Archive of Our Own

Jihoon finds it when he’s reorganizing the shelves in his closet: a small envelope with For Jihoon scrawled sideways on the front, kept shut with green tape and bulging in the center. The corners are torn almost enough to fit a fingertip in, but the tape seal has done its job, completely unbroken for however long he’s had this. As he gazes at it, he isn’t sure himself how long that might be. No matter how long he spends looking, he can’t figure out what it is.

It’s his own possession, but he’s not sure if he should open it. Something about the glaring brightness of the tape seems like a no trespassing sign, something about the fact it looks so old yet he’s clearly never seen what’s in it before. The paper smells vaguely like something he thinks he recognizes, but he chalks it up to the quiet odor of the clothes in his closet, the scent of his own home. Still, it bugs him. The longer he looks at it, the more it bugs him.

He sits down at his desk and debates with himself a while before deciding to use his letter opener on it. As much as he’d like to try peeling the tape off to keep it in its original condition, the paper of the envelope just seems far too brittle to hold together. When he draws a slice through the envelope’s top fold, he holds his breath. He doesn’t know why. After the top is fully opened, he tips it over and watches the contents spill forth. Out they come, a tiny sea, spreading all over his desk like spilled paint. Pictures. So many of them, so many small polaroids clustered together without a pattern. He picks one up to inspect it more closely, and suddenly he remembers what these are.

Soonyoung took them. He remembers now. When they were sophomores in college, Soonyoung bought himself one of those little vintage cameras and started using it all the time. His passion for it burned out before even a year had gone by, but he took enough pictures to make up for all the empty space on either side. Now Jihoon remembers it. He gave each of them a little envelope like this after they graduated that final spring, the last time they went to have dinner together as students. Jihoon remembers everything so clearly—the restaurant, the way Soonyoung teared up when he handed them out, the way he actually did cry when he was giving a quiet speech over his third drink. What he doesn’t remember is the last time he actually saw Soonyoung.

The picture he’s holding must have been taken by somebody else; it features Soonyoung himself, holding a sparkler way out to the side, grinning at the little sparks that fly off it. This was at the little party they had that summer, five days after the fourth of July, since they got rained out the actual day. It was technically against the law by that time to be shooting fireworks, but they did it anyway, in Wonwoo’s uncle’s backyard. Jihoon remembers how they went home with mosquito bites covering their legs, how Soonyoung almost caught the deck chairs on fire with one of his sparklers. A smile warms its way onto his lips. How young they were back then, how young they had been without even realizing. How amazing that he could have forgotten it until just now.

He sets the picture down in the emptiest corner of the desk and starts poring over the others. Soonyoung is in so many of these pictures, and Wonwoo too. Jihoon remembers as he searches for himself that he hated having his picture taken back then, hated having to see himself looking so out of place in these shots. Maybe it’s not so different now. Eventually, he stumbles across a picture with him in it, and he stares at it for a long time. God, how young. He still looked like such a kid back then. Probably because he was one. They all were. When his eyes start to feel a little too warm, he looks at the ceiling.

Slowly, the minute hand on his wall clock crawls forward, and he stays seated at his desk, sifting silently through this mound of photographs. Every time he picks one up, he finds so many more hidden beneath it, and he wonders how Soonyoung ever found the time to take all these, where he ever got so much film. Picture after picture, almost entirely Wonwoo and Soonyoung, he sorts quietly into stacks at his desk’s loneliest edge. After a while, when he’s worked toward the base of the mound, the faces change, almost all to one. Jihoon picks one up, thumb gliding over the shiny finish. Inside his chest, both lungs freeze themselves somewhere between expanding to explosion and contracting into nothing.

Jihoon was surprised to see Junhui had dyed his hair. Up to that point, he’d only ever known him as having dark hair, longer and longer throughout high school until he cut it short again when they were in their second year of college. Spring break of sophomore year, without mentioning anything about it beforehand, he showed up at Soonyoung’s house with a head of honey blonde. Wonwoo whistled when he walked in the door.

“Something looks different about you,” he said, “but I just can’t put my finger on it.” Junhui laughed at him, bigger and brighter than usual. Maybe it was an effect of the new hair. He seemed so much more confident.

“I thought it was time for a change,” he said, grinning. “It looks good, right?”

“It looks different, that’s for sure,” Soonyoung told him, nose scrunched. “Why blonde?”

“You know,” Junhui said, closing his eyes and falling to his seat on the couch beside Jihoon, “blondes have more fun. Besides, it’s almost summer. Blonde is summery.”

“It’s barely spring,” Wonwoo said.

“With that attitude, maybe.” Junhui opened his eyes and turned them to face Jihoon, wide with the freshness of a newborn deer. “You like it, right, Jihoon?”

“I don’t know,” he said. He didn’t know. All he really knew was that he was surprised. Blonde. It was such a strange choice, so far out of left field, but the longer he looked, it almost seemed natural, golden curls spilling in short waves over his ears. Junhui frowned.

“Come on, you’re so cruel,” he said, flopping his head to the side. Some of that yellowed hair fell just a bit when he did, brushed right against Jihoon’s shoulder. “What do you mean you don’t know?”

“It looks nice, I guess,” Jihoon said then.

Beside him, Junhui brightened instantly, looping an arm around the back of Jihoon’s neck. “I knew you would like it,” he said, voice gentle as a bird leaping into flight from its nest. Slowly, he squeezed his arm tighter, little by so very little, until their cheeks were nearly pressed against each other. Soonyoung never had the air conditioning on at his place, and Jihoon could feel himself turning red. If only it weren’t getting so hot already.

“What are we doing today, anyway?” Wonwoo asked, spinning in lazy circles in the rolling chair from Soonyoung’s dad’s office, magazine opened on his lap. Junhui turned to listen to him speak, and his hair swept over the apple of Jihoon’s cheek when he did. Ticklish. Just as if a little ladybug were crawling there.

“What a stupid question,” Soonyoung said, tossing a pen from the coffee table in Wonwoo’s direction and only barely managing to hit him on the knee. He rested both hands on his hips and twisted his face in a grin of loud pride. “We’re enjoying our youth.”

