˗ˏˋ 𝐝𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐥 𝐢𝐧 𝐝𝐞𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐥 ⁿᵒᵐⁱⁿ

2 • 𝘩𝘢𝘸𝘬𝘦𝘳 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘴

"Hey." A whisper from his right made him break out of his small brooding, reminding him he had friends in this class.

'Oh shit I ruined my reputation in front of my friends what the hell Jaemin.'

Jeongin was already looking at him by the time he drew his gaze away from the tiled floor, meeting eyes with a stern but caring face that hadn't morphed into whispering about him or laughing amongst themselves. Actually, that applied to some other students in the class too. His friends were looking at him, as if wanting to see if he was okay when everyone else dropped the subject and looked ahead to the board. No, they'll definitely bring it up again, how Na Jaemin Ace of Neo College fucked up attending one of his classes and got called to be talked to by the professor. There goes his pristine image.

"Are you okay?" Jeongin asked in a low whisper.

"Yeah.." Jaemin said briefly, flashing a faint smile at the boy before completely ignoring everyone else allocated around the room. "Yeah. I'm fine."

❧

Haechan, Nancy, Renjun, Seungmin, Felix and Shuhua decided to stop by the café down the street after class. Sei and Yuqi had other things to do, so the majority of the friends went ahead. Jeongin said he'd join them soon, and he'd show up with Jaemin. They wanted a break, and time to talk, so here they were, back where they frequent for discounts and freebies, waiting for the two.

"I should've known it was because of his headaches," Haechan started, hitting his head on the table.

The dessert teaspoons and plates rattled along with the table from the impact– trust me, it was a huge one– making some adults surrounding them give the college students a concerned look. Haechan rubbed his forehead soon after, angrily grumbling curse words at the table under his breath.

"Hyuckie it's not your fault. Or the table's." Shuhua laughed lightheartedly, bringing a hand down to Haechan's bowing head to lift it back up from devouring the poor café's table with his glaring eyes. 

"Okay but I know about his migraines better than anyone else here so who is there to blame for not checking up on him properly? Lix for not knowing Jaemin until I mentioned him last week at the Neo Festival?"

Felix, quietly drinking his americano  and chatting to Seungmin one-on-one, perked up at the sound of his nickname coming from an aggravated Haechan's mouth across the round table.

He opened his mouth to reply but closed it after some thought, shaking his head and resuming his small conversation with his best friend instead in his low voice that was still unfamiliar to the ear. They only ever heard Yongbok speak Korean– or speak at all– when he's answering the professors in their classes, but never really spoke within his group. Quiet but confident, he's rather reserved but lets it go when he's with Seungmin, which Sei has mentioned she was jealous of because she wanted to hear Felix open up more to all of them.

"See? Even Lixie agrees it's stupid."

"No, you're stupid." Nancy corrected, slicing a quarter of chocolate cake with her fork. "Haechan you're an idiot if you think bashing yourself up over your boyfriend would help with anything."

"He's not my–"

"Really?" Renjun finally spoke up after toying with the paper straw in his milkshake, voice laced with boredom and a seriousness no-one dared to joke about this time. "Assuming people's sexuality?"