Hidden in the shadows of the balcony, Zelo witnessed the ceremony he had fought so hard to be allowed to watch. He felt underdressed in his jeans, sneakers, and hoodie, all black to conceal his presence. He stood where the choir would normally sing from, lurking in the pitch black darkness, looking down to the unsuspecting wedding guests. His friends, his real family, the ones who went to visit Choi Junhong’s fake gravestone every month.

Zelo had no family, no real friends. He had coworkers, a nice apartment, a steady job, and a guy checking up on him and making sure those who wanted him dead were still kept at bay. Zelo was a lonely soul and lacked all the spark and cheer that had once belonged to Choi Junhong. All they shared was a body, a mind, and a soul full of crushing feelings.

They were all there, all looking in the same direction: the bride. Zelo couldn’t see her yet, so he focused on Himchan instead. He looked so grown up! No wonder, he was getting married. He looked handsome beyond words, manly, not just cute, as he usually was. He looked determined, yet happy. Full of hope, yes, that was it.

Zelo remembered what hope felt like. The opposite of the abyss he had drowned in the moment he had become Zelo. He thought he knew hopelessness when he was crying on Reiko’s shoulder over one girl or another that Jongup had brought to the studio or to Rei’s house where they all spent most of their down time. He smiled at himself remembering one of their feistier conversations on the topic of his no-way-out romantic situation.

“Ah, you’re such a hopeless idiot,” Rei spat. “Kiddo, you have to either do something about it, or give it a rest and stop crying like a…”

“?” Junhong offered, grinning.

“Well, yeah! You complain they all treat you like a child, but, man, do you act like one!” Rei pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed deeply.

He couldn’t be upset with her, he knew she was saying all that because her heart broke for him every single time. She was about his age, so they were the youngest of the bunch, but she had somehow been pushed into taking Himchan’s role as mother hen of the group. Himchan was too taken with her to still mother them as before, so she had jumped right in.

“What do you want from me, Rei? I am a child!”

“You’ve just turned 18. You can actually drink and get married in a lot of countries in this world. Plus, other than your brain, the rest of you is a teenager at best,” she lectured.

Junhong wrinkled his nose and then smiled brightly at her, giving her what he thought was the sweetest grin in his arsenal.

“That’s not cute!” Rei complained. “Not with that tear stained face of yours!” She sighed and wrapped him in her arms. “The hell am I gonna do with you?”

“Put up with me till I grow a pair?” He laughed it off in the comfort of her arms.

“You laugh, but you guys are what keeps me up at night!” Rei complained and plopped right next to him on the oversized couch in her living room.

“Ah, shut up! Himchan is what keeps you up at night. Don’t blush, we all know he’s an animal, we’ve heard him while on…” He quickly covered his mouth with both his hands when he realized what he was saying. They never spoke of Himchan’s pre-Reiko phase, banging one groupie after the other in twisted all-nighters he claimed replaced his workouts while they were touring. Rei knew it had been his way of dealing with loving an underage girl, but it still hurt her. She had also been in love with him and she had had no distractions, just the occasional tabloid article featuring Himchan and his latest catch.

“Relax, it’s ok,” she claimed, but he could clearly see the streak of pain on her face. The girl was an open book and he felt rotten for having hurt her.

“Anyway,” she continued after plastering a smile that did not reach her eyes. “Jongup is a player, he will always have a new girl, and while I know how that feels first hand, I still want to smack you!” She pointed a threatening finger at him.

“Don’t,” he yelled, waving both of his hands. “You’re crazy strong!”

“You have to tell him, J! You can’t waste your time crying over him,” she urged.

“What good would that do? Confessing my unyielding love to the straightest guy of the bunch? That’ll break us all up for no good reason,” he said, shaking his head.

“He doesn’t look like the straightest of the bunch though,” she mused with a huge, wicked grin. “Even if he is, you’d be able to stop wondering.”

“What am I wondering?” he challenged.

She sighed and whispered it, “What if?” then quickly covered it up with a shrug.

She had been right. About his “what if” scenarios, about what he needed to do, the girl had this nasty habit of always being right. To make matters worse, she always did it without the much dreaded “told you so” aftermath. Now she was walking confidently toward Himchan, white dress and everything, all made up and styled and gorgeous. Zelo bet she was feeling uncomfortable, but her chocolate skin looked perfect in the creamy texture of the dress, so did her funky hairdo. He wished he could see her, and he eventually caught a glimpse of her profile when she turned to face Himchan.

Jongup was the best man. He looked serious and proud. Zelo knew Himchan would have chosen differently, had it not been for Choi Junhong’s sudden and violent death.

