Star in the water

Chapter 1 - Deep down

Even in a person’s exhausted heart, there’s still love floating everywhere.

“Nan, please come in. He wants to see you.”

The sentence that could be heard coming from someone, made the small,
brown-haired owner of the house swallow a big chunk of saliva down his throat. The
small hands were wet with sweat, his blue sapphire eyes shivered full with anxiety.
Every step he took felt like a tight grip that made his heart feel like it was going to
stop beating any time soon.

‘Muangnan’ stopped next to the white bed, where a body was lying. His legs almost
failed him when he saw that body with his very own eyes. It wasn’t the first time that
he had met him but it might have been the last one.

Because in his heart he only wanted… for that day to be the last one, as everyone
kept repeating.

“Nuea”, his sweet voice called the name of the person resting on the bed. He was
trying to restrain his tears as best as he could but it was too difficult. Eventually he let
them roll down seamlessly.

Compassionate.

Yes! He was crying because he took too much pity on that person.

He had never called that person “phi” despite their four year gap.

The body on the bed opened his drowsy eyes. His nose was bound by a breathing
aid machine which moved up and down rhythmically. No hair was left atop of his
handsome face. His body had deteriorated and had to be unbearably hurting after
going through treatment for a while.

Cancer.

‘Nueankin’ suffered from cancer.

Muangnan wasn’t sad, because sadness would only make him start to let go of a life
of “hatred”. To put it bluntly, he hated ‘Nuea’, his older brother from a different
mother, since he could remember.

They had the same father but the string that bound them together didn’t make him
love his brother in the least. Nueankin’s mother was just a mistress who destroyed
his parent’s marriage and his family when she got pregnant. Even though his mother
and older sister didn’t feel bothered, nobody could say that they were happy until this
day came…

The day when the mother and son couple would disappear from his life.

Disappear… and he would receive a lot more of his fatherly love.

But for Nuea, he hated immensely the illness he was facing not because it made his
body sore and weak, but because it was separating him from one person, despite his
smooth life inside the university’s border, despite his dream of being accepted by his
younger brother, Muangnan, and being able to ‘love’ the way he wanted.

Love… it didn’t matter in what form. Their relationship had never had a name to
begin with and it was still the same to this day. He wasn’t an ‘elder brother’ because
the other person wouldn’t acknowledge him that way. They weren’t friends. They
were nothing. But he wanted to be just someone who could stand beside that little
boy every day.

“Nan… come here”, the low voice said, gasping as if he was completely out of
strength. Still, he forced himself to speak with the person in front of him.

Before he had no other chance.

Before he’d leave for another place, no matter if it was in this world or the horizon
that was drawing nearer.

“Nueankin”, a soft hand slid to grab the other person’s hand and held it tight. He
squeezed and released it a few times as if he was worried. Despite their opposite
feelings, he bent his head and whispered words that only the two of them could hear.

“Go. Just go.”

“...”

“Don’t ever come back.”

“I’m...sorry”, briefly said the taller boy. Nuea was just being selfish. He wanted to
have a life for Muangnan, he wanted to keep his fleeble breath for a very long time,
waiting to see this little person’s bright future.
The person he loved the most in his life.

He had loved him for a long time, but the other person was never aware of it.

“No need to apologize. Just don’t… ugh… don’t let me see your face ever again”, he
repeated with tears streaming down his cheeks. His body shivered due to feelings he
didn’t know how to put into words.

He only knew that he had to hate his older half-brother until his last breath.

Hate him until death would tear them apart.

Those cruel words like a sharp knife sliced his heart until it bled. Even though they
would never fade away from his memory, his pale, sick face nodded in reply.

He forced a small smile and as much as he wanted to stretch out a strengthless

hand to dry the other person’s tears, he couldn’t. He let it be just a thought, let him
be a fantasy he wanted to protect even though it was impossible.

“Nan… don’t cry for me.”

Even though he was only crying out of compassion, hate or pity, Nuea didn’t want
him to cry for him.

Nuea hated Nan’s tears. He wanted to see his pretty smile on his sweet face until the
time came for him to say goodbye. He still forced himself to smile until the last
second and hoped that Nan would reply with a smile.

