A warning, this chapter's like a big mess 'cause it's 12:02 am and I honestly don't know what I've been doing all day =.=" homework took be about fifteen decades to do 'cause my fingers were freezing up and in my mind it was about -1000000 degrees, kay.

“You know who I really feel bad for?”

               Sungjong took a quick bite of his chicken before saying, “Who?”

               “Vegetarians.”

               Really, he wasn’t surprised. It was such a Hwayoung-thing to say. “So, not Soyeon for being neglected or…no? No? Vegetarians?”

               “Well, you see,” she started, taking another bite, “we can eat their food, right? But they can’t eat our food. And have you SEEN our food? Look at this stuff!”

               “…You make it sound like they’re a completely different species or something. You know my mom’s vegetarian, right?”

               Hwayoung just laughed, rolling her eyes. There was a very little chance, no matter how much she wished, that Sungjong’s mom was going to be his mother-in-law, so why should she have cared? “I’ll keep in mind not to bring meat to your house when I come over.”

               She casually went back to eating while Sungjong sat still, realizing something.

               Hwayoung had never been to his house before. Not that she didn’t want to, but because he had never invited her. It was all on him – he was literally in her house right now, and she’d never been to his.

               “Hey, are you busy next Saturday?”

               Not even looking up, Hwayoung shrugged. “Saturday’s supposed to be the day in the month that Jiyeon’s parents aren’t home. She throws a party every time and it’s mandatory that all of the Queens come – I get it, she hates me, but she still forces me to go – but she’s really mad at me right now, so all in all, I don’t even know.”

               Before Sungjong could comment on this, Hwayoung muttered, “I’ll ask Sungyeol or Myungsoo. They can ask Jiyeon if I’m coming. Wait…that isn’t a good idea. She has this stupid notion in her head that I jinxed her or whatever, and that’s why Myungsoo didn’t come to the mall.”

               Sungjong waited an extra long time to reply, just in case she’d interrupt him. “You should just go.”

               “Are you crazy? ‘Just go’?” Hwayoung snorted, wiping her fingers off on the napkin set before her. “What if she gets pissed off and kicks me out in front of everybody?”

               “But then again, she’d be even more pissed at you if she expected you to come and you didn’t show up,” Sungjong suggested, smiling as if that could happen over Hwayoung getting kicked out.

               “I’m not sacrificing my reputation on a chance like that happening.”

               “…You’re sacrificing your reputation by hanging out with me,” Sungjong stated, as if that had been an obvious fact that she’d somehow missed.

               “That’s different!” Hwayoung cried. She didn’t know how many times she’d have to stress it to him – hanging out with him wasn’t a choice, it was mandatory for her to. If their friendship ever flopped, it would be her fault. If she didn’t want their friendship to flop, she’d have to give in her all.

               Besides, she had this tremendous crush on him, why wouldn’t she want to hang out with him? Well…except for those Saturdays when she stayed home.

               “Just go,” Sungjong pushed her, his eyes twinkling. “Take me, too. I wanna see what Jiyeon’s house looks like –“

               “NO!”

“UMMA!” Sungjong screamed, looking around the house. “I’M HOME!”

               He yawned a bit, throwing his backpack on the couch and tossing his keys onto the countertop before walking to the kitchen, where his mother was too busy cooking to reply.

               “You’ve been home late these days,” she commented after taking the spatula out of .

               “I know.” Opening the fridge, Sungjong took out an apricot and washed it. “Been at a friend’s house.”

               “Ren?” She asked, a little hint of joy in her voice. She hated seeing her wondrous son so down, and these days, he’d just seemed so much happier. “Because if you are, then I want you to take this batch of cookies to his mom tomorrow. I just baked them!”

               With the thought of inviting Hwayoung to come over still nagging on his mind, Sungjong just smiled and nodded, eyeing the foiled bag of chocolate-chip cookies.

               “Hey, Umma, can I have a friend come over –“

               “Oh, you mean Ren?” Well, freak his mother for thinking the only friend he had was Ren. “Well, sure –“

               “No, Umma, my other friend. I would love for you to meet her, she’s super sweet and she absolutely adores your brownies. Maybe you could make them tomorrow?”

               “Oh, so now you want me to make some brownies for this mysterious girl friend of yours?” She grinned a bit, knowing for a fact that this person was “just a friend” because, after all, it was a girl.

