HIKE

05 | period cramps

"Okay, question," said Jeno. He was happily marching along in the front until he abruptly stopped, making all the others crash into him like a wall of toppling dominos.

Donghyuck fell on his ass and kicked out at Jeno's leg in anger. "Can you give a bit of fucking warning, you twat?"

"Stop being a diva, Hyuck, and get up," said Renjun, rolling his eyes and trying not to snigger as he watched Donghyuck stagger to his feet with the weight of his heavy rucksack on his back.

"We've literally been walking for like twenty minutes," Jaemin observed with a sigh.

(It was going to be a long weekend, that much was for sure.)

"Um, guys, I had a question?" Jeno asked again.

"You don't sound so sure," said renjun slowly. He raised an eyebrow at the taller boy and tried not to look concerned. "What was it?"

Jeno looked at each of them in turn, and then at the path ahead. "Does anyone actually know where we're going? 'Cause we've passed that tree like twenty times now..."

"Wait, what?" Jaemin blinked.

"And you only thought to mention this now?!" Donghyuck practically screeched. A few birds ruffled their feathers and fled from a nearby tree at the sudden noise.

"It didn't seem important the sixteenth time!" Jeno objected, instantly defensive and determined to prove that none of this was ever his fault.

"It's literally the same fucking tree!"

"Maybe you should've noticed then!"

Renjun sighed and snapped his fingers in their faces. "Guys, we are in a forest," he stated, his voice becoming a monotonous drone.

Jeno looked at him blankly. "So?"

"So," Renjun answered, like he was explaining this to a bunch of three year olds at a daycare centre, "don't all the trees look the same?"

"So we're not lost?" Jeno frowned. He narrowed his eyes at one of the trees in confusion. "But I swear that tree looked the same..."

"I swear to god, if we're fucking lost-" Donghyuck fumed. They all knew he was only mad because he'd gotten mud on his ass when he fell over.

"Actually, we aren't," Jaemin cut in, staring at the map in scrutiny.

"Well you could've said that before I fell on my ass! Jeno, you fucking-"

"It's not my fault!" Jeno insisted, snapping back at the enraged Lee Donghyuck (a dangerous animal in the wild, must handle with extreme caution).

"But we were about to take a wrong turn?" Jaemin put in, offering Jeno a weak smile as he tried to defend him.

Donghyuck considered this for a second. "I guess you weren't a complete dumbass then," he conceeded. "Can someone put some music on? I don't want to feel depressed and muddy anymore."

"SHINee?" Renjun suggested, getting out his phone.

"You always listen to SHINee," Donghyuck whined, whilst stamping the mud off his feet. He wasn't even sure why he was complaining, because he loved SHINee too.

Renjun shrugged and flicked through his music, trying to find something that wasn't SHINee. It was a difficult task. "Lucas likes SHINee, so he downloaded a ton to my phone."

"Lucas only likes SHINee because everyone says he looks like Minho," Jeno mumbled with a pout in Renjun's direction.

"Which is stupid, considering they're different races," Donghyuck added.