When Mark called “Jen and Sehun! Five minutes!” I was in the trance that Sehun left me. After Sehun told me that last phrase, he simply walked away without another look back at me. My empty hands were left dangling at my sides and my eyes were left trailing the outline of his retreating back. I couldn’t comprehend the episode that had just unfolded, because nothing obviously went as I had originally scripted.

    “Jennifer Chen! Get ready! Sehun’s already ready; what are you doing?” Mark barked at me from behind. Raking a hand through my tousled hair, I bit my bottom lip and furrowed my brows to prevent any more tears from ruining my makeup. “Jen-” I felt Mark’s hand on my shoulder as he turned me around. His mouth was hanging wide, probably from witnessing the unheavenly sight of my tear-stained, crimson cheeks and overall disheveled appearance. “Wh-what happened to you?”

    The warmth radiating from his touch was so similar to Sehun’s that I immediately fell into his embrace. “I screwed up, Mark. I screwed everything up!” I shamelessly cried as I buried my face into his hoodie.

    “Sweety, it’s okay.” He probably knew I was talking about Sehun, since they were brothers after all. He probably knew about every heartless statement I told Sehun and every excruciating situation I put him through. “Just talk to him. If you want, I take your performance off the list for this year.”

    I shook my head at his suggestion. I had to dance with Sehun, even if this was to be the final duet. I knew what I had to do on stage. “No, I have to dance.”

    “That’s my girl. I’ll give you five additional minutes. Get on stage in seven!” With an encouraging smile, Mark patted me on the shoulder before leaving me to fix whatever was left of my makeup.

    As I stared at my reflection in the mirror, all I witnessed were traces of eyeshadow, smeared mascara and eyeliner, and cakey foundation. And to add to that list of eyesores were the flyaway hairs sticking to my dampened face, bloodshot eyes, and tear stains. Ruling my appearance a helpless cause, I decided to just remove all my makeup and simply conceal the redness and swelling around my eyes. It was time to show my natural face to the world and declare my sincere feelings, rather than hiding them in fear.

    As I heard Mark counting down the last seconds discretely while I was approaching the stage, I saw Sehun already walking onto the center without waiting for me. With a simple glance at me that I failed to miss, he faced the audience. Right when the music began playing in the hall, I strode onto stage and stopped beside him. I heard my pulsating beat in my ears and felt Sehun’s familiar, comforting heat radiating from beside me. We recited the steps that became branded into our memories.

    However, our original passion and intimacy never returned. It felt even more unnatural than our last practice. I couldn’t stand it anymore. It was almost as if Sehun was resisting my touch and was waiting for the last word of the song to play to end our dance together. But I was not going to let it end so s simply.

    “Cause all of me, loves all of you. Love your curves and all your edges, all your perfect imperfections.”

    When the chorus began, I abandoned our original choreography and pulled Sehun towards me. With one hand around the same clump of fabric on his shirt and one hand around his tensed neck, I crashed my lips onto his as I heard the entire audience gasp in astonishment. At first he remained stationary, but when our lips finally began molding together, everything else was silence. The relief that I experienced when I felt his arms wind around my waist informed me clearer than the blue sky on a cloudless spring day that I loved Sehun more than I have ever loved Jongin - that, compared to what I shared with Sehun, my first love was nothing more than a memory.

    When we parted from each other, only smiles were needed to confirm our mutual feelings. As the music slowly returned us to our positions on stage, we shared bashful grins of ecstasy and flushed cheeks. We resumed the dance and concluded it with a tight, long-awaited embrace. Cheers and whistles resounded from the audience, and although our final dance did not follow our faultless choreo that we spent weeks perfecting, it could not have been more perfect.

    As we proceeded backstage, with my hand tangled in his, Mark gave us a light scoff of disbelief and a knowing smirk. “You almost ruined my entire show,” he scolded. “You’re lucky that the audience actually liked that little kiss of yours - or should I say big kiss because it was a minute long.” My face flushed at his statement, but Sehun and I couldn’t help but smile contently at each other. “Go get a room. I honestly don’t know what to do with you two idiots.”

    “Come to our future wedding?” I heard Sehun coyly remark from beside me. I turn to him only to be met with a smirk and mischievous glint in his eyes that were still slightly pink. Incredulous, I playfully punched him in the arm and apologized to Mark for the drama that we caused. When Mark left after congratulating me and Sehun, I turned to Sehun.

He bent down to lightly peck me on my forehead before leaning his face against mine and whispering, “Thank you, for our last duet together...”

“Our last duet as friends,” I completed our mutual thought.

“So, since we’re no longer friends,” he began as he leaned back without loosening his hold on me. “Will you…” Sehun retracted one hand to nervously scratch the back of his head.

I decided to because I was still slightly upset at him for not listening to me explain before. “Will I continue to be your best friend?”

I smirked in victory at the sight of his crestfallen face. But suddenly, his facial expression darkened and his body straightened. As a result, the atmosphere became tense and serious. “No. Will you be my girlfriend?”

I smiled genuinely before answering, “Yes-”

“And marry me someday?”

Although I softly slapped his arm and scolded him, I still knew clearly that my answer was “Yes.” He just didn’t need to know yet.

“You know...If you listened to me at all before our performance, it would have went much more smoothly…”

“I know,” he hummed into my ear as he wobbled the both of us side to side. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I should have just made my feelings clear earlier instead of being dumb and hurting you.”

“It’s okay, because I can punish you now,” he whispered in a sly tone.

I giggled and buried my face into his chest to inhale his fresh scent. “I love you, dumb Sehun.”

“I love you, too, my Jen.”

Our last duet together as friends marked our first dance together as lovers.

    First loves were always meant to be beautiful memories - not recurring nightmares. Even so, I did not ignore the callings of my heart. Just because my brain continuously warned me of the dangers of being with Jongin again, I did not silence my heart’s passion and love for Sehun.

    In Jongin’s absence, my heart mended its own damages but remained vulnerable. To account for that susceptibility, it chained itself to block anyone from entering and enjoying a longer than favorable stay. But Sehun broke those chains, whether or not I approved of his actions.

    His love for me was clear, and so was mine for him. But our shared love was no longer an immature, teenage crush, susceptible to destruction and pain. Our shared future together was no longer an imaginary fairy tale, but a simple love story with a happy ending.

    Past memories were never meant to be forgotten. Rather, they served as story books that reminded the parties involved of their shared past, their beautiful as well as malicious memories. However, never should they impact our perception of the future or decisions.

And it's a wrap! Hopefully this story lived up to all your expectations.

Thank you all lovelies so freaking much for supporting me in this story and waiting for me to update based on my extremely irregular schedule. I loved reading all your comments! So please upvote and comment! Because I LOVE COMMENTS! <3 Goodbye, for now ;) Check out my other stories!