“So,” I say and turn to the boys on the couch. “What do you want to know?”

A few minutes ago, Jimin had asked about me. What my favorite color was, food, song etc, etc – the usual. And the boys immediately joined in saying that they wanted to know exactly that since they didn’t know anything about me besides being an employee of the company. So I decide to amuse them and get rid of their boredom.

The first question was from Jimin.

“Why do you like writing?”

And my answer went like this. “Because it gives me freedom from the screwed world.”

This left the occupants in the room deadpan all of a sudden. Did I say something wrong?

“That’s deep,” Rap Monster coughed out. J-Hope went next. He asked, “Ai ssi, what do you do in you do as a hobby? Like when you’re free and all?” I give him a quizzical look and give the most obvious answer. “I write, of course!”

J-Hope, at this point of time, tries to clarify his question (which, I thought, was pretty clear from the start). “I mean in your free time. When you’re not writing.”

“Oh,” I reply obliviously, “I go to school. And I eat and sleep.”

J-Hope slaps his forehead and tries again. “Those are your daily necessities,” he says. I gain a skeptical sense of what he said and shake my head slowly, very carefully. “No,” I reply, emphasizing on each letter and sound.

“What he means is,” Rap Monster joins, “what do you do for fun?”

Was I speaking Greek or something that they couldn’t understand the fact that I WRITE FOR FUN? “Exactly,” I reply, becoming a little irritated now, “I write for fun!” J-Hope interjects, “Isn’t writing your job?”

“I love my job then!” I say, now growing confused. What was wrong with these boys? “You possibly can’t…” J-Hope is about to continue when Jin cuts him off, realizing that we were not getting anywhere.

“Let’s just skip to the next question,” Jin finally says and forces the members to let it go. Especially J-Hope. I still can’t understand why he found it so hard to believe that I spend all my time writing. I basically write anything, everything. Writing is my life. That probably sounds lame and all but I really love writing.

But I’m not one of those people who want to write for a living. I would like to earn money through writing, yes, but I don’t necessarily have to. (Did that make sense?)

So, simply put, I don’t write to live. I live to write.

“How’s the new college treating you?” Jin asks, putting my train of thoughts to a hold. And I answer very very honestly. “I hate the very essence of it.”

The boys should really stop looking so surprised whenever I reply.

“Why? Are the people not nice?” Jin (whose name I saved in my contacts as ‘eomma’) asks curiously with a tinge of worry in his tone. I guess the rest also look worried.

“No. They’re not bad, I think,” I reply, unsure of every word that was coming out of my mouth.

“Are the teachers not good?” Rap Monster asks, looking equally worried.

I think hard. “…No. That’s not it either.”

“Are the surroundings not spacious enough? Not enough grounds for you?” Taehyung asks curiously. It is at that moment that I notice that his head is rested on Jungkook’s shoulder and their fingers are interlocked. I mean come on… Seriously? I dare you to tell me you guys are not a couple, I double dare you.

But I choose to ignore that scene (for the moment) and I answer his question. “No. There are loads of grounds.”

“So why do you hate it?” Jimin asks finally. And I reply with care, thinking of each and every word slowly. “It’s the mere idea of it that I hate,” I begin to explain and Suga comments a quick “This should be fun.” “Don’t get me wrong, I love education. The teachers are amazing and all although sometimes they’re not punctual, they teach really well. The people are considerably alright and the girls don’t give me weird looks in the washrooms anymore…”

“Hold up,” Suga interrupts and I look at him, annoyed at the interruption. “What do you mean give you weird looks in the washrooms?”

“They all thought I was a guy on the first day,” I say; which wasn’t all their fault considering I had shorter hair than most of the boys and I walk like one and talk like one. “What? Didn’t they…” J-Hope asks and his eyes roam down to a particular part of my body. The chest. Jin slaps his lead and apologizes profusely, embarrassedly.

I simply say that it’s fine even though I realize I was starting to blush a little. “I wear clothes that make me look like a grandfather,” I say. “Loose shirts and jeans. Doesn’t really make me look like a girl, you know.”

“But, but,” Jungkook stutters, “You’re so pretty!”

