[CONTENTID1]Blankets and Beer [/CONTENTID1]

[CONTENTID2]"We're terrible human beings, really. But whereas Baekhyun pretends to be nice, I like to tell people beforehand that I'm not."[/CONTENTID2]

[CONTENTID3] Yeseul tugged on a loose thread from the cuff of her sweater as she waited by the entrance of the Plateau Gallery, watching as workers took down the temporary walls. The art had been removed already, and the large room was like a canvas being stripped clean in preparation for something new. They were doing some sort of workshop series next, according to Sumin, where artists came in and used the space however they wanted, and visitors could observe or join in on the process, depending on what the artist wanted. They were having special sessions for the art students at the local universities, and apparently a group was coming all the way from Seoul too. 

They'd agreed to meet when Yeseul was done with lectures for the day, but when she arrived Sumin ran out and said she needed at least fifteen minutes to finish up a call with one of the artists they were hosting becuase he'd been very specific about how his workspace was arranged. Gallery organisation being Sumin's primary job, she had a lot of work ahead of her, particularly when the artists were picky (which most of them were). But she'd called up Yeseul that morning anyway, asking if she'd be interested in coming along to a presentation at Sumin and Sehun's university on interpretations of literature in art in a particular era of history. It seemed interesting enough, though she couldn't for the life of her remember what historical period the lecture was focused on, and Yeseul didn't have any other plans. 

After ten long minutes of waiting, Yeseul was starting to get restless. Her shoes squeaked against the concrete floor whenever she moved her feet and seemed to echo through the whole building, and there was nowhere to sit down. Men in workwear gave her strange looks whenever they passed, wondering why some girl was loitering in the lobby of a closed art gallery. 

The loose thread was nearly as long as her pinky finger. Yeseul frowned at it, then picked at the rest of her cuff, cursing the wide-knit sweater for being so prone to fraying. She'd only bought it because the colour was nice, and had been regretting it ever since. 

"Yeseul?" 

Yeseul's head whipped up, her lopsided bun flopping against her head, and she saw Seojun standing a few feet away. He wore all black again, save for the baby blue shirt underneath his jumper, and looked even nicer in the daytime than he had in the evening when she'd seen him at the exhibition. "Hey," she said, quickly dropping her hands to her sides and trying a wide, friendly smile. 

Maybe it was because she didn't smile very often, but people always reacted well when she did, almost astoundingly so. Yeseul had been told she had a nice smile, that her lips were made for it even. The compliments were fine, but being told she should smile more was completely another. Yeseul smiled when she was happy, she smiled when she needed to, but it was never as simple as just smiling more. When you weren't a naturally cheerful person, it was never that simple. 

"What are you doing here?" Seojun asked, striding over. 

"Waiting for Sumin." 

"Oh, are you going to that lecture?" 

"Yeah," Yeseul replied. "It sounds cool. I do English at university, so I'm all for literature related things." 

"I was gonna go, but I've got to get on a train to Seoul in a few hours. One of our investors wants to spend a few days in Seoul before she comes up to Busan. I'm being sent to play host." 

"Why does she need a host?" 

Seojun ran a hand through his hair, looking a bit sheepish. "She's Vietnamese. Only speaks a few words of Korean." 

Yeseul's mouth curved into a smirk as she narrowed her eyes at him, and she slid a few paces closer. "You speak Vietnamese?" 

"Yeah, but I'm not going to do it now," he said. "Seems like something someone would do just to show off, and I'm not about that." 

"Too bad, I'd be awfully impressed. Even if you were just showing off." 

Even grumpy people could be good at flirting. Yeseul's expansive dating history was evidence of this.

"Maybe another time." Seojun bit his lip, regarding her with curious eyes. "Did you, ah, sort things out with the guy from the show, then?" 

Yeseul's eyes widened as she realised he was asking after Chanyeol. "Oh! No, we ... we're not–we don't have anything to work out." 

"Who's he talking about?" Sumin asked with interest, coming up from behind them. 

When it was obvious Yeseul wasn't going to answer, Seojun filled in. "Super tall guy, dark hair. Kind of large ears." 

"Chanyeol?" Sumin gaped at Yeseul, clearly expecting an explanation. She didn't think one was needed; it should have been obvious to Sumin that it was just another one of her and Chanyeol's many rows. 

"It's not what it–Jesus Christ, he's not even a friend of mine, just a massive pain in the ." 

Seojun looked pleased. "Well, if that's the case, do you want to get a drink some time?" 

Relieved, Yeseul gave him another wide smile. "Sounds good. When do you get back from Seoul?" 

"Next week, I think. Why don't we say Friday after next to be safe?" 

Yeseul nodded. "Have you even been to the Gallery? It's a bar on campus, there's all this art hanging up. Seems like an appropriate place." 

