cloud-9

The scene itself was odd. You both are standing outside the school’s gymnasium, the music’s bass shaking its grounds. You can hear your fellow classmates screaming the words of the current song. Once in a while, the disco lights would flash past the door’s windows. You’re wearing the dress you bought with your mom a couple of weeks ago and Taehyun’s also in formal attire. His suit’s jacket was probably sitting on some chair inside. He was only wearing a vest. 

Taehyun’s standing steps away from you, arms limp at his sides and he’s struggling to hold eye contact. Over the past few weeks, he’s been trying to flee this budding crush, denying it from comments that slipped out of his friends’ mouths and trying to wave off thoughts that involved you and his beating heart. But how could he hold his emotions back while you were standing across the room looking so beautiful?

“Say something.” You’re growing impatient. You need an answer out of him or else you’re going to explode into bits. 

“You’re acting as if it’s forbidden for me to have feelings for you,” He says quietly. There’s a hint of hurt in his voice. Taehyun’s eyes flicker between you and his feet, which he felt were screwed into the school’s floor. His heart is beating and pounding against his chest. 

You sigh, “I didn’t say it was forbidden, Taehyun.” You run a hand through your hair, feeling the need to groan, “But… it’s like you’re running off-script! We’ve been at each other’s throats for how long? So long that it should practically be normal for us to hate each other. Why switch up now?”

Your final question echoes through Taehyun’s brain and he’s trying to search for an answer that would make the most sense. 

The real answer: he doesn’t really know. 

Taehyun doesn’t really know why his feelings decided to head in some unpredictable direction. But even so, he digs down into the deepest depths of his mind just to provide you with an answer. He feels like you deserve it. 

Taehyun finally plucks out a single moment and squeezes his eyes shut, “There was this one day a few months ago…” He looks up to see if you’re listening, feeling relief when he finds you looking back at him, “I was already on my way home when I realized that I forgot my notebook for an important exam we had, so I knew I had to run back and grab it, because there was no way I was letting you get higher grades than me.” He lets out a soft chuckle, “When I got back to school, I sprinted to our classroom. I wanted to get in and out because I was starving. But before I entered the classroom, you were there.”

Your ears perk up, curiosity creeping up on you. 

“I wasn’t expecting to see you,” Taehyun continues, “So obviously I was thrown off and I froze. Because what were you doing there alone after school hours? There was practically no one on campus.” He pauses and runs through the events in his head, making sure he doesn’t mix up the sequence, “It sounds creepy but I got nosy and wanted to see what you were up to. You weren’t even doing anything bad. You were just studying.” 

Ah… You can recall that day easily. It was the night before the physics exam.

“It took me a moment, but I realized you were crying,” Taehyun says quietly, “I couldn’t see your face because you had your head down. I only knew you were crying because your shoulders were shaking.” He feels his chest tighten before it releases itself at the memory. “I didn’t know why you were crying. I just knew that you were sad. You looked sad.”

Taehyun makes sure that he isn’t overstepping boundaries. He feels a sense of relief when he sees that you don’t seem to be reacting badly to his story. 

“I wanted to step in and comfort you,” Taehyun continues carefully, “Even if I know we always compete over any possible thing, there was no way I was letting you just… cry alone like that… but before I even got the chance to open the door, you wiped your tears away and you sat up and you said something to yourself. Something like ‘you can do this, you’re smarter than you think.’” 

You watch Taehyun as his eyes search for more words to say. It’s like you can see his brain loading, loading icon and everything. “I don’t get it.” 

Taehyun’s eyes bore into you, “Don’t get what?”

“I asked you what made you realize these feelings for me,” you say, “And it makes no sense that that was the story that did.”

Shaking his head, Taehyun lets out a mix of a huff and a laugh, “That’s not it. That was just the day I realized that I cared about you.”

Your heart does a small somersault in your chest, but you keep yourself composed. This is Kang Taehyun you’re talking to. The Kang Taehyun who you’ve been rivals with for as long as you can remember. Hell, probably even longer than that. You’re heart’s not supposed to flutter over Kang Taehyun. You stay silent.

Taehyun goes digging for a moment in time that fulfilled your request. He’s not sure whether he should tell you a handful of smaller moments or one single significant one. It was like giving you a present. Would you rather receive many smaller presents, or one big, extravagant present? 

“It’s the little things,” Taehyun settles, “You let the younger kids go ahead of you in the lineup for food… you bring extra umbrellas for your friends… when it’s Christmas, you’re the only one who gives the caretakers presents… you go out of your way to help our classmates if they need help because you understand the content that quick…” He can go on and on about the things he’s noticed, but he’s afraid that it’d be too much. 

You gulp. Although it wasn’t odd that Taehyun has noticed your deeds, remembering them is another thing. You’re not sure what to say.

“I can’t control what I feel, Y/N,” Taehyun frowns, “Even if I could, I don’t think I’d be pushing what I feel for you away.” The thought of being with you was something that he had been thinking about ever since this crush started to creep up on him. He didn’t hate it—which genuinely scared him at first. But he’s grown to accept it. If he gets hurt, then he gets hurt.

You don’t move an inch from your spot. You’re afraid to even breathe. But Taehyun was right. Feelings can’t be controlled, not even if you tried. 

“I’m sorry.” Taehyun sighs and shifts his weight from one foot to the other. 

Your brows furrow and you tilt your head in confusion, “Sorry for what?”

“For my feelings,” he replies, “I just needed to let it out. I’m not even asking you for a chance. It was enough for you to listen to what I had to say.” Dumbfounded, you feel one of your feet stutter forward. It’s probably the millionth time you were speechless tonight and all of these times involved Taehyun. You’re placed in a position that made it hard for you to even decide what way to go because, sure, Taehyun has been your rival since elementary. He’s been that itch that simply won’t go away even if you tried to get rid of it. But on the other hand, he’s been the same boy you’ve grown up next to. It didn’t matter what relationship you and he had. You’ve quite literally seen him turn from a boy into a man. You’ve been through a lot together.

“Taehyun… I…”

Did that script even matter anymore? 

——————————

You liked being the best, and you were good at it.

Your list of titles and achievements was long for your age: President of the student council, most promising player on the basketball team, and top performer in every exam season. In any metric you could name, you were always in either first or second place.

The person you had jockeyed for first with for the last four years was none other than Choi Yeonjun, the golden boy, the unstoppable force to your immovable object.

He was the most promising player on the football team. As your Vice-President, you two were the highest-ranking student leaders in the school. Perfectly and equally matched in academics, you both constantly oscillated between the two top spots on the yearly grade rankings. You could’ve been a high school power couple had it not been for one thing: you hated each other’s guts.