The blonde hair makes these photographs so easy to date. He only kept it dyed for a short time—the fall semester had barely begun again when his roots started to grow in enough to make him dye it back to dark. Just that one month of school, and those three short months of summer. Such a short time, but back then, it had seemed so long. Jihoon remembers being convinced that Junhui would just keep his hair that way forever, that it would start to grow back blonde all on its own. The things you can only waste your time thinking when you’ve still got so much time left to act like a kid.

He runs his thumb over the picture a few times. The background is dark, but Junhui stands proud in the center, skin washed a bit too pale by the closeness of the flash. On either side of his face, he holds his hands in two V’s for victory, smile stretched wide in contentment, and it’s hard to take in how happy he looks. Just seeing the picture, Jihoon feels the joy eking into him, subtle and warm from the tips of his fingers. In the dark corner of the photo, he sees his own blurred figure in the midst of walking by, arm a gray phantom smudge, and his eyes start to feel so strangely damp. After setting the photo on the edge of his desk in a new stack of its very own, he reaches for another.

“Come on, Jihoon,” Junhui said, pushing lightly at his shoulder blades with two overheated palms. “The creek isn’t that deep. It won’t kill you.”

“I’m not worried about drowning,” Jihoon told him, stepping over the mossy rocks underfoot, following the weak sound of moving water. “I’m worried about how disgusting it is.”

Wonwoo still had another exam before he was fully finished with his first year of school, but the three of them were already done, and it was Soonyoung’s idea to go for a swim in the creek behind some park a few miles from campus before going back home for the summer. They were always Soonyoung’s ideas, somehow. Junhui always went along with them no matter how stupid, and Wonwoo usually caved easily enough after a little bit of pushing. Jihoon was harder to sell.

“It’s not that gross,” Soonyoung assured him, boldly leading their small party from an easy fifteen feet ahead. “Would I suggest it if it were?”

“Probably.”

Junhui’s quiet laughter echoed around them, sifting through Jihoon’s ears before fading into the hush of the small grove of woods. While they walked, he kept his palms always at Jihoon’s shoulders, sure to stop him if he decided to try running off. Jihoon wouldn’t have tried to run, anyway. Soonyoung drove them out there, and it was too long to walk back, no matter how much he wanted to try. Still, Junhui didn’t let him go.

The creek looked just as gross as ever when they finally arrived at its banks, shallow and slow-moving and thick on the surface with dull algae blooms. Jihoon grimaced as he watched Soonyoung drop his bag by the bank wade into it, flecks of green sticking to his knees even when the ripples he stirred rolled by. “It’s nice and cold,” he called, enthusiastic, but Jihoon didn’t quite believe it. It was enough, though, to get Junhui to release his shoulders and slip in after.

Standing there, they looked so strange together. Two boys in an ugly little creek, four feet too tall to be acting like they were enjoying themselves, timidly splashing water at each other amid short fits of giggles. A bizarre thing to see. When his shirt started getting too soaked, Junhui peeled it off and tossed it to the safety of a few grimy rocks next to Soonyoung’s bag, and then he looked even more out of place. Long since had he stopped having the build of a kid, and the sunlight danced gold across his chest in mesmerizing ways. Junhui looked back at Jihoon after a while, and it took until then for him to realize he was staring.

“Aren’t you going to get in?” he asked. Somehow, the way he smiled always had a strange effect. Just as much as it put Jihoon at ease, it made him feel like crying.

“I already said I don’t want to,” Jihoon said. He watched the wash of green coating the hairs on their legs with a frown. “It’s nasty.”

“Come on, don’t be like that.” Junhui held out both his arms, waiting. As if he was ready to catch Jihoon the moment he jumped. As if Jihoon could even jump that far. “It feels nice.”

“I doubt it,” Jihoon said, but he stood and started heading toward the water anyway, fists bunched around the hem of his shirt. Even though he was too focused on watching the rocks he stepped on to look, he knew Junhui was watching him, knew he was grinning.

The water was lukewarm at best, exactly as he thought it would be, a tepid griminess washing over him until just above the knees. Beneath his feet, occasional rocks poked sharp through the mud, and it felt disgusting squeezing between his toes. Nothing he hadn’t predicted. A breeze swept by them, made it even more plain just how warm the water was, and Jihoon watched the way Junhui’s hair danced in it. It was needlessly bright, that hair. That smile. All of him. He was always so bright for no reason at all.

“Why do you look so mad?” Soonyoung asked, sending a small wave Jihoon’s direction to have it crash on the waistband of his swim trunks. “Have a little fun. It’s summer!”

“This is disgusting, that’s why,” Jihoon said. He tried to find a steadier footing, somewhere with a little less mud, but to no avail. All it did was make him slip more. “It doesn’t even feel nice. It’s like standing in dirt soup.”

“Dirt is part of nature, Jihoon,” Junhui crooned, waddling toward him through the muck. “You should appreciate it.”

“Well, I don’t.”

“You’re so un-fun,” Soonyoung sighed. “I don’t know why we take you anywhere.”

“Jihoon’s plenty of fun,” Junhui said, edging ever nearer, “as long as we’re inside.” He came to a stop too close to be natural, chest hardly an inch shy of Jihoon’s shoulder.

“What are you doing?” Jihoon asked.

“Nothing.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not doing anything,” Junhui said. “Honest.”

A moment passed by, silent, and Jihoon almost started to believe him. Then Junhui slung an arm around his back and bent over, slid his other arm behind Jihoon’s knees and lifted him from the water in an easy swoop. He should have known this was coming. The splash it stirred rippled over to wet the lower half of Soonyoung’s shirt as he doubled over with laughter. From the distance and the way his hands clasped for safety behind Junhui’s neck, Jihoon could see stars bursting to life in his eyes.

“I knew it,” he said. “You asshole. Put me down.”

“But I thought you didn’t want to be in the water,” Junhui hummed, taking his first in a series of slow steps toward Soonyoung. “Since it’s gross.”

“That doesn’t mean you should just pick me up like a doll.” The steadiness of Junhui’s arms below him was different from what he expected. No matter how many steps they took, he never jostled. It took a while for Jihoon to remember there was even a possibility he could fall. When Junhui stopped, he thought for a moment that time had as well. Then he felt a few drops of water hit his arm from where Soonyoung had flicked them.

