chapter 11
the psychology of good studentsKyungsoo wakes up in the middle of the night, his heart beating strangely fast. The room is dark and quiet.
Turning around slowly, he rests his head on one of his hands, then feels the small empty space beside him with the other. And then just for the sake of it he checks his watch — but it isn’t time to get up yet.
Pulling the covers up to his chin, he snuggles in and thinks about what he can do to pass time. With his heart acting up like this it should be impossible to fall back asleep anytime soon. He flips around again. Then his mind drifts back to his dream.
He can’t remember much — he can never recall his dreams — but he knows it is a happy dream.
And another thing he knows (for sure) is that Jooyoung was with him in the dream.
He can picture her in her faculty tee and her long coat. He can picture her sending annoyed texts asking him to pay for his own food. He can picture her laughing. And it’s doing strange things to his feelings.
Kyungsoo never gets bothered by most things. Spending way too much time thinking about or acting upon anything is unnecessary. So people find him especially cool for being so nonchalant and carefree all the time, but he feels its nothing too exceptional. In fact, it should be the way of living.
Until Jooyoung — he thinks way too much about her (even in the shower, for goodness’ sake) and does too many weird things just for her (going all the way to a convenience store to ‘study’ when all he did there was play games). It’s not like Kyungsoo. But at the same time these don’t feel unnecessary at all.
He feels a smile settling itself onto his face. “Ah well,” he chuckles to himself. Even a fool would know what this means. He gets ready to entertain his endorphin (the happy chemical) producing brain — sleep can wait.
Jooyoung sniffles. She’s been up for a long time now (but how long exactly, she doesn’t know) and with every passing minute it feels colder and colder. She tugs the blanket until it reaches right above her nose, then close her heavy lids. Man, her eyelids don’t even just feel heavy, they feel swollen.
And then she sneezes four times in a row. Her nose is clogged up and she feels absolutely horrible. Her sneezing fit doesn’t stop, however, and she wonders if it’s possible for someone to die from sneezing.
She is tired but her blocked nose is so uncomfortable it’s preventing her from going to sleep properly. Jooyoung realises after a while that tossing and turning in bed is not going to get her anywhere, so she gets up and slowly rummages through her room for flu tablets, but she can’t find any.
So she shuffles to her phone and goes to her instinctive option again.
To: Scrooge
it’s going to be morning when you see this message but bring some flu tablets for me for the trip thanks
She is about to crawl back into bed when her phone lights up. In surprise, she goes to check the message she has received.
From: Scrooge
why are you not sleeping
From: Scrooge
and why do you need them please don’t tell me you’re really...
She bites her lip.
To: Scrooge
yes genius i’m sick
From: Scrooge
goodness, han jooyoung
From: Scrooge
oh no we’re flying today though
From: Scrooge
this is why i told you it’s totally possible to fall sick getting wet and cold
From: Scrooge
han jooyoung why aren’t you replying me
From: Scrooge
okay you’ve probably gone to sleep
see you in a while hopefully you’ll recover a bit in this few hours
Jooyoung wakes up realising she isn’t even properly on her bed. Somehow she had fallen asleep really quickly after texting Kyungsoo. She still had her phone in her hand, even.
But the sleep she has gotten doesn’t seem to help with her recovery. She sneezes again as she drags her feet to the washroom. Then she rubs her nose and stares at herself in the mirror’s reflection. Goodness, her face really does look swollen today.
But she can’t be bothered about that. Sitting on the toilet bowl seat cover, she brushes her teeth and gets everything else prepared. Then she changes into something especially warm, drapes a scarf around her neck and drags her (packed!) luggage out of the dorm to the meeting area, which is a bus stop just round the back entrance of the dorms.
She’s the first one there, so she sits by a small bench first, blowing her nose into a piece of tissue. But soon, after a few bouts of intense sniffling, she sees Kyungsoo coming her way, dragging his own luggage.
“Hey,” she says, moving over to give him space. He sits himself down beside her and gives her a bag.
“Medicine. For your flu. I got lozenges too if your throat starts to hurt,” he says. Jooyoung takes the bag from him — it looks freshly bought, but when? She digs in the bag and picks out the receipt, which he had left inside (perhaps on purpose).
Kyungsoo had bought it at 2:19am — right after Jooyoung had texted him. Aw.
She is about to thank him when he lets out an exaggerated sigh.