Your rivalry was well known throughout the school, although most people saw it as just a mildly petty competition. No one would ever expect such capable, talented, and hardworking students to indulge in that sort of immature behaviour. The only people who knew the true extent of your animosity were your kids.

You and Yeonjun called the other student council members your kids, and they in turn called you both their parents. On the administrative side Yeonjun had under him Soobin, the general secretary, and Beomgyu, the treasurer. On the operations side you led Jimin, head of logistics, and Minjeong, communications and liaison officer. Of course, you two had also fought over who would take admin and who would take operations (the kids voted in the end). Sometimes when you and Yeonjun were acting up too much, one of them, usually Soobin, would say, “Not in front of the kids!”

But as co-leaders of the student body, your school’s star athletes, and joint cohort-toppers, you had a lot in common with each other. Maybe that’s why you disliked him so much: he reminded you of yourself.

——————————

You and Yeonjun were indeed busy bees. Your school days started earlier than everyone else’s, because you were in charge of the morning announcements and had to get ready before assembly. During breaks when the others got to relax or nap or eat you had disciplinary duties, not that either of you ever actually disciplined anyone (snitches get stitches, even for the golden kids). You also finished school later than most; being in the Excellere class for gifted students meant extra, harder, and longer lessons. After Excellere, you both had sports practice two to three times a week. If it was competition season like it was then, you had practice every day. In between commitments you were always stuck in meetings with him and the rest of the student council, or with him and the school principal.

Since school was just about all you did, that meant you were with Yeonjun for nearly every waking moment of your life, barring weekends. And sometimes not even that. You spent far too many of your precious weekend hours with him, either on Zoom calls or representing your school at external events.

“Good morning, Pres,” Yeonjun greeted that morning, punching your arm as he waltzed into the front office like he did every day. He always called you Pres. Never your name, just Pres. You hated it, and you’d told him as much more than once. That only made him do it more. He pointed at the hot pink post-it note on the announcement book. “What’s this?”

“The Spring Festival ticket sales announcement. Jimin finished setting up the website last night,” you told him. “Minjeong says we can start making the announcement every week, and she’ll put it on the school socials after assembly today.”

“Why can’t you do it?” he asked.

You folded your arms. “Because it’s not my job. She’s our communications officer.”

“What is your job, then? You seem pretty free to me,” he said.

“You’re one to talk. Are you still bitter about losing to me, Mr. Vice President?” you taunted, pointing to his student council badge. It was silver and read ‘student leader’, like all the other members’ badges, while yours was gold and read ‘president’.

“We all know I’m equal in rank to you. The President/Vice President distinction is just a formality,” he retorted, but you knew he had been disproportionately upset by the badge thing when you were both sworn in. 

“A formality you gave up being football captain for, and still lost,” you teased. It was childish, but you stuck out your tongue at him anyway. He seemed to bring that out in you.

Student council Presidents were not allowed to hold a second leadership position, so he had turned down the captain role offered to him because he had expected to be appointed President. It was either him or you, that much had never been in question, but he’d gotten cocky. You remembered him being absolutely gutted about losing the presidency to you, not least because he hated the boy who ended up captain. You, however, didn’t really care about your position on your team as long as you got to play. You did, though, care about beating Choi Yeonjun.

“I’m still the best player on my team,” he countered, defensive and equally childish.

“So am I, genius.”

“I am a genius, aren’t I, Pres? That's why I came first in our latest Excellere ranking.”

You were just about to answer when the principal entered the office. It was almost time for assembly to start. As petty as you both were, you knew better than to fight in front of faculty. Yeonjun, having gotten the last laugh, glanced over at you and winked obnoxiously. You’d get a chance to get back at him later.

——————————

Whenever Yeonjun winked or smirked or rolled his eyes at you, you were reminded of the infuriating fact that he was, undoubtedly, extremely good-looking. He was the golden boy, after all, and it was only fitting for that status to extend to his appearance too. Tall and fit, with gorgeous eyes and the stutter-inducing confidence of someone who knew they were attractive. Other students sometimes greeted you both as you walked around the school (neither of you were that popular in the traditional sense of the word, but you were well known to say the least) and he could often make them swoon with just a smile.

But he didn’t date. In fact, as far as you knew, he’d never dated at all, nor even spoke about it. He was too busy for love, something that no doubt caused heartbreak throughout the whole school.

You were the same: you had no shortage of suitors but no interest in frivolous relationships that would only distract you from your duties. Your immature rivalry with each other was just about the only non-important thing either of you allowed yourselves to partake in. You had places to be, battles to win, things to achieve.

That was a mantra you found yourself repeating in your head more and more these days. You were starting to wonder what was even the point of pushing yourself this hard. Maybe you were burnt out.

Yeonjun nudged you with a smirk when he noticed you nodding off. “Tired?”

“I’m fine,” you said, resolute, sitting up straighter and squaring your shoulders. As much as he got on your nerves, he was also the closest thing to a friend you had in Excellere. You sat together in nearly every class.

He snorted, amused. “Are you sure, Pres? Because class is over,” he said, pointing to the clock at the front of the classroom. Sure enough, the teacher and all of the other students were gone. It was just you and him.

You pushed him to hide your embarrassment. “Whatever. Move, I need to get to practice,” you said, grabbing your bag.

He pushed you back, hard enough to knock you back down into your seat so he could get up first. “Me too, sleepyhead. You’re not special,” he mocked, swinging his own bag victoriously over his shoulder with a triumphant smirk.

“I never said I was. Unlike you, I don’t have an inferiority complex,” you retorted, standing back up and rushing out of the classroom. You were not the type of person to fall asleep in class, and you sure as hell weren’t going to stick around to give him the chance to remind you of that.

——————————

By the time practice ended, you could barely keep your eyes open. It was past 10pm now, and you sat at the bus stop in your basketball uniform, knees pressed to your chest. Your teammates had all gone home, but since you always missed physical training due to Excellere, you had to stay behind and complete your three kilometre run after practice.

“Hey.”

You cracked one eye open to see Yeonjun standing in front of you, hands on his hips, peering down at you curiously. You immediately sat up straight, blinking a couple of times as if that would erase your tiredness. “Why are you here?” you asked.

“It’s a public bus stop, and I’m a free man,” he said, pushing you aside so he could sit down next to you.

“Yeah, exactly. It’s a public bus stop, and there’s plenty of room elsewhere,” you scowled, pointing to the abundance of empty space on the bench aside from the spot right beside you. He winked in answer. “I mean why are you getting the bus? I thought your mom usually picks you up.”

He shrugged, balling up his navy blue football jersey and holding it out to you. “She’s busy tonight.” You stared at the jersey in confusion. He scoffed and shoved it into your arms. “Is your brain broken? Put it on.”

