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"He will come."
Kim Yoon Shik's unwavering conviction can't keep Yong Ha from feeling sick with worry. After all, Kim Yoon Shik doesn't know about Jae Shin's extracurricular activities, has no reason to suspect that anything more serious than a stupid archery competition is at stake. For once Yong Ha doesn't care about unraveling the mystery surrounding the effeminate student whose recent arrival at the school has caused such a stir. He can only think of Jae Shin, Geol Oh, and his insides clench as he pictures his friend captured by the guards, wounded, dying, his blood staining his clothes a brilliant red. Please, he begs, please be alright.
*
Suddenly Kim Yoon Shik is everywhere. It's strange that even though the effect she has on his friend makes him bristle with irritation, Yong Ha still can't bring himself to dislike her. She is intelligent, brave, principled, and not just a little crazy for entering Sungkyunkwan disguised as a man. He can't actually articulate why her growing closeness with Jae Shin bothers him so much. He ought to be cheering for his friend, really, once he gets over the hilarity of the love triangle - polygon really, if you include the kisaeng- that is developing around Kim Yoon Shik.
Yong Ha has never once during his decade long friendship with the man known as Geol Oh, the crazy horse, seen his friend so affected by anyone. He guesses that a part of him feels that if his friend has to be falling for someone he thinks is male, it ought to be him. Which is unthinkable, crazy... His heart racing, Yong Ha immediately clamps down on that train of thought. The images it conjures in his mind are too unnerving.
He can tell that Jae Shin isn't even aware of his own crush yet. On some subconscious level he must have recognized that Kim Yoon Shik is female all along though, after all, the tell tale hiccups never lie. Idly, Yong Ha wonders how long it will take his friend to realize the truth. For such a smart guy he really can be quite obtuse sometimes.
*
Yong Ha is always on top of whatever is going on within the school. He is the first to know of any scandals, and it isn't just because he is the instigator behind a great many of them himself. When he was a young boy, his father had forced him to observe his business dealings. At the time he hadn't appreciated it, as he had been a very restless and easily bored child. Now he understands the value of a keen eye and an alert ear.
Yong Ha observes people. His flamboyant and carefree appearance frequently puts others off their guard, even as his reputation as a shrewd puller of strings slowly grows. But as much as he watches everyone else, when Jae Shin is around he never can take his eyes off of him. It's like there's an awareness between them, a link that always catches his attention. If Jae Shin is bothered by all the staring he never mentions it and he generally acts like he doesn't notice it at all. Sometimes though, in rare moments, he turns around and returns the stare, fixes his dark gaze on Yong Ha with an intensity that makes his heart skip a beat.
*
Tricking Kim Yoon Shik - or whatever her real name is- into taking a bath in the empty incense hall is almost too easy. Yong Ha really can't understand how anyone as intelligent as she obviously is simultaneously can be so gullible. So, now, unless his intuition finally has failed him completely, he himself, his friend, and that uptight Noron, Lee Sun Joon, are all one closed door away from a naked woman. It's quite exciting, really. Judging by his amusing expression and incoherent spluttering Jae Shin has already taken a peek through that door and has caught on to the obvious. Finally. Even he couldn't miss the truth when it's taking a bath naked right in front of his eyes after all. Oh, how he will tease his friend about this! Yong Ha loves it when entertainment practically falls into his lap.
*
There aren't many things in this world that Yong Ha is afraid of. Having his heritage exposed, Jae Shin getting hurt, prospects like that terrify him. But when it comes to the things not of this world... Let's just say that he never expected that his little prank on Kim Yoon Shik would backfire in such a way. Ghosts! It doesn't help matters any that Geol Oh seems to find his fears amusing.
*
As he watches Cho Sun moon over Kim Yoon Shik, Yong Ha briefly wonders whether the kisaeng's feelings would change if she found out the secret the object of her love is guarding.
*
Yong Ha is quite proficient at lying to himself, but his dreams dispel all that hard effort by refusing to be anything but brutally honest. He wakes up with his heart hammering in his chest and visions of his best friend running his strong hands all over him racing through his head. When Jae Shin innocently asks if he slept well, he blushes and can't quite meet his eyes. His friend just eyes him strangely and mutters something about "crazy bastards". His life sucks. It figures that in this tangled mess of mistaken genders and misguided crushes, he's the one stuck dealing with feelings that never can be reciprocated.
