"Appa? What's going on? Why are you here now?"
Jeno spoke to the man and Jaemin's eyes widened. That was Jeno's father? It was too coincidental...Jeno would hate him even more now, for whatever trouble Jisung had caused.
"Hey Jeno, it's just about our car problem. I found a student ID lying around and I'm just asking about him."
Jeno leaned over and took a peek at Jisung's ID, looked at Jaemin, then looked back at the ID. Jeno's dad said, "That's not him, it's his brother."
Jeno and Jaemin made eye contact and stared. Jaemin looked away first. He had too much pressure on his shoulders right now.
Jeno watched Jaemin's defeated posture, the way his shoulders slumped, the pitiful look in his eyes. No. There was something wrong. At that moment, Jeno felt a burning truth that life had taken advantage of the boy in front of him, hurt buried deep in his heart and blame and hate that he'd never been able to get rid of. Jeno felt like he could see the child underneath the pink-haired boy's face, the child who had to wear an adult's mask. At that moment, it didn't matter what Jaemin did outside school hours, what intentions he had in talking with Jeno, what horrible reputations he'd gained. Jeno felt sorry for him.
He took a breath and swallowed before starting his act...
"Park Jisung? He's my friend, he was at our house last week."
Jaemin's head jerked up and he stared blankly at Jeno. What was he talking about? A different Park Jisung?
"Who," Jeno's dad asked and pointed at the ID, "him?"
"Yeah," Jeno replied and nodded naturally, "he actually called me later and told me he couldn't find his ID and asked me to look around. Where'd you find it?"
"Near the bush beside the car outside."
"Ah, I hadn't looked outside."
The police turned to Jeno. "Is Jisung at school right now?"
"I don't know, he told me he would leave early for something but I don't exactly remember."
Jeno's dad furrowed his eyebrows. "How come I don't know this Jisung? Have I met him?"
Jeno lied, "I thought you did, yes sir. I even introduced him to you at the party last week, before you went to the conference. Remember? Maybe you were in too much of a hurry..."
His dad shrugged. "Maybe. You have too many friends I really can't remember a whole lot of them."
Through the confusion, Jaemin felt relief for no good reason, because he had no idea what was going on. Maybe because of a certain someone's presence? Did Jeno being near him make him feel a little safer? Or maybe it was just because the attention was off of him for now?
Jaemin was brought back to his senses as the officer's deep voice said to him, "Jaemin is it? So where is your brother? Shouldn't he be at school? And how old are you—"
"I don't think he has an involvement in it, sir," Jeno's dad hastily came in, himself feeling rather sorry for the boy who seemed to be falsely accused at this moment, innocent of wrongdoing.
"Well what about the boy Jisung," the officer said flatly.
"That's just my son's friend. I believe he was just unfortunate in losing his ID in my yard. Besides, the kids had BBQ at the house a week ago and they were all over the place outside. I'm pretty sure this kid was there. Yes, now that I think about it, I think I do remember Jeno introducing me to him. He's not a bad kid."
"Are you asking us to drop him?" the officer asked.
"Yes sir, if it's good."
"Well...all right then." The police turned to the secretary. "Where are the other boys?"
Jeno's dad looked at Jaemin. "Sorry for the problem. My car was vandalized not too long ago and your brother's ID just happened to be left behind. I apologize for your pressure. There's nothing wrong, you can go. Oh and, here's the ID for you to return to him. Take care."
"Thank you sir," Jaemin said breathlessly and bowed a countless number of times, to Mr. and also to Jeno. He took the ID and bowed to the officers and the secretary. Out of the corner of his eye, he took a peek at Jeno who had an unreadable expression on his face. "Thanks," he whispered again and hurriedly rushed off. He didn't want to hang around the uniformed men any longer. He would text Jeno later. As Jaemin scurried away, he could feel those two eyes piercing into his back.
Jeno looked longingly at his classmate who had left so quickly. Jaemin was interesting, that's for sure. And he was full of secrets. Jeno wasn't someone to be snoopy or curious in others' business, but Jaemin seemed different. Jeno almost felt like it was his duty to come into Jaemin's life in some way.
"Is he your friend too?" his dad snapped him out of his thoughts. Jeno blinked twice at him, confused but then remembered his make-up story. "Oh, no, not really, I just know Jisung. I mean, I know Jisung had a brother but I didn't know it was Jaemin."
His dad was pretty chill, didn't ask about it anymore, and took his son's word for it. The tightness Jeno felt slowly loosened as he believed he had successfully saved Jaemin and himself.
The other supposed perpetrators didn't show up, and Mr. Lee was told that he would be contacted as soon as possible. Since it was late by now and Jeno had missed the bus, he went home in his dad's (new) car. Sitting in the passenger seat, he felt his phone continuously buzzing in his pocket. He felt that it wasn't good to take out and look at now, so upon arriving home he told his father that he'd go do homework and quickly went up to his room.
Damn, why'd Jaemin call him so many times?
You could've just texted me or something, Jeno thought. Now that the tense situation at school was over, Jeno felt a slight pang of annoyance in his classmate's incessancy. And video calling too. Who does that?!
Jeno felt obliged to call him back and particularly video call him because that's what Jaemin had done. Jaemin picked up in a split second and Jeno was met with an interesting view of the boy's face from the chin. "Hey Jeno," he said. Well, at least Jaemin's voice was back.
"Hi. Why'd you video call me?"
"Jenooo. I don't know what happened today but really, thanks for saving me."
"It's really nothing."
"Why'd you do that? Do you know my dongsaeng?"
"No."
Jaemin repositioned his camera to get a better angle. He smiled at the camera and tilted his head this way and that way to make sure his face looked nice. Jeno absentmindedly thought it was cute.
"Woah," Jaemin suddenly said.
"What."
"You're face looks really handsome in the camera."
Jeno was shocked at how fast the pink-haired boy had changed from just a little while ago. He felt his face hot from blushing, hopefully he wouldn't come off as embarrassed to Jaemin. "Umm th-thanks."
Nana giggled and showed his white teeth, then he got a little serious again. "No really, why did you do that today."
Jeno shrugged. "I don't know. I mean, I guess you looked like you were in a really bad position and..."
Jeno suddenly had the view of a very-zoomed-in-Nana's-face, as Jaemin brought the camera extremely close and loudly whispered, "But you even lied to the policeee."
"Well just forget about it," Jeno said exasperatedly. "I-"
His bedroom door suddenly opened and he turned his head to see his pretty girlfriend, Jung Kiara, standing in the doorway. She giggled upon seeing her boyfriend's cute sprawled-out position, lying on his stomach holding the phone, which he quickly sat up because he found it embarrassing. "Ah h-hi bae."
She laughed smiled brightly, "Jeno-yah, why are you--"
"Bae? Who's 'bae'?" a voice coming from the device in Jeno's hands said loudly and unashamed, Jeno's eyes widened as he forgot about the little rabbit in his phone.
No way he was letting his girlfriend see Jaemin. Jeno hadn't meant to cut Jaemin off abruptly, but in a haste to hide the boy, hung up on him without any explanation. Oops.
Jeno smiled shyly as he stood up, "Sorry, I didn't know you were coming. Are you hungry?" he said as he came toward the door, leaving his phone on the night table."
"Not really," Kiara answered. "Who were you calling?"
"Just a friend," Jeno reassured.
"Okay!" the girl took his words easily, and the two went downstairs together, to the living room.
On the other side of town, Nana sat on the ground of the musty apartment, pouting at Jeno's sudden cut-off. Who was bae? Had his girlfriend come? Jaemin sighed.
First day meeting his new crush and Jaemin had already been ghosted twice!