chapter five;

week by week, day by day

    Ri Ahn tries.  She really, really tries, spends more time than she cares to admit trying to get over Jongin.

But Jongin doesn’t make it easy. Not when he always insists on sitting next to her. Not when he hugs her tightly and ruffles her hair and grabs her by the waist so that she’s sitting in his lap. Not when he takes care of her like she means something to him.

Ri Ahn sighs out loud. She’s staring up at the ceiling, at the space just next to the ultra-bright light bulb in Lu Han’s living room ceiling. She’s here because she has class on this campus tomorrow morning, and Lu Han (and Baekhyun, and Chanyeol, and even Kris) insist that she sleeps over. Their university has four campuses total, which is weird, and somewhat of an annoyance - but either way, if this persists, Ri Ahn may as well just live with these four boys.

The light disappears abruptly and suddenly she’s staring at Lu Han’s face, a halo of light around his head as he peers down at her.

“What are you sighing so loudly about?” he asks, and Ri Ahn nearly palms his face out of the way, half-expecting it to be Baekhyun leaning over her.

“Nothing,” she says, sitting up. Lu Han comes to sit next to her, crossing his legs. He looks at her like he doesn’t really believe her but he doesn’t push it, simply settling into the couch. She looks away, leaning her head back onto the couch, jolting back up when she feels somebody bounce in the seat on her other side; Baekhyun is narrowing his eyes at her, hair flopping into his eyes, still wet from a recent shower.

“Are you and Jongin a thing?”

Ri Ahn opens for a smart retort, then hears Kris groan, shutting the bedroom door behind him. “I told you, you can’t just go around asking girls about things like that!” Chanyeol is next to Kris, snickering, and Kris throws him a glare. “Don’t laugh. You were going to do the same thing, you think I don’t know you well enough by now?”

Chanyeol shuts up, pouts dramatically at Ri Ahn for getting scolded, and Ri Ahn giggles. “It’s okay, Yeollie. I don’t mind you asking.” She glances at Baekhyun, then flicks him in the forehead. “You need to stop.”

Baekhyun whines, rubbing his forehead, huffing. “You treat me so unfairly, girl.”

“You deserve it,” she shoots back, but can’t resist smiling when he frowns, looking petulant. “Stop looking so upset. Here,” she gently moves his hand and uses two fingers to rub the sore spot.

Baekhyun makes puppy dog eyes. “I wanna you kiss the oo,” he says childishly, then yelps and practically dives under the living room table when Kris makes a warning noise. Ri Ahn laughs out loud.

    -- -- --

Ri Ahn tries to convince them it’s a story they don’t want to hear. “It’s a long story,” she says tiredly. “And complicated.”

But Lu Han’s eyes are gentle when he looks at her, and he smiles softly, a promise in his eyes that she doesn’t have to say anything, but that he’ll listen patiently if she does. Ri Ahn wonders what the hell kind of luck she has, to have ended up surrounded by four handsome boys, all of whom are looking at her like she’s porcelain.

They have the same kind of look her brother has every time he promises her that no matter how far away he goes, he’ll always come back to beat up any boy who hurts her. Ri Ahn doesn’t understand what she did to deserve friends who would be willing to protect her at any cost, but she’s grateful.

When Lu Han offers her Kris’s dragon to cuddle for comfort, Ri Ahn laughs quietly, and takes it. She wraps her arms tightly around it, and sighs.

Her story with Jongin is five years long. It’s long, and complicated, and a mess, and Ri Ahn hates it because she knows she’s been playing the fool for five years, and she still doesn’t know how to stop.

    -- -- --

She met Jongin in the eighth grade.

She should’ve known he was bad news when he started dating Tzuyu, a girl Ri Ahn has known since the second grade. That was ninth grade then, and Ri Ahn stayed up until two in the morning talking with Jongin more often than not, falling asleep to the sound of his voice.

He hadn’t talked about Tzuyu during those phone calls. No, Jongin saved that for text messages, asking Ri Ahn what Tzuyu liked. Ri Ahn only thought of him as a friend then, and tried not to be irritated at him for not knowing his own girlfriend enough to know what Tzuyu would like for her birthday.

Ri Ahn figured herself for a fool. She should’ve known her irritation wasn’t just because Jongin makes for a lousy boyfriend.

Fast forward and Ri Ahn is a senior in high school. Jongin and Tzuyu have long since separated, settling on friendship, and he’s only had one other short-term fling. Jongin and Ri Ahn are inseparable these days; he has his arms around her shoulders all the time and Ri Ahn is past the phase of claiming she thinks of him like a brother.

