I walked through the woods mindlessly, aimlessly. My mind was blank. Everything was a blur. I couldn't concentrate. I couldn't think. Only your sweet voice echoed in my empty brain. Your cute giggles, your melodious voice, it all repeated in my head. But you had to come up to me one day and ask that hard question.

How was I supposed to answer such a ridiculous question as that?!

I can't make up my mind, yes, but you must know that I love you.

Okay, fine, I still had another love, a delicious one, but you were even more delicious in a beautiful way.

You and I had been friends since high school. You told me I approached you in high school differently than other guys.

While other guys had six-packs, I barely had any. While other guys bought you expensive gifts, I was no more than a meer boy with little earnings and savings. While other guys had the ability to charm and woo you, I was too shy to do that. While other guys had way hotter looks than me, I had a simple face. While other guys were brave enough to tell you they loved you in front of the whole class, I was too scared to even proclaim my love for you like them.

Yet, you still chose me despite my weirdness.

You said I was special in a weird, but beautiful, way. Me with my love for chicken. Me with a chipmunk-like face. Me with my shy personality. Me with my stick-thin body.

I love chicken, yes, but that doesn't mean I don't love you too.

But, instead, you had to ask me that hard question.

Which brought me to the woods here.

I slipped over mossy rocks, hitting my head and scratching myself. I tripped over brambles and bushes and stones. Prickles tore my skin, leaving bloody scars on my hands and my face. Branches clung to my wet hair that smelled like a few thousand skunks. My wet clothes hung on me like a rag. I looked like a drowned rat that had just been pulled out of the Hongdae River.

I reached the little wooden treehouse that we had built together during our summer holidays when we were in high school. I opened the bamboo door and stepped inside. The room smelt faintly of chicken and your perfume.

I ran my hand over a stone carving I had made in a craft shop. The stone was in the shape of a heart. Our names were engraved in it. This was meant to show that we were each other's property. To show that we belonged to each other.

The carving smelled of old chicken. I remembered that I was eating fried chicken while making this for us both. When I gave it to you, I remember you smelling the scent of chicken and interrogating me about why it smelled like that. When I confessed my mistake, you simply laughed it off like a big joke. Eventually, you got me to laugh along. Your laugh is just too addicting to resist. I just had to laugh along...

An old, faded picture of you and I sharing our first kiss together hung on the wall next to the stone carving. The frame smelled of my chicken-scented hands and your sweet perfume that smelled like your favorite flower, the lily of the valley. That flower is just like you. You yourself are a beautiful lily in a vast valley. You were the rose among the thorns.

You were the rose.

I was a common ordinary flower.

But your beauty made me shine and grow to become another rose by your side. You transformed me.

I broke down into tears and sank to my knees. As I looked up, only your face appeared before me. You were smiling gently.

" Onew oppa.... ", you whispered out in your kindest voice.

" J--Ji--Ji Eun Mi-ah.... ", I stuttered out, barely able to contain my tears.

As I looked at you, your hand seemed to reach out for me. I extended my hand to touch yours. But just as I barely tounched your soft, fragile hand, you disappeared before my very eyes.

You had left me...again.

I was again alone.

Friendless.

Unloved.

Lonely.

Sad.

Tired.

Cold.

Wet.

Incomplete.

I lay down on the damp, mucky floor and cried myself to sleep. Everything seemed so gloomy without you by my side.

When I had woken up from my slumber, my body burned. I was physically, mentally and emotionally tired. My insides burned with intense heat. My head throbbed with agony. My hands felt clammy to the touch. My hair was wet, sticky, smelly and dirty with grime, moss and brambles.

I was burning with a dangerous fever.

A physical body fever.

A mental fever.

An emotional fever.

All of them were the same.

Fiery.

Intense.

Incurable.

Dangerous.

Deadly.

I don't know which is worse.

I was broken.

Physically.

Mentally.

Emotionally.

I was lost.

Physically.

Mentally.

Emotionally.

I felt cold.

Literally.

Figuratively.

I was alone.

No one by my side.

No one.

Nobody.

Nothing.

Not even a little ant passing by.

I wished I could die right there, drowning in my loneliness and grief.

Leave my broken body behind.

Leave my broken spirit behind.

Leave my shattered heart behind.

But your question kept me from leaving.

Do I love you more or chicken more?