Walking down the corridor, there were giggling girls everywhere. Tomorrow was Valentine's Day. They were all sporting new handkerchiefs, waving them around, comparing them, discussing enthusiastically the merit of each and every one and how it would match its future owner. It was the new Valentine's thing, it was all the rage. Someone had started a myth that if you gave the guy of your dreams a handkerchief with your lipstick mark on it on Valentine's, then he would fall madly in love with you. It was obviously not true, but it was fun and silly. Something to lose yourself in and it gave those hopeless one-sided crushes one day of hope. He wished he could be as free as those girls, free to openly giggle over giving his crush a magical handkerchief. Then he got an idea. A crazy idea. The handkerchiefs were anonymous, that was like the whole point of the love spell. He could do anonymous. As long as nobody found out, there was nothing keeping him from taking part in this silly tradition. His heart did a backflip. He couldn't believe he was really going to do this. And without noticing, a little part of him started thinking it might work, maybe the myth was true.

“I've got some errands to run, so I can't go with you today.” he apologized to Jungkook. They had developed a habit of walking home together every single day. It was his favorite part of the day. Even though it was just one day, and he was missing it for a good reason, an important reason, he still felt a pang of sadness over missing their walk. It was the most precious thing he had, time with Jungkook.

“Oh, no prob! See ya tomorrow!” Jungkook waved, smiling his big happy smile at him. He couldn't hide from the disappointment, realizing he had been hoping to see at least the tiniest hint of regret in Jungkook's eyes, but he was his happy-go-lucky self, just as always. He knew he was asking too much. He was fortunate to even know him, let alone get to walk home with him every day just the two of them. He should be thankful, and he was. He really was. He felt like he was the luckiest guy on the planet. But still there was a little green monster hiding inside of him that wanted more.

He had no idea what kind of store one went to in order to buy handkerchiefs, he had never bought one before. He decided the mall would be his best bet, since there were all kinds of stores in one place. It turned out his worries were completely unfounded, for every other store was selling them for Valentine's. There were so many kinds, how was he supposed to choose?

The stores were full of giggling girls, and only girls. He wasn't sure he had the guts to join them, it was too obvious. Thankfully he had had the foresight to go to a mall far away from both his house and school, so there was no chance of running into anyone he knew. But still, it was practically like coming out of the closet. Even though it would only be to strangers, he knew he wasn't ready for that. He had hardly even admitted it to himself yet.

He was about to head back home with deflated hopes when he got an idea. Before he could chicken out he turned around and walked straight into a small candy shop.

“Eh..Excuse me.” he waved one of the clerks over.

“Yes?” a sweet girl in her twenties came to his assistance. She didn't really look like she had that much experience in matters of the heart, but she would have to do.

“I eh.. my little sister has a crush on this boy at her school and made a big deal over having to get him this Valentine's handkerchief thing...” he started explaining, acting like he was slightly annoyed at this imaginary sister of his, amazed at how fast his brain filled in the details of the story. He almost felt like it was true.

“So our mom sent me to buy one.. but I'm like completely lost....” he shrugged, pretending to be this macho guy that knew nothing about girly things.

The girl giggled politely. “Don't worry, I can help you find the perfect one. Do you know anything about the boy she has a crush on?” she smiled and led him to a rack of handkerchiefs.

“Eh...she said he was very lively and cute, and good at everything.” he blushed talking about Jungkook out loud for the first time. He started to realize just how much he really liked him.

“Hmm... I'm thinking this light blue one here, it's smooth and bright like the sky, kind of optimistic and full of energy, don't you think?” she suggested.

“Perfect. I'll take it.” Jimin beamed at her, thankful for her help. He couldn't have done it without her, she had no idea just how much of a help she had really been.

“Aigoo, you're such a good brother. My big brother would never've done anything like this for me.” she giggled as she wrapped the handkerchief up nicely. Then she slid something in his hand. “Feel free to ring me up if you need any more help.” she gave him a subtle wink. He wasn't sure what the politeness protocol was in such a situation, so he just bowed awkwardly and made himself scarce as quickly as he could. He looked in his hand, he was holding a name card. It had her cell phone number on it. What a helpful girl. He tucked the card into his pocket and flew home, his feet not touching the ground once. He too was going to enjoy Valentine's Day like everyone else.

