“I think the spy is Mark.”

Mark’s eyes widen as he hears the words coming out of Koeun’s mouth.

His first reaction is, wait what? And then Koeun is patting his shoulder and he loses his train of thought for five seconds.

“But- I’m not!” He finally sputters when he remembers where he is. “What makes you think-?”

He’s interrupted by Koeun explaining her reasons to the PD.

Lami picks him as well for reasons like “initiating skinship with Herin” as the main one.

“Woah, just wait a minute. What, now I shouldn’t be taking care of the younger ones?” He tries to clarify, sneaking a peek at Koeun while he’s at it.

She doesn’t seem too fazed by Lami’s accusation. He’s not too sure if he’s bothered by it or not.

Hina picks him as well and he somehow ends up with three votes even though he knows (and the PDs know) that he’s innocent.

It’s Herin’s turn and to his delight she picks Koeun as the spy. “Oh man, what a twist. I love a good team kill. This is great!”

It’s Mark’s turn to pick now and the obvious choice is Koeun (even if he knows she’s definitely not the spy). He ends up picking Herin though; he likes to think that he vouched for Koeun’s innocence by doing that.

It turns out that the spy is Jaemin after all, and he picks up the foldable chair jokingly pretending that he’s going to hit Jaemin with it. A hand on his arm stops him and he looks to see that it belongs to Koeun. When did she get here?

As it turns out, the losers’ punishment is to get on the banana boat while Jaemin gets to sit in the comfort of the speedboat.

He’s slipping on his life vest when Donghyuk steps in front of him. Raising an eyebrow questioningly, Donghyuk’s response is to angle his chin towards the girls putting on their life vests.

“Go help her.” He sees that Koeun is too busy helping the younger girls put on their gear and has yet to get her own set.

“Buh,” is what comes out of Mark’s mouth. Donghyuk rolls his eyes (that brat, this is the second time today he’s gone out of line).

His hands are suddenly full with a helmet and another life vest and he’s being pushed by Donghyuk (and his handy helper Jisung) towards the direction of the girls.

Mark stumbles and catches himself before he can fall flat on his face.

“Hey, you ok there?” He can hear the other girls giggling at him and Koeun shushing them.

“Er, yeah. Fine. Just- wanted to pass these to you.” He unloads the gear onto Koeun’s outstretched arms and scurries back to the boys.

“Thank you?” Koeun says bewilderedly.

He sees Donghyuk face-palming and Jeno and Jisung clutching onto each other as they laugh (at his expense). He’s too embarrassed to turn back.

“Koeun!” Mark calls out.

“I’m ok!” is the reply he hears and he inwardly lets out a sigh of relief. He edges to the other side of the banana boat, reaching out his hand ready to rescue help her out of the water.

The rotors of the speedboat churn and cold water is suddenly showering upon them, soaking them even more (if that was even possible). He suppresses a shiver as the ice-cold water slides down his back. Immediately he checks to see if Koeun is all right, she swims the short distance and grabs his hand.

He pulls her up onto the banana boat and she sends him a grateful smile mouthing thank you over the loud churning of the rotors. And, as cheesy as it sounds, he’s suddenly not as cold anymore.

Koeun’s smile brightens, “Cool, I knew you’d understand. That’s what friends are for, right?”

“Yeah, friends.” Mark echoes her words bitterly. Luckily, it seems Koeun doesn’t pick up on it.

“I’m really glad to be friends with you, Mark.”

He doesn’t know how to respond to that, so he keeps quiet, willing the blush on his cheeks to recede. For a moment, neither of them makes a move. The comforting silence between them is broken when Lami exits the tent. “Come on unnie! We gotta get back to the dorms!”

“Coming!” She turns towards him. “Hey Mark?” for some reason she’s holding his hand in hers and his mind conveniently blanks out. “Good luck for the SMRookies show in August, I know you’ll do great. Fighting!” Koeun gives his hand a little squeeze before running off to join the girls.

What just happened? Mark involuntarily feels his lips stretching into a wide grin. Out of the corner of his eyes, he sees Donghyuk (who obviously saw the whole thing) doing some weird celebratory dance.

Maybe he’ll let Donghyuk off, just for today.