Preserving Remains

There's this Roman legend that says the toucher destroys the touched. It perfectly summarizes every angle, every second, and every recorded event of Sehun's life. Instances that would require him to look at his reflection, would somehow push Sehun into believing that he isn't human. He must be some kind of species that resembles that of a human. No human could cut through flesh with bare teeth, could bruise soft napes with words, and could shatter hearts to the point where the king's men can't pull them back again. Humans feel and that's the last thing that Sehun does.

Sehun lives in a large apartment, and the remains that visitors left behind are still there. They appear as a chip on a mahogany frame, a cow-shaped coffee stain on the table, a broken vinyl record, and even as a sprawled writing on a crumpled sheet of tissue paper. His new nosy neighbor, Soojung, pretends to faint upon seeing the condition of his refuge. Sehun ignores her, and tries to get Soojung away from the broom and mop. It might be chaotic, but that's how he finds comfort.

everyone that Sehun has ever loved had been marked. they're subtle at times, and loud at others. to his first love, he left behind heavy words that she carried all the way to adulthood. to the love that never was, he had graced her kitchen with fine charcoal out of spite. and now, there's soojung; he simply doesn't know what to do with her.

his hands aren't clumsy, they're just horribly itchy when it comes to beautiful, organized things. his hands seek to destroy, to mar, to engrave his presence in the form of ink or red slashes against jutting hipbones. sehun finds beauty in the breakdown, but he can't find beauty in soojung because she's already six feet under. you can't destroy someone who's already damaged beyond recognition.

instead of getting closer to soojung like a parasite to its host, sehun shies away from soojung's absorbing eyes. the emptiness unnerves him, when it should have turned him on. soojung doesn't move him the way he wanted to be. soojung persists on delivering him the morning newspaper, on cooking for him, and on supplying light small talk every evening. somewhere between the catfights, mind-boggling cries, irritated confessions, and peaceful silence; these two fell off to bed together and somehow, they couldn't find their way out of each others lives anymore. sehun is scared because soojung makes the hair on the back of his neck stand up when she plants a kiss on his jawline. he's shaken because soojung is just as empty as he is and that he thinks its wrong, for the first time.

when pink lips meet his dry ones, sehun tumbles in a field of roses and thorns. the creepy part is that he doesn't know what hurts the most; the sharpness of the pricks, or the alluring aroma of the blood-red petals. soojung blurs the line between reality and fantasy.

but then the skies turn darker, rain falls faster, and the season changes. the sheets are warm with the presence of mating, eager bodies. sehun feels the opposite and tries to save soojung.

he's a hypocrite. trying to rescue someone when you're drowning in a sea of lies and secrets along with them is not really a heroic feat. he doesn't know. he's never felt like this. that's why he's unsure as he tries to lift soojung's spirits up by doing crazy dance routines for her right after she comes home from college. he listens to everything that comes out of her mouth, be it a ragged moan or a lifeless monologue. he commits everything to memory, tucking facts about soojung into the pockets of his mind.

it took him five months and a billion kisses before realizing that he was inlove.

unfortunately, it took just as long for soojung to realize this and ran away. she thought that sehun was safe. she thought that there were no strings attached because they were both so hallowed out there was nothing left of them to hold on to. she thought of a hundred and thirty nine ways why sehun is the perfect skeleton for her to slither her decaying roots into. she thought wrong.

when his hugs started to get tighter, kisses lasted longer, and looks melted into her soul deeper; she knew it was time to leave.

so soojung left, and in the end she turned out to be another antique to add to his collection. what she left behind were a stack of newspapers that sehun decided to place beside his bed--it was the closest out of the rest and whenever he'd wake up; he'd see that and be reminded of how sometimes, it can also be the touched that destroyers the toucher.