Chapter Text
“So… it’s over?” The words fall out of Taeyong’s lips and towards the floor, unsurprisingly bitter.
He’s currently upside down, head hanging off the edge of his bed, his phone’s bright screen acting as the only source of light in the pitch-black room. Hands fumble around cotton sheets before finding the phone on his stomach and bringing it down to meet his face, flushed red with all the blood rushing in. Throughout the entire duration of this phone call, Taeyong’s eyes have been squeezed shut, eyebrows furrowed. Like getting your blood drawn for 3 minutes and 26 seconds. Just waiting for it to be over. He only opens them to hesitantly squint at the screen when the silence stretches long enough to make him wonder if Doyoung was still on the line at all. He still is.
His eyes flicker away from the bright screen and find stray crumbs of the chocolate bar he was previously enjoying, scattered on the floor beneath him. Slender fingers reach out in an attempt to clean them up but to no avail. Taeyong sighs. The air rushing up his chest and down his throat is a strange sensation. After what feels like hours (but was really only 42 seconds later, according to the updated call duration), he hears Doyoung mimic him on the other end. Then Doyoung lets out a little laugh, nice and soft. It’s a laugh, but Taeyong can tell he’s being serious. He hates that he’s being serious. He really hoped this was just a joke.
“Don’t say it like that, you make it sound like we’re breaking up.” Doyoung finally retorts, accompanied by that laugh again.
Taeyong glares at the wall, and the polaroids taped neatly around his mirror. He’s sure Doyoung’s in at least half of them, as expected. They’ve been best friends since he'd smacked the back of Doyoung's head with a volleyball during high school gym class. “Well, that’s basically what we’re doing aren’t we?”
“You know one day we won't be friends if we keep doing this. I almost murdered you before we finished that last story.” It’s Taeyong’s turn to be silent. Of course, he knows.
The initial brainstorming, drafting, and pitch to the publishers was all sunshine and roses, but when it came to the actual production – the managing of schedules, the nights of yelling at each other through face time, keeping each other accountable for individual deadlines, constantly having to pick up each other’s slack over and over and over again - it became clear that collaborating with your best friend was not as easy as they hoped.
Before Taeyong can reminisce for too long, Doyoung breaks the silence. “Look, I love you and I love money, and believe me, I cannot be more grateful for the amount of money we made and the publicity we received these past 4 years. But I am being a surprisingly good person and calling it quits.”
Doyoung waits, but receives no reply.
“Think of this as me choosing you over money!” he throws in for good measure, but Taeyong doesn’t find it very touching. With a pout remaining on his face, he continues the silent treatment. A part of him wants to time 42 seconds of silence, just so it’s fair. The call duration’s at 4:36 so it would be-
“Taeyong?” Doyoung tries again, the mix of concern and annoyance echoing out of Taeyong’s phone and into the dark. “Look, I know you’re mad, but you can’t tell me you haven’t despised me these past few months either. Face it, we can’t come up with a compromise for our working styles and our compatibility as business partners is at almost zero.”
Taeyong doesn’t like that it’s true.
“I know this is your passion, and with your talent, you can reach even greater heights… but without me. I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to get stuck in another project that’ll just result in me hating you. I loved what we created together, and I’ve learned so much through working with you but,” There’s a slight pause, a quick swallow, before Doyoung gives in.
“No amount of money or success will be worth it if I lose my best friend in the process.”
Taeyong remains silent until it hits 5:18.
“Thank you,” he mumbles, finally, sitting up and grabbing the nearest pillow to stuff his face into, “for liking me over money.” It comes out muffled through the pillow pressed into his mouth, still stuck in a pout, but Doyoung hears it anyways.
“What a brat,” Doyoung scoffs, “You really needed me to say all that shit before you could be satisfied, huh?" Another pause, and then, "Get dressed. Let’s get dinner and not kill each other for once.”
--
Bitter. He hated it, but he always found himself craving something bitter when life was going to shit. It was almost a form of self-punishment, or symbolism, or making a bad situation worse. Taeyong takes another sip of his black iced coffee, the little droplets from the cold glass leaving his fingers wet. He mindlessly wipes them on his pant leg before moving back to the keyboard. Once again, he stares at the email on his screen for a few seconds, and once again, he gives up, bringing the wet glass of coffee back to his lips. It’s a never-ending cycle.
