I woke up the next day much happier because I was simply glad that it was a Saturday. There was no need to cope through another day with these annoying cramps, but thankfully it wasn’t as bad today and my fever had gone down remarkably too. After we got back last night Jun had made sure that I took a lot of medication and told me to rest, saying he’d take care of dinner. We had ended up eating pizza in the end, but it still made me happy.

The other reason as to why I was on a high note this morning was because I woke up to Abba's soothing piano playing from the living room. It was the sweetest kind of alarm someone could have for the morning, for me at least. In Jun’s case it was the smell of delicious food cooking, because it would excite him enough to get him out of bed faster than anything else.

I knew Abba was practicing for his concerts so I got ready without making any noise until I slipped on my shoes and walked up to the front door.

“Good morning Abba,” I called out while putting on my jacket.

“Good morning Minhee,” he responded without stopping the music, well, it’s not like he had to look at his fingers to be able to play after all. He was like Korea’s very own Ray Charles.

“I’m going to head out to Jun’s now, I’ll be back later. There’s still pizza left over from last night in the fridge in case you want something to eat and just call me if there’s anything you need.”

“Got it,” he nodded, “Have a safe trip.”

I closed the door behind me and pulled out my phone to send Jun a message that I was about to set off. I climbed on my bike and happily pedalled away, looking forward to helping Jun with his fashion blunder disease. I was already wondering what to do today because I hadn’t had anything planned, so when this came up I was pretty thrilled. I had always wanted to fix Jun’s fashion sense so much (for years) that it even haunted me in my dreams sometimes, but he’d always refused to let me do anything about it. So today was pretty much the start of a wonderful revolution –which was long overdue.

Aside from that, this was going to be the first day I was actually going to see Jun’s house and his room. A grin formed on my face at the thought of that, because although I knew Jun pretty well I couldn’t imagine how his room would be. It was ought to be much larger and luxurious than a normal person’s room, I knew at least that much. I’ve had a few other chances to visit Jun’s place over the years that I had known him, but the thought of his status and meeting his dad always kind of intimidated me for some reason. I mean I wasn’t exactly poor, but in comparison to Jun I could be considered that way. And from the way he always sounded when talking—or more like complained—about his dad making him do things he didn’t want to only made it seem more uncomfortable for me to be there. Jun too always seemed to prefer for us to spend time at my place instead of his because he liked seeing my dad so much and claimed it felt much homelier. But today, I was going to visit him for sure. This time he asked me to come over himself and really needed me for something, which didn’t involve food or cooking. For once he willingly asked me to help me with his looks, no kind of intimidating large mansion or scary father could ward me off now.

When I arrived in front of his gate, I slowly got off my bike with my mouth hanging open in shock. The gate itself was enormous and I considered turning around and running when it opened to let me in as if it had been waiting for me to arrive. I just couldn’t help but feel like I was being engulfed by the jaws of a megalodon. There were security guards everywhere but they allowed me past them and lead me into the mansion.

“Young master is waiting for you in his room,” a butler walked up to me and greeted me with a bow so I bowed back and followed him like a puppy as he took me to Jun. My eyes were wide in awe as I stared at the vast and luxurious interior of the place. There were four floors and so many rooms that it probably would be possible to forget the exact number even if you lived here for years. The beautiful chandelier in the centre of the ceiling which all the staircases were built around was so gigantic that it could probably kill a number of people if it were to fall on them.

The butler knocked on Jun’s door for me and it opened almost immediately.

“Minhee! You’re finally here!” Jun grinned down at me with an excited expression and waved me inside before closing the door behind us again.

“Jun, this place is huge!” I gasped, feeling disorientated.

“I guess,” Jun gave his own room a glance around before looking back at me and walking towards his king sized bed and plonking down on it. He picked up his gaming console and started playing the game he had paused on a big TV screen on the wall.

His room however had a feeling to it that the rest of the place had lacking. There were posters of Jun’s favourite music artists and video games all over the walls and he had album collections on his shelves as well as action figures. His bed linen was of Pororo the little penguin and there were even little pictures of his favourite foods pinned up on the notice board in front of his desk. Basically, this room screamed ‘Yoo Jun’ from all sides and it felt kind of comfortable like a home whereas outside this room it was as if I was looking around a museum.

“Okay, let’s get started! Where are your clothes?” I glanced around for a closet but realised there were only showcases for his collections, “Yah, you don’t have a closet?”

“It’s over there,” he pointed towards a door on the other side of the room, still engrossed in his game.

I made my way towards it and curiously opened the door, only to find a walk-in closet room. “Good god…”

It was like a short hallway with clothes, shoes and accessories on both sides with convenient mirrors. I walked into it and found myself surrounded by a galore of the highest brand clothes left and right. For someone who was quite into fashion like me, it was like a paradise. Weirdly though there were so many attractive clothes here that I had never seen Jun wear and wondered why.

