Lee Jooheon was once again perched on the rooftop; his arms draped over his crouching knees and a black skeleton mask half covering his face as he stared up into the dim sky. Stars flickered across the swarm of darkness they called night, giving the shadowed Seoul a bit of radiance and hope.

It gave his shadowed heart a bit of hope. Despite the multiple piercings that ran up his left ear and the gothic, black clothes he always wore; despite the stink of alcohol and cigarettes which clung to his skin 24/7, Lee Jooheon still liked to do a bit of stargazing every now and then.

It reminded him of his childhood. Of Innocence. Of Baek Hyunju-

Rrring.

Speak of the devil.

Smirking as he pulled his phone out from the baggy pockets of the loose trousers he was wearing, Jooheon didn’t even have to look at the caller ID to know who it was.

“Yo, reddie.” Jooheon chuckled to himself silently of the genius nickname he gave the girl due to her dyed maroon hair, “I’m at the rooftop.”

Reddie – or, to be more precise, Baek Hyunju could be heard snorting from the other end of the line. Shuffling of footsteps and the sound of her overworn flip flops tapping against the floorboards could also be heard faintly in the background, and Jooheon didn’t need to ask to know that she was already on her way to join him.

“I bought some fried chicken and beer.” Hyunju’s voice was slightly throaty – she had caught a cold recently from stubbornly agreeing to Jooheon’s dare of swimming in the freezing ocean waters at 5am in the morning, “You know, from that drama ‘You who came from the stars’”

Jooheon rolled his eyes before hanging up on the girl. Despite her bold, red hair and sassy attitude, he knew she always had a soft spot for romantic things. Sometimes, Jooheon wondered whether he knew more about this girl over knowing about himself…heck, was there even anything that he didn’t know about Baek Hyunju?

“Hey.”

Jooheon snapped out of his daze and glanced up to see Hyunju standing beside him. As expected, she was wearing those faded green flip flops and was dressed casually in a white hoodie and blue jeans. In her hand held a bag of fried chicken and beer, and she placed the bag down before reaching in and handing a can of beer to Jooheon.

Taking it from Hyunju, Jooheon wordlessly opened the can and began drinking. Not really in the mood for fried chicken, he was contented with just the alcoholic drink and continued admiring the flickering stars above.

“There’s not many stars in Seoul, is there?” Hyunju was the one to break the silence, “compared to those times we went stargazing in Busan before.”

“Hmm...” Jooheon let out a small sigh at the mention of the place.

Busan.

His hometown…and the place he met Hyunju.

In the back of his memories, he could almost still reimage the transfer student from Seoul; a young girl of eight with long black hair and big round eyes who introduced herself to the class prettily.

“Hi, I’m Baek Hyunju,” The girl had declared brightly as the boys in the class whistled loudly over their new, dainty classmate. “And I like Busan better than Seoul because the stars in Busan are prettier.”

Her introduction struck Jooheon greatly. He too, was an admirer of stars. When his father would come home drunk and beat up him telling him how he was the cause of his mother’s death, Jooheon would try to numb the pain by catching glimpses of the starry sky whenever he could.

Whenever he saw those shining, glistening stars hovering delicately above everyone else, it would give him comfort that the smallest of things could still one day be on top of the largest of obstacles.

Though later in life when he grew older, Jooheon came to know that stars were actually massive substances of plasma only seen to be small due to the immense distance, but nevertheless, it didn’t stop Jooheon from enjoying the company of stars every once in a while.  

“Yah! Aren’t you going to eat the fried chicken?” Hyunju’s complaint brought Jooheon out from his running train of thoughts, “Do you know how expensive they were!?”

“Probably too expensive for a broke girl like you.” Jooheon snickered back in reply, earning himself a good smack from the said girl. Pouting cutely and obstinately, Hyunju let out a ‘harrumph’ before grabbing herself a piece and began nibbling away on the chicken, promptly deciding to ignore Jooheon for his rude comment.

Smiling to himself and shaking his head slightly at the stubbornness of the girl, Jooheon allowed himself to fall back into his thoughts.

It wasn’t until that night when he coincidently bumped into a sobbing Hyunju in the park did he actually got to know her. Despite the feeling of curiosity and attraction he had always felt towards the young girl, but due to her pretty looks and outgoing personality, and the fact that she came from Seoul, she had quickly become the ‘flower’ of the school. Which didn’t leave much chance for a scrawny, abused boy like Jooheon to go near her.

Henceforth that fated night, after running away from home in fear of being beat up by his father again, Jooheon was surprised to see Baek Hyunju sitting at the end of the slide crying to herself. At first, Jooheon was scared to approach her, but when she muttered the following words: “Aren’t you going to come and comfort me?” Jooheon found himself sitting down next to her and awkwardly patting her back.

He later found out that the reason why she came to Busan wasn’t really because Busan had prettier stars. It was because her father’s business had gotten bankrupt, and her parents had sent her over to Busan in order to live with her uncle.

“But,” Hyunju had said, “I wasn’t lying when I said Busan had prettier stars.”

Thus began their journey as stargazing buddies, as best friends…which then developed gradually into love.

The two were seventeen when Jooheon decided to confess to her.

It was a starry night. The stars seemed to glow more brightly than ever and his heart seemed to beat twice as faster as he awaited for Hyunju to make her way up to the rooftop. He held a guitar in his hand and was prepared to sing her a song.

When Hyunju arrived, everything went according to plan. Though he had a few off-tune notes here and there due to his nerves, and maybe stammered a bit during his confession, but in the end, Hyunju embraced him and whispered an excited “yes” in his ear.

That night, as Jooheon stared into her gleaming eyes under the starry sky, he could see the stars in his eyes from his reflection in her brown orbs. And he saw what she saw in him that very special moment.

