~

“Are we just going to keep standing here?” Oppa asked shaking me from my stupor.

“I personally don’t mind, but err, I think So-Hyun-ssi might be a bit uncomfortable. After all she’s had such a tiring day.”

I turned to the source of the voice and widened my smile. “Ani. Let’s go inside…” I urged for them to go in and my ears didn’t fail to hear a snicker from a certain someone. What were the odds of my cousin and this guy being friends?

Okay, so the odds were probably pretty high but today of all days. We didn’t exactly set off on a good start.

I hung my bag to the side as we made my our way down the hallwy into the living room, following both of them closely behind. I was working out in my head how I was going to diffuse the awkwardness that I felt with Boss when all of a sudden both of the guys stopped walking causing me to bump into them.

I looked up to find both of them with their hands balled up into fists, staring at each other with conviction. There was a sudden boost of testosterone in the atmosphere and it felt like everything got dead serious – literally, I was almost expecting them to fight if I didn’t see them being chummy five seconds ago.

Much to my surprise, that wasn’t the case. 

“Rock, Paper, Scissors!” They both shouted.

I stood watching as my boss pulled a scissors and my cousin showed papers.

“Aish, best to three?” Youngjae Oppa offered with a sulk, but with the way his competitor shrugged him off with a laugh he wasn’t going to budge. “Whatever, I’ll take it like man! I’ll be back in a bit.”

“Err, care to explain what this is about?” I hissed, still confused as to what they were doing.

“Before you came we were going to play rock paper scissors, loser has to go and collect our pizza. I’m the loser.” He said going to grab his coat.

What? “Oppa…You can’t possibly think of leaving me here?”

“Why?” He shrugged on his coat with a blank look on his face.

“I…”

I turned to my left, but Do-Hwan…ssi? It felt so awkward to call his name like that, had already disappeared into the house.

“Hyung! If you try anything with my dongsaeng, I’ll kill you~” He sung over me and opened the door to leave but stopped once more. “Also if you start the movie without me, I’ll kill you.” And with those threats he vanished.  

Right then.

I slowly stepped through to the living area expecting to see my boss, but I didn’t. I breathed a sigh of relief and made my way into the kitchen to grab a bottle of water only to find him whistling as he looked through one of the cabinets. He took out a wine glass, swiftly opened a bottle of wine from the wine rack and filled the contents of the glass of up with the red liquid.

One thing I was sure of was is that he was very comfortable in this house. Especially wearing such a sweater. 

I felt the need to break the silence rather than stand there timidly, after all I was pretty good with meeting new people. I just didn’t know how professional it would be to treat my boss like someone I met at school.  

“Would you like one?” He suddenly asked, startling me some as his back was still facing me.

I cleared my throat, “Pizza and wine? I’m not too sure about that combination…”

He laughed and it wasn’t a small one, his back shook when he did so, confusing me because I didn’t think what I said was particularly funny.

“Don’t knock it till you try it.”

He was clearly comfortable with me seeing as he wasn’t using honorifics. Perhaps it was easier since he was my boss.  I cleared my throat and eased into the kitchen towards the fridge to scan its contents because I was still functioning on an empty stomach.

“With how hungry I am, I might just have to give it a go.” I returned, gulping down a can of apple juice I found. I wanted water but opted for juice to boost my sugar levels.

“Sorry about that.” He said all of a sudden turning to face me, “If it makes you feel any better I didn’t get to eat either.”

I didn’t try to hide the intrigue on my face at his apology, it wasn’t like I required one. I was simply doing my job and so was he.

What to say, what to say, what to say…

“Have you had a chance to look through my proposal for the conference, sir?”

“As stuck up and hardworking I look, I don’t bring my work home Miss Hyun.”

I nodded and looked around the kitchen I’ve seen a thousand times.

“No wonder you left so early…” I mumbled unconsciously.

“What was that?”

 “So… How long have you and Youngjae Oppa known each other?”

