It was terrifying.

Jungkook was in a room with an old man who smoked his cigarette. The man massaged his temple, while Jungkook bit his lower lip in fear. It didn’t help at all that the man had such an intimidating appearance and aura.

The man wore a black T-shirt with skull on it and ripped jeans–too casual for the campus, but Jungkook always knew that the man didn’t really care about rules.

(Everytime he saw the man, he was instantly reminded by those intimidating gangster boss he saw on TV. That was exactly how he looked like.)

The man sighed as he stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray.

“Don’t submit this if you want to be the best,” the man said, leaving Jungkook clueless.

“Sorry?”

The older man reached for another cigarette and lit it up. Jungkook tried to mask his cough by covering his mouth. He didn’t really like the smoke of cigarette, but what could he do?

“You’re a talented kid, Jungkook. That was the reason why you got the scholarship, after all.” The man smiled, but Jungkook knew better–the man wasn’t satisfied with his work. “But this is like a repetition of what your past songs and even I eventually get bored by that. You didn’t go out from your comfort zone.”

Jungkook nodded, taking notes at what the man said.

“You do know that the showcase is at the end of semester. And you do know that the CEO of Nine Cloud Entertainment will come, don’t you?”

Jungkook nodded, again.

“He seeks for someone talented, Jungkook, and unique,” the man said, “and that will be your time to shine. You have to stand out enough for him to notice you and maybe contract you as their future song-writer.”

Jungkook already knew that. He knew better than the old man–which was his professor in Music Major. But how could he risk making music that was out of his comfort zone on that kind of important day?

It seemed like the man could read him. The older man then stared at him, but eventually talked.

Usually, his rough voice would sound warm due to his father-like personality. Not now, though. Jungkook felt chill on his spine as the man spoke.

“Listen here. If you’re going to still write inside your comfort zone, sure, I have no right to stop you. But I will assure you, Jungkook, you won’t be recruited,” the man said sternly.

“Mr. Han, I–”

“You say you can’t, I say that’s because you haven’t tried.” Mr. Han massaged his temple and gave back his CD. “That’s it for today.”

Jungkook nodded weakly, accepting his CD back and put it in his bag. He stood up dejectedly and bowed at the man.

“Thank you for your guidance, Mr. Han,” he said while Mr. Han flipped open a file.

“Yeah. You can go now.”

-----

“Reina Kim!”

The girl was still wrapped like a cocoon with her blanket when she heard him. She squirmed and stretched her body, but decided it was too cold and pulled back her blanket. She reached out for her phone from inside the blanket.

07.18 AM.

Reina groaned. She should wake up right now, but her body couldn’t handle it. She felt cold, but her body was hot due to her fever.

At that moment, she heard footsteps and decided to ignore it. She already knew who it was even without looking at the person.

“Reina, I told you to take care of yourself, but the kitchen is a mess! I know you’ve only been eating ramen for these past days! I can even see your art things in the kitchen and–oh?”

Reina peeked out from her blanket. She could tell that Seokjin was worried from the look of his face.

“Rei, you’re sick?”

Her voice was hoarse when she said her sentence jokingly. “No, I’m just burning up.”

Seokjin widened his eyes and put his palm on her forehead.

“Oh my God, Rei. I told you to take care of yourself!” he exclaimed. He flicked her forehead when he could feel the latter rolled her eyes. “You’re staying home. I’ll make a porridge for you, but I’ll call Mom so she can take care of you. I have work after this.”

Reina whined when she heard the word mom.

“You know I’ll get scold if you call her and I won’t be allowed to live by myself again.” She pouted as she tugged Seokjin’s sleeve. “Please, don’t call, please?”

Seokjin sighed when he saw her puppy eyes. He knew she needed someone to take care of her and their mother was the perfect person to do that. On the other side, he also knew that their mother was too overprotective toward her children.

It took a year to convince their mother that Reina would be fine living by herself.

“Just call Taehyung, then,” Reina suggested.

Seokjin widened his eyes. “What? No! That boy is a walking havoc and the least thing you need right now is someone who destroys your house.”

Reina pouted even more when she couldn’t see her best friend. Seokjin saw that look and glare at her disapprovingly.

