Jackson honestly has no idea whatsoever what attracted him to the baby-faced boy, four years the boy’s elder. Maybe it was just that, his baby-face, innocent-like persona that could be completely different than anyone else Jackson had dated. Completely and utterly different.

     They had met in South Korea; both in a schooling program abroad, their only mutual language being English. Both alone, scared, culture shocked; they had just instantly clicked together more like a survival instinct. Kunpimook needed a hyung and Jackson needed to be somebody’s hyung.

     That’s all it simply was at first, using each other so they each wouldn’t feel absolutely totally lost in this foreign country. However, as their Korean progressed and so did their knowledge of one another – it was undeniable there was some kind of mutual attraction.

     Kunpimook, a name that Jackson had struggled with so much earlier now flowed off his tongue so easily. Saying his name felt like a hidden meaning to Jackson, whereas Kunpimook would easily introduce himself with some kind of nickname. Together in their own little world, a clique of two people who faced these struggles together both at young ages, they loved each other. It could be seen from miles away the adoration felt from one another.

     Nonethless, as their small clique began to grow into that of seven, they began to see the differences instead of the similarities. Instead of taking their heated arguments that began to grow more frequent into learning, they would drag them on for days at a time. If they weren’t fighting, they weren’t speaking. Constant comparisons of other people, they began to see what they had missed out on; all things they never knew they enjoyed before only created a bigger abyss.

     The only time Jackson thinks about his and Kunpimook’s relationship sentimentally is at a time like this. Lazily smoking a cigarette with Mark on his left. Mark, someone Kunpimook has always adored after Jackson, and every time Jackson makes the phone call to Mark after the younger has left for his routine class, there’s a pain of guilt. Though it’s not too noticeable to actually prevent Jackson from dialing the number.

     Maybe because him and Kunpimook had never really gotten past the point of sloppy s he calls Mark. Then once his lust is gone and he has a clear mind, he calms his anxiety about Kunpimook finding out by lighting out his hidden stash of smokes.

     It’s drawing near Kunpimook’s arrival though, and that’s when Mark begins to get up and quickly dress himself while Jackson lays in bed, covered waist down, watching the elder.

     “Why don’t you just break up with him?”

     Jackson just laughs, sitting up and putting out his bud in the ashtray on his bedside table, “I can’t break up with him, you know that.”

     Mark stops midway from pulling up his pants, staring incredulously, “And why the hell not?”

     “You know him Mark! He needs me. You look at it from my perspective, I was the only thing he had when he came here and he still relies on me! Hell, he looks up to you too!”

     Mark shrugs carelessly, of course he loved the kid. He was caring, sensitive and frankly something Jackson had once deserved but not anymore. “Well what about me? I need you too.”

     Jackson stood up, wrapping the sheet around his waist, walking slowly to the redhead with clear desperation on his face. Putting his fingers to his chin, he lifted up his head to press a chaste kiss that contradicts to their past ones. One that wasn’t filled with pure lust. “I just can’t, and you know that.”

     “I know but-“

     Jackson shushed him with another kiss, “I’ll do it soon, okay? Just wait, please. I don’t feel right about cheating on him either okay?”

     Mark only nodded his head before wrapping his arms around his neck, pulling him down into a deeper kiss. 

     “I love you.”

     There was a knot in Jackson’s stomach, one so painfully obvious by the way he froze when their lips had finally touched and the word had finally registered.

     “I know.” He smiled when Mark had walked to their entrance, the cover still hanging off of his waist. However, when Mark had pulled him down for their last kiss until the next time Kunpimook had class, it was forced and awkward.

     Jackson dropped on the couch when Mark closed the door softly behind him with a small smile filled with hope. He felt so guilty, so ing guilty he was disgusted with himself. But, then again there was that small voice inside his head that continually told Jackson that he loved Mark too. Maybe not in love, but definitely loved.

     Jackson deserved happiness, god dammit he deserves to be happy after this past year where he so obviously put Kunpimook’s needs before him. Where he would fantasize about Mark’s smaller lips compared to his boyfriend’s. When Kunpimook would snake his hand down in Jackson’s pants after a day where they would speak without coldness, he would fantasize about Marks hand him to pleasure instead of the college student’s.

     Jackson honestly doesn’t even know when Mark and his relationship had escalated, probably around the time his and Kunpimook’s did. Instead of Kunpimook being Jackson’s sole support system, the only one he had for three years, it had converted to the hyung. The kisses friends usually share, the small pecks that mean nothing had turned into raw emotions when they would drink too much at the stuffy bar that they often went to.

     When they first made love in Mark’s apartment where he shared it with two other boys, the muffled moans and the immense pleasure that Jackson had never experienced before with Kunpimook had spurred on their relationship past friends with benefits, to something really emotional and deep.

     Sneaking out at night was Jackson’s forte now, hiding the remains of all traces to Mark was something he mastered. Basically, deceiving Kunpimook had become their relationship, and Jackson had became too good at it, so good he’s ashamed to admit it.

     Though Kunpimook may be young, he’s definitely far from stupid, or even oblivious. Even if he has known, there’s no way that he’s showed signs of even caring besides the sly comments about the hanging smoke smell in their shared bedroom.

     Jackson doesn’t really attempt to hide it anymore though, his thoughtlessness has taken him this far. When they hang out as friends, the occasional dinner, when Mark is touching Jackson thigh in such an inconspicuous way that he’s sweating under the collar, but Kunpimook laughs with the others, not glancing at Jackson whatsoever.

