mono.

seoul.

Namjoon was 22 when he moved back to Korea, three years since he had been. Instead of Busan he decided Seoul was the place for him, far away from painful memories but close enough that it was still familler.

He wasn't sure if he liked it or not. It was just as simple as his life in Japan. He once again had a parting job, this time it was pumping gas, and a roof over his head. It was everything he was used to, but it felt different.

Maybe it was because the days of his youth were so far gone. Perhaps it was the contrast of the skyscrapers of the city to the safe suburban home he had grown up in. It just seemed so strange. He hoped that maybe life would be better, maybe that's why it's so new.

Now he realized how ironic the name Seoul really was. Why did it sound so much like soul? It had no soul, it chewed people up and threw them out to be picked up by whoever, if anyone, would take them. He was afraid of Seoul.

Seoul wasn't any different from Tokyo or even Busan. Everything was filled with sorrow, he was still alone. The Han river bared so much sorrow it once almost sucked him in like it did a disgusting amount of people yearly. Even when life was changing faster than he could comprehend, even when buses past and landscapes became new it felt like time stood still. It was all so not different from everything he had ever had no time seemed to have gone by at all, he might as well still have been locked up in an attic instead of a sixth story studio apartment.