Cat Boy

11 | milkshakes and boys

The café is much livelier than usual, with more than just the two live-in baristas bustling around the space with a multitude of trays balanced precariously on their arms. It's finally back to school season after a long, humid summer, and the city, along with Café Callisto, is coming to life.

Wonpil sits on a corner table with his chin cradled in the dip of his palm. The seat of the chair digs into the bones of his butt, but it's the only free seat in the café, the rest of which is populated by laughing college-age students and stressed-looking high schoolers. And he barely feels the pain anymore, after a quarter of an hour of butt-numbing stillness helped along by the book that lies open in front of him.

It was the thinnest book Wonpil had been able to find in the cupboards stacked against one wall of the café, after Joshua had informed him that the orders would take longer than usual. His original goal in picking the thin paperback had just been to distract himself until he got his strawberry milkshake and piece of pie, but after a few turns of the pages, he found himself immersed.

The volume is a beginner's guide to constellations, with neat letters dividing the book into sections according to the constellation. There's nothing scientific about the book—it's filled with myths and stories, legends behind the names of the stars. He's always been a sucker for fairytales, and it doesn't take long for the book to suck him in.

Wonpil is three-fourths through Orion when a drink is set down on the table in front of him, casting an elongated shadow over the page. He looks up, blinking as he is broken out of his reverie, and finds a smiling Joshua standing over him with his hands on his hips.

"I hope you haven't spilled anything onto my book," he says superiorly, but there is a joking undertone to his voice.

Wonpil grins, unable to help it. He's moved about quite a bit throughout his childhood, but this is the first time he's met someone who's grown on him so quickly. If someone had told him two months ago that he'd be all buddy-buddy with a stranger who dumped coffee on him, he would have laughed, but here he is. Here the both of them are.

"I haven't actually gotten my order yet," Wonpil says with half a smile, and inserts a finger between the two halves of the book on the page he's at before closing it shut. "Service is pretty bad here."

"Oh, please," Joshua says, the same all-knowing smile playing across his lips. Despite his joking demeanor, Wonpil knows that underneath lies layers of wisdom he hasn't even begun to understand. "I had more important customers to serve."

"As probably your only friend in this city, I'm offended."

"You haven't even begun to see the extent of my popularity," Joshua says with a shake of his head and a theatrical sigh that singles him out as an art kid. "Why do you think all these people flock to this café?"

"Your brother is prettier than you," Wonpil says with a challenging incline to his head.

"We combine our charm to exercise it on the masses," Joshua answers, without missing a beat. "It brings all the girls to the yard."

"I thought that was your milkshakes."

"Aha," Joshua exclaims deliberately, "those bring the boys."

Wonpil laughs, and the door opens. He doesn't see it open, of course, the glass gates being out of his line of vision, but he feels the hot wind that ushers in at its opening, the fingers of the warm outdoor breeze tickle his face and the fringe of his hair. They both glance towards it—Joshua out of necessity, and Wonpil out of instinct. A person steps through, with the strap of her bag slung across one shoulder and hair mussed from the hot winds, a skateboard clung in one free hand.