Chapter 6

Hyukjae strolled into the boy’s toilet and went into one of the cubicles. He heard the toilet door being open again and some footsteps but ignored whoever had come in – until he heard what they were talking about.

“I really think Donghae purposely let that lame kid got first place.”

Someone else snorted, “Obviously. Three years and this is the first time Hyukjae had receive higher score than him, not to mention Donghae’s score dropped 4 marks than before. Definitely on purpose.”

“Maybe Hyukjae bribed him. You see that BMW bike before. I bet he is rich enough to make Donghae give him that easy way up.”

“Or maybe he just whined at Donghae. They are closer than ever nowadays,” Hyukjae heard the two boys snickered and felt his blood boiled.  He could win that first place by himself, he thought. Though, the seed of doubt started growing inside him rapidly at their words.

He huffed out a breath silently before Hyukjae opened his cubicle’s door and went to the sink even though he did nothing to dirty them while in the toilet, having forgotten whatever it was he was about to do. While he walked and washed his hands, he kept his head down, either looking at the floor or the sink. He could feel the two boys stared at him. He didn’t expect them to come closer, though.

One of them used the sink next to Hyukjae while the other leaned against the wall close to him, both of them keeping either side of him closed.

“Must have been great to finally get first in something, right?”

“Heard you have been working hard to get it,” the one leaning on Hyukjae’s right side chided in.

A snort came from the other boy while he turned off the tap, “How hard can it be to wine up to our president until he gave that first place on a silver platter, right?”

As soon as the two boys started laughing, Hyukjae turned around without a glance for them and stormed out of the toilet, heading back to the canteen where Donghae was waiting.

When he took his usual seat opposite to Donghae’s, the school president already had a guess that something wasn’t right. Hyukjae grabbed his spoon and scooped up the rice from his food tray, shoving them into his mouth harshly. He kept shoving spoon after spoon of food – not waiting to chow it down – until his mouth was full and he couldn’t force anything else into it. He chewed slowly, not looking at anything except his food stray.

Donghae opened his mouth to ask something, but then, a hand came down on Hyukjae’s head, ruffling his hair not so lightly.

“Don’t take it too hard, Hyukjae. We knew you worked hard to ‘deserve’ it,” one of the boys that had taunted Hyukjae in the boy’s toilet shoved the blonde’s head, not so hard and just enough to make sure no one would notice.

Donghae did notice, though. He looked up, straight into the snickering boy’s face, his brow lifted and a piercing glare in place, he mouthed, “Go away.”

The boy cleared his throat and swallowed hard, feeling intimidated by the look he had never seen cross the president’s face before until now. He moved away, not so quickly as to make sure he didn’t look scared but disappeared in less than ten seconds from Donghae’s sight.

Hyukjae had not look up and see the exchange between Donghae and the boy.

The glare was gone and Donghae softened up when he looked at Hyukjae and placed a hand on top of the blonde’s hand, which shoved his food tray away from him. “What happened?”

“It is none of your concern.”

“But you are my concern.”

Hyukjae stared at Donghae for a moment, words at the tip of his tongue. He opened his mouth but then shut it back. He let out a sigh and gave his temples a massage, “Are you done eating?” the president nodded before Hyukjae continued, “Then let’s talk while walking.”

Donghae followed him as he stood up and they walked through the nearly deserted hall, except for a few lingering students.

“So…” Donghae tried to urge Hyukjae to start talking when they were finally in an empty corridor.

“Why am I your concern, Hae?” Hyukjae asked as he leaned against the wall.

“Huh?” Donghae stood in front of him.

Hyukjae sighed again, “Forget that. Because I’m your friend, right? So of course I’m your concern.”

Donghae nodded, a bit fast to quickly get rid of the heat that started to burn on his face.

“Then, do you concern about me until you can willingly let me get first place in the test?” Hyukjae asked bluntly.

