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When Till is five years old, his world shifts on its axis.
He falls out of a tree. Someone calls for an adult. Till is dazed and his arm hurts like hell, but he’s not dead.
I’m not dead, Till thinks, equal parts nauseous and bewildered. It is with a sputter that he sits up. He is bundled into a stranger’s arms with a cough. He is rushed off to an emergency care center. Not a laboratory. Not a cell. They run diagnostic tests on him without strapping him down to a single table.
The experience is about as pleasant as it can be.
Till’s mind has always been crowded, but not like this. Information about the body he inhabits comes to him in bits and pieces.
Apparently, his mother’s name is Kayla. His father is Miles. He has a younger sister named Jen. When he looks at them, his brain says family.
When Till is released from the dinner table, he stares at the turquoise tape wrapped around his cast; apparently, this is his favorite color. Next, he glances at the mirror in the corner of the room. His face is free of bruises, but it looks much the same way it did when the segyeins put him on the market.
His voice sounds the same. He tests out a chord progression. Jen claps, amused by the free entertainment.
Till doesn’t know any lullabies. He makes one up on the spot.
It is like this, with confusion in his heart and music in his soul, that he commits himself to learning more about the situation he has found himself in.
Vaguely, Till remembered learning about Earth.
Put more accurately, he remembered Ivan talking to him about Earth, about its long-dead cultures and countries. Ivan had been particularly fond of their travel systems, especially trains. The sky there wasn’t simulated. The grass there grew out of the dirt rather than tubing placed in low elevation grid systems.
At long last, Till pays attention in class. It’s difficult to reconcile the memories of tragedy with the peaceful suburb he lives in, where his neighbors wave to him as he walks down the street and half a dozen children tug on his arms to ask if he wants to play after class lets out.
He accepts, appreciating the sense of community. If this place is to be his new home, so be it.
His friends and family adopt the nickname he insists upon without questioning it much. His parents buy him a guitar and a keyboard when he asks them to; they can afford the expense. They are delighted by Till’s sudden interest in music.
His fingers are small and clumsy, but he remembers what to do well enough.
Till’s lackluster compositions win awards, but he refuses to show his parents the disturbing things he draws late at night when he can’t sleep, unsure if this world or that one is real.
Over time, Till becomes accustomed to peace. To true childhood. His own had been rife with violence, plasters tacky on his arms following hours of experiments.
There’s only one thing missing.
Did Ivan also come here after he died?
Ivan died before him. It was entirely possible that he could be an adult. Curious, Till searches the web for the world population; there are almost eight billion people alive.
It’s an overwhelming number, too high to fathom.
He closes the browser window.
Determined to take advantage of the opportunity he has been given, Till channels his concerns, frustrations, and memories into his music.
By the time he’s eleven, he has released a number of tracks and made a fair bit of money, even as an underground, underaged artist. However, mandatory education is a necessary evil. He won’t be able to commit himself to music full-time for a few more years, but he finds that he doesn’t mind. Learning is fun. He finally understands why Ivan liked it so much.
Some days, Till does a fantastic job of forgetting about Anakt Garden. On others, he fails.
Today, it’s the latter. A head of dyed-pink hair steals his breath away. Till would know this face and these amber eyes anywhere, but Mizi looks exactly the way she does in the drawings he has hidden in the closet: short, small, and bright.
The teacher is about to introduce her when Till stands up. Startled, everyone stares at him. Flustered, Till runs to the nurse’s office. He would look spectacularly insane if he called out a name that didn’t belong to her, superimposing another girl’s image over a lookalike. A manic smile graces his lips as he slumps to the floor.
Till was certain he had given up hope. He stopped looking in crowds for the faces of old friends. He stopped wishing, wanting, begging a particular nuisance to appear, murmuring his name over and over again like a prayer.
Now, this.
“Shit,” Till whispers. He feels insignificant. If Mizi was here, Sua had to be. And if that was the case…
Stop it right now. He’s setting himself up for failure and he knows it.
By the time he returns to class, they have moved on to arithmetic. Till ignores the giggles and the pointing.
Never before has Till taken the initiative when it comes to Mizi, but there’s a first time for everything. He feels bad for following her out of the building, but he promises himself he’ll never speak to her again if his gut instinct turns out to be wrong.
