Archive of Our Own

Where am I? Dongho looked around at the quiet street in front of him from underneath the eaves of a closed shop. He stayed close to the walls, but a few drops of rain reached his polished black shoes. In his hand was his phone, battery dead, useless. There was no one around him except for the occasional car that would zoom past, unaware of him.

The longer Dongho stood in unrelenting rain, the more anxious he became. Worst case scenarios crept into his mind. What if someone attacked him, mugged him, kidnapped him? He would be an easy target, and he doubted that anyone would notice his disappearance for a while. At least, his mom wouldn’t until she decided that it was time for another talk about family honor and family loyalty and the family company and how foolish Dongho was for wanting to throw that all away. Stranded in the rain, Dongho would gladly take a hundred lectures for his mom for her to be here with him, preferably with an umbrella and a way home. A way back to the home of his childhood when the possibilities were endless, and when Dongho thought that his mom loved him, not who she wanted him to be.

The monotonous pitter-patter of rain had caused Dongho’s eyelids to droop ever so slightly, but the memory of how conditional his mother’s love kept poking him like a small needle. Something that he should’ve been able to brush aside was causing him to feel like the world was slowly closing in, and all he wanted was to go back home. Back home to sleep and forget about everything, the bad day he was having, the company, and about the notebooks forgotten at the bottom of his closet with lyrics and stories that would never escape the dark.

“야! 빗속에서 무엇을하고 있습니까?”

The voice was coming from his left, outside the glass door of a closed cafe. Dongho quickly blinked away the small tears that were starting to form, and he saw a person around his age and with red hair run up to him with a black umbrella. He stretched out his arm to cover Dongho’s head.

“안으로 들어와야합니다.”

He was pointing towards the cafe. Not wanting to stand in the storm any longer, Dongho gladly accepted the stranger’s offer of warmth. He could care less if this was all a trap and he was about to be kidnapped, at least he would be held hostage somewhere dry. Thankfully, the cafe didn’t look like a place someone would get kidnapped.

Once inside, the red-haired stranger (‘Jaewon’ his name tag read) dragged him to a chair, before disappearing behind the counter. Dongho nervously tapped on the table, and he wondered if his rescuer had, by any chance, a phone charger. Eventually, the tapping of the rain on to the windows and the comfortable chair lulled him to sleep.

When Dongho woke up, he had a horrible crick in his neck, and the light coming through his hotel room’s curtains was blinding him. Wait. Dongho was suddenly aware that this wasn’t his hotel room, nor was he in his room in L.A., and he wasn’t even on a bed. He jumped in a panic, which caused the white chair he had been sleeping on to fall.

The clang of the chair hitting the floor fully woke a perplexed Dongho. He took a few deep breaths, and once his heart went back to a normal pace, he finally noticed the person sleeping on the other side of the table.

It was the red-haired stranger from last night. Had he stayed here all night? Why hadn’t he just woken up Dongho?

Dongho stood beside the table awkwardly until he took out his phone to search up directions back to his hotel. Then, he remembered that his phone had run out of battery last night. It wasn’t fully charged when Dongho stormed out of the office building, and away from his mother’s lecture.

He stood by the table a little longer, unsure if he should wake up Jaewon and ask for directions. Before a decision was made, Jaewon woke up.

Jaewon muttered in Korean, but Dongho’s subpar Korean skills could only understand the “Good morning”, and “My name is Ahn Jaewon, what’s yours.”

“Um,” Dongho stumbled, “I’m Kang Dongho. I don’t… I don’t speak Korean, uh, well.”

Jaewon immediately apologized profusely, and he took out his phone. It was a different brand than Dongho’s, so there went Dongho’s hope of charging his phone.

“Hello,” the robot voice from the translator in Jaewon’s phone read, “I’m Ahn Jaewon. I didn’t want to disturb your sleep, so I didn’t wake you. Would you like some coffee? It’s free.”

