"Hey," Baekhyun's voice greets Seolhee around midnight. He is holding a glass of water that he slowly hands towards her. Seolhee sits up and finished the glass in one shot. She's been so exhausted that she immediately fell asleep. Baekhyun places the glass on her bedside table. Then he slips under the blankets to welcome Seolhee in his arms.

     "Baek?" she calls out.

     "Hm?" he replies.

     "Tell me something about yourself," she says. "It feels like I have known you for a long time without really knowing you at all," she adds.

     Baekhyun clears his throat and tries to think of what he could possibly tell Seolhee, what information Seolhee could possibly want from him. So he asks, "What do you want to know?"

     Seolhee tightens her arms around Baekhyun's waist and inches closer to put her head on his chest until she hears a faint heartbeat. "Tell me about your parents, what do they do? Are you close with them?"

     "My parents own a restaurant back home. I talk to them from time to time. Am I close to them? I don't know," Baekhyun exhales. "Is anyone really close to their parents?" And that made Seolhee laugh. In terms of issues with parents, she's pretty sure she can be an executive if there was ever a support group for that. So she agrees with him, mumbling a "You're right," and kissing his chest.

     "What about your brother? Are you close to him? Do you have any other siblings?"

     "Nope, he's my only sibling. I also talk to him once in a while, although I'm closer to my niece and nephew than him. They're five years old, twins. You should come to see them sometimes. Judging by how close you are with Kyungsoo's sister, I guess you like kids?"

     Seolhee chuckles and nods. "Yes, I do. And I would very much be willing to see them."

     "Sure, I'll take the three of you out sometime,"

     And that was how their perfect night ended.

     It was Saturday afternoon when Seolhee just came home from a brunch with Chaeyoung and found Baekhyun in her apartment with his headphones on, focused on his laptop as he screams to teammates through his microphone. "You ing idiot!", "Are you blind?", "Goddamit Kyungsoo!", "Yah Suho what the ?", "No, Sehun! It was your fault you idiot," and she would laugh. Baekhyun was so focused on the game he didn't even notice Seolhee's arrival until ten minutes later when he finished the game and he was so pissed with the other players that he decided to go to the kitchen to drink some water and then found Seolhee sitting there, watching him play with her friends.

     "Oh," he says with eyes wide open, "I didn't realize you were here." 

     "Well, you were so busy shouting profanities at my friends that I didn't want to disturb you," she laughs and then stands up. She kisses Baekhyun on the lips which he gladly welcomes, wrapping his arms around her waist and then kissing her once more. "Do you want to do something?" he asks.

      Seolhee shakes her head. "No, not really. I just wanna stay in bed and read,"

     "Okay," Baekhyun nods his head and lets Seolhee enter her room.

     For a while, they stayed like that, in separate rooms, as Baekhyun continues fighting with his teammates, Seolhee sits in silence in her bedroom while reading a romance book that she's been meaning to read for so long.

     Romance fictions were generally frowned upon inside their house. Back when Seolhee was 15 and discovered the beauty in reading young adult fiction, she was scolded. "Girls like you should not indulge yourself in something so pathetic," her mother would say. "You should try reading more academic books instead. You'd learn more from them," her father would add. And every time she goes to the bookstore, Seolhee would always make sure to buy herself some medical books along with one or two romantic books that she would hide from her parents.

     She would read those medical books, and honestly, she enjoys learning while reading them. However, she would find solace in reading fiction, too. She enjoys reading about young girls who were promised that they could change the world, and while she's feeling the bitterness of never being given the chance to feel that much power and freedom, she would still hope against all hopes that she also gets to change her world.

     But that was before. She was a kid back then. An innocent girl filled with the naivety of how cruel life can be. Now she's grown up and she thinks she's matured enough. Matured. At least that's what her parents told her when she finally decided to take biology as her pre-med undergraduate program. "Good thing you finally came to your senses," was what her mother said when she gave up her hope of studying literary, the "impractical" and "futureless" literary.

     And so Seolhee finds more comfort in making her parents proud rather than pursuing other things. Life just doesn't go the way she always wants, but maybe that was for the better. Since then, Seolhee decided that she will need a roadmap, a concrete plan for how the rest of her life would go to avoid disappointing her family. In this way, she will know exactly what the future holds for her.

     And while we're being honest, she would admit that Baekhyun was never really part of a plan, but she's pretty sure he wouldn't damage that either.

     An hour or two later, Baekhyun entered the room, jumping on her side and leaning on her shoulder. "What are you reading?"

     "Why, do you want to go out?" Of course, she wouldn't answer his question. She would not admit that she, a biology major, is still reading adult fiction. "Nope," Baekhyun answers.

     And Baekhyun stayed right there, allowing Seolhee to continue reading while he falls asleep embracing her.

     Days with Baekhyun fall faster every day. It was already almost their finals and she's quite scared that she doesn't see Baekhyun studying while she's already busting her , almost not sleeping every single day just to study and study. No matter how much she does it, she feels like she's still not studying enough and is still bound to fail the finals.

    That was a good thing for her. That means she will be forced to continue studying until she feels her anxiety get out of her system, until she feels confident that she will ace the finals. Passing is not enough. She needs to ace it. Perfect, it must be perfect.

     So more time studying means less time with Baekhyun. One evening, when she hasn't seen Baekhyun in three days as she caves inside her room all day and all night, she decided to give him a call. They would talk, Baekhyun would check up on her from time to time, making sure that she eats her meals and still gets at least five hours of sleep.

     "Hey, Seol. Is everything alright?" Baekhyun greets. "No, I just... I- uh," Seolhee suddenly grows nervous and she doesn't even know why. "What is it?