Hi everyone! Thank you all for the amazing support you've given me for my works. I never dreamed that my stories would be liked so much and honestly it means a lot to me. This isn't the end of my writing but it is an end of this blog, as in vitaminkyeom as I shall be shifting to another blog, @kkooongie . Hope to see you guys on the other side, I have a lot of fics planned out and hopefully things will be better there!!!
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
make a new main blog where I shitpost AND write fanfics [for fandoms incl. svt]
make a new main, new vitaminkyeom all fandoms to be written
I just rebrand vitaminkyeom and multifandom BUT [read below]
Voting ended onMay 22, 2025
For the first 2 cases I shall link the old fics and maybe even reblog them. Basically starting afresh and new.
As for 3rd option, the reason I made so many blogs was cus my before blog was so messy but now this is also too much. And honestly the aesthetic is too much to dismantle (I spent hours on it :'D) and it icks me to have 247854 svt posts and then suddenly amapgamous fics.
“BECAUSE I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE MORE THAN FRIENDS WITH YOU, SUNSHINE”
PAIRING || Jihoon x Female Reader
GENRES || Romance, Humour, Enemies To Lovers AU, Academic Rivals To Lovers AU, Rich Kids AU
SUMMARY || Jihoon, school's no. 1 (or no. 2), was nothing but a pain in the ass for you. Sure he was better than you in some subjects but so were you. The two of you were equally good enough for the first place so to increase the competition, he decided to suggest the most scandalous thing you had heard: the two of you tutor each other.
Or, in which, you were the rich kid with your family's dignity on the line and he was the poor kid with his family's sacrifices on the line.
WARNINGS || none
WORD COUNT || 10.6k
A/N || HI EVERYONE! Never thought I would be writing an enemies to lovers of this size but here we are. This is for the Lonely Hearts Cafe Collab by @camandemstudios !! Thank you so much for letting me particpate and do check out all the other authors here. Also moving my taglist to reblogs until tumblr fixes this horrible glitch cus its messing with the aesthetics tbh
Cram school had to be the worst phase in a teenager’s life.
You looked out of the window aimlessly, trying to drown out the teacher’s voice. It was pitch dark outside and you couldn’t really see anything, except for your own reflection staring back at you. Your hair wasn’t out of place at all, neatly brushed and clipped to keep it out of your eyes. Your school uniform was crisp and clean, as though you had decided to come to your cram school straight from home, and not after a long day of school.
But then your eyes met your reflection’s and you felt the tiredness hit you like a truckload. Your eyes looked like you had been awake for a thousand years, your eyes carrying the weight of all your previous generations. Which… wasn’t wrong in a way.
You rapidly blinked at your reflection, trying to get rid of the sleep from your eyes. Sighing, you turned your head back to the board where the teacher was explaining Faraday’s principle of electromagnetic induction, and your eyes flicked up to the clock overhead.
7.55 pm.
Five more minutes until this physics class got over.
You could survive five more minutes, right? Sure physics was the subject you dreadest the most but hey, you could bear a few minutes of it. You were doing this for four years already so five minutes shouldn’t hurt at all.
Then you made the mistake of looking at your best friend’s book, lying next to your blank one.
Kim Mingyu scribbled down furiously the concept the teacher was explaining, adding his own words to it as an indicator that he was understanding everything being taught. You watch him glance up at the board and nod his head in approval to what was being said, before looking back at his book to solve the problem.
Immediately, you felt the familiar feeling wrap around your throat, stopping any air from entering your lungs. Your fingers balled into a fist, nails digging into your palm as you tried to suck in a breath without making any noise.
The last thing you needed was for the entire class to look at you and wonder why you were hyperventilating. Screwing your eyes shut, you began doing the exercise you had looked up on the internet for anxiety attacks.
Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to-
“You okay?” Mingyu’s voice broke the chain of your thoughts, snapping you out of your mantra as you opened your eyes to look at him, trying to cover your distraught look. But no matter how well you had practiced the art of hiding your feelings, there was no secret you couldn’t keep from Mingyu.
He mirrored your expression, widening his eyes in worry as he gently touched your shoulder, edging a bit closer to you.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
You nodded, refusing to make eye contact with him. Embarrassment flooded your cheek at the thought of you getting an anxiety attack just because your best friend was able to understand the class and solve the problem.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just stifled because physics is just so hard.” You lied, hoping he won’t think too much about it.