“Feel free to ignore this if I sound crazy,” Till whispers, voice hoarse, “but have we met before?”
Thankfully, recognition dawns. Till wonders if talking to her unlocked something in Mizi’s brain. He files that information away for safekeeping, throat tightening when Mizi starts crying. “Till?”
“Yeah.” Tears well up on his lashes in kind. “Yeah, Mizi, it’s me.”
They drop their bags to hug each other fiercely. They have so much to say, yet they can say nothing at all, clinging to each other’s shoulders as they sob.
The waterworks subside after a few minutes, leaving them snotty. Till digs in his bag for tissues—it’s an old habit, a holdover from the days when he got into fights all the time.
“Have you found anyone else?” Till shakes his head. Mizi smiles bitterly, patting him on the shoulder. “That’s okay. I’m glad you’re here.”
“Me too, Mizi. I missed you so much.”
“I missed you too, Till.”
He knows this to be true, even though Mizi only recalled their past lives five minutes ago. They make a promise to talk more tomorrow. Thus, it is with red-rimmed eyes that Till goes home.
Sua appears two years later. Her memory comes back to her in bits and pieces. Mizi doesn’t mind. She would wait a lifetime for Sua. She already has.
Till attempts to pull away to grant them space. He is not so stupid as to play pining third wheel to them again.
Mizi will hear nothing of it. The fact that they have gathered again and that they’re all alive is miraculous. Shy of crashing their dates and their openly announced alone time, he has a standing invitation. Mizi gasps when Till blushes, hiding his face, because, “We’re only thirteen, Till, jeez.”
This time, Sua is a little nicer to him. Till can’t help wondering if part of the reason she was so cranky is because Ivan was such an enormous pain in the ass and the two of them came in a set. Probably, is the answer to that, but Till doesn’t have the courage to ask.
At this point, thinking about Ivan hurts.
Ivan was the first person Till actively spent time with. Rather, Ivan sought him out. Till had been well aware of his own abrasive personality. Worse—he often got put in isolation for acting out. Thus, he wasn’t hated, but he wasn’t particularly well liked either.
Till can’t help wondering if Ivan’s absence is karmic retribution for his inability to understand his best friend.
In ninth grade, Sua says, “Why don’t you audition for a talent show?”
He lifts an eyebrow.
There is trauma associated with brackets and votes, of course, but in this world, there is no immediate danger associated with these types of competitions. At worst, losing would bruise his ego.
“I’m not against it, I guess,” Till says, picking at his slacks. “Why, though?”
“Exposure. It will give Ivan a better chance to see you and figure out who you are if he’s here.”
She makes a good point. So, Till asks his mother for permission. They invest in a ring light and a stand for his phone. He records his interview and a sample. He gets in.
Till remembers staring at the glowing blue PASS in rapture. He remembers thinking, I finally have a chance to prove myself. This will make her look at me for sure.
He never imagined he would have similar thoughts about Ivan. Ivan, who never looked away, not once, even when Till betrayed his trust and turned around.
“Shithead,” Till whispers, pencil scraping over paper. He can never seem to get Ivan’s nose or his eyes right, only his hair and the vague shape of his face. “Why aren’t you here?”
Till introduces himself using his stage name. The tech nods, whispering something into a headset for the announcer’s benefit.
He opted not to bring his guitar, relying solely on his voice. After all, he wasn’t playing an instrument the last time he saw Ivan.
It feels strange to sing this song as a solo rather than a duet. It probably isn’t bombastic enough to push him through, but he doesn’t care.
He has always found it easiest to imagine that he’s singing to one person. For one person.
Till tunes out the harsh glare of the lights, the stares of the audience and the judges. He bellows, struggling not to cry on national television as he spills his heart into the microphone.
He is so dazed that the thunderous applause doesn’t register. Till sweats out of his skin as the pedantic chatter roles in, as scores are doled out.
An 8.75 is higher than he expects.
It is one of the highest scores in the preliminaries.
Till has never been much for social media, content to let his mother do whatever she wants with his name since he is, technically, a minor.
If he was notable in certain circles before, when the majority of his audience came from random clicks on suggested videos, he comes close to achieving household fame as the competition drags on. He stands out as someone who writes his own music, ranging from truncated rock operas to ballads.
