“Hansol!” Seokmin beamed as he waved at his son who was dismissed from school. His son waved at his friends, Seungkwan, Minghao, and Chan, as he headed to his father, pushing up his glasses.

“Hey, dad,” he smiled, feeling his hair being ruffled. He was buckled into his car seat as Seokmin started the engine and drove to their humble abode.

“What’d you learn in school today, kiddo?”

Hansol shrugged as he began doodling on the condensation that filled window. “The usual first grade curriculum... Weather, snow, holidays..”

“Sounds like fun!” Seokmin grinned as he looked over in his rear-view mirror, sharing a smile with Hansol. He pulled up to their garage, parking in their usual spot, before Hansol hopped out holding Seokmin’s hand. They were walking to the elevator, greeting the doorman as they entered their apartment lobby.

“Is daddy almost done with decorating?” Hansol asked, pushing the seventh floor button as the doors soon began to close afterward.

“I think so.” Seokmin hummed, Hansol smiling and giggling as he tried to match his father’s tone. He did so all the way down the hall to their door.

As soon as the door opened, Soonyoung looked up from the fireplace as he hung the last stocking. “Oh! You’re back earlier than I expected!”

Hansol ran over to Soonyoung and grinned as he was greeted with open arms, a warm embrace, and plenty of kisses. “Daddy, what are you doing?”

“I’m about to light the wood in the fireplace so we can make s’mores!” gleamed Soonyoung. “Why don’t you wash up and get into your jammies while your dad and I set everything up!”

“Can I wear my proton jammies?”

Seokmin sat nearby and rested his feet up on the ottoman. “You can even bring your periodic table blankie if you want!”

Hansol squealed in delight, quickly rushing to his room as his parents instructed.

“Sometimes, I think we raised him to be too smart,” Seokmin chuckled.

“Tell me about it,” Soonyoung sighed, slowly getting up and heading towards the kitchen to get the chocolate, graham crackers, and marshmallows. He headed back with the skewers for the s’mores along with a few plates. “I tried to tell him about finding a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow the other day when it rained.”

“Really? You know he loves talking about weather.”

Soonyoung began placing the marshmallows on the skewers and nodded. “I’ll say...” he looked up at Seokmin and scrunched his nose. “He told me that there is no such thing as the end of a rainbow because it’s just water droplets refracting sunlight.”

Seokmin couldn’t help but laugh, almost spitting the tea that Soonyoung made for him out. “Our Han said that?”

“He’s too smart for his own good,” Soonyoung shook his head.

It was quiet for a minute, the only sound being the fireplace burning and the faint radio playing holiday music from the kitchen. “Soon,” Seokmin sat up straight, “I think this is the year we tell him about Santa.”

With wide eyes, Soonyoung looked up at his spouse. “Hun.. are you sure? We’re talking about Han here.. you know.. our son who tried to convince us that angling our pillows at a certain level will decrease the risk of us dying earlier.”

“But he’s still a kid, love,” Seokmin commented. “Who knows? Maybe we can convince him.”

-

Hansol soon came back, glasses still in tack, as he wore his science footy pajamas and dragged his periodic table blanket into the living room. He sat in Soonyoung’s lap as Seokmin started breaking the chocolates for the s’mores.

Seokmin looked over at Soonyoung and they shared a gaze, telepathically arguing with raised eyebrows and pouty lips as to who would tell Hansol about Santa.

To Soonyoung’s disadvantage, and he blames the fact that he pouted too much with his facial expression, he was to do the honours.

He handed a skewer to Hansol, his offspring excitedly holding it up to the fire with the two of them and humming the different types of periodic elements song he learned a few days ago.

“H-Hey Han?”

“Yes, daddy?”

Soonyoung looked helplessly at Seokmin. “I can’t do this!” he mouthed.

“Hun, just try,” Seokmin mouthed back.

There was no use fighting it, so Soonyoung just had to wing it. “S-so.. have you talked about Santa Claus with your friends?”

“Mhmm!” Hansol responded composedly, not letting the marshmallow out of his sight. “Chan’s been talking about how Santa is going to bring him presents at his chimney and eat the cookies and milk he puts out for him.”

Eagerly, and with a bit of hope, Soonyoung and Seokmin smiled at each other. “Great!” Seokmin cheered, pulling his skewer out of the flames. “So then.. you know that means he’s going to come to our house to give you presents too, right?”

Hansol pulled his marshmallow out as well, blowing on it as he watched the ember-coloured marshmallow let out steam. He looked up at Seokmin and blinked. “Ah.. no.. I don’t think Santa exists.”

“I told you!” Soonyoung mouthed to Seokmin, raising his eyebrows.

“Just convince him!” Seokmin silently communicated back.

“H-Han.. why don’t you believe in him?” asked Soonyoung, taking his marshmallow and placing it on top of a graham cracker.

Hansol handed his marshmallow to Seokmin as he watched his father assemble the sandwich cookie and handed it to him, his eyes twinkling in delight. He took a bite out of it and smiled to himself, swallowing his bite before he answered the question. “Well.. it doesn’t make any sense logically..”

“Logically?”

With another bite, Hansol nodded. “Well, first off, how can a man, an old one at that has a fifty-inch waist line slide down perfectly a chimney, which by standard is about twenty inches in diameter?”

The two adults blinked at each other, appalled by their son’s question.

“Maybe.. he just sucks in..” Seokmin answered, a bit hesitant.

