Stay with me always, I want you to be the keeper of my dreams—I tried to get myself to that point at least. Jaehee, you’re really leaving me behind. The people who had stifled their laughter at the intro were letting it loose for real when I turned my head away in the middle of the song, thinking that I was acting a part and hamming it up. Then Jaehee came over to me, dragging the train of her dress, and took the microphone. She began singing the rest of the song.

—The only one in my heart, that one precious love . . .

Jaehee could do anything, but she was a terrible singer, and the backing track was for male voices, making her sound even worse. The elegance of the hotel wedding took a nosedive into the black carpeting and my tears went right back inside their ducts, making me marvel at how Jaehee would always be on brand. I sucked in my snot and finished the rest of the song with her, thinking that I was all right with losing to anyone in the world but her, that the Ock Joo-hyun of the day was going to be me. I sang with all my heart.

When I got back to my seat, my cohort was laughing it up and saying, “Who listens to Fin.K.L in this day and age?” “You weren’t really crying just now, were you?” I’m a faggot so I’m going to sing Fin.K.L, I almost said but didn’t. Instead, I chewed my way through the steak that had gone cold. Every­one else at my table had so much stuff to talk about. Who was next to get married, who had just had a baby, who had gotten a promotion, who had switched companies, who had failed to get a job, who had inherited a holiday home from their parents . . . Noisy, boring chatter, so effortlessly generated. That Jaehee’s new apartment was in Songpa, that it had appreciated in value by 300 million won, that Jaehee had met a rich guy and had basically won the lottery . . . I wanted to say it was her parents who bought the apartment, you morons . . . but I didn’t. Why bother? I got up from my seat with the steak half eaten. Saying I was going to the bathroom, I walked out of the hotel.