Synopsis. Seonghyeon becomes a regular at the açaí shop where you work, and his order never changes. Simple enough to memorize, dangerous enough to make you look forward to the bell above the door.
Pairing. non-idol!Seonghyeon x fem. Reader
Notes. My side quest... i lowk hate this i cant like BUT ILL KEEP IT UP FOR NOW 😔
The first thing you learn about Seonghyeon is his order.
The second thing you learn is that he is rude. What? You swear you aren’t holding a grudge... Okay, fine, maybe you are.
Not loudly rude. Not the kind of rude that gives you a dramatic story to tell later with hand gestures, offended gasps, and a very detailed reenactment for your roommate. He does not yell. He does not snap his fingers. He does not complain about prices like you personally set them in a dark office somewhere, cackling over the cost of granola.
His rudeness is quieter than that.
It is in the short answers. The distracted glances. The way he keeps looking down at his phone like the conversation is something he has to survive quickly before getting back to whatever is making his shoulders sit so tensely beneath his wrinkled button-down.
Unfortunately for him, you are not in the mood to be generous.
Tuesday afternoon has already been awful. Your morning lecture ran over by twenty minutes because your professor discovered, apparently for the first time, that he enjoyed hearing himself speak. Your bus to work was so crowded that someone’s tote bag spent six stops pressed directly into your ribs. Then, when you arrived at the açaí shop, Mina had looked up from behind the counter and said, very seriously, “The freezer is making a sound.”
The sound turned out to be less of a sound and more of a mechanical cry for help.
So by the time the bell above the door rings and he walks in, you are tired, sticky with fruit, and emotionally prepared to be annoyed by almost anything.
The shop is small and bright, tucked between a dry cleaner and a café that charges enough for coffee that you assume every cup comes with a financial consultation. Your shop has pale wooden counters, white tile walls, a chalkboard menu written in Mina’s unnecessarily pretty handwriting, and a row of fake hanging plants that still somehow look like they are losing the will to live. It smells like frozen berries, banana, peanut butter, and the faint lemon disinfectant your manager insists is “barely noticeable.”
A blender whirs behind you. Mina is crouched near the freezer, muttering threats at it under her breath.
The bell rings again as the door swings shut.
He stands just inside the entrance with a laptop bag over one shoulder and his phone in one hand. He looks around your age, maybe a little older. His shirt is neat but wrinkled at the sleeves, as if he has spent all day pushing them up and pulling them back down. His dark hair falls softly over his forehead, a little messy in a way that seems more exhausted than intentional. He is handsome, which you notice against your will, but not in a loud way. There is nothing attention-seeking about him. If anything, he looks like he is trying not to take up too much space.
You wipe a streak of peanut butter from the counter with a damp cloth and wait some more.
The blender stops. The shop settles into a silence that makes the waiting feel louder.
“Hi,” you say finally, keeping your voice bright because customer service requires you to sound like fruit has healed you. “What can I get started for you?”
He does not look at you right away. His thumb moves across his phone screen once, then he seems to catch himself. He locks it, slips it into his pocket, and lifts his gaze to the menu again.
“One açaí bowl,” he says.
His voice is quiet. Soft, almost. But the words come out clipped, as if they have been cut down to save time.
You keep your smile in place. “Sure. What toppings would you like?”
“Banana,” he says. “Strawberries. Peanut butter. Granola.”
You tap the order into the register. The screen chirps under your finger.
“Anything else? Honey, coconut, chia seeds, cacao nibs?”
The answer comes too fast.
You pause with your finger hovering over the screen.
“Okay,” you say. “For here or to go?”
It is small. Barely anything. But on a better day, you might have missed it. Today, you notice everything. The way his jaw shifts. The way his eyes flick to your name tag and then away again. The tiny inhale, like even giving his name requires energy he does not have.
You type it in carefully.
“Seonghyeon,” you repeat, mostly to make sure you got it right.
No smile. No warmth. Just yes.
You tell him the total. He pulls out his card and taps it against the reader before the green light appears. The reader beeps angrily. He looks down at it, blinks once, then taps again too soon.
“You have to wait for the light,” you say.
It is not harsh, exactly. It is quiet. Flat. Automatic. Like he is already somewhere else in his head, and this moment is just another thing going wrong in a long list of things going wrong.
The second the words leave your mouth, you know you probably should have swallowed them.
For one second, neither of you moves. Your hand rests beside the register. His card hovers over the reader. Behind you, Mina stops moving so completely that you know she heard everything and has chosen self-preservation over friendship.
Seonghyeon’s expression changes first.
Something quieter. Awkward. Embarrassed.
His gaze drops to the reader, then to his card.
The apology is so quiet and immediate that your own annoyance stutters.
The payment goes through.
