Chapter Text
Nervousness crawled inside each of her bodily senses, be it butterflies inside her stomach, or trembling fingers, or a thumping heart- all were happening at once as she caught a glimpse of Taehyung in front of Level 4 restroom just now. Their eyes did not meet and somehow that appeased her agitation yet it made her regretful for not using that chance to greet him or at least nodded professionally at him. All these thoughts and feelings came haunting her while she was in the restroom.
"Oh well, it happened . What can you do about it now, Wheein?" she sighed, flapping her hands curtly to dry the water off them and looked at her reflection in the mirror. She had hoped just now, for Taehyung to look at her and smile so that she could try to continue the greeting with short conversation; but of course it didn't happen.
Sighing, she dejectedly walked out of the washroom and looked at her phone to pretend reading something on it to avoid any eye contact with other people. LOL. The fact how badly she hated (and lazy) socializing with the rest of the humans at work was disturbingly acceptable in her ignorant mind. Hwasa, her close friend, had advised her countless times that this habit would eat her up some day in the future but Wheein could not care any less. ' I'll try to improve my social skills ', she'd tell others in a way to convince herself along the process.
She arrived at her desk, looking apathetically at the dossiers crowding her workplace. ' Must she finish processing all of these on top of reading hundreds of emails?, ' she would constantly wonder. Her teammates were busy doing their tasks. Yongsun was diligently compiling the files; Byul was clicking the mouse and typing fast the keyboard while headbanging to what Wheein assumed metal songs; and Hwasa was just being herself reading the latest news (or gossips, who knows) on her desktop with no care given to the rest of the world. For the rest of the day, Wheein tried hard to focus on doing her job; in between the work, she would go to the bathroom and lowkey hoped to bump into Taehyung but one can only dream.
It was six in the evening and everyone started to punch out of work. Byul and Yongsun were talking about some work gossip instigated by Hwasa during lunchtime earlier.
"... Yeah , and apparently Sujung just told me that two of the people from every department will be selected as their department's ambassador for that conference," Byul raised her brows, "not sure though how the selection will be done for ours", she shrugged and untied her shoulder length hair. Wheein could swear she saw Byul blushing when Yongsun did that but eyes are the trickiest trickster.
"I think Hwasa could get the spot, or at least in the Top 3." Wheein suggested, followed by the other ladies nodding to that. " Yo , why was my name being called?" Hwasa arrived and started packing her stuff. She gave the three of them a cheeky side-eye and brushed off her own question casually, not that it mattered.
"So ladies, dinner together tonight…?" Byul's question trailed for a few seconds, bit too long with no one answering,"... owkay , I guess home it is. You guys are so boring." she said out loud, yet she had the exact similar thought as the other three. Byul and Yongsun departed first as usual given they needed to catch the train at 6.30 p.m. while Hwasa sat at her desk and looked down on her phone, 'scrolling tweets again ' Wheein thought and chuckled. "Wheein, are you staying back again today?" Hwasa asked nonchalantly, eyes fixed on the screen. Wheein stretched her body out before sitting straight. "I don't have any choice, Hyejinie. Maam needs this report by Wednesday. And it's already Tuesday. You can go first if you want. Take the scooter, I'll rent a bike." That caught Hwasa's attention, her eyes snapped away from the screen to Wheein's. They shared an understanding gaze between one another and nodded respectively. "Okay, see you tonight. Keys with you?" Hwasa interrogated. Rattling sound was heard. "Okay, have fun lol and stay safe". With that, she was gone. Wheein was now all alone in the office, which meant she could finally focus on her work without any unnecessary distraction. She put on her earphones and got back to work.
'Clicking on Save ... There you go. ' It was a quarter before 10 p.m. when she finished preparing the report, and for an extra security measure, she emailed a copy of the document to herself before shutting down her desktop.
