chapter 13
the psychology of good studentsnTo others, Jooyoung might just have the perfect life. Good grades, chill personality, even a relatively stable social standing because of her role as the student government Vice President. And to some others, she might even be a nerd, who studies all day in her one-bed room just to bag those HDs.
But to those who know her best, she’s just Han Jooyoung. Jooyoung who has the most explosive personality, who became Vice President just because everyone thought she was up to the job because of her good grades, who watches animated movies and rolls around on her bed before realising she has to rush to finish all her assignments to get those acclaimed grades.
Sometimes — most of the time — she’s satisfied with how things are. But today, watching her dreams fly out of her reach with her very own eyes, she wants to be so much more.
She sighs.
Jooyoung is sprawled on the sofa with a rolled up piece of tissue up her nose when Kyungsoo comes in again, hesitantly this time, and with his phone in hand.
“Minseok asked us out for dinner today,” he says. “Wanna go?”
“Shouldn’t it be ‘wanna come’?” She teases, correcting his word choice. The Kyungsoo she knows will never pass up a dinner offer like this, because one, the other person will probably pay; and two, he’s Mr. Popular and Sociable.
“Nah. I’ll accompany you if you want to stay at home. You’re sick and, well, sad.”
Jooyoung is slightly surprised at his answer, and feels herself getting touched again. Honestly, she feels she doesn’t deserve Kyungsoo sometimes. He’s done so many things for her to make her feel so emotionally good, and she’s only ever repaid him with material goods. But maybe it’s just her emotions warping her mind and making her overthink again. It happens.
“You can cross sick off,” she says, sitting herself up. “I’m feeling better after the medicine. And you can cross sad off too because I won’t be sad once I drink. If we go to a drinking place. So let’s go to a drinking place. Or at least a place which sells drinks.”
Kyungsoo still doesn’t look convinced. “You sure?”
“Yup.”
“How is your alcohol tolerance?”
“Better than yours, at least,” she cheeks.
He finally gets a relieved look on his face at the return of her personality. Then he grins and holds her by the waist again, wrapping his fingers around her side. “That’s my usual Han Jooyoung. I was waiting for that. Okay, now I can bring you out.”
Both his arm around her waist and his words (my Jooyoung?) send a nice shiver down her heart. This time she knows it’s a different feeling from just being touched. It's more than that. It'll last longer.
The three of them do congregate at a drinking place for dinner in the end. They end up eating Bangers and Mash after walking around for ages (Kyungsoo had rejected a steak place because it was too expensive; then a Fish and Chips place because he insisted that Jooyoung’s throat wasn’t well).
Jooyoung sneaks a piece of kimchi in between bites of sausage. She had insisted on bringing it out and Kyungsoo didn’t even put up a protest. It’s quite comforting to eat it like this, when sad and in a foreign country and all she wants to do is to go home.
Minseok has been trying to get Kyungsoo to drink for ages. “One won’t hurt!” He hovers a glass in front of his eyes, but he shifts his face away.
“Nah,” Kyungsoo says again, stuffing mashed potatoes into his mouth instead.
Minseok looks to Jooyoung for help, but she just shrugs and drinks her own. Kyungsoo may be carefree about most things, but when he insists on something it’s hard to get him to do otherwise.
He holds the glass obstinately to Kyungsoo’s face again. “It’s English liquor! Different from soju and makgeolli.”
“I don’t drink soju or makgeolli. I don’t drink at all.”
“Which is why,” Minseok explains. “Now, after you’ve come halfway round the world to London, you should try something new. Like their liquor.”
Kyungsoo, this time, sighs and takes the glass from a suddenly very satisfied looking Minseok. Jooyoung can tell Kyungsoo’s doing it just to placate him and to bring the conversation away from alcohol.
“If I get drunk, pay for our cab ride home,” he says, gingerly sniffing the liquid as if to check if it is spiked.
“Of course I will! I’m very responsible,” Minseok acclaims proudly, downing a glass of his own. Kyungsoo sighs again, then squeezes his eyes shut. He lifts the glass swiftly and drinks a big gulp, looking as if he’s taking herbal medicine or something. Before he recovers Minseok takes the glass from him and fills it up again, and places it into his hand right when he opens his eyes.
“Nice, right?” Minseok laughs at Kyungsoo clutching his head.
“I think I’m dizzy,” he says. His face is turning a bright shade of pink, and Jooyoung can’t help but burst out laughing. Is he already drunk?
“You’ve only taken one small glass!” Jooyoung laughs, leaning in to Kyungsoo.
“I can’t do this anymore.” He really does look groggy, and he lays his arm out on the table to lie down. Jooyoung shifts away and places her head on the table too, looking directly at Kyungsoo.
