Somebody said once that a friend is the person you can call up at 4AM. Well, in this case he didn’t have to call up but just get into my room and stir my blankets until he managed to get inside my bed. I limited to sight and tried to look like I was sleeping but it was obvious that no person in this world could be sleeping with the earthquake Hanbin was. Well, maybe Chanwoo, you could be setting the house on fire and I’m sure he would be sleeping, dreaming about saunas or a kitchen filled of freshly made food.

-What do you want at this hour, Hanbin. Can you just let me sleep and tomor…

-I’ve got a date!- he interrupted. And I tried to stay calm and fake a big smile on my face that he could not see because it was dark and, for God’s sake, I wanted to sleep.

-Good for you.

-C’mon! Jiwon… I lied. I told him that I wanted to help you with your date and for that you needed my support and…

-Wawawawait- I instantly straighten my body and looked at him. Even if my room was dark and the only thing that could give me a clue of where Hanbin was, was the light coming from outside I could feel his eyes upon me and his puppy face.

Along the years he learnt that, every time he decided to use that look, he could get everything he wanted from me. And it was kind of a because I really wanted to say ‘no’ most of the time. But who could say no to that pair of lovely eyes looking straight to your soul?

-Pleeeeeeeeeeeease.

-I don’t understand… Hanbin… why did you lie? I can’t go with you in a date with your… did you say ‘him’?

-I thought we went along that topic long time ago.

-You’ve always dated girls.

-But I like boys and you already knew that.

I did. I know inside myself I did; and sometimes it hurt a little because I loved him more than anyone in this world. I wished Hanbin didn’t like anything so he could stay that gold forever.

Robert Frost wrote that poem I always remembered when Hanbin and I got into those deep-philosophic chats. Hanbin is a person with a quite lovely personality and most of the time I thought that he was made inside of candyfloss or something like that. I mean… is not like he’s overflowing situations with flowers, pink and , but he’d always made people feel less serious and… well, maybe I mean blue. I don’t know, I don’t know exactly how to describe my best friend even though I’ve spent four years by his side now. This is coming out of my mind the way it is said, and I swear for God this kid is strange and sometimes irritating and demanding but… when he smiles is like switching on the light of the room you’ve been stuck for hours in darkness.

So, I mean… he’d always been that dork which purpose is to debut and eat most of the time. No hours left but two or three in which we both leaned on one another and talked about things. Not important things sometimes, and some other pretty scary and sad. There were those moments which I thought ‘we should stay like this forever’, talking without breath or not talking at all. It didn’t matter; his presence was the one that made me think about Robert Frost’s poem. All the time: his gaze, his smile, his cheering attitude… the flame behind his eyes. Hanbin made it all look easy, and ‘his all’ made me think about his goldness.

I stayed quiet for some time, trying to think straight. I have to say I was an impulsive person; if the one sitting there had been Junhoe or Yunhyeong… even Jinhwan, I wouldn’t have had to think about it. But it was Hanbin, my leader, my best friend; and I couldn’t help but to contain the air in my lungs and then let it scape again.

-We should talk about this tomorrow morning.

-It is tomorrow morning! Please… say yes. I need it.

-Hanbin… -My voice sounded like an older brother. He used to be the one taking care of me, taking care I wouldn’t get hurt or sad or taking wrong decisions. He was my mentor, making my path alongside with me. I didn’t know when it had changed and I was the one trying to endure all the things changing around us.- can you tell me where the hell will I get a date? You kiddin’ me, buddy?

-You owe me one! I’ve been giving you the last piece of chocolate for two months. And I let you go earlier while training! Please… do this for me. Just for once.

I wished I had said ‘no’.

But… you know? That ing little-puppy-look made my decision process shake a little.

So… there was that boy Hanbin was chasing after for almost four months. Most people would think ‘four months is nothing’ but it is, I mean, we’re nineteen and eighteen, nobody cares about five-year relationships. It was all about that boy being cute and hot and I had to deal with that ty-stuff for long until The Day came.

My best friend was walking around my room changing clothes for almost two hours and meanwhile I faked a smile and waited with my baggy pants and shirt trying not to fall asleep. He was muttering things I didn’t hear because… honestly? I didn’t want to hear them. Like a father, I couldn’t stand the fact my little boy had grown up, and I wasn’t aware of why, or maybe I knew it but didn’t want to think about it. You shouldn’t force yourself thinking about things you already know you don’t want to hear.

-How do I look? –Hanbin turned to me with a new shirt. It was grey and plain this time. It didn’t match with his trousers but it was like… the seventh time he changed his clothes? And…

-You’re ugly with that.

Of course, my mouth run faster than my head and Hanbin stared at me progressively frowning.

-Well… have you seen yourself? Your birth certificate is an apology from the factory.

