Sungjong felt his stomach churning as he sat in front of his former best friend.  Munsoo was surveying him over the rim of his wine glass, his expression unreadable. It was one of the things he hated about Munsoo – there was no saying what he was thinking. He might be in excruciating pain but his face would show no signs, the complete opposite of his brother.

Even as a teenager, he had mastered the art of poker face. Sungjong had always been bad at reading people, and Munsoo just made it more difficult for him. It wasn’t that he was aware of it or he did it on purpose to manipulate situations, it came naturally for him. Sungjong knew this because he had actually asked him to stop; his friend had been completely baffled and no matter how much he had tried, he couldn’t fix it.

There was a period of time when Munsoo would have done anything for him. He had been one of the craziest persons he had known, giving into his foolish whims without a question. They had clicked for some reason, even though they were quite different in terms of their personalities. However, they were both popular in their school, albeit in different ways - Sungjong because he was an arrogant ‘ulzzang’ full of attitude and Munsoo because he was the coolest kid in class, ruggedly handsome, good in every sport, and a mysterious attraction provided by his poker face. He had been very unlike his socially awkward older brother with milder looks and untamed hair.

But something had definitely been right between them. So very right.

“Are you going to say anything or stare at me all night?” Sungjong finally asked, picking up his wine glass. He tried to avoid drinks, but tonight, he needed some. It is difficult to meet people from your past, especially so if the goodbyes hadn’t been exactly what you would have wanted them to be.

Munsoo moved in his seat, smiling.

“I missed you.”

“Yeah, me too.”

They hadn’t seen each other in a little over four years. There had been no contact between the two; when they had parted, they were in no positions to exchange numbers.  After all this time though, despite everything, Sungjong felt warmly towards his friend. He wished things had been different between them, but he could say the same about a lot of things. Regrets – he seemed to have collected a lot of them over the years, so it wasn’t a surprise that he had some regarding his last best friend.

Heaving a deep sigh, Munsoo leaned forward, putting down the wine and looking into his eyes with an intense gaze.

“I wish we never broke it off.” His voice was soft but it still hit Sungjong like a freight train. He had just taken a sip of his wine and the drink dribbled down his chin as he started.

Why would he say something like that after all this time?

It would be a lie to say that Sungjong had never once thought about Munsoo in the past years he had been absent from his life. Sometimes, late at night, when he would feel lonely and cold, lying beside one of his abusive ex-boyfriends or someone he didn’t care about, he would think about Munsoo. He had been his best friend for the longest time – best friend and more…

When he had run into Munsoo at the office, he had been at a loss. Returning from Minho’s room, he had been very preoccupied and had slammed into someone. Apologizing profusely, he had helped the man to his feet only to come face to face with the only person he had cared about back when he had been a teenager. He hadn’t changed much. His face looked more matured, the boyish good looks replaced by handsomeness. His dark fringes were still long so that they fell into his eyes. The sharp nose that fitted so well with the chiseled cheekbones, the slightly crooked eyebrows, and the little smirk, they were all reminiscent of the teenage boy he used to know.

Munsoo had been just as shocked as him. They were both so surprised that they had been standing there, staring at each other for minutes before Woohyun had come to in, sharply ordering Sungjong to get back to work. Munsoo had been the first to break out of the reverie and quickly set up a meeting after Sungjong got off work. To be honest, Sungjong was hesitating whether to accept the invitation or not – he still cared for his best friend but being around Myungsoo had proved to be him that it wasn’t exactly a good idea to try and pry open old cans. In the end though, he had decided to show up; who knew, this might the only time he got to see him again.

So here they were at Radisson’s, still a little disbelieving at their chance encounter.

“You know what I wish,” Sungjong whispered, feeling tears caught at his throat. “I wish we had never…started. It was wrong, we were best friends. And then I messed up everything between us, it’s my fault. I was so greedy and foolish. Why couldn’t I be happy with what we had as friends?”

