three is the perfect number || jaenoren (norenmin)

quatre

Jaemin shook his head, a serious look overcoming his happy-go-lucky demeanour, "I'll let you in on a secret. I'm a fake bitch, and if I hadn't gone to the toilet before I came here I would have pissed myself by now."

Renjun followed his snort with a cough and hesitated inwardly before putting his hand on Jaemin's shoulder. It's a friendly enough gesture, it's not like I can channel all my gayness through this. "That makes two of us. Hopefully, we won't soil ourselves on the first day of work."

Jaemin nodded, "Cheers." He then pushed the door open and they turned and walked into the building one after the other (Renjun was embarrassingly happy that Jaemin had let him go first). They found themselves in the bustling kitchen. Renjun felt a hand brush his own and looked around to see Jaemin gesturing to a little room off to the side. They deposited their things with the other employees' possessions and left the kitchen to find the bar, as they had been told to go there first in an email they had received confirming their employment.

They went up to the counter on the side, lined with glasses for drinks, but unlike what had been mentioned in the email, there was no one there to tell them what to do. Renjun started when there was a sort of frenzied clinking sound from below him — then, all too suddenly, a head of grey hair and a grin popped up right in front of him from behind the counter. Renjun stumbled back to avoid headbutting him, bumping into Jaemin, who grabbed his shoulders and held him steady.

The grey-haired young man smiled at them. "Hi! You guys must be the new employees, right?" They weren't even given a chance to do more than nod before he was talking again. Renjun swallowed, still leaning against Jaemin's side, the boy's hands on his shoulders. Please keep talking. God, please don't shut up, you strange bartender.

"Welcome! My name's Kim Jungwoo."

Jaemin nodded again, then quickly pulled Renjun upright and grinned at him again, the absence of his warm fingers and the bright smile making Renjun feel hot and cold all over, like he was going to have a stroke. He blinked, hard, turning back to Jungwoo and trying to at least seem like he was paying attention

"You two must be Huang Renjun and Na Jaemin." This man spoke like he was twenty minutes late to a meeting, but was actually quite happy about it. "You are actually two minutes early! Which means you are currently free! So..." Jungwoo stopped talking to then double over and begin to push something around to the door that led out of the bar. Jaemin and Renjun watched in dull confusion as a huge, clear, plastic container of liquid presented itself to them.  

"If you could please use those spare two minutes to please carry something over to the kitchen for me, that would be amazing."

"You want us —" Jaemin pointed to himself and Renjun, "to carry that gigantic bottle of water —" He pointed to the container now gleaming menacingly under the overhead lights, "— all the way there?" He finished off by gesturing to the kitchen situated all the way across the rather spacey room.

 Jungwoo nodded, his fringe flopping around almost playfully. "Yep! Think of it as a test — if you can't carry this across the room, how will you carry dishes? Also, it's not water, it's vodka." Neither of the new waiters had enough time to comment on this. "When you get there, go find Jihoon —  he's the teeny, cute, angry one —" He held a hand up somewhere around his waist, indicating the subject's height, "He will tell you what to do from there. Good luck!" Then Jungwoo looked at them expectantly, as if they were to leave. 

"Thanks." Renjun called out, decided against telling Jungwoo that this was hardly practice for carrying dishes — the heaviest thing they'd be carrying would be a big bowl of soup. The bartender had already disappeared back underneath the counter.