For a while Yong Ha gets a kind of twisted pleasure from the obvious torment Lee Sun Joon is experiencing regarding his attraction to Kim Yoon Shik. It's his own fault for being so blind, when all his problems could be easily solved simply by convincing Kim Yoon Shik to quit her crossdressing ways. Pushing those two together is the next natural step for Yong Ha. He tries to convince himself that it's what he would have done anyway, regardless of his recent confusion toward Jae Shin, but at the back of his mind there's a little voice that he can't shut up, whispering about jealousy. He regrets his teasing when he finally goes too far and for the first time in years makes Geol Oh genuinely angry at him.
Yet he can't seem to stop himself. He's not sure if giving Lee Sun Joon advice on dealing with inconvenient romantic feelings toward a very male best friend, advice that doesn't even apply to the Noron's situation and that he personally knows doesn't work, falls into the realm of tragedy or comedy. If only he were able to erase his feelings for Jae Shin by reading erotic books, then his life could stop being such a farce.
*
Whenever Yong Ha has a personal problem his normal course of action is to talk to Jae Shin about it. That's why, when it's clear that something is eating at the usually cheery Yeorim, Jae Shin gets all huffy and hurt when his questions all are met with a wall of stony silence.
But Yong Ha could hardly tell him the truth now, could he?
"My problem is that I'm inappropriately attracted to you."
Yeah, that was sure to go over well.
*
Yong Ha has never felt the taste of failure as bitterly as that night when he watches Jae Shin walk away from him right into the trap they both know is waiting. He's useless, utterly useless. Angrily he wipes away the tears drenching his face, the evidence of his emotions that nevertheless couldn't sway his single-minded friend from the deadly path he has chosen to thread.
When Jae Shin against all odds makes it back alive, that encounter hangs between them. Even as Jae Shin gets all embarrassed and gruffly scolds him for the dramatic displays of emotion, there's a hint of contemplation in his voice, a reassessment of what he thought he knew. He's not the only one doing some re-evaluating. The Yong Ha that goes to bed that night is not the same man as he was before. He who always has kept his distance now feels open, raw. If they only had the time to properly work things out between themselves... Then Jae Shin and Kim Yoon Shik get dragged in front of the student council and the field trip gives him just that opportunity. For a short while there's a lull in the action, what he later on realizes amounts to a calm before the storm. Then the king gives them a mission and the noose starts closing in on the Red Messenger. In a very short time everything goes to hell and Yong Ha gets a chance to decide once and for all just what kind of man he wants to be.
*
As things start to come to a head, Yong Ha gets increasingly aware of the ever present tension between himself and Jae Shin. Those two idiots who had been dancing around each other for ages have finally figured themselves out and all of a sudden there is no Yoon Hee between Yong Ha and Jae Shin anymore, no one to act as a buffer, a safety zone. He doesn't know if it's just his imagination playing tricks on him or if the weird air between them actually is mutual. Where he always used to be the one watching Jae Shin, now he constantly catches Jae Shin's gaze following him out of the corner of his eye.
*
"Hey, you bastard, give it back!"
Laughing, Yong Ha jumps out of Jae Shin's reach, taunting him with the book he's just snatched from him held over his head. Jae Shin lunges at him, Yong Ha trips on the hem of his own robes and suddenly they're both on the floor in an ungainly heap of flailing limbs.
"Ugh, get off!"
Pressing down on him like this Jae Shin really is quite heavy. Yong Ha can feel his friend's breath on his neck, warm and slightly irregular. Suddenly his own breathing seems to him uncomfortably rough and much too loud. The pounding of his heart makes the blood roar in his ears and Yong Ha swallows, confused by how intimate their present predicament feels. Jae Shin is so close to him that he feels trapped. Jae Shin, his best friend, who apparently now has decided to torment him even further by going completely still. This is bad.
"I said, get off me!" Yong Ha can't keep his voice from coming out as a squeak.
Jae Shin startles and immediately rolls off him.
"Uh, right, sorry."
"It's okay, you must have been eating too much rice recently, you were really crushing me there."
Yong Ha tries to defuse the situation in his usual lighthearted manner but, as has been happening with an alarming frequency as of late, what should have been a normal everyday situation has once again irrevocable taken a turn for the awkward. Unlike the previous times this has happened, this time Jae Shin isn't just content to let the matter rest though. He's looking at Yong Ha, really looking, like he's trying to see what's going on inside his brain.
"What's the matter with you lately? And," he adds before Yong Ha has a chance to answer, "don't tell me that it's nothing. That's bullshit."
"Would you have liked Yoon Hee if she really had been a man?" Yong Ha wants to take those words back even before they've finished leaving his mouth. He's not sure who looks more shocked, he or Jae Shin. He hadn't planned on blurting that out!
"Eh? Yoon Hee's a girl."
Oh well, in for a penny, in for a pound.
