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Assistant: Title: All the Pretty Birdies
        Author: whatwasoncesilver whatwasoncesilver 
        Chapter: 1/1 
        Summary: “They were very pretty birds. Cinderella depended on them very much. And though she probably could have gotten by without them, they made her happy and they loved her. She couldn’t imagine her life without them.”
  
  
    San closed his eyes. “She loved them too?”
  
  
    “Yes,” said Hongjoong. “She loved them too.”
  
No matter what happens to San, Hongjoong and Seonghwa refuse to let him die.
        Contents: Summary:
            
              
  
    “They were very pretty birds. Cinderella depended on them very much. And though she probably could have gotten by without them, they made her happy and they loved her. She couldn’t imagine her life without them.”
  
  
    San closed his eyes. “She loved them too?”
  
  
    “Yes,” said Hongjoong. “She loved them too.”
  
No matter what happens to San, Hongjoong and Seonghwa refuse to let him die.
            
        

        
  Notes:





    
      Please heed the warnings in the tags! If you’re here after that, I hope you like the story. ♥️
    

    (See the end of the work for more notes.)



  





    
        
          When Hongjoong and Seonghwa pick up San from the ward, he gives them a watery smile and gets into the back seat of their car. Hongjoong’s been telling him for years that he doesn’t have to sit there, but he continues to dislike the front seat. He says sitting there makes him feel like people are watching him.They don’t talk on the way home. When they get to the apartment, Seonghwa puts on the kettle and Hongjoong puts San on the living room couch with the big blue blanket he likes. “Do you want to watch a movie?” Hongjoong asks.San looks at Hongjoong with his big brown eyes. “When am I going home?”Hongjoong sits next to him and takes his hands. “Not for a while, okay? We’re going to supervise you for a few weeks. Besides, you’re still renting your apartment out.”San leans his head on Hongjoong’s shoulder. “I want to stay with you guys,” he murmurs, and he clasps Hongjoong’s hands tighter.“I know,” says Hongjoong.Seonghwa brings them tea. Later that night, when San is asleep, Hongjoong and Seonghwa sit on the couch and talk like roommates do.“Do you think he’s better?” Seonghwa asks.“Would they have let him go if he wasn’t?” Hongjoong asks. He’s looking at their faces in the shiny black TV surface. They’re very pale.“I don’t know,” says Seonghwa. “I don’t know what the conditions are for a patient’s release.”“He’s got us,” Hongjoong says. “To watch over him. You don’t have to worry.”“I always worry about him,” says Seonghwa, and Hongjoong can’t say he doesn’t feel the same way.Seonghwa wakes up that night gasping. Hongjoong hears it from his room, having grown attuned to his roommate’s nightmares. Seonghwa’s sleeping on the couch, having given San his room until San’s apartment is free again. Hongjoong hurries into the living room, almost tripping in the dark, and shakes Seonghwa awake. He straightens immediately, eyes frenzied, looking around as if unfamiliar with his surroundings before his eyes land on Hongjoong. “Leaking,” he gasps. “Red. From the wrists. There was blood everywhere.”“It was just a dream, Seongie,” Hongjoong says, stroking his hair.“It happened,” Seonghwa insists, trembling.“I know it did,” Hongjoong says. “But everything’s okay now.”Seonghwa clasps Hongjoong’s arm. “The gun safe is locked, right?”(Hongjoong fell in love with Seonghwa the first time he refused to even put his key in the ignition until Hongjoong buckled his seat belt.)“I have the key,” Hongjoong assures him, swallowing everything down. “It’s in my safe. Go back to sleep, Hwa.”Seonghwa says he can’t go back to sleep, so Hongjoong sits in front of the couch and holds his hand until his breathing evens out and he’s quiet once more. The position hurts Hongjoong’s legs and his back and his neck, and he doesn’t get up until morning. 
  The day Hongjoong and Seonghwa first came across San was a lovely day. There were birds chirping and children playing with their younger siblings in their strollers, and the air was fresh and clean. They were juniors in college. They had just bought some alcohol from the grocery store and Seonghwa was carrying it in his backpack. He was going to use it to make some kind of sauce for the chicken they were cooking for dinner.

