You Again (1/1)

There isn’t quite a word that could properly describe Chicago on a day like this. Beautiful is painfully vague, gorgeous may be a tad over-reaching, and pretty doesn’t quite cut it. The skies are blue, as they usually are when the sun is out, but it’s Jiyong’s favorite type of blue-- layered and thick, like fresh paint pigment wetting a canvas; but yielding, veiled behind a cloak of wispy white clouds, making it strangely fluorescent but still subdued. It’s the kind of sky you find yourself staring at, lulled in by its brilliance even though there’s a ticking noise at the back of your mind reminding you to blink before you burn your eyes out. But if you’re careful, if you know how to look, you could steal a part of it-- cut out a swatch of blue, and keep it for yourself.  Armed with his camcorder and an undeterred will, this is what Jiyong has been trying to do for a good part of an hour. Trying, and failing, and tripping on his shoelaces because he refuses to let up and stop until he gets his shot. It’s equal parts blind determination and idiocy, if he’s being honest with himself. “I wish I was a little bit taller, I wish I was a baller…” he raps mindlessly, mouth running on its own accord. He cranes his neck, shields his eyes from the sun with a hand as he peeks at the little rectangle video screen of his camera. He strains his arm up, holds the device over his head, aiming the lens at the reflective face of The Bean. It was a good idea, in theory. But Jiyong tends to neglect logistics and several laws of Physics when it comes to his guerilla style of filming. He has the scene perfectly mapped out in his head-- the bustling backdrop of the city spanning three-fourths of the frame, while the rest is a focused shot of himself from the neck up, head bobbing along to music only he can hear from his massive red headphones. When he hazards a glance at his watch, Jiyong thinks to hell with it and starts to jump. Tiptoeing can only get him so far up and his right arm has been dead for almost a full minute now. There’s a small smattering of people that pass behind him; Jiyong sees their shadows in his periphery but he pays them no heed. It helps that his surroundings are drowned out by a constant stream of music blasting in his ears, Pharrell telling him shake it up… shake it up, girl as he bounds up after bending his knees and kicking off against the ground.  Jiyong lands back on the tiled floor of the park, barely gets his footing back when a sudden nudge on his shoulder has him cursing and nearly dropping his camera.  “What the...” he starts, cuts himself off when he whips his head around and-- oh. Oh. An amused smirk pulling on twin dimples and a sly set of eyes are what greet Jiyong. There’s a familiar mop of short black hair, a little more tousled than usual from the afternoon breeze, and two hands pocketed away in a pair of black skinnies he’s sure he’s already seen. Jiyong is smiling before he even realizes it.  “What are you doing here, Seunghyun?” he asks, question directed towards the universe more than the boy in front of him. Truth be told, Jiyong is actually half-shouting, unaware of just how loud his voice is as the thumping bass of the N.E.R.D track on his iPhone still reverberates against his eardrums. Seunghyun’s face breaks out into a wide grin-- a little bashful, but a lot pleased.  “Nothing,” Jiyong hears him say after slipping his headphones off. “Just wandering.” Seunghyun’s eyes sweep over Jiyong. He pans his sight from Jiyong’s sweaty face, travelling the length of his wrinkled denim shirt and navy pedal pushers until his gaze settles on Jiyong’s unlaced pair of Keds.  “Also, your shoelaces are untied,” he says, smirking.  Right. Great. Jiyong’s free hand pulls on the strap of the leather messenger bag over his chest, latches on so he doesn’t smack himself in the face for looking like an embarrassing slob in front of Seunghyun. Again. At least he’s dressed better, Jiyong likes to believe. “Do you come here often?” Jiyong calls out from where he’s crouched, fingers and eyes busy with tending to his shoes.  