“You should dunk him,” Soonyoung stage-whispered, hand shielding one side of his mouth as if it would block the sound. Junhui brightened.

“Hey, there’s an idea.”

“You better not,” Jihoon coughed, tightening his grip around Junhui’s neck. “Don’t even think about it. You better not.”

“Do it!” Soonyoung called. His voice seemed suddenly so far away.

“I will never talk to you again,” Jihoon whispered in a rush. “We will not be friends anymore. I swear to god. I mean it. If you dunk me in this nasty water right now, I will never even look at you again.” He knew Junhui wouldn’t think he meant it in earnest, and he knew he didn’t mean it to begin with, but he hoped it seemed like he meant it just enough. Junhui looked into his eyes for a long time, careful, inspecting. “Don’t do it,” Jihoon said, quiet.

“Alright.” Junhui readjusted his grip and turned, walking on steps so much shakier to the bank. As slowly as possible, he set Jihoon down on the rocks at the side of the creek, right next to his own drenched shirt. Soonyoung huffed out a loud breath.

“You guys are both so boring,” he said. “Seriously. If Wonwoo were here, he would’ve done it.”

“Want me to dunk you then?” Junhui asked, turning around and wading toward Soonyoung in long strides. Jihoon watched the moles on his back move with each step, felt the redness in his face, looked up at the sky. If only it hadn’t been so hot out, or the water had been just a bit cooler. “I bet I can pick you up. It’ll be easy.”

“What? No way you could,” Soonyoung said, but he started to flee anyway, and Junhui followed him, farther down the creek until they were out of sight. Jihoon listened over the sound of birds leaping between trees for the splash he knew would come, then watched as Junhui marched back into view with Soonyoung clutched snugly in his arms. He looked so small curled against Junhui’s chest for safety, and Jihoon could only imagine how much smaller he himself must have seemed.

“Alright, Jihoon,” Junhui shouted, hefting his cargo, “should I dunk him?”

“Yes.”

“No hesitation,” Soonyoung squawked. “You guys are assholes.”

“Hey, you wanted this,” Junhui said sweetly. “It’s called enjoying your youth.”

“Just get it over with already.”

In a single breath, Soonyoung’s head was already under the water, hair soaking up the ugly green murk for a few seconds before Junhui brought him gasping back to the surface. The thought of having his whole face under that water made Jihoon’s stomach turn, and he closed his eyes while the two of them laughed in front of him, three feet away but miles apart. When he opened his eyes again, Junhui was beaming.

“Hurry up, Jihoon,” he said, light, giddy. “Grab Soonyoung’s camera and take a picture!”

The Junhui in this picture looks so strong, grin shining over Soonyoung’s limp form hanging defeated in his arms. Looking at it, Jihoon thinks he was much too handsome for his own good, especially with his hair dyed that peculiar sunny color, tanned skin radiating gold. Then he stops himself. The Junhui in this picture. He thinks about it. The Junhui in this picture was nine years younger than they are now, he thinks, almost ten years younger than Jihoon is at this very moment. Maybe it’s a little strange of him to be looking at this picture and thinking about how beautiful he is, but Jihoon can’t help but think it. Nine years. That’s so much time.

All the rest of the pictures seem to have Junhui in them somehow, and there are so many more than it seemed at first. He has no idea where to start, and the longer he spends looking through them, the tighter his throat feels, the weaker his lungs. No matter how much he thinks, he can’t remember the last time he saw Junhui. He picks up another picture, one where he’s lounging on that old couch in his attic with a tired smile on his face and his eyes half-closed, blonde tufts falling in a lazy halo around his head.

When he thinks of Junhui, this is the version he remembers. Of course he can recall the way he was before and after, when his hair was longer and shorter and darker, when he was less serious and more serious, younger and older, but this Junhui is always the first image in his head. Blonde hair and easy smiles, always so quietly hyper, so carefree. This was maybe the most like himself he ever was, Jihoon thinks, but he wonders if it makes sense to think that. How much did he really know, anyway, about how like himself Junhui ever was? He sighs and sets another picture in the slowly growing stack by his idle elbow, then picks up a different one all the same.

That year, they had a lucky summer. At least, they all thought of it that way. Three days before Soonyoung’s birthday that June, his parents went on a week long vacation to the Bahamas—some acquaintance or other was getting remarried, they said, and they decided to make a trip out of it—and left Soonyoung at home alone. By that time, his older sister was already out of the house, which meant he had the whole place to himself for the entire week. A dangerous thing, giving Soonyoung that much power.

Jihoon didn’t understand why they trusted him with that kind of responsibility. He was technically old enough to handle it then, maybe, but he still acted so much like a kid. It might have been that they trusted Jihoon and Wonwoo to keep him in line while they were gone rather than trusting Soonyoung himself. Whatever the case, it didn’t matter. Soonyoung decided to throw a joint party to celebrate his and Junhui’s birthdays, and whether Jihoon wanted to or not, he couldn’t do much to stop him once his mind was set.

In truth, he was excited. Normally he wouldn’t go for such a stupid idea, but something about it at the time seemed so fun. They all went to the dollar store together to pick out decorations, kiddie things like streamers and patterned plates, and Jihoon really felt like he would have a good time. He didn’t like parties in college because of all the people, so many he didn’t know, and all the loudness, all the energy. Even if a lot of people showed up to this joint birthday party, he was sure he could deal with it. He’d been to Soonyoung’s house a million times since he was little, after all; even if he got worn out, he knew where to hide.

A lot of people did show up, some friends they’d met at the university and some they’d known in high school, most with alcohol in hand. Soonyoung was so gung ho about drinking in the way people only are when they can’t yet do it legally. It was so childish, the way he pretended he could handle it. Barely out of his teens, shotgunning beers in the kitchen under a messy bunch of streamers that seemed so childish and out of place. At least he knew where the bathrooms were if he had to puke.

Junhui drank a lot less, and he handled it much better. It was in subtle ways like that that his five extra days of maturity usually showed themselves, quiet and easy to miss. If it weren’t for nights like those, Jihoon could have forgotten that Junhui wasn’t the youngest of them all like he so often seemed to be. As Jihoon sat on the couch watching Wonwoo fiddle with his iPod to change the playlist, Junhui wandered over to sit with him, carrying a plate of cake in each hand.