  They were taking a turn around a corner when they saw him. He was sitting on a bench, hands clasped, elbows on his knees, gazing at a pair of birds playing in a puddle a few yards away. He was cute and boyish with sandy hair, and as they were passing by, he rose to his feet and, without seeing Hongjoong, bashed into his shoulder.

  Hongjoong stumbled into Seonghwa, who he caught him. From behind them, San made a little distressed noise and said, “Oh my God, I’m so sorry! I didn’t even see you.”

  Hongjoong turned to him and blinked, taking in his anxious expression, the way his face was drawn up tight. He seemed so distraught that Hongjoong felt the giddy urge to laugh, because he wasn’t upset at all. “It’s all right,” he said, waving his hand. ‘I’m not hurt.” Seonghwa smiled at San encouragingly.

  “I really am sorry,” San repeated, looking miserable. “I’m just having one of those days, you know? Everything’s going wrong.”

  Seonghwa nodded in understanding and seemed about to speak when he caught sight of the logo on San’s sweatshirt. “Hey, do you go to Dumont?” he asked. “My brother goes there.”

  San looked down at his college crest. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m a sophomore.”

  “My name is Seonghwa,” said Seonghwa, “and my brother’s name is Yeosang. Do you know him? Last name’s Park.”

  San shook his head. “No, sorry.”

  Hongjoong smiled at him. “No worries. It’s a big place.” He put out his hand. “I’m Hongjoong.”

  San took Hongjoong’s hand and shook it. “San.”
 Seonghwa makes pancakes the morning after they bring San home. Hongjoong can tell he’s still worried about San by his uneven smile, but he’s doing his best to hide it. Hongjoong arranges eggs and bacon to make a smiley face on San’s plate and sets it down in front of him. He manages a small smile. “I don’t want to be a bother to you guys,” he says.“You’re not,” says Hongjoong, sitting next to him. “Eat your bacon.” Once he’s done with his own breakfast, he leaves Seonghwa and San to the TV. It’s cold outside and the subway isn’t as close to their place as he’d like, but as a generally environmentally friendly citizen of the Earth, he feels like he doesn’t have a choice but to pull his collar up against the wind and trudge forward dutifully. (Also, their car kind of sucks and Seonghwa needs it more, anyway.)Wooyoung is setting up his desk when Hongjoong gets to the office. Donovan’s in his cubicle as well, fashioning paper airplanes out of meeting minutes. Hongjoong sits in front of his computer and begins the process of turning it on while he shrugs off his coat and slings it over the back of his chair. Wooyoung has Joni Mitchell playing softly on the loudspeakers.“What’s up, babe?”Hongjoong looks up to see Donovan next to his desk, grinning at him. He always calls Hongjoong “babe” even though he’s asked him to stop.“Not much,” says Hongjoong, shuffling some papers. There’s a pause. “I’ve got San staying with Seonghwa and me.”Donovan’s forehead wrinkles. “San.”“Yeah,” says Hongjoong, tapping his computer screen with the mouse so it doesn’t fall asleep. “You remember him?”“That shy guy who’s come to a couple of Christmas party?” Donovan asks. “Yeah, I remember him, I think. Why’s he staying?”Hongjoong shrugs, wishing he hadn’t mentioned anything. “He’s renting his place out,” he says.“Why?”“He went on vacation,” says Hongjoong.“Is he your boyfriend or something?” Donovan asks.“No.”Donovan grins. “You don’t have a boyfriend, do you?”“Is it imperative for you to know the answer to that question?” Hongjoong asks, brushing his fingertips over his keyboard and mentally prioritizing the list of things he has to do today. (He ignores the regular churning in his chest that comes whenever anyone asks him that question.)“Yeah,” says Donovan, “because I want to go out with you. What’d you say, babe?”“Donovan!” yells Susan, who has just entered the office and is frowning at him. “You’ve got about five dozen reports you haven’t handed in, and if you miss one more deadline I am going to fire you. Get back to work. Hongjoong, can I see you for a second?”Hongjoong follows Susan into her office. She sits down at her desk and gestures for him to sit across from her. “So,” she says, and she smiles. “I was very impressed with your last report.”“Thank you,” says Hongjoong.She leans forward and puts both elbows on her desk, interlacing his fingers. “The quality of your work in general is above the level of your current position. I think you’d be happier in a different environment.”“I’m happy to be wherever you put me,” says Hongjoong.“That’s just it,” says Susan, and she pulls her chair closer to her desk, looking at him intently. “We need someone to lead our branch in Denver.”“Denver,” Hongjoong repeats automatically.She nods. “I know it’s not home for you, but I’d like to offer you the position.”“I—” says Hongjoong, “um—”There’s a crashing noise, and Susan frowns at the door. “You think about it,” she says, standing. “I’ve got to go castigate Donovan.”Hongjoong’s still sitting in the chair when the yelling begins. 
  A few months after they met San, he sat on the edge of their couch and slumped down, sighing. “Joong,” he whined. “I feel terrible.”

