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She and Baekhyun are still on the phone, talking for more than three hours but never out of topics because they talk about almost everything—sharing a bit of their childhood, their most and least favorite memories, school stuff like friends they both know and what they love and hate about some teachers and so on. Haerin throws in a bit savage lines here and there while Baekhyun slips in his flirty jokes. Haerin can feel her cheeks ache for smiling too wide and too long. But she loves it because their conversation makes her stress earlier away, hiding at the corner of her brain.

Haerin feels like the time flies so fast. For when she glances at the clock on her wall, it is ten minutes to one in the morning. Her sharp gasp making Baekhyun halts in his speech. He asks what is wrong, worry is evident in his tone.

“Baekhyun. It’s almost one in the morning. We have school tomorrow morning!” she shrieks, changing her position to a sitting one now.

Despite Haerin’s panic, the boy chuckles in amusement. There’s a sound of rusting in the background. Then, Baekhyun finally says that they should hit the bed, avoiding being late arriving school tomorrow.

“See you in the dream,” he says in a sing-song manner.

“To kill you? Absolutely.”

“You are too violent,” he snaps back, triggering a giggle out of Haerin’s lips.

“Haerin,” Baekhyun calls suddenly and Haerin hums. “Goodnight.” His voice low and gentle at the same time and from it she just knows confidently that the boy is smiling to himself.

Haerin bites her lips, forcing the heat on her face to quickly dissipate.

“Night,” she ends before finally ending the call.

Haerin lies on her side, biting her thumbnail as she is deep in thought. It’s apparent that she and Baekhyun has gotten closer which is natural for them mostly stuck with each other for the sake of their plan. But Baekhyun’s behavior towards her seems to have changed recently. Haerin has an inkling about it but doesn’t dare to actually say it out loud. She has gotten scarily comfortable next to the boy too to the extent that it seems like kissing him is no big deal but it is something at the same time. From the start, the two of them is the least closest within their circle of friends and seeing their rapid closeness is a bit scary to Haerin.

Putting that aside, there’s still something what Sooyoung had said had bugging her in the back of her mind that not once or twice she thought of telling this to Baekhyun and asking for his opinion. Though, for now, Haerin honestly thinks maybe this relationship which isn’t real in the first place should stop soon.

Haerin makes a quick trip to turn off her lights before lying back on the bed. Acting like the sudden heaviness on her heart doesn’t bother her at all.

⏩

The next morning it’s not surprising for the both of them looking like zombie due to lack of sleep. It’s a struggle to stay awake in class. Haerin already yawns the nth time while Baekhyun next to her is in the brink of dozing off with his head nodding and eyelids fluttering. As Haerin glances at Baekhyun again, this time the boy has finally submitted to his sleepiness. She leans her forehead on her palm, staring at Baekhyun, noting his eyelids shut, lips parting just a little, his head tilting to one side, and his chest visibly going up and down. For a moment, Haerin forgets her own sleepiness as her inside having this fuzzy feeling watching Baekhyun’s sleeping face.

Then the bell finally rings for lunchbreak. Baekhyun startles from his seat. His brown eyes peek through his eyelids still in dazed. He can hear his classmates saying goodbyes to their teacher as he stretches his limbs and stops half-way when he realizes Haerin is staring at him. He can feel the warmth crawling to his cheeks but one side of his lips tilts up.

“Hello there, Sleeping Beauty,” Haerin greets.

“Have you been staring me? That’s just creepily romantic.”

Haerin snorts at his words, not bothering to answer him. They both stand up from their seats when they see Jongdae who is also in the same class with them is approaching to go to the cafeteria together. But Haerin says she’ll skip lunch today and take the time to take a power nap at the library. Because the next class they have is Mr. Jang and his class is the most boring class ever. She afraid she’ll fall asleep and get into trouble.

“Yeah, you two look tired today. What did you guys do last night?” Jongdae asks as they walk out their classroom now.

But nobody bothers to answer him because of different reasons: Haerin purposely avoids him, feeling a bit shy to reveal to her friend it’s because she and Baekhyun were in a phone call until late at night forgetting the time, while Baekhyun busy worries about Haerin that Jongdae’s question doesn’t even go through his ears.

“Are you not hungry?” Baekhyun asks, frowning at the girl.

Haerin waves her hand absentmindedly. She’s way more sleepy