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Let’s make one thing clear- Jung Hoseok isn’t a professional waiter by any means. A poor, starving college student? Yes. Friendly and charming? Also yes. Attractive? He gets enough numbers on the bottom of checks that yeah, it’s probably safe to say he’s pretty easy on the eyes. But an actual waiter, by profession instead of necessity? Nope.
Waiting jobs just tend to work for him- the hours are generally flexible, he gets to move around a lot and socialize as part of his job, and, not to brag or anything, but Hoseok’s good at waiting. He’s nice and sociable and tries his best to treat customers like friends instead of inconveniences. Sometimes this leads to Hoseok not making it through all that many customers in a night, as he’ll talk and joke with every table that he can, but the tips and the smiles on people’s faces as they leave make it worth it.
The past six months, however, haven’t been having great for Hoseok in terms of employment. Every restaurant he’s worked at -five, at this point, which is ridiculous- has somehow managed to go out of business within a month of him working there. The causes have ranged from rodent infestations to the kitchen catching on fire to someone being actually murdered at the bar (thank god Hoseok hadn’t been working that day) and he’s honestly getting a little fed up with it all. It’s like a black cloud of bad luck is following him around, and bills don’t care if Hoseok’s jobs quite literally go up in flames through no fault of his own.
So now he’s on the hunt for a job again, because if Hoseok wants to keep his apartment he needs a decent paycheck (and soon, because rent is due in just a handful of weeks). Honestly, he’s close to cracking and just taking a cashier job at the closest gas station just so he doesn't have the constant fear of eviction hanging over his head. But every time he makes up his mind and starts walking, he thinks of the one and only time he’d tried to apply for a job there, wherein the manager had propositioned him within two minutes of them sitting down to discuss the job application, and Hoseok always decides he’d rather have his dignity than whatever mediocre paycheck the gas station would provide. So waiting is his only bet, and at the moment, jobs are scarce.
He’s out today to buy groceries with the tragically small amount of money he has left that isn’t set aside for rent, ready to buy as many ramen cups as the store will sell him. In fact, Hoseok is so deep in thought trying to mentally figure out totals so he won’t get to the store checkout and have his card get declined, that he walks right past the sign that reads “WAITERS NEEDED” in bold, mahogany letters.
It takes him a solid ten seconds to process what it said, and when he does, Hoseok screeches to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk and practically knocks a woman over in his haste to go look at the sign. “Sorry!” he calls behind him as he runs, darting around people and eventually screeching to a stop in front of a window where the sign is hung.
“Three positions open, act fast!” the sign commands, and goes on to describe the benefits one would get for doing just that. Flexible hours, health and dental benefits, and an “above minimum starting wage” sounds really, really nice. Too nice, even. Hoseok’s never worked at a restaurant with baseline benefits anywhere close to being as excellent as these, and he can’t help be a little suspicious. There has to be a reason a simple waiting job is so lucrative.
Still, he’s considering it, as long as he’s not contract locked for long. Money is money, after all, and as long as he’s not being forced into anything illegal, Hoseok will take it. Maybe this is finally the lucky break he’s been hoping for.
However, while he stares at the sign contemplatively, debating on whether or not to go into the restaurant, a tired-looking blonde woman appears and takes it down from the window. His heart drops and disappointment floods him. But the woman has a marker in her hand, and instead of removing the sign, she scribbles something on it and sets it back onto the windowsill.
“Four positions open, act fast!” the sign now reads, and maybe that should be a red flag, but Hoseok is too relieved to care. His employment history is impressive enough that he’ll definitely get the job. He only has to work here long enough to pay this month’s rent- after that, he can quit and find a a less sketchy place to work.
Groceries forgotten, he steps into the revolving door of the restaurant -it’s called The Raven, of all things- and puts on his best, most hirable expression as he enters.
It’s- wow. It’s sort of like walking into a Hot Topic, if that Hot Topic was aggressively modern and built to resist a bomb. All of the furniture -the tables, the bar, even the backs of the chairs- is built from smoky gray glass, and the walls are painted a deep obsidian. The windows all have thick shades over them, entirely obscuring the outside world from view, and the only source of light in the restaurant comes from lights inlaid in the ceiling that have something that look like chicken wire protecting them.
The really strange part, though, is that everything in the restaurant is very, very, sturdily built. Reinforcing plates cover every corner of the furniture, and everything that isn’t reinforced is thick and tough-looking- the glass of the tables looks bulletproof. The tables and even some of the chairs are bolted to the floor.
Distracted by his odd surroundings, it takes Hoseok a minute to notice, but then he’s suddenly struck by the realization that the restaurant is also entirely empty, despite it being around noon on a Friday. Nothing’s set up on the tables, no one’s tending the bar or in the kitchen- it’s eerie.
Saying this whole thing is weird would be understatement, but Hoseok is too desperate to really question it, so he walks deeper in the restaurant in search of the staff member he’d seen earlier.
He finds her next to a silvery metal door -it looks at least five centimeters thick, which is disconcerting- typing into tablet so fast it’s a little scary. The only indication that she’s aware of his presence at all is the way she turns slightly towards him, not even bothering to look up.
“Hi,” he begins, bowing and offering her his brightest smile, “I saw the sign in your window about needing waiters?”
She doesn’t spare him a glance, instead continuing to type intently on her tablet. “Cool, you’re hired.”
Hoseok stares. “I am?”
She nods. “Unless you don’t want to be?” Her voice is entirely deadpan.
“Don’t you need my resume? And don’t you want to interview me?” Hoseok’s not trying to lose his opportunity, here, but The Raven is sketchy enough that the gas station is suddenly seeming pretty reputable in comparison.
“Turnover here is high enough that we don’t need to,” she replies casually, and that sets off further alarm bells in Hoseok’s head.
“Can I ask why?” he says carefully.
She shrugs. “People come and go a lot. It’s a lot of pressure working here and most people can't handle it.”
“So that’s why the benefits are so good,” he mutters to himself, careful to be soft enough that the woman can’t hear.
“Yeah, they’re nice if you last to your first paycheck,” she says with a scoff, and Hoseok blinks at her in shock. How did she-
The woman finally glances up at him, and he meets ice blue eyes that are so entirely dead he can’t look at them for long without shivering. “You can start Saturday, if you want. I’ll get you a uniform.”
She presses her hand to the metal door, which lights up white around the space she’s touching -is that a fingerprint scanner? What the hell?- and the door slides open. She’s already through it and gone by the time Hoseok recollects himself enough to be able to ask the many, many burning questions he has.
At least he has a job, now? With better-than-decent benefits and a first shift already scheduled?
This isn’t how Hoseok expected to spend his day, but he’s sure as hell not complaining. He’s not sure what the woman meant by “a lot of pressure,” but Hoseok’s been waiting for a few years now, and he’s confident he can take whatever it is. Even the worst customers, the kind that yell and make a scene and demand to speak to the manager, he’s handled time and time again with grace and poise and a smile on his face. He’s got this.
The woman reappears just then, throwing a black lump of cloth at him that he just barely catches. He laughs a little in embarrassment, and the look she fixes him with is entirely unimpressed.
“Show up at six PM, you’ll be here till two,” she tells him curtly. “Your first paycheck comes in four weeks. We’ll talk how much you’ll make then, and you’ll be compensated fairly for the work you’ve done. If you back out early, you don’t get paid. You get two half-hour breaks you can take whenever you want so long as you tell someone first.”
She sounds very rehearsed and robotic, like she’s given this speech a million times before. She probably has, considering the turnover rate she mentioned. “How long have you worked here?” Hoseok asks curiously.
“Two years,” she replies, and he gapes at her. If most people don’t even survive two weeks, according to her, how could anyone last that long? Hopefully he won’t look anywhere near as empty as she does by the time he quits.
“That’s- impressive,” he manages, unsure of what else to say. “Can I have a copy of the menu so I can learn it for Saturday?”
“You won’t need one. You’re starting on hosting until I trust you.”
“Oh, okay. That’s fine.” Hoseok’s good enough at hosting. It’s not as socially in-depth as he’d like, and he won’t get tips for it, but with the paycheck he’s hopefully receiving, he’ll survive a shift or two as a host. “Anything else?”
“One more thing.” She shoves the tablet at him. “You need to sign this NDA.”
Hoseok blinks at the screen, takes in a lot of complicated legal terms, and glances back up at her. “Why do I have to sign this for a waiting job?”
The woman looks like she’s trying not to roll her eyes. “Restaurant policy. Sign it or don’t bother showing up tomorrow.”
So Hoseok signs the tablet with his index finger, doing his best to scan the terms of the contract and ignore the woman’s piercing gaze observing his every move. It looks very strictly binding- he can’t talk about the job on social media outside of saying that he works at The Raven, he can’t discuss anything he did on the job after he quits, and if he breaks the agreement he’ll be sued so far into oblivion that it’ll be the legal equivalent of being dark-web assassinated. Hoseok decides right then and there he'll never breathe a word of this job to anyone.
“Thank you, see you Saturday,” the woman says tonelessly, taking her tablet back the second he looks up, attention already off of him again.
“Are you going to be my manager?” he asks, feeling a little awkward. She’s clearly dismissed him already, but Hoseok would rather not walk into work on Saturday, know no one there, and be subsequently traumatized by going through an entire shift without any help.
“Okay then, manager-nim, what should I call you?”
She pauses her typing at that, and looks at him again with that same empty gaze. “You can call me Laura-ssi,” she says after a moment.
“That’s not a Korean name,” he blurts, and that finally brings a ghost of a smile to her face. It’s far more intimidating than pleasant.
“I’m aware of that, thanks,” she says, almost amused.
“Sorry, Laura-ssi,” he says. “I’ll just- be going now, I guess.”
“You do that,” she replies, still with that ever-so-slight grin.
“See you Saturday then!” Hoseok gives her his most charming grin, marches out the door, and the moment the sunlight hits his face he shudders like he’s just been dunked in ice water.
“What the hell,” He breathes as he shuts his eyes against the harsh rays of the sun. “What the hell, what the hell, what the hell.”
He has a job, and despite employment being a source of constant worry for him over the past two weeks, it’s somehow now the least interesting and important thing he’s been through in the past hour. The Raven is weird. Hoseok’s never been in a place like that in his life, and working there will definitely be an experience, to say the absolute least.
