Archive of Our Own

San didn't know why it was so hard making friends. It looked easier in the movies and shows than it actually was. 

He really wished for half-meant but polite smiles and a few occasions of lending his stationery to all the other kids was enough to make friends. But it wasn’t and that irked him.

He was 9 years of age and every other 9 year old he saw had at least one friend and that annoyed him. What did the rest of them have that he didn't? 

Was it his hair? His face? His hands? His laugh? What was it that made him so painfully unlikable? 

Did really no one like him enough to at least befriend him? Was he actually painfully unlikeable? 

He asked his older sister once why he didn't have friends like his other peers and she just laughed mean at him and told him because he was unlikeable. So he supposed that was the real reason all along. 

But he doesn't know how his sister had friends. And that too more than one. How was she any better than him? They were the same blood, how was she better? 

And maybe that is the reason why he is sitting on a swing in the vacant playground in the scorching summer seat in the afternoon because unlike everyone else he didn't have friends to spend time with in his summer vacation. 

He kicked his feet on the ground and swung up higher, his grasp tightened on the hot metal chains when he suddenly saw another kid–around his age and just a tad taller than him–enter the empty playground. 

It was hard to make out any of the features due the distance but his skin looked like one out of the summer movies he loved so much. It looked like, if his favourite colour was a person. 

The boy was looking around and San thought that must be hard for him considering how half his hair fell in front of his eyes and he was laughing at his own mean little joke when he observed the boy's eyes falling into his own. 

The boy looked amused like he wasn't expecting anyone else and that amused San in return because he wasn't expecting anyone either and yet this boy with shaggy bangs and honey skin was staring at him with his lips slightly parted. 

There was a short awkward moment when San knew the boy wanted to walk up to him but he doesn't didn't how to so he decided to be kind and shoot a soft smile at the boy. 

And it was supposed to be any other half genuine polite ones but he felt his own lips stretching further and eyes crinkling softly. 

And he supposed his attempt worked wonderfully because the boy's lips curled up too and he swiftly sprinted towards him.

“Hi.” The boy greeted as he sat down on the swing next to San and smiled at him, this time wider and more genuine. 

It was the most genuine smile San had ever received and he couldn't stop his own lips from stretching into a smile too, trying to mirror the one in front of his eyes. 

“I am San.” San spoke up and he once again clutched the metal chain of the swing hard, trying to resist the odd urge he had to brush the hair away from the boy's eyes. 

“I am Wooyoung. What are you doing here alone?” Wooyoung’s tone was curious and not mean–unlike most—and yet San still flushed pink at the slight embarrassment he felt. 

“I–uhm. I don't  have anyone to hang out with so I uh– I hang out here. Alone.” San stuttered out and he knew the pink of his flush was probably worsening when he heard Wooyoung let out a small laugh. 

“Me too.” Wooyoung just simply admitted in a mutter and San looked at him confused.

“I don't have any friends either.” Wooyoung noticed and clarified. San found out a few things that day. 

1. San wasn't the only one who was embarrassed admitting the fact that he didn't have any friends because it was indeed embarrassing.  

“Oh. Well, I am kind of glad,” San uttered without thinking and Wooyoung’s eyes widened as he looked just the softest shades of offended and San spat out the next few words with much urgency, “because I thought I was the only one.” 

“We.. could be friends?” Wooyoung offered after a moment of mutual understanding and San’s jaw went slack and his mouth went agape in the slightest. 

Friends. Friends. Friends. 

This boy who looked like a character out of a book? Who looked like what someone's favourite crayon shade would look like. 

“Really? You want to be my friend?” San questioned and he still couldn't believe it when Wooyoung nodded but he felt a strange swelling in his chest as he finally came to another discovery. 

1. He would never actually have to utter the words previously mentioned that embarrass him because they just become utterly untrue. 

“So what do you say? Friends?” Wooyoung asked, a bit nervous as he noticed how quiet San had fallen and San immediately shoved away his mental list and nodded like his life depended on it. 

“I would love that. I really, really would.” 

“Yeah?” There was this soft delight in his voice, the way his voice softened at the edges made San way too glad.

He had a friend now. 

His first friend . 

—

San never figured out why he didn't have friends (he mustn't be so terribly unlikable if Wooyoung asked him to be friends? Right?) before Wooyoung but it didn't take him long to figure out why Wooyoung didn't have any friends before him. 

He was kind of very wild and reckless. Standing next to him was like closing your eyes and falling into a pit. It was no less than a risk. 

He had never known anyone as mischievous as Wooyoung in his life and his mom tells him everyday that he had many long years before him to still live, yet the feeling that Wooyoung will probably be the most mischievous person he will ever know doesn't go away. 

Once San was waiting for him at the skirts of the woods, standing there as he awaited the return of Wooyoung who had rushed into the forest after a bully took away his bike and disappeared into the green sea of leaves and brown wood. 

San tried convincing him to leave that plan to go awry and go and fetch someone elder and get James ass beat. 

Wooyoung just placed one dramatic on his shoulder and assured him that nothing will go wrong and he will be back in the matter of 10 minutes. 

It has already been 30 minutes since Wooyoung ran in. 

And just when he was finally going to give in and walk into the woods himself, he heard a shout of his name and Wooyoung biked in his vision and he gasped when he saw James just tailing behind him. 

“Run!” Wooyoung exclaimed and San fell into panic mode as he stumbled on his own feet before taking off but looking behind him every other second, he was afraid of leaving Wooyoung behind. 

“What the hell did you do!?” San whispered as soon as James was out of sight and Wooyoung and San were hiding behind a bush just in case. 

“I-I kind of called him a bunch of mean names…” Wooyoung began a bit sheepishly as his eyes met everyone but San’s own. 

“And?” San urged him as he moved closer to his side and Wooyoung sighed before he opened his mouth and closed it again before he finally spoke up. 

“And then I punched him and ran away.” Wooyoung barely whispered but San was basically pressed into him and he heard it like a loud shrill and he gasped. 

( He had two completely different things swirling in his mind and he couldn't decide which one was overpowering the other. 

1. Holy shit! You are dumb as hell. Why would you punch the tall American boy with ghostly blue eyes?! Now he is going to hunt us and beat the shit out of us.

Or 

1. Holy shit! You punched the tall white guy who has been bullying us almost for a year now for no reason? Why are you so brave? But you still do realize he will beat the shit out of us at the first chance he gets? )

“Holy shit…” He begins with that with a faint mumble and Wooyoung just shoots him a small proud smile because in the end San couldn't be mean to him and his tone sounded almost proud. 

“I know right? I never knew I could do that!” Wooyoung remarked as he pressed even further into San’s side and he didn't know that was possible.

“You never thought you could punch a guy?” San asked, a bit humored at the comment, a humorless laugh leaving his throat. He was sure Wooyoung could punch a guy, he was sure Wooyoung could punch any guy.

Wooyoung was… Wooyoung. And he was brave and San was not. Wooyoung could punch every guy from San’s behalf. 

He was sure of that. 

“No… But like James? I never thought I could punch him. He was just too…” Wooyoung wandered off as he scratched his nape and San laughed again this time it was real before he supplied, 

“Tall? And scary? Yeah I know.” 

“Yeah.” Wooyoung breathed out, looking almost relieved at the fact that he didn't have to utter the words and San just glanced at him from the corner of his eye. 

The shadow of the leafy trees was falling halfway on his face and he was smirking about something to himself and San felt like he was a year younger and sitting on a swing in an empty playground. Alone. Until he wasn't. 

“Yeah.” San muttered under his breath as he turned his gaze to in front of him. His heart was still beating fast and unsteady like he was ten and gripping so hard on the metal chains of a burning swing but he felt like he was flying as he swung up and up and saw his town below his feet. And familiar giggles of two boys ringed in his ears. 

—

It was his 11th birthday and instead of being happy like he should be. He felt annoyed. 

It was his 11th birthday. And he felt it was so important (because it was.) And his father chose to go on a business trip instead of being here. 

Being here for his son on at least his goddamn birthday! 

It was a long time ago when he accepted the fact that his father would never love him like other fathers’ loved their sons. 

His father would never remember his favorite color and he would never remember that he couldn't bear to eat carrots ever. He wouldn't remember what songs he liked and which he didn't despite him voicing that all out a hundred times. 

His father would never say ‘I love you’ and neither would he try to show it. But deep inside his heart he expected his father , his family, his blood to be there for him at least on his birthday. 

He assumes not as he sits sulking at the edge of the lake, his feet dipped in the water and his elbows propped on his knees and his face cupped in both of his hands. 

Wooyoung sighed as he glanced at him from where he was standing ( barely 10 inches away from where he was sitting) and skipping stones into the lake. 

“Don't be upset. He must have been busy.” Wooyoung tried to console him and he just rolled his eyes and took another angry breath ( he had been taking a lot of those ever since the morning). 

“That's the fucking problem. Why is he always so busy? And even if he is, can't he be just unbusy for just one day. He's my dad. He is supposed to be here.” San rambled. He felt angry tears pool in his eyes and that just made him even more angry. He wasn't supposed to cry. Why was he crying? He's not a crybaby and his dad doesn't deserve his tears anyway. 

“Not all dads know that.” Wooyoung muttered as he threw one last stone in the lake and San felt even worse. 

He was being selfish. 

Wooyoung’s dad wasn't even here . He had left a long time ago and Wooyoung won't speak anymore about it but he knows it must hurt like hell because he can see it in his eyes whenever he speaks of that. 

His dad wasn't even here for silent dinners or awkward moments on the couch as they both watched the football game. 

Wooyoung didn't even have that. And yet he was the one sulking and crying like a little kid. 

“I am sorry.” San slurred out as he wiped away the tears threatening to fall down soon enough in a harsh but quick wipe from the bottom of his palms. 

All he hears is Wooyoung just giving out a watery laugh as he settles beside him, taking off his shoes and then his socks and also dipping his feet into the cool lake. 

“It's not your fault my dad…did what he did..” Wooyoung mumbled and gave his best and most reassuring smile but they both knew San could see right through him. 

His gaze could cut right through all the lies and into his heart and he didn't know why he could do that and sometimes he doubts that it is because Wooyoung allows him to. 

“Dads suck.” San settled with that despite all the other words and sentences bubbling and clawing at his throat and Wooyoung laughed again, this time he sounded more alive. 

There was a moment of silence and San took that to go through every prominent memory he had of his father. And he recalled what Wooyoung told him about his own father. 

There was a lot. There was more bad than good but maybe he should be thankful that there was any good to compare with the bad to begin with.

He came to a daunting realization. And it clawed at his throat harder than any other set of words begging to let out. 

“Did your parents ever love each other?” San slowly and hesitantly let out the question and Wooyoung turned to face him. 

His face was neutral like this was a completely okay question considering the fact what his dad did. He cheated on his mother. And yet Wooyoung looked like the deepest shade of unbothered and it was admirable but then again everything about Wooyoung was. 

“Maybe before I was around. My older brother told me once that they were in love. But not anymore.” Wooyoung confessed easily and it was like the words were flowing out of his tongue like a river would flow into the ocean. 

It was that easy for him. 

“What about yours? Do they love each other?” 

It was fair of him to ask. It was only fair but it might have been easy for Wooyoung but it wasn't easy for San to admit even though his parents were still there, together , at least physically. So, maybe that is why when he tried to take another breath, this time it hitched. 

“No. I never saw them in love. I don't know how it is to be in love but I am pretty sure it's not like how my parents are. They're always fighting and shouting at each other and other times they just sit in an awkward silence. It's scary. Maybe that's why my dad doesn't like sticking around much. And my mom always sours whenever he comes around and it's just awful to think that they are married.”

San started out slow, carefully picking his words and how they came out and then he looked at Wooyoung. And he remembered this was his only friend and he could tell him anything and everything so he did. 

“Why are they still married then?” 

San was used to knowing everything. He liked it when he knew and when he didn't he just simply didn't enjoy it. And right now, the question thrown at him, he was completely clueless. 

Why are they still married? 

“I-I don't know.” He admitted in a quiet whisper and his voice almost wobbled. 

“Oh. It doesn't matter, you know that right? Don't think about it much.” Wooyoung just said into the serene air and lied down on the grassy ground looking expectantly at San. 

Don't think about it much. 

Wooyoung was just like that, he always said that he didn't waste his time thinking about anything or anyone for more than a few minutes. And San wished he could be like him. 

“I am not going to lie down in mud.” San scoffed as soon as he realized what his friend was asking for and Wooyoung pouted the slightest. 

“It's not mud. It's grass. When have you ever seen green mud?” He whined and San shook his head as a firm no. 

Wooyoung clicked his tongue, maybe annoyed or maybe not, then he sat up and San thought maybe he didn't want to lie down alone. 

Well, he was right, in one way at least. 

Wooyoung first just placed one innocent hand on his shoulder and he didn't think much of it instead he liked it. Wooyoung was warm and even if more warmth in the burning summer sun wasn't ideal, Wooyoung’s warmth was just different. 

San just gazed cluelessly at his face and then he saw that damn grin curling up on his face and muttered under his breath, 

“No.”

The smile stretched further and he felt himself being pulled into the ground and a faint whisper of an excited, 

“Yes.”

San tried fighting the force as he pushed himself to the front into the lake's direction and Wooyoung let out a audible whine as he grabbed both of San’s shoulders and San really didn't want to lie down in the mud so he pushed harder into the front and before he realized both of them tumbled into the lake. 

“Holy–fuck–is the water dirty?!” San spewed as he flailed his legs and arms around, trying to spot Wooyoung despite all the water trying to block his vision by invading his eyes.

“No? Yes? Maybe? It’s the lake, are lakes dirty?” San heard Wooyoung’s pitchy voice from somewhere and he turned to his front and saw Wooyoung, just like him, soaked with the lake water, his hair sticking into his scalp but he was smiling so wolfish. 

It was more endearing than it should have been. It shouldn't have been endearing at all, San thinks, but how can it not be? The way his eyes were shining and the way his lips were smiling. It was like he was born to be endearing in the most unlikely situations. 

San felt himself gulp as he tried to look everywhere else but Wooyoung but it was like his eyes had a mind of their own and wouldn't budge. 

Wooyoung swam towards him and stopped just a few inches short and smiled even wider–how was that even possible?

“Are you happy now? We're soaked.” San finally tried to scold Wooyoung after a while he just felt dazed. He tried for it to sound angry but it just came out as a whisper, small and confused whisper. 

San never liked the water, in fact he hated it so much that once when they went to Seoul when he was 6 and visited the beach; he sat on the sand playing with it all the while everyone else played around in the ocean. 

He didn't like how it soaked one, how it felt so heavy like a burden to carry around.

But right now he couldn't even bring himself to be angry as he just felt the water seep into his clothes and then into his skin and then somewhere deeper. 

And he didn't hate it, not right now, not ever if Wooyoung was the one who pushed him in. 

“Yeah. I like swimming, don't you?” Wooyoung snorted through his nose because he lied and he knew he lied and he knew that San knew that he lied.

And all San did was close his eyes as he smiled too–probably wide, probably impish, probably full of mischief. (What can he say? Wooyoung is rubbing off on him) He swam downwards and grabbed Wooyoung's legs to pull him down in the water too. 

San heard Wooyoung's scream faintly through the water and he couldn't help himself grinning wider and wider when Wooyoung’s annoyed face came right to face his own under water. 

Wooyoung rolled his eyes and placed his hands on San’s shoulder and Wooyoung looked like one of the magical creatures his mom read him about at night until he was 7. The sunlit water and the way it hit the lake and the way it hit Wooyoung under the lake too was probably the reason. 

And Wooyoung shoved him backwards once, twice, thrice and maybe more as he swam towards him too at the same time but all San could see was the bubbles they were forming and the well illuminated water and Wooyoung's face in it. 

And then they were reaching towards the surface and gasping for air as they tumbled around in the water, breathing so heavy like they were breathing for their life. 

San was, he wasn't so sure about Wooyoung, he stared at him through his eyes which felt raw and teary as he inhaled greedy hefty gusts of breath and watched Wooyoung do something similar. 

“Happy birthday.” Wooyoung rasped and San’s stomach fluttered ( for unknown reasons and he rather let those reasons stay unknown) at the thought that maybe the water seeped into Wooyoung too. Into his skins and bones and deeper and deeper. 

“One hell of a birthday.” San scoffed and Wooyoung looked at him funny before he laughed. 

“How many gifts did you get?” Wooyoung asked and this time San laughed. Wooyoung was a little dumb. Who would give San presents? How many friends did he have? 

“How many friends do you think I have?” 

San expected another giggle and then a sarcastic remark, he expected a light hearted joke but what he didn't expect was him to stop his swimming and turn to him. 

Eyes wide in realization, his mouth slightly hung open and San was sure some of the water of the lake must have entered his mouth. 

“What?” San asked incredulously. 

“You didn't get any gifts? Like none at all?” Wooyoung asked even more incredulously and San’s mouth suddenly felt dry despite every other part of him being absolutely soaked. 

“N-no, I mean my parents and my sister got me one each like they should but like–” 

Wooyoung didn't even let San complete, he swam towards the shore and hopped out of the lake. 

“What are you doing?” 

“What time is it right now?” Wooyoung asked hurriedly as he put on his shoes, his wet clothes dripping down onto the grass. 

“You are soaked. What are you doing? ” San enunciated his previous question as he also got out of the lake, swiping his hair back from his forehead as Wooyoung just stumbled around. 

“You know what? Like–uh–I will meet you in an hour or two? Yeah, probably. So uh–I’ll call you up. Bye–Bye!” 

“Wooyoung! What?” San called out behind Wooyoung as he ran away and San just stood there watching him get smaller and smaller until there was none of him left to witness at all. 

“Happy fucking birthday.” San mumbled as he simultaneously sighed, kicking the small rocks beneath his feet. 

It had been an hour ( maybe two?) eversince Wooyoung totally lost his mind and ran away leaving him alone. 

Leaving alone San on his own birthday knowing he was the only friend he had to celebrate with. 

And that thought he stabbed his slice of cake with his fork for the hundredth time since he had got in on a plate about an hour ago. 

He didn't even feel like eating it so he settled with murder instead. 

“Stop stabbing the cake and fucking eat it, San.” His sister groaned when she walked up to the dining table and tried to stare holes into his head. And he stared back. 

“No. I actually won't. It's my birthday and I will do whatever I want to.” San snarked picking up his plate (harshly to the point it almost fell and shattered) and bolted away to his room. 

