Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Ebi de tai wo tsuro nante, muda da yo”

(“Trying to catch a big fish using small fry? Don't waste your time.”)

---

The guest was already halfway through the check-in process when Nico heard the first soft lilt of Korean (thank you, hotel-sponsored language classes).

It was barely louder than the whir of the old ceiling fan above the front desk, but it tugged at something sharp and instinctive in Nico’s chest. He looked up from behind the surfboard rack, where he’d been arranging rental fins for the fourth time that morning, and watched the new arrival adjust the brim of a comically large straw hat, face mostly hidden behind round glasses.

“I think he’s trying to ask if breakfast is included,” murmured one of the front desk girls, flipping through a laminated guidebook. The man—maybe the same age as Nico—gestured to his reservation slip. Polite. Quiet. Utterly unreadable.

Fuma appeared beside Nico with a bottle of Pocari Sweat and a smirk like he’d just caught him staring.

“Don’t even think about it,” Fuma said, slapping the bottle against Nico’s arm. “He’s clearly out of your league.”

Nico didn’t respond. He kept his eyes on the guy’s hands—long fingers, careful movements. One palm rested lightly on the handle of a battered sky-blue suitcase, sea salt crusted along the wheels like it had already touched sand somewhere else.

The concierge bowed. The guest bowed lower.

Nico blinked once, then casually slung the rental towel over his shoulder like he hadn’t been watching at all.

“You’re drooling,” Fuma added, cracking open his drink.

“Am not.”

“You are. I can see it.” He handed Nico the Pocari Sweat. “Here. Hydrate. Clearly you’re thirsty.”

“Shut up.”

But Fuma didn’t. “What’s your plan, huh? Gonna offer him a surf lesson? Maybe teach him how to read your desperate vibes?”

“I didn’t realize ‘be nice’ was the new code word for ‘bang’.”

That earned Fuma a light punch to the arm—more reflex than force—which he dodged too late and laughed off anyway, unfazed as always.

---

The next time he saw him was by the vending machines, the guest peering blankly at a row of unfamiliar cans. Nico didn’t mean to stop. And even more so didn’t mean to approach.

“Hey,” he said. Too loud.

The guest startled slightly and turned, eyes wide behind the glasses.

Nico panicked.

“You want—uh. You want surf wave?” he blurted out in broken English, even though he was absolutely fluent. Damn these nerves.

There was a beat of silence. The fan hummed overhead. Outside, cicadas screamed.

“I mean—surf. Surf wave. I mean, surf lesson. Tomorrow? Maybe?”

He mimed paddling.

Regretted it instantly.

The guest tilted his head, unsure. Then nodded. Slowly. Politely. Like someone agreeing to a free sample they didn’t actually want.

Nico wanted to slam his forehead into the vending machine. Instead, he smiled too wide and said, “Okay! Good! Ten o’clock!”

Fuma, crouched beside the cooler on the deck, caught the whole thing. He gave Nico a thumbs-up and mouthed: Ebi de tai wo tsuro nante, muda da yo.

“Shut up,” Nico muttered, half to himself.

---

Later, Fuma found him waxing a longboard that hadn’t seen water in a week.

“Prepping for your date?” Fuma asked, dangling upside down from a beach hammock.

“It’s not a date. He didn’t even look interested.”

Fuma clicked his tongue. “So why are you smoothing out wax like it’s your funeral suit?”

“I don’t know, man. What if he shows up?”

“What if he doesn’t?”

Nico hesitated, knuckles brushing along the board’s edge. “Then I’ll go surfing anyway.”

Fuma rolled over onto his stomach and dropped his voice into a mock documentary tone. “Nicholas Wang, local surf instructor and expert in romantic delusion, teaches yet another lesson to a ghost.”

Nico threw a towel at his head. “I swear to god, you’re the worst lifeguard in this whole prefecture.”

“Wrong,” Fuma said, tossing the towel back. “I’m the hottest lifeguard in this prefecture. Look at these pecs. Also, I’m right. That boy’s clearly a whale, Nico. And you? You are dried shrimp.”

