Chapter 1: Black Coffee and Shaking Hands
Rain smeared the world outside the café window into a impressionist blur of neon signs and passing taillights. Inside, the air was thick with the smell of wet wool and dark roast. Soojin methodically wiped down the espresso machine’s steel face, her reflection warping in its curved surface.
“You’re not listening to a word I’m saying,” Bora announced, nudging Soojin’s hip with her own.
“I am. Eclipse. Comeback stage. Blue hair. Very important.”
Bora blew a raspberry, scrolling through her phone. A video played on loudspeaker—synthesized music, a too-perfect voice, a scream of adoration from a crowd. “It’s not just blue, Soojin. It’s ‘Atlantic Storm.’ And his dance break? Ugh. Jihoon Park is a literal art form. A masterpiece in human shape.”
“A masterpiece who probably hasn’t eaten a real carb in two years,” Soojin muttered, rinsing her cloth. The lo-fi playlist from the café’s speakers felt like a gentle protest against the sonic assault from Bora’s phone.
“That’s the dedication! The sacrifice! You wouldn’t get it.”
“You’re right. I don’t get dedicating my life to pretending to be in love with a camera lens.” She turned, leaning back against the counter. The café was empty except for Mr. Jung in his usual corner, nursing a single pot of tea for three hours. “It’s all manufactured. The smiles, the feelings, the ‘authentic’ moments staged for a behind-the-scenes vlog. Where’s the real person in all that?”
Bora shrugged, unbothered. “The fantasy is the point. I don’t need him to be real. I need him to be perfect.”
The bell above the door jangled, sharp and discordant against the mellow music.
A man stumbled in, bringing the storm with him. Water sheeted off a black designer coat, pooled around scuffed boots on the worn floor mat. He pushed back his hood, and damp black hair fell across his forehead. He was pale, with the striking, almost severe bone structure of a classical statue, but right now he just looked exhausted. Hunched. Human.
Bora’s hand clamped down on Soojin’s wrist. Her nails dug in.
The man didn’t look toward the counter. He just walked to the farthest booth by the rain-streaked window and slid in, shoulders rounding as he stared out at the gloomy street. He shed his coat, revealing a simple grey sweatshirt, the kind anyone might wear.
Bora was vibrating. She mouthed one word, soundlessly: Jihoon.
Soojin looked back at the figure in the booth. He was smaller than she expected from the videos. Not a giant screen idol, just a guy. A wet, tired guy who seemed to be trying to fold himself into the shadows.
“Go,” Bora hissed, giving her a push.
“Why me?”
“Because I will actually pass out. My voice will become a dolphin squeak. You don’t care. You’re immune. Go!”
Shaking her head, Soojin walked over. Up close, the fatigue was more pronounced. Dark smudges under his eyes, a tightness around his mouth. He sensed her approach and turned. His eyes were a deep brown, weary but alert. A professional alertness, like a camera was about to switch on.
“What can I get you?” she asked, her voice the same flat, polite tone she used for every customer.
He blinked, as if the question required translation. “Just… black coffee. Please.”
She nodded and returned to the counter. Bora was frantically texting under the counter, her face lit with a rapturous glow. Soojin ground the beans, the loud whirr filling the quiet cafe. She poured the steaming water, watching the dark liquid swirl. Simple. No nonsense. Just what he asked for.
She set the heavy ceramic mug on his table. “Here you go.”
“Thanks.” He reached for it. His hands, long-fingered and graceful in the fancams Bora forced her to watch, were unsteady. A faint tremor ran through them as they wrapped around the mug. He noticed her noticing and quickly pulled them back into his lap, out of sight.
He stared at the coffee as if it were a puzzle.
Soojin hesitated. Her feet felt rooted to the spot. She thought of Bora’s words about carbs and sacrifice. She thought of the hollow look in his eyes. It wasn’t hero worship; it was a basic human calculation.
She walked back to the counter, cut a generous square of the daily cinnamon bun—still slightly warm—and placed it on a small plate. She went back and slid it onto his table beside the untouched coffee.
