" Zhang Yixing,  are you in here?" Jongin's voice repeated.

"Yes...yes. I'm sorry." Yixing gasped back, fresh pangs of terror making his legs shake as he unlocked the stall door. He was met with the sight of Jongin's furrowed brow and thin-pressed lips. He must be angry. Yixing organized his face into a weak representation of a vacant smile. "I'm sorry, for a minute I felt very ill."

"Are you...sure? Do you need to go home for the rest of the day? " Jongin spoke slowly, carefully,  like he was trying to understand,  but didn't know if anything needed to be understood.

"I'm fine. I'm sorry for being such an inconvenience. "

"I take my interns very seriously.”Jongin gave him a searching look,  shrugged,  and let a small smile twinkle into his eyes  “Nothing is an inconvenience when it comes to any of you.".  It was a kind smile.  Not sure how to respond,  Yixing bowed and turned to the sinks, pressing down firmly on the button that let cold water pour onto his too-hot hands. The water soothed his skin and roiling emotions.

Yixing let Jongin hold the door open for him after he had dried his hands with a white paper towel, trying to scrub his fears off his hands with the water. They walked down the hallway in silence; Jongin pretended not to be examining Yixing out of the corner of his eye, and Yixing pretended he didn’t notice the watchfulness of the other man.

Before they re-entered the intern offices, Yixing had to stop for a minute to take in a huge breath, squaring his shoulders to step through the doorway after Jongin. His fearful eyes soon fell on Baekhyun. The young singer was sitting, stricken, on the couch, one of Chanyeol’s long, wiry, arms slung around his leather-clad shoulders. His eyes were misty and the eyeliner them seemed a little smudged. All of the other interns had gathered in the main room as well, and they turned to look with concern and distress at Yixing as he shuffled in. The young Chinese man fisted his hands around the hem of his sweater, tugging slightly on it as he took a few determined steps to stand directly in front of Baekhyun. He fixed his eyes on his shoes.

“Baekhyun,” He said slowly, not making eye contact. Chanyeol made as if to say something, but seemed to change his mind. “Baekhyun-ssi, I hope you’ll accept my apology for my behavior earlier.” Baekhyun made a choking noise, and Yixing looked up at him. A watery smile was spreading across the boy’s face.

“Then...You’re not mad at me?” Baekhyun wobbled.

“No, of course not! You didn’t do anything wrong! You couldn’t possibly have known....” Yixing trailed off, uncomfortable. “I have some...issues...with physical contact.” He finally said. “Arms and shoulders are fine, but not much else. Anything intimate...well...scares me.” Under his breath, in Mandarin, he finished this thought with “It brings back memories I’d rather forget.” Yixing offered the other interns small smiles by way of apology whilst Baekhyun smiled in a bewildered fashion. He was still a little perplexed by Yixing’s problems with physical contact, but still seemed too happy about not upsetting the boy that he couldn’t really wonder about it. Tao was sitting nearby. Yixing hadn’t noticed the way his eyes had widened at the whispered Mandarin.

“Chanyeol? I believe you were showing Yixing around?” Jongin broke the relieved but awkward silence that had spread over the room. “Everyone else, there are important people who need their coffee. Amber, you aren’t allowed to spill Kris’s on him on purpose, okay?” Amber shrugged this off with a mischievous grin and skipped happily out of the offices and towards the elevator with Sehun and Kyungsoo. Everyone else dispersed to seemingly random locations to complete a range of seemingly random tasks.

“Are you really okay to keep going?” Chanyeol asked Yixing hesitantly, as if he was likely to shatter. Sometimes Yixing did feel like he was shattering, but never over something like today. Today couldn’t compare to the past.

“I’m fine, I promise. I have anxiety but I’m not an invalid.” Yixing offered the tall boy a half-hearted grin, an attempt at humor. This seemed to reassure him, somewhat, and Chanyeol stood.

“Great, then I’ll give you the rundown of your job. You’ll be working in the recording studio downstairs for a few weeks. We switch positions every month or so, or whenever someone leaves or gets hired, but the recording studio will be your home for now. I was working there before you came, so I can explain everything really well.” The tall boy promised, leading Yixing out into the hallway. They took a left and two rights to end up in front of another elevator. Chanyeol pressed the down button firmly and it lit up. He pressed it another two times as well. Yixing got the impression that Chanyeol was the type of kid that loved pressing buttons, no matter what they did. He probably fought with his friends over the right to press the button at crosswalks. “The recording and dance studios are on the fourth floor.” Chanyeol elaborated happily. “It takes forever to walk down all the stairs to get there, so I always use the elevator. Tao usually takes the stairs. He says it’s part of disciplining his body or something like that.” Chanyeol laughed self-consciously, scrubbing at his hair with the palm of his hand. One piece on top of his head was now sticking almost straight up, like an antennae. Yixing giggled.