There he placed his plate on his bed and for the last time struck it with the fork and left the fork deep inside when suddenly telephone ringing echoed in the whole house. 

He shot up from his bed leaving the angsty scene of the murdered cake right on his bed and flew open his door, sprinting down the hallway to the home phone. 

“Get the hell away! It's for me!” San instructed his sister who was treading slowly towards the ringing phone. 

She scoffed, rolling her eyes before she muttered in a slow tone, “Oh my, is it one of your 60 friends calling you up?” 

How dare she. 

“Shut the actual fuck up, alright?” San responded to his sister as he pressed the phone to his ear and he was immediately met with an amused giggle. 

“I didn't even say anything…yet.” 

“Wooyoung.” San breathed out at the familiarity of the voice. It was all too warm again. 

“San.” He sang his name out, dragging out the ‘n’. And San finally beamed after what felt like forever. 

“Where did you run of–” 

“Can I come over?” 

They both spoke at the same time, their voices colliding. 

“I mean–yeah. You don't need to ask.” San replied after a short moment of chuckles and he could hear Wooyoung smiling through the line. Was that even possible? Hearing someone smile through the telephone line? But he swears the sound of Wooyoung smiling bested out loud so obnoxiously.

“Okay! So don't laugh! I don't how to like package things or whatever, plus I was in a hu—” 

“Hey, man, shut up, you know I won't laugh at you, come on.” San finally cut into Wooyoung’s pointless ramble which he felt like has been going on forever. 

Wooyoung rushed into his house and grabbed his hand and pulled them into the room all the while hiding something behind his back and now he just won't shut up and show him. 

“Okay. Fine.” Wooyoung sighed and his eyes finally shone in the way that told San he was going to do it. 

He shoved a clumsily wrapped gift towards him. San glanced down at it and couldn't help but let out a small half muffled chuckle as he saw how poorly the gift was wrapped. 

It was cute. It was really cute.

“Hey! You promised not to laugh!” Wooyoung pouted and tried pulling back the box but San held on it too from the other end and just stuck his tongue out at him. 

“I didn't laugh. I just smiled. I am allowed to smile, aren't I?” San defended himself as he tugged on the box and he felt Wooyoung loosening his grip and it slipped right into his hands. 

“Don’t open it right now.” 

“Why?”

“Just don't.”

San eyed him suspiciously as he reluctantly placed the red shiny paper wrapped box on his desk. 

“So you ran away just to buy me a gift. It wasn't that urgent.” San said between sipping his can of coke, looking at Wooyoung who also had a can in his hand. 

They were sitting on his bed talking about everything and nothing at once like they always did. And talking about everything and nothing with Wooyoung somehow always felt like everything. 

“Don't be stupid. Of course it was urgent.” Wooyoung scoffed pretending to be staring at his can but anyone with eyes could see he was looking at San from the corner of his eyes.

“So urgent you ran out with your shoes untied and clothes soaked?” 

“Yeah.” Wooyoung pursed his lips as he muttered, dropping the can on the floor and falling on his bed on his back. 

San copies him and turns his face to face Wooyoung, the softest yet surprised gasp leaving his lips when he found the latter already doing that. 

“Remember the drawing you gave me last year? The ones with dragons and us being superheroes and fighting them?” Wooyoung whispered directly to him, it was so low that San was sure only he could hear it. 

He hopes that he is the only one who can hear it. 

“Yeah. The dragon looked kind of shitty.” San laughed at the memory of the giant ugly green dragon he drew what felt like ages ago. 

“No. It was good, it was really good.” Wooyoung shook his head firmly before stating and San felt like he was drowning . 

“Don't have to–” San tried to humble himself, he tried to rise up to the surface and gasp for air but Wooyoung didn't let him as he shook his head. 

“I swear, it's still on my wall–you know, in my room. You draw really well and well–I know your dad doesn't like that. But I want you to know that I love your drawings. Please keep drawing,” 

San’s breath stuttered, his jaw went slack and he turned his own head away from Wooyoung to his walls. There were a few papers pasted on them, many drawings of dragons and fairies and vacant playgrounds with two bo– 

“Forever.” Wooyoung whispered the last word and he was damn sure he wasn't meant to hear that. But despite the sound of water rushing clouding his ears, he could hear it loud and clear. 

“ Forever ?” 

Did Wooyoung even know how much ‘forever’ (with a capital F) was? Did even San know that? 

“Yeah. Forever” 

But the way Wooyoung spoke, the way his voice sounded and resonated so deeply in his body, San was almost convinced that Wooyoung did indeed know how much forever was. 

“Fine. I'll be here in my room with oil pastels smeared on my hands and shitty dragons on countless pages, forever.” 

“Yeah?” Wooyoung asked and his voice came out as a breathy chuckle. 

“Yeah. You've left me no other option.” San half joked but that died down in his throat the moment his eyes fell on Wooyoung when he placed his hand over San’s own. 

“Good.” 

Good .

Really, really good. 

—

Being almost thirteen years old was not a fun time. Again, the movies and shows and books lied to him. Being thirteen was a pain in the ass. 

Suddenly his legs were too long and his arms were too short compared to the other pair of limbs. His voice cracked like it was dry soil and he was too embarrassed to speak in the fear of that happening. 

Being thirteen was hard for other reasons too. These were a little personal and not universal like the previous ones and sometimes he tossed around in his bed, awake, at night cursing those reasons. 

Crushes .

There he said it. His horrifying secret that he clutches so hard into his chest that they have started leaving marks. 

Crushes. He hated having crushes because he didn't have crushes like other normal boys his age. 

Because he was sure that while agreeing with everyone else on how Yoona from Girls Generation was the most good looking idol ever there shouldn't be the underlying words of, 

But Junho from 2PM is very good looking too. 

Or when every other boy was gushing about how pretty Roh Jinhee ( the prettiest girl in their class according to at least 8 boys) was.

He was sure he shouldn't be thinking about how pretty Kang Yeosang is.

He really shouldn't be doing that. 

Why was he doing that? Why wasn't Jinhee prettier than Yeosang? Why was Junho more pleasing to him than Yoona? Why was there a funny feeling in his stomach whenever Wooyoung was a little too close? 

Why?

“Hi.” Yeosang snapped him away from his thoughts by suddenly speaking in between the lecture from the table beside him, where he sat. 

San would have preferred Roh Jinhee so terribly not because she was so fucking pretty or anything but the exact opposite. 

He is damn sure that can't be right in any way at all. 

“Hello.” San greeted nonetheless and also didn't forget to add the small and sweet polite smile to it. 

Yeosang was one of the only few kids who actually bothered to talk to him except Wooyoung. 

And San was really thankful that (he really was, he swears) but why did Yeosang have to be so…good looking? So nice to look at? 

“How’s your day so far?”

“It's alright.” San leaned back in his chair, eyeing Wooyoung who sat in the row beside him, just a seat behind his own. 

Wooyoung was already staring at him with the look in his eye which screamed anticipation. He smiled at Wooyoung too–but the kind of smile he swears he has only ever smiled at Wooyoung before. It was polite probably the opposite and yet it felt like the most right thing in the world. 

And he smiles back like he smiles back every time, leaning on towards, torso resting on his two hands which in return were resting on the table. 

“Last day before summer. Are you excited?” Yeosang once again interrupted him–this time his and Wooyoung’s little stare off. 

San nodded his head, picking at his nails, legs bouncing up and down and up and down. 

San was always excited for the summer. He loved the summer. He loved the scorching heat of it, he loved the cold ice creams, he loved all the free time, he loved the time spent at the lake, he loved being cooped in his room all his afternoon just trying to get Wooyoung’s nose correct for once on the pages of his sketchbook. 

He loves the summer. He loves the summer because all of it goes to Wooyoung. Wooyoung owns the summers—at least his and San’s. 

“Yeah. I love the summer.” 

And I love spending it with Wooyoung and that's partly why I love the summer.

“Yeah? Me too,” Yeosang agreed with him and it was probably the first time they exchanged more than a few words, “But–uh– I never kind of see you around?” 

San tilted his head at the question. San saw Yeosang around (in the playground with all the other boys or sometimes at the grocery store) . Maybe Yeosang just didn't look hard enough. 

“I am… around. At the lake or in the woods mostly.” San shrugged, stuffing his books inside his back, eyes glancing at the clock, waiting for the bell to ring anytime now. 

“The woods? Aren't you scared of what might be in there? Like I don't know animals or bugs?” San laughed at that as he shook his head no. 

“Of course not. There aren't any scary animals, just stray dogs and cats. Those are cute, not scary. And plus I don't wander in there alone, I have Wooyoung.” 

He started out softly (deciding just to say one sentence) but then he glanced at Yeosang and the faint curious glint of his eyes and words just spilled out. 

“Oh yeah. You hang out a lot with Wooyoung…” 

San nodded at that, glancing back at the said boy who was in turn glancing at the clock. And just at the right time the bell rings and he shoots up from his seat and bids a quick goodbye to Yeosang. 

“Yeah! I was wondering if—” Yeosang hurriedly slurred out whilst also standing up and slinging his bag on his shoulder but rest of his words but washed over by the chattering crowd of the other kids (and the heart bursting feeling in his chest when Wooyoung grabbed his hand and pulled him out of the door.).

So he just turned to him and  smiled wide at Yeosang the words of slight sorry shining in his eyes as he was being dragged away. 

“Who was that?” That's the first thing Wooyoung asks him as soon as they walk out of the school building. 

“Yeosang. You don't know Yeosang?” San questioned, a bit surprised at how someone could not notice Yeosang.

“No. I do… I just forgot his name. What were you both talking about?” 

San shrugged, biting the insides of his cheek. 

“You know, just the summer. He was like ‘I don't see you around much’. I just told him I am at the lake most of the time.” 

“Did you invite him to hang out with us?” 

San shook his head no when he finally realized the warmth on his hand. He glanced down with one eye to see Wooyoung and his hands interlocked and his breath got stuck in his throat. 

There is that feeling again. That feeling which is so sure is so very wrong. Yet he likes it and wants to cherish and lock it in his heart and hear it beating with that feeling in the middle of night in the dark. 

That's so much emotion for being 13. That can't be right can it? 

“San. San? San!” Wooyoung snapped out of his daze, snapping his fingers right in front of his face. 

“Yeah. Sorry, what?” 

Wooyoung sighed before he chuckled. Shaking his head and whispering into the air slowly but loud enough so it is audible. 

“What were you thinking about so intensely?” 

You. 

“Things. Many things. Like how Ms.Won didn't kill me for incomplete English assignments.” San chose to lie through his teeth instead because what if he doesn't like the truth? 

“She did give you the dirty side eye she uses so much. She'll definitely mark you less in the next assignment.” 

San let out a breath of relief when Wooyoung exclaimed and believed his lie (which was so obnoxiously false from the way his eyes flickered around everywhere). 

Act cool. 

Act cool. 

“Yeah! I can't believe how strict she actually is! Like English is the hardest thing ever, she can't expect me to be perfect at it.” 

(Now there are 2 completely things San wants at the same time as he side glances at Wooyoung’s chattering face,

1. To confess. To confess all his feelings and muddly mountains of emotions in a hurriedly slurred out word vomit. 

That is the one which is wrong.

1. To harbour his feelings forever just for the sake of being able to look at Wooyoung like this–the shine on his face, the glint in his eyes, his wide and probably mischief planning grin on his lips and the few beads of sweat glistening on his forehead–again and again.

And this one is supposedly right, but is it if even the thought of keeping it in forever hurts so much?)

But he wants to be right, and he wants to be right to the point where he almost needs it, so he nods to himself, trying to keep his pulsing heart at bay and chooses the 2nd one.

The right one. 

San likes to draw. Actually scratch that San loves to draw. Art is one thing which feels right no matter what. 

No matter what. 

Even if half his sketchbook is filled with poor attempts of sketching Wooyoung (sometimes intentional other times not), it is right and nothing in this world can make it wrong. 

He reverently started to scribble with the blue oil pastel on the page (it was starting to look like an awfully familiar lake) when suddenly his door burst open. 

“You can knock!” San hissed at a bouncy Wooyoung as he stared at the one stroke of blue invading the green and brown surrounding it. 

“What are you drawing?” Wooyoung asked excitedly, totally ignoring his question (slash complaint) and yet San couldn't help but melt. 

If someone loved San’s art more than San (and that was a lot of love because San only loves 2 things counted on his fingers more than his art) it's Wooyoung. 

“The lake.” San muttered as he started down at the canvas, the blue scribbles which had finally started to resemble a lake and the grass and mud around the water body, little trees peeking in from the corners accompanied with a bright blue sky (a peculiarly blue sky) and a shining (also oddly bright) sun. 

“No way the sky actually looks that blue to you. That's very blue.” Wooyoung commented as he dropped down to sit next to him on the floor, fiddling with the green and brown pastels on the floor. 

“It is perfectly blue.” San pouted, trying to blend two shades together with the tip of his fingers, tongue sticking out just the slightest out of the corner of his lips in concentration. 

“No, I am pretty sure it's not that damn blue. It's almost romantic how exaggerated its color is.” Wooyoung continued to nag, his voice laced with something unreadable for once. 

“It's not romantic. It's the lake, what can be so romantic about a lake?!” San snapped lightly and he hated when he asked questions he already had the answers too. 

San thinks the lake is indeed very romantic, in fact San can barely name a few things more romantic than the lake. 

“Okay. You have a point.” 

Don't agree with me. 

“Lakes are pretty…meh.” 

Don't agree with me, please. 

“Yeah. But I like the lake. I love the lake.” San breathed out, his finger slowing the process of blending of colors. 

Please say that lakes are romantic. 

“Yeah sure. Why don't we hang out outside? Let's go!” Wooyoung diverted the topic, trying to pull San away from his work and San barely remembered to struggle as he was being pulled up and then away. 

Wooyoung was pulling him out the door and the house and probably he would pull them out of their street too eventually and yet all San could focus on was the blue staining Wooyoung’s forearms from where San’s hands were pressed against them. 

San always considered his soul to be a colourful blue. And right now he could see all that colorful blue staining Wooyoung like it belonged to him all the while he pretended to own it. 

It looked beautiful and it looked so right that washing off that color would be no less than a sin in San’s books now. 

That day he learned two things. 

1. His soul was probably as blue as the sky in his summer fantasies. 

And 

1. That blue looked the most stunning on Wooyoung. 

—

Summers were cruel and they just grew more cruel by the years they grew older. It was like the sun grew more cruel and the skies got more bluer but San? San stayed the same. And he knew that wasn't right, he was supposed to be growing up like everyone else. But he felt stuck, like a loop of a memory. 

14 felt like a lifetime to San. (Also the fact he finally outgrew Wooyoung. Thank you 2 inches of extra height he gained). He felt like too many things had already happened during 14. 

He had a girl like him for the first time. Trying to play footsies with him in maths class. He felt oddly guilty while sliding away his foot. 

(Why though? Because he was rejecting the girl or was it the fact that he'll never be able to love a girl at all? But he rather not admit either). 

Her name was Lee Yunbi and she was pretty, she really was. She had pale white skin and big bright eyes and long brown hair till her waist. But he can't help thinking that maybe if she had shorter hair and broader shoulders and a sharper face San would actually find her pretty. 

He is sure that can't be right. He was supposed to find girls like Yunbi pretty with her lean shoulders and gentle face. 

But maybe if she was just a bit more alike to him , she would totally be his type. 

14 was also the time he came to the full and daunting realisation of what his parents were. 

Victims of the need for normalcy. 

Victims of fear, fear of being different and fear of being themselves. There were too many words to describe it. 

(I should've never married you! 

Oh really?!? Then who was going to marry a bitch like you?! You should be glad I married you. I made your life good. 

I would have been happier if it weren't for you! I would have been less rich but happier. You ruined everything for me!

Shut up. You're stupid, you don't realise anything.)

She was young and he was rich and it was the perfect opportunity for everything. To be the standard suburban family of everyone’s stories. 

It wasn't love. There was never love. And it would foolish to even think there ever could be. 

And that scared him? Because then what was love actually? Was it like how the boys ought it to be? A pretty girl who is probably an amazing kisser, is that what love is? Or is it like the movies where the perfect person is always there at the perfect times for the perfect emotions? 

Yup. 14 felt like a lifetime. 

14 felt too minor. 14 felt too minor as San layed down with Wooyoung on the latter's bedroom floor staring up at the ceiling, vision and mind clouded with sleepiness. 

“How did you even paste that to your ceiling?” San finally asked after too much mindless staring at one of his drawings on the ceiling of the room. 

All the other boys their age had posters of bands and movies (and women) up on their walls. And it was totally understandable but not Wooyoung. 

He means he did have a few posters of bands up and pictures with his mom and brother but the rest of his wall? They were covered with drawings. 

Drawings which looked like a 10 year old drew and then drawings San remembers just drawing vividly (because they were recently made). 

It made everything in his mind go blank because there were drawings he remembers crumpling up and throwing out in one corner of his room. The same he considered a waste of time and the same which now occupied space on bright teal walls. 

“The ceilings are not that high. And ladders exist.” Wooyoung slurred out in a few breaths. Nodding almost proud of himself. 

“Why is that the only one on the ceiling?” 

“Why not? It's my favourite.” 

“The lake one? The one you said had too blue of a sky?” San asked, a bit humoured. A breathy laugh at escaping his throat in the last few words at the thought. 

A breathy laugh because his throat went a little dry at the memory of bright, bright blue on honey skin. 

He thinks about that way too much. He thinks about it every time he sees the sky, the lakes, the blue crayons, the blue pastels, the blue paints, blue everything. 

He thinks about that. He thinks about him. 

“I like blue. I like the lake. I like the sky. I like your drawings. I like you. Do you need more reasons?” 

No. But if you could speak forever and I could hear you speak forever. 

“No.” 

“I could give you more though.” 

Over the years San has known Wooyoung, he has come to know one thing. Wooyoung being sleepy was almost like people being drunk in the movies. 

He would say everything he would never usually say when he was more awake, more conscious. 

“Yeah?” 

San felt a sudden surge of confidence and he slid his hand just the slightest to his right and let his hand just linger beside the younger's. 

“Totally. Do you want me to?” 

Why would San ever refuse? 

So he nodded, unsure if Wooyoung could catch it all but unknown to him Wooyoung stared at him all this while with the slightest and softest smile on his face from the corner of his eye. 

