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xelasrecords · 5 months

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As One So Half

Han Jumin x MC

Jumin goes to V's house after burying him, marking the first time he visits without his friend waiting on the porch.

Based on the Secret Ending with some changes, most notably the MC being romantically involved with Jumin instead of Saeyoung. How differently would Jumin grieve if he had someone by his side?

CW: graphic descriptions of death and grief

Words: 6k

Masterlist Read on AO3

Grief had hung upon V and him for as long as Jumin could remember. At times, it was a shadow lurking in the dark. Other times, it was a crushing weight that broke his ribcage in. From the moment Jumin crashed his toy car into V's house and V bargained for his friendship in exchange for forgiveness, they had invited grief to sit with them like a premonition. Their friendship started with an accident and ended with one.

The clamour at Mint Eye still reverberated in Jumin's ears. How his security guards broke through the cult doors and he caught a mop of turquoise hair on the ground, stupidly relieved that V was finally within reach and Jumin could ask him everything he had been holding back. How the relief was brusquely cut with terror when it dawned on him that it was V, sprawled on the floor, unmoving.

Jumin had rushed in and almost slipped in his own friend's crimson blood, finding purchase on his still warm hand and feeling for his pulse and came back with nothing. He had pulled V into his lap and saw V's head drop without resistance, noticed his chest not rising and falling and thought the sensation of it unnerving. He had pressed on V's gunshot wound, willing the blood to stop flowing. No words could come out of his throat. He closed V's clouded mint eyes with stiff fingers and both knees in the pool of blood.

The blood was warm and had soaked into his dress pants. He could still feel the fabric clinging to his legs.

When he registered the pandemonium around him, Rika was already keening below the gaudy throne and Saeran had crumpled into a foetal position, a gun inches away from him. Saeyoung had fainted and was hauled by a brown-haired stranger. The new party coordinator was scrambling at V's pants pocket, her cheek streaked with blood. She's alive, Jumin had thought dully. Saeyoung was wrong. V didn't betray her. Jumin could not reach for her despite his heart. His limbs had petrified on the ground V died on.

Jumin saw V dead over and over. He saw V in the shower where he stood underneath the water, diluting the blood from his three-piece suit and rinsed away what was left of V from him. He saw V in the bed where the fifth glass of wine had muffled his senses but failed to put him to sleep. He saw V at the funeral before they closed the casket, his face frozen in a serene smile as if there was anything peaceful in being shot to death.

That was how Jumin lost V for the final time. He would not see him again.

Jumin stood alone in V's living room now and he didn't know where to start. There was no user manual for clearing up one's dead friend's belongings. His hand hovered over the light switch before rendering it useless. The harsh tangerine sunset cut through the open windows and washed the rustic room aglow. It was enough lighting and a reminder that V was gone. V would have paused with awe on his face and took a photograph.

Jumin had come over right after V's burial, and restless silence had greeted him where V's earnest welcome should have. The refrigerator hummed from the dark kitchen, the grandfather clock ticked on, and the brine in the cool breeze pricked at his skin. The quiet was deafening, devoid of the laughter that he was used to.

It wasn't just the house. The anxious chitter in Jumin's head had deadened as well. It used to thrum without end when V started to disappear and come back as if everything was fine two years ago, but Jumin could always detect the nervous fiddling and the melancholy that weighed him down. He had begun to lose V since then. He simply didn't know it yet.

Two years was a long time not to know peace, and there was no peace in the aftermath. Only resounding emptiness remained. For two years, Jumin had been living with fear fused into his bones that he couldn't recall another way to live. Two years of being on high alert, wishing V would put an end to it.

V finally did now.

Jumin knew the logical conclusion was that he was grieving, but he was a distant observer watching his grief engulf him. Nothing was as heavy as this sorrow, as the tether of his soul being cut in half. He couldn't see the end to it, this grief that had started since V was alive. Each time V returned from his long absences, he was more damaged, more changed, and there was nothing Jumin could do to help.

He almost missed the days of fearing for V's safety when V was at least still alive. If Jumin focused on the well-being of the RFA and the mess Rika left behind, he could feel normal, as if nothing had changed. He could delude himself that none of this was real. It was easier to handle practical tasks than turn to his emotions, easier to care for others than himself.

