For the first time in a really long time (if not ever), Kibum was not looking forward to the end of the workweek.

He went to work early in the morning, drafted and filed a lot of applications, had meetings with prospective clients, processed other paperwork, and went home at night ready to keel over. His weekly routine consumed enough of his mind and focus to keep him from thinking of anything else, with the tedium broken enough by random outings with different people—lunch with Kwon Boah and Jung Yunho on Monday, dinner with several friends from university on Wednesday, some after-dinner wine with the Chois on Thursday, a birthday celebration for the firm's managing director on Friday. He had even stumbled upon Jjong during one of his midday coffee runs early in the week. 

All in all, it seemed like he had spent time with everyone… except for the one he wanted to see. 

When Saturday came, he cleaned house as per usual, did laundry, watched some more of those two gay wizards—There's no way these two are just friends—and cooked some coq au vin and spaghetti aglio e olio to go with it, for a change. 

To be fair, the day was spent rather productively, but it still felt anti-climactic—which wasn't necessarily a bad thing, but it was a far cry from his usual reverence for the day as the highlight of his week. 

He was kind of hoping that someone would hijack his day again— Yeah, that's never gonna happen.

Sooyoung invited him to a launch event at some club in Itaewon, but Kibum begged off on the pretext of feeling under the weather (well, he technically didn't lie so…).

As soon as the sky started turning dark, he slipped on a tracksuit and left the apartment to run laps around the park. He lost track of time and might have overdone the running a bit, so he killed some time sitting on one of the benches to catch his breath and watching people enjoy the cool summer night. 

It was pretty late when he headed back to his building. He picked up some Lay’s, string cheese, and lemon frozen custard at e-Mart, and then ran into Taemin by his building’s entrance. 

“Hyung! You were out?” Taemin said as a greeting. He looked like he was trying to read an idiot board beside the actual camera instead of meeting his eyes. 

“Taemin-ah. It’s pretty late. What’s up?” Kibum tried to say casually around the lump in his throat.

“Ah. I’ve been meaning to give you something.”

 “Okay. Have you had dinner?”

Taemin shook his head.

No weekend date?

They rode the elevator to Kibum’s floor in complete silence. Kibum felt self-conscious about his unkempt appearance and his sweaty tracksuit and glared in disgruntlement at Taemin’s charcoal gray v-neck shirt that bared his collarbones. His light floral-musk cologne filled the cramped space of the elevator. Hm. That scent must be concentrated around the area of his collarbones… and neck… mmmm...Shut up, Kibum!  

He wished that the ride would end sooner.

Kibum let them into the apartment and went straight into the kitchen to stow away the contents of his plastic bag. “Sit. I’ll just heat these up so you can eat while I take a shower.”

“No, you go ahead, hyung, just tell me for how long.”

Kibum turned the induction cooker on low to heat up the chicken stew. “Just take out the pasta from the fridge and nuke it for half a minute. I’ll be out in five.”

“Take your time, Kibum-hyung. I’ll be right here.”

Kibum hurried to the bathroom and took a quick shower. His skin was prickly all over, and he felt jittery like he hadn’t for a long time. 

He slipped on loose gray track pants and a thin black and white striped shirt and had to content himself with some moisturizer on his face. Then, before he could change his mind, he spritzed a literal drop of his freakishly expensive date-night niche perfume onto his wrist and dabbed it onto the other wrist and behind his ears. Way to be subtle, Kim Kibum. He doesn't like you like that, remember?  

He headed out and found that Taemin had laid out the food on the table, as well as two place settings and the bottle of the unfinished pinot. He also had a small fig-scented candle burning on a shallow dish.

If not for the lack of flowers, the setup almost looked like a dinner date.

Shut up, Kibum! But really, who could blame him?

He tried to go for casual. “Wow. Nothing got bur