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In all of Jongseong’s daydreams about his wedding, he’d always imagined that he’d be the one waiting at the altar, watching the person he’d love for the rest of his life come closer with each step.
Instead, he sees Sunoo’s goofy smile widen all the way from where he stands at the altar, and Jongseong struggles not to burst into laughter and trip all over his stupidly expensive dress as his hands grip around a stupidly expensive bouquet. Not that he doesn’t respect seamstresses. Or florists. He thinks both are masterful arts.
⚜
Sunoo’s cheeriness probably comes from his parents. Case and point: when Jay’s family moved to their neighborhood from faraway Seattle, the Kim family was the first to greet them with a fruit basket and a warm welcome.
So Sunoo’s known Jay for practically forever, which means he’s seen him grow through all his embarrassing phases—including when his closet was exclusively composed of pretentious polos and flashy watches—and all his roller-coaster relationships too.
Jay, despite the steady person he is, has never seemed to have the best of luck in love. Sunoo remembers bits and pieces like a partially-wiped film reel. The opening credits: returning from the Seoul Grand Park bathroom with Jay on a school field trip to see a blushing Park Sunghoon, Jay’s best friend and the subject of Jay’s first crush, holding hands with the Australian transfer student.
“Hoonie's been my best friend for three whole years! Then Mister perfect, smart,” he complained, drawing out each adjective, “Nice, pretty Sim Jake comes in all lalalalala for a week, and boom! Sunghoon’s in love with him!”
For a while, it seemed like he would never recover. Jay continued to pine over Sunghoon for another painful two years— until they entered high school and suddenly there seemed to be a lot more fish in the sea.
Jay met his fish within the first three days of junior year; Yang Jungwon.
He caved less than a pathetic half an hour later and spilled everything to their little group over lunch.
"Alright," Sunghoon had said over a mouthful of noodles like Jay hadn't just met the love of his life. "Does he even know you exist?"
He did, actually. Jungwon was assigned the seat next to Sunoo’s and he found himself steadily on the road to friendship with him. Once, Jungwon casually mentioned the 'handsome taxi-cab fee hyung' who paid for his ride home when taekwondo ran late. A week later, Jungwon pretended he didn't care about Jay at all when he waved at them in the cafeteria.
Sunoo, naturally, fell into his usual matchmaker role.
⚜
“I hate him,” Jay said after the first breakup, teeth clenched but eyes bloodshot. Maybe Project Jaywon would be the undoing to his flawless matchmaking record. They certainly didn't make his job easy for him. The bleach Sunoo brushed into Jay's roots—that was evidently a terrible breakup-induced decision and not an exercise of free-will. “He never gets what I want to say. He never wants everything I want to give him.”
There were others during what Sunoo called their ‘off-seasons.’ Sunghoon’s neighbor, Wonyoung; one of their seniors’ sisters, Bahiyyih; and Beomgyu, who Sunoo and Jay’s mutual friend Lee Heeseung had introduced to him. But it always came back to Jungwon and the specific smile Jay reserved for him, on and off for four years straight.
“Don’t you get tired of it?” Sunoo had asked once at the convenience store, taking advantage of the free AC and cheap sodas on the way home from school.
“Of what?”
“Never going steady steady with Jungwonnie.”
His laugh was different, not Sunoo’s to hear. “I know how this story ends. We always end up together, anyways.”
The last time Jay and Jungwon broke up—the halting, crash and burn end to their story—Sunoo had to break into Jay’s apartment. Well. It's not technically breaking in; not really, if you factor in his spare key.
“Jay-hyung, dearest,” he starts, pushing the door open, “you can’t just send me a text like that and then proceed to not pick up for the next forty-eight hours.”
Sunoo knows Jay won’t reply, but it still takes him a beat to notice that the returning silence feels different this time. Turning into Jay’s living room, Sunoo sees him slumped against his nice leather sofa, the one Sunghoon and Heeseung helped him carry up the elevator. He's wearing the jade-green shirt Jungwon always used to borrow, eyes red and watery. His face reads defeat.
“He said he met someone new,” Jay says, instead. “His name is Riki. I’ve met him before—Jungwon’s birthday party last month. He’s… so different. I can’t even blame him.”
It’s never been this bad, Sunoo realizes. He gingerly sits down next to him, already pulling out the industrial pack of tissues from his breakup emergency bag.