“You look like an alien.” He said cryptically. Chanyeol gave him a quizzical look.

“Huh?” He asked intelligently. Yixing just shook his head and smiled. He certainly wasn’t going to be the one to tell Chanyeol about the cowlick, it was cute, and Yixing made a point of enjoying cute things for as long as possible.

When he was allowed to.

Yixing shuddered as the doors dinged open, following close on Chanyeol’s heels. The floor of the elevator was shiny black tile and Yixing thought his black converse looked strange and dull against it. The elevator was smooth and silent in its descent.

“You’ll like the audio director. His name is Du-Ho. He’s a bit odd, but he’s nice. Make sure to only give him decaf coffee, but never tell him that it’s decaf. When he has too much caffeine he gets a little crazy, and for him, that’s saying something.” The elevator doors dinged again, and the two young men disembarked. This hallway was dimmer, but not in a displeasing way. It was filled with soft yellow light that made it seem like night had already fallen. Chanyeol turned right and walked all the way to the end of the hall. Five doors lined each side of the hall, and one was centered at the end. This was the door they entered through.

“Du-Ho-ssi, I’ve brought the new intern to introduce to you!” Chanyeol sang out into the room. It was a recording studio like Yixing had seen online, a big glass tank for the artist filled with microphones, and a sleek black desk covered in knobs and sliders for the audio technician. A sudden flash of movement to Yixing’s left caught his attention. A man in his early forties or so was heaving himself to his feet from the floor near the wall, sheet music spread in front of him like a pale mosaic.

“Oh? A new intern?” He wore spectacles. Round ones, like the bottom of a bottle.

“Hello Du-Ho-ssi. My name is Zhang Yixing. I will work hard.” Yixing bowed.

“Oh, Chinese are you? I’ll call you Lay.” The man informed him simply. Yixing’s head cocked to the side and he opened his mouth, but then thought better of it and snapped it shut, shooting a grinning Chanyeol a curious look.

“Du-Ho-ssi gives everyone nicknames. He calls me Giraffe.” Chanyeol explains, teeth gleaming.

“Giraffe makes sense, you’re very tall. But why Lay?” Yixing addresses this question to Du-Ho.

“I don’t know. You look kind of flaky, like a potato chip, I guess. You know Lays potato chips?” This makes Chanyeol laugh outright. Yixing just blinks. He’d never paid much attention to brand names before, but he didn’t dislike it. It wasn’t a cruel name.

“I’ll leave Du-Ho-ssi to tell you everything else. I’ll come back and get you when it’s time to go out to dinner, okay?”  Chanyeol gives the two of them a stupid wave and vanishes, leaving Yixing with the strange man. He noticed that the man’s over-sized sweatshirt was advertising an American movie. Elvis in Blue Hawaii. They examined each other for a minute.

“I should probably tell you what I’ll be needing you to do. Basically, I need you to keep me organized, caffeinated, and on schedule. I’m awful at remembering to alphabetize my sheet music by who’s supposed to sing it, but I can never find what I’m looking for if the music’s not in order. The filing cabinets are over there.” He points to the towering cabinets that take over most of the opposing wall. “The coffee machine is down the hall on the right, in the break area. I don’t drink decaf, so make sure it’s full caffeine.” Yixing noticed the way Du-Ho bounced when he talked, and decided to take Chanyeol’s advice when it came to the coffee. “I tend to lose track of the time, so I need you to make sure that I don’t miss my appointments to record SM artists. If I’m still working with someone when my next appointment arrives, kick whoever I’m working with out. I don’t care if I yell or if they’re super famous. I need to stay on schedule. That’s about it. Got it?”

“Yes. I think I can do that.” Yixing said honestly.

“Good. Now. I have a meeting, so for now I need you to go through my files and clean anything out that’s more than a year old and put it in those,” he gestured to a pile of empty cardboard boxes in a corner, “Make sure you label them carefully. They’re going into storage tomorrow. Bye now!” And with that, Yixing was alone.

“I can do this.” Yixing said cheerfully. He’d always been good at focusing on tasks, especially mind-numbing ones. He settled himself on the carpet in front of the filing cabinets and tugged open a heavy drawer. He began to sift through the folders, singing a Chinese pop song that was popular when he was in middle school as he worked. The moments melted together and time sped by. He hadn’t even realized how long he had been working until a deep voice broke through his humming.

“Hey, you have a nice voice!” Yixing spun around at the sound. Chanyeol’s cowlick was gone. Yixing was disappointed. “Are you ready to go?”

“Yes, I suppose.” Yixing finished sealing a box and got to his feet, teetering on numb legs.

I hope this is fun, I don’t need to frighten them any more today. Yixing smiled sadly to himself and firmly closed the door to his new workplace.