“I don’t want to fight you in particular. It’s a mask I’m wearing to interact with. I want to fight for you if you’ll allow me.”

Soyeon’s busying herself with separating the large family-sized chips’ bags into three bowls, each bowl with a color representing the chips’ flavor. The soothing low music in the whole apartment reverberating through the open kitchen she’s currently in, fixing up their food, while the rest of the boys are in the living room watching sappy romance movies and laughing at them. She’s not usually the kind to be given food distributing duties, but the scowls Baekhyun has been giving her throughout the day has begun to tire her out, so, as a way of keeping her sanity in the right direction, she volunteered to do their chips. 

Not like she has anything against chips, really. It’s a bit thrilling to be the only one around dozens of bags of different shapes and kinds which she can’t afford some of, her hands dazedly going through one and scooping some, only to go straight to where no one is looking, keeping the sound of the crunch between her teeth a minimal. She’s silly like that. 

Her moment of thrill is sadly interrupted by the same boy she has run away from, the heat of his burning stare and his insufferable body is stuck on the back of her head, leering at her, a predator inside a cage with a prey. She’s not going to acknowledge him; she never does, but he always makes it his only mission to have her eyes settled on him. She doesn’t understand if its an ego test or some sort of he has; keeping his nemesis’s eyes on his for the longest of times, but she learned to ignore Byun Baekhyun’s strange actions throughout time.

True to himself, he kicks his way from the kitchen’s entrance and heads towards her, where he casually stands next to her, eyeing her hands opening up bags of chips and putting them in bowls; his eyes raised up to look at her side profile, the same old scowl he always reserves for her shown clearly on his face. He’s obviously looking for a confirmation of sorts, his eyes beady and open; dangerous, and his body sticking close to hers in front of the counter, hips threatening to touch by a single nudge closer, their shoulders only a brush away, a shadow distance from interlacing. She knows what he wants, but she decides to ignore him. It’s the best of what she can do regarding the boy. 

Knowing that she’s up to ignoring his presence considering that’s the only thing she has been doing to him; he takes things in his own hands. He reaches over her bowl she’s holding and snatches it away from her hands, making her shoot him a look which he doesn’t meet, quickly taking another full bowl she has readied before in his hands. Then, he gives her another look, his eyebrow raised up as if asking her about what she’d do now. Knowing the sort of childishness that entraps Byun Baekhyun’s being, she says nothing and merely returns his look, a similar eyebrow of hers raising up to ridicule him.

He finds it amusing, though, and cracks a small smile, before clearing his throat, nodding his head towards the large blue bowl she has filled first. “I’ll be taking these first.”

“Wait, that’s Suho’s.” She tells him, reaching out to snatch the bowl from his hands, not thinking he’d take it for himself when he already has a bowl in his other hand. Having predicted this, Baekhyun easily avoids her grabby hands by twisting out of the way.

“I’ll deal with that,” he rolls his eyes, “Just settle on doing your work, dearie.” 

“Don’t patronize me.” Despite wanting her tone to come out of her angry and annoyed, it comes out nothing more than a murmur. It’s her time to clear . “It’s really Suho’s, he entrusted me with it because he knows the kind of piggish behavior you guys have. I can’t allow you to have it.”

“Oh yeah?” He challenges, stepping closer to her with eyes flickering alive with flames that always flare whenever he’s around her. She’s giving him a neutral look back; she has seen this look of his a lot in the past month she had met him through Suho. He doesn’t scare her. “What are you going to do about it? Will you drag me down by my collar and pull it away from me?”

She says nothing, her eyes slowly creasing in annoyance because he likes, no, loves to look down at her, like she’s nothing other than a child that needs to be scolded all the time to teach them manners. However, she figured out the harder way what it causes when she gets ruffled and replies back, so she just keeps her eyes on him, irritated and exhausted, lips pressed together silently.

His eyes glint, knowing that she finds him annoying, repelling, infantile and atrocious, every sort of bad synonym that defines him and his actions towards her. He takes a step forward, the sole of his overused sneakers squeezing the floor sounding loud over the silence that enwraps them. “Tell me, dearie, what are you gonna do about it?”

“Maybe it’d be a good idea to talk it with Suho,” She turns around, as if he weighs nothing more than the dust in her shirt, and returns to sorting chips into bowls, not giving in to his childish intentions. She works silently; nonchalantly, and Baekhyun slowly curls his free hand into a tight fist. “It’s his chip bag after all. We’re also in his house, in the honor of his own party. You might wanna have a peace offering in return of his chips, or,” She waves her arm around her all over the different bowls of chips she has readied before, a sort of mock flickering alive in her eyes when she looks at him, her lips pursed in dissatisfaction, “You can choose a different bowl from this large assortment of flavors. Why do you want to pick a fight?” 

Baekhyun swallows his growing nerves, looking away from her so she doesn’t see the growing irritation and anger that swims in his eyes (which she did already see) his jaws locking in their place like an angered child, body tensing up. He takes a deep breath and then turns to her, a diplomatic, thin smile growing on his face. 

“I said I’ll deal with him.” 

“I am on chips duty,” She retaliates, sighing heavily and sounding just tired, “I think it’s better I take his bowl for him.”

