He placed his half-emptied glass on the sleek marbled countertop, afraid that if he tried to hold onto it himself, it’d slip from his hands. He knew his limit, and he was far, far past that point. He didn’t even like drinking, but it was a warm and soft feeling that kept him at it. He’s not some sort of clinical alcoholic, mind you. He’s not particularly a public nuisance when he goes past his limit. He just gets warm, careless, and a little clumsy. He heaved a sigh and caught the worried glance of the bartender, causing his cheeks to turn redder than they already were.

He was tired, tired of everything: his lover keeping him on a constant paranoic edge, his workload at the university an ever-increasing monstrosity, his part-time job at the coffeeshop refusing to give him easier hours...

He wasn’t happy. He leaned back against the stool and hiccupped. A stranger a couple seats away noticed, and bit back a chuckle. Luhan grimaced at the stranger, what right did he have to judge? He didn’t know what was going on. He didn’t know anything.

Luhan cupped the glass and downed the rest of his cheap beer. The stranger kept a curious gaze on the now flushed and full boy. Luhan exhaled an irritated sigh and set the glass back down, rubbing his mouth with his sleeve, before turning his own eyes towards the too-curious stranger. His words were slightly slurred, but intent clear.

“Whaddaya lookin’ at, huh? Funny to see a heartbroken kid in a bar like this? Is that funny t’you? Let me be in’sad for once. Leave me alone.”

The stranger took an elegant sip from the amber liquid in his own tall glass, the corner of his lip twitching up.

“I’m innocent. Besides, I haven’t done anything. You’re just a peculiar sight. It has me wondering what reason a kid like you has to have to get so tipsy”, he spoke, ending with a smile.

Luhan pursed his lips and looked down, mumbling, “whatever”. He had finally reached his low, his breaking point, just as this stranger decided to in to his business.

“I broke up with my boyfriend, okay? Boyfriend of th-three years, to be exact. I went and picked up all of my from his place today, and I’m not ing okay, Is that reason ‘nough for you?” he asked rhetorically.

“A lovers’ quarrel, then.”

“Yeah, if we were still lovers. He’d stopped caring for me long ago, I was jus’ too stupid to realize it”, he spoke, glancing at the stranger with a look so miserable that the other man’s countenance softened.

‘And all I loved, I loved alone,’ said a great poet, once. Love is troublesome, I know”, he spoke with a shift in tone. He drew closer to Luhan, “Perhaps I could aid in throwing away these painful thoughts, if for just one night,” he suggested.

Luhan briskly stood up and shook his head at the man. What a pig. To Luhan’s surprise, though, the stranger wasn’t finished with his offer,

“…I have a couple decent records laying around my place that have helped me survive such ordeals, if you’d ever like to borrow them.”

Luhan furrowed his brows in slight confusion, as the stranger produced a thin fountain pen, scribbling on a napkin, before handing it to the boy. Luhan shoved the makeshift note into his pocket, and stormed out of the bar. What a weird way to hit on people, he thought to himself as he slowly began the walk to his apartment.

When he arrived, he messed up dialing the digital passcode on the door lock a couple more times than usual, and plopped down on his bed. His cat, Bolero, jumped up and rubbed herself against him. At least she was there for him, right?

Before granting himself some well-deserved sleep, he recalled the napkin in his pocket, and out of pure curiosity (at least, that’s what he told himself), looked at what was written.

My heart is ever at your service.

In evidently hurried but elegant penmanship, the short note was printed along with a number.

Luhan thought the whole thing as rather queer. He dropped the note by his bedside table and lay down, shaking his head. Things would be clearer tomorrow, and the sharp pains of reality were meant to continue. He heaved a little sigh, and drifted off into a dreamless sleep.