Crash. Plink! Plink!

Sehun freezes. Right now, he’s stuck in a weird pose that can only be described as an ungraceful ballerina. His left leg is extended behind him and as he balances on the right leg while his arm is hanging in midair, his left hand struggles to keep the black tray still from the sudden displacement.

There had been four champagne flutes on that tray and now there’s two left, each wobbling precariously awaiting its fate. The shattered glass is littered like confetti around Sehun’s perimeter.

From across the room Junmyeon places his face into his hands, a poor attempt at hiding Sehun from his line of sight.

“Nice going twinkle toes,” Baekhyun teases as he approaches Sehun with a broom in hand. He leans the broom against the crook of Sehun’s elbow and swifly transfers the shaking tray into his own possession by skillfully sandwiching the thing between his hands. The left hand is underneath the tray while the right hand is holding down the flutes up top and Baekhyun smoothly exits the danger zone. He throws a look over his shoulder and calls out, “Better start sweeping newbie!”

Sehun slowly brings his leg back to the ground and straightens himself out. Clearing his throat and fighting off the embarrassment he begins to sweep. From his peripheral vision he can see two female food runners giggling and his ears pink at the soft tinkling sounds. Dammit, did I really have to trip right in front of her?

Sehun shuts his eyes and lets out a deep sigh before finishing up his task. He takes the broken pile of glass over to the bar and disposes of it in the recycling bin. Minseok lets out a whistle and throws Sehun an apologetic look.

“Hey man, it’s okay. It’s just glass.” Minseok shrugs.

Sehun keeps his focus on the ground as he sighs yet again and then groans, “But sunbae, that was the eighth glass I’ve broken in two hours. There’s no way I can get this checked off my training for the day.”

Minseok grimaces as he looks out across the floor and catches Junmyeon leaning against Yeonhee in defeat while the girl is fighting off a smile. Baekhyun and Jongdae are whispering to themselves and snickering like schoolboys.

“Like I said man, it’s just glass. And besides we’re not even open yet so don’t fret! The people that saw don’t even care, in fact it’s great, we haven’t had this kind of entertainment since we last brought on Jongin.”

The door to the service room pulls open and out pops Jongin’s head.

“Did someone call me?” Jongin asks.

Minseok waves him off, “No one even said your name. Get back to work.”

Jongin lets out a pout and disappears inside once more.

Sehun grits his teeth as he mentally prepares himself. Alright Oh Sehun, it’s going to work this time. Now grab the tray and keep it together you oaf.

The younger male begins assembling his tray. He carefully places four empty champagne flutes onto the circular black tray and rearranges them into a square. Then he fills each glass a third of the way with crushed ice. Now here comes the tricky part, don’t sweat it Sehun, just take it easy. Careful…Careful…Okay now, lift up.

Sehun successfully picks up the tray with his left hand. He pauses to let his body adjust to the weight of the tray and the feeling of it in midair. He keeps his gaze on the middle of the tray as he turns right. Alright, baby steps now. He takes one step forward then stops to look left and right. Coast is clear, let’s go. Sehun advances slowly. He’s made it to the edge of the bar now and is about to take the first step onto the carpeted dining floor when the server room door is pulled open by Jongin as he throttles himself out.

“Augh!”

“Ack!”

Crash! Plink! Plink! Crash! Ding!

The two boys are hanging onto each other as the floor is covered with yet another light dusting of shattered fine glass and the addition of a rather abstract ceramic mosaic created from the broken cappuccino and latte mugs. Sehun’s right side is covered with milk foam while Jongin’s chest is covered with the rest of the coffee.

Minseok bursts out laughing and is soon joined by the rest of the employees on the floor who got to witness this glorious moment firsthand. A small whine could be heard, and one can only assume that it came from Junmyeon.

“You were supposed to say corner!” Jongin shouted.

“Uh what! You were supposed to knock before coming out the door!” Sehun shouted back.

“Clean up on aisle three!” Baekhyun yells, earning a high five from Jongdae.

“Whoaaaa, what did I just walk into?” says Yixing as he enters from the Maitre’D stand and passes into the main dining area.

Sehun looks up with his eyes squeezed shut and pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs.

I’m never going to make it across the room.

“Hey Sehun!” Baekhyun greets the younger boy as he enters the break room to clock in.

“Hi hyung!” Sehun greeted back, mouth full of pre-service dinner.

