One month passed since that day in the hospital. My time now found itself divided between visiting my mother, visiting Jinyoung, and working. Thankfully school was on summer break so I didn’t have to worry about that for the time being. It felt like I had enough on my plate.

          While I slowly got used to Jinyoung being in the hospital and to him having cancer, it was still strange for me. Strange to think that the person that I really cared about was suffering from something that may not be fully curable. I had come to terms with my mother’s suffering years ago, or at least I thought I had. Maybe that was why I was taking it harder than normal. Maybe it was a combination of me loving Jinyoung and me not fully accepting the fate that my mother was dealt. Maybe I had buried the feelings that I had regarding my mother deep inside and never thought of them again. Maybe.

          I saw Jinyoung before I heard the guitar. He was sitting outside on a bench with his guitar lying across his lap and his notebook sitting next to him. “It’s a nice day we’re having, isn’t it?” I asked surprising him.

          “Yah, Minyoung,” he said practically jumping up from his seat. Once he registered my presence he quickly made a move to shield the notebook, quickly picking it up and sitting on it.

          “What were you writing?” I wondered. That wasn’t the first time he hid what he was working on from me. It seemed to happen frequently lately.

          “Nothing, just some ideas.” Jinyoung shrugged his shoulders and I took a seat next to him.

          We said nothing for a while, just sat there in silence and listened to the sounds of the city. The people walking past and the cars that zoomed by. I hooked my arm in his and gently rested my head on his shoulders. “I like this,” I sighed.

          “I do, too,” Jinyoung said placing his hand over mine.

          It was a comfortable silence that was between us. Neither of us really felt the need to say anything and that was kind of how it had been for a while. I didn’t want to keep bringing up talk about my mother or about why Jinyoung was in the hospital and we had already talked about what happened when I worked or done other things. All of the talk was old between us, it didn’t seem like anything new was happening, so comfortable silence was common, but greatly appreciated.

          After a couple of more minutes passed I looked up at Jinyoung to see his eyes fixated on something far away. I followed his gaze and found a young couple with a child that I assumed he was staring at. The couple seemed happy and in love, they were smiling and giggling with each other the entire time they walked on the sidewalk across the street. The man was pushing an empty stroller while the woman carried the child who was also partaking in the giggling. They looked like a happy family.

          “Minyoung,” Jinyoung softly said, “do you regret anything in the world?”

          “Regret…” I repeated. Did I have any regrets in my life? There were things that I was angry at, especially regarding my mother and what she did while I was growing up, but those weren’t my decisions. I can’t regret something that she did. Then I wondered, did I ever actually do anything with my life to have something to regret?

          “You know, anything you ever did,” he sighed.

          “I’m not sure,” I said shaking my head. “Do you have a regret?”

          “I have a lot.” He pulled his eyes away from the young family to look at me. “Minyoung, do you regret meeting me?”

          I didn’t know what to think. The question caught me off guard, but the answer that immediately entered my mind was no. I didn’t regret meeting Jinyoung. Did he think that I did?

          I unhooked my arm from Jinyoung’s and interlocked our fingers together, making sure that I looked him right into his eyes. “No,” was all I said. “I don’t.”

          “You don’t think I’m holding you back?”

          “Why in the world would I think that?”

          “Because I am, aren’t I?” he half-laughed. “I wouldn’t blame you if you regretted meeting me.”

          “I told you I don’t. Is there something wrong?” I was beginning to worry about where the conversation would lead. Was Jinyoung telling me that we should break up? If he felt like he was holding me back then I felt like that meant that he thought he wasn’t good enough for me. But he was Jinyoung, he was definitely enough for me, probably better than what I deserved. Should I have told him that more often?

          “You could be dating someone better than me, someone who could give you everything. Like that young family over there,” he said gesturing his head in the direction that they were walking. “You could be looking for a potential husband, looking for someone to start a family with, but you’re with me and I can’t have any of that.”

          “Who said that you can’t?” I wondered with a gentle smile. “And why do you think that I would regret being with you over that? I’m only twenty-one, I’m not really looking to get married right now.” Jinyoung stared at me and I could see the tears start to form in his eyes. The feeling that I had gotten earlier from the conversation was something that I definitely did not like and the fact that Jinyoung seemed like he was starting to tear because of it certainly set off all of the warning signals in my body.

          “The doctors have gotten the remainder of my test results back and I went for a follow-up,” he started to explain. “They said that I have an inoperable brain tumor.”

          The reality once again hit me like a ton of bricks. First it was the fact that Jinyoung had a brain tumor in the first place, but now he has an inoperable brain tumor. “Inoperable…” I whispered.

          “They told me that there are treatments that I can undergo, but they’re not sure how well they’ll work. You know nothing is 100% accurate. They also said that there is a possibility that the tumor may be malignant. In other words, at this point, they’re not exactly sure of anything. I have to have more tests and explore my options.”

          I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to say. What could I say? Was there actually anything that was good enough to say? I thought he was doing well. I thought they had at least gotten it under control, but it was the opposite. He was doing worse, he wasn’t doing well at all.

          “You still don’t regret meeting me?” he asked.

          I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. When I gently opened them I saw Jinyoung staring at me and leaned closer to him before placing a tender kiss on his lips. I started to pull away but lingered there for a moment longer, our lips barely touching one another, both of us soaking in the moment. I rested my forehead against Jinyoung’s and looked straight into his eyes. “Does that answer your question?”

          “But…why?” he asked, his voice slightly breaking. I moved away and placed my hand on his cheek. “I’m going to be preventing you from being eternally happy, aren’t I?”

          “What sort of nonsense are you talking about?” I asked resting my hands in my lap. I wanted to know where he got such ideas. “Who says that I can’t be eternally happy with you? That I won’t be? You, Jung Jinyoung, make me, Seo Minyoung, feel like I’m the happiest person in the world. I’ve never felt like this before. You make me feel so special, you make me feel like…I don’t even know,” I said shaking my head. “I just…I was just living life aimlessly before, going through the motions, but you…you came into my life, you invaded it with your constant talking to me and…you became my friend. You became more than my friend, though. You became my pillar, my source of strength…” I paused and looked at Jinyoung before saying what I really wanted to say. “You became the person that I possibly love the most in the world and I didn’t think that was possible, but it apparently is. I love you, Jung Jinyoung. You are not a regret to me, you will never be a regret to me. Why? Because I love you.”