He knew that she saw a boy she loved standing in front of her.

A boy who shared the same, dancing stars in his eyes.

“Jooheon…” Snapped back to the present, Jooheon turned and looked at the red-head sitting beside him who was still munching away on fried chicken, “How are you?”

A slight tingle of pain ran through Jooheon’s heart, yet he brought himself to smile at Hyunju.

“What do you mean, how are you?” Jooheon nudged Hyunju playfully, “I’m as handsome and talented as usual.”

Hyunju was silent, leaving Jooheon’s joke hanging awkwardly in the air.

“No, I mean…” her voice was soft, “How are you faring these days with…you know, your father?”

Now Jooheon was the one silent.

“I’m…doing alright.”

Another round of silence enveloped the two.

 “I think…” Hyunju broke the silence as she munched a chicken thoughtfully, “that you should stop running away from reality.”

Jooheon pulled his mask further up his face to cover the pained smile on his face.

That was the exact same thing she told him two years ago when his father died one night due to over drinking. Though Jooheon should be elated that he would finally be freed of his abuser, yet when he saw his father being lifted into the ambulance, a white cloth covering his lifeless body, Jooheon couldn’t bring himself to feel happy.

Despite the man being abusive and violent, but he was Jooheon’s only family left on this planet.

“I’ll be here for you, Jooheon.” Hyunju had whispered to Jooheon as she held his arm tightly, “Don’t run away from the reality, Jooheon. I’ll be here to overcome it with you.”

The funeral was pathetic. The only other person who turned up was Hyunju, and the two spent the duration of the funeral silently sitting before the coffin.

After the funeral, Jooheon never stopped wearing the colour black.

For the first few weeks, the neighbours and kind ahjummas selling vegetables on the street all gave him sympathetic looks. But soon after, when Jooheon gave cold shoulders to their ‘consideration and kindness’, unwanted pity soon turned into false and destructive rumours.

“Hey, did you hear that Mr. Lee’s son…what’s his name? Ah, right, Jooheon. Did you hear that he actually poisoned his father’s drink?”

“Omo…how dangerous! How could he do that do his father?”

As the rumours spread around faster than fire, Jooheon’s heart became colder than ice. And when Hyunju’s uncle heard of this rumours, he quickly locked hyunju up in her room and forced her to stop dating Jooheon.

Though Jooheon knew it wasn’t Hyunju’s fault, but at the time, he felt extremely betrayed.

She said she would be by his side, but where was she now?

Hurt and disappointed, Jooheon left Busan and dove straight into Seoul. Wandering into pubs, Jooheon began a life he had never known; binge-drinking alcohol; partying until he was vomiting on the dance floor; getting tattoos and piercings done all over his body…and hooking up with girls.

At the back of his mind, a small voice would always remind him: “You know that you’re technically still dating Hyunju right? You know that she probably still loves you, right?”

Yet his response to this voice would always be:

“She’s going to leave me soon anyway, just like everyone else.”

And that was when he met Kim Hyorin. A beautiful girl with large eyes and a mesmerizing, husky voice. She was a pole-stripper in the nightclub, and every time she moved her body along with the silver pole, Jooheon would find himself eyeing her hungrily.

But no matter the one-night stands they had, or the times they even went on a ‘date’ like a normal couple, Jooheon couldn’t push the idea out of his mind that what he was doing wasn’t right.

It wasn’t until Hyunju showed up again did Jooheon actually fathom just how wrong his actions were.

It was another typical evening for Jooheon. He and Hyorin was kissing passionate in the small room he had rented, and just as he was about to take off her clothes, a soft gasp that sounded painfully familiar stopped him in his tracks.

Jooheon was almost scared to see who it was. But when he did turn his head, he saw Hyunju standing by the door, her large eyes widening even more and a hurt expression plastered across her face.

“H-Hyunju?” Jooheon couldn’t stop the stammer that came to his voice, and he certainly couldn’t stop his feet as he found himself chasing after the said girl.

When he finally caught up with her, they were both once again trapped beneath the heavy presence of the stars. At night, not many people roamed the empty streets, and as he searched desperately into Hyunju’s eyes, he couldn’t find his reflection in them.

For her eyes were so clouded with tears that it didn’t allow stars to shine in them.

After a few hours when they’ve both calmed down a little, Hyunju finally explained bitterly that she had ran out of home, out of Busan and back to Seoul in order to be with Jooheon.

“But,” Her tone was cold, “It seems as if you’ve moved on already.”

And Jooheon couldn’t find the strength to defend himself. It was then that he made a choice as he stared into her broken expression that he knew he should stay away from her. The rumours were right. Her uncle was right. Such an innocent and good girl like her should not be associated with a broken, abused boy like him.

So with that thought in mind, Jooheon began politely distancing himself away from her. Despite her tears, her pleads, and her screams as she demanded that she’s already forgiven him so why was he doing this to her, Jooheon stuck blindly to what he thought he was doing right at the time.

But once again, time proved him wrong.

“Hey, Jooheon.”

Jooheon glanced over at Hyunju in the present; with her flashing red hair and the peaceful smile on her lips. She had finished the whole box of chicken by herself, and she turned to Jooheon, almost bashfully.

“You remember Shin Hoseok? From primary school?” Hyunju sounded shy, and the sweet melody in her tone send daggers piercing through Jooheon’s heart, “We’ve begun dating as of yesterday.”

“Is that so?” Jooheon smiled naturally back at her. He had already mastered the act of pretence. Despite his heart hurting like crazy right now, despite the regret rushing towards his head right now, despite the curses he was directing at Shin Hoseok right now, but all he could do was smile.

For as he stared into Hyunju’s eyes once again under the starry night, he knew she no longer loved his starry eyes.