Mingyu smiled at you softly. “Don’t worry. I know physics is eating you up but hey you aren’t that bad. Not to mention, you’re the maths topper. You can score great marks in the other subjects. One subject won’t pull you down that much.”
You knew Mingyu was lying through his teeth to make you feel better because one subject could pull down your rank because of the amount of competition, but nonetheless you felt at ease at his reassurance. Yeah, you weren’t that bad in maths, and you could try a bit more harder and improve your physics, right?
Right then the bell rang, and the teacher yelled out a few instructions to the class but you were too busy grabbing your pen and book and dumping them in your bag. You scrambled out of the class right behind the teacher, even leaving Mingyu behind as you ran straight to the washroom.
No sooner had you flung the toilet door open you puked, your stomach hurling out your lunch. After what felt like an hour you forced yourself to stop retching, gasping for breath as you clutched your hurting stomach. Your heart was still beating like crazy and a bead of sweat dropped from your forehead.
Slowly getting up, you took in a deep breath to stop your body from trembling too much. You could hear some girls chatting outside the door, and embarrassment creeped into your cheeks.
Had they heard you? No one had seen you, right?
If people found out that you were having a panic attack just because of a physics class…
You waited until the chatter outside died down before opening the door and peaking, making sure the coast was clear. It was empty, indicating that break time too was almost over.
Quitely, you slip out of the washroom and back to your classroom, walking back to your bench. Mingyu was nowhere to be seen, so you assumed he was probably in the canteen, buying some milk for the two of you.
You sat there silently for a while, your breath and heartbeat returning to normal as you took in your surroundings. Your classmates were either playing with crumpled balls of paper or chatting to each other. Your eyes then fell on one particular boy, who was completely absorbed in his book, scribbling away furiously.
Your eyes narrowed at him as you felt a pang of jealousy. Suddenly, he raised his head up and turned to look at you, both of your eyes locking and causing you to freeze in place.
Lee Jihoon smirked at you, twirling the pencil in his hand as though he knew about the little episode you just had.
Why, that asshole-
He got up and started walking in your direction, and you hastily pulled out a book from your bag and opened it to a random page to pretend like you were… well, occupied.
But of course Jihoon had to come and sit down on the bench in front of you, turning to you as he rested his elbow on your book, his palm cradling his face.
“Hey.” He said, that smirk never wavering off his face. God, he was so infuriating-
“What do you want from me?” You asked, yanking the book from his weight.
“Can I not come over and tell hi to my friend?” His cocky voice caused you to look up at him dryly.
“The dictionary definition of friends would beg to differ from what we have.”
“Damn it. I was hoping you would be too high headed to look at a dictionary.”
You scoffed.
“Not as air headed as you though, because you’re clearly wasting break time chatting with me instead of studying. You’ll need every single second to beat me in the test series next week.”
Jihoon smiled at you, his eyes glinting in amusement. I ought to punch those pearly white teeth. “Next week’s? Why not this week’s? Didn’t do so well?”
“Shut up.” You fumed, seething with his rage as he brought up memories from this week’s exams. The anxiety you had felt a few minutes ago was starting to surface up and you were not going to lose in front of him. “I’m still going to beat you in maths.”
“But beating me in math alone won’t give you the first rank.” He beamed, as though already knowing tomorrow’s results. You knew too, to be honest. You were just blatantly lying right now to save your face.
This week had been a particularly hard week, your period cramps paired with the worst chapters in every subject for the exams. While writing the exam itself you knew you were doomed, and the pain had been eating you away ever since you finished writing the test a few hours ago.
Maybe that was the reason you had a panic attack?
“Falling once won’t mean my CAT scores have been thrown out of the window.” You argue back. It was okay to fail, right?
That’s how you always calmed yourself down. There was no learning without failing after all. You had to learn from your mistakes. Next time, you would be even more flawless-
But how many more times did you need to fail to become flawless? How many times did you need to beat Jihoon until your rank was permanently 1 and not fluctuating between first and second place?
“Yeah sure. We’ll see who gets the early admissions to SNU.”
“Look, if you’re here to insult me-” You began but he looked at you hurt. This man should have become an actor instead.
“Insult you? You’re the one who has been keeping me up all night, making sure I’m giving my hundred percent no matter what! I love what we have. I’ll never insult you.” Jihoon mocked, causing you to roll your eyes at him.
