Minki studied Jinyoung’s reflection in his floor length mirror and granted him an approving nod. “Perfect,” he said decisively. “If he’s not 100% crazy for you now, we’re going to push him the rest of the way there with this.”

“They’re just clothes,” Jinyoung said, looking himself up and down.

“Humans have been seducing each other with clothing for centuries, Park Jinyoung. It’s not just the ladies. And you can bet your sweet that Mark is going to notice how nicely these pants accentuate said sweet .”

Jinyoung snorted, but Minki could tell by his expression that a bit of confidence was breaking through all of his nerves. My work here is done, Minki thought with a grin. I’m ready to launch him out to meet his destiny with his soulmate.

After one last bolstering hug of support from Minki, Jinyoung at last headed out for a night of stargazing and confessions with Mark. And now for my own special night, Minki thought. He grabbed his laptop, a DVD, and a bag of snacks he’d put together the night before. It was Saturday night, and he knew he could most likely find Aron where he usually was at this time—in the common lounge working on homework like the dork he was.

Sure enough, Aron was on the lounge couch working on editing an article when Minki popped in. He looked up, smiling and immediately scooting over so Minki would have space to sit beside him.

“Hyung, it’s Saturday night,” Minki informed him.

“Thank you, Calendar-App-Minki,” Aron teased. “Do I have any appointments tonight?”

“I’m canceling your date with Journalism and replacing it with a date with me.” He lifted up his DVD. “Because this is thriller…thriller night.”

Aron squinted at the DVD cover. “The Psycho Slasher Slayings?” he read.

“Sounds fantastic, right?”

“I would not have pegged you for a horror fan.”

“I love them,” Minki said earnestly. “They’re terrifying and give me weeks filled with nightmares, but I love them.”

“I’m not quite sure I feel so enthusiastically about them.”

“Hyung. I don’t want to watch it alone. I’ll get scared, and there will be no one around to use as a body shield or cling to screaming.”

“Are you sure you actually enjoy horror movies?”

Minki nodded again. “Being terrified is half the fun.”

Aron looked skeptically at the DVD cover, then sighed in resignation. “Well. I’m not about to deny myself the pleasure of being your body shield. Still, I’m not sure how well this movie and I are going to mesh.”

“Somehow, I think it’ll be worth it for you in the end,” Minki said, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. “Now get these textbooks out of my sight so we can have a mood.”

Aron obediently shoved them into his backpack. In their place, Minki dropped his snack bag. “Oh, what’s this?” Aron asked. He picked it up. “Grapes…with eyeballs?”

“Caterpillars,” Minki corrected. “All the grapes are on little bamboo skewers to form caterpillars. I call it ‘Putting Butterflies in Your Stomach’.”

“Huh?”

“You know that phrase you have in America when you’re nervous or fluttery? ‘I have butterflies in my stomach’ or ‘I’m feeling butterflies’? These caterpillars will go in your stomach and turn into those butterflies.”

Aron tilted his head, a smile growing on his lips. “You want me to be nervous?”

“There are good kinds of nervous. But most of all, I want you to be fluttery.”

“Then I better start eating some caterpillars, huh?” He pulled a skewer out of the bag. “What are the eyes made out of?”

“Don’t worry, just icing. I already had Jinyoung sample one to make sure they weren’t poison, and he survived.”

“That’s comforting to know.” Aron pushed the skewer between his lips and ate the first two grapes. “Mmm. Not bad.”

“See, I can make art that’s both visually appealing and delicious,” Minki said as he set up the laptop.

“I never doubted you.” Aron polished off the rest of his caterpillar, then reached back to grab the blanket hung over the couch and pull it over both of their legs. “This way we can get that cozy winter feeling, even here in LA.”

“You just want to snuggle, right?”

“…maybe.”

Minki started up the DVD on his laptop, then sank back into the blankets with Aron, pressing his cheek against his shoulder. Aron wrapped an arm around his shoulder, pulling him closer.