'Dang, it's late .' She looked around her department and noticed only her workstation was lit up. She stretched out a bit before quickly gathering her belongings into her tote bag and started to tread toward the main entrance. Since it was yet 10 p.m.. she could see a few more people from other departments heading out of the office, tired faces like her presumably. Some were rushing, some were walking at a slower pace. Her eyes scanned around the surrounding hoping to find that familiar figure and gush all over him one last time before today ended. She shuddered at that thought and apologized to Taehyung in her heart as she felt she was starting to obsess over him like a creepy stalker. ‘ Just a crush, Wheein. Don’t go overboard .’ her sensible subconscious warned her.
She walked faster as she suddenly remembered those who stayed back late would either: i) call the ride-hailing transport services, ii) walk, or iii) employ the company’s bicycle rental service. Upon reaching the designated area which was a bike stall that could store around twenty bicycles, she spotted only 1 bicycle was left at the farthest aisle from where she was standing (from another perspective, it was parked the nearest to the self-tagged counter) after squeezing her eyes a bit, inclining on one side. She stopped walking and carefully reached into the bag to search for her ID tag which she just put inside in a rush just now and continued walking ahead once she retrieved it. But on her way there, she noticed something was not right- that the bicycle was gone with the wind, literally , as she heard the screeching noise of the pedaling and the swooshing breeze passed by her as she was pacing to the counter, simultaneously turning her head to the place where the bicycle was parked at- everything was happening at the same time leaving her all perplexed. The aisle was now empty as someone else had apparently managed to rent it first. “What was that all about? Like , now do I have to walk home? Definitely not going to call Snatch as it’s almost the end of the month which means... I am broke as hell !’ she muttered harshly under her breath while subconsciously putting her bag on the self-tagged counter. And most importantly, who was the person who managed to rent the last bicycle?
Well, her question was soon answered as that person suddenly returned to that place and parked the skeletal-like vehicle in front of her. It was Taehyung - huh , she did not see that coming. Well, she was not exactly angry (more frustrated) at the person before, just irritated, but once she was aware that person was Taehyung, her irritation waned. Quietness filled in the place for a tad while.
“Hey, do you want this bike?” he softly offered, his sultry voice breaking the silence.
‘ Erm yes, and you too if you don’t mind ,’ if only she could say this.
Instead, she shrugged and replied in defeat, “I did, but you got it first so…but thanks for asking,” she tried not to look annoyed and smiled as sincerely as possible.
“I see.” Awkward silence ensued.
So...” he trailed hesitantly, “You sure you’re okay then? Just double-checking because you know, it is late night already”.
“Yup, I’m good.” Wheein gave him two thumbs up as a reassurance.
“Okay, then.” he said with a resigned tone, shrugging prior to swiftly swinging his left leg over the saddle and maneuvering the handlebars all the way to the right before scooting ahead. He was off within seconds, never looked back as Wheein had hoped. The first thing that came into her mind was how dazzling he was. Second thing was, ‘Not even a goodnight wish, huh? ’ she thought, biting her lips, while letting her subconscious to attack her invisible guts. ‘ Well Wheein, you could’ve just wished him first you know, ’ and such retrospection made her whimper inwardly.
But, one can always dream , she thought, and she was sure as hell to be dreaming whatever happened tonight with Taehyung in her sleep- over and over again.
***
“Hyung... Hyung !”, Taehyung snapped out of his thoughts and looked up just to see Jungkook puckering up. He adjusted his spectacles slightly to balance it after it got angled wrongly when he was resting his head on his right palm just now.
“ Umm , do remind me why you’re still here again?” he felt slightly annoyed by his junior’s sudden presence. Taehyung was in the middle of coming up about the title of his copy which he had been struggling with since this morning, and Jungkook had snapped him out of his creative thinking process. Somebody definitely owed his sunbaenim a Starbucks tomorrow.
“Hyung, are you going to sleep here tonight? It’s already 8 p.m.” Jungkook said while packing up his stuff, preparing to call it a day finally .
“ Oh .” Taehyung reflexingly stretched out his upper body and stood up. For a few seconds, he just stood still, spacing out with a blank mind due to him actively milking out his brain the whole day. He scrutinized the whole department and saw another two colleagues of theirs still locking their eyes on the desktop screens, ‘ I wonder if I look like that? ’, he pondered. He shook his head and looked at Jungkook who was all set to go back home.
