Chapter Text

INSERT COIN

Thursday, September 10

Keonho woke up with a headache, someone else's hands, and a phone he didn't recognize.

The headache was familiar. The phone was unfamiliar. The hands were new.

He held them up over his face.

Long fingers. A thin silver ring on the index finger. A tiny pale scar near the thumb, which he knew because he'd once watched Seonghyeon get it opening a can and then insist that it was barely a cut.

Keonho turned his hands over.

"No," he said.

The voice that came out was Seonghyeon's.

He sat up so fast that the room tipped sideways. A backpack slid from the chair beside him and hit the floor. The phone on the desk, Seonghyeon's phone, vibrated once. The screen lit up with a notification.

MOM:

Text me when you get on the train.

Keonho stared at it.

Then he stared at the hands again.

Then he looked for a window, a reflective surface, a way out, a hidden camera, a reasonable explanation involving a prank so elaborate that it would probably be illegal.

The study room was empty except for him, two paper cups of vending-machine coffee, a stack of books, and Seonghyeon's jacket folded over the back of a chair. Through the glass wall, the vending machine in the corridor hummed to itself, lit up and patient. Outside, the city was washed in the flat grey of early morning. Rain still threaded down the windows, though the storm from the night before had moved on.

Keonho found the mirror in the phone's black screen.

Seonghyeon looked back at him.

Not a resemblance. Not a dream version of Seonghyeon. Seonghyeon, exactly: the line of his nose, the shape of his mouth, the sleepy crease between his eyebrows. His hair was flattened on one side from where he'd apparently been sleeping against his arm. His contacts were still in, which was either a miracle or a threat.

Keonho touched his own face.

Seonghyeon's reflection touched his face too.

"Oh, this is bad," he whispered.

The reflection looked genuinely concerned. It was very convincing.

The phone vibrated again.

keonzz.ahn:

Are you awake?

Keonho almost dropped it.

He typed with Seonghyeon's thumb on Seonghyeon's keyboard, which had an aggressively neat layout and no unnecessary stickers. The account at the top of the screen was eomhyeonn.

eomhyeonn:

define awake

The reply came almost immediately.

keonzz.ahn:

Where are you?

Keonho looked at the door.

eomhyeonn:

study room. where are u

Three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.

keonzz.ahn:

Don't move.

That was not a reasonable explanation.

Keonho stood anyway.

The door opened hard enough to bump the stopper.

His own face looked in.

Keonho had never been so relieved to see himself. He'd also never seen himself look quite so furious.

Seonghyeon's heart, which Keonho was apparently in charge of now, did something unnecessary against his ribs. Shock, probably.

Seonghyeon, wearing Keonho's face, his rumpled hoodie, and the expression of a person who had been given a group project with the universe and discovered that everyone else had gone home, closed the door behind him.

They stared at each other.

Keonho lifted a hand.

Seonghyeon lifted Keonho's hand.

Keonho lowered his.

Seonghyeon lowered his.

"Okay," Keonho said in Seonghyeon's voice. "So."

"Don't," Seonghyeon said, in Keonho's.

"I haven't said anything."

"You're about to."

"That's fair."

Silence settled between them. It was the sort of silence that normally belonged to Seonghyeon, which made it particularly rude to have it in Keonho's body.

Seonghyeon crossed the room and held out a hand. Keonho took it automatically. Their palms met, his own familiar hand attached to someone else's wrist, and both of them flinched.

"That's weird," Keonho said.

"I know."

"Your hand is colder than mine."

"Your hands are always warm."

Keonho paused.

Something moved across his own face, a fraction, and then Seonghyeon let go.

"Focus," Seonghyeon said.

"Right. Freaky Friday typa shi. Focusing."

"Do you remember anything from last night?"

"Rain. The lights went out in the library. You said the emergency generator sounded like a dying washing machine."

"It did."

"And then we were arguing about whether I could make it to the hills bus before the rain got worse."

