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There are times when Jisung can’t help but wonder if his withered friendship with Minho is some sort of experiment set up by the universe to deduce how opposites interact. One young boy from a working class family, versus another raised in wealth. The outcome was always going to be one of two things: friends or enemies. 

At least, it should have been that simple.

Jisung isn’t sure the experiment ever truly accounted for an in-between, a limbo where he and Minho are neither friend nor foe. The neutrality that exists between them now is unremarkable, nothing for anyone to take note of, least of all themselves. 

Sometimes Jisung finds himself wondering what went wrong, but no matter how hard he thinks about it, he comes up blank. Nothing went wrong, per se. No animosity surrounds them, growling, hissing, gnashing at their heels. They have merely drifted apart, like most teenagers do when faced with the looming threat of high school. 

The new environment introduces a startling sense of clarity, a freshly polished mirror in which Jisung can view the reflection of his personality when pitted against Minho’s. The differences between them build atop one another until a precariously balanced structure looms over them, one wrong move away from crumbling completely.

Minho twirls his pens between the joints of his fingers, whirling it gracefully like a prima ballerina. Jisung chews the ends of his to a wrinkled, pulpy mess. 

Jisung loves the rain, spending hours sitting out on the porch of his home, listening to it batter against the portico. Minho hates it, refusing to leave the safety of his room lest the elements accost him. 

Minho listens in class but doesn't take notes. Jisung takes notes but never listens. 

Jisung brings his lunch from home in a little bento box his grandfather used to use when he worked as a mechanic. Minho buys his from the cafeteria, producing crisp notes from the leather wallet his mother bought him for his eighth birthday.

They are opposites in almost every way, so it only makes sense when they begin to separate, tearing slowly away from one another like the segments of a tangerine. 

It begins when Jisung joins the football team at the age of thirteen, and it ends somewhere far less certain, an untraceable point in time he can’t recall for how prosaically it presents itself. 

(If Jisung really tries to remember, he thinks it might be his fault.)

*

Social hierarchy has never been more prevalent to Jisung than in the halls of his high school, a relatively small institution but one town over from where he grew up. He and all of the other children who attended their small-town primary school go here the second they graduate, shipped off on a rickety school bus each morning, stuffed to the brim with kids from every village within a ten mile radius. 

The seating arrangement of the bus acts as a contents page for the story ahead, providing tiny snippets of an underwhelming tale. 

As outlined by the clichés of every teen movie to make it out of Hollywood, the ‘cool’ kids monopolise the back row. The football players. Their girlfriends. The guys whose parents let them have house parties every weekend. 

The rows directly in front are for those who aren’t quite a part of the It Crowd, but have earned enough respect to linger in the circumferential circles of their privileged peers. 

The middle section seats the most unremarkable of the school’s populace. The not-quite-nameless, but without nicknames. The friendly, but not quite friends. The party-goers, but those of the phantasmal variety; there one moment, and gone the next. 

Finally, the front rows are reserved for the outliers, the kids who don’t fit in with any pre-existing group, nor even the patchwork clique created for them through their banishment. They sit as separated from one another as they can in such a crowded environment, never speaking or exchanging glances of mutual dissatisfaction, offering each other nothing but silence. 

To everyone’s surprise, least his own, Jisung has been adopted by the teenagers commandeering the backmost row of seats, tucked in between his friends of three years like a book squeezed into an already overflowing shelf. The only other person from Jisung’s hometown to infiltrate the inner circle is Lia, which is perhaps the least surprising thing about the turn their lives have taken since leaving the watery cartons of milk and rusted monkey bars of their childhood behind. She sits to his left, smelling like strawberry body spritz and bubble gum lip gloss; overwhelmingly sweet, yet familiarly comforting. 

What has become of Minho is a fate most kids face at their school when they don’t make an effort to stand out amongst the cookie-cutter crowd. Sequestered to the side lines, Minho has learned to camouflage himself, melting into obsoleteness. He doesn’t partake in any extracurriculars. He drives himself to school instead of taking the bus. He eats his lunch alone, claiming a single seat near the back of the cafeteria, ignoring the discreet glances Jisung occasionally sends his way. 

Jisung regrets that he and Minho have conformed to these stereotypical standards, but it’s too late to reverse the damage. Their friendship is far beyond repair. 

Sometimes, when life is at its bleakest, Jisung finds himself reminiscing. 

Hazy, sun-bleached memories swim through his mind, curled at the edges like old photographs that capture moments he can’t truly remember unless prompted by a visual aid. The trail of seashells on the bathroom window ledge, or the collection of yellowing drawings pinned to the fridge with souvenir magnets, or the J+M  4EVR messily carved into the trunk of an innocuously placed tree by an unmemorable creek. All of these things bring forth echoes of a life Jisung can hardly recollect, but cherishes because he knows it was once his. 

Crooked, toothless smiles, grass-stained knees and scraped palms filter through flashes of sunlight that only last as long as Jisung’s dreams. Now that he’s eighteen, Jisung has had more than ten years to make new memories, replacing old ones with first kisses, tentative sips of alcohol, and nights of stealthily clambering through his bedroom window well past the limitations of his curfew. 

Jisung’s new friends aren’t so new anymore, and the present version of himself will soon become a memory too, tossed amongst the others he struggles to recall all these years later. He doesn’t view himself as a new and improved version. Jisung has simply grown up, like he has always wished he would. 

Only, Jisung is starting to think he should have been a little more careful with his wishes. 

At times, Jisung thinks his new friends find him boring. It’s not as harsh an estimation as one would expect because it would be right to suppose as much, but only because Jisung knows he never really tells them what he’s thinking. Feeling. Missing. 

Chan and Changbin are the closest he’s had to a best friend since Minho, but there’s something absent in their friendship, something that doesn’t truly allow Jisung the liberty of honesty. He struggles to tell them things about himself, things that aren’t already obvious to the rest of the world. Maybe if their trio stopped there he would find it easier to talk to them, but it doesn’t. 

For some reason, Jisung has extended his friendship to Shinwoo. The other boy is the captain of their football team, and while he certainly has the talent, Jisung thinks that he lacks the team spirit necessary to support his role. That, and his tendency to make crude jokes about anyone he doesn’t consider a friend, makes Jisung rethink his decision often. The urge to combat insensitive comments always lingers on his tongue, yet Jisung can never seem to get the words out. They sit there like a lump in his throat, like a dry chunk of bread he ate too hastily and can’t seem to swallow. 

In a town so small and so sheltered, collective opinions are commonplace. 

Jisung recalls the first and last time his town was up in arms about something that was certainly none of their business. The summer Jisung turned ten was the same summer two girls ran away on the night of their graduation, leaving behind everything but a change of clothes. Following that , some choice words were thrown around in cafes and shops in town, the sort that made Jisung flinch, his stomach turn, and his grandmother press her hands over his ears. Such prejudices aren’t so loud anymore, but they still exist, passed onto the younger generation like a sordid family heirloom.  

A strange pinch nips his stomach every time he recalls that summer. Jisung isn’t sure why. He was never close with either girl, and as far as he knows they’re happily married, living it up in a city somewhere far from home. Still, his gut twists when the laughter gets too loud, a response to a joke told by some sleazy teenage boy with slimy morals and questionable hygiene practices. Jisung isn’t sure if it’s merely the winding roads that make him feel so queasy.

*

To say that Jisung misses Minho would be wrong, just as to say Jisung likes to read would be right. It’s a statement that is prone to change depending on circumstance. Say, for example, Jisung were to read a book he disliked so wholly he decided to never read another. That’s the sort of stance he takes when thinking about Minho. Missing Minho, specifically.

As of late, Minho has done little to make Jisung miss him. It’s not a bad thing, nor is it a good thing. It’s just a thing, without any ulterior motives underlying its existence. Jisung feels fairly neutral about it, but he doesn’t doubt that one day, something may happen to make this ‘thing’ good or bad. 

Until then, Jisung chooses to pretend Minho doesn’t exist. He’s not evil in this intention, nor is he saintly. Jisung just is , and from where he sits at the back of the bus, Minho isn’t .

It’s easier this way, to ignore the twist in his stomach when he thinks of summer. 

It’s easier, but if Jisung thinks about it hard enough and lets the memories bleed through the cracks, it hurts a little too.

*

“Han! Over here!”

The ball thuds against the arch of Jisung’s foot, flying across the grass before it lands an inch or two away from Shinwoo’s cleats. He offers Jisung a grin that’s a little sharp around the edges, and for once, Jisung can’t blame him for his irritation. 

The morning has been odd to say the least, right from the very moment the sun rose and Jisung’s eyes fluttered open. 

Well, it would perhaps be more accurate to say that Jisung has been very odd. The morning is just a consequence, a victim caught in the line of fire of Jisung’s oddness. Unable to blame himself, he has simply decided to place the onus of his misfortune on the time of day coinciding with it. 

He thought his friends wouldn’t notice. He thought they didn’t pay enough attention to figure out when he is acting like himself, or when he is acting very much the opposite. In all honesty, Jisung thought they didn’t care. The sharpness of Shinwoo’s smile neither confirms nor denies these thoughts. 

The air smells damp in a clammy way, like half-dried laundry rather than rain, and Jisung feels off. Not right. It’s an inexplicable feeling, one he can’t fully describe. Ugly, is the closest he can think of, but not in an aesthetic sense. Jisung feels ugly on the inside, a self-loathing for what rests beneath the surface of his skin. There isn’t one, distinct part of himself he dislikes, choosing instead to round up his fractions of hatred into a patchwork whole.

Jisung can't tell if he hates himself, or merely hates the version of himself he presents to others. These days, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish between the two, and at this point, Jisung isn’t sure he wants to. 

Football practice ends without much fanfare, and Jisung still feels unusual. Unusual and ugly. 

“Good game, today,” Chan says, looping an arm around Jisung’s shoulders. It’s a lie, far more sugar coated than Shinwoo’s smile, but a lie nonetheless. 

“I guess,” Jisung mutters noncommittally. He wants to shrug Chan’s arm off and seclude himself in a shower cubicle for five minutes, but he also doesn’t want to be rude. If it’s not already too late, that is. 

Another arm appears in Jisung’s line of sight. This time it bends, and a sharp elbow nudges his own. 

“Jisung, are you alright? No offence, but you were kind of dead on the pitch.” Changbin isn’t known for his delicacy at the best of times, no matter how fragile the situation, so Jisung simply chooses to do as he’s told.

“None taken.” He shrugs this time, causing Chan’s arm to reluctantly fall. “Just tired, I suppose.”

A beat passes, too lengthy and too loud in its silence. Jisung knows his friends are far from convinced, but he thinks he might not care. Or he cares too much. Jisung’s emotions have all melted into one, big, indecipherable blob he can’t separate. A tightness forms in his chest, the breathless kind that crawls up your throat and holds your tongue tight in its clutches. 

“See you guys tonight,” he mutters, a half-hearted farewell, brushing between Chan and Changbin to make for the showers. 

