Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

I think when we love we look for someone against whom to say: But I am like this.
— Sofia Samatar, The Winged Histories

It’s raining on the day Jay’s life falls apart. A sudden storm, heavy and warm, appearing out of the blue in the way things often do in the summer.

Jungwon tastes the first drop of rain as they walk outside together, tilting his face up to the murky grey sky to catch some more. Jay just stares at him for a second.

“Should we run?” Jungwon asks, wiping away a raindrop. He smiles, and that’s when Jay knows the answer, the heartbeat of yes yes yes ringing through his chest.

So they run, and they keep running, sneakers slapping down against the wet pavement. Laughing with the giddiness of it—as if they’re playing tag, as if they’re invincible again—until they arrive under the awning at the front of Jay’s house.

There’s a moment where the chill settles in—where Jungwon watches him as he fumbles with the keys to unlock the front door—and then they’re safe, they’re inside the warm comfort of Jay’s home, and even if Jay’s shirt clings to his skin he knows the promise of dry clothing is near.

Jungwon turns to him, smiling with his dimples on display. “We made it.”

Jay wants to hold that smile deep within him, let it soak into his skin just like the rainwater, and become a part of himself.

He exhales. “Yes, we did.” His hair is wet and dripping onto the floor. Jungwon grins at him; he's exactly the same—t-shirt plastered to his skin, skin shining slightly.

Jay's house is warm and dry in contrast to the raging thunderstorm outside. Jay can't register anything, really, besides how thoroughly soaked he feels. Drowned out, and uncomfortable—he only notices it now, and he’d ignored it before. He'd been too focused on Jungwon, he supposes.

That's happening more and more nowadays. Jay thinks about the university forms he still has yet to complete, the move-in checklist he's barely looked at yet. All those things that had been abandoned by the wayside for this.

"Hey, are you even listening?" Jungwon waves a hand in front of his face. "You were zoned out for a moment."

Jay blinks, and then he realizes Jungwon's standing closer to him than he thought. When Jay pushes Jungwon's hand away, Jungwon merely holds on tighter, intertwining their fingers. Jungwon's fingers are cold and damp like the rest of him.

"Your hands are so warm," Jungwon marvels, grabbing onto Jay's other palm as well. He looks at Jay with the weight of expectation that Jay isn't quite sure if he can carry. He lets go of Jungwon's hands gently.

Jungwon is—

He's a lot. A lot more than Jay could have ever predicted when Jungwon stepped into his house that first time—more astute and unpredictable, vivid and lovely. He's been noticing it recently, just how lovely Jungwon is, but he doesn't know how to connect all the discrete hints to form a picture he wants to see.

"Jay."

Thunder rumbles all around them. The house creaks.

"Jungwon."

Jungwon leans forward, and then they're kissing. They're kissing, and it's not particularly good, but Jay doesn't want to stop—and Jungwon reaches up to cup the back of Jay's neck, eager, tries to bring him closer. It's only once Jay feels the cold dampness of Jungwon's fingers against his skin that he remembers, realizes—

Jay pulls away. His hands are shaking, and it's not from the cold. Jungwon is mere inches away from him, impossible to ignore, eyes wide and curious. Jay has thought of kissing Jungwon before, but there’s a difference between thinking of something and making it real. A difference between a passing wish and an action he can’t take back.

"That was nice." Jungwon's starting to smile, a small, tentative thing like a flower blooming in ice, and Jay needs to stop this before Jungwon's expectations are taken too far. Before Jay forgets that this is just one summer.

"No." Jay watches Jungwon's smile fracture off his face in small increments. "Jungwon, we can't…”

Jungwon's entirely serious now. "What's stopping us?" he asks, a challenge.

"We shouldn’t," Jay corrects himself. More lightning outside the windows, and Jungwon startles at it.

Jungwon opens his mouth, seemingly ready to protest before he closes it again. They stare at each other, tense: a moment locked in time. Jay can still remember the taste of Jungwon's mouth on his, and that knowledge burns in him like a brand on his skin.

"Fine, then," Jungwon says eventually. He's the first to turn away.

Then, just as calmly, just as collected, Jungwon reaches past Jay and wrenches the front door open again. Unmuffled by the door, the storm hails down loud and fierce and screeching.

Without any hesitation, Jungwon steps outside into the pouring rain. Jay watches him leave.

And for a moment, there, Jay wonders how it all went wrong.

It’s been less than a week since they’ve moved into the new house and Jay already misses his friends. A normal Monday morning, and he’d be desperately cramming in the last bits of breakfast while Heeseung, his best friend, honked impatiently from his driveway. A normal Monday morning, and he’d have a whole day ahead of him to spend with his friends.

But school’s out now; Jay received his diploma just last Thursday, cap and gown and all. And then the move had happened. Of course, the move, which Jay had seen coming—his parents were never good at lowering their voices while arguing—but still took him by surprise nonetheless.

“This is fucking terrible timing, you know,” Heeseung had pointed out. He held onto his graduation cap by the tassel then started swinging it back and forth idly.

Jay watched its trajectory closely. It was easier than looking at Heeseung’s face as he spoke. “What do you mean? It’s perfect timing.” Or so it was for his parents, at least.

“I’ve finished school, so there’s nothing else…” Nothing else keeping us here. Jay glanced up at Heeseung’s face, stopped in his tracks by the blatant hurt displayed there.

It had been awkward, to say the least, those last premature goodbyes. The sharp jut of Heeseung’s shoulders as Jay hugged him for the last time, Taehyun blinking rapidly to stave off the tears and Kai crying openly. They hadn’t been as close as they used to be, but that can’t erase the decade all of them spent in school together.

Jay knew that it could’ve been worse, though. His parents had never been fond of the town where Jay grew up, and the recent tax hikes hadn’t helped matters. He was lucky he finished out high school in the same place for all four years. But there’s a difference between knowing the facts and being able to side with his parents wholeheartedly, and he has to be honest—right now, Jay hates his parents just a little bit. For taking away his senior year summer plans with Heeseung just like that, for moving to this sleepy retirement neighborhood where Jay hasn’t spotted a single kid his age—or anyone under twenty, honestly—yet.

There’s only two and a half months of summer left, and he can’t wait for them to pass him by. It’s just a liminal interlude in his life, forgettable and brief, before Jay embarks on a new journey in college. Nothing’s going to happen.

But then he meets a boy.

Jay doesn’t think much of Jungwon Yang at first. It’ll make him laugh when he looks back on it, because it truly shows how little first impressions even matter. He wonders if it’s even possible to look at someone when meeting them and just know—know what they’ll mean to you, know what impact they’ll have on your life. Right now, he’s completely clueless.

Jay doesn’t think much of Jungwon at first. He shows up at Jay’s doorstep on the eve of the sixth day of their move—Jay’s been keeping a steadfast count—holding a container of japchae in his hands, his grandmother standing behind him. Jay will come to know a lot of things about them: that they comprise the only other Korean family in the neighborhood, that Jungwon has an older sister away at a summer internship, that Jungwon is sixteen and loves the sun singing on his skin.

But at this moment, Jay can only see what’s in front of him. The boy and his nervous-creased khaki shorts, the way he dresses like someone else had chosen the clothes for him. The boy and his wide eyes as he takes Jay in.

It turns out they had come over for dinner, at the invitation of Jay’s parents. The meal is a strange affair, at this new house and with these new people.

Jungwon stays silent unless addressed, deferential and bland as he responds to Jay's parents' questions in Korean: yes, he's going into his junior year of high school; no, he's not sure if he wants to do computer science like his sister.

Normally, at a dinner like this, Jay would start some side conversation with Heeseung, shooting shit about whatever in English after fielding the usual formalities with the parents. But Jungwon just seems so… different from the other Korean kids Jay knows. Everyone’s a bit more uptight around adults, but not to this extent.

It’s only after a question about Jungwon’s friends is asked that a crack in Jungwon’s perfect facade shows.

“There aren’t a lot of kids in this neighborhood, now that Jeongwoo moved,” Jungwon says. He falters, shooting a glance over at Jay. “Especially not our age.”

Jay recognizes something in that brief glance, something he hadn’t understood while clocking Jungwon’s wide-eyed fascination earlier. An echo of the loneliness Jay’s experiencing, not the exact same type but similar enough—like a melody modulated to a new key, different notes to a familiar song.

Jay’s mom smiles indulgently. “It’s good that Jay’s here, then,” she says.

Jay winces at the obvious maneuvering, and Jungwon’s smile looks equally strained. They make eye contact, a shared moment of oh god this is so embarrassing, and that’s when it clicks for Jay.

He realizes, then, that pretty much his only shot at companionship for the summer lies in this sixteen-year-old boy. It’s a strange feeling. He knows that if he was back home—at his real home, where he grew up, not this quiet neighborhood—they wouldn’t have any reason to know each other.

But right now, Jay’s trying to cope with the cards he’s been dealt.

So after the plates have been cleared, Jungwon’s grandmother moving to sit in the living room with his parents, Jay turns to Jungwon. It’s late, but the summertime type of late, which means that the sky is still bright blue outside. The sun won’t set for another hour or so.

“Wanna go on a walk?” Jay asks. He still hasn’t finished settling in his room, and he isn’t sure how well he’ll get to know Jungwon within earshot of his parents.

Jay’s pretty sure that’s an expression of relief as Jungwon says, “Sure.”

It’s beautiful outside, beautiful in a way Jay doesn’t want to appreciate.

Jay had already scoped out the neighborhood one time, dragged outside by his parents, and he has to admit that it has something going for it in the way his old home didn’t. He’d used to live in an overcrowded suburb, crammed with families hoping to get in on the good public schools there. Here, the houses have actual lawns instead of yard-wide patches of grass, each mailbox spaced far apart. Here, the streets are quiet with barely any cars passing by, nothing like the busy main road Jay used to drive on with Heeseung to get to school.

He looks over at Jungwon, then. Jay likes meeting new people, honestly—there’s something about the stiltedness of trying to get to know another person, mind roving for new questions to ask and ways to twist the conversation into entertaining directions, that’s almost a welcome challenge. But Jungwon’s also hard to read, his face so perfectly impassive as he answered those questions at dinner.

Jay starts off small. “Who’s Jeongwoo?” he asks, kicking at a pebble on the sidewalk. “You said—he was your age?”

“He moved.” Jungwon’s squinting because of the sun, and Jay can’t tell if his frown is just from the bright light or something else entirely. “He used to live in your house, actually.”

“Oh.” Jay tries to imagine how he’d feel if something like that had happened with Heeseung and winces. Nothing like being a walking reminder of Jeongwoo’s absence. “Uh, sorry?”

Jungwon gives him a strange look at that. “It’s not like it’s your fault,” he says. “He always wanted to leave.”

“What about you?” Jay finds himself asking. “Do you want to leave?” As he says this, they reach the small recreational area at the end of the street, a small clustering of benches alongside a poorly maintained field dotted with dandelions and a rusty swing set.

“No. I mean—I don’t know,” Jungwon replies. He sits on one of the swings, kicks his legs out absently. “I guess it might seem boring here, compared to where you lived before, but it’s pretty nice.”

Jay sits down, too, hands gripping onto the chains, but he doesn’t start pumping his legs just yet. “Maybe you should show me around, then,” he says impulsively. “Show me what’s good to see around here.” Anything’s better than staying stuck at home, bored and tethered to his friends only through late-night Discord voice calls.

