Honestly, this is like a...mush, no joke. I just got back from having to read the entire freaking ballot in vietnamese for my super old grandmother (somebody tell me again why she even has to vote.) so my english was seriously off for about an hour. I was like itching to write this in Vietnamese for some reason ._____.

Sungjong let out a shaky breath, watching Hwayoung as she slept. His eyes shifted over to his phone, where the screen was lighting up, continuously telling him that he had four missed calls. Two from Ren, one from Sungyeol hyung, and another from Myungsoo hyung.

               He didn’t know why he avoided picking up, he just didn’t want to. It was one of those times when you had no idea what to do, you’re unsure of everything surrounding you, so you do the easiest thing.

               Sungjong reached over for his cell phone, letting it vibrate in his hand as the “Incoming call: Ren” flashed onto the screen.

               Knowing that it’d be bad to make his boyfriend leave three missed calls, Sungjong picked up. “H-hey…”

               “Jongie? Are you okay?”

               “What? I’m fine…why wouldn’t I be?” Sungjong held his breath and watched Hwayoung slowly let hers out. “Did you…make it home okay?”

               “I’m fine, you don’t need to worry about me.” There was a slight pause, and Ren started speaking again. “How’s Hwayoung?”

               Sighing, Sungjong bent over to feel her forehead. He pulled back instantly when he felt how hot it was. “She’s not doing that well, I don’t think. Her fever hasn’t gone down, and I just don’t know what to do.”

               “Did anybody come home yet?” Sungjong was a bit surprised to hear that, yes, Ren actually sounded worried.

               “No. It’s only 3, the headmaster won’t be coming back anytime soon.”

               Sungjong could nearly hear his boyfriend gulp over the phone. “You know, Sungjong…we have to talk about this later.”

               “Talk? About…this?”

               “You know what I mean.”

               The boy slowly lifted his head to bring it down again, nodding to nobody. “Hwayoung…”

               “Don’t make it sound like I’m a bad person, Jong. I just don’t want to see you get hurt – you…I can see it, literally, I can see how much you love her. And not in the romantic way, in the most friendliest way I can make myself believe. But she’s one of them, and when she just leaves you behind, I don’t want to be the one having to watch you cry.”

               He nodded again, making a shuffling noise over the phone to let Ren know that he understood. Hwayoung was an unpredictable person, one minute she would be willing to sacrifice her entire reputation (and at such an age, reputation was what most people lived for) for him, and the next, she’d leave him quicker than the snap of a finger.

               “I’ll see you later…” Sungjong whispered, pulling his phone away from his ear before Ren could reply.

As he parked his car on the driveway, the headmaster of T-LLIM Academy made sure to pull his keys about before reaching for his briefcase.

               He was tired, and today had been a long day. All day he’d wanted to do was go home and see how his little girl was doing, but he couldn’t. Apparently some kid was marked absent without an excuse, and when the office had attempted to call home, nobody was there.

               “Kids these days,” he muttered, pushing open the door. “Ditching school…what happened to this generation?”

               Shoving his car door back in place and making sure to lock it, the man walked up to the front door and unlocked it.

               “HWAYOUNG!” He screamed, closing the door before flinging his suitcase on the couch. “I’M HOME-“

               He stopped abruptly, staring at the teenage boy that was skipping down the stairs with his index finger over his lips, signaling the man to be quiet.

               “She’s resting,” the boy explained. “Her fever went up by a lot.”

               The man stared at him, dumbfounded. “What…who are you?!”

               “I’m Lee Sungjong,” Sungjong introduced himself before bowing. “I came to check up on Hwayoung a few hours ago…she wasn’t doing too well.”

               “Dammit, I told her to look after herself better!” The headmaster groaned, hitting his forehead with his right palm. “I’m so sorry about that, really. Would you like to have a drink?”

               Sungjong thought about it for a second, then shook his head. “I really need to go –“

               “No, I insist! You’ve done so much, really! Come in here with me.” As he led the way, he began to speak again. “So, Sungjong…Hwayoung hasn’t really spoken about you to me.”

               “Oh, we just became friends a while ago,” Sungjong answered, the word ‘friend’ somewhat tasting strange in his mouth.

               “Ah…” He led Sungjong to the seat, and went to the refrigerator. “When did you get here?”

               Sungjong blinked a bit, unsure of how to answer the question. He was talking to his headmaster, after all. “Um…this morning. I was kind of worried about Hwayoung, so I left school early with my boyfriend and we went to see how Hwayoung was doing.”

               The headmaster’s eyebrows scrunched up a bit as he handed Sungjong a cup of tea. “Boyfriend?”

               The boy gulped, holding the hot cup tightly in his hand. Oh God, he shouldn’t have said that… “Yeah…my boyfriend.”

               As to shock him even more, the man smiled and said, “Well, then I guess I shouldn’t be worried about you making a move on my daughter!”

