He keeps tapping his pen on the desk. There are a few papers scattered in front of him, asking for his attention and signature, but he can’t focus.  He should have been here by now; where is he? He checks the time with a quick glance. Ten forty five; he said he would be here by nine. He should fire Kai for being tardy on this one day that Chanyeol is anxiously expecting him. But he can’t really fire Kai. For one thing, there is no point, since Kai will still be around as his best friend, pestering him and embarrassing him, like any best friend should do. For another, Chanyeol’s father hired Kai to establish a favorable relationship between their enormous company and the huge one which belongs to Kai’s father; what bothers Chanyeol in this arrangement is that technically he can’t fire Kai –only his father can. But it is ten forty seven and Kai is still nowhere to be seen, driving Chanyeol to the edge of exasperation.

There is a light knock on the door and Chanyeol almost jumps from his seat.

“Come in” he orders curtly and Kai walks in with his aviator glasses still on, strolling casually to the expensive leather couch. Chanyeol is this close to strangling him.

“Morning” Kai wheezes coolly.

“What on earth took you so long?!” he snaps, banging his hand on the desk in a childish tantrum. Kai takes off his glasses, revealing a surprised look.

“Calm down Yeol, jeez. Why is it so important to you?” he lifts his bag from the floor and starts searching inside. Chanyeol deliberates if throwing all the contents of the bag on the floor will help them find the papers faster. “Here” Kai pulls a yellow envelope out of the bag “That’s the one” he hands it to Chanyeol who snatches it away quickly. He guts the envelope open and quickly scans the precious papers he has been waiting for a whole weekend.

The photograph is smudged but the rest of the CV is printed legibly. He is twenty two years old, older than Chanyeol only by six months. It says he is one seventy eight centimeters tall but, if Chanyeol had to guess, he would say the guy was shorter than that, maybe one seventy four. He seems smart too, good grades, awards, national youth business award…Disappointingly, that’s as far as personal information goes and there follows a three page list of all the events he has ever planned. Chanyeol is not interested in that for the moment, so he turns to the first page again. Byun Baekhyun. Mr. Byun. Or just Baekhyun. Bae~khyun. It sounds cute. Baekie…

“Yeol, you’re smiling like a creep” Kai interrupts and Chanyeol would like to shoot him a deathly glare but, for some reason, he can’t erase his stupid smile from his face. “What’s so interesting about the guy?” Kai tries to peek at the papers and Chanyeol childishly pulls them closer.

“I don’t know…” he mumbles innocently “He is just…interesting”

And boy, was he interesting! He had barely spent two glances at Chanyeol, yet the latter felt like he would do anything at his command. He had an indefinable aura of power, something that made him look like an emperor in that glorious chaos backstage. He had beautiful chestnut hair, smooth white skin, pretty little lips and those dazzling brown eyes. Chanyeol never had a thing for guys, but this guy didn’t look like a guy all that much. His black suit was tailored to hug his tapered waist and those sinful hips, which had Chanyeol gaping at the sight of the guy walking away. And he was a heart breaker too. He barely paid attention to Chanyeol when he was talking to him, he didn’t know who Chanyeol was and, when Chanyeol asked for his name, the guy just shrugged his shoulders and walked away like a mysterious femme fatal. And that smile, oh god, that smile. Chanyeol felt really jealous and he wondered who could have caused that sparkling smile to appear. Even then, the guy averted his crescent eyes away from Chanyeol, breaking his heart again.

What was Chanyeol supposed to do after all that? He got curious. Maybe he was annoyed, because he likes having the upper hand, maybe he wanted to find out who was the one person in this country who didn’t know his name, maybe he was hoping to find out a bit more about the guy or, who knows, maybe he was hoping to find a way to see him again. He usually asks Kai to find information about someone if a. they are going to work with them or b. he has a phone number and he needs to arrange a date. This case doesn’t seem like either though.

