The stairwell - a painted railing, cinder-block walls, dim lightning - and there I was, big sky above and pebbles under my feet, the feeling of open space a surprise, even in the half dark.

The dance team: I saw a group of them to the left, faces and bodies clustered around something. I couldn't see what it was because the only light came from the orange glow of the parking lot, and anything below the line of the parapet was cast in shadow.

I could guess, though. This was the bar.

As Shinhye and I got closer, I saw what they were drinking: Boba teas, those drinks that the student council was selling them downstairs for a dollar each, and up here this kid N was using a syringe to inject shots of vodka into them, collecting a dollar as well, though I guessed the guys on the team drank free, because all the dancers were down cups like preschoolers in the back of their moms' cars.

Just outside the group, Jin was perched on the edge of the parapet, a Boba tea balanced listlessly in his palm, his expression neutral, as if nothing upsetting had just happened. He was looking down toward the parking lot.

"He's looking for you," Shinhye said. "He wants to see if you're leaving."

"Well, I'm not leaving." Seeing the slump to his shoulders, the blank expression on his face, I knew I'd been right in my guess. I knew why Jin had wanted to run away from me. I knew why I had to catch him. I wasn't angry anymore. I wasn't scared either.

"Suzy?" Shinhye said.

"Yeah?" 

"Don't let him hurt you. If he starts to say things that are going to eat away at you later, just walk away."

I didn't tell her that everything Jin would say to me would eat away at me later. I left Shinhye with the others and headed toward Jin, alone, calling his name as I got close. He turned, and when I stopped in front of him, my feet planted firmly, my hands on my hips, he lower his cup to the ground.

I pointed to the skirt of my dress. "Look what I'm wearing," I said. "A dress." He nodded. "We're on the roof. It's nighttime. All those things you told me you remembered before, when I barely knew you. You tried to tell me about this memory you had, and I stopped you. But I'm ready now. You don't have to push me away or protect me. I want to know what's happening." I didn't know what else I should say. Or could say. "Jin. Please."

He put his head in his hands, and I wondered for a second if I'd made a mistake.

But then he looked up and I could see that he didn't have the strength to lie to me again. His face was twisted in pain as he stood. "Come with me," he said, and led me to the back of the bulkhead, our shoes crunching on the pebbly surface. He squinted at the bulkhead's brick wall like there was a sign on it he was trying to read. Finally, he said, "Stand here, facing the wall, okay?"

He slid between me and the bricks, leaning against them, putting his hands on my waist. He checked the view to either side, and then he pulled me toward him. "This is it," he said. "This is what I remembered."

"You remembered," I whispered.

"Back in September, I tried to tell you about it. About how I almost kissed you up here. But you didn't believe me."

"I -" I started.

"You couldn't have believed me. I don't blame you. I didn't even believe me. But still, I know my memory was real." I shook my head slowly, wishing he didn't sound so crazy. "It was our first kiss," he went on.

"But our first kiss was months ago," I protested. "In the park near my house."

"That was this time," he said, giving me a moment to absorb his meaning. "I'm talking about a time before."

"You mean -" I couldn't even find the words to explain what I thought he was trying to say. You think "there was a time - for us - before this one?"

He nodded, and I made a move to step out of his embrace. But he held me tight. "Stay," he said. "Please."

I stayed.

And he began to tell me a story that came out like a confession. I think it was relief to him to finally say it all out loud. how long had this been eating away at him?

"Like I said, in that time before, tonight was our first kiss," he began. "Things didn't happen as fast for us then. I'd had a crush on you since the day you walked into physics, since you'd smiled at me when I was mowing your neighbor's yard. But I didn't think there was chance you'd ever like me. You were so smart. You worked so hard in school."

I shivered, and without asking, he shrugged his arms out of his jacket and wrapped it around my shoulders. He pushed the hair off my temples. "I started going to the library, just to be near you. And we'd talk. We got to be friends. I'd tell you these things I'd never told anyone. I told you about my parents. I told you stuff about Seokie and Jinnie, stuff I wouldn't generally tell my other friends. You told me about your mom and dad. One time, you got really mad about some current events thing. It blew my mind how much you cared about the stuff I thought of as 'the news,' just endless static.

"You made this big deal about how I shouldn't join the marines, and it was annoying but also kind of nice that you cared. I always felt like you saw the best parts of me. You waited for them to float to the surface, I guess. You trusted that they were there. Even when I was being kind of a ."

"You were a ?"

He laughed. I laughed. And then out of nowhere. I felt myself tearing up. How could I feel so close to him when what he was telling me ought to be pushing me away?

I swiped at what I knew was my mascara running some more, and he said, "Don't bother." When I kept bothering anyway, he said, "You're cute."

"And you're amazing," I gushed without thinking.

"No, you are," he said. "Back when I didn't know if you liked me," he went on, "back in that other time, you tossed off this thing once. You said you liked how different I was from everyone else you knew. And I held on to that comment. I held on to it tight. It gave me the courage to ask you to the dance, to kiss you up here in the dark."

He was looking straight at me now, and before I could raise the questions that felt like they belonged in books or movies instead of my real life - the crazy details - Jin kissed me.

I asked myself, Do I remember this? Has this happened before? And then it didn't matter if I believed him because I was there on the roof of the gym, with Jin holding my face in his hands, tears streaming down his cheeks, saying, "I want this to be real. This is what I want to be real."

"Jin?" All I wanted was for him to know he could trust me. If we could just get there, I thought, I'd worry about the rest later. "Please tell me what's happening to you, how what you're saying is possible."

The orange light shimmering up from the parking lot, the low voices of the kids wrapping around the bulkhead, the wool of Jin's jacket scratching my bare neck, the awareness my lips stilled carried of having been kissed hard - these sensations all knit themselves together. Tenuous reaching. Listening for distant bells. I felt for a moment that maybe he didn't have to tell me. Maybe I already knew. Or I almost knew.

Jin took my right hand in both of his and held it up to his chest. It would've looked melodramatic if he hadn't been so completely serious about it. "Suzy," he said. "I've tried to ignore it, or make it go away, but I can't anymore."

"Make what go away?" I said.

He looked from side to side, then said, "I can't tell you here.