“I miss you,” Myungsoo heard the small voice through his phone's speakers. 

He was sitting outside his house with a camera, taking pictures of a cat that seemed to have showed up just in time for the photo shoot (when his parents made him go outside because it was the middle of summer and it didn't make sense for him to spend so much time indoors). She was posing in a surprisingly professional manner – assuming cats did so consciously – so Myungsoo didn't even have to stand up to take good pictures of her.

The day was too hot to move about anyway. The day was too hot to speak too. The day was too hot. Full stop.

His phone had been sitting next to him on the sidewalk since it first rang a half hour before; he had to set it down so that his hands would be free to continue the ‘catography’ session. 

“I miss you too Sungjong,” he finally let out without much emotion in his voice, then clicked the camera a couple of times.

“Kim Myungsoo. Can you not put me on loudspeaker? You know I hate it when you do other things while you’re on the phone with me.” 

“What do you want me to do? Sit here and do nothing while the phone burns my ear for two hours?” 

“No. I want you to sell that camera in your hand and use the money to get a ticket for a flight back home to me.”

Sungjong probably meant it to be funny or light-hearted but Myungsoo knows the sound of his best friend's sincere voice when he hears it, and that was sincere. He hung his camera from the strap around his neck and took his phone back in his hand before standing up and dusting his pants with his free hand.

The cat wandered off almost immediately as if it had known that the session was over.

“I can't do that.” Myungsoo's voice sounded a lot softer then. “This is my home now.”

“I know… Sorry. I just miss you a lot.”

Myungsoo sighed. “It’s been two weeks.” I miss you a lot too, but he didn't say it. 

That's two weeks of loneliness for Myungsoo, having moved into a completely new neighbourhood, and thus not knowing anyone. Sungjong had it a lot better as he still had other friends. Myungsoo had lost everyone with the move, not just his best friend. 

The two boys chatted for another hour, Myungsoo keeping his old promise to Sungjong about not finding himself other activities while on the phone to him. Meanwhile, he strolled aimlessly around the new neighbourhood just staring at the ground immediately in front of his steps.

At one point he had to come to a stop because of a pair of feet, wearing bright red converse high tops, standing in his way. 

“Are you okay? Why did you get so quiet? Did you trip? See a pretty girl? Kim Myungsoo.”

“I'm... I'm fine, Sungjong.” Myungsoo let out. His eyes were fixed on the bright and happy eyes of the person in front of him, smiling a casual friendly smile. He returned the smile timidly with a mumbled apology, thinking it had been his own fault for not looking up, and continued his stroll. “What were you saying again?”

“You don't sound fine.” Sungjong told him with a suspecting voice making his statement almost sound like a question. But then there was the click and creak of a door opening, followed by sounds of loud and playful cheers coming from the background, which distracted Sungjong. “Oh. Woohyun says Hi and he misses you. He came over for drinks with Dongwoo.”

“All right. Tell them I said Hi... and Bye.”

“Bye?” 

Myungsoo glanced at the same smiley guy he'd walked past just then, who seemed to be strolling after him, following him while nodding his head along to the beat of the music he was listening to. But there was only one earphone in his ear — was this guy listening in on his phone call?

“I'll call you again tonight. Don't drink too much, okay? Bye Sungjong.” Myungsoo ended the phone call abruptly without hearing Sungjong's response, then stopped and turned around. “Why are you following me?”

The red high tops guy stopped as well and watched Myungsoo slip his phone into his pocket.

“Finally. I’ve been waiting an hour.” 

“Waiting for what?” 

“I have a favour to ask of you. Want to come with me for a while?”

 

∞

 

It was clear that Myungsoo needed a friend or two, otherwise he'd have had to spend the entire summer alone while taking photographs of cats like he did that morning. His long distance friendship with Sungjong wasn't all that easy to get used to either.

So when his neighbour showed up to offer his friendship on a silver platter, how could he say No?

Not that it was that simple though, when the older male tried to lure him in with such an odd way by saying: ‘You're Myungsoo, right? My father just told me about you, and as it happens, I'm looking for someone new to hang out with during this hot, hot summer anyway. I'm Sunggyu by the way.’

It just didn't quite do it for Myungsoo.

What did quickly pique Myungsoo's interest, however, was when Sunggyu admitted that he had been watching him during his little catography session before his dreadfully long phone call with Sungjong. He promised a more interesting place for Myungsoo to take his fantastic photographs.

Now that was a good deal.

Soon Myungsoo found himself sitting on a small set of steps between a pair of low rails in the middle of a skate park, snapping some pictures of a total, absolute beginner on a skateboard attempting a simple kick flip. Sunggyu sat by Myungsoo's side, cheering them both on with words of encouragement. “You're doing great! The pictures are fantastic! Wow. Genius. The both of you are doing so good!”

Part of Myungsoo felt a little shy about how close Sunggyu was to him, and how he gently tapped his waist from behind so as to not shake the camera in Myungsoo's hands had he grabbed onto his arms or shoulders instead. The way that Sunggyu was excited and supportive like no one Myungsoo had ever met before was half of the reason why he enjoyd it. Even Sungjong was always just his subject, and never said a lot about his actual photographs, just the ones of him. It felt nice.

Sunggyu's approval and appreciation gave Myungsoo a really warm feeling. He really liked it.

Then there was the feeling he got from Lee Howon, his subject for this session. He liked it even more.

Howon's captivating but cold eyes whenever he watched Myungsoo to see if he was still taking pictures (or maybe to check if he was laughing at his failures) and the low grunt he let out whenever he sent his skateboard flying awkwardly – well, Myungsoo found everything about this man strongly attractive, even his mess-ups. 

And he shouldn't have felt any of those feelings he felt.

Because Howon was Sunggyu's boyfriend.

 

---

 

AN: I was planning to update this chapter sooner but it didn't go as planned. I had to go over it a million times because I hated it and the increasing number of subscribers made me nervous. ha ha. Thanks for reading! <3 

Edit: I changed the entire chapter to past tense. It felt awkward in present tense! Sorry. :)