“I like the summers. I like them because we have more time to be with each other. And I like the lake because we spend so much time there. I like your hair when they get all messy and wet because of the lake. I like when we run to my house because it's closer to change your wet t-shirts because you catch colds too easily. I like the lake, San. I love the lake.” 

San held his breath the whole time Wooyoung spoke because he was too afraid of disturbing Wooyoung even the slightest when he spoke. 

And then he felt like he forgot to breathe completely when a warm hand pressed upon his own. 

“I also like when you sneakily try to hold hands. “ He chuckled out, drawling his words out slowly. 

“I don't do that.” San croaked out, his throat feeling like it was a desert, like it was dry like summer. 

“Okay. Then maybe I just wanted to hold your hand.” 

There wasn't a hint of mischief or sarcasm in Wooyoung's voice as usual. It was just breathy and drawly and genuine. 

But he won't remember this tomorrow morning. He never does, all the things he says in the middle of a tired and sleepy unconscious state, he never cares enough to give them a place in his mind. 

It's like once your secrets slip out, they become secrets even to you. They become the secrets of the world. 

“I know. I like holding hands too.”

“Just hands or my hands?” 

How can you just ask things like this? 

San smiled, turning to face Wooyoung who was already facing him with a wider smile. 

“Hands. Just hands.” 

Wooyoung scoffed, rolling his eyes (but they looked too fond to be snarky at all),

“Well I like holding your hands. Your hands.” He enunciated holding up their hands which were now intertwined up for them both to see. 

“That’s cute.” San whispered into the air and he let the air carry that to Wooyoung’s ear and then he hopes his heart too because there were still the underlying words of, 

You're cute. 

“Our hands?” 

“No. Your hands.” 

And if San could choose a moment to live in forever, he would choose this one where Wooyoung laughs a little and their hands drop on the floor and he feels like his heart is in his throat. 

—

Girls. 

If girls annoyed him at 13, then girls had become the bane of his existence at 15. 

Every boy he ever talked to just had that on his tongue. 

Girls this, girls that. 

Sometimes he just wished he could shout out to the whole world that he wasn't like them, so they would stop bothering him. 

But he can't. So he just sighs and purses his lips and nods along as Choi Yeonjun from Geography talks his ear off about some girl named Ahn Kyurin because he was unfortunately stuck in the seat next to him last year. 

“And she's so pretty. Like she has this crazy soft hair and like her eyes are so pretty. She's so pretty—” He rambled on endlessly.

“Hey, what's your name though?” He finally paused in between just to ask this a few seconds later. 

“San. Choi San.” San muttered, trying to look through the shelves and find all the things his mother asked him to fetch from the grocery store. 

“What about you? Who do you like?” 

San groaned inside his mind, dropping his hands down and finally facing the boy. He was pretty. Wait, no, he isn't supposed to think that. 

He cleared his throat and clicked his tongue. 

“None of your business, Yeonjun.” He snapped. 

Yeonjun pouted before stepping just one step closer and whispering out, 

“Oh come, I won't tell anyone.” 

What a lier. San thinks. The moment he finds out, he will probably announce it to the whole world. Anyone would. 

“I don't like anyone.” San settled with that, picking up his hands again and trying to get back to work. 

“I saw you scribbling ‘S+W’ at the back of your notebook once.” Yeonjun said so nonchalantly and yet San felt his blood run cold. 

Fuck. 

He froze and his teeth immediately started grazing his lips. His legs started to bounce up and down. And he closed his hands into fists. 

“Do you like Woori? You know Moon Woori?” He asked, his eyebrows wiggling, his lips raised in a smirk. San wanted to punch him. 

San gulped before he shook his head no and desperately tried to go back to finding whatever his mom had told him to get. 

Take deep breaths. It's ok, there is no way he'll know. Just act normal. 

“Hong Woongji? But she's two grades higher than us.” 

“I don't even know her. Don't be stupid.” 

San finally gave up on trying to focus on finding the things he needed and just started staring at his own feet, hoping that Yeonjun would disappear into thin air and never return into his sights ever again. 

“Ah-ha! It's Wonjin fro–” 

“Hey, man, how about you stop bothering him?” 

Yeosang’s hesitant voice cut Yeonjun. And they both turned around to see Yeosang, leaning against the fridge opposite to the shelf 

“Geez. Fine. I was just asking.” Yeonjun rolled his eyes, his voice conveyed fully that he had lost interest before he grabbed a few packets of candy and walked away. 

But San’s neck was still turned to Yeosang, who he smiled politely at (like always). Yeosang also smiled (a little wider) as he walked up to him, shoulders brushing against one another. 

“He's chatty, isn't he?” 

San laughs, his tense body finally relaxing before he shrugs and finally grabs the things his mom asked for. They were right here, how didn't he spot them earlier? 

“He talks a lot. About useless things too.”

“You think girls are a useless topic too?”

San bit his lip, nodding and trying to suppress a smile at the oddly triumphant voice Yeosang spoke with and the way he waved his hands around while speaking. 

“They talk about them too much.” Yeosang concluded, picking up a packet of MnMs (Wooyoung loves those.) 

“I know right. It's almost annoying!” San groans, feeling like an unknown weight being lifted off his chest by finally admitting out loud that girls to him at least, were not an entertaining topic to talk about all the goddamn time.

Just a minimal thing, such immaculate joy. 

Yeosang nods very enthusiastically before he falls oddly silent. It looks like he is contemplating in his head very intensely. 

“Can I—Can I have your number? You know we have known each other for so long. It wouldn't hurt to get to know each other better.” Yeosang finally spits it out and San can't help but play out an amused grin on his face as he takes out his phone and hands it to Yeosang. 

His eyes brighten as he immediately starts to punch in his number and then saves it and hands it back to San. 

“Yeah. Well I have to go now but call me later. We have a lot in common, it will be a fun conversation.” San said, smiling at Yeosang for once not being just polite but also genuine. 

“Yeah! Yeah–of course. Thanks.” Yeosang calls behind him as he walks away to the billing counter and he chuckles fondly under his breath.

“Who are you texting? Oh my god. Is it a girl finally?” Wooyoung jokes in the dark room they are sitting in, both of them pretending to watch the movie playing in front of them. 

San rolled his eyes a scoff barely escaped him before he turned to face Wooyoung and he fell completely silent. 

The light of the TV reflected on his face and fell beautifully on him. Lighting up his already shiny eyes and defining his lips. 

Why is the world so against him?

“It's Yeosang. From school.” He answers truthfully, no playfulness present like the other boy who just nods at the new information. Face expressions gravely changed all of a sudden. 

“He is nice. Really nice. He always helps me cheat in maths.” Wooyoung comments, dropping his head on his shoulder. 

San held his breath for a few seconds. 

It is okay.

It is okay.

Calm down.

“That's why you score so well. No wonder why.” 

San laughed a watery laugh and Wooyoung laughed similarly too (not because of the poor attempt at a joke–or whatever that was.) 

“Yeah. Do you want to go outside?” Wooyoung suddenly proposed and San gasped a bit. 

“At 11 PM? My parents are going to skin us alive.” He scoffed, jokingly pushing Wooyoung off of him who stayed stubborn and clung to him even more. 

San’s heart pumped with a new kind of life at that. 

“They don't have to know. They are asleep. And in heavy sleep.” Wooyoung whined, grabbing one of his arms (San had been gaining more muscle recently) and slowly rubbing his face against his shoulder. 

“No. Wooyoung, I will not do that.” San firmly said, bringing back his attention to the screen of his phone showcasing the words typing… in a small corner at the bottom. 

“Oh come on. It will be fun. This movie sucks anyway.” The whining intensified and so did San’s replies of ‘no’ and ‘no way’.

San hissed as Wooyoung stepped on his foot as they hopped out of the front door. Wooyoung just laughed sheepishly at that. 

“Sorry.” He muttered, pushing him out in the street, licking his lips (he does that a lot.) 

“If we get caught it's on you. And you alone.” San jabbed a finger into his chest and whispered right into his face. 

“I know. Now stop stabbing me with your finger.” Wooyoung hissed this time, pushing San a bit away. 

“What are we even going to do so late at night?” San asked, looking a little awed at how empty and serene the streets at night were. 

The only sign of life except them running around in the empty streets were the distant lights in a few people's rooms, who were still awake. 

“This feels so….movie-ish.” San pants out when they finally stop running around like two little kids in the vacant streets, laughing escaping them like light seeping in through the cracks of a window. 

“See? I told you, it will be fun.” Wooyoung smirked, a little smug than not. And San thought Wooyoung was the most beautiful like this, when he was winning and San decided at that moment he'll always let Wooyoung win between them two.

And San reads a lot and he sees a lot of romance books and movies, respectively. He always reads how crushes makes a person feel like living, feel like flying then why does he feel like he's dying? 

“Yeah.” was all he could muster and yet Wooyoung seemed to be pleased to the moon and back. 

Vending machines suddenly became his favourite thing in the whole wide world. 

He just stared at Wooyoung, and his face in the faint and electric glow of the vending machine as he licks his lips and carefully slips in some cash into the machine. 

He doesn't even know how they reached the other side of their small town. How far did they run? How fast did they run? 

Sometimes Wooyoung looked too good to be true. He looked like he would crumble and fade away any second because real people can't actually look like that, can they? 

But Wooyoung was real. He was very real, he was real under the sun, he was real under the stars. He was so very real. San almost wished that he wasn't. 

So that San could pull him in and kiss him, like he has done too many times in his head already and it won't be wrong. 

But Wooyoung’s real, as real as San is and even more real is the soothing ache in his heart when Wooyoung hands him the packet of chips and their hands linger around each other just for a moment too long. And it was okay, because in the dark of the night, the only witness was the dull but electrifying glow of the vending machine resting on Wooyoung’s face making him shine. 

Shine like he was all the stars in the sky and the sky above them was just littered with useless stones of no utter use at all because Wooyoung did the entirety of their work. 

And all of a sudden when Wooyoung smiled at him, all crooked and lopsided and so damn Jung Wooyoung when he stumbled and dropped the packet of crisps. 

He wasn't dying anymore. He was finally rising. 

He felt like he would die any second now, all because of a realisation. 

Kang Yeosang, sweet and funny and charming and handsome Kang Yeosang. The same Yeosang who San had become such good friends with over the past few weeks was maybe just like him. 

Okay, maybe too much like him. 

But not like him at the same time. 

Yeosang was sweet spoken and almost shy. He was so pretty and pleasing to look at but as gentle he was, he was even more strong. He was amazing. 

And he was into men (still under investigation but firmly believed to be true). 

San should've seen the signs. He really should have. It's not every day another guy walks in through the local grocery store and shoos away Choi Yeonjun for you. And then also admits that he finds all the other boys talking about girls annoying (when they both know that is what they should be also exactly doing.) 

But Yeosang just doesn't like any boy. He likes the boy. He likes Wooyoung . And he isn't doing anything to make it less obvious. 

San has seen how he looks at Wooyoung, with a sense of longing. A weird sense of longing he can't quite place his finger on. But it's longing and it's yearning and he would know because he lives within those words most days than not. 

And he doesn't know whether to be relieved or jealous so he chooses both. 

“Oh my god. I am going to sound so stupid and so hypocritical and so asshole-y,” San one day finally found the courage to ask the question of confirmation in his mind as him and Yeosang sat by the lake, knees worth of legs dripped in the water and lemonades to sip along, “but do you really don't like anyone?” 

Yeosang gave him a weird look, the straw bit between his teeth. 

“That's a weird question, especially coming from you, you are like the number one ‘let us not talk about getting girlfriends for once please’ advocater I have ever met.” 

San laughed softly at that, barely shaking his head no, his whole body fumbling inside with even the thought of speaking those few words. 

“Oh really? But the real question is how many ‘let us not talk about getting girlfriends for once please’ advocates have you actually met for me to be the best?,” He started with a harmless joke, even earning a justified laugh from Yeosang before he dropped the tsunami all at once on him, “but I never said it had to be a…girl.” 

He tried to ease his words in slowly and steadily because he doesn't know if Yeosang stands in front of his mirror every night and tries to convince himself that being whatever the fuck he was, is okay like him or not. He didn't know how hard it would hit him. 

Yeosang barely let out a breath and let go of his, almost bit off at the upper edge straw, from his teeth. 

“That's…weird.” He finally spoke up and San finally let out a breath. 

Weird. 

“It is. But not bad weird.” San still tried to soothe over the words and how big their impact was after all. 

“Well. Yeah, I guess. I do like someone,” Yeosang confirmed, “and I don't know why. But that someone is just there and I am just there. They're cute.” Yeosang speaks but just vaguely, hands waving around the air, maybe trying to make the information seem more than it actually was. 

“Who is that someone?” San asked and from the corner of his own eye he saw something spark alive in Yeosang's own. 

“I’ll let you figure that one out.”

And Yeosang looked too alive for San to shoot the arrow that read ‘ I already know it is Wooyoung.’ and pierce both of their hearts. 

Wooyoung was angry. Like genuinely and completely angry and most likely fuming, standing at the gates of his house, leaning against the door frame. 

“Where were you all day long?” He immediately asked as soon as San walked up to him, jumping in and standing just a step shy of the other boy. 

“The lake.” San nonchalantly replied, still trying to figure out why Wooyoung looked so angry in his already clouded mind. 

“With Yeosang? Are you replacing me with him now?” Wooyoung’s sharp words cut straight through all the clouds of his mind and almost killed them. 

“What?! No! Are you fucking stupid? I was just hanging out with him for fun!” San pushed him aside but grabbed his hand with his own and using the other push opened the door of his house and pulled them in. 

“You're always hanging out with him nowadays. I feel like you're going to spend all summer with him! What happened to us?” 

Us. Us. Us. Us. Us. 

His mind chanted and chanted, he caught his breath in a few beats before he firmly shook his head no and placed a firm hand on Wooyoung's shoulder. 

“You're still my best friend, alright? It was just something bugging me. I just wanted to figure that out, it's not as big as you are making it.” 

“Then tell me what that bug of your mind is that you almost forgot about your best friend ?!” Wooyoung scoffed, shrugging off his hand with such ease. 

Best friend. 

Wooyoung loved using that word, and he rolled it off his tongue like stars in the skies and the flowers in the bushes and the waves in the lake, like the most natural of things. 

“I don't think I can tell you.” San whispered, a little shamed–wondering if Wooyoung can actually see the little light shades of that on the hood of his eyes. 

With one confession, there had to be another one. And he wasn't ready for either. 

But Wooyoung just rolled his eyes, not even trying to understand the genuinity of his words at all, maybe blinded too severely by his own anger of being seemingly replaced, that too, by his best friend. 

“Yeah. Because there is no such reason!,” He exclaimed and then all of a sudden he fell quiet, “Is he cooler than me? More fun? More calm?” He asked and each word from Wooyoung was trying to rip his heart apart. 

(And once again in his life Choi San was met with options

1. The truth. 

Or 

1. The truth.

Either he spills Yeosang's truth or he spills his own and he doesn't know which one is actually the more poisonous to let free.) 

“Yeosang–he—he is not like you,” San finally broke his silence, ``he is like me and you won't understand because you're not like us, “ and he likes you okay? He likes you like Yeonjun likes Gyuri or whoever!” 

Wooyoung’s face blanked at that and San almost wanted to bit his tongue into two because what the fuck did he just do?

But before he could do so, Wooyoung closed his eyes and laughed–not mean or I am still mad laughter–just normal laughter. 

“You think Yeosang likes me?” 

“You don't actually think Yeosang likes me. Anyone with two functioning eyes can see that Yeosang likes you.” 

What. 

“What the he—” 

“No fucking way, San,” Wooyoung continues laughing almost sounding relieved ( but sometimes San lets his mind wander and wish a little too ahead of himself.) as he slid down the hallway walls of San’s house and sat on the floor. 

And San joined him. 

“He doesn't like me.” San protested weakly.

“He likes you.” Wooyoung instantly bit back. 

San sighed, his mind too cloudy to think anymore so he just dropped his head into his knees which were against his chest. 

“Promise me one thing.” San spoke, stronger and louder and wholly serious. 

“You will not tell anyone about Yeosang. I was a fucking asshole to tell you but don't you dare speak that to a single soul—I swear to god if you do.” He threatened lightly, his voice just muffled at the ends from his face being hidden in his knees because he most definitely wasn't flushed pink right now. 

“Yeah. I won't do that obviously, what kind of monster do you think I am.” 

The worst part about hiding, San thinks, is when you leech off the words to someone else. Right now he leans his head on Wooyoung’s shoulder and sighs and soaks in as much solace as he can from the words which he didn't even have any rights to. 

—

Irony was one funny fucking bitch. 

San felt like life was like water colours. A little shade of something, even just a little drop, but it will still slither and spread as far as it could. 

Wooyoung was a canvas and all the wrong colors were being splashed on him to his accord. 

If last summer San was trying to ‘ ditch’ Wooyoung, this summer Wooyoung was trying to completely scrub him out of his life. 

Intentionally or not, that's the real debate in his mind. 

Roh Jinhee was indeed the prettiest girl ever. Because he now knows how Wooyoung looks at her. 

How he changed his route to Math, just to bump into her and awkwardly chuckle while apologizing. 

And he has to stand there, quiet and suffocating, and pretend not to be a whirlwind of emotions, a messy black made because you mixed too many colors together. 

He just thought it was cruel, he was learning how to be content with whatever he had of Wooyoung—not every part of him but at least he had few. But now that was also being snatched away from him. 

Wooyoung was probably out somewhere, thinking how to impress Jinhee or maybe even probably impressed her by now and here he was sitting by the lake—once it used to be their lake— only feet in water yet all of him drowning. 

He stared at the calm waves of the water. The orange and yellow hue on the surface because of the setting sun. And yet he feels like he'll be forever covered with ugly blotches of blue. 

Sometimes he thought he was a hollow pit like the one of a lake and Wooyoung was the water, that Wooyoung and him are supposed to be one and there is no other way. 

Then suddenly the sun named Jinhee rose with so much intensity and started to dry away all the water, his water. 

And now he's just a dying lake , a dying boy. 

He didn't even realise when he started to cry and when the tears started to roll down his cheeks, when he started sniffling and trying his best to stop them. 

Maybe his body was trying to fill the drying space with new water but San didn't want anyone or anything else except Wooyoung. 