Jay’s eyes stay closed. “I just want to be the first choice,” he murmurs.
It's hard for Sunoo to find something to say. He doesn’t remember if there’s ever been anyone he’s really wanted the way Jay wanted Sunghoon and, later, the way he wanted Jungwon. Jay doesn’t make him say anything; he just continues on forward.
“Do you remember the promise we made at high school graduation?”
Sunoo's quick, snarky mouth is always the receiving end of Jay's never-ending banter. It's part of why they get along so well. And for all that Jay always claims he can count the number of times Sunoo’s been truly speechless on one hand, he never brings up graduation as one of them. It's likely because he just didn't notice.
Kim Sunoo back then, freshly eighteen but still baby-cheeked, wondered if he should say something before they both walk through those same iron gates and become completely different people. I hope we keep in touch, or something like that. He doesn’t know how to phrase it. Jay’s going to Jungwon’s university, and Sunoo, somewhere else.
How do you tell someone who’s been a constant for half your life that there might be a version of the next half where it splits off and away from them? That you're holding onto hope that speaking the unbearable truth out loud means the two of you can avoid it, even if it’ll still be impossible and you'll both just need to live with that knowledge?
In the end, it turns out it isn't impossible.
In that moment, though, Heeseung stood taking photos of Jungwon on the other side of the congratulatory crowd and Jay looked on at him between the hugging families with soft, liquid eyes. “I’m going to marry him someday, Sunoo-yah.”
No one would have seen it coming. Jay and his white day gifts that make every student in their grade bloom green with envy. The ever-reliable sight of Jungwon waiting in the courtyard with his hands tucked in his pockets. Out of all the couples in their school, it was a no-brainer that they were the cutest. They just belong together. Maybe even to the degree that in any timeline, Jay and Jungwon would still be bound to meet and love each other the way they do.
“If you don’t, I’ll make you marry me instead. That’ll be enough incentive to make sure you carry through,” Sunoo warned jokingly. There's no need for the warning, of course: Jay's made his intentions clear as day already.
Jay smiled. “Deal.”
⚜
So. Life has a funny way of working out. Jay’s on one knee in front of him, someone Sunoo is sure Jay had never thought it’d be.
There’s a sunset and a picnic and a long walk on the beach, because of course there is. Jay wants to do this right.
He doesn’t really think about it. “Deal,” Sunoo says, because he knows Jay will tell him he's the reason romance is dead later. He doesn’t really know what he’s doing, but somehow this doesn't feel wrong.
⚜
They’re waiting for the bill in their regular spot. At this point, Jay is like an old habit, an all-too familiar song. Sunoo knows all the words.
He loves the way Jay's planning goes with his worrying, how Jay works out all the details before he has to lift a finger. Giving him options. Thinking of what he'll want. That is Jay to Sunoo: a choice. It's always felt like an easy one.
Even now, Sunoo knows Jay has already narrowed down the options to what he knows Sunoo will like, before presenting them for Sunoo's final decision. Maybe Sunoo just wants to beat him to the punch, this time. Maybe he wants to refract just a bit of Jay's own light back on him and to let him bask in it himself, for once. He hears himself ask: “Summer or fall wedding?”
“Hm,” Jay toys with his straw wrapper. He does that every time, tearing at it until it crumbles to tiny shreds. It annoys Sunoo endlessly. It endears him infinitely. Jay catches Sunoo by the hand and ties it in a little bow around his ring finger. “Summer.”
At their regular table, in their regular place, at their regular time, it sounds like a promise.
⚜
When he was five, Jay had planned out his entire life, all the way down to each cake flavor in his three-tier wedding cake and the teddy-bear print tie he planned to wear at the reception. That tie is definitely too small now.
Getting married is still important to him, so he decides to follow tradition and host a bachelor party. That, and because Sunghoon keeps bothering him about it, because the limited pleasure he gains from social outings as an introvert with a meager social battery is magnified exponentially when Jongseong pays the tab.
A few drinks in, though, and suddenly Sunghoon seems to be less satisfied with Jongseong's life choices.
