New World | SOOKAI

Goodnight, Sweet Prince (Part 3)

I stared straight through Soobin in my bewildered silence. My eyes couldn't even blink away the burning tears that filled my lower lash line as 18 months of unprocessed emotions hung from my lips. I could only sit there upon the ground and watch Soobin's eyes spin with his tears as he found his own answer within my stunned silence.

"... I see..." he was standing up now and I hopelessly tried to grab his hand but he twisted it out of my pathetic grasp.

"Soobin, no.." I begged and he took a few steps away from me, his deep velvet coat pushing a cold, unwanted breeze at me as it swung behind him.

"Please, Soobin.." I started crawling upon uneasy hands, trying to grasp at him but he stepped away further.

"I.. I may be oblivious to many things in this world, Kai. I may not be able to read people or situations as well as you or Yeonjun can. But there is one thing that I am better at than either of you."

I watched him turn his head to look down at me over his shoulder, his cheeks graced with the tears I had put there.

"I know when I can see love in your eyes, Kai. That little sparkle in your depths is always unmistakable when you look at me, even when you're crying in pain.." he looked away, staring up at the night sky between the tree branches for a moment before continuing.

"Just now, I saw that same glimmer of love within you. But it wasn't for me this time... was it, Kai?"

I swallowed hard, looking back down at the ring in my hand while I suffered an almost unendurable pain in my shoulder blade once more. Was Soobin right? Had I been... in love with.. both of them?

My eyes widened as something Yeonjun once said to me echoed from my memories.

"Never fall in love with two people at once, Kai. It will be your undoing."

.... No... I couldn't have been... But God, why did it almost make sense? Had I not only lied to both Soobin and Beomgyu? Had I also been lying to myself about my feelings this whole time?

"I'm... I'm sorry, Kai. I'm sorry that I wasn't enough for you," Soobin sounded almost accepting of what his thoughts had figured out for him. Like he was.. giving up on us.

"Soobin, no.. Don't say that.. You are enough for me.. You're everything.." my voice cracked with each and every word I spoke to match the deep ravines within my heart as I felt Soobin slip further and further away from me.

"Am I?" Soobin turned around to me fully. "Am I the only one that lives in your heart, Kai? Or did you split it into two pieces with Beomgyu that night?"

Slight concern covered my features now as I stared at him, no longer in pain, but in thought.

Split into two... something about his words made sense, but not in the manner I knew he was trying to express. I had always felt split down the middle since that night of my turning; a being borne of two worlds. Were my sinful acts with Beomgyu in order to try to save Soobin's life the reason for that? A seemingly good deed committed in an evil way. Was that why upon the cusp of my death I hadn't belonged in Heaven or Hell, but rather.. stuck in between? Becoming an amalgamation of both..?

One half of me, devoted to my life and love with Soobin, and the other... tortured with guilt and a mystifying longing for Beomgyu.

I looked down at the ring in my hand again, the musical note and my name cut into the ruby that shone up at me like a little red star. I dropped my mind back into the maze of Beomgyu's memories that he had shown me. His bright and happy childhood. His deep passion for music, almost a mirror image of my own. The mysterious, unfortunate events that befell him. The undeniable stunning features of his and how I had almost.. enjoyed kissing him that night. The pain he felt for me having misled him and for him to die with that agony. Followed by my own unspoken grief I had carried around with me all that time.