And anyways the lake wasn't completely dried up yet, so he sighed as he stood up and walked further into the lake. From his feet, his thighs then his stomach and then his chest (the highest the water reaches because that's where heart is) all soaked in the water. 

He can still feel Wooyoung in the waves, it's like the waves held back in a part of him every time he climbed down into the water to just whisper them to San’s heart later. 

And what a foolish heart he had because the poor thing stopped beating and let every syllable and drop submerge him to no point of return. 

And he just let that happen. 

San hated the water. San hated the feeling of heaviness it bought, the way it just broke into everything and decided to stay there. He hated the way it flowed on and on and on and then right into his heart. 

San hated the water because it reminded him of Wooyoung. 

He hated that stupid grin with one side curled up more than the other, he hated those hands which moved too gracefully even while doing the least graceful tasks, he hated those eyes which shined too bright that all the other lights in the world were too dim compared to them, he hated how he couldn't help but want to let his fingers mindlessly hover over the mole under those one of those eyes and every other mole and every other part of Wooyoung. 

He halted his movements in the water and hugged his own shoulders, the late evening, late summer breeze making him shiver. 

A smile slips out despite the now dried and washed away tears on his face because he couldn't stop it because right now he was water and holding on to anything was too hard. 

But it was always easy to hear the leaves crunch and the bushes and leaves rustle. It was too easy to know Wooyoung was near. 

“You're here alone swimming in the lake like this was some fairy tale and I spent almost 2 hours looking around for you everywhere!” He heard the loud and exasperated exclaim invaded with little pants and sucks of air in between. 

He looked at him from the middle of the lake where he was. 

And then the water was seeping into his skin, into his bones and then into his heart. 

“You're the one who told me you had something important to do.” 

San hated the way sweat glistened on Wooyoung's forehead, he hated the way that his voice was almost as equivalent as his favourite song. He hated how the colour of skin haunted him in his dreams, how it was the color also splashed abundantly on the canvas he was. 

San just hated the water (he didn't). He just hated how Wooyoung jumped into it without a second thought (he didn't). 

“What's more important than you?” Wooyoung asked, tone in quiet whispers, almost as quiet as those in the waves. 

“I don't know. You tell me, you're the one who ran off.” San replied nonchalantly but from the corner of his eyes he could see the orange yellow lake slowly be tainted with a spreading blue of the summer, blue of the bright, blue of his colour.

“Your hair looks so strange right now. It's so fucking weird to see them blond.” He commented, tone a bit louder now, his hand barely inches over his wet hair pushed back. 

“They look good. I look good.” 

Please tell me I look good. 

Just look at me and me and me and just me. 

“Yeah. You look handsome.” You look pretty. 

He convinced his heart that there were underlying words, grinning, life rushing into him. 

He swam into the water and he felt he was 11 again and forever as he pulled Wooyoung down with him too.

Faint screams blessing his ears as much as the following whines did. The pout on the shorter’s lips was endearing under the water and he couldn't help but just mouth, 

‘You are pretty too.’  

A mild shade of confusion flashed before realisation struck and then in the coloured reality of hue orange and his dream of false blue he would see soft pink, not by his eyes but by his experience of knowing how Wooyoung would look with that color on his face. 

And then he rose out of the water, his head and his heart all at once and he was pleased to hell and back at the fact that he was still met by his face.

Now the faintest pink visible. 

And the pink was dripping down and spreading into his blue stained fantasies. 

Wooyoung smirked before splashing what seemed like half the lake onto his face, a giggle escaping ruggedly from his throat. 

And that stained him entirely with all the pink and all the blue he could ever imagine. 

San usually didn't get into many fights. He was the one to be quiet, to stay in the corner, maybe even try to hide in them. 

Wooyoung wasn't. He liked to speak and speak and speak till all the world could remember were the echoes of his voice, whether they be good or bad. 

He supposed the bad side was heavier when he saw Wooyoung mildly argue with Gyunwon (a guy in his art class). 

And then Gyunwon threw a punch and Wooyoung threw one. And yet he was the one being pulled away from the taller brown haired boy, face bruised and so were his knuckles. 

San usually didn't get into too many fights but he couldn't bear seeing Gyunwon pushing Wooyoung into the ground like he had any right to. 

He hissed at the sting in his shoulder from where Gyunwon scratched through his clothes with his oddly sharp nails. 

“Why the fuck did you fight him?” Wooyoung whispered sharply, inspecting his face for the injuries. 

San rolled his eyes. 

For you. He thinks.

For you. 

For you. 

For you. Just fucking spit it out. 

“Says you. You literally started the whole conflict.” He retorted, slapping away the lanky hovering hand away from his face. 

“You're an idiot, Choi San.” 

Wooyoung sighed. 

Don't you know? Just for you. 

“No, I am not! You are the one who started to bitch fight with him. I just helped you!” 

San just wanted to stop walking and drop dead on the road because the injuries stung a little too much for his liking. 

“Then why are you more injured than both of us combined?” Wooyoung tried to snarked, it came out more of a breathy laugh. 

“Because I am the braver soldier here, obviously. And I did Taekwondo for like 3 years in middle school.” San’s voice pitched up, arms flying out from their sides and trying to defend himself. 

“That just tells me that you shouldn't have been this injured,” Wooyoung mutters, pushing back his arms gently to his side, “And well your parents and sister are out of town, who's going to treat us? We're screwed.” 

San groaned trying to kick a stone in his vision but ending up stumbling on his own feet and almost meeting with the ground when a hand grasped tight on his shoulder preventing that. 

“Can you stop trying to become a stuntman and walk back home like a normal man?” Wooyoung lightly scolded him. 

San stuck his tongue out at him, trying to sprint away from Wooyoung and his oddly slippery grasp to just run back home and rip his heart out and shove it under his bed because it was trying to beat out of his chest. 

Wooyoung’s hand slipped down from his shoulder to his upper arm and then his forearm as their bodies once pressed together furthered away but stopped tight at his wrist. 

(Holding there and he knows it was dry summer weather and yet there was feeling of paint, 

A feeling so familiar for two reasons, 

1. Because he was all too familiar with the feeling of having sticky and thick paint on his hands. Pale skin being filled with all the color you could name. 

And 

1. Because he was too familiar with the beating of hearts and fastening of breaths and the beloved feeling of paint on skin returning whenever he touched Wooyoung or vice versa. )

“And if you die, it won't be my fault.” 

Lier. You're literally trying to steal away my heart. 

“I am literally bleeding out,” He states dramatically, pointing at a gash on his cheek which was indeed bleeding quite a bit, “I am just this close to death.” 

“Don't be stupid. Do you just expect me to let you die? Just like that?” He sounded a bit too offended for it to just be a joke which he was trying to play it off, awkwardly smiling at his own feet. 

San falls quiet. Sometimes it is better not to speak, he learned a hundred summer agos. But he still intertwined fingers and joined him by staring at the gravel roads too. 

How is he supposed to answer that? 

And then they continued walking back home, hand in hand, souls trying to flow into each other ( at least that's what San likes to think) all while he bled. 

While he bled for Wooyoung. 

The moment they stepped into the beige entrance hallways of San’s house. Home. Wooyoung turned to him and pressed his lips together, gulping softly before spitting out, 

“I won't.”

He answered his own query. 

“I know you won't.” San simply replied like it was something as casual as talks of dinner and no matters of life and death. 

“This means now I definitely have to put my totally spectacular nurse skills to work and patch you up.” Wooyoung slurred out in a hurry, hands finally breaking apart and maybe Wooyoung thought San totally missed the faint pink on his honey skin as he snapped his face away and ran into the house. 

But of course he didn't. Not when it was pink, not when the sight haunted him in all his dreams, not when it was Wooyoung. 

“Do you even know where the first aid kit is?!” But that is all he shouted behind him. 

It turns out that neither of them really knew where the first aid box was, having used it last almost a year ago. 

So they scrambled through almost all the cupboards in the house and Wooyoung let out a triumphant cry when he finally found it in one of the cupboards in his parents’ bathroom. 

And that is how they ended up sitting on San’s parents’ bathroom floor, the first-aid kits contents spread all over the floor between them. 

“You don't know how to pour antiseptic on cotton—let me—no, Woo! Oh my god!” San struggled trying to snatch away the antiseptic liquid and cotton from Wooyoung who was also struggling to work with them. 

“Who's the nurse Sanni? Me or you? You're the patient, act like one!” Wooyoung slapped away his hand, barely holding the antiseptic container and cotton in one hand and before they both knew it tumbled down and fell on its side and the contents started to spill out. 

They both shrieked in panic as Wooyoung swiftly picked it up, preventing the eternity of it emptying out. 

San glared at the spreading liquid on the floor and then at Wooyoung's hands also stained with the same colour and index and thumb gripping tight on the neck of the small bottle and then his face with his teeth grit and lips stretched into a straight line. 

“Wooyoung! I told you!,” He whined, snatching away the slippery container from his hands and a new cotton pad from the packet beside him. 

“Who's the nurse Sanni? Blah blah bleh. ” San mocked him with exaggerated facial expressions, pouring the liquid on the cotton pad slowly and watching it spread out slowly before he glanced up at Wooyoung's face. 

He looked defeated in a sense, lips jutted in a pout and shoulders slumped down. 

Gosh. Fine. 

He sighed, handing the pad to him, watching his face brighten as he carefully took it between his fingers.  

“Wooyoung is the nurse, San-ah. ” He replied to his earlier comment with a smug tone and an even smuggler face, dabbing the gashes on his face with the cotton pad. 

And his brain short-circuited from the way he pronounced his name to the way how gentle his actions with the cotton piece was and just how close his face was. 

Kissing someone has never felt easier. But what does he know? He has only ever wanted to kiss one person in life. 

“Why'd you hit Shim?” Wooyoung whispered (he whispers so often but only ever with him.) His eyes slanting down in concentration, concentration on his face, on him. 

“Why'd he hit you ?” He whispered back. This was their secret, the rest of the world didn't need or deserve to hear this. 

“He was talking shit. Stupid and bucket load of shit.” Wooyoung muttered, picking up a band-aid and pasting it right on his cheek. 

“About?” 

First he fell silent. Completely quiet and tried to sew his mouth shut because it was written on his face. He was trying his hardest to refrain. 

“You.” 

But he spoke after a beat, his breath caught. 

“He was saying stupid stupid shit about you. I couldn't help it,” He finally withdrew his mindlessly hovering hand away from his face, “I am sorry.” 

“What did he say?” 

“It was really stupid, Sanni. It doesn't ma–” 

“What did he say, Young-ah?” San cut in through with a gentle voice. 

It was okay. 

“He called you…called you a…you know that word.” He tried to convey with his hands when he realised that the words wouldn't be sufficient, stained cotton pad waving around. 

San tilted his head to the side.

“What word?” 

Wooyoung groaned under his breath, his hands getting more enthusiastic. San furrowed his brows. 

At the end he defeatedly dropped down his hands and muttered something under his breath so quick and soft that it was impossible to catch. 

“What?!” San asked, now a bit more frustrated. 

“Faggot. Okay? He called you a faggot. And then he kept on going. He was being a fuckface.” Wooyoung snapped. His voice rising and lowering inconstant as he spoke. 

San first blanked when he heard that word leave his mouth but then he couldn't help but chuckle. 

“Oh my god. So many people call me that. It's not—it doesn't bother me or upset me. You don't have to go around sucker punching everyone who calls me that.” 

And it was true. It started about 2 or 3 years ago when one of the mean ones called him that and loved the shocked reaction on his face. And then they continued calling him that just for his reaction and disappointment. 

And he honestly doesn't blame them. He gets it, he wasn't like them. He flinched when a girl tried to flirt with him, he frowned when they talked about them too much. Hell, even his own father noticed that and sometimes taunted him about that. 

Wooyoung can't attack all of them. There are too many of them. Too many for it to just be a speculation anymore. 

“That doesn't make it okay! They have no right to call you that! And yes I will indeed punch all of them, you aren't going to stop me, San,” He sounded so determined for San to break his bubble and present him that they might just be right, “And anyway it's your turn to be the princess now.” 

San laughed throaty at that. He remembers when they were way younger, 10 years of age, they liked to play this game on the slides where San was the brave warrior and Wooyoung was the damsel in distress who he fought with imaginary monsters for. 

But the monsters Wooyoung wants to fight are real. So very real. Too real. 

“I guess I'll finally let you be the prince. You grovelled for it too much when we were younger.” He answered, a little smirk which was a little proud and a little smug at the same time. 

“And yet it took you almost 6 years. Shame on you, princess San.” 

“Oh my god! Do not called me princess San—” 

Wooyoung giggled bright and full of energy at that as he shook his head no, almost bouncing. 

“No fucking way! You used to always call me princess Wooyoungie! It's my turn now!” 

San shook his head too, cheeks flushing red at the embarrassment, almost as red as the blood stuck in his untreated wounds which were now long forgotten. 

“I was like 10. You were 10!” 

“Oh shut up, princess Sanni.” Wooyoung scoffed, picking up the cotton and started to treat the wounds he thought he had already forgotten about like they were from another lifetime. 

“Princess Wooyoungie.” San teased, sticking his tongue out at the younger boy. 

Wooyoung shut his eyes close, a laugh bubbled down in his throat as he pressed one of his fingers onto his lips and shushed him. 

“You're the only princess now.” He said once again but now all the hint of teasing gone and the genuinity in something so weird was yet back. 

So San just smiled and closed his eyes and treasured the feeling of Wooyoung's breath fanning over his face and his fingers dancing on his skin trying to patch their dance floor up again. 

Wanting to say the words ‘I fucking love you' never felt more easier. But what did San know? He only ever wanted to say that to one person. 

Sometimes San thinks life can be just as innocent as being soaked to the bone, t-shirts sticking to your skin and wet strands of hair falling into your hair as you run through your town. 

These were the moments San felt okay being who he was because there couldn't be anything as beautiful as the feelings in his chest and the light dust on his cheeks as Wooyoung simply moved his hair away from his eyes. 

And maybe they moved back in exactly the same position because he wanted Wooyoung to do that again,he couldn't get enough of the feeling, ever. 

Right now, he feels like there will be nothing better in life than just browsing through snacks and candies in the grocery store with Wooyoung. 

With Wooyoung and his sweet sweet smile and the even sweeter echo of his laughs in his brain. The drying but glistening sweat on his forehead. He just wants to lock the sight in his heart forever. 

“You want chips? I want chips.” Wooyoung muttered, inspecting some random candy bar in the candy aisle. 

“I'll eat anything, get whatever you want.” San spoke, not even an ounce of attention on any of the products but all of it on Wooyoung. 

He squeezed the bag of candy in his hand, his eyes always glancing at Wooyoung at every moment, trying to take in more and more of him. 

Till he could take no more.

But each time there is a funny feeling in his chest telling him that he'll never be satisfied. 

“Staring at my face isn't going to make us choose any faster, Sanni.” Wooyoung suddenly chuckled out and San almost gasped, dropping the packet he was holding in his hands onto the floor. 

San started to mutter small words of defence, bending down to pick up the packet and putting it back where it was kept. 

“It's like you had something on your face–yeah—like you know…. something….on your face.” He stuttered, avoiding to look into eyes which he knows are scrunched like it's his second nature, feeling the burn intensify in his face knowing the pink is probably growing deeper. 

And he hesitantly lets himself think that, does Wooyoung also notice the shade on his skin? Does he think about it too? Does it also keep him awake at night? Does he also feel like a canvas just coloured top to bottom with San’s skin shade and then beautiful splashes of pink on them? 

Does he? 

San thinks it almost sounds like a love story but it is not and it never will be, he always reminds himself. 

Love story. 

He likes that word and how fuzzy it feels on his tongue. He thinks about what it would be like to have a love story? 

Will his own be like the movies and shows he has seen? Will it be like how he has imagined it? Or will it be at all?  

He was so lost in thought that he didn't realise when a new figure started to loom behind them. 

“Hi!” Suddenly a squeaky voice startled them both. They both turned out at the same time to just find Roh Jinhee, with the biggest smile on her face. 

Despite them reacting almost similarly before this, both of them had painfully different expressions to her sudden appearance. 

Wooyoung just looked surprised, his eyes shining with a glint of pleasantness, smile unfolding itself slowly. 

San felt like he was drowning and he felt like he was drying. He felt like he was burning . 

Rose once again the sun of his nightmares, trying to steal away as much water as she can. And San feels it is hard to breathe as the other two talk and laugh together at some inside joke he'll never know. 

“Hi! I don't think we have ever talked before!” The cheerful voice then turned to him, he tried to pull off the grimace off his face and fake a polite smile, he really hoped he was succeeding. 

“Yeah,” And yet that was all he could muster. His eyes falling back again and again on Wooyoung despite all his thousand tries of his for them to not to. 

“What is your name?” 

“San.” 

“San? That's cool! Mine is–” 

“Jinhee. I know,” San supplies to her in the middle of her sentence and her already impossibly wide grin stretches farther, as she tucks in a strand of short blonde hair behind her ear. 

She was beautiful in a way he could never be. She had the softest smile and his was just too rough at the edges, she was pretty through and through and he understood why Wooyoung would look at her like that. He finally understood, finally. 

He sighed and he felt empty. The sun had almost dried away all his water. He gulped, blinking back what he thinks is tears. 

He promptly grabbed whatever he could  get his hands on at the moment and silently made his way to the counter. He just hopes Wooyoung will be able to eat whatever he gets. 

If they still want to hang out. 

But then he feels shoulders brushing against and more items being dropped down on the surface and from the corner of his eyes he can see those same eyes. 

He sighs a bit content. The skin contact felt like rain, it felt like new bought paint, it felt like a hot summer afternoon in the lake. 

But how long can good things last for? 

Because the rain eventually stops, the paint gets used up and they climb out of the lake.

And Roh Jinhee calls out for Wooyoung from where they are walking down the road and makes them both halt their steps. 

“Wooyoung.” She whispers and he shoots her an encouraging smile. 

And San can already see it in her eyes and the twitch in her lips because he has been in her place too many times. The difference is that she can and he just can't. 

She probably thinks she's the first one to kiss Jung Wooyoung hard on the mouth. She's wrong. 

And maybe this is a love story after all. But not his, never his. 

Maybe Wooyoung's

Or even more fitting maybe Jinhee’s. 

