the words we buried
@247qian // 2018 . song tai yu’s grave . cemetery . 12:00 pm
she paints what she feels. every color, every stroke, every precise movement of the brush contains specs of her emotions displayed out on canvas. and right now she thinks of him and her lips curve up while her tears flow down. and she paints with his favorite colors. colors that do not necessarily fit together, but somehow, when it came to him, it always works. because who he was wasn’t simple. he wasn’t someone that was able to be categorized because he was simply himself. he’s shown yeeun a side of him she’s learned to love, but she knew there was more to him than the colors on this canvas. but now there isn’t a way to find out. not anymore.
after the news of the car accident in back in high school, yeeun found it hard to breathe. she couldn’t move other than her legs failing beneath her, dropping her down into a pit of sadness. she had forgotten how many times she called his number and then to qian’s just to understand if this was all true, and the moment she received a letter, she knew it was true. yeeun didn’t think she could go and say goodbye. it shouldn’t have been a goodbye because he was too young, too precious to so many people to just leave this world like that. then she thought of qian and she was the only strength that made her go.
his life, their friendship was short-lived after that. the other had avoided her that day and the days after that. yeeun called, messaged, did whatever she could to speak to qian, to show her that she is there for her, that she didn’t have to go through it alone. but there was no response. no contact after that. and years after that, yeeun still remembers.
she takes the bright colored canvas with her into the taxi, holding it close to her chest as she directs the driver towards the cemetery. whenever she could, she would bring a single flower to his grave, but it had been a while, so she brought a painting for him, knowing that he’d like it and smile just like before. yeeun places the canvas by his grave, towering over it. she looks down at it with a smile, remembering him. remembering the memories.