Chapter Text
“Adenohypophysis”
“Adenohypophysis”
“Neurohypophysis”
“Hypophysis”
You repeated the words over and over, memorizing the sound of them on your mouth. You had a big test coming up for your Neurophysiology class and you were having some trouble keeping the parts of the pituitary straight.
“Adenohypophysis! Neurohypophysis! Hypophysis!!” You said with confidence, a little too loudly and you heard a sound. Someone behind you cleared their throat. You jumped and turned around quickly and saw a man standing at your counter wearing a face mask.
“Oh! You scared me!” You held a hand to your chest and exhaled.
He was holding a plastic bag. His eyes looked familiar and you guessed due to the location of your parent’s dry cleaners and the fact that he covered his face he may be a celebrity. That and he was dressed a little too nicely for a regular customer. You bowed your head and welcomed him and he looked at you for a moment without moving.
“Can I help you?” You asked politely and he walked closer to the counter, his eyes had a smile now and they looked at you with an amused glint in them.
“Sorry for scaring you, the door chimed right as you were shouting your…spell.” His voice was familiar too. You laughed at his joke and he looked at you with the same amused eyes.
“Oh, here.” He put the bag he was carrying on the counter and pulled out a white shirt. You see lots of clothing come through the shop. It was located in an upscale neighborhood and some of the items brought in cost thousands of dollars. This shirt was expensive. And it had a big ugly stain on it.
“Do you think this will come out?” He asked while rubbing his hand over the back of his neck. He was fidgety. You could see him lightly rocking back and forth on his feet.
You held the shirt up to see the stain clearly, trying to determine what it was. As you squinted at the garment. You furrowed your eyebrows.
“What is that? Is that baby poop?” You suddenly asked. And you heard him laugh.
“It’s curry.” He said with an adorable eye smile. You really wished he would take off the mask. He seemed so familiar.
“Ohhh yeah, curry isn’t a problem. It’ll be ready in 2 hours.” You filled out a tag for the shirt and paused at the name section.
“Ummm, you can use an alias if you feel more comfortable” you began and he looked down at your hand holding the pen.
His hand shot up to his facemask and he removed one side.
“Byun Baekhyun.” He whispered with a wink and adorable smile and he quickly covered his face back up.
It took every single ounce of self control you had in you to keep your face calm. The only reaction you allowed yourself was a small lift of your eyebrows and a polite smile.
“Byun…” You began to write slowly on the form.
“Baek..” You continued, drawing out the syllable slowly. You glanced up and he was watching you with a single eyebrow raised now. Waiting.
“Baek…what was it?” You asked. Having fun now. He looked at you with wide eyes. Then looked down and exhaled. Blinking a few times he shuffled on his feet again.
“Hyun” he finally said again.
“Ohh, right. Baek [space]Hyun. ” you wrote the names separately on the form. It was incorrect with the space in between and he was looking at it with furrowed brows. It seemed to bother him. He looked back up at you and then he looked down again at what you wrote. He sighed and took the pen from your hands and crossed it out. Rewriting his name clearly and correctly above it.
“And now I have your autograph!” You exclaimed with a smile and he looked up at you with big surprised eyes. Then you heard him laughing behind his mask as he shook his head.
“Hey! You.” He started and had to take a deep breath. He tossed the pen on the counter in a huff.
“That’s not even how I do my autograph!” He complained with an adorable whine and you laughed.
You then saw him glance down at your name tag then look back up at you.
You saw him bite down on his lip and then let it go. He clicked his tongue.
“I’ll see you in two hours.” He said and he turned and left the store. Shaking his head as he walked out the door.
You turned back to your notes and resumed chanting your way through the parts of the human brain. About an hour later you heard the door chime and you turned around to greet your customer. You were surprised to recognize the same coat and facemask as before.
“You’re early Mr. Byun.” You said in a sing song voice, your mood was light since you finished the adrenal system and felt confident in your knowledge of the parts and their functions.
He walked up to the counter this time removing his mask as he approached you. You noticed the small smile on his face and his the playful look in his eyes. He had something in his hands.
