➪The Man|| WINRINA

𝙵𝚘𝚛𝚝𝚢-𝚜𝚒𝚡

Winter was fucked—more than usual fucked. Kun was added to the mix and he will not hesitate to expose her to the school. She felt dismayed, why were the last few months of her tenth grade full of misery? Had she done something wrong in her past life to deserve this? No, maybe, maybe yes? Yesno? I don't know.



She didn't know.



For obvious reasons, she had to find Jaemin. Yes, Jaemin. Kun said it himself, he was doing this for Jaemin, and if Jaemin can convince Kun to not expose her, maybe, just maybe her big secret wouldn't be a topic discussed for generations to come.



She turned to a sharp corner, slipping past the walking students who all turned their heads, confused to see him running. She didn't know where she was going. She didn't know where Jaemin was at that moment because the bunny told her to not report to him. He had nothing for her to do.



“Excuse me,” She paused in front of two conversing students. She looked at their nametags, “Seungmin and Felix, do you happen to know where Jaemin is? Na Jaemin?”



“Jaemin?” The two looked at each other before looking back at Minjeong. “I think we saw him going to the school paper office. He's the news editor of our paper.”



Fuck. Winter let out a breath of disbelief. Of course Jaemin was part of that organization. He just had to be part of that organization. How stupid of her to forget.



“Is there something—” Felix's words were interrupted when Minjeong suddenly held his shoulders, surprising him. “How about Kang Taehyun and Choi Soobin? Jung Sungchan? Or at least Shotaro?”



“I think Shotaro has hiphop. He's part of the dance team in school. For sungchan, I think he has practice. I'm not sure with the other two. I don't know them.” Seungmin replied with a shrug of his shoulder. He only recalled the last two because they were big names in their academy. Sungchan being the second son of the most influential family in their city and shotaro dating his cousin.



“I...” Minjeong shook her head, letting go of Felix with a light push. “Thanks.” She gave them a small bow before running away, accidentally shovinf Felix to the side. She needed to find Xiaojun.



Felix gave Seungmin a look of confusion. “What was that?”











Minjeong had already reached the second floor but found no sight of Xiaojun or any of the gucci gang members. She had also passed the school paper's office and debated if she should knock and ask for Jaemin. She immediately dismissed the thought because who in their right minds would do that? Kun was there.



She was still running, passing the underclassmen who would turn to her with a look of confusion. It was not every day you see a running upperclassman.



Just as she was about to take another sharp corner to head down the ramp, a hand managed to wrap around her wrist and pulled her, making her let out a loud yelp. A hand came flying to cover her mouth as she was slammed against the wall, back colliding with the rough surface. Her eyes shook in fear as two pairs of hands held her hands at the side of her head and a hand pressed against her stomach.



She was about scream when—



“Jesus Christ what the hell are you guys doing?" Winter snapped her head to the voice, eyes widening as she caught the sight of Hendery, his brows furrowed as he stared at the scene. “What the hell are you one, two, three—eight of you doing in that space?”



Hendery took out his phone and turned on the flashlight, shining it onto the dark space and revealed the members of gucci gang (minus jaemin). Yeonjun and Beomgyu each held on one hand of Minjeong while Karina had her right hand covering the male's mouth and her left against his stomach. Were his boyfriend's friends always this weird?



“It's called hiding, Hendery.” Hyunjin sarcastically answered, moving past Karina and the other idiots. He placed his hands on his hips, looking at Hendery conceitedly. “Did I answer your question?”



“Did you receive my text?” Hendery ignored Hyunjin and gave a stern look to the eight members. “Jaemin is distracting Kun.”



Winter got another shock of her life. She harshly pulled her hands off Yeonjun and Beomgyu's hold, sending them flying to the other side of the narrow and dark corridor, before gently placing her hands on Karina’s waist and gently pushing her to the side.  She gave the girl a shy smile



“You mean—”



“There wasn't supposed to be a meeting but Jaemin made an urgent one.” Xiaojun explained, coming from behind hendery. His chest rapidly rose and fell, trying to catch his breath. “I barely excused myself without Kun growing suspicious. Jaemin, in his wrong mind, suggested they talk about the second issue.”



“I don't understand.” Winter admitted truthfully. She was confused why everyone was, she guessed, trying to help her. Not that she was unappreciative, it was just weird since a few weeks ago they were hating her guts. “Can someone explain?”



“We heard that Kun threatened you.” Donghyuck placed a hand on her shoulder, which he used to turn her around to face them. “We're here to help.”



“Why?” Winter wanted to ask how, but she knew he had to have answers for their sudden change of attitude towards her. “Didn't you guys hate my guts?”



