☤

Three weeks go by, the days gray and dull and blending together to fill a canvas of nothing that hurts Jongin’s eyes and heart, and the hype regarding Do Kyungsoo’s transfer has died down completely, buried and left behind as the gossip mill has moved on to more exciting topics.

It is five minutes until the next lesson begins, and Jongin is moving down the long, bleak hallway, expertly dodging the faceless students crowding the corridor on his way to the classroom. He can’t remember the names of half of the people who calls his nickname – ‘Kai’ – after him, but he turns around and waves with a grin (fakefakefake) anyways because that’s what they all expect him to do and he can’t deviate from the pattern set for him.

He can’t take that risk.

So he waves, and he grins, and he acts just like always, because that’s what they all want him to do and what he, in turn, knows he needs to do in order to some day be able to achieve his dreams.

But then he walks into someone – or more like collides – and Jongin stumbles backwards in surprise before finding his balance again, an annoyed frown creeping onto his face as he looks at the person he’s run into.

And it’s like a punch to the gut, the way the air leaves his lungs in a rush.

Because the person standing in front of him… he’s not perfect. He’s shorter than Jongin, his dark hair is mussed and looks like he just woke up and his school uniform is disheveled. His cheeks are full and his eyes big, making him look younger than his age, and his frame is somewhat scrawny compared to Jongin himself and the other male students who have all undergone special treatments and enhancements to have their bodies look perfectly muscular and proportioned.

They all have the ideal bodies, the ideal faces, the ideal hairstyles, the ideal clothes. They are the ideals.

But this boy… it’s so painfully obvious that no scalpel has ever touched his skin – Jongin can even see a mole peek out from beneath the collar of his uniform! – and compared to the students around the two of them crowding the corridor, the boy is very ugly, because unlike the rest of them he is so incredibly flawed. Jongin knows that if his own parents would’ve been there they would have gasped in mortification the second they laid their eyes on the boy, mouths curling in disgust at the boy as they would’ve dragged Jongin away from there.

And Jongin can’t tear his eyes away, the breath still caught inside his throat and refusing to move as a feeling he knows by instinct is very dangerous pools inside of his belly and grows stronger the longer they stare at each other.

Then Jongin notices the deep scowl on the boy’s face, something unintelligible behind his eyes as he glares darkly at Jongin. “Look where you’re going,” he snaps, making Jongin gape in surprise (how long was it ago that someone addressed him in that tone without bowing and apologizing immediately afterwards when they realized who he was?), and then he shoulders his way past Jongin to get to wherever it was he was going.

Jongin just stares after him, mind reeling.

Because that boy is the most beautiful person Kim Jongin has ever laid his eyes upon.

And that was how Kim Jongin officially met Do Kyungsoo for the first time.