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There’s a new bakery just across the street.
Now, that would ordinarily not be an issue. The more bakeries, the merrier, right? Except that whoever bought the long-empty building to settle their business into neglected to take into account that there is already a bakery on this exact street. Now there’s this dumb, flashy, neon yellow banner announcing a grand opening right in his eyeline.
A grand opening that, by chance, happens to be today.
Donghun scowls at the banner some more.
“You okay?” There’s a nudge against Donghun’s shoulder that startles him out of his thoughts. He turns to look at Yuchan, braced against the counter of the bakery’s storefront, currently stretching to try and figure out what’s gotten Donghun so pissy this early in the day.
“Of course I’m not okay? Those guys are gonna steal our jobs. Bet they’re not even good at baking, either,” Donghun grumbles. Maybe, if he glares enough, he can burn a hole or two into the banner - or better yet, the whole storefront.
“That’s dumb,” Yuchan states resolutely, and Donghun has half a mind to fire the guy. “They’re probably really nice people. Plus, we have regulars. They’ll still keep coming here.”
“Not if they cheat them away from us.”
Yuchan frowns. “How can you cheat at baking?”
“Oh, if only you knew things.” Donghun shakes his head, a world-weary frown decorating his face, and slumps over the counter. “In any case,” he says, chin digging painfully into the wood surface, “we’re ruined. Time to pack up, Channie. I’m sure the guys down at the community theatre would still love to have you.”
“But then who would give me free surplus pastries?” Yuchan pats Donghun’s back, lets his hand linger just a second, and then pulls away to check the cash register. “Also, your batch of Danishes is probably done by now. Get your mopey butt back in the kitchen.”
“No way to talk to your senior,” Donghun protests, more out of habit than anything, but he still goes. After all, the quality of his pastries matters more for now.
For now. When he’s done, he’s absolutely going to be angry about their new competition again.
Donghun has always prided himself on one thing: all of the pastries his bakery offers are made fresh every day.
Of course, that means that he has to get up at an ungodly hour in the morning and enlist a part-time aspiring baker to help get everything done during the busy days, but it’s helped him build up a steady customer base over the years. People like him, they like his assurance of freshness and quality. He’s never had any actual complaints, except for the time in his first month where he prepared an entire batch of dough with salt instead of sugar. That had been a rough thing to explain to his regulars.
When there’s leftover pastries, and there always are because that’s better than running short in the middle of the noon lunch-rush, he just makes Yuchan take them. The boy wants to do sports for a living, he figures he could need the extra energy. Plus, Donghun’s more of a savoury person in his own time, anyway.
The point is, Donghun has put a lot of work into this place, from the decor over the music choice to the actual ingredients and baking. This is what he’s good at, and he’s not going to let some hack with store-bought pastries fuck that up for him.
Never.
When the last of the businesspeople trying to get a fix for their sugar addiction leave, Donghun throws the rag he’d been wiping his hands with over a chair in the back baking area and stomps into the front. Yuchan is currently busy rearranging the items in the display case to make it look less empty.
“Oh,” Yuchan says when he hears him approach, eyes raising up to meet his, “good. You’re here. We need to refill these, do you have any fresh ones in the back?”
“Yeah, I’ll do that. I have a mission for you.”
“Oh?” Yuchan perks up. He’s almost like a dog, that way - Donghun swears he can see a tail wagging. “A mission? Sounds dramatic.”
“It is,” Donghun agrees. “I want you to go spy on the new bakery.”
“Spy?” Yuchan inclines his head, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “How would I do that? Break in?”
“No. Just… just, I don’t know. Go pose as a customer, check out what it looks like. Bring back some of the pastries, I want to see what they taste like.”
“You are aware that going in and purchasing their product for money means I’m actually just a regular customer, right?”
Donghun clicks his tongue and cuffs Yuchan over the head gently. “Just go, idiot.”
“Fine, fine…” Yuchan rubs the back of his head sheepishly, gives a wave, and leaves. Donghun takes his place behind the cash register as he waits, and fervently hopes that nobody comes in during this time.
Nobody does come in. Donghun’s first win of the day.
(Likely his last, too.)
Yuchan comes back about twenty minutes later with a big smile on his face, ruffled hair, and two white boxes cradled delicately in the crook of his arm.
“Donghun!” he yells loudly as soon as he gets the door open, to the great shock of a poor old grandmother walking the street, “these people are great. I wanna keep them.”
“What do you mean, great?” Donghun makes grabby hands at the boxes, and Yuchan reluctantly parts with one of them. “So their place isn’t a gross dump?”
