✨MIN-HO✨

--- The air in the Department of Business always felt heavy. It wasn’t just the air. It was the smell of expensive cologne that the seniors wore, and the quiet rules that nobody said out loud but everyone followed anyway. Who talked first. Who poured the drinks. Who sat where. For Park Min-ho, that whole thing felt like a mountain he had no business climbing. He pushed his thick-rimmed glasses up his nose again. They were always sliding down. Always. He looked at his phone. The screen was bright and he was doing the thing again. His thumb hovered over Kang Jin-woo’s latest post. It was just a picture. A black coffee sitting on a windowsill with the Han River behind it. That was it. But to Min-ho it looked like something from a magazine. Like something important. Jin-woo was a sunbae. The kind everyone whispered about. Tall. Always smiling like his teeth cost money. And right now he had silver hair. Silver. It should have looked stupid. It didn’t. It made him look like he wasn’t even human. Like some kind of god that showed up to the business faculty meetings. Min-ho knew better. He knew he wasn’t ready for a relationship. And he definitely wasn’t ready for someone like Jin-woo. So he did what he always did. He watched. Quiet. From far away. A ghost on Jin-woo’s profile. What Min-ho didn’t know was that Jin-woo saw him. Every time Min-ho watched a story two seconds after it went up, Jin-woo saw. Every time Min-ho accidentally liked a photo from three years ago and then panicked and unliked it, Jin-woo saw that too. Jin-woo noticed everything. The department outing was at a pojangmacha. One of those tented bars with plastic walls and orange lights. Outside the wind was cold and sharp and it cut through your jacket. Inside it was too hot. The heaters were on full and the odeng soup was steaming on every table and the air felt wet and thick. Min-ho sat at the very end of the long table. He made himself small. His shoulders were hunched. His frame was thin and his face was round and soft and usually that meant people forgot he was there. That was fine with him. But tonight the seating was bad. Really bad. Across from him was Jin-woo. Jin-woo sat there like he owned the place even in a puffy jacket. His silver hair caught the light from the tent bulbs and made it bounce. He looked up, and his eyes found Min-ho’s. He tilted his head just a little. Like he knew something. Min-ho immediately looked down at his lap. His heart was beating too fast. It felt like a bird trapped in his chest trying to get out. Then a heavy arm dropped onto his shoulders. “Our little hoobae is too quiet!” one of the seniors from marketing shouted. The man was loud and his face was red from drinking already. He didn’t wait for Min-ho to answer. He just grabbed Min-ho’s waist with a hand that felt like iron and poured soju from a green bottle into a small glass. “In this department, we drink to success. Hold your glass, Min-ho-ya.” Min-ho’s throat closed up. The anxiety hit him like a wall. He wanted to say no. He wanted to say he got drunk off one shot. He wanted to say he hated the way alcohol burned. He wanted to go home. But he couldn’t. This was Korea. A senior pours, you drink. That was the rule. You didn’t argue. So he took the glass with hands that were shaking and he drank it. The first shot hit and felt warm. The fifth shot hit and everything was on fire. By eleven o’clock the boy who couldn’t look people in the eye was gone. Min-ho’s cheeks were red. Not cute red. Dusty rose red. His glasses were crooked. Every time he talked he hiccuped in the middle of the sentence. “And another thing!” Min-ho said, way too loud. He was waving a piece of pickled r****h around like it was a pointer. “The market trends for Q3 are... they’re just... they’re very pointy!” The whole table burst out laughing. For the first time Min-ho wasn’t invisible. He wasn’t the quiet hoobae in the corner. He was loud. He was funny. People were looking at him. From the other end of the table Jin-woo watched. His chin was resting on his hand. His eyes were dark and they didn’t look away. He looked interested. Quietly interested. When they all spilled out into the street the cold hit like a slap. February air. It bit. The ground was slick and the world was spinning for Min-ho. He pulled out his phone to call a taxi but the screen was just white and blue smears. He couldn’t see. His glasses were in his pocket and they were crooked and the alcohol made everything worse. He stumbled. His boot slipped on black ice. He wasn’t looking for a taxi. He was looking for someone safe. Someone warm. And he saw him. Jin-woo, standing under the streetlamp. Tall. Real. Min-ho didn’t think. He just walked over and leaned forward and buried his face in Jin-woo’s chest. The coat was expensive and warm and smelled like cedarwood and cold air. “Sunbae...” Min-ho mumbled. He fumbled and shoved his unlocked phone into Jin-woo’s hand. “Can’t see. Help?” Jin-woo looked down. The boy in his arms was a mess. Red cheeks. Crooked glasses. Hiccuping. Jin-woo didn’t push him away. He smiled. Not the fake billion-dollar smile he used in class. A real one. Small and soft. “Cute,” Jin-woo whispered. He didn’t call a taxi. He bent down and slid one arm under Min-ho’s knees and one arm around his back. Then he picked him up. Bridal style. Like it was nothing. Min-ho was light. Min-ho sighed. A long, happy sound. He snuggled deeper into Jin-woo’s chest to get away from the wind. Hic. One more shaky breath and Min-ho’s head fell to Jin-woo’s shoulder. He was asleep. Drunk and asleep and warm. Jin-woo adjusted his grip. Held him closer. And started walking through the cold night with him. ---