He drifted through work and came back to Yena’s apartment in a daze. His mind wouldn’t wrap around his mother’s words. It was already too much to handle the arranged-marriage-not-arranged-marriage as it was, but knowing who his potential fiancé was tipped him over the edge.

Tuan Mark. The name burned in his brain for the past several hours prompted 2-3 years of teenage hormones and drama to come rushing back.

He’d known him in high school. He’d been two years ahead of him, and was one of the few publicly out kids in the school. Some people saw that as grounds for bullying, but he was like a shadow: he could just evaporate, just like that, and then reappear in his next class like he’d been there all along. No one could pin this kid down, and after a while, no one bothered. Of course, that didn’t stop people from completely trashing his reputation and gossiping about him, using him to drag other potentially gay kids through the mud. He’d been a loner all through high school.

And the worst part? Jinyoung hadn’t helped him.

Jinyoung hadn’t been one of the bullies, that was for sure: his parents had always thought bullying was demeaning and unclassy, and so Jinyoung hadn’t even thought about becoming a bully, but that hadn’t meant he’d done something to protect him. He’d been too afraid to get bullied, especially because he had Yena by his side, and he hadn’t wanted to implicate her in all this either. He was guilty because he didn’t do something, and now he didn’t know how to approach Tuan Mark. What was he like now? His mother didn’t touch too much on what he was doing now, only that his mother was still angry with his uality, and that he might be heading a department in the family business, but not the entire company, which was apparently a “waste.”

He winced. That was one of the things he had worried about when he first realized he was gay. That was one of his worst nightmares, and Mark was living it. He couldn’t stop feeling so guilty, like it was his fault that Mark was going through his personal hell. Logic said he wasn’t at fault, but his heart said otherwise, cheesy as it was.

“Jinyoung?” Yena’s voice broke through his thoughts, bringing him back to earth, where he was apparently staring at the door to Yena’s apartment and had been for a while. “Jinyoung-oppa, are you okay?”

He jerked. “O-Oh! U-Um, yes, Yena-ya, I’m okay.”

She sighed. “No you aren’t. You were just staring at my apartment door when I got home, and I get home later than you do. Have you... just been staring at my door for an hour when you have the key?”

“No, that’s not why,” Jinyoung replied, “though I have no idea when or how I got here.”

“That’s worrying,” she countered, opening the apartment door. “Come in and sit down. You still have to tell me what happened at lunch with your mother.”

“That’s kind of why I’m a little... hazy,” he said, walking inside and sitting down on the couch.

“Even more worrying,” she looked nervous, her feet rocking back and forth as she observed her ex-fiancé in this state. “Do you need to eat something?”

“No, I can talk about it now,” Jinyoung reassured her, gesturing for her to sit down. “So... my mother accepted me.”

“That’s good news,” she said, easily picking up that there was more to it. “And...?”

“I have the option to end up in a new arranged marriage.” Jinyoung finished. “To a guy.”

Yena froze, not in fear, but in disbelief. “What?” She whispered. “Another arranged marriage? To a guy? Your mother wants to publicly arrange a marriage with a guy?”

He frowned. “Did you think she would try to hide my uality to the public?”

“No,” she backtracked. “Of course not, what with your father’s policy on honesty. But you do know that arranged marriages are usually to match the best children together for the purpose of either a business merger, a business alliance, or to create the best children. Like pedigrees for dogs,” she added rather disdainfully. “This arranged marriage does none of that. So what is it for?”

“My mother wants to revolutionize the chaebol world,” Jinyoung replied. “She wants to make it okay for chaebols to be homoual or part of the LGBT community.”

Yena definitely wasn’t expecting that, and she leaned back in shock. There was a long pause while she thought over Jinyoung’s words. “Wow...” she breathed finally. “Your mother is... bold.”

“Yeah,” Jinyoung sighed, raking his hands through his hair. “And that’s not the worst part.”

“Then what is it?” She asked.

“The guy... it’s Tuan Mark.”

There were a few moments of confusion before the name clicked, and then Yena was on her feet. “Tuan Mark? Like, the heir to Tuan Incorporated who was bullied--”

“Because he was gay? Yeah, that kid,” Jinyoung confirmed quickly.

“Yah, he’s older than you, don’t disrespect him,” she scolded lightly. “Why is that such a bad thing?”

Jinyoung turned to look at her. Did she really not understand? “Because all this time, all while he was being bullied for his uality, there was a kid who was gay like him, and didn’t think to stand up for him? And now he’s going to marry him?”

“You said it yourself, this isn’t binding,” Yena reminded him. “And yes, not helping him back then might have been almost as bad as bullying him, but you aren’t the same person you were then, and neither is he. Besides, this helps him more than it helps you. You could think of it as an apology for all those years.”

Jinyoung shrugged, still not convinced. “I guess.”

Yena sighed. “Jinyoung, Mark’s family is at least twice as conservative as yours. There’s no doubt in my mind that he’s suffering so much more than you are. You know you can always turn to me for help: who does Mark turn to? He was an outcast through most of high school, and no doubt his reputation alienated him from making close friends in college who weren’t gold diggers. You know you and I had the same troubles.” Jinyoung could acknowledge that. It had been tough to make genuine friends when the first thing people thought of when his name was brought up was money. “He didn’t have friends in high school, and he probably didn’t have many close friends in college, either. In other words, he didn’t have an escape. He’s probably been surrounded by coworkers who associate him with being his family’s disgrace and his family who treat him like a disgrace. He doesn’t have a place for him to be him, to be accepted.”

Jinyoung knew where she was going with this. “Yena, are you trying to guilt trip me into doing it?”

She looked a little sheepish. “It wasn’t my intention,” she assured him. “I just wanted to remind you that it’s Mark who’s more at stake here than you. You were accepted. He wasn’t.”

Put that way, he felt even guiltier. He had the option to make a person who had a terrible childhood better, and he was more scared for himself than for Mark. It was just hard, to separate the image of the bullied high school student with the man he probably was now. He knew he was being selfish, but he was still stuck in the mode of self-preservation, and he automatically put himself first.

He needed to think about the two people involved: him, and Mark.

In the long run, he would be safe no matter what happened. Bar him doing something actually bad, his parents would stick by his side, protect him from the judgemental eyes of the traditional business world. Mark, however, did not. Judging from Jinyoung’s mother, Mark’s parents seemed t