There was about ten minutes of “plot” before the titular psycho slasher appeared and commenced his psycho slayings in all their gory glory. Minki shrieked and hid his face partially behind Aron’s shoulder as he watched. Aron could only handle about five seconds before he started covering his eyes and making gagging noises.

“Disgusting,” Aron groaned once the carnage was over.

“Yes, but it feels cool when you’re watching,” Minki insisted. “Getting that, you know…jolt of terror? You can’t get that anywhere else, unless you’re really getting chased by the psycho slasher.”

“I don’t know. That scene tickled my gag reflex a lot like ‘Rainbow Mosaic in the Desert’ did.” Minki whacked him over the head with a pillow.

The movie carried on in disgusting, terrifying fashion and every second of it was perfect, from the rush of adrenaline whenever the slasher popped up unexpectedly which sent them flailing into each other’s arms to the desire to scream at the idiot protagonists for their stupid decisions. It was amazing that the sense of fear and terror never fully canceled out the feeling of the butterflies in his stomach when they touched and clung to each other. Even during the serious moments, he felt the urge to laugh hysterically at Aron’s cute little shudders and whines of “Minki, why are you torturing me with this movie?”, followed by an urge to snuggle deeper into his arms for the feeling of safety that watching these movies gave him since he was warm and at home and protected in the arms of someone who would never let the horrors of the world come close.

They hit a quiet moment in the movie, and Minki could feel Aron exhale against him in relief. A boring part. Minki didn’t do boring parts, whether in movies or real life, so he decided that this was the perfect time to fill in that empty space with something exciting and beautiful.

“Hyung,” he said, snuggling infinitesimally closer. “I made a deal with Jinyoung a little bit ago.”

“Yeah? What kind of deal?”

“About what we’re going to do about the fact that we’re technically not 100% sure about the soulmate thing, but I’m 100% sure I’m in love with you.”

Aron’s breath caught. “Yeah…?”

“I care a lot about Jinyoung’s feelings, since he’s my best friend. But I care a lot about yours and mine, too. So I factored all three of us into my decision that I wouldn’t kiss you unless Jinyoung told me first that he was sure he was in love with Mark.”

Aron’s expression turned a little wary. “Which you said probably wouldn’t be happening any time soon given how badly they failed to hit it off.”

Minki’s lips quirked. “You think? Because a very impassioned Jinyoung visited me a few days ago with tears rolling down his eyes, telling me that he had fallen very much in love with Mark to the point where he didn’t even know what he was going to do about it.”

“H-He did?” Aron asked, caught off guard.

“Really, hyung, you give my imagination far too much credit. I’m not making this up.” He trailed his finger along Aron’s jaw. “Do you want me to be? I can be patient, if that’s what you want. It’s only a few more weeks until the holiday. That’s not so far away in the scheme of things.”

Aron caught Minki’s hand in his. “Do you have a thing for toying with me, Minki?”

“Only because you have a thing for being toyed with, hyung.”

Aron made a gruff little noise in the back of his throat, then pushed Minki down on his back on the sofa and kissed him, arms wrapping tightly around his slender frame. There was something comfortable about the feeling, as if he was at last arriving at the place he’d been trying to get to his entire life, but it all still felt wild and electrifying with the way the butterflies burst into a scattered frenzy inside of his heart at the feel of Aron’s touch. He grabbed on to him, kissing him back with all he had, somehow feeling he would never get enough of it no matter how much time they had, no matter how often they connected just like this.

Aron pulled away a little, then lifted his hand to trail his pinky along Minki’s lower lip. Minki could almost see the crackle of red on it, the thread that connected them together by fate. Minki had spent so many years debating how he felt about the notion, coming up with any number of ‘what ifs’ to delimit its desirability or importance, but right in that moment he was so very happy that there was someone in the world capable of loving him wholly for everything that he was, and that there was not a single quirk or oddity inside him that this person would fail to love.