“And how could Santa survive, for over five hundred years, in an environment of minus twenty degrees Celsius?”

“He has a really thick, red jacket that he wears,” Soonyoung added, getting a thumbs up from his partner.

“What about the reindeer?” Hansol looked up at Soonyoung, wiping the crumbs off of his small hands. “With the aerodynamic potential of the average reindeer, and the laws of gravity, there’s no way that they, or Santa himself, could fly through the air without crashing into pieces. And the fact that he can travel to every house in the world in one night?”

The two adults were speechless. Hansol placed another marshmallow on his skewer and held it to the fire, humming his science song to himself, blocking out the conversation his parents were having.

“Not as easy as you thought, huh?” Soonyoung snickered.

“Okay, I didn’t realize Han was so good at speaking,” Seokmin scratched his neck.

“When he was six, he kept telling you that a tomato was a fruit and not a vegetable!”

Seokmin groaned. “Okay, don’t remind me! It’s not my fault that the tomatoes are near the other vegetables in the grocery store...”

“Love,” Soonyoung sighed, “listen. The only way to get our Hannie to believe in Santa is to fight fire with fire.”

“Which means...”

“Prove Santa exists with science...”

“Dad,” Hansol chimed in, holding his skewer of toasted, fluffy sugar to his father, “can you make another for me, please?”

A small smile crept on Seokmin’s mouth as he patted his lap. “Sit here, I’ll teach you how to make it.” Hansol gasped cheerfully, crawling over to Seokmin’s lap and sitting there as he watched the s’more sandwich being made. Soonyoung reached over and laid the periodic table blanket over his son’s lap.

“S-so.. Hansol?” Soonyoung inquired.

“Yes, daddy?”

“T-There’s some science behind Santa’s existence too.”

Silence, one full of tension, filled the air as Hansol paused and looked up at Soonyoung, quite surprised. Seokmin peering over with an almost anxious gaze. 

“There is?”

“Y-yeah...”

“Like what daddy?”

Soonyoung thought for a good moment. “W-well... you know how you said that Santa has a fifty inch waist?” He scratched his cheek. “He actually doesn’t... Santa wears a special thermal coat that protects him from the North Pole temperatures. But he actually isn’t as wide as most people seem. It’s just the jacket.”

The two of them were holding their breaths, waiting for Hansol’s reaction.

“Really? Wow, that’s interesting! What else is there?”

Seokmin let out a huge, silent sigh of relief. Motioning Soonyoung to continue.

“Uh... well... Santa gives his reindeer special feeding pellets so that they can withstand the pressures of gravity...”

“Oh! They have something like that?”

“Yes,” Seokmin joined in. “And Santa’s sleigh... it can travel faster than light speed!”

Hansol gasped, truly in awe at his parents’ words. “How is that possible? There’s no way!”

“Why, Santa has a hyperspeed module that he connects to his sleigh,” Soonyoung laughed. “He just needed to realign the quantum overdrive--”

“To compensate for the hyperspeed inversion!” Hansol gasped, continuously eating his s’mores. “Wow, of course! That makes senses!”

“It does?” Seokmin mouthed.

“Yeah,” Soonyoung sighed in content.

“How does he deliver all the presents?” Hansol curiously asked, gripping his blanket and leaning back in Seokmin’s chest, looking up at Soonyoung.

“Well, he has this hypercube--”

“You mean the geometric figure in four or more dimensions that is analogous to a cube in three dimensions? He has that?”

"How does he know this?” Seokmin baffled as he looked at Soonyoung.

His spouse shrugged in response. “Santa certainly does have a hypercube! That’s where he stores all the presents!”

“Oh, it all makes sense now,” Hansol giggled, squirming around in Seokmin’s lap. He looked up at Seokmin and smiled eagerly. “This is exciting! Why didn’t I hear about this sooner?”

“We didn’t know if you were mature enough to handle it,” Seokmin snickered, making Hansol puff his cheeks to which his dad kissed.

“So he’s coming to our house, right? Santa?” Hansol drew his breath in sharply. “We need to prepare him cookies and milk!”

“We will, we will!” Soonyoung laughed. “We still have four days to go, Hannie! Plenty of time to prepare!”

“I can’t wait!” Hansol jumped off of Seokmin’s lap and began to run around with his blanket as a cape, increasingly telling himself about all the possibly gifts that Santa could be giving him this year.

“Holy shit,” Seokmin stared at Soonyoung in awe. He leaned over to kiss his partner’s cheek. “How the hell did you do that?”

“I have no idea,” Soonyoung admitted. “I took one semester of physics and public speaking back in college and that’s about it.”

They high-fived and expressed amusement as they watched their son excitedly pace around the apartment, repeating to himself the wonders of Santa.

“He’s going to find out we’re lying though,” Seokmin mentioned.

“Yeah,” Soonyoung shrugged as he began to clean up the plates and skewers. “But we’ll find a way to convince him when the time comes.”

“How?”

At the significant age of fifteen, everyone on the planet is embedded with a set of numbers on their wrist, signifying the countdown of days as to when they will meet their soulmate.

Once the partners meet, whether it be their first or fifty-first time meeting, the number on the wrists of both parties reaches a finalized number of zero. The date of marriage, or other significant date, may be stamped only once they are united.

Most teenagers around this age had their numbers set and the digits kept diminishing as days go by. It was an exciting and exhilarating symbol of entering adulthood that every child awaited ever since they were told of their body’s etching in primary school.