Jungwon skids to a stop, sneakers dragging against the wood chips underneath. He gives Jay a wide-eyed look, and it reminds him of the way Jay had felt when he had opened his front door to Jungwon’s family just a couple hours ago. Like he’s being faced with something completely new, unpredictable.

“Unless you’re busy,” Jay rushes to add, feeling a little sheepish. His summers before his senior year had been prized real estate, a blank space with which to fill prestigious “internships” and summer programs. Now, it’s almost as if he has too much free time, and an impending sense of doom as the days pass by—like he’s wasting some precious resource without even knowing.

Jungwon’s smiling at him now, a tentative, small thing. “I volunteer at the hospital some days, but I’m pretty free outside of that,” he says. An open invitation if Jay’s ever heard one.

Jay roots through his pockets and pulls out his phone. “What’s your number, then?” he asks. “Text me.”

And this is how it starts.

“Are we just going to the playground again?” Jay asks. They’re walking the same path that they had the day before, and it’s the same time of day, too: the beautiful bright sky dotted with wispy clouds, the textbook definition of perfect weather.

Jungwon gives him a look. “No, it’s better than that,” he says confidently, not offering any explanation outside of that. And instead of stopping by the playground swings as they had done last time, Jungwon leads him along the back fence of the lot, where cut grass meets forest.

“There’s a trail.” Jungwon points to a narrow clearing between the trees in front of them. “It’s—I like it here.”

Entering the forest feels like entering another world. Once they’re a couple of paces along, the sounds of the neighborhood—the buzz of lawnmowers, the whirring sprinklers, an occasional car zooming by—peter off into nothing. It’s not silence, not exactly; the forest seems to thrum with an invisible heartbeat, something that lives more in Jay's chest than his ears. But there is a hushed, warm nature to it—like the loving, gentle part of a mother's embrace.

"Do you go here often?" Jay asks, following Jungwon along the footpath. It isn't marked by anything but a couple of stray streaks of red paint every few trees, and the trail itself is barely worn enough to be distinguishable.

"Sometimes." Jay senses that there's something more behind that curt answer. Something that maybe Jungwon doesn't want to share with him quite yet. Jay has the whole summer to figure it out, he supposes.

He glances up, then stops in his tracks. The leafy canopy above blocks most of the light, but there are bits and pieces where the sky comes through. It casts everything in muted shadows. Then he looks along the path, into the distance. All he can view are tree trunks, no horizon in sight. "Where does this go?"

Jungwon stops, too, turning back to look at him. "If you walk far enough? The next town over, probably. I've never got to the end of it, though."

"Oh, cool." Jay starts walking again, still distracted by how eerie everything seems up above. So distracted, in fact, that he trips and stumbles over a tree root. "Shit."

"You okay?" Jungwon faces him again, reaching out to grasp Jay's shoulder. His warm hand steadies Jay for a moment, his smile even warmer. "Pretty clumsy, huh?"

"Yeah. Oh my god," Jay says, just a little embarrassed. And oddly pleased, too, to see Jungwon’s smile come out after all of this. "Whatever, it's fine." A stubbed toe hurts a weird amount, the type where it isn't that painful but it's still damn annoying.

From then on, they walk side by side. The path is narrow, but it's more convenient this way. Or so Jungwon says, eyes crinkling with mirth as he remarks wouldn't want you to trip and actually hurt yourself—

Jay doesn’t mind being teased; he’s always been able to forsake saving face over getting along with others. And if this is what can break the ice between them, so be it.

They start off slow:

“What are you going to major in?” Jungwon asks. His shoulder brushes up against Jay’s briefly, a side effect of the narrow path.

Jay doesn’t mind the touch, doesn’t think anything of it, actually. “I applied for chemistry,” he replies.

“The way you said that,” Jungwon begins. He stops and gives Jay a considering look. “Do you like it, though?”

Jay has thought about this before, but something about the weight of Jungwon’s gaze leaves him turning over half-memorized answers in his brain, searching for something new—and more true—to offer.

“It’s fine,” he says, looking up at the trees again. “It’ll be a lot different from high school chem, but—I like it.” And that’s true enough.

Jungwon hums at that. “What if you had a second life?” he asks. “What then?”

“Ah, I don’t know, let me think,” Jay says. Even as he speaks, an answer forms at the top of his lips, a little hesitant to escape—it’s always been difficult to keep from wearing his passions on his sleeve, but this feels especially personal. He lowers his gaze from the canopy above, finally brings himself back to the ground. “I have an idea, but…”

“But what?” Jungwon prompts.

“Don’t laugh,” Jay warns, averting his eyes from Jungwon’s face. “But I guess it would be fashion.”

“Fashion?” Jungwon echoes. “Like, designing clothes?” He doesn’t sound judgmental or critical, just curious—that same open curiosity that Jay had sensed all of yesterday.

“Yeah, that,” Jay replies. Part of him wants to launch into an explanation of why he likes it so much, what exactly makes fashion so fascinating to him, but— “What about you? I know it’s early, but is there anything you like doing?” He’d rather find out more about Jungwon first.

“Not really.” Jungwon turns his face away from Jay, so that Jay can’t read his expression—not that Jay would be able to decipher it properly anyway. “I don’t know.”

“That’s okay,” Jay says, hoping it comes off as genuinely reassuring instead of patronizing. He remembers being sixteen, consumed by self-doubt and confusion. All the things he knew then, all that he’d soon come to learn. “You have time to figure things out.”

For the past week, Jay had spent his nights on Discord, voice-calling his friends from home while alternating between video games. This is the first night he does something different—lying on his bed, staring up at the ceiling in between exchanging messages with Jungwon.

Jungwon, of course, doesn’t have a Discord. Jay has half a mind to ask him to make one, but it’s only their first night texting like this. Who knows whether Jungwon will talk to him like this, at length, again.

He’s also different from Jay’s friends in other ways. The only thing they agree on is their shared interest in badminton—when Jay tries to bring up favorite TV shows or movies, all are met with some measure of disinterest. Not in him, just the material. The first thing to spark an actual reaction is when Jay tries to come up with a favorite book.

When Jungwon sends him a string of question marks, followed by Really? That’s your favorite book?, Jay knows that he’s hit the jackpot.

i dont deserve this slander!! whats urs though, Jay sends in reply almost immediately. Jungwon proceeds to type for so long that Jay wonders if his wi-fi connection has lagged or something.

from: Jungwon
The Little Prince when I was younger
But in terms of something I read recently hmm
That's sort of hard to decide

from: Jay
i didnt know u were so into reading

from: Jungwon
I'm not
Are you free tomorrow

Jay realizes just how much Jungwon had downplayed his interest in books when he drags Jay to the local bookstore. It’s not that Jay doesn’t like reading, but most niche fashion books aren’t readily available at in-person stores. He’s more likely to order such things online.

Jungwon clearly has an entirely different approach to books. He strides up to the door confidently, pushing open the door with a wide smile and saying "Watch your step!" over his shoulder.

Jay, while entering, barely manages to avoid stumbling over the sudden difference in elevation when he steps inside.

The front table displays all the “hot and new” bestsellers, the sort of books whose titles Jay's seen name-dropped but he doesn't actually know anything about. Jungwon walks straight past those novels and deep into the depths of the store, where the shelves get even more cramped due to lack of space.

Jay hasn't been to a bookstore in ages—the last time he'd been was on vacation because that was where the closest wi-fi hotspot had been located at the time. Even so, he's honestly more fascinated with Jungwon's reactions to things than the actual shop itself. There's a sense of open wonder in Jungwon's expression as he walks slowly between the shelves, fingers trailing over the spines. It’s something new, something he hasn’t seen in Jungwon yet before.

"Is there anything you're looking for?" Jay asks.

Jungwon doesn't look up. "Not really," he says, pausing by a certain bookcase. "If I see something cool, I might get it." Jay checks the end of the case, and it's labeled with Travel Guides and Tourism Books. Riveting, he supposes.

"Sorry if this is boring," Jungwon adds, glancing up at Jay briefly. "But—"

"It's not," Jay interjects quickly. He's content with trailing after Jungwon, seeing this side of him.

The only spot where Jungwon bothers to pause and flip through novels is the Used Books section, all the way in the back. It's mostly classics here—that, and old-looking books that Jay has never heard of, the type he assumes are too irrelevant to be deemed classics.

"Here," Jungwon says, pushing a book into Jay's hands. Insistent and confident instead of quiet. "You should read this."

"Why this one especially?" Jay turns the book over in his hands. It's a hardcover copy, but the book sleeve has long been lost to time. The pages alternate a little bit in length so that when Jay runs his finger over the thickness of the book, it ruffles under his fingers.

"It's really good," Jungwon replies, before launching into an explanation of exactly what he means. Jay had thought that the text messages were a lot, but this—this enthusiasm is something else entirely.

Jungwon is bright-eyed in front of him, hands moving as he explains himself, loose bangs falling in front of his forehead. Jay gets the sudden urge to reach out and sweep them to the side, wants to grasp onto that golden energy and savor it himself.

And it's in that moment, while Jungwon is explaining the merits of one of his favorite books, while Jungwon is surrounded by the things that he clearly loves, that Jay realizes: Jungwon is cute. It isn't something Jay had thought about at all before. But now that he's noticed, he can't unsee it—Jungwon's cuteness.

Jay doesn't know what to make of it, any of this. So instead he listens to Jungwon's explanation, nodding at all the right moments, and buys the book before they leave the store.

“I’m not into reading, you said,” Jay recounts as he starts the car. He can’t help but feel a little amused at Jungwon, right now. He holds onto that feeling, focuses on it—better than the alternative. “I didn’t know you could be this excited.”

Jungwon makes a face at that. “It’s not serious or anything,” he says, and Jay knows Jungwon better now—knows that Jungwon’s lips are shaped around a lie.

“You sounded pretty serious to me, back in the store,” Jay replies.

“Whatever.” Maybe Jay pushed too hard, too soon, for Jungwon closes up a little after that. Jay glances over at him when he stops at a red light, taking in the way Jungwon’s lips are pressed together. Not displeased, just pensive. That’s okay, Jay thinks. He can let things unfold as they will—gradually, with time.

He’s usually the impatient one, but there’s something here that makes him want to savor every moment.

Turns out that there isn’t much to explore in their small town. After a couple of afternoons exploring cafes, yet another trail, and the historical section of the neighboring town, they end up right where they started: at the dilapidated soccer field, Jungwon carrying badminton rackets and a shuttlecock with him.

But Jungwon’s clearly a lot more comfortable with him now, considering how often he ribs Jay as they play.

“I thought you went to the badminton club every week,” Jungwon teases. They aren’t keeping score or anything, but if they were then Jay would definitely be losing by a large margin.

“Hey! I never said I was good,” Jay protests, smiling despite himself. Somehow he always ends up like this—made fun of affectionately, gently poked at in a way that he can’t deny. He thinks that being teased so ruthlessly because of badminton might be a new low, but well. It’s not bad, really.

“Sure, whatever,” Jungwon replies. He covers his smile with a hand, clearly amused. “Come on, serve the next one.”

The shuttlecock whistles through the air, and they continue to rally back and forth. The sun is still high in the sky. It’s a relaxed, easy pace for the most part, except for when Jungwon feels in the mood to slam something impossible down at Jay and watch him try to lunge for it anyway.

