Fourteen months and seven days… Had it really been so long? It had felt like just yesterday he’d woken up so achingly early in the morning, felt the boy’s little puffs of breath on his neck, tucked his chilly feet beneath the sheets. It seemed like they had only just fallen asleep that way, the boy’s head pressed against his chest to listen to his heart, his arms wrapped tightly around the boy, praying he would never have to let him go.

He recalled all the times they shared a pillow, too sleepy to collect the discarded remnants of their pillow fight. He remembered curling up on the couch, watching movie after movie with the boy, the same movies they always watched, the boy jumping up and pointing during the same parts, excitedly saying how that was his favorite part.

Fourteen months and seven days. It couldn’t have been. So much time since the day he found them, pressed together in the backseat of a car, skin slick with sweat, breathless. His heart had shattered that day.

He couldn’t help but wonder what they were doing then. As he was thinking of the boy… Were they doing those same things? Were they watching movies, sharing pillows, listening to the sounds of their heartbeats? Everything he had done… Was the boy doing it with him, too?

Fourteen months. Seven days. It should have seemed like a lifetime, such a long time with such pain. But it seemed like mere minutes.

There was a knock on the door.

“Kiseop?” a small voice called. That voice… So familiar… “I’m coming in!” The door slowly swung open, and there stood the boy. He gazed up at him, heart ripping in two.

“What?” He asked quietly. “What could you possibly want?”

“JaeSeop and I were wondering--”

“Oh, go away. You know I don’t like hearing his name.” Kiseop turned his head back to the television, finding static in lieu of the television show he had been watching earlier.

“Please, Kiseop! It’s been over a year! Haven’t you moved on?” the boy angrily stomped his foot.

“It seems like yesterday…” Kiseop breathed.

“He’s better than you think, you know. Really, a great person! If you would just give him a chance.”

“Does he love you?” Kiseop turned his eyes to the boys.

“What?”

“Does. He. Love. You?” Kiseop slowly repeated.

“How could you--”

“He doesn’t?” Kiseop sat up a little straighter.

“I didn’t say that!” the boy ran up to Kiseop, gripped his shoulders with an uncharacteristic strength. “I didn’t say that…”

“DongHo…” Kiseop gently placed his hands atop the boy’s, rubbed his knuckles gently with his thumbs.

“He does! I know he does…” the boy whispered. “He has to…”

“DongHo, look at me, please.” DongHo’s eyes reluctantly lifted to meet Kiseop’s. “You have to promise me something.”

“Promise what?”

“Promise me that you won’t just throw it away,” Kiseop searched the boy’s eyes. “Okay? Promise me that if you really, truly, honestly love him, you won’t throw him away like you did with me.” The boy’s eyes began filling with tears. “Can you promise me?”

“Kiseop…” DongHo’s head fell to the older man’s shoulder. “I never meant…”

“Shh, it’s okay.” Kiseop placed his palm on the boy’s back and began rubbing it gently, soothingly. “Just promise.” DongHo’s body began to shake with sobs.

“I… I can’t…” he muttered.

“Why not?”

“Because I… I… I lo--” He was cut off by a light rapping on the door.

“Hey, Kiseop, it’s JaeSeop,” a deep voice called from the hallway. “Have you seen DongHo?”

“Don’t…” DongHo whispered, looking pleadingly at Kiseop.

“He’s actually,” Kiseop began. DongHo shook his head violently, giving the older man another puppy dog look. “He called me awhile ago and said he had some work out of town for the night,” Kiseop called hesitantly. “Didn’t he tell you?”

DongHo breathed a quiet sigh of relief. Thank you, he mouthed.

“No, he didn’t,” JaeSeop said, sounding a bit sad. “Thanks anyway…”

“No problem!” Kiseop waited until the sound of JaeSeop’s footsteps faded away to being speaking again. “What the heck was that all about?”

“I’m sorry!” DongHo cried as though he had been holding it in for an eternity. “I’m sorry and I miss you and I didn’t mean any of it and I’ve wanted so long to come back and tell you, once and for all…” He took a deep breath, seemed to steady his nerves. “I love you.”

He was not surprised. He was not upset. Because everything that had happened between them, all the bad things, had been stored in a dark recess of his memory. It was somewhere he never went. So hearing those words, those achingly familiar words, he felt as though just that morning he had woken up to the boy’s sleeping figure curled up against him, hot puff of breath on his neck, cold feet slung across his legs, the way they always used to sleep.

He wrapped his arms around the boy, inhaled his scent, closed his eyes. “Let’s watch a movie. That one we always watch. It’s my favorite.” He could feel the boy smile, remembered the way his eyes crinkled at the edges, remembered the way the corners of his mouth stretched almost to his ears.

“Okay, let’s watch it, like we always used to.”