“No, gross. It smells like your sweat,” you said.

“Ungrateful bastard. I can see you shivering.”

You shoved it right back to him. “You wear it then, if it’s so cold.”

“Fine.” He yanked it back and put it on, even though you could tell he hadn’t yet cooled down from his practice. His chest was still rising and falling faster than usual, the veins on his arms were still sticking out, and there were still beads of sweat on his forehead plastering his hair to his skin. Idiot. “Do you always take the bus home alone? What about your teammates?” he asked, looking around. It was dark, and he’d never taken the bus at this time of the night.

“They finish before me. I have to make up my PT because of Excellere. Don’t you?” you asked. He nodded. It seemed like you both were always the first students to arrive at school and the last students to leave. You took your phone out to check the bus timings. “Which bus are you waiting for?” you asked. Yours was coming in a minute.

“I don’t know,” he said, stubbornly pretending like he wasn't overheating in his jersey.

“You don’t know? Have you never taken a bus before?” you mocked. “Well, I suppose that’s what happens when you’re chauffeured around everywhere.”

“Fuck off, Pres. Of course I have,” he countered, defensive. “I take 47 home sometimes.”

“47 doesn’t run this late. You’ll have to take mine and get off two stops after me,” you said, not really sure why you were helping him. He had Google Maps and thumbs, after all.

Right as you said that, that very bus arrived. You flagged it down and rushed on board, not bothering to check if he was following you. He was, and he again sat down next to you in the back of the empty bus with a satisfied grin.

You sighed and looked out the window as the bus started to move. “Can’t you sit somewhere else?”

“No, I cannot,” he said, pulling up the sleeves of his jersey instead of just taking it off like he clearly wanted to do.

“You’ll catch a cold if you keep wearing that and sweating in it,” you told him. The bus was freezing.

“That’s not how colds work,” he shot back, immediately pulling his sleeves back down. “For someone who bangs on constantly about how good they are at biology you’d think you’d know that colds are caused by pathogens.”

You took your headphones out of your bag and plugged them in. “Fine, then. Stew in your grubby discomfort.”

He said something else, but you pretended not to hear him, continuing to look out the window. The rest of the bus ride went by in silence, until:

“Hey,” he said again for the second time that night, knocking his knee against yours. You ignored him. He yanked your headphones out of your ears in retaliation.

“Ow!”

“What’s the matter with you today? Why were you falling asleep in class?” he asked, holding your headphones high above his head, out of your reach. During a momentary flash of self-awareness it occurred to you that you were both far too old to be acting like kindergarteners. You couldn’t imagine what the principal would think if she knew this was how her two star students behaved in private. 

You narrowed your eyes at him, preparing to be made fun of, and stood up briefly to snatch them back. “Why do you care?”

“I want to know if you’re sick so I can avoid you,” he replied.

“No, I’m on a caffeine ban,” you answered, somewhat reluctantly. He raised a questioning eyebrow. “Our coach puts us on diets before competition season to make sure we don’t get sick. No caffeine, no sweet drinks, no fried food.”

He laughed, completely unsympathetic. “And you still lost last year?”

“We came in second at nationals,” you retorted, “while I seem to recall your team didn’t even make it to regionals.”

“At least we get to eat whatever we want,” he said, knowing it was a weak comeback even before he said it. Last year was a bad season for the football team; they lost to a school they should’ve easily been able to beat and didn’t even get the chance to compete regionally. You had teased him mercilessly for it ever since, just barely stopping short of bringing your national silver trophy to school and putting it on his desk. Or carrying it into a meeting with him and using it as a drinking cup.

You reached over and pushed the stop button on the handrail behind him. “Sorry, I couldn’t hear you over the deafening sound of all of my medals clattering together. Move. It’s my stop.”

Annoyingly, he didn’t move, forcing you to climb over him to get out and off the bus. He flipped you off as the bus drove away, and you flipped him off right back.

——————————

Two days before your basketball championship, you’d finally admitted to yourself that you were not doing well. All the practices, student council meetings, and weekly Excellere rankings were starting to get to you. Your school days were fifteen hours long, your nights and weekends lost to studying or catching up on the meetings you and Yeonjun missed while in class or at practice. Which was frustrating, because it wasn’t like you hadn't gotten through these things before. You didn't know what was wrong with you this time.

“What’s with all that stuff?” Minjeong asked, watching you force a towel and a bag of toiletries into your locker and slam the door closed before they fell out.

“Yeonjun and I are staying late today to go over the work you guys did this week, so I need to shower here after practice,” you said. “We’ve missed way too many meetings.”

“Yeah, because you’re both busy. His championships are tomorrow and yours are the day after. Can’t it wait?” Jimin said.

You shook your head. “No, you guys are already doing work that’s meant to be ours.” You paused for a second for comedic effect. “Besides, I hope he’s tired after tonight so he loses tomorrow.” They both laughed.

“As expected of the golden kids,” Minjeong said, giving you a hi-five. Yeah. As expected of the golden kids.

——————————

It was 11pm, and you and Yeonjun were sitting beside each other in an empty classroom going over the minutes from the last three student council meetings. His hair was wet from his shower and he hadn’t bothered to get dressed fully, with too many buttons undone, an untucked shirt, and his tie nowhere in sight. You stopped taking notes.

“Can you please put your uniform on properly?” you asked.

He snatched your pen and notebook away from you to add in something you’d been fighting over for the last ten minutes. “Why do you have yours on like that, with everything all done up and tucked in? There’s literally no one else here.”

“You look unbecoming,” you said.

“I’m comfortable. You should try it. You can’t convince me you like wearing your tie and buttoning your shirt all the way up like that,” he said, pointing the pen at your collar. When he was done writing, he looked up at you in satisfaction and smirked, arrogant. “Or am I distracting you?”

You would never admit it, but he was right. On both counts. He was distracting you. “Is Soobin okay? He’s been doing a lot lately,” you asked, ignoring him, looking over your notes again. If there was anything that could get you and Yeonjun to stop bickering for even a second, it was talking about the other council members.

“I think he’s a little tired. Once we’re both done with our competitions we can start pulling our weight more,” he said, humming thoughtfully, as if you both weren’t already doing as much as you could. “But you’re right, the kids have been working hard. We’re not being the best leaders right now.”

“Yeah, we’re not,” you sighed, thinking about how you’d seen Jimin online past midnight a few days ago. You should be doing more.

Yeonjun kicked you in the shin under the table, ignoring your hiss of pain. “You know who’s not okay? You. You’re fucking out of it these days.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m fine,” you scowled. “You’re the only person who thinks that.”

He rolled his eyes at your pride. “Yeah, but that’s because I know you better than anyone.” You scoffed at that, but he continued, “Seriously, Pres, who else gets you like I do?”

