Chapter 5: The Blue Haired Girl.

Youngjae and Jaebum were currently at a local department store, trying to buy some clothes for Youngjae. Youngjae’s been whining all week that he had no T shirts to wear and that all of his old ones were too worn out and had lost their ‘special charm’. So after whining and getting on everyone’s nerves for a whole week, Youngjae finally got Jaebum to become with accompanist to go hunting for some new T shirts.

Frankly, Jaebum didn't want to go, because of two things. One thing was that he was exhausted from travelling everywhere and doing shows and fan signing events every single day; and another thing was that he wasn't exactly good or even interested in stuff like shopping or styling. But he agreed anyway; it was Youngjae after all, and Jaebum just couldn't say to his angelic voiced younger brother.

It seemed like it's been a few thousand years since Youngjae went into some store and started to look through all the graphic Tees the store had for Youngjae. Jaebum, of course, was tired and bored to death. On top of all that, the store had no sofa or even a single chair for Jaebum to sit on and relax his muscles. Which was why Jaebum was now sitting on the cold floor, and silently judging everyone go went in and out of the clothing store Youngjae was shopping in.

Suddenly, as he was looking through all the people in the store, he spotted some girl with short bright blue hair that stood out to him more than anyone in the store.

"Cool hair color" Jaebum thought to himself, impressed by the excellently done dye job. But as he continued to stare at the random blue haired girl harder, he noticed how gorgeous she was. Although she was just wearing a black T-shirt, that was a bit too big for her, along with some ordinary black skinny jeans, she seemed to be oddly extraordinary. And it wasn't just the hair color. Jaebum didn’t normally find people with strange hair colors preferably ‘unusual’ or ‘pretty’. But there was just something so special and unique about her that Jaebum just couldn’t stop staring.

"She’s really pretty” Jaebum said to no one in particular, eyeing the blue haired girl, not like a gross fifty year old e of course, but like normal twenty two year old guy checking out a girl that was around his age, or like a twenty two year old guy possibly starting to fall for a gorgeous girl.

"She is" Youngjae, who just happened to be standing next to him at the moment, said.

"Hyung, do you like her?" Youngjae smiled cheekily and lightly punched his hyung.

"I don't even know her, so how can I like her?" Jaebum quickly answered getting flustered about his possibly crush on the random blue haired girl.

"You do like her, don't you?" Youngjae continued to tease his red from embarrassment hyung.

"You should go talk to her, or do you want me to talk to her for you?" - Youngjae smirked, mischief and trouble written all over his face.

“Hey, that girl in that black..." - Youngjae started to yell, his voice loud enough to be heard from the 10th floor of the huge department store.

Luckily, Jaebum covered Youngjae's mouth just in time and stopped him from doing something incredibly embarrassing that would’ve probably killed any type of chance Jaebum had with the blue haired cute stranger.

"What the hell are you doing? I clearly said that I didn’t like her" - Jaebum muttered under his breath and exited the store, dragging his excited younger member beside him.

"C'mon, hyung, you can't lie to me. I can see right through you. It's really obvious that you like that girl" - Youngjae kept pushing.

“Even if I liked her it’s not like I can date her” Jaebum sighed, reminding Youngjae of the company policy. It wasn’t that JYP Entertainment didn’t allow their signed artists to date, but if you do date while still being considered a rookie and get caught, the company didn’t carry any type of responsibility for the outcome. In simpler words, the company’s policy for rookies like Got7 was that they shouldn’t date, not that they couldn’t, which was even scarier if you ask Jaebum. So because of that many of the Got7 members were careful of being caught even talking to females, let alone dating them.

"But, hyung” then after thinking it over Youngjae stopped himself from saying anything else. He perfectly understood the reason behind Jaebum’s sad yet very true statement. After all, Got7 were idols, and it was on Jaebum if some very dedicated (obsessively possessive) group of fans spotted Jaebum flirting with a pretty girl.

"Oh wait, I forgot to pay for the T-shirts" - Youngjae suddenly exclaimed, turning around and starting to walk back to the store.

"I already paid for them” Jaebum said, stopping Youngjae.

"You did, when?” Youngjae looked genuinely surprised. It wasn’t that Jaebum was greedy or anything, he actually paid for the group meals most of the time, and he even bought Bambam a really expensive ring Bambam was dying to get for his birthday. If anything, Jaebum was the most generous member in the band. Frankly, Youngjae himself didn’t even know why he was so surprised by the news, since it was pretty expected from Jaebum to pay without even being asked to.

"While you were busy making fun of me, I was busy paying for your clothes" - Jaebum replied, reaching for Youngjae’s neck for punishment.

"Must've been really expensive, since I picked way too many tops" - Youngjae mumbled.

"It’s fine since it’s you" - Jaebum said quietly, smiling.

