Chapter Text
The first time Sieun hears Suho say his name, they haven’t met each other yet.
”It says here that I got assigned to…Room number 23…and my roommate is some guy named…. Yeon Si Eun ”, a deep voice speaks out loud, as if he’s trying to piece together the last remaining ends of a puzzle board.
At the sudden mention of his full name, Sieun gets pulled out of a mental fog. He clicks his tongue and rubs both of his eyes, sobering himself up, realizing he was deeply immersed in another daydream. One of those types that come to him often, looking so real that it almost feels palpable.
The person responsible for taking Sieun away from his tangled mind and back into the real world, seems to not mind if everyone around hears the details of his own personal tales, if the way he’s chatting without a care, phone glued to the right side of his temple, is any indication.
Now fully present, Sieun notices that there’s a short distance between this stranger and him, with merely two students filling the space in between them. All of them apart of a long waiting line.
From where he stands, Sieun can see that the guy who just finished summoning his name is slightly taller than him, maybe two or three inches of difference between them. He’s wearing a black and red jumper and his broad shoulders are carrying a big duffle back. Sieun assumes he’s a freshman as well.
“ …I don’t know if we have classes together or not…”, the deep voice continues. His head is folded to one side, laying above the muscle of his right shoulder; his phone is sandwiched in between; and both of his hands look busy unfolding a large piece of paper.
“All I know — and don’t quote me on this, I didn’t read the whole page — is that I can only request to switch roommates if he get’s transferred to another campus, or maybe, I don’t know… takes a one year Leave Absence…”, the boy goes on and on, trying to lay down all the relevant points to the person on the other side of the phone line. While hearing this, Sieun imagines in what circumstances would he be able to take one year off of College. One thing he knows for sure: he would probably be cut off from his parents’s will for even entertaining such a possibility.
The call somehow ends after a short while, and now, the buzz of a nearby vending machine is the only sound disturbing the space’s silence. Before Sieun can miss it, the play by play of someone else’s plight continues. The person called upfront on the University’s registry’s line is the chatty, talkative stranger. Without much effort, and thanks in part to the two people ahead of him having their necks positioned down; busy scrolling mindlessly on their phones; Seiun still gets a view from the stranger.
He looks on as a red haired woman sitting on the other side of the counter, receives that large piece of paper from the boy’s hands. Seconds pass by while the Registry Clerk’s gaze is traveling attentively between the paper and the younger’s face, and then; gently; she leans forward and hands it back to the boy, not before whispering something. Something that Sieun can easily make sense of, if he focuses his eyes enough to try and read her lips:
“Dear, I’m gonna have to ask you to come back another time. Theres a big line of people behind you, and your case is a complicated one.
“Another time? Ma’am, I have a tournament in six weeks … If I don’t solve this thing with the scholarship…”; the boy commiserates, worry ascending at the woman’s suggestion, “ I have all my documents here, see?…”It’s just missing one recommendation letter…”
Sieun’s attention; a tool he mostly reserves for studying; is now completely devoted to the conversation ahead.
He’s curious if the red haired woman has any means to provide the boy with a solution to his dilemma, whatever it may be.
Sieun doesn’t have the faintest idea of what this stranger looks like; what are the intricacies that map the expanse of his face; the other’s back has been turned away from him this entire time, but with each passing minute, Sieun can almost imagine a crease of worry forming in the middle of unsee brows.
The taller boy seems depleted from the aliveness he had mere moments ago, when he had no clergy to convince. No conditions to meet.
Sieun can’t help it, he finds himself rooting for a break through for the stranger, a solution of sorts.
Before the boy can move away, the red haired woman suddenly gets up and asks for a second of stillness.
Sieun catches himself obeying her and waiting as well, rooted to the floor, even if some steps behind frame.
After a short while, she comes back, sits down and writes something on her desktop computer.
Watching the way the woman adjusts in her seat and licks her bottom lip, Sieun can see her shape-shift in real time, embodying the image of a sharp nail that slowly but steadily approaches an unassuming bubble, it’s only role to finally burst it.
“The thing is, Mr. Ahn Su Ho,”, she starts, calmly, “Rules are rules. Our University’s scholarship process is fair precisely because of its structural nature. There are no special favors.”
