Ice Skates || Park Sunghoon

~ 5 ~

Seollim cleaned table after table, looking up and cheerfully welcoming customers as they came in.

It had been only a couple of days since she'd first met Sunghoon, and ever since then her luck seemed to just get better and better.

Of course, she knew that "luck" was due to her and not him, but she still couldn't help but feel he'd had a positive influence in her life.

She'd studied all week for her math test. It had been their hardest chapter yet, and she'd barely passed the previous quiz, it had just been so hard. But this time? A 95!

She'd gotten a job at a cafe, this one with better hours. The pay was good, and her boss was a ton more understanding.

And she loved it. He kept her outside, at the cash register and cleaning tables. She loved being outside, and watching the customers. The couples, being sweet and laughing and holding hands under the table. The families, dropping in for a quick snack and chatting, their eyes bright with their love for each other. She loved talking to them and meeting new people, no matter how brief their meetings were.

The door chimed and she looked up again. "Welcome..." she trailed off, unable to stop the laughter that tumbled out of her. "You! What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same thing," Sunghoon said, his eyes shining as he sat at the table she'd just cleaned.

"Well isn't it obvious?" She asked, pointing at her apron. "I work here."

"Isn't it obvious?" He mimicked, raising his eyebrows. "I'm a customer."

"I think you must be following me," she told him teasingly, tilting her head at him. "Suddenly you're popping up everywhere you go."

He laughed, the sound like music to her ears. "I'm not!" He protested, pretending to be defensive. "You sure you're not the one following me?"

"Sir, I was everywhere first. The ice skating rink, my apartment building, and here. Clearly you're the stalker here."

He wrinkled his nose at her, the expression only serving to make him even cuter.

"Come to the resister and order something," she continued, walking away from the table. "What would you like?"

"How about two strawberry milkshakes?"

"Two?" She repeated, looking around. "Are you meeting someone?"

"I hadn't been planning to, but I think I am now," he said, his eyes sparkling happily.

"Oh," she said, unable to keep the disappointment out of her voice. She'd been hoping that maybe they'd just get to spend some time together and talk. The shop was practically empty; they could have done that. But for the first time is occurred to her that she really didn't know him, she didn't know much about him at all. The only friend of his she'd met was Heesung, and he hadn't met any of hers. They weren't all that close or anything, not really. He had his own friends. Maybe he even had a girlfriend.

The thought deflated her, and she struggled to keep a smile on her face.

Sunghoon smiled, reaching forward and tugging on a strand of her hair. "Kkangseol," he said his voice a mixture between scolding and teasing. "I was talking about you, silly. The person I'm meeting is you."

Seollim blushed, tapping the order into the register and not meeting his eyes. "Oh... I knew that."

"Sure," he said, laughing. "You should have seen your face."

She felt her cheeks get even hotter. Sunghoon looked like he was enjoying making her flustered, which of course only served to make her even more shy.

"You're pretty cute," he said, leaning on the counter and cupping his face in his hands, staring at her.

The look he was giving her was about enough to make her heart beat right out of her chest.

She looked up, meeting his gaze. "The same could be said about you," she told him.

His face lit up. "You think I'm cute?!?!"

Seollim giggled, reaching out and poking his cheek in a burst of confidence. "Of course. You're handsome and adorable."

Sunghoon smiled happily, a slight blush coming to his cheeks as well. His expression said she'd made his day, and seeing him happy made her heart flutter.

"When did you start working here?" He asked, watching her as she started making the milkshakes. "If I'd known you were here, I would have come a lot sooner."

"I only started yesterday," she told him. "Honestly, would you like to know the reason I was crying on Sunday?"

"I have been a little curious," he admitted, running his hands through his hair and glancing at her sheepishly. "But I thought it would be wrong to ask. Especially since we don't yet know each other all that well."

She tried not to get hung up on the word yet, but failed spectacularly. A smile rose to her face and shone right out of her eyes. Seeing her like that, Sunghoon grinned too, though his eyes were laced with confusion, still waiting for that explanation. 

"I'd been fired from my previous job," she told him. "I ran late too many times. You know how it is. Sometimes the teacher wants to talk to you after class, or you have to go back to your locker, or grab something from the library, and then bam, suddenly you're late."

"That can't be helped sometimes," he agreed. "I'm happy you found a new job though."

"So am I," she said happily, handing him a milkshake.

He stayed up there at the counter with her and they enjoyed them together.

"Will you be at the rink again this weekend?" He asked her.

"I go every weekend," she reminded him, the words bringing a smile to her lips as she remembered their first meeting, and how she'd also told him that.

"Oh, you're right!" He said, snapping his fingers. He shook his head at himself, looking slightly embarrassed. "You'd told me already. Sorry I'd forgotten."

"Honestly, I would have been more surprised if you had remembered."

Sunghoon gave her another one of those sparkling smiles of his. "Maybe I'll see you again this weekend," he told her, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.

Seollim opened her mouth to respond, but then his phone started ringing with a timer. He pulled it out of his pocket.

"Practice."

The reminder was named practice, though it didn't say what he was practicing for.

He turned off the timer and shoved the phone back into his pocket.

"I'll see you later," he told her, walking away. He broke into a run when he exited the store.

It wasn't a promise, and she didn't know when they'd actually end up seeing each other, but her heart thumped as she whispered his words back to herself.