All I Want for Christmas is You

Young Forever

When we arrived back at the studio, I started to walk off, but Yoongi grabbed me by the arm and dragged me over to his studio, shoved me in, and closed the door behind us. He sat down in his desk chair and I pulled up a chair to sit across from him. I stared at the floor, making it a point to not make any eye contact. It was completely silent for a few minutes. Suddenly, I was smacked very hard over the head with some kind of semi-soft object. I put a hand on the spot of the blow and looked up to see Yoongi placing his baseball cap back on his head.

"Aish, what's wrong with you?" I replied. He lifted his sharp eyes to me.

"No. No Hoseok. There is nothing wrong with me. You, on the other hand, have a whole motherload of problems." I turned my gaze to the floor again.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Even though I wasn't looking at him, I could feel his glare.

"Don't even try. What is wrong with you Hoseok? What? What is it?" I barely shrugged my shoulders.

"Nothing," I mumbled. I could feel the anger rolling off of him.

"Why do you even think that I'll take an answer like that Hoseok? Do you think I'm stupid?" I shifted in my chair a little bit.

"No..." I mumbled again.

"Then what? What is it? What is your problem? You better give me an actual answer this time. Don't make me hit you again." I shrugged again.

"I don't know," I said quietly. He half-chuckled in unbelief.

"Really now? You don't? Well allow me to explain it to you. You, Jung Hoseok, are selfish." I jerked my head up in shock to meet his icy glare. I was absolutely livid.

"What? How could you even think of saying that? The love of my life is on her deathbed and could die at the drop of a hat and you have the audacity to call me selfish? I'm the one who should hit you over the head." Yoongi's gaze never faltered.

"And why is that?" he replied coolly.

"What do you mean why?" I spluttered. "For weeks, I've been living in agony, not knowing if my girlfriend will even be alive the next minute. I feel lost without her. I'm so overwhelmed by grief that I don't even know what to do with myself. She was my whole world Yoongi!" I yelled. "And now, now... she's gone..." I finished quietly, collapsing back onto the chair in tears.

"Yes. She was your whole world. But not in the way she should have been, at least since the concert." He paused for a moment before continuing in a much gentler voice than he had been using. "Hoseok, there's more to your world than just Liz."

"But I-" I started to speak, but he cut me off.

"Since you broke down at the concert, you have almost acted as if the rest of us didn't exist. You won't even speak to us most of the time. All you care about is how horrible you feel and how miserable you are. The focus is all on you."

"And why shouldn't it be? Can you honestly say that anyone misses her as much as me?" I snapped back.

"Yes, I could say that Tracy misses her as much as you do, if not more. Have you forgotten that they're best friends and have known each other almost their entire lives?" He paused again, and when he spoke, I could tell that he was fighting back tears. "Don't you realize that you're not the only one who misses her?" I wanted to speak, but I knew he was right. "Hoseok, before all of this happened, Liz was still your world, but you also knew that there were other parts of your world that were just as important. Things like working on your mixtape, practicing for the comeback, ARMY, things like all of us. Since the accident, and particularly the concert, you have treated us like we don't exist. You don't care about doing anything other than wallowing around the dorms or the studio in tears. You haven't tried to reach out and comfort Tracy, let alone the rest of us. You lose your temper with us at the drop of a hat. You've become so centered on yourself and how you feel that you got mad at Elizabeth for what happened and blamed her for leaving you!" My eyes widened a little as I realized that he had heard my yelling, and he seemed to notice. "Don't try to act surprised that I heard you; I'm surprised the whole hospital didn't hear your yelling. Hoseok, you've become so focused on one part of your life that you've forgotten that the rest exist. You're so determined to hold on to it that you aren't willing to realize that it may be time to let go and figure out how to carry on with your life." I looked at him with a hurt expression.

"What are you saying? That I should just give up on Lizzie? Should I just pretend like she never existed? That I never cared about her? That she never completely changed my world? Is that what you want me to do?"

"No, you shouldn't give up on her. And stop saying she's gone, because she isn't. Never give up hope. I would think that you of all people should know that."

"Then what do you want me to do?" I cried, exasperated.

"Life is made up of change, and of things that are always coming and going. We are constantly having to learn how to let go of some things and embrace new ones. Letting go hurts, and change is hard. But no matter how much we dislike it or wish it wasn't, it's a part of life. And the people who learn to embrace it are much better off for it." He stopped to look me dead in the eye. "Hoseok, do you love Elizabeth?" I felt tears well in my eyes again. Love. One word so simple, yet so powerful. A beautiful word. A word that managed to encompassed every single infinite, unexplainable thing that I felt towards Elizabeth that I couldn't find any other words to express, yet a word that I had somehow never expressed to her. And now, a word that I would never have the chance to express to her. And that fact alone caused me more heartache than I had ever known before.

"More than I can ever explain," I murmured.

"Then do you love her enough to accept that she might not wake up? That you might have to go on living life without her? Would she want you to live this way, not willing to move on with your life and not caring about anything or anyone else? Or are you too selfish to care about what she would want?" I shook my head. I knew he was right. I knew it. I knew that I had to move on. But it hurt too much.

"But, I can't accept it. It can't be happening. We were too perfect for it to end this way." Yoongi's sharp gaze softened. 

"Hoseok, do you want to marry her someday?" My eyes widened in surprise. His question caught me rather off guard. It wasn't hard to answer though. I couldn't think of any person that I would rather spend my life with than Elizabeth. 

"Yes," I replied softly, "Yes I do."

"Part of the wedding vows say that you will love them for better or for worse. That means you stick with them and love them no matter what, till death do you part. This isn't a fairytale world. Not everything has a happy ending. Not every perfect couple lasts. This is life, where bad endings happen, sometimes the bad guy wins, and the prince and princess don't always live happily ever after. Nothing lasts forever, and sometimes, we have to let go of the things we love most. Are you willing to do that?" I lowered my gaze and stared blankly at the floor.

"It... it hurts too much..." I said quietly, my voice cracking from the tears.

"It's going to hurt. But if you want to move on with your life, you have to learn how to let go. Can you honestly say that you love someone if you're not willing to let them go when you need to? If you're so focused on yourself that you're not willing to let go of how someone benefitted you? Yes, remember how much they meant to you, and be grateful for all that they did for you. It's okay to miss them and be sad when they're gone. But when the time comes for them to move on, you can't just refuse to let them go. They're going to go whether you like it or not, and whether you let them go willingly or fight it and make yourself bitter and miserable is your choice. You need to let them go and realize that a chapter of your life is closing and that a new one is starting. And you never know, the new chapter could be even better than the one you just finished. But you'll never get to find out what's in store for that new chapter if you refuse to accept that the previous one is finished." I knew he was right. My head felt like it would explode from all the emotion I was holding in. "Hoseok," he said very softly. I forced myself to look him in the eye and was surprised to find a few tears running down his face. "I don't want to let her go any more than you do. She's like a sister to me. But I think we both know that if we don't, it'll only cause us even more pain."

I didn't know what to say. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't even think. I slowly stood up and made my way towards the door.

"I... I need some time to think." I opened the door, stepped out, and gently closed it behind me. With a shaky deep breath, I began to walk down the hall towards the dance practice room.

I knew what I had to do.

But I didn't want to.

Lizzie, I love you too much to let you go.

~*~

I want to say that this is the last time I'll be this heartless in this book, but I'd be lying if I did......