“You always go all out,” Jungwon says. He seems surprised at the fact, as if such a thing is counterintuitive. “Even when it’s obvious you won’t get it.”

Maybe it is, for someone like Jungwon, but it’s always made perfect sense to him.

“Hey, you never know.” Jay stands up and brushes stray bits of grass from his legs. “Even when it looks like it’s impossible, I might make it anyway.”

Sure enough, one of Jay’s improbable dives actually does pay off. Grass scratches against his shins as he lunges forward, the badminton racket barely meeting the shuttlecock. Jay can’t help but feel a little smug about it. “See?”

“Maybe you’re right,” Jungwon says. “Just this one time.”

“Hey!”

They play until Jay tires out, and he collapses onto the grass, staring up at the sky. It’s still as beautiful as it had been a couple of days ago, even more so with a distinct lack of clouds above. He hears Jungwon settle down beside him more than he sees it.

“This was fun.” Jungwon’s voice, coming from beside him. He sounds content, as opposed to that usual quiet restraint.

“Yeah.” Jay runs a hand through his hair. He’ll have to wash it when he gets home considering the sweat coating his forehead. “It was.”

“Even if you were eating shit half the time?” Jungwon asks, eyes wide and innocent. Jay knows, now, how much of a front it all is.

“What do you mean!? I’m amazing at badminton,” he says.

“Um,” Jungwon says, a teasing glint returning to his eyes. “That’s questionable.”

He shouldn’t have expected anything more from Jungwon. Jay rolls his eyes, and Jungwon imitates the action until finally, they’re giggling into the grass together.

Quiet settles over them, but it isn’t truly silent. Jay can hear their breathing intermingling with the sounds of the outside world. The soft breeze. People chatting, the sounds all distorted. The sprinklers run in their periphery, splashing rainbows of water droplets into the air. Jay feels sweat starting to cool down and dry against his skin, and he knows that soon he’ll have to go home and face the end of the day.

But for now, that sweet summer stillness feels infinite.

Jay sort of hates how hot it gets here. Hit with a heatwave, Jay barely has the energy to go outside. He stays in bed longer than usual that morning, scrolling through his phone idly. He wades through Reddit, backreads on some of the Discord servers he’s a part of, and finally taps through his friends’ Instagram stories. It’s everything that Jay’s used to, but he can’t help but linger on Jake’s post, in particular, the way Jake holds up a peace sign to the camera and manages to catch Heeseung and Sunghoon in the background.

He’s always been acutely aware of the distance the move would cause, had known that keeping in touch over the internet wouldn’t necessarily bridge that physical gap between him and his closest friends. But this is the first time he’s gotten the sense that it—this solely online connection, Jay as a passive bystander in Heeseung’s life—is pushing them further apart, leaving him disconnected. They haven’t talked in a couple of days, anyway.

Jay sends a message to Heeseung on Discord, but when he doesn’t get an immediate reply he simply turns his phone off. He knows, in theory, that there’s a lot he could do right now. He still has college forms to fill out, pages upon pages of medical histories and roommate preferences to relay to the university. There’s still a pair of pants he found while thrifting that he hasn’t altered to fit him, just because he hasn’t bothered taking out his sewing machine yet.

Instead, he finds himself in the kitchen. Without his parents at the house, it’s a lot more peaceful and quiet here. And it’s been a while since he’s been able to cook or bake, with the unpacking process going on.

The last time Jay had prepared food had been at their old home, in their old kitchen which Jay knew intimately. He misses it, misses being able to know where every spice is located and which rack in the oven is perfect for roasting fish on. He misses his favorite stool at the counter and being able to sit at the granite countertop and think, this is home. This room is smaller than their old kitchen and unfamiliar in so many ways.

Jay decides to make his favorite honey cookies. It’s the recipe he arguably knows the best—besides the corn cheese he can make in his sleep—and that return to familiarity feels desperately needed, now. It takes him a minute longer to find the flour, but measuring it out is a practiced motion.

Then the doorbell rings.

“Oh, hi,” Jay says, relieved to see that it’s Jungwon in front of him. “Uh, what’s up?” He doesn’t know anyone else in the neighborhood yet, and he’s uncomfortably aware of how he looks right now—glasses on, bangs tied up away from his eyes in a stupid little ponytail because it’s hot out. Definitely not the best way to greet strangers.

Jungwon’s eyes widen as he takes Jay in. “Is this—a bad time?” he asks. Jungwon’s forehead is shining with sweat. He seems as awkward as Jay feels right now, shifting his weight from one foot to another as he stands on the front porch. “You didn’t respond to your phone, and I just…” Jungwon trails off.

Jay thinks he gets it. “I turned off my phone, that’s all.” He feels the need to be gentler than normal. It’s an odd emotion he’s experiencing right now—seeing Jungwon when he hadn’t quite expected is nice, pleasant, like stepping into a patch of sunlight that’s been warming the hardwood floors. Not the scorching type of heat that Jungwon must’ve experienced on his walk here, but gentler than that.

“Just come in,” Jay continues, feeling slightly ridiculous for conversing for so long on their front porch. He can picture his mom scolding him for letting out the air-conditioning, or something. “I’m making cookies.”

“You bake?” Jungwon asks, spoken with that innocent incredulity as he steps inside. Jay should’ve expected this reaction. The boys he grew up alongside, Taehyun and Heeseung, had never not known this part of him. Another thing he misses, just a little.

But the only way to proceed is to be as matter of fact as possible. “Yeah, when I feel like it.” Jay continues walking to the kitchen, and Jungwon follows.

Baking is mostly for when he’s stressed—Jay vividly remembers poring over his college applications with a slice of banana bread beside him, or studying for tests junior year with another batch of something in the oven—but it’s still a nice habit to keep up. Baking is what got him grudgingly interested in chemistry in the first place: being able to understand the mechanisms in the transformation from dough to dessert, being able to internalize those complexities and better make them his own.

“You’re into so many different things,” Jungwon says absently. “Fashion, chemistry, baking…”

“I don’t know,” Jay replies, a little confused by Jungwon’s tone. “I just do what I like.” But what if you had a second life?

Jay looks over his shoulder. Jungwon seems lost in thought, frowning at nothing in particular. And Jay wonders, for a second. Because he’s never been good at just stopping at the realm of imagination, he says, “Do you want to help? If you came all the way here, you might as well.”

“Wow, bossy,” Jungwon deadpans.

Jay crosses his arms. “You could just go back home.”

“No, I want to help,” Jungwon says quickly. “I just don’t know anything about baking.”

He takes a seat at the kitchen counter, and first takes a look at the mixing bowl, eyes later roving over the rest of the kitchen with barely concealed fascination.

“Baking’s not that bad.” Jay slides the recipe across the counter to where Jungwons sits. “It’s just following directions, honestly.”

Even so, Jay’s going to be honest. Jungwon… is a horrid baker. Jay had thought himself the clumsier one of them both, but however unfamiliar Jay might be in this new kitchen, Jungwon is doubly so.

They get a good laugh out of Jungwon’s egg-breaking—it’s all about controlling the force, Jay tells him, but he honestly isn’t keen enough to even continue letting Jungwon smash eggs so brutally—and Jay shows Jungwon the proper way to measure flour, aerating the particles before scooping it into the cup measure in question. At least Jungwon’s good at shaping the cookie dough into little balls; the small frown of concentration he wears on his face, too immersed in the process to say many words, is almost endearing.

“See? It’s not that bad, right?” Jay asks once they’ve finally got the tray of cookies into the oven. He takes off the oven mitts and sets them on the counter in front of Jungwon.

Jungwon wrinkles his brow, his legs kicking back against his stool. “It was kind of complicated.”

“Complicated?” Jay can’t help but smile at that. “Oh my god. Man, this is about as simple as it gets. Just wait till you see—”

“You have flour on your face,” Jungwon interrupts, gesturing at his own cheek to show where it is.

“Oh.” Jay rubs at his skin half-heartedly. “Better?”

Jungwon, in lieu of a reply, just reaches out to swipe at his skin himself. It’s a brief, perfunctory touch, but it leaves Jay speechless for a moment.

“You’re kind of a mess,” Jungwon says, as if he hadn’t just had his hand on Jay’s cheek a couple of seconds before. “Nice ponytail?”

Or maybe Jungwon genuinely doesn’t care about stuff like that. Jay’s a naturally touchy person himself—arms thrown over shoulders, taps and pats to check that the other is okay—but he’d assumed Jungwon was the opposite.

Jay makes a face at Jungwon’s words regardless. “It’s because you showed up early,” he protests. He’d almost forgotten about the ponytail, in the excitement of baking, but now that he remembers he feels the blood rushing to his cheeks in embarrassment.

“It’s not a bad thing.” Jungwon stretches, and with his face tilted up toward the light streaming in through the windows, he looks like he’s basking in the illumination almost. Limned in the golden light, burnished in something precious. “It’s just you.”

The cookies look different than normal when Jay takes them out of the oven. Probably due to the differences in elevation, Jay explains to Jungwon, but even with the varying conditions the honey cookies still taste comforting. And it’s that blending of the familiar and new—baking a trusted recipe, sharing an unfamiliar space with someone he’s still getting to know—that sets him at ease.

Sure, he misses home, misses his friends. But that doesn’t mean he can’t forge something, just for a moment, here with Jungwon.

Jay sets the book down with a groan, leaning back onto the couch awkwardly. The furniture at Jungwon’s house is a lot more rigid than what he’s used to, a different sort of discomfort from the soft scratchy grass he’d rather lie down on. Such are the side effects of a heat advisory. "I don't know if I can do this."

"You just have to read and see, okay?" Jungwon says. He’s curled up in an armchair across the coffee table, clearly immersed in his own book. Jay wishes he could say the same about himself. "I promise it’ll get better."

“I guess,” Jay replies. He flips back through the pages he's read, counting it up in his head. A whole fifteen of them, and so far he's learned more about the architecture of the household than the actual plot of the book. It's not terribly written—at least not to Jay's unknowledgeable eyes—but every moment of the story is narrated with painstaking detail, so many sentences dedicated to the description and setting that Jay can't help but find it ludicrous. "But literally nothing has happened so far."

“You’ve barely started,” Jungwon points out, and, well, it’s not as if he’s wrong. Jay thinks that Jungwon is about to return back to reading his book, and he flips back to the page that he’s on to resume reading about the dreadfully boring pursuits of this stuck-up thirteen-year-old. But, Jungwon continues, a little hesitant: “Look, you don’t have to read it if you don’t want to. It’s just something that I liked, and wanted to share with you.”

And, well, put like that—in the face of Jungwon’s rare moments of earnestness, when he’d so much more often tend towards glib teasing instead—what is Jay supposed to say in response?

“Okay, I’ll keep reading,” Jay replies, mouth dry.

“I bet you’ll cry when you finish, though,” Jungwon adds. He raises his eyebrows. “Do you cry a lot? You seem like the type of person to cry at the movies."

"Who doesn't cry at sad movies?" Jay can feel the back of his neck heating up in embarrassment. "It's not a bad thing." Jay's in touch with his emotions, so what?

Jungwon raises his hands up in mock self-defense. "I never said it was!" He's smiling, that same pleased look Jay's starting to see on him more and more—especially while he's teasing Jay. "It's just what you're like."

