You had been pissed. Beyond annoyed. It was finally Friday and you had had an extremely stressful week and were exhausted, mentally and physically. The first reason you were in such a foul mood was because of work that day. Your department at work had gotten into a bit of trouble, a series of forms that were supposed to have been filled out and handed in ASAP had somehow gotten lost in the office and no one was aware that they had even existed. You weren’t the head of your department (thank goodness), but you were high up enough in it to be privileged to attend the meeting in which everyone got such a tough scolding that some people even cried. After the meeting your department had been given new forms to fill out and they had been completed within two hours. With that done you had gone back to your apartment. Your very messy apartment.

This was the second reason why you had been upset. Your boyfriend, the ever reliable Leo, had said he would clean his messes up in the kitchen and do the laundry. You can stand a bit of mess anywhere in the apartment, except for the kitchen. Leo had gotten so used to Hongbin cleaning up after everything that when he visited you he often didn’t clean up after himself. Since he had become a semi-permanent resident, your apartment had gotten progressively messier.

When you had gotten home from work yesterday  you had expected the kitchen to be clean and at least a bit of the laundry to be done. You were sadly mistaken. The kitchen was still in disarray and he had only washed a few of his cardigans and jackets. Nothing of yours. You were down to two pairs of underwear and one pair of socks for goodness sake (it had been a really busy few weeks). You had finally snapped when you saw him eating a snack on the couch, getting crumbs everywhere while watching tv.

You had tried to start the conversation off civilly, asking him why he hadn’t done what he said he would do. He didn’t even look up at you, just shrugged and kept on watching the tv. You raised your voice, he raised his. It soon got into an over-heated argument about who cared more, about what, you still weren’t sure. All you knew was that it ended with him yelling “FINE!” while walking out and slamming the door, leaving you to clean everything up as you cried. You knew he just needed some time alone, or with the boys, so there wasn’t really any point in going after him.

It was now Saturday morning and you were trying to get ready to go out. You had shoved as much laundry as you could into the washer and had it running, but you needed to get more cleaning supplies. Almost the whole apartment had been cleaned spotless due to you being so wide awake after the fight last night. You were currently in the middle of trying to straighten your hair when the cord knocked over a bottle on your dresser, which led to a domino effect.

Bottles of hair product were spilling and also knocking over your makeup and even a few picture frames even fell off, somehow being sprayed by the mousse?! You quickly turned to the bathroom….but all your towels were currently in the wash. With a heavy sigh you walked over to your bed and grabbed your comforter and placed it on the floor. You then put everything that was on your dresser on the comforter and then grabbed some toilet paper to wipe up the rest of the wet and sticky mess on the dresser.