“Who are you, Sigmund Freud? Stop psychoanalysing me,” you said, glancing over your notes one last time, checking to make sure you had covered every point in the meeting minutes.

“So you think I’m smart?”

“No, I think you want to fuck your mom.”

He relented after that, a type of mercy he didn’t afford you very often. You wondered, then, if you really were as not okay as he was claiming. How had he been the only one to pick up on it? No, you were fine. You were fine. There was nothing to pick up on.

The two of you worked in near-total silence for the next couple of hours. That was a pretty standard affair, once you’d both exhausted your barbs and witty comebacks and didn’t have anything else to say to each other anymore. What wasn’t normal, though, was that you weren’t even being bitchy to each other in the comments of your shared Google Doc as you wrote your emcee script. The thought of Choi Yeonjun, of all people, noticing- you were fine.

“We still need to finalise the event schedule for review by tonight,” he reminded you, breaking the silence. You’d completely forgotten about that, and you never forgot anything.

“I’ll do it. You have your match tomorrow,” you volunteered.

“How charitable of you, Pres,” he said, giving you snark instead of gratitude. You didn’t have it in you to retort, although if the kids were around you probably would have. He raised an eyebrow. “What, no comeback?”

Checking your watch, you mumbled, “It’s past 1am. Let’s just finish this script and go home.”

He looked closely at you. You were being weird, he was sure of it now. He could see the resignation in your eyes, the only sign you’d shown in the four years he’d known you that maybe you weren’t quite as untouchable as you appeared. 

“Hey, seriously, what’s wrong with you? I can’t have you breaking now and leaving all the work to me,” he asked, sounding sincerely worried about you for the first time in his life. He had never thought of you as someone who needed to be worried about.

“I’m fine,” you insisted through gritted teeth, “I just-”

You glanced up at him, which was a mistake. The moment you saw concern (of all emotions) on his face, you cracked. You hadn’t cried in front of another person since you were eight years old and broke your leg in a car accident, but now there were tears in your eyes threatening to spill over. Immediately you blinked them away, hoping he would just let it go. Unfortunately for you, however, he had other plans. He laughed and put his arm around your shoulder.

“What are you doing?”

“Comforting you, dumbass.”

You shrugged his arm off of you, clearing your throat in a futile attempt to ease the knot you felt forming at the base of your neck. “I don’t feel comforted.”

He scowled, leaned back in his seat, and crossed his arms. “Well, then, talk to me.” His tone was so solemn and authoritative that it made you comply immediately.

“People keep asking me for things and expecting me to be able to do everything and saying that I’m capable of anything but I’m a fraud. I don’t know what I’m doing and I’m so tired and I just want it to stop.” At some point during your outburst you’d started to cry, though you weren’t sure when, because his arm was back around your shoulder and he was palming away the tears on your face with his free hand. He hooked one foot around the leg of your chair and pulled it closer to him.

“You’re not a fraud,” he said under his breath, his eyes staring straight into yours and his hand warm against your cheek. You didn’t know why he was being so kind to you, and, more confusingly, you didn’t know if you wanted him to be. Which was mortifying.

Through the sheer power of your embarrassment, you willed yourself to stop crying. “I’m fine. You can let go of me now,” you told him, looking away.

“Right.” He seemed to snap back to normalcy at the same time as you, moving back and dropping his hands. You both got back to work like a switch had been flipped, aggressively avoiding each other’s gazes.

——————————

It was nearly 2am by the time the script was finished.

“You shouldn’t stay up to do the event schedule. We’ll just tell the school we need more time,” Yeonjun told you as you both started packing up. His words, for once, were void of arrogance or mockery. It made you anxious in a way that was entirely foreign to you.

“Don’t look at me like that,” you grumbled, turning away. You hated having to ask for more time, to not deliver something you were meant to deliver.

He grinned. “You mean like this?”

Before you’d had the chance to insult him or tell him to knock it off, he took you by the shoulders and stared right at you, his face just inches from yours.

“What the fuck are you doing?” you asked, but your nervousness slipped through in your voice. He smirked, having heard it too.

“Don’t let this go to your head, Pres,” he began, “but I really want to kiss you.”

You rolled your eyes, trying to ignore your quickening heartbeat. “Yeah, whatever. You think I’m hideous. We’re gonna miss the last bus-”

His lips were on yours without your brain having even had the time to process what he’d said. One of his hands shifted down to your waist while the other moved to your jaw, tilting your chin up slightly. Your own hands instinctively came to rest on his chest, and you found yourself kissing him back without thinking. You could feel his heart hammering through his shirt. He was the first to pull away.

Frozen, you could do nothing but stare at him, with your eyes wide and lips still slightly parted. “What-”

“I had to do it. At least once,” Yeonjun whispered, not moving at all either. He was searching your expression for signs of something, you didn’t know what, but when he didn’t find it he let you go. Neither of you said a single word to each other during the entire hour-long bus ride home.

——————————

What a dickhead. How could Yeonjun go from kissing you to ‘idk about pres’ that seamlessly? He had been so kind, so sweet to you that day. You purged that thought from your head as quickly as it had come.

“There’s our president!” Beomgyu cheered as he let you into the meeting room, and the others broke into applause.

“Congrats on winning your finals yesterday!” Jimin added, still clapping.

You closed the door behind you. “Thank you! Sorry for being late,” you said. “I promise I will not miss a single meeting now that my comps are over.”

When Yeojun eventually showed up, he barely looked at you. You didn’t really know why that upset you as much as it did, or what you had been expecting. Once you all started working, however, you quickly fell back into a familiar rhythm along with the other council members.

“Where’s the chit from the popcorn machine vendor?” you asked Beomgyu, sifting through the stack of papers on the desk.

Beomgyu looked up from the printer that he and Jimin were trying (and failing) to get to work right. It was currently spitting out black and white pages that looked like they had been printed in Hell on a Tamagotchi by Satan himself. “What chit?” 

“The nacho store we were going to get cancelled on us last weekend, so I asked Yeonjun to get a popcorn guy instead,” you explained. Fucking Yeonjun. You turned to him. “Did you forget to call him back? It’s been four days.”

He thought for a bit then shrugged, relishing your annoyance. “I guess so. Whoops.”

“Call him now, before he backs out,” you instructed, turning your attention back to the papers.

“Haven’t you ever heard of saying ‘please’ and ‘thank you’?”

You didn’t even bother to look up. “Haven’t you ever heard of doing your fucking job?”

He threw the pen he was holding on the floor in response. The other council members exchanged furtive glances.

“Come on, guys. Not in front of the kids,” Soobin sighed, ever the mediator, picking up the pen. You wanted to tell him he didn’t need to clean up after a child, but that would just make things worse. You continued working.

