Hanahaki Strings • seventeen jihancheol

Chapter 47: First Argument

Joshua

"Anyone want to go with me?" I asked.

All eleven of us were here. We're all in the library, doing our activities. Well, not all of us have any activities. Like Seungkwan who was just texting Vernon on the side, Minghao was helping Jun, Seokmin and Soonyoung annoying Jihoon, Mingyu was just staring at his soulmate who's busy reading something, Jeonghan who's asleep on his seat and Seungcheol was jotting down notes.

"Where are you going?" Jihoon asked me before glaring at his boyfriend.

"Restroom," I simply answered.

"Nah, I'm fine," Jihoon said.

I turned to each one of them and they just shook their heads. When I turned to Seungcheol, he wasn't looking. Then I shifted to Jeonghan. He lifted his head, eyes still drowsy as he turned to me. He wasn't saying anything, so I could only guess he wasn't going.

"I'll be going then," I said.

"Wa—"

I quickly walked away. I've been keeping this for a bit because I'm too lazy to get up but I couldn't take it anymore.

The restroom wasn't that far from the library, thankfully. However, I felt some goosebumps as I made my way to the restroom, as if someone was looking at me and following me. Shrugging it off thinking that I'm just overthinking since there's only a few students around, I quickly entered a cubicle and hurriedly finished my business and washed my hands before leaving the restroom.

Just as I stepped out of the door, I saw a figure leaning on the wall outside.

"Hyungwon?" I muttered upon seeing his face.

He turned to me and stood up straight although one side of his legs were limping. My forehead creases upon seeing the bruises on his arms and face.

"What happened to you?" I couldn't help but feel worried upon seeing his face. This is an act of violence! Aren't they prohibited inside the school premises? Why isn't he telling it to the Prefect of Discipline?

I know we're not really on good terms but I think he suffered enough already.

And he just came back from the hospital a few weeks ago! His injuries just got healed, why did he get another set of bruises?

He ignored my question as he said, "are you free right now?"

"What happened to you?" I also ignored his question.

He shot me an irritated look, "I'm asking if you're free right now."

"Why do you have so many bruises? And why are you limping? Shouldn't you tell it to the head—"

"Can you stop pretending to be worried?" He cuts me off, voice laced with annoyance as he stared at me sharply, "this is nothing. Can you just tell me if you're free?"

"Why are you asking?" I asked, confused.

He looked around first before answering me, "I just wanted to talk with you. Alone."

"Where? And what are we going to talk about?"

"Just follow me. I just want to ask something."

"Alright..." I muttered, unsure.

Just when I was about to follow him, I heard a voice emerging from behind.

"Joshua!"

I turned around and saw Jeonghan's approaching figure. He was running towards my direction. I smiled at the sight of him, "Jeonghan! Were you going to the restroom?"