Love exists everywhere, where hormones and biased opinions shouldn’t be what defines the essence of true love. People have to be daring sometimes to admit to who they think they really are; and daring was one of Jeon Jungkook’s favorite words. Jeon Jungkook was biual. And he liked it that way.

“Kookie!”

“Gyeomie!”

Jungkook turned to find his tall best friend rushing towards him in high speed, about to send him toppling when he pounced and gave him a bone-crushing hug. Did Yugyeom grow again?

“Oh my god, where were you the past few days? You weren’t sick, were you? I was so alone for like, three days where were you oh my god I could have brought you something. . . why didn’t you call me?! I texted you about four hundred times and you never responded do you know how worried I was-”

“Gyeomie, I want you to look around and make sure no one’s listening.”

Yugyeom turned his head and shrugged. His shaggy brown hair flopped on his forehead and he gripped Jungkook’s shoulders tighter. “I don’t think anyone is. Why? What happened? Tell me tell meeee-”

“I. . .” Jungkook leaned in for effect. “I got hit by a car.”

Yugyeom blinked. Then, a smug smile crept onto his face as he smacked Jungkook’s shoulder, scoffing his way into the classroom.

“Seriously though! I was at the hospital for two days and they couldn’t find anything wrong with me except for this little cut on my head and apparently I was bleeding buckets but I was perfectly okay, and I think i’m a child of God, I swear i’m not kidding!”

 “Lalalalalalallalaalalallaaa I can’t hear your lies over the sound of me getting away from your !”

Jungkook was just about to retort when the teacher walked in, sending all of the students to their seat. He sighed in defeat as he took his place near the back.

“Good morning, class! I have a surprise for you all!”

A sea of whispers washed over the class as Jungkook leaned back in his chair. He popped a stick of gum in his mouth and blew a bubble; the teacher too busy ushering a kid in to notice.

“We have a new student!”

A couple of girls glanced at each other before murmuring amongst themselves, while the boys gave the kid a quick once-over before rambling to their friends again.

 Jungkook looked up. “Dang,” he unconsciously muttered.

The boy was fairly tall. He looked young; with sharp eyes and fluffed up hair with lavender tips, something Jungkook mentally applauded at. He was pouting when he walked into the room, but as his eyes raked over the students in the class, he eased his shoulders and let an excited smile creep onto his face. “Hello, everyone.”

Jungkook’s bubble popped with a loud smack, causing the boy to glance at him. He felt his heart spike and cursed himself for letting him slip out of his ‘i’m a bad boy and ain’t nobody gonna affect me’ appearance. The boy’s voice was a whole heck of a lot deeper than he thought it would be.

“My name’s Kim Taehyung, i’m going to be a new student here in your classroom, and I hope you guys can treat me well.” He carefully said his words as if he recited them a hundred times before, and his deep bow showed that he was somewhat. . . .new to the experience. He ended it with a cheeky grin.

“Alright, Taehyung, you can sit over there in that empty seat next to Jooheon. . .Jooheon wave your hand, please?”

A slightly chubby male cheerfully waved his hand. The new kid waved back with just as much enthusiasm and took his seat next to Jooheon, and they share polite grins before the teacher began class.

Jungkook propped up his chin with one arm while gazing at Taehyung, who sat a couple of seats in front of him in the next row. He had a good angle to view him at without being caught; speculating and wondering what type of person this new kid would be like. He liked that.

As the class went on, Jungkook found himself getting more bored by the second - where the only two things he did were lazily doodling on his math worksheet and trying to identify all the shades of brown and purple on Taehyung’s head.

__________________________

As the bell signaled for lunch, Jungkook took his time to pack his things and go to his locker. Many of the sophomores were already scrambling their way to the cafeteria, but Jungkook whistled while putting his books away and slammed his locker closed. He glanced to his side to find. . . the new boy. Switching his stares between a locker, a lock, and a slip of paper.

He probably doesn’t know how to use a lock, Jungkook thought. Where’s this kid from? Was he home-schooled?

He wrestled with his conscience before letting his heart win and walked over to the student. “Excuse me?”

Taehyung didn’t move an inch; only his eyes flitted to look at Jungkook.

“Do you need help?”

“I think so. What do you need to lock away here?”

“Uh. . .books?”

“Ick.”

“Yeah. . .you might wanna buy a couple of notebooks and folders and get the textbooks you need for each class from your teachers. I don’t think you want to come to school empty-handed.”

Taehyung frowned at the lock in his hand. “So. . .do I like, twist the knobby-thingy and get to the numbers? And then it opens?”