You clear your throat and look at the receipt printer instead of his face. “It’s fine.”
It is not entirely fine, because now you are embarrassed too, which is more annoying than being annoyed.
You turn away and begin making his bowl with more focus than necessary. You scoop the açaí base into the container and smooth it down. You slice the banana evenly, arrange the strawberries along the side, drizzle peanut butter across the top in clean lines, and add granola last so it stays crisp. You place the lid on carefully, then wipe the edge because if nothing else, you are going to be professionally competent.
He stands near the pickup counter while you work.
He does not check his phone again.
When the bowl is finished, you slide it into a paper bag and place it on the counter.
“Seonghyeon,” you call, even though he is the only one waiting.
He steps forward. His fingers curl around the bag handle, but he does not take it right away.
This time, the word is softer.
You nod. “Have a nice day.”
He seems to know you do not fully mean it.
You seem to know he knows.
He takes the bag and leaves, the bell above the door ringing brightly behind him.
Mina waits exactly two seconds before standing upright from behind the counter.
You grab the cloth and begin wiping an already clean spot near the register. “He was rude first.”
Mina raises both hands, grinning. “I’m just saying. There was tension.”
“There was customer service failure.”
“I’m not discussing his cheekbones.”
“I noticed he couldn’t operate a card reader.”
Mina hums like she does not believe you, which is irritating because she is right.
You do not think about him after that.
Or at least, you do not mean to.
But two days later, the bell rings at 4:13 p.m., and when you look up from refilling the granola container, he is there again.
Same laptop bag. Different shirt. Same quiet exhaustion. Same soft dark hair, a little messy over his forehead. Same posture...
You stare for half a second too long.
His hand tightens around the strap of his bag.
The greeting is awkward enough to have corners.
You step toward the register. “What can I get started for you?”
He glances at the menu, though you get the strange feeling he does not need to.
“One açaí bowl,” he says. “Banana, strawberries, peanut butter, granola.”
You tap it in. “Anything else?”
This time, the pause feels intentional, as if he is reminding himself not to answer too quickly.
Even Mina looks up from the blender.
You enter the order, trying not to let amusement show on your face. “Name?”
The words slip out before you can soften them, but they do not sound as sharp this time.
His expression shifts. Surprise, maybe. Then something quieter. He looks down at the counter, where your fingers rest near the register.
“You were here two days ago.”
“That doesn’t mean you had to remember.”
He nods once, like this is logical and therefore acceptable.
The card reader lights green.
He waits this time before tapping.
Neither of you says anything.
While you make his bowl, he stands near the pickup counter with both hands wrapped loosely around the strap of his laptop bag. He does not look at his phone. Instead, his gaze drifts around the shop — the chalkboard menu, the jars of toppings, the hanging plants, the stack of loyalty cards beside the register.
When his eyes land on the freezer, it makes another low, dying noise.
His eyebrows lift slightly.
“Yeah,” you say, following his gaze. “It does that.”
You snap the lid onto his bowl. “Do architecture interns usually inspect appliances while waiting for fruit?”
You do not know why you guessed architecture intern. Maybe it is the laptop bag, the rolled papers sticking out of the side pocket, the way he looked at the menu like he was evaluating whether the spacing was structurally sound.
For a moment, you think you guessed wrong.
Then he says, “I am an architecture intern.”
His mouth twitches faintly.
“An educated guess,” you correct.
He takes the bag when you hand it over, but he does not leave immediately.
“My supervisor sent back a model that day,” he says after a second, looking down at the receipt taped to the bag. “That’s why I was…”
His fingers shift against the paper handle.
His ears turn faintly pink.
You lean one hip against the counter. “That’s one word for it.”
He looks up at you, and for the first time, there is something sheepish in his expression.
“I was short,” he repeats. “Sorry.”
The apology is quiet and awkward, but it feels real enough that your own embarrassment resurfaces.
“I was also short,” you admit.
“You asked if I knew how to use a card reader.”
“You didn’t look like you did.”
He nods slowly, like you have both presented evidence and he has accepted the case.
Behind you, Mina makes a strangled sound and turns it into a cough.
“Did we just settle this like a legal dispute?” you ask.
Seonghyeon’s gaze drops to the bag, but this time you catch it — the smallest curve at the corner of his mouth.
You laugh once, surprised out of yourself.
His eyes lift at the sound.
Then he looks away too quickly.
“Thanks,” he says, raising the bag slightly.
He turns toward the door.
The bell rings behind him.
Mina appears beside you as if summoned by gossip.
“Mutual fault,” she repeats, delighted. “He’s weird.”
You look at the door, still smiling despite yourself.
“Yeah,” you say. “A little.”
After that, Seonghyeon becomes a regular.
