Beautiful // Nomin

~43~

Jeno had unofficially-officially turned from popular boy to emo boy at the high school. He didn't hang around his group of popular friends anymore, and he seemed to be having an understood break from his relationship with Kiara. She'd tried to cheer him up and understand what was wrong, but he didn't let her in on anything. So she just gave up for the time being.

So here was emo boy Jeno walking down the hallway, head slightly bowed, wearing a black hoodie, jeans, and listening to music through wired earbuds. He was still attractive as ever, just in a different, unapproachable way.

Jeno stopped at his locker before going to lunch because he had to get something to give to a teacher later during the day. His fingers numbly picked at the numbers and he opened the door like it was any other day.

The first thing his eyes landed on was a poorly folded, crumpled piece of notebook paper resting on his gym bag. Jeno picked it up and was about to open it up to read, but he had a weird feeling that he was being watched, not the usual "I'm-popular-so-I-have-stalkers" watch, but like there were people specifically watching him read the note.

So instead, he stuffed the paper in his pocket without reading it, and headed towards the restrooms. He could have sworn that he'd heard collective groaning behind him when he didn't open up the paper. What was so important about it?

After he'd entered the restroom, Jeno was checking the stalls when the door suddenly burst open, revealing an out-of-breath Jaemin who came in and headed to the sink to wash his hands. Jeno stopped and wondered if he should just go about his business or say "hi" to the younger boy.

He didn't have to think too long, because Jaemin himself suddenly turned around like he'd just noticed Jeno and said with a bright smile, "Oh hi, Jeno-ssi."

Jeno was taken aback by the sudden turn of events, but that smile of Jaemin's melted him like ever before. He hadn't experienced that warm feeling for a while. "Hey Jaemin," he said quietly, his smile reaching his eyes.

Jaemin snatched a paper towel and dried his hands at 2x speed, then, to Jeno's bewilderment and surprise, came over and wrapped his arms around Jeno, giving him a big hug. "We haven't hung out for a while, Jeno," he admitted. "Sorry that I've been busy after work started up again." He eyed Jeno's pocket.

"It's all right," Jeno assured shyly, basking in the embrace and Jaemin's voice that he'd missed so much. "Do you have time today?"

"Ohh...no," Jaemin said quickly. "Unfortunately, I literally work every hour out of school now. And then I get home and I'm exhausted." He sighed. "I'll text you when I have time!"

"Sure," Jeno replied, still wondering why this felt so strange and too sudden.

"Well...I have to run to class now," Jaemin said with a sympathetic smile and he gave Jeno another quick hug around the waist and leaned his head against Jeno's shoulder for a few seconds before backing off and giving him a quick wave. "See you, Jeno-yah."

"See you..." Jeno was still experiencing butterflies and wondering why Jaemin had class during lunch break as he stared at Jaemin rushing off. He suddenly noticed, before the younger boy stepped out the restroom door, that Jaemin was holding a paper in his hand.

Jeno blinked and immediately looked down at where the folded paper was in his pocket.

Well, it was gone.

----

"Yeah well now he's not just avoiding me, he's also hiding stuff apparently," Jeno complained through his mic as he sat up on his bed, leaning against his pillow, Switch in hand.

"What does he have to hide?" Yu asked on the other end. They were playing Rumble today.

"Bro literally gave me a hug just to steal a paper I had in my pocket," Jeno whimpered. "If that's not called hiding—he plainly just didn't want me to read it or something. I wasn't even suspecting anything."

The voice of their third team member, "Eric," suddenly cut in and asked, "What're y'all talking about?"

"Just school stuff," Yu replied.

"Bro," Eric said to Jeno, "you sound a lot like this guy at my school."

"Oh really," Jeno said, unsuspecting.

"Hell yeah," Eric laughed through the other end.

The group suddenly cut their casual conversation and threw in small phrases of input as they'd entered a conflict on the game. After the fighting was resolved, Eric asked, "Where are you guys from? I mean if you're comfortable."

Jeno, sweet and naïve online, revealed the city of his residence. To which Eric replied, "Wait, for real? I live here too."

"No way," Jeno said.

"Yeah way. What school do you—wait, is it okay to talk here?"

"Yeah it's fine," Jeno assured. He trusted Yu. "I'm a senior at Huimang."

"You're lying," Eric said in denial.

"I'm not," Jeno gave a small laugh.

"You're Lee Jeno," Eric guessed excitedly.

"Wait, what?" Jeno said.

"I'm Son Youngjae from physics class!"

"Wait, what??"

Yu snickered and commented, "So you're saying that out of all the fucking players in the world, you guys who have the same class together got paired up on a team? Damn."

"Apparently," Jeno said with a sigh. "This is embarrassing."

"It's not," Eric disagreed. "This is cool. And I bet you're talking about Jaemin."

"Sounds about right," Jeno said weakly.

"Bro," Eric said. "I put that paper in your locker."

"Wait really?" Jeno was confused. He wasn't that close to Youngjae.

"Yeah it's a poem that Jaemin wrote for you in English class but he was too shy to give it to you," Eric spilled.

"T-then why did you have it?" Jeno was bewildered.

"Because it ended up in my hands after the teacher came in class and we had to stop squabbling. I had to get it to you, my man. It's the most NoMin thing ever," Eric admitted. Yu just kept laughing at the sudden revelations.

"NoMin...?" Jeno had a bad feeling about this.

"Yeah, NoMin. It's you and Jaemin's ship name that everyone in the school knows about except for you," Eric informed.

"What..." Jeno suddenly felt tired.

Yu interjected, "What did the paper say?"

"Aish," Eric said painfully. "I don't remember the exact words but it was something along the lines of like 'I don't want to avoid you, I love you so much but we can't be together' kind of trope. Anyways, he didn't want you to see it."

"Obviously," Jeno breathed. So Jaemin still liked him—loved him.

"Wow," Yu commented.

"Time for you to kiss and make it up," Eric announced.

The game had ended by now, the three getting close to last two teams but getting wiped out in a small Safe Area. "Nah," Jeno shook his head.

"Why not?" Eric and Yu said almost simultaneously.

"Because Kiara and my parents," Jeno said simply.

"Dude." You could almost hear the eye roll in Eric's voice. "I'd pick Jaemin over Kiara any day. I mean, no offense to your gf is you still like her, but I mean like no hate but she's kind of changed a lot?"

"No cap," Jeno sighed. "I don't have a choice."

"Duke it out with your parents, man," Eric suggested.

"Yeah right," Jeno croaked.

He wished that was an option.