"You said you could run."

"I could have."

"You tripped over a traffic cone."

"That was before I started running."

Seonghyeon pinched the bridge of Keonho's nose. It was a very strange sensation to watch someone else do it to his face.

They had stayed late to finish a presentation for Contemporary Society, the general-education class that was the only one they'd shared since high school, then waited out the storm in a campus study room. At some point, Keonho had put his head down on his folded arms. Seonghyeon had been sitting across from him, camera on the table, scrolling through the pictures he'd taken on the way to campus. There had been a flash of lightning, a sharp crack of thunder, the lights going out. The vending machine in the corridor had stayed lit through all of it.

Keonho remembered saying, half-asleep, "I wish I knew what it was like to be you for a day."

He remembered Seonghyeon replying, "You'd last twenty minutes."

And then nothing.

"Oh my god," Keonho said. "I did this."

"You did not."

"I literally said it."

"You also said the vending machine was judging you. I don't think it has that kind of authority."

They both looked through the glass at the vending machine.

It hummed.

"Maybe it heard me," Keonho said.

"Keonho."

"Okay, okay. We need a plan."

Seonghyeon folded his arms. On Keonho's body, it looked like a threat from a very small, very tired bouncer.

"First, we get through today without anyone noticing."

Keonho glanced down at Seonghyeon's clothes. The sleeves were too long for his wrists. He had never realized how much Seonghyeon disappeared into his own clothes until he was the one wearing them.

"That's your plan?" he asked. "Pretend to be each other?"

"We're not exactly going to announce it."

"Fair. But how hard can it be? I know you."

Seonghyeon stared at him.

Keonho reconsidered. "I know facts about you."

"That's worse."

"It's a starting point. I've known you since we were seven."

"Then you know a lot about me at seven."

Keonho opened his mouth. Closed it.

Seonghyeon looked at the window. The clouds had begun to break, leaving a pale strip of light over the buildings. "We have classes."

"Of course we do."

"And you're taking the train to the coast with my body."

"You're taking the bus to the hills with mine."

"I know."

"Do you have a bus card?"

Seonghyeon looked at him.

Keonho winced. "Right. It's in my wallet. Which is in my bag."

"Then we should switch bags."

"Great idea. I have no idea what's in your bag."

"Neither do I, apparently."

They exchanged bags.

Keonho's backpack was a familiar disaster: a charger cable tangled around a notebook, two pens that worked if you held them at the right angle, a packet of crackers, an umbrella with one broken spoke, a receipt from his family's restaurant that he had apparently been carrying for three weeks, and a folded café shift schedule with Saturday circled twice.

Seonghyeon's bag was in order. Notebook. Pencil case. Wallet. Camera. Charger. A small pouch with eyedrops and a contact-lens case. A lanyard that said STUDENT COUNCIL, VICE-PRESIDENT. A folded timetable.

Keonho held up the lanyard. "You wear this?"

"Only to meetings."

"Do I have a meeting?"

"Not today."

Keonho put it back and held up the timetable. "You carry a printed train schedule?"

"It's a backup."

"For what?"

"For when the app doesn't load."

"It's 2026."

"And yet."

Keonho tucked it carefully back where he'd found it.

"Okay," he said. "Rules. We don't tell anyone until we know what happened. We answer to each other's names. We don't do anything that would get the other one expelled, arrested, or disowned."

"Your mother would never disown you."

"She'd disown me for you. She likes you better."

"Your mother likes everyone."

"Exactly. She'll ask if you've eaten, then feed you until you can't move. It's a trap."

"Your family restaurant is a trap?"

"An affectionate trap."

Seonghyeon sighed. "We should go."

"Wait." Keonho pointed at him, at himself. "How do I walk like you?"

"Walk normally."

"I do walk normally."

"Then you'll be fine."

"That's not what I asked."

Seonghyeon looked him up and down. "You swing your arms too much."

