Night

It did rain badly. And loud thunder boomed everyone in sleep. The three gays were fast asleep in their own room. Seulong was about to sleep. Under his blanket, he likes to sleep without clothes only to prove to him that he is not a gay and that he’s just pretending. He would even think of girls chasing him at school, giving him chocolates and shouting his name whenever he passes by.

“What else should I think?” he thought while closing his eyes. “How’s ____ doing in the next room anyway?”

____ was covering herself under her blanket. Ever since she was a child, thunder is her weakness. She would think back of those bad memories that had happened to her.

As she was thinking of it, a loud thunder crashed through the sky as if it was a grenade. Adrenaline rushed through her and she went out of her room and went to the next room; which was Seulong’s.

____ jumped on the bed and went under the blanket. Seulong was startled and his thoughts of being a real guy stopped for a moment.

“____, what are you doing here?” he asked.

“I’m sorry for intruding your sleep.” It was all she said. She yelled again loudly when another lightning struck which almost lit the whole town.

“Hey, it’s all right. You don’t have to be scared. It’s just lightning.” Seulong comforted.

“No. he’s gone. He’s not coming back.” ____ started to sob and realizing that she said something weird, she stopped talking.

“What do you mean he’s gone?” Seulong asked.

“What happened?” Jokwon and the others appeared at the door.

“Ya! What are you two doing?!” Eunhyuk got mad seeing them in one bed.

“She came here. I didn’t do anything.” Seulong said.

“Eunhyuk-ah, maybe it’s the lightning. She just got scared and went to the nearest room.” Jokwon said.

“Ooh. Sorry.” Eunhyuk said with a squeaky voice.

“Unnie, can I sleep here?” ____ asked.

“Ya!” the other gay named Jinwoo spoke in a manly voice. Jokwon nudged him in the stomach.

“Uhh, I don’t think it’s appropriate for a girl and a boy sleeping together especially if you’re not that close. You know what I mean ____.” Jinwoo spoke gently.

“You don’t have to worry about anything. We’re all one and the same here.” Seulong laughed.

“Oh. That’s good then.” Jokwon tapped his chest in relief. “Finally coming out of the closet huh?”

“Don’t be too harsh on her.” Eunhyuk advised. Seulong nodded gracefully.

“Now we can sleep! Whoo!” Jinwoo rejoiced with his normal voice. Jokwon and Eunhyuk smacked his head.

“Whew, that was close.” Seulong said putting on his shirt. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” ____ said in a low voice.

“Is something wrong?”

“Everything’s not my fault.” ____ lay flat beside Seulong. “I lost my favorite person in the world when I was small.”

“Oh I’m sorry.” Seulong said sadly. He lay on his chest and faced her. *normally, girls do that. Boys don’t lay flat on their chest while talking to a girl.

“A furious lightning burned our house down. My brother’s room was next to mine. He always teases me that there are ghosts in my room so that I’ll come crawling to him at night. He always wanted me beside him. He would always think that he was not gonna last long since he had a disease. He loves me more than my parents and my parents love him more than me.”

“When I felt that our house was on fire, I went to my brother’s room and tried to wake him up. He won’t listen to me and just kept on teasing me. But later, he got up and found that the whole house was burning. My parents were already outside screaming that their son was still inside the house. But I didn’t even hear my name.”

“My brother and I were running, looking for a safe place. But the fire was too fast, eating up our house. When we were at the top of the stairs, my brother sent me down first and that was the time the stairs collapsed. When I got out of the house my parents ran to me and I hugged them. They asked me where my brother was. They didn’t even saw that I have a big wound on my arm.”

____ caressed the scar she got from the accident. Seulong joined in.

“When I told them that he fell, my dad slapped me and my mother said that I couldn’t be trusted and I was useless. What do you expect from a 6 year old little girl anyway?” ____ sobbed, grabbed Seulong’s arms and wrapped around herself. Seulong was surprised by how fast they got close when he admitted that he was “gay”.

“But you should be lucky you’re alive. I’m sure your brother is happy to see you unharmed and protected by wonderful people.” Seulong said as he combed her hair.

“Seulong-ah, don’t leave me like my brother did okay? Mom and dad had said they love me but since that accident happened, they don’t love me anymore. I felt like I was betrayed so don’t you betray me too. Okay?”

Seulong couldn’t answer her. Long before she asked for this, Seulong was already pretending and soon enough, ____ would feel betrayed by him.