Goodbye.

_{jongin had asked him once, what living forever was like. chanyeol remembers the moment clearly even after all these years, the same way he remembers a lot of things about jongin. they lay together amongst white, flawless sheets with chanyeol’s face pressed into the younger man’s chest. jongin’s breathing was steady and his heartbeat resonated within chanyeol’s own hollow body like a clock, ticking, ticking. immortality is forever. it’s watching those important to you wilt away year by year, decade by decade, like a flower in the winter. jongin wanted to die a human death, he didn’t want forever. and maybe chanyeol had resented him a little for it, had wanted him to stay for his own selfish reasons. forever is too much to promise anyone, but he wish jongin had.}

_{a century passes and chanyeol muses it over. “i’ve been with his ghost longer than i’d been with him when he was alive.” he laughs, loud, and broken. it never did get better.}

_{“you’ve become something like a ghost yourself, y’know,” baekhyun says, nonchalant. time, too, had stopped for him years ago. “but then again, maybe we all have.”}