Eunha stood in the middle of her kitchen and studied the stack of cookie sheets piled one atop the other. Beads of sweat rolled down her neck as she slowly came down from her frenzied productive high. Chest heaving, her eyes swept past the tower, past the overflowing sink and messy counter, past the mixer, and came to rest on the haphazardly stuffed basket of baking ingredients.

Clean up was going to take hours.

With a sigh, Eunha wiped her face and started to tackle the mess one area at a time, starting with the dishes. She needed to start thinking before she acted; if she had, maybe she wouldn’t be stuck undertaking a massive clean up project on a beautiful Monday morning, one of her rare class-free days.

She blamed Minhyuk for half of it. Realistically, Eunha knew it was her own fault for choosing to take her frustrations out through baking when she lived alone and knew all of it was going to go to waste--but some responsibility lay with her boyfriend too. He was the one she was mad at in the first place. If it weren’t for him, she wouldn’t be facing her end by cookies or kitchen clean up (both of which were absolutely deadly).

Thanks a lot, Minhyuk, she thought, fully acknowledging he was a convenient scapegoat.

Well, there were worse things. Eunha could’ve always been prone to destructive anger, throwing chairs and smashing tvs. It looked cool in the dramas, but violence didn’t sit with her. She barely even raised her voice at people. All things considered, baking her problems away was a good coping mechanism. Comparatively.

Once the kitchen was more-or-less back in order, Eunha pulled out a giant box and began carefully placing the dozens… and dozens… (six dozen, to be exact) of cookies inside. Her plan to get rid of them was to stand outside the building and pass them out to complete strangers because why not. It wasn’t like Eunha was going to eat any, and most of her friends were on diets. The last thing she wanted to do was trash them all. Regardless of whether she’d really wanted to make them or not, she poured blood, sweat, and tears into them.

Besides, who said no to free food?

Lots of people said no to free food.

Eunha wondered if it had something to do with the fact that she was wearing a sweater with a skull and crossbones on it, à la the universal symbol for poison. Or maybe it was just awkward to begin with; a petite woman offering free homemade chocolate chip cookies on the daily commute to work or school was not your typical sight. At best, people gave her a polite smile while passing by, and at worst, they glared and muttered under their breath about “useless people” taking up space (which was ridiculous in itself since Eunha was at the very edge of the pavement, geez).

Only one person stopped to grab a cookie: an elderly man who gave her a bright smile and his heartfelt thanks before walking away, happily munching on his spoils. Considering that, maybe it wasn’t a complete waste for however long she’d been here. Fifteen minutes? Half an hour? Balancing the box with one hand while pulling her phone out to check the time with the other, Eunha almost dropped both when a voice interrupted her concentration.

“What are you doing?”

Standing in front of her looking perplexed was a tall, tall guy wearing a high school uniform. His hands were shoved in his pockets as he peered down at her and her offerings, a crease forming between his eyebrows.

“Handing out cookies,” Eunha answered simply. “What are you doing?” Shouldn’t he have been in class by now? She’d graduated from high school over two years ago, but she was pretty sure most of them started soon.

“I--I was--” he broke off, oddly flustered. “I just wanted to see…” Scratching his cheek, he changed tack. “But why?”

“Huh?”

“Why are you handing out cookies?” he asked, sounding exasperated.

“Oh.” Right, she expected someone to ask this question a lot earlier. It spilled out of her in a breathless rush. “I angry-baked too much and ended up with a lot more of them than I can finish by myself and I didn’t want them to go to waste. I know what you’re thinking: why didn’t I just give them to friends? But they probably wouldn’t eat it and this sounded like a good idea in theory.”

His lips twitched. “I didn't think that.” Before Eunha could respond, he reached out and grabbed one of the cookies. Taking a bite, his eyes widened and he nodded. “It’s pretty good; how come you have so many left?”

“Thank you,” she said automatically, beaming as he finished it off and stuffed another into his mouth. “I don’t know either! Maybe people are intimidated?”

Eunha thought he mumbled something like, “Not possible,” but his voice was too low for her to hear, and he was suddenly avoiding looking at her face. Her smile faded into a confused frown as he cleared his throat. “You know,” he began slowly. “If you really want to get rid of all that stuff, I’ll take it.”

“All of it?”

“All,” he confirmed. “High school kids love food.”

That was certainly true. With a wide grin, Eunha passed the box into his arms. “Thank you, thank you so much! You’re the best, um…”

“Mingyu.” His cheeks were a little pink. “My name’s Mingyu.”

“Mingyu! Thank you,” she repeated. “I’m Eunha, by the way. Really, thank you for this.” Truthfully, she was getting a little tired of standing out here by herself, so this was the perfect solution to all (most) of her problems.

“No problem.” He smiled down at her, and Euna was surprised by how refreshingly sincere and cute it was. Mingyu was kind of a giant tree, but he reminded her of her younger brother. “I need to go… but--” he looked like he was going to say something else, then shut his mouth and shook his head. Giving her a hesitant wave, Mingyu tucked the box under his arm and turned around.

Eunha waved back until he was out of sight.

The next day, she found Mingyu waiting outside her building where she’d met him earlier. The box she’d given him--now empty--was in his hands as he stood in place, shifting from foot to foot nervously. Eunha didn’t need to wonder why he was there; it was obvious he wanted to return her container, but it was a bit strange to see him again. “Mingyu?”

“Eunha.” A look of relief spread across his face when he spotted her and jogged over. “I wanted to give this back. My class really liked the cookies too, so…” he trailed off, clearly embarrassed. “I ate like, half of them on my own though.” He smiled sheepishly, making him seem younger than he looked, and Eunha was possessed with the sudden urge to pinch his round cheeks. To distract herself, she took the box from him and smiled.

“I’m glad people liked them!” A thought struck her and Eunha narrowed her eyes. “Just to be sure, no one… dropped dead or anything, right? Everyone survived the cookies?”

“One girl passed out,” he answered with a straight face. “She had to get her stomach pumped.”

“WHAT--” Mingyu cracked up. “That’s not funny,” Eunha pouted. For a moment there, she was worried. She wasn’t a professional by any means, but she could hold her own when it came to baking. Cooking was a different story; a chef Eunha was not, and her attempted dishes were toxic. “Don’t tease your elders.”

“You’re not