The Sunchaser - Chapter One

By Eiryia

Seungyoon placed the neatly organized pile of papers in his shoulder bag as he peeked out the window from his small apartment on the fifth floor of a large old apartment complex. Outside the wind was howling loudly pulling at anything it could get its invisible claws into making the old oak by his bedroom window creak and scratch against the glass. 

A low pit pat noise from the rain could be heard against the roof and he was highly tempted to postpone his afternoon mission to a day with better weather, but no, he needed a job and the only way to get it was to get out there. 

Standing behind the stained glass of the entrance hall of his building he took one last big breath bracing himself before walking out into the stormy weather. 

He was already on the last year of his bachelors degree at the university in town studying journalism and even though he was picking up work writing for local papers and magazines was he now in needed a more reliable part time job. Something he could keep doing once he was done with school while he worked on his book. He didn’t plan on writing travel guides and news articles for the rest of his life, he wanted to become an author, but he still needed to eat while he wrote and so now he began his hunt for a job. 

Walking down the street he gave his middle aged neighbor rushing by without an umbrella an acknowledging nod as they hurried past each other. Except from the two of them was there hardly anyone outside despite it being early Friday afternoon. 

His strategy for acquiring his new job was simply to leave his resume around the shops in his neighborhood. Hopefully would one of them call him back. It would be convenient to be able to walk to work and since it was a pretty quiet area couldn’t he imagine that work would become too stressful. 

The first stop that afternoon was his favorite coffee shop. Despite having mixed feeling about working there as he was so fond of it as it was had he stepped inside. It was run by an old couple and only got five tables inside and when the weather was good a few small round ones outside. 

    "The usual?" the old woman asked cheerfully seeing him approach while closing his dripping umbrella. 

    "Not today" he replied smiling while taking out one of the papers from his bag. "I’m looking for work" he explained handing her one of the papers.

    "Oh" she said, her smile fading a little. "We would have loved to have you son, but we already hired someone a couple of weeks ago" she explained looking truly sorry. 

    "Thats okay" he said patting her hand which was resting on top of the paper. "Let me know if anything pops up though"

He had stuck around chatting for a while listening to the old woman gossip about the neighboring shops. The bakery needed help, that she was sure of, but would his stick skinny arms be able to handle the heavy work? She worried for him out loud while making a thoughtful face. 

    "There is no point asking the small flower shop further down on this street" she said lowering her voice as a pair of high school girls rushed in through the door, raincoats dripping heavily from the rain. "That guy never hires anyone, it’s been only him in there ever since the place opened three years ago" she said handing him a good luck vanilla latte to go for free. 

Clutching his umbrella tightly with one hand and holding the coffee just as closely in the other he hurried down the street. He stopped by the small book shop and the convenience store before he found himself standing in front of the flower shop. It was a tiny place with a cheerful sunflower logo on the shop front. That was the only cheerful thing about it though. The rest was painted in a deep green color and there was mostly small bushes of green in dark pots lining the entrance to the shop. Not any vivid flower displays like one would expect, but then again it wasn’t exactly the season for it either. 

Hesitating he thought about what the old woman had said. How could it hurt to ask about a job, the worst thing that could happen was for him to be rejected and he was expecting that from most of these small places anyway. 

A small bell rang as he entered the shop and he wrapped up his umbrella tightly with the string before making his way to the back counter. 

The counter it self was intimidating enough; huge, painted in glossy black, taller than the usual desk. Behind it sat a guy reading a poetry book looking like he didn’t enjoy it very much as a deep frown was fixed on his face creating a deep furrow between his brows. His whole aura was pretty much radiating leave me alone. 

The man who was now looking up at him over his book was wearing a grey tank top with a loose ed green shirt over it. What caught Seungyoon’s eye however was the many tattoos poking out wherever skin was visible. Looking at the apron dangling from his neck with the cheerful sunflower and then up again at the guys ever souring expression he swallowed hard. 

    "Yes?" the guy asked getting to his feet while closing his book without marking how far into it he was. 

    "I’m looking for work" he replied, his usual deep steady voice failing him hard making him sound just as squeaky and nervous as he felt.  

    "Are you now?" the guy said, sounding unamused while pushing his semi long black hair out of his narrowing eyes. 

Seungyoon reached out his damp resume and looked around unable to face the intense judging eyes staring directly at him any longer. 

The place itself was charming enough although kinda dark for a flower shop and it smelled lovely. It was hard to imagine it being run by such s grumpy fellow. 

