Moments - Yoon Jeonghan x Hong Joshua ft. Choi Seungcheol
[a/n: this is just a jeonghan blurb i wrote because i was upset earlier and wanted to let out my feelings lol.
the back story to this is that seungcheol and jeonghan are the sons of koreaâs largest businesses and are expected to marry when they grow older. during his and seungcheolâs senior year of college, jeonghan meets joshua. they meet often and i might write a blurb about it too but this is their last interaction
also tw: jeonghan has depression and though never clearly stated, it is very evident in this blurb. if those types of things are triggering to you then i will please beg you not to read this.]
âWhy do you do it?â Joshua asks.
Jeonghan keeps his eyes on the lush green grass, fingers twisting the blades between the tips as a small smile creeps across his face. It looks sad, sick and a little twisted if you stared for too long but his eyes...theyâre painted with defeat and pain. He chuckles, small and quietly but his gaze still remains on the ground.
âMy family has loved Seungcheol for their entire lives. Choi Seungcheol the Great, thatâs what we called him growing up. The boy with a perfect smile and perfect grades â the athlete. The brainiac. The music prodigy. The barbecue master. How could you not love him?â
He sighs, head lulling to the side, staring out at the sky that is already bleeding out with purples and orange hues. He shuts his eyes, basking in the warmth as it slowly caresses his cheeks, fingers still twiddling with the grass.
âI donât- I donât understand, hyung. He hurt you.â
âMultiple times,â Jeonghan whispers. âMultiple times has the son of Adonis himself taking my heart and stabbed it with the sharpest knife.â
âAnd you still love him?â
Thereâs a laugh that escapes his pink rosey lips. Itâs moments like there where Joshua can count the flecks of glitter on his lids from where heâs applied eyeshadow. He can see the way his rosey red lip stain has smudged just a bit at the corner. He can see his bronze high light and the way that he seems to glow from within. Joshua wonders if he stares a little longer, if he could count the pieces of his shattered heart as well.
âI love him so much, âShua,â he says. âSo so much,â he whines.
And for the first time since they started talking, Jeonghanâs perfect eyes finally find his. Joshua can see hints of sorrow and pain hidden in the tear ducts that have cried too many times. The wind blows and he watches wisps of his hair dance and settle just as quickly.
âI used to hate Seungcheol. He hurt me. So many times. He forgot my 18th birthday. He tore my favorite shirt. He broke the chain my grandfather had given me. He threw up on my favorite pair of vans. He scratched my car. He got me into trouble in school...and so many other things. And I held so much hatred for him for so long that I eventually grew so sick and tired of it â of having to see him everywhere and feeling so angry that I couldnât breathe. I was so tired of watching everyone fall to his feet while I was almost blacking out with anger.â
He clicks his tongue and shakes his head, laughing dryly. âSo imagine my surprise when I found out that Choi Seungcheol the Great, the man who could get anybody he loved, had the hots for me.â Thereâs something theatrical about the way he places his hands on his chest, cradling his fist like itâs the most precious thing in the world. Joshua thinks that somebody like Jeonghan belongs in a movies. He deserves to be admired by the world. He thinks that Jeonghanâs face should be hung up in art museums all across the globe.
âSo I decided to start loving him. Every time he got on my nerves, I poured him another shot of my love in hopes that heâd get so drunk off of it, heâd finally care about me. I loved and loved and loved him in hopes that it would drive out the resentment that I had felt my entire childhood.â
âBut it didnât work...â Joshuaâs words are careful. â...did it, hyung?â
Jeonghan stares at him and in this moment, this small moment where Jeonghan shows just a second of weakness, Joshua swears that he hates Choi Seungcheol with every cell of his body. He can feel his skin prick with heat as if Jeonghan had set a fire ablaze within him.
The smile slowly creeps across the olderâs face again but this time, itâs defeated.
âI let him make a fool of me. I let him hide me away. I let him call whatever we had casual. I let him kiss other people in my face. I let him hold my heart and squeeze it until I was on my knees begging him to stop.â
Yoon Jeonghan of all people did not deserve to wear this sort of look â the kind that says that he has grown so accustom to Seungcheolâs bullshit that he eventually became numb to it.
âYoon Jeonghan, you are celestial. You are way too beautiful to let yourself become a shell of a man over somebody like Choi Seungcheol,â Joshua thinks.