**

"We're back!" - Youngjae yelled, entering Got7's dorm, that definitely smelled like eight grown man living under one roof. Thank god, their dorm was bigger than most rookie groups’ dorms.

"Did you bring anything to eat?" Bambam asked running up to them.

"We haven't eaten anything since the morning” Bambam confessed.

"Yeah, Jaebum hyung bought pizza for everyone" Youngjae answered, handing Bambam the boxes warm pizza.

Everyone gathered around Bambam, eager to consume the delicious smelling dinner. Jaebum just laughed and went into his room, quietly.

No matter what he did, Jaebum still couldn't get the blue haired girl out of his mind, which was weird. He couldn't even remember the last time he looked at a girl and immediately felt this weird stomach ache of some sort. As long as he could remember, his mind's been captivated with thoughts of Youngjae for the longest time. No one up until today seemed to be good enough to even be compared to his roommate. But the blue haired girl somehow gave him butterflies and made flowers grow in Jaebum’s mind.

Did that mean that Jaebum was over his weird crush over Youngjae? Did that mean Jaebum was normal after all?

Jaebum tried to remember why he liked Youngjae in the first place. Was it his voice? Maybe it was his innocent and gullible personality, or his blinding bright smile. Was it their shared weird sense of humor? Or perhaps it was his soft and soothing voice, his warm eyes that gave out the safest vibes and his sonorous laugh that filled the room, and made rainbow appear out of nowhere.

Jaebum smiled to himself thinking about Youngjae, remaining completely calm, which was weird. Whenever Jaebum thought about Youngjae, his heartbeat used to fasten, he used to get anxious but excited at the same time, as if he was on a rollercoaster – afraid but eager; Jaebum’s whole body used to tense up and he used to become so aware of his surroundings, scared that anyone could tell he was possibly in love with his male friend, that he could hear people breathing in and out. But now, as Jaebum was thinking about Youngjae and the very precious image of him in Jaebum’s head, Jaebum was unruffled and normal.

"What in the world is happening?" Jaebum mumbled and closed his eyes, not wanting to think about any of it any longer.

"Jaebum hyung, I saved the last slice of pizza for you, come and eat it. But please hurry, 'cause I don't think I can keep it safe from 'them' any longer" Youngjae shouted from the kitchen. The others all started to shout in protest.

“What do you mean ‘them’, do we looks like couple of uneducated rude savages to you” Jinyoung shouted, offended by Youngjae’s title for s who were actually fighting for the last slice of the pepperoni pizza.

Jaebum sighed and proceeded to lie on his bed, trying to tune out everything from the outside world, along with his thoughts.

"Jaebum hyung, what are you doing? Please hurry, they’re starting to bite me” Youngjae shouted even louder this time, holding the pizza box to his chest, keeping it away from the animals’ (Got7’s five scary members) reach.

"I have a headache; you can eat the last slice instead" Jaebum weakly said, making a brief appearance in the kitchen and stopping the fight for the precious pizza. It was fascinating really, to see all of s on the floor, Youngjae with a huge pizza box and everyone else surrounding him like a wolf gang surrounding a single fat lamb.

"You mean I fought with these freaks for nothing” Youngjae muttered letting go of the pizza box and letting fate decide its owner.

“Do you want some pills, hyung? There are some in my drawer if you want” Youngjae suggested, noticing Jaebum’s very obvious frown.

"Nah, it is fine. I just need some sleep" Jaebum replied and headed back to his room.

Jaebum lied on his bed for about 3 hours after that, constantly changing his sleeping position, trying to fall asleep. But whatever he did was useless.

"It's only 7PM?" Jaebum muttered under his breath, checking the time. Since it was still pretty early, Jaebum decided to go for a refreshing walk that would hopefully get the female stranger out of his head and stop his headache.

"I'm going for a walk" Jaebum quickly shouted and left.

It was surprisingly warm outside, making it more enjoyable to just walk alone, not having anyone to disturb and annoy him. He walked past a local coffee shop, where he saw Her again. She was sitting inside the coffee shop, passionately scrabbling something on her notebook, which made her look even more special.

Without even thinking Jaebum entered the coffee shop and ordered himself a cup of coffee. After getting his order, he straight up walked up to where She was sitting and sat down. She looked up, a confused, awkward and scared expression on her face.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Is it okay if I sit here?" Jaebum said in a polite manner and smiled. Although it was rare for the Got7 boys to flirt, they all knew their charming points and they knew what exactly made the girls’ hearts flutter. Got7 was an idol group after all.

"Uh, sure” She replied, hesitating a bit. Jaebum smiled even wider, satisfied but not surprised at her very much expected answer. Jaebum stared at the gorgeous girl before him, admiring every inch of her beauty.