  Hongjoong sat next to him and gave him a bowl of chicken soup. “I know, sweetie,” he said, handing San a tissue. “Eat your soup. It’ll make you feel better.”
San sighed and poked at the metal spoon. “Does Yunho still have your Cinderella DVD?” he asked.
  “Yes,” said Hongjoong sympathetically.

  San sighed. “Can’t he just watch it on the internet?”

  Hongjoong shrugged. “The screen is too small for him. I know you really want to watch it, honey, but I’m sure he’ll give it back soon.” He pet San’s hair. “And maybe next time you can be more careful with your own DVDs so you don’t accidentally throw them away,” he added gently.
San sighed again. “Are you sure your laptop is broken?” he asked.
  “Yes,” said Hongjoong.
San made a loud whining sound. “Why does Hwa have to turn his phone off every time he goes to the library?” he complained. “I need his laptop password. I really want to watch Cinderella.”
  “I could tell you the story,” Hongjoong offered, stroking his hair.

  San scrunched up his nose in cute consideration and then made his decision. “Okay,” he said, bringing his legs up onto the couch.

  “Okay,” said Hongjoong, mimicking San’s position before tucking him up into the blue blanket.

  “Tell me about the birds,” San requested, tugging the blanket closer to his neck and looking at Hongjoong with wide, expectant eyes. He could have been an anime character.

  Hongjoong smiled. “All right. There once lived a beautiful little girl named Cinderella. A few years after her mother died her father remarried, but after her father passed away her stepmother and stepsisters grew very cruel toward her. The only comfort she took was in her friends, the little mice of the house and particularly the birds that flew in through her window.”

  “Were they pretty birds?”

  “Yes,” said Hongjoong. “They were very pretty birds. Cinderella depended on them very much. And though she probably could have gotten by without them, they made her happy and they loved her. She couldn’t imagine her life without them.”

  San closed his eyes. “She loved them too?”

