He'd been so determined to tell Chunji the truth about why CAP had spoken to him during their English class the previous day. He really had been planning on telling him the first moment they were alone.

But things hadn't quite worked out according to plan.

The first moment they'd gotten alone, all Chunji wanted to do was to jabber incessantly at him about how he'd spent the entire class talking with CAP the day before. He was so happy, his eyes shimmering in his glee about the incident, as he relayed every second of it to him. Even going so far as to try to match the tone, speed and pitch of every sentence the other boy had uttered to him.

From the way Chunji told it, he had a feeling he'd been repeating the same story to himself all night, trying to convince himself that it had really happened. The thought that he could be so deliriously happy about the small incident, served as the first blow to his resolve.

He'd still tried to talk to Chunji about it gently, suggesting that perhaps, spending an hour discussing a class assessment and how to approach it, might not be tantamount to a declaration of love, but the older boy would not be persuaded. He had argued instead, that it was clear evidence that the plan was working.

The plan was to be the smartest boy in the grade in order to get CAP's attention, and make him fall in love with him. He had performed exceptionally well on the first task, making him the current smartest boy in the grade. As a result of that, CAP had paid enough attention to him, for them to talk for an entire lesson. Ergo, his plan was succeeding.

“At this rate, Minsoo will be mine by the end of the year. Maybe sooner!” he'd cried, ecstatically, as he jumped up and down. But before L. Joe could about the fact that he'd finally admitted he wanted CAP romantically, he found himself locked in the other boys excited embrace.

Chunji's breath had rushed onto his neck, making him want to shiver, but he suppressed the urge for fear that doing so would cause the moment to shatter. It felt so nice to have Chunji's arms locked around him. But then, hugs between friends, always did feel nice. The moment was over in an instant, but L. Joe told himself not to dwell on it, or try drawing the other boy closer again, despite the strong desire to do so.

“It's all thanks to you. Thank you L. Joe! I couldn't have gotten here without your help!” Chunji had squeaked, excitedly, bouncing around in joy. Chunji was so happy at the thought that CAP wanted to speak to him; that there was a chance that the other boy might be starting to like him.

What could he do to protect his friend, now that things were like this?

- -

L. Joe blinked lazily as he made his way to school, trying to convince himself that he needed to hurry up and get there or else he'd be late. Usually he didn't hurry in the mornings. He liked his sleep, and had trouble getting up on time. If his mother didn't have to go to work early, he'd never have the chance to sleep in, but as it was, he was left alone in the mornings. If he actually had Niel or Chunji in his first class, he might've been more inclined to get up on time, but, he was alone for his first class.

So under normal circumstances, L. Joe would've slept in for an extra 20 minutes, than he had that morning.

He yawned, trying to force himself to stop feeling so grumpy, about the fact that he was awake. He kept trying to tell himself that 20 minutes didn't mean that much, but when it made the difference between getting 5 hours sleep, and getting about 4 and a half, it meant more than a meagre 20 minutes.

He had to keep reminding himself why he'd bothered to get up at this time, to try and stop himself from turning around and going back home. That there was a very good reason why he was going to get to school on time today. A good reason why he'd have to be coming in on time everyday from now on, but even that failed to assuage him. The decision, despite how much he stood by it, still left him feeling unsettled.

For the past few days, he'd found himself thinking about Chunji's crush on CAP and what he was going to do about it. The happier Chunji was, and the more convinced of his own success he got, the more worried L. Joe felt for him. Because regardless of what Chunji thought, no matter how CAP might make it seem, there was just no way that CAP was ever going to care for him. And the more hopeful Chunji got that things might work out, L. Joe found himself fearing the day Chunji got rejected once and for all.

He liked Chunji. He was interesting. Whenever they were able to talk, they tended to get along pretty well. Though L. Joe got quite a bit of enjoyment from their bickering too. Regardless of what their relations had been like, Chunji never seemed to put a lot of attention towards L. Joe himself. He liked that, in a way. He liked being able to step back, and focus on something else: someone else for a change. As far as L. Joe was concerned, the two of them were friends. Probably really good friends.

He didn't want his friend to get hurt. But the ending he saw coming from Chunji's confession, could only get a thousand times worse, with how hyped up Chunji had been as of late about the whole thing. The outcome of his confession might destroy him: sending him into a spiral of depression maybe even suicide. L. Joe wouldn't put that sort of melodrama past him.

The only kind thing he could do would be to intervene in some way. But trying to talk about it, had never worked thus far. He didn't have the heart to confront Chunji with the truth. But CAP had made it perfectly clear he had no intentions of changing his opinion about Chunji. So what could he do?

He'd been pondering the matter for days, before he'd finally had an epiphany. He'd been about to give up on it all, tossing those thoughts aside bitterly, annoyed at his inability to figure out a solution. He'd almost resigned himself to accepting that once Chunji came top of the grade, he'd confess to CAP and get rejected, and he'd just have to accept that it was inevitable.

But then that thought struck something within him. The words were turned upside down, and he couldn't help crowing in triumph. Finally, these thoughts would stop bothering him. He had the perfect solution.

All he had to do to spare Chunji's feelings, would be to stop him from coming first. Without that background, Chunji wouldn't have the guts to even try revealing his feelings to CAP. He'd been told that many times now. Niel had told him that the only reason Chunji was going to confess to CAP was because he came top of the grade; that's the reason he hadn't confessed his feelings yet, because Minyoung came top of the grade the previous year, and so now CAP liked her.

Though thinking about that, L. Joe couldn't help but find it odd that he'd never heard CAP mention her to him before. Weren't they supposed to be friends?

This left him with two options. Either he could sabotage Chunji's attempts to study. He had a feeling that he couldn't keep that up for the rest of the year. It wouldn't take long for Chunji to stop him from interfering, if he could manage to do it at all. He had a feeling Chunji would kill him sooner than let him touch that precious notebook of his.

So that only left him with one way to interfere. To steal first place from him. If he could beat Chunji, and get first place instead, then he wouldn't have to worry about Chunji getting hurt anymore.

But to do so, he would have to start taking his studies more seriously again. He would need to pay more attention to his assessment tasks, and actually show up to class and do work more often. But he knew he could do it. He'd been a good student up until this year. He might not have been perfect, but he was reasonably confident that he could compete with Chunji.

It shouldn't even be that difficult. They'd only had one assessment task thus far, and he was only a few marks behind Chunji, without really trying. Not that he'd ever bothered to tell anyone else about that. Especially not Chunji: he wouldn't even realise that L. Joe was a contender, until it was (hopefully) too late.

But the thought of doing this sort of thing again still left him unsettled. He'd been adamant that after last year, there was no way that he was going to try and draw attention to himself, academically, ever again. He hadn't wanted to try and step into the limelight. That's what had caused him so much trouble, the previous year. He didn't want to repeat it.

But at the same time, he knew it was the only feasible way to look out for his new friend, so what could he do?