"What's your name?" Jaebum started another conversation. She looked up from her notebook and frowned in an awkward way.

"Max" She answered finally giving her pretty face a name.

"Cool name. I’m Jaebum” Jaebum answered, still smiling.

"Can you stop smiling like that, it's kind of creepy”

“Why, you don’t like my smile?”

"No!" Max started panic.

 "It's not that I don't like it. You actually have a really gorgeous smile. It's just that, the way you are smiling, that's creepy. You're smiling as if you're a lion that just found what to eat for his dinner” she quickly explained, making Jaebum laugh with her clumsy explanation and fast talking.

"I'm talking too fast, aren't I? Oh, I am. Now what will you think of me? Great, Max, you managed to weird out the person who was about to befriend you” she babbled on and on. It was kind of cute how she talked faster and faster, until she was finally out of breath. It was really adorable, kind of like what Youngjae did when he was nervous.

"I'm sorry" Max apologized and took a huge gulp of the lemonade that was sitting on the table in front of her.

"It's okay. I kind of find it cute" Jaebum smiled. It was obvious Max was embarrassed, as her ears started to get redder by the minute. Soon they were looking like a pair of tomatoes on either side of her head, just like Youngjae ears look when he gets all tense and embarrassed.

"So umm, what were you doing before I disturbed you?" Jaebum asked looking at her notebook that was filled with words.

"Nothing important, really; I was just writing whatever that was on my mind" she answered and wiggled her nose in this weird way, the way Youngjae did whenever it would itch from the 10 pounds of stage make-up.

"That’s cool, I actually also write frequently, song lyrics most of the time. Maybe I could show them to you sometime” Jaebum made a pointless promise. He didn’t show his lyrics to people, unless they were finished and it was JYP or any other PDnim that wanted to see them.

"Yeah, but that's if we meet again” Max said.

"Of course we will! Why? You don't want to see me again? Does my face make you want to throw up?" Jaebum teased. Jaebum was surprisingly good at ‘picking up’ girls. If anyone who didn’t know about Jaebum’s regular daily schedule which consisted of practicing for ten thousand hours a day, would actually think that he spent all his time picking up chicks.

"No no; how can you say that? I didn't mean that..." Max blurted out thousands of words at the same time again, making Jaebum laugh again, but only louder this time.

"Cute" – Jaebum whispered, looking at the very nervous girl.

"Then, prove that you're not actually disgusted with my face and want to hang out again by going somewhere with me” Jaebum basically ordered, sending down shivers down Max’s spine. Hey, he wasn’t called ‘the scary leader’ among s for nothing.

"But, I mean, we just met and wouldn't it be kind of weird?" Max said, sounding barely audible, a bit scared of Jaebum’s deep and serious tone.

"Okay, then. Fine, I get it. You are disgusted with my face" Jaebum spoke, getting up from the table.

"No wait" Max said, quickly holding on to Jaebum's hands and sitting him down before her again.

"Sure, I'll go, I just really hope you’re not a psychotic murderer or some sort” Max whispered, looking down.

Soon enough they were at an abandoned playground near Got7's dorm, no one, expect Got7 members, knew about, which was pretty miraculous.

"Isn't really nice here? It's so quiet and calm” Jaebum said, sitting on one of the old toys.

"It is" - Max smiled and sat down beside Jaebum, scanning the playground.

“Hey, can I ask you something?” Max asked.

“Go ahead” Jaebum allowed, expecting the usual “aren’t you in a band” question he usually receives from his newly made friends.

“Is this the part where you bring out your hidden mechanical saw and cut me in half?” Max asked. Jaebum laughed loudly. Max was definitely something else.

"So what do you do? Are you a university student or?" – Jaebum asked after some silence. He was dying to know more about the mysterious Max that somehow managed to capture his heart.

"I am. I'm a psychology major. I'm an aspiring music therapist. I believe music can fix everything. That might sound a bit stupid but..." - Max explained her choice of career, with bright stars glistening in her eyes and words coming out with such passion and ambition.

"Youngjae wants to be a music therapist" - quickly crossed Jaebum's mind, but Jaebum didn’t really pay attention to it.

"That's really cool" - he smiled, trying not to think about that otter resembling weird kid that still managed to steal all the attention away from Max without even physically being there with them.

"Yeah, I'm cool like that" Max sang, laughing shyly.

"Hey, that's lyrics from one of my favorite songs" Jaebum exclaimed getting up excitedly.

"Mine too! It's also from my favorite film "Freedom Writers"!" Max also got up, half-shouting in excitement.

"I love that movie too!" - Jaebum cheered. He wanted to also add that it was Youngjae’s favorite movie as well and how it was actually Youngjae who first showed the film to him.