Seojun grinned. They set a time, and Yeseul managed to avoid giving him her phone number. She was going to hold off on that if she could. Once they'd said goodbye to Seojun, Yeseul and Sumin headed out of the building and toward the bus stop nearby. 

"Seojun's nice, you'll like him."  

"He seems nice," Yeseul agreed, twisting the strap of her bag. "But I don't think he really ... gets me." 

"Don't go into this thinking it'll end badly, or you'll ruin it for yourself," Sumin advised. "And you've only just met." 

"I know. To be honest, even before Eunha, I don't know if I would have said yes to drinks. I've always been bad at dating." 

Sumin frowned over at her as the bus rolled into their stop. "You used to go on dates all the time when we first met!" 

They got on, snagging two seats at the back. Yeseul glanced around, saw that there was no one sitting near them, but lowered her voice anyway. "No, I had a lot of when we first met. With different people." 

The other girl rolled her eyes, smirking. "God knows why he thought you and Chanyeol had something going on. You two are complete opposites." 

"Tell me about it." 

Yeseul hauled off her boots and dragged her sweater over her head on her way into her room, where she discarded the wool material in a heap on her bed, along with her bag and keys. She swapped her black jeans – which were in desperate need of a wash, since they smelled of popcorn – for her favourite comfortable leggings, and sauntered out to put on the kettle. 

She was midway through tying her hair into a ponytail when she entered the living room and spied Baekhyun, Sehun and Kyungsoo sprawled across the furniture while Chanyeol worked in the kitchen, sleeves of his long-sleeved white shirt hastily pushed to his elbows. Rather than putting the kettle on as she planned, Yeseul went over and slapped Sehun upside the head. 

"Ow!" he exclaimed, rubbing the spot. "What was that for, Yeseul?" 

Hands on her hips and one brow raised in the most judgemental fashion she could muster (it was quite impressive), Yeseul ignored the giggles coming from Baekhyun and Kyungsoo's general direction and kept her focus on Sehun. "Why didn't you go to that lecture yesterday? Sumin rang me in the morning asking if I'd go because you couldn't be bothered." 

"It sounded boring," Sehun said, and upon glimpsing Yeseul's scowl, quickly backtracked. "Um, I mean, more your speed. Art in literature or whatever, it's totally your thing." 

"Literature in art," Yeseul corrected. She forced him to make room on the sofa and sat with her legs criss-crossed, catching Baekhyun's funny expression just before he composed himself. She stuck her tongue out at him, resulting in a gleeful cheer from him. 

"Yeseul's in a good mood tonight, boys, aren't we lucky!" 

"Shut up, Baek," she said, rolling her eyes. Without meaning to, Yeseul glanced back towards the kitchen.

Chanyeol was mixing something in a bowl, his back to them. Plugged in on the other side of the counter from where he was working was the kettle, already on its way to a boil. A mug sat in front of it, the string from the tea bag inside twisted around the handle. Chanyeol's journal was out too, sitting open near the kettle where it wouldn't get splattered with food. Yeseul wondered if he was following another hastily written recipe from work, or maybe one of his own creations. She had no idea if Chanyeol made up his own recipes or not, because she'd never asked, but it seemed like something he might do. 

The protective behaviour he showed toward the journal, hiding it whenever someone came into the room, always having it on hand, only made it more interesting to her. It suggested there was soemthing more than Chanyeol than meets the eye, and Yeseul was more invested - or at least more curious - in him than she had ever been before. The idea of friendship between them was still a little fanciful to her, despite the strides they seemed to be taking in that direction, but that was mostly caused by her lingering animosity toward her. A year of teasing and arguing wasn't easy to just let go of, regardless of how quickly Chanyeol seemed to transition to whatever it was they were now. 

"Sehun," she whispered, suddenly thankful she had sat with him rather than the other two. "What do you know about that notebook Chanyeol always carries with him?" 

"Not a lot," Sehun replied, not even asking why she was curious. It didn't matter to him. "I think it's just like a regular journal." 

"But why would Chanyeol keep a journal?" 

Sehun scratched his chin, eyes on the television, his voice staying at a low volume that only she could hear. "I don't think Chanyeol's the person you think he is," he said, pensive. "He's a lot more like us than he lets on - likes being by himself, thinks too much, that sort of stuff." 

The main reason Yeseul and Sehun had clicked so easily was their similarities. Never had it occured to her that Chanyeol might be a kind of introvert too, just one who was less willing to admit it. The journal was starting to make a lot more sense, even if she still had no idea what he wrote in it. 

"But he's so ... loud," Yeseul finished lamely. 

Sehun jerked his chin at the two on the larger sofa. Kyungsoo swatted Baekhyun in the head with a cushion and Baekhyun responded with an elbow jab to Kyungsoo's stomach. "He's not like those two, though, is he?" 

"No, I guess not." 

