And that face isn't young

[dainuhsoar]

title: And that face isn't young
pairing: woohyun x sunggyu
rating: r
tw: self-harm
wordcount: 5522
summary: frankenstein au, sunggyu is frankenstein and he finally comes out to woohyun, who he has been watching for weeks now.
a/n: inspired by frankenstein or the modern prometheus by mary shelley. title from 'stray cat' by kassidy. even i am so done with myself.

And that face isn't young

            it's always stories with characters who make strange (wrong) decisions that actually make it into stories. what kind of protagonist makes the correct decision all the time? that'd be boring, that'd mean there will be no story to tell. woohyun wants to make all the right decisions so he'll have no story to tell.

            but you can only go so long before making a mistake. woohyun has spent all his life making the right decisions and staying in the shadows, it's only due that he makes his first wrong choice- but he swears he swears that he'll never stray out of the shadows. he likes it here.

            he likes it here with the leaking brick walls that are tacked, crowded, with WANTED posters. the word WANTED in angry bleeding bold capital letters, serif so it'll look more menacing and official and urgent. it must be urgent because the flyers and posters are everywhere – trying to find just one man. people wouldn't even call the WANTED man a 'man'. he's a monster, they whisper as they crumple the flyers in their fists. he's like me, woohyun thinks as he walks past in soft footsteps.

            and the monster that everyone wants (dead) now sits on his worn-out armchair. the armchair sags pathetically under the monster's weight. he- it isn't as big as woohyun imagined, it's about as big as woohyun, a little bigger maybe, with longer limbs; nicer fingers, to be honest.

            this is also when woohyun makes his first wrong decision. he doesn't scream for help, doesn't run out of his house screaming for the police, doesn't pick up his phone and dial for the police. he just stands at the door for a very long time. the front door is still open behind him. he thinks and processes the figure staring right back at him for a very long time. maybe 20 minutes. and then he steps in and closes the door behind him.

            it's fucking weird.

 

            “hi.” woohyun says. he's strangely calm. shouldn't he be trying to climb walls to get away from the monster? it stinks. it really does, probably from weeks of not having a bath. can he- it even have a bath without all the loose threads holding its limbs together fall apart? “hi.” woohyun repeats.

            “hi.” its voice is soft, very boyish sounding, polite and gentle and just what the ever loving fuck is going on?

            the monster gets up and stands next to the armchair. it puts its hands behind its back and waits. woohyun doesn't move. so the monster gestures politely to the chair, gesturing for him to sit. woohyun finds his stiff legs shuffle forwards, going closer to the monster, but he doesn't sit. he gestures for the monster to sit instead. it shakes its head. they each flank the armchair's sides and stare at each other.

            “i don't mean any harm.” is what both of them say at the same time.

 

            woohyun has always been friendly to those who deserve it. he listens to the monster's story and he thinks yeah, no wonder it's a protagonist of its own story, it has made all the wrong decisions. the monster carries no expression, eyes empty and lost. its personality and characteristics are all borrowed from other people, people it has observed and learned from over the years – it seems to have picked up a lot from woohyun's mannerisms because woohyun recognizes the slow nose-scratching with only its thumb nail. but only once- once does the monster display something that is so obviously its own and it's when its sewed on lips twitch slightly and his eyes curve along.

 

            woohyun tells the monster it has to stay in woohyun's house because everyone out there's looking for it. there's a huge bounty on its head, woohyun tells it, why he isn't turning the monster in at the very second is anybody's guess.

            woohyun sends it to the shower, asking if its threads will come loose and limbs will fall off in the shower. the monster shakes its head and then squints a little, making eyes smaller than the slits they already are. woohyun asks it if it needs help in the shower, it shakes its head no again. woohyun then lends it some clothes and then goes into the kitchen to make coffee while he waits.

            the monster comes out smelling fresh and clean. it could've looked happier if it had any expressions. it stands in the doorway of the kitchen, sniffing at the air. woohyun wonders if its smelling the coffee or its own freshness.

            “my wrist is falling apart.” the monster says, holding his- its wrist out. it's wearing the jumper woohyun saves for Christmas because it's thick and festive with all the green and red. when the monster pulls the sleeve up over its left wrist, the wrist hangs limply from the faded black threads holding the wrist to the arm. woohyun can see bone and black blood and black flesh. he gags. “i'm sorry.” the monster apologizes and tries to attach the wrist pathetically.

