Jonghyun pulled Onew aside the next time he had a chance. “Since when do you want to stay in 2014?”

“Shouldn’t I be asking you the same thing?” the two were following Key and Minho on their way to dinner after their awkward first encounter. Jinki wasn’t exactly good at expressing himself, how could he explain that when he saw Key walk in it was like he could hear birds sing? Key was the most beautiful human being Jinki had ever seen, and all he wanted to do was look at him as long as he could. The two continued talking about theories on time, and how bad it would be if they just stayed in 2014.

Key and Minho led the two, not paying any mind to what the two were talking about. They were wrapped up in their own conversation. Key wanted nothing to do with Minho’s ‘pets.’ He had two dogs of his own, and wanted to keep it that way. Key couldn’t like though, he had grown to enjoy Jonghyun’s company. Especially when he needed someone to try on one of his new designs. “I just don’t understand why we have to keep them,” Key sighed, “Onew’s here so Jonghyun can go home.” Minho didn’t know how to respond, so they walked in silence until they got to the cafeteria.

Jinki was just as bad as Jonghyun was the first time he saw the food court. There was food everywhere, and most of it was outdated to them. They were things that they would usually only have on special occasions, and everything was more natural and fresh than they would find in the future. The two boys had never seen something like eggs that actually came out of an egg. Naturally, Jinki got way too much food. He underestimated how hungry he was, and he wanted to try everything he could get his hands on. Luckily their school ran things buffet style.

“This is why college get’s so expensive,” Key scoffed when he saw the amount of food on Jinki’s plate, “There’s no way you’re going to finish all of that.”

“I’ve never had food like this before.” Jinki’s ears turned red in embarrassment, “I wanted to try everything.”

Minho gave Key a stern look, “be nice Kibum.” Key just stormed off, looking for a table.

“Don’t mind him,” Minho said, addressing Jinki, “he’s just being childish, he’ll get over it soon.”

“I hope so,” Jinki said under his breath.

“What was that?”

“Ji-Onew!” Jonghyun said, interrupting their conversation, “where shall we sit?”

“It looks like Key got a booth in the back, but I’m not sure if he want’s to sit alone.” Minho responded.

“Can we please sit with him?” Jinki quietly asked the taller boy.

Minho contemplated it, “I guess, but you have to deal with his wrath if he doesn’t want us to.”

Jinki smiled and practically skipped over to the booth with his tray full of food. “Can we sit with you?” He asked Key, who seemed to be enamoured with his bread roll.

Key looked up at him and rolled his eyes, “fine.” Key scooched over on his bench to make room, expecting Minho to sit next to him. He was a little surprised when Jinki sat down next to him instead.

Jonghyun and Minho piled into the other side of the table. Once they were settled, the awkward boy and his friend from the party walked up to their table. “Do you mind if we sit with you?” the more confident boy asked.

Key kicked Minho from under the table to get the boy’s attention. Minho glared at Key, and Key just shook his head. The last thing he wanted was for more people to be at their table. It was enough just dealing with Minho’s lost puppies, he didn’t need any more. Don’t get me wrong, Key was usually a friendly person who had a lot of friends, but he picked who he was friends with, and these people weren’t exactly his usual friend material. He was friends with people who had class, not some random people from the street.

Just to get back at Key for kicking him in the leg, Minho invited the two to join them. It was a tight fit once the two sat down with their own trays, but they some how made it work. “Could you remind us of your names?” Minho asked the awkward boy that was sitting next to him.

“I’m Kai, and this is Taemin,” his friend, Kai said across from him, “I’m sorry we left things a little awkwardly at the party.”

Minho was sitting with Taemin on his left, and Jonghyun on his right, and across from them sat Kai, Jinki, and Key. Key was ignoring the whole conversation, and Jinki was entirely focused on Key’s hands. It was as if he had never seen hand’s before in his life, and hoped to learn everything about them by observing Key’s. Jonghyun was uncomfortable with the whole situation. What Minho didn’t know, was that while the taller boy was looking for him at the party, Taemin and Kai had taken him aside to “talk.” Kai threatened Jonghyun, explaining Taemin’s unrequited love. Apparently, Taemin had been in love with Minho since before he even started school here. It was actually the reason he picked this school. It was just a lucky coincidence that they had an astounding arts program. Kai had been working all this time to get the two together, and he explicitly told Jonghyun not to ‘interfere.’ It was hard for Jonghyun. He didn’t even think he liked Minho in that way, but recently it was harder for him to think that his feelings were just ‘brotherly love.’