“When will you stop owing me things?”
There goes Kyungsoo again.
Jooyoung immediately drops the thought of him being thoughtful. She deadpans, “I asked because I thought you would have some at your room. I wasn’t expecting you to buy anything. I can pay you back, you know.”
“This cost me my time.”
“ it up, loser. You’re not the sick one here,” she jokes, then swings the bag around. “But thanks anyway. It’s appreciated.”
“Yeah, yeah... and now I even have to take care of you during the trip,” he laments.
“That’s your fault for asking to share an apartment with me just to save money.”
He groans, and Jooyoung can immediately tell he’s joking. He’s never this negative unless he’s joking — she knows him well enough to know that. He’s chill about mostly everything.
“You think I’ll be a burden, Do Kyungsoo?” She raises her eyebrows, sniffling. “I won’t, just watch me. I’m independent, and don’t need any guy to take care of me.”
“Too bad this guy has a conscience and will feel bad if he doesn’t take care of you. It’s not even a gender thing now. It’s health, man,” Kyungsoo lightly kicks at a pebble on the floor, watching it bounce. Jooyoung laughs. She doesn’t know why she’s feeling so tickled.
Maybe it’s just nice and laughter-inducing sitting at a bus stop before sunrise alone with Do Kyungsoo.
The bus ride to the airport is more than awkward. Jooyoung can do nothing but count the seconds one by one until they reach the airport. And she is resisting cringing every few seconds because the situation is that bad.
She sees Minseok in the reflection of her bus window and narrows her eyes at the reflection, cursing in her mind at him. It is all his fault. Stupid Kim Minseok — when the first bus arrived that could take them to the airport, he had insisted on sitting with Kyungsoo on one of the two empty pair-seats, leaving Jooyoung to sit with Krystal, who has her elbow wrapped in a immobilising bandage and is especially chatty today.
“Ooh, did you know the London Eye is not actually the tallest Ferris wheel in the world, Vicey?” Krystal chirps in awe, scrolling through her phone. “It’s the High Roller in Las Vegas first, then the Singapore Flyer second, and the Star of Nanchang in Jiangxi, China, third! London Eye is fourth!”
Jooyoung nods politely but she isn’t really listening. She has lost count of the number of random useless facts Krystal has shared with her about London in the last five minutes on the bus. She wonders if Krystal’s glossed lips has ever cracked from smiling and talking so much.
“This is so cool! Did you know there are over 300 languages spoken in London alone? That’s so many!” Krystal exclaims loudly. From the corner of her eye Jooyoung sees an old man glaring at the both of them. Of course he would be glaring at them — the sun is barely up and this girl is shouting random facts onboard public transport.
Jooyoung really wants to change seats. She really, really, really wants to.
It takes an eternity to reach Incheon Airport but when they finally do, she bursts out of the bus and escapes having to walk next to Krystal by briskly scooting right to the front of the group. She joins a group of students also going for the same exchange programme whom she doesn’t know. But it’s okay. It gives her peace at least for the two hours they wait before boarding the plane.
Jooyoung times her movements precisely. Ten minutes before they are scheduled to board, she shoots out of her seat in the waiting area and plonks herself next to Kyungsoo, who is, of course, with not only Minseok and Krystal but a huge group of other people, because there seems to be an invisible rule that Kyungsoo and Krystal must always be surrounded by lots of people who love them. (It’s called popularity.)
She lightly drags him away, and he doesn’t protest.
“You’re finally back,” he states. “You were gone for long.”
“Yeah, I put myself into a time travel machine and disappeared into the prehistorics,” she says, in the same matter-of-fact tone he used. “Anyway, sit with me on the plane.”
Kyungsoo looks amused. “It’ll all depend on the seat number on our ticket, though. What’s yours?”
“21A. And I don’t care, you can always ask 21B to move, since the entirety of that area is occupied by our university’s students anyway. Or I can ask the person beside you to move too.”
“Just your luck, because 21B is this handsome man standing in front of you.”
Jooyoung is satisfied, so she doesn’t retort to his cocky remark.
“Yay,” she says softly instead. At least she knows her 13 hour-long plane ride will be entertaining. If she doesn’t have anything else to do she can disturb Kyungsoo — poke him and whatnot. It’ll be fun.
Kyungsoo laughs at her odd show of excitement. “What was that?”
