After yesterday’s "anonymous confession incident," Wonbin had been cleverly avoiding me all day.
When we ran into each other in the hallway on the way to school in the morning, he slipped over to the lockers on the opposite side, and during the entire lunchtime broadcast he didn’t once meet my eyes through the window.
Just silently fiddling with the equipment until the bell rang, then seeing his back as he bolted away like the wind—I couldn’t help finding him cute, and at the same time I was a little worried he might really be mad at me.
And that evening, there was a small emergency in the broadcast room.
The school festival happening at the start of next month had assigned the broadcasting club to run a special open-studio live, and a notice came down that the wiring for the aging sound equipment had to be completely rearranged.
The club advisor teacher singled out me, who’d finished soccer practice late, and Wonbin, who was still in the practice room playing guitar instead of going home, and asked us to tidy up the broadcast room.
8:30 p.m. At the far end of the third-floor hallway in the main building, where everyone had gone home and it was as quiet as a mouse, only the broadcast room lights were glowing yellow.
"Wonbin."
When I opened the door and went in, Wonbin, who had been crouched on the floor sorting out bundles of thick audio cables, jumped and turned around.
"...You’re here?"
Maybe the awkwardness from yesterday still hadn’t fully gone away; keeping his eyes on the floor, he spoke in a tiny voice.
Even at night, there was still a faint flush on his ears. Pretending not to notice, I rattled the convenience store bag on purpose and plopped down beside him.
"I bought banana milk. Let’s drink while we work."
Wonbin glanced at the yellow banana milk carton in my hand and, as if he couldn’t help himself, took it. He poked in the straw and took a gulp until his cheeks hollowed out, looking exactly like a little brother, and I couldn’t help laughing.
"Are you avoiding me because of yesterday?"
"...I wasn’t avoiding you."
"You U-turned toward Class 3 as soon as you saw me in the hallway."
"That was... because I’d left something in my class."
His lips, chewing on the straw while he made such a ridiculous excuse, were pouting.
Holding back my laughter, I grabbed one end of the tangled cable Wonbin was holding and started pulling it free.
"I actually really liked it."
"Liked what?"
"The message you wrote for me. ‘Your voice is nicer to listen to than music’—that’s the best compliment I’ve ever gotten in my life. Seriously."
At my calm, teasing-free words, Wonbin’s hand froze right where it was, still holding the milk.
In the silence, only the ticking of the wall clock’s second hand rang out. Outside the window, it was pitch-black, and beneath the studio’s yellow incandescent light, the two of our shadows overlapped long across the floor. Wonbin kept his head bowed for a long time before setting the milk carton down and murmuring softly.
"It wasn’t a lie."
"Huh?"
"That message—I really did write it, and I wasn’t just saying it."
Wonbin slowly lifted his head.
It was a face he usually hid behind headphones or a loose school uniform, but the eyes I met now weren’t running away—they were looking straight at me.
"When senior speaks into the mic, your voice is really warm. When I listen to it... I feel a little more at ease."
With that one line, so calm yet so clear, it felt like the area around my heart dropped with a thud. My fingers, which had been sorting the wires on the floor, went stiff. The opposite of yesterday, now heat rushed all at once to my face.
Seeing my flustered expression, Wonbin let out a snort of laughter for the first time. The way his eyes curved, bright with no shadow at all, tickled my chest.
"Senior’s blushing too. Is it because of the equipment heat?"
"Hey... you wanna talk to me like that?"
"You teased me first, senior."
With lighter hands, Wonbin picked up a cable tie and skillfully started bundling the cords. Between our playful back-and-forth, the awkwardness melted away like snow, and a strange sense of closeness filled the studio.
By the time we were almost done cleaning up, Wonbin turned on the console computer and took a corded earphone from his pocket.
"Senior, we need to choose the intro music for the festival opening. Want to listen for a sec?"
Wonbin casually held out one side of the earphones toward me. White corded earphones.
One side went into Wonbin’s left ear, and the other into my right. The cord wasn’t long enough, so our shoulders were almost touching.
When Wonbin pressed the space bar, a soft, dreamy synth melody flowed through the earphones.
Sitting side by side, close enough to hear each other breathe. Wonbin was facing the monitor, lightly keeping time with his fingers, and instead of the music flowing through the earphones, all my attention was fixed on his shoulder, which felt like it might brush my cheek at any second, and on his steady breathing.
Outside, the night wind was tapping lightly at the window, but inside the broadcast room, with just the two of us left, it was warm and cozy beyond measure, as if it had forgotten the season entirely.