âJoshua,â he whispers, leaning in closer. âDo you want to know a secret?â When he doesnât answer, Jeonghan tilts his head slowly to the side. Joshua sees the reflection of the golden hour glimmering in his teary eyes as he lets out a shaky breath. âIn this life, we are all prone to the love we think we deserve.â
âBut you never deserved Seungcheolâs love,â Joshua says, voice like a crack of thunder compared to Jeonghanâs.
âAnd perhaps thatâs why it didnât work,â Jeonghan responded.
Jeonghan wonât admit it, but he thinks Joshua is ethereal. Thereâs something so breathtakingly beautiful about the underclassman. From the way he drowned in his sweatshirts and looked so incredibly soft one day to being a full blown model the next. Thereâs a musical that could made from the percussion of his steps. From the way he draws to the way he sings; Jeonghan has never seen somebody as beautiful as Joshua Hong.
Of all the people in the world, Joshua just had to fall for Jeonghan in this life â the life where he is destined to be with Seungcheol.
The world has a funny way of working. Here was Joshua, a boy with bright eyes and an even brighter future who was ready to give it all up for Jeonghan and Jeonghan was barely even capable of loving him back.
How could he when he could barely love himself at this point?
And perhaps, thatâs why he never received Seungcheolâs love.
No matter how hard he tried, no matter how bruised his knees got from begging, no matter how much his chest hurt from crying, no matter how much he wanted Seungcheol to love him, he knew deep down inside he could not receive something he didnât feel. He knew that the love he felt was just a mask to prevent him from admitting that he was just numb to everything else in this world.
It scared him. It scared him to know that he wouldnât be able to feel anything for the boy that would be in his life until the day he died. It scared him to know that even with the effort he showed him, that it still wasnât enough.
It wasnât enough to get him to feel something other than lust. It wasnât enough to fix their shitty relationship. It wasnât enough to drive out his resentment.
Jeonghan was, as proven time and time again by Choi Seungcheol his entire life, just not enough.
And a boy who is not enough does not deserve the love of Joshua Hong, the boy who is more than enough.
The sun rises and falls for Joshua Hong. How foolish would it be for Jeonghan to think he deserved the love that Joshua Hong could offer?
The world doesnât work like that.
Joshua Hong deserves a whole heart, not bits and pieces of one.
âYou have a good day, Joshua.â Jeonghan says as he gathers his things and brings himself to his feet. His lips tug once more into a small smile. Itâs more genuine this time â sad.
âWait,â Joshua catches his hand like one of those cheesy romantic dramas that Jeonghan used to force Seungcheol to watch with him. Back when it was late at night and they were hidden away from the world.
The small moments when Seungcheol had nothing to worry about...those were the moments were Jeonghan knew that he was the only thing that mattered to Seungcheol â the ones where he had no homework, where it was so late in the night that the entire world was asleep and no incoming texts or calls could bother them, those days off of work, those microscopic milliseconds. Those are the moments where Jeonghan knew for a fact that he was what mattered most to Seungcheol simply because Seungcheol had nothing else to worry about.
âWhen will we meet again, hyung?â Thereâs hope in his voice. A rosey pink dusts his cheeks and he looks almost like a high school boy finally confessing to his crush.
In this moment, the only thing that matters to Jeonghan is Joshua and the grip he has on his wrist. The only thing that matters is the slow beat of his pulse that is nothing compared to the erratic earthquake that is beating against Joshuaâs chest.
âYoon Jeonghan!â an all too familiar voice calls out followed by the sound of feet jogging towards them.
Jeonghan notices the way that Joshua slowly drops his wrist. He notices the way his eyes tell him not to go, the way theyâre screaming at Jeonghan to stay with him. The way theyâre tell him not to make himself look like a fool once again at the hands of Choi Seungcheol.
He doesnât deserve Joshua Hong.
âHey,â the man finally catches up, smiling at Jeonghan. His eyes are stone cold and nothing like Joshuaâs, the boy who is birthed from the Sun herself. âBusy?â
Joshua watches the way Jeonghanâs face fall. He watches the painful stretch of a smile and the way his shoulders slump in defeat.
âIâm never too busy for you, hyung.â
And just like that, Joshua gets it.
Choi Seungcheol has hurt Jeonghan so badly that the boy is not only completely numb to the way he feels towards him but how he feels to the world.
This is the last moment Joshua ever speaks to Jeonghan again.