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It's weird.
Christmas season used to be one of Ricky's favorite times of the year.
He liked the way the city seemed much more livelier during this time of the year. He liked the way lights are strung around buildings making everything much more vibrant, the way shops are dressed up like they were embodying the holiday spirit itself. He liked walking longer routes just to pass by decorated streets, dressed in his carefully chosen outfit, layered to perfection to fight off the harsh cold that came with the warmth of the holiday. He liked the music everywhere, even the bad covers, even the Christmas songs he finds cringey and complains about, then catching himself humming it.
He liked traditions. Decorating even when no one asked him to, choosing gifts months in advance, then hiding them in the back of his closet, convincing himself that the effort and surprise mattered more than the gift itself. He liked the late nights and quiet mornings, waking up and seeing the world painted in white snow.
He liked Christmas.
Until suddenly, he didn’t.
Because along with all of those came with the reminders. The late nights wandering the street with Gyuvin beside him pointing and laughing at everything and nothing. Gyuvin singing along badly to the Christmas songs playing in shop speakers. The two of them decorating together while bickering on what should go where. Choosing gifts for each other months in advance, hiding them just to surprise the other, laughing at each other’s terrible taste. Stolen kisses in quiet corners of decorated malls, pretending no one could see them. And the way Gyuvin’s hand always found his and putting them inside the pocket of his coat, because Ricky always refused to wear gloves, saying it doesn't match with his outfit.
A year ago, Ricky didn't think Christmas could feel like this.
A year ago, he and Gyuvin ended things a week before Christmas.
A full year since a quiet conversation, side by side on a warm bed that they used to call theirs. A mutual understanding that the love they had, started to feel like something they were dragging instead of holding.
It’s been a year, Ricky tells himself he’s fine. He’s been telling himself that all year and most of the time it’s true. He adjusted. He means that, honestly.
January to November passes easily enough, he’s been working more, going out more, and meeting new people. He learned how to not look for Gyuvin in crowds, how to live without checking his phone every five minutes, and how to stop expecting a familiar name to light up his screen. He learned how to fold memories neatly and store them away where they wouldn’t cut him open every time he brushed past them. He learned how to live without reaching for what used to be there.
He learned how to move on.
Although, moving on didn't come all at once for him. It came in quiet, smaller moments. Like the first time he went an entire day without thinking of Gyuvin, the first time he woke up without instinctively reaching for the other side of the bed, and the first time his phone buzzed and he didn't feel that brief, humiliating spike of hope before checking the screen.
There were failures too. Moments he learned to smooth over and pretend didn't count. Ricky told himself that this was normal, that healing wasn't linear. Most days it worked, other days he believed himself it was fine even when it wasn’t.
He just didn't realize how much of that belief depended on the calendar.
Because apparently time doesn't care about progress.
December remembers for him.
He finds it in the smallest things. The way a stranger brushes past him humming something achingly familiar, the way the air feels cold and sharp, and the way his phone feels much heavier in his hand as Christmas inches closer. Every reminder drags him backward, through memories he didn’t ask for but can’t stop revisiting. Christmas drags everything back up.
Then suddenly it hits him, he's running through halls he shouldn't be, through rooms full of echoes, like every memory is a corridor he keeps running down, hoping to find the exit.
He tells himself he doesn’t miss Gyuvin, but as time ticks by it feels like a lie more and more.
Though, he doesn't miss Gyuvin the way people would usually miss someone gone from their life. Ricky thinks it's much deeper than that. He misses being known without effort, he misses the version of himself that existed when Gyuvin was there beside him, he misses the home they built together, the one that's still standing in his head, empty and the halls lingering with memories.
He walks past a store window displaying decorations he once would've lingered at, but this time he doesn’t stop, doesn't even bat an eye to it. He keeps his hands in his pocket and gazes forward.
Ricky pulls out his phone from his pocket and checks the time—11:57 PM. Three minutes before December 25th.
He hasn't heard from Gyuvin all year.
Good.
That’s what Ricky wanted. Thats what he needed. For space and silence. He spent months rebuilding himself piece by piece, convincing himself that this was better for the both of them. That they would grow more as people without clinging to something that was already wearing thin.
After all, it was Ricky who ended it. He was honest, painfully so. He was the one who told Gyuvin that they weren't the same anymore, that love wasn't always enough. That holding on would be much crueler than letting go.
So it's hypocritical—almost insulting even—that Ricky's standing here missing him, as if all those past months of him moving on meant nothing. It's pathetic, really. How a holiday he used to love has turned into nothing but reminders of the person he told himself he was better off without.
He wonders if this is punishment. Ricky thinks that maybe he's being punished for being brave enough to say it out loud. For choosing peace over persistence. For choosing to leave instead of staying and trying to fix whatever happened to them. For choosing himself.
There are days he's proud of the choice he made. Though, there are also nights where he questions if what he did was right. Nights like this make him question if pride and regret are just two sides of the same coin.
Missing Gyuvin feels like breaking a promise to himself. Like he's undoing the months of effort for a single emotion. And He hates that no matter how much sense the breakup made at that time, none of that logic matters when nostalgia hits him like a truck out of nowhere, and everywhere he looks he's reminded of Gyuvin.
Ricky stands there for a moment more, staring at the time on his phone. And just as soon the screen flashes 12 AM, he powers off his phone and puts it back in his pocket.
He lets out a long sigh.
He knows himself well enough to be honest about this. If Gyuvin calls, he won't be able to pretend he's okay. If he hears his voice, the walls he's carefully built all year would collapse.
So he hopes the call never comes.
