Like Torn Wallpaper (1/2)

Woohyun, I...

I don't know how to tell you this...However will I tell you this?

My thoughts are so jumbled -

Too tangled to see,

Too loud to hear,

Too blurred to read.

You're all I think about.

You are the matter of my mind. Each snare hides your face,

Each crevice echoes your voice -

Your words that make me tired

And bind me to you by concern, by pity, by longing -

Longing to collect the broken pieces of you

And reassemble them,

To make art of what was made desolate;

To grow love in rocky soil.

I see your face

And I want to touch it. Is it okay to touch your face?

I don't know what is okay to want anymore. All I know is that I want that -

To touch your face -

And I don't know if it is right or wrong,

But that doesn't matter to me. Because there is only enough room left inside of me

For you to matter.

You and nothing else.

You are not as beautiful as you once were. You are thin;

You are pale;

Your eyes are sunken;

Your lips are chapped. But despite all of that,

I still think you are beautiful -

Far too lovely,

More than I deserve.

Do you know that I think this way -

Think that you are beautiful?

I still remember when we were young

And you would visit me every day. Do you remember how we stayed up all night

Talking about nothing,

Talking about everything? I listened to everything you had to say, Woohyun,

And I have forgotten nothing. Your words have blended with my own,

And now our voices are one. Can you detect the change in my voice?

I now speak only to you -

I speak for you -

I speak because of you.

Do you remember how the cold whipped against our cheeks

And the starlight was too far away to warm us? But even then I was warm

Because I could feel your heat next to me.And you don't even know

How much I wanted to touch you

And feel your warmth on my fingers. I can feel your heat in my eyelids,

And all I want is to feel your heat on my hands,

On my face,

On my chest -

Everywhere.

Do you remember that time...

When I asked to see your scars? You were still wearing your long sleeved shirt then;

You were still ashamed of your scars. I remember how you cried,

Telling me that you were embarrassed at the thought

That you lost control and became so weak...

Weak enough to challenge death

Just to prove that you would win -

Just to prove that you had worth

And that you were everything your father said you would never be.That you were a man.

Do men think these thoughts, Woohyun?

Do men think about the faces,

The words,

The scars of other men?

I think not. So a man I am not.

My thoughts

Are not the thoughts of a man. But they are my thoughts -

You are my thoughts;

My thoughts are mine -

You are mine. If being a man means not seeing you,

Not hearing you,

Not touching you,

Not thinking about you in the same way,

Not ever, not at all...Manhood can leave me behind.

When you rolled up your sleeves

And let me look at your scars...Were you showing me

That you were no longer ashamed of...The thought of not being a man? The thought of...

Caring for another man?Caring for me?

Your scars you equated with loss of manhood,

And you hid your scars to prove that you were a man.But that night you showed them to me...

Rolled up your sleeves with no one around

But me and my careful eyes

That watched your tear drops drip from your nose

And fall one by one onto the white scars that seemed to glow

In the absence of light and the absence of sound... Just the two of us bound by silence,

By insecurity,

By sinfulness,

By unspoken words and thoughts unrealized...Were you telling me that you...accepted...

Your loss of manhood? Were you telling me...

That you were thinking the same thoughts

That I have been thinking

For the past five years?

For five years

My thoughts have escalated

Into a single word:Love.

Do you hear the same word

When I walk into your room? Do you breathe the same word

When I move closer? Do you feel the same word

When I look into your eyes,

Brush against your skin,

Sit with you for hours

And comfort you when you cry?

Could you possibly...

Feel love for someone...

Someone like me?

I have loved you for five years, Woohyun. Since the day you first spoke to me in the hospital,

I have been unable to forget your face. But...every time I try to tell you this...

I choke on the words. They disappear -

They cower in the back of my mind,

Where it is impossible for me to retrieve them. And when the silence surrounds us

And the truth remains unspoken,

Nothing but regret -

Nothing close to love -

Finds me in turn.

And I can't live with the regret...

With the forever unanswered question

Of what could have been -

All that could possibly be -

Any longer.

I love you, Woohyun.

Why can't I just tell you this?

"Woohyun?" Sunggyu asked with his eyes closed and his fists clenched. His own mind had betrayed him;

He wasn't ready to tell Woohyun his secret.

And he was almost...no...

Entirely certain

That Woohyun wasn't ready to hear it.

He wanted him to know so badly,

But he didn't want to hurt him anymore. How could he destroy their friendship -

Woohyun's only solace -

For the sake of wrongful love?

Woohyun was not ready to love,

Not after her -

Especially not his friend -

Especially not...

Another man. The thought would terrify him;

The thought would destroy his sanity

And destroy the bonds of friendship.

No, Sunggyu wasn't ready to tell his secret,

And Woohyun wasn't ready to hear it either. His words

Were better left

Unsaid.