            “no, it's fine, go into the living room.” woohyun says, gesturing for the monster to go.

            the monster shuffles into the living room stiffly, woohyun follows behind. woohyun takes out his sewing kit, a heart-shaped straw box. the monster is already seated on the armchair, the only chair in the living room, in front of the tv box set. woohyun drags a stool over next to the chair. he balances the box on his lap and he taps the arm of the chair on his side for the monster to rest his hand on.

            “will it hurt when i sew you back up?” woohyun asks.

            “no, not at all.”          

            so woohyun threads the needle and pierces the needle through the grey skin and sews a jagged line through the flesh, carefully stitching the skin back together with red thread, his hands stain with the black blood and gore collecting between the skins of the monster's wrist. woohyun can feel the monster flinch beneath his pressing fingers every time he pierces the skin. he glances up at it, it's staring at its bare feet, unkept and greyish toenails.

            “it hurts, doesn't it?” woohyun asks.

            “yes. but it's my fault for lying to you that the threads won't fall out in the bath.”

            and does it think it can punish itself for lying by putting itself through this pain? woohyun finds that he has no pity for the creature. he just pierces on and stitches on.

            and when he's done, the monster finally looks at his wrist and then he stares at woohyun's own wrist. woohyun doesn't say anything but he tugs down the sleeves of his own jumper to cover his own stitches.

 

            they turn the tv set on and watch the pictures until they fall asleep. the monster remains on the armchair while woohyun naps on the floor by its feet. woohyun wakes up when a particularly loud laugh comes from the tv. but the monster continues sleeping as if it's used to such loud noise.

            woohyun turns the tv off.

            he stands, yawns and stretches. he thinks he should leave the monster here because he ain't got an extra mattress anyway. he stares at the monster for a while longer. the only light source is the lamp shining in from outside through the balcony window next to the armchair. he lives on the 10^th floor and there isn't a building close enough for anyone to be able to look in and see the WANTED monster in woohyun's house, thankfully.

            the lamp lights are white and fluorescent. they bother woohyun sometimes when he's trying to fall asleep on his armchair before. but it's definitely not bothering the softly snoring monster.

            the monster's gentle, at least not as rough as the definition of a monster is. he isn't a monster at all but woohyun isn't going to go out of the norm and start calling it a him, is he? (he's already breaking so many “social norms” by keeping the monster in his house. this is so fucked up.) the monster's hair is long and covers its cheeks. but with its head tilted to one side, its hair falls to a side as well, exposing one cheek. and there's a stitch up that cheek, from below his chin to the outer corner of his eye, a jagged messy stitch barely holding the skin and flesh to the monster's face. the skin is peeling, threatening to just fall off its face and display its yellow teeth and stripy flesh under.

            woohyun touches the stitch, anyway. it feels rough. the monster's skin feels smooth like human's. and then the monster's eyes fly open and they're staring at each other. they don't say anything. woohyun doesn't move his hand. the monster's eyes move to the stitches along woohyun's wrist, peeking out from under his sleeve. woohyun still doesn't say anything.

            “good night.” the monster whispers and closes his eyes again.

            i don't pity him i don't pity him i don't pity him, is what woohyun repeats in his head as he climbs into bed, touching the fingers that traced the stitches to his rough lips.

 

            woohyun spends the weekend lying on the floor of the living room, falling asleep whenever he feels like it or flipping over and watching tv when he isn't sleeping. the monster doesn't know what to do so it copies woohyun, lying around on the floor, and sleeping more than woohyun does because god knows how much sleep it needs to make up for the lack of over the years.

            and then woohyun occasionally flips over on his side to watch the monster and the monster's eyes open as if on instinct – a slow flutter of eyelashes that look too real to be sewed on to black eyelids – and then they're watching each other watch each other. there's a song that goes something like this – the boys watch the girls while the girls watch the boys who watch the girls go by, woohyun sings it to the monster in frankly horrible English and he knows his pronunciation is trash, tacky jesting like that will usually get woohyun some laughs but the monster doesn't laugh, doesn't even smile.

 

            it told woohyun about how he hid out, how it learned to talk by listening and watching this small family of 3. it said, “they were wonderful.” they were wonderful because they were happy, beautiful and emotional. it watched them for years, learned their language. and when it finally felt confident enough to say hello to them they almost killed him with hammers and knives. they called it a monster and it caught a look of itself in a reflection and yes, it was a monster. it could no longer refer to itself as 'he' or 'him' any more because it was simply it. and then it ran away and dwelled in shadows again. and when it finished telling woohyun this part of the story, it said, “they were wonderful.” again and woohyun added, “you mean, to themselves.” the monster stared at woohyun for a moment and then repeated, “they were wonderful.”