               Sungjong just nodded, smiling and not noticing the shift in his mother’s attitude. “You can come over to my room to talk later, alright?”

               “You’re saying that as if I actually come in with your permission!” His mother called after him, while Sungjong just chuckled a bit and kept walking up the stairs.

Hwayoung picked on the blanket, looking up at her ceiling. Somehow, she noticed, the wall wasn’t completely smooth but rather, they had little specks of pieces building up on them.

               She smiled, although not knowing why, and turned to her side. “It’s dark…”

               It was dark. It was colder too, but that hadn’t come to her mind as she cuddled in her large jacket, the same jacket that Sungjong had once put on her.

               Idly, she reached over to her radio and glanced at the door, making sure it was closed. Hwayoung couldn’t sleep, and whenever she couldn’t, this was her resolve.

               She went past station to station until she came upon a happy song that didn’t talk about love dying, or cheating, or how subtly sad it was. Plainly, a happy song with happy people.

               Most people in her position didn’t take a liking to songs like this, it reflected the love that they wished they had but couldn’t. On the contrary, Hwayoung thought of it as giving up her love to let other people have theirs. It didn’t make sense when you thought about it, but trapped inside her room at 2 in the morning without a thought of waking up, it made complete sense to Hwayoung.

               She’d have these moments of thinking “what if Sungjong did that for me…” but they were soon overshadowed with thoughts of, yes, out there somewhere, there’s a person that’s doing that for somebody else. And that was good enough for her.

               But lately, all she could think about was Sungjong. It’d be Sungjong, then overruled, then Sungjong again, the process was never ending.

When she’d gotten a call on her phone early the next morning, the last person she expected for it to be was Sungjong.

               “Yeah?”

               There was some vivid chewing, followed by “You wanna ditch today?”

               Hwayoung was mortified because one, she was the Headmaster’s daughter, and two, she’d just gotten dressed. And the school’s uniform had more layers than you’d think.

               “Are you crazy?!”

               “Chill, it’s not really ditching. I already called your dad.” There was another slurp, and Sungjong said, “He agreed with me., you’ve been acting really tense these days for some reason. And he said that you haven’t been out for a while. Besides, there’s no way for any of the es to be there since it’s during school hours.”

               Hwayoung just growled into the phone, wanting to kick her table or something. She couldn’t not like Sungjong, not when he was always willing to give up his hours of learning to comfort her –

               “School’s stupid anyway,” he started, as if reading her mind. “The only reason I can go and not kill myself afterwards is you. So let’s go, alright? I’ll drop by your house after I visit Ren.”

               In that one sentence alone, Hwayoung felt her heart skip a beat, then die later on.

               Did he always visit Ren?

               She’d admit it, it was sweet. Anybody would die just to have him as a friend. Letting out a shaky “okay” and hearing Sungjong’s goodbye, Hwayoung put her phone back on her bed.

               Time to choose the outfit.

“Coming!” Ren screamed, yawning as he walked over to the door. He’d been expecting these little calls every morning, Sungjong made sure that he’d always visit.

               “Hey Jongie,” he half-smiled, pulling opening the door. “You good?”

               “I’m fine. I brought you some cookies my mom made.” Sungjong handed the only thing he was holding to Ren, which got his boyfriend into a confused state.

               “You’re not staying?” After all, it was only 7:05 and Ren’s house was about ten minutes away from Sungjong’s school.

               Still grinning, Sungjong shook his head. “I’m taking Hwayoung out in a few minutes, she has too many nerves that need to be relaxed. I’ll swing by later before going home, alright? And if you don’t mind, Hwayoung’s gonna be with me.”

               “…You’re taking her home with you?” Ren asked, the bag of cookies somehow starting to feel sweaty in his hands, although it was nearly freezing outside.

               “Yeah, I want her to meet my mom,” Sungjong shrugged, the stupid smile still plastered on his face. “They’ll really hit it off.”

               No matter what jealousy was boiling in Ren’s mind, he had to admit that Hwayoung and Sungjong’s mom would make a good pair of friends.

               Besides, he wasn’t even in the right place to be jealous. He was the one that had a chance with Sungjong, and if what he’d been thinking was right, Hwayoung was going to be the one left behind.

               “Probably will,” Ren nodded, not too sure if he was supposed to feel bad for Hwayoung or feel good for himself. “Hey, tell Hwayoung I said hi, okay? And tell her to get those nerves loosened. I’d hate for anything to happen to her.”