Choi Hansol, at the golden age, realized the numbers within his epidermis were acting stranger than his fellow peers in high school. It came to the point where he was rather embarrassed compare to everyone else’s excitement.

He was one of the first of his peer group to see his drawn over wrist. But after seeing it, he made sure to keep it hidden, always pulling down his sleeves, never wearing short-sleeves in public. That didn’t stop his curious classmates from figuring out what Hansol was hiding as all of their wrists, one by one, soon revealed a number.

While everyone else was showing their wrists, giggling and chattering away as many of their numbers in the four to five-thousand range, some even fewer than that, Hansol’s was at a solid twelve.

A fucking twelve.

  12.

  Much lower than five-thousand.

5,000.

  “That means you’re meeting them really early!” his friend, Dongjin, cried out, congratulating him on such a privilege to meet his soulmate at such an early age. 

However, that number stayed within him for the next year, making him upset and worried.

“Is this normal, mom?” he asked his mother as she kissed his forehead goodnight.

She sat by his side, sliding his sleeves up to see the number still unchanged. Hansol glanced over at her own wrist, a solid zero was impressed, underneath was the date her and his father wedded.

“I’m not so sure, sweetheart,” she sighed, rolling back her son’s sleeve. She plastered a smile on her face, patting his cheek and kissing his forehead once more. Truthfully, she didn’t know if the fact that the number was fixed and low was a good thing. Nor did Hansol, which worried him.

Just seeing the number, while changing into his school uniform, cuffing his sleeves, he couldn’t help but think sometime was wrong with himself. 

That stupid number twelve.

What could it possibly mean?

Did it even have significance?

Or was Hansol the only unlucky one to have an error with his soulmate code?

  12.

 - 

“A dozen?” his friend Lee Chan, 4896, suggested.

Minghao, 3902, rolled his eyes, slapping the younger one’s backside of his head causing him to yelp. “We’re talking about his soulmate, not a grocery list.”

“Maybe… he has a dozen soulmates?”

“Chan… please…”

“Well, whatever it is,” Hansol furrowed his eyebrows, “I hate this number. It’s stupid.”

“Hansol,” Minghao patted his curly, brunette haired friend. “Really, don’t beat yourself up too much about it. I’m sure that it holds some importance, we just don’t know what, yet.”

“Maybe your soulmate died!”

“Lee Chan!”

“It’s a suggestion!”

Hansol grimaced at the thought. Could he actually have been meaning to meet his soulmate, only to have the news delivered on his wrist that they were deceased? Was there truly somebody out there for him?

 His last year of high school rolled around. Hansol decided not to worry about the extraneous digits on his wrists and to focus on school as he would be entering university the following March. By this time, Chan’s number was down to the 4100′s and Minghao’s to the 3100′s.

Walking home one night, he entered his house, only to be led back outside with his mother and younger sister, Sofia, who’s counter had yet to set off.

 Without even warning him, she took him to the hospital. (Which, to Hansol, was a severely delayed appointment that should have happened when he first showed her, but, he supposes better late than never.)

-

“Mrs.Choi,“ the doctor sighed, “I believe Hansol’s soulmate… may be…”

“Dead?” Sofia blurted out, raising her hand in the process. Hansol’s figure stiffened, his mother shushing his younger sibling.

“But at such an early age?” she asked in disbelief. “And it’s such a low number…”

“I’m sorry to say, Mrs.Choi, but that’s what it seems to be.”

His mother and doctor kept going back and forth, but Hansol shook his head, seeing it as a lost cause as he put his hoodie back on, rolled his sleeves down, and brushed his hair out of his face. He sat at the waiting area with Sophia as they waited for Mrs.Choi to complete the walk-in appointment payment.

He was drowning himself in his beats, the only place where the only numbers that mattered were how long it would be until the next song was to play.

There was a slight tug at his side. “Oppa,” Sofia spoke. “What‘s the number on your wrist again?”

“Sof, I said I don’t like talking about it–”

“But what is it?”

The play button was pushed and he moved his arm to show her the number. “Here, just look at it.” He rolled up his sleeve to reveal to his little sister.

“Thirteen?”

“Yeah, see? Exactly. Thir–” He paused, just as his music did as he quickly pulled off his headphones. “What did you say?”

“Thirteen? That’s the number on your wrist.”

Quickly, Hansol looked down to see that the number on his wrist wasn’t twelve. It was, in fact, thirteen.

Thirteen.

  13.

 His parents, doctor, and friends didn’t believe it, even when he showed it to all of them.

“This was twelve just a few minutes ago!” his doctor exclaimed.

“Sofia saw it!” Hansol stated, his sister nodding in agreement.

From such a mysterious number change, he was under constant surveillance, recording the number change on his wrist and updating his doctor on a weekly basis.

Fourteen…, seventeen…, twenty-two…

  14…, 17…, 22…

  By the time of his graduation, Hansol had a thirty-four etched onto his skin.

Thirty-four.

  34.

  His doctor, and the team of scientists who deemed to have never seen such a rare case as this, were still dumbfounded as to the relevance of the growing number.

And Hansol had a little bit of hope that, maybe, whatever the reason the numbers kept growing, that his soulmate was still out there.

 --

 Entering university, Hansol’s number rose to forty-two.

Forty-two.

  42.

 He drifted physically from his two best friends who moved back to their hometowns, Minghao  Liaoning, and Chan to Jeollabuk-do. However, they still kept tabs on each other, especially checking to see how Hansol’s digits were doing.

