Jihoon woke up feeling the worst he’s ever felt. He was plagued by his thoughts until late in the night, unable to escape until his body blissfully collapsed from exhaustion. Every part of his body ached, and he immediately wanted to fall back asleep in the hopes of getting some more rest, but then he remembered the music festival. He groaned miserably, slowly sitting up, rubbing his eyes.

Joshua, who clearly looked ready for the day, took one look at Jihoon’s haggard appearance and dropped his shoes on the floor, rushing to Jihoon’s side. “Hey, you don’t look so good,” he said softly, placing a hand on the younger’s forehead. “You’re not feverish, so at least there’s that. Do you have a headache?”

He nodded. “My everything hurts.”

“Well, we were just planning to let the kids enjoy the festival until call time. Why don’t you take a hot bath while I let the kids loose?” Joshua suggested, reaching for his shoes again.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Jihoon protested weakly. “Who knows what they’ll do?”

Joshua chuckled. “Your kids are more responsible than most of my kids. They’ll be fine. It’ll be like normal field trips, just with fewer people. We can have them check in every two hours by text, or I’ll arrange a meetup.”

He frowned. “I’m still not sure. Shouldn’t I at least go to the festival?”

“They’ll understand if I explain you’re feeling a little under the weather and want to get some rest before the festival,” Joshua shook his head.

“Fine,” Jihoon sighed. “But I want a response from everyone every hour.”

Despite his protests, Jihoon enjoyed his alone time. Joshua stepped out to explore the festival, sending Jihoon texts and photos every so often. Thankfully, his students complied with Jihoon’s--rather extreme, in hindsight--requests, even sending him selfies, which he really didn’t need, but he appreciated their attempts to placate him. He spent the morning relaxing, laying in his bed and messing around with his composition program.

After a few minutes of deliberating, Jihoon called Soonyoung, who responded almost immediately. “Jihoon-ah!”

Jihoon glanced at the time, frowning when he did the math. “I didn’t realize how late it was in Korea,” he said. “I’ll call you later, get some sleep.”

“Glad to know you care, Jihoonie,” Soonyoung grinned, “but I’m not planning on going to bed for at least an hour more. I have to clean up the choreography for my advanced dance class. What’s up?”

“Nothing, really,” Jihoon mumbled. “Just... realizing I never tried to move on from Jun, and figuring out how to.”

Soonyoung’s grin faded into something more serious. “I see. And have you figured out what you’re going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Jihoon shrugged. “I just... I guess I’m just not ready right now.”

“Jihoon-ah, it’s been two years. Do you know why you don’t want to move on?”

“If I knew, don’t you think I would’ve come up with a way to get over it?” Jihoon snapped.

Soonyoung shook his head. “Jihoon, do you know what I think? I think you’re holding onto memories of Jun and using them to punish yourself for ever being with him in the first place.”

Jihoon flinched.

“I know you, Jihoon. You bear the weight of the world for those you care about, and you’ll place the blame on you the moment anything goes wrong. You’ll punish yourself for mistakes anyone would make, and you’re quick to judge everything you do as a mistake. It’s an unhealthy mentality, and that’s why Joshua and I interfere so much. We want to take care of you until you figure out how to take care of yourself. This... this is something we can’t ever help you with. I don’t know how this story will end, if you’ll go back to Jun or if you’ll move on, but whatever you choose, your first priority should not blaming yourself for everything that goes wrong, especially when it comes to Jun. You had three happy years with Jun. Don’t blame yourself for the last few weeks.”

“Is that what I’ve been doing?”

“Yeah,” Soonyoung said softly. “But you know now, so you can figure out a way to fix it.”

He had just ordered lunch when Joshua came back, looking pleasantly worn out. “Hey,” he greeted softly, “Feel any better?”

“Yeah,” Jihoon nodded. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Joshua grinned. “Besides, if you didn’t get better, I’d have to conduct, and that would be a disaster.”

Jihoon rolled his eyes. “You wouldn’t be terrible. The kids just wouldn’t follow you. I ordered lunch. Pizza.”

“Awesome,” the older exclaimed, throwing himself on the bed. “I’m tired. I need some greasy food.”

Call time wasn’t long after lunch, so Jihoon put on his suit and headed to the lobby to wait for his students, who had all dutifully returned to the hotel to get ready. It was at times like these that Jihoon was grateful for his students. He really lucked out with them. He could’ve gotten a group of irresponsible troublemakers, instead of the hardworking brats he had.

