Changkyun.

            “Yah! Maknae!” A voice called out to him. Changkyun opened his eyes slowly, still drowsy from sleep. He was too lazy to speak, but he had school. He sat up and walked outside, his bed hair sticking up. Kihyun was holding up his blazer, mustard yellow and (most importantly), clean. “Who did this?”

            “Who did what?” He muttered, mussing up his hair.

            “Who cleaned this! Look at how clean this is!” The mother figure snapped. “You know we never have clothes totally clean, and the laundry downstairs is not of much quality, either!”

            “A girl from school.” Walking up to Kihyun, Changkyun snatched the ugly blazer away from his hands. “I need to take a bath.”

            Hoseok, listening to the whole conversation piped in. “Changkyun has friends?”

            Minhyuk snorted from the sofa. Rolling his eyes, the maknae took his uniform from the washroom and went to bathe. Upon finishing, Kihyun called out to him once again.

            “So the girl has a laundry?”

            “I don’t know.”

            “We need to wash our clothes! Look at how dirty these are!” He shoved a few piles of nonquality clothing they had to Changkyun’s face. He pushed them away.

            “Yeah, sure.” Putting a few of their clothes that needed desperate washing in a purple, handheld bag from a department store, he put it next to Changkyun’s school bag to make sure he doesn’t forget.

            A driver drove him to school while the other members had practice. The drive to school was long, but at least he got along with the driver. He was an old man in his late 40’s, but he had a great sense of humor and economy (weirdly enough). He’d talk to the 17-year old about school and his lessons, sometimes printing his projects and reports.

            Upon arriving to the gates of hell (a.k.a School), he grabbed his converse bag (with the laundrybag, of course. He didn’t want to be seen with that, so he stuffed it in his bag forcefully. It bulged like a pregnant woman) and slammed the car door. Girls glanced at him from the sides of their eyes, but idols were common here in the Seoul School of Performing Arts. He walked to his locker and opened the code, 2979. His locker was plain and bare; the only personal thing he had there was a stick of deodorant for sports. He put his bag down and got his things out for the first period; math. He sighed before closing the door with a bang, causing a few people nearby to jump in surprise.

            Fishing his phone out from his pocket, he rethought about sending a text to the ugly girl he bumped to yesterday. Nah, he mentally shrugged, I’ll just find a laundry nearby.

            He recalled the memory.

            Practice had ended half an hour ago at 12:45 and all the members were sound asleep, with one exception. Changkyun was stuck with school, which he had to put up with. His homework was done easily, a record time of 15 minutes. The next one was English, which took 5 minutes. Easy. His essay was stopped midway by a knock at the front foor. His eyebrows shot up, confused. Who the hell wanted to knock on someone’s door at 1 in the morning?

            “Coming!” He shouted after opening the room door and walking to the front one. His hip bumped into the edge of the sofa, releasing curses in every language he knew. His toe got snubbed in the process of relieving his hip, causing him to cry out in pain. Recomposing himself, he walked over to the front door and opened it.

            He saw… nothing. He looked down, and lo and behold, was a neat, brown bag with a blazer. Oh. From the girl who bumped into him before. He had forgotten, but at least he remembered to text the address. An instant scowl adorned his face, reliving the memory. He grabbed the packet and brought it to the washroom. Surprisingly, the cloth was well-washed and clean, ironed crisp and folded with precision.

            So the girl had common sense, after all. The group’s clothes were done washing. He moved them to the dryer, where it’d be done by the time he would wake up. Hanging the blazer by the hangars, he shrugged and left the washroom before going to his shared bedroom to continue his homework.

            Without anything important, the school day ended uneventfully. He texted the driver that he would be late and pulled a black mask from his bag before putting it on. He opened Instagram and scrolled down his feed before remembering to check Narikei’s profile for updates. A picture of a rainbow surrounding a white circle and the white background made Changkyun wonder. What the hell was that?

            A washing machine, he realized dumbly. How the hell can a washing machine look so cool? He raged internally. He liked the picture before commenting ‘#mylife’.