It hits him then properly that he’ll be able to pay his rent, now, and Hoseok lets out a whoop so loud a passerby on the other side of the street stares at him like he’s insane. He waves excitedly at them, and they shoot him a look of pure disgust before stalking off. Hoseok just laughs full and loud and heads back towards the grocery store with a skip in his step. Maybe he’ll splurge and buy something that doesn’t come out of a ramen cup. After all, he’ll need the energy to survive whatever Saturday will bring.
~0~0~0~
It’s five thirty on Saturday night, and Hoseok is looking at the door of The Raven in trepidation. He can hear bass beats of music inside the restaurant from here, sinking into the concrete of the sidewalk and making it shake ever so slightly.
He carefully straightens the lapels of his suit and sets one gloved hand on the door but doesn’t push on it. Hoseok had been stunned when he’d gotten home, examined the bundle of clothes he’d gotten, and discovered it to be a suit. A very cheap one, yes, but a suit nonetheless, complete with with white silk gloves that make him feel absurdly fancy. The suit itself is plain black and wrinkled because of Hoseok’s lack of care and further lack of an iron at home to fix it. He kind of feels like a knockoff Monopoly man, but so long as it passes muster he doesn't really care.
Hoseok takes a deep breath and finally slips into the revolving door, because being early to one’s first day at work makes a good impression, and he steps into the restaurant with no idea of what he’s going to see. What kind of people go to such a gothically-decorated restaurant, anyways? Edgy teenagers? Middle-aged parents attempting to stay hip?
Neither, it turns out, because everyone dining in The Raven is wearing a suit, or, in the case of a few people, fabulously expensive-looking evening gowns. The place is loud- the music is low, bassy R&B that fills the dining area and makes a quick home in Hoseok’s bones. People have to talk extra loudly to be heard over the music, so the dining area is a cacophony of chatter and music and silverware clinking. The sound is beautifully familiar to Hoseok, and he smiles to himself as he walks.
He meets the eyes of a few diners as he moves deeper into the restaurant, and all of them have ice cold gazes and look him up and down with distaste. One middle-aged woman looks him up and down with a smirk so openly lecherous that Hoseok can barely resist the urge to wince.
He catches sight of Laura at the host podium, looking as bored and exhausted as she always does, and practically runs over to her. “Laura-ssi!” he exclaims, and she briefly glances up at him.
“You’re early, good. Last hostess quit two hours ago and I need you to take over. You’ll get paid extra for this.”
Hoseok will never say no to more money, and he’d shown up early for a reason, so he moves to stand beside her in the booth. “You weren't kidding about the turnover rate,” he remarks lightly.
“I wouldn’t joke about that,” she replies, entirely serious, and Hoseok frowns a little. “Anyway, you know how to host, right? System here’s the same as it is everywhere. You’ll be fine.” She shoves a tablet into his hands, larger than her personal one, and heads off deeper into the restaurant before he can say a word.
“Thanks, that’s really helpful,” Hoseok huffs, but he steps up properly behind the podium and greets the first customer to walk in -a woman wearing a pinstripe suit and carrying a violin case- with the brightest grin he can muster. She stares him down with empty eyes, and his smile quickly wilts.
“If you’ll follow me, customer-nim, I’ll show you to your seat,” he says politely, and she follows obediently as he takes her to a booth in the back of the dining area, where she carefully sets the violin case in the space next to her like it’s her baby. “Do you play professionally?” he asks, and she looks up at him with that same hollow expression, totally lost.
“Play what?”
Hoseok has no idea what to say to that, so he just shakes his head and drops the topic. “Your server will be right with you, enjoy your meal.” Thoroughly unsettled, he avoids even glancing at that area of the restaurant for as long as he can for fear of meeting the woman’s haunted gaze.
Despite the customers and the strange looks he’s getting, Hoseok ends up falling back into the feel and swing of working in food service quickly enough. It feels a little like coming home, and though the environment is dark and oppressive, Hoseok smiles at every customer he sees. A few of them even offer halfway genuine smiles back, and he counts that as a win.
Right after seating a particularly scary man wearing solid red contacts, something flies right past his head as he heads back to his podium, making an odd buzzing noise as it moves. Hoseok flaps his hand near the spot, trying to shoo away whatever insect is bothering him. A moment later, he catches sight of the wall behind him in his peripherals and sees a knife lodged there, right about at Hoseok’s head level. Had that always been there? Even for the odd decoration taste of The Raven, knives in the walls seem like a bit much. Hoseok brushes it off and keeps working.
When it hits about nine, the steady flow of customers slows to more of a drip, and Hoseok decides to take his first break. He flags down the first waiter he sees, who introduces himself softly as Hyungwon, and trades his spot at the host podium for a bench in the back room. Hoseok’s not in the system yet, but a waitress had taken pity on him after watching him fight with the scanner on the door for five minutes straight and let him in. The back room is huge, much bigger than the average restaurant, and there’s doorways against the far wall that suggest it’s even larger than what he can see. It’s still dark and dreary like the rest of The Raven, but Hoseok is rapidly becoming immune to the decor, so it doesn’t bother him the way it would have even a few hours prior.
He’s doing nothing, just messing around on his phone and wondering if he can get free dinner from the kitchen if he asks nicely, when Laura walks in. She opens a metal drawer, one of many adorning the walls, glances into it, and types something on her tablet. Doing inventory, maybe? Moving to the next one, she repeats the process, all without ever once acknowledging Hoseok’s presence.
That’s pretty much the norm for her, though, so Hoseok decides to try and be social.
“Hey, so I’ve been meaning to ask,” he begins cheerfully, and Laura hums without looking up from her tablet. It’s as good of a go-ahead as he’s going to get, so he continues. “Why’s the decor the way it is? No offense, but it kinda looks like a movie villain's lair, or a mercenary hangout.”
Laura takes a long time to respond, and she actually stops typing for a second. It’s hard to tell, but her already pale face seems to grow even paler. “Uhhh,” she says blankly, after a pause that stretches a little too long, “it’s based off of...Edgar Allan Poe’s aesthetic?”
Hoseok looks at her for a moment, then smiles. “Oh, that’s cool! It’s like a theme restaurant!”
She visibly relaxes. “Yep, exactly that.”
The door whooshes open, and Hoseok turns to glance at the waiter that walks in. He’s middle aged and tired looking, and he carries a wicked looking scar over his left eye. “Jisoo-ssi just quit,” he announces without fanfare. “Stormed out.”
Hoseok stares at him, stunned by his utter lack of inflection despite just losing a coworker.
“How long did she last for?” Laura asks, somehow managing to looking even more apathetic than the waiter.
“Three weeks,” he answers, still entirely toneless. It’s a little like listening to the Google voice talk. He hasn’t looked at Hoseok once, and he’s very glad for that fact.
Laura nods at that. “Not bad. Send someone to collect her uniform tomorrow and remind her about her contract. Tell her her final payment will be sent within a week.”
“Yes, Laura -ssi,” he says, and the waiter is gone as quickly as he’d appeared.
“Congrats,” Laura says, turning to him. “You’ve been promoted.”
“Wait, really? I don’t even know the menu-”
She waves a hand. “Everyone here is a regular. Write down their orders and the kitchen will figure it out.”
She turns behind her and opens one of the drawers she’d been previously leaning on, pulling out two different folded fabric napkins. One is folded in the standard cradle for silverware, and the other is in an odd, bulky triangle. “There’s one thing you cannot mess up, though. Every customer gets one of each of these when they sit down. You screw this up, you skip someone, you’re fired. Got it?”
Hoseok stares at the napkins and nods slowly.
“Good.” Laura opens another drawer and throws him a black apron from it. “Good luck, don’t do anything stupid, and if anyone gives you any trouble, let me know.”
“Yes, Laura-ssi,” he replies, still a little off-balance, and she pats his shoulder a little too roughly as she walks out.
Hoseok busies himself first with tying the apron around his neck, careful to tie it tightly. The action is soothing in its familiarity, and when he’s done he takes a deep breath and moves to grab a few sets of the napkin bundles. He’s got this. Hoseok’s a good waiter, and he handled hosting fine. Waiting won’t be too much worse.
The silverware bundle is standard-issue for most restaurants, but the triangular napkin is strangely heavy. Hoseok is tempted to unfold it and see what’s inside, but he doesn’t want to waste a perfectly good folded napkin if he can’t figure out how to put it back together. He’ll see someone open one at some point while he works, he’s sure.
Hoseok reenters the restaurant, the music too-loud in his ears again after the period of relative quiet he’d been through, and heads back over to the hosting station. Hyungwon is still there, looking exhausted, but he offers a wan smile to Hoseok when he sees him. “Your section’s back there,” he says, tilting his head towards the back corner where violin lady had been earlier. “It’s the six tables closest to the wall.”
Hoseok thanks him and heads over. Only four of the tables have people at them, and two have their food already. He picks one of the other two tables on a whim, and bows at the woman and man sitting there. They nod back, looking tense and uncomfortable, but Hoseok guesses from the position of their arms that they’re holding hands under the table. Odd.
“Hello, I’m Hoseok and I’ll be taking over for Jisoo-ssi this evening,” he begins, pushing past it. “Have you ordered drinks and appetizers yet?”
They haven’t, so Hoseok collects their orders and glances around for the kitchen until he finds it, the heads over to put the order in and get drinks ready. The wine they’ve ordered is more expensive than his entire apartment. He delivers it dutifully, and moves to the next table like clockwork.
Hoseok works until midnight without issue. The customers are cold and professional, but he works hard at charming them, and is pleased to learn that with the right combination of cheer, flirting, and efficiency, most of the people he serves soften up enough that he doesn't feel uncomfortable or nervous around them at all by the time they leave.
The tips turn out to be ridiculous. One woman left him a million won. A man with bright pink hair and a diamond nose piercing left him a ring with a giant ruby set in the center, along his number on the bottom of his check. With the tips he’s made tonight alone, Hoseok could probably pay his rent for at least two months and have money for other things left over. He can eat things that aren’t ramen every day, now. He can buy that Supreme hoodie he’s had his eye on for a while now with the really soft inside. He can dye his hair red again and get it done professionally for once.
