#asked one of the exchange students how the tutor meeting went yesterday + what are we going to do and she literally said:

[drugsforaddicts]

.

[theluckyyyoneee]

antipode | pcy

pairing: park chanyeol x reader

contents: high school!au, soccerplayer!chanyeol, serious!yn, mild cursing, reader becoming very confused and thinks they’re going crazy!seriously reader has minor panic attack:(

word count: 10,2k

summary: AlternateUniverseAU! When the guy you hate—and who you’re certain hates you—becomes your boyfriend after you swore he kicked a soccer ball at your head.

part 01  |  part 02  |  part 03:finale

You can’t be friends with everybody.

Damned if that wasn’t the truest statement you’d ever heard.

Trying to appear friendly to everyone you met without changing your personality to fit theirs or their expectations they held for you a few moments after first meeting you, you now used that saying as a very important and undeniable proverb to live by at a relatively young age.

You guessed it was a good thing that you weren’t one of those people who needed to be the center of attention or someone who enjoyed being surrounded by people who all pretended to be your friends to your face while insulting you behind your back. So that was why you preferred to keep company in the form of three close friends who were like your own family. Ugh, high school drama.

You couldn’t wait to graduate and spend at least one month relaxing before starting to register and pack up for college, already grimacing at how busy you would be this summer, but at least at college they would treat you more like the adult you were, or at least the adult you felt like, rather than babying you in high school.

“Class don’t forget, I already gave you an extension on yesterdays homework, so I fully expect it on my desk tomorrow afternoon before class starts. Okay?”

Groans erupted from the whole class, save you and a few other students who had actually completed the assignment when it was first issued. 

“Ms. Lee, can we just turn it in on Friday please? I haven’t had time to finish it with the soccer practices that I have everyday, I’m sure you know that the game is coming up.” You didn’t even have to look to your right to know it was Chanyeol who was speaking, his smooth and loud words piercing through the noise and the whole classroom silenced at the sound of his voice. 

You also didn’t have to look at him to tell that he was giving Ms. Lee his signature kicked puppy expression; wide brown eyes and his lower lip jutted out in an exaggerated pout. Keeping your constant gaze on your teacher instead, you watched somewhat amusedly at the flush that crept on her cheeks you could see from your seat, the way her hands balled into fists at her side then gripped the material of her slacks as she agreed with a shaky tone, deciding that Friday was a better day after all.

As soon as the teacher had turned her back to the students, no doubt fantasizing a scenario that would land her in jail if she acted upon it, given the teacher student relationship, even though you were certain he was eighteen. Chanyeol and a few of his jockhead buddies next to him exchanged high fives, the bell signaling the end of the school day motivating everyone to spring up from their seats and out the door.

“Ugh,” you muttered under your breath, taking a stand as well and stole another glance in his direction, scoffing and shaking your head slightly at his eyes already on your figure, his head tilted to the side as he wiggled his fingers in your direction, his friends watching from the sidelines, giggling at his actions, slapping him jokingly on the arm as they watched you exit out the door.

Idiots, didn’t they have minds of their own? You didn’t think so, since they chose to spend their time with that pompous and self-entitled jerk. No, maybe they were just as bad as he was, but there wasn’t a way for you to know since they had never attempted to mess with you the way Chanyeol adored.

“Wow, so approachable Y/n, no wonder you only have, like, three friends. You know, you should really appreciate me more for even talking to you.” Junmyeon chides, slinging his arm over your shoulder as he appears suddenly at your side in the busy hallway, keeping close to you to avoid getting in anyone’s way.

A genuine smile crept on your lips and you softly jabbed him in the stomach with your elbow, ignoring how solid his midsection seemed underneath his shirt. A huff of air escaped him and he clutched his stomach dramatically, wringing his hold on your shoulders even tighter and you gasped, grimacing as he pushed your face into his chest as he ruffled your hair with his other hand.

“Yeah right, you with your dad jokes, you would just drive them away.” You retorted, pushing him off you as the two of you neared your locker, shaking your head and fixing your nest of a hairstyle thanks to that nerd. Putting in the right combination on your lock, you smirked as you glanced at him leaning against the lockers next to yours and continued, “I swear, sometimes it’s like you’re a middle aged man inside a teenagers body.”

He opened his mouth in indignation, rolling his eyes and scoffed, looking into the distance as a scowl graced his handsome features. “Not my fault that I have a sense of humor too sophisticated for a peasant’s taste like yours.”

Giving him the middle finger with one hand, you shoved your locker shut with the other and readjusted your backpack and walked alongside Junmyeon in the much emptier hallways towards the school’s exit. Running into Yerim and Kyungsoo along the way, the four of you stopped by the doors leading downstairs, conversing a bit before they had to make their way down to the photography room—both of them involved with taking photos for the yearbook.

You couldn’t help but smile a bit at the way she leaned back into his chest as you talked, his arms casually hanging around her shoulders.

They were so cute.

After awhile their allotted time for conversation was up and they waved goodbye and you continued on your way home. You two resided in the same neighborhood about an eight minute walk away from school, so it was routine to walk home together almost everyday when he didn’t have tutoring on Tuesday and Thursdays.

“Leaving for the day? Must be nice.” A low voice echoed out to you and startled the two of you apart, attempting to calm the pounding of your heart you looked behind to where the loud sound had came from and frowned to see Chanyeol bounding about a yard behind you and Junmyeon, a black gym bag draped casually from his broad shoulders. 

Long gone were his baggy tee and jeans and his famous soccer uniform adorned his frame now, looking ridiculously even more tall now than he did before. He eyed the two of you with a deep stare, his lips forming a line as you eyed him with a similar hard gaze and looped your arm in Junmyeon’s. 

“Uh, y-yeah, we are. Heading to practice?” Junmyeon replied hesitantly beside you and you eyed him weirdly, wondering why he was acting so buddy buddy with him. While you on the other hand, kept your grip on his arm tight and continued to walk without glancing back.

“Yeah. The teacher wanted to talk to me after class and I still had to change before heading over to the field.”

You rolled your eyes, remembering the blush that was distinctly on Ms. Lee’s cheeks and wondered how that conversation went. Chanyeol probably got his way like he always did.

Junmyeon made a sound of acknowledgement, not really knowing what to say in return to Chanyeol’s story, and he opened his mouth after glancing at you, most likely going to utter an awkward goodbye before Chanyeol cut in before he could with—

“Are you two dating? You guys are always together.”

His tone had a certain edge to it that he didn’t previously possess and you frowned at both his nosiness and his hostility. Why did he care? So he could find another reason to make fun of you?

You were suddenly being pushed away with a gentle hand on your arm as Junmyeon explained quickly, “No, no, we’re not dating. We’re just really close friends and have lived in the same neighborhood since middle school.”

You couldn’t have agreed more, but you were a bit put off by how quick he was to deny a relationship with you, were you really that bad, you pondered with a slight pout.

Chanyeol must’ve seen the expression on your face and pounced at the chance—

“Right, who’d want to go out with Y/n.” His words were said with a snicker, having caught up to the two of you in no time and stepping around you to flash you a smirk, glancing up and down at your figure before exiting the double doors.

“Yah!” You shouted at his back, already being able to tell he was laughing at the way his shoulders shook just before the doors shut behind him with a loud noise. You were fuming at his words, fuming at the way he wanted to make you less than average.

Placing your hands on your hips, you blew air out of your mouth and paced around in a small circle, trying to burn this sudden burst of hot energy you found yourself experiencing. You wished you would’ve landed a roundhouse kick right in the square of Chanyeol’s back, but let’s be honest, you would’ve most definitely missed and given yourself an embarrassing cramp.

“Why do you guys do that?” Junmyeon asked exasperatedly, eyeing the doors Chanyeol had exited out of in a quiet curiosity you were used to seeing on his face by the long years you’ve known him. 

Your mouth dropped open at his question and pointed at the closed doors. “He obviously started it! You saw, I didn’t even say anything to him and he still managed to insult me.”

“Was it an insult?”

“How was, ‘Right, who’d want to go out with Y/n, har har’, not an insult? Sure he didn’t outright say any demeaning words or phrases, but it was well implied and you know it.” You lowered your voice when repeating the phrase, trying to mimic the deep tone of Chanyeol’s voice with some difficulty.

He titled his head to the side a bit and pursed his lips, walking ahead of you and opening the door and you had to rush to not be left behind, the heat from the sun warming up your skin. “I don’t think so, but whatever you guys want to call it, it has to stop. Just date already.” 

“Excuse me?” You all but screeched, looking at him with an expression of disbelief.

He shrugged and held up his hands in a peaceful gesture. “Hey, don’t look at me. You were the one who told me you that he was cute when you first met him.”

“That was before he opened his mouth and I found out what a jerk he is,” you mumbled, heat creeping up on your cheeks as you remembered, yes, technically once upon a time you did find Chanyeol somewhat charming and handsome.

You usually stayed away from the athletes, they created unnecessary attention and special treatment wherever they went. It wasn’t as if you had an interest in things such as football, soccer, diving, track, etc., so you didn’t understand the obsession with these athletes that drove everyone crazy at the mere sight of them.

The first time you had laid eyes on Chanyeol, he hadn’t been dressed in his uniform, looking comfortable as ever in a plain t-shirt and jeans combination, and you could admit it to yourself now, that yes, your heart did pick up its pace a bit at the sight of him, your face heating up as you made yourself look away, being stuck in a daze of just gazing at him for sometime.

It wasn’t as if you automatically had the naive assumption that everyone on earth was an angel or anything of that nature, but you thought that he was generally a good person, seeing as no one seemed to hold any grudges or contempt towards him, always greeted and greeting everyone with a wide smile and the joyous everyone reacted to his presence. 

You were fascinated by him.

Did your fascination cross some line into a crush like thing? You weren’t sure. It wasn’t as if you wanted to talk to him and enter his busy world, you were completely fine watching him from afar, your faith in humanity returning the tiniest bit by finding a good young person in this Sodom and Gomorrah that you called high school.

Until you had a personal interaction with him.

It was completely random timing, it was an ordinary day, you were already seated in your chair near the back where Ms. Lee had assigned you at the beginning of the semester. You had your book you were currently engrossed with open on your otherwise empty desk, but you had looked up when you heard someone enter. 

Chanyeol walked in with his backpack, that looked practically empty to you, comfortably slung over his shoulder and he sauntered to his seat and you froze as the two of you made eye contact for the first time. 

You expected for his eyes to skim right past you, but they didn’t. He kept your stare with his wide brown eyes for a few moments longer before he let his backpack fall to the ground by his seat and slowly sank himself in it, you not noticing his teammates and desk buddies watching the whole exchange, their grins hidden behind their hands that covered their mouths. 

You blinked and distractedly returned to your book, not remembering what part you had been on before or the context to make sense of this sentence when a pair of large feet encased in some no doubt expensive sneakers came into your view of vision and you whipped your head up to stare blankly at Chanyeol standing about a foot away from your desk, gazing down at you with a smile.

Your lips began to turn up in response to his, until of course he opened his mouth—

“Don’t you have any friends?” He asked you, his voice the usual amount of volume as it usually was but it felt like he had shouted it, the classroom silencing at his words and chuckles began echoing from your classmates all around you two. 

Your skin began to flush with the embarrassment at being laughed at, at being made fun of so openly, an unpleasant feeling settling in your stomach as you eyed the confident smirk that rested on his lips as he stared back at you expectantly. 

“Of course I do.” Was all you could think to reply, your tone slightly questioning, wondering what he meant to accomplish by asking you that question. 

“Then why are you always alone?

Your features twisted into a glare at his next question. What is wrong with him? Why had he chose this particular moment to ask you a somewhat private inquisition in front of the whole class rather than approach you when there were less students present and at a much less close proximity. 

Was what his goal? To embarrass you? If so, it was working, as much as you willed it not to.

It was a reaction you couldn’t seem to help. You were human after all, as much as you were confident in yourself, you doubted anyone enjoyed being laughed at unless they were actually trying to be funny intentionally.

Your lips formed to put your thoughts into words when the bell rang, your mouth still open as you watched him leave to return to his seat in the front of the classroom. 

You could feel the stares of the students around you and you used your hair as a shield for the rest of the time. Your eyes fixed on the clock routinely, you began quietly packing up your books and pencils and was the first one out of your seat and out the door by the time the bell rang—not noticing the way he stared at you as you sped out the room at lightning speed.

After that, it was as if he had forgotten your existence, how it had been until that one particular encounter. You had given it a discomfiting amount of thought, the only explanation to his questions was that he was in fact trying to embarrass you, the more you thought it, the more his seemingly innocent smile seemed like a sinister smirk.

It was fine for awhile, he left you alone like he’d always had, but you no longer watched him from afar, you strayed as far as possible from him and his buddies who seemed to always be in a sudden giddy mood whenever they spotted you from across the hall or cafeteria. You could feel his eyes on you, but you tried to distract yourself with engaging into a conversation with Kyungsoo as to why he should bake you a cake this weekend.

Then he somehow decided you existed again and began to make passing remarks to you in the halls.

“Nice hair, sleeping beauty!”

You had woken up late thanks to sleeping right through your alarm and had gotten ready in about eight minutes, your hair drying in an awkward way from the way you tossed in your sleep the night before and had thrown it in a ponytail that barely tamed your natural waves that you were trying your best not to feel so self conscious about.

His comment made your cheeks flame as you registered the snickers that sounded all around you at his words. You made no facial expression whatsoever as you passed each other, determined to maintain your nonchalant and confident facade that crumbled pitifully as you were sure he was out of sight.

“What’s up, nerd?”

Chanyeol appeared beside you, a good foot taller than you, but you managed to hear his words just fine in the midst of a million conversations that were happening all around you. He walked ahead of you, but not before he nudged you with his shoulder and knocked the books you held in your arms down tumbling to the floor, earning attentive stares as they stared you bent over, picking up the strewn books off the floor and back into your arms.

He didn’t even look back, that asshole. Seriously, what was his problem?

Ever since then, you made it clear you wanted nothing to do with Park Chanyeol. Not like your over-exaggerated indifference to his glances and stares, seemingly playful waves and loud greetings of your name in a sugary tone that made people stop and look at you deterred him any. 

If anything, your lack of reactions only seemed to encourage him, his voice echoed louder in the halls than before. People were starting to associate you with him, amused smirks creeping on their faces and watchful eyes with just the sight of you wandering down the halls. 

You hated the way the rest of the whole student body ate from the palm of his hand, laughing and smirking along to his words.

But all you had to do was continue to ignore him, no way was there a chance in hell that you would ever willingly approach him first.

Or so you thought.

“You’re tutoring Chanyeol?”

“I was supposed to, but I can’t. My grandparents flew in and they can only stay for tonight,” he started to explain, looking the least bit frustrated at the surprise visit but mostly excited. “My mom wants me home early to spend time with them before they continue on their journey of seeing the world or something like that, I don’t know.” He sighed, shaking his head. His expression suddenly changed and he was grinning at you broadly and gave you the notebook that was previously in his grip. “Can you just give him this notebook of notes I wrote out for him, he told me that he has last minute practice anyway so it was fine, I wrote everything very clearly and dumbed it down enough for him to understand it.”

“I doubt that, all he knows how to do is how to kick around a ball and think the world revolves around him,” you couldn’t help but mutter, an impressed expression no doubt taking place on your face as you skimmed the contents of the notebook, Junmyeon was very detailed and if Chanyeol still had no idea after studying this guide, he was an even bigger idiot than you thought.

“Y/n, please?” Junmyeon sighed in front of you, even going as far as to clutch your shoulders in his hands as he looked down at you with a pleading expression. “I know you two don’t get along, but just get his attention for one second, point to the notebook and leave it on the bleachers and leave. I would go myself, but I’m already late going home and the field is all over on the other side of the school. Please, I’m counting on you! Thank you! If I’m any later, they said they would send Minseok out to come get me! I’ll text you later!”

He left you with your mouth hanging open watching him sprint down the street and out of your sight in less than ten seconds, almost falling face first after rounding a sharp corner. The sight of him almost biffing it made you crack a grin, wondering just how secretly scary his slightly older brother was to make him run home like that.

Their parents sure made handsome boys, shame though, you knew just how much Mrs. Kim had always wanted a daughter and got stuck with two boys instead.

A grimace came on your features as you sluggishly began your journey to the field, a sigh escaping you. You thanked your luck that it wasn’t a sweltering day or else you would’ve literally turned around and forgotten about the whole thing, but since Junmyeon had seemed really anxious and pleading, you would do him this favor.

He totally owed you a meal for this.

The walk actually wasn’t too bad and passed far quicker than you anticipated, must have been all those years practicing your fast walk to perfection,  and you could hear the whistle and yelling from a distance, only becoming more clear and noisy the closer you came to the field, the rich green turf momentarily blinding you if you looked directly at it. 

Tall, lean forms in matching white jerseys and shorts ran along the field, each with their own ball, taking turns taking free shots at the goal net at the other end of the field.

Good, at least you caught him early on in the practice as to not possibly getting yelled at by the head soccer coach that had always intimidated you by his yells you could hear miles away.

Clutching the notebook tighter in your grip, you slowly made your way around the fence, coming closer to the bleachers that held many gym bags along with half filled water bottles and towels laid untidily on the seat, making you grimace at the disorder of it all.

Your hesitant arrival becoming noticed rather quickly, you watched with a feeling of impending doom as the whole team shouted Chanyeol’s name, his head shooting up from his focus on the soccer ball in front of him to you, his face changing from a stoic concentration, to shock, then to a smirk.

You eyed the whole ordeal strangely. Maybe Junmyeon had told him that you were coming to drop off the notebook in his stead and to look out for you when you arrived? You ran through your previous conversation with the man in question, but nothing came up of him telling you that Chanyeol was expecting you other than gaining his attention.

Which you did, in a surprisingly short amount of time and effort. His teammates all had big grins on their faces and were playfully shoving him around and your brows furrowed in confusion at the reaction your presence created.

Just show him the notebook and get out, Y/n, you told yourself, gritting your teeth and held up the notebook in your right hand—Chanyeol still staring intently at you, fiddling with the ball at his feet—and dropped it on the bleachers, not bothering to find his personal bag and felt relieved that you managed to complete Junmyeon’s plea with much less difficulty than you were anticipating. 

“Watch out!” He suddenly exclaimed with a yell as you caught the tail-end of his kick, his right leg swinging out in front of him with the force of it.

Eyes widening in alarm, your heart beating at an alarming rate as you realized the ball was heading straight towards you, then everything went black with a thump.

You blinked and all of a sudden you found yourself laying in an uncomfortable bed located in the nurses office. A cold and foreign object being placed gently on your temple that throbbed and hurt like a bitch made you flinch back in surprise and pain, a hiss escaping your parted lips.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” a breathy and apologetic voice sounded from beside you and once again you startled, your heart rate going from a normal range to tap dancing within the confines of your rib cage. You swung your head to the left, only to freeze as you locked gazes with Park Chanyeol, the sight of him and the onslaught of increased pain leaving you to groan, your left hand instinctively coming up to poke and prod at the area causing you so much discomfort.

“Would you stop moving, I’m trying to keep this ice pack on your head.” He spoke again, this time much less breathy and more exasperated, yet still weirdly apologetic, his own hand catching your wrist and gently tugging it back down before you could make contact. He made no move to extract his hand from yours and you eventually pulled away, choosing not to focus on how warm and secure his hand had felt holding yours.

Memories came rushing back to you the longer you stared quizzically at him, a gasp leaving your mouth as the suddenly crystal clear vision of that damned soccer ball zooming straight in your direction, a smirking Park Chanyeol being the one to kick it at you, after all. 

“You hit me with the soccer ball!” Yelling only upset your injury more but you didn’t care. You knew he didn’t like you, but kicking a soccer ball at full speed from the other end of a giant field at you crossed the line. 

“I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to hit you, it was an accident, I must’ve lost my aim or something.” He rushed out the excuse, his words gaining volume as his expression changed back into what looked like guilt, furrowed brows and he gnawed at his bottom lip as he winced in conjunction as he readjusted the ice pack on your head.

You rolled your eyes and scoffed, letting Chanyeol know that you didn’t believe his sorry story for a second. “Yeah, right.”

“What?”

“You totally meant to hit me, there’s no way your aim could’ve missed.” It wasn’t like you were on the actual field standing in front of the net or anything, you had been standing in front of the bleachers. 

