A/N: Hello! We welcome you back for the second chapter of double trouble! Both of us would like to thank you for all of the love that the story has received already just from the first chapter!

We hope you continue to enjoy, the story, don't be afraid to comment, we love hearing from you!

Happy reading!

-Arya and Hannah.

***

Kyungsoo shifted uncomfortably at the library table, after the day had ended he had to face the music. And that music was the man sitting across from him, they had been sitting in silence for a good part of ten minutes. Neither of them taking the initiative to speak, he knew on some level that the initial contact was going to have to come from him. 

Especially after this morning. 

Kyungsoo shifted his gaze from the rows of books to actually take a look at the man sitting across from him. Now that the day had gone by and he was a little less irritable and cognizant, as well as the pounding headache he’d had this morning had disappeared. He felt a little embarrassed in all honesty, he wasn’t the type to go around lecturing other people about morals and how to be a decent human. He blamed it all on the lack of caffeine and several sleepless nights.

Besides, he felt he had a right to, especially when the guy was so rude to him earlier.

Or was he?

Kyungsoo took a moment to look at him again, the guy was wearing a light-yellow sweater with washed-out jeans and dirty sneakers. His bag was Gucci, but it was a bright yellow backpack instead of the classy one he saw at Starbucks. Kyungsoo sat back taking a minute to absorb everything. His hair seemed to be shorter and lighter. He also didn’t remember seeing the Frappuccino guy wearing glasses.

Did he really see correctly?

Did he just confuse this guy and snapped at him in front of the class for no reason?

Oh no.

The man across from him stares back once he sees Kyungsoo looking at him, Kyungsoo cleared his throat. 

“So, Jongin right?” He receives a slight nod, the other guy seems hesitant to even speak and Kyungsoo wouldn’t blame him after everything he said. “I’m sorry for how I acted today, when we met at Starbucks, I was running low on caffeine. I tend to get easily irritated.”

“Starbucks?” It was the first time Jongin spoke in a while, he had been awfully silent and Kyungsoo didn’t like it.

 Kyungsoo was puzzled, but instead of asking another question he decides that it's better to just start over. “You know what, it doesn’t matter now. But I still apologize for going at you in front of the entire class like that. I think I got you mixed up with someone else.” He holds out his hand over the table. 

“Let's start over, I’m Kyungsoo.” He offers a smile. 

The ash-blond stares at his hand before taking it and shakes it with a small smile of his own, the moment is over as quickly as it had come. But Kyungsoo finds himself grateful that he was allowing him the chance to start over.

“Whoever crossed you in Starbucks must have left quite an impression.” Jongin mentions, his voice soft, pulling his own materials out of his yellow-colored bag.

What is that, leather?  

Kyungsoo slightly scoffs, an impression was a word to use. “The guy apparently didn’t know what a line was and decided to cut in front of me and everyone else to give his order.” He huffs a little pulling out the book they would need to begin at least outlining the project. “But it’s in the past, I got my coffee and that’s all that matters.” 

He digs through his bag for a working pen. “At present, I think we should focus on this project or at least the outline.” 

Jongin nods in agreement, the pair getting to work. Kyungsoo discovers that Jongin is not really talkative and only speaks when he feels that he has something important to explain. It doesn’t really bother him, all he was concerned with was the fact that the other could do the project properly. 

The pair work diligently for an hour until the sun begins tingeing orange-red light on all of the surfaces it touched.

He yawns as he stretches. “I think this is a pretty solid start for an hour…” the aspiring chef checks his phone, looking at some of the notifications that he had missed. 

A few from the group chat he was in with Jongdae and his other friend Baekhyun, one from his mother, but nothing completely urgent. His eyes traveled to the guy in front of him. How could his mind play such tricks? The more he stared at him the more convinced he was that Jongin was a different person. He didn’t know how to explain it but there was just a different feel to him. Jongin didn’t seem to be a jerk at all. He finished packing his stuff, finally looking back at Kyungsoo with a polite smile hanging from his lips.

“I’ll get going then.” He grabbed the yellow bag and stood up from the table, bowing slightly and walking away. Kyungsoo looked at him as he left, wondering about a lot of things, but not really wanting to put any of those things into words and run the risk of going insane. He suddenly remembered they hadn’t agreed on a time to meet again and work on the project or either get his contact information to discuss it later. Kyungsoo let out a sigh as he packed his stuff as well.

I’ll probably see him around.

Kyungsoo exits the place without another thought, instead, spending the rest of the night doing other assignments for his other classes, including finishing up a mock menu. This kept him up at an ungodly hour, the next morning he’s back on his familiar routine and probably hopped on too much caffeine. 

But no one or anything was going to stop him from achieving his dream, not even a slight caffeine problem. So far this morning, things were going well, he had woken up on time despite his late-night, had a decent breakfast and now he was going to get his fuel. 

