a reason to smile // seo changbin ✔️

chapter twenty-one

it's all coming out

moon jieun - sunday evening

the sound of the rushing water below was the only sound that filled my ears. my legs dangled over the small bridge, gaze fixed on the water as it flew by, clashing on the icy rocks. i shivered, having forgone a jacket as i practically stormed out of the house, and ran all the way here. tears idly slid down my reddened cheeks, but i could hardly feel it. everything was just so utterly... numb.

a feeling i was once used to. never caring if i was freezing to my core, never caring that i couldn't feel my fingertips or toes. numb used to be a welcomed feeling. and over the past weeks i've grown to feel things i never let myself feel before. but now that the numbness was coming back...

it was awful. an awful feeling, and i didn't know how i ever got used to it. i didn't want to get used to it again, but i felt myself slipping. that familiar darkness that has slowly worked its way out of my system, was slowly creeping back in.

i am not enough.

my own mother doesn't think i am enough to stick around.

i am not enough.

i felt a warm jacket wrap around my shoulders, but it did little to actually warm me up. i didn't even look as changbin sat down next to me, letting his feet dangle from the bridge as well, his thighs brushing up against mine. i tried to focus on his presence. i really did. but all i could think about was how i am not enough.

"what happened?" changbin asks softly, a hand reaching over to wipe the tears from my cheeks. "christ you're freezing..." he tugs the jacket tighter around me, and all i could do was lean into his touch. his strong arm wrapping around my back, rubbing up and down on my arm as his other hand presses warmth against my cold cheeks.

i didn't know what to say. the story of my parents is a long one, and i had always had a hard time telling it. i knew exactly when the switch happened. when my parents grew distant, when my father started seeing another woman, when my mother realized he was seeing another woman. and most importantly, i remember the fake normalcy that both of them had pushed on me. i hated the fake that invaded our home like a parasite. but now that it was all gone, well... i finally understood the saying "ignorance is bliss.".

"i was going to end it this winter." i blurt out. "i was waiting until all the leaves fell off the trees, and until the branches were covered in snow one last time."

"that day i saw you at the park then..." changbin concludes. i could only nod.

"i always liked the cold, and the numbness that came with it. i was going to do it right here. just fall off the bridge and into the icy water, just let it carry me away..." i sniffle, my gaze still fixed on the water. i feel changbin tense next to me, his arm tightening around me as if he were afraid i'd push myself off right now. but i wouldn't.

"why?" he dared to ask. i could tell he was afraid of the question. it was a coin toss on how i would take it. and had he asked me a few weeks ago, i might have snapped, but now...

"i didn't see a point in life... relationships end, friends leave, things fall apart... it just seemed like an endless cycle of... of trying to stay afloat and... i didn't feel like swimming." i explain, i couldn't even figure out how to get my whole point across. there were just no words that explained how i felt. "everything changes, and the world keeps spinning. so i thought... the world doesn't really need me."