He tapped Taek’s shoulder. He pointed to a paper above the coffee display. Written on the paper with bold letters was “VENDING MACHINE UNDER REPAIR”. Taek sighed, feeling disappointed. He turned to Jung Hwan and smiled brightly, “Jungpal-ah, what are you doing here?” Grabbing Taek’s luggages, he answered, “Picking you up. Come on, I treat you to coffee. Hyung told me there is a new coffee shop opened in Insadong.”

Taek followed Jung Hwan to his Jeep. He had a feeling he knows what made Jung Hwan come. He opened the door and jumped inside. Jung Hwan started driving, but no words exchanged between them. They always like this. Both are the more quiet kids of the bunch. Sun Woo and Dong Ryong talked a lot, so he almost never had a silent moment with them. Different with Jung Hwan, they usually spent time together quietly, enjoying the comfortable silence. With Jung Hwan, he could never guess what he was thinking about. Jung Hwan is quiet, unpredictable but affectionate.  

After not too long, they arrived at the coffee shop. It was a small but nice coffee shop. Dominated with color brown and red for the furnitures, definitely a nice place to have a cup of coffee. Might be because it was a newly opened coffee shop, but they seemed to be the only customers. Jung Hwan chose to sit beside the window, gesturing to Taek to take a seat in front of him.

A waiter came, and after placing their order, Jung Hwan asked, “Did you have a good trip?”

Taek nodded, “Yes, I slept the entire train ride.”

“Did you win?”

“Yes, I won,” Taek answered. He leaned his body to the chair, and folded his hands on his thigh, “But, did you pick me from station only to asked these? You could call or page me.”

Jung Hwan smiled nervously, “Yah, can’t I just see you? I just came back from Sacheon this morning, I haven’t change out of my uniform yet but I miss you so much I go straight to your house and Ahjumma said you supposed to come home from your competition in Busan today. So I decided to save your money on taxi’s fare and pick you up.”

Taek stared at him, not believing his excuse. The waiter came and served their drinks. Jung Hwan took a sip of his hot cappuccino, the sweet and bitter taste calmed him a little. He figured Taek didn’t believe his excuse. Taking a deep breath, he decided to tell him straight to the point. “Deok Seon and I….” he stopped to see Taek’s expression, but as usual Taek has a blank expression, “….we are dating now.”

Taek heart sank. He didn’t know what to say, his face is still on his poker face mode. He just nodded and said, “Oh.”

Jung Hwan stirred his cup of cappuccino, avoiding to see Taek’s face. “You are the first to know. We just started dating two weeks ago. The last time me and Deok Seon came home on break. The night after our last get together.”

Taek remembered. The gang had a drink night without him. He initially intended to join. But Deok Seon rejection the other day made him hesitant. He thought he couldn’t act normally around her, and he didn’t want the other guys found out about his rejected confession, yet. He thought he needed to avoid Deok Seon for a while, to clear his mind and heart from the thought of her. At the end, he contacted Sun Woo and faked a sudden company dinner. He figured it was the night Jung Hwan meant.

“I hope you could give your blessing to us,” said Jung Hwan softly. “Because you are an important person for Deok Seon and I.”

Taek chuckled, “Yah, am I her Dad or what? Why would you ask for my blessing?”

Jung Hwan stared right at Taek’s eyes, “Because you also love Deok Seon.”

“I already got rejected.”

“I know.”

“You know and you still asked me?” Taek shook his head, “Jungpal-ah, you are so cruel to a man who just got rejected.”

“I want you to be the first to know. Your blessing is really important to me. You are my friend, and also Deok Seon’s friend. I need to make sure that our relationship won’t change, just because I’m dating Deok Seon. I don’t want to hurt anybody.”

Taek hit Jung Hwan’s arm playfully, “Don’t worry. I’m not going to stop hanging out with you all just because you date Deok Seon.” He smiled apologetically, “Me too, has something to apologize to you.”

“Do you know that a person’s feeling could be seen from the eyes? Especially when they’re looking to a person they loved. Six years ago, I ignored the look you had in your eyes when you see Deok Seon. It confused me, I didn’t know what should I do from knowing that my friend also like the girl I liked. Should I continue to pursue her? Or should I step aside and gave up my feeling?

After I found out about the picture on your wallet, I decided to wait. I believe that our friendship is more important than my feeling. But then I started to notice small things about Deok Seon. Like the way she talked to each of us. The way she took care of us. The way she dressed, smiled and laughed. It was different. She looked at you differently than the rest of us. She always put on make up and wore nice clothes when you came home from your training base. As the years gone by, I was certain she also loves you.