“ But Mrs…”, the boy tries, his voice now a little less assured, almost pleading.
“Unless this request of yours was written, signed and submitted before the beginning of the application process, there’s nothing we can do for you now” The sharpness of her nail was precise in blowing up his bubble.
With no strength left to bargain, the Suho kid takes his paper back from the counter and folds it neatly, his broad back turning into an inclined shape with the weight of both his bag and his defeat.
When he bows his head to the secretary and turns his back to her, ready to start walking away, Suho’s eyes travel through the long line of students, all of them awaiting to present their cases next.
Maybe pushed by a invisible wind, or beckoned by a mysterious pull; maybe influenced by a spell or perhaps by the power of good old Fate; the boy stops walking and pauses his gaze on one particular person inside the line. Only then, he speaks:
“Good luck everyone. Hope whatever you guys came here to request, will be accepted.”, he says, sincerely.
Of all the twenty something people forming this line, Suho’s gaze manages to rest above Sieun’s. Their eyes dont exchange any perceptible words since in theory, they don’t know each other yet.
“So this will be my roommate…” , Sieun whispers to himself.
He doesn’t know what the taller boy is thinking, doesn’t know why he remains fixed in place, his duffle bag sliding off a bit, perhaps due to the material of his black and red jumper. All he knows is that this Suho guy, although looking a bit warned down, has a cool quality to him, carries it around nicely, like a golden retriever sporting it’s shiny coat of fur while running on a field. He has a memorable face too: jet black hair falling effortlessly over a slightly tanned skintone, one side of his pronounced jaw sporting a small, almost imperceptible scar.
The Black haired boy looks trapped in some sort of mental fog, like the ones Sieun gets whenever he disassociates. Seeing him glued to the spot, Sieun speaks up with a levelheaded tone,:
“Someone is calling you.”
“What?”, Suho asks in a whisper, cocking his head towards the stranger inside the line, his almond shaped eyes squinting a bit, clearly caught off guard .
“To your right. Someone is calling you”, Sieun repeats.
“Yha, Suho-ah! Do we need to cut off some of that MMA training? …I Think you’re getting deaf!”, a tall boy with a lively voice appears just right of Suho, like the stranger pointed out. The kid is power walking into the spot where Suho’s been glued to the floor, as if he was a toddler being set free after his first day of school.
“I’ve shouted your name like three times!”, the lively guy says promptly, playfully punching Suho on his shoulder,”How did it went?…are we going to celebrate with some tteokbokki later?”
“Nah, Baku. Apparently not…”, Suho says with a deep sigh, the both of them instantly moving in unison and resuming their walking in the direction of the stairs, “ Gonna try again once I receive my old coach’s letter.”, Suho starts explaining.
“No way…They didn’t accept your request?!”
“Nope… They’re strict as hell! I don’t get it….”
Sieun observes the pair attentively. The two tall; clearly athletic guys; drift away from the line until they take a segway towards the stairs and disappear out of his view.
With only two people ahead of him before its turn on the line arrives, Sieun ponders for a bit. He begins to put two and two together, figuring that the lively kid must be the one Suho was talking on the phone.
Some friendships just make sense even by one glance, and that was one of those, Sieun thinks to himself. It was pretty obvious even from that five second interaction that Suho and his friend seemed to be equally yoked: Boisterous and animated, the confident jock archetype brought to life.
He was raised by a sports man, so he knew how to spot one.
Sieun knew too much of their shadow side as well: their brash nature, their competitiveness, their sharp shifts of mood whenever they were met with loss. But this Suho kid, if he really happened to be an athlete, didn’t seem completely obnoxious though. At least not like the ones his dad got to train for all of Sieun’s childhood.
Maybe to brace himself for their inevitable meeting, Sieun forges up positives on his mind. He manages to come up with only one:
Maybe the two of them could be cordial roommates, he thinks, the kind that even if stuck sharing some roughly 100 square feet room for months, don’t have to see each other every hour of the day, or interact much.
He doesn’t dwell too much on it, though. Sieun takes one step ahead; head and shoulders held a bit higher; for his turn to be heard by the Registry’s secretary has finally arrived. He forgets all about roommates and athletes, because for now, he has also a complicated request to make.
