Hae’s POV 

I watched as Hyukjae headed towards the stage, coming to a halt in front of the podium. 

I can’t believe I was acting like that before. I don’t know what came over me. I know I’m a shy person to begin with, but when he was here standing so close to me, I felt myself get all weird. Whenever I felt his eyes on me, I couldn’t stop the embarrassing blush on my face, and I felt my palms get sweaty. Maybe it was because he looked so intimidating and didn’t speak as friendly as Minnie hyung did. 

But still. Ugh! I must have looked stupid and it’s embarrassing to think that he saw me like that. 

Right now I was focused on the speech he was giving, not really listening to what he was saying, but instead, noticing how the angles in his face stood out more under the bright lights and how he was speaking comfortably and with ease. 

His eyes were scanning the crowd as his speech continued, and at one point, his gaze landed on mine. I couldn’t help but quickly look away, averting my eyes to the left, turning instead to see what Sungmin hyung was doing. 

He was inspecting his pinky finger, clearly not listening to his friend’s speech, either. He felt me looking his way and exaggerated a ‘bored to death’ look and I let out a silent laugh. This is why I found it more comfortable to be around Sungmin hyung than Hyukjae. He’s just more easy to talk to, like Kyu. 

Minnie hyung scooted a little closer to me so that our arms were touching.     

“So how old are you exactly? If I had to take a guess, I would say ten, but I think I might be a bit off,” he whispered quietly, followed by a soft chuckle, seeing as how the entire hall was silent except for Hyukjae’s booming voice over the microphone.

I scrunched up my nose at his joking manner and whisper back. “I’m eighteen, hyung. I’m going to start college in a couple of months.”

“Ah, I see,” he nodded his head in understanding. “So what do you plan on studying?” 

I shrugged. “I haven’t really thought about that yet but I’m guessing it’s supposed to be business or finance or something along those lines.”

This time hyung scrunched up his nose. “That stuff is way too boring for me. I was actually an accounting major at first but that class almost got me to drop out of school. I ended up getting a degree in art history.”

“Art history?” That’s actually really shocking to hear. I thought all people in the business industry had to get some kind of business degree. “How did you end up working for such a big company then?” I asked, genuinely curious. 

“I guess I’m just good with organization and keeping track of things. That’s really all my job requires me to do. And having your best friend as the CEO doesn’t hurt your chances at all,” he wiggled his eyebrows. 

“But wait… if you’re only eighteen, what were you doing at a bar?” He looked a little skeptical. 

“O-oh. It’s not what you think. I wasn’t doing anything bad— I was just waiting for my friend. He was working there and I was going to spend the night over at his place.” I was careful to leave out the fact that I had actually been kicked out that night. 

“Ahhhh. Ok.” He slapped my arm lightly. “I don’t even know why I considered such a thing from you. You’re just too innocent looking. But who’s this friend you have handling alcohol, huh? Is he someone special?” 

He question sounded very suggestive but I didn’t catch it at first, replying very casually, “Well, yeah, he is,” finishing off with a smile. 

Min hyung’s eyebrows disappeared past his hairline. “I thought you said you didn’t swing that way?”

Swing that way? I titled my head in confusion. “I don’t understand what you’re saying…”

“I thought you said you weren’t into guys.”

“…Oh you think— n-no, that’s not what I mean. H-he’s just a friend. My best friend.” 

Hyung let out a sigh and shook his head. “I really need get my mind out of the gutter,” he muttered to himself, palming at his face. 

Just then, the entire room erupted in a loud applause, signaling that the speech was over. My attention was drawn back up to the front, seeing Hyukjae stepped off to the side to make way for Umma to take over. He stayed up on stage as she began her speech, which was much shorter so that Sungmin hyung and I managed to keep quiet until it seemed that all of the public addresses were done. 

Everyone started to disperse back into their little conversation groups and the loud chatter once again started. 

Min hyung grabbed me by the wrist and tugged me in the direction of one of the food tables. “Looks like it’s just you and me now,” he said looking off somewhere behind me as he pulled me along. I turned back to catch a glimpse of Hyukjae talking with Umma and a group of other people. “He’s stuck there for the rest of the night. No chance in rescuing him now.”

We ended up spending the rest of the time sampling the food and talking about ourselves. I had learned a lot about Min hyung. He hates fishing and golf, likes cheese except when on pizza, will punch you in the face is you tell him a lame joke, and he absolutely loves American movies and sitcoms but can’t stand soap operas, which is weird because he mentioned that he likes Korean dramas. I didn’t really talk much about myself except for stuff he asked about.

Around eleven o’clock, Min hyung had just started talking about this time when he went hiking and got lost and almost got eaten by a wild squirrel when I saw Umma approaching us with some other people around her. 

Sungmin hyung noticed her and stopped talking. 

“Donghae, sweetie, why don’t you head off to bed now? I don’t want you to get too bored staying down here,” she said with a smile on her face, placing her hand on my arm. 

“Alright, Umma,” I said and she nodded her head before leaving with her followers. 

I turned back to face hyung who was looking kind of surprised and shocked. “Umma?” he questioned. 

“Um, yeah. She’s my mom.” I thought everyone knew that already. 

He still looked a little stunned by managed to get himself to get. “Sorry. That was just unexpected. So I guess you’re leaving now. Awww. It’s going to be so boring without you now,” he pouted. 

“If you want, I can stay,” I offered. 

“Oh god no. Don’t suffer because of me. Go on and save yourself,” he said quite dramatically and I laughed at his antics. “And, now that I know exactly who you are, I expect we’ll run into each other soon.”

I nodded enthusiastically and we said our goodbyes before I started making my way out of the ballroom. As I was weaving past people, I tried looking around for Hyukjae, but it didn’t really work out because I was much shorter than everyone else in the room so I just gave up. I slipped out of the grand ballroom and made my way to the end of the corridor and followed up the stairs to my room. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hyuk’s POV 

After making a petty excuse about being tired, I managed to escape, finding Sungmin by himself hovering around the dessert table, snatching bite sized snacks every so often, tapping away furiously at his phone. When I came up next to him and glanced at the screen, I had to shake my head a little. Only he would be playing flappy bird at such a business party. I bet he does the same thing during meetings. 

I poked a finger at his screen messing up his game. 

“Hey! I was just about to make a high score,” he punched me in the arm but I moved out of the way in time. He tends to punch really hard when he’s angry. 

“Well, you can either stay here and spend another hour playing a game, or you can come with me and I’ll take you home where you’ll be able to play in a much more comfortable environment,” I said. 

“Oh, thank goodness.” He grabbed my hand and pulled me hastily towards the ballroom exit, not stopping until we were outside in the cold night air. “Hurry up and tell the guy which car. I wanna go home~” he whined. 

I rolled my eyes but told the valet parking guy which of the fancy cars was mine. 

We waited around whiles he headed off in search of the white Bentley. 

“So what happened to the kid?” I just realized that he hadn’t been with Min when I found him. 

“His mom told him that he had to go to bed,” he said, standing on his tippy toes trying to keep track of the valet guy. 

“Huh?”

“Yeah. Oh and he’s actually her son.”

“Who’s son? You’re leaving out crucial details here.”

He stood properly and turned to me. “Hae’s mom is Mrs. Lee, the CEO. I never would’ve guessed.”

Well, I didn’t expect that. But I guess now I’ll be seeing him more often. 

Hello readers :) 

to anyone who’s getting bored of the pace, the next chapter is when things really start to happen between hyuk and hae. hope you’re liking it so far. comments are always appreciated ^^