“Ugh… ugh… go.”

“First promise me that… you’ll be happy.”

“Ugh…”

“Nan. When I won’t be around, you’ll be happy. Won’t you?” The first tear stained his
pale face. Nueankin tried hard but to no avail. His determination in avoiding his little
brother to see him cry collapsed clumsily when his weak beating heart bled
endlessly.

“I promise… I’ll be happy.”

“I won’t be here… live your life.”

The small boy nodded, but his heart lost his strength as never before. This feeling of
saying goodbye to the person he had hated all his life was worse than he had
thought and what was even worse was that the other person accepted everything he
was imposing on him before parting.
“Nan. It’s time, son. Nuea has to go.”

Nueankin’s mother let out an exhausted sigh at the same time as the clock struck
when its hands met again at midnight, the night that relatives could visit the patients
autonomously.

“Please.”

He turned around and walked away from the bed. He saw the patient unfold a smile
while saying one sentence that plucked and blew away his heart as soon as he
heard it: “Nan. Smile at me, can you?”

It hurt… Nan was hurting so badly that his heart was festering. It was much less than
Nueankin, who was forcing himself to smile with suffering. The only thing that they
both knew was that they should part with a smile, rather than with hate and tears of
loss.

The small figure stood still for a moment, then raised his right trembling hand, waving
it while forcing a half-smile out.

“Goodbye…”

Nueankin waved his hand, he was going far, far away.

The horizon was drawing nearer.

America was on the other side of the world. He was going to receive treatment over
there and he prayed for the dawn to come. He could see the small boy sitting,
smiling at home. Then, wave a hand to call him downstairs to eat breakfast together.
He dreamt of it even though it was impossible to happen.

Goodbye, P’Nuea…

I’ll be happy.

‘Me too.’

4 years later…

Muangnan was a sophomore and was enthusiastically rinsing his face after getting
out of the big bed in his squared, wide room. He would then go to class as usual.
The life of an undergrad in Pharmacy wasn’t flashy but not even as bad as he
thought and he was still a child who was hoping to receive his father’s attention as
he had always been.

Nan still went to his father’s club regularly and yet behaved recklessly and met up
secretly with heavy drinkers as if he was shouting for his father’s attention. But the
effect was the usual, that his father didn’t have time…

His world had been twisted for a long time but in the end he had never been
accustomed to it.

...a life of sleep and waking hours seemed his only future, even though that person
had disappeared from his life four years before…

There was no news, no movements, letters nor emails had never been delivered. He
didn’t know how Nueankin and his mother were doing, if they still walked the streets
or were watching over him from heaven.

That… was only a silly thought.

After that night, the mother and son pair had never come back. His father tried to
search for them and make contact in any possible way but it was fruitless. He only
knew that Nueankin was sent for treatment to a new, unknown hospital. Eventually,
the life he had always dreamt about became true: a perfect family.

But why… was he still unhappy?

‘First promise me… you’ll be happy.’

And even though that dream was blurry, he could still remember his feelings and the
time of their goodbye, their promise. The small boy had never forgotten. He was
happy. Ha had what he loved and smiled every day because Nueannkin had
promised never to go back. That’s why he promised as well.

“Nan, where are you going after class?” His friend asked him after their chemical
analysis was over.

“I’ll meet P’Attha. What about you, Mork?”

“I’ll stop at the nong’s training for the Freshy Moon Contest. See you!”

“See ya”, he waved his hand at his friend, who he had known since freshman year.
He was “Mork” or, as everyone liked to call him until the name stuck, Doc Sattaya.

Muangnan kept walking till he saw his senior relative raise his eyebrows at him, not
far from where Nan was. Attha was a relative of his on his mother’s side. They grew
up together since they were kids and the older was jealous of the smaller boy and
wanted no one to get close to him, to the point that people said they were pretending
to be a couple.

“P’Attha, are your classes over?”

“If they weren’t, would I be sitting here, waiting?”

“Ehm… The hottest man in Administration might be here hitting on girls. Who would
be waiting to take their nong home?” Muangnan teased him until he heard his
laughter.

“So will you let Doctor That pick you up? I’ve heard that you want me to take you to
him. Is that so?”

“You know it!”

