Baekhyun finds himself at the door of Taeyeon's room, uncomfortable and anxious. He fixes the backpack on his back and the scarf circling his neck before knocking, praying for the girl to be inside. It's almost 9am on a Saturday morning and most of the residents of the Oldie usually go home on the weekends. Baekhyun likes the habit; thanks to that it's even quieter and he's free to study in the library without hushes whispers interrupting him. Today is an exception. Today, he needs a helping hand to stay sane when choosing the present.

The door opens and Baekhyun lifts his head up to look at the girl now standing at the entrance. She has long, black hair with straight bangs covering her forehead. Her skin is pale, eyes almond-shaped, lashes long and lips full. She's beautiful, he has to give it to her. There's only one problem. She's not Taeyeon.

"Hi." he starts and darts his eyes to look past her silhouette in search for the one he's looking for. "Is Taeyeon here?" The man at the reception gave him the number of the room, it can't be wrong. 

The girl gives him a nod and wow, her eye smile is really no joke. "She's in the bathroom, you can wait inside." she moves a bit to let him in.

The room smells like vanilla-scented candles and is way brighter than his own. The steel bunkbed is standing in one corner and has its frame wrapped in christams lights; even though they're turned off now, they give off a cute, homey and girly vibe. A white, fluffy rug is placed right next to it and Baekhyun wonders is it's even practical to have one that is white, wouldn't it get dirty fast? He lets his eyes slide against the furniture of the room, the same as the one in his room, but decorated with flower-shaped stickers; delicate lines dance around one another, creating exquisite flower petals and stalks. He finds four more stickers on the window, one in each corner, making it seem as if the vine is trying to creep its way to the center of the glass. Baekhyun finds it charming. 

"You're Byun Baekhyun, aren't you?" she asks from behind him and Baekhyun turns around to smile at her.

"Yeah."

She looks down, bashful, and plays with her fingers for a sencond (nails white and covered in a few crystals, he wonders is she's not uncomfortable with those stcking out) before she looks back at him, pouting.

"You've heard us the other day talking abuot you, I'm really sorry for that. We didn't mean any harm, I promise." she says, clearly embarrassed. She should be, Baekhyun thinks.

"I'm not mad or anything" he assures. "I've figured people'd talk if they knew me and Chanyeol have a thing."

The girl seems to get the wrong idea as she starts waving her hands in front of her body and blushing.

"We're not jealous of you two! I mean, it was quite a shock for everyone when the news of Park Chanyeol dating another boy spread out, he was never interested in those things. But I personally think you two look good together "It's Baekhyun's turn to blush. "and I hope you'll last a long time." she hurries with explanations.

"It's okay..." he pauses, not knowing her name. 

"I'm Stephanie, but everyone here calls me Tiffany." she introduces herself and Baekhyun notices the way her foreign name easily rolls off her tongue. "I'm from the States, but my family moved to Seoul when I was sixteen." That explains her good Korean.

"It's okay Stehapnie. It was a shock for me too, to be honest."

The bathroom door opens and Taeyeon is standing there, cream, long-sleeved dress hugging her body. She looks at Baekhyun with surprised eyes.

"Baekhyun, hi."

He remembers why he's here and approaches her with pleading eyes.

"I need your help."

They walk around the mall, eyeing the shops and boutiques. Baekhyun looks at his watch every 10 minutes, feeling the pressure increaing, and whines inwardly. The girls next to him (Stephanie ended up tagging along, but he doesn't mind) chat constatnly, but Baekhyun doesn't pay enough attention to them to know what they're talking about.

The mall is big and spacious; wide hallways writhe between countsless stores, wooden benches and inviting purple airmchairs placed every now and then alternated with African Blue Basils and Adam's Needles growing freely in brown pots. The shopwindows are decorated with christmas lights already, but Baekhyun doesn't stop and stare at cute reindeers and Santa Clauses, too focused on finding something for Chanyeol. He only glances at endless starts and innumerable Christmas trees, letting the girl do all the fangirling for him.

"So you've said that Chanyeol likes drawing. Maybe buy him a new sketchbook and decorate the cover by yourself?" Stephanie offers, leaning into his vision from her place on his right.

Baekhyun burrows his nose in his gray skarf and murmurs something about not having enough time (he decided not to mention his lack of any artistic skills).

"How about a set of pencils? You said he likes sketching the best." Taeyeon proposes from his left.

"He probably had those already. He said something about needing to buy one last month." Taeyeon nodds and looks forward again, thinking of something else. 

Baekhyun lets out a huff and shoves his hands into the pockets of his ped coat. He's starting to lose hope, when a particuar shop at the end of the hallway catches his attention. It's rather small in comparison to the stores they've been passing next to for the last half an hour. A picture of a boy in a red coat, his face blurred, hands hanging comfortablydown his body stares at him from the shopwindow. What Baekhyun is interested in, however, is the gray wolf standing alongside with the boy, composed but attentive; almost-white ears pointed upwards, listening. The field surrounding them is emptied of people, the gray sky visible at theupper side o the photograpy heavy and bare. The store's logo is supended over the back-rimmed entrace; it's a pencil and a blasketball bat crossed over one another, creating an X letter, with four letters filling the spaces between the lines. BWCW. Boy Who Cried Wolf, Baekhyun reads the name of the shop placed under the logo. 

"Let's go there." he says absentmindly, pointing at the store.

Baekhyun thinks about his wolf while looking at the gray one presented on the picture in the shop. He wonders if it's fine, if it's safe with it's friends. He remembers the wolf's eyes, brown and understanding, soft and tired but also affectionate, just like...

Just like Chanyeol's.

Baekhyun halts his steps, eyes still locked on the wolf.

His wolf's eyes are just like Chanyeol's. The way Chanyeol's eyes darken when he's sleepy or angry, the way his wolf looked at him when it saw Baekhyun for the first time and the seconds before it fell asleep on Baekhyun's lap. Chanyeol's grateful glance when Baekhyun passes him his soda during lunch, the wolf's thankful stare when they were parting. It's the same, eveything is the same.

"Baekhyun?"

Taeyeon's voice brings him back to earth and he smiles sheepishly, pushing his thoughs for later and entering the store.

They leave fifteen minutes later, a bag with a white snapback, the red Boy Who Cried Wolf logo decorating the front, in his hand. Stephanie assures him he chose well (she chose it). Baekhyun thanks both of them for their help with a smile, but his mind is elsewhere.

He sets the snapback back into it's box after cutting off the price tag. He thows himself onto his bed without closing the box and closes his eyes. He can hear the person in the room next to his taking a shower, water running and drowining the faint humming. The beat of a popular pop song echoes through the walls of the building, it's probably the guy living in the room above his again. He tires to focus on the familiar rhythm, but fails after a few moments.

How is it possible for Chanyeol to have eyes so similar to the ones of his wolf? Baekhyun can swear they're almost identical. He thinks of the growl Chanyeol let out when he found Baekhyun with Donghan and mentally compares it to the sound his wolf made to scare him off. They're nearly the same; dangerous and alarming. It's not the same when Chanyeol growls at him playfully, still low but not threatening. 

Chanyeol's hearing is better than Baekhyun's, way better. He hears the quietest of whispers Baekhyun lets out, not matter if they're in Baekhyun's room, silent libaray of crowded and rowdy cafeteria, sitting on the opposite sides of the table. He senses Baekhyun's emotions, notices the slightest changes in his mood better than anyone else. He-

His phone interrupts his thoughts, a silent beep signaling that he received a text.

Baekhyun lifts his hips off the bed to fish his phone out of his back pocket and sees it's a message from