“I finally joined a club today,” Hyunjin said as a form of greeting.

He dropped bunch of flyers on the cafeteria table before sitting down. His best friend, Seungmin, glanced at the multitude of paper that was placed in front of him with a look of surprise, before looking back up at the other boy. They were already in their third year of university. Within the last two years, Hyunjin had sworn off joining clubs, so the sudden change of heart made his friend curious.

“Just one? It looks like the clubs were trying their best to get you, as usual,” Seungmin commented, picking up a flyer for the Positive Science Club and quickly placing it back down.  The boy himself was alright with clubs, being in one of the many music clubs himself; ever since Hyunjin’s reputation as one of the university’s best looking guys grew over the years, however, the latter was always a target during recruitment week. Club members figured that if they got one of the popular students to advertise them, more students would join.

For that very reason, Hyunjin normally avoided recruitment week like a plague.

“Yeah, well,” he replied with a nonchalant shrug. “Maybe if I finally just stick to one club, the rest would stop bothering me.”

“That makes sense,” Seungmin agreed, although he still felt like something was off since the other boy could have done that last year, too. “So, which club is the lucky winner?”

Hyunjin picked up the stack of flyers and began shuffling through them, finally stopping at one with a sudden smile on his face. It was a fond sort of smile, one usually reserved for cute things like puppies; Seungmin was sure there was no club for that since dogs weren’t allowed on campus. Maybe it was dance? But he was already in his own team. The other boy presented the flyer with a flourish as Seungmin began to read the words.

He read it silently once, twice, before loudly exclaiming:

“What the is the Betta Fish Society?!”

“Now I know what you’re thinking,” Hyunjin immediately said, raising his hands up defensively. “I swear I can explain.”

“Do you even know what a betta fish is?” The other boy continued regardless, reading through the flyer. Apparently the whole point of the club was to showcase the beauty of various different types of betta fish, teach people how to care for them, and also overall aimed to stop the practice of purposefully pitting them against each other in fights. It was a fairly new club, created just that year, although how they got it approved was beyond Seungmin.

Across him, Hyunjin at least looked a little sheepish, “a little bit. The guy handing out the flyers went on about them for a good five minutes.”

“You listened to him talk about fish for a whole five minutes—“

Immediately, his best friend saw the whole picture.

“You found the guy cute, didn’t you,” Seungmin stated, not really a question, rolling his eyes as Hyunjin merely grinned in response. 

In his defense, Hyunjin would like to say that he had avoided this situation for a good two years. That was still two years without being swayed into joining a club, two years of ignoring the people who pleaded at him with puppy eyes and sweet voices, and two years of nobody grabbing his attention. Each time he ended up caught by someone during recruitment week, he would smile politely and excuse himself, but that day went a little differently.

For one, the boy who stopped him didn’t even know who he was.

“His name is Yang Jeongin. One year lower. He didn’t ask me to join for the club’s popularity; I don’t think he gave a about who I am,” he began to tell Seungmin, who had finally stopped giving him a judging look and demanded the whole story. “He asked me to join for the sake of the fish. He had some lined up on the booth’s table, too.”

“Really? That’s what sold you?” Seungmin asked with a scoff. “C’mon, what’s the real answer?”

Hyunjin considered the question thoughtfully. Being in his Junior year, it’s not like he hasn’t had crushes before, but most of the time his interests faded quickly. Either that, or he never found it within himself to actually act upon said interests. With Jeongin, he could surprisingly name quite a lot of things he liked. The younger boy’s sharp eyes that disappeared when he agreed to support the club? The way his voice sounded? His ing braces—

“His passion,” he finally answered, figuring that was a safe and true choice. Hyunjin could appreciate someone who knew what he wanted and worked to get what he wanted, for sure, since he was the same. “Literally, he had his cute little face all up in mine—at least, as close as he can get for his height—talking about how making such beautiful animals fight is mean. I ing agree.”

The boy got Seungmin’s drink and jokingly held the cup up in a mock toast, “to betta fish.”

“You’re on your own, Hwang Hyunjin.”

