Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

part one

Love does not begin and end the way we think it does.

2002

20 & 22

The first time Jisung sees Minho in four years — the first proper time, not the glimpses during Chuseok and odd weekends here and there when he’d come down from university — he’s running his hand through his hair and looking so unbelievably beautiful Jisung almost falls off his bike. 

He hasn’t spoken to Minho in a long time. 

Not necessarily for lack of wanting to, it just happened that way. They grew apart in the years Minho was living in Seoul to study, and that…it happens. Jisung doesn’t fault either of them for it.

But it’s been a full year now. The last time Minho came home was last summer, the last time they spoke his hair was cropped and his skin was shiny with sweat on an especially warm day, the last time Jisung could call them best friends was the night before Minho left for college and they were lying on his roof. 

He’s missed him, but he’s grown used to that feeling. 

It doesn’t hurt the way it did when he first moved out and didn’t call, or when he’d come back home and they’d barely talk, spending more time apart while he visited than together. 

These things happen. Jisung knows they happen. 

That doesn’t make him hate it any less. 

Or, that’s not true. That isn’t quite the case anymore. He doesn’t hate it, he’s at peace with it. 

But Minho’s back now. He’s back and he’s getting out of his car and giving Jisung the tiniest of waves. Minho’s back and he’s walking over, an easy smile, hair longer than Jisung’s ever seen it, and all the years of not missing him because he didn’t allow himself to hit him like a swift kick to the stomach. 

“Jisung,” Minho says. “Hi.” 

He’s grinning and Jisung doesn’t know what to do with that smile. He’s never known what to do with that smile, really, but it feels bigger then, an impossibly bright thing that almost hurts to look at. It’s beautiful, is the issue. Minho’s smile has always had the unique ability to make Jisung a little bit weak in the knees, and right now is no different. 

“Hey,” he says, and smiles back shyly. “How are you?” 

Minho nods. 

“Good, yeah. I’m back for good. Graduated, you know.” 

He hates how tense it is between them. They grew up together, they used to be best friends. Next door neighbors who spent all their time together. Their windows faced each other — well, they still do — and they would be up way past their bed time trying to land paper airplanes through the window. 

Minho was always much better at it than Jisung. 

“Cool.” 

Minho snorts. 

“Yeah, I guess. The plan is to take over the restaurant eventually.” 

“Oh,” Jisung says a little uselessly. “That’s nice.” 

The Lees own a restaurant a few minutes away that Jisung spent about a third of his childhood in, helping Minho sort through the spare change and bothering Mrs. Lee until she caved and let them steal and split a soda from the refrigerator. It was easy, they’d spend afternoons when they got home from school there, doing their homework in a tucked away table in the corner, Minho helping Jisung with his history. 

Jisung still goes there from time to time, but it’s a little bittersweet now. Just enough that it aches when he greets Minho’s parents, who still treat him with the same gentleness they did when he was an eight year old boy and new to the neighborhood. 

So it is nice that Minho is taking over. Jisung knows he got a business degree to do exactly that, spent four years hours away from home just to come back someday. That’s always been the plan, that’s what Minho told him the night before he left. 

Jisung almost can’t believe he’s actually back, though. 

For good. 

And talking to him like nothing’s changed. Like they’re still sixteen and eighteen in Minho’s dad’s car eating ice cream on a still too-cold spring day. Like they’re thirteen and fifteen playing board games in Jisung’s room. Like they’re eight and ten and running down the street, bare feet pounding down on the asphalt as they laugh, Minho chasing after Jisung. 

Jisung would run down the road as fast as he could, but he was never any match for him, Minho taller, faster, stronger. 

It was nice. 

Minho smiles at him warmly. 

“It’s good to see you, Jisung-ah.” 

He sounds so genuine. It kills him a little in a way he wasn’t expecting. For a long time he was Jisung’s worn in t-shirt, comfortable and familiar, the material thinning from wear. For eight years, he was the only one Jisung felt like he truly knew, and Minho was the one person who truly knew him. 

He thinks that might still be true. There are moments they’ve shared that are theirs in a way that he could never share with anyone else, not even if he described the memory in detail. 

“It’s good to see you, too.” 

“I hope we can see more of each other now. I know I’ve been distant, but—” 

“It’s okay!” Jisung says brightly, cutting him off, because as much as he’d like to have this conversation, he doesn’t feel like doing it on the sidewalk in front of their houses with a bike still between his legs. 

Minho looks like he wants to argue. Jisung recognizes the look on his face, the tiny furrow that creases between his brows. 

He doesn’t argue, though, and it’s almost disappointing. 

There’s a distance between them that’s never been there before. Or, that’s not true. There’s a chasm that has grown and split them apart over the past four years that Jisung recognizes, but it’s never been this clear, never this apparent. 

“It’s not okay, Jisungie,” he says, raising his hand like he’s going to put it on Jisung’s shoulder, like he’s going to cup the nape of his neck they way he used to, but he aborts the movement halfway through and runs his fingers through his hair again. 

It’s long enough that the shortest strands hit past his cheekbones. He looks good. 

He always does. Always has, really. 

“Well,” Jisung says brightly. “Welcome back.” 

Minho smiles. Jisung doesn’t go weak in the knees, but it’s a near thing. 

“Thank you,” Minho says softly. “I need to unpack. Do you want to help me?” 

Jisung doesn’t get it. He doesn’t. This is the most Minho has spoken to him in four years, and he’s just not sure what he’s trying to get at here, because Minho is the main reason they never spoke again, Jisung just tried to respect it. 

And now he’s…here. Trying to strike up a conversation, asking for help moving in, and Jisung almost wants to say yes just to spend more time with him. Jisung almost wants to say yes because he missed him, fuck, he did. 

He can’t, though. It would be cruel to him to act like nothing ever changed, it’d be extremely unkind to himself to go into Minho’s childhood bedroom and put away the clothes he took to university like this is the way they’ve always been. 

In a way it is. 

In a lot of ways it isn’t. 

He hasn’t stepped foot in Minho’s childhood bedroom in ages, but he’s seen it through his window. The walls are still the same shade of blue and the same tv they’d stay up late watching action movies on collects dust in the corner and his bookshelf is still half full of CDs.

Jisung can’t step into that. 

He can’t.

“Sorry, I told my mom I’d help with dinner. Maybe some other time?” 

Minho nods like he knows other time means never. 

That’s not entirely true, Jisung would like to help him unpack. As soon as he figures out how to build a time machine and keep their friendship from ever falling apart so this moment doesn’t feel so horribly awkward.

Still, he smiles. 

“Some other time, then.” Minho walks off, turning around to give Jisung a look as he walks into his house. 

The sunlight hits his face and he squints against it. Jisung’s mouth goes a little dry at the sight, at his easy grin. It’s so infuriating, is what it is, because this is how easy it should’ve been this whole time. This is the ease he wanted at seventeen and eighteen and nineteen, and he doesn’t get why he didn’t get it back then. 

He missed him, though. Regardless of how weird he’s being, how weird he’s been, Jisung’s missed him horribly. 

He has other friends. He has Felix and Hyunjin, has Jeongin and Seungmin, but his relationship with Minho has always been something else. 

He was his first best friend. His first real best friend. They would spend hours and hours together, and it was always comfortable, because they clicked. They were dust from the same star that time swept away with a broom, and Jisung made his peace with that. 

For a long while, he’d cuss the universe out for it. For separating them the way it did, but he knew it was what needed to happen, too, in a way. 

Minho disappears into his house, the front closing with a squeak and a click of the lock. Jisung stays on the side of the road and lets the occasional car pass him by, not moving until the sun dips behind the houses. 

“It’s so hot,” Felix complains. He’s sprawled out on the floor of his room, fan on high and Melee abandoned on the TV, complaining about the heat for the tenth time in the past hour. Jisung doesn’t think it’s particularly hot — there will be hotter days, it’s mid June and the weather is still simmering, hasn’t boiled over yet, and it’s nice. He likes the heat when it’s like this, likes that it makes everything drag on and on a little longer. 

It’s summer break and it’s a Tuesday afternoon. The heat enters without knocking from Felix’s open window, the smell of cut grass and early summer spilling into his bedroom; there’s something warm in the air aside from the dipping sunlight, something Jisung feels might be his fault, even if he doesn’t quite know how to explain that part to Felix. 

Because to explain that he’d have to explain Minho. 

And he’s not sure how to explain Minho to anyone. 

Felix knows him, of course he does. They all grew up in the same town, they were two grades apart in school, but they went to the same one, and it’s not like Felix never saw him around, but it’s one thing to know of someone, and one thing to know them. Truly. In ways no one else ever could, in ways no one else was allowed to. 

Jisung wonders if that’s changed. He wonders if someone knows Minho better than he did. He wonders if everything they shared he shared with someone else, or if their moments were as special to him as they are to Jisung. 

Felix is his best friend. They’re together a good majority of the time, and this has been the case since Minho left, but before, before, when he still lived here, when he was one house down the street and not hours away, Minho was something. 

More than a best friend but not like that. They weren’t dating, and Jisung’s glad. Glad nothing true, nothing real ever happened, because he’s not sure how he would deal with that guilt. It would eat him alive, he thinks. It would. 

(It does.) 

He doesn’t know how to sit with that so he doesn’t. It’s been years of learning how to shove it all down, so he shoves it all down and doesn’t think about any of it. 

Or, he did. 

But now Minho’s back. Back for good, back to stay, and Jisung studies at the local university and spends his time at the local arcade and the local movie theater and his house and he’s going to see him, he’s going to see him everywhere. 

What does he do with that? 

What is he supposed to do with that? 

How is he supposed to shove it down when it’s staring him in the face? When it’s getting dressed in front of the open window that faces Jisung’s bedroom, miles and miles of smooth skin on display? 

He’s got no fucking idea. 

“Minho’s back,” he tries to say casually. The words feel strange in his throat, in his mouth. Feel strange behind his teeth and on his tongue, foreign and far too familiar all at once. 

Felix doesn’t seem to notice the way he’s failing to be even remotely nonchalant about the whole thing. Jisung twists the hem of his shirt between antsy fingers, and waits for his response. 

“Oh, is he?” Felix says, succeeding at casual in a way that Jisung envies. He’s never been normal about Minho, not even when they were kids. Minho was always the coolest to him. Even when he left, even when people asked when they didn’t speak anymore, Jisung couldn’t find it in himself to not look back on his youth and find Minho glowing at the center of it. 

“Yeah,” he says. “I ran into him on Sunday when he was moving back in. He’s home for good.” 

Felix hums noncommittally, starfished on his bed as he faces the ceiling. 

“How do you feel? I mean, you guys were really close. I bet you’re happy to have him back.”

Jisung pauses. Takes a second before he answers, long enough that Felix lifts his head to look at him, eyebrow quirked. 

“Yeah,” Jisung says. “I mean, it’s weird, I guess. I missed him, but it’s been a long time since we were close the way we used to be, so.” 

“It’s shitty that he stopped talking to you out of nowhere, though.” 

“Maybe. But I never held it against him. He went to college and we drifted apart a little, that, you know. That happens.” 

Felix nods and flops back down onto the bed. 

“I guess. Still, though. Did you guys talk?” 

Jisung nods. “A little, yeah. It was just small talk, though, it’s not like we actually had a conversation.” 

“Do you want to?”

“What?”

“Have that conversation with him?” 

The use of that makes Jisung’s neck grow hot. He’s not sure what Felix is implying, it’s not like he knows anything, not anything that matters. He was there after Minho left, and Jisung is sure he remembers how awkward that was, but it’s not—he doesn’t—it isn’t—

There’s no conversation for them to have, anyway, not really. That’d be…too much, maybe. There are things that lurk in shadows that must stay in the darkness, bones that should stay broken lest they heal strangely, secrets that are secrets for good reason, and memories so tucked away they’ve seeped between the cracks of the hardwood. 

His relationship with Minho is sticky and glued to the drywall and there’s a large sign saying DO NOT TOUCH right above it so Jisung doesn’t accidentally get his hand stuck. 

And he’s done a good job at staying away from it. 

It needs to stay that way. 

“What conversation? There’s no conversation to have.” 

“I mean, you were really weird after he left, I don’t know. If you don’t want to talk to him about it, that’s up to you, right, but you were pretty upset.” 

“I guess. But it’d be weird to have that conversation the second he arrives. He was getting out of his car, he was still on the sidewalk. I can talk to him about it later. Maybe I will, it’d be nice to be his friend again the way I used to be.” 

“Hey,” Felix says, throwing a small stuffed animal at him. “You’re not replacing me with Minho.” 

“Obviously not.” And he couldn’t, even if he wanted to. “You and Minho have always been different for me.” 

Felix nods and doesn’t say anything. The silence is unsettling. Deeply so. He wishes he could crawl out of it, but then Felix would ask why, and Jisung would be forced to answer, because he’s no good at lying to him. 