Not officially. There is no ceremony for it, no loyalty card fanfare, no plaque on the wall that says congratulations, you have ordered enough peanut butter to become part of our emotional ecosystem. It just happens.
He comes in on Tuesdays and Thursdays, sometimes Mondays if he looks especially tired, rarely Fridays. Always around the same window of time. Always with the same laptop bag. Always with the same order.
Banana. Strawberries. Peanut butter. Granola.
At first, you remember because it is easy.
Then because he is frequent.
Then because it becomes impossible not to.
You learn that he watches the bowl being made, not in a suspicious way, but with quiet attention. You learn that he cares about the granola going on last because “texture matters.” You learn that he does not like when the peanut butter pools too heavily in one corner because it “changes the ratio.” You learn that he is calm most of the time, even when tired, but his calmness is not empty. It is full of tiny reactions if you know where to look.
A blink when you surprise him.
A small ear flush when Mina embarrasses him.
A pause before he says something honest.
A barely-there smile when he finds something funny and does not want to admit it.
You also learn that he is not nearly as cold as he first seemed.
He is just bad at entering conversations and worse at leaving them.
One afternoon, during a slow shift, he walks in while you are rearranging strawberries in the display case. The bell rings, and you look up before you mean to.
“The usual?” you ask, straightening.
He stops in front of the register, one hand still on the strap of his bag.
“Banana, strawberries, peanut butter, granola.”
His eyes stay on yours a little longer than usual. “You remember every time.”
“You order it every time.”
He considers this. His brows draw together, but softly, as if he is not irritated so much as academically opposed.
“I’m consistent,” he says.
You lean on the counter, amused despite yourself. “Explain.”
He shifts his bag higher on his shoulder. “Predictable sounds boring.”
“I implied you have a stable relationship with peanut butter.”
“You’re defending yourself very seriously.”
“Very architecture intern of you.”
His gaze drops for a moment, and there it is again — the almost-smile.
“It’s a controlled system,” he says.
You stare at him for a beat before laughing under your breath.
He looks away, but his shoulders loosen.
You enter the order. “One balanced fruit system. To go?”
The hesitation is different this time. Not because he does not know the answer, but because he seems to be deciding whether to change it.
“For here,” he says finally.
He immediately looks like he regrets being perceived.
“For here,” you repeat, carefully normal.
You glance out the window at the painfully clear sky.
He pays, then retreats to the table near the window. While you make his bowl, you see him take out a notebook and a mechanical pencil. He opens to a page filled with neat lines and tiny notes, the kind of handwriting that looks controlled even when rushed.
You set his bowl down at his table instead of calling his name.
“Your balanced fruit system,” you say.
You glance at the notebook before you can stop yourself. “Is that a building?”
Then he looks up at you with the faintest hint of amusement. “Usually.”
You smile and head back behind the counter.
He stays for forty minutes.
Not that you are counting.
“You’re staring,” she murmurs while pretending to restock napkins.
“I’m checking if he needs anything.”
“He needs you to stop looking at him like he’s a limited-edition fruit topping.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“He’s a customer whose peanut butter ratio you respect.”
“That is professional pride.”
“That is emotional involvement.”
You turn away before she can see your face warming.
The next week, Seonghyeon betrays his own system.
He walks in looking more awake than usual, which is already suspicious. His sleeves are neatly rolled, his hair is less chaotic, and he approaches the register with a strange determination that makes you put down the marker you were using to fix the chalkboard.
Mina, behind you, freezes with a container of bananas in her hands.
“Blueberries?” you repeat.
His expression remains calm, but his ears redden immediately. “I can order blueberries.”
“It’s a controlled experiment.”
You bite the inside of your cheek. “What’s the hypothesis?”
He looks at the display case of blueberries, then back at you.
“That I’m not predictable.”
Mina makes a soft squeaking noise behind the bananas.
You ignore her with heroic effort.
“Very scientific,” you say. “What’s your sample size?”
You make the bowl exactly as ordered, including the blueberries. He watches the process with the grave focus of someone observing a structural test. When you hand it over, he studies the container through the clear lid.
“Enjoy your experiment,” you say.
He nods solemnly. “I’ll evaluate the results.”
The next day, the bell rings.
Seonghyeon stands in the doorway holding the half-eaten bowl.
For a second, he simply stands there, daylight bright behind him, face carefully blank.
You press your lips together.
“You looked like you were going to.”
The words land between you a little too softly.
You lose the smile for half a second.
Then he looks down at the blueberry bowl and clears his throat.
You fold your hands on the counter. “Tragic.”
“The blueberries disrupt the texture.”
“Did they attack the ratio?”
You finally laugh, and this time he smiles. Small, embarrassed, real.
“The usual,” you say, still laughing. “No blueberries?”