His mouth flew open and a noise of assault exited his mouth, eyebrows shooting clear up to his hairline at your use of his own words against him, his tone becoming more desperate with each word he spoke, eyes fixed earnestly on yours. “It did! Why don’t you believe me?”

“Because you hate me, that’s why! You’ve probably had this planned for a week, but it backfired because you know I know, and that’s why you’re taking care of me—give me this.” You snatched the ice pack away from him, the movement causing your head to hurt even worse and you reapplied the ice pack to your temple with a groan and a death glare.

Chanyeol was looking at you like you had just eaten the last slice of pizza after taunting him for ten straight minutes, the hurt and betrayal clear in his expression, his dark eyes wide and mouth turned down into an obvious frown as his gaze roamed over you repeatedly.

“Why would you say that? Are you okay? Why on earth would I hate you?” You hated the way those words sounded coming from him. How would he expect you to understand something like that?

“How the hell should I know? You tell me.”

“But I don’t hate you! I love you!” He seemed especially and genuinely earnest now, even more than a few moments ago, going to grab your hand in his once again, but you retreated before he could, a look of hurt crossing his features, and then you registered his sentence.

Well, you weren’t expecting him to ever utter those words in response to yours. “...What?”

“Of course I love you, you’re my girlfriend.”

“WHAT?”

The two of you stared at each other unblinking for a few moments, before you broke it with a tired sigh and shook your head the tiniest bit to as not to upset your headache and injury even more. “Look, I don’t know what you’re trying to pull, but it’s not working, so you can stop. I’m not in the mood for this right now.”

“Stop what?” He seemed confused at your words, large frame scooting closer to yours on the bed, to which you scooted back with a questioning gaze.

You stared at him in all seriousness then and answered with a sneer, “As if we would ever date.”

You had to give him credit, he was keeping his character for longer than you thought he would, and his face still held that expression of bewilderment and concern as he continued to study your face with his wide eyes, his mouth turned down at the sides in a frown.

“Y/n, this isn’t funny, okay? I already feel really bad about hurting you, I get it. You don’t need to pretend to not know who I am.” Gone was his faux concern and in came his signature eye roll that you’ve seen many times, relaxing from his alert position to lean back in his chair.

You squinted your eyes and continued to look at him weirdly, wondering if he was the one who got hit in the head and not you, what with his sudden strange behavior and all. But after a few more moments, you realized you really didn’t care, and just wanted to go home and maybe set up a doctor’s appointment to get your bruise looked at by a professional. It didn’t hurt as much as it did at first, but your head still throbbed from the collision.

“I know who you are, obviously, but we’re not dating—you know what, I don’t really care, I’m going home now, thanks for nothing... except for possibly giving me a concussion.” You huffed as you slid off the bed slowly, shrugging off Chanyeol’s helpful irksome hands as he tried to help steady you, scowling in irritation at how annoying and clingy he was being, deliberating on taking the ice pack home with you but deciding against it and placed it in the sink with a small shrug. Your house wasn’t far from here, surely you would survive the walk. Spotting your bag strewn on the floor by the entrance, you bent down to pick it up, but was beaten to it Chanyeol. He hurried to open the door for you with watchful eyes.

You were beyond annoyed but didn’t have the energy to deal with wrestling it from his grasp and opted to exit through the door, knowing by now he was going to follow.

“Are you being serious? Let me take you to the hospital, I really think you should get your head looked at.” He followed behind you like a lost puppy as predicted, and you wanted to scream. 

Why couldn’t he just leave you alone?!

You were about to yell your thoughts at him when two identical uniform clad goofs you recognized as his two buddies who he was almost never seen not by his side came bounding to the two of you, concerned expressions adorning their surprisingly—though not so surprising—handsome faces. 

Both of their gazes were intense, but the one closest to your right was even more so, the furrow of his eyebrows made your heart rate increase, you would not want this man to be upset with you. But you were the victim here!

You recognized their faces, but had never gone through the trouble to remember their names. Your eyes narrowed at the unexpected close proximity as they hounded you with questions.

“Y/n, are you okay?”

“Are you dizzy?”

“Dude, I can’t believe you actually hit her with the ball!”

At the last comment, you turned your attention back to the guilty giant on trial, giving him the meanest and hardest glare you could muster up before continuing on your way home. 

“What’s going on? Did you guys fight?” 

“Jongin, she’s sporting a head injury from being hit in the head by a flying soccer ball, genius. Of course she’s upset.”

Ah, so the less intimidating one was Jongin—wait, why did you care?

“But it’s not like you did it on purpose, have you apologized yet?”

“Of course I have! Like a hundred times, I don’t know why she’s suddenly saying that we’re not dating,” Chanyeol piped up behind you, still trailing behind you, albeit at a safe distance. You could imagine his pout in your mind without having to look back at him, convinced his friends were in on this prank he was trying his best to pull off.

Hell, they were probably silently giggling behind your back at this very moment. Mouthing their rehearsed script as to not mess anything up.

You couldn’t trust them, you needed to call Junmyeon. He would assure you this was just a stupid and juvenile attempt to further aggravate you, which reminded you to take your bag back from Chanyeol.

“That’s an indirect way of saying, ‘Let’s break up.’“ Those words were spoken with a laugh.

“Sehun!” The voice you now recognized as Jongin’s whisper-yelled from behind you as you halted in your stride and heaved a sigh. 

Enough.

“Y/n, are you really breaking up with me? I already told you it was an accident and that I’m really sorry. That’s not a reason to break up, right?” His eyes were wide when you turned around, lips parted looking very concerned and stared at you as you stepped closer, looking the exact definition of a kicked puppy that only served as more irritation for you.

“We’re not breaking up,” you huff out exasperatedly, stopping in your stride long enough to take your bag back from Chanyeol’s loose grasp, his shoulders drooping with what seemed like relief judging by the sigh that escaped him and the smile he gazed at you with. That quickly faded with your continuation of, “because we never went out in the first place. I told you, I’m not falling for this.”

Turning back around you felt around in the first pocket for your phone after realizing it wasn’t in your pocket, while they continued to discuss among themselves in quiet voices as you grasped the familiar object, not knowing how it got there but didn’t really mind as long as you held it in your hands. 

“Do you think she should go see a doctor?”

“Yeah, what if it’s amnesia? That has to be why she can’t remember your guys’ relationship!”

“I’m standing right here, and I’m lea—” Your next word cuts off as you press the home button, as your eyes land on the picture of your wallpaper, brows furrowing and heart beginning to thunder in your chest as you tried to make sense of this.

Replacing your wallpaper of one of your favorite artist’s albums was a photo of Chanyeol. He was obviously posing for a picture, eyes closed and a smile on his face, little stickers and emojis of hearts decorating the space around him, your facial features scrunching up into a grimace the longer you eyed the cursed image.

What the hell?

Were you really—the thought made you gag internally—dating Park Chanyeol?

The thought made you laugh out loud at the absurdity of it, causing the guys to look at you with wide eyes. 

Of course you weren’t dating Chanyeol, you would’ve remembered making such a stupid decision. He must’ve been the one to sneak your phone in your backpack after finding a way to change your wallpaper. 

To think you nearly fell for this stupidity.

You studied the photo and sighed, wondering if he was really narcissistic enough to take a picture of himself like this and add hearts on it himself.

Who were you kidding, of course he was.

He was willing to go this far for a stupid prank that wasn’t even working?

Feeling much lighter, you showed them your wallpaper with an unimpressed expression on your face. “Ha ha, very funny. How did you change my wallpaper you creep?”

“Creep?” Sehun couldn’t help but let out a giggle at your words, earning a glare and a slap to the arm from the boys by his side and an eye roll from you, a small huff of pain escaping you as the pain in your head from that move, and moved to enter your passcode and frowned as it told you that you had entered it incorrectly.

Typing the numbers in slowly and carefully, you sighed when it told you it was still incorrect, making Chanyeol freeze in his stride towards you as you shot him a glare, immediately jumping to the conclusion he changed it along with your wallpaper. 

“And you changed my password, too? Unlock it.” You held your phone out to him with a hard face, just wanting to go home and forget about this. 

“I didn’t do anything to your phone, Y/n.” His lips were turned down as he slowly took it from you, then smiled a bit as he gazed down at your screen—most likely at the picture of him. “I didn’t know this was your wallpaper, though. You’re mine, too.” He fished his out from his back pocket and held it out to you, that small grin still placed on his lips, and you frowned at his words, nonetheless taking his phone from his palm.

“Ugh, you damn lovebirds make me sick.” The one you now recognized as Sehun moaned, fake gagging as Jongin laughed along to his words.

Blinking at the picture of you, you couldn’t help the confusion and the bit of panic that hit you. It was a photo you had no recollection of, but you seemed ridiculously happy judging by the wide smile on your face, your face tilted to the side and braced against the palm of your hand, eyes shining brightly as you stared into the camera, bright neon pink blush effects placed on your cheeks with similar heart emojis surrounded your face.

Your breathing became a bit heavier, you continued to look at the picture, heart rate picking up in your chest. 

How did he have this picture? When did he take this? You didn’t remember yourself taking a picture like this, you’d never smiled so big like the one on the screen. 

This was obviously you, why did you have no memory of it? What was going on?

Placing your thumb on the screen of his phone so the screen wouldn’t go dark, you continued to stare lost at the picture, trying to decipher the background, your clothes, anything that could tell you when this was taken.

The bright lights behind you were hazy and unfocused, no major landmarks or buildings behind you to clue you into where the hell you were. 

But you had more pressing thoughts rather than where that picture was taken.

Was it possible the two of you were really dating? That this wasn’t all just a poorly executed endeavor to prank you? Did you really gain amnesia over being hit with the soccer ball and just didn’t remember? How else would him having a picture you didn’t remember being taken—when you could clearly see you willingly posed for it—be explained somewhat logically?

You needed to get out of here. 

“...Y/n? Shit, Y/n? Are you dizzy? You look really pale, let me take you to the hospital, I think you should really get checked out.”

Flinching and shying away from the hand he attempted to lay on your shoulder, you noted once again the flash of hurt that passed through his eyes at your actions, but it wasn’t as if you could help it. 

Your mind was racing with all these confusing thoughts, and his reaction to your reaction didn’t make anything easier for you, only adding onto it if anything, your expression worried as you tore your eyes from him to flit over the empty hallway, attempting to ignore the concerned gazed of Jongin and Sehun.

“No, I’m fine. I’d rather go by myself...” you trailed off, sluggishly handing him his phone back and exchanging it for yours, forgetting that he still hadn’t told you your passcode to unlock it, but you’d figure it out later. 

You just needed to get away from this before you lost your mind, though you felt that it was a bit too late for that, your headache coming back tenfold.

Chanyeol on the other hand, shook his head at your words, a determined expression taking hold on his face and moved with you towards the exit, along with his two lackeys from the sound of six feet following you. “No, I’m not letting you go alone, it’s not safe. You might have a head injury.”

“I have a head injury, thanks to you.” Your harsh tone was a striking contrast from his, your patience running thin from humoring this prank for so long, a weird pang of guilt hitting you as Chanyeol flinched slightly at your words, hearing the halting footsteps of the two behind you.

“Please, Y/n. I would feel better if you let me go with you.” His phrase was delivered with a desperation you just didn’t understand and that fact made you even more upset.

“I’m not going to the hospital with you, I don’t even know you or like you. I’ll just call Junmyeon when I go home and see if he can take me.” Your words were uttered in nothing less than a frustrated growl, causing the words Chanyeol was going to say to die in his throat, his pleading and anxious expression transformed into a much harsher one.

His eyebrows narrowed and his mouth formed a tight line as the two of you continued to stare at each other, neither one blinking as if willing the other one to give up first. Then a sigh escaped him, “Fine.” With that he marched ahead of you in angry steps, leaving you behind to stare at him, not wanting to examine the feeling in your chest as you watched him walk away at your words.

Sehun whizzed past your figure without a second thought, running after him. Yet for some reason Jongin hesitated by your side, noticing your slight wince and how you clutched your head, exhaling a steadying breath. “He’s just worried, you didn’t need to yell at him like that.”

That wasn’t yelling, you thought. But you didn’t voice your thoughts and said instead, “Regardless of what you guys tell me, I don’t recall ever being in any type of relationship with that jackass. I’ll be fine getting home by myself, I’m not a little kid.”

His expressions changed many times during your speech, and he seemed like he wanted to something but chose not to, opting with, “Just text us when you get home and what the doctor says, we’ll be worried about you.”

Your brows furrowed at his words and followed slowly behind him towards the exit, nodding a bit in thanks as he held the door open and looked back a few times as he stood in the same spot, like he was making sure you got home all right without being overly pushy like Chanyeol was.

His words confused you, since when were you two so close?

Your mother greeted you from the kitchen and had audibly gasped in horror when she saw the giant bruise forming on your temple, questions of what happened and are you okay all jumbled into an incoherent stream as he ushered you right back outside, stopping to let the backpack fall from your shoulders to the doorway before sitting you in the passenger seat as she called your father on speaker, telling him you were going to the hospital and that she would give him more details when she could.

Since head injuries and head traumas were taken very seriously, you were taken in to get some tests done that were more meager than they were annoying. You had wanted to get into the doctor’s office earlier, but now all you wanted to do was go to sleep and forget this whole confusing and tiring day happened, relieved once they told you they weren’t going to keep you awake, certain you didn’t have a concussion, but were puzzled at the fact you lost memories of only thing; or person, chalking it up to temporary amnesia.

“I wouldn’t worry too much, okay?” The handsome doctor Mr. Jung told you as he laid a reassuring hand on your shoulder—and for some reason, you were reminded of how you shot down Chanyeol when he tried the same thing, that same pang of guilt hitting you right in the chest. “You’re an intelligent young lady, I know this must be driving you insane, and it might feel as if you’re actually going insane.” The two of you share a small laugh and you nod, wondering if he could read minds as well.

“Just remember to rest and to not push yourself to remember too hard. Take part in hobbies you enjoy or take a nice walk outside. If you experience any pain, feel free to come back for another check up to make sure everything is doing fine. Okay? Okay, I’ll see you no sooner than two weeks I hope. Feel better!”

Did you really have amnesia? It would make sense to trust your doctors words, even your mother was surprise you didn’t ‘remember’ your relationship with Chanyeol, apparently the two of you had been dating for around six months.

You about spit out and choked on the water she had you sipping on after the two of you had gotten home a good almost three hours later, well into the night and your father was out at the store getting the prescribed painkillers your doctor had prescribed you. She even told you he had called her in a panic while you were getting your tests done, begging for an update, and she told him that you were fine but that it was maybe best if he stayed away for at least tonight. 

But your mind was stuck on the six months part.

Six months? Surely your mother wouldn’t lie to you, so then it must be true, no matter how much something inside you told you it wasn’t. You opened your mouth to ask her some questions when there was loud pounding on the front door before the person remembered they had a key and let themselves in. 

Junmyeon came barreling in, eyes locking with yours and immediately sprinted in your direction, hands coming to grasp your shoulders as he looked you over with wide eyes. “Are you okay? You remember me, right? There’s no way you’d forget about me... right?”

“Of course I remember you, you dummy. And I’m fine... mostly. Just here icing my bruise.” You took his hands off your shoulders and motioned towards the ice pack sitting on the kitchen counter.

“You’re not fine, you have amnesia.” Junmyeon told you and you rolled your eyes, but stiffened when he said, “Chanyeol called me earlier.”

Suddenly becoming very aware of your mothers presence, you tilted your head in the direction of your room, smiling tightly to her as she gazed encouragingly back at you.

“Chanyeol called me about an hour after school ended, saying he hit you in the head with a soccer ball and that you couldn’t remember him or something like that, I don’t know, he was freaking about it I couldn’t really understand him all that well on the phone, saying that you two weren’t speaking at the moment and asked how you were doing, I just updated him vaguely about five minutes ago thanks from the details I got from your mom. She already gave him an update at the hospital, but I guess he just wanted to be sure. He told me he’s called you like twenty times and you haven’t answered.” He tells you, eyeing you as you pat your back pocket at the remembrance of your phone in your back pocket, taking a seat at the edge of your bed as you followed his actions. 

“Which I guess makes sense since you don’t really remember him, but you could at least text the poor man back and tell him your doctors visit went fine and you’re home safe. You might think you’re strangers, but he really loves you.”

Your brows furrowed with his lecture, ignoring his last five words and played with your phone, sighing as you stared at the picture of Chanyeol as your wallpaper. “I don’t know the passcode, I think he changed it while I was knocked out.” You mumbled quietly into your chest as you refused to look at him.

His hand swipes it from your grasp and you watch as he types on your phone, not expecting him to be able to decipher whatever random code Chanyeol must have put to have your mouth hang wide open in shock as he hands it to you once again, your home screen in full view.

“What the hell? How did you know what it was?”

“He didn’t change it, you created this passcode. It’s his birthday.” He said simply.

“Chanyeol’s birthday?” You placed your phone back in his hands to re-enter the passcode so you could change it to something you would actually remember, opting to change your annoying wallpaper later.

“Yep.”

“I’m really dating him?” You had to clarify, even though you’ve been told you were by literally everyone, letting your phone drop onto the bed in your lap, questioning if you were really the type of person to put in your partners birthday as a passcode, please—you so hoped that wasn’t you.

“Yep.”

You groaned. “Why? Do you not remember how mean he was to me?”

“What?”

“Oh come on, those snarky comments he’d always say to me in the halls? That was not flirting, I don’t care what you say.”

“What are you talking about?” Junmyeon’s face was scrunched up in confusion at your words, and your face scrunched up at his words and were about to clarify, when he continued. “Y/n, I think you’re remembering things differently, or else you had a weird dream yesterday that’s got you confused after your accident, but Chanyeol has never said anything even remotely mean to you. He’s basically been in love with you since you two met earlier this year.”

“What?” Now it was your turn to be confused.

“Okay, let me fill you in a bit since you can’t remember for yourself how the two of you started dating.” You narrowed your eyes at him as he shuffled closer a bit, looking like the epitome of seriousness as he stared at you, then awkwardly avoided eye contact as he began to fill you in on your lost memories.

“Let me see,” he murmured with pursed lips as he thought about where to start, a slight furrow to his brow as he began, “Um, you two shared a few classes together last semester, I think—yeah, you did. Because I remember you rambling to me about this ‘cute guy’ that you shared classes with.”

You strangely did remember that, but you had thought it was only that one class, with Ms. Lee? But along with that memory, came the onslaught of his comments that would continue for the next months that angered as well as embarrassed you, so something was not adding up. 

“Wait—“ you held a hand up to pause him, squinting your eyes at him. “I know, we literally had this conversation earlier today.”

Junmyeon’s brows furrowed as he blinked at you, eyes narrowing as he studied you a bit more closely. “Y/n, we’ve barely talked at all today, and it certainly wasn’t about you and Chanyeol. I was busy tutoring, remember? Oh right—” he paused to giggle at his own joke, “the amnesia.”

You in turn did not find his mediocre attempt at a joke amusing and you noted internally that today was in fact Thursday, one of the two days of the week he tutored for some extra cash, his words seeming like they should make sense or strike a chord with your messed up memory, but you couldn’t shake this—weird—feeling. 

But Junmyeon continued on without seeing your turmoil. “Then maybe a few weeks after classes had begun, he approached me out of the blue and outright asked me if we were dating.” He started laughing at the admission and your eyes narrowed as you experienced a bit of deja vu—certain you had a conversation of this manor before. 

“And I told him there was no way in hell that would happen,” he paused to gauge your reaction and you scowled at him to which he sent you an over dramatic finger heart. “Sorry, you know I love you, but you’re not my type.”

“You’re not my type, either. Every time I look at you I still see naked Junmyeon from the seventh grade.” You retorted and shivered in response to the image you conjured up with your spoken words and giggled when he jumped back.

“Yah! You should’ve known to knock by then, especially if I told you I was getting ready to shower.”

“Who doesn’t lock the door when they’re about to shower?” You smiled as you spied the barest hint of pink gracing his cheeks and the tips of his ears.

“Whatever. We’re not getting into this right now.” He glared at you, seemingly blaming you for getting off track and you shrugged and he cleared his throat and continued. “Where was I? Oh yeah, and he seemed really relieved and said thanks and left. Then you told me that you gave him your number a few days later and the rest is history.” 

You blinked at his triumphant expression, wondering why he was acting like he did this big thing, when all he really filled you in on was something you could’ve gotten from almost anybody. “You told me nothing.” Rolling your eyes, you shook your head at him and eyed the phone in your lap silently.

