Idiot's guide on how to get engaged.
Part two: Effect.
(refs x, x)
featuring @anthropocentrik & @nicadanis
It's saturday evening, and suspended between pale, late february skies and the humming earth below, was a momentary sprinkle of snow.
Taeil has been standing in the middle of his bedroom for as long as he can't bother to remember, statued on long legs as though the weather has frozen him in time. A steaming mug of tea silently counts the minutes–hours instead, and weighs his palms as flickering thoughts do his mind.
On the window frame, snow gathers into a soft ensemble. And through the thick glass, arms of moonshine lay outstretched in a chase after his bare back. He feels his nape flush and tingle at the feeling. But if he even registers that strange, brittle touch stroking icicles along his spine, he doesn't show it. He just clutches around the drink, blinks at the suit laid out on his bed and thinks.
Stuck on a page written since four years ago, Taeil wonders about his age and the expectations written between the lines of it. He counts with a dull nail rapping against the base of his mug, how many of the umpteenth times his mother had tried to coax from him any existence of a girl he could remember off the top of his head. I'm getting old, she would say gently, I want to brag about my son's beautiful wedding someday soon. Though he told it with his own mouth, the voice that always lied to her never sounded like his own. Like it rose from someone else's chest, whispered off in the far distance. I'm too busy for that.
He gulps down tea every time a thought passes, as though they were the wispy clouds chasing each other at witness of the moon slashed in the sky outside.
An unfair timeline, posing as an ideal no one human could possibly abide to. Love and it's complexities; of what they personally mean to him. The temperature of his tea drops a bit more, but that incredible degree of sureness Hansol might've felt as he proposed the idea of forever back then starts to bleed into the back of his lids. If he'd ever come across it with a lover himself, or missed the opportunity entirely, Taeil couldn't tell. Is it even as real as we make it?
Hansol had asked him to prepare a speech when they'd met some weeks back. Talk about us, he'd said, expectant. How so? Taeil asked. About their friendship, in relation to the way his friend loves was the final agreement. Taeil had agreed to it, while knowing that by the time he'd run out of words, part of his soul would be left agape. Torn from his roots by his own bare hands, laid out in exposure for the world to grasp at how it pleases. But for a friend as good as this, he'd always endure it.
With his last sip, Taeil finally settles at the foot of his bed, joints grinding in a crackle-pop. Comfort slips back under the bed as the mug falls cold and empty. Hansol and his fiancé had made him this mug for Christmas last year, in a pottery class somewhere in Yeonnam-dong. Hansol says you collect these without knowing you do. Taeil remembers tearing through the snowman flecked wrapping. We thought we'd make you another one for that collection. Thank you, Taeil had murmured. The girl smiled, plump with delight.
It's a heavy thing, the mug, since they made it large and thick to fit and protect the hands it were made for. It'd easily become a monthly favourite.
Taeil's eyebrows knit together at the charming memory, then slant downward as a hostile upwelling of what feels dangerously close to resentment surfaces from the depths. They're hardly in his life anymore, yet reminders like this still linger. Why is that? Were they solely a product of his imagination, or were they as tangible as a scalding mug? Dulcet as a lover's kiss?
Impulsively, he releases the dense cup from his fingers and hopes it does what he needs it to. It hangs in the air for an excruciating interval, though like sensing Taeil's intentions and how regret would wreck him later on, it disappoints with a soft thud as it hits the polished floor between his feet. A far cry from shattering.
As innocent as an object could get, it rolls clumsily until interrupted by the handle, stopping where the moon kisses a silver sliver on the floor. His puppy, who'd been lounging nearby, draws near on all fours for a sniff.
Anticlimactic, and a balm to his bitterness. It brings him back to earth, where he sighs with sudden exhaustion. Loneliness weighs his bed with its knees and pulls him back into his pillows, and Taeil simply obliges–settles for a dreamless sleep. But as rarely as they come, tonight, he dreams: of plunging his fingers into the earth and gripping an earthquake in his palms. Of never letting go.
