(part 1: 5.8k)

“Aloha dear friends! Did you miss us?"

Upon hearing the voice, Kyungsoo, Suho, Chanyeol and Baekhyun all look up from their drinks to see a grinning Luhan walking toward them with outstretched arms.  Sehun, who is now three times darker than before he left, trails not too far behind, and the both of them are clad in matching tourist tee shirts that they probably picked up at one of the overpriced shops in the airport.

"Luhan, you went to India not Hawaii."

"Ah, how I missed your dry sarcasm. Nice to see you too, Baekhyun."

Luhan grabs a nearby chair and sits down on the end next to Kyungsoo. Sehun glowers when he sees there is no room for him next to his boyfriend of two years, and with a pout, settles in next to Chanyeol who is currently snickering at Sehun's awkward tan lines.

"So how was it?" Kyungsoo finally asks when everyone has situated themselves. He plays with the latte in front of him, stirring it round and round aimlessly with the cute spoon that he usually finds so endearing at this corner side café, buried deep in the small back streets of Seoul. Kyungsoo sounds tired, and the dark circles under his eyes are more prominent against the white of his skin than usual, Luhan notices.

"It was amazing! Sure, some parts, like the balls hot weather and all the poverty, , but the exotic animals and spicy food made up for it."  Luhan explains, smiling fondly as he speaks.

"I wasn't a fan of the spice though." Sehun adds with a frown, sticking his tongue out in disgust.

Chanyeol snorts. “I don’t even get how you can call yourself a Korean.”

Luhan laughs in agreement. "I’m more Korean than he is. Sehun couldn't handle the heat. He went a good two days without eating anything until eventually he caved and we had to make an emergency stop at some rut tut shack on the side of the road and buy some nuts or some , and even those were spicy."

"...you probably don't even know what they fed you. Or what sicknesses you probably have." Kyungsoo says warily, leaning slightly away from Luhan. Luhan latches himself onto Kyungsoo in response, clinging tightly to him and in the process wrinkling Kyungsoo's pressed dress shirt and tie.

Luhan, ignoring Kyungsoo's annoyed 'get off me!'s continues on, "But hands down riding on the elephants was the best part of the entire trip."

Sehun's scowling again, to which Luhan bursts into laughter. "Sehun probably didn't like that part much either. He somehow--honestly I didn't think it was possible--managed to fall ten feet off the elephant and roll five feet into a nearby ditch."

“I still have the bruises on my . And the mud still refuses to come out of that shirt. At least, I hope it’s mud.” Sehun twitches when thinking about his designer shirt (what possessed him to bring his designer clothing to India?) that was now caked with some viscous brown fluid. He doesn't understand how bad things could happen to a person as good as him.

“We also went to a gazillion temples. All that meditation really helped me get in touch with my inner zen.” Luhan continues to gush before he snaps into a makeshift yoga pose. The others roll their eyes at the blonde; only he would try to do yoga in the middle of a café.

“Inner Zen my , you fell asleep every single time. Don’t act like you’re a changed man now that you’ve rode and elephant and prayed a little.” Sehun snorts, and the others aren’t surprised.

"But I am a changed man! I understand the value of soft beds and beauty products and clean tap water; but most importantly beef, god bless beef I never thought I would be so glad to see a steak in my life."  Luhan's starting to drool a little, especially as he momentarily reminisces about the steak he had almost immediately after getting back to Seoul.

"I think Baekhyun needs a trip like that. Maybe then he will learn to value clean water and stop SPENIDING 2 HOURS IN THE SHOWER." Chanyeol accuses suddenly, voice continuing to rise in volume. Obviously the two had been arguing about something before they got there, and of course Chanyeol would choose to continently continue to bicker with Baekhyun when they were very much in public, where everyone could witness it. (Kyungsoo knows they like the attention). As Baekhyun and Chanyeol start to bicker like an old married couple, Sehun leans across the table to show  Luhan something on the menu, probably some kind of beef dish. Suho’s phone suddenly goes off, and he bows sheepishly when he reads the caller id, saying that he will be write back before he answers his phone and makes a beeline for the bathroom

.In the midst of all of this, Kyungsoo quietly sits between all of them, eyes glazed over, and face blank as he goes through a mental list of things he needs to do before he goes home.

