Luhan peers wonderingly out of the tall glass window of his high-rise apartment. The television, set to a random entertainment channel, is blaring loudly to fill the silence of the place as he looks over the city lights, towel low on his waist. He sees nothing but the harsh artificial glare of white and neon lights against his window, but somehow it’s comforting.

There wasn’t much Luhan hated, nor were there much that he liked. Even then, the things he hated stood out the most in comparison to the few things he liked.

For instance, he hates being alone. He lives alone in a really big apartment, and isn’t particularly fond of it, but he has no choice. He has no one now; in the past he’d dated women and men, shacked up with them for the short period of time they’d be together and then kicked them out without a hint of remorse when the love died. In between the relationships were the flings, short things that he knew had an expiration date before they had even begun.

Luhan loved beautiful people, regardless of age, he loved the flashiness of their lives, and how they’d brighten up the dull greyness of his own with their eccentricities. He’d slept with widowed women that wore too much make up and too many bright colors. He’d been with older men, whose laughs shook the apartment, wore expensive gold rings, and white gold watches.

He’d loved them, the romances, the flings, in his own fleeting way, and now he was alone. President Kim had said months ago that there was too be no more traffic inside of his apartment, which meant no more loves, no more men , no more women, until he found a real relationship, not a distraction, but an actual long-term, give and take relationship.

While Luhan gets dressed his thoughts suddenly stray to President Kim’s new secretary. Kim Minseok wasn’t exactly his type. He liked his men older. He liked the type of guys that made him feel small, the ones that wanted to possess him in any and every way, and then show him off like he was a doll.

Kim Minseok was someone that looked too fragile, there was a boyish charm to him, an innocence that had yet to disappear even after he’d hit puberty. Luhan wanted to know more about him. Maybe he felt the same way for Minseok as he felt for Sehun when they first met, and then eventually Kai. Maybe Luhan wanted to take care of him, maybe he wanted to be friends with the boy. Maybe it was just a small curiosity; Kim Minseok was in fact the first male secretary President Kim had in a very long time.

****

A light laugh slips pass lips as red as the first bright rays of sun. Luhan’s whispering slurred secrets into the ear of the bubbly girl beside him as strong arms wrap around his waist. He leans back against his seat and the arms draw him closer and away from his new found friend. His eyes close momentarily, the dancing lights dizzying him, and the poignant smell of alcohol and the lingering woody scent of a cigar making him nauseous. He leans to his left, letting his head hit the shoulder of the person beside him, the same person holding him, and as arms pull him closer, Luhan responds by brushing his lips against the smooth skin of the person’s neck.

He draws up suddenly, body swaying against his will as he attempts to whisper in the man’s ear. “Let’s get out of here,” Luhan mutters, words slurred and so soft, it’s barely heard. The guy does hear him, because he’s helping Luhan up, and supporting him as they leave the club.

The hotel is not too far away, but they still take a taxi cab. Luhan disregards his image, legs straddling the man as he trails lazy kisses along his neck. Fingers slip into tight black jeans to pull him flush against his partner as they behave like two overly-hormonal schoolboys. He’s not sure how the guy pays the taxi driver but he doesn’t care because moments later they’re stumbling out of the taxi and heading straight towards a hotel elevator.

****

Luhan feels nauseous when he awakens. He feels gross from falling asleep sweaty and beside a stranger he barely knew a thing about. The guy he’d met at the club was a businessman traveling to the Capital for work, and had passed out almost as soon his back hit the bed. The man was still fast asleep and as Luhan recalls the night he can’t help but give the guy, whose name had slipped his mind, an annoyed glare.

Luhan decides to take his slow time abandoning the expensive hotel room and showers in the marble tiled bathroom. When he’s leaving the bathroom, dressed in one of the hotel’s fluffy thick white robes, a petite hotel staff member walks into the room with a cart full of cleaning supplies. Luhan smiles politely as the woman stands in a stunned silence, eyes’ moving from him to the man sleeping on the bed before a disgusted grimace darkens her face.

“Excuse me,” he tells her, when he hears the loud vibrations of his cellphone. It’s Kyungsoo calling, and even though everything in Luhan’s being is telling him to ignore the call he knows just how persistent Do Kyungsoo can be.

“The President’s angry,” Kyungsoo tells him before he can even say hello. “He went into a fit of rage when he heard that you didn’t come to your photo shoot today. The shoot that he told you he had arranged yesterday.” Luhan hears the soft sound of a door closing and turns his head, moving the phone away from his ear.

Once he realizes that the cleaning woman has left he begins to get dressed. “I forgot about it,” Luhan says. “Can’t it be rescheduled?”

“That was a future business partner Lu,” Kyungsoo tells him with a sigh. “That magazine is rising in notoriety. Some of the top stars all over the world have already been featured in it, and if you would have done the shoot, Nessen would have had a yearlong endorsement deal.”

“You couldn’t send Sehun or Kai in my place,” Luhan asks. On the bed the business man is finally starting to stir and Luhan turns his back, leaving the guy behind as he exits the room.

“It would have looked like we’re making fun of the guy,” Kyungsoo tells him, his voice is strained as if he is trying his best not to shout at Luhan and honestly Luhan appreciates the way the younger controls his temper. “He asked specifically for you, and the President promised him you’d be there.”