“People can change back, I guess.”
You make him another bowl, and when you hand it to him, he does not leave. He takes it to the window table, opens his notebook, and starts drawing.
From then on, Mina calls him Blueberry Boy for exactly one day before he overhears her.
“Blueberry Boy?” he asks, standing at the counter with his card in hand.
“It’s not official,” you say quickly.
“There are official names?”
You sigh. “Sometimes regulars get nicknames.”
He processes this with alarming seriousness.
“What was mine before Blueberry Boy?”
“You don’t want to know.”
His gaze narrows slightly, but not unkindly. “I do.”
You busy yourself with the register. “The usual?”
Mina, traitor that she is, whispers, “Peanut Butter Guy.”
Seonghyeon slowly turns back to you.
You point at Mina. “She said it, not me.”
“You order a lot of peanut butter.”
“It’s part of your identity now.”
He looks down at the card reader, visibly trying to decide whether to be embarrassed or amused. Embarrassment wins first. His ears go pink. Then amusement catches up.
“Peanut Butter Guy is better than Blueberry Boy,” he says quietly.
He taps his card once the light turns green.
“Predictable,” you correct.
He looks at you as he picks up his receipt.
For once, he smiles before turning away.
The routine becomes dangerous because it feels harmless.
Seonghyeon comes in. You make his bowl. Sometimes he sits. Sometimes he tells you about his internship in fragments while you clean the counter or refill toppings. His supervisor changes plans too late. A model breaks in transit. Someone asks for a design to feel “modern but nostalgic,” which makes Seonghyeon stare at the wall for ten full seconds when he tells you about it.
You tell him about college in return. About readings that seem designed to punish eyesight. About professors who use simple words only when more complicated ones are unavailable. About group projects where the group part is theoretical. You complain while slicing bananas; he listens with his chin propped against one hand, looking calm enough to be soothing and attentive enough to be dangerous.
He is not smooth. That becomes increasingly obvious.
He does not flirt in the obvious way. He does not lean over the counter and deliver lines. He does not compliment you with easy confidence. Instead, he notices things.
One evening, when the shop is empty and you are hunched over a textbook behind the register, he steps inside and pauses.
“You’re on the same page,” he says.
You look up. “Hello to you too.”
“Hello. You’re on the same page.”
“You were on that page when I walked past earlier.”
You slowly lower your pen. “You walked past earlier?”
His ears turn red so fast you nearly smile.
“I was checking if it was busy,” he says.
“You’re distracting the point.”
You close the book with one finger still marking your place. “That is not news.”
“You sound like my mother.”
He places something on the counter.
You look at it, then at him.
“Wow. Thank you for clarifying.”
“You always get coffee during your break, but today you didn’t.”
The shop feels suddenly warmer than it was a second ago.
His gaze drops to the cookie. “It was obvious.”
“You usually get an iced vanilla latte. Extra shot. Less ice.” here i am writing this when i dont even drink coffee 💔
For a moment, you do not know what to do with your hands. You pick up the cookie only because it gives you something to hold.
“You remember my coffee order?”
“You’re not working at the café.”
You open your mouth, then close it.
He looks faintly pleased with himself.
You hate that it is cute.
“You’re very annoying,” you say.
“You didn’t ask anything.”
“That’s also not a question.”
He tilts his head slightly. “Are you going to eat it?”
You glance at the cookie.
It is your favorite kind.
“Same problem, different font.”
He looks confused for half a second, then smiles when he understands.
You eat the cookie on your break.
It tastes like being known, which is a stupid thing for a cookie to taste like.
Another afternoon, you discover the notebook is not only for architecture.
It happens by accident. The shop is quiet. Seonghyeon is sitting by the window, one elbow on the table, pencil moving across a page. You assume he is sketching floor plans again until he turns the notebook a little too quickly and you catch a glimpse of words written between lines. Not measurements. Not labels. Something closer to lyrics, broken into fragments, with arrows and crossed-out phrases.
You set a fresh stack of napkins near his table and try not to look curious.
His pencil stops mid-word.
He closes the notebook halfway.
“That was the least convincing answer you’ve ever given me.”
His ears turn pink. “Some of them.”
He looks down at the notebook like it has betrayed him. “Sometimes.”
He stops, as if searching for the right word and finding none.
You lean lightly against the chair opposite him. “Not what?”
“That wasn’t my question.”
His fingers tap once against the notebook cover. “It’s just structure. Sounds. Words. I don’t know.”
“Emotional architecture,” you say.
He looks pained immediately.
“Please don’t call it that.”
He looks up at you then, embarrassed but not upset. There is something almost shy in his expression, something younger than his usual calm.
You smile sweetly and return to the counter before he can respond.
After that, the small acts multiply.
