Day 2

Kyungsoo goes to class with Jongin the next day. It's not like he wants Jongin to drag him across the campus and storm through the busy hallways, but the younger male insists on going to class together, and he drops Kyungsoo off at his class first before leaving for his own class.

Dirty looks are cast towards Kyungsoo the moment Jongin disappears, and he has to bow his head the whole time because the attention is just too overwhelming and sudden. It's not like he's bothered about his relationship with Jongin being out in the open, but hell, Jongin was right about the attention. It's like everywhere he walks now, threatening death glares are being directed in his general direction and it's unnerving. He couldn't even excuse himself to the bathroom without hearing someone 'whisper' behind his back. It's not exactly a whisper when the whole class could hear it.

Music lessons are the best though, because no one could hear anything above the deafening noise of instruments being strummed and played. Kyungsoo sits at the side with Jongdae and Minseok, trying very hard to ignore the disgusted stares trained on him as he tunes up his guitar. Jongdae places a firm hand on his shoulder, and the look he gives Kyungsoo is a sorry one. But Kyungsoo simply shakes his head and tells him that everything's okay.

"He shouldn't have rushed you into it." Minseok says.

"I'm glad he did. It means he's serious about this."

"But you're getting all the bad treatment. You don't deserve this, Soo."

"This is nothing compared to what Jongin did to me months back." Kyungsoo states silently. "I'm not going back off just because things are a little different now. And besides, it's not like I could."

He's right, of course. No one would dare touch him at the moment when Kim Jongin could suddenly appear to beat the living daylights out of that person. They could only talk nastily behind Kyungsoo's back, calling him a , a , for taking Jongin away, and that's all the treatment he could ever get. Kyungsoo could still handle piercingly harsh words, as long as those words do not manifest into something physical.

For the rest of the day, he's basically dragging himself from one place to another, wondering why the day seems to stretch on longer than ever. The only he wants to do right then is to go home and sleep, forget about the people around him for a second, and just do something to make himself happy again. Jongin turns up at the cafeteria for lunch, instead of joining his frat buddies on their daily food spree, and he eats beside Kyungsoo, ignoring all the offers from the other frats to come eat with them.

Kyungsoo is a little relieved at least. And grateful. He's glad Jongin's sticking to his words this time, instead of always pushing him away when they're in a crowd.

"How's your morning, Soo?" He sees the gloomy look on Kyungsoo's face and becomes a little worried.

"It's not too good." Kyungsoo says honestly. "I got people glaring at me all morning, and a few death threats from the Theta and Nu frat."

"Is Seunghyun bothering you again?" Jongin asks, hands balling into fists.

Kyungsoo shakes his head. "No, he's keeping a good distance away from me, but his frat goons aren't. They don't touch me, but I spent almost thirty minutes this morning fishing out my stuff from the pool. They ransacked my locker. Half of my textbooks are either torn apart or scribbled all over. They call me , , stupid, short, and whatever nicknames relevant to my height."

Jongin watches him in silent, eyes sad and eyebrows creased.

"I don't really give a . As long as I get to graduate with all my limbs still intact, I should consider myself lucky. And you shouldn't feel bad about it, Jongin. It could have gotten much worse if they found out about it earlier."

"Worse?"

"You'd probably leave me back then." Kyungsoo chuckles humorlessly, and Jongin feels guilty again.

"No, I won't, Soo. I'll protect you. I'm sorry if I made you feel that way before." They eat their burger in silence after that, amidst the jeering and taunting circulating the cafeteria. Kyungsoo tries very hard to hold back the tears in his eyes, and Jongin could see it. He feels bad for putting his lover in such a situation, but it's not something he could control now.

A surge of bravery suddenly courses through his body, and he finishes up his burger quickly. Kyungsoo could only gawk at him in silence when his lanky boyfriend stands up on his chair and faces the crowd. The whole cafeteria goes quiet.

"This..." He points towards Kyungsoo. "...is my boyfriend. We've been dating for almost a year now, and December would be our anniversary. He's not a or a , nor is he stupid because he's simply the most amazing person I've ever met. Some of you don't know him, but most of you know who I am. I used to sleep around a lot, and I'm sure some of you still remember how that felt like. Compared to Kyungsoo, I deserve the title more, don't you think? And before you go around calling him names, maybe you should look in the mirror for once and tell that to yourself. I can still remember some of the faces I slept with, and I also heard what you said about Kyungsoo lately. If you think I'm not going to do anything about it, you better think again. This is a warning, s. Stay the away from Kyungsoo."

He gets down from his chair and drags Kyungsoo out of the cafeteria after that. The older male struggles a little to step up to his long strides, but eventually they find themselves standing the west wing garden, and Jongin kisses him on the lips there; full, moist and gentle. There's really no reason to hold back anymore. The whole campus practically knows about them now, so he might as well do it.

"Soo, I'm sorry for always causing trouble on you. I know I still have more than a week to win you back, and I'm gonna use those two weeks to prove it to them that I'm serious about this. I'm dead serious about us, angel. I would never want anything bad to happen to you, and I'll promise to be there when you need me. But you have to let me be there for you, do you understand? You need to tell me what's wrong without me asking you. I need to know everything about you."

There's a nod, and then Jongin pulls him into a hug, pressing their bodies together. "I kept all my things in your locker temporarily." Kyungsoo says.

