Chapter 5

 

Jaejoong's hands fiddled with a red rose. His anxiousness was astounding as one of his friends from middle school stood in front of him. He needed to tell someone and he didn't really care who found out...Well, except for one person. 

 

Lee Jihoon. 

 

He had known Jihoon had a small thing for Yuri and if he found out Jaejoong had planned to asked her out at all, he had ruined his life. They were kind of friends in middle school. You know, they were the kind of friends that weren't really friends at all. It was a hollow title that people assumed was true. 

 

"Dude, when are you going to do it?" His friend asked, with raised brows. It was the day before high school started. The two boys were sitting down at a local coffee shop. Jaejoong stared at the rose and then at his drink. He couldn't get his mind off of her though. 

 

The two of them were childhood friends. Sure, he messed around with her but only because he like seeing her a little frustrated but then, he had make her laughed so hard until her cheeks got all red because she couldn't breathe. He smirked at the thought then glanced back up and shrugged at his friend. 

 

"Tomorrow probably. Oh crap, I'm freaking nervous!" He groaned, and ran his hands through his short black hair. His friend laughed. 

 

"Come on, you can't be nervous. Chicks don't digged that. Plus, you know her and...Well, she's kind of below your league, dude. I mean, I'm surprised you want her. She's like really heav..." 

 

"Finished that comment and your dead!" Jaejoong sneered at him, practically destroying the stem of the rose, "Sorry, my bad. She's...uh, I'm sure she will say yes." 

 

He rolled his eyes. What he didn't understand was that Yuri was beautiful. She was always so positive and he felt at eases around her. It's not his fault other guys seem to think with their . 

 

"Whatever, I got to go." Jaejoong replied, when suddenly, a guy in a Surplus Green Columbia Deschutes rapids colorblock hoodie 'accidentally' slammed into their table. What the heck?! Just as he was about to yelled at him, he turned back and threw Jaejoong a glared. His eyes widened. Jihoon. 

 

Oh, crap! If he heard Jaejoong's planned, he wasn't sure what would go down tomorrow. Now, he really needed to. Hastily, he took his rose and scrambled to followed after his so-called friend. This wasn't going to end well. 

 

"Wait, Jihoon! What are you doing?!" He cried, as Jihoon twisted around to face Jaejoong in front of the parking lot. A soft chuckled escaped Jihoon as he crossed his arms over his chest. 

 

"Why? What would make you think I'm doing anything? Why the hell would I do anything after hearing my only friend was about to betrayed my feelings for Kwon Yuri?!" His brown, almond-shaped eyes flickered to the rose as Jaejoong shifted on his feet. 

 

"Jihoon, it has nothing to do with you. You barely even know her. She only spoke to you when I was around. I'm asking her out tomorrow and she will be happy. With me." Jaejoong tried to reasoned with him. 

 

Jihoon's tongue clicked, "Oh Jaejoong, you might be right about one thing. You can asked her out but will she be happy though? I'm not so sure about that if you do." He turned to walked away from him but Jaejoong wasn't about to leave the conversation like that. If he learned anything about Jihoon during the last three years, cruelty was woven deep in his blood. 

 

"Jihoon!" Jaejoong said sternly, "What do you want?!" 

 

Another chuckled. This one sent chills down Jaejoong's spine. 

 

"You know, I'm sure Yuri has had to deal with enough bullies in her lifetime but I wondered what it would be like if the entire high school decided to poke fun at her? If you decided to go through with your planned Jaejoong, I won't hesitate to make her life a living hell." 

 

"You ing bastard!" 

 

"Wow, your language has certainly become colorful, hasn't it?" 

 

"No one's going to listened to you, you freak!" Jaejoong tried. 

 

"Won't they? Are you willing to find out? I have a lot more connections than you seem to think." 

 

"Ok, let's say I don't asked her out. You won't do anything?" Jaejoong had to grit the words out of his mouth. As much as he wanted Yuri, he didn't want to hurt her. If this meant she was safe, he had back off. Besides, he could be her friend. That would be enough, right? 

 

"I had say I don't trust you. I want to make sure there's no chance of Yuri ever being with you. If I can't have her,  neither can you. So come tomorrow, you may want to think of a few hurtful descriptions to called Yuri. It's your called though. You picking on her verses a few hundred students? Which is worse?" 

 

Jaejoong didn't know what to say. Was he serious? 

