Work Text:
It's a typical night at Sweet Circles—typical ambiance, typical volume of the patrons’ chattering in this café down on 9th street, with the typical Thursday coffeehouse playlist buffering in the background.
It’s not a typical night for Jihoon—but in a good way, at least. For the first time in what felt like forever, he's not sipping his black, black coffee in haste, nor drinking it just to force his eyes open because he's still seven pages short from the assigned page count of the day's chapter, four hours prior to its deadline. No, tonight, he's just "chillin'", as how his teen-aged niece prefers to call times like this, in his favorite corner of this café. It's kind of safe for him to say that despite not having his name engraved in the quite-fancy wooden table, they already own this spot since he was nineteen.
They already own this spot... since he was nineteen.
Okay, his mind wandered off again.
His plate of chocolate cream puffs looks yummy enough to pull him back into the present so he gave in, picked up a piece and munched on it. After eating a couple of them, he considers getting a plate of vanilla-filled ones, but hesitates since he only eats vanilla-flavored food when it's... a night to write about heartbreaks.
It's his free time tonight and he just wants to chill, for God's sake, so he doesn't.
He was tuning in to the conversation of two friends talking about how stressful their work is, a table away from him. Not because he's a nosy bastard, but because he is an artist—a writer to be specific. And artists need to be like "sponges" who can absorb everything around them, because ideas are everywhere. Inspirations are endless.
Reasons, he could hear Junhui saying it inside his head.
Okay, he's eavesdropping. But only for literary purposes. Nothing else.
He was jotting quick notes (for future references, shut it) about the conversation of the said pair of friends to his left. He was looking slightly sideward but body facing the front so he could still see the pair of friends in the left side of his peripheral vision while appearing discreet. He was getting too invested with it, until he felt a presence near him. It was rather intimidating in a way that it wasn’t budging for a good ten seconds already.
So he had to look at it.
"Would you mind if I join you?"
Tonight's not a typical night.
And he was totally, utterly, caught off-guard by it.
Try to call a night when your ex, whom you haven't seen for a very long time (roughly what, five, six years?) come to you like you didn't break each other's hearts (his still aches, by the way) due to the lack of closure from the both of you, and asking if he could join you in a table you two "owned" since you were teenagers, a typical night. Jihoon dares somebody, but nobody in particular, inside his head.
He fucking dares.
And of course he minds. He fucking minds. But he's an adult who shouldn't be bested by his emotions. And just because... maybe he does want to see Soonyoung longer than when he dashes out of this goddamn café pathetically. So he managed to draw out from his throat a choked,
"Sure, it's not like we don't know each other at all."
And fuck. Just a short, polite, and simple "Sure." would do but of course, one's brain-to-mouth filter always fails the very moment they want it to work at its optimum. Nice.
Soonyoung is kind enough not to show any sign that he just saw the mental breakdown all over Jihoon's face the moment their eyes met. This newcomer, this ever-dashing man just smiled curtly to Jihoon as a reply, as he sets his tray down the table—a tray that has a grande cup of hot chocolate and guess what—
a plate of vanilla-filled puffs.
"I like vanilla," says a voice too cheery to be ignored, so he humors him.
"Yeah? Do you have any particular reason why?"
"It reminds me of you. Smooth, just the right hint of sweet, the others dare to call a plain flavor but you know how I like things simple. Uncomplicated. Comfortable. Like home."
"That's too much cheese coming from a vanilla lover, don't you think?" Jihoon lightly countered.
"But between us you're the one who likes cheese more yet you don't," Soonyoung does an air-quote, "deliver the amount this relationship needs, so I somehow have to compensate for it."
Jihoon chuckles at that. "I find it cool that we complement each other in so many things."
Soonyoung hums as he takes a sip from his vanilla latte. "You say."
"But we're really like opposite poles, hm?" Jihoon asked rhetorically.
Soonyoung smiles at him, eyes twinkling, "Like magnets, the very reason why we're so attracted to each other."
Three goddamn minutes of idle air feels like forever and a half for Jihoon. Sure, he thinks that he must be the one to initiate a conversation, because that's how it used to be. He initiated everything first. For your comfort, Soonyoung reasoned one time. Soonyoung just always follows.
Or followed, should he say.
Soonyoung always forgets to remove things from his messenger bag—paper bills, calling cards of some relevant people from the entertainment industry who are interested with him and his dancing, sometimes sticky notes with short handwritten messages from the younger to Soonyoung. Once when he soaked Soonyoung's bag in water, the latter whined about a sticky note that he forgot to retrieve from it. The older sulked that whole night.
