65. 2 Books & 3 Photos
[Drabble Collection] One Hundred KissɛsPale, ghostly smoke rises above Taemin's straw colored hair and over his dark, peeping roots. Jongin's mind hazes over as he drags, long and suffocating on his shrinking cigarette. Holding his own stick between his teeth, Taemin uncrumbles the wad of paper in his hand - damn quarterly exam grades. Jongin has long since shot that crap away in the dumps.
"Kim Jongin. Lee Taemin."
Jongin freezes, brain storming ways he could possibly not makes the two of them look at all... in less trouble.
"What do you want, Jung smart ?"
Oh. It's just her. Jongin relaxes, pinching his cigarette between two fingers and drawing it out of his mouth before turning, catching an eyeful of the sharp, jet black hair, long and straight down to her prim, white blouse. The spotless clean uniform doesn't surprise him, no. But since when did Jung Soojung have s? Sturdy, pale legs curving at surprisingly the right places before tucking into neat, black high tops?
She's glaring at him. That's definitely not new.
"The library is right above you. You know that, right? Not like this is the first time I've come explained this, you know?"
Taemin snorts, puffing smoke. He starts burning holes into his exam grade sheet with his half-gone cigarette.
"Soojung, go back to your cutesy studying. We're busy here."
Jongin takes a few, leisurely strolls toward her, blowing smoke in her direction. She frowns, wrinkling her nose.
"It's not like I'm ordering you to stop with the gross smoking. Do whatever the hell you want, I don't care. But just because you wanna die twenty years earlier, that doesn't mean I do. Just take your disgusting tobacco smoke poison way from me. That's all I ask. That can't be too much, right kkam Jongin?"
She thinks she's freaking two-eyed cyclops, protecting some billion dollar cerebro. Jongin doesn't see any dangerous red beams coming out of those pretty brown eyes though.
"Actually, Soojung, you're asking so damn much of us, my brain is about to explode from the stress. I could practically turn you in for life-endangering threat."
There go her nostrils, widening.
"You think I won't get sick of being nice, jackass? You wanna push my limit and see?"
She's so obvious. She might as well have just handed her the damn phone. He knows she always, always carries it in her right pocket, and he knows she's fast but he's faster.
"Yah!"
Jongin wags her phone high up in the air, higher than this skinny girl will ever grow. Sure, she used to be taller than he. Until they turned thirteen.
"Give it back!"
"Why? So you can take pictures of me and Taemin smoking on school grounds? You think I'm that dumb, Soojung?"
Behind them, Taemin stands up from the sidewalk, crushing his cigarette under his foot.
"Jongin, let's go. We've wasted enough of Miss Jung's precious study time."
Jongin looks from the phone above his head to the pretty brown eyes below.
"You want it? You promise not to take paparazzi shots of us?"
She puffs out, one hand on her hip, the other gesturing for the phone.
"Just go. You're not a thief, Jongin."
"Maybe not like this, but you don't know, Soojung."
He hands her the phone, she rolls her eyes, pocketing it just like Jongin knew she would. He smirks at her, before he turns away with a final puff of white smoke.
"If I wanted to, I could just go tell any of the teachers. They'd all believe me without a blink, you know."
Jongin can see right through that fake steel in her voice. What could Jung Soojung possibly hide from him?
"I think you're right, Soojung. But too bad, you can't do that."
"And why's that?"
Taemin's already almost gone the other way, dirty backpack slung messily over a shoulder. Before Jongin catches up though, he just can't resist turning back one more time.
"Because, Soojung. I'll show you after school."
-
Gently wrinkled photos tucked in his back pocket, Jongin plops down on the old, wooden bench, watching for black hair and black high tops.
She's earlier than he thought she'd be, strong strides up the slight hill toward right where he's sitting.
She plants those high tops right in front of his filthy, dark converses. Scans him up and down, messy hair, white t-shirt, jeans.
"Did you even go to a single class today?"
Jongin grins, shaking his head. Soojung scoffs and crosses her arms.
He can't help it when the grin gets wider on his face. He stands up, sliding the photos out of his back pocket. He sticks them in front of her, wordlessly. Soojung mumbles about what nonsense he's playing at, but takes the photos.
She gasps - she tries to do it quietly but he's right there for goodness sake - and her pretty brown eyes do a double take, sparkling a little.
She looks at all three of them carefully, slowly, stealing glimpses up at him and lowering her eyes immediately after each time.
"What is this? What are you trying to prove with these?"
She just can't take her eyes off of them, those three photos.
"Well, you know. In the case that you ever feel like crossing the line and tattling on me and Taemin to the teachers, I have no choice than to exploit you too. I'll have to spread these pictures.”
