The weekend passes in a blur, as weekends always do. People visit the lively twisting streets of Hongdae for the artisan markets and the shopping in the daytime and the nightlife and clubs in the evening, and Amaranth is busy from ten in the morning till close. They don’t serve alcohol, so they avoid the worst of the drinkers, though every now and then people come in already plastered. Jongdae wonders a couple of times how the cat café is doing, but he barely has time to breathe, let alone pay them a visit.

Monday is blissfully quiet in comparison. Jongdae serves his regular early morning customers, students and businesspeople on their way to early classes or work. Yixing comes in at half past nine, and Sehun and Junmyeon turn up a few minutes later and invade Yixing’s booth.

“The prodigal customers return,” Jongdae teases when he’s made their drinks and put them in front of them. “Cats across the road still too scary for you, Sehun-ah?”

“I don’t get why animals always have to come to me,” Sehun says, frowning at Junmyeon's soft laugh. “I prefer to admire them from a respectful distance. It’s like they know and do it on purpose just to mess with me.”

“They probably do,” Jongdae grins. “Isn’t it a known fact that cats always go to the person who hates them?”

“I don’t hate them, I just don’t want them on me,” Sehun retorts, and ducks Junmyeon’s attempt to ruffle his hair. Jongdae leaves them bickering as usual and goes through the kitchen into the tiny storeroom under the stairs. He made a batch of non-alcoholic elderflower champagne two weeks ago and it should now be fully fermented and ready to drink. The plastic bottles are rock-hard when Jongdae tests them. They feel like they’re fizzy enough to cause an elderflower geyser if anyone unscrews the caps recklessly, so he grabs some masking tape and a permanent marker and labels each bottle EXTRA FIZZY! OPEN SLOWLY! Then he starts the mission of fitting six 1-litre bottles into the already jam-packed kitchen fridge. He wedges five bottles in somehow or other around the produce and Kyungsoo’s tidily-stacked containers of sauces and marinades, wondering if they need to get a bigger fridge, and if it would fit in the narrow kitchen, and what equipment they could move to make it work, until he realises it doesn’t matter, because there’s no way the accounts will stand for buying a new fridge.

He can’t get the sixth bottle in no matter what configuration he tries, so he takes it out the front and puts it in the fridge under the espresso machine with all the different kinds of milk. When he straightens up again, Kim Minseok is standing across the counter from him, with a smile on his face that is boyish and lopsided and absolutely devastating.

“Oh, Minseok-ssi,” Jongdae says, heart leaping up in his chest, and because he was unguarded, all his surprise and delight splashes out in his voice, in his smile. Surely he is flayed open, laid utterly bare. “What brings you here?”

Minseok’s eyes sparkle. “You never came back. I thought I better make sure Haru didn’t scare you off.”

Jongdae laughs. “No, that was our Sehunnie,” he says, and Sehun turns around in the booth to give him a look of pure betrayal.

Minseok leans on the counter, looking up at him through ebony lashes, curls falling over his forehead. Jongdae wonders if they’re as soft to touch as they look. “Then why didn’t you come back?” He props his chin on his fists and pouts at Jongdae disappointedly. “The cats missed you.” 

That pout should be classed as a lethal weapon. Jongdae feels like he’s at risk of exploding like one of his elderflower champagne bottles. He forces his feelings down, a fizzing pressure in his chest.

“It’s been really busy,” he says. “I know you said come any time, but a quarter to midnight seemed to be taking that a bit far.”

“You really do a lot here, don’t you?” Minseok says, gazing around the café, at the strings of fairy lights adorning the pale brick walls and shelves. 

“Too much!” Sehun chimes in from behind them, eavesdropping without a hint of shame. “Jongdae-hyung never stops working. He’s a certified workaholic.”

“I’m not,” Jongdae laughs. “I just like being here.”

Minseok looks back at him. “But you’re coming to the club tonight, right?”

“Yes. Yes, I’ll be there.” The words bubble out of him, elderflower champagne spilling over his lips, extra fizzy.

“Good. And make time to come visit me and the cats soon. I don’t mind if it’s late. Everyone needs a little cat therapy sometimes.”

“I will, I promise,” Jongdae says. Minseok grins at him and turns to leave. Jongdae watches him go through the glass door and cross the road, and it’s not until Yixing is standing across the counter from him that he realises he’s been smiling like an idiot the whole time. He refocuses with some difficulty, holding out his hand to take Yixing’s loyalty card.

“He seems nice,” says Yixing.

