Taekook and the ECLIPSE

21 | What Happened To You?

"That's all?" he finally asked.

I blinked. "Isn't that enough?"

"It's not that you were . . . more eager for immortality itself than for just me?"

And then, though I'd predicted that he would laugh, I was suddenly the one having hysterics.

"Taehyung!" I gasped out between the paroxysms of giggles. "And here . . . I always . . . thought that . . .you were . . . so much . . .smarter than me!"

He took me in his arms, and I could feel that he was laughing with me.

"Taehyung," I said, managing to speak more clearly with a little effort, "there's no point to forever without you. I wouldn't want one day without you. I just love you too much to live without you. I thought you knew that already."

"Well, that's a relief," he said. "It's nice to understand, though. And I do understand your perspective, Kook, truly I do. But I'd like it very much if you'd try to consider mine."

I'd sobered up by then, so I nodded and struggled to keep the frown off my face. His liquid gold eyes turned hypnotic as they held mine.

"You see, Kook, I was always that boy. In my world, I was already a man. I wasn't looking for love —no, I was far too eager to be a soldier for that; I thought of nothing but the idealized glory of the war that they were selling prospective draftees then — but if I had found . . ." He paused, cocking his head to the side. "I was going to say if I had found someone, but that won't do. If I had found you, there isn't a doubt in my mind how I would have proceeded. I was that boy, who would have — as soon as I discovered that you were what I was looking for — gotten down on one knee and endeavored to secure your hand."