Jumin walked past a line of small cacti on the bookshelf and headed to the brown leather sofa, grazing it with his fingers. He could almost hear V telling him to sit down, wait here, as he made a fuss in the kitchen over which wine he thought Jumin would enjoy the most. Jumin would then say that all wine was enjoyable with the right company and V was the best company anyone could have. V would modestly shrug it away, but it wouldn't stop Jumin from reassuring him that he was worthy of the title.

V was not here anymore, yet Jumin hadn't lost the ability to predict his moves like he could predict his own thoughts. No matter the secrets V brought to his grave, he was still the friend that Jumin knew. But if V had in him a semblance of the friend that Jumin was familiar with, shouldn't he have been able to read V's mind in the past few years?

He would never forgive V for leaving on his own.

Slowly, Jumin walked and stopped outside V's bedroom. Though the white oak door was wide open, he couldn't bring himself to take another step. He hadn't been aware that the last time he entered would be the last. V's arm had been slung around his shoulder as he hauled him into bed. Jumin remembered V chuckling drunkenly, hopelessly, pleading with him to keep it from Rika.

He had known something was wrong then, but assumed V would confide in him in his own time. Jumin had faith in his friend and clung to the hope that it was reciprocated. What hope it was. Some lessons you could only learn not merely after hitting rock bottom, but after you were dragged across the serrated surface and bled out alone.

Jumin leaned his head against the door frame, watching dust motes drifting above the unmade bed. He wished they had met up more often. He should have hunted V down for even one night of conversation over wine. However disappointed Jumin was in V, his yearning to tell him of his pain was even greater. For years, V had been the first and only person who came to mind when he wanted to talk, and that had not changed.

"You've abandoned me, V," Jumin murmured under his breath.

He could forgive V for almost anything, but not for leaving him alone in a world where he was already alone.

Suddenly, he felt a light tap on his shoulder, and he closed his eyes. For one second, he could pretend it was V about to tell him that his death was just another lie he concocted to cover up a greater evil. This lie he would forgive. He would give up nearly all his possessions for the one person who shaped all that was human in him, who then took it with him when he left. Jumin was only masquerading as a person on the outside; his soul had drifted somewhere he could not follow.

But the hand on Jumin was too reverent and not at all like V's. It was the hand that had brought him to his feet after the paramedics wheeled V's body away, the hand that held him tightly as if he would break if she let go. He would not. Not in front of everyone. He never learned how to, and there were people to take care of.

Jumin fixed his tie, braced himself for another wave of bad news, and turned around.

But the party coordinator cut in before he could speak. "Everyone got back safely from the cemetery," she said. In the shadowed room, the rings of exhaustion beneath her eyes were barely noticeable. She hadn't changed out of her black mourning attire—a silk ruffle blouse with sleeves that cinched at her wrists and a long skirt that flared down to her calves. "Rika went with Yoosung and Zen, Saeyoung returned to the hospital for Saeran, and I just got off a call with Jaehee. She was brewing coffee at her home."

Her method of mentally tracking the members was not unlike his. Jumin couldn't deny his gratitude for the familiarity and her concern for them. "And you're here at V's home," he commented. "I suppose this could be a safe place for you. I used to find it a sanctuary myself."

"Is it still?"

"One would think I'd hate coming back to my dead friend's place, but I can feel him here." He let the rough texture of the wallpaper scrape the pads of his fingers. There was a faint maroon stain against the beige where V had spilt his wine while laughing at Jumin's office anecdote. "He might have built this house for him and Rika, but everything here speaks of him, even the things he got out of devotion for her. They are still his devotion. In the safety of these walls, V lives on."

Perhaps he didn't come here to sort out V's belongings. His subconscious might have led him here to seek shelter from the disasters in the ghost of V's warmth. His spirit could even linger here. Jumin longed for a sign that his fascination with the occult would be proven true.

Her eyes swept through the house, taking in the mismatched antiques that V dearly loved. Jumin wondered what impression they left on her, if she could see what he saw and felt what he felt. "Do you think he's saying anything right now?"

"If he does, I cannot catch it. He's too distant from me to predict," Jumin said without inflection. "It wasn't always like this."

She studied him—not with pity, he noticed with a muted surprise—but sorrow. It felt too much like a burden that he had to change the subject.

"Have you ever had to bury someone you love?" he asked.

She faced ahead. There was a remote look in her eyes that pulled her from the present as if she was reliving a bygone time. At that moment, she felt almost as distant as V was. Jumin did not know yet how that would feel, but he realised with a pang that she had known unbearable pain, and wished he had been there for her. "Yes," she said. "I wanted to claw them out."

