Patience Tested
The Days of Caffeine and Candy Kisses
“I heard they’re being looked at for a debut.”
“No way! Yoon Doojoon’s only been here a few months! I heard they’re looking at Kikwang.”
“You’re both wrong. It’s gonna be Junhyung and Yoseob. You’ve seen them both practice vocal together, right?”
“We all have. What’s your point?”
“They play off each other! Don’t tell me you guys missed that! It’s why they always pass the tests.”
“But Junhyung’s always rapping….”
“His voice is pretty good with singing, too, you know.”
“Have you heard Yoseob’s range? It’s crazy!”
Doojoon sighed as he tried to focus on his music in the cafeteria. It was a Saturday and he was still at the company, getting as much time in as possible before his vocal lesson. He’d been told to learn the song and he was pretty sure he had it, but it never hurt to make sure. Of course, it’d be a lot easier without all the yapping around him.
“Hey, shouldn’t you be heading to vocal?”
Damn it. He was never going to-
“I got switched to your time slot with you.”
Doojoon frowned and finally looked away from the sheet music to find a rather twitchy-looking Yoseob staring at him, mere inches from his own face. It was very disconcerting to have those big eyes looking at him so curiously, especially when paired with the stick from a er protruding from between the small boy’s lips.
“What do you mean you got switched? Did you ask?”
Yoseob shook his head.
“Then what?”
Pulling the er from his mouth, he his lips free of the sugary residue. There was very little of the er left, so obviously Yoseob had been on it for quite some time while looking for Doojoon. “When I went to my lesson I was told my time and instructor had changed. They forgot to tell me yesterday.”
“I wasn’t told anything,” Doojoon stated crossly.
“You haven’t gone to your lesson yet,” Yoseob retorted.
Doojoon scowled at him. Whatever interest he’d had in the adorable boy in recent days, he certainly wasn’t feeling it now. All he felt now was irritation. Here he was, practicing and memorizing until his eyes felt like they would pop out of his head from exhaustion, and there sat Yang Yoseob, a er in one hand and a sticky red streak in the corner of his mouth. The kid acted like it was no big thing to learn a new piece.
“How can you be so relaxed?” Doojoon asked with a grumble as he started packing up his things.
“How can you be so grouchy?” Yoseob shot back far too innocently. Watching the taller boy put his things into his backpack and grab his music again, he bit off the last of the er, crunching and swallowing while bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet. “Did you get enough sleep last night?”
“I’m not grouchy.”
“Maybe you’re hungry. Did you eat?”
“I’m not hungry. Let’s just go,” Doojoon said impatiently.
“Did you get dumped?” Yoseob chucked the stick from his er into a trash bin and looked up at Doojoon as they left the cafeteria, actually slowing down a little as he asked.
“What? No!”
“Aaah… I see. You got rejected then.”
Doojoon’s eye was starting to twitch. He put a hand on the smaller boy’s back and propelled him forward. “Are you going to guess until I admit to one?”
“Oh! Caffeine withdrawal!”
“No! Aish! Can you just… move?!” Doojoon pushed him, but the boy laughed and spun away from him, dancing several feet ahead of him.
Yoseob grinned and walked backward, fingers gripping the straps of his backpack on his shoulders. “That’s it! You’re going through caffeine withdrawal and you’re stressed and grumpy!”
Doojoon rubbed at his temples with the hand not currently holding his sheet music and bowed his head. “I have a headache…” He mumbled with an agitated whine. When Yoseob hopped up to sling an arm around his shoulders and got his neck instead, Doojoon winced from the jerk downward that he suffered.
“Relax! I’ve heard you sing and your voice is pretty unique, but I think they’ll look at you more for the rapping.”
“You don’t say…”
“Yup! I do! Oh, hey, do you have a er on you? I’m all out and Kiki won’t buy me any more. He says sugar makes me crazy.”
“Ya think?” Doojoon lofted both brows and snorted at him, but didn’t stop walking. He didn’t want to be late, even if it was a little hard to walk with the hyperactive boy hanging all over him.
“Oooh, look! It’s Junhyung and Kiki! KIKI!!” Yoseob let go and started off in another direction several doors away from the room Doojoon’s lessons were in. “Hey! Kiki!”
“Come on, you psychotic little monkey,” Doojoon grabbed the back of his new partner’s shirt and tugged, ignoring Junhyung’s amused smirk and Kikwang’s confused stare as he dragged Yoseob down the hall to their lesson. The smaller boy chattered the entire time, voicing several protests at not getting to talk to Kikwang.
When the door closed behind them, Kikwang stared blankly for a few moments before he turned his gaze onto Junhyung. “Uh…”
“Don’t worry,” Junhyung said calmly, tucking his hands into his pockets. “He gets agitated easily. That’s all.”
“Seobie’s gonna drive him nuts,” Kikwang said worriedly. “I hope he doesn’t buy him any sugar.”
Junhyung grinned. “I hope he does. Doojoon needs a little shaking up now and then.” He clapped the younger boy on the shoulder and chuckled. “Come on. We should go practice choreography. I’m sure they’ll find us when they’re done.”
“More like hunt us down..”
Caffeine & Candy Kisses is essentially the prequel to WIB, but about Dooseob instead of Junseung. I've gotten a lot of questions about that..
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