“All right, I’m dying of curiosity here,” Jinyoung said, plopping down at their ‘investigation table’ in the studio as BamBam began setting up the cameras. “Are you going to tell me now why I wasn’t given a script for this episode?”

“You’ll see in like ten minutes when we start filming,” Mark said innocently.

“But why? You seriously want me to wing the entire episode? I’m not an improv expert.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be doing most of the talking in this episode. You can just ask questions and make asides as they come to you naturally.”

“And remember, I’ve got a hot date at 4, so we’re going to split the filming in half, anyways,” BamBam reminded them. “You can use that time to figure out your next moves for the second half. And I’m not going to let something that makes you look like too much of a doofus end up on YouTube, OK? Our bank accounts depend on you coming across more like a prince than a village idiot.”

“Gee, thanks.” Jinyoung jutted his lower lip out. “Wait, is the mystery something like ‘How did someone like BamBam manage to get a date?’”

“Annnnnd, I just instantly changed my mind about preventing you from looking like an idiot, Jinyoung,” BamBam said with a glare. “Better watch your back now.”

“BamBam’s been using a dating app,” Mark explained to Jinyoung. “There’s apparently a lot of people desperate because Valentine’s Day is next week and they don’t have a date yet, so one of those desperate people matched with desperate BamBam. They’re going on a warm up date this week to see if they can actually make it to Valentine’s Day, though.”

“All right, so it looks like both of you are going to be edited to look like idiots,” BamBam said. “Good to know. Anyways, that’s an important detail to keep in mind, Jinyoung. This episode will be airing next week on Valentine’s Day.”

“Ohhh, so we’re like doing a holiday special, then? Some kind of fatal romance mystery, or something?”

“You’ll see,” Mark said vaguely. “Don’t worry, I’d never plan for anything less than amazing for our show.”

“So, what about you, any Valentine’s Day plans?” Jinyoung asked abruptly, looking at him like a detective at a suspect.

“Huh?” Mark asked, immediately on-guard as he always was whenever the subject of dating came up around Jinyoung, the person he secretly wanted to date. “No. No plans.”

“Are you sure?”

“Uh…yeah? I mean, I would know better than anyone if I had plans, right?”

“But I find this whole thing about you being single since we met suspicious.”

Mark knew there was a perfectly logical reason why meeting Jinyoung had killed his desire to go out with anyone else, but he wasn’t about to admit to that. “Why would that be suspicious? You haven’t gone out with anyone since I’ve met you either.”

“But I’m not as attractive as you,” Jinyoung pointed out.

“Says who?”

“And I don’t have as many people after me. Remember all those girls who were into you in university?”

“Jinyoung, there were, like, two in total. You had about just as many after you.”

“And now you both have legions of fangirls who drool over you on a daily basis so you could probably get a date with zero effort, but you and I both know you won’t and that you’d rather spend the day in your apartment eating heart shaped pancakes and watching Dateline rather than going on a date, so I don’t see why you’re even having this conversation,” BamBam said drily. “Everything’s ready to start filming, so let’s get this episode underway, shall we?”

Mark and Jinyoung got the investigation table in order, then waited for the signal from BamBam to begin. Jinyoung had absolutely no idea what this episode was going to even be about, so it was up to Mark to lead the filming.

“February 14^th, Valentine’s Day,” Mark began. “A day of celebrating the love we share for the people around us, whether they be significant others, family, friends, or people we have yet to confess to. Also the day last year where my co-host Jinyoung bought me a stuffed bear holding a Conversation Heart that said ‘CALL HOME’ for a 80% discount at the convenience store and then proceeded to get mad at me because I didn’t buy him anything.”

“A-And here I thought it was this super nice gesture to encourage you to call your mother more,” Jinyoung said, turning a little pink. He probably hadn’t expected Mark to pull that one on him right out of the gate.

“Don’t rewrite history, Jinyoung. You spent $3.00, then spent the rest of the day trying to guilt trip me for not buying the nearly $40 specialty boxes of pecan clusters that you wanted.” Mark grinned. “Well, your guilt trip has worked. Belatedly.”

Jinyoung’s eyes widened. “Wait, you got me the pecan clusters this year?”