“What are you, his dog? Why are you so loyal?” He squints his eyes at her, as if she told him she eats raw worms in the morning for breakfast, the same Baekhyun-scowl coming back on his face. “It’s just a damn bowl of chips he can afford three times over four. You’re taking your doggie job too seriously.”

“I’m the one who takes this too seriously?” She drops her work on the chips to turn sideways towards him, her eyes a little bit bigger than normal in disbelieve and growing, simmering annoyance, not like the previous feelings of hers have gone down anyway. 

Baekhyun shoots her a judgmental look, his eyes were dissatisfied. “Yes, you are. You’re the one arguing about it. I was just going to take it and go.”

“But it’s not yours— you know what?” She sighs deeply, the humming noise of her exhale sounding large in the muffled quietness of the whole kitchen, disturbed by no one but the two of them. “You can deal with Suho’s wrath yourself. I don’t care. I wish he burns you with his expensive lightsaber.”

“That’s the spirit, dearie.” There’s a small, orb-like light that flashes in approval in his brown, dark eyes; his lips quirking upwards to reveal a pleased smile. She just rolls her eyes, fiddling with the bags a little too roughly and expressing her anger. He lingers a little before leaving; she notices him from the corner of her eyes and the sneakered feet of his that still remain on the ground beside her. She doesn’t know what else he wants because the conversation — if it’s called one — is clearly over, and she seems as uninterested in this, whatever it is, as she looks, eyes lazy, half-lidded, and unfocused. What else is there to be said? Especially since Byun Baekhyun doesn’t do conversations.  

He sighs after a few seconds of her actually counting time in her head, one, two, three, until he finally swivels around to leave, his shoulders looking broad in the black tee he’s wearing; big yet soft, also littered with tension so clearly she feels a sort of longing inside of her to placate it. She sighs and looks away. 

When she’s finished with her work; she begins her trip towards the living room with two bowls, leaving the remaining four on the counter to journey back to get them or get one of the sloths lying on the couches to get them for her. The trudge to the living room takes more time than a walk towards a living room from the kitchen should take, but because Suho’s filthy rich, he just likes to have exaggerated things, exactly like this apartment and its humungous capacity. No first years in university should be able to afford things like luxurious apartments in the middle of the capital, but capitalism doesn’t work like that for everyone. She enters the wide living room and glances around at the four long couches being occupied by Suho’s friends, all watching, as she has guessed, cheesy romantic comedies with apt concentration, laugh lines decorating their lips, getting ready for another burst of laughter at the sheer ridiculousness of the movies.

Baekhyun’s eyes instantly flicker up towards her direction when she flutters inside, bearing another annoyed scowl. Suho, who he’s sitting with to share the chips’ bowls after a mini quarrel, notices the younger’s distraction and follows his eyes, beaming happily when he notices her.

“Soyeon,” Suho calls quite happily, patting the other empty side beside him with beaming eyes, “Sit next to me. Let the rest bring the other bowls. Sehun,” Suho kicks his foot on the back of a tall guy’s head sitting down on the marbled ground in front of him, his socked foot connecting with the back of his head rather loudly. “Go bring the rest of the bowls with the rest. There’s dozens of beer in the fridge. Bring that too.”

“You’re wearing a sock from two days ago, hyung,” Sehun whines, patting the back of his head softly with his big, calloused hand, shooting Suho a dirty look. “That’s disgusting, and you touched my hair with it!” 

“I literally just wore these pair today, you bastard,” Suho stares offendedly at Sehun. “Now go bring the rest of the snacks.”

 “Jerk.” Sehun whispers discreetly, standing up with an exaggerated groan to do as he said.

Soyeon takes the place next to Suho much easier now that Sehun’s body wasn’t blocking the way, and almost instantly, Suho leans against her side, fixing his position on the couch so he’s giving Baekhyun his back; lying his head on her shoulder, humming in comfort soon after.  

“Hmm, Soyeon, you make the best pillow,” He mutters sincerely, squinting his eyes at his large plasma TV and trying to read the translation with his wacky eyesight. “You should’ve came here earlier.” 

“So you could use me as your pillow? How nice.” She clucks her tongue, shaking her head at him. Suho simply laughs, wrapping a warm hand around her arm and squeezing, as if telling her he’s only kidding with that gesture. He’s too busy trying to read the subtitles to answer verbally.

Soyeon’s eyes move past Suho’s head when she feels a burning stare, and she meets with Baekhyun’s ungentle eyes. He’s staring at her, she notices, like always, his mouth moving around the bits of chips he stuffed in earlier on. She doesn’t understand what sort of emotion that flashes in his eyes is, but she knows it’s not fond. Ever since she saw him a month ago, and he seems to find faults in her. Every time their eyes meet, he’ll scowl, either looking away after or squinting his eyes more, daring her to look away. She breathes out of her nose, keeping contact with his eyes for a few seconds, a small beat of her heart pounding under her ribs, before she looks away towards the TV, hoping she can drown herself in the stupid movie’s cheesiness instead of Byun Baekhyun’s challenging eyes. 

Suho’s parties actu