love, me | gyuricky

ten.

Gyuvin contemplated staying home that night and just having a quiet night watching movies and eating instant ramen, but he figured as long as he wasn't at that party and didn't get into that car, it didn't hurt for him to be anywhere else. As long as he didn't drown in that lake, the prediction of his death wouldn't come true. Thus he decided. There was a small cafe that was said to sell really good Japanese food, in one of the quieter streets in a residential area near the campus. Most people who knew of it did their best to gatekeep it, so it usually wasn't too full on weeknights. The weather was crisp and mildly windy, as characteristic of mid-February Seoul. All things considered, it was one of the days where a solo night out just seemed right.

He took the bus from the campus down to the stop two streets away from the little cafe. It was quiet; most of the house had lit windows, but it was peaceful, the sounds of crickets chirping the only thing he could hear, apart from the faint rumble of passing cars in neighboring streets.

It was a nice night to die, he thought.

The street that the cafe was on was the only street in the area that was fully lit up; he could see the lights of a small bookstore, a convenience mart and another store beyond the cafe he wasn't quite close enough to read the signage to. The street was empty. The other side was lined by a low seawall that opened out onto the beach. The water was calm, the waves hardly rough enough to make much sound.

As he walked down the middle of the small street, headlights flooded from behind, and as the light of high-beams cutting through the darkness pooled around his shoes, casting his shadow on the asphalt like an angel in the snow, the world seemed to stop.

A second later, something collided into him so hard he lost his balance, tumbling onto the ground of the sidewalk. The sound of a truck's sustained horn was all that filled his ears. In the middle of the street lay a crumpled body, illuminated by the harsh headlights of the now-stationary truck, blood surrounding him like a halo.

He was standing again, without really thinking about it, running out into the street and kneeling over the body, trying to see the person's face. It was an old man; his skin was wrinkled, his hands soft with age, his hair streaked with mottled silver. His eyes were closed, but as Gyuvin shook him gently, his desperation rising in his throat, he could see something closed in the old man's palm. A square of paper, folded so many times it could fit in his fist.

He took the piece of paper, opened it, and read.

Dear Gyuvin,

I found these journal entries typed out on my computer in the year 2030. I did not know who you were then, but from the content of those journal entries, I am assuming something must have changed in your timeline and altered the course of events drastically such that we never knew each other.

I am deeply sorry. I know we were once important to each other, but I no longer remember who you are, and I assume neither do you in your own timeline, but here is what I know. In my old timeline we met on the 28th of December, 2023. After that day passed for you and we didn't meet like we were supposed to, our connection must have been broken. I must have said something that kickstarted a butterfly effect. I'm sorry if I'm not able to save you in the end, but I'll do my very best to.

I'm 76 now as I'm writing this. It is the 15th of February, 2078 today. Tomorrow I am going to do something that no one in this world has ever succeeded in doing. If I am successful, then my biggest regret will be erased from existence. If I fail...well, I'm old now, so it matters less if I die. I've lived a good life. My wife has passed on, and my children are grown up. It is at this point that I can look back into the past and try to change my own history. In my lifetime, I lost you. Maybe in another lifetime I won't.

I don't even know if we ended up meeting in your timeline, because of my interference. If we never do, then I wish you would be happy always. If we do, then I hope that I cherish you in this lifetime more than I did in mine. I'm running out of space on this piece of paper, so this is all I'm going to write.

My name is Ricky Shen. My love for you transcends time.

Love,

Ricky

Gyuvin collapsed onto the ground, his knees digging into the cobblestone sidewalks, his hand pressed tight against his mouth as if there was anything, anything that could suppress the tears running down his cheeks like spring rain down the windowpane of a bus in the night. All around him, the February snow swirled through the night wind, little flakes of ice dissolving into the blood pooling in the middle of the empty street. The old man did not move any more.

He could hear the buzz of people talking and gathering around him. People were circling around, streaming out from the stores by the side of the road to gawk at the commotion. He didn't care about them.

The old man was already dead.

No, his name was Ricky. Gyuvin would remember it for the rest of his life.

Someone was yelling for someone else to call an ambulance. Gyuvin wanted to tell them not to bother. Ricky was dead. He'd come back to the past to accomplish only one thing, and he had.

"Hey. Are you okay?"

Gyuvin looked up. He blinked, fast, chasing the tears out of his eyes so he could see the person standing in front of him. He had bright, spun-gold hair that glistened in the reflection of fluorescents in the night. Something in his eyes was inexplicably comforting; it washed over him like a calm wave over a shoreline, pulling his overwhelming grief away into the roiling ocean.

"I think you should move away from here, okay?" he said softly. "The ambulance is on its way. Do you think you can stand?"

Gyuvin stood. His knees ached after kneeling on the ground for so long, but as he turned away, he took one more glance back at the body crumpled on the asphalt, and mouthed a thank you into the night wind. Taking the stranger's hand, he walked away and didn't look back.

"What's your name?"

The stranger looked back, pulling Gyuvin out of the crowd of people and into a quiet alley.

"My name is Ricky. What's yours?"