embedded under his skin | w.jh

[i believe]

「3/3」

The sentences didn't make sense.
The words felt wrong, you couldn't tell where to start; you couldn't even tell what you wanted to say anymore because there was suddenly nothing to understand.
Bare was the back of your deeds when they fell into place, after seconds of doubt about if you were still enough of human to him.
His eyes were draped in a heady fore sighting you would never be able to assimilate - again - and you were afraid, you were afraid of what he was going to think.
Jiho was bad at keeping his feelings a secret, he had never liked hide and seek. He had held his head higher than yours would've reached those days, he sat down on the dusty ground and waited until another game was afoot.
At least he told you this story over and over again, it could be a lie. Just that he wouldn't lie, he was bad at lying to you. He was bad at so many things and after all he was still better than you, than many others.
So you wondered and wondered till a pink colored rain was likelier than you finally gaining enough courage to confess your failure to him. It wasn't all about embarrassment; it was a deploring hesitating and wincing of the velvet picture you had of him. You didn't want the colors of his personality to wash away and show you a new patterned skin again; he was probably the last person you hadn't disappointed, was probably the most beautiful thing you could touch.
Though you only stayed quiet about the whole truth, it felt like lying a lie that lay threatening on your conscience.
The whole truth was like a phantom of memories, full of crying, running and a pathetic impassivity which caught you when there was no place left to flee to.
Mom was the first one to move her feet and she ran as far as her muscles would carry her; she took your hand and some belongings that lay around, took your almost grown up hand and left your youth behind. Your steps in cadence, away from your father. Your steps in cadence, in utter ignorance.
This night you had felt like a child, younger than the juneberry trees, you felt so unaware.
Dad wasn't a drunkard, wasn't a scrapper; he wasn't good - that's all - he wasn't anything and you were not enough.

