It’s two a.m. on a Wednesday. Kyungsoo sits at her desk staring at the blinking line in the empty document until her eyes go cross and her vision blurs. Gah! She takes off her glasses and shakes her head so hard, strands of black hair fly away from her top bun and into her face. A big huff of air out of her plump lips blows them away some more.

“I’m never getting this done on time,” Kyungsoo murmurs to herself. 

This is her thesis, and because she’s in a creative writing program, the thesis is actually a novel. A full eighty-thousand-word book in the genre of her choosing—science fiction. Every time Kyungsoo let that sink in, a ball of cold formed in her stomach, like a pint of undigested ice cream after a night of wallowing in misery, leaving her slightly nauseous.

Kyungsoo shivers and looks away from the computer screen. Except for the soft snores of Halo—her black Pug—the apartment is dark and silent around her. The neighbors on this side of the building have always been nice and quiet people, and since she closes all the windows at night to keep the cold away, the noises that come from outside are muted at best.

Checking the screen again and ignoring the painfully blank page, she focuses on the wordcount at the bottom of the window. It says forty-nine thousand three-hundred and twenty-nine. It’s a little over half of what she needs by the end of this final year. Which, considering all things, is good. The problem is the wordcount isn’t going up fast enough. 

And that is unacceptable.

And terrifying.

And stressful.

It’s a semi-writer’s block. Kyungsoo has gone through them before, but it that she had to get one during her final year. The thesis is all the work she needs to do, aside from a few meetings with her writing mentors, before her final reading and presentation. Mentors who will ask to see progress where there is barely any.

All these things have lead to Kyungsoo becoming a zombie night-owl with just one friend (the best), no boyfriend or girlfriend (no time), and a lowered hygienic standard. Why wash her hair or change her clothes when no one will see her? Pjs are good to use for a few days anyways. 

Instead of staring at the screen some more, Kyungsoo gets up from her desk chair and heads to the kitchen. Over the years, she’s developed a few methods to get her writing even when inspiration and motivation are running low. The first thing to try when she can’t write is to make some Chamomile tea. It helps soothe her anxiety after staring at a blank page for too long and the motions of making the tea itself will sometimes spark an idea. 

Yet tonight, it doesn’t work.

The second thing to try is to clean, but when Kyungsoo looks around for some area to terrorize with foul-smelling cleaning liquids and a scrub, she is met with sparkling countertops, shinny floors, and pristine windows. After weeks of these nightly routines, there’s really nothing left to clean in her small apartment.

Kyungsoo rolls her eyes and goes back into her room. The third thing to do when all else fails is to take a walk. She grabs her soft and worn hoodie, shrugs it on, and zips it all the way up. There’s only one Chewbacca slipper under her bed, so she goes around to where Halo’s sleeping basket is and slides the other from under his . 

Halo used to wake up and make a fuss when Kyungsoo first started going out at this hour, but the pug is so used to it now that he gives Kyungsoo’s hand a sleepy when she pets his head.

Grabbing her keys, her phone, and her mini-taser, Kyungsoo heads out. The night is a lot livelier outside. The sounds of cars far off in the distance, the lights of the university setting the night aglow a few blocks away, and of course, the rowdy ambiance on the other side of the C-shaped building where she lives. 

Sometimes, when Kyungsoo is feeling brave, she heads over there. It’s where her (only) friend Kris lives. The guy is like an intimidating, flesh-and-bones Gundam suit, all sharp angles and long lines beside her tiny, curvaceous form. But though he looks like a robotic weapon of mass destruction, he’s the sweetest, most loving carebear inside. It’s the middle of the week, so he’s probably cuddling the out of his boyfriend right now, who uses the weekends to return to his hometown.

Kyungsoo doesn’t feel like interrupting them or facing any uni people in the hallways anyways, so she heads downstairs. There’s a shop around the corner which works twenty-four seven and she often finds herself stuffing her face full of ramen or chips or…really, whatever she’s craving that day. Yixing, the night manager, has even started a tab for her, so she doesn’t have “to carry around any money at this hour, pretty lady. It’s not safe.”

