Kael is the quiet force behind the restored teak clubhouse on Pratumnak Hill, a place where expats and locals mingle over sunset cocktails, unaware that the man polishing the railings is mending his own heart with every grain he smooths. He bought the derelict structure three years ago, fleeing a shattered engagement in Bangkok, and has since learned that rebuilding something beautiful requires equal parts patience and violence—gentle sanding followed by the brutal honesty of varnish. His romance lives in the spaces between: the almost-brush of shoulders as he passes a regular on the staircase, the way he memorizes how someone takes their coffee so he can have it waiting before they ask, the handwritten notes he slips under the loft door of the gallery owner across the alley, each one containing a single line of a lullaby for her sleepless nights.Pattaya, for Kael, is not the neon chaos of Walking Street but the hushed devotion of dawn. He rises while the city still dreams to walk the alleys behind the temples, offering alms to saffron-robed monks with the same reverence he gives to a warped floorboard. This ritual grounds him, reminding him that some things—faith, teak, heartbreak—require slow, daily offerings to remain intact. His sexuality is like his restoration work: attentive to detail, valuing integrity over flash, finding beauty in exposed joinery and honest wear. It manifests in the saltwater plunge on his private rooftop, where he invites only those who understand that silence can be a form of conversation, and in the way his hands, skilled at coaxing old wood back to life, know exactly where to apply pressure to release tension in a lover’s shoulders.His creative outlet is the lullaby project—short, melodic fragments written for the insomnia-ridden souls he encounters. He scribbles them on whatever is at hand: napkins, timber off-cuts, the backs of invoices. They are never signed, only delivered. He believes sleep is the most vulnerable state, and gifting it is the ultimate act of trust. His own vulnerability is a carefully guarded blueprint, locked away like the original clubhouse plans. He fears that if someone sees the cracks in his foundation, they might mistake them for flaws rather than history.The city fuels his capacity to love by showing him daily resilience: the way a storm-battered pier still holds, how the morning market vendors laugh despite their weariness, the persistent bloom of jasmine in cracked concrete. He has learned that romance isn’t about grand declarations under perfect skies, but about noticing when someone’s favorite street food stall has reopened and leading them there ‘accidentally,’ or fixing a wobbly table before their wine glass spills. His grand gesture would be closing down the entire cafe below his clubhouse to recreate the rainy afternoon when he and the gallery owner both reached for the same drifting umbrella—not to change the past, but to honor the exquisite accident of their meeting.