Massaging his temple, Jonghun drove home slowly that night. His muse and Hongki’s brain didn’t seem to agree that day. When he thought his song would sound better with only an acoustic guitar, Hongki believed that it should have something more than just a guitar. The thing about working with someone that hardly played any instrument was that it sometimes had its challenges. Hongki had a great voice, more than great in fact, and Jonghun wouldn’t deny it. But the singer didn’t have any proper music background and even though he played guitar now, it was Jonghun that made him do so. Sometimes he wondered why his boss made Hongki his project.

“It’s a sincere love song. If I were to add anything more to it, then it would be acoustic bass or some percussion instrument,” Jonghun spoke up, breaking the silence in the car.

“But… will you actually add those instruments to the song?” Hongki asked, pushing forward his lower lip.

“I’m considering. Stop bugging me about it. You should just learn your lyrics,” Jonghun rolled his eyes.

“But you’re the one that wanted me to be involved in the production process.”

“That would be ideal. If only you weren’t so stubborn about everything,” Jonghun pointed out.

“You are the stubborn one,” Hongki retorted.

“No, I’m not. You are!”

“You are!”

“You!!”

“No, no. It’s impossible for Lee Hongki to be stubborn. So it’s you!”

“No, you!”

“Damn it, it’s yo-… Jonghun, watch out!!” Hongki suddenly exclaimed, a hand reaching over to the steering wheel on his left.

Jonghun didn’t have the chance to register what was happening, but his hands moved the steering wheel by reflex the moment Hongki shouted at him. There was someone crossing the road, and Jonghun was that close to knock over that person with his car. Trusting his reflex, he managed to drive off to the side of the road. But did he manage to turn away just in time?

The car went silent; the two men turned their heads to each other and could only blink in disbelief. Hongki’s eyes were widened open; his lips were apart as he was surprised, while Jonghun could feel his heart pacing double its normal rate. “D-did I hit him?” Jonghun asked Hongki, gulping in anticipation. The other man just shook his head, more because of uncertainty than anything else.

Unbuckling their safety belts, they both quickly rushed out from the car. If he hit this guy, he was so doomed. Not only his career, Hongki’s career would totally be in dangerous too. They both were new. One debut single, and that was all that they had done. There were a lot that they still had to do – the slightest mistake and Hongki might have to go back to his theatrical career while Jonghun might not get another project to produce anymore in the future, or worse, fired.

There, on the road, a guy was laying on the hard road with what it seemed to be groceries scattered around him. “, , …” Hongki mumbled, following Jonghun that was already running towards the guy. “We’re so screwed. Oh my God, Jonghun, it’s your freaking fault!!” he squealed. Jonghun, of course, tried not to care about Hongki because the only thing he was worrying about was the guy that he might just hit.

“Hey, are you okay?!” he quickly asked as he knelt down, grabbing the shoulders of his victim.

Whimpering, the guy slowly sat up. He rubbed his elbow, whimpering once again when he accidentally touched the scratch that his fall had made to his elbow. “How can I be alright?! You almost killed me!” a hand shoved Jonghun away; his voice was a mixture of agitation and rage.

“I’m sorry, but this guy over here couldn’t shut his mouth up when I was driv--… eh…?!”

There was a pause as both of them stared at each other, the only person that was moving was Hongki, who was tilting his head at the weird silence that suddenly crept between the two persons before him. “…what’s wrong with you guys?” Hongki mumbled.

“Argh! That guy that lives across the building!!” the guy exclaimed.

“The Chopper hat guy!” Jonghun remembered almost right away.

------

Quietly, Jonghun watched Hongki treating his injured neighbour from the kitchen. It felt rather awkward to just suddenly talk to him so Jonghun decided to make some tea while Hongki dealt with the rest. Hongki was good with new people anyway - not that Jonghun was socially awkward, but Hongki was friendlier and louder in general.

“So Jaejin, you live here too?” asked Hongki, hands skilfully wrapping the bandage around Jaejin’s elbow.

“Yeah. At the other building though,” he explained.

It was Jonghun’s first time to see his neighbour in such a close proximity; not all that close but close enough to have a look at his face properly. Now that it wasn’t just another accidentally staring into the other’s house, Jonghun realised that Jaejin’s face wasn’t all that forgettable. He might look common yet he had quite a good profile. And he was taller than Jonghun had anticipated. Maybe around Jonghun’s height in fact.

“Sorry about the groceries… and the scratch,” Jonghun said, walking over to where Hongki and Jaejin were with the teacups on his tray.

