Echoes of You
[📘 Content Warning:
This story contains Boys’ Love (BL) themes. Reader discretion is advised. Please read the disclaimers mentioned in the Instagram post.]
As the weekend arrived, a chance invitation promised a break from the usual.
It’s a chilly Saturday night, Jonas invited Zhan and Eva to a party at a friend’s farmhouse just outside the city.
The place was sprawling, with warm lights strung through the trees and loud music vibrating through the wooden floors.
People danced barefoot in the grass.
The barn had been converted into a dance floor, the bar stocked with cheap booze and glowing cocktails.
Zhan drank.
Laughed.
Let loose.
They stayed late, until most people were too drunk to drive or even find their coats.
Jonas had already settled into a hammock out back, whispering about the stars and the music in the night air.
Zhan glanced around the room, some people were still laughing and enjoying themselves, others looked tired, and a few had already left.
He finished the drink in his hand.
Taking a deep breath, he stumbled upstairs and somehow found his way to the terrace, seeking some fresh air and a break from the noise.
He stepped out into the cold air, the sound of the party muffled beneath him.
The view was quiet… open farmland meeting the distant outline of Amsterdam’s lights.
The wind was crisp.
The stars above twinkled in their scattered brilliance.
Zhan leaned against the terrace railing, the alcohol buzzing warmly through his veins, his breath visible in soft white puffs.
For a while, he just stood there.
Then, a hand landed gently on his shoulder.
He turned.
Jonas.
He had thrown on a flannel over his black tee, the sleeves rolled up carelessly, his hair a little messy from the dancing and wind.
“What happened?”
Jonas asked, his voice quieter than usual.
“You disappear or something?”
Zhan shook his head, voice low.
“No… I just wanted to be somewhere quiet for a while.”
Jonas stepped beside him, elbows resting against the cold railing.
“I get that.”
He said after a beat.
“Amsterdam’s peaceful like that, right? Doesn’t yell too loud. People don’t look too hard.”
Zhan nodded slowly, eyes on the far-off city lights.
“Yeah… true. But I still miss home.”
Jonas glanced sideways at him, his voice gentler.
“Yeah. We all do. Home is… well, it’s home.”
Zhan smiled faintly and nodded again.
His expression softened… like he was hearing a voice from another life, one he’d packed away too carefully.
“Where’s Eva?”
He asked after a pause.
Jonas snorted.
“Last I saw, she was making best friends with the DJ. And possibly stealing someone’s wine. I love her, but that woman’s chaos.”
They both laughed softly.
The sound was a gentle thread between them, tying them to something warm in the night’s quiet.
Then Jonas looked at Zhan again, something different in his eyes now.
Less teasing.
More curious.
“You know…”
He said slowly.
“I always figured you were kind of a loner.”
Zhan blinked.
“Really? I didn’t know I gave that vibe.”
Jonas smiled faintly.
“Not in a bad way. Just… you always seem like you’re holding something back.”
Zhan didn’t respond right away.
He looked back out over the fields, the distant lights shimmering like memories he didn’t want to touch.
The wind swept softly between them, stirring their jackets and hair.
The silence that fell wasn’t awkward, it was heavy.
Meaningful.
“You’re different from most people I know.”
Jonas said after a while.
“You’re grounded. Gentle. You think before you speak. But you don’t let people see you. Not really.”
Zhan’s lips tugged up a little.
“Maybe I just like being a mystery.”
“Or maybe you’re still stuck in something.”
Jonas said, almost too quietly.
Zhan turned to him, for a moment, their eyes met… really met, and the world around them seemed to quiet.
Jonas shifted slightly, taking a careful step closer just enough to close the small space between them.
His voice dipped, low and hesitant.
“Can I…?”
His hand hovered just inches from Zhan’s cheek, eyes searching… wanting, pleading, but never forcing.
The air between them thickened as he leaned in slowly with anticipation.
As Jonas leaned closer, a fragile ache lingered in Zhan’s chest… then suddenly, memories of someone flashed through his mind, shadowing his heart.
And just before their lips could meet, Zhan pulled back… breaking the fragile moment.
It wasn’t abrupt.
It wasn’t cold.
But it was clear.
“Jon… I can’t.”
He said, voice low and apologetic, like a quiet confession more than a rejection.
Jonas lowered his hand and looked straight into his eyes.
“Why not…?”
Zhan opened his mouth… but nothing came out.
His throat closed around the answer.
Jonas studied him for a long moment.
Then, quietly…
“There’s someone else, isn’t there?”
Zhan’s gaze dropped.
He didn’t nod.
Didn’t speak.
But his silence said enough.
Jonas gave a small, almost bitter smile.