She finally looks up at him from those photos. Well, the slightly confused look in those pretty brown eyes isn't exactly what he expected, but he keeps his poker face. She stares at him just until his poker face is about to falter.
"Jongin. Stop being stupid. These... These aren't threatening. I'm not afraid of these photos getting... Where in the world did you even find these anyway?"
And she goes back to looking at the photos again, and is she really nonchalantly okay with it? Just like that..?
"What will people think, Soojung? When they find out that the top student of the class and the worst, ill-tempered delinquent in school used to be playmates."
Soojung sighs. In the sort of lecture-like way like she used to when they were younger.
"You can stuff your stupid bluff back down your throat, Jongin. I'm not gonna tell on you. It's not worth anything to me."
The slightly twisted smirk he’d had on his mouth melts into a real grin. Had he known? Of course.
"I knew it. I can read you like a book, Jung Soojung. Always could."
She rolls her eyes and widens her nostrils, but not before Jongin catches the slightest of a smile at the corner of her rosy lips.
"You should read some real books sometimes, kkam Jongin. Preferably, textbooks."
She goes back to looking at those three photos for the nth time since he's shown them to her. He tries to grab them from her, because they are his after all and he didn't exactly think to make copies of them, but she dodges him too easily.
She snickers, eyeing him smugly, taking a few steps back from him.
"What makes you think you're the only one who can read people like a book? Isn't it obvious? You're nothing I can't read either."
Jongin goes for his best sneer. The nerve of this girl.
"Then what am I think about right now, Miss smarty."
Soojung looks from the photos in her hand to him. He feels vulnerable. But there's no way she knows. She may be the smartest girl he knows, but he's done too good of a job of hiding from her.
"You knew these weren't real threats when you brought them here, Kim Jongin. There has to be a different reason..."
Jongin sees her thoughts moving inside those pretty brown eyes. And more and more, he gets this eerie feeling that she'll figure him out...
Who knows who walked toward the other first or who leaned forward first. Who the hell knows. Because, in the end, the fact of the matter is that he's kissing Soojung. He's kissing Soojung, and she's kissing him back, she's ing kissing him back, and she has him all figured out like the easiest, children's abc book, but that doesn't even matter now. She smells nice, the afternoon sun feels nice, and he's sorry that he might smell a little bit like cigarette smoke, but suddenly the thing that comes to his mind is one of those three photos. In it, five year old Jongin and five year old Soojung are kissing, just like they are kissing now, and Jongin remembers that Sooyeon is the one who took the photo with her old, disposable film camera, giggling until she couldn't breathe. He likes that one a lot but it's not his favorite, because his favorite is the one where five year old Jongin and Soojung are sitting in the grass holding hands and on lollipops that Sooyeon gave them. The third one is nice too, one Sooyeon asked the apartment security officer to take of the three of them, smiling goofily, grimy dirt on their faces. But his favorite is the hands and lollipops.
They stop for breath and stumble backward from each other. Jongin's eyes immediately fall to the photos in Soojung's hand.
"I've figured you out, Kim Jongin."
Jongin has no choice but to accept his defeat. Jung Soojung is the smartest girl he knows, after all.
She smiles. How the hell did little Jung Soojung who lives three floors above him grow up to be this beautiful girl? How the hell did little Kim Jongin grow up to be this sorry, good-for-nothing delinquent who reeks of cigarette smoke and could never deserve the top student of their class?
"You know what, Jongin? How do you think Taemin will react if he sees these pictures of you?"
Jongin freezes, curses under his breath, snaps out for the photos in Soojung's hand without success.
"You should really grow out of that nasty habit of threatening people with things you don't really mean to do."
"Oh? And are you that positive that I won't show Taemin these pictures? Is that what you read from me?"
The cockily raised eyebrow lowers as she laughs, like she used to when they were younger, bright and melodic. And then, she turns and starts walking toward the apartment entrance, his photos in hand, nice, slim legs moving gracefully one after another.
"Hey those are my pictures!"
He doesn't have much choice but to run after her, does he? And maybe, quit smoking, start attending more classes in school.
Drabble requested by @-teethrich! Sorry it took so long! Also, I feel like I may not have made Jongin as "bad" as I'd hoped... it's just that the Jongin I've come to know from EXO is just way too nice of a guy to begin with xP Anyways, thanks so much for requesting!
I hope no one else has forgotten that we do take requests here! I mean, are we really only at #65?!?! I thought we'd gotten farther than that...
And we also share the world's grief today for the passing of actor Robin Williams. Please rest in peace.
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By Jellyfriedgreen7
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