âwell uh, riddle me this first.â
he punches a hole in the first tag of the pile, pencil uncharacteristically perched on his right ear. he canât be haughty if thereâs no real reason to be, but his shoulders are fixed anyway, nose up if you ignore the fact that your glasses work best that way with the finer things. his tongue sticks out the corner of his mouth ever so slightly, professional nametag (huzzah!) a little something called uncooperative for all the best reasons one could possibly, strangely muster right now.
weird, perfect timing, 2017 being the mother of its subculture. supposedly.
âyou see the little pin thingy hanging from my shirt?â kiel raises one brow, eyes and hands still fixed on the remaining tags stashed on the counter. only one elbow rises to point west (my left, your right). it points to nothing, clearly helping the stranger in finding what he doesnât think he needs. itâs hard to tell whether heâs capable of that part anyway - thinking. wasnât an expected situation ever, really. kind of the most exciting thing thatâs happened in for-fucking-ever, which is tragic for a town thatâs not even so small.
itâs simple human company. but something ~*~within~*~ tells him itâs beyond that. mad money goes straight to branding him an easily amused fool. and so wednesday goes.
finally, kiel places the tags down. salvages one that hasnât been punched yet, offers it to the man across the counter without still sparing him a glance. the pencilâs next, glasses close to falling off his nose as he inhales sharply in a daze that heâd been convinced would bring up the pair. âtechnically you could have one too, but it seems weâre out so.â he fixes his specs properly, middle finger habitually on the bridge of the frame as he focuses his gaze on the recipient of some nonsense that never stops (youâll get used to it). âthis should do.â the corners of his lips quirk up by a millimeter, nostrils flaring in the midst of pausing for a well-needed second or two.
âyour uh, name. sir.â
Heâs caught somewhere between thought A and thought B when he comes up to the counter, only to encounter thought Y.
Thought A: Thereâs absolutely no way weâre making it out of whatever this is weâve signed up for and making it across town to catch the movie. 52 miles between starting point and ending point, 1.2 miles walking to the nearest street, 16 minutes. Maybe 10 if paced correctly at a light jog. Cut through the graveyard field, cut another 2 minutes. Eight minutes to get to the nearest street. Another two waiting for the Uber to get around. The graveyard, huh.
Thought B:Â If someoneâs buried alive, theyâve got maybe six hours before they start to asphyxiate. If theyâre buried in a coffin, anyway. As long as theyâre staying calm, anyway. Huh. Once the oxygen drops 10%, theyâd go into a coma. Sudden death would occur somewhere between six and eight percent. But then youâve got to look at the oxygen youâre replacing with carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide binding with blood better than oxygen being a problem, now maybe youâre looking at maybe 160, probably more so 150 minutes. Killing you a whole two hours before your coffin ran out of oxygen. Huh. Not to mention youâd probably be dead before anyway, in the way six feet of dirtâs about five hundred pounds, barely liftable by a normal human. Huh.
Thought Y, Part 1: Counterboy has better hair than me.Â
The thoughts cease for a moment, and he shuts up in his own head. Something about the moment is miraculous to a point, maybe even a little odd, and a whole lot unnerving. He looks over at the stranger, blinking exactly four and a quarter times before leaning a little closer.Â
Thought Y, Part 2: Counterboyâs kinda cute.
"Wait, Iâm a little confused. Okay, a lot confused.â He gives a smile -- the signature one, that softened the sharp bits of his face and made most (most, related key words: not little, not few, but certainly not all) people a little more responsive, and a little less crude (crude, being subjective) to him. Heâs thinking itâs working, until he sees the way the strangerâs face is pulled all taut in all the rightly wrong places, and not so seemingly ready to pull loose.
âIâm new. I donât know how the system works. Or anything around here, for that matter.â Now heâs hoping for the other to make a dad joke. Or crack anything, for that matter.
âWonwoo. Jeon Wonwoo.âÂ