Have you ever experienced a moment in your life where time stands still, and everything around you moves in slow motion? Where even the beat of your heart feels ten times too slow, and every breath you take feels forced and unnatural? I have this theory that the older we get, the more often these moments make themselves apparent in our lives. The first of your childhood friends announcing that he or she is expecting a baby. The first time you experience your first heartbreak. The first time your significant other says “I love you”. All of these moments are moments where time stands still, moments that stick with us for the rest of our lives and ultimately shape the future decisions we make.

Well for me, that moment was the moment that I told all of Super Junior that I was engaged to one of their members. That moment of silence was the moment that, in reality, lasted for only about 3 minutes, but, to me, felt more like 3 years.  I mean, it honestly shouldn’t even have come as a shock, really; everyone had been pushing for it to happen for quite some time, and some had even come to expect it to happen sooner or later. What they didn’t expect, I guess, was for it to happen sooner rather than later.

“Wait, I’m sorry. Do you mind repeating that for me, one more time?” Void was the first to break the silence, narrowing his eyes and cocking his head bit as if my words hadn’t quite registered with him.

“I said, we aren’t dating anymore,” I repeated nonchalantly, “because we decided we’re getting married instead.”

And it was in that moment that I accidentally released the floodgates of questions and accusations.

“WHAT?”

“WHY DID YOU WAIT SO LONG TO TELL US?”

“WHEN THE HELL DID THIS HAPPEN?”

“WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, EVERYBODY, SHUT THE UP!” Void exclaimed, his voice ringing clearly above the rest. Once everyone quieted down, Void marched right up to me, grabbing me by the collar of my T-shirt.

“Void, get your hands the off me!” I shouted at the same time that he yelled, “WHY DID YOU TROLL US ALL DAY.”

We both narrowed our eyes at each other, a silent staring contest. Growling under my breath, I slapped his hand away and nonchalantly responded with a slight smirk on my lips, “Simple. We thought it would be funny.”

“Uki, you messed with our emotions like that, leading us to believe that you two were over because you guys thought it would be funny?” Siwon asked slowly, carefully.

“Ah, ah, ah, I wanted to tell you guys from the very beginning, but she thought it would be funny to mess with you guys,” Donghae piped up.

A smile broke out on my lips as I gave Donghae a side-eyed glance. “So this is how our marriage is going to be, huh? You throwing me under the bus to save your own skin?”

He chuckled a bit and gave my hand a reassuring squeeze as he said, “’Till death do us part.”

Sudden, hysterical laughter cut through the air of confusion that had settled around the room, and I looked over to see Alex practically on the ground in a fit of uncontrollable laughter. I cocked an eyebrow in question as she wheezed in between her gasps for breath, “Of all—of all the ways to announce—your engagement to us—you choose—you choose the way that—nearly gave us a heart attack. That’s actually typical Uki!”

The rest of her words were lost once her laughing picked back up, and the more and more she laughed, the harder it became for me to bite my smile back. In the midst of all the craziness that has happened lately, I could always count on Alex to find the humor in any given situation. Lifting my gaze to look at the rest of the guys, I held my arms out, palms facing upwards in a questioning manner and asked, “What? No congratulations? No well wishes? I thought you guys would be happy!”

“Uki, I think we might have broken them,” Donghae murmured to me when still, no one said anything.

As if on cue, Siwon stood up carefully, walked over to Donghae and me, and stood right in front of Donghae. Looking him straight in the eyes, Siwon smiled, clapped him on his left shoulder, and said, “I know I say this a lot. I know I always threaten you, warning you to take care of my baby sister. But now, I have more reason than ever to not only say that you now have to take care of her for the rest of your life, but also… welcome to the family… hyung.”