He places second overall. It’s a standing to be proud of. The audience takes offense to his loss. In the weeks following the televised announcement, a fervent fanbase is culminated.
Till, for his part, is disgruntled about having to catch up on so much schoolwork. Mizi has never been especially academic, so they both have to rely on Sua, dodging the girls flitting around angling for Till’s autograph.
“Shoo,” Sua says, pointing to the sign overhead. “We’re in the library. Can’t you read?”
Dejected, they leave, grumbling about her under their breath. Mizi is usually laid-back, but the shit-talk has her rolling up her sleeves, ready to kick ass.
“It’s fine,” Sua assures her, smiling fondly. “I don’t care. These things happen when you brush elbows with celebrities.”
Pink dusts Till’s cheeks. “Quit it. It’s not that serious.”
“It could be,” someone else chimes in.
Till stops breathing. In slow-motion, he turns to look at the person who spoke.
He’s pale. Dark haired. Dark eyed. Sleek.
“Ivan,” Till rasps.
A thick eyebrow lifts. “I don’t know what I did to catch the resident heartthrob’s attention, but yes. That is my name.”
Definitely Ivan. Never before has Till be so grateful for the sting of irritation in his throat.
On wobbly legs, he pulls up the chair next to Ivan. He doesn’t know how long it’s going to take for Ivan to regain his memories, but Till is willing to wait. Minutes, hours, days, years.
“This is temporary,” Till insists, waving off the backhanded compliment. “They’re gonna forget about all this soon. Besides, it’s not like anyone has ever confessed to me.”
His signature snaggletooth has been somewhat corrected with braces, but his bright white smile stands out all the same, canines oddly sharp. “Woe is you. Being wanted for your talents rather than your looks…how pitiful.”
Till elbows him. “Jerk.”
The responding chortle drifts into Till’s ears.
Mizi is the one to ask if Ivan will help them study. Ivan is egotistical enough to assume his reputation has spoken for him; he is one of the top performers in the school, after all. Perhaps the top performer. Till wouldn’t be surprised to see Ivan turn out to be the valedictorian of his class, placed a grade above the rest of them.
Sua helps Mizi. Ivan helps Till. On occasion, Sua gets stuck. Ivan explains things in his droll, holier-than-thou tone, earning her ire in a matter of minutes.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Ivan integrates seamlessly, with or without his memories. He teases Sua like his life depends on it. He shares casual, uninterested physicality with Mizi, treating her like a younger sister.
With Till, well. Ivan isn’t clingy anymore. It’s understandable. They didn’t grow up together.
Someone else was Ivan’s first friend. Ivan would have modeled his plastic smile after their grin, gotten into playground fights with them over inconsequential things.
The idea that Ivan wouldn’t like him this time around never occurred to Till.
He wakes up in a cold sweat, shaking off a nightmare of Ivan’s rain-drenched corpse rising from a bloody platform to say, “The past should stay in the past.”
Till punches his pillow. He can’t accept that.
He has never been the type of person to put faith in a higher power, but he can’t dismiss the whispers of fate. He assumed he would have to travel the world to find Ivan, but Ivan had basically fallen into his lap.
He contents himself with what-ifs. On occasion, Ivan looks at him, through him, in a way that speaks to experience beyond his seventeen years, but Till doesn’t know Ivan well enough to determine if he’s jumping to convenient conclusions.
It is Till’s turn to observe.
As expected, Ivan is popular. He speaks with a smile, voice even-keel. He’s tall. Well-groomed. Intelligent. His hairstyle isn’t particularly trendy, but then, he’s young. Till has gone through an awkward phase or two himself.
He doesn’t hover over Till’s shoulder, pestering him about the songs he’s working on. Not that he could even if he wanted to—it would be odd for Ivan to walk into Till’s classroom and assert himself like that.
Regardless, he comes whenever Till calls. The four of them hang out together more often than not.
It is on an afternoon when they go to a karaoke bar that Till realizes how much he likes Ivan’s voice.
The slapdash sketches are replaced with new ones. Till works everyone in as best he can. They’re smiling because that is the world he wants them to live in.
Till puts the pencil down.
Maybe it’s a bad thing to want Ivan to regain his memories.
Maybe Ivan is happier like this, freed of his burdens.
The revelation weighs heavily on Till’s chest.
He doesn’t sleep much that night.