“Jun, are these really all your clothes? Why have I never seen you wear these?” I called out to ask him, knowing he would still hear me.

“It’s too much of a hassle… Abba gets the maids to bring them for me,” he answered back.

“Sheesh, even your dad has better taste in clothes than you,” I said whilst poking my head around the door to look at Jun.

“Hmph,” he grunted, clearly in disagreement but still unable to argue back to that point so he just continued gaming.

“Yah! Put that down and come here, let me show you what kind of clothes would look best on you,” I scolded, making him do as I said immediately. He paused his game and dragged his way into the closet room too as I made myself busy selecting some clothes that I knew would fit him really well.

“This is going to work, right?” Jun looked unsure as I held up a number of shirts against his chest to visualise the image of him wearing them.

“Of course it will, there’s nothing I can’t accomplish when it comes to transforming people,” I mused, still focused in what I was doing. “But you have to put in some effort too, if you really want this change.”

“Yeah,” he said as he looked at one of the sweaters I had been holding against him, “So basically I should just copy that jerk Woonha.”

He didn’t sound happy, and it worried me. I was already hesitant about this whole situation because I knew that it was because of what happened yesterday that he now wanted to change. I didn’t want him to force himself to be someone he wasn’t, but I wanted to do anything possible to help him boost his confidence with things like this so he was going to have to get past his grumpiness over this part first.

“No,” I sighed, “There are things only you could wear that wouldn’t suit Woonha in a million years.”

Jun looked almost a little flustered as he went speechless, making my cheeks heat up slightly while I panicked if I had said something weird.

“O-okay, listen carefully to the things I’m about to tell you now because I’m not going to say things twice.” I turned away to point at the clothes I was about to mention to him.

Jun simply nodded to himself as I went on to describe the kind of clothes he should wear, with what combinations and which accessories. This was clearly not the sort of thing he liked to be lectured about, I could tell just from the way he looked bored to death, but he was still trying hard to gather all the information I was giving to me in his head. Although he wasn’t genuinely interested, he had an advantage of having a better than average memory so I knew he wouldn’t just forget the things I was telling him.

“And your homework is to wear them the way I suggested just now,” I added at the end of a long, long while of rambling. “I couldn’t go through all your clothes because you just have way too many but I’m sure you get the idea of the do's and don’ts now. Try this on!” I shoved an outfit into his arms and walked out of the room.

It took him about five minutes until I heard him calling out my name in distress, "Minheeeee!"

"Are you done?"

"No, I'm stuck," he sulked from the other side of the door.

"How the heck did you get stuck?!" I placed my hand on my face and sighed.

"Heeelllp, I can't breathe! I'm gonna die!"

"Aish!" I marched into the room and found Jun mostly dressed but his sweater was somehow caught up in his messy hairball. How that could happen when the sweater didn't even have any buttons, I didn't know.

"This is why I tell you to tame that mop of yours," I walked over to him and pulled the sweater down over his head. His hair was all over his face, just barely showing the pout he was pulling at me from underneath. Damn cute Babo.

Ignoring the butterflies in my stomach I helped him adjust the sweater properly and stepped back to judge how it looked on him.

Oh my god. I always knew he would look amazing in stylish clothes but seeing it in reality was leaving me speechless. He was wearing beige pants with a red chequered shirt under his navy blue sweater. It was simple, but made him look so dapper.

"Well?" he raised an eyebrow as he waited, not realising what turmoil he was causing in me.

"Good." I momentarily looked away.

"That's it?"

"I think it'll make a bigger difference if you let me do something about that shaggy bowl-cut of yours." I folded my arms over my chest, looking at him hopefully.

"No," he immediately refused and held out his finger with closed eyes, "Can't touch the crown."

"Okay, fine. It's not like it’s me who wants to change," I shrugged acting indifferent. It was a strategy I used often on him and more than often, it worked.

He peeked his eyes open, "You can't…”

"Sure, that mushroom look of yours will do just fine,” I mused and pretended to talk quietly to myself. "…Such a shame though, Yoori definitely would’ve liked you more with a haircut."

As expected, that instantly caught his attention and he looked at me with curiosity.

"What? Yoori?" he tapped on my shoulder as I turned away from him, still playing my role as the overly sympathetic friend.

"Hmm? Nothing," I shook my head, enjoying how easy it was to change his attitude. Yet even though it was amusing, the fact that he was only showing a reaction because I mentioned Yoori hurt a little.  It was seriously annoying in fact and I wanted to headbutt him for it really badly. But I decided to save it for later.

I watched him eventually taking a deep breath and looking at me with determination, "Fine."

"Really?!" I jumped wide-eyed in excitement.