And it was in that moment, that moment filled with cheers and happiness, that moment filled with tears and hugs, that moment, despite all my prior fears and inhibitions and misconstrued hatred towards the very idea of marriage, that I knew that everything was going to be just fine.

~~~~

With a smile on my face, I hummed to myself quietly as I went through the tedious task of folding and putting away mine and Donghae’s clothes. It was a lot of effort, considering the fact that I was not only unpacking the suitcases that I had packed to fly back out to London, but also Donghae’s suitcases from his trip to Taiwan. Despite the tediousness of the task, however, the smile on my lips never once faded. Never in my life did I think that I would be lucky enough to fall in love with my best friend. It was always one of those things that I thought would be too good to be true, something that I didn’t think I really deserved, yet here I was, the hunk of a rock on my finger confirming to me that anyone is capable of finding love.

A soft knock on my door drew my attention away from the clothes strewn around me. My eyebrows knit together in confusion as my eyes flickered to the alarm clock on the nightstand. Who in the hell is bothering me at 3:30 in the morning?

So as to not wake Donghae up from his slumber, I stood and walked to the door, opening it to reveal Leeteuk standing in the dark hallway, an unsure look on his face.

“Oppa!” I quietly exclaimed in surprise. “What’re you doing here?”

“Uh… Can we talk?” he asked timidly.

“U-um, sure,” I replied, flashing him a reassuring smile although I had no idea how this next conversation would pan out. “Let me grab a coat, and we can head to the roof?”

He smiled and nodded. “Sounds perfect.”

I turned away from him and grabbed the closest jacket, which happened to be one of Donghae’s dark grey hoodies, slipped on a pair of house slippers, and began walking towards the door. Shutting the door as quietly as possible so I wouldn’t wake anybody else up, I followed Leeteuk as he led the way towards the front door. The silence between us was awkward and uncomfortable, with Leeteuk looking anywhere but me and me not quite sure what this was all about. I mean, Leeteuk and I never really mended things ever since that whole alcohol poisoning incident. And then add on the night that I went, got stupid wasted with Void at the club, and then disappeared for the night without so much as a phone call, it goes without saying that he and I weren’t exactly on the best of terms.

When the elevator opened with a ding, signaling that we had reached our destination, I tentatively took a step out onto the cold concrete floor of the roof, shuffled quietly towards our normal spot by the edge of the roof, and took a seat. A slight, chilly breeze blew past me, moving my stray baby hairs that had eluded me when I put my hair in a messy bun around. I took this as my cue to slip the hoodie on, and when I pulled my head through the opening of the hoodie, I saw that Leeteuk had finally made his way over to sit next to me. Drawing my knees up to my chest, I wrapped my arms around my knees and patiently waited for Leeteuk to begin talking.

Instead of talking right away, though, he continued to stare out at the sight of nighttime Seoul. I fondly recalled our times together, before things got complicated, when we would spend our nights together up on the roof just talking about life. Back in the days when I could always count on Leeteuk to be my best friend and nothing more. I smiled sadly, half wishing that we could go back to those days, half knowing that I was way better off where I was now in my life. I sighed, chewing on my lower lip thoughtfully, sneaking a glance at Leeteuk’s quiet and pensive form. My curiosity was running wild, wondering what the hell he could possibly want to talk about at such a late hour, but I dared not say a word. Whatever it was that was on his mind, I knew it must have been pretty serious for him to pull me out of bed when everyone else went to sleep, so I wanted him to be able to begin talking about it on his own terms.

We sat in silence for so long that I felt myself slowly nodding off to sleep when finally, I heard a quiet, “So… What changed your mind?”

I blinked a few times, bringing a hand up to rub the sleep out of my eyes. “Come again, huh?”

Leeteuk cleared his throat slightly, never once turning his gaze to me and instead kept it fixated on the beautiful view that was nighttime Seoul. “About Donghae. About getting married. About… Everything… What changed your mind?”

I thought about his question, carefully considering how I should go about answering it. Sighing, I rested my chin on my drawn up knees before saying, “Well Teukie… I’m actually really not sure how to answer that.” I smiled slightly, a sad look entering my eyes as I said, “But deep down, despite all that I’d said about not wanting to get married before this… I know it’s the right decision.”

“Are you kidding me?” he asked slowly, snapping his gaze over to me.

My eyes widened slightly in shock considering that was the first time he’d looked at me all night, and I was most certainly not prepared for him to stand up and cry loudly, “You’re doing this because you think it’s the right decision? Do you realize the commitment you’re making right now? Do you realize what you’ve said yes to? Do you realize that you’re about to pledge the rest of your life to some scumbag who ran out on you the moment you guys disagreed on something as big as marriage? And then all of a sudden, as if by the flip of a switch, you guys suddenly, miraculously came to an agreement about getting married? That’s ridiculous!”

I blinked a couple of times, unsure of how to proceed next. I had said yes to Donghae so quickly that I didn’t even think of how it would affect everyone else. I figured some people would disapprove of our decision, but I didn’t prepare myself for this.

