Confession (1/1)

CHAPTER 15MIRAE’S POV:After our school trip came to an end, we headed back to Seoul. Kai seemed healthier than ever even though I highly doubt that was case. He was smiling more often, talking and became more outgoing. Something was off. I wasn’t like him. It was kind of like those cancer patients who find out they have a few more weeks to go.I started crying.I was lying in my bed alone. Thinking. I hate thinking. It only gets me nowhere I want to be.I got off my bed after I realized I had completely soaked my pillow with tears and sat on my desk with the lights still turned off. I plugged in my earphones and played some soft music. My tears were running faster than the Han river. I pulled my knees closer to my body, closed my eyes and listened.I had school the next morning. I needed to sleep, but I knew that was not happening tonight.I tried to remember any sort of indications that might hint about his situation. None. There was nothing.I thought I could be the drinking, but the first night we drank together, he went home safely as I recall. The other occasions where we went out drinking, no one got seriously drunk. The other time we over-drank in Paris, nothing happened right after that night. He woke up safe and sound. Hungo`ver maybe, but healthy nonetheless. The incident happened later.The doctor in Paris told us he was fine. He said Kai was just dizzy from low blood pressure and that he needed some rest. It was odd. Your blood pressure doesn’t just drop like that out of nowhere. Not from drinking, and not from anything. There must be a reason. A reason I can’t seem to think of.The doctor seemed to avoid direct questions such as the one I was proposing, “what exactly is wrong with him?” He wouldn’t answer and turn back to Mr.Saccuci.Think. Think. Think!Wait. Didn’t he skip school for about a week after we drank the very first time? And that night in Paris, Kris said he hadn’t seen him come back. Both times he disappeared, he was uncontrollably drunk. But then again, the question proposes itself: where does he run off to?Drugs? I don’t think so. He doesn’t fit an addict’s description.It only comes down to one thing. He’s sick.It could be from the alcohol or from God.I started coming up with scenarios of possible cases, each one made me cry harder than the one before.The sun came up and I hadn’t even blinked an eye of sleep.My heart hurt. A lot. And my chest tightened with each breath. I felt like I was dying from the inside. Something was eating me up, slowly, mercilessly.Slowly, I fell asleep soundly thinking of only one word.Kai.  KAI’S POV: I kept telling myself, “suck it up and be a man.”I had to tell Mirae what was going on. And so I did. On the very last day of school, and just when everything between us was going perfectly well.“I made a bet with Kris the day I saw you.” I said, dryly.“A bet?”“Before I tell you anything more, I want you to hear me out completely before overreacting. To the very end.”She nodded. We were walking in front of the school gates, going home.“So after my first day at school, I met up with Kris very late at night. We do that every now and then. We were joking around and we drank a little, and at one point Kris started joking around about how I lost my charm with the ladies and so I got a little angry. I told him I can get any girl I want and so we bet on who can get a girl first. Up until then, I had won. I got you before he got Tiffany. We wanted to make it a little more fun so we took you out that night to drink and things heated up from there. We were enjoying the roles we were playing and so we stuck to them.” I paused. I wanted to let the words sink in, but she just stared at me, her eyes empty.“So what you’re trying to say is that you never once liked me and that this was all because of some childish boy-bet?” She gave it a thought, “Oh.”“Well not exactly, I liked you, I really did and I still do, but not to such an extent.”“Okay, whatever, but what about you? Are you sick?”I was frustrated. She was still worried about me after everything I just told her.“Are you sick?” She repeated.“No.” I started to become nervous and my hands were sweating.“Then what the hell happened to you that day in Paris?”“I skipped my allergy medication. It can become quite serious, but it’s an embarrassing allergy I have so I told the doctor to lie.”“That’s it?”“Yes.”“Go on.”Oh shit. I think this is where she starts to become angry. “I tried to break us off a few times, but I didn’t have the balls.” Like the time I wanted to kill myself because I ended up in the hospital after someone punched me and for some reason I passed out, and the doctor messed up my file with someone else’s and I thought I had terminal cancer.“Get to the point.” Now, she’s seriously angry.“I’ll make it simple. We can’t be together. Tiffany and Kris can’t be together. It won’t ever work.”“Why?” Her eyes were slowly filling. I feel like an ass. “All these months we’ve spent together, you must’ve felt something. At least one. Why did I have the target? Why Tiffany? Why are you  two-”I cut her off only to say two words that silenced her.“We’re gay.”