“I’m tired, Jongin,” Kyungsoo says and proceeds to loudly sob into the younger’s sharp shoulder blade. His jaded words are accompanied by spontaneous hiccups and short breaths. His worn out sobs sound broken and hollow, a perfect description of how Kyungsoo feels this exact moment.  “I am just so tired. I-I don’t think I can stay there anymore.”

“Shh,” Jongin soothingly whispers whilst trying to comfort the elfin man in his arms; it seems like he was made to be there judging by the way he fit so perfectly in his arms. Oh how blind Kyungsoo was to his feelings.

Jongin had tried to express his affection for the man in every way; he treated the man like a prince, he succumbed to everything he asked for, but there was one thing he couldn’t do and that was to express his feelings with words. Every time he tried, the words he would struggle to cough out would tangle up in his throat like a knot and would effortlessly roll to the pit of his stomach with a deep gulp. They say actions speak louder than words, but Kyungsoo was the naïve type, he was the type that needed to have everything spelled out for him to finally understand what something meant.

“Don’t stay there then. You can stay with me.”

“You and I both know we can’t do that, Jongin.” Kyungsoo exhales an empty laugh and once again lays his head on his best friend’s shoulder. His tears have stopped. “Stop being ridiculous.”

“I’m serious, hyung,” Jongin says with his tone void of any hint of humor. “How am I being ridiculous? You always tell me how tired you are and how much it hurts, and yet when I offer you an opportunity, an opportunity to get out of there, an opportunity to run away, you bail. Tell me, how am I being ridiculous? You can’t let those people hurt you anymore!”

‘It doesn’t just hurt for you, it hurts for me too. Every time I see those bruises on your beautiful face, every time I see those tears, it tears me apart inside,’ is what Jongin wants to add to his rant, but just like all the other times he’s tried to tell Kyungsoo exactly how he feels, he decides to keep it to himself. Instead, he settles with asking, “Just what are you so afraid of?”

Kyungsoo sneakily tries to shift his gaze away from Jongin’s strong one but his head is forcefully pulled back to his previous position by a pair of roughly calloused hands. His eyes fall downcast and Kyungsoo suddenly finds the cuticles of his plain fingernails interesting.

“Tell me,” Jongin sternly commands.

“I don’t want to be a bother to you.” The bruised boy soon admits with shame evident in his tone.

“Bull,” he roughly curses, tiny particles of spit involuntarily flying out of his mouth. “You and I both know that’s bull. I wouldn’t ask you to stay with me if I find your presence a bother. You know I’m not that kind of person, I’m not like you, hyung,” Jongin sneers and Kyungsoo subtly flinches at his statement.

He flinches because he knows it’s true. He knows that not wanting to be a bother to Jongin was an excuse, utter bull. He knows that Jongin wasn’t like him; he knows that Jongin wasn’t a people pleaser who always put everyone’s needs above his. Jongin wasn’t like him. Jongin was never and will never be like him, he wasn’t weak.

 “And I would love to have you here. I live alone, you know that. And it’s getting kind of lonely in here.” Jongin stops talking for a while and just stares at the dainty man in front of him, he watches Kyungsoo fidget and play with his fingers as his round eyes constantly wander the marbled floor lying beneath their feet. Jongin waits, and steel silence envelopes them as the younger of the two gives Kyungsoo the time to think before he tries again. “So what do you say?”

“I-I don’t know.” He hesitates.