“No is a no, Rei.”

“Fine,” Reina muttered. “We both know that this fever won’t last long.”

It was true, though. No matter how worried Seokjin would be, they both knew that Reina had a strange ability to heal fast from a sickness, but at the same time, would catch an illness as fast as she got them.

The older man eventually gave up. He massaged his temple, then put his hands on the air.

“Alright. I will still make you porridge, though,” he said. “Beside, doesn’t Taehyung have a class today?”

Reina nodded weakly. “Yeah, at 9, but I was hoping he could visit me and then go after that,” she answered as she pull the blanket closer to cover her better. “It is such an inconvenience to have him at different campus. Plus, it’s no fun without him.”

Seokjin scoffed. “You miss that human chatterbox? I can’t believe you, Rei. I can’t even understand how you are friends with him since junior high.”

A grin crept up on her face. She peeked out from her blanket, again, and could tell that Seokjin didn’t mean that when he said that.

“That’s the whole point, oppa. He makes the day brighter,” she said as she covered her head again. “You do know that. That’s why you keep him in your café. Even though you hate to admit it, he’s another reason that people are attracted to Eunoia.”

Seokjin got to admit that it was true. Many people had started coming to Euonia–especially, every Thursday, that was the day Taehyung worked–just to see the boy he called human chatterbox. Strangely, they found Taehyung quite an amusement and eventually grew fond of him.

Well, he had this strange charm that made people couldn’t help but attracted to his weirdness.

“I’m going to make the porridge,” Seokjin said without responding to her statement about Taehyung. “You have to stay put. Don’t do anything or I’ll call Mom.”

Although she sulked, she replied with a murmur, “Yes, Mommy.”

-----

“Rei, here’s the porrid–” Seokjin widened his eyes when those orbs caught Reina on her desk, reading her comics and giggled quietly.

Reina seemed to notice his presence. She turned her head to see Seokjin and motioned him to put the porridge on her desk.

The older obliged, then proceed to put his palm on her forehead after he set down the food. He hummed in approval when he felt the fever was almost gone.

“Told you it won’t last long,” she said, but sneezed after she finished her sentence.

Seokjin flicked her forehead, soft. “But not the cold.”

Reina pouted when he said that, tugged the sleeve of Seokjin’s shirt and gave him her best puppy eyes.

“I want to go out.” Seeing the disapproval look upon his eyes, Reina clasped her hands and begged. “Please?”

Seokjin grunted and muttered, “Seriously, you’re going to be the death of me.”

But Reina knew that she had already won from his sentence.

-----

Seokjin did allow Reina to go out.

That was not without these multiple layers clothing, though.

The older had managed to force Reina to wear her T-shirt, sweatshirt, jacket, and scarf at the same time. He also forced her to wear beanie–gosh, he didn’t know how much she hated that–that made the younger groaned.

She felt terribly hot in this kind of clothing.

Reina sulked and decided that she would go to the street Jungkook usually busked on.

Well, she didn’t joke when she said she was his fan. In fact, she always went to listen to Jungkook’s voice whenever she felt down or just bored–even before she knew him personally. Because, really, she had been trapped in Jungkook’s charm.

She fell in love with his music.

Reina sighed contently. She occasionally slowed down her pace just to see the kids, running around with happy laughter that surrounded the air–the parents of the kids looked so worried, but nonetheless smiled as they saw the happiness on their faces.

Sometimes, she would also slow down just to see the neighbourhood cat, comfortably sleeping in front of a house. She noticed how the cat would yawn and stretch out its body cutely when it woke up, then went inside the house again.

She would also notice the dance of the trees that caused by the wind, or how the sky looked so beautifully coloured in blue and white.

Reina smiled to herself.

This world was just too beautiful to live in, and she was thankful that she did live.

Unknowingly, her feet had taken her to the place. She gazed upon the figure of a boy who was still preparing for his guitar. Her eyes immediately lit up as she realized it was Jungkook.

She decided to approach him and tapped his shoulder.

“Jungkook-sunbae,” she called out.

Jungkook turned his head to Reina, and widened his eyes when his eyes caught her face in front of his.