The next time Hyunjin was supposed to see Jeongin was during the club’s official first day, happening a few days after they met. When he signed up, he had given his contact details along with his name, and was pleased to find that Jeongin had immediately added him on his social media accounts. He knew it was so that the younger boy could invite him to join the Betta Fish Society group and also ask him to like the Betta Fish Society page, but that didn’t matter.

Once his classes for the day had ended and school activity hours begun, Hyunjin made his way to the dedicated room that Jeongin posted about the other day.

When he entered, he was pleasantly surprised to find the other boy already there. On what was supposed to be the teacher’s desk was the same row of aquariums that the older boy saw when he first applied. Each aquarium held just one brightly coloured fish, with black paper covering the sides that faced the aquarium beside it. Curious, he decided to approach Jeongin about it, hoping the younger boy would be pleased that he showed interest.

“Hey,” Hyunjin greeted, coming up behind the younger boy, who had been too busy tending to one of the aquariums to notice him first arrive.

Jeongin immediately turned around at the sound of his voice, with a look of surprise on his features that quickly became a bright smile.

“You’re the one who signed up a few days ago!” He said excitedly. “I was almost thinking you wouldn’t come.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” the older boy asked, sincerely wondering why Jeongin had thought so negatively. He joined the group, liked the pages, even followed the Instagram dedicated to the younger boy’s fishes—Seungmin had called him ing whipped when he found out, declining when Hyunjin told him to do the same—so where did he go wrong?

The other boy’s smile wavered a little bit, “sorry, it’s not you, I was just worried. You’re, uhm, the only one who signed up all week.”

The revelation immediately made Hyunjin want to hug the younger boy, but knew that wasn’t the most okay thing to do upon meeting someone for just the second time. Was he really the only one who joined the club? He could have sworn the group page had a few people in it, probably not as much as other clubs that was for sure, but a good handful enough. When he brought this up with the other boy, Jeongin had chuckled nervously.

“Those are all my friends who joined the group just to support me, but they’re all already in different clubs since last year and couldn’t sign up for mine,” he explained. “My best friend—his name is Felix—was supposed to be here today if it weren’t for soccer practice. Even he’s not an official club member, though.”

He paused, an embarrassed blush appearing on his face.

“So I’m afraid it’s really just you and me, Hyunjin.”

“That’s fine,” the older boy was quick to say, careful to make sure Jeongin didn’t feel any more insecure about the whole situation. He could tell the younger boy was really excited about the club and its fishes, ever since recruitment week, so it to see how much people didn’t pay attention to it. A part of him felt guilty for joining just because he found Jeongin cute, too, and even guiltier that he felt happy about being alone with the younger boy.

As a way to make up for it, Hyunjin decided that he was going to do his damn best to be as interested in the fishes as he possibly could.

“So, since I’m here, care to tell me more about what we’re going to do?” He cheerfully asked, hoping it would bring the topic back to a happier one.

It worked, thankfully, as Jeongin immediately resumed his bright smile and began to talk more into detail while Hyunjin did his best not to be distracted by how cute the younger boy was and actually listen. He had a total of three different types of betta fish on the table, each one distinct because of the design of their tail. Hyunjin knew a little about them from the Instagram page, but listened dutifully as Jeongin explained the differences.

He even whipped out a book from his bag that was all about betta fish, just to show Hyunjin the images of the remaining fish types he didn’t have.

When the boy ended his explanation, he looked at Hyunjin with both a nervous and hopeful expression, waiting for a reaction.

“I like this guy,” Hyunjin said, pointing towards the one in the middle—a navy and black coloured Half Moon betta. “His name is Pepi, right?”

“Yeah!” Jeongin replied with enthusiasm, nodding his head a little too quickly before catching himself. He stopped his movements as a blush appeared on his features yet again. Hyunjin couldn’t help but take note of just how easy it was to get the younger boy flustered, and he wasn’t even doing anything. Not yet, anyway.

The older boy pointed towards the black cover he was curious about earlier, “why the division?”