For the most part, this world is peaceful, but there are certain individuals who manage to perpetuate chaos all the same.
Ivan and Till made plans without the girls, aiming to play video games until they fall asleep. It’s summer vacation, after all, the only one they get to share before Ivan sets off for college.
Till gets the distinct impression that someone is following them, but dismisses it as paranoia. Ivan practices some form of martial arts for his mental health; he is equipped to handle this sort of situation. He carries on the conversation like nothing is amiss, prepared to disarm whoever it is in the event that they make a move.
Unfortunately, training or no, there is little Ivan can do about the guy slinking out of the shadows and brandishing a knife. The first strike hits his arm. The second comes dangerously close to his ribs, then Ivan gets a clean hit in, jamming his knee into the man’s windpipe. The wounds are shallow, but they require immediate medical attention. Their assailant, at least, is unconscious.
Till dials emergency services with shaking hands. Calmly, coolly, Ivan tells him that he knows first aid. He asks if Till can go to the nearest convenience store by himself because someone has to keep an eye on the guy. Till stubbornly shakes his head.
I can’t do this again. Ivan. Red everywhere. An elusive, confusing smile.
Abruptly, Ivan seizes. Wide-eyed, Till babbles to the person on the phone. He clutches Ivan’s bloody hands, “You’re not allowed to die, don’t you dare fucking die,” watching the EMTs wheel him off with a numb sense of dread.
Hollowly, Till answers questions to complete the police report. Handcuffs click around the man’s wrists. The officers block off the street, marking it as an active crime scene.
It is not until much later that Till finds out his assailant’s ex-girlfriend had been a fan. She was infatuated to the point that she talked to his posters like they were animate, treating Till like he was her boyfriend.
It is then that Till decides the spotlight is not for him.
The hospital lighting washes Ivan out, but according to the doctors, he’s in good health. He’d gotten lucky.
Still, he remains unconscious. Multiple professionals propose shock. “He’s not like that,” Till hisses, upset by the false assumptions heaped on his friend.
Mizi and Sua stop by with gifts, wishing him a swift recovery. “You piss me off, but I never wanted you dead,” Sua murmurs, scowling.
Internally, she thinks, If you could see Till now, if you knew how much time he’s spent crying over you, you would be insufferable.
Two days pass, then three. Till has to go home at some point to change clothes. He buys something for Ivan as well, guessing at his size.
He jolts out of a doze when he hears a weak cough. “Till?”
Thank god. Till bolts out of his chair, rushing to call a nurse.
They perform all kinds of tests. They help Ivan sit up, offering him ice chips and easily digestible snacks. He doesn’t have much of an appetite, but he tries his best.
Eventually, the two of them are alone. Till is the one to explain that his mom left this morning, but she would be back soon; he texted her as soon as Ivan woke up.
Ivan blinks at him, confused. “My mother?”
Till’s breath hitches. Concern mixes with a delight so heady he feels dizzy. The sensation intensifies when Ivan touches his left side, doubtlessly searching for bullet holes. “Yeah. Dianne.”
Plump lips purse. “I didn’t die?”
“You did.”
The lightbulbs flicker on in Ivan’s brain. Till remembers his own messy revelation, disdain followed by doubt.
He waits Ivan out. The silence is heavy.
Several minutes later, Ivan turns to look out of the window. “I see.”
A volume of words left unspoken rest in that brief statement.
Now is not the time for Till to grill him. “I’ll come back tomorrow, okay?”
Ivan says nothing.
Till doesn’t know if this is better or worse.
It’s unusual for Ivan to be this quiet, but Till is used to parallel play, alternating between gaming and drawing.
Try as he might, Ivan cannot resist the pull of old habits. He finds himself staring at Till, surprised to be stared at in return. “Do you want to see it?”
Ivan nods.
Till wipes the detritus off of the page before he hands the sketchbook over.
There is a close-up of Ivan’s face in profile in the hospital bed and a more detailed render of their competition. The nuances of Ivan’s outfit are lost to time. His own is also an approximation, but it’s close enough.
It is a relief to know that he finally got Ivan’s face right.
Ivan traces the left side of the paper, honing in on Till’s drawing of himself. “You’re prettier than this.”
Warmth creeps into Till’s cheeks. “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder or whatever.”