A low cough made him to shift his focus back to the man and forcing a smile he blurted out: 

    "I totally understand if you aren’t hiring, but I figured I’d ask anyway" before turning his on his heel on him before he could say anything in response because Seungyoon already knew it wouldn’t be anything to his favor anyway.

Standing outside the shop in the rain fighting to open his umbrella again he felt a chill spread up his back. Was he being watched? Or was it simply because he walked out from such a warm humid place into the cold downpour again? Pushing the button on his umbrella while shaking it vigorously it suddenly flew open, smacking him directly in his face as it went. 

Seeing stars for a moment he staggered before rubbing his nose while muttering some well chosen words. 

He had stopped by a couple more places down the street before giving up as the weather was getting so bad he had to close his umbrella. 

Arriving back home he couldn’t quite shake the stare of the flower shop man from his mind. His business had to be going well considering its been open for several years already, but who would want to buy flowers from someone who kinda looked like they would follow after you and murder you in your sleep. 

He knew he was being overdramatic with that last part, he was pretty sure the florist wasn’t a murderer, but the man had definitely not seemed very approachable. 

Peeling of his wet clothes getting ready to shower he went over the feedback he had received from the other places he had stopped by. Both at the book shop and the convenience store had been positive about hiring him and so his spirit was pretty high despite the awkward encounter with the angry florist. 

A week went by without him hearing anything. School work and an article on local tourist spots had kept him busy and it was only when he was faced with another rainy Friday he remembered that he had not heard back from any of the shops. He had diligently checked his email and replied to every unknown number that had called him the last week despite how uncomfortable it made him feel. Then he realized he had not checked his mailbox. 

No one used normal mail anymore except from the old people and so he had only put his address there to let people know he lived in the area and could show up on short notice. 

Slowly emptying his mailbox he realized he probably needed to check it more often in general as it was packed with advertisement. In between the piles of glaring headlines screaming about sales and glossy paper with clever adds was there however a small letter marked with a sunflower.

The sunflower gave him a pretty good idea who it was from and so he quickly ran out to throw away all the paper trash before rushing up to his tiny apartment. 

As soon as the door shut behind him in the hall had he begun tearing up the small envelope. On the blank paper were only a few lines written. A general introduction, he made sure to remember the name Mino, before reading on: 

   "I weren’t planning on hiring someone anytime soon, but because of a sudden incident of recent am I forced to hire some help. I can offer you only a 6 month contract with the kind of work you requested as I understand that your student responsibilities comes first. If you wish to take me up on this offer please show up at the shop this coming Saturday" 

Saturday, Saturday? That was tomorrow. Good thing he had thought to check his mail at all or things could have become embarrassing later. 

Walking in circles he smiled from ear to ear, he got a job! 

A few minutes later his immediate happiness had faded into a slight worry. Would his now new boss like him? Would it be awkward? He knew very little about plants and flowers, he only got one potted plant and it had seen it’s better days. 

He could learn though, learn to take care of plants. 

What he got more sever doubts about was whether or not he could learn to like this Mino guy. One doesn’t have to like ones boss though, they just had to get along. 

Surely they could do that! 

The next morning he was greeted by the first sunny day in what felt like weeks. The air was still chilly however and so he pulled his scarf up to his nose and buried his cold hands deeper into his pockets. 

Mentally praising himself for having managed to land a job in the neighborhood he stopped by the corner coffee shop and picked up coffee. He bought one for Mino too, even if he didn’t know his preferences. Black coffee felt like the safest option, especially for an intimidating, grumpy, tattoo covered guy like that. It would be amusing if his assumptions where proven very wrong he thought as he tightened his grasp on the paper cups. 

Hurrying down the pavement impatiently sipping on his too hot coffee he was soon standing outside the flower shop. His tongue was prickling numbly after getting burned and he took in one large gulp of cold air before going in. 

Mino was sitting by the counter reading another poetry book seeming just as unimpressed with this one as the last one. 

    "Morning" Seungyoon said with a low voice setting the coffee he had bought Mino carefully on the counter. He thought he saw a flash of a smile on Mino’s lips for a second as he picked up the coffee, which strangely gave him more hope for their work life together than it probably should have. 

    "You came" Mino said sipping on his coffee. 

    "Of course" he replied still standing awkwardly by the counter. 

Mino gestured for him to take a seat on an old green wooden chair with flakey paint and he did before the morning