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[Ilay’s POV]
A cough.
Sharp and dry, pulled from deep in his chest.
At dawn, when he thinks I’m still asleep.
But I’m not.
I never sleep when he’s not beneath my hands.
He slips quietly out of bed, lifts a glass of water to his lips,
Like it’s holy water.
The coughing doesn’t stop.
Not until his fingers tremble.
“Tae,”
I called.
He doesn’t answer.
The first time he collapsed, it was in the garden.
Among the flowers we planted together—
Stupid, delicate flowers that didn’t suit this house.
He knelt and crumpled down.
One hand pressing against his ribs.
When I ran to him, he smiled.
“Just dizzy,” he said.
“Stood up too fast.”
Liar.
I lift him and carry him back into the house.
He smiles like he’s trying to make it easier for me.
I lay him on the sofa but don’t leave his side.
Not this time.
I started watching him again.
Like when we first met.
Does his hand tremble when he holds a spoon?
Is his shirt looser than before?
Does pain flicker through his eyes—
And is he trying to hide it with that familiar smile?
He thinks he’s hiding it.
But I know.
It’s death.
Wearing someone’s shell and walking toward us.
“Ilay,”
He says one night, curled beside me.
“What would you do… if I wasn’t here anymore?”
He says it like a joke.
Like someone mumbling nonsense in a dream.
I kiss the back of his neck.
“You’re not going anywhere.”
Silence.
He doesn’t say “okay.”
The second collapse is worse.
This time, there’s blood.
On his lips. His hands.
He tries to hide it with his sleeve,
But I see the stain spreading red.
“I’m fine,” he rasps.
And that lie shatters between us.
I slam the door and leave.
I scream in the forest
Until my throat tears.
Punch tree trunks
Until bones break again.
They never healed right.
Neither did I.
I demand Kyle bring a doctor.
He complies.
The doctor checks Taeui’s pulse,
Looks into his eyes, listens to his chest.
Then pulls me aside.
“It’s too late,” he says.
“Far too late.”
I don’t understand.
I make him repeat it.
“It’s an illness he’s had for a long time.”
No.
“He never told you?”
No.
I turn my back.
Before I destroy something.
Before I hurt someone.
That night, I sat at the foot of the bed.
Taeui is asleep.
The window is open, and the wind smells like autumn.
The flowers outside are withering.
I look at him.
His lashes cast shadows on his cheeks.
His breathing is shallow, barely there.
He was never mine.
I grip the bedsheet so I don’t reach for him.
The first true helplessness I’ve ever felt
Tightens around my chest,
Like the last bit of air is being squeezed out.
It was so desperate—
That for the first time in my life, I pray.
Please.
Don’t take him.
“Don’t take him away from me.”
————————————
[Jeong Taeui’s POV]
It was a Tuesday.
That morning, sunlight poured in like shards of glass.
The sky was clear.
Too clear—like a sky people quietly, beautifully die beneath.
I woke before Ilay.
His arm was wrapped around me, as always.
So tightly, I couldn’t tell where his body ended and mine began.
I could hear his breathing.
I wondered—
Did he know mine was growing fainter?
Unspooling like thread, slower and slower.
I didn’t want to die in his arms.
I didn’t want him to remember the end that way.
So I slipped away. Quietly. As silently as I could.
The pain today was different.
It bloomed like fire from deep below.
It hid behind my ribs.
My legs were heavy, vision dim at the edges.
Like the world was folding inward.
Still—I walked.
I went to the kitchen.
I tried to make tea.
My hand trembled.
The cup slipped.
Shattered.
I think I collapsed with it.
I might’ve called his name.
God, I hope I didn’t.
I didn’t want him to see me like this.
On my knees, palms scraping the floor, coughing up blood.
My lungs were drowning in flame. My body betrayed me.
Again. And again.
Then—
His arms caught me.
“Tae.”
Ilay’s voice was hoarse,
Drenched in fear.
I wanted to tell him it was okay.
That I was used to this. That it didn’t hurt as much as it looked.
But no words came.
He lifted me.
Like years ago in the snow,
He held my broken body in his arms.
As if I were something precious.
As if I were still whole.
“Stay with me,”
He whispered.
“Don’t close your eyes.”
But my eyelids were so heavy.
Once—they blinked.
His face hovered above.
Twice—
His hand cupped my cheek.
The third time—
Darkness.
When I opened my eyes again,
I heard someone crying.
Not me.
Ilay.
Ragged, breaking sobs.
His forehead was pressed to my chest.
His fingers clutched at my shirt.
He thought I had died.
