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Por loved Tee. Tee loved Por.
It was the kind of love that poets try and fail to write about—the quiet, steady kind that doesn't shout but settles into the bones. They had been each other's since high school, through the chaos of youth, through college exams and late-night fights and the slow, beautiful building of a life together. And now, after all those years, the waiting was almost over. Their wedding was two weeks away.
Everything had been perfect. The preparations were a symphony of joyful chaos—the suits tailored and pressed, the venue a garden bursting with white flowers, the caterers chosen, the guest list finalized. Every detail, accounted for. Por had dreamed of this day so often that he could close his eyes and play it like a film reel behind his lids: walking down the aisle on his father's arm, the tremor in his hands as he was handed over to Tee, the warmth of Tee's fingers wrapping around his. He could hear their voices cracking as they exchanged vows—for better, for worse, in sickness and in health, till death do us part. He could feel the ghost of their first kiss as husband and husband, the room erupting in cheers and tears, the echo of congratulations bouncing off the walls. He had believed, with every fiber of his being, that they would live their happily ever after.
The wedding day came.
Por stood in his suit. Tee stood in his too—handsome, peaceful, perfect. But there was no priest. Instead, a Buddha statue watched in silence. There was no music. Only crying. And Tee… Tee was not standing. He was lying down.
In a coffin.
Por tried to listen to the monk's chanting. He tried to focus on the sutras, on the promise of rebirth, on anything other than the yawning void in front of him. But his mind kept spiraling back to one stupid, cruel detail: he had refused to let Tee see him in his wedding suit. It's a surprise, he had said, grinning like an idiot. And now Tee would never see it.
He stared at Tee's face, willing it to move. Please. Just open your eyes. Tell me this is a prank. I'll be so angry. I won't talk to you for days. I swear. Just please—open your eyes. But the longer he looked, the more he realized he would forgive everything. Every lie, every joke, every cruel trick—if Tee would just sit up and laugh, Por would fall to his knees and thank every god that ever existed.
He stepped forward to adjust Tee's tie. To make him look proper for the funeral. But his hands stopped. Because Tee always said that looking proper felt like suffocating. So instead, Por loosened the knot. Just a little. Just the way Tee liked it.
Tee's brother touched his shoulder. Por's own brother wrapped him in a hug that said nothing and everything. Tee's mother collapsed into his arms, sobbing, and Por held her—but he couldn't cry. It was as if his tears had been stolen. He moved through the day like a puppet, responding to condolences with hollow words, watching other people's grief splatter against him like rain on glass. He saw them cry. He wanted to join them. But nothing came.
That night, he went back to the home they had bought together. Relatives begged him to stay with them. He refused. I want to be alone, he said. And he meant it.
He tried to live. Or, at least, he went through the motions. He would wake up and roll over, reaching for Tee's warmth—only to find the sheets cold and empty. He cooked meals for two, set the table for two, sat across from an empty chair. He washed the dishes and handed a plate to the air, expecting invisible hands to rinse it. The plate shattered on the floor. He shouted at the kitchen for more cherries—we just finished the last bowl, Tee, go buy more—and the silence that answered back was louder than any scream.
Then, one day, he opened the closet. Tee's cap fell out. One of the few things recovered from the accident. Por picked it up and tried to put it back on the shelf. It fell again. And again. As if the cap itself refused to stay where it belonged, refused to accept that its owner was gone. Frustration boiled over. Por threw the cap across the room.
And then—like a crack in a dam—a single tear slipped down his cheek.
Then another.
And then the pain hit him like a freight train. It crushed his chest, stole his breath, dropped him to his knees. He clutched his heart, gasping, sobbing into the carpet. He crawled to the cap. He hugged it. He pressed it to his face and inhaled nothing—no scent of Tee's shampoo, no warmth, nothing but the cold smell of absence.
He remembered the phone call. Tee had gone out to buy him a gift. It's a surprise, Tee had said, voice light and happy. Por remembered feeling anxious that day, a strange, nameless dread coiling in his stomach. He thought now that his body had known—that his soul had felt the exact moment Tee's heart stopped beating. He had driven to the scene. They wouldn't let him see the body. He saved a child, they told him. Pushed him out of the way. But he wasn't so lucky himself.
Por had looked at that child—alive, breathing, crying—and felt something dark and ugly rise in his chest. Why him? Why Tee? He had screamed at the mother, who only wailed and apologized over and over. He didn't care. He couldn't care. All he could see was Tee's face, Tee's smile, Tee's hands that would never hold him again.
