EMBERS • HAECHAN (Not Finished Yet)

Chapter 90

"No, I was just uh, curious if-"

"She's somewhere outside talking to a few friends from her soccer team."

Amused by the boy's babbling, I simply smiled at him and nodded my head toward the end of the hallway.
Knowing that he couldn't talk himself out anymore, he just sight out loud, scratching the back of his head before he turned around and left in embarrassment.

"I'll see you later."

There he went, swinging his black umbrella a little while he made his way through the crowd to get outside to my pretty friend. Hopefully the two would work out.

Not long after, my eyes fell back on Donghyuck and I looked at him a little closer.
Like the last time at the cemetery, his soft hair was now slightly curled, lightly falling over his perfect eyebrows.
My thoughts automatically wandered to the day I had met him for the first time.

Comparing that time to now, he hadn't really changed that much.
Back then he had also had a dark suit, curly hair as well as his sinister aura.
If I just looked at his appearance I would have said that nothing had changed over the past few months at all.

Thinking about our relationship and my feelings for him now though, there was nothing that had stayed the same.
Instead of  boiling with rage and disgust at his mere presence, I felt a different kind of tingling that traveled through my entire body.

Butterflies.

"What are you dressed up as?" he asked me in a surprisingly indifferent voice, snapping me out of my thoughts and sending an icy shiver down my spine in the very same moment.

There it was- the ice-cold look in his eyes that made him seem so arrogant.
It had been quite a while since I had seen his threatening attitude and as much as I liked him, it left anything but a good impression on me.
It reminded me of his earlier smug and self-absorbed days, which I detested with all my heart.

Annoyed by his suddenly put-upon facade, I raised an eyebrow provocatively and pierced his head with an equally condescending stare.

"Secret agent, how about you?"

"Kingsman," he replied monotonously, while the corners of his mouth gradually started to move up. "What a coincidence, we almost look like a couple don't you think."

I cringed right away, frowing had his last comment that he emphasized a little too strangely before I started questioning my own costume for a brief moment.
As if struck by lightning, realization hit me and I remembered what had happened the our before the other girls and I had come to the party.

"Wait a minute, you planned all this with Momo, didn't you?" My mouth fell open as I glared at him shock.

"That's why she put me in a completely different outfit all of a sudden! You texted her!"

"Guilty as charged," the brunette gave in without arguing, raising his hands into a proud, but defensive position.
Slightly mad, I inhaled deeply and massaged my temples while trying to accept the fact that the two of them had prepared that behind my back.

"Well," Donghyuck shrugged, still not making a different face. "I guess you just have to go with it."

Again there was this certain seriousness in his voice that provoked me me more than it actually should.
I mean I shouldn't be surprised. He was a gang member after all, people had to fear or at least avoid him in public.
Still, in this very moment there was no one around us so why did he have to look at me like that?

Squeezing my eyes a little, I gave him an annoyed look.

"Back with that cold attitude of yours, huh?"