Where Skies Are Blue | BTS

01 | Whispered Constellations

Life's curtain, Jungkook learns, doesn't descend with the flourish of a playwright's pen, nor does it unfold with the eloquence of a poet's verse. No, the end of things rarely possesses the grace of poetry; it's more often a solemn unraveling, a fading ember rather than a resplendent blaze.

Nothing ever ends poetically. It's the everyday prose, the mundane cadence of existence that brings about an ending. It's the finality that sneaks upon us like a shadow stretching its fingers in the waning light, claiming its place as the sun dips beneath the horizon.

A story doesn't conclude with the resonance of a sonnet, but rather with the hushed tones of reality's whispers. We don't close our eyes and fade into poetic oblivion; we simply step out of the spotlight, one foot after the other, until the stage is empty and the applause dwindles into memory.

And in the same breath, when it's all said and done, what remains is a stark truth. All that blood, all the turmoil, the pain, the sacrifice—it never takes on the hues of a romantic masterpiece. It's not a canvas that showcases intricate brushstrokes of beauty; it's just red, the color of life flowing in the veins, raw and unfiltered.

The crimson spills, stark against the backdrop of existence, devoid of adornment or illusion. It tells no tale of grandeur, no tale of valor. It simply is, stark and real.

And Jungkook, too, bleeds. His life, like a cocktail mixed with sweat and tears, now embraces this new addition. The scarlet stain spreads, like ink seeping into parchment, sinking into his very essence. His head feels clouded as if wrapped in a cocoon of cotton saturated with the sting of alcohol.

Jungkook bleeds, and pretends that he isn't.

It's easier to pretend that he isn't affected. He pretends, for perhaps for his own sanity, that he isn't affected. That the spill of red isn't indicative of something deeper, something more profound. He holds onto this pretense, willing himself to believe that he's impervious to the ache that accompanies the flow.

But the truth is there, glaring and unignorable, like a red stain against a blank canvas. And he clings to the artifice that he can handle it all. The pain, the uncertainty, the fear—everything flows, much like the crimson that stains his reality, unadorned and honest.

He masks the hollowness that gnaws at his core, a sensation akin to staring into the abyss of a moon crater, its darkness stretching unfathomable. It's like standing at the entrance of an ancient cave, the shadows within hinting at mysteries and depths uncharted, but he's too afraid to find out what lies underneath its surface, choosing instead to accept the facade he presents to the world.

It's difficult, pretending to be at ease with the hollow echoes that ricochet like ghosts within his mind.

The remnants of conversations linger, replaying themselves relentlessly like a malfunctioning movie projector. He puts on a brave face, as if he's content with the repetition as if he's unfazed by the way his own voice bounces back to him, a chilling reminder of the solitude that pervades his surroundings.

The world is a stage, and Jungkook is but an actor. So, he does what he always does, orchestrates an act, a theater of okayness, while the walls of his (their) home absorb his every word, capturing the solitary monologues that punctuate the silence.

He tells himself that he's adjusted to the one-sided conversations, to the truth that only his own voice fills the empty rooms. That he's okay with the stillness, the kind that allows the pulse of his heartbeat to echo like a taunting metronome, a reminder of his own fractured existence.

His heart feels like a traitor, its rhythmic cadence resounding in his ears like a ticking time bomb.

He's ensnared in a paradox, trying to convince himself that he's content with this solitude, even as the reverberations of his heartbeat underscore the loneliness he tries to suppress. He feels thirteen again, alone and ever so hollow, where the cavernous quiet had amplified his internal battles, each beat of his heart a discordant symphony.