Red Yarn: Chapter 05

            Kyungsoo was feeling extremely confused. He didn’t know whether he should be happy about Jongin’s close proximity and allow him to complete the distance between their lips, or if he should just push Jongin away. Honestly, Kyungsoo wanted their lips to meet. He really did want to know what it would be like to kiss Jongin, but his mind doesn’t want that, no, not even with his heart practically screaming kiss me, Jongin!

            What should Kyungsoo do then? Should he just let Jongin kiss him? But…wouldn’t it be wrong for him to kiss Jongin?

            Kyungsoo mentally nods to himself. That’s right, it would be wrong because Jongin couldn’t possibly like him like that, you know like, like him like him. Kyungsoo suddenly widens his eyes at the thought. “Of course he doesn’t like you like that.” his conscience says quite harshly with a scoff, “He probably only wants to convince you to play as the princess for the winter festival since they need someone to replace Tiffany.”

            Is that really Jongin’s true intention, to only convince him to play as the princess?

            Kyungsoo begins to feel uncertain with himself and for some reason he feels this strange pain gnaw its way into his chest. He slowly loosens his hold on Jongin’s sleeve that he had when they were dancing, and he carefully scans the younger boy’s facial features before sadly looking to his lips, which were still slightly brushed up against his own.

            Jongin’s eyes are now closed all the way as he leans in closer to fully connect their lips together, but Kyungsoo backs away making the slight contact of their lips break apart. The movement causes Jongin to open his eyes in confusion. They finally open up wide when he feels Kyungsoo grab onto his shoulders and push him away.

            Immediately the owl-eyed boy looks down to the floor. Jongin lets out an uneasy breath once he realizes that he had almost kissed his childhood crush. He can’t believe he allowed his emotions to take over him like this, and he was feeling ashamed for making Kyungsoo feel uncomfortable.

            Kyungsoo tries to swallow away his nervousness and wills himself to speak, “J-Jongin…”

            Jongin hastily cuts him off feeling that he should quickly apologize for his behavior, “Kyungsoo, I’m really sorry. I just…I guess I got caught up in the moment…”

            The older just absentmindedly accepts the younger’s apology by nodding his head, “I-It’s alright…”

            “But what I said to you, I meant it.” Jongin suddenly blurts out, “Uh, w-well, what I mean is…that is…I…”

            Kyungsoo raises his head and stares at Jongin with a shocked expression. Was Jongin trying to say that behind his words he was actually kind of confessing to him?

            ‘Be my princess, Kyungsoo.’

            Pfft, yea, right…there’s just no way.

            Kyungsoo just mentally laughs. It was hopeless to think that a person like Jongin would even want to confess to someone like himself. “Remember Kyungsoo, Jongin doesn’t like you like that. He only wants you to play as the princess.” His mind bluntly reminds him. Kyungsoo could only frown. Was he actually hoping that Jongin liked him or something then? The older boy now scolds himself for such foolish thinking. He has no right to wish for such things. He barely even noticed the younger boy’s existence until just recently, but now when he thinks about it, he somehow feels that maybe, just maybe, he has noticed Jongin before, but never took the time to fully understand what it could possibly mean.

            Wait…does this mean that Kyungsoo likes Jongin in that way?

            Kyungsoo was even more confused with himself now. He wasn’t even paying attention to Jongin’s incoherent babbling.

            The older boy finally snaps out of his thoughts when he realizes Jongin was talking a mile a minute. He quickly nudges Jongin’s arm to get his attention before giving away a playful punch to his shoulder.

            “Jongin, don’t play around and say such things.”

            The older meant for his words to come out jokingly since he wanted to believe that the younger was also just joking around, but he could not deny seeing a flicker of hurt pass through Jongin’s eyes.   

            Jongin just awkwardly laughs and forces a smile to appear on his lips, “Right, I’m sorry, Kyungsoo.”

            Kyungsoo’s heart suddenly becomes heavy. Maybe he was wrong about Jongin doing all of this just so he could get him to play as the princess, but Jongin just couldn’t possibly like him. Really, there’s just no way. Even so, Kyungsoo doesn’t like seeing Jongin look hurt like this. He suddenly feels bold and startles Jongin when he reaches out to grab one of his hands into his own.

            “I’ll do it.”

            There’s a subtle silence between them before Jongin finds his words, “What?”

            “I’ll do it.” Kyungsoo repeats.

            “Really?” Jongin blinks, “You’ll really do it? You’ll play as the princess?”

            Huh?

            Kyungsoo’s confidence is now swirling down the drain. Oh, my Krisus, why did he say that? He can’t believe he just agreed to be a part of the play. Kyungsoo let’s go of Jongin’s hand and mumbles, “Ah, n-not as the princess, but I’ll play as the maid.”

            Jongin feels disappointed, but he gives Kyungsoo a radiant smile. Kyungsoo may not be playing as the princess, but he can finally be a bit closer to the older boy now. It’s definitely better than always trying to steal glances every now and then towards Kyungsoo’s corner in the practice room to see if he was still over there or not.

