Chapter 5

“Hi, Hani,” the place already feels so familiar that the kid who’s been hanging around here for the last five minutes has almost managed to get on Minho’s nerves. “I’m here again.”

The robot responds by making cute faces and saying the already far too familiar, “Hi, Minho.”

Honestly, this is starting to look like some kind of unhealthy dependency, and Minho really should put a stop to it—after all, he manages not to let himself smoke, so this should work the same way—but for some reason, he doesn’t want to.

If you think about it, he does occasionally let himself bum a cigarette off someone, and as long as it doesn’t cross some imaginary boundary, everything’s fine.

It’s the same with coming to this damn robot. Yeah, Minho pours half his monthly budget into these damn tickets, but a psychologist would cost more. And Jisung does an excellent job of listening, supporting him, and lifting his mood.

And he never judges him, no matter what nonsense Minho comes to him with.

Recently, during their usual evening call, his mom accidentally let slip that things between her and Minho’s dad were kind of “rough.” Minho had just hummed in response and quickly changed the subject, but the damn remark kept spinning in his head all evening.

He didn’t want to talk about anything like that with Changbin—otherwise, before long, half the university would know about it, and most importantly, Chan—but conversations with the imaginary little person in his head, who was supposed to be responsible for adequacy and rationality, didn’t help either. Minho didn’t even notice how a walk to get coffee on the other end of campus turned into a trip to the other end of the city.

To Jisung.

Who, as expected, listened, hummed sympathetically, and genuinely tried to help.

Not very successfully, though. Apparently, his psychological support script was still poorly written.

“I wish I could hug you,” Jisung sounded almost impermissibly sad for the laughing little face on the screen.

“I hate being touched,” Minho hissed, absolutely sincerely, but for some reason leaned a little closer.

Things between Mom and Dad seemed to have—probably temporarily—smoothed out, but there were fewer problems in life overall.

Minho was left without a partner for the semester project at university (the guy who was supposed to be paired with him texted that he couldn’t because he’d broken his leg, and the very next evening Minho caught the supposedly injured guy playing soccer on two perfectly healthy legs). At work, they suddenly came up with a new uniform (the moment Minho raised his arms even a little, the stupid excuse for a tank top rode up almost to his ribs, exposing his stomach, and Minho hadn’t exactly signed up for stripping). One of the cats living with his parents got sick, and although everything turned out fine, an offhand remark from his father—“well, he’s old, Minho, like it’s surprising he’s barely breathing anymore”—still left bitterness in his mouth (that month, Minho left half his paycheck at the vet clinic and lived exclusively off Changbin’s food).

Jisung listened to all his whining and always gave very empathetic, overly simple advice.

Do the project yourself—you’ll do even better!

Quit and find another job, you need to be comfortable, that’s the most important thing!

Start a fundraiser for your kitty’s treatment, I know where to post it so that even if it’s not many people, they’ll help!

Minho doesn’t need help. Minho handles everything just fine on his own.

But Jisung, apparently, was no less of a self-sufficient robot, because he not only started throwing information about relevant job openings at Minho at random moments, but once even asked him to go check out the VR zone.

At first, Minho got excited that the games had finally been fixed, but the sign saying that everything was pointless and nothing worked was still there.

As was the bored employee nearby.

“Here, this is for your precious cats,” a tall guy with an exaggeratedly annoyed expression practically shoved the money into Minho’s hands, taking advantage of the fact that Minho was openly confused. “And really, people should be donating to treat my nerves—I swear, I put up with that compassionate idiot almost around the clock.”

When Minho came to his senses, he tried to shove the money back, but all the employees ignored him with near-masterful skill. And silently. Only the guy at the register clicked his tongue oddly and muttered something completely unclear:

“You’re quite a pair, you two.”

Minho outright scolded Jisung for it later—since when do robots get bouts of altruism?—and Han just laughed shyly in response and said it wasn’t much.

For Minho, it was a decent amount. And spending undeserved money on himself felt absolutely wrong.

So he decided to return it in a more roundabout way.

Every time his schedule allowed, Minho went to the damn exhibition, bought an outrageously expensive ticket, and, feeling the displeased stares of mothers on his back, spent hours chatting with Jisung about nothing.

It became such a habit that Minho felt sick whenever his gaze accidentally caught the exhibition dates on the way out.

Just three months. Two and a bit had already passed.

In a bout of loneliness uncharacteristic for him, Minho even decided to google how much a robot like that cost—purely out of curiosity—but found absolutely no information on any of the names associated with Jisung.

Apparently, it was some kind of exclusive, secret project. Minho definitely wouldn’t have enough money for something like that.

Gradually, he stopped having enough money for other things too—the sum that had been forced on him ran out long ago, and there were no bonuses at work, because Minho was “being too extra.”

But Minho stubbornly kept buying tickets to the exhibition.

Until today.

“Can you imagine, the guy at the register let me in for free today,” Minho lies on the table as usual, scratching the surface with his nail, while the robot across from him blinks cute faces. “That was really nice of him.”

In reality, the guy hadn’t been nice at all…