It’s complicated. It’s always complicated. What is he supposed to say about it? He wants to talk about it, the need crawls up his throat, claws up his throat, makes itself ever present in the back of his mouth where it cuts up his soft palette, but never fully comes out. 

Sometimes he wonders if he needs to shove a hand into his mouth and pull the words out by force. It’s a gruesome image, it’s uncomfortable to think about, but he thinks about it often. 

Thinks about it right then. 

Felix looks like he’s seconds away from falling asleep, so Jisung goes over to the wall and flicks on the light switch. The sun has mostly set by now, and it’s dark enough in Felix’s bedroom that sleep calls to them. 

Jisung wants to fall victim to it, tired from a day of doing nothing. 

Jisung doesn’t want to dream. 

Not of good things, not of bad things, not of Minho, not of anything else, anybody else. 

“What the hell…?” Felix asks, squinting against the harsh overhead light. 

“Don’t fall asleep on me. We should play another round.” 

Felix shrugs and sits up, going over to the corner of his room where there’s the TV, and sitting down beside Jisung. 

“You want to lose to me again?” he asks, and the mood lifts. 

Jisung scoffs. “You wish.” 

It’s easy again, and Jisung is thankful. 

He loses pretty miserably, but that’s okay. He doesn’t really mind. 

It’s later, much later, and Felix is walking him to the door. Jisung’s pulling on his shoes as he waits for Felix to say whatever it is that’s on his mind. 

“You know I’m not actually jealous of Minho, right? I don’t want it to come off like I don’t want you two to go back to being friends.” 

“It didn’t,” he says. 

Felix smiles, all sunshine-y. “We should do something with everyone this Saturday.” 

Jisung shrugs. 

“I can host. My parents will be out Saturday night, I’m pretty sure. Everyone can come over.” 

Felix grins like he planned this. 

“Good, I need to crush you at Monopoly.” 

Jisung laughs. 

It’s early summer. Late spring, technically. The best thing about late spring is the weather. Jisung likes winter, has plenty of good memories — days in the snow with a red-tipped nose and visible laughter in the air — but he loves the cherry blossoms and he loves spending time outside more. 

He’s walking home from Hyunjin’s, enjoying the evening air and how it’s still cool enough for him to pull his flannel over his chest. 

There’s no moon in the sky, only the early smattering of stars and the streetlamps guiding his way home. He knows the way by heart and has since he was eight and got sat next to Hyunjin in class. 

A car passes, honks at him for walking too close to the middle of the road, but Jisung doesn’t pay it any mind. 

He’s almost home when he sees someone waving. It’s Minho, taking out the trash and beckoning him over. He looks good the way he always does. A familiar heat coils tight in Jisung’s belly when he smiles at him, but he tries not to show it. 

Jisung jogs over until he’s standing in front of Minho. 

There’s something to him that’s changed. Maybe it’s graduating college, maybe it does that to you. 

Or maybe it’s something else, maybe it’s someone else. Someone pretty, someone kind, someone back in Seoul who will come up and visit him and leave Jisung tinged a bright, angry green. 

“Hi,” Minho says. 

Jisung rocks back and forth on the balls of his feet. “Hi.” 

Minho smiles. Minho laughs. It’s still his favorite sound. 

“Do you want to come in?” he asks, and Jisung almost says no. Almost immediately snaps out a no thank you, not tonight the way he did the other day when he saw Minho for the first time, but then Minho’s speaking again. “My mom’s cooking. I’m sure we’ve got enough for you, too.” 

Jisung pauses. 

Mrs. Lee is a good cook. 

And, God, he misses her food. 

So he smiles. “Yeah, okay.” 

Minho’s eyes widen like he wasn’t expecting Jisung to say yes, but the smile he gives him is blinding, and Jisung suddenly understands where the bright light of the moon went. 

He follows Minho into his house, into a home he used to know so well. The Lees painted the foyer a different color, a soft yellow where it used to be light blue, and there’s a bookshelf in the corner of the living room with picture frames and photo albums that didn’t use to be there, but he still recognizes the chip on the counter and the worn in leather couch. 

Still knows it all well. 

There’s a picture on the wall, framed next to all the other ones, of him and Minho when they were kids. They’re laughing in it, wild and raucous, and it makes him smile. 

“So,” Minho says, coming up behind him, so close Jisung feels his hot breath on the back of his neck. “How’s life been here?” 

Jisung turns around. Minho’s so close, but he’s smiling, loose and easy and it gets to Jisung in ways he can’t begin to describe. In ways that make the thick slime of guilt wrap itself around his fingers, around his throat. 

He pushes the feelings aside. 

“It’s been good.” 

“You’re studying music, right?” 

Jisung nods. “Yeah. Music education, so I can teach.” 

Minho smiles, small but genuine. 

“You’ll be so good at that.” 

Jisung wants to yell at him. Ask how the hell would you know? You haven’t been around. 

He doesn’t. Obviously. 

“I hope so. I’ve still got two years left to go, so. Hopefully it works out, you know?” 

“It will. You’re too smart for it not to, Jisungie.” 

Jisungie. He swallows. 

“Thanks. How was college? Are you relieved to have graduated?” 

Minho nods and looks at him. Looks at him in a way that unravels him, that splits him open. Looks at him the way he used to look at him, back when they were what they were. Best friends, neighbors, too close to be normal, too close to be right. 

“I am, yeah,” he starts. “But I missed home.” 

Jisung pauses for a second, a split second, just long enough for the thought to enter his mind. 

Did he miss me? 

He doesn’t ask this, because it’s not his place. He missed him, he missed him bad, and he hopes Minho feels the same, if only so all this missing feels a little less embarrassing. 

Minho snorts. Jisung tilts his head as he looks at him. 

“We were not this awkward.” 

Jisung giggles. “Well, we spent four years apart.” 

He doesn’t mean it as a dig, but Minho’s face still falls a little. 

“And I’m really sorry, Jisungie. You have to know that, but I—” 

He cuts himself off when his mom walks into the room, mouth snapping shut with a clack of his teeth. 

She gasps before smiling widely. “Jisung, it’s so good to see you. I was hoping Minho would invite you over. He’s been talking about you since he came home, I hope this means you’re back to being friends.” 

Jisung swallows thickly and nods. Minho turns to face him and brings a hand up to cup the back of his neck. Jisung’s mouth hangs open, cheeks no doubt red, red, red. 

“I hope so, too.” 

Jisung wants the ground to swallow him whole, because the thing is, Jisung’s been in love with Minho since he was eight years old. 

Not really, not in a way he recognized until a few years later, but it doesn’t make it any less real. It doesn’t make it any easier to deal with, doesn’t make the hand around his heart loosen its grip, doesn’t make the heat in his chest cool down in any way. 

Minho was older. Two years his senior and so unbelievably beautiful, even at ten years old with the teeth he hadn’t yet grown into and the smile that made Jisung’s mouth drop open in awe. He didn’t get it then. He was too young to, and there were pretty girls in his class who were nice to him, whose pigtails he was told to pull even though he didn’t want to. 

Eventually, he got it. 

There was something special about Minho, something that wasn’t supposed to be special. He wasn’t supposed to like him the way he liked his first girlfriend, and he sure as hell wasn’t supposed to like him more. 

But he did. God, he did. And he was coping with Minho leaving well, was dealing with it all very maturely, but then he came back and he’s acting like absolutely nothing changed between them. Like they didn’t use to be best friends, attached at the hip. Like his bedroom wasn’t Jisung’s safe space, like he wasn’t Jisung’s safe space. 

People in the neighborhood expected to see them together. The older people didn’t get it, didn’t understand why two teenage boys would choose to spend all their time with each other, touchy and smiley, in each other’s pockets. 

Girls would flock to Minho. He was gorgeous, undeniably so. 

Jisung fell for it, too. 

So he stands there in Minho’s living room with Minho’s hand on his neck, his mom smiling at them, eyes bright with amusement, and he doesn’t know what to do. He feels paralyzed, because this wasn’t part of the script he’d prepared when he heard Minho was coming back to stay. 

“Are you staying for dinner, Jisung?” Mrs. Lee asks. 

Jisung nods. “If that’s okay…” 

“I’m offering,” she says with a kind smile. 

Jisung nods again. “Then yes, I’d like to.” 

“Good,” she says, and makes her way over to the kitchen. 

“We’ll be waiting in my room, is that okay?” Minho asks, and Jisung nearly flees. 

Abort mission. 

Abort the fucking mission. 

Minho turns and looks at him. “It’s okay with you, right, Jisungie?” 

Jisung nods, because he’s never — never ever — been good at saying no to Minho. Not once in his life has he been able to, so he follows him up the stairs and down the hall and into his room. 

On the wall, there’s a ribbon from a cooking competition he participated in when he was twelve and there’s an abstract looking painting he did as a child and there are, most importantly, multiple photos of them. 

“I like this photo,” Jisung says. It’s from Jisung’s ninth birthday, back when he still celebrated it by himself. He and Felix always do something together now, but before they became friends at twelve when Felix moved from Australia, he would celebrate his birthday with his family and Minho. 

No party, just them. 

He was holding an obnoxiously large teddy bear that Minho got him, squeezing it against his chest, and laughing at something Minho said. Minho was looking at the side of his face with a giddy smile, like he was revelling in the way he made Jisung laugh. 

Minho was still ten. Hadn’t turned eleven yet, and those months were Jisung’s favorites, when they were closer in age. Nothing really changed, but he felt so much older when he and Minho were only one year apart. 

“This one’s my favorite,” Minho says, and points to a polaroid taped above his desk. It’s of Jisung, covering his face and showing only his eyes. He’s wearing one of Minho’s hoodies in it. He was fifteen, he’s pretty sure. 

He knew then. 

“It’s a good one,” he says, because he can’t possibly say what he’s thinking. Can’t possibly tell him he loved him then, he just can’t. Can’t say Minho with the devastation he feels and he can’t let Minho read him the way he knows how to. 

“Have you ever been to Seoul?” Minho asks. 

Jisung nods, sitting on his messily made bed. “Yeah, years ago.” 

Minho sits on the bed beside him. “You would like it, I think. You would like my friends, too. Chan and Changbin. They’re good company. You should’ve visited while I lived there.” 

Jisung bites the inside of his cheek. 

“You should’ve invited me,” he says softly. 

Minho slumps. Doesn’t look at him, and Jisung interrupts him before he can even say anything. 

“It’s fine, Minho,” he tells him, and finds that he means it. “I get it. I’m not mad at you. It’s not like I reached out, either.” 

“I’m older, though.” 

“Yeah.”

“I’m still sorry.” 

Jisung smiles at him and pokes Minho’s toe. He’s wearing purple socks. It matches the hoodie hanging over the back of his desk chair. 

“I’d like to go back to what we were,” Minho says after a beat, words so quiet he almost doesn’t hear him, but he does, he does, and Jisung swallows, mouth going dry. 

He doesn’t know if he knows how to do that. He doesn’t know if they can go back to what they were, but Jisung — God — Jisung’s bad at saying no to him. He thinks he’d let Minho ruin him forever if that’s what he wanted. He thinks he’d be happy like that. 

Jisung doesn’t like it. Doesn’t like what he’s always felt for him. It makes him feel dirty, it feels wrong. Feels wrong to like a boy when all his friends are out kissing girls at every party, when they’re going on dates with sweet cheeked, bright eyed girls. And he’s here. 

In Minho’s bedroom, tucking his toes underneath Minho’s thigh. 

It’s fine. It’s always been this way and he thinks it may be forever. 

He’s so beautiful it’s not real. Funny, sweet. Weird as hell, and so charming. 

How the hell was Jisung meant to keep from falling for him? 

“I’d like that, too,” Jisung tells him, just to see him smile. 

Minho does. 

His breath catches painfully in his throat. 

1990

8 & 10

About a day after the Hans move into the neighborhood —  an unseasonably warm winter day, the sun high in the sky and beating down on the asphalt; Jisung was wearing a sweater over his turtleneck, and he was comfortable without any extra layers — they hear a knock on the door. 

“Go open it, will you?” his mom asks, busy sorting the silverware into the kitchen drawer. His brother is busy carrying boxes up to his room, and his dad left earlier to go get something for them to eat, the fridge empty. 

It left Jisung to open the door, sitting on the edge of the stairs and watching everything around him with his cheek propped up on his palm. 

He nods, getting up and pulling the front door open. 

There’s a woman on the other side, and a boy that looks about his age. They’ve got matching eyes, dark and expressive, but where the woman’s are squinted as she smiles, the boy’s are wide and shy. 

“Hello,” she says. “Is your mother home?” 

Jisung nods. “Yeah. Mom!” 

His mom lifts her head from where she’s invested in organizing their knives. “Yes, Jisung?” 

He points to the woman and the boy at the front door. “She wants to talk to you.” 

His mom comes over with her friendliest smile, and greets the woman politely. 

“Welcome to the neighborhood,” the woman says, handing his mother a box of rice cakes. “I saw your son when you arrived yesterday, how old is he?” 