Maybe Jay would mind Jungwon's teasing words more if they weren't accompanied by that smile, by that laugh. But they are, and so all he does is duck his head and admit defeat. “Whatever,” Jay replies. “Guess I’ll just finish the book and prove you wrong, alright?”

“Deal,” Jungwon agrees.

So Jay opens the novel and starts reading again.

Heeseung does respond, eventually, and soon enough Jay finds himself video calling his best friend. It’s both different and the same. Even miles of distance and pixelated smiles can’t change the fact that they’ve known each other for more than a decade.

It’s a different type of friendship that he has with Jungwon, Jay realizes. With Jungwon, it’s like the knowledge is more intentional. Every detail shared is another way to spur on their friendship. But all that Heeseung knows about Jay comes from years and years of gentle accumulation, everything building up gradually: two trees with their roots tangled together below the soil.

Jay tells Heeseung this because he tells Heeseung everything, and Heeseung fixes him a look through the laptop screen.

“And this Jungwon guy, you two are just friends,” Heeseung says. It sounds like a question stopped half in its tracks.

“Yeah,” Jay replies, mind still hinging on the just hanging between them. He realizes half a moment too late. “Wait a second. You can’t think—”

“Tell me,” Heeseung interrupts. He’s got this strange look on his face, eyes a little wide. “Is he cute? Do you have a picture?”

Jay doesn’t reply. Part of him realizes that if Heeseung ever sees a photo, he’d be able to tell instantly.

“Oh, he totally is, isn’t he,” Heeseung continues.

Jay groans into his arms, head hitting the keyboard. “I don’t know.” There’s so much that he feels clueless about. He isn’t even sure if Jungwon could like guys, let alone him, but he doesn’t know how to convey all of this to Heeseung right now. This is touchy territory for both of them, but who else can he talk to?

He looks up at Heeseung, torn in hesitance in front of him. All of a sudden, Jay is hit with a wave of acute longing. He misses seeing his best friend in person and reading his posture beyond the tense set of his shoulders that appears on the computer screen.

“Well, I don’t know either,” Heeseung says. Except Heeseung does, can intuit things without knowing the nitty-gritty details. “But it’s not like back then—I mean, you can figure out what you want, now.”

“I’m sorry,” Jay replies, wincing right after. An automatic reflex at this point, but not a welcome one for either of them. Heeseung smiles—the same strained flash of teeth he’d aimed at teachers he particularly hated during junior year.

It’s been a while since then—a while since Heeseung had kissed him that fraught fall afternoon, a while since Jay had sorted through the mess of attraction and emotion within only to determine that keeping his best friend was more important than possibly losing him.

And there are things that Jay still can’t take back, now. Mistakes he’s afraid of repeating.

Jay distracts himself by diving into the book, instead. He finishes the first part that night and he just knows, then. It’s a little past midnight, the low golden lamplight by his nightstand the only thing illuminating the pages before him.

He can’t stop thinking about what Jungwon had said—what Jungwon has been telling him, about books and reading, this whole time.

from: Jay
u up?

from: Jungwon
Was going to sleep soon
What’s up

There’s something special about texting at night. The lights are low in Jay’s room, and he’s sprawled out on his bed. All he needs to do is roll over and place his phone and glasses on the bedside table before falling asleep.

Jungwon has been teasing him with those quippy little smirk emojis, and Jay just feels comfortable, inhibitions lowered. He knows there's a different sort of courage that comes from hiding behind a screen; sometimes the perfect avenue for a heart-to-heart conversation isn’t face-to-face.

Jay figures he might as well ask what he’s been wondering about ever since he started reading the book.

from: Jay
do u wanna be a writer

from: Jungwon
I don't know
I know I like it but that's it

from: Jay
i get what u mean
its how i feel about fashion haha

from: Jungwon
Oh yeah
You never really talk about that
???

Jay can read between the lines; he knows that it’s an open invitation from Jungwon to tell him about this. He wonders whether he should start off with his Hedi Slimane rant or explain why he wants to design clothes or even—

They stay up pretty late that night, just texting. And even when Jungwon wishes him goodnight, citing the volunteering shift he has to attend tomorrow, Jay’s mind can’t stop moving a mile a minute. He scrolls up through their conversation, rereading the way Jungwon had reacted to his whole tangent on muted color palettes, then goes further, all the way back to the beginning. do u wanna be a writer feels almost a trite question, like asking him if he wants to be a designer. And writing…

Writing? Jay shuts his phone off, rolls over onto his stomach, and places his phone on the bedside table without looking. The glasses follow after that, and soon he has his head pressed into the pillow.

He pictures his English classes and imagines Jungwon enjoying the discussions about symbolism or theme. Jungwon sitting at his desk at home, the words he spins the only vivid part of his mostly solitary life. Jungwon making something beautiful out of nothing, from mere thought itself.

It’s scary, a little. For every inch Jungwon gives him, Jay wants to take—wants to give back—another mile.

"So how does, like, designing clothes work?" Jungwon had asked a seemingly innocent question. He'd shifted forward on the armchair, book forgotten in his lap. "Is it like how they do it on Project Runway?"

Jay had given Jungwon a look of disdain, unable to help himself. “What do you think?”

Aside from briefly interrogating Jungwon on Project Runway—my sister watched a couple of episodes, okay, Jungwon protested—Jay had to admit, he was excited to show Jungwon more about the things he likes. So excited that he'd forgotten to consider the obvious upon bringing Jungwon upstairs. It's only hitting Jay right now, as he faces the door of his bedroom.

No, it's not that his bedroom is messy—although it is—nor that Jay barely finished moving in just a day ago—though that's also true. Instead, he's struck by how much yet how little Jungwon knows about him, and what this room might reveal.

He cracks open the door and peers inside, reconsidering everything from Jungwon's perspective. There’s a cluster of the perfumes on his counter, and sunscreen because his mom doesn’t want him to get any more freckles. There’s a One Direction poster hanging in the far corner—a gag gift Heeseung gave when Jay was obsessed with Zayn Malik as an elementary schooler—and a BTS album nestled among the novels in his bookshelf. And, of course, there's his shiny sewing machine and the haphazard stack of French language-learning textbooks. In conclusion: Jay Park is a fucking dork.

He glances back at Jungwon for a second. It’s not as if Jungwon doesn’t already know that, he thinks. What’s going through his mind must be exceedingly apparent on his face; Jungwon laughs at what he sees.

“Is your room messy or something?” Jungwon asks. “Come on, I won’t judge.”

Yeah, Jay thinks. Messy with everything that Jay’s obsessed with: fashion, music, languages.

"It's fine," Jay decides. "Just—oh, just come in." He takes a deep breath, and they both step inside.

It takes approximately one second for Jungwon to get a glance at the One Direction poster and announce, “Wait—is that—okay, never mind, I’m slightly judging right now.”

“Jungwon!” Jay grabs him by the shoulders and turns him around so that his back is to the poster. “Oh my god—just pretend it doesn’t exist. Please.”

“Why not?” Jungwon grins at him, eyes glimmering with mirth. “It’s cute.”

“It’s embarrassing,” Jay mumbles, trying to ignore the way his heart rate picks up after Jungwon calls him cute.

Jungwon peers over Jay’s shoulder at the wall behind him. “Can I… look?” he asks, nodding toward the bookshelf. “It’s just—I want to see what you have.” It’s a meager arrangement—for some reason, he imagines Jungwon’s own room to have shelves teeming with novels, stacks on stacks—with not a lot of actual books taking up space.

“Sure,” Jay replies, wondering if Jungwon will find anything interesting in-between his surreptitiously placed Wings album and Hedi Slimane anthologies. “There isn’t much.”

“Yeah, there isn’t,” Jungwon replies. Even so, he slips a book from Jay’s shelves—a novel Jay’s aunt had bought a couple of months back—and holds it in his grip, giving it a considerable glance.

“You can borrow it,” Jay says.

Jungwon looks at him the same way he’d looked at the book in his hands: with an air of discovery, of curiosity. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Jay confirms. He sits on the edge of his bed, watching as Jungwon walks away from the bookshelf.

Jungwon pauses at the dresser first, eyes widening once he spots the perfume bottles. “Oh. Wow.” He looks over at Jay again, then back to the perfume just as quickly. Jungwon mumbles something imperceptible under his breath, and it puts him on edge.

“Don’t judge,” Jay says, defensive.

“I wasn’t—I’m not judging, I swear,” Jungwon insists, the edges of his ears turning red. “Is that why you smell like—ah, I should've guessed.”

Jay blinks at him. “Like blackberries?” Already he’s wondering: is it noticeable in a bad way? Is it too strong? He thinks back to all the times they’ve sat by each other, and wonders whether Jungwon had ever found him suffocating.

Jungwon frowns. “What are blackberries even supposed to smell like?”

“It’s the scent I use,” Jay explains. “So it’ll be whatever I smell like, I guess.”

“It’s sweet, then,” Jungwon says quietly. He moves on, back to the embarrassing One Direction poster, before Jay can even process what he’s said.

“Who’s your favorite member?” Jungwon continues. He sounds normal again.

“Uh… Zayn,” Jay says. He can feel his cheeks heat up. “Yours?”

“My sister liked Harry,” Jungwon says absently. He glances back at Jay and continues. “I don’t know the other members. They're not really my type.”

"Your type," Jay repeats blankly, feeling as if this conversation took a severe left turn without him realizing it. Is he hearing the same words that Jungwon is saying, right now? His ears ring with the question he wants to ask: what's your type, then?

“Weren’t you going to show me how you…” Jungwon trails off, gesturing vaguely at the sewing machine on Jay’s desk.

“Oh, right.” Jay rushes to clear the desk of his mess, dragging over a stool so that they can sit together. He isn’t sure about showing Jungwon his sketches, but at least he can preview some other parts of his process. “I like styling outfits too, but I got kind of into making some small things.”

Jungwon peers over his shoulder and listens with rapt attention as Jay talks about fabrics and the annoyances of using a sewing machine. It takes a couple of minutes for Jay to notice, in the midst of their conversation, but once he does—once he realizes that their shoulders are touching—he can’t stop thinking about it. A gentle, grounding sort of awareness that Jay can’t help but want to lean into.

With Jungwon, it’s like time fractures, in a way. It doesn’t move at the same sluggish pace that Jay is so accustomed to. The hours he spends alone or with his parents are always weighed down with the summer heat. Yet, merely a morning and afternoon spent with Jungwon can pass in the blink of an eye.

Jay’s summer is starting to speed past him, and he doesn’t know how to make it stop.

Chapter Text

Jungwon, Jay has noticed, is a bit of a romantic. He’d gotten the sense ever since he’d started reading the book Jungwon recommended to him, but it becomes startlingly clear when they go to the movie theater.

Jay usually gravitates towards watching action films with his friends, but Jungwon has chosen a sappy romance movie. A rare opportunity for Jay to tease Jungwon about his tastes, although Jungwon’s remarkably difficult to shake, remaining calm in the face of Jay’s laughter.

Not that that’s the point of going to the movies with Jungwon in the first place. Jay glances over at Jungwon as the movie begins, the way the dim movie theater and its shadows heighten the depth in Jungwon’s face, the way Jungwon’s cheeks and nose bridge are highlighted by the projector’s secondhand light.

Jungwon catches him looking. “Are you going to watch the movie, or just stare at me instead?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. He doesn’t seem surprised, though, even as Jay flushes with embarrassment.

