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as taehyung and aera grew closer, so did her feelings for him. she constantly found herself thinking about him, what he was doing, what food they should try next, what songs he could try sing etc etc.

she also spent almost all her time with him, and although she never grew tired of his company, she was beginning to miss jungkook's.

and she felt horrible too, for leaving jungkook behind. it had been a week and a half since taehyung came to school and aera could barely remember the last time they had a decent conversation.

aera : hey kookie, sorry for neglecting u recently! i was too excited that tae was gg to sch w us... mian! i will buy you lamb chops if you forgive me!!

his response came within minutes.

buffkookie💪🐰 : kure... but you have to buy me the big set meal with the drink after sch on mon. just the two of us k?

aera rolled her eyes at his request, but still agreed, happy to have her friend back.

_

in school on monday, a new girl transferred into their class. her name was eunbi and there had been a lot of buzz about her, mainly because she was the second transfer student this year, and it helped that she would pretty too.

aera had went to the toilet at the beginning of class, and only returned to class seeing eunbi in her seat, talking to taehyung.

when aera saw her, she was confused and just thought that she was one of taehyung's fangirls, but then she realised she had never seen her before. she also couldn't help but compare herself to eunbi. eunbi had that cutesy school girl vibe going on, as she had a petite stature and huge doll like eyes. aera on the other hand, was considered tall for a girl and eunbi only came up to her shoulder. eunbi was also very girly, and owned a lot of pink. aera's style was more casual and she usually wore black or white.

she felt a little self conscious, envying how effortlessly cute and small eunbi looked. and also because taehyung and eunbi were laughing at something eunbi said.

"uh hi, sorry but this is my seat..." aera began, a polite smile plastered on her face.

the new girl smiled and got up. "oh, sorry, its just that i hadn't seen tae for so long! i'm eunbi, who are you?"

aera tried to contain her surprise. she called him tae, did that mean they knew each other? "i'm aera, nice to meet you!" she glanced at taehyung who looked at her cheerfully.

"rara, eunbi's one of my ex-classmates from daegu! she suddenly transferred here, what a coincidence!"

"oh... i see, but you don't have an accent?"

"yea, my mother's from seoul so i can switch between both."

aera just nodded and an awkward silence consumed the three of them.

"oh uh taeee, can we eat lunch together?" eunbi asked, and taehyung turned to aera for approval.

she didn't mind eunbi tagging along for lunch so she just shrugged, not fully knowing what she was signing herself up for.

_

by the time lunch came, aera couldn't help but feel slightly annoyed. eunbi shared three classes with them and she always chose to sit next to taehyung. they seemed to have an never ending flow of conversation, and aera couldn't help but feel both ignored and left out.

so when the three of them arrived at the cafeteria, she immediately took a seat next to jungkook and sighed, leaning on to him.

"oh, is this your boyfriend? you guys are so cute together!" eunbi exclaimed.

the whole table froze and awkwardly stared at eunbi. aera peeled herself off of jungkook and taehyung scratched his neck before meeting eyes with aera.

"um, actually..." aera began.

"i'm her boyfriend." taehyung concluded with a smile.

"o-ohh!" eunbi replied, smile faltering before she quickly caught herself. "this is awkward... sorry hehe..."

"oh it's fine, this is jungkook, my best friend!" aera exclaimed.

lunch only got more awkward from there. eunbi kept asking them questions about their relationship. how long had they been together, where did they meet etc etc.

but then she asked, "what do you like most about each other?" aera tensed, not liking where this was going. the two of them were only fake dating after all, and even though she was beginning to like taehyung, it would probably be difficult for him to answer eunbi's question. would they be caught?

she nervously chewed on her lip, meeting taehyung's eyes as he blushed. "ah... 그냥... i like how rara always supports me and takes care of me so well... she's pretty and charming too, what more could i ask for?"

and now it was her time to blush as the table (with the exception of eunbi and jungkook) awwwwed. she could feel herself swooning even though he was probably making it up.

and now it was her turn. "u-uh, i like how he can always cheer me up when i'm sad, and how he protects me from nasty things... *like sooji* and how he has so much courage to pursue his dreams!" the words flew out of her mouth effortlessly, and aera knew she could've said paragraphs more, but decided to keep it short and sweet.

to taehyung, this was fake and they both didn't have feelings for each other. but to her, every smile shared, every touch of his hands against hers, and every word spoken between them, only pulled her closer to the edge of falling for him.

but would he be there to catch her?

at the end of her "confession", taehyung wrapped her in a hug and kissed her forehead. she knew it was just for show, but she wished it was real.

she wished he could be hers, for real.

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그냥 (keu-nyang) : just

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