It’s not a date.

Taehyung keep telling himself that, but somehow he can’t force himself to believe it. He hadn’t even thought that Jungkook might still have a girlfriend. He has to keep reminding himself that it’s still possible.

When he get up the next morning, he sort through his clothes, looking for something decent to wear. He had never been one to put much thought into what he wear, just as long as whatever it is isn’t too anything: too tight, too loose, or the worst one- too revealing.

This is silly. He end up picking out his favourite jeans, and the light blue sweater that Seokjin pointed out yesterday.

When he goes down for breakfast, Seokjin whistles at him. He could kill him, but their mom is watching, and looks thoroughly confused. Obviously she doesn’t remember their conversation from last night.

On his way out the door, mom calls, “Good luck on your date, TaeTae!”

Damnit Seokjin.

His face is already flaming, but mom has just made it a million times worse.

When he got to school, Jungkook is already there, sitting in his usual seat. He has a large travel mug of something sitting on the desk before him.

“Hey,” Jungkook says when he walks in.

He's a little late today, due to him having to drop off something at the bookstore downtown. Jungkook smiles as he set his books down.

“I’m not late, am I?”

Jungkook shakes his head. “Nope.”

He sighs with relief. As he do, Momo sweeps into the classroom, her heels clicking on the hardwood floors.

Taehyung doesn’t understand how people wear heels. He tried wearing one of his mom's heels but they pinch his feet and make them ache, but Momo and her preps wear them nearly every day.

“Hey, Pet.” Momo mouths to him.

Jungkook isn’t looking, but he does catch the look on his face afterwards.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

His stomach clenches tightly. “I’m good.” he tries his best to smile at him.

His fists are clenched so tightly in anger towards Momo that he has to ask Jungkook to repeat himself when he asks him a question.

“What was that?”

“Is your hand okay?” he repeats.

Taehyung looks down to see a trickle of red coming from his palm.

“Oh ...”

Releasing his grip, he finds that he had clenched his fists so hard that one of his nails has punctured the skin. In other places there are small half-moon shaped dents.

He wipe hastily at the blood, but it stings.

Jungkook jumps up from his chair, grabbing Kleenex from the front of the room.

“Thanks,” he mutter, wiping at the torn skin, which only makes it sting more.

“Are you okay?” he says again.

Taehyung sighs. “I’m fine,” he tells Jungkook, looking up.

He starts at seeing that Jungkook’s eyes are filled with concern. He opens his mouth to say something, but Mrs. Lee sweeps into the room.

She starts right away by telling them that they’ll be talking about their scavenger hunt projects.

Around the room, he watch people start to make eye contact with their friends, trying to get the word across so they can be partners. Taehyung had never seen the point to that- teachers almost always put you with people you don’t like anyway.

“You’ll be working with the person beside you,” Mrs. Lee says suddenly.

His lips part in surprise. He hadn’t been expecting that.

“Nice,” Jungkook whispers, nudging him with his elbow.

He's about to answer when Mrs. Lee goes on. “This project will be a sort of semester long competition between all the pairs in the class. At the end of the semester we will set up everyone’s projects and do them together. I’ll explain later how this will work. For now, you should start working on creative ways to do your scavenger hunt. You may want to choose a theme and work around that. In previous years, I’ve had students base theirs around holidays, seasons and specific TV shows. You’ll have a few days this week to get started on this, including the rest of class today. In a few days we will be starting our real work, so getting a head start on this project is a good idea.”

The class erupts into sound as people start to discuss, brainstorm, and complain.

“What do you want to do?” Jungkook says. He has to raise his voice so Taehyung can hear him.

“I don’t know. What do you think?”

Jungkook contemplates his question. Personally, when he think of scavenger hunts, he thinks of a bunch of lame clues that lead to people taking pictures of stupid things, like painted people, or dumb signs.

Suddenly though, Jungkook says, “Holidays!”

“Sorry?”

“We can do Halloween and Christmas.”

“You’re right,” Taehyung says, “It’s a brilliant idea. Okay, then you explain to me how we’re going to do it.”

“I don’t really know. Luckily we have the spare to work on it.”

Taehyung smiles at him. For the rest of the class he try to badger Jungkook into telling him where they are going later, but he keeps his mouth shut with a huge smile on his face.

Momo’s regular glares of obvious hatred make it kind of hard to concentrate, so when the bell rings, he barely said goodbye to Jungkook before hurrying out of the classroom.

Later, in Calculus, he feels a lot better. His palm has stopped stinging, and without Momo to glare at him, he's calmer.

Jungkook seems to notice the change in his mood- he also seems more relaxed.

Because of this, Taehyung tries springing the question of where they're going later on him again, to see if he’ll slip up and tell him, but Jungkook's very good. He never says a single word.

“I’m still not going to tell you,” Jungkook says, after he springs it on him for the tenth time during Calc.

