Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Did you get laid?” Jojo asks, voice staticky yet successfully portraying his excitement through the conduit of Wooje’s tiny phone. Wooje wants to hang up on him immediately.

“No, Jojo, God,” Wooje says instead of hanging up, because he’s not rude. He closes the refrigerator door with his foot and sets his sandwich materials on the counter, grabbing his phone from where it’s wedged between his shoulder and head. He puts Jojo on speakerphone then places the phone down with a sigh, curling his hands around the edge of the counter and rolling his neck.

It’s the morning after the wedding—well, late morning. It’s sometime around eleven, though Wooje doesn’t know for sure. He’s in his kitchen, making himself food for once. Sandwiches. With lots of mayonnaise.

“Heck,” Jojo says. “No wonder you’re so depressed all the time.” He immediately pauses at that, backtracking apologetically. Sometimes Wooje thinks he doesn’t talk before speaking, but this particular instance, it’s funny. “Wait, that was insensitive. Seriously, you’ve been okay, right? Taking your meds? Taking care of yourself?”

Wooje rolls his eyes and sighs. Loudly, making sure it can be heard over the phone. “For the last time Jojo, I’m not on antidepressants. I never was.”

“Huh. I could’ve sworn—”

Wooje uses a spoon to smack a dollop of mayonnaise on his bread aggressively. It deserves it. Mayonnaise is disgusting. “And I’m not sure what taking care of myself consists of anymore.”

Jojo pauses. What comes out of his mouth next is unexpected, a “Wait, did you ghost your therapist?”

Wooje laughs, spreading out his mayo so he can start assembling his sandwich. Cold cuts. Cheese. Lettuce. “After two sessions Jojo, are you kidding?”

“…That was years ago,” Jojo says, sounding hurt.

“Congrats.” Wooje’s voice cuts through the air like a knife, sharp and sarcastic. There’s a twinge in his stomach that feels guilty from the tone, but he can’t stop himself from digging. “You’re caught up.”

Jojo pauses again. When he speaks, his voice is small and uncertain. “You… never told me?”

Wooje shrugs, even though Jojo can’t see it. “I never lied to you,” he defends. Like clockwork, Jojo goes on the offensive.

“But you never told me,” he accuses.

“Yeah,” Wooje agrees. He stares at his sandwiches, and suddenly doesn’t feel all that hungry anymore.

Jojo speaks, but Wooje barely hears it. “I’m sorry for not noticing.”

“It’s okay. You noticed enough.” Wooje sighs, moving to put the rest of his sandwich materials away. Then he gets a knife and cuts each open-faced sandwich in half.

“When’re you coming back?” Jojo tries. “Wedding’s over, right?”

Wooje doesn’t feel much like answering, but he manages a half-assed “Mhm.” He takes his plate and phone then migrates over to the kitchen table, putting them down and sitting so he can eat. “Might head out today. Need to pack.”

“What? Why? You should stay a bit longer.”

Wooje stares at his food. “I kissed my ex,” he blurts. Jojo gasps.

“Wooje.”

The excuses and justifications come spilling out before he can even stop. “I didn’t hook up with him, I just—I didn’t mean to but it was a wedding and he’s also really fucking stupid and clearly still in love with me and I probably shouldn’t lead him on even though I like him too, it’s just I’m going back to California so I—”

“Wait,” Jojo interrupts. “That’s why you want to leave Washington already?”

“What? Yes, I—”

“Wooje.” Jojo sounds very frustrated. He turns away from his phone. Wooje hears footsteps fading away, and then a very faint scream in the background. More footsteps, coming back. Jojo picks up the phone. He says, out of breath, “You can’t keep running away.”

“I’m not—”

Jojo’s firm. “You’re running away. I’m contacting your therapist.”

“I don’t have a therapist!” Wooje cries.

“I’m contacting your therapist from two years ago. Maybe she can talk to you about your stupid avoidance issues.”

“I don’t really deserve to be here, Jojo. Or with him.” Wooje squeezes his eyes shut, and shakes his head rapidly, as if that’s going to do something. “Ugh, can we—can we talk about something else?”

“No!” Jojo says automatically. Then he goes, “What? I mean, sure, I guess. Just don’t leave. I don’t want to see you home until August.”

“If you hate me, just say so.”

“I don’t hate you, Wooje.”

Wooje slumps, setting his elbows on his table so he can put his head in his hands. “Then why are you forcing me to stay in my worst favorite place in the world?” he mumbles.

Jojo sighs. “You don’t hate it there.”

“I have texted you I want to leave at least—”

“Three times, Wooje. I was honestly expecting fifty.” Jojo’s voice is soft as he says, “Admit it. You like it there.”

Wooje is adamant. “I don’t like it here.” But he gives Jojo a small win: “I like the people here. Everyone here is cool. All the bad people died. But the place still sucks.”

“Well, you’re running away from the cool people there, dipshit,” Jojo says matter of factly. He sighs, and Wooje hears a rustle from his end. “Stay for a little while, or I’m kicking you out of the apartment. Danny can replace you.”

“Don’t kick me out of the apartment!” Wooje protests, but it’s lacking any real fear because Jojo can’t. Wooje’s the one that deals with the landlord, since Jojo doesn’t know how to.

“Just stay, Wooje. Don’t make me beg.”

“You’re already begging,” Wooje points out. He scoffs, but sinks down in his seat, relinquishing. “Okay, fine. Just remember to water my spider plants. How long do you want me to stay?”

“Uh… I don’t know,” Jojo admits through the tinny speaker. “I just don’t want you to ghost your friends. Or your ex-boyfriend, especially after kissing him.”

Wooje runs a hand through his hair. “Yeah, that’s probably a pretty shitty thing to do, huh?” Hyunjoon’s texted him a good morning too—not answering that would also be pretty shitty, but he can’t bring himself to just yet. And it’s not like he’s leaving Hyunjoon on read, anyway, since he hasn’t clicked on the notification yet. It’s just a bright red bubble waiting for him.

“Mhm.”

“Well,” Wooje starts circumspectly, “I wasn’t going to leave without a word—”

“Wooje.”

“Okay, okay.” Wooje gives up on defending himself. “I’ll stick around for a couple days, I guess.” Just to be a brat about it, he mumbles, “Don’t know what I’ll do, though.”

“Stick around!” Jojo says enthusiastically. His voice is ten times more upbeat, glee seeping through Wooje’s cellphone speakers. “Duh. Kiss your ex some more. Maybe get laid.”

This time, Wooje really does hang up on him.

Minseok knocks on his door sometime in the afternoon. Wooje opens it. “You can just walk in, you know,” he says. “It’s not like I lock it.”

Minseok rolls his eyes, and pushes past him to enter. Minhyung, ever-present, trails behind him. “You should,” he says, as he passes Wooje. Wooje closes the door behind them and pointedly does not lock it.

They stand there for a minute, in the entryway. Minseok’s staring at the living room, with its sun-bleached furniture and the floating dust particles illuminated by the light from the windows. They never did hang out there: aside from his room, bathroom, and kitchen, Wooje’s house is foreign to himself.

Minseok shrugs, and leads everyone into the living room. It’s got old Persian carpets and ancient furniture, and grandparents’ ashes on the mantle. Wooje hates it. Wooje loves it. He should really do something with those urns—he doesn’t like them staring at him.

Minhyung glances over at him, then around the house before he sits on the sofa. Minseok swings his legs over his lap when he does. “Leaving today?” Minhyung asks.

Minseok smacks him in the gut with his knee, not so subtly. Minhyung doesn’t even flinch, and clearly doesn’t care, but neither does Wooje. It’s a fair question. “No,” Wooje says.

Minhyung raises his eyebrows, but says nothing. Wooje hurriedly explains himself—“I’ll leave sometime after you guys do, for your honeymoon. I just don’t have anything to do in LA right now, so—”

“Right,” Minseok says softly. He’s got a weird look in his eye, and the edges of his lips are almost twitching downwards. “‘Cause you graduated.”

Wooje swallows. “I want a vacation right now. Not… job hunting and stuff.”

“That sounds good. Even after we leave you can hang out with Sanghyeok, and Seongwoong, and Hyun—”

“I kissed Hyunjoon,” Wooje blurts for the second time that morning, red flushing to his cheeks. And then he buries his head in his hands, letting out a pathetic little whimper.

Minhyung chokes. Minseok squeals. They don’t say anything else, because Minhyung’s recovering from his outburst, and Minseok’s laughing.

Wooje’s too scared to look up. “I didn’t mean to,” he mumbles. His hands are pressing against his face in an uncomfortable way, pushing the lens of his glasses into his eyes. He drags his hands up to rake through his messy hair. “I—don’t be mad. Please?”

“Why would we be mad?” Minhyung asks, sounding confused. Wooje looks up then, feeling relief roll off of his body in waves. It’s like all the pressure and guilt wound up in his chest has disappeared automatically, just because of this.

“I said it before,” Minseok says, laughing a little. “I think you two are functioning adults. Do whatever, figure it out. Maybe it’ll work this time.”

Wooje flushes, already embarrassed but with guilt eating away at him. “It probably won’t lead to anything. I don’t know.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Minseok reassures.

Wooje’s doing that thing again. Using other people to approve or disapprove his actions, like he needs an excuse and needs to be told what to think. What to feel. It’s weird. It’s ridiculous. It’s—can’t Wooje just do things he wants to without feeling guilt over it?

Yeah, Wooje’s stopped being able to do that four years ago.

“Okay,” he says. Minhyung hums. He doesn’t seem opposed to the idea of Wooje dating—or playing with Hyunjoon’s emotions —anymore. But then again, Wooje and him have talked. Minseok and him have likely talked. Hell, Hyunjoon and him might’ve talked.

And if Wooje’s serious this time, there’s nothing to be mad about. And Wooje is serious this time. He is. He’s going to stay in touch this time. Right?

Old habits are hard to break. Wooje’s not sure how he’s going to manage it all, but he’s… willing to try. He lost them once, and losing them again sickens him to his stomach even more than all the lies and the guilt do. Maybe that says something about him.

“We’re going over to his in a bit,” Minhyung says. “He says he's got something he wants to show us.”

“Personally,” Minseok jumps in. “I don’t trust him.”

“Oh.” Wooje laughs. “Right. Honestly, I wouldn’t either.”

At that, Minseok shoots him a look. “Do you know?” he asks incredulously. Wooje waves him away. 

“It’s nothing.” It’s probably their wedding gift. Wooje hesitates, before tentatively asking, “Can I come?”

“Wanna see him again?” Minseok teases, and Wooje flushes. Yeah, this is exactly why he was so hesitant about asking.

“Stop it,” he says.

Minhyung just rolls his eyes. “Yeah, you can come. He texted us to bring you, anyway. And told us to tell you to answer his messages.”

Something like heat spreads to Wooje’s cheeks, but then again he was already blushing. But it’s… weird. Hyunjoon hasn’t made him blush and stumble like this for a long time, and honestly? Back then Wooje was the one making Hyunjoon blush, at least most of the time. Now it’s—Hyunjoon’s got the reins. Entirely. He never had it all before: neither of them did.

It’s almost like a honeymoon phase all over again. Wooje’s not sure how he feels about that.

“Yeah, okay,” Wooje says. He stands up, motioning to the door. “Might as well go now. Not like we have anything else to do, right?”

They take Dreamboat Annie. Wooje’s banished to the backseat, but he doesn’t really mind. He sits on the left side, behind the drivers’ seat, since that was his assigned seat back when all four boys got driven around by Sanghyeok or Seongwoong. Wooje on the left. Minseok in the middle. Hyunjoon to the right, and Minhyung in shotgun.

When they pull up to Hyunjoon’s place, Seongwoong and Sanghyeok are already there. Minseok parks on the street, and everyone gets out. Wooje leans against Annie to watch the show—half to stay back, half because his leg aches if he stands on it for too long and he doesn’t know how much time this is going to take.

“Is this some sort of intervention?” Minseok asks, eyes narrowed. Hyunjoon laughs, but his eyes are fixed on Wooje.

“Nah,” he says, tearing his gaze away. “Just a present.”

Minseok is quick to throw the nearest object straight at Hyunjoon’s head, which ends up to be his jacket. He takes it off, balls it up, and chucks it straight at him. “We told you not to get anything!” he cries, words flying with the jacket.

Hyunjoon ducks, the jacket unrolling and landing on his driveway. “You haven’t even seen it yet!” he exclaims, as Minseok advances toward him and unleashes a torrent of smacks.

“Do we need to hold him back?” Seongwoong asks, eyeing the assault cautiously. Even as he says it, he doesn’t make a move to stop it.

“Probaby,” Minhyung says, then raises his voice. “Baby! Stop hitting Hyunjoon.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, jerk!” Minseok yells, but stops anyway. He folds his arms and opts to shoot a very mean scowl at Hyunjoon.

 “Yeah, Minhyung, can you hold him back please?” Hyunjoon asks, wary. “When he sees the present he’s gonna kill me.”

“Don’t—” Minseok says, but Minhyung’s already stepping up and hugging him from behind, weaving his arms underneath Minseok’s and lacing his fingers together so he’s stuck. Minseok scowls again, pouting, but he sinks into Minhyung’s embrace, an automaticity he’s just too used to doing. Minhyung smiles a little to himself, leaning down to whisper something in Minseok’s ear, who only elbows him back.

“Do I have your attention?” Hyunjoon asks, waving his arms wildly at the couple. He has his garage door opener in his hands, Wooje realizes. He can see the lump of gray. “Okay, this is a gift from all of us four, to you guys. You’re welcome.”

He presses the garage door opener, and it slowly opens. Minseok’s already shrieking and writhing against Minhyung’s grip as it does. “What did you guys do!?”

“Got you a car,” Hyunjoon says with a grin.

“Hyunjoon,” Minhyung says, sounding in awe. He almost lets go of Minseok, but thinks better of it, opting to take a few steps forward with Minseok still in his arms. “What the fuck?”

“You got us a Challenger?” Minseok demands.

“A project Challenger,” Seongwoong corrects from his spot on the sidelines. “Not a mint one, but we’ll help you fix it up. And don’t forget about the bike.”

Minseok shrieks. “What bike!?” And then he spots it, and successfully breaks out of Minhyung’s arms to tackle Hyunjoon in a hug. And then Minhyung joins in, and Sanghyeok and Seongwoong, and all of a sudden, Wooje’s pulled and swept up in a stupid six-man group hug with his almost-family, even when he was wallflowering.

The rest of the time is spent with Minhyung and Minseok waltzing around the car and the bike and admiring them, as the other four hang back and watch. Minhyung’s mainly got appreciation and thanks to say. Minseok does too, but he interlaces a good amount of insults and complaints, though they’re all light-hearted— where are we gonna get the space to keep this? and I swear to God, you guys are just encouraging Minhyung at this point.