“No Sungjong,” Munsoo said, shaking his head vehemently. “It’s not your fault. It was right. We were in love, I loved you. I should have never broken up with you.”

True, it had been a difficult break up, but it had only been the first of many more to come. It might sound ridiculous, but that relationship was the longest in Sungjong’s entire life, discounting the many times they had fought and broken up, only to make up the next day. Being a same-aged couple had meant that none was wiser than the other, but both thought that they had the better grip of the situation – it was doomed from the start but they had both pushed it.

Sungjong wished he had known better.

“It’s…well, you had your reason, I don’t blame you.”

Rolling his spaghetti around on his plate with his fork, Munsoo said quietly, “You know what, I think love has seasons. And no matter how difficult it is, you just have to get through the winter. Once you do that, everything’s going to be alright. I failed where it mattered the most. That’s a regret I’m still living.”

Why do we have to talk about this? Can’t we just talk about the present and bury the past?

Nostalgia is a dangerous thing. Once it starts pulling, it never lets go. Right now, Sungjong felt that he was being dragged to the very depths of nostalgia, making his insides feel liquid.

All of a sudden, he was 15 again. His world consisted of nothing but himself. It had all been about him. But Munsoo had been there with him, always beside him. Every happy memory of his teenage years was associated with Munsoo somehow. He was so convinced that he had been in love with him.

Aish, what did I know about love back then?

There was this one day in winter that was still vivid in his mind - they had been standing on a field covered with thick white snow. He had run out of his house, wearing just his father’s overcoat over his pajamas and flip flops to meet Munsoo. Even at the tender age of 15, Munsoo had vituperated him for not wearing enough warm clothes in negative temperature, just like his mother did, and then lent him his beanie and his socks. Finally, wrapping his scarf around Sungjong’s neck, he had pulled him closer by the shoulder and kissed the top of his head. At that moment, Sungjong had thought that he loved Munsoo more than he loved himself, the only time he felt this way about someone other than himself.

The more he thought about how he had been then, anger started to fill his mind. Life would have been so different if he was a bit more considerate. He missed his best friend; only if it had never changed…

Clearing his throat, Munsoo reached out and took Sungjong’s hand in his. Shocked by the sudden gesture, Sungjong stared at him, his hand squirming. It didn’t seem right, sitting in a candle-lit restaurant and holding hands with his ex, there was something wrong about the picture.

“You know I still-”

“I guess I’m interrupting something.”

The new voice made Sungjong jump. The coldness in the voice was oddly familiar, one that always caused his heart beat to speed up dangerously.

His head turned sideways and his eyes locked on the tall, impeccably-dressed figure of Kim Myungsoo standing by the table. Immediately, he flushed deep red. Munsoo slowly retracted his hand from Sungjong’s, looking slightly embarrassed.

“I thought we had planned to meet here at 8. If you’re otherwise occupied I can just leave-”

Sungjong sprang to his feet, collecting his coat from the back of his chair, his legs shaking. He had never imagined being here again, in front of the brothers, a reason for conflict. Bowing low at Myungsoo, he said quickly, “I was about to leave. Bye Munsoo.”

He didn’t wait for anyone to say anything and made a beeline for the exit. He had never felt so suffocated. His breathing had almost stopped back there. It was as if every time he found a window to climb out of, the shutters dropped and he was trapped again.

He had no idea on what Munsoo was about to say to him but he was glad that he hadn’t heard it. There was no need for any more complexity in his life and he had a hunch that whatever his ex-best friend would have said would not have simplified anything. The next time they met, if there was going to be a next time, Sungjong wouldn’t give him a chance to bring up the past.

The skeletons are best left in the closet.

---

Myungsoo slid into Sungjong’s seat, gesturing for a waiter to come over and clean up the younger’s untouched dinner plate. Walking in on his brother when he was holding hands with his ex-boyfriend had not been a pleasant experience for him. It had angered him for some reason, like he had observed something unjust. He let the unruly feelings settle in his stomach before saying something, and took a long drag of wine.