He did not quite share her feelings. Rather than unearthing V's corpse, Jumin wanted to revive him through the debt of unfulfilled promises, or necromancy. But here was someone who understood. He wouldn't take her for granted. He had lost enough in this life.

"It must be suffocating inside," Jumin noted.

She nodded. "It's probably good that he can't feel pain anymore."

Jumin didn't have to ask which he she was referring to. "I would've been happy for him if he didn't leave a mess behind."

"I heard what you said earlier when you blamed him for leaving without you," she said, watchful gaze seeking a change in his expression. "Did you want to go with him?"

Jumin's jaw tightened. "I want him not to go at all."

"He must have been special for you to love him that much."

Jumin scoffed. "He was definitely extraordinary, to have wreaked this much havoc in the RFA. V is—was complicated. Despite all the things he'd done, I can't see him as anything but a good friend, but the magnitude of his faults isn't something I can look past either."

"I think he tried to do good at the end," she said. "I was there when he tried to right his wrongs. I saw his sacrifices, but we can't neglect the casualties and how he dealt with things. I wish he understood that one poor decision could snowball into something too massive to handle alone."

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions." It was an axiom that Jumin came across when he was young, but its meaning never dawned on him until he was forced to see it in V's downfall. "Trying to understand V is like reading a book you love upside down in a mirror. Deep down, you know the story is one that you keep close to your heart, but you struggle to make sense of it when the words are jumbled. It's hard for me to accept that V had changed so thoroughly without my knowing."

She rested her back against the doorframe, stretching out her legs until their toes almost touched. "It may be that he was neither good nor bad. It's impossible to box people into two rudimentary options."

Jumin laughed mirthlessly. "Oh, he was no doubt a bad parent to the twins."

She sighed. "A child should be loved and protected, and it's always more important that they feel your love. It's not their job to constantly convince themselves they're safe and loved. It should be easy for them to know how much love they deserve without worrying it would be taken away if they're not good enough." There was a frown between her brows that Jumin itched to ease out. "It wasn't just V, but Rika too. One through passive neglect, the other active violence." She put her hands into her skirt pockets, her voice softened. "Do you hate the twins? Saeran?"

The mention of Saeran was a blow to his gut, as it did whenever he imagined Saeran firing the gun at V, a scene that he never got to witness. Jumin was not sure if it was good that he never did, for now he was left to forever wonder how V felt in his final moments. The loud bang was all he heard when he stood outside the locked gates, and his desperation to get to V was the only thing that kept him upright on his feet.

"V failed the twins. Half of his failure is mine, and I consider it my duty to finish what he started," said Jumin in a tone that brooked no contradiction. "The RFA is family. That includes Saeyoung's lost brother. I have to protect them. You've seen how much danger they're in. I would've helped V if I had known. I have the power and resources at my disposal." His gaze strayed to the unopened Romanée-Conti bottle on the copper side table in the living room. Jumin had gifted the wine to V after a trip to France, but he never got to taste it. There were a lot of things V would never get to do. "I would have, if only he'd asked."

She unhitched herself from the wall and stepped closer to him. In all bewilderment, his breath halted. He had thought it impossible to feel anything but numbed anguish since V died. "You have a remarkable capacity for forgiveness and an even more remarkable heart, Jumin." She laid her palm on his chest, right on top of his beating heart. "I've always admired your compassion—I haven't forgotten how you flew back home the minute you knew I was living with a bomb—but you still surprise me with how good you are. Not everyone can do what you do, and you do them without being forced. Among all the people I've met, you're one of the kindest. No wonder V chose you as his best friend. I would too."

Her words were awfully gentle and soothing, urging him to pull her into his embrace and let down his armour. It was such an outlandish desire that Jumin found himself almost reaching for his phone to inform V about his latest emotional development, the realisation catching up a second late that V's phone was in his possession now, that it would just ring in his pocket and he wouldn't hear any more Jumin, it's you. How is Elizabeth the Third? and he wouldn't exhale in relief because V sounded fine, there was nothing wrong with him or their friendship, and he could finally sleep without relying on wine.

The deepest wound V left behind was the loneliness Jumin didn't know he was capable of feeling. He could not reminisce about V with anyone because no one knew him exactly like Jumin did. No one knew V used to have a spark of mischief in his eyes that he would cover up by feigning innocence and everyone but Jumin would fall for. No one knew V used to laugh with abandon when they snuck out of their childhood homes and raced to catch the sunrise breaking over Han River. Even Jumin's impeccable memory might not stand a chance against time. He might forget the sound of V's laugh as age corroded him. There would be no one to keep V alive after he passed.

