♫( ･･ ๑)

“Hey, speak of the devil! I see him over there,” she says excitedly, pointing at somewhere behind you. You turn around towards the direction of her hand, finding a group of guys conversing among themselves by the staircase.

“Jake!” Haewon hollers, trying to be heard over the music blaring from the speakers. She waves a beckoning hand. “Come here!”

One of the guys, with neat dark hair and a pair of black-rimmed glasses perched upon his nose, turns around at the sound of his name. His eyes search the room at first, before landing on the two of you. He seemingly excuses himself to the others, before heading over to where you and Haewon were standing. As he approached, you noted the relaxed, charming smile adorning his admittedly handsome face.

“When’d you get here?” Haewon asks him in a somewhat accusatory tone as soon as he’s within earshot.

“Jeez, no hi, hello?” Jake says, feigning hurt. “I got here, like, five minutes ago.”

“And you somehow already have a drink in your hand. Nice!” Haewon snickers.

“Did you call me over here just to bully me in front of one of your friends?”

“No! Not really,” Haewon quipped. “I wanted to introduce you to her! y/n, this is Jake—the friend I was telling you about.”

“y/n?” he repeats. He meets your gaze, before offering his hand as the corners of his mouth quirk up into a friendly smile. “Nice to meet you.” 

“Hi,” you laugh sheepishly as you shake his hand. “It’s nice to meet you, too.”

“What were you saying about me this time?” Jake questions, turning back to Haewon with his eyebrows raised.

“Nothing bad! I was just saying how funny it was ‘cause y/n here has this guy that she’s known since, what, middle school?” You give her a nod of confirmation. “Yeah, and, you know, we were thinking—“

She’s suddenly interrupted by someone else calling her name. You search the room for the voice and find a girl, likely one of her roommates, urgently beckoning her to the kitchen.

Despite not knowing what exactly the situation is, Haewon seems to understand that her presence is needed. “Duty calls,” she sighs, throwing her hands up wearily. 

She glances between you and Jake. “But I mean, you two are good here, riiiiight?” she continues, starting to walk away with a mischievous glint in her eye. “Have fun! I’ll come find you again later!” 

Haewon gives a not-so-subtle wink as she leaves, but you’re exactly not sure who it’s directed to.

You’re left standing next to Jake, now forced to make conversation with him without Haewon acting as the buffer. As you sip your drink awkwardly, you frantically think of anything to say to fill the silence, but Jakes beats you to it.

“Sorry, I don’t really know what her plan was when she called me over here,” he laughs as he rubs the back of his neck apologetically.

“No worries, I’m sure she left me in good hands,” you quip, earning another chuckle out of him.

As you’re talking to Jake, you realize that, for whatever reason, you can’t hold eye contact with him for more than three seconds at a time. Instead, you resort to glancing down into your cup or anywhere at the party raging around him. Regardless, you could still feel him studying you through his glasses, head subtly tilting towards you as he tried to catch your gaze.

“Okay, I hope this doesn’t sound too weird, but…” he says, sounding like he had been pondering this thought for a while. “Did you happen to take math with Professor Yoon last semester?”

You finally meet his eyes, your eyebrows raised in surprise. “Yeah, I did, actually! Were you in that class, too?”

He nods. “I was asking ‘cause I think I remember you sitting in front of me in lectures. You were always next to this one guy— pretty tall, has a hamburger sticker on his water bottle?”

You laugh, amused at his memory of such a specific detail. “Mhm! That’s Sungchan, we live together.”

“Oh, are you guys… a thing?”

“Nooo, oh no,” you find yourself saying a little too quickly. “We’re just friends. We live with two other guys.”

“Whaaat?” Jake’s eyes widen in genuine disbelief. “Wait. So you’re the only girl?”

“Unfortunately,” you confirm with a dramatic sigh. “I’m kidding, though. They’re all great.”

“That sounds… interesting. Or fun…?” Jake tilts his head thoughtfully as he tries to find the appropriate word. “Were you already friends with all of them before you moved in?”

You take this as an invitation to tell him about how you ended up in this odd living situation, even going into the rather ridiculous things you’ve experienced since moving in. Without realizing it, you end up talking for a good amount of time, but Jake doesn’t seem to mind, as he just listens to you attentively while you go into your spiel.

Once you’d practically recounted the past three months of your life to him, Jake could only amusedly remark, “Jeez, you guys sound like you’re living in a sitcom or something.”

“Might as well be,” you shrug with a laugh. “I dunno, I’d feel like you’d get along with them—my roommates, I mean. I think it’d be funny if you all met.”

“Yeah?” Jake laughs with a skewed smile. “Hey, I’d be down to meet them.”

This catches you off guard, leaving you blinking up at him in surprise. “Really?”

“Unless you were joking…?”

“No!” you blurt out. “I mean, if you actually want to…”

As Jake lets out a soft laugh at your reaction, you feel a blush creeping up your cheeks and to the tips of your ears. You fervently hope he doesn’t notice, or that he just chalks it up to you being flushed from the alcohol. 

But as you watched him direct his ever-so-charming gaze back towards you again, you figured that, even he didn’t notice your blushing face, you were sure he had already realized at this point how you were inexplicably, undeniably, into him.

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꒰ AUTHOR’S NOTE ꒱ me taking like half a year to continue this story only to introduce a new love interest for yn 🕴️ HEAR ME OUT OKAY!!!!

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