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The water doesn’t do anything to calm him down. He fills his cheeks and focuses on every cold drop that trickles down his throat to settle in his belly.
It feels like he’s back in the mouth of Eden.
Does it?
The voice that taunts the question into Jongwoo’s ear isn’t his, but it’s one he’s grown familiar with and internalized.
Are you scared, honey?
It isn’t fear, no. It’s something else. Something more eager. More melancholy but just as visceral.
The door clicks open, and Jongwoo takes his time lowering his bottle from his lips. He takes his time screwing the lid on top and lifting his eyes.
Moonjo’s smiling. That’s the first thing Jongwoo notes as he’s escorted into the room.
The second thing is the 1303 stamped to his chest. And he wonders if Moonjo requested it. If he pleaded with the security guard to choose his number.
The thought almost makes Jongwoo laugh. Almost. He doesn’t remember the last time he managed so much as a smile.
Moonjo sits down at the opposite side of the glass. His eyes take in every inch of Jongwoo’s face like he’s trying to nail down every change he’s missed out on in his past two years behind bars.
Jongwoo doesn’t dare speak first. He won’t give him that. Over his dead fucking body will he let Moonjo hear his voice before he gives Jongwoo his own.
Moonjo doesn’t seem to mind taking the initiative. He’s always put Jongwoo above his dignity.
“Honey.”
It’s fond; it rolls off Moonjo’s tongue smooth and breathless, like he’s greeting a lover after spending too long apart.
Jongwoo glares at him, and Moonjo’s lips stretch over his teeth.
He doesn’t look so creepy anymore. Not with short hair. Not with eyes that somehow look more lifeless than they had back in Eden. Not with no one to back him up and a glass pane between them.
“Did you miss me as much as I missed you?” Moonjo teases, sounding an awful lot like the Moonjo in Jongwoo’s head.
Jongwoo has half the mind to pinch himself just to make sure this isn’t another hallucination.
He scoffs, wryness pulling his mouth into a crooked smile. “As if.”
Moonjo’s head tilts to one side, then back. He balances his chair on its rear legs and hums at the ceiling.
“Then what brings you here after so long? How long has it been? Two years, honey?”
Jongwoo swallows. It’s been a while since he’s felt so bare. So vulnerable and unprotected.
He thinks it’s because Moonjo’s the only living person who knows what he’s done. Who, how and what he is.
“Didn’t you say it yourself?” his voice wilts a word into the question. He swallows again. “Back then? That we enjoy watching the weak suffer?”
Moonjo looks at him, expression wildering and soft.
“Why didn’t you tell them?” Jongwoo asks, much firmer than his last sentence. “What really happened?”
“What really happened,” Moonjo echoes. “What did happen, honey? Refresh my memory.”
A breath trembles out of Jongwoo’s flared nostrils, his mouth pressed tight. He hasn’t felt this angry in a while.
“You know what I’m talking about,” he bites back. “And I know you enough to know you’d love to have me behind bars as well. A good ending to my novel, don’t you fucking think?”
Moonjo hangs his head, a laugh unfurling in his chest and spreading to his throat. Jongwoo wants to throttle him.
It’s hilarious how the partition between them is meant to protect the visitor from the prisoner and yet the only one at risk here is Moonjo.
The laugh comes to a tired end as Moonjo lifts his head. “Oh, honey. You don’t know me at all,” he murmurs.
Jongwoo lifts a brow.
“I love you just like this,” Moonjo clarifies. “Uninhibited and free.”
Free.
Jongwoo laughs, shaking his head at the absurdity of the word.
Moonjo has shackles around his wrists. Jongwoo has teeth around his. It’s laughable.
“I put some money in your… jail account. Or whatever they call it,” Jongwoo says at last, deciding it’s time to give them closure. “Since you don’t have anyone out here anymore. I thought I’d repay you for…” he trails off. Decides he doesn’t owe him shit. “I’ll deposit a little every once in a while.”
“Can you afford it?” Moonjo questions. It isn’t condescending. Jongwoo can’t say it’s curious either. It’s a lousy attempt at trying to keep the conversation going.
“My book’s starting to sell.”
Jongwoo thinks Moonjo’s reaction is hard to fake. And he hates believing it’s genuine, but it is. Every shift in expression is real. From the easy sprawl of his smile to the way his eyes go soft and back to studying Jongwoo’s face the way they had when he first walked in.