Baekhyun laughs at his mannerless friend and ruffles Sehun’s hair before running out the door. Baekhyun didn’t want to be late to line up yet again; Yeonhee had warned him that if he was even one minute later than 5pm she’d schedule him one day less for the next month.

It’s been three days since the champagne flute fiasco and Sehun had somehow been taken under Baekhyun’s wing. The two had bonded over the breaking of glass once Baekhyun shared his own struggles pertaining champagne flutes with Sehun. Since then the two had grown rather close and Sehun looked forward to Baekhyun’s stories. He had discovered that Baekhyun liked telling jokes and that sometimes he and Jongdae would come up with a day’s worth of puns and bad dad jokes to pass around during shifts. Chanyeol loved hearing the two act up and gave them food to take on their ten minute breaks before service. This would inevitably spark Junmyeon’s competitive side as he believed himself to be the dad joke king. Chaos then ensues as Junmyeon battles Baekhyun and Jongdae in a dad joke contest with Chanyeol as the judge. While back in reality the only person who laughed at Junmyeon’s jokes genuinely was Chanyeol whereas Baekhyun and Jongdae laughed only at the absurdity of his content.

But even more so than loving Baekhyun’s class clown persona, what Sehun really admired was his sunbae’s innate ability to woo and flirt with the opposite .

Baekhyun held a kind of charm that made him seem suave and smooth. This was a great advantage because whatever Baekhyun said just sounded cool and not cheesy, even if it was. Sehun on the other hand has not yet masted the art of seduction and so whenever he would throw one of Baekhun’s pickup lines out there he was met with laughter. In his own mind, this was considered a good thing because hey, any reaction is better than none right?

“Alright young padawan,” Baekhyun teased, “Do you remember what this one means?”

He points to a phrase on Sehun’s vocabulary sheet and waits for a response. Sehun smirks and nods yes. Baekhyun grins and says, “Good. Now, when you’re going back for more bread for Table 30 or if you happen to see that someone refilling bread, do you know what to say?”

Sehun nods yes again, determined to succeed.

“That’s m’boy!” Baekhyun cheers, “Good luck Sehunnie!” A wink and a pat on the back is all Sehun gets before Baekhyun flies off to greet an incoming table.

Sehun steels himself and prepares to enter the kitchen hoping that the timer was buzzing.

The kitchen is bustling as always and as usual, Sooyoung is waiting for more bread to be baked off halfway through service. She’s back in the pastry corner chatting with Yoona about the differences between caster sugar and granulated white sugar when the timer goes off.

She excuses herself as she grabs the side towels off the pastry bench and folds them into hot hands. Then she turns the buzzer off and pulls open the oven doors revealing fifty-eight freshly baked miniature French baguettes.

Mmm Sooyoung thinks as she breathes in the delicious sent of warm bread. She reaches in carefully and pulls out the hot sheet pan and closes the doors with her elbows.

She yells out, “Corner!” and passes the walk-in and dish pit and once again yells, “Corner!” as she curves around the end of the pass and in front of the garmo station where Tao is. A few more steps down the line she passes behind Chef Soo and shimmies into her own little space by the front of the pass where the breadbaskets are sitting under the heat lamps.

Being so caught up in not burning herself or those around her as she made her way down to the front of her station, Sooyoung hadn’t noticed the tall figure standing in front of her with his back toward her.

She panics and yells, “Hot behind!” before landing the hot sheet pan onto the cool metal countertop.

Sehun whirls around coolly and goes, “Oh thanks,” he pauses slightly and points at the pan of bread and states, “You’ve got some nice buns yourself.” He winks at her and begins tucking the bread into the napkin lined baskets.

Sooyoung freezes on the spot and blushes hard. Normally she would laugh off Sehun’s advances but today she was caught off guard by how naturally he flung that comment out and she hadn’t registered his intent until she saw the wink.

“Uh…” She mumbled back softly.

Sehun cocked his head and glanced at her sideways before extending one of the miniature baguettes out to her. He smirked and whispered, “Bready for some roll play?”

Sooyoung coughed and dumped the rest of the bread into the hotel pan under the heat lamp and hurried off to the dish pit fleeing from Sehun as fast as she could.

