Winter Hearts

Panos Has Some Fun

Hongbin felt the sudden welcome chill of mountain air as he opened the door and left the club, Panos close behind him. Although he had enjoyed being out and with guys who were great fun, he was glad to be outside and wanted to have some time to wind down before they returned home.

The ride up with Panos had been quiet but comfortable, as they had fallen into an easy companionship during the last week from spending so much time together.

However, Hongbin's mind was preoccupied, during the ride and during the clubbing.

Much as he had been rooting for Leo Hyung and hoping that he would follow through on whatever attraction he had obviously had for Siana from the start, he couldn't help thinking about Siana's welfare.

Even though Panos had often spoken of Siana's toughness and independence, Hongbin couldn't help feeling that Panos was worried too. As her cousin, he would be aware of Siana's vulnerabilities, which, besides Hongbin's own concerns from afar, could lay her open to attack. Hongbin could see Panos was keeping those concerns to himself - and it spoke of a deep and intimate knowledge of her that only these close cousins could have, which he didn't want to share with relative strangers, no matter how friendly they had become.

Hongbin could take a guess though, from any number of presumptions. Siana was a single child, she came from a broken marriage, and lived her life between two homes. She was striking out pretty much on her own at a young age, but even with the support of loving parents, was alone in her endeavours. He worried how a failed relationship in this particular situation would affect her - and by particular he meant a celebrity for whom she had obviously carried a torch for a long time before they had even met. What expectations would she have? Was she going into this realistically? Did she have much experience with men? Hongbin couldn't help thinking that she was going into this relationship with barely anything on her side.

Also, this was Leo Hyung, whose commitment to complication seemed inevitable.

Panos gestured to a tiny fastfood bar that served hot sandwiches and drinks. They walked in and Hongbin let Panos order two baguettes, stuffed with lamb from the gyros and slathered an eggplant and tomato concoction before it was pressed flat on a griddle. They took a seat at the tiny bar that ran along the length of the wall and the front window, facing the street.

Hongbin took a moment to text the others and found they were ready to leave the club and have some food too.

"Let's eat!" Panos said, unwrapping his sandwich and biting the top of it with relish. Hongbin took a bite of the compressed bread and was pleased with how neatly the sandwich could be consumed, despite its messy contents.

"So what do you think about this development with Siana?" Hongbin asked out of the corner of his stuffed mouth.

Panos chewed thoughtfully, pausing to take a sip of soda and swallow his mouthful. They watched as Ken, Ravi, Hyuk and Min Seok appeared from the alley and dawdled up towards their eatery. Hongbin was happy that they had had some fun, because other than the dance studio, they rarely had the occasion to enjoy music and dancing without restraint. The club had been quite full and dark and nobody had even an inkling htat they were tourists. Or at least, it was the sort of crowd that didn't care much who they were.

The boys bustled in, interrupting Panos' train of thought by peering over their shoulders at their sandwiches, then going up to the counter to look into the display fridge which held all the possible fillings and condiments that they could want.

"Do they have kimchi?" joked Ken out loud.

To their surprise, the stout little man behind the counter pulled out a commercial tub of kimchi from a corner of the fridge and dropped it on the counter matter-of-factly.