He’s glad Seunghyun can’t see his face right now, cheeks burning and mouth twisting because who even says that anymore. Jiyong hears a rumble of laughter (no doubt directed at him) and sees one ratty, old Adidas sneaker scuffing against another from the corner of his eye. “No, actually. I haven’t been here in months,” Seunghyun tells him, dimples still fixed on his face when Jiyong straightens and stands up.  “Small world,” he adds with a wry a tilt of his head. “Yeah,” Jiyong says after biting his lip. “Same.” Seunghyun gives him another assessing look, mouth twitching when he says, “You’re such a liar, by the way.” Jiyong physically balks, eyes and mouth falling open trying to parse out Seunghyun’s words.  “Um, I am?” he asks, feels his lips weighted down by a pout. Seunghyun’s eyebrows shoot up before drawing together in a confused furrow. He hastily pulls a hand out from one of his pockets, motions over to the camera in Jiyong’s hand and then to a spot high up over Jiyong’s head.  “Not an artist?”  Jiyong actually turns around, sees his own puzzled expression mirrored on The Bean’s surface. He laughs, drops his head as well as the arm holding his camcorder because it turns out that no matter who he chooses to be that day-- Jiyong, GD, or some combination of both-- Seunghyun’s presence still has the same dizzying, disarming effect on him.  “Oh, yeah. Right.” He nods, feeling sheepish. “But hey, you’re one to talk,” Jiyong quips, the futile trip to Wicker Park a few days ago still fresh in his mind. “I dropped by the bookstore last Tuesday, but someone didn’t keep their promise." “Wait.” Seunghyun says, grin slipping off his face. “You came looking for me?” Jiyong frowns. “I said I would, didn’t I? Didn’t your boss tell you?” Seunghyun shakes his head, tentatively rocking on the balls of his feet. “No. I only just saw him this morning, but he never said anything.” He huffs, eyes narrowing into slits. “I’m gonna kill him.” “Not at my expense.” Jiyong is laughing although a tiny part of him half-agrees with Seunghyun’s sentiment.  “And it’s okay because I found you, anyway,” he says. “Well...” Jiyong grins, just a shy twist of the lips. “You found me.” Seunghyun’s smile finds its way back onto his face, two shades more blinding than it was before.  “Yeah,” he murmurs softly. “I did.” Jiyong’s fingers fiddle on the strap of his bag, renews his grip around his camcorder in his right hand. It’s a precaution, more than anything, so he doesn’t succumb to the urge to grab hold of any part of Seunghyun in fear of having them unceremoniously part ways, like they somehow always end up doing. Seunghyun sighs, shoulders deflating. “I looked for you too, actually,” he says. “I went back to Alchemy the other night, but apparently you don’t work Wednesdays.”  “No, I don’t,” Jiyong says with a shake of the head. “I was covering a shift the night you were there.”  Seunghyun looks just about as resigned as Jiyong feels. Jiyong welcomes the company, glad he has someone to commiserate with in his lamentable lack of luck. “That was my first time spinning for hip hop night, actually,” he adds over a laugh. “I think the last time I was that nervous was during my first time behind the deck.”  Seunghyun grins, leans in closer to say, “If it helps, I couldn’t tell.” “Thanks,” Jiyong says, worrying his bottom lip with his teeth. “But, um, too bad you didn’t get to stay long enough to catch my second set.” Seunghyun glances away for a moment, shifts his weight on his feet before looking back at Jiyong.  “It’s not that I didn’t want to,” he says, eyes as sincere as the cadence of his voice. Seunghyun is quiet for a beat. Then he smiles, playful, eyes sparking with a glint that has little to do with the midday sun hitting his face.  “I guess I’ll just have to come back, then.” “You should come on Tuesday,” Jiyong says brightly, has a quarter of a second to celebrate before the knowledge of what happens on Tuesday dawns on him.  He can’t quite meet Seunghyun in the eye so he rests his sight on every other part of the boy’s face instead-- the thin ridge of nose, the soft well over his mouth, the floppy curve of his earlobes resting by the sharp divot of his jaw. It’s almost like drafting a sketch from memory, like Jiyong’s brain is actively filing away every detail of Seunghyun it could spare to keep. Seunghyun eyes him curiously. “What’s the occasion,” he asks.  “Um.” Jiyong hesitates, but hedges on when Seunghyun nods for him to continue. “My going-away party.” Seunghyun blinks.  “You’re leaving,” he says. Or questions. Jiyong’s isn’t too sure. What he’s sure of is how the light in Seunghyun’s eyes is gone, and the implication that he somehow is the cause for it. Jiyong takes a half step closer to Seunghyun, almost unconsciously.  “Just for three months,” he says. “I have this trip planned; twelve weeks with just me and a backpack.”  Jiyong ducks his head, gives himself a moment to laugh at how ridiculous his words sound out loud, but no less real.  “I know it sounds crazy,” he says, seeking Seunghyun’s eyes. “But it’s something I thought I needed to do. For myself, mostly.”  Seunghyun is silent, face impassive. Then, remarkably, he starts to smile.  “It’s not crazy,” he says. “It’s brave.” Those two words are probably the only words Jiyong needed to hear. Not are you sure, or will you come back, or why.  So, he smiles. “You think so?”  “Yeah,” Seunghyun says, lips quirking up. “Not many people have what it takes to step outside their comfort zone, y’know?” “Yeah, definitely. It’s something I need to get used to again,” Jiyong says. For a moment or two, they’re just standing there-- sharing the same two-feet box of air, trading smiles as their own form of currency, the tips of their shoes like arrows pointing towards each other.  It’s Seunghyun who breaks the silence first.  “So, are you super busy right now?” he asks, gesturing to the camcorder in Jiyong’s hand. “Because it would be great if I didn't have to watch you walk away again.”  Jiyong muffles a giggle with a the back of his hand. He’s embarrassing, but apparently Seunghyun doesn’t mind hanging around with someone like Jiyong. “Not too busy,” he manages to say. “I just needed some shots for a film project. And no one’s walking away today.”  Jiyong peeks at his watch, just to make sure.  “Not until 5:00, at least.” Seunghyun’s smile mirrors the one Jiyong feels plastered on his own face.  "Good," he says. He points a finger over Jiyong’s shoulder. "Do you, um, d'you wanna sit somewhere or--" “Sure.” Jiyong doesn't even let Seunghyun finish his sentence. He gifts Seunghyun with an easy smile, makes his way to the patch of grass next to the amphitheater, walking backwards and beckoning Seunghyun to follow him. Seunghyun laughs and catches up with Jiyong until they're almost shoulder to shoulder. He slows down, lightly taking Jiyong by the arm and making them both sit.  "So is film what you're studying?" he asks. “I wouldn’t call it studying, but yeah. I’m a film major moonlighting as a DJ,” Jiyong says, eyes never off Seunghyun’s face as his hands fumble with his bag to put his camera away. Seunghyun barks a short laugh. "But still not an artist,” he says, lips upturned in amusement. He draws his knees up, fingers combing over the grass, coming dangerously close to brushing Jiyong's bare knee cap.  "I’m curious why you’re so against using that term," Seunghyun pries.  Jiyong hums. “I just think people throw that word around too loosely these days,” he says, setting a hand on either one of his knees. “Everyone thinks it’s as easy as taking a urinal, turning it over, and signing their name on it. Haring, Basquiat, Klimt-- now those are artists.” "Yeah, but don't you think that's a little harsh, putting a limit on creative expression?” Seunghyun asks, eyes challenging but the upward curve of his mouth remains soft. “Not that Duchamp necessarily does or doesn't deserve the title, but he was making the same point."  Jiyong’s smile grows, just a small baring of teeth. It’s refreshing not to hear another tirade about how conceptual art isn’t even supposed to be art, or that Tumblr is where all art goes to die.  “I never thought to think of it that way,” he muses. “I guess as long as you have something to say, you might as well go ahead and say it. Because at the end of the day, it’s not about pleasing other people, right?” Seunghyun nods. "That's the hard part though… not letting yourself be influenced by what other people think. What other people want." He rests his cheek on his knee to face Jiyong, arms wrapping around his thighs, body swaying to his left.  “I try to remind myself not to care about public opinion,” Jiyong says, fights not to fixate on the tiny point of contact between him and Seunghyun. “It’s just…”  He trails off, wonders if he should show another piece of himself to Seunghyun but when Seunghyun lightly presses himself on the hand Jiyong has perched on his knee, he continues.  “I feel like everyone who looks at me always expects me to do something amazing.” Seunghyun squints, blows out a breath before laughing slightly.  "I know exactly how you feel,” he says. Levi’s words from Tuesday come to mind, about Seunghyun being amazing somewhere in the world that isn’t a second-hand bookshop. It’s something that Jiyong carried with him along with a paper bag full of graphic novels on his way out of Inkwell that night. “I had a feeling you did.” he smiles, leans his body to the right, pressing against Seunghyun, just for a bit, before drawing back.  Seunghyun is quiet, but the warm length of his arm almost flush against Jiyong’s own is deafening. Jiyong casts his gaze down and away from Seunghyun’s eyes, finds that it’s too much to fit himself in the boy’s space and be the sole focus of his scrutiny.  “So, what’s your story?” Jiyong asks, needlessly fixing the hem of his shirt before looking up. “You already saw a cliffsnotes version of mine.” He turns over the arm resting on his thigh, pointedly glancing at its inked surface.  “And I wonder,” Jiyong adds, “how come someone like you just works at a bookstore?”  "Hey, don't knock Inkwell," Seunghyun teases, nudging Jiyong with his elbow. "As for my story," he sighs, wistful, matching the look in his eyes. "It's not the most pleasant. So I'll spare you the gruesome details."  Jiyong really doesn’t want him to. So he surges to his right, closes the thin gap of air between their arms, and waits. "Um," Seunghyun says, looking up at Jiyong, smile wavering. "I'm a writer. Which sounds so fucking awful every time I say it. It shouldn't, but it does.”  He pauses, body sinking towards Jiyong. Seunghyun sighs while Jiyong swallows one of his own. "Sometimes I think I'm more in love with the idea of it. But mostly I just think I'm afraid. Afraid to succeed, afraid I’ll keep failing," he says, mouth drawn in a bitter line. "Although you'd think the shrine of rejection letters above my desk wouldn't bother me anymore." Seunghyun drops his head, stretches his legs over the grass, and lets out a low groan of frustration.  Jiyong’s all too familiar with the sight. He sees it every other night on the blackened screen of his laptop when it’s three, four, even five in the morning and none of the shots he’s amassed seemed to work with the film concept he had playing in his head. So it’s easy, carelessly easy, for him to move his palm over to the spot just above Seunghyun’s knee, and squeeze. For reassurance, for solace, and maybe even for something more. “Everyone gets scared,” Jiyong says. “And it’s good to feel that from time to time. But...” Jiyong stops because what he’s formed in his head is advice he’s yet to take himself.  He smiles, continues his line of thought when he notices that Seunghyun’s frown has completely disappeared from his face.  “But it’s a matter of how you choose to face your fears,” Jiyong says. “And monsters are only as terrifying as you want them to be. Those letters? Do they really have to be tacked to your wall?”  Jiyong knows he’s babbling now, fingers absentmindedly twitching over Seunghyun’s thigh when he tries to fix his thoughts. He laughs, a little rueful.  “Um, do you know what an inspiration board is?” he asks. "Vaguely?" Seunghyun answers, amused. “Well, my friend, Laya, had one during the start of freshman year.” Jiyong twists his torso, fully facing Seunghyun now. “It’s just a corkboard and she’d pin pictures of all sorts of things. Places she wanted to go, people she’d love to meet.”  He laughs, ducks his head down, fingers absently playing over the the material of Seunghyun’s jeans. “It sounds really lame, but I thought it was a good idea. Because sometimes setting your mind to doing something just isn’t enough. And you needed to see with your own eyes what you’re actually working your butt off in college for, you know?” Seunghyun smiles, dimples in full force. "Maybe you're right. I'm just not sure my brain operates like that." “If you say so,” Jiyong says lightly over a laugh. “But at least consider taking that shrine of yours down? Even just one letter at a time.”  