Jun Kwon doesn’t make mistakes.

That’s rule #1 at K Innovations, and rule #1 of being Jun Kwon. You don’t slip. You don’t crack. You don’t accidentally send a 2:17 AM breakdown to every employee in the company.

Except he had.

The email had been titled “Q4 Profit Margins.” The body was supposed to be spreadsheets and quarterly projections. Instead, half-asleep and running on three hours of rest and too much cold brew, Jun had typed:

_I’m tired.

I’m tired of boardrooms and fake smiles and everyone calling me ‘Ice Prince’ like I don’t have blood in my veins.

Do any of you ever feel like you’re screaming into a void?

God, I need a vacation. Or a drink. Or someone to tell me it’s okay to not be ‘on’ 24/7.

Delete this. Don’t tell HR._

Then he’d hit send. To _all@kinnovations.com_.

By 2:18 AM, he was lying on his penthouse floor, contemplating whether it was easier to fake his death or move to Jeju and become a tangerine farmer.

By 2:19 AM, his phone buzzed.

An unknown number.

_CEO-nim? You good?_

Jun stared at the screen. He doesn’t give his personal number to employees. He barely gives it to his own mother. His first instinct was to throw the phone across the room. His second was to recall the email, issue a company-wide apology, and resign before the board could fire him.

_Who is this_, he typed back.

_It’s Tae Hyun. From Creative. You left your phone in Conference Room B yesterday. I was gonna return it at 9 but... well. I read the email._

Jun closed his eyes. Of course it was him.

Tae Hyun. The new creative director with paint perpetually under his fingernails. The one who wore oversized cardigans to investor meetings and had once told the CFO that K Innovations’ branding was “boring but make it fashion.” The one who pitched campaigns like they were poetry and looked at Jun like he wasn’t made of glass.

_Delete it_, Jun sent.

_Already did. From my inbox. Can’t delete it from my brain tho. The ‘screaming into a void’ part was very poetic._

Jun’s jaw clenched. _I’m firing you._

_For reading an email YOU sent to everyone? CEO-nim, that’s not very legal. Also you approved my PTO last week. I’m untouchable until Monday._

Jun could hear his own pulse. The penthouse was silent except for the hum of the city forty-seven floors below. He should stop this. He should put the phone down, fix the mistake, rebuild the wall.

Instead, he asked: _Why are you awake._

_Couldn’t sleep. Pitch deck for the Han Corp campaign is due at 9 and your ‘profit margins’ email made me spill coffee on my laptop. Why are YOU awake?_

Jun’s thumb hovered. He could lie. He could say _work_. He could say anything but the truth.

He didn’t.

_Couldn’t sleep either. Kept thinking about your tagline. “For the quiet moments.”_

The three dots that meant Tae Hyun was typing took forever.

_You... remembered that? I pitched it 3 months ago and you said ‘it’s too soft for our brand.’_

_I was wrong_, Jun sent. _It’s the only line I remembered._

The silence after that was heavier than the email. Jun could almost hear Tae Hyun breathing through the phone.

_You don’t have to be ‘on’ 24/7, you know_, came the reply. _Even Ice Princes melt._

_Don’t call me that._

_Then stop acting like one 😗

Jun looked at the clock. 2:31 AM. The city was finally quiet. No pings, no board members, no expectations. Just a man who’d accidentally told the truth and the one person who hadn’t used it against him.

His next text was reckless. He knew it was reckless.

_Meet me on the roof. 10 minutes. We need to discuss the... Han Corp campaign._

_At 2 AM? On the roof? That’s against like 7 company policies. ...do you have hot choco?_

Jun was already pulling on a coat. _Two cups. And a blanket. It’s for team morale._

_Right. “Team morale.” CEO privileges sure are something 🥵_

_Shut up. See you in 10.*

Jun ended the call and exhaled. It was the first real breath he’d taken in years.

He’d probably be unemployed by noon. The board would see the recall notice, they’d ask questions, HR would have a field day. His reputation as the Ice Prince would shatter.

But for now, there was hot chocolate. And a blanket. And someone who read his breakdown and texted back instead of running.

For the quiet moments.

Maybe Tae Hyun was right.

The roof of K Innovations Tower was 47 floors of wind and bad decisions.