Minki lifted up his own pinky and hooked it together with Aron’s. “Thank you for being here, hyung,” he murmured in a soft voice.

“Thank you for finding me, Minki,” he whispered. Their lips joined together again, and Minki felt a pull in each of his fingers this time, an insistent desire to trace the path of every vein, to scale every muscle, to touch every strand of hair, to pull him in even closer until there was no separation at any point. The haunting music, slashes, and screams in the background did nothing to pull him out of the moment—if anything it just made him feel all the more like he wanted to be pulled into their own separate world where nothing outside the two of them and what they were doing together mattered.

Of course, the outside world was nothing if not unfair. The moment Aron’s hand started sliding up his shirt, Peniel’s intruding voice broke in, saying, “Hey, what are you guys watching in he-eeeeeello!”

Aron broke away from Minki with an annoyed tsk, looking up at Peniel. “We’re a bit busy in here.”

“Clearly,” Peniel said in his troll voice. “Making out to the tune of people getting chopped up is an interesting choice, but you two seem to be having fun.”

“Feel free to leave us to it.”

“Awww, but I want to hear about how this pairing happened.” Peniel plopped down in the armchair. “Wait. Is this The Psycho Slasher Slayings? I wanna watch with you guys…not that you were actually watching.” He grabbed his phone and tapped the screen a few times, starting a call. “Hey BM—grab Vernon. Minki and Aron are watching The Psycho Slasher Slayings in the lounge!”

“What did I do to make you hate me, Peniel?” Aron asked, picking himself up from on top of Minki with a low groan. Minki also popped back up, swiping his hair back nonchalantly. He had nothing to be ashamed of. In fact, he’d do it again in a heartbeat.

“Just living my best life, Aron, that’s all,” Peniel said grinning widely. “So, what’s the deal, anyways? Neither of you have clock implants, but you were certainly making out there with the confidence of soulmates.”

“We don’t have implants, but it doesn’t matter,” Minki said, resting his head back on Aron’s shoulder with a happy sigh. “As long as we have our red strings.”

To their mutual annoyance, Peniel, BM, and Vernon stayed through the rest of the movie and after, and when Minki and Aron decided to call it a night and go to bed, they lingered out in the hallway, whispering back and forth about whether or not Minki was going to slip in to Aron’s room for the night or vice versa. Minki wanted a goodnight kiss, but didn’t exactly want an audience with everything so new and fresh, so settled on taking his hand, giving it a squeeze, and whispering in a low voice “Tomorrow.”

Tomorrow could usually come quickly with an easy transition into dreamland where time passed at a different speed. But the butterflies were still wide awake in Minki’s stomach, beating their wings and making it impossible for him to even shut his eyes without slamming against his chest and demanding he stay awake and revisit every second of the kiss. His pinky finger felt a dull ache, and Minki could just imagine the thread tugging and tugging, not wanting to be separate anymore now that they’d finally come together.

He tried again to go to sleep, but his body wasn’t having it. He slipped out of bed and poked his head into the hallway. Peniel, Vernon, and BM had blessedly gone back into their own rooms and were no longer out. As quietly as he could, Minki crossed the hallway and knocked with the lightest possible touch on Aron’s door.

Aron answered, still wide awake himself even though he’d changed into his pajamas just like Minki. Minki placed a finger on his lips, and Aron quickly ushered him inside and shut the door behind them.

“Hyung,” Minki said, still keeping his voice low. “I keep on thinking of the Psycho Slasher, and I don’t want to sleep alone.”

“The Psycho Slasher, huh?” Aron asked, a note of amusement in his voice. “Are you sure that’s why you can’t sleep?”

“Of course. Every noise I hear could be a knife wielding maniac who wants to kill me for the fun of it.” He nodded to Aron’s bed. “But if I’m with hyung, it won’t be so scary.”

“If you say so. I’ll make sure no one gets you, Minki.”

