.

Jaejin had been making restless glances around his seat at the two doors of the classroom for quite some time now, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that he was waiting for a certain freshman to walk in through those doors.

It was very unlikely for Seunghyun not to show up. It was lunch time, but he wasn’t at the cafeteria earlier and hadn’t shown himself since the previous afternoon. Jaejin worried that he caught his cold since they were practically taking in each other’s breaths yesterday. Just the memory of it was enough to make his skin heat up in anticipation.

But more than anything, he felt extremely anxious. What if this was that day? Seunghyun woke up in the morning, decided he was through with him and his scent, and just like that completely forgot that he ever existed. Of course there could as well be other reasons for him not showing up, but Jaejin refused to be consoled when the uncertainty of the situation was eating him up.

“If you’re so bothered by his absence, go and check up on him.” Key suggested, hardly looking up from the magazine he was flipping through. His chin was perched over his palm and he had the most bored-to-death look on his face, obviously missing the hilarious exchange which used to provide for his entertainment on a routine basis.

Jaejin snapped his head towards him and glared, “If you’re so bored as to go out of your way to give me a friendly advice, then you should have advised me to remind you that it is prohibited to bring magazines to school.” When Key only gave him a dismissing shoo with his hand as a response, he scowled deciding he wasn’t in the mood to have a proper conversation with him either. He stood up and muttered “I’m going to the comfort room.”

Key lazily watched him walk out of the door, before he rolled his eyes and shook his head as if to say, You’re so predictable it pains me as your best friend.

The comfort room was down at the end of the hall, pass the stairs that lead up to the third floor and down to the first floor. Before Jaejin could step inside, his feet wavered, and he glanced back at the stairs. On the third floor would be the third years, where Jonghun and Hongki were. On the first floor were the freshmen, where Seunghyun would be.

If he went down, he would most likely see him. And then what? He doubted his pride would allow him to ask Seunghyun why he wasn’t sticking to him like he usually does, nor let Seunghyun realize how distraught he was by his absence. So what was he gonna do once he saw him?

It was funny and ironic, because he was this bright kid, but right now he couldn’t comprehend anything properly aside from that he really wanted to see Seunghyun. He couldn’t believe how so unlike himself he had become within a short three months of letting that weird boy hang around him. He had turned into this insecure, possessive, frustrated mess, and it was all that boy’s fault. Seunghyun just better make sure to take full responsibility for what he made him into.

Drawing in a long breath, Jaejin descended the flight of stairs. It was almost time for the afternoon classes to begin but many freshmen students still loitered here and there along the corridors. Among them, there was no Seunghyun. Jaejin refused to feel disappointed this early so he dragged his shoes and walked forward.

“Lee Jaejin hyung?” A boy he just passed down the hall called his name. Tilting his head back, he recognized him as Seunghyun’s friend, the one named Choi Minhwan. His heartbeat picked up as he glanced around for any sign of a Seunghyun but sadly, he found none so Jaejin forced his eyes back to the boy.

“Oh, it’s you. You’re Seunghyun’s friend right?”

“Yes, hyung! I’m happy you remember me.” Minhwan’s cheeks colored pink as he grinned sheepishly. “Are you looking for Seunghyun? He’s–”

“Ah, no! No. I was just... passing through.” he denied as he waved his hand in front of him. Jaejin faked a smile, unsure of why he was making excuses. Until a second ago he was sure he went there to see Seunghyun, but now, he was suddenly scared Minhwan would say that Seunghyun was there somewhere. Because if he was, then he should’ve been next to him long ago. But he wasn’t and there was only one reason why he wouldn’t be, and Jaejin wasn’t sure he wanted to confirm that.

“Passing through? To where?” Minhwan looked really curious but his face told Jaejin he didn’t see through his lie at all. Just as he was about to respond with another excuse, a boy yelled Minhwan’s name from inside the classroom nearest to where they were standing. It was a voice that made the pit of his stomach clench unpleasantly.

“Oi, Seunghyun! Jaejin hyung is here!” Minhwan called excitedly, waving the boy over as Jaejin was glued on his spot. Seunghyun walked up to them, looking at Jaejin with a surprised expression.

“Hyung, I didn’t see you there.” was what he said. Jaejin frowned suspiciously.

Didn’t see me here? Didn’t you often say you could smell my scent from several feet away?

“I thought he was here to see you, but he said he was just passing through. Oh yeah, to where again, hyung?”

Seunghyun’s gaze just seemed to pierce right through his senses, Jaejin wasn’t confident he could pull off a believable excuse this time. “I, uh. I was going to see someone. Key asked me to go for him, but I, uh, forgot his name, so I should probably just head back.”