“I never thought your alcohol tolerance was this low. You , Do Kyungsoo,” she taunts. Minseok cackles and reaches his hand out for a high-five, which she returns. When he doesn’t give any reaction, she continues. “I bet your wimpy soul can’t take another glass.”
“You’re right,” Kyungsoo slurs, facedown now. Just when Jooyoung thinks he’s not going to react further than that, he suddenly sits up and grabs his glass with determination. He takes a deep breath and drinks it all up. And then he slumps on the table again, groaning softly.
He doesn’t move, and his eyes are closed.
Minseok reaches out to tap him on his shoulder. “Bro. You okay? Awake?”
Kyungsoo starts to chuckle, and he turns his head to face Minseok. “Why would I not be okay? I’m feeling great.”
Jooyoung tries to hold back a laugh as well. That was fast — she’s never seen someone reach this state of drunk within two small glasses of liquor. Kyungsoo sits up straight now, his head bobbing slightly. He looks around the table, fixes his gaze on Jooyoung, and stares for a moment. She’s amused.
“You gotta pay to look at art, you know,” she says, posing like The Thinker. This time Kyungsoo’s gaze changes and turns soft.
“Stop being so cute,” he merely says, his gaze finally, shyly, breaking away. Jooyoung freezes momentarily to become a real-life statue. When she manages to find her muscles again she her head slightly to the side, giving up on the pose. Minseok is grinning at her like he can’t believe what is happening, and she just wants to shrink into a corner. Her stomach is becoming a butterfly farm.
Minseok moves the wine glass away this time when Kyungsoo reaches out for it. His fingers close onto nothing, several times, and when he gives up on grabbing the wine glass he pulls his chair closer to Jooyoung instead.
“I can’t find it,” he pouts (oh my gosh). Jooyoung holds her breath. His thick lips are just a little puff, and his face is just a bundle of cuteness. It is frustrating.
“Can you stop doing that?” She asks, exasperated. She needs to calm down because he is making her feel things, out-of-the-ordinary sort of things. And by right, she isn’t supposed to feel these things for a friend.
Kyungsoo laughs this time, throwing his head back. Then he groans. “My head hurts,” he whines. “Prince Soo’s head hurts.”
Maybe it’s supposed to be cute as well, but the entire idea of the cool and composed Do Kyungsoo calling himself Prince Soo is so funny both Jooyoung and Minseok can’t help but burst into laughter. She decides to tell him all of this when he is sober again just to see him flustered. The sober him and the drunk him are so different Jooyoung can’t even picture how they are the same person.
“Why are you laughing,” Kyungsoo asks this time, his eyebrows furrowed. He’s pouting again, goodness.
“Stop,” Jooyoung pleads again, between peals of laughter. He just stares at her and moves his seat even closer.
Then he latches himself to Jooyoung, and she yelps softly in surprise. He rests his head on her shoulder, his arms circling her right one. Minseok stops laughing. He wiggles his eyebrows at Jooyoung, who gives him a flat look.
"Do Kyungsoo. Who gave you the permission to grab my arm like this?" She asks, as frustratedly as she can make her voice sound.
(But her heart is beating and she's slightly giddy herself and she really likes the way he's holding her.)
Kyungsoo, though not in his right mind, still hesitates for a moment, that gentleman. But he knows that Jooyoung doesn't really mind him holding her from the way she's not putting up a protest, so he relaxes.
"But you're mine," he mumbles, then buries his head into her shoulder. Jooyoung cannot breathe. This is too close, too sudden.
"Are you sure," she whispers because other words are stuck in . She can’t think in this condition — her heart is beating faster than when she sat for the first paper of the college entrance exam. She stops noticing Minseok staring at the both of them proudly at the other side of the table.
Kyungsoo nods, his head still on her shoulder. It tickles but she doesn’t push his head away. Then he places an arm on her waist, just like he had done when she cried.
“Jooyoung is sad?” He asks, his breath tickling her neck. After asking he looks up at her with his big eyes. She resists staring into them.
“Not now,” she says. It’s true, though. At this moment she isn’t feeling any sadness at all; the pressing feeling in her heart has been pushed far, far away by the intense palpitations. Now all she can feel is Kyungsoo clinging onto her.
“Not now? Then later?” He asks, looking genuinely worried. “Jooyoung is still sad. Then now Kyungsoo is sad too.”
“I’m not sad anymore,” she assures him. “I’m Han Jooyoung! Are you underestimating my emotional strength?”
Kyungsoo analyses her for a while, and it is silent. Minseok slowly slides his chair backward and goes to pay the bill — not that anyone notices. Kyungsoo’s eyes settle upon different parts of her face. She swallows and reminds herself to keep breathing.
When he is done he buries his head back into her neck. “Jooyoung isn’t sad. Prince Soo is happy now,” he says. Jooyoung can imagine the smile on his face. It makes her smile too.