Today it’s pretzel M&Ms that she’s craving. Kyungsoo grabs two bags, a can of orange soda, gets it written on her tab, and heads to the benches outside. It was raining earlier, so the seats are all wet. 

There’s one closest to the shop’s awning that should be dry, but when she goes around to sit, there’s a dark figure waiting. Kyungsoo startles so badly, her soda splashes around her hand and she has to pull it away from her body fast, splashing it even more. Great.

Kyungsoo surveys the mess on her pjs—it was time to change out of them anyways—and then looks back up.

A guy is fast asleep on the bench.

A clean-shaven, fluffy haired, tanned guy with one arm over his eyes and his mouth slightly open. He’s wearing a red-plaid bomber jacket and dark jeans. His gray sneakers hang off the edge of the bench, but otherwise the guy seems pretty comfortable lying there.

Kyungsoo spends a full minute or two observing him, watching the way his broad chest rises and falls with each of his soft breaths. Temperature rises in her cheeks and she snaps out of it, looking away. Dammit. There’s really nowhere else to sit that’s not wet. So, she clears loudly hoping the guy wakes, but it’s no good. She does it again. He doesn’t even stir.

A growl rumbles in . This is her routine. She cannot just go back to the apartment. She needs to sit and unwind and gorge on M&Ms before she can write, and no guy is going to stop her from her goal.

She shoves the M&Ms in the pocket of her hoodie, and grabs the taser on the other hand, keeping it inside the pocket. The guy doesn’t look dangerous, but looks can be deceiving. “Excuse me.”

No answer.

“Hey, you!” She kicks the bench.

The guy springs up, scaring the crap out of her (again). She almost turns the taser on. He flails his arms and his head jerks everywhere trying to find the source of whatever woke him. When he finally spots her, he calms down, blinks slowly and rubs his eyes. “Hi?”

“Yes,” Kyungsoo says, keeping her taser in check. “Hi. You’re hogging the only dry bench.”

“I was sleeping.” His voice is deep, or maybe it’s the lingering grogginess from sleep. Either way, it’s nice and warm, and why the hell is she focusing on it?

“I noticed,” she says.

“You woke me.”

Kyungsoo nods. “Clever boy.”

The guy sighs heavily and then moves over. He settles his arms on the bench table, gives her one last look, and then sinks his head into the arm-circle he’s made.

Very slowly, Kyungsoo lets go of the taser and after a minute the guy’s breaths even out. Huh. So, he went back to sleep. Kyungsoo takes the very edge of the bench, pops her soda can open, and gets to demolishing her two M&Ms bags. The guy doesn’t stir while she’s there, not even when she gets up to leave and bangs her knee against the bench and explodes in a firework display of curses that would make Kris faint.

Kyungsoo returns to her apartment that night ready to dive into writing. It goes incredibly smooth, even with part of her brain replaying her encounter that night.

~💞~

It’s twelve a.m. on a Friday. The other side of the building is bursting with color and light, and—since she had to change pajamas and shower—Kyungsoo is not opposed to doing a quick walk over there to explore. She sometimes does this and calls it ‘field recon’ for her writing.

“I’m going out, Halo,” Kyungsoo says to her pug as she slides on her most comfortable jeans. She keeps on the sports bra and simply puts on a hoodie.

Halo barks from his sleep basket, clearly disapproving of her choice.

“What?” she asks him. “I’m not about to submit my tatas to the torture of wired-bra at this hour.”

Halo does not look impressed, but he lowers his head and keeps staring at her.

Turning her back on his judgmental , Kyungsoo surveys her appearance. It’s not that bad, just extremely casual. “I’m just going to see Kris. Pretty sure he doesn’t care about my s or any other s for that matter.”

She shoves her feet into some old-but-still-decent canvas shoes that Halo tries to bite away from her. Then she lets down her hair, checks in the mirror, and decides to pull it back up into a messy ponytail. One last fix of her bangs, a quick belly rub for Halo, and she’s ready to go.

