"Do you want a drink? I can get one for you-"
"Are you serious? What if the others find out I'm here?! I mean, if you don't mind, I'm really okay with sharing a bottle."
Chucking his bottle at Y/N who gracefully caught it, Ju-in took a seat next to Y/N on his bed.
"Hey Ju-in, can we just keep this meeting between us?"
Unable to reject Y/N with her pleading and puppy dog eyes, Ju-in nodded in agreement as he sat in silence, listening to what Y/N had to rant to him. Taking out two phones from her jacket pocket, she handed one of them to Ju-in who took it, staring at it in curiosity.
"...What is this?"
"I have two phones. I give the number of the phone that you're holding to strangers while I give the number of the phone I'm holding to my friends. Actual friends."
The phone that Ju-in was holding had no phone case and looked plain in particular while the other phone that Y/N was holding had much more decorations than the other one. Swiping up the screen of the phone that Ju-in was holding, showing him that there was no passcode needed to unlock the phone, Y/N opened up the 'Messages' app.
Never in Ju-in's life had he been more shocked.
Curses to insults were all included in the million messages that the app held. Looking up at Y/N who had a disappointed look on her face, Ju-in's eyes furrowed in worry.
"How long?"
"Since I was 11."
Ju-in said nothing else and continued scrolling through all the messages, each getting worse and worse.
"Their opinions don't matter much to me since they are strangers..."
Ju-in looked up from the phone screen to see Y/N sighing while she rested her head on his shoulder.
"But why do I feel stuff when I read those messages?"
Soft sniffles escaped the poor girl's mouth as Ju-in gently rubbed away her hot tears with the sleeve of his sweater.
"Even my therapist said I had no hope. Mommy said she regretted giving birth to a child like me and would have opted for abortion if she was given another chance. They even wrote me one of those messages-"
At this point, Y/N could not hold in her cries any longer and started bawling a little louder than usual, which stirred a little bit of confusion from outside.
"Ju-in, are you alri-"
Ji-ho's eyes widened the moment he saw the girl crying and rushed to her side almost immediately trying to calm her down while patting her head. Making eye contact with Ju-in who had concern and sympathy written all over his gaze, Ji-ho nodded before silently calling the other two heavenly kings in.
'What about the rest of the guys?' Ju-in mouthed the words to Ji-ho, who replied with 'they had all gone to sleep.' Only the four heavenly kings were awake now, except Chun-young who was suddenly woken up from his sleep.
Tissue boxes and snacks were brought in the room while the four heavenly kings sat in a circle, surrounding Y/N since Ju-in had a pretty large bed.
"S-Sorry for troubling all of you like this again. I just couldn't b-bring myself to tell Dan-I and Yeo-ryeong about this yet."
Pouting while reaching for another box of pocky, she held the box out, asking whether any of them wanted a stick, which all of them gently refused.
"E-Erm, I should probably stop pausing my stories halfway, it's getting pretty hard to track, isn't it?"
Y/N gave a light chuckle, trying to light up everyone's moods which failed perfectly.
"Who...made you cry like that?"
Chun-young asked as Y/N continued stuffing countless sticks of pocky into her mouth.
"I just felt depressed all of a sudden. Again, me crying like a baby didn't happen. We shall never speak about this again."
Puffing out her cheeks, Y/N folded her arms and sat up straight, trying to get herself to maintain a serious expression as she began explaining her story.
"After my dad died from the plane crash, my mum started to get more exposure for me since she was worried about my fame, and she may have cared too much about that. So she's constantly forcing me to attend random formal events and make friends with people that had great popularity, fame, wealth, and all the other shit."
Taking the bandage off her right arm and lifting up the hem of her sweater, she showed all of them the scars that had accompanied her since young. There was another long scar running from her right hip to her ribcage and another small one around her neck.
"Of course, I didn't like that and rejected my mother quite harshly. So she had no choice but to harm me. That time, I didn't believe that my own mother would actually hurt me but I guess I was proven wrong. Nobody knew about this, not even my brother. My mother would always attempt to hurt me when nobody was at home."
Covering her exposed skin, she stared back at her fingers as she continued to play with them.
"But after doing the laundry a few times, my brother found out about this whole incident because of the blood that was stained on my clothes. My brother then took me along with him as we ran away from home. Thankfully, my brother was able to get a part-time job and earned enough for us to have a place to live."
Holding up the phone that Y/N had just chucked to Ju-in, he raised it up, catching the attention of the other three heavenly kings.
"Then what about the messages?"
"What messages?"
Throwing the phone to Ji-ho, the three of them took a look while scrolling through all the insults, death threats, and hurtful comments as their faces slowly morphed into one of rage and fury.
"After my brother and I left, my mother had to come up with lies and fake stories about how the both of us abandoned her and people just started posting mean comments about us being extreme rebels. Our mother also fake cried on TV to get sympathy from viewers. Ugh. Such a bitch."