“I brought you cake,” he said, easing onto the cushions. Jihoon took it gingerly, careful not to let the plastic fork fall off the side and find itself lodged in the center of the couch.

“Thanks.”

Since the two of them couldn’t agree on a cake to split, they ended up buying two. Soonyoung’s was a cookies and cream affair decorated with six whole Oreos flattened on top, while Junhui’s was a classic Carvel ice cream cake that he’d worked very hard to pipe his own name on with gel icing. It was this cake that he brought a slice of for Jihoon, chocolate ice cream melting into the blue icing of the border. It had a sloppy letter on its top, either an N or a U, and the icing dripped down the side as well, a death crawl toward the surface of the plate. Junhui’s own slice was much larger, home to the entire letter J, and Jihoon figured then that he probably had the U.

“Is it good?” Jihoon asked after watching Junhui tear away half of his slice in only a few bites. A few red drops of gel icing stood out around his lips when he looked up to meet Jihoon’s eyes and smiled. It was hard not to fixate on them.

“Of course it is,” Junhui said. “I picked it.”

“Right,” Jihoon scoffed, prodding the slow-melting mass with his fork a few times before scooping a little bit into his mouth. As he thought, it was a little too melted. Ice cream cake always tasted better when it was still really cold. In a way, though, it seemed to taste the exact way Junhui wanted it to. Jihoon helped himself to another bite.

“It’s good, right?” Junhui asked, eyes glimmering. The lamp light catching on his hair made its shade look even deeper, impossibly, like every follicle was wrapped in real gold leaf.

“It’s fine,” Jihoon said. Junhui rolled his eyes.

“Always so mean,” he said. “Even at my own birthday party.”

“Yeah, whatever.” Jihoon sat quiet for a moment, fed himself another bite of cake. “Happy birthday, by the way.” He listened to Junhui’s soft laughter with his eyes closed, felt a warmth gather at his arm where Junhui leaned into him just enough to be felt.

“Thanks.”

“How’s it feel?”

“How’s what feel?”

“Being twenty.”

“I don’t know. Same as being nineteen, I guess.” Junhui turned to face Jihoon head on, lips a tiny smile. Their noses were almost touching. Instead of looking in his too-bright eyes, Jihoon focused on the freckles dotting up his cheek. “Why do you ask me that every year?”

“Do I?”

“Is it not on purpose?” Junhui gazed at him a while, flecks of light bouncing off his skin and into Jihoon’s brain. “You’ve asked me that every year since I turned thirteen.”

“Really?” Jihoon thought about it. Maybe it was true. He couldn’t remember very clearly. “I guess I’m just curious.”

“Guess so.” Junhui hesitated a moment before asking, “Is it okay if I lay down?”

“Huh?”

Even as he asked, Junhui was already shifting himself to the side, draping his wiry legs over the edge of the couch. Gradual as could be, he lowered his back to the cushions, until he was all the way reclined, head firmly in Jihoon’s lap. Jihoon stared down at him, at a loss, but Junhui just smiled up. From this angle, he looked so different, almost like a baby and almost not even like a human. When he spoke, the shapes his lips made were so strange.

“I guess it’s always like this,” he said. Jihoon blinked down at him.

“What?”

“My birthday,” Junhui explained. Small cherry stains remained where icing had just been, so close to the lips but not quite touching. “When it happens, I always feel the same. But when I look back after a few years, everything suddenly seems so different.”

“I guess,” Jihoon said.

“Is it the same for you?”

Jihoon took a second to think about it. He thought about himself when he was sixteen, seventeen, about Junhui when they were that age, Wonwoo and Soonyoung. Things were different in so many ways. “Probably,” he said after a while. Junhui’s laughter wobbled in his knees.

“I thought so.”

Then they were silent. Jihoon wondered whether he was supposed to keep looking at Junhui’s head resting in his lap or pretend it wasn’t there at all, whether there was a decent middle ground between those two options or not. To his side, Junhui’s arm lay idle between his own body and the back of the couch. When it finally moved, Jihoon felt his shoulder shift first, then the row of his knuckles bumping deliberately into his side.

“Are you having fun?” Junhui asked, quiet below the sound of the music, far beyond clear.

Jihoon held his breath a long time before speaking. “Yeah, I am,” he said.

“Mean it?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” Junhui stretched both arms straight upward, then allowed them to fall back down above his head, like he was trying to reach something behind him. “I’m glad.” He stared at Jihoon a little while after that, smile waning just a bit. “I wish your birthday was in June.”

“What? Why?”

“You hate parties,” Junhui said, “but right now, you’re having a good time.” He lowered his eyebrows, a little frustrated that he even had to explain himself. As far as Jihoon was concerned, he still wasn’t making any sense. The weight in his lap was becoming unbearable. “All the rest of us have birthdays in summer, I mean. By the time it gets to November, you won’t even feel like celebrating.”

Jihoon watched him, waiting for the rest of the explanation, but Junhui stayed silent. So that was it. Jihoon hummed. “I guess,” he said, and Junhui chuckled.

“Have I ever told you I think you’re handsome?” he asked. For a long minute, Jihoon only looked down at him. Sometimes, he was so hard to understand.

“No,” Jihoon said after a while. Junhui’s grin morphed, but looking at it from above and sideways, Jihoon couldn’t put his finger on exactly how it was different.

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Well, I do.”

Jihoon tried to think of something to say, but his tongue turned to jelly in his mouth, brain water between his ears. Unsure what else to do, he shut his mouth with his last bite of cake and looked to the kitchen, where Soonyoung had moved on to doing shots in the middle of a small crowd. Junhui pulled himself back upright and sighed.

“Guess we better go make sure he’s okay.”

What a terrible thing to recall, looking at this picture of Junhui smiling from behind the little candles on his slowly melting Carvel cake. Again here, his hands are raised in mirroring V’s on either side of his face, and his eyes are shut to make way for the size of his grin. It was a while after this that he brought cake to Jihoon on the couch, laid himself down across his lap. Even now, Jihoon’s chest burns remembering the way Junhui had said handsome. The sound of his voice is so clear only this much later.

