Page 361 of Scarbound

“Our family is here. Our work is here. Our lives are here.”

Then he looked at Duri.

Duri was already looking at him.

“And so is everything we want to come back to.”

Ji-Woo studied the invitation. “Wait. Am I best man?”

“No.”

His face fell. Noeul managed to keep a straight face for approximately two seconds.

“Of course you are, idiot.”

Ji-Woo threw himself across the table and hugged him. Noeul laughed, nearly knocking over his glass.

Around them, their parents were already discussing flights, clothes, hotels, and everything else Noeul had deliberately avoided organizing himself.

He leaned toward Duri. “We may have made a mistake.”

“Definitely.”

“Your mother is planning our entire wedding.”

“I heard that,” Yujin called.

Noeul immediately straightened. “I said you’re doing an excellent job, Yujin eomma.”

Duri laughed.

Noeul turned toward him. For a moment, everything else faded. He reached across the small distance between them and kissed him.

Not caring who watched.

Not caring who understood.

When they separated, Duri rested his forehead against his.

“Happy?” he whispered.

Noeul looked around the table once more. At his family. At Ji-Woo laughing. At Yujin arguing with his mother about wedding flowers. At his father pouring another glass of soju.

And finally, at the man beside him.

“Saranghae, jagi,” he whispered.

Duri smiled.

“Saranghae.”

Noeul intertwined their fingers beneath the table. And as laughter filled the table around him, Noeul understood something that had taken him years to learn.

Some scars are not meant to fade.

But we are not our scars.