HAPPY MY BDAY TO YOU ALL! :D

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‘A real job?’ Donghae asked for the umpteenth time still looking amazed at his roommate, who for some reason showered two times already since he came back from getting his new job. ‘With an actual human being?’

Kyuhyun was smelling his skin and deciding that it had a flowery scent he stopped. ‘I wouldn’t call it human…’ He murmured. His friend looked at him with a raised brow. ‘Never mind. The pay is amazing. And it’s just cleaning, how hard it can be?’ Then his mind went back to the apartment he was in just an hour before and shuddered.

‘Whatever gets you the rent money.’ Finally Donghae shrugged and leaned on his bed with some magazine.

Kyuhyun pursed his lips.

***

He let himself in since he got his own set of keys. The apartment was just as dirty as before, no sign of the owner who was probably holed up in his office. Kyuhyun wasn’t even sure what the man was doing. But that wasn’t important, he was paying. That was what Kyuhyun cared about.

There was a small note and credit card on the coffee table and Kyuhyun noticed it only because everything else got shoved off of it onto the floor. A clean surface was a striking sight in that apartment. He walked up to the table careful not to step onto or into anything. His face scrunched when the carpet made a squishy sound under his foot.

To the cleaning guy,

My agent said I should give you money to buy stuff to clean since I have none here. Just get whatever you need. Along with that vacuum cleaner thing – never bought one.

 I want to eat something later but my agent forbade me from using the kitchen until it’s not growing a biohazard so just order a take out. No Thai. And don’t do my bedroom today.

If you take a taxi to bring all the stuff take a receipt and leave it… somewhere. I’ll get you the money.

S.

Kyuhyun read over the note a few times before grabbing the credit card. He looked around to determine what he should choose in the shop. Did he see white undies on that lamp? Was it a lamp?

Shuddering he decided that he would just buy everything.

***

‘Um, sir?’ Kyuhyun spun around when a shy voice asked from behind him. There was the shop assistant eyeing his cart, which was already half full with nothing but different detergents. ‘Maybe you would like some help?’

Raising his brow Kyuhyun looked with superiority at the small girl.

‘Just give me the strongest stuff. For everything.’ He said and walked away while the girl started to run all around the shop bringing bottles and boxes.

He stood in front of the shelf with plastic bags. He took ten rolls.

Twenty packs of wiping cloths and as much wet wipes for the furniture. He observed his mom cleaning a few times. He knew what he was doing. Probably.

Two mops, a kick vacuum cleaner, endless number of bottles and boxed detergents, glass wipes, and many other things later, he was at the register. He didn’t even want to look at the amount he spent.

***

Kyuhyun scrunched his face at the brownish splotch on the carpeting in the hallway in front of the apartment. He trashed the bags with take out on his way to the store and didn’t notice that they were already leaking, creating quite an artistic design on the floor.

He kicked his way into the apartment and after dropping all the bags he had somehow managed to drag upstairs with a little help from the sympathetic guard, he dug through their contents. He knew he bought something for the stains…

‘A-ha!’ He pulled a huge spray bottle out and quickly went to the hallway. After fighting with the cap for a few seconds he finally managed to turn it and in a moment he sprayed the thing all over the stain. On the bottle it said to leave the thing for about half an hour and scrub. He would prefer to burn the stain out but well. He’ll leave it for an hour.

Already happy about himself he walked into the apartment. His face fell. He didn’t know what was he so happy about. The place was a dumpster.

Sighing (and almost gagging because of the smell – small breaths, small breaths…) he looked around deciding what he should do first. Kitchen was out of question. He needed to prepare himself mentally for that one. First he had to get rid of the trash.

Grabbing the bag with rolls of plastic bags he took one out and tore one bag from it, tucking the rest into the back pocket of his jeans. Once again looking around he was glad he decided to buy rubber gloves.

***

Doing the living room wasn’t that hard. Kyuhyun just swept everything into the trash bags not really looking what it was. If it was lying under endless amount of garbage it couldn’t be anything important, hence it belonged in the trash.

He managed to uncover two tables, a couch, two armchairs and what looked like an alcohol trolley but he couldn’t be sure since it was previously littered with only cans of beer. They left nasty marks on the wood and he scrunched his face at them. There way no was he would be able to get rid of those.

The long and low sideboard which was standing under one of the walls was covered with clothes among all the other rubbish and Kyuhyun decided that he needed his new employer to draw him a list of things he’s supposed to do. Because all he could think of doing with that pile of dirty clothes was throwing them all out. For now he settled on putting them all in a basket. He had to go into bathroom to take it. The smell there was overwhelming and even tying a towel over his nose and mouth didn’t help much. And he had to throw the clothes that were already in it into the bathtub since there was already a pile there.