“No. Even better. I’m giving you your favorite thing: a mystery.”

Jinyoung tilted his head. “Please tell me you didn’t commit a crime for me, Mark.”

“Not at all.” Mark turned to one of the cameras pointed at him. “A fact about Jinyoung our viewers may not know is that he is an ace at two-minute mysteries. You know those story collections that briefly set up a mystery and leave a single clue for you to catch in order to solve it? Jinyoung has a perfect record of solving those without needing to check the answer. So today, I’m giving Jinyoung a real life mystery to test his skills on. It’s a little bit longer than two minutes, but in this case, there’s also really only one clue that points to the culprit.” Mark turned back to Jinyoung. “Are you up for it?”

“Well, now that you’ve hyped me up so much, I can’t possibly afford to let the viewers down.” Jinyoung cracked his knuckles. “Hit me with it.”

“Then let me set the scene. In 2016, the Chicago Cubs ended their World Series drought in a historic come from behind win against the Cleveland Indians, who had been comfortably leading the series. I don’t know how much you know about American baseball, Jinyoung, but this was huge for Chicago, who had gone so long without a World Series victory that people assumed they were cursed. And when Americans celebrate a huge victory in athletics, they tend to…get a bit overzealous.”

“Right, like setting fire to furniture, overturning cars, destroying cities, all that? I’ve seen it on the news before, and I seriously don’t get it.”

“Me either, honestly. But even more common than that is celebrating with a little—or a lot—of alcohol. Such was the case for college baseball player Jake Raleigh and his two friends from the women’s softball team, Jodie Ashby and Nicola Floreth. After the Cubs’ victory, the three friends went bar hopping into the early hours of the morning, stopping at about seven local bars before returning to Ashby’s apartment at 4 in the morning.”

“I have to assume they were pretty drunk by time they returned home?”

“Very. Later, Ashby and Raleigh would also test positive for pot.”

“So…their favorite sports team won, and they decided to celebrate that by making themselves unable to function cognitively? Didn’t they want to, I don’t know, retain their mental awareness of why they were so happy and excited?”

“I honestly don’t have the expertise to psychologically understand the minds of sports fans, Jinyoung.”

“Well, they were athletes. They’ve probably been hit on the head several times, which may have messed up their decision-making centers to begin with.”

“Funny you should say ‘hit on the head’,” Mark said grimly. “Because at 10 am, the police received a 9-1-1 call from Jake Raleigh that Nicola Floreth was dead from a traumatic head wound.”

“That…escalated quickly.” Jinyoung frowned. “How do we get from them coming home from the bar to her ending up dead? Was there a break in?”

“That’s the thing, Jinyoung—there was a campus security camera at both entrances to the residence, and it showed only Ashby, Floreth, and Raleigh entering the residence at 4 am and no further activity until the police arrived at 10:30 am the next day. So that means our only two suspects are Jodie Ashby and Jake Raleigh, and both were blackout drunk and high at the time of the murder. When the police arrived, Ashby and Raleigh had no idea what had happened or who had killed Nicola Floreth. In fact, the investigation revealed that Floreth had actually been killed at 4:30 am, just thirty minutes after they’d arrived back at the apartment, and Ashby and Raleigh had out sometime during the course of the morning. Raleigh awoke from his blackout shortly before 10:00 am, and immediately called in the murder. When the police arrived on the scene, both Raleigh and Ashby claimed to assume that Floreth had been killed by a home intruder and were shocked to discover that they were suspects when the security camera evidence was revealed to them.”

“So they didn’t remember anything?” Jinyoung asked, befuddled.

“Nope. Ashby’s last memory was of knocking over a barstool at the second to last bar they visited, while Raleigh’s last memory was of walking home and almost running into a stop sign. Neither reported any conflict with Ashby that would have resulted in them murdering her, and testimony from their friends largely backed this up. The only point of friction between them was minor: Ashby was a bit on the heavier side, and Floreth would occasionally make fun of the difficulty she had running the bases quickly. However, everyone interviewed reported Ashby always brushed off these kinds of jokes. She wasn’t an angry drunk either—in fact, Ashby’s friends said she tended to get giggly when drinking.”

