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"You're an addict." Namjoon glances at the hot cup of coffee in Iris's hand. That's why she had been late to their study session, another cup of coffee to ruin her liver with. Ironic, an aspiring surgeon treating her body like shit to get through school. It's a large comfort to know she still has years of medical school to get through. She was hardly even halfway through. "That's your third cup today, I've counted." He murmurs as she sets her cup down on the table and tosses her bad gown into the chair beside hers. With an exhausted sigh, Iris sat down and ran a hand across her face.
If she weren't so exhausted, she might have smiled at his careful consideration, him taking the time to count something as little as how many cups of coffee she had drank in a day was something no one's ever done before. In a household where most of her actions—even the biggest ones—went unnoticed, things like that made her heart flutter. Just the smallest about of attention at all and she was in love.
"Yeah—well caffeine addiction is the only way to get through college. If I could just inject it straight into my veins like heroin that would be great." She takes another sip of scolding hot coffee. She doesn't care that it burns her tongue, leaves it tender and incredibly sensitive. Maybe it's deserved. Coffee wasn't the only reason why she was late. A phone call with her father that went on for a little too long filled with 'yes sir's and 'no sir's because he wouldn't respond to anything unless she showed such respect. He was a military man, stationed in Korea years before Iris was even a thought in her parents' minds. He treated Iris like she was one of his trainees and less like a daughter.
"Four."
Namjoon raised a brow at her. "Four what?"
Iris raised her coffe. "Four cups. Jungkook got me one this mourning." She set her cup down and finally began to open up her bag to grab her laptop. She watched Namjoon grab the cup himself. "Jesus woman– give your body a break. That much coffee can't be healthy."
"When I can find time in my schedule to sleep for more than 3 hours at a time, I'll start drinking less cofffee." Iris found herself maybe a little too invested in the way Namjoon lifted her cup to his face, lips latching to the same place hers once was, an indirect kiss. It was uncommon for a man and woman to be so close as to drink off of one another. Many often mistaked them as a couple which Namjoon would be prompt to correct with a sheepish smile and a red face. "Just good friends", he'd say.
Such a relationship would have been frowned upon anyways. It wasn't always strikingly apparent that Iris was also Korean at first glance. It wouldn't have mattered anyways. If you aren't 100% Korean or seem like it at least, you'd never be considered one. Iris has long come to terms that most would never accept her as one of them. It was fine. She knew who she was.
Immediately, Namjoon flinched. "Why is it so hot?" He set it down between the two of them, the corners of his lips pulled into a deep-set frown. "What kind of shit do you go through in your day-to-day that simply makes you unphased to coffee this hot? Do you also casually take baths in volcanos?" His words draw a smile across her lips. Never fails to make her smile at least once while they're together. Sometimes it was unprompted. A casual admiration of the art before her that stirred up emotions still rather unfamiliar to her. It might be a bit farfetched and dramatic to say that she's in love but Iris is almost sure that this feeling she's experiencing can only be described as such.