He flinched, startled by her return.
“Eat something,” she said quietly, not meeting his eyes. She turned to leave.
“I didn’t order this.”
She paused, halfway back to the safety of the counter. “It’s on the house. The rain’s bad. It’s a rain special.”
A beat of silence followed. Then, a soft, barely-there sound. Almost a sigh. “Okay.”
She didn’t look back. Bora was a statue of barely-contained euphoria. “You talked to him. You touched his table. You gave him pastry. I’m going to frame this apron.”
“Shut up,” Soojin said, but there was no heat in it. She watched from behind the counter as he cautiously picked up the bun. He took a small bite, then another. He ate like someone who’d forgotten how, methodically, but the tension in his shoulders eased, just a fraction.
He drank the coffee finally, wincing slightly at the heat or the bitterness.
When he stood to leave, he brought the empty plate and mug to the counter. Bora had conveniently vanished into the back. He stood before Soojin, a different person than the one who’d walked in. Still tired, but less brittle.
“The rain special,” he said, his voice low and calm. A good voice, even tired. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
He held her gaze for a second too long, his professional mask not quite fully in place. In that sliver of a moment, he wasn’t Jihoon Park of Eclipse. He was just a guy grateful for a moment of quiet and a bun. Then something shifted behind his eyes. The wall came up. He gave a small, polite nod—the kind he’d give a staff member on set—pulled his hood up, and vanished back into the storm.
The bell jangled again.
Bora exploded from the back room. “Details! Every single detail!”
“He ate the bun. He drank the coffee. He left.”
“That’s it? You didn’t ask for a selfie? You didn’t tell him I’m his biggest fan?”
“He looked like he wanted to be alone, Bora.”
Bora deflated, then brightened again, looking at the mug and plate he’d returned. “I’m not washing these. These are historical artifacts.”
Soojin rolled her eyes and grabbed the mug. As she did, she saw it. On the underside of the plate, where it would have been hidden, he’d drawn something in the faint condensation. A simple, quick sketch. A little storm cloud, with a tiny sun peeking out behind it.
Soojin stared at the drawing. The lines were faint, already fading as the porcelain warmed to her touch. It was a thirty-second doodle, meaningless. Probably a habit. Idols were always doodling for fans.
But it felt like a message. A quiet, private one.
“What is it?” Bora asked, leaning over her shoulder. She let out a dramatic gasp. “Is that his autograph?”
“No. It’s nothing.” Soojin wiped the plate clean, the cloud and sun dissolving into a damp streak.
The rest of her shift passed in a haze. Bora’s excited chatter blended with the hiss of the steamer and the slow drip of the afternoon rain.Mr. Jung left, and a pair of university students took his place, spreading textbooks and arguing quietly over philosophy. Normalcy reasserted itself, but the image of his unsteady hands wouldn’t leave her.
She was refilling the pastry case when the bell jangled again.
Her head snapped up. It wasn’t him. It was a delivery guy with a box of oat milk. She felt a ridiculous pang of disappointment, sharp and unwelcome.
“You were hoping,” Bora sang under her breath as she signed for the delivery.
“I wasn’t.”
“You checked the door. Your whole body did that little ping thing.”
“I did not ping.”
“You pinged.Admit it. The great Soojin Kim, critic of all things manufactured, has been intrigued by a real-life prince.”
“He’s not a prince. He’s a customer who looked cold.” Soojin slammed the fridge door harder than necessary.
“A customer who draws you cute weather reports on crockery.”
That shut Soojin up. She had no retort.
At closing time, Bora finally exhausted her stream of Jihoon-related facts and speculations, tying her apron strings into a neat bow. “Same thing tomorrow? My shift starts at ten.”
“Yeah. See you.” Soojin locked the door behind her, watching Bora’s bright yellow umbrella bob away into the damp evening.
