What now?
"Am I required to flirt back?" Seungmin snickers silently. He seems to swallow his words, deeming unable to be fully deciphered. But with Jisung's keen attention on him, Seungmin is heard.
Of course, he is.
Jisung will always hear and listen to him.
"Not really," Jisung suggests and tightens his hold on Seungmin. Now dragging him to the outside of their work building, he winks at Seungmin. "Unless you really want to."
Jisung knows that Seungmin is holding his breath and it amuses him.
He has that effect on his friend and his friend has a certain effect on him as well.
It all comes down perfectly to one thing.
To one ending.
―SECOND FLOWER.
JIsung likes to believe that Seungmin did not fall out of love just like that. He likes to believe that Seungmin did not wake up, looking at his side of the bed, thinking that Jisung is no longer worthy of the sanctity they are to proclaim months from now.
He shifts in his seat, staring blankly at the magazine in his hand. He is not reading nor is he skimming through it. It feels like it was just an instrument he’ll use when Seungmin finally decides to come home, sparing him a glance or two.
It has been a week since Seungmin tried to call off their engagement. It has been a week since Seungmin's hold on him lasted for longer than a minute. It has been a week since he coughed a blanch petal of rose.
Seungmin's shuffles ring in the room.
"Have you eaten already?" Jisung can tell that Seungmin is trying. Maybe not to save their relationship but to mend some of the pieces that he broke from Jisung. Jisung does not want that.
"Have you?" He asks back without any intention of answering Seungmin's query.
JIsung likes to believe that Seungmin did not fall out of love just like that because he knows to himself that they did more than what they could for the sake of what they have. They are happy―he can still see it in the glints of Seungmin's eyes when he finally looks up―and they are still together. Those were all that he has been holding on for so long. Jisung likes to believe that Seungmin did not fall out of love just like that because he doesn't think he can take it if Seungmin did. He doesn't think he can accept it.
"Hyunjin and I were about to eat outside," Seungmin muses and hangs his shoulder bag on the hook. Jisung feels his presence behind him. "But I couldn't just let you eat alone."
He crumples the piece inside his palm―the creases, curls and angles are hopefully enough to show his rage―and snaps his head up to look at Seungmin.
Seungmin does not smile.
Seungmin does not smile even when he always smiles at Jisung.
"Does that help you realize that you still do love me? Or are you just pretending?" He speaks with remorse, poison in his tone. He could intoxicate Seungmin if he wants to but he does nothing of such.
Seungming still does not smile.
He wishes Seungmin does, or even will, because maybe in that way, he can stop bothering with the knocking on the back of his throat.
"I care about you, Jisung." Seungmin never smiled.
Jisung likes to believe that Seungmin did not fall out of love with him. He likes to believe that everything Seungmin still does―texting him to come home early, bidding him safe and goodbye, leaving a cup of tea on the bedside table, and writing notes on the preheated leftover―is all because Seungmin still loves him.
He's not one to beg for affection.
But if it's Seungmin, it doesn't matter whether it's the crippling in his chest, the unusual stinging on his lower rib that gravitates to his sternum, or any of the unfolding pieces that tickles his throat. If it's Seungmin, he'll do everything.
It is Seungmin after all.
***
He eyes the man being introduced to him by Seungmin. Hyunjin, Seungmin says his name―Jisung chooses not to hear the name being said by Seungmin―and to be frank, Jisung doesn't like the way Hyunjin has his arms around his Seungmin.
Not the very least.
He stands up a little bit too proudly―though he's short―and sees the way Seungmin is trying to keep his chuckle in his chest.
Jisung dusts his butt off and attempts to look tall with his puffed chest.
"Who's that?" His voice sounds a bit deeper. He tries to mimic Felix but fails ultimately.
Hyunjin does not interest him. Not the very least. But that boy looks shocked, but not disappointed to Jisung's dismay, of Jisung's antics.
Seungmin flashes him a smile.
A smile that can light up the light poles lining the road―Jisung's words―and successfully catches Jisung's heart that has been crazy mad since his jealousy rose up in his chest.
