“Are you wearing cologne?” JaeJoong asked ChangMin suspiciously, sniffing the air once the younger guy passed by him.

ChangMin stopped abruptly, before quickly trying to side step the pastry chef. “Noooo, why would you say that?”

“Don’t play with me Min, I know every smell in my kitchen and that was certainly not my vanilla sticks I smelled before.” JaeJoong set down the bowl of cream and quickly makes his way towards ChangMin, preventing any means of escape by a pointed glare. Like a dog, he takes a sniff at the other man’s neck before jumping back and pointing an accusatory finger at him. “YOU ARE!”

ChangMin groaned. “So what if I did?”

JaeJoong grinned evilly, before bellowing at the top of his lungs. “GUYS! CHANGMINNIE IS WEARING COLOGNE!”

Instantly YunHo and JunSu burst through the door, YooChun trailing behind. ChangMin doesn’t even want to know why his roommate was also there, even though he’s not even a staff of the coffee shop.

“Well well, smelling good Minnie.” YooChun smirked at him, scrutinizing him from head to toe.

YunHo ruffled the younger guy’s hair. “I see you’ve cut your hair a bit. Looks good on you, Min-ah."

JunSu giggled. “I think this is the first time I see your uniform all freshly pressed and ironed, ChangMinnie.”

ChangMin wondered if it’s too late for him to look for another part time job somewhere else because there has to be other work that doesn’t have annoying colleagues like the ones he have now.

Come to think of it, he should look around to find a new roommate slash best friend also.