Alone in the quiet café, the only sounds were the hum of the industrial fridge and the soft tick of the wall clock. She finished the closing duties on autopilot: wiping tables, sweeping floors, counting the till. Her mind kept circling back to the booth by the window. The hollow look in his eyes. The deliberate way he’d rebuilt his composure before leaving.
She took out the trash last, the heavy bag thumping against her leg as she pushed through the back door into the narrow, rain-slicked alley. The air was cold and smelled of wet brick and garbage. She heaved the bag into the dumpster, the lid clattering shut with a final boom that echoed off the walls.
A scuffle of motion to her left made her jump.
A figure leaned against the wall, partly obscured by the shadow of a fire escape. The glow of a smartphone illuminated his face from below. Same sharp features, same tired eyes. Jihoon Park.
He was smoking. She saw the brief, orange flare as he inhaled.
They stared at each other. He didn’t look surprised to see her. He looked… resigned. Caught.
“You forgot something?” she asked, her voice sounding too loud in the confined space.
He shook his head, took a final drag, and flicked the cigarette into a puddle where it died with a hiss. “Just… avoiding.”
“The rain?”
“People.”
The word hung between them. It wasn’t coy or mysterious. It was flat. A statement of fact. He was hiding in a service alley to avoid other human beings.
He pushed off the wall. He was closer now. She could see the damp still clinging to the shoulders of his jacket. “The bun was good. Thank you.”
“You already thanked me.”
“I know.” He looked down at his hands, then shoved them into his pockets. “The coffee was terrible, though. Bitter and burnt.”
A laugh burst out of her, short and surprised. “Then why did you drink it all?”
“You gave it to me. It felt rude not to.” He finally looked directly at her, and a flicker of something like humor touched his mouth. It changed his whole face, making him younger, less like a statue. “Also, I was freezing. It was hot.”
Soojin folded her arms against the chill. “Most people would’ve just asked for sugar. Or milk.”
“Most people aren’t being watched to see if they ask for sugar.” The humor faded. His gaze drifted past her, down the alley towards the muted sounds of the main street. “A dairy allergy last year caused a two-week diet rumor. Sugar turns into a ‘concern for dental health’ and a sponsorship issue. It’s easier to just… drink the terrible coffee.”
He said it without self-pity. It was just the manual for his life.
Soojin didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry” felt pathetic. “That’s insane” was probably not helpful.
“The manager buys the cheap beans,” she said finally. “I keep telling him. He doesn’t listen.”
He nodded, as if this were a normal and reasonable topic of conversation. “You should stage a coup. Seize the bean supply.”
“I’ll consider my options.”
Another silence, but it was softer now. The initial shock of finding him had worn off, leaving a curious, shared stillness in the dripping alley.
“I should go,” he said, but he didn’t move. “My manager thinks I’m at a gym in Gangnam. He’ll call soon.”
“The famous rain escape.”
“Something like that.” He took a step, then paused. “Is it always this quiet here? In the afternoons?”
“Weekdays, yeah. It’s a dead zone between lunch and people wanting dessert.”
He nodded again, a quick, decisive little movement. “Good.”
Then he was walking away, his footsteps quiet on the wet pavement. He didn’t look back.
Soojin stood there until the alley swallowed him up. The ghost of his cigarette smoke mixed with the scent of rain and rotten vegetables. She touched the back door handle, cold metal under her fingers.
Back inside, the café felt different. The amber lights, the empty booths, the silent espresso machine—it was no longer just her workplace. It was a stage for a strange, secret play. A hiding spot.
She walked over to the booth. His booth. She slid into the seat he’d used and looked out the window. The world was still a blur of rain and light, but from here, it felt insulated. Protected.
Her phone buzzed in her apron pocket. A text from Bora.
Forgot to tell you! Eclipse is doing a fan sign event at the Starfield Mall this Saturday! We HAVE to go. I’ll camp out for tickets.
Soojin looked from the bright screen to the dark, rain-streaked window. She thought of the drawing on the plate. The awful coffee he’d drunk without complaint. The weary confession in a garbage-scented alley.
She typed a reply.
You go. Not really my thing.