After five hours of collecting every single thing that was littering the living room, Kyuhyun stood behind the couch and looked around. He was scrunching his face with disgust because even though he got rid of all the trash, took out ten huge bags to the garbage because it was impossible to push them down the trash chute, and collected the clothes the room was still dirty like a pigsty. Sometimes pigsties were cleaner.

Shaking his head, he decided that he needed to do something about the bathroom next because he refused to go behind the dumpster and pee there again. Even if it was more sanitary than his employer’s bathroom.

***

‘Man you stink, shower at least once a week!’ Donghae flinched away from Kyuhyun when he entered the kitchen and came closer to his dongsaeng.

Kyuhyun glared at the man and went back to stirring his instant ramen. He just came back from his work and didn’t think about showering first because the hunger was stronger than the smell. Or at least for him since he probably became already quite immune to the stench.

‘It’s not me, it’s that apartment. The smell seeped into my clothes.’ He finally said and even surprised himself that he didn’t come up with some snarky remark. He was truly tired.

Donghae raised a brow at that but decided that as long it didn’t involve him and FINALLY earned Kyuhyun money for the rent he could ignore the stink. It wasn’t as if his flatmate was a very clean person normally.

***

A vein throbbed on Kyuhyun's forehead when he entered the apartment the next day. On the table which he had cleaned the day before were again dirty clothes mixed with empty boxes in which take out was brought after he ordered it according to what the owner of the flat wrote on the note. And he could swear that there weren’t any brownish spots on the carpet before.

Clenching his jaw he pulled on his robber gloves and began.

***

Turned out that his employer, who he resolved to calling by the name Stinky, read his own note from the day before because right now he had a list in his hands. A list of all the things he was required to do. And the list would be much shorted if the man wrote simply everything on it.

Kyuhyun's nostrils flared as he read: vacuuming, wiping and dusting furniture, washing windows, floors and tiles, scrubbing the shower cabin, toilet and bath, polishing the mirrors, taking care of the kitchen (the only idea that popped into his head was burn it). The list included also doing the laundry, ironing, putting everything into drawers and wardrobes. What’s more he was required to order or prepare food. What he didn’t really expect was that he was supposed to pay the bills and do the errands like buying appliances that stopped working or are old and also sheets, curtains, any kind of covers and decorations if needed.

Lee Sungmin didn’t need a maid. He needed a nanny.

***

By the third day Kyuhyun discovered that there was a hidden room in the bathroom – a laundry room. Probably never used before judging by the amount of dust piled on the washing machine and dryer. But it was a happy discovery because he already started thinking that the Stinky bought a place without any laundry appliances so that he would have an excuse not to wash his clothes.

After two hours of cleaning the small room, he deemed it good enough to start the laundry. At least that was one thing he knew how to do well. Of course he was dumping his dirty clothes on Donghae whenever he could but there was a time when he was living by himself and there was a limit to how many times he could appear for lectures wearing the same dirty t-shirts and jeans without making the security throw him out thinking he’s some hobo.

He stored all the baskets with clothes he already gathered around the house since there was still no place he could let them dry after washing and also he never bought any detergents. Stinky was living in his own filth for such a long time, a few more days wouldn’t make him any difference, Kyuhyun assumed.

He managed to clean the bathroom of all the empty bottles, and some full ones (when he saw the expiration date and almost screamed), papers, things that looked like hair bands and razors. He didn’t even know why Stinky had razors there, that one time he met him the man looked like a cave man. Somehow without all the stuff cluttering it, the bathroom seemed like a much bigger and spacious room, and Kyuhyun imagined how awesome it would be to soak in the huge bath. At least until he peeked into the said bath and saw huge centipede at the bottom of it and ran out, his girly scream muffed by the towel he still needed to have wrapped on his face to be able to be in the bathroom.

After a small mental crisis, rocking back and forth in the hallway outside the apartment for about ten minutes, Kyuhyun repeated aloud the pay he was going to get after only that one month of working and he called Donghae to ask the man if something bad would happen if he used a deodorant and fire trick on the tub.

***

Deciding that he needed to rest his nerves after the centipede accident, Kyuhyun opened the storage doors on the fourth day.

And closed it immediately when something looking like a huge ice- pick fell right beside his foot.

***

The same day Kyuhyun decided that he didn’t have enough clothes to get them all dirty in under a week time and on his way to the trash dropped by a store to buy an apron. There was not much choice and he ended up buying a pink one with frill on the front because it was the only one covering the most. The sales woman was praising him for being a good son and buying things for his mother. He didn’t need to tell her that half an hour later he would be the one wearing it.

***

It was long time since Donghae had stopped questioning his roommate. Kyuhyun was weird, period. But when he saw younger spread out on their sofa watching Perfect housewife show on his laptop instead of playing StarCraft he stopped and stared. And even brought his dongsaeng herbal tea because he was obviously sick. And he didn’t know how to deal with crazy other than brewing a herbal tea.

