VIXX | Ken (Lee Jaehwan)

Plans Can Wait

“Thank you for your hard work!”

“You worked hard today!”

The group bowed to the various staff members as they made their way back to their allocated waiting room. They had finished filming an episode for a new variety show and were eager to get back to the dorm to get some rest before going to the scheduled M-Countdown recording.

Cutie main vocal Ken was more excited than usual and his members smiled, knowing the reason behind it. Jaehwan had plans with _______, his girlfriend of a few months, and he’d been looking forward to them for weeks. Checking his phone to see if she’d contacted him during the recording, a frown flashed across his face for a split second when he saw no new notifications but he quickly decided not to let it get him down.

“Hyung, you frowned. What’s wrong?” Hongbin nudged the older boy while peering at his phone. “Did ______ say something?”

“Oh no, nothing’s wrong. She hasn’t contacted me so I guess our plans are still on.” An uncontrollable grin broke out across his face. That’s right, don’t think of it in a negative way. She’s probably just excited too and has started getting ready. Ken had a whole evening planned out for the two of them to just be together, and she only knew about the first part of his itinerary, the dinner at her favourite restaurant. Thinking of the surprises he had in store for her, he couldn’t help but give himself a mental pat on the back: if everything went according to plan, it would be an unforgettable evening.

After changing out of his performance clothes and getting the okay from their manager, Jaehwan bid his members and the staff goodbye, not wanting to waste another second before getting the evening started. He hopped into the rented car that was parked beside the group’s van, relishing the feeling of being behind the wheel again.

Driving, especially in solitude, had always been something the vocalist enjoyed, but he had gotten to do it less and less often after debut. Popping Fly to the Sky’s best-of album into the CD player, he carefully set off towards _______’s apartment as the first song began to play.

Despite having set his ringer to the loudest it could possible go, his fingers would not leave his phone alone. Every few minutes, he would take it out to see if there was anything from his girlfriend, his heart leaping at the sign of any notification only to be dismayed when he saw it was just his members chatting on the KakaoTalk group. Turning the group’s notification off so as to not have his hopes falsely lifted like that again, he clicked on her name and tapped the screen impatiently, willing a message to come through. He didn’t want to send her a message without receiving one from her because she had promised to text him before she started getting ready and he didn’t want to seem too eager.

Fifteen minutes passed with nothing appearing and finally Jaehwan arrived at a towering building in a recently developed neighbourhood of apartment blocks. Hurriedly parking the car around the corner, he dashed up the steps to the entrance and legged it up the three flights of stairs to her floor instead of waiting for the lift to come down. Reaching Apartment 3E, he rang the doorbell in the rhythm the two of them used to signal the other they were at the door and fidgeted, smoothening his hair and hiding the bouquet of roses he had stashed in the car before the recording behind his back.

Moments passed with total silence from within the apartment. He looked down at the wristwatch she had bought him for their first anniversary and frowned. He was neither too early nor too late… surely she was inside getting ready? Abandoning the bell, he rapped on the door with his knuckle.

“Jagiya? Are you in there?”

Again, silence. His brow furrowed in concern. He tried the handle of the door and to his surprise, it opened easily.