There were people who attract attention without intention; Lee Jieun was one of them.

The number of people in the train increased after two stops, this time there was an old couple who squeezed their way in. Suho, the ever gentleman was quick to give his seat to the old lady. Jieun only lifted her eye to see whether Suho was getting off the train and casted down her eyelids again after seeing Suho's good deed. The attempt of the old man to have Jieun giving him the seat by blatantly coughing was in vain- she did not even glance at his way.

The old lady who sat in Suho's seat scrutinized at Jieun until noticing that the young girl had no the slightest intention to move away, then, indirectly asked her to do so by saying aloud, "Old chap, you can't stand long, here, take my seat."

"Never mind, you need it more than I do with your cold legs." Her spouse was quick to disagree.

Intentional or not, the old couple's voice was loud and high-pitched, easily attracted attention from the surrounding passengers. Despite the increasing disapproval glances at Jieun, she turned a deaf ear and stayed like a bump on a log.

Unable to bear it anymore, Suho approached Jieun wth a frown, "You, get up."

"We haven't reached a stop yet."

"It's for the grandfather."

Jieun spared a glance at the seemingly 'weak' old lad before replying.

"Why should I?"

Jieun's response made Suho had the urge to smack her for her crudeness. He took a deep breath and reminded himself to be calm. Suho might be used to witness Jieun's disrespectful acts, still the annoyance seeped into his words.

"Do you not see the sign of 'priority seats'?"

"I doubt this kind of old man is included in the category of people who need seats."

Suho was speechless at Jieun's retort, but she did not stop at there.

"Really, they don't look that weak in need of sitting down compared to students and office workers who have strived for the day. They are probably retired elders who spent their time by gossiping, attending all sorts of recreation classes like dancing. So, I could never understand the perception which it's necessity for the youngsters who are truly the hard workers to give their seats to this kind of people?"

Jieun sneered as she looked at the old lady's leg beside her.

"It must be a miracle to actually have the relapse of cold legs in the season of summer."

The supposedly condemned gazes of the passengers changed after making sense out of Jieun's words and turned to the old couples who were red with embarrassment- they had obviously finished a dancing class with the fan and dancing scarves in their hands. The rude girl was not being unreasonable after all.

Even so, Suho already decided to turn back on Jieun the moment she refused to comply, let alone listening to what she had said subsequently. For Suho, whatever Lee Jieun said, it would be sophistry. Therefore without giving notice, Suho just left the train once it reached his destined stop. Jieun was quick to follow and remained a few steps behind the still piqued Suho, not because she toned down her attitude for his sake, rather Suho's pace was always ahead of hers; Jieun did not see the need to change her temperament for one's pleasure.

Once they reached the top of the stairs, child beggars swarm at Suho like bees with their hands outstretched. Suho halted and eventually withdrew several red notes from his wallet for the dirty little hands. Jieun who was right behind him only frowned in distaste and avoided the unkempt children. However, these children were bright from years of begging. They did know from Jieun's attire she was well-off, moreover the person she was with had just easily toss out a big amount of notes. Not letting the opportunity off, the children surrounded her, hoping to scrape even more from Jieun, but she was never one to succumb easily, not to mention in such situation.

"Scram!" Most the children did at Jieun's cold word and intimidating sharp gaze, but one older child remained with his lips bitten and immediately grasped at Jieun's leg when she was about to walk away.

"Please take a pity on me!"

"I said get lost!"

Jieun's temper flared up when the child stuck onto her like a gum, unable to shake off. Other by standing children seemed to think this tactic worked and attempted to do so as well, but finally a kick at the older child dismissed their thoughts to bother the kicker.

Suho narrowed his eyes at the kicked child who was struggling to get up. What did he expect from Lee Jieun?

A woman in a similar disheveled state shrieked and picked up the older child. With teary eyes, she hollered at Jieun.

"Is your heart made of steel? How could you kick a child?"

Feeling needless to 'speak' with the woman, Jieun rolled her eyes and went around her to leave. Seeing this, the woman promptly dropped down to Jieun's legs, wailing all her might and making a scene.