“So...we're looking for a motive here, basically. What about a love triangle? This is Valentine's Day, after all.”

“That would make things a little jucier, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint you on that. All three of them were just friends. Floreth had been dating a female childhood friend for eight years, and both Ashby and Raleigh were in casual relationships with other classmates.”

“Huh.” Jinyoung tapped his fingers on the table. “So did they really forget everything, or were they just pretending?”

“What do you think? They were blackout drunk and high!"

"I've never been blackout drunk and high before! How would I know?"

"Well, an expert analysis determined that with the amount of alcohol and drugs in their system, it was very likely that both Ashby and Raleigh had severe cognitive impairment prior to, during, and after the murder. So next time I go drinking, don't get mad at me for forgetting a few things when I wake up the next morning."

"Not a chance. If I tell you to take out the trash or clean the toilet after you're done puking in it, you better do it."

Mark rolled his eyes. "Anyways, they were in fact still heavily under the influence when they called 9-1-1 and were slurring their words and seemed incredibly disoriented during their initial comments to police. Even when they sobered up, both were confused as to how this murder could have happened. They both insisted they had no motive and wouldn’t think themselves capable of committing a violent homicide. Usually in cases with two suspects like this, the suspects would be in a rush to implicate or blame the other, but in this case both suspects were terrified that there was a possibility that they themselves could have done it. Ashby was nearly hysterical with her fear that she may have been responsible somehow.”

“That complicates things, then.” Jinyoung chewed on his lips. “What was the physical evidence?”

“Nicola Floreth was murdered by a hard swing from a metal baseball bat belonging to Ashby, which hit the left side of her head at an ascending angle. Both Ashby and Raleigh were right handed. The bat had fingerprints of Ashby, Raleigh, and Floreth on the handle—all three often used it when playing impromptu games of ball in the yard of the residence. As they were both baseball players, both Ashby and Raleigh were physically strong enough to deliver that forceful of a blow to the victim. The residence contained plenty of DNA from both suspects, but as it was Ashby's apartment and Raleigh was a frequent visitor, none of this evidence provided any clues to the crime itself. There was no DNA evidence under Floreth’s nails, and no scratches on Ashby or Raleigh. There was no sign of a larger physical fight between the three. Neighbors reported hearing laughing and excited whooping shortly after 4 am, but didn’t report hearing anything that sounded like an argument at the residence.”

Jinyoung’s brow furrowed. “OK…well…there obviously was no premeditation involved…and a lot of limited mental capacity…if I had to guess, maybe Floreth said something upsetting to one of the suspects while drunk, and they snapped while under the influence? But which one? Were the police really able to figure it out?”

“They did. Eventually both Ashby and Raleigh lawyered up, and both decided to declare themselves as ‘not guilty’—they never outright accused the other person of being guilty since they both maintained they had no memory of the evening, but that was kind of the implication. If they were willing to insist they weren’t the one in control of the murder weapon, that meant they were willing to believe the other person was. Both lawyers submitted compelling defenses on behalf of their clients. As it turns out, both Ashby and Raleigh were on the DL from their sport, which meant their capacity to deliver the fatal blow may have been limited.”

“The DL? You mean ‘the down low’? They were…I don’t know…avoiding playing baseball for secret reasons?”

Mark burst out laughing. “They weren’t ‘on the down low’, Jinyoung. DL means the disabled list. They both had injuries which prevented them from playing.”

“Ohhh. How was I supposed to know that? I don’t know anything about baseball!”

“You don't know baseball, you don't know about being blackout drunk or high... what do you know, Jinyoung?"

Jinyoung socked him hard in the arm for that one. Mark just laughed.

"Jodie Ashby was on the DL because she had a distal radius fracture accompanied by a fracture to the ulnar styloid on her right forearm," he continued. "Do you know what that is this time, Jinyoung, or do you need me to translate this part, too?”

“Excuse me, but I was a master of anatomy, thank you very much. I’ll explain this one to our viewers.”

"Master of anatomy? Really? Have I been being rude by not referring to you as Lord Jinyoung, Master of Anatomy since college?"

