Sehun entered the room, seeing his fiance’s face in a cascade. Looking at Kyungsoo’s photo, Sehun wanted to cry as well for losing a good classmate. Yet, Sehun cried because Kai was crying too hard for Kyungsoo, and the way Kai mourned that hard after knowing the fact months ago, it only meant that Kai still had Kyungsoo in his heart…until now.

Sehun left Kai inside, and he thought he couldn’t do anything if Kai still loved Kyungsoo.

It was their first time going back to Korea after they left. Kai and Sehun would finish their last semester for their undergraduate degree. They would go back to America after—Kai would go to medical school while Sehun would go back to his job as a clerk, and maybe try to get himself promoted at the company.

Kai’s mother didn’t make it despite they had been so devoted with the treatment; and again, Sehun’s shoulders were the ones Kai leaned on.

A week after the death of Kai’s mother, a friend of theirs called overseas, sharing the news of Kyungsoo’s death. At that time, Kyungsoo was dead for more than a month.

Kai didn’t really know what to feel when he heard it. All he knew was he dropped tears, and they were so uncontrollable that he couldn’t sleep for nights. It had been a month before he knew about Kyungsoo’s death. It had been many couple of days when he could have cared, when he could have done his best to reach Kyungsoo, when he could have loved him still. Kai was just hit too hard with the fact that he didn’t care, and with what he heard that everything that came from Kyungsoo’s mouth were all about him, and they.

Sehun observed how Kai behaved so differently when he heard the news. There came less smiles and laughs whenever they went out for a date. Kai gave fewer roses, and even though he offered one to Sehun, Sehun could how feel how hesitant Kai was. Sehun thought that Kai badly wanted to give the flowers to Kyungsoo.

Every night, Kai had a nightmare. He had always jerked from sleep shouting Kyungsoo’s name, panting and sweating and shaking, and Sehun would wake up trying to calm him down, yet Kai would always rise up from the bed and walk out of the room. Sehun simply went back to bed, dropping tears because Kai didn’t even want to lean on him.

Sehun even went crazy knowing Kai’s whereabouts, only for him to discover that Kai was asking almost every recycling plant in America trying to find the photo album he threw.

“This is all your fault! If you just stopped me from throwing it, this won’t happen!” Kai yelled at Sehun, and he even pushed him to the floor.

Sehun whined at the pain and he struggled to stand. “What the is wrong with you?” he shouted back at his fiancé, “It was your choice! It was your choice to forget Kyungsoo!”

Kai slapped him so hard hearing those words, and it was not just once. He hit Sehun twice, thrice, four, five times until Sehun’s cheeks bled because Kai had his silver ring in his finger.

The next day, Kai begged for Sehun’s forgiveness. Sehun relented quickly, and he understood the pain Kai was dealing with. Yet something was really wrong. Why did Kai hurt him that way just because of Kyungsoo? Who was Kyungsoo for Kai?

Sehun thought Kai had already forgotten Kyungsoo. Sehun thought he was the only one Kai would love. Sehun heard each and every word when Kai told him he loved him so much. Kai was even the one who asked for marriage.

Sehun guessed Kai was simply lying at that time.

Whenever Sehun would try to hug Kai, Kai wouldn’t hug back, or if he did, it wouldn’t last for seconds, and it wouldn’t be as tight as he did before. Sehun could see the love behind Kai’s eyes before, yet now, everything turned into ashes. It was as if the Kai he knew was gone. It was as if Sehun suddenly became nothing to him.

Kai’s heart belonged to someone else. Sehun pondered if he would marry a man who didn’t really love him.

And so, Sehun made up his mind-- that he would just wait for Kai to take the ring off him. He would just wait…just like how he waited for Kai to ask for marriage. Sehun couldn’t be with a man who had someone in his heart. Sehun couldn’t handle the pain of understanding everything forever. Sehun was not just a repair shop for Kai’s broken heart. And Sehun would let Kai go, because after all, he still loved Kai so much.