Jumin put away her hand, not daring to indulge in the feel of her skin. "You give me more honour than I deserve."

"Because you don't give yourself enough."

Jumin stared at her with bleak despair. "Have you ever thought that I may not want to choose him back? That if I could go back in time, I may not want to begin this friendship with him, knowing how he would end?"

She tilted her head and watched him sadly. "V kept the contract too."

"The contract the two of you signed when you became friends. He kept it in his pocket." She carefully unfolded a yellowing paper from her pocket and handed it to him.

Jumin blanched. Whatever argument he was about to launch dissipated into thin air.

"What?" he croaked, the question scratching at his throat.

With trembling hands and quick strides, Jumin brought the paper to the windowsill. The sky above the slated roof was a fiery blaze that burnished their childish signatures with orange light. Jumin could feel the flames of fury licked at him, though for what he couldn't reason. It was V keeping yet another secret when Jumin thought he had lost his copy of the contract. It was the guilt of swearing not to forgive V when V had cherished him until his end.

Jumin bowed his head over V's barely legible handwriting, scrutinising every swoop and slant that dictated the start of their friendship. I hereby declare myself a friend to Han Jumin. At the end was a measly drawing of a toy car in green ink that had faded with time. There was dried blood staining the edges of the paper, blood both new and old.

"Why are you giving this to me now?" Jumin asked tersely.

She stood by his side. "I thought you wouldn't want to see it with everyone around."

Jumin couldn't peel his eyes away from the paper. The words were starting to morph into one another. It was the shortest contract he had ever signed. He had thought it effective. Now he wondered whether the contract length was directly and infernally proportionate to the period of their friendship. He should have included a clause to prevent his idiotic friend from doing anything that tempted death.

Jumin clutched the broken contract to his chest, hunching over it like it was V's lifeline, his breathing quickly becoming erratic. There was an awful pressing against his ribcage, a grotesque need to grieve with emotions bursting out of him as he had implored V to do when he thought V was mourning for Rika, but he couldn't. He had locked himself in this glass prison for as long as he could recall, and now he was paying the price. Thick, unscalable walls closed in around him. No matter how hard he pushed, he could not break through. He could not cry.

His best friend had died and he could not shed a tear.

"It's okay if you can't cry. It's okay," she muttered close to his ear. "You're not wrong for not crying. I know you're hurting. You don't have to prove that with your tears."

His breathing was out of his control. The sea air was choking him. He wanted to check on his cufflinks and tie clip and whether the tuck of his shirt was perfectly even on all sides. He wanted to fall to his knees.

He felt an arm around his shoulders and a hand gripping him, enveloping him with a warm, decadent scent that he always associated with her.

"I was supposed to go first," Jumin heaved out, words tumbling out of his mouth before he could stop them.

She stiffened. "What do you mean?"

"I was supposed to go first," he said. "When we were teenagers, V promised he wouldn't die before me. He'd always been reckless and I was afraid of losing him, so I made him swear an oath. I thought I could keep him alive if I tied him to me."

Her face contorted in pain. "It's not your fault, Jumin. You can't change his decision when it's not yours to change. V has chosen his path and you can't follow him. You can't."

But Jumin wasn't listening. "For years when I forgot how to be human, I only ever had to turn to V as my reminder. He was my mirror of truth. In the steadfastness of his friendship, I found the conviction in myself that I am human, that I am capable of being generous and kind and all the things you mentioned. I can only stand before you and be the person you admire because of V. I owe him my entire life, but it is not much of a life to live when he won't be there to see the end of it."

"It's still your life. That is important." Her fingers slid up his jaw and cradled his face with tenderness. It was the closest Jumin ever got with anyone, the most loving touch he had ever received. It made him want to simultaneously shatter into pieces and pull himself together. "I wish V knew how loved he is. I can see how much goodness he inspired in you, and you in him. I'm sorry you lost him so soon. You should have had more time."

"I thought we put in each other the same amount of faith," Jumin said. "I thought our shared history meant more to him. I knew he had secrets and trusted that he kept them with the best intentions. That trust was misplaced."

"You trusted him because he gave you no reason to doubt him. It is as you said. How could you have known that your closest friend went behind your back when all he had been was good to you?"

