Third Person POV…   Earlier…

Sohee sat on the edge of her bed, kicking her feet out of boredom. “There’s nothing to do,” she groaned. She reached out for her phone, tucked under her freshly cleaned pillows. After a second thought she dove under the sheets and rolled onto her back, her phone stretched out in front of her. She flicked through her contacts. There weren’t many.

“Jisu?” Sohee said in a considering tone. She pouted and shook her head—she might still be on her date with Kai. “Wouldn’t want to interrupt,” she told herself.

‘Junhong’ was the next contact. Sohee stared at it for a while wondering when—when did she last message him, call him, talk to him or even give him a second look? She frowned as her thoughts jumbled together without any clear answer. Her finger was hovering over his name without her realising.

Suddenly the phone yelled out at her and she instantly threw it to the other end of her bed, biting back what could have been a terribly loud high pitched scream. The device continued yelling out nonsense. Sohee frowned and edged towards her phone. She could hear snickering from outside her door.

“OPPA!!!” she growled figuring it was another of her brother’s pranks. Minhyuk must have changed her ringtone and put it on full blast, Sohee decided. She scowled again and quickly picked up the phone before the other person could hang up.

“Yoboseyo?”

“Sohee?” said the voice on the line.

Sohee jolted slightly and brought the phone away from her ear. “Who is this?” she mumbled to herself as she read the unknown number. She brought the phone back to her ear. “Who is this?” she repeated to the shady person on the other end.

“It’s Jongup,” the voice said. “Moon Jongup?” Jongup added, ending on a high tone—probably unsure whether he had the right number.

“Oh,” Sohee exclaimed, her free hand instinctively finding her cheek. She began to play with her top lip nervously. “How’d you get my number?” The cracks and bumps in her voice hopefully smoothed out through the wires.

“Uh—” Jongup stopped. There was a muffled sound, like scratching and then the line was clear again. “Hello?”

“Hello?” Sohee echoed.

“Sorry, but do you know where Jisu is? She isn’t back yet.”

Sohee frowned, finding herself slightly disappointed by her question being turned down. “She’s—” She stopped to think. ‘Jongup’s her brother… Would it be okay to tell him? But what do I tell him? But she’s old friends with Kai so it wouldn’t be fishy if I—”

“Hello?” Jongup pressed.

“Sh-She’s with me!” Sohee lied immediately. She scrunched up her face, her lips twisted as she brought the phone to the other ear. “Uh yeah, we’re studying together,” she added as convincingly as she could. She furrowed her brows in guilt.

“Oh really? That’s a relief,” he exhaled. There was a pause. “Can I talk to her?”

Sohee’s heart stopped and she looked around her in worry. “Uh—Uhm—she’s in the bathroom!” she blurted.

“I can wait,” Jongup said patiently. For once patience was not what Sohee wanted.

“It’s—” Sohee mumbled something under her breath then explained it was constipation. She suddenly became embarrassed even though she wasn’t the one in the bathroom.

“Oh.” Jongup replied awkwardly. “I-is that so?” There was a muffled sound, this time it sounded more like chuckling. “Ah okay.”

Sohee sighed in relief. “I don’t know what time we’ll finish,” she explained, continuing to cover up her friend by lying to her brother.

“That’s fine.” Jongup said smoothly. “Study hard,” he added sounding playfully strict.

“Yeah” Sohee murmured, drowning in guilt.

There was a bashful laugh on the other end. “Well, good night,” Jongup said in a low tender voice as if the girl was already half asleep and he didn’t wish to wake her. “Sorry to bother you.”

“That’s okay,” Sohee whispered back. “Good night,” she echoed before the call was ended. She sighed in relief, pressing her lips together as she squeezed the phone in her hands. Sohee tilted her head then swiftly saved the number to her phone. “Good night,” she repeated.

Jongup placed his phone face-down on the table. He sighed and put his sister’s address book back onto her desk. She was one of the very few people who still had an address book and it surprised him how up-to-date it was. Jongup flexed his hands, noticing they had gone stiff and damp from nerves.

Jongup looked around Jisu’s room. There were multiple posters of several boy bands on the walls which he couldn’t recognize and some of their childhood photos had been removed. He pursed his lips and picked up his phone again, checking his history as if the recent call might have just been in his mind. He didn’t notice the missed calls from Jisu as he strolled out of her room. “She’s going to kill me if she knew I went into her room,” Jongup grumbled as he shut the bedroom door.

