Taehyung, bless his kind soul, was waiting for you just off the campus and took your hand, walking in pace with you as you headed to Introduction to Design. You were still shaky from the night before, but Taehyung’s presence made you feel much more at ease. Unfortunately, it wasn’t long before you heard the familiar sound of Nick screaming you name. Despite this happening every day, you still cringed in embarrassment. Taehyung squeezed your hand in silent comfort and straightened up, steeling himself for a confrontation.

“Erin do you want to eat lunch with me later? I’ll buy it for you.” Nick shouted, even though he’d caught up to you and really didn’t have to shout for you to hear him. He didn’t even acknowledge the fact that he texted you like a total creep! Taehyung responded before you could.

“Sorry, we’re eating together.” He replied in an impressively cheerful voice. Nick didn’t like that. He picked up his pace to walk beside you and made a grab for your wrist. Taehyung was faster. As soon as Nick moved to walk beside you, he pulled you closer as if to hug you, then gently nudged you to his other side, forcing himself between you and Nick. You took his hand again, grateful for his endless sacrifice.

“I wasn’t asking you, . Erin you should really dump him, he’s not worthy of you.” Nick looked at you pleadingly, and you wondered whether or not you should tell him you and Taehyung weren’t dating. It might only encourage him. Still, you had to stand up for Taehyung. He deserved that much, and a lot more.

“We’re just friends, Nick. Please don’t be rude to my friends.” You said sternly. Nick seemed to like that answer, poking at Taehyung with glee that wasn’t reciprocated. Taehyung kept silent, just giving you a smile and a nod.

“Hah! Loser! I guess I’m not the only one who got friendzoned, huh?” Nick half bragged loudly. Now he was really starting to annoy you. To prevent yourself from squeezing Taehyung’s hand tighter in an attempt to relieve the anger, you glared at Nick.

“You’re not my friend.” You said venomously, almost instantly regretting your words as you realized the temper tantrum you were about to witness. But you couldn’t stop. “I never friendzoned you, because you’re not my friend. You’re in the ‘creepy guy who won’t stop hitting on me despite me rejecting him zone’.” Before he could explode, though, Taehyung found it necessary to pour some educative fuel on the fire. With an honest to God smirk on his face, he looked Nick up and down before adding.

“Don’t say anything about how girls don’t like nice guys. Girls love nice guys, you just aren’t nice.” There could never be a better reason to high five Taehyung, but you restrained yourself anyway so as not to take away from the moment. Nick, turning red with anger but apparently verbally constipated, muttered something unintelligible before turning around and running away.

For once, you thought that something you said had paid off. Nick didn’t show up in front of you in between classes for a few days, and he sat on the other side of the lecture hall, leaving you and Taehyung in peace. He didn’t even text you! So it wasn’t that strange that you eventually let your guard down. Taehyung still walked to lunch with you, but you were no longer attached by the literal hip. Once you got to the line, you let Taehyung go ahead.

“I like the menu today. I wish we could have this every day.” Taehyung smiled as he happily scooped meat onto his plate, taking in the scent of perfectly cooked beef. He wasn’t wrong, but you still tried to get some vegetables on your plate as well.

“I’m just glad today is almost over.” You said as you carried your plate along. “I’m going to catch up my homework this weekend.” Yeah, homework. Taehyung raised an eyebrow at you, clearly amused.

“You know you’ve friended me online, right? I saw you post about your Pixar marathon.”

“Psh, that’s basically homework.” You laughed. “What are you going to do? Does your puppy have obedience training again?” Taehyung seemed to swell with pride at that, and started explaining just how well his baby had been behaving (‘hasn’t peed inside for a week now!’), when suddenly the smile faded from his face. He’d noticed something behind you. You didn’t have to look back to know what it was.

Before you could hear Nick cry out for you, Taehyung grabbed your shoulders and moved you around him, placing you in front of him. It was really impressive how good he was at finding impromptu solutions. Once he’d made sure you were blocked off, he continued telling you about his puppy.