“You ready?” Joshua asked.

He nodded. He’d worked hard for this. He wasn’t going to let outside influences keep him from showing the judges--and through them, the school--what he and his ragtag, eclectic ensemble could do.

That being said, he hadn’t expected for them to win.

He had hoped for it, but he knew that realistically, that outcome was unlikely. A lot of the schools he saw perform were larger and clearly had more funding. His ensemble was as good as those schools, but he knew that the funding and size would give them an edge over his students. It that things that had little to do with musicality and performance could have a huge impact on the judging, but there was nothing he could do. It was why he entered the festival in the first place: at the very least, he wanted recognition of his ensemble’s talents.

Because of this, he hadn’t registered that they had gotten first in the high school ensemble category. In fact, he wouldn’t have been on stage to accept the award if Joshua hadn’t shoved him out of his seat. He was in so much disbelief that he didn’t remember accepting the award, nor returning to his seat. He didn’t remember taking the kids out to dinner and barely remembered offering to pay the entire bill.

When he finally wrapped his head around their win, they were outside, getting ready to head back to the hotel.

He asked Joshua to do a headcount--it was hard for him to do when they were all standing up--and was about to pull up directions back to their hotel on his phone when a familiar voice interrupted him.

“Jihoon?”

He was ready to scold the student who dared to use his first name when he realized that first, the voice came from the opposite direction of his students and second, the voice was painfully familiar.

Slowly Jihoon turned around to face the one person he never thought he’d see again.

“Jun.”

Behind him, the entire ensemble quieted, whether in awe of being in the presence of a celebrity or in confusion about Jihoon’s apparent connection with said celebrity, he didn’t know, too busy taking in his ex-boyfriend.

After two years, Jun looked both heart-wrenchingly similar and drastically different. He looked confident. He looked comfortable. He looked better.

Maybe leaving was the best choice, Jihoon thought miserably.

“I, uh, didn’t think I’d see you here,” Jun stammered hesitantly, eyes flickering from Jihoon to the students behind him and back.

Here as in the United States in general, or here as in anywhere he is? Jihoon wondered, struggling to keep calm.

“Is this where--”

“Me neither,” Jihoon cut him off sharply. “I thought you’d be busy filming or something.”

The taller shifted nervously on his feet. “I just finished a meeting about filming,” he explained. “I was just about to get dinner.”

When had Jun learned English? Obviously, he had to have been fluent in order to land the Hollywood movie, but he hadn’t thought about it until now. He sounded... nice, speaking English, in comparison to his attempts back when they were dating. “English is so dangerous,” Jun had said once. Jihoon had thought he was being ridiculous. Now, though...

“Oh,” Jihoon said, trying to find an excuse to leave.  He didn’t know how much longer he could talk to Jun before he exploded. He wasn’t ready to face Jun. Not yet.

Thankfully, Joshua stepped in. “Jihoon-ah,” he interrupted in smooth, slightly accented Korean. “We should head back. We have to pack up and check out before the bus comes.”

“You’re--you’re right, hyung,” Jihoon stuttered, letting Joshua slide a hand around his back, hand rubbing the back of his neck comfortingly. “Bye, Jun-sshi.”

“B... Bye, Jihoon,” Jun answered quietly as Joshua led Jihoon back to his students, who silently surrounded him, shielding him from Jun’s eyes. As they walked back to their hotel, one of the students taking the lead, they began to loudly talk to each other about the festival, leaving the music teacher to get lost in his own thoughts.

He did, however, hear Vernon ask Seungkwan, “Hey, I thought you said you’ve always wanted Jun’s autograph.”

Seungkwan huffed, even as he heard Vernon grunt as someone--Chan, presumably--elbowed the sophomore in the stomach. “I did, but that was back then, before I met him. He’s not that impressive in person.”

Something in Jihoon’s chest ached.

Maybe getting over Jun would be harder than he’d originally thought.

In the aftermath of the music festival, Jihoon found himself under a mountain of stress. The school had been proud of Jihoon’s accomplishments and had dutifully allotted him a larger budget for next year. The expectations were higher, and Jihoon wanted to prove to the school that he was capable of handling the responsibility they’d given him.

No one mentioned Jun after the festival. Not even Seungkwan, who now followed Zhou Jieqiong, a famous Chinese actress who landed the role of Jun’s love interest in “No End to Your Road,” the name of which Seungkwan also now avoided.

