“O my God! How you didn’t explode, the world may never know?!” Alex screamed, focusing on her friend with such earnest before falling backwards onto her hotel bed. She promptly flipped over to scream into her pillow while Fay mimicked her. Talia simply stood in the doorway, a thousand yard stare plastering her face.

            “Maybe we spoke too soon,” Fay squealed, sitting up in bed to look at the stunned girl barely able to shuffle inside and close the door.

            “Well, yea, if he looked at me the way he did to her, then I don’t think I would have even made it out the venue!” Alex concurred.

            “Mine with him was so short. We did the most basic pose, but for her, it’s like they may as well already be married!” Fay sighed, a subtle hint of remorse in her voice. She should have been more straightforward, but she was simply happy that they extra shifts at work resulted in an overpriced picture with him.

            “You guys are crazy,” Talia stammered, her usual playful charm absent as she made her way to her and Fay’s bed before flopping onto it. She stared up at the ceiling, gingerly gripping the polaroid as if with her dying breath.

            “No, no, no, that’s not fair! He was all over you!” Fay countered. “He wanted you,” she assured her.

            “Honestly, I don’t think he had that much skinship with anyone else. I mean, he is a man after all and you guys are the perfect height. Just look at how cute you guys are!” Alex pointed out. “I mean, Y was just as handsy with me, but Seungmnin… There was something special between you and him. Just admit it,” she continued. “It was fate. The angels, the gods, the saints, everyone, especially him, were smiling on you tonight,” she declared with an uncharacteristic hopelessly romantic air. She knew she had done the right thing, though knowing so did not make the subtle pain in her heart subside any faster. Sainthood did not come without such pain. She, like Fay, would simply grin and bear it in exchange for their elated, yet still absentminded mind.

            “No, you guys got it all wrong. This whole thing will blow over tomorrow when we get back on a flight back home. They’ll go on doing their thing and we’ll go back to school, bread, and old people,” she refused, her words still slow to form and release as if she didn’t want to speak such a reality into existence, as if she had any power to stop it from being so. Her fingers tapped the back of the polaroid that she held tightly to her chest and pondered. The ceiling would be the white of her wedding dress. He could wear the same outfit he had worn that night, the laces on their outfits matching as the lace between their hearts surely must have. His sweet and powerful voice would once again be music to her ears as he spoke his vows. Fay and Alex would stand behind her, giving her much needed reassurance just as they were now. This would be a new reality, if only she didn’t speak of the inevitable one.

            “But, what if it doesn’t? I mean, sometimes you hear stories of fans getting everything they’ve ever wanted,” Fay challenged, her mind clearly fashioning fantasies of its own. While her heart ached for Seungmin, her sights were and always have been focused on Joochan. She wished she could be one of those girls and if everything came true for Talia, then she would gladly—and shamelessly—live vicariously through her.

            “Alex, talk some sense into her. You’re the oldest; that’s your job,” Talia muttered, her fingers still tapping ever so lightly on the photo.

            “I would usually be the first one to bring the hopeless romantic to reason, but on this one, I have to agree,” she declined. “I know you probably can’t see it because everything was happening all at once, but from our point of view, he was there for you and only you. It really did look like something out of a fairytale book.”

            “Or a Disney movie!” Fay chimed. “Even going through Twitter and talking with some of the friends we made there, others are saying that their interactions didn’t feel nearly as magical. I swear, you’re starting to become everyone’s OTP and you don’t even know!” she pointed out, eagerly whipping out her phone to scroll through the quickly populating hashtags before shuffling over to their bed to show her.

            “You see, we couldn’t make this up if we tried. If Bomin and I were photographer’s favorite, then you are certainly Goldenness’ favorite. It just takes a step back and not to be in the moment to tell.”

