Quietly letting the minutes pass between him and the freshman in front of him, Sungyeol couldn't help but feel his mouth slowly morph itself into a frown as he waited for the other to finally stop looking like a deer caught in headlights and grab the book from his hold. Especially when his arm was getting a bit tired from holding it out for so long that even his wrist was twinging in pain every so often that Sungyeol couldn't help but find himself slowly getting annoyed by the other as well, the good deed that he was doing was turning more and more sour by the second. Particularly the boy in front of him was doing nothing to help that fact.

The book was pretty damn heavy and despite him being on the tennis team and first string at that for varsity, it still didn't mean that his wrist wasn't twinging in enough pain that it was only a matter of time until he would either have to drop the book onto the floor or secure it better in his hold.

And seeing that the freshman wasn't going to take it anytime soon since the boy seemed to be quite unresponsive to what was going on, Sungyeol decided to bring back the book to his chest so that he could wrap his arms around it instead, he scowled, "Are you going to take the book or not? Or do I have to hold onto this as you continue to stare at me as if you're a goldfish? Seriously, this book isn't exactly light, you know, so stop staring at me... Especially when you look kind of creepy doing it... I know I'm hot, but I'm not that hot." 

Face turning completely red at his words, especially towards the end of his statement, the boy finally waking up from whatever dream he had been in moments ago, he looked quite embarrassed about what had just happened due to how red his cheeks and ears were.

Feeling a tiny bit bad about how he had worded things, almost snapping at the other as if he had done something much worse than just standing there looking like an idiot, a somewhat cute idiot at that, Sungyeol almost found himself going to apologize for his overly harsh statement, that he only found himself frowning even more instead when the other just proceeded to wave and gesture his arms wildly, still not taking the book from him.

Clearly unable to understand what he was telling him, almost as if the freshman was completely stupid, or that Sungyeol was missing out on something important that was actually part of the reason why he wasn't taking the book that he had been trying to get. He could only continue to watch the other gesture at him, a heart sign popping up here and there and some waggly fingers and who knows what was being said, Sungyeol didn't expect the other to suddenly stop what he was doing to bow him, almost as if he was trying to apologize. 

The boy moving on to bow at him multiple times, body folding itself until it was completely in a right angle with every bow, shoulders so tense as he did so, that Sungyeol couldn't help but feel even more confused and possibly more than a bit weirded out by the kid's behavior that Sungyeol wasn't exactly sure that he was ready to deal with the kind of crazy the other was sporting right now. 

There was a reason why he didn't find himself dealing with freshmen that often, unless they were on the school tennis team or were Sungjong, who acted more like a college student already, and this was the reason why. 

Some just didn't know how to talk to their upperclassmen and seeing the guy in front of him do nothing but play charades with him instead of taking the book that he was trying to get earlier, Sungyeol found himself becoming more and more irritated and less tolerant to the other's games. 

Holding up a hand and cutting the other off, too tired to deal with this, Sungyeol quickly muttered, "You know what, I was just trying to be nice and friendly, but I don't really appreciate you - you, doing this, so I'm just going to leave the book here," as he walked over to a nearby table to set the book down, "And leave... And maybe next time, you can actually try talking to me like a normal human being instead of trying to play whatever game you were trying to play."

Quickly focusing on a way to get out of there, only to sigh in relief a moment later when had he noticed an EXIT sign, he managed to give a small wave as he called over his shoulder, not looking back to see how the other would take his words as he was more than a bit done with the other for the time being and any other unfortunate freshmen to get into his way, his voice being quite loud as he said, "Bye, have a nice time reading that book," he proceeded to speedwalk his way out of there.

While the freshman, Myungsoo, could only lifelessly walk to the table that Sungyeol had left the book on, pull out a chair, and slump down into it before putting his head into his arms. Eyes feeling unnaturally hot and a bit painful due to him being close to tears, Myungsoo silently found himself crying into the sleeves of his jacket, feeling more than a bit cold and exhausted with his life. 

Of course, he would be the one of the only people to meet his soulmate and have them hate him within moments of them meeting. 

The idea of never finding his soulmate being quickly replaced by his soulmate hating him instead, that Myungsoo just wanted to bury himself into the ground at all the hurt that he had felt, at all the shame that raced through his body, making him feel even more insecure and fed up with his life. 

It only took a few seconds for someone to ruin him more than he already was. 

Feeling pained at the fact that his soulmate hadn't understood him, hadn't even tried to do such a thing as he had quickly went from being nice to downright rude and almost scathing with him, Myungsoo couldn't help but silently ask his mom why.

Why him?

Especially when she used to describe how special it was when she had met his father, to recount their first meeting to him whenever he asked, excited to learn about how his parents had met, how great it must have felt to meet the other person that literally completed them. The woman always going on to tell him how happy she had been when they had met, how happy his words had made her feel, and how her tattoo had twinged in pain after his words, telling her that his father was the one, the one that she would eventually marry and build a life with, eventually having him in the process.

The twinges of pain being the one thing that he had taken as word of God in his life.

The twinges of pain that raced up his arm right now, telling him that his soulmate had indeed spoken to him and that he wasn't dreaming about everything that had just happened.

The twinges of pain being the only thing that he could actually count on when it came to meeting his soulmate because he couldn't use his voice, couldn't tell his soulmate that he was indeed his other half.

Even though he had tried to sign to him about how he had felt, silently telling him that he was the one, that they were soulmates, only to feel like a fool a couple of minutes later when the other just continued to look at him with frustration and annoyance, rather than the smile and sudden happiness that had encompassed Myungsoo's very being at finally having something so wonderful happen in his life again. 