“Hey wait!” Sehun yelled after her. A low laugh grumbled behind him. Sehun turned to see Chef Kyungsoo with a half amused half oh God grin plastered across his face. Kyungsoo couldn’t hold down the laughter any longer and decided to let out his warm honey toned chuckles. On the other side of the line Chanyeol was smacking his thigh and gasping for air. Sehun ears pinked as he quickly ran out the door just as Baekhyun walked in with an arm full of dirty dishes.

“What’d I miss?” asked Baekhyun.

Saturdays were the days Minseok taught Jongin how to make latte art. The two would be tucked away by the espresso machine in the server room. This particular Saturday the duo had an extra person in their midst.

Sehun had been put on temporary napkin folding duty while Junmyeon went on break because "I swear if Sehun asks me which fork is for what one more time…"

Sehun didn’t mind though. He liked folding napkins and liked watching Minseok teach. The comforting aroma of coffee made him feel happy and content.

He watched as Minseok steamed a carafe of milk and used it to draw an elegant leaf onto the top of the latte. Jongin was furiously scribbling in his pocket notebook detailing the specific temperature the milk was heated up to and notching how much liquid was poured onto his drawing of a mug.

The espresso machine was beautiful. It was a rose gold colored platinum with silver handles and bells. There were three espresso spouts, two steam wands, and a large enough rack instilled on the side to hold all the cappuccino and latte mugs. The top of the machine held the sugar cubes, demitasse spoons, and saucers. The espresso bean containers were connected to the back of the machine for an efficient and streamlined process. It was a sight to behold and the coffee produced from it was a dream come true.

Sehun was a third of the way done with filling the giant lexicon when he heard a "." He looked up to see Jongin surrounded by espresso cups and mugs of lattes, each one decorated with a blob of white milk in the center.

“Why is this so hard?” Jongin whined.

Sehun put down his napkins and walked over to Jongin.

“Is it harder than you expected?” he asks.

Jongin nods and complains, “I don’t know how Minseok hyung does it. I follow his exact movements and yet I end up with a blob instead of a leaf.”

“Hmm, did you tilt it towards you before pouring in the milk?” Sehun asked.

“Towards me? What the cup holding the coffee?” Jongin says back.

Sehun nods in affirmation, “Minseok sunbae tilted the coffee mug towards himself slightly before adding in the milk. I was watching you guys earlier and you by yourself and I think that’s the only difference.”

Jongin gave a small little "oh" before bending down to grab more milk out of the lo’boy.

“Thanks, Sehun, I’ll try again and see how it goes. Hey, you want one of these espressos? They’re still fine just not as hot.” Jongin says from inside the fridge.

Sehun’s eyes brighten and says a quick “Yeah sure!” before taking a mug for himself.

The coffee is wonderful. It’s rich and dark with a touch of hazelnut at the end. The earthy and bitter notes of dark arabica seeps into his soul and warms him up from the inside out.

“Wow, this is amazing,” Sehun says.

Jongin laughs and says, “Yeah, Minseok hyung’s got the espresso art down. He times the grind and makes sure the acidity level is the same every thirty minutes. He also checks and makes sure the temperature of the steam wand is being kept at 180F. It’s crazy how so many little things go into making a cup of coffee.”

“Well whatever he’s doing, it’s working.” Sehun muttered into the coffee.

“You want to try one of the lattes?” Jongin says as he juts a thumb towards the array of mugs.

Sehun gladly takes him up on his offer and goes to town.

An hour later he’s bouncing off the walls.

Every stack of napkins had been folded and stored away properly. All the wine glasses for the night had been polished and set in the side stations and cupboards. The bar had been wiped so clean that the silver was shining gently from the reclining sun. The floors were immaculate and the couches by the fireplace had freshly plumped pillows sitting on display.

Sehun was now working on dusting the wine display and showcase, meticulously turning the bottles so they all faced the same direction at the same angle.

Junmyeon came bounding up the stairs from the exit and met a snickering Luhan creeping from the side of the wall by the dining room entry way.

Luhan hadn’t notice Junmyeon behind him and still laughed by himself and Junmyeon thought that for once Luhan looked happy and carefree rather than his usual grimace of stress and annoyance. He looked away from the pixie boy and tried to find what the apple of his eye was.

Sehun had moved onto the silverware. He was going at warp speed dunking the unpolished silver into vats of hot water and out quickly into his microfiber towel wrapped hand. He had three separate utensil dividers spread across the table and each time he threw the correct utensil into its corresponding compartment he let out a "Woohoo!" or an "Aw yeah, nothin’ but net" and continued like so. This went on for a couple more minutes before Sehun looked up and saw Junmyeon across the room.