He makes one quiet wish to no one in particular.
Let this season pass without reopening what barely healed. Let him keep the version of himself that learned to live without needing to lookback.
Merry Christmas, please don't call.
—
Gyuvin never really figured out how to be “fine”
He's functional, sure. He learned how to exist without falling apart in public, how to keep his voice steady when people asked casual questions about the breakup he doesn’t want to answer. From the outside, he probably looked like he moved on better than expected.
But “fine” was never really something that stuck.
Every now and then, he finds himself replaying the breakup more often than not. Gyuvin remembers sitting beside him, noticing the way Ricky's hands were steady on his lap. He remembers how Ricky spoke like someone who had already made peace with the ending long before he said it out loud.
It's strange to Gyuvin, even now, how Ricky could utter those words without second guessing himself. Strange, how three years of love, shared routines, and carefully built memories could be let go of so easily. Gyuvin doesn’t think that Ricky meant to make it feel disposable, but sometimes—especially times where he lays awake at night, trying to figure out where it all went wrong—that's how it felt. Like everything they had was heavy and Ricky simply chose to stop carrying it.
And as much as that hurt, Gyuvin never truly blamed him for it. He never hated Ricky for being able to say those words out loud, for choosing honesty over endurance—for choosing himself first. Gyuvin knew, just as much as Ricky did, that they were barely keeping the flame alive, pretending that it wasn’t already flickering.
Ricky didn't cry that time.
Gyuvin remembers realizing, at that moment, that arguing would've been pointless. Begging would have been cruel. He didn't beg Ricky to stay when he could feel how heavy staying had already become. If Ricky had already been grieving in silence then the kindest thing Gyuvin could do was not make it harder.
That was his final act of love.
To let go without resistance. To step quietly out of Ricky's life, even when every part of him wanted to stay. He swallowed the ache in his throat and let the silence settle between them like how the first snow quietly settles on the ground.
He never stopped missing Ricky after that. He just learned how to live with it.
Missing Ricky became something quiet and constant, like some background noise he never really noticed until everything around him went quiet. It followed him all throughout the year.
Christmas just makes that noise louder.
Gyuvin has always liked this season, but experiencing it without Ricky feels empty, Gyuvin feels like he's not really there, like he's watching something through glass.
Sometimes he wonders if Ricky feels it too. If his chest tightens at the same invisible reminder during this time of the year. If the lights and the music and the cold air pull at him the way it does to Gyuvin.
He remembers the way Ricky used to laugh whenever Gyuvin sang along to bad Christmas song covers, how Ricky would get excited over the smallest things—decorations, lights, anything that made the season feel brighter, their little tradition of gifting each other the ugliest little trinkets they could find. Most of all he remembers how Christmas used to feel warmer just because Ricky was there.
And maybe that's why Gyuvin never really learned how to move on.
But missing Ricky isn't painful all the time, most of the time it's even comforting.
It shows up when he passes a store window and instinctively thinks, ‘Ricky would like that’. When he’s ordering food and unconsciously adds Ricky’s favorite to the order, or when he gravitates toward anything strawberry flavored. It even shows up when he sees a cat pass by and chuckles to himself, thinking it looks a little like Ricky.
Months ago, without meaning to, Gyuvin bought a gift. He saw it in a store while strolling and reached for it before his mind could catch up. A pair of simple silver earrings, something he knew Ricky would wear. Gyuvin doesn’t even realize what he's done until it's paid for and he’s standing outside the store, bag in hand.
The sudden realization hits him embarrassingly hard.
He hides it in the back of his closet, behind clothes he doesn’t really wear anymore. He tells himself that it's just muscle memory, that buying something doesn't automatically mean giving it.
He never took it out again.
When December comes, Gyuvin doesn't try to numb himself to it. He decorates half-heartedly, strings lights without much care on how it looked. Bought himself something he thought he deserved for getting through the year. And a pat on the back for holding himself back from texting or calling.
He made a promise to himself and one final quiet promise to Ricky, a promise to not interfere with the life the other was trying to build without him.
But on this particular night, he feels himself close to breaking that promise.
Gyuvin holds his phone a little too tightly, thumb hovering over the call button of a very familiar number. He keeps trying to convince himself this is just another night, that Christmas is just another holiday among many others, that missing someone doesn't give him the right to reach out.
Yet, a thought keeps popping up in his head.
What if I call and Ricky picks up the phone?
The thought alone makes his chest tighten. He could imagine it so clearly, the sound of Ricky's voice answering the phone, familiar yet distant. A voice he hasn't heard for a year now. He wonders if calling would feel like walking back into a place he no longer belongs, tracing the outline of a home that only exists as a memory now. Gyuvin wonders if Ricky is lonely too. If the distance and silence feels heavier tonight than it has all year.
He doesn't want anything grand, he doesnt want to undo the past or rewrite their ending. He just want one chance to finally let out the truth he's been holding in his chest, to finally say the words he's swallowed for months, keeping it trapped in. But calling would mean breaking a promise, it would be selfish, it would mean risking everything he’s worked so hard to respect.
He glances at the time on top of his screen—11:59 PM. A minute before Christmas. And unfortunately, Gyuvin is a weak weak man. As soon as the clock hits 12 AM his finger betrays him by pressing the call button.
The familiar sight of Ricky’s number and contact photo appear in front of him. But before it could even ring, Gyuvin hangs up. He sets his phone down and lays back down, closing his eyes.
And just like that, Gyuvin lets Christmas pass with the words still trapped in his chest, waiting for the day they'll finally be let out.
Merry Christmas, I miss you.