He shrugged from his spot across from you. “You guys like each other—no, I’m pretty sure you guys are crazy in love with each other. I don’t really know much about anything else about your relationship details, other than you guys deserve to go jail from the amount of cutesy shit you pull out in public.”

It was unsettling to have him talk about you about events that you didn’t remember and decided to distract yourself with the phone that seemed so foreign and held it in your hands.

Your eyes grew wide at the number of calls and texts you received, your lock screen keeping your messages and caller ID’s hidden and you typed in your new passcode, studying the picture on your home screen you were registering for the first time, unlike the first time when you were so fixated on changing your passcode.

Again, it was Chanyeol, but it also had you in it. The two of you looked like to be in front of a building that you didn’t recognize, wearing casual street style clothing and had your arms around each other, cheesy wide smiles on your faces as you looked at the camera.

Seeing a picture with you in it, yet having no recollection made your skin crawl a bit and wondered if you could find anymore.

You grow silent as you somehow find yourself clicking on your gallery, scrolling through what seemed like hundreds upon hundreds of pictures of you and Chanyeol. Varying locations and all different types of photos greeted your vision; ones where you two smiled at each other, faux seriousness, ones where the two of you gave each other piggyback rides, ones at the movies, the arcade, the fair, wrapped up in each others embrace, there was even one where you had your arms around him after what seemed like a pretty intense soccer match, his hair matted to his forehead with most probably was sweat.

It was definitely you in the pictures you were staring at, but it seemed like a completely different person. This person on the screen looked so happy, so content, so carefree. That wasn’t you. Your gaze shifted to Chanyeol on the screen, always by your side, with his arms wrapped securely around you. Were you the one that put that wide smile on his face? So many memories shown, but you couldn’t account for any of them.

“Look don’t worry about it too much, okay? It sucks that you got hit in the head with a soccer ball and that you got amnesia from it,” he starts to chuckle in between words and tries to calm himself once he sees just how not impressed you are with his amusement. Clearing his throat, he tries again, “But you were really happy with Chanyeol, you were always telling me that he was the love of your life and that you were going to marry him one day, it was really disgusting.” A small smile came onto his lips at his words, seemingly reminiscing in the past.

“And you don’t have to jump back in if you don’t want, okay? Just... Just text him, at least. Tell him that you’re okay, he’s really worried and I had to convince him at least a dozen times to not stalk your house. I know that hearing you’re okay from you will really help calm him.”

Remembering all the missed calls and messages you had waiting for you, your eyes widened at the majority being from Chanyeol, some from Yerim and Kyungsoo, and weirdly, Sehun and Jongin.

Eyes furrowing at the name you had Chanyeol saved under, you began reading through his numerous texts.

Chan❤️

[3:40 PM] i’m so sorry y/n i shouldn’t have left you to go home all by yourself, even if jongin did it on my behalf. I just felt so guilty and upset at the way you were reacting to me

[3:43 PM] saying that we weren’t dating and that you didn’t like me, and refusing my help like i was a stranger

[3:46 PM] and you looked so scared and confused, i’m so sorry again, it really was an accident i would never hurt you on purpose, you know that, right?

[3:47 PM] I love you so much, please be okay

[3:55 PM] Just please answer your phone or answer my texts so i know you’re okay

[4:05 PM] I called Junmyeon and he said he didn’t know anything about you going to the hospital???

[4:00 PM] Please tell me someone took you

[4:00 PM] Your mom filled me in a bit, saying it’d be best if I stayed away so I wouldn’t stress you out more.

[4:01 PM] Which is smart.

[4:02 PM] The last thing I want is to stress you out even more

[4:03 PM] Which means I should probably stop sending all these messages.

[4:05 PM] Remember to get lots of rest and stay hydrated and to get plenty of protein and nutrients, okay?

[5:30 PM] If you could, please just let me know that you’re doing okay. Please.

Your lips quirk up a bit at the absurdity of everything and nodded to appease your friend, thinking that it might be the least you could do. 

Chanyeol did seem genuinely concerned, after all. 

Seeing you nod seemed to please him and he patted your shoulder twice before standing up, telling you that he’d better go home and tell his parents and Jooyeon that you were fine.

“Jooyeon?”

“My younger sister?”

“Oh, of course.” You shook your head and he laughed at your silly question and told you to get some rest and he’d text you tomorrow, you had the Friday off as orders from the doctor so you had a long weekend to look forward to.

But you couldn’t help but frown as he closed the door softly behind him, hearing him say goodbye to your mother before he left your house.

You could’ve sworn he had an older brother, not a younger sister.

tag list: @rashidamesrur @totallynerdstuff @organic-hemp @etaerealboy @yasmini24 @imlonelysometimeshappy @rpavlxk​ 

this was so much fun to write, i didn’t expect this story to be as long as its turning out but im happy w it nonetheless! didn’t want this to be a monster lol so i am splitting it into 3 parts!!!and i hope you all like it! as always i love feedback so pls show this some love <33 if you’d like to be added to the taglist just say so down in the comments or shoot me a dm!

[lovelivingmydreams]

A story by Heroes and Vilains. Logan Anker: Allies

No man is an island. We all need others to rely on.

Previous chapters in masterpost

“You are sure I don’t have to compensate you for your trouble? Yesterday was only a few hours but…”

“Virgil is an absolute angel Logan. He is no trouble at all. You get to work,” Celine assured him.

Logan nodded and knelt down to look at Virgil.

“I have to go to work Virgil. But I will be back in the evening okay?” he asked calmly.

Virgil nodded, squeezing his Stitch tightly to his chest.

“If you need me, just ask for me okay? Promise?” Logan asked.

“Pwomise,” Virgil said as he stepped forward, putting his arms around Logan’s neck in a hug.

“Bye papa,” he said before letting go.

Logan smiled a little and ruffled Virgil’s hair. “Be a good boy okay?”

Virgil nodded again. Logan got up and left, forcing himself not to look back. He felt like he had more trouble with being apart from Virgil then the other way around. Which he supposed was a good sign. It meant Virgil was enjoying his time with the neighbors and that they were as nice as they seemed.

Thomas, as the dean of the college Logan would be teaching at, was of course the one to show him around campus. It was a pleasant work environment as far as Logan could tell.

Big open spaces, the lecture halls were well lit and had good airflow.

Not to mention state of the art educational material and…

“Oh, Thomas! There you are! I was looking for you all over, but then Talyn told me you were showing around a new professor and…” Logan looked up at the cheerful voice and his eyes found a freckled face holding two wide, innocently blue eyes. When their eyes locked the man cut of his rant.

“Oh… Hi,” the man smiled a little sheepishly.

Logan collected himself and approached the man to greet him. “Greetings. I am Logan Anker. I will be starting here next fall,” he explained.

“Patton Bonair! Very nice to meet you,” the man, Dr. Bonair shook his hand excitedly and while normally he would find that overwhelming or even annoying, there was such a pure sincere joy in his eyes that he could only classify the behavior as endearing.

“I teach moral philosophy. Just started last year not too long before our new dean here. We’re all so proud of Thomas for getting that position! He is young, but he is very fit for the job just you wait and see!”

Logan could appreciate Paton sticking up for Thomas. “Yes. Thomas and I met in high school and I had the pleasure of being his roommate in college. He is a very capable man. I trust him to make well informed decision in the faculty and the student body’s best interest,” Logan assured Patton in turn.

“Oh that’s so exciting!!!” Patton giggled. It was a rather pleasant sound.

“I bet you have tons of fun stories,” the other man winked.

Ah. “Nice try. But I will not be divulging such information,” Logan stated firmly.

“Aw, Logan! I knew you secretly cared.”

“I merely assumed that this would make for a mutual beneficial arrangement. I don’t reveal any personal information about you without your consent and you regard my private life with the same amount of respect,” Logan stressed. Not comfortable in showing any kind of fondness for his ally and friend. Not in front of a stranger. Not even if it was a very kind and cute stranger.

One who was watching the exchanged with a very sweet smile and now clapped his hands in excitement as the lights of an idea sparkled in his eyes.

“Why don’t you come over next Friday for movie night? You can get to know some more people and…”

“Apologies but I have prior commitments,” Logan stated before Patton got too worked up over the evening.

“Oh…” Patton deflated at that. “Well I’m sorry I didn’t…”

“Don’t take it personal Pat. Logan isn’t trying to get out of spending time with you. If he was he would just say he didn’t want to come. Trust me,” Thomas explained.

Logan nodded. “Indeed. Speaking of which I should get settled in. I wanted to call Virgil over my break,” he stated as he swiftly left the room.

Virgil was, from the sound of it, doing rather well in his absence. Logan assured him that he would be home soon before hanging up and getting ready to join Thomas in the basement.

Time to get settled into his role as a manufacturer of support items for heroes and a tutor for young heroes in training.

He donned his disguise and his new Shade glasses that cast a shadow over his face so that even someone who stood nose to nose with him wouldn’t be able to discern any facial features or the voice modifier he was wearing to make his voice more monotone and robotic.

He arrived in a conference room where Manifestor and one other person were waiting for him.

“Ah! Brain Storm! Let me introduce you to Sweets. He is an empath and will be assisting you in teaching any young heroes in training. Sweets you’ve probably heard of Brain Storm.”

Logan prepared for judgement and distrust… But that was not what he got.

“It is very nice to meet you,” Sweets stated warmly as he offered his hand. He seemed sincere.

Logan simply nodded. Distance was key. Sweets was clearly disappointed to find him unwilling to exchange more than the most basic of pleasantries. With his colleagues it was hard to escape. But down here, Thomas could explain his aversion to closeness of any kind.

He had a handle on his gift around Virgil. Having him as an emotional anchor actually helped prevent any flare ups even when he lost hold of his emotions.

Maybe he should discuss possible ways to extend this effect to his work environment in some way with Picani next week.

“Oh like a talisman? That sounds like an excellent idea Logan. I must say I am proud of you for making so much progress on your own!” Picani told him warmly.

“It would be nice if you could allow yourself to actually get along with your colleagues. Both as Logan and as Brainstorm,” he finished.

Logan wasn’t sure if he needed that. He did care about being able to actually express some excitement while giving lectures next semester. But he didn’t think any of his colleagues would really benefit from a friendship with him. He was already at his limit of social pleasantries when interacting with his helpful neighbors and he liked them well enough. Thomas wasn’t as exhausting since he knew all his edges and accepted them for what they were. People like Patton were better off never having to deal with those.

When he went to pick up Virgil that evening David opened the door with a smile.

“They are in the garden,” he told him as he led him to the backdoor.

He opened the door and both men looked around, trying to spot the boys.

When they found them though they saw Virgil curled up in a ball shaking with sobs as Janus tried to comfort his friend.

“Virgil!!!?” Logan called out as he rushed over. Virgil stiffened and tightened his hold of his legs.

Logan let himself fall to his knees. “What happened? Are you hurt?” he whispered in an attempt to soothe him with a softer tone of voice. Virgil didn’t respond.

Logan looked up to the other boy. “Janus? What happened here?” he asked desperately wanting to know what had happened to his son.

Janus bit his lip nervously and shook his head. “I don’t know…”

Well obviously that was a lie. “Janus… you are not in trouble. But you will be if you lie about this. Now what happened to Virgil?” he tried to stay calm but he was on his last nerve. The only reason why things weren’t exploding left and right was because he had his hands on his shaking son who he didn’t want to frighten any more.

Janus looked down. “Stitch,” he muttered.

Logan let out a sigh of relief and turned back to Virgil.

“Virgil… are you upset because your Stich got torn or dirty?” Logan guessed.

Virgil hiccupped and a faint move of his head seemed like a nod.

“Can I see him? Maybe I can repair the damage?” he suggested gently.

Virgil looked up tears and snot running down his face. On any other kid it would have undoubtedly repulsed Logan. But this was Virgil and so he only cared that his son was upset.

“Not mad?” he wondered.

Logan allowed a gentle smile. “Of course not. Accidents happen. I am just glad you aren’t hurt. Now let me see…”

Virgil let go of his legs and retrieved the plush from it’s hiding place against his stomach. A good chunk of the ear had come off. From the looks of it it would be easier to cut off the top bit and close the lower one up.

And Logan had an idea of how to soften the blow of the loss of stitch’s ear.

“I think I can do something about this. Let’s go home,” he told Virgil.

His son nodded and waved goodbye to his friend.

Once home Logan got to work. He cut and sewed and he dug in his desk for a surprise for Virgil.

He came back downstairs and handed Virgil the repaired doll. Virgil inspected the shorter ear for a minute and then nodded in approval. “Little, broken, good,” he murmured. Paraphrasing his favorite quote of his favorite movie.

“Indeed and look.” Logan showed the little pouch he’d made from the remains of the ear.

And then he opened the box he’d retrieved from his desk. Virgil’s eyes widened when he noticed it contained all the rocks and leaves and feathers he’d given Logan over the past month. All things that Virgil had considered valuable and so they meant the world to Logan.

“How about we pick out some things to bring with me tomorrow? To keep me safe?”

He was in the unique position where this wasn’t a lie to give the child some sense of control over the separation with their parental figure. This ‘talisman’ would help him keep himself grounded, to remind himself why he couldn’t make mistakes.

Virgil smiled and nodded and carefully selected the best treasures and put them on Logan’s palm, one after the other so he could put them in. Logan took as much care with his task as Virgil did.

“There. Now, how about dinner?”

“Okay Virgil, dad has to go now. You be good to Janus’ papa okay? I’ll see you tonight,” Logan promised as he finished off his daily check in call with his son.

“Bye, bye daddy! Luv you!” Logan felt his heart fill with warmth at that. “Love you too Virgil,” he said softly. Virgil had only recently started saying ‘I love you’, and he seemed to understand the weight of the words, if the look in his eyes every time he used them was anything to go by. Logan was not usually comfortable with voicing his feelings, not even to Virgil. But over the phone he felt less vulnerable and had an easier time returning the sentiment.

“Hi Logan. How are you settling in?”

Logan looked up and was rather happy to see Patton walk in.

He would be foolish not to acknowledge the butterflies in his stomach every time Patton entered a room. But he had no time for relationships, he was still getting used to being a father. Not to mention, he did not trust himself around others enough to even consider letting a stranger in that much. No Virgil had to be his priority and he was already going through enough changes as it was. Besides, who wanted to date a man with a two year old toddler?

“Patton. I am doing quite well. I feel like I am ready for the start of the year.” He gestured to his desk, which he had made his own. An old space themed mug to hold his pens, a clear box for notecards in case he needed to write himself reminders and of course a picture of Virgil taking a nap with his Stitch and his blanket.

“Oh! Who is that precious little angel!” Patton squealed pointing at the picture.

Logan couldn’t help a smile. “Virgil. My… My son,” he said. It was the first time he called Virgil that out loud and it filled him with a warm pride.

“Oh… That is Virgil… How old is he?” Patton wondered beaming at him in a way only Patton could make look sincere.

“Two. Though he’s only been my son for the past two months. He’s rather well behaved for his age.” Logan caught himself about to start boasting about his boy and smiled apologetically at Patton.

“You sound very happy to have him,” Patton pointed out.

“I am…. He is my entire world,” Logan confessed.

Logan kept going to see Picani once a week for about two years. He didn’t stop going after that. But he didn’t need the weekly sessions anymore and he preferred to spend that time with Virgil.

Teaching was every bit as fulfilling as he’d hoped it would be and his talisman worked without fail.

So far he had yet to be involved with any heroes in training. Keeping to developing exercises for civilian gifted, reviewing data and creating tech for sanctioned active heroes.

Virgil and Janus had made it through kindergarten together and had just begun elementary school.

And for whatever reason Virgil had decided  to start playing matchmaker. So Logan sat him down to explain homosexuality to him, in terms Virgil would understand.

“It isn’t funny Thomas,” Logan grumbled over lunch while his friend was figuratively dying of laughter.

“What isn’t funny?” Patton wondered as he joined them.

“Virgil tried to set Logan up with some random woman from the park and he decided now was a good time to…” Thomas stopped himself and looked at Logan questioningly.

“It is fine Thomas. I see no reason to keep this from Patton.” He turned to their kindhearted friend. If anyone was going to be accepting it’d be him right.

“I came out as gay to my son this weekend.” He then turned back to Thomas.

“And there is no point in hiding this from him. If we want the LGBTQ+ community to get normalized we have to start with treating it as normal in front of the children, wouldn’t you agree?”

Thomas thought of that for a moment and nodded. “Yes, I suppose you are right. Should I come out next time I see him then?” Thomas wondered.

“You can if you want to.”

Logan would come to regret that later. Because Virgil’s conclusion to that revelation was that he should get uncle Thomas to be his dad’s boyfriend.

Time just kept spinning out of control and before Logan knew it, Virgil was in middle school.

It wasn’t long before Virgil made a new friend there. He and Janus were spending a lot of time with a boy named Remus, as Logan came to understand. They never invited him over as far as he was aware, but he was with them often during recess.

Until one day at the start of seventh grade Virgil came home rather upset. Remus was pulled out of school due to a rather persistent bullying problem.

“Why didn’t you tell me about that Virgil? Me and Mr. and Mrs. Bullard we could have talked to the teachers and…”

“I thought you’d say I couldn’t be friends with him anymore…” Virgil admitted.

Logan was shocked by that reveal. “Why would I say that?” he asked dumbfounded. When had he ever given Virgil the idea he would prefer he abandon kids who needed a friend the most?

“You say I shouldn’t look for trouble and…”

Oh… Oh. Logan had very soon realized that his son had inherited his birthparent’s selfless and protective nature and he had feared that this would end up getting him in trouble.

So he’d tried to caution him against reckless behavior. This, however, seemed to have left a very wrong impression with his son. That was something he should talk about with Picani.

“Oh, Virgil. I didn’t mean I wanted you to turn away from people who need help. I just meant… Sometimes being brave, being a hero means knowing when you need to ask for help. Promise me that next time, you’ll let people help you okay?”

Virgil nodded and gave him a hug.

And then, not a week later…

“And then this boy pushed the mean kid away and he turned out to be Remus’ twin Roman!”

After that Roman was talked about a lot. Logan had a suspicion that his son had a small crush on the boy and he didn’t know how to feel.

“That is so adorable!” Patton squealed when Logan explained the situation. Logan didn’t know how it had happened exactly. But he often found himself turning to Patton when he sought advice on how to handle certain problems in raising Virgil.

“I’m not ready for him to have crushes though Patton. It is impossible. It feels like only yesterday he struggled to sleep without his blanket and now…” Now his blanket and worn out stitch plushy had gotten a more decorative spot in his son’s room.

How much longer before Logan became just as obsolete?

He gently squeezed the talisman to ground himself and keep his thoughts from spiraling.

“It’s a part of life Logie.” Patton and only Patton got away with calling him that. He didn’t have the heart to ask him to stop.

“But rest assured you will always be important to Virgil. You’re his dad. How can you not be?”

Logan relaxed at that. Right. At the end of the day, Virgil was his son, nothing could change that.

Not even the unforgiving sands of time that had Virgil come down the first day of summer before his freshman year of high school with dyed hair and a new hoodie, announcing himself as bisexual.

Logan felt happy that Virgil felt comfortable telling him this. But also a squeeze in his heart as he realized that once more his boy was growing up.

Virgil had started experimenting with make up a few weeks ago and it was clear he was setting up a shield against the world. Logan just feared that he’d end up being kept out by that shield as well.

4)Pupil

Masterlist

@moonlightshow00 @naturallyunstablegamer @alias290 @meowthefluffy @frida0043 @angelic-cali

[xserpentlife]

Problems

Requested: Anon -  may I request a sweet pea x reader where the reader is a good girl north sider and has to tutor him and at first he finds her annoying but the more they spend time together he ends up falling for her (maybe they could have a moment where they talk about their life's and her life isn't as perfect as she leads on)

A/N: here’s a fic for y’all. Hope you enjoy it. I may do a drabble because I have a feeling @wayward-river​ my beta is going to request one haha

Warnings: Talk of drug addict parents

Word Count: About 1840

You were about to leave class when the teacher called you and Sweet Pea up to his desk. You were told to stay behind as the rest of the students left and you really didn’t understand why, especially not with the southsider.

“Yes Mr. Eric”

“Ah Ms. Y/N, I need to ask a big favor of you” You looked over to see Sweet Pea looking down at his feet as he leaned against the desk

“Yes?”