About an hour later Jisu was back.

Next Day…

The classroom was filled with hushed chattering and the endless screeching of an old blue marker on the white board. The teacher continued lecturing, ignoring the jeering complaints of the students.

Sohee gave Jisu a glance from the corner of her eye. Jisu returned it. Sohee then put her head down to write something into her book. She tilted it slightly, bending the bottom corner of her exercise book towards her friend.

‘What happened yesterday?’

Jisu snorted lightly then stooped over her own book to write a reply.

‘Nothing.’

Sohee frowned at the tasteless answer. She twisted around slightly in her chair to look for her friend’s date the day before.

Kai sat a row behind the right side of Jisu. He had a cheek planted into his palm and another hand extended, overhanging on the other side of his desk. He sat there obviously struggling not to steal glances in Jisu’s direction. Sohee snickered lightly as he realized he was being watched.

She swivelled back into a more comfortable position then quickly scribbled something down for Jisu.

‘You weren’t home at 5 o’clock. Your brother was worried.’

Adding just underneath it in smaller squiggly hand writing:

‘(Kai keeps staring at you…)’

Jisu lifted a brow, mouthing ‘what?’ before turning around to knock eyes with Kai. Jisu cringed then poked her tongue out at him. He smirked and mouthed he was looking outside the window.

Jisu turned back around smugly then rethought what her friend had written. She scribbled something and routinely flipped her book over for Sohee to read.

‘How do you know?’

Sohee slumped down slightly to her friend’s triumphant grin, knowing she would get some gossip out of the answer.

‘He called…’ it said in tiny neat letters in the corner of Sohee’s book. It was surrounded by the previous messages in much bigger hand writing.

Jisu lifted a brow suspiciously and made her usual ‘you-have-such-bad-taste’ expression.

“I don’t like him,” Sohee muttered, aloud by accident.

“Sohee?” Miss Jeon chirped. She had turned away from the board and was looking directly at Sohee; one hand on her hip and the other holding the marker with poise. “Did you have something to say?”

Sohee shook her head. “No—”

She was suddenly cut off by a tall lanky boy stumbling through the door. The class’ heads turned as he tripped over the little lump separating the floor of the classroom from the hallway.

The boy straightened himself up again, becoming even taller than he already was. He rubbed the back of his neck and coyly apologized for his tardiness.

The class watched, entertained by the slapstick and the break from endless preaching torture. It was difficult to describe as ‘noisy’ or ‘silent.’ Half the class that were chatting through the lesson was watching silently in amusement and the other half that was concentrating on the lecture had broken into whisper.

Sohee watched Zelo explain his lateness without an ounce of interest showing on her face. Gradually the boy’s head began to curl towards his seat, accidentally meeting eyes with Sohee. His eyes looked tired and hollow, irritated red, possibly by dryness. His brown eyes quickly jolted back to the teacher as she continued to scowl up at him. Zelo nodded continuously and apologized once again before taking his seat.

The whole class sighed as the lesson continued on until lunch break.

Sohee quickly packed up and slid towards Jisu’s desk where she was carefully placing items into her bag.

“Tell me what happened on the date!” Sohee whinged.

Jisu looked up from her packing; pulling a face she muttered playfully ‘it wasn’t a date. Nothing happened.’

Of course, a few minutes into lunch Jisu had told Sohee everything.

Sohee’s lips twisted up as she held back a squeal. Jisu was explaining what happened on the beach, how they had stayed still staring at each other, so close to—

“He’s so childish,” Jisu snorted. “That’s why I’ll never like him.”

Sohee frowned in disappointment, feeling slightly hurt on Kai’s behalf. “Then why didn’t you move?”

Jisu stopped, looking as if she had come to a realisation. “Because…” the word seemed to linger in , the sentence coming to no end. She looked up, looking confused and in denial as she gritted her teeth.  “I don’t like him!” she persisted.

Once Jisu had was up to explaining their goodbyes she was flushing and stuttering, her sentences starting and stopping then restarting whenever she messed up.

Sohee giggled childishly once Jisu had come to the end of her story. “How nice,” she said happily, “and you have a date next week too…”

“He’s an idiot,” Jisu grunted like nothing between him and her had changed. “And we’re not officially dating!”

“He gave you his jumper,” Sohee reasoned, hoping the statement would earn Kai a gold star.

Jisu rolled her eyes, “Only because I asked for it.”