“Let’s go then.”

“Ok.”

The couple walked side by side along the street until they reached a fancy car. Their
destination was not far because they had to park in the usual spot at the university
hospital.

The place that Muangnan called ‘true happiness’.

XXX

“Nuisance!”

That stern voice that floated together with the air made the name’s owner smile
when he turned to face the other one. His heart was soaked as if it got watered every
day.

“Dooooc!”

‘Guntithat’, or That, was an external medical doctor in his senior year. He was
spending his internship at the university hospital.
Four years… Since Nueankin had gone, Muangnan had never opened his heart to
anyone until he met Doctor That. P’Attha had introduced them when Nan was a
freshman but it was only a private relationship that nobody knew of, until… the day
they both agreed to become serious not long time before.

If you asked what love is for a guy like Guntithat he might easily say that it was…
Muangnan.

“P’That, I’ll leave my nong with you. Nan, I have stuff to do”, Attha was only a driver
till there, because he feared that the intern doctor would keep him until he wouldn’t
have time left to drive to pick up his own sweetheart.

“Going now, my duty is done.”

He left the two of them, who were engrossed in a conversation in the hospital’s food
court after they had a break together.

“Has your job been heavy today?” Nan asked. It was his usual question he had
asked every time they met.

“No, but there’s a bit of a difficult case, who tried to kill themselves many times.”

“Oh? What’s troubling them?”

“Teenage intrauterine pregnancy.”

“...”

“She’s pregnant before the right time. Nobody knows who the father is”, the answer
caused the other one to pale. Actually, he almost hated hospitals nor didn’t he want
to know the pain and sufferings of those people. Every time he met Guntithat, the
beautiful world he was trying to build always got ruined because he would hear the
truth.

“And how is she doing now?”

“Still have to check on her and send the case to the psychiatric department to have it
handled by a doctor.”

“Are you tired?”

“No. Being here with you makes me feel much better”, the doctor said with a clear
voice. Suddenly, the image of one person popped up in the doctor’s mind and he
wanted to tell him about it.

“Today I took care of a patient.”

“What’s weird about it? It’s what you usually do. Like room 4012 which is a special
patient of yours.”

“No, the doctor wanted me to take care of this case. He used to have leukemia but
he recovered. He has to have health checks every month in case the illness will
appear again. But it is unusual in that they’ve used many ways to treat him with
chemical and radiation treatment. It disappeared when he assumed a new, very
expensive drug, which the American doctors were able to research. Very brave of
him.”

“Someone suffering from leukemia must be suffering a lot. If I heard that it’s gone, I’d
be tremendously glad.” Still, he didn’t know that patient.

Every time he heard the name of that illness, Muangnan always thought of that
person.

But it’s impossible… There’s no way that that person had come back…

He was sure about it.

For Guntit and Muangnan, they were a couple who walked their life with little
concern. University and hospital, casual conversations and the sound of laughter.
That made them know how beautiful it was to have someone they loved, without
fights, just being there to support each other.

“What are you doing now?” They had finished their lunch and had to start their daily
routine.

“I’ll head to the ward after taking you home.”

“Oh… do you want any special dish tomorrow? I’ll buy it for you.”

“Anything is fine. Whatever you’ll buy, I’ll eat it all.”

“What a sweet talker.”

“Oh, that’s my patient. Khun Nuea!” The young doctor called his patient’s name and
the name’s owner turned around with a frown.

But for someone like Muangnan, who was looking from afar, it was impossible to use
words to describe it. He didn’t even know why his heart was beating faster than
usual. Something was telling him though… the thing that he was trying to push
forward, the feeling of hate and the past promise, right now seemed like they were
approaching like the horizon at hand’s reach.
“Hello, doctor That”, said the low, extremely familiar voice, with his tall body that was
approaching until Muangnan almost couldn’t breath.

“Hi! Khun Nueankin, you haven’t returned home yet?”

…!!

“Your professor has just told me to wait for the X-Ray results.”

He wasn’t mistaken.

His height, his face, his features.

Even though they hadn’t met for four years, he could remember.

Nueankin.

His older brother… the one he didn’t want to share the same surname with and who
was a patient in the care of Gunthat.