“Yeah. Thought so.”
“I’m sorry, Jon.”
Zhan whispered.
“I didn’t mean to lead you on or… I just… I’m sorry.”
“Zhan…”
Jonas said, calm and kind.
“Please, don’t be. You didn’t lead me on. I just… hoped a little. I should be the one to apologize.”
His voice soft but firm.
“I should’ve known.”
Zhan looked down, his expression unreadable.
“I… I think I should go.”
He murmured.
Jonas nodded.
“I’ll tell Eva.”
Zhan hesitated, then nodded back.
“Thanks.”
Zhan walked through the party alone, his footsteps echoing oddly loud in his own ears despite the bass thudding below.
He didn’t say goodbye to anyone else.
He booked a taxi and waited by the roadside, arms folded, the night air pressing against him like guilt.
In the taxi, he sat silently by the window, watching the city blur past.
The buzz of alcohol was long gone.
What remained was a deeper ache.
A familiar one…
And he painfully realized that… he hadn’t moved on.
Not really.
He had gotten busy.
He had gotten stronger.
He had even learned how to laugh again.
But healing and moving on…?
That was another matter entirely.
Because Yibo…
Yibo wasn’t just a person in his past.
He was every corner of his heart still holding breath.
Every half-written message in Zhan’s drafts.
Every reflexive turn of the head whenever someone laughed with a voice too close to his.
No… Zhan hadn’t moved on.
He had just… carried it all with him.
Like a wound he never let anyone touch, pretending it didn’t bleed.
Suddenly, he was back on that rainy night by the riverside… sitting in the downpour, tears blending with the rain.
He was still stuck there, the pain crawling back into his mind once again.
And it hurt… because he still loved Yibo.
———————————
Zhan didn’t go to the office the next day.
He stayed home, curtains drawn, laptop closed, the silence in his apartment stretching like a second skin he couldn’t peel off.
Outside, the streets of Amsterdam carried on.
Bikes whirring past, trams humming along tracks, conversations in cafés blooming and fading like flowers in the wind.
But inside his flat, everything felt still.
He’d done little all day, moving in slow, distracted motions, his head heavy with a faint hangover and something heavier he couldn’t quite name.
So, when the doorbell rang that evening, it took him a moment to move.
He opened the door and blinked.
Jonas and Eva.
Zhan was surprised, though not unpleasantly.
Jonas stood with both hands shoved deep into his coat pockets, eyes carrying a shadow of guilt.
Eva held a bag of snacks and a bottle of wine like it was a peace offering.
“Can we come in?”
She asked gently.
Zhan stepped aside without a word.
They settled into the couch.
The air was quiet but not heavy yet.
Zhan sat on the armrest of the couch, sipping from a half-cold mug of tea he’d forgotten about earlier.
The light from the floor lamp painted soft amber across the walls, and the sound of distant rain ticking against the windows played like background music to something unspoken.
“So…”
Eva finally said, stretching her legs out and looking at him.
“You’re not gonna come to the office anymore or what?”
Zhan let out a small breath, not quite a laugh.
“It’s nothing like that. I just… wasn’t in the mood today.”
Eva glanced at Jonas, then back at Zhan.
“Is it because of what happened between you two last night?”
Zhan’s eyes flicked toward Jonas, who was already looking down at his hands.
Then back to Eva.
“Yes, Zhan…”
She said, catching the silent exchange.
“He told me everything.”
Jonas looked up, face flushed with shame.
“Zhan, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make things awkward or cross a line. It just… happened in the moment. Please don’t feel bad. Or be mad at me.”
Zhan offered a small, tired smile.
“Jon, I’m not angry. And I don’t feel bad. It’s just…”
He looked down at the mug in his hands.
“Last night… something came back to me. Something I thought I’d buried for good. Moved on from.”
He let out a low, painful chuckle.
“But it turns out… I was just lying to myself… all this time.”
His voice didn’t waver, but something in his chest did.
Eva sat up straighter.
“Zhan…”
She said softly.
“Do you want to talk about it? Only if you’re comfortable.”
He didn’t answer right away.
His gaze had gone distant, unfocused, fixed somewhere just beyond the rain-blurred window.
And when he blinked, the shine in his eyes betrayed the memories climbing their way up from deep inside.
He finally spoke, voice quieter now.
“There was a boy… Yibo, my Bo…”
He began, fingers tightening slightly around the ceramic of the mug.
“A few years ago. He was a student. Did part-time delivery work to pay his bills, and ran this tiny garage near his house. We used to travel in the same metro train almost every day… never spoke, just familiar faces passing by.”
A faint, faraway look crossed his eyes, as if he could still see those train rides in his mind.
