“Oi, agasshi, over here!”

Your head snapped up from your inspection towards the paper bag that contained the gifts for Eun and you catch Jihoo’s eyes, his hands vigorously gesturing for you and Chen to come over to the restaurant’s back door. 

“See there?” He points to a table, where you see Eun and Yoojoon together.

“Cake! Cake cake cake!”  Kyoungmi whispers as she arrived, bringing down a white box along with her.

Peeking inside, you, Chen and Jihoo almost whoop in excitement.  It looked absolutely delicious and somehow, it was very Eun-like.

“Do we come in together?” She grins in satisfaction, preparing the cake properly.

Jihoo glances into the restaurant and catches Yoojoon’s eyes.  “We, follow his lead,”

Yoojoon scans quickly over the four of you and he looks back towards the counter of the place and nods at the staff. 

Then, a waiter comes to their table, a silver tray in his hands, carrying two tall drinks on it.  His lips move in accordance to his words, barely audible to the four of you.  Eun shakes her head at the waiter and the waiter glances at Yoojoon, who shakes his head too, sending him away.

But Yoojoon suddenly sticks his foot out and trips the waiter, and the drinks fall to the floor with a loud, ringing crash.

The restaurant goes quiet abruptly, heads turned towards the source of ruckus.

“Omo, hidden camera?” Kyoungmi gasps.  Although she sounded as if she felt bad for Eun, but still, the four of you kept your eyes trained on the event prepared.

“Hey!” The waiter loudly yells, getting up from his big fall.

Yoojoon arrogantly shrugs after he says a quiet “Sorry,” and sets his elbows on his table, an ignorant expression on his face.

“You tripped me!” The waiter continues, confronting Yoojoon.  Another row of sentences that showed his anger followed, “Look what you did!” He points to the shards of glass.  “That was for another table and you were the one who caused us the loss!” The waiter starts gesturing angrily with his hands.  Yoojoon kept quiet, ignoring the waiter’s exclamations of irritation until it seemed like he really couldn’t hold it in any longer.

“Ya!” Yoojoon slams his palms on the table.  “Is that any way to treat a customer?!” He stands up loudly from his chair, a sharp grate of the chair across the floor following his action.

“Yoojoon-ah,” Eun’s eyes travelled from the waiter to Yoojoon, her hand tentatively reaching out to touch Yoojoon’s, trying to calm him down.

“No, noona,” Yoojoon brushes her off roughly.  “Do you think that was any way to treat a customer? By yelling at them?” He raises his voice at her, then turns back to the waiter.

“Omo, omo, omo,” You grimace at the situation, naturally flowing and amazingly natural, but highly scary.

“Whoa, now it’s my fault?” The waiter slightly steps back, his face still hard with anger.  “Who began all this again?” He jabs a finger at the broken glasses.  “Miss, you saw right?!” The waiter turns his eyes onto Eun.

“U-um, w-well,” Eun hesitates.

“Did you see, noona?” Yoojoon eyes her.  His tone slightly threatening her to tell a lie.

Eun nervously looks away.  “Y-Yoojoon-ah, actually—“

“Come on!” Yoojoon groans aloud and rolls his eyes at her.  “You really don’t know how to have fun,”

“Dude, quit it,” The waiter slightly pushes Yoojoon’s shoulder.

“Quit what?!” Yoojoon slaps his hand away.

“Quit bothering her!” The waiter s both of his palms onto Yoojoon’s shoulder, making him stumble backwards.

“Who’re you to tell me what to do?!” Yoojoon returns the push and in a blur of movements the two pushes each other with such energy that the staff around them crowds about, stopping both the waiter and Yoojoon from getting into a real fist fight.

“Let go!!” Yoojoon breaks free of the staff’s grip, roughly dusting off his shoulder and casting Eun a dirty glare.  “I’m outta here,” He leaves, not bothering to pay for what he and Eun ordered.

Coming out of the front door, Yoojoon swiftly makes a round turn, going to the back door as quick as he can. 

“Ouch, Yoojoon,” Chen winces.  “’Don’t know how to have fun,’ really, now,”

“Sorry, too immersed,” Yoojoon too, had a grimace across his face and a guilty look in his eyes.

“So, what now?” Jihoo asks. 

“Omo, Eun, dear me, she’s crying,” You nudge Yoojoon gently, seeing Eun sitting alone on her table, tears streaming down her cheeks and dropping down to her lap as she lowered her head to get some money from the wallet.  “Good acting by the way.  Gotta give credit to the cute waiter,”

Yoojoon playfully bows.  “Now, the lights go out,” He grins.

And literally, the restaurant goes dark with a loud bang, as if the switch to the whole place was flipped off at the same time.  A restless murmur rippled across the room, and you can clearly hear Eun choke in surprise.

“The other customers know, so don’t be surprised when they sing along and celebrate along with us.  They know we’re regulars,” Yoojoon whispers as he quietly pushes the backdoor open.

Jihoo lights up the candles on the cake and as the tinkle of bell above the door rung, the lamp that hung above Eun’s head became the only lamp that was , as if a spotlight was directed at her.

“Happy birthday, Cho Eun, happy birthday, Cho Eun, happy birthday dear Cho Eun, happy birthday to you,” You start and immediately, the whole place follows, as your group of five make your way across the place and onto Eun’s table.

Eun just stares at each of your eyes in shock and breaks down into tears once more, evoking laughter from everybody who started to crowd around her table.