"-soo."

Kyungsoo finally snaps out of his daze only to find five pairs of eyes trained on him curiously.

"What?"  He finally straightens up, at full attention. He must have spaced out for a while.

"I asked you how work is going." Luhan frowns.

Kyungsoo's face seems to pale at the mention of work. "Work," he pauses, rubbing at his face tiredly, "work is stressful. Tiring."

"Kyungsoo has a new boss--Kris was his name I think-- who doesn't like him much. He transferred in from another department about a month ago. " Chanyeol, who works in the same department as him, elaborates.

"Weren't you supposed to get a promotion?" Luhan asks with furrowed brows; not less than three months ago Kyungsoo had come gushing to him about how he could feel the promotion he had been working at for more than two years coming. He could almost taste it, almost picture 'Do Kyungsoo Executive Manager' engraved into the gold nameplate of the executive suite on the 23^rd floor.

“Kris obviously didn’t think so.” Chanyeol says lightly, but his face is grim.

Sehun nods in understanding and Luhan reaches over to give Kyungsoo a reassuring pat on the shoulder.

Luhan starts apologetically, “It’s ok Kyungsoo-”

“No, it’s not ok. Let’s just- Let’s not talk about this anymore.” Kyungsoo cuts him off, voice cold and he tries to keep his face passive but there is disappointment in his eyes, and they can all see it.

The table falls into uncomfortable silence. Luhan gulps and he and Sehun exchange a knowing glance.  Unable to withstand the tense atmosphere any longer, Luhan suddenly springs up.

“I have something that will cheer us all up.” Luhan announces with a childish smile and bright eyes.

Kyungsoo no longer looks upset, but he’s definitely not convinced that anything Luhan can do for him will cheer him up.

Luhan reaches down to dig through his bag and the clangs and rustling of things colliding inside as he feels around for the mystery objects are obnoxiously loud. Kyungsoo still looks unconvinced when Luhan finally produces a rather large, lumpy brown bag, setting it down with a sheepish smile, and an excited, “We bought souvenirs!!”

Luhan starts passing out the gifts one by one: a beautifully carved elephant statue for Baekhyun, an ornate necklace for Suho, some flavorful teas for Chanyeol. Luhan saves Kyungsoo’s gift for last. He slides a medium sized square box in Kyungsoo’s direction.

“Go on Kyungsoo, don’t be shy,” Luhan coaxes.

Kyungsoo eyes both the box and Luhan wearily before slowly taking the lid off. Inside, nestled in a nest of fuchsia cloths, lies a golden lamp. The side facing up shines dully, worn by age, but it doesn’t take away from its beauty. Intricate patterns adorn the lid and wrap all around the body of the lamp, some of which appearing to be in a foreign script.  Kyungsoo hesitates, afraid to touch something so fragile looking. He finally, upon Luhan’s continual pestering, picks it up cautiously and studies it. Kyungsoo is surprised when he finds that it weighs more than he had orginally thought, and it’s warm to the touch, as though something had been in it recently. He’s too tired to try and figure it out. It’s a beautiful artifact that was surely even more glorious at some point, but it’s defiantly not suited for a business man’s apartment.

Kyungsoo hopes it will make a somewhat decent make a nice mantle ornament.

“So what do you think?” Luhan asks expectantly.

“It’s really pretty. It’ll look good above my fireplace. Thanks guys.” Kyungsoo replies honestly, though it sounds a little gruff because he tends to get embarrassed easily, especially when thanking others.

Luhan lets out an appalled gasp, loud enough so that other patrons turn to see what the commotion is. Sehun rolls his eyes, and Baekhyun and Chanyeol lean forward, intrigued.

“What, what’s wrong?” Kyungsoo demand, startled at the sudden outburst.

“You were going to do WHAT with the lamp?!” Luhan asks, as if he can’t believe what he had just heard.

“I said I was going to put it above my fireplace?” Kyungsoo replies confusedly, and he relaxes a little in his seat. Luhan is being dramatic again.

“I go to India, bring you back a magical lamp with mystical wish-granting- powers all so you can put it above your damn fireplace? I think not,” Luhan growls, putting both his palms on the table so he can lean forward and glare at Kyungsoo.

