Taekook Oneshots

Standing By

(Big ass tw: cancer, death, being an amputee, some angst)

Sometimes you don't realise what you have until it vanishes. Until everything you feel, everything you dream about, everything you hold dear, fades right before your eyes.

And sometimes you know from the moment it's in your hand that you should never let it go. Sometimes, your instincts kick in, and your heart won't allow you to move on from a miracle. Sometimes, people just get lucky. And those are the ones who really feel, who really get to fall in love, in a way that the rest of us simply never understand. But that's okay.

There are countless galaxies, infinite stars, and yet still there's something shining. A consciousness, a life, an existence. For some reason, our planet was chosen as one of those lucky enough to carry life. Perhaps even the only one. We don't know. Perhaps we never will. Our species might, in generations to come, if humanity lives that long. If anything lives that long.

Love doesn't need to make sense, not to the most intelligent scholars on the planet, not to the family dog who sits and stays for the sake of its human pack. Not to the couples, the singles, and everything in between. Sometimes, when the stars just about align, we don't need to understand what they're telling us.

We're too busy living the life they've given us instead. And I think that's beautiful, in its own way. I don't know why. But sometimes, I don't care about my fate. I don't care about destiny. I don't need to. It's not important, because right now is all I care about.

We all need to find our own thing. That's what life is about. Sometimes, we need that star, that fixed mark on which to lay every single hope.

Sometimes, it's a person, someone to hang onto and trust with life and limb. And sometimes it's an interest, a love of something creative or expressive. You don't have to be a singer or a painter to be an artist, and you don't have to be an accountant to be intelligent.

Life isn't constricted like that, unless we force ourselves to believe that it is. The greatest disappointment of all is perhaps the notion that somehow, we aren't enough. In our humanity, in our flawed existence, in the luck we experience every moment, whether we're awake or not, there's more than enough. The notion that we aren't anything less than whole is wrong.

We may not be a perfectly formed puzzle, but that doesn't mean there's something wrong with us. It doesn't mean that something is missing. It might just be that the pieces are in an odd order. But that's okay. We have time to figure things out.

You may wonder why I'm talking about this.

Well, I believe I may have found my own star.

Allow me to elaborate, if I may. I know it seems odd, personifying the presence of a flaming ball of gas, giving consciousness to something that cannot be proven as alive. But to me, it makes sense. To me, it all slots into place.

He came into my life when it was darkest, when the clouds covered a new moon and every other star, when the sun was gone and the world seemed misty with uncertainty and confusion. He came when people began to step away from me, as I transitioned from child to adult, boy to man.

And he came in the shape of someone else, a human.

He wasn't wearing a star costume, and there were no neon lights above his head signing to me that there was something about him that was particularly important. He was just another person. But he had his own glow about him, his own positivity that shone from a bright smile, a kind gesture, a friendly hand when I needed help.

Maybe I'm overselling the impact he had on my life, but for me that was honestly how it felt. It was better, more, than I could ever put into words. From day one, there was something about the way he smiled, something about his voice, something about his face that just drew me in. Made me want to get to know him better, made me want to know his story, made me want to understand him.