At the time, Jihoon didn’t know what to say, though looking back now it seems so obvious. He should have said that he thought Junhui was handsome too, because he did think it, but he wasn’t quick enough to realize that was the right thing to say. He thought back then that Junhui was just teasing him a little. Recalling the look in his eyes, he should have known better. Junhui always knew when to be honest. Jihoon was the one who didn’t know how to understand himself.

How many years has it been now, he wonders, since he last spoke to Junhui. Five? He can’t remember if he’s even seen him since they graduated, though he’s sure he must have, at least once. Surely. All he can dredge up from his mind is sending Junhui is text on his birthday, but that must have been three years ago now. Jihoon’s gotten a new phone since then; he can’t check even if he wants to. Not that he’s been thinking much about Junhui at all before right now. He wonders if Junhui’s thought about him, but the thought makes his eyes wet. Too wet. A few tears spill over and splash on the desk in front of him.

It hurts to look at these now and realize for the first time what he had so many chances to see. It hurts, yet he can’t stop once he’s begun. He’s so close now to having gone through every one, and if he quits now, he’ll only be frustrated. If he quits now, it’ll only hurt more. Wiping at his eyes with a palm, he sets the picture on its stack, now higher than the others, and continues to look through the rest.

In July, they threw a birthday party for Wonwoo. He himself wasn’t usually too fond of parties either, but he was prone so often to letting Soonyoung’s enthusiasm wear at him. When Soonyoung started pestering him about the possibility just days after they’d cleaned up the aftermath from his own birthday party, Jihoon knew already he was doomed to agree to it before the month had passed. On the 29^th, Wonwoo announced with a reserved grin that he was on board with the plan.

Since his parents had no plans of vacationing any time soon, Soonyoung did his own groundwork to dig up a place where they could act like they weren’t kids anymore. The place he settled on was the weekend cabin of some friend he met in his biology lab at school, nestled in the mountains a neat hour away. Wonwoo’s parents had more reason to trust their son than Soonyoung’s had to trust theirs, so they had no problem with the four of them going an hour off to celebrate. He was practically an adult already, they said. Soonyoung agreed wholeheartedly, grinning all the while.

The party was conducted in much the same fashion as before: self-financed decorations and food, largely mixed attendance. What really made it different was the location. This place was completely foreign, nothing like the comfort of Soonyoung’s house. Out back, a little river ran behind it, perfectly visible from the upstairs balcony. Jihoon watched it flow by lazily, occasional fireflies lighting up in small yellow dots by the banks.

Despite how long the sun had been set, the night was still boiling hot, cicadas singing their lives away in the thick darkness. The music from inside carried out to blend in with that harsh screaming, the sound of chatter and the occasional burst of laughter. Such a strange soundtrack for an evening so hot. A spike in volume came alongside the sound of the balcony door being opened behind him, then dimmed again to its former hush. After a few seconds, Junhui stepped up to the edge of the balcony beside him.

“Whatcha doing?” he asked, voice soft. His elbow rested against Jihoon’s, touching just enough to seem deliberate, with the rest of his arm hovering close enough to make things too warm.

“Just watching the river,” Jihoon said, nodding his head down at it. He thought he heard Junhui hum in response, but the noise of the night was too loud to be sure. “How about you?”

“Just talking to you,” Junhui said simply.

“Tired of the party?”

“Not really,” he said. “Are you?”

“Yeah.”

“I figured you would be.”

Jihoon inhaled another steaming breath and pushed it out all the same, dewy traces of sweat gathering on his forehead. “I guess you know me pretty well,” he said, and Junhui leaned a little bit closer while he chuckled. There was red in Jihoon’s cheeks, he could tell, but it was dark enough that he knew Junhui probably couldn’t. For a minute, they stood without speaking, taking in the ambience of the night enveloping them. “Aren’t you going to go back in?”

Junhui hummed. “Maybe not.”

“Why?”

“It’s not that I’m not having fun,” he said, “but I just wanted to come find you.” Jihoon glanced over to see the moon catching on all the slopes of his face, silver in glowing contrast with the way his hair still shone gold even in the dark. “I had a feeling you would be somewhere like this.”

“Guess I’m predictable.”

“That’s not what I’m trying to get at.” Jihoon was on the verge of asking what he was trying to get at, but Junhui’s palm was over his hand suddenly. Then it wasn’t. “You missed the cake,” he said like it was important.

“Is there any left, do you think?” Jihoon didn’t really want to ask that—he wasn’t so interested in eating any, anyway—but it felt like the right question for the time.

“Maybe. I can check.” The cicadas grew louder suddenly, urgent, and a line of five lightning bugs lit up all in a row down in the yard. “Do you want me to bring you some?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll be right back.”

It was still hot as ever, but Jihoon felt the onset of a chill as soon as Junhui fled back inside and left him alone with nothing but the noise. Slowly, the river below started to look like a shifting mass of emptiness, the fireflies lighting up around it nothing but cosmic blips in a web of vacant space, and fatigue began to seep into him from the legs. After a minute or two, he lowered himself to the floor beside the door and pulled his knees to his chest, gazed out through the slatted bars three feet ahead. Junhui nearly kicked him in the side when he returned, then made a loud noise of surprise and sank to have a seat adjacent.

“There wasn’t much left,” he said, handing over the meager plate he brought back. The piece of cake on it was so small Jihoon couldn’t help but laugh; it almost looked more like a bunch of scraps pushed together into the shape of a slice, barely coated in the chocolate icing layered over it. Junhui sighed. “Sorry.”

“Thanks, anyway,” Jihoon said, popping the single bite worth of cake in his mouth and taking his time to chew on it. The plate was too big for the piece it had carried, almost completely clean in its new emptiness, and Jihoon only stared at it because the thought of facing Junhui made his chest feel cramped. It lost its shape more the longer he looked, somehow existing both in only one dimension and also in five. What a tacky design.

Without warning, Junhui leaned over to rest his head on Jihoon’s shoulder, shifting his own broad frame out of the way to allow for it. Where just moments ago Jihoon had felt a bizarre chill, he now felt like he was overheating, all skin from the neck down burning to glowing embers. Jihoon stayed as still as possible, eyes ever forward, and pretended he didn’t feel the way Junhui’s arm curved to fit the shape of his back.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” Junhui said.

