Baekhyun is a boring person. He is ordinary; nothing about him stands out in particular. He has decent grades, a couple of friends to survive the hell that is high school, and a few insignificant crushes. Baekhyun is not inconspicuous, and he does not aim to be one, but he definitely prefers little attention on him, so you can say he is rather contented with his life.

However, Baekhyun is an odd individual with a peculiar hobby, which is collecting smells. He has an extraordinarily adept sense of smell, which explains his love for things that please his olfactory senses. Kyungsoo, his friend, likes to call him a dog, which he would playfully retaliate with, “You’re the dog! I’m such a cute puppy.” Baekhyun has a huge collection that he is proud of, all contained in a transparent glass bottle with the name of item pasted on it. Orange peel, cinnamon stick, amber pine, you name it, he has it. He would take a sniff of the scents every night before his slept, which he claims to be soothing. His dream is to be a world-class perfumer, to be surrounded by the different and vast collection of fragrance as he carefully curates a perfume that would intoxicate everyone in the world (especially his crush). It seems like a dumb ambition to many, but he holds firm to his dream, which Kyungsoo begrudgingly agrees is commendable.

“Soo! I have a new item in my collection!”

“What?” Kyungsoo asked, not looking up from his math homework. Baekhyun adds something to his collection at least once a week, so it was nothing new to him. Last week, Baekhyun added a tissue branded exodus to his collection because "it has wafts of fresh pines and vanilla", which Kyungsoo sniffed and deadpanned that it smelt like any other tissue paper in the market.

“Look at this flower! I found this at the park near my house! I have yet to identify the flower, but this flower has scents of lemon and mint! I think I can even smell some plywood from it!” Baekhyun rambled on as he dug his hand into his coat pocket to bring out a small pale yellow flower. Kyungsoo did not even bother taking a whiff, for he knew that the flower would just smell like nothingness to him, despite it having such a complex texture of scent to Baekhyun.

“That’s interesting…” Kyungsoo commented apathetically after taking a glance at the flower, before returning back to his math assignment.  “Are you ever going to start on your homework?”

Baekhyun rolled his eyes at his statement before letting out a dramatic sigh and taking out his homework. “What a nerd,” Baekhyun muttered, only to get his foot stomped by Kyungsoo.

After an hour, they were finally done with their math assignment and Baekhyun could not be any more relieved to be out of the stuffy library full of sweat stench.

“Jeez, the school can’t even afford to repair the leaking air-con,” Baekhyun complained while Kyungsoo nodded in agreement. The pair of friends had such polar opposite personalities that many questioned the authenticity of their friendship; Baekhyun was loud and annoying, while Kyungsoo quiet and intimidating. However, precisely because they had such different personalities, that they complement each other well, allowing Baekhyun to speak as much as he wants while Kyungsoo listening intently and occasionally responding to Baekhyun’s rambling.

Baekhyun continued to ramble about the school until he walked past a certain stranger. He halted his steps and froze on the spot, causing Kyungsoo to stop suddenly. Kyungsoo gave him a queer look and urged for Baekhyun to continue moving.

“Wait!” Baekhyun exclaimed, “That smells like heaven!”  By then, Kyungsoo was full out judging Baekhyun.

“What again?” Kyungsoo ask, tired of Baekhyun’s odd antics.

“Him! His cologne! That cologne is the best thing I’ve smelt for the whole of my 17 years of life!” Baekhyun squawked, clearly intoxicated by the waft that plagued his nostrils just now.

“Oh, he’s Chanyeol,” Kyungsoo whispered hurriedly as his tried to dragged an astonished Baekhyun away from the crowded hallway. “Stop being such an embarrassment and save me some face!” Kyungsoo squeaked as Baekhyun finally realised the commotion he has made.

“Chanyeol?” Baekhyun remarked thoughtfully. The name sounded oddly familiar, despite him being sure that he has not seen nor smelt the person before. “What class is he from? Why does his anme sound so familiar?” Upon hearing this, Kyungsoo could only shake his head in disbelief.

“He is from our English, AP biology and AP math class, you !” Kyungsoo chided while Baekhyun tried to search for any recollection of such person. “Chanyeol? Chanyeol?” Baekhyun seemed to vaguely remember such a name being called during rowcall, but he could not put a face to the man. “Oh, and additional fact, he shares the same group of friend as Oh Sehun.”

“Oh Sehun?!” Baekhyun squawked inaudibly, excited at the mention of his crush. Sehun, the vice president of contemporary dance team, has captured Baekhyun’s heart since Baekhyun saw Sehun’s first ever dance performance.

 Suddenly, something clicked in his brain and he seemed to recall such a guy with a baby face by the name Park Chanyeol who was often spotted with Sehun and was also taller than 180cm. “Ahh, that Park Chanyeol, the drummer of the school band, right?” Baekhyun confirmed, and Kyungsoo could only shake his head tiredly. Baekhyun knows nothing except for his scent collection and Oh Sehun, Baekhyun is a complete hopeless case.