“Don’t be that protective. There is one person I really want to get me, after all.” He pushed Aron down into his bed and wasted no time in getting on top of him and kissing him on the lips. Aron responded to him eagerly, pulling him the rest of the way down and wrapping him up in his arms. Now that they had time of their own with no threat of intrusion, they took it slowly, focusing on finding each other’s rhythm and easing each other into the process of discovering what they liked and what felt best. Aron’s fingers gently traced along his back, while Minki rested them against his chest, feeling the rise and fall of his breaths. It felt good to know that he was now a part of the pump of his heart, the firing of his nerves, the rushes of blood through his veins.

After what felt like a good five or so minutes of this slow, exploratory kissing, Minki moved his hands to the buttons of Aron’s pajama top and began to undo the top two so he could touch more of his warm skin. This action seemed to flick the switch a little, and Aron’s hands flew down to his waist, going under his shirt to touch the skin of his waist. Minki rolled his hips just slightly, hands pressing down hard on Aron’s chest, and Aron rose to meet him, responding in rhythm with his movements. They both pulled away from their kiss, gasping as the heat of the moment shifted.

“Minki,” Aron whispered in a voice which struggled for steadiness. “Did you want to…?”

Minki chewed on his lip. The situation was different now than it had been now that Jinyoung was in love with Mark, and for Minki’s part, there was not a doubt in his mind that he was already with the person he was going to be with for the rest of his life. If it didn’t happen now, it was surely going to happen soon, so why wait? But at the same time, Jinyoung’s peace of mind still mattered to him, and he didn’t want to have a single regret attached to the first time, even if that regret wasn’t his own.

With a smile, he eased off Aron a little, not wanting to stir him up further. “Astrologically speaking, next year has much more favorable conditions for consummating the love between a Scorpio and a Gemini. Maybe after the holidays? I hear, er, Mercury…and Mars…will be in ideal positions in January when I’m back from Korea.”

Aron looked baffled for a moment, then suddenly grinned and shook his head. “Well. Far be it from me to interfere with destiny.” He pulled Minki against his chest, kissing his forehead. “But like I said: you’re going to owe me for lost time.”

“I’ll pay you back with interest, hyung,” Minki said, linking their pinkies back together. “I’m already planning to give you more than you can take.”

Jinyoung was worried that the atmosphere with Mark would be uncomfortable thanks to the tearful and confession-laden nature of the last time they’d spoken face-to-face, but to his immense relief, Mark was all smiles when Jinyoung met up with him in the parking lot. “Hi,” he said. “I’ve picked a destination, just like you asked me to. It’s a bit of a drive, though. Is that OK?”

Jinyoung nodded. After talking with Minki the other day, he’d texted Mark to pick his favorite nature spot and schedule some time there where they could talk in quiet and sort things out. He’d remembered how Aron had said that Mark had an affinity for the best natural landscapes in LA since he often needed to pull himself away from the chaos of running his store and all the distractions that came along with living in an all boy dorm. That was exactly what Jinyoung wanted, too—to be pulled away from all possibilities of distractions in a place where it was just the two of them. The last thing he wanted was a half- dormmate showing up from the showers asking for shampoo or for Peniel and Joshua to turn on their amps and drown them out with an impromptu concert.

He slid into the car, and Mark the radio. They were already playing Christmas music even though it was still November; at least the station Mark had tuned into seemed to be playing only instrumental versions of the more solemn and haunting songs like “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” and “O Come, O Come Emmanuel.” Jinyoung really didn’t want to be singing “Jingle Bells” to himself for the rest of the evening.

“So,” Mark said after a stretch of comfortable silence as they listened to the music. “Exam season’s coming. Are you holding up all right?”

“It’s essay season for lit majors,” Jinyoung said. “The only classes I have tests for are core classes, and those shouldn’t be too difficult. But having four or five major essays due at the same time is a little bit tricky.”

“I can imagine. It must be tricky writing in your second language, on top of it.”