“Good morning, my boys! How are we today?” Luhan marches in through the open door, with a huge smile on his angelic face. The angel face is just a distraction; Luhan is the best sample that Darwin’s evolution theory has to offer. He looks innocent, beautiful, well behaved and elegant but he has really bad mood swings, he is domineering, mischievous and he swears a lot when he is under pressure. He is also two years older than Chanyeol but he looks like he is still fifteen. His father appointed him to supervise Chanyeol and Kai at work, just to make sure that some work gets done and the boys are not constantly fooling around; Luhan is the devil when it comes to deadlines.

“Good morning, hyung” Kai answers and Chanyeol nods, watching Luhan hopping to sit on his desk and perching on the side with elegance.

“What are we looking at?” he asks and he snatches the papers away from Chanyeol’s fingers, much to the latter’s dismay. “Event planner” he murmurs, examining the papers “Wait. Does that mean that Kai is actually doing his job, recruiting people for the upcoming event? I am shocked; speechless. Wow. Well done, Kai” he mocks astonishment, looking at Kai.

“Yeah” Kai dismisses all the snide comments “Apparently, we are hiring someone interesting for the upcoming event” he presses with a leering expression.

“Interesting how?” Luhan’s brow creases as he is scanning over the information again. “What’s with the picture? What happened to his face?”

“My printer is a bit sick these days” Kai answers casually.

“He is beautiful” Chanyeol mumbles without thinking. Shoot. He hasn’t contributed anything to this conversation for a while and he is still smiling like an idiot and now both the other two idiots are looking at him with a knowing and interested expression; he will be cornered in no time.

“Good morning, everyone. What a nice assembly” Lay greets them, breaking the awkward tension, strolling in the office with papers at hand. Lay is Chanyeol’s fabulous secretary and the only reason Chanyeol can cope with his work –and work mates. “What were you talking about?”

“Someone interesting!” Kai offers with a teasing smirk.

“And beautiful” Luhan adds, confusing Lay a bit.

“Okay, what is interesting ’s name?” he asks, intrigued by the odd set of information. Chanyeol groans. He wanted to be alone, to indulge in memorizing information about his guy, to relive their moments in his head and try calling his name out loud to see how it sounds. Instead, all the information is turning into a public announcement and his office is crowded and he has to control his tongue, at least, since his smile is raging out of control.

“Byun Baekhyun” Luhan reads grandly “Oh, it’s cute” he realizes right after.

“What about Baekhyun?” Lay asks casually.

“It’s Mr. Byun to you” Luhan corrects him, holding up one finger strictly, no doubt with the best intention to tease Chanyeol and his growing frustration. It’s his guy! His Baekhyun! They shouldn’t be talking about him.

“He really insisted that I call him Baekhyun though” Lay mumbles innocently.

“What?” the three others demand in unison, heads snapping to the secretary’s direction abruptly. Lay looks taken aback and he holds his arms up in surrender.

“What? I sort of know him. Is that bad?” he looks half defensive, half intimidated.

“How do you know him?” Chanyeol demands, injecting from his seat and barely keeping from grabbing his secretary’s collar to shake the truth out of him as quickly as possible.

“We were class mates and neighbors in primary school; we were sort of friends, like all kids are friends during that time of school. But then we both moved to different places and we switched schools, so we lost touch. I bumped into him recently by chance in a café and we met to catch up a few times; he is an event planner and a sweet guy. And that’s it”

“Where is that café?” Chanyeol asks, already searching his pockets for his car keys. His intentions must be obvious, because Lay is giving him a disapproving look.

“Chanyeol, it’s not like he lives in that café, I met him there by chance. Why do you need to find him so badly anyway?”

“Yeah, why do you need to find him so badly?” Kai presses with a knowing smirk. Chanyeol shoots him an angry glare. But really, why does he need to find him so bad? He is not so sure. He groans and exhales loudly, plopping back in his seat. He crosses his hands on his chest, sulking, and pouts.