"Yes, and if you don't start showing me some respect, I'll kick you in the posterior cruciate ligament."

"Uh...posterior? Are you threatening to kick me in the ?"

"No, the back of your knee, genius." Jinyoung lifted his chin haughtily. "See, this is why I should be the one to explain distal radius fractures, not you."

"Very well, oh Master of Anatomy."

Jinyoung extended his arm to the camera. “The radius is a bone in the forearm that ends right at the wrist, right here.” He pointed to the spot on his body. “It’s a pretty common place for a break, and a lot of the people who break their radius bone also break their ulna bone. The ulna is the second major bone of the forearm, and is on the opposite side from the radius.” He pointed again to the location on his arm. “According to Mark, Ashby broke her ulnar styloid, which is the kind of bony, knobby part of your forearm near your wrist you can see protruding out a little right here.” He pointed to it by his wrist. “It plays a pretty big role in how strong and flexible your forearm and wrist are.”

“Ashby had surgery to treat the fracture,” Mark added. “Unfortunately, there was a complication during the surgery which caused joint instability and made it impossible for her to rotate her wrist or forearm without extreme pain.”

“And Raleigh’s injury?”

“He suffered from Pitcher’s Elbow in his right elbow—also known as an injury to the UCL, the ulnar collateral ligament, which is-“

“The area inside the elbow that connects the humerus bone in the upper arm to the ulna bone in the forearm.” Jinyoung pointed to it on his body. “The Master of Anatomy knows this already.”

"Yes, but does the Master of Anatomy know how it plays into baseball?"

"Well...if it's called 'Pitcher's Elbow,' I assume it's something that pitchers deal with a lot."

“What staggering intellect, Jinyoung," Mark said, clapping teasingly. "Pitcher's Elbow makes it incredibly hard to throw things painlessly. It’s treated through Tommy John surgery—which is famous for incapacitating players for a season, since the surgery can take around 12 months to recover from. Raleigh was still in the later phases of the recovery process during the time of the murder.”

“All right…two injured players…but a style of murder that would be difficult to execute while injured.”

“Exactly.”

“So…have you given me the clue that will solve the murder yet?”

Mark nodded. “I did. One of the pieces of evidence I outlined points to one of the two as the definitive killer. Do you know which one it was?” Mark turned to the camera, addressing the audience. “Do you?”

“All right, CUT!” BamBam yelled. “We’ll stop here for now. Jinyoung, you’ll have a little bit of time to think it out, but you are absolutely not allowed to cheat by looking up anything online or asking Mark more questions since he already gave you the information you need to know. I’ll be back sometime this evening and film you proposing your solution to Mark. Sound good?”

“I guess,” Jinyoung said. “It’s a bit of a headscratcher, but I’ll figure it out, I swear.”

“Good luck on your date,” Mark said to BamBam. “Don’t blow it.”

“I’ll give you a blow if you don’t shut up.”

“Excuse me?!” Jinyoung asked indignantly. “Are you threatening my partner here with oral ?”

BamBam wrinkled his nose. “Uh, no. I meant ‘blow’ as in a physical blow…as in a blow to the arm or the head…and now I think I need to go drink bleach to get the mental image of the other kind out of my head. Thanks, Jinyoung.”

“Just get out of here,” Mark advised BamBam, also wrinkling his nose at the unwanted mental image.

“Don’t mind if I do.”

When BamBam left the room, Mark turned to Jinyoung. “Hey, while you puzzle that mystery out, I’m going to order a pizza to the studio so we also have something to eat for dinner before BamBam gets back. Is a large pepperoni OK?”

“Sure, that’s fine,” Jinyoung said distractedly. He was already scribbling down notes in his little investigative notebook, his mind whirring away at cracking the case. Mark smiled fondly, then went out in the hallway to order their pizza.

Jinyoung’s skill at solving two-minute mysteries was one of Mark’s favorite early memories of him back when they’d met in university. In fact, it was his earliest memory of Jinyoung. Mark had been reading a book of two-minute mysteries in the hallway while he was waiting for the class before his Criminology 101 lecture to let out, puzzling over why the suspect was guilty of murdering his boss when it looked like a suicide by all appearances when someone had leaned into his ear and whispered “It’s because there were rope marks on his chin. If he'd hung himself, he would have been able to put the noose properly around his neck.”