The idea of not being poor for once makes Hoseok giddy, and he practically waltzes through the restaurant, bundle of napkins in hand as he moves to set up a table. On the way, he accidentally bumps the edge of a table with his hip - it hurts, those reinforced tables are no joke- and drops one of the triangular napkins on the ground. Hoseok bends over and picks it up quickly, then notices it’s become unfolded around the edges. Realizing he’ll have to fix it before he can put it on the table, he tries to tuck the corners back in, but somehow only succeeds in further unfolding it. Frustrated, he resolves to just return it to someone who actually knows how to fold the triangle, but then Hoseok finally catches a glimpse of what’s inside of the bundles.
He drops the napkin again like it burnt him.
There’s a gun inside of it. For the past three hours, Hoseok’s been handing out guns to every single customer he’s served in The Raven.
He can’t breathe, all of a sudden. He needs to leave now, before he screams or makes a scene and gets himself fired (or shot, apparently, because he has to worry about that now). He roughly pushes past everyone he sees, desperate to go somewhere where he won’t have to think about the gun, and eventually he finds himself in the bathroom.
It’s quiet inside, the silence a too-sharp contrast to the chaotic symphony of the dining area, and Hoseok can hear the panicked beat of his heart as he locks himself in a stall, leans against the door, and puts his head in his hands. His lungs feel overfull and empty at the same time, and he can't remember how to breathe in an even rhythm. His mind is racing so fast that he can’t think at all- his thoughts are too muddled and harried to untangle.
Hoseok lets out a weak noise that might be a sob. Catching sight of his apron as he tries to get his breathing in check, he remembers that he has four or five guns in his pocket at the moment and claws at the knot, desperate to get as far away from the weapons as quickly as possible. The knot he’d tied so carefully earlier does its job, though- he can’t remove it.
After a few frantic, fruitless moments of trying, he finally just ducks and steps his way out the apron, draping it over the side of the stall and then pointedly looking anywhere else.
Hoseok doesn’t quite know what this place is, still, but there’s definitely something illegal going on behind the scenes. That would explain the non-disclosure agreement, the turnover rate, the customers, and, of course, the guns. He can barely bring himself to even think the word. Anyone he’d served that night could have, were they unsatisfied with their service, shot him with the very weapon he’d handed them with a smile and a wink.
They hadn’t, though, and Hoseok isn’t sure if that’s because everyone in here has some semblance of a conscience or because he really is that good of a waiter. Regardless, he’s not complaining. But now he has a decision to make- does he stay until he gets his first paycheck and quit, or does he take the tips he’s made and walk out now, like a sensible person?
It should be an easy choice, but Hoseok is as much of a slave to capitalism as anyone, and financial security is still an alluring prospect. Plus, if he stays and dies on the job, he won’t have to worry about rent anymore. But then Hoseok considers that dying would forcibly stop him from finishing college and getting a dog and doing whatever other adult things he wants to do, and suddenly the idea of staying seems a little less appealing.
“Fuck,” he hisses out with a sigh. “What do I do?”
“You okay?” someone asks from outside of the door, voice low and gravelly, and Hoseok yelps and flinches so bad he nearly trips into the toilet.
“Who’s out there?” he demands, glaring daggers at the stall door like the person outside will be able to see it and be appropriately intimidated.
“Someone who can help you out,” they answer, sounding amused. “You name your problem, I’ll name a price, and I’m sure we can work something out.”
“Wait, are you, like, a hitman?” Hoseok anxiously checks the lock on the stall door like it’ll somehow protect him if things go wrong. Waiting on criminals is one thing, but actually having meaningful conversations with them? In private, where no one would hear him get murdered? No thanks, not for Hoseok.
The guy laughs, a surprisingly cute sound. “Among other things.”
“I don’t need that then, you can just go away and forget this ever happened, thanks for the offer but I’m okay-” Hoseok’s rambling, he knows, but he’d lick the toilet seat if it got the actual hitman outside of his door to leave him alone.
“Are you lost?” the hitman’s voice is almost concerned now. “You don’t sound like you belong in a place like this.”
Hoseok can’t help but scoff. “I didn’t know what I was signing up for when I agreed to work here, trust me.”
The hitman hums in understanding. “So you’re a waiter, then. Most of them don’t last long, I’ve heard.”
“Shocking,” he mutters, and the hitman laughs again. Hoseok finds he kind of likes the sound of it.
“If you come out, I’ll give you some tips on how to seem like you belong in this kind of life. It might help,” he offers, and try as he might, Hoseok can’t detect anything malicious in the hitman’s voice.
“You’re not gonna kill me or anything, right?” he questions.
The hitman snorts. “Unless you’re paying me to, nope.”
That’s all Hoseok needs to hear, and he cautiously unlocks the door and peeks his head out of it, finally catching sight of the hitman.
“Oh, you’re short,” he says before he can stop himself, and the hitman scowls darkly at him. He’s also very pretty, with bleached hair and sharp feline eyes, and he wears his suit with the kind of dignity and poise Hoseok can only dream of emulating.
“Maybe I will kill you,” he threatens, but there’s no heat behind his words. Hoseok smiles. Just another -admittedly cute- customer to charm. He can do this.
“So, hitman-ssi, what can you teach me?” Hoseok leans the front half of his body out of the stall and runs a hand through his hair to fix it. The hitman’s eyes follow the motion, and he clears his throat awkwardly. “First of all, I’m a mercenary, not a hitman. Secondly, don’t call me that. Suga-ssi is fine.”
“I repeat my question, then, Suga-ssi.”
He beckons Hoseok out of the stall, and he complies, waiting uncomfortably as Suga looks him up and down with a critical eye.
“Keep doing the flirting thing you’re doing, that works well,” he says at last. “Shows you’re not afraid. You’re not so delicate that you have to be extra aggressive to compensate for it, but you are attractive-”
“Aw, thanks!” Hoseok chirps, and Suga huffs in annoyance.
“-so people are going to harass you. Flirt back if you want, or shut them down, but if things start to go south get up in their face and tell ‘em to fuck off.”
“That’s not really how waiters are supposed to act, you know.”
“Waiters aren’t supposed to give out guns with the silverware, either, but that’s what you’ve been doing all night,” Suga points out, and Hoseok has to concede him that point. “The worst thing that’ll happen is you losing your tip, and your safety matters more.”
Hoseok nods and leans against the bathroom stall. For a mercenary, Suga’s being quite nice to him. To be fair, Hoseok doesn't have a ton of experience with criminals in general, so they could all be like this, but he’s been pleasantly surprised by his experience so far.
He tells Suga this and cackles when the mercenary honest-to-god blushes. “Consider yourself lucky you met me instead of some of the other assholes in here,” he says. “I hate this place.”
“Then why are you here?” Hoseok asks.
Suga sighs. “Business. Contract negotiation, specifically.”
Hoseok nods and hopes he won’t continue, because he’s not sure he wants to hear about the things Suga does when he’s not being nice and helpful to waiters in restaurant bathrooms.
Thankfully, Suga seems to pick up on this too, because he awkwardly gestures towards the door. “You should probably get back to work,” he suggests, not unkindly.
Hoseok then remembers he hadn’t told anyone where he’d gone, and he’s thus abandoned at least four tables. Not a great thing to do on his first night on the job- or any night, really, but it’s especially bad when he’s still so new.
“Shit,” he hisses, snatching his apron from out of the stall -with the guns still sitting in it, which he decides not to think about- and slipping it back on in record time. Suga watches him while pretending to examine his reflection in the bathroom mirror, amused by Hoseok’s panic.
“It was nice meeting you, Suga-ssi,” he calls, halfway out the door and barely remembering to bow. “Thanks for everything.” He can’t catch Suga’s reply before he’s already out the door and back to work.
His heart skips a beat every time he sees blonde hair for the rest of the night.
~0~0~0~
By the time Hoseok’s been working at The Raven for a week, he has a handle on how things work. As long as he doesn’t think about the guns they don’t bother him, and beyond that the place really is just an edgy version of the average upper-tier restaurant. Suga’s advice has been helpful, and Hoseok now receives enough jealous looks from the rest of his fellow waiters whenever he counts tips that he knows the customers like him more than most of the other staff. It’s strangely flattering to know that a bunch of hardened contract killers find him charming.
Hoseok’s been doing so well, in fact, that he’s honestly considering sticking around for more than just his first paycheck. No one’s ever been shot or hurt while he’s been on shift, and the money’s so good that he actually goes and gets his suit dry cleaned every couple of days now. He’s even thinking about buying a new one at some point.
He hasn’t seen Suga again, but he catches himself looking for him whenever he has a moment of peace.
Today, he’s taken the afternoon shift, and he’s just about to go on his lunch break when one of the newer waitresses -her name is Wheein, and she’s sweet enough that he knows her resignation is imminent- tells him that someone’s requested his service.
His first thought is that Suga’s back and asking to see him, and his heart leaps. He checks his hair in his reflection on one of the tables, and practically skips over to the area she’d indicated, glancing around for his favorite not-technically-customer.
A few seconds of searching reveals that Suga isn’t there, and Hoseok’s shoulders slump in disappointment.
“Hey, you’re Hoseok, right?” A man with a voice the consistency of honey is sitting alone at one of the tables, and he smiles at Hoseok when they make eye contact. He looks like something out of a classical painting, with silvery hair, regal features, and entire universes caught up in his eyes.
“That’s me,” Hoseok says, trying not to let his confusion be visible.
“Wow,” he breathes, looking Hoseok up and down like he's a piece of fine art. “You really are pretty.”
This interaction has gone from weird to “abort the mission” very quickly, and Hoseok takes a step away from the table. If things start to go south, get up in their face and tell ‘em to fuck off, he remembers Suga telling him, and he squares his shoulders and looks the man dead in the eyes. “Who recommended me to you?” he demands, an edge to his voice.
The man raises his eyebrows. “Yoongi-hyung. You know him, I’m sure. He likes you.”
“I don't know who that is.” Hoseok’s memory isn’t infallible, of course, but customers here tell him their names so rarely that they tend to stick in his head.
The man stares at him for a moment, something undecipherable in his eyes, and then he lets out a laugh. “You ever met a Suga, then?”
“You know Suga-ssi?”
The man seems to find this even funnier, and he almost hits his head on the table as he laughs. His smile is less perfect when he isn’t trying so hard to be debonair, and it looks a little like a rectangle. Despite being still on edge, Hoseok can’t help but find it kind of charming.
“He didn’t even tell you his real name? Smooth, hyung,” he says when he recovers. “I’m V, by the way.”
“Aren’t you doing the exact same thing Suga-ssi did?” he asks skeptically.