“It’s fine.”

“I’ll pay back the groceries,” Jonghun added.

“No, it’s alright. You don’t have to,” Jaejin shook his head, smiling to Hongki who was handing him his tea.

“I insist,” he narrowed his eyes. “Or Hongki can pay for the groceries instead?”

“Hey, don’t drag me to this mess!” Hongki kicked Jonghun’s leg from where he sat.

It surprised Jonghun when he heard his neighbour laughed. Literally laughed out loud. Now, Jonghun definitely didn’t see that coming. Someone as harmless looking as him could actually laugh like that. In annoying manner even more.

“Who drove the car?” he asked.

“I did,”Jonghun said, followed by Hongki’s index finger that was pointing at him as well.

“Oh well. Ok then. You’ll be the one paying,” Jaejin decided at the end.

---

If there was one thing that Jaejin wanted to do at that moment that would be to knock some sense back to his two juniors. Since Jaejin told them about what happened the other night, Seunghyun and Minhwan had been nesting at his veranda just to have a look at Jonghun. It didn’t bother him at all at first, especially because his scratch took longer to heal and it would be his pleasure to see the guy that hit him being watched over more than necessary by his two adorable juniors. But now that it happened each time those two came around, it started to become annoying.

“Hyung, you should hit him back with a bigger car,” Seunghyun mumbled, munching on the chicken that Minhwan brought along with him.

“Don’t be stupid. He said he’d pay back the groceries,” Jaejin poked Seunghyun’s forehead. “And I don’t have a car.”

“What if he didn’t?” Minhwan asked.

“Erm… I don’t know…”

“Well, at least we know where he lives~,” the tallest one among the three of them grinned, wrapping an arm around Jaejin’s shoulder, seemingly trying to assure his hyung that if Jonghun didn’t pay for the groceries, he’d be the first one to launch a nuclear bomb at Jonghun’s apartment.

Jaejin was just glad that they finished their lunch faster than he had expected and that he would have enough time to leave for his class soon. If not, he would have to literally kick them out of his apartment. He wouldn’t want that to happen of course. The last time he did that, Minhwan pulled an aegyo act, faking a cry before his front door that had caused the old lady next door to force him to take Minhwan back inside. It was embarrassing.

“Anyway, you two. Out. Now. I have class to attend,” he said, clearing up all the empty fried chicken boxes from their lunch.

---

Dragging his legs, Jaejin sighed and suddenly wished that he had brought his baseball cap with him. As much as he loved summer, Jaejin had always felt insecure about his self-proclaimed dark skin and striking summer was definitely his biggest enemy. Jaejin sighed again, heading back home while reading through the assignment that his lecturer just gave to him.

“You’ll get hit again if you’re walking while reading, you know.”

Jaejin furrowed his eyebrows, breaking his eyes away from the paper on his hand before turning to the source of the voice that had greeted him. There, just by the side of the road, a rather familiar looking car was driving slowly – somehow looking as if it were trying to match Jaejin’s pace. He blinked as he stopped walking, wasn’t expecting to encounter this car any time soon.

“…I wasn’t reading when I was hit by you…” he pointed out.

Jonghun grinned and stopped his car, winding down his window even further to make their conversation somehow easier. “My fault. Totally. And Hongki’s too.”

“He wasn’t the one that drove though.”

“He was nagging me,” said Jonghun.

“Are you trying to put the blame on him? Man up, dude. How much harm can a guy like him do?” Jaejin rolled his eyes, definitely wasn’t appreciating the fact that Jonghun had made him stand under the hot sun longer than he had wanted to.

“…you’re weird. And Hongki can cause a lot of harms, just so you know,” Jonghun commented. “Anyway, I’m on my way home from work. Was thinking of dropping by your apartment since I’m actually planning on getting some groceries shopping done, so I thought I should bring you along. But since I saw you walking, might as well greet you.”

Jaejin didn’t really like the idea of sitting in a car that almost sent him to the hospital just a few nights ago, but he hated standing under the sun even more. So without really thinking twice or even waiting for Jonghun to actually ask him to go to the supermarket with him, Jaejin got into the car and settled in next to Jonghun.

“Okay, let’s go,” said Jaejin as he buckled himself up.

He noticed the weird stare that Jonghun was throwing him but he decided to ignore it.

------

It took longer than I had expected, but there you go! :Dv Gonna work on chapter three once I'm done with my workload~. Critiques are welcomed.