"I don't know." Jumin's reply was a whisper of a broken boyhood dream. "Twenty years I have called him my best friend and gloried in the truth of it right before my eyes. Now I don't even know how to be without him."

"Oh, Jumin." Her hands slipped to the back of his neck and held him close. Soft wisps of her hair tickled his cheek. "You will learn. It will be tough, but there's no other way. You just live through it, one day at a time. But know that I'm here with you."

There was no one who could see through him as well as V did, no one who could understand him with a single glance and infinite patience. Jumin wondered if he would catch V's exact shade of turquoise on anyone else's head. He wondered if he wanted to.

"Thank you," Jumin mumbled into her neck, allowing himself to stay in that position for five seconds, counting them in his head, before pulling away. "I must ask you something. How did you know that V had the contract on his person?"

She hesitated. "It fell out when we were locked in the cult prison and Saeyoung... hurt him out of anger. I saw V putting it back into his pocket. It was the first thing he salvaged when Saeyoung stopped. I'm sorry I couldn't stop him. I tried to shield V but Vanderwood dragged me back."

A bolt of pain struck Jumin when he realised it was how V got the bruises that he inspected on the cold metal table in the mortuary. And another when it hit him that she might have got injured during the commotion.

Jumin grasped her elbows and scanned her figure, wondering if the long sleeves and skirt were to cover up the bruises. "Were you hurt?"

She seemed startled but quickly recovered. "Not intentionally."

His stomach dropped with dread. "Then why did you intentionally throw yourself before someone who meant harm? Have you no concern for yourself?"

"I thought the kicks were getting too much for V," she said. "And for you. Your heart would break if you saw him so battered. He didn't even try to protect himself, Jumin."

"Neither did you, it seemed."

"Better I get hurt than him. He was already so weak. He couldn't anticipate the blows because he was blind. I don't think he even wanted to. He just lay there sputtering apologies and claimed all Rika's faults as his." The arch of her chin was a challenge, and in it, Jumin saw the quality that attracted him to her, not that he would mention it at the moment. "Tell me you wouldn't do the same."

He was starting to suspect he gravitated to a certain type of people. "That is hardly a fair comparison," he gritted through his teeth. "You don't know him like I do."

"Do I have to befriend someone to protect them?"

Jumin shot her a sharp look. "You should have known the danger you were in."

"And I know you love him!" she snapped.

Jumin was stunned. She was not one to lose her composure, least of all at him.

"You love him," she said again, lower this time, "so I looked after him."

"God." Jumin put his palms over his face, trying to ignore the convoluted pain that twisted and thrashed in his chest. Yet another person he failed to take care of, added to his list of failures. It was a short list, but the guilt would stay for a long while.

"Jumin," she said. "I know my limit. And it was Saeyoung. Beneath his anger was grief. I had to trust that he wouldn't do anything deadly to me. Besides, he's apologised and I've got myself checked up. Only bruises. Nothing fatal."

Jumin's hands fell to his sides. "Only?" he said incredulously. "He could have caused serious harm to you."

She lifted her brow. "Do you prefer V to take the brunt of it instead?"

Jumin stared at her in disbelief. "You can't do that. You can't be like him and sacrifice yourself recklessly to save people. Do you expect me to be grateful if my peace is paid with your blood?"

"It was quite strategic, actually," she said. "We split the pain between us. Not at all reckless."

"Don't you start."

She pressed her lips together, dissatisfied.

"I just wish to protect all that I care about," Jumin said. "I never want you or him to get hurt, but he did and now he's dead and there's only you left, so I can't"—he choked, pain lancing through him like wildfire—"I can't lose you either."

She closed her eyes briefly then took his hand, pressing it against her cheek. "You're not losing me. I'm alive, right here," she said. "When I was at Mint Eye, I could hold on because of you. I was thankful that you weren't there, that you were safely out of reach. And then you burst through the doors. I was horrified. I didn't want you to see V like that. I didn't want you to be near those elixirs and weapons." She kissed his knuckle, the softness of her lips sending shivers up his arm. "I'm just as afraid of losing you."

Jumin brushed a thumb across her cheekbone, guilt and helplessness roiled in him. "I'm sorry for getting angry. It isn't like me to lose my temper."

She shook her head. "You also just lost your best friend. Grief can pull out the worst in us and make us do things we don't normally do."

