Work Text:
To Narutaki Ryu
Do you remember, that day in the park, when we placed our stamps on Seiichi and Sumiko's marriage registration papers? We said goodbye to them but I didn't want to leave until after the sunset. You asked me then and many times after, "Yohan, why do you like sunsets so much?"
Maybe it's time that I answer you finally. The sun setting never felt like an ending to me, sure it was a precursor to the night's darkness, but somewhere on the other side of the world, the same sun that I was bidding farewell to was bringing much needed light to others. It felt miraculous that the ending for one side of the world could mean a beginning for another. To watch that happen, to witness the descent of the sun across the sky, and know that it heralded a new dawn for so many others, it felt like a miracle no matter how many times I watched it happen.
Kiseki, it's a word I associate with many things, you, Kanau, the time I spent with you in Japan, the family you gave me.
I was selfish. I did not want you to see my end, I wanted to stay frozen in your mind like the strong, blazing sun. We were at the summit of our youth when I left, every step that led me away from you took more out of me than this illness ever could.
Did it work? Did I remain the man that you looked at in the boxing ring and felt moved?
I considered making you a video, but the me in this wheelchair, the Yohan who cannot even eat solid food anymore, the Yohan who has to waste away little by little, that is a Yohan who would differ too much from your memories.
Sometimes I wonder what it would have been like to grow old with you, to watch Sua get married—she's writing this letter for me and rolling her eyes as if I can't see her—I wish I got to see Kanau grow up.
You will have to do it for me, do it all Ryu, live your life for two, when you drink alcohol drink one more cup for me, when you kiss Kanau's forehead kiss it one more time for me, test whatever rascal Sua chooses for me, walk Sua down the aisle in my stead.
If fate had been kinder, I would have liked growing old with you.
사랑해
You must have known already but let me put it in writing, let me make it tangible, a physical reminder that my love for you has existed for a long time now and will continue existing as long as you hold onto my memory. Farewell.
From Hwang Yohan
The letter is accompanied with another one from Sua herself, detailing how adamant Yohan had been that the letter only be sent once he's well and truly gone, she had not been able to do it. Sumiko and his mother prod him for answers but his tongue refuses to form the words he needs to, until all he can do is place the letters in Sumiko's hands. His mother's choked sobs do not pull him out of his reverie neither does the look of shock in Sumiko's eyes.
They sit together like that in silence for a while, until his father comes home with Kanau in tow, in middle school now and louder than ever. For a moment it seems like life is breathed into the house, like Ryu can feel the heart of it stuttering before falling back into rhythm. Dinner is served as usual, Kanau chattering away about school and her friends, Sumiko disappears into the room that his dad had remodelled into a study for her. His parents retreat to their room, no doubt his mother will break the news to his father.
After so many years, Ryu had gotten used to it, the ache in his chest that somewhere out there Yohan was happy and in love with someone, someone who could probably give Yohan all that Ryu cannot. He'd even imagined Yohan with children of his own, with a faceless, nameless woman who called him her own. In the start, he'd thought it the worst kind of pain possible.
He'd been wrong. This is the worst kind of pain possible.
A haze covers his actions over the next few days, the packing although most of it is done with the help of his mother, booking his one-way ticket, explaining to Kanau why he had to leave. Sumiko is the one who drives him to the airport, eyes that mirror his as she recalls having felt something much the same.
Only at the door of Yohan's hospital room does his vision gain clarity, on the car ride over Sua had already given the information he'd need before entering the room. Yohan would not be able to speak much, the illness had progressed but short sentences were manageable. They had no idea how much longer his respiratory system would hold out, Yohan had signed a DNR she'd said with her voice wavering. He holds no judgement for her acceptance of that decision, he knows Yohan too well, the man would not want to prolong his pain with assisted breathing.
Their eyes meet as Ryu opens the door, Sua staying outside to give them privacy. Yohan's disbelief quickly transforms into that anger of his, the one Ryu knows is not really malicious, it's the anger that Yohan pulls on as a mask, to shield himself from the world. He's thinner, less colour in his face as if this grey and bland hospital room had leeched all life out of him until all that remained was a vague outline of a once mighty force of a man.
"Why?" Even that one word Ryu can see takes too much effort from him.
"I came to find the piece of my soul that walked away from me all those years ago."
It is with Ryu's hand in his, when Hwang Yohan finally succumbs to his eternal slumber, at the side of the secluded lake in Berlin where Yohan had once celebrated his freedom. Surrounded by his loved ones, sporting a sticker from Kanau's collection on his right hand, his head lying in Sua's lap he breathes his last.