Sieun isn’t superstitious, his inherited gene of solid rationality had always been a gift and a curse from his maternal line. Even so, he chooses to mimic the devout behaviour of his Bhudist paternal line and crosses his fingers behind his back, praying and hoping for his wish to be granted.
*
Less than an hour later, Sieun is traveling across campus with ease.
He’s thankful for being a freshman in an Era far away from the one when people had to figure out a path without clues, or worst: rely on strangers. Sieun is instead following the trajectory on the School’s Map App, a brand new software, built by the School’s Engineering Department.
With this tool in hand, Sieun can see the location of pretty much everything on the University’s grounds, including the Dorms.
While doing a cursory look on it, the boy notices something called MapSharing. After some quick scrolling, he figures that the purpose of it is to allow anyone to share locations with one or multiple people. He finds this particular tool a bit useless, can’t imagine any situation that would push him to share his location with anybody, ; excluding maybe kidnapping.
He struts away. On the right side of him sits the campus Library, an overpowering site, built with a brutalist design: functional and straightforward, sharp lines and raw looking materials. He knows he will spend most of his future time inside the walls of that place, other than classes, of course.
He reaches the front of his Dorm building less than ten minutes later, the famous snail shaped stairs present before every construction on Campus, showing itself in front of him.
Sieun doesn’t think he’s going to be around this particular place much, save for the basic things; like sleep and showers.
He knows this College is known for having a lot of athletic programs, both its Baseball and Lacrosse team being nationally recognized. On the way here, only minutes before, he came across two tennis courts and an outdoor training pool. But the amount of a particular detail is jarring, Sieun thinks:
There are athletes everywhere.
The place is only missing a Gym and some Running Club, which the boy doesn’t doubt is in between the premises somewhere and gets annoyed just by imagining.
“Yah, kid! Get out of the way!!”, a ringing shout comes up right behind him, startling him and making him turn on his heel.
Some lanky guy riding a bike at full speed motions at Sieun to change courses, a last minute warning that if he hadn’t heed, could’ve resulted in a full blown accident. He shakes his head and has the burning desire to flip this cyclist off, but before he can get himself together, Sieun sees that the bike is already turning a curve ahead, disappearing into nowhere.
He adjusts his backpack and decides to climb the stairs ahead, bracing himself for whatever might present itself after those doors are open. He also realizes that as he crosses the threshold that finally separates him from the Outside, he will be officially a College Student.
The moment Sieun walks through the door into the Dorm’s main Lobby is far from magical. The boy is surprised by the sheer amount of young men crowding the place: banter and yelling occupying every crevice of the space.
“I’ve told you, fuckface! Stop messing with my girl”, a guy dressed in a Baseball Uniform shouts shamelessly, a crew of boys dressed in matching attire backing him up.
“And who’s your girl, again?”, a familiar voice retorts to the shouting man of the Baseball crew, seemingly bored.
“I make the questions here! Did you hit on my Na-eun?”, the baseball player pleads, his left hand resting for a quick second above his chest when he voices the girl’s name.
“ Lee Na Eun? Park Na Eun”, the boy asks back, confusion dressed on his voice.
“Son Na Eun, you dick!”, the player yelps before pushing through the crowd and surging against the other boy. Bat in hand and ready to rumble.
Sieun can’t for the life of him understand why would anyone be fighting on the early hours of a Saturday afternoon, and inside a Dorm of all places. The scene looks taken straight out of a Highshcool Drama flick. He doesn’t have enough patience in him to even bother to see who’s the guy fighting the baseball player, so he turns his back to the crowd and tries to look for a way to his Room.
After ducking up and down, trying to miss pushes and elbows, feeling exhausted by the all-consuming noise and maneuvering his way through the sea of people; most of them hyped up teenage boys; Sieun gives a sigh of relief, for he thinks he has found his way out of the testosterone infested lobby.
He believes himself safe when he sees the space to one of the hallways empty, but before he can set another foot ahead, Sieun is knocked on his left shoulder, stumbling ahead and almost planting himself on solid ground, face first.
Thanks to some miracle; or more precisely; a reverse gravitational pull, he gets pulled back, avoiding the possibility of a not so pretty fall.
Theres a strong arm encircling his waist and rooting him against a chest.