“Hyung,” Jongin sighs and pulls his shoulder –that Kyungsoo was currently lying on- away to grab his face so that he was staring right at him, he stares hard at Kyungsoo’s eyes, hoping his hopeful gaze would convey the message he wanted to say just in case his words didn’t get through his best friend’s thick skull. “If you don’t have the guts to do this for yourself, do this for me too alright? I don’t want to see your face bruised up or wet with tears anymore, okay? I see the cheap makeup you use to cover it up. And believe me, cheap hooker makeup does not suit you,” he chuckles lightly, trying to liven up the serious atmosphere. It doesn’t help. The light smile Jongin forces on his face slowly fades away and he turns serious again. “It kills me to see you like this. I want to see that clean face again, one that isn’t adorned with bruises and cuts.” Jongin’s fingers slowly traces Kyungsoo’s face, starting from the bridge of his nose to his cupid’s bow to his cheeks. Jongin lightly rubs his thumb against the latter’s check and his light touch leaves a hot  and burning sensation against the latter’s skin, making Kyungsoo feel as if his skin has been torched by a candle. “So what do you say, hm?” His tone is less harsh and gentler this time.

Kyungsoo feels it again, the spell that only Jongin can cast on him. He feels himself getting swayed by Jongin’s persuasion like a sailor getting swayed by a siren. It was dangerous, it was risky, he knew there were going to be consequences, but he couldn’t bear to give a about that right now. Because all he cared about was now.

Jongin too, of course. Jongin was always etched on his mind like a barnacle, it was almost impossible to get rid of him there.

But no matter how hard he tried to think about now and only now(with the exception of Jongin), he couldn’t stop thinking and asking the tiny question regarding his future. “W-what if they find me?”

“They won’t. I’ll make sure they won’t.” He inspirits confidently. “Just trust me.”

“Hyung, I want you to single-handedly count how many stars there are up in the sky.”

“Are you stupid?” Kyungsoo lets out an airy chuckle and looks at Jongin as if he suddenly grew two heads. “That’s impossible.”

“Until the day you count how many stars there in the sky, that’s when I’ll stop loving you.” Jongin continues, disregarding the petite boy’s insult to his intelligence.

“You’re cheesy,” he teases and lets out a long pause. “But I like it. I love it,” he pauses once again before declaring, “no, I love you.”

“Look who’s the cheesy one now?” Jongin presses a soft kiss against the bridge of his lover’s nose and Kyungsoo allows his eyes to flutter shut, savoring the feeling of his boyfriend’s soft lips placed against his skin. They stay like that for awhile, silently enjoying each other’s presence without uttering a single word under the watchful eyes of a thousand blinding stars that light up the city sky.

“You lied.” Kyungsoo wistfully whispers through short ragged breaths and rivers of pain-filled briny tears. His hand is lightly placed on the circular doorknob and his black stretched silhouette is extended on the bedroom floor. A burst of scintillating light shimmers through the door, allowing him to see two people lying on his their bed. “You broke your promise.”

Jongin’s eyes widen at the unexpected –although not much since it was technically Kyungsoo’s room too- visitor to their shared bedroom. He hastily pushes himself off the girl under him and grabs his shirt off the nightstand in one quick motion. “Kyungsoo, no. It’s not what you think.” His voice sounds horrified, and Kyungsoo can’t help but wonder how many times he’s practiced that to pull it off perfectly.

“Oh, it’s exactly what I think.” The said man retorts in a disbelieving voice and proceeds to pivot on his heels to leave but then he hesitates. This movement of hesitation gives Jongin a second –a sliver of hope. Kyungsoo pauses for a while before he turns on his heels yet again and storms inside their bedroom. He knows exactly what it was; he even stayed there to make sure that his eyes weren’t the ones deceiving him.

“You.” Kyungsoo sharply points at the unknown girl who is currently trying to dress herself. He briefly ignores Jongin who is trying to talk to him and persuade him to believe that it wasn’t what it looked like, because Kyungsoo knows it’s exactly what it looks like. “Get the out of my bedroom.” Kyungsoo harshly behests with anger, but then he stops for a while and his head and rephrases himself. “No, get your dirty, ty out of my house. Right now.”