Eventually, everyone disperses. They discuss plans to move the vehicles—even loading the bike and its parts into Annie to bring it to Minhyung and Minseok’s place—setting the Challenger for another day. The couple head off, and so do Sanghyeok and Seongwoong. Wooje doesn’t.

Hyunjoon grins at him. “Come in,” he says. He does. Wooje sort of stands in the hall awkwardly, until he just deigns to pull his wallet out of his pocket.

“Here,” Wooje says, passing Hyunjoon a check slipped inside of it.

Hyunjoon takes it, and stares down at it, baffled as he computes what it is. “What’s this for?”

“Wedding present,” Wooje explains, taking his shoes off and migrating to the living room. “You said it was from me too. It wasn’t. Now it is.”

Hyunjoon sighs, following him through the house. When Wooje kneels by his music crates to choose an album, he sticks the check in the air to try and to hand it back. “Wooje, I’m not taking your money.”

Wooje waves Hyunjoon’s hand away, already sifting through CDs. “You let Sanghyeok and Seongwoong contribute,” he insists. He doesn’t look up to meet Hyunjoon’s eyes. “Let me. It’s not for you; it’s not propitiation for everything I did wrong. God, I’m not that terribly guilty. It’s for the gift.”

Hyunjoon sighs again, but Wooje sees him drop his hand from his peripheral vision. “How’d you even know how much?”

“I asked Sanghyeok and Seongwoong how much they contributed. They said you paid half, so this makes it split into four.”

“When?”

Wooje shrugs. “Earlier. Before the wedding.”

“I don’t need it.”

“Again, it’s not for you,” Wooje insists. “I want to say I contributed to my friends’ wedding gift. So take it.” he stands, and passes Hyunjoon a CD. “The Clash.”

Hyunjoon snatches the case out of his hands, stuffing the check in his back pocket. “Ooh, titular,” he sings, but he hasn't made a move to put it in yet. “No London Calling? And did you seriously kiss me, ignore my good morning text, then come to my house to give me money?” 

Wooje’s heart skips a beat. He shrugs, and feels the greenery in his body grow and blanket his organs. “Put it in,” he repeats. “And I was coming over anyway. Didn’t need to text.”

Hyunjoon turns and kneels so he can put the CD in the player. “Were you now?”

“Mhm.” Wooje can barely suppress his grin, rocking back and forth on the balls of feet. “Good morning to you too, by the way.”

“It’s four.”

“Thought that counts.”

“Sure.” Hyunjoon grabs Wooje by the waist and drags him in, sitting down on the couch. Wooje falls into his lap with a surprised cry, turning so he can wrap his arms around Hyunjoon’s neck. “Properly,” Hyunjoon tells him. He taps the space beneath Wooje’s eye, finger under his glasses frames. “Next time text me back.”

Wooje rolls his eyes, sitting up and looking away. Hyunjoon says, “We’re on the same page about this, right?” softly, thumbing Wooje’s cheekbone delicately, and Wooje wants to cry. Scream. Die. Break stuff— it’s just one of those days. He has spores inside of him, floating pollen and firs needles suffocating his lungs.

“What’s that?” Wooje asks, trying his hardest not to choke around his heart sitting in his throat. “Explain the page.”

“Properly,” Hyunjoon echos. “And.” He uses his hand to turn Wooje’s jaw so he’s looking at him. “Look at me. Same page—you want this too, right? Not just me?”

“I want this too,” Wooje agrees, but it’s only half true because he also wants pain. He wants a forest fire to come through and burn his evergreens to the ground. He doesn’t want a second chance as much as he does want it, maybe even more, because he doesn’t think he deserves to have it.

“Okay,” Hyunjoon says, a soft smile on his face. Oblivious. He uses his hands to carefully take Wooje’s glasses off, before returning his grip to Wooje’s waist. “I’m going to kiss you now.”

Wooje wants him to claw his heart open with his teeth.

He kisses Hyunjoon with a lot more ferocity than the other expects, considering he gasps against Wooje’s mouth when he does it. Stupid, Wooje thinks, pressing harder into the crevice of his mouth, punishing. Hyunjoon curbs his surprise, picking up and following Wooje’s movements.

It’s not enough. Wooje wants to be torn apart at the seams. He wants to be consumed. He wants Hyujnoon to reach his hands in the gaping hole in his chest and uproot the tendrils and vines stuck with this heart.

Hyunjoon doesn’t kiss him nearly as insistently, or as desperately. His lips aren’t searing, but gentle.

Crush me crush me crush me crush me, Wooje repeats in his mind, digging his hands into Hyunjoon’s hair, and dragging down. His fingers fumble to unbutton his flannel, irritating and cramped and causing too much space between the two bodies. Wooje wants punishment. He wants cruelty. He wants—

Hyunjoon takes everything carefully, giving back with just the right amount of love, slowing down the pace. He’s tender again, and soft again, and Wooje can’t take it: he rips away from him in disgust. He climbs out of Hyunjoon’s lap and buries his head in his hands and tries not to scream.

“Wooje,” Hyunjoon says, soft and breathless. His hand touches Wooje’s wrist, feather-light. Wooje wrenches his arm away at the slightest bit of contact. “What do you want?”

He doesn’t sound hurt. He sounds sad.

“I want—” Wooje struggles to say. The bile in his throat isn’t making it easy to speak. I want to be destroyed, he thinks mindlessly. But conversely— I want to be held and told that I’m okay.

“Same page?” Hyunjoon asks. His hands are shaking; Wooje can see them from out of his peripheral vision.

“No.” Wooje says it, because he doesn’t feel like lying. But he’s still lying. He’s half-lying again.

Hyunjoon sighs softly. He stands. “I’m taking you home.”

“No!” Wooje says, jerking up to grab Hyunjoon’s hand and stop him from leaving. Hyunjoon jolts in surprise, turning back to stare at him. His hand fits perfectly against Wooje’s. “I want to stay.”

Hyunjoon sits back down. He stares at their hands. “Is that what you want, Wooje?”

“Yes.” Wooje has to blink away his tears. He doesn’t get why his eyes are watering, all of a sudden. It’s not like anything of import has happened. “I want you.”

“I’m not just going to sleep with you, Wooje,” Hyunjoon says softly. He lets go of Wooje’s hand, and Wooje wants to scream in pain. “That’s not what you want.”

“I want you to hold me,” he whispers. I want you to destroy me.

Wooje doesn’t say the last part out loud. So Hyunjoon holds him. He drags Wooje into his lap again, wrapping his arms around his body and leaning to rest his chin on his shoulder.

“Remember the accident?” Hyunjoon asks in a mumble, breath tickling Wooje’s skin. “Remember surviving?”

Wooje flinches. “No,” he says honestly. A bad shift, a jerk of the wheel. He only remembers losing his leg. Too many trees, then airbags. He only remembers losing Hyunjoon. Screaming.

Hyunjoon pulls him closer to his chest, hands smoothing out over the expanse of his back. “You just asked me to hold you, like this. When we were waiting for the cops to come.” He closes his eyes, and buries his head into the crook of Wooje’s neck. “You were so small, all of a sudden. So, so small.”

Wooje chokes back a sob. He feels the opposite of numb—sensitive. Too many emotions. He feels his body overgrown with them and with too-long roots, digging so far into his skin and flesh and bone that they dig into his soul and sow seeds that can never be removed. They’re embedded in him. Forever. “I was trapped inside. You weren’t. You stayed with me anyway.”

“Of course I did,” Hyunjoon murmurs. “That’s what I do. Stay.”

Wooje has tears falling out of his eyes, finally seeing the light of day, but doesn’t know why he’s crying. “I’m sorry I didn’t.”

“That’s alright.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t keep in touch, either.”

“That’s alright too.” It isn’t, and they both know it. Hyunjoon moves to press a soft kiss to Wooje’s jaw. “You’re here now. That’s what matters.”

Don’t leave me, teenage Hyunjoon would scream. Not out loud, not with his words. But with his actions. With his fast and hungry kisses—never in the moment, never getting enough. Don’t leave me don’t leave me don’t leave me; don’t leave me like my parents did.

Hyunjoon now has learned how to let go. He wears his bleeding heart on his sleeve, always has, but his kisses are soft now and his touches are light as a feather. He’s not grasping and clawing to keep people from leaving anymore. He learned to let go when Wooje left for college. When Wooje cut him off. When Wooje ran away.

Wooje—hasn’t.

Wooje hasn’t. That’s why he’s got a growing, perennial garden in his body. There’s no letting go for him. There’s no withering, or dying, or annual plants. Only evergreens.

“I want to go home,” Wooje whimpers.

“I’ll drive you there,” Hyunjoon says.

Hyunjoon drives him to Sanghyeok’s.

“Hey kiddo,” Seongwoong says softly, after Hyunjoon picks Wooje up from the Civic, carries him to his and Minhyung’s old room, and lies him down. Wooje stays curled in Hyunjoon’s arms, not crying anymore, but with tear tracks dry on his cheeks.

He doesn’t know why he’s like this. He doesn’t know a lot of things. He knows he likes the warmth Hyunjoon gives him, though, and he knows how much he wants it.

“Hi.” Hyunjoon replies for Wooje, because Wooje just turns away and buries his head into his chest.

Seongwoong doesn’t seem all that bothered. “He’s like a koala,” he says fondly. “Didn’t outgrow the little kid that much, huh?”

Wooje’s doing too much growing these days. But he’s got the same roots.

“Sanghyeok’s making him tea,” Seongwoong continues. His next words are hesitant. “…Does he want to talk about it?”

Hyunjoon sighs, heavy and weary. “I don’t know. I don’t know what he’s feeling. What there is to talk about. He’s just….”

“I’m right here,” Wooje mumbles, poking his head out just a bit. Hyunjoon’s hand immediately darts out to smooth over his curls.

“Yeah, well, you aren’t exactly talking, Wooje,” he murmurs.

Wooje’s lower lip trembles. “I missed you guys.”

“Okay, Wooje.”

Wooje peeks up, making eye contact with Seongwoong. “I’m sorry about Sanghyeok.”

Seongwoong flinches, and looks away. Hyunjoon inhales sharply—Wooje can feel him against his chest. Wooje’s just broken an unspoken rule—not to speak about it. They’ve never spoken about it before, because Seongwoong’s pining wasn’t something to gossip or speak about. They stayed quiet out of respect. Everybody knew. Nobody mentioned it.

Seongwoong swallows. “Don’t be,” he manages to say. “He has his own emotions.”

“I didn’t know you still loved him,” Wooje tells him simply. “I don’t know why I thought you didn’t anymore. ‘Cause it’s not like Minhyung and Minseok stopped loving each other, and it’s not like I stopped loving Hyunjoon. So I don’t know why I assumed you stopped loving Sanghyeok.”

Maybe he only really says it because Hyunjoon’s there, and Hyunjoon hears his words—he clearly does, because he goes stiff, and Wooje can feel more than hear him breathe in sharply. Wooje’s too much of a coward to tell him straight-out, so in a different conversation with Seongwoong it is.

Seongwoong softens. “Consistency runs in the family, I guess.”

Wooje does not mention the fact that none of them are blood related besides Sanghyeok and Minhyung, and even so that’s very far removed. But then again, it doesn’t have to be by blood. Maybe consistency and love isn’t passed down like a gene, but passed down like a value. Like integrity, like a belief, and like a moral. It’s a familial affliction by teaching, not by blood. Because Sanghyeok and Seongwoong taught Wooje how to love, right? They taught Minhyung how to, and Hyunjoon how to, and Minseok how to. They stayed consistent. They stayed strong.

Maybe everyone here just has roots in their body, not just Wooje. Maybe that’s the thing about Washington: it traps people here forever. Even when Wooje thought he got out, he didn’t. A golden rule of their town is, after all, that no one gets out of their town.

Sanghyeok’s figure appears next to Seongwoong in the doorway. He’s holding a cup of tea in his hand. “Hi,” he says.

Hyunjoon and Seongwoong tense up, if only because the previous subject matter was Sanghyeok himself. Wooje doesn’t. “Hi, Sanghyeokie,” he says.

Sanghyeok jerks his head out toward where he came from, as if to gesture everyone else out. Even before he says, “Let me talk to him,” Seongwoong’s already disappeared down the hall. Hyunjoon untangles himself from Wooje with a lot more hesitancy, but a couple of glances from Sanghyeok send him on his way. He closes the door behind him. It clicks shut.

Sanghyeok sits down next to Wooje on Hyunjoon’s old bed, springs creaking under the mattress, and passes the cup of tea over. Wooje sits up, taking it in his hands.

“What’s wrong?” Sanghyeok asks. And Wooje responds automatically, words flowing oh so easily out of his mouth the way they always do when it comes to speaking with Sanghyeok.

“I don’t know. I feel weird.” Wooje squirms, thinking about overgrown gardens in his stomach and bright ex-boyfriends not burning him away. “Homesick.”

“Missing LA?”

“No.” Wooje scrunches his nose, upset at the insinuation. “LA isn’t home. Missing here.”

“You are here,” Sanghyeok reminds him gently, as if to wade off the animosity from his simple assumption. It makes sense, really. Wooje doesn’t know why he’s offended—he guesses he shouldn’t be. It’s not like he’s given anyone any reason to believe that Washington is still home to him. It’s not like anyone knew what he was thinking for four years. What he’s thinking now.

“It’s not the same,” Wooje starts slowly. “I’m not the same. I’m missing who I used to be.” He stares at Sanghyeok. He’s not entirely the same either: he’s loving someone else now, taking a few more days between shaving now. But he still has his constants. He’s dressed like how he always is, plain tees and the same pair of jeans he’s had for a decade. His glasses are thin and polished. He has the same comfort to him, the same command, the same aura. He still sneaks cigarettes on the back porch when no one’s awake and he’s still obsessed with numbers.

“You didn’t change all that much,” Sanghyeok tells Wooje. He puts a hand on his knee. “Still the same old Wooje.”

Wooje shakes his head again, refusing the statement. “I did change. On the inside—I feel it. I’m a Ship of Theseus.”

Sanghyeok stares at him for a minute, an inexplicable expression on his face. “That’s alright,” he finally says. “We don’t mind.”

Wooje sips his tea and lets it burn his tongue, as if doing that is going to make his tears subside. It isn’t enough. He drinks more. He finishes the cup and puts it aside, letting the warmth of the liquid cover the expanse of his chest, wanting it to hurt like heartburn.

“When did Hyunjoon move out?” he asks.

“Hyunjoon?” Sanghyeok frowns, confused by the sudden subject change. “Year and a half ago. After Minhyung. He rents out his house for pretty cheap—well, everything here is cheap.”

Wooje takes a breath. “Did he choose to leave or did you kick him out?”

“I… gently persuaded him.” Sanghyeok shakes his head with a smile. “He doesn’t like to leave. You know him.”

Does he, though?