A familiar sense of dread begins to creep in as Jisung strips himself of his grass-stained kit, hidden behind a flimsy curtain that does little to protect his dignity. The feeling is familiar in a way he wishes it wasn’t, like the scent of moulding fruit or the lyrics of a song attached to bad memories. 

Sometimes, but always at the most unpredictable moments, there’s this unpleasantness that overcomes Jisung. It’s less of a worry, more like anticipation for something that he knows will never come. Unfortunately, the logical part of Jisung’s brain and the irrational seem to disagree on the validity of his anxiety, battling it out until one side wins. More often than not, it’s the irrational half that is crowned the victor.

Jisung wishes that was the end of it. The thumping heart, the ringing ears, the tightness of his lungs. Jisung wishes that was the end of it, but he can only wish.

There are moments after these strong waves of panic when nothing seems quite real. It’s like Jisung’s viewing the world through a window, hazy with condensation, a divide between himself and something he can’t see or reach. It’s like everything he once knew turns out to be a dream, a surreal imitation of what he once thought to be his reality. It’s like life has become an empty space in time where Jisung is the only living thing. 

In these dreamlike moments, Jisung feels so terribly alone. 

The water that spurts from the shower head is icy, chilling Jisung to the bone. His heart pounds so loudly that he can hear it thundering in his ears. It’s difficult to find an equilibrium; to benchmark a place in which Jisung can both hate himself and be happy, because neither one nor the other seems to want to take centre stage. 

Why must he choose?

Why can’t he have both? 

*

The birds in the sky are so small they look like bats, swarming, crowding, ready to pounce. Jisung slips into his grandfather’s old car, sheltering himself from the sunlight that has appeared since football practice ended. 

The car is a newly instated privilege, and one Jisung is only allowed to use on weekends and days his grandmother is working, meaning today is one of the few days Jisung does not have to cram himself into the back seat of the bus and hope he fits in. 

His hands are still shaking when he turns on the ignition, the aftermath of his moment in the shower. Realistically, Jisung knows that there’s a name for his ‘moments’, but the thought of labelling them with something so concrete as a title terrifies Jisung more than anything else does. 

The window rolls down the second Jisung turns on the ignition and he takes a deep breath of sweltering air. It doesn’t help. It’s like swallowing a mouthful of sticky treacle, cloying and sickly-sweet. 

Sweat trickling along his brow, Jisung pulls out of the half-empty car park to the sound of gravel crunching beneath the wheels like gritted teeth. Jisung’s jaw remains clenched as he tumbles down pothole-ridden roads, swooping up and down like a flying kite. His mind reels, yet Jisung is unable to pinpoint a single, concrete thought. Everything seeps together into one, indistinguishable mess, bubbling in a pot until it all boils down to one thing: Jisung needs to stitch himself together before everything falls apart. 

*

When Jisung pulls into the driveway, he’s surprised to find the front door propped wide open and the porch void of his grandmother’s familiarly crooked figure. He cuts the engine with a shuddering jolt and opens the door. It creaks like old bones, grinding metallically. Jisung winces. 

Usually, by the time Jisung arrives at the Lee’s house, his grandmother is already awaiting his arrival, apron in one hand and her pink rubber gloves in the other. She always smells like disinfectant, the lemon scented one she uses when she cleans. It’s the same disinfectant she uses at home too. There’s something lying in that fact, a partially formed thought, a tender connection between two homes. Jisung doesn’t linger on it.

It’s only April, but the air is thick and heady, and it smells like summer. It doesn’t make sense, but it seems that there’s somewhat of a theme with each hour that passes. A theme of oddities, irregularities, and abnormalities. A theme Jisung wishes he could write out of his story. 

He leans against the side of his car for a minute or two, waiting on his grandmother as the sun continues to get hotter. A moment’s hesitation comes and goes, and then Jisung makes the unknowingly detrimental decision to enter the cavernous mouth of Minho’s home. 

It’s sort of an unwritten rule that Jisung should never enter the house unless an emergency calls for it. He can’t remember if it was him or Minho that fashioned it out of tension-logged air. All Jisung knows is that he doesn’t cross the threshold, and Minho doesn’t dare invite him in. 

Jisung feels like he’s committing some sort of cardinal sin as he slips through the open door, an irreversible crime he will always be guilty of. He almost expects God to come down and smite him for it, with thunder and lightning and biblical storms. 

Instead, it’s as though Jisung has stepped into Dante’s ninth circle of Hell. The foyer is cold, all cool marble floors and empty white walls. It’s quiet too, in that same empty way. Jisung thinks about calling out for his grandmother, but that would only aid in alerting his unwanted presence, which is the very last thing Jisung wants. For all he knows, Minho could be waiting around the corner, readying himself for a battle of wits or fisticuffs, neither of which would surprise Jisung. 

The house seems to only grow colder as Jisung dares to tread further inside, following the familiar route towards the kitchen on an unconscious autopilot function he didn’t know he possessed until now. He hasn’t stepped a single foot in this house since he and Minho last called themselves best friends, yet the familiarity lingers. In the tiny scuff on the otherwise flawless floor from when Jisung and Minho got into a scuffle ten years ago. In the almost imperceptible smudge on the white wall, a result of a poorly aimed kick. In the silk flowers sitting atop the hallway dresser, frayed from the time Minho offered them to a stray cat as a chew toy. 

If memory lane were a real place, then this would be it. This would be Jisung's. This would be theirs. Jisung’s and—

Minho.

Jisung swallows down a sharp breath upon finding his old friend perched happily on the kitchen counter, a chocolate cookie in one hand and a wistful expression on his face as he gazes out of the large bay windows splayed across the wall behind the dining table. 

This is it. This is Jisung’s chance. While Minho is suitably distracted, he can turn around, make his escape, and wait in the car like he’s supposed to. Like he was never here at all. 

Of course, as with most plans concocted by yours truly, Jisung finds that the odds are most certainly against him. 

“Jisung. Hi.”

It’s somewhat underwhelming, really, that these are the first words Minho has spoken to Jisung in three years. A generic greeting and his name. Jisung can’t help but wonder: Is this it?

“Hi.” 

“Not to be rude,” Minho says, undeterred, speaking through a mouthful of double chocolate chip, “but what are you doing in here?”

Not rude, just blunt. Like always. 

“I was just, uh, just looking for my grandma,” Jisung responds, eyes flickering between the cookie in Minho’s hand, the pile of folded laundry on the dining table, and the scuffed toes of his own shoes. He avoids meeting Minho’s oppressive gaze at all costs. 

“She’s in the garden,” Minho says, swinging his legs like a child balanced on a chair three times their size. 

“The garden?”

“Where else do you think we hang out washing?” 

Jisung shrugs. “Tell her I’m waiting in the car?”

Minho stops chewing his cookie and gives Jisung a long and peculiar look. It’s like he’s trying to figure Jisung out yet simultaneously knows everything about him. 

Unnerved. That’s how Jisung feels. Undoubtedly so. If that is Minho’s intention, then the success is all his. 

“Sure,” Minho says eventually, eyes unwavering. His agreement is more a reluctant acquiescence, like he doesn’t particularly want to give into Jisung’s request but finds he has no real choice in the matter. 

Jisung attempts a close-mouthed smile to express his gratitude, but he’s sure it looks more like a terrified grimace. “Thanks,” he says, just for good measure, in case the grim smile didn’t quite get the message across. 

He makes to leave the kitchen, although it’s difficult to confirm whether or not he truly ever entered, but stops short when Minho speaks once more.

“Or you could just wait in here,” he suggests, like everything is perfectly normal and Jisung’s heart isn’t pounding a mile a minute in his chest. For five years Jisung has thought that he and Minho are nothing to each other, neither enemy nor ally, but his fluttering heart and spinning head have him thinking that his calculations leave something to be desired. 

“Uh—”

“It’s hot outside,” Minho shrugs, and then he takes another nonchalant bite from his cookie. 

Jisung doesn’t say anything, listlessly watching Minho from his place by the door. The other boy looks like he always has, but more. Minho is taller, broader, brighter than he ever was when he and Jisung were friends. But that’s just growing up, isn’t it? Between the two of them, Minho has always been the best at it. 

What does Minho see when he looks at Jisung? A grown up version of the boy he used to be? Or a scared little coward with a captured tongue? Whichever it is, Jisung hates that Minho is looking at him at all. 

Jisung nods wordlessly. He doesn’t sit down, or worse, clamber onto the counter beside Minho. He takes another handful of steps forward and leans against that very same counter with his clammy hands stuffed in his pockets.

Minho doesn’t smile, doesn’t betray any satisfaction in Jisung’s hesitant acceptance of the invitation, but his eyes lose their sharpness and his shoulders look far less like they carry the weight of the world. Jisung doesn’t know what to do. He stands gormlessly by Minho’s swinging feet, sweating palms pressed against the material of his school trousers. 

“You are allowed to sit, you know,” Minho snorts, eyeing Jisung with something strictly amused swimming in his gaze. 

“I know,” Jisung says, clearing his throat when his voice cracks awkwardly. “I just like standing.”

Minho remains unconvinced. “Fine. Have it your way.”

The conversation ends there, dying a swift but rather painful death, limp and bloody where the air hangs thick between them. Minho resumes eating his cookie, and Jisung has nothing else to do but let his gaze dance across the spotless kitchen and listen to Minho chew. 

It’s not terrible at first. The silence. It’s almost peaceful if Jisung pretends, and he has always been good at pretending. Then again, pretending can only get you so far, and reality rears its ugly head far sooner than Jisung is sure either of them would like. 

“So…” he begins, only to trail off in a matter of seconds. Jisung’s confidence has always been a short-lived thing whenever it bothers to exist, and his current predicament is no exception to that rule. 

Minho arches an eyebrow. “ So? ” he echoes, a little heavy handed with the sardonicism. 

“Are you going to Changbin’s tonight?” Jisung knows it’s a stupid question before he even asks it, but suffering in this thick, sweltering silence is almost as bad. Maybe even worse.

Minho seems to agree with the acknowledgement of Jisung’s stupidity. “What do you think?”

You see, Minho doesn’t go to parties. Actually, scratch that: Minho doesn’t get invited to parties. Jisung isn’t sure why he’s volunteering as the first one to break the unwritten rules of their school’s social hierarchy, but it seems that the speed of his mouth has won the race against the dwindling functionality of his brain. 

Jisung shrugs helplessly. “I don't know. You’ve always been a little unpredictable”

He chooses to meet Minho’s eyes, a dreadful, dreadful decision, and is horrified by what he sees. 

Honey. Bright. Golden. Beautiful. It pools in Minho’s eyes, shadowing everything with a strangely compelling darkness Jisung struggles to look away from. A sick sense of satisfaction twirls inside him, flooding the veins pumping blood to his heart. He has done this, reminding Minho that they know each other far better than they know anyone else. No one else knows Minho quite like Jisung does, and for some godforsaken reason, it fills his heart with pride. Is Jisung selfish for relishing the feeling? Perhaps. Does he regret it? Maybe, but his satisfaction outweighs all else. 

