Chapter Text
“Ah.. Good afternoon, sir.” Hamin bows at the person outside beside the balustrade of the apartment floor. The man still had his pajamas on with the blue slippers and headband pulling his hair back from his eyes. It was a regular look for the man, especially in the mornings. He was always outside early in the mornings, but with the sun setting soon?
“Hahah! You still with the formalities? I told you, you can call me hyung, yeah? I’m not that old.” The man chuckles at Hamin’s actions “Am I..?”
Hamin again, bows and turns back to unlock the door.
“You’re gonna leave me hanging on my request?” The man pouts at the boy. “I swear! I’m not that old!” He pleads with his hands clasped together, eyes sparkling trying to convince him.
His neighbour is so odd, “Good afternoon. Yejun-hyung.” It feels weird off his tongue “Did I say it right? It kind of sounds weird..” By then the man was on the ground clutching his chest, uttering the words ‘thank you’. It only makes Hamin want to hurry into his home even more, he makes weird first impressions and it wasn’t even his first..
As soon as Hamin enters and locks the door to his apartment he drops his school bag onto the floor and goes searching for something in the area.
He can’t find it..
He lies on the floor of the small living room until he gets another idea where to look and gets up to search again.
Still gone..
He lies on the floor until realising the lights were off. He gets up to flip the switch on, squinting at the new brightness until his eyes adjust.
Oh wait, so it was on the counter. Hamin grabs the sheet of paper and rereads it.
“Ah.” The boy looks back at the door. Then looks back at the paper.
…
I’ll do my homework first..
Hamin does a quick check of the paper before deciding to take it with him to his school bag. The homework was a printed template of empty clocks and writing, it must be easy since there wasn’t much given.
…Nevermind..
What does this mean??
Hamin stares at the sheet, the only thing he had done was write down his name. His pencil was still in his grip as he looks down at the paper as if the answers will pop up if he concentrates enough.
It didn’t. He gets up and decides he’ll do it later.
Hamin sees something moving up the staircase, their hair jumps up with each step. Is it a dog? He knows the place is animal friendly by what the tenant said. He hopes it is, Hamin likes fluffy animals.
“Hamin-ah? It’s a bit late now, are you going somewhere?”
It was not a dog.. :(. It was the man that lived next door. A mysterious one at that, always out at night and never to be seen in the day. It always gets him curious when he passes by his door when he gets out of apartments.
“Yeah. I need..” Hamin loses his words. He forgot the word. He takes one of the straps to his bag off his arm and opens it, handing him a sheet of paper. The man takes it and reads it out aloud like Hamin needed to hear it himself. He probably did though, he could forget.
“Ah hah! I know what you need! It’s literally in the convenience store!” The man gives him back the paper, his enthusiasm unmatched for such a simple reason. Hamin bows and walks past him down the stairs, causing the man to act shocked from his actions, “Hey! I.. I thought you.. I thought you wanted my help!” That man is sure going to get a noise complaint soon enough..
The boy stops to face the loud man. “Well I.. kind of did, but I’m completely fine now. Also you already helped me. Good day-.. night, sir.” Hamin bows again for the nth time and carries on. He doesn’t hear a word from the man as he reaches the sidewalk. Wait, is that the right word? I meant ‘until’.
“‘Sir’? Do you respect me that much?” The man hops beside Hamin, his thick jacket making stiff noises with each movement.
“..I thought it’s good manners. Is it not?” Hamin holds the handles of his backpack in his hands because he’s bored. The man stops in his tracks, causing Hamin to slow down, waiting for him to fully think through his response. Because he’s got his fingers resting on his chin, showing the world he’s deep in thought. Grown-ups are so odd. He’s already met two and they live beside him.
“It issss, but some people think it means they’re old. Like c’mon, do you guys not like respect anymore?” The dual haired man gestures his confusion, following Hamin as he spots the store. He talks and talks. When they get inside he’s still talking.
Hmm.. where do I look?
Instead he starts from aisle one and looks until he reaches the end and starts again on the next line of shelves. The man is still talking.
“What is it called again?” Hamin asks himself, he crouches to get a closer look at the bottom shelf.