"Don't get married, Jongsaeng," he sniffs on the way to the bathroom, loosely swinging his left arm around Jay's shoulders. He's shouting to make himself heard over the club's pounding music, but hasn't seemed to realize that A) they're far enough from the booming speakers to not need to yell anymore and B) the full force of his dance floor volume will be the cause of Jongseong's premature hearing loss.
"No freedom at all," he continues, shaking his head minutely, like one of those men who make hating their wives their entire personality and post minion memes on Facebook about it instead of putting on their big boy pants and employing the golden tools of critical thought and healthy communication.
Jay scoffs at the silver band sitting hypocritically on Sunghoon's ring finger as he pushes the bathroom door open. "Fuck off. You still need to piss or not?"
His friend smiles up at him, big and goofy, laugh lines deeper than Jongseong remembers them being. He folds the memory to keep.
"You wanna see my dick?" his best friend asks.
"God, what-" Jay splutters, jostling him in the side. Now that he's paying attention, his breath also fucking stinks. "What the fuck, Park Sunghoon?"
"Bet mine's still bigger." Sunghoon sing-songs.
Jongseong laughs a little, unearthing the memory of that particular ego contest in the high school gym changing room so long ago.
He shoves his best friend toward the far end of the urinals. "No peeking, you fucker."
When they wash their hands, Sunghoon turns to him again, blowing a huge bubble through his soapy hands and laughing uncontrollably as it pops in Jay's face.
He approached the quiet figure skater sitting by the homeroom window like a goddamned anime protagonist, thinking he'd be cool and could maybe introduce him to some girls. Instead, he'd gotten a certified idiot who clung to him like glue because he was too shy to talk to anyone else.
As they weave their way back through the dancing crowd, Jongseong reflects that being Park Sunghoon's friend is probably simultaneously the best and worst scam he's fallen for in his whole life.
Sunghoon’s clinginess is still a terminal illness, too. As soon as their table comes into view, Sunghoon's demeanor becomes even more intolerable.
"Jakey!" he pouts atrociously. "I missed you!"
Jake eats it all up, of course, cooing incessantly and reaching up to cup Sunghoon's face.
"Whipped," Jay shouts at them, disgusted. As Jake pulls Sunghoon to the dance floor with an apologetic grin, their matching rings glint under the strobe lights.
Heeseung's still nursing his glass of whiskey when Jay slides into the booth next to him. "Got your eye on anyone tonight?"
"Eh," Heeseung shrugs. "Those two have been staring at me all night." He tilts his head to where a boy with pink hair pulled into a half-up ponytail grinds against a tall boy in heels.
The taller one meets Jay's gaze and flushes, stepping on the other's foot in a panic. Jay picks out their voices over the music. "Fuck, Soobinnie! What was that for?"
"Sorry, sorry," the other one groans. "It's been a while."
Jay laughs. "They're cute. Not going to go over and introduce yourself?"
Heeseung meets his eyes, a little oddly contemplative. "Nah. I'd rather hang with you tonight." He lifts his glass. "Cheers to getting hitched, man."
Time passes nicely between songs and they chat about anything and everything. The herb planter Jongseong got him in their friend group's regular Secret Santa last year. Boxers versus briefs. Birthday gifts for Sunoo.
Somewhere along, Heeseung tries to ask Jay if he's sure—not because he doesn't trust him and Sunoo, but because, "This is a major life decision, Jongseong."
Jay lets him finish, but he can tell from the look in his eyes that Heeseung already understands, despite what he's chosen to say out loud. He knows, because where Jay's chosen to commit, Heeseung prefers to step out. He learned that lesson somewhere along the way.
He makes sure all his friends get safely into cabs. His own is the last one on the way and he stands on the curb, just breathing in the city smoke for a bit. Life is good. It finally feels like the puzzle pieces are slotting into place, even if those pieces came from unexpected places.
When he returns home, Sunoo's already back from his spa night with his sister and friends. He glows in the lamplight of their bedroom like a pearl.
"Hey," Sunoo smiles. "I need to take you on a spa day the next time you complain about work," he sighs dreamily. "So healing, really."
"Seems like you had fun.” He yawns, the night finally catching up to him as he removes his makeup. “How's your sister? And Geonu and Jaebom?"
Sunoo joins him in the bathroom, pulling his hair back with the fluffy headband Jungwon got him last month. “Good.” He pauses to dab on his eye cream. “They think we’re a good match.”
