Chapter Text
[I feel stupid, what should I even wish for?]
Anything you want, that’s what wishes are for.
[What if I asked you to leave?]
Anything but that.
The store stood, but just barely.
After two train trips, a mishap on the metro, and three transit stops on the bus, Wonwoo was surprised to find himself there yet again.
He could tell that father time had been unkind to the store during the years he was gone with its sign—perched atop the small building—no longer illuminated by neon fluorescence. Rather, it randomly flickered with a ghostly green light whenever Wonwoo looked away, something he might have attributed to the long day he just had if not for the fact that nothing about the store looked like how he remembered.
If sunlight passed through the swaying trees behind him at just the right spot, Wonwoo could see the few places where cracks had started to line the walls. Had he not visited the store nearly every single week years ago, he might not have even known that the color of the outside walls were supposed to be eggshell, instead of an uneven mocha. It only served as a welcome distraction from the very obvious weeds that curled from all different corners.
Though, the sign still hung proudly to inform passersby that this was, indeed, Lee's Grand Dreams Grocery Store .
“What am I doing here?” Wonwoo asked no one as he tilted his head towards the sky and blew a breath back onto his face. The pack of gum he chewed on during the entire journey there did little to hide the fact that he had forgotten to brush his teeth this morning.
The trip to Busan had been long, tiring, troublesome. Wonwoo hadn’t even let himself think it through before agreeing to Jihoon’s request to meet up back at the store, back where they used to work together as teenagers. But now that he was standing in front of the store, the swirling in the pit of his stomach that grew as the day went on turned into a black hole eating at an unfamiliar self-assuredness from just twelve hours ago. Unbelievable that all it took was a short text from Jihoon to convince him to spend a decent chunk of his severance check for a visit.
It would have been a bigger waste to not meet Jihoon considering he was already there, so Wonwoo willed himself to check the time. With the long hand of his wind up watch almost completely upright and the short one inching its way towards five, he knew he had only a few minutes before Jihoon would try to spam him with texts if he didn’t get on the roof by the agreed upon meeting time.
Some combination of a sigh and a blown raspberry made its way from Wonwoo’s lips before he headed for the rickety staircase at the back of the store where he remembered it being.
It was a narrow spiral, barely wide enough for him to climb, but maybe that was because he had grown in the almost decade since he had been there last. The squeeze was tight with Wonwoo’s knees touching uncomfortably as he tried to go up the first few steps before the stairs started to curl in on itself tightly. Thinking about the discomfort in his back, hunched down to avoid hitting his head on the bottom of the steps directly above him, was preferable to focusing on the mixture of sounds that only seemed to grow louder the longer he found himself on the staircase—something akin to a hellish scream and a pained groan.
With his final step, Wonwoo managed to reach the building’s roof before the entire structure of feebly put together steps collapsed under him, thanking every known deity for looking out for him in the minutes he was tempting death by getting on the staircase in the first place.
Immediately, Wonwoo spotted a hunched over person sitting at the edge of the roof, his back adjusting to the movement of feet swaying back and forth. Wonwoo couldn’t see his face, the person facing away from him, but it didn’t take much to know that it was Jihoon.
“I can’t believe you didn’t fix that death trap–” Wonwoo paused to point back at the staircase, deciding against it when Jihoon still hadn’t turned around to look at him. “In the ten years I’d been gone. What if someone gets injured on that thing?”
“Bold of you to assume that anyone else aside from me still uses that way to get onto the roof,” Jihoon yelled back, voice reverberating in the air as he turned slowly to straddle the edge of the roof. “You’re late, by the way.”
Hanging low in the sky, brushing against the horizon, the sun illuminated Jihoon’s face. Wonwoo could see the fuzz on his cheeks as he stepped closer, boyish despite their shared age of twenty seven, only complemented further by the impression of a single dimple that held briefly before disappearing completely—a possible trick of the light. Despite its familiarity, ten additional years of experience were written on it that Wonwoo didn’t recognize, causing his mind to buzz with questions.
Only one managed to make its way from between his teeth, jarring. “Why’d you ask me to come all the way out here, Jihoon?”
Jihoon patted the space in front of him twice, the sound similar to a failed high five. He looked up at Wonwoo with an expression that said, “Sit.”
“If you really wanted to kill me I’d think there would be easier ways than trying to push me off the roof of a two-story building.” There was barely a bite to Wonwoo’s words, dulled over by the decision to immediately take the seat beside Jihoon. From where his legs were dangling, Wonwoo could see that the Lee’s had installed a safety netting above the sign, probably the only improvement the store had seen in a long, long time.
“How are you, Wonwoo?” Jihoon asked casually.
“Yeah, fine, Jihoon.” Wonwoo strained to get the words out, embarrassing himself in his lie and causing him to turn his head away. He thought about the rest of his severance pay, crumpled up and shoved deep into his pants pocket—not even enough to get by until the end of next week. “Broke, actually.”
The laugh that made its way from Jihoon felt like a remnant of the past. Like if Wonwoo tried hard enough to remember, he’d be transported to high school again—he’d be a boy with infinite potential instead of the perpetually unemployed jackass the boy turned into not long after high school ended.
When Wonwoo turned his head towards Jihoon, the ghost of himself faded in his mind, replaced by the very real, very confusing reality of this moment: himself next to Jihoon again. Same, old Jihoon who looked at him like he held all the answers, even with just a simple greeting. Wonwoo's heart emptied at being perceived.
“Me too, in case you were wondering,” Jihoon uttered loudly when Wonwoo didn’t elaborate or ask him the same question out of courtesy. No malice behind it, just an attempt to amend a conversation that felt like the store they were sitting on top of: overgrown with weeds thanks to the passage of time.
