Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chanyeol had a small crush on a content creator or rather producer, he watched religiously on YouTube when they uploaded a new video, showcasing their musical talent. And they were also streaming live on Twitch. If there was one thing, which he had in common with his favourite streamer, was that both of them worked in the music industry…on different spectrums. Whereas Chanyeol was a composer for orchestras in a minimalist tradition of people like Steve Reich but also Phillip Glass, he immensely appreciated the old composers as well, on occasions he pulled a Yvette Young as well. He like to try out new styles and things all the way, even if it meant he had no definite sound that was his own.

Youtuber, producer, and Twitch streamer Encre et Poivre, also known under his alias eep didn’t care about copyright claims when he blasted some tracks before the stream began and Chanyeol squinted at his small phone screen before deciding to rather open his laptop and sign into his twitch account and be able to see what the streamer was listening to. eep had a versatile music taste that still managed to shock viewers and listeners alike, but Chanyeol appreciated the openness to music.

And there was nothing more beautiful than catching a relaxing stream after barely meeting the deadline.

eep was massive on heavy remixes and sampling and creating music from scratch with the OP-1; those were the videos Chanyeol loved the most. Watching the inked hands tapping away on the small machine and creating beautiful melodies with silly text appearing on the screen, explaining what eep was doing and what the reason was for it. And today the streamer was livestreaming once again.

But the first thing the viewers were greeted with was a video that showed the view under the desk with two loop machines present, but also a pillow with a black cat curled into a furball. A message from eep appeared in the chat, the microphone picking up someone typing on a keyboard:

eep_offical: She’s the reason I didn’t stream in a few weeks, she’s a needy little thing that needed to get used to her new home. She’s an old one already but seems like she likes the space under my desk.

eep_offical: So, yeah, I adopted a cat from the shelter and Ink and Pepper took well to Ms Murray, which surprised me.

The video of the cat got a little smaller and was pushed into the corner of the screen and overlayed another video focused on the OP-1 eep owned. An index finger tapped against the desk before vanishing from the screen again and the music overlaying the screen was turned off.

Another message appeared.

eep_offical: Thanks to everyone joining for today, I need a better method of communicating. I actually wanted to do a voice reveal today but I’m hoarse like I screamed the whole night. Which I didn’t, for the record, I just woke up with barely any voice today but I’m feeling good. So, no worries.

Chanyeol gasped, holding a hand to his mouth. He was infatuated with the streamer’s hands which was already weird enough but knowing he might hear the voice soon got him unreasonably excited. But also, a little wary if it might ‘destroy’ his perception of the persona he had created for himself.

eep_offical: This time around I build the song around the lyrics, I already have an audio track of the lyrics. Something new per se.

Chanyeol had not expected to end up in a fast-paced Indie Rock track, but it was a bop. The singer’s voice was pleasant to listen to and if there was the chance of more tracks between eep and the singer, Chanyeol would be on board.

The streamer took a break and as always, as if to torture the viewers, It’s a Moray was playing in the background and the viewers chatted with one another.

Maybe a little self-indulgent in misery, Chanyeol typed out a comment.

real_pcy: I wish eep would do more collaborations, I’d like to see what he’d do with different genres. Like, as a classical composer myself, I’d like to see what he would make out of it.

Someone else pointed out that they were a fan of Chanyeol’s now that they recognised his username which was very close to his real name after all. And Chanyeol bloomed at that comment a little.

eep_offical: Who wants to collab with me?

eep must’ve come back a while ago and scrolled back up in the chat from the moment they left and Chanyeol felt his ears get warm from embarrassment.

Someone shouted in the chat, getting an automated warning for using All Caps right away.

xoxoxis: MY FAVE CONTEMPORARY COMPONIST PARK!
inky_stinker [Mod]: Warning to user @xoxoxis for using All Caps in chat.
xoxoxis: sry, my bad

The microphone picked up something else besides the typing, or rather hammering on a keyboard on the streamer's side, which was a small little soft ‘oh’. Chanyeol’s ears flared.

eep_offical: Unfortunately, I haven’t heard of them yet, at least the name does not ring a bell.
BanditTheEvil: Didn’t you say you’ve watched Ocean Gold and really enjoyed the ost?

