Jiyong ran up behind Seungri only to give his shoulder a playful bump with his own, a lazy smirk on his lips. “Seungri, come for a quick smoke with me. We can be a little late for class, hm?” He offered the younger boy only for him to return it with a small frown of concern. “Hyung, how many times do I have to tell you that you should stop smoking?” Half a second passed until Seungri gave in with a casual shrug of his shoulder. “Fine, we’re gonna die either way.” So he tagged along with his older friend to the steps outside where all the smokers went into the lukewarm wind, the sun shining down on the two. The younger boy awkwardly standing off to the side as he waited for the other to finish.

Seunghyun had so happened to come to the same area with a lit smoke already set lightly between the edges of his lips, walking up from behind. “Jiyong, what did I tell you about bringing this kid along? He’s still inhaling our smoke, y’know.” They had both turned around from their conversation and Jiyong let out a laugh, taking his smoke between his two fingers to reply. “God, why is everyone on my today? Let the kid live.”

“Hyung, why’d you come to the other side of the school to smoke? You’ll be an extra five minutes late to your next class.” Despite the light teasing the boys gave the younger one, he still smiled brightly to each of them.

“I plan to skip next period, besides it’s just science and I doubt I’ll need that in my future.”

“You don’t think rockstars need science?”

“Not any cool ones.”

“Oh.” Seungri trailed off.

So the quick break between periods had passed with a sound of the bell and the three boys remained in the smoking area despite everyone else who had left to attend classes. Surprisingly, they didn’t care.

They had snuck back into the school on a search for the other two missing from their regular group of friends, Youngbae and Daesung. This involved Seungri awkwardly standing at the door motioning for the others to come out of their shared classroom while the teacher’s back was towards him, Youngbae managed to escape first with the excuse of a dental appointment and Daesung followed shortly after with the mentioning of stomach sickness.

Though now they had nothing to do, it beat being in class for the rest of the hour. They made their way to the rather large library where a number of students were, sat by a large table by a window and began talking.

“Why the hell do we always come here when we ditch classes?” Youngbae had questioned with the slight raise of his eyebrow.

“Hey, if you wanna go back to class so badly, go.” Jiyong answered as he leaned back in his chair. From the corner of his eye he saw Seungri shuffle in his chair for his backpack. “Yah, that excludes you. You’re staying right here.” Seungri stilled before letting out a soft huff, leaning forward to rest his head against the cool table.

The eldest had been doodling on a scrap piece of paper with a black ink pen, a sketch of him with a guitar in his hands at center of the paper. Daesung took notice and plucked the pen out of his friend’s hand and slid the paper towards him, beginning to draw himself alongside Seunghyun as the other three talked amongst themselves. “What the hell is that in front of you?” He had asked Daesung, amusement laced in his voice as he peered over his shoulder.

“It’s a drum, jackass.”

“Looks like chicken scratch to me.” Daesung could only scoff in response until Seungri had snatched the pen and the paper. “Oh, what is this?” He cooed with curiosity and excitement in his eyes, a cheerful grin on his lips as he began to doodle himself on the paper as well.

Soon, Jiyong had taken interest and drawn himself as a stick figure with a bass in his hands - deciding to draw Youngbae beside him with a piano set in front of him which earned an eye roll and a laugh from him as he looked on at the atrocity which was Jiyong’s art skills.

Jiyong looked over the paper silently for a drawn out moment as the others spoke casually, an idea rang in his head at the visual stimulation. He spoke up and everyone shut up. “Let’s make a band.”

The other four had stared at him for a solid second until the youngest had responded with a grin breaking out onto his face, the idea too crazy to be taken seriously. “Sure, as long as I’m the lead singer.”

“I’ll be drums.” Daesung chimed in after.

“Are pianos common enough in bands to be essential?” Youngbae had asked.

“No, seriously. Guys, shut up. Seriously. Seunghyun isn’t the only one who wants to make music and be famous, and I’m sure you guys want to do it too. Let’s do it. We have everything we need for a band: visuals, instruments, vocals, and brotherhood. What’s stopping us?” Jiyong knew he must’ve sounded weird and stupid with too much dreams but he imagined the next 10 years with his friends just making music. He wanted that, a lot.

“I- well...sure, hyung. I’m down.” For once, Jiyong was grateful for Seungri’s outgoingness.

“Jiyong, this isn’t some game. Making a band and music takes a lot of effort and money, we don’t have the equipment. Seungri and I are the only ones with jobs and even put together we can barely afford more than two fancy meals. It’s crazy and would never work, I know cause you can’t just pull a band out of your like this cause of some stupid drawing.” Youngbae finished. Despite being harsh, everyone knew he was being honest.

All Seunghyun did was nod his head along with Youngbae until Jiyong spoke up in defense.”Hey, money is not a problem. My parents are stacked with cash and if I just complain about not feeling loved they’ll get me anything I want as an apology. Anything. I can get us some mics, speakers, soundproof my basement, the whole shebang.”

“Shebang?” Daesung mouthed to himself with a slight squint of his eyes.

Youngbae sighed, knowing full well that Jiyong was capable of all of that. He gave in. “Fine, let’s try it then.”

Seunghyun, feeling slightly pressured, agreed hesitantly. “Sounds good, Ji. I just don’t know if I feel right about you paying for every-”

“You won’t have to pay me back, okay?”

“Oh thank God.” He sighed in relief.

Suddenly, Daesung felt everybody’s eyes on him. They were waiting on his response and he just wasn’t sure if he could answer.

“Well?” Seungri questioned with the tilt of his head.

Daesung’s eyes averted towards the table and remained silent. A torturously long moment passed by until he suddenly got up, slinging his backpack over his shoulder and began to walk over to the library’s exit hurriedly. The rest of the boys following right behind, the library constricting the volume of their voices.

Once they had made it out into the hallways of the school, Jiyong had run up to step in front of him with a look of confusion.

“Daesung, what the hell? Where are you going without giving us an answer?”

He tried to step to the side and walk past but Jiyong was stubborn as hell and blocked him until he gave in. He gave a sigh of frustration before reluctantly meeting the other’s eyes.

“I can’t do it. You know how my dad is, he wouldn’t ever allow me to stray from his plans. He would go ing berserk, sure you guys can do whatever the hell you want with ease but when you have my dad it’s just not possible without disowning. Good luck.” He, again, tried to brush past Jiyong but was stopped.

“Daesung, who said he had to know?”