EPILOGUE: The Fallout

“Jongin, wait…” Kyungsoo feels his voice give out. He swallows hard as he watches the beloved boy from his childhood drop everything and leave. It’s frighteningly similar to how they last parted ways… only he’s the one rooted to the spot this time and Jongin’s the one walking – no, running – away.

But Kyungsoo’s still the one with a broken heart in his hands.

“Jagi? You okay?” Hongbin pets his back and looks between him and the rapidly vanishing man exiting the store. Kyungsoo takes a shaky breath.

“That was him.”

“Who?”

“That was Jongin.”

“Jong-- Kim Jongin? That was the guy??” Hongbin turns Kyungsoo by the shoulders to look at him, and the elder reluctantly stares up with tear-filled eyes. He nods. Hongbin sets his jaw and grabs Kyungsoo’s hand, tugging him forward. “Go. Go! You can still catch him,” he says urgently, gently pushing Kyungsoo’s shoulders from behind now.

The shorter man resists, digging the soles of his shoes into the linoleum floor. “Catch him and tell him what? Things he clearly doesn’t want to hear?”

“You can’t know that. Besides, it’s not just about him.”

“I’m not going to force him to deal with my hang-ups with forever ago.”

“Soo, I know it’s been a long time and you’re scared, but you need to talk to him. For closure. For you,” Hongbin implores with a tender of his cheek.

Stubbornly, Kyungsoo shakes his head. “You don’t understand. It was going so well: he recognized me right away, and we were catching up just fine.” Jongin’s shy smiles from mere minutes before replay in his mind, and he aches. “But didn’t you see? He couldn’t wait to get away from me the moment he—” Kyungsoo’s throat clogs for a second, “... the moment he was reminded I’m gay. One second, everything’s good, he was even friendly to YooA, but once he saw you…” he drops his gaze along with the end of his sentence, biting his lip as a tear finally leaks out and trails down his cheek. It shouldn’t hurt this much. It shouldn’t feel as bad as it did a decade ago.

But somehow it’s worse. More personal.

Jongin at 17 had never met someone who was gay before. He was young, naïve, caught off-guard. Jongin at 27 and living in NYC, though, had to have encountered other non-straight people and been able to function around them. But not around Kyungsoo… he couldn’t even pretend for a minute that he was unbothered. A sense of betrayal sits heavy in his chest, but he knows it's really his fault.

His self-loathing as a young, small town boy returns in an instant, transporting him back to that fateful night 10 years prior. ‘Stupid. Stupid stupid stupid. Why’d you ever delude yourself that he might…’ Kyungsoo sees himself on his knees at the creek in a rumpled tuxedo, throwing pebble after pebble into the water and watching them sink like all his hopes. Alone in the moonlight, he said goodbye to every fond memory he’d made with Jongin. ‘When you tried to bake me a cake and ruined the oven.’ Plop. ‘The time we waited up for the meteor shower and you fell asleep on my shoulder.’ Plop. 'When I trashed my bike and you had me ride on the front of yours, fingers laced overtop of mine on the handlebars as you pedaled us home.' Plop. He had stayed there all night, til the sun peeked up over the horizon and there were no more stones left on the bank.

“Hey. Come here,” Hongbin pulls him out of his memories and into a tight embrace, kissing his temple. “I love you,” he reminds the elder, and Kyungsoo sighs, sinking into the comfort of his husband.

“Papa? You okay?”

YooA’s innocent voice behind them prompts Kyungsoo