V grins. “Yeah, except I’m not madly in love with you -yet, of course, I’m open to the prospect- and my alias is actually cool. It gives me an air of mystery.”
“Okay then,” Hoseok replies indulgently. “If you see him, tell him I say hi, please.”
“Sure thing, Hoseok-hyung,” V says with a two-finger salute. Hoseok isn’t even going to question the honorific.
“Just between you and me,” V reminds him, scooting across the booth seat to lean close to Hoseok, “His real name is Yoongi. Min Yoongi.” V straightens back up and smiles pleasantly.
“Don’t tell him I told you that, okay? Thanks!” And with that, V abruptly hops out of his seat, brushes past Hoseok, and leaves the restaurant.
Hoseok stands there in the aisle for a minute, stunned, and he lets out a long breath. “Okay then.” He decides to clean up V’s table and put that very strange encounter out of his mind until he can think about it when he doesn’t have half a dozen other tables to concern himself with.
V didn’t even order drinks, but Hoseok discovers he did steal his complementary gun, which Laura won't be happy about. Other than that, cleanup is quick, and Hoseok is soon back to work as usual. Ten minutes later, though, he reaches into the pocket on his apron to grab silverware and finds a very expensive-looking watch in it. On the interior of the band, there’s a phone number written and a little smiley face. Against all reasonable judgement, Hoseok adds the number in his phone, wipes the ink off with a napkin, and puts the watch on. It glints in the low light of The Raven, and for some reason wearing it makes him feel just a touch more confident, like he finally fits in with all of the stupidly wealthy criminals that frequent the place.
It doesn’t take long after that for him to pick up on the eyes following him around the restaurant, because apparently Hoseok will never be able to get through a normal shift (an oxymoron, really) working this mess of a job. He’s developed a pretty good sense over the years of when someone is staring at him, a helpful skill in the food service business, and when he turns around, sure enough, he meets someone’s gaze across the dining area. It’s Suga, of all people, watching him intently.
He doesn’t look away even when he meets Hoseok’s eyes, so Hoseok waves and attempts to explain through enthusiastic hand gestures that he’s going to go on break. Judging by the stares he gets from both nearby tables and Suga, it doesn’t work out, so he gives up, darts off, and lets the host on duty know where’s he going.
He collapses into the seat across from Suga a minute later and smiles warmly. “Suga-ssi! Thanks again for the help the other week.” Should he call him Yoongi? Is that too much?
Suga’s answering smile is smaller than Hoseok’s but equally joyful. “Hoseok-ah. You seem a lot happier than the last time I saw you.” Something in his expression looks conflicted, despite his kind words, and Hoseok wants to ask what’s wrong, so he does.
“You met Ta- V,” Suga says, voice even and clearly hiding something.
“I did,” he replies. “He called you Yoongi-hyung, though, so I assumed you two were close. Are you rivals or something?” Do mercenaries even have rivals? How does one get a rival in the killing-people-for-money business?
Suga shakes his head no, so Hoseok will probably never know the answer to any of his questions. “Close is...a way to put it.”
Hoseok nods like he understands even though he doesn’t. “He gave me a watch,” he adds, rolling up the cuff of his suit jacket to show it off properly. “And his number.”
Suga snorts. “That’s a very Taehyung thing to do.”
So V’s real name is Taehyung. Good to know. “Can I call you Yoongi-hyung, by the way?” he asks, and Suga sighs.
“I was hoping to introduce myself properly without Taehyung-ah being a brat,” -Hoseok lets out a surprised laugh at that- “But yeah, go for it.”
“Cool, nice to meet you properly then, Yoongi-hyung,” he says, holding out a hand.
Yoongi takes it, amusement dancing in his eyes. “Does the bathroom not count?”
“If you want our first date to have been in a bathroom, that’s fine by me, but I personally prefer the ‘romantic restaurant date’ idea,” Hoseok quips.
“Ah, so we’re dating now,” Yoongi says with polite interest. “How nice.”
“Married, actually,” Hoseok corrects, trying desperately not laugh. “We had a beautiful ceremony in Busan.”
“Of course, how could I forget?” Yoongi tries for a sentimental smile that’s a little too wide and gummy to be good acting, but cute all the same. “You tripped walking down the aisle.”
Hoseok breaks at that, laughing so hard he flops over against the wall. Yoongi looks delighted.
“This has been...romantic,” he says when Hoseok manages to sit himself upright, sounding apologetic, “but I should’ve left ten minutes ago.” The table is empty, and Hoseok assumes he’s already paid his check.
He’s disappointed but doesn’t let it show. “Mercenary stuff?” he asks, and Yoongi nods. “Unfortunately.”
There’s a pause where Yoongi gets up and slips on a leather jacket over his suit- an odd look, but one he pulls off annoyingly well- and then he smiles at Hoseok, almost shy. “Do you always work at this time? I’ll start coming more often.”
“I thought you hated this place?” Hoseok asks.
“I think the staff is starting to make me change my mind,” Yoongi replies, and before Hoseok can even process that Yoongi’s smiled at him one last time and left.
“That smooth fucker,” he marvels, and heads back to his section with a smile on his face.
(Twenty minutes later, he reaches into his apron pocket and finds a silver bracelet inlaid with what looks like sapphires there. There’s a note wrapped around it, and from it Hoseok receives his second phone number of the day. Honestly, he’s just impressed that both Taehyung and Yoongi have jewelry like this lying around.)
~0~0~0~
When Laura asks him after one shift to come in on a Friday, Hoseok is initially very confused. He’d been under the impression for several weeks, now, that the restaurant was closed that day. And that’s not technically wrong, he learns. Fridays are reserved for important guests- the kind of people with the real power and influence in Seoul, the kind that make their normal clientele seem pathetic in comparison. If no one important enough asks for a reservation -they get many a request from egotistical small-time gang leaders that go unfulfilled, apparently- then The Raven just stays closed that day.
When he walks in through the door on the first Friday he’s worked since being hired, the restaurant is dead quiet. No music, no voices- even the kitchens are totally silent. Hoseok’s first concern is that he’s here at the wrong time, until someone in a cheap suit with their tie undone -a waiter for sure- pops out of the door to the back room and drags Hoseok in, smacking his hand over Hoseok’s mouth when he opens it to ask just what the hell is going on.
The waiter releases him as soon as the door closes again and disappears. The back room is in a state of utter chaos, which is saying something, because most of the time it’s already a mess. People are slathering on makeup like they’re attempting to poorly reenact the Baroque period, and several girls are wearing dresses, a deviation from the normal dress code of suits for everyone. A bottle of hairspray slips out of someone’s hands and flies across the room, nearly hitting Hoseok in the head, and they shout, “god fucking dammit!” with the inflection of someone who’s just watched their dog get hit by a car.
“Alright, idiots!” Laura has hopped up on a couch against one wall, arms folded and face tight. “He’ll be here soon. Line up for the drawing.”
There’s instantly a variety of groans and what almost sounds like a sob, along with a confused noise from one of the newer employees that Hoseok very much empathizes with. He gets in line, still very much confused about what’s going on -Hoseok is always in the dark working at The Raven, both literally and information-wise- and watches people pick sticks from Laura’s hands. One girl gets a particularly long stick and immediately sinks to her knees, laughing hysterically and clutching it to her chest like it’s a winning lottery ticket.
When it’s finally Hoseok’s turn, he smiles at Laura politely before plucking a stick out of her hands fearlessly. It’s very easy to be brave when one has no idea what’s going on, he’s found. It also helps that the sticks are uncooked spaghetti, which makes him laugh as he grabs the closest piece.
It’s small, a few centimeters in length at the most, and the waitress behind him catches sight of it and gasps. “He drew the short one!” she crows, and the sigh of relief that goes up through the room is comical.
“What does that mean?” he asks, still lost, and the palpable relief in the room immediately shifts to pity.
“You see, Hoseok-ssi,” one of the hosts begins, voice gentle and sympathetic in way that’s very concerning, “Whenever a particularly important guest shows up, they have to be waited on-”
“Dammit Jisung-ah,” a waiter snaps -he was the one who lost the hairspray earlier, and his hair currently looks like an angry red hedgehog- “Don’t make it weird like that.” He turns to Hoseok and smiles apologetically. “You have to be the main waiter for today’s guest.”
He watches Hoseok like he’s waiting for him to break down weeping or praying or something, but Hoseok just shrugs. “Okay. When are they gonna show up?”
Laura checks her watch. “He should be here right now, actually.”
It’s like a stampede- everyone is instantly across the room and fighting to see out of the door, hoping to catch a glimpse of the guest. Hoseok watches them for a moment, laughing, then moves as close to the door as he can get without being blocked by the crowd of bodies.
“I’m gonna go say hi,” he announces.
One of the busboys, a kid named Soobin that most likely isn’t legal and definitely shouldn't be working in an environment like this, grabs his wrist before he can even take a step. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?” he hisses. “That’s Kim Namjoon out there! He’s the most influential handler in Seoul! You come when he calls, not whenever you feel like it!” Several other staff members nod empathetically along with his words.
“That was very expositional,” Hoseok remarks, and pries his arm out of the boy’s grip.”I’ll be fine. I’ll just introduce myself and take his drink order.”
“It’s your funeral,” a waitress mutters, but she moves to let him through the door, and the whole staff watches with baited breath as Hoseok strides across the floor of the restaurant, shoes clicking on the hardwood and echoing through the dining area. He approaches the table and offers Kim Namjoon, scariest handler in Seoul, his most disarming close-eyed smile. “Good afternoon, customer-nim,” he begins, “I’m Hoseok, and I’ll be your waiter today. Can I start you off with something to drink?”
“Do you have Coke here?” he asks, voice pleasantly low, and okay, Kim Namjoon apparently likes soda instead of fine wine.
“We do,” Hoseok tells him. “Will that be all?” He’s not sure they do, actually, because no one’s ever ordered soda since he’s been here, but someone on the wait staff will be able to scrounge something up. Hopefully.
He finally meets Kim Namjoon’s eyes, and temporarily forgets how to breathe because damn is he handsome. But then the most terrifying handler in Seoul smiles at him, and all Hoseok can focus on is his dimples, and he decides right then and there that he can’t possibly be scared of someone who looks that cute smiling. “That’ll be it. Thank you, Hoseok-ssi,” he says, so Hoseok nods awkwardly and disappears back into the kitchens, where most of the staff has now migrated to in order to gossip and shoot conspicuously inconspicuous glances at Kim Namjoon’s table.