Donghae almost gaped but collected himself immediately before Hyukjae would get more suspicious. He tried to laugh it off, “What? Pfft… Why would I do that? No, Hyukkie. I may be concerned and cared for you but I won’t do that. You and me, we are both just as good when it comes to study. It was just a matter of time.” He placed a hand on Hyukjae’s shoulder, giving him a light squeeze.

Hyukjae nodded and gave a small smile to Donghae. The bell rang then and they headed back to class. Donghae dropped Hyukjae off at the class before he made his way back to the canteen to make sure no student lingered there anymore and all had gone back to class.

While heading there, he saw again that boy who had bothered Hyukjae earlier. He strode forward confidently and with as much strength he though was sufficient to deliver his message, he purposely slammed his shoulder against the boy’s. Donghae stopped and turned with a smile, nearly a smirk, and looked at him with his brow lifted again but without the intense glare, “Sorry.” Not waiting for a response, the president turned again and continued his way to the school’s canteen.

The smile he had faltered as he thought of Hyukjae finding out the truth.

It was the last class for the day and it was Mathematic. The students knew they were getting their papers today since the result was out last Friday. They weren’t expecting to study except for receiving and discussing the questions from the test.

The teacher usually strode in and straight away hand out the papers, but, not this time.

She walked in, grabbed the chalk and almost furiously started writing an equation on the board. She placed the chalk back down before turning to look at the rest of the class.

“Lee Donghae, come forward and solve this,” she said before taking her seat.

Donghae walked to the front, a bit wary by his teacher since she called him with his full name. Nonetheless, he grabbed the chalk and answered the question with ease. He brushed off the remnants of the chalk from his hands and was about to go back to his seat when he was stopped by his teacher.

“Stay right there.”

The teacher stood and checked the answer, finding it correct, just as she expected it to be. She looked at Donghae with her hands on her waist and the boy was staring at the floor with his hands behind his back.

“How can it be, that you get it absolutely right, using the right method here, when you get zero for this question in the repeat test?”

Donghae looked up, shocked and read the question on the board again. Only then he realized that it was the question he had intentionally answered wrongly.

“You answered it completely wrong until it baffled me. This question was taken from the previous Mathematic paper which you got full marks. Even if you had miscalculated, you could have gotten at least two out of the four marks for the working,” she grabbed the test paper and handed it over to Donghae with a warning of not repeating the same stupid mistake again, “It was as if you purposely got it wrong. Go back to your seat!”

Donghae walked back with a sunken heart, not because of the teacher’s scolding, but because of the unmistakable feeling that what he had just thought of a few hours ago was becoming a reality.

He slipped a glance at Hyukjae and the blank face confirmed it; Hyukjae knew the truth.

The blonde got called after Donghae sat down and the teacher congratulated him for getting the highest score. He bowed at her while the other students applauded him. Donghae wanted to clap too, but his hands hung mid-air and he managed to clap once before Hyukjae returned to his place with the same blank face.

Donghae, not knowing how to restrain himself from grabbing Hyukjae’s shoulders and making him listen to his explanation, bit his thumb’s nail – a habit he just recently got from the blonde who did it whenever stuck on a question.

The class went on just as it should; the whole of it spent discussing the paper. When school finally ended, Donghae still couldn’t figure out whether he most anticipated it to end or he dreaded it. He stayed rooted at his place as the rest of the class occupants scrambled out of it – all except for his best friend, also known as his crush, though only to him. The minutes that passed by felt like hours, the hall outside grew quiet as the students left, and nobody could imagined how Donghae itched to just grab Hyukjae, crush him in his arms and will him to understand his reason. But Donghae only fisted his hand, his nails leaving small crescent indentations on his palm.

Hyukjae suddenly stood, grabbed his bag and shove his chair under his desk. Then, he left.

Donghae stared at nothing and a shaky breath left his mouth, the words he wanted to say left along with them. Another moment passed, before he pushed himself up, making his chair fell to the floor, and he ran out of the class. From the end of the corridor where their class resided, Donghae saw Hyukjae at the other end of it, his bag being dragged slowly on the floor as he walked slower than the usual rate. Donghae only stopped to take in the sagged shoulders for a second before he ran again, “Hyukjae-ah!”