The theater in town is one of the few movie theaters that hasn’t switched out the narrow seats for more couch-like seating, and Jay’s glad for it, now—glad for the proximity, almost unconscious, as his shoulder nudges up against Jungwon’s and their knees touch ever so gently.

But Jungwon pays rapt attention to the movie once it actually starts playing, and Jay mostly follows suit, still sneaking peeks from time to time. It’s a romance movie, brimming with melodrama, and predictably enough Jay finds himself tearing up at the resolution. Thankfully, Jungwon hadn’t been looking at him as he subtly tried to wipe away the wetness from his cheeks.

They walk slowly as they leave the movie hall, down the poster-lined hallway covered with flimsy carpet, and out to the parking lot. Maybe Jay’s imagining it, but it feels as if Jungwon’s dragging his feet—trying to prolong the night, lengthen every moment.

“What’d you think of the movie?” Jungwon asks. He’s shivering—now that the sun has set, the summer night is almost chilly.

“It was good,” Jay replies. He keeps on thinking about the ending, how happy the couple had been in each other’s arms—that private sort of tenderness broadcasted on a big scene. He wants it, but it scares him, too.

“Just good?” Jungwon continues. They reach the car and sit inside. “That’s all?”

Jay doesn’t start the car immediately, just sits there and turns to face Jungwon in the passenger seat. “Uh, well…” he tries to think of what else he could say that doesn’t sound too damning.

Jungwon reaches over and puts his hand on top of Jay’s. “I saw you crying.”

“I liked it,” Jay says. He swallows deeply. At night, inside his car, Jungwon is the same way as he was in the movie hall—covered in darkness, shades of grey—but the silence, the aloneness, makes it more intimate. “I liked it a lot.”

It’s—this is strange. Not strange in a bad way, per se, just different. Different from all of the moments they’ve shared before, and Jay wonders if Jungwon can sense it, too.

Jay removes his hand from underneath Jungwon’s palm and starts the car. “Whatever. I guess I’m just a softie.”

Jungwon laughs in agreement, and just like that, they’re back to normal. As if those strange seconds in the car together had just been a mirage in the desert, something in the air that’s just a figment of Jay’s imagination. A blink-and-you’ll-miss-it type of brightness, but ultimately misleading.

Jungwon’s busy over the next few days, and that space—shorter replies, a string of sorry, can’t make its—gives Jay the perfect opening to do what he does best: overthink every life choice he’s made.

Is Jay reading too much into things?

He stares at the messages Jungwon has sent him from yesterday. Goodnight followed by an exclamation heart emoji. It’s the last in a sequence of several things that have given Jay a bit of pause recently. Like: Jungwon reaching out, more than usual, to pat Jay’s shoulder or grab at his wrist. Like: Jungwon standing closer to him, close enough that sometimes their fingertips brush up against each other, or sitting so that their knees touch. Like: Jungwon calling him cute again, when Jay gets embarrassed, always with laughter outlining the edges of his voice.

Jay closes his eyes and rolls over from where he lies on top of his bed. He can hear his mom coming up the stairs, familiar footsteps slow and steady, and he doesn’t bother moving.

“What are you doing?” his mom asks, opening the door with a slow creak. “Aren’t you usually with Jungwon at this time?”

“Nothing,” Jay mumbles in response, cringing at how predictable he is—at how his life has shifted to accommodate Jungwon’s presence over the course of weeks. He turns over and sits up to face her, though, combing his hair back into place with his fingers as he does so.

He wonders how obvious it is, whatever he’s going through, for his mother takes one look at him and the stern look on her face softens.

“You two have been close lately,” she continues. “Did you get into a disagreement?”

“No, it’s—nothing,” Jay repeats, sure he sounds even less convincing the second time around. His mom gives him this look—she can hear a lie from miles away—but doesn’t push it, thankfully.

“Have you filled out all the paperwork, then?” she asks, completely switching topics. “I just got an email from the university. The deadline is tomorrow.”

Jay squints as he tries to remember. “I think?” He stands up, walks over to where his laptop sits on his desk. “I’ll go check, actually.”

“Just stay on top of things,” his mom continues, gentle and firm. She ruffles Jay’s hair before she leaves. “I won’t always be there to remind you of what to do.”

Logging onto the university portal is just another reminder of all that’s to come—the summer eventually closing to an end, Jay headed on a plane across the country. New life, new friends. In a sense, there's an obvious answer to all of his troubles.

There’s no point in Jay losing sleep over this uncertainty. Not when, a month away from now, Jungwon will be starting one of the most stressful years of his life and Jay won’t be down the street any longer.

“Sorry about the past couple days,” Jungwon says the next time they meet. They’re heading to the trail again, side by side. Jay thinks he could measure the distance between them down to the exact centimeter. “I just had to figure some things out.”

“Oh. Is it like—?” Jay breaks off, unsure of whether to delve further. He switches tracks. “You can always talk to me, you know.”

“It’s not a big deal,” Jungwon insists, smiling lightly. He looks right at Jay, then. “Seriously, don’t worry about it.”

Jay nudges Jungwon’s shoulder gently. “That just makes me more curious,” he admits.

“Guess you’ll have to stay that way,” Jungwon says. As casually as he might speak, there’s something in his tone that’s unyielding. And so Jay drops the subject.

It’s easy to stay quiet in the forest, anyway. Even Jay—who likes talking, likes asking Jungwon questions—feels some long-lost serenity settle over him.

Eventually, Jungwon stops in his tracks. "This is going to sound kind of stupid, but… When I come here, it's like—I'm more here than I usually am." Jungwon's looking at him, and it's hard to tell what he's thinking. Jay isn't quite sure how to categorize what he sees in Jungwon's eyes.

Jungwon turns away, tilting his face up to the sky. Somehow that's easier, just studying Jungwon in his entirety—looking at how the light falls against Jungwon's cheeks, Jungwon's eyelashes fanning out against his skin when he closes his eyes.

The forest is lovely. Everything here is lovely.

"You know how here, it's like—you want to soak everything in?" Jungwon asks. His eyes are still closed. "Every little detail, every little second. That's how I feel when I read something beautiful."

"Like the book," Jay says, the realization washing over him.

“Like the book,” Jungwon agrees. He opens his eyes again. “Isn’t designing like that, too?”

“I—” Jay remembers the afternoon they’d spent together, the way Jay had shown him the different reams of fabric he’d possessed and all the work that went into the final product.

Jungwon steps closer to him. The sides of their sneakers brush together. “Actually, I’ve been curious about something, too,” he says softly.

For a second, Jay is terrified of what Jungwon might ask.

“Why aren’t you studying fashion?” Jungwon continues, frowning slightly. “Is it possible?”

It’s both the right and wrong question, all at once. Something that aches at his weak spots but doesn’t completely knock him over. Jay laughs, more out of relief than anything else, but Jungwon’s frown only deepens.

“What about writing, then?” Jay says, crossing his arms. “Sure, you could study it. But does anyone think you’re serious when you talk about it?”

Jungwon blinks rapidly. “Well, I thought you did, but maybe—”

“And I do,” Jay interrupts. He does not know how to be gentle like this, gentle with his words, so he presses his palm against Jungwon’s shoulder and hopes that the touch can make up for what he says. “But I’m just one person.” But you’re just one person, he thinks but does not say. “And everyone else thinks it’s a hobby—for both of us.”

Jungwon doesn’t say anything for a long while.

“Do you see, now?” Jay asks, leaning in to take a better look at Jungwon’s face. “It’s just—it’s not always that easy.”

Something in Jungwon’s eyes hardens, but he still nods in agreement. He still lets it go, at least for now.

Jay does a good job of pushing it—this, whatever he has with Jungwon—out of his mind, he thinks. At least he’s been keeping up with it—avoiding Jungwon’s eyes after extended periods of contact, making sure that no touch lingers too long—until today. It’s a day like any other, except for the rain.

It was the rain that got to him. The rain, and the fact that they’d been caught up in it, the exhilaration coursing through his veins as they sprinted to the closest source of shelter as fast as they could. And then—the kiss. The kiss. That’s where it went wrong.

For a couple moments, all he can do is stand there and stare out the window, mind blank with shock. To think that Jungwon had been so close, wet-warm skin underneath his fingertips, and now he’s just—gone. Out the door, out into the storm.

That’s when Jay realizes that it’s still fucking raining, and Jungwon’s stuck out there. After that, everything seems much more simple.

Jay opens the door again and steps outside. He runs.

It doesn’t take long for him to catch up to Jungwon, who’s even more drenched than before. There’s water streaming down Jungwon’s face and Jay can’t tell if it’s tears or just raindrops.

“Come back,” Jay says. He doesn’t touch Jungwon. “You’ll get sick if you walk home like this.”

Jungwon frowns. “I—”

“Come on,” Jay insists.

“Are we going to talk about this?” Jungwon asks. He doesn’t move an inch, just looks at Jay with wide pleading eyes.

Jay shakes his head, unable to form the words. Not yet, not now, he wants to tell Jungwon. But he’s too much of a coward for even that much.

He finds his voice as they enter the house for the second time. “Let's dry off. I'll get you a change of clothes.”

Jungwon nods mutely, withdrawn. Jay almost can’t believe that there used to be a time when he couldn’t read the minute expressions on Jungwon’s face, a time when every working thought in Jungwon’s head was a mystery. It seems so clear to him now, and Jay wishes that it weren’t that obvious. That he could be ignorant to all the damage he’s caused.

Jay soon busies himself with making hot chocolate once they’re in dry clothes. It’s the only thing he can think of, to avoid looking at Jungwon. And when he’s done with that, they sit in the kitchen together. The storm—the conversation between the thunder and the rain—fills in the silence, a weighted sort of quiet.

It’s not like he never considered it before: Jungwon liking him back, Jungwon kissing him. But those had always been wispy fragments of thoughts, nothing like the solid touch of Jungwon against him. Nothing real. But now he can feel his heartbeat in his throat, a rearrangement of bodily senses. Jay knows what it’s like to kiss Jungwon, and he doesn’t know how to forget it. His hands tremble, vibrating with all that he’s restraining.

“I’m sorry,” Jay begins slowly. “But—wouldn’t it be easier to just be friends?”

Jungwon frowns. It’s not the restrained frustration Jay’s seen from him before, no—this is stronger. “Why are you always like this?” He makes an aborted move to reach out to Jay, then clearly thinks better of it. Jay watches as his fingers curl up to form a fist.

“If you had another life, would you make the same choice?” Jungwon continues. The same question, yet such different circumstances. And still—Jay doesn’t know the right answer. He’s never known the right answer.

“Let me think about this,” Jay says. It’s directed more towards his mug of hot chocolate than it is toward Jungwon. “I’ll message you, okay?”

“Fine,” Jungwon replies. “I—” he breaks off, sighs. “It’s stopped raining. I should get going.”

Jungwon leaves swiftly, his cup of hot chocolate left unfinished and his wet clothes still lying in Jay’s bedroom.

The next day is torture. He doesn’t talk to Jungwon, doesn’t see him at all; the only reminder of his presence is their text conversation that Jay finds himself rereading at two a.m. and his clothes hanging to dry in Jay’s closet.

This is what it’ll be like when you go to college, Jay reminds himself. Even though he’s certain that he won’t be shut up in his room the way he is right now, trying to clear his mind but desperately failing.