“It’s not that easy. You have to uh, here, just gimme that.” Taehyung handed him the lock and clutched onto the slip of paper.

“What’s your combo?”

“11, 11, 17.”

“Simple, nice. You’re lucky yours isn’t super complicated.” Jungkook spun the knob a couple of times while showing Taehyung. “Spin it a couple of times to clear it; always spin it first a couple of rounds. Then stop at the first number. Yours is 11, see? Okay. . . . and then you turn in the opposite direction and pass the second number once, then stop at it for a moment the second time. And then you turn the opposite way again and stop at the third number, yours is 17, and. . .” He pulled the lock open with the click and glanced at Taehyung, who had his eyes trained on the boy’s hands. “Get it?”

“Wat.”

Oh boy. Jungkook felt his shoulders slump around him as he hurriedly placed the lock in Taehyung’s hand. He had to get to lunch quickly so he wouldn’t get an earful from Yugyeom, and judging by the angry pout Yugyeom unconsciously sported throughout the morning, Jungkook probably owed him lunch now.

Quick. He needed to do this quick.

He took Taehyung’s hand and tried to ignore the proximity and bluntness he enforced [although he did mentally clap himself on the back for A+ flirting skillz], dragging it towards the knob. “Spin it a couple of times.”

“Okay,” His face was pressed with concentration as his fingers sloppily spun the lock.

“Alright, now stop at 11.”

“Yeah, and. . .?”

“Turn backwards.”

“Me, or the lock?”

Jungkook breathed out a chuckle and leaned his side against the lockers. “Just how old are you?”

“I feel like i’m five.”

“No, really. How old are you?”

Jungkook felt uncomfortable under Taehyung’s long, hard stare. “Probably older than you.”

“Probably?”

Taehyung suddenly flashed a wide smile, waving his hands in the air to almost knock his lock into Jungkook’s forehead. “I’m uh, probably older than most people in our grade. One of those. . .early bloomers. . . .you have those, right?”

 Now it was the younger boy’s turn to give the other a long stare. Man, he has long lashes, Jungkook thought. And his hair is so cool! I wish Eomma would let me dye my hair like that. . . “Do you dye your own hair?” Wow, way to be cold and mysterious, Jeon Jungkook.

But he didn’t regret it when he saw Taehyung’s eyes light up. “No, actually, my broth-. . .my friend dyes it for me. He dyed his hair like, all the time, and he would experiment on my own hair sometimes. Awesome, right? Look at ma little purplieees, they’re so prettyyy!” He his hair before Jungkook let loose a giggle.  

And then the bell rang.

“Shoot, okay, let me just open it for you. You’ll probably get the hang of it later, anyway.” Jungkook opened the lock with a click and opened Taehyung’s locker, shoving the boy’s books inside and dragging him to the cafeteria. “You’re buying lunch, right?”

“Uh, no. My. . .dad. . .packed me lunch.” Taehyung didn’t want to admit that he had his older brother drag himself to the kitchen at 5 am to neatly make triangle-cut peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for Taehyung to take to school. ‘Wow, at this rate you could really be a father!’, Taehyung had joked. He wasn’t laughing when Yoongi chased him around with the knife he was cutting the sandwiches with.

Jungkook sighed. “Fine, get your lunch. I’m gonna head to the cafe.” But before he could turn, Taehyung fiddled with the slip in his hand. His long black hoodie sleeves slipped over his knuckles, something the younger scrutinized at. “What?”

“I still don’t know how to open my lock,” Taehyung muttered, “and you locked it.”

“Ah, for crying out loud.” Jungkook didn’t know if he should stay back to help the boy or not. He would probably get skewered by Yugyeom with his cheap wooden chopsticks if he came any minute later, but staying back to help Taehyung meant staying back to help a cute guy wink wink. Then again, when were cute boys at high schools ever worth the wait?

 Based on what Jungkook knew, it was almost never. They always had some sort of major flaw. Besides, he had a cold-guy reputation to keep and a whiny best friend to attend to. After a good two seconds of thorough contemplating, Jungkook managed to convince himself to shrug it off, discreetly glanced at Taehyung once more - regretting it - and then sighed. “I don’t know. Solve it yourself; not like you’re always gonna have someone to help you around here.” He turned his back and quickly paced himself down the hallway, where he felt the other boy’s gaze fall in between his shoulder blades as he walked away.

But it was like two voices were arguing in his head - one saying to go back and help the new boy, the other one praising him for walking away from a death trap.