Mark had then turned around and seen the most beautiful human being he’d ever laid eyes on in his life smiling at him with a pair of lips that seemed to convey all the kindness and sweetness in the world with just the slightest curve. It was the first time in his life he’d ever felt physically weak in the knees just from the sensation of someone looking at him alone, but the reaction had been surprisingly immediate. His body knew right then and there that it enjoyed being looked at by this person, that it loved the feeling of being held in those wide and friendly eyes.

“Sorry for reading over your shoulder,” the guy had said, still smiling. “I was curious about what you were so fascinated by. I can totally relate—mysteries always get me like that, too. It looks like we still have a few more minutes before class starts—want to try seeing who can solve the next one in your book the fastest?”

Mark had pretty much been a goner for Jinyoung ever since. That brightness and quick wit he’d shown in that very first moment had only been expanded on in every moment after, and Mark had indeed become hopelessly fascinated by the mystery that was his mind. Every time he looked at Jinyoung, he wanted to know what he was thinking and which thoughts dancing around that head of his added up and gave him that sparkle he always had in his eyes and that special playfulness in his smile. He wanted to be wrapped up in Jinyoung’s thoughts and see the world as he saw it if only to carry that same spark inside of himself that he loved so much inside of Jinyoung.

He wanted to keep filling Jinyoung’s life with the mysteries he loved solving so much to bring back that smile from their first meeting where he’d experienced all the joy that arriving at that exact right answer caused—hence the Valentine’s Day gift this year. It most likely didn’t seem all that romantic on the surface, but he meant it a lot more deeply than Jinyoung probably had any idea of.

With the pizza ordered, he went back to the studio room. Jinyoung was still immersed in solving the case, so Mark left him be and instead worked on researching a mystery that had been on his radar for a future script to pitch to BamBam. The two of them worked quietly—though Jinyoung got up several times to mime swinging a baseball bat in different ways—until the delivery guy called Mark to let him know the pizza was here.

“All right, break time,” Jinyoung declared as Mark brought the box in. “Which is good, because I have a bone to pick with you.”

“Really?” Mark asked. “What did I do? Do you not find this an acceptable Valentine’s Day gift? Do I have to go get you those pecan clusters, after all?”

“I love the gift. In fact, it’s the exact kind of gift I like—you taking into consideration what I really love and care about and weaving it into this fun activity for me as a part of the show I also love and care about.”

Mark flushed with happiness. “Then what’s the problem?”

“The fact that your consideration in thinking of this gift idea makes me look like a real for the $3.00 ‘CALL HOME’ bear from the last year?”

“Oh, come on. Don’t compare me from this year to you from last year. I didn’t even get you anything last year, so the ‘CALL HOME’ bear was still a win over me.”

“Still, there was the fact that I did nag you about the pecan clusters after, and they were almost 20 times the amount I spent on you.” Jinyoung picked up a piece of pizza and set it down on a paper plate. “Can I just take this opportunity to clear my name a little? Mitigating fact #1: I originally went to buy the bear a few days before Valentine’s Day, when it was still full price. But then I waffled about it, and by time I decided I wanted to buy it for sure, it was marked down 80%.”

“Which made it…what? $15 originally?” Mark shrugged. “All right, that’s a pretty generous budget to spend on your YouTube co-host, I’ll give you that.”

Jinyoung shifted in his seat. “And…there’s also mitigating fact #2: there were other sayings on the Conversation Hearts the bears were holding when I originally considered buying the bear. But by time I came back, ‘CALL HOME’ was the only one left. I had no choice.”

Mark lifted an eyebrow. “Oh? What did the one you were originally planning on getting say? ‘HUG ME’?”

Jinyoung shook his head. “Not that.”

Mark had to Google other popular Conversation Heart phrases, since he couldn’t really remember. Most of them seemed unlikely, like ‘KISS ME’ or ‘BE MINE’ or ‘MARRY ME.’ There were a few funny ones that seemed up Jinyoung’s alley, though. “SAUCY BOY?” Mark guessed. “BESTIE? #1 FAN? COOL DUDE?”

