“,” Sehun hissed as he whirled around to study the nearest storefront window he could find. He didn’t dare tear his eyes away from—apparently he was focused on staring intently at natural digestive vitamins—to see if Baekhyun had noticed him when he unexpectedly turned around to answer his cell phone. He hoped almost equally as hard that, if Baekhyun had in fact seen him, he didn’t happen to notice him staring down digestive aids meant for people more than twice their age. He really, really did not want to be remembered as the drooling latte boy with stomach problems (although half of that plan had already recently been scrapped), but he almost supposed that would be better than his current wisp of existence in Baekhyun’s life.

Since that night in the café more than a week ago, they hadn’t exchanged more than a cordial “hey” once or twice as Baekhyun rushed to set up and hurried just as quickly to blow out the door. Sehun had always felt the warm hum of the subtle, subdued energy that permeated the walls of the café, but Baekhyun scurrying out the door into the darkness left him deflated and empty, his excitement sapped from him as easily as the cozy café air was into the night as the singer left. Sehun wondered about him when he’d catch Baekhyun’s cheery smile as he bolted from the café with an urgency he didn’t notice before—or perhaps it hadn’t manifested yet—the boy whose life seemed so bright and busy and full yet always sang for lonely hearts.

Sehun’s curiosity (he had decided to avoid “concern,” for that implied a level of emotional investment he wasn’t quite ready to admit to himself yet) had gotten the best of him after another night of watching Baekhyun hastily say his goodbyes and fly out the door, which would explain why he was currently praying that the singer didn’t notice he had been tailing him for the past five minutes.

After spending a little too much time absentmindedly following the twists and turns of the detailed digestive tract diagram in the window, Sehun suddenly acknowledged that he could no longer hear Baekhyun’s warm chatter cut through the cold air, and his eyes flicked from bundled head to head in alarm. Being tall had its advantages, one of them being that he could survey the quiet street and navigate the steady stream of coats and hats with ease. Sehun decided this was not of much use when he spotted Baekhyun darting across the street a few yards away from him, and his frozen, lanky legs sprang awkwardly to life as he darted after him.

He swore on his life that if Baekhyun turned out to simply be hurrying home or something similar to that effect, he would sprint to his bed and burry himself in his covers and drink until the potentially mortifying experience would be permanently wiped from his memory and perhaps not go outside for a few days. In fact, it would probably be the best for his own mental health to forget about Baekhyun altogether if he happened to unintentionally see something like that—a sense of urgency as he’d fish for his keys in the cold, unlocking his front door, wiping his feet of snow before stepping inside—things that were so normal and natural that they were private, too personal and intimate and close for Sehun to feel comfortable seeing without permission. There was an undeniable space between them, natural but definite, that Sehun was not quite sure he could ever cross.

Sehun started out of his reverie and froze when Baekhyun’s petite figure ducked into a bar. He crossed his arms and his lips apprehensively, his curiosity tugging at his feet while his human decency urged him to turn around and forget this ever happened. This was something else private he wasn’t meant to see—unwinding at the end of a long day (although he really didn’t know what exactly he was expecting to see). Sehun rocked on his heels and in a deep breath, the cold air sinking in his lungs as he took a few long strides forward to glance through the window in passing before he’d slink away into the night, head down and shoulders hunched and cheeks burning with embarrassment despite the chill.

The breath that was crushed in Sehun’s chest rushed out of him, inconveniently fogging up the window. He hastily wiped the glass with his sleeve to see Baekhyun setting up his mic stand and cables, yawning obnoxiously as he fiddled with a screw. The corner of Sehun’s mouth twitched in amusement as the boy’s face scrunched up and lips stretched over his teeth, but the moment was quickly forgotten as the question of why Baekhyun was here weighed on his shoulders like a wet blanket, heavy and cold. Sehun glanced at his watch—half past eleven. If Baekhyun’s set was like his gigs at the café, he would be here for around three hours (Sehun chose to ignore the fact that he knew this information and to perhaps judge himself later for it).

Sehun leaned against the window, watching with soft eyes as Baekhyun animatedly spoke through the mic and began singing. The bar was small with low golden lights that hung suspended in the thick, dark air like moons, completely still with a sense of stability and calmness. A different kind of warmth exuded from the deep wood walls and polished leather of the bar, one that aimed to shelter and console from more than the icy tendrils of the frosty winter air and promised to not pass judgment as more and more glasses were emptied that night. There was no piano in the tiny bar, so Baekhyun was simply singing—Sehun could barely distinguish the muted sound through the glass—but as he watched the dark shadows pass over the singer’s face, he couldn’t help but feel that, while Baekhyun was alone on the podium, the bar immersed him in a certain raw closeness that gave him the freedom to move—to close his eyes and twist to the side as he hit a high note, to let his lips curl into a snarl as his voice seeped into the air, to let his fingers ghost along his cheeks, his touch matching the tenderness of his falsetto. Sehun had never seen him like this before, and goose bumps raced along his skin.

