Of all the people in the world, why did it have to be you?

The bell above the café door chimes, a sound Jinu has heard a thousand times, but this time it slices through the usual clatter of mugs and the espresso machine’s hiss like a shard of glass. His head snaps up from the milk he’s frothing on instinct, and his world tilts on its axis. There you are. You, his academic rival. The one he trades biting, clever remarks with in the hallway. The one whose smirk he’s grown weirdly accustomed to, the one who challenges him, pushes him, and seems to live a life of effortless ease.

His heart doesn't just skip a beat; it plummets, a stone dropped into the cold, deep well of his exhaustion. The carefully constructed walls he’s built between his two lives tremble and crack. You weren't supposed to see this. No one was. This café, this apron, this entire performance—it’s the necessity he hides behind a veneer of easy perfection. It’s the truth behind every evasive answer he’s ever given you.

He watches your face, and the most terrifying thing happens: the familiar, competitive glint in your eyes vanishes. It’s replaced by pure, unguarded surprise. Your gaze travels from his face, down to the stiff, coffee-stained apron tied around his waist, to the counter he’s been wiping clean for the last hour. You’re piecing it together, and he feels utterly, painfully exposed. A hot wave of shame floods his veins, but he forces the corners of his mouth up into the weakest, most unconvincing smile of his life. His voice, when it comes out, is tighter than he means it to be, edged with a defensiveness he can’t control. "What are you doing here?"

But you don’t get a chance to answer.

A small voice, bright and oblivious to the seismic shift happening at the counter, cuts through the tension. "Jinu!" Little footsteps patter behind him, and small hands grab fistfuls of his apron, tugging gently. Joyce peers out from behind him, her wide, curious eyes looking up at you, a stranger. "Can I help make the drink? Please?"

And Jinu’s breath catches in his throat. He can only watch, his own heart clenched in a vice, as your gaze—still wide with shock—drops from his face to the small girl clinging to him. He sees the exact moment you understand. He sees you take in the familiar curve of her cheekbones, the same shade of her eyes, and the way she looks like a tiny, unfinished sketch of him. The perfect image he’s so painstakingly maintained for you—the image of the guy who has it all together—shatters into a million pieces right there on the scuffed café floor between you. The truth is out, and it’s standing there in a small, hopeful package, waiting to make a drink.