Hyukjae continued to walk at the same pace but never stop. Donghae was not even sure whether he heard or not.

Donghae wrapped his hand on Hyukjae’s arm, but his hand was forcefully jerked off as Hyukjae pulled away harshly.

“Please, Hyukjae.”

“You lied,” was the only respond Donghae received.

Donghae stopped on his track and stood staring at Hyukjae who was still moving away. Softly, he said, “I know.”

“I trusted you,” the reply came with the same soft tone.

“I know.”

“You played me.”

“I’m sorry…”

His bag was let go and Hyukjae spun around fast, stomping back to Donghae and grabbed his collar when he was close enough, “You think I’m so stupid, you think you are so much better than me that I need you to literally shove that first place into me!”

“No, I didn’t mean that,” Donghae held onto Hyukjae’s hands with both of his. He didn’t try to pull them off him, but instead he only held them, wanting in any way to have a hold on the other. He looked into the glaring eyes with his own soft ones.

“But you did, Hae. You think I’m incapable of achieving that place by myself.”

“No, it’s not what you think.”

“It seems so trivial, right? I am supposed to be grateful because you gave me something that I told you I would love to have. Thank you, Donghae. Thank you for making my pride flopped down into a grave after we did that celebratory hug last week,” with one shove, Donghae stumbled back a few steps and Hyukjae walked back toward his bag without another glance for him.

“I’m sorry, Hyukkie. I know it’s my fault.”

“Sorry doesn’t fix things. And it surely doesn’t fix my mistake of actually started calling you a friend.”

Donghae’s eyes widened. ‘Oh no! No, we couldn’t go back to being nothing’ Donghae’s mind went frantic.

“We’re not friends anymore, Donghae. No more.”

That snapped something in Donghae and he once again chased after the blonde. This time he did grabbed Hyukjae’s arms and he pushed him into one of the classes, shocking Hyukjae. He shut the door behind them.

“Why won’t you let me explain first?” Donghae asked with fierce eyes.

Hyukjae stared back at him with the same piercing stare, though unlike when he had glared at Donghae before, his heart starting beating faster. ‘It was like that night’ his mind suddenly mused. He invisibly swallowed and said, “What’s there to explain? Why should I even let you explain? As you know, I don’t have much experienced with friends before, but I am positive that no one will ever approve of his friend giving him something like this. Who like to be looked down by their friend, huh?”

“But I didn’t do it because I looked down at you,” Donghae almost growled.

Hyukjae felt confused and dizzy, with the change of situation. ‘Why was he the one being so mad instead of me?’

The blonde snorted, trying to look nonchalant, “Oh yeah? I wonder why else would you do such a thing.”

Suddenly, Hyukjae found himself against the blackboard and all he saw was the smirk, that familiar, enticing smirk, so close to him.

“Why?” a chuckle left Donghae’s mouth, “I guess, Hyukkie, because…” That same mouth closed itself on Hyukjae’s. It was just a simple, soft kiss, just the touch of lips that lingered on for a long moment. Seconds after seconds passed, and Hyukjae’s widened eyes could only stare at Donghae’s closed ones. He was stock still and beyond speechless.

After a long while, Donghae finally pulled back and opened his eyes, “Because I love you, Hyukkie. I’m sorry.”

Trust me when I say I don't know how did that happened!!! I was just typing and THAT just came out of me. Don't worry, I do know where am I going after this, though the plot has not been completely done. I'll make the next chapter clear this mess, hopefully. Am I being too fast, though? Do you like how this is going,you? I hope you do. Love cookies for all of you. Comments make me happy, guys.

By the way, I hope all you ELF are okay with Sungmin being married now. It is hard, I know the feeling (I cried yesterday!). But, support him, okay?