Chapter Text
It was New Years, and Moon Bin was not only tired — he was bored. He sat at a table on the far side of the hotel ballroom, an overenthusiastic girl chattering on in his ear because Bin didn't have the nerve to tell her straight to her face that he wasn't interested.
Light bounced off the walls from the chandeliers hanging from the ceiling to create an elegant feel without draining the energy of the party. Bin wasn’t really sure why he was here — all he knew was that Rocky had been invited to a fancy new year’s party, held in a fancy hotel, and he’d invited Bin. And then Rocky hadn’t been able to get a ride down into the city, so here Bin was, all alone and doing his best not to be bitter.
Bin awkwardly extricated his arm from the girl’s grip, cutting her off and standing up as her lips, painted bright red, turned downwards. He muttered a half-hearted apology and went to get a drink. God, her voice had been grating, but there was really no polite way to tell her that, was there? He leaned against the wall, awkwardly sipping champagne. He surveyed the room over the rim of his glass.
His eyes met those of a man across the room, and Bin barely managed to stop himself from choking on his drink. He was ethereally beautiful, hair falling across his forehead in inky black waves, his eyes sparkling in the light from the chandeliers. He was sitting at a table with a man much older than him. His father, or maybe even his grandfather?
Before Bin could ponder it for long, the man smiled softly towards Bin once more before looking back over to the man as he spoke, banishing any thoughts about his companion and leaving Bin reeling. He blinked and sat down at the closest table, taking another hasty sip of champagne.
As he watched, a girl approached the table, clearly trying to flirt with him. The older man who was with him appeared to laugh, cracking some kind of joke with a laugh. The girl appeared a bit confused, but the gorgeous boy just shrugged and smiled along with his friend. She left only a few minutes after that.
Bin was having a mild crisis. This boy was gorgeous in an inescapable kind of way, and Bin felt a strange feeling that if he didn’t find a way to ask him out he would come to regret it. It was a gut feeling, Bin convinced himself, although in reality it could have been a combination of many things — the smile, the soft light, or maybe even the champagne that Bin had been drinking steadily throughout the night.
In any case, Bin decided that he was going to ask this man out, no matter what. He sat alone at the table and stewed as the clock ticked closer and closer to midnight. Ten minutes before the end of the year, the man’s friend got up and walked to the piano and began to play. The man was alone.
Bin really knew he should take this chance, but he still found the whole idea far too intimidating. He'd gotten ahead of himself. Yes, the man was beautiful, but he had forgotten that he was a bit of a coward. He watched helplessly as the time passed and sighed, looking down at the table.
When he looked up again, the man had gone to whisper into the pianist’s ear, who nodded and continued to play. And then the man walked straight towards Bin.
Bin wasn’t proud of it, but he panicked, and froze. As the man approached, Bin sat perfectly still, employing all the techniques one would if faced by a wild grizzly bear. You don’t back down, but you don’t move, either. You don’t make eye contact. If it attacks, you play dead and wait for the danger to pass.
The boy walked right by Bin, his coat jacket brushing the table as he passed. Bin blinked, realizing that the man was leaving, which was really not good for the whole asking him out on a date plan.
So Bin had two options. Option one, let the man leave and hate himself forever for having no spine. Option two, chase the man down, potentially making it weird, and ask him out on a date.
People began counting down, voices bright, inebriated. Bin remembered the gut feeling, and decided that this was one regret that he could live without.
Bin stood hastily. He was in such a hurry that he knocked his glass over in the process, the slender stem falling over and nearly snapping on impact. The golden liquid inside spilled out to stain the pristine tablecloth an (admittedly not unpleasant) shade of yellow. Bin did not even stop, very nearly running from the room in an attempt to catch the man before he left.
He turned into the hallway, shoes silent against the hotel’s carpeting as he ran towards the elevators. The door was closing and, desperate, Bin threw himself forward and shoved his hand in the remaining space. The doors didn’t hesitate. They closed on his hand and Bin winced.
“Ow,” he murmured, mildly upset. Though painful, it did have the desired effect. The doors opened again with a soft ding, revealing the man from the party — who looked both amused and a little bit unnerved by Bin’s entrance.
“You know, you could have just waited for the next elevator,” he said, that same gentle smile Bin had seen earlier still in place.
“Yeah, I could’ve,” Bin admitted. “But then I would have sacrificed 27 floors with you.”
