Chapter Text
Churches tended to be cold with their tile floors, wooden pews, and stained glass windows that kept out the wind as well as single pane windows did. And it was a particularly cold day outside…
That said, Hae-il still had no real reason to be feeling as chilled as he did standing there in front of the alter, a lighter clutched in his hand and Gudam’s provost in front of him.
“We’re priests," he whispered. "That can’t just…happen.”
Seong-kyu…Father Han took it surprisingly well, especially considering Hae-il didn’t have the balls to look him in the face while he said it. “…I agree.”
“I…” To his utter shame, Hae-il turned even further away before he continued. “I think we should stay away from each other…for a while…”
The young priest hummed quietly. “…I understand.”
His voice…was so goddamn gentle…
“I…” Father Han added. “I apologize for the role I played—“
Hae-il cut him off. “No—“ he bit out, half turning to face him only to chicken out at the last second before he could meet Father Han’s eyes, his gaze falling to the church’s tile floor. “No… Don’t be.”
Don’t be sorry. Not for that. No one has ever kissed me like that. That was the closest…I have ever felt to salvation—
And that was the closest you’ve ever come to breaking your vows, another voice scoffed. And bringing him down with you.
Stop, Hae-il thought, walking away from the other priest and continuing with his work of opening the church before S—Father Han could see the stricken look on his face.
It is just like you to struggle yourself and drag others down with you—
STOP IT!
Hae-il just barely managed to keep himself from screaming those words out loud.
*
It had been years since it was this bad.
Part of him wondered if it had ever been this bad…
He hadn’t gotten more than an hour of sleep at a stretch in days, nightmares shaking him to his core and chasing away anything resembling rest, so he did everything he could to get away from them, any reminder of them. He kept himself so busy during the day that he scarcely had time to breathe, let alone think. When that didn’t work, he got up at the crack of dawn every morning to train, working himself to the bone so he would be too tired to dream come evening. When that failed, too…he started drinking.
…He started drinking more.
He couldn’t look the clerk, Yo-han, in the face either as he paid for the soju he was buying every night at the corner store (especially considering how much of it he bought). There was no hiding the truth behind it, no reason why one man —a goddamn priest— should be buying that much every night. That could only signify one thing.
The young man kept his thoughts on his local priest’s obvious habit to himself for the most part, but Hae-il could still feel his increasingly worried gaze as the days passed—
“Father Kim…” the shopkeeper finally whispered one evening, when it was more than clear that the priest did not have the money to support this habit…but he was going to dig through his wallet for change and keep at it anyway.
Hae-il did not lift his head, shame burning him alive (though it did nothing to change his actions).
“Are you…are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Hae-il bit out, reaching for a lie. He was taking it to some sort of event (four nights in a row and dressed like a bum as you are?), he was stocking up (with what money and again, how many nights in a row?) Hell, he even considered throwing Detective Gu directly under the bus and saying he was buying it for him…only for Father Lee’s voice to pop up in his head, admonishing him for daring to try and blame his own decisions on anyone but himself, least of all someone who had dragged him out of trouble multiple times over the course of the past weeks…
You’re a disgrace, a voice that sounded far more like his own hissed.
So he said nothing.
Yo-han clearly didn’t know what to do. He was standing there behind the counter, opening and closing his mouth like he wanted to say something else but couldn’t think of what to say any more than Hae-il could.
When he finally did speak, his voice was weak. “…I miss him, too…”
Hae-il blinked.
He thinks…I’m drinking because I miss Father Lee…
He let out a quiet breath.
If that were my only reason…I would not be in such bad shape.
Hae-il…saw something out of the corner of his eye just then. A shadow standing outside the window. An intense, jealous gaze. A scar slashed across a cheek…
It had him damn near panicking.
“Father Kim?!” Hae-il vaguely heard Yo-han squeak as he leapt away from that window, his heart pounding so hard in his ears it drowned out the ambient noise of the shop, his vision beginning to grow fuzzy….
There’s nothing there, he told himself sternly, staring with wide eyes at the empty window. You’re just…fucking wired. On edge. You’re fine.
But he wasn’t fine, he’d been seeing those shadows all damn day, couldn’t convince himself that he wasn’t out there, coming after him—
Calm down. You’ve only been intermittently freaking out about this for weeks and nothing has materialized. You've looked and found nothing. No one is coming after you. At least no one who actually scares you.