“You should come,” he suggests, and this time he thinks his attempt to smile might be successful. 

Minho studies Jisung’s face like the pages of a textbook, intense and scrutinising, reading each feature like an overly complicated, jargon-filled chapter. Jisung thinks he might be searching for any evidence of foul play, but Minho should know by now that Jisung has never been a very good liar. If there were any untoward intentions behind Jisung’s invitation, they’d be written across his face in perfectly legible text. 

“I’ll think about it once I’ve finished my cookie,” Minho decides, concluding that no ulterior motives plague Jisung’s suggestion, but that he also lacks the trust necessary to commit to something as serious as a party invitation. From an ex-best friend, no less. 

“Cool.”

Before another awkward silence has the chance to ensue, Jisung’s grandmother makes her long-awaited appearance, hobbling in through the utility room door with a heavy wicker basket in her grasp. 

“I’ll just be a minute,” she says in lieu of a proper greeting, smiling thinly when Jisung approaches and takes the basket out of her hands. That smile grows into something bright and real when she catches sight of Minho, popping the last morsel of cookie into his mouth. 

“Ah, Minho! How did they taste?”

“Incredible, Mrs Han. You’re a genius.”

Jisung drowns out their conversation, not wanting to intrude on what he’s sure has become a routine between his grandmother and Minho by this point. Instead, he places the basket on the dining table, stares at the copse of trees visible through the window, and thinks. 

A cobweb hangs in gossamer strings across one of the window panes, glinting in the sunlight like the wink of an eye. Tiny black specks dot the web, a collection of dead flies caught in its sticky clutches, but there is no spider in sight. Jisung wonders if it ever plans on coming back. 

Just then, Minho lets out a chiming laugh, and it’s perhaps the one thing about him that hasn’t changed in the slightest. The sound makes Jisung’s stomach twist again, only this time it doesn’t make him feel sick. Not at all, and therein lies the issue. 

On this sunny afternoon, in the lifeless kitchen of the Lee’s cold house, Jisung realises that Minho has always existed in his eyes, and that Jisung has always missed him. Whether that is a bad or a good thing, only time will tell. 

(It must be one or the other. It must. )

*

Insomnia has become a recent late-night visitor of Jisung’s. 

It keeps him awake well into the early hours, pawing at him like an excitable puppy overflowing with an abundance of restless energy. Sunlight doesn’t deter his wakefulness, nor does it ward off his unwelcome guest. Jisung has found that there is no real way to beat his insomnia, but there are ways to distract himself from it. Reading, music, compilations of movie kiss scenes on YouTube; Jisung has done it all and seen some more. 

Above all, however, the most effective distraction is one that lasts into the wee hours of the morning, all the while providing measures of entertainment unseen by any other means. 

In a word: parties. 

They’re few and far between where Jisung’s attendance is concerned, but he does attend when the occasion calls for it. 

After the somewhat life-altering day he’s had, Jisung thinks he is entitled to a night of subdued chaos and a few sneaky sips of Changbin’s dad’s homebrewed beer. Jisung quickly comes to regret that last part, though, because he’s fairly certain that he has never tasted a worse beer in all his eighteen years of life. Not that Jisung is a beer connoisseur or anything, but he has tried his fair share. Enough to know what’s good and what is unpalatable. Mr Seo’s beer is definitely the latter. 

“God, what did your dad put in this stuff,” Chan grimaces, pulling the bottle away from his lips with an audible pop. “It tastes how I imagine piss would.”

Changbin’s own face creases into a disgusted frown following a particularly lengthy sip. “Man, who knows. I wouldn’t be surprised if he added motor oil for a deeper flavour.”

“Deeper flavour?” Shinwoo parrots. “When did you become an expert?”

Changbin sighs; a horrible, long-suffering sound. “When I became my dad’s personal guinea pig.” 

Jisung chooses to just sit back and watch. His grandmother always tells him that if he has nothing important to say, then he should just shut the hell up. Perhaps he’s taking her advice a little too literally, but today has been weirder than most. He thinks he deserves to interpret his grandmother’s advice however he likes.

Music thuds, teenagers chatter, and Jisung is merely a spectator to it all. His friends are somewhere in between their second and third drinks, a happy-medium level of tipsy that allows for easy laughter and jokes of a slightly less dignified manner. 

It isn’t until their fourth and fifth beers make an appearance that the night begins to slide downhill.

“Who invited him ?” Shinwoo’s gaze has drifted over Jisung’s shoulder, focused with laser-like accuracy on an unknown and rather unfortunate victim. Him . Shinwoo almost spits the word out, like it’s nothing more than flavourless, rubbery gum. 

“Who?” Changbin cranes his neck above the crowd, squinting through the handsy couples, drunken football players, and Lia’s huddle of dancers. She meets Jisung’s eyes from across the room and offers him a sweet smile he finds himself unable to reject. 

“Him,” Shinwoo says, jerking his chin. “I can’t remember his name.”

Jisung can’t say he’s not surprised when he turns his head and spots Minho standing by the fireplace with a drink in hand and a faint scowl on his face. In all honesty, Jisung hadn't expected Minho to accept his invitation, and certainly not to the extent of actually showing up. 

“Minho.” 

Jisung doesn’t even realise he’s spoken until all eyes are on him and Shinwoo fixes him with a frown. 

“ What? ” Shinwoo scoffs, his mouth twisting nastily.

Confident or cowardly.  Jisung must pick one before he can decide how to answer Shinwoo’s oddly threatening query. 

On one hand, if he barrels forwards, all guns blazing, Jisung could damage the structure of his current friend group. Without these three boys, he will become the butt of Shinwoo’s latest joke, and Jisung isn’t sure that he’ll be able to come out the other side unscathed.  On the other, allowing Shinwoo to carry on being an absolute asshole will sever the loosely knotted tie Jisung formed with Minho this afternoon, and he isn’t ready to let it go so soon. 

“His name is Minho.”

Confidence. An unusual but apt choice, Jisung thinks.

Or maybe it’s not really confidence. Maybe it's just the beer. The really bad beer. 

Whatever the case, Shinwoo does not seem to be impressed by Jisung’s newfound boldness. He folds his arms across his chest and raises an inquisitive brow. “And how do you know that?”

Jisung shrugs, trying to ignore Changbin and Chan’s wide-eyed expressions, obvious with their surprise. “Because I invited him.”

“Why would you do that?” Changbin asks, only he sounds genuinely intrigued rather than inquisitorial. 

Jisung can feel himself beginning to lose his nerve, each question chiselling away at his confidence, chip by chip. The only way to maintain his front is by standing his ground. “Why wouldn’t I?” 

Unfortunately, Jisung’s last stand is also Shinwoo’s last straw. 

“You know what, Jisung? You’ve been acting really weird recently,” Shinwoo goads, clutching his beer in a white-knuckled grip. “Got anything you’d like to tell us?”

Jisung kisses his teeth, frustration building beneath his skin, sparking like a live wire. He’d rather he didn’t accidentally set himself alight. 

“Not that I’m aware of,” he says, slamming his drink onto the nearest coffee table, “but I’ll make sure to keep you posted.”

With a forced smile and an apologetic shrug directed towards Changbin and Chan, Jisung springs out of his seat and storms towards Minho, fuelled by his simmering anger and something else, something he refuses to give a name. 

Minho catches sight of him when Jisung is still halfway across the living room, and if he’s surprised, he’s awfully good at hiding it. 

“Gee, you look happy,” Minho says once Jisung is within hearing distance. “Must be one hell of a party.”

“Hell is right,” Jisung mutters, tossing a careless gaze over his shoulder to where his friends still sit, either frozen with shock (Changbin and Chan) or seething (Shinwoo). 

“Your friend is looking… friendly,” Minho snorts, eyeing Shinwoo warily over the curve of Jisung’s shoulder. 

“Yeah, as a hungry mountain lion,” Jisung deadpans, only to match Minho’s rueful smile with one of his own. 

“It’s good to see you,” Jisung adds once their smiles fade and the music grows louder, surprising both himself and Minho with his honesty. 

“You didn’t think I’d come, did you?”

Jisung shakes his head, shocked to find himself smiling for a second time in the space of a minute. “Not in a million years. I’m expecting five bucks in compensation.”

“Damn,” Minho tuts. “I only have four and a half. Looks like I'll have to settle my debt the old fashioned way.”

"With livestock?"

"With a duel."

It almost scares Jisung how easily they slip back into their old ways. He recalls the bickering matches of their childhood with unmatched vividness, like a film captured in Technicolour. Everything seemed to be brighter back then. Prettier. Easier. Not like now. 

It almost scares Jisung, but thankfully, he doesn’t scare easily. 

“D’you want another drink,” he offers, gesturing to Minho’s empty cup. 

“You could at least buy me dinner first,” Minho snickers, smirking when Jisung lets out a sigh of his own, one of exasperation rather than mockery. 

“There’s cold pizza in the kitchen.”

“Lead the way.”

*

Jisung isn’t sure how he got here.

Here, being the back porch of Changbin’s house, his left shoulder pressed firmly against Minho’s right as they pass a bottle of raspberry vodka between them. Stars speckle the black canvas of the sky above, making for a pretty sight despite the raucous background noise, and Jisung begins to mentally concoct something strangely like a poem before he takes another cursed sip and his brain gets all muddled. 

“Why did we stop being friends?” he finds himself asking, throat still burning from the vodka. Jisung didn’t mean to ask the question out loud, isn’t sure where it even came from, but as his grandmother once said: drunken words are like promises; you can’t take them back. It’s one of her wiser sayings, but Jisung still thinks she could stand to learn why the classics are untouchable, including proverbs.

Minho hardly bats an eye, though, taking the proffered bottle without so much as a flinch. “We just did,” he shrugs, offering Jisung a brief glance that’s a little sad. “One day we were, and the next we weren’t. I don’t think there is a ‘why’.”

“Do you ever…” Jisung trails off mid-sentence, unsure if he’s willing to commit to this particular drunken promise. 

“Do I ever what?” Minho presses, sharper than Jisung thinks he should be after the amount of alcohol they’ve shared between them. 

“Nothing. I was just…” Jisung pauses, waving a dismissive hand. One, hard look from Minho has him finishing his train of thought. 

“Do you ever miss it? Do you ever miss us?”

There. He committed to the promise, to the cause of his drunken mind. Now what? 

Minho doesn’t say anything at first. He turns his gaze to the glittering sky and exhales shakily, his nerves of steel rattled by the sudden whiplash of Jisung’s questions. It’s a fair reaction, one that’s most certainly warranted, but it does nothing to ease Jisung’s own nerves. He sits by Minho’s side with his lower lip tucked between his teeth, nibbling at the skin until Jisung thinks he might be bleeding. All he can hear is the party raging inside and the discreet giggling of a couple sharing Changbin’s younger sister’s swing set at the opposite end of the garden. 

Minho doesn’t say anything at first, but then he goes and ruins it all by saying too much.

“I don’t know what you want me to say to that, Jisung.”

Jisung scoffs bitterly. The vodka has made his mouth taste sour. “A simple yes or no would be nice.”