Jun Kwon stood by the east water tank at 2:40 AM with two paper cups and a wool blanket he’d stolen from his own office. His breath fogged in the cold. He was a man who’d negotiated billion-won acquisitions without sweating, but his hands shook around the hot chocolate.

He didn’t wait for people. People waited for him.

The stairwell door banged open.

“CEO-nim, if I get pneumonia, I’m naming you in the lawsuit,” Tae Hyun said, stomping onto the roof. Pajama pants. Paint-stained cardigan. A knitted scarf that swallowed half his face. His cheeks were red from the cold or the run or both. “And this is definitely a violation. I checked the employee handbook on the way up.”

“There is no specific policy about the roof,” Jun said, too fast.

“Because normal executives don’t hold campaign meetings here at 2 AM!” Tae Hyun took one of the cups, his fingers grazing Jun’s. Neither of them moved away. “Is this even hot? What café is open right now?”

“The one in our lobby. It’s open 24 hours.” Jun held out the blanket like it was a peace offering. Or a white flag.

Tae Hyun stared at it. “You brought me a blanket.”

“For team morale.”

“Right. Team morale.” Tae Hyun wrapped it around his shoulders, but he was hiding a smile in the steam from his cup. “That’s why we’re dodging security cameras.”

They sat on the ledge. The city bled neon below them, but up here it was just wind and the distant, mechanical heart of Seoul. No deadlines. No board members. No one calling him Ice Prince.

“You answered me,” Tae Hyun said eventually. He wasn’t looking at Jun. He was watching the skyline like it might give him answers. “After the email. I thought you’d pretend it never happened. Or fire me. Fifty-fifty odds.”

Jun watched him instead of the city. In meetings, Tae Hyun was quiet, deferential, always sketching in the margins while the VPs talked. Up here, with chocolate on his lip and a blanket around his shoulders, he was something else entirely. Braver, maybe.

“I considered it,” Jun admitted. “Pretending.”

“But you didn’t.”

“No.” Jun didn’t have words for 2:17 AM. Didn’t know how to explain that his carefully built persona had cracked in public, and Tae Hyun was the only one who hadn’t flinched. “You said Ice Princes melt.”

Tae Hyun choked. “That was a joke! You’re not supposed to remember my jokes!”

“I remember everything from that conversation.” Jun’s voice came out lower than he meant it to. “Especially the part where you didn’t send it to HR.”

The wind picked up. Tae Hyun shivered and shifted closer. Close enough that their shoulders touched under the wool. Jun went still. No one touched him at work. No one had touched him, period, in years. Touch was a liability. Touch was HR paperwork.

“You’re tense,” Tae Hyun murmured. “Perks of being CEO?”

“Perks of having a creative director who doodles me as a bear on company time.”

Tae Hyun buried his face in the blanket. “Oh my god. Kill me.”

“Don’t,” Jun said, and it came out rough. Honest.

Tae Hyun looked up at that. His hair was a mess from the wind. He had dark circles under his eyes and a coffee stain on his cardigan. He looked like he’d also been screaming into a void.

“Why did you really ask me up here?” Tae Hyun asked, quiet. “And don’t say team morale. You’re terrible at lying after midnight.”

Jun looked at the city. Then he looked at Tae Hyun. “You said your tagline was ‘For the quiet moments.’”

“Yeah?”

“This.” Jun gestured at the cups, the blanket, the two of them suspended above Seoul. “This is quiet.”

Tae Hyun’s breath caught. For a long moment, neither of them spoke. Then Tae Hyun did something dangerous. He leaned his head on Jun’s shoulder.

“Just for research,” he mumbled against Jun’s coat. “Very professional, CEO-nim.”

Jun’s heart was loud enough to be a company violation. He didn’t move. He didn’t breathe. He just stared at the lights below and thought: _This is what it feels like to not be performing._

Slowly, muscle by muscle, he let himself relax. “Don’t get used to it, Director Kim.”

“Too late,” Tae Hyun whispered. Jun felt him smile.

They stayed until 3:12 AM, when the security sweep started and they had to sprint down 47 flights of stairs, spilling chocolate and biting back laughter like kids caught after curfew.

At 5:00 AM, Jun was back in his office. The blanket was folded on his couch. There was a post-it on his laptop in his own handwriting that he didn’t remember writing.

