Work Text:
seungjun missed when work used to be exhausting and exciting to him.
if someone brought it up, he could talk long enough for all the words he spat out to be assembled into a whole thick book with a laminated black cover. or maybe a little weirder, considering his job. just to suit it rightfully.
there used to be days when seungjun would beg the god to let him rest for a brief moment, to stop and catch up with a regular life. there used to be times where seungjun asked the universe to let him step out of the bar for a few seconds and escape from the smell of alcohol that became too intolerable to him sometimes.
but nowadays, it would be empty most of the time.
it wasn’t a matter of money. neither he nor the country were in the state to feel concerned about money. there was no fun to spend it on no place to visit; not one that you could also carry your heart to. he missed people, he missed when life used to go on in front of his weak eyes.
as seungjun sailed his ships in the ocean of thoughts, heels to a pair of boots, which he used to hear of a lot around that time, interrupted the silence he was enjoying.
he could detect them at that point. those boots belonged to a soldier.
it was all a harmony, the sound of boots, the stressing noise of planes flying over his place, the colts and owen guns. the songs of war that scratched his eardrums every day and night, substituting his nice gifted radio as the warzone stepped closer to his bar.
everything was just there to warn him of what was going on outside, he was witnessing it all in real-time. all live. thus, the radio would be useless.
the black-worn disturber of his seas walked to the counter. seungjun peeped through, the soldier was carrying a mixed scent of rain, soil, and gunpowder.
as well as a winchester rifle on his shoulders.
he looked almost same age as seungjun, a little older maybe.
seungjun stuttered a little. no man had even walked in with a weapon in hand, not with odd blonde hair at least. it was a little bit strange. he chuckled in panic, watching the stranger as he rested his hat on the table, ruffling his damp hair.
“wow,” seungjun swallowed down, wiping the bottle in his hand a little bit rougher, trying to use a simple ice breaker, “nice hair you’ve got.”
the soldier ignored him and quietly laid the rifle on the other one next to him. he looked tired, soaked by the rapid dust and drops of the rainshower going on outside.
and he looked sad.
he even acted sad, making seungjun pout to watch him bang his head on the counter and start coughing. it wasn’t unfamiliar, everyone’s mental health seemed to be drowning, flopping. retreating, just like their country. seungjun left the bottle on a table behind him and reached out to pat his shoulder and tell him it’s okay.
he reacted way before seungjun touched him, scaredly lifting his head to look at seungjun. paranoia sparkling in his eyes.
seungjun smiled at him, but the soldier didn’t seem to focus at all. instead, he looked over behind the island in the middle of seungjun’s space, which was just as big as his mom’s kitchen. well, his mom was another reason for the huge space. she liked to nose around and insert her unasked ideas into the design seungjun came up with just before building the place with the help of his three brothers.
the soldier started to talk in awe, wiping seungjun’s older memories away.
“soju?” he pointed to the desk behind seungjun, the piled-up white clays resting at the end of the two rooms. “you collect soju jars?!”
seungjun huffed, his smiling face fading away into an expression of boredom. he picked the last craft up and walked to the aisle behind the island, where he stored everything, including the clay jars. he smiled again, words so sweet that the expression on his beaming face could be heard through them.
"they're pretty. i like to collect pretty things, like the letters my brothers send to me or the foreign coins merchants used to give me.”
“probably men too.”
“excuse me?”
the man in black uniform smiled, grinding his teeth to avoid looking awkward as broke his knuckles. he ignored seungjun’s eyes on him, rubbing the back of his neck.
“nothing, pretty collecting boy. just bring me your top shelf please.”
seungjun held his hand out, cutting to the chase.
“stop demanding shit and have this soju. this isn't the right place to ask someone for that.” the bartender opened the jar and handed it to the soldier.
“you're giving me the entire thing? no shots? rocks? anything?” the blond rubbed his eyebrows for a few seconds, then moved to his pockets and emptied both of them. he showed seungjun the palm of his two hands where had absolutely nothing but two sour candies. “i'm not gonna pay. have nothing on me. are you still on your word?”
seungjun rolled his eyes and snatched the sour candies to bury them in his own pocket. he then looked at the ruined-looking man, returning one with pity, placing it back on the table as well as a shot glass.