“I said ‘yay’, you stupid.” She rolls her eyes and readjusts her carry-on haversack on her shoulder. Then she points at the speaker, which is announcing that is is their turn to board the plane. “Let’s go.”
Jooyoung literally drags Kyungsoo to their seat just in case Mr. Nice Guy exchanges his 21B with another person again, for whatever reason. The only person on this trip she doesn’t mind being stuck on a super long flight with is Kyungsoo. And actually also Minseok, but she reminds herself that she’s mad at him for winding her up to sit with Krystal on the bus in the morning. So not Minseok, which only leaves her with Kyungsoo as an option.
After a while Jooyoung watches a flight attendant as she makes her way to Krystal’s seat, which is a few rows in front of her. She says something smilingly to her, and Jooyoung can’t help but think Krystal speaks in the same way as the flight attendant all the time — way too pleasant, and way too fake. She can’t see Krystal’s reaction nor hear her response, so she goes back to browsing the in-flight catalogue.
But then Krystal pokes her head out of her seat and looks directly at Jooyoung. It is rather scary, especially when she grins.
“Vicey, Kyungsoo! There’s two empty Business class seats up front, and we can have it without paying extra. Do you want to take them?”
Jooyoung has seen this happen before. On previous flights, she always watched on enviously as people were offered better seats which were unoccupied. Now it is her turn, finally! This is good luck.
“Okay,” she says nonchalantly, then mumbles a ‘thank you’ as she unbuckles her seatbelt and grabs her haversack from under the seat.
Kyungsoo looks confusedly at her for a second as if he is in a daze, then follows suit once his consciousness hits him. Except instead of merely muttering a word of thanks he stops directly at Krystal’s seat to thank her, giving her a big smile.
Which Krystal returns. And Jooyoung scowls at.
And when Kyungsoo finally catches up to her, he gives her the same expression he always does when it comes to talking about Krystal. “Don’t be so mean...”
“What?” She says indignantly.
“A ‘thank you’ will suffice. She’s kind enough to give us the Business class seats she was offered,” Kyungsoo says. They load their carry on baggage into the overhead compartment and settle into their seats.
“I did say ‘thank you’, you idiot.”
“Oh, you did?” Kyungsoo looks surprised, then his expression changes into a smiley one, the kind someone would give when addressing a child. “Ah, Han Jooyoung. I’m so proud of you.”
“Proud of what? I’m not as bad a person as you think,” Jooyoung mumbles, buckling her seatbelt. Kyungsoo merely laughs. She considers telling him all about how she helped Krystal with her arm in the late night, but then again, anyone would have done the same. So she zips shut before she feels bad about herself again. Kyungsoo is so nice to everyone that it’s making her feel like a devil in comparison, sometimes. Jooyoung believes in the own good parts of her personality, and knows she shouldn’t change for anyone, but he makes her want to improve all the nasty parts of herself too. It’s making her think. A lot, actually.
They don’t talk again until the plane takes off, and he hands her a piece of tissue as soon as it does. She looks at him with question, and he just stuffs the wad into her palm.
"I brought a lot for you. Just take it," Kyungsoo says.
"I'm not sniffling now, though." Jooyoung opens the tissue paper to its full size, but it's really just a piece of tissue paper. No words. Nothing. So she crumples it up again.
"You gotta blow even if your nose is just stuck. If not the stuff is never going to clear."
"But precisely. I can't blow. It's stuck." She her head at Kyungsoo, and he looks exasperated.
"Okay, fine then. Don't blow," he says, then instead scrambles around his seat, finding the blanket provided on the plane itself. Once he does he spreads it out and tosses it over Jooyoung.
"At least keep warm. You're having a flu," he says again, returning back to his original position and browsing the safety manual evasively.
Aw. She realises she's been feeling touched a lot recently, and it makes her feel nice and especially snuggly under her blanket. She hesitates, then reclines her seat, before helping him recline his as well.
"Might as well take full advantage of our Business class seat," she mumbles as an explanation.
Kyungsoo turns towards Jooyoung, all smiles and nods. “Of course we have to. And do you want to know my favourite part about this Business class seat? It’s technically free.”
She narrows her eyes at him, holding back a smile. “Miser.”
“Loser.”
“Scrooge.”
“Dumbo.”
“Short.”