“Then one day, he showed up at my bookstore for food delivery. That’s how we properly met. From there… our friendship started. Slowly. Clumsily. But it grew.”
He exhaled softly, almost as if saying the words was pulling him back into those moments.
“Nothing dramatic. Just small talks at first. Random smiles. I didn’t even realize it was happening until it already had.”
A soft smile tugged at the corner of Zhan’s lips.
Eva and Jonas said nothing.
They listened.
Zhan continued, more quietly now.
“I thought it was just a passing thing. But he kept showing up. And slowly, somehow… we started to fall into something real.”
“He was a little rough. Honest to a fault. He didn’t read much, never cared for fancy words, but he had this quiet way of seeing through people.”
Zhan’s voice broke just a little on that word.
He swallowed.
“We didn’t call it love for a long time. But that’s what it was. In between the talks and the silences and the laughter… it was love.”
His gaze softened, a flicker of warmth passing through his eyes.
“It’s like we built something over the years. Secret, but solid. My love for books and paintings and his love for cars and bikes were worlds apart, yet we were… imperfectly perfect for each other.”
He paused, the corner of his mouth twitching in a bittersweet half-smile.
“He’d sneak food into my shop. Sometimes I’d scold him for riding his scooter too fast or going to his illegal street races. We even went for a weekend getaway with his friends… it’s one of my most precious memories with him.”
His voice dipped at the end, as if holding the memory too tightly might break it.
“But then problems came. And more than me, he suffered a lot… especially from his father. I couldn’t do much except try to be with him…”
Zhan’s gaze flickered briefly toward Jonas and Eva, as if searching for understanding before looking away again.
“Then, again, we had a hope. When I got the opportunity to come here, we decided we both would… and I started moving his papers for that.”
A pause.
It lingered, heavy, as if Zhan didn’t know how to shape the next words without breaking something inside him.
“But then… one night, it all ended. Just like that.”
He exhaled shakily, eyes fixed on the floor.
“I still don’t know why he ended everything so suddenly. No warning… no real explanation. Just silence. He just… vanished.”
Jonas’s jaw was tense.
Eva blinked, her eyes suspiciously wet.
Zhan looked down again.
“I thought I’d made peace with it. That it was just a chapter. But last night… when Jon reached for me… I realized I hadn’t let go. Not really.”
A faint, almost helpless smile ghosted across his lips before fading.
“I still carry him. Every single day. And I haven’t been with anyone since. Not because I didn’t want to… but because it just felt wrong. Like I’d be betraying something.”
Jonas and Eva exchanged a glance, the kind people share when they’re not sure if comfort will help, or if silence would be kinder.
Jonas finally said.
“Zhan… Yibo’s a really lucky guy. To have someone love him like that. Even now.”
Eva’s tone was warm.
“If he could feel even half of what you feel, he’d know how lucky he’s been all along.”
Her voice softened, almost like she was choosing each word carefully.
“But… I’m not saying you should hold on to hope if you believe he’s never coming back.”
She glanced at him gently.
“Life moves forward Zhan, not backward. And if he’s truly gone from your life, don’t let the past weigh you down too much.”
Zhan didn’t respond.
But he smiled.
A sad, soft smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
———————————
That night, after they left, Zhan sat on his bed in the half-dark, knees drawn up.
The apartment hushed except for the occasional creak of floorboards and the wind knocking gently against the glass.
He reached for his phone.
Flicked open the hidden album he hadn’t touched for almost a year.
Yibo…
Smiling with chopsticks held between his teeth.
Sleeping in Zhan’s lap, hoodie bunched up.
Making faces at the bookstore mirror.
The two of them on the train… cheeks nearly touching, tired but glowing.
Yibo grinning after winning a race, still sitting on his bike, fingers forming a V.
That selfie at the sunrise point.
Zhan scrolled slowly.
A tear slipped down without warning, carving a path down his cheek.
“What are you doing now, Bo?”
“Do you ever think of me? Even for a second?”
“Or have you already learned how to live without me?”
So many questions.
Too many.
They rushed in like a tide, relentless and cruel.
And Zhan let them come.
He set his phone down, eyes fixed on the bed, tears slipping free.
Tonight, he missed Yibo with the same sharp ache he’d felt a year ago.
And he let the pain stretch through his chest, like the echo of something unfinished.
Because pretending he had forgotten didn’t make it true…
[To be continued…]
———————————–
Author’s Note:
Heyyy, you made it to the end of the chapter! 😊
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Think of it as your way of telling me, “Hey, I’m here, and I loved it!” — it means the world to me and truly keeps me inspired to write more for you! ✨
The Red Ribbon 