“I’m still working at the store. We have a couple of part-timers but it’s still mostly me and my dad running it. They’re kind of a hoot, actually. I think you’d like them a lot. Yesterday we got this shipment of—” Jihoon waved his hands in the air and started clicking his tongue behind his teeth, willing the word to magically appear on its tip before giving up. "It's actually not important, but what happened was someone accidentally ordered a hundred boxes of it instead of just ten. The stockroom is overflowing with it now, though, and we even had to keep some of the stuff up in my room. It'll take a lot to sell all the stock, so I think me and the other boys will need to sell door-to-door again like we used to do back then. "
Wonwoo understood the feeling of wanting to run away from something, recognizing it in the way Jihoon’s sentences changed suddenly from short and rushing to long and winding. Like it was tiring to not think about the thing he was desperately trying to forget existed. The alternative was that Jihoon had suddenly turned into a chatterbox since they last spoke, a development as likely as the world ending from a dinosaur invasion.
“Um, what else ?”
“Why did you contact me, Jihoon?” Wonwoo repeated, softer this time.
The way Jihoon's breath puffed around his mouth made it visible, even on this summer afternoon, as if air had weight and color to it. Heavy and blue, if Wonwoo could assign both. “Dad’s still sick.”
Wonwoo let his hand find its way to Jihoon’s shoulder, rubbing awkwardly in a useless act of comfort. It felt too intimate for a friendship that no longer existed, so he looked away and took his hand back as he said, “I’m so sorry to hear that. If there’s anything I can do…”
He regretted not taking the normal way to the roof from inside the store. Maybe he could have seen Mr. Lee, asked how he was doing—it was the least Wonwoo could do after all these years. He could make sure to go back the other way, say his goodbyes properly, but then that would mean he’d have to explain why he went through the death trap instead in the first place. There’s no way he could—
“I really need your help, Wonwoo."
Pulled away from his remorse, Wonwoo snuck a glance at Jihoon, noticing a tension he hadn’t seen before release from his jaw and shoulders. The tightness could still be heard in his voice. His locked eyes on Wonwoo never wavered, making him feel uneasy.
Holding Jihoon’s gaze meekly, Wonwoo thumbed the outside seam of his pocket and mumbled, “I wish I could but I don’t have any money. Broke, remember?”
“Not that, Wonwoo.” Jihoon’s eyes softened to the point of glazing over. If he cried, Wonwoo knew he wouldn’t be able to get out of anything he was being asked to do. Wonwoo’s mind raced through all the different possibilities, somehow always eventually landing on death and debts, both of which he was incredibly unequipped to handle at this fucked up quarter-life-crisis stage. He hadn’t actually meant it when he said “anything,” it was just an expression.
He was just about to apologize and leave when Jihoon forced a shaky laugh, sounding heavy with unshed tears.
“We want you to come back. Please come back to the store, Wonwoo.”
Wonwoo should have wanted to run away at the prospect of returning to his first workplace, his first job, his first boss, his first colleague. His life wasn't how he wanted it to be. He was hanging onto the loose change in his pocket for dear life. His friends had all gone on to better opportunities, leaving him in the dust of their successes. He should want to move forward—the logical direction of life leading him to something better, where time was pushing him.
So, it should have come as no surprise to himself when he nodded silently to Jihoon's request. Moving backwards was always Jeon Wonwoo's specialty.
🏪
Going back down the spiral staircase had Wonwoo seeing spots, either a sign of old age or panic at yet another near-death experience orchestrated by Jihoon. He didn’t even have a choice; as soon as he agreed, he was being dragged down the steps at a speed he could have only described as potentially neck-breaking. But before he knew it, they were both back on solid pavement, somewhere down the street from the store.
“What’s this?”
They were standing in front of automatic double doors, making way to reveal a shiny fluorescent lit space lined with seemingly infinite rows of shelves and hanging signs. The doors opened and closed partially, wheezing, whirring trying to convince the two men in front to either come in or fuck off.
Pulling his neck back as far as it could go, Wonwoo looked up to see Happy to Shop written in big block lettering. Its purposefully dim lighting around the edges of each letter worked to draw attention, especially as the sun was setting and the sky had visibly darkened, as if to indicate that this was the only place that needed to be open at this time for anyone to visit. This was new.
“You didn’t bring anything with you, did you?” Jihoon gave Wonwoo a quick once over to check. It made Wonwoo self-conscious about the fact that he hadn't even packed a bag, he just decided to leave Seoul with whatever was in his pants pockets from the day before.
Wonwoo gave Jihoon a pained smile. “Uh, no, I didn’t even think I’d be here for dinner time.”
“Exactly, so this is why we’re here.” Jihoon stepped in front of Wonwoo, holding his arms out like he was a tour guide, a mismatch to the blank look on his face. “You can get whatever you need. My treat.”
As far as Wonwoo remembered, his dad taught him a few things growing up: smoking kills much faster than the coolness fades, money doesn’t buy happiness (but it’s used to buy things that make you happy), and something about not taking things for granted because of one reason or another. He could never get that last one to stick in his mind, but he knew that Mr. Lee wouldn’t be pleased to find out about his son choosing to shop at a competing store across the street from their family’s business, even if a part of Wonwoo wanted to take Jihoon up on his offer of free things.
“Don’t you think we should go back to your dad’s store for this kind of stuff?” Wonwoo rubbed the back of his neck and subtly tilted his head towards where Grand Dreams was.
Jihoon shook his head, the tips of several strands landing dangerously close to his eyes. Wonwoo felt his own eyes itch at the sight, getting the urge to swipe them away or tuck them behind Jihoon’s ears. They were probably long enough for him to do that now.
“I have some things to explain first. And then… Well, if you’re still with me by the end, we’ll get you settled,” Jihoon said, backing into the bright white interior and gesturing for Wonwoo to follow him inside.