“Hey, don’t tease my boy that much” Luhan coos, patting Chanyeol’s head. “See what we can do: I will go to that café and check it out for you, okay?” he offers, hopping off the desk.

“I can go” Kai volunteers but Luhan glares at him strictly.

“If you go, there is no guarantee you will be coming back. If Chanyeol goes, he will probably camp there and if Lay goes, no work will be done today. So, I’ll go after lunch and I will report to you tomorrow morning; I’m the fittest for the job” he smiles angelically for show.

Chanyeol is not entirely pleased with that arrangement. He wants to see the guy for himself and talk to him and find out things about him and make him smile. Does his Baekhyun like strawberries? Does he have scars from childhood accidents? What sort of music does he like? Has he been to the opera? What’s his favorite book? Or is he a movies person? What’s his job like? Does he have any pets? And so many other things that Chanyeol wants to find out.

Okay, this is weird. Chanyeol never cares about such things, not for the people he dates, certainly not for the people he works with, not even for the people he calls as friends –Kai is more like family after all the years of friendship, so he doesn’t count. For some reason, Chanyeol is suddenly scared as hell. This caring thing about a complete stranger no less spooks the Jesus out of him. Maybe it’s better if Luhan goes after all.

“I still don’t get why we have to find him” Lay mumbles, picking up some signed papers from the desk.

“He’s our event planner” Luhan dismisses him casually and follows Lay out the door, dragging a protesting Kai from the collar of his shirt.

It’s not just our event planner, Chanyeol thinks after they are all gone. He is his guy, his Baekhyun. “Baekhyun” he mutters shyly in the silence of his office. It sounds cute. It also brings that unsettling feeling in Chanyeol again, so he shakes his head to clear his thoughts and tries to focus on the paperwork.

--

Baekhyun opens the door to the café and he is welcomed by the familiar ding of the bell. He really likes these mornings between a finished project and the beginning of another. It’s like mini vacation. He doesn’t have to be on edge, stressed, depressed and glued to his phone on this sort of days. No ear piece, no demanding customers, no sneaky room owners, no lazy kitchen stuff or tardy florists. He can just be himself and enjoy his life; the little things in it, at least, because he doesn’t have enough time for big things, like travelling abroad, or going to the beach, or picking up foreign languages, or getting a pet, or things like…maybe someone special? No, don’t go there Byun Baekhyun, it’s a depressing place and you know it. Today is a happy day, it’s sunny and warm and relaxing, so let’s enjoy that.

“Good morning, hyung!” Sehun greets him from behind the counter. The kid is everywhere Baekhyun looks. He works three part time jobs, the café, an internship and the one for Baekhyun, to pay for his studies. Baekhyun doesn’t know what sort of studies Sehun is taking, but the kid is hard working and that alone is enough for Baekhyun to like him.

“Hey” he greets him with a small smile.

“Thankth for the payttheck” the younger adds while preparing Baekhyun’s usual order: hot chocolate. Yes, Baekhyun is one of those people who don’t like the taste of coffee and he is head over heels for anything chocolate for as long as he can remember himself. Because chocolate is divine and anyone who cannot see that is a complete idiot, unworthy of participation in human civilization.

“You worked hard” Baekhyun approves; he is trying to apply positive reinforcement on human subjects, because he likes reading psychology books and they usually put ideas in his head “What are you going to buy this time?”

“I don’t know yet…” Sehun pauses in thought “Maybe a new pair of thoes? But I bought thoes latht time ath well. I don’t know; any ideath, hyung?”

“I’m going to buy a really nice jacket I saw the other day” he has been planning to get his hands on that from the first moment he saw it; he always wears well tailored clothes on the job and this was love at first sight.

“I am not into jacketh though. Maybe I thould ask Do hyung!” he exclaims, waiving towards the door. Baekhyun turns around and smiles at Do. “Hyung, what thould I invetht in?” Sehun asks quickly.