“It rose by fifteen?” Chan gasped, practically choking on the potato chips he was snacking on.

“It’s at fifty-seven now,” Hansol beamed, holding his wrist up to the webcam for the other two to see.

Minghao whistled. “That’s something alright.”

“It’s been going up like crazy now!”

“What does it mean?” Chan asked after chugging down a bottle of water. “Did the doctors say?”

Hansol shook his head. “No, but I think I like it like that. It seems more interesting than having a countdown.”

 -

Two months into the post-secondary education life and Hansol was more ecstatic than ever. His number was slowly rising, but he didn’t mind the gradual decline. It was almost like a game to him, guessing how high the number currently is when he looks back at it.

Sometimes, it was on point: sixty-four, sixty-seven, seventy-eight.

Usually, it was just a bit off: Sixty-eight instead of sixty-five, seventy-five instead of sixty-nine, eighty-two instead of eighty.

It was nearing the end of May. Hansol’s counter was at ninety-nine as he was walking from his dormitory to the library to meet with two older classmates, Choi Seungcheol and Kwon Soonyoung, for a group project. Seungcheol, a forth year, had his counter at a little over seven hundred, meaning he’d chance upon his soulmate within two years. Soonyoung, a third year, still had almost two thousand on his counter.

“It’s pretty big,” Soonyoung commented as he showed it to Hansol, “but I guess I’ll just have to keep myself pretty busy until then.”

Hansol, growing closer to the older two, revealed his unique counter, the others captivated with it’s odd functionality.

 -

He was heading back to his dorm, the streetlights being the only source that revealed his path when he bumped into someone.

“Shit!” Hansol vociferated.

“I’m so so so sorry,” the stranger panicked, running up to Hansol and offering a hand up. “I should be more careful where I’m going…”

Hansol brushed himself off and was about to give a piece of his mind when the light struck the stranger at the perfect angle. He felt his ears warm up in the chilly atmosphere, meaning they were reddening, and he coughed. “D-don’t worry about it… just watch out next time..”

The stranger bowed. “Again I’m so sorry.. uh..”

“Hansol,” he stuck his hand out, his sleeve rolling up to reveal the ninety-nine on his wrist. The other smiled, sticking his hand out, his wrist displayed a set of four numbers implanted into Hansol’s head. “Choi Hansol.”

“Seungkwan. Boo Seungkwan.”

They exchanged farewells and headed their separate ways, Hansol turning back and watching Seungkwan walk before turning back.

Hansol went to bed that night with Seungkwan’s digit in his head.

Zero, five, two, six.

  0526.

  The next day, Hansol’s counter reached a hundred.

One hundred.

  100.

  -

“That’s rather strange,” Hansol’s doctor aforesaid. “I’ve never heard a zero appearing in front of a set of three digit numbers.”

“I still think mine’s weirder, doc.” He continued to gaze at his wrist, twisting and turning his arm around as if that would help him solve the mystery of the digits before him.

“What’s the count at now?”

“One hundred and eight.”

  108.

  “Wasn’t it just a hundred this morning?”

“Yeah, it rose pretty quickly. Should I worry about it?”

“Are you ill?”

Hansol shook his head, even though his doctor couldn’t see his actions through the cellphone next to his ear. “Just sick of studying and exams is all.”

“Then don’t worry about it. Focus on your studies. Keep on keeping track of that number of yours.”

 -

It wasn’t until Hansol bumped into Seungkwan again, not physically this time, at the local coffee shop a few blocks down from campus.

“Nice to see you not on the ground this time,” Seungkwan snickered, Hansol soon joining in after. He pulled up a chair as the other closed his notebook and swirled around the toasty beverage in his hand.

“Coffee?” Hansol inquired.

Seungkwan nodded his head as he exhaled, a bit of steam escaping his lips, as he set the cup back down on the mahogany where his laptop and book rested. 

“Cinnamon dolce latte. Want a sip?”

Hansol kindly declined. “Not much of a coffee drinker.”

“Tea person?”

“I guess.”

“What’s your usual?”

“Cinnamon chai.”

There was another sip of his drink before Seungkwan nodded. “Alright, I guess you can stay then.” Hansol tilted his head as the other laughed. “I was gonna say, if you had poor taste in drinks, I was going to kick you out.” They both laughed, spending the entire day together.

-- 

The second term rolled around in late August as Hansol found himself in the same music appreciation lecture class with his new acquaintance, who was increasingly becoming a friend, Seungkwan.

Just to their luck, they had three classes together throughout the week: music lecture on Tuesdays and Thursdays around two and a basic psychology class at seven o’clock on Wednesday evenings.

Thursday nights were mutually dedicated to spending time together at the library studying. It didn’t take very long for their acquaintanceship to reach friendship and exceed that to an extremely close friendship.

It wasn’t long until Hansol, with rolled sleeves, was writing notes down from the psychology video online that Seungkwan saw the number on Hansol’s wrist raise by a single digit from one hundred and thirty-two to one hundred and thirty-three.

  132. 133.

  “Whoa! What was that!” Seungkwan exclaimed, quickly gaining attention from the students and faculty near their surroundings.

“What?”

“Y-your wrist!”

It was bound to happen, so Hansol took off his glasses, setting them on top of his keyboard, and revealing his secret to Seungkwan.

There was a ghostly silence until Seungkwan rolled up his sleeve and showed his inner wrist, surprising Hansol.