“What’s going on with you two? You’re even worse than usual,” Minjeong said.

At that, you and Yeonjun locked eyes from across the room. He scoffed and looked away immediately. You watched him closely, but you couldn’t read him at all. You were quickly realising that, despite being mirrors of each other and spending almost all of your time together, you barely knew him.

“It seems our Pres is touchy today,” he teased. “They’re a little stressed out.”

You pinned the papers you were holding together with a paperclip and filed them away. “Watch it, Yeonjun,” you warned.

He ignored your glaring at him, your eyes telling him to stop, continuing, “Despite all appearances, they’re not as golden as they so desperately want everyone to think. They even had a little breakdown before their competition.”

Before anyone else could react, you passed the file in your hands over to Beomgyu (what you were doing was technically his job, anyway) and left. The room fell deathly silent.

——————————

Strangely, Yeonjun followed you into the corridor, feeling a weird compulsion to do so. His feet moved under him without him realising. Running after you and shouting your name, he easily caught up with you in just a few long strides. He grabbed your wrist and pulled you back, forcing you to turn around.

“Let me go.” You shook his hand off of you, unable to stop the tears from welling up in your eyes. This was humiliating.

He laughed lightly, unfazed. “What’s your fucking deal? We’ve said way worse things to each other before,” he said. He had a point. And you did have some sort of tacit agreement with him that nothing was off-limits. Maybe you’d been too naive in thinking that that night was different. That it had meant something.

“Fuck off! I need to go fix your fucking mistake,” you shouted, turning back around. Your voice was trembling.

“Pres, relax,” he teased, taking you by the shoulders and spinning you around before you’d even had the chance to take a single step away from him. He leant down to emphasise the height difference between you two, something he did often that infuriated you to no end, pleased by how easily he could rile you up. “Don’t you know throwing tantrums is counter-productive?”

“I hate you, Choi Yeonjun,” you said coldly, biting the inside of your cheek to try and stop your tears. When all he did was laugh, you pushed him away. Against your wishes, a sob broke its way through your pressed lips and you lost it. You balled your hands up into fists and pounded on his chest repeatedly to get him to let go of you; it was like hitting a brick wall and you both knew it. “I hate you! IhateyouIhateyouIhateyou.”

He stopped. “Are you crying?” You crying once the other day was out-of-character enough, let alone twice in such a short span of time. He was pretty sure he’d never even seen you show the smallest sliver of vulnerability before this week.

“Yes, I’m fucking crying, asshole. I’m glad your snail of a brain finally caught up.” You hit his chest again, so weak you barely disturbed a single fibre on his school blazer.

Any sympathies he might have been forming for you earlier dissipated in an instant. He easily grabbed both of your wrists with one hand to stop you, glowering at you, his jaw clenched. “You should’ve known I would tell the kids. Everything between us is fair game, isn’t it, Pres? Why did you even tell me any of that if you wanted it to be a secret?” he snapped.

All the vitriol in your voice evaporated. When you next spoke, you sounded like a child, scared and upset and betrayed. He had never heard you sound anything like that; it was jarring to the both of you. “Because I thought you would understand.”

There it was. The revelation. Perhaps that was what your entire years-long rivalry with this dick of a man boiled down to: a secret hope that he was struggling as much as you, and a frustration that it didn’t seem like he was. You hadn’t even understood that was what it was until you said it.

He sobered in an instant, his eyes softening in the realisation that he’d gone too far. “Pres,” he said quietly, like he was calling a wounded animal. The guilt in his voice was probably as close to an outright admission of wrongdoing as he would ever get with you. “I didn’t know you were-”

“Whatever, dickwad,” you mumbled, deflated, pulling your hands out of his grasp. “I have to call the vendor before he pulls out of this deal. We don’t have a lot of time.”

“Pres, I didn’t know,” he repeated, more urgently this time, still not an apology, following you as you walked away from him. 

You stopped in your tracks and turned back around, your voice now calm and measured, holding up a hand to stop him from continuing. “I will be civil to you for the next week so we can see this event through, but I’m done with-” you gestured vaguely between the both of you. “I’m done with whatever this is. Bye, Yeonjun.”

This time, he didn’t chase after you.

——————————

Why was Yeonjun bringing up the day you both stayed until 2am? The day he kissed you? He made it sound like an average day, as if it had meant nothing to him, but something had clearly changed between you two since then.

He was walking on eggshells around you, trying to crack jokes, and engage you in conversations where he didn’t pick on you. You hated it. It made you feel weak. But you were the only one to pick up on it, which was the upside to every single student council member being up to their eyeballs in stress. None of them really noticed his strange behaviour. Or yours.

The festival kicked off smoothly — so smoothly, in fact, that it took Yeonjun and the rest of the council a whole half hour to realise you were missing. After you and Yeonjun finished your joint emcee duties, they hadn’t needed to call you or report to you for anything.

“Hey, have you seen the pres?” Jimin asked, Minjeong following closely behind her. “We’ve been looking for them everywhere.”

“Nope,” Beomgyu said.

Soobin shook his head. “Me neither.”

Everyone turned to Yeonjun in unison. “I’ll go look for them,” he said, already leaning over to grab his jacket hanging off the back of the chair next to him.

“You can’t leave us too! You’re our second-in-command,” Minjeong pointed out.

“Yeah, whatever. You’re in charge now,” he declared absent-mindedly, not really listening to her, one foot already out the door.

——————————

Yeonjun sprinted straight to the bus stop, ignoring the stares of the other students as he ran right through the festival booths. He got there just in time to see your bus pulling away, letting out a long string of curses that made the elderly man sitting on the bench glare at him. He was usually careful about his behaviour in public, especially when he was in uniform like he was then, but he didn’t care anymore.

Your taunts last week were partly true; he didn’t really know how to take buses, and he really was sort of driven everywhere by his parents. So it took him far longer than it should have to figure out how else to get to your house (he stood there staring at the bus chart for long enough that three different people offered to help him). Even the aforementioned elderly man took pity on him, but not before tsking disapprovingly at his student leader badge and calling him foul-mouthed.

He ran ten minutes from the bus stop he ended up alighting at to your house and reached your front porch without even knowing why he was there at all, but he pounded on your door anyway. You came to the window, peeked out from behind the curtain, and left.

“I can see you, Pres. Open the door,” he called out, out of breath. When you complied, he didn’t even give you the chance to speak. “Why are you here?”

You looked him up and down, deciding to be annoying. You usually did when it came to him. “This is my house. Why are you here?” 

“You know what I meant, dipshit.” How charming.

