— epilogue —

   "renjun!"

   "renjun!"

   the said male opened his eyes to have chenle and jisung peering down at him. they both cracked up at renjun's startled face. "i can't believe you just slept through the whole thing," jisung laughed in disbelief. "two whole hours," chenle added, standing up from his seat, "can you believe that?"

   renjun looked down in his lap. there was popcorn on it?

   he looked up, noticing the big screen in front of him which was turned off. he was surrounded by rows and rows of soft cushioned seats. why am i at the movies? he thought.

   "honestly, i'm just glad renjun hyung was the one paying," chenle and jisung talked among themselves, collecting their things." "it's kind of sad that he missed it though, that was one heck of a movie," jisung sighed.

   the both suddenly turned to look at renjun, staring down at him since he was still sitting. "you're not still sleepy, are you?" jisung asked. renjun only blinked at them blankly. being unresponsive, the two younger males lost interest quickly. "i heard the stunts in that movie were all done without doubles, isn't that crazy?" chenle gushed excitedly.

   renjun tuned them out, but stood up, still confused as ever. they were the last ones in the cinema as the lights had already been turned on with all the seats evacuated. 

   he grabbed his jacket and almost entirely full bucket of popcorn and followed behind his friends. they threw away their trash and left overs and took seats in the lobby. "the others' movie should be ending about now," chenle checked the watch on his wrist. 

   who are 'the others'? renjun wondered, but didn't want to ask. he had a feeling chenle and jisung would only look at him strangely again.

   five minutes later mark, donghyuck, and jeno came into view, joining them. it had been years since he'd seen them all together. renjun only manged to weakly wave at them.

   "how was your movie?" chenle asked. "eh," donghyuck shrugged, eating leftover popcorn, "not as sad as the reviews said, but good enough." "yours?" jeno asked. chenle and jisung grinned, "it was awesome," the younger spoke first. "renjun hyung slept through the entire thing though," chenle didn't forget to mention, making everyone turn and look at renjun.

   "why so quiet?" mark asked him as if suddenly taking notice in his lack of speech. "just...," renjun looked at the concerned looks that he was recieving from his friends, "tired, i guess."

   "next weekend we should swap movies," jisung suggested. "we'll watch the angsty one while you guys watch the action one." everyone let out words of approval which had it decided. "will you be joining us or are you ditching us for another walk in the park next week?" jeno slipped in beside renjun as the group now walked out of the movie theatre together.

   "no," renjun shook his head, "i'll be there." jeno raised a brow, seemingly unconvinced. renjun exhaled, feeling like he was leaving a piece of him behind, "I think i've spent enough golden hours there. this is our senior year though, i wanna spend more time with you guys."

   jeno smiled at him, eyes disappearing and turning into cresents. "that's nice to hear,"he slipped his hand into renjun's, catching him off guard.

   renjun didn't pull away and acted naturally, but he knew he'd held someone else's hand countless times before in another setting—one that he was promising to never return to.

— the end —

this is the end of the book, and damn was it a long ass ride. i never realized how hard it is to write about a ship that you don't ship, but overall i'm glad i manged to do it (?) thank you for reading, voting, and/or commenting until now. every little bit of support motivated me to finish this. though the plot was no where near what i originally planned and i could honestly delete this with no bit of grief at any given moment, i hope you guys enjoyed this book!!

if you liked it and want to read more of my works, i currently have two ongoing markhyuck books and one completed markhyuck book. (teddy bear; markhyuck, never not; markhyuck, and scripted; markhyuck)

this book is originally dedicated to @pjmsimp95 but also check out her book 'double take' for more renmin ((it's better than my renmin book))

my final request is that everyone who made it to the end of the book leaves a comment here. even if you didn't comment the entire, a simple "." will do. ↬

i don't want to bore you guys with this outro, so i'll stop here. once again thank you for reading, even to my silent readers, i appreciate all the support!

you have reached the end of;

golden hour

renmin

∞

|completed|

✎ ---- dreaminghyuck⤾

finished ⌦ 062223