Lucifer | Woosan

26: "Dead or Alive" (Wooyoung)

November 3, 2020

Wooyoung POV:

Falling asleep has never been a problem for me.

My whole life, tired or not I'd almost always fall asleep effortlessly. To the younger Wooyoung, it felt like a curse, especially during the sleepovers with Yeosang and Changbin. They'd stay up all night having the time of their lives- while I'd be fully knocked out by 11 p.m. at the latest.

Now all I want is the "curse" back, because falling asleep had reached a level of difficulty far too high for me to attempt.

I have too much to think about now- which had never been the case before either. Everything had always been simply the way it was. What I knew was all that was important, and all that was important was what I knew.

But now, there's too much I don't know, too much I'm not aware of- and I'd only been conscious of the revelation for so long. It drives me nuts, the fact that I'm questioning things I'd always firmly believed were undisputable- the one and only solid truth. Things I believed I'd give my life for, sacrifice myself if it meant not giving it up.

All because I met a guy.

And I'd kissed him. Kissed a boy.

"Kissing is wrong, boys and girls. It's dirty to give your body like that to someone you're not bonded with eternally through marriage"- we'd been told. You're only allowed to kiss when the preacher says you may kiss your bride. You're only allowed to hold hands and hug after marriage.

Kissing someone as an unmarried teenager? You're on the way to becoming a prostitute, a lost whore.

Kissing a boy? Same sex love was barely ever talked about in the church- it was a topic for the adults, something too serious for children to hear. Most of us had heard of it once or twice, but that was it.

And I'd never even thought about it to myself before I'd met him. Didn't think it was even possible to like a boy that way.

It had all come naturally yesterday, like an instinct. As if feeling his lips against mine was something I'd known for an eternity. It felt so right, so impossibly satisfying.

What I feel around Choi San is what I imagine being drunk must feel like. Around him, I lose all common sense. I want and I need more and more, I desire him too much. Everything about him is addicting, and he's pulling me down with him slowly- but he makes the downfall seem so sweet, so devilishly enticing.

Screw it, I'm going for a walk. It's 4:00 a.m.- only two hours left before my alarm rings anyway. I doubt I'd be able to fall asleep before that and even if I do, two hours of sleep just isn't worth it.

Not even twenty-four hours after my last try to sneak out without permission. If I've mastered it the way I think I did, I should be fine.

My sock-clad feet glide soundlessly across the laminated floor as I successfully make it out of my room and through the corridor. At least I don't have to share a room with both of my sisters anymore. Jeongyeon is a light sleeper and the memories of the nightly tantrums she would throw all because I'd needed to use the bathroom or cough were still vividly implanted in my mind.

Make it past my sisters' room, past my parents', and then it's the stairs. As long as the twenty-second one doesn't creak like I learned it sometimes decides to out of the blue, I just might manage.

And indeed, luck is on my side today. I let out a quiet sigh of relief as my feet hit the bottom step and then the floor.

Now it's to the kitchen. All the adrenaline and spontaneity of it had gotten me excited for something as simple as a morning walk in the woods- except for me it isn't all that simple. It's something I'd wished to do ever since I could remember, and now I'm about to go out the same way I'd always imagined- it's still dark outside, morning stars dotting the sky, and the air must be cool and crisp, the birds just beginning to wake.