hi there!

this epilogue is kinda special: Jisung narrates these next two parts

the first one takes place directly after Minho becomes a vampire, and the second one is Chapter 2 told from Jisung's POV.

and yes.... i have written all of Daybreak from Jisung's POV. comment if you want me to post it, and maybe i'll do that once my batteries have recharged

hope you like them~

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~ Part 1 ~

The clouds curled back in the wind, and a ray of sunshine reached toward the ground, gripping the hemlocks in honeyed light.

Minho stepped into the sun, chin tipped up, and his face — his perfect caramel skin — shone. His lips, smeared red with blood, twisted up into a smile.

I sidled up next to him and touched his arm. He turned to me. His eyes were vibrant red, blood dripping from his chin, and now this — sparkling like a vampire. My love was a vampire.

I should have spiralled. I knew I should have. My humanity, my soul, my redemption — now the same creature as I was. I had fallen in love with him because of his flesh and blood, his warmth and soft edges — I should have felt like I'd lost him.

His dark lashes fluttered. "What? Am I dribbling?" He licked his lips.

I hadn't lost him. He moved differently, his heart now sat idle, his skin no longer burning hot to the touch. But he was Minho. Death couldn't steal his humanity. Death couldn't steal him from me.

I pulled my sleeve over my hand and wiped the blood off his face.

"You're shiny," I said.

"It kinda tickles," he smiled.

"Are you still thirsty?"

"Yeah, actually. But I don't want something big. It feels..." He folded his arms over his stomach. "Sloshy."

"Now I wanna shake you around."

"Don't — seriously, I might throw up." His eyebrows lowered. "Can vampires throw up?"

"No. You could do a handstand until it—"

"I have a feeling whatever you're about to say is gross, so I'm gonna stop you right there."

I smiled and stepped closer, cupped his face in my hands. "It's weird at first. It'll get better."

His arms looped around my back and tugged me closer. I stumbled forward into him. Either he hadn't yet realized he was so much stronger than me, or he was deliberately throwing me around like a rag doll.

"It couldn't possibly get better, Jisungie," he said.

I let my head rest on his shoulder, cuddling into his arms. The same arms I knew, I loved — that I would love for the rest of eternity.

~ Part 2 ~

I stared down at the food in front of me. It was a bagel. Why couldn't bagels just be toast? Why make them round? And with a hole in the middle. It's impossible to eat the absence of something — not that I would be eating it anyway.

Till next time, brothers, Felix thought, giving each of us a wink. He stood and walked away, emptied his tray into the garbage can and left the cafeteria. He had to get to his class early; every day he sliced a little more off one of the legs of each chair in his classroom, and then watched, giggling, as the other students wobbled slightly for an hour.

Dr. Bang's kids.

I looked up when I heard Chan's name. It was a reflex — one I hadn't kicked, though I'd been alive like this for around a century. I could hear everyone's thoughts, all the time, and it was exactly as grinding and awkward and useful as one would think.

Jessica Stanley was the one who thought it — across the room, sitting at her usual table. I looked up at her for a second before my eyes flitted to the boy next to her. The new one, the one everybody was thinking about.

Minho Lee.

Our eyes met, but I looked away — fast.

His face stayed with me as I pretended to consider the cracks in the walls. Dark eyes, pouty lips, golden-brown hair. Harrumph. He was beautiful. More beautiful than I liked anybody who didn't have the vampire excuse to be. The jealousy that leaked into my mind was not surprising. The seven deadly sins were a to-do list for me.

I turned my attention to Minho's thoughts. For newcomers (not that there were many — Forks was like dead water) thinking about us and our alienness was natural.

But I couldn't hear anything. I heard Jessica next to him, Mike on his other side, the rest of the people at the table, the rest of the students in the cafeteria, the rest of the residents of Forks — but not him. Why not him? Why?!

It was a moment before I remembered I could hear their real-world conversation — distracted as I was. I didn't often have to stoop to eavesdropping. I shook my head and focussed.

"They don't look related," Minho said. His voice was a quiet tenor.