“Hyung–,” Seunghyun grabbed his wrist before he could attempt on a sprint, but just as quickly let it go and muttered “Oh, sorry.” before taking a step back.

Sorry? Why was he apologizing? All these time, he never apologized even when he embraced Jaejin against his will and invaded his personal space. The skin on Jaejin’s wrist where Seunghyun’s fingers had just been felt like it was burning. Seunghyun was acting weird. He was being apprehensive all of a sudden.

“Are you well now?” Seunghyun asked, his voice echoing concern.

Jaejin pinned his eyes down at the boy’s chest. That chest which had been so close yesterday was now inches away from him, out of his reach and hesitant to come closer. “Yeah. I took some more medicine when I got home.” Seunghyun nodded in relief. “How about you? You didn’t get infected by my cold, did you?”

Seunghyun shook his head and forced a grin onto his lips, “I guess you get all better when I’m not around you.”

The heaviness in his tone surprised Jaejin, making him want to look up and see the face he made as he said those words. Seunghyun was casting his gaze down, his eyes gloomy and lacked the steady brightness and spirit he always carried. The shrill bell then rang throughout the entire building, signalling the end of lunch break and the start of afternoon classes. Seunghyun blinked as if the sound just snapped him out of his reverie, and then his eyes were back to normal.

“I’ll go inside first. Hyung, Seunghyun, if you don’t hurry, the teachers are gonna reprimand you both!” Minhwan said and then headed off to a door just like all the students who were littering the hall did. Jaejin thought he heard him murmur something about ‘the atmosphere being all tense’ to himself.

“So, did you... did you find another scent to get obsessed with already?” he asked when it was just the two of them and the thick silence left in the corridor.

“Eh?” Seunghyun seemed to be quite surprised for a moment. “Ah, that... Well... I guess you could say so.”

Jaejin nodded brusquely. “I see. That’s good, just perfect.  How great, huh. You won’t have to bother yourself with me anymore, and I won’t have to put up with you anymore either. You won’t have to go up to the second floor and I won’t have to get stressed out. We won’t have anything to do with each other anymore.”

He strained the words through his throat, afraid of what his voice might turn into if he didn’t keep on talking. Seunghyun wasn’t saying anything and this frustrated him even more, yet he couldn’t muster any strength to look him in the eyes. “So, this is it, huh? We won’t see each other from now on.”

Seunghyun hummed shortly after a brief moment, assenting. It was a cruel piece of music to his ears.

“Students,” the raspy voice of a male teacher called their attention as he walked towards their direction. “Classes are about to begin. Why are you still in the corridor?”

Jaejin took the chance to turn his back at the younger. Then, giving an apologetic bow to the professor, he dashed away without a word of goodbye for Seunghyun. The boy ignored the teacher’s reprimanding stare until Jaejin’s back disappeared up the set of steps.

The next few days went by with Jaejin hardly bumping into Seunghyun, or rather, he was purposely trying not to bump into him, which was quite a hard task to accomplish since Seunghyun just seemed to be everywhere; literally, since afterall they were just a few flights of stairs away from the other and their classes had breaks at the same time; and metaphorically since a bazillion miniature Seunghyuns had somehow decided to take permanent residency within his thoughts and refused to leave him alone.

He was tired of running away, to be honest. There were times when Jaejin just wanted to confront him and spew out everything right on his dorky face; how insensitive he was, how he was a big jerk, and how he deserved to rot in hell for all these upsetting feelings he was making him feel. He would convince himself that he could, but it was always futile, because he always came up blank each time he caught Seunghyun returning his gaze from across the hall, the field, or wherever they bumped into each other. And then he would run away again.

Today, he ran up to the rooftop. If there was a single place in the whole school Seunghyun and that pathetic twig-like body of his couldn’t be at, he supposed it was surely the rooftop. He couldn’t possibly climb up the five floors of stairs without him losing his breath and his bones cracking anyway.

Letting out a sigh, Jaejin rested his head over his arms which were propped on the railing. His hair flew in all directions as he looked down at the mixture of different colors layering the gardens in the school’s backyard. No wonder the air smelled so great up here.

Scents, huh. Great, STUPID, you just thought of Seunghyun again! Why must you keep thinking of him? Don’t you have a pride or something?–

While he was sternly reprimanding his thoughts as if they had a mind of their own, he vaguely noticed a girl treading down the path of dirt separating two flower gardens towards a bench of wood which was smartly placed between a couple of young acacias. Jaejin couldn’t see her face properly from up there, but it was obvious how restless she was as she started pacing to and fro in front of the bench instead of sitting on it. His bored gaze wandered everywhere but saw no one. What could she be doing there?