He finishes the book that night and, just like when he’d gone to the movies, the ending makes him shed a few tears. He imagines what Jungwon’s reaction would be—you’re such a softie, Jay—and cries even harder. It’s late at night and he’s running on four hours of sleep and—

And he finds himself standing in front of his closet, opening the doors. Rifling past the select designer pieces, past his vintage graphic t-shirts and handmade pants, to where he’d hung up Jungwon’s clothes. Taking Jungwon’s shirt, the cotton material stiff and rain-dried, in his hands. Pressing his face into the fabric, trying to remember Jungwon’s physical presence through scent alone.

Jay still remembers the time Jungwon had said you smell like that and hadn’t been able to elaborate on what “that” exactly meant. He’d understood, in a way.

Because Jungwon doesn’t smell like anything in particular, not anything with a name at least—he doesn’t wear perfume, doesn’t have a signature shampoo. But when Jay closes his eyes and inhales he just knows that it’s Jungwon—sweet and comforting and mostly just like skin, even if most of it has been drowned away by the rainwater.

God. Jay wishes… He wishes…

He places Jungwon’s shirt and shorts into his laundry hamper—to wash them clean, wishing he could shed his feelings just as easily—and goes to sleep instead.

“What’s with you?” His mom stands over him, concerned. She presses a hand to Jay’s forehead, presumably to check his temperature. “It’s past 1 p.m., why aren’t you out of bed yet?”

Right. Jay had been able to go under the radar for the past couple days with his parents leaving early for work in the mornings, but today’s a Saturday. And as much as he enjoys sleeping in, he’s never gotten up quite this late before, not without good reason.

Blinking up at his mother’s face, the weary wrinkles and warm eyes, Jay doesn’t have the energy to lie, nor the courage to tell the truth. He rolls over with a groan, shoving his face into his pillow instead.

“Jay.” His mom’s voice is more insistent now that she can tell he isn’t physically unwell. “Get out of bed.”

“I’m coming,” Jay responds. He doesn’t move, though. Not yet.

His mom sighs. “You only have a couple weeks of break left,” she says. She leans over, placing a hand on the back of Jay’s neck, the touch gentle in contrast with her blunt words. “I don’t understand why you’re just wasting your time like this. You should get up.”

“I’m trying.” Jay rolls over and forces himself to sit upright. His neck aches for some strange reason—he’d been tense in his sleep—and it seems fitting, facing inexplicable hurt.

Normally Jay doesn’t get caught up in tangles like this, at least not emotional ones. He can only think of one thing to do, now.

Heeseung hits him with a request for a video call moments after Jay messages him. As soon as he appears on Jay’s laptop screen, pixelated and dim, Jay can’t help but wish that he was here—an instinctual response more than anything else.

A video call is better than nothing, though. After a summer filled with missed calls and half-hearted messages, it’s reassuring to know that when it comes down to the important things--the times when Jay truly needs Heeseung--they’re here for each other.

“Are you alright?” Heeseung asks immediately. “The texts you sent me were like… I was seriously worried, okay.” He bites down on his lip, hesitant. “I miss you.”

Knowing that he’d been missing out on those last high school memories had caused Jay to distance himself out of self-preservation. Meeting Jungwon hadn’t helped matters, either. “I wasn’t sure if you cared,” Jay replies.

It’s been two years since Jay first messed with their friendship, and Heeseung still isn’t good enough at hiding when he’s hurt. “Sorry, that was harsh,” Jay says. “I’m just—I haven’t been doing well.”

Heeseung’s expression softens. “Have you talked to Jungwon about it?”

“Not really.” Jay pauses, then admits to the one thing he’d been carrying all by himself for the past few days. “He—he likes me.”

“And that’s a bad thing?” Heeseung asks. “If you know he likes you, the hard part’s over.”

Jay has to parse through his thoughts. It’s not confessing that he’s afraid of, necessarily—just the inevitable fracturing that’ll occur later on. The changes that could shift their relationship for the worse.

“I’m not scared of liking him anymore,” Jay says. “It’s everything else. Breaking up is—it’s just—” He doesn’t know how to go on any further.

Heeseung is silent, deep in thought, for a long time.

“Haven’t you ever regretted not trying?” Heeseung replies, finally. I don’t want to ruin what we already have, Jay told Heeseung once. And Jay still isn’t sure whether he made the right choice, then. “I just don’t get why you’d want to repeat that again.”

Why are you always like this? Jungwon had asked.

“I don’t know,” Jay says. Can things be that simple? “I guess changing things is just..”

“Going to happen, whether you like it or not,” Heeseung finishes for him. “You’re different. We’re different, now. But different doesn’t mean over; it’s not a bad thing, Jay.”

Jay isn’t so sure. There’s nothing that frustrates him more than this: being faced with the fact that something seemingly complex had merely been a mess of his own making.

He can’t figure this out on his own. He needs to talk to Jungwon.

Needless to say, there’s a lot running through Jay’s mind the next time he sees Jungwon. They meet at Jay’s house, same as usual, empty with his parents having gone to work. Jay’s going to be honest: it’s difficult, seeing Jungwon again. Having him in close proximity after days apart. It’s only been a short while, but Jay can feel that tension in the air, the latent awkwardness from what had happened the last time they’d spoken to each other.

Jungwon thinks things are simple. “I came here to tell you something,” he says. They sit on the living room couch together, and it's still hard for Jay to face him entirely.

Jungwon pauses. Leans forward, hands on his knees. “I know it’s probably obvious, but—I like you,” he continues, clear and impossible to deny. He seems like a picture of confidence, all serene and impassive in front of Jay, but Jay knows him better than that—senses those hairline fractures in his facade, the slightest tremor in his fingers that he hides by grasping his knees harder. “And I thought you felt the same, but—”

“I do,” Jay interrupts. It seems unfathomable that he’d ignored how he felt for so long. Seeing Jungwon in person again has only made it more obvious, just how much Jay cares. Like losing something and coming across it again and wondering how could I ever live without this? Everything becomes startlingly clear, in a way that is undeniable.

Jungwon’s eyes widen, and he almost seems relieved, until he takes in Jay’s expression. “Then—then what are you afraid of?” he asks. He scoots closer to Jay on the couch, still facing him.

Jay hugs his knees to his chest. “I’m going to college across the country in a month.” He’d known that separation was inevitable as soon as he’d moved into this neighborhood, had invited it, even. Life is a revolving door of people leaving and entering; it’s too naive to expect someone to be by his side for that entire journey. He’d thought that there was no point in prolonging something that was bound to come to a close sooner rather than later.

“So what?” Jungwon returns.

“So what’s the point if…” Jay looks up, pausing when he sees Jungwon’s expression. There’s something there, determined and insistent, that renders him speechless.

“A month is still a long time,” Jungwon says. He reaches out, places a hand on Jay’s knee. “I mean, think about it—did you even like me a month ago?”

Jay laughs at that. “Oh my god, don’t remind me.” His hand comes to rest on top of Jungwon’s. Jungwon’s skin is soft under his palm.

“I just—I just know that I like you, and you like me, and…” Jungwon trails off, biting down on his lower lip. “Why can’t it be as simple as that?”

Jay looks at Jungwon for a second—the boy in front of him, so certain and forthright—and he’s lost for words by all that he feels. By how Jungwon had managed to cut through every tangled problem by exposing the pure and simple truth. He already likes you, so the hard part’s over, is what Heeseung had told him. Jay had barely believed Heeseung then, but looking at Jungwon now—he gets it, he thinks.

More than that, he’s just spent a couple days cut off from Jungwon, and he knows how miserable it feels. Lying lonesome at night, missing Jungwon in a way that supersedes words altogether. What his mother had told him, the truths Heeseung had admitted to, all that Jungwon has given him—it all comes together, now.

Jay starts to nod slowly. “You’re right,” he says.

Jungwon’s expression—so carefully controlled before, so calm and impassive—absolutely brightens at those words. “Oh. I—” Jungwon reaches out to hug him, leaning over Jay’s knees and resting his head on Jay’s shoulder. He doesn’t say anything more, for those next few moments.

Jay presses his face into the crook of Jungwon’s neck and breathes. He’s reminded of the shirt he needs to give back to Jungwon. What had carried on old cotton is no comparison to the real thing.

He might not have forever, but a couple weeks is still a while. A short time to cherish the only pocket of familiarity Jay has found in this town, but better than nothing at all.

Jay closes his eyes and waits for Jungwon to continue what he has to say.

“I finished the book, by the way,” Jay says later. His back is to Jungwon as he stands at the stove, making an easy snack—corn cheese—for the two of them. “You were right; it got a lot better.”

“What did you think of the ending?” Jungwon asks.

Jay stops stirring and looks over his shoulder for a moment. Jungwon is perched at the counter, at ease and comfortable, so different from the hesitance he’d displayed that first time he’d entered the kitchen.

“I mean, I cried,” Jay replies, remembering the bet he’d made with Jungwon. “It was so—it was realistic, but I still wasn't expecting that.”

“I like it, though,” Jungwon says. He taps his fingers against the countertop. “It feels more real that way.”

“What, you don’t like fairytale endings? Happily ever after?” Jay asks, taking the pan off of the stove and bringing it to the oven to finish off. He’s genuinely curious—there’s a part of Jungwon that seems so idealistic, the same part that had brought Jay to see a romance movie in the first place. Yet Jungwon also seems more clear-headed and straightforward about these things than Jay could’ve initially guessed.

Jungwon frowns in thought. “More like, I don’t think things have to last to be important.”

Jay takes his oven mitts off, bending down and turning away from Jungwon again as he stores them in one of the kitchen cabinets. He knows, now, that he subconsciously made the decision to face whatever would come as soon as he had stepped out into the rain after Jungwon. Jay had chosen Jungwon, over everything else.

It seems too early to think about this, too early to think about things that he knows are inevitable. The feelings linger in the back of his mind regardless.

They progress in stages, gradually. I just know that I like you and you like me, Jungwon had said to him on that day, and for now, that’s enough.

Or rather, it’s not completely enough—for it unlocks a new chest of desires that Jay had never even thought to consider before. He’d been interested in the details of Jungwon’s life, the small idiosyncrasies behind his calm and level-headed demeanor, but now Jay wants to know everything with a near-obsessive fervor. They spend time together and it passes so fast, too fast. Jay stays up late at night, messaging Jungwon until the light outside his window starts to shine, then he wakes up and wants to see Jungwon again.

He’s starting to feel a little crazy.

And that’s not the only thing, either—of course, there are other things Jay wants. To reach out, to hold—to feel Jungwon’s skin against his, a sort of wanting that burns in his throat but never gets voiced aloud.

If anything, they’re more cautious than before. When they walk to the trail, the sun shining above and the air perfumed with the scent of freshly-mown grass, they walk side by side but don’t touch. Jay’s never been so aware of minute distances before—of being able to hear Jungwon’s footsteps and soft exhales and sweet voice and see him but not feel. He’s waiting for Jungwon to make the first move.

In the forest, the sidewalk narrows into a footpath, barely wide enough for two people to walk side by side. Then, it’s only inevitable that their hands brush together, just brief touches of fingertips, all hesitant and shy.

Jungwon grabs his hand.

Jay’s pulse quickens, and they stop in their tracks for a second. He looks over at Jungwon, who’s staring resolutely ahead, a bit of pink resting on the apples of his cheeks.