“That was Sungjong’s,” Munsoo pointed at the wine glass in his hand. He had been absent-minded and had picked it up without any thought.

So Sungjong had held this same glass, talking with Munsoo, drinking from it. Sungjong’s lips had touched the rim of this glass. It was almost as if the wine glass he had left behind was his presence. It wasn’t just the two of them here, Sungjong was there, in essence.

“I’m sorry,” Munsoo apologized, making his brother turn towards him.

“You two looked busy,” Myungsoo commented, a little heavily. He had hoped things would go smoothly during the dinner but it had gone terribly wrong from the beginning. He wished he hadn’t seen his brother and Sungjong together – the scene was reminiscent of the past he was trying hard to bury.

“We were catching up, kind of. I can’t believe he ended up working for you.”

Myungsoo scoffed.

“Life gives you lemons at times.”

His brother frowned at him disapprovingly.

“I hope you’re not giving him a hard time just because-”

“Just because what?” he asked sharply, glaring at his brother. “Just because he broke me beyond repair? Because that’s not too bad, right? And yes of course, he was young, he didn’t know any better, so I’m the bad guy for holding it against him. It was my fault for falling in love with an immature brat, right? I should have known better, is that it? So in all of this, Sungjong's the victim and he should be pitited?”

Unknowingly, he had raised his voice, causing people at other tables to turn around and look at him reproachfully. His chest was heaving – he had never had the opportunity to speak out loud about how Sungjong had made him feel when he had trampled on his feelings. He had no idea why he decided to bring it up after all these years, but it was as if all this time, his bottled up rage had been looking for a release. And who better to storm against than his brother, who had been there, who had watched it all happen and hadn’t cared at all?

Sometimes, he wondered if it would have been a little bit better if Sungjong had denied him outright, instead of pretending to go out with him.

Those seven days when he had been allowed to hold Sungjong’s hand and walk him to school and go to the arcade with him had been his happiest. Of course, he hadn’t known that Sunjgong had no interest in him whatsoever. How could he have known? The boy had him wrapped around his finger. When he had asked out the younger, his answer had been ‘yes’. But happiness doesn’t last forever, and his lasted for a week only.

Even now, he had nightmares about the fateful evening – he had come back home from a manga convention to find his boyfriend and his brother intertwined, lips locked in a passionate kiss. They were so into it that Myungsoo had stood there, unnoticed by the both of them, for over a minute, watching them, dumbfounded, while his skin seemed to burn and fall away from his flesh. It had been pain like he had never known.  It destroyed him.

When the two had finally spotted him, they both looked unabashed. He was still too choked to ask for an explanation but Sungjong had given it to him anyway.

“What, you really thought I like you? You? Have you looked at me properly? I do not go out with the resident nerd, all right, I have a standard. I’m supposed to date the popular kid, not you, you freak. I couldn’t believe your nerve when you asked me out so I decided to play around a bit. Honestly hyung, I’m way out of your league. Go back to your mangas and hang out with people of your age. Oh wait, I forgot you have no friends.”

The evil words that had fallen from Sungjong’s pretty lips were burned into his mind. Even today, he could repeat them, word for word. 

At times when his mind was being mischievous, it would play back Sungjong’s voice from eight years ago, saying the hurtful things that had reduced him to pieces. Before that, he had never known that words could physically hurt.

Sungjong’s words had been like arrows, all aimed at his heart. In the background, Munsoo’s guffaws had punctuated Sungjong’s sentences.

Munsoo had been the popular kid at school, so of course he had been Sungjong’s type. How had he been so blind to see it?

Sungjong would always drop his hand whenever there were people around them and they never hung out in front of his friends. In the seven days that they had gone out, Sungjong had maneuvered carefully so as not to be seen with him. That would have put a dent in his status at school. And there Myungsoo was, actually hoping for something permanent between them.