“Nope!” The counter creaks the tiniest bit when Yuchan hops down to sit on it. Donghun swats Yuchan’s leg, but decides to not nag him about it. It’s his job to clean the thing, after all. “The decor’s really cute, and the cashier? Byeongkwan? He gave me pastries for free when I said I’m from here! Said they wanted to build a positive relationship with us.”
“A positive relationship?” Donghun huffs and pries open the flaps of the takeaway pastry container. It smells… well, it doesn’t smell as bad as he thought it would, honestly. Or bad at all. Actually, the fragrance is kind of nice.
Donghun scrunches his face up. “These smell weird.”
“Yeah?” Yuchan asks in between bites of what appears to be some sort of muffin. “I think they’re tasty. Almost beats your kitchen.”
Donghun glares at him until Yuchan grins, crumbs stuck between his teeth. It’s gross.
“Almost, I said. Stop acting like I insulted your family heritage and eat, gosh.”
Donghun grumbles, rolls his eyes, but reaches inside the box instead of arguing any more. Inside are two things - a muffin, chocolate and cherry from the looks of it, and some type of eclair with a light glaze and a chocolate drizzle over it. He goes for that one first, takes a small bite, chews thoughtfully. It’s coffee-flavoured, and the blend of flavours works surprisingly well. The muffin is alright too, more flavourful than he’s used to, and definitely a lot sweeter. Not unbearably so, but maybe more than Donghun himself would enjoy on a regular basis.
“They forgot to put salt into the dough,” he concludes as he lobs the box the pastries came in into the bin. “It’s way too sweet.”
“Oh, I think your inherent salt will be more than enough for that.” Yuchan wipes his mouth with a napkin, looks out the storefront window, and hops off the counter. “These are good. You just don’t want to admit that.”
“I have no idea what you mean,” Donghun grumbles. He resolutely does not look at the empty pastry box and its incriminating lack of leftovers.
Surprisingly enough, Donghun doesn’t end up losing every single one of his customers to the sugar-fiend across the street.
Sure, his foot traffic is a bit lessened, but a week later he’s still retained pretty much all of his regulars. At least someone around here appreciates actual depth in their food’s flavour profile instead of just having sugar thrown at them from every direction.
Still, though - the new bakery has left an impression on Donghun’s bottom line. That’s why he’s currently trudging through the deserted streets at three instead of four in the morning. If he can get a head start on baking for the day, he can try out that new raisin bread recipe he’d tweaked last night and bring back some of the people he lost. The smell alone will show those idiots what they’re missing. Yup. Exactly like that.
Donghun shoves his hands deeper in his pockets and tries to suppress a shiver. It’s cold out, autumn slowly giving way to winter, the leaves under his feet gently frosted over. His breath fans out in a cloud in front of his face, and he recoils as he accidentally fogs up his own glasses. Stupid things. He really should get surgery someday. Or invest in proper contact lenses.
As he’s waiting for his lenses to clear, he spots a person walking in his direction on the opposite side of the street. The man is bundled up in a thick winter coat, twirling a set of keys, and… whistling? At three in the morning? Donghun shudders in disgust. Morning people. The man disappears behind… ah, the new bakery.
Morning people and rivals.
Donghun shuffles along a little faster. He can’t let himself be beaten just because he got into the kitchen two minutes later than that guy.
Later that day, they gain a new customer.
Well, they don’t gain him as much as he forcefully inserts himself into their shop.
Donghun is in the kitchen area, whipping up some more cream filling for his handmade doughnuts (suck on that, Dunkin Donuts) when he hears a crash from the front of the store, then a bell jingle uselessly, the new arrival having announced their entrance quite effectively already.
“Oh! Yuchan!” the customer yells with a certain degree of familiarity that gives Donghun pause. He doesn’t know that voice, and he knows most of Yuchan’s friends from where they come by and distract him from doing any meaningful work about twice a week. Curiously, he wipes his hands mostly clear of flour and steps into the customer area.
“Yuchan?” Yuchan turns to him from where he’s leaning on the counter, grinning from ear to ear.
“Hun! This is Byeongkwan, he’s the cashier at the bakery across the way.” He gestures towards the short man with the soft looking face on the other side of the counter, who’s giving Donghun an impassive wave. Donghun squints at him.
“Hey,” the guy says. “I’m on my break. Sorry if I’m disturbing the store, but there’s not many people around right now, so I figured it’d be okay to pop in and say hi.”
Yup. Insufferable asshole.
“Well, we still have customers here, so.” Donghun pointedly looks at the old man in the corner, asleep and drooling over his plate. Oh. Maybe not the best example. “Anyway. Are you here to buy something?”