But then I got scared and greedy. I couldn’t stand the thought of her in another man’s arm, even if it was you. Then you started dating other girls, and only I could see the hurt in her eyes. She also started going on blind dates. I started asking her out to eat and watch movie together. She always happily accepted my offer, so I thought I had a chance and we were making progress. You already got girlfriends, I thought you already gave up on her. I decided to pursue her slowly, I determined to make her see myself as a man and not a mere friend. But she always fly in and out of the country it became hard to meet her, and if she came home, she had blind dates. Me too, always having matches, so I thought, it was just not the right time yet to confess.    

And when I heard she being ditched by her boyfriend, I felt relieved and also scared. Because I saw how you looked at her. With you being in the same town as her, I know you could pursue her again. I forfeited my match and met her at the concert. My only goal was I had to confess to her, to let her know my feeling. But when I saw her looking surprised that I came for her, I realize that she only had you in her heart. She never looked at me like she looked at you. She already chose you from the start. Knowing that was my last chance, I braved my heart to be rejected. Finally I confessed my feeling.” Taek hold out a long sigh, feeling relived after pouring his heart’s contents for years. His eyes hot from all the emotion he felt.

Jung Hwan listened to the story with heavy heart. He never knew Taek’s feeling to Deok Seon was very strong. He thought Taek would pursue Deok Seon, that’s why he decided to fold his feeling and dated other girls instead. He did feeling curious why Taek and Deok Seon hadn’t date each other yet. The misunderstanding had finally resolved after six years. It took a long time, but at the end they are all happy. He wondered what would happen if he decided to ignore Taek’s feeling and ask Deok Seon out six years ago. Would they still date? Would their relationship with the others changed?  

Taek had his head down, and spoke softly, “I’m sorry, Jungpal-ah. I made you and Deok Seon apart for so long.”

Jung Hwan didn’t say anything for a while. He smiled and said, “Thank you for telling me this, Taek-ah. Honestly, didn’t it all turn out for the better? If I dated Deok Seon six years ago, I don’t think we would last long, given our personality and young age. Now we are together, but we already more mature and ready. Right now is the right timing for us.”

Timing is a wicked thing, Taek thought. Even with right timing, you couldn’t exclude fate as the major factor in life. Choi Taek might have the right timing, but in the end, Deok Seon didn’t fated to love him more than a friend. He smiled at Jung Hwan gratefully, “Thank you Jung Hwan-ah.”

The comfortable silence they always had when they are together has engulfed them once again. Both are busy in their own thoughts, their coffees forgotten.  

“By the way, at the train station just then, did you really not see the paper saying the machine is under repair?” asked Jung Hwan suddenly, genuinely curious.

Taek nodded, “I didn’t see it.” He leaned back at his chair and sighed disappointedly, “I really want to drink the coffee, though. I think I already tried 10 times before you came.”

Jung Hwan laughed and hit Taek’s arm playfully, “Persistent bastard. As expected from Choi Taek 8-Dan.”

Taek smiled widely. They already joked around now, he knew they will be fine and nothing would change. About his feeling to Deok Seon, he will get over it soon. For now, he might be still heartbroken. But he knew Jung Hwan, he knew there will be no other guy who could love Deok Seon as strong as Kim Jung Hwan. The Jung Hwan who never stopped loving Sung Deok Seon, and had to fold his feeling because of him. After the pain he caused them he felt sorry, and as a friend, he wished nothing but happiness for both of them.

“Yah, Jungpal-ah.”

“Hmm?”

“Be good to Deok Seon. If you fought, I will take her side for sure.”

Jung Hwan choked from his coffee. He let out a little cough and stared at Taek nervously. No matter what, Taek had feeling for Deok Seon almost as long as him, he couldn't help but feeling worry..

As if knowing his worry, Taek smiled teasingly. He sipped his coffee and in his poker face, said matter-of-factly, “She will hit us if we don’t take her side, anyway. So you should be good to her.” He fold his arms on the table and leaned closer, in a serious tone he said, “For the sake of our bodies.”

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I'm sorry I couldn't update sooner. Things at work really took a lot of my time.

For this chapter, I try to incorporated important scenes between Jung Hwan and Taek. In the drama, Taek visited Jung Hwan's training base for a man to man conversation. But Jung Hwan dismissed the talk from early on, refusing to talk about his feeling. I don't like he was being so afraid to speak about his feeling. So in this story I switched it. Jung Hwan took Taek to a cafe, and having a man to man conversation they should've had it years ago. Well, I finished writing this chapter at 2.13am and I need to catch up some sleep before I had to go to work in a few hours. 

Enjoy!