“Do we have Coke?” he asks the room at large.
“No, but give me five minutes and I’ll run and get you some,” a waitress offers.
“Does he have five minutes?” a waiter whispers. “I’ve heard Kim Namjoon shoots people who aren’t punctual.”
“I’ve heard he kills people for just looking at him the wrong way,” someone else hisses back.
Hoseok tilts his head and stares at them. “He has dimples and he asked me for Coke,” he says. “Are we talking about the same person, here?”
“I guess he might seem nice on the outside, but he he runs the scariest mercenary guild in Seoul,” one of the chefs supplies, because apparently everyone in The Raven ate a book of facts about Kim Namjoon for breakfast that morning, “One wrong move, and,” he draws a finger across his throat, “It’s all over for you.”
Now, Hoseok won’t attest to being the world’s best judge of character, because lord knows he’s made mistakes before, but something about all of these rumors doesn’t seem to fit with the Kim Namjoon currently sitting in the booth outside.
“That’s ridiculous,” he huffs. “There’s no way he’s that bad. No one here is.” And it’s true. Despite the guns and the suits and the terrifying looks in some people’s eyes, personality-wise no one he’s spent any real time with has fit his mental stereotype of the cold-blooded mercenary he’d expected when he’d first started working. Kim Namjoon won’t be any different, he’s sure.
The waitress from before busts back into the room, panting, and slaps a bottle of Coke into his hand. “I had to shoplift this to get it in under five minutes,” she gasps out.
“Thanks, but that really wasn't neces-”
She waves a hand and moves to go collapse against one of the counters. “Save it. If you tell me I could’ve not committed a crime to get that for you, I’m going to scream.”
Hoseok wisely decides to stay quiet and instead fill up a cup -a wine glass, because that’s the first thing someone handed him- with Namjoon’s drink. He slips back out the door a moment later and heads back to the table, setting the glass on the table with a smile.
“Oh, I didn’t order wine,” Namjoon says. He doesn’t sound ready to kill Hoseok, further cementing his opinion that the rest of The Raven’s staff is wrong about him.
“There’s Coke in it, I promise,” Hoseok tells him. “That was just the first cup someone handed me.”
“Are you new here?” Namjoon asks as Hoseok sets a straw on the table. “None of the servers have ever talked to me before.” His tone is light, conversational.
“Would you like me not to?”
Namjoon looks surprised for a second, but he shakes his head and smiles. “Not at all, Hoseok-ssi. It’s a nice change.”
Curiosity -and maybe stupidity, too- makes Hoseok a little braver than usual. “Everyone else is afraid of you,” he admits. “My coworkers are all in the kitchen, spying on me and fearing for their lives.” He decides he won’t tell Namjoon about the straw drawing- yet.
Namjoon laughs, and it’s a warm, pleasant thing that doesn’t sound anything like how a terrifying mercenary handler should. “Really? People think I’m that scary?”
“I don’t,” Hoseok says before he can stop himself. “To be fair, though, I’ve been working here two weeks. Maybe I haven’t heard enough horror stories yet.”
“They’re terrifying, I’m sure,” Namjoon agrees with a chuckle. “I probably shoot puppies or blow up orphanages in my spare time.”
Hoseok can’t help but laugh at that. “You monster,” he says overdramatically, hand over his heart. “I can’t believe you’d do things like that.”
“Me either,” Namjoon laughs, and Hoseok has to stop himself from doubling over under the force of his own mirth. He has to retain some semblance of professionalism, after all.
“Alright, customer-nim,” he says upon recovering, order pad and pen at the ready, “Have you decided on a main course?”
Is it just his imagination, or does Namjoon look a little disappointed? Regardless, he orders without incident, and Hoseok smiles a goodbye at him and makes his way back to the kitchen. About halfway there, he stops, turns around, and glances at Namjoon’s table, weighing a decision in his head.
“Kim Namjoon-nim?” he calls, and Namjoon pokes his head around the side of the booth curiously.
“Yeah?”
It’s a stupid idea, he knows, but Hoseok has a pretty good track record with stupid ideas, so he pushes forward. “Would you like some music while you eat? I can put some on.”
There’s a long beat of awkward silence that feels even more choking in the totally empty restaurant. Hoseok is fairly sure there’s someone currently in the kitchen writing out his will in case this backfires.
But Namjoon grins wide, and Hoseok can’t help but smile back. “Yeah, that’d be great!”
So Hoseok takes a detour over the the hosting station and turns on the music. The first track that comes up on the restaurant's playlist is some bassy Drake song he’s heard but doesn’t know by name, undoubtedly put on by some bored staff member that wanted to listen to more than just R&B on their shift. Hoseok just hopes Kim Namjoon likes rap.
It’s nice to move through the restaurant with that ever-present bass in his bones again. It makes the whole place feel alive, like the bassline is The Raven’s heartbeat, and Hoseok loves the feeling.
He swings by Namjoon’s table on the way to the kitchens, about to ask if his choice of music is fine, but when he arrives he finds Namjoon eagerly bopping along with the song, mouthing the lyrics and tapping the tune of the bass onto the tabletop with a finger as he moves.
It’s stupidly endearing, so Hoseok leaves him to it, merely brushing by the table to go put Namjoon’s order in without catching his eye.
Hip-checking the door of the kitchen open, Hoseok goes so far as to do jazz hands as he greets the rest of the staff. “I lived!”
“Are you making him listen to Drake?” a busboy bursts out incredulously.
“Making is the wrong word,” Hoseok replies as he hands his order ticket over to the small group of chefs all leaning against the same counter, hunched together like a flock of very stressed birds. “He likes Drake, so it’s more of an allow, I think.”
The poor busboy looks like he’s going through an existential crisis on the spot. Hoseok shrugs. “I told you guys he’s not that bad.”
“Well yeah, but no one believed you,” someone points out.
“You want me to go sit with him the whole time his food gets made and talk to him as proof? He’d let me,” Hoseok challenges. In truth, he has no idea if Namjoon would allow that or not, and he doesn’t particularly want to ask, so he desperately hopes they won’t take him upon it.
But two minutes later, he’s standing in front of Namjoon’s table with a sheepish grin on his face. “Kim Namjoon-nim?” he asks, and Namjoon glances up at him from where he’d been typing on his phone intently, humming along with the current song playing. “Yeah, Hoseok-ssi?”
Hoseok offers his best charming grin, runs a hand through his hair. “Want to help me prove a point?”
Namjoon does, thank god, so ten minutes later Hoseok is sitting across from him at the booth and discussing, of all things, the student debt crisis. It’s quickly turned into an anticapitalist rant -at least, on Namjoon’s end it has, and Hoseok firmly agrees with most of his points- and the discussion feels like something he’d do in the dining hall at his college, not while waiting on the leader of a mercenary guild. It feels too normal, too mundane for that. He’s enjoying himself, at least, so Hoseok does what he’s been doing a lot lately and decides to just go with it.
At some point, a ding comes from the kitchen, accompanied by something that sounds a lot like- the screech of a dying owl?
“Do you keep birds here?” Namjoon asks him, visibly confused.
“No,” he sighs, “that would be my coworkers.”
Namjoon lets out a startled laugh. “They seem like an interesting bunch.”
“To say the absolute least,” Hoseok replies dryly, standing up. “Your food will be right out.”
“So, who did the owl impression?” he asks upon reentering the kitchen, watching the chefs finish plating with a level of intensity that wouldn’t look out of place in an operating theatre.
No one owns up to it, unsurprisingly. “Kim Namjoon-nim found it funny,” he informs them, and the room is still silent, but one waiter elbows another and grins, and that’s probably the closest thing to an admission Hoseok’s ever going to get.
The head chef hands him the tray with Namjoon’s food on it, still adjusting some of the decorative herbs on the side, and the moment the plate is in Hoseok’s possession he begins to fidget anxiously.
“It looks great,” Hoseok says with the best comforting smile he can offer, and heads back out to deliver Namjoon’s food.
He leaves the check behind with the food too, because someone else will have to go out and take care of payment -why, Hoseok’s not sure, but that’s apparently the standard procedure- and hops up onto a counter to watch his coworkers draw spaghetti sticks again and act like they’re getting selected for the Hunger Games. It’s just as entertaining as it was the first time, especially because Hoseok now knows Namjoon is entirely harmless.
When Namjoon leaves for good, Hoseok slips out of the kitchen to collect his tip, heading to Namjoon’s table as everyone slowly gets ready to leave, gossiping and laughing to each other. They’re different people off the clock- the relaxed, pleasant young adults they were before taking this job.
On the bottom of his check is a phone number -and Hoseok isn’t even going to attempt to process that for a good long while- and, next to it, a surprisingly well-drawn laughing emoticon and a note. Hoseok skims it, frowns for a second, and then bursts into laughter.
“Hey guys,” Hoseok announces a minute later, waltzing back into the kitchen. Everyone quiets instantly and turns to look at him, thirsty for more stories of the infamous Kim Namjoon.
“Namjoon-ah says hi,” he tells them, smiling widely, and the looks on their faces are priceless.
~0~0~0~
Hoseok’s never seen anybody get shot while working at The Raven, despite there being more guns than wine glasses out on the dining floor at any given time. He’s a little concerned, though, that tonight will be his first brush with violence.
He hadn’t seen the table in question get seated, having not been in charge of their section, but then Seungkwan had tripped while he was working and hit his head on one of the tables, and suddenly they were his problem.
...Actually, at this point, “problem” would be a compliment that they don’t deserve.
“Fucking say that one more goddamn time-“ one of them roars at the other, leaning very closely into his personal space. As Hoseok watches, he slams his hand on the table and knocks over a whiskey glass, which -unfortunately for whoever’s in cleaning duty that night- immediately starts leaking into the hardwood floor.
“Deaf and stupid,” the other hums, taking a casual sip of his wine and looking infinitely more composed. “What a combination. I’m impressed you’ve made it so far in this line of work.”
The first mercenary lets out a noise like an angry bear and moves to slap the wine glass out of the other’s hand, but the latter blocks the hit fluidly. “You touch me again and I’ll break your arm so bad you’ll wish I’d cut it off instead,” he says coolly, effortlessly relaxed and dignified.