“Come on!” he beg, “Please?”

“Never.” Jungkook pokes the bridge of his nose and turns back to Mr. Yang, the Calc teacher.

By the end of spare, Taehyung's feeling completely impatient. Jungkook still won’t tell him where they’re going, and it’s making him nervous.

He thinks he senses that he's about to ask him again, because while Jungkook's walking him down to History, he says, “So if you wanna meet me in the parking lot, we can leave right away?”

“I drove my own car today though,” he says, half to himself.

“It’s cool. Drop whatever you need and I’ll pick you up.”

He smiles, and tells him his address. Jungkook writes it down on his phone and smiles at him. As Jungkook's walking away, he hears, “Hey, Pet.”

He turns to see Momo and a bunch of the preps walking down the hall towards him.

“Do you think you’ve got a chance with the new kid, Pet?”

Ignore her.

“He couldn’t like you, Pet. You’re too bland.”

Bland? Wow, that’s scathing.

Despite the sarcasm in his brain, his stomach clenches. He can pretend it doesn’t hurt, but it does.

Luckily the bell rings before he can get up enough courage to retort. Not that it would be a very clever sentence, but it could have been a reply that’s something beyond the word “Hoe.”

His phone buzzes in his pocket. He takes it out, welcoming a distraction.

New Message

From: Jungkook

1:13 pm

Excited yet?

New Message

To: Jungkook

1:17 pm

Absolutely!

History passes way slower than he'd like it too. By the time the bell rings, Taehyung is positively buzzing with nervous energy. Hanging out with anyone besides Jimin is something he had never done…not to mention that he's now going to hang out with an extremely cute guy, who actually seems to want to talk to him.

He climbs into his car at the end of the day and feels his stomach start to curl into knots.

Why did I agree to this? I’m no good at…having friends would probably be the right word.

He swears silently. This will probably be a disaster…

He puts his car into drive and gets out of the parking lot, trying to think of a reasonable excuse to use on Jungkook. Nothing good comes to mind. He doesn’t know him well enough to know if he can spot lies.

A beep rings out from his pocket, and he checks it when he pulls into the driveway.

New Message

From: Jungkook

2:37 pm

I’m on my way :)

His stomach clenches again. . He sees his mom in the kitchen window, waving at him. He waves back, and a guilty feeling settles over him. She’d want me to hang out with him, he reminds himself. Slightly grudgingly, he text him back.

New Message

To: Jungkook

2:39 pm

Sounds good!

New Message

From: Jungkook

2:41 pm

But seriously, you should probably be ready.

New Message

To: Jungkook

2:43 pm

I’m going, I’m going. Geez. (PS, don’t text and drive)

Jungkook doesn’t text again, which he take as a good sign that he’s heeded his advice.

As soon as he walks into the house, his mom ambushes him. “Is that boy picking you up?”

He nods. “Yeah, he’s coming over now. Should be here in a bit.”

His mom nods, but there’s a big grin on her face. “I’m so happy that you’re hanging out with someone besides Jimin.”

“Not that I really have a choice.” he mutter. Luckily mom doesn’t notice.

“So,” she says, “What’s he like?”

She follows Taehyung up the stairs to his room, and perches on his bed.

“He’s nice,” he tells her, “And funny.”

“And cute?” she asks.

“I’m not having this conversation,” he tells her. He exits his room, catching the smile on his mom’s face as he go by.

Taehyung walks back down the stairs just as the doorbell rings. His mom is sitting on the stairs behind him, bouncing with excitement.

He pulls open the door to see Jungkook standing there, that huge grin on his face. Taehyung's heart beats a little faster, and he has to tell himself to breathe normally. They stand there awkwardly for a second, just smiling at each other. His mom kicks him, and he jumps into action.

“Want to come in?”

Jungkook looks slightly uncomfortable. “We should get going.”

His mom jumps up from the stairs and butts in beside him at the door.

“Hi there!” she chirps.

“Hi…uh-” Jungkook shoots him a pleading look.

“This is Jungkook,” he tells his mom, “We’re just leaving.”

He grabs his jacket off the stairs and goes to pull the door closed behind him.
“Have fun!” his mom calls, “Not too late!”

Taehyung feels the blush seeping into his cheeks before he can stop it.

“Sorry about that,” he tells Jungkook, “I don’t really go out much, so she’s pretty excited.”

“Then this is an honour,” Jungkook says. A sly smile creeps over his face. “Allow me.” He pulls open the door of his car with a slight bow.

A nervous giggle erupts from his throat before he can quell it. “Thanks.”

Jungkook gets in the car beside him and starts it up. Unlike most boys’ cars, his is very clean.

“Will you tell me where we’re going now?” Taehyung ask.

“Nope. It’s still a surprise.” Jungkook shoots him a smile as they’re backing down the driveway.