It isn't his fault that he is a jealous person. Everyone can like Seungmin as he is unfortunately the best and seeing a beautiful lad beside his one and only Seungmin is not ticking something right in him.
The beautiful lad smirks at him and tightens his hold around Seungmin. Jisung scoffs.
"Hi! You must be the infamous Han Jisung." The beautiful lad remarks. "I'm Hyunjin!"
He is the what? Jisung looks at Seungmin. He looks for any confirmation―has Seungmin been talking about me?
His thoughts run more than what he can comprehend. He shivers slightly at the sight of Seungmin grinning up at him and feels something in his chest.
It crawls to his neck, irritates him almost. His stomach is curling and he can feel his blood rising up to his face.
Seungmin only grins and here he is, so whipped for that man.
Hyunjin laughs wholeheartedly.
"Jisung is so interesting, Minnie." Hyunjin releases Seungmin and pushes him to trample on Jisung's side. "I can totally see why you like him."
Jisung freezes.
―THIRD FLOWER.
Maybe caring is just a part of who they are and what they are. There is no possible way for either of them to stop caring about each other when both of their right hand's at stake, a band of promise and silver, declaring their supposed love for each other.
Jisung looks at the blank space in his studio―all garnered white and yellow, a cream at a distance, but just blanched with his proximity.
Listening to the beats created by Chan's fingers and Changbin's mouth are not enough to take him out of his trance.
His mind flies. All he thinks about is Seungmin, Seungmin, Seungmin, the things he will do for Seungmin and yet―
Yet he cannot bring himself to give Seungmin what he had asked.
He doesn't think it's his fault for feeling this way; for holding on to Seungmin even when Seungmin wants to let go. He doesn't think it's his fault for wanting Seungmin to stay, he loves Seungmin after all, and if he needs to say that over and through, he will never be tired. He loves Seungmin too much to give a damn about the figs that stem in his lungs.
"Did something happen between you and Seungmin?" Chan's voice startles him. He looks back at the eldest in the room.
He knows that the others can see the furrows of his eyebrows. He isn't that oblivious of his worries.
"What would happen?" He attempts to brush off the query. He does not want to dwell on it―not when he stays up late at night for two consecutive days just to look for a way to wither the flowers in his lungs. Chan does not buy it from him. "I'm serious, hyung. We're okay."
Or at least, he tries to be.
Changbin looks in his direction. The older's eyes are slowly raking over his features, trying to scrutinize something that shouldn't be there but is. With a firm straight line of his lips, Changbin brings his phone down the table and nudges Jisung's knees.
"Hyunjin talked to me." Changbin's words are starting to deflate his huge ego.
Hyunjin, who has been a good confidante since the very beginning of their friendship all due to his liking of Felix, is never one to spill his dirty little secrets to anyone.
He gets scared―maybe of the fact that Changbin has this pity in his eyes, or of the fact that Chan is starting to look at him with worry, connecting two improbable dots just by piercing the gazes they, Changbin and he, are throwing to each other. He gets scared because Changbin, for the longest time he has ever known this man, never really tells him off, unless there is a need to.
"W-what did he say?" He regrettably stutters. He wishes he didn't. He wishes his facade isn't so weak like he is.
"Hyunjin got that disease, right?" Changbin tries to choose his words appropriately, Jisung applauds him for that.
But that shit still hurts.
It gnaws in his stomach, the way the roots are stemming out of his lungs. He retaliates, retreats, and pushes his back on the cushion of the couch.
He closes his eyes and immerses himself with the feeling of his love being unbudded by reality.
Seungmin is slowly falling out of love with him.
"But Felix learned to love him, hyung. It's not the end of it." He defends himself. Not from Changbin or Chan whose hand is right around his knees. He defends himself from himself. "He coughed the flowers out right after they kissed in that field and he's been the happiest since then. Please. Seungmin can―"
But the question still lies in his chest.
Can what?
It rattles him, leaves him awake of the reality that shouldn't be his reality because he knows he has to marry Seungmin.
It is their promise.
He will marry Seungmin.
So he pushes the question down, further until it is buried in the pile of his worries.
Chan presses on his knees, enough to startle him out of his bubble. "Sung, it's only going to hurt you even more."