 

            woohyun works at a family restaurant. they love him there. they love his jokes, his charming smile and greeting, they love how he's always making the children stop when they cry; the customers love him and so do his bosses. he's skinny and always exhausted and everyone knows just how hard woohyun's life is after his father died so they let him bring home the leftovers in containers, and the customers always tip him heavily.

            so every time woohyun returns home from work, he'll always have a paper bag stacked full with containers of leftovers from the restaurant. and it has been 2 weeks since the monster came into his life and in these 2 weeks, woohyun finds out the monster is a really picky eater.

            it's almost hilarious that a monster can dare to be picky, really.

            “you will only get pie when you finish that omelette.” woohyun says, pushing the container of mushroom omelette towards the monster.

            it grunts and shakes its head. “it's oily.”

            “big deal.”

            “then why don't you eat it?”

            “because it's oily.”

            the monster doesn't budge, unhappy. they face-off for a couple of minutes and then woohyun sighs and pushes the container of pie over and drags the omelette container to himself.

            he watches the monster (almost) happily attack the pie. and he thinks sometimes the monster does a suck-ass job at being a monster. and then the monster finishes the pie, not leaving any for woohyun and woohyun stays angry at it for the entire night, slamming his bedroom door behind him, not that the monster made any effort to apologize or anything.

 

            the monster spends a lot of time just staring out the window when woohyun isn't home. it has even pushed the armchair to face the window instead of the tv box set. when woohyun had spotted it, he just gave the monster a flat and tired look and then went to take a shower. the monster doesn't understand why woohyun'd rather watch the silly tv instead of the amazing view he has. the house is on the 10^th floor, which isn't very high but high enough to appreciate a view.

            “what are you looking at?” woohyun asks once, snatching the armchair seat before the monster could shuffle over to it after dinner.

            “the view.” it answers.

            woohyun wrinkles his nose. it isn't a very pretty city actually. for some reason, the fluorescent street lights are forever on but the apartment lights are never on. maybe it has something to do with the fact that this is almost a ghost city. there's hardly ever anyone on the streets, only litter and stray animals. shops and restaurants have been abandoned, doors broken and chains cut by burglars too poor to be living in a city with no business. why anyone stays is a question even God can't answer.

            “but it's such an ugly city.” woohyun says.

            there's a beat of silence between them as woohyun watches a lone crow hop from the balcony railings and then fly off into the greyish sky. the city's so gloomy, even the sky is grey all the damn time.

            “and that's why i watch it.” the monster replies.

 

            woohyun watches the view until he falls asleep on the armchair. the monster never left his side (or the armchair's side, to be exact), and when woohyun fell asleep, the monster carries him into his bedroom. it has never been in woohyun's room before and woohyun's room is scarily the opposite of woohyun. woohyun is calm and cheery and funny, the bedroom is just scary and screaming and desperate. the papers on the walls look like they've been torn down recently. the monster puts woohyun on the bed and woohyun grunts and rolls over on his back, he grabs the monster's wrist, sliding the sleeve up over the skin. he traces the familiar thread and asks,

            “aren't you going to ask me about mine?”

            his eyes are focused, he's sober and awake, he's aware of the thick tension in the silence between them, he knows that's panic in the monster's eyes, but he doesn't let go, doesn't roll over and pretend he's dead. he just stares into the monster's eyes and repeats the question. 

            the monster shakes his head and walks out.

 

            the monster told woohyun it wanted to find its creator. it wanted to know what the point of its existence is. it had successfully tracked its creator down but it suddenly froze, tongue-tied when it saw that its creator was just another man, a father to another son, just another old man with white hair and broken glasses and an even more broken soul. it fled and hid and watched its creator for days. its creator had never been a very good father, after all he had created one son but abandoned both. he was about to take his own life when the monster appeared, tried to snatch the gun from him. the creator screamed and tried to shoot it, and honestly, it would have allowed its father to kill it. it'd rather be killed by its creator's hands than to die in someone else's. and then everything went wrong and the creator was dead, shot in the heart.

            a witness shouted, “that thing killed him!”

            when the monster paused in its story, woohyun whispered, “it's a privilege to know why you exist.” and his fingers trace the scars on his wrist, uncaring if the monster stared and stared and stared.