“I’m eight,” he answers, smiling widely, front teeth missing. “I turn nine in September.” 

The woman smiles down at him kindly, like she finds him very cute. “What’s your name?” 

“Han Jisung,” he says brightly. 

“Well, Jisung, this is my son. His name is Minho, and he’s ten. Do you think they could maybe play together for a little bit?” The last part is directed towards his mom, who looks at him to see what he wants. Jisung looks at her with wide, pleading eyes, because he would much rather hang out with Minho than help her unpack the entire house. 

His mom nods. 

“I’m sure he’d like that, but just for a little bit. My husband will be back with lunch soon, but until then, they can play.” 

“Really?” 

It’s the first time the boy speaks. He’s got bunny teeth, Jisung notices, and he’s looking at Jisung, really looking at him. It’d be unsettling, but there’s something about Minho he automatically trusts. His gaze is a little weird, there’s something about him that’s a little off that Jisung likes. He didn’t have many friends in his previous town, and he definitely doesn’t have any here yet. 

He thinks he’d like to be friends with Minho. 

Jisung nods a little shyly, and smiles back when Minho smiles at him. 

They go over to Minho’s house and run up the stairs to his bedroom. 

“Do you want to play a board game?” he asks. “I have model trains, too. And puzzles.” 

Jisung lights up. 

“I like puzzles.” 

Minho nods seriously, like puzzles are incredibly important business, and grabs one from his shelf. 

“I haven’t done this one yet. Do you want to do it together?” 

Jisung feels really special, feels something swell in his chest. It burns bright — burns so bright that it’s blinding, almost. It warms him from the inside out, and he appreciates the heat in the cold of winter. 

He makes grabby hands at the puzzle box. It’s two hundred pieces, a picture of a puppy running through a field. 

“Do you like dogs?” Jisung asks Minho, who nods as he dumps the pieces on the floor, propping the lid up against the foot of his bed so they can look at the picture on the box. 

“I like cats better, though,” Minho answers. “I want three, but my parents say I can’t have even one until I can clean the litterbox by myself. I think I could do it now, but my mom doesn’t think so. I want it really bad, though.” 

Minho pouts, bottom lip jutting down, and Jisung laughs. 

“I want a dog, but my parents won’t let me get one either because they don’t think I’d walk it. What would you name them?” 

“What would I name your dog?” 

Jisung giggles, and doesn’t roll his eyes even though he’s in an eye rolling phase. “What would you name your cat, duh.” 

Minho hums, piecing two blue sky pieces together. Jisung helps him with the bottom of the border as he focuses on the top, putting together all the flowery grass pieces that the dog is running through. “Soonie, Doongie, and Dori. That’s what I’d name my cats.” 

Jisung smiles at him. He feels a little silly when he smiles without his two front teeth, and he’s taken to smiling close lipped and small until they grow in, but he’s not afraid of Minho’s reaction for some reason. He knows he won’t judge him. 

So he smiles. Smiles big and giggles and doesn’t hide it behind his hands. 

“I like those names,” he tells him. 

Minho’s smile echoes his, wide and silly, and Jisung has the strange thought that he likes his teeth, awkwardly bunny-like as they may be. Maybe it’s just jealousy that he has teeth, he’s not sure, just knows Minho’s grin makes his own widen until his cheeks hurt, and they break into giggles, high and sweet like the ringing of a bell. 

Minho’s cool, he decides. Jisung wants to be his friend. 

The puzzle starts to take shape, the two of them working surprisingly fast, like there was an unspoken agreement to finish it before Jisung’s dad knocks on the door. There’s half a sky and a paw when Jisung asks Minho what his favorite movie is. 

“Ghostbusters, I think. I really like Gremlins, too.” 

“You like scary stuff.” 

“They’re not scary.” 

“I get scared.” 

“You can watch with me one day and you’ll see that they’re not actually scary.” 

“Will you hold my hand?” he asks, and immediately feels like a baby. He’s eight years old, he’s not a baby, but he’s still scared of scary things like monsters and ghosts and weird gremlins. His brother doesn’t get it, but he’s older, and watches movies Jisung isn’t allowed to see yet. 

But then Minho nods. 

“Yeah, I can hold your hand.” 

Jisung’s mouth drops open, and Minho goes back to the puzzle. 

“What’s your favorite book?” Minho asks, looking up from where he’s putting a flower together. 

“I don’t think I have one.” 

Minho hums, tilting his head. “I don’t know if I have one, either.” 

“I prefer games, anyway.” 

“Video games or board games?” 

“Both, but I guess I play board games more because my brother doesn’t let me use the TV because he always says it’s his turn to watch even though he uses it everyday. Just ‘cause he’s older.” Jisung pouts, huffing petulantly. “Having an older brother is the worst.” 

Minho shrugs. “I wish I had a brother.” 

“No, you don’t. Friends are way better.” 

Minho’s eyes light up. They’re dark, so dark, and Jisung likes them. There’s a brightness to them that Jisung’s never seen in anybody, there’s a warmth to them that makes something in his belly tighten, but he figures that’s probably hunger. 

“Yeah?” 

Jisung nods. “I can be that for you.” 

Minho’s eyes get brighter somehow. 

He’s sitting at a table in the corner of the Lee restaurant, Minho helping him with his homework since he did it all two years ago. The restaurant smells just like the Lee kitchen, something Jisung has grown familiar with over the past few weeks, constantly going over to see if Minho wants to play. 

He always says yes. 

It makes Jisung happy in a way he doesn’t know how to describe. He’s making friends at school, but they’re school friends, and nothing close to what he has with Minho. He’s never had a best friend like him, and it hasn’t been that long, but Jisung knows they’ll be best friends forever. 

There’s no one in his life that makes him feel the way Minho does. There’s something warm in his chest every time he compliments him and something buzzy in his hands every time Minho throws an arm around his shoulders and it makes him happy to know that he has somebody like that in his life. Somebody he loves with his whole body. 

“I can’t really help you with writing, you know I’m really bad at it,” Minho says, looking at Jisung apologetically. “You’re probably better than me, you’re good at making stories and stuff.” 

Jisung grins at him. 

“Thanks. I think I wanna be a writer when I grow up.” 

“You’re gonna write books?” 

“Maybe. There are probably other things you can do with writing, I don’t like reading enough to write books, I think. But I like making up stories. What would you do?” 

Minho shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe become a chef so I can work in the restaurant with my parents.” 

“You can cook for me.” 

“Yeah.” 

They fall into a comfortable silence, both of them going back to their homework. His stomach growls, and Minho laughs at him, but not unkindly. 

Never unkindly. 

“You should eat, Jisungie,” he says, leaning across the table to poke Jisung’s cheek. He’s taken to doing that lately, poking him wherever he can reach him when nobody’s looking, like these touches are their little secret. Jisung likes them, it makes him feel important in a way he’s never felt before. 

There are old people who don’t think it’s right for boys to be touchy, but Jisung never got why, and his parents don’t want to explain it to him. His brother says it’s none of his business, too, but Jisung gets the feeling it’s because he doesn’t really know either. 

So the touches are for them and nobody else because they know people will talk, even if they don’t know what they’d be talking about. 

“Yeah,” Jisung agrees, and his stomach growls again. They both giggle. “Call your mom.” 

“You call my mom.” 

“No, that’s impolite.” 

“Jisungie, you go to my house everyday.” 

“So? Call her. Please?” He makes his eyes big and round and juts out his bottom lip until Minho sighs and gets up off the chair, disappearing into the kitchen and coming back with kimchi and pork dumplings. 

“I’m only doing this because you’re my best friend, even though you’re younger.” 

And there’s that weird buzzy feeling again, because no one’s ever called him that. He’s never been someone’s best friend, not the way he’s Minho’s. Minho chooses him and he chooses him back. 

And it’s really nice. It’s nice to be somebody’s person. He thinks he loves Minho more than anybody in the world, and he doesn’t get it when people say that you don’t love your best friends the way you love your wife. 

“I want to marry Minho,” he told his mom the other day. “I don’t want to spend a day away from him ever,” he explained. 

She laughed softly. 

“Minho’s your best friend, Jisungie.” 

“Yeah, and dad’s your best friend. You said so.” 

His mom hummed, putting the shirt she was folding back in the basket so she could look at him. The look on her face was serious, more serious than he’d ever seen it, and it made him squirm under her gaze. 

“Boys don’t marry other boys,” she said sternly, but her voice was still soft. “Boys marry girls, Jisungie, that’s what’s right. That’s how God made us. Boys who marry boys go against His word.” 

Jisung didn’t know that. He’d never read the bible because it was way too long, but he remembers hearing somewhere that God loves everyone. It feels silly that God wouldn’t love him anymore just because he and Minho should be together forever since they’re very best friends.

Jisung didn’t get it. His mom didn’t yell at him and she wasn’t mean because his mom’s never mean, but it made him sad anyway, and he didn’t know how to explain that to her. He was pretty sure that would make her upset for some reason, so he nodded shyly and let her kiss his forehead before going back to folding the laundry. 

He doesn’t get why he can’t marry Minho. Because he loves Minho as big as his arms can stretch, and maybe that doesn’t sound like much because his arms aren’t as big as his dad’s, but it’s as much as he can fit in his body. 

It’s a lot to him. 

“You’re my best friend, too,” Jisung tells him.  

“Even though I’m older?” 

Jisung nods. “It’s cool that you’re older. You can show me cool things.” 

“Like horror movies.” 

Jisung nods again. 

“Yeah, and you help me with my homework even though you have homework too.” 

He’s pretty sure Minho would poke him then if more people hadn’t entered the restaurant. 

“Good. You’re allowed to make friends at school, but they can’t be better friends than me.” 

“That’s not possible,” he tells him, and means it, because even though his mom says boys don’t marry boys, Jisung still wants to be by Minho’s side forever. Would still spend the rest of his life with him if that was allowed. “I see you every day.” 

“You see your school friends everyday.” 

“Not on the weekends,” he points out, mouth full of food. Minho wrinkles his nose at the action. 

“You’re gross.” 

“You’re grosser.” 

“You’re more grosser.”

“You’re grossest,” Jisung says, words muffled. 

“That’s not a real word.” 

“Yes it is, I’m better at writing than you.” 

“Yeah, but you’re still younger and don’t know as many words.” 

Jisung rolls his eyes because his mom isn’t around to smack the back of his head because of it. 

It’s the middle of spring, finally warm enough to wear t-shirts and play outside, which is very nice because Jisung is in the middle of learning how to ride a bike. Minho is trying to help him, and it’s not going very well. Currently, he’s pretty banged up. He’s got one of those big square bandages on his elbow from where he fell and scraped it, and he ripped a pair of old, worn jeans trying to turn. 

He’s become intimately familiar with the asphalt in front of their houses, but Minho keeps telling him to try and try and try again, so Jisung tries and tries and tries again, because he’s older and cooler and Jisung wants him to keep liking him forever. 

“I don’t wanna do this anymooore,” Jisung whines, shoving his homework out of the way and taking a bite of the last dumpling, offering the other half to Minho who takes it happily. “I hate math.” 

“I know.” 

“Do it for me?” 

“No.” 

“Please?” 

“You have to actually learn it because it gets harder. I’m learning multiplication with big numbers.” 

“Whoa.” 

Minho nods, smug in the way only ten year olds know how to be. “See? You don’t even know how to multiply.” 

Jisung frowns. 

He has a point. 

“Fine,” he says, long suffering. “But only if you ask your mom for more dumplings.” 

“It’s your homework!” 

Minho asks for the dumplings anyway.

It’s summer, and he’s bored. 

The Lees are travelling, spending a week in Japan. 

Jisung is bored, bored, bored. There’s nothing to do without Minho. He could ask his mom to call Hyunjin’s mom and see if he wants to come over to play Super Mario Bros 3 with him, but his brother is probably taking up the couch again. 

As usual. 

Jisung stares out the window. The window that faces Minho’s room. The window that, just three nights ago, was open as they threw paper airplane notes to each other. 

Some of the airplanes fell miserably onto the lawn below or hit the wall and didn’t make it, and those airplanes got rescued the next day, because it was always too late, always past their bed time when they sent them flying. 

They tried to yell once. Tried to communicate via shouting, but everyone complained, so they had to find a new system. They tried getting cans and a rope and speaking into it, but the tape attaching the rope kept falling off, and Jisung’s dad didn’t want to lend them his stronger tape because it’s not like they were supposed to be up so late anyway. 

Jisung’s reading through the notes Minho sent because he’s grounded from doing anything after talking back to his mom. They’re really funny, Minho’s really funny, and he draws little doodles in the corners and the margins because he knows Jisung likes them. 

He drew a picture of a monster, and it honestly looks kind of horrible, but Jisung keeps it anyway, sliding it into a drawer so his mom doesn’t think it’s trash when she comes into his room to clean it. 

