The paper weighed down on his shoulders like a ton of bricks. He wasn't quite sure how it was possible for something so light in the literal sense to be so heavy in the figurative. His eyes glazed over in boredom. There was absolutely nothing interesting about how the human heart functioned. Yet, here he was, trying to write a ten page paper about it. And he had, oh, say about five hours to do so. This was so not getting done.

He was pretty sure it was not humanly possible for someone to write ten pages in a mere five hours. Not even for someone like him, who was known for cranking out relatively decent work under extreme time constraints. Admittedly, he was the one who put himself in those situations, but still.

He slammed his computer shut. It just wasn't happening.

"Quitting, are we?" a voice called from somewhere right over his shoulder.

Zhou Mi turned to see a familiar looking boy standing against the cubicle behind him. He thought he recognized him from one of his biology classes he was taking, but he couldn't be positive. Zhou Mi had a tendency to block out the rest of the world when it came to school.

"Not quitting, just postponing," Zhou Mi answered as he packed up his things. If he left now, he could still get a few solid hours of sleep before having to go to class and come up with a good excuse to get him an extension on that paper.

"Same thing, isn't it?"

"What do you want?" Zhou Mi groaned in frustration. He was tired and he was under a lot of stress. Two things that when combined didn't make him a very pleasant man.

"Nothing, I guess. I mean, what is it to me if you fail? I was just in here finishing up a project and then I saw you falling asleep and figured you might want somebody to give you a little extra push to finish that thing."

Zhou Mi simply grumbled in response and picked up his bag to leave. As he passed by the boy, he recognized the text book in his hand. So he was in his biology class after all. Then he remembered something. Just a week or two prior, this same boy had given a presentation on the heart. Zhou Mi realized he should have been paying more attention, but he had been particularly spacey minded that day and had settled for staring out the window and drifting into his own conscious dreamland.

But now Zhou Mi stopped and turned, looking at the boy and trying desperately to recall his name. It started with 'Kyu'. Kyuson, Kyumin, KYUHYUN! That was it. A though occurred to him that maybe, just maybe, Kyuhyun could help him.

"Hey, Kyuhyun?" Zhou Mi asked, taking a few steps back towards where Kyuhyun still stood, watching him walk away.

"Yeah?"

The words that came out of Zhou Mi's mouth, he wouldn't realize just what Kyuhyun took them to mean until much, much later.

"What do you know about the heart?"

Zhou Mi's paper was finished in four hours, thanks to Kyuhyun's expertise on the cardio vascular system.  The remaining time they had left before their biology class was spent walking a few blocks from the University to Zhou Mi's favorite coffee shop.

"Why don't you get a seat and I'll get us coffee?" Zhou Mi offered and Kyuhyun nodded in agreement, too tired to really argue the fact that he doesn't like coffee.

Zhou Mi returned a few minutes later with two coffees and two chocolate chip muffins.

"Thanks," Kyuhyun mumbled and took a sip of the coffee. It was surprisingly sweet, and didn't burn going down as Kyuhyun had expected.

"So why in heaven's name did you help me with that paper last night? Don't get me wrong, I mean, I'm really grateful for it! It just seems strange, you don't even know me and you helped me write a paper at 3 a.m." Zhou Mi rambled on, trying to fill the silence that had settled around them.

Kyuhyun cursed under his breath, wondering how someone could still be so chatty when they hadn't slept at all.

"Maybe I'm an insomniac. Maybe I just don't like seeing people fail," Kyuhyun paused. "Or maybe, I think you are really cute."

Zhou Mi laughed at the last suggestion, drawing glares from the people around them as they too, like Kyuhyun, were annoyed by the loud noise that was Zhou Mi first thing in the morning.

"I guess I may never know, but I truly am grateful for it. Thank you," Zhou Mi said and Kyuhyun just nodded and returned to his coffee.

As they walked back to the campus from the coffee shop, Zhou Mi was once again the one to speak up.

"Hey Kui Xian, you really aren't a morning person, are you?"

Kyuhyun's ears perked at the sound of the nickname he had just been given. He wasn't stupid. He knew that Zhou Mi was from China, so that was probably his name in Mandarin. It was the fact that he liked the sound of it coming from Zhou Mi's mouth that had him so alarmed.