Keonho immediately stopped swinging his arms.

"And now you're walking like a malfunctioning robot."

"Okay. How do you walk?"

"Like a person."

"That's not helpful."

"It's what you told me."

Keonho opened his mouth, closed it, and grabbed the bags. "This is going to be a disaster."

"Probably," Seonghyeon said.

The worst part was that he sounded a little amused.

On the noticeboard by the stairs, someone had pinned a new poster: CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS, CAMPUS PHOTOGRAPHY EXHIBIT. Seonghyeon walked past it without turning his head. Keonho looked at it long enough for both of them.

They made it to the main corridor before the first person recognized them.

"Seonghyeon!"

Keonho turned.

A girl hurried over with a roll of tracing paper hugged to her chest. Keonho knew her face but couldn't remember her name. He had seen her once, waiting outside Seonghyeon's studio. Seonghyeon, in Keonho's body, had gone very still.

"Hey," Keonho said, trying for Seonghyeon's usual quiet greeting.

The girl blinked.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"You just said hey."

Keonho looked at her.

She looked at him.

"Usually you say hi," she explained.

"Right. Hi."

A longer silence.

Seonghyeon took a step closer. "He didn't sleep much," he said, using Keonho's easy, friendly voice. "We were finishing a presentation."

The girl looked between them. "Oh. Okay. Well, don't forget crit got moved to the afternoon."

"Got it," Keonho said.

"Thank you," Seonghyeon added, with a polite nod.

She walked away slowly, glancing back once.

Keonho waited until she was out of earshot. "You sounded like me."

"I was trying to."

"You sounded like me if I were a customer-service hotline."

"You sounded like you if you'd been replaced by a very polite ghost."

Keonho gasped. "That was mean."

"It was accurate."

They reached the stairwell. Keonho took the steps two at a time, then remembered he was supposed to be Seonghyeon and slowed down. Seonghyeon caught up without effort.

"You don't have to change everything," he said.

"I'm trying to get into character."

"You're not playing me in a school production."

"Maybe you should be grateful. I could win an award."

"For what? Best performance by someone who doesn't know where his own classroom is?"

Keonho pointed at him. "You're getting too comfortable in my body."

"I've had it for twelve minutes."

"And already you're meaner."

"Maybe that's what your body does to people."

Keonho laughed, then stopped when the sound came out of Seonghyeon's throat: lower and quieter than his own laugh, more breath than noise. He tried again, just to check.

Seonghyeon gave him a look.

"Don't do that."

"I was testing it."

"Test it later."

"Sorry."

The apology came out automatically. Seonghyeon noticed. He didn't comment.

At nine, Keonho discovered that being Seonghyeon required remembering a frightening number of things.

The first was the classroom.

The second was the lecturer's name.

The third was the fact that Seonghyeon had already completed the reading for a seminar Keonho had not known existed.

Keonho's own first class wasn't until eleven, so Seonghyeon, in Keonho's body, took the bench in the corridor, where the narrow window in the door let him see in.

Keonho sat in the back row with Seonghyeon's notebook open in front of him. The handwriting was small and tidy, with headings underlined and key points marked in the margins. There were no doodles. Not one. Keonho's own notes tended to acquire little faces, arrows, and the occasional sketch of a cat if a lecture ran long enough.

He flipped to the next page.

There was a tiny drawing of a cat.

Keonho smiled before he could stop himself.

Through the window in the door, Seonghyeon lifted his head.

Keonho quickly looked down.

A minute later, his phone buzzed.

keonzz.ahn:

Stop smiling at my notes.

eomhyeonn:

there's a cat

 

keonzz.ahn:

I know.

eomhyeonn:

you draw cats???

keonzz.ahn:

I drew one cat.

 

eomhyeonn:

it's very cute

keonzz.ahn:

Pay attention.

Keonho set the phone facedown.