“Are you always this clingy when you’re drunk?” She gently chides, turning her head to look at him on her shoulder.
“What are you talking about, I’m not drunk,” Kyungsoo slurs. “You are just really, really comfortable.”
“There are better pillows out there.”
“But you smell good.”
Jooyoung’s heart momentarily stops. Then she softly moves such that his head jerks off her shoulder. “Can you stop with these, please? My heart feels like it's going to explode.”
His head returns to its original position on her. “You don’t like them?”
She swallows. “Well... it’s not exactly that.”
A small smiles slides across his lips. “Then I won’t stop.”
And though she knows it’s a little wrong, she wants this not to stop. She wonders when is the next opportunity for drunk Kyungsoo. She wants Prince Soo to come out and cling onto her again. She doesn’t want this to end.
“My head hurts,” Jooyoung groans. She’s bent over her lecture notes as well as her laptop, rubbing her head. Kyungsoo, from the other side of the table, looks up from his phone.
“Is it the flu coming back?” He asks, reaching for the medication she had strewn on the side of the table. But she shakes her head and flops onto her pile of notes.
Kyungsoo sighs at her this time. “Then it’s the drinks, isn’t it? I told you not to drink so much yesterday.”
Jooyoung feels her heart thump at this. She hasn’t told him what had happened last night, besides confirming the fact that he got horribly drunk and eventually conked out at the end of the night, leaving her to drag him to take a cab back. Minseok had left when no one had realised, but he paid the bill, and left money for the taxi as promised, so Jooyoung isn’t complaining.
“Says the one who couldn’t even get out of bed this morning because he was so hungover,” she retorts. She sits back up straight and stretches her arms. “Nah. I don’t want to worry you. I’ll be fine.”
“Since when have you worried about me being worried for you?”
Jooyoung gives him a flat look. “You’re right. Never.”
But he doesn’t give up being annoying ol’ Do Kyungsoo. “And I never said I’ll be worried for you.”
She decides not to respond to that. Instead she starts working on her notes again. She has better things to do than to give him any sort of a reaction. Letting out a curse under her breath, Jooyoung swears in her head she has gone mad for even thinking Kyungsoo is, well, boyfriend standard for even a moment.
Jooyoung ignores her headache, refusing to look up from her work for even a moment. To be very honest with herself, she half-expects Kyungsoo to get her attention back by laughing and saying he’s kidding. Or something of the sort. But he doesn’t — and when it’s silent for way too long she finally succumbs to the urge to look up.
He’s not there.
“Kyungsoo?” She calls, putting down her pen. She stares around the room, slightly upset. But then she sees him popping his head out of his room.
“What? I’m taking my wallet and stuff to go out and buy food for dinner. Want anything in particular today?” Kyungsoo asks plainly, slipping on his coat. She grins at him and shakes his head. She has to admit that for a moment, her heart fell when she saw he wasn’t there, but now it’s back and beating.
When he comes back with two packets of food he drops them in front of Jooyoung, which makes her jump and enter some typos — not that she isn’t already doing so because she is so tired. She is glad to be able to use dinner as an excuse to stop working and start her procrastination going.
“Thanks,” she smiles, pushing her work to the corner of the table. Kyungsoo sits opposite her, as usual, and watches her open the packets up.
He sighs. “We’ve been in London so long and we haven’t had a proper dinner out yet.”
“We have!” She says, confused. “Just last night? With Minseok?”
“I mean just the two of us.”
Jooyoung feels her face heat up, and it’s funny because they’ve had so many meals together back in Seoul, but Kyungsoo putting it this way now makes it feel different.
“Oh.”
“When can we go out and eat?”
At the other side of the table, Kyungsoo looks rather sad. And it’s making Jooyoung feel more than just a little guilty, especially since it’s always because she doesn’t want to go out that they don’t. So she puts down her fork and spoon, packs up the rest of the food again, and puts them back into their carrier.
“Let’s go out and eat,” Jooyoung says with determination.
“But I’ve already gotten takeaway-“
“On the benches at the sidewalk, at least,” she interjects. Kyungsoo stares at her for a moment and laughs.
“Game,” he says without much consideration. “But first, your food is £10. My food is too, if you wanna treat me.” Kyungsoo tosses his wallet to her ever so casually, like it’s normal for someone to be so extremely miserly.
“I hate you,” she grumbles. But she fishes for her own wallet anyway because she knows there’s no way to argue, and stuffs in only £8, hoping Kyungsoo won’t notice. Jooyoung knows that he’s looking at her, but perhaps he really doesn’t notice, because he doesn’t say anything.
“Thanks,” he says when she tosses the wallet back to him. Jooyoung rolls her eyes.
