𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐚𝐥𝐫𝐲 | 𝘺𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘹 𝘮𝘢𝘭𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥𝘦𝘳

NINE.

You were screwed. You were royally screwed. Sure, you could survive being mauled by wild animals, having your address leaked online and being targeted somehow by the student council, but never once in your life had your father taught you how to get out of this kind of situation.

A promise you broke—kinda—years ago.

The situation was awkward. Kaen was eyeing you, Inei had that familiar deadpan expression on his face, except this time he looked more amused, somewhat. More entertained by the sudden prospect that you, of all people, would be shaken slightly. The ineffable, unfazed you.

The thought made Inei feel satisfied.

"I did not ask for a reunion..." you muttered. "Hell, that promise was literally made years ago."

You really wished you had a gun to shoot yourself in the leg. Were you dreaming? You had to be, right? The male in front of you was none other than the vice president of the school you were currently in, and technically, your ex fiance. The one that your father had failed to save his mother.

You couldn't isolate, ignore, or ibuprofen your way out of this one. Or mansplain, malewife, and manipulate.

Kaen glanced back and forth between you two. "You two know each other?"

Then his eyes narrowed, his expression became more vicious, more malicious. Brimming with venom that rivaled the time your uncle had stolen the family secrets and your father had found out. "And what do you even mean by marry? That's ludicrous."

"Ah, well." Inei rubbed the back of his neck. "Isn't it unfortunate that I'm too lazy to explain anything?"

"Even if [Name] has met you before by some trick of fate, he would never agree to marrying you."

"Why so defensive?" Inei drawled, his tone lucid and slow, "you sound jealous."

"Jealous? Of you?" Kaen scoffed. "Stop lying to yourself, Inei. Just because you're a vice president doesn't mean that—"

"Are you two deeply in love or something? The sexual tension here is stifling." You blurted out, before you blinked.

"Oops, was not supposed to slip out. My bad."

"I see you haven't changed one bit, [Name]."

"Is that an insult?" You wondered aloud, frowning. "If it is, I don't quite appreciate it." Also, two people fighting over you? This seemed like a scene from a drama—though for a long time, you really thought the whole theory of bisexuals putting the b in bitchless was real. Turned out there was a glimmer of hope in the darkness.

Inei ignored you, instead raising an eyebrow. You shrugged back, though you tried your best to avoid his gaze. Now that you actually saw him face to face, all the memories had come flooding back—the endearing blank expression of his, the way his face just seemed so perfect, flawless—with no oddities whatsoever—his demeanor. You two had gotten along well previously, but...

It was nostalgic, to say the least. It wasn't like you didn't have a happy childhood—it was the opposite, really—but there was just something about childhood naïveté that you dearly wished for. Perhaps it was the fact you could wake up undaunted from the promises of adulting, you could wake up without a care in the world, free and childish...and Inei was one of the few who you had shared those previous, young memories with. He was someone you had related to, you had spent time with.

Another was a person you still kept in touch called Arata, but the last you heard from him was that he was currently an idol traveling from places to places. He had signed with an entertainment called JEON entertainment, supposedly created by the heartthrob Jeon Jungkook who happened to have made several of your absolute favorite songs.