Take My Hands Now

Chapter 8

"I feel your pain", "I feel your loss", "I know how much it hurts" – people say such things too easily. But whenever you said it, you could actually feel it.

You hated it now more than ever. Looking into Jungkook's eyes made you think the situation was genuinely so unfair. Why did you have to be the one to feel his pain?

Meanwhile, Jungkook was still grappling with what you just did. Then, the chance to say anything was lost.

"Y/N", Namjoon came up to you and he warily looked at the bruised-up guy standing before you. "You guys talking about something?"

"No, we are done", you replied as Jungkook's eyes were still fixated on you.

"OK... let's go then, Mirae is late again. She told us to save her a seat."

"Yeah let's go", you forced a smile at Namjoon. You were so glad that the lecture today was not the one you shared with Jungkook.

As you strode past him, he kept thinking about how much he wanted to just hold on to you so that you wouldn't leave him there again. How many times he contemplated grabbing onto your wrist to turn you around, to ask you to listen to him, to just have you standing before him again.

—

The next day wasn't so fortunate for you, you were having that damned lecture with him again.

"Were you the one who beat Jungkook up?", Namjoon jokingly nudged you.

"What? No! Of course not, what the hell Namjoon", you whispered sharply back at him as the lecture was ongoing.

"Chill, I'm just checking, because he keeps staring at you and I can't tell if it's out of vengeance or what?"

You knew he was looking at you, your peripheral senses were on edge. However, never once did you even acknowledge his presence. You endured it all the way until the lecture was finally done and then the ever-so-unhelpful Namjoon had to insist that he must converse with the professor about an unnecessarily academic question. So, here you were, waiting for him outside the lecture hall.

"Y/N", you heard that same voice that still makes you shudder.

You looked up at him with a frustrated frown and took one step to your right, ready to bypass him. He quickly moved to block you again without getting too close to you.

"I know you must really hate me now, and you have every right to but will you please hear me out once? It will only take a while", if you weren't already fooled before, you would have considered the plea.

"Hate you? I don't hate you. But the last thing I want to do now is listen to another word from someone like you."

"I know you must think that I am an asshole, just like all the other party boys but I...",

You felt the need to shut him off right there, "Stop saying 'I know'. Stop pretending like you know anything about me."

"I don't! I know so little about you. But in the same way, you don't know about me", Jungkook was almost raising his voice at you.

You heightened your volume right back at him, "I have absolutely no freaking interest in knowing anything about you! And for the record, you are worse than all the other guys."

The breath he held hitched in his throat but he tried to continue, "Y/N... ever since that night you asked whether I was ok, everything stopped being ok and..."

You couldn't let him continue, for fear that your mind will be overridden by his schemes, "Maybe your insistence on all of this is because you think you failed this challenge", you hissed as you gestured yourself.