Oh? Did Chanyeol miss a stream…he did, when he was having a concert and the video hadn’t been uploaded as VOD, which had been only eight minutes long. Oh? OCEAN GOLD?!

xoxoxis: ure telling us you didn’t look up who made the ost?!

Frantic typing was picked up by the microphone and the cat moved, looking up at whatever was happening. A few loud clicks later, someone cursed under their breath.

eep_offical: English-Korean Contemporary Composer Chanyeol Park (38) Received His Third Award For Best Motion Picture Soundtrack At This Year’s Film Festival In Seoul For <Ocean Gold>, Directed By Lee Myung-Shin
eep_offical: whoops.
eep_offical: I formally apologise and take a hiatus to properly acknowledge and reflect on my wrongdoings.
eep_offical: This is…
eep_offical: awkward.

Chanyeol took to his keyboard at record speed.

real_pcy: Oh my, how embarrassing. Please. Don’t take it too heart; knowing you enjoyed the soundtrack already means a lot to me!!!!!

At the same time, Chanyeol took a screenshot. He might print it or post it to Twitter if the timing was right and he wanted to boast about being acknowledged by his favourite producer.

Chanyeol’s cover of Yvette Young’s Yearn went a little more through the roof than he had anticipated when he had uploaded the cover of him playing to YouTube. And since he wasn’t too proficient in his ability to play the violin, he rather sang the violin’s melody over him playing the piano. Which was even weird to him, but he liked trying new things once in a while. And at the same time, he got part of the orchestra he’s conducting to cover some fox capture plan songs since he minored in conducting while working on his master's thesis. The viewers seemed to like seeing a high-grade professional orchestra take it easy once in a while if it wasn’t for Chanyeol to write the scores.

Out of nowhere, an EP dropped which was self-titled as Encre et Poivre each song out of the six on it was a feature but nothing that listeners were used to from eep as an artist so far. Not only was the album full of beats and features, samples and so on. But it was Hip Hop of its finest. It wasn’t a far shot from the usual electronic music he made, but this was different. And Chanyeol would kiss eep’s shoes for dropping that release. The only thing surprising was the heavy use of Korean film and movie samples and the Asian influences on the EP as a whole. But Chanyeol was also waiting for the second part of the EP because of course eep was an ass and released his upcoming album in two parts. But that might also be the reason why people couldn’t buy it since it was only released digitally so far and there were rumours that there would be a physical release once the second part would be released; which had no date whatsoever.

It wasn’t the most critical claimed release of the year; it was far from it and most people didn’t know eep or just faintly heard of his live streams or the occasional video that went viral of his. But besides that, he was relatively unknown in the community.

But if Chanyeol was being honest with himself, he was addicted to the intro song of eep’s EP. Or rather the annoyingly short prelude but the piano sounded so strong and violent on it as if eep had only played whatever had come to his mind while recording and it was working so well, but at the same time it seemed so new to Chanyeol who followed eep for years now. Yet, eep was still able to surprise Chanyeol so much with whatever he released; it was a mystery.

“I said I’m not doing album reviews anymore but hear me out before you tear me apart in the comment section,” Chanyeol held up his hands in a surrendering motion towards the camera, waving them wildly around. “Someone, I dearly envy for their musical virtuosity, released an EP. And no, it’s not classical music or something along the lines. Maybe it’s even more abstract to viewers that are unaware of the genres I listen to…but hear me out…” The next thing shown on the screen was the cover of eep’s EP.

Kyungsoo chuckled while watching Chanyeol go on a tangent about the EP, begging eep, that if he was watching, to release the second part because Chanyeol wanted to blow money and finally have a physical copy of it. He was even asking for a vinyl for his collection. And he was blatantly advertising himself to be open to collaborating with eep if there should be a chance.

And he was cute but not all that different from how he acted online. Now that Kyungsoo knew who that person in his chat was. It was a little unexpected, of course, that he had exactly the composer in his chat whose OST he was obsessed with. A stroke of good fortune, if he had to name it, serendipity if he must use the fancy words. He had Ms Murray sitting on his lap, purring like a small engine while getting petted by him. The composer went into an in-depth analysis of the traditional Korean samples eep used. He was surprised to learn that Chanyeol was also so educated about Korean music when eep penned him as a minimalist composer without a lot of outside influence. Well, at least as far as he could tell from the content he consumed so far. But he should’ve guessed after the OST for Ocean Gold.

