Chapter 10

The first thing Jinki notices when they were about to leave for breakfast is the postcard lying on the floor nearby the door. He picks it up, being careful not to drop it.

“What’s that?” Taemin tiptoes behind him curiously, putting his arm through the sleeve on his uniform blazer.

“I don’t know” Jinki says turning over the postcard and resettling his glasses. “A birthday invitation?”

Before Jinki could have a proper look, Taemin snatches it away from his hands.  As soon as he reads it, he grins widely, eyes blown wide and all twinkling. 

“Changmin hyung is throwing a party to celebrate his birthday!”, he shouts flailing his arms around in excitement and hair bouncing in all directions. “What are we going to wear?”  

Jinki doesn’t care.

“I’m not going.”  Simple as that.

Taemin’s smile turns into a grim line.  

“But whyy? Come on Onew, it’s going to be fun.  Cratus usually never does anything like this.” he says checking the time and gasping afterwards, realizing they have to hurry.  He drags Jinki out of the room and starts walking. When he doesn’t get a reply he looks at Jinki wonderingly.

Jinki sighs. He has never been to a party. He is not willing to go to one either. What will nerd like him do in a party anyway?  He’d rather study in his room. But when it comes to Taemin, he knows he will have to eventually admit his defeat.

Then he remembers something.

“What if Jonghyun’s going to be there?”

Over the past few weeks, life has been really peaceful for Jinki.  As days pass by he was staring to see less and less of Jonghyun. Now that he doesn’t have lunch in the canteen anymore, he barely even thought about the porcupine haired boy. If he catches a slight glimpse of the black Cratus uniform anywhere in SM, he would turn on his heels and run for his life towards the opposite direction; even if that meant lots of tripping and getting lost in the building.  He did his best avoid Jonghyun at any cost.

“Jonghyun? No way! You know how he hate his brothers.” Taemin says laughing at the excuse Jinki made.

Jinki thinks about it. Teamin is right. Judging by the interactions he had witnessed between Jonghyun and his brothers, the chance of Jonghyun being in Changmin’s party is more than slim. Still, it isn’t impossible. He opens his mouth to protest.

“Listen Onew, you can’t always be like this. Sitting in your room always engulfed in studying is not how you live your life. You need to get out sometimes and you know, have fun.”  Jinki looks at Taemin, quite surprised.  “And I would hate to go to the party without you.” He finishes by flashing Jinki a smile.

Jinki remains quiet, thinking about it over and over again in his head. He can’t deny a word Taemin has said. So at the end he dumbly nods.

“I’ll think about it.”         

 Jinki didn’t have a single clue of just what was awaiting for him when he made that decision.

Jinki was missing Eunhyuk and his gang. Although each of them was in at least one of his classes and he gets to see them in the singing club, spending lunch time with them had been fun and he misses it. Speaking of singing club, he loved every moment he spent there. Junsu was always so kind to everyone, always encouraging them and being supportive. Except when...

“Why is Yoochun so annoying?” Jinki wonders aloud after telling Taemin about how the guy sneaked into the club today to give Junsu flowers and got his kicked. He could totally understand why Junsu dislikes him.

 “He is in really love with hyung, I guess” Taemin utters a giggle while allegedly scribbling in his book.  

They do their homework together on the same table in Taemin’s room, partly because Taemin was weak in English and needed Jinki to help him.

“When he first confessed to Junsu hyung last year, he was really confident because he was one of the top Models and everyone admired him. But hyung rejected him straightaway. It was sad at first but then Yoochun hyung never gave up. He kept on pestering Junsu hyung and we all got kind of used to it.”

Jinki hums in response. Perhaps Junsu just isn’t interested in men. That would be sad. He still doesn’t get why people fall in this thing called love. It’s stupid and risky. He gives Taemin a sideway glance, who is nibbling on his lips trying to figure out how to solve a Maths equation. He secretly wonders if Taemin has a girlfriend. He could ask he want to but he settled with another question.

“Was last year the same like how it is now?  The Cratus and everything I mean.”

Taemin looks up from the book and an expression grows on his face, like he is recalling something. He sighs and shakes his head slowly.

“No. Last year was way different.  The Heads were different.  There were only six members in Cratus including Changmin, TOP and Yonghwa.  Cratus’s Head was Jungmin hyung. There were also Dojoon hyung and Kibum hyung. They were the seniors so they graduated last year.”Taemin closes his book. “They were not really nice. They looked scary and the students didn’t dare to talk to them.  Compared to then, Cratus is much better now.  See how Changmin hyung arranged a party for his birthday? He might look crude but he is actually a fun loving person.”

