Beautifully Flawed

9. Shifting Tides

The tide will always turn at the set time
—

Jungkook

Monday morning came after an excruciatingly long weekend of nursing a hangover.

"Hey Soobin, can I ask you something?"

"Sure, anything you wanna know. I got you!" he replied flashing his pearly whites.

Meet Soobin. – The one that I couldn't do without in this labyrinth of an office. With so many people to know and so many meeting rooms to go to, having a friend is essential. He was my first friend at work and also the team's resident gossip. There was nothing happening in the office that he didn't know about.

"Who is that guy? Y-You know the one that led the strategy meeting on my first day..." I asked trying to sound nonchalant.

"Ahhhh... you mean Mr. Park Jimin. Such a hottie right? Such a mystery too," he responded with a raised eyebrow.

"Mystery huh? How so?" I asked trying to push for more information. I did not want to give anything about my interests away.

"Yeah. What you see is what you get. Apparently no one has any insights on his personal life. He is really good at separating his personal and work life."

"I see," I replied... nodding my head. That was so little to go with.

At this point, I was certain that there were a thousand and one questions going through Soobin's mind and I wouldn't be surprised if he caught on. A lot of the times, I wished he was slow. And then as if he had heard something surprising, he jumped up from his chair and came over to my desk with inquisitive eyes.

"What?” I asked him with an innocent shrug. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Pray tell", he responded with a smile.

"I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about,” I insisted.

"Well, if you don't spill, I am never telling you what I know," he said in a sing song. It was like dangling bait for fish and I was hooked. Though, through it all I tried all that I could to keep my composure.

"Nothing, I just was curious. I wanted to know what he is like," I replied. "You know that I am taking over the collaboration with his team right? And I just want to get to know him so that I can know what to expect." I had to sell the lie and I could tell he wasn't buying but I continued nonetheless, "What is he like? Is he intense? How easy is he to impress? Is he a pain in the ass? You know stuff like that," I shrugged and leaned back in my chair maintaining eye contact to sound more convincing and less evasive.

It was far from what I wanted to know. What did he like to do? What did he do in his free time? Was he seeing anyone? Who were his friends?

"Oh well, we haven't collaborated a lot in the past. We did a little before he got promoted. You see this is his first big project where he takes lead since his promotion but, I can tell you for a fact that he is the easiest person I have ever worked with from the M&D department." He paused looked at me expressively and added, "Oh... and in case you are wondering, he is totally single.” With that, he walked back to his desk like he had just not drop the most important piece of information.