You add extra strawberries when he comes in looking especially drained. The first time, he notices immediately.
“I didn’t pay for extra,” he says, holding the bowl near the pickup counter.
You snap the lid into place. “I know.”
“You looked like an extra strawberry day.”
He looks down at the bowl, brows slightly drawn.
“That’s not a real thing.”
He does not answer. For a moment, he only looks at the strawberries through the lid. His expression is too quiet for teasing.
Then he says, “Thank you.”
No awkwardness. No correction.
Later, he starts helping when he comes in near closing. The first time, you tell him he does not have to stack chairs. He says, “I know,” and stacks them anyway. When you tell him customers are not supposed to take out trash, he says, “Then I’m not a customer right now,” and immediately looks like he wants to disappear because that sounded too meaningful.
You pretend not to notice.
You both pretend not to notice a lot of things.
That is how you get into trouble.
Because somewhere between banana, strawberries, peanut butter, granola, failed blueberry experiments, extra strawberries, music notes, and quiet closing shifts, Seonghyeon stops feeling like a customer and starts feeling like a part of your day you wait for.
Not to Mina, who would be unbearable.
Not to yourself, because that would be worse.
And definitely not to Seonghyeon, because there is still a counter between you. A register. An apron. A role you know how to play.
You are the girl who makes his usual.
Then you get the internship.
The email arrives during your break between classes. You are sitting on a bench outside the library, balancing your phone in one hand and a half-finished sandwich in the other, when the notification appears.
Internship Application Update.
Your heart jolts so hard you almost drop the sandwich.
For a second, all you can do is stare at the screen while students pass in front of you, laughing and talking and dragging tote bags full of books. The world keeps moving like nothing has changed, even though something has.
A paid internship at a small publishing office near campus.
Experience that actually connects to what you want to do after college.
Then, almost immediately, you think of the shop.
You hate that his name arrives so quickly.
You tell your manager the next day. She is kind and practical, which makes it worse somehow. Mina screams, hugs you, calls you a traitor, then says she is proud of you while threatening to steal all your shifts before you leave. Your coworkers congratulate you. Everyone acts like leaving a part-time job for a better opportunity is normal, because it is.
Only Seonghyeon does not know.
The first chance comes that Thursday, when he walks in at his usual time, shaking rain from the shoulders of his jacket. You are restocking granola. The bell rings. You look up. His eyes meet yours, and the words rise in your throat.
Instead, you say, “The usual?”
He nods, pushing damp hair off his forehead. “The usual.”
The second chance comes when he stays until closing and helps wipe tables. You stand beside him with a spray bottle in one hand, watching him carefully align the chairs after putting them down.
“You don’t have to make them perfect,” you say.
He nudges one chair leg with his shoe. “It was crooked.”
“It’s a chair, not a moral issue.”
“Crooked things become noticeable.”
He glances at you. “You notice too.”
I won’t be here after next week.
But he looks tired, and the shop is quiet, and you are afraid of making the moment strange.
So you spray the next table and say, “I notice because you keep pointing them out.”
The third chance comes three days before your last shift.
He knows something is wrong before you tell him, because of course he does.
You are slicing bananas, knife moving carefully through soft yellow fruit. The shop is empty except for the two of you, afternoon light falling across the counter in pale strips. Outside, traffic moves slowly past the window, but in here, everything feels too still.
“You talk more when you’re avoiding silence.”
“That is a very specific accusation.”
“You and your observations.”
He looks down at the counter, then back at you. “Am I wrong?”
You place the banana slices into his bowl one by one, arranging them with more care than necessary.
That is one of the worst things about him. He does not force you to speak. He simply leaves space, and sometimes that is harder to resist than pressure.
You take the peanut butter bottle and drizzle it over the fruit, watching the thin line fold over banana and strawberry.
The words sit right behind your teeth.
You have three days left to come in and order your usual from me, and I don’t know why that feels like something I should apologize for.
But when you look up, Seonghyeon is watching your hands instead of your face, his expression calm and tired and open in that quiet way he gets when he is not trying to protect himself. His laptop bag rests against his hip. One sleeve has slipped down his wrist. There is a faint smudge of pencil near his thumb.
Suddenly, telling him feels too personal.
Too heavy for a Tuesday afternoon.
Too much like admitting that somewhere between banana, strawberries, peanut butter, and granola, he became someone you would have to say goodbye to properly.
So you reach for the granola instead.
“Maybe I’m just tired,” you say.
He does not answer right away.
The granola rattles softly as you sprinkle it over the bowl.
You can feel him looking at you now.
He says it gently. Not accusing. Not sharp.
You snap the lid onto the bowl and press around the edges until it clicks into place. “That’s a very serious thing to say to someone holding your food.”
