The hum of the city felt distant once you stepped into his apartment. It was neat, but not in the kind of way that suggested warmth—more like the kind of order that came from someone who didn’t want to leave traces of himself anywhere. Papers and files sat stacked along the desk where you were supposed to work with him, the glow of a single desk lamp giving the room its only real light.

Eunhyeok didn’t glance at you at first. He moved smoothly, like this was just another job, not the first time he had seen you in ten years. He set his jacket over the back of a chair, rolled his sleeves to his forearms, and leaned casually against the edge of the desk as though your presence meant nothing at all.

“You can put your things there,” he said flatly, pointing toward the opposite chair. His voice was calm, steady, almost clinical. There was no hesitation in his tone—none of the fumbling or apology you had half expected after so long. Just smooth, detached words, as if the past had been erased.

Your boss had insisted on this arrangement, brushing it off with a careless, “You two will work well together. Eunhyeok’s sharp, you’ll keep up.” But the moment you stepped inside, the silence between you made it clear how wrong that assumption was.

You sat, opening your laptop, the click of the keyboard almost painfully loud in the stillness. Eunhyeok didn’t speak at first, only walked to the counter, pouring himself a glass of water before returning. He looked at you finally then, his sharp eyes unreadable, carrying the same weight they had in high school. Back then, those eyes had softened whenever they landed on you. Now, they felt like walls.

He leaned over the desk, scanning the sketches and designs you had been told to show him. His presence was the same as always—unbothered, calm, like he was one step ahead of the world. “Not bad,” he murmured, as if your work was no different than any other file he was handed. Then, after a beat, he added, “Still meticulous. You haven’t changed.”

The words hung in the air. They sounded casual, but you could hear the weight buried in them. You hadn’t changed—but he had, hadn’t he? Ten years gone without explanation, and here he was, talking to you like the gap meant nothing.

Your silence stretched, and he didn’t fill it. He simply shifted, slipping his hands into his pockets, eyes flicking away as though he couldn’t be bothered to linger on the thought. That old habit of his—it hadn’t left. He always avoided your gaze when something mattered too much.

At some point, you noticed his cigarette pack on the desk, unopened but present. He picked it up absently, turning it between his fingers but never lighting one. A nervous habit. For the first time, you saw the faintest crack in his composure.

“Ten years is a long time,” he said finally, voice lower, quieter. “But it looks like you managed fine without me.” He said it without a smile, without irony, but his words had a sharpness to them, like a blade wrapped in silk.

It wasn’t an apology. Not even close. If anything, it sounded like a dismissal of the years you’d waited, wondered, maybe even hoped. He didn’t ask about your life. He didn’t explain why he disappeared. He simply existed in front of you again, as though time hadn’t shattered everything between you.

You shifted in your seat, your chest tight, the memories of high school pressing in around you. The way he used to walk you home, the way his silence used to be comforting instead of suffocating. Now it was unbearable.

Eunhyeok glanced at you then, and for a moment—just a flicker—you saw something softer in his expression, something that contradicted his detached words. But just as quickly, it was gone. He straightened, walking around the desk to sit opposite you.

“Let’s just focus on the work,” he said, pulling a file toward himself. His tone was back to neutral, businesslike, as though that fleeting moment of honesty had never happened. “It’s easier that way.”