“I didn’t ask him to apply to colleges with me, because it would uproot his life. All he knows and loves is here. Me too, but I wanted college to uproot mine.” Wooje puts his hand over his heart. “But the roots live here. It didn’t work. I failed.” Tears fill his eyes at the statement again, watering. Almost overflowing. “All I do is try. And I always fail.”

“Wooje,” Sanghyeok says quietly. His hands reach out to take Wooje’s as if he’s trying to warm them up between his palms. Wooje needs it. He craves warmth like a plant reaching for the sun. “You didn’t… you don’t fail.”

“I fail at everything. I couldn’t move on my own. I couldn’t leave you guys. I mean, I did, but I never stopped thinking about it. I never stopped beating myself up. I just… can’t.”

Wooje’s going to get angry again. He thinks about Washington. He thinks about the smell of a cigarette burn on his skin, and the things he lost here. He thinks about the people he knew. This town is haunted, but it’s only haunted for Wooje. He’s surrounded by ghosts, and grandparents, and grand firs. Circling around him, closing in.

He thinks about almost-families, and Minseok’s sweet mother across the street, and Sanghyeok’s nice boyfriend Wangho. He’s haunted by the smiling faces of boys obsessed with cars and mechanics that work at their own family shop. Wooje sees faces in the rain, and evergreen trees, and in clouds. He gets reminded by the ache in his leg when he walks for too long, by the sight of a Mustang or a stick shift car.

Wooje dug his own grave and cut his own communication. Speaking used to be the only thing he had, but now everything sounds underwater, and everything is said in some strange foreign language, and now Wooje has forgotten how to speak. It was the only thing he had, and he forgot how to do it. He cut off his own tongue and burned his bridges to the ground, and now he feels bad about it even though he did it to himself.

“Do you want to?” Sanghyeok asks. “Leave us?”

“No,” Wooje admits. “Not emotionally. That was a mistake. It hurt you. It hurt me.” He flops down on the bed so he’s lying down, staring at the ceiling. It’s plain and white, with one of Minseok’s folded paper crane chains from his origami phase in middle school hanging from a hook. Measly. Only three cranes are on it—all blue. One a gingham patterned paper, another one floral, and the last one solid. “But I couldn’t help it. And I can’t stay here, either way.”

“I don’t understand why you couldn’t have the best of both worlds. People do that all the time—visit home during breaks and stay in touch, and move back after college—well. I guess you wanted to start a life and career in California but…. Why’d you cut us off?”

“Because I felt bad for leaving in the first place,” Wooje whispers. “I don’t want to show my face. I got to LA, and I felt so, so bad for running away from home and from my grandpa and my grandma’s ghost and for breaking up with Hyunjoon that I couldn’t face any of you. So I just hurt you more.”

Sanghyeok sighs, and it almost sounds like he’s been expecting that answer. He looks down at his lap, as if contemplating something, before finally looking over at Wooje.

“You have so much resentment,” he says sadly. “I wish you could look past it.”

Wooje covers his face with his hands. “It’s part of—”

Sanghyeok stops him short. “No, Wooje.” He uses his hands to lift Wooje’s so he’s looking up at him. “No. It’s not a part of you,” he says sternly. “Learn how to forgive yourself. Everybody else already has.

“They are so generous for that. They’re giving you a second chance. The question is, Wooje, what are you planning on doing with it?”

“I don’t want to run away again,” Wooje whispers.

“Then don’t.”

Wooje’s lower lip trembles. He covers his face again, to stop Sanghyeok from seeing the hot tears coming. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles.

“Don’t be,” Sanghyeok says, quiet and gentle like he always is. He lies down next to Wooje, hands reaching out to turn him in and hold him. All of a sudden, Wooje’s a kid again, slipping underneath Sanghyeok’s covers after a bad day. “There’s no point in that. Next time, don’t be a stranger. Just stay in touch, and ask me how I’ve been.”

Hyunjoon hasn’t left the house. He’s got his brow furrowed, and is mid-rapid conversation with Seongwoong when Sanghyeok and Wooje enter the living room. He shuts up and swivels around. “Wooje?” he asks.

Wooje rubs his arms. He’s cold. “Hi. Can you drive me to my place?”

“You can spend the night, you know,” Seongwoong tells him.

“I know.” Wooje turns back toward Hyunjoon anyway. “Drive me home?”

Hyunjoon drives him back home in his Civic. When Wooje’s back in his room, he squeezes his phone between two palms and texts Hyunjoon. Properly.

text me when u get home/when u see this

He thinks, and adds, dont need u getting in a car crash

Hyunjoon replies ten minutes later, when he’s home.

Home safe. Goodnight Wooje.

Wooje wakes up to Suhwan in his house again.

“…What are you doing in my house?” Wooje asks, squinting as he makes his way down the stairs. He’s still wearing pajamas, while Suhwan’s dressed in typical clothes. It’s way too early in the morning for this, but Suhwan’s standing stiff and erect, painstakingly formal in his posture.

“I’ve come to strike a deal,” Suhwan says importantly. Wooje blinks.

“Uh… have some breakfast first.”

So Wooje ends up making breakfast for himself for the second time in a row. Suhwan criticizes him as he’s cooking, and Wooje has no clue where the kid gets the fucking audacity.

Probably Wangho. And Jihoon, honestly.

“Okay,” Wooje says, once he passes Suhwan a plate of slightly overcooked scrambled eggs and bacon. “What do you want?”

Suhwan answers by shoveling eggs into his mouth. He takes his time chewing, doesn’t speak until after he swallows, and Wooje is left feeling vaguely exasperated.

Finally, Suhwan speaks. “You’re going back to LA, right? Even though you graduated?”

Wooje shifts in his chair, twirling his fork in his fingers. “…Yeah,” he says cautiously. “Why?”

“I have a proposition.”

Wooje gives Suhwan a look. “You can’t just say I have a proposition and not tell me what the proposition is. What’s your proposition?”

Suhwan rolls his eyes. “Jeez, you’re just like Sanghyeok,” he complains loudly. “Okay, okay. Will you let me and my friends use your place to hang out while you’re gone? We won’t use utilities, and we’ll clean up after ourselves and we can even take care of your garden and—”

Wooje snorts, interrupting him. “Aren’t you going to hang out in my house anyway?”

“Well….” Suhwan pauses, and shrugs. To his credit, he’s unapologetic about his answer. Wooje respects it. “Yeah. But this way I get Minseok off my back.”

Wooje doesn’t have to contemplate it for long. “Okay, kid,” he says. It’s almost weird that he can say that. Kid. He was always at the receiving end of that nickname. “Sure.”

With that over with, Wooje makes a move to focus more on his breakfast, but Suhwan isn’t done. He jolts up, surprise drawn clear on his face. “Really?”

“Yep,” Wooje confirms, chewing on a piece of bacon. He waves his fork around—“Ground rules: no going into my room. No breaking, selling, or taking stuff. You can garden actually, that’d be nice. If you pay for utilities, you can use them. Hell, you can even move in without rent, as long as you don’t touch my room.”

Suhwan looks like he’s got a lot more than he expected. “Really?”

Wooje just shrugs. “Sure. I’m not touchy like Minseok. And no one else is staying here, so….”

“Thanks!” Suhwan says, bright. “I probably won’t live here, ‘cause Wangho won’t let me, and I don’t really want to pay for utilities. But I’ll take care of the place and hang out here! And study, and stuff—do you have WiFi?”

“No.” Wooje snorts. “Just use Minseok’s. I can give you the password. He won’t notice.”

“Ha! Okay,” Suhwan agrees pleasantly.

A scoff sounds out in the room, and Wooje looks up at where it came from. Minseok’s standing there in the doorway, hands on his hips. “What about me?”

Suhwan’s unfazed. He scoots back in his chair to stare over at Minseok’s figure. “Y’know Minseok, for someone giving other people shit for breaking into houses, you don’t seem to follow your own beliefs.”

“Oh, fuck off.”

“No, the kid has kinda got a point,” Wooje says. “Want breakfast?”

Minseok waves him away. “I ate already. Just wanted to say hi.”

“Burning time before you go off on your honeymoon where you can fuck Minhyung all day and not worry about work?” Suhwan asks.

“Suhwan, I’m literally going to kill you.” Minseok manages to make the statement sound more like a humorous deadpan rather than a threat, but Wooje catches that murderous glint in his eye and suddenly fears for Suhwan’s life.

Suhwan does not fear for his life.  “Extreme,” he quips. “Just fire me.”

“I can’t do that; that’s so unethical. Why’d you fire him, Minseok?” Minseok mimics in a high pitched voice. “Oh, he was a little shit. You’re a good worker. I’d rather murder.”

“Okay, and that’s where I take my leave. Thanks for the food, Wooje. And the deal.” Suhwan drops his plate in the sink—actually cleans it and sets it aside to dry—then scampers off. Minseok turns to Wooje.

“Weird kid. Never let Wangho raise someone. For some reason, I don’t think Suhwan was this chaotic until after he moved in with him.”

“He woke me up,” Wooje says mournfully. He’s still craving his sheets. Maybe he can nap?

“It’s ten, Wooje.”

“Is it?” Wooje shoots him a look, eyeing Minseok up and down. There’s got to be a reason he’s here, other than just… to say hi, and Wooje thinks he knows what it is. “Okay, what’s up?”

To his credit, Minseok doesn’t beat around the bush. “Sanghyeok told me you had a… thing.”

“A thing,” Wooje repeats. He folds his arms, unimpressed.

“Episode?”

“Oh my God,” Wooje says, looking away. He shakes his head, unfolding his arms to push his plate away. “That is not the definition of an episode.”

Minseok fiddles with his rings, twisting them around his fingers anxiously. “You’re not going to stay home, are you?” he asks, but he’s apologetic about it—Wooje can hear it in his tone. “You need to—find work and stuff in LA, and—are you going to cut us off again? It’s okay if you do, I just—”

“Minseok.” Wooje stares at him, an ugly feeling seeping into his stomach. He speaks the most self-assured that he has in years , anger at himself and at Minseok being a people-pleaser building up inside him. “Don’t be such a pushover. It’s not okay to cut you guys off without a word; it wasn’t; Minhyung was right; and you can stop pretending that you’re fine. You’re not going to scare me away. If I’m leaving, I’m leaving, and if I want to stay in touch then that’s what I’m going to do.”

And it’s like Minseok breaks. He sags, weakens at the edges, a sense of something wholly tired overtaking his expression. He opens his mouth, but it’s not to question Wooje on why he cut him off, or why he avoided him, it’s just… “Stay. Please? Just in touch, and visit during holidays, and—I want my best friend back, Wooje. I really do.”

“Do you want me to?” Wooje asks in a whisper. Something twists in his gut, something ugly and unworthy, something that eats him alive. A root that digs too deep. A plant that takes too much. Something soaking up his life force as a nutrient so it can flourish—guilt and fear and everything that made Wooje block numbers and never visit home. “Don’t you think this place is better off without me?”

Minseok stares at him. And then he gets that madman glint in his eyes again and he yells, “What the fuck?”

Wooje caves in on himself, already wanting to backtrack, but Minseok’s shaking and firing off already. He’s quick with it—always has been with his words. “Do you know how fucking unfair it is to say that? To leave and then say that it’s for the better and insinuate that we like it without you!? So you know how fucking unfair you have been?”

“Yes,” Wooje whispers. “I do. But I had my reasons. And I didn’t mean it like that.” He says it softly, because soft is the only thing he can be right now. His anger and frustration and fear have run his course, and he’s just—tired. Wooje is so, so tired. “You guys just all seem so happy—I mean you just got married— and I feel left behind, and it’s all my fault, I know, but now I’m wondering if it’s too late to come back at all when you’re perfect already.”

Minseok seethes. Wooje can tell when he’s about to blow up. He clutches his hands into fists and screams, “Home isn’t perfect now!” And yeah, Wooje saw that coming when the shaking started but now when he opens his mouth to try and explain, Minseok’s just off ranting again. “It never was! We’re happy, but we’re not perfect. Nobody’s perfect, Wooje.”

“I know that, but—”

Minseok’s got this affliction that makes him unable to hear when he’s mad. Maybe it’s genetic. Maybe it’s familial. He just talks, and talks, and talks until he’s dry. Wooje’s seen him shrieking with anger, and crying with madness before, but it’s… been a while since then. Minseok’s still the same in that way—he says item after item like he’s ticking off each box in a list, pouring everything out like a shaken can of soda. His temper isn’t one to be messed with.

“Hyunjoon’s still fucking guilty over hurting you. He doesn’t know how to drive his car anymore. Sanghyeok can’t have a proper relationship with anyone because he’s already in a partnership with Seongwoong, and Seongwoong can’t try and love anyone else because he’s still in love with someone who calls him his brother.”

Minseok sobs, and when Wooje walks over to hold him the older man still keeps on talking, but he doesn’t push Wooje away—just holds onto him as he yells. “Minhyung searched and found his bio family, do you know that? Through old records in Sanghyeok’s grandma’s attic. They replied that they didn’t want anything to do with him, and he still flinches when you say the word parent. And my mom doesn’t remember me anymore, so I had to move her to a home three hours away, and you weren’t here for any of it. You were my best friend, and she was like your mom too, and you didn’t know. Christ, IF I HAD INVITED HER TO MY WEDDING, SHE’D HAVE A MANIC EPISODE IN THE MIDDLE OF IT BECAUSE SHE WOULDN’T REMEMBER WHERE SHE WAS.”

“Minseok,” Wooje tries, hands moving to try and catch Minseok’s flailing ones. Minseok hits his chest weakly in lieu of an acknowledgement, and lets out a twisted sound somewhere between a wail and a sob.

“For two years, for two years, Wooje, I went over to your house every single day, treating your shitty grandpa with kindness until he died even though I just wanted him to suffer for putting up with your grandmother’s abuse to you. For two more, I went over every single day to keep it tidy for the day you came back. For four years I waited and I waited and I wanted to know what I did wrong that made you leave me. What did I do wrong? Do you hate me that much?

“I still wake up in the middle of the night and make sure your car doesn’t leave your driveway, because I know this isn’t going to last and I know you’re going to disappear again but I’m so scared because I don’t want you to.” He clings onto Wooje’s shoulders tightly, tears running down his face as his says, “We’re already fucked up! We always have been. That’s the basis of this town and our family! You didn’t cause it, and you’re not going to take perfect away!”

He’s breathing heavily by the time he finishes. So Wooje slowly leads him to the living room and sits him down on one of the couches, then leaves to get him a mug of hot water.

“I’m sorry I didn’t ask about Mom,” Wooje says softly, letting the sofa dip down from his weight as he takes his place next to Minseok. Minseok’s mom was all smiles and cardigans and baked goods and graying hairs, concern and worry and doing the best for the fucked up almost-family living in the weird house on the other side of town. She was love for her neighbor across the street and for her son even though she didn’t have a husband, and Wooje doesn’t know why he didn’t inquire more. Because he heard she moved to a home in the city on the first day and he hadn't asked about her since.