The way they had up on Eden’s roof.
Like he’s fucking– committing every damn blemish to memory.
“I knew you’d do great.”
“Yeah, well.”
Jongwoo sniffles and pushes on the counter to shuffle his chair back. He reaches into his bag leaning against his seat and pulls out a book.
“Here,” he puts it down before the glass. “If you want to read it.”
Moonjo looks at it through the glass. He looks like he’s holding back from reaching for it.
“Would you want to hear my thoughts about it once I’m done?” he asks instead, forcing his eyes away from the novel to look at Jongwoo.
“No,” Jongwoo replies. “I don’t give a shit what you think. I only came to see you out of obligation. This is the last time you’re ever seeing my face.”
Moonjo’s body language gives nothing away this time.
Jongwoo pats the book once and stands up. He slings his bag over his shoulder and turns to leave.
“I never said that.”
Jongwoo goes still. He roots through everything he’s told Moonjo since the beginning of the visit to figure out what the hell he’s talking about.
“Watching the weak suffer,” Moonjo clarifies. “I never said that. You came up with it on your own.”
Jongwoo’s jaw clenches. He keeps his back to the older man. “I won’t let you fuck with my head from behind bars, Moonjo.”
“That’s the first time you’ve ever said my name.”
“Well fucking enjoy it,” Jongwoo snaps, turning to level Moonjo with a glare. “You’re never hearing it again.”
Moonjo smiles and rises to his feet. “I’ll see you soon, Jongwoo.”
...
What happened that night?
The clock ticks to 1 a.m.
Jongwoo can’t sleep. He can’t fucking sleep.
He’d thought that meeting with Moonjo would quell his insomnia, but here he is.
I never said that.
Jongwoo breathes out slowly.
Watching the weak suffer,
You came up with it on your own.
What happened that night?
I don’t know, honey. You tell me.
Jongwoo swallows.
I’ll help you a little.
Let’s start with our showdown on the fourth floor, hm?
I told you we should put an end to that lovely novel of yours.
Jongwoo closes his eyes.
Remembers the feeling of fabric between his fingers, the rips in his knuckles, the battering of a hammer to his bones.
Oh, now that’s just cruel, darling. I would never hurt you like that.
“I killed you,” Jongwoo rasps.
I don’t think so, Moonjo murmurs back to him, voice ringing loud in the confines of Jongwoo’s skull. Come on, dig a little deeper for me, sweetheart.
Jongwoo draws a shaky breath.
Did you miss me as much as I missed you?
And Jongwoo’s back where he was last week, staring at Moonjo through a sheet of glass.
Moonjo tilts his head back to ask the ceiling how long it’s been. Two years?
Darling, you’re straying.
Jongwoo swallows, a blush heating his neck. Longing floods his insides, warm and disgusting.
Did you miss me as much as I missed you?
He’s breathless. He holds the air in his lungs for a few excruciating moments before releasing it in a huff.
And he gives up. He thinks about Moonjo. About how he looked at him. How he– How he didn’t look away.
He wonders if he’s reading his novel right now. If he’s put it down since he got his hands on it.
If he’ll ever put it down.
Jongwoo’s hand is down between his legs before he can overthink how damaged he is that he’s touching himself to the idea of the man who completely fucked his chances at living a normal life.
Honey,
I love you just like this.
Jongwoo grasps the sheets in one hand, the other working his cock wetly, with the vigor of an animal in heat.
Uninhibited and free.
What happened that night?
What do you want to have happened that night, honey?
He’s on the fourth floor again.
His back hits the wall, the mallet between his fingers dropping with the impact. And Moonjo’s fingers are in his hair, grip vice tight and teeth buried in his lip, his leg hiked high between Jongwoo’s thighs.
Oh, honey. I love you like this.
I love you just like this.
I love you just like this.
I love you just like this.
Honey, did you miss me as much as I missed you?
Jongwoo comes with a breathless, yes.
...
“So.”
“So?”
“What do you think?” Jongwoo asks.
“About what?” Moonjo answers, leaning forward.
“About my novel.”
“Do you care what I think?” Moonjo lists his head to the side, his bottomless eyes burrowing into Jongwoo’s relentless ones.
“Yes.”