He scrolled through Chanyeol’s socials until he found his management’s email address and started drafting a proposal.

He leaned back in his chair, the creaking startling his cat, and he took a drag from his cigarette while staring outside. Maybe he should sample some compositions from Chanyeol?

He got a decline from someone claiming to be Chanyeol’s agent a few days later and was flabbergasted.

That was not what he had expected at all.

He’d ask another time again.

He had decided to be more like an influencer for once after fans started asking not for a room tour but what music he owned, since in photos something that looked like a bookcase full of albums appeared in a post of his. But he needed a cup of coffee first, meanwhile almost slipping back into sleeping while he was standing upright, filtering his coffee. His manager was also supposed to drop by in the morning.

Still only wearing his shorts, he sat cross-legged in front of his bookcase, back leaned against the adjacent wall, letting his eyes roam over the albums he owned. Should he just show a few selected ones instead also explaining his filing system?

At least they hadn’t seen his vinyl collection, but some eagle-eyed viewers had recognised some album backs as K-Pop albums. Which was a little embarrassing. It would be even worse if they would see his questionable DVD collection.

“Uh, I’m feeling peachy today,” Chanyeol moaned out while leaning back in his chair, his back letting out some unpleasant-sounding pops when he stretched. But something felt off.

He heard barking on the outside and his ears perked up and he jumped up when he heard a key turning in the lock.

“Hansol! Zzar!” He scooped up his little princess when she barrelled into his shins and he smooched her little face all over, completely ignoring his friend.

“And where is my kiss?” Hansol pouted at him and Chanyeol hasted towards Hansol who slipped out of his shoes, lips perked in an attempt to give him the wettest smooch he could muster, but Hansol was quicker and pushed Chanyeol’s face out of his own with a little more force than necessary. “Not on the lips, you idiot. Not when you slobbered all over Zzar just now!” He tapped his cheek instead, face a little red and Chanyeol did just that, pressing his lips against Hansol’s cheek unable to contain a wide grin.

“How was your vacation with Zzar?”

“More comfortable than having to take a vacation with you if I’m being brutally honest. And you let your crush show on that producer during your latest live stream, hyung.”

Kyungsoo was standing at his desk, drafting emails while singing along to the music he was blasting over his headphones. He also had a deadline approaching.

“And I’m digging holes without you. Can’t be on my own without you, I’m a little bit lost without you, without you, oooh… Why am I singing such depressed lines?” He continues singing alongside the melody. His PC beeped with a notification that Chanyeol had started livestreaming and eep had his priorities set out for him. He opened Twitch and pulled Chanyeol on the outermost screen while keeping his emails open and turning off his music.

“Oh. Oh? Oh! Y’all got nothing better to do than listening to an old man rambling on a Saturday evening?”  Chanyeol started, the video still not on and Kyungsoo’s eyes drifted towards the comment section. He pursed his lips before typing a message.

eep_official: I’d say it’s more of a case of having you run in the background while working.
bff1568fae: eep is the man of the hour, only speaking the truth. Same for me, working on my thesis and listening to you is a bit nicer than having to listen to other people moan about their workload

“And I just want to cry about the fact that I paid 18$ excluding shipping for a single. It’s a single with two songs, it’s not even an EP! And it’s a CD, not a vinyl! If my manager learns about it, he’s taking away my access to my adult money.” The video turned finally on and Kyungsoo covered his mouth with his hand, eyes a little wider than usual behind his glasses. Chanyeol was fresh out of the shower, wearing a loose tank top, revealing his collarbones. “And I finally completed my Alan Parsons Project discography. The last of the vinyl just dropped in my mailbox which I got used.”

His grin was so brilliant, Kyungsoo rescaled the livestream he was watching on full screen. “Fuck, I might get a crush…” Chanyeol on fullscreen wasn’t good for his heart. But Kyungsoo hesitated.

Alan Parson?

eep_official: Sir, by any chance….