---

By sundown, the beach had emptied into a soft hush—just the wind sifting through hotel towels and the push-pull of tide against the shore.

Nico sat cross-legged outside the surf shack, watching the horizon blur into the slow orange of summer dusk.

He checked the forecast again. The swell was decent. No jellyfish alerts. Minimal wind. Perfect beginner conditions.

He refreshed the tide report anyway, like it might tell him whether Euijoo was going to show up tomorrow.

Okay, sue him—he hadn’t meant to find the guest’s name. It had just been… there. On the guest sheet. Byun Euijoo. Room 203. Here for six nights.

Korean. Name checks out.

He bit the inside of his cheek.

He should’ve just said something normal in Korean. Like “Hi.” Or “Do you like the beach?” Instead, he said “surf wave.”

God.

He tossed his phone into the sand beside him and leaned back on his elbows. The moon had already begun to rise.

Behind him, someone played a cool jazzy beat from a portable speaker. The waves hissed.

Nico muttered aloud, just to fill the quiet.

“I don’t wanna think too much.”

He didn’t say the rest of it—

I’m already too busy trying to like you.

That part stayed inside. Shrimp and all.

---

Chapter Text

“Yappari ebi de tai wo tsuru no wa muda datta ka”

(“So, after all, it was a waste to try and use small fry to catch a whale.”)

---

Nico tripped over the leash cord.

It wasn’t a dramatic fall—just a quick snag around his ankle as he turned to wave. But still. His heart jumped, and for a half second he looked like an inflatable tube man losing structural integrity.

Way to be smooth, Weno.

Byun Euijoo was standing exactly where he said he’d be: by the rental board rack, ten o’clock sharp, hands tucked neatly in front of him like a kid waiting for a piano lesson. His straw hat was gone, revealing straight dark hair cut above the ears. Nico could see the tops of his cheeks, pale and sun-blocked.

“You came,” Nico said in English, trying to act like his soul hadn’t just cartwheeled.

Euijoo nodded. He looked at the surfboard, then back at Nico. Then at the sand.

Silence.

“Cool, uh, good day for surf. Wave. Surf wave,” Nico added, unsure if he was helping or hemorrhaging.

He handed over the smallest beginner board and gestured down toward the shoreline. “We’ll just, you know, start with basics. Easy stuff. Sand work.”

Euijoo nodded again. His eyes were unreadable behind the tint of his glasses.

They walked together in silence. Nico’s brain was already preparing for its own funeral.

He was not good at silence. Especially not this kind of silence. The kind that felt like maybe the other person just didn’t care. Or worse—was enduring it.

Once they reached the beach, Nico set the board down with a soft thud and gestured to it like it was a prized car. “This guy’ll keep you steady. We’re just gonna practice paddling first, okay?”

Euijoo tilted his head. “Pado… ling?”

“Paddling,” Nico clarified, doing the arm motion. “Like swimming, but flat. Sort of.”

Euijoo gave a polite “Ah,” and crouched beside the board, trying to copy the motion.

He was careful. Precise. His sleeves kept slipping down his arms, exposing pale skin Nico refused to look at for more than a second.

“So…” Nico said, kneeling beside him, “you, uh, vacationing? Alone?”

Euijoo blinked. “Yes.”

“Cool. You like Japan?”

“I come… many times,” Euijoo said, slowly.

Nico smiled, relief flickering in his chest. “Nice! For… food? For travel?”

A pause. Euijoo seemed to search for the word. “Peace.”

That took Nico off guard.

“Oh,” he said, quietly. “That’s… yeah. It’s peaceful here.”

The surfboard between them suddenly felt too wide. Nico shifted.

He tried again, this time in Japanese. “日本語は、少し話せますか？” (Do you speak some Japanese?)

Euijoo looked confused. “少しだけ,” he said back—just a little.