“Articulation classes? You really need to work on that” Do answers, taking a seat next to Baekhyun. Sehun gets engrossed in making whipped cream and Baekhyun smiles. No one takes to heart the things Kyungsoo says; he has a naïve trait of telling the truth. Truth hurts sometimes but it’s not reasonable to get angry at the person who points out the truth for you. Psychologically speaking, most people choose to ignore the things Do says or dismiss them as cute comments or humor, so that they can keep the positive impression of their identity intact; it’s one of the possible cognitive dissonance strategies, Baekhyun has read about it.

“So, what do we have today?” he asks cheerfully; this is the fun part of his job.

“Cloth samples and then some new flower arrangement ideas. Oh, we also have to review that new lettering style for invitations” Kyungsoo provides, damping an armful of albums and papers on the table. All these are samples for what Baekhyun can potentially use in the future and they bear this sense of ‘discovery’ that he loves. “But, before we proceed to that, can you tell me more about some tall guy who showed up during Chen’s show?”

“Where did you hear about that?” Baekhyun asks and his smile drops to a disappointed pout.

“Everyone was talking about it afterwards. They said he was really beautiful. What were you doing speaking to a beautiful person, Byun Baekhyun?” Do wiggles his eyebrows suggestively and Sehun giggles. Baekhyun is not that amused.

“It wasn’t like that” he says grumpily “He was interfering”

“Talk about setting off on the wrong foot for your standards” Do mutters, resting his chin on his fist. Baekhyun can’t tell whether it was meant to be ironic or it was just a comment to encourage further disclosure.

Here’s the thing about that stranger. He was beautiful –okay, he was drop dead gorgeous –and he was cute and tall and charming and all. But Baekhyun doesn’t like people who keep him from his job, and that’s exactly what that man was doing. In addition, he can’t guess what the man’s intentions could have possibly been, so he can’t really justify him nor blame him. Therefore, Baekhyun, when doing his bed time analysis on his encounter with the man, he initially thought he didn’t like him. But then again, he didn’t have a way of getting a definite answer for the man’s motives and consequently he couldn’t get out of his indecisive assessment of the stranger. Thus, he decided he could afford not to care –it’s not like he would be meeting the man ever again. But. Do you remember the ‘he was beautiful’ point? It kept coming back around, refueling the same thoughts all over again, irritating Baekhyun throughout the weekend.

“Umm…Are we not going to get any further details?” Do asks after a while of silence.

“What other details are there?” Baekhyun asks unwillingly. He just wants to dive into the cloth samples as soon as possible.

“Like, was he really beautiful? How tall was he? What did he look like? Did you get his name? Or his phone number? Is he single? Is he interested? What is the color of his hair and his eyes? What’s his voice like? What’s his character like?” Kyungsoo sputters quickly. Where did all those questions come from all of a sudden?

“Um, let me see…Yeah, he was beautiful. I mean, if you like that sort of face. He was too tall for mankind, hazelnut hair, large brown eyes…um, oh, right, he had a deep voice too, kind of a funny match with his face…I have no idea about his character, except for ‘annoying’ maybe. I didn’t get his name and, what the heck is it with all the date-related questions?”

“Hahaha” Sehun bursts out loud “Hyung, you’re funny”

“I wasn’t trying to be” Baekhyun mumbles in a low voice. He doubts he really was funny. Funny is not his thing.

“But you are funny Baekhyun” Do presses with a serious look “You’re telling me you had Adonis standing in front of you, and you just told him ‘please go back to your seat’?” Baekhyun nods serenely and innocently. “You’re unbelievable” Kyungsoo mutters and takes out the first catalog.

“Oh, Do hyung, I almotht forgot! Here’s the magazine you athked for” Sehun says and hands Do an expensive-looking magazine.