Minseok sniffles, wiping his nose with his sleeve. He takes the mug. “‘S fine.”

“Not really.”

“Yeah, okay,” Minseok agrees automatically, after taking a sip. It’s almost humorous. “A lot of the shit you did is not really okay.”

Wooje barks a laugh. He sobers up a moment after, asking, “She doesn’t remember?”

“Nothing except baking. She remembers that. I visited her yesterday—whenever I bring her cookies or cake, her face lights up and she—” Minseok’s voice falters, but he manages to stay stable, “—she finally seems like she has life, you know? And I was curious so I asked for her old banana muffin recipe one time and she actually managed to write it down in full.”

“Oh,” Wooje says. Minseok’s mom was always a baker—a hobbyist, not a professional. She had wanted to open up a bakery, if she had the money and didn’t have a kid to risk. Minseok got his love for baking from her and… now he’s fulfilled the family dream. “What was the other stuff? Something about Sanghyeok and Minhyung’s family?”

Minseok scoffs. “They’re assholes. No wonder Sanghyeok’s grandma became a recluse.”

“I thought she just did that because she was weird,” Wooje tries. Minseok gives a weak laugh.

“That too.”

There’s a moment of silence. Wooje bounces the musty sofa cushion from underneath his hands, and focuses on the main part of the conversation, the elephant he’s dancing around. “I didn’t cut you off because I hated you. Or leave.”

Minseok stares at his palms. “But it felt like you did.”

That’s about all Wooje needs to hear, but Minseok continues anyway. He looks up, soft and sad. “You left without a word. You ghosted us for four years. Christ, we were supposed to be like any other family that has kids going to college. Staying in constant contact. Visiting during breaks.”

Wooje shakes his head. “I know,” he says. “But I—it wasn’t you. I cut you off because I felt guilty for leaving.”

Minseok drags his legs up and wraps his arms around himself. “You didn’t have to,” he whispers. “We were there for you. We encouraged you to go.”

Words are heavy on Wooje’s tongue. He tries to explain his thoughts: “I wanted to punish myself. I wanted to hide.”

Minseok sinks. “I get that. I understand your reasoning, and I’m sorry you feel that way, I really am but—it doesn’t change the impact. You ended up punishing us, too. And we’ve been hurting for four years.”

“I know,” Wooje whispers. “And you let me back in anyway.” Not without slack, not without passive-aggressive comments, but those are given. Those are understood and maybe even fair. But his whole family just stretched their arms open and welcomed him home. By all means, he’s surprised he wasn’t turned away. He’s still surprised he was invited to the wedding.

“Because we love you.” Minseok leans over, and squeezes Wooje’s palm comfortingly. “That isn’t to say we aren’t mad or upset—you hurt us a lot. You did. But we love you, and Hell, I’ll give you a thousand chances to be back in my life.”

“It was really really bad, for a while,” Wooje says. He curls up on the couch and closes his eyes. “It still kinda is. But it’s getting better.”

“Good,” Minseok says simply.

“I’m sorry.”

Minseok flicks his forehead with a wet grumble. “Stop apologizing. You sound like Hyeokgyu.”

“You sound like Sanghyeok,” Wooje counters, but settles down with a feeling of ease in his chest. “Fine.”

Minseok’s voice is soft. He doesn’t looks meet Wooje’s eyes as he asks, cautious, “Do you have anything else to tell me?”

Wooje lets out a lighthearted shrug, curbing the acid twisting in his stomach. “Just questions. I want to know how you’ve been. How is it being in the Sanghyeok-Hyeokgyu-Seongwoong love triangle?”

Minseok shakes his head, turning away to curl up on the couch. “It’s not a love triangle,” he mumbles, deflated. “Seongwoong isn’t not even an option. Sanghyeok and Hyeokgyu are really happy together, actually. Seongwoong’s just pining like he always is. I feel bad for him, but what can you do?”

“Yeah. And what about….” Wooje hesitates, but just bites the bullet. “Hyunjoon?”

Minseok just shrugs, a little life returning to his body. “You’ve talked to him. He just needs time. And you, maybe—I don’t know. Just don’t mess him up again and I trust him in your hands.”

“I guess we are all pretty fucked up,” Wooje admits.

At that, Minseok lets out a struggling laugh. “Yeah, no shit. Born and raised in a small town, baby! Low-income broken family living. You get what you get.” Minseok says it sarcastically, and there’s a tinge of pain in the words. And Wooje realizes that maybe Minseok sees everything too. He just doesn’t have the same darkness that Wooje does. For every bad action Minseok faces, he returns nothing but pure, unapologetic love.

“Did you ever look for your dad?” Wooje asks, and Minseok shakes his head.

“Nah. Don’t wanna disrespect my mom like that, since she was uncomfortable with the idea. And I don’t even want to. He’s a piece of shit.”

“Fair enough.”

“You’re really gonna stay in touch?”

“Yeah.”

Minseok sits up and squeezes his hand. He allows himself a small smile. “Okay.”

Wooje lets out a breath. One, two. The pressure on his chest lifts a little, next to all the bad parts that haven’t disappeared quite yet. “Is your boy— husband —” he corrects himself, “going to get mad you’re spending the day with me?”

Minseok snorts. “As if. It’s Minhyung. And anyway, he had yesterday, and the wedding, and our honeymoon soon. So it’s whatever.”

Wooje sighs. He curls up on the couch, wrapping his arms around Minseok’s body, and muses, “You think it’s going to be hard to get used to calling him husband?”

“Nah.” Minseok’s voice takes a softer cadence, all feather-light and crinkled edges just like whenever he talks or thinks about Minhyung. “Everything comes easy with him.”

“Yeah.” Wooje shifts suddenly, a thought occurring to him. “What’s your sexuality anyway?” he asks. “I don’t know it. I mean, I always figured it was… I don’t know. Minhyung.”

Minseok giggles. “I’m gay.”

“Oh. I don’t know why I didn’t know that.” His lips tug downward in a pout of their own will, the gravity of upset dragging them down. “I was your best friend.”

“You are my best friend,” Minseok reminds him. “And probably because Minhyung basically is my sexuality.”

Wooje’s satisfied with that answer. He buries his chin in the crook of Minseok’s neck and sighs, something warm and fuzzy in his heart. He feels like he’s sixteen again. Or ten. Or five. Minseok’s been his best friend all his life, and he still is. That probably shouldn't make Wooje as happy as it does.

There’s a knock at the front door. Wooje groans, lifting his head. He doesn’t know why people even bother to knock at his door. “It’s unlocked!” he yells.

Sanghyeok pops his head in. “Hi,” he says. “Is there a Suhwan around here? He texted me asking for a ride back to Wangho’s.” Sanghyeok steps in, opening the door all the way and sliding off his shoes. “He needs to get his license, I swear.”

Wooje squints across the way at Sanghyeok as the older man enters the house. If Sanghyeok can see that Minseok was just crying, and that the two are now cuddling on the couch in comfort, he doesn’t mention it. “Wait, he can’t drive? How’d he get here?”

“Walked,” Minseok and Sanghyeok chorus.

“Probably,” Minseok says as an addendum.

“Wangho lives across town.” Wooje swivels his head to look at Minseok, then Sanghyeok, trying to see if they understand the bafflement of the thought. The walk has to be over two hours. His right leg is fucking aching at the thought of walking that much.

Instead of saying a reasonable explanation like Wangho moved, now he lives closer to us, Minseok just says, “Don’t mention it. Suhwan’s fucking weird.” Sanghyeok shoots him a look, as if to tell him not to say that, but Minseok just ignores it. “He’s probably just bothering Minhyung, Sanghyeokie.”

“Okay.” Sanghyeok glances over at Wooje and asks, “Wanna go?”

“Go?” Wooje asks, confused. “Go where?”

“Wangho’s,” Sanghyeok says simply.

“Why?”

“I don’t wanna face my ex alone.”

“Please,” Minseok scoffs. “You broke up eight years ago. And you see him all the time.”

“I wasn’t asking you. You wanna come or not, Wooje?”

Wooje glances over at Minseok, first. Once he nods in confirmation, Wooje gets up from his seat on the sofa, untangling his limbs from Minseok. “Sure. Just let me change.”

Minseok sighs, flopping down and sprawling across Wooje’s now-abandoned seat.

“Have fun,” he says softly.

Suhwan gets sentenced to the back of the Mercedes, and Wooje thinks half the reason Sanghyeok wanted him to come along is so the kid doesn’t sit shotgun. So Sanghyeok isn’t bothered. But it doesn’t do much—Suhwan sits in the middle and sticks his head in between the two seats to bother Sanghyeok anyway.

The Mercedes is a 1991 300SE, black like like BMW, and equally as clean. Sanghyeok’s got a type when it comes to cars—long, big, and black. Wooje can’t exactly blame him, because his Crown Vic fits that exact criteria, only its interior isn’t leather and it's all rounded edges instead of sharp corners for a square body.

“Why’d you get a new car anyway?” Wooje asks. Sanghyeok shrugs.

“It was a cheap wreck. Gave me something to work on for a year. Why not?”

Before Wooje can reply with his thoughts on that, Suhwan does. “Sanghyeok, are you gonna get me a car?” he asks, poking Sanghyeok’s right elbow. Sanghyeok jerks his arm away like he’s been electrified.

“No. Wangho can do that for you.”

Suhwan pouts, leaning over the central console. “I don’t think he will. Hey, you know Wooje was the one that told me you and Wangho used to date?”

Wooje cringes, but Sanghyeok’s unfazed; there’s nothing for Wooje to be afraid of, anyway. Sanghyeok already knows. . “Yeah. Wooje’s lucky I love him, otherwise he’d be dead.”

“Darn.”

Maybe Wooje should be afraid. “Why are you praying on my downfall?” he asks, twisting around in the passenger seat to stare at Suhwan. “First you want my house, then you want Sanghyeok to kill me?”

Suhwan shrugs, unbothered. “Don’t take it personal. I just like chaos.”

“You remind me a lot of Minseok when he was your age,” Wooje says, turning and flopping back in his seat. Suhwan chokes, then kicks the back of Wooje’s chair.

“Ew! I hate Minseok!”

Sanghyeok snorts. “Maybe that’s why,” he mumbles. Suhwan catches it.

“That’s not why,” he says matter of factly. “It’s because he’s team Hyeokgyu-and-you, and I need to be team Wangho-and-you.”

Sanghyeok is far too patient for what the kid deserves. “Suhwan,” he says gently, “you learned about me and Wangho a week ago. And I’m team Hyeokgyu and me. We’re dating.”

“Well, yeah, but if you dated Wangho you’d be related to me, and I really want to be related to you. You’re cool.”

It’s a weird, twisted compliment. Wooje really thinks he likes Suhwan; he’s a perfect fit to their small town and almost-family’s friends. Wooje has to keep from laughing out loud, biting the inside of his cheek to hold it in.

Sanghyeok looks pained. “Thanks, kiddo. Not gonna happen. Sorry.”

Suhwan shrugs. “‘S okay. I don’t really care that much. Learning about how you used to date makes Wangho’s crush on you all the more depressing though.”

Sanghyeok cringes, hitting the brakes a little too hard as they reach a stop sign. He breathes out shakily, and says, “I didn’t need to know that.”

Suhwan’s response is scalding. “Please. You knew already.”

Sanghyeok sucks on his bottom lip. “Well… sucks for him. He broke up with me.”

Wooje’s eyebrows fly up in surprise. He glances over at Sanghyeok, saying oh so innocently, “I thought you said it was mutual?”

Sanghyeok immediately turns the radio on, switching the volume up. The Smiths are playing How Soon Is Now? , the instrumental swampy and addicting. Wooje can hardly hear Sanghyeok over the music now, but he thinks that was the point.

“Shut up, Wooje.”

Sanghyeok and Wangho pretend that they hate each other.

It’s pretty funny, actually. It’s in a friendly way, since that’s what they are—awkward friends, or acquaintances, or something. There’s a weird, uncomfortable thing about exes—they know how each other taste, feel, and look stripped bare. That’s the weird thing about Hyunjoon.

Like, oh, hi, I know your name. I know all of the physical things about you but I don’t think I know who you are anymore.

But Hyunjoon hasn’t really changed that much, and he refuses to let Wooje. Anyway, the awkwardness isn’t as prevalent, because, well, they’re… Wooje doesn’t know. Trying to date again?

He supposes it’s up to him now, but he’s not very good at making decisions on his own anymore. Hasn’t been for a while.

“Thanks for the ride,” Suhwan says, and barrels past Wangho once he opens the door, so he can go to his room or something. Wangho throws his arms up in the air in a large sigh, turning to make eye contact with Sanghyeok.

He’s got a witty conversation starter at the tip of his tongue already. Wooje’s sort of impressed, even if it isn’t to impress anyone. Not Sanghyeok, certainly—Wangho may like him, but he’s a respectful guy and knows Hyeokgyu well. Wangho isn’t the type to step on any toes, or to be vindictive. “Kids. How did you do it? I can’t handle him.”

Sanghyeok snorts, sticking his hands in his pockets. “Probably helped that I had mine while they were growing up. Unfortunately, you got Suhwan kind of late.”

“You guys are so weird,” Wooje says, making a face. God, would it be weird to say he feels like a little kid under their teenage honeymoon-phase noses? Yeah, probably. But seeing them together when they’re not dating is weird—he’s never seen it before. Hecan’t help it. “Did he walk to my house?”

“Probably. I didn’t even realize he was gone,” Wangho admits. It’s completely psychosomatic, but Wooje swears to God he can feel his leg ache in pain at the mere thought. 

Wangho glances over at Sanghyeok. “You wanna come in?”

Sanghyeok looks at Wooje, as if telling him it’s his decision. Wooje shrugs. “Sure.”

They go inside. Sit on the kitchen table Wooje remembers doing algebra homework at in the past. Wangho gets them both drinks without even asking what they want—a black tea, no sugars for Sanghyeok, and a hot chocolate for Wooje. Wooje wants to laugh out loud, if only because Sanghyeok shoots him a look like why the fuck.

Wangho gets himself coffee, and sits down. “Wooje, ever since you told that kid that we—” he gestures to himself and Sanghyeok “—used to date, it’s been Hell. Apologize.”

Wooje giggles. “Sorry.”

“I’m serious! First there was the day of why didn’t you tell me, then it was wow that’s so weird I didn’t know you had rizz, and I can’t imagine you dating anyone much less Sanghyeok and wait why’d you break up and—” Wangho groans, burying his head in his hands. “I want to kill him.”

Sanghyeok stifles a stilted laugh. “He’s nosy. I think he was bugging Hyunjoon too.”

Wooje shoots him a quick look. “About what?”