“What are you doing?”

“Just resting.”

“Are you tired?”

“Not really.” He readjusted his head on its new resting place, honeyed hair tickling Jihoon’s chin. “But you seem tired.”

“I am, I guess.”

“I knew it.” Gradually, the cicadas began to realize the moon wasn’t the sun and shut up for the night, quieting down one by one until the only sounds were the liveliness from inside and the occasional muted swish of the river. “Are you having any fun?” he asked after a while.

“A little.”

“You don’t have to lie to me,” Junhui said, quiet, thoughtful. “It’s not my party, anyway.”

Jihoon laughed. He didn’t mean to, but it came out before he realized it was on its way. “I’m not really having fun.”

“I knew it,” he said again. Even when they were the same words, his voice always made them sound different. “If only your birthday was in June.”

“I don’t think it makes a difference when my birthday is.”

“It does though,” he sighed. “If your birthday was in June, you’d celebrate with us.”

“Maybe.”

“You would.” Junhui blew out a hard breath, rippled the front of Jihoon’s shirt when he did. “In a month,” he began, somber, “we’re gonna be back at school. We’ll be juniors already.”

“Guess so.”

“You don’t sound sad about it.”

“Should I be?”

“I don’t know. I am, kind of.”

Jihoon blinked. When he said that, he really did sound sad, and Jihoon wasn’t sure how to take it. Such a rare thing, for Junhui to be sad at all. He was only ever grinning. “Why?”

“Time is just passing so fast now.” It was true. Jihoon had felt the same way for a while. “I just wish it would be a little slower.” Jihoon chewed on that a while, silent below the crushing pressure of Junhui’s head on his shoulder.

“I know what you mean, I think.”

Junhui hummed quiet assent, then nestled his head a bit closer. It was hard for Jihoon to get his breathing normal again, hopelessly offset by the balance shift Junhui caused just by being there. In front of him, he watched a fly land on his empty plate, wander around in the darkness before buzzing off again and leaving them at peace. The sound of the party inside seemed to die down, or maybe it was just that the two of them had drifted so far away that it sounded quieter. If Jihoon focused, he could make out the smallest hints of individual voices among the shifting songs.

“Hey,” Junhui said, “I’ve told you I think you’re handsome, right?”

Jihoon kept breathing like normal. It felt strange to be able to breathe so easily, strange when he knew his chest was so close to collapsing. He never understood Junhui. It was so much harder to understand him when he couldn’t see his face. For long, so long, Jihoon only breathed. “Yeah,” he said finally. “You told me.”

“I thought so.”

Junhui didn’t say anything after that. Instead, he brought his arm around the other side, felt with his hand to find where Jihoon’s lay idle against the ground and held onto it. His grip was tentative, palm warm, fingers barely fitting themselves into the gaps between Jihoon’s. All Jihoon managed was to wonder what he was doing. At first, he meant to ask, but a wave of weariness hit suddenly, and he closed his eyes instead.

He’s never seen this picture. He’s never even heard about it. For most of these, he might have eventually stumbled on the memories one day had he never found this envelope, but this one is impossible. In the photograph, he lies asleep, eyes shut tight and hair pushed sideways at a bizarre angle, but that’s not what strikes him about it. It’s that Junhui’s sleeping face also featured in the picture, just adjacent to his, that he’s so clearly resting on top of Junhui’s chest, the ugly couch from the upstairs room of that cabin beneath both of them. In the bottom corner of the image, he sees his own arm wrapped loosely around Junhui’s waist. The sight clogs his throat with cement.

What a terrible picture for Soonyoung to take. So terrible, when he must have known how much Jihoon was in love with Junhui. Looking back, Jihoon thinks they all probably knew. Maybe even Junhui. He was the only one who didn’t realize it. As he holds the picture, the pressure of his thumb and forefinger starts to bend it out of shape. Everyone knew, and now he’s nine years late to realizing, and there’s nothing he can do.

It’s been years since he’s heard anything from Junhui, three at least, maybe more. He can’t even recall the last time he saw him in person, the last time he looked at his face. It must be so different by now, yet all Jihoon can picture is that same youthful glow, that same blonde head, though he knows they’re long gone. The two of them are hardly the same people anymore as they had been nine years ago. Nine years. That’s so much time. Are they even connected to each other anymore? Does Junhui still have the same phone number?

Jihoon’s own phone is unlocked in his hand before he thinks about it, opened up to Junhui’s contact information. No recent conversations, no contact picture. As far as he knows, not even a functional number. It could be nobody at all. Yet his palms clam up at the thought of calling it, forehead dews. His fingers tremble when he places the picture onto its designated stack and ghosts his thumb over the call button.

What will he say if he does call? If Junhui doesn’t pick up? Loss of contact is a collaborative effort, after all. Maybe he’s better not to, better to dry his eyes and seal these memories back in their envelope and pretend he never dragged them back to the surface. But his chest hurts, like everything inside it is gripped in the same hand, waiting to be crushed. And without paying attention, he hits the call button.

The ringing catches him off guard. It’s so loud when Jihoon puts it up to his ear, and every ring seems to get longer by years, until they become a ceaseless drone together echoing around inside his skull. Three rings go by before there is a click and its heavy silence. Jihoon holds his breath.

“Hello?”

A simple word and a simple voice. Jihoon feels both like crying again and never shedding another tear, and his chest is numb. How unusual for his voice to sound so exactly the same, so recognizable when it’s been so long since Jihoon heard it. He opens his mouth, but he doesn’t have any words ready, so none come out. How long, he wonders, before Junhui decides to hang up.

“Who is this?”

His voice sounds so warm still, so patient. Maybe life has been good to him these past few years to make him sound so gentle. Jihoon realizes he has no way of knowing. Maybe there are even new people in his life, who make him happy, who’ve never heard of Jihoon. Suddenly, calling seems like such a selfish thing to do. He takes the phone from his ear and goes to hang up, but his finger freezes over the glowing red exit.

“Jihoon?” the voice from the speaker asks, faintly.

