Catch-22, HAECHAN

12 | damned if I do

Chaerin takes in a deep breath, her nails digging into her palms as she scrunches her eyes shut even tighter.

Even with her head buried in her arms, the lights in the auditorium still feels too bright for her— further aggravating the pounding in her head and the bile in her throat.

She blames herself for deciding to stay up late last night to study for a quiz, knowing full well that it wasn't going to work well in her favour. Now, she would have to deal with the consequences.

The voice of her professor had far long dissipated into nothingness in the background, and Chaerin could only hope that the lecture would end soon.

Her body seriously could not have picked a better time to malfunction on her.

"Really, Cherry? You couldn't have made it any less obvious that you're sleeping?" An all-too-familiar voice suddenly pops up from next to her.

Chaerin suppresses a groan, already feeling her migraine multiply tenfold at the new source of irritation.

She lifts her head up slightly to squint at the owner of the voice, quickly regretting her decision as the harsh lights of the lecture hall instantly blinds her eyes.

Chaerin reburies her face into her arms. "Go disturb someone else today, Donghyuck. I'm not in the mood," she mumbles.

"Yeah, neither am I. Can you move? I'm gonna be late for practice," the boy mutters impatiently, and Chaerin could hear the incessant sound of his sneaker tapping against the carpeted floor.

Chaerin groans in frustration, lifting up her slouched body to return to her sitting position. She glares at the boy, Donghyuck only staring back at her with his tongue poking his cheek. It's clear that he's only doing this to rile her up, since the other side was clearly open for him to exit, but alas, Lee Donghyuck wouldn't be Lee Donghyuck if he didn't attempt to make Chaerin's life a living hell at least once a day.

Amidst their little staring contest, Donghyuck is the first to break as he started to chuckle, shaking his head slightly.

"I think you got a little lost in my eyes there, princess," he teases. "But as much as I'd love to let you continue doing that, I'm afraid we'd have to give way for the next class."

Disregarding his comment, Chaerin whips her neck to look behind her, realising that he is in fact right.

She didn't even notice that her own lecture had ended, let alone that a new one is starting. Her place at the very top row of the auditorium granted nearest access to the second level double doors, where students are already streaming in for their lesson. The seats of the auditorium are quickly beginning to fill up with more students entering from the bottom entrances as well, leaving only Chaerin and Donghyuck as the only students from the previous lecture.

Not having it in her to argue with the boy, she wordlessly begins to zip up her pencil case before standing up, lifting her bag from the floor to the table as she does so.

Her head is quick to swirl the moment she does, Chaerin realising a little bit too late that doing so so quickly was likely not the best idea. It takes her a moment to regain herself, her fingers clutching on to the side table for balance, and it's only when the black spots stop dancing in her vision does she realise Donghyuck's sudden close proximity to her, the boy standing awfully close to her back as though shielding her from something.

"So, I may have found out why you're feeling so sick," he mumbles with his eyes trained downwards, all humour from his voice gone.

Chaerin furrows her eyebrows, confused by his words, before she lets out a gasp at her sudden realisation.