This chapter is dedicated to _dustydream for voting for this story! TY:)
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Just a reminder!
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Youngjo's thoughts were like a jumbled up ball of yarn, the knots constantly nagging him, begging for him to release them from their unnatural state.
He contemplated discussing his conversation with Hwanwoong to Keonhee due to the harsh direction it had taken in the end.
Ultimately, he ended up setting up a meeting time with him the next morning wanting to find a solution out of his problems.
Sleep was a foreign concept at this point, it always had been ever since he held his gaze with Hwanwoong's eyes. The spark within him always craving for the Omega, especially at night.
Several tosses and turns later, he sat straight up in his bed, his eyes drowsy but unable to completely engulf him into darkness.
"Today's going to be a rough night."
-×-
"You waiting for somebody?"
Soomin's genuinely curious tone inquired of the stiff figure sitting on the living room couch, his fingers constantly fidgeting with his phone.
Youngjo looked up to see Soomin take a seat next to him, her relaxed figuring adjusting the cushions to find a more comfortable position.
"Oh? Yeah, just a friend."
"Oh, so you were waiting for me?" She joked, gently hitting his shin with her foot, unknowingly easing him. The few months she had stayed in their mansion allowed him to get to the jovial girl with the frivolous flair for dramatics.
"Who said you're my friend?" He playfully retorted back, making Soomin feign hurt, placing her palm dramatically on her chest in offence.
"How could you, Kim Youngjo? Everything we had...did that mean nothing to you?!"
"How many dramas have you watched?"
Shrugging, she reached forward to take a sip out of Youngjo's glass of water, "It's called a natural talent."
Youngjo would not have minded, but he had gotten to know Soomin enough to know she had intentionally done that to annoy him, earning a slight smack on her back, just like when he would hit Keonhee whenever he would steal his food. "How did I find so over the top people as friends?"
"I know. It's hard to find people like me."
"Not really. My friend coming is actually exactly like you if not more."
"He must be a catch," she fanned herself, earning a chuckle from him.
"He's quite the handful. I'll just say that."
"Then I definitely want to meet the person who gets under your skin."
"No way am I allowing you both to meet. You two together, I will go crazy."
Right at that moment, the ringing of the doorbell echoed throughout the mansion, prompting Youngjo to get up and dash towards the door with Soomin calling out from behind, "You say that like it's a bad thing."
Lightly shaking his head, Youngjo unlocked the door before any servant could even answer the door, surprising Keonhee to be personally greeted. "Hey. What's up?"
"Come on in."
Youngjo intended to directly usher his guest to his room, but to his surprise Soomin stood right behind the door, jump scaring the two, "So you must be Youngjo's friend?"
Youngjo readied to give each of them a brief introduction of the other, but it seemed like it was unnecessary.
"Soomin?" Keonhee stared at the familiar girl, an accusing finger pointed at her.
"Keonhee?" Soomin returned the new arrival's finger, both their expressions shocked.
Youngjo was about to intervene again, enquiring how they knew each other beforehand but their questions continued, each overlapping the other.
"You didn't tell me you're living with each other?"
"You didn't tell me you knew Youngjo."
-×-
"You guys are what?!"
Keonhee smacked his palm across Youngjo's mouth, indicating for him to be quieter although they were in Youngjo's room.
"Are you deaf or just dumb?"
"So you knew the whole time that I was going to get engaged to your girlfriend? And you never told me!"
"What difference would it have made, Kim Youngjo?" Soomin's rhetoric question forced him to turn towards the female who had her hands on her hips, annoyed by his stupid question.
"Wait. Hold up! You lied! You said you weren't ever in a relationship."
"We had to hide it, you fool," Soomin explained calmly also while raising her hand to smack the top of Youngjo's head. Presumably to push some sense through his dense skull. "I can just go galavanting around screaming this to everyone, especially my possible fiancee. That time I didn't trust you enough."
"Rude. But, nevermind. Back to relationships," he paused to motion his hands towards the door in a polite manner, "Soomin, do you mind? This is kind of personal."
Soomin assessed Youngjo as a pretty reserved person in the few first days of her stay, therefore she understood the severity of the situation and immediately let herself out.
The door clicked shut and Youngjo's lips parted to talk, "There's a problem. Well, two now."
"What did the midget do now?"
"We..."
"You guys fought, didn't you?" Youngjo did not need to lure out his curiosity as to how he knew about it, "He had been pulling me away a lot yesterday. Hell of a suspicion. So why did you guys fight?"
This was another situation in which Keonhee showed his intellect. He was always observing, analysing his environment thoroughly.
"I seriously don't know. He just lashed out saying he didn't want to bond with me. I didn't even bring that up. He just went on a rant."
Keonhee had taken a seat on the bed, his legs folded and his fingers holding his chin in thought, rewinding all of the previous day's events.
"He didn't mention anything yesterday."