The great thing about the building is that you can go from one side to the other using the long hallway balconies on each floor. It’s all interconnected. So Kyungsoo only has to go up one level, and then walk to the other side where Kris’s apartment is.

The change is more than noticeable from her hallway to the next. Over here, doors are adorned with posters and mini-whiteboards where students leave messages—sometimes nice, sometimes obscene—and there are doors wide open with music dripping out and people flitting around the spaces at leisure. There are groups and couples and singles, all unwinding from the stress of another long week at uni. Kris’s boyfriend once described this side of the building as “a nightly den of debauchery and socialization, better than a bar since the booze is free and shared.”

Kyungsoo makes her way past everyone, her head down and eyes focused on where she’s going. Up ahead, she recognizes the tall figure with ash-blonde hair obsessively styled for more than an hour to look messy —she’d timed him once—and waves her hand in greeting.

Kris mouth splits into a wide and welcoming grin. “Hey, gorgeous! What brings you over?”

The music and noise coming from inside his apartment is way too loud, so she motions for him to lean down so she can speak into his ear. “Clearing my head with some ambiance noise.”

He laughs, a booming sound that has Kyungsoo jerking away before her eardrums bleed even more. “Don’t know how well that’ll work with all this chaos! Someone brought a karaoke machine!”

“That explains it,” she mutters.

“What?” Kris yells.

“I said, that explains this mess!”

“Yeah!” he says, pretty excited. “Hey, do you want a drink?”

“I’m fine!”

Kris frowns. “Wine? I don’t know if I have any. Let me look!”

Before Kyungsoo can grab his arm and stop him from leaving, Kris is gone. She stays by his door, nodding to people who nod at her, some she recognizes from her past classes and others she’s seen around campus. She feels ridiculous standing there, like she’s some sort of guard to Kris’s apartment.

Kyungsoo’s anxiety is just about reaching dangerous levels, and she is about to leave when Kris returns with a glass of wine in hand.

“Found some!” Kris says. “Jongdae had it stashed away so no one would finish it off tonight.”

It’s clear, with a faint rosy tint to it, and when Kyungsoo takes a sip, it tastes like strawberry. “Very…fruity.”

Kris wiggles his brows. “Yes, I am.”

Kyungsoo slaps his hip, making Kris dance away and outside to the hallway. She takes another sip and glances inside. There are guys and girls all over—dancing, sitting on the old navy couches, standing by the kitchen counters. Way too many people for her comfort zone.

“Where is your boyfriend?” she asks.

Kris leans against the wall beside her and it’s nice that he knows her well enough not to push her to come inside. “Dae has a big presentation coming up, so I told him to leave this afternoon, get some real rest back home, and start early tomorrow on the project. I told him if he finished the project by Sunday we could skip Monday and have a full spa day.” 

“Aw, you’re so domestic it makes me wanna puke rainbows.”

“I’m in love, so sue me.” Kris says, without an ounce of embarrassment or any hesitation. 

Kyungsoo isn’t sure she could ever say those words like that; she isn’t sure she could say those words at all. Of course, she’s been in relationships before, but none of them ever felt real enough or deep enough for a declaration of love. Maybe it’s just her that never feels connected to anyone. She takes a deeper sip of the fruity wine and it goes down fizzling.

They stay outside watching students move along the hallway and chatting for a while. Kris finds her story about the guy sleeping on the bench hilarious. And she listens to him complain about a few classmates.

It’s two a.m. when Kyungsoo finishes her fruity wine with one last sad sip and checks her phone. “Gotta head back.”

Kris grabs the now empty cup of wine and asks, “How’s the book coming?”

Kyungsoo pouts.

“I know, I know,” Kris says, waving the cup in the air. “I’m not supposed to ask unless you have a pizza and beer in hand to drive away the panic.”

“Exactly.” She tightens her ponytail and then shoves her cold hands into the pockets of her hoodie.