“Hmm,” says Jongdae, lowering his head to stamp the card with the little red spray of amaranth, and avoid Yixing’s shrewd gaze.

✽ ✾ ✿ ❀ ❁

Jongdae spends lunchtime in the kitchen. Kyungsoo has Mondays off, which means Jongdae gets to be the chef. It’s his preferred role, but he often ends up doing front work more, either drinks or serving, because Kyungsoo is both a more talented and well-trained chef than Jongdae, and also despises waiting tables with a passion that radiates off him like a small thundercloud and scares the customers. Amaranth doesn’t seat enough people to make two chefs at once necessary very often. Sometimes it can get a bit crazy if the wait staff don’t stagger the order dockets well enough, but Baekhyun is really good at that, making sure there aren’t too many dockets up to deal with at once, and he usually manages to control Chanyeol as well, whose enthusiasm to keep his tables happy makes him forget to consider how the kitchen is doing. Jongdae really doesn’t know how he’d cope without Baekhyun. He has very conflicted feelings about it, because he knows Baekhyun is wasted as café staff. He should be doing music. But all the same, Jongdae is glad he’s here.

It’s a quiet day, as is normal for Mondays, and Jongdae is able to alternate making meals and working his way through the prep list Kyungsoo has left for him. By the time they close at four, he’s finished the prep and done the inventory, and he spends ten minutes on the phone ordering produce for the next couple of days while Baekhyun tackles the front and Chanyeol gets on the dishes. By five everything is done, and Jongdae is left with no excuses to stay and work. He’s conflicted again as Baekhyun drags him upstairs. All his friends are going, and Jongdae wants to hang out with them and have fun too - but at the same time, he really, really doesn’t.

“Why is everything you own black?” Baekhyun asks, tossing shirts and jeans haphazardly out of Jongdae’s drawers and onto the floor. “Are you going through your teenage emo phase a few years late?”

“You’re making a mess,” Jongdae whines, though he already knows Baekhyun will ignore him. He flops down on his bed, which is the only seating in the single room apart from a couple of cushions on the floor. “Our uniform is black and I spend all my time here. There’s no point in buying other colours.”

“There is so much wrong with that statement I don’t even know where to start,” Baekhyun says, turning around to squint at him. “Do you seriously not have shirts in any other colour?”

“I don't think so? Oh wait, Yixing gave me a shirt that got left at the laundromat a while ago.” Jongdae frowns at the ceiling, trying to remember where he’d put it. He’d kept it in case he wanted to do dirty jobs and not mess up his uniform shirts. He rolls off his bed with a groan and looks under it, pulling out the plastic box with his winter clothes in it. Baekhyun hangs over his shoulder, snatching the folded shirt from on top of Jongdae’s puffer jacket with a triumphant "hah!", and Jongdae belatedly remembers why he’d not kept the shirt out to wear everyday. It’s a delicate shade of pink.

“What the , this is Versace,” Baekhyun says, shaking it out. 

“Yes, well. I think it wasn’t originally pink,” Jongdae says, eying the shirt dubiously. “Yixing thought something red in the same wash ran and that’s why the customer ditched it.”

“Doesn’t matter, pink will look great on you,” Baekhyun says, holding the shirt up against Jongdae and giving a satisfied nod. “Go shower, you smell like kitchen, and when you get out, make an effort, will you?”

“Aren’t you going home?” Jongdae asks, catching the pink shirt when Baekhyun tosses it at him.

Baekhyun beams. “I planned ahead! I brought my stuff so I can get ready here and make sure you don’t bail on us. You better still have that coconut scrub thing I like or I’ll be very disappointed.”

“Bold of you to assume you can use my shower,” Jongdae says, fighting a grin.

Baekhyun gives him a flat look. “Now, why would you say a thing like that when you know I know just how ticklish you are?” He pounces, and Jongdae spends the next five minutes shrieking as Baekhyun digs his sharp fingers into all his most ticklish spots.

After escaping Baekhyun’s clutches, Jongdae showers and dresses in the pink shirt and a clean pair of black jeans. While Baekhyun’s filling his tiny bathroom with coconut-scented steam and warbling a medley of girl group songs in glorious falsetto, he eyes his reflection in the mirror set in the wardrobe door. His hair is pretty short and only needs his bangs swept up off his face with a little holding cream to make him look more put-together than usual. He’s not going to wear eye makeup like Baekhyun undoubtedly will, but he remembers a pair of earrings Sehun gave him for his birthday last year, dangling pale gold cats sitting elegantly upright. He puts them in, wincing a little as the skin rebreaks because it’s been about eight months since he last wore earrings, and looks again. They hang close to his neck and draw attention to the sharp line of his jaw, and the colour sets off his skin tone. It's been a very long time since he did anything more than throw on his uniform and drag a brush haphazardly through his hair, and he’s genuinely surprised by the difference a coloured shirt, styled hair and earrings makes.