“Oh, I keep that there so they don’t ram into the glass and stuff, since it could hurt them. It’s not advisable to keep them together in a tank, and even just seeing another betta fish could cause them to naturally respond,” the brunette began to say with a bit of frown, and Hyunjin realized he’s heard this before. “Betta fish are also commonly called fighting fish, but the reactions they have—“

“It’s really just because they’re territorial rather than purely aggressive in nature, right?” Hyunjin finished, remembering bits of what the boy said during recruitment week. “That’s why you want to stop the mindless fighting.”

As he spoke, Hyunjin could have sworn he heard Jeongin let out a surprised little squeak. He was initially worried that maybe it was a bit rude of him to into the other guy’s explanation,  especially since Jeongin was the club president and all, but that thought easily went away when he noticed the younger boy was blushing yet again.

“Y-you’re right,” Jeongin said, avoiding Hyunjin’s gaze when their eyes met.

Hwang Hyunjin was a lot of things, but dense wasn’t one of them. Still, he also wasn’t the type to jump to conclusions, although it made him happy to think that the other boy was possibly interested in him as well. He knew the main cause for Jeongin’s excitement was since he knew something about betta fish though, the boy’s one and only true love. If he had to keep learning about fishes, then so be it, if it caused such a cute reaction.

“Hey Changbin, do you want to join the Betta Fish Society?”

“Oh, so you’re recruiting now, too?” Seungmin asked with a snort right after Hyunjin spoke, while the third person in Hyunjin’s dorm room looked positively confused. Changbin was technically part of their friend group, although he was also perpetually busy, so he was rarely around and always late to the news. It was no problem since the other two would usually update him eventually, like what was happening right then.

Hyunjin grinned, sitting on the floor beside his bed, “anything for the fishes, dude.”

“For the fishes, sure, and you’re not whipped.”

“Back up,” Changbin butted in, occupying the bed fully so he could get in a more comfortable position. “Let’s start from the top. What the is this about fish? This is the most I’ve heard that word used in one conversation.”

The reaction made Seungmin laugh loudly from next to Hyunjin, while the latter easily explained his situation, ignoring the laughing boy. There wasn’t anything that Changbin ever judged him for, thankfully, so he could retell his story with ease. Cute boy, recruitment week, and fishes. Lots of fishes. At the mention of Jeongin’s name, Changbin looked significantly more interested, which Hyunjin picked up on immediately.

“Do you know him?” He asked after he finished telling them about what happened during the club’s first meeting, something Seungmin has heard before and didn’t comment on this time.

“Not exactly,” the other boy said, suddenly looking bashful. “I know his best friend though. We’re in the soccer team together.”

Hyunjin tried to recall what he knew about Changbin’s soccer team from the stories he’s heard and also Jeongin’s best friend, took in the other boy’s expression, and easily put two and two together. Every now and then, whenever he was around, Changbin had one topic: this amazing new player they recruited for the soccer team just last year. The only freshman with potential, although the way Changbin spoke about his freckles more than his soccer moves always gave him away.

“You’re telling me Felix is the freshman who caught your eye last year?”

Instead of answering, Changbin threw the nearest pillow he could find at the younger boy’s head, which the latter easily caught since he was so near. With the change of topic came Seungmin’s interest in the conversation again, as he quickly got the same pillow and threw it back on the bed towards Changbin with a wide, eating grin.

“I guess you are joining the Betta Fish Society, then.”

“I can’t, I have soccer,” Changbin said in his defense. “Plus, so does Felix, so I have no reason to join if I already regularly see him.”

At that, Hyunjin remembered something Jeongin mentioned about Felix supposedly dropping by whenever there was no soccer practice. He brought this up with Changbin, along with how the club was meeting again that Friday, and whether or not he had soccer practice that day. After thinking about it for a while, the other boy said no. Seungmin could see where the conversation was going before it even happened.

“Hey, I brought a friend today.”

The moment the words left his mouth, Hyunjin knew it was a good idea that he brought Changbin along. He entered the room with the other boy in tow, after enticing his friend with the idea of his soccer boy crush Felix being there, too. When they got to the room, however, it was clearly j