The clock struck one when Chanyeol and Eunji arrived in the lobby of the latter’s apartment building lobby; he was restless, eager to be invited over, whilst she was terribly weary from the day. Chanyeol pressed the elevator button, its light illuminated under the skin of his thumb. “You don’t have to walk me ‘till my door,” Eunji told him while offering a faint smile.

He was only about to open his mouth when the sentence brought him back just a week ago where only his second meeting with her occurred. A picture of Sooyoung saying the words to him evoked him to give her a call as he hadn’t for the whole day

“Please, let me do.” A smile, just a normal genuine and warm smile, was returned from Chanyeol. So they entered the elevator consecutively—the lady first, of course. Eunji pressed 7 and they rode upstairs where her home was.

His eyes trailed Eunji, watching her every movement, watching how the weariness was eating her up so she can’t help but leaned against the cold metal lining, and he fought the urge to pull her into his embrace and let her rest there instead.

The walk to the door was silent, but not the tiniest bit awkward, so Chanyeol enjoyed the serenity of the empty corridor in the middle of the night, the sound of their shoes against the marble floor and only with their breaths as the companion, and being beside Eunji though not doing anything. Also, it was what Eunji needed to loosen herself up after a tiring end of the day.

It was only until they came to a halt in front of someone else—who actually had been in front of Eunji’s door for quite awhile now—did Chanyeol realized Eunji went from being fatigued and frail to being completely on her guard.

The person, the man, looked familiar in Chanyeol’s eyes, but he couldn’t quite refer him with a name; he could have sworn he had seen that face a zillion times already. He exchanged glances with Eunji, and Chanyeol was able to see they were familiar with one another. The girl turned to face Chanyeol and said, “Thank you. You can leave now.”

“You sure you’re all good?” Chanyeol asked, not sure if the man was not a threat from the look he had on his face.

“I am.” She firmly nodded to assure him that she was and that it was best for him to quickly leave the scene. To respect her privacy and all, Chanyeol gave in and eventually nodded. “I’ll see you soon!” Then he started to make his way to the elevator. The door on the side which they used to ride up earlier opened subsequent to him pressing the button.

Just before he stepped inside, he took one last glance to his side to check on Eunji and the not-so-unfamiliar man. ‘Who could he be?’

-

Chanyeol took Sooyoung out on a date the next afternoon as it was his obligation as her boyfriend. The girl couldn’t stop telling him the recap of her week and he had to fix an expression that would assure her he was indeed listening though not. She sat beside the window at the bus whilst Chanyeol was on the outer one. His eyes drifted away from her and then to the driver of the bus and then to the floor and then at Sooyoung’s lap where her iPod was.

“Who are you listening to?” He just had to ask her something else or she won’t stop talking about her two classmates who were going to debut later that year.

“Oh? This?” Sooyoung showed Chanyeol the album artwork of the song, a finely edited picture of the singer guy on the right with his name and album name on the left. “This is Kim Sungkyu. Don’t you know him? He’s really popular, oppa.”

“If he is that popular then I would have known him,” Chanyeol said. Then his gaze drifted away again from her. ‘Wait.’ His head turned at Sooyoung again who was scrolling through her song list. ‘Hold on.’ “Can I see the song cover again?”

“Sure.” Sooyoung changed back to Sungkyu’s song and handed Chanyeol her device.

Chanyeol ignored what she said and asked, “This,” while pointing to the picture, “Is Kim Sungkyu?”

Sooyoung raised an eyebrow. “Yeah. What’s the big deal?”

“Just . . .” Chanyeol slowly returned the iPod to its owner but not even one second sparing his eyes from the screen, “Just wondering . . .”

“What’s wrong?” She was still curious as to why Chanyeol had that look after seeing the idol’s face.

“Well, I . . . just wanted to know how the person every girl in the country is going crazy about looks like,” Chanyeol told her. He couldn’t count how many times had he lied to her since they started the relationship.

“He’s not that good-looking, oppa, don’t worry.” But of course, that wasn’t the problem. “You’re more handsome than he is. I like you more.” Chanyeol turned to look at her and smiled.

As the wheel of the bus kept rolling, Chanyeol’s mind kept on wondering why a top idol would be at Eunji’s doorstep in the middle of the night. ‘Could it be that . . . they know each other well?’ They had to. Otherwise, why would he be there last night, right?

-

They were waiting for their food order to come in one of the many restaurants in Myeongdong, a place Chanyeol often visited when he wanted to go sight-seeing. The slow song that flowed out from the speakers on the ceiling was causing him to go deeper into his thoughts. Only until Sooyoung spoke that he came back to the surface of his consciousness. “I’m going to the bathroom, okay?” she told him as she stood up from her seat.

“Okay,” he answered her. When she was gone, he picked his phone out and entered the keyword ‘Kim Sungkyu,’ in which the first result was his basic profile. The fact that he was actually 3 years older than him was not easy for Chanyeol to digest. “He looks rather young to me,” he muttered. Recent news regarding Kim Sungkyu was shown on Chanyeol’s screen when he scrolled just a little downward.

‘Sungkyu revealed that he dated recently,’ wasn’t that much of an answer to Chanyeol’s questions so he scrolled passed it and went to read the next headline. ‘Sungkyu tells us about his songs inspiration,’ didn’t seem to appeal to him either. His eyes went frozen on the news which the next headline read, ‘Sungkyu’s recent ex-girlfriend is a Busan girl.’

‘Nah,’ Chanyeol thought. ‘Busan girl could be anyone.’ Though saying so, he went to check the article out nonetheless.