Author’s Note: This story is set in an alternate universe, in an imaginary town and country, and during an ambiguous time period.

“Hey,” Jeon Lani kicked his foot under the table.

He snapped his attention to her. “Yes?”

She gave him a little inquisitive grin.

He returned it and tried to focus on her, but he could not help but do a quick survey of the Starbuck again.

Now that Jaejoong knew that Yunho was a student on the same campus, and that he was his A.aime, he tried to steer away from the science and engineering centered buildings because he knew he was an engineering student. He also made it his mission to stay away from anything athletic on campus and the popular hangout sites. He was especially conscious of the library and the canteens.

Yes, Jaejoong had managed to not bump into the guy, but it had only been a week since that unfortunate day. His luck might run out soon. Jaejoong was tired of anxiety. He was always on guard and hyper conscious of Jung Yunho’s existence. The fear of seeing him as he goes about his day on campus kept him up at night and kept him living in his head and unable to enjoy the moment when he was out with his friends like this.

Jaejoong hated Yunho, that’s a fact. Hoswever, he appreciate that Yunho was not stupid enough to reach out. 

Now, he wasn’t perfect or mature enough to admit that he had not and was not waiting for him to say something. Anything! If it was a mistake like he said and he hadn’t known and wasn’t playing games with him, shouldn’t he be apologizing? About everything! But, he didn’t think he was ready to have Yunho reach out, so he was thankful.

Nothing makes sense.

“Are you looking for someone?”

He blinked hard at her. “Huh?” 

He was really out of it that Wednesday.

She rolled her shoulders and leaned forward, swaying closed to her cup of iced-coffee. “You’ve been looking around since we walked in.”

“No,” he rapidly muttered, rubbing his bottom lip.

She cocked an eyebrow.

He shrugged at her and gave her a lopsided grin.

She tilted her head questioningly, but shrugged once more, with a hint of a smile on her full, glossy lips.

Lani was a close friend. Someone he had met through the LGBTQ+ society club, and someone he had instantly connected with. Their connection came about not just because of their similar membership to their club, but also due to how sweet, lovely, personable, and attentive she was.     She reminded Jaejoong of his oldest sister, and when they met he had been homesick and looking for that someone to look after him and simply care that his bed hair was because he had stayed up catching up on homework and was feeling overwhelmed with the world.

“This week has just felt so long, but at the same time, so short,” Lani was rambling, her critical eyes fixated on his face. He couldn’t hold her gaze, but not only was he hearing her words through a filter, he was having to remind himself to periodically survey the restaurant and make sure he didn’t see anyone unsavory in its vicinity, and to also act like he was working on his work.

His frantic worries didn’t make him a good companion.

Jaejoong had thought about skipping his group’s study session that Wednesday evening because of where they would be congregating, the Starbucks on campus, which was right in the library. Which made it all the more worse. 

However, he had a few reasons for not giving into his fears. The fear of failing was greater than seeing Yunho, his sworn nemesis, and the person who whenever he thought of, which he did often now—every three seconds, 24/7 a day—he felt as if he was being asphyxiated. 

Jaejoong had never been good at mathematics, but he had always been good at studying and motivating himself to reach out for help in the areas he recognized as his weakness. This study group focused on math, and they were specifically made up of all the students taking statistics, and he needed all the help he could get this semester. Also, Jaejoong loved his study group. The study group was composed primarily of members from the LGBTQ+ society club.

Lani had been the one to make the suggestion that they help each other out. The freshmans would rely on the upperclassmen because they have already taken those classes, and the upperclassmen could refresh their memories and hone their skills in the subjects they chose to tutor.

Jaejoong would forever be grateful to the day he decided to join the club.

In high school, he had been the president of the Straight and Gay Alliance (SGA), and he had loved the organization. That was how he made most of his friends. All of his best high school memories were made through the meetings and the events they partook in as a club. The same thing had happened in university. He had been able to meet so many different people and make friends he saw himself cherishing past university.

Jaejoong tried to focus on the material he was reviewing when Lani kicked him under the table again.

“Could you please stop,” he said, not lifting his head.

“Not until you tell me why you are so nervous.”

“The fear of failing Statistics is keeping me awake at night.” He looked up and his eyes twitched really badly from refraining from looking around to make sure that he was still safe.

She smiled, and sighing loudly and in an exaggerated manner, she leaned back in her chair, running her fingers through her hair, twinging the pink tips around her fingers. She had a lot of thick hair that she wore loose or in intricate braids, and she changed the color of the tips every other week. 

She said, “Tell me about it. As an art student, I just do not see why I am doing this.”

“I regret my majors.” He was double majoring in sociology and computer science. Jaejoong pressed the bottom of her pen in the corner of his closed eye.

“Drop one.”

Jaejoong shook his head. “I need to do something I love, sociology, and I need to have marketable skills to get hired after I graduate and get a high paying job, computer science. I am from an immigrant, Korean, household.”

She laughed. “Relate. Hard.”

He sighed laboriously with her. They laughed.

“I just want to get high,” she said. 

“Don’t you already do that daily.”

“Don’t tell my parents.”

There was a slight pause before Jaejoong smiled, giggled, then laughed. She joined him.

She was one of Bryan’s smoking partners. And they were legit potheads. Jaejoong didn’t know how they got anything done. Jaejoong knows this because he was often present. 

Jaejoong didn’t smoke. He had smoked before and would again, make no mistake. However, he didn’t like getting high. Matter of fact, he wasn’t too keen on getting drunk, too.

While they would get high, he would sometimes have something to drink, most of the time non-alcoholic, and sometimes he’d cook or he’d work on assignments, read, or play games. As they eat, get high, and get drunk, they’d read poetry. Some of it was good, some was horrible poetry. 

Bryan had joked they should just make it a club meeting and titled the club “The High Poetry Society,” after one of his and Lani's all time favorite movie, The Dead Poet Society. That had been vetoed because, as Lani had declared high as a kite, they did more than just read and write poems. Sometimes they’d compose musical scores and spend hours singing this never ending song that they kept on adding lyrics to and changing the tone and tune. And, not to mention their quiet reading and video game playing that they’d partake in, too.

For Jaejoong, it was less about the getting high part and he more so enjoyed their company instead, and it was great. They were great.

He loved university. It was everything he thought it would be. He could be his unapologetic self. He loved that version of himself a lot. 

He sighed again, pressing his eyes shut. 

, why did it have to be Yunho? Why?

University had been great until the whole A.aime thing went down last week. Now, he wasn’t sure, and he hated that this horrendous guy he thought he had left back in his hometown had followed him to his nirvana and he was stifling him, wrapping him in a smothering cocoon of unhappiness.

!

It was so unfair. This world was so unfair, and it was always him. He was always the unlucky one. Always him.

His eyes burned and stung. He wanted to cry.

!