"I never actually went to bed, so that isn't a fair judgment," Kyuhyun retorted.

Zhou Mi pondered this for a moment before speaking.

"Well, I guess that means that one day I'm just going to have to wake up with you to find out," Zhou Mi said.

Kyuhyun wondered if Zhou Mi realized fully what he was saying. It was possible that he wasn't aware of the second meaning behind his words, but Kyuhyun knew Zhou Mi's Korean was better than that. So he took it as what it sounded like: a promise rather than a threat.

Kyuhyun had to hide his face as the thought of that brought color into his cheeks.

The opportunity for Zhou Mi to wake up with Kyuhyun didn't happen quite as Kyuhyun expected it to. In fact, he hadn't been expecting Zhou Mi at all.

"Kui Xian, open up!" Zhou Mi yelled as he banged on the door to his apartment that he shared with his best friend, Sungmin.

"What in God's name do you want, Mi?" Kyuhyun yelled as he opened the door to reveal a laden down Zhou Mi.

"I have games, and food, and movies," Zhou Mi said as he stepped into the apartment and stumbled over to Kyuhyun's bed where he dumped all the stuff.

Kyuhyun just stood and stared at him, hand's on his hips.

It wasn't the first time that Zhou Mi had barged into his apartment. No, ever since that night that Kyuhyun helped him Zhou Mi seemed to think that he owned a part of Kyuhyun.

"What do you look so mad for, Kui Xian?" Zhou Mi asked, the innocent, puppy dog expression spreading across his face almost instantly as he saw Kyuhyun's disapproving expression.

As he looked at Zhou Mi, who was really nothing more than an overgrown child, he felt that he didn't mind that Zhou Mi owned a little part of him. The man was all sunshine and smiles. Kyuhyun swore it never rained on Zhou Mi.

"I have to study, Mi," Kyuhyun said and Zhou Mi looked as though he had just had his heart ripped in two.

"But it's Friday night, I thought we could just hang out and do nothing," Zhou Mi whined, the pout on his face getting bigger with each passing second.

"I can't, I have this project due on Monday that I need to work on."

Zhou Mi, feeling rejected began piling back up all the stuff he had brought with him, preparing to leave. Kyuhyun couldn't help but feel a little heartbroken, so he suggested an offer he probably shouldn't have.

"You can stay, Mi, I don't care. Just don't bother me."

At the proposition Zhou Mi's face lit up and he plopped back down on the bed along with all of his stuff.

"I won't bug you, I promise, Kui Xian," Zhou Mi said as he began flipping through the movies, looking for one to watch while Kyuhyun did his work.

Zhou Mi didn't bother him, just as he had promised. Kyuhyun didn't know Zhou Mi all that well yet, but he had picked up on the fact that the man hated to be alone.

A few hours later, around 1 a.m. he heard the credits to a film rolling. He had been able to tune it out, mostly because the film had been in Mandarin so he didn't understand a word of it. Kyuhyun glanced over at Zhou Mi, only to find that he had fallen asleep curled up in his bed. Kyuhyun stifled a laugh. If he thought Zhou Mi looked beautiful while he was awake, he was possibly even more beautiful while he was asleep.

Kyuhyun stood and stretched before he walked over to turn the TV off. He discarded the stuff that remained on his bed onto the floor and nudged Zhou Mi.

"Hmm, Kui Xian?" Zhou Mi mumbled, eyes still closed.

"Mi, scoot over," Kyuhyun ordered and Zhou Mi obeyed, moving his slender body over enough so that there was room for Kyuhyun to slide in next to him.

Kyuhyun lay on his side so that he was facing Zhou Mi's sleeping face. He traced his features gently with his fingers, mapping his face.  When he was done he reached for Zhou Mi's hand, intertwining his fingers with his own.

"Goodnight, Mi," he said quietly and placed a gentle kiss to Zhou Mi's temple.

Kyuhyun didn't sleep that night, his thoughts running rampant in his mind. There was something about Zhou Mi that made him swell up and want to squeal in happiness. But this happiness made him want to run and hide. The conflict between the two ran around in circles, never getting anywhere.