“You see I’m the basketball coach here as well as the science teacher, and Pea here is not doing very good in Chem like you are. I would like you to tutor him”

“Mr. Eric, I would but I don’t think that is such a good idea…”

“Ms. Y/N please, I’ll even throw in a few extra credit points for you, and I’ll be able to add this to your letter of recommendation”

“Okay… I’ll help

“Thank you, please once you both leave, make a plan to meet up as soon as possible” You turned picking up your books and leaving the room, waiting outside the door for Sweet Pea.

“Sorry I’m such an inconvenience for you, I know you don’t want to be seen around with a Southsider”

“That isn’t what I said…”

“Doesn’t matter”

“Whatever Sweet Pea, meet me in the library tomorrow right after school”

“Fine” He walked off without another word, You really didn’t know Sweet Pea all that well. You knew he was from the southside, and you knew he was part of the Serpents, but that was about it. You had no problem with him being in the Serpents, you were just extremely busy and having to tutor him on top of it, was not helping you at all.

You went through your day as normal. You worked through the night at your bartending job in Greendale, picked up your brothers from your house, and then got to school with minutes to spare. You were dead tired. The nice northside girl that everyone knew you as was starting to slowly fade away. You got through school fairly well, completely forgetting about having to tutor Sweet Pea, until you saw him sitting in the library as you were leaving. You walked in sitting down slowly at the table.

“Sorry I was late”

“Look at that the goody Northsider wasn’t on time”

“I already apologized”

“I know…”

“Are you ready to study…?”

“I mean you're the tutor, aren't you supposed to tell me?”

“I’m really not in the mood today Sweet Pea”

“Aww what? Perfect little Northsider had a tough day?”

‘You know what... here are your study guides and guided notes, study yourself, oh and check your attitude and maybe we’ll try this again in a few days…  meet me here on Thursday” You walked out after that, rushing to Pop’s because you were going to be late for your afterschool shift.

The past few days have been fine with Sweet Pea, and his tutoring sessions. He came learned and left, not many words were exchanged between the two of you.

You missed school yesterday due to the fact you had to work all day meaning you missed the study session you had planned with Sweet Pea. At School today you had to act like you weren’t tired, and act as peppy as possible because Cheryl was using you for a campaign for the school news and her presidency. You were smiles all day, forcing them upon your face. You finally gave up when you went to the library to wait for Sweet Pea. He was late, five minutes past, then ten, you lost track at twenty falling asleep at the table. You didn’t need to be here, but he needed you and you weren’t one to give up on people.

Sweet pea was about to leave the school, basketball practice ran late, but as he looked into the library he saw you asleep at the table. In the past few weeks the more he has gotten to know you the more you have grown to annoy him. Constantly badgering about his grades, assignments and everything in between. He just wanted to be a normal teenager, but living on the southside he was behind on his work and to play basketball he just couldn't be. He actually felt bad when he saw you sleeping at that table, he walked in tapping you on the shoulder.

“I’m sorry”

“Really… that’s surprising”

“Sit down so we can get started at least, I only have 20 minutes”

“You know you don’t have to be a bitch. I shouldn't even be here”

“Really because it kinda is your fault you're here, you're the one that needs to be tutored not me, so do you want the help or not?” He shuts up after that, taking the papers, and responding to your questions. The timer on your phone went off signaling you had to leave to go work your shift.

“I'll see you Wednesday after school for our session right?”

“Actually no Pea, I’m going to be at work… but uh you can come there if you need the help”

“Alright I’ll be there, we have our test the next day so I really need the extra help” He realized that he needed the help, that you were important to him, and you had become important in the few weeks he had spent with you. He didn’t mean to be rude to you, it was just the way he was raised.  People never helped you for the sake of you, but only ever for the sake of themselves. He was wary of new people and at the time you were new. He realized quickly he wanted to make that up, but that didn’t make up for the fact that he was still trying to decode you, still trying to understand if you truly cared or not”

“Yeah that’ll be fine”

A few days later was your study night at Pop's. Usually, it is slower during the week so you thought you would have time, but work that night was non-stop. You watched Pea come through the door taking a seat at one of the booths. You walked over quickly.

“I’m sorry Pea I’m just slammed right now, give me a few minutes” A few minutes turned to ten and it felt like you were becoming him, that night that he left you there. You sat with him for the ten-minute break you had. You expect to be done after working another twenty after that, but Pop offered you to stay later and you had to take it, you couldn’t deny you needed the money more than anything.

Pea was getting angrier. He knew you were working, but you kept promising you would be done, and it felt like he was getting disappointed like he had a hundred times in his life. Memories flooding back of the people that left and lied. He barely knew you but he felt something with you like he hadn’t felt with a lot of people. He wanted you to keep your promises and he knew you were working, but you not helping was making him more and more upset so he got up about to leave before you walked up to him.

“I’m so sorry Sweet Pea, it’s been crazy in here…”

“Save it, I get it I’m not that important…”

“You just love being a dick huh” Pop Tate looked at you “sorry Pop Tate, we'll go outside” You drug Sweet Pea by his sleeve, Pop giving you a nod that your shift was over.

“Why do you have to be such an asshole I’m sorry I haven't been as available for you tonight, I never meant for that to happen. Usually, this is our slow night. I figured I could get two things done at once, but then Pop Tate mentioned more hours and I had to take it”

“Why? You probably don’t even have to work with your rich northside parents”

“You don’t know me at all…”

“I’m sure someone like you has loads of problems.”

“You really want to know my problems, Sweet Pea, I’ll lay it out straight for you. I come from the northside that’s true, but my parents are nobodies, no money, no jobs. Oh and you wanna know the worst part, we are broke. I’ve lived on the street, but I now pay for a small apartment for me and my brothers. My parents are nowhere to be found, they are drug addicts, probably dealers by now. I try to keep us hidden as best I can. I work three jobs. Sometimes my job in Greendale is all night and then I come to school like that day you found me sleeping when I was late. My life isn’t rainbows and unicorns Sweet Pea, and I do have to work. I need money to take care of my brothers by myself. So yeah, I’m so sorry that I chose work while I was helping you study, but I needed the money, okay, and I hate to admit it but I'm tired so fucking tired of people thinking my life is so fucking perfect” You sat down on the bench outside of Pop’s head in your hands, and you felt Sweet Pea’s weight sit beside you. He pulled you into him, you felt comfortable around him, he made you so mad but instantly you felt a wave of calmness.

“Let me help… I know people we can get you a small trailer, help you out with money, you’re basically like a single mom”

“I don’t need a payout, I'm fine on my…”

“What on your own? Y/N you’ve been doing this for so long by yourself, and I can damn well see that you are capable but I want to be there like you were there for me. I want to help you. Let me help you and we can get this all sorted out for you…

“There is no “we” Sweet Pea”

“But what if I want there to be we… I know we don’t know each other that well but in the past few weeks, I’ve fallen for you. You are so fucking annoying and naggy but it's so fucking cute and I can’t control how I feel, and I’m sorry I was such a dick at first but I was scared, but I like you…” he leaned in kissing your lips and you leaned back looking him in the eyes feeling the exact way he did.

You were sitting outside the classroom legs bouncing as you waited for him to come out the door and you saw his boots enter the hallway as he stared at you test in hand

“What did you get?!”

“I got a B+” He came towards you lifting you off your head tilting his head down and connecting your lips. Maybe tutoring the Serpent wasn’t so bad after all.

[ohnoyoonoh]

thirty days | jaehyun fanfic x reader | TRYOUTS DAY 2 | words | lowkey sexual jokes, but it’s really nothing | “italicized words like this” are them talking in english | italicized words like this are just thoughts

walking around that campus, you taken in the spring breeze. oh the sweet pollen that you didn’t miss. you were an exchange student from the maple trees of canada. you wanted to be part of the exchange program, so you can set foot of your grandparents’ homeland. luckily the university you attend in canada had an exchange program to south korea. you were surprised that the exchange student program was still accepting, usually they end during the beginning of the semester. there was an exception to those who were trying out for a sport, in which a certain family member would be. so, you were able to join him through the exchange student program. your younger brother had moved to south korea with you with high hopes of being part of his favorite college baseball team, the neo university’s neo dragons. he has dreamed to be a dragon ever since he was a liitle boy, but he did fall out of the college’s baseball’s loop once he committed to the college baseball of north america and major league baseball. 

you pulled your phone out of your pocket seeing if your brother texted you back. he didn’t really say when tryouts started or ended. you honestly wondered if he made any new friends. he always was able to make friends wherever he went. he was an open kid and wasn’t afraid to do anything. but, maybe the new air of south korea made him feel timid. you were worried, despite him being happy yesterday night. you were sure that he would be okay, you think. 

seeing there weren’t any new notifications, you sighed. maybe, south korean air has changed him to not talking to you, but you truly knew he was at tryouts, working his hardest. over dinner, he talked about how practice went. he ended up meeting the star pitcher from university of florida, jung jaehyun, and he was nervous that he wouldn’t reach the starter position or even the top five pitchers. he described this jung jaehyun as a little arrogant but defended him as players who try out must be arrogant and confident otherwise, you wouldn’t make the team. but, baseball players aren’t your thing anyways. dating isn’t your thing, no matter how many romance novels you enjoy. 

seeing your phone is already in your hand, you checked your schedule when you could head to the library and study for your classes and complete some assignments. it was a little too early for your brother to leave practice and too late for lunch, so it was perfect to fill empty time to head to the library. you wondered where the library was anyways, you barely knew the campus. you turned your head to see if any students were lingering around to ask where the library is. there weren’t any except two baseball players. are they late to practice? you decided to try your luck anyways, plus they were coming your way 

“hi, i don’t know if you guys are from here. but do you know where the library is?” you questioned. you looked at them, the bright blue dye showing through the shorter male’s baseball cap. the taller male had a natural hair color, but it was longer in length. it seemed similar to the hairstyle you’ve seen from the baseball team back in high school. never again.

“oh, we’re not from here. but we’ve been trying to find the baseball field entrance and we don’t know where it is, we saw the field we needed to be at but the gate there needed like a security pass or something like that. and no one was there, so we thought we went to the wrong one,” the blue-haired male answered, holding his phone up to show the message with the information to where they needed to be. “our team’s phones are off due to a rule from our coach, so we can’t call. the coaches and team manager aren’t picking up our calls.”

you understood, and your assumptions of them being from another university were confirmed. as a student of your university, it would be your job to show them where it was. “ah.. do you want me to show you both where it is?” 

“if you can, but we wouldn’t to take away from your study time,” the black-haired answered your question. you really didn’t have anything better to do anyways. major tests weren’t for another couple of weeks. your group project wasn’t mandatory, neither were any essays due. your part time job as a tutor wasn’t starting until later in the month. in addition to helping them, making friends between the university’s rival would be beneficial to the school, i guess. the baseball field wasn’t even that far. 

“i’m not that busy, plus it would be great to see my brother since it’s still tryouts for them. just follow me,” you smiled, walking the other way. picking up your brother from practice the day before helped you remember where the neo park was. you just needed to find shortcuts, just in case there was a time you were late to a game. today wouldn’t be the day to do that, just play it safe.

“so.. baseball team are all usually together. how did you guys get stranded? unless you’re trying out for the baseball team here,” you asked. the silence was bugging you and couldn’t do it anymore. you could see that they looked at each other, communicating with their eyes. something you and your brother would typically do when you both were in trouble from your mom. finally, the two came into conclusion as they stopped. you guessed that they were deciding who was going to answer as the blue-hared talked first.

“we got lost after eating lunch at the cafeteria. wooseok needed to use the bathroom, so i waited with him. when we got back to where everyone was waiting, they were gone because someone took too long,” he emphasized on someone by looking at him. wooseok threw his hands up in defense, “someone in the restroom was taking forever.”

the blue-haired male grumbled, “or, maybe you took too long taking pictures.”

before wooseok could defend himself, you interrupted them, “it’s okay. you guys will be there in no time.”

the rest of the walk there was silent. you made it to the actual baseball venue but needed to go around to arrive at the actual field. the taller fellow started bickering with the other quietly. you could easily hear what they were talking about. 

“ah, we were here earlier. i told you this was the right way.”

“no, you didn’t. you said that way was the right way.”

so they actually got here, how did they manage to walk ten minutes from the field? you shrugged it off, they probably had more reasons as to why they got separated. reaching the main field, you see multiple teams as the colors differed from the green that the neo dragons wore. 

“thank you for taking us here. we would’ve been late,” the two in front of you bowed in thanks. 

you waved it off, “nah, it’s no problem. have fun with your scrimmages!”

they both nodded. wooseok seemed to see their team, running off. the blue-haired male stayed, “so, i feel bad for taking your time to show us the field.”

“no, you’re good! i get to see my brother play.”

“i wanna pay you back somehow. is it okay if i get your number or like some sort of social media to contact you?” he held his phone out, the notes app opened. you laughed out of nervousness. this was definitely a first for you, well in college of course. typically people only needed your information to do a group project or work.

you taken the phone, wondering what you would give him. the only thing you could think of was your twitter and instagram. “you don’t have to pay me back, but..” your last word lingered as you typed in your social media handles. “here’s my twitter and instagram. i put both just in case.”

receiving his phone back, he bowed and a bright smile was showcased. you couldn’t help but smile back. he talked first, “well-”

the male was cut off by wooseok who came back to retrieve him, “kino, yah! coach is about kick your ass if you don’t hurry up. i told him you were in the restroom. i’m pretty sure he sees you because you’re the only who has bright ass blue hair.”

“well, i gotta go! thanks again, [name].” kino was dragged off by the taller kid. you laughed once they were gone. oh how you missed playing a sport and the relationship between players. watching them go, you were suddenly surprised by a voice behind you. you didn’t hear what they said but you knew that voice anywhere.

“kim dami, stop doing that!” you turned to look at her. “plus, why are you here?”

“just coming by to drop food off for my brother, which i did. then i saw you here with two guys. so...” the ending of her sentence turned sing-songy. you knew what that implied. 

“no. i don’t have a boyfriend. i gave him instagram, because he said he would pay me back,” you crossed your arms. of course, your best friend would tease you, because that’s what best friends are for.

“pay you back in what way?” she suggestively questioned.

“yah! i swear, nothing of that sorts. gosh, you’re so annoying,” you rolled your eyes. you knew dami since you were a baby. growing up, she always had jokes up her sleeves. she knew when to brighten up the mood especially to those who are close to her. 

she hugged you from the side, “you know you love me.”

you grumbled, but you agreed. she was truly a third of your rock. the other third was mark. the last third was gone and not taken by anyone. you didn’t think anyone would fill that void.

“i brought extra food, you wanna sit with me and watch the neo university versus yonsei?” she asked. you knew she was going to drag you anyways whether you liked it or not. to take the safer way, you hummed in agreement. she led you to where she was camping out for the next couple of hours to watch the games. “i heard this was the official cutting day.”

“really? i thought tryouts lasted till tomorrow?” you grabbed an apple slice, eating it as you watched the neo dragons and yonsei eagles finish their warm ups.

“yeah, but usually the last day of tryouts is to see the chemistry of their final decisions. they cut some people out on the results but that’s unlikely. they know who they want already,” she said. “plus the scrimmages last for a couple weeks. today and tomorrow are also to see whether the people they want are truly who they want, because games are typically show how they use their skills. you can practice all you want but if you can’t use those skills, you’re out.”

you nodded, understanding. you found that wooseok and kino were on yonsei university. i think i’m honestly stupid, i can never read sometimes. then, you see your brother with the other dragons. until, he got sent to the bullpen to practice pitching. you sighed, but as long as he makes it will be enough for you. probably not enough for him. 

“since there’s a bunch of players trying out due to the star pitcher from university of florida, they had to use the backup fields,” dami continued to talk. she’s all about sports.”but this field is for the people who have the most likeliness of making the team. i’m glad mark is doing his thing, he’s always been a really good baseball player. i’m just worried that neo dragons will continue plummeting ever since the 07 left for the MLB. but who knows, maybe they can change that. it’s the only sport we’ve not been doing so hot on. plus, they have multiple tournaments to go to. one of them is in japan!”

“damn. i just hope this is a good season for them.”

“me, too. look there he is, the infamous jung jaehyun.”

not gonna lie, but he’s kinda hot.

---

NEOZONE:

@jaehyunxyoonoh​ @powerstobe

[ashtonsunshine]

Hi! I'm so sorry to bother you, I apologize beforehand. I just needed to tell someone because I think I'm going crazy. Just thought your opinion would help.  I'm interning at a high school as part of my teaching degree. My last day was Monday. Everything was going great, I loved the kids I got to interact with (it's a high school but it's higher education –weird, I know. But it's my country's way of what they call 'Vocational Training'–, so the kids are more or less my age). (1/8)

We went on a visit to a Theatre building and my tutor couldn't come with us, so it was just me and another teacher from the school whom I had only talked to once, exchanging contact info in case we were arriving late at the meeting point on Monday.  The visit went great. After that, it being my last day, the kids asked me to stay for drinks at a nearby place. This teacher, who had seemed nice during the few minutes we were waiting outside the Theatre counting the students, stayed too. (2/8) 

I found out he lived in the same town outside the city as me, and we got talking. And at first I thought he was just being nice, as I was. But then he kept asking personal questions. And started to repeat how much we 'had in common'. And since another couple of students lived in the same town, when we parted ways we all went home in public transportation. Once we arrived, the students said goodbye and wished me luck with my thesis, and I thought I was going to walk home alone. (3 /8)

But this teacher suddenly asked me if I wanted to go have lunch with him. I politely declined. I was already starting to feel creeped out, and all I wanted to do was go back home.  Turns out, he lived like a 3 minute walk from my street, so we walked together until there. And then he insisted on accompanying my home. It was like 3 o'clock in the afternoon. I don't live in a dangerous neighborhood whatsoever. And I couldn't exactly say no because, why would I? Maybe he was just being nice(4/8)

But once we were in my street I said goodbye and he lingered. Like he didn't want to let the conversation die. I was really uncomfortable at this point and even more knowing he knew where I lived. And I started to feel stupid too, because what if I was misreading?  He kept me there for like 15 minutes, talking nonstop about places around my street he frequents and saying how weird it was that we had never seen each other before. Then he waited until I got inside my building. (5/8)

I was going to meet my tutor yesterday at the high school say goodbye and I cancelled because this guy somehow found out and texted me Monday afternoon that if I wanted a ride to the school on Tuesday he could take me. I declined again, told him I would take the bus as 'tradition'. The next day when he found out I wasn't at the highschool and he sent me a text saying something like "are you okay? Do you need any help? I can come by."  I haven't answered to that one. I'm too creeped out. (6/8)

I'm just feeling guilty because maybe he's just nice and I'm feeling weird when there's no reason to be, and then I'm feeling stupid because society has brought us up in the belief that women shouldn't complain about stuff like this. And it's a never ending cycle.  I just keep thinking, if he's actually hitting on me, that I'm the exact same age as some of his students, what makes it right to make a pass at me and not them? Because he isn't hitting on them. (7/8)

I haven't gone back outside since that day because I'm scared shitless that he knows where I live, where I shop. Maybe I'm just making a very big deal out of nothing, but I'm so scared I can't even concentrate on working on my thesis.  Sorry to unload on you like this. Just wanted to get a second opinion on if I'm somehow blowing things out of proportion or it was really something. Because he didn't touch me or said anything explicit, but I just can't shake this weird feeling. (8/8)

-

You reminded me of this dude who rode the same train as me. 

One day he started talking to me and he seemed nice and I stupidly gave him my number when he asked for it. The next day he texted me saying "I can't wait to see you on the train tonight ;)" and I freaked out. I was shaking and crying and it took me a couple hours to gather myself and the courage to text him back saying that I had a boyfriend and did want anything to do with him. I was stressed out on my ride home every night after that day because I didn’t want to see him or talk to him.

A couple weeks went by and a colleague of mine told me a story of this guy on my train who stared talking to her with the exact same line as he did with me and then I realised he was doing it to every young woman on the train. I saw him do it several times as I tried to avoid him in the train at all costs. 

My point is, if you think the guy has a bad vibe, I think you should trust your gut like I trusted mine, but don't stop living your life because of him. If you happen to meet him again by chance and he insists on you, then tell him loud and clear that you're not interested. If he keeps on insisting and gets stalker-ish, tell your friends or people you trust so they are aware of the situation. If it escalates from there, go to the police. 

