How Donghyuk and Junhwe met and dated each other.

Design plate assignments, Advance Color Theory reports, Contemporary Art research.

Donghyuk’s been doing that for 3 whole months since the 2nd year of art grad school had started. It’s tiring with the mind and sometimes more difficult than aiming the critical points of a target, but he enjoys doing his studies. Couple that with his weekly practices at the university’s dance club, he feels like he can fully leave his previous lifestyle.

The only annoyance he has so far is the types of people who want to be part of his new life. His former shadow agent persona might have something to do with it; the remnants of his spy aura pulling questionable people to him. Thus, most of the time, the ones who ask him for dates are either bad news or ones who only want temporary relationships focused on .

Donghyuk’s not against the logic of hook-ups but the thing is, he’s looking for someone worthwhile. Someone who could give more meaning to his new life. Someone who could make his heart ache and soar not because of death and the thrill of adrenaline. He had enough of that.

It’s difficult to find someone worthwhile in the field he chose to go into. So many are adhering to questionable social trends and rare are those who’d prefer to go through the traditional path for relationships. More than enough times, he’d been led on to believe he might have a new friend or a potential lover, only to be severely disappointed.

Take for example, this classmate of his who’s currently pestering him in the middle of an extracurricular class activity.

“Why did you suddenly leave last night? I thought we were having a good time.”

The pesky classmate whispers to him, a warning hint on his voice. Some of the drama production staff they’re observing give them curious but annoyed looks, while his other classmates chose to just ignore him in favor of doing their own thing.

Donghyuk suppresses instincts that command him to pull the guy into a choke hold. Instead, he steps away and gives a cold smile.

“A good time” for him would be having meaningful conversation over good food and ending the date with respect and the virtue of patience still intact. Not suggestive talks on his ear, hands crawling up a feel, and certainly not having to chug a drugged drink down the faucet.

“You tried to drug me.” he says and pushes up the center of his reading glasses. “You honestly think a sane person would stay after that?”

The guy gapes, looking shocked that he’s found out. Donghyuk glares at him and turns away, determined not to let the rest of his day be ruined by a prick. The 2 hours given to their class to observe the production set is almost up, and he has to do a mock-up proposal after.

But the guy grabs his wrist and pulls him back, hissing. Donghyuk suppresses his shadow spy instincts again.

“You think it’s wise to accuse a person of something like that? Do you even have proof, you little ?”

“The proof is all in the security cameras.” He starts contemplating whether a quick jab to the guy’s core won’t be suspicious.

“You ing--”

“Excuse me.”

The prick tenses up at the intrusion of another guy. Donghyuk looks up to see a tall one, most probably around his age, with dark hair peeking out under a white snapback, and equally dark eyes underneath thick eyelashes. He’s holding a box full of clipped folders. The tag on his jacket says he’s one of the junior producers.

“What?”

“This is a workplace. Lover’s quarrels aren’t allowed here.”

Donghyuk and the jerk exchanged a glance. Donghyuk could tell that he’s being harassed, but what would the producer do? He’ll most likely just be ignored and will probably be kicked out of the studio. His classmate seems to know it too and is quick to take advantage of it, suddenly wrapping an arm around his shoulder and smiling dopily at him.

“Yeah, sorry. My baby here is just being a bit moody. A bad day and all.”

“Whatever it is, keep it down or go outside.” Junior producer-nim scolds. He adjusts his hold on the box and gives them a final pointed look. “You’re all post-grad students, right? Do what you came here for.”

Donghyuk steps away as soon as the producer is out of sight. His classmate lets go of him and gives him a mocking smirk as if he won, flipping him off and mouthing a curse word at him before walking out of the area.

He frowns and rolls his eyes. That guy just lucked out. Good thing he isn’t with the White Lotus any longer because if he still is, that guy would have already been found half-dead in the outskirts of Busan. Not that Donghyuk’s wishing for it, but sometimes he has the urge to pull out Ezra from within just so he can do something to warn off people like his bastard of a classmate.

Really, such an annoyance. That was the 5th disaster date in a month. At this rate, it may be better to just be alone. He sighs and shakes his head before setting his focus back on the filming, taking down more notes on the props and the styling used.

“You alright now?”

Donghyuk gasps in a breath and looks up, surprised. The junior producer from earlier is there again. He’s still holding the box but now, it’s empty. When did he get there?

A sudden shot of suspicion drives Donghyuk’s mind to think of possibilities but he quickly throws them out. Nope, he’s just been too occupied with his thoughts. It’s not impossible for an ordinary person to catch a former spy off guard.

“Yeah, thanks for asking.” he answers and smiles reassuringly at the producer. “It’s just been a bad day, like my classmate said.”

Junior producer-nim tilts his head and frowns, seemingly considering his answer. Donghyuk tenses up a bit when the other male sets his dark eyes on him, not saying a word for at least 5 seconds.

“Better avoid guys like that. You’d want someone who can make your day better instead.”

“What?”

Donghyuk blinks a couple of times before raising an eyebrow. He expects the other to apologize for assuming or just excuse himself but instead, he shrugs.

“Just saying.” he says, giving out a friendly smirk before leaving him alone.

Donghyuk follows him out with his gaze. Quite an interesting guy, that junior producer. He feels regret for completely ignoring his name on his tag. It was Jun-something. He’s hot too. Like, really hot.

He feels his cheeks go warm but he shakes it off. It’s not like he’ll meet Jun-something again.

***

But he meets Jun-something again, one week later. This time when the dance club asked for sponsorship in shooting vlog-style dance videos. The university forwarded the request to its partner production outfit - which also happen