“Have you given it back?”

Jisu pursed her lips and briskly shook her head, explaining she had washed it and that she had it in her bag but hadn’t found the time to return it. Sohee grinned, urging Jisu to give it to him ‘right now.’

“Can you go over to B.A.P’s practice room?” Jisu asked after she gave in and was about to go look for Kai.

Sohee looked startled at the sudden request. Recently the hip hop club had been known for their actual name, ‘B.A.P.’ The name rang around the corridors from one group of girls to another, and every now and then some boys would bring them up too.

“Why?” Sohee asked.

“Jongup asked me to watch their performance as an audience today,” Jisu shrugged casually. That was true except her brother hadn’t specified ‘today’ and Jisu was mostly requesting this on Zelo’s behalf, since part of her pitied him that much. Jisu grinned, “Don’t you want to watch my brother dance?”

Sohee lifted her eyes. Struggling to deny and at the same time struggling to admit.

Jisu grinned smugly before turning to find Kai, half wanting to see him and half not.

Sohee looked around nervously before knocking on the practice room door. She could hear the swift footsteps stop abruptly. There was a pause. Sohee pouted then timidly pushed open the door.

Sohee was startled to be greeted by a sweaty chest, smoothly breathing in and out. Her eyes trailed up the wiggly trails of sweat from his collar to the boy’s alarmed face.

Zelo stood by the door. One arm leaned on the door frame and the other hand was about pull open the door. He looked down at Sohee, still trying to register the situation. Sweat was dribbling out of his hair and into the corners of his eyes. His eyes were large and sunken, sleep deprived and still in shock, like he had been electrocuted then froze. It had been so long since they had made eye contact that Sohee had forgotten what his face looked like, but this wasn’t the face she grew up with.

“Is Jongup here?” Sohee finally blurted out.

Zelo looked like he had been stung, electrocuted again. He turned around and motioned behind him. “Yeah, come in.” He said dully.

Sohee stepped inside, feeling inferior as she entered the room. The only thing dominating that thought was how much Zelo’s voice had changed. It sounded coarse and dry, maybe a bit lower too. It was still in her mind as she tried to explain why she had come to visit.

Jongup wiped the sweat off his forehead and nodded. “Ah yeah that.”

The other members stood around, trying to suss out what that was.

Jongup explained to the others how he had asked his sister to come over and watch them perform, critique this and applaud that. He paused then turned back to Sohee. “So why couldn’t she come?” He asked, tipping his head.

Sohee perked up. “She went to return something to Kai.”

Daehyun flinched.

“Something wrong?” Youngjae asked, turning to him with a worried expression.

Daehyun shook his head and gestured for them to go on. Any news on either Jisu or Kai had been irritating his for some time, he wasn’t sure why though. He rubbed the back of his neck irritably and continued to listen.

All the while Zelo tried his best not to lift his head, knowing that if he did his eyes would immediately fix on Sohee.

Once the discussion ended and they had gotten into starting position, Zelo could finally lift his head casually. When he did, his eyes crept to Sohee, reasoning ‘you have to connect with the audience.’ She is the audience. But afterwards he wished he hadn’t. Wished he hadn’t seen her watching someone else. To see that untouchable face watching in full admiration to someone a little to the right of him; he wished he hadn’t urged to look up, wished he was not in the centre but a little to the right.

That performance Jongup was the centre even as Zelo took to the middle of the stage.

But Zelo hadn’t realized how much Sohee’s eyes seemed to drift towards the centre of the stage between every second heart beat.

A few minutes after Sohee left, everyone else was leaving too. Zelo stood in the centre of the room as the other’s crept away.

Yongguk stood by the door, asked if he was leaving too.

Zelo shook his head. “I’m going to practice,” he said, not moving his gaze from where Sohee had stood.

Yongguk blinked, shrugged and shut the door, leaving Zelo in the silence before the music was turned back on.

Happy Valentines Day !! My gift to you~ Have you seen B.A.P's video making chocolate ?...

Today I gave chocolate out (to my friends..).. but.. that's about it ahahaha

How'd you spend valentines?

Oh ! And B.A.P won 1st on Show Champion !! *** And Music Bank !!!! And they're on After School Club.. I got dance practice so I can't watch...and my album still hasn't arrived...

Almost forgot... thanks for 50+ subs.. I was planning to thank getting 50 but it suddenly increased to 54 ahaha. Thank you~