Jung Soo could only grimace with an expression that looked like complete and utter pain as he heard a lot of paper-crinkling sounds coming from his office.

Opening the door to his shabby office – which he’d never gotten the chance to refurbish – he walked in, and saw... nothing?

Creasing his eyebrows in confusion and turning his head from left to right, inspecting the room, he was extremely confused as to why there was no one in the room, when he had clearly heard a bunch of paper-crinkling sounds. With a slight groan, he realised that the paper-sounds had stopped, and the room was in silence. Had that perp run away or something?

“...Hello?” he called out, feeling completely stupid.

There was a long silence that followed suit, and just as Jungsoo was about to lose his patience and go complain to Eunhyuk that there was no one in his office and that perp had probably run to the boss already, a head popped out from under the desk.

Jungsoo’s unconscious glare fixed itself on the head, as a neck popped out, then a body. “Hi!” the figure called out, as though they were long-time friends. Running over to Jungsoo, the other held out his hand for the other to take. “My name’s- uh, Kangin. Sorry for being under your desk! I thought it was the boss coming...” The dark-brown hair was very prominent, but is wasn’t just that; his eyes... they looked... somewhat familiar?

And what Jungsoo found really mysterious, was that this Kangin had been so hesitant to say his name made Jungsoo wonder if it really was his name - which would be confusing because, well, why would one choose to hide their own name?

“Why would you hide from the boss...” Jungsoo muttered, grasping the other’s hand and shaking it professionally. There were in fact a lot of other why questions he could ask now, but he’d get to those later. “Park Jungsoo,” the other nodded, and grinned hopefully. This Kangin’s personality seemed too bright – almost blinding.

“So glad we’ll be working together! You look like someone fun!” Kangin’s grin increased and he turned around, much to Jungsoo’s horror. “Let’s get to know each other better, as we’ll be together for 2 months! That’s 10 weeks, right?” Kangin put a lot of emphasis on the last sentence and Jungsoo honestly wondered why that was. “Guess things about me!”

This kid was honestly like a child, and Jungsoo seriously couldn’t stand it. “Dunno. You look a little familiar, and slightly annoying, too.”

Ignoring the casual insult, Kangin perked up at the ‘slightly familiar’ part. “I look familiar? Oh, do you know me from somewhere?”

Jungsoo shrugged, looking Kangin up and down. The name didn’t ring any bells, and nor did anything else; excluding the eyes. “No,” he responded finally, watching as the other’s face dampened in such a manner. “...Should I know you?”

Kangin shook his head. “No, you shouldn’t. But I was just wondering, because well, that’d be great if we knew each other from before, huh. The introductions would be way easier! Because – you know, if we already knew each other from before then we wouldn’t have to introduce each other, and- uh, yeah... I’m going to stop talking now. Uh.”

Feeling the sudden (and slightly creepy) urge to hug the other for being so goddamn cute – was it cute? He didn’t even know -, Jungsoo chuckled a bit. “Yeah; you do that. Anyway,” he looked at the clock. Damn, 7 more hours of work to go. With a sigh, he straightened his tie and walked over to his desk, setting down his briefcase and sitting in his chair, folding his arms behind his head. “I’m not entirely sure why I was called out to help you for 2 months when—”

“10 weeks!” Kangin interrupted, but then stopped. “Heh, sorry.”

“...10 weeks,” Jungsoo continued with a slight frown, “when all I really do is just file things, talk on the phone and organize a bunch of things.”

“Maybe it’s so my niceness will rub off on you!” Kangin bounded over to him, leaning on his desk almost dreamily. “Come on – you gotta admit, you’re really dull.”

“Shut it,” Jungsoo warned. “As soon as I’m done with you,  I’m off to Japan, and I’d rather not leave with a bad impression.”

“Oh well; doesn’t matter!” Kangin chuckled and looked at Jungsoo happily. “So, Hyukjae told me stuff about you, you know. He said he’s your closest friend! How did you two become friends?”

“... Who’s Hyukjae?”

“Oh, sorry, I meant Eunhyuk.” Noticing Jungsoo’s look of confusion, Kangin shrugged. “Nickname,” he rushed out as an explanation. “He gave me a nickname for him. Uh, pretty, don’t you think?” Jungsoo just looked back weirdly. “Anyway, how did you become friends?”