Okay. English wasn’t great. Japanese barely. Nico’s brain sparked. He’s Korean. You idiot. Just use Korean.

Nico hesitated. His tongue felt clumsy, but he tried anyway.

In Korean.

“Do you like the ocean?”

Euijoo looked up. Froze.

Then he pulled off his sunglasses.

“You speak Korean?”

Nico shrugged, trying to look casual and not like he was breaking apart from the inside. “A bit. Hotel classes. Mostly vocabulary for ‘towels’ and ‘do you want rental snorkel.’ Self-studied the rest of the way.”

A breath of something soft passed between them. Euijoo’s voice changed slightly when he answered in his native tongue—easier, gentler. “Your accent’s good.”

Nico laughed, ears already hot. “I’ve been told it makes up for the rest of me.”

Euijoo’s eyes crinkled just slightly. That was the first real smile Nico had seen.

Then Euijoo stood up and brushed sand off his knees. “Shall we start the lesson?”

Nico blinked. “Oh. Right. Yeah. Surf. Surf wave.”

He immediately regretted saying that again.

---

“Did you get his number?”

Fuma’s voice broke the calm of the breakroom as he shoved a hand into a bag of shrimp chips.

Nico lay on his back across the bench, arm flung over his eyes. “No.”

Fuma clicked his tongue. “Come on. You had him alone on the beach for what, an hour?”

“He barely said anything. Just nodded a lot. Didn’t even try to stand up on the board.”

“Maybe he was nervous.”

“Maybe he was bored.”

“You’re projecting.”

“I’m being realistic.”

Fuma shrugged and bit into a chip. “Well, reality check—he came back after the lesson.”

Nico sat up. “What?”

Fuma smirked. “Yep. Asked the front desk what your work schedule was.”

Nico narrowed his eyes. “You’re lying.”

“Am I?” Fuma shrugged again, infuriatingly blank. “Maybe he wanted a refund. Maybe he wanted your phone number. Who’s to say?”

Nico groaned and collapsed back onto the bench.

Fuma tilted the bag toward him. “Shrimp chip?”

“Too soon.”

---

After closing, Nico stood at the edge of the beach, arms crossed loosely over his chest. The tide had come in, soft and lazy. There were a few tourists still walking the shoreline, but the light had faded into purples and oranges, and most of the towels were gone.

He spotted Euijoo down the way, walking slowly across the sand with the rental board still tucked neatly under one arm. It hadn’t touched water. Not once. Just followed them like a prop.

Nico felt something hollow and familiar tug in his chest.

So that’s what it was. Just politeness. A vacation checklist.

He watched Euijoo pause near the dune grass, take a picture of the ocean, then bow slightly as a couple passed him. He still had that quiet gentleness around him, like someone whose presence didn’t shout to be noticed—but Nico had noticed anyway. Too much.

He rubbed at the back of his neck.

He didn’t even try to surf.

The lyrics of that stupid song looped in his head again, unbidden.

“I don’t wanna think too much…”

Too late.

He’d been thinking about him all day.

Maybe Fuma was right. Maybe shrimp were useless.

Still, he watched until Euijoo disappeared from view, board still cradled like it mattered.

---

Chapter Text

“Umaku, ebi de tai wo tsutta koto ni narimasu ne”

(“He would have successfully used small fry to catch big fish.”)

---

The surfboard was still dry.

Nico could tell before Euijoo even reached the deck, the board balanced lightly under one arm like a pool float. Not a drop of seawater on it. No sand on the wax, no marks from a leash cord. Pristine. Untouched.

And still. Euijoo looked like he was returning something sacred. Like he was sorry for borrowing it in the first place.

“You don’t have to clean it,” Nico called out as Euijoo stepped up onto the wooden planks, sunlight slanting in sharp lines behind him. “That’s… my job.”

Euijoo paused. “But I didn’t use it.”

“I noticed.”

It came out sharper than he meant. Not annoyed. Just… worn down by overthinking. He reached for the board anyway, fingers brushing Euijoo’s.

