Prologue 

We sat silently for a while, just enjoying each other’s silence, not a single word passing between us, because he was being polite and I was busy trying to make my life worthwhile with unwritten words. I heard him quietly sneaking up his camera to his eyes, subtly focusing the lense, pressing the button and then flinching when the camera made its soft click as it took my picture. I allowed myself to quickly flit my gaze at him, long enough just to see him push the camera underneath the table and give me a small wink, before I went back to my indecision. I heard a soft, satisfied sigh moments before a camera screen replaced my computer. “Wow. Look at how beautiful you are, even with that pout. It makes you look like some mysterious, dark hero.”
 

I glanced down at the picture with so little interest that I’ve come to wonder if he has ever thought about leaving me at that moment. Whining at me to pay attention to him when he was here and then storming out of the room, either into my bedroom to collapse on my never-made bed, or out the door, into the streets where he would might feel a little less alone. But no, he just sat there showing me my own picture, a brilliant light in his eyes that I had failed to notice.
 

In the picture I briefly saw me, but then as I kept looking I saw that it wasn’t quite me. My face, clouded by frustration, eyes blank with failure, my mouth numb from dissatisfaction. My fingers were captured in mid-air, posing as if asking for the camera to notice them. I didn’t recognize myself, maybe it was because I had never been aware of when these moments were happening. Regret, resentment, grievance. Maybe I was stuck with the vision of the twenty-one year old who stayed to expand his horizons and start with nothing but desperate dreams and determination, that naive boy who held his head high with hope being his only support. That was who I saw in the mirror everyday because that hope still haunted me, clinging onto my body and my mind like a parasite, an aura of sickness that never seemed to go away.
 

I looked away from the camera and stared down at the notebook, biting down on the end of my pencil. “That doesn’t look like me,” I said in a flat voice.
 

He sighed, smiling a little sad. “I guess you’re right. It can never measure up to the real image.” His fingers mimed a camera and, shutting one of his eyes, he took another picture. “You’ll be saved,” he said reassuringly, pointing to his own head. “Up here.”
 

Nodding without really listening, I flipped a page from the notebook because I was sick of looking at the same old blank page and wanted to look at a new blank one. It didn’t really make a difference and that sent a small jolt of annoyance through me. The hand on the computer curled to a hard fist, the bones obviously taut and strained. The glasses slid down farther, coming to a point where I was seeing four computer screens, one pair blurry and the other showing a clear image of a blank page.
 

“Hyung.”
 

I heard nothing.
 

“Jiyong hyung.”
 

Again, still nothing.
 

Silence filled the gap of anticipation on his part and sheer ignorance on mine. I heard him slide his chair up closer, leaning towards me as his breath grew more shallow and heated. His finger quickly, briefly, yet confidently twisted my gaze away from screen, tilting my chin towards him as best as he could so that I was looking at him, irritated, through the corner of my eyes.
 

“What?” I questioned.
 

It was quick, it didn’t even last a second, his lips on mine. A quick flutter of lips, barely a kiss as he pulled away so quickly and awaited for me to come back. He was waiting for something; an outburst, a reaction, an expression. He waited for anything to show that I was still alive, still aware, still able to feel the warmth of his breath against my neck, the only sensation I had felt before his lips. I stared at him, away from my indecision and my mistakes. I don’t quite remember the look in my eyes as I stared into his.