“i don't really know how, but your friends mostly drink a bottle or two anyways. i didn't want to add one to shittone i have to wash tonight, but that's fine.”
seungjun walked away, loosened his tie, and jogged to the sink to wash all he just mentioned. the warrior raised his head to peek at what was inside the sink and shook his head after finding out how little the amount that seungjun just complained about was. he filled the glass, knocking on the wooden container with the same glass to draw seungjun's attention as soon as he chugged it.
“hey,” he pointed at seungjun, pouring himself another drink and staring at him meanwhile, “bring a shot glass and join me, it feels weird drinking alone for the first time.”
seungjun chuckled at the offer, wiping his hand to his apron. he grabbed a plate of leftover sweet and sour chicken he had made earlier that night and left it on the counter for him.
“sorry sir, i don't drink.”
seungjun winked at the soldier and walked away, leaving the one across the table with an open mouth. he chuckled, staring at the pile of white jars, “what kind of barkeeper doesn't drink?”
seungjun was too busy to answer him. he rinsed the last glass delicately, turned the tap off, hung his apron on the nearest handle and eventually walked over the counter again.
“me. i am the barkeeper who doesn't drink.”
he finally responded, standing in front of the soon-to-be-drunk guy. he noticed that the other was checking him and his basic outfit out, from head to toe, taking to the opportunity of witnessing the sight of his plain white shirt free from the cover of his stupid black apron.
“whatever, you've always been this weird, must say.”
hyojin reached for a drink again, confident of putting an end to the argument. which didn't last long enough, causing him to pause drinking once the barkeeper's fingers held onto the tip of his chin to raise it and force eye contact.
“is it me who is weird, or you? my soldier last call, running here at 3 am when there is a shooting going on outside?”
seungjun's gaze shifted from his eyes and traveled down to his name tag.
“kim hyojin? you're too pretty to be one of these losers.”
“so what? pretty people don't die in war?”
hyojin replied in a disgusted tone. he violently brushed seungjun's hand off his face, wiping where he had just touched.
“and to correct you, i'm a major general.”
seungjun took a bite-sized chicken from the dish, playfully sitting on the other side of the counter to maintain the talk.
“a general? that’s even worse. i thought they wouldn't end up here.”
“and so i thought no one would be here at this time of the night..”
hyojin paused to prove his upcoming point, so that the sound of the squealing soldiers could become clear to them.
“with all the tangling stuff going on outside, you should be at home under a cozy blanket right now. see, we all make mistakes.”
“oh, come on. i couldn't leave the bar. i live here."”
hyojin took a few seconds off his business to deliver the boy who was carelessly laughing at his face a confused, blank expression. "that’s dangerous, you’re a little brave." he thought to himself.
“no wonder it looks like a whole kitchen over there. it's not like you own a restaurant.”
hyojin watched over seungjun, who foolishly climbed on the board to get to the other side, took a seat next to him, and just casually resumed the discussion as if nothing had happened. he wondered if the bartender was always this weird around strangers or it was just a one time thing.
“blame my mom.. she insisted on it. i mean, whoever else would like to voluntarily send her son in the heart of where all sort of fucked up people show up to have a little fun as they say?”
hyojin's hands were once again gripping into the shot seungjun had made him let go of, murmuring before taking a sip, “you talk too much.”
seungjun frowned and looked away. living in his own bar for seven years without any rest, talking too much was the last thing he could hear someone complain about. it’s usually the other way. it’s usually his regular customers calling him over and trying to make small talk with him. it’s usually that jaeyoung guy telling him he is the quietest barkeeper he has ever seen, over and over.
“fine, general. why are you here alone, then? if it makes you uncomfortable to drink on your own, why would you come here to drink at this time of the night?”
hyojin clicked his tongue. from how he had finally greeted seungjun with a grin after holding an entire conversation with a resting bitch face, he could tell that the general seemed appeased by his question.
“to forget.”
“to forget what?”
“to forget that i'm ashamed.”
“not to invade your privacy, but ashamed of what?”
“ashamed of drinking.”
seungjun stared at hyojin in silence, letting a few moments pass to digest what he had just heard.