But not his, that's why he just watched as Jinhee tip-toed and leaned up to press her lips so softly against Wooyoung’s. 

And then he just felt like a drought .

She leaned back and smiled so sweet that it made San sick and want to throw up and never see that smile again. 

But Wooyoung's eyes were wide and his pinks dusted with pink, 

( And he felt betrayed to great extents because pink was supposed to be something just so intimate.) 

He cleared his throat and looked down at Jinhee and broke into a soft smile, pink cheeks and shining eyes. 

And San almost wished that he would have the nerve to kiss Wooyoung too. Then maybe Wooyoung would look at him like this. But maybe that is just wishful thinking. 

“I'll see you tomorrow?” Jinhee asked in a way that you knew she wasn't asking at all. 

Wooyoung just nodded, a sigh(it didn't sound much dreamy like it should have) leaving his mouth as she watched walk farther and farther away. 

“That… happened.” San awkwardly commented after the silence of them almost walking half way home became too much to bear. 

“Yeah. I guess.” Wooyoung shrugged like he wasn't just starstruck moments ago. With pink spreading on him and San wasn't the reason. 

“It's cool. You know? She's cool,” 

No she's not. She's scorching heat and she's burning me and my heart. 

“She kissed me.” Wooyoung finally breathed out like San wasn't standing just there tearing apart his heart by witnessing the sight. 

I could have kissed you. I could have kissed you years ago. I could have just had the absolute nerve and just leaned in, in one of the moments out of thousands when our faces were a little too close for it to be right.  

I could have kissed you, Wooyoung. 

“She likes you.” San tried to sound cheery, he tried to sound happy for his best friend . Because before a person, San was Wooyoung’s best friend and best friends should be happy for each other and shouldn't be in love with each other. 

Sometimes he was just tired of being in love.

“Probably. I mean like, probably.” Wooyoung rambled mindlessly, steps slowing down and tone dropping down. 

“Are you okay?” He asked all of a sudden and San’s beat stuttered in his heart. 

No. 

“ Yeah. Of course.” He lied. 

“Are you okay?” He asked Wooyoung after catching his breath. 

“Yeah. Totally.” Their words were similar. But only one spoke the truth, San thought. 

Wooyoung had grown up. And that's so stupid to think because San was practically older than him but watching his friend hesitantly leave for a date with a girl made him feel inexplicably small. 

San had never thought that Wooyoung would get a girlfriend. Not in a mean-no-one would like Wooyoung way but in no-one-can-like Wooyoung-more-than-me way so why does he need anyone else?

But he guessed that was not enough because of course he was going to grow up and get a girlfriend like any other boy because he was just like any other of them. 

San was the only one who wasn't.

San sighed, staring at himself in the mirror in his bathroom, wiping off his tears rolling down his cheeks. 

Sometimes he wondered what was actually wrong with him? How did he turn out to be like this? There must be some way to fix this right? 

His father says that people like him are just fucked up in the brain. That there is just something wrong with their wiring. 

So he is sure that there must be some way to unfuck his brain, to fix the wiring. To become normal and then maybe finally grow up. 

Maybe then he would stop crying over Wooyoung. Then maybe holding his hand would be totally normal. Then maybe kissing his lips would be none of his concern. 

Then they could really be best friends.  

He walked out of his bathroom and into his room. His blue walls were taunting him with every second he spent surrounded them. 

He opened his closet and stared at the cloth covered shelves. Many of the clothes belonged to Wooyoung. 

So much of everything San owned belonged to Wooyoung. 

He stretched out his hand, placed it on a black band tee and felt it's fabric and it was like any other cotton tee but it felt softer under his touch because it was Wooyoung's. 

He shoved all the clothes to one side until he saw it. The box. It was a big box of pastels he never opened and put to use even though he had since he was 11. 

He never had the heart to. And that was just stupid (like the most of everything about him). They were just too special. 

He reached out and grabbed them and stared at them. They felt way heavier in his hands than they should. They were just oil pastels but it felt carrying his own heart in his hands. 

He didn't know when he actually started liking Wooyoung. It could've been the first moment or it could have been anywhere in between. He liked to think that on his 11th birthday, Wooyoung first made his heart stutter. 

That's when it all started. 

And maybe that's why he could never use these pastels like they were just any other. He had hundreds and thousands of crayons and paints and brushes to use those paints. 

But he will never be eleven and have the right to not be grown up and just watch Wooyoung run out soaked to the bone just for him. 

It will never be his 11th birthday again and he will never be 11 and just lie down with Wooyoung on his bed and laugh about crooked dragon wings. 

And maybe that is why he never wants to use these and store them like they were the greatest of his treasures and he was a pirate king. Because letting them dust down would be letting his hope and his fantasies dust down and facing reality. 

That would actually be accepting that he will never be 11 again and he will never have Wooyoung like he did back then. And he's not ready for that. 

He feels like he'll never be ready for that. 

So he placed them back exactly where the were kept before and slammed the closet door shut a little too harsh. 

And profusely hoped he trapped his feelings in there too. 

He supposed he failed in his poor attempt to banish away his feelings as he shook with rage while his father shouted at him. 

It was a small mistake, a broken glass and yet the number of pieces it shattered into made it seem so big or was it the yelling from his father? 

It was a small glass, one of what seemed like 100 and San’s father didn't need to get so mad and he didn't need to bellow about how childish he was, about how he needs to grow up and that he is not a kid anymore . 

It wasn't just a glass anymore, it was personal. He balled his fists, staring at his father's falling glasses at the crook of his nose and his angry face. 

“It was just a fucking glass!” He spat out, barely containing any of his rage from his tone. 

His father paused and blanked and in moments like this San was slapped in the face with the fact that that man was still his father due to how similar they were. 

“What kind of fucking language is that? Is that how you talk to your father?” Then he finally spat back, his face scowling in growing rage. 

“Don't fuck with me right now. It was just glass, there are 20 more. You always want to act like you're the only one who has difficulties in life. I have them too!” He flew a pointed finger at him, his words seeping into him like a snake's venom into a human. 

That's just how their relationship was. One snake and the other human and for the first time San was the snake. 

“It was just a fucking glass. Alright? Just a fucking glass . Maybe Dad, sometimes I'd like it if you'd choose me over little stationery objects. I am your fucking son for crying out loud.” 

San had dreamed of this moment for so long. He had wished for years just to scream out loud and tell his dad that yes, I am your son. You should treat me better . 

But it quickly became a nightmare when San felt his eyes sting with tears like his father was right along and he did need to grow up and the man just grimaced at him and walked away. 

He whimpered, watching him leave and he wanted to jump out and pull the man back and shout at him more that he can't do this to him. 

He can't do this to him. 

He just did it to him. 

He always does this to him. 

San barely chokes back on a sob, running back into his room, his eyes too fragile to carry the burden of such heavy tears. 

The first thing he does immediately after entering the room is punching his closet door the hardest it can. 

And the second thing was pulling out a phone and being selfish and being stupid and dialling Wooyoung's number. 

San watched through raw and teary eyes as Wooyoung climbed into his room through the window, a stupid grin stretching across the enterity of his face when he stepped inside. 

It didn't matter that the grin almost entirely dissolved once he saw his tear stained face. It didn't matter because it was there and San was there to witness it unfold and then fold back up again. 

“Oh my god, who the fuck made you cry?” He asked, almost aggressively, sprinting to make space next to him on the bed. 

“My dad.” San simply said, his voice came out with much force and much desire in his chest to just lean and swoop Wooyoung in a hug. 

Wooyoung looked angry. And not the kind of anger his dad owned. The kind of anger which almost made him feel safe. His jaw twitched and his eyes darkened and he muttered curses under his breath. 

“He's fucking stupid. He.is.fucking.stupid.” He spoke through gritted teeth and San couldn't help it anymore so he leaned in and wrapped his arms around him. 

“I am sorry.” 

That's what he mutters into his hair, feeling the warmth of Wooyoung's breath on his chest, his heart trying to bottle it up and try to engrave it in. 

“For what?” 

Many things. I ruined your date, I made you climb up my window, I can't seem to just grow up.

I am in love with you. 

His breath hitched and the thought terrified him because it probably wasn't even true. San didn't love Wooyoung. It was just a silly crush. It was never that serious. 

His heartbeat quickened as he felt fingers massage his scalp and sweet comforts being muttered to his heart. 

“You have nothing to be sorry about. Okay? Never.” 

And what if I say I am in love with you? Love with a capital L and what if I say it's true? And what if I tell you I love you, Wooyoung. 

“I am sorry.” And that's all he could mutter. His own discovery was too shocking for him to handle. 

Wooyoung's grip tightened on him. 

Oh my god. I am in love with you. 

—

Being 17 finally made San realise how fast everything was just flying away. 

Okay that is a lie. Losing Wooyoung slowly piece by piece made San finally realise how long it has been. 

At first it was just Jinhee dancing around him, trying to flirt with him. He used to get a soothing to the pain in his heart whenever he saw Wooyoung being a bit hesitant with Jinhee. 

He was a fool. 

It may have taken a few months for Jinhee to finally get Wooyoung to ask her out, as in officially in that boyfriend manner, but she finally got it. 

In the beginning it was fine, only slightly weird. Wooyoung wanted to hang out with Jinhee for a few hours?

He has every right. They are dating. 

But then it got worse and worse to the point San didn't see Wooyoung straight for weeks. 

He tried to convince himself that maybe Wooyoung was just busy, that maybe he just had a lot of work. No one ignores their best friend just like that? Right. Right? 

But then he would see the Instagram stories of Jinhee’s with sly pictures of Wooyoung smirking or leaning against a wall somewhere. Sometimes their hands intertwined. 

He was busy. 

And then they fought more than ever they had in all of their years of friendship ever before.

( He remembers the first fight clearly. He remembers how Wooyoung kept shouting for him from down, he remembers glaring down at him through his open window before harshly shutting them close. 

But before he knew, there were small pieces of rocks thrown at his plastic glass windows, making them rattle irritatingly and apparently the threatening texts reading, 

Wooyoung pls stop throwing rocks at my window n go away or I'll drown u in the lake. 

From San had no effect whatsoever so without any option left, he walked up to his window and flew it open and shrieked out a exasperated, 

“What?!” 

“Why are you ignoring me? Are you mad at me?” Wooyoung shouted back, eyes squinting. 

“Bingo! Now go away!” San remarked angrily, getting ready to shut his windows again when Wooyoung hurriedly slurred out, 

“I am sorry! I–I got you flowers! Lets just talk once at least please?” San knows he should've shut the windows and not succumb to the pleading voice and the wide eyes. 

But he did exactly the opposite, sitting face to face with Wooyoung who extended out a small bouquet of roses and smiled sheepishly at him. 

“Talk. You have 15 minutes before I drag you to the lake and drown you.” San ignored the flowers and threatened in the most fitting voice he could muster. 

“She just got mad at me alright? She was like you never spend any time with me and well so maybe I did go a bit overbo–” Wooyoung started but San cut him off immediately with a dry laugh, 

“It's been a week, Woo. A whole fucking week I didn't hear a word from you! You could have been dead for all I could have known!” 

“Well, I am sorry, alright? I know what I did was shitty and maybe I was too worried about Jinnie-ya but I swear this week felt like the strangest week of my life.” Wooyoung started out strong and defending but word by word his voice slowly started to dissolve into something that San couldn't quite put his finger on but all he knew it was genuine to some extent.

San chose silence. His hands twitching to finally accept the roses that were being extended to him once again. 

“Come on. If you're mad at me any longer I will actually explode and perish.” Wooyoung jokes, but his hands shook slightly pressing the roses into his chest. 

“Fine but I swear if this happens agai—” San sighed, feeling the rose petals underneath his fingertips. 

“It won't!” Wooyoung chirped happily and San also let himself finally break out into a small smile as he bashfully observed the roses.) 

Wooyoung lied. And Wooyoung never used to lie to him and that made everything just ache everything more. 

And all he could do about it was sit in his room, with empty canvases and all sorts of items to fill them up and yet he let them be empty for the longest while before actually starting to fill them up. 

He always ended up with something a little too blue, a little too pink, a little too ‘ I have been in love with you for so long, too long’ , a little too much Wooyoung. 

Or lie in his bed, spread out, melted into his mattress, phone in his hands and texts outgoing which he knows won't be seen until hours later. 

He knows. 

He knows. 

He fucking knows. 

He groans, throwing his phone on his bed and shuffling around in his bed to press his mouth into the pillows. 

5 days ago was when he last saw Wooyoung, when he came to visit him with a bandaged hand (because he cut himself with a sharp object, he refused to explain any further) and they played video games for hours like they were just 15 again. 

Just San, Just Wooyoung. And just them. No fear and no desperation, no sorrows of knowing that this was something rare now (when did it become so rare? It was like breathing to them before). Just them. 

And then he disappeared like he does and the only window to his existence was his girlfriend’s stories. And San just helplessly peeped in to get as much as he could. 

What he got was scarce. 

But he supposed that's too much in a drought. 

San loved parties. He had only been to a few before, he enjoyed them quite a bit. But right now as he pressed himself to the kitchen counter of a random seniors house who Yeosang knew, he wasn't just feeling it. 

There was a cup of alcohol (he apologizes to his parents for underage drinking) in his hands and he just stared at the liquid surface. 

He was getting intoxicated just looking at it while at the same time wondering why he came in the first place. 

Was it because of Yeosang? Or how kindly he asked? Was it because he couldn't say no? Or was it because he had nothing else to do? 

Who knows. 

Yeosang smiled wide at him and San felt warmth engulf him all of a sudden in the chill he was drowning in. He smiled back as the other pressed their sides together and spoke up, 

“Where is Wooyoung?”

Oh. 

“Like he's just always with you, you know? It's almost weird to see you without him.” Yeosang laughed, shaking his head. But San just gulped and suddenly downed much of the bitter liquid in his hands. 

“I don't know. He might be somewhere. Here or there.” He replied dryly, hissing at the sting in his throat burning down to his chest, joining the other burn which at this point lived there. Or probably that sting was just his heart. 

“Is everything okay?” Yeosang asked. And San hated how obvious he was making this. 

San sighed. He couldn't even believe if any of this was real or was it just a dream where he would wake up and the mysterious voices of the universe would taunt him for thinking of Wooyoung even in his sleeping moments. 

“Do you like Wooyoung?” He sharply asked. 

Yeosang paused and turned to face him. His face was expressionless like most of the time. But his eyebrows were raised. 

He then smirked like he was humoured. Like San might just be the funniest person alive. 

“What?” He asked, barely containing a laugh by downing his own glass. 

“You don't like Wooyoung…?” San asked. And he was confused because that didn't make any sense. The longing looks all those summers ago. 

Nothing made sense. 

“I don't like Wooyoung. I never liked Wooyoung.” He confirms, looking at him with soft eyes and a wide smile and a tone so humoured. 

“What…?” He cluelessly muttered. His head pounding with the deeper he thought about and maybe Yeosang noticed and maybe he cared when he spoke up, 

“I didn't like him. I liked you.” 

San blanks. 

“I never liked Wooyoung. I liked you. But that summer we became friends? I found out something. Do you want to know?” Yeosang continued, his voice falling into a whisper as he leaned into San's ear. 

“I am not in love with Wooyoung.”

San croaked because he already knew what Yeosang would say. 

“Oh, but you are. And you have been for as long as I can remember.” 

San wanted to believe that Yeosang was taunting him, being mean to him so he could get mad at him and walk away. But he wasn't, he was just telling him the truth.

“I am sorry.” He settled with ignoring Yeosang and the truth he spoke. 

“For what?” 

San didn't know. What was he sorry for? Was he sorry for not returning Yeosang's feelings? Or was he just sorry. 

“You have nothing to be sorry about? Alright?” Yeosang pressed further into his side and shot a comforting smile at him that he almost believed in him. 

“Oh. And Wooyoung is here. In the lobby. And he's drunk. Like piss drunk.” 

Oh. 

“Oh. Uhm. Well that's surprising.” 

“You should help him.” 

“I know—but—,” but it's been almost a week since we spoke. And I don't know if I can handle being beside him right now or ever. I don't know Yeosang. I don't know, all I know is that I love him. And I probably shouldn't. “ You know what you're right. I should probably go and check him, thanks.” 

But if Wooyoung was a game and San would always lose even when there was nothing left to actually lose. 

Yeosang was right. Wooyoung had never been this drunk before (he means Wooyoung has barely been drunk before so this was even more overwhelming). 

He grinned stupid the second San came up to him and tugged at his arm to return back home. 

“Sannniii.” He slurred out, stretching out his words and San held his breath. 

“Let's go back home. I don't even know why you're here.” He muttered under his breath, dragging away Wooyoung who just stretched wider his stupid smile and just let himself be dragged away. 

“It’s not even that late” He shouted, accompanying it with a little chuckle at the end and yet all San did was frown and drag him faster. 

“Where are we goin’?” Wooyoung asked and even though San couldn't see his face, he could basically hear the pout in his voice.

He feels like he's about to cry. And he probably is. 

“Home. I mean you go to yours and I go to mine—” 

“Home! Yes, let's go home.” He exclaimed before he could finish like an excited child and then San finally let himself look back at Wooyoung. 

Wooyoung was flushed pink , and his cheeks were stained with dried tears and yet his eyes glistened with perhaps some unshed ones but he still had a dopiest grin on his face. 

It wasn't supposed to look beautiful but it was, of course it was. It was Wooyoung and Wooyoung was always beautiful even when he was completely wrecking San inside and out. 

And in his eyes San could see Wooyoung—the Wooyoung he knew once–and his breath wavered and he slowly dropped Wooyoung's arm. 

“What were you doing at the party?” He asked, voice very calm now.

“Heejin—” 

“Jinhee, her name is Jinhee.” San corrected him, immediately knowing who he was talking about. 

Of course, even a drunk Wooyoung had her name on his lips. 

And then there was the idiot named San who felt the name of Wooyoung every time the sun hit him, every time the water of the lake washed him over even the slightest, when he got even a drop of paint on his hands. 

“Yeah, whatever. She dumped me. She told me I didn't love her enough or whatever. I was angry.” He spoke in between too many breaths. 

Angry 

Not 

Sad. 

“She's being stupid. She'll take you back in no time.” San tried to assure him but his voice died in the last word when he observed the expression morphing into the younger's face. 

“I don't want to get back with her. She's annoying.” 

San hated false hope the most. He already had too much of that. Too much. He can't handle any more of it. 

