By noon, my shirt is still damp, the hungry fabric close against the small of my back.  I sit under the waning sunlight, drying slowly.  The light refracts through the glass of the window and the wooden floor of the studio gleams with the water dripping from the ends of my hair.  I sigh.

My fingers fiddle with the flaked corner of the table while my head tosses back and forth the image of Jongin.  Resting, smiling, posing.  I brush my fingers through my hair and I imagine him doing the same.  I rest my chin in my palm and I wonder if Jongin ever sits on his bedside at the crack of dawn to think about broken nails and sad love stories.  I wonder if the glow in his eyes is from too many heartbreaks or too many perfect nights.

I wish for a change of clean clothes.

__

As I'm gathering my things to head home, I see the shadow on the floor beside me.

A figure outlined in gray pencil and frayed edges if I had had the chance to picture it for myself.  I memorize the sound of his quiet footsteps as Jongin approaches me.

I turn to see him dressed in a white woolen coat, concealing his unblemished complexion.  His smile hasn't altered since this morning, but the shadows under his eyelids begged to be silenced.  He extends his hand with a "Hello, hyung."

I nod in response, the surprise in my chest from a combination of the youth in his voice and not knowing that he was younger than me.

The way he stands and the way he speaks makes it seem like he's already been accepted into this world of processed and unprocessed film.  Easily.  He looks secure.

I tell him he did well today, for his first day.  And that if he continued like this, he would be paid well.

He laughs with shaking shoulders.  The corners of his lips are somber even though his laugh is so bright.

"I don't need the money," he finally says, as if I should have known.  "I'm here for different reasons."

I ask what reasons.

He laughs again and says, "Aren't you going to shake my hand?"

So we shake, his soft palms clasping around by clammy fingers as we greet each other properly, for the first time.  Simply, gently, modestly.

He sits himself in the stool beside me, one leg raised higher than the other as his hand rests on his knee.  Our conversation begins.  He asks me about my day, what I had for lunch, where I'm planning to go for dinner.  His silhouette darkens with the evening as we speak.  He asks when I started photography.

The studio is empty, save for the two souls that sit by the window, talking about Jongin's name, his age, his past girlfriends. His voice is small but I feel like I've heard it so many times that it's loud enough for me to hear forever.  I have an urge to smile when I feel like I've known him for a hundred days.

Jongin doesn't look at me in the eyes as we speak. He looks past them.  Maybe he sees through them, or through what I can't see.  Maybe he sees something behind them, something I didn't know was there.

But my eyes are there.  I've seen them.

__

I leave the studio before sunset, camera in one hand and trepidation in the other.  The ride home is shorter than it should be.  I sit in the very last seat, the very last choice.  It's only been another day at work, but half an hour immersed in a conversation with the new recruit has my heart trembling all the way home.