It only took about five seconds for Nick to spot you, because that was when you heard his usual cry, followed by him appearing behind Taehyung and pushing your friend slightly in an attempt to get in line behind you. Taehyung didn’t budge, closing the distance between you and him.

“I thought we’d gotten rid of him, too.” He said, though his voice sounded as cheerful as before. You nodded in agreement and smiled at Taehyung. Nick, to his credit, scrounged up his face as he looked at Taehyung, who had turned to the extent that he was almost blocking you from sight completely. Deciding that lunch wasn’t as important as getting close to you, apparently, Nick left his plate and waltzed past Taehyung to stand next to you. The cigarette smell nearly made you wretch.

“I know he’s talking bad about me, but if you give me a chance you’ll find out that I’m really a good person Erin. I’d treat you like a princess and I’d make you happy, really.” Nick insisted, stepping so close that you could feel his breath. You shifted closer to the food trays uncomfortably, subconsciously reaching for Taehyung’s hand.

“The way a dragon treats a princess, maybe.” You mumbled quietly. Taehyung still caught it and laughed, taking your hand and squeezing it. Nick, turning red again, grabbed your wrist so harshly that it hurt, and yanked it out of Taehyung’s hold. You let out a yelp of pain.

“Why do you have to be such a ing about this? Do you really think he’s going to be there for you after you finish your year here? He’ll just forget about you and hit on the next girl he sees.” Nick snarled, glaring at Taehyung.

Taehyung didn’t take kindly to this, grabbing the metal chopsticks from his tray and hitting Nick’s hand with them as he pulled you into a hug, turning you away from Nick. You could hear his breathing picking up as he held you, a look of indescribable anger on his face. Your knees were shaking. Sure, Nick had tried weird things before, but he’d never outright hurt you like that.

“Get. Lost.” Taehyung spat gruffly at Nick, still holding you close. Luckily people had started staring when they heard all the yelling, and Nick apparently had a sense of shame because he fled to the end of the line. With Nick gone, Taehyung turned back to you, scrutinizing your face and reaching up to wipe away the tears of fear you were trying to blink away.

“Are you okay Erin? Don’t cry, it’s going to be okay. Let’s go sit with my friends, alright?” He briefly tightened the hug before realizing people were staring at him and stepping back to pick up his tray. In spite of the circumstances, that was pretty cute. You felt a sort of fluttering in your chest and quickly picked up your own tray, heading towards the cashier.

Taehyung’s friends were already sitting next to a window at a table that could easily fit eight. You recognized a couple of them from some of your courses. The guy with bleached blond hair sticking out from under a beanie and squishy looking chubby cheeks, was named Yoongi. He was in your Texture and Lighting course. The guy sitting across from Yoongi with shorter, pink hair, who was trying to imitate an octopus, was named Namjoon. You took Digital Imaging with him. Since you knew the two of them, you took the empty seat next to Yoongi. Taehyung took the empty seat on your other side.

“Hey guys. This is Erin.” Taehyung introduced you. You gave a shy wave and greeted Namjoon and Yoongi. Luckily they both recognized you even though you hadn’t really spoken with them a lot. “Those three are Jungkook, Hoseok and Jin. Hey, where’s Jimin?”

“He had some last minute retouching to do. There’s this in his class who decided he could ‘fix’ the rendering that Jimin worked seven hours to complete.” Yoongi replied. He sounded grumpy at that. Jimin must be a close friend of his. “I think it was the you two just yelled at.” Oh . You wanted to shrink away. Hopefully Yoongi didn’t think you were in any way close to Nick.

“Really? Dang. I thought it was just us he liked to annoy.” Taehyung commented airily, though you could feel him twitching slightly. He still seemed wound up from the encounter. You didn’t say anything and poked at your lunch, feeling significantly less hungry. Namjoon didn’t like the mood dropping.

“I’ll make you guys stamp cards. For every… Ten encounters, you get a sticker.” He smiled. You laughed at that. It was such a childish thing, but very sweet and genuine none-the-less.

“Thanks but no thanks, my laptop is already covered in stickers. Taehyung can attest.” You answered. Taehyung nodded very seriously.

