𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝟷

                                    

                                          
I've been holding on to hope that you'll come back when you can find some peace 
- bruises; lewis capaldi 
                          
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A warm day in early summer inclined to an end when Youngjo - as it was common for dog owners during this time of the day - locked the door to his apartment in order to grant his dog Sunny some movement and attention after having spent the majority of his wake hours working. 
The outside temperatures allowed him to leave his house with only a turtleneck jersey and a flimsy coat covering his body; in contrast to previous days, which had been swayed by a cold breeze and comfortless rain showers, today, the sun reflected somewhat golden on the cold and damp leaves and pathways, warming their glistening surface while relatively setting and being not far away from disappearing behind the horizon. 
                          
Despite his exam period laying a reasonable period of time in the future, Youngjo had an adequate pile of things to get done for university, so that he had barely managed to leave his room that day - and it was Sunday, the first vacation Sunday to be precise. 
At times, it occurred to him that his free time was less constricted on days he spent frequenting the university's building in the flesh and showing up to as many lectures as his syllabus for music management prescribed him to than it was on so-called days off. 
What eventually wasn't the finite truth, on the other hand, was that he had not entirely and exclusively grappled with uni-relevant work, as he had, among other things, rehearsed the songs for his performance in Seoho's café; the café didn't bear the name Music Hideout for nothing. After all, it wasn't uncommon that Seoho would sometimes start rounding several volunteers up to suffuse the coffee shop with some enjoyable music for the course of a midmorning - and apart from that, Seoho enriched his costumers with his humming conforming the tunes of the music coming from the stereo non-stop anyhow. 
Presumably, Youngjo was considered one of the standard-performer in aforesaid café by now, and he was always so cuffed to play the songs of their choosing in front of a small audience while being musically accompanied by Dongmyeong, Dongju's brother, and his keyboard.
                          
Nonetheless, the memories evolving around the beginnings of this café were still present in the back of his mind, which not least resulted in Youngjo having refused to engage in the café's musical facet for months, even if only it was about chiming a loose harmony into the microphone, as every song without Hwanwoong by his side felt so achingly wrong. 
As long ago as the café had seemingly just passed the stage of being merely a wooden cradle, Seoho had asked Hwanwoong and Youngjo to perform a duet, and upon seeing the excited sparkle in their friend's eyes as well as remembering his year-long rhapsody about the cafés entity, they had agreed. 
Back then, with only two microphones, which Youngjo had only half-heartedly authorized borrowed from one of the music rooms in his university's building, they had sat there, on two chairs in the middle of the room between benches, tables, and chairs, and sang for each other rather than for the purpose of their audience. 
Their love-struck duets had almost routine, the quality of the café's technical equipment improved, and the customers grew consistent and enduring, so that Seoho had already offered the couple a salary at this point, as he professed the customers would only visit the café because of them. Youngjo and Hwanwoong had declined - no money in the world could possibly fulfil Youngjo with the happiness and devotion that Hwanwoong managed to endow him with his smile and his angelic voice alone. 
                          
Youngjo sighed, sadly. Sunny let loose a little squeak, appearing to have noticed that Youngjo as of late seemed to follow such longing and starving trains of thought.
Admittedly, Youngjo had been thinking of Hwanwoong and everything that their relationship and their connection had ever been especially consumptively lately.
Though, the alarming inner turmoil caused by his everlasting lack of insight and the desperate searching for reasons and explanations had subsided, a dainty fissure had survived that not once the ticking clock of the bygone six months had been able to fill, so that Youngjo would sometimes wake up on faltering mornings with Hwanwoong as his first and only thought that seemed to be meant to accompany him for the rest of the day. 
How was he even supposed to come to terms with their breakup and get some closure if there had only been a blank refusal and a following disappearance instead of an explanation? 
Where was he, was he okay, and would he ever come back and return to his hometown? 
On some days, the situation got his blood up. On most days, his heart filled with care and worries for Hwanwoong and sorrow for their wiped out magic.