I always thought you were beautiful. From the very first moment I saw you, getting out of your car in the pouring rain. Beautiful. People say that that's not the word you should use to describe a man, but it's the first thing that came to my mind. Then, as we spent more time together came gorgeous, sweet, funny, cute, stupid, silly, fragile, naive, vulnerable.

Dazzling.

Just like sunshine.

I never undertsood why no one else saw it. Why you get hurt so many times. It still continues to bewilder me how anyone could stand to cause someone like you pain. I'm smaller than you, less muscular. Everyone always says that i'm the one who looks delicate and cute. I'm the one who looks breakable.

So why is it that it's your pieces i'm always picking up off the floor? 

I love it so much when you smile. It's blinding. I know that you hear that a lot, that you have a great "eye-smile" and I know that you get a little self conscious sometimes. I'v caught you practicing your smile in the mirror. But my faveorite is that unpracticed one, the one that shows all your teeth and is usually accompanied by that stupid laugh. The one that sends your eyebrows shooting up and makes it impossible to tell weather or not your eyes are closed.

Your sunshine smile.

I've never told you, never told anyone, how my heart breaks, shatters into a million pieces, when you cry. It's wrong, unnatural, for someone like you to cry. It's funny, isn't it, for me to say something like that. After all, I'm always the emotional one, the first one to break out into tears. And you're the one to laugh at me and clap my back. My world always falls just a little bit apart when I open my door to find you crying. It's like all the light in the world has dissapeared. The moon, the stars, the sun. Gone. 

That's how I feel right now, as we lie on my bed together, your muscular body held tightly in my arms.

Someone has broken your heart again. 

You always love so easilly. You'll give your heart to anyone and everyone....

Except me.

Me who would polish it every day. Me who would keep it in a glass case and cherish it like the treasure that it is. Me who would never let you cry, never hurt you.

No, you never give your heart to me.

But it's fine. This is enough for me. To be your strength when you need it, to support you quietly form behind. I don't mind living this way, even if I lose my heart somewhere along the road. You shift closer to me on the bed and give one last sniff as those beautiful eyes finally run out of tears. This is always my faveorite part. The smile that you give me after your tears have washed all the pain away. The press of your forhead against mine as your arms pull me closer, and suddenly I feel small, as if i'm the one being protected, not doing the protecting. Even your body is warm, and i swear if sunlight had a smell it would be something like this.

"Yoseob ah?"

I love the sound of my name in your voice.

"What is it Gikwang?"

Oh that smile. I'm so in love with that smile.

"Yoseob-ah, you are my sunshine."

I wonder sometimes if you know what your words do, how they break me inside. Every syllable in that breathy tone is like a hammer, assulting each rib inidividually, trying to shatter them so the words can reach in and pluck my heart out. Is this your revenge? Taking my heart and hurting it the way yours is always hurting? But I'll take it. For you, I'd do anything. 

"You're killing yourself, kid."

Dujun hyung means well. He can probably see the way shadows cling to me, under my eyes, in the curve of my shoulders, on my neck where my chin dips to meet it. This always happens when you're not around. Like a flower that wilts without the sun, missing you is a physiacl pain, eating away at me. I shrug in response to my boss' concern and he shakes his head, about to speak again when someone walks in, asking for help on buying his first violin. With one last glance in my direction, he leaves me to choke on the darkness in peace. What are you doing right now? Are you ok? Maybe something has reminded you of him and you're sitting somwhere, sad and lonely. It should comfort me, the thought that we're feeling the same, but it only serves to make me feel even more pathetic because while you are the reason for my every emotion, I am always the farthest thing from your mind. Surrounded by stars, why would the brilliant sun ever look down to the wilting flowers?

"Can I come over tonight?"

"You brining dinner?"

"I'm at the market now. Any request?"

"Anything that isn't ramen. I almost killed my toilet yesterday, it was like a freaking horror movie. The Ramen's Revenge."

"Hahaha, you're disgusting. I have no interest in discussing the details of your bowel movements, thanks."

I can hear the smile in your voice and it warms me up from the crown of my head to the tips of my toes.

"Be here soon. I'm starving."

"I'm guessing I should leave?"

Junhyung rolls his eyes and snorts at my shocked expression, making it obvious that the sound of your voice completely erased my memory of his presence. I smile sheepishly.

"Um, you can stay. I'm sure Kwang won't-"

"Nah, I have no interest in breathing pink."

"uh, what?"

"Pink. As in the color that pours out of your ears every time that guy is around. It makes me nautious. And if I have to see that clueless fool look at you like that, I swear one day I'm just gonna-"

"Like what?"

"..."

"Look at me like what Junhyung?"