“Oh? Nah, I’m surrounded by pastries every day, I think I’ll actually die if I had to eat them for lunch too.” Byeongkwan shakes his head. “Though I’ve only ever seen Junhee eat pastries from the shop. I have no idea how he’s still alive.”
“Junhee?” Yuchan perks up. “You mean the baker?”
“Baker, owner, same thing. Yeah, he’s the one who does all the food.”
Junhee, huh.
Donghun clears his throat, bends under the counter to tug out a small takeaway box in pastel green with a see-through lid, and begins filling it up with pieces from the glass case next to the cash register. In the end, the box barely closes, dented from the sheer mass of sweets in it, but Donghun shoves it at Byeongkwan’s chest regardless. Byeongkwan fumbles with it, a quizzical look on his face.
“These are for Junhee or whoever, so he’ll know what real baking tastes like,” Donghun declares. “Also, your break is probably over by now.”
“It’s n…” Byeongkwan rolls his eyes as Donghun scowls at him. “Fine, it’s over. Thanks for the free food, he’ll probably be happy about it.” He waves half-heartedly and makes his way back out the door.
“They’re not for him to enjoy,” Donghun calls after him, but the door has already closed with a soft jingle of the bell above. He huffs, rakes a hand through his hair. “He’s supposed to be intimidated by my flavour profile, not enjoy them. This isn’t elementary school.”
“Hm. Sure.” Yuchan bumps his hip against Donghun. “Don’t you have baking to do? We’re low on croissants.”
“Right.” Donghun nods to himself, then returns to the kitchen with a satisfied smile. That Junhee guy’s gonna get what’s coming to him, aka bankruptcy for choosing to be Donghun’s rival. He’ll probably pack up immediately after eating these - Donghun can’t wait.
Except, two days later, he actually runs into the guy, and quite physically so.
“Oh!” Through his thick insulated jacket, Donghun feels hands grab his shoulders to keep him steady. “Sorry, man. Are you okay?”
Donghun cradles the travel mug with coffee he’d taken from home against his chest, like it’s both his most valuable and most fragile possession. “Who’s ever okay this early?” he asks like an entire idiot, but the man he ran into laughs, for some reason. Bad sense of humour.
“Right. Sorry. I guess I didn’t really look where I was going.”
Donghun knows that it’s actually him who didn’t look, but he’s not about to dispute someone taking the blame, especially when it’s this early and words don’t form so easily yet. You’d think he’d have gotten used to waking up so early, considering how long he’s been baking, but no. It never gets easy.
“Eh,” Donghun grumbles, and finally looks up.
Well.
Down, rather.
“Oh.”
The (infuriatingly pretty, though he’ll never admit that out loud) other baker frowns. “What, oh?”
“You’re Junhee.”
“You know me?”
Donghun huffs, jerks a thumb in the direction of his own bakery. “Yeah, I own that place. You’re the guy who just crashed in and tried to steal all my customers.”
Junhee frowns, takes a step back, lets his hands fall, finally. Donghun’s shoulders immediately feel a few degrees colder. “You’re Donghun? Wait - no, listen, I’m not trying to steal anyone’s customers? I’m sorry if I gave that impression?”
Donghun clicks his tongue. “Whatever, it’s too early to argue about that.” He turns to his bakery, turns back around, squints at Junhee. “What’d you think of the pastries I told Byeongkwan to bring you?”
“Oh?” Junhee grins. His whole face lights up, that way, and it’s kind of gross. “They were good! Kind of light on the sugar, but the pastry cream was great.”
“Good.” He sniffs. “Though, the amount of sugar is perfectly reasonable, and they’re better than the stuff you sell.”
Junhee shifts. There’s leaves trapped under his heels, but they’re so soggy from the rain and the frost that they don’t make any sound. “Well…” His breath puffs in front of his face, obscures his features for a second. Donghun is glad to give his eyes that break. “I dunno. I still think my baking is better.”
“On what grounds?”
“You’ll see later today.” He winks - honest to god winks - and digs into his jacket pockets for keys, presumably. “Do you have any flavour preferences?”
“Coffee.”
“You’re a weird man.” Nevertheless, Junhee gives a little salute. “Coffee it is. I know you’re gonna love it.”
“Don’t bet on it,” Donghun grumbles, squares his shoulders, and stomps his way to his own store. Who does that guy think he is, all confident about being better than Donghun could be. Donghun’s been here for years, and he’s not about to let an idiot like that run him out of a job.