“Sunbae! Come look at all these weird lil forks! We have so many of them! They’re shaped like tiny tridents or something. I accidentally stabbed myself a couple of times, and like wow they’re sharp, but look! So cool! What are they? Have we always had them? What are they used for? Wait are they new because I swear I’ve never seen them and it’s my sixth day here. I asked Jongin and he said maybe they were oyster forks? Or something like that I wasn’t too sure. He was concentrated on making more blobs, I mean leaves, with milk…”

Junmyeon’s face falls and he groans. The night had barley begun and he knew that in the next hour or so Sehun would come crashing down out of his caffieneted high.

Sehun’s continued blabbering goes on in the background, “Which reminds me, have you heard of oat milk? I mean c’mon what’s next in the milk world. How does one even milk an oat?! Oh and wait back to the forks, speaking of oysters, are they good? I’ve never had one because they always look so slimey and just yeck. I don’t know man, I don’t think I could swallow one of those ers. It just looks so gross and they smell so briney.”

Luhan laughs out loud this time and slaps Junmyeon on the back.

“Sehun’s a goof but a good goof. Have fun~” Luhan drawls as he turns back towards his own station.

Junmyeon just stares at Luhan’s retreating figure as Sehun continues barraging him with questions and anecdotes from their time apart.

“Did you know that Tao has to scrub like a thousand oysters every day?! I can’t believe how many people eat them here. Like. So. Many. Sunbae! I finished all the napkins! I also had extra time, so all the glasses are done too. Oh, oh!! The coffee machine!! Sunbae!! It’s beautiful it’s, it’s majestic. Oh God the coffee here is so good. Jongin let me have all the ones he messed up on. I think he’s getting better though but definitely not as good as Minseok sunbae. Actually, I think Minseok sunbae might be a God a coffee God.”

"This is going to be a long, long night" Junmyeon mutters under his breath as he braves across the floor to help Sehun with the rest of the silver.

Today is Wednesday, which meant that Sehun has now been training for a little over a week. He’s gotten a little better at carrying cocktail glasses and has proved Junmyeon proud by being able to memorize the entire floor plan and menu within three days.

There’s still quite a bit left for him to learn but today is Wednesday and Wednesday's meant wine. Wednesdays were the days that the wine purveyors would come by and visit Yeonhee. Not only was she the restaurant manager, she was also the Sommelier of the restaurant. Yeonhee took it upon herself to train the entire staff on wine knowledge and so every Wednesday became Wine Wednesdays. The entire staff was scheduled to come to work at three o'clock so they could have a proper wine tasting. This came as a huge win-win for Yeonhee because the staff could learn about wine and give guests the extra push by saying even say they’ve tasted it themselves. This event became a huge motivator for staff to come to work on time, for only those who respected company policy could join in on the wine tastings.

Sehun was happy, to say he was excited would be an understatement. The last time he had a nice bottle of wine was at his older brother’s wedding. On Monday, Junmyeon had showed him how to properly uncork a bottle of wine and how to decant the wine. He wasn’t allowed to do that in front of guests yet, but it seemed easy enough. But that was besides the point because Sehun was focused on the tasting part of Wine Wednesdays.

An hour into the lecture and about five different varieties of white wines later, it was safe to say that Sehun was a little buzzed. Of course, he was professional, and took appropriate sips as one did during wine tastings and lectures. Junmyeon had explained how to taste wine properly. One was to only have enough wine to coat his tongue and must spit out the second and third tastes. In professional settings, no one was to actually drink a full glass of wine at any tasting. The purpose was to learn how to identify the nose, palate, and finish of the wine not get drunk.

Even still, Sehun was buzzed. And okay fine, maybe he wasn’t the good little student that he should have been. He may have downed the last glass of Sauvignon Blanc, had more than five sips of the Gewurztaminer, and faked spitting out the Gruner Veltliner when no one was looking.

The class had progressed to champagne and sparkling wines now. Three different bottles were placed on the table to the right of the wine purveyor and another was being demoed.

A small pop rang out in the middle of the room.

“And that’s how you properly open a bottle of bubbly.” The wine purveyor gently rested the bottle back into the ice before putting his wine key away in his pocket.