You let him in and poured him a glass of ice water. It was weird seeing Yeonjun sitting in your living room, like a forced merger of two spheres of your life that you kept separate as much as you could. His school blazer was hanging off the end of the sofa.

“It’s hot,” he said defensively when he saw you looking at it. It wasn’t; he was just sweating from running from the bus stop to your house. He took the glass from you and set it down on the coffee table without using the coaster you’d so nicely placed right in front of him, making you see red. “Four ice cubes? Are you telling me to die?”

“As if you have a superstitious bone in your body, Choi Yeonjun. Is this how you act as a guest in other people’s houses too?” you asked, sitting down beside him.

He loosened his tie and popped the first two buttons of his dress shirt open. “No, just yours.”

“Sure, please make yourself at home,” you said sarcastically. “What do you want?”

“I came to apologise. You disappeared and we all freaked out. God, I can’t believe I’m worried about you-”

You raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. “Are you sure you know what an apology is?”

“Shut up. I mean-” he groaned in frustration and ran his hands through his hair, something he often did when he got annoyed. “You’re being so difficult!”

“Says the guy complaining about the number of ice cubes I put in his water!”

“For fuck’s sake,” he sighed, putting his head in his hands. “Hang on. Let me start over.”

The living room was completely silent apart from the sound of his heavy breathing. You were about to say something about it — a star athlete being so winded from a short run was pretty entertaining to you — but you decided not to. Your phone dinged. It was Beomgyu telling you the popcorn vendor had shown up late, drunk, and thrown up in the popcorn machine, followed by three increasingly ridiculous reaction images from Megamind. Maybe you shouldn’t have hired a popcorn vendor after all.

“What’s so funny?”

You flashed him your phone screen. “Beomgyu sent me something.”

Yeonjun didn’t even look at it, despite being the one who’d asked in the first place. “I like you,” he declared. 

“Are you having a heat stroke?” you asked, disinterested, typing out a quick reply.

He knocked your phone out of your hand in a huff. “Stop fucking texting Beomgyu.”

Your phone clattered to the floor. “Hey!”

“You are such an irritating person.” He dramatically (as always) got up from the sofa to kneel on the floor in front of you, looking up at you with an indecipherable emotion in his eyes. “I like you, Pres. I have for a while now, but I only realised it the other night. I got scared and I lashed out, but that doesn’t make what I said okay. I betrayed your trust and I’m sorry.”

Your head started spinning, and your heart leapt up into your throat. I like you. Your jaw would’ve dropped open had it not been for every muscle in your body going rigid at once. He casually sat back down next to you, picked up his glass, and took a sip. As if he hadn’t just delivered you the single biggest shock of your life. You could barely get his name out of your mouth.

“Yeonjun, I-”

“Look, you don’t have to say anything. I just needed to tell you because it was driving me crazy. You drive me crazy, actually-”

You grabbed his tie, pulled him towards you, and kissed him. If he was surprised by your boldness he didn’t show it, his hands easily finding their way to your waist as he kissed you back. His lips were cold from the ice water.

“Thank you for the apology. I didn’t know you had it in you.”

He broke the kiss, laughing breathily. “I can’t think straight when you’re kissing me. I didn’t hear anything you said.”

You flicked him lightly on the forehead, unable to stop yourself from smiling. “I said thank you for apologising. I appreciate it. But I’m still mad at you.”

“I know,” he said. Right at that moment, both of your phones went off at the same time. “We should get back to school.”

He stood up, casually took your hand, and started walking. You didn’t pull away.

——————————

Although you did it often, being in school this late at night with no one else around never quite stopped feeling other-worldly. Your body was tired, but your mind was still awake and buzzing and alive. 

“I’m sorry I made you miss the festival,” you said as you finished making your rounds through the school to check each room one last time, switch off the mains, and lock the doors. 

“You didn’t make me do anything.” Yeonjun took your hand in his again and gave it a comforting squeeze, before adding, “Don’t be so full of yourself.”

The words were familiar, but his tone and the warmth in your cheeks were not. Choi Yeonjun of all people was making you act shy and blushy. Revolting.

“The golden boy of the school just confessed to me a few hours ago. How could I not be full of myself?” You stopped walking and turned to face him. “I like you,” you mocked, an over-dramatic caricature of his voice.

Yeonjun groaned and hid his face in his hands. “God, I can’t believe I actually said that. Like a character in a Netflix original.” You laughed, wondering if you’d ever laughed with him, not at him, before.

He’d called his mom earlier and told her not to pick him up — he wanted to take the bus with you, even though it would take him twice as long to get home. Leaving the school, you both turned to look back down the empty corridor.

“I guess this is the end of our late nights,” he mused. Your competitions were both over and there were no more events to organise for the year. All that remained were your final exams.

“Until our Valentine’s Day celebrations,” you reminded him. “Jimin wants to start planning that next week.”

He retorted immediately, “I don’t.” As the lights of the corridor started to turn themselves off (they were on automatic timers, which you found very annoying), he leant down, cupped your face gingerly in his hands, and kissed you twice.

“I want to do this.”

——————————

thanks for reading <3

AS MUCH AS YOU HAD TRIED TO PLAY OFF YOUR NERVES, you had to admit to yourself that you were nervous as could be about meeting your potential roommates. It hadn’t fully dawned on you until just then that you were really considering living with three dudes. Three dudes who were basically strangers. You were really beginning to regret not letting Yunjin or Chaewon come with you.

With a deep breath, you finally lifted your fist to knock on the door, saying one last mental prayer that you weren’t about to get murdered. There was shuffling on the other side of the door as you stood, tapping your finger against your thigh in an attempt to control your buzzing nerves. And finally, the door opened, revealing a tall, black haired man huffing like he’d just ran a marathon.

“Hi. You must be Y/N.” He greeted with a charming smile, holding out his hand for you to shake. You stared blankly at him, reluctantly reaching out to shake his hand. “I’m Yeonjun. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“No, stop!” A voice called out behind him, then the door was fully swung open to reveal two other men behind him. One of them began to drag him away from you, while the other watched awkwardly. He was somehow even taller than Yeonjun, making you feel like a child standing next to him.

The two continued to wrestle while you and the giant watched, and you began to fear for your safety. “Oh, you can come in.” The giant suddenly spoke up, stepping out of the way so you had full access to the apartment.

Once you stepped inside, you were able to get a good view of the place. It had a lot more space than you had previously imagined, and also a lot cleaner. You wondered if one of them had a girlfriend who regularly came over, that was the only way a place where four guys were living would stay so clean.

“Hey, take off your shoes!” Yeonjun called out, finally getting the other guy off of him and straightening up. “Please.” He smiled, and out of fear for your life, you quickly obliged him. Out of the corner of your eye, you glanced up at the boy Yeonjun had ben wrestling, who was watching you with curious eyes.