-Ouch. Shots received, man.

We both laughed for a while and then he changed again into that tartan shirt he abandoned in second place.

Since the day I said ‘yes’ to that crazy idea of double date, I had a plan. I couldn’t date anyone because I don’t have that nature of flirting around everyone. I don’t know about love, well, maybe I do, but I can’t date people if I don’t like them. I had a girlfriend when I was eight and it was a school-break affair I can’t remember anymore. It still hurts the way she left me because Jack had dinosaur-printed cookies.

I may say I had no experience in love field and still I managed to look like I knew it all. Hanbin was the only one I had purely and entirely loved in my whole life. I still don’t know if it was the love he felt for that supposed hot guy or just the love you feel for somebody you care. The only thing I know is that I felt it inside my bones, making me shake sometimes, making me angry when all our conversations ended up in the name of that subject. I didn’t want to hear about him, about his eyes, his body, his smile, his personality. I knew I wasn’t that great and never ever gonna be like that dude, and it still made me sick to hear about him everytime we went out to take a coke or mess around our neighborhood.

That’s why I started hating the guy without knowing him. I judged him because I was jealous and knew I couldn’t be hot, have a nice body or smile, or personality or eyes. In short: I was ugly.

‘Why should I care about this anyway?’ I told myself while walking to the gym. No, I wasn’t an exercise-lover but I had no choice but to write my name in one to try at least to get a nice body. ‘Hanbin doesn’t care about my body or my eyes or that , I don’t know Jiwon, you should be working instead of worrying about what your best friend thinks of you’.

Was my best friend opinion the thing that was driving me mad? At all.

And yeah, I was jealous. So what. I couldn’t do anything about it. I was completely engaged with being hot and the plan came when I realized I couldn’t go any further with my mentality.

I avoided Hanbin’s question about my date, about how was she or her name. My clothes, my plans… I preferred to hear him talking about the dude and leave me alone so I hadn’t to explain him how much it hurt to feel obliged to date someone you don’t care about.

My moral didn’t let me do it. I was going on a double date with a man I hated for no reason and my best friend who I was deep in love with.

Wait. What have I said?

Well, it doesn’t matter. I was in love with him. Not in the meaning I wanted to buy him flowers or chocolate, but the love you feel for the person you care the most. I didn’t want him to get hurt, I loved him. I was in love with our friendship.

-I think I love him, Jiwon- he told me while we were sitting on the couch one of those tiring days. He had his back against my chest and I could smell his shampoo and the scent of his deodorant. Those things sound like I was a psychopath or something. I liked his smell the most and made me feel okay.

-Hm?- I answered without even hear what he was saying.

-I’ve said I love him. I mean… do you know what it is to have that person listening to you all the time? He just stares at me and smiles like I was the most beautiful person in the world. And after I finish speaking he says so. And then he takes my hand and gives me advice and… Gosh, I love him.

I stood in silence, unable to say a word. I felt like, if I said something, the wrong answer would come out my mouth. I was looking at the mole in his neck and wanted to touch it, so many times I did it hiding my intentions of just touching his skin. He was soft, as I’ve always thought.

-That’s cool, man.

Hanbin turned and looked at me a bit confused.

Well, I said I knew the words chosen would be the wrong ones.

-Did you say ‘that’s cool’?

-Ahm… did I?

He got up, inexplicably angry with me and turned when he was in the center of the living room. At first he was looking at the window or something behind it, and it took me some time to realize he was actually staring at my reflection in the glass. Maybe he did see something different about my face or movements or just my confused expression. I was still trying to find the correct words and I had no experience in those situations so I just found myself against a mental wall. 

-You’re my best friend and the only thing you can say is ‘that’s cool’. What’s wrong with you? You’ve been acting weird for weeks and I don’t know what you think. Are you angry at me? Did I do something wrong? How can you just say that when I’m opening my heart to you and…

-I’m happy for you- my words came out of the blue, strong and clear; and even so, they sounded warm and calmed.

And I was. I was happy for him because I knew that’s what a friend has to feel for his best friend when he’s happy. When someone you love is happy, then you have to be happy.

I wanted Hanbin to be okay, to feel okay with himself and I was proud of him admitting those feelings and having someone that cared about him as he said the dude did.

Yeah, I was happy. But, as Jeanette Winterson said once, happy is an adult word. You don’t have to ask a child about happy, you see it. They are, or they are not. Adults talk about being happy because largely they are not. Talking about it is the same as trying to catch the wind… much easier to let it blow all over you.

So I was being an adult. I was faking I knew about happiness but didn’t. My happiness was with my best friend and, as he was smiling, I knew my words were the happiness a child might feel. I made him happy. So… that’s everything I needed.