Jieun pointedly looked on at the woman's tantrum and tugged her lips upward mockingly.

"Do you want money?"

The beggars eyes glinted at the mention of money, but continuing in weeping.

"You injured my child, there's no reason for you to not compensate! Oh, my poor child! Look! He's even having a hard time to breathe."

Going along with his mother's act, the child gasped for air. Jieun was indifferent to the accusing murmurings that she was so used to hear from around, instead she took out her phone unhurriedly with obvious taunting.

"What to do? I still do not intend to give you even a single cent and here you are acting shamelessly. Let's have the police officer to reason this out."

With that said, Jieun pressed onto her phone, but the woman grabbed onto her hand seeing the situation and cried even harder.

"Look at this person! Even has the decent to call more people to beat us up!"

Hearing upon this, there was a commotion among the onlookers while Suho remained mute at the sideline, watching Jieun's expression turning more devilish. As if the next moment she would be pulling out a knife and killed the woman mercilessly. This thought made Suho not wanting to see any further and withdrew himself from the crowd.

"Sooner or later, the station officers will show up and still contact the police. Also, there is a camera surveillance right above us, pretty much recorded what exactly happened here. I kicked the child was only because he prevented me from leaving. Furthermore, I had warned them beforehand, I could still justify myself if I were to face the court. Oh, right-"

Jieun shook off the dazed woman's grip and pretended to have a sudden thought. 

"You don't even have the money to litigate me."

Sure enough, not more than five minutes, Jieun was already trailing behind Suho under the pointing of others. He gritted his teeth when Jieun was looking as complacent as ever.

"This can be easily solved as a daughter of the rich by giving away some money. Is there a need to make it unsightly?"

Jieun raised an eyebrow, unexpecting Suho to be talking to her with a tone of accusation and replied, albeit duly.

"Why should I give them money?"

"They're only children!"

"So it makes them plausible to ask for money?"

"Lee Jieun! Their family financial situation is not like yours. If they didn't manage to get enough money, both adults and children couldn't even live by a day! Can't you have the slightest empathy towards them?"

Suho's pitch went higher as he spoke. From all these times, he might be disapproval of all sorts of outrageous actions she had done but he never spoke a word of it. However this time he could not bear it anymore, not after he saw Jieun kicked at the child.

Jieun met the angry gaze of Suho's, though surprised she gave him a smile that Suho thought it was innocent and hateful at the same time.

"If the children managed to get money, those beggars will be more aggravated in using them. Once money comes too easily by just begging, those children who grow up will just use the same tactic with their future children. Living a pathetic life that deserts pride and leeches off people's empathy. Is that what I should do? Well, those parents should at least be aware that their children will be bullied by someone like-"

Jieun cocked her head as her smile widened, but her eyes getting colder.

"-Me. Then again, they don't deserve to be called parents when those able-bodied people have their children to sustain their family instead of working themselves."

Now, Suho remembered why he never tried to talk sense into Jieun for her past wrongdoings. No matter what awful words she had said or despicable things she had done,  she could always make out a good case of herself.  In return, Suho could only be more frustrated with no words to retort. Childish thoughts like- strangling Lee Jieun would always flash up in Suho's mind.

Unperturbed with Suho's dark look, Jieun walked into a nearby store and bought a bottle of spring water to wash the dirty handprints on her hands from earlier.

Suho never had the intention to wait for her, especially now because he was not sure he could resist himself from strangulating Jieun if she were to up to something again.

"Suho oppa!"

The mellow voice rang in Suho's ears, scattering the clouds of disgruntlement over him. He turned to the direction of the voice, in time to see a girl clad in a simple white tee and jeans skipped towards him. Under the scorching weather, the girl was beaded in sweats with some hair in her face yet she looked more refreshed than grubby.

"Naeun! What are you doing here?"

Naeun brushed off the hair from her face and her eyes reflected her gentle personality and a smile she had yet to give to Suho as she rested to catch her breath.

"Selling newspapers to earn living expenses!"

True enough, in Naeun's hands were a few copies of newspapers; she must be almost done.

"Under such hot weather-"

Suho's words were abruptly cut off with Naeun's shove of papers into his hands and her careless request.