I wanted to tell him—
No.
I’m here.
I’m still here.
Instead…
I moved my hand, just a little.
Placed it on his hair.
He froze.
Looked up.
His eyes were wet.
Wide. Mad.
“Don’t cry,”
I whispered.
“Don’t cry because of me.”
He kissed my hand.
Pressed it to his lips like a prayer.
And then—
For the first time since I’ve known him,
He spoke.
Not out of rage.
Not as a whispered tease during sex.
Not as a threat.
But like an oath.
Like a vow.
Like the truth.
“I love you,”
He whispered.
“I’ve never stopped loving you from the beginning .”
————————————
[Ilay’s POV]
The doctors don’t speak.
But I hear everything in their silence.
There’s no need for explanation.
I already knew that Taeui was dying.
From the day he stopped teasing me for stealing the blankets.
From the moment his fingers trembled while pouring tea.
From the way he held my face with both hands, staring like he was trying to memorize me.
He knew it too.
But he never said a word.
He made me laugh.
He helped me sleep.
It made me imagine a future.
And now—
He lies in Kyle’s private ward.
Face pale as the sheets.
Lips cracked and dry.
Skin cold.
So cold.
Seeing it makes me want to scream.
They won’t let me stay in the room.
So I sat outside the door.
I don’t pace. I don’t move.
I just sit there, staring at the door.
Kyle tried talking to me once.
I didn’t listen.
Christoph came.
He put a hand on my shoulder.
“Ilay,”
he said softly.
“You need to rest.”
I brushed his hand off.
Like it burned me.
“I need to prepare—”
“Shut up.”
It was the first time I’d said something like that to him.
He said nothing.
And never came back.
From inside the room, I hear sounds.
The beeping of machines.
Ragged breathing.
Cracking coughs.
And his voice.
A voice so broken.
“…I don’t want him to see me like this.”
I don’t know who he’s talking to.
But I press my forehead against the doorframe.
You fool.
If I had to cut off my hand, I would.
If I had to tear out my heart, I would.
If I could give him one more day,
I’d burn T&R to the ground for you.
And again.
And again.
But you—
You think I can’t bear your weakness?
I am the weak one, Taeui.
It was always you who was strong.
That night, I didn’t sleep.
I sat by the door, unmoving like a stone.
In my hand,
Was the letter he’d once forced me to write.
Months ago.
“If I die first, you have to live.
Eat, sleep, and one day, find peace.
Promise me.”
I never answered.
Never signed.
Because—
I knew.
There was no way I would outlive him.
Just before dawn, I went into the room.
He was sleeping.
Or worse.
I sat beside him.
Held his hand.
It was light.
Too light.
“Come back,”
I whispered.
I kissed the back of his hand.
Buried my face in the blanket.
“Come back.”
And then—
He moved.
His eyelids fluttered.
Just barely.
His eyes met mine.
In them—
There was both pain and salvation.
“…Don’t cry.”
His voice was so faint.
Just audible.
“Ilay…
Don’t cry because of me.”
And I…
I collapsed.
Kneeling,
Trembling all over, fists clenching the blanket.
Like I would disappear into the floor.
“No—”
I whispered.
“I can’t take this.”
“I don’t want to let you go.”
He smiled.
Faintly.
“…But you already did,”
he said.
“…A long time ago.”
Liar.
I don’t remember what came next.
Only one thing remains—
That cold, quiet voice.
You promised.
He asked me to live.
But I—
I never agreed.
I will follow him.
One way or another.
————————————
[Ilay’s POV]
The morning I buried him, it rained.
Not a downpour, nor a storm.
Just quiet, steady rain.
Drops that seeped into the skin, like sorrow made visible.
A sky too tired to do anything else but cry.
They said he passed peacefully.
Lies.
Someone like Jeong Taeui does not die peacefully.
He was someone who loved too much.
Who looked at you as if his gaze alone could hold back the end of the world.
And he—
He really did give that world to me.
I stood beside the grave in a black coat.
Unshaven.
Eyes red, hands empty.
No eulogy. No speech.
No family.
Just me.
No one came.
Maybe perhaps they wanted me to be alone with him during this time. (They were mourning secretly)
In the end, only we remained.
As it always had been.
I knelt and touched the stone.
Cold and wet with rain.
I traced his name with my fingers.
Jeong Taeui
A cheerful and bright man.
The letters blurred.
My vision blurred with them.
Some people came,
Christoph said something. I didn’t hear.
Kyle put a hand on my back. I didn’t flinch.
A hollow space had replaced my heart.
That night, I returned to his room.