“I’m not nice,” Minho says, all self-sacrificial and martyr-like. If Minho wasn’t Minho, Jisung is sure he’d find him insufferable for it. “I’m rude and blunt and incredibly prickly.”

“That you are.”

“Maybe that’s why we stopped being friends. Maybe we’re too different.”

“Different?” Jisung echoes into the night. It’s a thought, but not one he necessarily agrees with. Sure, he and Minho have always been different, but that was the appeal of their friendship. Opposites are supposed to attract and complement one another, aren’t they? Is it actually possible to be too different, to the point of incompatibility?

Minho certainly seems to think so. “Hmm,” he hums affirmatively. “You’re not prickly. You’re…”

“ I’m? ” Jisung urges hypocritically. He knows there’s a reason Minho won’t continue, because it’s probably the very reason why Jisung refused to do the same. 

“I should go home,” Minho blurts all of a sudden, swiftly moving on from the topic of Jisung’s indescribable existence with a bluntness previously reserved for people Minho saw little potential in getting to know. 

Has Jisung truly become one of them?

“Oh,” Jisung says, his voice rather small. “Okay.”

The seconds following his reluctant acceptance of Minho’s departure are quite easily contenders for the worst of Jisung’s life. Someone inside the house screeches like a pterodactyl, the couple on the swing have started aggressively sucking one another’s faces off like something out of Alien , and Minho watches Jisung with incredulity swimming in his eyes.  

Jisung has curled in on himself like a dried-up rose, suddenly rather self conscious. His heart genuinely feels like it’s in agony, thrashing and screaming within the confines of his ribcage. It’s the worst pain Jisung has ever felt. 

He starts moving to lift himself onto his feet and bid Minho goodbye. “I guess I’ll just—” 

“Yes.”

Jisung freezes, his body atrophying as though Minho’s voice has turned him to stone.

“What?”

“My answer is yes. I miss it. Us. You.” Minho pauses, taking a deep breath because he can’t take back his honesty. “Sometimes. Not always, but sometimes.”

Minho has missed him. This knowledge doesn’t offer Jisung the satisfaction he thought it would. Instead, he feels sort of sad. Nowadays, Jisung always feels sort of sad, but more so now than usual. 

They sit aimlessly on Changbin’s porch for a while longer, neither of them willing to address the elephant squashed uncomfortably between them. 

The couple on the swing set make themselves scarce when another girl stumbles out of the house, yelling the boy’s name followed by a litany of threats. 

A ginger cat slinks out of the bushes, prowling through the garden before coming to investigate Minho’s outstretched hand, purring happily when he scratches behind its ears and under its white speckled chin. 

Jisung thinks he sees Chan peek his head out of the back door, but the backlighting is too bright to make his figure appear as anything other than an indistinguishable silhouette. 

After that, they’re alone, and Jisung has never wanted anything more and less at the same time. 

“Walk me home?” Minho suggests when the sound of the party grows catastrophically loud and the flashing blue and red of police lights flicker out front. 

And who is Jisung to deny Minho anything?

*

With Minho, Jisung feels like he’s constantly grasping at straws. As blunt and honest as Minho can be, Jisung has no idea what he’s thinking or how he actually feels. 

Take now, for example, as they traipse the wooded path leading to Minho’s house. Minho is chattering happily, as if their conversation back at Changbin’s party is a thing of ancient history, and Jisung can do nothing but listen. 

Minho, with moonlight in his hair and the remnants of raspberry vodka on his tongue, talks about nothing of importance in the same way people discuss their most beloved hobbies. He sounds like Jisung when the topic of music or books comes up, but the version of Jisung that only exists inside his head. Jisung doesn’t talk about the things he likes anymore. 

With Minho it was so easy. They were just two kids abound with passing interests, too much excitement, and vivid imaginations. Now that Jisung has grown up, however, he can’t seem to be able to talk about those very same things without cringing. He sounds too childish, too immature, too wistful. At eighteen, his hobbies should be more substantial than listening to other people’s music and reading other people’s words, but alas, Jisung has never been able to leave that part of himself behind. 

“Oh, look! A spider!” Minho exclaims, stopping both himself and Jisung in their tracks. His gaze is focused on Jisung, which can only mean one thing: he has become home to one of those creepy crawly cretins. 

“What?” Jisung blanches, searching what’s visible of his own body with panicked hands before registering that could mean touching the spider’s crooked little legs, or beady little eyes. “Where?”

Minho looks amused as he points vaguely in Jisung’s direction, “Just there, on your shoulder.”

Jisung gulps dryly, but he doesn’t scream. Spiders can sense ill-will – he’s sure of it – and he does not want to get on the bad side of an angry arachnid. “Can you… Can you get it off?”

“Why?” Minho grins tauntingly, wiggling his eyebrows. “You scared?”

“No, I’m not scared. I just really—”

“Really hate them, I know,” Minho finishes, his smile smaller but sincere. “I remember.”

“Hm. So can you…” Jisung coughs, gesturing to his shoulder with a thin-lipped smile. 

Minho rolls his eyes, a poorly disguised grin tugging at his lips. “Alright, you big baby.”

“Some time tonight would be good.”

“Oh my god, it’s harmless! Stop panicking. And stop moving too, while you’re at it.”

Minho’s left hand clamps down on Jisung’s spider-free shoulder, hard enough to hurt. His fingers dig into the thin material of Jisung’s T-shirt, the crescent curve of his nails cutting against the skin beneath, but Jisung barely even registers the pain. If anything, it feels like Minho has reached through Jisung’s chest instead and clutched his lungs tightly in his grasp. 

I can’t breathe. 

I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe. 

It’s like a mantra, playing on a loop in Jisung’s head. His chest feels impossibly tight, knitted together in a tangled mess he doubts he’ll ever be able to unravel. 

Minho’s face seems so close yet so far away all at once, sort of dreamlike in between the shadows and moonlight spilled through the trees in pools of blue and silver. His mouth curves like the moon before parting into two crescents, eclipsing the glint of his teeth. It takes Jisung a minute too long to realise that Minho’s mouth is not merely moving of its own accord. 

“Jisung? Are you okay?” Minho’s voice comes into focus like Jisung has just broken through the surface of a pool after being submerged for seconds, minutes, hours.

“F-fine,” Jisung stutters, his own voice coming out strained and tight, like the knots have spread to his throat and tongue. 

Minho’s brow creases with a concerned frown and his tongue peeks out to lick those cursed lips. “Look, I’m sorry for making fun of you about the spider. I guess they can be kind of scary—”

“I said I’m fine,” Jisung snaps, shaking himself free of Minho’s hold. It’s like he’s a dog, hackles raised, gnashing and biting and growling in the back of his throat. 

“Okay,” Minho says, slow and wary, like Jisung really is a rabid dog rather than an eighteen-year-old boy with a storm swirling inside of him. His eyes are wide and round, and if Jisung looks close enough, a glint of hurt seems to reside within the gilded gold. “You're fine. Noted.”

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

“You said that already,” Minho points out, a little too pleased with himself for saying so.

“I know,” Jisung says indignantly. “I was just trying to hammer the point home.”

“Consider it done.”

“Okay. I’m glad.”

“Happy to help.”

The air between them fills with the sound of heavy breathing and the tangible tension of their frustration. Minho looks oddly pained, like Jisung’s words have actually hurt him, but there’s something else that resides within the depths of his eyes, hidden by what the moonlight refuses to reveal. 

What Jisung does next can only be blamed on the beer and the beer alone, because he refuses to accept his actions as sober or conscious in any way. 

One step, two steps, three, and the space between them closes. A twig snaps, someone gasps, and then mouths meet in a messy crash of lips, tongues, and teeth. It’s disastrous, like a car crash, or an earthquake, or a volcanic eruption. Jisung’s hands scrabble for purchase before tightening in the fabric of Minho’s shirt, clutching the hem tight enough to tear and pulling Minho impossibly closer. 

Minho’s mouth tastes strangely sweet, like ripe raspberries, melted sugar, and liquid sunshine if such a thing could exist. His tongue dips between Jisung’s lips, warm and wet, and his hands rest at the nape of Jisung’s neck, tenderly strumming the short hairs between his fingers. 

An owl hoots somewhere in the trees, leaves rustle in a silent breeze, and Jisung swallows down the quiet groan that threatens to bubble into their kiss. Kissing has never felt like this before. It has never felt so dangerous. Jisung feels like he’s standing on the edge of the world, waiting to fall. All he needs is one, last push. 

That push comes in the form of Minho’s teeth scraping the swell of Jisung’s lower lip, drawing a pained hiss with a nip of tender skin. They pull apart, torn like waxy skin from a fruit, letting sour silence pool between them, bitter and full of pulp. 

Minho’s lips look like a blood moon. Jisung has never been so scared. 

“I need to go,” he says, stumbling backwards until his back hits the trunk of a nearby tree. 

“Jisung,” Minho begins, taking a hesitant step forward, “I–”

“I need to go,” Jisung repeats, head spinning, heart pounding, ears ringing. The innate wrongness of it all turns his stomach, churning its contents into a rancid, foaming mess.

Jisung trips over his own feet in his haste to get away. There’s now way he can stay here with Minho. There’s no way he can let his dreams become a reality. 

*

There are days when the rain pours and Jisung smiles, his mouth stretching as droplets splinter across his face like broken shards of glass. Then, there are others when the sun shines, its light dripping through cracked curtains like a burst egg yolk, and Jisung lies in bed, inexplicably numb. Each morning, he awakens to discover what kind of day faces him. There is no guaranteed way to predict the weather, just as there is no way to foresee how Jisung will be feeling on any given day. 

Today is one of those rare sunny days where wallowing in his sadness seems favourable to all other potential activities, school included. 

It’s the Monday after Changbin’s party and Jisung is feeling particularly sorry for himself. If he could blame it on Mr Seo’s beer he would, but even that would be too far a reach when the cause of Jisung’s misery can be found in the very same place as his unfortunately sharp memory. 

The imprint of Minho’s lips still burns, branded into the crevices of Jisung’s mouth, an ineffable scar. 

God, how could he have been so stupid? How could he have kissed Minho like that? Like he was desperately thirsty, and Minho was a beautiful oasis in the middle of a withered desert. Like he was a boat being tossed across storming ocean waves, and Minho was his only anchor, his only tether to safety. Like he had never been kissed before and he was hungry for it. 

Last night was far from Jisung’s first kiss, but it felt like it. It felt like he was free falling, tossed from a plane without a parachute or a soft landing. There was no sticky film of lip gloss, no vanilla scented body spray, no soft curves or lace ruffles. Minho tasted like raspberry vodka. He had smelled like the very same aftershave he’s used since he hit puberty. He had been a solid weight against Jisung’s body, all hard lines, pressing them against the rough bark of the nearest tree trunk. Boyish. That’s how Jisung would describe Minho if he were prompted. A boy in every way. 

And that’s the very root of Jisung’s problem, isn’t it? 