When he arrived home he went straight up to his room, quickly throwing his stuff into a corner, and unwrapping the handkerchief. It was a nice color. It went with Jungkook's eyes, he thought as he stared dreamily at it. Then he snapped out of it. What was he thinking? This was madness. What if he got caught? He threw the handkerchief on the bed as if it was on fire, burning his fingers. He stared at it as it lay there, looking like just a random piece of cloth. But it wasn't. It represented everything he had spent his whole life suppressing, hiding, even from himself.

He turned away and ran downstairs. After pacing back and forth for a while, he went into the kitchen to get something to eat. When he couldn't take the excruciating silent scream of his heart any longer, he threw the rest of his soup in the sink and went upstairs. He opened the door to his room slowly, his heart pounding away in his chest. It was still there. Just lying on the bed. What had he expected? That it had somehow got up and flown out of the open window? He couldn't escape it no matter how he tried, he couldn't wish it away. It was there. It was there to stay. He reached for his bag and closed the door again.

He did his homework in the living room. The house felt bigger today, or he felt smaller. After doing just about every single math problem wrong, he slammed the book shut and stormed upstairs. He grabbed the handkerchief from the bed, crumpled it up and violently threw it into the bin as hard as he could. It just lay there, at the bottom of the empty bin, wrinkled and abandoned, unable to fend for itself, its destiny in the hands of others that cared nothing about what it wanted for itself. He felt sorry for it, he couldn't just leave it there. He reached for it and tried to smooth it out. Carefully, he put it on his desk, it gently.

He sighed.

He was tired of fighting a battle he knew he could never win.

He stood up and headed into his parent's bedroom. He felt like he was trespassing, that any moment he would get caught red handed, or red lipped more like it.

He took the first lipstick he could find, he didn't have time to care about the color. His mom would be home at any moment.

He locked himself in the bathroom. Never had he concentrated so hard, how did women do this every single day? He was having the hardest time getting the lipstick to stick to his lips and only his lips. Frustrated, he wiped his mouth for what felt like the thousandth time. He took a deep breath, steadied his hand and watched the outlines of his lips in the mirror. They looked nothing like Jungkook's. Jungkook's lips had defined lines, manly yet cute. His weren't manly at all. He puckered his voluptuous lips, sending himself air kisses in the mirror. He bit his lower lip enticingly, trying out a y kiss pose, wondering how it would be best to kiss the handkerchief. At least he was confident that his lip print could be mistaken for a girl's.

Holding his breath, he held the handkerchief up against the mirror, imagining it was Jungkook. Ever so slowly, while doing everything in his power not to tremble, he touched the cloth softly with his lips, gently pressing them up against it. A lonely butterfly fluttered excitedly around in the empty space inside him, the only one that was fooled by the pretend-Jungkook on the mirror.

He stared at his fiery red lip print, oddly satisfied with how it turned out. It looked so good that it was almost as if it was fake, as if it had been printed on there. His stomach churned at the thought of Jungkook seeing it, holding the handkerchief in his hands. Could the myth be real? Maybe if he wished for it hard enough.

“Jimin-ah! I'm home.” he could hear his mom calling from the living room.

“!” he muttered, folding the handkerchief carefully before stuffing it into his pocket, rubbing his lips raw with a wet wipe.

He ran downstairs to greet his mom, panting as if he had run a whole race and not just down a couple of steps.

“Why are your lips so red?” was the first thing she said when she saw him, handing him a couple of grocery bags to carry into the kitchen.

“Oh...eh... I eh....they were chapped so I put some lip balm on them, I think they're having a bad reaction to it.” he tried explaining. Thankfully, she was too tired and busy with getting dinner started to give it any more thought.

He looked at his alarm clock. 4 AM. He hadn't slept a wink. He was too excited for tomorrow. Nervous. Terrified. He kind of looked forward to it, wanting to see Jungkook's expression when he discovered it between the pages of his history book, where he was planning to hide it. He knew this was beyond silly, but it was the closest he would ever get to confessing his feelings for him.