When Zhou Mi woke the next morning, he couldn't return the bright smile that was given to him.

"Morning, Kui Xian," Zhou Mi spoke softly.

Kyuhyun felt a hand run through his hair and he winced at the touch. Not because it was painful, but because he liked how it felt to have Zhou Mi playing with his hair.

"Kui Xian, did you know you are beautiful?" Zhou Mi said randomly, still staring at his face. Neither of them had moved since they woke up, still tangled up in each other as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

Kyuhyun stared into Zhou Mi's eyes, reading everything written there. It wasn't that he didn't like what he saw, because he did. It was that he didn't want it.

"Zhou Mi, I know nothing about the heart."

The words took a little while to process, Zhou Mi's memory going back to the time he asked Kyuhyun that question a few weeks ago. It slowly began to register with him, exactly what Kyuhyun was saying.

"You're quitting, aren't you?" Zhou Mi asked, pushing himself off of Kyuhyun's bed and beginning to gather his things.

Kyuhyun sat up, watching him pack up.

"No, Mi, I'm just postponing things."

"Aren't you the one who told me that they were really the same thing?" Zhou Mi asked.

Zhou Mi gave him one last sad stare before he left Kyuhyun's apartment, knowing full well that he wasn't coming back again.

Postponing something and quitting something are two different things. Sometimes, though, it is impossible to postpone something without quitting on it. After a long time, the two really become the same thing. There is no difference between putting something off and giving up. Kyuhyun had known what he could have had with Zhou Mi. He saw it in his eyes and in his smiles. But the truth was, he wasn't ready for it. Zhou Mi had been. So he put it off, thinking that, one day, he might be ready like Zhou Mi was.

But that day didn't come, not for years after they had both graduated from school, become successful doctors and found other people.

It was only by chance that they found each other again, at a benefit event held by their alma mater.

Zhou Mi thought the man sitting next to him seemed familiar, but it was only when he turned his head that he realized it was Kyuhyun sitting next to him.

"Kui Xian?" Zhou Mi breathed. It wasn't a question, nor a statement, simply a deposition of shock at the man before him.

Suddenly Zhou Mi wished that Henry, his boyfriend, would show back up. He didn't feel comfortable being around the man who had so long ago quit on him.

"Mi," Kyuhyun's response was equally quiet and timid.

They didn't have words to say to each other, so they simply stared, too confused and hurt to do anything.

Just like back on that day in the coffee shop, it was Zhou Mi to break the silence.

"How are you?"

"Good, I guess. You?"

"Good."

There was an awkward silence that followed the exchange and Zhou Mi had really started hoping that Henry would waltz up any second and save him, but he was nowhere in sight.

"So how has life treated you? Been successful in everything you tried?" Zhou Mi asked, trying to keep the conversation light. Anything was better than that awkward silence.

Kyuhyun didn't answer for a moment, thinking instead.

"What is success, Mi?"

Zhou Mi didn't want to admit it, but the sound of his name on Kyuhyun's mouth still sent his heart spinning.

"I guess, to me it is being happy with what you have accomplished," Zhou Mi answered.

Kyuhyun remained silent, and as another man approached him he smiled slightly.

"Zhou Mi, this is my boyfriend, Sungmin."

Zhou Mi grinned half-heartedly at the familiar man. He had seen him a few times back when he and Kyuhyun spent time together.

"So then, I guess you have been successful. Haven't you, Kyuhyun?"

It felt weird, calling him by his actual name when he hadn't even thought about him by that term since the first day they met. Zhou Mi could see that it made Kyuhyun uncomfortable too.

"Yeah, I have. It was nice seeing you, Zhou Mi," Kyuhyun answered, standing up and taking Sungmin's hand to leave.

It was all Zhou Mi could do to give them a half-hearted smile and a wave goodbye.

Sometimes success takes multiple different forms. Completing an assignment on time, or doing something that makes you feel accomplished. But ultimately, success is about finding happiness in life because that is what makes one truly successful. And sometimes, this success isn't limited to one opportunity. That's the great thing about it.

There is an infinite number of opportunities to succeed in life.