I immediately am stunned to hear this. But I recover quickly because it’s too absurd.

“Nice try, Jungkook,” I say and stay alert of Taehyung’s ever so tiny reaction. When Jungkook said that, for a split second, Taehyung looked alert and scared. Now, I don’t like to make assumptions but this reaction has caused me to think that my future endeavors with these boys will be superbly interesting.

I ignore my hero’s (Jungkook) protests and continue on with my story. “As I was saying, the students are alright but it’s the whole aura of ‘college’ that annoys me. It lacks discipline so much that I want to punch someone square in the face.” (Note: I have used the best description possible and tried my best to show my decency in front of the boys by not swearing and using profanities)

“And I don’t understand their love for parties. They are apparently demanding the institution to hold a fresher’s party. I mean what the actual hell? Oh and there’s the problem with the language too.”

“What sort of problem?” Jin asks. I think he is in the middle of regretting why he even bothered to ask such the question relating to college in the first place.

“I understand that this is Korea and they want to speak Korean. But I took up the language English for a reason. Why explain the whole thing in Korean when the subject clearly says it’s friggen English?”

“Don’t you understand Korean?” Taehyung asks. Seriously, sometimes, I wonder what goes on in his head. “How do you think I’m talking to you right now?” (A/N: Let’s say that all this conversation is in Korean/ Hangul, okay?)

“You seem to know the language just fine,” Rap Monster says and I give him an agreeable nod. “But I don’t know the ‘core’ language. And the teachers just speak the core of the language. And… wow, I am just complaining to you. I am going to shut up now.”

“But why don’t you know the core language?” Jungkook asks. I give him a weird look and explain, wondering why he even asked the question in the first place. “My name itself suggests that I am not Korean. My dad’s Japanese.”

“What about your mom?” J-Hope and Jimin asks simultaneously.

“Oh, she’s Irish,” I reply plainly.

Suga has a smirk on his face. And it depicts that he’s impressed with my answer. (I really wonder why, though) The rest of the boys just look dumbstruck to find out that fact.

“Next question,” I say and push away the dumb looks on their faces.

Deciding to keep the whole thing on a light note, Rap Monster asks what kind of food I like. “Anything that doesn’t cause me allergies,” I reply. If I were them, I would have groaned at how much complications I have in everything I speak.

“You have allergies to certain foods?” Jin asks as Rap Monster is in the process of taking out his phone to make a call to someone.

I nod. “Prawns and other crustaceans. Some nuts. Snails. All mollusks.”

Taehyung gives me a pitying look and comments that he’s sorry. “Why?” I ask, growing very confused at the apology. “I took away all the genes from mom and dad to eat these things when we were born. I’m so sorry.”

Wow, is this kid serious?

Seeing him look so miserable, whimpering and giving me the puppy dog eyes, I decide that there was nothing to do about it. So I reply that I forgave him a long time back.

The next question was asked by the golden maknae Jungkook. “Who is your favorite writer on the website?”

I spark up in interest as I turn to the raven haired boy. “I have loads. But if I had to name some, I’d go for the usernames crinchan, gimtaehyung, vkookies and YuukiHikari. They write the sweetest and most interesting and amusing fan fictions.”

“Involving pairings, I presume?” Suga asks, picking at his perfectly manicured nails. (I just noticed that he has better manicured nails than me!) “Obviously,” I reply with a thousand watt smile.

“Besides BTS fics, do you write anything else?” Taehyung asks sensibly.

“I used to. But under my contract, I have to write and upload only BTS fics, remember? But besides fanfictions, I write stories too. I just haven’t published them,” I reply.

“What are you waiting for?” Suga asks suddenly.

“Huh?”

Rap Monster joins him. “Why haven’t you published them?”

The answer was simple. The stories weren’t good enough to be published. But I lie. “I am a little preoccupied at the moment,” I say instead.

“Oh,” the boys all say.

Then a series of random questions followed.

“Do you like animals?”

“What’s your favorite color?”

“What’s your favorite song?”

“What made you like Bangtan in the first place?”

“Do you like plush toys?”

“What’s your ideal type?”

“Do you like any other bands-slash-groups?”

“Can you sing, dance, rap?”