"Yeah, but ONLY a bit of a trim. I'd feel like my favourite pet just died if you take it all away…" he whined, petting his own hair with a dramatically forlorn expression.

I rolled my eyes, "Well, it does look like a dead ferret sitting on your head. Okay, any little change to it is better than nothing."

He nodded and followed me out of the closet room. "But Minhee… Have you cut someone's hair before?"

"Nope."

"Eeeehh?!" he grabbed hold of his hair like a maniac having a mini-heart attack.

"Let's look up some haircuts then, or should I pick one for you on my own?" I took his laptop from his desk and sat on the edge of his bed, ignoring his little drama queen moment.

"No, no! Let's look for it together." He climbed onto the bed and sat behind me to see the screen as I browsed through images of countless male haircuts.

"These look so cool!" I grinned at Jun as I halted at a few K-pop inspired ones, but he looked unimpressed.

"No that's too much! I said you can only cut it a little!"

I sighed, "Okay fine, what about this?" I clicked on a style that was almost like Jun's, but it had shorter bangs and was more trimmed around the sides. With the slight layering at the top, he would be able to pull off a decent side swept look. It wouldn't be a drastic change since it was still overall an improvised version of his bowl-cut, but it would be a start.

He reluctantly agreed to it and we got out the tools that we needed; a comb, scissors and newspaper to catch the hair falling on the floor. I placed the chair on top of the newspaper and made him sit down in front of me. Then I pulled up my sleeves as I got ready to start.

"Wait!" Jun yelped as soon as I touched a strand of his hair, making me jump in shock.

"What?!"

"Are you sure about this?!" he looked genuinely scared, "You haven't done this before!"

"Aish," I whacked him on the back of his head, "Almost made my heart jump out for nothing. Just trust me, it'll be fine."

He continued to sob to himself as I began to snip away at his fluffy hair. I probably looked really sinister during the whole process, but I was just that happy to be getting rid of this hideous mop of his.

After a while of what Jun called torture, we were finally done and we patted away the excess hair strands from our clothes. I ruffled his hair happily and swept it to the side like in the picture we saw. I was really impressed with myself because it looked spot on like the original.

After he got up, I stared up at him with a tingling feeling in my chest. I couldn't believe the change a subtle haircut could make for him.

"It's an improvement." I smiled at him with a generous compliment.

"But now my ears are all revealed," he pouted whilst looking at himself from all angles in the mirror.

"That was the whole point! You looked like a hermit crab under that hair with only your eyes peeking out!" I retorted, when suddenly Jun's room door opened and someone older who was tall and dressed in a tailored suit walked in. It was someone whom I had only ever seen in photos so far—Jun's dad.

"What in the..." his dad, whom Jun most definitely resembled, stared at him with a baffled expression. "Wow, did a miracle happen? Now that's how my son should be looking like." he looked so thrilled that it made me feel happy about my work because it proved to be worthwhile.

Jun simply grunted in response and looked out of the window stubbornly, still unable to see the bright side of his semi-transformation. His dad then turned towards me and narrowed his eyes thoughtfully.

"This is…?” he asked no one in particular.

"Good afternoon Ahjussi. I'm Jun's friend, Lee Minhee," I immediately bowed in front of him politely at ninety degrees.

"Aah! So I finally get to meet Lee Minhee. He talks about nothing else!" his dad laughed loudly, somewhat like thunder.

I briefly glanced up at Jun whose face seemed to flush slightly. He quickly turned to his dad with an almost hostile tone, "Did you need something from me?"

"Come down to have lunch," he answered. "Please do join us too, Minhee."

"O-okay..." I nodded stiffly. As expected, the superior aura he was giving off was on a whole other level.

Jun in the meanwhile just looked at the both of us with a blank face, not necessarily looking bothered nor enthusiastic about me meeting his dad.

Later at the dining table, which extended through the whole length of the dining hall, Jun's dad was doing most of the talking. He was sat at what could be called the King’s seat at the very beginning of the table while me and Jun sat opposite each other at the sides next to him. He seemed really curious about me, to the extent that I really wondered how much Jun might've talked about me.

"I'm really glad that you're Jun's friend," he repeated once again to the point that I had lost count of how many times he had said that. It made me really happy though so I didn't mind hearing it, because initially I had always been worrying that perhaps Jun's dad wouldn't like me or find me too 'common' to be around Jun.

"You did a good job with improving his style. He used to remind me of an alpaca wearing glasses." he guffawed, almost making me choke on my drink and earning a glare from Jun.

"So what are your parents doing?" he causally continued to ask in between eating mouthfuls of the excessively grand feast that was in front of us.