The man looked mildly surprised (honestly, Bin was a bit surprised too — when had he become so forward?) but he took it extremely well, his gentle smile back in no time.
“Well,” he said. “It was risky, regardless.” Silence fell for a moment.
“I’m Moon Bin,” Bin said. “I’d offer my hand to shake, but it still kind of hurts, so I hope you don’t mind.” The man beside him let out a small laugh.
“Ah, I’m Eunwoo,” he said. Eunwoo, Eunwoo, Eunwoo. By itself the name wasn’t really spectacular, but on him it was gorgeous. Bin smiled a little.
“Eunwoo? Like from the poem?” Eunwoo looked intrigued, but also a little at a loss. He looked at Bin out of the corner of his eye. Barely turning, Bin grinned and said, “No? It goes like this: A white guest from the sky. It is falling down shyly as the wind makes a reserved joke. It softly shakes, but it is made up of its whiteness. The warm and inviting guest approaches. I want to imprint on my heart. I want to draw my heart upon it, so that I may remain as white as the snow in your heart. I am cold, but Eunwoo kisses warmth into my lips and my heart thaws.”
Eunwoo smiled, shaking his head. “And who wrote that?” He asked, a teasing lilt to his voice.
“Oh, one of the romantics I suppose,” Bin said airily, waving the question off.
“Oh, come on, you know the answer,” Eunwoo pushed.
“Maybe I do,” Bin said. He did. “But maybe I don’t want to come off as a know-it-all.” Eunwoo surveyed him, and the doors of the elevator opened. Eunwoo sighed, his smile still in place.
“What a shame,” he said, wistful. “I adore know-it-alls.” And with that he walked out of the elevator, leaving Moon Bin gaping behind him. A moment later he regained his bearings and was scrambling after Eunwoo, a mess of limbs.
Eunwoo had received a dark green overcoat and was pulling it on, and Bin tried not to gape because it was absolutely stunning on him. Then again, someone like Eunwoo could probably wear a trash bag and Bin would still consider it high fashion.
As Bin stumbled up behind him, Eunwoo raised a hand, calling for a taxi. Eunwoo smiled at Bin, turning just slightly towards him.
“You know, you should really head back soon. You wouldn’t want to upset your girlfriend.” Bin frowned, bewildered.
“What? I don’t have a girlfriend.”
Eunwoo just looked at him skeptically, one eyebrow raised. Light shifted across his face in a mesmerizing pattern that came from the headlights of the cars passing on the busy road beside them. He was silent and then —
“That’s ridiculous,” he said, exhaling. His breath crystallized in the cold winter night, hanging there for a moment before dissolving. “Who was the girl whispering in your ear, then?”
Bin felt a shiver go down his spine that had nothing whatsoever to do with the cold. Eunwoo had noticed that girl, seen Bin with that girl and taken note of it. This definitely meant something.
“Oh my god, no. She was the worst, honestly,” Bin blabbered, kind of relieved to vent. “She kept chattering on in my ear about nothing at all, and honestly I’ve never wanted to die more. Why do you think I left?” As Bin spoke a taxi pulled up, and Eunwoo laughed. He pulled open the door and he began to slide inside. He paused, a hand on top on the taxi.
“I still find it hard to believe that you’re single,” Eunwoo said, his smile a little wider than before. He retracted his hand and pulled the door closed. The taxi began to drive away, and Bin became desperate. At the last moment, he grabbed ahold of the taxi’s open window and it jolted to a stop. For the second time in 10 minutes, Eunwoo jumped in surprise.
His look of shock melted to an amused grin. “There you go again, sticking your hand in places it doesn’t belong,” he breathed. Bin smiled nervously back.
“Eunwoo, don’t think that you can leave without a proper goodbye. After all, I'd like there to be another hello, sometime.” Eunwoo looked at him, a sadness in his eyes that Bin hadn’t expected.
“Good night, Moon Bin,” he said, his voice dripping with bittersweet melancholy. He smiled at Bin and rolled the window up, the taxi pulling off into the night.
Bin stepped back from the curb and sighed, defeated. He watched the taxi disappear into traffic, taking Eunwoo with it. There was nothing else to do — a rejection is a rejection. He returned to the party to down another glass of far too expensive champagne in the hopes of forgetting all about the entire incident.