“Now, during service, it’s important to remove the wire cage and place it into your server aprons first before attempting to uncork the bottle. This way, you’ll have free hands to go about handling the bottle. Remember, it’s almost like a time bomb. You never know how much pressure is pushing against the cork form inside the bottle. As soon as you release the wire cage, place a thumb over the top of the cork, and point it away from your guests and your own face! Now, who wants to give it a go?”

No one responded, mainly because the older and more experienced servers already knew how to handle a bottle of champagne. Sehun glanced at his colleagues as his tongue poked out of his mouth, a nervous habit of his, silently wishing he wouldn’t be called on. He was feeling a little floaty from the wine.

Jongin nudged Sehun’s shoulder and motioned for him to volunteer. Sehun shook his head and mouthed a No. Jongin raised his eyebrows in question but didn’t take no for an answer. He nudged Sehun again and whispered, “go on, you can do it! Now’s the perfect time to try.”

Sehun bit the inside of his cheek to bite down a groan. He looked around the room again but didn’t see anyone else volunteering.

“I’ll give it a go.” He said shyly.

“Wonderful!” exclaimed the purveyor. “Come up here now and let’s see what you’ve got.”

Junmyeon casts a wary look over at Yeonhee but she just mouths It’s fine at him before giving Sehun her full attention.

“Alright, step one, show the host the label.”

Sehun bends slightly towards the pretend figure seated at the table and shows the label.

“Perfect, now continue.” The purveyor says with a wave.

Sehun pulls back and stands tall. He takes a small step back from the table and tilts his body so he’s facing slightly away from it and points the top of the bottle towards a neutral space behind him. He slowly unwraps the metal around the cork and puts it into his pocket. He’s holding the bottle by the neck so that his thumb easily wraps around the cork. The next part was the iffy bit. He cradled the entire bottle in the crook of his left arm while using his right hand to begin pulling the cork out.

Sehun pulled.

Nothing happened.

He tried a little harder this time.

It didn’t budge.

He tried even harder this time, slightly moving the bottle inwards as he exuded extra force but still no luck.

He repositioned the bottle into the right angle and tried again.

Still nothing.

Frustrated, he moved his left arm briskly jostling the bottle causing more pressure to build up under the cork. The trail of bead moved faster and faster after each attempt Sehun made.

“Okay, maybe you should stop,” The purveyor started, but Sehun was insistent. Ignoring the teacher, he twisted the top and tried to loosen it that way and when it still didn’t budge, Sehun tiled the entire bottle at 90 degrees…

“Wait! Don’t!” shouted the purveyor but was too late, Sehun had already removed his thumb and before his right hand made it to the top of the bottle the cork shot straight up and hit the ceiling.

Champagne jetted out and shot Sehun right in the face. Spluttering and gasping for air, Sehun ed his arms away from himself aiming unfortunately at the other servers sitting in front of him.

Seohyun and Seulgi screamed as they were hit with the drink. Jongin and Yixing were laughing at the others while trying to dodge the stream of golden liquid. Yeonhee stared shell shocked at what had just happened while Baekhyun and Jongdae laughed at each other’s hair both soaked from the rain of champagne. Minseok was at the edge of the seats with Jumyeon and so both were able to escape from the splash zone.

Meanwhile the cork bounced back down and ricocheted off another table, back into the air, and landed on the side station only to bounce up and down between the countertop and the bottom of the cupboards.

Sehun moved his arms again and tried to straighten the bottle, it wasn’t gushing out anymore, but a steady stream was still bubbling out of the mouth. Baekhyun ran up to Sehun, champagne flute in hand and began filling his own glass.

“Cheers!” yelled Baekhyun as he scampered away revealing Jongdae behind him. Instead of filling his own glass he took the entire bottle away from Sehun, threw a serviette at the poor kid and returned to fill the rest of their coworkers’ glasses as well.

Sehun gaped at the mess and the wine purveyor patted him on the back and said, “Well, at least you didn’t give yourself or anyone else a black eye.”

“A black eye!?” Sehun yelped.

“Oh yeah, these little tricksters always manage to get someone every once in a while. Usually those with less experience or less wine-know-how gets caught being the victim. Don’t worry kid, you’ll do better in due time.” The wine purveyor says as he pats Sehun on the back.

Sehun feels the blood draining from his face.

Well thank God I didn’t hit Junmyeon.