But I know him, I know what he's like. I know that jealous bastard will never let me go. It's a miracle I've hidden from him this long, but it's only a matter of time before he finally tracks me down and finds me. He's gonna find me, he's gonna—
Calm. The fuck. Down.
Slowly, the noise of the shop came back into his ears, leaving him with burning cheeks and an embarrassment so crushing, he could feel himself lose several centimeters off his height.
He said nothing more to Yo-han, simply grabbed his bag off the counter and got the hell out of there.
As soon as he was outside, he cracked open a bottle and drank straight from it.
*
“Fuck!” he let himself shout in a dingy back alleyway, his hood pulled up over his head so no one would recognize him, would think him just another one of those crazy homeless drunks (which he was only one bad move away from being).
“Fuck…” he whispered, his eyes stinging with tears as exhaustion hung heavy off his shoulders.
*
The nasty hangover he found himself with in the morning was not worth it in the slightest, seeing as he had not managed a single bit of rest, far too haunted by the past to even shut his eyes.
He couldn’t meet S—Father Han’s either, because the young priest knew what a hungover Hae-il looked like, and he couldn’t bear to see that bitter recognition on Father Han's beautiful face.
For fifteen years Hae-il had been letting Father Lee down with every sip of soju he drank, and now that Father Lee was dead, he had made that shameful shortcoming into someone else’s burden.
It was hilarious that he had ever thought he could be anything other than a burden to Han Seong-kyu.
*
“Soo…where does that leave us with the case?”
Hae-il cracked open his eyes, looking across the table at Detective Gu. To be perfectly honest, he had thought the man had fallen asleep sitting straight up. “My friend —the doctor you both met at the hospital— agreed to run Father Lee's DNA test for us. He’s coming to pick up the sample we got at the villa tomorrow.”
A visit Hae-il was very much not looking forward to, but that was another story
“Gooosh, that’s greeeaaat…” Detective Gu drawled, mostly asleep.
Hae-il glared at him from where he had his head resting on his arm. “Goodness, don’t overwhelm us with your enthusiasm.”
Across from him, Detective Seo sighed softly. “Father,” she began politely. “While we wait for the results…please take a rest.”
Hae-il choked down a wry snort, shutting his eyes.
As if he could.
“It’s all right—“ he started to say….
…only to hit the fucking ceiling when Detective Seo suddenly slammed both fists down on the table, letting out a frustrated shout.
“Why won’t you listen to me?!” she snapped, glowering at him where he now stood about five feet back from the table, the chair he’d knocked over in his haste to get up (to get away) lying on the ground in front of him. “You can’t keep going like this forever! You’ve already gotten hurt several times, we need you in one piece if we’re going to continue this fight!”
Taking a few slow, shuddering breaths to calm his racing heart (he was so fucking on edge, to hell with him getting hurt, he was going to end up hurting somebody else if he didn’t get a grip soon), he leveled her with what he hoped was an even look but probably wasn’t.
“She’s right,” Detective Gu muttered, still mostly asleep despite the disruption. “You should listen to her.”
I really, really wish I could, Hae-il thought bitterly, picking up the chair and sitting back down. I desperately need to sleep. But every time I shut my eyes…
He cut that thought off there.
*
It was two in the morning, and Hae-il was still not asleep.
He had tried…so hard not to drink that night…but then the shakes started, and he caved. Three bottles of soju deep, and while he had finally stopped trembling, he still felt no less wired and no closer to sleep.
So he did what a priest like him should do, and he prayed. He prayed and prayed and prayed…
More like he begged and begged for forgiveness, for mercy, though he knew he didn’t deserve either. The nightmares were his punishment for the things he had done…but he asked for mercy all the same.
I’ll take the nightmares about the blast, he pleaded. I understand that I have to live with those dreams…but please…please no more of…of those…
Nightmares of his time in combat absolutely did keep him up, disturb his sleep. He hated them, dreaded them like nothing else…save one thing. Those…dreams…
Dreams about…him.
His greatest source of shame, a truth that would never see the light of day, but a reality that was slowly eating him alive…
Please… he begged, his rosary wrapped tightly around his hands as he pressed his forehead against them, eyes screwed shut and a grimace on his face. Just one night. Just a part of a night. Just let me get some rest, please…
I’m sorry I kissed Father Han. This all started again after that, so this must be my punishment. I’m sorry I dragged him down like that. I shouldn’t have. I should never have let him get close enough to me to even consider it. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’ll never do it again, just please, I’m begging you…
I’m so tired, I can’t…I can’t keep going like this…
…Please make it stop…
He shuddered badly, so horribly cold.