Jay hums in acknowledgement. When Sunoo raises his head to study his reflection, he finds Jay is already looking at him, intense and serious. He’s not even looking at him through the mirror—he’s turned to Sunoo like a sunflower as he brushes his teeth.
“Yah, what is it,” he bumps his shoulder into Jay’s. Jay just continues looking at him. “Come onnnnn.” His smoldering gaze is starting to make him feel a little flustered, to be honest. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
The tiniest smirk lights up his blank face and the familiarity of it floods Sunoo’s chest. Jay spits out his toothpaste. “Can’t a guy admire his fiancé?”
In the mirror, Sunoo looks like a cherry tomato. “I’m divorcing you.”
Jay gives a dramatic little gasp, adopting an old-timey accent. “Leaving me at the altar before our nuptials have even begun? Who’s the other man?”
Nuptials. What a funny word. “Sunghoon-hyung,” Sunoo gets out between giggles and attempts at even, circular applications of his evening moisturizer. “And Jake-hyung. We’re having a threesome.”
“My husband has left me for not one, but two men,” Jay cries mournfully. “What, pray tell, do they have that I don’t, unfaithful husband of mine?”
“Hm. Brains. Beauty and wit. Humor, good fashion taste-”
“Hey.” Jay jostles his shoulder gently against Sunoo. “You take that one back!”
“Maybe it’s true,” Sunoo smirks as they slip into bed.
Jay turns out the lamp. The evening quiet settles over them, the slow crawl of cars outside like an ocean tide. In an apartment upstairs, a pan clatters. “I want a dog,” Sunoo says. “A stupidly cute one that puts Layla and Gaeul,” Jay can hear the impish grin in his voice, “and Maeumi and Bisco to shame.”
Jay does too. They’re building a home together. “We’ll go to the shelter tomorrow then.”
“Okay. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.”
A thought digs at Jay and his lips curl. “Did you tell your sister about the sketchy face masks that turned your skin orange?”
“Shut up.”
“Really compliments your eyes. Foxy. Rawr.” He lives and breathes to be annoying.
“I said shut up,” Sunoo says in a way Jay supposes he thinks is forceful, but it comes out more like a childish whine. He also tugs the blankets over to his side and, well, that’s a declaration of war.
“Gimme,” Jay yanks more than his share back to his side.
“Hey!” They devolve into a cackling mess, sweaty and breathless when they finally declare a hard-earned truce.
It’s like having a sleepover every single night with his best friend. It makes Jay feel so warm.
“Okay, let’s go to sleep for real this time,” Sunoo grumbles. “My face is going to be all puffy tomorrow thanks to you.”
Jay snickers. He’ll take pictures. “Goodnight, Sunoo-yah,”
Sunoo’s voice is already clouded with sleep. It’s terribly adorable. “Goodnight, hyung.”
⚜
Grocery shopping together is a new weekly tradition they’ve picked up too. Sunoo doesn’t come on every small run but, sometimes, even when Jay insists he can handle it alone, he tags along anyways.
When Jay goes solo, he finds himself picking out Sunoo’s favorite jams and updating the chatty cashier ajumma on the new recipes he’s been trying out on Sunoo’s fickle palette.
Today’s one of those late afternoons they both get off work and meet each other at the store to check off everything on Jay’s notes app list. Sunoo’s crossing the street from the bus stop to the storefront, where Jay waits.
His hair still folds cleanly across to the right like it did this morning, impeccably glossy under the tangerine-honey sun. In his right hand, he lugs around his bag of curling irons and twenty-five different hair products—Jay recalls from when he last asked: mousse, pomade, dry shampoo, and countless others he can’t remember the name of—and waves back and forth like a kid with his left.
“Hey,” Jay smiles, grabbing Sunoo’s bag for him. He grunts as the straps settle on his shoulder. “How many gains are you hiding, lugging this around all day?”
"I’m secretly buff," Sunoo smirks, fluffed up and pleased. Somehow everything fits right: their schedules, their lives, their quirks and dislikes. It's that tangerine-honey sun hanging in the sky, lighting up Jay's life and sweetening his night.
⚜
“New marriage, new wardrobe!” Sunoo announces to the entire mall as they pass through the sliding doors.
“New marriage? I’m not your first spouse?” Jay mocks offence.
Sunoo laughs. “You’ll be my last if you play your cards right.”
