The rain was pounding when Kyuhyun woke up. It tattered along the roof, echoing inside his skull and rattling his brains. 

 

“Take back your storm, Jove. It is misplaced,” he groaned, rolling over and tossing an arm out across the empty bed. 

 

“You’ve slept away the better part of the morning,” Jongwoon admonished from across the room. 

 

Fighting a skirmish with the bedsheets, Kyuhyun struggled into a sitting position. “Good morning, hyung. I see you have risen early with ambitious hopes for the day. This is foolish of you.” 

 

Standing at the window with arms folded, Jongwoon transferred his scowl from the rain to his friend in bed. “You’ve only just awoken. Don’t start one of your tirades.” 

 

Kyuhyun ignored this, as was his habit. “I have never known an early riser of good temperament. They are eternally judgmental, sour folk, and this temperament stains everything they do. Priests are early risers, and what good does it do them? They scourge themselves and count up the sins of everyone around them. Bakers, too, are early risers. I have never known a sorrier profession than bakers. Every one I have ever met is red and bloated with flour and ill-spirits.” 

 

“Kyuhyun.” 

 

“Rising early is not a natural habit for students and revolutionaries, Jongwoon-hyung. They are the children of the dusk. All the best ideas are formed in the early and middle hours of the night, and absorbed best at the same times. By rising so obstinately early, as you do—“ 

 

“All the late sleepers I have ever known are drunkards and layabouts.” Turning his back on the rain, Jongwoon leaned back against the window sill and studied the man in his bed. 

 

“That is true. But we are men of good temper.” 

 

“You are drunk. I had hoped you would sleep it off.” 

 

“Impossible. The entirety of my person is soaked in years of wine. Every hair, every membrane is saturated. There is more wine in my veins than blood. If you were to dry me out, there would be nothing but a husk, which would crumble at a breath of wind.” 

 

“You are talking nonsense. Put on some clothes and go home.” 

 

“I was saying,” Kyuhyun continued from an earlier dropped skein, “that Jove has misplaced his rainstorm. He is watering the roofs and paving-stones of Seoul, to make them grow. We do not need more roofs and paving-stones. There are enough of them. Let Jupiter take his rain to the country, where it may fall on flowers and grains. Korea needs more of those. By giving Seoul the portion of rain due to the provinces, he makes the farms shrivel and the farmers starve. Deprived of their livelihood, they come to Seoul, and take habitation beneath the newly-bloomed roofs and paving-stones. At which point there is a greater expanse of them to be rained upon, and fewer farms, so that Jove then allots a larger portion of his rain again to Seoul. It is poor resource-management on the part of the heavens.” 

 

“There are parks and gardens also in Seoul.” 

 

“Let them look to themselves.” 

 

“How callous you are, Kyuhyun! You will sacrifice the flowers of Seoul for the flowers of Korea.” 

 

“You’d do the same.” 

 

Jongwoon was not pleased by the comparison. “Put on your clothes, Kyuhyun. Go home.” 

 

“It is raining. I have no umbrella.” 

 

“Take mine.” 

 

“It is pouring gouts. I will become damp to the knee and catch a cold, and then I would be a drunkard with a cold, which is unpleasant company.” 

 

“Rather it might confine you to your bed, and spare the re