[heyoricohannah]

Post Bar Mitzvah Part 7:

TJ may not be completely hyped out of his mind on caffeine like he was yesterday, but he’s still surely out of focus, as of right now in a way that’s more moody than laughable.

“TJ.” Buffy says, sitting across from him at the same table in the school library for the third time this week. “If you’d just listen to my instructions...”

“They don’t matter, okay? Doesn’t change the fact that my brain switches around all the numbers.”

“Okay, well, if you could just be specific with me we could work out a plan.”

“No, okay?” His eyes roll. “It’s not gonna work.”

“Why wouldn’t it?” She snaps. “Do you wanna get better or not.”

“Not if this is what it takes.” He‘s flat out given up.

“TJ I know it’s hard-“

“No, you don’t, okay?! You don’t know what it’s like because you don’t have my mind or my brain or my vision. You don’t know what it’s like to be understanding when towards students like me.”

“Excuse me?! I understand plenty!”

“Not really!”

“Well what do you want me to do, huh, no longer be your tutor? TJ we’ve barely even tried.” She says.

“Yeah and I wonder why that is.” He stands up and begins his way out.

“TJ!” She yells. “Come on, we can’t be doing this again!” She goes right after him, wordlessly following behind and sitting down with him on the front step of this floor’s staircase.

For a long moment, a quiet pause fills the space between them, and they both figure it’s what they need to gather their thoughts.

“You’re not a bad teacher, Buffy.” TJ puts an end to the silence.

She looks at him.

“I just think—that maybe I should see someone, who specializes in teaching people who have what I have.”

This, she can wrap her head around. “Yeah...Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.”

He smiles.

“I’m sorry I was so hard on you.” She says.

“Nah, it’s fine. I can be kind of a pain to work with.”

“Yeah, maybe just a little.”

They snicker.

“Do your parents know about this?” She asks them.

TJ scoffs. “Oh, please, they’ve been struggling to help me for hours on end every night. I’m pretty sure I’ve caused six of their arguments.”

“TJ! You could’ve asked me to be there!” Buffy exclaims.

“Trust me. You do not want to be in the middle of that. I kept telling them that you were helping me at school and they didn’t believe me.” He explains.

“Wow. I don’t know whether or not to be offended by that.”

They grin. “So you think they’ll help you get the right tutor?” She hopes.

“I don’t see why we couldn’t afford it, so it’d be pretty wrong of them not to.” TJ says this as they stand up.

“Cool. Keep me posted. You’re gonna get back on that team, I can feel it.” Buffy motivates, making him beam.

“At least now during lunch we can be there to see how much Jonah and Cyrus are into each other.” He points out.

When they go back to the cafeteria after Buffy returns to the library and grabs her things, it’s pretty much the first thing to be noticed, Andi having anything but a problem with the display.

“Hey, back already?” She sees Buffy and TJ approach their table, Jonah and Cyrus’ dumb laughter dying down at their presence.

“Yeah, uh.” TJ and Buffy sit down next to her. “We’ve decided that I should get a tutor that actually deals with kids who have my kinda thing.” He explains, Andi and the other boys nodding in agreement and taking a liking to the idea.

“Could you afford it?” Cyrus asks.

“My finances? Yes. My mindset? Not so much.” They all snicker.

“You’ll be fine.” Buffy says. “Besides, unlike me, this person will probably really know how to deal with teaching people who have major trouble focusing.”

“Yeah we’re gonna have to get you some Adderall.” Jonah jokes to TJ, making the five of them burst out laughing.

“Adderall for math and steroids for basketball.” He teases.

“Oh please.” Buffy smirks and rolls her eyes. They laugh lightly.

“So,” Andi starts. “Jonah and I proposed a plan, and if the rest of you guys can make it, we want you to be there at The Spoon when I talk with Walker.”

“Like meet him?” Cyrus asks.

“More like eavesdrop from the next booth over and pretend to run into me and get me out of there if things go wrong.” Andi clarifies.

“I’ll do it.” He says, TJ and Buffy glancing over to each other. “We can practice later.” She says.

“I can schedule it after your practice.” Andi tells them.

“Okay. We’ll be quick. It doesn’t take long for me to take TJ down.” Buffy smirks.

“I thought I was supposed to be ‘carrying on your legacy’,” he laughs.

“You will be! But until I’m gone, I’m the team’s best player.” She shines, Cyrus, Jonah and Andi giving TJ playful looks.

“Fine.” This is his way of agreeing.

“If things go good with Walker, which they will, can we meet him?” Buffy asks Andi.

“He can meet you, but I don’t know how he’ll feel about me having three guy friends. One of which who I went out with.” She glances at Jonah.

He scoffs. “I wouldn’t worry about that. We barely even held hands.” This makes them each laugh.

“Has anyone said anything to you about your paper?” Buffy asks him.

“No, not really. Did you read it...?” He grows embarrassed.

“Well I promised myself that I would only read the first few words but it was already really addicting so I may or may not have read it.”

“Buffy!”

“What?! It’s really good, you should be proud of yourself!” She laughs.

“I haven’t read it.” TJ proudly shares.

“Thank you TJ.”

The others scoffs.

“So you and Gus are good now?” Buffy asks Jonah.

“Yeah, we’re good.” Jonah looks pretty happy about it, which fills Cyrus with conflict.

“Eh. I still don’t trust him.” TJ starts eerily looking around for him.

“TJ!”

He knew this would get Cyrus to laugh, grinning over at him as the rest crack up.

“Why, ‘cause he’s ginger?” Buffy jokes.

“Yo, whoa, okay.” TJ grins and holds his hand up. “I’m not like that. I’m no ginger-phobe.” He makes them cackle.

After that, for a majority of their time’s remainder, the rest have to hear him go on about the episode of South Park where Cartman tried to exterminate all gingers.

By the time lunch ends, TJ, Cyrus and Jonah have begun watching it online, the girls cringing from what they can hear of the content and rolling their eyes at the boys’ obnoxious laughs.

“Too many white boys at this table.” Buffy smirks at her.

At this point, they’re laughing even louder than them.

Near the end of Buffy and TJ’s after-school practice, Buffy decides to shake things up a bit by showing Andi a few pointers.

“What, two against one?” TJ asks, telling Cyrus and Jonah to join him.

“That’s three against two, now.” Andi grins.

“Whoever ends up tutoring me is gonna be real lucky.” He makes the rest of them chuckle.

“Here.” Buffy stands Andi a fair distance from the net, demonstrating how to ace the shot.

“Whoa,” TJ’s impressed by her perfect three pointer. “Watch out Buffy, you might not be the best girl at this school anymore.”

“Best what, now?”

“Person.”

“There you go.”

Andi snickers.

“Alright.” TJ walks closer to her. “Let’s see you do it with a lil competition.”

When Andi tries to move forward, he continuously blocks her way, grinning as he blocks her shot and laughing when she lurches her way around him to make the basket.

“Stop!” She giggles, when he tries swiping the ball away from her.

“What do you mean ‘stop’, it’s how you play the game!”

Andi laughs so hard that she almost misses the basket, grinning at TJ the second the ball makes it through the basket.

“Was that my phone??” She heard a buzz coming over from where Cyrus and Jonah sit on the bleachers.

“Maybe.” Jonah teases.

“Who was it, I have to see if it’s Walker, we have to go soon!” She runs over and up the occupied row of bleachers where the boys are currently refusing to give her her phone.

“Give it back!” She laughs, witnessing them toss it back and forth and hold it high in the air where she can’t reach until moving up a few more steps.

“It is him!” She was able to grab it from Jonah, walking down to steps she had climb up to get it and reading his message as she approaches onto the floor.

“He’s on his way there! Guys, walk over with me, will ya?” She’s already heading towards the doors.

When Jonah and Cyrus come down and walk over from the bleachers, Jonah instantly takes the ball off the floor and tosses it over to him.

“Fine, meet me out there.” Andi smirks at him.

“No no no stay and watch, it’ll be fast, see?” Jonah smiles, running up to Cyrus and taking full hold of him.

“Jonah! You don’t just pass me the ball and attack me for it that’s not how it works!” Cyrus laughs, being lifted off the ground and glided around.

“Yes it does.” Jonah grins, moving in closer to his ear and suddenly cracking up as Cyrus tries to wiggle himself loose.

“Owe, Jonah! You’re so loud, I’m not playing!” Cyrus laughs, chucking the ball forward onto the floor.

Andi, Buffy, and TJ beam at each other when Jonah turns him and Cyrus in their direction.

“C’mon.” Jonah sets him down, the others growing pleasantly distracted from how close together the two of them walk on their way to the diner.

Through the diner window, Andi can see that Walker’s already arrived and sat down right down next to an unoccupied booth, meaning that the others should have no problems eavesdropping.

She gasps. “Guys. Walk in before me so it looks natural.” She walks in after Buffy and TJ do, leaving Cyrus and Jonah to exchange amusing glances.

“What.” Cyrus smiles, Jonah brightly repeating him, making them giggle together on their way in.

“Hey!” Andi’s greeting Walker, who slides out his side of the booth and gives her a gentle hug.

“Hey.”

Jonah and Cyrus slide in next to Buffy and TJ within the booth next door, returning to one another satisfied glances.

“I uh, brought this for you.” Walker takes the piece of paper of his off his and Andi’s table, showing it to her and revealing how it’s the same portrait of her that she had given back to him at the Bar Mitzvah.

“Oh...!” She’s struck with guilt. “Oh my gosh, I am so sorry I ever gave that back to you.”

“It’s cool.” He smiles, handing it over and sliding into his side of the booth, smiling as she slides in across from him.

“Uh-oh.” Buffy whispers from her booth, noticing no one other than Amber working her shift at the register.

“Who’s that...” TJ takes notice. “She’s hot.”

“She’s my ex.” Jonah instantly alerts, TJ freezing in embarrassment and awkwardly scrunching up his face.

Cyrus snickers.

“That’s Amber. She left Andi on top of a Ferris wheel.” Buffy shares.

“Oof...” Is all TJ can say after a pregnant pause.

“If she sabotages them I swear...” Buffy whispers.

“Relax. She’s not waitressing right now.” Jonah assures, just before Amber makes her way out from behind the counter and grabs two menus to bring over to the particular pair.

“Or she is...” Jonah concludes.

The moment Andi sees her, Walker can sense that something inside her is tumbling down.

“Hey Amber...” She feels foolish for even trying to sound positive.

“Hey, I get you guys started with drinks?” There’s an edge in her tone, eyes barely looking at them when she passes their menus.

“Um...I’m fine...” Andi claims.

“You sure?” Walker asks.

Buffy, Cyrus, TJ, and Jonah can’t help but cringe. They all know why Andi’s so hesitant.

“Yeah...” Andi glances down.

“I’ll just get water.” Walker states.

“Any ideas on what to eat, yet?”

“Not yet.” Walker says, while meanwhile Andi’s pretty sure that she no longer has any desire to eat at all.

“Alright, I’ll be right back.” Amber goes and gets four menus for the others, who are glancing to each other with more concern the closer she gets.

“What’s up kids.” She asks them.

“We’re not hungry, thanks.” Buffy icily denies.

“C’mon Buffy, she’s not gonna contaminate our food.” Jonah whispers.

“She might!”

Andi’s makes bold eye contact with her, eyebrows raising and commanding she keep it down.

“Uh.” She chuckles to Walker. “Should we sit somewhere else...?”

The real question being, should they go some place that’s anywhere but here.

[yourkeeperoftherunners]

That 80′s Scene

Plot: AU When a friend sends him a link to a video recreating a scene from an American movie, he’s shellshocked to discover that the leading lady looks an awful lot like you, the exchange student here on study abroad.

Characters: College Student!Jungkook, Female Reader Exchange Student, College Student!Yoongi, College Student!Namjoon, College Student!Jaehyun, plus mention of the other members.

Rating: PG-13 (Language, mention of a girl in a bikini pretending to remove her top, male fantasies, minor jealousy) NSFW-ish

Notes: Moodboard is by me – please no reposting of this or the related story anywhere else! For those of you who aren’t familiar with 80s American films, the scene mentioned and depicted in the moodboard is from a film called Fast Times at Ridgemont High. The original scene was a fantasy sequence dreamed up by a male character after watching his female acquaintance prepare to take a dive into his pool.

“Hyung, what’s the point of this book?” Jungkook moaned as he put his head down on the desk.

The older student looked up from his worn copy of the required reading and glanced over at the second year student making a dramatic fuss. He placed a hand on Jungkook’s arm and gently shook it, reminding him that he chose to take this course.

Jungkook lifted his head and frowned at the comment. Yes it was true – the second year reviewed the classes he could take to finish his Literature GE requirement, selecting the current one that was focused on world literature. It seemed less heady compared to the Korean Lit class and he reasoned that the other writings from other countries couldn’t possibly be that bad. But now they were on some awful dense piece from a Russian author and he was kicking himself for choosing the course. Thank goodness for Namjoon being in the same class, otherwise he’d probably get a big fat F.

“I can explain the book’s importance–” Namjoon began, pausing when his phone went off. He dug around in his bag and retrieved it, unlocking it to take the call. “Hello Mrs. Ahn...ah no I’m not in class now...yeah of course! I can head over now. I’ll be...5 minutes. Okay thank you.” He hung up and apologized to Jungkook as he began packing up his things.

Jungkook sighed as he watched the other male pack up – it was an emergency tutoring session from the sounds of it. In addition to juggling a full load of classes, Namjoon was a tutor for the student tutoring center and often he’d take last minute gigs for Lit and Music if needed.

“Tomorrow?” Jungkook asked as Namjoon slung his bag on his shoulder.

Namjoon nodded and checked his watch. “I’ve got 2 classes and my meeting with my advisor for thesis tomorrow, but I have time after 14 PM. That okay?”

Jaehyun

Did you try SparkNotes? Sent 16:29 PM

Jungkook

No, I’d rather ask Namjoon. Besides, the professor will know if we consulted Wikipedia or something like it. Sent 16:30 PM

“Playing games again?” you teased the young man as you approached him in the dorm lounge.

Jungkook jumped and looked up from his phone, straightening up from his slouched position on the couch. He shook his head and put his phone in his pocket, explaining it was texts from his friend.

“We’re both struggling in class noona,” he explained. “It’s this book by some Russian guy and Namjoon’s the only one who seems to get it. I bet you anything he read it for fun before taking this class!”

You took a seat beside him and prompted him to share which title it was. He pulled the book from his backpack and you smiled knowingly.

“Make that two people who get it,” you replied as you took the book from him. “I can break it down into simpler terms if you have time.”

He grinned widely and nodded enthusiastically, fishing out a notebook and pen to scribble things down.

“I didn’t know she was into literature! Now I really wanna meet her!” Namjoon sighed.

Jungkook shrugged, trying to hide his reaction. While he admired and respected Namjoon for being smart, helpful, and a bit quirky (Ex. Going on rambles about whales out of the blue), he sort of didn’t want his elder to meet you. Then again, he couldn’t help but feel a bit jealous when he saw other guys admiring you on campus.

You were an exchange student doing a year long study abroad. In order to help the exchange students acclimate, the university asked for current students to volunteer as guides/buddies that would show the exchange students around and answer their questions. Jungkook volunteered, curious to know more about somewhere outside of Korea and was assigned to you. Despite the age difference, you treated him like an equal and tried to dissuade him from calling you noona. But he couldn’t help it – it was a habit and he liked thinking of you as his noona.

Of course, there was the drawback that being from another country meant everyone wanted to hang out with you or get to know you. You exuded a different attitude and energy from the Korean girls on campus, which made a lot of the male students curious to chat you up: some with innocent intentions, while others were clearly hoping to get your number.

“She’s cool hyung,” Jungkook replied. “She happened to run into me yesterday and said, “Kookie, I’ll help you.” So we’re all good.”

Namjoon fixed his bag on his shoulder and asked if his friend Jaehyun needed help. Jungkook nodded and said that his good friend was just as lost about the material as he had been.

“I think he’s done for the day – you could probably message him and find time to discuss,” Jungkook offered.

He sucked in a sharp breath as he copied the link from his phone, index finger tapping the Enter button on his computer. Jaehyun sent him the link earlier, asking if he had seen the video yet. Initially Kook thought it was probably something like a reaction video or some YouTuber copying the Fortnite dance challenge or something. He clicked the link and saw it was someone who did their version of a scene from a movie – probably a low budget student project thing for a grade.

The movie was in English so he didn’t understand everything happening in terms of dialogue. He saw it was a guy peeping out his window looking at a brunette in a red bikini standing on a diving board, then the scene changed to the girl in the red bikini swimming to the surface of the pool ladder, taking a breath. That’s when he dropped his phone into his lap when the camera focused on her face, or should he say, your face.

At first he thought it was a weird daydream he was having with you in it. Once he got back to the house he shared with three other guys, he took a seat at his computer and copied the link into YouTube. The phone screen was small – it was hard tell if this girl was a twin or his brain inserting you into the scene.

The site thought about it before pulling up said video and it began to play. A dated synthesizer sound played through his speakers and his eyes focused on the girl swimming up for air. Once her head was visible, he leaned closer and gaped in shock. It was you.

His hands shakily rested on the desk as his eyes stayed glued to the screen, watching as you addressed a male character off screen.

“Hi Brad,” you said, “you know how cute I always thought you were.”

The line made him puff his cheeks out unhappily as he watched you climb out of the pool, walking in a slow, dramatic manner toward a guy in a suit. It was just a scene, but he was definitely not liking this ‘Brad’ guy you were walking toward.

His hand hovered over the mouse and he scrubbed the video back to the beginning, just to make sure it was really you.

“Are you putting more viruses on the computer?”

Jungkook whipped his head around, seeing it was one of his housemates Yoongi. The elder was in his final year of undergrad, majoring in Music Production and Business. Jungkook and his friend Jimin answered his call for roommates and managed to pass Yoongi’s questionnaire. Jungkook shook his head and pouted as he pointed to the screen, currently playing the video.

Yoongi leaned forward and sniffed as the clip showed a young woman standing on the end of a diving board, before transitioning to her slowly swimming to the surface of the pool. He was about to turn away, leave the other to his porn but he blinked when the young woman’s face broke the surface of the clear water.

“Eh? Is this a joke?” he demanded as he placed a hand on the back of the other male’s chair, trying to get a better look at the young woman.

“You see her too, don’t you hyung?” the younger boy said. “It looks like Y/N.”

Yoongi’s eyes widened as he watched you address Brad before walking over and pretending to unclasp your swim top, leaning in for a kiss. Then the scene shifted to Brad in his room fantasizing the scene while jerking off, while in reality, you dove into the pool and complained that you got water in your ears.

“Maybe she has a twin?” Yoongi offered.

Jungkook shook his head and scrolled down to the summary section, pointing to your name. He heard his phone buzz and he realized he probably left Jaehyun hanging, grumbling as he unlocked his phone.

Jaehyun

It’s really her – the credits say so! Sent 18:19 PM

Namjoon

Jungkookie, you didn’t tell me your friend acted! Sent 18:25 PM

Wait, hyung saw the video too?

Jungkook typed back to Jaehyun, the latter replying that he got caught watching the video again instead of summarizing the details of the book at Namjoon’s instruction.

Jaehyun

Sorry Kook, Nam took my phone and he looked like a deer in headlights when he saw Y/N’s face. Sent 18:49 PM

We’ve re-watched the video a couple of times to make sure – so much for studying! Sent 18:50 PM

Jungkook groaned as he put his head down on the desk. At the rate they were going, who hadn’t seen this video of you in two tiny pieces of Spandex looking too sexy?

“It looks like it was a student project,” Namjoon shared with Jungkook a few days later. “The original movie was this American movie from the 80s and the guy’s channel is made up of a lot of recreations of movie scenes.”

“So it’s not a porn?” Yoongi asked as he joined them.

Namjoon shook his head and explained that he rented a copy of the original American film and compared it side-by-side with the video you were in.

“The movie version could almost be a porn,” Namjoon confessed. “The girl actually took her top off and the camera showed it. No rectangle – everything on display.”

Jungkook reddened and Yoongi almost choked on his coffee he was enjoying. It was too much for him to think about – you wearing that bikini and coyly addressing your male counterpart before making out with him.

“You talked to her about it?” Namjoon asked.

Jungkook shook his head and confessed that you had different schedules. He hadn’t seen you since your run-in at the student dorm lounge where you lived.