***

Equipped in his rubber gloves, basket for dirty clothes, plastic bags and wipes for the start Kyuhyun entered Stinky’s bedroom on the fifth day. There was a note on the door to it that the man would be out until late evening and Kyuhyun could go inside and clean the place. Thankfully it wasn’t in the same state as the rest of the house since the man needed to use it and he apparently didn’t want to sleep in a total dumpster. Although the trash was everywhere it wasn’t as overwhelming as in the rest of the house.

Kyuhyun quickly filled four bags with papers, take out boxes, tissues and everything other that was lying around. He stripped the bed and changed the sheets with disgust,] imagining that Stinky probably never changed those. Or he did only as often as his agent told him to since the man obviously had a huge influence on Stinky’s life. He was present in every note his boss was leaving him.

By the end of the day, the room was clean. Truly clean. The wooden floor was mopped and waxed, same as all the furniture. Bed was made and there wasn’t a single stray paper lying around. There weren’t any decorations to adjust in the room so suddenly it seemed very empty and big without all of the things cluttering it. The adjoining bathroom was small thankfully, and since it was used from time to time Kyuhyun managed to more or less make it look good enough to shower in. Well, he wouldn’t, but for Stinky it was probably better than a five star hotel like that.

***

Kyuhyun was standing with take out leaflets in hand wondering what he should do. he was already going out in a moment, Stinky was not yet back and he didn’t know if he should order the dinner for the man or not. Normally he was waiting until the delivery came, knocking on the bedroom door and going out since it turned out pointless to wait for the man. He was obviously a hermit and preferred to be alone.

The moment he was about to just leave it and go home since it was already getting dark and he still needed to finish the assignment for his course he heard a key in the lock. His eyes grew wide and for some reason his heart started to beat rapidly. There was always that thought at the back of his head that he wasn’t alone in the apartment whenever he was cleaning but since he never encountered his boss it was as if he were alone there. The prospect of meeting the man suddenly made him really nervous.

The front door opened and closed a moment after and a few second after a lone figure walked into the room. It was undoubtedly Lee Sungmin. He was wearing crumpled and too big jeans, really worn down sneakers and a hoodie. The hood was on his head, pulled so much that it was covering half of his face and for a moment Kyuhyun wondered if the man even saw him. But he apparently did when he suddenly stopped when his house help jumped off the stool.

They were both silent for a moment before Kyuhyun bowed his head politely. This man was paying him some serious money, he could force himself to be at least a little pleasant. He could always vent on Donghae when he goes back home and that way get his daily dosage of snark.

‘Hello Sungmin-ssi.’ He said slowly hoping not to scare the strange creature that was standing in front of him away.

His boss didn’t reply for a second but then suddenly he moved and pulled the hood off the face and head. Kyuhyun barely stopped himself from backing away. The stubble was even worse than those few days before, hair was in the same state but the face in general didn’t look like of a human being. The eye bags were almost black already and the eyes were so bloodshot it was an easy guess the man didn’t sleep for a long time.

‘Oh.’ Sungmin mumbled looking a little out of it. ‘You’re…’

‘Kyuhyun. Cho Kyuhyun. You hired me five days ago to clean your apartment.’ Kyuhyun hoped that the man remembered.

Sungmin furrowed his brows before shaking his head a little. ‘Yeah, I know. The food doesn’t order itself.’ The man sighed and run a hand through his hair. Thankfully he didn’t notice the disgusted grimace Kyuhyun's face scrunched into at that. ‘I’m tired. You can go now. And I already ate.’ He waved with the same hand at the other and walked to his room.

Still with scrunched face Kyuhyun walked around the spot where Sungmin was standing and moved towards the entrance but got stopped when WHAT?! came from the bedroom. Panic rose in him again, he was very careful when cleaning and double checked everything he was throwing out because he knew that his boss’s workroom was connected to that room. But he didn’t find anything that he deemed important.

Swallowing Kyuhyun walked slowly back towards the bedroom. Sungmin was standing in the doorframe as if rooted to the floor.

‘Something’s wrong? You said I could clean it.’ Kyuhyun kept a safe distance from the stink that was emanating from the other male.

For a moment Sungmin was just standing there before turning around, his red eyes wide and creepy, like the ones on zombies from Kyuhyun's games.

‘No… it’s just…’ His boss stuttered a little searching for the right word.

‘Clean?’ Kyuhyun offered.

The other blinked and looked into the room again. ‘Yes. Clean.’ He took a few steps in. ‘Was it always that big?’ Kyuhyun raised his brow at the question and decided to ignore it. The man was standing now in the middle of his bedroom and was looking around.

‘Okay, so I’ll go…’ Hoping that it was only a his employer was experiencing due to the shock he quickly run to the door and out before the other could talk to him again.

He was hoping he would never have to deal with the man beside exchanging notes.