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“I like that melody.“
“Of course you would.“
“Are you saying I have bad taste?“
“Well…“
“I chose you, remember?”
Chan laughs.
It’s more wet than it is humorous. Like he’s going to start crying. Which…
“Hey! Stop that!”
Chan looks up from his computer. His boyfriend is perched on the bay window seat to the right of his desk. He’s almost glowing in the dying light of the sun.
Framed by golden sunbeams and pink fluffy clouds, he looks angelic.
Chan misses him.
“Minho,” he says simply. Wetly.
The laughs turn into sobs.
He really misses Minho.
They met five years ago when Chan was nineteen and Minho was eighteen. It was during the new student orientation for their university. Chan went because he was an R.A. Minho went because he was one of the new students.
They clicked in a way Chan has never clicked with anyone before. He found himself falling into a routine with Minho easily.
It wasn’t a surprise when they began to date.
Minho dying was a shock though.
“Isn’t the deadline next month?”
“What’s it matter anyway?”
“Chan…”
“None of this matters!”
“Chan.”
“It doesn’t!”
Crash!
Broken shards of glass from the cup Chan had been drinking out of land against the hardwood floor. They reflect the afternoon sun brightly. It hurts Chan’s eyes to look at them, but he can’t turn away.
“Chan,” Minho tries again. “You need to finish the song.”
He turns from the glass shards to look at Minho. He looks tired. More tired than he had in a while. “Why do I have to finish the song? What will happen if I do?”
Minho sighs, turning his head away from Chan’s searching gaze. “You can’t go on like this,” he says instead.
“Maybe I don’t want to,” Chan mutters.
“Chan…”
Minho died five months ago.
An unnoticed brain aneurysm that burst unexpectedly while he was sleeping. Chan had woken up next to a corpse.
Now he wakes up next to a ghost.
“You need to eat.”
“M’not hungry.”
“Chan! You haven’t eaten for two days now.”
“So what?”
Minho sighs. “Are you trying to die?”
Chan shrugs. “What’s it matter?”
“Eat.”
He eats.
Only because he couldn’t bear looking at Minho’s pitiful gaze anymore. He always hated that look when Minho was alive, and him being dead had no change in Chan’s feelings.
The food tastes like nothing. He isn’t surprised.
He hasn’t been able to properly taste anything for five months now.
“You need to eat more regularly,” Minho scolds. “You can’t die yet.”
“You weren’t supposed to either,” Chan snarks.
Minho sighs.
This is an old argument. A song and dance they’ve done ever since Minho appeared. “You know I would still be alive if I could be.”
And isn’t that the worst part?
Chan’s laying in bed when Minho’s ghost appears. He’s sitting at the foot of the mattress wearing what he slept in - soft black joggers and an old, worn out black tee that was Chan’s. His hair is a mess and his eyes are tired.
Chan stares at him. “Minho?”
“You’re being an idiot,” Minho says. “I’m dead, but you’re still living.”
Chan reaches out to touch Minho, but his hand just passes through. “Pretty sure I said I was dead,” Minho snarks.
“You’re a ghost? How?”
Minho shrugs. “I don’t know.”
The song was supposed to be theirs.
Or at least, that is what Chan planned.
It was supposed to be about them. Something romantic for him to send in and play on the radio. All so everyone could know the kind of love Chan had in his life.
Now the song just mocks him every time he hits play.
A constant reminder of what he used to have.
There’s only three more weeks before the deadline.
“I miss the sun.”
“You’re literally sitting in it right now.”
“But I can’t feel it anymore.”
“At least you can’t get burnt anymore.”
“Chan!”
“I’m just telling the truth.”
Minho huffs, turning his back on Chan.
Chan doesn’t mind, he likes to be able to stare at Minho. Minho, who is bathed in gold. Who glows like the stars in the night sky.
Chan could almost believe he was real.
That he was sitting next to Chan like it was before.
But the more he stares. The more he realizes just how transparent Minho is. How he can almost see through the parts of his body.
“You’re beautiful,” he breathes out because the statement is always true.
Minho shakes his head. “You’re an idiot.”
I’m your idiot, Chan almost says.
But that would just hurt too much.
Do you want to die together?
It’s a question that Chan wishes the universe would’ve asked him. He would’ve replied yes in an instant. Would have gladly given up this life to be with Minho for all eternity.
But the universe didn’t ask.
And now Chan is left being haunted instead.
“I love you.”
“I know. You say it every day.”
“Well I love you every day.”
“But you never say it like you love me.”
“Then how do I say it?”
“You say it like you’re telling me goodbye.”
Minho is silent.
Chan watches him.
“Have you finished the song yet?”
There’s only two weeks left. He’s beginning to understand.
“Almost.”
Minho smiles at him. “Good. I can’t wait to hear it.”
Ghosts are a funny thing.
Chan never thought he would actually meet a ghost. He never thought they were real in the first place. Not until Minho appeared.
He wonders sometimes if Minho is really a ghost. Or if he’s just grieving.
Maybe it’s both.
“You’re making it a duet?”
“It was never going to be anything else.”
“Maybe we can sing it together.”
“Maybe.”
The sun is shining today.
Minho is glowing.
Chan wishes it could always be like this.
“I love you,” he says.
Minho startles, looking at him with wide eyes. They soften in seconds. “I love you too,” Minho says quietly.
Chan used to dream of a future.
A diamond ring and a picket fence. Three cats and a dog. He would whisper it to Minho quietly when the moon was out and the air was still.
He had already picked out the ring. Was ready to get down on one knee.
But… well, you can’t really marry a ghost.
And the diamond ring would never fit his finger anyways.
Minho doesn’t need to sleep. But he still lays down next to Chan.
His dark brown eyes will watch Chan as he lays down. Minho will scoot as close as he can without touching. And if Chan closes his eyes and thinks really hard, he can almost imagine Minho is really there.
That he’s breathing. That he’s solid.
He can almost imagine Minho in his arms and it would be better.
He usually just ends up crying.
“I’m tired.”
“You’re a ghost, you can’t get tired.”
“Chan.”
“Just one more day. Just wait until the song is done. Please.”
“One more day.”
Chan wakes up, the next day, alone.
He sings the song by himself, the response to his call never comes.
He sends it in anyway.
“I love you until the day I die.”
“So don’t die today. Please don’t die today.”
He looks up, surprised that someone answered. The song was old, thirty years almost.
It was his fathers favorite love song. Said it was written with great feeling.
He never knew why he latched onto the song. But the first time he heard it, he cried. It stayed with him since then.
But, not many other people knew the song. Especially the people at his university who listened to the top forties mostly.
But someone answered. They knew the next words.
Another boy with dark brown eyes and midnight hair smiled from where he stood across the table. “Sorry, I just really love that song,” they say sheepishly.
“It’s ok,” he says earnestly. “I didn’t think anyone would know it.”
The other boy stands awkwardly swaying back and forth on the balls of his feet. “Oh, please sit. I would love to talk to you more.”
He does.
“By the way, my name is Chan,” he says quietly. “I’m a sophomore. And you?”
“Minho.” The other boy says. “And this is my first year.”
“Cool. Well, I can show you all the ropes,” Chan says.
Minho smiles. “That sounds great.”
I’m another life, Chan used to dream about a future.
A diamond ring and a picket fence. Three cats and a dog.
In this life, he doesn’t have to dream about it.
The ring fits perfectly on Minho’s finger.