“Now that felt like an insult.”
“Why were you in a rush today by the way?” He asked suddenly.
“Wh-what?” You felt your cheeks sink in as you looked at him in horror. No way- There was no way he knew, right?
If Jihoon of all people knew then- No. It couldn’t be.
“After class.” He continued, completely unfazed by your reaction. He tilted his head at you, looking at you even more lazily if anything. “You ran out. It was almost like you were dying-”
“Jihoon.” A familiar voice cut him off and never had you loved your best friend more than right now as you turned back to see a Mingyu looking at Jihoon questioningly, as though urging him to continue saying whatever it was. “What are you doing here?”
“Is it illegal to talk to you both now?” Jihoon asked sarcastically.
“No… but bullying is.”
Jihoon’s face darkened at those words, and he glared at the two of you. “Bullying? I swear you high society kids are so stuck up that even having banter is considered bullying.”
“Well, Y/N doesn’t look like she’s enjoying your… ‘banter’ very much.”
He snorted, and stood up, causing you to breathe a sigh of relief. “Fine then. Suit yourselves. I won’t bully you much if that is what is causing you so much trouble Y/N.” Giving the two of you a weird look, he walked away, going back to his bench and slumping off on his desk.
Inhaling deeply, you looked up at Mingyu and smiled. “Thanks.”
He smiled back at you, before placing a banana milk carton on the desk. “Here, I thought you weren’t feeling well so I brought some banana milk for you from the canteen.”
“Thank you!” You said, feeling a bit cheerful as you peeled off the seal and sipped it, the cold milk cooling you down just like how Mingyu had anticipated.
The door of the classroom opened again as the teacher walked in, and everyone scrambled to get to their places and greet the teacher.
As you stood up, your eyes fell on Jihoon. He looked really glum, like what Mingyu had said really offended him.
You took that as a win.
“L/N Y/N.” You flinched as the teacher spoke out your name, causing you to look up and stop rubbing your thumb finally. Sucking in a deep breath, you plastered a small, confident smile on your face before walking up to her.
Ms. Yun gave you a dry smile before extending the result sheet, and you felt your heart shatter almost immediately. Still, you just smiled back at her and took the sheet, walking back to your desk, not daring to look at your result.
Once seated (and glancing through the class quickly so that no one’s eyes was on you), you let your eyes fall onto the printed piece of paper in your hands.
Your stomach jumped.
2/246
Second place? Again? That would mean that Jihoon was-
Your grip on the paper tightened a little as tears blurred your eyes. No, no, no! I cannot cry here!
You knew it. You knew this would be the result. But still… you had hoped that maybe fate would be kind to you just this once.
You had drowned out your surroundings, staring at the numbers again and again as though if you looked long enough that two would change into one. What were you going to tell your parents?
Oh my god. What am I going to tell them-
“Y/N!”
You jerked at the sound of someone calling your voice, blinking rapidly so that there was no obvious wetness in your eyes. Your vision finally concentrated on a rather familiar face in front of you, and hatred kicked in almost as a self defense.
“Daydreaming much?” Jihoon asked, smirking at you as he tilted his head slightly.
“Not at all.” You said, smiling at him with the most fake smile you could muster. Through the corner of your eyes, you saw that most of your classmates had left, only a few going through their books one final time before leaving for break. “I don’t have that much time in my hand. Unlike you.”
“Oh well, then I must be really talented if I managed to get the first rank while daydreaming so much.” He laughed, the sound causing your heart to accelerate a little. His laughter was so annoying that you were sure you would end up with heart problems one of these days.
“Well, I did say I would beat you next week.” You said, trying not to raise your voice at him.
“You’ve been saying that to me since the beginning of this year.”
“Yeah well if you haven’t forgotten that first place was mine for the last few years.”
“And before that it was mine.”
“One year. In middle school.”
“Anyways,” you glance back at the report card. You had got second place in physics again, but first in maths. Well maybe that would be your saving grace in front of your parents. “Looks like no matter how much you try you cannot beat me in maths though.” You gave him a little smirk, leaning in a bit as though you were about to share a big secret.
“How are you acing in physics after being so bad in maths, huh?”
Now it was Jihoon’s time to scoff. “It’s the second rank. I’m just behind you by a few marks.”
“Sure you are not by hearting physics numericals?”