Jihoon stuck forty five sticky notes all over their shared unit the next morning.
So that night when Jihoon is in the laundry area of their shared unit, double-checking Soonyoung's messenger bag, Jihoon really found something.
A letter, an invitation letter to be exact, for Mr. Kwon Soonyoung to work and study dance at Japan, with all the expenses paid for.
"Jihoon!" Soonyoung's heavy footsteps are audibly rushing to the laundry area. He doesn't know what made him do it. Hell, he didn't even know how he did it, but he managed to put the letter back as it was inside the bag. He then rushed to pick one of the laundry baskets up as if that's what he's been doing before Soonyoung even reached the laundry area.
"Have you seen my— oh gotcha! My goodness." Soonyoung sighed in relief. Jihoon choked on his own breath.
Soonyoung flew to their shared room, messenger bag on hand just as fast as he reached the laundry area.
Jihoon let out the longest exhale he's ever done in his whole life.
"So, when did you come back from Japan?"
Nice, Jihoon. Do it like that.
Soonyoung felt relieved that he's not going to spend his whole night on this table in awkward silence. "Ah, just a day ago? This was kind of unplanned actually, me coming back in here."
"Ah."
One. Two. Three.
Oh. So it really has to be me again?
"What brings you here in Sweet Circles?" Did you come here with the same purpose as I always have?
"I'm here for Minghao." Oh.
So no. You aren’t here to reminisce.
Not for me either. Of course.
"I mean, I'll be waiting for his shift to end. I'll be staying the night at his place but I didn't get the keys from him earlier so... I'd rather wait here with chocolates and vanillas than to wait inside my car alone, you know." Soonyoung ended his reasoning with a small grin.
"Good decision, I guess."
"I know, their vanilla puffs didn't even change!"
No Soonyoung, everything has changed.
Everything except these feelings I have for you.
"You're right. They didn't."
///
Soonyoung visibly became more comfortable after that exchange of words. Not much, but still. At least.
"Say, Jihoon, how have you been?"
Living in monochrome ever since you left.
"Fine, I guess. I write for a living now."
"You write? Like, write write?" Jihoon hums. "What about music?"
I started to fail patching melodies together ever since you left.
"Nah, I quit after just a few months of going around Seoul, my compositions with me."
"I…” Soonyoung trails, “I didn't expect that. I thought I'll come back here hearing your songs playing in all the stores along the streets."
Jihoon lightly chuckles. So, he still has that vision for me. "Thought of that too. But hey, at least I never stopped writing."
My pen never stopped bleeding against paper, like how my heart never stopped beating for you.
"That... I'd agree to that." Soonyoung raised his cup of hot choco. "Cheers?"
"Idiot." I missed your smile. "But okay, with hot beverages in paper cups, cheers."
"Jihoon," Soonyoung called from the sofa, "Babe, Ji," he insisted.
Jihoon spat on the sink. "I'm brushing my teeth. What?"
"Did I say... did I say something to you last night?" The older carefully inquired.
"You know you talk too much when you're drunk. About what, specifically?"
Soonyoung hesitates, but there’s no turning back now. "About dance... and dreams?"
Jihoon mentally prepared himself for this ever since last night. He knows Soonyoung can be so fucking wasted to the bones but can still somehow manage to recollect (even just a bit) the events that happen on his drunken nights.
"Maybe you did, maybe you did not."
"Ji," Soonyoung whined.
"Okay, you did. But we're running late now, don't you think? Wonwoo and Junhui are now in the resto. We'll talk about it later, okay?"
Left with no other choice, Soonyoung dejectedly nods. Guilt has been eating him for weeks already but now that it's confirmed that Jihoon finally, finally knows, or at least has a hint of it already, guilt is devouring him whole.
W hy did he even hide it in the first place?
"Now get your ass up from there. Let's go."
"But Ji, you know that I love you, so much, right?"
It's as if Soonyoung's words dripped with sincerity stopped the time. Jihoon stood by the door, while Soonyoung too, stood by the end of the sofa. Jihoon doesn't know what's gotten into him that very moment. Was it the light that came from the windows that made Soonyoung glow like a fallen angel on land with the hopes of flying back to where he really belongs, or Jihoon’s lack of sleep because he couldn't get a minute of shut-eye trying to weigh all his alternatives to come up with the 'best and wisest' decision overnight, or just how Soonyoung looked at him—regretful and hopeful at the same time?