Taeil never minded a freezing cold morning. He liked watching his breath smoke through the air, and tasting pinpricks on his tongue every time he spoke in and out of turn. The breeze catches in your lashes, flaps at the bill of a hat and ices tears across the cheeks of weeping children. It also intertwines between fingers like a lover not wanting to stray too far, and hides with coy intent underneath long, quivering coats and padded jackets. Coming along with it, illness. Or worse–that relentless sense of inner solace that can be bandaged only after the passing of snow.
Most, it drives where warmth can defrost the creeping numbness in their limbs, soothe the ache in their hearts; usually where the fragrant scent of grinded coffee beans and baked bread stirs harmoniously in the air, if not tucked further under the covers.
For today in particular, the cold morning brings with it love. Unconditionally, and forevermore.
The ceremony unravels around them like a peacock fluffing out its iridescent tail. Nothing short of ethereal, suave and composed. Taeil witnesses the beginning of a beautiful journey within the featherweight steps of a pianist as she graces her tiny side-stage, sweeps her black satin dress to the side with confidence and sits with her hands braced, ever so gently, over the polished keys.
The world withholds a breath, and a second of suspense shivers across the entirety of the wedding hall before the pianist begins to play. The band bracketed along the edge of the stage follows her lead shortly after, an elegant chorus of cellos and violins unraveling into a sonata Taeil can't name, but appreciates nonetheless.
Flanking the centered aisle are two elongated tables, stretching as far as the eyes can see, black tablecloth neatly draped over them for the obvious purpose of blending in with the meticulously lighted venue. Reserved for an explosion of brass candelabra that are flocked by fresh arrangements of flowers each. Parallel across the ceiling hang long strings of fairy lights that remind Taeil of the wispy arms of a wisteria tree. The air conditioned breeze pushes so subtly against them that their swaying goes easily unnoticed–as though rain had come to a pause in time overhead, curious of what becomes of the world before the initial splatter.
A brief introduction from the host delicately plucks the groom from backstage. Hansol ascends the back end of the aisle, achilles heels chased by a spotlight. As if purely drawn to him by nature, radiance accentuates his refined beauty and opulence of the tux enveloping his broadness, as smooth and black as a starless evening sky. The entire venue greets him with a vibrant, deafening tide of a round of applause, and with the regality only a prince could muster, Hansol drops into a humble bow.
Taeil claps his hands so hard he's almost surprised they don't kindle fire by the time he's finished cheering for the bride, who appears a few heartbeats later. More beautiful than Taeil ever could've admitted of her before, she's fitted in a dress that embodies the polar opposite of Hansol's suit. Taeil marvels in awe at how it shudders and pleats around itself as she clears the stage to her husband to-be; equivalent to a whirlwind of shimmering stars, or a condensed supernova. Rested on the stiff volume of her crown, a delicate tiara skewers the air, perfectly compatible and present as her star-dress.
Together, they're the beginning of an end, and the end of a beginning. A dark knight who'd swallowed an erupting star in his arms.
A searing kiss seals the enchanting promise of forever between the young lovers, and simultaneously deepens the fresh gap arching in Taeil's soul. Like twisting a knife in a fresh stab wound, it deepens and weeps. When the time to congratulate comes again, Taeil claps with every ounce of bittersweet bliss he'd gathered at home and brought with him within the reserve in his heart.
In his head, he pretends his hands are mallets and his pain hovers between them, and with each thunderous strike, he's being forged whole again. Even if he knows it's not so simple.
Ten minutes, the announcer says. He has ten minutes before reception to somehow turn the bitter film on his tongue around and stitch away the pit. To find a silver lining.
So ten minutes before reception officially begins, Taeil harrows a waiter for a shot of whiskey he thinks he desperately needs. I'm afraid we don't have whiskey, sir, the young man says politely, likely trying to avoid trouble for premature labour. What kind of wedding doesn't come with at least a single bottle of Jack Daniels, Taeil says with a quiet ferocity that wins him the discussion. The waiter folds himself in a curt, yet apologetic bow, and returns two minutes later with a proper whiskey on the rocks.