And so disgustingly weak.
You don’t have to continue like this, Father Han is just down the hall— part of him urged.
He is, another spat back. And that’s none of your business.
He’s still your friend, your fellow priest and your provost as long as you’re here. There’s no shame in just going to talk to him—
This all started with ‘just talking’ late at night, and you know it. You’re just as bad as your parishioners at confession, begging for forgiveness and then changing nothing. You deserve this punishment, and you’ll take it alone.
It was three in the morning when Hae-il drank the rest of his fourth bottle of soju and tried again to get some sleep.
And failed.
*
Hae-il…
“Hae-il?”
The priest jerked awake, his head snapping up, having just half-fallen asleep at the table.
The doctor sat across from him, a drawn look on his face.
Hae-il cleared his throat, forcing himself to sit up straighter. “What were you saying?”
The doctor blinked. “…That I’m going to send the test to a junior of mine to run in his lab so the NIS won’t see what I’m doing. He owes me a favor.”
Hae-il hummed. “Good. How long will it take to get the results back?”
“Mmm, few days to a week.”
Hae-il’s eyes narrowed. “I want it back sooner than that.”
The doctor leveled him with an annoyed look. “That’s just how long it takes to run the test. I don’t know what to tell you.”
Too tired to argue, Hae-il let it go. “Fine, I’ll talk to you then.”
The irritation faded from the other man’s face, leaving nothing but sadness and his own kind of exhaustion in its wake.
Hae-il looked away.
He…did not want to be working with this man again. Unfortunately he had to. He needed the man’s skills as a medical examiner, his connections and rather rare talents as one who worked for the NIS. But that reality did not make sitting in the same room with him any easier.
You sold me out. You sat there and watched me drown—
He stopped himself. The last time he had really let himself think about that, he had beaten this man half to death. Even in the bar the night Hae-il first called him, when they both drank their weight in soju and hashed out a conversation that had needed to happen for fifteen years, he hadn’t really thought about it. Because really thinking about it drove him to violence.
You knew. You knew what he was and you just stood by and watched. It’s because of you that I’m like this, that I can’t sleep, that I get kept up by night terrors of—
Stop.
He scrubbed a hand over his face, wishing Sister Kim had not just walked in with tea for them right as he had been about to tell the doctor to get the hell out.
“You must know Father Kim very well…” the nun prompted as she set out their cups, once again trying to weasel information out of the doctor about Hae-il’s past, the same as she had been every time she saw him.
The doctor laughed, though the way he glanced at Hae-il and squirmed in his seat betrayed his discomfort. “Ah, kind of…”
“How long have you known him?” Sister Kim pressed, decidedly not looking at Hae-il.
The doctor, however, did not miss the look on Hae-il’s face, nor was he stupid enough to let anything slip.
“Oh, many years now…” he answered vaguely, turning away from her.
Sister Kim, however, had never been able to read body language. “‘Many years’ means you’ve known him a long time—“
Hae-il had had just about enough. “Sister,” he said flatly, his tone betraying his irritation.
Thankfully, she picked up on that. “Sorry, sorry, you know how curious I get…” she trailed off then, her own voice growing just the slightest bit uncomfortable.
Hae-il glanced across the table, and found the doctor staring at her intently.
“Forgive me, Sister…” he began, looking as if he had seen a ghost. “But have we met before?”
“Oh, no, certainly not,” Sister Kim answered far too quickly. “Not outside of the times you’ve met with Father Kim here...”
Liar, Hae-il thought, eyeing her just as intensely as she fidgeted.
“No,” the doctor murmured. “You definitely seem familiar.”
“I have a very ordinary face,” Sister Kim laughed, waving him off. “This tea is too hot for me to pour just now, so I’ll leave you to it.”
And with that, she scurried out of the room without another word.
Both men watched her go.
If that wasn’t out of character for someone so goddamn nosy.
“She…looks very familiar…” the doctor said again as the nun vanished around a corner. “Do you know what she did before she was a nun?”
“No, I don’t,” Hae-il answered, his voice sharp.
And even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you.
