Seonghwa took another sip of wine as he tried his best to listen to another one of Wooyoung's stories. They were funny for the first few minutes but after about half an hour they were getting old. San seemed genuinely entertained by each one. But Seonghwa had to keep himself from groaning at each punchline.

Where the hell was Hongjoong?

Did he get scared by the fact that San had called it a date? If so, Seonghwa would be seething. Clearly he was joking. Hongjoong seemed to take everything San said to heart.

Not that a part of Seonghwa hadn't thought about it. After all, he couldn't deny that Hongjoong was pretty cute.

But he was trying to make friends. And Hongjoong was clearly embarrassed by the idea of dating him so he was best off to just keep his mouth shut.

It was strange to Seonghwa. Whenever Hongjoong made a joke that felt flirtatious, he always carried so much confidence. And he did it all the time.

Yet whenever Seonghwa tried to reciprocate his jokes, Hongjoong freaked out. He didn't have much experience with people but it seemed like he felt uncomfortable with Seonghwa making suggestive comments. As if he hadn't intended to insinuate they could ever be in a romantic relationship.

But Seonghwa wasn't even trying to imply that. He was just trying to joke around with a friend. So why was Hongjoong so on edge about it?

"—and do you know what Yeonjun said to me?" Wooyoung baited, as he wrapped up another story.

"What??" asked San, deeply enthralled.

"He said, 'damn I'm not San but I sure as hell wish I was,'" Wooyoung laughed and San laughed too.

Seonghwa tried his best not to roll his eyes. He couldn't possibly imagine sending sexts to the wrong person on accident. This was partly because he only had four contacts (with the additions of Wooyoung and San whom he hoped never accidentally sent him their sexts) and therefore would have a pretty hard time mixing them up.

He also felt like it was something personal enough that he would check multiple times before he sent it.

As Wooyoung was about to start another story, a waiter began to approach the table followed by an out of breath Hongjoong.

"Guys I'm so sorry I'm late I thought I had enough time to walk here but there was construction on one of the sidewalks I always take and I had to reroute by like six blocks and—"

He paused a moment to take a drink of his wine as he sat at the table.

"—ooh, what is this? This is amazing! Anyways—I'm sorry."

The three of them stared at him for a moment as he took another drink of his wine. Finally Seonghwa broke the silence.

"We're just glad you made it."

"Besides, it's not much of a double date when there's only three of us," laughed Wooyoung and San laughed with him.

Hongjoong laughed anxiously and took another drink of wine.

"If you want to take a quick look at the menu, we could call the waitress over and put in our order," Seonghwa smiled and Hongjoong gratefully took the distraction.

Hongjoong figured out what he wanted and they were able to order pretty quickly. Once the waitress had left the table, the four of them were left in awkward silence.

Just as San was about to attempt to start up a conversation, his phone began to ring.

"Agh, I'm sorry you guys. I thought I put it on silent!" San dug in his pocket until he found it and was about to silence it when he saw the contact name.

He looked up at the group in surprise and answered the phone. Who could be calling?

"Hello?"

Everyone watched as San spoke with the man on the other end. No one had caught who was calling and everyone was concerned as San wouldn't have picked up if it weren't important.

"Yes sir, I'll let them know right away. Thank you for letting me know."

San ended the call and the other three jumped forward with questions.

"Guys—I can't answer when you keep yelling questions at me! One at a time!"

The three of them nodded and sank back into their seats.

"Who was that?" Wooyoung was the first voice to speak up.

"That was Mingi-nim."

The table shifted. So the call had been work-related.

"What did he want?" Hongjoong asked.

"He says—there's an important meeting coming up this weekend in Seoul and he wants Wooyoung and I to prepare our marketing teams for the trip. We're going to Seoul!"

Wooyoung and San both jumped in excitement and Seonghwa smiled. Since he knew the city pretty well he could lead them around and get to bring his new friends to all of his favorite places! And as long as the meeting was a one-day affair, they'd probably have a lot of free time to hang out together.

He turned to share the excitement with Hongjoong but his smile fell. Hongjoong didn't seem very excited at all. That's when Seonghwa remembered that Hongjoong had worked at JYP in Seoul for a few years. And they'd treated him like shit.

No wonder he wouldn't want to go back. He decided this was a good moment to try and be a friend to Hongjoong. Especially since he was starting to feel a little guilty for ignoring him earlier.

As Wooyoung and San were still celebrating the news, he made eye contact with Hongjoong and motioned for him to follow him to the bathroom.

Hongjoong seemed hesitant at first but followed.

Thankfully the restaurant had a single stall bathroom so once both had entered, Seonghwa locked the door behind him. Feeling he had given Hongjoong as much privacy as possible, he turned back and placed his hands on Hongjoong's shoulders.

"Wanna talk about it?"