You’re hallucinating.  Welcome to Crazy Town.  I closed my eyes and squeezed them shut.  Shaking my head, I opened them and looked at Ji Ho.

                “What did you just say to me?” I asked, flatly.

               “This can’t surprise you,” he replied disdainfully.  “It can’t surprise you to know how badly I want you.  How badly I’ve always wanted you?”

                “How badly you’ve always wanted me?!” I shrieked heatedly.  “You’ve never said anything!  You never did anything!  Why wouldn’t you tell me?”

                “Never did anything!  I’ve been dropping hints for years!”  His face grew cold and hard.  “But, you’re right.  I never said anything and I’m going to guess it was for the same reason you never said anything to me.  I’d rather get to sneak in your window and lie with you at night as your best friend than not be with you at all.”

                Oh. My. God.

                “You didn’t want to ruin our friendship,” I stated.

                “I wouldn’t trade what I have with you for anything.”  He slammed his hand against his chest.  “And I’d stab myself in the heart before I said anything to ruin it.”

                “I don’t believe you,” I said, unable to raise my voice anymore.  “All those girls.  All the time.  And then Natalie.  I don’t get it.”

                “Don’t you?” he snarled.  “All those girls, all the time?  You never wondered why they only lasted a week?”  I said nothing because I couldn’t piece together enough words to make a coherent sentence.  “It only took me, oh I don’t know, fifteen seconds to realize not one of those girls could hold a candle to you!  But, for the sake of giving them the benefit of the doubt not to mention I wasn’t getting anywhere with you, I tried.  Except, a week was all I could stand.”

                “But Natalie…?”

                He rolled his eyes and plopped down on the sofa.  I slid onto the cushion next to the one he sat on and pulling my legs up underneath me, I faced him.

                “I never gave a crap about Natalie.”  He in air through his teeth.  “I mean, she’s cool and pretty or whatever, but she’s just a friend.  I never wanted her.  I was getting to my breaking point.  You would only ever go out with guys like Soo Won for a single date.  Then, you didn’t go out with anyone for a week or two, but you still didn’t give me any signs.  I met Natalie and figured…”  He ran a hand down his face and laughed to himself.  “I figured maybe if I was with a girl like her, you’d lose it and tell me not to.  That you didn’t want me to be with her.  That you wanted to be with me.  I kept dropping hint after hint, but maybe I just wasn’t doing it right because you never said anything.”

                Oh. My. God.  All the things he said about Natalie, it was just to make me mad.  Jealous?  He just wanted me to break and tell him I wanted him to stop.

                “But you wanted to be her boyfriend,” I reminded him, still slightly dazed.

                “After you started your stupid plan with Kyung!” he exploded.  “I thought if you had Kyung, I’d take whoever was there.  Which happened to be Natalie.  Then, I caught you with him.  In your underwear!”  I cringed.  “Do you have any idea how long I’ve been wishing I could see you dress like that for me?”  His voice lowered to a growl.  “Do you have any idea the things I fantasized about doing with you thanks to your ty romance novels?”

                Oh. My. God.  Kyung was right.  I should call him and tell him I take back every terrible thing I ever thought about doing to him.

                Focus, Jordan.  I opened my mouth to flirtatiously ask Ji Ho what sort of things he fantasized about when he continued, still somewhat aggravated.

                “But no, you’re always hiding your body.  In my clothes, of all things!  But for my friend, you strip down to your underwear!  The thought of you touching him…”  His voice lowered yet again to almost match Ji Hoon’s baritone and his eyes grew hazy.  Anger furrowed his brow.  And then it just disappeared.  “The thought of you being with him while wearing my clothes made my eye twitch.”

                “You never showed any emotion and then you got all excited about your plan to get Natalie to be your girlfriend,” I reminded him.

                “I must have lost my damn mind.  I made up that plan on the spot!  I was hoping you’d think it was so romantic, you’d snap and confess to me so I could tell you the truth.”  He bounced closer to me on the sofa and glared at me.  “But what did you do?  You agreed to help me!  Were you crazy?”  Funny he should say that.

               I snorted.  “How many times do I have to tell you, Ji Ho?  I’d do anything for you.  You wanted Natalie, I thought, so…” I trailed off grumpily.  “So that’s why you weren’t upset when Natalie didn’t show.”

                “Right.  Then you told me you and Kyung were just friends.  I couldn’t believe my luck.  You didn’t notice I couldn’t keep my hands off you after you told me that?”

                “I’ve been having trouble distinguishing reality from the insanity created inside my head lately,” I muttered.  “I didn’t know what to think.”

                You were so right, Kyung.

                Everything replayed in my head, everything that happened between the two of us, with this new information.  I saw everything in a new light.  A clearer, sane light.

                “You offered to kiss me…”

                “I’d be damned if I was going to let my buddy have your first kiss,” he griped.  A funny ‘ah-ha’ sound came from him and he straightened up.  “You didn’t have your period.”

                I hung my head.  “No, that’s not why I was crying.”

                “Why were you crying?” he insisted.

                I scoffed.  “Because my best friend – you know, the one I’m in love with? Yeah, that one – offered to kiss me so I’d be good for when his friend wanted to kiss me.”

                “You should have said something!” he roared, flinging himself back against the back of the sofa.  “Look at me!” he ordered, pointing to his face.  “I’m Woo Ji Ho.  I don’t blush.”

                “You blushed after you kissed me.”  Oh.

                “Because…”  He rolled his arms in front of himself indicating I should continue.

                A lazy smile appeared on my face.  “Because you love me.”

                “And you were going to go off and kiss one of my closest friends!”

                “Ah!  But-but I didn’t!” I reminded him, inching closer to him until my knees were touching his side.  “I never kissed Kyung!”

                “You created a plot to get each one of my friends too though, didn’t you, you looney toon?” he muttered looking at me out of the corner of his eye.  Maybe I shouldn’t have revealed everything when I was confessing.

                “I was desperate since I couldn’t have you,” I replied, in a tiny voice.  “You big jerk.”

                He laughed again and sighed, sagging against the back of the sofa.  “When, in reality, you had me this whole time.”

                Feeling lighter than I had in a really long time, I sidled up right next to him. 

                “Just like how you’ve always had me,” I grinned cheekily.

                “Oh, now you want to be cute,” he muttered.  I threw myself over his lap, leaving my legs draped over his legs and leaned my back against the sofa arm.

                “And?  How am I doing?”

                He held onto my legs and slipped out from under them.  The smirk on his face as he crawled over to me made me think of pages 101, 32, and one scene in particular on page 26 of my latest trashy romance novel.

                Until he froze.