But he doesn't care.
Not the very least.
Because there is one thing that Seungmin doesn't know about him.
"I'm going to marry Seungmin." He is dedicated.
Until something tickles the roof of his mouth, dangerously hanging at the edge of it. Something will come out and he has to repress it.
***
It is truly a bliss to have a boyfriend to wake up to, cooking you scrambled eggs and toasted bread in the morning, topped up with a cup of coffee.
He never thinks he deserves any of these royal treatment but wow Seungmin with an apron is such a look.
"I don't know if I like you more without your clothes or with just your apron on." He chirps his way to Seungmin and eventually wraps his arms around his waist.
Seungmin looks at him fondly.
"You're so―" Seungmin chuckles before he gets cut by Jisung.
"Sexy?" It doesn't come as a surprise to Seungmin anymore. Jisung just nudges his head against Seungmin's nape.
Seungmin just agrees. "Yes."
"Hot?" Jisung retorts back, enjoying the shrilling of Suengmin's body under his touch. Seungmin smells like a fabric softener.
"Yes, Jisung." And not just a fabric softener. But a scent that smells so much like his bed, so much like his room that gives him comfort after a very tiring day at work.
"Pretty?" He speaks only what the first things come to mind. He doesn't think through it. He just speaks and speaks.
Seungmin places his hand over Jisung's arms. His long fingers tracing shapes of invisible inks on his skin. The dampening of his fingers creating a silent profession of his love like no other.
Jisung wants to hear it.
He wants to hear Seungmin say it despite seeing it in the way Seungmin acts with him. He wants to hear those words.
He wants to hear Seungmin proclaim him as his love and he wants to do just the same to Seungmin.
"Everything, Ji. You are so my everything." Jisung malfunctions.
It is truly a bliss to wake up to a morning such as this. Seungmin presses his back further against Jisung's chest, their skin conversing like no other.
They cannot see each other. Not with the way he is hugging Seungmin and the way Seungmin is cooking.
But it is okay.
He is okay.
"Did you just―"
Seungmin lets out a deep breath.
"Yes, Jisung. I did. I love you."
―FOURTH FLOWER.
He isn't usually secretive.
He knows Seungmin does have his own set of secrets and he does not want to get further into that because he wants Seungmin to still be himself, but he―
He, Jisung, is just different.
He isn't secretive because he knows that Seungmin deserves to know everything that he knows. He isn't secretive because he believes that Seungmin is his other half, and being his other half gives him the sole right to own everything that Jisung owns.
Including his secrets.
So he isn't secretive. He can never hide a secret from Seungmin.
But the moment he sees Seungmin waiting for him by the couch with a frail smile on his face is the time he realizes that maybe, he does have a secret that he doesn't want Seungmin to know.
Not now when they're on the verge of breaking their ties off. Not now when Jisung believes that he can still save a thread of that hope―a thread to tug and pull their heart strings together.
"Why are you still awake?" Jisung tries to act nonchalantly. The once warm house he comes home to after a session with the rest of his producer friends is now an abode of silence and heavy breaths; cold and damning. He stares at his feet.
He doesn't want Seungmin to leave him. He doesn't want Seungmin to just tell him that he isn't in love with Jisung anymore because Jisung knows that he did everything he could to deserve that love.
He doesn't want Seungmin to move on without him. He doesn't want Seungmin to move forward just to leave him.
"We really need to talk, Ji." Seungmin still sounds sweet with his voice traced with sleepiness.
If only Jisung can look at Seungmin without tearing up, he'll show Seungmin a goofy smile that always makes Seungmin chuckle.
"We are talking." He hates the fact that his eyes still begin to sting. He believes that he is okay without seeing Seungmin but goddamn, even hearing his voice is wrecking the shit out of him.
"We need to talk, Jisung." Seungmin uses his stern voice. One that Jisung promises to not hear again since the first time he has heard it.
Frowning, he steps his way in the living room. The tension is thick, cutting him into pieces, slices of himself that he doesn't want to regain. Those parts of him are thrown to Seungmin's direction, or at least he thought, just so Seungmin will stop asking him to break the engagement off for he and Seungmin are indestructible.