“For giving a reason for Jaemin to be manipulated by Jeno? Yes,” Jungwon sneered, “But we have morals. It's going to be a waste and unfair to you if your future is ruined because of how petty Kun is.”



“You're a good student, Winter.” Hendery affirmed, surprising the girl when he called her by that name. He gave her a reassuring smile. “Jaemin told me. He tends to expose people when he's frustrated.”



“Don't worry,” Karina stood beside her and locked arms with Winter, giving the girl a reassuring smile. “He only rants to Hendery.”

🧑

“We can't convince or even negotiate with Kun, sadly.” Xiaojun sadly mused, pacing in front of the large window in Jaemin's office. They had relocated themselves into the space after clearing everything that needed to be cleared, why they were in the dark space in the first place—they wanted to catch Winter.



He nibbled on the fingernail on his thumb. He was growing stressed. They had a few before Friday. Today was Thursday already. “We have nothing against him.”



“I tried digging but Kun's records are clean.” Hendery sighed, sitting on Jaemin's chair, which alarmed Winter since she had to clean that again. “So are his circle.”



“Who is in his circle exactly?” Jungwon asked, going through the anonymous gossip twitter account their academy had. Someone had to post some dirt on kun somewhere.



“As far as I can recall we have Ten, Doyoung, Namjoon, Irene, Minghao, Jun, and Hansol.” Sunoo enumerated, counting with his fingers. “Our biggest shot would be Ten but it's going to be hard to approach him without Kun knowing.”



“And we don't have that much time.” Karina ended worriedly. She sighed, covering her face with her hands. She sat beside Winter on the couch. “This is all my fault.” she whined.



Winter placed a hand on Karina’s shoulder for comfort. “It's—”



“We can always bring Jaemin's accident.” Donghyuck suggested, which made the room suddenly grow tense. Xiaojun stopped pacing around to look at him, Sunoo and Jungwon stopped scrolling through the latter's phone to look at him, Yeonjun and Beomgyu stopped bickering, Hendery, who was tossing a crumpled piece of paper, caught it and crushed it with his hand,  and Hyunjin was rendered speechless.  “Or maybe not.”



“We could use that but,” Yeonjun started slowly, “It's a risk. What can that help?”



“Kun turned a blind eye at that accident. He himself was there.” Hendery explained, standing up. He placed his hands on the table. “If we tell that we can blackmail him. Ignoring his duty to implement the safety of the students can damage his records as the school would have him interrogated. If they find something else, he'll be dismissed before their graduation.”



“Isn't that a little bit too harsh?” Winter frowned. True, she wanted to find a way to stop Kun, but she didn't want to jeopardize his graduation for the sake of hers.



“It's an eye for an eye.” Donghyuck replied, “But even if we use that, we don't have the evidence to prove he was there and witnessed the accident before stepping in.”



“I hate to say this but,” Karina stood up from the couch, “We have to ask Jeno’s help.”



“Oh hell no!” Hyunjin hollered, jumping out from his side of the couch as well. He pointed a finger at Karina. “That male has caused enough trouble already. We can't drag him in this. What if he helps Kun? That's the last thing we would need.”



Karina would like to disagree. “He's a changed man.”



“That's the same thing you said when he started dating Shotaro after rejecting Jaemin.” Hendery scowled. Despite being at odds with Jeno, he still respected the man as Jaemin's friend and was lenient with their interactions. “We're not dragging Jeno and that's final.” His voice was firm, preventing any other objections.



Winter tugged on Karina’s skirt, making the girl look down at her. “I have to agree with Hendery. He's unpredictable, and we can't risk it. I can't risk it.”



“Then what are we supposed to do?” Karina fell back onto her seat. She grumbled, “That was our only shot.”



“Or one of us could tell the truth.” Beomgyu suggested, earning a gasp from Huunjin and a slap across the face from Yeonjun. He hissed, holding the bruised flesh. “What? It was a suggestion.”



Winter felt sorry for Beomgyu. He looked like he has been through a lot with Yeonjun. “What do you mean?”



Beomgyu opened his mouth, “Winter sweetie, Kari—mph!” Yeonjun quickly covered Beomgyu's loud mouth as he tackled the male on the ground. The two were rolling on the floor, Beomgyu trying to get away from Yeonjun. He tried biting yeonjun but the older was used to the signs and found the right time to remove his hand before slapping it on again.



Winter turned to Karina. “What was he suppsoed to say?”



Karina fiddled with the ends of her skirt. Here's goes nothing. “Winter,” She sucked in a deep breath before exhaling slowly,













“I....”












“love you?”

-𝐭𝐛𝐜-

I smell the edning already. Maybe two to three chapters from now. Anyway, Hi :)