Squinting into the morning sunshine, Jisung groans and hides his stinging eyes. He wants nothing more than to roll over and bury his face into his pillow, like he is an ostrich and his bedding is a mound of sand. He wants to avoid all responsibilities. Above all, he wants to avoid Minho. 

Unfortunately, Jisung’s grandmother cares little for what her grandson does and does not want, particularly on a school morning. 

“Up. You’re going to be late,” she commands sternly, bursting into Jisung’s room like a long-coming storm and ripping open the curtains to let in an onslaught of terrible golden sunlight. “And remember, no car this morning. You’ll have to take the bus.”

There’s no use in denying his grandmother, no matter how badly he wants to, so Jisung rolls out of bed and proceeds with his usual morning routine. 

By the time he’s showered, dressed, and munching on a dry slice of toast, dread has decided to accompany Jisung at the breakfast table. After everything that happened with Minho, he forgot all about the state he had left his friendships in. 

Jisung’s phone lies somewhere under his bed, wherever it landed after he dropped it there on Saturday morning, and he hasn’t felt like retrieving it since. There’s a chance Chan or Changbin have tried to contact him over the course of the weekend, but the thought of reading their messages makes Jisung feel sick. Everything about that night makes him feel sick, and Jisung is someone who has never dealt gracefully with ailments of any kind. When he was younger, he used to run into the house crying about scraped palms and knees, or twisted ankles, or a sore tummy from eating too much ice-cream when his father came to visit. 

Speaking of Jisung’s father, he hasn’t called in a while. It’s understandable that his work keeps him busy, but it would be nice for Jisung to hear his dad’s voice, or see his pixelated face over a poorly connected Facetime call. 

Don’t get him wrong; Jisung’s grateful for the stable life he has with his grandmother – something he’d be missing out on if he remained by his dad’s side – but that doesn’t mean he can’t miss his dad when life gets to be too much for him to handle on his own. 

Jisung considers running back to his room to collect his phone, but in that same moment, his grandmother begins ushering him out of the front door, rambling about the bus schedule and how Jisung should know that “car privileges are called privileges for a reason”. 

Halfway to the bus stop, Jisung realises that his shoes are on the wrong feet and that his laces are undone. That probably has something to do with the fact his grandmother stuffed them onto his feet whilst he put on his school tie, but this morning has passed by in such an indecipherable blur, Jisung can hardly recall it happening. 

Letting out a deflated sigh, Jisung crouches down by the side of the road and begins remedying the problem. He swaps his shoes, ties his laces (double knotting them for extra security), and pulls up his black socks. An unfortunate side-effect of this issue, however, is that Jisung manages to miss his bus. He approaches the corner where the bus stop resides to find a cloud of dust and smog awaiting his arrival, the only evidence that the bus was ever there. Jisung could always turn back and beg his grandmother for the keys to his car, but then he would miss half of first period too. 

Right now, that seems to be Jisung’s only solution. He’ll just have to suffer through his grandmother’s scolding, and then his teacher’s scolding, and then his father’s scolding when the former two get a hold of him over the phone. If they can get a hold of him, that is. 

Jisung makes it no more than a metre away from the bus stop when a horn beeps, startling him out of his panicked reverie. A sleek, red car rumbles in the middle of the road, glinting like a cherry in the morning sun. Minho sits in the driver’s seat, his fluffy head of hair poking out the open window. His facial expression is somewhat elusive from a distance, meaning Jisung can’t tell how angry Minho is. The last time they saw one another, they did far less seeing than they did kissing, and after that it has been radio silence ever since. From Jisung’s end, at least. Minho may have tried to initiate contact at some point, but there’s no way of knowing until Jisung switches on his phone. 

“I really don’t recommend walking,” Minho advises before Jisung can attempt an unhostile greeting. “The blisters are a bitch to get rid of.”

“Blisters,” Jisung repeats dumbfoundedly. 

Minho wears a small smile and shrugs, his hands still on the wheel. “It happens to the best of us.”

“This is me offering to give you a lift, by the way,” he adds when Jisung does nothing but gape stupidly from three feet away. “In case that wasn’t obvious.”

“It wasn’t,” Jisung says. 

“I guess I’ll have to work on my delivery then. Hop in.”

Jisung hesitates, clutching the straps of his backpack with sweaty hands. His mouth feels dry, his tongue is like sandpaper, and his heart shudders in his chest; all three of which are usually a sign of nerves. Is he nervous right now? Is that why his body refuses to move, frozen to its current spot like he’s suddenly made of marble? Is that why anything more than monosyllabic answers are as far fetched as reciting a Shakespearean monologue from memory? Is that why the thought of getting into Minho’s car – alone – has his stomach doing that thing again? That thing it has only done once before. That thing it did two nights ago, when he kissed Minho.

“Well?” Minho prompts. “Are you getting in or not? Because I’ve already been late twice this month, and I don’t think I can handle another detention with Mr Park.”

Detention? Jisung is no stranger to detention, although he’s usually dragged into it because of something his friends did. Minho, on the other hand… Any sort of delinquent behaviour is very unlike him. Or at least, it was. Maybe things have changed far more than Jisung could have ever expected. 

“I’m coming,” Jisung mutters, ignoring the impatient tapping of Minho’s fingers against the steering wheel as he slides into the passenger seat. 

“Thanks for this,” he says once his seatbelt is strapped into place. 

Minho gives him another one of those small smiles, and from this close, Jisung can tell it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “No problem.”

Not another word is exchanged for the rest of the drive. The engine rumbles, and the radio hisses with static until the signal is good enough to play a crackly rendition of Lorde’s Buzzcut Season, but their conversation ends the moment Minho pulls away from the bus stop. 

They pass by crumbling cottages, withering hedges, dying flower buds, and Jisung thinks that this is it. Everything is beginning to unravel, and he’s helpless to stop it. 

*

The school day pans out much how Jisung expected it to when he awoke this morning. 

Shinwoo ignores him, while Chan and Changbin attempt to participate in light-hearted sports talk with Jisung to ease the obvious tension. It doesn’t work. Shinwoo continues to seethe silently, scrolling through his phone with his earphones firmly plugged into his ears. He ignores all of Changbin’s efforts to get him to join the conversation and leaves the second the bell signalling the beginning of first period rings, stalking off without so much as a farewell glance. 

“He’ll come around eventually,” Chan says, a kind but unnecessary offer of comfort. Jisung doesn’t really care when or even if Shinwoo will talk to him again. He already has too much else on his mind to worry about things like petty arguments and pettier friends. 

One hour of biology with Mr Park is enough to have Jisung’s eyelids drooping before homework is assigned, balancing his head in the palm of his hand, his elbow resting on the pen-marked desk like a poorly constructed pillar. The words on the green chalkboard blur into a fuzzy mess of letters and symbols, perhaps some numbers too, like a flurry of snowflakes across a forest of evergreen trees. 

In his altered state, Jisung’s mind begins to wander, treading dangerous, dangerous waters. His memories take him to a darkened clearing, split into fragments by blue moonlight. It’s familiar, from the twisted roots of the trees, to the shimmering surface of a creek. 

A heart beats somewhere amidst the trees and shadows, and it takes Jisung a moment too long to realise that it’s his, thundering like a stampede. 

A hand holds his, warm and comforting, all golden skin and knobbly knuckles that melt in between Jisung’s fingers. 

A voice whispers in his ear like the rustle of leaves. It warps and curls and distorts until it’s calling Jisung’s name. Jisung, Jisung, Jisung–

“Jisung!” Mr Park wears an unusually stern look, dark eyebrows furrowed in a frown. “It’s not everyday that you meet a student who knows more than you.”

“Huh?” Startled and confused, Jisung jumps in his seat, a belated response considering the urgency in his teacher’s voice. The girl in the seat behind him snickers into her hand. 

Mr Park crosses his arms and glares. “How else would you have enough time to take a nap during class if you didn’t already know this lesson inside out?”

“Sorry, sir,” Jisung apologises weakly, cringing under the collective gaze of his entire class. 

Something in Mr Park’s composure changes just then, his eyes softening considerably. He sighs loudly, all tension leaving him with the sound. “Just try to get your eight hours in, and then we won’t have any more problems.”

Jisung nods diligently, shaking himself awake with a discreet pinch of his wrist. His vision clears well enough for the words on the chalkboard to make sense, and Jisung wishes he had never made it here on time. He rubs his eyes for good measure, just to make sure that what he’s seeing is real. 

GROUP PROJECT, reads the board, in stark white letters. 

“As I was saying,” Mr Park says, continuing to explain what Jisung had clearly missed during his impromptu nap. “The plan is to split you all into trios, have each of you set pitfall traps, note your findings, and draw comparisons with the rest of the class. It’s a simple enough task, and certainly an easy one at this point in your school career, but it doesn’t always guarantee good results. See? I’m preparing you for the real world in a way.”

A quiet murmur of laughter ruffles the classroom. Jisung doesn’t join in. Any and all mentions of the so-called ‘real world’ always sends him spiralling into an uncontrollable bout of panic.

“Alright!” Mr Park claps his hands together. “We’ve got five minutes left. Once you’ve been allocated a group, you are free to leave!”

Mr Park slowly but surely makes his way through the class list, grouping the names at random, meaning there is no way for to predict just how fucked he’ll be. Changbin and Chan are called one after another, so there’s no chance of Jisung getting in with them, and any other of Jisung’s acquaintances have already been put into groups of their own. Well, not all of them. There’s still– 

“Lia, Minho, and Jisung.”

Jisung should have seen this coming. If he’d had his wits about him, he would have. Trust Jisung to end up in a group with his first kiss as well as his last. Is this what they call poetic justice? If so, Jisung considers rethinking every positive thought he has ever had about poetry. He liked it, too. 

Lia appears before Jisung, that pretty smile of hers stretched across her face. Before she has the chance to do anything more than smile, Minho drops into the empty seat beside him. Jisung has been cornered. Deliriously, he thinks he feels Minho’s hand brush against his own under the desk. 

“My place or yours?” Minho asks. It doesn’t matter if the question is directed at both his groupmates, because he’s only looking at Jisung.  

The dread returns. This won’t be good.

*

How Jisung’s house became the official headquarters for their biology project is somewhat of a mystery to him. One second, he’s still recovering from the shock of being put in a group with Lia and Minho, and the next, he’s sitting in his kitchen with the aforementioned classmates directly across the table from him. 

It’s the first they’ve been together as a trio since their primary school days. They weren’t friends, not in a group sense, but they were friendly. Lia would join Jisung and Minho’s forest adventures when her mother allowed, but she’d never last much longer than ten minutes before she spied an earthworm or a centipede and got too spooked to go any further. It’s somewhat ironic that this stupid homework assignment will likely take them back there.

“Okay, so we need to plot our traps first,” Lia says, asserting her position as group leader—not that Jisung or Minho are complaining. Jisung has never been confident enough for leadership, and Minho lacks the motivation. 

“Sounds good,” Minho agrees, lounging lazily in his chair. He doesn’t look happy about all of this, per se, but he doesn’t look overly upset either. An enigma. That’s what Jisung sees. He just isn’t sure he’ll be able to solve him before Minho decides to clam up again. “Got anywhere in mind?”