"Wow, we've known each other for 30 minutes now, and already have so much in common" - Max laughed. Max sounded a bit like a crying whale when laughing and it was too funny not to laugh with her. But at the same Max remained the cute blue haired girl that stole the attention away from everyone with her charm and beauty.

"Hey, by the way, I feel like I have to mention this right now so that  things won’t get awkward later; I’m actually in an idol group, just so that you won’t get a heart attack later when you accidently see me on the internet or something like that” Jaebum uncomfortably muttered.

"Oh, so that's why you looked so familiar. You’re from Got7. Even your name sounded really familiar, but I couldn't exactly remember why. Now I know why. Aren't you JB, the leader?" Max beamed as if she'd remembered something really important.

"I am” Jaebum smirked.

"That's amazing; now I have an idol friend" - Max giggled.

A sudden thought popped into Jaebum's mind along with a conversation he had with Mark a week ago.

"Mark, what would you do if you saw a really gorgeous girl" Jaebum asked out of the blue, while watching TV, waiting for one of Jackson’s many variety shows to air.

"I don't know. Probably get to know her and then ask her out? I don't ask people out though, I've been rejected very brutally once and that's enough for me" Mark replied casually.

"You would ask her out? Even though you’re still a rookie and the contract isn’t over?”

"I mean, if I really like her, I don't think our contract should play an important role" Mark said, still focused on the TV.

"That's true. But what if PD says you can't date her?"

"If I like her, I like her. Whatever PD says, it shouldn't matter."

"Hey, let's date” Jaebum said, not thinking twice about it.

"What?" Max was incredibly confused. Everyone would be if a random guy you met an hour ago suddenly suggested that you two should date.

"Let's date. You know, be boyfriend and girlfriend” Jaebum explained.

"Yeah, I'm not stupid. I'm just very surprised and even further convinced that you’re a psycho serial killer”

"Why?" Jaebum laughed.

"We literally met an hour ago. We don't know each other and you want to date, sounds like something a killer would do”

"We do know each other. I know your name, you know mine. That's what matters. The rest we can find out in the process of our relationship" Jaebum insisted.

"So, shall we?" Jaebum asked, looking into Max’s chocolate brown eyes.

"I don't know” Max was inevitably leaning towards a negative answer.

"C'mon, wouldn't it be cool to have an idol boyfriend?" - Jaebum smirked.

"What if our personalities don't match, Mr. ‘I’m an idol, which is why you should date me’?”

"We break up”

Max frowned. But after a few minutes of silence and thinking over what Jaebum, JB of Got7, have suggested.

“Sure, then, why don’t we date”

"Serious?” Jaebum was really happy he got a positive answer as he was waiting for Max’s rejection.

"But you should know that because I'm an idol, we probably won't have many dating spots and we probably won't even be able to meet that much if at all” Jaebum stated. It was true and it was better for Max to face the harsh idol rules earlier. Got7's schedule was packed for the season, as they were still promoting their winter album and still had a promotional tour in Japan; and who knows what will JYP say about their relationship, he might even say that Jaebum can't date her. Plus what if someone catches him and Max being out together, then his career and Max's life would be really doomed. They were too many complicated things, but for some reason they didn't bother Jaebum as much as they would if it was any other time. Jaebum was just happy that Max didn't reject him.

"It's okay. You're an idol. I can only imagine how hard it must be. But we can talk on the phone and text each other, right?" Max laughed. It fascinated Jaebum how positive and open-hearted Max was. Her positive and open mind reminded him of his roommate. Youngjae would laugh no matter how hard the situation he was facing currently was. He'd just laugh it off, trying to lift the spirit, assuring everyone that everything will turn out just fine. Jaebum unconsciously smiled, while thinking of Youngjae and his stupid smiled.

"So, Mr. ‘I’m cool’, are we on our first date right now?" - Max spoke, snapping Jaebum out of his thoughts.

"I guess we are" Jaebum laughed.

Max and Jaebum talked for what seems like hundred thousand hours that night, getting to know each other. Weirdly enough, it turned out that she was quite similar to Youngjae. Youngjae and her both shared hatred for cucumbers, they both loved cats but were allergic. They both loved music but Youngjae sang like an angel and Max couldn't sing. The only difference Jaebum could find was the Max was fluent in English, as she was born the States, and Youngjae just very passionately tried to copy Mark’s English conversations with his parents.

"Our first date turned out to be no so bad after all" Max laughed.

"The second date will be ever better, I promise” Jaebum smiled.

“Look at you, idol” Max joked, messing up Jaebum’s hairdo.

“Hey, watch it, Max, it took me 6 hours and 8 cans of hairspray to reach perfection with my beautiful silky hair” Jaebum joked around, laughing like a maniac.

“Let me mess it up more, then” Max laughed, ruffling Jaebum’s hair even more.

“You messed with the wrong idol” Jaebum said, running after Max, laughing.