“I’m going to stay over a bit. Still stuck at the title, tsk … See ya tomorrow.” Taehyung winced and slowly sat on his seat, reclining onto the back of his seat with his chin up, eyes closed, and praying for ideas to come knocking into his mind.
Thirty minutes passed and Taehyung just knew he could not stay focused any longer (though staying focused was inevitable as the deadline was the next day) and decided to get himself a hot black coffee. Off he went to the pantry with his mug, treading his steps discreetly as he did not want to disturb anyone’s peace in the vicinity.
The pantry of his department - Branding, was shared with another two departments; Finance and Commercial. These three departments were in the same Bubble, designed in a three-way roundabout with the pantry as the epicentre. There were a lot of Bubbles at the office and each consisted of either two or three departments respectively. Why Bubbles one might ask; it was not surprising as the company was called Foam so, go figure .
He arrived at the almond painted pantry that was vibing with subdued light, eyes drifting around before settling himself at the spot near the curved, fish-eyed structured window at the back of the confined area. The bare window was heavily painted with rain droplets he noticed. ‘ This is some lofi stuff ,’ he chuckled inwardly, sipping his black coffee. He checked on the clock on the wall and it was 9 p.m. sharp and in his mind, the clock was blaring thrice to remind him of the time. He washed the mug and left it on the wooden case marked Branding and afterward dried his hands off using a Good Morning towel hung nearby. His phone buzzed out of the blue; the screen showed Namjoon calling, ‘ perhaps to check out on the work progress ’, he thought to himself, and scornfully picked the call up.
“Yeah, I’m almost there. Yes, I’ll make sure to complete it by tonight. Relax, Namjoon. You’re on a date, for God’s sake!” Taehyung cried out loud to his workaholic colleague who was also his best buddy. “Okay, hanging it up now,” he abruptly hung up causing the phone to fall on the floor. He reached out to it and slowly stood up noticing someone was approaching the pantry. He eyed the person from his standing spot and saw the person was a lady, with earphones on and eyes glued to her phone. Her head was slightly bobbing and he could hear giggles coming out from her. It was pretty fascinating to watch her, Taehyung thought. She did not seem to notice the other person’s presence in the room as she was so engrossed in her phone tightly held by her right hand. Her thumb flicked the screen up and down swiftly, frown creasing her forehead once in a while, made him wonder what she was reading - or thinking- and simultaneously she would occasionally miss to grab the coffee decanter’s handle- either she was too occupied or she was just swaying her left hand absent-mindedly following the beats of songs she was listening to. Observing these motions of hers even though within the span of seconds, manage to make him grin- almost chuckling, because he found her to be... cute . Aigoo ...
Somehow, Taehyung managed to remember and summon himself to the reality of working life that he still had an unfinished business awaiting him at his desk and reluctantly, ‘ Ungh, ’ he left the pantry in a rush. Maybe, just maybe, he might bump into her soon he hoped, somewhere, like ‘ I don’t know ,’ he inwardly sighed, ‘ ...at the bike stall perhaps. ’- that wish of his made him chuckled out loud for real this time. He sat back on his seat once he arrived; sitting straight and all focused, he quickly typed the finalized title of the copy before clicking on Saved .
Meanwhile at the pantry, Wheein who was previously occupied, looked up and turned her head quickly to her left as she felt wind whooshing out of nowhere. Feeling a bit spooked up, she grabbed her mug and hurriedly walked away back to her desk to continue where she left off just now.
Extras:
**Employees checkout/rent a bike by self-tagging their IDs at the automated counter (a small vertical box stuck on a one-metre standing pole)
**Uniquely, each department was not bound by an entry; all three had their own entrances and backdoors so people could easily travel anywhere within the Bubble. Everyone stayed connected as the company practised an open-space work environment hence you would end up at least feeling familiar (sense of familiarity) looking at faces there.