 

            woohyun suggests they go out a week later. he holds up a baggy hoodie jacket and a medical mask, grin on his face.    

            “are you crazy?” the monster asks, squinting at him. “is this your master plot to get me killed?”

            “no way, that's such a lame master plot.” woohyun says. “i just want to bring you out.”

            “i don't want to go out.”         

            but it was forced into the jacket and woohyun snaps the mask over its mouth and nose and they're out, walking the streets, arm looped in arm in 10 minutes. the monster cowers and sticks to woohyun, gripping him tightly with its gloved hands. woohyun just laughs and pulls him along, telling him there's nothing to worry about.

            “where do you wanna go first?” woohyun asks.

            “back home please.”

            “how about we go to the library and use the computers there?”

            “i can't read.”

            woohyun gasps and then swears to teach the monster how to read. they spend the next hour in the library, bent over a children's book. they don't bother keeping their voices down because there isn't even a librarian, not a soul in sight. the only people in the library are hidden in the back, sleeping on the chairs and tables. they're used to woohyun coming in and shouting over the computer games so they sleep through the loud quarreling between woohyun and his friend.

            “you're hopeless!” woohyun shouts, swiping the book away angrily. “let's just go play computer games.”

            “you're impatient.” the monster says. “i took years to learn how to talk and you think you can teach me how to read in an-”

            “woohyun?”

            one of the sleepers from the back approached them. he glances to woohyun then to the monster, who ducks its head and grips woohyun's arm.

            “who's this?” the man asks.

            “a friend. he travelled all the way from the capital to see me.” woohyun says stiffly.

            “hm, well, keep your voices down.”

            he walks away but the monster still keeps its head ducked and its face buried in woohyun's shoulder. woohyun pats the monster on the back, gathers the book back to them and continues reading the story softly.

 

            on the way back, woohyun keeps ripping WANTED posters off walls, crunching them up and tossing them aside. whenever anyone sees him, he just grins at them and they grin back because it's woohyun and woohyun is a precious, beloved, trustworthy kid. and the monster watches each exchange with its beady eyes and then it murmurs, “is this your first mistake?”

            woohyun freezes and then shoves the poster in the monster's face, telling it to “eat it.” and then he detaches himself from the monster's side and absolutely does not look back when it catches woohyun's wrist with its gloved hands. woohyun tugs his hand out of its grip and walks away angrily.

            only to turn back 10 seconds later because he can't bear to leave the monster alone in this city.

 

            they're sharing the armchair, squeezed on to it with their sides pressed so tightly against each other. woohyun has his sewing kit on his lap and the monster has its arm around woohyun's waist, but not gripping, not snaking, just resting there because there is nowhere else to fit it. and woohyun's gently stitching up the monster's face, the cheek with the stitch from the chin to the corner of its eye. the monster hisses every time the needle goes through flesh and skin. it starts to cry at the sixth piercing but woohyun doesn't pause, going on relentlessly because he knows the pain would only be worst if he stopped and continued later. and when he's done sewing up the monster's face, he whispers, “you've gotta treat the pain like you deserve it.”

 

            later, when the monster is feeling slightly better, and trying to ignore the white-hot flaring in its face, it asks woohyun, who's tangled up in its side like there's invisible thread tying them together still, “is that how you cut your wrists?”

            woohyun laughs and says, “i carved my hands on rocks, and whipping branches caught my wrists in knots.”

            and even later when woohyun had fallen asleep next to it and the monster is feeling less bitter over the pain in its face, it brings woohyun back to his bedroom. woohyun grabs its wrist and feels the new thread and he asks, “are you going to ask me why?” the monster shakes its head again, this time with less manic panic, and walks out.

 

            two weeks later they attend a wedding at a church. the church's broken down and oh gosh, is the roof caving in? the statue of jesus pinned to the cross still stands strong and watches over them, though. and that's enough to call the sanctuary a church, for a wedding to take place safely.

            woohyun is dressed in a nice formal turtleneck and pants while his companion wears a baggy jacket and that medical mask again. there's gossip about them, obviously, about this mysterious man who can't reveal his name or his face, about how the man and woohyun are 'together' together, about the man overstaying his visit, to be quite honest.

            everyone lingers around to have cake and chat after the couple exchanged vows and rings and kisses. the monster goes and gets a slice for both of them only to have the edge of its jacket tugged by a little kid half its height. the kid asks for a big slice of cake. it has no choice but to comply, the kid keeps asking for more and the monster carries on complying.

            woohyun watches this, almost laughing. and then a lady comes over and he recognizes her from the restaurant. she knows his name but he's afraid he doesn't know hers but it's not like he cares to know.