  “Yes,” said Hongjoong. “She loved them too.”
 When Hongjoong gets home from the office, Seonghwa asks, “How was work?” He’s cooking stir-fry.“Susan wants me to go to Denver,” Hongjoong blurts. And then winces at his lack of delicacy.Seonghwa blinks. “Denver,” he repeats slowly.“Um,” says Hongjoong. “Yes.” Suddenly exhausted, he drags himself over to the couch and drops his briefcase onto the ground. He sinks onto the edge of a cushion and digs his hands into his hair until it’s sticking up in strange directions. “My work clothes are so d@mn uncomfortable,” he murmurs.After a moment, Seonghwa turns off the stove and sits beside him. “What did you tell her?” he asks. His voice lacks any emotion.“Nothing,” says Hongjoong. “She told me to think about it.”Seonghwa taps his thumbs together. He won’t look at Hongjoong. “Do you want to go?” he asks quietly.“I want the job,” Hongjoong confesses. “But I don’t want to leave you guys.”Seonghwa closes his eyes. “San can’t move,” he says after a moment. “He couldn’t handle the stress.”Hongjoong covers his face with his hands. “I just want to get away,” he says, and it comes out muffled. “From that place. From those people.”Seonghwa is silent for a moment, and then he puts a hand on Hongjoong’s shoulder. “Is Donovan still harassing you?” (It bothers Seonghwa almost more than it bothers Hongjoong.)“Yes.” He thinks he feels Seonghwa’s fingers tremble.“I don’t know what to tell you,” says Seonghwa. “Except that I want you to stay.”Hongjoong forces himself to ignore that for his own peace of mind. “Would San hate me?” he whispers instead. (He hopes it won’t hurt Seonghwa.)“No. I wouldn’t hate you.”Hongjoong’s head jerks up to see San in the doorway of Seonghwa’s bedroom, one hand on the frame, having woken from his nap. He smiles. “How could I hate you, Joonie?” he asks. Hongjoong doesn’t have an answer. San walks up to them and sits on the coffee table. “You should go,” he says, looking into Hongjoong’s eyes. “You don’t like your job here.”“I like you guys,” says Hongjoong.San takes his hands and doesn’t speak for a moment. “Joongie,” he says softly, eventually. “If you fall into a grave and take too long getting out, you might forget that you even can.” He pauses. “I don’t want you to become one of those people.”Hongjoong swipes his eyes, and the sides of his fingers end up colored with makeup. He smiles. “How did you get to be so smart?” he asks.San shrugs and smiles back. “I don’t claim to know a whole lot. I just say what I see.”After a moment of silence, Seonghwa gets up and resumes making the stir-fry. 
  Two years after they first met San, he had a breakdown. Hongjoong opened the door to his apartment using the key San gave him to see him standing at the kitchen sink, scrubbing at a pot furiously. His hands were bright red.

  “San,” said Hongjoong, and San didn’t jump. “How hot do you have that water on?”

  “Really hot,” said San, and he continued scrubbing.

  “That pot looks clean to me,” said Hongjoong. San’s hands were cracking and starting to bleed. “It’s really clean, San.”

  San turned to him. “My bird died.”

  “Kamea?” Hongjoong asked, blinking. “Your blue jay Kamea died?”

  “Yes,” said San. “Also, my parents.”

  “I—what?”

  San’s face crumpled. He flew away from the sink without turning off the water or drying his hands and sunk down into a chair by his kitchen table, burning hands covering the soft skin of his face.
“My parents died in a car crash,” he said. “First my jay died and I don’t know why, I don’t know what I did to kill her, and then some b@st@rd thought it would be a good idea to drive on the freeway having consumed a couple hundred beers and he hit my parents and they died horrible slow painful deaths. They were good people, they didn’t deserve that, they paid for my insurance and my therapy and my education and I didn’t even get to tell them thank you.”
  “Oh God, San,” said Hongjoong. “Have you—have you taken your medication today?”
“No,” San sobbed, gripping his hair. “No, Joong, no, I didn’t, it was never supposed to turn out this way, it wasn’t, it wasn’t.”
  Hongjoong turned off the water and sat next to San, bringing his head to his shoulder. San clutched at his shirt, dropping tears onto the fabric, and shook. After a moment a low, uneven humming started emanating from that area, and Hongjoong realized he was singing.

  “Hush, little baby, don’t you cry. Mama’s gonna sing you a lullaby.”

  After a moment’s hesitation, Hongjoong picked up, softly. “Mama’s gonna sing a song for you. Robins and jays gonna warble for you.”

  “And when you wake, you’re gonna see,” San sang, “all the pretty birdies, Papa, and me.”

  “Hush, little baby, don’t make a sound,” Hongjoong sang, and then he stopped.