“You’re usually annoying.”
His mouth moves like he almost smiles, but it does not quite happen.
You slide the bowl toward him. “Your usual.”
His hand rests beside it, but he does not pick it up immediately.
For a second, you think he might push again. Ask what you are lying about. Make you say the thing you have been avoiding for days.
Instead, his gaze drops to the clear lid.
“You added extra strawberries, again?” he says.
You had not meant to. Or maybe you had. The strawberries sit bright and red against the açaí, tucked neatly beside the banana slices, more than his usual portion.
You try to smile. “You looked like an extra strawberry day.”
“That’s not a real thing.”
Usually, he would argue. Usually, he would tilt his head and say something strange about inconsistent serving standards or experimental fruit distribution.
This time, he only looks at the bowl.
His fingers curl lightly against the counter.
“You did too,” he says softly.
What on earth does that mean.
You look away first, reaching for the cloth beside the register even though the counter is already clean. You wipe at nothing, because if your hands are moving, maybe the rest of you can stay together.
“You say that when you’re not.”
“You haven’t known me long enough to make that call.”
You let out a laugh, but it sounds thinner than you want it to. “Of course you do.”
The silence that follows is not uncomfortable exactly. It is worse than that. It is familiar.
You hate yourself a little for how much you want to tell him.
You hate yourself more for not doing it.
His phone buzzes once in his pocket. He ignores it at first, still watching you with that quiet, steady attention that always makes you feel too visible.
He pulls it out, glances at the screen, and his shoulders shift almost imperceptibly. Work, probably. His supervisor. Another deadline. Another problem shaped like someone else’s poor planning.
“You have to go,” you say.
His eyes lift from the phone. “I didn’t say that.”
“Unfortunately, I learned from the worst.”
This time, he does smile. Small and tired, but real.
It makes everything harder.
He slips his phone back into his pocket and finally picks up the bowl. The paper bag crinkles softly as he settles it in his hand.
You can see the question still there. Not fully formed, maybe, but present in the way he does not turn toward the door right away.
What are you not telling me?
Your fingers tighten around the cloth.
Then the freezer hums too loudly behind you, and a car horn blares outside, and the moment breaks just enough for your fear to get back in.
“Don’t let the strawberries ruin your ratio,” you say.
He looks at you for a second longer.
His voice is quiet. Careful.
Then he turns toward the door.
The bell rings when he leaves, bright and cheerful and completely unaware that your chest feels too tight.
You stand behind the counter with the cloth still in your hand, watching him pass the window. He does not look back, and you are grateful for it.
You are also disappointed.
Both feelings sit together, heavy and embarrassing.
Mina appears from the back a moment later, carrying a box of paper cups against her hip.
“He didn’t stay?” she asks.
You fold the cloth slowly.
She looks from the door to you, then back again. Her expression softens in a way that makes you want to run directly into the freezer.
“You still didn’t tell him?”
You stack the cloth beside the sink. “No.”
You keep your eyes on the counter.
Because he is a customer.
Because he is not just a customer.
Because saying goodbye to him feels like admitting I was waiting for him.
Because I don’t know what I’m allowed to want from someone who only knows me from behind a register.
That is how you know it is bad.
Finally, she sets the paper cups down and says, gently, “It’s going to feel weirder if he finds out after you’re gone.”
You stare at the door long after Seonghyeon has disappeared from view.
And still, you do not tell him.
He does not come in on your last shift.
Mina tries to make your last shift fun. She brings cheap cupcakes and writes GOOD LUCK TRAITOR on the paper bag. Your manager buys drinks from the expensive café next door. A regular yoga lady gives you a hug that smells like lavender and protein powder. Your coworkers make you take photos behind the counter, and you smile in all of them because you are happy.
Still, every time the bell rings, you look up.
Every time it is not him, something in you sinks.
By 8:57, the shop is empty.
You wipe the counter slowly. The same counter where he first tapped his card too soon. The same counter where he apologized awkwardly. The same counter where he argued about blueberries and ratios and consistency. The same counter where you told him too late.
Mina watches you from the register.
“He might still come,” she says gently.
You force a shrug. “It’s Friday.”
“He doesn’t usually come Fridays.”
You fold the cloth. “It’s fine.”
Mina’s expression says she does not believe you.
You leave your apron folded beneath the counter.
And just like that, you no longer work at the açaí shop.
For two days, you hear nothing.
Which makes sense, because you never exchanged numbers.
That fact becomes newly humiliating.
Your internship starts on Monday. It is everything you hoped for and more intimidating than you expected. The office is small but busy, filled with stacked manuscripts, crowded bookshelves, half-empty mugs, and people who speak about deadlines with the weary intimacy of soldiers discussing weather. You are shown how to organize submissions, how to track edits, how to format documents, and which printer to avoid because it jams “when it senses fear.”