“We’re allowed to use Hayer U’s writing lab for editorial support, so it’s not too bad. There’s just a lot of pressure to write something truly thought-provoking, and…well…my thoughts seem to be a little scattered these days.”

“It happens. Real life creeps in. But I’m sure you’ll be fine. You seem like a person who always comes through when it counts.”

“How about you?” Jinyoung asked.

“Me? Junior year’s a killer, honestly. Or maybe that’s my own fault for declaring my major too late and having to pack my schedule full of business classes to meet all the requirements. I’ll probably do fine on the exams, but there are some classes where they made our final a group project…”

Jinyoung winced. There weren’t that many group projects for lit majors, but he’d heard enough stories to know how hellish they were. “Do you think you’ll still be able to graduate next year even with the delayed major thing?”

“That’s the plan. I still took business classes Freshman and Sophomore year, so I’m not too far behind. If I have to, I’ll take a few summer classes to make up the difference.”

“I was thinking about taking some summer classes, too, so I can stay in the US. I’m probably not going to move back to Korea permanently, so I think I should get used to living here full time.”

“If you need any help…”

“…I’ll know who to ask, thanks.” They fell silent again as a new song began. Jinyoung sang under his breath along with the radio. O Holy Night, the stars are brightly shining…

“You can sing louder,” Mark said. “You have a pretty voice.”

“Oh. I’m not trying to show off or anything.”

“I know. I just want to listen to it.”

Jinyoung obliged him, singing a little bit louder. A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices, for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn…

When that song ended, Jinyoung made Mark sing the next, “What Child Is This?” Jinyoung closed his eyes and listened, his mind filling unbidden with thoughts of Christmases in the future they would spend together. Pine trees and wrapped gifts and hanging stockings over the fireplace. Please, whatever force it is that determines our fate, let this dream of mine come true.

After about an hour in the car, they turned off the highway and down a gravel path that led to an empty lot. “This place is packed when there’s a meteor shower or a blood moon,” Mark said. “But it looks like it’s just us tonight.”

“Good,” Jinyoung said. That was the exact way he wanted it.

Mark unbuckled his seatbelt. “Actually, I’m a little worried you’ll find this whole place a little underwhelming. There’s nothing really special about it when there’s nothing particular going on in the sky. But it’s a favorite of mine. There are some nice trails in the nearby forested areas for a hike, and I like to end my hikes right here to look up at the stars.”

Jinyoung did just that as he stepped out of the car. All the clutter and chaos of LA was behind them, leaving the night sky vast and uninterrupted above them. The last time Jinyoung had gone stargazing was in Korea, and it suddenly struck him just how far he had come since then, standing under the same sky in what felt like an entirely different world, one where everything had changed in spite of the same stars and moon gazing down on him. In a way, he felt a little sad when he thought back to the boy he’d left behind, the starry eyed child chasing a simple happy ending and a perfect ideal, but at the same time felt happy he was here in this far off point from all his expectations with someone who made him not regret the fact that he’d matured and saw the world now with different eyes.

“Do you know any of the stars?” Jinyoung asked as they looked up at them together.

“The Big Dipper,” Mark said, pointing to it. “And polaris.”

“Everyone knows those.”

“I know the names of plenty others, and I know the jist of the picture they form. I just don’t know where to find them.”

“You don’t want to try to look?”

“I dunno. The big picture is awe-inspiring enough on its own. And all those stars are part of it, anyways.”

Jinyoung exhaled. “True. It’s truly beautiful.”

“If this were a romance movie, I’d agree with you while staring at you instead of the night sky.”

Jinyoung looked over. Mark was indeed looking at him, with an expression more serious than Jinyoung was used to seeing from him. “Is this a romance movie?”

“Yes. I’m just not sure if this is the scene where I become the love interest or the stepping stone to reach the real romantic lead. And to be honest, I’m scared half to death to find out.”