Jisung tries to draw things for him, too, but they never turn out as good. It’s probably because he’s ten and Jisung’s only eight so he’s been drawing for longer. Or maybe he’s just naturally good at it because he’s good at pretty much everything. 

Except swimming. 

But, then again, Jisung isn’t good at that, either. 

They’re a pretty good match, he thinks. There are things Jisung does better than Minho — Minho doesn’t know how to play the guitar, and Jisung’s taking lessons because he’s discovering he really likes music. His grandmother says he has a beautiful voice, which annoys his brother because he doesn’t get those kinds of compliments from her. 

Because he’s a horrible, terrible singer. 

He tries singing along to Queen anyway, which is awful, because he really is bad, and his English is even worse, but he likes the western groups better than anything he can actually understand for some reason. 

He’s singing in the shower loudly, and Jisung doesn’t even have Minho to throw a paper airplane to complain. He grabs one of the notes off the floor. 

We’re going to Japan tomorrow. Sorry I haven’t told you, it’s because I don’t really want to go. I would rather spend time here with you. I’ll bring you something back from Japan that reminds me of you. I wish you could come with us. 

Jisung had pouted. Frowning at the note when Minho had sent it. Jisung’s good at coming up with stories, but Minho’s writing is still better than his, fewer mistakes in it compared to Jisung’s. It would make him insecure, but Minho never makes fun of him for it. Just corrects him gently so Jisung can learn. 

He’s a good best friend. 

Jisung misses him. Being grounded would be way less awful if he was here, but he’s in Japan with his family, and Jisung’s here. 

He sighs, grabbing a puzzle from his shelf. He’s gotten into them since the first time he completed one with Minho, and now he asks his parents for new ones at any given opportunity. They say yes often enough that Jisung continues asking them. 

It’s much more boring to do it without Minho, but he manages to complete half a puzzle of a dragon before getting too bored and too tired and deciding to go to bed. 

He dreams of dragons and best friends and magic.

“Minho.” 

He ignores him. 

“Minhooo.” 

He ignores him some more, so Jisung pokes him in the shoulder.

“What’s wrong?” 

Minho frowns. “I don’t want it to be my birthday tomorrow.” 

Jisung sits up. He’s laying on a sleeping bag on the floor of Minho’s room, and he stares at him in confusion. 

“What? Why not? I love birthdays.” 

“Because we’re closer in age right now. Some of the guys in my class think it’s weird that my best friend is in third year when I’m in fifth, they don’t get it. Right now we’re only a year apart, so it’s less weird, I guess.” 

Jisung gets up off the floor so he can jump on top of Minho, squishing his cheeks between his palms. 

“It’s not weird.” 

“You’re only saying that because your friends think it’s cool that you have an older best friend.” His words are hard to understand due to Minho’s squished cheeks, so Jisung pulls his hands away and squeezes himself in between Minho and the wall. He painted it blue recently, and Jisung really likes it. He tried to convince his parents to let him do the same, but they said no. 

“See! People think it’s cool.” 

When Minho speaks, it’s quiet. So unlike the Minho he knows, who is weird and loud and makes him laugh so hard his sides hurt. “Not the guys in my grade. They think you’re a baby just because you’re nine and they’re turning eleven soon. Some of them are still ten, but they make fun of me for it.” 

Jisung’s face falls. 

“We can stop being friends if you want.” 

Minho’s head snaps to look at him. So quick Jisung worries he’s hurt himself. “Why would I want that? Jisungie, I would never want that.” 

Minho pokes his cheek. Pokes it again. Gently, so gently. Minho’s never rough with him, not now, not ever. Jisung sees how some of the guys treat each other during break at school, and he wonders why they’re different. They have been since the day they met, and maybe it’s Minho’s fault for leading them in that direction, but Jisung appreciates it. 

He doesn’t think about it for too long, though, because it makes him feel strange. Because it makes something twist in his chest, and chests shouldn’t twist, so he ignores it because it doesn’t feel right. 

“I want you to be my best friend forever.” 

“I will be,” he promises, and means it so truly, so deeply, so wholly. 

“Do you promise?” Minho asks, insecure in a way Jisung’s never seen him be. He reaches out and takes one of Minho’s hands in his and squeezes until Minho complains and pulls his hand away. “Ow.” 

“That didn’t hurt.” 

“Maybe it did.” 

“It didn’t. You’re stronger than me.” 

“That doesn’t mean you can’t hurt me.” 

“Did I?” 

“No,” Minho says smiling. His skin is pale and washed out from the moonlight spilling in through the window, and he looks very pretty, Jisung thinks. He doesn’t think boys are allowed to be pretty and he doesn’t think he’s allowed to think that and he doesn’t think it should make him sick in his stomach when he looks at him. He shouldn’t feel sick looking at his best friend, but he feels weird in ways he has no words for. 

“Good,” he says. “Also, I promise.” 

“You promise?” 

“I promise I’ll be your friend forever. For a bajillion years.” 

“That’s not forever.” 

“Okay. Then I’ll be your friend forever plus a bajillion.” 

Minho opens his mouth like he’s going to say something, but he cuts himself off and smiles instead. Jisung doesn’t ask what he was going to say, because he gets the feeling Minho’s not ready to share it. 

(He’ll share it eventually. Eight more years down the line, he’ll share it. Whispered between the two of them, words no one else should ever know, because it’s not right. It isn’t. Jisung knows it, but he can’t help it, either. He knows how to name the twist in his chest and the buzziness and the words he didn’t have yet at eight and nine and ten years old.

And it’ll hurt. It’ll hurt like hell, because he knows what happens when you let that kind of thing slip. It’ll feel like a knife shoved between his ribs, like the tip of it pressing into his heart, the heart that’s been Minho’s since they were kids. Since that sunny winter day, since that puzzle. 

The heart that’s been Minho’s since before he even knew him, really. A Minho shaped hole in his chest that he didn’t realize was empty until Minho stepped into it.) 

“Good,” is what Minho settles on, all smiley and sweet. 

Jisung grins back.

2002

20 & 22

The only light in his room is the lamp by his bedside table. Not even the moon is out, a dark void in the sky where it should be hanging, its pale light lighting up Jisung’s bedroom along with the streetlights outside and the warm light beside him. 

The only sound comes from the cars on the road and the faint sound of his parents having a conversation in the kitchen, but the sound is muffled, feels a million miles away. 

Sometimes his parents do, too. Feel a million miles away, on a planet he doesn’t know the route to. Sometimes he thinks they feel the same way about him, like they don’t recognize the person he’s grown into. It hurts, a little. Hurts like a side wound; he can’t bend over, can’t turn around, must stand horribly, perfectly still if he doesn’t want to bleed out. 

He wonders if it’d be better to bleed out than to live like this. Fearing his parents, fearing a God he believes in at a cost far too high. He wonders if it wouldn’t be better to be stained red, to have his hands be dirty than to feel this way, so trapped in a cage of his own making. 

It’d be easier if he had never moved in next door to Minho. It’d be easier, but it’d be miserable. 

It’d be a swift kick to the throat, it’d be an uncomfortable itch he can’t scratch, it’d be a vast emptiness, a moonless sky, had he never met him. 

He forgives him for leaving, he really does, and he’s glad he’s back, glad he seems to want to stay. 

Jisung missed him. Missed him the way you miss a bruise when you can no longer poke at it. For the longest, longest time it was them. It was them and nobody else, nobody else came close, not for him, not for Minho. 

He knows what went wrong. 

He just doesn’t let himself think about it. 

Never ever. 

He’s flipping through a book on the history of music, one that was recommended by his history of music professor last semester. It’s horribly boring for the most part, but Jisung just got to the part that talks about rock in the sixties, and he’s interested in that. 

He flips through the pages. Him and the wind coming from his open window, flipping through the pages with him, when he sees a light flick on in Minho’s bedroom. 

He walks over to the window and tries to be subtle in the way he watches him. 

He’s so beautiful. From this distance, from up close. He’s beautiful. Easily the most gorgeous man Jisung has ever seen, pretty in a way that feels unreal, almost. His straight nose and the upper lip Jisung can’t admit to wanting to kiss because he feels like it might kill him and his eyes, big and dark and expressive, expressive now the same way it was when he was ten years old and staring bug-eyed at Jisung who was smiling back at him, eight years old and unfamiliar with awkwardness, with shyness. 

Minho catches him. Obviously. Jisung’s just sitting by the window staring at him, at his body as he changes, at his grin when he turns to face the window and look at Jisung. 

“Hi,” he says. Mouths, really, speaking too softly for the sound to travel across the space — miles and miles and miles — between their bedrooms. 

Jisung waves back. 

Minho grins, raising a finger telling Jisung to wait where he is. 

He scrunches his brow curiously, watching Minho write something in a notebook before ripping out the sheet of paper and folding it into a paper airplane, going back over to the window to throw it gently into Jisung’s room. 

His chest tightens. 

They haven’t done this since they were kids. 

But Minho’s smiling at him with his head tilted, so goddamn fond that it nearly kills him, so Jisung unfolds the paper airplane and reads the note and blushes like a fool at what’s written. 

Hey, cutie, it says. Because Minho seems dead set on killing him. 

Jisung waves at him again, and Minho laughs. It’s bright and almost reaches him, drops to the floor like a flower petal in spring, just shy of Jisung’s ears, which feels unnecessarily cruel. He thinks he should always be around when Minho laughs. 

God, he loves him. 

Loves him in a way that lasted for four years. Loves him a way that was tested by time and distance and fear. Loves him anyway. 

It’s scary. It’s so scary. Loving Minho is the scariest thing he’s ever done. 

It’s also the easiest. 

That just scares him more. 

He grabs paper from his desk and writes a note for Minho, because that’s how they do this, and he’s not about to change it now. Not when Minho’s back and seems intent on becoming his friend again, turning back time until they’re the way they used to be. 

Hi, he writes. What are you doing? 

He tosses it. It successfully lands in Minho’s room. 

Jisung watches him unfold the paper, read it, grab his notebook, write in it, fold the paper carefully — so carefully, the way he’s always done — and toss it. It lands on Jisung’s floor. 

Talking to you. You look good. 

Jisung can’t seem to stop blushing. Can’t seem to be normal about him. 

He never has been, really. That’s not news. 

He looks at Minho as he bites his cheek, and Minho smiles like he’s won. 

Thank you. So do you. You’ve always looked good, though. 

He throws it and hopes it doesn’t fall because he doesn’t want to go downstairs to pick it up, and he definitely doesn’t want his parents asking why he’s holding a paper airplane to his chest, unwilling to let anyone take a look at what’s inside. 

His dad would be so disappointed. His mom would be so sad. 

He almost wishes they’d get angry, but he knows they wouldn’t. They’d read the note on the paper and know immediately who it’d be for. His mother would cry and ask God where she went wrong, his father would go silent, would probably never speak to him again. 

Minho stretches his hand out to catch the paper, and manages to grab it in his palm. 

Jisung exhales. 

Minho grins wickedly when he tosses his over. 

You’re so cute, it’s always driven me crazy, you know? You’ve grown up a lot since you were sixteen. Damn, you look good. 

Jisung knows the tips of his ears are red, but he still reaches his hand up to check their warmth. 

Another plane lands in his room before he has time to write his response. 

I love making you flustered. 

He needs to bash his head through a wall or something, because there’s no way this is normal. There’s no way the way his heart beats for him is okay, there’s no way it’s good or right. 

But it feels good. 

It feels right. 

Always has, really. 

What’s up with you? 

I missed you, Minho’s airplane says. When Jisung meets his eyes, he’s smiling at him sadly. 

I missed you, too. I want to go back to the way we were. 

I want that, too. I’m sorry… 

And then there’s something colored over with black marker that Jisung can’t read. He knows what it says, though, of course he does. He knows what it says because he’s sorry, too. 

But he can’t think about it. He can’t say it. 

It’s okay. I mean it. I never held it against you. I don’t think I could. 

Minho smiles at him sadly from his window. 

I’m glad you don’t. It feels selfish, though. I don’t think I deserve it. I don’t think I deserve you. 

Jisung swallows around nothing when he reads that one. It’s so close to the words he’s been dying to hear since he was sixteen and so desperately in love with his best friend. With his best friend who was older and funny and so strange, so endearing. His best friend who he wanted to kiss and who didn’t want to kiss him back. 

With his best friend who didn’t even know he liked guys in the first place. 

It’s complicated. Of course it’s complicated. Minho knows now, of course he knows, he’s known for four years, and he hasn’t said anything, not really. It’s an open secret neither of them know how to touch or talk about or think of. 

At least, Jisung doesn’t know how to touch or talk about or think of it. 

Sometimes he gets the feeling Minho’s just letting him be emotionally constipated about the whole thing, because he’s so good at being himself. He’s so unapologetic about it, even if it’s in a quiet way, even if he isn’t screaming that he’s gay from the rooftops. 

He’s still unafraid of it. 