I still don’t really like her, but I like you even less.
The doctor flinched ever so slightly at his tone, staring down at the tablecloth. “…Hae-il…” he began, audibly biting off the endearment he used to tack onto the end of Hae-il’s name (the one Hae-il had since disallowed him from using, rejecting the familiarity).
The former soldier let out a breath. “What.” he growled.
“How…are you? Really.”
Hae-il stared at him for a drawn out moment. “…Get out.”
“Hae-il—“
“I’m exactly as you might expect,” he snapped, just barely reining in the volume of his voice. “Now go.”
Thankfully, without another word, the doctor complied, having long since learned not to test Hae-il’s ire.
Hae-il remained exactly where he was for a long time after the other man left, just….
…‘Regretting’ was the wrong word, because he had done nothing to destroy the friendship they once had….
Perhaps Hae-il should have felt bad for how he was blatantly using the doctor’s guilt over his roll in the end of their friendship to manipulate the man into doing what he wanted, sticking his neck out for him. Hae-il knew damn well the doctor would lose his job if he got caught doing what Hae-il had just asked him to do…
Maybe a part of him did feel bad, but in the face of the nights he spent dreaming about…him, and everything that had come to pass because of him…
No. Hae-il really couldn’t find it within himself to regret it at all. The doctor owed him, and Hae-il would collect on that.
*
People had used the somewhat gendered word ‘beautiful’ to describe him before. With the right makeup and a wig, Hae-il did pass as a woman quite well, so long as he didn’t have to speak for too long. It never bothered him, it was a disguise like any other, one he had actually preferred at times as an agent simply because no one looking for him was looking for a woman.
Similarly, no one watching out for a bad-tempered priest sticking his nose where it didn’t belong would look twice at a woman in a short skirt, on top of the mountain they had thrown Father Lee from or not.
(And he hadn’t really known what to do with Detective Gu, so covering him up as much as possible and hoping no one looked too close at the Middle Eastern man who was decidedly Korean in appearance was his best bet. Hae-il himself could pretend to be arm candy in that scenario and hopeful draw away any undue attention).
Yes, the whole plan was ridiculous, as both Detective Gu and Detective Seo repeatedly pointed out, but to be perfectly honest, Hae-il had picked the costumes he did because they were so ridiculous. If they were caught snooping around while looking for evidence of how Hwang Cheol-bum and his goons had taken Father Lee to that cliff, their outrageous appearance would almost serve to hide them in plain sight. Obviously they couldn’t look anything close to themselves, and dressing in black like they had before when they broke into the villa would only scream to any surveillance team that they were Up To Something Suspicious, never mind how badly they would stand out in black in the middle of the woods. But two absurdly out of place people stumbling about? No one up to no good would ever be that obvious.
...Simply put, thoroughly confusing his enemies had bought Hae-il enough time to get away many times before, both when he had been a solider and after it….and he and his exhausted mind really didn’t have any other ideas. So they went with it.
The woods on the slopes of that mountain were oddly quiet. Birds occasionally called out to each other, and Detective Gu insisted he saw some sort of creature that was apparently not supposed to be white, but otherwise….it was eerie. Hae-il hated every second of it.
And that was before they made it to the cliff.
That fall wouldn’t have killed him had he walked up to it uninjured, Hae-il thought darkly, casting his eyes over the area. After interrupting three of my four attempts on my own life, he would have known how much it takes to actually kill oneself. And this isn’t it.
Unfortunately, they didn’t get much further in their search than that before things somehow got worse from that sobering thought.
Ironic, considering Hae-il was not actually all that sober as he stood on that mountain in a dress.
As if one bottle of soju in his stomach could stand against the things that had been infiltrating his blood and poisoning his soul the last time he dressed like this…
To make a long story short, one of Hwang Cheol-bum’s goons masquerading as a worker from a development company chased them off public land, and they likely only got away as cleanly as they did because the man was far too busy staring at Hae-il’s body to remember how firm he was supposed to be with trespassers.
Of course Hae-il took advantage of that. Of course he stood in such a way that the tight dress rode up his thighs just a bit. That was the whole reason why he picked this disguise, so he could distract someone like this. Of course he let the man look…and felt like he was about a foot behind his body while he did it.