            “there hasn't been a wedding since 2 years i think.” the lady comments, handing woohyun a glass of champagne. “i think the entire town is here just because of how rare a wedding is.”

            “not many couples around the city, i think.” woohyun agrees.

            “hm,” and woohyun should've slapped himself for even bringing the topic up all by himself. “speaking of that, you and that stranger...” woohyun doesn't say anything, sips his champagne and shrugs, giving a little helpless smile. “when are you two getting married then? he's stayed around in this pathetic city for nearly a month when he can be back at the capital any time. all for you. if you two aren't committed, i don't know what is.”

            woohyun knows either 'we're not dating' or 'we are dating but we don't see marriage in the future' won't make a difference, she'll carry the answer back in her shallow pockets and swaying hips and spread the message among her catty friends anyway. what if woohyun tells her 'we're not together because he's the monster all over the WANTED posters'? she'll scream and then run and tell her catty little friends, probably.

            “... city has no law, even gays can get married, y'know, no shame in that.”

            “hm.” woohyun hums and walks to the monster's side, handing it the glass of champagne and taking the plate of cake. woohyun hands the overflowing plate to the kid, who's giggling at how silly the mysterious man is. the kid thanks the both of them and skips away.

            woohyun hooks an arm around the loop of the monster's arm and kisses it softly on the cheek, over the stitch line.

 

            that night, they walk home through a tunnel. it used to be teeming with vehicles at any hour of the day and night. but it's completely empty now, a few cars abandoned along the sides. the fluorescent lights lining the curved roof of the tunnel are still on, useless, wasting energy. woohyun and the monster walk along the side of the tunnel, occasionally stopping beside some cars to peek in and steal anything they could use.

            woohyun finds a cigarette pack in the glove box of one car and sits down on the thin ledge along the tunnel and lights a stick up. he offers one to the monster, who takes it but plays with it between his fingers. he takes a seat next to woohyun. he copies woohyun and puts the cigarette between his lips.

            “here.” woohyun helps him light the cigarette, cupping his hand round the end.

            the monster takes a breath but chokes on the taste and coughs violently.

            “i don't enjoy it that much too.” woohyun says, taking the stick out of his mouth and tossing it somewhere. the monster follows suit. they stare as the cigarettes fizzle out. and then woohyun crosses his arms on his knees and rests his head in the cradle of his arms, facing the monster. “i'm tired of calling you a monster and 'it'.” he murmurs. the monster shrugs. “d'you have a name?”

            “name me.” the reply is short, sharp and quick like he's been thinking about it for a while now, like he's wanted to say it for a while now and now he can. his eyes flash a kind of desperation. “why don't you name me?”

            woohyun presses his lips together. he sits up. and then he puts one hand behind the monster's neck and pushes him forward so their foreheads touch. they stare into each other's eyes, a familiar habit between them, it's almost like a game they play all the time, to spot emotion in the other's eyes before the other can spot their own. “sunggyu then.”

            “what does it mean?”

            “i don't know.” woohyun whispers. “i just know it's the name my dad wanted for the son he never had.”

            “tell me your story.”

            “you know my story.”

            “tell me your story please.”

            woohyun laughs softly. “for a monster, you can be so pushy.”

 

            sunggyu told woohyun he didn't leave even after the WANTED posters started being put up. because by then, he'd found another reason to linger around; by then, he'd found something more important than finding out what his point of living was; he may have found the answer to that question, anyway. sunggyu didn't even know his creator but he cried for days after the old man died. but the old man's own son didn't cry, the son put on his black suit and knelt in front of his father's framed photo and watched as they incinerated his coffin but he didn't shed a tear. what he did do, though – he went home, sat on the armchair and dug fingernails into his skin until he shed blood, until the pain in his wrist took away the pain in his chest.

            and sunggyu had watched the son do that. he didn't know what to do, struck dumb, struck scared stiff. he watched the son for months and he learned his mannerisms and then he came out from the shadows and met the man he had been watching flesh-to-flesh. and he had stared at him and the other had stared back and sunggyu had felt conscious of his grey skin and his stitched skin and just being in his own skin sickened him.

            but woohyun's eyes rooted him to the spot and the first word they said was the same, “hi.”

            the second thing they said was the same too, “i don't mean any harm.”

