The only source of light is the stars above. They´re just like cute freckles, covering the cheeks of the dark sky above on this cold December night. The few trees around are all half-, clad in a thin layer of snow only.  The chilly wind is picking up a bit and snow is slowly starting to fall again. Big chunks of snow fall down gracefully, in the silence.

The snow lands on your hair, sending small chills down your spine. The snow makes almost squeaking sounds as you walk down the snow covered street slowly.  You drown the silence by listening to music, and have already gotten lost in your own world.

Today has been a tough day. Your heart aches painfully, and a shaky breath leaves your dry lips. It feels that no matter how much you try it´ll never be enough. Your whole existence isn´t enough. A numb pain takes your body hostage. You´re on your way home, but you don´t feel like going back. You don´t feel like you´ve a reason to return. 

Another shaky breath leaves you as you look up at the sky. “Beautiful” you murmur, as you decide to sit down at a nearby bench. You´re staring, but not seeing, at nothing as time slowly crawls by. Snowflakes are gathering, and you´re soon almost covered by white. You can´t feel the cold.

You don´t know how much time has passed, as you slowly realize that there are a pair of dark leather shoes invading your field of vision.  Your distant eyes regain their focus slowly as you take in the sight before you.

A young man stands in front of you with a seemingly indifferent expression on his round face. His quite small, almond shaped eyes regard you, and as the wind picks up, his dark hair comes to frame his face nicely. The grey long coat he´s wearing dances in the wind. His neck is a bit exposed though, and you wonder if he´s cold.

You´re slowly coming back to your senses. Why is he staring at me like that? Thinking that he might have asked you something, you break the silence by saying “Did you say something?” after taking off your headphones.

Without saying anything, he gives you another long stare, and turns away from you. Your eyes follow him with a frown as he slowly disappears in the darkness. Embarrassment makes your cheeks turn red, and it warms up your cold body. He must have thought you´re crazy, sitting here in the cold alone so late at night.

He´s right.                                                                                                                                                                                    

With a deep sigh, you force your tired and cold limbs to push your body off the bench. That´s when you notice how a black scarf falls from your lap to the ground. A pair of confused eyes stares at it for what feels like an eternity as you try to understand.

Did he…? You grab it gently, as you stare into the darkness where he disappeared.

It´s not until you return to work the next day that you realize that the guy who found you in the snow last night has been around for a while. As long as you remember, there has always been this group of five young men gathering at the coffee shop you work at to hang out. Judging by the instruments they´ve with them, you guess they´re some kind of band. They´ve always been a lively group, but you´ve never payed them a lot of attention.

 Until now.

You lean against the wall as you regard them discreetly while you clean a used coffee cup. He´s sitting by the window, with his long fingers clad in several metallic rings touching his cheek, as he listens to the others speak in silence. His head is covered by a purple hat with ears, making him look quite fashionable person who could be into rock, or even “darker” music such as metal.

You frown a bit, as you´re making sure that he´s really the guy from yesterday. The indifferent and slightly cold expression of his is hard to forget, and you´re suddenly convinced.  Pulling out the scarf from your backpack, you approach their table slowly. Although you thought it´d be impossible to return it to its owner, you actually carried it with you.  Nervousness takes over your limbs, but you put on your poker face.  You´re at work, so you need to act professional.  The walk from the cashier to their table feels extremely long.

 “Excuse me.” You say, as none of them seems to notice your presence.

The four men look up at you, with faces of slight surprise, while the guy from yesterday looks quite indifferent.

“…This is your scarf, right?” You ask in a kind voice.

You hold up the black scarf and, after a short moment, he nods. He leans over the table and grabs it cooly without another word, but gives you a small glance of appreciation. It was him, the one who saw you all messed up, and left his scarf with you.  As you try to observe him, you think that he must be a kind person since he did that, although he looks cold. As if he felt your eyes on him, he looks at you and your eyes meet for a moment. He has nice dark eyes, an you can see hints of warmth in them.

“Woah!” One of his friends exclaim. “What does this mean, Youngjun?”

The guy from yesterday, called youngjun, gives the other a slightly irritated stare. The other boy gets hushed by a young looking man with purple hair. He gives you a smile, but you can see his curiosity, and it makes you a bit uncomfortable.

You force a smile. “I found it lying around, and I thought I´d seen him wear it before.” You don´t lie, but you don´t say the full truth either. “Please enjoy your stay here, and remember you can always get free refills of coffee.”

“Thank you.” Youngjun tells you with a steady stare, and a smile tugs the corner of his lips upward just a tiny bit.

The small smile is mesmerizing. If you were a poet, you´d compare his smile to sunlight caressing the soil for the first time after a long winter. With a shake of your head, you force yourself out of your world of dreams. You smile his way awkwardly, nods, and walks away to the cashier.

Your cheeks are burning for some reason.

