loml
Lost Of My Life
Ohyul’s POV
One thing about losing Ryul was that I could never truly leave him behind. Not really.
Because love like this did not disappear overnight. It stayed in the quiet corners of my life — in the coffee Ryul used to make too bitter, in the late-night songs we sang together, in the way I’m still reached for the other side of the bed before remembering no one was there anymore. Every memory lingered like perfume trapped inside old clothes; impossible to wash away no matter how many times I tried.
And the cruelest part was that none of those memories were bad.
Yes, we argued sometimes.
Ryul was stubborn, and I had this habit of shutting down when things became too overwhelming. There were slammed doors, exhausted silences, nights where we slept facing opposite directions. But somehow, we always found each other again. Always. One apology, one tired laugh, one gentle touch on the wrist, and suddenly the world felt right again.
That was what made it hurt so much now.
Because I kept replaying everything, searching for the exact moment it all slipped through my fingers. Like if I looked hard enough, maybe I could still fix it. Maybe there had been a warning hidden somewhere between our smiles and whispered “I love you(s).”
But there wasn’t.
There was only that night.
The night when Ryul snapped.
I still remembered the look in his eyes — not anger, not entirely. It was worse. Exhaustion. Months of bottled-up pain finally tearing its way out. Ryul’s voice cracked as he shouted, hands trembling, words spilling faster than he could take them back. I stood there frozen, unable to recognize the person in front of me.
And maybe Ryul didn’t recognize himself either.
Because the second silence fell between us, the damage was already done.
No dramatic goodbye followed. No final kiss. No movie-like ending. Just two of us standing in the ruins of something ours once believed would last forever.
Ryul left first.
I remembered hearing the door close softly behind me, and somehow that hurt more than if Ryul had slammed it. As if even at the end, Ryul still loved me enough to leave gently.
After that, everything became quieter. Too quiet.
Ryul tried to call at first.
Then text.
Then long paragraphs sent at 3 a.m. that I would just stare at for hours without replying to.
“I’m sorry.”
“I didn’t mean it.”
“Please talk to me.”
I read every single message until the words blurred together. I wanted to answer. God, I wished to. But every memory that once made me warm now cut into me like glass. Loving Ryul had once been the safest thing I knew; now it felt unbearable.
So I let the silence grow.
And Ryul eventually stopped reaching out.
That was the part I never got used to — the stopping. The way Ryul could go from being the center of my universe to a stranger I’m no longer spoke to. One day I knew every version of him, and the next day he was just… gone.
Still, even now, I caught myself missing him in embarrassing ways.
I missed Ryul’s sleepy morning voice.
The way Ryul always stole fries off my plate even after claiming he wasn’t hungry.
The tiny scar near his lip.
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The way he would pull me closer in crowded places without even thinking about it.
I hated that love could survive even after destruction.
Years passed anyway.
Time kept moving with or without him. Cities changed. Friends disappeared into adulthood. The songs once we loved became old enough to feel nostalgic. And somehow, despite everything, I learned how to live around the ache instead of through it.
But some losses never fully leave the body. They just settle quietly inside me.
Years later, the air smelled like September — crisp and clean with a bite. I was inside a bookstore I never meant to visit, in a city I’m no longer called mine. I wandered between shelves absentmindedly, fingertips brushing against worn spines, trying to ignore the loneliness that always seemed louder in unfamiliar places.
And then I felt it.
That strange, weightless shift in gravity.
I looked up.
And there he was. Ryul.
Still tall. Still ridiculous in that same denim jacket he once swore he would retire after college. Still undeniably Ryul. Looking more mature.
But quieter now. Softer around the edges. Older in the way people become after surviving things we never talk about. His smile was smaller than the way I remembered, more hesitant, like he no longer expected good things to stay.
Time had not stopped for either of us.
But something inside me did.
Ryul noticed me almost immediately.
For a second, neither of us moved. I wondered if Ryul was seeing the same thing I was — every version of us layered on top of each other. The way we used to be. The lovers we almost became forever. The strangers we forced ourselves into becoming.
Ryul walked toward me slowly, like he wasn’t entirely sure that I was real.
“Hey,” he said softly. His voice carried uncertainty now, fragile around the edges, as though the word itself might shatter between us.
I swallowed. “Hey.”
Silence settled after that, heavy but not cruel.
Ryul let out a small laugh, barely there. “Of all places.”
I looked at him for a moment before answering quietly, “Of all people.”
“Happy birthday, Ryul…” I said spontaneously.
“Do you still remember?” Ryul answered.
“Of course.” Ohyul sighed.
“Thank you,” Ryul smiled a bit.
We stood there with a galaxy between us, years of hurt and silence stretching wide — and yet somehow still orbiting the same thing.
I didn’t know if this was forgiveness.
I didn’t know if this was closure.
Maybe some loves were never meant to end cleanly. Maybe we simply changed shape and followed us forever.
But standing there beneath the warm bookstore lights, looking at the boy he once built his whole future around, I understood one thing with terrifying clarity:
Ryul had been the love of my life.
Not perfect. Not gentle all the time.
Not forever. But real in the way that mattered.
And even if us never found our way back to each other again, in this one strange moment, after all the years and all the silence — Ryul was here. And I was too.
