Scaredy Cat

Usually, I would be mortified at this situation, but I'm startled and preoccupied with the monster to respond to him.

And, there, I find it: It's a cat. A freaking cat that is now hiding behind Hajun's legs, hissing at me.

The audacity.

However, my fear hasn't caught up with that realization yet, and I'm still shaking. Maybe encountering that dead man has had some long-lasting effects on me. I don't recall being so terrified of literally everything before I found him.

Since no words have left my mouth, Hajun is currently trying to comprehend the situation by himself. His head turns from the cat to me to the cat again.

Then, he steps closer to me while the cat rudely hisses at me one more time before it disappears somewhere into the apartment. "Rose. It's just a cat."

Wait, since when do we even have a pet? And how come I did not know about this?

I still don't react, which leads Hajun to bend down slightly once again, so I'm forced to look him in the eyes.

"It's just a cat, Rose. It won't hurt you." He tries to read my face, probably to see if I'm kidding or not. When he realizes I'm actually scared, his eyes meet mine, full of concern. However, his mouth is twitching. It's like the different parts of his face haven't agreed on a common expression, making his face look very conflicting.

Hajun's trying his hardest not to laugh at me. And I can't even blame him since I'm ridiculous. I kind of want to laugh at myself, too.

"Why?" I finally push out. "I didn't know you had a cat."

My boss shakes his head while he gently leads me back into the living room and onto the couch. "It's not mine. It belongs to the neighbours. That second entrance door has a cat flap, and whenever its owners are on holiday, it comes here to snoop around for some food."

"So, you knew about this?"

We're both sitting on the sofa now. Hajun narrows his eyes at my question. "So did you. I mentioned it to you a couple of days ago."

That's believable. Hajun explained everything about my new home in detail to me, so it'd be unlikely he'd just forget to mention this. However, knowing my brain, it'd be very likely I just wasn't listening at that moment.

"Oh," I mumble, now ashamed. "I must have been..."

"...daydreaming again?" he finishes the sentence for me with a raised eyebrow. Wow, he's really starting to understand me.

I offer him an embarrassed smile, to which he just rolls his eyes. "Sorry."

"Why were you so scared of the cat anyway?" he asks.

Before I can answer, Hajun's gaze glides over to the TV, which I hadn't turned off yet. The title of the movie is still dancing on the screen.

Shit.

I want to grab the remote control and turn it off, but he reacts faster than me and snatches it from my hands.

Great. End me now, please.

"Why were you watching a scary movie, Rose-ah?" he asks, visibly struggling to stay calm.

"To... to relax?" I respond sheepishly.

"To relax?" he repeats incredulously. His sarcastic tone clearly indicates how stupid he thinks I am. "This didn't make you relaxed, it made you paranoid. Is what why you were frightened of the pet?"

I don't even bother to respond because we both already know the answer to that question. It's so frustrating when he talks to me like I'm some ignorant, little child. Especially when he's right. I hate it.

Hajun just shakes his head at me, sighing. "Why do you do things that you know are bad for you, Rose?"

Dear Hajun, that's what I ask myself every single day.

"Well.," I frown, my tone being a tiny bit defiant. "That's a deep existential question. I just can't answer it like that."

I almost expect those words to make him even madder, but instead, a chuckle escapes his lips. "Well, I'll check back in a year when you've thought of an answer."

In a year... who will I be in a year? My job is to focus on Hajun's day-to-day and near-future activities, so I've never thought this far ahead. Will I still work for Hajun? Will we get along better?

Will I have finally gotten over my silly crush on him, which makes working for him a thousand times more unbearable?

Probably not, considering he's growing more and more attractive by the day.

While these thoughts run through my head, Hajun's still staring at me, a wicked grin forming on his face.

Oh no. I'm familiar with that expression. It's the expression he makes right before he makes fun of his hyungs.

I raise an eyebrow at him. "What?"

"You're a scaredy-cat.", he says smugly. "A scaredy-cat scared of a cat."

He's never looked prouder of himself.

"It's not funny," I complain, but the smile in my voice betrays me.

Meanwhile, Hajun's still grinning. "It's never a boring day with you, Rose, that's for sure."

...

In the next few days, Hajun and I get along a little better. Sometimes, I catch him staring at me with a wicked grin and mouthing "scaredy-cat" across the room, making me roll my eyes.

Yes, An Hajun and I officially have an inside joke now.

Luckily enough, he hasn't told his hyungs about any of this. Yet. I've got to be careful with Hajun; I never know what he'll use as blackmail material against me someday.

Which leads me to the point that irks me quite a lot: Hajun has seen me embarrass myself and do dumb things for countless times since we started working together. However, he is always freaking unreproachable. I've never witnessed him doing or saying anything ridiculous.

Maybe it's the many years spent in the spotlight, but one thing is confirmed, Hajun is a thousand times cooler than I'll ever be.

If we spend more time together, perhaps he'll end up showing me more of his goofy side. Because I also need blackmail material on him, just in case. I don't like how unbalanced our relationship is.

The next week is super busy as the boys are giving interviews and preparing for their upcoming "Platonic Love" tour named by their most recent (and most successful) album.

Besides, just the amount of events coming up in 2019 make me exhausted already. Every evening, I'm already so tired that the whole room is spinning around me when I go to bed. However, whenever I talk about our workload with any of the HA staff, they express their joy about the fact that these last weeks have been a "calm" period.

"Calm" period? If this schedule is already killing me, I don't know how I'll survive the next months.

I'm baffled as to how Hajun has been working this hard every single day in the last six years.

When I come home on Thursday evening after a long day, all I dream of is my bed. However, I still need to make dinner. Even though I could afford to eat out much more now that I have a salary, I don't want to waste money that I could spend on travels with Eun in the future.

A hollow laugh escapes my lips at this thought. Ha. Vacation. As if that would ever happen.

For me to go on vacation, Hajun would have to go on one first, and taking time off to relax is not a concept he's familiar with.

Sighing, I decide to make some pasta with tomato sauce and to add some grilled zucchini on the side. That'll make me feel healthier. While I grill the zucchini, Eun facetimes me, and since I haven't seen her in five days, we have a lot to catch up on. In fact, we have so much to talk about that I completely forget my food.

Completely.

I only remember what I'm supposed to be doing in this kitchen in the first place when the smell of burnt food catches my attention. As I turn around, I see that the zucchini has turned black – wholly burnt.

No. That's not possible. My heart sinks.

"Hajun just came home, I'll call you back," I tell Eun as I hang up. I don't want to admit to her that I can't cook even the most basic of things.

Gosh, I'm such a loser.

Then, I start to cry.

The exhaustion, the fact that I'm going to eat boring pasta with no vegetables because I'm freaking incompetent, and the amount of coming workload all just come together in my head.

It's just too much.

The stress has overtaken my body.

"Rose? What's going on? Why are you crying?"