That feeling did not abate when they were off the mountain, sitting at a rickety table outside a food stand at the base of it, regrouping as they went over their findings of a whole lot of nothing. Hae-il had dropped his fake voice as they spoke, his efforts at pitching it two octaves higher than normal having made him a bit hoarse, but his much deeper voice that stood out against his very feminine appearance did nothing to dissuade the man two tables over from staring directly up Hae-il’s skirt (because the former soldier did not know how to sit properly in a chair on a good day, let alone on a bad one in a skirt).
Part of him enjoyed it. Men who would so shamelessly ogle a woman were also generally the kind of men who believed ‘homosexuals’ were an affront to nature, and the thought of how surprised and horrified they would be if he were to actually give them what they so clearly wanted typically entertained him to no end. But that day, that part of him was very, very quiet as the man’s greedy gaze made his skin crawl.
He crossed his legs and yanked his skirt down over his knee.
Hae-il knew that many people found him attractive. He had used that to his advantage in one way or another countless times as a special forces operative, dressed as a woman or not. Even as a civilian he ran into it all the time. Parishioners who didn’t know his name referred to him as ‘the handsome priest’ (and so did his friends and coworkers as a joke). He could feel eyes catch on him when he would walk down the street in the middle of the day (sometimes they would outright stare). Even Prosecutor Park had made several insinuations that she found him attractive (as much as that seemed to distress her).
The part of him that was a vain bastard loved the attention, craved it, but just as much of him —if not more— hated it.
People around him calling him handsome had him drawing his coat tighter around him, grateful for the loose cassock he normally had covering his body. Eyes catching on him in the street made him fiddle with his collar, a reminder that he was very, very off limits, and he had shouted at the prosecutor for her insinuations, berating her for having such thoughts about a priest.
As it stood…the only time in the last twenty years that he had had anything in the way of a positive reaction to someone commenting on his looks…had been when Father Han told him he was the most beautiful man he’d ever set eyes on.
He…didn’t know how to feel about that, so he just…didn’t.
And things...continued to go downhill from there.
*
Of course. Why on God’s green earth would he have thought that he would be able to rest that night? How silly of him.
Fuck…
Hae-il’s skin stung under his sleeves where he had scrubbed it raw in the shower, yet he still felt like he hadn’t bathed in days. He’d come down to the corner store to eat some food on the step outside, hoping the change of scenery and the brisk night air would calm his racing thoughts and make the dirty feeling fade from his skin.
It did help, if only a little. There were still far too many corners and alleys that Hae-il found himself scanning, looking over his shoulder whenever he heard someone enter or leave the store, but the cold air in his lungs did slow his overactive mind. And at that point, beyond strung out, he would take what he could get.
Just breathe, he told himself, sipping the broth from his microwave ramyeon. You’re fine. Everything’s fine.
But he wasn’t fine, his teeth were aching from how tightly he’d been clenching his jaw, his shoulders were beyond stiff from the tension he held in them, and he felt like he hadn’t drawn in a proper deep breath all day—
Stop. Calm down.
Easier said than done.
Maybe…maybe Father Han will sit outside with you for a little bit when you get back, just to talk. Just talking in public wouldn’t hurt anything. You could…use the time to update him on where the case is. Practical things.
Much as he wished to shout at that part of himself that still grasped for the young priest for relief from the hauntings of his mind…his resolve was rapidly crumbling.
Just practical things…
…Yeah. Yeah, that would help…
Okay… he thought, his heart beginning to slow. Okay…you’re fine. You’re gonna be fine…
Maybe he would have been, had he not started a squabble with none other than Prosecutor Park as she passed by.
To be perfectly honest, he wasn’t sure why he did it. He was sitting where he was the way he was to dissuade anyone from speaking to him. He had come for a snack and a bit of fresh air, and then he was going back to the rectory to attempt to chill the fuck out and actually get some sleep. Scratching at the prosecutor and instigating her to scratch right back at him accomplished precisely none of those goals…and made everything exponentially worse when she recognized his eyes.
Oh yes, she had gotten a real good look at his eyes —the only visible part of his face— when she caught him in the bedroom in Hwang Cheol-bum’s villa. As irritating as that error had been, he hadn’t thought much of it, doubting that she would remember a thing between the shock of running into intruders and getting knocked out by one of them, certainly not enough to recognize him. But whatever angle she had seen him in just now flipped a switch for her, and that very nearly ended in disaster as she walked right over to him and grabbed him by the front of his jacket, dragging him half out of his chair to get a better look at his face.