The lecturer asked a question. Three people looked at their desks. Keonho kept his eyes on Seonghyeon's notes and hoped the floor would open up before he was called on.

"Seonghyeon?"

There it was.

He lifted his head. "Yes?"

"Would you like to add anything?"

Keonho stared at the question on the slide. It was a question about a reading he had not read, for a class he was not taking, with a professor who was looking at him like he usually had something useful to say.

He glanced at the notebook. Seonghyeon's notes were annoyingly thorough. Keonho found the relevant heading, scanned three bullet points, and assembled a sentence from them.

"I think the question is less about whether the design works on paper and more about what happens when people actually use it," he said. "The reading assumes everyone moves through a building the way the plan says they will. They don't."

The lecturer nodded. "Good. Can you elaborate?"

Keonho's mind went completely blank.

Through the window, Seonghyeon had stopped pretending to look at his phone.

"It's in the next paragraph," Keonho said, because apparently he had decided to die with honesty. "I can explain better after I finish reading it."

A pause.

Then the lecturer smiled. "Fair enough. Come prepared next time."

"Absolutely."

He sat down.

His phone buzzed.

keonzz.ahn:

That was not terrible.

eomhyeonn:

that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me

keonzz.ahn:

You once ate a sandwich off the floor.

eomhyeonn:

it was wrapped

keonzz.ahn:

It was not.

Keonho bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. Through the glass, Seonghyeon's shoulders moved once, almost imperceptibly.

From outside himself, Keonho could see the small things Seonghyeon did when he thought nobody was looking. The quick glance over his shoulder. The way he pressed his lips together when he was trying not to smile. The way he kept one hand on the strap of Keonho's backpack, as if it might wander off without him.

Keonho had known him for twelve years. For the last year and a half, he had mostly known him at lunch.

Seonghyeon looked up and mouthed, stop staring.

Keonho mouthed back, sorry.

Seonghyeon rolled his eyes.

Some things, at least, still worked.

The next disaster happened at lunch.

In high school it had been the convenience store by the school gate: triangle kimbap, tuna mayo, every day for three years. Keonho had never learned what Seonghyeon ate here.

At the campus cafeteria, Keonho stood in front of the menu and tried to guess.

"Rice bowl," he said.

"Which one?" Seonghyeon asked.

"The one you get."

"I get different ones."

"Okay, the chicken one."

"I don't get chicken."

Keonho turned slowly.

Seonghyeon looked at him with his own face, which made the disappointment somehow more personal.

"You don't eat chicken?"

"I do. Just not from here."

"Why?"

"Because the sauce is too sweet."

Keonho looked back at the menu. "How do you know all this about the cafeteria?"

"I have taste buds."

"Debatable."

They ended up with two bowls of noodles, because Keonho didn't know what Seonghyeon liked here and Seonghyeon refused to make the decision for him on principle. They sat by the windows, where the rain had left the glass streaked and the city looked like a half-finished watercolor.

Keonho picked up his chopsticks in his right hand. They felt wrong.

"Left," Seonghyeon said, without looking up.

"I know."

"You've seen me eat."

"Not from this angle."

"Please don't say that again."

Keonho tried to eat with his left hand. The first noodle slipped back into the bowl. The second landed on his sleeve. The third made it into his mouth, which felt like a personal victory.

Seonghyeon watched him for a moment, then reached across the table and turned the bowl a few degrees.

"Here," he said. "You're holding it too far away."

Keonho adjusted his grip.

"Thanks."

Seonghyeon nodded and went back to eating.

Keonho looked at the bowl. Then at Seonghyeon. Then at the bowl.

"What's wrong?" Seonghyeon asked.

"Nothing."

"You've been saying that a lot."

"Maybe you ask a lot."

"Maybe you're bad at lying."

"Maybe you're too good at noticing."

Seonghyeon set his chopsticks down.

Keonho thought he had said something wrong. He was about to apologize when Seonghyeon said, "You don't have to pretend to be me perfectly."