"... Don't worry about it. But, hey, haven't you ever thought of-"

"No. I heard it today from Dujun, I don't need it from you. I'm his friend, his best friend. That's how he wants me, that's what I'll be."

"I was going to say 'Haven't you ever thought of calling me hyung?' But it looks like you've been thinking of soemthing else."

I hate the smirk he gives me, the way he tilts his head, looking from one eye as if he knows everything. The door opens then when mt head is still confused with anger and guilt. When his fingers run through your hair, it gives me another reason to hate him.

"Hyung! Are you joining us for dinner?"

"Nah, spending a Friday night eating instant dinners with two other men is a little too pathetic for me. I'll let you two lover boys have your fun without me, thanks very much."

He touched your face again as he passes and I really do hate him. But your smile is directed at me and who could be angry when facing a light so bright? Your hair is mussed from the wind outside, scarf hanging lopsided off your shoulders and the plastic bag crinkles slightly as you lift it to me, fingers purple with cold. God, you're so beautiful. Dujun is right, i'm dying.

"You don't like it?"

I look up from my bowl of chiken and potatoe stew, borws furrowed in confusion.

"It's just," I watch as one of your shoulders rises and falls helplessly, "You've had this kind of.... You look upset."

"No, I like it. I'm fine, just... thinking."

You nod, as if you understand. You don't, you never could.

"Rough day at work?"

I wish I was strong enough to respond with words, but all I can do is make a starngled noise at the back of my throat. Damn Dujun, damn Junhyung. Filling my head with useless thoughst and hopes.

"... Seob, if you're not feeling well ou could have told me, I wouldn't have come."

"No, no, it's not that, I'm just tired. Saty, please. I want you to stay." If only you knew how much.

"Ok," your smile is beautiful, "I'll stay. I'll stay with you."

I'm tempted to let myself believe that meant something more. Your smile almost lets me.

"Help me clean up. I'm not really hungry. We can watch a movie, your pick."

You dim for a moment, so brief I wonder if it really happened, becuse then your shining bright as anything. It's during the movie, a good hour and a half later, when I feel it again, a fading in the atmosphere, a burst of cold as you shift next to me.

"Kwang?"

"I meant it."

"What?"

"The other night.... I meant it when I said you're like the sun for me. You light up my life."

I'm glad the lights are off and you can't see the way your words rap around my throat, squeezing the life out of me in the form of a frantic laugh.

"Alright, is the movie getting to you? You always get so emotional watching cartoons. You shouldn't have picked "The Fox and the Hound" if you knew you're going to get like this."

"Yoseob, i'm being serious. You're always here when I need you. Every time I get my heart broken, you never criticize me, or say 'I told you so'. You're always comforting and taking care of me. I'd die without you, you know that?"

"Okay, okay. That's enough. If I wanted this i'd go to the Hallmark store."

"Yoseob, really, I love-"

"STOP! STOP IT! Why are you doing this all of a sudden? Why tonight of all nights? I'm trying, Kikwang, I'm trying. Honestly I hate it, hate that I'm the one you come to cry to, like it's my job to put your heart back together. I'll do it. I always do. I'd do anything to make you smile. But why do you have to make it so damn hard? Why do you have to say things like that? Like i'm your sun, your hope, your ing whatever. Your killing me, Kwang, I hate this. Hate feeling like maybe I could..."

I don't know when I started crying, but suddenly my face is wet, my vision blurred. I can barely make out huge eyes satring back at me from a shocked face and know I should stop, take it back. But it's too late and now that i'm going to lose you forever, what's the point of hiding anything? 

"Why can't I be the one? Why can't it be me? I'd take care of you, Kikwang, love you forever. I'd never hurt you. I'd...."

But what else can I say? I could do anything and everything, could bring you the entire world. But I'll always be just a flower and you'll always be the sun. 

"I'll never be bright enough for you."

"How could you say that?"

It's not often that you soud angry, and never at me. Your warmth is around me again, holding me to you. I feel so safe in your arms. 

"You're the only light I need."

And as your lips touch mine, your hands brushing my face, I can almost believe it.

I have your heart  now. I keep it in a glass case where I can cherich it like the treasure it is, taking it out only to polish it. I gave you mine too, and you were so surprised and sad when you so cracked and bruised it was, all covered in shadows. Like w ilting flower that had been dying quietly in the dark. But it's alright now, safe in your hands, where you can shower it with sunshine smiles until the shadows are all gone and it forgets what the word 'darkness' means. From now on, I will be te flower, and you will be my sun. But that's alright, because for you, I am also bright, and together we can create a light that will fill our world, an eternal summer filled with our sunshine.