“Ah.” The man grabs a box. “Found them!” He shakes it to show his findings to Hamin. The boy’s eyes light up at the box, jumping up to his feet and reaching his arms up towards the box. “You wanna say please and thank you first? It’s basic manners—“ Hamin grabs another box from the shelf and turns back to look at more stuff to see if he can find anything interesting.
“Heyyy, am I not getting respect anymore? I helped you, that means I should be even more respected.”
“You act like Kuta when he’s upset.” Hamin continues looking precisely at each shelf and when he goes too fast past something, he goes back to look at it again. He can’t miss anything important.
“Who’s Kuta? And, hey what?” The man pouts at Hamin. He is really immature for an adult. (Guys english is my first language, its for the pov, ik its somehow worse than the people whos first aint eng but OK MAN, OFC I SHOULDNT BE JEALOUS OF THEIR BILINGUAL ASS..)
Hamin ignores him after that. Too much talking.. It doesn’t really matter because the man starts talking to himself so he’s not lonely anymore.
Eventually, Hamin manages to pick out about three items, some he had to get help from the crazy adult because large shelves were designed for them not him. He was even talking when Hamin tried to reach for a packet of food and the man simply grabbed it and threw it lightly in the boy’s hand. Hamin wonders how he keeps on talking and talking forever, he could probably out talk those weird fancy people on the tv who keep rambling about how they’re gonna improve the world. Except those people are always angry when they talk, this man is always doing funny hand movements and smiling and laughing to himself. It’s weird..
“Oh you’re.. I’ve seen you around before.” The person behind the counter lightly points at the man when they approach. The man stops to confirm someone was talking to him.. because before, it was just himself.
“Ah, really? Didn’t know that, you sure?” The man rubs the back of his neck, why is he nervous? Is the cashier a scary woman?
“Yeah, yeah! You’re.. uhh it’s on the tip of my tongue.”
“It’s Do Eunho, ma’am.” Hamin says with a flat tone. He wants the worker to scan his stuff because they have been talking for too long. The cashier looks down at the boy and apologises as they collect and scan everything.
The man is still talking… When will he leave?
“The moon is a big circle. Like a clock..” Hamin mumbles to himself, but the man, Eunho, was still tagging behind.
“Yeah, time for the werewolves to come out and howl at it.” He’s got his hands resting on the back of his head, he stops talking. Is he broken now? “Though, won’t your parents be worried that you went out with me or something? It’s like way past dinner time. Oh man, I'm hungry.” Eunho grumbles to himself.
“I live by myself, sir. There’s no hurry. Do you want a cracker?”
“What? You just bought those. Don’t you want to eat them at school?”
“I’m too impatient..” Hamin looks into the plastic bag, the green cardboard box on top of everything is like a gem in a glass case. Should he really?
No, if i don’t wait, the reward won’t be rewarding..
The boy looks back and carries down the footpath. Do wolves really howl when there's a full moon? Why would they though?
“Do you know how.. clocks work?”
“Eh, kind of.. just stick the batteries in and—“
“I mean like reading it.” Hamin is still looking at the moon. There’s holes on the moon. I wonder what’s in the holes.. aliens?
“Ahhhh, is it homework? If so, just remember that there's a short and long line called hands and the long line goes up to sixty and the short one goes to twelve.. it’s like me and you.” And the man is talking to himself again at this point, “But just so you know, the little one has the biggest heaviest job. So don’t feel bad because you’re the itty bitty hand.” Eunho’s voice becomes higher when he says the last bit, and he kinda just looks at Hamin for approval..?
The boy does not understand grown-ups.. he nods hesitantly and the man smiles in return. He’s got little fangs coming out.. fangs? And he’s never out in the sun… he better not get on Eunho’s bad side. Hamin stays on high alert until he gets into his home, the man seemed happy so he couldn’t be next. No one would believe him, he has to shut his mouth or he’s going to be it.
He looks into the plastic bag. Right, he’ll have something quick and then straight to bed. And maybe try to do the homework again.
Ah! It makes sense now!
Hamin thinks to himself when he faces the sheet of empty clocks once again. He happily gets through the front page, it was quite easy when you finally understand it! He flips the page over—
…
He only explained the bits without the words.
What is half past??
Chapter end.