𝐒𝐭𝐮𝐩𝐢𝐝𝐥𝐲 𝐏𝐫𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐲 ♧ SeungJin

XXVIII

"Keep your friends for friendship, but work with the skilled and competent."
Robert Greene : The 48 Laws of Power

♤♡◇♧

By the time I got back to my own room it was around 3am. Mi-Young had fallen fast asleep by 12, but I wanted to wait until the storm had mostly passed to leave. When I walked into my own room I was greeted by my phone, buzzing endlessly on my desk.

Who was texting me at a time like this? Maybe Chan having another break down, or Jisung asking for the answers to the homework he didn't do-

Oh...

It was much worse indeed. A bunch of messages from people asking if I was gay, if I had really slept with Seungmin and other things along those lines. How did they know? Surely Jisung hadn't said anything, or Seungmin for that matter.

I couldn't click on Chans message fast enough. An image was attached, an Instagram post from some guy at school who hung around Seungmin a lot. It was of us.. me and Seungmin, taken from through the crack of a door and clearly without our permission. Chans message said:

is this serious?
Hyunjin I'm worried about you
Answer me
Why didn't you tell me you slept with Seungmin
Is something wrong?

I quickly sent back a message telling him all was well and I'd give him context of the image later. My first thought was of Seungmin- he was closeted, was he okay? Did he know about the image-

Bang, bang, bang,

♤♡◇♧

I knocked hurriedly on Hyunjins door. I wasn't really sure what I was doing here but I needed somewhere to go, something to do with myself to try and fix this, or atleast feel like I was fixing this.

After I had finished bawling my eyes out for two hours I started to feel angry, not sad. Angry that I let this happen to myself, angry that Hyunjin had drawn me into this trap; into his web of lies. Do I really know if this is his fault? No, but it has to be someone's.

I bounced on my heels as I waited for someone to answer. I didn't care who answered the door, I would find a way to speak with Hyunjin. Did he even know about this yet? I sure hope so, so I don't have to waste time explaining before I drill into him-

"Seungmin?" Mrs. Hwang stood before me and my face immediately dropped into a pathetic frown. Only now was I realizing how unpresentable I was. I was wearing pajama shorts and an old sweater, uncombed hair, and not to mention I was soaked from the rain pouring down.

"I uhm.. I really need to speak with Hyunjin. It's an emergency." I mumbled. Her confused face fell into one of worry as she let me into the house. I saw as I created a small puddle at the door.

"Does your mother know you're here? Did you drive here? Are you okay? You really look quite pale," she pressed her hand to my forehead.

"No I'm okay, I just.. really need to talk to Hyunjin. If that's okay?"

"No, of course." She said, "He's in his room now if you'd like to go see him-"

I nodded, slipping my shoes off and running away before she could really even finish. I hope she didn't think I was being rude. As I ran my anger built again, and I clenched my fists at my sides, throwing his bedroom door open.

He was standing in the dark room at his desk with his phone lighting up his face. I saw his surprised expression but paid no mind, "You!" I cried, "You, how could you! I trusted you enough to sleep with you and you do this to me? Allow people to take pictures like that of me in my most vulnerable state? I never should have trusted you! You're a real sick fu-"

He threw his hand over my mouth, shushing me. I wrinkled my eyebrows in disgust and tried to pull away but he gripped my forearm tightly. "Mi-Young is sleeping in the other room, you need to be quiet." He closed the bedroom door with his foot before slowly releasing my mouth, "If you're talking about that picture Jae posted, I have nothing to do with that."

"Oh piss," I said, "how was he able to sneak into the room without either of us noticing? I know you planned that."

He was quiet for a moment, then shook his head, "I didn't.. I guess we were just having really good sex. I mean your face says it all to be honest. Kinda hot—ow!"

I hit him in the shoulder, "I don't care! Now that's been posted to the internet forever and everyone suddenly hates me—I've gotten death threats already, every slur you could imagine!" I felt my anger start to decay as Hyunjin's face softened. He gave me a sad look and I knew, he had nothing to do with this. "I'm sorry.." I whispered.

"No, I'm sorry." Hyunjin shook his head, "I should have been paying more attention when it happened." He looked.. guilty.

Tears. Now tears were flowing down my face and I let out an ugly sob, my back hitting the door as I curled my arms around myself. I was right back to crying my problems away, like a baby.

"Oh.." Hyunjin mumbled, wrapping his arms around me as I tried to slide to the floor, "It's okay. No one cares that much anyway. When you go to school tomorrow I bet no one will even care.." he said softly into my ears, "shh.."

I sniffled and sobbed, lips trembling and snot dripping from my nose, "They hate me, they all hate me—I'm never gonna live like a normal teenager again!"

♤♡◇♧

It's still strange to see Seungmin like this. When he had first arrived, angry, that seemed like him, like the boy I knew. Now though, he was sobbing in my arms and it didn't feel like him at all. He was like a stranger to me, a weirdly cute, crying stranger.

He's a lot more sweet than he acts toward people. I doubt any of my friends would believe this if I told them about it—though I guess they all now know that we fucked.

"I'm stupid, I'm so stupid for thinking I could ever sleep with you without consequences like this.. I should have known.." he muttered, voice raspy, "I'm sorry that picture was taken. It was obviously just hurt me but you got dragged into it as well,"

My clothes were wet where his body made contact with mine. Had he ran here through the rain or something?