Then, inexplicably, he wonders if Minseok will notice that he looks nicer than usual, and his stomach flops over. He frowns at himself, or tries to, because his eyebrows do that stupid thing where they tilt up instead of down and he just looks acutely worried. 

He shakes his head, feels the little cats bump against the soft place just behind his jaw. Then he shuts the wardrobe door firmly and throws himself down onto his bed to wait for Baekhyun to finish in the shower. Of course Minseok won’t notice how he looks. Why would he? They barely know each other, and it shouldn’t matter to Jongdae, anyway.

✽ ✾ ✿ ❀ ❁

At the Darkroom they find most of their group already there, gathered around one of the big square booth tables along the edges of the room. Joohyun and Yerim from the flower shop wave at him brightly from the back of the table, drinks in hand, and beside them Yukhei is already deep in conversation with Lu Han. Jongin and the other part-time dishwasher, Seungwan, are giggling over something on Jongin’s phone. Jongdae finds himself sitting next to Sooyoung, no doubt due to Baekhyun’s skillful maneuvering. He introduces himself to her politely while Chanyeol and Baekhyun scrawl their names on the open mic blackboard and wait for their turn to perform. Minseok is across the table from him, talking to Kyungsoo, and apparently working his magic on another shy person, because Kyungsoo is smiling and talking back in an open, unguarded way Jongdae rarely gets to see. Minseok’s eyes look even more incredible than usual, elongated at the outer edges and very slightly shimmering, and Jongdae can’t stop darting glances at him. Is Minseok wearing makeup? It hardly seems likely, and Jongdae doesn't want to stare too much in case Minseok catches him looking.

Sehun and Junmyeon arrive together about ten minutes later, and Sehun almost crushes Jongdae by falling into his lap and delightedly flinging his long arms around his neck when he sees that Jongdae’s wearing his gift. He stays there, flicking the earrings repeatedly to make them swing, and refuses to get off until Junmyeon eventually lures him away by telling him he can sit in his lap instead. Jongdae’s legs have pins and needles for a good five minutes after that experience, but he’s glad to have made Sehun so happy. He should have worn the earrings before.

Sooyoung is nice. Jongdae hadn’t really expected anything else. Baekhyun, though Jongdae would never admit it to his face, has good taste, and he wouldn’t try to set Jongdae up with someone he didn’t like. She’s clever and friendly and interesting and funny, and Jongdae enjoys talking to her. 

When Baekhyun gets up on the stage and he and Chanyeol adjust their seating and the couple of simple microphones in preparation for their set, Sooyoung leans closer. “Your friend was quite insistent that I meet you,” she says. “He was really singing your praises.” 

“Ah,” Jongdae manages. The half-glass of beer he’s drunk goes heavy and acidic in his stomach, and it's ridiculous, he thinks, that a few simple words can curdle inside him like this, that his stupid worries can turn something he'd been enjoying into something his body wants to purge in the space of a sentence. “Sorry about that. Baekhyun’s about as subtle as a brick to the face.”

Sooyoung laughs. “I mean, correct me if I’m wrong,” she says, “you do seem like a nice guy, but I’m getting the impression you’re not as keen about being matched up as your friend is to match you.”

“You’re not wrong,” Jongdae says quietly. “It’s - it’s nothing personal. I’d like to be friends. I just…” he rubs his forehead, and takes another sip of beer despite his queasiness to fill the gap in the words he can’t navigate. 

Sooyoung nods, touching his arm lightly. “I understand.” There’s a knowing look in her eyes that makes Jongdae want to go home and curl up under his blankets and never come out. Against his will, his eyes go to Minseok, and finds Minseok already looking at him. When their eyes meet, Minseok smiles. Jongdae, for once, can’t quite manage to smile back. He forces himself to look back at Sooyoung.

“You probably do,” he says. The words are heavy as bricks, crushing him beneath their impossible weight.

“You should tell your friend,” Sooyoung says, her eyes going to Baekhyun up on the stage, looking deceptively angelic with the dim club lighting glowing in his golden hair. Chanyeol checks his tuning, bends a listening ear to his strings. The air is busy with murmured conversation. Most people aren’t paying attention to the musicians. “If you tell him," Sooyoung says softly, "he’ll stop doing this.”