After finishing your hair you  stripped the rest of your bed and dragged everything to the laundry room. You walked back into your room and put on your last pair of socks and then went out and put your shoes on then sat at the bar side of your kitchen counter. You sat down to make a shopping list, which morphed into a ‘Leo this is why you annoy me’ list. It was similar to Kat’s poem in one of your favourite movies, ‘10 things I hate about you’. You and Leo had watched it together the night you had returned from Japan for your weekly movie night. It got a bit out of hand when you wrote down, ‘too cute for me to function’. Laughing at yourself, you then grabbed your real list and left. You would have to stock up since there was not really much food in the fridge either. Thanks to your wonderful boyfriend you had to buy twice as much Special K and coffee now. You didn’t really mind all that much, you did love him after all.

~~~

As you left your apartment to go shopping, Leo had left the dorm to come back. He had felt pretty bad about how the argument had gotten so blown out of proportion. He also felt horrible for walking out on you. After your first real argument, you had both decided that you would never walk away from a disagreement, but that you should instead try and talk/yell through it. He knew you had had a tough week, but so had he. To be honest, he just didn’t feel like cleaning, didn’t want to. So he didn’t. He also didn’t think you would get as upset as you did.

When he had arrived back at the dorms last night, N had been surprised to see him come in so late. He had asked Leo why he had come back instead of just spending the night at your place. When Leo didn’t respond, just walked straight past him and into his room, N knew something was wrong. He rarely ignored a question if it was about you. One time, he had accidentally answered Hyuk’s rhetorical question of “Will she have her period that week?” when asking about bringing you to an amusement park with him. He answered with a simple “No, it starts the 9^th.” Only after did he realize what he had said, head falling onto the table while his ears turned pink.

N had quietly walked into their shared room and sat down on the bed. Leo was face down on the bed, still wearing his jacket and hat that he had on when he had walked into the dorm. “Hey, do you want to talk about it?” He placed his hand on Leo’s shoulder but he made no noise in response. “Did you and _____ fight?” Still no response.  “You have not yet gained the super power to completely ignore me so turn around and spill it.” Leo flipped over and sat up facing his friend. “While she was at work ______ asked if I could clean up and do some of the laundry.” Not yet seeing the problem N just shrugged and said, “Yeah, and?”

Leo pouted a bit and looked down, “All I did was cook food for myself, wash a few of my clothes and rested while I watched some tv.”  He knew he had been in the wrong, knew that he should have cleaned and did your laundry with his, he was just being spiteful. Last week you had gone on a trip to Japan by yourself. It had been a rare four day weekend for you and instead of spending it with Leo, which he thought you should have, you instead spent it shopping with your best friend in Japan. You had been saving for it and were thrilled that the opportunity had so nicely presented itself.

Leo, however, was annoyed. Annoyed that you weren’t spending those days with him. Annoyed that you wanted to go somewhere like that without him. But he was also annoyed at himself for feeling so jealous of your best friend. Annoyed that he couldn’t take time off and go with you.  So he told all of this to N too and then waited to hear what his opinion was. “I think you should spend the night here, cool off a bit. Think about what she said and what you said. Then tomorrow, you should go back and both of you should apologize to each other. Explain why you acted the way you did.” Leo nodded his head. “You two have been dating for a very long time now, this should be an easy argument to sort through.” Leo thanked N and gave him a hug, then pushed him off of his bed. He went to sleep thinking of how to apologize to you.

It took a bit of coaxing to get him out of his bed this morning. N and Hongbin had made breakfast which consisted of a mixture of random dishes. Hongbin had been trying to learn how to make American food from you and so he always tested everything out on s. He had once told them that they were his personal guinea pigs.  While Ravi pretended to be offended, he didn’t mind not having to cook. So when Leo finally did come out, due to Hyuk hitting him with a pillow, hard, and running away, he was met with a buffet of random food.

Hongbin had tried to make omelets while N stuck to his veggie rice balls and honey chips. While N’s food looked edible, Hongbin’s omelets looked like they had been attacked by the spatula a few times. Leo sat down and tried out Hongbin’s, even though it looked less appetizing, he had already known that N couldn’t cook all that well. He was right. After getting ready, and a pep talk from N, he left to go to your apartment.

He knocked on your door and waited a few minutes. After a while had passed and you had still not come to the door he punched in your key code and let himself in. Taking off his shoes he made his way to your bedroom. He figured that you were either still sleeping or listening to music so loudly that you didn’t hear him knock. What he was met with made him stop short. Your room was empty. Nothing on your bed. Nothing on your dresser. He walked over and opened your closet. Most of his clothes were still there, but only a few of yours were hanging up. He opened your dresser drawers, only one pair of underwear? There weren’t even any towels in the bathroom!

He rushed back out to the living room and saw that everything was extremely clean. He went into the kitchen and saw that it was spotless as well. He opened the fridge and was met with an almost empty fridge. A few left over’s that needed to be thrown out and a semi molding cucumber was all that was in there. What the hell was going on?! He spun around the kitchen once, trying to find anything that could give him a clue as to where you were. He spotted a piece of paper on the counter and walked over.

He couldn’t really read it. His English was improving, but only listening and speaking, he couldn’t read it yet. He saw that Taekwoon was written at the top and figured it must have been a letter that you had left for him. He tried to use a translator app that you had downloaded onto his phone, but it wouldn’t translate it. The only word he could translate by himself was the word “hate”. Now he was in full panic mode. Did you leave? Were you coming back? Where did you go? How long had you been gone? Had you left soon after he did last night? He called you but was sent to your voice mail after awhile. He kept calling you but you didn’t answer. In a panic he called N.

As soon as he picked up Leo started rambling. “Hakyeon I don’t know what to do! It’s so clean and I don’t know why. And I don’t know where everything is and I can’t read English and all I can understand is the word hate and what am I supposed to do?! Tell me what to do.” He started to hyperventilate a bit and felt a bit dizzy so he sat down on the kitchen floor. “You need to breath, take deep breaths, and tell me what you mean.” N waited until Leo’s breathing returned to normal. “Hakyeon, I don’t know where she is, I don’t know where _____ is. Most of her stuff is gone, the apartment is spotless, she won’t answer when I call her. Tell me what to do.”

Try calling her again. If she doesn't answer then you should stay put alright? I'll call her too and see if she picks up for me. Think of all the places she could go. I'm going to call her now."  With that N hung up and called you.

~~~

During your shopping trip you had run into a friend and decided to go and get coffee with her before going back home. You had spent well over an hour in the coffee shop with her. Your phone kept buzzing but you tried to ignore it and continue your conversation.  It had finally stopped and you were happy to have that annoying sound gone. It was probably something important about work, but you were too mentally drained to answer any calls that had anything to deal with your job at the moment.

After a few minutes of talking your phone started to vibrate again and you scrunched up your face while your friend laughed. "You better answer your phone, it seems that they are really persistent." You sighed and nodded your head. Reaching over you saw that it was N who was calling you. Knowing you were in trouble for ignoring his calls, because that was most likely who had been blowing up your phone with calls and texts, you figured that the best thing to do was to start off with an apology and then an explanation before you could get a lecture.