"Yes?" Woohyun responded.He looked at Sunggyu.

He did not notice how tightly Sunggyu's eyes were closed

Or the way his fists clenched atop his knees.

Sunggyu swallowed the sentences threatening to escape

And looked at Woohyun. His face was beautiful;

He could not share his secret.

What if...

What if when he told Woohyun...

He yelled at him and wanted nothing more to do with him?What would he do then?

Sunggyu had lived for Woohyun for five years.

Without him...

What would he be?

What...who...

Would he live for then?

Sunggyu looked at Woohyun's face. He wanted to touch it,

But he knew he could not.

So he clenched his fists tighter

And pretended that he was clenching onto Woohyun's hand instead.

Too afraid of the truth

To set it free,

Sunggyu asked in a whisper

As if to stifle the words roaring, screaming, tearing at his mind

And to deny that his thoughts were filled with nothing but Woohyun's face and his scars:

"Woohyun...

Can I just...

Look at you for a while?"

Woohyun said nothing. He only looked at Sunggyu

And let him swallow him whole with his eyes. And the resulting silence

Was heavy on their bones,

And even heavier on their hearts.

His face is warm and friendly.Unattainable...

Right in front of me.

It is beauteous

Because it is familiar -

Because it is dangerous.

I cannot love his face -

I cannot love any part of him. I will forget her;

She will never come back.I will prove my father right;

I will prove that I am not a man.

But the danger in his face

Only makes me love it more. I only wish

That he too

Would love my face.

Sunggyu's eyes say so much

About who he he is:

Patient,

Calm,

Nurturing,

Responsible. The essence of a father -

The essence of a man.

And how could a man

Be mixed together

With someone like me -

An anti-man not by choice

But by design?

He does not deserve

To be the subject

Of all of my thoughts.

But...wait...

What is that in his eyes?

It is...

Vaguely familiar. I have seen it before,

A long time ago...

But it looks...

So different than it did then. It was fuller then,

Larger then,

With light and with life -

Actually alive. Now it is only

A memory of what was -

A cryptic demonstration

Of how much I have changed.

It is my face,

And it is reflected in his pupils.

His eyes that reveal everything about him

And speak nothing but the truth

Are reflecting my face -

Are revealing a part of me inside of him.

Perhaps I have been wrong this entire time;

Perhaps Sunggyu...really does...

Think about me

In the same way I think about him. Maybe he doesn't mind that I'm...

Hopeless...

That I'm...

Wrong. Maybe he has accepted my wrongness

And is going to make me right...

By making himself a little more wrong in turn.

Could he actually...

Do that? Is it possible to be wrong...

By choice?

What is that behind my reflection?

What is covering my face?

It is...

Nothing.

Nothing but darkness.

But the darkness...

Is growing so loud.

Why is it screaming?

Why isn't Sunggyu reacting?

'No! You're wrong! Stop!'So loud! Why is everything so loud?

Why isn't Sunggyu reacting?

'I hate you! I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!' Please, stop screaming.

Everything is so loud...it hurts! Why don't you hear anything, Sunggyu?

Why won't you stop the noise?

'I am not worthless! I'll show you! I'll prove you wrong!

And the day I turn eighteen is the day I get out of here and show you how wrong you are!' These voices...

Where have I heard them before?I can't think! It's too loud!

Where have I heard them before?

Sunggyu, can you hear me now?

Make the shouting stop! Please!

Where have I heard these voices before?

Sunggyu, make the noise stop!

Wait.

I know now.

I recognize the words now.

I remember everything,

And everything plays itself out in his pupils.

The belt buckle comes down hard against the skin –

Thwak!

The stinging is intolerable

And the metal is cold

Against the burning bruises starting to form

On the red, raw skin. The inner thigh is a vulnerable spot,

Which is why there my father always whipped me.

To show me I was weak

By rendering me defenseless.The buckle rises up and hits my skin again,

Harder this time.

He always liked to save his strongest blows

For the middle of his whippings.

The end was when he would finish you off

By abusing you with every insult he could throw

At each of your most desperate, most crippling inner thoughts.

And that was, by far, the most painful part of all. The buckle stayed in the air less than a second,

And its contact with the skin lasted for just as long.

But the stinging it left behind would last for hours, days, months if the beating was bad enough,

And the bruises would not fade for twice as long –

Always there, always reminding me that my father was right

And I could not run away from his rightness. But by the time the bruises would fade,

Two more beds of bruises would flower on other parts of my body,

Just as dark and as painful as the others had been.

And if my father was really feeling ruthless enough,

He would find my fresh bruises and bring the buckle down on them again,

Just to remind me that he was in charge

And that everything he said was right.

Because he was my father –

He was a man –

And I was always wrong. When my skin felt like it would melt away

And my father would be left hitting muscle and bone,