"Thank you for stating the obvious. But what if she wasn't?"
"Yong Ha, why are you asking these kinds of questions? You know I'm not into her anymore." Jae Shin looks concerned and a bit flustered. "Hey, you aren't in love with her or anything, are you?"
"No, I'm not in love with her." Yong Ha nervously bites his lip and lowers his eyes, he doesn't feel brave enough to look Jae Shin in the face right now. " I'm not in love with a woman at all."
Yong Ha has accused Jae Shin of being thickheaded quite often in the past but now he pieces together the puzzle immediately.
"Oh."
If the pit of his stomach didn't at the moment feel like lead Yong Ha definitely would come up with a witty remark to that. Instead he says nothing.
"So." Jae Shin clears his throat. "It's me, right?"
Yong Ha nods, and chances a glance at his friend. Jae Shin looks wide eyed and flushed but he doesn't appear to be angry or disgusted. In fact, he seems to be taking this remarkably well, much better than Yong Ha had ever dared to hope. Then, suddenly, Jae Shin jumps to his feet and crosses the distance between them in a flash, and for a brief terrifying moment Yong Ha fears that he has read him and the situation horribly wrong, but that all disappears when Jae Shin brings their mouths together in a clumsy kiss.
Jae Shin mouth is a hot pressure on his and his stubble feels scratchy against his chin. It's sloppy and eager and it's over before Yong Ha has the time to adjust to this new equilibrium. As they break apart and are left staring at each other, breathless, he can't quite believe that this is happening.
"So, what does this mean?" His own voice sounds strange in his ears.
Jae Shin just shrugs. "You're crazy if you don't know that."
Yong Ha smiles - his friend always has been a man of action rather than words. Unless it's about politics, then he never shuts up.
"Alright. Just a heads up: I'm so going to teach you how to kiss properly."
"There's nothing wrong with my kissing," Jae Shin says, incredulous.
"Ah, but you've forgotten one thing." Yong Ha mock seriously puts a hand on his shoulder. "I'm Gu Yong Ha. Of course I'm an expert at kissing. There's not a technique in this world that I'm not familiar with."
When Jae Shin snorts and pokes him in the side Yong Ha feels giddy. Although everything has changed, they're now back to being them again, this comfortable companionship that he'd taken for granted for so long. Now, there are simply some additional perks. And a need for secrecy, but both of them are good at that and he's confident that it's all going to turn out absolutely wonderful.
*
It's a quiet summer day. They are enjoying the evening breeze and getting drunk under a tree ("In honour of all the alcohol you just pretended to drink when really you were running around as the Red Messenger"). They've exhausted many topics of conversation already and are languishing in a companionable silence, when suddenly Jae Shin turns to Yong Ha.
"Ever thought about farming?"
"I suppose it's the foundation on which society is built..."
"No, not like that. Like, owning a farm."
"A farmer? Me?" Yong Ha looks at him incredulously. "Can you imagine me as a farmer? I wouldn't last a week."
They sit in silence for a while, looking at the sunset.
"I would be the most stylish farmer around of course."
"Of course."
"I would know everything there was to know about the neighbours in a week or so, especially the things they didn't want me to know."
"Probably."
"It really could be quite entertaining, we'd probably be the first farmers ever to have attended Sungkyunkwan."
"Eh, what the hell, let's do it."
Gu Yong Ha's and Moon Jae Shin's adventures in farming last for all of two months until Yong Ha declares that he now officially is done with hard manual labor (to which Jae Shin retorts that the majority of said hard manual labour has been carried out by him with Yong Ha admiring him from a comfortably seated position). When they decide to return to the capital (to the immense relief of their families), Yong Ha already has his next venture all planned out. For Jae Shin the path to the future isn't quite as clear as that, at least not until Yong Ha jokingly points out that possessing years of experience of successfully evading and fighting the royal guards really ought to make him more qualified at their job than any of them.
*
Life is good. Yong Ha's reputation as a womanizer keeps people from suspecting that their relationship might be anything other than platonic in nature, even when they move in together. Everyone other than their closest friends that is: after some really weird but ultimately supportive conversations he's had with them, Yong Ha can be reasonably sure that Lee Sun Joon and Kim Yoon Hee have their suspicions. Both he and Jae Shin know that they can trust those two with their lives if so needed though, and so he isn't even slightly worried on that front. Sometimes, on the rare occasion that Jae Shin actually gets wounded on duty, Yong Ha briefly feels that cold, familiar stab of fear that used to keep him up at night back when Jae Shin risking his life as a vigilante was an everyday occurrence. It's different this time around though, and now Yong Ha can trust him to return home to him safe and sound.
THE END