It was the third day in a row, Luhan was roaming through the streets, eyes on his camera to recapitulate his way to the cozy café (read: to a certain cute barista). He planned on using the photos he shot that day as a guide, but pictures of things like a bird or a few leaves didn’t really help him find the way.

He had actually wanted to memorize the route during the taxi drive, but had soon been lost in thought, so he couldn’t remember it. So much had happened with Luhan on that day, it was like he found the meaning of life.

While he did hardly wake up before 11 a.m. before, he was now walking blindly through the streets for a while already at 9 a.m. While he always had to persuade himself to get out and take a few photos before, he now took hundreds of them while spending all day outside of his sheltered home. While he would meet with Sehun every two days or so before, to not feel so empty anymore, he now hadn’t even thought of the boy for the last days. Instead a certain round cheeked boy with catlike eyes seemed to dominate his mind. Not that Luhan complained.

So he was walking through the streets, searching for the boy or rather the place he met him in. Slowly but surely he was getting desperate. He already wasted two days on this, two days he would have rather spend in Minseok’s company. He should just give up. The probability of accidentally finding the café was almost nonexistent. So why did he try? Simple answer: Because of Minseok. Ever since he met this boy he wanted to be near him. He imagined being with him and astonishingly those thoughts weren’t dirty thought. He rather thought about talking to him, being his friend or even his partner. Holding his hand, kissing him, making him feel loved.

He thought about what the strange man had told him in front of the café. No one had tried to flirt with Minseok in a while. Why? Was something wrong with him? Well Luhan guessed that meant less competition for him. But how could he convince Minseok of himself? Be a little more obvious? But what if he felt repelled by it? Luhan thought he was going to get crazy one day.

But all these considerations didn’t help him, if he didn’t find the café first, so he was back to problem number one.

Frustrated he kicked a tin can in front of him. Couldn’t just everything go right for once in his life? Why couldn’t he find some happiness? Was that too much to ask for?

Tears were threatening to spill from his eyes. Great, now he was also mutating into a crybaby. Perfect. He decided to just let the tears fall. What was the point in holding them back? Being in public didn’t disturb him. There was no one that knew him anyway. Wrong.

“Luhan?”, a tall person in a suit with milky white skin and blonde hair separated from the crowd, appearing in front of the crying boy. “Hey, hey, hey, everything is alright.”, he soothingly told Luhan, pulling him into a hug.

It was Sehun, Luhan noticed, when he slung his arms around the guy, crying onto his shoulder. At the moment he didn’t even care about overstepping the boundaries of their relationship with his actions. It just felt good to have someone comforting him. Never in his dreams would he have thought the emotionally reserved businessman could be that comforting, but he was.

Luhan found himself being dragged into a building and soon found himself in Sehun’s office. He hadn’t even noticed how close he had been to the company of Sehun’s father.

So he sat there in Sehun’s office chair, crying his heart out, while Sehun stood over him, patting his shoulder and whispering sweet word to him, to calm him down.

“What happened?”, he finally asked, when Luhan had almost no tears left.

“I will never see him again”, Luhan said with a thin voice. “Just like that he is out of my life and I can’t find the place, where I met him. “ Luhan was sure that Sehun had no idea, what he was talking about, but he just couldn’t tell him everything.

“Hun-ah!”, Tao came bursting into the room with a big smile on his face, that immediately fell, when he noticed Luhan. “Oh, you again. Can’t you guys just meet outside of working hours…what’s wrong?” He threw a questioning look at Sehun, when he noticed Luhan had been crying.

Sehun shrugged his shoulders. “I think someone died and he wants to go to the place they met in to find peace, but he can’t find it”, he gave his explanation.

“Okay”, Tao sounded a little confused, then he slowly retreated. “I’ll just come again, when he’s gone.”

“Tao wait!”, Luhan shouted when Tao was about to close the door. He jumped out of the chair and looked through his camera. “You know your way around Seoul’s gastronomy, right?”

Tao nodded hesitantly. “Why?”

Luhan finally found the pictures he has been looking for. “Have you ever been at this place?”, he asked showing him the camera with the pictures of the café, he met Minseok in.

“You know, I can’t possibly know every…Hey, I know this place”, Tao exclaimed. Luhan couldn’t help but let his hope rise a little. “Really?”

“Yeah, I’ve been there a few times. It’s called Café of Return. They serve some great cake and coffee and the atmosphere there is just lovely.”

“So you do know where it is?”, Luhan felt himself become excited again. He would finally be able to see Minseok again.

The little bell rung when he walked through the door into the cozy café. Tao’s directions had been great and Luhan remembered to write the down, just in case.

It actually was the café Luhan had visited three days ago, there was the same vintage look, Baekhyun hurrying around to serve the customers, but something essentially was different.

It wasn’t Minseok, who worked at the coffee machine. Instead it was a guy, maybe one or two years younger than Luhan, who looked like the perfect son-in-law.

So it was all for nothing, Luhan thought, where is Minseok? Did he not work here? Have I just imagined him?

“Hey, you”, the new barista motioned for Luhan to get closer. His voice seemed oddly familiar to the Chinese. Of course, he was the guy, that spoke to him in front of the café. He went to the guy, who seemed to have recognized him too. His nametag said his name was Kim Junmyeon.

“You´re the guy, that flirted with Min right”, Luhan nodded his head. “I knew you would come again. I’m Junmyeon by the way. Min’s brother.”

“Nice to meet you”, Luhan bowed politely. “I’m Luhan. Say, where is Minseok? He works here, right?”

“Yes, he does, but we rotate our shifts. He has the afternoon shift today. If you want to see him, you can just sit down and wait a little”

“I can’t I have a photoshoot this afternoon.”

“So you are a model? Well you are extremely handsome.”

“No, I’m actually a photographer”, Luhan was beginning to feel a little awkward. “How about tomorrow? When does he work that day?”

“He has the morning shift. Should I leave him a message?”, Junmyeon showed him a bright smile.

“No, I will just stop by tomorrow”, he started to retreat, but got held back by Junmyeon. “A coffee for the way?”

Luhan just shrugged his shoulders. “Why not.”