Kyungsoo would laugh if he weren’t so busy giving Luhan a judging stare.

“You think that lamp is magical?” Kyungsoo pinches the bridge of his nose. Kyungsoo feels like Luhan comes up with something more ridiculous every time he comes back from vacation, but he has to hand it to him, this one, has been by far, the most creative one yet.

“I tried telling him the guy was a con artist, but he wouldn’t listen to me,” Sehun interjects with a sigh, “Luhan was just another one of the dumb tourists he managed to scam. It’s ok, we love you for your face, not your brains.”

Luhan glares at his boyfriend menacingly. “I will have you know that I was not conned. You just have to trust me Kyungsoo, that this will work. Ok?” Luhan grabs both of Kyungsoo’s hand between his, waiting for him to answer him. When Kyungsoo doesn’t say anything, Luhan squeezes his hands harder. “OK?”

Kyungsoo grumbles in annoyance until he finally mumbles, “Yea ok sure.”

“Good boy! You will be thanking me later.” Luhan reaches over to ruffle Kyungsoo’s hair, but stops midway when Kyungsoo glares daggers at his hand and scoffs.

He has far more pressing matters he should be worrying about, like work.

Oh, and work.

--

The sky is just starting to fade to black when Kyungsoo gets home. What’s left of the sunset floods through the room length windows of his apartment, but it’s not enough so he flips on the lights and sinks down onto the couch. Kyungsoo sighs when he finally loosens the choke hold his tie has on him. His suit feels tighter and tighter with each passing day, and it gets harder and harder to take off every time he puts it on.

 He spends more time in it than out.

 He tosses his tie and jacket on the ground carelessly, uncaring if he it was on the dirty floor; it was already wrinkled and stained from his afternoon at the café.

His apartment is the same as always: moderately clean thanks to cleaning service he uses (the dishes from this morning still sitting by the sink indicate to him that they hadn’t come today), somewhat modern with it’s sweeping rectangular windows, sleek furniture and top of the line appliances, but hardly homey. He’s never at home long enough to actually call it that anyways.

Kyungsoo sits in silence for a few moments, until the beeping from his answering machine grates at his nerves. He walks over the phone to see that he has three missed messages. The first one is from his dry cleaner telling him his suits were ready to be picked up, the second from his cleaning service and the final one is his one from his mother.

“Kyungsoo ah when are you going to come by and congratulate your brother? You know how hard he has been working, and now that’s he finally back from Yale, we should all celebrate as a family. I miss you,” there is a pause in the message, “you might not believe me, but your father misses you too. We all do. Call me back when you can, ok?”

Kyungsoo deletes the message with absolutely no plans on calling back his mother. A small amount of guilt and longing stabs at him—it’s been so long since he’s even thought about talking to his mother or his brother, almost 10 months now—but he pushes it away. He does love his mother, and he certainly loves his brother, but right now is not the best time to talk to them. Not when he feels so far from being good enough.

Kyungsoo doesn’t, however, feel any remorse for ignoring his father.

--

Kyungsoo stands back, observing his fireplace. The gold lamp, though not terribly large or gaudy, stands out greatly against the crème color of his mantle, and he frowns at how out of place it looks there. With a sigh, he picks the lamp up and sets it on the coffee table; a temporary home until he can find somewhere to put the blasted thing. Maybe he could sell it on ebay. No, that would take too much time—time that he doesn’t have.

It’s late, and Kyungsoo should probably sleep but he can’t. He feels restless, like he should be doing something, anything, even if it was almost twelve. It was odd for him to be at home before midnight.

Making himself some Soba had taken half an hour, and showering and changing into something more comfortable had taken another hour. But now he had nothing to do, and that left him with time to think about things. And thinking about things was never a good thing with Kyungsoo.

It’s painfully quiet, and Kyungsoo needs something—anything—to distract himself, so he turns on the T.V to fill the silence.  His hands itch to do something, so he picks up the lamp again, fiddling with it. It’s calming in a way, but it’s not enough. He’s unable to focus on anything that flashes on screen, and he’s stuck with his thoughts again.

