From that point I ignored Key completely. Not because I wanted to, but because I didn’t know what else to do. Of course, he didn’t let the silence go so easily: the texts continued coming, as did a few phone calls here and there, the messages ranging from “Yo, Messy—where are you?” to “I miss you” to “Yah! Why are you avoiding me?”

            Still, I found it hard to answer. What could I possibly say to him? I felt angry at him—even though I knew there was no reason to be. Or maybe it wasn’t anger at all… but whatever it was, I felt compelled to stay away at least a little longer. He’d never told me he was gay, so why did I somehow resent him for keeping the truth from me? I’d never even asked, but how could that possibly be my responsibility when he was introduced to me a certain way? Now I was stuck in a different kind of situation; I certainly couldn’t ask him. It didn’t matter anyway; I was not free to ask those kinds of things, because I wasn’t free.

            “Did you and Key fight?” Jong asked me some days later. He’d come home late as always, smelling like the bar where he’d spent the majority of the night.

            “Hm?” I ask, feigning disinterest, even though the sound of Key’s name always arrested my attention completely.

            “He says you won’t return his calls or texts—he hasn’t seen you in nearly a month?”

            This takes me by surprise for a multitude of reasons, the foremost being that I had no idea that the two of them had talked. I found myself wondering what their conversation consisted of—and guiltily feared it had something to do with me.

            “So?”

            “ ‘So’?” He pursed his lips. It was clear he did not believe me. “You should talk to him.”

            I kept a straight face. “I will eventually. I need a break from planning.”

            “No, I mean, you should talk to him…”

            I stared at him curiously. “Why? I have no reason to.”

            “So melodramatic. I can see all the things you want to say in your eyes; you don’t even have to open your mouth.”

            “What are you talking about?”

            Jong reached out to grab my arm. “I know you have feelings for him. I know you like him.”

            “Bwo? You’re drunk—”

            He nodded. “Maybe. Yes. But it doesn’t change anything.”

            I shook his arm off mine. “I’m going to bed…”

            “Talk to him,” he repeated. It never occurred to me at the time just why he was so persistent. All I could think of in that moment was how much I wanted to run away. From him, from Key, from myself—from the truth.

            But what could I say to him, either of them? How could I ever face him again knowing what I did? Wanting to do the things I wanted to do to him? How much easier it could have been—how much more manageable my feelings had I not had the extra condition to consider: that the man I’d fallen for wasn’t gay at all, but still equally unobtainable. Suddenly, any sort of confession to either party seemed to border more on betrayal than comical error; after all that they’d been through, after all that they meant to each other… how could I bring myself to tell him that I had feelings for his best friend? And how could I tell Key—tell him that the wedding he’d been helping me plan was a mistake, because the wife-to-be was in love with the best man—?

            In love?

            In love…

            It was worse than I thought. How was this possible? I didn’t know how, but for some reason the word pulsed over and over again in my brain, and no matter how hard I searched a lesser one to describe my feelings, nothing else could adequately take its place. I can’t believe I’ve done this to Jong. I can’t believe I’ve betrayed the closest person to me in the entire world—the sweetest, most loyal man. I can’t believe I’ve allowed myself to be so sloppy, to be so careless with my feelings, especially with our wedding only a small cluster of weeks away. And I can’t see how either of them could ever forgive me…

            “Raina… are you trying to worry me? Mission accomplished.” This was the text I got from Key after I closed the door behind me, leaving Jong alone in the living room. But even this I didn’t answer. And who knows if I had whether or not anything would have changed. Either way, I woke not much longer, at 2:59 AM, to see a simple: “Please write back,” and though I knew that I couldn’t put him off any longer, resigned at least to wait until morning. Little did I know then that I wouldn’t get the chance.

* * *

            Had I wrote him that night, perhaps it wouldn’t have happened. Had I wrote him that night, maybe everything would have sorted itself out differently. At any rate, all I remember was Jonghyun’s phone going off at three thirty that morning, his sleepy answering of it followed by an alarmed bout of excited, desperate questions.

            “What is it—what happened?!” I say frantically, knowing that a phone call at this hour is never a source of good news.

            I can tell that he is bothered. I can see that he is emotional and worried. So when he says the one word I feared he’d say, I didn’t spend any effort trying to hide my equal dismay.

            “Key’s—a car accident, Raina.”

            “Car accident?” I snapped back. “Key doesn’t drive!”

            “He wasn’t in the car,” Jong said, obviously upset, “he was hit by a car. Some crazy wasn’t looking where he was going…”

            “Where is he—oh, my god, is he okay? Is he—is he?!” I nearly threw up as the last word came out of my mouth.

            Thankfully, Jong shook his head. “He’s really hurt. They took him to St. Vincent’s…”

            “We’re going, right?” I exclaim, speedily jumping out of bed. “Come on, let’s go! Please!”

            There was no need for pleading; Jong was already out of bed and half dressed before I’d even buttoned my pants. We had to get a cab at the late hour since all the buses stopped before two o’clock, which was just as well, because the cabbie went faster than any bus driver would have in the same situation, so by the time we got to the hospital only twenty one minutes had passed since the phone call had come in from Key’s grandmother, who apparently remembered him from high school and found his name first in the list of contacts on Key’s cellphone.