“And what about the ELFs?” Leeteuk continued heatedly, color slowly rising in his cheeks as if to emphasize his frustration. “Did either of you guys even think about how you’d break the news to them? Did either of you guys even think about how they’d react to this? Did either of you guys even think?”

Immediately, I felt anger spike inside me as an angry light flashed across my eyes. Standing up, I pointed a finger in his face, eyebrows knit together in frustration. Before I yelled at him, though, I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself down. Just calm down, Uki. He’s hurt. He’s upset. He’s worried. Dropping my hand back down to my side, I looked him straight in the eyes and said, “Look. I know you’re upset, but Donghae and I have talked about this. It’s not as though ELFs hate us together, and as crazy as some ELFs may be, I know that they’d rather see their oppas happy than anything else. Why must we sacrifice our happiness because of our fear of how other people might react? If we all did that, none of us would ever find happiness.”

Leeteuk sighed in an irritated manner, aggravatingly running his hand through his hair. His breathing quickened into angry breaths before he looked up at me, and I could see the faintest glimmer of tears in his eyes. “Why! Why him? Can’t you see…?” His voice dropped about ten dynamic levels as he said, “Uki, can’t you see that you chose the wrong guy?”

The anger in me from earlier disappeared completely, and my eyes softened in a sympathetic manner. Of course… Of course this was what it was all about. It always came back to this with him. “Teukie—There was just—I just—We can’t—” I let out a breath, shaking my head slightly. And then, quietly, “I know you’re hurt. I know you didn’t see this coming. Hell, I didn’t even see this coming. I know, that above all else, you wished that somehow, some way, you and I would work out and end up together, but…”

I frowned sadly, barely willing myself to keep looking into his defeated and heartbroken eyes. I felt as though my heart was slowly being ripped to shreds, and I silently cursed myself for not having done this sooner, for not having shut the door on us sooner.

“But you need to realize that I love Donghae. And regardless of what happens, whether Donghae and I break up for some unfathomable reason between now and forever, or I suddenly decide that I don’t want to get married after all, you and I will never be together,” I finished.

At this point, he was chewing on his lower lip in an agitated manner, tears slowly falling from his eyes. I hated this. I hated being the one who continuously had to do this to him, the one who continuously had to break his heart time and time again, but if I didn’t do this now, if I didn’t end things between us once and for all, it would only complicate things even further in the future.

Sighing, I leaned up on my tip toes and kissed him on the cheek, pulling my face back so I could look him in the face, my hand giving his shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “I love you, Leeteuk,” I said quietly, “but not in the way that you wish I did. It would be in your best interest if you… If you just forget about me completely and ignore my existence so you can move on and find your own happiness. You deserve that much.”

Feeling as though I’ve said all I needed to say, I gave him one last sad look and my heel, towards the elevator doors. Just as I was about to open the door to reveal the elevator doors, I heard a very quiet, “I’ll never get over you, Uki.”

I frowned, taking a deep, somber breath. “Well, you’re going to have to.”

Before he could say anything else, I opened the door and stepped inside the elevator, hitting the button labeled with a black 15. It was in that moment that the tears that I didn’t even realize I had been holding back began rolling down my cheeks. It was in that moment that I finally realized the severity of the conversation that just took place. It was in that moment that I broke my best friend’s heart, hopefully, for the last time.

Funny, how in these moments, time seems to stand still.

So hi guys! :)

Long time no see! It's kind of unbelievable actually that it's been three years since I've last written anything, but it's even more unbelievable to me that even after all this time, you guys have remained faithful and patient, waiting for me to update. Even though I last said that I wasn't going to be writing anymore, I became really nostalgic after I started going through all my old fanfics and subscriptions and whatnot and remembered why I fell in love with writing to begin with. After a long, long time of thinking about things and reevaluating my life, I decided that I was going to read through all my old fanfics first and then decide whether or not I wanted to continue writing again because quite frankly, I really missed it. So, I spent about a week and a half and read through everything. In total, across all my old fanfics, I read 219 chapters and realized that I wanted to finish what I started after all. :)

So. It might take a bit, and updates aren't in any way going to be regular, but for the life of me, I have decided that one way or another, I will finish all the fanfics that I have began and then probably leave the world of fanfic writing once and for all. 

Now, in regards to the chapter itself. As you can probably tell from this chapter alone, the writing from here on out will be vastly different than what it was in my previous fanfics. My writing in general has become a lot more... Different? Idk lol And of course, Uki herself is going to be written a lot more mature and grown up in this installment as well. So, no more emoticons in my writing, no more overly, unbelievably dramatic scenes, and a lot more believable scenes of actual substance. It's going to be different, but I'm going to try my damned hardest to make sure it'll be on par with everything else you guys have read. :)

So, without further adieu, I bid you all hello to the first chapter of the final installment of the Emotional Series, and the first chapter that I have written in three crazy years <3