It’s times like these that he feels his apartment is just a little too big for just him. It’s also times like these he wishes he didn’t feel so alone—he wishes there was someone waiting for him at home, someone to curl up with at the end of a stressful work day, to share his worries with. His mother had always nagged at him to get a nice girlfriend back when he was still living with at home, going on and on about different girls she could set him up with. Good girls from nice families or more specifically, a girl like his brother’s girlfriend.  Too bad his mom didn’t know that Kyungsoo didn’t like girls like that. Or that he just didn’t like girls in general. But that was another disappointment he was going to save for a different time.

If he was feeling crummy before, thinking about how alone he is makes him feel worse. He feels like crying but he’s cried enough before—there are no tears left for him to cry.

So instead he wishes.

“I wish I wasn’t a failure,” Kyungsoo whispers to himself, because hearing it out loud somehow makes it seem more achievable, and it’s kind of a habit to talk to himself now. It fills the all to consuming silence that surrounds him much too often.

 “I wish I wasn’t alone. I wish…” he clutches the lamp harder unconsciously, “I wish I was happy.”

The air in the room seems to settle for a moment, and even the T.V. seems to fade into the distance, if not for just a minute.

And suddenly the lamp is burning. It is so unbearably hot that Kyungsoo reflexively lets out a loud yelp before dropping it onto the coffee table. He wouldn’t be surprised if he has third degree burns, but he doesn’t have time to worry about his hands because steam is starting to pour out the sides of the lamp, like a kettle that has been on the stove for too long. If the steam wasn’t scary enough, the lamp starts to violently rattle too, enough to shake the whole coffee table, like a bomb just waiting to explode.

Kyungsoo freezes, unsure of what to do; Was the lamp supposed to do that? Was there something inside the lamp?

What had started off as thin white wisps of steam now morphs into thick purple smoke. It’s almost suffocating but it’s enough to finally cause Kyungsoo to get ahold of himself and rush into the kitchen to frantically search for a bowl or container big enough to put out the lamp.

Finally, he manages to grab the biggest cooking pot he owns and turns the faucet on as high it can go, hopping from foot to foot anxiously as he waits for it to fill.

The pot seems to take an eternity to fill, but when it is full enough, Kyungsoo hastily picks it up and waddles back into the living room as quickly as he can without spilling water on his expensive rug.

It’s pointless though, because Kyungsoo drops the pot the moment he gets into the living room anyways.

--

There, in the middle of his apartment, is standing--no, not standing, but floating--a male decorated in a simple silk top and billowy pants, both of which are colored a bright shade of blue and are lined with an equally bright shade of red. The array of gold bangles that occupy both his arms, however, are far more distracting than his handsome face, and Kyungsoo is only able to take in the stranger’s broad features and lean tan figure before he feels lightheaded and has to sit down.

One breath in. One breath out. Kyungsoo thinks he must be more exhausted than he realized. He just needs to rest for a minute, and surely things will go back to normal.  He leans back on the couch slowly, closes his eyes and waits.

“Hey, don’t just ignore me. I know you’re awake.”

Kyungsoo jolts off the couch, eyes flying open and mouth agape. “Y-you. You’re not real! Y-you are a figment of my imagination. Figments are not allowed to talk! Stop talking!” Kyungsoo is panting when he finishes, partly because he hadn’t bothered to breathe before speaking and partly because he was starting to hyperventilate. He had enough mental problems as it is, he didn’t need to add schizophrenic to the list.

“Oh, I’m very real. You can see me can’t you? You’re conversing with me. I’m just as real as you are.” Said figment is smirking and looking very attractive as he does so. At least Kyungsoo can say he has a tasteful imagination.

“No, no, no. I know you aren’t real because there is no way an almost disturbingly attractive male that I have never seen in my twenty four years of life could be floating casually in my living room as if he was just here to talk about the Red Sox.”

The aforementioned only smiles floats a noticeably large step forward, while Kyungsoo simultaneously retreats back.

“S-stop that!!” Kyungsoo stutters nervously. He unconsciously assumes a defense position, with his arms in front of him and his legs poised, ready to run.

“Stop what?” The stranger asks innocently, though the smirk plastered on his stupid face is enough to tell Kyungsoo that he’s anything but.