He watched Chanyeol tilting his head when he read the somewhat question, “Yes?”

eep_offical: By any chance…it wasn’t the Turn of a Friendly Card?

He held his breath; he had just recently packaged and sold his second version of that exact vinyl a little more than a month ago. He watched Chanyeol’s eyes go wide in slow motion, mouth opening and closing as if he was a fish out of water. “Don’t tell me it was you? On Discogs? A month ago?”

Kyungsoo slapped his hands over his face, groaning in distress, “What are the odds?!”

Instead, he just sent an ellipse in the chat. He started laughing hysterically. What the fuck are the odds? But while he was having a breakdown over the revelation, Chanyeol, on the other hand, laughed his ass off. Wiping his tears, he couldn’t even speak since he broke out into continuous giggles all over again.

“Hell, that’s great. Now I can personally send you tickets for the premiere of my next piece if you’re interested that is.” Chanyeol grinned into the camera, the corners of his eyes wet with tears from laughing so hard.

Kyungsoo swallowed down the embarrassment.

eep_offical: I’d like that.

He was still butthurt about being declined a collaboration through the management three times now, but he was also too timid to just message Chanyeol personally just now. And he doesn’t want people to see his face.

What no one knew was the fact that Chanyeol was freaking out on the inside, spiralling out of control from embarrassment himself from that interaction and the possibility of maybe, hopefully, seeing Kyungsoo?

There was a song dropped on various streaming platforms without prior notice. It was neither a cover nor a song with a feature. But it had the melodic signature that was very much known to be eep’s. And it had lyrics, vocals scratching as if the voice was ground down by rough sandpaper, singing about toxic love, cursing the recipient of the lyrics, crying out a broken heart. And it slapped hard.

A week later, another one dropped, citing Aldous Huxley in Brave New World.

After that, it was a different genre, even more, reminiscent of very electronic and technical metal music, not something Chanyeol was familiar with.

And after that, an instrumental track.

And the vocals remained the same.

This circle of pumping out music continued for three months and ended in the digital release of an album by eep again. And Chanyeol was at the forefront of begging for a physical release, at least a collector’s edition vinyl.

eep’s scheduled livestream had a most interesting name and got Chanyeol to sit on the edge of his chair in his little studio, surrounded by instruments and music scores all strewn across the surfaces and floor. Eight months after his initial try, the streamer tried again, titling his streaming something along the lines of ‘✨VoIcE rEvEaL✨ and vocal recording w/ ms murray and eep’.

eep_official: Hey guys, look at my little lady!!!!

He adjusted the camera angle to frame his cat even more, showing her with a little hat and bowties, sleeping on his tower in her little cat bed.

eep_official: Oh, wait…

The camera angles changed, and Ms Murray within a small little corner and eep’s hands took over the majority of the screen, but it wasn’t his trustworthy OP-1, but his keyboard instead.

Coughing suddenly filled Chanyeol’s ears and he swallowed his breath, just waiting for the voice.

“Hello, hello, everyone can hear me ‘ight? Lemme know if I should change the sound levels?”

But instead, the chat was only filled with emojis and incoherent strings of text. eep seemed to make a sound at the back of his throat that sounded like a scoff, “Y’all so mesmerized that you can’t even type anymore? I didn’t think you’d behave like that…”

He laughed. He goddamn laughed and Chanyeol’s heart swooped out of his chest with a pang. Holy fuck. It was not as rough as in the vocal tracks, but it had a nice timbre, the voice tilting upwards when he was laughing but it still had a rough edge as if the speaker was smocking a pack a day for the past thirty years.

Chanyeol’s crush was becoming more than a crush at this point.

“I know it said vocal recording in the title, but I also still need to record a few samples which I will also do today. You’re not going to see my face, of course, but I had a friend help set me up a recording setup that will show you what I’m doing without showing my face of course. And I had a prior engagement, so excuse my appearance in a minute.”

This was too much for Chanyeol when the camera view changed again and showed eep moving around his studio, legs hugged by ironed dress pants and a white dress shirt, arms rolled up, showing his lower arms. Chanyeol wasn’t too sure—he checked the quality of his stream which was at a fantastic 1080p—but the shirt seemed either a little too small or eep was just really buff. He suddenly stopped moving and came closer to the camera, leaning down and revealing bits and pieces of his chest now that it was obvious that the shirt’s buttons were undone, “By the way, is Chanyeol here?”