  “Mama needs to find us a burial ground,” San continued. Hongjoong was loath to have him finish the song, but he didn’t stop him when he sang, “Hush, little baby, you know I can’t stay—” He stopped and choked and couldn’t go on. Hongjoong stroked his hair and ran the last few words through his head involuntarily:

  And all the pretty birdies faded away.
 Hongjoong dreams of San, how his eyes light up when he sees a puppy, the way he’s a genius at board games, the way he’ll start scratching at the scars on his arms when he gets nervous. When he wakes up he checks the gun safe. The revolver sits safe and innocent on its perch, docile, its silver surface dull and ordinary. Hongjoong stares at it until his eyes water, and when he becomes aware of the pulse in his ears he locks the safe and tucks the key away. Then he goes to the couch and shakes Seonghwa awake.“We should get the gun checked,” he says when Seonghwa opens his eyes and squints at him.Seonghwa blinks. “Wha?”“The gun,” says Hongjoong. “The revolver. We should take it to the shop and make sure nothing’s wrong with it.”Seonghwa runs a hand through his hair and stifles a yawn. “San and I are going to pick up his meds at the pharmacy tomorrow,” he says. “We can get the gun checked before that.”“I want to go,” says Hongjoong.Seonghwa rubs his hand over his eyes and then shoves his hair away from his face. It makes him look like a little kid. “Okay,” he says. “We’ll all go, and then we can go roam around in the park for a while.” He leans up and puts a hand on the back of Hongjoong’s head, pressing a soft kiss to his forehead. “Go to sleep, Joongie.”Hongjoong doesn’t go to sleep. 
  A few months after San’s parents died, Hongjoong sat in a hospital room, waiting for Seonghwa to get his voicemail and come join him. He was staring at San in the bed, the way he looked paler than milk, the way the cuts on his wrists were so grotesquely stark and red. The welts were raised and they looked like makeup, the perfect cosmetics for a horror film, but it was real and it was blunt and Hongjoong’s life no longer resembled a comedy even a little bit.

  San was staring at the ceiling. “Hongjoong,” he said. “If you were a superhero, what power would you want?”

  “I—I don’t know,” said Hongjoong. “I don’t—know.”

