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- Sappho, fragment 83, trans. Anne Carson
The sunlight is balmy where it kisses Hongjoong’s eyelids, his skin glowing golden under her gaze. His eyelashes are bleached in the blaze, the shadows on his cheekbones not strong enough to fight against the gleam of the sunbeams.
Seonghwa wonders absently if Hongjoong remembered to put on suncream, the way he always nags him to before they leave the house. But, if he hasn’t, he promises himself he will lavish love on each little freckle, each little blemish that appears as a result, balming the burn with his lips.
He smiles as Hongjoong hums something gently under his breath. The song is unformed, wandering aimlessly through the grove, a lost lover. He knows that, although Hongjoong looks absentminded about it now, he’ll hunch over his laptop when they get home — Seonghwa worrying about his posture and his eyesight and a hundred other things — and mould it into something else, something beautiful, or majestic, or haunting.
But, for now, the thing shifts, formless, dragging across Seonghwa’s skin with a melancholy touch.
He smiles as Hongjoong shifts on the grass, tucking his hands up beneath his head. The bottom of his shirt tugs up, exposing just a sliver of his soft stomach, rising and falling languidly in the heat.
Seonghwa’s mind wanders to earlier that day, when the sun was still fresh in the sky and the world was not yet fully awake.
How Hongjoong’s skin had felt silky under his fingers. How he had captured his soft moans with his lips, drawing out little small noises with his fingers. How Hongjoong had opened up for him, like a flower in bloom, his movement slow and sleepy and content.
Hongjoong’s fingers had wound tightly into his hair, his hands keen when the rest of him was still languid. Seonghwa had hissed when his grip got too tight, the sound drawing a low chuckle out of Hongjoong, his stomach tightening with the sound.
Seonghwa had buried himself deep in Hongjoong after that; like a secret or a prayer. He’d felt Hongjoong’s nails on his shoulder blades, his own fingers digging into his hips in reply. The room had been buoyed by the sound of them, pressing up against the windows and the walls and the ceiling, swelling like a balloon.
One of the bruises from that morning is blossoming on Hongjoong’s skin now, a faint purple on an otherwise unmarred expanse. Seonghwa sets his book aside, stretching himself out beside Hongjoong. He kisses the small mark and Hongjoong makes a soft noise.
“I hurt you,” Seonghwa murmurs, lips against the imprint. He kisses it again, an act of private penitence.
Hongjoong’s eyes are still closed. “Not much.” His hand comes down to Seonghwa’s head, sweeping down to rest on the back of his neck. “I hurt you too.”
Seonghwa rolls onto his back, his head pillowed on Hongjoong’s chest. “You healed me.” The words are soft but huge. The breeze carries them up to the gods, but Hongjoong catches them nonetheless.
He hums and Seonghwa feels it through the base of his head, travelling down through his body.
The grove feels bigger without Hongjoong’s quiet song. Like it fills up the whole world, a universe just for them. Seonghwa lifts his hand to where Hongjoong’s now rests on his chest. He loops their fingers together, the motion familiar and comforting.
He raises them to his mouth, kissing each one earnestly. “I’m sorry I hurt you.” The words don’t seem like enough. He doesn’t think anything he says ever will.
“I’d let you do it again.” Hongjoong’s voice echoes through Seonghwa like thunder. “I’d let you pull me apart, piece by piece. Just because you’re you.”
Seonghwa knows his eyes are open now, his face serious as he stares down the heavens. It makes him smile. “I’d put you back together again,” he promises, letting his own eyes drift shut. “Even if it took all my lifetimes.”
The birdsong is a drumroll in his ears, the breeze a crowd’s cheer. Hongjoong tightens his grip on his fingers, edging on the side of painful. “I know,” he whispers.