The four digits he saw the other day, zero-five-two-six, were still imprinted, but they were followed by a few numbers after a decimal.

  0526.290.

  “I should be asking you the same thing!” Hansol exclaimed in a hushed tone, trying not to cause anyone else to look at them oddly. He circumspect around him before scooting closer to whisper. “Does anyone else know?”

“Just my mom,” Seungkwan admitted. “The decimals appeared about a month ago, but the other four digits have been there for a while.”

“Ever since you turned fifteen, huh?”

Another wave of silence hit, Seungkwan shaking his head slowly. He sighed. “Actually.. I got mine at a different age…”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Much younger than fifteen, actually.”

“And that was–?”

“When I was eleven.”

 --

 They were part of each other’s daily routines now. Hansol woke up extra early to drop by Seungkwan’s place to walk with him to the music department where he stayed with the vocal performance major for about an hour until he needed to head over to the science department for his biology lab.

   “You really don’t have to walk me every morning,” Seungkwan snickered.

Yawning, the curly haired brunette shook his head. “It’s fine, really.” He rubbed his eye as he hummed. “I need a reason to wake up and get out of bed anyway, and being late to class isn’t convincing myself enough.”

He wasn’t exactly sure if those words were just humourous or flattery, or a combination of the two, but Seungkwan couldn’t help but blush.

“Thanks,” Seungkwan grinned. “It’s nice to have company anyway.” Especially when it’s with you.

  Every day of the week, ranging between noon and one in the afternoon, they made time for lunch with each other, at the usual table that was ‘claimed’ to be theirs since they always occupied it.

   “You take yours with two sugars, right?” Seungkwan asked.

“You remembered that?” Hansol nodded as he stirred the steaming tea Seungkwan placed in front of him

“Of course!” He stirred in the half & half into his own mug and blew on it before giving it a sip. “And I used the pure cane sugar since the artificial sweeteners are processed in machines that process peanuts.”

He even remembered my allergies?

    On weekends, Hansol invited Seungkwan over to his dorm. His roommate was rarely over, only came to sleep and change clothes, so Seungkwan never felt the awkwardness or the need for an introduction.

At first, it was weird to lay in the same bed, especially since the extra-large twin bed was, but they managed. Hansol’s feet rested on the wall where his pillows lay, feeling the rough texture of the walls through his socks. Seungkwan’s dangled from the ledge, constantly tapping the sides to the beat of the instrumentals that they both listened to together.

   “Oh, this one is my favourite,” Seungkwan beamed.

“Yours too?”

“Whoa, seriously?”

“Yeah, it’s like my guilty pleasure,” Hansol admitted.

“It’s got a good beat to it–”

“And the way the instruments flow together–”

“Especially the orchestra–”

“I used to be in orchestra. In high school.”

“Same.”

“What did you play?”

“First violin. Second chair.”

Hansol smiled delighted. “I expected nothing less.”

“You?”

“Cello. First chair, but there were only two of us, so–”

“That’s still impressive.” All of you is impressive.

    Seungkwan couldn’t help but feel the tugs at his heartstrings. Could this be it? Could Hansol be what he thought he had no chance of finding? Was this truly his soulmate, the person he would be spending the rest of his life with until death do them apart?

Seungkwan could only hope.

  --

  “I doubt it’s him, Kwan,” Lee Jihoon, 698, replied to his younger friend.

“But, hyung,” Seungkwan pouted, “it could be! We’re probably the only two people in the world with broken counters!”

“He has a point though, hyung,” Lee Seokmin, 951, backed up his younger companion. “I mean, think about it. What are the chances of Seungkwan’s soulmate having a normal counter while his is like… this…”

“Jihoon, go easy on him,” Jisoo whispered to the composition major.

"Easy for you to say, hyung. You met Jeonghan hyung already! You two reached zero earlier than any of us…” he mumbled.

Looking over at Seungkwan as their other friends were bickering back and forth, Jeonghan patted his shoulder. “You really think it’s him, huh?”

“Positive.”

Jeonghan smiled knowingly. “Then I’d say go for it.”

 -

“Decimals?”

Chan gasped, the hefty portion of the cake slice causing him to cough a great deal. He downed the cup of milk on his desk before he could breathe normally again.

“Honestly, Chan, must you always eat when we video chat?”

“Hey, don’t tell me how to live my life, Minghao!”

Minghao rolled his eyes, letting Chan do as he please as he focused back to Hansol. “What’s Seungkwan’s decimal number at now?”

“Last time I checked, one hundred eighty two.”

  0526.182.

 “Do you think… it’s him, Hansol?”

“I don’t know.”

Chan was distracted by the argument he was having with his roommate, Samuel, about how messy Chan’s side was with all the plastic bags and various food crumbs everywhere to listen in or see the expression of Hansol’s face.

“Seems like you want it to be him though, hm?”

Hansol was in denial, but Minghao always seemed to know exactly what he was feeling. “Kinda..”

“More like a definite to me.”

“I’m just… scared.”

“That the numbers on your wrist might think otherwise?”

A moment of uncommunicativeness dawned upon Hansol. He observed his wrist, the pads of his fingertips grazed upon the ink implants. “I’m still not sure what it means.”

“You’re smart, Sol. You’ll think of something.”

 -

 Hansol skipped his shared lecture with Seungkwan to search extensively about his special counter. Glancing over at it every once in a while, he noticed it seemed to escalate every few minutes. He felt a bit anxious by it.