            “Okay then.” Jongin says softly, the smile still placed on his lips. He then places his hands into his pant pockets wishing they were held in Kyungsoo’s hands instead.

            “So how did it go?”

            Jongin gives a long sigh before facing his hyung, “Well, he agreed to play as the maid.”

            Baekhyun nods his head, “Okay, but I already heard that from Joonmyun-hyung. What I want to hear are the details, Kai. You hear me? The details.”

            Jongin blushes and turns his head away from Baekhyun. He can’t tell him that he almost nearly kissed the owl-eyed boy yesterday in this very room. “There’s nothing much to say, hyung.”

            “Oh, please. Your tomato face is telling me otherwise. C’mon, Kai, you can tell me. I’m your hyung remember?” Baekhyun begins to pull on Jongin’s shirt sleeve hoping the younger boy would get annoyed enough just so that he could tell him what had happened.

            Jongin tries to avoid his hyung by making himself look preoccupied with other things. He grabs a pile of random music sheets off from the table that was in front of him and some bags filled with various costumes and fabric from the floor. He then heads his way over to a group of student that were standing nearby the stage. Baekhyun just clutches onto Jongin’s sleeve like the whiny child he is and follows after him.

            “Kai, seriously, if I didn’t tell Kyungsoo that someone had ruined his props yesterday he would have never been in this very practice room with you afterschool so you better tell me what happened between the two of you this instant, or else by Shisus Krist I will find a way to slowly torture you until you tell me. If you want to save yourself from a painful death I suggest that you spit it out now, Kai, so spill it!” 

            Jongin just rolls his eyes and laughs. Baekhyun is always just so dramatic isn’t he?

            “Alright, I’ll tell you, but I’m not going into the details.” Baekhyun sighs at this, but decides to just let it go and impatiently motions his hands towards Jongin to tell him to get on with it, “So…uh, we hugged.”

            Baekhyun grabs the bags from Jongin’s hands and gives them to one of the students who were in charge of the costumes, “Alright, so you guys hugged. That’s good, what else?”

            Jongin starts to blush again, “W-We danced.”

            “Danced?” Jongin nods, “Okay…wait, why would you guys be dancing?”

            “I was singing to Kyungsoo. Um, you know, the part in the play where the prince and princess dance together.”

            “Ah, I see.” Baekhyun then smirks, “Isn’t that also the kissing scene, Kai?”

            “W-What?” Jongin’s cheeks are now a serious flush of red, “Oh, uh, y-yea, but n-nothing happened.”

            Baekhyun squints his eyes and stares at Jongin accusingly, “Boy, are you trying to hide something from me?”

            Jongin shakes his head a bit too quickly from side to side, “N-No.”

            “Kai.” Baekhyun says sternly only to be startled when Joonmyun’s voice coincidently says Jongin’s name at the exact same time as him. Baekhyun and Jongin both turn their heads to the side seeing their hyung walk over to them.

            “Hyung.” Jongin mentally thanks Joonmyun for saving him.

            “Hey, I was looking all over for these.” Joonmyun takes the music sheets from Jongin’s hands before looking up to the boy with his angelic smile, “So, Kai, I just wanted to thank you for getting Kyungsoo to be a part of the play for the winter festival.”

            “Ah, there’s no need to thank me, hyung.”

            Joonmyun suddenly smacks his clipboard right into Jongin’s chest making the poor boy cough out in surprise. The unexpected action caused Baekhyun’s eyes to widen almost as big as Kyungsoo’s eyes since the clipboard nearly hit his face. Well, they both certainly didn’t see that one coming, “I am not happy with the fact that you couldn’t get Kyungsoo to play as the princess though.”

            Jongin and Baekhyun both blink together in perfect synchronization. They both wonder to themselves how Joonmyun is able to keep that angelic smile on his face even when he is angry. Why was the student director, slash, student body president so freakin scary when it came to theatrics? No one will ever know, except for maybe that one kid. What was his name again? Ah, that’s right, it was Lay wasn’t it? That kid seems to know everything…

            “So, uh…” Baekhyun awkwardly claps his hands together trying to think of something to save Jongin from Joonnmyun’s oncoming wrath, “Where is Kyungsoo anyway, hyung?”

            Joonmyun just points to the other corner of the stage right to where the owl-eyed boy was standing. Jongin’s heart rate was already beating like crazy when Baekhyun mentioned Kyungsoo’s name, but now it was about to fly off into the sky when he looked up to see the older boy. 

             Kyungsoo looked a little lost and confused. He was just standing there with absolutely nothing to do. Everyone was busy doing their own thing, either rehearsing over their lines or trying on their costumes, so Kyungsoo felt out of place. He was still cursing himself over and over again for having his tongue slip up for agreeing to take on the maid’s role for the play. At least he’s already memorized most of his lines already. The maid didn’t have very many parts so it was easy to remember them. Besides he’s heard his classmates practice for this play like a gazillion times already so if he didn’t know most of the lines by now that would be kind of lame.