     Or even the time when they both had gone to the restroom together and Mark and off Jackson in the handicap stall. Both coming out in a dazed mess, the others had raised their eyebrows but Kunpimook had only smiled at their return and never said a word.

     But maybe that’s what exactly gets to Jackson, the fact that the younger never, ever says something about how he only smokes on Monday afternoons. How the once perfectly made bed is a mess of sheets whenever he returns. There’s no way he can’t suspect it, no possible way.

      Yet again, maybe Jackson is a little relieved he hasn’t exactly left yet.

     They had been together since Kunpimook nearly seventeen and Jackson twenty-one. Watching each other grow, it was inevitable that at least somewhere they would disagree. Not that they disagreed much, they don’t even talk to have the chance to even see who likes what now. The last conversation Jackson has noted to be decent is when he had asked the younger if his class was still on. Kunpimook had only mumbled a small, “Yes.” And continued to work on his homework he always put off the night before.

     Even when he had gotten a pink tinge in his hair on one of the days Jackson had come home late from staying at the bar, Kunpimook had looked to the elder with wide eyes and dropped his gaze when there was no response and just quickly trudged to their bedroom.

     Jackson had probably sat on the couch for an hour, the television blasting out mindless things that was incoherent for the last sixty minutes. The silk sheet once heated between two bodies now limp and cold. He sighed, standing up allowing the thin cover to fall beneath his feet as he went to go shower before Kunpimook got home.

     Their bedroom still smelled like smoke, and the ashtray filled with remains of post-. Kunpimook would probably clean it though, he always cleans up the mess  Jackson makes. Sweeping all his mistakes under the rug like they don’t exist, but he still knows they’re there.

     Throwing the sheet on the tangled bed, he walks into their small bathroom, seeing the hickeys covering his shoulder. Not the neck, Jackson had insisted, because he may be an but he at least has a bit of humanity.

     Letting the hot water, too hot or his liking, burn away his mistakes. He scrubbed the smell of smoke off of him, though it’s impossible because Jackson more than anyone knows that it sticks to every surface. He scrubs himself raw, raw to the point it hurts.

     Not even this shower could make Jackson feel completely clean, having ed Mark on the side of it during their risky rants.

     Getting out of the shower, his skin red and towel covering his lower half, he sees Kunpimook emptying the ashtray and the bed completely crease free. He looks up, eyeing the red torso before going back to his task. There wasn’t a smile, one hasn’t graced his face in for god knows how long.

     He looked disappointed, oddly dreary. Fed up, everything but how Kunpimook, usually is, however he didn’t say a word.

     Jackson raises his eyebrows, the younger’s pink hair is now faded into an orange-like tint. He hadn’t dyed it after Jackson had walked away unfazed by the sudden teenage-like rebellion.

     Softly making his way out of the room, he shut the door to give Jackson his privacy. It was weird, still seeing someone he used to know so well be so distant and cold. Not that Jackson was someone to blame this all on the other, probably more than half of their problems rely solely on Jackson’s shoulders.

     Slowly putting on his clothes, he could hear Kunpimook speaking his language in the other room. Something he used to adore him for, his intelligence, his linguistics. Now, it’s something to be somewhat paranoid about, how he could be telling his family about how he knows Jackson’s wrongdoings.

      Opening the door, making his presence known, Kunpimook only briefly looks up before mumbling soft goodbyes that Jackson had picked up from the four years of dating him.

     He’s sitting at the kitchen table, something that they had fixed up together when they were too broke to afford new furniture. Hidden behind his laptop screen, face glowing white, he stares at Jackson and Jackson at him.

     It’s uncomfortable, almost like sitting at God’s punishment, except Kunpimook may be a little bit more intimidating to Jackson than the higher power.

     “Who were you talking to?” Jackson has absolutely no reason to ask, or rather any right to ask.

     “My mom.”

     “Oh.”

     “I’m going back to Thailand.”

     Jackson stumbled, hearing but not comprehending the words, “W-what?”

     “I’m going to go back to Thailand, to live once our lease is over.”

     “Why?” They both know why. There’s absolutely no doubt about it.

     “You know.”

     “How long have you known?”

     Kunpimook slammed his laptop shut, rubbing his hands over his tired eyes. Something Jackson hadn’t noticed until right now. “Either you think I’m absolutely ing stupid, or, you’re the biggest to continue to ing screw Mark hyung while I am completely aware.”

     Jackson was in dismay, so much disbelief. He had known Kunpimook had known, he’s known just as long as him. Though, he thought he’d be at least the one to break it off and not some kind of sick leaving back to Thailand.

     “How did you find out? I mean, I just – how?”

     He gave out a pitiful laugh, one that made Jackson’s heartache enough to clench his chest. “I graduated two weeks ago, Jackson. You constantly asked about my Monday classes. I ing graduated! You didn’t come, you didn’t even care!”

      Jackson has never heard the younger swear so much, use so much anger and force behind his words. It was his entire fault, and maybe it’s because Jackson is on the receiving end of the breakup rather than the planned giving, or because it’s being spat in his face how much of a complete he’s been to Kunpimook.

     “When are you leaving?”

     Kunpimook crossed his arms, “That’s all you have to say, really? I’m leaving as soon as our lease is up, weren’t you listening?”

     Jackson ran to the calendar that they kept on the side of the fridge, rustling through the pages until he found the circled date that was more prominent than their anniversary or birthdays.

     February 28^th, 2014.

     It was circled in a bold red marker, “What day is it?

     “The 14^th.”

     .