The Sweetest Lie [Ko Kyung-jun]

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[PROLOGUE]

3rd PERSON's PoV

They had always been three.

Three girls, three different smiles, three shadows linked together since middle school. Lee Se-ri, Kim Sul-hee and Park Se-eun.

Through awkward braces, late-night study sessions, and whispered secrets in bathrooms stalls, they'd survived it all together. Or so they thought.

By their second year of high school, the world didn't feel the same.

Rumors started spreading faster. Phones buzzed like traps waiting to snap. And one day, without warning, a video began to circulate.

"Se-eun, I don't want you to freak out. But have you seen the videos?" Sul-hee called out from outside the bathroom stall where Se-eun was.

"What are you talking about Sul-hee?" Said girl came out, and her friend was quick to hand over her phone. When she saw the edited video of herself, she felt disgusted.

"This isn't real Sul-hee, Se-ri" She fell to the floor. Tears coming out as if they were a waterfall.

"Se-eun" Se-ri called out. Sitting down next to her on the floor and embracing her best friend.

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Se-eun's name became a hashtag. Her face became a meme. And no matter how many messages Sul-hee and Se-ri, sent, no matter how many times they begged her to talk, she didn't answer ever.

Until one day after school, she insisted she stayed after school as she was supposedly gonna talk to the principal, and the girls being naive, believed her. Leaving her at the school not knowing what she was about to do.

Later that day she was announced dead.

Now, the two girls remain-left with memories, guilt, and questions that may never be answered.

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Some time after the incident, nothing was the same.

The laughter the girls once shared became something brittle, something forced, almost. The empty seat between them was a wound that never healed, and slowly the two of them began to change. Se-ri wasn't her usual happy self, always distant, and only talking to Sul-hee. But Sul-hee though... Sul-hee refused to be quiet. She filled the silence with loudness, with parties, with boys whose names she didn't even bother learning. It was her way of not thinking, not feeling. At least for a while.

Se-ri always scolded her after she would find out about her adventures. She was scared that one of those boys would do something to her.

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"Sul-hee, please stop. One of these days, those boys are gonna leak a video or photo. Or worse, give you an infection"

"I wear protection Se-ri, besides I don't think none of them are recording me"

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But the world is cruel to girls who stumble.

Sul-hee's name was viral, circling the halls just like Se-eun's once had. Photos. Videos. But her's weren't fake. They weren't edited like her friends had been. The whispers came back sharper than before, and Sul-her broke in a way that was frighteningly familiar.

Se-ri thought she would lose her too. Just like she lost Se-eun.

But the day she was about to jump. Without telling anyone. Without saying goodbye to no one.

Someone stepped in. The last person she ever expected.

Ko Kyung-jun.

A bully, the kind of boy she and her friends had spent years avoiding. Loud, Cocky, feared by everyone else. But when he saw Sul-hee on the edge, he didn't laugh. He didn't spread it further. He stopped her. And for some reason that Sul-hee still didn't understand, he refused to let her go.

And so the circle changed.

Two broken girls. Three boys with reputations as messy as ever. None of them belonged together, but somehow, after everything, they did.

They used to be three girls against the world. Now, they were something else entirely different.

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Hope you guys liked the prologue, I know it's not the best but it's something. I tried my best.

I hope you guys have a great day/night. Eat, and drink lots of water.

Love u 😚