Sieun’s back is currently glued to that protective chest and he’s breathing with exasperation. He’s irritated by the sheer effort he has employed since planting his feet in the cursed lobby, only to still be here and not in his Room, unpacking his things. His backpack is somehow splattered on the floor, luckily right in front of him.
Sieun looses no time ungluing himself away from this stranger and picking up his backpack. He has the heart to turn around and give a thank you bow to whoever saved him from an ugly crash, only to see that his savior happens to be the Suho guy from the Registry’s line, from earlier. His supposed roommate.
Sieun only has the chance of saying five words to him before a flying bat finds a way to almost land on the dark haired boy’s head:
“ Watch out. To your left!”
Suho manages to take his eyes away from Sieun and point them to the left, as advised, just in time to catch the bat with only one arm.
Taking advantage of his quick reflexes, Suho reaches his other arm and pulls the guy responsible for sending the bat his way, by his collar, flinging the weapon to the floor.
With one hand free, he waists no time whatsoever and punches a quick but effective strike into the player’s nose, knocking him out clean.
Theres a collective “ Woah!” heard inside the entire lobby, a frenzy feeling of excitement coalescing in a row of impressive sighs coming for pretty much everyone.
Suho doesn’t seem amused by his doing, or by the noise of praise surrounding him. He clearly didn’t want to be involved in any of this.
He gestures towards one of the guys of the Baseballl crew and a random one complies, carefully coming closer to the body splayed on the ground:
“ Take him to the infirmary. Don’t even think about mentioning my name.” Suho adds the last part with a bass on his already deep voice, “Your boy went too far….didn’t leave me with an alternative”
Less than a minute later, the Baseball Crew is carrying down their team mate; princess style; towards the hallway that goes to the infirmary. As quick as the crowd had come to sheer for blood and tears, so as quick had they left, whispering in between themselves mindless things that Suho couldn’t care less about.
Baku appears in front of him as the crowd disperses.
“Yah, Ahn Su Ho! I go take a piss for two seconds and you manage to organize the first fight of the Semester’? Slow the fuck down, man”, his friend fires away with a cheeky smile hanging off of his lips.
“You didn’t miss much…”, Suho responds scratching his head in confusion. He’s looking for the cat eyed boy who was seconds away from falling, before he pulled his body towards him.
He was light as a feather, Suho rememberes. And like a cat, incredibly agile, for he’s nowhere to be seen.
“Did you see that guy?”, Suho questions Baku, turning his neck to every direction, searching.
“You need to be more specific, what guy?”, his friend responds with an open expression on his face.
In Suho’s mind, Baku is; for a lack of better words; not the most observant person . And apparently he had missed most of the latest events. There’s no way he saw whoever Suho is looking for.
“Forget it…”, he says then, beckoning his friend to leave the space with him. “ I don’t get it, though….why did you go all the way to the second floor’s bathrooms? Theres one right over here?”
“Gotta get my steps in.”, Baku replies while taking a look at his phone, “Cardio, you know?” He finishes, provoking a chuckle out of Suho.
“Right…”, Suho chortles, as if he could believe such a lousy excuse. He lightly hits his friend with his elbow to make him snap his eyes out of the phone. His eyebrows are making a suggestive shape, while he coos:
“Someone’s got your attention and you went to meet them on the second floor, amirite?
“Why would anyone in here catch my attention…?”, Buko asks, sending a genuine confused expression towards his friend, “ We’re in a male Dorm…I’m not into dudes, thank God!”
The way Baku says that last sentence provokes a shiver out of Suho, who catches himself quickly before his face a betrays him and somehow contort with something suspicious.
“Yeah,…of course…I know…”, he says with a nervous laugh, “…wouldn’t be the first time anyone brought a girl here, you know?”
“I wish… I’m not having a lot of luck with girls, man. Shit’s embarrassing…”
“Your luck is gonna change, Baku. Just be yourself!”, Suho speaks sincerely, trying to cheer up his best friend.
“I mean is easy for you to talk, Suho”, Baku says smirking and nudging the other boy on his left arm, “You’re a goddamn lady’s magnet. The hoes love you.”
“I don’t know man….if you trying to attract them, maybe try calling them something else other than hoes.”, Suho advises, looking ahead, his room approaching into their vision.