Two weeks have passed since he and Doyoung ended their partnership, and even worse, since he’s ignored the daunting email from his publishers. After dinner with Doyoung that night of the phone call, they collaborated on their last project together; an email explaining their separation to the publishers. They expressed Taeyong’s desire to keep publishing under their penname alone, along with a sincere request for an appropriate extension for his next pitch, and all the other pleasantries and apologies.
He shouldn’t have been surprised to see their reply the next morning, all understanding and sympathetic with a deadline far enough into the future to help Taeyong get settled and used to working alone. He should be more grateful, he knows. He knows he wants to keep drawing, to keep providing good content for the loyal audience they so graciously collected. But he's never written a story alone before, he's only ever drawn them out. He kind of wished the publishers weren't so nice. He kind of wished they just told him to fuck off, to not bother, to start new with a different publishing platform. He kind of wished he'd be getting an easy out.
Having a set deadline meant he’d have to give them something at some point, and he doesn’t know if he’ll have anything to give ever again. He reads over the words, as if reading it over again and again would solve his problems, or even better, just wipe the words out of existence. With a sigh, he slides off his glasses (purely for fashion, though no one’s ever asked) and pinches the bridge of his nose.
The familiar, overbearing smell of quality coffee and fresh pastries baking in the backroom floods Taeyong’s senses and works to slowly soothe his nerves. This is why Semi-Sweet, the aesthetically pleasing dessert café (just a block away from his condo!), is Taeyong’s workplace of choice. The welcoming scents, the dark wood stools, the tiny fairy lights draped all along the ceiling, the carefully chosen trinkets adorning each table, the huge plants in huge pots that seem to be placed in every spot you’d expect one to be placed – it all helps him breathe a little easier.
And on top of all that, all the boys that work here are cute. It’s perfect for the kind of inspiration he needs.
“So, now what are you going to do?” Jungwoo asks over his shoulder, eyes locked on Taeyong’s dejected puppy face but hands busy at the bar, like mixing and measuring were just second nature. His dark red hair looks a little less red in the dim section of the bar he's standing in, surrounded by syrups and brewing machines, away from the bright light of the windows. Just watching him work so effortlessly helps calm Taeyong down too. Jungwoo's his favourite barista.
Taeyong’s eyes slide away from Jungwoo’s, and down to the email from his publishers again, open and menacingly present on his laptop screen.
“I guess I just… have to start writing and drawing by myself. Doyoung allowed me to keep our penname, and the publishers are fine with me doing so as long as the quality of the content doesn’t suffer.” Taeyong wants to laugh just from saying it out loud. His voice drips with shaky confidence and he knows Jungwoo can hear it. With a sigh, he props his elbow onto the bar and leans his chin into his palm, his ash brown locks falling into his eyes. “I really don’t think I can do this alone. They’re giving me so much time before I have to pitch my next idea but, I don’t think there’d be enough time in the world.”
Jungwoo gives Taeyong an empathetic pout as he gently places the finished product onto a tray. The sound of the glass hitting wood summons Mark over almost instantaneously. Taeyong tilts his head to watch as he approaches.
Mark’s throwing the wet cloth onto his shoulder and then wiping his hands on the plaid apron, tied loosely around his waist. His walk is always confident, with purpose, like his life mission is to personally serve you the best tasting coffee and cake you’ve ever had in your life. His black hair, pushed back and perfectly gelled in place, still leaves a few strands to bounce slightly with every step.
There are other people watching him, most notably the excited high school girls in the corner table, but this is no surprise. Mark is probably the sole reason for about half of this café’s loyal customer count.
Admittedly, Taeyong’s used Mark as a sort of visual muse many times in the past, secretly, of course. Beyond Taeyong’s own personal scribbles and sketches for practice, Mark even inspired the basic character design of the young, attractive second lead in Taeyong and Doyoung’s most recent smash hit, again, completely unbeknownst to Mark himself.
