ONE

Donghae has a secret.

He does not like sweet food.

It’s a secret he’s been keeping for six months now, because every morning he stops at the tiny sweet shop he passes on his way to work and buys a little paper bag of candies and chocolates.

Sometimes he gets caramels.

Sometimes he gets toffees.

And every morning when he gets to work he hides them guiltily in his desk drawer.

Donghae has another secret.

The little sweet shop is not actually on his way to work at all. He walks an extra half an hour each morning to buy candies he does not eat. This makes him late most mornings too, and he could easily stay on the train another stop and save himself the walk but he can’t because-

‘Good morning!’

The owner of the shop smiles at him, bright and happy.

‘How’s my best customer?’ he asks. ‘What would you like today?’

Donghae blushes, and all the cool, interesting things he planned to say vanish out of his head.

‘Um,’ he says, and points to one of the sparkling glass jars at random. The other man scoops the brightly coloured confectionary out, weighs it, and then pops it into a bag for him.

‘I’ve put in a little something extra,’ he says, folding up a second tiny bag carefully. ‘Something I was working on last night. Let me know what you think of it?’

Donghae nods again, and the other man is already handing over his change and wishing him a good day. Another customer steps up to the counter, and just like that, the highlight of Donghae’s morning is over.

‘Stupid,’ he mutters to himself as he joins the grey crowds of people on the pavement. ‘Stupid!’

Donghae’s third secret is that he is head over heels in love with the slim man with the gentle eyes who owns the little sweet shop.

It all started six months ago. Donghae had just moved to Seoul, a small town boy suddenly dropped into the big city, hurrying for his first day of work – and he had gotten lost.

Despite leaving far earlier than necessary, he’d accidentally gotten off the train at the wrong station. Then, bewildered by the subway map, he’d decided to walk the rest of the way, only to find himself hopelessly disorientated in minutes. Worse, nobody cared. Donghae tried asking at a dry cleaners, and then a bookshop, shocked and then hurt at how he was ignored or brushed aside. It was getting to the point that he was near tears (he was going to lose his (mom’s) dream job before he even started, okay?) when, like a ray of sunshine through the gloomy city, someone smiled at him.

Amongst the maze of dirty streets and crowded pavements, a man about his own age was leaning on the counter of the smallest shop Donghae had ever seen, gazing at him with soft, almond-shaped eyes, a smudge of chocolate on his cheek.

‘What can I get you?’ he’d asked, scoop poised over a jar of milk chocolate mice, and Donghae had been smitten.

‘Um,’ he’d said. ‘Um-’

Somehow he’d found himself paying for a paper bag filled with candies, trying to get the nerve to ask for directions. It was only when the transaction was complete and his lingering was becoming awkward that Donghae had managed to stammer out his original reason for approaching.

‘I’m – um, can you help? I- I got lost.’

Instead of losing interest and moving on to another customer, the man had taken Donghae’s slip of paper and turned it around, frowning.

‘Oh,’ he’d said sympathetically, seeing the address on the business card. ‘No wonder you look nervous. Anyway, you need to go keeping going until you hit the main road then turn left. Keep walking until you pass a subway station then go down the road opposite. It’s on the other side of the plaza.’

He’d handed the card back and Donghae had managed to thank him, stomach filled with nervous, hopeful butterflies that had nothing to do with being late for work. Furtively he’d looked around, trying to see street signs, trying to work out if he could walk home this way too.

‘Good luck with the appointment,’ the man called as he walked away. ‘I hate dentists too!’

The butterflies in Donghae’s stomach died early deaths.

Donghae’s final secret is that he had not been going to a dentist appointment.

He is the dentist.

Six months have passed since then. Donghae is no longer lost or anxious about work. He has a nice apartment and his mother is pleased. His goal (or perhaps it’s his mom’s goal) is that he open his own private clinic in a few years, so he works hard. As well as his regular position, he is also on-call for the local emergency room during the weekends, so while his social calendar is sadly empty, his savings account is slowly filling. He doesn’t have many friends yet, but he does have a routine. He gets up early to work out, makes himself a healthy smoothie with lots of greens (he’s almost managed to convince himself he likes kale), then catches the wrong train so he can walk past the tiny sweet shop.

Then he buys something – anything – so that he can exchange a few, brief words with the slim man behind the counter. Invariably he becomes tongue-tied and clumsy, receives another kind smile from the man, then hurries the rest of the way to work equal parts elated and despairing at the simple interaction.

This morning has been no different.

‘Good morning,’ Mrs Kim the receptionist says disapprovingly, looking at the clock pointedly as he enters the chrome and glass-fronted clinic.

‘Morning,’ Donghae says, and slips her some of the candies. Mrs Kim’s expression does not change as she slides the little bag out of sight behind her keyboard. Donghae learned quite early on that he can stay on her good side by sharing his daily purchases so he winks at her then goes to hide the rest