Chanyeol suddenly blanked out before letting out a gasp, slapping his hands over his mouth. Was eep talking about him for real?

“Come on, reveal yourself. You’re always here and now that I call you out, you refuse to answer?” eep was so different from how he wrote, and it sent Chanyeol on a spiral.

real_pcy: … yes?
GODMOD [Mod]: 👀
cremedela__754: 👀👀
boohoobobohu: 👀👀👀
inky_stinker [Mod]: 👀👀👀👀
xoxoxis: 👀👀👀👀👀

Chanyeol stared a little blankly at the chat ...

real_pcy: 👁️👄👁️
real_pcy: tf you guys?

Chanyeol had to wait until eep took note of his message.

“Ah, wonderful, there you are. I received the tickets you sent me for the premiere. I really appreciate you doing that!” eep showed two thumbs up into the camera before pulling back.

real_pcy: … Bro, you’re embarrassing me here. I have an image to maintain.

Chanyeol and eep had started messaging each other just a month ago when eep had suddenly contacted him on Twitter, asking if he really meant it when he said he’d sent him tickets for his premiere. Which he did, it wasn’t for another month, but that meant that Chanyeol would finally meet his idol and hopefully get rid of this embarrassing crush he had. He easily developed a crush, Hansol had mentioned in all those years he worked under him, Chanyeol wore his heart on his sleeve and was easily swayed by handsome individuals. And that also meant that Chanyeol was prone to fall for individuals that weren’t good for his heart and were more often than not people interested in men if Chanyeol fell for someone of the same gender. Just thinking back to his high school crush that only experimented with him only to cheat on him with a girl which he later went on to marry and then had the guts to ask Chanyeol to compose something for their wedding free of charge. Of course, he didn’t do it and continued to drag the guy through the mud without even once saying his name.

Chanyeol and eep only wrote on occasion but he once had asked Chanyeol if he’d like to give his opinion on a song that he was working on; Chanyeol had been overjoyed and had done his best to give the most elaborate feedback and criticism. eep had been so grateful that he had actually commissioned Chanyeol for a small commission paying him handsomely for it. And Chanyeol would appear in the credits as well once the song should ever be released. Chanyeol had therefore already accomplished all the goals he had set for his life, once working together with one of his idols. But Chanyeol still didn’t know eep’s name and he was also a little too shy to actually ask him because eep was very keen on keeping his privacy.

boohoobobohu: Composer park ad eep are close enough to call each other bros? What did I misss?!
cygnusrye: First name basis! Ship’s sailing
inky_stinker [Mod]: 👀👀👀👀

eep pulled back again and started rummaging through his studio again before pulling back into the viewfinder, tenor saxophone in his hands. “As I said, I still need a few sound samples to play around with.”

He spent around twenty minutes re-recording him playing the saxophone, sampling, and working with it, barely giving attention to his livestream, but that’s what he had his mods for. He let the melody run through once while adjusting all those little things Chanyeol had no idea about until he seemed satisfied. He harrumphed and put the sax away. The whole feel of the song so far had bar jazz feels but something reminded Chanyeol very starkly of old-school hip hop.

He hummed along, muttering words and phrases, stopping and restarting as if to get into the rhythm.

“Okay, okay. So. I didn’t write lyrics, I also won’t improvise. Just that this is an example of me pulling too much poetry.” He started again, whispering the first few verses, Chanyeol assumed and stopped. “Okay, I think I’m back on track with this one. I’ll just record my voice right over the track since I might record it properly later.”

He had such a colourful rich voice, Chanyeol wasn’t aware of, despite knowing the last few releases had to be all eep’s voice. But listening to him waxing poetry with sophistication as if he was almost rapping in some form. He must’ve adjusted the poem to fit his melody otherwise Chanyeol was sure he would’ve had a harder time getting the flow so smooth. “The sanguine Sunrise, with ‘meteor eyes, / And his burnin’plumes outspread, / Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, / When the morning star shines dead: /As on the jag ‘mountain crag, / Which an earthquake rocks and swings, / An eagle alit one moment sit / In’t light of its golden wings…”

 He finished the whole poem in one go, not stepping or stumbling once and the chat was eerily quiet for some reason. It almost seemed as if eep had forgotten he was doing a livestream when he muttered to himself, listening over the whole thing another time, replaying certain sections and adjusting the vocal track until he seemed a little happier with whatever he was doing.