“What?” Jihoon says in response without thinking. He raises the phone back to his ear again, just in time to hear Junhui’s faint laughter. Always the same, that laugh.

“So it is you.”

“How did you know?”

“I don’t know,” Junhui admits. “I just had a feeling.” The line falls silent between them for a while, just empty breathing. “I lost all my contacts when I upgraded my phone a while ago,” he explains after a moment. “But I thought, based on the area code, you know. That maybe it was you.”

“I see.”

Quiet again. Jihoon should have thought of something more substantial to say. He should have thought of a better reason to call in the first place than realizing he was in love almost ten years ago. He should have thought at all. In some ways, he still hasn’t grown at all.

“How are you these days?” Junhui asks.

“I’m alright,” Jihoon breathes, throat dry. “How are you?”

“I’m good.” A long beat of silence. What a mistake. Junhui laughs again, small. “It’s been a while since we talked, huh?”

“Yeah,” Jihoon says, sighing. “I guess it’s really been a long time.”

“We have a lot to catch up on.”

“Guess we do.”

Silence. Junhui breathes out. “I don’t know where you’re living now,” he says, “but I’ll be home visiting my parents for their anniversary next weekend. If you’re not too far…” He huffs. “Well, never mind. You’re probably… forget it.”

“I’m close,” Jihoon says. “Sort of.”

“You are?”

“A little bit, yeah.”

Junhui waits before speaking. “Then do you want to meet for lunch?”

“Sure,” Jihoon says. And he feels like crying when he says it. He can hear Junhui’s smile on the line’s other end, so very far away, same as it always was.

They meet at a restaurant they went to often when they were still in high school, home of the caramel brownies that used to be Junhui’s favorite. Those brownies are all Jihoon can smell when he steps inside, the air still flush with that same sense of comfort he hasn’t felt in maybe twelve years now. The hostess sits him at a booth by himself, and he passes the time waiting by staring at the menu and pretending to read it. He’s sure they sat together in this booth before, with Soonyoung and Wonwoo too, when they were younger. The vinyl red seats of the chairs feature in more than a few of Soonyoung’s pictures from that summer where he took so many. A knock of knuckles on the table grabs his attention, and he snaps his neck up to watch Junhui slide into the seat across from him.

“Hey,” Junhui says quietly.

“Hey.”

God, does he look different. His smile is the same, eyes the same, all the same, but he’s so different. It’s not that he looks older or any less handsome. Just that he doesn’t look quite like the same person from so long ago. His eyes even carry their twinkle, the exact way they had when they were still in school together. Somehow, though, he’s not the Junhui Jihoon remembers, and it makes him feel like crying more.

“You look so different from the last time I saw you,” Junhui says, leaning his chin into his palms and grinning. Jihoon thinks he also looks like he might cry.

“Do I really?”

“Well, not really,” Junhui admits, “but I feel like you do.”

“Do I look old?” Jihoon asks. He finds it in himself to smile at the way Junhui laughs, just as giddy and childish as ever.

“I don’t think you’ll ever look old,” Junhui says, warm. “Do you feel old?”

Jihoon hums. “Sometimes.”

“Me too.”

A server arrives to take their orders, and they work their way back from the silence with idle chatter. The way they speak is so strange to Jihoon, so quiet and empty, talking about nothing at all in particular. Junhui says he went back to school and got his master’s, Jihoon says he’s surprised. Junhui never seemed like the type to put himself through more schooling than necessary, and he laughs when Jihoon says so. He’s living a couple hours away now, but he still doesn’t manage to visit often. Jihoon says he’s the same. They’re both working a lot. Neither of them are seeing anyone. Everything is so strange.

Junhui orders the brownies just when Jihoon thinks their meal is wrapping up. They arrive steaming, two brownies with a small mound of vanilla ice cream between them and caramel oozing out the sides. He pushes the plate to the center of the table between them, presenting Jihoon with one of the two spoons their server brought them. He waits to break off a piece for himself until he’s seen Jihoon do so first, humming around the chocolate in his mouth.

“Just as good as I remember,” he says, content, digging his spoon into the side again for another bite and scooping up a bit of ice cream on the way. Jihoon smiles watching him, and that pain in his chest is just a strong as ever.

“I wondered if you still liked these,” he muses, absent. Junhui looks into his eyes, smile softening.

“You remembered that I like them?”

“Of course,” Jihoon coughs, filling his mouth again. His cheeks are red and he knows it. “They were your favorite since we were kids.”

“Well, I guess that’s true,” Junhui sighs. His spoon hovers above the dessert, poised for its next attack. “But I don’t remember if you even liked them.”

“They’re fine,” Jihoon says, “just too sweet.”

“Ah, I remember now,” he hums. “You told me I should only eat these on special occasions.”

“Did I say that?”

“You did. When we were seniors in high school and we came here on skip day and I got them.”

Jihoon sifts through his memories, but this one doesn’t come. Maybe because it seemed so insignificant at the time. All he remembers is that golden hair. “I don’t remember,” he sighs. The sweetness starts to kick in then, and he sets his spoon down, blinks slowly. “There’s a lot I don’t remember, I guess.”

“I think it’s just that I remember too many things,” Junhui tells him.

“Maybe.”

For a while, they look at each other without speaking. Junhui’s smile has somehow shifted, a little more curious, more difficult to understand. All this time, he’s been changing, but Jihoon can’t tell how. He makes the exact same expressions he used to, but they look a million yards off, distorted by distance. Maybe it’s just that. How the gap between them has grown so unbridgeable. Junhui blinks, and Jihoon watches the way the freckles dancing up the side of his face move with it. Even now, his chest tightens up the same way he could never figure out ten years ago. This time, he’s trying to understand himself.

“Say, Jihoon?” Junhui says suddenly, softly, gaze unmoving from Jihoon’s face.

“Hm?”

“Why did you call me?”

Jihoon fumbles over his lead tongue. “Why did I call you?”

“It’s been such a long time since we talked,” Junhui says. “I was wondering if there was any reason in particular.”

“Well, not really,” Jihoon says. Then he kicks himself under the table and sighs. If he’s already here, he should say what he’s thinking. Across from him, Junhui doesn’t say anything. “Actually, no. It was because of… well, do you remember when we were sophomores in college?”