After that day the five young men started to greet you as they entered the coffee shop, and you quickly learned their names and what they´d usually order. Work got more lively, and you can´t lie and say it hasn´t become more fun as well. Hanbyul, the loudest and most energetic of them, tends to drink coffee with some milk. The purple haired Kwangyeon tends to pick different fruit juices. The humorous Hyoseok seems to try out the sweets: one new every time he arrives. Kyumin, the tallest of them, likes lattes which gives you an opportunity to practice your latte art. At last, Youngjun orders coffee, but the amount of milk and sugar depends on his mood. Sometimes he takes it black, sometimes with loads of sugar or/and milk.

Today is one of those days when Youngjun wants a lot of sugar and milk, which tells you that he must have had a rough day. Your mind wanders a bit as you prepares his coffee, and you wonder what happened. As you give him the cup, and warns him it´s hot, he gives you a tired but honest smile.

For some reason, Youngjun stays back longer than the others, as he sits by the window reading through some papers. You regard him discreetly as you sweep the floor. His frown will give him wrinkles. A thought strikes you: maybe it´s time to return the favor. As an employee, you can get discounts on a lot of things, so you decide to buy him a dessert you´ve seen him buy before.

“Ah, I didn´t order this.” Youngjun looks up at you with a confused expression on his face as you place the plate on his table.

“I know.” You give him a gentle smile. “It´s a gift. We are closing in thirty minutes, but feel free to take your time. I´m closing today.” You tell him softly.

“Thank you.” He whispers, as he looks at the cake. “I like this one.” He gives you an honest smile.

“I know.” You say without thinking, and you get embarrassed. You don´t want to come off like a stalker. You´ve just been a bit curious about him, that´s all. “I mean, I do take your orders most of the time…” A nervous laugh leaves your lips.

The way his eyes widened a bit at your words makes you feel very foolish, and you want to disappear. Youngjun regards you in silence for a while before he gives you a warm smile. It makes your cheeks flush red, and another awkward laugh emerges from your lips. With a nod of your head, you return to work. What you don´t notice is how Youngjun´s eyes rest on you as you walk away.

Although you don´t really want to work on Christmas, you agreed, because you´ll get a quite high salary. The reason why you wouldn’t want to is because the coffee shop is full of lovely-dovely couples during those days and that you´d actually like to spend it with your family or friends. When you told your family this, they agreed to wait for you. Because of this promise, you managed to survive the day at work, because this year you´ll be able to celebrate as well. A happy smile makes you look a bit younger.

As you´re closing the shop you realize that he five men didn´t come today, and you can´t help but feel a bit disappointed. They must have better things to do, like, going out with their girlfriends. For some reason, that makes your heart feel a bit heavy. With a shake of your head you change your clothes and start to go home.

Feeling a bit excited, you check your phone the moment you exit the coffee shop. Eyes move over the screen, and your smile slowly fades and turns first to disappointment, and then to sadness.  Your chest hurts, and you feel how the pain slowly reaches your throat, and face, as you have to fight back your tears. A shaky breath leaves your trembling lips, and a foggy cloud is created in the cold air around you.

Why, on Christmas? You think, as you pity yourself for a moment. Your friends cancelled, and a message from your parents said that they got impatient and has already started celebrating without you. You did tell them you´d be late. You did ask them to wait for you. But they couldn´t and you don´t feel like ruining it by joining in the middle.

A deep sigh leaves you.

The world around you is full of happiness, but you can´t see it, as you drag your feet behind you.  Once again, you don´t feel like going home. No one will be there to welcome you home this year either because they´re at some fancy restaurant you don´t know.

You walk with your eyes fixed on the ground, and as you spot a pair of slender legs, you look up, and eyes widen. Youngjun is standing in front of you with a worried expression on his face.

“Youngjun…-sshi.” You whisper and you hate how your voice breaks. “What are you doing here?”

“I was going to wait for you to finish work… but you had already left.”

“I was allowed to go back earlier.” Is the only answer that leaves you, because you can´t comprehend the situation.  Why would he come to meet you? You have no idea. It frustrating that Youngjun finds you like this for a second time. You want him to see you in a good light…

You try to say something but the pain in makes it hard. You close your mouth, and open it again in a second attempt. “I need to go…”

Warmth encircles you suddenly, as Youngjun wraps himself, and his coat, around you in a hug. Your teary face is pressed against his shoulder. Your whole body tenses up by the surprise. He doesn´t say anything as he holds you close. This makes a shaky breath leave you as your tears fall freely.

“What are you…? “ You murmur. “…Your coat, I´ll…” You mumble in confusion, as you don´t want to get tears and snot on it.

“Don´t make that face.” He murmurs into your hair.

“…What face?” Your voice sounds weak to your ears. Weak with nervousness.