And Jisung gets that it’s because he doesn’t fear a God the way he does. Jisung gets that it’s different for him and his parents who wouldn’t hate him the way Jisung’s would, but it makes it hard. It makes it so hard. 

Because he loves him, sure, but he likes him, too. He’s had a hopeless crush on him since he was thirteen years old, and he thinks nobody will ever compare to him. One day, he’s gonna get married and have kids and he’ll feel an ever consuming guilt, because it doesn’t matter. 

It doesn’t matter who he marries, who he settles down with, she will never, ever be Minho. 

You deserve me, he starts and doesn’t finish, balling up the paper and throwing it in the trash. It sounds too close to you can have me, it sounds too close to please want me, it sounds too much like a confession he can’t make. 

I like your hair, he says instead. 

It’s safe. 

So he sends it across. 

I already told you that you look good. Manly, very different from the last time I saw you. 

You’ve seen me since, Jisung sends with a furrow between his brows. 

Not like this, Minho answers. 

Jisung’s left wondering what the hell this is. 

They talk for a long time. Jisung changes the subject to the restaurant, and their letters get longer, full stories being told in them, and there’s no flirting, no cutie, Minho lets him breathe. 

He appreciates it. 

(He wishes he wouldn’t though. Let him breathe.)

I’m going to sleep. Goodnight, Jisungie, we can talk more tomorrow, yeah? Minho says at the bottom of a letter. When Jisung looks up at him, he’s stifling a yawn. He turns away when Minho peels his shirt off, because that’s not for him to look at. 

Jisung nods at him. Minho’s smile is so blinding he almost can’t look straight at it. 

Jisung waves goodbye and shuts his blinds. 

He stares up at the ceiling for a while, and doesn’t manage to fall asleep for a long time. 

“We,” Felix starts. “Should throw a party at the end of summer.” 

“Mm,” Hyunjin says. “Whose house?” 

“Mine. My parents are gonna be out at the end of summer for a week. We can totally throw the party then,” Felix offers, moving his piece on the monopoly board. He’s currently winning, which is honestly a shock, because he’s horrible at board games, like, in general. 

The house is empty aside from the five of them sitting around the coffee table in the living room. Jeongin gave up about five minutes ago, and decided to just watch the game. Seungmin is trying to trash talk everyone into losing. It’s not going well. Hyunjin is losing miserably, and Jisung’s just content to be playing the game with his friends. 

After the airplanes sent back and forth two nights ago, it’s nice to go back to what’s simple. What’s known. 

In a way, Minho’s known, too. Minho’s still familiar in every way that counts. 

But he’s familiar in a way that scares him. Jisung knows him well, still bets he knows him better than anybody else. There are things they shared that Jisung knows Minho doesn’t talk about, because it wouldn’t be fair to Jisung if he did. 

“I’m down for a party,” Jisung chimes in. “I think it’d be fun.” 

“Maybe you’ll actually get with someone for once,” Seungmin says, not looking up from the board where he’s thinking of his next purchase. 

Jisung swallows and laughs a little awkwardly. 

It’s not that he doesn’t like girls. He does, it’s part of what makes this so confusing. He likes girls and likes kissing girls but he likes Minho more. That's the problem. He thinks he wouldn’t mind kissing Minho at the party if that was something they were allowed to do. 

It isn’t, though. 

And it never really will be, he doesn’t think. He can’t imagine a world in which he gets to kiss a boy in front of somebody else and face no repercussions for it. Can’t imagine a world in which that is okay. 

It’s sad. He finds it sad. He would be proud to be Minho’s boyfriend if that was something Minho wanted, but he can’t imagine it is. If it was, then—

Well, it isn’t. He made that clear when he spent days and weeks and months and years gone. 

He’s a little resentful, if he’s being honest, but not enough to really hold it against him in any way, because he has Minho’s email written down on a notepad in his desk drawer, and he never once messaged him. 

It’s not just Minho’s fault. 

It’s his, too. 

“I get with girls,” he argues, not meaning a word. 

He doesn’t, he knows he doesn’t, his friends know he doesn’t, but he can’t let it slide. 

“You don’t. You’re not a bad looking guy, Jisung, you should go after people.” 

“You think I’m so good looking, I’ll just go after you,” he jokes. Seungmin scrunches his face in disgust. 

“No,” Seungmin says. “Absolutely not.”

Jisung pouts and pretends to be upset about it. 

“You don’t want to kiss him anyway,” Jeongin says. 

“Why? I’m a great kisser.” 

“Yeah, but your breath smells awful.” 

Seungmin frowns. 

“It does not.” 

“It does, too. You’ve slept at my house enough times for me to know.” Jeongin smiles sweetly, dimpled innocence that makes Seungmin’s frown deepen. 

“Everyone has morning breath! It’s totally normal.” 

“No, but yours is on another level.” 

Seungmin rolls his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest and mumbling whatever under his breath. 

Jisung laughs at his expression, everyone else’s laughter mixing with his. 

It’s nice, he thinks. Nice to be surrounded by some of his favorite people. 

“Jisung, do you have anything to eat?” Jeongin asks, already getting up off the couch and making his way to the kitchen. Jisung gets up and follows him — it won’t be his turn for a while, anyway — and opens the fridge, pulling out last night’s leftovers and handing it over to him. 

“Here. Just don’t eat all of it.” 

“I wasn’t gonna, but now I am.” 

“Is that your mom’s food?” Felix asks from the floor. Seungmin groans, complaining that it’s Felix’s turn to play and he should focus on the board instead of getting up to get food. 

“It’s Mrs. Lee’s,” he says. He went to the restaurant yesterday to pick up their takeout, and found Mrs. Lee had packed a lot more than they had ordered. 

“I’m just so happy you and Minho are friends again. He missed you so much, Jisungie,” she said. Jisung nodded and thanked her for the food, and didn’t think about the fact that Minho missed him so badly that his parents knew about it. 

“Oh, shit, even better,” Felix says, and Jisung frowns at him. 

“You don’t like my mom’s cooking?” he asks, just to be a little shit, because everyone knows the Lees’s restaurant is the best one around. 

“No,” Seungmin deadpans. 

“I wasn’t asking you.” 

“I love your mom’s cooking,” Hyunjin says from where he’s sprawled out on the couch. He runs a hand through his hair. He recently bleached the tips of it, and it looks really cool. Jisung likes it.  

“Thank you, Hyunjin.” 

They’re laughing, teasing each other the way they always do whenever they’re together when there’s a knock on the front door. 

They all eye each other curiously. They didn’t invite anyone else because it’s not like they have any other friends, so Jisung steps away from the kitchen despite knowing that his friends will eat the rest of the leftovers and leave none for him if he doesn’t get back to the fridge fast enough. 

He pulls open the door. 

Minho is standing on the other side, smiling at him. 

“Minho,” Jisung breathes out. He hasn’t seen him since they talked, not even through his window, somehow always missing him despite his blinds being open. “Hi.” 

“Hey. Are you busy?” he asks. 

Jisung shakes his head before remembering he has friends over. Friends who are watching the interaction from behind him, their eyes boring into the back of his skull. He can feel them staring at him, staring at Minho, who they all know but aren’t friends with. 

And they don’t really like him very much. Not when Jisung was heartbroken when he left. His friends don’t actually know the why, they just assumed his best friend left and decided not to come back. 

“I’m kind of busy, yeah,” he says. 

“Oh.” Minho’s face falls just a little bit, just enough for Jisung to notice. 

“Did you want to play?” Jisung asks with a shit eating grin, and immediately regrets his choice of words. It sounds weird now that they’re adults. It sounds like something sexual now that they aren’t eight years old, but he doesn’t take it back. 

Well, there’s no way to. 

“Yeah,” Minho says, taking Jisung’s awkwardness in stride. “ I was wondering if you wanted to play Melee at mine, but I see that your friends are here, so I can leave.” 

He smiles kindly and turns to go home when Jisung’s hand grips his wrist. His skin is warm. 

“You can stay. We’re just playing board games and stuff. We’ll probably switch to video games in a second, we always do a competition to see who comes out on top, so.” 

“What does the winner get?” 

“Bragging rights,” Seungmin says from the kitchen, because of course he’s listening. 

“Yeah,” Jisung agrees. 

Minho looks hesitant. “Are you sure?” 

Jisung nods, maybe a bit too quickly as he looks at him. 

“Then okay,” Minho says, and steps into Jisung’s house, toeing his shoes off. He looks so at home here. 

He looks like he fits right in. There’s a bookshelf with his mom’s self help books and his dad’s history novels, there’s the TV in the corner with a collection of DVDs underneath it, and there’s Minho right in front of him, taking up space that is rightfully his. 

“Hey, Minho,” Felix says. “How are you?” 

Minho nods. “Good, yeah. I’ve been working at the restaurant, which is nice. It’s what I got my degree in for a reason.” 

Felix nods. 

“Cool. Do you want to take my place in Monopoly? I can’t stand to play it anymore. We’ve been going at it for hours.” 

Jisung snorts, but they really have been going at it for a while. He forgets how long Monopoly takes. 

Minho snorts too, smiling at him instead of Felix like he just can’t look away. 

Jisung gets the feeling. 

Everyone knows Minho. Everyone remembers him from school and everyone remembers him from Jisung’s birthdays and everyone remembers him because they all saw him around all the time, but Jisung doesn’t think they ever saw him in a context so casual. He almost doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do here, how he’s supposed to act. 

Because this crossover? 

That’s not supposed to happen. 

Minho and the guys have always existed separately. They were his school friends, and Minho was his neighbor. They were his friends, but Minho was his very best one. It’s different, it’s always been different. 

He feels a little like he’s on uneven footing, like he can’t stand straight without getting dizzy. 

“Do you cook as well as your mom?” Hyunjin asks, taking a bite of the gimbap.

“No,” Jisung answers for him. Minho grins down at him like him saying no is the best thing that’s ever happened to him. Maybe it is, Jisung isn’t sure. Maybe it shows that they’re going back to what they used to be. 

“I really don’t. I’m not a bad cook by any means, but…” he answers. “I handle the business part of the restaurant. It’s what I went to college for.” 

They all nod. 

“That’s cool. It’s cool that you’ve graduated. I can’t wait to finish school and get out of here,” Felix says. He appreciates the effort he’s making to talk to Minho, because he knows how Felix feels about him. 

He wonders, sometimes, if Felix knows that Minho broke his heart. Wonders if Felix sees right through him and into the buzzing in his chest, if he sees the bees and the butterflies that flood him whenever Minho so much as smiles at him. 

They’ve been close since high school. Felix has seen him interact with Minho plenty of times, probably more than any of the other guys, and Jisung— 

He worries. 

He worries a lot. 

Because he knows it isn’t right. He knows some people say it’s because of God and that he’ll go to hell for feeling the way he does about a boy (and he doesn’t get that. He doesn’t get it at all, because loving Minho is so easy, it feels so right that Jisung isn’t sure how on earth it could possibly be wrong), and there are some people who think he’s a horrible person because it’s not natural what he’s feeling. 

He doesn’t get it. Doesn’t get it either way. 

Because it’s not like he chose to fall for Minho. He wouldn’t have chosen that otherwise. 

(He would. He would, because it’s so good. Loving him is so good, it’s natural and it feels right and there’s nothing bad about it, not even close. Jisung would choose to fall in love with Minho as many times as he’s allowed to, and if that’s forever then he’d choose to fall in love with him forever.

And ever. 

And ever.) 

Maybe there’s a universe out there where he falls in love with him and it’s okay. Maybe there’s a universe out there where loving him doesn’t make him a bad person. 

He wishes he lived there. He hopes that that Jisung is happy. He hopes that that Jisung is wrapping his arms around his Minho’s waist and kissing the back of his neck in the morning as Minho makes breakfast for them in the apartment they live in together. 

That universe has to exist somewhere, he’s sure of it. It’d be cruel if it didn’t, he thinks. 

Sometimes he wonders if it’s not possible to steal a little bit of that world and drag it into his. Maybe get an apartment with Minho in Seoul, pretend they’re just bachelors living together, friends who chose to split the rent in a big city. 

And then, behind closed doors, he would get kissed and touched and loved on. 

It wouldn’t matter that the world outside wouldn’t know, because he would get to have him. And that would be enough. 

Close to enough, at least. 

As close to enough as he’ll ever get. 

And he doesn’t even have it. 

“Minho, are you good at any video game?” 

Minho shrugs. “Yeah, I’m not bad at Super Mario 64, and I know Jisung has it.”

The ease with which he says it unsettles him. What if he had gotten rid of it? What if he had donated it? What if Jisung decided he didn’t like video games anymore? 

It’s not like Minho would know. 

“Oh, yeah, I love that game,” Hyunjin says. Minho smiles at him. 

Jisung’s not dumb and he’s not blind. He’s seen the way Minho looks at men and the way he’ll exist around them. Hyunjin’s not gay, but Minho still smiles at him and leans into his space a little, and Jisung can’t help but hate it. 

He doesn’t think Minho’s even doing it on purpose. Thinks this is maybe just how he is. 