“You’re right, I know,” Jongdae says. He thinks that might be pity he reads in the cast of her eyes, and he feels sick. 

It shouldn’t be so hard to tell Baekhyun. One might think it was simple, just a sentence, a couple at most. It's not hard to think of the words. He's come up with hundreds of variations over the years. Baekhyun, he could say now, I appreciate your efforts on my behalf, but I’m more interested in the Minseoks of the world than the Sooyoungs.

But there’s just so much weight hanging on those words, sunk deep into the core of his chest, and over the years they’ve only grown heavier, because he never said them at the start. He gave in to the first blind date, and the second, and after so many years of allowing those words to sink ever deeper, he doesn’t know how he’ll ever find the strength to haul them up and out.

He’s always been one to take the path of least resistance, going with the flow because he’s afraid to rock the boat, and he’s always believed that this way was better, safer, for everyone. But somewhere along the way he’d discovered that all he’s done is locked himself into a cage of his own lies, and he’s long misplaced the key.

Chanyeol starts strumming, his acoustic guitar amped by pickup. Baekhyun sits a little straighter on his stool, preparing to sing.

“Guys,” Jongdae says, leaning forward to catch the attention of the rest around the table. “They’re starting.”

Everyone quiets down at his unvoiced request. Jongdae curls his fingers around his half-empty glass, chilly and damp with condensation, and lets the music wash over him, soft water lapping at his raw places. It’s an R&B song they’ve arranged for two voices, Baekhyun’s voice gliding bright and clear above Chanyeol’s warm baritone. Together, they sound like rays of colour, like sunlight reflecting through a prism being held underwater.

Jongdae watches, not taking his eyes off them, but he thinks he can feel Minseok watching him still. He doesn’t look to see if he’s right.

✽ ✾ ✿ ❀ ❁

Jongdae is fourteen and still living in his parents’ house in Daejeon when he meets a beautiful boy named Park Jimin. Jimin laughs like a sun shower, and kisses Jongdae like a butterfly, lots of little light and fleeting brushes of his lips, like he's scared Jongdae is going to run away if he's not extra careful.

There’s something about Jimin that makes him more wonderful than Jongdae has a hope of explaining. Jimin makes his heart feel light and fluttery, makes him breathless in an entirely new and wondrous way. Jongdae wants to be close to Jimin in a way he has never wanted to be close to anyone else before.

"Why do I feel this way when I look at you?" he asks. They’re lying in the long dry grass behind the basketball court, side by side, and the lowering sun paints Jimin golden, and Jongdae can’t take his eyes off him. “Why are you so beautiful?” 

Jimin gives his shimmering laugh.

"Who cares why," he replies, and places his delicate butterfly kisses on Jongdae’s ear and his nose and all along his jaw. Jongdae may not know why this is so wonderful, and Jimin may not care, but what he does know is that boys should want to kiss girls, not other boys, and yet Jongdae has never been happier than when he is returning Jimin's butterfly kisses with cautious trembling kisses of his own.

Then Jongdae is sent to school in Seoul, and he tells Jimin they have to stop.

"It’s okay," Jimin says, one arm around Jongdae’s shoulders as he whispers apology after apology. "My mom says teenage romances aren’t meant to last forever.”

“It’s not…” Jongdae tries to say, but he can’t bring himself to finish the sentence.

“I’m going to miss you,” Jimin says. He’s crying, and Jongdae’s chest is aching so bad that he can hardly breathe. “You don’t have to write to me or anything. You can forget all about me if you want. But I hope one day you learn to accept yourself, Jongdae. I really do.”

About halfway into second year, Soojung from Jongdae’s homeroom stops him just as they’re leaving the classroom and asks him to consider her friend Park Sunyoung. Jongdae knows what Soojung is asking. It’s a common tactic among the girls to send a friend to scope out their chances with their boy of choice, sparing them the humiliation of being turned down to their face, but it has never happened to him.

Almost automatically, Jongdae considers Soojung’s friend Park Sunyoung. She’s in his chemistry and English classes. She seems friendly and bright. He’s never seen her being mean to anyone. He wouldn’t mind getting to know her better.

Then, unexpectedly, he finds himself remembering Park Jimin and his sunshine-laugh and butterfly-kisses, and a pit opens up inside him, mineshaft deep. He compares the way he feels when he thinks about them, and he finally comes to the understanding of what he and Jimin were, and what that means Jongdae is.