He looks up. Slowly at first and eventually paces with the sad eyes boring holds right into his skull.
He isn't usually secretive. But now, he just has to.
He has to keep it a secret.
"I am trying, Seungmin." He hopes his voice is not wavering as much as his body does. He wants to just be tucked in their bed. Anything to get away from this conversation. "I am trying so bad."
Seungmin has a firm line on his lips. It looks like his pair is trembling and has so much to say but so little time left.
Is he afraid of hurting Jisung? Jisung begs for him to say no.
"Jisung, it's just not how it works." Despite the fact that Seungmin's the one breaking things off, Jisung can still feel the pain in Seungmin.
He wants to laugh. At his misery, yes. At Seungmin's tone, even more. He wants to laugh and hide because he doesn't have the guts to cry in front of Seungmin.
"So how does it work, Seungmin?" His lips are quivering, he halts his steps and drowns Seungmin with his dilated pupils. He is tearing up. "How should it work, Seungmin?"
He hates being the one to do this―to sound like he's begging for Seungmin to love him again―but he has to.
It's a secret he has to keep hidden because it is something he has to pay up with everything. He has to keep it a secret.
Most especially from Seungmin.
"Jisung―" Seungmin raises his hand and stills in the air. Jisung wants to hold him. "I love you but―"
"If you love me then why are you having doubts? If you love me then why are you looking like you want to say goodbye? If you love me, even the littlest bit, then why does it hurt so much? Why are you hurting me, Minnie?" He bursts readily, like a ticking-time bomb, he explodes. His blood pops his veins and his eyes almost bulge out but neither is enough to justify the wailing sound he let out by the time he closes his mouth.
He cries. All tears, all muffles.
"The bed doesn't feel like ours anymore, Jisung."
Maybe if Seungmin just walks out of the room and slams the door at Jisung's face, Jisung will have enough reason to weep down the floor so much, but Seungmin doesn’t. All he feels across his cheeks is his tears.
But Seungmin doesn't.
Instead, Seungmin kneels down beside him and lays his palm on his head, patting his hair with such a weak grasp. It feels like Seungmin is shifting away from their house, away from him.
He closes his eyes hard, blinking the neverending tears that rolled down his skin. He looks miserable, he knows―but damn, he feels even more miserable inside.
There is the same gnawing and clawing right against the corner of his ribs. The sensation is spreading at a faster pace, digging his flesh as if it is a wound on the superficial part of his skin.
He doesn't know if he is crying because of Seungmin.
"I love you, Jisung. You know I do. But I have to love myself too."
Or maybe he's just crying because he knows that Seungmin loves him back.
He swallows the moistened petals down his throat.
***
He fingers Seungmin's hair to his nape. After a long day at work, coming home to bed with his boyfriend is the best part of the day. Seungmin hums to his touch, snuggling slightly.
"Hey, Ji," Seungmin whispers. His breath fans the skin of Jisung's arm. Jisung smiles. "I have to wake up early tomorrow, I might go in two."
Jisung chuckles lightly with an idea popping in his head more often than not. He tries to find the words he can say without scaring Seungmin―that's the last thing he'd want to do.
Seungmin looks up at him and reclines his head to Jisung's left thigh.
"Are you thinking of something?" Seungmin's voice is laced with concern. Voice so gentle, eyes so peaceful.
"Yeah, actually."
Seungmin possibly coos at him, he doesn't know. All that he knows is that Seungmin has his eyes on him; that Seungmin can only see him at that moment in time; that Seungmin is right there with him in a place that he is willing to share with him;
That Seungmin chooses him and continues to choose him.
Seungmin hums to urge him to speak more. He retaliates, afraid of what Seungmin is going to react to what he is about to say.
But you know what?
He doesn’t care anymore.
He wants Seungmin.
“What if you,” he stops for a moment and lingers his eyes slowly to Seungmin’s. The man under his touch looks adorable. “You know… you live here instead?”
The widening of Seungmin’s eyes is a part of his success. It can mean anything at that moment—‘No.’ or maybe ‘Are you sure?’—and whatever it is that Seungmin gives. He just wants Seungmin.
