Everything Special Has A Flaw
'I crossed your heart, husband, now it's time for you to take my name, only your husband's name,' I thought and smiled.
Taehyung and Yoongi bump into each other by chance at an airport lounge. Six months and many meetin...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
“There’s a reason for everything, you said, and though it’s a mystery to me now, I know it won’t always be so.”
-Ben Sherwood
PRESENT
It had been a week since Taehyung had heard from Yoongi. His phone was still switched off. He was not in denial any more. The Instagram post proved what he didn't want to accept. He understood that the life that had promised him heaven had taken him straight to hell. Min Yoongi was dead. The man he was in love with; the man who had filled his otherwise mundane life with so many memorable moments; the man who had made him believe that even at the age of thirty it was possible to build a new future; his Yoongi was dead. This was the man for whom he'd taken the most difficult decision of his life weeks ago: to leave Jungkook. And now this man was dead. What was he supposed to do? Forget him like a vivid dream? Or remember him like a didtant reality?
The week saw an increase in Taehyung's workload. A few new tie-ups, along with some fund-raising presentation meetings, kept him on his toes. He had to make a few business trips to different countries as well. Every time he crossed that restaurant on the highway where he'd last met Yoongi, he wondered what had gone wrong. Did it have something to do with the postponement of the plan? How did he die? There were no police officers making inquiries in the colony, so he could safely conclude that he wasn't a victim of any malicious intent. But something somewhere wasn't adding up. And it all made him restless. Till Jungkook was here, he had something to distract himself with, but once he left for Gwangju, he found himself driving to the places he'd visited with Yoongi and remembering their several rendezvous. Could a cushion of memories protect someone from their reality?
There were times when he would just scroll through Yoongi's Instagram profile. It had twenty-seven posts in all. The first, which had burst his bubble of denial, was a glimpse of the Busan skyline from the balcony of his apartment in DFL Enclave. Another post was a selfie with a blurred background. There was something about the picture that perturbed him but he couldn't put a finger on it. It was impossible to tell where he'd clicked it. The date of the post was 1 October 2019. And the caption read: If you want to cross the line, make sure you do it for someone who is worth it.
It was a line Taehyung had said during one of their dates. He smiled to himself and quickly checked the caption of the first post as well. It read: 'Certain horizons are closer than you think.' Was that also meant for him? Did he always know they lived in the same colony? And if he did, why didn't he tell him?
Before he left, Taehyung had asked Jungkook what had happened to 'Mr Min'. He had made it sound like a casual question.
'I heard he was suffering from a life-threatening disease. I don't know what exactly. He was only twenty-seven. This is so unsettling. I've already fixed an appointment for a fullbody check-up for us for the coming weekend,' he had said.
Taehyung hadn't taken it seriously since Jungkook always panicked when it came to health. He'd had the same argument many times with him and finally given up. Now he agreed to everything he suggested. Instead, he had focused on Yoongi and why he hadn't told him about the disease. The least he had expected from him was the truth. Why else were they in love? And if he knew he didn't have long to live, why did he make a plan with him to shift to Greece? Every time Tae retired to bed, he asked himself these questions but couldn't find an answer. And the more he thought about it, the more it screwed him up. He felt like a fool for even considering leaving Jungkook. It left him frustrated. He stewed in his own juices. He simmered with suppessed anger but couldn't give vent to his emotions. He was furious at the choice he had made; furious at the fact that he hadn't got closure, and at Yoongi's unwillingness to tell him that he lived in the same colony as him.
...
Don't you think it's odd?' Jungkook said. It was the weekend and he had flown in from Gwangju Taehyung had gone to pick him up from the airport. They were entering their colony when Jungkook had asked Taehyung to slow down in front of the gate. He had popped his head out of the window and asked one of the security guards if Min Yoongi's funeral service had been held. The security guard had replied in the negative.
'What's odd? I asked my husband.
'His husband died and there was no prayer meet or funeral' Jungkook was right. He hadn't thought about it. Though he hated the thought of going to a prayer meet for the man he had been in love with, he couldn't agree more with Jungkook. It was odd.
'Maybe he did or maybe he was too sad to do it,' he said, more to convince himself than Jungkook.
'Too sad to do a funeral service? You know how stupid that sounds, right?
Taehyung agreed and quietly drove towards the parking lot. He noticed how Jungkook kept waving and greeting people they passed. He caught him looking at her.
'Jealous that even though you live here, people know me better than you?' Jungkook asked.
He knew he had said it in a lighter vein so his response was just a smirk. But it was true. Not the jealousy part, but the fact that Taehyung had always had a problem initiating a conversation with people or even remembering them.
Taehyung remained quiet through dinner. Jungkook talked to his parents on the phone later in the evening, spoke to his cousins on a video call and finally retired to bed. Taehyung was finishing a video call with his lawyer on a legal matter when Jungkook complained of pain in his right thumb.
'Damn, I need to stop playing those silly games on my phone,' he said. Taehyung stared at him as he shifted him phone from one hand to the other. It was a eureka moment for him. He finally understood what was wrong with Yoongi's Instagram post. Yoongi was a lefty. He had noticed him eat with his left hand, click selfies with his left hand. But he had clearly used his right hand to click this particular picture. Was there more to all this or was he unnecessarily reading too much into it?