They say love is blind, I was so blind.

“I’m not saying what he did, what we did, was right,” Munsoo whispered quietly, his face overhung with shadows. His eyes were fixed at his plate. “But it was my fault too and Sungjong doesn’t deserve-”

“What’s your deal?” the editor cut across his brother irately. How could his own brother be defending what Sungjong had done when he had been there to witness all of it, when he had been a part of it? Why was he all of a sudden on Team Sungjong?

“Hyung, I know what he did was horrible, you can hate what he has done, his actions, but not him. Can’t you see he regrets it? He’s not the same person. He wouldn’t even look into my eyes anymore.”

Myungsoo said nothing. There was a possibility that he was still feeling angry because of what he had seen upon his arrival at the restaurant. He just couldn’t accept it for some reason. And he regretted his sudden outburst. It was his aim to show that he wasn’t the pathetic person he used to be, pining about lost love.

I have moved on. Why can’t I just act like it?

He needed something to turn this around, to prove to his brother that he wasn’t still nursing Sungjong’s footsteps on his heart.

“I’m getting married. I’m going to propose to Jiyeon tomorrow,” he said solemnly, gulping down his wine in one go. He had finally decided and he was not going to back down from this, not this time. Right after this, he was going to call up Jiyeon, tell her to meet him tomorrow. He was done with all this. No one could label him as a pathetic broken-hearted lover – everyone, Sungjong, and Munsoo and everyone else would know that he had the strength to move on.

For some reason, Munsoo didn’t look surprised by the news. Raising his wine glass at his brother, he said, with a small smile, “Congratulations! Mom and dad will be happy to know that they have at least one son who will be able to give them grandchildren.”

Myungsoo, who was refilling his glass with wine, stopped midway.

“Hold on, I thought you told mom that you broke up with Sungjong because you realized you’re into girls.”

Heaving a deep sigh, Munsoo covered his face with his hands, resting his elbows on the table. There was a moment’s silence, after which he replied, “It was just an excuse. I wanted to get away from it all, from Sungjong. I was stupid, letting him go just like that. Truth is,” he looked at his brother through his fingers, “I love Sungjong so much. I love him a little bit more every day.” Sighing again, he leaned back on his chair, running his fingers through his hair. “You wanted to know why I’m back, this is why. I want Sungjong back.”

There was silence for a minute during which Myungsoo downed another glass of wine like it was water. Pouring himself another measure, he said in a steady voice, “And how does Sungjong feel about you?”

His brother shook his head.

“I don’t know but he has to feel something for me…he used to love me.”

In his head, he heard the words differently –he used to love me, not you. Something scorched his insides, he had to do something about it.

“Let me tell you this Munsoo, if you’re my brother, if you care for me even a little, do not go near Sungjong. Forget him, find someone, anyone, I don’t care, a guy, a girl, whatever. But if we are family, don’t you dare-”

His brother looked shocked as he gaped at him.

“But why?”

His face hardened. “Because I said so.”

“Hyung, why? I love him.”

“He doesn’t deserve you, so don’t. If you bring Sungjong back into your life again, lose my number and forget that I’m your brother.”

His breathing was shallow as he watched with concentration the changes in expression on Munsoo’s face. He had a difficult decision to make; it could change a lot of things. Myungsoo, on the other hand, was satisfied by his performance. He couldn’t let Sungjong have a happy ending with Munsoo, not after what he had done. Hadn’t Sungjong being with Munsoo the very reason why his heart had been crushed? He couldn’t just let it happen, again. This wasn’t about him, this was about the rules of nature, this was about karma. Sungjong did not deserve happiness.

“Remember, Munsoo,” he warned once again, feeling horribly empty inside, like he had just sold his soul.

A/N: Personally, I'm very proud of this chapter title. It's my most favorite chapter title evaaaar!