A young boy with ambition, life just unrolling itself in front of him, a spotlight following him wherever he goes. Mark is the perfect inspiration for characters like that, with his perfect posture, blinding smile, and genuine desire to improve in every aspect of himself to somehow reach his dreams.
Taeyong remembers a time when he felt like that too. And then his dreams became a reality with his best friend. And then his best friend broke up with him. His mind flashes back to the bold, italicized deadline slapped on the end of the email, and aggressively breathes in the smells around him, praying for the nausea to subside.
“Mark Lee,” Taeyong whines, “Give me some of your youth. I need to be inspired.”
Mark swiftly picks up the wooden tray in his right hand and places his other on Taeyong’s shoulder. “Is it the same email you’re dreading over, or is there a new one?” Being a part-time waiter in this café, Mark’s seen his fair share of Taeyong’s slumps and artist blocks before, but the expression on Taeyong’s face right at this moment is unfamiliar. He peeks over at Taeyong’s laptop screen for half a second before Taeyong slams it shut. It startles Mark and Taeyong both.
“Sorry,” Taeyong laughs awkwardly, before Mark can apologize himself, “It’s a reflex”. He opens the laptop again to show Mark that indeed, it was the same email.
Even though Mark, and all the workers in this café knows exactly what Taeyong’s job is, he can’t help the instinctual reaction to hide his screen. It really was a reflex, reinforced by the amount of times he had worked in this very café, surrounded by people. To be fair, whenever he was really working on a scene, he’d be sitting in the corner where the high school girls are right now, back against the wall so there was no chance of anyone coming to peek. Unless they were really trying to. The feeling of unexpected eyes on Taeyong’s screen triggers his hand almost instantaneously. It’s understandable, with the kind of content he draws.
He draws manhwa. Rated R manhwa. Explicit, don't read in public, get your tissues ready, rated R manhwa. And Taeyong can draw it all, Male/Female, Female/Female, 3 Females/1Male, but his specialty is, of course, Male/Male. That genre’s got the best paying target audience. Plus, Taeyong’s always had an eye for beautiful men, and he’s always had a hand that was equally capable of drawing them out. Doyoung, during his early stages as a writer, had asked Taeyong to sketch out a scene from the erotic novel he was drafting. And on that day, at 20 years of age, Taeyong discovered his specialty in drawing beautiful men in explicit contexts. It was fun, he was good at it, and when Doyoung and Taeyong decided to team up under one penname to start publishing their work on Lehzin, this specialty of his landed them a large audience, and an even larger amount of money.
And now, Taeyong is alone. With expectations. With deadlines. He wants to vomit.
“I’m sorry, I can’t help much with inspiration,” Mark says to Taeyong, unaware of that being completely untrue. He walks towards the excited high schooler receiving her fourth drink of the day. “Iced caramel macchiato, cali-style, with soy milk.” Mark announces, in that sweet, sweet voice, placing the tray on the table and transferring the glass in front of her. He flashes her and her friends a quick smile, and she can’t even stammer out a thank you. “It must not help that Lucas transferred out earlier this week too, huh?” Mark sighs as he returns beside Taeyong at the bar, putting the tray back in its designated spot.
“Lucas,” Jungwoo half sighs, half cries, theatrically collapsing on an empty area of the bar, “I’ll miss having him here. Any time I was having a bad day, I’d just take in all that eye candy. Or, eye chocolate, I guess, since he’s a chocolatier. Whatever.”
Mark blushes at the statement but laughs anyways. “Taeyong must be feeling the same way, considering Lucas was his dream boy.”
“Not my dream boy! He was my muse.” Taeyong corrects, “His built body and nice face were just perfect for the main character I was working on in our last series.”
Unlike the situation with Mark, everyone knew Taeyong used Lucas as inspiration, mainly because Lucas himself suggested to be used. He was so excited, so honoured, to be drawn as a sexy main character in an erotic manhwa, that Taeyong couldn’t pass up the idea. It worked even better, since he was already using Mark as inspiration for Lucas’ character’s partner. God, if Mark found out he starred in that same manhwa as Lucas’ sex toy-
“Well, your muse, and my dream boy is now working at the new Semi-sweet location. You can’t use him as inspiration now. Unless you decide to hang at their location instead of this one.” Jungwoo throws Taeyong a sad look with those humongous puppy eyes. “But you would never do that to us, right Tyong?”