“you are out of your mind.”
hyojin gulped down, making no eye contact with anyone and anything besides the triangle of the table, the two shot glasses consisting of his and a one that seungjun had brought himself, and the jar.
“no, i just read a lot of books.”
seungjun glanced at the little shelf beside him where he laid no other book than demian and sighed, “couldn't be me.”
hyojin cleared another glass carelessly, staring at the ulcerous edges of the book that seemed like one of the pieces a family would pass to the next generation as if it’s a relic. except that, demian, to hyojin’s knowledge, wasn’t even old. he wondered what seungjun has done to the pages. maybe he had passed the one book he had to people who asked for one at his bar. but who would ask for a book.. in a bar?
“and maybe that's for the better.” hyojin stepped out of his zone, reaching for the jar again.
the brunette's hand was wrapped around his wrist to stop him.
“hey.” seungjun hushed, threatened, and took away the jar from hyojin. “aren’t you being too much for someone who has a shift tonight?”
“and how do you know that? why would you care?”
“because i’m not the best at tolerating drunk people?”
hyojin had been to many bars.
he had been drunk in many places, many cities, so many countries that seungjun probably wasn't aware of the existence of. extremely developed metropolises that would freak seungjun out to see, and he had at least one shot at each of them. but no one, no one had ever warned him about how much he consumed.
not the friends he made at dusk and barely recalled the existence of before getting into his carriage again. not the bartenders he sometimes compelled with, not even the waiters and women he made small talk with. no one. as if no one cared enough to elbow his side to keep a track of him, letting him die by his preferences.
it was intentionally done. as if he threw himself in the water waiting for someone to bother enough to get him out of the streaming water. to hear their reason to do so. to see if someone was reasonable to save him and to be his reason for not making that attempt again.
but it never happened, anyways.
he smiled, returning a warmth he was somehow given after being unknowingly too deprived over for ages.
“will you oblige me by burying me and my words under your place?”
seungjun hesitantly nodded a yes, placing the second jar back on the table and waiting for the other to start. the untouched shot glass was pushed towards his side of the table.
“have you ever been out there?”
seungjun’s pupils followed the direction that the tiny fingers pointed at, outside of the gloomy window that was all dark due to fall of the midnight. he understood that what hyojin meant wasn’t outside of his bar as a whole, but the heated tension of anger going on at places not too away from them. he shook his head, replying a no.
“i hope you never do so.” hyojin smiled, finally obtaining the jar again, “you talked about your mom earlier. do you miss her?”
and there was where seungjun realized that it was gonna be a long night of confirmation.
that it was going to be a long night of him nodding yeses and noes to the general's questions even if they weren't too hard to answer. deep conversations and unwanted questions always felt like a rope around his neck, but being talked deprived won over that pain in the debate the two sides of him held that night.
“she passed away last year.”
“oh.” hyojin chewed on his lips, dropping his head down in regret. a weak whisper was all seungjun heard from him “i’m sorry. i will deliver this to her, though.”
“what?”
hyojin forced a smile, wordlessly picking up the weapon next to him and placing it on his thighs. seungjun stared at him caressing the rifle, eyes locked on a distant point in his dim kitchen.
“i had a weird conversation with my mom the day before i left the town. i don’t cry easily, but gifted my mom a river of tears that day. i cursed her and yelled, saying that it’s too cruel. that i would never want to be born in the first place, and would never choose that ever again.”
hyojin paused to look at seungjun, the hazy halo of the boy who had his hand under his chin, carefully looking forward to the story hyojin was telling. he acquired a sip of the drink in front of him before taking his palms back to the weapon.
“she then calmly told me that if you want to stop being born, you'll firstly have to let go of all the hatred you have in your heart. it's weird to say that when i'm literally on the battlefield, drinking as they drop bombs on my people. it's ironic to say that when i always have this guy resting next to me. but i will drink one shot to every person i truly hate. so that.. maybe that's gonna help?!"
seunjun laughed at the stupid description he was just presented, questioning if it was the alcohol getting under hyojin's skin, forcing him to blunt stuff he would probably mock when sober.
“it’s not gonna help..”
hyojin was distracted by the lazy answer that he heard from his left side. he let the weapon down again, swiftly turning his head to seungjun, who seemed a little bit more tired.
“what?”
