DISHEARTENED. || BAEK KYUNG

VIII.

As Gaeun walked into school—she was met with the sight of Danoh screaming hello in varied ways. She quickly made her way next to the shorter girl, patting down to look at her face. "What's wrong with you?" She asked, her voice filled with confusion.

"Oh, dear Gaeun~ I finally got to see his face." Danoh said, slamming her hands against her cheeks as a smile was upon her lips. Gaeun couldn't help but to make a face of disgust.

"Really? Is he good-looking?" She asked, in which Danoh simply responded with a sound of agreement to it. As the two walked up to the door, Gaeun saw a hand open it before they could causing the two curious girls to look at the figure behind them.

"You! You're in my class too??" Danoh said loudly. This clearly made out to Gaeun who the mystery boy was. He simply responded with a head nod before making his way into the classroom—Danoh following closely behind seemingly quite happy.

"Are you going in?" She heard a voice behind her, causing Gaeun to spin around coming face to face with Kyung, surprisingly close. She quickly backed up a bit and nodded her head.

"You can go in before me—I'm sure you have something to talk to Danoh about." She responded automatically—shit it's a scene. She thought to herself as Kyung nodded his head moving past her into the classroom.

Gaeun peered in as she watched the overly dramatic scene before Danoh and Kyung take place—she hated how the writers made it seem like Kyung really hated Danoh, when it was clear that wasn't it. As soon as scene was over, Gaeun found herself sitting next to Saemi and Danoh on the bleachers outside.

"What the fuck..." Gaeun mumbled to herself as the loud sound of girls cheering rang through her ears especially with Saemi competing with Jooda to win Namju's attention.

Though Danoh's full attention was on number thirteen—the mysterious boy who seemingly captured the weakened heart of Danoh's. Gaeun couldn't help but to smile, as Danoh seemed surprisingly happy in her out of character self.

Gaeun and Danoh were both sitting in the kitchen with the Squid Fairy, seemingly Danoh was questioning about Thirteen. Suddenly the sound of an exhausted Dohwa came into the kitchen, Gaeun looked at him wide-eyed as he called out to Danoh.

"This seemed to happened quicker than I thought, now there's three of them." the Dried Squid says clearly interested on how quickly Dohwa was self-aware as was Gaeun.

Seemingly he was complaining of the sudden changes between time here, as if he first didn't accept his self-awareness, which in most case the three of them had in common.

"Is it really possible that this world is a comic?" Dohwa asked clearly stressed by the thought.

"That's what everyone's first response is." The three awareness said to Dohwa with a smile on their face.

"Then explain it to me, now!" He said, causing each of them to point to a sudden floating object in the room, startling him even further.

"Okay, but im not a crybaby. What kind of male main lead cries everyday like this, huh?" He asked, causing Gaeun to try and muffle a laughter that eventually erupted.

"Why does everyone believe they are the main leads?" She asked, still laughing as Gaeun was the only one from the two to not think she was a main character.

"Are you saying I'm not?? Don't tell me... Are me and Danoh suppose to be together?" Dohwa exaggerated, causing Danoh to roll her eyes in annoyance before slamming the comic book onto the table for Dohwa to read.

Soon after reading the comic, Dohwa understood what was going on and who were the main characters of the story. It was the next day, Gaeun had arrived to school later than usually due to her father wanting to stop by the graveyard to pay some respect to her mother. It was something Gaeun hated. She didn't hate her mom, she just hated thinking about her as the case of how she died was left unsolved. It necessarily made her very upset and out of place at times.

As she walked into the school, she felt someone grab her wrist causing her to turn around and come face-to-face with Kyung. He was looking down at her, as if he was examining her expression before speaking.

"What's wrong?" He asked, finally sensing her upsetness as he released her hand.

"Nothing. I'm fine, come on we'll be late." She spoke her voice more silent than usually—this definitely wasn't a scene she was putting up, in and out of character this is how she got when she was reminded her mom was dead.

Gaeun didn't say another word before walking off to class, not bothering to send another glance towards Kyung who was trailing behind her. It was clear to him, she was more upset than she usually was, it had been a quite some time since he had last seen her like this—and of course, it was causing him to also worry about her.

Class went by slow to Gaeun, she was waiting for science to start as everyone gathered into the lab room dressed in white coats along with wearing safety gloves. She had knew a scene was about to start when she heard a click and Kyung had walked up to where she was sitting next to a non-existing Danoh, who had disappeared for her part in the scene.

"Wanna pair up with me today?" Kyung asked, looking down at Gaeun. She felt her head nod without her consent as she got up from her set to see Danoh and Jooda enter into the classroom with the dried ice boxes.

Kyung seemingly was already sitting down, but Gaeun had stopped in her place infront of the dried ice stacks, watching as Namjoo and Jooda argued back and forth.

"Don't you think you are being arrogant right now?" Namjoo asked, causing Gaeun to move away from where she was standing next to Jooda.

"Hey, aren't you the one being a bit too arrogant right now?" Gaeun rhetoric back, she was frowning as Namjoo turned his attention towards her before looking back at Jooda.

"You succeeded..." He said as he walked towards Jooda causing her to backup slow in confusion. "If gaining my attention was what you were going for, you succeeded." He crouched down to her level coming face to face with Jooda.

She watched as Jooda and Danoh continued to backup coming to collide with the iceboxes but they were pushed towards Gaeun and Jooda who were now both on the ground, the dried ice burning both their skins.

"Fuck!" Gaeun said, her voice showing her pain as it broke—trying to conceal her crying as she was the type of person who cried when badly injured. Kyung quickly moved from his place crouching down next to Gaeun, grabbing a hold of her arm examining the area.

"Can you get up? Come on, I'll take you to the nurse." Kyung said, pulling her up in his arms before she could respond—she was in a wide amount of pain as most of the dried ice hit her arms and legs as a way to protect Jooda from getting hurt.

As Kyung and Gaeun entered into the nurses office and she was placed on one of the beds—the scene ended, her arms and legs no longer stinging as a sigh of relief left her mouth. It was crazy, how badly she was in pain while in the scenes but outside—she was automatically healed.

Laying her head against the pillow on the bed, she felt the bed weigh down a slight bit as Kyung too a seat next to the bed, placing his hand against her forehead as if checking her temperature. "You seem fine now." He said, his voice signaling his relief at her condition. Gaeun couldn't help but to only respond with a small upon her lips as she looked up at him.