He blinked, not knowing what he was supposed to feel. Surprise or yell at him? It
was confusion mixed with other feelings, while the other one felt the same. Meeting
the other person in that place was similar to a miracle. He couldn’t speak, he could
only walk slowly until he stopped in front of the smaller boy, but his eyes stared at his
face without faltering.

Muangnan only reached his shoulders.

“This is my patient, his name’s Khun Nuea”, Gunthat said with a smile while the air
around them started to smolder with something that he couldn’t put his finger on.

“N-...Nuea…” Muangnan said without finishing his sentence.

Nueankin rolled his eyes back and forth. The eyes of the soon-to-be doctor that the
nurses of the entire ward called Doc That were too obvious, affecting his handsome
face and he smiled unconsciously at the corner of his lips.

Nan already has an owner.

Don’t feel sad, he told himself.

But deep down in his heart…

There was the belief that if the world’s axis had stopped turning and changed its
degrees, everything that had happened would turn back one more time. This time as
well…

Nueankin’s entire world inclined and it would never be the same again.
“Khun Nuea… Khun Nuea!” Guntithat’s low voice interrupted his train of thoughts
and plucked him from afar to bring him back to the present. The tall boy flung his
face up a little, chasing his distracted thoughts away from his mind. Then he paid
attention to the trainee doctor’s voice.

“Y-yes?”

Nueankin didn’t even dare to meet the smaller boy’s eyes.

He knew it was impossible. Their past relationship had no name, now it had to be the
same… It was only useless for his heart that was full to the brim to come back form a
far away country to search for that person, when the sea that joins with the sky is
farther and farther away.

...because there was a huge mountain right in front of him.

“This is Nan”, he politely introduced the smaller boy.

“Nice to meet you”, Nueankin replied in a flat voice.

He was shaking… so badly…

He felt pain… he felt love…

“I have to go back now. Excuse me.”

“Ok”, the young doctor said, even though he was a little confused about his patient's
quick escape. Muangnan didn’t block him as his heart wished.

“Th-That… Today you don’t have to take me home. I just remembered that a friend of
mine is picking me up to do the activity at the faculty.”

“Just remembered?”

“C’mon, you go to the ward, doc, or you’ll get scolded. Bye”, Muangnan ran away
before quickly waving his hand to the famous person that was his lover.

“Bye.”

XXX

“Nuea… Nuea…”

He thought that he would never call that name again, when in fact he did the
opposite. Nueankin was a little surprised. His hands were shaking and he could feel
beads of sweat permeating his entire body. Slowly, he approached the smaller boy,
waiting for him to continue the conversation.

“...”

“Nueankin.”

“You remember me?”

Four years had passed. Their way of speaking had changed but neither of them let
the words phi and nong slip from their mouth. They hadn't been in touch to the point
that Muang thought that the taller boy had already passed away. He stared at him in
the sky all the time.

“Yes, I do. When did you come back?”

“I’m sorry.”

“...”

“I’m sorry for coming back.”

“It doesn’t matter. What are you doing now?” Weird. He only wanted to know
everything about his older brother, his head was so filled with questions that there
was almost no free space to think about anything else. The hate he used to harbour
when he was a little boy had disappeared together with the sands of time and his
growing up.

“You mean, as a job?”

“Mh.”

“I don’t have any normal job. I used to study Architecture but I didn’t graduate. I can
be called unemployed. I spend my life aimlessly, I only have a camera and my
travels. I sell pictures.”

Muangnan was a person who hadn’t completed anything. He had studied many
years at university, but he didn’t get a degree, due to his going in and out from
hospitals to treat his illness, until he was completely cured.

His mother, who was the only bond he had, had quietly passed away three months
earlier. That was the reason that immediately tore his decision of not going back to
his hometown. He decided… the life that he had left shouldn’t be spent in a
white-skinned people country, with blond hair, who spoke a foreign language.
Actually, going back to Thailand might be the answer to half of the life he had left.

“That’s a hobby for unemployed people and it’s not going anywhere.”
“Nuea…”

“...”

“Do you want to meet dad?”

The tall figure stood still for a moment before shaking his head with a smile.