If Sanghyeok had any loyalty to Hyunjoon, it’s lost. “You,” he says, and yeah, Wooje sort of expected that answer. He stares at his chocolate sullenly.

“Why?”

You were mentioned a lot, while you were gone, in stories and stuff,” Wangho supplies helpfully. “The other kids knew you, but Suhwan didn’t. Now you’re here, so it’s: is this the same Wooje you always told me about?”

“Jesus Christ.” Wooje doesn’t know what he was expecting. He takes a scalding sip of hot chocolate and remembers, “Shit, he told his waiter friend—Jeonghyun—about me too, I think.”

“He likes you,” Sanghyeok tells him. “Of course he talks about you.”

Wooje flinches. “…Yeah.”

“Wait,” Wangho says. He sets his coffee cup down so he can wave his hands in the air as he speaks—“Forgive me if I’m wrong, but I thought you  guys were rekindling whatever? That’s what it seemed, anyway.”

“I….” Wooje changes his mind about answering, and takes a sip of his hot chocolate so he can avoid the question. Sanghyeok laughs at him.

Wangho shrugs. Doesn’t push the topic. “Okay,” he says, sweet as ever—especially when Sanghyeok is around. It’s probably a subconscious act.

Suhwan enters the kitchen, beelining straight for the fridge. “Oh,” he says. “You’re still here. Stop flirting, Wangho. He’s dating someone.”

Wangho drops his head straight on the table so fast that Wooje startles. Words come out somewhere from the mess of hair, directed toward Suhwan. “Get the fuck out.”

Wooje spends the rest of the day at Sanghyeok’s. Sanghyeok makes an awful lot of mutters about Wangho during the ride back, and the fact that he doesn’t even like me, we’re friends, which Wooje all sort of agrees to half-heartedly. Denying it would just send the poor man into a spiral.

“Do you know how hard it is to function when two people you don’t like are in love with you!?” Sanghyeok demands, apparently foregoing his decision to be blind to it all. “Especially when those two people are your friends and you love them just not in the way they want you to and they’re trying really hard to be respectful of your current relationship so you can’t even be mad at them because they’re polite and nice and apologetic for even having feelings in the first place?”

“No,” Wooje says, because he doesn’t.

Sanghyeok lets out a strangled sort of groan. “I’m going to kill myself,” he says, hands gripping the steering wheel so tight that his knuckles turn white.

Wooje snorts, turning to stare out the window. The evergreens they pass are aromatic and lovely, an opposite of the stress the car’s interior is filled with. “Stop making suicide jokes, Sanghyeok. That’s not your thing.”

“Uh-huh.”

“What does Hyeokgyu think?”

Sanghyeok tsks, drawing out a hum as he thinks about it. “Um… I don’t think he knows about Seongwoong. I mean, no one told him, because we don’t… talk about Seongwoong’s feelings. It’s rude.

“Hyeokgyu probably suspects, though. Maybe. I think he knows about Wangho. He was around when we dated.” Sotto, he mumbles, “Hyeokgyu can’t really be mad about it because those two are so polite anyway.”

“Men?”

“Men,” Sanghyeok confirms. “I should’ve stayed a bachelor. Single dad.”

Wooje laughs, flipping which side his weight is resting on so he can stare at Sanghyeok. “You’re so dramatic.”

It’s a Monday, so Seongwoong isn’t at the house. He’s at work—Wooje tries not to linger on the fact that Hyunjoon must be at work too, and tries not to wonder if he’ll come home for dinner along with Seongwoong.

Sanghyeok puts himself at home, playing a Simon and Garfunkel album as he starts on some chores. He tells Wooje that he’s welcome to do whatever, even leave, but Wooje just stays and helps him fold laundry.

They don’t… talk about a lot. Not anything going on in their lives recently anyway: not the topic of Hyunjoon or the topic of Wooje’s turbulent life and emotional state. Because it’s turbulent , and Sanghyeok knows, especially after yesterday. No, they mainly just reminisce about older times, when they were younger and poorer and about the same emotionally, just upset and turbulent about different things.

It’s fun. Normal. They cycle through music—The Goo Goo Dolls, Blur, Radiohead. Sanghyeok tackles a whole list of chores, humming along as he sweeps and cleans. Eventually, he sits down to do some paperwork, so Wooje heads outside to Sanghyeok’s garden.

Wooje’s always liked gardening. While Seongwoong and Hyunjoon liked getting their hands dirty from working in the garage under the hoods of cars, he preferred getting his hands dirty from digging in dirt and pulling up weeds. Sure, Wooje liked working on cars just as much as everyone else in their little almost-family, but the garden held a special place in his heart. He didn’t get to have one in LA, minus a few houseplants and herbs growing in water-filled cups in the kitchen, and standing in one now just… makes that little pile of love explode.

He learned his love for gardening from Sanghyeok, who learned it from his grandma. By the time it was just the kids in the house, they already had a garden to launch off of: herbs and vegetables in abundance. It helped them when they needed food. Wooje works on it now, watering the plants and getting rid of weeds. Sanghyeok’s garden is a lot like himself—it’s practical. It’s full of practical plants: fruits, vegetables, and herbs. Succulents too, because he has a soft spot for them—but even those (namely aloe vera) have their uses. The only reason the garden has flowers and inedible plants of any kind is because of Seongwoong.

Seongwoong’s not really a gardener, but he has a taste for the softer things in life. Cooking. Cleaning. Flowers. Inedible plants. He’d put in marigolds and geraniums, and the only reason Sanghyeok put up with it was because of companion planting—to help the bugs go away. But Seongwoong did have flowers. He had roses, really, ones planted in the front yard and in the back. If Wooje recalls correctly, Sanghyeok’s grandma had put a couple in, way back when, even had a plan for a whole rose garden—but after she passed Sanghyeok held no interest in continuing it. Seongwoong was the opposite. Seongwoong grew roses of every color, lined around the old house on all sides.

Wooje pretends not to know why, but it’s because of Sanghyeok. Sanghyeok loves roses, mainly because his grandma loved roses, but he’d deemed them as vain and unnecessary. Seongwoong—well, he likes spoiling Sanghyeok. Always has. He forces him to have the things he enjoys, even when Sanghyeok flat-out refuses them.

Sanghyeok hasn’t, and never will, acknowledge the reason the roses are growing. But they’re there, and they won’t go away.

Wooje busies himself until evening, or six. There’s a slow ache in his leg from overworking it by the time Sanghyeok comes and gets him when Seongwoong comes home, but he doesn’t mind it. Hyunjoon doesn’t come home with Seongwoong, though, and Wooje doesn’t know if he’s disappointed or not. But Seongwoong makes dinner, and the three eat together, and Wooje asks if he can have two of the young potted rose plants Seongwoong’s growing, the ones ready to go in the ground. He takes them, and then Sanghyeok drops him off at home.

Wooje unloads the rose pots and puts them on his back porch, then texts Suhwan.

hey you said you’d take care of my garden, right?

yeah and hell spawn does too

Wooje stares at his phone screen in bafflement for a moment before responding. What

sorry i set my phone to autocorrect hell spawn’s name. A second later, MINSEOKS

oh ok. thanks.

Minseok happens to be out on his porch when Wooje gets back, so after he puts the roses aside he walks across the street to talk to him. The front door is half open, and a Queens of the Stone Age song is drifting out faintly. Minseok has a drink in one hand, and waves with the other as Wooje steps up the stairs.

“Hi,” Wooje says. He’s almost certain Minseok has been waiting for him.

“Hey.”

Wooje takes his place next to Minseok, staring out at the evening. “What are you doing out?”

Minseok shrugs, taking a sip from his glass. “Just enjoying the night. Did you have a good day?”

“Yeah. Leaving for your honeymoon tomorrow?”

“Day after. Will you be here when we get back?” 

Wooje hesitates, then shakes his head slowly. “Probably not.”

Minseok looks just the slightest bit disappointed, but he shakes it off with a shrug. “First summer after graduating, right? Whole lot of stuff to do. Find a job, internships….” He glances over at Wooje, curious. “What, um, is your plan, exactly?”

“I don’t…” Wooje starts, because he doesn’t have a plan. He’s never really had a plan: he just… went to college. Worked at the call center. Took internships, had interviews, and networked. And ever since leaving, the future has been unsure. LA was a big dream, and once he got there he just followed the script and forgot to think about what happened next. 

“Um, I think I want to work as a translator or a linguist, maybe. I don’t know yet. I just want to… speak. I’m focusing on phonetics and phonology. I could be a speech pathologist, but I don’t really want to work with people like that. Just by myself.”

“Do you know a lot of languages?” Minseok asks curiously.

“Three or four. Linguistics isn’t really about learning languages, but obviously it happens.” Wooje shifts, uncomfortable. “I have a job dealing with foreign-language customers at a call center, which is okay. Had a few internships—one dealing with linguistic engineering and another working with kids. It’s a big field, so I don’t… really know. Don’t know if I wanna go into applied or general linguistics, either.”

Minseok smiles a little, but it doesn’t reach his eyes for some reason. He seems tired, as he stares down at his glass of liquor and swirls it in his hand. “You do know I don’t understand what any of that means, right?”

Wooje laughs awkwardly. “Sorry. Point is, um, I don’t know. Something in linguistics but I don’t know pedantics. I probably should.”

“Nah,” Minseok dismisses, waving his glass in the air. “It’s okay that you haven’t figured it out even after four years in college and a degree, you know. How was that, by the way? Cool?”

Wooje wrings his hands together, thinking about it. “Yeah,” he decides, after a moment. “I liked college. UCLA is nice. My professors were nice, and the classes were interesting.”

Minseok’s voice is soft and he stares at Wooje with a tinge of sentimentality. “You actually did it, huh? Got out of the small hometown. Succeeded.”

He pauses for a moment. Wooje thinks he should say something now, but his throat is full of tears and he doesn’t know how to speak anymore. Minseok seems to catch it, so he just gives Wooje a soft, sad smile, and says, “You’ll figure it out,” then offers to walk him back home.

He does. It’s a short way across the street in silence, Wooje not thinking about much but Minseok seemingly lost in thought. He almost trips while climbing up the steps, and Wooje has to laugh and catch him.

“What?” he asks, giggling. “You’re so out of it.”

“I just miss you,” Minseok complains, dragging out his words. “You seem so far away sometimes. And I don’t wanna leave on my vacation and come back to you gone. Tomorrow’s gonna be our last day together.”

“I’ll be back, for visits. And I’ll text you,” Wooje reminds, opening the front door to reach in and turn the porch light on. It switches on, dim and flickering in the night.

“Can I visit you?”

“Sure,” Wooje says with a shrug. “Text me and we can plan stuff.”

Minseok hums, pleased. “When did you move out of the dorms?” he asks.

“Second year. Wanted something bigger. Without cockroaches.”

Minseok laughs, light and airy with a shaky quality to it. “Fair enough.”

Wooje smiles. “Goodnight, Minseok.”

He fully expects Minseok to say the same, and head back over to his house, but it’s not what he gets. Instead, a look of alarm and then discomfort passes over Minseok’s face in a flash.

“Um. One last thing,” he says hurriedly, stepping forward uncertainly. He fiddles with his fingers, twisting the rings decorating his left ring finger. He’s got three now—promise, engagement, wedding. He swallows, uncharacteristically nervous. “I just—want to let you know, before I leave on my honeymoon.” Minseok seems somber, all of a sudden. A tinge of seriousness and worry behind everything.

“Minseok?” Wooje asks, tilting his head. He frowns, concern filling his stomach. It’s not—in character for Minseok to act like this. Especially not after his wedding, especially since he’s supposed to go off on his honeymoon. Even though it’s not a huge change in demeanor—Wooje hears the words one last thing, I want to let you know, and he can’t help the feeling of anticipatory dread in his stomach.

He’s expecting something dreadful but nothing prepares him for what Minseok actually says.

“I know you dropped out of college,” Minseok blurts.

Wooje’s—

heart—

drops.

He stumbles back, legs suddenly unsteady. Reaches out to catch himself on the wood of the front doorway, but his grip just slips and his knees buckle and he ends up collapsed on his porch in a pathetic little pile of Wooje. He can’t breathe before he knows it, lungs not working and eyes working too well, because oh, there are tears falling. Panic fills his lungs instead of air, moving all the way up and closing his throat. Wooje can feel his body moving, his shoulders moving—up and down and up and down—but he can’t feel himself getting any oxygen.

He tries his hardest to hide. To curl in a little ball and try to breathe, as Minseok just keeps stumbling over words and talking, maybe even crying himself—Wooje can’t tell. It’s all inaudible to him now: underwater. Blanketed over a nest of greenery. Wooje’s lost his comprehension. Wooje’s lost his language.

He shuts his eyes to try and shut them out, but it doesn’t work. Nothing works. The porch light flickers unsteadily. The night sky taunts him. The stars sparkle, and they look so far from the stars that Hyunjoon kissed him under. The boards of his porch from his house he never loved splinter his hands and feet and heart, keeping a part of it with him at all times. He can never leave. He can never escape. He will never survive.

“Wooje. Wooje.”

Minseok’s voice, loud and panicked, snaps him out of it. Somewhat. Wooje looks up, still unable to breathe, panicked inhales and exhales working faster than his heart. He tries to open his mouth to speak an acknowledgement, but all that comes out is more quickened breaths, because if he speaks then he can’t breathe.

“Um,” Minseok stutters hastily, kneeling down on the wooden steps so he’s on Wooje’s level. He seems unstable himself, stumbling over words and trying not to panic at Wooje’s reaction. His eyes are glassy with tears, shining in all the wrong ways. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I— Wooje, look at me, okay? Look at me? Here.”

He reaches out his hands to take Wooje’s. Wooje would like to say that he meets him halfway, but in reality it’s more Minseok picking his hands up, since he’s too shaky to move.

“Breathe,” Minseok soothes, voice sweet and calming and it’s hard to believe that this same voice dropped that bomb from earlier. He starts to instruct, “Inhale—good, hold it: one, two, three—okay, exhale.”

Wooje follows his words shakily, trying to get a hold on himself. Trying to steady himself, trying to breathe. It works, marginally at first, taking some time—he doesn’t know how long they sit there, working through breathing exercises together. His head’s still swimming, his heart still beating erratically fast. But it seems to even out; getting less desperate. Less lethal.

When he semi-recovers, Minseok whispers, “I’m sorry. I didn’t—mean to scare you.” He lets go of one of Wooje’s hands so he can hastily drag the back of his hands across his eyes, wiping away tears that Wooje hadn’t seen. 

“Why are you apologizing?” Wooje cries, words pouring out of his mouth like weeds. He watches Minseok with a feeling of guilt beating with every pulse of his heart. He takes his hand again, when he reaches out. It’s vaguely wet and tear-stained, a detail that makes Wooje want to cry again.