  156. 159. 163.

  The internet wasn’t much help. He couldn’t find a case, nor even a similar case, in which someone’s wrist numbers were increasing However, he did seem to find information about the decimal numbers.

Rather than counting down the days when one would meet their soulmate, it meant something else, information that none of the scientific journals were confessing.

Scientists only observed one specific case, subject, coincidentally, being Hansol’s psychology advisor, Dr.Son. As Hansol read through, her digits, when first discovered, read a number similar to Seungkwan’s.

  0421.096.

  --

  Dear. Dr,Son,

I am  a first year undergraduate psychology major, directly in your department. I recently read about a scientific study case about your soulmate counter and would like to speak with you in person for further inquiries.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Regards, Choi Hansol

  --

“I haven’t heard from him all week,” Seungkwan frowned, staring down at his phone, scrolling to see that Hansol had read yet not replied to his text messages.

“Give him time,” Jeonghan placed his cup of americano back on the table and patted Seungkwan’s arm. “He’s probably busy…”

“With what? Studying? We usually study all the time together… he didn’t even shown up to our usual on Thursday… And, clearly, he’s not too busy since he clearly has time to read my messages.”

“I told you guys,” Jihoon mumbled, whimpering when Jisoo hit his shoulder.

“Seungkwan-ah, really, maybe he just needs some space…”

“Have you ever needed space from Jeonghan hyung?”

“Yeah, plenty of times,” Jisoo confessed, earning a glare from his soulmate. “What? It’s true!” Don’t give me that look.

Jeonghan rolled his eyes. “The point is that… well, maybe you should focus on yourself for a bit as you wait for him.”

But what if waiting risks me to losing Hansol?

  “What the fuck!” Hansol practically screamed as he paused up the steps to the library. He earned a few fixed stares from bystanders, tightly gripping the cold, metallic railing as his eyes widened at the sight.

Five hundred thirty-three.

  533.

  “It was three hundred and one just two hours ago.” Stammering up the stairs, he took the elevator to the forth floor where the professor offices were located. Dr.Son’s office was packed up in the bunch, 4P-2.

One way or another, Hansol just needed to find at lease a hint as to what him and Seungkwan’s numbers meant. As he was looking at the floor mat, his phone vibrated. Another messasge from Seungkwan asking if he were okay.

Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just researching to find out if we’re soulmates.

He left it unread, locking his phone and walking to his advisor’s office.

- 

Seungkwan stayed behind at the cafe, waving and saying his farewells to his older friends as they departed. Stirring the spoon in the small espresso cup, he zoned out everything else except for the clinging of the spoon against the insides of the glass.

“Maybe this is a sign,” he exhaled.

There was no affirmed plan of action as to if Hansol was his soulmate or not. Why was he even thinking about it? He barely understood the numbers on his own wrist. He checked it once more and saw the integer diminish by one.

  0526.098.

  He could just ask Hansol. But can you ask somebody to be your soulmate? It was all put into place, and he didn’t want to be selfish and steal Hansol from his actual soulmate, assuming it wasn’t him. Seungkwan had that small percentage of hope he was wrong, but a majority of himself didn’t want to go for it.

His mug was left untouched as he left a tip, walking back to his dorm. (Or apartment complex, really. Point was it was shared with Seokmin and Jeonghan.) He kicked his shoes off at the foyer, dropped his bag on the floor to his room and locked his bedroom door behind him, pulling out his phone and dialing up his mother to discuss the earliest flight back to Jeju Island.

 “That’s incredible!” Hansol declared, receiving a smile from his advisor. After two weeks of emailing back and forth, realizing the first time he dropped by her office was during lunch hours (a time to never seek an advisor) he was finally able to discuss with her about the situation at hand..

“It makes sense now, right?” 

“It sure does!” he grinned, standing up and bowing as he shook Dr.Son’s hand, continually thanking her for telling him about her insight. He eagerly grabbed his backpack and sprinted out with only one strap on his right shoulder, looking rather please. “I need to tell Seungkwan. He has to know.”

 - 

“The decimal, I read, signifies something other than the usual countdown.”

“That’s correct. Any guesses?”

“Ma’m, I’m as clueless as ever.”

“It is a countdown of days, but a much different one.”

“I’m still stuck in a rut, Dr.Son.”

“It’s the number of days that the person realizes who their soulmate is.”

"It seems like the other countdown, ma'm."

“Not quite. This is, like scientists observed, a rare case. Only two, well I suppose three now, people have experienced this, myself included. A regular countdown signifies you have no idea who your partner is, even if you pass by someone with the same digits, there is a chance you just meet your soulmates on the same day.”

“And this case is different… how?”

“You’re a curious cat, you know that, Hansol?”

“I’ve been told.”

“This is different because you, in a lack of words, receive your decimals only after you meet your soulmate.”

“May I see your wrist?”

“Certainly. Give me a second.”

“Take your time.”

“Here. All numbers past the decimal zeros now, but the three of them used to be digits.”

“The numbers prior are still there though.”

“That’s the date you run into your soulmate. Zero-four-twenty-one. I met my partner on April 21st.”

“So… a set that reads zero-five-twenty-six…”

“Means that that individual will, or has, encounter their soulmate on May 26th.”

  -

  “What?”

“He’s gone, Hansol,” Jisoo repeated to his younger, concerned friend. “Jeonghan and I dropped Seungkwan off at the airport yesterday morning.”