At this point, a fair portion of The Raven, both wait staff and customer alike, are watching the spectacle with rapt attention. Hoseok’s never heard the restaurant so quiet before. Even the music is something low and dramatic, because even their Spotify playlist has a sense of theatricality.
Hoseok has yet to intervene, self-preservation instincts very much in working order, and instead hangs near an empty table just out of the line of sight of the scarier mercenary, waiting.
It’s only when the first mercenary pulls out a gun -not the complimentary one, but a beast of a shotgun pistol that scares Hoseok just looking at it- and points it at the second one that he decides to act. “I don’t have to touch you to end your pathetic fucking life,” the mercenary snarls, and the other one laughs, the sound airy and light.
“Sirs,” Hoseok begins as he approaches the table, holding himself so tense he’s surprised his muscles don’t already ache from the effort, “We don’t tolerate violence here.”
Once, when Hoseok was eleven, his dog had run out into the street and almost gotten hit by a car. He remembers the fear he’d felt- it moved through his body like a lightning bolt, fast and powerful and scorching everything in its wake. He doesn't feel that way now. Instead, this fear is dark and creeping, leaving him uncomfortable in his own skin and unable to breathe properly. There are dark spots hovering around the edges of his vision.
Hoseok might actually die here, and he’s not ready for that.
The first mercenary turns slowly to look at him, gaze thunderous. He doesn’t move the gun, though, and that’s the only reason Hoseok hasn’t fainted. “Stay the fuck out of this,” he hisses. “You’re lucky I haven’t shot you ye-”
The second mercenary, taking advantage of his opponent being thoroughly distracted, slams his palm into the first one’s face, and with a thunk his head hits the metal panelling of the booth behind him-
The gun goes off.
It echoes, loud enough to ring in Hoseok’s ears long after the actual shot is finished, and several diners gasp. The second mercenary, though, had the foresight to duck before he had attacked, so the shot goes harmlessly over his head and lodges itself in the wall.
The mercenary actually stands up and bows, offers a grin to the crowd. “Looks like he got his just desserts, right?” he jokes, like he hasn’t just been through a near-death experience.
There are several groans from around the room, and the mercenary laughs, high and hiccupy and very unlike his earlier cackle. Daintily sitting back down and ignoring the unconscious body next to him, he glances curiously at Hoseok, who’s still entirely frozen in place.
He offers a brilliant, model-perfect smile. “Contract negotiation, right? You know how it is.”
Hoseok does not, in fact, know how it is, and he fixes the mercenary with the best glare he can while staying within the bounds of etiquette he has to follow as a waiter. He needs to go lay down. He needs to take a month off and have quite a few therapy sessions. He needs to figure out why in the hell he’s still working this job when he’d almost just died.
“I’m gonna go take my break,” he hears himself say faintly, and the mercenary’s expression shifts to one of concern. It suits him oddly well -every expression suits him well, actually, he’s gorgeous- but Hoseok can’t really appreciate that right now.
“How about you go to the bathroom, wash your face off, and come back here, okay?” he suggests, kind and pleasant, and Hoseok, not really in any space to protest, nods and heads to the bathroom in a daze.
He vaguely remembers splashing water on his face and drying it, watching his dead expression in the mirror with detachment, but the next time he feels fully aware again is when he’s sitting uncomfortably next to the mercenary. The unconscious body of the other man is nowhere to be found.
“I’m Jin,” he says with a smile that’s a little too smooth and charming to be entirely genuine, and they shake hands. “I’m sorry you had to see that.” He sounds like he means it, oddly enough.
Hoseok’s sorry too. The trip to the bathroom helped, and time is rapidly dulling the memory of how afraid he’d felt, but he still wants nothing more than to go home and sleep for a week.
“Please, try not to almost get yourself shot in here again,” he says dryly, filter eroded by what’s probably rapidly setting in shock. “For both of us.”
Jin snorts. “Trust me, I’ll do my best. This isn’t my idea of a fun evening either.”
“That makes two of us, then,” Hoseok says, and lays his head down on the table. Somewhere in the back of his mind, his sense of professionalism is screaming obscenities at him, but he can’t bring himself to give a damn. The surface of the table is nice and cool, anyways- why would he want to move?
There’s a rustling from his right, and then a jacket is being gently draped over Hoseok’s shoulders. Shifting his head just enough that Jin comes into his line of vision, he raises an eyebrow in an attempt to convey his confusion.
“It’s the closest thing I have to a shock blanket,” Jin explains. “You should probably go home. Or to the hospital, if you’re allowed.”
Home sounds fantastic, but it’s not an option. “I still have tables left,” Hoseok grimances, sitting up and rolling his neck in a futile attempt to feel a little more alert. Curse his sense of responsibility. “Have to finish my shift before I can do that.”
The look Jin levels him with is nothing short of incredulous. “You, a civilian, nearly got shot, and your manager won’t let you go home until the end of your shift?” He looks ready to get up and go fight for him, and Hoseok lets out a weak laugh.
“No, my manager wouldn’t mind, but we’re understaffed as is, and I shouldn’t just leave.” His shift is only what, another three hours? He can handle that. Possibly.
Jin shakes his head, almost amused, and rests a gentle hand on his forearm with a sympathetic half-smile. “Go home, Hoseok-ssi. They’ll survive without you.”
Jin must have magic powers of persuasion, because Hoseok finds himself nodding before he can stop himself. “Okay.” Shrugging off Jin’s jacket, he moves to hand it back to him, but all the other does upon receiving it is gently set it back on Hoseok’s shoulders.
“Keep it for now,” Jin says with a grin. “I’ll come back.”
And Jin does. It takes two days for Hoseok to come back to work- when Laura heard about what had happened, she sent him home with profuse apologies and a check with so many zeros on it it made his head spin just looking at it, and he’d decided not to quit- but within an hour of his first shift back Jin is sitting at one of the tables.
Hoseok is feeling much better than he was the first time they’d met, so he greets Jin with a little wave as he hands him his napkins. “Good afternoon, my name is Hoseok,” he says, just to see what Jin will do. “Can I start you off with something to drink, customer-nim?”
“Don’t ‘customer-nim’ me,” Jin replies with a laugh. “We’ve been through a near-death experience together, call me hyung.”
“How do you know I’m not the hyung here?” Hoseok teases.
Jin looks him up and down pointedly. “I will give you a hundred million won as a tip if you’re actually older than me,” he deadpans.
“Damn,” Hoseok sighs. “Now I wish I was old like you.”
“I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that,” Jin sniffs, and Hoseok laughs.
They continue with their easy banter as Hoseok takes Jin’s order and leaves to put it in, and he hums as he heads back over to deliver the mercenary’s wine. He likes Jin’s company far more when they’re not being held at gunpoint, he’s learning. Maybe they could even be friends someday, like he and Yoongi and kind-of Namjoon. (He steadfastly ignores the part of him that hopes beyond that.)
But when he arrives back at Jin’s table, the mercenary is gone, no trace of his presence left behind.There’s a note on the table, at least, and Hoseok swallows his disappointment as he moves to read it. He’s probably not just in the bathroom.
Hoseok-ah, it reads (and all on the back of a Gucci receipt, of all things), had to take a call I couldn’t ignore. Sorry! I’ll come back tomorrow and get my jacket. With love, Seokjin-hyung.
Hoseok scoffs and picks up the receipt, ready to fold it and put it in his pocket, and then notices the stack of bills left folded underneath it. A quick count totals the money at a million won, and he slips the money into his apron.
“You’d better be back tomorrow, hyung,” he tells the note firmly, like it’ll answer him, and sighs as he goes to put the wine back.
~0~0~0~
Hoseok has just gotten off of his lunch break, is just about to go ask Hyungwon where he’s going to be working for the rest of his shift, when a scream rips through the restaurant.
His first thought is that it’s a small child in danger, because the sound is very high-pitched, but when he whirls around in alarm to find the source, he sees a middle-aged man on the ground, being kicked forefully by a short blonde guy. Blondie’s attacking so viciously that he’s partially falling over from the force of each impact.
The guy is screeching like a banshee with each kick, curled up in a ball on top of what looks like a mess of broken electronic parts that are probably stabbing him in the ribs every time he tries to move. Hoseok sighs, gets ready to play peacekeeper again, and decides he’s going to ask for a raise after this.
“Sir, please stop kicking him,” he intervenes, using his most placating voice. “Whatever happened, we can sort it out without violence.”
“No,” the guy snaps, meeting Hoseok’s gaze with electric blue eyes that crackle like fire, “we can’t.” Hoseok takes a step back and holds his hands up in surrender. He’d rather not be next on blondie’s hit list. His ribs definitely couldn’t take it.
“This asshole’s been putting cameras in the bathroom,” he explains, kicking him in the stomach again for good measure. The man moans pathetically, curling up into himself even further as blondie watches dispassionately.
Hoseok has no idea how to handle a situation like that, but he agrees that it’s a situation that very much needs to be handled, so he gestures vaguely towards the back room and says something about fetching his manager.
“You don’t have to do that,” blondie says darkly, glowering at the pathetic lump of a man on the ground. “I can take care of him, make sure he learns his lesson.”
“Legally, I can’t let you kick some guy’s ass in the middle of the restaurant,” Hoseok explains, and blondie pouts at him. He really shouldn’t find that cute, should he?
“If I go outside, it’s not your problem anymore,” he offers. “Would that work?”
Blondie really wants to beat this guy up, apparently, and honestly, Hoseok can’t blame him. He’s not a violent person, doesn’t really condone things like this, but in this case, maybe it’s okay to turn a blind eye to it. The police aren’t really an option, after all.
Hoseok sighs, makes his decision. “If you go out the side door, the one next to the bathroom, there’s an alley out there where no one will see you. Do whatever you want.”
Blondie’s eyes light up, which is a little concerning considering he’s so elated about committing an act of violence, and he throws the guy’s mostly unconscious body over his shoulder with impressive ease. “Thank you!” he chirps. “I’ll come back in for lunch after I’m done.”
“Don’t kill him?” Hoseok asks, because he doesn’t want his moral ambiguity to lead to someone’s death. He may no longer be within the realm of strict moral goodness, but he’s not that bad of a person.
Blondie shakes his head and smiles placatingly. “Of course not. I wouldn’t want to make you have to clean up the mess.”
“Thanks,” Hoseok says faintly, and blondie offers him a cheery wave as he heads outside to go kick some ass.