“Jisung.”
He just truly wants Seungmin even if Seungmin does not want him.
He closes his eyes and pulls his hand from Seungmin’s hair.
“Honestly, I’ve been meaning to ask you to live with me too.”
But Seungmin does.
Seungmin does want him. Just as much.
He opens his eyes and stares down at Seungmin. He isn’t usually emotional—that is Hyunjin’s job—but that certain instance where Seungmin is just smiling up at him with the gentle curve of his lips that Jisung loves to kiss, he cannot help but feel himself tear up.
He just loves Seungmin—
He loves Seungmin—
He loves… Seungmin?
Oh.
“I love you.” This time, he is the one who says it like he means it.
Seungmin covers his face with his arm. With a muffled voice, he replies, “You do?”
And Jisung never means anything as much as he does right now.
“Yeah, I do.”
—FIFTH FLOWER.
He isn’t usually secretive. Felix always tells him that his mouth cannot shut up which is why Felix never tells him a secret or two, despite them being the closest friends.
Maybe it is his fault for being him; for being like this about Seungmin. But he cannot find himself to care anymore.
Feelings do not change overtime. They don’t just shift from being so all over a person to doubting each other. They don’t just move around from being each other’s, now seeing Seungmin climb down his car.
He wishes he didn’t resign from his job with Seungmin. Maybe in that way, Seungmin will be reminded of Jisung—call Jisung obsessed, call him everything—and will not decide on going back to his flat.
Jisung is not secretive, but god damn, he wants Seungmin to be his secret. He wants Seungmin to be his own, to have him away from the rest of the world. He wants to keep Seungmin to him, to his inside if he can, if that is what it takes for Seungmin to choose him again.
“Ji,” Seungmin peers down the car window. Jisung does not try to look back and stares at the road where he is led to a place with no Seungmin. “It’s okay. We are okay.”
Just anything. Please.
“We aren’t okay, Minnie.”
And it is the truth.
He slowly turns his head to Seungmin’s direction, expecting Seungmin to finally straighten his back with his face unseen by Jisung, but Seungmin doesn’t. He straight up watches Seungmin frown and blink, worry drenching his whole face, and open his mouth that seems like the last for a long time.
“Jagi, we are okay. This is just a phase. I cannot unlove you, you know that.”
He takes his time to fully comprehend Seungmin’s words. Maybe if he does this, Seungmin will stay, will ask him to drive back to their apartment, to choose him again without promising him these empty words—maybe, just maybe.
Seungmin can say whatever he wants and fool Jisung. But the fact that something is in his windpipe, begging for a release that he has been holding on for so long, is an enough reason for him to finally lower his head and bid farewell.
It aches. It burns. It stings.
Aren’t flowers supposed to signify love?
Then if the flowers that blooms in his lungs are a sign of Seungmin’s love, then so be it.
He’ll endure everything. He’ll take anything.
He opens his mouth and coughs—once, twice—and strains his throat. Spluttered saliva on his palm and a tinge of blood mended with his sputum, he tries his hardest to hide it from Seungmin.
Seungmin sees it.
“The fuck?” He hears Seungmin exclaim.
He cannot look back. All he feels is his veins bulging, his eyes spilling a tear or two, his chest that heaves with pain, and the unfurling of the balled petals up above his tongue.
“Why didn’t you tell me— Ji!” And the door of the car opens.
***
To others, the time he spent with Seungmin may be short, but to him, it is already everything that he wishes for. It isn’t a surprise when Seungmin barges in his room with Hyunjin and Felix following his back like they're kids lining up for a field trip.
And maybe they actually are.
“Oh my god, Hyunjin! Didn’t I remind you earlier to bring the cake?” Felix exasperatedly grunts at Hyunjin who looks back at him like he’s been kicked.
Jisung hollers a laughter, fondly watching Seungmin and the other two create chaos in his safe place. Seungmin just pushes Hyunjin off him as the latter seeks defence and goes straight to Jisung who was busy writing something in his notebook.