He’s always seemed less afraid than Jisung. Jisung’s always been terrified of his feelings, of his feelings for men, for Minho. They’ve always scared him. 

Minho doesn’t seem that scared. He’ll laugh at someone Jeongin says, laugh harder when Seungmin chimes in, and then look over at Jisung with the fondest of grins on his face. And Jisung can admit that it’s fond, can see that there’s love there. 

But it’s not how Jisung loves him. 

And, honestly? 

He’s sure he wants it to be. 

Or, that’s not true. A part of him really wants to be loved by him. He has an ex-girlfriend who he had sex with once, and then proceeded to cry as he biked back from her place. It’s not that it was bad, he liked it fine. The sex felt good, and Jisung should’ve been happy about it. 

But he didn’t want to sink into tight, wet heat. He wanted to — wants to be pinned down and fucked into the mattress in a way that’s…far from what he’s supposed to desire. He wants Minho to be rough with him and he wants Minho to be gentle in a way that’s overwhelming. 

The other part doesn’t want to let himself want that. 

They make their way over to the couch. Jisung sits down in the armchair so no one can take a seat beside him. Minho sits on the couch next to Hyunjin, right in front of the window. 

It paints him golden. 

The sun is setting outside, and its light is warm and orange. It turns Minho’s skin just as golden and warm and orange, his eyes squinting against the light, looking lighter than usual when the sinking sunrays hit them just so. 

It reminds Jisung of winter, weirdly. Of being out on the street late at to catch the first snow of the season on their tongues. Minho was warm and yellow from the street lights lighting up the otherwise empty road, and he was something. 

Jisung was thirteen. People will tell you that you know nothing about love when you’re thirteen. 

Whatever he knew then is certainly more than he knows now. 

He thinks his knowledge of love peaked when he was ten and Minho was twelve and Minho held his hand while they watched a scary movie the way they always did even though boys weren’t really supposed to do that, and he allowed himself to feel. 

It felt weird. His chest felt tight, he remembers, but he felt something and didn’t censor it. 

That’s closer to love than whatever mouse trap he’s put himself in. 

He watches him. Watches Hyunjin, too, and Felix. Tries to compare what he feels for the three of them, even though he loves each of them in ways so different and distinct it’s incomparable. 

Hyunjin’s been his friend for years. 

Felix has been his best friend since middle school. 

Minho’s this untouchable thing. More than a best friend, more than a lover. Something worse. Something better. 

Jisung wishes he was brave enough to figure it out. 

He catches Minho as he’s getting into his car. Jisung’s hopping on his bike because he said he’d meet Felix at the ice cream parlor near the movie theater, and maybe see if there’s anything they feel like watching. 

Minho drives a few feet forward until he’s right in front of Jisung. 

“Where are you going?” he asks. 

“To the ice cream place near the cinema.” 

Minho leans over and pushes the door open. “Get in, I’ll drop you off.” 

Jisung stares at him. 

“Don’t you have somewhere else to go?” 

Minho shrugs. “Yeah, but I’ve got time.” 

Jisung stares at him for what feels like forever, a long while that stretches, before nodding. “Okay, yeah. Let me just put the bike back?” 

Minho smiles. “Sure.” 

He gets in the car after putting the bike in its place, and slides into the passenger seat next to Minho. He expects the air to be stiff and the silence to be loaded, but it’s neither one of those things; instead, they fall into easy conversation, talking like the four years they put between them never happened. 

“You’re close with Felix now,” Minho comments as he turns onto the main road. Jisung might be imagining the downturned curve of his mouth that disappears quickly when he turns to look at him, probably is, really. 

But for a split second, it looks like Minho is jealous.

“Yeah. We’re pretty close, he’s my best friend these days.” 

He doesn’t mention the obvious, doesn’t poke the sleeping elephant in the room, and mention that it’s only Felix now because Minho left. 

Minho looks like he feels guilty for it anyway. 

“Are you…you know?” Minho asks, cheeks dusting pink with shyness. With embarrassment. 

It takes Jisung a second to figure out what he’s asking. 

“Oh! Oh, no. No definitely—definitely not. It’s just Felix.” 

“Cool,” Minho says with a smile, the most genuine one he’s given Jisung since he got into his car. 

“There’s never…” he trails off, shrugging. Minho looks almost pleased. 

They’ve been this way for years. This endless push and pull, this neverending tight rope he has to walk on if he doesn’t want to die, this ice he’s been skating on for far too long, afraid of falling into the water, but not knowing how to get to solid ground. 

Not wanting to get to solid ground, really. 

It’s been this way since he was thirteen and realized he was in love with his best friend. 

It’ll be this way forever, he’s sure. 

It’s never been anything. Between them. It’s never been anything, but it’s not nothing, either. 

There have been moments. Moments where it felt like something more could’ve existed in between the lines, the paper scribbled with notes of a love story unwritten in the margins. Of could’ve beens and should’ve beens. 

He wishes he had done something about it before Minho left. He wishes he had taken the bus to Seoul and to Minho’s apartment and confessed at his front door, consequences be damned, because at least that would’ve been real. 

At least that would’ve been honest. 

“Everyone here’s always been crazy for not noticing,” Minho says, staring at the road. They pull up to the ice cream shop. Jisung sees Felix leaning against the door as he waits for him. 

“Not noticing what?” 

Minho’s hand drops from the gearshift, and his pinkie grazes Jisung’s thigh. It’s electric, he’s electric, Jisung doesn’t know what he’s meant to do with him. 

Hasn’t ever known. 

“You,” he says with a smile. Jisung blushes horribly. He thinks that might’ve been Minho’s goal. 

He doesn’t get it. Not really. Part of him does, part of him wants to make assumptions and see if Minho wants him the way he wants and craves and needs Minho. The other part can’t fathom any of that. Can’t fathom Minho’s hands on his or his body pressing against Jisung’s as he kisses him or the way his cock would feel inside of him. 

He’s not a virgin. He’s been with more than one girl, even. All pretty, all sweet and cute, all of them laughing at his jokes that weren’t funny in the slightest. 

Minho would’ve smiled at him with the same crinkly-eyed look he’s giving him now, all fond and warm, and Jisung wouldn’t know what to do with it. Doesn’t know what to do with it. He wonders if he ever will. 

“I should—” 

“Yeah. See you later, Jisungie,” he says, and taps Jisung lightly on the butt as he gets out of the car the way he’s done since they were teenagers. 

Felix has his arms crossed over his chest and an eyebrow raised when he reaches him. 

“Was that Minho?” 

Jisung nods. “Yeah, he was going somewhere. Offered to give me a ride.” 

Felix nods, something curious about his expression that Jisung can’t figure out. 

1994

13 & 15

It’s winter. It’s snowing. 

The world is white around them, the moon high in the sky, the streetlamps casting shadows on their faces. Minho’s lips look especially nice in this lighting, curled up in a smile as he looks up at the snow falling down around them. 

There’s no one else out right now. Just the two of them on an otherwise empty street, bundled up in their layers and their puffy winter jackets. Jisung’s staring at Minho. He’s been doing that a lot lately, he’s noticed, and he hasn’t exactly figured out why. He doesn’t fully understand it. 

Just knows that there is nothing in the world more interesting to look at than Lee Minho with snowflakes on his eyelashes, tongue out to catch them. He’s wearing a scarf so chunky it goes past his chin, nearly reaches his bottom lip. 

Jisung’s spent a lot of time staring at that bottom lip. 

Lately, it seems like that’s all he does. 

Look at him. 

He looks at him and expects he’ll get tired at some point and just…doesn’t. He doesn’t ever get tired, because there’s nothing more beautiful than his best friend, Jisung’s convinced of it. 

He’s not a painting in a museum because he’s better. He’s got all these little imperfections that only Jisung knows about because he’s the only one who has spent enough time with him to notice. 

Like the way one eye closes more than the other when he laughs and the way one of his front teeth stick out and the way he sighs after every fit of laughter. Those are things he knows. 

It’s so much better than a perfect piece of art. 

His chest feels tight and funny and achy and his hands burn and buzz and he— 

He has a feeling. 

A scary one. 

The kind of feeling he’s not supposed to tell anybody about. 

He’s…Jisung’s heard things. Heard things from his brother and heard things from his dad, and he’s heard things that are wrong. That aren’t natural. That aren’t right. It reminds him a lot of the conversation he had with his mom five years ago, where he said he wanted to marry Minho and she said he couldn’t, not when it was so wrong. 

Everyone said they’d grow out of it, their touchiness. Everyone said that, someday, Jisung would want to marry a pretty girl. Settle down with her and have kids, a future he’s supposed to want. 

A future he hasn’t wanted since he met the boy beside him. 

Minho’s fifteen. He’s older in a way that makes a difference when you’re thirteen years old, but he’s still his best friend. They still do everything together. Sometimes Jisung worries about him, because he has other friends, but Minho doesn’t really seem to hang out with anybody else. 

“I’m not lonely, Jisungie,” he said one night, the two of them staring up at the glow in the dark stars on Jisung’s ceiling. There was a mattress on the floor still neatly made from where Minho wasn’t using it. 

In the morning they’d wake up and rumple the bed so it looked like someone slept in it, but for now, Jisung welcomed his body heat and the shoulder he was using as a pillow. 

Minho was running gentle fingers up and down Jisung’s arm, scratching his skin with blunt nails. 

“But you never hang out with anybody else.” 

Minho shrugged. Jisung didn’t see the movement but he felt it underneath his head. 

“I don’t really care about that.” 

“You can’t have only me forever.” 

He remembers Minho tensing slightly at that before relaxing and then poking Jisung in the shoulder, in the cheek, in his hair. 

Anything to make him laugh. 

It worked, Jisung giggled quietly — careful not to wake his mother, who would barge into the room and see Minho wrapped around him and freak out, probably. 

“What if I want to have you forever?” he said, and Jisung’s breath snagged on a lump in his throat. Minho sensed how thick the air got and cleared his throat. “Sorry, I mean—” 

“Best friends forever, right?” Jisung said. 

Minho smiled a little weirdly, and nodded. “Exactly, yeah.” 

He thinks about that moment often. Thinks about it as he’s brushing his teeth and every time he crawls into Minho’s bed. He thinks about it when he’s making himself breakfast in the morning and when he’s walking to school by Minho’s side, arms brushing with every step. 

What if I want to have you forever? 

What if Jisung wants that, too? 

“What are you thinking about?” Minho asks, turning to look at him. The tip of his nose is pink from the cold and he looks like a bunny. A very, very cute bunny. 

Jisung’s not supposed to find him cute. 

He does, though. 

“Nothing. Just looking at how dumb you look with snowflakes on your eyelashes.” 

Minho scoffs, shoving his shoulder.

His inhale is shaky.

Jisung realizes he’s in love with Minho like this:

On a Thursday night in the middle of the street, Minho laughing when Jisung stumbles and falls into the snow, and then jumping into the snow beside him, Minho’s gloved hand coming to run through Jisung’s hair where his hat’s fallen off. 

It’s incredibly mundane, really. That’s what catches him off guard. He knows people will tell him he’s too young to know what he’s talking about, but he knows. He knows what the feeling in his chest is, knows what the burning in his lungs is, knows, knows, knows that he loves him. 

It’s sudden and all consuming and Jisung’s never been more sure of anything in his life. 

He sighs. Breathes out a visible exhale. 

Minho taps his nose with an ice cold finger. 

“You’re being weird, Jisungie.” 

“My turn, then. You’re always weird.” 

Minho considers this, and hums. “I guess that’s fair.” 

Jisung laughs. 

They laugh together, lying there in the snow. 

It’s not the first time Jisung’s thought about what it might feel like to kiss someone, but it’s the first time he wonders what it might feel like to kiss Minho. Someone specific. Someone with a face he can imagine and a name he can taste on his tongue. 

It’s strange. 

It’s strange how good it feels. How nice it is to finally figure it out, because for too long this need has existed, simmering under the surface but never fully reaching a boil. For too long this desire has burned so bright it nearly blinds him, an almost that’s been driving him insane. 

He can never tell Minho, he knows this. 

He can never tell anyone. 

But the words settle in his mouth like they belong there, an I love you that would carry a weight their I love yous never do. 

“You’re being all thinky,” Minho says, taking snow and smushing it against Jisung’s forehead. It’s cold, and he complains about it a second later than he’s supposed to, too busy thinking about pressing his lips to Minho’s to really care about the iciness of it. “What’s on your mind?” 

God, you. It’s you, Minho. 

He doesn’t say this.

Doesn’t say it because he’s thirteen and Minho will laugh softly and tell him he knows nothing about love, not yet. Doesn’t say it because Minho wouldn’t even be mad, he’d just pull away slowly until JisungandMinho, one word, separated into two very distinct parts. 

Minho wouldn’t hate him, but it’d change things. 

Thinks Jisung doesn’t want to change. 