When Himchan took Rei’s hand and gave it a little squeeze, Zelo’s heart sank. He felt his knees buckle and he grabbed one of the marble columns adorning the balcony. “Jongup,” he whispered. Or mouthed, he wasn’t sure. But apparently it had been enough, because Jongup’s perfect face turned and looked up, right at him. Zelo hurriedly covered his mouth to stiffen his cry of surprise. A hand grabbed his shoulder to steady him and the familiar voice of his handler reached his fuzzy mind.

“He cannot see you. And he most certainly cannot hear your whispers.”

Zelo nodded his thanks and turned back to watch the ceremony, but all he could see was Jongup’s back. He was fidgeting, shifting his weight from one leg to another, clenching his fists. Zelo was very familiar with that nervous body language.  And right then a flash of the last time he had seen it hit him full on.

The New Year’s Eve Party had been awful. If that was how the rest of the year would go, then Junhong prayed to sleep through it. Jongup had been face with a girl nonstop for hours. That was no biggie, he always did that at parties. The problem this time around was that it was not a new girl. It was the girl he had hooked up with at the Christmas party Himchan and Rei had thrown and continued to see her till New Year’s. That hadn’t happened since middle school!

After having forced himself to stay there till the countdown, to see them more face, Junhong had slipped out of the condo and left the scene of the crime. His heart shattered, his mind blurry from all of the beer and tequila shots, his whole body shivering, although he wasn’t cold, he was just what he felt like: a mess. Hours later, he was still wandering aimlessly around his neighborhood. Going home could not fix his problem and he was way too worked up to pass out.

He suddenly remembered he had some whiskey at home. Ironically, a present from Jongup on his 18^th birthday. Suddenly excited about something, he made his way to his apartment, determined to drink himself into oblivion.

While he was fumbling with his keys, he sensed movement to his left. He turned and froze when he recognized the eyes glaring at him. Jongup was leaning on the wall at the end of the hallway. He pushed himself up and stalked towards Junhong who was still sunned in the same awkward position. Jongup stopped a few feet from him, but he was anything but still, constantly shifting his weight from one leg to another, his eyes moving left and right and roaming all over Junhong.

“Why did you leave the party?” he finally asked in a voice that sounded way too calm to Junhong who clearly saw him fidgeting around.

“Yo, answer me!” Jongup urged.

Junhong pocketed his key and turned to face his love interest, all pain and fear gone. He hadn’t found his long lost courage, the alcohol was just the main act in his head for the moment.

“What the do you care?” he challenged.

“Have you gone mental on me? I’ve known you all my life, of course I care!”

Junhong smirked, for some reason remembering all the important things in his life Jongup had totally missed, mostly because of some girl or another. But he still claimed to care, the little !

“No, really! Forgive me, brother, I forgot how much I meant to you,” Junhong started to spill his guts. “You are right! I just dreamt up all those birthdays, skateboarding competitions, hip hop battles, and all the other significant life events you couldn’t be bothered with!”

“Dude, you know I couldn’t help it, why would you bring that up?”

“Not being able to keep it in your pants does not translate into an excusable reason not to be there,” Junhong stated matter-of-factly, surprised by the calmness in his own voice. Jongup cringed and looked away.

“So why did you leave tonight?” he asked again after recovering from his momentary discomfort.

“Hell if I know,” Jonhung shrug it off.

“So Reiko just happened to slap the back of my head for no reason after figuring out you’d taken off?” Jongup asked with a raised eyebrow. God, he looked so damn gorgeous! Junhong found it harder and harder to concentrate. His eyes would drift to Jongup’s lips, or his chest, or the jeans riding low on his hips.  He shook his head to focus on the conversation.

“Why didn’t you ask her?”

“I did, she refused to talk to me.”

“Tough luck!” Junhong said, feeling the corners of his mouth traveling up to present Jongup with a positively wicked (or drunk and crazed) grin.

“Don’t grin at me like an idiot! Tell me, please! What’s going on? Are you mad at me or something?”

Jongup’s voice sounded incredibly soothing, but the hand that was moving to his face terrified Junhong. How am I supposed to control myself if he touches me, he thought and tried to move out of the dreaded hand’s path. He lost his balance in the process and nearly fell. Jongup’s strong arms intervened and pulled him back to his feet.