Finally, your shoes were off, and the wrestling had stopped. Now, the room was uncomfortably silent as the three of them stared at you, so you decided to clear your throat and break the ice. “Hi. I’m Y/N.” You introduced yourself, smiling weakly at them. “Uh, is Taehyun not here?”

“No.” The boy with shaggy hair was quick to answer, frowning at his own response. “Had some kind of ‘gym emergency’? Sounds made up, if you ask me.” He rolled his eyes, and you nodded slowly.

“It’s okay, we’re the ones you might end up living with, anyway, come sit.” The tallest motioned for you to follow him over towards the living area, and the other two tagged behind. You opted to sit in the chair while they piled onto the couch, which made the whole thing feel like some kind of job interview. “I don’t know if I mentioned it yet, but I’m Soobin, that’s Beomgyu, and Yeonjun already introduced himself.”

“Right… Soobin, Beomgyu, and Yeonjun…” You muttered, hoping to make the names stick in your brain. Your gaze jumped around between the three of them, attempting to match their names to their faces.

“Why don’t you tell us about yourself, Y/N?” Beomgyu asked, and he put an emphasis on your name that almost made it sound like he was mocking you. Oh no, you really hoped you hadn’t already made him hate you.

“Um, well, I’m 22. I just graduated college, and I have a degree in education…” You began, then paused, trying to think of what to say next. And then you really regretted what you chose to say next.

“Oh, I just went to New York last week! But then I decided to cut my trip off early to surprise my boyfriend, and—you know in horror films, when a character is about to go into a room, and you’re like, ‘no! Don’t go in there, you’re going to die!’? Yeah, it was kind of like that. Except I wasn’t murdered, I just found my boyfriend of, like, almost a year cheating on me. We were living together! Which meant, obviously, I couldn’t live there anymore. And that’s how I ended up here.”

Yeah, that was definitely the wrong thing to say.

There three of them blinked back at you, eyes widened in horror. Oh, they probably thought you were insane, now.

“Also, I like to sing to myself a lot. A lot.” You tried to break up the tension, but it didn’t really work.

“Y/N, that is so awful, I am so sorry that happened to you.” Soobin said with a frown, and you tried to give him a reassuring smile to ease the mood.

“You know, I know something that will make you feel better.” Yeonjun said, and almost immediately Beomgyu and Soobin began to protest. Before you even had a chance to process what was happening, he was lifting his shirt up over his head, exposing his bare skin for everyone to see. “You see these?” He asked, gesturing down to his toned abs. “This is the LLY. Ladies Love Yeonjun.”

“What did you just say?!” Beomgyu turned to look at his friend with a horrified expression.

“Jar! Now!” Soobin yelled, and Yeonjun frowned.

“Are you serious?”

“Yes!”

You watched as he got up with an annoyed groan, pulling a dollar bill out of his pocket to stick in a glass jar with a sticky note reading ‘douchebag jar’.

“This place has such good lighting.” You spoke up, trying to deter away from whatever had just happened. “Chenle hated light. It’s hard to say his name.” You lowered your head, thinking back to your ex boyfriend for the nth time that day.

“That’s okay. Beomgyu would know all about that, he just got dumped.” Yeonjun said with a smile, finally pulling his shirt back on.

“What? No. I did not get dumped.” He laughed, then his smile almost immediately faded. “Yeah, I got dumped. She dumped me. But that was, like, six months ago! I’m over it!”

He continued to ramble on, trying to convince everyone (read: himself) that he was moved on from his breakup, and you took the opportunity to get a better look at the loft. It really was a nice place, especially for the price Taehyun had told you. And even though the guys were a bit… Weird, they weren’t too bad.

“Hey, could you guys show me to the bathroom?” You asked, hoping for a place to frantically text your friends free from their presence.

Once you decided you’d done enough hiding in the bathroom, you finally came out to see the three of them standing in the hallway, turning to look at you in surprise like you’d caught them deliberating on something very important.

“So…” You started, crossing your hands in front of you. “I really like this place. I would love to move in.”

“Hang on, hang on.” Beomgyu started waving his hand at you. “I just feel like we still barely know anything about you. We can’t have a stranger moving in here.”

You nodded slowly, understanding his point. “I get it. Um, I really like arts and crafts, I do a lot of sewing. One of my friends, Yunjin, she works at a coffee shop and can get us free coffee if we want. Oh, and Chaewon, she knows all about movies, she could recommend us some good ones. And Sakura, she’s a model—“

“A model?” Yeonjun quickly cut you off, a grin spreading across his lips. “How soon can you move in?”

authors note: omg first written chapter!!! and y/n is moving in woo!!! officially entering roommates era yass!!! i’m so excited to rly get into this smau

Yeonjun mostly came to your house to hang out with your brother, but there are those rare moments when he shows up abruptly at times when your brother isn't home yet and you keep him company for a while. You always think about these moments as the best ones, because you have that alone time where you can talk to the boy about anything and enjoy his presence. You can look at his sunny smile and hear his boisterous laugh when you said some lame joke and keep it in your memory to remember when you have bad days. 

Being in his presence always felt warm like you are sitting under the spring sunshine. Yeonjun comforted you a few times when you had rough days at school. He wiped your tears with his soft hands and told you some stupid stuff that makes you laugh through the tears and then gives you hugs to calm you down.

However, as time went by you noticed that he rarely came over to your brother. At first, it's just 2-3 times a week, then once in two weeks, and then two or three times a month.  You wondered why he suddenly stopped spending his time here, you even asked Wooyoung about the reason, but he just shrugged and said that Yeonjun is busy with his study at university or something like that.

And now you begin to treasure these moments when the boy appears on your front porch. At these times you felt like a little child on Christmas seeing their desired gift under the Christmas tree. You missed him a lot, you missed his soft smile, you missed his loud laugh, you missed his eyes that were full of warmth,  you missed your small talks and his occasional jokes, you missed everything. 

And now the three of you are sitting in your kitchen and you can't stop staring at the boy who sits in front of you. You want to remember every little thing about him until you see him next time. However, you haven't prepared for what's waiting for you this evening. 

You heard the notification ding through the room and Yeonjun picked up his phone to check it, you saw the soft smile adorning his pretty face. "Guys, I would really want to spend more time with you, but I totally forgot about the date with Minso I have like in an hour, so I guess I should go. See you around!" he smiled, his eyes forming crescent moons. Then he bumps his fist with Wooyoung and half hugs you saying his goodbye. 

