Chapter One

You snuggled the top of your head against your boyfriend's long neck, and closed your eyes dreamily. "Kidoh, baby -- if Jin and I were both dangling off the side of a cliff, about to fall to our mortal doom, which one of us would you save? You know, if you could only save one of us."

For a little while, all you heard was the sound of Kidoh's pen as he scratched out lyrics in his notebook. He was always working, even when he was supposed to be relaxing on the couch with you -- like now.

When a couple of minutes had passed and he still hadn't answered, your eyes popped open. Is he...is he thinking this over or...? Really?

"Kidoh?" you asked, softly. Something had been bugging you lately, or really, someone. A particular someone with a three-letter name. A someone who happened to be your boyfriend's best friend forever.

"Both. I'd be like Spiderman and sling some web or something like that. Save you both," Kidoh laughed, not pausing at his work at all.

"Hyosang, do you realize that you have more pictures of Jin on your Twitter than you have of us?" Your voice was sweet, maybe overly sweet. You sat up on the couch, and ran your fingers faintly through his short dark-brown hair. "And what if you couldn't save us both from falling? No life-saving spiderwebs. Seriously, no cheating at your answer."

"Baby...that's a crazy question there," he said, tapping the top of his pen against his notebook, and as he took a big swallow of air, you saw his beautiful dominant adam's apple rise and fall. He looked at you and smiled. "Would you mind getting me a glass of water? I have to ask, asking for a glass, because you know I'm thirsty, nothing rhymes with thirsty..." and he laughed at himself.

You couldn't help grinning at his weak free-styling as you walked off toward the kitchen of his apartment. He actually was a very good rapper. He was good at most things, because he never gave up and kept pushing. How goal-oriented he was -- that's one of many things you loved about Kidoh. Of course, this also meant that he was gone a lot when he was working on new stuff for his underground rap group DaeNamHyup.

One of your male friends named Lu once said that you should never mess with a bromance. Well, in your opinion, what Jin and your boyfriend had was bordering on a bro-affair. It was pretty serious.

A clean glass. You pulled open cabinet doors as you hunted for any kind of glasswear in Kidoh's kitchen. You'd been dating him for six months, and still couldn't figure out what kind of system he used to organize the stuff in his apartment.

Briefly, you paused in your search -- burying your face into your sleeve as you muffled and contained your coughs, keeping your germs away from your hands. The random snowfall outside these past few days had been beautiful and romantic, but it was translating into coughs and sneezing for you. You hoped you weren't coming down with any sickness -- especially with Valentine's Day only a week away.

You popped open the cabinet beside the fridge. Tucked on the shelf was a very pretty golden gift bag decorated with little silver hearts.

Oh, no, I found the gift Kidoh's giving me for Valentine's Day! you lamented, staring at the bag with wide eyes. Then you smiled, rephrasing that thought. Oh, yes, I found the gift Kidoh's giving me for Valentine's Day!

He must have hidden it here right after he bought it. And a little peek wouldn't hurt, right?

As silently as possible, you pulled the gift bag from its hiding place. The bag had some weight to it. Soundlessly, you set it on the countertop. A little piece of paper fell down, and drifted toward the tiled floor of the kitchen. You bent down, and swiped up the paper -- and after a quick glance, you realized it was a receipt with a date from three weeks ago at the top. Wow, my sweetie bought my Valentine's Day gift all the way back in January...

You sunk your hands carefully into the bag, making sure not to rattle the paper. Your hands touched the softest, most beautiful, azure-blue scarf. Cashmere? Kind of expensive. But I love it. It looked long enough to wrap around both you and Kidoh.

As you did a little happy dance -- a silent happy dance -- you noticed a card in the bag. It wasn't inside of an envelope, so it was easy for you to notice that the pink card was decorated with the faces of the Disney princesses. That's right: Cinderella, Belle, Ariel, Snow White, and all of those chicks that you weren't too crazy about. The color pink and cartoon princesses had never been your thing. However, you were in such a good mood that you would have hugged any member of the cartoon royalty at that moment.

I bet he wrote me a cute little rap, you thought to yourself, unable to resist one more peek as you flipped open the greeting card.

"Crap!" you huffed as the song 'Every Girl Can Be a Princess' burst from the card. Of course, it had to be one of those cards that makes sound! Quickly, you closed it.

But wait a minute now. You frowned to yourself. Did I really just see what I think I saw?

You opened the card again, not much caring now whether you were caught with the gift. Your eyes stared at the writing in the card -- Kidoh's scrawled hand-writing.

As the Disney song "Every Girl Can Be a Princess" continued to grace the kitchen, you read the card to yourself, "'Keep your head up, my brother, and don't forget to laugh! Happy V-Day! Hope you love the scarf. Your bro, Hyosangie.'"

He bought Jin's Valentine's Day gift three weeks ago?!

You heard the door of the kitchen swing open behind you.

"It's just a joke thing," Kidoh said, laughing. Actually laughing. "We have this inside joke of ours -- that we've had for years. You know -- I call him 'Princess' and I don't know, it's just funny to us. Baby? You understand, right? Baby? Are you okay?"

"Oh, yeah -- it's hilarious," you said quietly, as you dug your free hand into the bag again and found a plastic sparkly tiara in the bag, under the scarf. You put it back down. You closed the Disney card. "Princess Jin. Brilliant."

Kidoh grinned, looking relieved, "I knew you'd get it. We came up with that joke ourselves. I got him a scarf because he has a duck neck like mine and we have to protect his throat from the cold air." He walked over and kissed you on the forehead. "Okay, my cute girl, I got to get out of here. Down to the studio. You going to chill here until I get back?"

"Sure. I'll be here." You placed the card into the bag and put the bag back in the cabinet.

You kissed Kidoh on his chin, and his eyes brightened happily. Your mind was focused on something else, though. Mario and Luigi in that video game were always aiming to save the princess. Not every princess needed to be saved. You knew at that moment that sometimes, the princess needed to be defeated.