Turning on a random video with a fairly old woman shown on the screen, she gave a "touching" speech about missing her children and how she "dearly" missed them. Wiping away her fake tears, she said the three magical words while the audience applauded loudly and gave her a standing ovation.
"Bitch turned the entire country against us."
Still curious about how Y/N and her brother managed to keep their identity hidden, Eun-hyung spoke up.
"But how were you and your brother able to keep your identity a secret? Won't paparazzi or bodyguards be chasing the two of you around by now?"
Poking her index fingers together, Y/N softly replied.
"Well, we were really small kids back then so the majority of our looks had changed, so the only thing left to do was to buy some new contacts and cover up most of our skin to hide the birthmarks and the scars. And our names were long forgotten since we made our debut when we were really young, so we doubt anyone would remember."
As if a light bulb went off on top of her head, Y/N's eyes lit up for a moment as she continued.
"Ah right! My mother is still in America and she has totally no idea that we are in Korea right now because the last time she saw us, we were still in America."
"So you're telling me your brother and you managed to board a flight all the way from America to Korea with that part-time job."
"Oh no, my brother started his part-time job in Korea, not America."
"...I see."
Playing around with her fingers as Y/N whistled, trying to make the atmosphere less awkward, she slowly spoke up.
"U-Um, if it isn't a bother-"
"You're not a bother to us. We told you before so many times that no matter what happens, we will be here for you."
Chun-young stared at Y/N sincerely as she was at a loss of what words to say.
"That's right, Y/N! Even though we may have just met you this year, it's more than obvious that you are a sincere and a kind person. We are glad to have you by our side N/N!"
Eyes lighting up at her old nickname being called by Ju-in, she felt a new feeling overwhelm her. Old enemies used to call her that name, but somehow, it felt extremely different when Ju-in called her that.
"If you're gone, I would have no one else to annoy now. Yeo-ryeong's and Dan-I's reactions are not as funny as yours."
Shyly admitting that, Ji-ho turned to look away while Y/N's eyes were full of gratitude.
"You're a good fighter too. You'd do anything for justice, I know. Plus if you were gone, who would be my rank 0 partner?"
Giving off her brightest, biggest, goofiest grin, Y/N dragged all of them in for a group hug while whispering softly.
"I love you guys. So much."
After hearing that, the four heavenly kings only hugged her tighter until she barely could even breathe. After hugging for a few minutes, Y/N quickly glanced at her phone screen before yelping out loud, covering her mouth after realizing how loud she could have been.
"Oh my gosh, it's already 3 in the morning! You guys have to rest! I'm so sorry for bo- I mean! I'm glad I got to chat with all of you! If you would excuse me, I have to sneakily head back to my own room right now."
After seeing Chun-young relax when she corrected her mistake, Y/N opened up the window to Ju-in's room and hopped onto the ledge before blowing a kiss to all four of them, professionally jumping up to the next window ledge of another room and onto another and another.
"I think we are all thinking the same things, aren't we?"
Ji-ho finally blurted out what he was thinking as everybody paused in their steps before slowly looking at the ground, unable to raise their head up in guilt.
'We...'
'All...'
'Like...'
'Her.'
Ru-da placed his finger on his lips as the audience immediately turned silent, with a few whispers and murmurs going around. Y/N was fast asleep in his arms as Ru-da lightly carried her in a bridal style.
Trying to mess around with her a little, Ru-da gave a light smirk as he suddenly tossed Y/N in the air, causing her to wake up in complete shock.
"A-AHHH FUCK YOU RU-DA! BOOHOO, WHY DID YOU DO THAT?!"
Y/N was completely scared out of her wits as she immediately woke up, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist so that she won't fall and drop out of the contest, not like she remembered anything about the contest anyway. She only agreed to join because she was light and had a tiny figure.
"Did you not get a single wink of sleep yesterday?"
Y/N finally noticed that they were standing in front of hundreds of students as she shyly shifted back to their original position while trying to fix her hair which had been upgraded into a messy bun right now. And boy did she look hot. (you're amazing don't doubt yourself <3)
"No...I couldn't sleep..."
Y/N shyly spoke while poking her index fingers together again, easily gaining the hearts of many people in the audience. After Eun-hyung noticed this tiny incident, he quickly whispered to Yeo-ryeong about something which she quickly nodded to. Placing Yeo-ryeong down on the ground, Eun-hyung stared at Ru-da and Y/N with a cold look written all over his face.
"You know that if we didn't step down first, you would be holding her all day long, right?"
Smiling brightly at Eun-hyung, Ru-da smirked a little.
"You're right, that could've happened. But even so, I don't mind carrying Y/N all day long too. She's nice to carry."
Sensing the tense atmosphere surrounding them, Y/N started blushing furiously at what Ru-da had just said, and quickly dragged him down the stage, ignoring all stares and whispers coming from every single corner.
"Now, the order for the talent show has been decided! So, are you guys ready to start the main event?"