“Jagi,” Seungmin presses a kiss on his forehead and he nudges his head towards Seungmin’s chin. His boyfriend hums a response. “You busy?”
“Not really. I just finished the lyrics for Chan-hyung’s song when you three came in.”
He pushes himself away from his seat and closes his notebook. Eyeing the door where Hyunjin and Felix will emerge later on, he wraps his arm around Seungmin’s waist, feeling the latter closer to his skin.
Their bodies press against each other. Without speaking to each other, just swaying to the sound of the fan filling in the silence in the living room, they make sure that they are professing and retelling their story not to other people but to each other.
And that is what matters.
Hyunjin brings in the cake and Felix narrows his eyes at the slumping shoulders of the taller of the two. Seungmin whistles beside him and he looks up at Seungmin who is smiling with a firm line on his lips.
“What are you two on?” He questions two of his closest friends.
“Come here!” Felix ushers him with his fingers with a quick wave of his hand and he comes.
Slowly walking to where Hyunjin and Felix are, with Seungmin following him closely, and seeing the smirks on each of Hyunjin and Felix’s face are unnerving to him. He doesn’t know what he is doing.
There sits on the kitchen counter the box of the cake. Wondering if there is any occasion, he looks at his boyfriend with curious gaze, tempting for an answer that none of their two idiot friends will ever spill. Seungmin does nothing but chuckles and places his hand on Jisung’s lower back.
Hyunjin evidently closes the gap between him and Felix.
“Open it!” The tallest exclaim in the room which Jisung immediately understands, so willing to finally witness the surprise.
Apart from Seungmin whom he loves the most, he also loves surprises—the planning and being the recipient of it, so if he ever plans for a surprise that is meant for him, do not judge him.
He slowly fumbles his fingers on the edge of the box, finding that one corner that is tucked inside a hole for security, and grabs it. Pulling the flap towards him and lifting it, his eyes focus solely on the four corners of the cake box—wondering, preparing himself for what is about to come.
And when he finally opens the box, all that’s left is his mouth wide open, Hyunjin and Felix smiling from ear to ear, and Seungmin holding his hand.
Seungmin places something in his palm.
“Just like what the cake says, Ji. Marry me or get out of your own apartment.”
Now who is he even to say no to that?
—THE SECRET.
When Jisung says that he isn’t secretive, he means it with his very own frail body. It doesn’t matter whether the physicians were able to extract much more buds, stems and petals from his windpipe that instant because all that matters to him is the fact that all the flowers that came out of his lungs signify one thing.
The beeping is quite loud for his sensitive ears and the light from the window panes in his hospital room is blinding through the lids that cover his sight. He does not want to open his eyes.
He is afraid. He is so afraid that once he opens his eyes he will be greeted by so many things that he didn’t prepare himself about. It isn’t his fault. He knows he isn’t at fault for having this rare disease. Maybe he is just special—like what Hyunjin said about the two of them—or maybe fate just knows how far he can go for the person he loves.
He somehow has heard from the physician when he visits hours ago that what they got is a white rose. To Jisung, it does make sense—white always seems to signify the latency, the calmness, the secrecy beyond everything else—because above all, Seungmin just makes him be someone that he usually isn’t.
He wants it to be funny; to laugh it off like he usually does. He is known for that, after all.
But there is a commotion outside his room, there are some footsteps resounding in his ears, and a certain voice that is so distinct that he can never ever forget how the timbres strike something in his heartstrings. It is Seungmin. Of course, it is going to be Seungmin.
“Then why didn’t you tell me?” Seungmin sounds mad at someone. Jisung hopes that the someone isn’t him, but if it’s him, there’s really nothing he can do, right? “You knew it all along and you didn’t tell me?”
Jisung holds his eyes close even if they are burning to open, to see a sight that will surely break his heart, to be greeted by that certain line formed by Seungmin’s lips and have his heart break, feel the pain in his chest that is caused by nothing of the flowers but of what he feels for Seungmin.
He tries. He really does try his hardest.
“Isn’t that the point?” Hyunjin’s voice easily takes Jisung mind off his thoughts, realizing now that Seungmin is with Hyunjin. He wants to cry even harder. It makes him wonder, how did Hyunjin even endure it?