Almost as if to answer his question, a boy emerged and strode down the same dirt path towards the girl. She seemed surprised for a bit but she stopped fidgeting once the boy stood in front of her. With his back on him, Jaejin could only tell that the boy was tall and thin.

However, as the two sat down on the bench and he was given a good view of that boy’s face, Jaejin gasped as he recognized that wavy brown hair, those soft eyes, that piercing smile. Those could only belong to a Song Seunghyun.

He straightened up, his face contorting into a mask of shock and disbelief, and for a moment all Jaejin could do was to watch them. Seunghyun was laughing too comfortably with the girl. She was sitting so close, she was touching him so easily, and the worst thing was that Seunghyun was letting her.

He felt betrayed. His chest throbbed in pain and he couldn’t stand any of it.

He wanted to look away, but Seunghyun lifted his gaze in an abrupt second before he could, and Jaejin felt their eyes collide. He snapped out of it and staggered back instinctively, his sudden action making him fall down on his bottom as he lost his footing, momentarily dazed.

Did he see him? No, he couldn’t have. He was too busy with that girl. He wondered for a brief moment if that girl and her scent was Seunghyun’s new obsession. How great, she seemed to have no problem showing how much she liked Seunghyun, unlike Jaejin.

Biting his lower lip as he felt the tears prick his eyes, Jaejin brought a hand to his left chest and felt his heart protesting loudly against his ribcages. “How silly of me.” he chuckled wryly. Gathering his knees into his arms, he pressed them hard against his torso as if that would somehow make the throbbing stop, or at least lessened to a more bearable extent. He couldn’t be gladder that there was no one else up there to witness this helpless act of him.

It hadn’t even been five minutes after that when the doorknob was turned from the other side of the wall, the shrill sound startling him into lifting his face at the noise. The metal door was then pushed open and after it came a panting, wheezing Seunghyun with his hands on both his knees like he would crumble down if he didn’t support himself. Funny enough, he didn’t seem to mind his current state so much and was grinning victoriously like he had just won the biggest lottery in history.

“Hyung! What are you doing up here?” Seunghyun strode over to where he was sitting, his hand on his stomach as he breathed difficultly.

Jaejin simply gaped at him in shock at first, before he caught himself and quickly wiped it off. “What are you doing here?” he asked back, surprising himself that he could still manage to speak softly despite the chaos rocking his insides at the moment. He just couldn’t help but feel sympathy towards Seunghyun at how obviously sickly he looked right now as he settled down a little distance from him.

Seunghyun leaned his back against the iron railing, his head slightly tilted upward as he closed his eyes and grinned. “I thought I saw you up here, so I came running. Phew, I felt like I just climbed up Mount Everest! That was a thrilling run!” His chest trembled softly as he laughed.

Jaejin regretted that he could only admire that from afar. He looked down and perched his chin over his knees. “So what if you saw me? You didn’t have to run all the way up here just because you did.”

“Eeeeeeiii… You think so?” Seunghyun asked playfully, shooting a charming smile at his direction.

Jaejin groaned inwardly; this boy was playing dirty again. “I don’t think so! I am saying that you don’t have to!” he yelled in frustration.

Seunghyun fell silent for a short while, and then he grinned. “Yes, yes! If you say so~.”

“So what are you still doing up here?” he sighed tiredly.

“Catching my breath. I never thought five flights of stairs was that difficult to climb! Thanks to you, I know now, hyung.” Seunghyun made a peace sign at him when he chanced a small glance towards him and Jaejin just couldn’t stop himself from cracking a smile. But it wasn’t enough to cheer him up.

“Go back down, wasn’t there a girl you were talking to?” he murmured and he swore that sounded like he was freaking sulking! He just hoped Seunghyun was as oblivious as ever to notice that.

“Oh, you saw her?” Seunghyun’s grin widened. Jaejin hoped with all he had that he doesn’t start talking about her, but Seunghyun happened to have the opposite idea. “Her name’s Lizzy. She’s a freshman too. She’s a really good friend of mine since we were in middle school, you know. She asked me out today because she had a problem and she needed some advice. Don’t you think it’s funny, hyung? I’ve never thought of myself as an expert when it came to boyfriend problems–.”

“SHUT UP!”

AN. Oh oh oh, one more and this is done ^^ thank you guys! I love you so much-y~

.

.