"No," Jessica replied. "They're foster children, because the doctor and his... you know." She widened her eyes, lips folded into her mouth. I didn't know quite what to do with that.

Minho didn't reply — he was staring at us again. Examining us. I looked up and met his eyes. My head tilted without my permission. I knew I must have seemed very curious to him, because I was.

Then he smiled, and it was like the corners of his mouth were attached to mine; I smiled back without thought.

He looked down, the tops of his ears pink. I heard him ask, "Who's the one with black hair? Um, the one in the flannel?"

"That's Jisung," Jessica answered him. "He never speaks to anyone — except his brothers. Never dates, either, so too bad for the girls here, I guess."

Jessica's cluelessness made me smile.

I knew he was looking at me, but I didn't meet his eyes. His very, very, very pretty eyes. I stared at my dumb bagel and wondered what he was thinking.

Seungmin kicked the leg of my chair.

Dude, stop making cow eyes, he thought.

I wanted to bluster, but I kept my mouth shut.

Is the new guy thinking about us? Changbin asked. He didn't stir, didn't lift his head or look at me, as he thought the question.

I shrugged my shoulders, just a little.

You don't know? Can't you hear him?

I moved my head to the left, to the right — slowly, inconspicuously.

Has that ever happened before?

Another subtle no.

Haseong'll wanna hear about this. Do you think Felix will be able to see him?

I didn't answer. I was swimming around in Minho's head. If I focussed, if I blocked everyone else out, the unending talking-talking-talking in my head dulled. I usually couldn't escape the noise unless I was alone — out in the forest, miles away from humans, where the wind and the ocean were all I could hear. Years, decades, a century of layered, grating tinnitus, and I'd never found peace.

Till now. I stared at the table and revelled in his silence.

Jisung, let's go.

Lunch was over — I hadn't noticed. A quick glance told me Minho was still staring at us. I didn't let myself stare back.

The five of us got up and walked across the cafeteria, single-filed out into the rain — not really sure where we were going, only that we could speak freely now.

"Felix is gonna want to know about this, too," Changbin said.

"Know about what?" Jeongin asked.

"Jisung can't hear the new guy's head."

"Felix probably already knows," Seungmin said. He pulled out an empty binder and held it over his head as an umbrella. I ducked under it with him. "As long as the new guy's a human, Felix'll be able to see him."

"We should make sure," said Changbin. "We need to be proactive. Minho Lee could be a Volturi spy, for all we know."

We pushed through the door to Building 2. Felix was there, laying on the floor, grating off the leg of a chair with a nail file.

"Sorry, boys," he said without turning to us. "I can see Minho. He's gonna have breakfast for dinner, read Harry Potter and cry himself to sleep."

Something about that — about Minho crying — made me uneasy. I leaned against the wall, against the anti-drug advert, and scanned the perimeter for teachers.

"Any idea why Jisung can't hear him?" Jeongin asked Felix.

"None."

"Do you think it could be a problem for us?"

"I mean, we'll have to check with bossman, but I don't think so. Not unless Minho gets suspicious about us. Did he seem suspicious, Jisungie?"

"'Suspicious' is a bit much," I said. "He looked kind of curious."

"Well, you were staring at him with your mouth hanging open," said Seungmin.

"I'm, like, seventy-five percent sure my mouth was closed."

"It must have been nice," Felix said to me. "To get a break from the voices, huh?"

I nodded at the floor. "Yeah. It was."

"And Minho is cute," said Hyunjin, smiling at me.

"I guess so," I muttered. "I didn't really notice."

"Someone unplug the smoke alarm — Jisung's pants are literally on fire."

I fake-laughed, and it echoed in the empty classroom. They all saw through it — every single one of them. They were grinning as I stomped out of the building like a crotchety toddler. I didn't bother to say goodbye; we would no doubt spend the whole evening together, discussing the aberration that was Minho Lee.

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i'm sorry for expecting you to read 27 chapters of Minho's narration and then suddenly switch to Jisung. i just thought it might be kinda cute to post them, plus a little promo for "Nightfall" 😗

still one epilogue to go! thank you for reading.

 see you then <3