My Muse

Chapter 3: Hangout

  It'd been exactly 6 days since Young K last attempted to write any lyrics. His frequent headaches had become more incessant and even developed into a full blown series of migraines. However, this ended up working in his favour, becoming his "Get Out of Jail Free" card in order to see Hwayoung again. It would be risky to assume that she worked at the cafe everyday, but he knew for certain that she'd be there for Karaoke Night again, so he set out to do something that he hadn't done in a long time: take the whole week off. 

  You see, Young K's migraines were only really unbearable for the first 2 days, but he used every ounce of knowledge he possessed from acting classes as a trainee to pretend that he was still sick and needed to get some rest. This managed to buy him another few days. The rest of the members were understanding, of course and didn't want to push Young K too hard, so they left him on his own most of the time while they continued to work on other songs for the comeback. 

 Two days before Karaoke Night, Young K's slyly concocted another plan using the cup of warm coffee that Jae so kindly delivered to his room every morning. He simply slipped his thermometer into it, unbeknownst to the other members, and all that was left was putting up a sluggish appearance in front of them and to deliver the bad news of a high fever.

  After what seemed like an eternal moment, Saturday arrived and Young K was all set to sell his story. Dragging himself out of bed, he informed the members that he was going to the doctor to get checked out and purchase some medicine. Of course, he'd taken the preemptive measure of stubbornly refusing to go under the request of other members on multiple occasions. This made him wanting to leave the house voluntarily much easier and even a relieving idea. However, he did face a little trouble when Dowoon offered to keep him company at the clinic, but Young K insisted that he should go alone because he wasn't in the mood to chat anyway, and it would be far more boring for Dowoon than himself.

  When his manager also gave him the green light, trying to hide the bounce in his steps, he quickly grabbed his mask, hat and personal belongings and set off. That night, the air was a little warmer than it had been a week ago and the moon beamed with a softer glow, but Young K didn't mind too much. After all, he had just quarantined himself out of his own free will in his house for a week. Being outside was already enjoyable enough. 

  Excitedly, Young K traced his steps back to the cafe and found himself there at 8.30pm. He deduced that by public transportation, it would take him around 20 minutes to get there from the dorm and decided to make a mental note of it in case it would be important in the future. That is, if this wasn't potentially his last time seeing Hwayoung.

  Speaking of which, where is she?

  Young K scanned the crowd in the cafe as he entered through the glass doors. His heart sank, soon realising that Hwayoung wasn't anywhere to be seen. He even took a seat at table that was closer to the stage in hopes that perhaps she was somewhere out of his sight, but a secondary glance around confirmed that she wasn't in the room. 

  Suddenly, all of it seemed crazy to Young K. Had he really just spent a week waiting around to see some girl he barely knew, only to be have the odds stacked against his favour? Young K felt like leaving the cafe and going back home with some of his dignity intact and he probably would have if a familiar face hadn't stopped to take his order. 

  "May I take your order?" Joonhyung asked politely. This took Young K by surprise and he stared at him for a few extra seconds just to make sure that it was actually Joonhyung talking. His tone today seemed considerably more welcoming as compared to his demeanour last week. 

  "Uhm, just some iced coffee is fine," Young K replied, absentmindedly inspecting the menu. Joonhyung scribbled the order down onto his notepad before leaving to take more orders.

  When he came back with the mug of iced coffee, Young K thanked him and assessed that the atmosphere between the two of them was good enough to ask him about the whereabouts of Hwayoung. It was only after this question was posed that Joonhyung's warm deposition became much colder, though still not as bad as it had been last week.