“You,” She sniffed and choked at her own tears.  “Idiots!” Eun buried her face in her hands.  “Scared me, to death,”

You sit beside her and wrap your arms around her shoulders, grinning at the quiet, continuous row of thank you-s she uttered under her breath, gratefully, unable to utter anything louder because of her tears.

As she blew the candles out, the lights in the restaurant came back on and Yoojoon laughs as the waiter that acted with him patted him in the back, hugging each other in reconciliation. 

“Oh, Yoojoon, you little,” Eun groans at him and shakes her head at the younger guy.  “You too, waiter-ssi, although I’ve got to applaud you for your excellent acting skills,”

The restaurant exploded with laughter and applauded for the waiter and the restaurant’s staff.  Yoojoon then explains that the damage done was dealt with and that the staff had cooperated beautifully even though he told them just today, a few hours before he invited Eun to the place. 

After half an hour of cake cutting and distributing, the restaurant returns to its usual bustle, the lot of people giving a toast to none other than Eun, afterwards going back to their own tables to enjoy their own food.

“Here’s a little something for you, Eun,” You smile, lifting up the paper bags you brought with you and handing it to Eun.

She gaped and marvelled at the contents, immediately putting on the heels you made on her foot and tossing her current ones into the paper bag.  “I’m wearing the suit tomorrow and forever,” Eun pats the bag and the whole table laughs at her rare ridiculousness.

“The three of us made these,” Kyoungmi hands out a framed picture of her, Jihoo, Yoojoon, Chen and You, edited in such a way that Eun was standing in the middle with everybody pointing at her with their own birthday messages.

“Aww,” Eun reads the comments one by one and wraps the present close onto her chest, giving Jihoo, Yoojoon and Kyoungmi hugs before carefully setting the frame inside the paper bag along with your gift.

Eunbok’s team ate and drank, laughing at jokes about Eun, mostly and many other things, turning the surprising night into a delightful, happy one. 

Nearing 10 o’clock, your phone rings and you glance at the caller ID, reading Rin’s name on it. 

“Yes, unnie?” You pick up, walking outside the noisy restaurant.

“Hey, you done with Eun’s party? I’m on my way to pick you up,” She says.

“Oh, alright, yeah, I’m done,” You smile at the phone and bid your goodbye, returning to the table.

“Rin-ssi?” Chen asks as you settle back into your seat.

“Mm,” You nod, tidying up your stuff.  “Picking me up, as I told you, I’m staying at hers tonight, Jongdae can you—thanks,” You receive the photo album he hands you, the one you took out to show to Eun, stashing it back into your bag and hitching the straps on your shoulder, you step back from the table and stand up.  “Eun-ah, happy birthday once more and guys, gotta go.  See you tomorrow!” You grin and wave at them as they waved back, replying to your sentence with grins and a lift of a glass.

“Wait, I’ll walk you out,” Chen gulps down his drink quickly and sets it on the table, pushing himself up off of his chair.

You laugh at him and pat his shoulder.  “It’s alright, you know, I can see all well now, you can sit down and enjoy,”

As you catch his eyes, you see an expression flicker in it, but it disappeared too quickly for you to register what it was. 

“Ei, I’m not resigned from the position of your assistant so I’ll still be walking you out,” Chen gets up anyway and readies his arm, which, without hesitation, you slip your arm into, walking arm in arm outside the restaurant.

You chuckle at his sentence.  “I just wish you’ll be here forever you know, never resign and stay with me as my assistant until I die,” You sigh.  “No one could ever replace who you are to me, Jongdae,” Tighter, you cling onto his arm, as if preventing him from going anywhere.

Chen breathes a laugh at what you just said, and once more, something out of place escaped that laugh of his, but quickly, too, it disappeared, disallowing you to register what it truly was. 

“Heeyy!” You hear a car’s honk and look up, seeing Rin by the pavement waving at you.

“Oh, there’s Rin,” You wave back, letting go of Chen and running towards Rin’s car swiftly, entering her ride and opening the window after Chen closed your door for you.

“Bye, Jongdae, drive safely home,” You smile at him, gripping his fingers tightly before letting go.

“Take care, Jongdae,” Rin adds quietly, looking at Chen from inside the car.

Chen laughs at you and your sister.  “Don’t worry too much, I’m always fine,”

As the car drives away and your window slowly rolls upwards and closed, you hear a quick patter of footstep trailing behind the car and catching up to its side, Chen coming into the vision out of your window.

As he runs, he yells.  “Agasshi, I have to tell you that I won’t be at work tomorrow! I—“

Your window shuts itself and the car drives completely away, leaving the sentence hanging in your head.  Glancing back, you see Chen mouth something incomprehensible and you grin and wave at him, vaguely catching a reply before the car turns and he disappears.

“What is it?” Rin asks, glancing at you.

“Oh, Jongdae, he’ll be absent tomorrow from work,” You sit back and answer her.

Little did you know, that as you drove away with that understanding, Chen’s mind says differently.

‘I should’ve said it,’ He grits his teeth, staying where he last saw your car turn away.  ‘You idiot Jongdae, you should have said it!’

Gripping his head in frustration, he curses.  ‘She was the only one that doesn’t know I’m leaving,”

CLIFFIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! don't hate me for this

but omg no time to be happy

it is a time of sorrow, remorse and sadness.