He sighed, turning away from the scene and leaning against the glass as he gazed into the quiet street. A light dusting of snow almost floated in the soft beams of the streetlamps, and it was impossibly silent, every sound contained and small as if someone was whispering right into his ear. Every time the door opened with the scraping of snow and clinking of glasses and low voices, Sehun flinched in surprise—he wanted to go in, but something trapped him to his spot against the window looking out into the night. The fear of Baekhyun catching him witnessing something he may not be allowed to see glued his numb toes to the cold ground, yet he hesitated to crawl back to his apartment, cold and lonely and far away from whatever this lame (and slightly creepy, his conscience added) semblance of closeness was. They were only separated by a pane of glass, but Sehun knew that it defined much more than physical distance—as he told himself before, Baekhyun’s life was quick and busy and energetic and full—there was no room for him. And yet he hovered outside, his back pressed against the window, listening to the muffled sound of Baekhyun’s voice for what would perhaps be the last time. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back to rest against the glass, his sense of time suspended with the snow.

Sehun almost launched himself across the street when a firm thud on the glass behind him reverberated in his chest. His heart protesting against the sudden shock, he whirled around to see Baekhyun laughing through the window, his face muted by the frosted glass. Sehun’s breath caught in his lungs as the boy opened the door to the bar, and he wasn’t exactly sure if he was shaking because of the weather or the singer.

Baekhyun draped himself against the doorway, two glasses of deep crimson liquid carefully balanced between his long, white fingers. “So, how long were you planning on staying out there?” He smirked, not a malicious twist of lips but a knowing grin that sent a flush of pink to Sehun’s already rosy cheeks. He supposed his broad silhouette pasted against the windowpane for who knows how long wasn’t exactly subtle.

“Uh…ah, no, it’s not like that…” he started, his mind desperately attempting to fabricate something at least marginally believable to say in response. Maybe something witty, even. His voice was too loud, feigning confidence and nonchalance, the two things Sehun was severely lacking at the moment. “I almost fulfilled my daily quota for staring off into space at odd hours of the night, but someone happened to interrupt me,” he said, his mouth twitching to a grin.

Sehun felt the urge to jump into the nearest garbage bin as he mentally reviewed what he just said, but Baekhyun was laughing. “Ah, I had no idea you were such a busy guy.” He shook his head, accidentally staining the snow with dark spatters of maroon when some of the liquid sloshed from his glasses. “Ooh. . Ah…” He looked up again, his eyebrows raising and pouty lips looking increasingly more inviting as they moved. “Why don’t you warm up for a bit? I’m on break.”

Sehun’s mind was firing in a million different directions at once despite the fact that he stood completely still, lips parted and wide-eyed. “You…you are old enough, right?” Baekhyun questioned.

“YEAH. Yeah, uh, yeah…I am,” Sehun stuttered, his voice still a bit too loud and overly reassuring. He wasn’t quite sure of Baekhyun’s age considering the boy’s petite frame, and now the thought that lingered in the back of his head was whisked to the forefront of his tongue, and he was just about to ask when Baekhyun’s throaty chuckle dismantled his train of thought.  

“Well, come on then,” he said, handing him a glass of what appeared to be wine.

Sehun willed his legs to move in a way that didn’t resemble a half-frozen giraffe as he entered the bar. His eyes anxiously flicked from table to table—unlike the venue at his café, everyone here was by themselves. Sehun pursed his lips in contemplation as the images of Baekhyun crooning through the glass seeped into the corners of his mind.

Sehun grinned to himself as he watched Baekhyun’s legs idly swing back and forth, his toes grazing the ground as they sat at the bar. It was endearing, to say the least, and more graceful than the way his lanky limbs were still wracked by shivers as he began to warm up. He took a sip of his drink, thankful for the satisfying burn of the alcohol to warm his throat. It was pleasantly sweet to his surprise, and Baekhyun grinned as he took another sip. “You like it?”

Sehun said his thanks and nodded. “Yeah, I love sweet things…”

“I know,” Baekhyun casually interjected. “You always put a ton of sugar in your drinks at the café.”  The realization that Baekhyun had seen him enough times at the café to know this coupled with a coy sidelong glance made Sehun almost choke on his wine. “That’s why I thought bokbunjaju would be good, yeah?” A sly undertone permeated his words that Sehun detected but wasn’t exactly sure about what it was implying.

He didn’t know whether it was a newfound courage or frazzled nerves that made him attempt to counter in a similar tone, “So I guess that means you like to watch me at the café then, huh?”