On Wednesday, Mina texts you.
You stare at the message in the hallway outside your lecture.
Mina: don’t insult me
Mina: peanut butter guy
Mina: seonghyeon
Mina: architecture sad boy
Mina: the man you abandoned for professional development
Mina: he asked if you were working
Mina: i said you quit
Mina: he got really quiet
You lean back against the wall, phone held too tightly in your hand.
Mina: he said “oh”
Mina: then he ordered the usual
Mina: but he didnt eat here
Mina: no
Mina: worse
Mina: polite
You almost laugh, but your throat feels too tight.
Mina: also he asked where your internship was
Mina: i did not tell him
Mina: because i am loyal and also afraid of legal consequences
Mina: but i did say it was near campus
You stare at the messages for a long moment.
The bell for your lecture rings somewhere down the hall. Students begin moving around you. You do not move.
You feel embarrassed in a way that is hard to explain. Embarrassed that he went back and found you gone. Embarrassed that you care. Embarrassed that you made him feel like he misread something when maybe he had been reading you correctly all along.
You avoid the old shop after that.
Not dramatically. You simply take longer routes. You buy coffee from different places. You do not pass the window where the table near the glass still probably sits empty at 4:17 p.m.
Knowing does not stop you.
A week passes before you see him again.
It happens outside the architecture building on campus, because the universe has a sense of humor and apparently likes watching you suffer in public.
You are crossing the courtyard with a folder pressed to your chest and your tote bag slipping off one shoulder when you see him near the steps. He is standing with a rolled tube under one arm and his phone pressed to his ear. His hair is wind-tossed, his coat open, his expression calm but tired in that familiar way that makes your chest ache before your brain can prepare.
Everything inside you panics.
You do the worst possible thing.
You turn around and walk the other way.
Not running. Technically. But with enough purpose that a stranger might assume you have just remembered a very urgent crime.
You make it about twelve steps before your phone buzzes.
You look back across the courtyard.
Seonghyeon is still near the steps, phone now lowered slightly from his ear, looking directly at you.
You answer, mostly because your body has chosen chaos.
Then his voice, quiet and familiar:
“I’m going to kill Mina.”
“So she had time to prepare.”
“She also said not to let you run away.”
“You changed direction very quickly.”
“It looked like running.”
You turn around fully now. He is still across the courtyard, phone at his ear, watching you with an expression that is difficult to read from this distance. Calm, yes. But not unaffected.
“I thought you were on the phone with someone else,” you say.
The line goes quiet for a second.
Then he says, “Because you were leaving again.”
You look down at the ground, at the cracks between the paving stones.
“No.” You swallow. “For how I did it.”
He does not answer immediately. You hear the faint sound of wind through the phone, even though he is close enough that you can see it ruffle his hair.
“You didn’t have to tell me,” he says.
You laugh once, small and embarrassed. “That’s what I kept telling myself.”
Across the courtyard, his gaze stays on you.
“It didn’t feel true?” he asks.
He is too far away for this conversation and somehow too close.
“No,” you admit. “It felt like an excuse.”
Something in his posture shifts. The tube under his arm dips slightly before he adjusts it.
“I thought I misread it,” he says.
Your fingers tighten around the phone.
He looks away first. Toward the building, toward the steps, toward anywhere that is not you.
Then, quietly, he says, “You.”
You stand there with your heart beating too hard, surrounded by students who have no idea that the courtyard has just tilted.
“I didn’t mean to make you feel like that,” you say.
Despite yourself, you huff a laugh.
His eyes return to you, and even from a distance, you can see the faint change in his expression when he hears it.
“I didn’t know how to say goodbye,” you admit.
“Why did it have to be goodbye?”
You do not have an answer.
Because it did not have to be goodbye. You made it one because it was easier to hide behind the counter until there was no counter left.
“I don’t know,” you say honestly.
Someone calls his name from the entrance of the architecture building. Seonghyeon turns his head. A man near the doors lifts a hand impatiently, gesturing toward the rolled tube under Seonghyeon’s arm.
“Right,” you say. “Of course.”
“Don’t disappear,” he says.
He studies you for a moment.
Then he nods once. “Okay.”
You stay in the courtyard after he disappears inside, phone still warm in your hand, feeling like you have just stepped out from behind something and do not know what to do with all the open air.
Not constantly. Not smoothly. Seonghyeon’s texting style is strange in a way that becomes immediately charming and deeply unfair.
Seonghyeon: is it okay that i got ur number from mina?
You stare at that message longer than necessary.
Seonghyeon: blueberries are still bad
You smile so hard it hurts.
You: did you try them again?
You: then why are you updating me?