“I know a place.” Damn Jisung and his quicksilver tongue. Now he has to think fast. Faster than usual, which is already an impressive speed indeed. 

Minho and Lia watch him with twin expressions of surprise, and Jisung can’t blame them. Not really. He’s not overly talkative, carefully picking and choosing when he does use his voice, so it only makes sense that other people have come to expect the things Jisung says to be of vital importance. 

“Oh? Really?” Lia asks excitedly once the shock wears off. Jisung isn’t sure why she’s smiling so much. They’re hardly going to find a fairy tale-worthy adventure in those woods.

Minho doesn’t seem to share in Lia’s glee. His eyes are narrowed with scrutiny and his mouth sits stonily on his face. He looks upset. 

“Uh, yeah,” Jisung stammers, fidgeting with the clasp of the old watch his father gave him for Christmas. They haven’t seen each other in person since. “It’s not far from here.”

Lia is more than happy to go along with Jisung’s haphazard plan, but Minho isn’t so easily pleased. He takes more time than Jisung would usually allow to consider the option, by which point Lia is shifting in her seat, clearly uncomfortable with the sudden silence. 

“Alright,” Minho ultimately decides. “Lead the way, captain.”

Jisung holds back a snarky comment of his own for Lia’s sake, but he manages to sneak Minho an unimpressed glare before she notices. 

The trio pile out of Jisung’s house, equipment in hand, following him across the back garden, over the rickety wooden fence, and into the dense collection of trees lining the mouth of the forest. 

The sun reigns the sky, dazzlingly bright, shading everything a muted hue of gold. It would be beautiful if it wasn’t so hot. Jisung’s hairline beads with sweat, while Minho and Lia’s cheeks have taken on a healthy shade of sun-kissed pink. 

Their short journey takes them to a sunny clearing, circled with tall trees, sprouts of wildflowers and a halo of late spring sunlight. 

“Oh, Jisung. This place is beautiful,” Lia sighs dreamily. 

She’s right. It is beautiful. Beautiful and overly familiar. 

Minho stands beside Lia, but instead of taking in the natural beauty of his surroundings, he’s staring at Jisung. Actually, staring him down , would be a more accurate description. There’s an unfaltering darkness shadowing Minho’s gaze, but there isn’t enough time left in the day for Jisung to try to uncover the light. Not if they want to pass their assignment.  

It isn’t until they start plotting their traps that Jisung realises where he has taken them. The creek, the rocks dotting its banks, the formation of the trees. Everything is familiar for a reason. 

This is the place where he and Minho shared their first kiss. 

*

“Aw, look!” Lia squeals, hopping from foot to foot with excitement where she stands by the trunk of an aged tree. “This is so cute!”

“What is it?” Minho asks, digging into the ground with his makeshift shovel: an old spoon Jisung found in the junk drawer in his grandmother’s kitchen. 

“It’s a carving!” Lia shouts. Jisung can hear the smile in her voice. “I think it must have been left behind by a couple or something. It says 'J and M forever'. How sweet!”

The air stills. Minho stops digging. Jisung stops breathing. Lia stops smiling. Everything stops. 

Jisung’s chest ties itself into a tight knot again. It’s becoming a frequent feeling these days, horrible in its familiarity. He hates it. Why can’t everything just go back to the way it was? Before Minho. Before their kiss. Before Jisung made his friends hate him. Why?

“Sorry, did I say something wrong?” Lia asks warily, her pretty face twisted with concern. 

“What? No! No, not at all,” Minho says, scrambling to come up with a response while Jisung sits on the forest floor and tries to remember how to breathe. “We just thought we saw a spider, is all.”

“Oh,” Lia blanches, her face turning pale. “Oh dear. I think I’ll stay over here if you don’t mind.”

Minho smiles at her. From afar it probably looks comforting, but from up close, Jisung can’t help but notice the tremble of Minho’s lower lip. “Not a fan of spiders?” 

Lia visibly shudders. “God, no. I’m terrified of them.”

After that, Lia returns to her detailed inspection of the trees, umming and awing to herself with each miniscule discovery. Minho picks up his abandoned spoon, but he doesn’t resume digging. 

“Hey, is everything okay?” His voice is soft as silk and tender as nimble fingers brushing through hair. It makes Jisung’s broken heart ache. 

“I’m not sure,” Jisung confesses breathlessly. The anxiety has dissipated a little, the knot in his chest loosening, but he still feels worse for wear. His hands shake and his stomach churns and everything feels wrong. Wrong and odd and ugly. 

*

Jisung has a dream that night. 

It’s the kind of dream that has him waking at midnight, drenched in sweat and embarrassingly hot all over. His skin burns like it’s on fire, with shame and want and the need for something he can’t have.

It started unassumingly. Dream Jisung was sitting on a sun-warmed rock, his feet paddling in the cool waters of an unfamiliar river. It felt like summer and looked like summer, but something within Jisung told him that it wasn’t summer at all. The weather didn’t surprise him, just like the sudden appearance of Minho didn’t shake him. 

“Don’t you want to kiss me?” Dream Minho asked, his mouth pinker than it has ever been in real life, even after Jisung kissed him the first time. 

“Yes,” Dream Jisung breathed. “I want to kiss you.”

And then, shock horror, Dream Jisung kissed Dream Minho. Jisung can’t remember how it went after that, but he distinctly recalls a flash of bare skin that was not his own and the sensation of a mouth against parts of his body that have only ever felt the touch of Jisung’s own hands. 

Now, in the inky darkness of night, Jisung sits against his headboard and wallows in his shame. 

None of this is right. It’s not supposed to be like this. He’s not supposed to want to be friends with Minho again. He’s not supposed to want whatever his dreams are showing him. The past should remain as just that. The past. It shouldn’t haunt Jisung like this. It shouldn’t have brought Minho back to him. It shouldn’t make him feel like this. 

Everything is so confusing. Jisung has no idea what he wants from his life. Good friends? A successful future? Love? There’s too much and not enough all at once, and Jisung can’t decide how to proceed. 

Jisung thinks about apologising to Shinwoo, but only momentarily. He was never a very good friend to Jisung, not really. It’s not that Shinwoo’s a bad person. He’s just a silly teenage boy with silly teenage boy thoughts that he’ll grow out of eventually. 

Jisung thinks about his university applications, sent away on one forgetful day in December. English literature. That’s what he’s got waiting for him. It’s not much, but it’s something. Something to do. Something to pass the time. Something that could always get him somewhere should Jisung need it. 

Jisung thinks about his relationships—past, present and future. Lia was his first kiss, Minho was his last, and somewhere in between lies countless others, none of them as noteworthy as the other two. 

It’s not that Jisung has a crush on Lia. He never did. Not seriously. One day, when they were sixteen years old and did the things sixteen year olds tend to do, they kissed on the swing set of a local park. She had initiated it because she liked Jisung and Jisung had returned it because it would’ve been rude not to. He knows Lia wants him to ask her to prom. He’ll probably have to because, really, what other choices does Jisung have?

The image of him and Minho dressed in complementary suits comes to mind. Jisung immediately banishes the thought, cheeks burning. Sooner or later, he’ll need to stop thinking about these things. About Minho. It isn’t healthy and it’s not right. All of this thinking about boys and girls and kissing. 

Jisung feels like he has been picked apart at the seams, stitch by stitch, and it’s getting too late to sew him back together. He’s running out of thread.

*

“Where’ve you been?” Chan asks, handing Jisung a bottle of water from the school vending machine. “Haven’t seen you around much lately.”

“Here. There. Everywhere.” Jisung shrugs, purposefully evasive, taking the water and cracking it open. He gulps it down gratefully, letting the chilled liquid cool him from the inside out. Sweat and grime stains his skin from their football practice, glueing his kit to his body and blades of grass to his skin.

Chan pauses while opening his own drink. He looks worried. “Is everything okay? Like, at home. I know your grandma can be kind of,” he twirls a finger at his temple, “eccentric.”

Jisung shakes his head, offering a close-lipped smile. “Nah, everything’s good.”

“Good, good.” Chan sighs. 

They both lean against the wall outside the locker room, side by side as they wordlessly sip on their water. It’s awkward between them in a way it has never been before, like one wrong word will crack the fragile façade of their friendship. One wrong move, and it’s game over. 

“I haven’t spoken to him,” Jisung says when he notices the questioning tilt of Chan’s mouth. “I’m pretty sure he’s enjoying the distance.”

Chan’s quizzical expression turns confused, and then surprised. “Who? Shinwoo?”

“Yeah,” Jisung frowns. “Who else would I be talking about?”

“I dunno, I thought that maybe…”

“You thought that maybe what?”

“I thought you might have meant Minho.”

Jisung almost physically recoils. The last thing he expected to discuss with Chan is his friendship with Minho who, until last week, was barely more than a blip on Chan’s radar. “Why?” he asks, trying to be nonchalant instead of defensive. He’s not convinced his efforts are successful.

“Well, I mean, you kinda ditched us for him at Changbin’s,” Chan explains, his mouth drooping a little sadly. “Then you guys got paired up for that biology assignment, and now…”

“Now?”

Chan shakes his head, ruffling a large hand through his sweat-dampened hair. “I’m just confused. Are you friends with the guy? Are you dating him? Like, what’s the script?”

What. The. Fuck.

Jisung swallows harshly, taming the oncoming panic with silent affirmations. Chan is a nice, friendly guy. There’s nothing outwardly aggressive about his line of questioning, nor does he seem even remotely disgusted by the idea of two guys dating each other. It’s fine. Everything is fine. Jisung is safe.

“No, I’m not dating him,” Jisung tries, but it’s weak; a thin, weedy response with no strength, no power, no conviction.

“But you want to.” Chan is no idiot. Three years is plenty of time to figure out when a friend is lying, and when that very same friend is telling the truth. He notices Jisung’s wide-eyed panic and places a comforting hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently. “Look, I won’t say anything. I’m not an asshole.”

“I know,” Jisung nods, his voice tight. His eyes prickle with tears he refuses to let fall. “Thanks, by the way. You’re a good friend, Chan.”

“And you better remember it,” Chan grins. “See you at lunch tomorrow?”

Jisung hesitates, picturing a painfully awkward meal spent under the suffocating weight of Shinwoo’s accusatory gaze. 

“Shinwoo won’t be there,” Chan adds knowingly. 

Jisung tries a wobbly smile of his own. “Yeah, see you at lunch.”

*

Minho is already standing on the front porch of his house when Jisung steps out of the car, a strangely nervous air about him as he hovers in front of the open door. 

“She’s not here.” 

Jisung raises a questioning eyebrow. “Hmm?”

“Your grandmother,” Minho explains. “She’s not here. She went out to get different laundry detergent because apparently my mother is incapable of reading anyone’s handwriting but her own and bought the wrong one.”

“Oh.” 

Jisung doesn’t know what this means for him. Does he get back in his car and wait on his grandmother’s arrival, or does he repeat last week’s fatal mistake and walk through that door?