“What about Jonghyun?”  He can’t help but ask “Was he always like this?” He does some gestures with his hands to emphasize “you know, mean and, uh, dangerous” And heartless and arrogant and so frickin difficult to deal with.

Taemin thinks for a while.  “Hmm , to be honest, he had always had a dark aura around him.  But he definitely changed after he became part of the Cratus. No one really knows what happened. He used to be in our House and was so passionate about music. You should hear him sing. He has one awesome voice.”  Taemin bumps their shoulders together.  Jinki gives Taemin his full attention, putting his pen down completely, suddenly finding the conversation more interesting than studying, to his own surprise.

“He isolated himself from everyone. Usually the students who are going to enter Cratus during their final two years don’t let other students know it because that will start to scare people away from them, including their friends.  But Jonghyun did the opposite.  He made sure that everyone in the SM knew he was going to be a future Cratus member so no one really bothered to talk to him.” Taemin shrugs vaguely. “Except for Key and Minho.”

“How come Jonghyun is not in the singing club then?” Jinki asks.

If Jonghyun’s voice was that amazing then he should be in the club right?  That was the rule after all. Taemin looks at him and laughs like he just said something really stupid.

“Onew, being in Cratus means taking responsibility of the whole Academy. When they get selected to Cratus they have to give up all the rest of the stuff and focus completely on running the Academy.”

“What about their education though?”  

Taemin ruffles his hair with both hands.  

“Nothing happens to their education.  They just can’t join any clubs or do any other activities like normal students like us do. Now get back to studying.” Taemin chucks the book on Jinki’s face and opens his own one back with a big frown.

“So joining Cratus is what made Jonghyun change huh.” Jinki feels like a dimbo when Taemin gives him a glare. “Sorry” He says and fights between whether to tell Taemin the answer he got for his fourth question is wrong. He decides he would tell him at the end and goes back to doing his homework.

No one speaks after that. When Jinki is finally done and checks on Taemin to see if he is too is when he notices that the boy’s lips are still curled into a frown.

“Taemin?”

His head snaps up to look at Jinki.

“It isn’t just Jonghyun who changed.”  He slowly mutters puffing his cheeks out, much to Jinki’s confusion. What was he talking about? Then it clicks on his head. But the conversation they had was almost an hour ago.

“I’m sleepy.” Taemin says pushing away the book and getting up from the chair. Jinki’s eyes follow after him as he slumps down on the bed mumbling a “goodnight Onew” with a small smile.

Jinki corrects Taemin’s homework and returns to his own room to sleep.

The whole Academy was prepared for the big party.  Jinki didn’t know what to wear. He was thinking of wearing his school uniform but Taemin rolled his eyes and said “we have to wear something casual” so thanks to him, he ended up wearing jeans and a black V neck T-shirt. But even that didn’t help.  Anyone could have guessed he was a nerd.

The place was crammed with people all around his age. Jinki couldn’t remember seeing them before in Apollo so he guesses they are from the other Houses.  Taemin though, talked to everyone he saw.

Changmin was standing in amidst his step brothers, looking ready to blow the nineteen candles off on his birthday cake.  TOP had the usual hard expression on his face, looking all around the room to see if everything is going alright. Jinki could see students ignoring his gaze when it comes boring into their faces.  Jinki speculates if TOP used to be like this two years before, when he wasn’t in Cratus. Yonghwa was also there, looking neither particularly happy nor unhappy, while Leeteuk and Chansung laughs hysterically at only God knows what.  Junhyung looks like he is there just because he had to be. Thunder though, hugs Changmin once he blows the candles cuts the cake.  Jinki doesn’t think he should even be in Cratus. Thunder somehow reminds him of Taemin.

“Have a blast everyone!”  Changmin says when he’s finished with cutting the cake and the music  starts thumping.

The dance floor opened and beside Jinki  Taemin whistled excitedly throwing away his jacket and literally flew onto it leaving a dumbstruck Jinki behind. When he disappeared  onto the dance floor, Jinki knew he was going to spend the rest of the evening unsuccessfully trying to mingle with the other students.

