As I write about my time with Jin, I find I remember so much more than I thought I would. Somehow, one memory leads to another. They don't exist in a vacuum but rather overlap with one another, each image, smell or sound that I recall just another link in a very, very long chain. I pull and pull and never seem to get to the end of it.

Some of the memories I can tell are important, but others surface for no reason. Jaehwan opening his locker, only to have a pile of books cascade down on top of him. He jumped back, caught a history text in one hand. Why would I remember that?

Shinhye spraying me with a can of whip cream outside the locker room after a big win, any disagreements between us about Jaehwan and Jin fading in the excitement of the victory.

Viviane dragging a coffee table she'd refinished through the front door of the house in her festive T-shirt, spewing swearwords appropriate to a sailor.

Jin throwing an arm over his mother's shoulder after Seokie announced at the dinner table that he didn't want anything for his birthday except his dad to come back home.

Are the memories we recall governed by the feelings attached to them? Is that why they stay with us? Or do we remember only what we remind ourselves of over and again as the years go by? How is it possible that some memories you'd like, the memories you'd like to hold on to slip away and others - mundane and sad alike, the memories you'd just as soon forget - stay, bubbling to the surface of your brain for no reason at all?

I remember Shinhye's dad quizzing us on the capital cities around the world over her mother's chicken, horrified that we were less than two years away from college and didn't know them all.

I remember eomma, who hates games, acquiescing to penny poker with Viviane and me, shaking her head in annoyance when she forgot the difference between a straight and a flush, giving me her "What have you gotten me into?" look when I threw down four kings.

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A Sunday-afternoon phone call with appa, the click of one metal ball hitting another in the toy he kept on his desk as he told me about a new protocol for fluid absorption.

Jin waiting by my locker at the end of a school day.

Jin tying his skates.

Jin sneaking up on Seokie and Jinnie in a snowball fight.

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My memories of Jin surprise me in dreams. They come back to me as if I just experienced them yesterday. I remember what he smelled like, how his skin felt when I touched his cheek, how I could shiver with pleasure just hearing his voice on the phone. I can see him fresh in my mind's eye, they way he looked coming off the stage after a performance, his hair matted to his head and his cheeks red.

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During a debate tournament where I was losing a round, up on an auditorium stage, in front of a crowd: one of the middle school helpers slipped a note onto my desk. I recognize Jin's chicken scratch right away.

Chin up.

How had he sent that note? The dance team was in a tournament too. Jin wasn't here.

Except he was. All the way in the back, against the wall next to the auditorium doors. His hair still wet. He must have rushed here between games. He lifted a hand and gave me a thumbs-up before rolling back out the door.

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Early in March, Jin and I were buying ice cream in the mini-mart of a gas station. There was a woman in front of us with a loaf of bread, two cans of tuna, and a bag of Doritos. A little girl in baggy pants and a matching tunic I later learned to call a salwar kameez was tugging on her skirt. "Hey," we heard form behind, and turned toward the granola bar and mixed nuts section. There was Felix Lee. His "Hey" was for Jin, as if Jin was someone he would have said hi to passing in the halls.

I did a quick calculation. The woman in front of us must be Felix's mom, the little girl his sister. I knew Felix's family was living in our city's motel, which you reached through the parking lot behind the gas station. So the tuna fish and bread - was that dinner?

Felix took a step closer to Jin, and Jin's arm tightened around my waist. "You're the guy," Felix said to him. "You're the one who brought back my dog."

By now Felix's mom was looking at us too. Even his sister was standing up straighter, as if eager to hear how the stranger her brother was speaking to would respond.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Jin responded, his voice deadpan, uncharacteristically unfriendly.

"No," Felix said. "it was you." He took another step closer. "The terrier, remember? Brown with black ears? The night of the fire, you came down to the fire station with him. I saw you leave him with the guy washing the truck. Where did you find him?"

Jin sighed. "He ran down to the river. Something happened to his paw, so he couldn't walk."

"He had glass in it," Felix said. "The vet fixed it. He said if you hadn't found him, he probably would have been too weak to find his way up the hill."

"Yeah," said Jin. "That's what I was guessing."

"But how did you know to look?" Felix said. His black eyes were flashing, his Adam's apple sticking out like a challenge. He had the beginnings of a mustache on his lip.

Jin shrugged. "I was down there anyway."

"And you just guessed he was ours?"

Jin stepped around Felix's mother and pushed the quart of ice cream over to the cashier, who picked it up without looking at it. Like Felix's mom and sister and me, the clerk was listening to the two boys.

"I figured," Jin said. "I'd heard about the fire, so I put two and two together."

"Do you have a police scanner?" Felix asked. "You found the dog before the fire had even been put out. Also, you could have taken him to the police station or the shelter, but you knew to come to the station. How did you know he was ours?"

Felix put his hands in his pockets, determinedly waiting for an answer, but Jin just stood there without even shrugging. "Okay," Felix said when it was clear he wouldn't get a response. He looked down at his feet, then back up. "Thanks. He really could have died."

"Yup," Jin said. "I know."

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Another Jin memory: We were at the pond in the woods behind his house. Seokie and Jinnie were scraping up a fine mist of ice dust behind them as they skated quickly back and forth, their skate blades clacking on the frozen surface. Even though they were playing by moonlight, they went at it furiously, their sticks tangling, their narrow hips checking each other, as if they were one person tripping over his own feet.

When Jin skated out to meet them, their game became two against one. They tried to shoot against him while he guarded the net. Then he was the monkey in monkey in the middle.

I stayed to the outer edge of the cleared ice - I hadn't been on skates in years, and I was slowly figuring out how to get my balance. But then suddenly, Jin was behind me. He skated into me as if he were going to knock me over, but he caught me, his hands wrapped around my waist, the two of us moving forward as one. At breakneck speed.

We skated in circles around the cleared area of the ice, twisting into figure eights, Jin holding my hands and skating backward, then coming back to join me, pushing the pace. I was pretty much screaming the whole time, but afterward I felt completely different about my balance. We could hold hands then and skate and I didn't feel like I was in danger of falling. In the bitter cold, we skated into clouds of our own breath. Beautiful.

"Look up," Jin said, and there was the full moon and stars and stars and stars. They traveled so deep back into the soft blackness it felt like they were falling on us.

"I feel so small," I said.

Jin nodded.

"And dizzy," I said.

He nodded again.

And this, now, I remember thinking, this was a moment, a peak moment, like the peak day of foliage I'm always waiting for it in the fall. It was a peak of happiness, but "happiness" isn't even the right word. What I felt was a connection, like a tunnel running between our minds had been opened and could never be closed.

"Maybe I won't sign up," Jin said.

"For . . . for the marines?" I asked. "You'd do that?"

"Maybe being back here, being allowed to return, even with the headaches, maybe this is my chance."

I didn't dare say anything. Jin wrapped his arms around me tighter.

And then he did this thing. Like we were figure skaters, he grabbed me around the waist and lifted me into the air. I trusted him so completely it didn't make me lose balance. I landed easily, and when he did it again, I lifted my arms above my head, feeling all the power of the night sky, the fire inside the faraway stars, the sheer momentum and force of my feelings for Jin giving me the strength to hold the pose. As I landed, Jin wrapped his arms around me and I breathed into his jacket. All I wanted was to stay like that, holding on to him in the night air.

I was sure we would have more moments like that. That they would go on forever.

I was wrong.