“Raleigh,” he croaks out, lifting his head to look at me, dark eyes swimming with unshed tears, the tip of his nose a little pink despite the makeup. There’s a smile on his face, the kind of smile that’s plastered there for the cameras, for the public, like it’s not really meant for me, and he huffs a little laugh, confused.

“Raleigh Montgomery. What the hell are you doing here?” he says, in French, swearing for a second, before running a hand through his hair, frowning when it doesn’t actually move with all the product in it. “How did you find me? How did you get here? What?!”

Jaeyong reaches out a hand towards me, palm up, smiling wide now, more genuine, the kind that reaches his eyes. My heart flip-flops, relieved down to the marrow of my bones that he’s recognized me.

This, this was worth it, even if I only ever get this from him. I saw him again, I’m making sure he’s okay.

“You gave me your email all those years ago, but I lost it, cried for days because I lost it. I kept trying different variations on what I thought it would be, since you weren’t allowed on Messenger, and I kept getting failed mail delivery, and I gave up. You didn’t give me a phone number or anything. Shit, Lucas, I had to find out about your super-famous idol status by randomly getting into K-pop!”

I place my hand in his, blanching at the fact that his hand is so, so much bigger now, dwarfing my own hand, fingers wrapping around my hand gently, carefully.

“I just thought you forgot about me. Holy shit, what’s happened to you? You look so different?”

“Me? Look at you!” I laugh, elated when his fingers tighten around my hand, like he’s just as afraid of pulling away as I am.

“I mean, it’s been a long time, I was bound to change. You got super tall, and I’m really mad about it,” I scrunch my nose at him, wiping my free hand down the leg of my jeans, as if that’s going to make the clamminess of my left hand currently held captive by Lucas (Jaeyong! Jaeyong!) suddenly disappear.

“This is crazy, I can’t believe you’re here…in Seoul.” It takes him a second, and his eyes go wide and big, and his mouth drops open like he’s just realized where I am. “You’re in Seoul, and I’m in Seoul! We’re in the same city!”

I remember him getting excited over things, practically squirming in his chair, pulling out random dance moves whenever he was happy or proud or anything but sad. I was always envious, severely lacking hand-eye coordination, and dancing always felt like a cruel joke. And now I know that Lucas can do absolutely sinful things with his hips, the mere thought of him dancing like that making my cheeks burn hotter.

“Yeah. I’m actually going to be working here for the year, and I’m being presumptuous, I know, but I put my number in there, where Goku finds the seventh dragon ball. Up to you, I know how busy you are, and your team is giving me a death glare, so I’m gonna go. No pressure, okay? It was so nice to see you after all this time.”

Lucas squeezes my hand, mouth set in a soft smile that makes me smile back, makes me believe that we’re alone and not in front of an entire room of people, some of whom are waiting patiently for their turn. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll see you, Raleigh.”

I move down and off the dais, light and airy, practically walking on a cloud as I move and take my designated seat in the crowd. I try to calm myself down, looking back up at the row of fans in front of our idols, in front of our boys, trying to stifle the smile that’s permanently glued to my face as of today.

My legs bounce as I wait for the line to peter out, catching sight of Lucas once more when he’s free to look at me, no other person blocking his view, no one blocking mine, and he flashes me a grin that I feel down to my toes.

Who knew?

Honestly, who freaking knew?

I watch Jaeyong glance down at the manga, flip through the pages while microphones are set up on their little stands in front of each member, every single one of them donning flower crowns, or funny hats that they’ve just received as gifts.

The maknae’s trying his best to move with no less than six of them stacked on his head, moving gingerly so they don’t fall over—he looks like the Mad Hatter or something close to it—grinning at his hyungs and at the crowd.

I try not to look at Lucas—at Jaeyong—but it’s hard going, my body flooded with relief and a sudden exhaustion that makes me realize how amped up I’ve been for whoever knows how long. Now that I’m seated, now that I can relax and the hard part’s over, all I want to do is crawl into my pajamas at home and go right the hell to sleep.

I watch Jaeyong flip through the manga again, looking like he’s studying every single page, flashing a grin at the pages when I think he’s found my phone number, keeping his eyes down, but still making my cheeks warm, even from this distance.

Puberty hit Min Jaeyong like a freaking truck, and I got gently grazed by the eighteen-wheeler of puberty doom, looking pretty much the same (except for the somewhat explosive growth of my tits before I went to cégep, and the same goes for my ass and hips). So yeah, I guess I was easier to recognize.

My stomach’s almost twinkling with something like euphoria when Jaeyong glances up, sees me looking at him, closes his eyes and smiles wide and big and I swear to God, my breathing just stops.

It’s disconcerting to find out that my old friend, the one true friend I had a lifetime ago, turned out to look so outwardly beautiful.

I never really thought of him as beautiful back then, couldn’t think of myself as beautiful. I had too many breakouts, too much emotion at that time during my life when everything felt out of control. Jaeyong was my best friend, the one person who got my jokes, who knew my eighth grade self like we were two sides of the same coin.

And now—if this goes the way I think it is going to go—we’re going to reconnect, a whole decade plus later, and Jaeyong…Jaeyong’s lived his life in a way that I can’t even begin to compare myself to.

Who gets to say that they chased their dreams until the very end, until they became a definite reality?

Not a lot of people, and I just happened to have been friends with one of them.

Still, though, it would be nice to reconnect, to get to know him again, to see if that mirage-like memory that swallowed up my loneliness whenever I thought about him during high school holds a candle to the man he is today, to the person he’s become.

I want to know all about him, I want to know everything—not just what I can deduce and garner through Trickshot’s online content available to fans; I want to be let back into his life to learn everything there is to know about the last twelve or so years of his life.

And yeah, I’m kinda terrified of what I’m going to say to him, but hey, we’ll keep the conversation about him since it’ll be way more interesting than anything I’ve ever done, so we’re guaranteed a good time. We’ll share a coffee, or a meal (that I’ll pay for because that’s the way things go when you reconnect and find each other again), and talk.

Jaeyong waves his hands at everyone, as do the rest of the members, standing up to formally introduce themselves as a group and then individually (as if we wouldn’t recognize them in the middle of a crowded street by their eye shape alone).

They settle back in their seats, and the moderator sets up the question and answer period, a whole line already made up in the aisle between the rows and rows of seats, fans ready to ask their idols questions.

Me? I’m just happy to be here.