His glare looked so intense and petrifying that it made the girl run out in fear, still barely dressed. The smile that Jongin saw her wear earlier had clearly vanished in thin air. Once Kyungsoo hears the front door shut, he slams the bedroom door and locks it. Originally, Kyungsoo planned on leaving because he didn’t want to see both of them humping like a bunch of dogs in their bedroom but he couldn’t give Jongin the satisfaction of that. He didn’t want to give him what he expected. Plus, it was his damn room. It was his damn house. It was his ing apartment. Why did he have to leave his own apartment?

Kyungsoo angrily tugs at the soiled bed-sheets while Jongin noisily bangs his balled up fists on the bedroom door, begging him to let him in all the while apologizing, making the former tug at the spreadsheet with more force than he intended to use.

“Open the door!”

Jongin’s pleading words are left unheard as Kyungsoo cranks up the volume of the speakers and soon, loud blasting music spreads from the speaker to the walls of the room while he disinfects his bed and pillows. He was not one for cleanliness, as long as it didn’t stink and didn’t have bugs crawling around it, then it was fine,  but he definitely didn’t want to catch anything from the germs that harlot contracted. Plus, who know how many people Jongin has slept with while he was not around. Who knows how many times he’s been with other women or men while Kyungsoo was out, working or buying groceries for the both of them.

“Please. I’m sorry.” Jongin croaks out when his throat finally runs dry from all the screaming and beseeching. His fists are starting to hurt from all the pounding.  Speaking of pounding, his head was too from all the screaming, but he didn’t want to give up. “Kyungsoo, please. Please let me in.”

Kyungsoo closes his fist and brings it to his mouth, biting on it as he sits on the other side of the door where he could stay as close to Jongin without seeing him. He’s trying to keep his muffled cries to a minimum. His heart hurts. It hurts like a . After giving his all to Jongin, after trusting him, after leaving everything behind for him, it hurt. It hurt so badly. He sacrificed everything, even if it wasn’t his motive to leave everything in the first place because he didn’t know he loved him then, but he did everything he could for Jongin. He did everything that was in his reach for their relationship. It hurt to have everything he worked for vanish. Their relationship, gone in an agonizingly slow painful heartbeat.

Kyungsoo leans his head against the door and silently cries to himself with no one to swallow his cries for him. Although he disinfected every nook and cranny of the bed, he didn’t want to sleep there. He could just imagine all the things they could have done if he hadn’t interrupted them. The lights were closed and the room would be pitch-black if not for the moonlight illuminating through the skylight. Kyungsoo could see a few stars scattered around the city night sky. He felt himself grow drowsy and his eyes grow turn heavy after trying his best to count the stars within his sight. His head lulled back and forth as he tried to stay awake.

“I did it, I counted the stars,” he says before allowing himself to be engulfed by darkness and slowly drifted to a world where maybe he and Jongin would still be happy. “Maybe this is the day you stop loving me.”

That night, both men fell asleep with soaked tears on their faces and their backs against the door -a thick slab of wood separating them- with one of their heart reaching for the other while the other slowly pulled away.

“Kyungsoo,” Jongin croaks out to the shorter male through half lidded eyes smeared with sleep. He was awakened by the pain that shot through his head that connected with the floor caused by the door that was abruptly opened. His voice was deep and husky –Kyungsoo once said he loved Jongin’s voice when it was husky- and his fists were still red from knocking at the door so much. Bruises were starting to form on his knuckles. “Kyungsoo,” he reiterates.

Kyungsoo was surprisingly in a better state than Jongin. His hair was groomed, and it was a Friday which meant that he didn’t have work so he was dressed in a simple plain tee and sweats. Jongin used to say he liked that look on him because he seemed more laid-back and relaxed. Although it should be the opposite considering that Kyunsgoo was the one who was cheated on, and the person who cheats usually looks better than the cheated (at least that’s what Kyungsoo always believed), nevertheless, Kyungsoo looked better than Jongin -whose hair was disheveled and face looked all beaten up. 