And Chanyeol was utterly in love all of a sudden.

A phone suddenly rang and eep seemed to be pulled from his stupor and he rolled around the room with his chair before rolling back after he had dismissed the call. “Forgot my surroundings for a second there. How are y’all doing? You’re all so quiet, you’re still there? Thoughts? This was, by the way, a poem called ‘The Cloud’ by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Interesting tidbit, he was the husband of the Mary Shelley, who wrote Frankenstein.”

Chanyeol, all of a sudden, had the urge to ask eep if he’d like to come along to the second part of the premiere as well, which would be held in Seoul for the next movie project he worked on. Something inclined him to ask the producer and tag him along and get the collaboration down. But for that, eep should trust Chanyeol more and share his name with him, at least they have their mailbox addresses to send some stuff if they would like that. But whereas eep was living in the States, Chanyeol lived in both  Scotland and South Korea, even if he moved to South Korea at the ripe age of 21. But his main residence was still Scotland.

eep’s livestream ended over an hour later and Chanyeol was lying in bed, contemplating his life at that point. He was asking himself if he should get to know eep better, trying to figure him out or whatever. His phone vibrated and he unwillingly checked it, and he almost ignored the Twitter notification but his nosiness got the better of him and he was glad it did. Eep had messaged him, and it was nothing much but a string of numbers and the international area code for the US. He sprung up; eyes glued to his phone.

Chanyeol was a little confused; it was very sudden; he didn’t mind but he would’ve liked a heads-up still.

The moment, they exchanged phone numbers, both Kyungsoo and Chanyeol chatted almost nonstop over everything music-related but everything that was mundane as well. Turned out Chanyeol also had a dog which led both of them to send each other photos of their dog or Kyungsoo sending Ms Murray content.

He wondered when he should mention the fact that Chanyeol’s management had refused Kyungsoo’s request for collaboration three times, but he even hadn’t told Chanyeol his name yet…

Chanyeol was surely cute, writing as much as he was talking.  Oh, wait. Kyungsoo had an idea. Not sure if it was a good idea, but he could try it.

Kyungsoo thought about it. When would he have another chance to meet Chanyeol who was living on a different content? So, he agreed.

Chanyeol was nervous beyond relief. Not because of the concert but the fact he would be meeting Kyungsoo for the first time. He had called him earlier and just straightforwardly told him that Chanyeol would recognise him either way. But reality hit him straight in the face when he finally realised again that he would be the one conducting. Hopefully, he wouldn’t embarrass himself in front of Kyungsoo watching him from somewhere. While he was an easy-going composer, he was a rather eccentric conductor. Which he might’ve from his mother who’s a conductor herself.

The premiere went fantastic, Chanyeol wanted to cry, but he still felt the sweat pearling down his neck in between the collar of his dress shirt and skin and he swiped his hair matted against his forehead back. So many people were congratulating him but his eyes were remarkably busy scanning the people around him, trying to find a face that looked Asian but that he hadn’t seen before. But he didn’t. He was a little sad, but he also didn’t know if Kyungsoo was more of an extro- or introverted fellow.

Once he was backstage, he frantically checked his phone and there it was; a sole notification from Kyungsoo telling him he was waiting outside the door of the backstage area, smoking. Chanyeol didn’t know he smoked.

It was from just two minutes ago. Chanyeol slipped out of his dress shirt into a new one, wiping his face down with a face towel and hasted outside, hoping Kyungsoo wouldn’t slip away.

He almost fell out of the door, but manged to steady his foothold moments before disaster struck, saving himself from embarrassment.

“Mr Park? Are you alright?” He heard someone ask and he shook his head out of stupor.

“Yes, just lost my footing for a split second. Have you seen…” He realised he couldn’t ask if someone had seen Kyungsoo except they could work with a very detailed description of hands… “Forget it, I’m alright.”

