I know what you are all thinking... - What a - .. and if you had asked me a few months ago how I feel about secretly dating a guy while having an official boyfriend, I would have thought just the same.
It´s horrible, and that´s exactly how I feel but still I can´t help myself.


So here I am, Amber Josefine Liu, a girl whose parents and friends would have bet their entire money on her never having a boyfriend, with not one but two boyfriends, behaving like the epitome of a .
Yes, I do loathe myself these days, BUT, before you judge me, let me tell you everything from the start:


I don´t exactly know when it started but my best friend Kibum (or Key as I call him), had somewhat started dating. Neither of us even remembers a first date. It just happened and then it felt really convenient and above all it made sense: we understood each other, and in a way we completed each other:
He had always been the most feminine boy at school, I was the most boyinsh girl.
He loved shopping, I loathed it, but in the end I like the things he picked for me.
I loved playing soccer and other kinds of sports, he sat on the bleachers beeing bored to death, but in the end he still was there supporting me.
    And imagine my mom, when I introduced him as my boyfriend! She went nuts and gushed about him (in his presence) for hours. While his parents greeted me with a "Well, we love you anyways.". Before Key piped in that I was an actual girl and how they could even think that he might be gay ("What´s wrong with an extensive morning routine and a little bit of make-up?!").

So everything was peachy. All of our friends approved, the families were elated, even the people who despised us before seemed more at ease.
I was happy, Key was happy, everyone was happy, but you never know the feeling of being madly in love untill it hits you.

And that´s when things got very complicated: I met Myungsoo in our apartment complex when I was just heading out for my daily morning jog. I had never seen him before, so I guessed he had just moved here with his family and was even more obviously fairly new to everything. He had been staring at his smartphone which was running a navigation app and I just offered to help him find the way and even though he was pretty quiet during our first conversation, something about him, didn´t let my mind rest. For the whole thirty minutes of my excercise, I couldn´t stop thinking about him.
In which of the apartments did he live?
Would I see him again?
Was he able to figure that I´m a girl?
To put it in a nutshell: I felt like I was the heroine of a teenage chick flick. Ugh.

When I picked up Key after a quick shower (the time I used for jogging, he used for his daily beautifying marathon), I couldn´t help but feel a little numb. I noticed for the first time that Key never had caused me to think so intensely about him, that holding his hand never made me giddy, that I never got excited when he leaned in to kiss me. Had I ever really been in love with him?
I discarded those thoughts, I forced myself to, off course it had to be the mere fact that this new guy, was just exciting simply because he was new.

Luckily I was never much of a talker in the morning so Key didn´t even notice the absence of my mind.

Days went by and I had met that guy - Myungsoo as he had introduced himself two days after our first meeting - on countless occasions. Usually he was just bringing out the garbage or walking the family´s German Shepherd dog "Nutella". He never said much; after the first two sentences our conversation usually died and we went our seperate ways.

Do I need to say? He still occupied a lot of space in my mind.

At that point I really started doubting my whole relationship with Key. I knew now, that I had definitely never been in love with him. I like him, of course, I also enjoy spending time with him, and the kisses are good, too, but I never once felt that tingly sensation that you´re supposed to feel (or so these woman´s magazines say). With Myungsoo it was different, even though I barely knew him. Just the thought of possibly seeing him in the morning made me smile. I cam to the conclusion that I needed to end this with Key, regardless if I ever would even be with Myungsoo. Holding hands felt faker and faker each day. It was unbearable.

But everytime I tried to talk to him about it there was something or someone interrupting: one time his mom barged in asking if we wanted to join the parents play the "game of life", another time my grandma made a surprise visit, repeatedly saying how nice we looked together and how our babies would be gorgeous, other times the phone rang, or , or, or,... the list goes on and on. It felt like god himself didn´t want me to break up with him! I grew so frustrated and our families didn´t make it easier. By now our parents had befriended each other and for them it was only a matter of time for us to marry and have kids.
Even Key got pretty obsessed of this thought from time to time, as he would use a website to morph our pictures into our possible baby (I want to see you to try and break up with someone at this situation!).

While I was trying to break up with Key so desperately, Myungsoo and I had gotten to know each other. One day he simply asked if it was okay for him to tag along while I jog (Nutella was joining too), and I let him. It was beyond awkward at first. You could see the both of us were trying hard to find a way to start conversation. So we ended up staying silent except for our steady breathing.

A more than crucial week passed like this. Silently running side by side. And when he finally adressed me, I was again too caught up in the thoughts of him and Key.
"...and that´s how it ended."
I was paralysed. Finally he had been talking to me and I had to choose just that moment to zone out. Great job, moron.
"So what do you think about it?"
"Uhm,...I... well... "
We had stopped jogging and he stared at me. So did his dog.
"Sorry, I didn´t listen." I hung my head. So that would be the end of our walks together. He looked at me with knitted eyebrows.
"You see, I´m just not used to hearing your voice... I promise to listen the next time, okay?"
I begged to the heavens that he´d forgive me.

And he did! He actually smiled at me and apologised for his silence that past few days. He admitted to being pretty shy and introverted but assured me he would try to change that.
From that point on we grew closer and closer. Those morning joggs became all I lived for. I could never wait for the morning to come, to see him again and to talk to him again.

When I wasn´t with him, my conscience killed me. When I held hands with Key, I imagined it was Myungsoo; when he kissed me, I imagined those were Myungsoo´s lips. Every minute with my boyfriend had a bitter taste but still I never found a decent moment to talk to him. I had never noticed the loads of people that had surrounded us each and every day and so I ended up faking everything. Looking into the faces of our families I felt I had to. My life had been so good when we told everyone that we were together. They were all so nice and approving.
It tore me apart.

When Myungsoo leaned in to kiss me, I had know him for 7 weeks, 4days and 23hours. For some reason I had become very aware of time since I met him.
I froze and the words spilled from my mouth. The fact that I had a boyfriend, the fact that our families had built so much pressure, the fact that the heavens didn´t want me to break up with him ...I even told him that I imagined to kiss Myungsoo whenever I kissed my boyfriend.
I even cried a little. Not that it made me look adorable like those girls in the movies that start to confess everything to their loved one. I was still drenched in sweat from our jogg and now the little make-up I had put on for him was smudging.

But he hugged me and we sat down in the gras while Nutella trudged around us in small circles. Myungsoo seemed very understanding about me keeping my boyfriend a secret. I have to admit I was pretty surprised. And I was even more surprise when he assured me, he´d come up with something.

And boy, did he come up with something.


I want to spare you all the (gory) details...
I just want you to know that if I had known about Myungsoo´s short but not irrelevant stay in a penal institution...
I wouldn´t have told him about Kibum at all...
I also wouldn´t have told him about Key´s day to day schedule, his habits, the way he takes to school or the mall, the things he always orders at restaurants or diners...

nothing of that sort would have crossed my lips.



But it´s too late for regrets.

I, for my part, know that I will wait for Myungsoo until he is discharged from that small prison near Seoul. I visit him as often as I can and from the way things look, chances are high that he is going to be released for good behaviour soon.
 

You know that I'll wait for you, baby
And we'll be apart, but you'll have heart
I'm saving it all for you, baby