Minseok found himself uncharacteristically calm and recharged when he awoke early the next morning.  Instead of his usual groaning and about how horrible it was that they were required to wake up at such and ungodly hour, he shut off his alarm and hopped out of bed, eager and ready for the day.

His enthusiasm was short-lived, however, when he learned what was on their schedule for the day.  They were rushed to a small studio where they were to have a live interview.  Minseok hated these the most – almost more than he hated ice cream (which was a quirk that the others found unforgiveable).  Even more than he hated early morning practices, and decaf coffee.  His understanding of Chinese was still remedial and the awkward pauses while they all waited for their translators to work, and terrified looks of misunderstanding couldn’t be edited out on live broadcasts.

But Minseok stuck it out with a smile, like he always did.  He didn’t like anyone to see the tiredness or nervousness behind his eyes – not even his fellow members.  The rest of the week flew by, though, and soon enough it was Sunday.

Minseok slept in like he usually did, and went through his usual lazy-day ritual of eating cereal and watching morning cartoons with the others.  It wasn’t until the clock neared noon that he decided to finally leave, dressed in his usual jeans and a hoodie.  He double-checked to make sure that his journal and pens were tucked safely inside his leather backpack before heading out.

This time, he knew where he was going and had his destination in mind.  He rode the subway to his new stop and challenged himself to find his destination on his own.  At the jewelry shop, he took a right and kept going until he came to the third noodle shop.  After taking a left, he spotted the telltale bright yellow sign, standing out amongst the thick smog and relative colorless wash of the surrounding buildings.

The café was a bit busier than it was during his last visit, and Minseok blamed it on the gradual warming of spring.  When it came his turn to order, he was pleased to see Meili behind the counter.  Her smile of recognition warmed him greatly.

“Annyeonghaseyo, Minseok-ssi.”  She greeted him in his native language, remembering his name. 

He responded in turn, a happy smile playing at his lips, and placed an order for his usual Americano.  Meili took his money and assured him that she would bring it to him if he would take a seat.  So he grabbed a spot by the window again and began doodling the EXO symbol as he waited.

“Here you are.  Sorry for the wait.”  She set his drink down and paused for just a moment before returning to her perch to help another customer.  He sighed just barely, a little sad to see her go, even though he had no idea what he could have done with her attention.

He sat, sipping his coffee.  It was quite good and, for awhile, he was content to sit and savor the bitterly rich flavor and enjoy the atmosphere without picking up his pen again.  As the clock neared 3, he picked up where he had left off the week before.

I don’t think I’ll ever speak Chinese well.  I don’t want to be a burden to Kris and Luhan.  Beijing is weird and I’ll never lose the weight they want me to and I miss my cat back home.

Weird, disjointed thoughts were crowding his mind, and he hated to be that negative guy – even if no one would read it but him.  So sat quietly for a bit, watching pedestrians pass by his window, reflecting back on his week.

The other day I took the bus with Yixing to a grocery store.  It wasn’t too full, even though it was right around rush hour.  I remember the sun was beginning to set and everything was cast in a golden glow.  We stopped at a corner and a man got on, quickly sitting by a window.  Outside, a woman waited, smiling and waving at him.  She was in a short-sleeved shirt and her inside slippers.  They seem to be talking through the window – he, waving at her to go back inside.  She, tilting her head to the side and telling him not to worry, she would go inside soon.

And I think what they were really trying to say was ‘I love you’.  Yixing didn’t notice – he was too busy zoning out, listening to his iPod.  I don’t think anyone else at all was watching.  But I was.

What I mean to say is, I want someone who will stand out in the cold in just a t-shirt and slippers and tell me that they love me until I disappear off into the distance.

Minseok put his pen down and wondered where that had come from.  Love?  Sure, he had had crushes on girls when he was in school, but since entering the company there was absolutely no time for that.  And, curiously, he had never really had any kind of moving desire to fall in love.  Until then.

He was drawn out of his thoughts by the sound of a chair scraping back against the tile floor.  Looking up, he saw Meili, settling in across from him.  He quickly looked around and noticed that they were the only two left in the café.  Examining the girl again, he saw that she was seemingly ignoring him, back straight and fully engrossed in a book that she had open in front of her.  He smiled to himself when he noticed that her hair, slightly unkempt in the most adorable way, was pulled back and held in a knot on top of her head with an old yellow pencil.  Charming, he thought, that she still used real pencils.

