rapture of the deep ; seodo

✯ chapter 20 ✯

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epilogue
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Geonhak could tell that Seoho was getting lonely – despite the assurances that he was glad they had each other, having to stay away from home and friends, having to hide from both souls of his kind and Geonhak’s, wasn’t as pleasurable as he liked to feign to Geonhak.

Despite Seoho’s initial protests, Geonhak had managed to convince him to meet Keonhee because one, Keonhee was dying to get to know the magical creature who had struck his best friend dumb (unquote) and two, a little change, communicating with someone who wasn’t Geonhak, would do his heart good.

That day, Geonhak and Keonhee had left work together and walked all the way to the secluded beach and the even more secluded cliffs, and while one minute, Keonhee had assured Geonhak that he would keep his cool and act normal, the next minute, his jaw had sagged and the colour had drained from his face.
(Geonhak hadn’t meant to laugh Keonhee out of curt but the instant change in his expression from confident and calm to disbelief and shock was priceless.)

However well Keonhee had managed the situation after a while of trying to regain his composure and stumbling over his words and conversations, Geonhak never mentioned that he had acted every bit as lost and laughable as him, and Seoho, who apparently had chosen to be extra cocky towards Keonhee, apparently had very much enjoyed seeing Keonhee all flustered and stretched thin as well as seeing Geonhak cackle resoundingly at his friend’s suffering.

“So, can you communicate with fish?” Keonhee had asked while actually holding Seoho’s ocean gaze for a second.

“Can you communicate with chicken?” Seoho had posed the counter question, Geonhak noticing the tug of a smile at his curved lips.

Geonhak had supressed his own laugh, wondering whether this was Seoho's subtle way of accusing Keonhee of being a half-chicken based on the stories about pigeons and horror movies that Geonhak had told him about Keonhee.

“No, but-“ Keonhee had tried to defend himself.

Geonhak had just laughed because Keonhee was always doing that; messing up and stubbornly defending himself as if he could argue his way out of the conversation.

“What do you with chicken then?”

Geonhak had practically seen the gears turning in Keonhee’s head until it had clicked and his mouth had formed a breathed oh.

“Exactly.”

Seoho had offered Keonhee an apologetic smile and Geonhak had patted his shoulder as they both laughed in unison at Keonhee’s pout and his mumbled comment that it was unfair how they plotted against him.

“You’ll get used to it,” Geonhak had assured on the way home.

There had been a slight change in Seoho’s demeanour; one that Geonhak couldn’t quite pinpoint although having grown generally confident in reading Seoho.

If Geonhak had to describe it he would define it as restlessness, but he didn’t know whether necessarily in a bad way.

So when Geonhak’s necklace lit up in a small firework of turquoise stardust in the middle of the changing room at the dive centre, he knew that it was about the thing Seoho had been refusing to tell him about.

Seoho had been right, though, the necklace did not inflict his chest with an insatiable longing and calling unlike he had thought when the homeworld of one of his ancestors had asked him for a visit; it just glowed and let him know that Seoho wanted to see him.