  “I would fly,” said San without hesitation. “I would fly really high into the air and I wouldn’t come down.” There was silence for a bit. San turned his head toward Hongjoong and looked him straight in the eyes. “Thank you for being here,” he said, and before Hongjoong could reply he had closed his eyes and gone back to sleep.
 The gun store is nerve racking. It’s furnished with firearms and fading targets that are propped up near the books on gun care. Bullets line the shelves and the walls are cluttered to the point of inducing giddiness, but when they walk in, the only person besides the woman at the counter is an old man with near-black eyes that track them from the time they enter.Hongjoong walks to the counter quickly and puts the gun down. He shouldn’t have brought San here. “Could you take a look at this, please?” he asks, Seonghwa’s eyes on his back. “I just want to make sure it’s working correctly.” The words are so quick they almost slur together, but they don’t tremble. The woman looks at him and then over at Seonghwa and San, her quizzical gaze holding for just a second too long, before picking up the gun.It doesn’t take long. Were Hongjoong less nervous, he might have asked that she take it apart completely and clean every inch (is that a thing?), but, as it is, when she says, “It’s fine,” he takes it back quickly and puts it in his bag.“Thank you,” he says, and he feels a drop of sweat fall down his left temple. The air is thick as he turns to leave.The pharmacy is more troublesome. There’s something wrong with the store’s computer system, which keeps insisting that San’s account was terminated. It’s just as he’s thinking that Elizabeth II’s reign couldn’t possibly have been longer than this visit that he turns his head, realizes that San is no longer with them, and promptly gets overcome by an indescribable hand of anxiety.He finds San about thirty seconds later eating some gummy bears in the store’s small refrigerated section. His heart doesn’t slow until he’s standing in front of him.“San, what are you doing over here?” he asks, reaching for him and trying to keep the stress out his voice.San blinks at him with his big eyes as Hongjoong’s hand lands on his shoulder, and bites off a little bit of red worm. Sparkling sugar falls from his fingertips and onto his jeans. “Don’t worry,” he says. “I’ll pay for the gummy worms myself.”When they get back to where Seonghwa is standing in front of the pick-up counter, he’s finally managed to purchase San’s medications—bottles of blue and white pills distributed among five stiff pharmacy bags. Hongjoong undoes the staple on each bag to check their contents as they make their way out of the store, pills knocking against one another quietly.“How long did we even spend in there?” Hongjoong asks, handing the bags to Seonghwa once he notices that San isn’t wearing anything on his hands.Seonghwa takes the bags, frowns, and sighs. “I don’t know,” he says, “but, in any case, it’s too dark to go to the park.”San stares down at where Hongjoong is stuffing his mittens onto his fingers with a little frown. “Hongjoong,” he says. “I can put on my own mittens.”“Maybe you’re capable of putting on your own mittens, but if you don’t exhibit those capabilities when we go out into the cold, I have no choice but to keep you warm myself,” he responds, giving the mittens a sharp tug to make sure they’re on tight enough. San winces, and Hongjoong pats his shoulder apologetically. San reaches into his pocket to get his gummy worms again.Seonghwa stops suddenly, looking into one of the bags with a little frown. “Joongie,” he says, “one of the bags is empty.”Hongjoong rubs his forehead with a mittened thumb and sighs. “We must have dropped one,” he says, and turns around, resigned. “I’ll go look for it. You guys get the engine started up for me.” Without waiting for Seonghwa’s response (and possible protest), he heads back to the pharmacy.He asks the sales associates if they’ve seen the medication. They haven’t. He searches around the store’s entranceway and then resigns himself to going back out into the cold. It’s dark, and the asphalt of the parking lot has cracked in many places. The sidewalk is decorated with gum and cigarette b@tts. He’s been searching for a few minutes, eyes straining, cheeks starting to burn, when he notices something white lying near the building’s base. It turns out to be only a receipt. He’s straightened and has just turned around to go look in the other direction when he bumps into a firm surface and stumbles a few feet back, hand clutching at where his scarf is looped across his chest.Donovan is looking at him, his black hair swept into disorder by the recurring wind. His eyes are black and liquid in the dark, and Hongjoong gets hit in the face by the stench of alcohol before he regains his footing a few feet away. “Donovan,” he says reflexively. He looks taller than usual in the dark, his skin tan and his coat a dark green that doesn’t stand out against the blacktop. He doesn’t say anything. Hongjoong takes a step back and clears his throat. “What are you doing here?”As an answer, Donovan holds out his hand, and it takes Hongjoong a few seconds to figure out what he’s holding. When he realizes, he blinks.