Kyungsoo gives her the laugh he always does when he knows she’s annoyed because of him (which is a lot). “It’ll culminate and the money spent will all be worth it in the future,” he promises.
She highly doubts it. But she doesn’t want to bicker with Kyungsoo over this anymore. So she just grunts, “It better.”
When they finally do go out with their food in hand it seems like all benches have vanished from the streets of London, because they have to walk far to get to one (that is empty). And it’s just Jooyoung’s luck that the bench is located near a roadside shop which is having a closing down sale — all through the meal a distracted Kyungsoo’s eyes wander to the shop almost hungrily and she just knows she’s going to have to watch him get awful clothing again.
It’s late when they finish their meal and wrap up Kyungsoo’s shopping (total haul: one off-brand polo tee, eight pairs of socks and a £2 black cap). The streets are lit and they know their way home, but perhaps it’s just the trepidation of being in a foreign country that makes Jooyoung feel a little uncertain.
They walk past closed shops, broken lamps and black street cats.
It’s a loud singing voice that makes her jump slightly, her hand slowly rounding into a tight fist. She knows the slur of the voice and the dryness of the chuckle that is let out soon after — it’s that of a drunkard.
Kyungsoo (like always) seems to notice her uneasiness when they turn a corner and see the drunk man stumbling towards them on the pavement. Jooyoung decides to look at the floor, hoping to avoid any confrontation. And they keep walking.
She’s not used to things like these because she stays in campus, and even before university the route she took to school and back was always just filled with students and the occasional dog-walker.
So when the man pounces right in front of her she can’t help but jerk backwards in shock. “Hey, baby,” he says in a low enough voice to make her tremble. “Going anywhere tonight?” He swings his empty bottle of whiskey in his hand with the tips of his fingers, as if he could drop it anytime.
Then almost immediately Kyungsoo grabs her by the wrist a little too hard, but she doesn’t feel the pain. He starts to pull her away from the drunk man but it only makes him grab tightly onto Jooyoung’s other wrist, making her yelp and her heart go the worst kind of nervous.
“Where do you think you’re taking this pretty thing,” the man snarls at him, edging towards the both of them. His hand swipes across Jooyoung’s arms and she can’t help but wince.
Kyungsoo tugs Jooyoung backward, stepping in front of her. His shoulders shield hers and he looks fiercer than she’s ever seen him. “She’s not a thing,” he says back in perfect English, his voice surprisingly still sounding calm. “And you are not taking her anywhere. Only I can.”
Jooyoung is alarmed. He should know better than to pick a fight with a drunk man, for goodness’ sake — what if he gets hurt? Do Kyungsoo at that moment is the most senseless man on earth. “Kyungsoo, don’t-“
“Boy, don’t make me smash this on your head.” The drunk man lifts the empty bottle dangerously. Instinctively she moves forward to stop him but Kyungsoo nudges her behind him again. Then he drops his shopping bags like he’s going to fight for real.
Oh no.
“Let go of her hand,” Kyungsoo says, his voice nearing a growl. Jooyoung squeezes her eyes shut as the man grips on even tighter. She hates being a damsel in distress but here she is, having a knight protect her from a monster. And the monster is huge and scary and has a weapon at hand. The knight is small and rather cute and she wants him to be safe.
“Why should I,” The man growls back, narrowing his eyes at him.
She can’t see Kyungsoo’s expression but she can see the veins popping out the back of his neck. He’s angry, she can tell. And she can also see the beads of sweat slowly forming there too. He’s... scared.
“Kyungsoo, it’s okay,” she whispers, her eyebrows furrowed. Why is he shielding her when he’s just as afraid? “You don’t even know how to fight. It’s dangerous.”
“I don’t care whether I can fight or not,” he says in English, clearly for the drunk man to hear. “This bastard needs to get his filthy hands off you.”
Jooyoung can see the red in the man’s eyes; the fury, the rage that has swollen in his face. He lets out an angry shout, his voice cracking in agitation.
“I’m going to kill you!” He shouts, and lifts the bottle high.
She braces herself.
And then Kyungsoo steps forward and knees the man in the groin. Hard.
The man shrinks to the ground in pain, the bottle dropping and shattering. It echoes too loudly in the night.
And then they both make a run for it.
a/n: I OWE SO MANY OF YOU REPLIES i promise i'll reply to all of you when i come back from my overseas trip! typing this just before i leave so i don't have the chance to do so now i'm sorry :''
also sometimes i can't tell whether a chapter is boring or fluffy do yall like this kind of stuff??
lastly,, the last scene triggered something in me,,,, so here is a muscly kyungsoo
I OWED SO MANY OF YOU REPLIES i’m so sorry!! just replied to everyone i hadn’t replied to aaa but i hope everyone’s having a great 2019 so far! i think it’ll take a while before my next story because of circumstances.... but i promise i’ll be back :”)
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