He offers Seunghyun another smile, tightens his hold on Seunghyun’s leg because Jiyong refuses to believe that there isn’t an ounce of self-belief in this boy who so clearly looks like he has a whole universe of words in his head just bursting to come out. Seunghyun breathes in slowly. He nods, reluctant, but he’s smiling.  “I will,” he says. “Or at least I’ll try.” “Good.” Jiyong nods, feels how big his smile is when it pulls on his face, baring his gums.  Seunghyun’s smile grows too, worry lines gradually falling off his face, the tense set of his shoulders loosening. He shifts from where he’s seated, body relaxing, jostling the hold of the palm that’s been sitting on his leg this entire time.  Jiyong’s cheeks heat, suddenly aware of where his hand has been resting, debates whether or not he should pull his arm back. His gaze travels from his nails to the ones faintly stained with ink and are far less bitten-down than ones he owns.  Jiyong reaches for Seunghyun’s hand, mindless, envelops it with both of his own while he squints down at the black smudges trapped in the whorls of its finger pads.  “So you’re one of those old-fashioned writers?” he asks, grinning when he looks up at Seunghyun. “Ink and paper over a laptop?”  Seunghyun takes a while to respond, fingers stilling in Jiyong’s hold on them. He clears his throat, free hand raking over his hair before he speaks. “Um… I use both,” he says. “But I uh, I only write by hand when it’s important.” Seunghyun pauses, regards Jiyong with a smile he can’t place. “When I really mean it.”  “Like for sonnets and grocery lists?” Jiyong teases, quirks a brow up and wonders how many moleskines Seunghyun has filled with his little scribbled thoughts.  Seunghyun snorts and shakes his head. “God no, I’d be terrible at writing sonnets,” he says. “And grocery lists are sacred, all right. My roommate, Alex, actually had one of them framed, and now it’s hanging in the hallway next to the front door.” Jiyong throws his head back and laughs. “All lists are sacred,” he says. “My fridge is covered in old post-its. Marco calls it neurotic, but I just like being neat.” “Whatever helps keep you sane, right?” Seunghyun smiles. Jiyong nods. “Also, it’s just nice to see all the items crossed out. It’s...”  Jiyong stills, feels Seunghyun’s hand move along his. He ignores it, ignores it until he can’t anymore when Seunghyun slots his fingers between Jiyong’s own. Jiyong sucks at his bottom lip, fixes his expression, though it’s probably nowhere near as unaffected as he hopes it is.  “It’s just really, um, nice to see the items all crossed out,” Jiyong mumbles, needlessly repeating what he’d just said. “It’s…” He flicks his eyes down, just a quick glance at their clasped hands. “It’s nice.” Nice doesn’t even begin to explain what having Seunghyun’s hand in his feels like. Jiyong’s other hand seems oddly bereft, untethered, now that he has proof of how warm and solid Seunghyun’s fingers are interlocked with his.   “Yeah,” Seunghyun says, hair fanning over his eyes when he lifts his head up. He watches Jiyong for a moment, stare unfaltering, then strokes his thumb over the back of Jiyong’s hand. Jiyong drops his gaze down to their linked hands because the way Seunghyun is looking at him feels too much like a question. A question he thinks he knows the answer to, but having Seunghyun here is so much more debilitating compared to a blinking cursor on a blank Tumblr draft. A question he has less than a week to ponder over because he’ll be miles away from Seunghyun by then-- in a whole other time zone, in a different city, in a time and place where being near Seunghyun is something even more unattainable than it was in the first place. Jiyong tightens his grip in Seunghyun’s hand, the soft press of their palms something he won’t be forgetting anytime soon, then slowly eases his fingers off and away.  