 

~~~~~~~~~

 

ChangMin stared at the front door nervously. Okay, so there was no guarantee that the girl –a small voice inside his head that sounded suspiciously like YooChun called her the love of his life, but he refused to listen to anything that even remotely sounds like his best friend- will come back again, but he have to hope, right?

“So has she comes yet?”

“YooChun, you asked me the same question just a minute ago.”

“Well, I hope this girl will show up soon; I have to break a date with a pretty chick to be here!”

“Really? You have a date? With a living, breathing real girl or the blow-up kind?”

“……I hate you sometimes, Su.”

“Aww, I love you too, Chun.”

ChangMin wondered whether in the previous lifetime he murdered the king or done some other heinous crimes, to be now cursed with a colleague and a best friend who are now stealing glances at him from behind the supply closet. From his peripheral vision he caught the kitchen’s door swung slightly and knew that YunHo and JaeJoong must be peeking in; no doubt his boss and pastry chef were also spying on him, in case the girl come again.

Yup, he must’ve been a really, really bad person in previous lifetimes and now karma has come to bit him back in the a-

“Hello.”

ChangMin looked up and immediately tripped over nothing at all. He heard the surprised gasps and amused chuckles from his friends and vowed to kill them all later.

“Oh my God, are you okay?”

The pretty, cute, beautiful, gorgeous girl from yesterday rushed quickly to him, kneeling besides him and looking with such obvious concern that ChangMin found himself falling in love all over again.

Hold on. Back up for a second.

Did he just say that?

Since when does he, the logical, reasonable, realist fell in love with a girl he hardly even knew?? Immediately, the small (YooChun’s) voice inside him snorted, ‘since yesterday, you fool’.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

ChangMin was still wide eyes and embarrassed, so he just nodded. After that ‘cheesy wheezy choc rum goo goo’ episode he doesn’t really trust his mouth to speak.

She helped him to his feet and ChangMin realized that she was almost a head shorter than him.

YooChun’s-voice-inside-his-head clapped with glee. ‘She’s even at the perfect height for you to cuddle!’

ChangMin shook his head hard to get rid of the voice. Really, from all the voices in the world it could take, why does his inner thought have to sound like YooChun’s?? He had enough listening to the real thing everyday.

The girl scrunched her nose (and he noted that the small act was just so cute!) in worry. “Really, are you sure you’re okay? That was quite a hard fall you had.”

So much for being valedictorian back in high school; ChangMin couldn’t find a thing to say to this girl. But she was still patiently waiting for his reply, so he racked his brain hard. Oh God, why couldn’t he remember anything?? Suddenly it was as if some external force has taken over his body and forcing his mouth to open and spluttered the words.

“Do you have a band aid?”

“Why? Are you hurt?” She began to look through her bag.

His common sense (or what was left of it) was screaming bloody murder at him to stop talking, but of course ChangMin was too far gone. “Yes, because I scraped my knees falling for you.”

“….what?”

The girl was staring at him, slack-jawed and from somewhere in the back of the room he could hear the (not so) subtle exasperated groans of his friends.  

ChangMin wanted to shut up, to tape his own mouth with duct tape so he won’t make any more embarrassing remarks but it was like his mouth have a mind of his own because the next thing he knew he was already spluttering the next sentences.

“Or perhaps you have a map, instead? Because I keep getting lost in your eyes.”

This time the groans coming from his friends were so loud that the girl even look over ChangMin’s shoulder to see where the noise came from.

ChangMin had never wished so hard to be invisible, not even when he was ten and comics’ superheroes was all the rage.

Suddenly a shrill ring tone was heard and the girl looked through her bag again before pulling out a small phone.

“Hello?.......I’m just buying coffee…right now? But….okay, okay, I’ll go back right away.” She flipped close the phone and offered an apologetic smile. “Sorry, I have to cancel on my coffee, my family are already waiting for me. Bye.”

She waved cheerily and turned around and ChangMin’s heart dropped down to his toes. From the corner of his eyes he saw his friends peeking out from their hiding places, all of them gesturing wildly and pointing to the girl and that somehow kicked his brain to function.

“Wait!”

The girl turned around to face him and ChangMin slapped his hand over his mouth. Did he ask her to wait??

“Yes?”

He gulped down his suddenly Arabian-desert-dry throat. He was now almost 100% sure that JunSu must have turned up the thermostat, because he was sweating buckets! And the fact that the girl was staring at him doesn’t make it any less hotter; in fact, she was making it even more scorching! Why does she have to look at him like that anyway, like she was expecting something? I mean, what could she expect….

Oh yeah, he did ask her to wait.

“Uhm……I just need to ask you a question.”

Small-YooChun’s-voice-inside-his-head congratulate himself on a good start.

Come on, make a conversation! Ask her things about herself, like her name, phone number, address, a date, if she want to be the mother of your babies…..

……...

..........

...........

...........

...........

 

Okay, maybe not the last thing.

“What did you want to ask me about?”

“…uh….Can I take a picture of you so I can show Santa what I want for Christmas?”

His friends didn’t even bother to hide the sounds of facepalms they all did.

The girl blinked. And blinked again.

With every blink, ChangMin could feel his face getting redder and redder, wishing that he could just up and die right away.

A shrill ring tone sounded again, and after checking the phone the girl rolled her eyes. “Sorry, I really have to go.”

Another wave and she was out of the coffee shop before ChangMin could do anything to repair his words.

Not that he had anything to say, of course (really, he will never, ever trust his mouth to speak again) but hey, it’s the thought that counts, right?

He groaned and sank his head down the counter, not caring about his friends who had come out to crowd him.

JunSu whistled. “Wow….”

“That.... " YunHo pointed at the door.

YooChun shook his head. “…..was….”

“Bad!” JaeJoong finished grandly. “Seriously Min, aren’t you supposed to be the smart kid? Because that was just a bundle of fail.”

“Shut up. I hate you guys. I hate myself,” ChangMin mumbled from under his arms.

YunHo raised an eyebrow in question. “Where in the hell did you learn all those horrible pick-up lines, anyway?”

ChangMin looked up and spit fire and brimstone at his roommate. “I got it from a book YooChun gave me last night, saying that it’ll help me win any girl.”

JunSu groaned as YooChun crowed victoriously. “Pay up, Su! Told ya he’ll fall for it!”

The other three dumbfoundedly looked on as JunSu forked up a large sum of money to YooChun.

“Uhm……what’s going on?” JaeJoong asked.

“We made a bet on how much fail ChangMin is going to be, and YooChun bet he’ll use the stupid, corny, lame pick-up lines in the book YooChun gave him. Really Min, even I don’t think you’re going to fall for that one.”

……...

..........

...........

...........

...........

The university will probably revoke his scholarship. Heck, they might even kick him out altogether for murdering a fellow student. But really, ChangMin felt that it was worth it to be able to kill YooChun (before he resurrect him so that he can have the pleasure of killing him all over again) as he leaped over the counter at YooChun with a wild roar, hands already clawed to tear the other man’s throat.      

 

~~~~~~~~

 

ChangMin looked up every time the door’s bell rings, filled with hopeful anxiety. But the girl hasn’t show up at the coffee shop again.

JunSu peeked up from behind the pastry showcase, eyebrows raised in question but one look at ChangMin’s crushed-hope face was enough answer.