Hansol’s heart dropped. “B-but… Why didn’t he tell me?”

“More importantly,” Jeonghan shut his book firmly, the slight gust of air brushing his bangs back, “why didn’t you respond to his messages?”

“Wha–”

“He was worried sick that you ignoring him due to compatibility issues, Hansol! Seungkwan figured it would be better to just leave rather than let the anxiety you caused him build up!”

“Jeonghan!”

“Jisoo, you know it’s true!” He glared up at Hansol, his gaze, intimidating. “I’m going to the bathroom real quick,” he huffed and stormed off from the scene.

“W-well… when is he coming back?”

“He didn’t say,” answered Jisoo. “Seungkwan wanted to keep that information confidentially. So even if we did know, wecouldn’t tell you.”

“Fuck.”

“What’s your counter at now?” 

Checking his wrist, Hansol grunted. “Really high, actually.”

  928.

  Jisoo whistled. “Whoa, I don’t think I’ve seen a number as high as that in a while.”

“It was around six-hundred a week ago… it’s been shooting up nowadays.”

“Have you figured it out?”

“Not yet.. it went up by twenty yesterday.”

Tilting his head, Jisoo thought for a moment. “Seungkwan was really stressed yesterday… kept mumbling about him,” Jisoo murmured to himself.

“Did you say something, hyung?”

“Can you text Seungkwan what his number is at right now?”

“I’m not sure if he’ll respond to me… not after I practically ignore him for two weeks straight.”

He patted Hansol’s hand encouragingly. “It’s Seungkwan. He’d be ecstatic to hear from you.”

  “Hey Kwan, sorry I haven’t been responding to your texts the past few weeks. Hope you’re doing well. Just out of curiosity, whats your number looking like right now?”

“It’s fine. Good to hear from you. 0526.084.”

  “That’s so soon,” Hansol muttered.

“What is?”

“His number. Eighty-four days until he realizes who his soulmate is.”

“Ah, you researched the decimal, huh?”

“That’s why I was gone for so long.”

“And you didn’t bother telling him, Hansol?”

“I didn’t… realize he would take it… like this.”

Jisoo sighed. “Hansol, you, of all people, should know this by now. Jeonghan and I, we may have known him since high school, but Seungkwan’s much more closer to you.” A smile crept on his face as Hansol blinked. “The connection you have… Most soulmates can’t conjoin at that kind of level, including me and Jeonghan.”

“Are you saying to… give it a chance?”

“I’m saying to not be scared.”

 --

  0526.007.

  Seungkwan’s decimal code was still an enigma to himself, but he finally got over his feelings for Hansol. 

Even if he did like him, he couldn’t do anything about it. He was bound to his soulmate, trapped by the code on his number. He wasn’t sure how high Hansol’s number was right now, but he could only imagine how tremendous the digits are.

He finished washing the dishes after dinner, his mother kissing his forehead before she headed up to her room for an early night’s rest, when he decided to take a walk. It wasn’t that chilly, but he realized how grey and cloudy the atmosphere was becoming.

With an umbrella and a light jacket, he headed out for a walk, part of his domestic routine.

His eyes were glued to the paved road, his peripherals passing onlookers who seemed to be moving awfully fast compared to him.

It’s been a little over two months since he moved back to his mother’s house, dropping out of his curriculum, consequently a semester behind his studies now. But that was the least of his worries now.

Truthfully, and Seungkwan was still in denial of it, but he desperately worried for Hansol. Everyday, despite the fact that they barely talked, Hansol because he was engaged in his studies and Seungkwan because he was calming himself down.

Tangled with his thoughts and emotions, he didn’t realize the path in front of him as he and a stranger.

“Shit!” He pulled his umbrella up, only to see a petite woman on the slippery pavement.

Just as their eyes met, the girl brushed her hair out of her face and took Seungkwan’s hand to pull herself up. “Oh– Seungkwan oppa?”

“Y-Yerim?”

She smiled kindly. “I go by Yeri now.” 

 -

“I thought you were studying in Jeollabuk-do!”

Yeri giggle, handing over a napkin as she saw the residue of coffee upon her older fiend’s mouth. They sat at a nearby cafe, drying off while watching the rain drizzle to their side through the window. “I still do. I’m on break!”

Taking another sip of his coffee, he noticed her wrist reading zero and he couldn’t help but smile. “You found them?” he asked, pointing to her uncovered wrist.

Not even having to look down, her cheeks were flushed to a rosy pink and she slowly nodded. “His name is Chan. Lee Chan,” She whipped out her phone, pulling out a picture of him.”

“He seems like your type.”

“He’s perfect, oppa.”

“I’m really happy for you.”

“I know this is short notice, but I might as well tell you in person rather than stopping by your house later this week, but do you think you can make it to the wedding?”

“When is it?”

“In about a week.”

“That’s very short notice.”

She whined, leaning her head onto her arms. “We’re very bad at planning, so we only invited a few friend’s each plus our direct family.” Her gaze met back up with Seungkwan’s as she pouted. “Please?”

“I’d love to come. Sure. I’ll be there.”

“You’re the best, oppa!”

 -

 It was a good thing Seungkwan was gifted in managing time when it came to deadlines. He picked up the attire appropriate for the small wedding and reception Yeri was going to have with her fiance, soon-to-be husband.

All the while, his counter kept decreasing.

  0526.006.

  0526.005.

  0526.004.

  0526.003.

  0526.002.

  0526.001.