            When he got there she seemed relieved to see him, but being the old age that she was, it was hard for her to stay there overnight; Jong insisted on taking her back home while I waited for him to come back. Key was in a coma, but the doctor assured his grandmother that he should make it to morning at least, and to try not to worry. To go home and rest and come back in the morning. It wouldn't do, the doctor said, to have her falling ill because of it... not when her grandson needed her now more than ever.

             Before they left, Jonghyun went into see him and came out again, eyes full, and told me he’d be back soon. I made my way in slowly to see him, not expecting to find the peaceful spectacle that I saw there. How ironic, I couldn’t help but think, that the near-dead look more at peace than the living. His face was relaxed and calm, eyes shut against the terrors of the world, erasing the terrible images that were likely his last before he surrendered to the darkness. The sound of the EKG machine was like a strange lullaby, and even as I sat down beside his bed and took his hand delicately in mine, my tears seemed to fall at the rhythmic cadence of its beeps; his skin was still untouched, like unblemished porcelain, save for a single scar above his right eyebrow, that mysteriously seemed to mirror one on my own. Most of his injuries were internal, the doctor said, and that should he survive, it would be with minimal longstanding trauma—this was the general prognosis anyway. And it was a hope I desperately held on to, no matter how much I knew the doctor was trying to be optimistic.

            I’d never seen anyone like this before, lying so helpless and battered in a hospital bed. It was terrifying, disturbing. It made my heart beat insatiably. What if they were wrong? What if he never woke up—what if he died? What if… what if I never got a chance to say the things to him that I couldn’t before? What if he died thinking that I didn’t care, that I’d forgotten him, that I was really a cruel, cruel person… that he'd done something wrong—that I hated him?

            I didn’t want to lose him.

            I couldn’t lose him.

            I made a promise to myself then: if he should wake, I would tell him the truth.  

* * *

            When Jong came back, an hour later, I was still in the same spot, my hand now melded with Key’s unconscious fingers by a coat of sweat. Adrenaline was keeping me awake now; adrenaline and a whole string of uninterrupted words that I’d spoken to a person who could not answer, leaving the room alone as a witness.

             I felt his hand on my shoulder, and then heard him sniffling behind me, and all once I realized that he was crying, which made me do the same.

             “Why was he out so late?” I released all at once. “What was he doing at three in the morning!”

             Jonghyun sighed. “He was out with me tonight. Had I stayed—”

             “It’s not your fault…”

             “It is… I left because I was upset.”

             “This has nothing to do with you…”

             “It has everything to do with me,” he sighed, troubled. “That’s what I’m saying—I left because… I left because I couldn’t stand to hear what he had to say.”

             I didn’t know what this meant, but didn’t press him. Nothing seemed logical in that moment. Nothing seemed to make sense. “Is halmuni okay?”

            “It’s a big shock to a person her age, but I think she’ll be okay. She can’t take care of him like this though. He’s going to need someone to look after him.”

            “Doesn’t he have a mom?”

            “His parents aren’t really around,” he answered.

            “You should stay by him—you should be there by his side when he wakes up,” as my immediate return. “Like he did for you.”

            He was shaking his head, but I couldn’t see it. Instead, I felt his hands massage my shoulders a minute and then slip away. “Raina,” Jong said, easily and with calm effort, “the person he’s going to want by his side isn’t me… it’s you.”

            “What are you talking about—you’re his best friend.”

            “That’s what I’m trying to tell you… what he said to me tonight. The things we talked about—Raina, he’s… he’s going to need you, okay? He needs you more than I do.”

            “More… more than you do?” The words didn’t seem cruel, just unexpected.

            “Just trust me on this.”

            I really didn’t know what to say, but the words that came next just seemed to find their way out all on their own: “I love him, Jong.”

            After I said these four words with more ease than I imagined they could be uttered, I felt an immediate burden release from me. I was conscious only of the present reality and nothing more, and in that moment nothing seemed complicated or complex. Everything was stripped down to bare, unhindered honesty. 

            He sniffed, but smiled at me immediately after. “Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I’ve known that all along?”

            “How could you know?” I said quietly. It was hard for me to believe, especially since I only felt I knew myself in that very moment, but I wasn't finding anything at the present time easy to believe.

            “Because he told me.”

            “He told you?”

            Jong laughed a little. “You know Key—always perceptive. He…” his voice dropped here, his tone uneven. “He loves you too, you know…”

            How simply even he too could utter such things. Still, the news took me wholly by surprise. “You’re crazy…" I sigh, still studying the canvas of Key's perfect face. I'd never longed to see another person's eyes open in all my life. Suddenly I'd forgotten how they looked, the color, the shape—I yearned to see them again. To see the arch of his smile that caused them to sparkle the way they did when he'd tease me; to hear the nasally pitch of his altogether perfect voice when he called my name. Perfect.

             Perfect: this was all I could think of, over and over again. Key was perfect. Perfect for me? No... just perfect. And I wanted the chance to tell him. To tell him how much he meant to me. I would do anything for the opportunity to speak with him again... 

            Jonghyun was quiet while this moment ensued.

            "He didn’t say that,” I finally added. My heart was too numb to fully digest anything that we were saying; trauma has a way of urging people to say things they normally wouldn’t under calmer circumstances, and when all the secret words were released they landed soothingly and without great upset, as compared to different timing when they would have most likely harm and damage. 

            “He didn’t have to,” was his simple reply. “But I know that’s what he meant when he asked me to forgive him.”