“Nope,” Jinyoung said, smiling slightly. “SAUCY BOY? That’s really a saying? Really?”

“Yup.” Mark set down his phone. “So…are you going to tell me which message you were going to buy?”

Jinyoung’s smile faded a little. ”I’ll think about it.”

“What do you mean you’ll think about it? You were literally going to buy it for me as a gift last year. Why is it suddenly a secret?”

“Because…new year, new me, right?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know…maybe I wouldn’t choose the same message this year that I would have chosen last year.”

“All right…so, am I supposed to anticipate another stuffed bear with a new message this year?”

Jinyoung shook his head. “Sorry. I went in a slightly different direction this year. But I hope you’ll enjoy it anyways.”

Mark sighed, eyes traveling to the top of Jinyoung’s head. What are you thinking up there, Jinyoung?, he wondered. What is that head of yours filled with, and why won’t you tell me? He wondered what it would feel like to actually know. Some mysteries were better left unsolved, after all, when the truth brought no peace or true closure, but only more pain and heartache.

He lowered his eyes again, meeting Jinyoung’s gaze. Jinyoung was looking back at him just as curiously, as if he was also trying to figure something about him out. For two people who were so good at solving things, they really were pretty hopeless when it came to each other—which was strange, in a way, because even with the moments of disconnect like this, Mark still felt closest to Jinyoung than to anyone else in the world.

“What?” Mark asked self-consciously after Jinyoung continued to look at him for a few more long moments while neglecting his pizza.

“I was just thinking that if someone like you is still single on Valentine’s Day, there’s no hope for the rest of us.”

Mark rolled his eyes. “Back on this again? Have you ever considered…” He trailed off.

“Have I ever considered what?”

“That…” He stopped himself short of saying ‘that I want to be single’  because that wasn’t true. “That I’m perfectly happy spending Valentine’s Day eating pancakes and watching Dateline and being ed at about pecan clusters?”

Jinyoung’s resulting smile was completely worth the admission. “Huh. I didn’t know all those things were such precious Valentine’s Day traditions for you. Guess I’ll have to keep them up, won’t I?”

“…I’m the one who makes the pancakes and turns on Dateline, Jinyoung.”

“Yes, but I’m the one who sits beside your dateless self and enjoys them with you.”

“Shut up and eat your pizza,” Mark advised.

Jinyoung grinned, setting Mark’s pulse back on edge. “Don’t mind if I do.”

BamBam returned from his date around 6:45, looking a bit deliberately cool, calm, and uncaring—which usually meant that it didn’t go all that well.

“So…?” Jinyoung said, taking the risk of asking the dangerous question.

“So, apparently having a profile picture with both me and Yugyeom in it on my dating profile isn’t a good idea because people might think I’m Yugyeom and get a bit confused when someone different from who they were expecting shows up instead,” BamBam said, shrugging.

“Why on earth would you use a photo with someone else in it?” Mark asked. “That’s just asking for mistakes to happen.”

“I look hot in that picture,” BamBam protested.

“Then at least crop Yugyeom out!”

“I can’t do that to my bro.”

“And this is why you’re doomed to be forever alone,” Jinyoung kindly proclaimed.

BamBam shook his head, turning to Mark. “This guy. How can someone so pure and goody-goody looking be such a sass? And then he always goes around acting like you and me are the bad guys even though he’s like this. Why do you put yourself through living with him?”

“He’s nice sometimes,” Mark said with a shrug.

“What a ringing endorsement.” BamBam tossed his bag down and went to fiddle with his cameras. “All right, clean up those pizza boxes. Jinyoung, are you ready to reveal your answer?”

“Yes,” Jinyoung said confidently. “I’ve got a reputation to live up to, after all.”

The three of them got the studio back in order, and once BamBam had finished readjusting the lighting, it was time to begin again. “All right,” he said. “Ready…Set…ACTION!”

“So, Jinyoung,” Mark said, picking up where they left off. “You’ve heard the case and what little evidence there was. What are your thoughts on this?”

