ILL HEARTS

7

Jungkook ~ March 22, 2019

"Okay, serious question, who invited that kind girl to our practice?" the coach asked, bursting into our locker room without a single knock. Kind girl. So she already wrapped my coach around her finger, what's new.

"I did, coach," I said, raising my hand to make the message clear.

He gave it a second of silence. "Okay. I'm asking again. Who invited that kind girl to our practice?"

I rolled my eyes, crossing my arms on my bare chest. "I did," I said again.

"You? Jeon Jungkook? With a girl?"

"She's not like that. Just a college friend."

"You better not get distracted. One glance at her and I'll kick your butt in a sparring."

"Yes, coach," I said, and he was gone.

A moment of silence in which I only got to grab my wrist wrappers before I was attacked again.

"You invited her over to your practice?" Hoseok asked, battling a smile. "Your enemy? The girl you hate? Why?"

"Because she's never seen me boxing."

"And there are no videos of you boxing on the Internet?" Namjoon asked. They all just stood there, staring at me, and never before had I felt so judged.

"There are, but videos are videos. It's different in real life," I said, turning away from them. For the first time I was intimidated, not intimidating.

They fell suspiciously silent for as long as I wrapped the bandage around my wrist, and I didn't dare to look back, acting like I didn't care. I knew they were exchanging glances, I knew they were glaring at me, too.

"Looks like... someone's in love," Yoongi said, smiling this stupid I knew it smile, and he had his arms crossed over his chest when I turned back.

I rolled my eyes, a well-practiced action. "I am not in love. I am everything but in love. Everything is going according to the plan." He didn't answer, and I dived back to my locker for another bandage. It should have been easy to let it go and move on, but I got stuck on this one stupid sentence. "What do you mean I look like I'm in love?" I asked, looking back at him.

I wasn't in love. He knew I wasn't. But what pissed me off the most about him saying this was that Yoongi was in love, and he knew what he was talking about. He knew what falling in love was like.

"You have been... brighter recently," he said.

"And you're not as much of an asshole to everyone all the time," Hoseok added.

"Usually when someone's in love, they are feeling so good that they act differently," Yoongi continued.

"I am not in love," I said, again, like one time wasn't enough for them. "I'm just having fun because my plan is working."

"And when you're done with your plan, you will gladly break it down to her that her dream of a love story is a piece of crap, because life is not sunshine and rainbows and people are all dickheads?" Yoongi asked, too confident in himself for my liking.

It should be easy to say 'yes'. It should pop out of me like a burp, in a second. But I was shut down, fighting with myself to say the answer I had at the tip of my tongue.

Namjoon joined in before I could claim my trails as failed. "Why does it even bother you that much that she is like that? Maybe she's not fake, maybe it's just... how she is?"

"It bothers me, okay? For... reasons. Nevermind," I mumbled, hurrying to get out of the locker room. I just wanted to be punching a bag already, not listening to their stupid blabbering.