#Phupha's been gone since the first time their eyes met

[lintunen]

ATOTS Rewatch 2022 - Day 3: ❤

He doesn't even know how to flirt

[burninglilys]

You are driven by your desires — the shaman had gravely told Phupha, as he held onto his palm tightly — you are confident but may become unempathetic on a gloomy day.

"You see this line?" the shaman had asked, shaking his head, pointing at a line on the center of his palm. "You see how straight it is? There are no rigid categories of right and wrong. Be sure to look at the grey areas in life, my boy. Not everything is black and white for you."

Nam had scoffed a little too loudly then, muttering something like see, I told you!

The shaman had touched the area where his thumb had ended, pressed down and said — you have no emotional connection to romance. Not yet anyway — in a blatant dismissal.

Phupha's eyes had found Torfun's eyes, then, who in turn had only smiled in return, her eyes dancing with something akin to amusement.

"You're just going to have to be careful," the shaman had said.

"Careful about what?"

The shaman had looked unimpressed, had pressed his lips in a thin line, and muttered quite seriously, "Someone is going to enter your life in bouts of hurricane. Nothing is going to be the same for you — you will thank them for that. You will love them for that. You will love them for showing you how to live. You will love them for everything that they are."

Phupha had been amused by this. "I will?"

"They will come and you will want them gone. They will stay and you will love them all the same. They will leave and you will find your heart leaving with them."

Phupha's amusement had died down then. He had never been the one for idle fantasies construed around words that were elicited by a mere touch of someone's palm on his. But this had seemed different.

"It will?" Phupha had asked in a moment of weakness.

"When you fall in love," he'd continued, oblivious to the turmoil in Phupha's heart, "you're going to fall deeper than what you imagine now. Do not allow yourself to be fearful of how ardently you'll want to be loved back. Do not hide from them. Your relationships have a potential to be restless, you see?" The shaman had tapped the starting of his heart line, underneath his middle finger. "Your relationship will last for a long time, though," he'd said, tracing his finger over his heart line.

"What then?" Phupha had asked, as though his future really did hold for him someone he is willing to give his heart for.

The shaman had looked disappointed then, had trailed a finger on his heart line pressed where it trailed off.

"It will depend on them," the shaman had said. "If you love them, you will want what is best for them. They will get to decide if they want to stay or leave. Not you — never you."

Phupha had nodded, entranced by the sincerity of the shaman's words, as though he could really be so consumed by love for someone, as though he could truly have that — have someone to return to, have someone to call his home.

All idle fantasies, Phupha told himself. Just because his palm showed the shaman things does not mean that they were true. There was no point in believing in those senseless dreams based on hopeless wishes he'd still had before. There was no point in hoping for someone who would love him just the same.

Then, he met Tian.

There was no point in hoping for love until a year later when his life revealed a cob-webbed space behind the camouflaged curtains that he'd thought of as previously non-existent — a space that Tian seemed to fit into, effortlessly, a space that had been Tian's ever since he lay his eyes on him.

Tian carried with him the winds of change, his presence cognate with all forces of nature, and Phupha felt his heart crawl out of his chest and sit atop of Tian, until all of him became consumed with Tian. Tian. Tian. Tian.

His heart screamed Tian's name when Phupha lay beside him, their little fingers touching. His heart screamed Tian's name when Phupha realised that all songs will, in fact, remind him of Tian. His heart screamed Tian's name every time Tian so much as looked, smiled in his direction. His heart whispered Tian's name — as continuous as the beat of a drum — when he found out. His heart thrummed Tian's name as he lay on the cold ground, blood oozing out of his shoulder.

Right now, when the room — their room, Phupha will maintain, even though Tian's leaving, even though he's staying here after Phupha had been cruel to him only to indulge Phupha — was enveloped by the hush of darkness, the distance between them an arm's length apart, Phupha is reminded of the words by the shaman, yet again. They will get to decide if they want to stay or leave. Not you — never you.

"Do you want to stay or leave?"

