Anyone could see how heartless a jerk Sehun could get on the surface. What no one had ever witnessed, however, was how he always endeavored to make it up to Aya in the coldest yet sweetest manner—if that was even possible—before the day even drew to a close.

With that, Aya found herself being plucked out of her cave (home) and dragged along by Sehun at half an hour past five in the afternoon. The sun was still glaring, but the medley of colors now seeping across the skies in inky bright orange and pink and indigo evoked a different kind of sensation from the brightness earlier that noon when Sehun had stormed away from Aya’s presence.

“Sehun?” Aya was not only shocked; she was dubious. Oh, and given her already homey attire, she also felt a tad bit self-conscious. Her white sneaker shoes aside, a faded, nearly translucent and hooded vest shirt paired with denim shorts that, while they didn’t reveal most of her thighs they still showcased the entire length of her legs, were certainly not among Aya’s outdoor get-up preferences.

She mentally sighed after giving herself a once-over. It was a fortunate thing that it wasn’t so cold out. This guy better had one heck of a reason for suddenly kidnapping her.

“Are you okay, Sehun?” She asked when he didn’t reply. And although she was sure to be ignored again, she added anyway, “Where are we going?”

Two blocks later and Sehun finally halted. They were standing before a shop, or a store, or whatever—Aya couldn’t be sure. She only knew that it was closed, perhaps for a long time already. She tried to wriggle free of Sehun’s grasp to take a closer look, but he did not let her go.

“Sehun?”

Nothing. Darn how frustrating it was to initiate even a simple conversation with the boy.

Aya released a sigh. “Sehun, really?” She shook his hand off. She’d gotten used to the boy’s coldness a long time ago, but there were times when her cards just weren’t playing well and Sehun’s silence was not being helpful. “If you’re just going to stand there hypnotized over that abandoned kiosk and not talking to me, then I’m going ahead.”

“It’s not an abandoned kiosk,” Sehun finally spoke before Aya could even turn around. “And I’m not hypnotized. I’m trying to remember where I hid the key.” He was squinting his eyes at the flower pots lining the front perimeter of the single-tier edifice. Once again he coiled his hand around Aya’s wrist. “And I’m not not talking to you.”

“Okay, but what are we doing here?”

When Sehun met Aya’s look over his shoulder, the faintest shadow of a smile was dancing along his lips. And his smile, the genuineness of it, extended towards his eyes.

“I can’t stop you,” he said, pertaining to his argument with her at noon. “And I can’t support you—outwardly, that is.” He pulled her closer to his side. “But if I can’t stop you, I’d rather you have me than those guys you’re hanging out with.”

Eyes dilating and jaws slacking, Aya could only gawk. She hadn’t quite comprehended his words—not because of his inborn lisp which he strived to hide from everybody else—but because they were too good to be real.

Not awaiting her response, Sehun proceeded to walk ahead (to which Aya automatically followed because his hand was clutching hers) and picked up a small metal piece from one of the pots. This clay pot housed a tiny sunflower, whose flower head was dejectedly hung low now that the sun had hidden behind the western horizon. Aya, still awed at her boyfriend’s declaration, was contemplating the wonder of a sunflower’s mechanism when Sehun suddenly relinquished his grasp and air-squatted beside one to study it.

“You like sunflowers?”

Aya jerked. “What?”

He pinned the lower stem of the smallest sunflower between his thumb and index finger and, with inexplicable fluidity, snapped it in two. Aya gasped, and then she held her breath when Sehun rose to his height and tucked the flower behind her earlobe. For a long time, all they did was behold each other. Sehun wanted to get inside and have this over with (though mostly he just wanted Aya and her not-so-covered skin indoors and out of plain sight), but he couldn’t seem to break his gander.

Aya was mostly speechless, but then she remembered Sehun’s sweet gesture and commanded herself to respond. “You just killed a baby sunflower.” She pursed her lips.

Sehun chuckled, grabbing her hand again and finally gyrating towards the door. “It’s not a baby sunflower. It’s all grown up.”

“How do you know that? It was the smallest sunflower among these.” She looked from side to side to acknowledge the flora.

“You don’t determine a sunflower’s age by its size, Aya.” The golden knob clicked with a single twist of the key, and the door gaped open, revealing nothing but darkness inside. Sehun didn’t move.

“How then?” She pressed. She was pretty sure they had tackled a little about plants in middle school, but she couldn’t recall of any in-depth discussion dedicated to sunflowers. Maybe in Sehun’s previous school they had studied about it?

Unfortunately for her and her curious brain, Sehun was back to his world of silence. He melded into the darkness, tugging gently at Aya to follow. A few clicks on the wall and the room was filled with light.

Aya was floored, all thoughts of the sunflower evaporated from her mind.

It wasn’t a shop. And it wasn’t a store. It wasn’t a kiosk either.

Mirrors covering every inch of the empty room seemed to expand the space to infinity. A combination of white and yellow lights spilled into every corner. To Sehun’s left was a barren counter. The layer of shelves behind it gave away the hint of its usability once upon a time. But perhaps wear and tear had finally consumed it so that it now looked too shabby and always in danger of crumbling. To his right was a set of mixers whose wires s along the edges of the ceiling to connect with their respective speakers. There were five large speakers in the room: one on each corner of the ceiling and the largest one sitting beneath the mixers.

It was, to Aya’s astonishment, a dance studio.

At last she could no longer tether her excitement. She leapt to the corner of mixers, inserted the numerous plugs into a column of outlets, and blasted on the speakers. The first song exploded in electronic bass and guitars. She laughed and turned down the volume while throwing a glance at Sehun who was leaning against the counter and passively rolling his eyes.

The thing about Aya was this: she was a great dancer. No, great would be an understatement. She was marvelous. She was a goddess in dancing, and she could rock just about every genre with her soft and swift limbs, her smooth and perfect grooves and basically every fiber of her system.

She could not remember w