. “Aww…What a gentleman you are, huh?”, Baku says, playfully slapping Suho on the back of his head, “Didn’t you mess around with that player’s girlfriend?…the one who wanted to beat your ass five minutes ago?Not very gentleman of you.”
“ The Nan Eu girl?”, Suho says absentmindedly, squinting his eyes towards the door of his room, that seems slightly open, “She dm’d me on IG, but we just talked for a bit. It didn’t take much to found out that she had a boyfriend. Plus, she’s not my type”
“That’s always your excuse, Suho…I have yet to see a girl that checks your type’s list, and we’ve know each other since elementary… Talk about picky…”
Suho is distracted, too busy looking ahead to reply to Baku’s nagging. He opts to say something else: “ Did I leave the door of my room open before we went out to the lobby?…why is it….”
Before finishing his thought out loud, the black haired boy starts taking long, powered up strides to bring himself closer, a bad feeling pocking at him out of nowhere.
Something seems off, Suho mulls.
“Stand a few steps behind me, Baku”, he whispers to the other when they find themselves only an arm reach away from the room’s door. Baku obeys, slightly raising his fists , knowing that when his best friend shifts his demeanor from playful to protective, something is bound to go down. Whatever is behind that door, should brace itself for the pair’s arrival, the taller boy thinks, on the heels of the other.
Suho is the first to walk into the small space, his body positioned in a way that doesn’t betray any doubt or fear.
Honestly, he doesn’t know what was he expecting, but a pair of cat eyes calmy raising away from a dresser and towards the door, where he and Baku stand, was not what he had envisioned.
A disinterested voice uttering a simple “Hello”, was also not on his bingo card.
“Hello?! Who the hell are you, and why are you in Suho’s room”, Baku screeches from behind, menacingly.
Suho doesn’t have time to tell his friend to turn his volume down, for the smaller boy in front of them clearly isn’t a threat, but before he can say a word, that same boy speaks, disinterest spilling from his lips again:
“Have you noticed this room has twos of everything? Two beds, two dressers, two tables…”
“Yah? Whats with the snarck? How old are you, brat? I bet I’m your elder”
“Baku…”, Suho advices, one arm reached out to his friend in a futile attempt to calm him down.
“This Floor is for freshmans. Unless you got held back at school, everyone here was born in the same year so…”, Sieun continues, a row of books lined up behind him, sitting pretty above his tightly, already made up bed.
“Who are you, kid?”, Baku interrupts, beyond exasperated.
Sieun takes a deep breath and locks his eyes with Suho, who didn’t take his gaze away from him once, since arriving in the room. The shorter boy replies:
“Didn’t know I had to introduce myself. Thought my presence here was enough of a hint.”, he bows his head forward, “ I’m your roommate. Yeon Si Eun.”
“Ahn Su Ho.”, Suho manages to get out, after a beat of a moment passes. Surprisingly, he speaks without a crack in his voice. He was worried about it since his throat feels inexplicably dry.
He extends an hand forward in place of a bow.
“Sorry for barging in like that… me and Baku grew up in a rough area.”, Suho begins his explanation with an apologetic tone,” I thought someone had broken in, for whatever reason. Deja vu, I guess…”
“You had people breaking in your room before?”, Sieun asks, genuinely curious.
“Not my room, but my helmoni’s bar a couple of times. And a friend’s car once.”
“Why would someone break into someone’s car?”, Sieun inquires, as if the entire concept was alien to him,”Why not just take the car?”
“Why?”, Suho inquires back, confused by the shorter guy’s naivety. Maybe he was one of those rich sheltered boys, he thought to himself.
“Robbers find left out, valuable objects inside cars.”, Suho continues his explanation, “Others just break in to take some parts of the car and sell more quickly. I guess if a robber is in urgent need of a couple of hundreds, smaller things would be better to pick and go.
” Makes sense”, Sieun nods, understanding.
“This is the dumbest introduction I’ve ever seen between two people”, Baku says out of nowhere, pulling at the invisible veil surrounding Sieun and Suho.
He walks over towards the bed of his best friend and plops up on it, no covers yet above it, since Suho didn’t bother packing out his things yet.
“So tell us, kid. Whats your major?”, Baku starts over, already forgetting the way he was shouting up the place just mere minuets ago, “By the way, I’m Baku! Pleasure” he gives a cheeky wave with his right hand.