Yoongi put his cup down and nodded as he spotted you. “Then go talk to her now.” He gently nudged Jungkook forward and began guiding Namjoon to the opposite side of campus, leaving you two to talk in private.

“Hey Kook, everything all right?” you asked as you approached him. You frowned as you lifted a hand to his forehead, checking for a temperature.

“Well you don’t feel warm, but your face is all flushed,” you noted.

Jungkook fiddled with his bag strap and awkwardly cleared his throat. “Um, noona,” he began, “my, my friends found this video and we saw a girl in it that looked like you. It was...an accident and we were really surprised.”

You sighed as you shook your head. “I had a feeling that would come up again,” you mused with a faint smile. “I did it as a favor for my friend – he needed to shoot a portfolio for his college to get into their film program and no one was available to play the female lead. I told him the top stayed on, but we mimed it so people got the idea. Apparently, it worked because he’s in the college and he’s doing well. But believe me, that’s my only credit acting-wise. I’m not cut out for that stuff as a regular job.”

Jungkook’s eyes snapped up and met yours. “You’re not mad?”

You shook your head and explained that he wasn’t the first to ask about the video. “I knew that it was probably going to raise questions,” you confessed. “But the guy was desperate – we’ve known each other since we were kids and he was having the worst luck with casting for that scene. I think he tested about...oh three other girls and they weren’t right or they quit for various reasons. Hell, I don’t even look anything like the original actress from the movie.”

“But noona looked...really good,” Jungkook admitted. “It was really –”

“Hot?” you teased. “Well, I guess you can use that for good imagery when you need it.”

“NOONA!”

“I’m joking,” you replied. “But yes, it’s me in that skimpy little suit and no, my body doesn’t look like that anymore. But it was fun pretending to be the hot girl every guy wanted.”

“But guys here want you – even with clothes on,” Jungkook protested as he gestured around the campus.

“Eh I don’t want any of them,” you said. “I’ve got enough good guys in my life: You, Yoongi, my friend back home...yeah I think that’s enough.” You crossed your arms over your chest and asked who found the video first.

“Jaehyun,” Jungkook confessed.

“Ah figures,” you said. “You saw it, I’m guessing others have?”

“My housemates,” Jungkook confessed, “and Namjoon-hyung, but that’s really it.”

You waved it away as nothing and shrugged. “Whatever, I don’t care – it’s out there, I owned up to it. They can take it or leave it.”

[placingglaciers]

A Price to Pay

Title: A Price to Pay

Genre: AU, Fluff, Getting Together

Word Count: 8, 278

Warnings: Mentions of alcohol intoxication

Description: In which Phil has a massive cliché crush on his writing tutor, the most popular guy at college, and gets invited to one of his legendary parties. One requirement though: Phil needs a plus one.

Author’s Note: This has been pushed off for a while! (Please remember that this is fiction.)

“You still need to come up with some transitional expressions to help make your paragraph smoother,” his writing tutor remarked, his red pen in his hand, of which he had no restraint on using with Philip’s essay papers. “We’ve been over this.”

               If it wasn’t obvious before, then let it be known now that Philip was far more interested in the smoothness of his tutor’s lips rather than the smoothness of his stupid paragraph. His Wednesday afternoon tutoring session only had fifteen minutes remaining. The mere progress they made was on the first page, the following four would have to be reviewed in a later session, of which Philip wasn’t too sad about, of course.  Having the most gorgeous boy in school be your unnecessary writing tutor was rather distracting—unnecessary because Philip was an English student, he could write transitional expressions in his sleep if he really wanted to. He admits that having a crush on this boy and tracking him down to this extent was a bit juvenile, but his college days were being numbered and being single during all of them was not ideal. So if playing dumb for a little while would help him get closer to the guy, then so be it.

               Philip’s eyes glanced down at the red scribbles that practically vandalized his precious essay and back up into those stunning blue eyes. “Um, right, what’s a transitional expression again?”

               You could tell he was being very patient with him as he bit the inside of his cheek and began drumming his pen on the wooden dining hall table. “It’s a sentence variety strategy,” he slowly explained. “You want your writing to sound more creative and poetic, don’t you? It keeps it from sounding monotonous.”

               Philip nodded his head in false understanding. “Oh, right, I think my professor gave us a handout on it during class today…” He continued to shuffle through his quite organized creative non-fiction writing binder. He knew exactly where the paper was, but he was hoping that by stalling, his tutor would lose patience and give him all the answers. Philip knew all the right buttons to push to get his way. This was rather fun, actually.

               “Well, we could start with this sentence here,” his tutor pointed to one of the sentences. “Instead of saying: ‘I must say that people who don’t like wearing pajamas are wrong,” you could say: ‘However, although some people don’t prefer wearing pajamas, they’re ignoring the facts of the multiple benefits of them.’”

               Philip tried his hardest not to cringe in front of him. Two transitional expressions in one sentence? And ending with a prepositional phrase? Never mind the fact that he still kept the contractions in his so-called “revision.” Thank God Philip wasn’t there for actual help. He pretended to think about that awful “sentence” for a few more seconds before coming up with a stupid question. “Yeah, but doesn’t that make the sentence longer?”

               “Yes, but that’s what you need.” He annoyingly pointed out to the paragraph with his pen again. “You have way too many short sentences here. This is why I said you need sentence variety.”

               For some reason, Philip was feeling highly annoyed. He already finished his final draft yesterday. This was just a way for them to keep occupied. But he really hated being told what to do by a Journalism student, who was completely different from an English student in his opinion. All his tutor wanted to do was report on football games. How difficult could that be? Philip had to actually work hard to gain an audience that wouldn’t be simply handed to him. But then again, he knew not one rule about football, so perhaps he should stay in his own lane. He checked the time on his watch. He was right. Unfortunately, he could only tolerate his tutor for an hour or two at a time and it was getting towards the end of the session. It was almost five o’clock; he was going to be late.

               “I think we’re at a stopping point,” his tutor mentioned once he saw Philip check his watch. He began packing his evil red pen and took a drink from his strawberry flavored water. He then said hello to a few passing people.

               Philip began packing his writing binder and essay papers slowly in case they wanted to exchange any heartfelt farewells to each other.

               “Say, Phil?” his tutor suddenly asked him.

               Philip looked up from his book bag and into those dazzling blue eyes again. “Yeah?”

               “I know I’ve only known you for half the semester, but letting a stranger review your personal writing takes a lot go guts,” he began.

               Philip wasn’t sure where this was going. He admits he poured a lot of personal stories into his essays that were difficult to expose to the public, but that only allowed him to get closer to him. And that was the very point to all of this.

               “I mean, writing a whole essay glorifying pajamas?” he continued. “That’s pretty cool.” He put his hand on his toned chest, “I personally sleep naked, but I tried to relate.”

               Philip desperately tried to get that image out of his mind. Naked? He hadn’t tried that before, but he’s willing to take up the challenge, especially with him.

               “You’re a good writer, Phil,” he said earnestly, leaning in on the table.

               Philip allowed himself to blush. “All thanks to you, of course.”

               He smiled at him. “Hey, you know I have that party coming up on Friday, right?”

               Although Philip should be happy he mentioned it, he couldn’t help but feel dread. He hated parties. The loud music, the annoying people, the alcohol, the drama…he hated it all. After being passed out drunk, waking up on a moist trampoline with half his clothes on at one of his old classmate’s houses a couple years ago, he promised himself he would avoid parties at all costs. But what should he do now? Turn down this exclusive invitation to one of the most legendary parties of the year by the host himself?

               “Uh, yeah, of course,” Philip failed to sound enthusiastic.

               “You’re always welcome,” his tutor said, getting up from his chair. “But of course, you need a plus one.”

               “P-plus one?” Philip asked without thinking.

               “Yeah, the goal is to get as many people there as possible,” he explained, casually putting one of his backpack straps over his large shoulder. “If no one brings a plus one, the party would be pretty lame.”

               Philip let out a fake chuckle. “Right, I’ll just go with you then.”

               “What, no! I’m the host, remember?”

               Philip blushed as embarrassment rushed through his lanky body. What was he going to do now? He couldn’t simply ask all his friends; he barely had any to begin with. And sending a campus-wide email would basically guarantee failure (and hatred). This would have to be solved a lot faster than what he was capable of doing.

               “I’ll see you tomorrow?” his tutor asked right as he turned to leave.

               Philip nodded his head slightly and smiled. He wasn’t expecting his tutor to give him this type of work. However, he had no other option but to figure it out at a later time. He was going to be late, after all.

               If there was one thing Philip was allowed to be proud of, it would be his unofficial board game club. The designated location was in the basement of the library, a bit symbolic as the club was metaphorically underground as well. Philip was denied by the student activities office three years ago for his club proposition, as apparently it didn’t “reflect” on student values. So rather than giving up, he went on with it anyway despite no financial support, campus support, or, really, student body support. Board games were one of his passions; all he wanted to do was create a space for other fellow “gamers” to share their passions together. The club had only less than ten people in it, which was their limit. Any more, and they’ll risk initiating a dirty rat, and the last thing they wanted to do was justify a lame board game club to the Dean.

               Philip entered the library’s small basement lounge breathlessly after he rushed his way across campus. Everyone was there, all five of them (excluding himself). He was bad at names, so he only knew a few of them personally. They were at the small snack table, digging in to some chips and candy, otherwise known as fuel for a long night of board games. This week, they were playing Yahtzee, a game Philip didn’t particularly care for, but it won out of majority vote. He dumped his heavy book bag on the floor with the others and joined everyone at the snack table.

               “Phil! You look spent!” the vice president exclaimed. “Tutoring session went well, I suppose?”

               “It’s not what it looks like,” Philip reassured him, reaching for a handful of bright orange nacho cheese flavored Doritos. “I rushed over so I wouldn’t be late.”

               “Well you already failed at that,” one of the members made sure to tell him as she filled her Styrofoam cup with cheap fruit punch.

               “Wonder what else you’ll fail at tonight,” another member added, sitting at the wooden round table that was in the middle of the dimly lit room.

               Philip rolled his eyes, already enjoying the competitive atmosphere in the room. “You guys know I’m bad at dice games!”

               As everyone took their seats in their own unique chairs (campus furniture barely comes in complete sets), Philip filled his snack plate with more Doritos and quickly joined the others. He was left with the orange leather chair, of which he was certain it hadn’t been cleaned since the seventies. He sat in between the vice president and a brown-haired boy of which he forgot the name of as he was the newest member.

               “Alright, the meeting has commenced!” the president announced excitedly. “Looks like everyone is here, so that is great. Thanks to those of you who donated tonight’s snacks. Though you may not be reimbursed with money, I hope tonight’s fun will be a sufficient payback.”

               Everyone around the table rolled their eyes, but laughed anyways.

               “For tonight’s agenda, we will cover our plans for the next meeting and get started with the game!” the president continued enthusiastically. “I say we’d be done at around nine? Ten?”

               Up to five hours of constant dice rattling? Philip was sure he’ll end the night with an intense migraine.

               “According to the club’s survey,” the vice president chimed in, holding a small piece of paper in his hands, “there is yet another tie between Scrabble and Clue. Therefore, according to the unofficial rules, there must be a coin toss. Would anyone like to volunteer?” He looked around the room eagerly.

               No one made the effort to retrieve any coin, because perhaps there wasn’t one there to begin with.

               “Alright, fine,” the vice president sighed and shoved his hand in his back pocket. “I know college kids are poor, but come on.” He placed the coin in his hands. “Heads for Scrabble, tails for Clue. Now, we all know I don’t know how to do this correctly, so I’ll just throw it against the wall.”

               The coin flew through the air and clinked against the wall and then on the vinyl tiled floor. The brown haired boy that sat next to Philip looked behind and announced, “Tails!”

               Philip crossed his arms and pouted. He liked Clue, but he was much better at Scrabble. Much to his dismay, most of the table cheered. The only way for him to feel better about this was if he was guaranteed to be Professor Plum, but the chances of that were slim.

               “Its sick how most of you guys choose murder over a word game,” Philip bitterly pointed out.

               “Words will always exist, but dead bodies will not,” the president wisely replied.

               One of the members grabbed the Yahtzee box and opened it before everyone.

               “Rules are simple: I’m sure you all know how it works, just roll the dice and use your basic math skills,” the president briefly explained as he tore off three score sheets. “There will be three teams to make it more fun,” he then pointed to different groups. “We’ll have the Girl Team, the President Team, and the, uh, Dan and Phil Team.”

               “Uh, excuse me?” One of the girls retorted. “Why must our team be defined as our gender?”

               The president rubbed his face tiredly, “Oh my God,” he muttered quietly. “Okay, just be whatever team you want to be.”

               “Alright, then, we’ll be the Queen Team,” the other girl confidently decided.

               Philip wasn’t sure if that was any better than the first, but he rather not interfere. He had more problems to deal with. Not only did he just learn his neighbor’s name for the first time, but he also had to be paired with him. From what he could recall, all Daniel was good at was Outburst, which was admirable, but not very helpful in this situation.

               “So, are you good at rolling or at math?” Daniel whispered in his ear.

               “Neither,” Philip replied quietly, writing both of their names on the score sheet. “I’ll just be here for moral support.”

               “Moral support?” Daniel whisper-shouted back. “You can’t expect me to be an expert at the both of them!”

               “Wait, you actually expect us to win?” Philip asked while the “Queen Team” rolled. “The girls cheat and the other two never let anything go. It’s exhausting.” He watched as the girls scored a full house. He then whispered in Daniel’s ear, “I think we should just float for a while before we make any waves.”

               “Well too bad, you’re rolling with the tide,” Daniel handed him the dice-filled blue cup that probably had been touched by way too many people by this point.

               Philip’s stomach tightened as he loudly shook the dice in the cup. He then threw them out on the table, each of them landing their own way. There were a lot of different black dots looking back at him, and he wasn’t sure what to do about that. He looked up at the rest of the table and they looked at him with a glimmer of disbelief in their eyes. He, too, knew what this meant. It just felt too unreal to accept it yet.

               “Phil!” Daniel exclaimed and shook his shoulders excitedly.

               A smile creeped across Philip’s face, but he kept silent.

               “Man! And it’s the first one of the night!” the vice president commented, with a tad bit of jealousy.

               Philip turned his chin up proudly as he handed the dice to the President Team. “Yeah? What are you gonna do about that?”

               The president snatched the cup from his hands and offered him a nasty look. “Shove all five of these dice up your behind until you’re constipated for a week!”

               “I’d like to see you try!” Philip yelled back, almost rising from his seat from rage.

               The game did end up continuing until ten, but Philip didn’t care. Daniel and he were rightfully in second place, with the so-called “Queens” winning. There was a long argument afterwards on the speculation of cheating, but was interrupted by one of the late-working librarians. Once they all left, the fall night air caused Philip to shiver a little as he didn’t bring his jacket. The moon was high in the sky and the campus was still and quiet, a big difference from all the escalation from tonight’s meeting.

               “Great game,” Daniel said behind him as they walked toward the dorms.

               Philip felt embarrassed to admit that he hadn’t done much talking to Daniel. In fact, he didn’t even know he lived in the dorms until now. But it wasn’t like talking to him was the worst thing in the world. It was actually quite nice. He felt more like himself and he was willing to challenge himself more with his friends than with his writing tutor. He felt free and he had fun, which was what he needed after knowing what he had to do between right now and Friday night.

               “Oh, um, thanks,” Philip replied, adjusting his glasses. He waited a few seconds for Daniel to catch up with him on the sidewalk. “Sorry we didn’t win.”

               Daniel shrugged, “At least it wasn’t a massive insult to our intelligence. It’s a game of chance, you can’t control it.”

               Philip kept his mind on more important matters than the dull conversation. He was trying to see how inviting one of the board game club members would work out. They were the only people he talked to, after all. First, he’d have to convince them that his writing tutor had more than two brain cells to rub together, which would be a miracle in itself. Then, he’d have to force them into a loud, obnoxious party full of drunk, pretentious, senseless people. And asking a bunch of lame introverts to do anything is exhausting in the first place. Perhaps he could show up without a plus one? It’s not like there’ll actually be a doorman checking every single person, right? It’s a college party, since when were there rules anyway?

               “Are you okay?” he heard Daniel ask him with concern.

               Philip’s worrisome thoughts drifted away and he looked at him in confusion. “Yeah?”

               “I was just wondering because your teeth were making weird noises. I couldn’t tell if you were grinding them or chattering.”

               He brought his arms closer to his body, “the latter.”

               Daniel began unzipping his jacket, “here, you can—”

               The beep of the resident hall door unlocking due to Philip swiping his I.D. interrupted him. Philip opened the door. “I…don’t think that’ll be necessary.”

               Daniel offered a disappointed smile and entered the building. “Um, well, goodnight I guess.”

               He doubted his polite positivity, but he could take all the luck he could get.

                                                                                       ***

               As Philip yawned loudly in his warm bed, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, he never recalled a more vivid dream than the one he had last night. He felt like he barely had any sleep, and the dream didn’t make it any easier. He put his glasses on and instinctively reached for his phone from his desk to check if he had any overnight notifications. He had a mysterious email from someone at his school named Daniel Howell in response to his online advertisement. At first, he couldn’t believe it. He read the email over and over again, but it still came to the same conclusion: this Daniel guy wanted to be his date for Friday night. He scratched his head; he could’ve sworn his dream was exactly like this, posting an online ad on some job website as a joke to get a desperate date on Friday night. With this sudden realization, and panic, he checked and understood that sleep deprivation could make a person do a lot of questionable things. He quickly deleted the advertisement as soon as he had the opportunity, cringing at the very fact that he ever did such a thing. But now what was he going to do with this Daniel guy? He could’ve sworn he met someone last night by the same first name, unless that was a dream as well. But no way would that Daniel be interested in some stupid party anyway. But besides that, Philip somehow finally had a plus one! Being that he was going to be late for his morning class if he spent any more time in bed, he decided to respond later to the email and get moving.

               Throughout the day, Philip was too preoccupied with doing homework, thinking about last night’s meeting, and reading his new book to even spend one minute thinking about the party. He even almost promised himself to attend the free movie showing on Friday if he hadn’t checked his calendar first. He was subsequently hit with dread for the remainder of the day. Then it somehow got worse when he had to be faced with the most gorgeous face he’d ever seen for an hour.

               “There you go again, using your passive voice rather than active,” his tutor told him, making a red mess out of his paper. “Pajamas are not worn by people, people wear pajamas! Always put the subject first to keep your audience reading. It gives it a little more life, you know?”

               Philip was a little more annoyed today than usual. He was growing impatient, too. The semester was halfway over and all he knew about this boy was that he played basketball, lived off campus, knew literally everybody, wanted to be a sports journalist, and hated having too much ice in his beverages. This was only the tip of the iceberg, Philip was certain of it. There had to be something more interesting to him than those few things. What was his favorite color? What board game does he like to play with his family? What movies does he cry to? It’s becoming exhausting to keep going like this. Philip had poured his heart to him through his writing, bought him multiple coffees, dedicated most of his afternoons, and even waited on him when he was an hour late repeatedly. Something had to be done about this. Philip bit his lip as he looked at him across the table, too concentrated on the flow of his red pen to notice. Friday was going to be it. The most popular guy in school was going to fall in love with him on that night. It only seemed fair. Now all Philip had to do was come up with an infallible plan.

               “Sorry, old habit…” Philip had to respond. “Did you check my revisions?”

               “Uh, yeah, they were pretty good,” he replied, barely paying attention to him. “When did you say this was due again?”

               “Next Wednesday,” Philip answered, checking his calendar, although it didn’t matter.

               “Right, perhaps we can meet again on Monday? You know this weekend is a bit busy for me.” He set down his pen and half smiled at him. “Which, now that I mentioned it, who are you planning on bringing?”

               Philip’s insides seemed to tighten all together at the same time, keeping him frozen in place. “I, uh, well…” he cleared his throat as he struggled to come up with a believable lie. “Someone I met…l-last week.” He honestly forgot all about the email from this morning.

               His tutor flashed him an impressed smile. “Phil! Wow! I can’t wait to meet them! Honestly, ugh, I’m so excited for Friday! I have a legit deejay coming, I’m getting a bubble pit installed, all the beer you can drink, and a bonfire. It’s gonna be sick! Legendary even!”

               Philip didn’t say anything as he wasn’t sure if any of those activities sounded good together. It sounded all too loud, boring, and unnecessary. At least nothing would distract him from his plan. He just hoped he would be able to execute it.