Jonghyun wanted nothing more than to leave, so he excused himself, even though he had barely touched his food. Minho looked at him concerned, “are you sure? You usually eat more than that.”

“I’ll be fine,” Jonghyun said, and left for the bathroom, throwing his food out on his way. Sitting in a stall, avoiding the two underclassmen he sent Minho and Key a text that read “I’m just hanging outside, text me when you’re leaving.” Minho responded with an annoyed face, and Key just looked at it, not making any effort to respond.

Back at the table, Taemin was sitting a little too close for comfort for Minho. He was fully aware of the presence of Taemin’s thigh, and hoped the kid would just move it. There was no reason for them to be squished on their side of the bench, but Taemin didn’t seem to want to budge. He decided to make some light conversation to keep his mind off of it, and especially off of Jonghyun. He was immensely worried about the boy, and wondered if he had done something wrong. “So Taemin, I think I’ve seen you at the soccer games. Are you a fan of the sport?”

Taemin’s ears turned red, “I just like using it as a break from dance practice,” he lied. He wanted to say, I’m a fan of you, but that was far too cheesy, and not something he could pull off.

“Are you a dance major?” Minho asked, just trying to keep the conversation going.

Taemin just nodded. This didn’t seem to be going well, and Kai could tell. “What major are you?” he interjected, hoping to get rid of some of the awkwardness between the two.

“I’m a physics major,” Minho answered.

Kai just smiled, “that’s a lot of math isn’t it.”

“It’s not as bad as you think it is,” Minho sighed. He was tired of hearing about the math thing. Yeah it was a bunch of math, but it was also a bunch of other things too. Like learning how cars work, and learning about the world around you. Okay, all of this involves math, but it’s more applicable than calculus that’s for sure.

Key had been fidgeting next you Jinki. He had noticed the older boy’s eyes on him and finally cracked, “why are you staring at my hands?!”

Jinki blushed, and looked at his food, “I was just, they’re very pretty,” he whispered at his carrots.

It was Key’s turn to blush, he shoveled the last bit of rice on his plate into his mouth and then excused himself, “I’m going to find Jonghyun. I’m getting worried.” He wasn’t lying. They had been sitting there for a while, and it was starting to get cold outside.

Jonghyun was sitting on a bench shivering and playing a game on his phone. He felt Key put a hand on his shoulder. “I got kicked out too,” Key said as he sat down next to Jonghyun, “Onew was getting a little weird for me.”

“He’s just awkward,” Jonghyun clarified, “you’ll get used to it.”

Key just looked at him through the light of the street lamp, “why did you leave?”

Jonghyun ignored the boy’s question and asked his own, “what if you liked someone a lot, like a lot a lot, but then someone says you shouldn’t like them, and on top of that you’re home is forever away, and once you leave you’ll probably never be able to come back?”

Key rested his head on Jonghyun’s shoulder and sighed, “sounds like a terrible situation that I wouldn’t like to be in.”

“I don’t even know how important I am here,” Jonghyun admitted quietly, “back at home I have friends like Ji- Onew, and my family’s there. I understand what’s going on around me. But here, here there are new exciting things, and exciting people. Things I’ve never seen before. If I leave I feel like it wouldn’t have made a difference if I came or not. I’m not learning anything here, at least as far as I can tell.”

Key just listened, and finally said, “you are an alien aren’t you.”

Jonghyun just hummed, “worse than that, I’m an alien from the future.”

Key laughed picking up on what he thought was sarcasm, “you’re pretty cool, I’m sorry I call you a pet.”

“I forgive you,” Jonghyun said, patting Key’s knee, “hey, when we get back to the dorm, do you want to dress Onew up? He’ll hate that.”

Key grinned, “that’ll be perfect. I’ll get back at him for that pretty comment.”

Jonghyun was confused but just went along with it, “I think we’re going to be good friends in the long run.”

“I agree,” Key said, patting Jonghyun’s hand. He paused, thinking of his word very carefully, “I want you to remember that Minho is very.. dense. He won’t exactly get it the first time, so don’t be discouraged.”

Jonghyun smiled, “thank you.”

They heard Minho and Onew coming out of the building and readjusted themselves. “Shall we?” Minho asked, helping the two up. The four walked back to the dorm, and Jonghyun couldn’t stop smiling. He was still unsure about his feelings towards Minho, but he knew that he sort of had Key’s blessing, and that was enough for him.

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Aurhor's Note: Hello my lovelies! Just updating and checking in here. Everything still going well? This chapter didn't exactly turn out how I wanted it to, but I think it became a lot better! People need to sort out their feelings tbh, cause this is getting messy! I love you all! ~^^