latermaybe | For S

With only a few weeks of the fall semester behind me, I already found myself slipping into the dull monotony of teaching. Covering the same material, with few exceptions, fielding the same questions, struggling to engage the same disinterested students, all while pushing towards a permanent place in a department I wasn't sure I had the passion for.

I was good at it. I'd always been good at faking it. I would be a relatively successful academic, with just the right amount of publications, and just the right amount of students who continue on to more lofty ambitions, and just the right amount of respect among my peers. Once, just the right amount was all I'd ever aspired to.

Now, I couldn't help the feeling that I should be reaching for more.

Sitting in a chair by the window at the shop, I thumbed through a volume Socratic philosophy, in need of a brush up. After a while, the words began to blur, and with a sigh, I tossed it aside. I rose to my feet just as the bell above the door chimed, and I glanced up, smiling at the familiar face.

"Hey."

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When Sihyun stops into the bookstore, it's on a total whim. Although he spends a fair amount of time reading lately, he usually borrows books from the library rather than buying them — a mentality carried over, he thinks, from his late teens in Seoul, when he and Jae-eun were barely managing to make ends meet, struggling sometimes to keep themselves fed, never mind being able to afford to go out and spend money on things that weren't necessities. It isn't like that here at all, between the stipend they both get from the city and his having a decently paying full-time job, but it's hard sometimes to shake that mindset.

Today, though, he's curious, and tells himself there's no real reason not to. He isn't expecting to step inside and be greeted by a friend, but it makes him all the more pleased to have decided to pay the store a visit. "Hi," he says, giving Oliver a smile in return. "I didn't know I'd be running into you here."

"This is Elio's store," I explained. Then, because I knew Elio liked to make the distinction, I added, "It's not something he ever planned on doing, but he inherited it from a friend."

Frankly, it seemed more like something I would've chosen to do, in one of the many ways I made ends meet over the years. In fact, I was fairly certain I liked the shop more than Elio did.

"Are you looking for something in particular?"

"Ah, really? I had no idea," Sihyun says, amused and a little surprised, as he shakes his head. He doesn't know Elio as well as he knows Oliver, so it makes sense, he thinks, that he wouldn't have known about this before now. It's an amusing coincidence, though, having chosen this moment to wander in here, only to find Oliver.

"And not really, no. Just browsing, seeing what looks interesting."

"If you see anything in the case, let me know. The key's back in the office," I said, rising to my feet. "The sales clerk stepped out for a bit, I promised to run the register."

While card transactions were handled by an updated system, the original antique register was still in use, as it had been when Elio came into possession of the shop. It was a beast, but it reminded me of a few of the odd jobs in tiny village pubs and restaurants I'd had during my summers in Europe.

"There are some interesting things in the back."

"Yeah? I'll have to take a look," Sihyun says with a smile. Reading is a comparatively new hobby for him, something he found himself spending a lot of time on in those few months before he arrived here, when he was all but bedridden and no longer playing music at all. Neither of those remains the case now, but he's continued with it all the same.

"Is there anything you recommend?"

"It depends on what you're in the mood for. The back is for rare volumes. Some from Darrow, some from other places," I explained. "Elio keeps a pretty extensive collection on music theory," I added, pointing the way.

"To be honest, I don't get to read for pleasure as much as I'd like. If you're looking for early access to the newest Journal of Philosophy, I'm your guy, but otherwise, I'm not sure I'll be much help."

"Meanwhile, I've started reading for pleasure a lot more than I used to," Sihyun replies with a self-deprecating smile. It was never a priority before, really, something he would do for school when necessary but that mostly fell by the wayside otherwise. His life is unrecognizably different now than it was a few years ago, but for all the trouble it took to get here, it's all for the best.

"Maybe I'll look at those music books. Not many places carry them."

"I'd blame it on teaching, but it's more likely that I've gotten lazy," I admitted with a huff of laughter.

Gesturing for him to follow me, I said, "I'll show you where they are. Elio will be happy to hear that there's someone else around who might appreciate them."

"I'll have to tell Jae-eun, and then maybe there will be a third person to appreciate them, too," Sihyun replies as he follows along with Oliver, only half-teasing. He isn't sure if it's something Jae would be interested in or not — if he would want to revive his interest in music that much — but it's an amusingly niche field of study.

"For me, it was... I had too much time on my hands, for a while back home. And reading was just about the only way for me to stay occupied."

"Please do," I laughed, "If nothing else, this place could use the customers."

While it wasn't exactly bleeding money, it was never a business that turned a huge profit. Honestly, if not for the emotional ties he felt for it, Elio would never have kept this shop, and I had my suspicions that he might decide to part ways with it somewhere down the line.

"Before Darrow, I think I made it a point not to stay in one place long enough to have that kind of free time."

"I didn't have much choice," Sihyun explains, slightly sheepish. "It was a health thing. I had a surgery, and while I was recovering... not much to do but sit and read." Even in the most nonspecific terms, it's a little strange to talk about. For something that was so all-encompassing for that period of his life, it isn't a subject he tends to bring up, mostly because of the amount of skirting around the truth it involves.

Explaining that his now-fiancé once tried to kill him is not a road he has any intention of going down. It wasn't then, and it definitely isn't now.

"Though, to be fair, I mostly stayed put before that, too."

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