“Stop that creepy floating thing!”

Creepy floating stranger pouts upon hearing this. “I was born this way. I shouldn’t just change who I am because someone asks me to, should I?”

Kyungsoo is flabbergasted; what is he supposed to say to that? Do morals even apply to hallucinations?

 “Uh. N-no but, it’s weird ok. Just. Maybe you should leave.”

Floating stranger frowns now. “What kind of manners did your mother teach you? First you tell me to change myself, and now you are going to kick me out, without even offering me any food or drink?”

“You know what maybe I’ll just leave then.” Kyungsoo starts moving towards his bedroom.

“Wait-”

“Don’t you dare think about following me. I need a good night’s rest, maybe a day or two off work, possibly some therapy in the future, and I’m sure you will eventually be gone. You better be gone.” Kyungsoo warns shakily. He’s almost to his bedroom when he hears laughter.

From inside his room.

Despite his better judgement, Kyungsoo throws his bedroom door open. Lounging on his bed, is none other than t his creepy floating house guest. Well, at least he wasn’t floating anymore.

“Look I think someone here is in denial. And we both know it ain’t me.”

Kyungsoo bursts into laughter. “Denial of what?”

“Denial of who I am. You know exactly who I am.”

“No, actually, I really don’t.” Kyungsoo glowers at him, because really, he hasn’t the slightest clue who this creeper is. Or how he does that floating thing (ok, he’ll admit it, it’s kinda cool).

Not-so-floating house guest rolls his eyes and sighs deeply before finally replying, “Your friend told you earlier, but you didn’t want to listen.”

“My friend told me- what friend told me-” Kyungsoo trails off, as he recalls Luhan’s ridiculous words from the day before.

Maybe they weren't so ridiculous after all.

--

“So, I will say this one more time. Slowly, so you it can finally sink into that simple head of yours. Me genie. You make three wishes. Genie grant wishes. The end.”

Kyungsoo frowns at his unwelcome house guest’s tone; what, did he think he was dense or something?

“Alright. You expect me to believe that you came out of that there lamp, and are here now, to grant me three wishes?”

“Yup.”

“And I can wish for anything want, anything at all?”

“Within limits, yes.”

Kyungsoo scoffs. “What do you mean limits? What kind of genie are you if you can’t even grant me my wishes?”

Genie heaves yet another heavy sigh, muttering under his breath something along the lines of ‘petty humans’, before he speaks again, “There has to be some rules. If humans had it their way, it would be a free for all. This whole arrangement would never work out. I can only make wishes that a human truthfully and actually wants.”

If Kyungsoo looked wary before, he’s definitely looking extremely unconvinced now.

“I. You. Alright, supposing you are really what you say you are, all I have to do is make three dumb wishes that I “actually want” and you will go away, right?” Kyungsoo doesn’t want to even imagine taking such a distraction with him to work.

The genie nods once, though he does pout when Kyungsoo talks about getting rid of him so soon.

“I’ve been in that dumb lamp for so long, don’t be so eager to get rid of me. It gets stuffy in there. And really, really boring. What is one supposed to do inside a lamp for eighty consecutive years?”

Kyungsoo rolls his eyes. “I’m sure that’s a hard life, doing nothing. I wish I could do nothing all day, everyday.”

The genie immediately seems to perk up at the mention of ‘wish’, back straightening and face alert. “Is that an official wish?”

Kyungsoo’s eyes go wide, and he frantically waves his hands back and forth. “No! I’m not going to waste my wishes on something as pointless as that! Because I could wish for something like- ,” Kyungsoo stills abruptly. “Because...I can wish for anything I want. Omigod I have three wishes that I can literally use on anything I want.” He laughs once to himself, and then again, and before he knows it he’s kind of laughing hysterically.

He stops when he sees the genie blatantly staring at him. “Wow, maybe I am a figment of your imagination. You seem kinda crazy.”

Kyungsoo shrugs at him. “Big business will do that to you. I will have you know I was perfectly sane before I took this damn job.”

“Oh, is that why you look so dead? And you act like you have a stick shoved half way up your ?”

Kyungsoo looks offended when he replies, “Excuse you, I do not have anything up my . In fact I haven’t had anything remotely close to my since freshman year of college.”