Well, Jihoon too, would like to stop the time if he only could.
"I know." He'll do anything for Soonyoung. "And I love you too."
"So, just guessing. You still live around the neighborhood?"
"At the same unit actually."
"Oh."
Yeah, Soonyoung, oh. How pathetic, right? I didn't even do anything to run away from everything. I stayed.
"The unit is affordable. I got used to the neighborhood already, and I don't fancy changes that much." You know I don’t. Jihoon grabbed a puff and took a bite. "And work's kinda near as well, luckily, so it's perfect."
But it could be more perfect if you'll be with me, again.
Honestly, Jihoon needs to stop countering his own words inside his head. It's not as if he'll remember all of these and jot down the exact words later in his notebook.
But Jihoon doesn't know where to stop. When to stop. How to stop.
"So how's the beautiful cherry blossoms of Japan?"
That made Soonyoung smile. "They're more beautiful than how we see them on postcards or even on high quality images."
"Thought so." Even you, you're more beautiful in the flesh, sitting in all your glory in front of me right now, than how you looked like in the old pictures I still have at our apartment.
No, my apartment.
"I want to try their vanilla latte if it's still the same, wait a sec," said Soonyoung as he grabbed his now-empty cup of hot chocolate, and threw it on the bin he passed by.
Now Jihoon, thank the gods, has the time to compose himself. That fuck, that is Kwon Soonyoung. Jihoon is just casually talking to the man who has been his muse, the man behind every heartbreaking novel he ever wrote. He is talking to the man he has been holding on to despite being aware that it is really, fucking hopeless to do so. The man... the man who has the biggest of dreams, whom he chose to let go because he doesn't want to be selfish—and that's how it should be. Love should not be selfish, right? That's him, walking away from Jihoon once again. Not to another country but just to the counter, like the old times, and old times has a good ring to it. And now, Jihoon really doesn't know what to feel about this.
Okay, maybe there’s no need to be dramatic about this all over again because the man isn't even walking away from his life anymore.
Because he isn't even in his life anymore to begin with.
Oh fuck, that hurts. It surely does. Jihoon writes about heartbreaks for a living. He wonders if that realization would sell to the public.
Why do people enjoy indulging themselves in the pain of someone else, by the way? Ah, the hell does he care? The pain has been there for years. He's been using it as some sort of a capital and he's been getting good money from it. Isn't he the smartest businessman out there?
Of course he's not. If anything, he should be called a professional sadist.
Really, his bitter counters to himself are great, but it'll be weird to write and write all those lines in his notebook for future use while Soonyoung is seated in front of him, right? Right. That'd be so weird.
"It took me time for a mini cup, sorry. Caught up with Mingyu on the counter. He's the same talkative and...."
"Nosy kid as ever, I know.” Jihoon cut Soonyoung mid-sentence. “Could see him from here, getting jittery while drilling holes to this table ever since you came."
They both chuckled at that. Mingyu, together with Minghao as well, are their college friends.
"I hope he didn't say too much things to you? You know him, he could get exaggerated with his stories sometimes."
Oh my god, what is he even saying? Why is he afraid of what Mingyu might say?
Soonyoung shrugs, "Maybe he did, maybe he did not."
Jihoon shot a pointed look to his ex. "Soonyoung."
Did Soonyoung just quote one character from his novel?
Or so he thought. Soonyoung quoted him. Jihoon is one of the characters in his own novel. The one who loved too much. The one who never stopped loving.
But he doesn't want to dwell on the thought if Soonyoung had quoted him on purpose or not. Because he bets he's the only one who remembers everything.
The said man stifled a giggle, raising both of his hands up in surrender. "Okay, he didn't say a lot. But he did say something about your caffeine intake." Soonyoung adjusted his seat, looked directly and with intent at Jihoon, trying his best to imitate Mingyu—the way he looks at people, facial expressions and all. "And I quote, it's gone worse, hyung, unquote."
Jihoon couldn't help but to wheeze at that. He surely missed happy times like this with Soonyoung.
Fuck love. Jihoon is getting dizzy with this feeling.
"It has gone worse, indeed. But it's for work, so..."
"I get it, Jihoon."
Jihoon. But I'm still Ji, I never stopped being your Ji.
"I trust you enough that you take good care of your health. I'm not going to beat you for it."
"As if I would let you," Jihoon bit back.
"Exactly! I know!" Soonyoung laughed.