The routine returns in a new shape.
No counter. No register. No apron.
Just messages slipped between classes and work. Short calls after long days. Pictures of badly designed chairs from him and pictures of overpriced coffee from you. He sends you a photo of a stairwell with the message: why is the railing like that.
You send back a photo of a sandwich from your internship office vending machine and write: why is lunch like that.
He replies: bad structure.
You reply: its a sandwich?
He reminds you to eat before evening lectures. You remind him that cooking instant noodles on maximum heat is how people end up with smoke damage and regret. He tells you about his supervisor. You tell him about your internship. He listens when you talk about editing like it matters. You listen when he explains building layouts with a quiet focus that makes even measurements sound personal.
He still does not ask you out.
You still do not ask him.
Mina says so several times.
“You two are emotionally dating without scheduling the activity,” she tells you one evening over the phone.
You are lying on your bed with your laptop open beside you, half an essay untouched on the screen.
“We are not emotionally dating.”
“Does he text you good luck before presentations?”
“Does he know your coffee order?”
“Did he once bring you a cookie because he noticed you were tired?”
“That was when I worked at the shop.”
“So your love language has a prequel.”
You groan and cover your face with your hand.
A few days later, after a particularly long shift at your internship and an even longer lecture, Seonghyeon calls while you are walking home. You answer with your scarf pulled up to your chin, one hand wrapped around your phone, the other holding a paper bag from a convenience store.
You smile into the cold air. “You’re predictable.”
“You ask a lot of questions for someone who avoids emotional clarity.”
Then he says, “Come by tomorrow.”
You slow down near the crosswalk.
“My workplace. There’s a café downstairs.”
“You said the food near your internship is bad.”
“I said the vending machine sandwich looked haunted.”
“You saw one blurry photo.”
The crosswalk light turns green. You start walking again, suddenly too aware of your own heartbeat.
“So you’re inviting me to lunch?” you ask.
“I’m saying the café has better food.”
“That sounds like lunch.”
“It is food at lunchtime.”
“Are you inviting me to lunch?”
You can picture him wherever he is — probably at his desk, phone in one hand, pencil in the other, expression calm while his ears turn pink.
The single word is quiet but steady.
You bite back a smile. “You’re very direct when you want to be.”
The softness of that nearly ruins you.
“Okay,” you say. “I’ll come by.”
“You changed direction aggressively.”
The next day, you spend an embarrassing amount of time getting ready for something that may or may not be lunch and may or may not be something else.
You tell yourself it is not a date.
Then you change your shirt.
You tell yourself a third time while choosing shoes, which is how you know you have lost the argument with yourself.
By the time you reach Seonghyeon’s workplace, your nerves have sharpened into annoyance, which is easier to carry. The building is taller than you expected, all glass and steel and clean lines. The lobby smells like coffee, cold air, and money. People in coats and office badges move with purpose around you, and you stand near the café entrance feeling like the only person who has not been issued instructions.
His reply comes almost immediately.
You stare at the message.
Seonghyeon: you have before
You are still glaring at your phone when you hear your name.
Seonghyeon is walking toward you.
For a second, your thoughts go inconveniently blank.
You have seen him in the shop dozens of times. Tired, damp from rain, awkwardly defending peanut butter ratios, sitting near the window with his notebook open. But seeing him here, in his own environment, changes something.
His shirt is neatly tucked, sleeves rolled to his forearms, ID badge clipped near his waist. His hair is still slightly messy, but in a way that looks less defeated and more like he gave up on perfection by choice. He looks calm. Soft-spoken. Nervous, if you know where to look.
His fingers adjust the strap of his bag once.
You recover by being annoyed.
“Your building is intimidating,” you say when he reaches you.
His mouth curves faintly. “Hello.”
“Do they charge rent per breath?”
You glance past him at the café. “This place better have good food.”
“That doesn’t mean you’ve eaten here.”
You stare at him. “For lunch?”
You feel your confidence return all at once, warm and terrible.
“You looked at reviews,” you repeat.
“You said the sandwich was haunted.”
“You were saving me from ghost food.”
He looks down, but he is smiling now. Small, reluctant, adorable in a way that makes you want to forgive him for every awkward silence he has ever caused.
His gaze flickers over your face carefully, as if he is trying to read whether you are teasing because you are uncomfortable or teasing because you are happy.
You soften without meaning to.
“I’m glad you asked,” you say.
The noise of the lobby seems to move farther away.
He shifts his bag on his shoulder, fingers curling once around the strap.
He nods slowly, like he is taking that in and filing it somewhere important.
Then, after a beat, he steps slightly to the side and gestures toward the café entrance.
“So,” he says, voice quiet, calm, and just awkward enough to make your heart stumble, “is this a date?”
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