“Have you ever kissed somebody?” he asks, avoiding the way Minho’s gaze cuts through his skin, digs into his side profile uncomfortably. 

In his periphery, he sees Minho nod. 

“Yeah,” he says quietly. “Have you?” 

“No,” he admits. “Why didn’t you tell me?” 

“I wasn’t sure you’d want to know.” 

“Of course I would. We tell each other everything.” He’s pouting, he knows he’s pouting, but he doesn’t care, because he doesn’t want Minho keeping secrets from him, especially not this kind, even if it hurts to hear it. “Who?” 

“You wouldn’t know her,” he says. “She’s from another school.” 

Jisung swallows around nothing. “What was it like?” 

He doesn’t ask for her name, because he’s not sure he wants to know. He doesn’t want to put a face to a name and hate a girl for no reason, hate a girl just because he likes boys. Just because he’s queer. 

There are other words, crueler words. He’s heard them. He doesn’t think people like people like him very much. His parents like to turn the news off quickly when he walks into the living room and there’s news about people like that on the TV. People like him. 

Like he wouldn’t somehow learn about it all, anyway. 

Like it’d keep him from turning out this way, in love with his best friend, the most beautiful boy he’s ever seen. 

“Wet,” Minho says, nose scrunched in disgust. “I don’t think she knew how to kiss very well.” 

“Maybe you were the problem,” Jisung teases. 

Minho scoffs. 

“There’s no way it was me, Jisungie. I’m a great kisser.” 

He wants to poke and prod until Minho offers to kiss him so he can find out, but that’s a crazy thing to hope for, and an even crazier thing to suggest. 

They’re in the middle of the street. Anyone could walk by. The older ladies of their neighborhood already gossip about them, he doesn’t need to add any fuel to the fire by kissing Minho in the snow. 

“I’ve never kissed anybody,” he says sadly, looking up at the moon, her light soft and kind as she brushes gentle fingers down their cheeks. 

Minho smiles at him. 

“It’s okay. I didn’t have my first kiss until recently. You’ll find a girl.” 

It’s kind. It’s sweet. It’s Minho looking out for him. 

He hates it the way he hates bile when it crawls up his throat and doesn’t come out, just burns. 

Burns and burns. 

2002

20 & 22

Jisung’s been staring at Minho’s window for a while. A long enough while that he’s starting to both get bored and feel a little weird about it. He’s not home, clearly, and is probably helping his dad out at the restaurant, but Jisung wants to see him. Wants to talk to him, and he is nowhere to be found. 

So he’s sitting at his desk, on his spinny chair, tossing a small soccer ball up and down and up and down, trying and failing to catch it every time. 

Eventually, the light in Minho’s room flicks on, and Jisung sits up, going over to the window. He leans his body half out of it, and then pauses, because Minho’s wearing a dress shirt, and he’s undoing it button by torturous button, so slowly, so agonizingly, that Jisung’s brain scrambles a little like eggs on a frying pan. 

He doesn’t know what to say. 

His plan — his very smooth plan — was to catch Minho’s attention and invite him to the party he and his friends are throwing via a paper airplane. Or yelling. Or…something. 

Really, he just needs to invite him, and hopefully convince him he needs to wear this exact white button down to it so Jisung can drunkenly ogle him from the other side of Felix’s living room. 

He’s still leaning out the window, mouth hanging open, jaw slack, when Minho notices. 

Shirtless. 

Jesus fucking Christ. 

He’s gorgeous, he’s absolutely gorgeous, and what hits Jisung in that moment is how familiar that body is. How it’s still Minho, his Minho. Still a body so known to him from nights changing into pajamas and summer days spent playing with the hose outside. When they grew up and had gym class together and Jisung did his best not to look at his best friend’s body, older and more defined than his fourteen year old self. 

The body he has now is bigger. Broader. But it’s still Minho’s. 

Minho walks over to the window — his mind an endless loop of skin, skin, skin — and smiles. The smile Jisung knows is for him. 

Always has been. 

Kids used to tease him for it, how he was so much softer with Jisung compared to how he treated the other guys in his grade, but neither of them ever really cared. Especially not Jisung, who has always been so in love with him it suffocates him a little. 

It’s strange, being in love. It’s a weight on his neck that only lifts when Minho’s around. 

He didn’t breathe properly for four years. Four years. And it wasn’t Minho’s fault the same way it wasn’t his, it happened. Things like that happen, people drift apart and torches continue being held and love doesn’t go away. 

Not this kind. This is the once in a lifetime kind. 

“Hi,” Minho says loudly. It’s not night time, they can talk without the use of paper, but Jisung used his neatest handwriting, and he wants Minho to have all the details written out somewhere. 

“Catch,” he yells back, and tosses it. 

Minho chuckles, unfolding the little plane and reading over it. Jisung fidgets with his hands anxiously as he waits, and then Minho’s lifting his head and looking at him. 

“You know you have my number, right?” he asks, but Jisung only half hears him. 

“What?” 

Minho sighs playfully, and grabs his phone to point at it. “My number. You have it.” 

Jisung knows that, obviously. He has a sticky note with it in the bottom of a drawer that he’s never touched. 

Minho has his number, too. Probably sitting in the bottom of a drawer, untouched for years. 

“Didn’t know if you’d want to hear from me,” he shouts. Minho purses his lips, and points to the floor. 

“Downstairs?” he mouths. Jisung nods and races down the stairs, ignoring his mom’s questioning as he walks out the door. Minho’s already down there when he arrives, a t-shirt pulled over his bare chest, which is a pity in ways Jisung can’t begin to describe. 

“Hey,” he says, aiming for nonchalant and missing by a mile and a half. 

“Hi, Jisungie,” he says, and maybe it’s weird, but Jisung has always liked the way he says his name. 

Some part of him should get to touch him. Should get to press on his tongue and brush across his lips, he thinks. 

“Did you read my note?” 

Minho nods, smiling shyly. “I did.”

“Are you available? I mean, you’re going, right?” 

Minho nods. 

“I’ll go with you.” 

And that’s—

God he can’t just say that. Not when Minho doesn’t mean it the way Jisung wants him to mean it. 

And he knows he doesn’t. 

He knows it’ll never be anything at all for him. 

Otherwise four years wouldn’t have gone by in silence. 

“I mean, you don’t have to go with me, it’s a party my friends and I are hosting and I, you know. I want to invite you.” 

Minho nods. His hair moves with the movement, and Jisung wonders if it’s as soft as it looks. 

“Thanks for the invite, then. Can we not go together, though? I mean, I can drive us.” 

“But then you won’t be able to drink.” 

“Is your plan to bike there? And then bike back drunk?” 

Jisung pauses. 

He hadn’t actually thought about that. Really, he figured he’d sleep over at Felix’s, but he would feel bad leaving Minho behind to go home by himself, and Felix has complicated emotions regarding him. 

He was there for him when Minho left. He doesn’t — can’t — know everything, but he was there for him when Minho was the problem, when he was crying helplessly over a guy who left him behind for the big city. 

And, listen, Jisung gets it. He would’ve left him behind, too. 

“You can drive us, then. If you’re sure.” 

“Of course I’m sure. I don’t mind not really drinking,” he says. 

Jisung grins at him. “Yeah, then. That sounds good.” 

“Thanks for inviting me,” Minho says, all genuine and sweet and surprised like he can’t believe Jisung wants him back in his life again. “Are you sure you want me to go, though?” 

“What do you mean?” 

“I don’t know any of your friends. You’ll have to stick by my side all night.” 

“That’s not gonna be a hardship.” 

Minho’s grin is a little awed. Minho’s eyes are a little brighter than normal. He swallows, shakes his head and resets his expression. 

“Then I’ll go. I don’t think we’ve ever been to a party together.” 

Jisung tries to think about it. 

By the time he started properly going to parties, Minho was already off to university, and when Minho was going to parties here, Jisung was too young to be included. 

“Yeah, I guess not.” 

“I bet you’re cute when you’re drunk.” 

“Stop calling me cute,” he complains, a little whiny. Minho laughs and shakes his head. 

“You’re so cute, I don’t know what to do with you.” 

Jisung blushes. 

“Minho,” he whines, dragging out the vowel, a hushed whisper because they’re on the sidewalk. “You can’t just…” 

“Can’t just what?” 

“Say that. You know you can’t.” 

“Why?” Minho says, just a little bitter. And Jisung—Jisung doesn’t blame him. He gets it, even, because he’s a little bitter, too. “You’re so cute, Jisung. You always have been.” 

“I was not cute at thirteen.” 

“Of course you were.” 

“You’re only saying that because you have a terrible memory.” 

“Maybe,” Minho agrees. “Or maybe I’m right and you just don’t want to admit it, because you think it’s not manly to be cute, hm?” 

And that’s part of the problem. Minho’s never had as much of an issue with the liking guys thing, not like him. Minho’s casual about it, he doesn’t tell people but he’s not afraid of it the way Jisung is. He’s not scared of what it means for him, for who he is, he has confidence in that. 

Jisung’s a little far from having confidence about the fact that he likes men. One man in particular, one man he wants to get on his knees for. Maybe in worship, maybe in something holier. 

Minho’s never cared. 

Jisung cares an awful fucking lot. 

He doesn’t think it’s dirty when Minho does it, because nothing about Minho could ever be dirty or gross. It’s him, it’s Minho, and Minho’s good. Minho’s so good. He’s weird and he’s sweet and he’s Jisung’s best friend and he’s his soulmate, probably. 

And Jisung doesn’t know how to love him. Doesn’t know how to let himself love him. 

“There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be a man,” Jisung says, trying not to let it show the way Minho gets to him. 

He knows, though. There’s not really any point in trying to hide. 

“You think I’m not a man, Jisungie?” he takes a step in. Jisung’s supposed to take a step back, but he doesn’t. 

He is. He’s a gorgeous fucking man. He’s all hard edges and sharp corners and straight lines, all broad shoulders and sweat and masculinity. 

Minho’s got a cock Jisung wants to suck and hands he wants in him, stretching him open until he’s begging for more, begging for him, always for him. 

Sometimes, he thinks Minho knows that. He’s pretty sure does, otherwise he wouldn’t be so flirty, wouldn’t try so hard to make him flustered, wouldn’t do his very, very best to make Jisung go weak in the knees over him. 

It’s not like he needs to do that much, anyway. 

“Will you go to the party? You can invite whoever you want,” he says to him, voice small. 

Minho glances at his mouth for a split second before looking back up at him. 

It’s so brief but Jisung catches it, so in tune to Minho even after all this time. 

“Yeah,” he says with a smile. “I’d love to.” 

The party is loud and Felix has bad taste in music, but there are people hanging out and drinking and the atmosphere is fun anyway. Jisung arrived with Minho about forty five minutes ago, and hasn’t seen him since Hyunjin dragged Jisung over to the kitchen to get his help with the drinks. 

Minho said he’d stay around and wait for his friends, said it was fine and that they’d meet up again throughout the night, no problem. 

He’s wearing a tight shirt that makes Jisung a little crazy, makes him want to sink his teeth into him hard. Enough to bruise, enough to claim. 

Minho isn’t his, he knows, but there are parts of him that will always belong to Jisung. 

He hasn’t seen Minho since he started drinking, because he’s also been avoiding Minho since he started drinking. This is because he can’t trust himself not to confess his feelings for him with alcohol in his system. 

Jisung just doesn’t think that’d be one of his brightest ideas. 

“Where’s your boy?” Seungmin asks, coming up behind him and nearly making Jisung spill his drink all over himself from being so startled. 

“What?” he asks, voice high pitched. He swallows. Clears his throat, and repeats himself. “What?” 

“Minho,” he says, voice flat. “Where is he? I saw him earlier but he disappeared.” 

Jisung looks around, and doesn’t see him anywhere. 

“I don’t know.”

“Maybe he’s outside,” Seungmin says with a shrug, and leaves with his drink. 

Jisung nods. Yeah, maybe, he figures. He should probably check, should probably go find him. Minho doesn’t know anybody here, not well, anyway. He invited some friends, but last Jisung checked, they hadn’t arrived yet. Jisung doesn’t think he should leave him alone. 

He opens the front door and finds Minho with two guys he’s never seen before. Minho’s clearly a little tipsy, but still flushed from the alcohol in a way that makes Jisung want to touch him. Makes Jisung want to feel the heat of his skin beneath his fingers. 

Minho lights up when he sees him. 

It’s almost cruel. 

“Jisungie!” he says, and goes up to him. He slings an arm around his shoulders, and faces his friends. “Chan, Changbin, this is Jisung. He’s my best friend.” 

Jisung flushes for reasons unrelated to the alcohol in his system. He thinks he might cry, thinks he might throw up. He’s not sure, but he knows he doesn’t like the way Minho’s friends are looking at him, and doesn't like the way they seem to know more than they’re supposed to. 

He feels seen. 

Uncomfortably so. 

“I thought we were your best friends,” Changbin says teasingly. 