            Shaking his head, he continued his walk. Café, department store, clothing store, shoe store, Changkyun read each shop’s sign before finding the laundry store. ‘The laundry store!’. A ding! From his phone made him take it out from his pocket once again to see what notification it was. Once again, Narikei had replied to his comment.

                                    ‘#ikr’

            And that was it. Just a simple hashtag, but it made him feel so giddy and wonderful inside. He couldn’t really respond to that, so he just left it be. Another notification had sounded, and his driver told him to ‘hurry up’. He didn’t look up as he entered the store, and did a double take. The laundry was very small, very cheap and sparsely furnished. He could see a little bit of (was it moss?) on the walls that they tried to cover up, and a faded white table in the middle. He raised his eyebrows at the situation.

            ‘Whatever.’ He rolled his eyes. ‘Better than asking that girl for help.’ Grabbing a laundry basket hesitantly, he put it on the table before opening his bag and taking the clothes out. There was the littlest corridor (or empty space, he’ll say) leading to a place that smelled like food. Right in front of the corridor was a plain brown door. The walls were green, and a staircase occupied the front area. Below it was a cashier table, where a register was placed.

            Footsteps sounded to his right, light and tappy. It came from the pantry (he assumed) before a beautiful woman stopped in front of him. She had a light brown apron on top of her jeans and white shirt. Her big almond eyes widened in surprise on her heart-shaped face. She looked to be 40-ish on closer inspection, but could pass off as a late 20’s woman.

            “Oh! I’m sorry, I must’ve not heard the bell.” Wiping her hands on the apron, she gestured to his laundry basket. “Go on then.”

            Changkyun nodded unsurely, his mouth twisting under his mask. “How much will it be?”

            “₩3,100.” She chirped, walking behind the cashier (Sorry guys, I don’t know how much a Laundromat costs or the value of South Korean Won, so forgive me!). For a Laundromat to be so cheap, the quality shouldn’t be that nice. He grimaced a bit, but the damage had been done. He couldn’t turn back now.

             Packing the clothes to the nearest washing machine, he turned his phone on. He could wait for an hour or two. He wouldn’t be that late to practice, right?

             The bell chimed as a man in sunglasses, a beanie and a cough mask entered. Changkyun felt like he recognized this man, but couldn’t put where.

             “Evening, Sumi!” He waved at her, and she returned the greeting with a slight blush. He had some clothes, but not as much as Changkyun had. He got the feeling this man’s main purpose wasn’t to wash his clothes, but rather to see the woman in front of him.

            His phone let out a ding! again, reminding him of his driver’s text message. That was when the man finally looked at him, and Changkyun gazed at him straight in the eye (well, as much as he could through those sunglasses). His visible brow furrowed a bit before his face lightened up.

             “I.M? Monsta X’s Im Changkyun?” He questioned.

             Changkyun’s face became confused. “Do I know you?”

             He let out a laugh, holding his hand out for him to shake. “Shinhwa’s Lee Minwoo. Pleasure to meet you. You might know me as ‘M’?”

             Relization worked his way to Changkyun’s face, and Minwoo looked like he might burst out laughing at any moment. He instantly bowed in front of his sunbaenim. “Pleasure to meet you too, M-sunbaenim.”

             “Just call me Minwoo.” He dismissed a hand at his greeting. Now it made sense to Changkyun. The ripped body, the beanie, the mask. 

             The woman’s brows furrowed from behind him. “You know this guy, Minwoo-ah?” Ah. They were familiar.

             “He’s from a rookie group called Monsta X, right?” He slung an arm around the younger man. “When did you debut again?” 

             “2015, Minwoo-sunbaenim.” He answered. His shoulder lowered a bit at the weight of the man’s biceps. He worked out too, dammit! Starship didn’t make him have a six-pack for nothing. He raised his shoulders a bit higher.

             “Ah, great, great. How’s Starship for you? What are you promoting right now?” He continued to ask questions, elongating the conversation. Changkyun found himself smiling and laughing a few times, enjoying himself. Sumi herself joined the conversation, though knowing nothing at all about idol life. It was a fun and happy aura.

            Once, he saw something move at the edge of the staircase, like the figure of a girl. Doing a double take with further examination, there was nothing else. He dismissed it as his imagination.