               Sungjong managed to summon up a somewhat empty laugh.

               Making a move on Hwayoung. He’d never even though about that, has he?

               “No, I guess not.”

Hwayoung awoke to the sound of rapid talking and the occasional laughter downstairs, and she knew all too well what was going on.

               Despite her raging headache, she pushed herself off of her bed and kicked the chair next to it, the one that Sungjong had been sitting on.

               Hwayoung walked out the door, which had been abruptly thrown open, and slowly walked down the steps, hearing her feet bounce against each one.

               “…Would you like some more tea?” Her father’s voice asked from the kitchen, the direction that she was walking to.

               She heard Sungjong answer with a modest “oh, no thank you” but of course, being the person he was, her dad just had to ‘insist’.

               When she had gotten to the door of the kitchen, she stood and watched as her father poured more tea into a cup set before Sungjong, who was sitting on the spot she always sat at in the dinner table.

               “Dad…” Hwayoung said, her voice coming out a lot more tired than she’d wanted it to.

               “Hwayoung!” Sungjong cried, standing up and turning around to look at her all before her father even had a chance to utter a word. “Are you alright?!”

               “I’m fine,” she dismissed, stealthily leaning against the wall beside her to keep herself from falling. “What…were you and my dad talking about?”

               “Nothing!” the headmaster waved, putting down the kettle of tea and rushing over to her. He grabbed her hand, pulling her into the chair across from Sungjong. “Why have you not introduced me to this lovely boy before?”

               I don’t introduce you to any of my friends, she mentally replied. But there was more to this than just that reason alone.

               Hwayoung knew, though, that if she didn’t properly answer her father, Sungjong would get the wrong idea…like he always does. “Because I just met him…”

               And that was when she decided to finally realize that she actually did just meet him – and she’d already fallen for him. Way to go, Hwayoung.

               “He’s a great person, you know,” her dad said suddenly out of the blue. “I’d love to invite you over for dinner sometime, Sungjong. Oh – I’d love to meet your boyfriend, too.”

               Immediately, Hwayoung’s head lifted up and she stared directly at Sungjong, who just shrugged and gave her that ‘what?’ look.

               She wanted to cry, seriously. Sungjong wasn’t supposed to…

               Great. She’d just fallen for a publicly gay boy who probably looked better in eyeliner than she did. Life was just going perfect for her, wasn’t it?

               “I’m pretty sure Ren already hates me,” she muttered unconsciously, dragging her fingers along the side of the table.

               “What was that?” her father asked, though Hwayoung couldn’t tell if he was genuinely deaf or just shocked and had given her a chance to change her words.

               Either way, she didn’t repeat it and instead stood up, pushing her chair back. “Nothing, I just said that I was…tired. I’ll go back to bed now.”

               She avoided both her father and Sungjong’s eyes as she left the kitchen, slowly tapping the stair rail with her fingers.

               When she reached her bedroom, she walked through the open door and made sure to shut the door tight without making a sound. She collapsed onto the bed, trying to forget her headache and heartache.

Sungjong stood in front of the closed door, trying to think that about half an hour ago Hwayoung was standing here.

               She had looked so out of it at the table. A mix of just-let-me-be and can-I-just-die-now? that somewhat scared him.

               He didn’t want to leave the house because, he knew, Ren would want to talk to him – about Hwayoung. What was there even to talk about? Hwayoung was Hwayoung, Hwayoung was his friend that yes, had friends that hated him, but was still the sweetest person he’d ever met.

               But to Ren, and other guys like him, there wasn’t a way to explain Hwayoung without including the part that she hung out with kids who looked down at anybody lower ranking than them.

               Rankings. What were they even? He could literally bet on his life that if he exploited the friendship he had with Myungsoo and Sungyeol, 2/7 of Infinite, he’d be one of the most popular boys in no time.

               “I’m coming in, okay?” He said quietly, pushing open the door.

               Hwayoung was just laying on her bed, turned to the side and staring at the wall. Either she slept with her eyes open or she was still awake, and he chose the second as the more appropriate answer.

               “Your dad left to buy some medicine…told me to look after you for the time being.”

               She didn’t reply, just kept staring at the wall. Her eyes occasionally blinked, telling Sungjong that she was still alive.

               “Are you okay? You seem a bit…dazed.”

               “I don’t feel good, you know that.” Hwayoung cleared , forcing herself to keep staring at the white wall.

               “I know.” The chair squeaked a bit behind her, and she knew that Sungjong had taken the initiative to sit down beside her bed. “You need anything?”

               “I’m cold,” she told him before she could stop herself.

               Hwayoung heard a sigh, then another squeak. There was a little ruffling from the closet, and Sungjong said, “You don’t have any extra blankets?”

               Sungjong looked out the window at the clouds covering the sky, the back down at Hwayoung, who was shaking her head and somewhat shivering.

