Chapter Text
It just didn’t feel real. Roksu wasn’t paranoid, per say, but in his experience things going right for too long was merely the prelude to something horrible.
He was constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Getting a scholarship and going to university alone had felt like an impossible fantasy but maintaining a peaceful life on top of that felt… bizarre.
It wasn’t that they had a normal life.
Often Cale still came home with strange bruises or there was an accident near his workplace that Roksu knew the reason behind.
Cale kept it quiet though. He knew what Roksu would think about the world trying to kill him.
Roksu’s curse trying to kill him.
Roksu didn’t know how or why he was cursed like this, but in a world where monsters sometimes crawled through the rift and his brother was a reincarnated noble from another world, having a curse seemed comparably normal.
The thing was that Cale kept living. Roksu despised the comparison to a cockroach but Cale truly was as difficult to kill as Hans.
In some ways, it filled Roksu’s heart with the hope that they could continue like this. That despite it all, they really could survive together and maintain a modest happiness. Even if Roksu was never able to make any other friends in his whole life, that was okay so long as he had his brother.
In other ways, it filled him with dread. The constant knowledge that one day Cale’s luck would run out. That something would tear them down.
That all the happiness and peace they’d built up would be torn down in a blink of an eye.
So when Roksu walked out of the last test of his second year of university, fairly confident that he’d passed, he wasn’t filled with joy or excitement.
Pure dread.
A fear resounded so agonizingly in his heart that he almost couldn’t focus on the test.
Throughout the semester, the constant fear had built to a crescendo and he was unable to deny the paralyzing terror any longer.
It was a lot easier to detach himself from reality. To distance his own emotions and feel that this couldn’t possibly be real.
Roksu stopped on his walk home.
He couldn’t quite bring his feet forward. Every step felt like further confirmation of something awful. Something disgusting.
It couldn’t be that easy.
It hadn’t been easy, every day was a struggle. They were always tight for money, Cale always worked too hard, the threat of the curse and monsters hung over them, and even after graduating there was no guarantee of getting a good job in this economy.
It was hard.
But Roksu’s expectation of life was that it always got harder. Whenever there was the slightest victory, that would mean yet another challenge was awaiting on the horizon.
It was suffocating.
Roksu looked down at his feet.
Move.
He should go and pick up his brother from work. Then they’d have a normal night together. There was no point in anticipating that something was wrong before the terrible thing had even happened.
What if today he was already too late?
What would happen next?
Could they survive it?
It didn’t feel real.
At this rate, he would easily achieve a degree and get a job and their financial situation would further stabilize and they could really survive. At this rate, they could find actual happiness. Maybe one day they would even get to relax.
Such a terrifying thought.
Roksu wanted it, he wanted it so selfishly and greedily and it really did seem to be within his grasp at the current rate of things. They were absolutely making it work despite it all.
The complacency was so scary.
Red. The sound of the ground shattering. His brother's broken body below. The muted sounds around him and the inability to breathe.
Red. The stench of blood and his pained expression.
Red. His brother's hair glinting in the sunlight, just before the car came careening at them.
Roksu clenched his fists at his side and tried to catch his breath, breathing unevenly as memories fought for supremacy over his heart.
He just couldn’t seem to breathe.
Everything was just going too well for too long. Something was sure to happen and he couldn’t predict how or when.
His vision spun as he looked down at the concrete below him, unable to move for fear that he would collapse.
Roksu, as a rule, wasn’t a nosy person. He already noticed and remembered far more than he ever cared to. His ideal lifestyle was to go on living without getting involved in the world around him. To be able to forget.
To be able to move on.
Roksu never pressed Cale for information about his other life . It was clearly a painful subject for his hyung and it never seemed to have much relevance toward their current lives. It was another world, another family. Another everything.
Roksu would never admit it, not even to himself, but a part of him never wanted to bring it up because of how distant Cale became.
Kim Kwangsu seemed to fade away under the overwhelming presence of Cale Henituse. And for all that they were the same person under the same name and two different bodies, there was something about it that made Roksu insecure.
Sometimes he wondered if Cale’s ability to survive the curse wasn’t due to luck or skill, but rather his own detachment with this world.
It felt as though the life of Cale Henituse could claim his brother once more and Kim Kwangsu would become nothing but a memory.
The fear was irrational and Roksu hardly even understood it, but there was something so dreadful about acknowledging that other life.
…sometimes he couldn’t help but feel that Cale would prefer to have been reborn there, back to his original family, and never met Roksu…
He wouldn’t be cursed. He wouldn’t suffer or work. He would be able to live happily.
And Roksu would be alone.
The thought was crippling.
A hand touched Roksu’s shoulder and forcefully pulled him from his thoughts.
He turned, heart leaping in his chest, only to see no one behind him.