That laugh. That laugh is the melody that has left me. Now it came back to me, just to pay me a visit and not to stay forever.
I'll never be able to write songs without you, Soonyoung.
"Ah, I was too caught up with my talk with Gyu I forgot to grab a stirrer on my way here," Soonyoung reached for his nape, a shy boyish grin on his lips as he's about to stand up, only to be stopped by Jihoon.
"No, I have some here, take one."
Soonyoung laughed again, a more light-hearted one this time. "Why do you have a bunch of stirrers in your bag?" Soonyoung good-naturedly inquires. "Now you're making me really alarmed of your caffeine intake if your stirrer to cup ratio is one to one."
Soonyoung is clearly teasing him now. God. They're really being too casual, was everything that had happened years ago just Jihoon's imagination? Dream? Nightmare? What should he call it? Why are they both acting like it didn't happen? Like nothing really happened?
"It has become my hobby to collect stirrers, as odd as it may seem, every time I come here. Don't judge, I don't know why either."
Or maybe one stirrer means one day I had waited for you to come in the café but didn't. To see you in front of me, to eat whatever vanilla you wanted for that day, and to say you've finally come back for me.
But I won't tell you that, of course.
"Nah, no worries, my old hobby of snatching tissues from anywhere and keeping it everywhere within my reach is still more odd, if you'll ask me."
Ah right. Soonyoung used to keep tissues in the oddest of places: in between pages of his books, under the cushions of their sofa, even in Jihoon's back pockets (maybe an excuse to grab his ass when he gets them from there?), just because. Soonyoung once justified it with him being sweaty all the time, a reason that Jihoon had bought because it's true. Soonyoung excretes liquid through his pores like mad.
Memories. All of those are just memories now.
"I still do it though, old habits die hard I guess." Soonyoung informs Jihoon, shrugging, while running his fingers through his gorgeous jet black hair. Jihoon recalls how Soonyoung used to dye his hair a lot when they were still in college.
That's... nice to hear, Jihoon thinks. It’s like Soonyoung has changed but he didn’t really change at all.
But something caught Jihoon's sight. Something glistened under the fancy café spotlights over their heads.
Something silver around one of Soonyoung's fingers that brushed through his hair.
Damn fucking shit.
Fucking shit.
Of fucking course.
Jihoon is so dumb. So fucking dumb. How can he not notice everything? That twinkle in Soonyoung’s eyes, saying that he’s genuinely happy. That nice glow on Soonyoung, telling him that he’s still the same Kwon Soonyoung, Jihoon’s best friend, Jihoon’s only love, but a better version of himself—an established person, a validated artist, an accomplished individual. A complete man.
And all of this happened when Jihoon had let him go.
The man of his dreams is now a man who has reached his dreams. A man who found happiness at the expense of his happiness.
Jihoon wants to cry at that. Should he take pride on it? Should he, what, what should he do about it? Fuck. He just wants to cry right now. Fuck.
“Fuck. Jihoon I have to go,” says Soonyoung as he stuffs his phone back to his messenger bag. Of course a messenger bag.
And Jihoon is already crying, albeit not physically. But he feels he’s really crying already. Deep inside. He knows.
“Apparently Minghao has left the café 30 minutes ago, when I thought he’ll be here until 11.”
It’s just 10:09 pm right now. Sweet Circles closes at 11.
“And uh… he kind of needs me to be there. I just read his texts.”
Jihoon doesn’t know what to do. What to say. Honestly. He’s been avoiding to ask Soonyoung directly how he has been (and that explains why he lamely asked how Japan’s cherry blossoms are instead of asking how the person who saw the cherry blossoms is) just because he’s afraid of whatever Soonyoung might answer him. He’s afraid of the truth. He’s afraid of hearing the truth from Soonyoung himself.
Maybe he has become an author of romantic fiction because he resents reality.
And so he just stares at Soonyoung, drinking in the sight of him for the last time. Because truthfully, this might really be the last time.
Soonyoung, who’s on his feet already, about to leave, sighed when he saw the look on Jihoon’s face.
Jihoon badly wants the tears to flow out of his tear ducts right now. He wants to burst into tears right when Soonyoung decided to sit down again because the man still knows Jihoon very well—that Jihoon isn’t okay with a certain setup if he doesn’t approve of it. Or declines. It’s just either of the two. When he doesn’t speak, it’s not yet finished. It still has to be settled.
And God knows how much Jihoon doesn’t want to utter any word maybe for the rest of his life, if that will make Soonyoung stay with him for this lifetime.