Moonjo breaks. A breath pours out of him. Jongwoo’s waiting for him to ask why. He’s been rehearsing his answer for a while.
“It was perfect,” Moonjo responds. Just.
Just like that.
“That’s all you have to say?” Jongwoo arches a brow. “You sound biased.”
“You put a lot of yourself into it,” Moonjo says back, winded and honest. “You smuggled a piece of yourself into my cell and you know how I feel about you.”
Jongwoo glances away. He can almost feel the grip of fingers on his throat as he swallows hard. “You’re fucked.”
“Why are you back here?” Moonjo questions. There’s no neutrality in his tone, there’s no passiveness.
All there is is him. Skinned raw to that stupid muscle crammed into his rib cage like some sort of afterthought.
Jongwoo’s chin juts. He wants to reach up and rip his tongue out of its place. Tear his vocal folds to pieces before he can show an iota of weakness to this man. But,
“I’m lonely.”
Moonjo’s being falters at the admission.
Jongwoo’s quick to bind up the mistake. “You took everything from me,” he means to sound spiteful, harsh even. But it comes out as anything but. “You ruined everything. You killed my friends and you– you ruined what I had with Jieun. I can’t read Raymond Chandler without feeling sick; you ruined my favorite fucking author for me.”
A broken sound creeps into the breath he lets out.
“You know you ruined me, right?”
And,
“I’m left with nothing. That’s why I’m here. Because–”
I’m all you have left, honey. Say it. Just say it. Let me hear it.
“Shut up,” Jongwoo hisses.
Moonjo blinks at him, but says nothing.
“And now you’re…” Jongwoo gestures vaguely. “While I’m out here. I don’t even know which one of us is the free man.”
“Do you miss me?” Moonjo asks, irrelevant and selfish and fucking infuriating.
“What do you think?” Jongwoo hurls.
He sees the way Moonjo’s throat bobs under the cut he left on his skin two years ago, a slice that didn’t serve its purpose.
“Stop visiting me, honey.”
Jongwoo looks at him. Fucking. Gapes. Because what the fuck?
Humiliation and anger settle heavy and hot just under his skin as he eyes the older man. “Are you serious?”
“Yes. Don’t you think it’s time to get me out of your system?”
Jongwoo could say, How can I get you out when you live inside me? In my fucking head all day and in my dreams at night. How do I escape a part of me?
He could say, I smuggled a piece of me into your cell, but you snuck your whole fucking existence into me.
But he doesn’t. Moonjo doesn’t deserve that confession, nor the victory that comes with it.
Jongwoo stands up, hands curling into tight fists at his sides.
He gives Moonjo the privilege of having the last word and leaves.
...
Officer – ‘it’s detective now’ – Junghwa’s in his living room.
She looks pleased, her eyes scanning the house with a small, polite smile on her lips. “You got a nice place, Jongwoo-ssi.”
Jongwoo nods once, putting a mug of tea down in front of her. “Thanks,” he answers. “It’s small, but it’s an improvement.”
Junghwa chuckles. Her eyes flicker everywhere but don’t stay on him for more than three seconds. Jongwoo wonders if she’s having difficulty getting over what happened at Eden too.
“Ah… My dad read that book,” she points at the book in question. Jongwoo’s novel. “He really enjoyed it. Have you finished it?”
Jongwoo’s chest warms at the compliment.
No one knows he’s the one behind the pen. He’d used a pseudonym. He likes the idea of anonymity and unswayed opinions. He takes the book into his hand and traces the letters of the title.
They’re quiet for a handful of seconds, then,
“Why are you here, Junghwa-ssi?”
“Oh… Right,” Junghwa slowly puts her mug down, having not taken a single sip. “It must be weird that I tracked you down after so long, right? I just wanted to check on you. My dad brought home a box of kittens and I thought of you.”
“Oh.”
“How are you holding up?”
“I’m okay,” Jongwoo responds, fumbling with the corner of the book’s cover. “I got a job. I’m saving up for a better place. And… yeah.”
“That’s a relief…
“Jongwoo-ssi…” she twiddles her thumbs for a moment. “...I heard you visited Seo Moonjo in prison.”
Jongwoo stops, blinking up at her. He’s silent for a second. “Is it a crime?” he asks back, only a little defensive.
“No, of course not,” Junghwa blurts. “It’s just…” and she’s looking at Jongwoo’s hand.