That night, Baekhyun was ridiculously happy as he took a sniff of all the different scents, letting the different fragrance take over him. Reminiscing the smell of Chanyeol’s cologne, Baekhyun fell asleep fast

 “Kyungsoo Kyungsoo KYUNGSOO!” Baekhyun screamed as he plopped down onto an empty seat next to Kyungsoo in their shared history class. “I need to know what cologne he is using! I have analysed the smell last night and I think it has hints of vanilla, lavender and amber! I love love LOVE it!” Baekhyun continued to exclaim while Kyungsoo could only hide his head in shame after failed attempts of hushing Baekhyun.

“Jesus, won’t you keep your volume down! You are like a walking megaphone!” Baekhyun let out a cheeky smile that seemed to convey his apology. “So what are you planning to do? Just ask him!”

Baekhyun scrunched up his face and seemed to disagree with the plan. “I can’t…” Baekhyun sighed, “He is in the same clique as Oh Sehun! Imagine if I asked him for his cologne brand and he thinks I’m a weirdo and tells his friends about me and Sehun will have such a horrible impression of me and we will never ever get together even if I make the most enchanting perfume in the future and that’s depressing.” Baekhyun rambled off, his face contorted with visible disappointment. 

“I think you are thinking too much into the issue but fine by me. Just don’t come complaining about how you desperately want to know the brand of cologne.” Kyungsoo turned back to his history textbook, leaving Baekhyun to contemplate about his following plan. If he could not ask Chanyeol directly about his brand, maybe he could find it at the perfume shop in the mall! However, he would have to take another whiff of Chanyeol’s perfume again, to reinforce his memory of the smell of the cologne so that he can locate it at the shop. He went through his schedule of the day that he had memorised, only to be delighted by the fact that they share the same AP biology class today. He could not wait for AP biology to start. Heavenly scent, here he comes, Baekhyun thought.

It was not long before their biology class started and Baekhyun could hardly contain his excitement. He wanted to smell Chanyeol again! Thus, went Chanyeol stepped into their classroom, Baekhyun was grinning like a Cheshire cat, ready to devour the smell that was Chanyeol’s cologne. Baekhyun purposely walked past Chanyeol’s seat to talk to his friend, Jongdae, who sat in front of Chanyeol, as an excuse to take another whiff of Chanyeol. When he returned to his seat, he was sure he had memorised the fragrance by heart, and realised there were hints of liquorice and citrus in the perfume, which only made him love the scent even more. Feeling revitalized by the scent, Baekhyun quickly paced back to his seat when their biology teacher stepped into the class. His mind was intent on dissecting the smell even further, as he could not wait to locate the brand of the perfume.

After school, he rushed to the perfume shop at the mall without even saying goodbye to Kyungsoo, which left Kyungsoo incredibly irritated. “All for that dumb smell,” Kyungsoo tsked as he saw Baekhyun fled out of class. Baekhyun reached the mall at record speed and was already testing out all the fragrance available while hoping for a synapse connection to establish, to smell the same thing he smelt on Chanyeol. After one hour at the perfume shop, he walked out disappointed and reeking of alcohol. He still could not identify the smell, much to his frustration. What is this smell exactly, he thought, how does the combination of them make the fragrance so heavenly? He was beyond irritated as he knew he would not bring himself to ask Chanyeol. After much consideration, he decided that the best option he has is to smell Chanyeol now and then to satiate his need for his olfactory drug, unless he wants to embarrass himself in front of Sehun by being known as the boy with a queer request for Chanyeol’s cologne brand.

As a result, Baekhyun was constantly loitering around Chanyeol for their English, AP maths and AP biology class. He was incredibly addicted to the smell of the perfume that Chanyeol donned, and it only seemed like which each sniff Baekhyun loved the smell more and more. It seemed like Chanyeol did not mind Baekhyun too, as he noticed the growing presence of the short boy around him. The usual meek Baekhyun who would only ramble to Kyungsoo in their shared classes started to interact more with his fellow classmates, especially those around Chanyeol, like Jongdae, Minseok, Luhan, but never Chanyeol. Chanyeol found it peculiar, for he doesn’t think he is scary at all, so why won’t the petite brunette strike up a conversation with him? As odd as it is, Chanyeol found Baekhyun’s presence entertaining nevertheless as he would occasionally eavesdrop about what Baekhyun did that day.

In fact, Chanyeol started to grow a liking for the brunette boy, as he heard stories about how Baekhyun would mistakenly take the wrong umbrella and got reprimanded and how Baekhyun once tried microwaving a mug cake, only to have the mug shatter into pieces. As much as he knew that he should not have eavesdrop at someone else’s conversation, he has to admit that some stories that Baekhyun shared with other their classmates do brighten up Chanyeol’s day. Sometimes, Chanyeol even accidentally laugh out loud at Baekhyun’s ludicrous tales. Though, he was still rather disappointed that Baekhyun refused to talk to him (even though he does not take the initiative as well).

As for Baekhyun, Baekhyun was elated to be around Chanyeol. Chanyeol’s scent was akin to a drug to Baekhyun (he knows he is weird), and somehow his liking for the scent only intensified as he stayed around Chanyeol more. However, his desire to learn about the name of the fragrance slowly faded off, as he thought that he was contented as long as he got to smell to fragrance every day. Baekhyun was also more than relieved that Chanyeol and his friends did not raise any suspicions as to why he was hanging at their seats more, and Baekhyun was thankful for that. Imagine the horror when Chanyeol do realise the real reason why Baekhyun is around Chanyeol is for the scent