            “it's weird that you said that,” sunggyu remarked when he's done with his recount. “because what harm could you do to me?”

            and woohyun had snorted and said, “i'm as much a monster as you are.”

 

            sunggyu's kiss literally tastes like death and woohyun whispers this into his mouth. sunggyu stops then, but woohyun pulls them closer together and kisses harder. he doesn't mind he doesn't mind he doesn't mind. he's sober, he's awake, he's aware of everything. he's kissing a monster and it feels like that's all he's ever wanted. woohyun's fingers lock around sunggyu's fingers and their wrists touch, the sharp bone knocking against sharp bone. and he can feel the rough thread rub against his scars, scratching idly at the healing wounds.

 

            sometimes woohyun taps sunggyu's stitched-on lips softly and says, “i should cut you a smile.”

            sunggyu has gotten sassy enough to reply, “is that the shape you like? considering how you cut yourself.” and his fingers go round woohyun's wrist, trace the scars there lovingly, whispering a no viper in the intent of his words.

            “i think it'll look better on you than me.” woohyun smirks. “you don't how to smile or laugh, do you?”

            and sunggyu proves him wrong, laughing heartily. “i know how to fake a smile or laugh because you do it all the time. i learn from you, remember?”

            to woohyun's credit, he hasn't faked one for some time already.

 

            sunggyu is also brave enough to turn up at woohyun's workplace. he waits outside for woohyun, stands very still with his hands in his pocket and a big scarf round his neck that acts as a mask for half his face too. he wears lensless glasses as well and he'd look every bit human if not for his slightly grey pallor. he nods at customers going in and out. they nod back at him, some smile back. he almost feels accepted.

            he feels especially at ease and accepted when woohyun comes out after work, grinning at him and throwing an arm around his shoulders. he jiggles the bag of food containers with his other hand and then turns them round to wave at his bosses and colleagues.

            “go on, wave back at them.”

            sunggyu waves awkwardly. all of them start beaming and waving back enthusiastically, as if seeing their son with his first love. woohyun tosses his head back and laughs and he's the most beautiful thing sunggyu has ever seen, happier, prettier and more wonderful than anything he's ever seen, watched or heard. he stares until woohyun hits him in the face.

 

            and then one night, when they're squeezed onto that ratty old armchair again, sitting by the balcony and watching the empty view, sunggyu takes woohyun's wrist and kisses the scars that decorate it.

            “why did you cut yourself?” woohyun sags beside sunggyu. finally. finally.

            “i was the son dad never wanted. mom cheated on him, had me with another guy and then died after giving birth to me. the other guy didn't want me.” at this point, sunggyu started crying silently. “so i was left with dad. but he didn't want me too. he wanted his own son, he created you, realized he created a monster, though he never realized you aren't quite that-”

            he pauses and kisses sunggyu's tears. “he turned back to me, tried to make amends but couldn't. and he'd rather kill himself than me. i saw you when you first woke up, saw your stitches and your cuts and you were falling apart. and i saw him run from you. you stayed behind and waited for him. i remember thinking,”

            woohyun pulls his hand from sunggyu's grasp. he cups sunggyu's cheek and kisses him on the lips softly. “how you must have hurt. later, dad told me you were a monster and we had to leave you. that stuck with me, y'know. monster monster monster. but i was the one who drove him to death. i was the one who killed him, indirectly or not. and i had to be the monster, i had you in my head as the picture and i deserved your stitches and cuts and so,”

            woohyun picks at the thread between sunggyu's skin. “i quite literally wanted to look like you just so i could find you and tell you, 'we're family'.”

            sunggyu is an ugly crier. he sobs loudly and takes deep breaths in loud gasps; his nose leaks messily and mixes with his salty tears; really quite a gross sight. and woohyun laughs at him and wipes at his face and loves him through the tears.

            “you're so stupid.” sunggyu murmurs through saliva webbed between his dry lips. “stupid.”

 

            the WANTED poster with sunggyu's cut-up face glare down at them, flapping against the strong wind on the wall. sunggyu huddles closer to woohyun, woohyun huddles closer to sunggyu. sunggyu whispers, “they're going to find me and kill me.”

            woohyun doesn't disagree, “you're not a monster.”

            sunggyu grins, genuine and learned from the best, y'know, “and you're as much of one as i am, right?”