"I’d tell you that you could have ended up worse, but…“

“Don’t bother,” Seokjin stopped the punchline coming with a weary sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. All those numbers and letters were dancing on the paper without order and he couldn’t concentrate no matter what he did. The tests had to wait for him to get a bit more sane again.

“And how did he take it?” Hoseok crossed his arms on his chest, his face showing morbid curiosity. Seokjin wanted to stuff him somewhere, at least for an hour. He had been bombarded with those questions since he came to school today, his mood dropped to zero when Jeon decided to imply they were already enjoying the benefits, and his class was watching him with wide eyes since he kicked both of those idiots out from the lesson.

Nobody was brave enough to add anything, thankfully, but when they were leaving, one of the students stopped near him and shyly said 'congratulations' before continuing onwards.

He wanted to ask 'for what' but stopped himself in time and just dismissed it completely. Thanks the Lord for he isn't completely dumb to ask the real deal or his mood might be worsen.

“I think he’s fine,” he just said, not really able to summarize Jeon’s stance in one word that would make better sense. “Naturally, he’s trying to use it to his advantage.” yeah, like controlling the older guy, reasoning that the bond was important and hurts like heaven, they should've make out instead ---oh, Seokjin, don't be too bold to even go there.

“Clever little bugger,” Hoseok smirked, and he seemed to be suspiciously amused. Seokjin expected him to act disgusted, maybe, since his inclination to the young boy were dissatisfied at the best, but he had that little smile on his lips all the time and it made Seokjin quite nervous.

“So how does it felt?” Hoseok asked, he tried.

Seokjin put down his pen and glanced at his colleague with an unhappy expression.

“That’s what you’re interested in?” he sighed. “How it felt?”

“Well, I’m sorry for the bubbling curiosity,” Hoseok walked closer to Seokjin’s table and shrugged. “I’m not bonded, I don’t know how it can get.”

“Unpleasant,” Seokjin looked back into his papers, not even trying to recall the strange burning sensation that was still occasionally flaring up in his wrist. It was still there, tugging at his consciousness every time he tried to forget about it. Still feeling as if it were dislocated, causing him to grip his hand once in a while to ease the pain.

“For real?” his colleague blinked in surprise. “I thought it’s like… maybe a little overwhelming, but in a good sense? People always talk about it with such joy when they found their soulmate.”

“If their soulmate is not a kid 18 years younger, then yeah, I bet they do,” Seokjin uttered a little too bitterly even for his own liking, and that made Hoseok step all the way to the table, and tap his long fingers against the desk.

“Jin,” he called his name, and Seokjin knew there was something he wouldn’t like to hear coming. “Like it or not, he’s yours now. And as much as you don’t want that, you’re his as well. That’s how the soulmate thing works.”

“Sorry for not being all cheerful about it,” Seokjin brushed him off, ignoring his presence completely, and earned a long sigh.

“Well, yeah, I don’t really blame you. But,” Hoseok walked away again, stopping at the window. “It will come to you.”

That was probably the main thing that scared Seokjin about it so much. That one day, during a dark moment in it, his brain was going to decide that yes, Jeon Jungkook was his soulmate and he was going to act accordingly.

He was just glad that so far he felt only the slight urge to disappear from the boy’s vicinity.

***

“You didn't drunk today, eh?”

Seokjin managed to stop the groan in time and just flicked off the ashes from the tip of his cigarette. He didn’t need to wait too long for the dark brown haired boy entered his field of vision, but he refused to show him any excessive reaction.

“It may surprise you, but I don’t drink in school on daily basis,” he kept his voice low and eyes stubbornly focused at the pouring rain that was gracing them since the morning. It was rather chilly in the garden and he regretted not taking a jacket with him, since every time the wind blew a little harder, he felt his skin prickling under the shirt.

“Oh yeah, I’m shocked,” the voice was closer now until Jeon was standing next to him, hands in pockets again, swinging on his feet like a petulant child. Still, Seokjin unsurprisingly found him as a bother for his break time.

“Your class?” Seokjin reminded him and saw how he shrugged by the corner of his eye.

“I’m allowed to be here, if you’re asking that.”

“Are you?” this time, the older man gave him a short look, immediately noticing the small smirk that was playing the boy’s lips. “Got kicked out again?” Seokjin guessed bitterly.

“Nah. Told her I don’t feel good,” another shrug. Minah’s lesson, probably, Seokjin thought. “Withdrawal symptoms from the fresh bonding and all that .” the boy seemingly too proud of his lies.

Seokjin rolled his eyes in exasperation. “There is no such thing,” he informed him sternly and Jeon snorted.

“She doesn’t know.”

Typical.

He brought the cigarette back to his lips, breathing in an unhealthy dose of nicotine and tried to calm down somehow. The boy’s presence was slowly seeping into his consciousness like poison, and really, no, he didn’t want to give him another reason how to challenge him.

“And I think there is, anyway,” Jeon spoke up again, this time a tad quieter. “At least I can still feel it.”

Seokjin hummed – he would be lying if he said there was nothing anymore from the yesterday experience. It swallowed him so thoroughly that when he closed his eyes, he still had a feeling he was falling at times.