“I—okay,” Jay says. Then, because Jungwon did make the first move and he might as well take it all the way, he lets go of Jungwon’s hand, then interlaces their fingers. Jungwon’s fingers, he notes absently, are a lot smaller than his. Cute and warm between his own. “Better?”

After that, it becomes easier. Like an instinct, a reflex, something that Jay barely has to put his mind to—if they’re alone, then Jay will reach out, slot his fingers in between Jungwon’s. He’ll find some way to tether them together, a small point of connection.

It’s merely holding hands. Kai used to hold his hand, sometimes, when he was particularly excited. At the movie theater, Heeseung would make sure to squeeze onto his fingers if they ever watched a horror film.

But it’s also more than that, because it’s Jungwon. Every simple thing is made special because of the person behind it.

Jay has never been inside Jungwon’s home for long, simply because he wouldn’t want to disturb Jungwon’s grandmother. He’s never even seen Jungwon’s bedroom.

But today Jungwon had insisted, which is why Jay is trying to recall the best of his manners as he speaks in stilted, awkward Korean. He’s used to speaking with his parents, but something about talking directly to a new adult—to someone related to Jungwon—is extra pressure, adding a hesitant edge to all of his sentences.

Jungwon’s grandmother, on the other hand, is calm and nods with understanding through Jay’s fumbles. It isn’t difficult to see where Jungwon got his levelheaded disposition from.

Not that Jungwon seems all that calm right now; he’s almost impatient, trembling lips pressed together, tugging Jay along to his room when they wrap up their conversation. As soon as the door shuts behind them, Jungwon bursts into laughter.

“Oh my god, it’s not that funny,” Jay protests. He can feel his cheeks heating up.

Jungwon flops onto his bed stomach-first, then rolls over to glance up at Jay. “You were so nervous. It’s cute.”

“I just wanted to make a good impression!” Jay sits down beside Jungwon’s torso, legs hanging off the edge of the bed. He toys with Jungwon’s bangs, an absentminded touch.

Jungwon sits up, taking Jay’s hand within his own palms. “Don’t worry about that. Trust me, she already likes you.”

Slightly more relieved, now, Jay takes a moment to look around Jungwon’s room. As he’d expected, Jungwon has a massively overcrowded bookshelf. There are surprises, though, too—the postcards from different countries arranged on one wall, the height marks on the door frame.

“She kind of reminded me of you,” Jay says, thinking of Jungwon’s quiet maturity. “Not in a specific way, or anything, but just—I got that sense.” He’s realizing, now, that Jungwon doesn’t actually talk about his family that often. Besides comments here and there about his older sister—away on some college internship—and other brief anecdotes, Jungwon hasn’t revealed much.

“She—I’ve learned a lot from halmeoni,” Jungwon admits. “I write because of her. She was the first one to ask me what I really wanted to do.”

“Do you remember the first time we talked about that?” Jay replies. “I think that was when I thought—I don’t know. I wanted to learn more about you.” He can recall that unnameable longing, that wishing to delve into the mind of someone new. The way he’d imagined Jungwon writing at his desk, and what he knows about Jungwon now.

“You know so much now.” Jungwon leans over, rests his head on Jay’s shoulder.

“Do you think I could ever read what you write?” Jay says suddenly. It’s occurred to him before, but this is the first time he’s ever felt comfortable enough to ask.

Jungwon tenses, straightening up off of Jay’s shoulder. “I don’t know. It’s kind of…”

“Private?” Jay guesses. He’s felt the same way about some of the designs he’s made and knows that he shouldn’t take this hesitance personally.

“Bad,” Jungwon supplies. He looks down at his hands, twisting his fingers together. “Like, I know you wouldn’t judge me, but I—I’m not ready yet.”

“It’s okay.” Jay reaches for Jungwon’s hands, smooths out the nervousness there with his own fingers. There’s a promise held in that yet that Jay can’t help but hold onto. “Just do what feels right.”

About getting to learn even more about Jungwon:

Jay likes asking him questions. It’s scary and thrilling, in a way—the sheer amount of honesty that they reveal to each other. He can ask Jungwon anything and know that Jungwon will try to give a truthful response. In darker moments, Jay thinks: a month from now there will be a boy, over a thousand miles away, who knows everything about me. But mostly he revels in it. At first, Jay had asked Jungwon the obvious questions—When did you start liking me? How could you tell that I liked you?—and the simple ones—Your first memory? Your favorite place that you’ve traveled?

They’re in Jay’s car when he tries something new. Not driving, just sitting in the parking lot of the local coffee shop. The sun is setting, and Jay knows they’ll have to go home soon. Jungwon’s face is still glowing with laughter, with the remnants of whatever stupid shit Jay had said beforehand.

Jungwon isn’t expecting this, Jay isn’t sure why he feels the need to say it now, but—

“Are you scared of the future?” Jay asks. It’s been something he’s been thinking about often without meaning to, a feeling he can’t push back. He drums his fingers anxiously against the steering wheel as he waits for Jungwon to answer.

“What, like, junior year?” Jungwon replies, gracefully side-stepping the obvious. “Not really. Everyone says it’s the worst, but—I don’t know.”

“Junior year, I was miserable,” Jay agrees. It’s not that any day was particularly devastating—besides that one kiss, that one afternoon with Heeseung—but his baseline level of happiness had been lowered. He looks back and every day was a bit of a blur, a bit of a slog just to get to the next week, to hope for a better next year.

“Aren’t you supposed to be reassuring me?”

“I don’t need to. I know you’ll be fine anyway,” Jay tells him. “I just wanted to be honest with you.”

Jungwon smiles at him, then. Orange-gold rays of light shine through the car windows, wash over Jungwon’s face, and it occurs to Jay that he’ll miss this—miss them, miss the exact feeling of holding Jungwon’s hand over the car console and staring at Jungwon’s dimples all the while.

Jay knows that they shouldn’t stay up too late texting each other. He’s used to late nights cramming for tests and even later nights calling his friends on Discord, but Jungwon has experienced neither of these things before. Even saying goodnight at two a.m. leaves Jungwon more worn out than usual in the mornings, eyebags starting to form under his eyes.

Jungwon keeps insisting that it’s not a big deal, though, so Jay doesn’t push it. Not when he sees just how much Jungwon wants to soak up every minute together while they can. And honestly, Jungwon is cute when he’s like this—slightly more clingy, slightly softer, as if his weariness makes him forget to harden his edges.

Like right now: Jungwon has his face pressed against his shoulder. Jay’s sitting on the couch, laptop resting on his thighs as he fills out some tedious form for university. It only reminds him that the move-in day is coming closer and closer, but he tries not to think about that. Instead, he glances over at Jungwon.

Then, with his other hand, Jay reaches over to cautiously pat the top of Jungwon’s head. “Are you sure we shouldn’t start sleeping earlier?” he asks.

“Mm,” Jungwon says into the shoulder of his shirt. “Don’t you like talking to me, though?”

Jay sighs. “Yeah, but,” he says, and that’s when Jungwon lifts his head from Jay’s shoulder. He blinks at Jay, a little sleep-bleary, and oh—he’s so fucking close. Jay’s fingers are still resting on the nape of Jungwon’s neck. If he leaned in…

“But?” Jungwon prompts. His gaze does not remain steadfastly on Jay’s face—no, he glances down at Jay’s lips, then back into Jay’s eyes. Expectant, anticipatory. Waiting for something that Jay is too scared for, just yet.

Jay turns back to the laptop screen instead, nudging his shoulder against Jungwon’s. “Never mind,” he says.

They don’t kiss.

Jay isn’t sure what he’s afraid of. Maybe it’s because every other kiss he’s experienced had been so fraught, so tense, so mistaken and filled to the bursting with heartbreak. Heeseung that one fall afternoon, Jungwon in the aftermath of that rainstorm. Both had ended in some sort of disappointment, and Jay doesn’t want that anymore.

Maybe that’s why it takes another storm for him to make that move—to try and overwrite those memories with something new, something better.

The rain comes out of nowhere. They had been playing badminton, just passing the shuttlecock back and forth lazily, and then the wind had gone out of control, and all of a sudden it was raining again.

“I think it’s worse than last time,” Jungwon calls out as they run back home.

Last time. The memory chills him to the bone, even with the warm summer humidity heating up his skin. But this time is different. This time it will be different.

“Come upstairs, I’ll give you a change of clothes,” Jay says, fumbling open the door quickly. He chucks off his sneakers as fast as he can, ignores his wet-soled socks, and makes sure to grip onto the banister as he races up the stairs to his room. He doesn’t bother to look over his shoulder to see if Jungwon follows; he can already picture Jungwon taking off his shoes with care, setting the sneakers neatly beside Jay’s.

He’s smiling at nothing, thinking about that as he grabs two t-shirts and two pairs of sweatpants and finds a clean towel to top it off. These are actions he’s all been through before, but instead of feeling weighted by the rain, he finds himself buoyant and breathless.

Jungwon enters his bedroom, rubbing at his arms. “I’m cold,” is all he says. Their fingers touch as Jay hands the clothes over, a spark that Jay had once tried so hard to avoid.

It isn’t long before they’ve both changed their clothes—eyes averted, economically quick with locker-room shyness—and Jungwon stands in front of him, as if unsure where to sit.

Jay sits on his bed, cross-legged and aware of the towel beside him, the towel he still hasn’t handed over to Jungwon yet. Should he—

“Come here,” Jay says, patting the spot next to him on his bed. Once Jungwon sits down, Jay begins to dry his hair gently.

“Hey—I can do it myself, you know,” Jungwon protests mildly, reaching up to tug at the towel for a second. Their hands meet for a second, and then he stills.

He looks at Jay, mouth slightly open, and Jay isn’t quite sure what Jungwon sees. But he knows it’s something remarkably of the present—this, here, the two of them sharing the cozy shelter of Jay’s bed and freshly-laundered clothes that Jay had handed him.

Jay has given so much. But he wonders if he can just give one last thing. This close, Jay can smell Jungwon, the sweet-damp scent of his hair, the laundry detergent that’s Jay’s, a combination of the unexpected and familiar.

“Can I…?” Jay begins. His pulse races. Jungwon is lovely, framed by the intimacy of his bedroom, surrounded by all of the soft sturdy things of Jay’s uprooted childhood—the navy bedspread, the memory foam pillows, the guitar hanging on the wall strumming an imaginary song in his heart.

Jungwon nods almost imperceptibly. They don’t need the words for I’m not afraid anymore. Or, it isn’t even a lack of fear for Jay—no, he’s managed to acknowledge that fear and turn it into something that can’t hold him back.

There’s a lot of ways this is different from before, Jay realizes now. Jungwon isn’t Heeseung. Jungwon isn’t even the same person he was to Jay a couple weeks ago.

The boundaries between them are like lines drawn in the sand, shifting with the passing day, always something new. Maybe that’s what makes it so easy.

So Jay closes his eyes. He waits for Jungwon to make the next move, to bridge that gap. And he lets Jungwon wash over him, gentle. He lets himself be okay with this, for once.

Every day, they’ve shared something new. Jungwon sends him Spotify playlists, sprawling catalogs ranging from pop songs to trot music that’s obviously gleaned from his grandmother’s tastes. Jay brings Jungwon to the mall one afternoon and dresses him up in his own style.