He looked around the outside spotting various members of the orchestra and staff smoking until his eyes fell on a person just outside of the light, watching him with hawk eyes and Chanyeol was confused for a split second until the person raised a hand to their mouth, taking a drag from their cigarette. Chanyeol’s eyes went wide, and recognition washed over his expression, and he slowly walked up to the man winking at him.

“You’re taller than I anticipated.” The voice was actually a little deeper than he had anticipated as well, sending a pleasant shiver down his spine.

Chanyeol laughed, relieved, “Am I supposed to answer with ‘you’re smaller than anticipated’?” Kyungsoo was different from what he had expected. But it wasn’t a bad thing… he looked like a bad boy, permed hair swept back and some loose strand curling in front of his forehead, eyeliner smudged under his eye, two nose piercings and ears stretched. There was an eyebrow piercing peeking from behind a strand of hair and the dress shirt was unbuttoned, giving a view to a tattooed chest, and the shirt itself spanning his chest. “You’re definitely buffer than what the videos showed. And pretty hot.”

Kyungsoo raised an eyebrow, smirking around the filter of his cigarette, “And you’re just as straightforward as your text messages indicated, conductor Park. And thanks for the compliment, you’re not half bad yourself now that I see you in the flesh.”

Chanyeol looked around, “I’m tempted to say that we should ditch the dinner appointment and go for some drinks instead, to get to know each other better, PD eep.”

“Depends on what you might plan after we had drinks; my apartment is close by, and I don’t know how far your hotel is. Especially after I learned through some proper internet research that you’re not super shy about admitting that you’re also into men.”

There was a thinly veiled offer that Chanyeol was willing to accept. He didn’t even think about Kyungsoo being the producer he looked up to or that he might’ve idolised before he got to know him. He just saw a beautiful man half hidden in the shadows, looking up at him with hunger in his eyes. Never had he thought his evening might end like this if the went that route down. But at the same time, Chanyeol also wasn’t the type for one-night stands, so maybe he should articulate that before that.

“Then I should preface our first meeting with the statement that I’m also not a person that does one-night stands.” This could now make it or break it.

“I’m glad to hear that, Chanyeol…” Kyungsoo’s smirk grew a little wider. “But I hope you won’t be put off by my appearance when you see me.” His voice took a rather sombre tone and his pleasant expression fell.

It turned quite serious in the span of mere minutes, but Chanyeol was old enough to handle such situations, hopefully. “Then let’s get dinner and drinks, just the two of us. There’s still a lot I also don’t know about you. Your age for example. I’ll get my things and say goodbye to the others, and I’ll be back in a jiffy. Alright?”

Kyungsoo nodded at that, the smile slowly coming back.

Chanyeol learned quickly what Kyungsoo meant by his ‘off-putting’ appearance which he had a hard time accepting. Not the appearance, but the adjective ‘off-putting’ which Kyungsoo had used. There was an ugly scar marring the side of his neck up to his ear, over his chin, from a car accident that happened some ten years ago, according to Kyungsoo. The only thing he had a hard time believing when he kissed along the column of Kyungsoo's neck later than evening in bed, was the fact that Kyungsoo was ten years younger than him. That was also the same evening that he learned that his management company declined Kyungsoo's requests for collaboration with Chanyeol three times and he would make sure that heads would metaphorically roll after that. They hadn't even asked him and even hadn't told Hansol who's his manager about it.

The most shocking, however, was when he learned that Kyungsoo was an ex-trainee for an idol group a year later when they both attended the movie premiere in Seoul, staying at Chanyeol's apartment. Chanyeol had composed the music for that movie after pulling Kyungsoo on board for a joint effort since he was demanding getting someone with expertise in the field of electronic music because that’s what the producers of the movie wanted.

There were quite a few idols present at the premiere since a few other idols had appearances in that movie. And that movie brought Kyungsoo back on the stage in South Korea. Some people from the entertainment industry somehow recognised him, be it either the fact his face had barely changed in ten years or the fact that his scar made him easily recognisable. Some representatives of labels hounded him that evening, making offers for him to come back and produce music for idol groups again. He politely declined them all while intertwining his hand with Chanyeol’s out of sight from prying eyes.

Chanyeol was amazed by his soon-to-be-boyfriend time again and again.