“What are you doing here?” Jungkook asked, flabbergasted by the fact that Reina was here.

The girl chuckled at that. “To listen to your song, of course. What else? Are there any new song?”

Jungkook turned solemn when she said that. He remembered what Mr. Han had told him–that his songs were going into a repetitive cycle that bored him.

It simply meant his song was not good enough.

Jungkook shook his head weakly. “No. I’m just going to perform … Love is Not Over? Maybe Rain, too, and–”

“Why are you singing such a sad song? No wonder people ignored you–although the biggest reason is that they're too busy to hear such a good song,” she said that, but surprisingly, Jungkook didn’t get offended by that. “Anyway, why do you want to sing those?”

Jungkook replied hesitantly, “Because those are my best songs … ?”

She grinned at him. “Ey, sunbae. What makes you change?”

“Huh?”

“You used to sing what you want to sing. I know because, I’ve told you before, I’m your fan,” she explained it for him. “I don’t know what happened today, but sing what you want to sing, sunbae. Isn’t today such a good day?”

Jungkook might not or might have to admit that he changed, partly because of Mr. Han’s words. Mr. Han’s words gave an opposite effect to him. Rather than stepping out of his comfort zone, he knew he held on into it too tight. He began to feel afraid, so he decided to sing what he thought the others might like.

And the boy widened his eyes.

This was not the reason why he sang.

The girl smiled when a look of realization came upon his face. She patted his shoulder a few times, and said, “I think you understand.”

Jungkook scratched his nape awkwardly. “Thanks, I guess.”

“No problem, sunbae,” said Reina as she smiled. “What do you want to sing today?”

Jungkook threw a teasing smile at her.

“I guess you’ll have to listen to know.”

-----

It started with an exciting strum of guitar.

Jungkook looked at Reina mischievously as he started singing his first line.

“What’s popping, girl. Let’s meet again. What’s wrong with you?”

And Reina’s ears perked up at the familiar lines of the song. She was getting excited and couldn’t help but squeal, attracting people’s attention by that. Some people looked at her way, and found out that a boy was singing.

“Our meeting was not fate. Meeting you was what I wanted.”

Reina smiled at Jungkook’s sweet voice. She began to cheer him and that made more people curious about what was going on.

Eventually, more people started to gather and watched the performance. They were interested at the exciting song and heart-warming voice Jungkook had.

Jungkook didn’t seem to notice this, but Reina did.

And she was more than happy that Jungkook got the recognition he deserved.

(Actually, the first thing that got them interested was Reina’s squeal–sounded like an obsessed fangirl who met her idol.

However, they began to realize that Reina’s squeal was an understatement, because Jungkook’s voice did sound that good.)

Slowly, but surely, the crowd got even bigger as Jungkook’s pleasant voice filled their sense of hearing.

Suddenly, Jungkook approached her, stood up as he carried his guitar with guitar straps around his shoulder. He playfully wriggled his eyebrows, and pointed her with his chin, then back at him.

“You’re a flower and I’m a bee. You’re honey and I’m a bear.”

Reina laughed at her senior’s cheeky action. He threw his arm around her shoulder for a while, and gave her a joking wink.

“How could these words come easily like I’m reading a book?”

People cheered at that, and Reina had to laugh. There were couples, pointing at their action and Reina could hear a girl said something about ‘why don’t you do something like that?’ to her boyfriend.

She could even see some group of friends–both girls and boys. There were even girls that recorded Jungkook’s action and squealed between her friends.

(Reina perfectly understood why they did that. Jungkook was a handsome boy, not gonna deny, and he had beautiful voice that swept off women by their feet.

Of course, she knew why the girls fangirled over him, because she was one herself.)

“Somewhere, I feel like you’re similar to me.”

The older boy grinned at her, then decided to dramatically strum his guitar strings and furrowed his eyebrows in a joking manner as if he was too in love with her.

“You’re too pretty, there’s some feeling. You explode in charms, give it to me now.”

Jungkook and Reina shared a knowing look. They both grinned as the song reached its .

Reina prepared to scream out the line of the song if she had to.

Both Jungkook and Reina jumped excitedly as they both sang.