Baekhyun’s lips cracked into a half-smile, his eyes dark and warm with the low lights of the bar. “You’re one to talk,” he replied just as quickly, and Sehun felt his heart thud against his ribs. “It’s hard not to pay attention when you’re always there.”

“Not always…” Sehun huffed.

Baekhyun nodded in agreement as he watched the way Sehun’s eyebrows scrunched up when he was flustered and how his round bottom lip pouted invitingly. “True, it’s pretty obvious you’re not there when I don’t see your puffy white hair and blank face sticking up from the rest of the crowd in the back corner.”

Sehun’s cheeks bloomed bright red as Baekhyun grinned, casually sipping his drink and allowing what he had just said to process in Sehun’s mind. He chose to ignore validating Baekhyun’s astute observation skills (or perhaps Sehun’s lack of inconspicuousness). “I don’t have a blank face,” he sniffed. “I’m just a person who can fully appreciate good music.”

This time, it was Baekhyun who blinked in surprise. His mouth parted in silence, and Sehun’s lips twitched in the smallest motion of self-satisfaction. “You think it’s good?” he asked quietly, suddenly seeming like a little kid.

Sehun resisted the urge to scoop him up and squeeze him and kiss him and yell about how amazingly talented he was at him, settling simply for an innocent, “Do you really think I’d be there all the time if I thought you ?”

Sehun’s upper hand was short-lived. Baekhyun quickly regained composure, teasingly pursing his lips and blinking through his lashes. “Depends how much you like me.”

Sehun’s heart was racing, drowning out any superfluous sounds that came from across the room or off to the side—unimportant places, places that weren’t the decreasing distance between their lips or the spot where their knees brushed against each other or the bright flush of Baekhyun’s cheeks that the alcohol colored on his face. For weeks there had been dozens of people and chairs and voices between them, but suddenly all that remained was the space filled with the scent of wine and Sehun’s heartbeat and their low voices intertwining. If he didn’t say something again soon, he might burst. “SO why are you here, anyway?” Sehun blurted. “I mean…like…don’t you play enough during the day? You don’t need to do this too, do you?”

Baekhyun was initially surprised at the bluntness of Sehun’s question, but he simply laughed, “Why not? I love singing, it’s fun—”

“Well yeah, but…” Sehun hesitated and Baekhyun waited. “I don’t know, you look different here.”

Baekhyun’s energetic grin fell to a soft, contemplative half-smile. His eyes fell to his glass, and his fingers slid absentmindedly over the rim. “Hmmm…you think so?” Sehun’s jaw was clenched to the point where he thought his teeth would break, suddenly stricken with the fear that he may have overstepped his boundaries—even as confusing as they were that night. Baekhyun straightened up then, clapping Sehun on the back and teasingly rubbing his shoulder. “I’ll tell you later,” he said simply.

Sehun tried not to jolt at the unexpected touch and tried equally as hard not to moan as Baekhyun’s nimble fingers worked at his tense shoulder. “Later?” he breathed, not entirely successful at his mission.

Baekhyun chuckled, hopping to his feet. “Yeah, because I have to finish my set now.” Sehun jumped up, forgetting that Baekhyun was simply on a break.

“Oh! Uh, yeah, sorry about that, I totally forgot…”

Baekhyun peered up at him intently, and Sehun’s words eventually trailed off to silence as he gazed down at him. “Don’t worry about it,” he said playfully, and Sehun cherished the new angle that he got to see Baekhyun’s pouty lips move. The singer fished around in the pocket of his jeans and handed Sehun a card, suddenly becoming embarrassed again. “It’s uh…if you wanna talk about ‘later,’ you know, later.” He watched Sehun’s throat bob up and down, struggling to form words. “Something tells me you would, right? Well, I hope so. I mean. Maybe. I don’t know.” He shoved a hand through his hair and glanced to the side, fidgeting in his spot.

Sehun couldn’t help but break into a huge grin at the sight of Baekhyun’s usual charisma impeded by alcohol just enough to make him stumble over his words (he also decided to ignore the thought that he most likely sounded like this to Baekhyun normally). “Of course,” he said. Too desperate? “I mean, yeah, ha, you know, sounds good. I’ll see you later, then.”

Baekhyun grinned, his white teeth a stark contrast to his cheeks flushed with red from their drinks. It was cute, and Sehun thought he might just reach out and take him into his arms, but he found himself quickly waving goodbye and bolting for the door. The part of his brain that wasn’t completely buzzed with sweet wine and words and accidental touches managed to register that Baekhyun had called out, “Okay, bye!” after him, but he was currently more focused on the immediate task of not breaking his face with the ecstatic smile that pulled at his lips. The walk home seemed like he was floating, the tiny business card clutched in his hands threatening to completely sweep him off his feet.