YunHo popped his head from the back office. “Still no sign of her?”

“Cheer up, Min,” JaeJoong patted the younger man’s shoulder. “I’m sure she’ll come back again. When was the last time she came here, anyway?”

“A few days ago,” ChangMin mumbled weakly. Well, four days, three hours, twenty seven minutes and twelve seconds, to be exact. But hey, who’s counting right?

YooChun took a bite of the tiramisu on the plate in his hand. “Well, I’d applaud her if she does come back. Because really, those pick-up lines you gave her was enough to turn even me off.”

ChangMin was ready to rip the small fork from the older man’s mouth and stab him in the eye with it.

“Hello.”

ChangMin looked up and almost jump up in joy. He could feel his mouth turning up so high his smile might reach his ears. YooChun snickered loudly while JunSu giggled, before they all quieted down when YunHo coughed discreetly and JaeJoong gave them a warning glare.

“You came back….” ChangMin whispered reverently.

The girl looked more amused than disgusted at his show of lovesickness fool, and ChangMin was grateful for that. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Well….uh…” He couldn’t very well tell her that he’s been counting the seconds until she came, right? “…just that you didn’t show up these last few days.”

“I’ve been out of town to visit relatives.”

“Oh…..”

There was an awkward silence, before YunHo coughed again and JunSu nudged him (not so) softly.

“C-can I get you anything?”

“Um….can I just get a cappuccino to go, please?”

ChangMin did her order with more care than usual, all the while gathering the remaining of his courage. But even until he ring up the bill and handed her the coffee he couldn’t find the words.

“Thanks. Well…..bye.”

The girl hesitated for a second, before giving a wave and disappeared out of the coffee shop. ChangMin looked at the door forlornly, before JaeJoong groaned and walked over to give him a hard smack over his head.

“OUCH! Hyung, what was that for?!?”

“Because you’re being a fool, that’s why! Are you just going to let her walk away??”

Something snapped inside him and before he can stop it he’d already jumped out from behind the counter and ran through the door. Looking left and right, he finally spotted her just at the end of the street. He ran up to her and patted her shoulder.

“Hey.”

The girl turned and looked surprised to see him there. Seeing her reaction he lost his momentary bravado, but fortunately she then smiled and that gave him the courage to go on.

“Look, I know this will sounds strange and weird. And normally I don’t do this, really I don’t. Those pick-up lines I said to you the other day, that really wasn’t me at all. I mean, I said it, so of course it’s me, but I don’t do that normally. The pick-up lines, that is. It’s just that, I really don’t know what to say and I was really nervous, because you make me nervous. And I really want to know you, but I was afraid you’ll think I’m a weirdo, and again, I was nervous, and my stupid roommate gave me that book, the one with pick-up lines, and somehow I just ended up saying it to you. Though I really don’t want to freak you out. Which I’d probably did, more so with me rambling like an idiot right now.”

……...

..........

...........

...........

...........

……….

He did say courage, not wit.

The girl seemed shocked, and with each seconds that passed ChangMin grew more and more desperate. There’s no way she’ll want to know him after this!

And suddenly, amazingly, the girl giggled. The giggles continued, until it blown to full-out laughter. Not the mean, cruel kind of laughter either, but really the joyous one, and ChangMin found himself laughing along with her.

When they’d finally collected their breaths, the girl smiled. “So…..mind running that by me again?”

ChangMin grinned. “I’m ChangMin, and I’d really like to know you better. May I know your name, please?”

A faint rosy blush spread across the girl’s cheeks but there was a twinkle of mischief dancing in her eyes. “What, no more lame pick-up line?”

ChangMin’s grin grew sly, a shot of extra bravery running through his veins. “Well, if you don’t want to give me your name, can I call you mine, instead?”

The blush was now spreading to the girl’s ears and ChangMin would coo at how adorable she is if he wasn’t waiting with bated breath for her answer.

The girl grinned back, a hint of shyness in her eyes as she looked up at him from behind her long lashes. “Well, I guess that depends on how our date will end then.”

 

~~~~~~~~

 

Ten minutes later when ChangMin walked back into the coffee shop, there was a name and phone number scribbled in black marker on the back of his hand. JaeJoong clapped in glee the moment he saw it and YunHo’s smile could rivals ChangMin’s in width, while YooChun and JunSu danced and pranced around the shop.

In other times ChangMin would’ve rolled his eyes at them for being so childish. But he’d let it go today. Because really, he’s just as much a fool as them

A fool in love, that is.