I Need You | Seonghwa

1

Seo Haerin steps into the classroom on her first day of university.

Of her third year.

She's yet to make any friends. No matter which year of her life she thinks back on, there's no year where she's had a friend by her side. Her shy personality and trust issues simply don't allow for it.

Every time anyone approaches her or tries to talk to her, she finds herself pushing them away again subconsciously. Maybe she has an intense inferiority complex?

Even today, she sits in her seat and looks around to a classroom devoid of any familiar faces. Sometimes she wonders if she should be concerned that she doesn't recognise anyone's face despite having been in classes with them for the past two years.

But in the end, she knows she can't blame herself. All her classes for the past two years contained more than two hundred students. This is her first time in a class with as little as thirty students, all in the same course as her.

She soaks in their appearances. They all look incredibly friendly, but she knows deep down that they hate her. It was always like that when she was in school. They looked kind, until then they began bullying her.

She flinches at the thought of all the horrendous memories.

Her thoughts are interrupted however, when a few more students come flooding into the room. She observes their faces and her heart hops in her chest at the sight of one of them.

That is the most beautiful man I've ever laid my eyes on.

He looks around the room for a place to sit, leading Haerin to the conclusion that he isn't friends with the other group of men that walked in with him.

To her shock, he starts to make his way to the empty seat beside her. She begs her heart to calm down and to stop pounding as if this is the first time someone this attractive is going to sit beside her.

But then she comes to the realisation that it is the first time.

Her palms sweat and she wipes them roughly on the surface of her jeans as the man gets closer. Once he finally sits down beside her, she turns her head away shamefully. There's no way she's letting him see her reddened face.

His subtle yet sweet perfume wafts through the air and when she catches its scent in her nose, she knows that she won't survive this lecture. She'll get a heart attack before it even begins.

"Hey."

She nearly jumps in her seat at the sound of his deep voice vibrating through her ear. She turns her head abruptly, pretending like she had no idea of his presence.

"Oh! Hi!" she exclaims, feeling more than ready to dive out the window of the room she's in.

The room is on the fourth floor of the building.

"Did you see the essay we have due next month? It's crazy how we're already getting homework and our first class didn't even start yet," he giggles, starting a casual conversation.

Haerin blinks the sparkles out of her eyes and gasps. "We do? That's not fair," she complains, mind getting distracted from the man beside her for a solid second, perhaps even a second and a half.

But then her cheeks return to their pink tint and she gets the urge to turn away again when she catches sight of his pitch black hair with his fresh undercut. She feels so humiliated right now. Why does she feel so horrified at the idea of someone so gorgeous having to look at her face?

"I know, right? By the way, I'm Seonghwa," he replies, shattering Haerin's previous plans to avoid talking to him. As much as she wants to reply with "Is that so?" before turning back around, she clenches her fist and takes a leap of faith out of her comfort zone.

"Nice to meet you! I'm Haerin," she forces out. This is it. She doesn't want to talk to anyone ever again. She's gone too far today.

"That's such a pretty name!"

She feels a whack to the heart at Seonghwa's statement. He's making it so hard for her to stay away. She lets out a small smile. "Yours too," she shyly responds.

The class begins shortly after, providing Haerin with a little bit of the peace she required. But every few minutes, she remembers that there's a man that would make models shake in their boots sitting right beside her and her heart speeds up again.

She frantically scribbles notes into her copy every time her small shoulder brushes off his broad ones. She needs to get his cute smile out of her head.

As soon as the class is over, she avoids speaking to him by stuffing her face into her school bag, aimlessly rustling her copies around to make it look like she's really struggling.

She glances to her side and sighs out of relief when the man is nowhere to be seen. As she's walking to the exit of the room, her eyes fall onto Seonghwa's figure again.

He's waiting at the door for her so they can walk together.

She gulps and does what she does best. Avoiding any human at any cost.

She storms past him quickly, pretending that she didn't see him. Before he can call her name, she takes a sharp turn into the bathrooms, gasping for breath once inside.

She hates herself for running away from him despite wanting to get closer to him so bad, but she can't help it. She can't handle the thought of talking to him every day. He's probably just trying to use her for her homework in the end anyway, that's also a common trend with her.

Once she arrives home that day, her thoughts are filled with Seonghwa. However, she's not just thinking about his magical eyes or serene voice or comforting demeanour. She contemplates whether she should finally trust someone for once. Should she become friends with him after all?

She knows this decision shouldn't be so difficult, but she finds it so tough to resist him, no matter how badly she wants to.

She closes her eyes and allows for her to drift off to sleep in her bed as she decides at last.

I'll trust someone just this once.

A/N
Welcome to this relatively short story of mine! While I can't say I'm very happy with what I've written (even after trying to fix it for a long time </3), I hope you guys can find yourselves liking it, even if it's just a little :D