“Hey!” He laughs, a little too loudly, so Jooyoung clamps her hand over his mouth instinctively. (Kyungsoo’s cheeks are squishy. They’re pretty cute. His lips are soft too, against her palm.)
“No use denying, because it’s true,” she singsongs, removing her hand from his mouth (it feels hot). “And that’s why Minseok loves you so much as well, shortie.”
Kyungsoo suddenly gets this serious look on his face, which is comical to her especially since he was just laughing literally seconds ago. “Yeah, on the topic of Minseok. Why does he like me so much? I don’t get it.”
“Everyone loves you, Kyungsoo.” She rolls her eyes. “But for Minseok’s case, I think it’s because he loves kids, and you kinda look like a small kid, you know? His ultimate dream is to become a paediatric surgeon.” The dream part is real, but the part about the reason why Minseok loves Kyungsoo is just a joke.
But again it’s making Jooyoung think.
When did she actually stop dreaming?
It’s a cheesy topic, she knows, but today, lying down on a comfortable plane seat, with her nose runny and her feet tucked under a blanket, it’s easy for her mind to just casually drift off to random topics as such. (Her head is literally in the clouds, anyway.)
Minseok wants to be a paediatric surgeon. Kyungsoo wants to go into business (but still chose to take psychology, that dumbo). Even Jina, although she doesn’t really like her major, knows what she is aiming for in life — to be a general practitioner. And Jooyoung knows Krystal wants to be a professional Netball player for the South Korea team.
But Jooyoung herself doesn’t exactly want to be anything in particular when she graduates. All she wants is a stable job which will earn her enough money to support herself (and perhaps her family in the future). Preferably be a high-flyer in her workplace. But she can’t picture herself anywhere in particular. The nearest she has to a dream is graduating with first-class honours, but where would she go with her honour roll, anyway?
When she was very young she used to want to become a teacher, because they were cool. Then a doctor (she had a cute doctor’s play set which she loved). Then a princess, and then the Prime Minister. And when she found out the President technically held more power than the Prime Minister in South Korea, the President instead.
But when she was in her last year of middle school, when the teacher had assigned an essay on their dreams as a final graded assignment, she didn’t write about any of those. She wrote that she wanted to become a mother, all because she knew it was easy to play with the teacher’s emotions, and for her to give Jooyoung good marks, with an essay like that. Her aim was to be the top in class. Only that.
Bu where has she ended up with her valedictorian status? Not anywhere much.
Jooyoung thinks about all these until she feels herself drifting into a daze, her eyes slowly shutting close. It is needless to say she doesn’t sleep well with so much on her mind (plus a blocked nose).
The first time she wakes up, she realises Kyungsoo beside her has fallen asleep too. The movie he was watching is still playing — it’s How to Train Your Dragon that is on the screen (she had assumed he doesn’t watch animated movies, so this comes as a surprise). His cheeks are squashed against the small cushion on his reclined seat. His cheeks are very squishy today. Jooyoung stares for a while before fatigue overtakes her again.
The second time she wakes up, her right side is warm.
Kyungsoo’s cheek is on her upper arm. His body is pressed against her side. His arm is very nearly draped across her torso, but it stops right when it is about to touch her. He’s snuggled close, and it is very warm. Jooyoung cannot breathe, and she isn’t sure if it’s really just because of her blocked nose.
The tips of his hair brush against Jooyoung’s cheeks, so she shifts a little, and stares again. This time she has a slightly different view of him as compared to the first time — but his cheeks are still squishy. She falls back asleep feeling extra nice.
The third time she wakes up, she has a human bolster. A comfy, warm one.
Her arms are wrapped around the still sleeping Kyungsoo, and his head is resting right below her chin, nose tucked into her nape, so she can feel steady breaths whispering on the back of her neck. She is half-awake, and half in a daze, but it is so comfortable clinging onto Kyungsoo like this. He is for once, of perfect size and height. Jooyoung momentarily doesn’t think about how inappropriate their position is — it doesn’t matter — and instead, holds him even closer and rests her cheek on the top of his head.
The feeling she has slowly blanketing her entire being is amazing.
a/n: i was away at camp this week and it was crazy fun but now it's back to the grind for me sigh
I OWED SO MANY OF YOU REPLIES i’m so sorry!! just replied to everyone i hadn’t replied to aaa but i hope everyone’s having a great 2019 so far! i think it’ll take a while before my next story because of circumstances.... but i promise i’ll be back :”)
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