            “You guys are insane,” she grunted, gently slapping away Fay’s phone before sitting up and shaking her head. “You guys have a lot of nerve messing with a girl like that,” she pouted, placing the photo in the back of her phone, getting out of bed and heading for the bathroom. “We should be getting to sleep anyway. Our flight leaves pretty early in the day tomorrow and we have to be out of here by 11—since I’m the only one with some sense left,” she sighed, exhausted, processing.

            “It’s better to be insane and in love than neither,” Alex called before begrudgingly putting away her own photos and encouraging Fay to do the same.

            “I’m not in love!” Talia screamed before turning on the shower.

            “Yet!” Alex and Fay screamed in unison.

            But he was.

            “Were you even able to get much sleep last night?” Alex asked as she slumped in her chair, staring out the window of the airport, watching the other airplanes come and go. She knew not from nor to where they or anyone on board were headed, but she wanted so desperately to once again soar through the skies in the paper crane to adventures and stories untold. She wondered if any of them were headed to Korea, her next dream spot now that traveling domestically had been done. Yet, though she was the only one with the money to do so, she knew that such a trip, though fulfilling, would be painfully empty without her friends with her. After last night, she wondered if such a trip would be better suited for Talia. She could walk into the Woolim café, find the love of her life, and find a way to love each other. That seemed, to Alex, a much nobler cause than touring, though she would never admit this or such a romantic side to her.

            “Not me,” Fay groaned, rubbing the back of her neck. “This one,” she paused to glare at her sleeping partner, “kept me up all night with the tossing and turning. Then again, if I had that type of interaction with the love of my life, I can’t be sure I would be any better. Still don’t like it though,” she teased halfheartedly. In truth, though Talia was the primary reason she couldn’t sleep, Fay’s heart was restless as Seungmin ran through her mind and she struggled to keep up. She couldn’t sleep too long for her dreams were both pleasant and nightmarish, reminding her of a love she had lost for a relationship that she had gained through Talia. If anything, she wondered if she had kept Talia up for as long as she had her.

            “He’s not the love of my life. He doesn’t even know me,” she grumbled, planting herself firmer into her chair. “You guys dream too much. Like I said, we’re going to get back to LA and life will go on as usual. This is worse than the time we tried finding that Cinderella moment—and outfit—for Fay. Just let it go,” she insisted, trying to distract herself from the distraction that had planted himself firmly in her brain. The sooner she could leave, she convinced herself, the sooner she could forget about these feelings nagging at her. She could forget about the fantasies and look back on this gift with fondness, not regret for being so selfish. The chance to have a photo with him was just that—a chance, gifted by the same saint who wanted to use her wings to fly. The chance to come on this trip was just that—a chance, partly encouraged by Fay’s incessant encouragement and splitting the trip with her. Yet, she had taken both chances and ran with them, creating memories without either of them, memories that she knew were true, but didn’t know what to do with. The other two hadn’t dreamed too much. They weren’t lovesick or hopeless. She knew she had a special connection with Seungmin and it did not eat at her that she did this at the detriment of the two smiling masks sitting next to her, but because she knew that what she said was true. She would go back home and it would be months, maybe even years before the group would return, much too much time for Seungmin to remember his feelings, that connection with her. She would live with the memory of his touch, of his soft smile, of his sweet words and not be able to relive them for some time. She, then, did not grieve over reality for her friends who had helped bring her here, but for herself and her mind.

            “We’ll let it go when you do. You aren’t a very good liar, you know,” Alex pointed out. “It’s ok. Just give in. We know it’s a lot to process but running away from the very real fact that he likes you isn’t going to do any good.”

            “If you’re worried about hurting us, we’ve already given up. It was clear as day that he’s into you and we just want you to be happy. We can’t wait to see how he makes you smile like that again,” Fay cheered, happiness hurting.

            “These men really see thousands of Goldenness and you really think that after whatever time, he’s going to remember me?” she scoffed, though her voice was somewhat pleading. How she wished that those two were right. How she wished she could have a redemption arc. How sh