Amazing :')

Gave this a reread, and it's honestly waaay better than I remember. I thought Wan was really playing with fire when he "exaggerated" his friendship with ha-woon; I was so sure it was going to blow up in his face when he inevitably got his memories back, so I kind of skimmed this during my first read because I was bracing myself for the worst. But at the end of the day Wan is an honest person - he might not have told Ha-woon the whole truth (which ended up being a good move that protected ha-woon in the long run - he wouldn't want to impose on Wan and his grandma and likely would've fallen into his brother's hand a lot sooner and with no allies), but Wan was always upfront about Ha-woon's importance to him and I believe ha-woon knew that on a subconscious level, so I think that's why there was no cheesy "how could you lie to me??" moment I think most of us expected there to be xd.

I'm so glad this didn't take a creepy turn that had Wan take advantage of his memory loss. Literally every one of Han's "friends'' and "family" would've done so without question. I'm happy Wan (and even Suh-hoo) were able to become his safe space. I disagree with the opinion that Wan is cowardly and weak-willed. He may give that impression at first glance (and even if he was, wouldn't blame him - boy's been bullied because of his appearance his entire life :(() but if he sees someone in trouble - especially if it's someone he cares about, he doesn't hesitate to help. I also disagree with the opinion that Ha-woon's personality did a 180 after losing his memories. I think that happy/cheery/friendly side of him was always the real him. It's just that he didn't have the memories of the years of his brother's abuse weighing him down that he felt free to be himself. His cold personality was a direct result of his brother's isolation tactics - that was him trying to protect himself and the people he cares about. Ha-woon really frustrated me at first, but once you get a look at his home life, you better understand where it comes from :(

Really loved reading this, totally worth the nightly binge despite having things to do in the morning. My only gripes with this story was 1) the rushed ending (I mean come on, all that suffering, yearning, and angst and the author features like 10 seconds of their happy ending?? I need more! I need ha-woon's path to healing, more fluffy moments between wan and han-woon, the developing friendship trio??? Man.). 2) His brother got off way to fucking easy. 10+ years of sexual and psychological abuse and all the father does is send him to another country for work?? No wonder Ha-woon could never open up to his dad. "Last bit of compassion" my ass. He's a useless sack of shit. Dropping my rating to 9/10 just for that bullshit ass move. Amazing story otherwise.