But Jihoon isn’t stubborn.
Well, okay, you might say he is stubborn, but not this kind of stubborn.
And it costed him his entire life ahead of him to say a word that will end everything. Break everything that is him.
“Go.”
“Jihoon, you still haven’t asked me how I’ve been.”
He’s still not crying, curse his defective tear ducts.
And Soonyoung is still there, much to his frustration. Curse this fucking feeling people call love.
“Right, I didn’t. I am too afraid to. But I know now.”
Maybe Soonyoung really went all the way here not for Minghao, but for him. Not to come back to him, but to give him the closure they know they both needed and longed for in years.
Jihoon just didn’t cooperate.
His heart wouldn’t cooperate.
It will never cooperate.
“Jihoon I’m—”
“No. Just don’t.”
Both went silent. The air around them is a mix of rotten memories, could-have-beens, and a love that happened but was never meant to go on.
“Don’t apologize for being a better man. Don’t apologize for achieving your dreams.”
And Jihoon sighs, the most heartbroken he’s ever heard himself. “Remember what I told you that day? If it’s meant to be, it will be. We just have to let it be.”
“Jihoon, just say… just say you don’t want me to go, and I will never.”
They are both crying, but Soonyoung is crying even harder. Soonyoung is shaking; breaths labored, words incoherent. This is his hardest cry Jihoon has ever witnessed. This is inhumanely breaking his heart. “Ji, Jihoon...”
“Jihoon, I’ll bring you with me. Li… listen, they offered me to.. to work there too. Jihoon, I’ll earn us a living. Jihoon, Jihoon I need you. I need you near. Please, we can’t do this Jihoon, please…”
This is killing him. He’s holding Soonyoung in his arms like it’s the only way he could stay alive. “But it’s for the better…”
“Don’t you say it’s for the better. I’m a better person when I’m with you, Jihoon, let’s not.. do this to ourselves.”
“Listen, you should go. You can’t just let this opportunity pass. If it’s meant to be, it’ll be. We just have to let things be. We have to grow as individuals, and this is a great chance for you to do that. Let’s just live our lives. Let’s… let’s meet again when we’re better persons. And from there, let’s see what’s in store for the two of us.”
That’s the first time one of them brought up a memory from their past. And Jihoon did it. Because remember? He always initiated things first.
Even for the last time, Soonyoung is doing things for Jihoon’s comfort, at Jihoon’s own pace. And it sucks. It sucks how life could be this unfair. Soonyoung is really a blessing, a blessing he was once graced with, but now a blessing he cannot keep. Anymore.
“Apparently, it’s not meant to be.”
Admit it, coward. You have to.
“We are not meant to be.”
And he heard himself choke on the first word. And Soonyoung heard it too. He’s sure of it.
“So go now, I’m really happy to see you doing well. Thank you for approaching me. Thank you, Soonyoung. I really, really appreciate it.”
He didn’t expect to feel a hand over his shaking one rested on the table, a hand that offered the achingly familiar warmth he had gotten used to and thought he’ll have for the rest of his life but godfuckingdamnit life has to get in the way.
It aches so much, so much, he just hung his head low.
He balled his hand into a fist, clutching the thumb of the hand above his while he’s at it. That’s all he could get a hold of. He doesn’t even have the heart (nor the courage, the right) to hold Soonyoung’s entire hand and relish in the warmth of it. He’s afraid he might search for a bigger warmth and hug his ex-boyfriend that he’s supposed to finally let go in less than a minute from now.
“Jihoon, you paved the way for me to become the man I am now. You are part of everything I’ve become. I wish you the best life ahead.”
I already had my best, Soonyoung.
And it’s about time to let it go.
He loosens his hold around Soonyoung’s thumb, withdrew his hand, and then raised his head to meet Soonyoung’s eye.
He knows his entire self is shattered, smashed into pieces right now, but he just hopes the sincerity in the words he’s about to say could somehow cover it up.
“Thank you. I am so, so proud of you.”
“Thank you, Ji.”
Soonyoung stands up.
“Drive—” Ji. Ji. “Drive safely.”
And once again, he watches the love of his life walk away from him, but this time it’s different. One a better man, and the other a man who’s going to have a better pay, because this heartache is just so grand that people will definitely go after it.
///
On that Thursday night, Jihoon was the last customer to leave the café. He’s not bringing home a stirrer this time, but carrying two bags of vanilla cream puffs instead.
It’s going to be a long night ahead.