“I remember.”

“And Soonyoung bought that stupid camera. And you dyed your hair.”

“Yeah. I remember.”

“Right.” He exhales, stares at the slowly growing pool of vanilla halfway between them. “I was cleaning out my closet and I found an envelope full of pictures that I guess Soonyoung took.” All around them, the rest of the restaurant seems to be moving in half speed, completely silent. Not even the music from the speakers reaches Jihoon’s ears. “I think he gave them to us when we graduated.”

“Yeah. I have some, too,” Junhui says. He takes a thoughtful beat to breathe and sets his spoon down on the plate, rippling the little white puddle out of shape. “So you looked through them, then? And just got curious what I was up to?”

“Well, yes,” Jihoon says, “but not quite.” Even when he looks up, he can’t find Junhui’s eyes. All the glitter sparkling in them isn’t quite enough to guide him home. “I was looking at all the pictures I had of you, and I just… You know, you were… Back then…” His face is getting hot. Everything is too warm, everywhere too stifling, and it still hurts. In his chest, he’s still crumbling. “I realized, I think, looking at the pictures.” Junhui waits.

“You realized what?”

“I was in love with you.” It sounds so much more true when he says it out loud. He almost wants to repeat himself, but Junhui’s eyes widen, and the strength fades from him again.

“Ah,” is all Junhui says, and when Jihoon blinks and opens his eyes again, Junhui’s face is covered by his own palms, eyes alone unobscured. There’s a heavy twisting in Jihoon’s stomach that he tries to pretend is only from the overly sweet brownies he can still taste inside his cheeks, but no luck. What a stupid thing to say to someone you haven’t seen in years. Neither of them move for a while.

“Sorry,” Jihoon says at last. Jitters are finding their way into his hands, and he starts to gather his coat before they get too noticeable, but Junhui shakes his head, holds out a hand to stop him.

“Don’t be sorry,” he says. “Really. It’s not…”

“No, I haven’t… It’s been so long.” His ribs tighten around his lungs each time he utters a word, painfully close to puncturing. “I don’t know why I told you that.”

“That’s not a problem,” Junhui says. “It’s not. I don’t mind.”

“You don’t have to pretend it doesn’t bother you.”

“I’m not pretending.” He covers his mouth again, then drags both hands down the sides of his face to cup his chin once more. A glowing honey pink stands out on his cheeks, vibrant and warm, distinctly new. “It’s just… you know, it’s not like you to be so late.”

Jihoon stares at him, expression blank. “Sorry?”

“Don’t you think?” The restaurant feels even farther away now, like they’re not even in it. Some special dimension with just the two of them, where time is slowed down. Junhui looks the same as he ever did, as he always has, light dancing gold at the edges of his hair. “It’s almost ten years too late for you to be realizing something like that.”

“Ah,” Jihoon says. “Yeah. It is. I know.”

“Soonyoung and Wonwoo always said so,” Junhui muses.

“Said what?”

“That you liked me,” he says. “They always said it, but I didn’t believe them.”

“Of course,” Jihoon huffs. “Why is it they knew, but I didn’t?”

“I don’t know,” Junhui says. His smile is only the subtlest curve. “It’s like that sometimes, I think. Maybe they just understood you better than I did.”

“I don’t think that’s it.”

“Maybe not.” Junhui readjusts himself, leaning his head instead into one palm and extending the other toward Jihoon across the table. Jihoon wonders whether he should take it and ends up just staring blindly forward. “Did you know that I had a crush on you?”

Jihoon coughs, loud. “How could I have known that?”

“They both knew,” Junhui says. “I thought you knew. I tried to tell you.” He pauses, exhales. “I thought you just weren’t interested.”

Maybe it was obvious—considering it again right now, it certainly seems so—but Jihoon barely put his own thoughts together for the first time just weeks ago. When he didn’t understand his own feelings, how was he ever supposed to see Junhui’s? It’s a complicated thing to be young like that, so complicated and so confusing. The fog only clears when you’ve come too far to look back anymore.

“I didn’t know,” Jihoon says. “I had no idea.”

“I guess you didn’t.”

And it’s too late now, Jihoon thinks. It’s too late now to do things about a past that’s already been buried, too late to take the lives they’ve made for themselves and act like they’re the lives they used to lead. It’s too late to go back and open a door they both thought was locked just because neither of them saw they key in it waiting to be turned. It’s too late to wish they were on time.

“Well,” Jihoon says after a while, “thanks for meeting me.”

“That’s it?” Junhui asks.

“What?”

“You’re just going to leave with that?”

“What else should I do?” Jihoon says, eyebrows furrowed. “We’re not kids anymore. It’s not the same. I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.”

“Say what you’re feeling right now.”

“Right now?” he asks. Junhui nods at him. “Embarrassed.”

“I didn’t mean that,” Junhui says, upturned palm remaining so on the table between them. “I mean what you’re feeling now about me.” His fingers relax and curl up again, like they have a mind of their own. “How do you feel about seeing me again right now? Is it the same?”

When he speaks now, Jihoon sees so many more traces of him as he had been back then, fresh and lively and captivating, shimmering all over with his own sort of gold. His blonde hair is long gone, but it still lingers in essence, a ring of light cast round his features. Jihoon’s heart is deep in his stomach, burning alive from the inside, compressing into nothing.

“I don’t know,” he says. Junhui smiles. That same old smile, the one that’s always made him feel a bit like crying.

“Do you remember the time I told you I thought you were handsome?” he asks. His hand moves a bit on the tabletop, and now Jihoon reaches out to take it. Warm, like the summer nights Junhui always makes him think of, without all the uncomfortable stickiness they come with. Fireflies twinkle in his eyes.

“I remember,” Jihoon says.

“Good.” Slowly, Junhui pulls their hands upright, until their fingers are forced to lace together. The feeling is so foreign yet so familiar, the opening bars of a song he hasn’t heard since he was a little kid. “And you know what?” His smile is burning, and his eyes are stars. Everything around them is stars, and they’re waist deep in lukewarm water on a muddy summer afternoon. Cicadas are singing in their honor. Junhui leans forward and speaks in a low voice, like he’s telling a secret. “I still think so.”