“I don’t know. I—I’m sorry. I just felt like you should know. That I know.”

Wooje tries not to collapse again, a horrible feeling of dread and regret pooling in his stomach. He musters up the courage to ask the biggest question pounding in his head, his heart— “Are you mad?”

His voice comes out a tiny and pathetic whimper. He flinches before Minseok even answers, curling into a small ball and rocking back and forth unsteadily.

“No—what? Why would I be mad, Wooje?” Minseok asks in a desperate plea, eyebrows creasing. Wooje sobs at the sight.

“B—Because,” he blubbers incoherently, “I left, and I didn’t even—I couldn’t even leave properly . I—I left for no reason.”

“Wooje.” Minseok sighs, bringing their held hands up as if to prove a point. He stresses his words, “I’ve told you this. We all have. Nobody’s mad at you for leaving. Please don’t be mad at yourself.”

“But I am,” Wooje seethes, letting go and burying his head in his hands. It’s wet, tear-stained, messy. He’s an ugly, bawling, mess right now, but Minseok doesn’t seem to care. Even when Wooje’s shaking, screaming, voice wrecked and whiny. “I’m a terrible person, Minseok. I abandoned you all, and for what? For what? To go to college and end up dropping out because of guilt? I haven’t graduated: I’m not going to graduate. I’m never going to graduate. I wasted four years of my life because I left my family, and I’m going to live with the guilt and pain until I die and I deserve that, because I’m a horrible person who tried to leave and to never look back but I can’t stop looking back. I’ll never stop looking back. I abandoned everything, and I hate myself because of it.”

“Oh, Wooje,” Minseok whispers, and then Wooje breaks and cries into his chest until he’s run dry of absolutely everything. Minseok strokes his hair gently, rocking his body back and forth on the porch, whispering soft comforts to him. “You didn’t abandon anything.”

Wooje whimpers, staring up at the stars through blurry eyes and tear-streaked glasses. “Didn’t I?”

Minseok’s hands move to hold his. “Wooje, I encouraged you to go to college out of state because I love you. Because I want you to be happy, and because I believe in you.” He laughs all of a sudden, eyes bright. “I just wished you kept in touch.”

Wooje’s cold. A chill from the night air runs through his skin and muscles so deep that he feels it in his bones. He says, “I didn’t keep in touch because I didn’t deserve to. Because every time I opened up your messages or hovered over the call button, I felt guilty for leaving.”

“Oh, Wooje,” Minseok repeats. It’s not pitying, but comforting. “You didn’t have to be guilty. You were just chasing what you wanted.”

Wooje’s body shakes. “I don’t know what I want anymore.”

“That’s okay, Wooje. You don’t need to.”

“I want to—” Wooje’s racked with sobs again, burying his head in the soft cotton of Minseok’s tee. “I want to be okay again.”

“You will be,” Minseok tells him. He smiles, soft and completely Minseok, and for the first time in years, Wooje actually believes the words he hears. “You will be.”

Minhyung finds them out on the porch an hour or so later. Minseok’s sitting on it normally, Wooje’s head is in his lap. The rest of Wooje’s body is sprawled on the porch stairs: Minhyung has to step over his legs when he walks up.

 He comes out of his and Minseok’s house probably checking to see why Minseok hasn’t gotten back yet—though, he’s given them a lot of time since it’s been over an hour from when they initially left. With just one glance, Wooje can tell he knows. Of course he knows: Minhyung and Minseok don’t keep anything from each other. Minhyung was probably the one encouraging Minseok to talk to him before they left for their honeymoon.

He sits down next to them, without a word. He slings an arm around Minseok’s shoulders, and reaches a hand down for Wooje to hold. Wooje takes it silently, staring up at the stars. One of his hands in Minhyung’s, and the other in Minseok’s.

Wooje holds both their left hands up. Minhyung has one ring as opposed to Minseok’s three. Wooje runs his fingers over them. One. Gold band. One, two, three. Ruby, sapphire, silver band.

“Hey baby,” Minhyung murmurs, voice soft. “We okay?”

“We will be,” Minseok tells him. Wooje just sets their hands down and stares up at Minhyung, framed by the stars. He takes a deep breath, and then says the words he’s never said to anyone, even though Minhyung already knows.

“I dropped out of college. I never graduated. I failed my finals. I cut off contact because I couldn’t live with the guilt. I don’t know how to speak anymore. I don’t know other languages because I don’t even know English. I don’t know any people because I don’t even know myself. I’ve changed for the worse. My roommate is a shut-in with an obsession with mayonnaise, and now I eat mayonnaise on everything.”

“Oh,” Minhyung says, dumbfounded. He takes this in for a moment, thumb rubbing circles in the back of Wooje’s hand. Then he simply shrugs, staring straight at Wooje. “Thank you for telling me.”

Wooje cries again, almost choking thanks to his back-down position—he has to sit up. Over his ugly sobs he can hear Minseok chastising Minhyung for it all. “Wait, don’t fight,” Wooje blubbers, lips downturning, and Minseok laughs.

“We’re not fighting, silly,” Minhyung tells him. “We never fight.”

“Don’t be mad at him for making me cry, Minseokie, you made me cry too,” Wooje begs. “And gave me a panic attack.”

Minseok lets out a yelp in offense. “Hey!” he exclaims, jerking up. He’s silent for a moment after, biting his lip and twisting his rings, before asking hesitantly: “Have you gotten panic attacks before?”

Wooje stares in his lap and picks at his fingernails. “They started in college,” he finally admits, even when every fiber of his body is yelling at him to keep it secret, keep it unknown . “But I had Jojo to help me through them. Every single one. Even if he wasn’t by—I’d call and he’d leave whatever class to sprint home or to whatever janitor’s closet or bathroom I was hiding in at the moment.”

“I’m glad you had someone to take care of you,” Minseok says sincerely.

Wooje blows out air in an exasperated puff, trying to add some humor in the somber conversation. “Yeah, well, besides that, Jojo’s kind of useless. He takes care of me but only in that regard. He can’t even take care of himself.”

“I…” Minhyung starts, then stops. “I don’t know what to say to that.”

“Just because—I know, and you know I know… that won’t change your promises, right?” Minseok asks hastily, looking over at Wooje with a sort of desperation. “Like, I don’t care what you do—just work, or go back to school, just—visit. And stay in touch.”

“Okay,” Wooje whispers. He lays down again, back against the wooden planks of his home porch. He takes a deep breath, the scent of trees and the flavor of the night filling his senses. He splays a palm out, stretching his arm upright and staring at it framed by the night sky. “I will. Nothing changed.”

“I was really—happy, I guess. When you came. Because I wanted closure for why you disappeared,” Minseok says. He shuffles, pulling his knees to his chest and wrapping his arms around them. “But then I… forgot to care about getting it once you were here. Just, you were here, so I forgot that you were gone in the first place. I forgot that I wanted to know why you left. I know now, but….” His voice trails off, and he glances over at Minhyung—for support, seemingly—before looking back down at Wooje. “We’re not the ones that really needed closure, Wooje. I mean, I would’ve been fine without. The person that mainly needed closure was you. With yourself. And I hope you got that.” Minseok rocks back and forth, staring down at his knees. “I really hope you did.”

“I think I’m… getting somewhere,” Wooje admits quietly. He sits up again with a sigh, mind running through his never-ending to-do list. “I still—need to talk to Sanghyeok and Seongwoong, and….” Wooje shakes his head before he says Hyunjoon. “They don’t know I dropped out, right?”

“They don’t,” Minhyung reassures. “We didn’t tell them.”

“Thanks. How’d you even know?”

Minseok shrugs. “After your grandpa died. I was cleaning up stuff around your house and found a letter you sent him… like, a year before. When you first dropped out. That’s where I got your address, too.”

Wooje winces. He vaguely remembers the letter—the only correspondence he had with Washington in all his four years. After he dropped out, he was bitter. Angry. Told his grandfather so, misdirecting his anger— look, I failed. Just like you and grandma always said I would. Are you happy now?

“...I should tell everyone else,” Wooje says slowly. “And… figure stuff out with Hyunjoon.” Wooje can feel tears prick at his eyes, and then the cold of the night air sting his skin. It almost hurts. Tender, like a bruise. “I kinda left him hanging.”

Minhyung pats his head comfortingly. “That’s okay. You’re figuring it out.”

Minseok’s lips tug downward, hands reaching out to hold Wooje’s again. “Are you gonna be okay?” he asks, a gentle worry. “Do you need us to stay?”

“Oh my God, no,” Wooje practically shrieks. He sits up in a jolt, shaking both men off of him. “Go on your honeymoon! I’ll be fine. Minhyung, don’t let him stay.”

“I don’t know,” Minhyung says with a skeptical look. Wooje groans. “Maybe we should.”

“I’ll be fine.”

Minhyung laughs, and the sound just makes Wooje smile. “I’ll be okay,” Wooje continues to promise. He sticks his pinky out as insurance. “Okay?”

Both Minhyung and Minseok hook it. It’s clunky and awkward, a three-person pinky promise. Minhyung and Minseok chorus their words. “Okay.”

The couple walk back to their own house. Wooje curls up in his childhood bed and has a faint—well, not quite a smile on his face, more a slight curling of the edge of his lips. He thinks of almost-families, and wedding rings, and best friends until he falls asleep.

The next day he sits up in bed and grabs his phone to text Jojo. lol they found out i dropped out

It’s not even 9 AM yet, a sure sign Jojo isn’t up, but he replies instantly anyway. Uhhh is that a good thing or a bad thing

idk yet havent decided, Wooje responds, glancing around his room quickly before sensing his next message. also why are you up

im still in bed i just grabbed my phone when it buzzed

ok ttyl

Jojo just sends him a picture of his spider plant in response. Thankfully, it does not look abused. Wooje says so, sending him a wtf you remembered to water it! in congratulations. 

Jojo doesn’t seem impressed, considering he sends a big FUCK YOU back .

After getting ready, Wooje goes to his backyard. On his back porch are the rose plants from Seongwoong, still sitting in their pots. So he gets to work.

His backyard garden is, surprisingly, somewhat well-kempt. Grass trimmed down, no weeds or overgrowth, the same perennial flowers just growing on their own. He thinks, if what Suhwan told him was correct, Minseok’s been taking care of it. Hopefully he still will, and so will Suhwan.

The first thing he does is dig, before he can dwell on what he’s doing—before he can cry. He finds two patches near the edge of the garden, right by the chain-link fence, and digs two holes: one for each plant. It takes him about half an hour to do that, and then he goes inside to get his grandparents’ urns from inside.

Wooje places one in each hole. He stares at them. His grandmothers’ ashes are in a stupidly ornate urn. Engraved and everything. His grandfather has the bare minimum—an unmarked white container.

He can’t bear to look at them anymore. He’s choking up—maybe the dirt flecks in the air, maybe the pollen, maybe something else. He covers the urns with a thin layer of dirt from the pile beside the holes. Then he depots the young rose plants and moves them in the ground. Completely covers them up.

He stares at the pretty rose plants. “You don’t deserve this,” he tells his dead family, before he can even think about stopping the words. They pour out of his mouth, growing with the garden and with the resentment in his heart. “But I’m doing it anyway because—because I—”

Wooje sinks to his knees, landing on the soft dirt with a faint thud. He tries to ignore the tears pricking his eyes, the ones coming now that he isn’t putting his body through the motions to stall them. “Why?” he screams to the empty garden. “I was all you had left, and you treated me like shit my entire life .

“I was your grandson. Your only grandson. I never did anything to you! I only loved you, and you—you give me fucking burn scars and a fear of the dark! Why? Why!?”

The wind blows. The dirt scatters. Wooje sobs.

Out of nowhere, a hand touches his shoulder. “Go inside,” Minseok says, when Wooje looks up to meet his eyes through tear-streaked glasses. “Take a shower and change.”

Wooje looks down at his wet palms. “They never loved me, did they?”

“I don’t think we’ll ever know,” Minseok whispers.

They stay there for a while. Wooje kneeling, Minseok standing. Eventually, Wooje gets up and goes inside.

He takes a long shower and changes into clean clothes. When he goes back downstairs, Minseok is still there with something for him to eat. They sit on the sofa after putting a Pink Floyd CD in the player.

There’s not a lot of talking. Eventually, Wooje moves to scroll on his phone. Eventually, Minseok leaves to pack for his honeymoon because he hasn’t yet.

It’s sometime around eleven when Wooje hears the honking of a car horn. He slowly gets up from his seat, and opens the door to his house to peer out.

Sitting in the driveway behind is a shark-nosed BMW. Sanghyeok’s shark-nosed BMW. Still running, windows down, with Sanghyeok sticking his head out of the window.

“Hey, Wooje.” He motions to the passenger seat with his head. “Get in.” If he notices Wooje’s puffy eyes, he doesn’t mention it.

Wooje grabs his phone, puts his shoes on, and gets in without a word.

He slams the door of the BMW behind him after he enters. “Evie,” he breathes. Sanghyeok smirks.

“Knew you missed her.”

“Yeah,” Wooje says, running a hand along the car door. Black leather. The whole interior is done in black leather. “I did.”

Oh, Evie. Sanghyeok’s late-80s (Wooje could never remember which year, exactly) BMW E30 M3 in all her glory, with shiny black paint and—shiny everything, really. Probably one of the more expensive things that Sanghyeok’s grandma left him, and also one of the only things he’d refused to sell. The Lees don’t sell cars like this, and neither does the almost-family.

“You can drive, in a bit,” Sanghyeok says. “But let me drive you around first. Makes me feel young again.” He sighs fondly, staring out the windshield at Wooje’s sad-looking house. “Like I was picking and dropping you kids off at school.”

Wooje just laughs at him. The garden and the dirt is suddenly just a faint memory in his mind. “You’re not an old man. Stop acting like it.”

“I’m thirty. ”

“You’re being dramatic.” Wooje pulls his seatbelt on, letting the latch click. He turns to stare at Sanghyeok. “Where are we going?”

“Where do you want to go?” Sanghyeok asks simply.

Wooje takes a deep breath. “Home.”

Sanghyeok drives him to his house. They set up shop in the kitchen, making tea and sitting down to chat. Seongwoong isn’t home again—work. Wooje’s not entirely sure what made Sanghyeok come and pick him up—well, he thinks Minseok might’ve texted him—but either way, he isn’t complaining. He’s enjoying the time he has left here, before he goes back to LA.

When they’re settled, Wooje swallows down his hesitancy. He takes comfort and finds strength in his house, in this kitchen, in his almost-but-not-quite-brother sitting before him. He admits, staring down at the old wooden table, “I dropped out of school.”

Sanghyeok studies him for a moment. Finally, he says, while straightening, “Well. I knew something was up.” He takes a sip of his tea, staring off to the side as he pauses. “Didn’t really expect this, though.”

“Sorry,” Wooje says automatically. Sanghyeok snorts in amusement, turning back to stare at him.