“Feel free to stick around until she’s back,” Minho proposes, his uncertainty palpable in the tight line of his shoulders. “Though I can’t say I’ll be particularly stimulating company.”

Minho is either incredibly skilful in the wiles of conviction or Jisung’s resolve is far weaker than he thought. 

“That’s fine,” Jisung says before his mind can comprehend his tongue’s actions, following Minho through the looming doorway. “I don’t really feel like being stimulated today, anyway.”

“Right. Well, if you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask.”

“Thanks.”

They hover in the empty foyer like poltergeists without a purpose; aimless and quiet. Jisung inspects the blank walls, hoping that something might have changed since he was last here, but they too remain unchanging. The house is like a time capsule, but the kind you’d never want to dig up for how boring it is. 

“Would you like a book?” Minho asks abruptly. For him, the novelty of his childhood home wore off long ago, and now it’s just the empty building he locks himself inside each night. “I know you like to read and we have multiple books.”

“Multiple books?” Jisung repeats, allowing himself a shadow of sarcasm. “Wow, that’s rare these days.”

Minho’s shoulders lose their tension upon noting the tone of Jisung’s voice, and he turns to face Jisung with a rueful smile. “You’re teasing me, aren’t you?”

“Maybe,” Jisung smirks. 

“Come on,” Minho sighs, tugging at the sleeve of Jisung’s shirt. “If I find you a good enough book, then maybe you’ll shut up.”

Jisung trails after Minho as he leads them down the hallway and into a room Jisung is sure he has never noticed before. The second they walk through the door, a gasp spills from Jisung’s lips, one of shock and awe. 

It’s a library. Jisung is quite sure he would have remembered the Lee’s having a goddamn library in their house.  

“Holy shit,” Jisung gapes, overwhelmed by the sight before him.  

The room is small, but the whole place is filled with books, from wall to wall. Austen and Bronte and Woolf watch over him, each of them with their own story to tell, and Jisung is more than willing to listen. “Since when did you have a library?”

“Since always,” Minho replies, running a hand across the spines jutting out of the nearest shelf. “But my parents thought that we were too young and careless to be allowed inside. Sorry.”

“Apology accepted. I just can’t believe that this has been here the whole time and I had no idea!” Jisung gestures to the shelves, asking a silent question. “Do you mind…?”

“No, not at all,” Minho says. “Take whatever you want. God knows no one else is reading these books. They’ve been collecting dust for years.”

“Wow. Thank you. Seriously.” Jisung is so distracted by his own excitement that he doesn’t notice the endeared smile curling Minho’s lips. 

The title he chooses is an old favourite, but the book itself looks brand new, its pages clean and white and crisp. 

“I didn’t take you for much of a romantic,” Minho comments, peering over Jisung’s shoulder. He’s close enough that Jisung can feel Minho’s body heat seeping through his school shirt. 

“It’s Austen,” Jisung says. It’s the only explanation he can offer Minho right now, too distracted by the scent of Minho’s cologne and the warmth of his presence to concoct anything more intelligent. 

Jisung flicks distractedly through the pages of Emma , scanning the words but not really taking any of it in. Minho has yet to move, still hovering behind Jisung, a tangible manifestation of everything he shouldn’t want. 

But Jisung does. Jisung wants. 

After his conversation with Chan earlier that afternoon, he hasn’t been able to think about anything else. Minho infiltrates every aspect of Jisung’s conscience, leaving little room for him to function as a well-adjusted human being. 

Minho. Minho. Minho. He’s all Jisung can think about. His name. His cologne. His warmth. The softness of his touch. The feeling of his breath on the side of Jisung’s neck. The cautious intonation of his voice when he breathes: “Jisung?”

“Yeah?” Jisung whispers. The room shrinks, closing in on him and Minho until their bodies touch, Jisung’s back to Minho’s chest. He can feel Minho’s heartbeat, trembling against his shoulder. 

“Can I?”

Jisung’s breath shudders as it passes through his parted lips. He can feel the curve of Minho’s nose against the nape of his neck, waiting for Jisung’s permission before his lips can do the same. 

Dear god, Jisung wants .

He doesn’t open his mouth, doesn’t say a word, but he nods his head slowly, silently. One second passes, then two. On the third, Minho presses the faintest of kisses to Jisung’s skin, so light it barely counts as such. It’s like Jisung’s neck is a petal and Minho’s mouth is the flutter of a butterfly’s wings, brushing against the flower in his search for nectar. 

The second kiss is carried out with more confidence. It’s firmer, a conscious action rather than something inconsequential. It means something. Fire licks along Jisung’s neck with the slightest brush of Minho’s tongue, bright and burning. The book falls from his grip, landing face-up and open on the floor, and then Jisung is twisting around in Minho’s tentative hold. He gives no warning before smashing their mouths together in a desperate kiss. 

Each press of their lips is hurried and uncoordinated, disastrous in every way, and Jisung fucking loves it.

He clamps his hands down on Minho’s shoulders and walks them into the nearest bookshelf. Minho grunts quietly, a sound that rumbles in his chest, but he doesn’t dare pull away from the hungry slide of Jisung’s mouth. 

An invisible magnetic pull tugs them together. It doesn’t matter how many times Jisung has wished he could forget about Minho. It doesn’t matter how many nights he has lost to dreams of this exact moment. It doesn’t matter that Jisung feels like he’s falling apart at the seams.

Minho is here to stitch him back together. 

Their lips never part for more than a breathless second, one of them swiftly swooping back in to lick their way into the other’s mouth. Jisung is surprised to find himself in control of the kiss, his hold on the back of Minho’s head allowing him to direct their every move. It’s a little startling how easily Minho gives in to Jisung’s touch, clutching desperately at Jisung’s waist, shuddering when Jisung’s nails run through the silky strands of his hair. Minho, who’s steadfastly stubborn and doesn’t listen to anyone but himself, melts like sunlight in Jisung’s hands. 

Jisung’s tongue reverently traces the curve of Minho’s mouth, committing every inch to memory like a prayer. Minho’s lips are red and soft, slick with spit and pretty as a petal, and Jisung vows to worship them for as long as Minho lets him. 

Unfortunately, their time is cut short with the disorienting ring of the doorbell. Jisung and Minho rip apart like a torn love letter, cutting off every point of contact before the bell rings out its final echo. 

“I should get that,” Minho says, wiping his kiss-swollen mouth with the back of his hand. 

Jisung can’t look away. “Okay.” His voice is little more than a whisper, floating like a feather in the space between them. 

“I’ll just…” Minho fails to complete his sentence. His thumb is directed in the general vicinity of the library door, but his eyes are focused on the lower half of Jisung’s face. He doesn’t move to leave, and Jisung doesn’t tell him to go.

The room feels like it’s concaving once more, their bodies drifting dangerously close, but yet again they are sabotaged by the bell. Minho offers Jisung an apologetic smile, strained at the corners, and turns to leave. He gets as far as pressing down on the door handle. Jisung can’t pinpoint the exact thing that spurs him forward. All he knows is that Minho can’t leave this room without knowing he won’t be leaving their kisses along with it. 

This kiss is Jisung’s favourite of all the others. It’s soft and gentle, hardly a step up from the first peck Minho left on his neck, but it’s the closest to perfection Jisung has ever experienced. 

“What was that for?” Minho asks, wide eyes searching Jisung’s face for an inkling of doubt. He doesn’t find any, because Jisung is smiling serenely, cheeks flushed with emotion. 

“I just wanted to,” he confesses, and it’s the shortest version of the truth Jisung can manage committing to in this fragile moment. Anything more could shatter them both. 

*

Lunch the next day is an awkward affair, but it’s no worse than Jisung is used to. The three boys sit in the booth of a local greasy spoon, menus propped up between them as they decide what to eat. 

“Why would anyone want warm tuna mayo?” Changbin shudders, grimacing in disgust as his eyes scan the menu. Beside him, Chan pulls a face of concern, flipping frantically through his own menu until he finds a hot lettuce salad, and promptly gags. 

The other side of the table isn’t nearly as chaotic. Jisung sits across from Chan, feet firmly tucked beneath his seat, staring blankly at the specials board. How they’ve ended up here, God only knows. And Chan. Chan knows everything these days. 

After a few minutes of silent deliberation, the oldest boy slides out from his seat to place the lunch orders, leaving Changbin to have a crack at easing the awkward atmosphere of their table. 

Recently, he and Jisung haven’t seen much of each other outside of football practice. Jisung knows that it’s his own fault for distancing himself from his friends, for assuming the worst despite the fact they’re trying their best, but he doesn’t know how else to cope with the complex labyrinth of emotions twisting through him. 

Changbin is the kind of friend Jisung needs right now, with his stupid jokes and his easy laughter. Even after Jisung cut off contact with Shinwoo, Changbin hasn’t stopped texting him, sending memes no one but himself finds funny, and inviting Jisung over to play video games neither of them really have any interest in. He complements Chan’s calmness and rationale with his ability to find humour in any situation, but is unfailingly genuine when it comes to the more serious aspects of maintaining a friendship. 

According to Chan, Changbin was the one who suggested they leave Shinwoo out of today’s lunch, and possibly all other lunches hereafter. He’s more perceptive than anyone gives him credit for, and to Jisung, that makes him a very important friend indeed. 

“Wow, great weather we’re having,” Changbin tries. 

Jisung peers out of the window at the grey sky. “It’s raining.” 

“Well, I just so happen to love the rain. A lot,” Changbin says. “If it were real, I’d marry it.”

Jisung offers him a befuddled glance. “Changbin, I don’t know how to break it to you, but rain is real.”

The realisation visibly registers on Changbin’s face, and the next thing they know, they’re laughing together. Jisung can’t remember the last time he laughed like this, slightly hysterical, his chest tight with the difficulty of trying to breath in between giggles. 

Jisung regrets pulling away from his friends, because he now knows that’s exactly what they are. His relationship with Changbin and Chan may be different from his connection with Minho, but different doesn’t always mean bad. The way Jisung views Minho has changed over time, and that’s different too. Good different .

Chan returns with their food: a collection of messily constructed sandwiches and paninis, with sides of ready salted crisps, coleslaw and limp lettuce leaves. Jisung peers sceptically down at his lunch, as do his friends with their own food. It was suspiciously cheap, but almost anything is better than the lunches served in the school cafeteria.

“So, who’s the girl?” Changbin asks once Jisung has taken a suitably large bite out of his panini. 

Mouth full, Jisung’s face twists into a confused frown. “What girl?”

Changbin points to an indistinct area on Jisung’s neck. “The one who gave you that?”

Chan lets out a poorly disguised snicker, hiding his smile behind the leafy outcrop of his chicken salad sandwich, and Changbin’s mouth twitches with a grin of his own. 

Jisung, on the other hand, finds the situation more embarrassing than amusing. His face burns red as he recalls the events of yesterday afternoon, tucked away in the private haven of Minho’s family library. It was meant to be a private moment, something for Jisung and Minho to share, but their carelessness has opened up a can of worms Jisung isn’t willing to deal with. Not until far into the future, when he’s miles away from this town and its ever-running rumour mill.

