The Seventh Year

. 30 .

b e a
Cara was much calmer than I anticipated when it came to meeting Darien. Andy and I sat at the counter and watched as she and Darien sat on one of the sofas and held a fairly normal conversation. She had asked him to tell her a bit about his experience as an idol. They hit it off straight away and it left Andy and I dumbfounded.

"This is the calmest I've ever seen her." He leaned in and whispered in my ear. "I thought she hated the entire male human race."

"Oh, she's obsessed with Koreans. Of course, you don't find a lot of those in this part of Colorado. She's actually quite docile as long as she's in a good mood." I replied and couldn't help but smile as Cara laughed. She doesn't genuinely laugh often, but when she does it's so pretty. Hell, she can cry (which she never does) and it'll look pretty.

"So never around me then, huh." Andy reached over and tucked some of my hair behind my ear. His fingers grazing the back of my ear sent a tickle down my neck and set off butterflies in my gut. I flinched and pulled back involuntarily. His hand froze. "I'm sorry, I just—"

"No." I cut him off. "Sorry. I didn't mean to pull away. It just tickled."

He smiled and rested his hand on top of my head, stroking it down. He repeated the motion twice. "I like you."

The butterflies intensified. I wasn't expecting to hear that from him. I was blushing intensely. So much that I had to bury half my face in my hands. I had spent years imagining what it would be like to hear him say he liked me. I had a whole list of scenarios, but they all had some sort of romantic gradual burn towards the moment when he'd say it. Andy said it so cool and casual and it caught me off guard. No build up. No tension. Just straight up, "I like you". I momentarily lost my shit. It took a lot to hold back a squeal.

Andy laughed at my reaction. "Stop that. You're making me want to hug you."

"I mean," I cleared my throat and pulled my hair behind my ears. "You're my boyfriend, so you're allowed to."

"I'm technically working, so I can't really at the moment." He replied and grabbed a rag. Andy pretended to wipe the counter as his coworker passed by and gave him a side-eye. That reminded me that I was technically working too. I glanced back at Darien and Cara. He was showing her a video of one of SILV-Rs live performances. Darien was explaining the choreography and Cara nodded at every word he said. Andy was right, she was peaceful.

"Cara looks so happy. It's a stark contrast from before we walked in. What did you do this time?" I asked him

Andy looked offended. He pressed a hand to his chest. "Me? Excuse me, I was being super nice to her. She was being a bitch."

"I can hear you, dipshit!" Cara hollered from the sofa and gave him a middle finger.

Darien and I laughed while Andy rolled his eyes. I grew a little concerned, as his regular reaction would be to tease her back. To see him actually irritated with her made me wonder how bad of a fight they had.

"Are you guys...alright?" I wondered out loud, "What exactly were you talking about a while ago?"

"Oh, you know," he shrugged and continued wiping the counter. "She was nitpicking at our relationship again. I'm just getting fed up with her attitude. She keeps saying she'll cut me crap, but she never does."

I pressed my lips together and lowered my head in embarrassment. "I'm so sorry. I'll give her another earful, I swear."

"No, no, it's fine. This is something Cara and I need to settle between us. Besides, I deserved it this time."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. We're alright. We can figure it out." Andy said. He tossed the rag aside and left me to attend to some new customers. Darien and Cara seemed to be done talking as well. I got up as they made their way back to me.

"I'm going home," Cara gave my arm a pat. "I have a drama to finish."

Turning to Andy, she said, "Hey Mason, thanks for the coffee. It was good."

He just nodded at her.

"We should get going too." Darien said. He had already finished his matcha latte. It didn't take him longer than five minutes to drink the whole thing. He even debated getting another one, but chose not to foster his addiction.

As he gave Cara his goodbyes, I gave my boyfriend mine. Andy asked his customer to wait a second to ask me if I was free that evening to hang out. I wanted to, but I had a lot of homework to do. It was no big deal, as we were going to see each other at school anyway.

At that, we parted ways. Cara to her house and her comfy bed and her dramas. Andy to work past sundown. And Darien and I back to his apartment to continue working.

When we returned, Darien made a beeline for the recording room to edit some more. I followed and sat next to him. He tasked me with transposing the sheet music for two of his songs from the key of D to a C. I worked beside him quietly as to not disturb his creative process.

"You and your boyfriend are cute." He commented out of nowhere. I looked up to find him still glued to his screen.

"Um, thanks." I answered, not really knowing what else to say.

"I've only ever had one girlfriend." Darien said with a chuckle. "Janessa San Miguel. She was a horrible person. I just dated her cause she was hot, and guys like me barely scored any hot girls."

I thought he was joking, so I laughed. When he didn't say he was kidding or make a face to show he was kidding, I stopped and fell serious. "What are you talking about?"

"I wasn't exactly popular back in my day. My grades were shit, I had bad acne, I wore glasses that didn't frame my face well, I was always writing in a leather-bound journal. I was also quite antisocial."

I shook my head in disbelief. "I bet you were still super attractive, but in an unconventional kind of way."

"You think I'm super attractive?"

"You can turn straight men gay."

Darien pulled his headphones back to laugh at my statement. I felt quite proud of myself for being witty. He leaned back and pushed his chair out a bit to look at me. I set the sheet music on my lap to give him my full attention.

He stopped laughing and rested his chin on his hand like he got lost in thought. "You know, for a while, I was convinced I was in love with Janessa. I must've been out of my mind."

"Were you not?"

"No. And yet she still got me to do a lot of messed up crap. I was such a dick to the people who actually cared about me. I lost all my friends. I don't even know if I have any left at all.... Man, high school was a nightmare and I didn't even graduate."

"You moved to Korea to become a trainee at sixteen, right?"

"Yeah. I thought running away from my issues would fix them. I was an idiot." He sighed and rubbed his face with his hands. "But you know, you grow up. You learn from your mistakes. You struggle to move on, but you get by."

I hummed and reflected his leant-back, chin on hand stance. The atmosphere between us was somewhat relaxing. Darien looked at me with amusement as I looked at him with wonder. He raised his eyebrows at me and I bobbed my shoulders in response. "Sorry. You just seem so human right now."

"But I am human." He answered.

"People tend to forget that about celebrities."

"That's why I left Korea. I wanted to feel human again." Darien sighed and sat upright. He scooted in closer to his desk to continue working. "Alright, let's get back to work. I only have you for another half hour today, so let's make use of your time."

I nodded and picked my pencil and the sheet music back up. As I wrote an A minor over an F minor, I looked up at Darien. He looked so hollow. I was glad he chose to show his vulnerable side to me, but it made me want to give him a big hug. Not only because he was hot. He looked lonely. I noticed it while he was still in SILV-R. Even though he had the other boys, Darien always seem to be living in his own world. It was sad. It made me sad.

"My friends call me Bea," I spoke up before he could put his headphones back on.

"What?" He asked, not quite catching what I said.

I repeated myself, "My friends, they call me Bea. So...you should too."