It was a hectic morning in KBS’ variety show department. A special episode celebrating Happy Together’s anniversary was about to start filming, with a series of special guests and old friends of the hosts. Consequently, Sehun and Hayoon had been sent off to help as the variety show department was understaffed.

As Hayoon was acting as liaison between the managers of the celebrity guests and the PD, she could not help but be impressed with Jackson. The blond male who had always shown a playful and boisterous persona was surprisingly hard working and immensely focused when completing his assigned tasks, not once complaining. Sehun on the other hand was another story, he was still displeased that he had to work on his supposed day off, but Hayoon could not blame the male as they both had finished late the day before due to technical difficulties that had occurred with the Music Bank stage.

Any sympathy Hayoon felt towards Sehun however soon dissipated as she caught him blatantly flirting with the stylist of one of the celebrities. Shaking her head, Hayoon mentally rolled her eyes.

“Hey intern, go bring water to the waiting rooms.”

Nodding, Hayoon headed towards the storage room where boxes of water bottles were stacked on top of each other. Inhaling deeply, Hayoon reached for one box, stumbling back due to its weight. Turning around, she came in contact with another pair of arms that easily grabbed the box from her.

“I’ll take this,” Jinyoung muttered. “They said to bring snacks too, so you can carry that. It’s lighter.”

Pushing her hair out of her face, Hayoon pushed aside some random items, finding the bag of snacks that had been prepared for the guests. Exiting the storage room, the two wordlessly walked down the corridors.

“I had an interesting conversation with Jackson the other day.” Hayoon broke the silence, paying close attention on Jinyoung facial expression.

“Huh.” The male coughed awkwardly. “Did he make a fool of himself?”

“He assumed that you are terrified of me because of a bad hook up where you, in his words, underperformed,” mused the girl. “What do you think?”

Hearing this, Jinyoung stumbled on his feet, almost dropping the box of water he was holding. Whipping his head towards Hayoon, the male had a horrified expression, the tips of his ears turning red.

“I swear it’s all him. I said nothing of the sort.”

“His other theory involved Sehun.” Hayoon chuckled. “I think his idea of university life has been overly influenced by k-dramas.”

Taking pity upon the male who looked like he wanted to dig a hole in the ground Hayoon continued talking.

“You don't need to be so weary of me you know. I don't go around snapping at people. We just happened to meet under rather unfortunate circumstances.”

“That would be a major understatement,” Jinyoung mumbled. “I have no idea how Chanyeol got out of it alive. I thought he would have been skinned alive the moment you confronted him.”

The moment he said that he regretted his words. Jinyoung flinched internally, fearing he might have tread into forbidden land by bringing up the name. Giving her a tentative glance however, he was shocked to see the bittersweet smile on her face, her eyes cast downwards she held back a wave of unspoken emotions.

“It wasn’t really my battle to fight.”

“Was it not?” Jinyoung muttered under his breath, but it went unheard as Hayoon was already knocking on the door of the first waiting room.

・・・

“Cheers for a surviving one hell of a day!” Jackson shouted, clinging his glass of soju loudly against Sehun’s.

Sitting in a restaurant near KBS, the four KNUA students were filling their empty stomachs with tteokbbeokki and soju — as Sehun put it, the ultimate combination.

Munching on a piece of tteokbbeokki, Hayoon stared at Sehun and Jackson, amused at how easily the two had bonded, granted the process had been greatly facilitated by the empty bottles of alcohol laying in front of them.

“Yah Wang, go easy,” Jinyoung warned. “I’m not dragging your drunken back.”

“Don’t be a spoilsport,” Jackson whined, downing another shot of soju. “We need to let loose, let loose!”

Shaking his head, Jinyoung downed a shot of soju himself, deciding that the blond male was not worth the trouble. He then turned to Hayoon, tentatively initiating a conversation with the quiet girl.

“Will you need to carry Sehun back if he gets drunk?”

Lazily throwing Sehun a side glance, Hayoon sipped on her glass, swirling the liqueur in before swallowing it.

“He’ll have to beg for it.”

“You truly are terrifying,” Jinyoung mumbled, his chopsticks reaching for the large plate of tteokbbeokki.

“You should be more worried,” Hayoon added. “Jackson doesn’t seem that good at holding his alcohol.”

“He’ll have to make himself handle the alcohol then,” Jinyoung stated with determination, feeling no ounce of sympathy for the blond male.

Silence fell between the two again. Shifting his attention towards Sehun and Jackson, Jinyoung immediately gave up trying to join their conversation as they had dived into a discussion about the hot female stylist that was there today, and how Sehun had failed to get a date with her. From how uninterested and indifferent Hayoon was behaving, it was