"This doesn't mean anything," she insists, her alcohol-infused breath hot against his neck, her hand fumbling with his belt buckle. "It's just ."

"I know," he whispers. And he does know, but the stupid, pathetic part of him that still loved her hoped that tonight would be the night she finally realized that she belonged with him.

 ***

Yuri.

Glass.

When he first met her, Minho's first thought was that she was anything but breakable. She stood in his doorway, jet-black hair tumbling down her shoulders, her dark, undecipherable eyes boring into his.

No, she was more like diamond. Beneath her brilliance, she was hard, cold, as deadly as a sharpened blade. Shattered glass can draw blood, but only diamond can slice a man to ribbons.

"You look like him, but you're nothing like him at all, are you?"

Her blunt words caught him off guard. Every single person he had met had marvelled about the family resemblance, as if he was some wax figure in a museum. So how was it that she could see him, and only him, with a mere sweep of those piercing eyes?  

He nodded, because it was after all, the truth.

He was wasn't smart, nor particularly charismatic. He had no admirers, asides from his weird, awkward neighbour who was barely in her double-digits. He was just the 'little brother', the forgotten shadow who could never be as good as the original no matter how hard he tried.

To his surprise, she smiled, if a slight upturn of her lips could be considered a smile.

"Good for you. God knows the world doesn't need two arrogant, self-centred Choi Siwon's."

He chuckled and her smile widened. That was the only time he was ever grateful for his jackass of a brother.

***

She was the over-protective best friend of Siwon's flavour of the month, Im Yoona. The pretty, doe-eyed student council secretary had caved into his brother's charms after a record three months of bouquets, acts of chivalry and a very public declaration of love over the P.A. system. The entire school had rejoiced over union of the homecoming king and queen, but not everyone was happy.

"He's an absolute , but she's naive enough to think that she'll be the one to change him," Yuri said, scrunching her nose slightly in annoyance. They sat in the kitchen with a bucket of ice cream before them, trying to ignore the giggling and creaking of the couch from the den.

"Maybe she can."

Yuri snorted. "Unlikely. I know his type, once a douchebag, always douchebag."

As much as he disliked his brother, it went against the family code to badmouth him (even if it was the blatant truth).

"Have you told her about his history with other girls?"

Something flashed in her eyes, before it was replaced by the usual flatness. "I didn't have to. Every single time we're in the washroom, there's some girl bawling her eyes out because of him."

Minho wasn't surprised. He had seen his share of weepy ex-girlfriends at his doorstep. "Well, let's hope she'll be the one."

Because if Yoona isn't, then he really didn't have a reason to see Yuri again.

***

It became a ritual of sorts. His brother would drive them all home, before dragging Yoona to his room to study, though Minho doubted that physics alone could incite that much laughter. He would sit in comfortable silence with Yuri as he studied both her and his frustratingly dull econ textbook.

"Let's get out of here."

Minho looked up to find her already standing, an expectant look on her face.

"Where?"

She shrugged. "Out. I can't stand it anymore." She glanced pointedly at the ceiling, towards the source of the high-pitched squealing that had rung through the house for the past hour.

He followed her out the door, because if he didn't, she would leave him behind. The thought was more terrifying than the prospect of failing his economics exam.

She walked purposefully, so he let her lead, happy to be beside her, drinking in the afternoon sunshine and fresh air.

"Am I a horrible friend for hoping she'd break up with him?" she asked suddenly. They stopped and she turned to face him, a hint of vulnerability, insecurity in her eyes.

"I dunno..." he mumbled.

She continued as if she hadn't heard him. "I want her to be happy, but how can I just watch as she falls more and more in love with him when I fully know that he'll never love her in the same way?"

Minho felt as if someone had punched him in the chest, her words ringing over and over in his head.

She'll never love him in the same way.

He was an idiot, for wishing that as time wore on, she would reciprocate his escalating feelings, would maybe smile when he found the courage to reach for her hand.

"Tell her not to wait, then. Tell her to find someone who'll love her back."

She looked back at him thoughtfully. "You know, sometimes I wish she had fallen for you instead," she said softly. "You would never hurt her."