Jinyoung took in a deep breath, steadying himself for what was to come. “The last time we saw each other, you told me you loved me,” Jinyoung said. “I have a simple answer to that. And a complicated one. Which would you like to hear first?”

Mark thought for a moment. “The…the simple one, maybe?”

Jinyoung nodded. “The simple answer is that I love you, too.”

Mark’s mouth fell open a little. Jinyoung had thought he’d start grinning or maybe even give Jinyoung one of his little ‘we both knew this would happen’ smirks, the ones that had annoyed Jinyoung so much when they’d first met. But he genuinely looked as if he’d not been expecting to hear these words so plainly spoken so soon.

“O-Oh,” Mark said. A beat. “I really, really don’t want a complicated alternative to that answer. Can I take the money and run?”

Jinyoung shook his head, a little sadly. “No. You know me, right? I excel at complicated.”

“Right.” Mark crossed his arms over his chest. “Well, I excel at withstanding your complicated. Do your worst, Jinyoung.”

“The fact that I can’t wear you down is one of the things I probably love the most about you.” He took another breath. “You know how you told me that your parents said there’s a red string of fate connecting soulmates? Well, they’re right. It’s real. And in the East, we have a way to help people see their string and learn a little a bit about where the other end of that string is. And you know how I told you that I was here to find my soulmate when we first met? That’s because I knew the end of my string was here.”

Mark nodded. He’d at least guessed a part of this on his own.

“Baldwin Hall. Hayer U. I had so many specific details, you would have thought there’s no way I could have messed it up.” He laughed mirthlessly. “But I got so caught up in the idea of my lifelong dream coming true, that I forgot about a little technicality—that Minki’s red string also ended at Baldwin Hall at Hayer U, and that if we weren’t careful, we ran the risk of running into our soulmates at the exact same moment. Which is exactly what happened. You may not remember, but the moment Minki and I walked into the lounge for our dorm meeting, you felt the tug of your string of fate on your finger. I did, too, and so did Minki and Aron. All four of us had our moment at the same time. You and Aron didn’t know it, then, but Minki and I did…and we had no way of knowing who the right person we were supposed to meet was.” Jinyoung’s voice dropped. “And…after the first time we met…I didn’t want it to be you, so I convinced myself it wasn’t. There was something about you that repelled me at first. No one had ever made me question myself the way you did, and I was scared of having to realize that nothing was as simple and straightforward as I had thought it was my whole life. But even through that, you kept drawing me in, in spite of myself. Maybe there was always this part of me that didn’t want everything to fall into my hands so easily. You really did wear down my stubbornness completely until I opened my eyes and truly saw you. And the person I saw was strong and kind and so endearing in so many ways. Even the parts of you I thought would drive me crazy in the worst way drove me crazy in the absolute best way. Just being around you makes every moment more than it has ever been before now. And I want you to be the one with everything I am. I want you to be my soulmate. I want to spend my life with you.”

There was a weighted silence for a moment, and Mark didn’t seem to be in any hurry to fill it. He just kept studying Jinyoung with a half-amazed, half-expectant look on his face.

“There is a way we can know for sure,” Jinyoung continued. “When I go back to Korea for the winter holiday, we can get the information that will make it 100% sure that Minki belongs with Aron and I belong with you. We may feel like we already know the answer, but…if there’s a chance we’re wrong, I don’t want what happened to you with Jaebum to happen to you with me. I never want you to go through anything like that again. So to avoid that, all we have to do is wait a few more weeks and-”

Jinyoung was cut off by a burst of laughter from Mark. It was so unexpected that Jinyoung froze and just stared at him blankly. It was a wild laugh, intense to the point where Mark was already almost doubling over with his inability to breathe normally. A jolt of fear shuddered through Jinyoung that Mark was making fun of him or mocking what he felt, but he knew Mark wasn’t the kind of person who would actually do that, and could also sense that there was no malice in his laughter. If anything, he just looked genuinely overjoyed.