"I'm not pretending," Keonho said. "I'm trying not to ruin your life."

"My life will survive one day of you being strange."

"That's reassuring."

"You're already strange."

"Wow. Body swap really brought out your honesty."

"It didn't have to."

Keonho laughed. The sound came out wrong again, and for once he didn't try to fix it.

They finished lunch. Seonghyeon stole one of the crackers from Keonho's bag and ate it without asking. Keonho watched him do it.

"That's mine."

"You have six."

"It's the principle."

"You don't have principles."

"I have several."

"Name one."

Keonho thought about it. "I don't steal crackers."

Seonghyeon looked at the cracker in his hand.

Then he ate the rest.

Keonho's phone, in Seonghyeon's hand, buzzed against the table.

taewoopie:

can u cover sat morning?? i'll owe u forever

"Who's Taewoo?" Seonghyeon asked.

"Café. He's nice. Say yes."

Seonghyeon typed. Keonho leaned over to look.

keonzz.ahn:

Yes.

"Lowercase," Keonho said. "No period."

Seonghyeon looked at him as if he had asked for something unreasonable, deleted the message, and typed it again.

A second later, Seonghyeon's phone buzzed in Keonho's pocket. A notice from the student council channel: candidate registration for president closes next Friday. Registered so far: Taewoo.

Keonho turned the screen around. "Wait. Taewoo from my café?"

Seonghyeon stopped chewing.

"He's running," he said.

"Is that bad?"

Seonghyeon took the phone, read the notice again, and handed it back without answering.

By the afternoon, their plan to keep the swap a secret had become less a plan and more a series of small emergencies.

Keonho forgot to answer when someone called him by Seonghyeon's name. Seonghyeon answered to Keonho's name too quickly and then had to pretend he'd been distracted. They both kept turning toward the wrong voice when someone spoke behind them. At one point, Keonho caught his reflection in a dark classroom window and nearly greeted himself.

The worst of it was the group chat.

Martin had sent a message asking if they were still meeting after class. Keonho, as Seonghyeon, replied.

eomhyeonn:

yes

Martin immediately sent back a question mark.

mj.edwards:

who are you and what have you done with eom seonghyeon

Keonho stared at the screen.

eomhyeonn:

what

mj.edwards:

you used a lowercase y

eomhyeonn:

sorry

mj.edwards:

OH MY GOD

Across the library table, Seonghyeon pressed a hand over his mouth.

"Don't laugh," Keonho whispered.

"I'm not."

"You are."

"I'm breathing."

"Your shoulders are shaking."

"It's a medical condition."

Keonho kicked him under the table. Seonghyeon kicked back, with Keonho's leg, which was deeply unfair.

Martin was waiting outside the library with two drinks and a bag of chips. Behind him, Juhoon glanced up from his phone, then back down.

"Seonghyeon," Martin said, looking at Keonho. "You good?"

Keonho straightened. "Yes."

Martin narrowed his eyes. "You said that like a school principal."

"I did not."

"You did. You're doing it again."

Seonghyeon slid in beside him. "He's tired."

"Café?" Martin said. "Before you both fall asleep standing up."

"Yes," Keonho said, too fast, then remembered he was Seonghyeon and added, "If everyone else wants to."

Martin looked delighted. "He said yes first. This is historic."

"I'm going to leave," Keonho said.

"You never leave," Martin replied.

Seonghyeon put a hand on Keonho's shoulder. "Let's go."

His hand was warm through the fabric of the jacket. Keonho looked at it for one second too long, and Seonghyeon removed it.

The café was worse. Martin kept trying to get Seonghyeon to make a choice about what to order, and Keonho couldn't remember whether Seonghyeon liked his coffee sweet or bitter, hot or iced, or if he'd once mentioned a specific brand of tea that was apparently important. Meanwhile, Seonghyeon had ordered Keonho's usual drink without asking and then, when James, who had caught up with them at the door, reached for the last piece of cake, said, "Keonho likes that one."

