Drifting Apart

Chapter 6: Impossible

'Yook Sungjae'

Ilhoon was confused. He couldn't understand why Sungjae called him.

Why me, why now?

Ilhoon didn't know what to do. Should he answer the call? Ilhoon swallowed. He wanted to talk to him, but had no idea what to say; he didn't even know why Sungjae was bothering to talk to him after all this time.

As the phone kept ringing, Ilhoon stared at it, trying to decide if he should answer or not.

Before he knew it, the phone went silent and the words, "Missed Call (1)" glowed on the screen.

Not knowing what to do, Ilhoon picked up his phone and threw it on the couch, then flopped down next to it. He could only stare into space, wondering if not picking up was the right thing to do.

He was now faced with a dilemma.

Should I call him back? Or should I just move on with life?

Ilhoon groaned. His life was already busy enough with Minjoo and he wasn't really in the mood to add more problems to his life.

He looked over to his phone.

'If he really needed me, he would text me back.' He decided.

There wasn't another sign of Sungjae later that day.

One week later

Ding dong

Ilhoon groaned awake as the doorbell rang.

Ding dong
Ding dongdingdongdingdongding-

"ALRIGHT I'M GOING!!" Ilhoon yelled towards the front door. Frustrated at the person spamming the doorbell, he quickly put a sweatshirt on and headed for the door before they broke his doorbell.

"What do you want?" Ilhoon asked angrily as he opened the door.

Ilhoon's eyes widened as he saw who it was behind the door.

"Sungjae," he said breathlessly. Sungjae grinned mischievously.

"Yo," he greeted.

Ilhoon stood blankly at the door as Sungjae noisily let himself in. He turned to see Sungjae setting out snacks and getting ready for hours of gaming. Ilhoon frowned. He knew that it was him who never got back in touch with Sungjae, but it felt wrong to have him suddenly come back and act like nothing happened.

He closed the door and stood near Sungjae, watching him.

"Why?" He asked out of the blue. Sungjae didn't respond. Ilhoon looked over and saw that the volume was turned up too loud, so he quickly turned it down.

He took a deep breath before asking again.

"Why?"

"Why what?" Sungjae asked. He didn't stop playing to look at Ilhoon.

"Why are you here?" Ilhoon slowly asked.

Sungjae chuckled to himself.

"Am I not allowed here anymore?" He laughed.

Sungjae took a quick glance at Ilhoon, and soon realized that Ilhoon was completely serious. He paused his game.

"What's up, Ilhoon?" He finally turned over to make eye contact with him.

Flustered, Ilhoon stood there. He had so many things to say, but he couldn't choose what to say first. Sungjae watched Ilhoon, waiting for him to respond.

Ilhoon cleared his throat.

"Why... Why did you come here all of a sudden?" He asked.

Sungjae frowned. "Isn't it normal?" He asked.

"We're friends, aren't we?"

Ilhoon held back the urge to laugh sarcastically. He knew that they were both aware that their friendship was changing.

"You call me all these things, then walk out of my life. Then all of a sudden, you come back and act like nothing happened. There's a lot of things wrong with that picture," Ilhoon said angrily.

Sungjae sat there, surprised. Then he grinned.

"Yeah, I came to apologize. I wanted to make it up to you." He said.

Ilhoon huffed.

"Yeah right," he accused. "You haven't even said a word of apology. You didn't even bother to do anything besides making yourself at home here!"

Sungjae held up his hands in a surrender position.

"I know, our friendship has been shaky these days. I want to go back to the way we were before. Can't we?" He pleaded.

Ilhoon started trembling angrily.

"You're really something you know?" Ilhoon said, his voice shaking. "Why don't you go have fun with the other people you hang out with?"

Sungjae shot up, glaring at Ilhoon. The two stood there for what seemed like an eternity, having a never-ending staring contest.

"You should be thankful," Sungjae said coldly. "I tried so hard for this friendship to work, but I guess you want to throw all that away."

Ilhoon opened his mouth to retaliate, but Sungjae shoved past him before he could say anything. He stopped at the door before turning back to Ilhoon.

"I gave you another chance to fix our friendship. I know that it's been really awkward and tough after all this time, that's why I decided to drop by and try to make up with you." Sungjae flung the door open.

"I guess it's impossible to fix such a thing with you," he said as he walked out and slammed the door shut noisily.

Ilhoon could only stand there, frustrated and confused. Sungjae was acting like he was the one who was hurt after this whole time. Ilhoon kicked a chair over, panting. He didn't realize that he was holding his breath this whole time and gasped for air as he squatted down with his head in his head.

Who was the one at fault here?

He rolled his head around his hands, thinking. Should he really have called Sungjae back that day? Ilhoon groaned, realizing that Sungjae may have wanted to apologize and clear up some misunderstandings that they might have both misunderstood.

Ilhoon went over to the couch where Sungjae once was and resumed the game. His mind was blank as he instinctively played.

He wasn't sure about what to do next.

The only thing he knew was that nothing would ever be the same, no matter how much he and Sungjae wanted it to be.

It was impossible to return back to the way things were.

[A/N: Thanks for reading! Sorry I haven't posted in a really long time... I had a lot of stuff this whole time lol. I'll try to update more often though!]