“It says ‘San,’” says Donovan. “I assume it’s for your friend.” Hongjoong stares at him, and after a few seconds Donovan stretches out his arm even more, little blue pills clacking chaotically within the bottle he’s holding. “Take it,” he orders.Hongjoong’s hand rises and floats over the bottle for a few seconds. Donovan just looks at him, gaze unwavering. Hongjoong takes the bottle out of his palm.Donovan raises an eyebrow, dark irises laughing. “What, no gratitude?” he asks. “A kiss to say thank you?” He takes a step forward and Hongjoong retreats automatically.“Thank you,” he says, and the words strangle themselves in his throat. He stuffs the bottle into his coat pocket, turns, and walks back to the car as quickly as he can without running. 
  Hongjoong never explained why they had a gun in the first place, did he?
 Hongjoong kissed Seonghwa once. But it was at a college party, and they were both drunk, so they never talked about it. (They remembered, though.)(Seonghwa kissed him back.)He plops down on the patch of carpet between the couch and the coffee table, laptop resting in front of him. He leans forward and puts his forearms on the table, and then his chin on top. He stares at the blank web page he pulled up.Seonghwa sits on the carpet next to him quietly, carrying a mug of tea that he blows on before setting it down on a coaster. (He doesn’t like sitting on the carpet.) He slides the coaster toward Hongjoong.“Hwa,” says Hongjoong.“I made you some tea,” Seonghwa says pointlessly. Hongjoong turns his head so that his left cheek is resting on his forearm and a few strands of hair are falling into his eyes as he looks at his Seonghwa.His roommate. That’s what he meant to think. His roommate.“Hwa,” he says again. “I wanted to—” He remembers the tea, looks down, and picks it up. “Thank you,” he says before taking a sip and putting it back down. “I wanted to thank you again for being so...freaking nice to me all the time. Especially now.”Seonghwa just looks sad. “You don’t have to thank me for that, Joongie.”“Well—well, no one knows exactly what to say thank you or sorry for, so I thought it was a good idea to say it just in case. I don’t tell you enough, anyway,” Hongjoong says weakly. Seonghwa doesn’t look any less sad. “You’re very good for San and me,” says Hongjoong. He feels his brow furrow. “‘For?’ To. You’re good to us. Sorry. That probably sounded really mean.”“Joonie,” says Seonghwa. “I know this is a terrible time to bring this up, and I know your parents won’t like it or whatever, but I really love you. Since college. You probably knew that, but I needed to say it out loud.”Hongjoong blinks at him, mouth open a little, head empty. He didn’t think Seonghwa would say it.(There’s the ghost of Seonghwa’s lips on his.)“Wow. Sh@t,” he says. He turns back to the tea and lifts it up to his lips before putting it back down. He turns back to Seonghwa. “You know I love you too, right?” he says. “Wait, let me reword that so we don’t miscommunicate. I’m in love with you.”Seonghwa reaches out and squeezes Hongjoong’s hand, since Hongjoong forgot to. “I was hoping so,” he replies.Hongjoong’s eyes lower. “Do we keep waiting until things get better?” he asks. “Or do we go for it?”“Go for it,” says Seonghwa. He pauses for a moment and then adds, “Please.”Hongjoong smiles to himself, looking into his mug. “I can’t do any more uncertainty, Seongie.”“I’ll make you a promise,” says Seonghwa. “When he gets better, I’ll take you far away from here. Wherever you want. You tell me whether you want to stay there or come back, and we’ll ask Sannie what he wants too. And in the meantime, I’ll keep making the tea and the stir-fry, and I’ll make you and me too. Whatever way you want.”Hongjoong finally looks back at him. “Only if you kiss me again.” Seonghwa takes his hands.Hongjoong thinks, as Seonghwa finally holds him like this again, that there’s more than one way to get to the sky.
  It was Hongjoong’s fault, he knew, for accepting the gun from his grandmother as a Christmas present. Seonghwa was vehemently opposed. When they sat down to discuss it, he put the unloaded gun on the coffee table and laced his fingers together, staring at the weapon lying on the clean wood. “I don’t know how to use this,” Hongjoong remarked.

