“Darn! I’m running late” Chanyeol cursed inwardly right after seeing his watch.

It's already 8 a.m. and his bus literally was fixed on its position, motionless. He still stuck in the same scenery he had seen for the past five minutes, watching on the same trees, the same shops, the same trash can—really frustrating.  The pedestrians walking freely beside him even looked like mocki him.

Seoul was never a kind city for those who slow. Either waking up early or stuck on street in rush hour where nothing you could do but sat down helplessly with car horn wildly whistled right into ears. Traffic jam had never been that worse before; and there’s nothing Chanyeol regretted the most that day than overslept.

 “Oh time please stop” He shouted in mind after glancing his watch for the umpteenth times. The time had passed for more five minutes, but his bus had only shifted five meters forward. He was beginning to finger-drum his knees and tapping his feet like they usually did whenever he got impatient.

Like the others, Chanyeol was busy. He was always busy.

His cell phone went off many times this morning, yet he didn’t pick it up even once. Chanyeol couldn’t tell since when he had considered a phone call as a distraction, but one thing he knew: he hated to be disturbed while composing a song. After all, he had already known who the caller was.

Kris Wu.

Who else? Chanyeol had no girlfriend. No girls wanted a poor boy like him to be their boyfriend. Chanyeol had a sweet smile and a pair of beauty eyes though, but girls in a big city would prefer man with thick wallet to handsome boy indeed. So no, definitely it wasn’t a girl. If his cellphone rang, it would be only Kris; because his boss would call him at least ten times a day just for asking the same question:

Are you done with the song?

Annoying.

Chanyeol was a composer. An amateur composer for now, but he never stopped dreaming to be a professional someday. He was born with a pair of decent ears along with a fine music sense, and Kris—his Chinese boss or band director which Kris preferred to be called with—somehow noticed his talent by the first time they met.

They’re in the same age; still in the middle of twenty, yet something named wealth brought them into different fortune. Chanyeol might call himself a composer all the way he wanted, but in the end—Kris was the boss and Chanyeol was nothing more than Kris’ worker. He had to write a new arrangement for Kris’ band every week if he still wanted to have proper meal three times a day. That’s what Chanyeol was doing for living; he composed a song not because he was inspired whatsoever, but for sum of money.

Chanyeol found it pitiful sometimes, but what else he could do when he had no diploma for find a better job? Fortunately, he had a great passion of music for real, otherwise to work with Kris would be so torturing.

Chanyeol loved percussion, and to be a professional composer and percussion player was his desire for a long time.

He loved when its every beat ran through his vein, slowly moving his feet to tap on the floor. He loved how the cadence of pounding bass drum pulsed along with his every heartbeat. Every he made on his snare drum lived his life to the fullest, which he could feel the freedom bursting out of his soul whenever his ears throbbed by the deafening beat.

To him, percussion was more than a profession.

It’s his life, his passion.

Chanyeol was back to his sense when he felt his pocket vibrating as if it raged wildly to be picked up. He didn't bother to check out the caller ID. After gliding his thumb over the screen phone, he answered the phone call.

“Hello, Chanyeol’s speaking” He flatly said. His voice sounded monotone almost like a robot.

“I know it’s you silly!! You are avoiding me, aren’t you? Why you didn’t answer my call, huh? Where are you right now?”

Chanyeol cringed at the words as Kris’ angry face flashed elusively at his sight. He had learned his lesson that it’s such a waste to get involved in argument with Kris. Chanyeol knew that he couldn’t going make it in time and Kris was a pure devil when it came to discipline.

“Listen, I want the battery get their new warming up done by this noon, so we can have a full band after lunch.”

Chanyeol reflexively looked at his watch again. It’s already 8.30 a.m., which meant he only had three hours to make it. He silently calculated the remaining time in his head, making an imaginary time schedule in his brain.

“No—no wait, Kris! I can’t manage that. My sections even haven’t seen the music score yet.” He barked his cell phone in panic, attracting attention of the other passengers. The music score they’re talking about were still in his sling bag as he had just finished making it up this morning.

“Oh yes, you can! The horn line have finished their part on time, so why you can’t?” Chanyeol could hear the other man across the line stated arrogantly. He cursed under his breath at his unfortunate of not having any assistant, while Kris had Joonmyun to get half of his work done. 

“Get your here immediately, okay? See you” Kris cut the line off, leaving Chanyeol on the other line hearing the calling tone.