“Look this way! Don’t try to run away! Look this way! Don’t try to run away!”

The crowd cheered them as they sung–some even sang along at the line.

“Look at this boy’s charms, people!” Reina added, earning a grin from the older. “Don’t try to run away!”

Jungkook managed to let out a chuckle at that.

“Look this way, since you’ll be wanting me soon.”

The song ended with the strum of his guitar and applause from the crowd.

Jungkook stared at Reina, watching the grin she had kept since the song started.

And Jungkook never felt this happy to sing before.

-----

Reina gave her senior a cup of hot chocolate and sat down beside him as she sipped her own drink–a cup of ice chocolate.

(She hoped Jungkook didn't tell Seokjin, though. She was already sweating because of the clothes he made her wear. She couldn't possibly risk to die due to overheat, right?)

“How was that, sunbae? Fun, right?” She grinned at the latter. “Although it seemed like my voice destroyed your song.”

Jungkook chuckled. “I’ve never had that many of people who watch me before.”

“I’m your lucky charm, then. Thank me,” she joked with him as she poked his side. “And what was that, sunbae? Were you trying to flirt with me?”

Jungkook’s face was red upon the realization. The song was meant for people to look at him, yes, but the actual lyrics were actually meant for a girl to notice him. And Jungkook forgot it the moment he started to sing with her due to excitement.

And how the hell did he manage to get so touchy-free with her?

Her eyes caught the look on his face and laughed hard while clutching her stomach.

“You’re cute, sunbae!” she exclaimed. “Look at how red your face is!”

“You’re the one who caused this!” he shot back. “Besides, I didn’t even realize the lyrics mean that way.”

The girl nodded, but still giggled. “I know, I know.”

Then, came the comfortable silence between them. Jungkook didn’t say anything, neither did Reina. Jungkook was still caught up on the feelings he had when he performed.

It was indeed new.

Jungkook was never that comfortable on performing. His shyness held him back, but he realized how comfortable Reina made him. It was as if he could show everything he had to the world and wouldn’t get embarrassed for it.

And for the first time in forever, he felt confidence that he could make something … different.

It clicked on his mind after that. Reina was the one who’s able to pull out his potential. She was the one who was able to make him have the confidence of his songs–something he really needed to go out from his comfort zone.

She might be a help for him.

“What’s bothering you, sunbae?”

Her voice snapped his thoughts and made him smile.

“I know something is bothering you, but I’m not going to ask if you don’t want to tell,” she said and patted Jungkook’s back. “Just know that I’ll listen, ‘kay?”

Jungkook sighed, trying to gain his composure before he decided something.

“I am scared.”

Reina turned to him, only to found him smiling at her. Seeing how the girl didn’t respond, he knew she was hoping him to continue. So, he did.

“Mr. Han implicitly told me that I am too afraid to get out from my comfort zone,” he said, ended up telling her everything, “and I am. I’m scared of something … new.”

Reina nodded, but didn’t say anything at all. Jungkook was glad she did that, though.

“I’m scared that people won’t like music that I make,” he said, earning a disapproval look from the latter.

“I beg to differ,” Reina had managed to say. “You’re amazing, sunbae.”

Jungkook smiled, not exactly happy because he couldn’t really produce something good lately.

“I seem to lost my touch on music,” he said as he stared right at her eyes. “So, will you help me?”

Reina nodded even before knowing what Jungkook wanted to say, but her eyes still asked him for what it was he needed her for.

“Please, be my muse for a while.”

A/N: dun dun duuun! I'm back, guys! (Told ya I'm on fire.) (I think I can't update this fast again, though, since I suddenly have a study visit to museums. And I have to make the observation report. Ugh. Just, urgh.)

Anyway, I am too rushed on the plot, ain't I? ((cries a river)) yeah. It feels like the story is a little too fast-paced, but okay. Can't wait to write the secrets and past they have, though. ((evil laugh)) Their past is gonna be a little complicated, but I hope I can write that properly. Anyway, let me know what you think about this one!

in case you guys don't know, the song is actually Look Here by BTS. (I imagined the scene to be the acoustic ver. of it, so ...)