Kris tilts his head. “I did just give you fruity wine. Doesn’t that count?”

Kyungsoo sighs. “I’m doing fine. It’s fine. A little behind, but…fine.”

“That bad, huh?” Kris says, though he seems distracted by something down the hall.

“You’re being mean. I’m leaving.”

“No, wait!” Kris thumps one of his big hands over her head and holds her steady. Kyungsoo hates when he does it. Kris yells at someone, “Hey, Jongin! Come over here.”

Kyungsoo hisses. What is Kris doing? Now is not the time to meet anyone! She slaps his hand away.

Kris glances down at her with hurt in his eyes, and a slight pout.

Kyungsoo glares harder. He was insane if he thought he was getting off easy from this one. She cools it for now and goes through a mental checklist, because there’s a figure fast approaching and she needs to know how bad it’ll be. 

Showered that afternoon? Check. 

Used deodorant? Check. 

Put on clean clothes (not just used-but-still smelling-okay ones)? Check.

Brushed her hair?…Sort of. 

“Jongin!” Kris says, wrapping an arm around a tall guy’s shoulders and then dragging him in front of Kyungsoo. “Jongin, this is the writer I told you about. Kyungsoo. Soo, this is my new neighbor and friend, Jongin.”

If Kyungsoo still had wine in her cup and taken a sip of it she would’ve spewed it all over Jongin’s red-plaid bomber jacket. Yep. He had to be the guy from the bench. He’s looking at her now with small tremble to his lips, probably holding back a smile and waiting for her to say something.

Kyungsoo looks at Kris and points to Jongin. “Kris, meet Bench Guy.”

Jongin’s mouth drops. “That’s what you’ve been calling me?”

Kris laughs way too loud as he slaps Jongin’s back. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Crossing her arms, Kyungsoo smiles her not-even-close-to-nice smile. “You never gave me your name.”

“I shared my bench with you,” Jongin says, looking flustered. “The least you could’ve done is given me a mysterious name like ‘the handsome stranger’ or something.”

Kyungsoo rolls her eyes, because men and their egos.

Kris is still struggling to breathe right again. He wipes his mirth tears away. “When you told me you’d found a solution and had been sleeping around, I thought…I thought—” He bursts out laughing again.

“It’s not funny!” Jongin kicks Kris’s shin, but the taller man reacts like he barely feels it. “I’m practically homeless at night and you’re laughing.” And the guy does look miserable as he says this.

“Kris, come on,” Kyungsoo says, whapping his arm to get him to stop. “It’s really not that funny.”

“Sorry, sorry. It’s just that,” Kris shakes his head as if to clear it, “Poor Jongin here lives with Baekhyun. Remember Baekhyun?”

“Is that the loudmouth you keep telling me about?” Kyungsoo asks. “The one who lives on the third floor and likes to—”

“Sing at night. Yes.” Kris grabs her shoulders, turns her around, and points over her shoulder inside his apartment. “Baekhyun.”

A guy with jet-black hair is climbing onto the wobbly table that serves as kitchen island. Once he manages that feat, he opens his mouth and starts drunkenly singing at the top of his lungs in perfect pitch. It’s a circus-worthy feat.

“Ah. I see.” Kyungsoo says glancing back at Jongin. “Music major?”

Jongin nods, his shoulders drooping even more as if the confirmation of this fact physically hurts. He looks tired, with bruising shadows underneath his eyes and slight stubble across his chin—though this last detail adds a bit to his charm.

For a second, Kyungsoo feels kinda bad for waking him up so roughly the other night. Then she remembers how he’d kept on sleeping, allowing her more time to study his features and be oddly comforted by his soft snores while she relaxed and ate M&Ms. Heat quickly gathers in her cheeks for no good reason at all, and her heart it’s doing this racing thing that she has not approved for it to do. It’s time to make her escape.

“That really , but don’t sleep around, Jongin,” Kyungsoo says as she starts to move away. “It’s bad for your health.”

Kris bursts out laughing again.