            He’s now fiddling with his fingers as he waits patiently for Joonmyun to come back to him. The student director told him to stay put here until he could give him the music sheets for the maid’s part. Kyungsoo insisted he didn’t need them, but when Joonmyun’s clipboard of death is a possible murder weapon to his demise, he would rather listen and behave like a good little boy.

            Baekhyun turns away from Kyungsoo’s figure and taps Jongin’s shoulder making the younger reluctantly tear his gaze away from the owl-eyed boy, “Well, good luck with practice today, Kai”

            Jongin scowls distastefully when his hyung adds in a playful wink before walking away. Joonmyun just chuckles, so even Baekhyun has figured out who Jongin’s crush was.

            “Oh, I almost forgot!” Baekhyun comes back and hands Jongin a piece of red paper, “You haven’t picked your secret Santa yet so I saved you one.”

            Jongin blinks questioningly at it. He totally forgot about the whole secret Santa thing that Baekhyun was in charge of. He had a feeling Kyungsoo’s name was written inside the neatly folded piece of paper since Baekhyun was the one giving it to him personally. He stared intently at the paper for a few more seconds and then sighed. He wasn’t really sure what to get Kyungsoo as a present.

            “You know what, Kai? Why don’t you give these sheets to Kyungsoo instead? I have to get everybody organized so we can start rehearsing.” Joonmyun gives the music sheets that he took from Jongin back to him, not really paying attention to how panic stricken his face had become.

            Give the sheets to Kyungsoo? After their almost kiss event yesterday, Kyungsoo avoided him like his life depended on it all day today. Joonmyun gives him an encouraging pat on the back before heading over to the large group of students gathered near the middle of the room.

            Jongin just stares quietly at the sheets for awhile before giving himself a little pep talk. Alright, Jongin, you can do this! Just go up to him and give him the music sheets. That’s all you have to do.

            Subconsciously Jongin’s feet carry him over to where Kyungsoo was standing and before he knew it he was in front of the older boy already.

            “Jongin?” Kyungsoo says with surprise.

            “K-Kyungsoo…um, here take this. Joonmyun-hyung wanted me to give them to you.”

            “Oh, thank you.” Kyungsoo carefully reaches his hand out to take the sheets from Jongin’s hand hoping he won’t accidently brush his fingers against Jongin’s skin. He let out a small sigh of relief when he managed to successfully take the papers without any skinship.

            “So, uh, I guess we should go?” Jongin says quietly as he points back over towards to where Joonmyun was standing with all the other students.

            Kyungsoo nods and quickly walks over there.

            Throughout practice, Kyungsoo was trying his best to not be so self-conscious of himself every time Jongin was on stage singing out his parts. Thank Krisus Joonmyun didn’t make them go over the kissing scene. Kyungsoo wasn’t sure if he could handle seeing Jongin go and kiss another girl when just yesterday they nearly kissed. He doesn’t want the memories rewinding through his head right now. Jessica seemed pretty bummed out by it, but knowing she had the princess’s part didn’t really dampen her mood all that much. She definitely liked the fact that now she could now rub it in Tiffany’s face. 

            After practice Kyungsoo was amazed at how smoothly things went. Joonmyun didn’t really lash out as much as he usually did during practice so it was safe to say that things were coming along nicely together. Joonmyun did have to remind Kyungsoo several times to sing louder though.

            “Kyungsoo! Hey, Kyungsoo!”

            Kyungsoo calmly turns around and sees Baekhyun run up to him, “Baekhyun?”

            “Here choose one before you go.” Baekhyun raises his hands up revealing nicely folded up red papers cradled inside, “I’m in charge of distributing one of these to everyone for secret Santa.”

            “Oh, but I don’t…”

            “Ah, ah, no buts. Pick one. You’re a part of this play just like everyone else so you have to take one or else you’re going to make me sad.” Baekhyun makes a puppy face.

            “Um, alright.” Kyungsoo hesitantly says. He then picks a random one from Baekhyun’s hand, but doesn’t open it.

            “Have fun getting him a present, Kyungsoo.” Baekhyun sing-songed as he walked away with a cheery smile.

            “Him?” Kyungsoo whispers as he looks down to the paper in his hands. Finally curious of whom he was secret Santa for he opens it and reads the name written in Baekhyun’s perfect handwriting. It read…

            Kim Jongin.

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A/N:

Go ahead and bash me. I know this chapter is really lame. I also made you guys wait hecka long for an update and all I give you is a lame chapter. I’m so incredibly sorry.  

Things should get interesting in the next chapter though. That’s when the Winter Festival takes place, which means more Kaisoo interaction and unexpected surprises. It might also be the last chapter.

I also got a new poster and background! ^^Thank you ing, I love your artwork. <333

<3 dububrit-on