“I know my shirt isn’t ready yet but I found another one that has a stain.” He held the shirt up to you and you took it carefully from him. You felt his fingers graze against yours as you grabbed the shirt and your eyes quickly looked at his before looking down. He cleared his throat and shuffled on his heels.
He watched you as you held the shirt up to examine it. You saw out of the corner of your eye that he was looking at your face and you tried to keep your focus on the stain. The stain looked fresh. Really fresh. It was still wet. You looked back at him now suddenly suspicious and you squinted in his direction.
His big round eyes looked at you. His face was the picture of innocence.
“Mr. Byun.” You said in your sweetest voice. Your eyes trained back on the shirt.
“Did you squirt chocolate sauce on this shirt within the last 10 minutes just so you could see me again?” You cooed at him now. Why did you enjoy teasing him so much?
His eyes widened and he opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again. Clearing his throat you saw him swallow before he looked back at you. Was he blushing? You had said it as a joke but his reaction was a bit too strong. Was that really what happened?
He was silent.
“I was just joking!” You said with a laugh and he looked at you stiffly. His complexion recovering from his blush. Jeez he was pretty in person. He bit his lip. Unable to respond.
“The chocolate will take another two hours. You can come back in two hours and pick up both shirts. Or you can come in one hour for the curry, and then again in another hour for the chocolate.” You said with a raised eyebrow and he looked at you and grinned. He nodded and pulled the pen from the cup near the register along with a card. This time he signed his signature and handed it to you with a wide smile that showed his perfect teeth.
“That is my autograph.” He said and he turned and walked out the door. You stared at the door as it closed with shock written all over your face.
You were a wreck as you waited. Looking up expectantly with each door chime. Your Neurophysiology notes were long forgotten and you found yourself staring at the door, shaking your leg, trying to breath normally.
You hated not knowing if he would be back in one hour or two and you watched the clock as the first hour approached. You busied yourself with straightening the tag and collar on his curry shirt, anticipating his arrival when you heard the door chime. Your head spin around and you saw a woman enter with a bag of clothing. Your stomach fell and you greeted her lifelessly, getting her information and counting the garments. You turned around to deposit them for cleaning and when you turned back to the counter you jumped.
“Ohh!” You said out loud.
“You scared me again.” You added sheepishly. Baekhyun was back and he was smiling at you now.
“Yah, why are you so easy to startle?” He said in a friendly tone. It almost sounded flirty, but you shook that thought out of your head. You preferred to live in the real world.
He drummed his long fingers on the counter and leaned forward. He leaned a bit too close to you and you inhaled sharply.
“Is my shirt ready?” He asked with raised eyebrows and a small smirk. He was so close you could see his pink lips and the tiny birthmark that sat above the corner of his mouth. He blinked at you expectantly and when you didn’t respond he smiled. You licked your lips nervously and you saw his eyes move down to your mouth for a moment before they looked back up.
And he bit his lip.
You felt your face heat up with the way he was looking at you.
You realized you were staring at him without moving or speaking when you saw him arch an eyebrow. Your eyes flew open wide and immediately turned around to grab his curry shirt. The one you had sweetly hung up and caressed the collar of with your fingertips over and over for the last 30 minutes.
You pivoted on your heels, holding the shirt and you handed it to him and you held it out to him, your hand was trembling and you gave it a death glare for betraying you like that. He took the shirt from you and you felt his fingers touch your hand and you froze. He didn’t immediately pull the shirt away. His hand lingered and his fingers touched yours for longer than necessary until you gave the shirt a little push so that he would just take it already and put you out of your misery. You felt like you were losing your mind. You were pretty sure your entire face was bright red by now and you lowered your eyes, refusing to look up at him as you scanned the tag and told him his total.
You watched the counter surface and saw long slender fingers slide a bill across in your direction which you quickly grabbed and placed into the register. You had to give him his change. You had to give him his change. Ugh. There were coins and a bill and you considered just dropping the whole thing on the counter top and letting him deal with it. It was his fault you were like this after all. Coming in here with his eyes and his looks and that goddamned lip bite. You slowly counted out the change and held it in your hands and when you looked over you saw his hand on the counter. Palm up. Ready.
