your words my lies | noren

t h r e e

The rest of the school day was a blur. Donghyuck had gone home right after school ended along with Jaemin who was supposed to have soccer practice, but didn't, due to the rainy weather outside.

For Jeno, basketball practice had just ended and he walked out of the change room in a fresh set of clothing, hair still slightly damp from the shower he had taken. 

The hallway was completely empty. It was quiet in a way that wasn't unsettling but rather an odd change compared to the number of bustling students during the school day. Jeno was used to it though. As captain of their school basketball team, he was always the last to leave, having to lock up the gym and equipment room after they were done using it.

From the windows of the main entrance, Jeno could see the rain still pouring heavily outside. Even though it was already mid-october, this was probably one of the heaviest rainstorms they had gotten all year.

Swinging his backpack off of his shoulder, Jeno took out the dark folded umbrella he had stored in his bag this morning. There was no way he was going to wait this storm out. It looked like it was going to carry on for quite a while and Jeno certainly didn't have the patience to wait that long.

With a deep breath, he opened his umbrella and walked out the door. 

Immediately, he was met with a chilling breeze and cold, heavy water droplets pelting down overtop of him.

Jeno cursed.

His house wasn't too far away, a fifteen minute walk at most. He could take the shortcut through the woods as well. That would save him some time and likely provide a little bit of coverage from the rain.

As he walked, his mind flashed back to earlier that day. The way he saw Renjun's fists spark with electricity, how he pounded his fists onto the desk and the strange force that pushed everyone backwards. It was all connected— it had to be.

But the strangest part was that when he asked Jaemin and Donghyuck about it, they both said they didn't recall any of that happening. Not even the way the whole class turned to dead silence when Renjun walked out of the room.

"Jeno, you're not thinking straight. Everything was perfectly normal this morning, don't you remember?" Hyuck had said.

Jeno wanted to laugh at that. He remembered seeing Donghyuck quite literally stumble backwards from the force this morning, and then the latter comes out with that? Something wasn't adding up here.

He was snapped out of his trance by a rustling in the leaves beside him. Jeno looked around, he had already made it to the shortcut in the woods. 

When the sound didn't appear for another few minutes, Jeno dismissed it as an animal in the bushes. Just moments after he began walking again, the sound reappeared, this time sounding more like footsteps than anything.

"Why would someone be outside during a storm like this?" he whispered to himself.

One side of Jeno wanted desperately to see what the sound was, while the other just willed himself to get home. A few minutes of mental debate ensued and in the end, Jeno's curiosity got the better of him.

Cautiously, he veered off the trail and towards the bushes on the side of the path, following them as they got deeper and deeper into the woods, farther and farther from the trail he was supposed to be on.

His feet brought him to the base of a willow tree, so impressively large that Jeno wondered how he hadn't ever seen it before. Although tall, the leaves stretched all the way to the ground of the forest, meaning that he was standing more at the base of the leaves rather than the base of the actual willow tree.

This was exactly where the sound was coming from. 

Reluctantly, Jeno brought his hand up to lift the leaves from the ground, allowing himself an entrance.

There, at the base of the tree, sat Renjun in a black button-up blouse, hugging himself as if to keep warm. 

That wasn't what shocked Jeno the most though. Renjun had wings— yes wings— a beautiful set of electric blue wings around the size of half his body. They seemed wilted though, and Jeno couldn't help but wonder why.

"Renjun?"

The boy looked up from where he was seated on a pile of fallen leaves and jumped at the sight of Jeno in front of him.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, glaring at Jeno in a way that would've been intimidating if the boy wasn't shivering to death.

Jeno just stood there, mouth still gaping as Renjun matched his gaze.

"I heard a sound in the bushes, and I thought I would come check it out, and I found you here which you are utterly beautiful by the way—" Jeno rambled, hand flying quickly to his mouth once he had realized what he said.

Renjun seemed unfazed. 

"What are you doing here, then?" Jeno asked, trying to cover up his words.

"It's raining," Renjun replied, "I can't stay out in the rain."

Jeno, still in disbelief, was not able to properly react to Renjun's words and silence filled the air between the two.

After a few moments, Renjun clasped his hands together. "Well then, I would like to kindly ask you to leave please," he said gesturing towards where Jeno had entered from.

Jeno ignored him. "You're just gonna ask me to leave without even giving me and explanation?"

Renjun kept quiet.

"You're shivering," Jeno said, slowly walking towards Renjun and taking off his jacket. Surprisingly, Renjun didn't shy away. Jeno hovered the jacket over Renjun's wings, slightly scared to damage them. But when Renjun didn't protest and curled his wings in, Jeno placed it down over Renjun's delicate frame.

"Now you owe me an explanation," Jeno stated.

"Fine, not here though," Renjun finally agreed.

Jeno smiled. This had to be good.

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i am so so sorry i havent been updating lately. school just started and my motivation to write just completely flew out the window

i want today to be a writing only day though, so hopefully i can follow through with that

ily all!! ty for sticking with me <3