It’s the first time Jinki has seen Taemin dancing. When Taemin dances, he transforms. All the cuteness and sweetness vanishes from his face. He twists and turns on the dancefloor like he belonged there, looking so fierce and graceful and full of confidence, his blonde hair swaying and flicking about wildly with the steady throb of the music.

 “ you!”

Jinki freezes like a deer in the headlights. Oh crap. He prays it was just another person with a voice awfully similar to Jonghyun.

“Don’t ing touch me. Ugly foot ers.”

Nope. This was definitely Jonghyun. Jinki slowly turns around, worried if he got spotted. Jonghyun had a bottle of alcohol in his hand and was standing in the middle of the giant security guards who looked scared less trying to get Jonghyun out of there under TOP’s order. Jinki hides in the crowd before Jonghyun sees him. He was drunk as hell.

“You can’t drink in here.”  Comes TOP’s sharp voice when the guards failed to do what they were told. “Neither was you invited.”

Jonghyun tsks and snickers gruffly, strolling towards TOP, Changmin and Yonghwa. Key and Minho suddenly appears behind him as if to support him if he falls over.

“Why? I just wanted to celebrate my beloved brother’s birthday.” Jonghyun says sarcastically looking at Changmin and spread his arms. “C’mere. Lemme give you a sqeeezy hug.”

TOP’s hand rolls into a fist and he lets out a hiss of frustration when Jonghyun grins. Changmin prevents him before he does something.

“Let him be” He says and turns to leave with TOP shortly following him.

"Hear that? So leave me the alone you stupid heads." 

Yonghwa glares at Jonghyun like warning him but he gets a “What” in reply. What Jinki sees before fleeing from the place is Key and Minho futilely trying to stop Jonghyun from drinking more.

After an hour of waiting by himself and trying to hide from Jonghyun, Jinki realizes Taemin has no plan to come back.  He rifles into the crowd of students in an attempt to search for somebody he knows. He sees Yunho talking with Junsu and some of his other friends. He thinks of going and talking to him but decides otherwise when he thinks about how awkward that would be. He was just going to make Yunho uncomfortable as well as himself. He gets a chair and sits on a corner, watching other students having fun. He could have brought a book to read if he knew this was how it is going to be.

Yoochun is an idiot, Jinki decides as he walks up to Junsu, grabs his hands force kisses him while Junsu struggles to push him away. When he is done, Yoochun grins like he just accomplished his life goal. Junsu, after getting over the shock, grabs a handful of Yoochun’s hair with both hands and yanked violently screeching in his dolphin voice, “YOU IN !!! I HATE YOU!!”

 It’s unbelievable, but later on Jinki sees Yoochun walking around casually talking to G.O and Jaybeom like nothing happened while Nichkhun pulls his shirt up flashing his abs and asks GD to take a photograph of him to put on tomorrow’s SM Express shamelessly.  Jinki notices how Donghae was missing from the gang and wonders if that has anything to do with how Eunhyuk was nowhere to be seen either. Jinki wants to go home and sleep. He didn’t have the heart to ask Taemin to come with him. So he gets up sighing and leaves the party.

The whole Academy was very dark as the power was out, except for the party area. Jinki couldn’t make out anything properly in the dark building even though there was a little moonlight coming from the large windows but he knew it was around midnight. Students who haven’t been to the party were probably asleep in their rooms.

It didn’t take much time for him to get lost completely. He had no idea where he was and there were no security guards anywhere in the building to help him get to his room. He walked up through corridors and went up and down the stairs with no sense of direction. Eventually, he sees a board.

CRATUS.

Oh. This was where the Cratus live.  Which means he was in the wrong building and has to get out of there as soon as possible. He now had an apparent idea of where the Apollo building was. So takes slow steps towards the way he think is right. Soon enough he trips on a lump and falls on his face. Jinki draws closer to have a better look. It was a person. In the light of the moon coming from the window, Jinki sees his face clearly.

Jonghyun

Jinki is pretty sure fate is playing games with his life.

A/N:  A completely wasted Jonghyun + Vulnerable Jinki = What do we get? XD  Wait till the next update to find out.

I’d like to apologize for not updating for a long time. I know I always say this but I don’t ever not update just because I feel lazy okay. I was too busy with completing my coursework before the deadline and so I just couldn’t find time to write this.  I’m sorry. And comment people comment!!! Your comments make me all warm inside and I’ll feel like updating more quicker :P Oh and the Kibum I mentioned in the chapter is the ex-member of U-KISS, if you weren’t sure.