Once more, Ivan studies the sketch. “This is what I look like to you?”
“Yeah.”
“Thank you.”
“What do you mean, thank you. It’s your face.”
Ivan holds out the book for Till to retrieve. “A biased artist’s rendition of my face.”
“You are determined to be an unrepentant jerk in every lifetime, aren’t you?”
“It’s a character flaw.”
Till frowns. “You don’t want to see the rest?”
“I suddenly have permission to look at your things?”
Flustered, he turns up his nose. “We’re friends, right?”
“…Sure.”
“So,” Till mumbles, hiding his face, “you can look.”
Quietly, Ivan unfolds the spiral-bound notebook. He starts from the beginning. A great deal of the pictures are recent, referenced images of them wearing uniforms and casual clothing.
The wispier drawings showcase the uniforms they wore in their previous world. There are tourniquets and syringes scattered about; comets and veins and the like.
Ivan appears more often than everyone else. The symmetry of his face grows more balanced with every drawing. In Till’s defense, he and Ivan reunited a few months ago.
“I’m sorry,” Till says, gnawing on his lower lip after Ivan closes the sketchbook.
“For?”
“I don’t know, Ivan. What do you want me to say?”
There is a brief lull, then a sigh. “Nothing. I’m feeling a bit petty, I suppose.”
Till laughs. “Wow. Honesty. Wasn’t expecting that.”
“Death has a tendency to change things.”
He swallows. Right.
In the interest of riding the wave since the floodgates have been opened, Till asks, “Why did you do it?”
“You can’t hazard a guess?”
That’s the problem—Till has so many guesses, he can’t make sense of which ones are decent. He has turned this issue over in his head so many times, it has become convoluted. On one hand, the answer could be so simple. On the other hand, this is Ivan he’s dealing with.
Ivan has always been something of an enigma.
Sensing Till’s distress, Ivan shows mercy. “I wanted you to live. It was the least I could do.”
“Giving up your life for me?” Hysteria edges into Till’s voice. “Ivan.”
“Till.”
“That’s not—you make it sound so simple.”
Ivan shrugs. “It was a simple decision for me to make.”
Till slaps him. Startled by the sound, a nurse in the hall asks if everything is alright. Ivan assures them that he’s fine and that’s the end of that.
“Why me?” Till whispers, on the verge of tears.
“Why not?”
He gathers his things, all but running out of Ivan’s room. He swipes at his eyes, crying all the way home, devastated by the realization that Ivan cared about him more than he cared to save himself.
“You left this behind,” Ivan says, handing the sketchbook to Till on his doorstep. His arm is bandaged to high hell and he’s wearing the clothes Till left in a bag for him, but he looks better.
“Thanks.” He pauses for a moment, studying Ivan’s expression. “Do you want to come in?”
There is a beat of hesitation. Till leaves the door open just in case. Ivan slips inside, refusing to let the air conditioning go to waste.
It’s hot as hell, but he turns on the kettle. Jen briefly comes down to say hi. Sensing the tense atmosphere, she leaves as quickly as she came.
Till turns on the television for background noise, scrolling through cooking videos until he finds one with no talking.
He waits until the tea isn’t scalding to talk again. “It feels like I’ve been alone for a long time. Mizi and Sua helped, but it wasn’t the same.”
“I’m surprised to hear that.”
“I’ve had a lot of time to think,” Till insists, mouth set in a firm line. “I didn’t know what I had until I lost it and—” He cuts himself off, emotional and exhausted.
Ivan puts his drink down. “And?”
“I’m sorry that I didn’t notice you were…”
“In love with you.”
“Yeah.”
Ivan shrugs. “I didn’t want you to notice.”
Till bangs a fist on the table. “That’s bullshit. That kiss was desperate. You choked me. I had nightmares about that round for weeks. You were being a fucking coward and you know it.”
“Would it have changed anything?” Ivan asks, tone frigid.
The truth is, they’ll never know. Till had not seen Ivan for what he was until it was too late. He loved Mizi until he didn’t. He was forced to reexamine everything he considered fundamental when the world turned upside down.
Till is forced to concede, if only partially. “You should have tried.”
“Fine. I’m still in love with you. What now?”
Flabbergasted, Till spills tea all over himself. He hisses, peeling himself out of his pants. He runs to the restroom to grab a cold washcloth, wiping himself down before he changes into clean clothes.