The Day came before I could even notice. As I said, I wasn’t a boi so my plan… well, I’m saying it was a plan but actually it all consisted in going there and say the girl or boy (I hadn’t decided yet) jilt me the day before and I felt bad declining the offer and leaving them alone. I could do that, I mean, I could have said ‘she/he left me, now you two go alone’ and meanwhile stay at home faking some kind of heartbreaking. Instead I preferred to go there and poke around that man while creating a huge great story about the hoe who left me alone the night before.

I left with Hanbin at eight o’clock making our way to a restaurant near the Han River. Everything around there was expensive and it didn’t matter, we had good wages, specially Hanbin and I. We both worked hard for months and had our hours well-paid, in exchange of a good amount of time in front of papers and and shouting and training and… well, y’know, that stuff. What I mean is that, it wasn’t a problem. Money. The big problem for me was investing my free time in meeting the guy that was banging my best friend. If they did, I didn’t want to ask Hanbin about that. There is a law between best-friend men that says you cannot ask about that if the other person hasn’t said anything about it yet. It is written between ‘when a stall bathroom is already occupied, a man choosing an open bathroom stall should take the farthest stall from that occupied stall’ and ‘any dispute should try to be settle by a game of rock, paper, and scissors’. And trust me; the first one is really important. Pretty annoying when you’re peeing and somebody walks in, peeing right next to you.

My buddy was nervous and it was a feeling filling the air. Hanbin was pretty annoying when he was nervous but it made me feel great. Everything he did made me feel ok. Have I said he is like an earthquake? Well, he is.

-How was his name again?- I asked, trying to hide a superior smile that saw the light right after my words.

-You tryin’ to piss me off?

I laughed the way to that restaurant and waited outside sitting on a half meter wall next to the park. Some people were walking through the riverbank and I imagined the two of us expending our time together like that, holding hands with nothing else to do but to listen the silence growing between us. A good silence, I mean those you enjoy because it means everything is okay.

Hanbin walked around constantly, checking his phone over and over. Moving from one side to another and then coming back to where I was. He sometimes kept looking up at me like if I had all the answers, thinking I wasn’t perceiving his gaze. I pretended not to see and not the care; however, as time passed, I started worrying about him. Not about what could have happened but about my buddy.

-Hanbin. Stop. You’re giving me a headache.

-He’s not answering the phone calls- he said instantly- or the messages. What if something has happened?

I looked at him a bit concerned. Hanbin was beautiful that night. Well, he was every night, but I mean he was spectacular with his skinny jeans and the shirt and the hair brushed back… I don’t know what made me think he was actually hot and I hated myself for thinking about those things in that moment. Even frowning and with that grin he was actually the most beautiful human being that had ever crossed my sight.

And I’m saying that as a friend.

-He’s probably in a traffic jam. Calm down.

While I was saying that, I wondered if maybe the dude saw a photo of me and got scared. Or maybe he knew I liked my best friend and he was actually a duff and could do nothing else and decided to step aside and let me take care of Hanbin.

I mean, I didn’t like him I just cared about him.

-If he was, he would be answering. Jiwon…

He was about to say something just before the song of Hanbin’s mobile phone rang. I didn’t move neither say anything. I heard his voice, getting further from where I was. I didn’t dare to move because maybe Hanbin wanted to be left alone with his boyfriend or whatever the that man was, and trying to find a solution for the delay.

And I realized as Hanbin was walking away, that it was exactly the thing that was scaring me to death: Losing him.

Because Hanbin was made of gold, but nothing gold can stay. The poem said so. If Hanbin had to change, I had to change too. I had to be with him, by his side. He was my best friend, my buddy, my everything. I couldn’t let him go away, take those steps, answer the phone of that jerk. For God’s sake, I knew he wasn’t in a traffic jam. Nobody stays in a traffic jam and doesn’t make a call. It was a jilt; that piece of stole my story. And it’s fine to stand me up but nobody does so with my best friend.

I saw Hanbin shouting to the phone; move his hands all over his face in desperation. I could hear his trembling voice talking to the phone and trying to find an answer to the ‘why’ dancing around his head. I felt the same he did; I could hear his thoughts from where I was.

Nothing could stop my desire to punch that prick in the face and destroy his bastard until there was nothing left of him. Because Hanbin was crying and nobody makes him cry, I’ve said nobody.

I wanted to move, to go there and shatter the mobile phone. Just throw it into the Han River and make sure that motherer wasn’t able to call again.

My best friend stood in the middle of the street. He had stop talking and was looking shocked his screen. I wondered if it was the moment to stand up and go there, and I wanted to… yet my toes didn’t move from where they were.

The boy started slowly walking. I thought he was going to scape and go home, maybe take a walk. On the contrary he was coming over and reaching the place where I was still sit. There was that trace on his cheeks of tears drying and I wanted to touch him, to hug him and promise him that everything would be okay if the two of us stick together.