Genie lets out a low whistle of amazement. “Wow, someone needs to get laid. Even I’ve gotten laid in the past two years, and I’ve been in a lamp.”

(Kyungsoo tries not to think about how a genie could possibly have . Or with whom for that matter.)

“Puh lease, as if I would waste my wishes on that either.”

“Well aren’t we a sassy, uptight businessman.” Genie actually seems slightly amused, and that bothers Kyungsoo. He doesn't try to be sassy on purpose, it just kind of happen; And he isn’t uptight all the time, just when he needs to be.

I didn’t ask for you opinion...uh”

“Kai,” Genie finishes for him. “Call me Kai.”

“Right then Kai. I wish you would keep your opinions to yourself.” Kyungsoo twitches when he realizes his unintentional slip of the tongue.

Kai on the other hand, seems excited again. “Is that finally an official wish?”

Kyungsoo sighs. He's had enough of this nonsense-- it's obvious what he needs is some sleep, and this little hallucination is proof of that.

More importantly, he has a meeting tomorrow and his bed is calling to him. Without another word he slips into his bedroom, pushing the door closed and locking it for extra precaution-- you can never be too sure, even if this was just one very long (and realistic) hallucination.

--

It’s the sunlight streaming in through the window that causes Kyungsoo to stir.

Damn it. He forgot to close the curtains again.

He turns away from the window and glances at the clock. Exhaustion seeps into his bones and his eyes feel heavy, which really makes no sense considering he got at least six hours of sleep -- a whole two more hours than normal.

Maybe it had something to do with that ridiculous dream he had last night. Yes, it was probably that; after all Kyungsoo knows he isn’t the most creative, so obviously it must have taken a lot of brain power for him to dream up something as imaginative as a genie-- an attractive one at that-- coming to grant his every whim. As if life was that easy; as if he could just wish or his promotion and then suddenly poof!  He was an executive manager and his father actually acknowledged his existence and suddenly life is just peachy.

No, life isn’t that easy and the fact that he has a meeting at noon just proves it.

Kyungsoo is tempted to stay in bed for just five more minutes; to just curl up into a tight ball and go back to the safety of his dreams, where work didn’t exist and where there were loving arms for him to fall into.

But knows that if he doesn’t get up now, he won’t be up before his meeting, so he begrudgingly flips his cover aside and sits up, sliding into his slippers before shuffling toward his door.

He’s not entirely sure why it’s locked, seeing as he lives alone, so he has never really made a habit of it before. He ignores the nagging voice in his head reminding him of the dream he had last night and opens the door, trying to get his thoughts coherent enough so that he can figure out what he wants for breakfast.

Plans of breakfast are put on hold however, when he sees the stack of dishes from last night piled up by the sink. For someone who lives alone, Kyungsoo sure went through a lot of dishes. Sehun tells him he does it because it makes his apartment seem less lonely-- it makes it seem like there is more than one person living there, but Kyungsoo usually just tunes the younger out when he starts saying ridiculous things like that (that is, things that are probably true).

Kyungsoo tries to ignore the dishes, attempting to start a pot of coffee, but his inner clean freak pushes him toward them against his will. He sighs and rolls up his sleeves, grabbing for one of the dishes. Unfortunately his motor skills weren’t the best when he is drunk, so the plates weren’t stacked in the nicest manner, and the entire pile goes crashing into the sink the moment Kyungsoo touches them. Kyungsoo remains frozen for a brief second before he sighs and decides that he’ll just leave the dishes for his maid to do later. He thinks a nice cup of coffee will calm his frayed nerves, but just as he reaching toward his coffee pot to go brew his morning cup, his phone dings in the pocket of his pjs.

He pulls out his phone and sees a new text from Kris.

 “Coffee?”

Kyungsoo, who is still engrossed in answering Kris’s text, accepts the coffee graciously without looking up. He blows on it once before taking a small sip.

 “Thank-”

Kyungsoo stops mid text when he realizes that he is holding a cup of coffee from the pot of non existent coffee he hadn’t ever brewed. He slowly looks up, cautiously, and standing there, in his blue silks and gold bangles, is none other than Kai.