“Ah, thanks. I didn’t have time to buy it for myself and I really didn’t want to miss it. It’s Park Chanyeol’s interview in this month’s issue”

“Who’s Park Changol?” Baekhyun asks with tepid interest. Kyungsoo and Sehun snap their heads in his direction with an astonished look, their jaws gone slack.

“You don’t know who Park Chanyeol is?!” Do exclaims after a moment. Baekhyun shrugs his shoulders innocently; he didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not like he missed a giant asteroid crashing on Earth, it’s just some person he doesn’t know. Maybe Kyungsoo is exaggerating a bit.

“It’s just a person, right?” he offers defensively.

“Hyung, it’th not jutht a perthon!” Sehun’s eyes are wide with wonder, his lisp going out of control “It’th the motht thuccthethful young perthon right now, who’th going to thucctheth the Park buthineth thome day!”

“Um, Sehun, do you think you could translate that in Korean?” Baekhyun didn’t comprehend anything substantial from the boy’s words.

“Park Chanyeol is only the most talked about business successor nowadays” Do offers quickly, his eyes equally wide with wonder “He is smart, he has excellent academic record, he speaks four languages and he is managing a part of his father’s business –for now –which has become the most thriving part of the whole business in just eighteen months! To top it off, he is gorgeous, he drives expensive cars and wears designer clothes, not to mention he is single and he has the coolest personality the papers and magazines ever crossed paths with. Just look at him Baek!” Kyungsoo pushes the magazine in front of Baekhyun’s face –Jeez, he really needs to calm down about this guy.

Baekhyun takes the magazine and holds it at a reasonable distance from his face to take a look at the ‘amazing’ guy, who, apparently, only Baekhyun didn’t know in this country. One glance is all it takes for Baekhyun to drop the magazine on the table like a hot potato. This…this cannot be happening!

“It’s him!” he shrieks terrified.

“Yeah, I know, it’s Park Chanyeol” Do agrees pointedly.

“No, you don’t get it! It’s him; the tall person from the show!” he explains. It takes a moment of bewilderment but, in the end, the appropriate amount of horror hits the other two as well.

“What?! Baekhyun, are you serious? You said ‘no’ to The Park Chanyeol?!”

“Yeeeessss” Baekhyun whines.

“Noooo” Sehun whines back.

“This could ruin us!” Kyungsoo clutches the table nervously.

“I knowwww” Baekhyun whimpers, burying his face in his hands. In the background, Do and Sehun deliberate on the consequences but Baekhyun is too devastated to focus. Their reputation, their job offers, their future…They have worked so hard for this little company of theirs and he singlehandedly ruined everything. It’s not entirely his fault, but it is. Stupid, stupid Baekhyun. That’s it. From now on, you are going to have to read some magazines, mister! No more Choderlos de Laclos for you.

When the first wave of panic has died down, Baekhyun peeks through his fingers. Sehun is quietly making an order for someone else and Do is going through the fabric samples. It doesn’t look like he is really looking at the samples, more like he is flipping the pages restlessly, glaring murderously at them with his huge eyes. He is muttering about magazines, business, successors, stupid Byun never tuning in to the rest of the world, job offers, income and chiffon. Maybe Baekhyun should just wait for a couple of days before speaking in front of Do again. His eyes wander to the table. Was Park Chanyeol this handsome before?

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a/n. Here is chapter two! I hope you started having better insight concerning the characters. More POVs coming soon!

Psychology related notes: Cognitive dissonance is a very interesting topic of social psychology and it explains a lot of things about the way we think. It was a pain to study for exams, but you are welcomed to search about it, because it was really interesting. Positive Reinforcement is easier to understand (and behaviorism in general is much more popular. It’s just not my cup of tea…)

Lastly, Pierre Choderlos de Laclos wrote ‘Les Liaisons dangereuses’ (The dangerous Liaisons) in 1782, which is a great book and I recommend it. Until next time, kitty~