He just barely restrained himself from losing it.
Don’t touch me, he thought, twisting his own hands in the fabric of his coat to keep them contained as his vision began to dim and his skin crawled where her knuckles were touching his chest.
Don’t touch me, don’t touch me, don’t touch me—
Then she pressed a hand over his mouth and nose.
And, for a split second, his hearing went out.
Shut up, Hae-il ah, a horrid voice whispered from the depths of his memory. I’m just about done with your bullshit tonight.
He couldn’t breathe. That hand was pressing so tightly over his face that he couldn’t breathe, which meant he couldn’t scream either, and he wanted to scream. He could feel the scream building up in his chest but it couldn’t get out. He couldn’t get out.
Get off me. Get off me, get off me, don’t touch me, stop, STOP—
He wrenched himself away from the prosecutor then, tripping over his chair as he wrapped his coat tightly around him and got himself out of her reach.
Or, better said, got her out of his range.
Between the minuscule amount of sleep he had gotten over the course of five days, the events of that particular day and the content of the nightmares keeping him awake, his sanity (and therefore his control) was already hanging by a thread. He didn’t know how much more he could feasibly take before that thread snapped, and it would not be pretty if it did, so she could not be within his reach. No one could.
It had been ages since he had felt this out of control of himself. His temper was always something that lived just out of his reach, but his penchant for indiscriminate violence was something he had kept tightly under wraps since…
The intense feeling of panic only increased.
He…had never told Father Lee —or anyone for that matter— why he suddenly attempted suicide for a fourth time several years after being ordained. The truth was that something like this had happened before. Something had triggered night after night of the particular brand of nightmares that were troubling him now, sending him into a sleepless spiral of shame and self-loathing, leaving him at the point where he was going to hurt someone if he didn’t do something to make it stop, and he didn’t want to hurt someone, especially not as badly as he knew he would if he lost control then. So, out of options and truly in crisis, he had turned that violence on himself.
Calm down, he told himself, remembering Father Han’s sweet voice as he described the breathing exercises Father Lee had taught him to get over his fear of public speaking, his gentle smile, his kind eyes…
Just breathe. You’re fine, you’re not in danger.
Slowly, his hearing began to bleed back in, though the only thing he could hear was the sound of his own harsh breathing.
“What makes you think you can just t-touch a priest like that?!” he snapped at the prosecutor as she stared at him, trying his best to ignore how his voice shook. “What’s wrong with you?!”
She did not answer him, recognition clear in her eyes as she turned and wordlessly walked away, but that was the least of Hae-il’s worries.
I need to get out of here, he thought, all but fleeing.
It’ll be fine if I just get home…
*
It was not in fact fine once he got home.
Part of him had been hopeful when he stumbled into his room, his eyes already closing as five days of little sleep finally caught up with him. He fell face first on his bed, managing one desperate prayer that he sleep dreamlessly before he passed out cold.
At which point…an especially vivid nightmare began.
Or something of the sort.
*
The smell of artillery was stuck in his nose. His eyes still burned from the smoke that clung to his hair, every muscle in his body aching with exhaustion and overuse, yet he couldn’t rest, adrenaline still pumping far too hot in his blood. And there was really only one thing he could do about that.
There was a hard cot under his back and the cold air of the room bit into the bare skin of his chest and his lower half. A sick anticipation crawled across his limbs alongside a writhing impatience—
“Settle down, Hae-il ah.”
Hae-il gasped as a form settled between his bare thighs, leaning over him.
Ice cold eyes that could see straight through him, a livid scar slashed across a cheek…
“How are we going to do this tonight, Hae-il ah?” that voice drawled, making Hae-il shiver, and not in a good way. “Are you finally going to admit that you enjoy it? That you crave it? Or are you going to insist on pretending I’m making you?”
Hae-il’s breath caught in his throat, and he found he couldn’t speak as that body pressed down on top of him.
“It’s fine if you want to roleplay that, I’m just getting a little tired of you trying to pretend that’s what’s really happening.”
He made Hae-il so angry. No one else had ever made Hae-il so angry. He wanted to beat him to a pulp, rip him to pieces with his bare hands…
But he never did. Sick and twisted and cowardly as it was, no matter what this man did to him…he never did anything to stop him.
Indeed, he found himself always walking right back into his grasp.