Later that day, a pretty disgruntled Byeongkwan bursts through the door connecting the sales area to the baking area. Donghun, immersed in getting the shortcrust pastry dough done in preparation for tomorrow, startles so hard he bangs his elbow against a metal surface, which in turn startles Byeongkwan enough that he almost falls.
“Dude,” Byeongkwan wheezes, braced against the doorframe, a hand splayed over his heart. “The fuck?”
“I could ask you that? What are you doing in here?”
Byeongkwan rolls his eyes, huffs, and chucks a white box at Donghun, who catches it out of reflex more than anything. “Junhee asked me to bring you these. Why do you need me to play postman to your flirting?”
“We’re not flirting,” Donghun replies absentmindedly, prying the flaps of the box open, dough momentarily forgotten, “this is just a perfectly healthy baking rivalry.”
“Huh. Sure it is. Well, I’ll go hang out with Yuchan. Let me know if you want to send something back.” He stops at the doorframe, hesitates, and then says: “He likes caramel, by the way. And strawberry flavours. You’re welcome.”
“I didn’t ask,” Donghun says, but Byeongkwan is already long gone, door left ajar behind him. With a sigh, Donghun moves to close it behind him.
Once he does, he pauses.
“Flirting? Seriously?
Byeongkwan sure is weird.
Donghun returns to his table, takes a bite of what appears to be some sort of chocolate-coffee cupcake with a tiny little coffee bean sitting on top of prettily piped frosting, and mulls it over.
Strawberry shortcake wasn’t planned for today, but he can probably pop in at the market for some fresh strawberries during his fifteen-minute break.
Donghun is aware that he works a lot.
Not only does he do all the prep in the early mornings, he also stays at the bakery for most of the day, doing orders (cakes, usually) and restocks of popular pieces and lunch foods. The only things that get him through it are frequent naps and Yuchan assuring for the hundredth time that yes, he can lock up around 3pm, don’t worry about it Donghun, just go home and rest for once in your life.
Still, though Donghun is basically working himself into the ground, he enjoys what he’s doing, and it’s worth it to him. He can only wonder if it’s at all the same for Junhee, but considering he arrives to work at around the same time Donghun does and is present all throughout the day until his own shop closes, he probably can’t be the biggest slacker Donghun’s ever encountered.
That’s one point in his favour, at least.
This goes on for about a week or so. Junhee sends him pieces from his bakery, Donghun eats them, tells Yuchan all about what’s wrong with every single one, and then sends his own pieces back. Yuchan’s taken to mild exasperation whenever he sees Donghun leave for the market down the street - Donghun’s taken to ignoring him. Let him think what he wants.
The stress, though, gets to Donghun in a quiet way, creeping up on him. He doesn’t even notice that anything is wrong until he almost sneezes right into his chocolate icing.
“You okay?” Yuchan calls from the front. It’s a slow time of day, so they have the door propped just a bit open, mostly so Yuchan can go into the back and sneak some pastry cream in between customers.
“Yeah,” Donghun replies, but his voice belies his stuffy nose. He’s pretty sure Yuchan notices, because a few seconds later he enters the kitchen with a concerned look on his face.
“You sure about that? You look kinda flushed.” He moves in, presses a hand to Donghun’s forehead. “Dude, you have a fever.”
“It’s just warm in the kitchen,” Donghun justifies, leaning back against his worktable. “I’m alright.”
“Donghun…” Yuchan sighs and looks around the kitchen. “You know you can’t work when you’re sick. You’ll get your germs all over the food, do you want that?”
Donghun deflates. “No,” he admits.
“So you’re going home?”
“Yeah. Can you handle locking up the shop?”
“Don’t worry about that.” Yuchan raises his hand as to vlap him on the shoulder, then remembers that being sick thing, and takes a step back instead. “Just rest up, I’ll try to reach Seungkwan or Kyungsoo for tomorrow. Let me know how you feel later?”
Donghun huffs. “It’s almost like you’re my manager. You do way too much work for a cashier.”
“Well, what can I say. I’m invested now, too. Now come on, let’s get you something to eat at home.”
Usually Donghun is the responsible one, but it feels nice, being taken care of like that for once, so all he does is follow Yuchan’s lead for a change.
Donghun takes four days to properly recover again. (He might have spent the entire fourth day playing the new Spiderman, but that’s between him and his PS4.) He even sleeps in until six in the morning, which he hasn’t done since his early culinary school days. If it were summer, he’d be rising with the sun just about now, but as it stands, it’s still just as dark as when he makes his way to work at four.
Speaking of going to work.
