One Week In August

Epilogue

... and a Saturday, two years later

"Hey Phu," Tian's voice rings out from behind Phupha.

When Phupha turns around, he's momentarily blinded by the glaring flash of a camera, the white light dancing across his vision as he hears Tian snicker from where he's lounging on the couch. Tian takes out the freshly printed Polaroid and starts shaking it, grinning at Phupha as he waits for it to develop and show his exasperated face.

Phupha rolls his eyes and groans. "Tian, you know I'd do almost anything for you, but doing this whole move alone is not one of them," he says, adjusting the heavy box in his arms, filled to the brim with books.

They're Tian's books. From Tian's flat. Because it's his place they're packing up to move out, not Phupha's, but Tian apparently prefers to rest and fool around with his camera instead of helping Phupha carry his belongings down two flights of stairs and into the jeep.

Right now, Phupha almost regrets the day he gifted Tian the old Polaroid camera he found at a flea market on his trip to Tarutao. Except he doesn't, because he loves it that Tian has taken to documenting their life together in little snapshots. He punches a hole into them and puts them all up on a string, one after the other, like a flip book telling their story, and keeps them all in a little box dedicated just to this purpose. At this point, the lid almost doesn't close anymore, the little hook clasp struggling to contain all the memories enclosed in it. Their story started with a picture, and they've made countless memories since, documented in hundreds, maybe thousands of images. Phupha cherishes every single one of them like a tiny treasure, even those that are blurry, or out of frame, or the ones where they both look completely silly.

"You look like Aoi," Tian says and laughs, and when he shows Phupha the picture, the latter can't really disagree.

Aoi, Tian's oldest cat, as fat, and orange, and murderous looking as always, hisses at him from his place on the kitchenette, as if wanting to protest the notion that he and Phupha could ever have anything in common. For some reason, he never warmed up to Phupha, and he likes to remind him of that often and quite vocally, sometimes emphasising his opposition with his claws. Phupha usually likes cats, and Tian's other two have grown fond of him over time, but Phupha wouldn't particularly mind if Aoi would fall prey to a leopard once they all live in the village. He'd never say that to Tian's face, though.

Phupha tries to put on a stern look, eyebrows raised promptingly, but it's difficult to keep the fond smile from spreading over his face when Tian smiles so brightly and looks at the picture he just took of him with so much tenderness in his eyes.

"Tian, come on," Phupha says again, but there's a helpless laugh in his voice that he cannot hide.

Tian sighs exasperatedly. "Alright, alright. Stop being so grumpy," he mutters with faux annoyance, but he puts his camera down and gets up from the couch, walks over to Phupha, and pecks the tip of his nose. Then he takes the box from his hands and bounces down the stairs. Phupha looks after him, aware that anyone watching him would be able to see just how much he adores Tian, and just how ridiculously in love he still is with him.

It's been over two years since Phupha kissed Tian in a dimly lit side street in the middle of Chiang Mai, two years since Tian wrapped his arms around Phupha's neck and whispered, "Don't go yet," two years since that first night they spent wrapped up in each other's arms.

Two years of growing closer and closer, of learning each other's language, quirks, and flaws, and of falling in love with each other so many times, Phupha lost count. Two years in which they grew and changed, separately but also together, and in which they slowly but surely merged their two lives into one.