Phupha hears Tian's shuddering intake of breath, then the rustle of his clothes as he shifts to dangle his hand off of the bed. "Isn't it a little too late to ask that, chief? After you've asked me to leave only if I return the feelings you have for me?"

Phupha shifts closer to where Tian's hand is; he wants to twine their fingers together, wants to plant a kiss on the back of his palm all the way to his shoulder. He wants, wants, wants, to make Tian feel, even for a moment, just how consumed he feels.

Instead, he looks at the Tian — not that he can see any discernible features, barely a silhouette — and asks. "Would you want to stay here if it weren't for me?"

Tian is quiet, then.

"You must know," Phupha says, "all I want for you is to discover the life you want to live. For your sake. Not for mine, not for Torfun. Would you stay here if it weren't for me?"

"You must know," Tian counters. "I would follow you to the end of the world."

Phupha catches hold of Tian's hand then, weaving their fingers together. "What do you want for yourself, Tian?"

Tian's answer is brutal, honest. "You."

Phupha tries not to let his anxieties creep up on him, then — what if he were to not return home one day, would Tian have ruined his stable life in the city for nothing? — but this isn't about him. It's about Tian and what he wants.

"What life do you want to live then, Tian? Here, at the village, regardless of my presence, at the city or someplace entirely new?"

Tian is silent for a moment, then his answer — open, honest. "I don't know."

"It's okay," Phupha assures, shifting so he is almost at the edge of his mattress. "You don't have to know, now. You have time to figure out what you want. The village won't go anywhere. It will always be here for you."

"Will you?"

"Will I?"

"Will you go anywhere? Will you be here, then?"

In a bout of courage, Phupha presses a kiss on the tips of his fingers, hoping it conveys, I will be waiting for you till you figure out everything you need to. Even if it takes forever. Even if you decide that a life at the village is not what you want. Even if you decide that you could never come here, even to visit.

Tian sifts his palm so that his fingers are now splayed across Phupha's cheek, tracing shapes. Phupha plants a kiss to the centre of his palm, then at his heart line, all the while hoping that it translates to, do you know why the hornbill waits for its mate in the same place? Because it believes its mate is just lost, that it will come home when it finds its way back. I love you, Tian, do you know? I will be waiting like a hornbill waiting for its mate, even if you decide to never come back.

The repetitive shapes that Tian traces on his cheek don't cease to continue and Phupha finds his eyes grow heavy. His last thought before falling asleep is — I love you, Tian. Did you know? I love you. I would count a thousand stars and wish for only your happiness and safety. I love you.

("If you love them, you will want what is best for them. They will get to decide if they want to stay or leave. Not you — never you," the shaman had said.

"What if they leave?" Phupha had asked — he hadn't known where the questions were coming from; he barely believed in fortune foretellings. But there was something about the certainty in which the shaman carried himself, something that made Phupha was to unravel everything there was to know. What if they leave and I am the one waiting for them the way my mother waited for my father? What if they leave and I am left behind, only their memories keeping me alive?

The shaman had only looked pitifully in his direction, tapping the back of his palm to move to another one of his lines.)

The day is frigid and soaked in misery, when Tian leaves. Phupha can only look at the car in the distance, carrying his heart and soul, leaving him behind.

(The shaman, after reading everyone's palms, had found Phupha again. He had made Phupha splay his palm out, and had said, in a tone of gentle assurance, "They will find their way back home. One way or another.")

The day is warm, the sunlight golden and honey-hued the day Tian finds his way back home. Phupha can only hold Tian in his arms, then — can only shout I love you from the summit in his heart, can only whisper, "Welcome home," in his ears for it to also mean I love you.

"I am glad to find my way back home," Tian replies, and Phupha hears I love you too, interlaced with every word.

Phupha will say it out loud later, when they've both finished eating together — the first meal that they've shared in over three months. He will say it because stifling those words is no longer a possibility, he has been bursting at the seams. He will say it because even if it were, he will want Tian to know the enormity of his feelings. He will say it, and Tian will lean forward to capture their hands together. Tian will say, I love you too. I love you, so much.

For now, they entwine their fingers and make their way to the village that welcomes them as its own.