I was tired of trying to hold things together that cannot be held. There was nothing I could say to make him feel happy. I was tired of trying to control what cannot be controlled. Tired of denying myself what I wanted for fear of breaking things I cannot fix. All those things would break no matter what I do; the proof of it was Hanbin’s heart.

I loved him. And not as a friend only.  

-He… he… break…

I didn’t let him say anything else. I jumped off the little wall and rushed to wrap my arms around his body. His smell came fast, mixed with the flavor of salt when I kissed one of his wet cheeks. Even sad, he was still perfect.

‘God…’ I thought to myself ‘If you knew how perfect you are you wouldn’t be crying for that douche’.

I my hands all over Hanbin’s hair, playing with some tufts between my fingers. His hair was also soft, like his skin. And I couldn’t help but to touch his cheeks, his neck, all of him. I needed to make him feel loved, because I loved him.

-This is a cliché… but I love you, and everything is gonna be fine.

And I meant it. I loved him. So much it hurt inside my bones and organs. I could hear a voice at the back of my brain laughing because I knew it all this time and couldn’t accept it. Maybe if I had said it earlier this could have been avoided, but nothing could guarantee that Hanbin loved me the same way.

I wanted to tell him that I was that type of guy. But I wasn’t.

Hanbin liked the guy who was listening to him all the time but I couldn’t listen to him more than three minutes because my eyes started going all over his face and his body thinking he was a treasure. And I could fake I was listening and tell him he was the most beautiful person in the world but I’d be lying. Hanbin was perfect, not beautiful: perfect. He had everything a person could dream about. He wanted the dude saying he was beautiful but I wasn’t the type of saying those things aloud because those are my secrets, my thoughts, and once he looked up at me, he’d know it because my dorky smile would tell him so. And I wouldn’t only take his hand but his whole body, covering him with mine trying to protect him from the world and the bad things. Yet I wouldn’t give him advices because he had to fight the world, and still he wouldn’t do it alone… I would be with him fighting the worst battles and supporting him in the easy ones. That’s what a friend does. That’s what somebody in love does.

-I love you too… I’m sorry. We can wait for your date if you want it.

A horselaugh came out of my mouth and I had to separate from him just few seconds.

-Sorry, I should have said it earlier. I don’t have a date- I said, smiling as wide as I could. His confused gaze made me laugh again still I managed to control my feelings and just take a deep breath.- I wanted to meet the guy and couldn’t date anyone to come here. That’s all.

-You saying you came here just to meet him?- his voice was still weak, I could feel he was about to cry again so I instantly reached his left cheek and touch it slowly to calm him down.

-Yeah, don’t you think I’m an amazing guy? You’re my date.

He punched my shoulder and then smiled. That smile… you know. That smile.

… he was amazingly beautiful.

-You idiot. Thank you.

-Thanks for what?

-Worrying.

I said nothing. Just curved my arm around his shoulders, resting some of my weight against his body and the same he did, just like we used to lay in our couch. We started walking, talking about some things that didn’t matter at all to get rid of the situation and the tears. And I wanted to say all the things I needed to say, confess that love that I had been feeling for long.

That night I saw Hanbin’s goldness disappearing into tears and then recovering it few hours later. I understood what Robert Frost wanted to say: ‘so dawn goes down to day’. Okay, Frost. I get it. Nothing gold can stay, but nothing gold disappears forever. That means maybe Hanbin was going to lose his goldness sometimes, but in the end I was the one thinking he was made of candyfloss inside.

So there we were, walking together: his arm around my waist and his chin resting on my shoulder. He was crying again, in silence. And I pretended not to hear and not to see.

I had the opportunity to say ‘hey dude, I love you. In a gay way, y’know, I want to kiss you and those things because I’ve been in love with you for so long’. I’m not a boi, I’m not the type of flirting around, and that’s why I don’t know how to treat boys or girls.

I didn’t want a relationship of four months because we’re eighteen and nineteen. I didn’t want a five-year relationship either. I wanted one to last a lifetime. And for that, you don’t need to kiss or to have relations or that stuff. You just need to sit down next to the person you love, take his or her hand, firmly. You can’t let them scape. Make them know you’re always gonna be there. That’s what friends do. What buddies do. What buddies do.

Someone said once you have to confess because you can lose your opportunity if you don’t do it.

But also, once, somebody said that sometimes being a friend means mastering the art of timing. There is a time for silence. A time to let go and allow people to hurl themselves into their own destiny. And a time to prepare to pick up the pieces when it's all over.

I know I made big mistakes I'm not even aware of. Remember I am not an english speaker 8(

Hope you guys enjoyed it! thank you for reading!