Hae-il ignored the man’s words, reaching up to him even as he hated himself for doing it.
“Just…” he bit out.
The man grinned, hiking the soldier’s thighs up around his waist. “All you ever need to do is ask, Hae-il ah.”
He hated it. He hated the endearment, the familiarity. He hated the man’s touch on his skin, grit his teeth at the feeling of a cock pressing up inside him. It was far too dry, with only spit as lube, and it hurt, but it always hurt. This man —his commander— was never gentle with him, was never even remotely kind.
This man had…hurt him, really hurt him, held him down and…forced him…more than once…
He…he had forced him. Hae-il hadn’t wanted that. He hadn’t. Why would he have wanted that? Why would anyone have thought he wanted it when he had been screaming for it to stop…
But if that were true, why was he still there, asking for it now?
And why, despite everything…was it starting to feel…good?
*
Hae-il woke with a jolt, sitting bolt upright in bed as he gasped for breath…
As his back arched with the last shivers of…
…of orgasm.
The next thing he knew, he was on his knees in the bathroom, vomiting up his guts as he reached his limit.
No, he thought, choking on bile. I didn’t. I didn’t want it. I didn’t like it. I…I didn’t, I didn’t—
He vomited again as he shifted, feeling that horrid, cold, sticky sensation—
I didn’t…I didn’t…
I can’t, I can’t, I can’t…
I can’t do this. I can’t do this. I can’t take this anymore.
Every night for five days, that is what had been waking him up every hour he dared try to sleep. Sex dreams, wet dreams… featuring him. His former commander, the one whose name he couldn’t even think with a cold shiver running through him, the one who had hurt him —raped him— more times than he could count, who had put a gun in his face and made him throw that grenade on pain of death, who had gotten him hooked on drugs and kept him that way, who had ruined his life in every way a life can be ruined…
And the fact that he kept waking up either aroused or having…unwillingly gotten off despite that…
I didn’t… he thought, his breath rattling painfully in his chest. I didn’t like it. I didn’t want it like that…
Yes, you did, that horrible voice whispered back from those dark depths. You can’t lie. It’s obvious how much you liked it.
It was then, and it is now.
Hae-il couldn’t breathe at all, his lungs paralyzed by soul-crushing shame.
Shame that had once been powerful enough to drive him to suicide.
He had no idea how long he sat on the floor of that bathroom, rocking himself back and forth as he tried to talk himself down off that ledge again. He prayed and he prayed, he begged God for a forgiveness he did not deserve, pleaded for mercy from this….because he could not bear this…
“Thems that’s gone’s the lucky ones…” he whispered, the English words stuttering over his bile-stained lips. He’d heard a British soldier say that once. He hadn’t understood it at first, needing a moment to decipher the less than standard speech, but once he did…he found that the soldier…wasn’t wrong.
The ones who died are the ones we mourn, but it’s the ones who lived that truly need it. The dead are at peace —or at least out of the reach of memory— but the living would trade places with them in a second to escape the burden of the past. It is better to be dead than to have to face life with memories such as these.
Thems that’s gone’s the lucky ones.
Father Han’s room is just across the hall, a voice that sounded suspiciously like Father Lee’s pressed just as he truly began to spiral. Go to him.
And say what? he fired back, his arms tightening around his knees as his breath shuddered and caught in his throat, his face damp with tears. This shame will never see the light of day, I will never speak of this aloud.
You don’t have to. All you have to say is that you can’t sleep.
Hae-il buried his face into his knees and squeezed his eyes shut tight.
He’ll push me. He’ll try to get me to tell him why—
He might ask you, that’s true. But you know he won’t press you if you refuse to answer. He never has before, why would he now? You trusted him before with one secret. Has he not more than proven himself worthy of that trust? Why would you think differently of him now?
Hae-il pressed his face harder against the sharp points of his knees
He stalled for a while after that, showered (and scrubbed his skin raw again), dressed in fresh clothes (and shoved the dirty ones in the very bottom of his hamper which he then hid in his closet where no one would find it, ‘no one’ meaning Sister Kim, who kept trying to do his laundry for him despite his insistence that he was a grown ass man who could do it himself). Then he paced around his room, his arms folded tight over his chest as he told himself to man up, it was just a dream, go the fuck to sleep and deal with it, don’t bring Father Han into it…
In the end…he went to the young priest’s room, because he knew it had gotten bad enough that if he didn’t, he would do something he’d regret just to try and make it stop. And he didn’t want that. Not really.