Roksu’s fingers moved up to his shoulder as he looked around, the phantom feeling of a touch still remaining.
Creepy… seriously creepy…
Roksu made his best attempt to shake off the spookiness of it and progressed forward hastily. He wanted to get home as soon as possible.
He was so rushed he didn’t notice the shift that occurred where his feet had been, a crack in the concrete that now contained grass from another world.
He also didn’t hear the muttered words left behind.
“...what a troublesome kid.”
Roksu didn’t pick up Cale from work. Too panicked and too unnerved to do anything but return to the refuge that their humble apartment offered.
He forgot how much he hated empty apartments.
There was no sign of Hans’ skittering when he closed the door behind him, just an empty and dark home.
Roksu closed his eyes.
His uncle’s forceful grip on his hair before his face was bashed into the ground.
Roksu tried to remember how to breathe and really couldn’t understand how it had become so hard.
His life would be so much easier if he could forget.
The emptiness of the apartment offered nothing in the way of danger or safety. It was just empty and dark.
A blank canvas for his mind to fill with anything.
Roksu swallowed thickly and held a hand over his chest, attempting to calm down. Attempting to stop hyperventilating. Attempting to stop everything raging inside of him.
It was so much easier to suppress this when he had to fight for every day, for every moment. A moment of struggle was a moment where he couldn’t fixate on a past that couldn’t be changed. The human mind set aside those instances for a time of safety and then forced people to face their demons.
It was cruel.
Roksu’s breath hitched.
What would he do if Kwangsu really did disappear?
What would he do if Kwangsu proclaimed that he never thought of Roksu as a brother, not really, and left him for another world.
Roksu thought about it.
The other world seeping into their own. Kwangsu claimed there was nothing waiting for him there but he was clearly still attached. He liked it when Roksu called him Cale, he liked styling his hair how it used to be , he liked to name their damn pests after servants he knew as nobility.
Cale hadn’t let go.
What would he do if all that he had left was this empty apartment?
Roksu slid down the door, his legs unable to sustain his weight any longer and a cold acceptance filling him.
…wasn’t that better…?
If Kwangsu left him, wouldn’t it be harder for the curse to reach him?
Wouldn’t it be better for Roksu to live a life of true solitude.
I could do it.
Roksu knew he could.
He wasn’t incapable of living on his own. He would manage. He would have to drop out of university and get a job but he could do that. He didn’t need his brother to survive. He knew that with an absolute certainty.
So why did the thought make him feel so cold?
He choked, his latest attempt to breathe properly turning him into a hacking and coughing mess as he practically vomited by the front door, confident in the knowledge that he was alone.
That he might stay alone forever.
The constant fear that one day he would lose his only family and he was powerless to stop that. In fact, his existence would likely be the reason, ripped open flesh with an unspeakable pain.
But he could do it.
A hand touched his back and Roksu froze, memories of his uncle so fresh and powerful that he was going to lose his mind, he thrashed out and just too late saw how he’d struck Kwangsu’s face.
Cale didn’t say anything.
He pulled Roksu into a hug and rubbed his back gently, keeping his shuddering and gasping brother held close while Roksu found the strength to calm down.
Roksu wasn’t sure how long it was when the ringing in his ears faded and he finally heard Cale’s voice.
“Shh… it’s okay, I’m here. Don’t worry. I’m here.”
What had Roksu said? Had he said anything or had he sobbed wordlessly and Cale had miraculously understood his fears?
It was mortifying.
Roksu was always scared of what would happen. The better his life became, the more scared he became.
The more that the shadows from his past leaked up from behind him and tore his body apart.
“It’s okay. I’m here, Roksu.”
Roksu sank into the warmth of his brother’s hug. The good thing about Cale was that he wouldn’t force Roksu to explain why he’d had such an extreme emotional reaction. The bad news was that Cale probably already knew somehow and that was embarrassing.
Roksu didn’t like airing out his insecurities.
When Roksu’s breathing had stabilized, Cale picked him up. It was a bit of a shock for Roksu but he knew that Cale worked at those construction sites and as Cale liked to put it with dramatic flair “I never miss leg day” so of course he could pick up his lazy scrawny brother.
It was still quite a scary experience before Roksu understood what was happening and he stifled a yelp.
Cale misunderstood and apologized, setting Roksu down onto the ground where his feet felt a bit stronger beneath him.
“...you okay now?”
Do you want to talk about it?
Roksu shook his head and headed deeper into the apartment, the lights making everything look much better and his heart now pained with embarrassment rather than fear. Still, he let Cale fret over him and braid his hair before insisting that they splurge on ordering out. To celebrate Roksu completing his second year.
A feeble attempt for Cale to hide how concerned he really was.
They weren’t perfect and the fear remained and sometimes it still didn’t feel real at all.
But they had each other.
And maybe they really could just be happy.