Some more silence as his Keonhee now held his forehead, eyes clenched in deep thought and recall, a few probable solutions coming to his mind.
"Are you sure you didn't bring the bonding thing up?"
Youngjo vigorously shook his head, advancing towards Keonhee standing next to him, "No, but ever since I went to his house he's been acting weird."
"That was months ago, I saw you two talk a few days back?"
"No, I went back because of reasons."
"Wait what?"
Keonhee head shot up, a confused yet keen expression overtaking his facial features, his eyes widened and eyebrows raised in inquisition.
"You do know that idiot doesn't let just anybody into his house voluntarily, right? It took me a long time of convincing to get him to give me his extra house key to help him in case he went into his heat, although he never did, still!"
"How am I supposed to know that?"
Omegas were immensely territorial of their possessions and homes, not allowing anyone but their Alpha touch and enter them, sometimes still earning a snarl if the Alpha manhandled them.
"What did you do in the house? You must have fucked up there."
No point in showing reluctance, he thought, but that did not mean he was slightly embarrassed, his insides folding in on themselves just at the memory.
He really did like Hwanwoong.
"Well, we actually...kissed."
Keonhee sighed in disappointment, hanging and shaking his head as he pinched his nose, "Oh, god no... At least I know where you fucked up."
"Hey! He was the one who initiated it."
"No fucking way. That stone would never. He would rather kiss me than you, some of the stubborn Alpha traits he has of his dad."
Shell-shocked, Youngjo's eyes directly hit Keonhee, unable to process his last statement as he had unknowingly taken the words of his other problem right out of his mouth. The part that was actually struggling to leave his tongue, the hesitation increasing after getting to know about his relationship with Soomin.
"Umm...that's the second part..."
Keonhee looked up to meet with Youngjo's devious glare, his uncertain tone making him a slight bit worried. Whenever Youngjo showed reluctance, it never ended up being good for him. "What do you mean?"
"He said he would rather mate with you than me. And he sounded like he intended on actually doing it."
"He would never. He knows I'm his friend," he scoffed, propping his hands behind in a relaxed manner. Keonhee spent enough time with Hwanwoong to know that he must have said those words out of spite, caught up in the heat of the moment. He always wondered how Hwanwoong ended up being an Omega when he clearly had some visible Alpha traits.
"I said the exact fucking thing and he said you deserve more than me. He was really angry," a concerned Youngjo defended himself.
Evaluating the situation and taking a once over in his mind, he slightly nodded, "I think I have a basic outline."
Keonhee stood up walking towards the whiteboard hung beside his desk which Youngjo used for his studies, dusting off the already existing writing to replace it with his own small writing.
"Did you guys only kiss? Or did you do something else?"
"Nothing much. He went to sleep and wanted my scent so I left my blazer with him."
The squeaking sound of the marker moving across the board made the two flinch, Keonhee continuing to write all the information Youngjo had given him.
"And he returned it to you, right?"
Youngjo nodded and squinted his eyes to see Keonhee's presentation on his whiteboard, "Reluctantly."
"Okay, so I think I know what's the problem. I'll just talk to him on Monday in school and try to coax more out of him. Till then, you won't talk to him or even look in his direction."
He turned towards Youngjo and accusingly pointed the open marker at him as a warning before clasping the lid back.
"I need to solve this bullshit. I can't have him trying to affect me with his pheromones and make me bond with him. That would not be an easy situation to explain to Soomin."
"How long have you been dating?" Youngjo interjected in an attempt to make the atmosphere a little lighter having come to a temporary situation.
"One and a half maybe?"
Youngjo snickered and threw a cushion in his direction which the agile Alpha dodged without breaking a sweat. "Betrayer."
"Why would I tell you about me dating?"
"Gee, I don't know? It would have been better to know beforehand that my future fiancee is my friend's fucking girlfriend!"
Keonhee threw the cushion back at him the owner along with the marker as a surprise element which hit Youngjo on the head, evoking a hearty laugh out of Keonhee, "For you to make fun of me? No thanks."
"Get out of my house. Is this how you treat your host?"
Sticking out his tongue, he presented him with the middle finger, the persistent wide grin not leaving anytime soon, "Is this how you treat your guests? Because I'm worried about how you treat Soomin the way you're hitting me. Thank god, her house is renovated now. Any longer here and-"
"Oh, now you become protective of your girlfriend?"
"Keep shut, will you?! You want the whole world knowing that?"
"Okay. Sorry, my bad," Youngjo apologised as he threw his stored packet of crisps, knowing the male to be hungry early in the morning or at any time for that matter.
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I did not calculate this!
I really wanted to give you guys a Christmas present and coincidentally it turned out to be the 25th chapter!
Anyway
🎁🎄Merry Christmas y'all 🎄🎁
And Happy Holidays!😊
Stay safe and healthy!
Fighting!
~Anna R.