--

The time Sehun waited for finally came. Just days after their semester started, Sehun found him packing up his luggage in the room.

“Where are you going?” Sehun asked, voice toneless.

Kai slowly turned to him, took steps to reach him, and gently held his hands. Kai dropped a tear, because he knew how Sehun would get hurt.

“Sehun…” he whispered and his voice was shaking, “I can’t…marry you.”

Sehun thought he was all ready for this moment. Sehun thought he wouldn’t even drop a single tear because every single day, he was mentally preparing himself just for this. But the reality drifted, and Sehun just realized that even if he prepared forever, knives would still stab his soul.

Sehun didn’t utter a word. He simply gave his best friend a gaze and a nod, and a small shade of smile as tears flowed on him. Sehun nodded more, so that he could emphasize how he wanted to set him free.

Kai went confused with Sehun’s answer. He expected a slap, hits and punches and screams and yells, yet there was Sehun smiling in front of him, holding his hands back, and his hands felt so warm.

Kai dropped more tears for guilt was clouding all of him, but he wouldn’t change his decision, because didn’t want to drown in a lie forever.

“Sehun…” he called again, and he embraced his best friend as he whispered, “I love you. Believe me, Sehun…I love you.”

Sehun wrapped his arms around, and he brushed his hair as he mumbled, “I know…I know…”

The syllables could hardly escape Sehun, and the sight of Kai’s clothes already fixed in the bag just made the words almost escape from him, “…you love me as your best friend…”

Sehun felt Kai nod, and that nod just pricked his heart. Nevertheless, he just wanted to let Kai know he knew his heart, and that he accepted the truth, “…but you can’t love me the way you love Kyungsoo.”

Sehun heard Kai’s soft “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” and so he hugged his best friend tighter, because Kai was sobbing so hard and Sehun couldn’t handle hearing Kai in pain.

“Just stay here,” Sehun said, “stay with me, Kai. Let’s live as best friends again.”

--

Kai and Sehun climbed up the stage, receiving the diploma they should have gotten earlier if going to America wasn’t necessary. Things between them were still hard to get back to normal, yet Sehun was struggling. Sehun had controlled his hands from caressing him, had strived to control his heart whenever Kai gets too close. In his house, they were already in separate rooms, yet every day they still went to school and went back home together, chit-chatting along the sidewalk, just like how they were when they were best friends.

Kai took an easier time to consider Sehun as his best friend again. He didn’t hold his hand anymore, and didn’t kiss him anymore. It was easy, because after all, his love for him was not as much as his love for Kyungsoo.

“So, have you decided on your specialization?” Sehun asked and he swallowed the food in his mouth. It was their graduation celebration, and though there was only the two of them at the table, it didn’t feel empty.

“Pulmonology.” Kai swiftly responded. “I will treat the people with respiratory diseases, and I won’t let them die.”

--

Kai went back to Korea, and the first person he searched for was Kyungsoo.

Still having his big luggage, he went straight to the flower shop, bought a bouquet of red roses, and after that, he rode a cab to the place where Kyungsoo’s ashes were.

Carrying his heavy bags inside, he panted and he grinned, because there was Kyungsoo smiling at him. He gave Kyungsoo the flowers and he exclaimed, “Kyungsoo! Guess what? I’m a doctor now!”

“Really?! I’m so proud of you, Kai!” he heard the voice, and it was so familiar. The timbre, the pitch, the quality…it was Kyungsoo’s voice.

Kyungsoo was beaming at him, and he picked a handkerchief from his pocket to quickly wipe Kai’s sweat on his face. “You looked so tired,” Kyungsoo whispered, and he hugged Kai so tight because he missed him so much.

Kai hugged him back, and he missed Kyungsoo so badly that he wanted to kiss him again and again. And so he did; he pecked him on the forehead, on his nose, his squishy cheeks and his lips, and they smiled until their lips couldn’t separate because they loved each other so much.

“I’m a pulmonologist now, Kyung. I won’t let you die. We’ll kill all those cancer cells and we’ll live together forever, okay?” Kai put his palms on Kyungsoo’s cheeks, and Kyungsoo loved the warmth as he nodded again and again.