He crept in as quietly as he could, telling himself that if the other priest was asleep, he would leave…or just lay down on the floor, even the proximity might help. He would try anything—
“Father Kim?”
He flinched, his eyes adjusting to the dim light of the room.
Father Han was indeed awake (or was now).
Shit…
Hae-il folded his arms even tighter over his chest and looked anywhere but at the young priest as shame and guilt had him hunching his back. “I’m sorry if I woke you…”
Father Han sat up, rubbing his eyes. “I wasn’t asleep yet,” he answered, a light smile on his face.
It grated on Hae-il’s skin that such a pure and beautiful thing could be trained on him, but at the same time, he basked in it…
“Nightmare?”
Hae-il yanked himself out of his thoughts, giving the other priest a short nod. “…I’m so tired…” he admitted. “But I can’t sleep. I can’t even rest...” He broke off, that shame clogging his throat for a moment. “I…know what we agreed on…but could I just sleep on your floor here? Just the company would help…”
He hoped.
The young priest gave him an unimpressed look, and Hae-il was just about to apologize for his assumption and flee…when Father Han pulled back the covers.
“Don’t be silly,” the young priest chided. “Your ribs are still healing. You can sleep up here...” He paused. “…Unless you’re uncomfortable, then I’ll sleep on the floor.”
Hae-il snorted.
Like hell.
He shouldn’t have done it given what they agreed. He was giving in to his own weakness by doing this and dragging another down with him at that…
But, desperate…he did it anyway.
“I’m a grown ass man—” he muttered, climbing under the covers and curling up with his back to Father Han, much as he wished he could dive into the other priest’s arms and stay there even as that horrid guilt and shame made him shiver. “—but I can’t sleep by myself without nightmares?” He scoffed.
I’m sorry, was what he couldn’t bring himself to say. I’m sorry I’m like this. I’m sorry I’ve become such a burden to you…
Father Han was quiet for a long, drawn out moment. “…I couldn’t sleep either,” he finally said.
Another moment, and Hae-il felt him shift, settling in at the far side of the bed.
Hae-il let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding.
*
Ya.
Hae-il ah.
You didn’t think you could hide from me forever, did you?
*
Hae-il’s eyes flew open as he awoke from the dream with a jolt, disoriented and panicked, unsure of where or when he was—
He’s gonna find me, he’s gonna find me, it's only a matter of time before he finds me—
…when a familiar scent reached his nose.
Seong-kyu…
He didn’t bother to correct himself as he gave in fully to his own weakness, rolling over and throwing an arm over the younger priest’s waist, burying his face in the back of his neck.
He’d apologize in the morning for stepping over the boundary they’d set, but for right now, he needed rest, he needed peace, comfort, security, all things out of his reach without this sweet, wonderful priest, and Hae-il was a bastard for taking it for himself, to hell with what happened to Seong-kyu—
His thoughts froze as a soft, warm hand settled over the hand Hae-il had twisted in the young priest’s sleep shirt over his belly.
Such a simple gesture…
Hae-il felt the tension leave his body, that blissful feeling of salvation settling back over him…
It’s okay…you’re okay….
They’re just dreams. It was just a nightmare…
Finally, finally…between the warmth of the body pressed up against his chest, the shape of someone under his arm, and the comforting scent that he was rapidly beginning to associate with the word ‘home’…he fell asleep.
And slept dreamlessly for the rest of the night.
*
“I…I’m sorry. I stepped over a line—“
“Stop.”
Hae-il looked up from where he still sat on Father Han’s bed.
The young priest was leaning against his desk, his arms crossed over his chest. “I missed you, too,” he said flatly. “I haven’t been sleeping either.”
Hae-il still looked away, feeling an embarrassed heat creep up his neck.
“You’re welcome here whenever you want,” Father Han finished, his tone leaving no room for argument. “As it stands, I might just end up sneaking into your room if it means I sleep through the night.”
For the first time in what felt like a long time, Hae-il smiled.
After a moment’s hesitation, the young priest stepped forward, curling his arms around Hae-il’s neck, hugging him.
Hae-il buried his face in the man’s shoulder and held him so tightly.
Thank you…he prayed. Thank you…
*
He wished he could say that fixed everything. It didn't. But...it helped. It really...really helped.