Finally, Mark’s laughter died down, and he straightened up and looked at Jinyoung with glistening eyes. “Hell no am I waiting until the holiday, Jinyoung,” he said in a firm voice.

“But-”

“No. No buts. I’m not doing that. Not after hearing you say all that.” He extended his arms. “Come over here.”

“Mark, are you really s-”

“Yes, I’m really sure. I’ve been sure since the beginning. You’re the one who’s not sure, right? You are, but you’re scared of that .1% chance of an error. Well. That .1% doesn’t exist. So come here and let’s not waste our time anymore.” When Jinyoung hesitated for a second, Mark shook his head. “Jinyoung. I swear to god. If you go through with getting your exact information in December and then come crawling back to tell me that you’re finally ready for me, I’m going to put you off for five years as punishment. Because if you can’t accept me as the one for you in your heart and body and mind without someone spelling it out for you, it doesn’t mean anything. I want your answer. Yours is the only one that matters to me. I need you to believe in me as much as I believe in you, and I swear on my life, Jinyoung, that I know without a single doubt that you’re the one person in this universe who was made to be with me.” He extended his hand again. “Now come here and be with me, all right?”

In that moment, Jinyoung was struck with the sense of clarity that had been eluding him for all this time. He could feel it in the rush of his blood, the beat of his heart, in the air around himself and Mark and how being with him felt deeper than being with anyone else. The answer was inside of him, manifesting just as much in his heart as it did in the unseen thread around his finger. Maybe the journey had begun with a detailed guide and what he’d thought would be a set path, but the rest of it had been of his own making—his and Mark’s—and against what he’d thought was his better judgement. He’d ended up under this exact expanse of sky with these exact emotions pulsing in his heart with Mark and not Aron or anyone else because he wanted this ending even in spite of all the doubt and uncertainty that it would turn out to be wrong.

But it was holding onto that doubt when the rest of him had already surrendered that would turn it from the right answer to the wrong. If he turned away from Mark now, he wouldn’t deserve him—and Mark would never forget Jinyoung’s lack of faith or fully forgive him for it, even if the five years passed. It wasn’t enough just to hope the answer was right. He had to be the person who made it right, who was strong enough to make the leap from ‘maybe’ to ‘yes,’ and to stand by that choice with all the certainty such an important thing deserved.

So Jinyoung made that choice right then and there. The soul inside him knew who it wanted to be with. And he was going to be with him from thereon out.

Jinyoung reached out for Mark’s hand and laced their fingers together, and Mark yanked him forward into his arms and kissed him without hesitation. It was the first kiss of Jinyoung’s life, and what he had expected to be slow and building was instead intense and already filled with so much hunger that it couldn’t stay delicate. He threw his arms around Mark and kissed him back with all of the same force of love and conviction, feeling the sense of everything falling into place inside him, the exasperated and relieved groan of finally, you finally let go and landed right where you belonged from the start.

Mark pulled away, his lips slipping into a sweet, affectionate smile as he cupped Jinyoung’s cheeks in his hands. “Silly Jinyoung,” he said in a slightly hoarse voice. “You had a 50/50 chance right from the beginning, and you still had all those doubts? Until you told me what you just did, it could have been you or any of the thousands of unclaimed people in the entire world for me from a statistical standpoint, as far as I knew. But I knew anyways that it was you. How could it be anyone but you?”

“I…I maybe think too much about things,” Jinyoung said dazedly.

“Not ‘maybe’. You definitely do. But that’s one of the things I love about you. And I don’t mind that I’m always going to be running around in that head of yours while you do all that thinking. As long as your thoughts always end with you deciding that meeting a jerk like me was the start of the greatest story of your life.”

“It was,” Jinyoung said with a smile. “It was a different story than I thought it would be, but a better one. Because in this case, the reality I found was so much more perfect than the ideal I thought I wanted.”