_Bring the blanket tonight. -J_

He stared at it. The recall had worked on the email. The board would never know. His reputation was intact.

But Tae Hyun knew. And he’d stayed.

For the quiet moments.

Jun sat down, opened the Han Corp deck, and started typing. For the first time in years, the words came easy.

9:03 AM hits Jun Kwon like a physical blow.

The elevator doors open to Floor 42, and for the first time in four years as CEO, Jun hesitates before stepping out. The fluorescent lights feel interrogative. The air smells like copy paper and impending unemployment.

He’d spent 2:47 AM to 4:15 AM on a rooftop with a blanket and Tae Hyun’s head on his shoulder. He’d spent 4:16 AM to 8:59 AM lying in bed, staring at his ceiling, wondering if HR had a specific form for “I committed seven policy violations before dawn.”

The bullpen is already loud. Phones ringing. Keyboards clacking. Normal.

Too normal.

“CEO-nim!” Mina from Finance waves a tablet at him. “The Q4 report—”

“Later,” Jun cuts her off, voice colder than he intends. He can feel eyes. Not the usual _Ice Prince is walking by_ eyes. These are _did you hear about the email_ eyes.

His office door is blessedly shut. He makes it inside, locks it, and exhales for what feels like the first time since 2:17 AM yesterday.

The post-it is still on his desk.

_Bring the blanket tonight. -J_

Jun stares at it. He doesn’t remember writing it. He must have come back to his office after the roof, running on adrenaline and hot chocolate, and left himself a note like a drunk.

A knock.

Jun shoves the post-it into his desk drawer and straightens his tie. “Enter.”

It’s Tae Hyun.

Of course it’s Tae Hyun.

He’s in a paint-stained cardigan over a collared shirt, holding two coffees and looking like he slept even less than Jun. There are dark circles under his eyes, and his hair is doing that thing where it sticks up on one side. He looks unprofessional. He looks real.

“Morning, CEO-nim,” Tae Hyun says, too casually. He sets one coffee on Jun’s desk. Black. No sugar. Exactly how Jun takes it. “Team morale delivery.”

Jun doesn’t touch it. “What are you doing here.”

“Returning your phone. Again.” Tae Hyun pulls it from his pocket, slides it across the desk. “And checking if you were still employed. The email thread was... active at 3 AM.”

Jun’s stomach drops. “Who replied.”

“No one. I think IT killed it before most people woke up. Perks of having a friend in Tech who owes me from that time I designed his wedding invites for free.” Tae Hyun shrugs, but his eyes are scanning Jun’s face. “You look terrible.”

“You look like you lost a fight with a palette.”

“Yeah, well, some of us were up past sunrise committing workplace violations.” Tae Hyun’s mouth quirks. “How’s the Ice Prince this morning?”

_Don’t call me that._ The words are automatic. But they don’t come out.

Because Tae Hyun is standing in his office at 9:07 AM, holding coffee, and Jun can still feel the phantom weight of his head on his shoulder.

“Don’t,” Jun says instead, quieter. “Not here.”

Something in Tae Hyun’s expression shifts. Softer. Like he’s filing that away. _Not here_ means there _is_ a here and a not-here. A them and a not-them.

“Right.” Tae Hyun nods toward the door. “Meeting in Conference Room B at 10. Han Corp pitch. You’ll be there?”

Jun always is.

“Yeah.”

“Cool. I’ll try not to call the branding ‘boring but make it fashion’ to their faces.” Tae Hyun backs toward the door, hand on the handle. “Oh. And CEO-nim?”

Jun looks up.

“I kept the blanket.”

The door clicks shut before Jun can respond.

He sits down hard in his chair. The coffee is still warm. The post-it is burning a hole in his desk drawer. And in three minutes, his assistant will come in with the day’s schedule, and he will have to pretend that 2:40 AM on a roof didn’t happen.

His phone buzzes. Unknown number.

Jun’s heart stops. Then he remembers — Tae Hyun gave his phone back.

He opens the text.

_Delete this after reading. But for the record?

Your ‘screaming into a void’ line is gonna win us Han Corp.

Trust me.

Jun deletes it.

Then he opens his desk drawer, looks at the post-it, and doesn’t.

For the quiet moments.

He has a 10 AM meeting to survive.