Their eyes met for a blink too long.

Nico cleared his throat. “Was it… not fun?”

A quiet beat.

Then, in Korean: “To be honest… I wasn’t really interested in surfing.”

Nico froze.

“…What?”

Euijoo scratched the back of his neck, suddenly nervous. “I mean—I thought it would be. But when you asked, I just… said yes.”

“Why?”

Euijoo looked down at his shoes, the kind that didn’t belong anywhere near saltwater. “Because you were nice. And you tried to speak with me even if I barely knew English or Japanese.”

Nico blinked. “That’s it?”

“You were thoughtful.” Euijoo met his eyes again. “I liked that.”

Nico’s brain emptied. Fully blank slate. Static hum. Fish memory.

He was pretty sure he’d never been called thoughtful by someone who made his chest feel like it might cave in.

“I thought I was being weird,” he said, still in Korean. “Or like… annoying. ‘Surf wave’ was not exactly my peak line.”

Euijoo smiled, eyes soft. “It felt like… telepathy.”

That cracked something open.

Nico laughed, light and disbelieving, one hand scrubbing through his hair as if that might reboot him.

“God,” he muttered. “You have no idea how much I spiraled about all of this.”

“I have some idea,” Euijoo said, glancing at the still-pristine board.

And Nico laughed again.

Then… a loud, unmistakable cough from behind them.

Fuma.

Leaning against a beach umbrella like he’d been born there, arms crossed, sunglasses perched atop his forehead like a smug crown.

“So,” he said, “seems you too are all chummy, or should I keep pretending I didn’t see this extremely cute moment?”

Euijoo blushed. Instantly.

Nico flipped him off. Automatically.

Fuma grinned. “That’s a yes.”

“I hate you,” Nico said.

He didn’t. Obviously. Thanks for everything, Fuma. You’re a real one.

Fuma stepped away, muttering something about "shrimp supremacy" under his breath, and wandered back toward the lifeguard tower.

Silence returned, warm and buzzing.

Nico and Euijoo sat under the umbrella together, neither of them really sure who suggested it. The board was propped nearby, still clean. Nico rested his arms on his knees. Euijoo sat cross-legged, the back of his hand grazing the hem of Nico’s towel.

Close, but not quite touching.

The wind had picked up slightly, lifting strands of Euijoo’s hair. Nico tried not to look too long. Failed.

Euijoo turned to him, speaking softly.

“I didn’t need a surfboard,” Euijoo said in Korean. “I just needed a reason to talk to you.”

Nico’s heart thudded once, stupidly loud.

He tried to say something clever. Failed again.

“…I don’t think I’ve ever been this relieved about someone lying.”

Euijoo tilted his head, curious.

“You said you wanted to surf,” Nico went on. “I figured I’d wasted my time. Small fry bait, you know?”

Euijoo smiled faintly. “But you caught something, didn’t you?”

“Barely,” Nico teased. “You’re still half a flight risk.”

“I leave Sunday,” Euijoo said, voice so soft the wind nearly stole it.

Nico exhaled. “Rude. And we were just starting to have some fun.”

Euijoo laughed. “You know, when I came here, I was trying to get away from a lot of things back in Korea. I thought maybe this place would feel like an escape.”

“And did it?”

A pause. Then: “Not exactly.”

Nico looked at him, trying to read the expression behind the sunglasses now perched on Euijoo’s head.

Euijoo continued, slower this time. “It felt more like… arriving.”

The sentence hit harder than any wave Nico had ever taken to the ribs.

He said nothing.

Just shifted his hand on the towel—palm face-up, fingers slightly open.

Euijoo noticed. Waited a beat.

Then reached for it.

Their hands stayed there. Still, steady. Laced together like they’d always meant to be.

“I think we can figure something out,” Euijoo said. “Worth a try, right?”

“I’d like that.”

The breeze came off the ocean in steady pulses.

And Nico thought, without irony:

Even shrimp can catch sea bream.