When he comes back in about fifteen minutes later, there’s a spring in his step as he picks and empty table and plunks himself down. Bathroom Camera Asshole is nowhere to be found.
“Hi again,” Hoseok says pleasantly, setting down a set of silverware and a gun for him. There’s a bit of an awkward pause as Hoseok considers what to say. So, how’d beating up that guy go? Is there a body in the alley I should be dealing with?
But blondie makes the decision for him. “Don’t worry about him, he won’t be coming back here ever again,” he hums as he unwraps his gun, checks it over, and sets it on the seat next to him. “He won’t be putting cameras anywhere else again, either.”
The evidence now points pretty strongly to blondie having killed him, despite his earlier promise, and Hoseok gulps. “Did you-” he begins, can’t bring himself to finish the sentence.
But blondie shakes his head immediately. “No, he’s still alive, I promise,” he assures Hoseok with a smile that’s too sweet to belong to a mercenary. Hoseok wonders, briefly, how he ended up in this life, beating people up in alleyways as a form of justice. “I’m hoping to screw him over a bit more, though, so he’ll learn his lesson. Nonviolently, of course,” he tacks on upon seeing Hoseok’s expression of worry.
“That’s- good,” Hoseok decides, and takes his drink order without any further discussion of the guy.
It’s when he’s back and pouring blondie’s wine, though, that something interesting happens- he looks him up and down for a moment, considering, and then catches Hoseok’s eye, the briefest flash of something like conviction in his gaze.
“I’m Jimin, by the way,” he says, runs a hand through his hair, and offers a grin that’s an unfairly attractive mix of a charming smile and a smirk. “I really like your hair.”
Hoseok’s hair is newly redyed red, another product of his lucrative paycheck, and he unconsciously fixes it as he replies. “Thanks! I love your contacts. They’re gorgeous.”
There’s a tiny pause where he looks Jimin dead in the eyes and smirks ever so slightly. “Not as gorgeous as you, of course.”
Jimin blinks at him, and then his face breaks into an even wider smile than before, an expression that’s more genuine excitement than a flirting tool. Letting out a laugh like the ringing of church bells, he rests his chin on the palm of his hand and leans a little closer to Hoseok.
So Hoseok had read the situation right. He smiles right back at Jimin, expression pleasant and coy in a way that he may or may not have practiced in the mirror before.
“I bet you say that to all of your customers,” Jimin says, and it would take an idiot not to realize they’re now playing the exact same game. Perfect.
“Only the really cute ones,” Hoseok replies, then goes a bit off-script. “And the rich ones. Gotta get those tips somehow.”
Jimin laughs loud at that and collapses against the booth, shoulders shaking. It’s adorable. “Lucky for you,” he says, voice warbly from repressed laughter, “I happen to be both very cute and I tip well.”
“The whole package,” Hoseok laughs. “I guess I really am lucky.”
It’s always fun to play the flirting game, even if nothing comes of it. It helps that Jimin’s cute, too, and he seems sweet enough. If he wasn’t a mercenary, Hoseok definitely would’ve asked him out already. He still might, if he’s being honest- as long as he can work around the moral implications of doing so.
“How about you test that luck then?” Jimin suggests coyly, like he’d read Hoseok’s mind. “Ask me out and see what happens.”
The offer is tempting, but Hoseok shakes his head and watches Jimin deflate. “After my shift you can try again,” he offers, and the smile is back on Jimin’s face like it had never left.
“When does your shift end?” he questions, and Hoseok tells him. “Clear your evening plans, then,” Jimin smiles. “I’m taking you out tonight.”
It’s not the most eloquent way he’s ever been sort-of asked out, but Hoseok doesn’t mind. “I never said yes,” he points out, but his poorly-repressed smile gives Jimin all the answer he needs.
But when he steps out of the restaurant that evening to look for his date, still half-wearing his uniform to look nice, the person leaning against the front wall of the restaurant isn’t Jimin.
“Taehyung-ssi?” he asks incredulously. “What are you doing here?” Now that he thinks about it, that’s kind of a dumb question- he works at a restaurant, after all, Taehyung could just want a meal- but something about the way he’s loitering just seems off.
“If I said it was exclusively for you, would you believe it?” Taehyung asks.
“No, but you’d get points for trying.”
“Damn,” Taehyung hums. “Worth a shot, I guess. Flirting like that is more Jimin’s style, anyways.”
So Taehyung and Jimin know each other? It’s an odd thing to think about, considering he’s never seen them in the same room together before, but it’s not implausible. Hoseok’s mind briefly flashes to Yoongi, and he wonders if Jimin knows him too. What a coincidence that would be.
There’s a pause. When it stretches on just a little too long, Hoseok speaks up. “Aren’t you going to tell me why?”
“I could,” Taehyung agrees, “But are you sure you want to know?”
It’s a fairly obvious warning, albeit a cryptic one. “Probably not,” Hoseok decides. “Can you tell me where Jimin is, then?”
“Business,” he replies, in that same tone that suggests Hoseok shouldn’t pry any deeper than that. “He was mad about it, though- he really wanted to ask you out properly.”
Hoseok had wanted to go out with him just as badly, so it’s nice to know he hadn’t been stood up. “If you see him before I do, tell him he can try again anytime.”
Taehyung offers a lazy two-fingered salute. “Gotcha.”
“Have fun on your date, whenever it does happen,” Taehyung says, with an air of amusement and something else that suggests he knows something Hoseok doesn’t. That’s pretty standard for Taehyung, though, from what he’s seen, so he brushes it off and bids him a cheery goodbye.
When he gets home that night, he packs a date-worthy outfit into a bag with the intent of leaving it in his work locker from now on. Just in case.
~0~0~0~
“Waiter?” a pleasant voice asks, and even though his section is on the other end of the restaurant and he’s just here to grab napkins, Hoseok’s waiter instincts kick in and he turns around. “Yes, sir?”
There’s a very, very young adult sitting alone at a table, drinking whiskey he definitely isn’t old enough to be ordering and wearing a suit so inky black it makes The Raven’s decor seem cheery in comparison. His eyes are pretty and doe-like, but they’re currently narrowed in annoyance at Hoseok.
“Is something wrong, customer-nim?” he asks politely, and the guy frowns.
“Yes. I didn’t get a gun with my silverware, and I’d like that to be rectified, please.” He sounds like he’s trying very, very hard to be formal. It’s one part cute and one part entertaining, with just a pinch of sad that really only adds to the cute.
“I’m really sorry about that, I’ll give you one right away-” Hoseok fishes through his apron for a gun, and then stops when he remembers that Jihoon is in charge of this section, and Jihoon’s been here longer than Hoseok and never once made a mistake like that.
“Wait, how old are you?” he asks, because even if there’s no age minimum for alcohol here, The Raven does have a few strict rules concerning minors.
The guy scowls. “Why should that matter?” he snaps, and Hoseok raises his hands in surrender.
“If you aren’t eighteen, or at least don’t look it, we don’t give you a gun. Restaurant policy.”
“What the-“ he looks infuriated. Hoseok braces himself for a rant. “Why wouldn’t you give guns to the people that need them the most? Are you trying to encourage murder? I’m eighteen anyway, this is ridiculous!”
“I don’t know, customer-nim,” he replies, in his emptiest Customer Service Voice.
Oddly enough, the guy pauses, looks at Hoseok, and then inclines his head in an awkward half-bow. “I’m sorry. It’s not your fault and I shouldn’t be yelling at you.”
Hoseok is so surprised by the apology that he blurts out an “It’s fine, don’t worry about it,” before he can think to do otherwise.
“It’s not,” the brunette says with that same fire in his voice. It’s much more charming when it isn’t accompanied by anger. “I’m tired and don’t want to be shot while I’m getting my first decent meal in two weeks, but that doesn’t make it okay.”
Hoseok really shouldn’t do this, but the guy looks so forlorn and genuinely sorry for his outburst -a true rarity in the customer service field- that he sits down across from him and slides him a gun across the table. The way his eyes light up as he checks it over and hides it somewhere below the table - the standard practice at The Raven, Hoseok’s learned- is ridiculously cute.
Hoseok will be taking his break a bit early tonight, it seems.
“I’m Jungkook, by the way,” he says with a smile. “Are you new here? I come here a lot and I’ve never seen you around.” The question itself could easily be perceived as flirtatious, but Jungkook delivers it with such genuine curiosity and interest that it’s just sweet.
Hoseok laughs. “I keep getting asked that, but no, I’m not. I’ve been here over a month now. Longer than most of the staff, actually.”
Jungkook makes a little impressed noise that dies quickly as he processes the full meaning of Hoseok’s words. “Wait, turnover’s that high?” he asks incredulously. “Why?”
Hoseok bites back a “why do you think,” and reminds himself sharply that he’s not Jungkook’s friend. Jungkook is a customer he’s known for less than five minutes and he should be treated as such, no matter how cute and friendly he is.
“Most people don’t know the kind of clientele we get when they start working, and they can’t take it. Don’t want to be shot on the job,” he explains.
“Oh.” a pause. “I’ve been doing this since I was fourteen, so sometimes I forget not everyone is as used to all of this as me.”
That’s- kind of sad. It explains why he’s so touchy about his age, too. Jungkook, who tries so hard to be formal and professional, probably has to act like that constantly just to claw his way into having any sort of legitimacy in this line of work. It sounds miserable.
He blinks at Jungkook as the younger man glares at him sharply, and he realizes he’d tuned out something he said. “Sorry, what?”
Jungkook sighs. “I said, don’t give me that look. I don’t want your pity. I made my choice, and I don’t regret it.”
“Okay,” Hoseok says, even though that wasn’t really what he was thinking, and moves to change the subject to something that won’t further upset him. “So you’ve been doing this for four years, huh? You must be good at your job.”
Jungkook practically glows at the compliment. “Damn right I am,” he says proudly, sitting up a little straighter. “They call me Golden in most circles because I can land perfect shots with any weapon I touch.”
That’s honestly terrifying, but Hoseok smiles at him and makes an appropriately impressed noise.
“What about you?” Jungkook asks. “Are you a student? What do you do?”
Hoseok has never, not once in all of his time working here, ever been asked a question like that. If he were a weaker man, he’d be crying a little. He settles instead for smiling so wide his cheeks hurt.
“I dance,” he admits, suddenly shy for reasons beyond him. Maybe it’s the way Jungkook looks at him, so bright-eyed and genuinely interested in what he has to say in a way so few other people are. Whatever it is, Hoseok loves it. “I’m a third year dance major, actually.”