“You're just angry right now. Let's just get you home.” He muttered pushing Wooyoung from his back with one hand. 

“I am not angry—I mean I am. I mean what I am saying.” He angrily said and yet his words slurred together like he didn't mean that all which was probably the case. 

“Yup. You're totally going to break up with Jinhee and start hanging out with me again and stop ignoring my texts for hours. Totally, Woo. ” Before he could stop himself, his slightly tipsy mind mumbled out the words. 

Wooyoung stopped in his tracks and San’s heart stopped beating. He bit his tongue, tears blurring his vision. 

“What?” The sound which came out of Wooyoung was the most broken he had ever heard someone. 

It wasn't even like this in the movies or the shows. He never heard such raw emotion in one word. He never ever heard someone so on the verge of tears. 

“Nothing–Wooyoung. Lets—” He tried to ignore the question and move ahead but Wooyoung didn't budge and just turned to him instead. 

“You think I am ignoring you San? God, no. I am not ignoring you—god, I could never ignore you. I am sorry if you thought I was ignoring you. I am sorry, I am sorry.” Wooyoung started his voice wavering, his lips wobbling, the unshed tears threatening to spill until they did. And he broke into sobs, his body shook violently. 

“No!,” San defended in a harsh panic, “Don’t cry. Don't cry! I am sorry. I was being stupid, you weren't ignoring me! Woo stop crying.” 

He tried to swallow his own tears back, he was an ocean of misery after all, a few more drops won't harm anyone. 

But himself. 

He felt a few tears roll down his own cheeks and he rushed in to hug Wooyoung. He wrapped his arms around his torso and the shorter boy's face buried itself into the crook of his neck. 

“I love you, San.” 

He wishes he hadn't heard the soft whisper, he wished he could've just ignored it and pretend like it never happened, he wished Wooyoung never said that in the first place.

The last time Jung Wooyoung told him that he loved him was when they were 13. That was the last time he heard those damned words. 

And he died a little everyday wanting to hear them again but he felt like he completely perished when Wooyoung finally said them. 

But he was drunk. And he was lying. 

“I wish you did, Wooyoung. I really wish you did.” He barely breathed out the words, squeezing his eyes close, caging every single drop of his ocean from falling out any further. 

San held his heart in his hand in the moment where he sat with Wooyoung on his bedroom floor. The air conditioner made him shiver but he wouldn't lower the temperature. 

Wooyoung was still drunk with his head dropped on his bed and his back pressed to the bottom of his bed, he was humming a random song that played too much on the radio. 

It was some English song, his favourite words went like ‘one night he wakes/ strange look on his face/ pauses, then says “you’re my best friend”/ and you knew what it was/ he is in love.’ 

And before he knew he started humming along too, the air around then felt alive, he felt it blow right across him and try to shake him. 

It had almost been half an hour since Wooyoung begged San to climb in through his window into his room. 

San was crying. His sobs were silent, way too afraid to disturb Wooyoung as his eyes observed the walls. He knew those sage green walls like he knew his name. He knew all those drawings—those too many drawings—on the walls because he made every single one. 

His eyes burnt but he still had them wide open as the blue sky he loves so much because Wooyoung really kept every single one ?

“Why…are you crying?” Wooyoung suddenly asked him, head tilting towards him, eyes so wide like San crying was the biggest mystery of the world to him. 

San sniffled as he shook his head. He was too weak, he couldn't look Wooyoung in the eye. 

“You kept every single one?” He asked, pointing at the brightest page on his sage green walls and Wooyoung almost immediately broke into the biggest grin. 

“I have more! They couldn't all fit on the wall. They are in a box,” He leaned forward and picked his head up and shoved his hand under his bed and dragged out a small cardboard box, “in here.” 

San’s mouth opened but nothing came out except a broken sob, he pressed his hand on his mouth. 

Wooyoung frowned and pushed apart his hand and intertwined it with his own. With his other hand he cupped his cheek, wiping away the tears with his thumb. 

San wanted to cry harder because this wasn't a dream. Maybe if this had been a dream he would have leaned in and pressed his lips against Wooyoung's and Wooyoung would've been sober. 

‘Don’t cry. It makes me sad.’ He mouthed so gently, making sure San could understand every word. 

He thought about it. Wooyoung is drunk and he's probably not going to remember tonight after tonight itself. He inhaled sharply and took the risk, mouthing the words very sloppily, 

‘I love you.’ 

Wooyoung smiled, in his purest way. San’s heart broke further and further until the sharp broken pieces were piercing right through his lungs. 

‘And I feel like I have spent my entire life loving you.’ 

It was getting impossible to breathe but seeing Wooyoung smile wider was like new gusts of air with fresh oxygen, it was like a whole new life in itself. 

“You're cute.” He simply says, his thumb now caressing over the dried tears, scooting in closer. 

And you're drunk and you'll never remember any of this. Ever. 

“Thanks.” He breathed out, he didn't know what else to say. 

“And I love you too.” 

And once again San’s heart ached with the words, I wish you really did, I really wish you did. 

Wooyoung indeed looked lost and hungover (which he was) in the morning as he sat up on the floor where he slept. 

“What…?” He questioned and San stared down at him from the bed where he had tried to sleep all night long. 

His red eyes and deep sighs showed that he obviously failed. 

“You were at Hongjoong-hyungs party last night and you were absolutely piss drunk and I dragged you all the way home and you forced me to climb in through your window and then you fell asleep.” He recapped quickly, trying to melt into the mattress as he pulled the duvet over himself. 

“Did I say something weird?” He questioned, glancing at him with such hooded eyes like he almost remembered his lies.

San gulped. 

“Something about Jinhee dumping you.” He partially spoke the truth and watched as Wooyoung rolled his eyes before he climbed into the bed and slithered under the duvet. 

Their arms brushed and he fell into the mattress too. He could feel summer in Wooyoung's touch sometimes. 

“Yeah. That doesn't matter. My head is killing me. I need more sleep,” He faced him and smiled a little sly, a little mischievous and a little more than just a little Jung Wooyoung, “and some cuddles maybe.” 

San didn't laugh or remark anything fitting. He just smiled more with his eyes and nodded. 

He just had to start learning to be okay with what he had. 

—

San was 18 now. He felt too old now, he saw how the blue skies had dullen in his visions, how the lakes looked almost rusted, lacking all their luster from his younger days. 

How Wooyoung couldn't maintain his relationship with Jinhee for the sake of both their lives combined. 

They were on and off, on and off like a fucking fault switch which just refused to work properly. 

And he was just the broken electricity current stuck in between them. 

So maybe that is why he stood awkwardly at the corner of the empty playground, just observing the sullen Wooyoung swinging alone on the swings. 

It had been a while since they last talked. To be exact, a month. It happened at the end of the semester where Wooyoung suddenly started to be distant with everyone. 

He always seemed to be at war with himself inside his own body and that made San disheartened and all he did was just try to talk to him but maybe he messed that up too. 

( “You don't understand, San!” 

“Well maybe if you tried to make me!” 

“It's not just something I can make you understand!” 

“Fine, do whatever you want!”

The exact conversation echoes too often in his brain for him to just ignore it.) 

So today he walked up to the swings just like he saw someone do a thousand summers ago. 

His hair falling in his air due to the summer loo. And he awkwardly stood in front of the slightly swinging boy. 

He looks down at him. And suddenly Wooyoung’s not that tall, and his hair aren't long any more, they are short and shabby and they are falling in his eyes and he has the weird urge to brush them away. 

“Hi.” He greeted and took the swing beside him. The other boy stayed silent. 

“I am San.” San suddenly said. His hands gripping hard on the iron chains like they did all those summers ago. 

Wooyoung looked at him, an amused look to his face, licking his lips before he muttered out, 

“I am Wooyoung. What are you doing here?” He spoke, starting low but slowly his voice rising. 

San shrugged. Looking down at his feet, it should probably be embarrassingly and how he remembers each syllable of that conversation. 

“I don't  have anyone to hang out with so I hang out here. Alone,” He spoke the same old, the same old he hears in his head all the time, “but today I saw you here and I really needed advice and you look like a wise person.” He half joked.

“What do you need advice about?” 

San sighed, kicking his feet on the ground and swinging higher, hearing the old swing creak, 

“I have this friend. Actually no, he is my best friend and well he means everything to me. Everything. But for the past month, I guess he has been mad at me. Do you have any ideas how to make it up to him?” 

Wooyoung hummed and pretended to think a little with his hand on his chin and everything before brightly saying, 

“Ah-ha! You're a dumb boy.” 

San’s eyes widened and his mouth hung open a little. 

“What?” He asked absolutely dumb founded. His mind blanked all of a sudden. 

“Who said your best friend is mad at you? I don't think he's mad at you. I think he thinks that you are mad at him. Look, stranger I don't know you but you look like a guy who I wouldn't personally get mad at.” 

San felt his face heat up. He breathed heavily, his eyes screaming the words bashful. 

“You're too kind, stranger. But how do you think I should approach my best friend?” He decided to continue the play. 

“Just approach him.” He spoke, his voice urging. And when suddenly he turned his torso towards him and his hair flew and fell right into his eyes. 

And San was 9 all over again and his chest once again burned with the need to reach out and brush them out of his eyes. 

And this time he did. 

He stretched out his hand and tucked the falling hair strands behind his ears, where they barely stayed and fell over his ears. 

San gasped softly at his own action and immediately snapped away his head, he felt he would stare at his face any longer he would lean in and do other things he had only ever dreamed of, and started to kick his feet harder and swig faster. 

The swings creaked for a while, they both swung up and down like they used to do everyday years ago. The sun shining in their eyes and the blue sky taunting San. 

“I am sorry. I should've called or maybe texted or come to your house and if you refused to open the door I should've climbed in through your window and I should have apologised.” Wooyoung finally spoke after a while, his voice soft but it was firm like he wasn't shying away from letting San hear it. 

“I would have opened the door.” 

“Yeah?” Wooyoung's eyes shined and the sun shined brighter and maybe Wooyoung was shining because of the sun or maybe it was the sun shining brighter because of Wooyoung. 

“ Yeah.” 

I would open it everytime. Everytime, I promise. 

 The movie continued playing on the TV and many empty soda cans were littered all around the room and San’s find felt fuzzy and all he could think about how calm the room felt with no commotion at all. 

But something electric was happening to him as he puffed out a warm breath into the chilly room, lying on the floor. 

He always liked to turn on the air-con more than he could handle, he liked the little shivers which tingled on his skin. 

“And then the main lead ran out and kissed the female lead.” Wooyoung continued to tell about the movie playing which he had already watched recently, his hands moving animatedly above them. 

San smiled softly. He bet if he looked out the window right this moment, the blue would be as bright as all those summers ago. 

“That's cute.” He commented, pressing his arms and palms further into the ground, liking how cold the surface was. 

“It was a cute movie.” Wooyoung agreed, his hands creeping next to his own and in contrast to the freezing cold of the room, even the presence of Wooyoung felt like the afternoon sun itself. 

“You watched it with Jinhee?” He asked to ground himself when a warm hand placed itself on his cold one. 

“No. She always hates my choice of movies.” He whined softly, a soft chuckle adorning the whole sentence. 

“How dare she?” San laughed back, his voice a light shade of dramatic, staring at the ceiling of the dimly lit room, the only source of light was the brave and sharp rays of sun peeking in through the curtained windows. 

“I missed this.” Wooyoung speaks all of a sudden, his voice almost like a confession of deepest sins. 

“Missed what?” 

“You. Your laugh? It's probably stupid to miss someone's laugh isn't it?” 

No. I missed your laugh too. I missed everything about you. 

San just smiled, speaking felt like the most unnecessary thing in the world right when he could just bask in the distant buzzing of voices and dialogues in the movie and Wooyoung's warm presence right now, eyes refusing to stay open any longer. 

“I missed you, San.” Wooyoung whispered again, more to himself this time, his voice laced with something San never wants to know the exact word for because it makes him feel too much at once. 

Or maybe it's because it sounds too much like ‘ I love you' that has been haunting him since last summer. 

He doesn't know and he doesn't want to find out. 

“I missed you more .” 

The lake shone once again after what seemed like years. And his heart quickened with every second and step they were closer to the water. 

It feels like a surreal dream to be standing with Wooyoung at the lake in complete comfortable silence of understanding and complete aura of nostalgia. 

“Damn, when was the last time we came here?” Wooyoung muttered, hovering directly over the water, his reflection shining the brightest out of all the lake. 

San shrugs. He doesn't know when Wooyoung last came here but San was here all along in his mind, just at the shoreline of the lake. 

So he just took a deep breath and joined Wooyoung on his side and stared at the calm water. He could already hear the waves start whispering.

He felt a hand on the small of his back and he felt it burning. He felt the hand mark his skin through the ridiculously thin fabric of his t-shirt. 

“I am sorry.” Wooyoung muttered but he didn't actually sound sorry. He sounded rather mischievous or maybe like the warm summer breezes and playful waves of the water. 

“What?” San asked, his mind spinning with what he meant. 

And maybe he should have known that Wooyoung would push him and throw him into the lake and that the moment he'll meet with the lake Wooyoung would throw himself in too. 

“That was totally uncalled for!” San exclaimed, spitting out some of the water that got in his mouth, breathing heavily for all the breath he lost when Wooyoung faced him with a smile so devilish. 

“You've always been too much of a pussy to go into the lake yourself. I had to do this.” Wooyoung laughed, bright like the summer. 

San shuts his eyes close and lets out a small laugh from the deep of his chest too because how does he tell Wooyoung that it's not the water which bothers him anymore. 

That's it the way the waves taunt him continuously by whispering his name to San. Again and again until San’s heart memorized his name and engraved it in there. The way the water touches him makes him afraid that he'll never actually stop loving Wooyoung. That he'll mentally always be here just drowning like he has been doing for almost half his life now. 

That's what bothered him. That's what scared him. 

“I don't like the water.” He lies. 

“Don't lie.” Wooyoung caught right on, the youth in his voice made San want to melt right into the water and become what he pretended to hate the most. 

“Okay. Fine. You caught me.” San puffed out, raising up hands in mock surrender, his mind itching with something. 

“I also missed this.” Wooyoung admitted and started to slowly deflate in the water. He saw all his worries flow down into the blue water. 

He wished he could do that. 

“I think the lake missed you too.” Because for some reason whenever I am here it keeps chanting your name. 

But if that was really the case why was the lake whispering right now and that too louder than ever. 

San held his breath and dunked his head underneath the water, choosing not to hear whatever Wooyoung had to say in response and swing up to his legs before pulling him underneath too. 

They were way younger all of a sudden as Wooyoung’s amused face came into view and it was a little too close but San wasn't going to move even a millimetre farther to change that. 

I could kiss you right now. 

I could just lean and just grab your face and just kiss you. 

His mind echoed and his heart langiuled at the thought that the lake may whisper his thoughts into Wooyoung's ear. 

And he thought they almost did when he grabbed his shoulders and came impossibly closer before he pushed him backwards. 

And he felt relieved and disappointed all at once as he just let him be pushed farther and farther until neither of them could breathe and rose to the surface to breathe. 

Usually he hated the small whispers the lake  initiated right into the best of his heart but right now as Wooyoung laughed, with his head thrown back and his body softly vibrating. 

The whispers and his laugh both engraved into his heartbeat and it sounded like a melody all musicians would dream of. 

And the feeling it gave him and the sight he saw was all he'll ever dream about from now on. 

It was just supposed to be him and Wooyoung. Just him and Wooyoung in his stupid room, with his stupid art supplies. 

It was just supposed to be him and Wooyoung like the old times, there shouldn't be this thick air of tension which feels like the worst crime of San’s. 

But he was happy. He was happy that he finally had Wooyoung back. That he finally felt the missing pieces fall into place. 

He wished he could live in this moment forever, pretending to draw something but in reality he was just staring at Wooyoung randomly splashing colors on the canvas sheet San gave him. 

He likes the way some of the acrylic paint (blue to be more specific) got on his hair and stayed there, colouring a few strands and the way they fell onto his skin made him look like he actually came from one of San's fantasies. 

San wanted to kiss Wooyoung. 

There, he said it. And even admitting it mentally was such a toll on him that he had to sigh deeply as his mind spoke those words to him. 

San wanted to grab Wooyoung’s cheek gently and he wanted Wooyoung to not mind the stain of oil pastels that will get to him as he sweetly puts their lips together. 

He smiled bashfully at the thought, glancing down at his own sheet which was fairly empty except a few pointless circles here and there. 

He feels great today. He feels like the sun is bright again and the sky is blue again and the lake is probably glimmering too and his heart is beating happily again and Wooyoung is right beside him like he should have been all along. 

Wooyoung grinned a little as he flashed his canvas. Wild strokes of blue and pink and white decorating the sheet. 

San nodded delightedly at him, noticing how some of the paint even invaded Wooyoung's face and he looked pretty. 

And maybe it was the rush of being next to Wooyoung without any hesitation again or maybe it was something else but he brought up his hand and felt the paint with his hands. 

It felt like summer afternoons being soaked to the skin and bones, like sun hitting honey skinned back and the absurd desire of San’s to write his name on there. 

If the sentence I am in love with you had a feeling it would be him caressing Jung Wooyoung's paint infiltrated face

Suddenly the tranquil moment of peace was interrupted by the loud ringing of Wooyoung’s phone, the BTS song playing louder than usually heard. 

The phone was vibrating, kept on San’s desk and he climbed out of bed (and away from the enthralling warmth of his heart) to go and fetch it. 

His heart stopped when he saw the contact name, it read, 

Jinhee. 

Jinhee. Jinhee. Jinhee. 

Wooyoung looked at him expectantly and he wanted to lie and tell him that it was a spam call and that it wasn't important so he wouldn't have to watch Wooyoung slip away from his fingertips. 

“It's Jinhee.” He croaked out with much contemplation and Wooyoung’s face fell, walking up to him and grabbing his phone. 

He looked at him with a look which could almost be conveying apologies. San felt like he deserved those as he muttered a faint ‘see you later' and walked out of the door. 

He walked out of the door with paint on his hair and face and San’s heart in his hands. 

Suddenly all the warmth he had collected fell onto the floor and shattered everywhere and thumped down on it just to glance at it all. 

Sometimes he was afraid of his own life. Afraid how it played with him like he was some cheap toy it had been gifted. 