He sighed. "V has a salve here somewhere," he said stiltedly, unsure how to act in the face of kindness so unexpected in times like this. "Let me tend to your injuries. It's the least I can do."

She smiled. "Later. Let's not be too eager to get me out of my clothes."

Jumin nodded and placed the contract on the side table, tucking the edge beneath the Romanée-Conti. Somehow Jumin could tell she was being honest. She had never shied away from the cold truth, and it didn't seem like she was about to now. He didn't think he could bear it if she treated him like a fragile thing the way everyone around him seemed to.

A framed picture on the wall caught his attention. It was a photo of V and Jumin in their school uniforms sitting in the car, Jumin looking sullen while V sporting a wide grin. V was still an amateur photographer then, so the picture had more ceiling than boys.

Jumin remembered that day as vividly as the sting of chilli that had burned his tongue. V had been on a rebellious streak and dragged Jumin to ditch Driver Kim after school for a cup of tteokbokki by the street. While the rice cakes had a strange, pleasant chewy texture, their digestive systems were unprepared for the unhygienic street food.

It was the most horrendous stomachache Jumin had ever experienced.

After snapping the picture, V had fallen asleep on his shoulder while he recited his defence arguments for V, knowing only the harshest scolding was waiting for V at home. But V was stubborn. He would always pursue more adventures, and wherever V was, there Jumin was as well.

Jumin missed the weight of V's head on his shoulder, the feeling of V trusting and depending on him. They were always Jumin and V, V and Jumin, two inseparable boys who tried to make their gold-spun lives into something bigger than themselves but found solace in one another instead. They understood each other's familial pains and knew the right things to say when one was hurting. They made each other better just by existing.

"Did V mention me when you were with him?" asked Jumin.

"I'm sorry," she started, and he immediately wanted to stop listening. "He only blamed himself and talked about stopping Rika by giving himself up. But that doesn't mean he didn't care about you." She gestured at the contract. "That itself proves it."

Jumin thought he would be hurt, but there was only numbness inside him. "What were his last words?"

"Something about always being with Rika like the sun. How she was the love of his soul."

Jumin chuckled bitterly. Of course V would weave nonsensical poetry at his dying breath. He recalled his speech at the party a couple of days ago. Many people ignore the inconvenient truth for the sake of being comfortable, but true happiness only comes when one has faced that inconvenience. Now faced with the blunt truth, he found no joy to glean from it. He would never know V's final thoughts about him. In the end, even the truest truth couldn't bring V back alive.

"You said V has chosen his path," said Jumin, staring past the swaying grass outside, "but the path he walks on is a lonely one, and he walks it alone. Didn't he know that I would've carried his burden with him?"

But even as he spoke, he knew it was precisely why V couldn't confide in him. V, who would take every problem upon himself, who wouldn't let anyone suffer in his stead, whom Jumin wouldn't call Jihyun again because V hadn't permitted him to.

He could wait forever for a chance to call him Jihyun. He was still waiting for it.

"I'm confident he knew," she said. "He'd have to be blinder than he was not to see how selfless you are."

The corner of Jumin's mouth quirked up, but it wasn't a smile that reached his eyes. "V was the selfless one."

"It's not a competition."

He glanced at her. "Do you think he's reincarnated somewhere?"

The temperature was dropping as night approached. She shifted closer to him. "If he did, I hope he'd live a peaceful life."

"No," Jumin said adamantly. "He's done too many awful deeds to be reincarnated as a human. He should be an animal. A cat would be fitting."

She frowned. "I thought you liked cats."

"Humans and cats are two different things. I like cats. I have no desire to be one." His mind was set. V must be reincarnated. Only then Jumin could meet him again and forgive him. "I'll be on the lookout for emerald cats in case it's V. I'll provide him with everything he needs. He won't have to put himself in danger again."

If there was anyone Jumin loved more than himself, it was V. There was nothing he wouldn't do for him. And if V was threatened with a loaded gun, there was no saying that Jumin wouldn't take the bullet for him. How could he hate V for doing something that he would do himself? Perhaps they were more similar than he thought.

"Elizabeth the Third would welcome a green friend," she agreed.

"Of course." Jumin fixed the lapel of his black suit. V had bestowed Elizabeth the Third with her majestic name. There was nothing in Jumin's life that V had left untouched. "I need a drink."

Her eyes flitted from the childhood picture to him, her face mirroring the unending pain that wrapped around his heart, and he knew she had seen through him. "I brought wine," she said. "But first, dinner. I'll be disappointed if you let my cooking go to waste."

