If there were ever a doubt in my mind, after tonight, it’s gone.

He is a better man than I ever was or likely will ever be.

I know Youngbae was probably too shocked to be as offended as he should have been.  I don’t think I fully understand what I was thinking when I outed him; it could only be my deep-seated insecurity finally making itself known publicly.  Still, I’ll have to find a way to earn his forgiveness, if not for Youngbae, then for him.

…

I don’t know when I started noticing it; it was after we’d been together for a while.  They were always the closest, so it wasn’t the amount or quality of interaction that caught my attention.  It was that Youngbae’s smile grew a bit wider when they whispered together, his laugh was softer when Daesung acted cute in front of everyone, and his eyes sparkled a bit more when seeing Daesung on the screen.  I had always been grateful for his special friendship with Daesung; I was happy that he had someone else to share his feelings with, someone else who recognized immediately that extraordinary heart.  But now, I started to suspect that perhaps Daesung was more than a friend for Youngbae. 

So I watched.  And I learned that my hunch was on target.  It wasn’t easy; but I now had the right to pay as much attention to Daesung as I wanted, and it was clear there was another who did the same.  But not once, not once, did Youngbae do anything that even remotely hinted at his feelings.  Maybe it was because we were already dating or he wasn’t comfortable acknowledging his feelings or he was scared, but somehow, I knew Youngbae was never going to let Daesung know.  My esteem for him only grew, as I knew how hard it was to try to build a wall around his heart when it came to Daesung.