“Hey, don’t apologize,” he says, a faint smile on his face. It’s said weirdly, like a joke but still with a certain sincerity in his words. “It’s not like I paid for your tuition. What are you sorry for?”

Wooje shrugs, fiddling with his fingers underneath the table. He’s squirming, and he doesn’t know why. “I don’t know. Not telling you before.”

“I mean.” Sanghyeok laughs again, scratching at his forehead through his bangs. He smiles again, kind. “I wish you told me when it first happened, and I wish you’d stayed in touch, but I’m not angry about it. I just wanted those things because I care about you. At the end of the day, you don’t owe me anything. You live for yourself, or you should, because that’s okay.”

“I don’t…” Wooje starts, then pauses. The kitchen is drafty yet cramped, the stove just a few feet away cluttered with pots and pans. Wooje stares at them until he remembers what he’s trying to say. “I don’t know. I don’t… think I do the things I want to? I’m too much of a coward.”

Sanghyeok only smiles. “You came back here, Didn’t you?”

The words make the realization hit Wooje, really hit him. They take root in his chest, curling and sinking in, because it’s right. It’s true. It really is. A smile ghosts across Wooje’s lips, before he can even stop it. He tries to hide it behind his mug, but it doesn’t quite work.

“...Yeah. I guess I did.”

If Wooje looked comfort up in the dictionary, he thinks he would find Sanghyeok. Because that’s what he is, to Wooje. What he always has been. He smiles, and asks, “Are you going to go back to school?”

“I….” Wooje hesitates, but he doesn’t have to for long. He’s known. He’s always known. It’s another root in him, another perennial plant he can’t get rid of, for it’ll keep on sowing and growing year after year. It’s the reason he left, the reason he was guilty—because he wants this. He really does. 

“I want to, I think. But it’ll be hard, and….”

“You want to,” Sanghyeok says firmly. No arguments. “Then that’s that. Do it for you again. You’ll get through it. Don’t get caught up. Call me.”

It sounds nice to Wooje, for the first time in a while. Going back to college. Taking classes, studying, and not panicking and failing his coursework. He used to dread the idea, used to have guilt eating him straight from the inside out. He hasn’t done it in so long, the mere thought of going to class almost inducing an anxiety attack . So while Jojo graduated, Wooje just watched him. That picture in his Favorites album has Jojo in a cap and gown, and Wooje in a hoodie and jeans.

“Okay,” he whispers. He runs his fingernails across the wood of the table. The sounds that emit are soothing and feel like home.

“Well,” Sanghyeok says, scooting his chair back a little. He takes a sip of his tea, holding it with both hands and propping his elbows up carefully. “If we’re, um, talking about confessions—I have something to tell you, too.” He looks apologetic about it, all of a sudden. “I wasn’t planning to for a while, but I think I might as well now.”

Wooje bites his tongue in anticipation. “Okay.”

“I’m going to college,” Sanghyeok blurts, all in a rush. His hands are shaking, still holding his teacup. “Uni—University of Washington. I, um, applied last year, while Sungwon was applying, because Seongwoong got the idea in my head—and then I… got in. And I have—enough saved up, and Seongwoong and the business are helping, and I applied for financial aid, and—um, anyway.” He drops his teacup on the table. The words he finishes up with are lackluster, but full of everything. “I’m… going.”

Wooje’s eyes have already welled up with tears. “Sanghyeok,” he says, voice low.

“I’m going to college,” Sanghyeok whispers. He stares at his palms. Wooje reaches for his hands and gives him one, comforting squeeze.

“Who else knows?”

“Seongwoong. Hyeokgyu. And—Sungwon.” Sanghyeok gives a shaky laugh at that, glassy eyes crinkling up at the edges. “We’re both going to Washington: going to commute together. It’s gonna be his first year in the fall, too. Funny, right?”

“Sanghyeok,” Wooje stresses. “You’re going to college.”

Sanghyeok laughs again. “I am.”

“W—What are you going to study?”

Sanghyeok takes a deep breath, letting go of Wooje’s hands and sitting back. He seems to try and get a hold of himself—shaking his hands out, taking a sip of tea, closing his eyes for just a moment to clear his mind. When he opens them, he talks.

“Mathematics, I think. I was insistent on just furthering my business education, but Seongwoong was more insistent. He told me to think about myself and not running the auto shop for once. So….” Sanghyeok spreads his hands. “I want to go into math. Stats, maybe. Something logical. I’m afraid I might be too old to start—I’m already thirty, and I only have a high school diploma, after all, but I don’t know. We’ll see, I guess. I just… I like learning.”

“Yeah,” Wooje whispers. He smiles, staring down at the vintage table. Old. Worn. Like this town, like this house, like the people in it. Worn, yet still loveable. Always loveable.

“Look at us. Two adults, going back to school. Going to college.” Sanghyeok scoffs, slumping a bit and waving a hand in the air. “Seongwoong and Hyunjoon would make fun of us. Who needs college, they would say.”

At the mention of Hyunjoon, Wooje goes soft at the edges. He’s got a spot in his heart, roots and pollen and something more, reserved just for him. A patch in his garden, a twisting of his arteries. Hyunjoon’s a constant—always has been. Twelve-year-old Wooje was right, when he finally found love in him.

“Nah,” Wooje murmurs. “Those two are too soft-hearted. Bleed all over us. Even if they never went, they keep cheering us on.”

“They do, don’t they?” Sanghyeok asks with a hum. He smiles faintly again, fingertips drifting around the mouth of his cup. “They’re a little too destructive toward themselves. A little too uncaring about their own well-being.”

“I should talk to him,” Wooje says suddenly.

Sanghyeok only quirks his lips, lifting his teacup to take a sip. Around the rim of it, he says, “You should.”

Wooje’s a coward, so he calls Hyunjoon instead of marching up to the shop to talk in person.

And he doesn’t even call Hyunjoon to tell him. He calls Hyunjoon to tell him that he has something to tell him.

Hyunjoon picks up on the first ring.

“Wooje?”

Wooje has to remember how to speak. He forgot a while ago, sometime during his second year of college. Well, he’d really been forgetting how to since he moved to LA and left a boyfriend with a bleeding heart and an almost-family behind, but he had lost all his words by his second year. He lost his voice.

“I have something to tell you,” Wooje finally says, holding his phone up to his ear, muscles too tight and too stiff. He feels like a board. Or a machine. Weirdly nervous, and definitely not relaxed. He’s at home now: he drove himself back in Evie, a rather enjoyable and long overdue drive. Sanghyeok came with him, so he could take his car back home.

Hyunjoon's carefree laugh crackles through the phone in amusement. “Okay,” he answers. “Yes?”

“In person,” Wooje clarifies. He looks down, and picks at his fingernails, then at the arm of the armchair he’s sitting on. It’s old—an ancient piece of furniture from his grandparent’s childhood—so there’s a small rip that’s formed from age and wear and tear. Wooje should sell it. Or throw it away, since it probably isn’t worth anything. He knows he won’t though, because he’s stupidly attached to this house and everything in it.

There’s a slow sound of an engine from Hyunjoon’s end, and then it stops, like he’s just pulled over on the side of the road. When he speaks, he sounds a little worried, and highway noises sound out faintly underneath everything. “...Should I be concerned?”

“No,” Wooje says honestly. “It’s not bad.” He fiddles with his chair arm again, picking at the rip that’s formed. Feels himself blushing, but musters up the courage to mumble, “I love you.”

Wooje’s a coward, so he immediately hangs up.

Hyunjoon calls him back.

Wooje picks up on the first ring.

“Hello?” Hyunjoon sounds slightly confused, as if he’s wondering whether or not Wooje meant to hang up.

“Hi,” Wooje squeaks. He can feel the red tinge on his cheeks, burning into his skin like a brand. Permanent, like the cigarette burn scars on his wrists and the ache in his right leg and the roots of home sown in his heart. He’ll never get rid of them. Of him. But maybe that’s not entirely a bad thing anymore. Maybe it never was.

“...Was that all?” Hyunjoon asks. Then there’s a muffled voice from beside him, and Wooje all of a sudden realizes that someone’s talking to him: that Hyunjoon isn’t alone right now. He can’t make it out, though, so he ultimately gives up on trying.

“Um, yes,” he answers, hopefully not sounding distracted. He feels off-kilter. Thrown. Awkward. “That was all.”

“Oh. Okay.” There’s another shifting sound, like Hyunjoon’s turned his head—turning to look at the person next to him, if he’s in a car. “You’re kind of giving me mixed signals, Wooje.”

“I know,” Wooje says automatically—apologetically. “I needed a bit to sort things out. But I got it now, I think.”

There’s a smile in Hyunjoon’s voice when he replies, and the softest edge to it. “Well, I’ll head over to your place now, since you wanna talk. Um….” He pauses, reconsidering. “It might take a while though: Seongwoong and I are in Vancouver right now.”

Wooje frowns, picking at the rip again. He pulls a little stuffing out, letting the white and cottony filling make a total mess. “What are you and Seongwoong doing near Portland?”

“Canada,” Hyunjoon clarifies. “Driving up the I-5.”

That really doesn’t help the confusion at all. “What are you doing in Canada?” Wooje asks. He tears the cotton stuff apart into little wisps with his free hand, watching as they fall to the ground.

“Learning to drive a stick again,” Hyunjoon says, and the happiness in his statement is so audible it stuns Wooje.

“What?”

“Driving a stick,” Hyunjoon repeats simply.

”You—”

“Listen, Wooje, I’ve got to get going if you want to see me by tonight. Talk to you soon?”

“Wait!”

“I love you too, by the way.”

And then Hyunjoon hangs up.

Wooje sits there staring at his phone for God knows how many hours.

It’s a knock on his door that finally jolts him out of it. When he looks up, the sky outside is darkening, and when he looks at the old grandfather clock across the room, it reads six thirty-five. He called Hyunjoon at two.

“Fuck,” he curses, scrambling up from his armchair. He takes one, two quick strides to the door, and wrenches it open.

Hyunjoon Moon is standing there, in all his glory. He’s framed by the afternoon sun, hands shoved into his jean pockets and his red-and-black flannel loose over his Blink-182 shirt. A lopsided grin decorates his face, teeth shiny and proud. Wooje’s heart has been working overdrive since he heard the knock on the door, and it certainly hasn’t stopped now.

“The door’s unlocked,” Wooje blurts.

Hyunjoon’s grin only widens, canines flashing like light. “I know.”

Wooje’s eyes drift to behind him. In the driveway, sitting pretty next to Wooje’s Crown Victoria, is Hyunjoon’s Mustang. Red and shiny and completely in place, only for the fact that it’s out of place. Because it shouldn’t be here. Because Hyunjoon doesn’t drive sticks. Hyunjoon doesn’t drive the Mustang.

“Did you drive that here?” Wooje asks, though the answer is obvious.

Hyunjoon looks like the sky splitting. Moon, his last name is, and it fits. Hyunjoon Moon is soft around the edges, with a cool-toned glow emanating from him. He’s not so obvious and attention-seeking like his brother, the sun in their dynamic duo—instead being the more gentle of the two. The more subdued of the two. Hyunjoon simply reflects light, and Wooje thinks he prefers the smooth subtlety he holds.

“Yeah,” Hyunjoon says softly, a tinge of pride in his tone. “I did.”

“By yourself?”

“Well.” Hyunjoon spreads his hands in humor. “You don’t see Seongwoong here, do you?”

Wooje swallows. He says, heart caught in his throat, “I have something to tell you.”

“So I’ve heard.”

He steps back, opening his door wider. It creaks on its hinges. “Come in?”

Hyunjoon lets a smile overtake his face again. “You don’t have to ask.”

They sit in the living room, both on the longer sofa. There’s an awkward three feet of space between them, but Wooje’s sure not going to close the gap. Hyunjoon’s patient, unaffected by the silence.

Not that there is any, really—Hyunjoon kept the conversation going as he entered the house and kicked off his shoes, looking around and making a note of how washed-out the place looks. “Like the sun’s bleaching it now, instead of heavy weather bringing it down.”

Hyunjoon’s unaffected by the silence as in he prevents it. He doesn’t let it exist.

“That doesn't make sense,” Wooje manages to say, curling his legs up on his end of the sofa. “It’s a house.” It sort of does, though. The windows are opened up and illuminating specks of dust in the air. It still smells like dirt, but nothing’s sagging anymore. It’s not sad.

Hyunjoon just eyes the side table. “You moved your Crosley.”

Wooje shrugs. “I did that a while ago.”

He notices the lack of urns on the mantle, too. “You moved your grandparents.”

Wooje snorts, if only because of how it sounds out of context. “They’re in the backyard,” he says a moment later, voice soft as he stares at his palms. “I couldn’t….”

Hyunjoon looks at him with understanding, not with pity. He looks like he wants to move closer. He changes the subject: a kind gesture. “What was it you wanted to talk about?”

Wooje swallows, pulling his chin up. He squeezes his hands together, wrapping them around his knees, trying not to choke. “I dropped out of college,” Wooje tells him, voice shaky but unwavering. “I never graduated.”

It takes a second for Hyunjoon to speak. “Oh,” he says, belated. He stops, sitting back, a contemplative look on his face as he registers the words. “Wait, what?”

“I—” Wooje tries his hardest not to choke up, and succeeds. With each person he tells it gets a little easier. “I didn’t—graduate.” He squirms, looking away in shame. “I lied.”

“Oh,” Hyunjoon replies. And then, “Okay.”

“Just… okay?” Wooje asks, a little bit desperate. “You’re not mad? You don’t want the reason?”

“I’m not mad.” Hyunjoon shrugs, but he isn't indifferent. His eyes are full of love, of concern, just like they always are. “Do you want to tell me the reason? I want you to tell me things because you want to, not because you think you owe it to me. You don’t owe me anything. Not your life, or your future. Those are for yourself.”

Wooje pauses, mouth slightly open. It’ll dry, like this, but he can’t be bothered to close it. Because this is something he’s heard before, and this is something he knows. From Sanghyeok, you live for yourself, and now, from Hyunjoon.

“I don’t want anything from you if it’s owed, Wooje,” Hyunjoon says softly. “I don’t want you to drop out of college for me or to kiss me because I’m still in love with you and you feel bad. I want it if you want to give it. Then and only then.”

“I want to tell you why,” Wooje says. He stares at his palms, and says, “I think you already know why, though. I was just… stuck. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t live for myself because the guilt hit me.”

“See, I don’t want that.” Hyunjoon’s voice is softer and painful when he speaks. When Wooje looks up, he’s got a hurt expression on his face, looking like he just wants to move over and touch Wooje but doesn’t know if he’s allowed to. “I don’t want that to keep happening.”