But as he continued to cry into his arms, book long forgotten, he couldn't help but wish that he had never learned about the other at all. 

He'd rather not have a soulmate than having one that hated him instead, because at least then, it was a lot less painful to miss something that you had never really had to begin with than to miss something that you know that you could have possibly ever had.

∞

Unable to keep himself from muttering things about the boy he had just met, almost ranting to himself about how odd and stupid the other had seemed, despite being kind of cute in that 'boyish, fresh-faced way,' he didn't really realize how loud he was being until Hoya walked up to him and flicked him in the forehead, hissing, "Stop you're complaining, you're being too loud and annoying. No one needs to hear your latest woes."

Rubbing his head while whining about how much Hoya's gesture had hurt, Sungyeol quickly turned to the other boy with a glare, "Doesn't mean you hit me for that. I should kick you in the shin for trying to bruise me and mess up my face. Seriously, between you, Woohyun, and Sunggyu, I don't know who's worse."

Giving a grin with his fangs showing, Hoya just ignored his whining to say something about how he and the others were just trying to cure him of his stupidity, but couldn't help but stop himself from saying anything when he had suddenly noticed his friend's arm. 

Instead of the boy's usual milky skin that had the etching of a red heart along his wrist, there seemed to be an odd pink color surrounding the heart, while his wrist looked a bit swollen, almost as if Sungyeol had whacked his arm against something rather hard. 

Feeling slightly worried for his friend, Hoya couldn't help but quickly reach out to grab the other's limb and bring his wrist close to his face so that he could get a better look at it, wondering if he would have to take Sungyeol to nurse for being too stupid to go there on his own. 

Especially since Sungyeol had this nasty habit of playing down any type of major injury, while he would whine and cry like a baby whenever it wasn't anything serious. 

Sprained wrist?

"No big deal," Sungyeol would say with a grin before grabbing his tennis racket to go play a few games, claiming that he's fine and that his arm doesn't hurt at all, even though it probably hurts like a . 

But something like a paper cut?

The end of the world was near and Sungyeol would literally whine and almost cry crocodile tears for such a thing, even going so far to play up his hurts to try to  get one of his friends to buy him ice cream or something equally as childish to suit his immature ways. 

Usually the tactics never worked, but it never stopped him from trying. Especially since Dongwoo was kind of a pushover sometimes and had the habit of wanting to spoil his dongsaengs, while Sunggyu on the other hand was only willing to spoil Sungjong, but still ended up spoiling the others from time to time whenever they did something well, got hurt and needed pampering, or a holiday was coming up.

The oldest of their group liked to pretend that he didn't care about them, but actually had quite the soft spot for them all.

So taking the other's arm until it was a few inches away from his eyes, Hoya proceeded to ignore the other's protests of "Hey! What the hell, Hoya? What are you doing?" as he continued to take a closer look at the other's wrist. 

Seeing the usual red heart tattoo look as if someone had taken a knife and had decided to etch into the skin, following the heart pattern that was there, blood thankfully nowhere to be found, Hoya noticed that the other's wrist was also a bit swollen and puffy and pink, almost as if it was a healing wound instead of just the usual soulmate tattoo that everyone had. Hoya quickly wondered about what had happened to make the other's wrist that way, wondering if Sungyeol had done this himself, or if someone else had decided to take his wrist and cut into it instead, that Hoya quickly found himself muttering some words, "How did you get this? What happened here? Does Woohyun know? Does Woohyun know that you did this?"

Feeling suddenly affronted at Hoya's actions, especially since Hoya started mumbling about him self-harming himself, something that Sungyeol had never done in his life and wasn't going to start anytime soon, if not ever, never mind the fact that he had no idea what Hoya was even talking about, Sungyeol ended up taking his wrist from Hoya's hold to give it a look himself. 

Only to widen his eyes in alarm at the sight of it, finally noticing what Hoya was getting at and even starting to feel more of an ache that he hadn't really noticed before, body most likely ignoring it due to the annoyance and frustration he had felt moments before. 

Quite shocked, he swiftly found himself looking up at Hoya with confusion in his eyes, "I-I don't know how it got there man. I haven't done anything and no one's hurt me either. I don't know why it's like this. Do you know why it might be like this?"

Shaking his head no, because he couldn't answer that, especially since he and Sungjong had met before they were supposed to get their tattoos, the two of them being childhood friends, some of the usual norms when it came to the soulmate tattoos didn't comply. So Hoya really had no clue about why Sungyeol's arm looked the way it did since he wasn't the one that did it or had someone else do it to him. 

But feeling like Sunggyu and Dongwoo would know since the two had met each other a couple of weeks after Dongwoo's thirteenth birthday, they might know something that he didn't, he quietly gave, "Let's ask Sunggyu-hyung and Dongwoo-hyung at lunch... Maybe even Woohyun, okay?" 

Giving a nod to the other's words, Sungyeol quickly went to mention that they should probably get back to work before some of the others noticed something or tried to make a big deal out of things, especially since they had quite a bit of weight around school, more weight than they needed.

The two forced themselves to get back to working on their homework, that Sungyeol couldn't help but drop that idea a few minutes later in favor of examining his wrist. 

It just continued to softly radiate pain.

[ A/N ] :  So this is a little bit shorter than the first part, but it was best that I ended it here than continue on. But more things will be explained in the next chapter and I've added a bit more about Sungyeol and some more soulmate/tattoo related things in this chapter to tide you guys over. But I'm really thankful for the wonderful response so far to this and that I hope you guys are continuing to enjoy it. :) Comments are always appreciated.