seasons of our ruin

two

JAEHYUK

i know you've always hated me, but after his death you've hated me more than ever. i could see how the venom of your hate had corroded the dusk skies of your bronze skin, which were marred with deep jagged red lines. i could see it in your onyx eyes that you would have done anything for him, because he was your galaxy with its suns and moons and stars. love hadn't always come easy to me, like everyone thought it did. no one ever realises to shine that bright you need to burn yourself away. i wish someone had loved me the way you loved him, so deeply and obsessively—your incandescent fervent love for him acting as the only glue that had kept him from breaking apart until one day it was not enough and he finally shattered and broke. i had been loved all my life by learning to burn myself away because being golden was so beautiful and mesmerising but what use is it to be the sun when i am just a hollowed shell of glittering memories slowly burning away with time.

i tried to not be empty, i tried to fill myself up with the sweet air of spring, with the flattering sugar coated praises served to me on a silver platter, with perfect grades, with pyrite love—but nothing had ever made me feel whole. your caustic hatred for me was the only thing that had me feel something and perhaps that's why i gradually found my way back to your glacial onyx eyes that had harboured nothing but hatred for me. even now, i should have stayed away from you but i can't help but crave for your trenchant hatred which stands in contrast to the pool of sugary love i am drowning under. i rest my chin on my palm as my eyes flicker around the sunlit classroom till they land on the cherry blossoms outside the window. i watch as the cherry blossom trees sway to the gentle breeze of spring, the pink petals fluttering as beams of sunlight illuminate their pastel borders.

i had always loved spring with its sweet honeydew air and blossoming flowers. i loved how no matter how dark or abandoned a corner was, it still bloomed with the sparkling vigour and beauty of spring. i loved having deep fried corn dogs under the cherry blossoms with my friends, as we laughed under the clear blue skies. but for the past two years i had hated those same cherry blossoms which had always managed to rekindle my burnt out soul. even the sight of them made my mind swirl with seething rage. there are times when i hate him, i hate him for leaving us like this, i hate him for being selfish, i hate him for making me hate the cherry blossoms which i had always loved; but the thing i hate him for the most is how he's absolutely torn everyone apart. everytime my mother sees a cherry blossom petal land on our scrubbed porch,her eyes widen in panic and her hands start trembling while her mouth twitches as incoherent sentences fall of her opal lips. i wished my father helped her but he's completely slipped away to the clutches of alcohol. his room used to be polished till there was not even a speck of dust in sight, but now its littered with empty liquor bottles. the only glue that's holding the remnants of what's left of us is me and the panoply of golden achievements that litter the void inside of me. you may think nothing changed for me after he died, but in reality everything did. i had to continue being the same golden boy for them, so that we could heal without breaking anymore. the only way for us to stay together is through the iridescent suns that have torched my skin.

i've learnt to be anything but myself, and now i am scared of who i really am. what if the real me isn't golden and effulgent?