 

"You have tomorrow to do it. If I don't see any action in place, I will have to take matters into my own hands." With that, Jihoon practically vanished as he turned the cornered. Jaejoong was left standing there. His rose fell to the ground. There was only one answered and it was to protect Yuri. Even if it meant hurting her, he wasn't going to ruined her entire social life. Damnit! 

 

His foot stomped on the rose and rubbed the petals into the concrete before leaving to planned how he would break both, his and Yuri's heart. 

 

Jaejoong woke up with a startled. His hand ran through his hair as he struggled to wake himself up from his deep slumber. ! Why the hell did he have to have a dream like that?! Every thing from four years ago played back. Images of that bastard Jihoon smirking and snickering had his fists clenching, ready to hit a wall! Eventually, the bastard had moved away during senior year unexpectedly! Had the thought to finally apologized to Yuri crossed Jaejoong's mind? Of course. 

 

She was happy though. 

 

He couldn't just popped back into her life like he never hurtled her on that first day of high school. 

 

Whatever. He groaned as his arms stretched over his head. He glanced at the other bed in his dorm. Still a no show for his roommate. His arm reached out for his phone charging on the nightstand to check the time. Oh, ! He was going to be late for History. It had been a full day since he had dropped Yuri off and that whole thing with Soohyuk went down. 

 

Scrolling through his messages, he saw her texts. 

 

'You are probably busy but usually, you text me back by now, serial killer.' 

 

He cringed. It had to be Yuri. There was no question anymore. What the was he supposed to do?! He couldn't go on ignoring her, could he? He kept scrolling. 

 

'It's been a full day and I'm being clingy, aren't I? I just really wanted to talked to you. Do I have to text you drunkenly again?' 

 

He turned off the screen and stood up to throw on a pair of Stonewash Levi's relaxed fit jeans and dark blue modern-fit plaid poplin button-down shirt. Yeah, he wanted to talked to her too, but how the was he supposed to talked to her about her?! If he told her who he was, she had just shut him out. She had hate him and think this was some cruel joke. 

 

His fists gently applied pressure to the wall as he fought the urged to freak out. He needed to get to class. He needed to make sure that dickwad didn't get closes to her. 

 

Someone stopped him right now because he was about to be an overprotective ! 

 

Yuri tapped her pencil against her desk as she stared at the board in her History class. Only a few other people had shown up so far. She fought the urged to check her phone again. Why wasn't he texting her back? Did she say something? Was he bored of her? 

 

No. They were obviously good friends. Maybe something happened to his phone. That's a very plausible theory. Oh, why did she have to think about this right now? What she should really be thinking about is the fact that Jaejoong would be showing up any minute. Oh, and that's right, Soohyuk, the guy who attempted to drugged her. Dropping her head into her arms, she collapsed her shoulders in exhaustion. 

 

She needed to quit all of this negativity and focused on something happier. Like...Like the fact that when she looked over at the syllabus for this class, there were no tests besides the final. Most of the class was projects. At least she could worked entirely too hard on those and try not to failed the final. Yeah, that was a good thing, right? 

 

Also, she was in college. This wasn't high school anymore and that meant a lot more freedom. She could do what she wanted when she wanted. Still, she kept her head snuggle into her arms while she watched her fingers poke at the surfaced of her desk. It followed the beat of the clicking clock in the background. 

 

"Yuri, can I talked to you for a second?" A hesitant voice announced itself, and Yuri glanced up to find Soohyuk standing over her. She paled, ready to tell him to stayed away when she noticed the large bandage around his nose. Oh god, what did Jaejoong do to him? There were some bruising near his right eye as well. 

 

She clasped her hand over in horror. 

 

"Listened, I wanted to tell you I'm so sorry and..." He didn't have time to finished as a hand gripped the back of his medium boulder heather Sherpa fleece hoodie to pulled him back. 

 

"What do you think you are doing?!" Jaejoong all but growled at Soohyuk, as he brought him face to face with him. He cocked his head to the side, "Did I say you could come near her?!" 

 

'Ok, that pisses me off. When did he make decisions for me?' 

 

"Why don't you let her decide?!" Soohyuk snarled back bravely, "Get your ing hands off of me!" 

 

Jaejoong was about to swing his fists at him with pleasure when Yuri slammed her hands on her table to stand up. 

 

"Stop it! Both of you!" She cried, and in returned, the class became silent. Her pink color lips pressed together, instantly feeling the embarrassment of everyone staring at her crawl up her neck and into her cheeks. Swallowing, she dare to looked up at the boys who stood frozen, "Soohyuk-ssi, I think it would be best if you sat somewhere else." She told him calmly. He opened his mouth to say something but she stopped him, "Please." Reluctantly, he stepped away and grumbled something while taking a seat in the front. 