"Abba." Jun suddenly intervened after having stayed quiet for so long. From the way he called out his dad and looked at him made it obvious that he didn't want him to question me about that. I could understand why Jun would do that. He knew about my parents and didn't like it when anyone brought up topics that would upset or make me uncomfortable, but it really was okay.

"My mom passed away when I was little, and my dad is a pianist," I smiled awkwardly between father and son.

"Oh," his dad nodded, "What's your dad's name? Maybe I know him."

"Lee Taesung."

"Lee Taesung?! The blind pianist?" his dad gasped in surprise, "I love his music, your father is an incredibly talented man whom I acknowledge a lot. In fact, I’m going to his performance tomorrow night."

“Thank you, I’m sure Abba would be really happy to hear that!” I smiled brightly, feeling proud of my dad like always.

I noticed a smile form on Jun's face too for once as we mentioned Abba. I swear this guy adored and admired my dad almost more than I did, but it was really cute seeing him instantly get into a better mood at the mention of him.

Jun and his father on the other hand seemed to have a normal relationship at first glance, but I could notice that there was a certain awkwardness between them. I couldn't tell what it was, but knowing that Jun had a lot of pressure due to the responsibilities that his dad placed on him I could only guess it originated from that. Honestly though, his dad was far more friendly than I had imagined. I guess it was only normal for a parent to wish for their only son to take over their position, but Jun had his own dreams that he therefore had to give up, so there was always going to be a slight tension in the air.

Jun's dad had to leave early due to something work related so he left us to continue with our meals.

"Typical." Jun said after putting a cherry tomato into his mouth, but it seemed somewhat emotionless. He was probably used to his dad leaving him to eat alone halfway through meals. I wasn't really sure what to say though, so I just continued eating too. After we finished, we headed back to Jun's room and it shocked me to find that the mess we had left behind had all been cleaned up. Jun just went straight to his game console as if he had been longing for it throughout dinner.

"Did your maids clean everything up already?" I gasped, not finding a single strand of Jun's hair on the floor.

"Yeah," Jun nodded, "I can't remember the last time I had to clean something up here."

How nice it must be to have people looking after you like this. I always felt guilty whenever Abba had to clean up or cook for me since little, and I knew he also felt the same way about not being good enough. He would apologise often to me when I was younger, especially nearer the time when Eomma had left us. He'd tell me that he was sorry that he couldn't look after me like a normal parent and that he couldn't even be a good dad, let alone make up for the lack of a mother. To me that had always been ridiculous, because I knew very well how hard Abba tried to do his best despite his illness. I understood and appreciated him being there for me day and night, and I tried to reassure him of it many times but I guess it was hard for him to accept that he could do enough for me so that I wouldn't find myself missing Eomma. Of course it couldn't be helped that I would always keep thinking of her; she'd always be a part of me. But I wasn't left with a gaping void of emptiness because I had Abba by my side and he had me.

I was walking around Jun's big room and was looking through his albums when I noticed a few folded music sheets sandwiched between two CD cases. I pulled the sheets out and gasped in excitement when I realised they were Jun's own compositions.

"Jun! Did you make these? How come you never showed me these?" I gaped at him, because I knew how talented he was when it came to music and loved hearing him sing or play instruments for me.

"That was just something I scribbled down a long time ago. They’re not so good." Jun looked away shyly, "But I improved a lot thanks to your dad."

"What about the collaboration you're doing with Abba? Are you nearly done with it?" I asked out of curiosity since these two guys didn't involve me much, just because I lacked the musical talent a bit. Or the interest in composing great music, I preferred listening to the music more than making it.

"Ahjussi called me over to work on it on Monday, since he's busy practicing for tomorrow's performance." He grinned, just barely able to contain how thrilled he was.

I nodded and smiled at the music sheets I was holding, "Play me something!"

"Aish, Minhee… No," he refused, looking awkward and hesitant as he scratched his nape.

"Please!" I insisted, until he finally gave in with a sigh.

He made his way to his keyboard beside his desk and massaged his wrists a little like he always did.

"It's not perfect yet but, here it goes." He placed his fingertips on the keys and began to play with great focus. The melody was so soft and sweet that it instantly had me in a trance and feeling like I was having a beautiful daydream. I walked to the bed and sat down on it, and I gazed at him from the back while he played on. The melody was so sweet, yet what was this feeling in my chest? This painful, suffocating ache that was choking me up with a forlorn longing as I stared at his back. I felt as though I was looking at a bright star in the far distance that I wouldn't be able to reach no matter how much I wanted to hold it. He was right in front of my eyes, but it felt like he was a thousand miles away.

The words I wanted to say to him so much—that I loved him, and that I wanted to hold onto him and never let go. I swallowed them down together with the painful lump I felt building up in my throat. And when he finished his alluring piece and turned around, I smiled. Just the way I always did when I wanted to cry. 

 

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