"I've been living with Chanyeol for two years, Yeseul," Sehun said. "He doesn't talk about himself, and he mostly just keeps to him room when he's at home. But when he's around other people, you wouldn't think that about him, because he's always on. I would have thought you'd notice with all the time he spends here." 

"I never paid him much attention until recently," Yeseul admitted softly. 

"Well, Chanyeol is all about reciprocity. He does what he thinks people like, need, whatever word you want to choose. But most of it isn't him, you know?" 

All of this was news to her, and yet at the same time, she'd known it all along. Yeseul glanced back at Chanyeol, who was stirring milk into the mug of tea. He grasped the handle and picked it up, turning toward them, his eyes meeting hers. She had known since the second she saw it, but it was still a surprise when he came over with the mug and wordlessly handed it to her. When Yeseul looked over at Sehun, he had a small smile on his face. 

"The only thing you really need to know about Chanyeol is that he's passionate about his cooking and the people he cares about. You might not believe it, but you're one of those people too." 

She was starting to believe it. Nobody has ever put in as much effort to maintaining a relationship with her (platonic, romantic, or otherwise) as Chanyeol had. Even when she hated him through and through, there had been a sort of determintation to him to prove to her that he wasn't just going to stop hanging around and engaging with her just because she snapped at him all the time. 

Dinner was surprisingly simple, given that Chanyeol usually liked testing things out on them, and not French for once. Baekhyun was just happy there was meat and that he could pronounce all the ingredients. But as they ate, whatever Chanyeol had baking in the oven started to release a smell somehow tangy and sweet at the same time. Perhaps their days of dinner experimentations were done, and it was onto pastries. 

When the dessert had cooled and Chanyeol deemed it ready for consumption, what he brought over to the table was far too elegant to be eaten by a bunch of kids living in a cheap apartment, and looked entirely out of place on the wobbly table with its mismatched cutlery, plates and chairs. "Are you sure you want us to eat that?" Sehun asked, voicing everyone else's hesitance. 

"Chill out, it's only an apple tart," Chanyeol said, setting the tart down in the middle of the table and fetching a knife. "It's a staple on our dessert menu and I've got to get it right." 

The apples were arranged in such a way that reminded Yeseul of a flower, each slice like a petal, darker on the edge where the sugar sprinkled over the top had browned. She wasn't sure if he'd done it on purpose or if it just came out that way, but in either case: 

"It's beautiful," she said softly. 

While the others were surely wearing interesting expressions, the only one that mattered was Chanyeol's. This was his career, his life, and not once had she actually commented on the food. He had made no attempt to conceal his expression that she could tell, and he stared at her in surprise and something else, something like wonder. 

"Thanks, Seullie," he murmured, tucking his chin to his chest and grinning. 

But the swell of happiness that came next, when she saw the dimples on his cheeks and his lip caught between his teeth, left Yeseul with the sudden and acute desire to smile. 

There were different kinds of smiles. They are different depending on the person, the situation, who they're focused on, and a dozen other things. The grin tugging at her lips wasn't just in , but in her nose, her eyes, her cheeks, and connected by a fragile thread down to her heart, making it want to smile too. This wasn't the smile she put on to please, or the one when Baekhyun did something idiotic, or the one when Serin said something wonderful. This was the smile when you said something true, and it hurt, because happy truths where Chanyeol was concerned were not ones Yeseul encountered very often. 

"Your face is all scrunched up, Seullie, I think you're putting too much thought into how beautiful this tart is," Chanyeol observed, putting a plate down in front of her. Baekhyun was already halfway through his slice. "Probably best that you stick to a neutral expression. If you try and show anymore positive emotion tonight you might give yourself an aneurysm." 

But he was still stupid, annoying Chanyeol, so she kept the happy truth, and its smile, to herself.

"Do you even know what an aneurysm is?" Sehun asked. "I mean, I know it's a turn of phase or whatever, but it doesn't actually happen like we think it happens, does it?" 

Chanyeol shot him a look. "It's a build-up in a blood vessel," he replied evenly. Sehun raised his eyebrows and looked at Yeseul, who raised her eyebrows right back, both of them saying nothing. 

After dessert, there was a great deal more television and arguing (not just Yeseul and Chanyeol this time, either, since Sehun wouldn't let Baekhyun watch the evening news) before Sehun went home and Baekhyun announced he was going to bed. Yeseul also retreated to her room, still feeling weird from the happy truth, and not wanting to be alone with Chanyeol. 

She started on her reading for next week, sat in the middle of her bed with her knees tucked to her chest and her book as close as to her face as possible without the words going blurry, pen between her teeth for annotating. Her mobile chimed a few minutes after she started reading; Yeseul lifted her book above her head and peered over her knees at the screen, where a message notification had Chanyeol's name attached to it. 

Rolling her eyes, Yeseul set down her book using her pen as a bookmark and picked up he