               He looked back at her closet, which he had to admit had a decent supply of outfits, and pulled out a thick Seoul University jacket. As he laid the hook back inside the closet, Sungjong walked over to her bed.

               “Here. Put this on.”

               Hwayoung forced herself to turn around and sit up, despite how uncomfortable she was at doing so. “T-thanks…”

               She lazily took the sweater from Sungjong’s hands and tried putting it on. Hwayoung sniffled a bit and was about to lay back down when a hand pulled her back.

               “You put it on backwards,” Sungjong huffed, a worried look plastered on his face as he grabbed the ends of the jacket and pulled it up over her head.

               “It’s fine.”

               “Not if you want the hood to shove itself into your face, it’s not.” Sungjong shook his head a bit and turned the jacket around. “Put your hands up.”

               She did as she was told, and the jacket was correctly slipped onto her body. Halfway through, Sungjong heard a muffled, “Why do you even care?”

               His hands froze themselves and he nearly stepped back, but instead, he just sighed and continued on pulling the jacket down. “Of course I care. You’re my friend, alright?”

               “But Ren was right,” Hwayoung said, staring pitifully at Sungjong. Her short hair was messed up a bit, bringing the eye bags out. “I don’t…I can’t bring you anything good.”

               “You were there for me when nobody wasn’t,” he smiled. “And you do realize without you, I would’ve never met Ren.”

               Hwayoung was too broken and just torn at what Sungjong said, she didn’t bother to freak out when he started pushing the loose strands of hair from her face.

               Great.

               So now she was reason her crush was with his boyfriend. Her life was just getting better and better, wasn’t it?

               “…Sungjong?” She asked, her voice sounding a bit meek. Her headache was beginning to grow a bit worse, but she told herself to forget it for a second.

               “Yeah?” He asked, pulling back a bit.

               “This is a bit personal…but…have you ever thought about…dating a girl?”

               Sungjong looked at her a bit strangely, his head titled to the left a bit. “You mean…am I biual?”

               Wanting to cover her face in embarrassment, Hwayoung nodded.

               “I had a crush on Eunjung once, if you were curious,” he laughed. “Does that answer your question?”

               Hwayoung had to cover with her hands to force herself from screaming. Eunjung?! “Wait…really?!”

               “Really.”

               So…if he was capable of liking Eunjung…he was capable of liking her, right?

               Oh, but she couldn’t forget the fact that Eunjung was exceptionally more beautiful than she was.

               “Keep in mind that I had a crush on her.” Sungjong sighed, looking a bit scared at the face Hwayoung had. “I wouldn’t anymore…you know…after what they’ve been doing to you.”

               Seeing that that weird look wasn’t off Hwayoung’s face yet, Sungjong frowned. “Just…rest, alright? You look a bit strange right now.”

               Hwayoung didn’t say anything back, just laid down again. Her eyes focused on Sungjong’s as she said, “If I tell you something, you promise you won’t freak out, right?”

               Slowly, Sungjong nodded. He began to subconsciously pat her back, as if soothing her to sleep. “Yeah.”

               “I have a really close friend, a girl.”

               “…Alright.” He was a bit skeptical about this “girl”. Would he have to interrogate her? Because anybody that dared to fake being friends with Hwayoung, he’d kill on the spot. The Queens were an exception because Hwayoung made him promise not to (and frankly, he didn’t even know why).

               “You ready?” Hwayoung said, her eyes beginning to shut close.

               “I’m ready.”

               “She has a crush on you.”

               Hwayoung kept her eyes close, telling herself to go to sleep. Sungjong’s hand hadn’t stopped moving behind her back, and she wasn’t sure if this was a good thing or not.

               Sungjong didn’t know how to react. Was he supposed to be completely and utterly surprised that there was a girl that liked him? Hwayoung wouldn’t lie to him, would she?

               “That’s nice,” he hummed. “Just sleep for now, you can tell me the rest later.”

               Was he supposed to back off because he had a boyfriend now? Really…what was he supposed to do?

               Though somewhat, he just smiled, because he was so amused at the rather content look Hwayoung had on her face.

YEAHH OKAY SO LIKE THIS CHAPTER IS PRETTY SHORT. I'M SORRY TO you know who you are ;DD

LOL I JUST HAD TO ADD THE ENDING IN. It's like, when somebody tells you that someone else you don't care about likes you, you're just like...mehh, that's nice. That's kind of Jongie's reaction right now because a) he has a boyfriend and b) he has no idea who Hwayoung's talking about♥ BUT YA KNOW HWAYOUNGIE'S ALL COURAGEOUS so she just had to let it out somehow♥

And apologies for the lack of cuddling♥ I MEAN LIKE. EVEN IF MY SISTER WAS COLD I WOULDN'T CUDDLE WITH HER. /shot/

♥ bahahaha so have a great week~ happy Sunday~ (haven't done any hw  yet, woo~!!)

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