“Computer Science and Engineering .”, Sieun responds while folding neatly a pair of socks, military style.
“So we have the same major? Neat!”, Suho responds with a big gummy smile, still on his feet in the middle of the room.
“That’s your major as well?”, Sieun questions, his tone neutral
“What? You didn’t think a jock could be a nerd too?”, Baku interjects, believing Sieun got impressed by the new piece of information, while Suho can secretly tell the other didn’t. And that makes the dark haired boy feel more at ease, somehow.
“Whats your major?”, Sieun asks Baku instead, “Just making sure we don’t have to cross paths more than necessary.”, he adds, inciting a chuckle out of Suho.
“Watch it, catboy!”, Baku warns playfully, flipping a finger to the shorter boy. “Psychology ”, he gives out.
“Don’t worry. He’s lying like shit.”, Suho offers, seeing the puzzled look that begins to form over Seiun’s eyes.
“Oh, ok. Got concerned for a quick moment”, the other replies, giving a genuine sigh of relief and pulling another smile out of Suho.
“Can’t believe I’m being teamed up against! By two nerds of all people”, Baku says, fake hurt on his voice.
“He’s majoring in Physical Education, by the way. No lies this time”, Suho speaks towards the shorter boy.
Baku is confounded. Busy looking his best friend up and down. Intrigued by his readiness and friendliness, knowing good and well how guarded Suho usually is. He interjects next, harmlessly, a click in his tongue.
“Tsk, tsk…To think that just a few hours ago you were giving me a rundown on the phone on how to change roommates.”
“Shut up, Baku.”, Suho tells him with a whine on his voice, his cheeks suddenly turning red, “ You’re the one that was pressing me on it, wanting to know if you could switch places and leave your solo room”
“You’ve got a solo room? How?”, Sieun immediately speaks, pausing his folding, a tinge of genuine curiosity married to his voice.
Seeing the look of coveted interest almost jumping out of the boy’s cat like eyes, clearly eager to know more, Suho’s mind starts moving almost instantaneously, his lips firing out bullet points:
“Yeah, but you can’t switch places with him. Unless there’s a major, very strong reason backed up by pages and pages of request. Believe me I’ve read the University’s policy book”
“Didn’t you said not to quote you on it? That you only read one page on their website…. “, Baku interrupts, unfazed by the daggers Suho is openly sending his way with his gaze.
“Yeah… but you weren’t there at the registry, and you didn’t talk with that secretary….She’s strict as hell”, Suho speaks matter of factly, adresssing his best friend, “She told me to submit a written, signed statement just because I asked for documented proof of my scholarship pending case. Do you think a request for a trade of rooms would be handled easily?”
“You do got a point”, Baku concedes, stretching his arms around, as if preparing for a physical exercise.
“Yeah. She is strict. Can attest to that”, Sieun adds, bringing Suho’s attention towards him just by speaking again.
“You went there as well? What was your request? .”
“ Yeah, I did”, Sieun says; a forthright reply for the first question; and then, like in a strategic move of poker, he withholds his hand for the second question.
“ She said my case was too complex and convoluted.”, Seiun says instead, evading it.
“God, which case isn’t? Is that their tagline?”, Suho sighs, nodding in solidarity with the other.
Without knowing why, Suho feels relief when he notices that after a while, the topic of a room switch is completely dropped off.
He likes being in a double room. The space isn’t much different from the one bedroom kichnet he shares with his helmoni in the outskirts of Seoul.
He misses her already.
Used to compressed places and shared morning routines, Suho couldn’t handle it if just like Baku, he was ascribed to a solo space.
And he doesn’t dislike his roommate; so far, at least. This short, cat eyed introvert.
Besides, if it turns out that by some reason their personalities dont mech and he feels alone in a room of two, Baku is right down the hallway, only one door away; just like in their apartment complex back home; always his next door neighbor.
But Suho secretly hopes for the opposite: for his and Sieun’s time together as College mates to go swiftly, and who knows? Maybe a friendship between the three can blossom from this compressed space.
He goes over to his side of the room and picks up his duffel bag, turning every now and then to talk to the cat eyed boy. The name just rolls out of his tongue:
“ So Sieun, what do you wanna eat later? I’m starving! Maybe some tteoboki?”