Jihoon leaned, suddenly catching you off guard by how close both of your faces were. But you didn’t let your expression change. “That seems like something you would do, to be honest.”
You moved away from him, raising your hand in defeat. “Well, I admit I’m, ah, a bit weak in physics. But you don’t want to accept defeat no matter what.”
“Ahahaha, I just want to admit to you. Funny how our weaknesses are complimentary, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, it’s almost like fate wants us to always be able to pit against each other.” You joked, folding away your report card and slipping it into your bag.
“Hmmm.” Jihoon agreed, looking out of the window. You watched him for a few seconds, taking in his features. His hair moved slightly from the light breeze blowing in, and you realised with a jolt just how soft and dreamy he looked right now.
Wait, what-
You banged your elbow against the table to drop your pencil case, immediately diving down to retrieve its contents. You felt like your cheeks were on fire and the last thing you needed was Jihoon to see you like this.
Why were your cheeks heating up in the first place?
Once you collected your (two) pens, you sat under the desk for a few seconds, trying to get rid of the heat on your cheeks. Deep breath, deep breath, deep breath-
“What are you doing?” Suddenly Jihoon appeared, crouching next to you, looking at you in surprise because who took so much time to pick up their pens and pencils?
“Ah!” You yelped, jerking away from him a little before offering him a sheepish smile. “I, uh, I was… just picking up my pencils!”
“Oh?” He looked confused, all cockiness from his face gone as though there was nothing to make fun of in this situation.
“Uh…yeah!” You laughed awkwardly as you showed him the pens, and he too nodded after a few seconds. “Man, you sure are slow even in daily tasks like these.”
There. There was the Lee Jihoon you knew.
“By the way, do you want to tutor each other?” He asked suddenly, sitting down on the floor as he looked at you eagerly.
Now it was your time to be confused. “Huh?”
“You know… I help you with physics and you help me with maths?”
“Huh?” You asked again, not sure you had heard correctly. Helping… each other?
Was it legal to fraternise with the enemy like this? And… tutoring each other in the weak subjects felt diminishing the competition you both had.
But then again… you really needed help with physics. Cram school wasn’t enough for you clearly, and hiring a personal tutor would mean seeing your parents waste even more money on you. You were willing to do anything to save your face. Forget your reputation, the least you could do was swallow your pride and save your family’s reputation.
“Help each other. Let’s put aside our differences and work together… at least for a month?” Jihoon explained again.
“Oh. Sure… sounds good to me.” You said. “Uh, maybe we could start from this Sunday?”
“Sure. But your house.”
“Huh? Why not the study cafe?” You asked, surprised.
“Because I'd rather be dead than be caught studying with you.” He smirked again, as though that should have been self explanatory. You rolled your eyes at him.
“Okay, but you could have been nice and invited me over to your house instead.”
At this he laughed. But when he saw that you weren’t laughing with him and just looking at him confused, he stopped, his face darkening once again. “My parents will be at home and I don’t want them to get the wrong idea.”
Now you nodded, understanding the situation. “I get it. Lucky for us, my parents won’t be home this Sunday so it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Cool then.” He said, before walking away from you, hands in his pocket as though you two hadn’t just decided to set aside your life long differences and help each other out instead.
“That’s it?” You called out, feeling a bit annoyed at how nonchalant he was while you had been overthinking if this deal was worth it.
Jihoon turned back. “What do you want?”
“No goodbyes?”
“Oh please.” He rolled his eyes, before smirking at you, causing your blood to boil once again. “We aren’t friends.”
You heard footsteps before the knock on the door, your stomach already dropping in fear. Your heart raced as you rubbed your thumb repeatedly, the page you were reading going completely blur no matter how much you tried to focus on the words in front of you.
“Y/N?”
Forcing your cheeks up for a smile, you turned on your chair to look at your mother standing by your door.
“You’re back?” You asked, trying for a small talk to calm down your nerves.
Maybe she forgot. Maybe she had a long day at work-
“Where is your report card?”
“Uh, in my- in my bag-”
“Thought I told you to keep it on my table immediately after you return from school?” Your mother said, narrowing her eyes at you. You felt your heart give an anxious squeeze, but you just gave her a small smile in an effort to reduce the tension in the room.