 

Exhausted, Yuri collapsed back down in her seat. The chair next to her squealed. A familiar stretching groaned had her head turning to find Jaejoong sitting comfortably right by her. 

 

"Really? You are going to sit there?" She asked, with disgusts. 

 

His brows raised at her as he looked down at where he was sitting as if he didn't know what she was talking about, "Yes?" 

 

"Don't you have some kind of reserved seat with a girl at the front?" 

 

Rolling his eyes, he smirked, "Jealous?" 

 

"Keep dreaming!" She retorted, "Sit where you want, I don't care!" Her back turned away from him as much as she could. Then she returned to her phone. Still nothing. 

 

"Oh no, someone not as popular as she thought?" Jaejoong asked, clearly trying to pushed her buttons. Her shoulders tensed, 'Don't give him the benefit.' Yuri told herself. How could he save her one second and drive her home and the next second, be a total jerk?! 

 

"If you must know, I'm texting someone who's actually a decent human being." 

 

"And I'm not?" 

 

"Debatable." 

 

"You have already moved on from Sihoo?" 

 

"Never mind, it's not debatable. You are not a decent human being. You are a jerky human being." 

 

"What? It's a question." 

 

"You didn't even know that I was texting a guy." 

 

"I do now." 

 

Yuri mentally kicked herself. Dare she looked at him. Glancing over, she saw the smugness written across his face. Why did he have to be so irritating? 

 

Thinking she was clever, she replied, "Jealous?" 

 

"Only if you want me to be, sweetheart." 

 

Her face raged with fire. Two days of History a week was going to killed her. Lips pursing, she got ready to throw insults at him when the professor walked in and quieted the class down. Slipping her phone into her pocket, she rustled into her black Kipling firefly bag to find a pen and notepad. 

 

"Alright class. Today I will be assigning the first project. You are to write a report and present about a decade during the time period. Let's say, pairs of two?" The professor announces, and her hands are up with two fingers to group partners together. Panic rose. 

 

'Please no? Please for the love of god.' "You two in the back." The professor pointed at Jaejoong and Yuri and smashed her two fingers together as if to make it official. 

 

Why was the world completely against her? 

 

"Hey partner." Jaejoong whispered, as the professor went onto the notes for class. 

 

'Focused on the notes, Yuri.' She told herself. His eyes were practically burning her cheeks. 

 

'Notes. Notes. Notes.' 

 

'He's staring.' 

 

'He's staring.' 

 

'He's staring.' 

 

"Would you quit it?!" She snapped in a hushed voice, and glared at him. 

 

"Quit being cute and I will." He replied, and nearly snapped his head around. What did he just say to her? The words caught her off guard and made her stomach dropped. 

 

Her pen tapped slowly against her paper. She could really uses some of her texter's advice about right now. 

 

"Let me get this straight. You started texting a girl who texted you drunkenly one night and this girl also happens to be Yuri? But she has no idea it's you because the two of you decided to keep things anonymous?" Kyuhyun asked Jaejoong, as they slid their fencing swords into their cases. They had just finished practicing at the school's studio gym. 

 

"Yes. Most likely." 

 

"Most likely?" 

 

"I'm one hundred percent it's her." 

 

"So you are positive?" 

 

"Yes." 

 

"Dude." 

 

"I know." 

 

Kyuhyun was silent as he polished his other sword. He had stopped to looked at Jaejoong and continued polishing the sharped piece of art. 

 

"Would you say something?" Jaejoong pressed, clearly distressed about the whole situation. 

 

"Well, I don't know why you are freaking out when this is your chance to get her back." He explained, and eyed his sword. He flung it into the air to see the shine. 

 

"What do you mean 'my chance to get her back'?" Jaejoong was very curious as he leaned his body against the wall, "It's simple." He said, mid-swing "Clearly, she likes the guy texting her. She will probably tell you anything. Figured out what she wants, what she's interested in right now, what kind of guy she likes, what she's looking for and boom, do those things. Be her dream guy." 

 

He tipped his head back to think about his proposition. Was he crazy to think that that might worked? 

 

Dipping down, he found his phone in his AMP ultra deluxe gym bag. He swiped his thumb across the screen until he found her messages. 

 

'Sorry about that darling, lost my phone. What's going on?'