“Talk to me, man! I can’t lose you,” Jongup said and it was those words that did Junhong in. He reached out, grabbed his friend’s shoulders and pulled him close, pressing their lips together. He didn’t know with what energy or courage he was moving, but he couldn’t stop. He and nipped his way into Jongup’s submission, feeling him open up enough for Junhong’s tongue to slide in. What the hell am I doing? I need to stop, now! Choi Junhong, stop right now, you idiot! But the sensation of their tongues sliding against each other, the velvety soft touch of Jongup’s lips, it was all too much to make way for any coherent thought. Or so he thought, right before his mind started wondering why he hadn’t been pushed away. Why on Earth was Jongup kissing him back?

The realization should have made him melt into Jongup’s body and pray he’d never wake up from this. Instead it felt like a cold bucket of water being dropped on him. Junhong pushed free of the embrace and stepped back, leaning on his door.

“Wha…” he started to ask, but Jongup’s mouth swallowed the rest of his question. Jongup is kissing me. He came right at me. Oh, God, I’ve hit my head and I am hallucinating somewhere. But the hand traveling down his body, and making its way to Junhong’s obvious was no joke and definitely not a dream. Jongup let it slide into his younger friend’s pocket and retrieved the key. He never broke the kiss while unlocking the door and moving them both inside.

Zelo smiled at the vivid memory. It had been the beginning of the most blissful period of his life. Crazy and sappy confessions about when they had started to love each other, plus a wildly possessive Jongup who seemed to believe all the world was set on snatching Junhong away.

Zelo’s smile faded away and tears filled his eyes. Such a short lived paradise! Only a few months later, Choi Junhong had died.

No, that was a lie. Zelo was the one who had died. An awkward young man who happened to stumble out of a bar at the wrong time, just when the loan shark enforcers were casing the place to flush him out. They had grabbed their bats and put them to merciless use. They probably didn’t intend to kill the guy, but he had stumbled out into the street and a car took care of the killing part.

Junhong had watched it all from the other side of the road. He had seen it play out, concealed by the busted street light. The attack, the bats, the body splayed on the street. The next day, a police officer had informed him he would go into witness protection. No goodbyes, no time to prepare, just a stone cold notice to everyone in his life. He had asked if he had any family. Junhong wanted to say yes, but couldn’t. None of them were related to him on paper. And he’d rather lose Jongup than force him to give up his very real family and the great friends they shared. That day, Zelo had been born. Junhong had taken the young man’s name as homage of sorts.

It had been three agonizing years since that night. An endless row of day after day of bitter loneliness, anger, and inability to move on. Zelo never let anyone get close. He couldn’t love anyone but Jongup, hadn’t been able to since middle school, he was not about to start now. As for friends, he didn’t want any more people he’d grow to love more than his own flesh and blood to then lose them in the blink of an eye.

He looked up to see the first husband and wife kiss of Channie  and Rei. He saw the rest of their friends surrounding them in a big group hug. Jongup was smiling, but he was keeping a safe distance from the rest, stopping right on the outskirts of the emotion and the touching that filled the air. Zelo noticed his beloved’s tears and grunted, silently praying that at least they were tears of joy. He leaned on as far as he could, to get just a bit closer.

“Time to go, Zelo! You had your last glance as requested.”

Zelo hated the man, although it was not his fault. Sure, death was easier than this torment. But it wasn’t just his life he would have gambled if he had chosen differently. He sighed deeply, reminding himself for whom it had all been. He looked over his shoulder, the six people he had kept safe were there, walking slowly to the exit.

He followed his handler down the stairs to a side door leading them outside of the church. The man signaled him to wait while he went ahead to check everything.

“All clear,” he announced. Zelo reached for the door, but he felt his body being pulled back and then locked tightly in an embrace he knew all too well.

“Where the hell do you think you’re going, Junhong?”

Jongup’s voice sounded threatening, but his entire body was shivering and warm tears reached the skin on Zelo’s neck.

He cleared his throat and tried to change his voice, “You got the wrong guy. I’m Zelo.”

“Who the cares about what name you choose to call yourself?” Jongup spat. “You still smell the same. I picked up your scent in the church the moment I stepped in. I’m a well trained dog, aren’t I?” he kept on rambling. “I thought it was my mind playing tricks, but then I stayed back and I saw you up there when they turned off the spotlights.”

“I’ve got to go,” Zelo tried to convince them both to let go, futile as it might have been. He felt the lock of Jongup’s arms tightening until he could barely breathe. Please don’t let go, he thought while going through the motions of struggling to break free.

“Not in a million years, Junhong or Zelo or whatever! Just give it up,” Jongup advised, and it sounded like the best idea ever.

“Then I guess I’m not going anywhere,” Zelo said and let his head fall on Jongup’s shoulder.