“What do I have to do,” Luhan sighs.

“I don’t know,” Kyungsoo says. “Talk to your father, talk to the editor-in-chief of ML Magazine, he was the one that requested you. Just do something before the day’s over.”

“Fine,” Luhan sighs.  “Damage control it is.” He’s not exactly sure when the term model translated into high class e but apparently that was as much a part of his job as putting on expensive clothes and getting artsy pictures taken of him. Not often does he need to reduce himself to ual favors, sometimes he plays , sometimes he plays older boyfriend, either way he was doing a lot more than his job description probably requires him to do.

****

ML Magazine’s editor-in-chief is no different than the rest and all it takes is a few lewd favors for the photo shoot to get rescheduled. Luhan makes the man promise to keep it a secret from the President because that’s how it works, President Kim doesn’t care what he does as long as he isn’t being too public about his life. He can give a guy a underneath his desk but if he invites a guy back to his place that’s going too far in the President’s eyes.

After visiting ML Magazine’s headquarters in the Capital, he heads back to Nessen’s. Kim Minseok, President Kim’s brand new secretary is finishing a call with a tiny professional smile as Luhan walks through the doors of the top floor office.

“President Kim is really upset with you,” Minseok tells him, just as Luhan approaches his desk.

“When is President Kim not upset with me,” Luhan asks.

“Yeah well President Kim has given me strict orders to not allow you into his office,” Minseok tells him, a small grimace on his lips. “I know it’s hard Mr....” he trails off, realizing that he doesn’t know Luhan’s last name. “I know it’s hard Mr. Luhan but could you please refrain from getting into too much trouble.  President Kim isn’t a kind man when he’s angry.”

“He bullies you,” Luhan asks, his eyes are wide even though he’s not really too surprised by the accusation. President Kim was a huge bully; Luhan had ten years of personal experience with the man’s imposing and demanding personality.

“He doesn’t bully me,” Minseok says with a laugh. “I’ve worked since I was sixteen, and I’ve met tons of bosses like President Kim, they’re just…”

Minseok trails off again and Luhan decides to fill in the blank for him, “Insufferable?” Minseok laughs more, it’s a real laugh, not one of his professional dismissive laughs and Luhan grins to himself thinking that Minseok should definitely laugh more. His laugh was a part of his boyish charms and Luhan could just imagine older women tripping over themselves to pinch at the boy’s cheeks.

“You started working when you were sixteen,” Luhan asks, “Minseok, how old are you?”

“I’m 23,” Minseok answers, he’s glancing at Luhan with amusement shining brightly in his eyes. “My birthday is March 26,” he adds. Luhan, the poster boy of deceiving baby faces, hadn’t expected that. He thought Minseok was at least twenty, twenty-one at most.  He’d reminded Luhan of a less high-strung Kyungsoo, mature but still possessing a somewhat childish naivety.

“You’re older than me,” Luhan says when he finally comes out of his stupor. Minseok gives him a closed-mouth grin and Luhan figures from the way the boy’s shoulders are shaking that he’s trying to suppress his laughter. “Don’t laugh,” Luhan tells him. “I didn’t really expect to hear that. You don’t look twenty-three.”

“Neither do you,” Minseok retorts, smoothly rolling his eyes.  Luhan leans over Minseok’s desk just as the black corded telephone starts to ring.

Minseok grabs the telephone and holds it close to his face. “Nessen Entertainment office, Kim Minseok speaking, how may I help you?”  Luhan watches as Minseok nods his head mumbling out soft yeses and other confirming noises when it’s appropriate. He mutters a ‘please hold’ and clicks a button on the black telephone body.

“President Kim, Ernest Baudet of Central Broadcasting Station is calling,” Minseok says, tongue easily forming the foreign syllables. President Kim tells him to allow the man through and Minseok does so, putting the phone back on the receiver afterwards.

“Ernest Baudet,” Luhan says the name with much more difficulty than Minseok.

“He’s the new head of CBS,” Minseok says. “He’s from the west and supposedly close to Great Ruler. The last head, Sada Mariko, her husband was charged with treason. It was all over the news. He was a member of the Red Devils.” Luhan doesn’t watch the news; he’d stopped watching it long ago, fed up with the propaganda. 40% of it dealt with the Imperfects, the rebels, the many that had refused to convert and refused to die, painting them to be creatures that weren’t even human, that prevented the world from living up to the country’s true name, Heaven. After the news inflicted fear into its viewers, the remaining 60% dealt with a history lesson on the Great War and the Great Ruler. Love thy Great Ruler who has led his people out of the burrows of hell into a shining future.

“Minseok, I have to meet with a childhood friend of mine, mind giving a message to the President for me?”

“Sure,” Minseok says, grabbing a pen and a paper.

“ML magazine’s shoot has been rescheduled for this oncoming Monday.” He straightens himself up, readying to leave and purposely ignoring Minseok’s surprise eyes, but then a sudden thought hits him.

“Minseok, when is your lunch break,” he asks next.

“Noon,” Minseok answers, as his surprise melts into curiosity.

“Okay,” Luhan says. He bides the secretary goodbye, and leaves the office.