Six hours later, Sunoo is not so peppy.
“Almost done,” Jay placates, as Sunoo hunts around for a place to sit. “You can rest there,” he points to the sofa nestled in the center of a forest of coats, “just need to pick out a new blazer.”
Sunoo doesn’t categorize himself as particularly devious—his legs really feel like they’re about to fall off—but he’s also an opportunist. Jay, humming as he analyzes jacket fabrics and cuts, seems the most relaxed he’s been in a long while.
So: “I’ve been meaning to ask,” Sunoo starts, slow enough to warn before the blow but otherwise direct, in the way Sunoo knows Jay appreciates. “Why didn’t you and Jungwonnie work out?”
He doesn’t look up, quietly choosing his words as he continues to thumb through a rack of near-identical tweed blazers. “We both wanted and expected different things from each other.” Sunoo notes that Jay has shed the bitterness that coated their previous conversations about his last relationship. He declares it a victory.
Sunoo hums, swinging his legs back and forth where he’s melted onto the cushion. “Then, what makes me different, dear fiancé?”
He half expects him to play along; Jay’s raised his head to return his smirk with an amused eyebrow raise. But instead, he responds plainly: “We don’t expect anything from each other at all.” Jay shoots Sunoo a mischievous sideways glance. “Fiancé,” he returns.
There might be something in Sunoo's throat. Blame it on the indigestion; he swallows it down. “So sure of yourself, aren’t you? How do you know I’m not expecting you to pay for,” Sunoo gestures to the pearly blouses, sundresses, and lightwash jeans in his lap, “All of these?”
“Marriage means what’s mine is yours.”
He feints a swoon. “So generous, Jay-ah! How fortunate I am to have such a charitable husband.”
A hand hoists an emerald overcoat into the air from the row Jay has disappeared behind. “You’re still paying for your own shit though. Marital equality and all.”
Sunoo snorts at that. “Right. I can’t even believe we’ll be married in less than a week. I literally wake up every day and think: what the fuck. I’m marrying Park Jongseong.”
“Your next thought must be wow. I’m so lucky,” Jay returns. “What do you think of this color?” he asks, holding up a suit jacket in an… interesting shade of burnt orange.
“Repulsive,” Sunoo hums.
“Who, you? Don’t be so hard on yourself, Sunoo-yah, you’re not all bad.” Jay swaps the orange coat with a salt and pepper one. “Hm?”
“Better. I think the green one you held up a few minutes ago was best though.”
“Hah, I knew you’d say that. Maybe we should wear green at the ceremony.”
"Banish the thought," Sunoo sniffs. "I'm not wearing green to our wedding."
⚜
Sunoo thinks they should probably at least go on one real date before they get married—it feels weird not to for some reason, even considering the weirdness of their entire marriage situation. He articulates the idea to Jay and so Jay makes a reservation at a high-end Japanese place he’s wanted to take him to for a while and shares a Google Doc itinerary with him by the next morning.
Sunoo stands in front of the mirror now, meticulously arranging two strands of hair to fall perfectly against his forehead. "You go ahead to let the cab driver know we're here… just need a couple minutes to find my nice studs."
Jay takes a second look at him, gaze flitting to his earlobes. He can't remember if Sunoo's ever worn earrings before. "When did you…?"
Sunoo's mouth curves into a small, closed-lip smile. "Special occasions only. Maybe you never noticed," he says.
Oh. He doesn't sound upset about it and it's such a silly thing, just extra holes punched in his ears一Jay pauses, eyes lingering over Sunoo's figure. Every crease in his outfit is deliberate, and even the angle at which he leans over the vanity feels calculated.
Jay wonders how much of Sunoo he still hasn't met, hasn't understood just yet, even after all this time.
Later, Jay stands behind Sunoo, leaning forward to point at an item on the gelato shoppe menu. Jay’s chest brushes against his back and his hand finds Sunoo’s waist. “They have mint chocolate,” he says. There are many things to learn, but there are also many things he’s remembered.
⚜
Jungwon, who, despite having hurt Jay badly enough to make him even entertain, never mind actually execute the thought of marrying Sunoo, is still one of Jay’s best friends. And so he stands inside the chapel in a neat gray suit next to Riki, while Jay’s in a room in the back with Sunoo, trying to hold back a flood of complicated, very wedding-unready tears.