Kyungsoo would have looked normal except for the red puffy eyes -a sign that he had been crying- and his stare that seemed to the life out of everyone.

The well groomed man stood on the island counter and sipped a glass of water –he never liked coffee in the morning- and kept his eyes fixed on the cool marbled table.

“Kyungsoo,” Jongin pleads, he was sitting on a chair that was right opposite of Kyungsoo.  It’s only been a few minutes since he’s woken up, and the only thing that escaped his lips so far had been his lover’s name, Kyungsoo. “Look at me.”

The said man follows the order and looks up, his gaze directly meeting Jongin’s and for a split second, his eyes falter, but it disappears before Jongin can even blink when his stare switches into a stoic gaze, something Jongin was not familiar with. They’ve had their fights, but not once did Kyungsoo ever look at him the harsh way he did now.

, I screwed up big time.

Jongin flinches under the piercing stare and allows his gaze to fall, it’s as if his eyes were penetrating his soul, reading every little sin and mistake that he ever committed, including the one that happened just yesterday.

“I’m so sorry, Kyungsoo. I don’t know what came over me,” he apologizes and tries his best to explain. “It’s just, I was out last night and Kris started to annoy me, he told me how whipped I was and how I became less of a man and stuff and you know me. You know me, right?” His voice never sounded so desperate and helpless before. “It damaged my pride. So he challenged me to pick up a girl and bring her home and I just couldn’t refuse it.” Jongin’s eyes travel up and Kyungsoo is still staring at him, his gaze looked like he was searching for a trace of lie in his eyes. He continued his story when Kyungsoo still looked skeptic. “Believe me; I wasn’t planning to take it that far. I was going to send her home right away but then she started being all aggressive and she pushed me onto the bed and I tried getting off of her but she pinned me down and when I rolled her over to get off first, you came in.”

“Hyung, say something,” Jongin implores. He couldn’t stand it when his boyfriend was this quiet; it scared him to no end.

“Tell me,” Kyungsoo starts with a calm spirit. Although his voice was not warm and welcoming and he didn’t use the tone he usually used with Jongin, the younger male took what he could get and was relieved when he spoke. He would rather be scolded than be punished silently. “Is your pride restored now? After what Kris said, about you being whipped,” He stops to raise two fingers to emphasize on the word, “-and damaging your pride, do you feel better now? Was that the actual reason you picked up the bet or was it because you were ashamed of being with me? Ashamed of being with a guy,” Kyungsoo pauses, his tone sounding as if he was disgusted when he said the word, “like me? Do you feel better now? Do you feel relieved after cheating on me with a mere stranger?”

Jongin’s eyes enlarges at this and immediately steps up to defend himself. “Hyung! You know that’s not the reason why I did that!”

“Lies!”

 Kyungsoo vociferates and sends the glass he was holding flying to the wall. The sound of glass shattering into tiny little pieces was muffled by his angry scream. He barely hears his loud voice though; the sound of his heart beating with pain fills his ears and drowns everything besides it. Kyungsoo feels as if he’s blinded pain, and the only thing he can see and hear is his heart wrenching in agony.

“Stop telling me lies, Jongin! Stop lying to me! Just admit it, you’re ashamed of me! You regret asking me to move in with you a few years ago! You regret loving me, Jongin! You don’t love me anymore. Stop telling me lies.” Kyungsoo’s chest heaves up and down as he tries to contain his anger, but all attempts were proved to be futile. “I felt it. I felt how distanced we were but I let it pass, because I thought it was just a phase, something we could get by if we tried hard enough, but I can’t let you lying to me pass! I can’t let you cheating on me pass. Just tell me the truth! I at least deserve the truth, Jongin! What happened to us? What made us this way? I gave up everything. I gave up everything I had because of you. I gave my all into loving you, I gave my ing all to you and tell me, Kim ing Jongin, tell me, is this what I get in return? ing lies and deceit?” Kyungsoo meant it to stop there. Actually, he wasn’t supposed to say anything in the first place but he couldn’t help it. “And you just couldn’t ‘refuse’ it?” he scoffed. “Cut the crap, Jongin. You could refuse it, you just didn’t want to. Because after all, every person is the same, right? Why go for one when you can have two?”