“Yeah, Minho. You’re leaving us behind for him?’ 

Jisung doesn’t like the way he says him. It’s not said with any malice, which is. The problem. If it was said with disdain, with something tinged with bitterness, he would understand that. At least, he’d understand that better than whatever it is that’s laced around his words. 

Like Jisung’s the butt of an inside joke he’ll never know about. 

He doesn’t think Minho is that callous that he’d make Jisung the punchline, even though they’re not friends the way they used to be. He trusts Minho, knows he wouldn’t do that. 

Still, he’s not sure how else to interpret it, his words. It’s strange. 

There’s a weight to the way they’re both looking at him, and Jisung squirms under it. 

Minho rolls his eyes, smiling and warm and pressed up against him. 

“Yes,” he says with a deadpan expression. “Obviously. Look at him, he’s way cuter than the two of you.” 

Jisung’s sure the tips of his ears are bright, burning red. He’s not sure what Minho is getting at here, doesn’t know what game he’s playing, and he’s not sure how he feels about it. 

Minho looks gorgeous under the porch light. It casts warm shadows across his skin, makes him look so, so pretty it almost hurts. 

“I’m not cute.” 

Minho looks at him. When Jisung looks back, he’s half expecting Minho to lean in and kiss him. 

Do it in a way so casual and mundane it doesn’t even catch anyone off guard. In a way so natural, it’d be like they’d done it thousands of times. 

God, Jisung wishes. Wishes kissing Minho was something that came like second nature, because that’s—

That’s all he wants. It’s been all he’s wanted since he was thirteen and all he’s wanted since he was sixteen and it’s all he wants now, twenty years old and still gone for the guy who broke his heart. 

For his first love. 

They’re often the same person, he figures. When you love someone the way he loved him, it becomes almost inevitable that they’d crash and burn somehow, that he’d ruin things, that they’d fall apart. 

When Jisung was a kid, he would see girls on the playground plucking flower petals off the daisies on the school ground. 

He loves me. 

He loves me not. 

Jisung’s pretty sure he knows which one he landed on. 

“It’s nice to meet you guys,” he says, smiling at the two of them. 

“Yeah, it’s really nice to meet you, too,” Chan says, his smile sincere. “We’ve heard, like, way too much about you.” 

Changbin snorts. 

“It’s like he gets drunk and forgets how to shut up about you. Like, Chan, remember that story about—” 

Changbin doesn’t get to finish, because Minho is launching forward and clapping a hand over his mouth. Changbin’s eyebrows draw together, a crease forming between them. 

“What the fuck?” he asks when Minho pulls away. 

“It’s just nice to meet you, Jisung,” Chan says, all polite and charming with a bottle in his hand. “We really have heard a lot about you.” 

The back of his neck feels hot. 

“Good things, I hope.” 

Chan snorts. 

“Definitely,” Changbin says, and the word feels teasing but Jisung can’t figure out why. 

Maybe if he was sober he’d manage to put two and two together and this wouldn’t be making his brain feel like it’s being scrambled. 

As it is, he’s closer to drunk than he’d like to admit. 

“Don’t forget both of you are staying in my house this weekend,” Minho threatens, but it’s empty and they all know it. An empty threat that makes the rest of them laugh until Minho joins in, giggling as he looks at Jisung. “Don’t look through the window unless you want to see Chan shirtless.” 

“Hey, I’ve got great abs.” 

Minho taps his stomach. “Whatever you say, Chan-ah.” 

Jisung wants to say something. He should…defend his honor. Something like that. He can’t have Chan and Changbin thinking he wants to ogle them, thinking he wants to watch them change, but, oddly enough, they just don’t seem to care. 

They’re joking, they’re clearly joking, but it’s the kind of joke Jisung could never make, not when there’s truth to it. Not when he does look out his window in the hopes of catching a glimpse of Minho. Nowadays he isn’t so much worried about seeing him half naked, but when he was younger, it was all he could possibly think about. 

He remembers being fifteen and seeing Minho in just his boxers. He was seventeen years old and had started running, and it toned his body in a way Jisung really appreciated. He looked good, he looked really good. His dark hair was short and his mouth was perfectly curved and his body, half boy, half man, was something Jisung didn’t get out of his mind for days. 

“You should come with me,” he said once. 

“So you can leave me behind?” 

Minho glared at him and poked him in the stomach. “I would never do that, silly.” 

He went running with him once. 

He was panting horribly by the end of it, and Minho was just standing there, gorgeous as always. 

Devastating, really. 

Jisung figured out the time he usually ran so he could be sitting at his desk by the time Minho got home so he could take a sneaky glance out the window to watch him change. He felt horrible. Dirty. Wrong. 

So wrong. 

But too full of desire to stop himself from doing it again. 

“I promise I’m not gonna look at your abs,” he says, too defensively for the jokes they’re making. 

Minho looks at him with a frown. 

“Jisung-ah, it’s okay, they—” Minho starts to say something, but Jisung doesn’t hear it, not when there’s blood rushing through his ears loud and impossible to drown out. He's not sure what Minho was going to say, and he isn’t entirely sure he wants to know. 

He turns around and heads back inside the house, and runs into Felix. 

‘“Jisung!” 

“Hey, Felix,” he says, wringing out his hands. 

“You okay?” 

“Yeah.” 

“You’re not drunk enough. You look sad.” 

“You know I cry when I’m drunk.” 

Felix rolls his eyes. “Yeah but never from sadness. It’s always something sappy and sentimental, like that time you told Seungmin his singing voice was so beautiful, it was like puppies and kittens playing together in a field. And then Seungmin told you to shut the fuck up because you were being weird.” 

“Well, I can get sad drunk.” 

“Yeah, but you don’t. Is it Minho?” 

“What?” he asks, heart suddenly lodged in his throat. 

Felix just shrugs. “I don’t know, maybe you wanted to spend time with him but he’s with his friends.” 

“No it’s—I told him to invite his friends. They’re spending the weekend, they came down from Seoul.” 

“Are they cool? They seem like good people, the strong one, Changbin, helped me carry shit.” 

Jisung snorts. 

“Yeah, they seem like cool people.” 

Felix watches him. There’s music blasting in the background, loud enough that they can’t have a proper conversation unless they take this outside, but to take it outside he’d have to spend time with Minho and Chan and Changbin. Chan and Changbin who so clearly know him in ways Jisung doesn’t know them. 

There’s no way Minho told them. 

There’s no fucking way he would do that to Jisung. Not when he knows. Not when he knows how absolutely terrifying it is for him. 

The fact that he’s into men. The fact that he’s…well not gay gay, because he does still like women, but something like that. 

He’s gay enough to be in love with a man, at any rate. 

And Minho…he isn’t sure if Minho knows that, actually. The being in love part of it. 

He never said, but Jisung doesn’t think he ever did a very good job of hiding it. 

It’s hard to hide your heart when it’s on the outside of your body, he thinks. Even when he’s wearing a shirt over it, there’s a bloody lump right over the left side of his chest, and it’s clear what it is even when he tries to hide it. 

Especially then, he thinks. Especially then. 

“If you’re sure you’re okay,” Felix says, letting the sentence hang. 

“I am,” he says too quickly. 

Hyunjin appears and throws his arm around both of their shoulders. 

“Guys, we go back to university next week,” he says, seeming genuinely devastated by the news, like they haven’t had access to this information since the last school year even began. 

“Yeah, that’s why we’re throwing this party.” 

Hyunjin groans. “That sucks.” 

They nod in agreement. 

As much as Jisung likes his major, he’s still dreading the end of summer. 

“Maybe this school year will finally be the year you guys get girls,” Hyunjin says, even though he’s also single. 

Jisung laughs, maybe a little too loudly, but he can always blame it on the alcohol. 

“I get girls,” Felix says. “I get girls all the time, I just don’t talk about it.” 

“Name one.” 

Felix pauses. 

“No.”

Hyunjin cackles. 

Jisung looks around as they talk, and finds Minho talking to a girl in the corner. He’s leaning against the wall, giving her his undivided attention, and heat flares in Jisung’s gut. A jealousy he can’t deny. 

He’s smiling down at her in a way that’s almost sharp, almost predatory. Jisung wants to be on the receiving end of that smile, would much rather have it be directed towards him than to a girl he doesn’t know. 

He gets a drink. 

There’s no point in being upset about it, not when he has no rights to be. Minho isn’t his. He should be, god, Jisung wishes he was, but he isn’t, and that’s fine. It’s not Minho’s fault he’s not in love with him. 

That’s entirely a Jisung problem. 

He’s in the kitchen getting another drink, and bumps into someone as he stands. He turns around, and recognizes the girl as one of Felix’s sister’s friends. She’s pretty, Jisung’s seen her around a few times, a little older, and always nice to him. Chaewon, he’s pretty sure.

“Hi, Jisung,” she says, leaning against the wall. 

He swallows. “Hey.” 

“Did you come with anyone?” 

“Uh, kind of. I came with Minho.” 

She chuckles. “So you didn’t.” 

“What?” 

“Jisung,” she sighs, getting up in his space. She takes the drink from his hand and puts it on the counter behind him, and oh. He gets where this is going now. Chaewon looks up at him, and she’s wearing baby blue eyeshadow. There’s gloss on her lips that looks sticky, but she looks beautiful. She is beautiful. “Did you come with anyone?” 

She asks again, and Jisung shakes his head no. 

“Good,” she says, and leans up on the tips of her feet to press her lips to his, right there in the middle of the kitchen. 

The first thing Jisung notices is how her lip gloss is considerably less sticky than he was expecting it to be. The second is that she tastes like strawberry candy and soju when her tongue swipes across his bottom lip. She’s forward, and he likes that. He’s not really very good at taking the lead. His exes used to complain about it, always saying he was weird and didn’t seem that into them.

He was into them. Maybe less than he was into Minho, but he’s never had to fake his attraction for a pretty girl when she’s in his arms trying to kiss him. 

Chaewon doesn’t hesitate to kiss him, though. It’s hot, he likes it. Jisung whimpers into her mouth when she wraps her arms around his shoulders and bites his bottom lip, and it makes her giggle sweetly. 

“You’re cute,” she tells him, and doesn’t wait for him to compliment her back. 

Kisses him again hungrily, kisses him like she means it, and Jisung tries to match her intensity, tries to mean it right back, and somehow manages to fall into the rhythm of making out with her, tucked against the corner of the kitchen, the refrigerator pressing against his back. 

“Oh, shit, sorry.” 

They jump apart, both looking to the side to find Minho standing there, frowning as he blushes. Jisung is about to open his mouth to apologize, to tell him it’s not what it looks like, but then what would that look like? It’d look suspicious, at the very least. 

He doesn’t know how to explain the look on Minho’s face to Chaewon, who clears her throat and excuses herself from the kitchen when the tension gets too thick to ignore. 

“I’ll see you later, Jisung?” 

He nods. 

“Sorry,” Jisung says, even though he’s not sure what he should be apologizing for. “I just came to get a drink.” 

“You don’t have to apologize for anything, Jisung,” Minho says, considerably more sober since the last time he talked to him. He must’ve stopped drinking, he thinks. He did say he’d take them home. “She was pretty.” 

“Yeah. Felix’s sister’s friend, I’ve seen her around a few times.” 

Minho nods. “Yeah, she looked familiar.” 

“She was a year above you in school, I think.” 

Minho nods again. “Right. I remember her.” 

Jisung hates a lot of things, but he decides he hates the awkward tension between them more than he hates anything else. 

“Minho, I’m—” he starts again, almost drunk enough to address the miles and miles between them that they put there, to, what? Keep things safe? Not hurt each other’s feelings? Because Minho noticed Jisung didn’t want him casually? 

“Please don’t say you’re sorry.”

Jisung shuts his mouth with a clack of his teeth. 

“Okay.” 

“Obedient,” Minho teases. “You’ve always been so sweet.” 

Jisung flusters. “Stop.” 

Minho takes a step forward, eyes searching his face. “Do you really want me to?” 

And Jisung knows this isn’t about the teasing anymore. The kitchen is dark and they’re both drunk enough to make bad decisions and Minho is right there, in his space, right in front of him, right where he can almost touch him, right where he could kiss him if he were to just reach up on his tippy toes and lean in. 

He wants to say yes. No. Please. Kiss me. 

Kiss me, kiss me, kiss me. 

But he doesn’t. They’re at a party with all of their friends, and Jisung doesn’t want to kiss him while fear is flooding his chest at the thought that someone might catch them. 

“I think I’m gonna go find Felix,” he mutters, and steps out from underneath Minho’s body, so fucking close and so far away. 

He doesn’t like that he’s ashamed of loving Minho. Doesn’t like that he's not allowed to kiss him anywhere, but that’s just how life goes. You like women, you get married, you have a baby, you don’t pine uselessly after a guy who’s been everything to you since you were a little kid. 

You don’t grow too close to him and you don’t fall in love with him and you definitely don’t kiss him. 

Too bad Jisung’s three for three.