You walked up to your bag and pulled out the report card, biting your lips as your stomach turned. What was she going to say? Would she understand if I told her what actually happened-
“What are you doing!” You heard your mother snap at you and before you could even react you felt her snatch it away from your hand.
“I-” You began but your mother’s eyes widened, face suddenly livid with anger.
“Second? Again?” She screamed, causing you to flinch.
“I- I can explain! I wasn’t feeling well!” You said, even though you could feel your stomach sinking to the depths of hell quite literally.
“Oh, really?” Your mother laughed, the sound causing you to flinch and take a step back as fear wrapped itself around your heart. “And what was the excuse last week? Right, that you were weak in a chapter-”
“Well, I’m not lying!” You exclaimed, your voice rising out of panic. “I’m not lying, I swear!”
“Then when will you get strong, Y/N? Huh?” Suddenly your mother grabbed your shoulders, her fingers digging painfully into your flesh and you tried your best to stop the tears threatening to well your eyes.
When will you get strong? When will you?
“Answer me!” She screamed, shaking you by your shoulders. But now her face wasn’t angry anymore. It was just… hurt and disappointment.
You felt your will completely crumble and the tears rolled down.
“When will you get better?” Your mother’s voice dropped to whisper as she stared at you intensely. “When? Don’t your father and I try hard enough for you? Don’t we give you everything you want? Then why can’t you do this simple thing?”
“I- I’m trying.” You whispered, sniffling as you felt more tears glide down your cheeks.” I swear I’m trying.”
“Then try harder!” She screamed once again, causing you to flinch. “Try till you are out of breath, try till you can’t take it anymore, try till you feel like dying, you worthless piece of-”
“I came first in maths!” You interrupted her, hoping she would see some hope in you.
Suddenly you felt a sharp sting on your cheek as you stumbled to your right by the force of your mother’s slap. Blood rushed to your ears as you slowly lifted your fingers to touch your burning cheek, looking at your mother in horror.
“You disgust me so much.” She whispered, and you felt your world crack. She doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it-
Sighing, your mother walked out of the room and shut the door behind her with a bang.
Your knees gave away almost immediately as you crumbled on to the floor, the first loud sob escaping you. You slapped your hand over your mouth as you cried, the tears coming down fast.
It hurt so much. So much.
You tried so hard to make your parents proud. Not to be a disappointment. They always sacrificed so much for you. Then where were you going wrong? You always worked so hard. Then why couldn’t you be first?
Why couldn’t you be like Jihoon?
Sucking in a huge breath to control your crying, you clutched your heart at the painful thought of him.
Jihoon.
Always at ease, Lee Jihoon.
Studying must be so easy for him, with how smart he was. He didn’t even need to struggle like you. He didn’t need to throw up after every test, lose breath every time he was unable to solve any problem or cry his eyes out because he was a disappointment to his parents and they hated him.
Life must be so easy for him.
You hated him. You hated him so much.
You buried your face in your hands as another sob escaped you and you felt the entire world darken around you.
You were such a failure.
As soon as the doorbell rang, you found yourself sprinting to open the door. (You totally were not sitting in the living room waiting for him.
You opened the door with a rush, and found yourself staring back at a surprised Jihoon.
“Wow, that was quick-” He began but you cut him off to distract him. “Hey!”
Jihoon smiled at you, tilting his head a little like he always did. “Hi.”
“Come in!” You squeaked, not sure why you were feeling so nervous. Actually the fact that Jihoon would come over had you feeling jittery but now that he was actually here, you felt slightly light headed for some reason.
Was the academic tension finally getting to you?
Jihoon stepped into the house, eyes glancing around as though taking in his surroundings.
“Don’t worry.” You said, closing the door behind the two of you. “I don’t have any booby traps hidden here to get rid of you or something.”
“How do I know that?” Jihoon asked, turning to look at you with a smirk. There was his goddamned smirk again. “You might want to get rid of your competition for all I know.”
You rolled your eyes at him. “The study room is this way.” Walking in front of him, you led the way. “Besides, if I needed to get rid of competition, then I would need to blow the whole country.”
“Oh please, I’m your only competition. No one is as intelligent as you.”
The two of you were climbing up the stairs to your study room when you froze, slowly turning to look down at him.
“You- you think I’m intelligent?” You asked, your voice almost sounding hollow.
Jihoon blinked at you, as though that was a stupid question to ask. “You are literally the topper of the school, what are you even talking about?”