The space Taeui had was filled with tea and strange plants.
The place where he’d always cupped my cheek with a cold hand when I came home injured,
“Idiot. Not even one text?”
he used to say.
His scent still lingered.
In the bedroom, one drawer was half open.
Inside—
The shirt I wore the first night I stayed here.
Folded neatly.
He had kept it.
That broke me more than anything else.
Beneath it, a letter.
Trembling handwriting.
My name.
Ilay.
I didn’t read it.
Couldn’t.
I already knew what it said.
Gentle words.
Painfully kind words.
Telling me to live a long life.
To be good.
To forget him.
He knew.
He knew I could never do that.
I sat by the window, the letter on my lap,
Until the sun rose.
When it did, I put on the same coat from yesterday.
I brought nothing.
Just a small knife.
And a cheap, ugly ring he once jokingly bought at the market.
I returned to the grave.
The world was silent.
No one saw me kneel.
I took out the letter.
Place it on the stone.
“…I lied,” I whispered.
“I can’t live without you.”
I took the knife from my coat.
Cold metal against skin.
And then—
I smiled.
By the time Christoph found me, it was too late.
Blood had soaked the grass.
My head rested on his grave.
The letter lay between us.
Christoph screamed.
Kyle ran. Peter and Rita called for help.
But I—
I was already with him.
Jeong Taeui.
He had been waiting.
I know.
And this time,
I will never let go.
————————————
[Postscript]
The world still turns.
The city rebuilds.
The final traces of T&R are buried in old documents and silence.
Buildings gone.
Contracts torn.
Shadows slowly swallowed by sunlight.
Though some corners remain untouched by light.
Even so, some names remain.
In an alley in Berlin, in an old bar, among the ruins of a broken network—
If you ask for long enough, someone will whisper.
About the man who moved like a blade, and loved like a wound.
His name was Ilay.
And the one he loved—
Was a boy who tried to smile through broken ribs,
Who tried to live even when his voice trembled.
The boy’s name was Jeong Taeui.
They are no longer in this world.
But they’re not truly gone.
Just before dawn,
When someone passes the old cemetery,
They might feel something strange.
A breeze in a windless night.
A pair of shadows kneeling before a grave.
One reaching to touch the other’s hand.
One tilting his head to smile.
In that smile—
There is no fear.
No pain.
Only familiarity.
Only return.
Somewhere, beyond the world we know.
Where light bends gently and time loses its weight.
Under a tree, two people sit.
Ilay rests his head on Taeui’s lap.
His eyes are closed. His breathing calm.
Taeui hums an old melody.
Their melody, known only to them.
Their hands are clasped.
There is no more blood.
No missions.
No fire.
Only this remains:
Silence that isn’t lonely.
Stillness that isn’t cold.
A love that doesn’t need to end.
“I’m here,” Ilay says.
And Taeui replies,
“I know Ilay. Welcome back.”
[The End]
————————————
[Epilogue]
He was buried on a hill where the sun lingers longest.
The wind knows his name.
It whispers it when no one’s listening.
Carries it down stone paths, through remembered hallways,
Onto rooftops now left empty.
Taeui. Jeong Taeui.
The boy who smiled even as he bled.
Who stood his ground until the end.
Who should’ve run—but chose love instead.
And Ilay—
The man who always walked toward fire.
Who saw everything in the world,
And chose one person.
It was a terrible choice.
It was the perfect choice.
He followed in the end. Of course he did.
Not in the way people fear.
Not in violence—
But in the quiet shape of love’s last gesture.
Like a decision made in stillness.
Like a return.
People said no one saw him die.
That he simply vanished.
That his name, his company, his city faded into noise.
But now, there is a second grave beside the first.
And sometimes—not always—
The wind stops.
You might feel it deep in your chest.
Like remembering to breathe again.
Like something impossibly turning inside your ribs.
And in that moment,
You may remember the two of them.
How they loved each other.
How cruel the world was to them.
And how—none of it mattered.
Somewhere,
They are walking again.
Side by side.
No distance.
No past.
No pain.
Only this.
Brushing fingers.
Lingering glances.
Names called like prayers.
“Ilay.”
“Taeui.”
Nothing more needs to be said…
[End]
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Uhm…so-
I wasn’t planning to write angst but SCREW IT, ANGST IT IS. I actually had to take a break and wipe my tears. But hey…at least it’s a happy ending rightㅋㅋㅋ
Apologies, I’ll write a fluff next…or maybe after another angst.
But for now,I hope this work is decently done :’)
Thanks for reading🫶🏻
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