“So, Erin doesn’t sound very Korean, but you speak it. What’s the deal?” Jungkook asked. Everyone settled into their lunch as you explained briefly where you were from and why you were here. Jungkook was excited to learn you were from the UK, and demanded you demonstrate your accent for him. Namjoon was quicker to demonstrate his ‘authentic’ English accent.

This devolved into people complaining at Namjoon, and you were able to eat in relative peace. About twenty minutes passed peacefully when unfortunately the public shaming Nick had gone through seemed to have worn off. Namjoon looked up sceptically at something behind you, and then the smell hit your nose.

The scent of cigarettes informed you that Nick was standing behind you. Fortunately, Taehyung had already picked up on it and leaned closer to you, pressing his shoulder to yours as Nick tried to push his way between the two of you. With that option out of the way, Nick decided to do something much more foolish. He tapped the student on your other side on the shoulder. Yoongi, who had been eating quietly with a mostly blank expression on his face, slowly lowered his spoon to his plate, his eyes darkening as he slowly turned to face Nick. You noticed Jungkook who was seated on his other side wincing away slightly. That didn’t bode well.

“You need to move, I have to sit next to Erin. Erin, I just want to talk to you!” Nick announced stubbornly, pushing his tray towards Yoongi’s face as if he expected him to dissolve into mist or something. Yoongi raised his glare of death and stared Nick in the eyes for a few seconds of silence.

“I don’t need to do . Beat it.” He finally said coldly, staring at Nick until the latter retreated. Yoongi turned back to his plate of food in silence and picked up his spoon like nothing happened. Taehyung next to you grinned and whispered ‘he gives me the chills’ into your ear. You smiled at that.

“I’m really sorry about that.” You said as the whole group had grown quiet, watching Nick slink away but still staring at you from a few tables over. Yoongi again dropped his spoon and for a moment you thought he might chew you out for inadvertently bringing Nick over, but to your surprise he had a serious expression on his face.

“Erin, you don’t have a lot of self-esteem, do you?” He asked. You weren’t sure what that had to do with anything, but he wasn’t wrong. Nick’s constant pestering made you second-guess everything you did or said, and that was eating away at your confidence. Yoongi gave a thoughtful nod. “Let me give you some advice. Don’t say sorry for things you can’t help.”

“Easier said than done, I feel bad about it and not mentioning it makes me feel like I’m taking you all for granted.” You answered with another shrug. Yoongi surprisingly broke into a smile that was very cute. Nothing of the evil glare was left on his face.

“It’s nice that you think like that, really, but if you’re grateful just say ‘thank you’, don’t say ‘sorry’. Sorry comes from a place of sadness, gratitude comes from a place of happiness. It’ll help everyone feel better.” He gave you a comradely pat on the shoulder and once again resumed eating. You nodded and rephrased your sentence.

“Thanks for helping me out.” You smiled, and realized that it did make you feel happier. The guys smiled back at you, Yoongi included. Taehyung dropped his head on your shoulder and let out a contented sigh, spooking you a little. He normally dropped most of the skinship once Nick was out of sight, but you decided to roll with it and reached over to play with some strands of his hair.

“You guys should date.” Namjoon remarked suddenly. Surprised you jerked away from Taehyung, who also sat up straight immediately and stared incredulously at Namjoon. “No I mean, you should fake dating each other. Maybe he’ll explode out of anger or finally direct his attention elsewhere.”

You looked at Taehyung and pondered it over. On the one hand, maybe saying you were just friends kept giving Nick the idea that you were therefore available. You were comfortable enough around him to hug him or have him hug you all the time, but on the other hand… Taehyung was a great guy. He was sweet, quick-witted, caring and absurdly attractive. What if by fake dating you, he wouldn’t be able to ask out the girl he liked? That thought made your heart heavy. You wanted him to be happy.

“I don’t know.”

“Let’s do it.” Taehyung said without hesitating. “It can’t hurt to try, right? Don’t worry Erin, we will get rid of him if it’s the last thing I do.” You wouldn’t be embarrassed to say you felt butterflies at that statement.