                                                                                               ***

               As the party began at nine, Philip contacted Daniel Howell to meet in his dorm room at eight. Either way, Philip thought nine was a bit late to start a party, but he didn’t make the rules. He probably wasn’t going to stay there all night anyway; he didn’t need to. He believed an hour should be sufficient to kiss a few times and get on with it. Currently, he was lying on his bed, staring up at his ugly water stained dropped ceiling, wishing Daniel Howell was there for some reason. He really needed someone to talk to. His chest was tight and his mind was racing, the way it usually did when he was hit with a wave of anxiety. He was finally beginning to have second-thoughts about all of this. Sure, he was a smart guy, but could he really pull something like this off? And what should he wear or say or do with his hands? He hadn’t kissed anybody in well over five months, and that was just for the pizza guy who he couldn’t afford a proper tip for (that was a bit of a disaster). Of course, the obvious answer would be to just be himself, but that’s a bit difficult as he was everything but that around his tutor.

               A sharp knock came from the door, which forced Philip out of his mind a little. He climbed out of his bed and went to open it.

               “Hi.” It was Daniel, but not the Daniel he was expecting.

               His eyebrows scrunched a little in confusion. “Daniel, right?”

               He was so cute. He was wearing probably one of the nicest white button down shirts he could find in his closet and his black jeans didn’t even have one speck of lint on them. He wore a dark gray bomber jacket over his shirt with a deck of vintage Bicycle cards and a single red rose in his hands. It was as if he was going on a special date. Philip felt bad. And stupid. Of course this was the Daniel all along. Nobody else would be pathetic enough to respond to such a silly online advertisement. Philip had to set things straight fast.

               “Well I sure hope so!” Daniel exclaimed. “Or else I’m gonna be late for a date with the most incredible guy I know!”

               He bit his lip and allowed Daniel to come further into his room. He closed the door behind him. “Dan, I have to tell you something…” he looked at Daniel sincerely, who was sitting patiently on his neatly made bed. He leaned on his dresser that was across the room. “This is not what you think this is. You’re…not exactly going to be my date for tonight.”

               Daniel’s face sunk and his eyes were filled with disappointment. “What do you need me to do then?”

               Philip felt bad for making him feel this way, but he had to tell him the truth somehow sometime. “I just need you to be my plus one when we enter the party, and then we can go our separate ways. So if you were worried if you were gonna have to be stuck with me all night, then I’m sure you feel a little relieved now.”

               Daniel bit his lip and set the deck of cards and the rose gently on the blue bedspread. “Why are you even going to this dumb party anyway? This isn’t like you.”

               Oh, what did Daniel know about him anyways! They practically just met earlier this week. He didn’t need to say that. Philip sighed, “Look, this will only be for an hour—tops. I just really need to do this one thing.”

               “Yeah?” Daniel folded his arms. “And what is that?”

               Now that he was going to say it out loud, the whole plan sounded stupid. Convince a practical stranger to kiss him? Could he be any more of a creep? “Well, um, it’s kinda silly, but it’ll help me in the long run, I’m sure.” He finally went to sit by Daniel on the bed. He rubbed his arm nervously, “I have a bit of a crush on my writing tutor.”

               Daniel nodded; “Yeah?” He paused for a moment and then said, “Phil, we all knew that. I mean, it’s obvious you don’t need a writing tutor. And, honestly, who doesn’t have a crush on that guy? He’s gorgeous.”

               Philip’s face lit up and he smiled widely, “Exactly! And perhaps by him inviting me tonight might say something, a small something, but still something.” He looked at him sincerely, “Dan, I really need to do this. It’s been killing me ever since the semester started. I just need your help just for one night.”

               It took a while, but Daniel finally nodded and agreed to his plan.

               “Alright, first, you look terrible,” Philip commented on Daniel’s outfit. He got up and rummaged through his dresser drawers and pulled out one of his blue college t-shirts. He threw it in Daniel’s direction. “Wear that. We’re going to a party, not to dinner.”

               Daniel shrugged off his jacket and began unbuttoning his shirt. “Great, just my favorite color.”

               Philip turned his head, slightly excited to know this special fact about him. “Really?”

               Daniel giggled, “No, it’s black, but you were close.” He shoved his head through the t-shirt, “And what were you planning to wear?”

               “This!” Philip pointed to his gray sweatpants and tight yellow t-shirt he got for free from volunteering. “What’s wrong with this?”

               Daniel pushed his arms through the sleeves and pulled the rest of the shirt down over his torso. “It looks like you’re trying too hard at not trying too hard.”

               Blood rushed to Philip’s cheeks and he glanced at himself in the mirror. He looked like he was going to the party in his pajamas. And although that was what his essay was about, he rather not be a living example of it in front of his crush. “What should I do then?”

               Daniel walked toward the mirror to fix his wavy brown hair. He shrugged, “Just slip on some jeans and a nice sweater. You’ll be fine.”

               “A sweater?” Philip retorted, heading toward his closet.

               “It shows off your softer side,” Daniel replied and then looked at him sincerely. “Guys like that.”

                                                                                               ***

               “Do you think its lame?” Philip asked Daniel with his head in his hands. “Arriving on time at a party?” They were a block away from the supposedly “abandoned” house where the party was located. They chose to sit on a low stone wall someone had in their front yard. The street was barely lit and quiet as most of the houses in the neighborhood were abandoned also. Philip heard it had something to do with the economy, but he didn’t care enough to pay attention. He crushed a few dry leaves with his sneaker and shivered as an autumn breeze passed by. He’s glad he’s wearing this sweater because it was another cold night. Daniel zipped his jacket and shoved his hands in its pockets.

               “This is my first party, so I’m not quite sure,” Daniel responded, watching a few cars pass by.

               “We should’ve stopped by Starbucks or something.” Philip’s mind was racing with thoughts of his own inadequacy and regrets.

               Daniel laughed out loud, which put Philip at ease. “Starbucks? Before a party?” he shook his head. “Starbucks is only for when you’re running late for a meeting.” He was quiet for a few moments and then looked at him sincerely. “I mean, we can bail if you want to. Coffee sounds really nice.”

               Philip shook his head, “it’s not like it’s every day you get invited to huge parties like this one.”

               “You’re right, maybe he’ll take offence to you not coming to his social status event that’s full of other fake people in need to maintain their social status.” Daniel rolled his eyes.

               Philip narrowed his eyes at him. “I bet you’re one of those people who announce a ‘social media detox’ and still sticks around just to see if anyone cares. Spoiler alert: no one does.”

               Daniel gave him a nasty look. “You’re mean when you’re stressed, you know that?”

               Philip sighed and stood up. “Shut up and let’s go.”

               Daniel sighed and followed him down the cracked sidewalk. They could hear the loud music pulsing from the party already. Philip could feel it in his chest (or was that his own heartbeat?). More cars raced down the street, with their music blasting as well. The closer they got to the house, they saw all the flashing lights and faint smoke from the bonfire. Philip’s stomach became tenser and his palms began to sweat once he realized this was actually happening. As they approached the house, they came across a long line of people that were already halfway drunk, waiting to enter the house.

               “You don’t suppose he actually made a guest list, do you?” Daniel asked Philip in his ear.

               Philip was too anxious to answer. There were at least a hundred people in the line. Some people were already being rejected and thrown out, which caused a loud commotion. After twenty or so minutes, they were finally at the front of the line. The whole ordeal felt like it was straight from a movie scene, with the huge intimidating bodyguard (he was actually one of the basketball players) asking for his name and checking the very sophisticated guest list. After they were approved, Philip felt a little better, but not entirely. The inside of the house smelled like mold and cat urine. There were old takeout food wrappers, bottles, cigarette butts, and broken pieces of rotted furniture everywhere. Candles and camping lanterns served as the only few light sources. All the windows were either broken or cracked and bugs were not a rare sight. However, perhaps the music and the people distracted Philip from how bad it really was.

               “Alright, in order to do this the most efficient way possible, I think it would be best if we split up,” Philip told Daniel loudly as they stood in the middle of a supposed living room. The chandelier above them was full of cobwebs and it was slightly swaying. “If you find him, you come get me.”

               “But how will I know where you are?” Daniel asked him. “By then I would lose him.”

               Philip had to admit he hadn’t thought that far into it. “I don’t know…this place can’t possibly be that big…”

               “Just…” Daniel reached for his back pocket and took out his phone. “Give me your number.”

               With much reluctance, Philip offered his phone number and turned toward the back door to go outside. He was hit with such an abundance of stimulation that he wanted to immediately run and hide from everything. The deejay booth was at the back of the huge backyard with inappropriately large speakers blaring out music that was rather distasteful according to Philip. Next to the deejay booth was the massive bubble pit that surprisingly had a lot of people participating in. As most of the people were nearly naked, Philip didn’t add that to his list of things to do. The bonfire was in the center, with the flames reaching at least six feet in the air. People from upstairs were throwing random furniture to the grass below to feed the fire; there was already a wooden chair, a broken desk, and a mattress. There were at least five kegs of beer sitting around, but no food. That was probably what made Philip the most uncomfortable.

               Philip made his way to one of the kegs and poured himself a half cup of beer and sat on the grass near the bonfire by himself, really wishing he had a s’more right about now. He took a drink, hoping it’ll help him find his confidence.

               “Well, he’s nowhere in the house, that’s for sure,” Daniel told him breathlessly. He sat down beside him and peered inside of Philip’s empty cup.

               “They have no food here,” Philip commented disappointedly, keeping his eyes on the fire.

               Daniel shrugged, “They’re narcissists; do you really think they’ll take the precious time to think about food instead of themselves?” He smirked, “besides, all they need to survive is fake internet points.”

               “Turn it down a notch, Mr. Edge Lord,” Philip rolled his eyes. “Can’t you just enjoy yourself without pushing your ‘alternative’ agenda on me?”

               Daniel smiled at him and he looked around. “They don’t have any games either.”

               Philip giggled, “Can you imagine if someone whipped out Monopoly?”

               He laughed, “Either you pay the full fine of Boardwalk with a hotel or you get banished to…the bubble pit.”

               Philip smiled widely and glanced over at the bubble pit. “What are the chances of him being in there?”

               “I think seventy-five percent,” he answered rather confidently. “But first you have to strip.”

               “That’ll really get his attention,” Philip laughed, crushing his cup and throwing it into the fire.

               At that moment, someone screamed loudly into the deejay’s microphone, requesting a trap remix of “All Star.” Philip was seriously questioning if he suddenly got pushed into an alternate universe where anything was absurdly possible within the heavily skewed timeline. Everyone began dancing recklessly and someone finally threw the smelly old mattress into the fire.

               “Well, at least we know what type of music the love of your life enjoys,” Daniel commented rather sarcastically.

               “You mean…?” Philip was in disbelief. His eyes scanned the dense crowd and he saw him. He could see that mop of blond hair anywhere. His stomach tensed and he rolled up his sleeves to help cool himself down.

               Daniel nudged his shoulder, “Now is your chance!”

               Philip sighed and rose to his feet, “Alright, but this requires another drink. Or two.”

               After gulping down another cup of beer, Philip fixed his hair, straightened his glasses, and pushed his sleeves up a bit more. He slowly made his way to the crowd. He pushed and shoved between the moist and drunk bodies to get to the life of the party. Finally, after a few suffocating minutes, he bumped into his tutor. Heat rushed over his body as he was shirtless and looked rather good that way.

               “H-hi,” Philip began nervously. Backing out now would not only be stupid, but also a complete waste of his time and effort. He accepted the fact that he was stuck here.

               “Oh, Phil!” He put a muscular arm around his bony shoulder. “It’s good to see you! I was hoping you would come.”

               “Nice party,” Philip complimented while he felt him dance all too closely to his body.

               “Aw, this is nothing!” He replied and wrapped a hand around Philip’s waist and shouted in his ear, “Wait until later! I got a firework crew coming!”

               All Philip could think about was that firm hand on his waist. Soon he was speaking without thinking. “Do—do you want to get out of here?”

               His tutor paused a few seconds, his blue eyes locking with his. Suddenly his large damp hand caressed Philip’s jaw and he glanced at his lips and back up to his eyes. He didn’t hesitate to kiss him hard on the lips, giving no time for Philip to adjust to the warm sensation. “You’re cute,” he simply said in one of his charming smiles.

               Philip’s insides were both frozen and moving all over the place at the same time. He felt weak in the knees. That kiss certainly didn’t go as planned, but it still felt exciting to him. None of his thoughts made logical sense anymore. Something in his brain switched and suddenly he felt the need for something more. “I’m serious; do you want to get away?” he had to shout in his ear.

               “Oh, I see,” he wiggled his perfect eyebrows at him and took his hand. As he had more authority, the crowd practically parted for them. Philip could breathe better now that there were less people.

               “Phil!” Daniel shouted as they passed by him.

               All Philip could do was shrug his shoulders as he was being dragged away too fast.

               The trip through the house was all but a blur to Philip as there were barely any lights and they were rushing through too quickly. His tutor was opening random doors until he finally discovered a dark room upstairs with still the mattress left. After he slammed the door shut behind them, he pinned Philip against the wall harshly and started kissing his neck.

               “Ah!” Philip gasped and tried to figure out where to put his hands. He finally settled to put them on his tutor’s waist. When he finally regained (most) of his senses, he confessed, “I guess you could tell then?”

               He felt him smile against his skin. “Phil, though you may be an English genius, you aren’t very good at hiding the obvious.” His lips trailed up to his jaw and he kissed him hard again.

               Philip gasped happily again and he pulled him closer. He was pretty sure he just saw literal fireworks outside the window. He heard the bangs and everything. “I suppose you like me too, then?”

               “Sure, you could put it that way,” he told him and gave his butt an unexpected squeeze. “Get on the mattress.”

               Philip was beginning to feel like this was going way too fast for him. Surely they’re not ready for this already? “Um, is it…is it sanitized?” Philip gently lowered himself on the dirty carpet and rested his knee on the mattress.

               “Yeah,” his tutor answered as he plopped himself down on the mattress. A small cloud of dust floated up. “Well, I think so.”

               Philip cringed and he tried to sit lightly on the bed. However, the boy climbed over him and kissed him hard enough to push him all the way into the dirty mattress. More explosions could be heard and sparks could be seen outside the bare cracked window. He glanced down at the boy who was now kissing his neck again and felt relieved, accomplished, and lucky at the same time. He took the liberty to run his fingers through his soft blond hair—something he had far too often dreamed about.

               His tutor sat up on his knees. “Phil, you still have your clothes on,” he told him as he began to unzip his own jeans.

               What? Philip was beginning to feel like something was wrong here. Why was he supposed to be the one to take off his own clothes? That wasn’t how this worked. However, given that he didn’t want to cause any trouble, he reluctantly pulled off his sweater, feeling incredibly self-conscious about his soft torso being too close to the boy’s toned one. Kisses were being trailed all over Philip’s chest now and he was beginning to feel good again. He let out a quiet moan as his heart was racing. Though, at the same time, he couldn’t help but feel dirty. Sure, for obvious reasons since he was on the most disgraceful mattress he’s ever encountered, but also because he felt so disconnected from it. They weren’t laughing or making any jokes—not even talking at all. It was only physical. Like he was being used. Perhaps he could change that.

               “So, um, what are your plans for fall break?” Philip asked him awkwardly as he struggled to adjust his body from being crushed to death by the muscular one on top of him.

               “I don’t ‘do’ talking,” he said firmly as he was kissing down Philip’s stomach. He then sighed in frustration. “Phil, your jeans are still on.”

               Yeah, and what are you gonna do about it; Philip wanted to say to him, but went along with it anyway. As his hands inched down to his zipper, he remembered something. “Do you have a condom? I wasn’t really expecting this and I’m not really that experienced, sorry.”

               “Uh, no?” he sat back on his heels. “But we’ll be fine, right? It’s just one time.”

               Despite having the most beautiful body on display before him like that, Philip suddenly didn’t want this anymore. He wanted to find Daniel, leave, and take a long shower. And then perhaps eat some pizza. But not this. Anything but this. Almost without notice, he felt like he couldn’t breathe anymore and coughed a little. He sat up and tried to retrieve his sweater from the darkness. “I have to go,” he said breathlessly.

               His tutor quickly reached out for him and pleaded, “No, stay! Isn’t this what you wanted? What we wanted?”

               Philip wrestled out of his grip and coughed again. “You’re drunk,” he slipped his sweater on, but the room was too hot for him to find any comfort in it. “Do you…do you feel that?” he stretched out his collar, trying to let more air into his lungs.

               “What do you mean?” he asked, but their attention was immediately diverted to the window. Hot orange flames could be seen, creeping down around the window. “The fireworks!”

               Philip didn’t even wait for him. He bolted out the door and ran down the stairs. There was only one thing on his mind. He needed to know where Daniel was. He needed to make sure that he was okay. He oddly didn’t care about himself, or his stupid tutor, or anybody else. It was only Daniel.

               Philip desperately rushed outside with a cloud of smoke and his half-naked tutor behind him. They both doubled over and coughed loudly and deeply. Philip saw flashing lights all around him in colors of red, blue, orange, and white. Firefighters in uniform rushed into the abandoned house. Everyone from the party was standing around in the street staring at the blaze. Some were seriously freaking out while others were making jokes and filming it on their phones.

               Philip rushed out on to the crowded street in a panic. Where did he last see Daniel? Through everything that has happened within the past thirty or so minutes, he wasn’t sure of a lot of things anymore. He ran his fingers through his incredibly dirty hair and tried to think hard. He really wished he didn’t drink that last cup of beer. He passed by an ambulance that already had somebody on a stretcher. That didn’t relieve his thoughts all that much. Tears were stinging his eyes as his questions still remained unanswered.

               “Daniel!” Philip shouted out as he passed through the crowd. “Has anybody seen Dan? Daniel!”

               He stopped in his tracks as his back pocket vibrated. He quickly took out his phone and felt relief surge through his body.

               “Hey, where are you at?” Daniel asked him on the phone almost too casually. “The freaking house caught on fire! You should’ve seen how it started, it was so ridiculous,” he laughed. “I swear, this idiotic party was set up by a bunch of—”

               “Are you okay?” Philip got straight to the point. “Where are you?”

               “I, um, I’m…I think I see you,” Daniel replied. “You look terrible.”

               Philip turned in circles until he saw a blue dot in the distance. Actually, it was pretty easy to see him as everyone was mostly shirtless to begin with. Philip rushed forward quickly, pushing people to get through, until he met with Daniel. He threw his arms around him tightly, making sure to not let go. He squeezed his eyes shut and by surprise, hot tears streamed down his cheeks.

               “Boy, you must’ve really missed me,” Daniel joked, wrapping his arms around Philip’s waist.

               Philip let go so he could take Daniel’s face into his hands. “No, you idiot! I was worried about you!”

               Something in Daniel’s mind suddenly clicked as he glanced at the burning house and back at Philip. “Don’t tell me…you weren’t…you weren’t in that house were you?”

               Philip sniffled, “Doesn’t matter. Are you okay?”

               “Pshhh, yeah, I’m fine,” he brushed off. “How did,” he smiled, “how did your ‘talk’ go?”

               Philip stepped back a little and he rolled his eyes. “That guy’s a loser. He made us lay on a filthy dirty mattress and he didn’t even bring a condom!”

               “You guys had sex?!” Daniel asked a little too loudly.

               Philip giggled and he shook his head. He looked at Daniel for a few seconds and he felt safe. He was glad they were both okay, but more importantly that Daniel actually cared about him. Perhaps it was the alcohol or the fact that Daniel looked good in his own t-shirt, but he felt something he hadn’t felt before. He wasn’t sure where that came from, so he looked at the fireball that was the house to distract him. “No doubt he’ll be going to jail for this,” he looked over at Daniel once more, then back at the flames, and he bit his lip.

               Daniel smirked, “Can’t believe you almost were the one that would have to bail him out.” He sighed with relief, “but I guess the only good thing that came out of this is was that you’re still alive.” He smiled at him.

               Philip felt something stronger then than when his tutor smiled at him. Oh no. This was certainly not supposed to happen. But perhaps, there were some things he couldn’t control. Very carefully, he took the chance and gently brushed Daniel’s face with his fingertips. He leaned in slowly and he kissed him. It wasn’t hard or desperate like the other kisses he received earlier this night; instead it was more sincere and slow. Daniel kissed him back eagerly, and it was clear that he didn’t do it to express good manners. Philip was sure he never felt anything more right this entire night.