Jinyoung leaned in and kissed him again, just as fiercely as before. Mark kissed him back as if he was still starving for every little bit of him and dying to get his fill. There was no doubt that he had more experience in this than Jinyoung, but Jinyoung didn’t think anything he had done with Jaebum in the past was dictating what he was doing now. The kiss felt entirely molded to him, filled with all Mark’s many efforts to catch him and keep him ensnared so that he’d never again keep him at arm’s length or fight the pull of being together with him.

And their desire to touch each other was growing relentless. Jinyoung felt his knees going weak as Mark pressed closer and closer into him and touched his body in ways no one had ever touched it before, and he took a step back to catch his balance, foot bumping into the wheel of Mark’s car. Mark grabbed him from the back and hoisted Jinyoung up so he was sitting on the hood, then wrapped his arms around his back to keep him close. Jinyoung also wrapped his legs around him, pointlessly holding him in place even though he knew he was at no risk of having this person go away from him. They were held together both by choice and by fate, a connection woven even stronger than most.

Mark broke away, practically panting for breath. “I’m going to lose it,” he whispered, looking up into Jinyoung’s eyes. “If we keep this up, I swear you’re going to make me lose it. I’ve been wanting this for so long…”

“How long, exactly? Don’t tell me that I flipped this switch from the moment I snapped at you in the laundry room.”

“Well, you did flip a switch of sorts, then. I happen to like challenges I have to work for.” Mark smiled. “I think it was when you started actively avoiding me.”

“Why?”

“Because the amount of dedication and effort you put into it was freaking adorable.”

“You’re out of your mind.”

“Clearly.” Mark cackled. “You also gave me so many excellent views of your retreating back, and I’m not going to lie, but my eyes were always traveling lower when you walked away. Do you know the expression ‘I hate to see you leave, but I love to watch you go’?”

Jinyoung shook his head. “That doesn’t really make sense.”

“Yes it does. It basically means ‘I don’t like having you walk away from me, but I love looking at your when you do.’”

“W-What?” Jinyoung flushed. “!”

“No one ever said I wasn’t.” Mark gave him a sneaky peck on the lips. “And this also wants to let you know that his body kind of wants to pin you down on the hood of this car after wanting you for so long, but I’m pretty sure that’s not exactly how you envisioned things for yourself, so if you’d prefer that not to happen, you better tell me now before we start kissing again and I truly lose it. Actually, I’d advise telling me to drive back because a middle-aged guy usually shows up here around 10 PM every night with a telescope, and he probably won’t thank us for turning this into makeout point.”

“Don’t drive me back just yet,” Jinyoung said scooting across the hood of the car so Mark could sit next to him. He still felt dizzy, and could go for some calming down himself. But he wanted to enjoy the night sky a little more after how far they’d come to be there. “You promised me more stargazing than this.”

“Fine, fine.” He plopped next to Jinyoung and took his hand, lacing their fingers together. “Anyways, I doubt any of this went according to how you'd envisioned things for yourself, did it?”

"Not a bit of it," Jinyoung admitted. "I was expecting a love at first sight, swept off my feet kind of story."

"Well, sorry I blew the whole 'at first sight' thing. But now I'm curious: did you have any high expectations of what would happen after we got together?" 

"No, I didn’t plan the finer details as much as you think I did. I just assumed that once I found the right person, everything would be perfect. Every part of it.”

“I’m suddenly feeling the pressure.”

“I don’t want you to. What I mean by ‘perfect’ is that it’s from you. The person I love. My soulmate. So whatever it is we decide to do, it will be just right for me. Just like everything about you is.”

“Haaa. I seriously can’t believe there’s actually someone in the universe that would say that about someone like me in all honesty.”

“Well. Out of billions of people, there’s only one who would say that. Not that impressive.”

“Or is it the most impressive thing of all? That I get to have you as my one in a billion.” He lifted up Jinyoung’s hand and kissed it. “We probably would have found each other either way, but thanks, Jinyoung. Thank you for following your red string here. I didn’t know I needed you in my life right then and there when things were at their hardest. But I’m glad you did.”