„Jiyong, hurry up, we need to catch the flight to Hongkong! If you don’t move your , we will miss it!“

„I get it Bae, I get it! Stop being so noisy!“

„Excuse me?! We are flying there because of you! If we miss it, you are the one who has to deal with the consequences, not me!“

„Okay, fine! I’ll hang up now so I can get ready properly, alright?“

„Finally! God dammit, you are worse than Seunghyun sometimes.“

„Yah, how dare you! Bye!“

Jiyong hung up, ending the phone call from Youngbae which had woken him from his deep slumber earlier, without waiting for his best friend’s reply as he jumped out of his bed and hurried to the bathroom to take a quick shower. He didn’t have enough time to take a full-on bath, even though that’s what he’d love to do right now. Work had gotten to him lately, the entire stress-thing made his body uncomfortably stiff and sore.

„Who would’ve thought that your hobby could wear you down that much.“ He grumbled as he stepped into the full-glass shower. „I can’t believe my uncle still says being a designer ’isn’t a real job’. Never mind, I make more money than he does.“

Listening to himself at the moment he sounded like the biggest, most self centered on mother earth. Truth to be told, though, he just simply wasn’t a morning person, especially if he was being woken up by a call from Youngbae, telling him he was late and in danger of missing the meeting regarding his new fashion line. And in Hongkong on top of that.

Actually, when he was relaxed or generally in a good mood, which was rather often, he had a soft personality. He wasn’t as outgoing as he used to be, he was more on the quiet side, at least with strangers, but that didn’t mean that he was shy. He simply learned to be modest.

Finishing his shower, he dried himself off in a hurry and realized in relief that he had packed his stuff two days ago already and was only missing the basic stuff such as his phone and charger. At least that left him enough time to get dressed and styled decently, not that it was of much importance since he’d have to do it at the hotel again when they arrived, after all he wouldn’t look that great after a flight from the US to Hongkong.

Calming down a bit, Jiyong let out a little content sigh before walking towards his walk-in closet.

What to wear? Well, he’d be on a plane for quite some time so something comfy would be good. But he also had to be cautious of possible photographers or other judging creatures. He was famous, among the fashion industry, but you never knew who’d see you and spread pictures about your apparently ugly clothes despite you being a designer. Sometimes it was a curse, so Jiyong was more than happy not to be as well known as Karl Lagerfeld, whom he was friends with by the way, ahem. Just sayin’.

„Perhaps this shi- no, that shirt, it’s really nice… and that jacket? It goes along well, the colors match perfectly. I’ll just go with regular pants I guess, I can always add jewelry.“

He took out his clothes, careful not to cause any wrinkles, and put them on before looking at himself in the mirror. Usually he needed, like, half an hour minimum to get dressed, mainly because he was always pretty much dissatisfied with his first three choices of clothes but not today. Though, maybe that’s because he had worn similar outfits on casual occasions already and right now he didn’t care as much about his appearance as people always liked to assume. If they saw him running around his apartment with his three year old sweatpants from H&M and his stained no-name shirt, they’d be surprised by how shabby he could look. And they’d judge him hard.

He put his hair up with the help of lots of hair spray and a bit of wax. In Jiyong’s opinion his black hair looked best like that. 

He had it dyed back to black after running around with first white, then red and then green hair for some time until he decided to go with a more serious look again, it fit his new fashion line, which was more mature compared to his previous ones as well.

„Done! New record!“ Jiyong yelled and pumped his fist up in victory as if he tried to prove someone wrong. „Why stressing so much, Bae? Huh?“

Now, that he had at least half an hour spare time, he plopped back onto his bed, not daring to lie down though, as he was known to fall asleep quickly.

„I feel like I forgot something…“ He thought aloud as he scratched his neck. What was it again?

For a few moments he sat there like that, thinking about what it was that he apparently didn’t think of yet, when suddenly it came to his mind.

That’s right! Youngbae’s high school photos!

That guy wanted to meet a few of his old friends and they asked him to bring them along, for whatever reason, but Youngbae couldn’t find them anymore so he asked Jiyong to look for a few.

Where did he put them again? It’s been some time since he had moved here and ever since he didn’t look for those even once.

Just like that Jiyong slipped off his bed and hurriedly searched for those damn pictures. 

! Why did he have to forget that? Why couldn’t Youngbae search for them himself to begin with?!

Suddenly, thirty minutes didn’t sound that long anymore or so he thought as he created a mess by digging through all his cabinets and closets.

„AH!“ He nearly fell backwards when he found that stupid box he knew contained his past pictures. Surely a few of Youngbae could be found in there as well.

Knowing he didn’t have that much time left to select them, he opened the lid of the box. 

And he went still that second.

Because he was greeted with the sight of something very familiar that caused his heart to tremble, even after all these years.

A stuffed toy in form of a panda.

And a patchy scarf.

Ah, the memories. 

★

It was winter and Seungri had turned eight just a few days before he told Jiyong with his all too excited voice that starting from the next day, over Christmas, he’d finally go on vacation with his entire family, though he didn’t know where to, his parents wanted to surprise him.

Jiyong had been so happy for the younger that he had treated him to some winter ice cream and he was incredibly thankful that he bought the Christmas present for Seungri earlier that year.

He had gotten him a notebook to write down all of his adventures but secretly left random notes here and there on a few pages in between. Even without knowing that, Seungri had been bursting with joy and hugged the life out of the older, who soon after received the present of the small boy as well.

It’s the scarf you wanted.

He had said proudly, his smile as radiant as always.

I hope whenever you wear it you will think of me.

Jiyong did, he did wear it until one day it became to small for his growing body and until then it had always been a reminder of that beautiful smile he used to see every day.

If he had known that the day they exchanged their gifts was the last day he’d see it, he would’ve told Seungri how much he loved him and that he only wished for his happiness. He would’ve hugged him until Seungri’s mother would’ve ripped her son out of the older’s stronger arms and he would’ve stared at his smile until he was sure it was carved into his mind for the rest of his life. 

It was anyway.

At first, during the winter holidays, Jiyong didn’t think much of Seungri’s absence, obviously, because he knew the younger has gone on vacation with his family. That didn’t stop him from missing the younger though because the only times he’d been separated from Seungri for more than a day was when his own family went somewhere, but knowing that Seungri’s family didn’t have the money, it was a special occasion for the boy.

So Jiyong decided to wait patiently, what else could he do anyway.

It got suspicious when the holidays came to an end. Jiyong didn’t know how long the trip was supposed to be but they had