She had turned a few pages in her book before he dared to break the silence.  “Er… sorry.  Have I overstayed my welcome again?”

Her eyes rose from the page, not seeming to be at all surprised by his voice.  “Not at all.”  She looked down at her watch.  “We’ll be closing in ten, but you’re welcome to stay.  It’s just that the customers have all left and I’ve already finished my work… I hope you don’t mind me sitting with you?”

“No!”  He kicked himself, mentally, for having responded so quickly.  He tempered his enthusiasm with a shy smile.  “It’s fine.  I could use the company.”

Meili stuck a tattered receipt inside her book to mark her place.  “You sure write a lot, Minseok-ssi.  Are you a student?”

Minseok considered his answer carefully.  He knew that Meili had not recognized him, or else she wouldn’t have been asking him his business in China.  That was good, he decided.  He didn’t want his fledgling celebrity status to change anything.  “Yes, I’m a student.  I’m studying Chinese, but I’m not very good at it yet.  But the writing is just a hobby.”  It wasn’t a lie – he was learning Chinese.  “What about you?”

“I study literature.”  Her eyes flickered down to the book in front of her.  “I just work here on the weekends.”

“Is that so?  Literature.”  The word rolled off of his tongue.  “Somehow, that seems to suit you.”

She cocked her head to the side and smiled softly.  “Does it?  But you barely know me, yet.”

Her ‘yet’ was quiet and made his heart seize up in his chest for just a moment before returning to it’s normal rhythm.  Yet.  He didn’t know her, yet.  But she wanted him to get to know her in the future. 

“I like writing, too.  What do you write?  Poems, short stories…?”

“Hm… not really that sort of writing.  It’s just-“  He paused, thinking to himself that maybe he could trust her with what he was about to say.  “It’s just that someone once told me that if you need to get something off of your mind, you should write it.  It helps me relax.”

Meili nodded, understanding.  “Sometimes there are things you just can’t say.  But if they stay inside you, they get all…”  Her brow wrinkled in concentration as she considered her words carefully.  “Stuck.  They stick inside you and they hurt you.  I wonder if you know what I mean.”  She looked almost apologetic for letting her thoughts out like that to him, a near complete stranger.

“I do know what you mean, exactly.”  And for the first time since he set foot in Beijing, he thought that there was someone out there, apart from his other five brothers, that understood him.

Meili stood up and stepped around him to flip the café’s sign to ‘close’, and when he turned to look at her, and saw a smile on her lips and a far-away look in her eyes.  He took that as his queue to leave and began packing up his bag.  Expecting to find Meili busying herself cleaning the counters, he was surprised when found her waiting at the door moments later, her bag slung over her shoulder and apron discarded.

“I already finished closing for the night, since it was so slow.”  She explained, seeming to read the question in his mind. 

Minseok nodded and followed her out onto the sidewalk, stopping to wait as she locked the door behind her.  He felt a bit awkward, wondering what he should do now.  He felt compelled to not lose her company so soon, but wasn’t sure what to say to stop that from happening.  “It’s getting dark out.  Can I walk you home?”  He bit his lip, hoping he wouldn’t be too forward.  But he didn’t want to lose her warmth and her smile just yet.

She giggled softly, “Yeah, that would be nice.  I’m just a few blocks over, though.”  She took off towards the direction of his subway stop, and he was secretly grateful that he probably wouldn’t get too lost. 

Meili stopped in front of a noodle shop that he had recognized from his walk there earlier that afternoon.  “I’m just above here, on the third floor.”  He looked up at the brick building and saw what he imagined to be the windows to her flat, on the very stop floor.  It was dingy on the outside, but he couldn’t imagine the inside being anything like the dirty monochrome that the rest of the city seemed to be made of.  For some reason, he thought that this, too, suited her.

“I’ll see you next Sunday, maybe?”  She questioned, keys in hand.

“Next Sunday, definitely.  Take care, Meili-ssi.  And thank you for the conversation.”  He stepped backwards, away from the storefront, waiting to see her safely inside, but stopped, thinking of something.  “Meili-ssi… if it’s all right with you, could we consider ourselves friends and drop the formalities?”

She smiled, showing off the dimple that seemed to only decorate her left cheek.  “Of course.  Goodnight, Minseok-“ She stopped, correcting herself.  “Minseok… oppa.”  And with that, she turned and opened the door to her building, waving goodbye over her shoulders.

He wondered if she was blushing just as bright as he was when he turned to find his way to the subway station.