“Oh. You wouldn’t know them,” he mumbles, taking a surreptitious sip of his lemonade. 

Chan chokes on his laughter, and Changbin has never looked more confused in all the years Jisung has known him. No one pushes Jisung for an answer, not after the disaster that was Changbin’s party, but neither do they hide their dissatisfaction with their answer. Lunch ends in a series of pointed stares, stage whispers, and god awful food. 

“Tell Minho he’s got good technique,” Chan whispers once they’re on their way back to school, grinning fiendishly. Jisung gives him an unimpressed glare, the effect of which is dampened by his violently flushed cheeks, and attempts to shove his friend into the nearest roadside ditch. 

*

The forest smells damp after the previous night’s rainfall, which is ideal for Jisung’s biology homework, but not for Lia’s new shoes. 

“I didn’t expect it to be so muddy,” she complains, pouting at the thick layer of muck caked to her once shiny Mary Janes. 

“What did you expect?” Minho laughs. His grey school trousers are tucked into a sensible pair of wellington boots, and a branded anorak hides the school crest stitched onto the pocket of his blazer. 

“Obviously not this,” Lia huffs. “Otherwise, I would’ve borrowed my mum’s hillwalking boots. Why didn’t you warn me, Jisung?”

Surprised at being addressed so directly, Jisung hasn’t the chance to produce an answer more intelligent than a muttered “Sorry.” His own shoes are his regular school loafers, but they’ve been on their last legs since winter so he doesn’t mind the mud as much as Lia does.

It doesn’t take them long to find the plot for their pitfall traps, the bank of the creek and the composition of the trees having become familiar to Jisung over the nights he has replayed his first kiss with Minho. 

“Do you think we’ll have caught worms,” Lia wonders aloud, visibly shivering. 

“Possibly,” Jisung says, rolling up his sleeves in preparation for digging out their makeshift traps. 

“Ew,” Lia whines, crouching down to inspect their findings. “Ew, ew, ew!”

“Lia, you haven’t even lifted the lid off yours yet,” Minho points out, smiling wryly. 

She pouts, elbowing Minho in the ribs. “Leave me alone! It’s gross and slimy and there’s probably a whole settlement of beetles living in there!”

“That is the general idea,” Jisung mumbles, just loud enough for Minho to hear, who laughs under his breath, shoulders shuddering discreetly. 

“Look, just go and sit on that rock over there, and Jisung and I will dig these up,” Minho suggests kindly. 

Lia’s perfectly groomed eyebrows raise in surprise. “Are you sure?” She sounds rather pleased by the prospect, but it’s obvious she’s attempting to be subtle about it, so Jisung opts to humour her. 

“I think we’ll manage.”

Finally content with her position in the group, Lia skips over to the rock by the creek and perches daintily on its mossy surface, immediately slipping her phone out of the candyfloss pink messenger bag strapped across her torso. 

“She has a crush on you, you know.”

Jisung eyes Minho warily. What an odd way to start a conversation, especially after the way their last one ended. Sometimes, Jisung thinks he can still taste Minho’s lips. “I know.”

“Do you…” Minho pauses, awkwardly clearing his throat. “Do you have a crush on her?”

“Nope,” Jisung replies, unbuttoning his shirt cuffs, readying himself for the grubby task at hand. 

“Oh. Does she know that?”

Jisung merely shrugs. If Minho wants to know something, all he needs to do is ask. “I’m not sure. Probably.”

“You should tell her,” Minho continues. “Just to be safe. You wouldn’t want to lead her on or anything.”

“No, I wouldn’t,” Jisung agrees, biting back a smile. 

Minho shuffles on his haunches, fidgeting with the lid of his pitfall trap. A question sizzles within him, Jisung can tell, but there’s something stopping Minho from asking it. Something only Minho can name. 

“Good. I’m glad.” 

A pause. 

“I mean, you could always do it now–”

“Oh my god, just spit it out,” Jisung groans, abandoning his patience once his curiosity makes an unwarranted appearance. 

“Spit what out?”

“Whatever it is you really want to say.”

Minho lets out a long, deep exhale. He looks at Jisung with renewed determination. 

“You don’t have a crush on Lia, and in the past two weeks we’ve kissed twice.”

Okay. So they’re talking about it. About the unspoken thing between them. About all the things Jisung has been keeping to himself since that first afternoon in Minho’s kitchen. 

Before now, they’ve almost been acting like it never happened. They kiss, and they don’t talk about it. It’s similar to how they treated the end of their friendship when they were thirteen. Suddenly and without notice, they were no longer friends. They didn’t talk about it. In fact, they barely even acknowledged that it ever happened. 

Strangely, Jisung is glad for this sudden change in pace. It means things are getting better. It means that he might have a chance at being happy. 

“That is correct,” Jisung nods, lifting the lid off of his trap. He breathes a sigh of relief upon finding it void of any spiders. There’s plenty else in there Jisung isn’t exactly thrilled to find, but for once, luck is on his side. 

“Well, I’d like to know why,” Minho presses. It’s the most frantic Jisung has ever seen him

“You’d like to know why I don’t have a crush on Lia?”

“No, I’d like to know why you kissed me. Twice. And don’t tell me it’s ‘because you wanted to’. That’s a tired and cliched excuse.”

“Okay, well…” Jisung trails off, quickly glancing towards Lia before deeming their secrecy intact. “I kissed you because I wanted to know if my dreams were right.” 

Minho’s mouth drops open, pink as a rosebud. “You’re telling the truth?”

“I’m telling the truth.”

“What does that mean for us?” Minho asks, earnest eyes fixed on Jisung. He looks especially pretty amongst the rich, green foliage of the forest. Jisung wants to pick the wildflowers twisted into the roots of the trees and sit them atop Minho’s dark hair.

Jisung brushes a stray grain of grit from his trouser leg. “What do you want it to mean?”

“No, don’t do that,” Minho says, voice sharper, bolder. “Don’t answer my question with a question. I know what I want, Jisung. Do you?”

*

Jisung doesn’t ask Lia to go to prom with her, but she asks him. He says no, of course, and she takes the rejection with a smile, but he still goes alone. So does Minho. 

They meet by the refreshment table, sipping on plastic cups of alcohol-free punch, and let their shoulders brush. 

“Well, this is nice,” Minho jokes. He looks good, dressed in a grey suit and a white shirt, the collar of which folds open just wide enough for a hint of his sharp collarbones to peek through. 

Jisung hides his smile behind the lip of his cup. “I couldn’t agree more.”

They watch the dancefloor from the side lines, judging their classmates’ dance skills all the while refusing to dance themselves. Chan, Changbin, and few of the other guys from the team have formed a mosh pit near the DJ (who’s music choice is questionable at best), laughing boisterously—and perhaps a little drunkenly too, depending on the contents of the flask Changbin’s been attempting to discreetly pass around. Jisung just hopes for their sake that it’s not Mr Seo's beer. 

They try to beckon Jisung over, even gesturing to Minho, attempting to grow their embarrassing display of flailing limbs and stomping feet by several bodies. Unfortunately, they don’t manage to succeed, attracting the attention of their teachers more than anyone else, and eventually finding themselves being escorted off of the dance floor by Mr Song, the PE teacher and football team coach. 

Their last game took place only a week before, bagging the team their final win before half of them head off to university and jobs alike. Chan and Changbin are sticking together, with plans to study at a local university. Jisung plans to stay in touch, maybe even visit during holidays and mid-semester breaks. He’ll miss them once he’s gone, but Jisung has gotten good at that. At missing people. It gets easier when you know they’ll come back to you eventually.

Shinwoo is sitting at one of the many tables circling the dance floor, a sullen-faced date by his side and a cup of watered down punch in his hand. He looks a little miserable and a lot lonely, but Jisung doesn’t care enough to find out anything more than what he can already see. They won’t meet again after this, and that is a small comfort Jisung welcomes with open arms.

“Do you want to get out of here?” Minho asks once the crowd has grown rowdier and the glares from Shinwoo have become unbearable. 

Relief washes over Jisung like a crashing wave. “I thought you’d never ask.”

*

Making out in a car is not something Jisung has ever considered putting on his bucket list, but he wonders if perhaps he should, just so that he can tick it off. 

The summer heat infiltrates the car, thickening the air until the windows of Minho’s car fog up and their skin melts together, sticky like caramel left out in the sun. Jisung’s mouth feels numb and his legs are cramping up, but in his eighteen years of life, nothing has ever felt this good. Minho sits in the driver’s seat with Jisung in his lap, knees bracketing his hips and Jisung’s hands under the hem of his shirt. Their suit jackets have been long abandoned, thrown carelessly onto the back seats only seconds after their lips met.

They kiss the way boys do. Messy and rushed and eager. Minho’s hands tangle in Jisung’s hair, and Jisung’s fingers dance along the crevices of Minho’s abdomen, drawing shudders and gasps with each touch. 

Jisung has never done this before, but he feels safe with Minho. They were each other’s first friend, first sleepover, first secret keeper. It only makes sense that they share this together too. 

Minho breathes a shaky exhale when Jisung’s fingers begin to undo the buttons of his shirt, revealing inch after inch of bare skin. Constellations dot Minho’s face and neck, tiny freckles blooming in Jisung’s favourite places to kiss, and his eyes look like they’ve captured all of the stars in the night sky, glinting in the dark, like the culmination of all of Jisung’s wishes.

“Are you sure?” Jisung asks, hands trembling, heart thundering, head spinning. 

There are a lot of things Jisung is unsure about. His future. His family. His friendships. He doesn’t know what awaits him beyond a tiny dorm several hours away. He doesn’t know if his dad will return from his year long business trip, or how much longer his grandmother will be here. He doesn’t know if his happiness will stay intact, or if it will turn out to be a momentary relief, drifting apart like pieces of a shipwreck in the middle of a dying ocean.

There are a lot of things Jisung is unsure about, but he’s certain of one thing, and one thing alone: he loves Minho. In the most terrifying, all-consuming way, Jisung loves Minho, and he thinks that Minho might love him too.

Unlike Jisung, Minho won’t be going to university in September. Instead, he’s planning on taking a gap year to figure out the rest of his future. He might spend it at home, or perhaps on a beach somewhere near the equator, but wherever life takes him Jisung will always be a mere phone call away. There’s no way of knowing if the distance will end up breaking them apart, but it’s a risk they're willing to take, even if all they get in return is three months of ice-cream kisses and sweat-soaked nights.

Jisung often likens Minho to the sun in his head when the day is bright and the world is awash with golden light, or even the moon, when all is dark and shadows crack with the glow of moonlight. Now, however, Jisung thinks Minho looks like a star on the verge of supernova. Bright and beautiful and ready to explode.

“I’m sure,” Minho whispers, brushing a strand of hair from Jisung’s eyes. 

When they kiss then, Jisung’s chest bursts with starlight, splitting through the last of his internal ugliness. This, he thinks, is the most beautiful he has ever felt.