the sun will set for you | jj project

♥epilogue ♥

2012

Jinyoung had woken up after six hours of best sleep he ever had. There was a strange bliss in the air making his head feel light weighted. Jinyoung drifts from room to room of his mother's apartment which wasn't as big as his old house but it was comfortable. He pictured his mother being a merry spinster all over again, starting her life from the scratch, finding a handsome co-worker soon and dream of establishing a family all over again.

For Jinyoung, he was free. The taste of freedom almost like a shot of alcohol coursing through his veins had brought him to the realization that his life would change for better now.

Jaebum was gone, forever and he had no place in Jinyoung's new world.

Around evening, Jinyoung had decided to unpack his luggage and that's when he recalled switching off his phone. But as soon as he tapped it open, notifications blew up. Mostly from Yugyeom.

Hyung, where are you? Hyung pick up the phone. Remember Jaebum hyung from your school?  They hauled up his car from the lagoon this morning. Cops are saying he hit the rails by the water. Probably a failed break. But they declared him dead.

Jinyoung blinked an absurd amount of times. He ignored Yugyeom's first text but found countless others following up. It was more or less the same thing. Jinyoung found a couple other texts from Jackson asking him if he was doing okay.

But Jinyoung was not okay. How could Jaebum die when he was just there in Jinyoung's backyard roughly 24 hours back? Yugyeom and Jackson might be playing some sick joke with him. However, the cloud of disbelief parted soon when his mother came out of her room, with her cell phone in tight grip, broadcasting a sensational news from their hometown.

"Mrs. Im's son, Jaebum. He died Jinyoungie."

And that's how Jinyoung's head spun out of control and he fell back on his bed with a loud thud, staring up at the ceiling to find nothing but a mountain of pain crashing down on him.

Jaebum never left that town as the world moved on. Jaebum remained in his grave, his existence merely reducing down to the standards of a ghost. He was reduced to nothing but memories of that bright talented high school boy.  Ruled out as an accident, Jaebum was declared dead at 3am sharp. The news reporters kept hounding around his house, showing the boy's room, talking about his interests, mourning his sudden demise. Jinyoung couldn't look at any of that as he locked himself in his room. He could hear his mother flipping through the channels, occasionally stumbling upon news channels which showed nothing but the replay of his car being pulled out of the lagoon, where Jinyoung and his friends used to hang out a lot. They showed pictures of Jaebum from when he was alive and his guitar recitals. But the media frenzy died down as soon as it came to life and other important things to report took over the channels. Who had time to focus on a single youth's death in other side of the world when a bigger tragedy had struck the coastal areas of United States?

Jaebum was soon forgotten.

Jinyoung went at a stretch of two whole days without functioning like his usual self. Food sent to his room remained untouched and the laundry piled up until his mother could physically drag him out to lecture about being a responsible young man.

Jinyoung wasn't quiet paying attention to anything, his mind occupied with nothing but Jaebum, trying to convince himself that it was an elaborate practical joke. It was at the end of the fourth day when he finally clung to his mother's chest and broke into violent sobs.

It was the week of Jinyoung's first day in medical school. Mimicking how he was sprawled on his old bed once, Jinyoung remained wide awake. Jaebum's presence was more real that ever. Wherever Jinyoung went, he could feel a pair of eyes follow him.  Jaebum's death had hit him in ways he didn't expect. Repeatedly telling himself that Jaebum's death meant nothing to him, Jaebum meant nothing to him, it never solved the problem.

Until he recalled about the existence of a certain piece of paper handed over to him. The only thing that had some concrete connection to Jaebum was a damn piece of paper which held his last touch, his last memory of meeting Jinyoung.

Jinyoung darted out of his bed to pull out his luggage, hoping the paper was still where he had left it last time.

And it was.

---

To Jinyoung,

I can't ask for forgiveness because I don't deserve it. I don't deserve you, I never did. But somewhere along the line, I realized I can't forgive myself either. Asking you to forget what happened between us is pointless too but I want you to forget our encounters and move on. Even thought you might deny it and you might fight back, you might think that you won't miss me but I have learnt a lot about you during all the time we've spent together.  So I can safely assume that you can't erase me from your memories. Mostly because of my selfish reasons and refusal to accept myself as the way I am, you suffered. Jinyoung you didn't deserve any of that. And by the time I had convinced myself to confront my feelings, it was too late. You had gone too far to come back to me. That day when I told you that I love you, that was probably the only time I've been honest with myself and you. But I had already fucked up and just like you said, I was sick. Before I could cure myself it was too late and nothing mattered anymore. I can't ask for your forgiveness, I can't ask for your love, all I can confirm is that you'll hate me forever and I definitely deserve that.

If only I could say that I loved you, even before you walked up to me that day in music room, if only I could say that I was always looking at you even when you were not looking at me, never finding enough courage to talk to you, I guess things would have been different. Making love to you would have been different.

But you know what they say, hearts are wild creatures and thats why our ribs are cages. Pretty sure my heart never managed to break out of it's cage when I still had time.

But we don't have time anymore.
I don't know if you'll rip this worthless piece of paper to shreds or keep it but this is all I can give you, as a parting gift.
This is all I could never say to you. I'll wait for you in this very town because I know you will come back one day and you'll always find me here.
My room is all I have to preserve your memories in..

Yours Regretfully,

Jaebum

---

2020

Jinyoung places a huge bouquet of gardenias over a gravestone, a single drop of tear escaping his eye.

Jaebum kept his word for once at least, he never left that town and he always waited for Jinyoung.