He walked into the Starbucks, taking in the smell of coffee and instantly feeling like home. He got in line as soon as he arrived and waited patiently for his turn to arrive. So far there hadn’t been any people trying to cut the line and he’s able to order his coffee in peace, while he’s waiting, he spots a familiar face sitting at one of the tables, staring back at him. He waves awkwardly and when he finally reaches the front of the line he puts in his order. Kyungsoo avoids looking back at him until he gets his coffee, he sips on it as he walks over to Jongin. 

“Hey,” He greets taking the seat across from him. “I was thinking about the project yesterday and came up with a few more ideas.” He opens his phone to enter a new contact. The guy in front of him just stares deeply, a corner of his lips lifting in a half-smile. He rests his elbow on the table and his chin on his hand as he watches Kyungsoo looking down at his phone.

“So, you are a regular here.” He mentions. He had hoped it was that way.

The statement has him looking up from his phone to the man sitting across from him, a smirk gracing the features of his face. It’s then that he does decide to take a closer look. He notices that there is something weird, a different feel he might say, but he’s not really sure. 

“Yeah, I guess? Gets me through the day.” He answers, the question settles in his mind, the dude from yesterday had asked him the same thing. There’s something there but he can’t put his finger on it.

Weird. 

“Anyways, I remembered I didn’t get your number yesterday before we left the library.” He slides the phone over on the table. The other guy picks it up, his eyes travel from Kyungsoo to the smartphone on his hands. He raises an eyebrow before typing in his number carefully.

“I didn’t know it would be this easy.” He murmurs. 

Without saying anything else, he hands the device back, offering it instead of just sliding it back like Kyungsoo did. Kyungsoo attempts to take it from his hand but he doesn’t really let go immediately. They stare into each other’s eyes for a moment, Kyungsoo feels the heat rushing to his cheeks for no reason. Jongin lets out a laugh before letting it go, Kyungsoo clears his throat, putting the phone back where it was.

“Thanks, I’ll send you a message later on.” Kyungsoo stands up. “Ah, I guess I’ll see you in class.” 

“Oh, I’ll see you, don’t worry.” He replies, taking a sip of his own coffee. 

Kyungsoo doesn’t think much of it and just leaves, not knowing he has eyes on him. The other man drinking his chocolate chip Frappuccino and thinking maybe buying coffee outside wasn’t so bad after all.

Meanwhile, Kyungsoo feels relieved just as he walks out of the establishment. He didn’t understand anything but he wasn’t going to break his head trying either.

*** 

Later that day Kyungsoo walks out of class, to find Jongdae and his other friend Baekhyun waiting outside for him. He had just spent the most boring two hours of his life and he felt like the teacher just drained his energy completely. Kyungsoo wraps his arms around each of his friends and just lets them put up with his weight, which is not really that much, he groans when they both laugh at him.

“I thought I was going to die in there.” He mumbled against Jongdae’s shoulder.

“It was that bad huh?” Jongdae softly patted the back of his head, in part amused by the situation.

“You have no idea.”

“Should we go grab something to eat?” Baekhyun suggests. 

It was like turning on a switch inside of Kyungsoo’s body, he pulls away and nods enthusiastically about the idea, his stomach also agreeing with a loud noise. “Will you cook something?” Kyungsoo’s smile faded instantly.

“Does it look like I have the energy to cook right now?” He glared at his friend, hitting his forehead with his index finger, the other protesting.

“We can always go to the cafeteria,” Jongdae says, getting in the middle of them. He didn’t want them to start arguing in the middle of the hallway.

“I’m tired of their food” Baekhyun responds, rubbing his forehead “Let’s go outside”

“Oh, let’s do Subway!” Jongdae almost laughed at how both Kyungsoo’s and Baekhyun’s eyes lit up at the suggestion. He knew his friends too well. 

They decided on that and walk towards the exit. Baekhyun speaking about how his literature teacher unfairly graded a paper based on pure nonsense, Jongdae promises to check it out and Kyungsoo can barely listen above his starving stomach. Soon he spots Jongin sitting on a nearby bench talking to another guy, well, not really talking but listening, as the other guy was doing all the talking. Kyungsoo had forgotten to text him but since he was there, they could agree on a time to see each other and continue working on that project.

Kyungsoo informs his friends and walks over to the two guys.

“Hey,” He greets. Jongin looks at him and smiles politely, while the other guy just waves at him without saying a word. “I have some time today after six. Do you want to meet at the library to continue the project?”

“Sure.” Jongin agrees. Kyungsoo then notices that he has changed his clothes, he is now wearing a blue shirt with again washed out jeans, his feet weren’t fully in his sneakers, his heel sticking out and stepping on the shoe’s material. Kyungsoo wondered if he changed clothes in between classes. It was obvious that this guy had money, judging on the brands he used but…

Was he ok? Who changes clothes that often?

“I’ll see you then.” He says before walking back to Jongdae and Baekhyun. 

“Everything alright?” Jongdae questions as he sees the puzzled expression on his friend's face. 

“Yeah, I just…” He looks back briefly at where Jongin and his friend were sitting. He shakes his head. “Let’s get something to eat, I think I’m going crazy.” 