 "Hey Hakyeon, sorry about not answering your earlier calls, but I'm with a friend right now so--" “Are you leaving Taekwoon?” Well, that wasn’t what you were expecting to come out of his mouth. “What? No? I…I went grocery shopping? What are you talking about?”

N sighed, but you couldn’t tell if it was from relief of annoyance, "Could you please go back to your apartment? Taekwoon got there and panicked. He said the apartment is practically empty and you haven’t been answering your phone. He’s really worried about you so please hurry back alright?” You nodded your head while making eye contact with your friend, “Alright, I’ll go home right now.” You ended the call and stood up. You looked at your friend again and was about to apologize and excuse yourself when she said, “Go ahead, you better get home, your facial expressions were no joke and you look really worried now. It was fun hanging out. I’ll see you later!” With that, you thanked her, grabbed your bags, and rushed back home.

When you had gotten a seat on the bus you remembered that you should probably tell him you were coming home. The bus you were on was crowded so that took the option of calling him away, so you texted Leo to let him know you were on your way home. All you got in reply was a one word response, “Hurry.” His text made you worry even more.

When your stop came up you quickly grabbed all of your bags and rushed off, accidentally hitting someone in the arm with your laundry detergent. You ran into the apartment building and repeatedly mashed your floors button. Leo would always fuss at you when you did that, saying that it wouldn’t make it go any faster, but you didn’t care, in your mind it helped. You ran into your apartment and put your bags onto the floor as you went. You found Leo sitting on the kitchen floor. The poor guy looked distraught, staring off into space.

You kneeled down next to him and hugged him tightly. It took him a few seconds, but then he turned and latched onto you, puling you down into his lap and burring his face into the crook of your neck. You sighed as you gently rubbed his back for a few minutes, just letting him stay there. You tried to pull away to look at his face but he wouldn’t budge, only hugging you tighter “Taekwoon, out of all the things to break up with you over, not doing the dishes doesn’t exactly make the top ten.” You could feel him turn his head a bit and then felt a, “You’re not funny” against the side of your neck.

After a few more minutes he released his grip somewhat and looked at you. “What did you write? What does this paper say? And why is everything gone?” You brushed his hair off of his face,  he must have cried earlier because his hair was wet and sticking to his cheeks a bit. You explained about how you had knocked everything over and gotten it all dirty and had shoved everything in the laundry room. He then handed you the list turned sappy poem. “Why did you write me a note in English? You know I can’t read it yet.” You smiled as you looked at the crumpled up piece of paper now in your hand. 

“Remember our movie night last week? When the girl stood up and cried in class while reading her poem? Well that’s kind of what this is.” He grabbed it back from you and looked at it like it had suddenly been translated. “You really need to help me with learning languages.” You tried to get off of his lap so you could do more laundry but his arm around your waist kept you from moving. “Taekwoon, Love, I need to do more laundry and put the groceries away.” He hugged you again and kissed your neck. Resting his chin on your shoulder he said, “I’m sorry I was rude. Sorry I made you mad. I was just jealous about Japan still and wanted to get back at you.”

You hadn’t realized that he was still upset about you going on your short trip, and felt bad for not understanding him sooner. “I’m sorry as well, I shouldn’t have blown up at you like I did.” You kissed his cheek and this time when you tried to stand, he let you. He put the groceries away for you while you did another load of laundry. Afterwards you both made the bed together and decided that it was a perfect time to take a well deserved nap.

You woke up a few hours later to an empty bed. You walked out into the small living room and saw piles and piles of clean and folded laundry on the couch and coffee table. Walking into the kitchen you saw Leo cooking something that smelled wonderful. You quietly walked up next to him to see what it was. He had made some kind of stew, you weren’t sure what was in it, but it still smelled wonderful.

Leo looked down at you and smiled. “I figured since I kind of messed things up a bit yesterday, that I should at least cook supper tonight.” You cheered and hugged him. You loved his cooking, whenever you tried to make Korean food, it didn’t always go as planned. Like the time you were cooking tteokbokki and had the heat on too high, causing the sauce to splatter all over the kitchen and the bottom of the pot to burn, or when your sweet red bean paste ended up tasting more like sweet refried beans (you still weren’t sure what went wrong with that one).

You quickly set the small kitchen table and got ready for supper. You were happy that everything was alright between the two of you again. You two had yet to have an argument where a bit of cuddling and food couldn’t fix. He placed both of your plates down on the table and then said, “So, when is your next long holiday? I was thinking we could go on a trip? Maybe to Gwangju or even Busan? I know you have been wanting to visit the south and I thought that it would be fun if we could go together. It’s fine if you are too busy, or don’t want to go.” He always rambled when he was nervous and you found it extremely cute.

You took his hand to calm him down a bit. “Taekwoon, a trip together sounds like fun, I would love to. Lets plan it after supper alright?” He smiled and nodded his head, thinking of the fun trip that was ahead.