Kai flashes him a handsome smile and waves at him. “Good morning sunshine.”

Kyungsoo doesn’t know what to feel upon seeing Kai again, other than slightly scared and somewhat concerned over the fact that he is hallucinating again. He feels his blood run cold for a minute before feeling returns to his hands a minute later and his heart rate returns to normal.

Kyungsoo decides that it’s ok if he hallucinates a little. Surely everyone goes through rough patches like this, and as long as Kai doesn’t get in the way of job, it wouldn’t hurt to have him around for a bit. At least until Kyungsoo’s brain decides that’s it’s done wishing for things, and starts focusing more on what’s right in front of him.

The best solution is to continue about his day, as if Kai was never there.

Kyungsoo decides that maybe he can live without his morning cup and dumps the rest of the coffee down the drain.

Kai watches him, and comments somewhat curiously, “Oh, are you not a coffee person?”

Kyungsoo ignores him, turning on his heels so that he can walk return to his room.

“Where are you going?” Kai follows after him. Kyungsoo ignores him again, speeding up a little, and naturally Kai does too. When Kyungsoo gets to his room, he quickly opens the door and slams it Kai’s face before he can follow after.

Kai frowns, and knocks on the door. “Hey! What was that for?!”

There’s no response from inside the room.

Kai knocks again, harder this time. “Why are you ignoring me?”

There’s some shuffling around inside the room, but still no response.

“You really think this puny little door can keep a genie out? That’s cute.” Kai snickers, his bangles jingling noisily as he knocks on the door. It’s almost condescending considering Kyungsoo knows deep down inside, that if Kai wanted to, he could probably get in—that is, if he really was a ‘genie’.

When nothing really happens for a while, and it goes almost completely silent outside, Kyungsoo assumes he had (hopefully) given up and goes about getting ready for work.

 Really he’s too preoccupied with what he has to get done by the end of the day and who he needs to contact about next weeks conference call to the China branch to worry about things like Genies and magic and –where the hell did he put his burgundy silk tie again?

Everything was stressing him out this morning! Can’t get a cup of coffee, can’t find peace and quiet in his own house, can’t find his damn tie!

Kyungsoo runs his hands through his hair; a really bad habit to have considering he does it a work all the time and he tends to forget his hair is styled most of the time and it ends up messing it up more often than not.

He rifles through the ties in his closet, checks under the pile of dress shirts sitting on his chair, checks in every drawer in his dresser, even checks in his dirty laundry hamper and it’s not anywhere.

Kyungsoo angrily tosses a shirt aside, checking under a pile of neatly folded pants.

“Where the did I put-”

“-this?”

Kyungsoo looks up and there’s Kai, standing in the middle of his room, holding out none other than his burgundy silk tie.

Kyungsoo involuntarily twitches a few times before he closes his eyes. Of course the ‘genie’ had managed to get in some how. Of course.  He counts to ten mentally, then he takes a deep breath and opens his eyes (his therapist tells him to do it whenever he feels a panic attack coming on). He stands up, grabs his tie as if Kai was nothing more than a coat rack or wall fixture, and starts putting it on. 

“Are you still going to ignore me?” Kai tries to step in front of Kyungsoo, but Kyungsoo’s steps around him, glancing down at his watch and making a bee line for the door when he sees that it’s twenty till and if he doesn’t leave now he’s going to miss his train and then he will really be screwed over.

“How long are you going to ignore me for?” Kai follows after him, as per usual.

Kyungsoo ignores him again. He slips on his dress shoes, not bothering to really tie his laces all the way because he’s still trying to finish tying his tie as he waits for the elevator to come.

Kai pouts, barely managing to slip out the front door the apartment because Kyungsoo had basically sprinted out of it and was hastily making his way towards the elevators.

“I’m not going to give up you know. I’m going to bug you until you talk to me.”

 If Kyungsoo hears him he doesn’t show it, and he continues to speed toward the stairs in the hopes that he will still be able to make his train.

--

A/N: i have been dying to write this, and i wanted to wait till i finished writing the whole thing but i couldn't wait tbh. don't know when the next part will be up, cause ill be in italy in two weeks and so im basically swamped this whole month; don't worry i definitely plan on finishing it though ~