And Jongin stands there, not frowning, not sleepy and tired, but smiling brilliantly at her.

Kyungsoo returns to her apartment. She makes a mental note of never going to the other side without a real bra on, as she puts on her pjs. She grabs her glasses and then dives into writing. It’s fast and fiery and explosive and focused, even with part of her brain replaying Jongin’s smile over and over and over.

~💞~

It’s two a.m. on a Sunday. She’s down to plan three again, but instead of taking a walk, she decides to tackle the overflowing hamper in the corner of her room. 

Kyungsoo grabs her laundry basket and heads down to the basement level where the laundry room is. She’s wearing her fave Harry Potter pjs, which means they are faded and have probably a hole or three. The pants are grey with all the house shields floating about, and the shirt has the Hogwarts castle silhouette. She’s still wearing the Chewbacca slippers though. Who cares if they don’t match? They’re cool.

The room is brightly lit and empty except for all the machines. It’s surprising to find a couple of them working at that hour, still cleaning whatever clothes her neighbors threw in them. Perhaps someone unable to sleep and trying to be productive like her. The washers are all in a row in the middle of the room, while the sidewalls hold the dryers, and the far wall has a couple of sinks for hand washing. 

Setting her basket on top of a washer, Kyungsoo opens up the one beside it with a clatter. She’s sorting through her clothes, getting the pieces detangled from one another and spread out inside the tumbler, when...

“Kyungsoo?”

“Kyaaa!” Her scream blasts across the basement space. Clothes fly out of her hands as she backs away from where the voice came, and her back hits the dryers behind her. She raises her fists ready for a fight, even with all her hair in her face, and faces the intruder. Breath catches in with a little squeak.

“I’m sorry,” Jongin says, trying hard not to smile. He rises to a full standing from where he was behind the washer. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

Kyungsoo lets out a big breath, her nerves still frayed. “What the hell are you doing?” Her tone is slightly hysterical, and her heart is about to beat itself right out of her chest.

“Um, my laundry?” He rubs his always-sleepy eyes. The sleeves of his red hoodie are too long, covering part of his hands and making him look like a child. “I was taking a nap on the floor when I heard you.”

“A nap.”

“Yes.”

“In the laundry room.”

“Well,” he runs a hand through his ridiculously fluffy hair, “I didn’t want to risk getting kicked out of a bench again.”

Kyungsoo huffs and lowers her fists. Fixing her unbrushed hair back behind her ears, she glances at the floor where the clothes fell. She wants to scream again. Her dirty pjs and —her superhero, Hello Kitty, and quotes —are all over the floor. She kneels and starts picking them up quickly, rolling them into a ball.

She rises and dumps it all into the washer.

“Um.”

Kyungsoo looks up and finds Jongin has one of her pinched between two fingers, the purple ones that say ‘I solemnly swear that I’m up to no good’ across the back. They must’ve fallen towards the back when she freaked.

“Cute,” he says.

Ripping the undies from his hand, Kyungsoo shoves them inside the washer with the rest of her clothes, then slams the lid close. 

“Are you always so violent at this hour?” Jongin asks.

She glares at him. “I’m violent at all hours.”

Jongin chuckles. And it’s nice and cute, and nope, she is not gonna smile back. He’s suddenly climbing over the washer and moving her basket aside to take its place. He grips the edge and bounces his feet a bit as he focuses on her again. “So, what is it with you and two in the morning? Do you also have a music major as roommate?”

“Nope. And if I had I would kick them out, and not wander around and sleep in odd places.” As soon as the words are out, Kyungsoo realizes how rude they are. She’s basically calling him a wimp. Ugh. Okay, so maybe she was being extremely violent with him.

Jongin simply laughs. “Yeah, it’s hard to imagine you taking crap from anyone. So, what’s your excuse then?”

Kyungsoo huffs. She focuses on inserting the correct change into the washer and pressing the start button. “I write better at night.”

“But you’re not writing right now,” Jongin says tilting his head just like a baby bird would and drumming his fingers lightly on the edge of the washer. Was the