Or maybe it was just trying to make him aware in the worst ways possible. 

Jung Wooyoung had ghosted him for several days again and he didn't even let his foolish heart ponder other possibilities which were sweet when he knew the bitter but definitive one in his heart.

Jinhee and him probably made up. And he forgot that his best friend existed.

But that finally brought him to realization which should've been realised months ago. 

Jung Wooyoung had changed. Jung Wooyoung had grown up. Jung Wooyoung just wasn't the same anymore.

And yet the only thing which grew in San was probably his body and the ache for Wooyoung in his whole being. 

Maybe he should have seen this coming, he should have known that they wouldn't be kids forever. 

He couldn't just cling on, he couldn't just convince himself that everything was still the same. 

That Wooyoung didn't have a girlfriend, that he was just like any other boy if they fucked him up with every little they they did, that if it wasn't Jinhee it would be some other girl . 

Some girl, some other girl. Not San, the same San who never let his blond hair fade away(until now) because neither did Jinhee. 

The same San who painted countless pieces of art thinking of him to the point where now he's all he can think about while painting. 

He sinks his upper teeth into his bottom lip rolling around in his bed. He wanted to scream too much out in the world to just close his eyes and fall into a slumber. 

Maybe he could call Wooyoung and scream at him and then block him forever and hope that they'll never cross paths again even though they live on the same street. 

Even though they were going to the same college after the summer because that is what they had dreamed for ever since the lake shined and the sun rose and San loved Wooyoung (since forever in conclusion) 

Even though San is in love with him. San is in love with Wooyoung. And Wooyoung will never like him back, his heart will never beat for San and San has spent what seems like all his life just hoping for that. 

He should've known this wouldn't end well when his mind echoed unhelpfully the words of Wooyoungie and me will be together forever.  

When he started liking Wooyoung's favourite flavour of ice cream more than his own. When he started watching every romance movie with him behind his mind. When he started scribbling his name in the back of his notebooks in every lesson they didn't have together, when he cried to Yeosang about how Wooyoung was quote distancing himself unquote, when he lay awake at night his buzzing with Wooyoung in his veins and brain. 

He barely let out a shaky breath. He loved Wooyoung too much to keep it in any longer, to hurt in secret, to love in secret. 

But he wasn't sure he was ready for sound just yet, so he climbed off his bed and pulled out a loose sheet from in between a stack of books on the floor and grabbed a random pen which was kept on his desk and sat himself there. 

He will write a letter and he will burn it, hoping his love will burn with it. 

He'll write a letter and he hopes his love flows out with ink and stays there forever on the page only if he ends up being too scared to burn it. 

Dear Wooyoung, 

Can I still call you dear? Probably not. Are you ever going to read this? Also probably not so it doesn't count this one time. 

I remember the day we met very clearly. I was overjoyed that I finally had a friend, who would have thought? 

Maybe I was the fool, maybe I am the fool. You don't fall in love with your best friends. You don't fall in love with them and yet I did. 

But is it really all my fault? Why were you so nice, why did you shine so bright? Why were you so sweet? Why were you so considerate? Why? Why?

I hate how all that is dying now. I hate that we have grown up, I hate that I am still not 14 running around town with you. I am not sad for once, I am fucking mad. 

I don't know if you remember but last year after Hongjoong hyungs party, you told me you loved me and I didn't let my heart believe that for a second. But was it really just a lie? 

I hate how we can't just live in my room forever with the aircon temperature too high and shivering just to amplify the feeling of your warmth beside me.

I hate how we can't swim in the lake forever, me just looking at you with soaked hair falling in your eyes. I hate how the lake will probably still sing their stupid little song made out of your name even when I am gone, even when you're gone, even when we're gone. 

I hate how I can't remember a time where I didn't love you. Where I didn't want to hold your hand and play with your hair and draw on your skin. 

I hate how that's all wrong despite it being all I have ever wanted. I hate that we are not kids anymore. I hate that we ever had to grow up. 

And I hate you. I hate you. I hate how much I don't hate you, how much I want you not to hate me. I hate how I can't imagine a life without you. I hate that you ever asked me to be friends with you on the swings because I can't handle it anymore. 

I feel like I have loved you my whole life. I feel like every summer I fall in love all over again. I feel like every summer is like that one thousand summers ago where my heart suddenly fluttered and my words almost stuttered and I fell in love with you. 

I don't hate being in love with you. 

I wished you loved me back or maybe I wish I didn't love you at all. But I love the summer and you feel like the summer throughout. 

I wish that I could give you this letter but I won't. Because I like to run till my feet ache and even now when my feet are on the verge of bleeding I can't stop running because I am too afraid what will happen once you catch me. 

But in conclusion what I really wanted to tell you above most was, clearly and loudly so you don't miss it, that I love you. 

A thousand summers ago, 

You stole my heart 

and for you that wasn't even hard 

And I fell in love with you. 

 And I am sorry for not being right and for being wrong. But if loving you is indeed wrong like everyone says it is then I feel like I have never been right in the first place. 

He can't burn this so he crumples it up and throws it into the small pile in his room with more crumpled up sheets and canvas.

Maybe he will ignore Wooyoung after all, and exit through the back door. Try to experience his last summer without the boy who had the whole experience in his eyes. 

Or maybe he will just go down to the lake and try to drown himself. 

Ignoring Wooyoung was almost like burning himself. It stung and the sting lasted from when he turned away to the opposite from where Wooyoung waved at him standing at his own door. 

He wonders what it would have been like if San was just wondering normal. Would he also have a Jinhee? But he can't imagine that, he can't imagine being not in love with Wooyoung. 

He didn't realise just how much of him Wooyoung really possessed until he was wandering around the town with nothing to do. 

Maybe he could go to the lake? 

He needs to stop being so desperately in love. 

Maybe he could visit the empty playground? 

Memories are the last thing he needs right now. 

Or perhaps he could visit the old café in the main street of the town but then he will remember all the evenings where Wooyoung smelled like freshly brewed coffee after long afternoons spent there. 

He could go anywhere and there would be pieces of Wooyoung lying around. He could try to escape but in the end it was impossible. This town was laced with memories and memories were laced with Jung Wooyoung. 

He ended up at the small arcade even though he remembers all of Wooyoung’s favourite games by heart, he still let himself sulk while playing Pacman. 

He groaned when he lost once again and all his money had been lost on the same game. He lightly kicked the old machine and scoffed, shoving his hands in his denim pockets. 

“You used to be good at Pacman.” A soft voice invaded his ears and he sucked in a sharp breath. It was annoying how he didn't even have to turn around to know who it was. 

And you weren't supposed to be here . 

He thought the arcade would be the perfect place to escape. San was always better at games than Wooyoung was (Wooyoung didn't actually know that because San would purposely lose every time.) 

And Wooyoung stopped visiting the arcade when they were 15, he thought it was too childish and he only ever saw 14 years old there and it was funny to San because they were just a year younger than them but Wooyoung always took too much pride in growing up. 

Now he wants to scream at him that he's 17 and he shouldn't be here because he was already everywhere. 

“Well,” San croaked out, still not daring to turn around, “things change and by change I am reminded that all my change is used up—I need to go home! Bye!” 

He hurriedly spits out and attempts to run towards the other end of the arcade when suddenly his wrist is grabbed by a hand which sets his skin on fire. 

“I–I have extra change! Let's play—let's play together.” The nervous sputter cleared everything in San’s mind and he relaxed his tense body. 

( “Wait, why don't you want to go to the arcade anymore?!” A frantic 15 year old San asked, his voice dripping with shock. 

“It's just a bit—you know? Childish. I only ever see 14 year olds there now. We are getting older.” He speaks in a tone, trying to sound like how San’s grandpa sounds in a wise elderly manner. 

San stayed silent. San always felt he never grew up and he never will. 

But maybe if he agreed to this. 

“Fine.” He monotonously replied with a shrug of his shoulders.) 

“No. I am sorry—I have things to do.” San spat out with great difficulty a feeling in his chest telling him that he'll probably have to travel to the moon to get over Wooyoung. 

“Just one game—I swear!,” But Wooyoung stayed persistent, his hands tightening over his wrist in a way San knew he really wanted him to turn around and just say yes, “Please.” 

What happened to growing up? Couldn't Wooyoung understand that San was trying to finally grow up. 

He turned around with a sharp sigh and closed his eyes, too afraid to melt if Wooyoung's glanced into his own. 

“Fine, but I actually don't have any money left.” He mumbled a bit embarrassed how weak willed he actually was. 

He was flushing pink and he hated that because he knew the sight of pink of his skin didn't keep Wooyoung up like the pink of Wooyoung kept San awake. 

“That's okay. I have plenty left.” Wooyoung softly reassures while they walk up to the Pacman machine and San feels he was 13 all over again. 

He wished he could turn to Wooyoung and recall him every time he lost purpose so Wooyoung could finally understand how much it hurt. 

“You want to go first?” 

San shook his head and just silently watched as Wooyoung operated the machine, trying his best to score the highest, his hair falling into his hair and the tip of his tongue poking at the corner of his lips. 

And this 17 year old Wooyoung who had almost swore that he would never come to the arcade again was right in front of him playing his favourite game. 

And then for a split second he stops blaming himself for falling in love with Wooyoung. 

“What are you doing here?” San finally asks the question he knows they both wanted to be asked. 

Wooyoung sighed, looking back at him for a slight second. 

“I just guessed you'd be here.” 

Oh. 

San closed his eyes and bit his tongue and clenched his fist. He didn't know whether to punch Wooyoung or kiss him.

“Why have you been ignoring me?” Wooyoung finally gets to the point, leaving the game and letting himself lose. 

San doesn't have an answer so he just turns around and runs away. 

He rushed past everyone, if he stays any longer he'll end up like every summer. He'll end up drowning and sinking and he will be trapped forever. 

He will be stained forever with a color he won't be able to spread to anyone else and Wooyoung would be fine but how long could San die in silence? 

He pretended like he never heard the cry of his name and exited the arcade with a scurried run. 

He ran through the colorful streets and then turned to run through the not so colorful ones too. He panted and he wanted to press his hands onto his ears to stop hearing the way this whole town screamed Wooyoung's name at him. 

The moment he reached home he locked himself in his room. He could have sighed, he could have cried when he realised his own room was not safe from the loud memories of Wooyoung. 

He could have. Just like he could have done many things. 

But he didn't. 

But he didn't. 

And instead just chose to curl up on his bed under the duvet. 

He wished Wooyoung would have kissed him at least once over all the summers they had, then at least he would have a justified reason to be in such despair. 

But he supposed that real despair was trying to justify it. 

And he wished his sister hadn't barged into his room and shouted at him about how Wooyoung was banging on their door, almost trying to throw it off its hinges. 

And he screamed back at her that she should tell him to go away. 

“He is not listening! I already tried telling him that. And if he breaks the door, I am telling mom you did it.” She angrily said before turning around on her heels and leaving. 

He didn't budge. How long could he keep it up for? San knew Wooyoung didn't have much patience. San knew Wooyoung like the back of his hand, like the way to make his favourite strokes on empty canvas, like the words to his favorite song. 

He knew Wooyoung didn't wait long for anyone. He knew he'd just kick his door in frustration once and walk back home cursing San’s name. 

He knew. 

But what he didn't know was that his sister would come in and to him again and look him dangerously in the eye and then try to drag him out of his bed. 

“Leave me—Noona—stop!” He fought back as she pulled him by his limbs. She grunted before she spat, 

“Wooyoung is now screaming and kicking our door. I can't take it anymore. Either you open the door or I open the door and let him in.” 

“He'll go away soon. He's an impatient piece of shit anyway!” 

“Yeah! After he breaks our door. Fine I am letting him in.” His sister left his limbs after one last tug and almost left through his door. 

“Fine! No! I'll handle it. Fuck off now.” He grumbled the last part under his breath, hopping off his bed and passing by her. 

He walked down the hallway with hesitant steps and just pressed himself to the door when he reached it instead of opening it. 

“What do you want?” He asked in a monotone tone. He was too afraid of letting any emotion slip past. He was too afraid of Wooyoung finding out that he was still weak after all. 

Weak for him. 

“Open the door.” He heard a rasp in return and he almost stifled at the thought of Wooyoung having a sore throat for the rest of the time because he was screaming for him. 

“What do you want?” But he spoke instead and it was sharp. If words could cut, this voice of his would be his favourite weapon. 

“I want you to open the door.” 

“I don't want to talk to you.” 

“Please, San.” 

San tried to be strong but in the end he was just weak. He could not bear to hear him plead, it pierced him. So with shaky hands he opened the door and was met face to face with Wooyoung. 

San has never seen Wooyoung like this before. He has seen Wooyoung in so many situations, in the highs, in the lows, in the dark, in the glows. 

He has never seen his eyes hooded with soft tears, his hands reddening, his face flushed with what looked like anger. 

“Why?” That was the first thing he said. His voice is even more harsh than before. 

Why? Why? Why? 

“What?” San croaked out, hands fisitng his jeans at his side, his throat getting dry. 

“Why did you run away?” 

Oh. 

“You weren't supposed to be at the arcade!” San spat instead. Wooyoung wasn't supposed to be there because he was too mature to be there. 

It was supposed to be a safe place for San while everyone else grew up, he could hole in there and feel at peace with his inability to be like the others. 

“You don't own the arcade, San. Of course I can be there!” Wooyoung let out an amused chuckle ( in the bad way) before glaring at him. 

“You told me that you were too old to be there! You can't be there Wooyoung because you don't want to be there.” He tried to calmly fight back, he wanted to pretend that this didn't affect him at all but his shaking voice betrayed him. 

“I never said that!” Wooyoung sounded like a wrongly accused victim and San just wanted to shut the door on his face. 

But he won't because it doesn't bother him that much. 

“Fuck you! You did say that, in the summer of 10th grade. You said it’s a bit childish. And we're getting older or whatever!” 

“Do you memorise everything I say?” 

“And what if I do? How is that the point of anything?” 

San sputtered without thinking, his eyes widening at his own words, mouth falling slightly agape before he decided that this did bother him and went into slam the door shut but Wooyoung noticed it and placed his foot in between in slight panic. 

“San, you're mad at me because I went to the arcade…?” He questioned his voice all breathy and light all of a sudden. 

San’s stomach tied into knots. He swallowed his own spit. 

“Why don't you just go and hang out with your stupid girlfriend?” San bitterly muttered, trying to poke away Wooyoung’s leg with own foot and close the door shut. 

Suddenly it was all too silent. It was like the world paused and everyone and everything stared at San, just like Wooyoung did, wide eyes and something clicking in his brain. 

“Is this about Jinhee?” 

“No! This is not about her!” 

Wooyoung laughed like he couldn't believe him (which he probably couldn't). He curled his lip up to one side and scoffed. 

“This is about Jinhee.” He firmly stated. 

No. This is about you. This is about you and this is about me. 

“Well I would've liked it if I wasn't just some guy you came to cry to whenever she dumped your ass.” San bitterly admitted after a beat, after a catch of Wooyoung's breath. Wooyoung’s eyes widened softly like a deer caught the headlights. 

“I do not do that.” 

“Oh really?” Now it was San’s turn to smirk and look at Wooyoung with unbelieving eyes. 

“Then why do you ghost me for literal days whenever you two make up?” 

Wooyoung sunk his teeth into his lip and began to tap his fingers on the frame of the door. All while San just glanced right into his eyes with a look so accusing. 

“You know how she is! And I come to hang out with you as soon as I can.” 

“ No.” San spat, shaking his head. 

“You come to me whenever you can't go to her! And that hurts because we used to be best friends Wooyoung.” 

Wooyoung bit his lip almost too hard, his eyes turning into blades at the words and directing them towards San. 

“San, you're still my best friend and I don't know what stupid misunderstanding you have but you don't—” 

“No, Wooyoung. If I were your best friend you would've—you would have—” San stumbled through his words because he had too much to say. But his mind only echoed with one thing, 

You would have loved me. You would have loved me back. 

“What are you mad for? Me getting a girlfriend? What did you expect of San? That we would never get girlfriends, that we would never grow up?” 

Wooyoung probably thought he put out the most fair point forward. 

Grow up. Grow up. Grow up. 

How does he tell Wooyoung that he never grew up? That he was still the little boy craving his best friend's entire attention forever? 

“I didn't expect my best friend to fucking forget about me the second he had a girl, that's what I expected Wooyoung.” He spat, and he spat with venom and maybe it got to Wooyoung because he realised he must have said something terribly wrong and opened his mouth to defend but San couldn't do it anymore. 

“Leave.”

“San—” 

“Wooyoung. Leave.” 

“Just lets talk it out—” 

“I don't want to talk. Leave.” 

San would have never thought in his life that there would be a time where he'd Wooyoung to leave. That there would be a time that he wouldn't desperately devour all the little crumbs Wooyoung threw at him. 

Because they were best friends. 

Best friends. 

He hated those words as Wooyoung walked away defeated, looking at him over his shoulder, eyes begging to San to stop him and–and do what? 

His eyes didn't convey that completely and left him haunted with the underlying message he thinks he will never figure out. 

But he shut the door. He shut the door nonetheless with shaking hands. And he sank to the floor, fighting the urge to fly open the door and beg Wooyoung to come back. 

He can't do that anymore.

It's been a few days since San turned away Wooyoung from his door and he knows that he has spent way too many days without the presence of Wooyoung (thanks to Wooyoung.)

But this was different. 

Wooyoung didn't send good morning texts daily, until now. And San never left him on read ever, until now. 

Wooyoung thought he was sneaky but San can see him lurking around his house for even hours at this point through his window. 

And he doesn't know why he is always looking down that window. It's not like he is waiting for Wooyoung or something. 

Never. 

He wanted this. He wanted to get over Wooyoung. He wanted to free Wooyoung. 

This is what he wanted. 

And that is why he definitely wasn't waiting for his phone to ping at 9AM sharp in the morning, and that wasn't definitely the reason for his restless shuffling on his bed. 

He just mindlessly scrolled through every piece of text that ever happened between him and Wooyoung. Letting out a wavering sigh when he realised there wasn't anymore to scroll up and see. 

Good Morning. 

His mind chanted endlessly to him, making him sink his teeth into his bottom lip. He clutched his phone harder.

Did Wooyoung get tired so easily? 

Did he really have enough?

Was he even awake yet? 

Is he okay? 

