Page 39 of Hamartia

“California. But I grew up in Denver. Colorado.” I add just in case, “I went to LA for college and never left.”

“What did you study at college?”

“I was a math major,” I say and he nods. Most people laugh when they find that out. He doesn’t. I smile. “I’m good with numbers.”

“But you wanted to be in a rock band instead?”

“I mean, I guess. Music was something I loved but did for fun.” I didn’t want to take it too seriously because ofhim. “It all sort of happened by accident. I used to do open mic’s, you know, like turn up at bars and sing for something to do and the free beer. One night after I played, Crawford and Zeke asked me to jam with them. They needed a lead singer and they liked my voice. It took them months to find out who my dad was.”

Ironic maybe that I’d used his money—the money he left me in his will after he died—to pay for my slot at Chapman, but didn’t use his name to pay for my slot in the Poets.

“Turned out they hated his music as much as I did.” I laugh a little at the memory.

“Your father makes music too?” Jae questions.

“He did. He’s dead now. I guess he was sort of a big deal.”

Not to me because I never met him, but to other people.

“He was in a band called Rapture of Malice. There was a tour bus accident in Switzerland in ‘99…I was a kid. He’d left my mom just after I was born—so I didn’t know him.”

It’s the most I’ve ever spoken about him to anyone but my mom. A few sentences. More than he deserved. Jae’s expression doesn’t change—he doesn’t know the band and so doesn’t know Finn’s name and it makes me happy then that we come from such completely different worlds. That what is common pop culture knowledge here, just isn’t, over there.

“He left you too,” Jae says.

I blink. “Huh?”

“You said he left your mom. But he left you too.”

He’s not being cruel about it; it sounds like the opposite. Like he’s angry with Finn on my behalf. He takes another gulp of the Yamazaki. He drinks whiskey like water. The way rockstars are supposed to, the way I can only dream of. Tequila, I’ve trained myself to handle. Whiskey still burns like a mother fucker on almost every sip.

“Do you get along with your parents?” I ask him. “Are you close?”

Did your father leave you as a kid too, is what I suppose I mean.

I see him swallow, the glow in his eyes fading slightly.

“My relationship with my parents is…complicated.” But then his expression changes. Lightening. “But I’m very close with my brother and sister. They both live in Daejeon, but I visit them when I can. They are so proud of me.” It embarrasses him this, I can see.

“But your parents aren’t? They don’t approve of what you do?”

I know Korea is a conservative country in lots of ways, that their kids are very well educated and that parents there are strict. Maybe they wanted him to be a lawyer or something.

“No, it is not that. Being an idol is a matter pride for them too. They are proud of all that I’ve achieved since I debuted. It is only that my father is very…traditional. The fact I am attracted to men is still…” He searches for the word again, something he does carefully and unhurriedly. “A challenge for him.”

Fuck. “I’m sorry,” I say for some dumb as shit reason.

“It’s okay, Raphael,” he smiles, but there’s sadness in it. “What about you? You are close with your mother?”

“Yeah,” I nod. “We’re close. It was just the two of us for so long, you know. So, she’s my best friend.” I feel my cheeks redden, but Jae only smiles, warmly.

“Then no brothers or sisters?”

I shake my head. “Nah just me. Mom was a single mom for so long—she’s an art teacher in high school—so she just focused on working and raising me, I guess. Two days after I left for college, she met a guy and they’ve been together since.” I laugh. “It’s like she was waiting for me to fly the nest. Ironic since the guy is a pilot…”

I’m rambling now. I have to force myself to stop talking. There’s loads I want to know about him, loads I want to ask, but I don’t want this to feel like an interview. Plus, sitting with him here, both of us half-naked and with the taste of each other in our mouths, feels like something I should savor, because fuck knows if I’ll ever get to have it again.

Fueled by want and a sudden notion that this might all be over when the sun comes up, I lean over and kiss him. Soft at first, before bringing my hand up to hold his head and pull him closer, kiss him deeper. The whiskey tastes sweeter from his tongue and I lap at it as he moans into my mouth.