Taemin did have hopes of sleeping in that morning—he had taken a day off because he needed to take some time for himself—but the noise coming from his neighbor’s apartment decided otherwise. He breathed out heavily in his bed. Would Minho ever change?

When he accepted that he wouldn’t get any more sleep that morning, he decided to focus on the sounds—he frowned. There was loud music, yes, but it didn’t sound like anything he had ever heard his neighbor play. The bass was heavier, the melody more repetitive, and the beat generally faster.

Then the music stopped suddenly and voices started to shout. Minho’s voice he recognized, however, the female voice that shouted back at him he didn’t know. Taemin had never seen anyone other than workers enter his neighbor’s apartment, and he wondered whose voice it was.

He breathed heavily, forcing himself to remain calm, and he decided not to check it out. They seemed to be arguing pretty badly, and he didn’t want to make the situation any worse than it already was. So instead, he reached out for his earbuds on the bedside table and looked for his phone that was lost somewhere in the sheets, and played some music.

He might have fallen back asleep, because when he woke up again the sun was higher in the sky and Luna was meowing repeatedly—she was hungry. Taemin stretched in his bed and chuckled when he made eye contact with her—she also looked angry. He lazily got up and put some kibble in her bowl.

Like every morning, he mechanically made himself some coffee and watered his plants, inspecting them for any issues, then looked at Kibum’s painting on the kitchen wall for half an hour, as if he was in a trance. Maybe that was the secret to this painting—the fact that every time he looked at it, it felt like he was discovering it again despite knowing about every drop of paint laid on the canvas.

Maybe beauty wasn’t about how it looked, but about how it made him feel. And it sure made him feel a lot of things.

When he finished his mug and put it in the sink, he realized the noise from the other apartment had died down. He hoped that whatever argument Minho was having with the woman had ended well.

After eating some proper breakfast, he decided that getting some fresh air would be a good idea. The weather was still getting slightly warmer every day, and Taemin felt like he hadn’t properly walked outside in a while.

He wandered down the streets of the neighborhood until he reached the huge park with a lake in the center of it. As he walked down the lanes and finally settled down on the grass, he felt like time didn’t exist. 

Hours must have passed by and when the sun got slowly closer to the horizon, Taemin decided it was time to go back home. He lazily started walking back, reveling in the fact that he had done absolutely nothing that day—not doing anything is a perfectly valid activity, Kibum always said to comfort him when he felt down.

Just when he was almost back home, he spotted Minho sitting on a bench outside the building. Someone was sitting next to him—too close to be a stranger, too far away to be someone he felt comfortable with, and too young to be anyone else than his daughter, Taemin realized.

Minho looked up and Taemin was taken aback for a second, then he gently waved and smiled at him. He was planning to continue his walk back home, until Minho gestured for him to come closer. His heart started beating faster all of a sudden, but he resisted the urge to run away and hide.

He could see Minho’s daughter eyeing him over her phone as he got closer, and he did his best to act cool. He knew Minho had it hard with her, and he didn’t want to make the situation any worse.

“Hey, Taemin, it’s good to see you,” Minho said quickly and Taemin chuckled. His neighbor seemed lost. “This is my daughter, Nari,” he added and gestured to the teenage girl who made a heavy sigh.

“Hello, Nari,” Taemin said in a breath. “That’s a nice pop socket you have here,” he added and gestured towards her phone.

“What’s a pop socket?” Minho asked with a frown.

“The thing she uses to hold her phone,” Taemin explained while still looking at Nari.

“Maybe if she didn’t have a phone too big for her hand, she wouldn’t need that,” Minho mumbled. Taemin couldn’t refrain from smirking when he noticed the death glare Nari gave to her dad. He couldn’t blame her.

“What is it anyway?” he asked as he sat on the bench on Nari’s other side. “Pancakes with blueberries and—pink maple syrup? Nice,” he said gently and looked at her with a knowing smile.

Nari looked at him back w