“He’ll definitely ask you to prom,” Jimin says, and Ri Ahn pretends she isn’t hoping for it.

And then he asks Yerin, and Ri Ahn forces a smile. There are three things Ri Ahn knows; first, Ri Ahn loves Jongin, second, Yerin does too.

Third, Ri Ahn would do anything for Yerin.

It’s a friendly date. But Ri Ahn can’t help but watch how well they balance each other, how well they match. Ri Ahn doesn’t fit into the equation.

Two months later, Yerin moves miles away, Jongin asks her out anyway, and Ri Ahn knows that she was never even a part of the equation.

There is one more thing Ri Ahn knows.

Jongin does not (will never) love Ri Ahn.

    -- -- --

“I’m going to whoop his ,” Baekhyun growls, and Ri Ahn places a hand on his arm, rolling her eyes.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she says, pushing him lightly. “And dramatic. He doesn’t know I…” she trails off, looking embarrassed.

“Anyone can see he’s just ing with you,” Baekhyun argues, and Ri Ahn pushes his forehead back with two fingers.

“Yeah, but he doesn’t, because he’s dense,” Ri Ahn says back, and Baekhyun huffs, grabbing her wrist.

“Still gonna whoop his ,” he insists, and Ri Ahn smiles sweetly at him.

“I’ll whoop yours if you even try,” she says, fluttering her eyelashes, and Baekhyun winces, releasing her wrist, her hand having formed a fist. She smirks, and Baekhyun sulks.

“Don’t interfere where it’s not your place,” Kris says, tapping Baekhyun on the head. “Don’t worry. One day Ri Ahn will find some nice guy and Jongin will regret everything.”

“You know what we could do,” Baekhyun says slyly, and before he can even finish, Ri Ahn smacks his knee.

“I’m not pretending to date you.”

Baekhyun looks offended. “Why not?” As soon as the question is out, he looks like he regrets it, opening his mouth to stop her, but it’s too late.

Ri Ahn shrugs, grinning because it’s just too easy. “I have higher standards.”

Baekhyun’s head thuds against the back of the couch. “I give up.”

    -- -- --

If there is anything Lu Han has learned about Ri Ahn, it is that she may as well be the reason the phrase “never judge a book by its cover” exists.

He watches her play around with Baekhyun and Chanyeol, smiling affectionately. Ri Ahn’s charm most certainly is that she looks young and naive, like a child. She’s small, with round cheeks and a perpetually lost look on her face. She looks so innocent and sweet that Lu Han forgets she can also be cold and calculating, capable of much more than she lets on. Her bright eyes and shy nature disappears and transforms into confidence and small smirks, and the change is so startling that Lu Han only believes it’s the same person because he’s witnessed it for himself.

Ri Ahn comes off as a girl who has yet to see the world for all its horrors and wrongs. She comes off as someone who knows nothing of hardship and pain, but Lu Han is wrong, he is so wrong. Ri Ahn is a world of hurt buried beneath cracked frames, shielded by steel walls and hidden by wide, curious eyes and simplemindedness.

The girl too clumsy to even stand on a moving bus has a rapier tongue and quick wit; she has the grays and whites of timidity but the fiery reds and oranges of a woman unafraid to burn those who underestimate her. She is a girl well aware that she’s a woman in a man’s world, and she’s determined to make it her own. She knows how to play the game; better yet, she knows how to win.

Ri Ahn is not helpless. She is not a damsel in distress; Ri Ahn with bright eyes and teasing smiles is soft edges and deadly poison - she is miles worth of depth and intelligent thought and Lu Han wonders if he could ever possibly get to know all of her.

The naivety Ri Ahn carries herself with is something of an act and a reality at the same time, and Lu Han thinks Ri Ahn is possibly the biggest contradiction he has ever met, and ever had the desire to understand more.

Then she flops down on the couch beside him again, curls up next to him, and he chuckles, ruffling her hair. She leans into his touch, and he laughs, especially when she kicks a foot out to keep Baekhyun away.

Eventually Baekhyun and Chanyeol drift off to get ready for bed, Kris disappearing back into his room to finish up an essay, and Ri Ahn tilts off to the side, her breathing slowing as she falls asleep among the mess of pillows and blankets and Kris’s stuffed animals. Lu Han gently tugs the blanket up to her chin, and he makes a promise, looking down at her serene expression, that he will protect her.

He has three months left of college and Ri Ahn has three years, but Lu Han promises.

He will do everything he can to protect Park Ri Ahn.

honestly halfway to shipping baekhyun and ri ahn thIS WAS NOT HOW IT WAS SUPPOSED TO GO LMAO

also yes hi i am alive