“Well, at first I thought Raleigh having ‘Pitcher’s Elbow’ was the clue,” Jinyoung began. “If he hurt his UCL to that extent, he’d definitely be a pitcher and not a batter, so I thought he probably wouldn't immediately be at home using a bat. But then I thought about it a little more and realized that’s not definitive evidence at all. Pitchers can bat. In fact, they have to be in the batting rotation, correct?”

“Yup!” Mark said. “I don’t know the rules in college, but in American pro baseball, pitchers have to bat unless they’re replaced by a designated hitter or pinch hitter, depending on what league they’re in.”

“Plus, you know, the fact that most human beings can pick up a bat and swing it pretty hard regardless of whether they play baseball or what position they play.” Jinyoung nodded. “Then I wondered about the fact that the bat was swung at an ascending angle. I thought that meant the person who swung the bat had to be shorter than Floreth since the swing was ascending. But then I realized that you would have mentioned the heights of the two suspects if that was an important detail, and then I also remembered that most baseball swings do ascend after the initial descent…right?”

“Right again. There are different ways of hitting a ball, but I would say that most people practicing a standard swing would do it with that kind of an ascent. And, for what it’s worth, Floreth and Raleigh were around the same height, and Ashby was just two or three inches shorter. Floreth may not have even been standing at full height when she was killed.”

“Right. So I got to thinking about that kind of standard swing, especially one forceful enough to, you know, kill someone. I thought about what your body would have to do to execute that kind of a swing, and that’s when the answer came to me.”

“Yeah?” Mark asked with a grin.

“I realized that kind of a swing couldn’t have been done that forcefully by someone whose forearm and wrist couldn’t rotate painlessly due to a surgery complication. Ashby wasn’t physically capable of it. So the one swinging the bat must have been Jake Raleigh.”

Mark’s grin widened, and he started clapping his hands. “As expected of you, Jinyoung. It was all elementary to a genius mind like yours.”

Jinyoung beamed proudly. “Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” he said, though his tone was pleased. “I was still a little bit tripped up by Raleigh having Tommy John surgery. You kind of use your elbow when you’re hitting, don’t you?”

“Definitely not as much as when you’re pitching. In fact, most athletes who experience UCL injuries can still safely do activities like lifting weights and batting—it’s largely the action of throwing that’s negatively affected. Besides, Raleigh was almost finished with his recovery at the time of the murder, which meant he was already able to start easing into basic pitching wind-ups again. He was perfectly capable of executing that swing. Jodie Ashby wasn’t.”

“How long did it take the police to determine that?”

“Quite some time. Ashby was drunk at the beginning of her questioning, then grew hysterical after finding out she could have been involved, like I mentioned. She definitely wasn’t in the right mindset to be thinking about the situation clearly, so it wasn’t until her lawyer arrived and she was able to calm down and look at the scenario as a whole that she remembered her injury cleared her. Her lawyer was also able to get a statement from her doctor stating that the swing would have been physically impossible for her.”

“So…by process of elimination, it had to be Jake Raleigh.” Jinyoung tilted his head. “Were they ever able to get any closure on why he did it? What set him off?”

“That’s the thing, Jinyoung. Neighbors only ever reported hearing the trio whooping and laughing before the murder, with no indication of an argument. There’s no way of knowing for sure, but investigators think that Raleigh was probably just fooling around with the bat while under the influence and didn’t realize Nicola Floreth was in the path of his swing. Her death was probably unintentional, so there was no motive.”

“Wow,” Jinyoung said. “The loss of a whole human life for absolutely no reason because of drinking, drugs, and stupidity. I hope this served as a wakeup call to people.”

“I hope so, too.” Mark turned to the camera. “And the moral of this wakeup call? We may think it’s OK to get trashed and stoned to excess as long as we’re not behind the wheel of a car, but we should all just remember that when we put our actions in control of a version of us who has lost all control, well…the consequences may just turn fatal. So, Americans: can we all just agree to find a better way to celebrate our sports victories than behaving like brainless idiots, please?”

A week later—Valentine’s Day itself—the video was up, and Mark was scrolling through the comments as usual. Most people were discussing whether or not they were able to solve the case on their own without waiting for Jinyoung’s answer, but like clockwork, the usual thread of conversation came up:

Markjin buying each other Valentine’s Day presents is, like, the gayest thing. Point me in the direction of two straight guys who would actually go through that effort for their platonic friend. I’ll wait.