Jungsoo shrugged, and leaned down to press the power button on his computer, before leaning up again and opening his briefcase. “Dunno. We’ve always been close, I guess, especially after—“ he cut himself off last minute and stopped. “Don’t worry about that,” he mumbled, pulling out more papers.

Kangin bent down so he was eye-level with Jungsoo. “After what?” he asked cautiously,

“Said it doesn’t matter,” Jungsoo grunted back.

“Tell me!”

“No.”

“Please?”

“No.”

“I’ll sing for you!”

“No.”

“I’ll be quiet!”

Jungsoo paused again, then let out a deep breath. “Fine,” he muttered, turning his attention to his computer, typing in his user password. “I was in an accident.” It was like the word ‘accident’ hurt him even more than the actual event itself. “Didn’t remember much after, but yeah. All I know was that he knew me and I knew him, and we’re pretty close. It was really lucky the boss here employed us together.”

“Oh.” Kangin was noticeably silent after that, after having pulled up a chair and sitting on it, resting his forearms on the table. “That’s... unfortunate.”

Jungsoo shrugged, clicking onto a folder. “I was annoying,” he admitted, opening up slowly. “People came and went, asking how I was, but all I could do was look at them and ask them who they were.”

Kangin copied Jungsoo’s previous actions and shrugged also. “That sounds bad. You know, did you ever ask Hy-Eunhyuk to explain who those people were? Or were you just...” he trailed off, looking up at Jungsoo, who was expressionless and handing him paper.

“Yeah, a few.” Suddenly a reality-check hit him on the head hard – he was saying way too much to this guy that he’d only met about 15 minutes ago. “... Anyway, that was a long time ago. I’m fine now. Look at those papers.” It was a way of distracting Kangin and it seemed to work temporarily, much to the other’s relief. “You have to go through these; organize them, sign them, log the contents into the computer... all that stuff. It’s difficult to explain and easier to watch, but you’ll get the hang of it. I’ll show you later.”

Kangin nodded slowly.

-

“So... what do you think of the new kid?” Eunhyuk called out, walking into Jungsoo’s office. It was ‘break-time’ and Kangin had gone out to buy lunch a few minutes ago.

Jungsoo cursed, standing up from his chair and running his hands through his hair in frustration. “I can’t do this, Eunhyuk.” Said man’s eyebrows rose slightly as if to ask why that was. “He’s too goddamn happy. So happy, in fact; he’s bringing me down. He’s asking me way too personal questions – for example, the accident. He ing insisted I tell him! I swear to god, I’m seriously going to burst into tears before tomorrow if this continues on.”

“Maybe he’s just trying to be friendly,” Eunhyuk started, but suddenly, Jungsoo walked over to him and grabbed his shoulders.

“He calls you Hyukjae! Said it was a ‘nickname’ – yeah-ing-right. He’s lying about his own name!”

“What... what makes you think that?” Eunhyuk asked cautiously.

“Who else hesitates THAT much before answering their name? I mean come on, it’s utter bull. He’s utter bull. I can’t stand it.”

Eunhyuk groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Look – he probably means well, and is just—“

“Just what, Eunhyuk? He’s annoying and I can’t wait for these two months to be over.”

Eunhyuk shook his head. “Don’t be like that, Soo. There are a lot of people like that out there; you just need to realise that not every annoying person means to be annoying, they’re just- well, over-friendly. That doesn’t mean to say that’s bad, though! Just... you just need to get used to that. Take a slice of cake before the whole thing, know what I mean?”

“I’d rather die.”

With a deep sigh, Eunhyuk pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers, before looking right into Jungsoo’s eyes.“Take that back before you cause trouble,” he stated simply, before turning around on his heels and walking out the door, leaving Jungsoo alone in his office. Groaning, he went to sit back in his chair, shutting his eyes.

Less than 10 minutes later, the door opened and Jungsoo leaned forwards, opening his eyes to see a red-eyed Kangin holding two drinks and two sandwiches.

And for the rest of the day, Kangin was weirdly quiet, and as Jungsoo lay in his bed that night after his torturous day, he wondered if Kangin had heard what he’d said to Eunhyuk.

A/N: double update as I promised uwu but yeah, Jungsoo's being a damn little brat isn't he TAT (also where the hell was Siwon through all this!!!! stupid boss alert omg) more will be revealed soooon~

FINALLY, did I ever say thank you for the two upvotes? OTL i love you guys (IAmToastFood and ayumuhide) okay <3