Donghun wraps both arms around himself and shivers his way down the sidewalk. It’s gotten a lot colder over the time he’s been sick, or maybe he just feels that way because he hasn’t stepped a foot outside since Yuchan had herded him home with a couple of sandwiches, a reminder to call Sehyoon to come take care of him, and the number for the nearest delivery place. Donghun had no idea that specialised soup shops even existed, much less that they delivered anywhere. Wonders of modern technology.
He’s fumbling with the keys, icy against his already stiff and cold fingers, when he hears a shout from the other side of the street. He turns his head, blinks blearily - he’s not wearing his glasses, so the walkway on the other side is a bit blurry to him.
Still, the man stomping towards him is fairly recognisable.
“Junhee?” he calls back. Nobody’s doing work in the nearby shops yet, so it’s quiet, and his voice carries pretty far down the street. Junhee, for his part, just jogs over the street and plants himself in front of Donghun.
“Where were you?” he demands.
“Uh.” Donghun shrugs. “Sick?”
“With what?”
“The flu? What, are you going to take my baking license or something?”
Junhee’s shoulders slump a little, free from earlier tension, and he leans against the brick outer wall of Donghun’s bakery. “I don’t know,” he says, “I thought something happened. Byeongkwan said you weren’t there to take any of the food I sent, and you never sent anything back, so…”
“So?”
“I thought you were sick of it, or got some kind of food poisoning from the blackcurrant stuff. Or just decided you actually hated me. I was worried, okay?”
Donghun sighs. “I do actually hate you, you know that.”
“Sure you do.” If Donghun didn’t know any better, he’d think that Junhee was rolling his eyes, but surely he wouldn’t be that rude this early in the morning, right?
“I do.”
“Right.” Junhee clears his throat - something about him shifts, gives off a feeling of sheepishness. “So, will you be in the shop today?”
“Until three, as usual. Why?”
“Oh, just trying to figure out what to wow you with.”
That makes Donghun huff a laugh. “Fine, fine.” He watches Junhee jog back over the street to his own bakery, and remembers: “I like coffee flavours!”
“I know! You’re really weird!” Junhee shouts back, and then disappears through the back entrance of his bakery into the kitchen. Donghun shrugs, takes one more look at the last semblance of quiet he’ll get today, and does the same.
Kyungsoo has a very peculiar organisational system that Donghun’s never been quite able to figure out, so he spends most of prep time reorganising everything and working himself into so bad of a time crunch that he almost doesn’t manage to bake the croissants on time. With that, all plans of making Junhee finally accept defeat at the hands of Donghun’s superior baking skills take a backseat for the time being. As such, he doesn’t even notice how morning rolls around to noon, would have kept powering through if Yuchan hadn’t barged into the kitchen and forcibly taken his rolling pin from him.
“No more baking,” he declares imperiously, “just eating.”
“But I’m not d-”
“Nope. Take a break. Please?” He looks worried, and Donghun feels himself give in pretty quick. He is actually exhausted, after all.
He pries open the flaps of - oh, it’s one of Junhee’s things. The box feels weirdly light, and as he peers inside, he can only make out a single pastry.
Huh. Cutting corners, are we?
Donghun lifts out the eclair. It has a light brown glaze, likely caramel, and little salt flakes sprinkled on top. Taking a bite, Donghun concludes that while salt on an eclair looks weird, it doesn’t actually taste all that bad. It’s not as sweet as Junhee’s usual fare, at the very least.
Chewing like that, it takes Donghun a while until he notices a piece of paper that’s been stuck to the inside of the lid of the box. He pries it off carefully - his fingers adding to the stains of fat already on it - and unfolds it as he’s eating.
Hey Donghun , it reads,
do you like this one? Byeongkwan said Yuchan told him to tell me to do something with salt, because you’re so salty all the time. You’re salty and I like caramel, so how about some salted caramel, right? :D
Donghun snorts. Somehow he can’t even be surprised that Junhee is the type to write out emojis.
I know you said you liked coffee , the note continues, but I figured real coffee is better than coffee-flavoured food. So if you want, we can get some coffee sometime! No pressure, but let me know if you'd like to.
Yuchan rests his chin on Donghun’s shoulder and pokes at the note. “So?”
“I can’t believe he’d ask me out like that. Idiot.”
“I think it’s cute! But are you gonna take him up on it?”
Donghun shrugs. Looks at the note, turns it over in his hands. Looks at the takeaway box with only crumbs of the former eclair remaining.
“What’s a subtle way to say yes?”
“Cu-”
“No cupcakes with the word yes piped on them.”
Yuchan deflates, pouting, and Donghun laughs as he ruffles his hair.
He’ll figure it out - but first, he has a lunch rush to prepare for.
(He still hates Junhee, though. Definitely.)