Everyone went quiet.

Seonghyeon froze.

James slowly put the cake back on the plate.

Keonho looked at Seonghyeon.

Seonghyeon looked at Keonho.

Martin's mouth fell open.

"That's," Martin said, very carefully, "a weird thing to know."

"I have eyes," Seonghyeon said.

"Clearly."

Keonho reached for the cake. "It's fine. I can share."

"You don't share cake," Martin said.

"I can today."

Martin leaned back in his chair, studying them with the focused interest of someone who had just discovered a new hobby.

"Okay," he said. "I'm not asking questions. Yet."

"Thank you," Seonghyeon said.

"I'm saving them."

"Of course you are."

Across the table, Juhoon watched Keonho stir his drink with his right hand. He said nothing, and went back to his phone.

When they finally left, the sun had come out. The sidewalks were still wet, and every passing car sent light sliding over the pavement.

"You're terrible at being me," Seonghyeon said.

Keonho adjusted the strap of Seonghyeon's bag. "You're terrible at being me."

"I got your drink right."

"You ordered it before I even sat down."

"You always get the same thing."

"That's not the point."

"What is the point?"

Keonho stopped at the crossing. The pedestrian light was red. On the other side of the road, a train passed over the elevated tracks, windows bright against the afternoon.

"I don't know," he said. "I think I thought I knew more."

Seonghyeon didn't answer immediately.

Then the light changed. People began to cross around them.

"You know enough," Seonghyeon said.

Keonho looked at him.

Seonghyeon kept his eyes on the crossing. "You just don't always notice what you know."

Keonho thought of the timetable folded in the bag on his shoulder. The bowl, turned a few degrees. The cake.

He said, "You make it sound like a lecture."

"It was a lecture."

"Can I get extra credit?"

"No."

"Harsh."

Seonghyeon smiled, just barely.

Keonho grinned at the pavement.

At five, they reached the station where their routes split.

The Coast Line platform sat above the road, all glass and metal and the smell of rain drying on concrete. Buses for the hills left from the terminal across the street. On any other day, Seonghyeon climbed those stairs and Keonho crossed that road. Today Keonho would ride an hour of train to the coast in Seonghyeon's body, and Seonghyeon would spend an hour and a half on the bus climbing into the hills in his.

They stood under the station sign, each carrying the other's bag.

"So," Keonho said.

"So," Seonghyeon echoed.

"We should probably tell our families we're alive."

"Yes."

"And maybe figure out how to undo this."

"Also yes."

"Any ideas?"

"None."

"Great. We're doing great."

Seonghyeon took out Keonho's phone and checked the time. His thumb hovered over the screen.

"Your mother messaged," he said.

Keonho leaned over to read.

MOM:

Are you on your way? There's food left from the restaurant. Don't buy anything.

A second message followed.

MOM:

And tell Seonghyeon he can come over next weekend if he wants. It's been too long. I made too much again.

Keonho smiled before he could help it. "She always does that."

"Make too much?"

"Invite you like you're a guest."

"I haven't been over since spring."

Keonho counted back. Seonghyeon was right.

"She noticed," Keonho said.

Seonghyeon put the phone away.

In Keonho's body, he looked more relaxed than he'd looked all day: the familiar slant of the shoulders, the hoodie sleeves pushed up, the hair that kept falling into his eyes.

"Do you want me to tell her?" Keonho asked. "That you're..."

"No. Not yet. She'll worry."

"Your mom or mine?"

"Both."

Keonho couldn't argue with that.

A bus pulled into the terminal across the road. Its brakes hissed. A handful of people climbed aboard, carrying grocery bags and umbrellas and the tiredness of the end of the day.

Keonho checked the departures board. The hills bus left in ten minutes. His train left in twelve.

