The graduation ceremony ends two and a half hour later after everyone’s caught up on what they each planned to do during their college years and discussed about their future goals. There are a lot of “working part-time,” “laying off college for a year or so,” and “marriage isn’t until ten years from now” comments. Of course, because this is all planned by Luhan, the gang has to stay an extra hour to clean all of the garbage and put away each and every equipment back to its place as promised. At first, the friends tell Luhan to do everything himself while they watch, but he takes forever to do everything, so the boys but Kris go over to help.

“Luna,” Hana asks, “Why did Luhan planned this graduation thing?”

“Oh, he didn’t tell you about it?” She sullenly asks in return.

Hana shakes her head. “He told me nothing about today.”

Luna glances at Luhan and then back at Hana. “Hana, he didn’t walk the stage with us.”

“WHAT?”

Her shriek scares Taeyang and he starts to cry. She’s about to take care of him, but Kris says that he’ll do it and for her to continue her conversation with Luna because she needs to know about it.

“Hana,” Luna doesn’t know where and how to begin. At first, she has thought of bursting Luhan’s little surprise, but she realizes that an explanation of hers—no, any explanation—will sound like it’s because of Hana that he didn’t walk the stage, even though he can. She just didn’t think she’d be the one to say it to her.

“Luna, tell me. Please don’t do this to me again.” She hints at the V-day incident to provoke guilt from her friend. “I—I just want to know what that pabo was thinking about.”

Yeah, Luhan is a pabo. He’s such a pabo that he bowed, begged, and signed a petition to get this done for you. “Hana…d-don’t think otherwise, okay?”

Hana nods without hesitation.

“You said it yourself, too, that he’s a pabo, so whatever he does, it’s all because he’s stupid. Got it?”

“Yes.”

“When you were still hospitalized and hadn’t woken up yet, Luhan figured that you wouldn’t be healed on time to walk with us, so—so, he asked…the school for permission to allow this to happen.”

“Why?”

“Because he wanted to walk with you.”

He did this AND did not walk the stage…for me?

“K, ready?” asks someone else, Luhan.

The girls perk up at the sight of the boys in front of them.

Luhan looks around and asks, “Where’s hyung and Taeyang? His stroller’s there.” He points to the stroller beside Hana. “Why you look so lost, Hana?”

She doesn’t look at him but gives him a ghastly reply. “Nothing.”

*

Walking out of the gym, the friends find Kris watching Taeyang walking around in awe of the new sights around him. When Kris spots the gang, he waves to them to come over.

“Hey guys,” Hana begins the conversation as she picks Taeyang up. “I think…Luhan and I are going to the campsite first. Today.”

“Eh?” That is everyone, including Luhan’s and Kris’s, response.

Kris, however, has a sure feeling that this is not the usual “camping” she’s referring to and exclaims to her, “You mean now? I-I thought—”

“—it has to be now, Mr. Lu.” With hurtful eyes that beg for his understanding, she says, “It has to be.” She walks away and puts Taeyang in the stroller. Without glancing back at her friends, she solemnly says, “I’m going to get ready.”

“Luhan,” Luna asks, “why are you guys going two days early?”

He shrugs, “I don’t know. I didn’t hear about any of this.”

Xiumin laughs and inserts, “You two have a lot of ‘I didn’t hear any of this’.”

Lay and Gayoon nod, silently agreeing with Xiumin.

Luhan nudges his brother. “Know anything about it?”

Everyone focuses on Kris whose previous response suggested a bit of understanding of why Hana would want to go earlier than planned with the friends. “Sorry, but, I’ve got to go, too.” Before he leaves though, he fails at trying to convince that his smile is anything but worry.

*

“Taeyang’s not going to stay with us?” Luhan asks his brother.

He, Taeyang, Kris, and Hana have endured the long two-hour, and extremely tense-filled atmosphere ride and have finally arrived at their personal lodge rented out by Luna’s parents who are more than happy to ever help whenever. It is thanks to them that the gang are able to save up money for other camping necessities. The two-story lodge with five rooms, three bathrooms, two living rooms, a huge kitchen that is twice the size of the virtual couple’s own kitchen, and two dining rooms, one of which is connected with the main living room in the center of the lodge.

The brown-colored lodge’s interior combined look of vintage and coziness make the virtual couple glad that they had chosen to camp. It was neatly decorated with vase-filled-flowers, art paintings of natures and wild animals, a line of fake animal heads—deer, moose, lion, and even a bear—are decorated at the top of the lodge’s entrance. The windows looked as if they have been glossed over as they sparkled here and there with no sign of dirt and each piece of furniture looks extremely brand new—they even smell clean.

Of course, the one who would actually do something like that is none other than Luhan.

“Yeah,” Kris responds to Luhan’s previous question. “I want to spend a few days with him before you guys camp together. That’s okay?”

Luhan glances back at Hana. “You okay with that?”

Hana sadly smiles. “Yeah, I am.” She walks over to the sleeping Taeyang and softly his cheeks. “I’ve packed everything of his already.”

“Got it.” Kris says. “I guess…”

“…Yeah…”

Luhan can’t help but wonder if there’s something being telepathically conversed between his brother and his friend, but he throws that assumption out of the window because something else catches his attention. Since a few days ago, Hana has been acting very weird. She doesn’t talk back to him like usual, she speaks much softer to him, and it’s like she wants to avoid him. He’s caught her stealing glances at him from behind his back a couple of times or silently watching him do something. And when they do talk, she’ll say something along the lines of “You have to remember, it’s done like this, okay?” She isn’t reprimanding him like usual, but it’s as if it’s the last time she’ll do something like that for him.