"You're caring for me," Jumin said. "You have been since the beginning. What an odd feeling. No one has ever cooked for me aside from my chef and V." He observed their elongating shadows on the hardwood floor, how they melded into the looming darkness in the room. "My utmost appreciation. That applies to your care for V as well."

She simply nodded and twined her chilled fingers with his.

Outside, the boiling red sky was dissolving into black. The sun hung low over the violent waves crashing against the cliff. She clicked on the light switch, and Jumin watched the light reflected off the picture frame glass, obscuring V's and his youthful faces. He followed her to the dining table, feeling like an intruder in his dead friend's home, listening to the ghost of their laughter over clattering plates from another time, silently willed him to come home, then pulled out a chair for her and ate in silence.

Footnotes:

Sunset as the atmospheric setting was logical and metaphorical. Timeline-wise, this fic is set a few hours after the burial took place at around noon. The metaphor comes from how V, the self-described sun, has died. The sun has to set now. It was a fun challenge to portray a scenic sunset alongside the dark theme of grief. But hey, beautiful and depressing are a perfect description of V.

This is the most planning and note-taking I've ever done for a fic because it closely follows the canon events! The bullet points, annotations, personal arguments and analysis are LONG.

It's also my most planned characterisation for MC. I usually figure out their personality as I write, but since I replayed the Secret Ending, I'd known I wanted to give Jumin someone who understands grief and loss and knows how to navigate the conversation without being too pushy. He's so lonely there. He doesn't know how to reach out and nobody can be there the way he needs.

My initial plan was to make this fic Jumin-focused without an MC, but then she entered the scene and from the way their interaction was going, it would've been wrong not to make them have feelings for each other for a while. I meant to show that love can coexist in your worst grief, and sometimes you find out how loved you are through those who stay after the external noise dies down.

Used Jumin's line at the funeral "he was a good friend, a good teacher, and a mirror of truth. I will never forgive you for leaving on your own" as a guide for his reverent and bitter sorrow about V. The usage of mirrors in his dialogues was also inspired by this.

I reflected on why Jumin directs all his resentment to V when Rika did even worse things, which isn't a very rational thing to do unlike what he believes, until it occurred to me that it's normal. Grief doesn't make sense. His emotions are bound to be all over the place when he just lost his closest friend whether he realises it or not.

Actually, I added Jumin and MC's argument during the later edits and it just felt right. We know Jumin is capable of outbursts when he's anxious, like when he confronts V on Jaehee's route or when he slams his hand against the wall to trap MC on his.

Jumin may think that as a kid, he was the one who followed V everywhere, but I think V would disagree. V craved friends and expressed it more than him. It was V who asked for the friendship deal after all.

Jumin tends to use metaphors i.e. the analogy of Yoosung watching V painstakingly pick apples and the concept of his dark threads, so I thought it wouldn't be OOC if he came up with the rock bottom and book-in-mirror metaphors. And, this man had been friends with V for decades—their linguistic choices were bound to seep into each other's to some degree.

The reincarnation idea came from the reincarnation trope in kdramas! I think Jumin, an avid soap opera/drama watcher, would find it fascinating.

Header Corner:

I caved. I've never put this much effort into a header. I wanted to find the balance between the raw grief and Jumin's modern sophistication, hence the strong gradients and sleek font. The movement is minimal, the text is small, the vast space is hollow, and the music is stripped down to 2 simple chords, all to instil the emptiness that Jumin feels.

The colours have double meanings: blue for the sea / deep sadness, and orange for the sunset / bitter anger and intense concern.

When the scene opens, the orange and blue lights take up the space, slightly touching before they part. It's Jumin's denial of V being dead, still calling for him while being anxious and miserable. Then the realisation sets in. Orange shifts to red in Jumin's stubborn refusal to forgive while blue disappears to make way for the dark, engulfing isolation.

Here are some alternative style frames before I decided on the current one!

Music credit: Sad Piano Music (no copyright) by Tushar Sharma

Buy me a glass of something that's definitely not coffee because I can't stand it but it is the website's name if my story touches you in some way? No worries if you don't. I'm still grateful you've read all the way through here.

#i've wanted to write about this since 2016 but didn't know how to approach it and do it justice until now #xela writes #jumin x mc #mystic messenger #jumin han #mystic messenger fanfic #jumin han angst #mysme #jumin han fic

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