He couldn’t help himself but look at the place where Jeon’s mark was, now perfectly hidden under the collar of his hoodie, and his hand itched.

“You could have at least thought of a better place,” a jab with strange familiarity, as if talks like those were on daily basis, and Seokjin tore his eyes from the boy with dissatisfied grumble. “Now it looks like we are two ers.”

“You could have listened to me when I said enough for the first time,” he shot back because there was no other way how to win that with him than agree to his little game. “At that point, nothing would happen.”

“Oh, right, that’s what you’d have wanted,” an evident distaste creeped even to Jeon’s voice now and Seokjin refused to look at him. “Stay in your little responsibility-free world, eh?”

“If you fancy yourself enough to think of yourself as my responsibility, then you’re mistaking me for your father,” the professor uttered, earning a scoff.

“My father would never run away from a soul bond.” Jeon voiced out. It sounded rather bitter and it made Seokjin glanced at him again with a raised eyebrow. Jeon’s face had been like a cold mask and it changed the air somehow around them. He wasn’t that cheeky brat all of sudden – it felt like he grew older and was ready to prove some huge point that could make Seokjin re-evaluate life choices.

He definitely didn’t want that.

“As far as I know,” the taller between the two decided not to let it go and flicked ashes off again, watching it disappearing in the rain. “I’m not running away.”

Another snort.

“Yeah, if you’re thinking this is dealing with it properly, then I have bad news for you,” the delinquent told him sharply.

“Because it’s absolutely normal to suddenly threw away all the time we have been antagonizing each other and play best friends,” Seokjin barked out a jaded laugh and threw the cigarette on the floor, stepping at it to extinguish the fire. “What a joke.”

Jeon said nothing, but there was an evident anger in his eyes.

“Look, boy,” Seokjin turned to him with a long sigh. “You can’t possibly expect that, no matter what were your illusions of a soulmate. Maybe with somebody else-,”

“I can’t have somebody else,” Jeon interrupted him with a low growl. “If you haven’t noticed. This is how cards are dealt.”

His body seemed ready to fight and Seokjin felt himself balling his hands into fists as well, just to stop an urge to reach out and shake some sense to him.

“What do you expect me to do?” he groaned, his patience running thin. “Pretend that I love you?” Seokjin snapped unconsciously.

There was the hitch of the boy’s breath again and his eyes dimmed slightly. “Pretend to care?” a low whisper followed, his shoulders dropped low like all the fight left him. It was a strange change. “At least a little.” Jeon felt beaten.

Pretend to care. Caring for somebody you’d rather keep yourself away from was a hard task – Jeon had to see that. They were never on good terms, from the first time they saw each other there was an evident dislike apparent.

If the soulbound was supposed to change that, it didn’t work. “You've got to be joking.” Seokjin couldn’t help himself but shake his head at that. “I don’t think I can do that.” really, Seokjin can't dishonest something pure as if he cares for the boy when he, in fact, isn't. If he wants to, he got to keep it real. Not playing a game.

“Then try!” a sudden outburst surprised him and Jeon grabbed his wrist and pulled at it, the mark burning again with vengeance. “You have no ing idea what can a bad bond do, you er! Like it wasn’t enough I had been throwing up the whole night yesterday-,”

“What?” Seokjin’s eyes grew wide and it was like being seized by a fire chain, how the boy’s fingers curled around his wrist, refusing to let go.

“If you think you can just push me away without consequences, you’re ing wrong-!”

“Calm down!”

Another tug, but the boy shut up, breathing deeply. Both locking gazes, feeling tensed. For a moment there was almost palpable tension between them, electricity, Seokjin would say, where one wrong move would cause explosion, until the grip on his wrist eased off and Jeon let go.

“You can’t do this to me,” he hissed stubbornly. “You can’t.” if Seokjin didn't knew any better, he'll believed that the boy seemed scared. But it might ain't wrong either after seeing his condition. Jeon was shaking. His shoulders trembled.

Seokjin didn’t know what to say, how to react, like all possible answers he prepared disappeared in thin air, so he just stood there, dumbfounded.

Well, there was a reason why he never had kids. He with kids.

“Please.”

He took a sharp breath, the single word stabbing him right in the middle of his chest. It was so quiet, so simple and absolutely unfair. But Jeon Jungkook – this thin, dark brown haired boy which before was nothing, that stepped into his life like a hurricane – was now looking at him and he appeared so tired and sad. Seokjin just couldn’t stop the guilt eating him alive.

“Alright,” his mouth moved, almost by itself. “Alright already.” he sighed heavily.

He almost didn’t catch the flurry of moves, but then there were lips on his and in another second they were gone along with the pressure, and Jeon was grinning at him cheekily like he just won something.

“Gotcha,” he just piped and before Seokjin could lose it and probably catch him by the collar and scold him like a misbehaving kid, he was running back into the building like a rabbit.

“No!” he shouted, already too late to run after the boy and he could have sworn he heard that little bastard laughing in the distance.

Unbelievable.

……………………

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Whoop, whoop! Stop, honey. Tomorrow I'll post another, promise. I don't feel like asking but it wud b nice if we're talking tho. So many silent readers causing me to think that this story didn't do too well.