Shit
You moved you hand, with the coins inside to hover just above his open hand and you released the coins. They jingled into his hand and he closed his fist and quickly put them inside his pocket and put his hand back on the counter for the rest. You knew you were being ridiculous. And obvious. But you were just trying to survive here.
You held the bill out with your fingertips and slowly moved it toward his hand. Inching your way closer until it hovered just above his palm. You let go and you flinched when his hand closed with force, grabbing and crumpling up the bill. You watched his hand move and saw him put the bill in his pocket with the coins. Then you heard him laughing. Hard.
“I do believe that was the most interesting monetary transaction I have ever experienced in my entire life.” You looked up and he was shaking his head as he laughed, holding his belly.
“God, you’re adorable.” He said under his breath and your eyes flew open in shock.
“I will see you in an hour!” He announced and he turned and waved a hand into the air as he walked out.
You felt your legs go weak and you dropped to the floor behind the counter.
Byun Baekhyun just said you were adorable.
You pretty much just acted like the weirdest person in the world in front of him.
But he said you were adorable.
Your mind was racing and your breathing was too fast, you closed your eyes and breathed in deeply, trying to calm down. And the realization that he was going to be back hit you like a ton of bricks. Shit! You had to do this again in an hour. Should you just give up and call the ambulance now?
No. You could do this. You could be normal! You had to. For the sake of your pride.
So you distracted yourself. You turned on some music and you busied yourself with anything you could to distract yourself from thinking about Byun Baekhyun. You cleaned the counter, organized receipts, organized your notes. You refused to let your mind wander.
A BTS song came on and you found yourself dancing to it as you swept the floor. You reached the entryway that separated the front lobby from the back work area when you heard the door chime. You were all the way down the long hallway and you couldn’t see who came in but it had only been about 45 minutes so you were relatively confident that it wasn’t him.
“I’ll be right out!” You shouted to your customer and you danced your way out toward the counter, moving fast so you wouldn’t keep them waiting long. As you rounded the corner into the open waiting space you ran into the waiting customer.
You heard an “oof” as you bounced off them and you felt your footing give way with the impact. Falling backwards now your hands reached out to grab something to hold on to and you found hands that had reached out to you.
The hands swiftly pulled you back up and you were now breathing hard, in what appeared to be an embrace with a complete stranger. You looked down at the hands that held you by the elbows and you noticed the fingers were long and slender. Your face shot up and you saw him. Baekhyun’s face had a similar expression of shock as you as he looked down at you. He was inches away from you. You could smell him and your eyes were looking at his mouth. You were frozen by those pink lips. And the tiny birthmark. His lips were parted and you saw the tip of his tongue peaking out from between his white teeth. You could feel his chest rising and falling with each breath and you felt his heart beating against your chest. Your eyes moved around his face until the they reached his eyes and he was staring at you. His gaze unmoving. And his expression was unreadable. You started to come back into your mind and you felt yourself begin to move away. But you felt his hands move. They were on your elbows but as you moved to back up they wrapped around your waist and pulled you back into him. Your eyes widened in surprise and you saw him smile now as he held you close to him.
“I think this might be even more interesting than last time.” He said in a whisper.
You cleared your throat and pushed his chest a little firmer to get free from his grasp. He let go and you noticed his cheeks were pink now.
“I’m sorry.” You looked down with a blush on your face as well. “Thanks for not letting me fall.” You looked back up at him and he smiled as he approached the counter. He was quiet now and was looking at you. He watched as you walked back to the counter to retrieve his shirt. The chocolate shirt.
“Okay I give up.” He said. He ran both of his hands quickly over his face and groaned. He rubbed his eyes before quickly running his hands through his hair. He placed his hands down on the counter and he looked back up at you. His teeth were gritted together and his face looked serious now.
“I give up.” He repeated a little quieter. You looked at him questioningly. What is he talking about?
He looked down at his hands on the counter and took a deep breath.
“Can I get your number?” He looked up and squinted his eyes and looked at you through a nervous grimace.