Like yesterday morning, when he drowsily slumped into his chair at the dining table while she was busily cooking, she came over and pulled out a chair to sit beside him.

She rested a hand on top of his and fidgeted with it. With a tone of regret, she said, “Luhan, you can’t be sleeping in so late and waking up late. In the future, you have to set a time, wash up nicely, cook and eat a decent breakfast.”

He didn’t bother to pay attention because what was the point? It’s not like he has to do it now. He still has years before he needs to start worrying about his health. He’s still a young man with much energy.

That isn’t the only time where she unhappily lectured him about his lifestyle.

A few days ago, she had bought him a tie to show him how to put it on.

“I don’t need to know how to do it.” He said. Smirking, he added, “If you know how, you can do it for me every morning.”

She had no energy to laugh because what he said stabbed her in her heart. “Pabo, don’t be relying on me so much. You’re a man. You have to do it yourself.”

“It’s okay. We’re friends.” He grabbed her hand and locked eyes with her. “Don’t teach me, okay?” He added a smile and leaned in towards her. “If you do, I can’t use an excuse to make you tie it for me.” He began unknotting the tie around his neck but she swiftly held his hands. “What?”

She avoided eye contact with him and said, “You don’t have to learn. Just…just let me do it this once. I’ve done it to my kids back then. But, this time, I want to try it on a man.”

“Oh, you think I’m a man, huh?” As he waited for her standard response, there is no reaction from him. He waited and watched her attentively did his tie for him but she hadn’t said anything about his comment. He forgot all about it when he saw how focused she was, with making sure that the tie was at the center, or that it overlapped correctly, or that one was supposed to be longer than the other or that it wasn’t too tight around his neck. One thing crossed his mind then.

She’d make a wonderful wife.

The door to the lodge closes and Luhan blinks back into reality. “He-he left?”

“Yeah.” She evades eye contact and goes over to her luggage. “I’m putting these away.”

“Hana.”

She stops at her steps with hesitation. “Hm?”

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” She inhales and then repeats her answer.

“You sure?”

She hears him coming closer and she fears his close reach. She rapidly inserts a question, “Ne, which room are you taking?”

He stops in his tracks to think about it. There are three rooms upstairs and two rooms downstairs. He knows that the bedroom would most likely be assigned this way: Gayoon, Luna, and Lay would get their own rooms, Xiumin and Luhan would have to share one, and Hana and Taeyang would be together. “I’ll be downstairs. The one on the left. You should take the big room since you’ll have Taeyang and he has a lot of toys.” He walks passed by her and brushes against her shoulders. “Want me to help you with your stuff?”

She shakes her head. “No. I’ve got it. Thanks.” She swiftly picks them up with no problem and heads upstairs, leaving him alone. She didn’t even bother saying anything else. Reaching her room, she exhaustingly cracks the door open, not because her luggage tired her out, but because she has too much on her mind.

She drops her luggage at the door way, not even bothering to bring them further in, and drags her feet to the bed. She flops her entire body stomach-first onto the soft and well-cushioned mattress with a cotton lavender blanket that neatly covered the mattress. Her eyes wander around the room and when it lands on the window directly across from her, showing the rays of sun seeping out from it, she thinks back to the car ride from before.

During the ride, Kris was busily driving, of course, Luhan was busily making a fuss about the view out of his side of the window, and at the back of the car, Hana was busily writing a few things on her notebook while Taeyang slept soundlessly beside her in his car seat.

I have almost everything ready. There are still a few things left, and I’d like for you to finish them for me. I will make the best of this, so don’t worry. I’m sorry for making you do all of this. But, thank you for helping me.

Hana closes her eyes after her flashback, trying to hold back her tears. With a whisper, she encourages herself, “No time to sulk. I’ve got to make the best of this.” Even though she says that, her hands trembled and she tightens her hands on the blanket under her and pulls them in to cover her tears that have fallen without her permission.

I’m sorry.

*

“Hana?” Luhan has been looking for her because he hasn’t seen her for two hours. He thought maybe she was setting up her luggage, so he went to do the same and they’ve been separated since then. But, when he finished with his, watched a show on the T.V. for an hour, he was curious to know why his friend is taking forever to be finished.

He heads upstairs to search for him, but thankfully, her luggage laid out by the door of the room shows him where she is at. He chuckles to himself, thinking that she’s probably having a hard time cleaning and he wants to make a fuss about it; however, when he enters, he sees his friend sleeping on her side.

He thinks she’s pretending, so he goes over and is about to nudge her to bother her but decides not to when he sees tear marks across her face.

Had she been crying? He walks to the bedside and crouches down to stare at her from the side of the bed. She must miss Taeyang. He bends over and crosses his hands on the mattress and then rests his chin on his arms. He quietly says to her, “You’ll see him soon. Let’s just have fun with the two of us for now.”

He pouts when he realizes that he’s talking to no one because she can’t hear him. He clears his throat to shake off the feeling. He stands up to stretch and her glowing cheeks tempt him, so he casually and leisurely leans down to drop a soft kiss.

*

Something ticklish amused his ears and he flutters his eyes open. In front of him is Hana, resting on her side, playing with his hair. “Oh…” he’s about to say something but notices that the room has turned dark with only the lamp at the opposite side of the bed is . He rubs his eyes, “What time is it?”

“7:24.”

He perks up from where he has slept only to flinch in pain when a throbbing pain nabs him at his sides. “Ow!”

She laughs at him, “Who told you to sleep right there?”

He puts a hand at his waist and starts to massage it. “I didn’t think I’d fall asleep.”

“Pabo.”

A sincere smile finally escapes from her and it melts his heart.

Seeing her looking at him with such a yearning expression, he remembers about her tear marks that have disappeared. “Ne, why did