He chuckled, most likely at my sudden change in topic. “Since we were kids.”

“Really? I have no recollection of ever seeing you. Oppa never once even mentioned you to me.” I mused.

“I know more of you than you know of me So-Hyun-ssi.” He finally took a sip of his wine and I raised my eyebrow in curiosity. “Youngjae always talks about you actually.” He clarified which brought a smile to my face. I wonder just how many people he’s been telling about me.

“He didn’t perhaps happen to mention anything about his tenth birthday..?”

“Oh you mean the one where you slipped on his vanilla icing and ripped your pants?”

I shut my eyes at the memory.

That was one incident my cousin never failed to embarrass me with when introducing me to new people, I didn’t think he went around using it as a story time to people I’d never met.

“Don’t feel too embarrassed, it was unforgettable and most definitely the best part of the day. I was there actually.”

"Huh… I see. Well, nice to officially meet you...?"

"You can call me Do-Hwan-ssi."

"Yes, nice to officially meet you Do-Hwan-ssi, for the second time." Yeah, I was probably going to stick with boss for now. "You can forget the formalities and call me So-Hyun."

"I look forward getting to know you better, So-Hyun." He smirked and finished the remainder of the wine in his glass. 

I could only smile in response. I had one of my arms crossed underneath the other as I excused myself from the kitchen and moved back into the seating area. I allowed myself to sink into the comfort of the leather chair, sighing in the process.

The sound of footsteps soon followed, “Shouldn’t you be at home with this amount of fatigue?” He moved round and sat beside me.

“I haven’t seen Oppa in a while since he’s always out of town.” I explained briefly, flicking through the TV channels. “The free food is a plus too.” I added which earned me a laugh from boss.

“I see you two are already getting along, how nice!” Oppa’s voice sounded from behind us and we both bent our heads backwards to look at him, or more like the warm goods in his hands.

“What made you think we wouldn’t?” I returned, carefully taking the pizza boxes.

“Yes Youngjae, what made you think we wouldn’t?” Boss repeated with a small smile on his lips. I turned back to the pizza and started to dig in.

Now that Oppa was back, I could leave them to their extraordinary world of brotherhood and eat.

The next thing I knew it was the morning and I woke up in the guest bedroom in Oppa’s apartment. The box of pizza I had to myself happened to put me to sleep – don’t judge, it was good. I spent the rest of the day at work till late wrapping up our ideas for the conference and the order of the day.

When it came to the day of the conference our firm’s talk went perfectly despite almost missing the flight in the morning – no one thought to tell me the actual conference was being held in Phoenix till the night before we left. I pinned it down to everybody being busy, but it was still crucial information. The tension between rival firms was palpable, but objectively our talk on the shifting dynamics in the financial market was much more interesting than anything else I’d heard.

The networking section after the stage was what took its toll on me, everyone was ‘set free’ to mingle, I had shaken so many hands it felt like my wrist was ready to fall off. A bit of an exaggeration, but that was really what it felt like. I stood by the boss’ side the whole day, doing as he directed, greeting the people who he already knew. In the presence of so many business tycoons I felt like a fish in a bowl of sharks, but I soon realised It wasn’t much different to the gala’s and fundraisers my mother hosted with big-shots and huge designers. Mother always had me mix with others.

Although I stopped doing that when it got me into trouble with some hot-shot designer’s daughter and her pet tarantula.

...Long story.

Once we took the short flight back and were all back at the office the team spread like a pack of bees, it almost felt like I wasn’t going to see them again. Maybe Jane was right in saying that it wasn’t always this busy.

Before I lost any of my notes or the contacts I had made I followed Boss’ instructions of staying in for a little longer to type up and file everything. Besides, I had no other plans for the evening and it felt empty to go back home early.

As soon as I was done with my duties, I cleaned up my office since it was a mess from the late-night brainstorming I did the night before. Locking my door, I stepped out to find boss still at his desk reviewing some papers.

“Sir?” I called tentat