“Kyungsoo,” The sobbing male reaches out to clutch Kyungsoo’s hands but it’s not warm like it usually is. It’s cold. Just like the frost slowly lining up around Kyungsoo’s heart. “I’m sorry.”

“Last time I checked, I was the victim here. I was the one cheated on, not you.” Jongin shrinks at the older’s bleak words and hostile tone. “I just-“ Kyungsoo says with a pinch of vulnerability in it, “-I just can’t believe I trusted you.”

“I am so sorry, hyung.” That’s the only word Jongin can find in himself to say right now. Sorry.

“There’s no need to apologize,” Kyungsoo says, retracting his arm from Jongin’s warm palm and returns it to his side. His voice is masked with coldness, hiding the whirlpool of emotions deep inside. “There’s no need to apologize for something that can’t be fixed. Just save the energy.”

“No,” Jongin begs and shakes his head, looking up at Kyungsoo with clouded vision due to the tears obstructing his sight.

 His hand touches the table a couple of times, hoping to find his lover’s warm hands there like it usually is, but it isn’t there. Jongin can only feel the cold empty feeling of marble biting his skin. The words ‘please no’ and ‘hyung’ escapes his lips like a mantra, maybe saying it a thousand of times would actually keep this from happening.

 “This can be fixed. Please, hyung. I made a mistake, I know. I ed up, I now. But it can be fixed. We can fix it. Together.” His voice sounds so desperate, desperate for the reason of his well-being to stay.

 The very sight of Jongin crying and begging in front of him makes Kyungsoo’s heart ache. But no matter how hard he tries, he can’t bring it upon himself to give Jongin another chance. He can’t find it himself to love him again because it’s not there anymore. He knows it won’t be the same. Every time they would kiss, he would just imagine the girl perched on Jongin’s lap, kissing the daylights out of him. He would imagine where Jongin’s hands would roam like it did to Kyungsoo before, he would wonder where she touched, he would wonder how many times she would cross the boundary that only Kyungsoo could cross before. If they were together, he would just be reminded of that day and be in pain every time he sees him. Kyungsoo doesn’t think he can handle any more pain. He just can’t be with Jongin anymore. The very essence of their romance was gone.

And that’s when it hits Jongin. Like a ton of bricks, his sanity slowly crumbles down and that’s when he realizes that he finally pulled the trigger and forced Kyungsoo to give up on him.

“Don’t leave me, Kyungsoo. Don’t leave me. I- I love you.”

That was the last thing he could say to make Kyungsoo stay. Jongin regrets everything. He regrets not saying ‘I love you’ often. He regrets not cherishing the times they spent together. He regrets taking up the stupid bet. He regrets going out even though he repeatedly asked him to stay. He regrets being careless. He regrets wasting his chance with him.

“It’s too late, Jongin.” Kyungsoo whispers, his voice gruff and full of hurt. This time he was crying too. He couldn’t stop his voice from cracking at the last word, he couldn’t stop Jongin from cheating on him, and he couldn’t stop this relationship from ending. There’s a part of his chest that’s burning, aching, and although every part of his body is screaming at him, he hopes the pain would be temporary, he hopes the closing feeling in his chest would subside soon because he can’t take his words back now. He can’t allow them to go back to how they used to be.

 ‘Although it may not seem like it right now, it’s for the better good,’ Kyungsoo repeatedly tells himself this, hoping that it would stay etched in his mind. Because when time comes, and he knows it will, he will long for Jongin, and that line would serve as his remainder on why he left him in the first place, that line would keep him from crawling back to him.

It’s for the best.

Maybe he’d actually start to believe that one day.