Unhesitating, Taeil downs it with his eyes hard-pressed on wisteria lights he'd been staring at for almost two hours. He blames the tears that cling to his lashes on the agonizing, knife-cut burning sliding down to the bottom of his throat.
Immediately after reception officially begins, Taeil briefly excuses himself from the table for three and goes to find Byeol. Framed in a barstool and the midst of gulping down free rosé wine, Byeol looks the same as he always did since Taeil had first met him in high school; clad in a sharp poise, his shoulders squared and his hair a stylish sprawl on his head. He's blonde now, but somehow, Taeil swears he could recognize that small head anywhere.
A pang of overwhelming nostalgia seizes Taeil's bleeding heart in a joyful interlude.
He goes for the shoulder, dropping a sudden, firm clap on the stern shaping of it. Squeezing hard. Startling, the hyung almost chokes around his next sip, if he doesn't spill it first. A humourless smirk climbs his plain, youthful features once recognition visibly settles in his consciousness–in those brown, tiger eyes of his. With a fox's mischief, Taeil responds with a cheeky smile.
"Really?" Byeol starts, a rapid-fire string of blinking fanning out his blatant incredulity, "That's the first thing that comes to mind when you get to see me for the first time in almost two years?"
"For what reasons would you dye your hair blonde other than all that's suspicious?" Taeil considers him for a moment longer, then says, obnoxiously, "Even your fucking eyebrows. It suits you, though."
This earns him a flat grin, which dusts off another shelved memory in Taeil's head. Byeol's smiles, no matter the volume, always crescented his eyes. Taeil could never figure out if it were because of the swell in his rounded cheeks, or the broad grins he always had to offer. Like unsheathing a secret weapon from his sleeve, his boyish joy could slice a heart tender.
Finally, Byeol chastely elbows the younger in the ribs. "You were always such a pain in the ass."
"So were you... But I missed you, hyung. It's nice to finally see you again."
"Likewise. And great speech, man." Byeol says, "Didn't know you could talk like you have a girlfriend trapped some thousand miles away from you, and can only express your debilitating pining through writing her letters."
"Thanks." Fondness uncoils inside Taeil, tender as a bruise. As though following a sort of instinct, he slots an arm around Byeol's shoulders, "You were my inspiration, since that really does sound like us."
"Please, you might be huge but if anything, you'd be the girlfriend."
"I agree, actually. So tell me, boyfriend, about the kinda' drugs you've been doing."
This time when Byeol elbows him, he really makes it count.
Five more shots of hard whiskey and a glass of champagne are enough to introduce blinding disorientation. Byeol made drinking in excess dangerously easy, and Taeil was sure that if the hyung hadn't the need to drive himself home without an accident, they would've galloped into a rate that likely could result in them passing out at the bar. Or tag teaming the bartender if he were to start refusing them any more drinks.
With a feline's politesse, the latter eyeballs Taeil from below his curved eyelashes as he fills one last glass goblet with champagne, which Taeil had demanded be expensive. Emboldened by Byeol's splitting, Taeil saw the ten percent chance of his ability to carry six—one for each shot of whiskey he'd taken so far—by himself with an extra zero, poorly drawn at the end. So he'd ordered six of them for no one in particular, just to prove a point.
He sprawls out lengthy fingers and fits delicately carved stem necks up to the crevices and, with a considerable amount of faith in himself, lifts them off the bar counter. Gravity betrays him as they immediately stagger and spill some, costing the exasperated bartender his sanity, surely. But without a single care left to give, Taeil squares his shoulders and walks away with champagne a haphazard spill down his suit sleeve.
Like this he circles the guest area twice with an infinitesimal slowness that spares his head a spin, before he names himself confidently lost. With so much whiskey thickening his blood and the wetness now sticking to his arms, he would rather sit with a stranger anyway. One of them in particular, actually.
After having passed him once with a stunning girl hooked to his left, the second time Taeil circles back on burning heels, he finds him alone. Another blonde boy, jagged hair a shade darker than Byeol's and showing signs of overgrowth at the roots. In his head, Taeil convinces himself that this was fate's handiwork, if only to grant himself more courage to approach. Plus his wrists are starting to tire.