Not long after he kept the cellphone in his pocket, an old woman sitting next to him told him that there was a car accident at the traffic light. Chanyeol regretted that he didn’t know the traffic situation earlier; he had been waiting uselessly for more than 15 minutes and waiting was such a waste for him. The bus could have stuck forever there, but his time kept ticking. So, after making a consoling nod, he confidently pulled his jacket’s zipper up, got his hoodie covering up his auburn hair, and got down from the bus at the nearest bus stop. He preferred to take a long run in late of October, ignoring the cold.

That was Chanyeol; a boy with a limited time, who was imprisoned in a busy world.

***

“Time should be the same to everyone, shouldn’t it?” That was the very same question Kai had been thinking over for the past two years.

He was alone in the library, sitting down on the corner of the room, hiding himself behind a large book-shelf. He was not there for the books, obviously.

Take a nap.

That's all he wanted for lunch time replacement. He loved its comfort; so calm, so quiet, and peaceful. Library was the place where his eyelids could grow heavy the fastest out of all places he had ever been sleeping at.

With hands folded up in not a comfy way over the table and put his cheek laying over it, Kai threw his gaze over the window. He was staring at his own shadow, watching the reflection of a pair of his dark orbs looking back at him and a transparent face reflection on the window glass combines with a soccer field as a background.

Looking at the soccer field through the library window somehow had been his habit; he couldn’t tell the reason why, but he found it amusing. It’s nothing like he could see something though; what he was staring at was literally an empty soccer field. No one was there. The frosty autumn breeze might be the reason why there was no one there; only two or three were passing it by for taking a short cut.

The only thing that made him stayed there for a good one hour was the falling leaves which stained the edge of the soccer field to be colorful. Brown, orange, red, and yellow.  Kai liked to see it. Each color was bright, contrast, and bold. They’re different but somehow perfect together. They’re different to complete each other. Kai blinked slowly as he took a deep breath at the sight. No one could understand how he missed someone to make him felt complete.

Kai let out a yawn, not knowing whether it was because of that soundless noon or his sluggish life. Not even five minutes, he had already felt light-headed, unable holding back the urge not to close his eyes.

It’s not like he was a sleepyhead. Kai was only an unusual boy who was living in a whole different world where the time moved slowly; at least he believed so. One hour of napping in the library was the only moment when his time ran in a normal rate. Only in that kind of moment, he could feel the time goes by in the right speed. So even though it meant he had to watch an empty soccer field for an hour, Kai will enjoy it as much as he could before his low speed time came back.

“Time should be the same to everyone, shouldn’t it?” He asked again to no one.

Everyone had been given the same 24 hours every single day to be spent; Kai knew it. Everyone had the same amount of chances every day to be seized; Kai believed it. But for him, one day was longer than 24 hours. Even every single minute seemed to pass by in low velocity to him.

People say that time should not be regarded just as a word. Once people regarded it as a word, like something ordinary that people could get it free anytime, time would flow slowly.

Maybe that’s the reason why; Kai was not grateful for all of his good times.

Kai had everything that the other boys at his age only could be dreaming of: a bright brain and perfect body proportion. In young age, he had passed the qualification to be a national soccer player.  He was a model for magazines and television advertisements as well. Compliments and praises had been showering him since then. Unfortunately, wealth and fame had nothing to do with him, but spoiled his personality. He just took it for granted. He had never really remembered on how exactly he got all of those achievements. Without noticing, he had already been in present time with all of such fortunes before his eyes.

It was him, the one who let out his own time losing control.

Peoples say that human couldn’t control the time. They believed it, but Kai didn’t. Albeit the time’s moving forward and never to the opposite, Kai believed that human could control the present time. Time management was the key. That’s why he had a personal manager. Kai was not a kind of well-organized person; he would rather make his personal manager to arrange his tight schedules instead.

So what in the world that made his time running slow if rotten time management was not the answer?

It’s Boredom.

Boredom might be the second greatest power to control time after time management, but it's way more effortless. It's nearly 100% true as whenever people was trapped in a very unexciting moment, they had just entered a different zone where the time passed by slower than normal, and they would wish for the time running faster. It seemsed like Kai had a free ticket to go to that different zone stuck on his life. He would do anything to get rid over it if it’s possible. Sadly, it’s nearly impossible to him.

Kai buried his face on his arm, facing the wooden table.

“Has anybody ever felt the same? Has been trapped in the inconsistent time?” He contemplated, before finally dropping his eyelids down, sealing his eyes from lethargy.