Work Text:
Three a.m. comes as a memory.
The area around him transforms into a bedroom much more familiar than his own, stars blinking back into existence, an entire universe flooding the space between the four walls. Gunwook is watching himself from a bird’s eye view, observing the celestial matter as it floats so close he could move his fingers to the left and grab a handful of comets, to the right and he could graze a black hole. At three a.m., the entirety of outer space is his again. But not his alone.
In his recollection Matthew lays face up beside a younger version of Gunwook. He reaches towards a small moon, cusping it gently before letting go, watching the sphere sway back and forth. In the night, the dangling foam planets and plastic stars on the ceiling feel more genuine than the sky outside.
Gunwook looks at the small solar system in the corner and thinks back to years ago when they hung it up together. Matthew had always wanted to go to space. It was his dream since they met, nine years old and drawing with chalk on the pavement. He would always make them play astronaut, casting bushes and plush animals as aliens they could attack with imaginary laser guns.
After outgrowing Martian movies and T-ball leagues, Matthew set his sights on the reality of what laid above them, dedicating his time to learning about inertia and gamma rays. Gunwook never quite understood the specifics of astronomy, all he knew was that if he squinted, Matthew’s constellations of glow-in-the-dark stars looked almost like diamonds in the dim of the night.
Despite this, he followed Matthew through the universe, past the comets and nebulae of childhood.
The boy helped him to believe that space was infinite, that no matter where he went there would be stars. However, along the path to becoming an adult, Gunwook seemed to have suffered a cosmic death along with the rest of the planets and asteroids around him, leaving his galaxy empty.
That’s when he discovered that his universe wasn’t a place, it was a person, and that individual had moved on without him.
But, that happened later. For now he tries to focus on the current memory—tries to ignore the looming aftermath.
Matthew brings his hand down to rest on the thin sheets, melting further into the mattress.
Gunwook knows exactly how the whole sequence goes. He’s spent countless nights reliving this moment, staying up late enough to escape his solitary limbo and enter his recollection of heaven.
No matter how often he replays it in his mind, the scene never gets old.
Matthew curls his wrist until his pinky finger brushes Gunwook’s, then he slowly slides his whole hand within the other’s grasp, squeezing tightly, grounding them to the bed and to each other—held together by the gravitational pull between their hearts.
Gunwook watches Matthew’s mouth, his brain supplying the words before the boy can even say them.
“Hey,”
His younger self turns until his eyes meet the other’s.
“What?” He whispers.
Gunwook shivers at the ghost memory of Matthew’s thumb brushing across his bottom lip. He can feel, almost exactly like when it happened, the pounding of his heart as if it’s a star ready to burst.
“Can I?”
His past self blinks, face blushing enough to be seen in the dark of the old bedroom. Gunwook knows it’s his own shock that distracts him—that leaves room for something inside to collapse as gravity takes over.
Pushing past his staggered astonishment, young Gunwook nods and Matthew reaches out to hold his face like the moon, moving forward to connect them. Gunwook remembers the effect of the kiss like it was occurring all over again—heart fully caving in, exploding into a supernova within his chest.
He observes the two of them on the bed, trying to recall the feeling of every one of Matthew’s tender touches, watching as each of them turn him more and more dumbstruck.
Their lips move like the natural orbit of the Moon around the Earth, of the Earth around the Sun. Matthew grips onto Gunwook tightly, creating folds in his shirt and straying strands of black hair. It’s like Matthew is trying to tell him something through the caress of his hands along the other’s skin. He brings them closer, so close Gunwook remembers thinking he might break in two. Then Matthew pulls away to open his mouth and it really does happen.
“I love you.” He pants between gasping for air.
Gunwook watches the words visibly seep into himself—wishes his reaction was different. He always loved Matthew, but in this scene, he always, always forgets how to say it. The solar system is moving fast while his younger self is still caught up in the kiss.
He watches something shake on Matthew’s face, feels the gravity securing the two boys shift and waver. Gunwook is reminded of how it felt the first time, how worry pushed him to move back in, shoving himself against Matthew, trying to stabilize something he was scared would fall apart.
This time, the kiss is like two planets colliding.
Their fragments create a cloud of debris, something else breaking when Matthew tears them apart.
He sits up, teary-eyed, looking down at the other.
“You didn’t say it back.” Matthew whispers.
Gunwook urges his younger self to speak up, to say he loves him too. He knows he felt it then, but he also knows that in that moment he just couldn’t do it. They were such small words, but he was so far behind, tripping over asteroids in his mind, trying to catch up.
He stumbles over his words trying to explain himself to Matthew, but the boy only hears excuses. Matthew doesn’t get that everything Gunwook has ever done for him spells out the three words he’s looking for.
I
Staying up all night to gaze at stars together,
love
buying him his favorite snacks without any special occasion,
you.
kissing him with fervor like it’s a dream come true, because it is.
But even then, Matthew doesn’t understand. Every time Gunwook goes back to the memory, he never does.
So, like always, Gunwook turns away from the fallout. He hears the voices of the boys in slow motion, enunciating each heart-wrenching word. He wishes he could bury himself in Matthew’s laundry pile, hide from the argument under the fresh heap of clothes.
Soon enough, everything cuts to black, and as quickly as it happened, three a.m. is over—passed by like a shooting star.
In the end, it was merely a moment.
Even so, Gunwook opens his eyes in his own bed and feels something wet roll down his cheek. It’s times like these when he realizes just how much he misses Matthew.
The memory fades for the time being, but the pain of it still tears through him like the lasting wounds of their collision.
Gunwook tries to find an excuse that will help him rest, at least until the morning. They were too young, they weren’t meant to be, they wouldn’t have lasted anyway, their love wouldn’t have been strong enough.
He rationalizes the decision for hours, sunrise slowly spilling into the room, but the only conclusion that guides his eyes closed and slows his heartbeat is the truth.
They were just creatures in heaven.
And they never will be again.