"Hey. Do you need some company? I do."
Sporting a coquettish grin, Taeil greets with the tone of a man who's already known the other for many years before. The champagne spills a lick one last time as he dismounts them on the table's surface. "Pardon my Italian, but if I don't drink all these, the bartender will probably find my address and come beat my ass. Help me out?"
Haru, he calls himself. And successfully pushes Taeil further into the clutch of his confusion about what it is with modern day musicians and dyeing their hairs in fifty shades of pasta.
They fall into each other with the ease of a biscuit being buttered, even if the conversation initially ranges on the typical side. Inevitably, Taeil understands, as there was no other way to break the ice between two strangers at a wedding but to introduce themselves, and talk about the tedious. But he's also well acquainted with the virtues of giving volume to flat things.
Haru smiles warmly, and soon after, Taeil discovers he has an equally rich laugh. In his blurry drunkenness, he reminds Taeil of pleasant summer days. The blazing sun baking his cheeks tan, pronouncing the freckles on his face and back. The smear of a soft-serve melting faster across his knuckles than he can eat it. Squeezing clammy palms together in midst of trapping a sunset within a kiss.
Most of these pleasantries would be lost by morning to plot holes in his memory, full pages torn in the middle of a long journal entry. Taeil almost considers mourning this fact as their absorption wears on in between pauses for breath, an excess of champagne and him meeting the lovely girl Haru had brought with him. Dani, a stunning young woman who makes a lot more sense at Haru's side than he ever would.
But then, spending the fraction of a second staring at Haru's hand with his jaded eyes, a brilliance occurs to Taeil. Epiphany wholly encouraged by intoxication alone, as he abandons all logic under-fire of alcohol. If the casuals will only be but a speck tomorrow, why not attach some extravagance to it, and while at that, a name? So it would be more memorable. Tangible, even.
After all, this was a wedding. Glorious and formal at every angle anyone could peer at it from. An event fit for the celebration of love, which was something to be found at any given second, if the illusion of free will ever allowed it to be. And just like Hansol and his wife invited them to share this moment, every other one of them should count as well.
In his chest, his heart begins to gallop as a mad horse at mercy of swelling adrenaline. While the world flocks and flails around them with indistinct chatter–less than a blot caused by spilled ink to Taeil, he turns his entirety to Haru and pins Haru's palm against the table with his own. Their pulses intertwine, and it sends the soft, fleeting hairs at the back of his neck into a bristling frenzy–a flash of lightning cutting through his veins.
Sitting straight, the corners of his mouth curl towards heaven. "I have a fine idea."
The chair almost flips over from him standing, and he wobbles on the way down to the knee that doesn't mysteriously ache every evening. All throughout, he awkwardly brings Haru's hand along, even when he rummages through the manpurse strapped across his chest for a sharpie.
"Earlier I circled this room twice, but every time I came back around, I could only look at you. I think that means something special, right? Sorry, Dani." Taeil's tongue lulls around his pronunciation, lisp thicker than usual, but his eyes hold a sort of obscure sincerity in them that he won't be able to explain by breakfast. He uncaps the sharpie, spits the cap itself at Haru's feet and draws a shaky circle around the circumference of his ring finger.
"For what it's worth, I'm asking your date to marry me. Will you, Haru?"
After Haru's earnest acceptance, the world starts to spin and transition much too quickly than he can keep up with, from a serene stillness to a jarring haste, like a running scene filmed handheld. The beautiful venue spirals out of his grasp, until Haru is the only thing left. The waxing moon their witness.
Next thing he knows, he wakes with morning knocking on his eyelids, a skull-splitting hangover that renders him completely useless, and a blanket hogger for a fiancé. If it weren't for him being right there, Taeil would've thought that the sun had hopped out of the sky and plummeted all the way into his bed.
For the first time since his first shot from yesterday, Taeil searches for the gap in his soul and finds it there still. Except no longer does it weep, or throb as much. Probably this guy's doing, he thinks, as he watches him wake with remnants of their night still whole on him.
Might this be sort of forever his good friend Hansol was talking about?