“How could he ever leave?”, a deep voice emerges from behind Taeyong’s back, accompanied by a heavy arm thrown over his shoulder. “He’d miss me more than anyone else.”
Taeyong turns to look at the source, Jaehyun, and he can’t help but roll his eyes at the ever-flirtatious smirk on his face. “Incorrect, I’d miss Mark the most, but welcome back from break.”
He can’t help but notice that Jaehyun’s white uniform shirt has 4 buttons opened from the top, 1 more than before, and it’s more than enough to show off his toned chest. He’s sure that that’s not allowed, but it’s not like it even mattered. If anyone can break uniform standards, it’s Jaehyun. If Mark is the source of half of the café’s loyal customers, Jaehyun is most definitely the source of the rest. And he had to be the best-tipped waiter of this café hands down.
Jaehyun chuckles, removing himself from Taeyong before circling behind the bar to grab his apron. “Are we talking about Lucas? I’ll miss that weirdo too.” A woman walks in and Jaehyun’s quick to welcome her, accompanied by that pretty smile that works hard for his tip.
Mark quickly scans the café to make sure none of the customers are in need of assistance, or worse, judging all of the staff for conversing at the bar. Everyone’s minding their business or peeking at Jaehyun. The high school girls are still shamefully staring at him though, quickly looking away when Mark's eyes reach their table. Mark still decides to grab the cloth off his shoulder and wipe down an already sparkling table nearby, just to be safe.
“Yeah, Jungwoo was just saying how much he’ll miss his eye chocolate.” Taeyong runs his fingers through his hair and ignores the way Jaehyun watches him do it. He’s long since gotten used to Jaehyun’s flirting, considering Jaehyun flirts with literally every willing person that steps into the café.
“Anyways, if I’m ever going to come up with a new series pitch, I’m going to need some inspiration. I’ve been trying to pull ideas out of thin air this whole week.” Taeyong shuts his laptop once more, crosses his arms on top of it, and lowers his head in defeat. He almost purrs at the way Jungwoo pats his hair.
With his head buried into his arms, he doesn’t hear the swing of the door opening, or the bell announcing the person’s entrance. He’s so focused on his own mental predicament and the way Jungwoo’s petting his hair down, that he doesn’t hear Mark’s excited greeting or Jaehyun’s “Dude, I didn’t know you were already starting today!” Neither does he hear the footsteps approaching behind him.
With an irritated groan, Taeyong throws his head up. “I just like to draw, damn it! Do any of you know a good writer who’d provide adequate plots leading to explicit porn with me?”
Silence.
Did he say that too loud?
He immediately catches Jaehyun and Jungwoo’s eyes behind the bar. They’re giving him an awkward look. And then they’re giving the same look to the person behind him.
The first thing Taeyong notices is the heavy smell of chocolate.
“Leading to explicit what now?” The voice behind him is equally as sweet as the scent, and it lets out a low chuckle that triggers sparkly feelings in Taeyong’s stomach. “Am I in the right café?”
Taeyong slowly turns, scrunching his face and biting his lip in preparation to apologize to this stranger for his language and most definitely not try to explain himself, but the person’s already entering his field of view and taking a seat on the stool beside him.
Chocolate, again.
This time, though, it’s his eyes. They’re dark brown, deep, inviting.
For a split second, Taeyong drinks the man in. Soft, light brown hair, parted at the middle, catching light from the window behind him perfectly, cascading his face in a way that just accentuates all of his handsome features. Big cheek bones. A nose that fits just right. Plump lips that shine wet after his tongue quickly darts across them. A devastating smile. And more importantly, big, broad shoulders, and a ridiculously sculpted chest, straining against that tight black long sleeve. He can almost see the outline of his abs, leading down towards-
Taeyong swallows involuntarily.
When he manages to get his eyes off his chest, he opens his mouth to offer that apology, but the other speaks first.
“My name’s Johnny, I’m the new chocolatier.”