He got more nervous with each second and he felt his heart trying to break free from his confined chest and run away to Wooyoung and bask in his presence forever. 

His presence alone would be enough for his foolish heart. 

Suddenly the phone started to ring and he felt like heart actually almost succeeded at its attempts when he saw who was calling. 

It was Wooyoung. 

Of course, it was Wooyoung. 

He considered just declining the call and forcing himself to go back to sleep and shut his mind for as long it can shut up. But then his heart shakes with a joy he missed dearly as his finger hovered over the accept button. 

He pressed it. 

He stayed silent, enjoying the faint static the phone emitted before feeling his heart falter at the familiarity of the voice that spoke up, 

“San, you picked.” He sounded surprised, like he was just playing with his luck or maybe throwing out a stone in the dark. 

But all San could think about was how sweet his voice felt to his ears. How he could feel his tone in his veins.  

“Yeah.” He barely breathed out. He doesn't know how he managed to ignore Wooyoung for this long without absolutely having his heart stop beating. 

“Let's hang out. The lake? You know, your favourite place,” He eventually spoke up after a while of just buzzing static and San’s heart trying to sync with it just so he could be a little closer to Wooyoung, “I broke up with Jinhee.” 

His heart stopped for a short second just because it couldn't stop forever. 

“I–I can't comfort you.” Not anymore. 

Wooyoung laughed and it sounded rather pleasant and he could basically hear the smirk in his tone, 

“I don't need you to comfort me. I broke up with her this time, every other time she breaks up with me.” 

“Why?”

“For you. ” He half joked and it was obvious he was partially joking but San’s throat went dry and then started knotting up. His mind burned with red. 

“ No.” He sounded in pure shock. His voice almost trembled as he threw himself on his bed and removed his night clothes with one hand. 

“Well—it is a long story. But who cares, I get to spend time with you now. All summer long .”

San is used to measure his life in summers. He loved summers to the moon and back, to his last heartbeat. And he considered how much he actually lived by how much time was spent with Wooyoung. 

And right now Wooyoung was trying to pump the most life he had in a while into him all of sudden. He had been dead for too long, he couldn't handle it. 

“No. No! Wait there. Right there. I am coming.” He put on a random t-shirt and a pair of shorts which were lying on his floor as he slurred out in panic before he ultimately cut the line. 

He didn't want a response. He wanted answers. 

His feet ached insanely by the time he reached the designated spot. His breathing heavy, his heart heavier. And there he saw him— through messy blond strands falling into his eyes and sweat sticking into his skin. 

He smiled bright at him, waving enthusiastically with both hands like if he put any less effort San would actually disappear. 

He might as well. 

But he didn't and chose to step forward one by one until there was only one step between them and the lake a few one steps behind them. 

“Why?” San asked, his words trying to cut right into Wooyoung's heart and figure out the answers to his doubts for once and all. 

“What?” 

“Why did you break up with Jinhee?” 

Wooyoung’s lips twitched and his eyes were painted with every shade of confusion San has ever known or felt. 

“Because I didn't love her.” Lier. 

“Don't shit with me! Did you upset her again? Did she upset you? How bad is it this time?” San exclaimed, his hand finding his forehead and swiping up his bangs. 

“San, calm down. I broke up with her because I realised what she and I had was incredibly stupid and what we had was upsetting you .” He softly cut in and San hated how it was way more effective than his razor sharp words. 

He inhaled a deep breath, his mind crumbling at how delicately spoke the words. 

You. You. You. 

“F-For me?” He struggled to push it out of his mouth, his throat tight, his fists balled. His heart in disbelief. 

“For you. ” 

He wanted to say so many things all at once. Too many, maybe. He wanted to bawl and clutch him by the collar and yet sob into his chest at the same time. 

You can't do this to me. You can't do this to me. I am in love with you, Wooyoung. 

But he was an ocean of misery and he was greedy for all the misery mayhaps or maybe it was just his helplessness that he had to take it all in. 

So he tried to turn around and run away like he always did. To run till his feet ache and bleed. But this time Wooyoung caught him by his wrist and rooted him on his feet. 

“What's wrong? Did I do something wrong?” 

“No.” Yes. 

“Then why are you trying to run away? Again.” 

San thinks not running away might just be the scariest thing to ever happen to him. He can't imagine staying still and letting all the truth spill. And as long as he was running the truth ran with him. 

“You can't do this to me.” San spoke, raw and honestly. 

But right now he was forced to still. And he just wished to experience whatever truth had to offer even at the slightest. 

“What?” He sounded extremely pleading to the point where he almost convinced San that he was the one struggling and not the other way round. 

He sucked in a deep breath and turned around to face Wooyoung. To truly face Wooyoung. With his eyes staring right into his. With his face so close that he could just give into his fantasies. 

“You can not do this to me! You can't–you can't break up with Jinhee and say it's because of me! You can't pretend like you care that much. ” 

“But I do care! San what is wrong with you? Why do you think I don't care? You're the best person in the world to me—” He immediately fought back, his hand tightened around San’s wrist and his voice was strained. 

San opened his mouth and Wooyoung shut his. His mind died a little like his heart did everyday and the reason was right in front of him. And before he knew the words slipped out of his mouth. 

“Because you don't understand Wooyoung. You don't understand!” 

His eyes widened a little and his grip loosened slightly. Before he asked, his voice highly troubled,

“What don't I understand?” 

San’s breath hitched. He looked away from his eyes finally and cast them on the lake. It was the lake. And this was Jung Wooyoung. The boy San feels like he has loved all his life. 

The boy who was like summer if it were a person. The boy who he memorized everything little thing about. The boy who shone brighter than the sun and the stars and all of them combined. This was the boy he was in love with. 

And contemplated, contemplated that he truly might never be 18 again, that he truly might not be at soul-tangling distance from Wooyoung ever again, that he might not be at the lake where he felt his life started, that he might not be in love with Jung Wooyoung again. 

Okay, maybe that was a lie. He would always be in love with Jung Wooyoung. As long as the summers came and went, his heart would joyously sing Wooyoung’s name to him. 

“I love you.” 

He said it in a quick breath. His voice was too low with hope that Wooyoung doesn't hear it or maybe he does and San disappears immediately not present to witness the aftermath. 

But Wooyoung heard it, maybe not all of it. Maybe he only heard the words on the surface and fell deaf on the years of pining and loving in silence, buckets and lakes of tears and paint he spent trying to paint him, the ink and page space of all his notebooks scribbled with his name. 

“I love you too—” Wooyoung began and San could see it so bright, the opportunity to fall into his words and agree and let him believe that that's what he meant all along. 

But he couldn't keep it anymore. Maybe he was finally flooding. 

“Not like I love you,” He sucked in a sharp breath and whispered and yet he could basically see the echoes of what he spoke, “You might love me–I don't know—but me? I am in love with you. ” 

At first Wooyoung was still blank but then it slowly started to morph on his face. The way his lips parted and his hair was swooped in on his face by the rude breeze of air and his eyes widened. 

The way his hand slowly let his wrist slip out and now he was definitely flooding. 

“And–And I have been in love with you for, for so long now. I feel like all my life I have been in love with you. And I–I love you so much,” His nervous ramble continued but he slowly started to step back slowly, one by one until he'll be out of reach forever, “And I wasn't upset that you were dating Jinhee–I was upset because I wasn't dating you.” 

“Because it seemed unfair—I am sorry—but I had loved you for what seemed like thousand years and thousand summers at that point and yet–yet she was the one kissing you. I am sorry.” 

It seemed fitting to San, it really did. Confessing your undying love at the place where you first fell into that pit. It was just like one of his fantasies, the lake shimmering behind and Wooyoung's eyes brighter as always. 

But if it really were one of his fantasies Wooyoung wouldn't have looked so shocked, so confused, so clueless, so silent. 

He looked speechless.

“I–I was never ever actually going to tell you. I was going to literally take this to my fuckin’ grave but–but it became too much to handle. I am sorry.” 

Wooyoung’s hand reached out like he was calling for him but he was too afraid, fastening his steps, his heart beating out of his chest and his teeth biting his tongue as if to punish it for spilling all their truth. 

“San—” The voice was trying to stop him. But San couldn't stop anymore. Not now, not ever. Not when Wooyoung knows . 

“I love you and I am sorry.” He quickly shouted before turning on his heels and running off with the strong urge to press his hands on his ears to ignore how Wooyoung called out his name behind him.

But he ignored that the best he can and he ran. 

And ran. 

San felt like this was it. This was all the growing up he could ever manage over the entire course of his life as he sat down on his floor room with the air-con at teeth chattering temperatures and unfortunately no sun like Jung Wooyoung warmth to bask in. 

He intensely blended the blue with the light shade of the same colour with his fingers, his mind slightly calming down at the smell of freshly opened pastels. 

He wanted to cry at the sight of his blue stained hands and fingers. He wanted to scream and shout and throw himself out of the window. 

But he couldn't possibly do that (like so many other things) so he shoved out his clothes and grabbed a box and ripped it open. 

And he did what he always did, he tried to trap all his feelings in colours on sheets. And then stared at them when they were done and felt all those feelings emerge in his heart again. 

Maybe this was how it was meant to be all along. Maybe San was meant to end up alone from the beginning. 

His grip intensified over the pastel, his chest burned as he struggled to take comfortable breaths. 

He tried his best not to let his mind wander to him for the entire hour it had been since the chaos took place. 

He almost regretted his words, almost . But even if it was hard to admit, even though it took everything in him to speak it out loud, it was almost comforting to have that big load off his chest. 

It was like he could almost breathe again properly. 

Almost. 

But the realization which was dawning cruelly slow on him, the realization of losing Wooyoung. That was snatching the oxygen away from him. Or maybe Wooyoung was the oxygen all along. 

He bit his lip, not knowing what emotion he was trying to contain, maybe it was all of them or maybe none of them at all. 

He slowly let the pastel fall from his hands and onto the sheet and the sound of it meeting the ground through the sheet resonated way louder than it should have. 

He sighs again and then again and then he finally lets the dams break and he lets himself drown because he can not bear staying above the surface anymore. 

His hands run through his hair continuously, his teeth biting his lips so hard they might just draw blood, his breaths stuttering, his eyes stinging but most of all his heart breaking.

And just breaking. 

Sometimes in the middle of the night, he would just imagine what would happen if he just told Wooyoung. What would he do? Would he tenderly hold his hand? Would he say it back too? Would he go as far to kiss him?

But he never wandered as far as to the possibility of nothing. He had even imagined the worst on bad days, he imagined physical violence, he imagined immeasurable lengths of disgust, he imagined Wooyoung running away. 

He just never expected nothing. And while he should be glad that none of his worst case scenarios actually took place but he then concludes silence was always the worst of them all along. 

He roughly wiped a tear from his cheek, knowing that the color on his hand probably stained his face and he should get up and wash his face but instead he fell on his back on the floor and didn't bother with the rest of the incoming wave of tears. 

Maybe it was the sobs which shook his body, the ache in his heart or maybe it was something completely else which made him think knocking on his window was another one of his imaginations. 

He sniffled, using his knuckles to wipe off his tears knowing it was useless anyway, he knew more would come along any second now. 

He sat up. He glanced over to his window. His breath almost died in the middle when he saw Wooyoung with his knuckles inches away from his window. 

For a second, he was almost convinced that it was another one of his fantasies. It was a scene definitely from his fantasies. Wooyoung at his window? At his window? For him? 

Definitely from his fantasies. 

But he stood up nonetheless, fresh tears already pooling his eyes as he made his way to his window. And sighed, placing his coloured hand right where Wooyoung’s own knuckles were hovering. 

Wooyoung looked too real. Maybe that has always been the problem, maybe Wooyoung was always too real. 

He blinked dumbly when his knuckles came in contact with the glass pane. 

“Open it.” Wooyoung's faint voice came in and that's when his eyes widened in realization. This was real. Wooyoung was real. He was actually at his window at this very moment. 

“Oh my god.” He whispered, sliding open the window and stepping back to make space for him to enter. His heart was literally vibrating in his chest. 

“Hi.” Wooyoung awkwardly greeted and San fought the urge to just leap at him and cage him with his arms, take back every word and just stay like that forever. 

“Wooyoung.” He mumbled. His tears escaping and falling, like his heart. Always, like his heart. 

“Don't cry.” Wooyoung muttered, shaking his head, hands slightly raised as he took just one step closer to him. 

“Why are you here? Why are you doing this?” He knew he wanted to sound angry, Wooyoung knew he wanted to sound angry. But in the end his voice came out more of a choke cry. Like a plea. Like what it exactly was. 

“You—You told me what you wanted to say—I think it is only fair if you listen to what I have to say now.” He struggled through his words. And it was so obviously present on his face that yes, he indeed had been struggling. 

But San didn't have the heart to hear whatever form of rejection was coming his way. He wasn't ready now , he wasn't ready ever . He wasn't ready because it was Wooyoung and he has been loving Wooyoung for almost half his life now. 

Half his life. Half the breaths he ever took, he took for Wooyoung. Half the smiles he ever shot, he shot for Wooyoung. Half his life for Wooyoung. 

And just a few words from him will make that all crumble and go to waste, taking his poor brash heart with them. 

“It is okay. You don't have to say anything. Our friendship is more than enough–I swear.” 

That's a lie. But please believe me. 

But all Wooyoung did was suck in an angry sharp breath and move forward and towards him. San wanted to fade away and just become the air he was breathing at most.

“But what about me? What about what I want?” He spoke, his voice dripping lower by the syllable. His hands fisted in a way that he was trying to resist from something. 

“What do you want?” San simply asked.  

“ You,” 

You. 

“And I don't think that you understand. I think it's you who doesn't understand,” He spoke, his voice pitching with a desperation San has never seen, with scurried steps nearing them, “ You mean everything to me. You—You are my entire world. And if you think you're the only one in love, you are wrong. ” 

San’s head was spinning as he stood there with a gaping mouth caused by disbelief of all sorts. He gulped before he whispered, 

“What? What do you mean?” 

Wooyoung shut his eyes and let out a frustrated chuckle before he ran his fingers through his hair. 

“I am in love with you , San. I have always been in love with you. But I was too afraid. I thought it was wrong,” He confessed and San’s world paused. His heartbeat stopped. 

He replayed the words in his head like his favourite song on loop until he could remember how each syllable was pronounced. 

I am in love with you, San. 

“ No ,” He softly gasped in disbelief. 

“ Yes.” Wooyoung croaked. 

There was a moment. A silent one. A quiet one. There was shock, there was surprise and then there was a heartbeat in San’s heart. 

And then there was anger. 

“No! No! You don't fucking love me—Do you think—Do you think this is funny?!,” He rushed in and grabbed Wooyoung by his collar, not caring an ounce about the blue colour staining his collar like it stained his face, like it stained his soul, and perhaps also his face as he cried down fat ugly tears, “You– I–I have spent my entire life just loving you. Just wanting you—at times almost needing you. I have loved you every day since forever. I can't just—You can't just trample over my heart like this!” 

Wooyoung’s breath got heavy and there were visible tears in his eyes, lips wobbling before he exclaimed back with much more emotion, 

“And you think I didn't fucking love you back? You think I wasn't dying every moment I pretended not to love you! I was scared of what I felt for you! But—But you really think I didn't lie awake at nights thinking about you? About you, your face, your hands, your drawings, your everything. Why do you think Jinhee and I never worked? Why? It's because I couldn't stop imagining you in her place and she–she knew and I knew!” 

San choked on a sob, his hold loosening on his collar. He pursed his lips. And his eyes stung as he looked at his slightly shaking hands on his collar. 

“I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. And I'll say it for every time I couldn't if you let me. I'll say it to you every other second of the day because I fall in love with you again and again every second. I love you, San. I have never not loved you.” 

Wooyoung’s hands reached out and his palm pressed on the top of his hand before he slotted his fingers between San’s own and he felt the tips of sun rays press down on his palm. 

“You–You love me?” He stuttered. His heart was racing and he just wanted to lean in. 

Wooyoung didn't respond, instead he brought up their intertwined hands up to his own face and pressed San’s contagiously stained palm on his own jaw and nodded. 

“I love you.” He whispered. And San heard it right in his heart. 

“Say it again.” He requested, voice shaking but his heart firming. 

“I love you. I love you, San. And nothing will ever change that or make that wrong. And if it is wrong then I was never right. And I never will be.” 

“Because you love me?” 

“Because I love you. Because I will always love you.” 

San didn't ever want to leave this moment. He never wanted to move again, he just wanted to stare into Wooyoung's eyes forever.

He smiled softly at him and he nodded, 

“I love you too. I love you more than you can ever imagine Wooyoung.”

And then he leaned in. He finally leaned in and he pressed his lips against Wooyoung's. His other hand found his way to his nape as he desperately grasped at it and felt his own waist be encircled by an arm. 

Kissing Wooyoung felt like the sun was dancing on your skin, like the lake was your heart all along. It was like messy afternoons spent in the playground, it was like pulling each down into the grass and it was like loud laughter resonating in hearts. It was everything and it was nothing all at once. 

They pulled apart just the slightest, their foreheads reading on each other's. San sighed blissfully. 

“Your face is so blue.” He chuckled, his heart brimming with joy. Brimming with Wooyoung to the absolute seams. 

“And you painted it on there. It's right where it should be.” Wooyoung sighed and his breath fanned over his face. 

And that was absolutely everything. Seeing blue flow down on his jaw, to see that blue again on that honey skin, to be with Wooyoung now and forever. 

It was everything. 

And deep inside his heart he admits that even in his wildest and most wishful fantasies, he never expected everything either but he supposes Jung Wooyoung was everything. He has always been everything. How dare San dream of anything less? 

So with the sun inside his heart and summer inside his veins. He leaned in again, feeling lips on lips again. And feeling his world stop revolving when he felt him smirk in his kiss as greedy hands grasped as much as they could. 

And as soon as they pulled apart, San resorted to kissing every inch of Wooyoung's face, making up for all the times he couldn't. 

And when the younger giggled, jokingly trying to push him away with one hand but the other still wrapped around his waist. 

It really dawns on him. It really awakes in his heart how long he has been loving Wooyoung and how long Wooyoung had been loving him back. 

And how much longer he would love Wooyoung and how much longer Wooyoung would love him back. 

The answer was as simple as breathing as simple as it could get, the answer was forever . Because the answer had always been forever. Because the summer in his heart was going to last for as long as he loved Wooyoung and that was simply just forever