Jongin chuckles but he doesn't let Kyungsoo go just yet.

"And I took your sweaty gym shirt. It's under my pillow at home."

"What?! I was looking everywhere for it. When did you take it?!"

"This morning. I went home for a few minutes to get some books I left and I hid the shirt under the pillow. Are you mad at me?"

"Hell no!" The younger male laughs. "You're too cute for me to stay mad at. But I do need my shirt back. There's a small game coming up."

"What if I say no?"

"Then I'll march over right now and grab it myself."

"Then no, you can't have it." He kisses Jongin lightly on the lips, and then it's time to say goodbye. The both of them still have classes until evening.

By the time classes end, Kyungsoo finally gets over the shock of whatever Jongin said in the cafeteria earlier. That was the last thing he expected from the younger male, knowing how Jongin used to be so serious about his frat's reputation. Now the boy is turning every table, trying desperately to win Kyungsoo back. It's really not a joke anymore.

He goes to bed feeling slightly lightheaded that night, receiving a text from Jongin few minutes later, wishing him goodnight and telling him to sleep well. Kyungsoo reads it over and over till he falls asleep.

_______________________

Day 3

Assignment! Mother of all---UGH! For the last couple of weeks, Kyungsoo hasn't been paying miuch attention to the work piling up on his study desk. He's totally regretting that now, because the workload might probably take him the whole day to complete. He wakes up before dawn, and dives in straight into the first stack of assignments without a moment to waste. 

An hour later, someone knocks on the door. "Soo, are you making breakfast today?" Minseok asks. He sees Kyungsoo stressing out at the study desk and decides to make breakfast instead. "Come down real quick in 20 minutes. Hyung will prepare something nutritious for you."

Kyungsoo nods, knowing he couldn't disobey Minseok now, and goes back to his work.

The rest of the household gets up a few minutes later, and by then Minseok's already done with breakfast and it's time to head down for their meal. The morning routine in the beta frat has always been peaceful, until everyone gathers in the kitchen.

"What the ?! What's HE doing here?" Baekhyun screeches, glaring at Sehun. Apparently the younger male stayed over in Luhan's room last night, and there's a huge grin on Luhan's face now as he feeds his boyfriend more kimchi.

"What do YOU think he was doing here?" Luhan questions back.

"You had , didn't you? That's so unfair! How come you get to do all that , and Minseok hyung won't even let Chanyeol sleep over?"

"Are you even ready to have ?" Minseok asks.

"That's up to me, isn't it? If I'm not ready, I wouldn't want him to sleep over. Plus, we already had . Like, a long time ago. And we're almost regular these days."

Minseok shrugs in return and tells him it's okay to bring Chanyeol over for a night if he wants to. It's not really a big deal. He was just worried about Baekhyun back then, because Chanyeol was an alpha (and he still is), and he might break Baekhyun the same way Jongin broke Kyungsoo too. 

Kyungsoo enters a few seconds later, and slaps Baekhyun on the head from behind. "No one needs to hear about your stories in the morning, Baek. Anyway, what's for breakfast, Minnie hyung?"

"Eggs, toast, kimchi, and nuggets. I've got some cereal here too. What do you want to eat, baby soo?"

"Everything. I need all the nutrition I can get to continue my assignments later."

"You're not going to class?" Jongdae asks.

"No, I've got way too much work to add another one. Just take down my notes for me, will ya?"

There's a knock on the front door after that, and Joonmyeon goes over to check who it is. A few moments later, the rest of the alpha gang joins them for breakfast, and Kyungsoo has to help Minseok prepare more food. The kitchen is lively and noisy that morning, with screeching and yelling and cursing all muddled into every conversation, and flying eggs not very long after. Kyungsoo has to share a seat with Jongin because there's only enough seats in the kitchen for all the beta boys, and Joonmyeon shares his with Yixing. The rest are just everywhere, either perching on the counter's edge or crouching on the floor, fighting for any remains of food to fill up their hungry stomach. Minseok seems to be the only one who is trying to calm everyone down.

Breakfast ends with dirty dishes piled up on the sink, and then it's time to head for classes.

"Do the laundry if you're not going, kyungie poo." Luhan orders, patting the invisible dust off Sehun's coat.  

"You're not going, baby?" Jongin pipes in, surprised. "Are you well? Do you feel sick? Do you want me to stay here with you?" He has dance practice in a few minutes, but the thought of Kyungsoo being sick worries him. 

The older male simply shakes his head. "I'm fine. I just have a lot of assignments to do. I need to get it down by tonight." 

"Oh. I'll come by for lunch then. What do you want to eat?"

"Fish and chips. Not the large one. I don't have enough money for that. Hold on, let me go get my money first."

Jongin stops him before he runs back to his room and tells Kyungsoo that he'll pay for the food. After all, his family is rich. A set of fish and chips won't put a dent in his wallet. "I'll pay for everything from now on, especially food. I don't want you to starve yourself because of money."

A few girlish squealings erupt behind Jongin, and their embarrassed boyfriends could only pull them away before things get out of hand. Sehun drags Jongin along, and Kyungsoo stands in the living room alone seconds later, deciding that now is the best time to get back to his work. He doesn't check his phone, however, when a message comes in, announcing the coming arrival of someone Kyungsoo has not seen for a very long time.

Since Valentine, to be exact.

 ____________________________

A/N:

*Dugeun dugeun* Who do you think it is?!