    Seungkgwan woke up the next morning, the day of the wedding, with a shocking surprise.

  0526.000.

  He wasn’t exactly quite sure what it meant when all of the zeros aligned, he most certainly hoped it didn’t mean he would explode into a million pieces, but he was an optimistic person, so he threw the idea to the back of his mind. The main focus today was Yeri and her wedding with Chan.

 -

 He was utterly shocked to see his friends from college in the chapel benches, especially since he had no idea how they knew his dongsaeng in the first place.

“Wow, we haven’t seen you in, about, fifty years,” Seungcheol snickered.

Jihoon rolled his eyes, hitting Seungcheol with the program in hand, quickly adjusting his bow tie. “Cheol, you need to stop moving around or this tie will undo itself.”

“And we wouldn’t want that, I’d rather you untie it.”

“Seungcheol! We’re in a church!”

“I didn’t know you guys knew Yeri.”

“Actually, we’re here for the groom,” Jihoon told Seungkwan. “In fact, most of us are.”

A few of his other companions filtered in as family members started filling in the empty spaces as well. Pretty soon, it was the start of the wedding, the piano player letting her hands sweep across the keyboard as the entourage humbly walked in.

And his eyes widened at the sight of Hansol.

He wasn’t too sure about it, but he was pretty certain that they shared a gaze before Hansol faced the center, walking down one of the bridesmaids down the aisle. towards the groom who awaited for Yeri.

Seeing her walk down the aisle, in the long, trailing wedding dress that made her look like a cherubic brought tears to his eyes. And the tears kept falling progressively as his eyes were glued to Hansol. He knows he should be paying attention to his dongsaeng, but he couldn’t help himself.

 There wasn’t much spare time between the wedding dismissal and the start of the reception, Seungkwan couldn’t find the courage to follow the entourage out nor was he able to catch up with them when he finally did go outside. He grunted to himself.

As terrified as he was, he figured he needed to confront Hansol one way or another. Whatever the outcome may be, Hansol had every right to know about Seungkwan’s feelings for him, no matter how invalid they may be.

 -

 Their tables were far apart, but they both noticed each other’s glances at each other.

Seungkwan caught Hansol stand up from the entourage table and that’s when he saw his chance to spring into action. He dismissed himself, walking to the bathroom, about twenty feet away from Hansol. Turning the corner, he yelped in surprise seeing Hansol waiting for him there, leaning against the wall, smirking at him before Seungkwan fell to the ground.

Hansol chuckled as he offered a hand up. “You’re still as shocked as ever.”

“H-Hansol,” Seungkwan cleared his throat, “I need to tell you something. The other gestured him to continue, but as soon as he opened his mouth, he yelped as Hansol tugged him by his dress shirt and let his back hit the reception hall wallpaper, eyes widening and mouth gasping as he felt Hansol press his lips against his.

He was frozen solid but, fuck, the way Hansol’s soft, plush lips coupled with his was everything Seungkwan had once dreamt. Their lips parted, both parties gasping for air as they gazed into each other’s eyes. “What the hell was that?” Seungkwan panted.

“Seungkwan,” Hansol beamed, “it’s you. It’s always been you.”

“What?”

Quickly, Hansol grabbed Seungkwan’s wrist and pulled the dress shirt cuff down, nodding with an assured smile on his face. “Yup, today’s the day you realize.”

“Realize what?”

“Who your soulmate is.”

It took him a bit until he realized that the decimal was a countdown, Hansol adding onto the fact that it was not when he would meet his soulmate but when he realizes who his soulmate actually is.

“And the zero-five-twenty-six combination?”

“That’s the day we first bumped into each other.”

“Holy shit.” In disbelief, Seungkwan grabbed Hansol’s wrist, blinking at how fast the digits on his wrist were increasing.

  3045… 3267… 3589…

  “Did you ever figure out–”

“Seungkwan, I’m going to ask you to stop thinking about me for a second.”

“What?”

“Think of the wedding gift you bought for Yeri for just a couple of seconds."

 He complied with Hansol’s orders, glancing down at Hansol’s wrist as he saw the number paused.

  3620.

  Seungkwan blinked, terribly confused. “I don’t understand–”

“Every increase,” Hansol smiled knowingly, “represents a thought you’ve had of me.” He couldn’t help but laugh loudly at Seungkwan’s dumbfounded expression. “You saw the first set of digits before the decimal when you were eleven, right? The number my wrist started at was twelve. Your starting age plus the one thought you had of your soulmate when you were younger.”

“That doesn’t mean there’s a correla–”

“There’s a strong positive correlation between your thoughts and these numbers on my wrist, Seungkwan,” Hansol heaved. “I didn’t spend a whole two months researching and writing continuous essays about this while you were gone if there wasn’t a connection.”

It’s not that he didn’t believe Hansol’s word, it’s just that he believed it too good to be true.

With his tears streaming down his cheeks, he sniffled and pulled Hansol towards them, their chests touching, feeling the beat of the other’s heart. Seungkwan nuzzled into the crook of Hansol’s neck, wrapping his arms tightly around as Hansol patted his back and gently kissed his cheek.

After their shared embrace, Seungkwan pulled back and wiped his tears with his sleeves before Hansol pulled a couple of tissues from his pocket to assist. “N-now what do we do?”

Hansol chuckled. “Now is only the beginning. What do you feel like doing, soulmate?”

 Seungkwan squeezed his soulmate’s hand as they both smiled at each other, knowing that it had only just begun.

--