"What is the point then, Hyun?”
“He is your fiancé, Seungmin. You should’ve known fucking better.”
Jisung isn’t usually secretive because he likes to be an open book; he likes to be read, to be seen by the people that are willing to see him as him. Jisung isn’t usually secretive because he knows he chose the right people to be with. He doesn’t want to have any regrets.
He doesn’t want anything but—
“Ji always tells me that you’re the secret that he will never share with anyone. I guess I now know the reason why.” It is the first time he ever heard that kind of tone from Felix. Now, even Felix pities him.
“What do you mean, Lix?” And somehow, the desperation in Seungmin’s voice mended with the sympathy and pity that came from their two friends.
He knows that he’s been coughing out white roses. It reminds him of Seungmin. Not because Seungmin is the reason why he’s begging for his throat to close every time Seungmin confronts him, but because white roses signify a little lie—a little secret that he’d like to keep.
And Seungmin.
Seungmin is his secret.
—Seungmin. He doesn’t want anything, anyone, even if they aren’t Seungmin. He wants Seungmin; he will only want Seungmin. It is his secret that he keeps to himself. A secret that no one will understand but him.
A secret that is the cumulation of everything that he has for Seungmin.
A secret that he isn’t embarrassed about.
“It means the bed will only warm up with you and me on it, Seungmin.” He spills his secret to Seungmin.
His secret. His Seungmin.
***
Seungmin slowly dissipates. His favorite mug is nowhere to be found and neither is his journal on their bedside table. Seungmin slowly moves away, far from him.
Jisung doesn’t know what happened, but Seungmin stops coming home early the way he usually does. He stops snuggling his head on the crook of Jisung’s shoulders and neck. He stops holding out his hand whenever he comes home for Jisung to massage. He stops being the Seungmin that Jisung fell in love with.
But that is okay.
He will love Seungmin no matter who and what he is; no matter who and what he becomes.
Jisung looks at Seungmin who is sleeping beautifully on their bed. The dark undereye on his face is noticeable, but there lies on his cheeks the soft, gentle smile that Seungmin always gives him. Even in the middle of Seungmin’s slumber, Jisung finds himself falling in love, harder.
He looks down at his right hand. A silver band is wrapped around his ring finger, an indication of his everlasting ties with Seungmin—that Seungmin will be his and he will be Seungmin’s. It is such a simple thing; marriage is supposed to be a simple declaration awarded with a certificate that grants two people a change in their civil status but Jisung thinks of it more than that.
He wants to be selfish of Seungmin.
And maybe, he is.
Maybe he is already selfish of Seungmin.
Because when he looks down at Seungmin’s right hand, he’s reassured of everything that he has been wishing for. There sits a ring—a ring that is of the same as him—and that is all that matters.
Seungmin shifts in their bed, his legs kicking the toppled blanket and slightly landing on Jisung’s lap. Jisung holds his hand towards Seungmin to touch his cheek. He feels the supple skin of his fiancé under his palm. His fingers begin to massage Seungmin’s nose, down to his lips, parting his pair into two, and drifting down to his chin. Seungmin feels so unreal.
He pushes his body forward to feel Seungmin’s warmth. He loves the feeling of Seungmin’s body—without the lust, without the locking of their hands to each other, their hips and their lips, all and intimacy, they are able to make love—because Seungmin is just everything that there is about love.
He watches Seungmin open his eyes slightly. Seungmin is dazed, clouded, and he presses his cheek against his fiancé's arm. It feels nice—his fiancé’s being seeping to his very own. He cherishes it to him, keeps it beside him, in him.
“It’s okay,” he whispers to keep his fiancé in the sheets. “You can sleep more.”
But something in the way Seungmin softly pushes him away makes him feel a searing in his chest. He does not know what it is; he does not have the intention to know what it is. It is strange, but he does not care.
All that he knows is Seungmin, “I love you so much, Ji, please,” loves him, and he loves Seungmin just as much even if he starts to feel some itching in his chest, in the expanse of his lower ribs. Something flutters, scratches, but that is all that there is to that.
“I love you too.”