“It won’t,” Wooje says, before he can stop it from coming, because it’s true. It really is now, and it’s almost funny, how insistent and real it’s become. Because the self-resenting parts of him have sort of… disappeared, now. Maybe Minseok really was right when he said that Wooje was the one that needed closure. “I think I’m ready now.”

“Are you going to go back, then?”

“I….” Wooje thinks about it for a moment, but he doesn’t have to debate the question for long, or at all. When he thinks about it, it’s more of a longing. He thinks about the stupid, gorgeous campus, and the stupidly hot weather. He thinks about his professors being kind and understanding as they watched him sink deeper into himself. He thinks about his stupid job at the stupid call center, and he thinks about his internships and the offers in his inbox. He thinks about speaking languages, different tongues rolling off of his. And he thinks about his shitty little apartment, and his gremlin of a roommate, who still hasn’t stopped texting him and checking up on him—not even for a day.

“Yeah,” Wooje whispers, and the tears that form in his eyes are ridiculous, but unstoppable. “I want to try again. I’m going to do it this time.”

“Good.”

“And I—” Wooje’s breath catches in his mouth, stuck somewhere between his throat and his teeth, maybe blocked from his vulnerable heart still sitting up there. It doesn’t stay stuck for long: it goes back down his throat and his breath comes out in a rush, the words he’d forgotten how to say ages ago finally free-flowing just like how they used to.

“I want you,” Wooje says. “Same page. Everything. I want to do it properly, and I want to call you every day, and I want to visit on weekends when I can and I don’t want you because I feel like I owe it to you, but I want you because I want to: I want you. I always want you.”

Hyunjoon stares at him. And it’s weird, how much he hasn’t changed. How much he hasn’t grown from the kid he once was, next to all the parts that show that he clearly has . It’s weird how reminiscent it is of their first kiss, because Hyunjoon just stares at him—and then he’s moving all the way across the seat of the sofa so he can reach Wooje’s mouth.

It’s not a hurried, clumsy, mess this time, though. It’s simply—he scoots next to Wooje, finally, and then he props his left arm against the sofa back and his right hand on Wooje’s waist so he can lean over their legs and kiss him. It’s soft, and gentle, and then he retreats with a soft smile rivaling the beam of a thousand moons.

“I always want you,” he repeats, voice a little amazed, and that’s about where their romance restarts.

It’s later that night when Minseok bangs on their door. Wooje opens it, getting up from his place on the living room floor where he and Hyunjoon are talking about absolutely nothing yet everything at the same time. Billy Squier’s Emotions in Motion is playing, one of many CDs they’ve cycled through.

“What do you want? It’s like, eight,” Wooje says. Minseok ignores him.

“Come on,” he says, mainly to Hyunjoon. “Let’s go.”

A grin slips on Hyunjoon’s face like it’s always been there. He gets up, moving to turn the player off.

“Where are we going?” Wooje asks, head swiveling to look at both of them.

He doesn’t end up getting an answer. Instead, he gets pulled in the passenger seat of the Mustang as Minseok leaves with Minhyung in his pickup, headed off to somewhere Wooje does not know.

Before he starts the car, Hyunjoon looks over at Wooje with hesitancy.

“I trust you,” Wooje says. “Drive.”

Hyunjoon drives.

Hyunjoon drives just like he always does—carefully. He handles the Mustang like it’s a second skin, shifting like this and speeding up like that, though he keeps casting worried glances that Wooje has to wave away with reassurance. Because it’s fine: Hyunjoon’s a good driver. Wooje really isn’t scared at all.

Anyway, he can’t be bothered to worry about the possibility of a crash once he realizes where they’re going. Because he knows exactly what they’re doing the moment they start driving the backroads, and excitement and nostalgia builds up in him before he can even stop it. The moment they head to a dead-end road, the same one he and Hyunjoon had stopped by in the middle of the forest the first day he saw him, he’s completely clear on what’s happening. 

“Oh my God,” Wooje says, when they pull up to the end of the road. Two other cars are already there—Minhyung’s truck, carrying him and Minseok. And Evie, which Sanghyeok and Seongwoong must have come in. Wooje gets up, gets out of the car once Hyunjoon parks, and runs toward where the four other men are mingling about. Hyunjoon trails after him with a laugh.

“I’m not fucking racing, just so you know,” Sanghyeok warns. He’s standing with his arms folded, a denim jacket warming up his arms. “I’m just going to watch.”

Seongwoong rolls his eyes—actually, pretty much everybody does. “Sure you are,” he says fondly. There’s two six-packs next to him, only one bottle is gone from one of them and found in Minhyung’s hand. To the newcomers Wooje and Hyunjoon, Seongwoong clarifies, “Oh, and I brought beer but that’s not to drink in excess.”

“You aren’t fun,” Minseok says, but it’s got no bite to it. He turns to Wooje with a bright grin, flashing in the moonlight. “Enough talking. Wanna race, Wooje?”

“Oh, get in the car with me,” Wooje says, casting a gaze toward Evie framed against the rest of the woods. Sanghyeok groans softly, but there’s absolutely no way he can stop it, considering he knows why he’s here. He brought Evie here. “I need to beat Hyunjoon’s ass.”

Hyunjoon raises his arms in defense. “Just so you know, I only started driving a stick a day ago—”

“Uh-huh. You don’t get to claim you let me win this time.” Wooje smirks, and feels glee build up in his body. “Sanghyeok, keys.”

Sanghyeok tosses them to him, and Wooje lets out a little whoop, spinning on his heels and running toward the car. Minseok follows him, circling around to sit in the passenger seat and closing the door with a click.

As Wooje puts his seatbelt on, he watches Hyunjoon through the windshield—throw his hands up in defeat and turn back to the Mustang. It’s not serious, though, because he’s got a goofy grin on his face.

“Figured it out?” Minseok asks from next to him.

“Yeah,” Wooje says, turning the key and the headlights on. “I did.”

Minseok smiles. “Good. Now beat his ass.”

It’s too late at night when they’re done. Wooje wins against Hyunjoon all the times he races him—three out of three—because, predictably, he fucks up the shift to third two times out of the three. Not on purpose, not just so Wooje can win, because he does the same racing against the others.

Wooje wins against Minhyung both times too. He goes even against Minseok, two losses to one win against Seongwoong, and loses all of his races against Sanghyeok. Because, yeah, Sanghyeok ends up driving. He’s the winner for the night—not dropping a single game to anyone.

Wooje curls up against Hyunjoon, sitting on the hood of the Mustang and nursing a beer, because apparently he’s not sober anymore. Hyunjoon still is—he opts for a root beer. Because Seongwoong brought some along for him.

“You might've been onto something, with Romeo and Juliet,” Hyunjoon murmurs. It takes Wooje far too long to realize he’s referencing the Dire Straits song.

“You remember that?” he asks, surprised. And then he thinks about Bullet With Butterfly Wings and the reason he became sober, and says, “The Smashing Pumpkins reminds me too much of you.”

“The Red Hot Chili Peppers remind me too much of you,” Hyunjoon counters, and Wooje sort of realizes that maybe he isn’t the only one tying music to people. “And of course I did. I love you.”

Wooje tries to hide his smile. “Uh-huh.”

Hyunjoon places a kiss on his temple. “Just so you know,” he mumbles.

Wooje laughs. “I’m not going easy on you next race, just ‘cause you said that. Don’t try to sweet-talk me.”

“Sure,” Hyunjoon says, stretching back to stare at the stars. Wooje looks back up at them too, admiring the gleaming little lights twinkling in the sky. He feels comfortable here. Content again. “‘Cause that’s why I said it.”

“You and your ulterior motives.” Wooje shakes his head, a small smile playing on his lips in amusement. He can’t really make it go away. Can’t make a lot of things go away, but it’s not all bad.

“Honestly, would it be bad to say my ulterior motives are to get you to like me?”

Wooje laughs out loud at that, flint striking up a little spark in his heart. “No,” he says. He buries a little closer in Hyunjoon’s chest, pulling his legs up so Hyunjoon can wrap both his arms around him in a hold. When he closes his eyes, he finishes, “But you don’t have to try: I already do.”

Wooje rides home with Minhyung and Minseok, and Hyunjoon goes back to his place with the Mustang. In the morning, Hyunjoon drives back over to their street in his Civic, and Wooje helps pack the married couples’ luggage in the car. He says his goodbyes to Minhyung and Minseok, trying not to cry because he knows it’ll be an indefinite amount of time until he sees them next, and then Hyunjoon leaves to drop them off at the airport.

Wooje stays at home for that period of time. He calls Jojo, letting the phone ring on speakerphone as he heads to his backyard to work on his garden a bit, since he doesn’t have anything else to do.

Jojo picks up on the fourth ring. “What’s up?” he asks.

Wooje puts his phone in my pocket as he sets up the garden hose so he can water his plants. “I’m re-enrolling in the fall. Also I think I have a boyfriend?”

Jojo’s instant with the response, sounding slightly surprised. “What? Are you being for real?”

“Yes.”

Jojo’s silent for a long, long time. So long that Wooje almost thinks that he’s lost him. But then he finally says, “Huh. Cool.”

Wooje’s spilling water on his boots. He jerks the hose away, moving to water his roses. “Yeah.”

“...You know you’re going to have to fill me in on everything when you get back here, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, good. When are you coming?”

Wooje shrugs, even if Jojo can’t see it. He watches the water pour from the hose. “Maybe sometime next week. Haven’t decided yet. Depends on when my manager calls me back asking where the fuck I am.”

Jojo laughs. “Sounds like a plan. Let me know.”

Wooje hangs up. Then he pulls on some gardening gloves found in the metal cabinet on the back porch, and weeds his garden. It smells like dirt and moss, and matches the garden in Wooje’s body. The blue sky above is gray-toned but bright, and the evergreens circling the property are aromatic and lush. Wooje wouldn’t change a thing about it.

Hyunjoon finds him staring at his grandparents’ roses when he gets back. “Hey,” he says, wrapping his arms around Wooje’s waist and dragging him in. Wooje jerks his head in surprise, but settles once he realizes who it is.

“I buried them here,” he tells Hyunjoon. The wind is slight today, ruffling his hair and light on his skin. It’s cool. Hyunjoon hums.

“That’s nice of you.”

Wooje nods slowly, mind wandering. He turns his head to the side to stare over at the back porch, and faintly remembers a time where he cried so hard he couldn’t breathe, so he just borrowed the air from Hyunjoon’s lungs instead. “Do you remember when we were on this porch? After she died?”

“What, smoking and kissing?” Hyunjoon lets out a laugh, deep and unserious, but his tone sobers up a moment later. A hand moves to take Wooje’s, thumb tracing a line over the line of faded cigarette burns on the inside of his wrist. “Yeah. I do.”

“She would hate this garden. The roses. Where she’s buried. Her urn, too.”

“She fucking hated everything.”

“Yeah.”

Hyunjoon uses his grip on Wooje’s waist to tug him away. “Do you want to go on a drive?” he asks.

Wooje blinks. “Where?”

“Wherever you want.” Hyunjoon shrugs noncommittally, leading him inside. Wooje pauses, but follows him back through the house and out the front. In the driveway, Hyunjoon’s Civic is gone—instead replaced with the Mustang GT. Wooje stares at it, the sun reflecting off its shiny red paint. The sky is light. The breeze is soft.

“Okay,” Wooje says.

That’s what they do. It’s mid-morning, and an empty state, and Hyunjoon drives them toward the woody backroads, open and full of nature. Wooje curls up in the passenger seat with a soft smile, leaning against his taut seatbelt as he watches.

There’s some talking, but mostly music. Silence, but it’s not awkward. It’s natural. It’s peaceful. At some point in time, Wooje knocks out to the tune of Stevie Nicks.

He wakes up to the feeling of someone shaking him gently.

“Wooje,” Hyunjoon says, hand on his shoulder. His voice sounds urgent through the haze of sleep Wooje’s stuck in, almost desperate in the fog. “Wake up.”

The car is stopped. There’s no music playing. Wooje blinks, bleary, trying to get a hang on his senses. He stifles a yawn, kicking the blanket over him down, so it’s straight. “Oh,” he says, looking up at Hyunjoon, who’s leaning against the frame of the car and the open door, peering down at him. Hyunjoon looks away. He’s framed by the blue sky and by evergreens all around them.

“Wooje,” Hyunjoon murmurs suddenly. Wooje’s staring at his jawline, since his head is still turned away and staring off into the distance. “I love you.”

“Huh?” Wooje blinks again, rubbing his eyes. They’ve pulled over by the side of the road, he realizes, and he doesn’t know how long he’s been passed out. His answer to Hyunjoon is automatic: “I love you too. All of a sudden?”

“You fell asleep,” Hyunjoon mumbles, glancing back to risk eye contact. His eyes are too open, too vulnerable. Too touched.

Wooje unbuckles his seatbelt. “Well, yeah,” he says nonchalantly, trying not to make a big deal out of it as he steps out and stretches his legs. It isn’t a big deal, he tries to convince himself. “I trust you.”

“Thank you,” Hyunjoon whispers, and okay, maybe it is a big deal to Hyunjoon. Wooje… isn’t going to take that from him.

They’ve stopped at a scenic point, on the peak on top of a mountain. Out ahead is nothing but rolling hills, blue water, and the scent of nature. Hyunjoon wraps his arms around Wooje’s body and they watch the sky together, saying nothing but holding each other in peace. It’s tranquil, for once. It’s breathtaking. Wooje thinks this might be all he needs.

They get back on the road after a while, Wooje fully awake now. No one else is around: it’s a peaceful backroad, empty and scenic. Tall trees stretch ahead on either side of the road, evergreens aromatic and beautiful. Wildlife scatter about—squirrels running up trunks and birds flying overhead. It seems so far from their hometown, but Wooje thinks they’re only a couple hours out.

He turns to Hyunjoon, and takes his hand since he doesn’t need to change gears anymore—they’re at a stable speed. Wooje stares out of the windshield.

Wooje can breathe again.

It’s cold, in the car, or maybe it’s just what Wooje feels. The blood rushes through his veins like the air does through his lungs. He feels light—his skin does—weightless and cool and unafraid of everything again.

Hyunjoon’s splitting the road down the middle, unconcerned about oncoming traffic. He drives carefully, but not necessarily slowly—he hums along with Mary Jane’s Last Dance and stays in fourth gear at an even speed. It was always Wooje’s favorite Tom Petty song, one that always filled him with certain anamnesis and with nostalgia. All light blue skies and cold temperatures, October birds singing their melancholic songs. It’s June, but this song sets a mood that no other can.

The further they move along together, the more of what Wooje’s been carrying with him for four years washes away. The road stretches out in front of them. Endless possibilities, a route they can travel together. A future. Wooje leaves the ghosts of his grandparents behind, and all the things he’s lost. He leaves his inability to speak, his fear of the dark. He leaves his guilt and all his anger, and he reclaims his dreams.

It’s still. The wind blows. The song plays.

Wooje is content.