Ivan addresses the damp spot on the couch, filing through the cabinets until he finds some sort of cleaning agent. They rejoin in the living room, but Till drags Ivan into his bedroom. There is absolutely no way they are continuing this conversation where anyone else can hear them.
“Are you. Do you mean that?”
“I haven’t made peace with this reincarnation business. It feels as if I died days ago and someone dumped knowledge of this world into my brain. My feelings haven’t changed.”
Till considers the prospect of returning Ivan’s feelings. It doesn’t seem outlandish. How many evenings had he spent tracing the scar? He had been sad to see the mark fade. It was one of the only things that served as an homage to his dead friend, after all.
“There’s no harm in trying,” he says.
Ivan looks at him. Stares and stares and stares. The intensity has Till fidgety, fussing with the hem of his shirt and rubbing at his elbows. He yelps when Ivan cups his jaw. He closes his eyes when Ivan leans in.
The meeting of their mouths is tentative. Carefully, Ivan laps at him, tracing the seam of Till’s lips. Till lets him in, wrapping his arms around Ivan’s back. He spares a thought for Ivan’s health, wondering if this is safe, but his thoughts turn into mush as Ivan sucks at his tongue, tugging on his hair.
It’s too deep to be casual. They adjust angles, gasping into each other’s throats, learning as they go along. They kiss voraciously, drooling hungrily. At some point, Ivan winces. Till pulls away. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
“Maybe we can try again when you feel better.”
Ivan smiles. It is a tender, earnest thing. “I’d like that.”
“What’s this I hear about you falling off the map?” Sua asks, pointing to a headline.
Ivan is absent on account of physical therapy attendance. Till’s skin tingles when he remembers sitting thigh-to-thigh with Ivan on his bed, holding his hand. Ivan stared at him the whole time instead of watching the movie. Till had gotten so embarrassed, he sat up to play guitar instead, wondering if these are the stirrings of reciprocation he feels.
{illustrations by @_aendee! ♡}
It seemed ridiculous that someone like Ivan, the boy who once punched him in the face, smiling about it with blood streaming from his nostrils, might have felt this way, sentimental and tingly because Till was sharing his space.
“I decided I wanted to make music for myself, not other people.” For the most part, he thinks, mind drifting to half-formed lyrics about falling stars and moonlight eyes.
“You could invest in a security system or hire a bodyguard, if safety is your main concern,” Mizi adds.
Till shakes his head. “I’m going to focus on art instead.”
They share a look. “Well, alright. If that’s what you want.”
Using Ivan as a model is convenient. He lives to tease Till until Till walks away from his workspace to kiss him silly, grinding in Ivan’s lap until Ivan flips him over and grinds against his ass. He doesn’t take it any further—neither of them are ready for that. Not yet.
They discuss the future. They make plans. Ivan goes to college and Till doesn’t and they move in together. They announce their relationship to the world so that no one can use it as a bargaining chip against them. They settle into a routine.
Till’s art pieces are purchased for exhibition purposes. Numerous articles reference Till’s flirtation with musical fame before he leaned into painting. In interviews, people ask about his partner. They ask him how he got together with a notorious scion.
Till is not, by nature, a liar. Regardless, saying, “We’re childhood sweethearts,” is easier than telling the truth and more credible besides.
The Boy Who Longed For Shooting Stars sells for an obscene sum of money that Till doesn’t feel comfortable managing by himself, bequeathing the funds to Ivan for investment. “You’re better at that sort of shit,” he mumbles.
Ivan's lips quirk into a smile. “Was that a compliment? For free? Hell hath frozen over.”
Till kisses him to shut him up. Ivan’s ego is already obnoxious, what with the subject of Till’s most famous painting being a clear reference.
Time unspools ahead of them, granting them opportunities to learn and grow. There is no fear of punishment for displaying affection. Warm meals, good company, decent sleep; the little things in life make it worth living.
Before he shuffles into the kitchen, Till stops in the doorway. “Thanks,” he says, cheeks dusted pink. “For loving me.”
“Of course.”
He makes Ivan’s coffee the way he likes it, complete with a disgusting amount of sugar. An hour later, they tear off each other’s clothes.
It’s an afternoon well spent.