Jaemin the Icy Prince on Campus - Na Jaemin NCT

4. The Gaps between Our Words

I'm writing this watching the sun come up. 

In a few hours from now, I will be leaving you.

The thought is unbearable.

You're asleep, dreams moving behind your restless eyelids. I wish I knew what you're thinking. Are you dreaming of me? Are you dreaming of our day together, our final day together before we part?

All night I've watched you sleeping, watched the moonlight come and go, casting its shadows across your face in black and white. I've never seen anything more beautiful. If only we could stay like this forever, if only this night is not a singular event, if only I could stay like this with you every night. 

I want my every night to be with you.

But it's not possible, is it? it's just a dream, isn't it? 

All I can do is to stay like this with you, stay close to you until the last moment...

So go on, darling; carry on dreaming of me. And as long as I can still dream, I will dream of you. 

Your  hands lie flat on either side of you, your arms at your sides. You seem to be barely breathing; I'm not sure if I'm breathing myself. I slide my hand across the bedsheet, just far enough that our fingers touch so lightly, and at once, the nerve endings in my fingertips prick softly, as if I were holding them over a low flame. I feel you stir a little beside me, and sigh, "Mina...", and you turn, and burrow into my body. Your eyes are shut, and your lashes cast fine shadows against the curve of your cheekbones. Your mouth curls into a smile as if you sense me watching you, and I wonder how you will look in the morning, with your hair messed and sleep circles under your eyes. Despite everything, the thought gives me a jolt of happiness.

I lace my fingers through yours. "Good night," I whisper. 

I followed you to your football match earlier in the afternoon. Your team won, and when the game was over, you ran to me across the field. I knew every girl's eyes were on you; the girl next to me had been screaming, 'Jaemin! Jaemin!' throughout the game, and she was overcome with excitement when she saw you streaking across the field, loping gracefully towards the stands, and her friends, this bunch of beautiful, willowy girls, with long hair and gorgeous legs, were going, "Omg, is he coming over here? Omg omg omg...!"

I sat in my seat, my heart pounding like crazy, and waited for you.

And then you bounded gracefully up the steps, and burst into my vision. You stopped in front of me, looming over me, your eyes on me, ignoring the screams of adoration, the stares of everyone else. The muscles bunched on your arms as you slicked your wet hair back from your face. It had grown longer since the last time I ran my fingers through its strands, my fists in it as we kissed, and it was streaked with dirt, because you slipped and fell in a mad tackle for the ball, straight into a muddy patch. An autumn wind swirled, and lifted your hair, making it flutter for a moment against your gleaming skin, glinting with a sheen of silky sweat, and I caught my breath and thought, oh God, you are magnificent...and you belong to me. This gorgeous creature is all mine, he belongs to me...

"Mina," you said softly,, and my name lingered on your lips, your lover's name, intimate and soft and sweet. I wanted to lick the word from your lips, catch the exhaled breath in my mouth from your mouth. I wanted to kiss you, right there and then, in front of everyone, in front of the girls next to me, staring at me in shock, in baleful silence. 

"Did you see? We won..."

"Yes, you did. Congratulations! I'm so proud of you."

"Are you?"

It's like living between breaths, you and me, you spoke to me, and I answered, but our eyes, our hearts spoke and answered a different tune, it was as though the things we really wanted to say, the things we felt for each other, rippled and simmered beneath, breathless in the gaps between our words, all consuming, like latent heat ready to burst into life with the tiniest spark...

 You looked at me, your eyes narrowed oh, so wickedly, and your voice sank to a whisper. "Wipe my sweat then..."

"What?"

"Wipe my sweat. I'm sweaty."

You pressed a towel in my hand and took a step towards me.

Our eyes held.

I swallowed.

I lifted the towel to your forehead, and pressed against the faint mist of perspiration clinging to your skin, like dew.

You leaned towards me and laughed, throwing your head back, so shatteringly beautiful, so radiant, bathed in sunlight...

And at the touch of your hot skin on my fingers, I burst into flames.

Break my heart, Jaemin my love, my darling. Break it a thousand times if you like. It was only ever yours to break anyway.