Jungkook gives him this starry-eyed look that Hoseok can’t focus on for more than a few seconds before his gaze drops to the table, flustered. “That’s really cool!” he gushes. “I used to dance a bit when I was younger, and I really liked it! Are you on YouTube?”
Hoseok is in fact on YouTube, and he’s accumulated a few thousand subscribers from the videos he’s posted. He shares his name with Jungkook, who enters it into his phone with a smile and a promise to subscribe.
There’s a moment of silence where Jungkook seems to be thinking hard about something. After a second, he looks at Hoseok, fire in his eyes and blushing slightly. “Hoseok-ssi, this might be a bit fast, but-”
“-Jung!” Jihoon shouts from a few tables away, hands on his hips. “Stop taking my tips and get back to your own tables!”
Hoseok knows that tone- it means Jihoon means Business, and he should probably get back to work. Laughing to himself a little, he stands up and gives Jungkook an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry, but I really should get back,” he says. “Duty calls.”
“That’s fine! You have work to do, I get that,” Jungkook says a little too quickly, still blushing.
“Just don’t let Jihoon-ssi know I gave you a gun, okay?” Hoseok adds conspiratorially, tilting his head towards said waiter, who’s still watching the pair like a hawk. “He’ll kill me if he finds out.”
“Well, we can’t have that,” Jungkook teases, and mimes zipping his lips shut. “I won’t tell a soul, don’t worry.”
There’s another brief beat of silence where Hoseok stands near the table but doesn’t quite leave, unwilling to end the conversation just yet.
“See you around?” Jungkook asks at length, almost shy.
Hoseok grins. “Of course! Just make sure you sit in my section next time.” He throws in a wink for good measure that has Jungkook blushing again.
“Will do,” Jungkook chirrups, and Hoseok waves a cheery goodbye to him as he heads back to work. Hopefully Jungkook really will come back soon- he’s looking forward to seeing him again. Maybe he’ll get to finish asking Hoseok out next time, too.
~0~0~0~
Hoseok tends to volunteer for Friday shifts whenever they’re offered, now. He tells himself the reason he does it is the extra pay, but in truth, it’s just really funny to watch his normally stoic and composed coworkers run around like beheaded chickens once a week.
“Hoseok-ssi,” Laura says, hand gently closed around his wrist to get his attention. “Kim Namjoon’s our guest for this week. Him and his mercenary guild.”
Hoseok doesn’t miss a beat. “You want me to wait on them, right?” He’d have volunteered even if she hadn’t asked, because he wants to see Namjoon again, but Laura tends to pay him more when he acts like he’s taking one for the team.
She nods. “If you don’t mind, that would save me and everyone else,” -she gestures around the room, which is in a state of utter chaos, as it always is on Fridays- “a lot of stress.”
As if to prove her point, someone shouts, “I found soju!” with an enthusiasm normally reserved only for phrases like “I found a lamp with a genie in it,” and instantly half of the room is converging on the alcohol and fighting over it with an aggression that puts the mercenaries they serve on the daily to shame.
She sighs. Hoseok lets out a laugh that he does his best to swallow, resulting in a weird, hiccupy noise escaping him instead. “I’ll do it, don’t worry,” he tells her.
She offers him the closest thing to a grateful smile her face can manage. “They asked for you, actually,” she admits, “But I don’t force requests on staff for special guests.”
Hoseok can’t stop himself from grinning at that, glad that Namjoon missed him too. “Guess they’ll be happy to see me then, huh?”
Laura looks at him oddly, like she can’t quite figure him out, and shakes her head wonderingly. “You’re weird, Jung,” she says, but it’s almost -almost- fond. “Go out and say hello whenever you’re ready.”
Hoseok salutes. “Yes ma’am!”
He strides towards Namjoon’s table -the same one as last time, does he request it?- and, at the last second, turns away and makes a detour.
Thirty seconds later, Hoseok is in front of Namjoon’s booth again, but now there’s a fast-paced Kanye song blasting through the restaurant that he can’t help bopping along to where he stands.
He catches sight of Namjoon first, because Namjoon is quite tall, and more importantly the only person he was really looking for at the table, but as he takes in the other five people sitting around him, his jaw drops.
“Wait,” Hoseok says in shock, “you all know each other?”
There’s a beat of silence at the table while its occupants exchange meaningful looks. It’s them again- all of Hoseok’s favorite (or most interesting, at least) customers. Yoongi offers him a quiet smile as Hoseok does an obvious double-take. Jungkook is holding his hand, Jimin and Taehyung are sitting in a way that suggests the former is draped over the the latter’s lap, and Jin waves brightly at him when they meet eyes.
Jimin lets out a little giggle. “You could say that,” Namjoon replies, laughing a little bit himself.
“You’re all what, Namjoon-ah’s mercenary guild?” Honestly, Hoseok shouldn’t be surprised. They’re all very pretty and even more chaotic- it’s fitting that they’d be in the same group.
“Among other things,” Taehyung says. He offers Hoseok a wink that would be much more positively received if he had any idea what Taehyung was implying.
It hits him then that he’s been hit on by or flirted with at least half of them, and Hoseok mentally cringes so hard it’s a true feat of self control that nothing shows on his face. Hopefully no one brings that up, lest Hoseok dies on the spot. “That’s cool,” he replies weakly. “Can I start you off with anything to drink?”
Orders are rattled off and put in, and if Hoseok takes a moment to thunk his head against the wall a few times in the kitchen before he heads back out, well, the rest of the waitstaff certainly isn’t going to snitch on him.
He pours wine and whiskey and Coke as smoothly as he always does, and is ready to slip back off to the kitchen when Yoongi scoots over in the booth. His moving causes the rest of the table to have to shift, and an entertaining thirty seconds follows wherein everyone at the table manages to get elbowed or kicked at least three times.
When the dust settles, Yoongi pats the space beside him in obvious invitation. Hoseok gulps and sits down next to him, glad he at least has an easy out.
“Taehyung-ah’s been devastated that you never texted him,” Jin comments as he sips his wine. “He complains about it at least once a day.”
“Oh,” Hoseok says, running a hand through his hair and laughing awkwardly. “I thought you were kidding with that.” He really did just assume it meant nothing, and his opinion had only been reinforced by Taehyung not mentioning it the next time they’d met.
Taehyung, with his own whiskey glass halfway to his mouth, freezes. “Why,” he asks slowly, disbelievingly, “on earth would you think I was joking?”
Hoseok shrugs. “Because we’d talked for like thirty seconds before you’d left it for me? Also because no one ever expects the numbers they give to waiters to get returned?”
“I couldn’t have been more serious if I’d proposed to you right then and there,” Taehyung says gravely.
“He’s jealous because he’s talked to you the least,” Jimin stage whispers, and immediately yelps as Taehyung kicks him under the table.
“How was your date then, hmm?” Taehyung coos, and Jimin blushes- out of anger or embarrassment, Hoseok can’t tell.
“I’ve been busy, okay, it’s not my fault I haven’t had time-” he turns to Hoseok, gives him this sad little look that has him melting, “I’m really sorry I haven’t been back to take you out. I will soon, I promise!”
Something truly unusual is going on here, but Hoseok has no idea what exactly it is. “That’s okay, I understand,” he tells Jimin, and the blonde smiles gratefully before turning back to Taehyung vindictively. “See, he doesn’t mind-”
“-He’s also very confused and doesn’t want to listen to your whining,” Yoongi cuts in. “Stop fighting over him like you’re in a bad drama.”
“Sounds like the words of someone who’s losing,” Jin breaks in with a cheshire grin, suggesting he probably only joined the fray just to be annoying.
“Hoseok-hyung really does seem confused, though,” Jungkook adds, and they all turn to look at him as one. Namjoon shoots him a glance of utter sympathy and opens his mouth, hopefully to explain just what the hell is going on.
Before he can get a word out, a ding sounds from the kitchen, accompanied today by a terribly off-tune whistle, and Namjoon breaks off to laugh. “They’re still doing that?”
“Just for you,” Hoseok replies with a grin, trying to ignore how incredibly lost he’s feeling, and gets up from the table slowly. “I won’t see you again after I give you your food, just so you know. Someone else takes your check”
“When do you work again?” Jungkook asks. He tells them, and bears witness to Taehyung actually writing the information down in his phone.
“Send it to the group chat,” Jimin whispers, and Jin nods in agreement.
“Hoseok-ah,” Namjoon says, more seriously than Hoseok’s ever heard him. He shoots the mercenary a nervous glance, but Namjoon’s smile sets his heart slightly more at ease.
“This is a lot,” he begins, gestures to the rest of his guild. They smile at Hoseok like he’s the only good thing in the world, and he can’t meet their eyes for too long for fear of smiling back too brightly. “We are a lot. But, if you’re interested, we’d like you to think about joining us.”
“I’m assuming you’re not asking me to be a mercenary,” he jokes, because he has no idea what else to say- they laugh, he smiles so wide his cheeks hurt, and Hoseok makes a decision.
He’s going to have to think about this long and hard, of course. They’re mercenaries, not just average people. (There’s also six of them, but that’s an issue for another day.)
But as he takes in their faces, energetic and eager and light as they look at him, he decides he’ll do his damndest to figure it out. He owes them that, at least.
“I’ll think about it and let you know,” he promises, and heads towards the kitchen.
~0~0~0~
“I have to admit that I’m impressed, Hoseok-ssi,” Laura tells him as he hangs up his apron after a grueling afternoon shift. “Normally people don’t last anywhere near this long. What’s kept you around?” It’s been six months since he started, now, and Hoseok’s gone from hoping to be able to pay his rent each month to owning a much, much nicer apartment.
(He might be moving again, soon, but that’s another thing altogether.)
Hoseok smiles dreamily, thinks of the six people waiting for him outside. “The customers. They’re sweet, tip well, and wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
Laura looks at him like he’s insane -and maybe he is- but she pats him on the shoulder anyway and bids him an awkward farewell. He can’t help but hum a little as he grabs his bag and gets ready to head out the door, smile as irrepressible as sunshine.
And when Hoseok slips into the back of an SUV with tinted black windows five minutes later, immediately being greeted by hugs and kisses and “Hoseok-hyung!”s, he decides he loves his job more than anything in the world.
(...Well, almost.)