He’s about to make the first excuse that comes to mind, but then he sees Sunyoung watching from the end of the lockers, flanked protectively by Amber and Qian. He sees her nervous expression and the way she clings to Amber’s hand, and he cannot bring himself to do it. It’s not her fault he’s like this. And who knows. Perhaps he’s wrong. Perhaps he can like a girl if he gives himself a chance. How can he really know until he tries?

So he dates Sunyoung. They’re a great couple. Everyone says so. They look good together. They get on wonderfully. They both like rock music and old movies, they like biking along the river and singing duets at the noraebang. They never fight. They kiss, sometimes, and Jongdae tries to tell himself he enjoys it. He does like Sunyoung. She’s sweet and kind and fun to be with, and he wants her to be happy.

It’s just so different to how he felt with Jimin.

It takes eight months for Sunyoung to tell him that she thinks they’d be better off as friends.

“I’m sorry, Jongdae,” she says. Her eyes are all scrunched up with unhappiness, and Jongdae wants to reach out for her, wants to hug her until she doesn’t feel sad anymore, but it’s his fault she’s unhappy this time, and he holds himself back. “It’s nothing you did. You’re a great guy and I really like you. It’s just that there’s no spark.”

She keeps on apologising, as if it’s her fault things haven’t worked out, and Jongdae’s stomach twists up into knots, because it’s not her fault at all, it’s him, it’s all him. He did this. He gives up on holding back and hugs her, her beautiful soft hair, and promises her that it’s okay. That he knows what she means, and that they can still be friends. She cries as she tells him she’s sorry for hurting him, and Jongdae’s chest aches so badly that it’s like someone has just plunged both hands into the centre of his ribcage and pulled apart, ribs cracking and popping and his heart exposed, on full view for all to see.

Baekhyun thinks he’s heartbroken, when Jongdae stumbles back into the room they share in the boarding house with a clenched fist pressed to his chest, white-faced and ragged-eyed and unable to catch his breath, and gasps out in response to Baekhyun’s panicked questions that Sunyoung broke up with him. Baekhyun doesn’t understand, though he cries with sheer sympathy and hugs Jongdae all night long, while Jongdae tries and tries to breathe. He doesn’t understand, and Jongdae cannot speak because the hands forcing their way into his chest just keep on digging deeper, and even if he could, he wouldn’t know how to explain that he’s not crying because he’s upset Sunyoung broke up with him. He’s crying because he’s not, and it doesn’t make sense that it should hurt like this. 

Perhaps it doesn’t matter, really, what the reason for his tears is. Jongdae’s heart is broken either way.

After that, Jongdae turns his emotions to the inside, buries them deep in his chest where they can be hidden and safe, where they fester and turn into the cold hands that wrap around his ribs and organs from the inside and squeeze. But hidden deep down there nobody can see them, and so his tender heart is protected, from everyone but himself. 

✽ ✾ ✿ ❀ ❁

When Baekhyun and Chanyeol finish their set, Jongdae makes eye contact with Baekhyun and does his best to smile, clapping and giving him a double thumbs up. Baekhyun beams at him from the stage, glowing with the performance high, and he’s seen that Jongdae’s been there and supported him now, so Jongdae can finally let himself stand up.

“I'm sorry,” he says when Sooyoung, and next to her, Yixing, glance up at him. “I have to go.”

There’s a general cry of protest around the table, but Jongdae backs away anyway, because he thinks if he stays any longer he might really be sick. He gives his card to the bartender and tells him to charge the table’s tab to it in an attempt to assuage some of the guilt. He'll deal with the credit card bill when it happens.

He’s left so early that it's not completely dark yet, the sky a deep umber with the lights of the city diffusing through polluted summer dust. The air is warmer than inside, but all the same Jongdae shivers. He takes a few steps in the direction of home, but his stomach keeps trying to lurch up his throat, and he stops and turns to rest his forehead against the brick wall. He wonders, as he tries to take deep breaths and stop shivering, what it was that gave him away to Sooyoung, and despises himself for running away. Baekhyun is going to give him that worried look again. He groans and knocks his forehead lightly against the wall. It’s distracting, so he does it again, but this time his forehead hits something soft.

“Don't,” says a gentle voice. Jongdae shies away, shocked to find that Minseok has placed his hand between Jongdae’s head and the wall. For a split second, he panics. But Minseok, instead of treating Jongdae like the freak he's acting like, just smiles at him, sweet and lopsided and completely non-threatening. “You need all the brain cells you can get,” he says. 