“No. It’s enough being here. What about you? Are you doing fine? Your boyfriend
looks like a caring person. I like him, that Doctor That.” In the end of the day, it came
down to comparing their differences again, instead of being used to it. He wasn’t
used to it at all. Wherever he was, he was still an insignificant, useless person as
usual.

Nothing could defeat that person.

Even though his future was so blurred he couldn’t see it.

“Where are you staying? And your mother?” Muangnan quickly changed the subject.

“My mother passed away. As for me, I’m staying at our old place, where we lived
before we moved in with your father. It’s run down, empty. I was thinking of repainting
it, but I haven’t had the time because of my travels.”

“Where did you go?”

“Wandering around, with no destination or route to take pictures. At night I’d sleep
there, not differently from vagabonds. But I’m happy. One day I entered the woods,
climbed up a mountain. Another day, I saw the sea of three different colors. A few
days later it was autumn and I’ll soon go back there to see the leaves bloom again.”
Nuea told him everything, what he saw. Wherever his two feet stepped forward,
there was always a dream to follow.

Many years before, Muangnan often used to open tourism magazines and show
them to his older sister. His mouth tirelessly murmured that he’d try to visit those
places one day. All his words, his pleases… he trusted the bond resembling an
invisible rope that he had to go everywhere he could.

“Nan”, a pair of feet stopped.

Nueankin’s face hid his suffering. He hated himself for being like this, he hated even
more when he remembered what he had said many years before, that he would not
come back. But he broke his promise.
“What?” The younger boy looked at his handsome face, doubtful. His brows twisted
in a knot, wondering, while waiting to hear other words. But he was disappointed,
more or less.

In the four years that had passed, even though they hadn’t met, even though he
thought he would hate him until his last day, even though love had bloomed and it
was priceless to the point of being unbearable… then why… when he saw him,
talked to him, looked him in his eyes again, his entire world was completely
swallowed by Nueankin?

“You might have nver known that I’m back because I miss you.”

“...”

“But if one day should I make a mistake and stand on someone else’s person’s side,
even though it feels nice, tell me. Remind me that’s not appropriate.”

“...”

“Remind me not to be too impudent.”

XXX

Nueankin had been back from the hospital for three hours. His life was moving
onward on a road he hadn’t expected. He closed the gate with a heavy chain and a
rusty lock. The vegetation had crawled around the fence in a thick layer but he had
decided to let it be. The gloomy sky was the signal of an upcoming storm.

Today Muangnan must have been exhausted from classes and everything
happening around him.

As for himself… on his future road which he still couldn’t grasp, he still had to keep
walking.

In a week he would come back there, before starting another long journey, going to
the many places where Muangnan is in his memory as well, even though Nueankin’s
the only one in the pictures taken there.

The tall boy looped his backpack around his shoulder and tightened it one more time
before checking his faded mail box. Then he slowly took the small, quiet road on the
left.
His life was propelled by love, hope and wait, like the four years he had spent in
America.

His hands pulled the photograph that was attached to the letter. It was the picture of
a northern road, which he himself had taken when he was walking on the narrowest
road of the Yukon, Canada. The words in his memory saying that they so badly
wanted him to go away, came back to him. At that time, they were still kids. That
world seemed so far away like a dream, but when he grew up he knew that
everything was not as difficult as he thought.

He missed Nan.

He only wanted to return…

Nueankin brushed his fingers through his hair to snap out of his reverie. His messy
memories of the past were just the past… But this was his present and he had to
keep walking ahead, without stopping. In the meantime, he opened one other
document, read the message in his own handwriting that he had sent to this house.
A tender smile appeared as he saw the residue of a tear that had smeared the ink,
just like in all the letters.

September, 23rd

I still dream, we walk the same course.

I still dream… that we walk the same course.

N.

[T/N first line is in English, second line is in Thai. The Thai version literally translated
sounds more like: I still dream… that each of us is walking on the same
path/road/course, but I like the words path and road more, eheh. Anyway, I think the
point was that the sentences deliver the same meaning, so I just went for the same
word choice.]

Nueankin believed that love would drive him insane and his longing wouldn’t be
fulfilled all of a sudden. But it had made him slowly suffer since their farewell, over
and over again, endlessly…
End of chapter 1