"Okay," he said. "New plan. We get home. We act normal. We don't tell anyone. We call each other if anything goes wrong."

"Everything has gone wrong."

"Then we call each other if anything goes more wrong."

Seonghyeon nodded.

Keonho held out his hand. "Deal?"

Seonghyeon looked at it for a moment before taking it.

Their handshake was awkward, mostly because Keonho was shaking his own hand, and that was a sentence he had never expected to think. Seonghyeon's fingers curled around his. The contact lasted a beat longer than necessary.

"Deal," Seonghyeon said.

Then he let go and turned toward the bus terminal.

Keonho watched him go.

Halfway across the road, Seonghyeon looked back. "Keonho."

"Yeah?"

"Don't forget to eat dinner."

Keonho laughed. "You're in my body. You can tell my mom yourself."

"That's why I'm telling you."

The bus doors folded open. Seonghyeon stepped inside.

Keonho stood there until the bus pulled away, carrying his face toward the hills.

Above him, the platform announcement called the Coast Line. Keonho ran for the stairs and nearly tripped on the top step. He caught himself on the railing and heard Seonghyeon's voice in his head: You swing your arms too much.

He straightened.

Then he swung his arms all the way down the platform, because if he had to be Seonghyeon for an unknown amount of time, he was going to be bad at it on his own terms.

The coast looked different from inside Seonghyeon's body.

Not the coast itself. It was the same grey water flashing between buildings, the same flat towns, the same gulls standing on the same rooftops. But the window was lower than Keonho remembered, and the seat was harder, and the hands resting in his lap were long and still.

He had always assumed the train was the easy one: shorter, smoother, no hills.

It wasn't.

The train stopped at every small station, letting people off one or two at a time. Seonghyeon had the whole line in his head: which station had the broken clock, which stretch tilted the carriage toward the sea, which stop opened the doors on the other side. Keonho only knew these things because Seonghyeon had mentioned them in passing, never as a complaint.

At the last stop, the air smelled like salt and wet concrete. Keonho followed the route from memory. He had walked it every Friday in middle school. He still checked the map on his phone twice, because the bakery on the corner was a phone shop now.

Seonghyeon's face stared back at him from the selfie camera when he opened it by mistake.

"Still weird," he told it.

His own voice would have sounded better saying that.

At the house, Seonghyeon's mother opened the door before he had a chance to knock a second time.

"You're late," she said, then looked at his face more closely. "Are you all right?"

Keonho had prepared for this. He had spent the entire train ride practicing how Seonghyeon said hello, how he nodded, how he answered questions without giving away more than necessary.

"I'm fine," he said.

His voice came out too bright.

She raised an eyebrow.

Keonho immediately lowered his voice. "I'm fine."

"Mm." She stepped aside. "How's Keonho? He hasn't been here since..." She thought about it. "Since before you started university."

"He's good," Keonho said. "He's fine."

"Tell him to come for dinner."

"I will."

"Wash your hands. There's food."

He had spent half his childhood in this house. The shoes by the door were arranged the way they had always been arranged. The light over the kitchen sink was on, warm against the evening. The plant on the windowsill was new.

Keonho washed his hands, then stood in front of the mirror by the hallway.

"Okay," he whispered. "You can do this."

Seonghyeon's face looked unconvinced.

Dinner was a bowl of soup, rice, and a small plate of side dishes. Keonho sat down, picked up his spoon in his left hand on the second try, and tried to remember how Seonghyeon behaved at home.

He remembered how Seonghyeon had behaved at home when they were thirteen. That was not the same thing.

"Your contacts are bothering you?" Seonghyeon's mother asked.

Keonho froze with the spoon halfway to his mouth.

"No," he said. "Why?"

"You keep blinking."

"Oh." He blinked again. "Dry eyes."

"Use the drops in your bag after dinner."

"Right. I will."

She watched him for a second, then returned to her food.

After dinner, Keonho took the dishes to the sink.