Dongho was about to decline, but when he saw Jaewon’s eager smile, he unexpectedly nodded his head. He immediately began to question his decision, but Jaewon had already moved behind the counter. Soon, the smell of brewing coffee filled the cafe as Dongho sat on the chair he had previously knocked over. Absentmindedly, he tapped his fingers on the table until a cup of steaming coffee was placed in front of him. He said a quick thank you, and Jaewon’s already bright smile became brighter. Dongho couldn’t understand how anyone could be this happy this early in the morning.

Jaewon and Dongho began to make small talk, although it was a bit difficult with a language barrier. Jaewon’s enthusiasm began to wear off on Dongho. They talked about their families (Dongho strayed far from the business), and they discovered that they were both fans of the same Korean band. Even after their cups were empty, they continued to talk. Dongho wished that he had taken his mother’s advice and had taken his Korean lessons more seriously. He wanted to be able to talk to Jaewon without a translator between them.

“너의 남자 친구는 누구야?” interrupted a voice from the door.

Dongho looked up from the sentence he was typing to see Jaewon’s face as red as his hair. The new voice laughed, and he made his way to the table. He, like Jaewon, wore a uniform, and on his name tag was ‘Jun’.

From the way Jun teasingly ruffled Jaewon’s hair, and was poked in the side in retaliation, Dongho figured that they were close. They talked rapidly in Korean, and he could only assume that Jaewon was introducing him. He couldn’t be sure because although Jun would occasionally look in his direction, Jaewon looked flustered. He was probably embarrassed for letting a stranger in the cafe in the middle of the night, Dongho decided.

Feeling a bit out of place listening to Jun and Jaewon’s conversation, he typed a new sentence into the translator.

“I should get going. Thank you for the coffee,” a robotic voice said in Korean.

Dongho handed the phone back to Jaewon, and began to stand, but his hand was caught. There was a sudden warmth, spreading from Jaewon to Dongho, from hand to hand. Jun made a comment in Korean and that warmth broke. Jaewon let go and hid his face behind his phone, typing away. “Let me walk you there.”

Jaewon was close, really close. The crowded streets forced them to walk shoulder to shoulder.

They stopped at an intersection. The skyscrapers around them were starting to look familiar. Dongho shivered. It was no longer raining, but there was a persistent cold. Suddenly, he felt something soft wrap around his neck, and the loose threads on the end tickled his nose. Jaewon’s scarf.

He looked down at Jaewon, and said thank you (he wasn’t completely incompetent in Korean). He felt guilty for taking the scarf after seeing how red Jaewon’s face was.

Before Dongho could offer the scarf back, the light turned green. The crowd pushed them forward, this time shoving them apart instead of together. In a panic, Dongho reached out and took Jaewon’s hand. Despite the cold autumn air, it was still warm.

Even after they escaped the crowd, Dongho didn’t let go. Jaewon didn’t either.

Not for the first time that day, Dongho really wished that he was better at Korean. They were probably only a few minutes away from his hotel. He only had a few minutes left with Jaewon, but there was so much he wanted to say. Dongho pulled the scarf tighter around his neck with one hand, and held onto Jaewon with the other.

They were in front of the glass doors of his hotel too soon. But Dongho didn’t want to let go. For some reason, Jaewon was comforting, his first bit of comfort since he arrived in Korea a week ago. Reluctantly, their hands separated.

This shouldn’t be goodbye. Impulsively, Dongho held out his hand. It took a few seconds (painstakingly awkward seconds), but Jaewon understood. He took out his phone, and went to the translator. It wasn’t until the cool metal slid into his hand that Dongho began to rethink his idea. In a final burst of courage, he typed into it before shoving it back to Jaewon. Embarrassed, he ran back to the glass doors.

Typed on Jaewon’s phone was a string of 10 digits.

(Shit, Dongho realized on the elevator, I still have his scarf.)