The aroma of fresh coffee beans floated in the air. It was in the middle of the afternoon, hushed conversations within the coffee shop filled the somewhat empty, quiet spaces of the shop. It was perfect. 

Sitting in the same spot as the last time she had visited, Yeonbin sipped her coffee through the straw as her eyes were glued to the glowing screen in front of her. Today was an off day for her but that didn’t prevent her from working furthermore to get ahead. Being away from the hospital and sitting in a less stressful place felt much better to be more productive in. Slightly shaking the cup in her hand to mix the contents more, she took another sip before setting it down on the table.

As her fingers typed away on her laptop, her surroundings faded into nothing. None of it mattered at all in comparison to what she was looking at. Yet as she worked, she couldn’t seem to pull herself to do her work diligently even without being distracted. The distraction wasn’t clear in her mind for her to figure out what it was, it was just major enough to keep her thoughts away from focusing on the task she had laid out in front of her. Running her hand through her hair, she let out a frustrated sigh as she forced herself to finish.

“I didn’t think I would see you here again.”

It was him.

Yeonbin’s eyes tore away from her laptop and glanced up. slowly went agape seeing Baekhyun standing before her with a fresh cup of coffee in his hand and his tablet in the other. His hair remained up but it was slightly more messy than normal and his attire simply consisted of a striped dress shirt tucked into khakis. He always wore dress shirts or sweaters, recalling the other times they’ve interacted.

But besides that, she didn’t think they would run into each other in the same place again.

“I didn’t either,” Yeonbin replied, feeling a smile threatening to appear on her face for some unknown reason. “Y-You’re off duty today?”

“Yeah,” Baekhyun nodded as he set his belongings onto her table before pulling out the chair from her table and sitting himself down across from her. “I am,” he ended before he took a quick sip of his drink. Noticing her laptop, he then asked, “You’re working right now?”

“Kind of, yeah,” Yeonbin replied as she glanced down at her laptop. “I’m off too but I figured I should do some work while I’m here.”

There wasn’t anything else for her to do other than that. 

Baekhyun rested his elbows as he leaned in towards the table. “Oh really? How long have you been in here?”

“An hour ago?” Yeonbin recollected, remembering she entered the shop at about twelve in the afternoon. “I’ve been working since then.”

“You should take a break then,” he suggested while inhaling. “You looked frustrated when I came over… I should entertain you during that time.”

That, she couldn’t deny. Yeonbin raised a brow at his suggestion as he shot her a teasing smile. “Entertain me how,” she questioned skeptically. A break didn’t seem like a bad idea but she couldn’t help but be wary of his suggestion from how he worded it.

“Just by talking to you, that’s all,” Baekhyun shrugged with a small grin. He cocked his head to the side and raised a brow. “What were you thinking about then?”

“N-Nothing…” Yeonbin shook her head, wondering why she would think of his suggestion weirdly. “I thought you would… you know, take me somewhere else.”

Shifting in his seat, he then said, “That doesn’t seem like a bad idea, to be honest.” Baekhyun beamed at the idea she had put in his mind. He rested the side of his face on the palm of his hand as his eyes were glued onto her. “Do you want to?”

Yeonbin bit her bottom lip, pondering. Her eyes trailed between her laptop screen and Baekhyun, who was fortunately checking his phone so she didn’t have to meet his eyes again. Glancing back at her laptop, a soft sigh escaped from her lips, seeing how much she had done in the past hour - a lot. The numbers and words on her screen were starting to blur together and she was starting to lose her focus on them.

“Well,” Yeonbin began as she glanced back at Baekhyun who was now off his phone. “I… I don’t know if I should.”

Baekhyun looked up from his phone and quickly shoved it into his pocket. It was silent as he looked at her, most likely studying her from how intense his gaze was. She felt smaller from it. 

He then exhaled through his nostrils. Softly, he asked, “What’s stopping you, Yeonbin?” Baekhyun rubbed his hands together momentarily before setting them down on the table, his eyes continued to bore holes into her. 

They were so powerful, pleading for Yeonbin to answer and she couldn’t even fight it - she doesn’t even want to. But it was hard to put into words on what was even stopping her. She wasn’t being held back by the strict rules and guidelines of Asan. Was it the fear of getting into something she would regret? The idea of being with Baekhyun for a prolonged period of time? She couldn’t exactly pinpoint it.

Baekhyun also called her by her first name, which almost took her off guard. He seemed to have noticed her expression. “What is it?”

“Nothing. It’s just that... I don’t know. I don’t know what’s stopping me at all,” Yeonbin replied, unsure of what to say. “And you called me by my first name.”

A soft chuckle came out of Baekhyun’s mouth. “Did I surprise you saying that?”

“It nearly took me off guard,” Yeonbin admitted almost sheepishly. 

“Well, we’re not working right now. We could drop the formalities right here and just call each other by our first names,” Baekhyun smiled with a snort. He then paused before continuing with, “You know, ever since I’ve dropped you off at your home, you never called me by my name even though you said you will.”

That was true, she did say she would call him by that. But ever since then, they had only met at work which would give her no reason to do so, knowing there were certain boundaries that couldn’t be crossed. But even now where none of that was being enforced, doing so felt off in a way. She remembered how natural it was to say and think, so what was stopping her? And why was it something he was always so pressing of?

“Yeah, I haven’t,” Yeonbin confirmed. “And um, I just want to know why you’re making such a big deal out of this, if you don’t mind me asking.”

“I just think after all those events that led us here - we became close, don’t you think? And it’s weird that I’m the only one being informal in this relationship.”

Relationship, that word left an unexplainable feeling within her gut.

“I guess we are.” Yeonbin found herself agreeing to his statement about them being close in some way. She then let out a light scoff. “I just find it funny that something like our names is significant enough to be talked about frequently.”

“Given the circumstances right now, I feel like it should be. And I didn’t think I would be acting this way about my name but here we are,” he grinned.

Yeonbin didn’t expect something such as names to be anything that would matter. Then again, the things she had previously experienced since late April was also unexpected. 

“I don’t know,” she sighed. “I’ve called you Dr. Byun so many times, it’ll feel weird to address you in another way.”

Baekhyun shrugged. “You should make yourself comfortable then.”

A scoff managed to escape from Yeonbin, amused from how he acted. “You really want me to call you by your name that badly?”

“Of course,” Baekhyun grinned shamelessly. “To hear my name mentioned by someone as special as you, Yeonbin… why wouldn’t I?”

There it was again, her being special. She was anything but that. Yet there was that fluttering feeling again that was pleasant to experience. It wasn’t the first time he had complimented her yet like always, it left that warm sensation that she found herself to enjoy. The compliment was common yet when it came from Baekhyun, it felt like a romantic sonnet for her. Why?

Rendered speechless, a smile then broke through her face, earning a light chuckle from the anesthesiologist. Shaking her head, she then sighed, “I’m not… You’re something, Dr-” 

Yeonbin stopped herself before she could finish.