"Hold it for me!"

Bewildered, Suho's eyes followed Naeun who rushed to the middle of the road and carefully helping an elderly to cross towards their side of the pavement. The flash of red on the traffic light nearby snapped Suho out of his daze from watching Naeun's affectionate expression for the elder.

Suho's shift of gaze coincidentally landed on Jieun that was heading towards him who was still wiping her hands. At this time, Naeun ran back to Suho and took back the newspapers. Instinctively, he frowned at the contrast of situation persons. 

Jieun tossed the half-emptied bottle into the bin and the sight of Suho talking to a girl she did not know came into her view. The flicking movements of her hands halted as Jieun noted the soft features of Suho while facing the girl- she never had the luxury to have such gaze landed on her not since Goomi had left.

Suho squinted his eyes when he felt a breeze of air and the sudden ghostly touch of something foreign on his face had his hand naturally shot up to swat it away. A moment or two then he realized it was Naeun's strands of hair. Suho smiled sheepishly at Naeun while the latter's cheeks reddened. All these fallen under the eyes of Jieun who hummed with a smirk visible.

As if telepathically, Suho turned and crossed gaze with a composed Jieun. Her placid expression gave out nothing that was on her mind, still Suho deliberately shifted and hid Naeun behind him.

Instead of confronting them as how Suho thought, Jieun only craned her head up, filling her sight with the cobalt sky through her half-lidded eyes. She gave a sigh of amazement- the sunlight was too glaring to the extent the blue behind the clouds was searing as well. 

"...So clean."

〜❅〜

Suho could never know what Jieun had up in her sleeves. On the way back, she had not said a word about Naeun. Unsure of what ulterior motives Jieun had, Suho could not help but to say something.

"Her name is Son Naeun, a scholarship student in our course. She's nice and earns her fees and living expenses by working."

Suho, who had been looking forward glanced at Jieun as he paused and said,

"Different from you."

The seemingly casual remark however imprinted on Jieun's mind and her tongue readily to roll off the same words, but she held it, leaving it to echo in her head.

Of course, Jieun was different, she was no common scholarship holder, she was enrolled into the university as the district highest mark holder in CSAT.

Still and all, in Kim Joonmyun's eyes, Lee Jieun was only a daughter of the rich.

Jieun chuckled, similar to a child's tittering.

"Why are you telling me this."

A statement, a euphemism of Jieun's 'So what'. After all, it was Suho she was talking to, but he never noticed her trivial changes for him. Jieun lowered her eyelids, the smile tugged on her lips grew wider as she thought of what could Suho ever notice about her.

Indeed, Suho had nothing to say and thinking back at how Jieun reacted earlier, she seemed disdained of this. Or Naeun was not worth of her to be concerned of?

Unknown to him why, Suho had a feeling that Jieun might not care about him as much as he expected. The mere existence of this presumption upset him more than seeing Jieun bullying others.

After that, the duo remained silence all they way they reached Suho's place. Unsurprisingly, the Maybach that Jieun rode in the earlier of the day was still there, waiting. Just a mere 'I'm going' from her, Jieun climbed into her ride and just rode off. Jieun's non hesistant series of actions had Suho staring blankly in response, who, in fact, wanted to ask her to stay for dinner. They knew each other for years unless special occasions, Jieun never stayed for a meal. Truthfully, she usually eats at home, one of the few chances to spend time with her father, but Suho was well aware that Lee Taewon was out for a gathering along with his parents that day and they would not be back by at least midnight.

As if on a duty, Jieun only came to him at the certain time, once it was to time to clock out, she would never spare another minute on him. Begrudgingly, Suho pondered the weight he had in Jieun's heart; it must be... Suho ruffled his hair in a huff.

Unknown to Suho, Jieun might be dictatorial, but not always going around to cause a scene, especially not with this Naeun girl, whom seemingly to be significant to Suho; he initiated a conversation spoke on his own accordance because he was concerned of what Jieun would do to her.

Since Naeun was someone Suho cared about, she had no reason and no right to affiliate.

To Jieun, Suho held an extraordinary existence in her life.

Then, what about her to Suho?