-GuiltyMarkjin-

 ↳

The funny thing is, I don’t think they even realize how gay it is. They’re just out here announcing it to us like it’s the most normal thing haaha

-MuderinoTina-

↳

God, you f**kin delusional fangirls, would you get off these videos? It was a GAG. Jinyoung just wanted to con his FRIEND into buying him expensive PECAN CLUSTERS. How long will it take you psychos to accept they’re straight and probably screwing es you losers could only dream of looking like? Why don’t you check yourselves for brain damage before you wind up killing your friends by f**kin around with a baseball bat, GOD!!!!!

-Trent

↳

Allright, here’s the thing, Trant. Jinyoung Park could buy himself 40 boxes of those $40 pecan clusters based on how much I spent on My Men of Mystery merch this year alone and it’s only FEBRUARY. He does not need to go through the trouble of dragging his rich down to the convenience store to pick out a bear for his beloved Mark and then get heartbroken that Mark didn’t do something cute for him just to get some pecan clusters he could buy for his own self OR HAVE THE ES HE'S SUPPOSEDLY SCREWING BUY FOR HIM, and Mark Tuan did NOT have to respond by coming up with the sweetest, most perfect gift for his beloved Jinyoung ever to make up for it to commemorate a holiday for ROMANTIC PARTNERS. I bet Jinyoung is going to give him his own gift today and it is going to be SWEET and THE GAYEST THING, so shove your GAGS up your pie hole, Trant!

-GuiltyMarkjin-

↳

Get wrecked, Tront!

-MeAThristyIntellectual

Mark shook his head. He could only imagine what Trent/Trant/Tront would think if he knew that Mark was using these “delusional fangirls” as a barometer to gauge whether Jinyoung potentially liked him back or not. He didn’t really know if Jinyoung buying him that bear last year really was “the gayest thing” because Jinyoung was just the kind of person who did things like that, but Mark decided to take it as a good sign for now, if only to stick it to heteronormative Tront.

Mark set down his phone and got back to work cooking up their obligatory heart shaped pancakes. These had become part of their Valentine’s Day tradition—if you could call it that, considering this was only their second Valentine’s Day sharing an apartment—last year when Mark had poured what was supposed to be a regular pancake on the griddle but had ended up looking slightly like a misshapen heart due to his bad pouring skills, and Jinyoung had seen it and graciously said, “You making me Valentine’s pancakes only slightly makes up for the fact that you didn’t get me a gift.” Mark hadn’t been stupid enough to tell Jinyoung the heart shape had been an accident and that he’d been making the pancakes for himself, and so had ended up making Jinyoung a whole plateful. The fact that he was doing it again this year even after having gotten Jinyoung a gift was probably the real Gayest Thing.

“Mmm, pancakes,” Jinyoung said upon entering into the room. “And this here is why I knew I had to make you my roommate.”

“Pancakes?”

“That. And eggs. And sausage links. And ramen. And all the other things you make me when I’m hungry.”

“You could learn how to cook, you know.”

“And steal your charm point? Not a chance.” He waited for Mark to pile up his plate before clearing his throat. “So…your gift this year.”

Mark turned to look at him, heart pounding just slightly, though he didn’t know what to expect. His body was always holding out for the possibility of a confession, no matter how unlikely it seemed. “Yes?” he asked, steadying himself against the counter.

“We had a similar idea this year…giving a special episode as a gift. But I’m telling you about yours in advance. Here.”

He passed Mark an envelope, which Mark slit open. He pulled out a letter, his eyes widening as he read what was written in it.

“Oh my god, Jinyoung,” he gasped. “Is this what I think it is?”​

“I don’t know?” Jinyoung asked, grinning. “What do you think it is?”

“My favorite true crime writer of all time saying ‘yes’ to your offer to fly out and film an episode with her?”

“Yup, that’s exactly what it is.” Jinyoung wiggled his eyebrows. “Hope you like Colorado, Mark. We’ll be going there next month.”​