“i can tell it’s not gonna help you. people come here to forget their sorrows and always end up cursing the reasons to them while walking out of this place. it’s not gonna help you.”
“alcohol’s influence on people differs per person.”
“yeah, the rest wish for death at the midpoint of their outcries.”
“i don’t fear death.”
seungjun sighed and it was just then that hyojin noticed that the glass in front of the other had been filled. he behaved, deciding to play along and remain shut about the matter. he continued,
“have you ever been ten feet away from death? well. i have. i have seen my friends die, collapse in front of my eyes. i have seen the fire that's four steps ahead of me. i watched them, and i started to think like, what would happen if i took 4 steps ahead? and at that moment, the temptation to join them for once it is so high that i always have to keep myself from doing it. it's so ridiculous when you have death so close to you.”
hyojin glanced at the glass again. it was now empty.
“i’m glad you didn't take the four steps.”
he raised his head to look at seungjun, who had his arms folded, smiling at his face.
“i’m also glad that you stopped me from doing so.”
“what?”
“what?”
seungjun’s sweet expression flew away, passing it to his knitted eyebrows instead. hyojin glances at the dish on the counter, reaching it with chopstick to prevent selling seungjun any more opportunities to talk. it wasn't the most reliable place for him to recall their history.
“but you know, it's not fun to live a long life. it's not exciting to watch everyone you know die.”
it’s a myth, a point that says a human can easily detect any eyes on them whether they're awake or not, and that could lead to you unknowingly waking up in the middle of the night because something is perhaps looking at you. hyojin most likely did not remember when he had learned it, but he sure did recall that he named it bullshit. however, he finally touched the point where he began to consider taking his words back, as the pair of eyes on him was totally felt, weighting on his body.
he did indirectly mention that, with his mouth full of food, grabbing the white jar, still concentrating on the plate in front of him to prevent mutual eye contact.
“do i have something on my face?”
“stop.”
he could feel how the atmosphere had reversed. seungjun sounded fierce, enough for him to detour around taking a look at his character at that moment. the jar in his hand was practically empty, causing a curse to escape out of hyojin's lips ere replying to his younger.
“stop what?”
“stop drinking.”
“that’s none of your business.”
hyojin was too exhausted to react, too tired to argue at 4 am. he silently approached for the second jar at the other side of the table.
it was eventually snatched away from his hand.
“this is my place. i can’t allow myself to send a stumbling, buzzed general off to a mission.”
“so what?”
hyojin chuckled at the scene in front of him, at a trembling seungjun holding the bottle up like he was a pirate and the jar was his newest personally found treasure he tried to keep away from the thief.
“and you don't have the money to pay for a second bottle.”
“is that your best explanation for stopping me right now?”
hyojin drew his seat closer to seungjun, bending over to his side, “black will take no other hue. i don’t fear death.”
“well, i fucking do!”
a huge burst distracted both of them, dragging their eyes to the entrance of the bar.
how seungjun yelled was covered up with a rush of vibration in the place. a huge fire lit up the outside view, painting an orange scenery behind the window hyojin was monitoring.
hyojin got startled, almost jumped and was thrown down from his seat by the sound of the broken glass he heard, produced by the windows and the jar in seungjun's hand he threw away. all of them followed by a siren.
seungjun was shaking, his body reacting to every slight noise that the shotguns out there made, his nails stretching the wooden surfaces of the counter.
hyojin noticed how pale he looked.
“seungjun?”
fuck. i shouldn't have said that.
hyojin pulled seungjun closer, taking his hands away from the table to hold in his.
what finally caught the general off guard was how he started talking again, resuming what he was saying in the same panicked tone, as if nothing had just happened.
he made sure to hold seungjun’s face firmly, trying to calm him through words. words that were immediately cut off before he even got the chance to begin his speech.
“i have enough empathy left to feel bad for you. i do have enough empathy left to call you my friend.”
hyojin caressed his cheeks, wet thumbs easily moving over seungjun's dump skin. he wondered what caused the tears, and whether it was him, the explosions, or the drink. regardless of that, seungjun was now a crying storm incapable of being shut down.
“seungjun, please,”
“it's people like you that make me hate my job. i wonder, i wonder why their missiles keep missing my plac-”
seungjun's eyes snapped open with a pair of lips that stamped his, unable to make any move for the few seconds that it lasted.