               And what surprised him was that he meant it. He knew that if anything bad did happen to Hwayoung, Sungjong would be the one messed up more than anything, and dealing with a messed up Sungjong wasn’t anywhere on his bucket list.

               “Will do,” the older boy agreed, still smiling as he backed away from the front porch. “I’ll call you, okay?”

               Ren just nodded before turning back to his house, deciding to call his tutor and say he was too sick to do anything.

When Sungjong had arrived at Hwayoung’s house, he was a bit more than simply shocked that the girl was only sporting a pair of leggings, black high tops, and a thin, long-sleeved white shirt with a white yarn vest.

               “A bit plain for you, isn’t it?” Sungjong teased, waiting for her and she cautiously hopped down the steps.

               Shrugging, Hwayoung replied, “It took about ¾  of the time getting out of the darn uniform, I wasn’t going to spend more than enough time putting on a nicer one. Besides, we’re not going anywhere important.”

               “Well, I was going to, but since you’re not dressed up for it –“ Sungjong laughed, pushing Hwayoung’s hand away from him. “Don’t hit me! I was just kidding, we’ll go anywhere you want to.”

               She just blushed because, actually, she wasn’t planning on hitting him at all. But it was nice to know that he believed she was a violent person.

               “Can we go somewhere quiet?” Hwayoung asked, her voice mildly above a whisper, though she didn’t know why. “It’s been really…I don’t know…loud these days.”

               “Quiet? Oh! I know the perfect place, it’s by the river, actually. Ren and I went there a few days ago when we were walking these dogs that we had to sit. I was meaning to go back sometime with him, but I guess we could go there!”

               The way he said it, how cheerful it was, somehow tore a piece of Hwayoung off. “…I guess…we could…if Ren wouldn’t mind –“

               “Oh, no, I don’t think he even noticed the place! I only stopped to take a look ‘cause the dog…well…basically, it went on the grass. Ren had to pick it up.”

               Watching her crush laugh at the memory, Hwayoung decided to just laugh along despite how awkward she sounded.

Walking hand-in-hand with Sungjong, though not really understanding how they’d got to this point, Hwayoung bluntly listened on about the incident that happened here with Ren – and oh, Ren would like this restaurant right here, better keep a mental note to bring him there.

               “Sorry,” Sungjong said after a while. His right arm began swinging back and forth, causing Hwayoung’s left one to follow. “I keep talking about him, don’t I?”

               “N-no, it’s okay,” she quickly told him. “It’s…really…cute. How everything reminds you of him.”

               “Ren said that too,” he laughed. “I think it was yesterday. I do that on accident, talking about people randomly. He said that I kept talking about you and how everything reminded me of you.”

               “Me?” She turned her head, stopping for a second.

               “Yeah, you. Maybe it’s just a weird habit? Next thing I know, I’ll probably be blabbing to Myungsoo hyung about Sungyeol.”

               Hwayoung shook her head at the thought, telling her mind that Sungjong talked about everybody else, too.

               But it still felt weird. Sungjong thinking of her. Did anybody even think of her?

Sitting on the river bank, though, Hwayoung had something keep playing in her mind. Yesterday night – or earlier this morning, either way.

               She’d talked about sacrificing her love for somebody else’s, right? With…with the happy songs.

               Maybe this was it. Maybe she was sacrificing her love for Sungjong to give to Ren and him, let them be happy.

               Tucking her legs further into her chest, Hwayoung swallowed and knew it was true. Still…she had to test something out.

               “Hey Sungjong.”

               “Yeah?”

               “Can I…can I tell you something?”

               He tilted his head, as if asking her ‘when have you ever had to ask for permission?’ “Go on.”

               She breathed in, then started. “There’s something super, duper, majorly important that I need to tell you.”

               “…Yeah?” He was still confused, because in his mind, that kinda fell under the ‘can I tell you something’ category.

               “…I like you.”

woohoo~ confession time.

I tried to make it as realistic as possible. c'mon, you guys have to have read a fanfic sometime in your life. the girl's always the that ruins that cute boyxboy couple ^^ except hwayoungie isn't really a so like...yeah. c;

KAY OFF TO BED 'CAUSE SCHOOL STINKS.

SERIOUSLY I LOVE YOU GUYS OKAY SO HAVE A GREATTT WEEK.♥ thanksgiving's coming up soon ^^

byebye~

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