Kai embraced Kyungsoo so tight, realizing that he was just embracing the air.

--

Kai rented an apartment while his new house was being constructed just a distance away from the hospital. As he sat at the bench along the hospital’s corridor, he picked up a piece of paper from the chest pocket of his white coat, and he dropped a tear, seeing the photo of a glasshouse that Kyungsoo cut when they were still together.

Kyungsoo wrapped his arms on Kai’s waist, and he loved how Kai looked so handsome with his white coat and stethoscope hanging on his chest. “Thank you,” Kyungsoo mumbled on him, because the house at the photo looked so similar to what was being built now. “I love you,” he added, and he kissed Kai on the cheek, making the pulmonologist’s heart jump in joy.

“It’s our dream house, and it’s turning to reality now,” Kai smiled at him as he whispered, “and I love you so much.”

Looking at the seat beside him, Kai knew he was just talking to himself. The seat was empty, but at that exact place, he and Kyungsoo were always sitting together, talking about this and that while the nurses were busy fixing needles on his mother at the room nearby. Reminiscing the old times, Kai could still remember the conversations they had, and now that he was sitting right at this place, everything seemed so fresh in his mind.

Kyungsoo inquired something while he opened the lunchbox, and suddenly Kai bumped his fists in the air because he was so happy that Kyungsoo cooked curry for him again. “Yah, before you eat my curry, give me a good reason why you will pursue medicine.”

“Am I really supposed to answer that?”

“Uh huh,” Kyungsoo muttered, taking the lunchbox behind himself so Kai wouldn’t reach it.

“I don’t know. Just…uhm…it seems cool and…my relatives said I’d be their scholar and they’ll give me much money only if I enter med school,” and he stood up trying to reach the lunchbox.

“Nah,” Kyungsoo uttered when Kai finally had the lunchbox in his hands. “You must have a good reason, Kai. It’s going to be five or six years of hardship. So, think of it well, and when you thought of one, share it to me, okay?”

“Kyung,” Kai wept silently as he stared at the faded colors of their dream house, “I want to be a doctor…so you won’t die.”

--

With his four-day vacation from the hospital’s work, Kai traveled to their practicum site, to where they spent so many memories together, to where their hearts secretly jumped whenever their eyes met, to that place where at first, they hardly imagined they would fall for each other.

“Kai! You’re back!” The family exclaimed, and their house got cemented and beautifully painted now, way better than the simple hut they lived in during the practicum.

They talked about a lot of things that happened through the years, about all the changes and stories they wanted to share, until the sun began to set and Kai told them he wanted to watch how it would rest behind the hills.

Kai walked at the grass field, to where he and Kyungsoo usually rambled around whenever their research work got done. Kai opened his DSLR and he faced the sunset as he searched for the best angle to capture.

The camera clicked, and Kyungsoo giggled because the shot was perfect. He was in so much awe with the tan-skinned male wrapping him with his arms.

“Whoa,” Kai heard Kyungsoo remark, and he grinned for the most wonderful moment he could have in his life.

“I love you so much, Kyungsoo,” Kai whispered as the sun finally set behind the beautiful mountains.

When the stars shined above, Kai lied down on the grass, on the same spot where they used to gaze at the stars.

“So wonderful,” Kyungsoo kissed him on the cheek again. Kai found Kyungsoo staring at him, and he thought that Kyungsoo’s face was so much more beautiful than the stars above.

“You…” Kai whispered as he faced him, gliding his fingers on Kyungsoo’s cheek, “…are the brightest star of all.”

That made Kyungsoo giggle, and so Kai did too, because Kyungsoo’s giggle was the best music he could ever listen to. “You’re the reason why I’m living each day,” and Kai put his lips on Kyungsoo’s forehead as stars fell from the sky.

Lying on the grass all alone, Kai told him his answer on the question where could a falling star go when it falls.

“Kyung, it will just disappear, but it will remain in my heart…just like you.”