And the answers went like this.

“Yes. But I’m allergic to most fur.”

“Red, white and blue. I honestly like all colors except brown and green.”

“I don’t have a favorite song. I can’t choose.”

“The power of the choreography and the amazing lyrics. The amazing vocals also contributed a lot to why I fell in love with your band.”

“Yes.”

“Someone whom I can take care of but who can take care of me at the same time.”

“Yes. BAP, EXO, GOT7, Block B… You know, the usual.”

Then an interesting question came up.

“Name some singers or songs you dislike.”

I don’t even need to think about the answer because it comes to me naturally. “I really hate Justin Beiber and One Direction.” The members laugh aloud to hear this and I ask what was so funny.

“Aren’t all girls supposed to like those two?” Rap Monster asks.

“Really?” I reply, not very interested. “Why, dare I ask,” J-Hope says, “do you dislike them?”

I hold out my sarcastic mode and give them the ‘one hundred percent Ai Yume brand bored’ face. “Do I really need to tell you?” I ask, my voice sounding out in one straight and flat tone. The boys all shake their heads, saying that they didn’t need to. And we leave it at that.

Suddenly, the glass door knocks. And outside the door is a man whom I have never before seen in my life. And he’s holding… Are those pizza boxes in his hands?

“Food’s here!” Rap Monster exclaims and opens the door to accept the food. When did they even…? Then I recall that time when Rap Monster asks me what type of food I liked. He was holding out his phone, wasn’t he? It was during that time that he ordered the food, didn’t he?

The boys all shout in happiness. And just like that, the whole room smelled like cheese and grilled chicken pizza with mushroom and other toppings.

One question which really caught my attention during this session was this. And it was asked by a very interesting person.

“What do you feel about homouality?” he asked as some of the members cleaned up the place while the rest went to the washrooms to wash their hands from staining them with the food.

I, honestly speaking, wasn’t surprised to hear this. Especially from him.

“I think love is beautiful. And its beauty can’t only be limited to the hetero ual people, now, can it?” I reply leaving him to smile a beautiful grin which holds untold secrets. I was half tempted to ask if there was a deeper meaning to the question but I forced myself from doing so. After all, who was I to interrogate my role models when it came to their personal life?

Suddenly, the door knocked and a particular raven haired, bunny toothed boy peeped in. “Hyung,” he called out and the male before me turned to the voice. I too did.

“The manager wants to meet us in ten minutes in the practice rooms,” Jungkook says and he turns to me. “It was really fun getting to know you like today, noona,” he says. “Let’s continue this tomorrow too, please?” And I simply nod at him. But from the corner of my eye, I see that the other occupant of the room has now turned away from Jungkook and he is in the in the middle of packing up his belongings.

“Hyung, you ready?” Jungkook asks. “Go on ahead, Jungkookie,” he replies. “I’ll catch up in a sec.”

Jungkook nods and leaves us after directing a small bow at me, wishing me to have a good night.

“Can I confide something in you, Ai?” he says, using my first name so freely. But I don’t mind. “You can,” I reply.

“Can I make sure of something first?” he then asks and looks at me with those gleaming eyes of his. His dyed hair is covering parts of them but the sparkle in them is prominent and is impossible to be hidden.

“Take all the time you need, oppa,” I say leaving him to give me another cheeky grin.

“Thanks,” he says in his strangely sonorous voice (which does not suit his face one bit) and wishes me a good night.

“See you tomorrow,” he says finally and disappears down the corridor. I wave back, a genuinely happy smile never leaving my lips.

BH ENT. CONTRACT

09. THE WRITER SHALL NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, WRITE AND UPLOAD ABOUT ANY OTHER BANDS/ STORIES TILL THE TERM OF CONTRACT EXPIRES. CAMEO APPEARANCES BY OTHER BANDS, HOWEVER, ARE ALLOWED.

A/N:

Hi guys...

Check out more of Ai Yume's fan fictions about the boys.

1. [TaeKook/VKook] The Offer Still Stands

2. [NamJin] A Very Ordinary Tale

Thanks for sticking through till here. Will try to update as soon as possible... (I'm on an updating spree while I have the chance)