The trio makes it to the establishment, laughing and talking their way through the meal. It was a welcome distraction for Kyungsoo as he was able to forget the weirdness he’d been experiencing over the past day and just laugh with his friends. But soon enough he departs from his friends heading back to the library early so that he wasn’t trying to rush anywhere.

When he arrives he finds that he is the first one there, he grabs a table, booting up his computer and taking out his notes. He spends the next few minutes looking through emails and looking at other assignments he had to do later. When he does eventually look up from his phone, he sees Jongin at the library entrance searching. 

“Jongin!” He calls, at least as loud as he could in the space waving his arms in hopes of catching his attention. 

Luckily this works and the other student waves back, his bright yellow bag making a slight thump as it meets the surface of the table when he arrives.

“Sorry for being late, something came up unexpectedly.” 

“It’s alright, you made it,” Kyungsoo assures as Jongin sits down with all of his things on the wooden table. 

The pair once again work in harmonious silence, only speaking when they had something to add or point out. But it wasn’t an awkward silence, it was probably the most comfortable he had ever been in silence with someone, especially someone that he doesn’t particularly know well himself, it was a surprising fact that he found, perhaps this project was going to be easier than he thought. He thanked whatever college gods were watching over him for giving him such a diligent working partner, he'd had the complete opposite before and he didn't want to ever be in that position ever again. 

He thinks that at this stage in the game he might actually hurt someone if it came to that, though the thought of his dream might be the only thing standing in the way of that aspect. 

All in all, he was grateful for the stress relief that this would bring to this part of the semester. So far it seemed that he could trust Jongin to keep up with his half of the workload, thinking of this, he wonders exactly how he had never noticed Jongin before this semester in class. 

He was certainly someone hard to miss, especially with the way he dressed every day, and he feels like he would have heard some talk around campus about him if he truly has the fan club that he says he does. 

Although he knew that he had a tendency to not pay attention to anything that wasn't particularly affecting him in any way. It was a double-edged sword, as it kept him out of the drama, but it also meant that his mind sometimes dismissed small details that his friends told him. Not that he had meant to, his brain just filtered them out, especially if he was focused on anything having to do with cooking. That was his zone, and nothing save a fire could pull him out from that, it was one of the few things he held immense pride in. 

"Say, Jongin," Kyungsoo started. 

Jongin stops typing on his computer giving the other student his full attention, Kyungsoo knew that this was the sign to go ahead, as it seemed he chose to give a lot more silent cues rather than straight verbal ones. 

"This is going to sound weird, but my friend told me that you have a fan club," He lets out a little laugh at the statement at how ridiculous it sounded. Jongdae could have been messing with him for all he knew, and Kyungsoo wouldn't put it past him either. "Is that true?" 

Jongin regards Kyungsoo for a moment, he can feel that bubble of uncertainty building up in his chest, so far Kyungsoo had been nothing but nice and a great working partner. But he could help that part of his brain that was ringing alarm bells that go off when there was the potential for anyone to possibly use him. 

"Ah... I guess I'm pretty well known on campus." He answers. 

Kyungsoo nods, looking thoughtful. "I see, sorry for the weird question." And then he didn't say anything else as he returned to his research, saving another source that could possibly be useful for them in the future. 

Jongin is still kind of frozen in place, hands just hovering over his keyboard. Kyungsoo didn't know who he was?

"You don't know who I am?" The question comes in a rare moment of impulse, brown eyes hesitantly curious. 

This brings Kyungsoo out of his own work, as Jongin rarely asked questions outside of school work. This causes him to laugh a little nervously once he processes the question. 

"As terrible as it sounds since we've had the same class since the beginning of the semester? Yeah, I didn't know who you were." 

Great, now he probably thinks I'm a little bit of an , he winces internally. 

"No, No it's fine. Just..." Jongin trails off, shaking his head before he himself goes back to work on his computer. 

Kyungsoo takes the response for what it was and decides not to push any farther for an answer, they return to a steady stream of work. And when the sun had gone behind the clouds, Kyungsoo realizes that he had stayed just a little bit too late, although productive he realized that he was more than likely going to be up later than he wanted to be. 

"Sorry, Jongin but I've got to go," Kyungsoo says shutting the laptop, and beginning to stuff things inside of his book bag. 

As Kyungsoo rises from the table, he's stopped from leaving immediately by Jongin's lightly tapping his own. 

"I need your number," He says as Kyungsoo continues to just stare at him. "You know for the project and stuff like that..." Jongin diverts his gaze.

Kyungsoo's brow furrows, either he was completely losing it, or the guy had purposely given him the wrong number. But he really didn't have time to contemplate the implications of this situation. 

"Give me your phone." He says instead, Jongin handing over the yellow iPhone, Kyungsoo entering his number without too much thought. 

"Just text me when we should meet up next, or if you have any questions," Kyungsoo says, giving a polite bow to the other before leaving the library, he didn't know what was going on, but there was certainly something happening. 

Whether it was him actually going crazy, or whether it was something on Jongin's end, he really didn't know. 

Nor was he sure that he wanted to actually figure it out.