But sometimes it’s just simple things, stupid teenage confessions. Like now:

“I like it when you say my name,” Jungwon says suddenly, in the aftermath of the kiss. He’s running a towel off of Jay’s hair. Jay has his glasses off, and he can’t see very clearly in front of him—right now, Jungwon is out of focus, a blur in front of him, a sensation instead of a person.

They’re sitting on Jay’s bed together, and Jay wants to kiss him again. He wants to overwrite every bad memory.

“What, Jungwon?” Jay asks. He leans forward, presses his face into the damp skin of Jungwon’s neck. “Jungwon. Jungwon.”

“Stop! That tickles,” Jungwon protests. Then, with a gentleness that belies his words, he takes the towel off of Jay’s head.

“It just feels personal,” Jungwon continues. “Doesn’t it? Jay?” He slides the glasses onto Jay’s face with a soft touch, and it’s a distinctly strange feeling—to be looked after with so much obvious care like this. To hear his name and feel a little thrill down his spine. To suddenly regain his vision, and see only Jungwon looking back at him.

“Jungwon. I’ll say it more often,” Jay promises. He touches his fingers to Jungwon’s temple, strokes his hand down Jungwon’s cheek absently. “Okay?”

And sometimes it’s more serious stuff, the things that keep Jungwon up at night—writing, what he wants to do in the future, his parents.

The sun has set already, and it’s late enough that there aren’t any kids on the playground swing sets. They sit together, kicking their legs idly, and Jay is reminded of their first meetings—the times they talked together, never knowing what they’d become to each other.

Jungwon is the type of person to squeeze out the fruit of life, someone who seems to move forward without much doubt. Their conversations lead Jay to browse through his school’s web pages in pursuit of his dream, looking into declaring double majors and transferring departments.

So when Jungwon says, “I’m afraid of being mediocre,” it scares him. Thinking about the difference between his perception of Jungwon and the way Jungwon sees himself makes Jay feel slightly off-kilter.

Jay doesn’t know how to say, you could never be mediocre to me. Not in a way that’ll ring true to both of them, to Jungwon’s thoughtful rationality. For as much as Jungwon is a special person to him, Jungwon is also a writer in a sea of thousands.

So Jay chooses his words carefully. “You’re just one person, Jungwon,” he says. “You don’t—you don’t have to be superman or anything. It’s impossible to be—it’s already enough.”

He hopes that this can be, too.

In the end, it’s Jungwon who brings it up. The number of days till Jay has to go off to college has reached the single digits, and in the back of his head, there’s an incessant timer—a countdown, like waiting for a bomb to set off. Waiting for inevitable destruction.

Even so, he's taken completely off-guard, the dreaded conversation starting when he least expects.

They’re in the kitchen together, hands still messy from the aftermath of making laminated pastry dough together. It had been fun, chaotic in the best way possible. Halfway through, Jungwon had taken one look at the mess of butter and flour crumbling on the counter and wondered how it would ever get together, and Jay had just said trust me, okay, and now Jay’s got a ball of dough all packaged away with saran wrap. He’s washing his hands in the kitchen sink, back to Jungwon, when he hears it.

“We’re going to break up, aren’t we,” Jungwon says. It sounds so impossibly final in the way that only things that ring true can.

Jay turns around immediately, hands still wet with soap bubbles and water. Whatever protest he’d had in mind dies on his lips as soon as he catches sight of Jungwon, glassy-eyed and resolute at the kitchen counter.

Jungwon tries to smile, and it’s wobbly. Trembling, uncertain—scared, even. “Jay, we’re going to—”

Jay shuts off the tap, rushes forward to gather Jungwon in his arms. He rests a palm on the back of Jungwon’s head and presses it gently into his shoulder.

“Hey, Jungwon,” Jay murmurs. His hand slips down Jungwon’s neck, and he ends up rubbing gentle circles into his back. “Jungwon, Jungwon,” he repeats senselessly. “We can try to—” he cuts himself off, hearing the lie as soon as it leaves his mouth.

He doesn’t say anything more than that, doesn’t assuage Jungwon’s fears with false promises. Not when Jungwon had so bravely spoken that truth into the golden afternoon light, cutting through the sweetness of their time together like a knife.

“It’ll be better this way for both of us,” Jungwon says, finally. And Jay knows that he’s right. “But—just remember one thing.”

“What is it?” Jay asks. Mere minutes ago, the two of them had been marveling at the pastry dough, at how the messy things had turned neat in front of their eyes. But he knows that this, them, isn’t quite so easy.

“You don’t have a second life,” Jungwon replies. “That’s what halmeoni always tells me. We just have this one, so make it count.”

Jay lets go of Jungwon to take a better look at his face. “I’ll remember that.” This would be easier, he thinks, if he didn’t know Jungwon—if Jay couldn’t tell how much it hurts him. If Jay couldn’t see the tears welling up in Jungwon’s eyes.

“Jungwon, you don’t have to—it’s going to be okay,” Jay says firmly. “We’ll be okay, in the end.” Because that seems true enough, the fact of life—that anything, given enough time and distance, can pass. Even if it hurts to think about a time that anything in front of him could fade, he understands it’s for the better. A pressed flower lacks freshness but it holds its own type of beauty.

Jungwon rests his head on Jay’s shoulder again. “I know it will be,” he replies. “But there’s a difference between fact and feeling.”

Jay’s starting to dread the day he’ll have knowledge of both.

Jay doesn’t want to pretend that he knows what love is. He’s eighteen; he’s lived less than a quarter of his life so far, if he’s lucky. And he’s—he’s not anti-romantic, not pessimistic, for sure, but being with Jungwon has twisted these thoughts into something more difficult to grasp onto.

There’s liking someone, having a crush on them. That’s a layer of knowing, a layer of noticing that veers on hypersensitive. Jay thinks of how closely he’d watched for Jungwon’s reactions, how he couldn’t even face his crush until it had kissed him in the face.

But past that stage—past that phase of surface-level observations—Jay is certain that what he has with Jungwon is more than just a simple like, a simple crush. Maybe love is too big a word. He would be remiss, though, if he couldn’t differentiate between all of the small ways in which things are different. How knowing someone changes once he can walk around with the knowledge of their affections nestled in his chest. How he passes by small things and is impossibly reminded of Jungwon, the whole world rendered in a more glowy golden light.

More than that, Jay likes that it’s easy. The ebb and flow of spending time together: sometimes Jungwon’s in the mood to tease him, loud laughter and protests; other times Jay can’t help but revel in the quiet simplicity of certain moments.

It’s like this: the most basic things are rendered profound, memorable. A walk in the park is still a walk in the park—but it’s also a kaleidoscope of memories, of different gestures conveying silent affection. Every second is painted in vivid technicolor in front of his eyes.

About getting to know even more about Jungwon:

“Remember when you asked me if I was scared of the future?” Jungwon says. Another aimless afternoon, and this time it’s Jay who has his face pressed into Jungwon’s shoulder, breathing in his smell.

“Yeah?” Jay closes his eyes, rests his head on Jungwon’s shoulder more firmly. Jungwon has broad shoulders, perfect for sleeping on—reliable, dependable, just like the rest of him.

“I lied to you,” Jungwon says. “Or, I guess I thought it was true, but my answer changed.”

“What do you mean?” Jay blinks his eyes open. Even so, he doesn’t look at Jungwon. He doesn’t think he could handle that right now, looking at Jungwon directly.

“It feels unfair, sometimes,” Jungwon continues. “Like, you’re going to go off to college, and meet so many new people, and I’m just going to be stuck here.”

Jay can hear the plaintive longing in Jungwon’s voice. He doesn’t fault Jungwon for this, remembering that aching feeling himself. That wishing to grow up, to be a different person already. Jay has never known it was possible to understand this much about someone who isn’t himself.

“I’m scared, too,” Jay says. “I’m starting all over again, and no one knows me there. I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

“But you’ll be able to make new friends,” Jungwon says. “And soon you’ll forget—”

“I won’t forget,” Jay replies. He closes his eyes. He thinks that if he forgets about Jungwon then maybe he’d be forgetting about himself too, a bit—a part of the person he is at this very moment. “Right now, you’re the only one who knows me. Even when I make new friends, and try new things—I don’t think I can forget that.”

When he says knows, he hopes Jungwon understands the sort of knowing he’s talking about. Not surface-level, but deep underneath.

“Do you get it?” Jay continues. He backs away, so they can face each other again.

Jungwon’s eyes are wide. Jay supposes knowing is its own sort of loving.

It’s sunny the day he says goodbye to Jungwon. In three hours, he’ll be boarding a plane; in less than a day, he’ll be starting a completely new phase of his life. Jungwon reduced to pixels on his screen, a sweet summer memory.

But now, at this moment: Jungwon’s right here in front of him. Tangible and sweet-smelling as always, lovely and loved.

“Read this in the car,” Jungwon says, handing him a folded-up piece of paper. “After I leave, okay?”

“Alright,” Jay agrees. Goodbyes are so underwhelming, he thinks. He knows his parents are watching in the distance, his mother already at the helm of the SUV to drive him to the airport, and that restrains him too; he can’t kiss Jungwon, just holds onto him tight and hopes that it’s enough.

It blows him away, really, how much only he and Jungwon know about each other. How much they’d revealed for themselves only, something precious and everlasting within the recesses of Jay’s mind. It had never mattered, what anyone else thought. Not when they were together.

And, it’s then that Jay’s certain that this is special. That even if he has feelings for another person—when he inevitably does find someone else—it’ll never be quite like this, never so hopelessly naive or desperate. Whether for good or for worse, this is something he only could’ve experienced once.

In the car, Jay unfolds the paper carefully. It’s Jungwon’s writing, a piece of his heart he’d been too cautious to reveal before then. The one last thing Jungwon had promised him.

Jay runs his fingers over the neat handwriting, the opposite of his own messy chicken-scratch. He reads, and he remembers.

Two days before Jay has to leave:

“I was listening to this song, actually,” he tells Jungwon. “It reminded me of you.”

“Oh?” Jungwon’s lounging on Jay’s bed, book in hand.

Jay runs a hand over the top of Jungwon’s head, almost absentmindedly. “Yeah, why don’t we listen together?”

There are so many different ways to connect to another person—look in Jungwon’s eyes, hold his hands, text him goodnight—but music is its own kind of special. Jay lies back next to Jungwon, headphone wires in between the two of them, and stares up at the ceiling as the song begins to play.

He can sense Jungwon’s body heat but they don’t touch. Jay doesn’t need to, at that moment—just the knowledge that he could, that if he reached out Jungwon would readily reciprocate, is enough for now. The music is their only tether for now, and Jay’s never felt more at peace.

Jay glances over at Jungwon, whose eyes are closed peacefully. Jungwon has long eyelashes. Jungwon has expressive, soft eyebrows. Jungwon has a crop of acne scars on his jaw. Jungwon, captured in the stillness of right now, seems so impossibly mundane and beautiful in that simplicity.

Maybe he doesn’t know what love is. Maybe when he’s twenty-five, or fifty, he’ll look back on his adolescence and laugh at his past self for ever considering such a trite thing to be akin to love.

But right now Jay is eighteen and he doesn’t know anything more than this. All the romance he’s experienced is contained within the four walls of his bedroom, all the affection he has contained within this inexplicable sixteen-year-old boy.

Maybe Jay doesn’t know what love is. But he thinks he’s getting closer to finding out.