No, he would never hurt her, even if she was the one hurting him.

***

She disappeared from his life as easily as she had entered it. They exchanged brief greetings at school, but nothing more, since really, what was there to say? His brother had moved on, though there were moments when the charming facade slipped, and Minho could see his own grief reflected in his brother's face. He, too, tried to move on, but even time and distance did nothing for the emptiness in his heart. There was no one who could fill it.

He still couldn't forget her.

***

He wished his parents hadn't left for France, not because he missed them, but because he wouldn't have had to deal with the countless strangers flooding into his house. They came in endless waves, not wanting to miss the party of the year, the number of guests (invited and uninvited) yet another indication of his brother's popularity.

Music blasted in the living room, the scent of alcohol and sweat permeating the air. Food and bottles littered the floor as he made his way to the kitchen. The rational part of him knew that he would be the one cleaning up the mess tomorrow, but the light, bubbly feeling from a couple of beers took over.

"Minho!"

He froze in his tracks. It couldn't be. But it was the same rich, husky voice that so often whispered to him in his dreams.

She walked unsteadily towards him, hair falling in messy waves over her bare shoulders. As she approached, he could see the glazed look in her eyes, smell the alcohol on her breath.

"Yuri? What are you doing here?" But she merely grabbed him by the hand and dragged him away, slowly leading him upstairs. Even in his impaired state, his heart pounded at the prospect of being alone with her for the first time in months. When they finally entered the quiet darkness of his room, she padded towards him, snaking her arms around his neck, pressing urgently against his.

"Wait--" he gasped. "You're drunk." Her only response was to pull him closer, trailing her demanding fingers down his back.

"So are you, love," she murmured in his ear. "But I don't ing care." And he was tempted not to give a damn either. Besides, was he really taking advantage of her if she was willingly throwing herself upon him?

As her hands travelled lower and lower, she whispered, "This doesn't mean anything, alright? It's just ."

He nodded. "I know."

But he hoped anyway.

***

It was her sobs that woke him. They were the gasping, gut-wrenching kinds that tore at his heart, made him want to find the one who had hurt her and reduce their face to a bloody pulp.

"Why..." she whispered, her eyes scrunched up in pain. "How could you?"

"How could I what?"

She seemed not to hear him, and continued to speak to whomever was haunting her in her sleep. "Of all people, why did you choose her? She's my best friend..."

Minho felt as if a brick had fallen into his stomach. He held his breath, waited with a pounding heart and a choking sense of dread.

"You said you would change, Siwon. You said you would do it for me,"  she whimpered, her voice filled with longing and insecurity, dashed hopes and raw pain. "But those were just lies...weren't they?"

At that moment, there was nothing he wanted more but for his brother to disappear. Wasn't it enough that he had already taken everything else from Minho?

But no, he only had his own stupidity to blame.

It's always so much harder to hate yourself.

***

She looked up from her cereal, clad in the dress she had worn the night before, the exact one he had torn off her and tossed aside. For a moment, something like confusion (or was it pain?) flashed in her eyes before she smiled at him, a wry smile that one would flash in an awkward situation.

"What are  you thinking?" he asked quietly. He had to know for certain.

She blinked in surprise. He was not the prying sort, had never demanded anything from her.

"I thought you were him," she replied airily, trying to hide the emotion behind those once cryptic eyes.

He laughed, a dark, humourless sound that felt strange coming from his mouth. "And that's why you slept with me, isn't it? So that you could pretend I was him instead? Pretend that he cared about you as much as I did?"

Shock, mixed with horror flashed across her face. For once, the cool, confident Yuri who always had a comeback remained speechless.

It was enough of a confirmation. Minho was done, finished. He had fallen for a mask that she had donned, a façade that she had constructed to hide her fragility and her pain. He had never seen the real her, had naively believed that people were what they pretended to be.

She was broken on the inside, and he couldn't fix her. Even if he tried, they would both be living a lie. She would never be able to see him, only the image of his brother, when she looked into his eyes. And he would never be able to forgive her, nor himself, for being a replacement.

Without another word, he his heels and left. Left behind the girl he thought he had loved, the girl who had seemed unbreakable, the girl with a heart of glass.