Jongdae blinks. “True,” he says, a hint of a smile touching his lips. He can still feel the echo of Minseok’s hand against his forehead, a phantom imprint tingling against his skin.

“You’re shivering,” Minseok observes. “Are you cold?”

“No,” Jongdae says, though he is, a bit, but he knows it doesn’t make sense with how warm it is out here. “I don’t feel that great. A bit much to drink, maybe.”

Minseok's eyebrows lift. “You barely had half a glass,” he says, and Jongdae shrugs, looking away.

“I’m gonna head home. You go back in.”

“You look pretty pale,” Minseok says. There’s concern in his eyes as he lays a hand on Jongdae’s arm. “I'll walk you back. You live above your café, right?” 

"Yes, but you don’t need to, I'm fine. I just need some sleep, probably. Stay and enjoy your evening, Minseok-ssi, I - I insist," Jongdae says, laughing a little at himself for using such formal language, but he means it, and he doesn't know how else to express it.

"You insist, huh?" Minseok sounds like he’s smiling. Jongdae shoots a glance under his eyelashes to see if it’s true, and it is.

"You know what?" Minseok says. “I think you could use some of that cat therapy I mentioned earlier.”

“Oh no, please don’t ruin your evening on my account,” Jongdae starts, but Minseok just shakes his head.

“It won’t be ruined. I want to. Besides, you promised to come back, and this way I know you’ll keep it.” His grin brightens. "I insist."

So Jongdae finds himself in Black Cat Nero, sitting on a big polka-dot bean bag in the petting corner, a takeaway cup of citron tea in his hands, and a long-haired white cat curled up in his lap. Minseok sits down on the beanbag next to him, the silver tabby called Mimi in his arms. The cat in Jongdae’s lap is purring, and just like when Haru did his lawnmower impression on him last week, the knots in his stomach slowly start to ease.

Minseok tells him the stories of the cats they’re holding. “Lala there was abandoned when her family moved,” he says, nodding to the white cat. “The landlord found her locked in the empty apartment a week later. She must have been drinking the water in the toilet cistern or she wouldn’t have survived that long.”

“That’s awful.” Jongdae Lala’s soft white fur. “How could anyone leave her? She’s so sweet.” One of Lala’s ears flicks back and forward again, her blue eyes half-closed.

“It’s surprisingly common,” Minseok says.

Jongdae remembers a thought experiment from his first year of university, from a philosophy lecture. Are human beings fundamentally good or bad? There’d been a debate in class on the matter. Jongdae hadn’t spoken. He’d not had a clear opinion then. He does now. He has since that first winter in the mountains of North Jeolla province, soaked uniforms and rice grains in the dirt, and a black eye that reappeared every time it started to fade.

“Maybe not so surprising. People can be very cruel.” 

Lala rubs her cheek against his hand, and he gathers her up in his arms, holding her soft warmth against his aching heart.

Minseok nods, eyes turned down. “It’s kind of why I quit vet school.” 

Jongdae tilts his head. “How so?”

“I was about a month into my internship at a working practice when someone brought in a cat they didn’t want any more. It was antisocial and they couldn’t rehome it, and my boss told me to put it down. It was part of our job, and I’d known that, but it never really hit home until then. It took three vet nurses to hold it down on the table. I’m sure it knew what I was going to do. I gave it the shot, and then I locked myself in the bathroom and cried for two hours straight. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever done.”

Minseok doesn’t stop Mimi in his lap, but he looks so unhappy that Jongdae can’t bear it, and he doesn’t think twice, dislodging Lala and sliding over to join Minseok on his bean bag, and wrapping his arms around him. It’s not until he’s already there, with the squishiness of the beanbag tipping their bodies against each other, that he realises that this might be weird. They barely know each other, and here he is hugging Minseok without even asking, like they’re close friends instead of barely acquaintances. He tenses, ready to pull back, but Minseok relaxes into him immediately.

“The thing is,” Minseok continues, “vets do that kind of thing all the time. I was the only one freaking out. It’s not only people who don’t want their pets anymore. Sometimes it’s because they can’t pay the bills for surgery, or it’s shelter animals when the shelters run out of space. The vet I was working for thought I was being ridiculous. He said if I couldn’t toughen up I wouldn’t last long, and he was right. I don’t regret dropping out. I only wish I’d done it before I put down that cat.”

Jongdae’s heart aches for Minseok. He wishes he knew something to say that would make the memory stop hurting, but he doesn’t know if anything he could say would do that. 

“This is probably going to sound selfish," he says,