A silence spread between you, but he shows no signs of letting you go. You´re starting to relax in his arms, but it still feels strange that he´d hold you. You´re not that close yet so he surprised you a great deal.

“…You looked as if you´d break… .” Youngjun states the fact in a quiet voice.  You stay silent, because your head is a mess.  “I won´t ask what happened, but, let me stay with you… a little longer…” Youngjun murmurs.

A shaky deep breath leaves your mouth. “O-okay…”

After you calmed down, Youngjun takes you to a small restaurant down town. He walked by your side in silence, as he let you recover. You stopped crying, but you still feel very tired and down. The place he takes you to is a place you wouldn´t have found by yourself, because it´s on a small side-street hidden by bigger brand stores. Although you now your face is a bit swollen after crying, you don´t mind going with him, because he´s considerate enough to pick a table in the back. Your chest feels warm as you realize he´s really thinking of you, that he cares. He has this cold and sometimes indifferent aura around him, but he´s really caring and reliable.  Your chest seems to swell a bit at the thought.

He orders for you and himself, and you get even more embarrassed especially when he rejects your offer of paying for your food yourself.  It´s almost like a date.  Your cheeks seems to be burning, you hope he can´t see it or that he thinks it´s because you cried.

“Thank you, really.” You tell him with an appreciating smile.

He gives you a small grin. “This is nothing.” And he looks away a bit, almost shyly.

It makes you smile. “You really saved my Christmas.” You tell him honestly. “I think that if I didn´t run into you, I´d be sitting at that bench in the cold again…”

He gives you a long glance, an almost sad one, and turns silent as he seems to think about something.

You´re really grateful over the fact that Yongjun is with you right now, but somewhere in your heart you hope that he´s not kind to you out of pity only… 

The food arrives and you dig in. it´s really tasty.  You´re soon feeling a lot better. The two of you chit-chat about everything and nothing and joy takes over you as you realize that it´s actually easy to talk with him. You get along very well, and this makes you want to get even better friends with him. Or honestly, you´d love to be more than friends with him… but it´s still very early. You can´t hope for anything just yet.

“The reason why I came to meet you today…” Youngjun starts after a hesitant silence.

“…Yes?” You as while taking a sip of your drink.

Youngjun seems a bit flustered for some reason, and he changes the sentence he was about to utter. It makes you a bit suspicious. You have never seen him act this way before. He has always been very indifferent and collected.

“…I first noticed you when we first started to go to the coffee shop.” Youngjun starts as he looks away from you.

…Is he… nervous? You ask yourself as you notice how he can´t seem to stop rubbing his hands together as he speaks. He rotates the silver rings on his fingers. This is a new side of Youngjun for you.

 “You were always working hard… although you got scolded by the manager you always got back up…”

You frown in embarrassment.  Just how much has he been observing me?

“…One day you just started to look sad.” He murmurs.

He continues and his facial expression changes a bit. He almost looks concerned. Your cheeks flush even redder in embarrassment.  It must have been around the time your relationship with your parents turned bad. It´s quite a while back. You can´t stop your hands from sweating, your heart from racing or yourself for holding your breath. This is almost like a…

“I couldn’t help but notice and pay more attention to you…” He gives you a reassuring smile. “…So when I found you sitting at that bench weeks ago, I … couldn´t just leave you there.”

You try to listen to him carefully although the only thing you hear is the rapid beating of your heart. It sounds like he´s confessing to you, but you can´t believe it. Although you haven´t known Youngjun for a very long time, you´ve realized that he must have known of you for longer.

“Since then, I guess I´ve started to … “He takes a pause, and looks away from you. “… care about you. When you gave my scarf back to me, I got happy, because I thought you didn´t recognize me...”

A slightly tense silence spread between you as you take in everything Youngjun just said. You look at him and realize he´s not daring to look at you. He plays around with the rings on his fingers, or looks at the roof…

After a while of hesitation, and after the silence turned rather painful, you dare to speak “…Is this a … confession?” You breathe as you break that silence.

Youngjun looks at you again and you can see a hint of nervousness in his dark eyes. “…Yeah...” He answers hesitantly.

Your eyes widen as you take his answer in.  Suddenly, new tears fall down your cheeks again. You wipe them away in surprise. “You´re making me cry.” You state the fact, and a happy laugh emerges your lips.

He smiles awkwardly as he gives you a napkin. Your fingers touch slightly, and your blush intensifies so you look away a bit. As Youngjun looks at you it seems as if he´s slowly getting more and more confident.

“…Go out with me?” He asks you bluntly.

You close your eyes, as you try listen to your own feelings. The butterflies are like crazy in your stomach. “….Yes.” You laugh happily. “I´m happy my Christmas didn´t turn out to be as bad as I first thought…” You murmur with a nervous laugh.

In that moment, Youngjun gives you a very bright smile, and you know that if things turn out well you might not have to feel so lonely anymore…