They handed him a wrapped package. Drenched in blood. Tee's blood.
He had kept it. Unopened. He never found the courage. That night, after the cap fell, after the tears finally came, he crawled to the bedside table and opened the third drawer. The package was still there, the blood now dry and brown, stuck to the paper like a scar. His fingers trembled as he unwrapped it.
Inside was a necklace. Beautiful. Delicate. And a handwritten card.
To my beautiful angel,
who deserves everything beautiful.
This will look so good with your wedding suit.
Por's vision blurred. He pressed the necklace to his chest, and then the sound that came out of him was not a cry—it was a wound opening. A gut-wrenching, primal wail that tore through the empty house. All the grief he had bottled, all the years of pretending, all the love with nowhere to go—it poured out of him like a river breaking through a dam. He cried until his throat was raw. He cried until his body gave out. He cried until the world went dark.
He woke up in a hospital. An IV in his arm. His best friend Auau at his bedside. Tee's brother Thomas holding his other hand. He looked at the doctor and whispered, I can't bear this pain. I need to die. I need to see him again.
They induced a coma.
When he woke up, Tee was gone. Not just dead—forgotten. Twelve years of love, twelve years of memories, wiped clean. His brain had protected him the only way it knew how: by erasing the most beautiful and devastating part of his life.
Isn't that cruel? He had everything—wealth, success, the world at his feet. And yet, he was always empty. Always hollow. Like someone had carved out a piece of his soul and left a wound that would not heal. His brain may have forgotten, but his heart never did.
And now, twenty years later, lying on another hospital bed after another medically induced coma—he remembered. Everything.
He was glad, in a strange way. The universe had taken pity on him and struck him with an illness. A severe heart condition. The doctors gave him three years, maybe, if managed properly. But with his memories returned, Por didn't want three years. He didn't want three days.
Tee. The name fell from his lips like a prayer, like a wound, like the last breath of a dying man. Even after twenty years of forgetting, the pain hit just as hard. Just as fresh. Just as deadly.
He stood to use the bathroom and caught his reflection. A middle-aged man stared back—no longer the pretty face Tee had fallen in love with. His skin was wrinkled, his hands scarred and yellowed from years of medication. He stared at himself for a long time. And for one fleeting moment, he thought he saw Tee's face in the mirror, smiling at him. But he shook his head and walked into the bathroom.
When he came back, he picked up his pill bottle. He held one pill between his fingers. He looked at it. Then he put it back. He lay down on the bed, clutched his chest as the familiar pain bloomed behind his ribs, and closed his eyes.
Pip, my love.
Por's breath caught. He knew that voice. He would know it in the dark. In death. In silence.
I'm here to take you with me. To take you home.
Por opened his eyes. Tee stood before him—young, beautiful, exactly as he had been twenty years ago. Not a day older. Por's lips trembled. I'm not the Pip you know anymore.
Why say that, my love?
I forgot you for twenty years. The words came out broken, soaked in guilt. Isn't that terrible? Lovers don't do that to each other. And look at me—I'm old. Wrinkled. I'm not the beautiful Por you used to know.
Tee stepped closer. His eyes were soft, wet with tears that did not fall. I should be the one apologizing. I left you alone in this world. That is my fault. And you're right—lovers don't do that to each other.
No, Por whispered. They don't.
Tee reached out and cupped Por's face in his hands. Por, you have always been beautiful. You are still my beautiful angel. No matter how you look—you are my Pip. My beautiful angel. Mine.
Por leaned into the touch, his cheeks pressing against Tee's palms. He wrapped his hands around Tee's arms, holding on as if falling. And in the space between one heartbeat and the next—he was young again. His wrinkles smoothed. His hands healed. His face became the face Tee had kissed a thousand times. A single tear rolled down his cheek and landed on Tee's palm.
Tee wiped it away with his thumb. Don't cry, my love. I'm here to take you home. We have a wedding to hold.
Por nodded. He stepped forward. And he held Tee—truly held him—for the first time in twenty years. Tee's arms wrapped around him, tight and sure, and pressed a kiss to the corner of Por's tear-stained eye.
---
It is with the heaviest of hearts that we announce the passing of Mr. Suppakarn, the world's richest man, at the age of 47. He passed away peacefully in his sleep after a long battle with a severe heart condition. Those closest to him say he was found with a contented smile on his face—the kind of smile that speaks of reunions, of homecomings, of love that not even death could touch. May his soul rest in perfect peace.