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He doesn't feel the same.
He isn’t into boys.
Donghyuck has to learn to live with that.
Mark wants to be his friend.
Why is he making it so difficult?
Mark doesn’t feel the same.
He asks Donghyuck if it hurts to be so close to him.
Mark touches him, even if he knows it kills Donghyuck’s heart.
Mark says he is sorry.
Donghyuck reassures Mark telling him that it’s okay. Everything will be gone once they graduate.
Mark doesn’t like what Donghyuck says.
They will never see each other again.
What if Mark wants to be in Donghyuck’s life even after high school?
Donghyuck calls him selfish.
He doesn’t feel the same,
and Donghyuck understands so he tells Mark that they can make a deal.
They can be friends for the summer, but once college comes Mark has to wait.
Wait for what?
Mark isn’t sure if he is okay with the whole thing;
but a deal is a deal, and it’s only fair that Donghyuck sets the rules.
It shouldn’t be a problem that Donghyuck only agrees to come back
once he gets rid of his feelings for Mark, once he likes someone else.
So they can be friends properly, with no one hurting.
Mark doesn’t feel the same after all.
The summer is wonderful.
The summer is so much fun.
The summer turns into a memory cherished in a golden box in Mark’s heart.
Summer is the beginning. Mark doesn’t want summer to end.
Autumn comes and with it Donghyuck is gone.
Mark keeps his part of the deal, and reminds himself of what's to come,
but it doesn’t make it any easier.
Donghyuck's absence feels like Christmas in summer.
It’s with the daffodils in bloom that Donghyuck comes back
and with them, Mark leaves the winter behind.
He doesn’t feel the same.
It’s a truth that both know, but now it’s also a truth that both feel.
Donghyuck talks about a guy he met in one of his classes.
Mark smiles while he talks and encourages Donghyuck to speak to him.
Donghyuck refuses and is content to just see the boy from afar.
Donghyuck confesses he has a crush on him.
Donghyuck talks a lot about him.
Mark feels a little annoyed.
Mark dissociates when Donghyuck speaks about the guy.
Mark didn’t catch the emotion on Donghyuck’s voice one day,
waits until he is done talking to ask him to drink together instead.
Days later Donghyuck invites him to a coffee, he tells Mark if he forgot.
Mark did, he actually can’t remember when Donghyuck set the date but he lies.
Donghyuck comes five minutes late and Mark doesn’t mind.
He waits for him with their orders already in his hands.
Donghyuck stops him when Mark walks towards the door.
He asks him to sit at one of the tables.
Mark gets confused.
He doesn’t feel the same.
He doesn’t feel the same and yet, when Mark cups Donghyuck’s face with one hand,
he finds himself leaning in, counting the stars dotting Donghyuck’s cheek.
He doesn’t feel the same and yet, he freezes when Donghyuck smiles with a giggle.
“It’s nice”
Mark realizes what he was about to do then.
It’s awkward, it’s a good thing Donghyuck has his eyes closed.
He doesn’t notice. He is unaware of Mark’s crime.
Kiss, kiss, kiss, it’s all in Mark’s mind, that and how pretty Donghyuck looks with his eyes closed.
How lovely he seems trusting Mark so wholeheartedly.
It’s warm and Mark can’t deny it. Mark thinks and thinks but this time it’s clear.
Mark knows it in the same instant that Donghyuck opens his eyes.
Mark tastes hot sand in his tongue when their gazes meet, he is wonderstruck.
A heart’s thumping with the force of a typhoon. One more push and it would burst, run from its cage.
Like that, reality skips over Mark’s mind and he doesn’t hear what Donghyuck has to say until the words finally sink into him.
“It’s nice to be like this with you and not feel like my heart is about to burst.”
He doesn’t feel the same.
Friends.
They are friends.
Wasn’t it what Mark wanted all along? Wasn’t that what he asked for?
Friends.
And Donghyuck isn't hurting anymore. Donghyuck is bright in his smiles.
He is looking at Mark, at least. Maybe he has another chance, maybe he can do things right.
He doesn’t feel the same.
Mark knows when Donghyuck’s eyes no longer look at him.
When Mark turns and catches the person crossing the door.
The ring of the bells sets the moment in which Mark realizes the most horrifying of the truths.
Donghyuck is shining and he is a sunflower looking at the sun.
His sun.
And it’s no longer Mark.
Donghyuck has little fires on his eyes, dancing in a charming dance.
Pupils so big they could hold a whole new sky. Delight.
He used to look at Mark like that.
He doesn’t feel the same.
But he found someone who does.
He found a boy with a pure smile and a gentle curve on his eyes.
He finds a boy that comes to him, holds his hand
takes him into a hug and kisses the moles that Mark missed to touch.
It’s a chaste gesture and yet, Mark would have preferred for him to claim Donghyuck’s lips instead.
It would’ve hurt less.
Mark is not sure why.
They feel the same.
Donghyuck tells him as much.
Jeno it’s the name.
And it drips as venom in an open wound.
Mark feels the same.
But Donghyuck isn’t there to see it.