               “Was this part of the agreement?” Daniel whispered after kissing him, their foreheads barely touching.

               Philip tilted his head in confusion, “what do you mean?”

               “You hired me, remember? The ad? The whole plan you had for tonight?” Daniel asked him. “I don’t mean to be that kind of person, but I’m still on the clock. And I don’t really care about the money, so don’t…”

               Philip shook his head apologetically, “I’m sorry, Dan. I honestly forgot.” He bit his lip, “I’m a bit broke at the moment.”

               Daniel smiled at him and he brought Philip’s hand up to his lips and he softly kissed it and rested it on his cheek. “That’s okay; I can accept weekly payments.”

[i-w-p-chan]

Red Crystal, Part 2

Previous

.

The next morning, Enma woke up refreshed; the bone-deep tiredness he had felt throughout yesterday was gone. Looking around the room, he noted that Skull's bed was empty; did he leave already?

He yawned as he walked towards the window and opened it; he stuck his head out and was surprised by the sun high in the sky.

He blinked in shock; he'd slept in until noon? Just how tired was he? And why was he left to sleep in like this anyway? He rushed back into his bedside to get his clothes and change into them before he left the room and looked around the corridor.

He… did not remember the way to the main hall.

He resisted the urge to slam his head against the wall in embarrassment. Maybe he should just wander around and hope he either ended up finding his way to the main hall or found by any of the priests.

Sighing, he walked away from the room in the first direction that grabbed his attention.

After minutes of walking and not finding anyone or hearing anything, he wondered if maybe he picked the wrong direction. Luckily, he came across a pair of big doors that looked promising.

Until he opened them and found himself in a library of sorts.

Enma sighed in dismay; he definitely picked the wrong direction.

He rubbed a hand against his face as he pondered turning back the way he came and hoping to find his way back.

Just as he was about to turn around, a vague memory echoed in his head; there was something about the Sky Temple's library? He furrowed his eyebrows in confusion and concentration as he tried to dredge up what the memory was about.

"Hey, Enma! You wouldn't believe it, but the library has a secret room!"

Huh? Enma blinked; secret room?

Why would he have a memory about something like that anyway? He shook his head and went to sit on the nearest bench he found inside the library. Putting his face in his hands, he refocused on the memory again.

Concentrating, he pulled up as much details as he could muster.

"Of course I know! I'm a priest there now!"

Enma's lips twisted in wry amusement; he didn't know who that person who told him about the subject in the past was (which was such a shame), but he had no idea how they could just tell him about becoming a priest, priests were supposed to keep their true identity a secret, to avoid stigma like what happened with the Sky Temple's first Head Priest-

Enma frowned; he knew the name, he was sure of it, why did it have to slip from him, too?

He sighed heavily as he leaned back against the wall.

The wall slid away from underneath him and he tumbled back.

Groaning, he rose up, wondering just what happened. A quick look around told him that he wasn't in the library anymore. Oh, he was in a library but not the one he was in just moments ago.

He couldn't have possibly stumbled across the secret room, could he?

He sighed; oh, great. He should probably look around for a way out.

The room didn't look like it had anything special, at first glance. But Enma was scouring the room in search for an exit, and so he noticed how old the books in the room were. There was something about them that attracted his attention: each and every one of them had compass-like markings on the spine. Enma's hand went to briefly cover his eyes as he closed them. The markings looked very familiar.

The markings looked exactly the same as his own pupils.

The room held many layers of secrets woven into it if anyone bothered to look deep enough.

And Enma bothered to look deep enough.

Everything felt achingly familiar from the couch off to one end, the cushioned pedestal, the books, the entr-

"There you are."

Enma jumped in shock before he whipped around to come face to face (or rather, face to cloaked face) with the Head Priest.

"We worried about you when we didn't find you in your room."

"Ah, sorry about that, I-" Enma started to apologize, but the Head Priest cut him off with a raised hand.

"No need to apologize." Enma could almost swear he heard the hint of a smile in the Priest's voice, "You're not the first person who ends up lost in the Temple on their first day. I'm more surprised that you found your way in here."

Enma stiffened.

"Relax, I know you did not break in, the entrance to this room isn't exactly locked to you as long as you know how to get in."

"But I don't know how to either."

"So it was an accident. The mere fact that you made it in means that there is nothing stopping you from being here."

Enma cocked his head to the side, confused.

The Priest gestured to the books, "These books are special and unique, you won't find them anywhere else on the land. That's because they teach Spirit Core techniques, and everyone has Soul Fire, no one has a Spirit Core."

Enma perked up at the term.

Spirit Core.

It sounded so familiar to him, a fifth limb he didn't consciously realize he had until he thought about it.

"The only reason you were able to enter the room without prior knowledge tells me that you have a Spirit Core. There is no way I could prevent you from making use of this room and what it has." There was a strange note in the Priest's voice, one that Enma could not place, "In fact, it's pretty much yours now. You can come here any time you wish and practice."

Enma shook his hands, "No, wait! I can't just do that!"

"Oh? Why is that?" The Priest cocked their head to the side, "Do you need help? An instructor?"

Enma blushed, "I-! I'm not sure why you are being so generous to me like that! It's your library, isn't it? Why are you handing it over to a stranger?"

"Enma, do you know what duties get carried inside a Temple by the Priests? Do you know what the Temples double as? A learning institution and training facility, to tutor people in how to use their Soul Fire. This place is the perfect place for you to learn and I-" the Head Priest reached out their hands to the edges of their hood, "-am the person qualified to tutor you." The Priest tugged the hood off and Enma flinched back, covering his eyes with his hands.

"Easy, you are going to be my student now, aren't you? I don't think pesky Temple rules about Priests keeping their identities secret from others who aren't Priests need apply."

Enma kept his eyes covered, "Do you do this with all of your students?"

"Oh, no, you're a special case." Enma blushed, "Now, remove your hands from your eyes; I do believe it would be difficult to navigate the room without your sight. Unless you know how to do so."

Enma didn't know how to navigate the room without his eyesight, so he reluctantly pulled his hands away from his eyes and slowly turned his head to look right at the Priest.

The Priest appeared to be around Enma's age, with combed, brown hair, held together and pinned at the back of their head, pupil-less, orange eyes, and a soft smile.

"You can keep this a secret between us, yes?"

Enma nodded, the Priest's smile widened.

"Call me Tsu when we are alone, okay?"

Enma's blush intensified.

Tsu tugged their hood back on, "Now, come, you still haven't eaten anything yet."

.

Enma pushed his empty plate away from him and looked around, wondering where he should go with it. One of the priests solved the dilemma for him by swooping in and snatching the plate away. He blinked at their back in bewilderment.

"Well then, what are you going to do next?"

Enma turned to the direction of the voice to see Tsu approach him, "About?"

"Your next step. I'll be tutoring you. But what about other things?"

"I don't know." He raked his hand through his hair, "You know about my memories. Or lack of them. I don't know where I came from or where I'm supposed to go next. I'm not sure I even know what I can do!"

Tsu hummed thoughtfully, "That wouldn't be a big problem. You're in Vongola City. If you go to their main building and talk with whoever is behind the counter once you enter, they'd see what to do with you."

Enma cocked his head to the side, "The Vongola, huh? If I remember correctly, they provide food and board in exchange for working for them, aside from paying money for any services you do for them."

"You know that, at least."

Enma frowned in confusion, "It's strange, it just popped into my head. I don't know from where I learned of this."

"Well, no matter." Tsu settled themself down on the chair next to Enma, "Would you like to go now? We could organize your lessons after we see what comes from checking in with the Vongola."

Enma rose from his seat, "Okay, I'll go do that." He turned and inclined his head in Tsu's direction, "Thank you for everything. You've been a really great help."

Tsu waved him off, "There's no need to thank me, I've just been doing my job."

"Still…"

"Alright, alright. You're welcome." Tsu rose as well, "Before I go, one of the Vongola will be dropping by soon, how about you go to the main hall to meet up with him and tell him about your circumstances. He'd probably also take you to the Vongola building in case the location is one you don't remember as well."

Enma smiled bashfully at them, "There you are, helping me again. I don't know where I would be without you."

Tsu was silent.

Enma's smile slowly slid off his face, wondering if he said something he shouldn't have said.

When Tsu finally spoke, there was a strange note in their voice, "You… don't need to thank me for this."

With that, Tsu walked away, leaving Enma confused and feeling like he missed something very important.

Again.

He hung his head, inwardly cursing himself; his hands were shaking as he raised them to his face. He pushed the heels of his palms against his eyes until stars exploded behind his eyelids.

He asked himself, for the umpteenth time since he woke up the previous day, just what was he doing, where was he supposed to go, where was he supposed be, who was he supposed to be.

But to no avail; he was still a stumbling, lost mess and he hated it.

He doubted that he could ever pick himself up and rebuild whatever it was that toppled and caused him to find himself unconscious on a strange island with half his memories missing.

When he deemed that he wallowed enough for the time being, he put himself back together as best as he could and walked in the direction he knew the main hall was in.

He was greeted by the sight of a frowning silver-haired, green-eyed teenager.

"You're late," The teen said briskly.

Enma's eyebrow twitched.

"Follow me." The teen gestured as he strode off towards the entrance. Enma sighed and trudged after him.

.

The teen silently guided Enma through Vongola City towards where Enma assumed was the Vongola's main building, the only sign he gave of acknowledging Enma's company was the occasional scrutinizing look he'd throw over his shoulder at Enma, as if trying to figure out a particularly stubborn puzzle.

(Enma would like to hear what he figured out, because Enma himself was still trying to figure things out himself.)

Their arrival to the main building was without fanfare; even the building itself didn't stand out, which Enma found strange, a part of him expected it to be very flashy.

The teen ushered him in and pointed towards the counter where a girl with short hair pulled up in a ponytail was standing behind it before disappearing into one of the doors.

The girl saw them enter and noticed Enma being led to her, she smiled, "Hello and welcome to the Vongola's offices! I'm Haru! What can I do for you?"

"Um." Enma fumbled a bit, wondering how he could broach the topic, "I'm here to ask about job offers?" He inwardly cringed at the way he phrased it.

"Oh!" Haru seemed to understand what he was asking about, "Here, our forms!" She reached under the counter and rummaged before she brought out some paperwork, "Please fill them out and hand them in sometime during the next three days and we'll look them over and see what jobs to assign you."

"O-okay." Enma held the paperwork and wondered if that was all, should he ask her?

"But there's one thing." Haru placed her index finger on her lower lip as she observed him, "We only get job applicants through recommendations, and every time, the person doing the recommendation accompanies the recommended applicant to meet the person manning the counter at the moment." She scrutinized him, "You're the first person ever to come by themselves. How did you know about the job applications?"

"I." Enma snapped his mouth shut, tense and wracking his brain to figure out a way to answer her, "I. Someone told me. I don't remember who at the moment. But."

Her eyes bore into his own, "You came from the Sky Temple?"

"Ah, yes?"

"Did the Head Priest approve of you coming over?"

"Yes."

Haru cocked her head to the side, "And they didn't tell you about the recommendation?"

"No, they didn't."

Haru gave him a strange look before she returned to her previous cheer, "Well, no matter! It's not like you did something wrong! So, relax! See you later, 'kay?"

Enma nodded mutely and walked out of the building. That was back to the Sky Temple with him. Again.

(It wasn't like he had another place to go to.)

.

Twenty minutes and going through many winding corners to get to one of the main roads in the city later, Enma was absolutely thankful to the natural slope of the land and the Temple being built on the very top, otherwise, he'd have been lost ten times over.

He clutched the paperwork tighter to his chest as he walked across the bridge to reach the Temple. He was met by Tsu once he approached the building, Tsu having just come down the stair-case rising at the side of the building.

"How did it go?"

"They gave me paperwork to fill out."

Tsu hummed, "We can go over it in the library and then I can start you off with your training. Is that okay with you?"

"Sure."

.

After the two sat down next to each other on the couch in the secret room, Enma spread the forms between them.

Tsu tugged the hood off and brought their face closer to inspect the papers, which brought them close to Enma, who was doing the same.

Enma tried to read the forms, but his attention kept being pulled towards the figure sitting next to him. His eyes trailed over Tsu, taking in the youthful features, the pupil-less orange eyes, the brown hair combed back and carefully pinned at the back of their head with fancily-shaped golden wire.

A ghost of a memory pushed itself to the forefront of Enma's mind, super-imposing a faint image over Tsu's figure.

"Have we met before?" Enma found himself asking.

Tsu jolted a bit, looking at him in slight confusion and- and another expression that Enma couldn't decipher. Something strong, deep in Enma's core, screamed at him to look, look and see. He was looking, and he was seeing, he just wasn't seeing clearly.

A strange expression flitted through Tsu's eyes as they burned brighter; they opened their mouth to speak, but a chime through the room interrupted them.

Tsu closed their mouth, lips pressed tightly into a thin line, eyes dimming before they blazed again, "It looks like there is something that requires my immediate attention. I must go. See you later?"

"Yeah. I'll… try to see what I can do about the forms."

Tsu nodded and left the room and Enma returned to scrutinizing the forms.

He couldn't shake off the feeling that he missed the opportunity to solve all of his current problems, to remember what all those echoing thoughts wanted to communicate to him, to know where he stood, in the grand scheme of things.

.

(Later, he'd look back to this moment and wonder if it really would have been a good thing that Tsu was interrupted when they were.)

.

End part 2

Next

[thelondonfilmschool]

MEET THE PROFESSIONALS - Sue Austen | Advice for potential LFS students

Filmmaking students who journey through the terms at The London Film School are guided by various mentors. To aid them over their final obstacle, their graduation film, two further guardians await to usher them over the finish line: Sue Austen and her joint Term 6 tutor Richard Kwietniowski.

Sue Austen’s background is as a producer, having worked mainly in television. Her career has progressed alongside the development of independent production within the TV industry and the convergence of both film and television in the UK, commonly working for companies that were involved in both sectors. Starting off at Goldcrest Films and Television as a temporary secretary and leaving as a script editor, she went on to work at Granada as Head of Development for their film division, and it was there that Austen came across a project that she felt she couldn’t hand over. "It’s like that thing of nurturing something and handing it over to the producer, and there was point at which I thought I just can’t do this any more. I really wanted to produce this film myself, and I was very fortunate in that I was given the opportunity at least to co-produce the film. We had a very experienced director who was also a producer, and he was very generous in what he allowed me to do.” The film, PAPER MASK, made its way to the Cannes Film Festival, where it was screened as the closing film in the Director’s Fortnight.

After the birth of her two children, Austen went to work for the European Script Fund, which funded the development of film and television projects from all around Europe. She worked there for 5 years, meeting interesting people from all over the continent, before returning to her role as an independent producer, mainly for television. "Some of the projects that I produced I had been involved in the development of and a few of them were ones where I was a producer for hire and brought in to produce a project that was already in some form of development beforehand.” The London Film School’s Laura Nucinkis sat down with Austen to find out about her role as joint Term 6 tutor, the difference between tv and film production and to garner words of wisdom for upcoming graduates and prospective students alike.

What brought you to The London Film School?

The first thing I did here was I ran a summer workshop programme for LFS Open, which was called ‘Showrunner' and was funded by Skillset. In America, different types of television programmes get made with a showrunner at the centre of that, and those are writers, but who actually take on the responsibilty of running a big TV series. And there’s been a lot of talk about whether or not that model would work in the UK. So what we did on the ‘Showrunner' programme is we selected 12 experienced television writers and ran a two week very intensive programme to teach them about production and producing, so if they were 'running a show', they would know something about the production as well as about writing for television. 

Then I started to do some ad hoc teaching on the MA Screenwriting programme, mainly to do with writing for television and television production where most of my background is. The reason I started the job that I’m now doing [as joint term 6 plus tutor] which I job share with Richard Kwietniowski, is that an immediate vacancy became available because the person who was doing it before left at fairly short notice because she has another oppurtunity to go to.  And the then director of the school, Ben Gibson, suggested that Richard and I should take on the job as a job share for a term and see how it might work out.  Richard and I hadn’t worked together before or even met, but we did it for a term, sort of figured out what we were doing as we went along and developed the 6th Term programme and we’ve carried on doing it since then and I think we make a pretty good team now.

And how does it work?  Can you talk a little bit about people going from Term 6 to their 6 plus?

When students come here on the MA Filmmaking programme, they have 5 terms which are very clear term exercises. When it comes to Term 6, it’s an opportunity to develop their graduation project, but they have two more terms to deliver their film after they’ve finished here at the school. So that means in Term 6, they tend to be around the school, working on the development of a project but also attending classes and extension classes that we run in lots of different areas. And then in Term 7 and 8, they’re actually away making their film, which they then screen at the crits at the end of Term 8, and what we’re doing in that period of time is working with them on their films and their scripts, advising them on production issues.   From your experience, would you say there’s a big difference in the skills needed to work in TV and film?

In the past, when I first came into this industry, there was quite a big difference in the way films and television programmes were financed.  After Channel 4, with the development of the independent production sector, there was still a tendency for TV to be more or less fully funded by the broadcasters. The independent producers might retain some rights and there might be some co-production but there still tended to be predominately funded by the broadcasters. Film finance and production is funded by one source if it’s a Hollywood movie, but nearly all kinds of other films are funded by a patchwork of different sources and co-productions and increasingly that is now how television is also funded.   

And what do you think is the biggest challenge coming towards people making TV?

I think technology is making it possible to make programmes with far fewer people involved in the crew and far quicker and far more immediately and I think that’s a potentially exciting challenge. It will mean, however, that we will have to look quite hard at crewing levels and at how many people we need. People may lose work as a result of that, but maybe it’ll just spread around more thinly. Obviously there’s a lot of economic uncertainty at the moment and in this country we rely very heavily on big productions coming in and filming at our studios like Pinewood and Leavesden and I think the uncertainty with the dollar and with currency exchange rates, I’m already seeing and hearing of productions that might have come here considering not coming here after all because of those kinds of uncertainties. Those are very serious challenges to address. 

And what’s a piece of advice you’d give to people to make the most out of their time here at the LFS?

I think... learn from the experience, from your colleagues, your tutors, from watching films and tv.  Don’t come necessarily thinking you know more than you do. Listen.  And be prepared to make mistakes. That’s the really fantastic and wonderful thing about film school, and I worry sometimes that for our students, everything needs to be perfect. The term 1 and term 2 exercises are a safe place to fail and learn from, and the same is true of all the other exercises. You learn by making mistakes. Everything I know, I’ve learnt from making mistakes. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. 

Obviously you look after filmmaking students especially if they’re preparing to graduate, and possibly stay in touch afterwards as well - what kind of advice would you have for people who are graduating now who are looking to start their own careers either in film or TV production?

I think networking is really important, keeping a note of all the people you’ve met and the circumstances in which you’ve met them. I think getting a range of experiences is very valuable, especially when you first leave and if you are offered opportunities to do short periods, by which I mean a week or two at the most, of getting practical experience in a TV or film company with a particular skill then take it.  Because it will extend your network, it will extend the people you know. But I genuinely know people who’ve been on the phone on a train and the person opposite has said, “I’m really interested in what you were talking about. Come and work for me”. So you just have to keep your options open in every possible way. 

You mentioned networking. I think to a lot of people, especially young people, it’s almost like a scary or a dirty word. What do you think are some top tips about how to network?

If you meet somebody interesting, ask them if they’ve got a card. I think it’s not crazy to have little cards of your own as well. But if you meet somebody and you have an opportunity to speak to them at a reception or an event, I’d definitely say “Can I take your card?” And if you have a really genuine question, follow that up and email them and say “I met you yesterday. And I’ve got this question”. Be interested in them as much as you want them to be interested in you.  I think that would be a top tip. Ask for advice about something specific if you want to ask for advice. And be knowledgeable about their work. Show that you know who they are and what they’ve done in those encounters. 

And you took some graduating students to a festival in January.  Could you talk a little bit about how that came about?

LFS was invited to take part in the New Talent section at the FIPA festival in Biarritz in January which was an honour. A number of different film schools from around the world – from Cuba to Serbia - came together to share student films by recently graduated student filmmakers. There were opportunities to meet, talk and view each others films.  It was a great week and I met some very interesting people. 

For more information about the MA Filmmaking course at LFS: http://lfs.org.uk/full-time-study/ma-filmmaking/curriculum