He keeps Seunghyun’s arm on his lap, can’t quite find it in his heart to let go of Seunghyun’s hand, much less brave a peek to see Seunghyun's face. So, Jiyong starts to play with his fingers, lightly taps on the tips of each Seunghyun’s ink-rimmed fingernails. “You have nice nails,” he says, cringes at how vapid he must sound. “Mine are all chewed-up from all the nail-biting I did as a kid.”  Seunghyun laughs, and if laughter had color, this one would be slate gray. “I like your hands,” he says quietly. “They have a history.”  “Yeah,” Jiyong says, meeting Seunghyun’s eyes and finds that they’ve lost some of their shine from earlier. “That they do.” Seunghyun gives him a half smile, the corners of his lips not quite tilted up like they normally are.  “All our parts tell a story,” he says. “It’s just a matter of knowing how to translate.”  Jiyong has to smile at this because Seunghyun is all at once this gorgeous boy with messy hair who spews out gorgeous words, and this not-quite stranger who thinks Jiyong is someone worth sharing his time with. “I bet you have that written down in one of your little writer’s notebooks, don’t you?” he says, if only to pull a smile out of Seunghyun’s face. Seunghyun laughs-- cheeks creasing, face lighting up, eyes disappearing into slits. Yellow. This one is definitely yellow.  “Asshole,” he mutters, knocking into Jiyong with his shoulder. “And I don’t, as a matter of fact. If you haven’t forgotten about me by the time you get back, remind me to prove it to you.” Jiyong’s smiles hard enough that his cheeks start to hurt. He looks at their hands again, it’s safer than looking at Seunghyun’s face. He has Seunghyun’s palm face-up, uses his forefinger to trace over the surface of his skin-- the soft swell of flesh by the base of Seunghyun’s fingers, the sideways sweep of his heartline, and the faint crease running right down the middle that Jiyong has been told stands for fate.  “You’re not very good at keeping promises,” Jiyong he says, no heat in his words. “But I’ll hold you to that.”  Seunghyun rolls his eyes, smile still fixed on his face. “You’re never gonna let me live that down, are you?”  “Nope,” Jiyong says with a firm shake his the head and a grin. He squeezes Seunghyun’s hand absently, rocking his body towards Seunghyun space. “Never.”  There’s a lot less gaps between their sentences from then on, a lot more laughter replacing the silence. Somehow, Seunghyun manages to extricate his arm away from Jiyong’s grasp. He only takes notice when he sees Seunghyun’s fingers sweeping his bangs away from his forehead. Jiyong folds his fingers together, tries not to mourn the loss of something that wasn’t his to keep in the first place as he looks at Seunghyun’s hand disappearing into the black mess of his hair.  They talk about a lot of things, things Jiyong wouldn’t have thought another person would find interesting apart from himself. Like the Chicago public transit system, or the heady smell of asphalt after a summer rain. They argue, too, but more often than not, they either find a middle ground to work with or each discover a new way of looking at something from a different perspective. Jiyong, however, will never forgive Seunghyun for calling Wes Anderson ‘just okay’. But it’s fine since he’s pretty sure he laughed way too hard over Seunghyun professing his ardent love for David Bowie. Jiyong won’t be able to memorize all words that would come out of Seunghyun’s lips today, would be hard pressed to recall the exact lines from one of his favorite Neruda poems, or the lyrics to a Talking Heads song Jiyong hasn’t listened to in forever. But what he’ll take with him is how Seunghyun made him feel, how his stomach ached from laughter, how his heart leapt whenever Seunghyun said, yeah, me too. He’ll remember the flashes of color-- the shifting of the sky from one hue of blue to another, the way Seunghyun’s mouth was a different sheen of pink when his wet tongue would swipe over his lips.  Jiyong won’t forget any of the shades that colored the scene of him and Seunghyun laid out on the grass on a balmy Friday afternoon. It’s like a shot straight out of a movie, and Jiyong intends to keep the film reel. He knows there’s bound to be a sequel or two if only he had the time. If only Jiyong had the time.