The time went past you while you were sitting frozen.  How come you never know he is dating someone? This question was the only thing that rings through your head. You didn't even feel the hot tears on your cheeks until your brother tapped your shoulder with a worried look on his face, you didn't bother to explain anything as you just stormed past him on the second floor and slapped your door shut. That night you cried yourself to sleep with thoughts that you should get over this stupid pretty boy, even if it would be impossible you should do it possible cause you can't live with that burning aches in your heart.

taehyun follows your gaze that’s just stuck in front of you – looking at the midnight sky sprinkled with stars.

“you should be back there, having fun you know?” he hums, realising how distant you were right now; the fog in your eyes making him wonder what’s on your mind.

“no one told me i look pretty”

there’s a sharp pain in his heart, almost as if someone shot it with an arrow.

you slowly look at him, sending him a soft smile. you gulp, the tears balancing at your waterline shining in the moonlight. the wind whistles loudly, making you shiver once again.

taehyun’s lips part and you grab the hem of your dress to play with it.

“you do look pretty. not just tonight. you’re the most breathtaking person i’ve ever seen” he breaths out, making you freeze “and it hurts me so much that you don’t hear it as often as you should”

he grabs your hand. slowly but gently his larger and warmer fingers interlock with yours.

“but i will change that. if you let me”

you finally gain the courage to look at him. and you’re met with his loving smile as well as the stars reflecting in his eyes.

[ masterlist <3 ]

your rivalry started in first grade when you got the maximum on a test and he didn’t. and when the teacher praised you for it? yeah, that was the starting point. you have no idea why did he care so much, you just wanted to be left alone. but when yeonjun signalled that he’s not leaving you any time soon, it quickly escalated into competition.

the worst part was that you realised that you kind of, well… have a crush on him. it was stupid, you knew. but he wasn’t that bad. okay, towards you he was a complete asshole. but you saw the way he’s nice to his friends and how he cares about them. and - you had to admit - he is such a pretty boy–

“–are you deaf or something?”

you snapped your gaze towards him and his stupid smile.

“piss off” you huffed and entered the room upon seeing how you two are the only left. hmph. the teacher must have came earlier.

yeonjun watched you and he felt his heart ache. you seemed exhausted. he felt guilt sinking in his stomach because what if he’s the reason? it’s the finals and you’re stressed enough…

he shook his head and entered the classroom, sitting on his spot. the teacher started giving out the tests and yeonjun took a last glance at you and your shaking hands.

three hours, one headache and sweaty palms layer you stormed out of the classroom, heading to the nearest bathroom to let out the tears you’ve been holding for the past half an hour.

you felt awful. the questions weren’t that hard, sure, because you studied but even though you felt that you failed miserably. it was just too much.

you slammed the door and leaned over the sink, taking a shaky breath. you let out a harsh sob, the emotions that bottled up in the past week finally breaking out.

you didn’t even realise when the door from the bathroom opened. only when you heard this annoying voice… that was strangely soft, you looked up just to catch eye contact with him in the mirror.

“y/n…?”

you let out a shriek, jumping away from the sink. it was yeonjun. what is yeonjun doing in a ladies bathroom, first of all. and why–

“get out!” you sniffled, manically trying to wipe out the tears even though he’s literally standing here in front of you and is a witness of your mental breakdown.

“you do realise it’s the men’s bathroom, right? soobin told me he saw you. as much as he always talks shit i had to check out myself” he scoffed. you didn’t see how his expression softened though. the feeling of guilt from before returning to him because he was unfortunately right. it was awful to see you in a state like this and especially knowing that he was party a cause of it–

“sorry”

yeonjun looked at you, eyes widening. the tears didn’t stop streaming from your face as you took your bag and rushed to the exit.

he didn’t know what to do. yeonjun knew he can’t leave you like this, as much as you probably hate him. you need to be taken care of right now.

he stormed out of the bathroom and caught up to you. yeonjun gently grabbed your wrist, the sight of his worried gaze confusing you.

“leave me alone” you hissed, trying to wriggle out of his hold. he did not let go.

“i know you hate me but y/n, you’re not in the best–” he started as you punched his chest, tears dwelling in your eyes once again

“yes, indeed i hate you. who you are to tell in what mental condition am i?” you spit out and gave up, letting out a harsh sob. you stopped moving, looking down.

“i’m sorry. i’m an asshole, i know” yeonjun mumbled and was caught off guard when you suddenly hugged him tightly.

“i’m just so tired” you cried into his shirt, probably soaking it. his eyes widened but he quickly wrapped his arms around you feeling that you needed that hug.

“i know. but please don’t cry. please” yeonjun whispered into your hair, feeling his eyes water as well “you’ll be alright. i promise”

“no i won’t. the exam went horrible” you sobbed but your breath started getting more stable.

“i’m sure you did well. i really am. but let’s take care of you now, okay? you’re overworked” he said. you fell silent, the occasional shivers of your body letting him know that you’re calming down.

he wasn’t rushing you. and when you finally let go, he quickly wiped his eyes before you could notice.

“why do you act like that?” you asked and yeonjun let out a deep sigh, cupping your cheeks and wiping gently your smudged mascara with his fingers “you literally told me to eat dirt yesterday”

yeonjun tightened his lips, mind racing with million of thoughts.

“i can’t say it…” he sighed, removing his hands. he couldn’t possibly tell you that he may or may have not developed feelings towards you.

“coward” you scoff, wiping your cheeks and taking a deep breath “well… thank you. i guess. but now i’m gonna go”

“please don’t–” yeonjun said before he could realise those words left his mouth. you turned around and he cleared his throat. you looked at each other shocked.

he took a deep sigh and pulled you closer.

“i know it’s not the best time to say it since you’re still stressed about the exam. and i know my actions says otherwise but i… i like you. and i feel so bad knowing that i was the reason that got you so stressed out too” he confessed, looking for some kind of reaction on your face. he certainly did not expect you to cry though.

“don’t joke about it. is this a test or what? that’s just mean” you sniff, hiding your face in your hands.

“what? y/n, i’m not. it’s just… i didn’t intend on being mean it just… happened” he mumbled, causing you to scoff “but i really like you. and i’m sorry i just threw it on you like that– oof!”

you hugged him again, sobbing into his shirt.

“i liked you for so long it broke my heart that you acted this way towards me” you murmured and yeonjun’s heart sped up. what…?

he took a deep breath, trying to calm down. his mind tried hard to comprehend how you managed to like him despite his mean posture towards you but right now he knew you have to rest.

yeonjun slowly pulled you away, pressing a soft kiss onto your forehead.

“i’m sorry. but let’s go over to my place now, okay? you have to eat something” he smiled softly.

“can you– hold my hand though?” you whispered, yeonjun’s heart clenching with how adorable you are.

“of course” he hummed and grabbed your hand, caressing it with his thumb.

[ masterlist <3 ]