No. She’s looking at his wrist. She’s trying to find any evidence of amity between him and Moonjo.
Jongwoo clears his throat. “Junghwa-ssi,” he starts again. “I’m going to ask again. Why are you here?”
“Seo Moonjo escaped last night.”
Jongwoo’s still for a moment. Then he huffs a laugh. “Of course he did.”
Junghwa looks unnerved by his tone. She looks at Jongwoo the same way he used to look at the tenants, and Jongwoo thinks, Is Eden in me? And he thinks, I’m one of them, aren’t I?
Of course not, honey. You’re different. You’re better than them.
“It’s– confidential information. I shouldn’t tell you, but you were the last person to see him. You’re the only person who saw him. You have to understand why I’m here.”
“You think I have something to do with it?” Jongwoo asks back. “I visited him because I wanted to ask him about that night. My therapist told me trauma can make people suppress memories as some– I’m not sure. A defense mechanism or something.
“I come up with a different scenario every time I try to remember. It just– took me time to actually prepare myself to see him. Why would I help him escape? The last time I saw him was nearly three…”
Stop visiting me, honey.
Jongwoo’s almost thrown off by the recollection of the words. So Moonjo’s been planning this since?
“Three months,” he finishes breathlessly. “That man killed my friend. He killed innocent people and kidnapped my–” he stops to reconsider the words. “–Jieun. Do you really think I’d help him escape?”
“I’m sorry,” Junghwa hurries to apologize. “I shouldn’t have…” she shakes her head, realizing the plot hole in her accusation.
“It’s fine. You’re just doing your job.”
“Yeah. I should– I should go. Thank you for the tea.”
Jongwoo sees her to the door and watches her step down the single step outside it.
“By the way…”
“Yes?”
She sounds hopeful as she spins around to look at him. Like Jongwoo’s going to clue her in. Or something.
Jongwoo turns the idea over in his mind. If he did have something to do with it… if Moonjo had told him where he’d find him…
Would he go? Would he hide his whereabouts from the cops the way Moonjo hid his crimes? Or would he tell them to send him back to the place he belongs?
Would Moonjo mind either way?
“I haven’t finished it.”
“What?” Junghwa questions.
Jongwoo lifts the book implicity.
...
The TV’s on when he enters the living room. He absentmindedly turns it off before pulling his coat off and slinging it over the backrest of the chair.
There’s a novel on the table.
No.
There’s his novel on the table.
Except it isn’t his.
It’s annotated. With bookmarks and sticky notes and dog-eared pages.
It takes him a breathless moment to hear the shifting behind him.
“You could’ve given me a heads up,” he utters. “Your breakout isn’t even on the news.”
“I’m a serial killer, honey,” Moonjo sighs. “The only thing scarier to the authorities is the fear my escape would stir up in people.”
Jongwoo nods, tugging his bottom lip between his teeth.
“Why now?” he wonders over his shoulder, lifting a brow. “After two years?”
He’s too scared to turn around only to find out Moonjo isn’t there, and his loneliness has decided to push him a rung closer to insanity.
“You see, honey,” Moonjo croons. “I don’t think I exist apart from you. I sometimes doubt I’m the artist.”
Jongwoo swallows.
“I didn’t see the point in escaping,” Moonjo sounds tired, exhausted even. “But then you told me you missed me.”
Jongwoo’s fingers trace the nail-tracks in the cover of the book as Moonjo approaches him from behind.
He could’ve escaped whenever, is that what Moonjo’s saying? He just didn’t want or need to up until Jongwoo intimated that he needed– no, wanted him?
Moonjo’s arms encircle his shoulders, and he tucks his chin into the crook of Jongwoo’s neck.
Jongwoo rests a hand on his arm, and he sinks back into his warmth with closed eyes.
He’s free. Moonjo’s free.
And he’s reaching for Jongwoo’s bracelet. And he’s untying his wrist from it. And just like that, Jongwoo’s free too.
“Let’s leave, honey,” he whispers, slipping the jewelry into his sleeve.
There’s something there, if Jongwoo searches hard enough. This bracelet is a finishing touch, honey, but are we finished yet?
“Where?” Jongwoo breathes. “Where do we go?”
Moonjo’s tilts his head and lets his lips brush his ear, tracing the curve of its shell. He lingers. “Wherever you want.”