“please shut up,” hyojin cried in frustration, breaking their short-lasting kiss. he laughed through his tears, soothingly rubbing seungjun's back, “at least it worked.”
it partly worked. just enough to stop seungjun from throwing a tantrum. still, the sirens were indeed loud, and so were the people outside, but none of them were blocking enough to prevent hyojin from hearing how seungjun breathed in his arms, sniffing on his shoulder.
“ah, seungjun.. you are young,”
“and so are you.”
the blond pulled seungjun out of his arms, holding his shoulders to keep the face to face communication with a smile on his face, all just to refill the tank of fresh tears in his eyes.
“and i have lived a life, but have you?”
“hyojin,”
“don't let another me in your life. you might think i'm crazy, which is true. you might also question why someone you met an hour ago is telling these to you, this one isn't.”
the incoming noises of the walkie talkie in back pockets of hyojin's pants distracted him, leaving him with no other way than letting go of seungjun's shoulders, breaking his character and digging in to find the device.
“hyojin, come in.”
“stand by.”
he pressed the walkie talkie in his hands and looked up at seungjun, who clearly understood what was going on.
“i have to go.” hyojin pat seungjun's head, hurriedly picking his rifle to run to exist.
seungjun stopped him.
holding onto his wrist again, mimicking what he just did an hour ago to stop him from drinking. neither did he succeed back then, nor would he now.
“general,”
the elder replied,
“yes?”
seungjun swallowed down the sob climbing on his throat, digging his nails onto the back of the thighs of the boy who stared at him dearly.
“i’m scared.”
“you’re gonna be fine, dummy. i’m not serving for no reason.”
hyojin returned him another smile, leaning down to leave a kiss on his forehead and pinch his cheek before placing his rifle back in shoulder and walking to the exit.
“what's your twenty?”
“i'm coming back.” hyojin broke the codes, expressing his gratitude, “thank you for granting my wish, and sorry i'm not there on time.”
the higher sighed through the device before ending their call.
“it's fine, kid. be careful.”
“on it.”
“kim hyojin!”
the general froze, clenching the doorknob in his fist.
seungjun cried out from the other side of the pub, “survive. and when you come back again, i won’t drink for real. and will tell you my story this time.”
hyojin exhaled, closing his eyes on the remembrances of their last farewell.
i already know that. you have told it all to me, and i made the same promise, and then, you were far gone, enough to forget even my name this time and not question how i know yours already. but it’s fine. as long as i still know you and the smile on your face, it’s all fine.
he turned to stare at where seungjun was standing, far away from him.
slowly approaching where the first set of tables of the bar rested, on hyojin's face the smile remained, now forcing him to taste the bittersweet drops sliding all the way down to his lips.
“in one of the stars, i shall be living. in one of them i shall be laughing. and so it will be as if all the stars were laughing, when you look at the sky at night… you–only you–will have stars that can laugh.”
hyojin still narrated, welcomed by a background of the raging machine guns.
he placed the coin he had pulled out of nowhere on the nearest table, walking back to the doorframe.
“and when your sorrow is comforted, since time soothes any pain, you will be content that you have known me. you will always be my friend. you will want to laugh with me. and you will sometimes open your window, so, for that pleasure.. and your friends will be properly astonished to see you laughing as you look up at the sky! then you will say to them, 'yes, the stars always make me laugh!' and they will think you are crazy. it will be a very shabby trick that i shall have played on you.”
for the last time, hyojin looked at the scenery of the man who he held in his arms not a long ago before finishing his narration.
“it will be as if, in place of the stars, i had given you a great number of little bells that knew how to laugh.”
he could see the image of him sobbing in the arms he rested on the table, probably because of the alcohol again, or the memories of their youth the liquid might have just helped him to recall. after making sure that seungjun wasn't watching over him anymore, hyojin picked the rifle from his shoulders, firing his gun as soon as the door closed behind him.
and so, seungjun's bar, felt very lonely.
even emptier than it was before the arrival of the young man. as if hyojin was the entire population on earth having a drink in his place and they have all walked out of that door.
leaving seungjun alone to enjoy the intertwine of silence, his sobs, and shotguns.