  “Neither do I,” said Seonghwa. “We shouldn’t have it. We’re only going to end up accidentally maiming ourselves.”

  Hongjoong turned to look at him. “We have a safe,” he said. “We can use it until we get one that’s made specifically for firearms. And we can learn how to use it—”
“Hongjoong.” Seonghwa ran a hand through his hair. “You’re not actually considering keeping it, are you?” When Hongjoong didn’t say anything, Seonghwa’s eyes widened and he stood. “Hongjoong, what are you thinking?” he hissed, gripping his hair so hard that his knuckles turned white. “We don’t need a gun to be safe!”
  “Maybe I need a gun to feel safe,” said Hongjoong, and Seonghwa fell abruptly silent. Outside, a few shouts from young children rose and fell in a series of waves before dying out completely, leaving them silent in their apartment. Eventually, Seonghwa sat again, and they both just stared out past the gun, straight into the wall opposite them for a while. When Hongjoong spoke, his voice was quiet and tired. “I miss San,” he said.

  He didn’t see Seonghwa’s expression, but he could feel him looking. After a few seconds he sighed, and Hongjoong could see his body deflating out of the corner of his eye. “I know,” he said, and he reached over to squeeze Hongjoong’s hand. “I know.”
There were two times in Hongjoong’s life he could have sworn that he was going to die from cardiac arrest. Once when a doctor misdiagnosed his father with cancer, and once when a friend stepped out into the street and almost got hit by a speeding bus.Neither of those compare to how he feels when he walks out of the bathroom to see San holding his gun.His automatic reaction is to halt and shut down. All his thoughts disappear, he loses sensation in his fingers, and suddenly he can’t tell whether the room is cold or warm, Arctic or hell.San is sitting on the floor with the coffee table in front of him, knees pulled up to his chest, back straight against the front of the couch. When Hongjoong takes a few halting steps forward, he sees that the whites of San’s eyes are stained with thin veins of blood red. He’s holding the gun in a grip neither loose nor tight, nozzle pointed toward the ground, gaze downcast. His thumb is running across the slick metal body.“Sannie,” says Hongjoong. “What are you doing?” San doesn’t look at him and he doesn’t say anything. As if from far away, Hongjoong can hear Seonghwa rummaging around obliviously in his room. “San,” says Hongjoong. San looks at him. Hongjoong takes a halting step forward. “Sannie,” he says. “The gun.”San looks down at the gun and turns it over in his hands slowly, rotating it until he’s peering down. Into the nozzle’s empty black entrance. “I just wanted to see it,” he says. “You keep it in the safe, but I wanted to see it. So I opened it.” Hongjoong doesn’t say anything, and San glances up. “Did you not know there are two keys for that safe?”Hongjoong takes a few stumbling steps forward, and San just looks at him, eyes tracking his progress, big and brown and placid. “Sannie,” says Hongjoong. San doesn’t reply, so Hongjoong lowers himself down next to him. “Sweetie,” he says. “Give me the gun.”San blinks, looks down on the gun, and looks back up at Hongjoong. He doesn’t move. Slowly, Hongjoong reaches over and slips the revolver out of his hands. San’s gaze doesn’t leave Hongjoong’s face. “It’s not loaded,” he says once Hongjoong has it in his grip. “I took out the bullets.” Hongjoong doesn’t say anything. “Look,” says San, gesturing for Hongjoong to check. Hongjoong puts the gun on his left and moves closer to San so he can put his right arm around his shoulders.“Sannie,” he says. “Did you take your medication?”San blinks slowly. “I don’t want you to ask me that every day for the rest of my life,” he says. Hongjoong doesn’t know how to tell him that he wants there to be a rest of his life.San’s gaze lowers until he’s looking at his interlocked fingers, resting on one kneecap. “What if this just goes on forever, Joonie?” he asks, so quiet Hongjoong almost doesn’t hear.Hongjoong pulls him close and puts his nose in San’s hair. “Do you remember Cinderella’s story?” he asks, soft.“Yes,” San replies dutifully.“Do you remember how much she loved her birds?”San’s gaze lifts until he’s staring at the wall. “Yes.”Hongjoong pulls him closer. “Then you don’t need to remember anything else,” he says.San sighs quietly and then finally, finally lets his heavy head rest on Hongjoong. “Are you going to Denver?” he asks.“No,” says Hongjoong. “No, of course not.” He puts the gun on the carpet so it’s out of sight, practice for when he gets rid of it tomorrow.From behind them he can hear the evening noises, the faint sounds of car horns and laughter and urban wildlife. San lets out a quiet exhale that brushes Hongjoong’s cheek, and Hongjoong thinks about Seonghwa cleaning the apartment with ABBA on full blast, stopping for minutes at a time to use his broom as a guitar. He thinks of the game nights the three of them have, Monopoly and Pictionary and Life, and how no one ever gets mad when San wins.He thinks of putting Cinderella in the DVD player and watching San dive to fiddle with the controls, mouth wide, teeth white, hands springing out of his sleeves like a bird flying out of a grave.'
User: Summarize the chapter based on the content provided, ensuring to follow the set format and emphasize key aspects within the specified length.
User: Summarize the chapter based on the content provided, ensuring to follow the set format and emphasize key aspects within the specified length.
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