She looked up. "You don't have to."

"I know."

He was already running the water.

She smiled a little. "Thank you."

Keonho dried his hands and went to Seonghyeon's room.

It was neat without being empty. Books on the shelf. A camera on the desk. A folded blanket at the foot of the bed. The wall above the desk used to hold their middle-school posters. Now there were photos pinned in a loose arrangement: the coast, a cloudy sky, a group of people caught mid-laugh. One photo showed Keonho at the university, head thrown back, mouth open in a laugh he didn't remember making. Seonghyeon had taken it from the side. The picture was slightly blurred, but Keonho could see the light in his own eyes.

He stood there for a while.

Then he sat on the edge of the bed and called Seonghyeon.

The call connected on the second ring.

"Hey," Seonghyeon said.

It was Keonho's own voice, coming through the phone. For a second it sounded like it still belonged to him.

"Hey," he said. "I survived dinner."

"Congratulations."

"Your mom knows something's wrong."

"Of course she does."

"She asked about my contacts."

"Did you use the drops?"

"I was going to."

"Use them."

"Okay, mom."

"Don't call me that."

Keonho grinned. "You sound like you."

"I am me."

"Debatable."

"How was the train?"

Keonho looked toward the window. Beyond it, he could hear the sea without seeing it.

"Long," he said. "The bakery's a phone shop now."

"Since last year."

Keonho picked at a loose thread on the blanket. "I always thought the train was the easy one."

"It is the easy one."

"It's an hour."

"Yours is an hour and a half. I know. I was on it."

"Sorry."

"For what?"

"I don't know. The hills."

A small laugh came through the phone.

Keonho smiled.

"Your bus?" he asked.

"Fine. I got a seat. Your mother made me eat twice."

"Only twice?"

"She tried for three."

"Did you find the bathroom light? It's outside the door."

"Yes."

"Did you—"

"Keonho."

"Right. Sorry."

The line went quiet again. Keonho leaned back on his hands and looked at the ceiling. Seonghyeon's room smelled faintly of clean laundry and something citrusy. The fan turned slowly overhead.

"Hey," Keonho said.

"Mm?"

"Thanks for today."

"For what?"

"For not letting me completely ruin your life."

"You did a moderate amount of damage."

"I'm proud of that."

"And you looked ridiculous trying to walk like me."

Keonho gasped. "You said I didn't have to pretend perfectly."

"You don't."

"Then why are you making fun of me?"

"Because you looked ridiculous."

Keonho laughed so hard he had to sit up. The sound came out of Seonghyeon's chest, warm and unfamiliar. On the other end of the line, Seonghyeon laughed too, Keonho's laugh, bright and unguarded.

Then Seonghyeon said, "You should sleep. You have to get up early."

"So do you."

"I know."

"Text me when you get home."

"I am home."

"Then text me when you're in bed."

"Why?"

"Because I said so."

"That's not a reason."

"It's a very good reason."

Seonghyeon sighed. "Fine."

They stayed on the call a little longer, talking about nothing in particular. The weather. The presentation they still had to finish. Martin's suspicious face. The cat in Seonghyeon's notes, which Keonho had now decided was his favorite discovery of the day.

Eventually, Seonghyeon said goodnight.

Keonho looked at the photo on the wall once more before he ended the call.

He switched off the light. The room went dark around him.

The phone buzzed once.

keonzz.ahn:

I'm in bed.

Keonho smiled into the pillow.

eomhyeonn:

goodnight hyeonie

A minute passed.

keonzz.ahn:

Don't call me that when you're wearing my face.

Keonho buried his face in the pillow to keep from laughing too loudly.

eomhyeonn:

goodnight seonghyeon

keonzz.ahn:

Goodnight, Keonho.

Keonho stared at the message until the screen dimmed.

He fell asleep with Seonghyeon's phone still in his hand, which was also Seonghyeon's hand, which was a problem for tomorrow.