» I would try the Green Tea Latte then, please. Thank You.« His voice was relaxed and polite as he talked to the waitress, only his eyes glowed like a little boy's ones in front of a candy shop. His skin so iced from the winter - the same winter which made your anorak to a bleeding achilles - so dewy that bruising flower petals were embedded under his cheeks.
» I thought you didn't like green tea.«
He looked up, those dark irises readily smiling at you. His shoulder brushing the silver ring-piercing in his ear when he leaned forward to rest his weight on the absurd love of ulna and radius for each other.
» I don't.« He held up the menu card and pointed at a depiction. » It's green. Don't tell me it doesn't look fancy.« His tongue clicked and the menu was set back aside; his neat and slender fingers which touched even the carton so delicately.
» Who are you thinking of?« The purring of his words sounded different if they were directed to you and somehow it made you feel sorry.
»Hm?« , you asked, though, you knew what he wanted to hear.
» You seem to be so carried away, tell me, tell me: what heists your day?«
» Are you really rhyming me right now?«
» Maybe, maybe, Baby, what if?«
» It sounds terrible. By the way.«
» 'Rhyming me' sounded beautiful. By the way.«
» Thank you.« And once again his warm presence brought a smile to your lips. And he laughed, showing the back of his throat, his bright, white teeth.
» No, really, I like that phrase. Sounds so - poetic -. Literally.« His chuckling sounded into the wood of the table and you felt like even the fibers rived from the fine vibration his lungs let slip out. The tenseness went up your spine to the roots of your hair, made your nails curl themselves, made you go deaf-blind for just one inhale in which you could hear your heart pumping the agitated blood rush.
»So, Yuna... Who are you thinking of - or what?«
You didn't love him.
You placed one hand on top of the other, the knuckles of your middle fingers touching, pressing the prudence back to your mind, the thumbs hidden under your palms.
»Uhm...«
You were thinking about him and nothing else. And you thought about lying, you were good at it but you had never lied to him. You didn't know if you could do it, it felt wrong. It never did before.
» I am just...«
You couldn't do it.
»I was thinking about you.«
There was dirt under your nails. The skin between your fingers was dry, almost completely white half moons were hemming your blue tinted nail bed.
You could tell that the sudden pain at your temples came from the unknown stares of disbelief and speechlessness from Jiho's eyes.
Jiho was never disbelieving, was never speechless. You didn't want him to change anymore.
The waitress brought his green coffee; he didn't move, he didn't even thank the girl.
» I mean; were here together! Why would I think about anything else?«
»Oh no, no, no. You're not gonna pull that on me. You're like a new person. How come?«
He wasn't angry, he still was the little boy in front of the candy shop, was chuckling his humming laughter to a reticence. Just that his mother wouldn't let him go in and now he was pouting.
He always sounded like a child talking to you.
» Says who?«
» Huh?«
» Forget it.«
» No, I-« But he stopped himself.
His hand brushed through his hair. It was fringy, you liked it.
He took a sip of the coffee and put it back down immediately.
You'd known beforehand he wouldn't like it. He'd known it too.
Instead of swallowing your pride and saying something you stayed still, your thumb scratching the inside of your hand.
You were the one who called him, you were the one who wanted to tell him everything, you were the one who gave up on the midway. Again.
» You still do that?« It was more of a statement than a question, his gaze so soft like the surface of water.
You followed his eyes and ended on your hands; they were still folded in that mannerly way you couldn't stand.
» Ya...Yes, I think so.«
And you opened them and hid them under the table, between your knees, almost crushed them as though you wanted to destroy them and every evidence reminding you going along.
It had become a habit ever since they required you to do it in school. It had become a habit to soothe yourself.
» I was thinking about you and me in those days. When we went to school together and all that. You know?«
The only thing he did in this moment was breathing, and he took a breath in again and leaned forward, trying to make himself more comfortable. He failed at it, he sighed, he put his hands in his pockets, sighed again, cleared his throat.
» Yes, I know.«
And suddenly he didn't sound like a little boy, he sounded like a young man, he sounded like his appearance. His voice aged in a second, it resembled your father's.
» I do too. Everything and everyone becomes more and more stressing with the time, I guess. And I don't seem to make any progress. I expect more from myself; they can't understand that. You would. You already did when we were kids.«
» It was easier to be young.«
» Even easier when there were just you and me.«
» Hm. I think there was no day we didn't laugh together.«
» Haha, ya. Probably. God, we're talking like we're old and fat.«
» Hm.«
You surveyed his face and for the first time noticed a slight sorrow in it; you had been selfish, what had you become?
» Just like a train rushing by, leaving you behind«, you said, maybe to quiet for him to hear.
His sigh was painful. He shifted in his place, it wasn't feeling right. A guy like him didn't belong on a plastic chair in some random cafe, with some random girl sitting across in a similar plastic chair and no courage to look him in the eyes when he talked. He didn't belong here and you didn't belong with him; he was supposed to be with his friends and write songs, give concerts and live his life - separate from you and the pessimism you kicked down the road - and that only in front of you so you could stumble over and over without lacking in reasons.
Though it was wrong, it felt good to make his maturing responsible for your frustration. Even if you knew it was your own fault to sit at the bottom of your confidence and crying over godforsaken things which seemed to haunt you ever since your family forgot how to be one.
» Everyone's cracking up: they want to archive the best result in the shortest time. I'm so-... So sick of this.«
He paused and scratched something off the coffee cup. The sore points screaming from his eyes, nearly drooping onto the table and gushing into a satin bed of buried strength.
He felt bad and you hadn't even noticed.
» I know I sound like a pitiful midlife crisis horror right now but I think I just waited for the chance to tell you this. I really thought of quitting, you know.«
» Don't.«
» I won't. I love all of it way too much.«
» I know.«
» I know.«
» I am sorry, Jiho.«
He stared into his coffee, you stared onto his lips. He was the boy again, because he felt like he talked too much. You knew that, he knew that and you both knew there was more. He kept still about the ugliest details; he had a great fantasy and his mind drew the most impressive paintings but every artist had their blemish, every color had an ugly side to it, every silence had their unspoken words.
» I don't like that coffee.«
» I figured.«
» Can we go home?«
» Sure, we can do that if you want to.«
And he pushed the cup away from
his body, pushed it over to you.