It was honestly heartwarming to see Seungkwan’s loyalty to him, but that didn’t mean it hurt less. Seeing Jun again felt like taking two steps back and tripping over his own feet in the process. If Jun had shown up two, maybe three months later, Jihoon might have been able to keep his composure. As it was, though, Jun had come back much too early for Jihoon to handle. He needed time to get over Jun and let his feelings for him go.

Taking Soonyoung’s advice, Jihoon began writing down every good aspect of his relationship with Jun, from how they got together to their memorable dates to their anniversary celebrations. He wrote down what he loved about Jun and what he hated, and tucked the book--and his thoughts--away in his room.

Joshua no longer talked about him to Jihoon, clearly sensing that the younger needed space. He still was the caring hyung he needed, making sure he ate regular meals and got sleep, but he let Jihoon figure things out on his own.

To keep himself from thinking too much about Jun, he made himself busy. He worked hard day and night, composing music for both the school and his Soundcloud in his free time. He let his students ramble about everything under the sun, especially after the school’s spring concert, at which Jihoon received a lot of praises for the ensemble’s performance. He asked Soonyoung about his dance studio and even composed dance tracks exclusively for his dance class.

Everything came to a head one innocent, sunny, Saturday morning.

Jihoon had woken up at 11:33, so maybe it was less of a morning and more of an afternoon, but nevertheless, Jihoon had woken up in a good mood. The smell of food lured him out of bed and towards the kitchen, where Joshua was presumably making the source of that tantalizing smell, humming a song under his breath.

“Morning,” Jihoon grunted, heading for the coffee machine.

Joshua glanced at the clock before chuckling. “Good morning. Did you sleep well?”

“Yeah,” Jihoon said. “What’s for lunch?”

“Spaghetti,” the older replied. “We’re running low on groceries, by the way.”

Jihoon nodded, watching the coffee stream into his mug. “We can go after lunch. Did you get the mail?”

Joshua shook his head. “Do you mind?”

“Nah,” Jihoon said, heading for the door.

The mailbox was decently full, though Jihoon knew most of it would be junk mail anyway. He shifted through them on the elevator ride up, sorting them easily.

One envelope made him pause. It was purple, written in neat, beautiful handwriting, and was addressed to him. It was apparently from a Jeonghan Yoon, who lived in the city where the music festival was held at. Jihoon couldn’t remember ever meeting a Jeonghan, let alone telling him his address. Who was this guy, and what did he want from him?

Jihoon was still trying to figure it out when he returned to the apartment, where Joshua was setting the table. “Something wrong?” he asked taking in the expression on his face.

“I got a letter,” Jihoon began, opening the letter, “from someone I don’t know.” He pulled out the letter inside and froze.

The writing on the letter was nothing like the one on the envelope. It was a messy, comfortable scrawl that was all too familiar to Jihoon.

Dear Jihoon,

I’m not sure if you really want to hear from me, especially after what happened the last time we saw each other, but I think we need to talk.

I’m currently in the city filming and will be for the next month or so. I was wondering if we could meet sometime, to talk. I would’ve emailed you, but I’m honestly not sure if you’d even want to hear from me anymore, and I figured sending you something you could tangibly burn or destroy would be more therapeutic than aggressively clicking delete.

You can email your response to my email if you still have it. Or you can mail a letter back to the return address. It’s my manager’s, so he’ll give it to me if your name is in the return address.

Love,

Jun

Jihoon trembled as he set the letter down.

“What’s wrong?” Joshua asked, reaching slowly for the letter, waiting for Jihoon’s consent.

Jihoon pushed the letter towards the older. “It’s from Jun. He wants to meet up.”

“,” he cursed, reading the letter. “Jihoon, what are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” Jihoon whispered. “I don’t know if I’ll be ready to meet him before he leaves. But if I don’t...”

“You might never have a chance,” Joshua finished grimly.

“I can’t decide now,” he shook his head. “I need time to think about it.”

Joshua paused, glancing back at the letter. “Can I say something?” he asked.

“Shoot.”

“I think, more than anything, you two at least need closure,” Joshua said. “Whether or not you decide to move on, you still need to tell him why you left, and he needs to tell you why he never tried to look for you.”

Jihoon swallowed thickly, his throat tight. “Noted.”