“It’s finally hitting me, Sunoo-yah,” he mumbles, sitting on a folding chair. “We’re getting married.”
“You’d better get used to it,” Sunoo replies from where he stands in front of him, though his tight grip on Jay’s hands belies the empty threat of his words. “You’re the one who came up with this ridiculous idea, anyway.”
With Jay’s head down, Sunoo can’t see his eyes, but he notices the corner of his mouth twitch upwards. He can never seem to read Jay fully, but Sunoo always sees just enough.
“You’re right. Like always," Jay exhales and lifts his chin. "But do you think you’ll regret this? Getting married to me? Are you sure you don't want someone else instead?”
Sunoo sighs. “Jay-ah. There's no one else. I think we’ll be alright, anyways. We’ll figure things out, won’t we?”
A rapid knock comes at the door. “Best man Park to grooms Park and Kim. Five minutes to showtime,” Sunghoon crows obnoxiously outside the room. “I repeat, five minutes to showtime.”
“Shut it, Park,” Sunoo shouts back, rolling his eyes.
Sunghoon gasps. “Already having marital issues, you two? It’s not too late to leave him at the altar, Sunoo-ssi.”
“Not that Park,” Sunoo grumbles under his breath. He looks at Jay. “Okay to go?”
He sighs. “Yeah. We’re already here, might as well." He calls to Sunghoon, “We’re coming, asshole. Calm your tits.”
Sunoo opens the door to a smirking Sunghoon, hair slicked back and wearing a Bordeaux-red suit. “You look like a used car salesman,” he frowns.
Sunghoon turns to Jay, mock horror on his face. “Will you stand for this disrespect to your own best man?”
“Yes,” Jay squints at him. “I’d say you even look like a hotel bellman.”
“Betrayal,” Sunghoon murmurs as they make their way down the hall. “Stone-cold betrayal.”
When Jay walks down the aisle, his eyes stay locked with Sunoo’s the whole time.
⚜
A few months later, they’re leaving the ramyeon place they stopped by for brunch with their friends—courtesy of Jake and Heeseung’s influence, of course.
The two ramyeon aficionados grandiosely review the highs and lows of the meal in a pretense to distract the others before they fight to cover the bill.
Jay drains his cup of iced tea and stands to stretch. "Sunoo and I should get going," he says. "our appointment at the lighting store is in ten minutes."
Riki bows his head slightly from where he’s seated. "Get home safe."
Sunghoon arches a brow. "Leaving without even offering to pay?"
Sunoo points to where Jake has taken advantage of Heeseung taking a moment to wipe his mouth and triumphantly slipped the waitress his credit card. "Jake-hyung's already got it covered."
Heeseung groans. Jake smiles innocently back at him and slips Sunghoon a high-five. "I'm the mathyung. You make me look bad!"
Jungwon laughs, eyes twinkling at Sunoo and Jay. “We'll see you around, hyungs."
⚜
A nun with darkened eyes and a blood-streaked face lunges out of Sunoo’s laptop before it fades to black. Lying on their bed next to him, Jay squeezes his eyes shut, forming long creases in his crescent moon face. “We’re never watching a horror movie again,” he grumbles.
His pouting always lights the warm and teasing thing living in Sunoo’s stomach. “Mm, was it really that bad, hyung? You know I’ll keep you safe.” God, marriage has turned him into a sap.
Jay turns to stare at him then, gaze full and characteristically intense. It’s unexpected but familiar and makes Sunoo feel like he owns all of him, if just for this one moment. He’s about to ask if he’s alright, maybe ask if the movie really was too much when:
“I love you.”
Jay’s feelings always seem to find their way into his words. Sunoo has to ask. ”Why?”
His husband gives a one-shoulder shrug, eyes owlish and shining with the reflection of the credits rolling on-screen. “You’ve always been around. I love you.”
Sunoo thinks he should touch him, feels like it’s now the most important thing he could ever do in this life. So he reaches forward and cups the back of his neck, fingers threaded where Jay’s hair is short and just slightly sharp to the touch when he softly strokes upward.
“Thank you,” he says. Sunoo has always been more careful with his words; passes each one through his mind before they leave his lips. “You know I’ll always care for you.” They have their whole lives together to look forward to.