You huffed out a breath, not knowing you were holding in your breath. “Forget it.” You mumbled before quickening your pace on the stairs. You heard Jihoon run up the stairs until he was right beside you, and he leaned in slightly towards you.
“Come on, just because I am beating you in the past few tests you cannot think you are unworthy, can you?”
There was no way Lee Jihoon was praising you, right? “I said forget it.” You said, opening the door to your room. Then you turned to him. “And besides, if I was one of the smartest, how come I am so bad at physics? I’m not even a little bad…I’m terribly bad at it.”
Jihoon smiled, his eyes crinkling into half moons. “Which is why I am here! Don’t worry though, you still won’t be able to beat me.”
“How thoughtful of you. You don't need to worry about our competition streak too. You'll never be able to beat me in maths.”
“Good thing we've got that cleared up. Nice room by the way.” Jihoon stated, looking around as he stepped into your study room. “Where is your bed, though? Or do you sleep on your chair because I've always got the vibes that you study during your sleep time too.”
“Ha ha ha. Very funny.” You narrowed your eyes at him, pulling him a chair next to your desk. “This is my study room. Obviously I wouldn't have my bed here. That's in my bedroom.”
He looked at you in disbelief. “You have a study room and a bedroom?”
“Well…” You started, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. Something felt off with the way he had said it. Like he was actually surprised. “You are not supposed to study in the room you sleep in so… I thought- I thought you knew this.”
His face was unreadable but he shrugged. “Guess not all of us have the privilege of knowing such amazing facts.”
What did that mean?
But you chose to ignore it, signalling him to sit down as you sat on your chair. “Enough chit chat. We didn't come here to bond. I was thinking… two hours maths and then two hours physics?”
“Sounds good to me.” he said, sitting down. “You're going to give me homework, aren't you?”
You looked at him surprised. “How did you know that?”
Jihoon laughed lightly, and for some reason you felt your stomach jump a little. “Oh well remember we had reverse classes for a week in eighth grade? You gave us homework for that class and corrected it and even graded it for us.”
“Oh wow… you remember that?” You asked, feeling your cheeks heat up. “To be honest, that was a bit too much for a reverse class-”
“It was.”
You glared at him. “But now since we’re trying to improve our grades I think it would be for the best if we gave each other homework. Would let us know where we stand and how much we improved and just keep in touch with everything.”
“I agree.” he nodded.
“Wow Lee Jihoon agreeing with me? Maybe the sun will rise in the west tomorrow!”
“Very funny. For your information, I never hated your homework. If anything I thought it was cute.”
You looked at him with a horrendous look on your face. Cute? Lee jihoon called some habit of yours cute?
“Please refrain from ruining the actual meanings of words.”
“Fine, you grumpy, friendless woman-”
“Whom are you calling friendless?”
“Oh so you agree you are grumpy?”
“I-” You began, faltering a bit. You were a grumpy person. There was no denying that. But you couldn’t lose in an argument to Jihoon. Nonetheless, he smirked at you at the win, leaning in a bit as he tilted his head at you. “Cat got your tongue, sunshine?”
“No, I just realised there is no point in fighting with you if we want to help each other out.” You lied, quickly turning away to grab some mathematics books. Your face felt like it was on fire and there was no way you were going to let Jihoon see you like this.
“Anyways, I wanted to say that don’t feel stressed teaching me.” Jihoon said. “I might not be as good as you but you are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thanks for transferring the stress over from you to me.” You said dryly, opening the book to the first chapter.
“Yes and if you’re struggling with physics it’s your fault not mine because I’m an even better teacher.”
You gave him a look and he burst out laughing, causing you to shake your head in disbelief.
“No, I’m serious. You are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thank you. Now after two hours I shall let you know if the same can be said about you.”
“It’s a competition. Whoever gets more marks next week in their taught subjects is the winner.” Jihoon’s eyes glinted with mischief and the urge to wipe that smirk off his face grew stronger.
“Deal.” You gritted your teeth, not wanting to back down. “What’s at stake?”
At this Jihoon grinned at you, leaning in until your noses were just inchest apart. Did he always smell this good?
“The loser has to admit that no matter what the fluctuation in our ranks, the winner is the true first rank holder.”
You felt the corner of your lip go up in a smile, feeling the familiar rush of adrenaline every time he challenged you to something rush through your veins. “You’re on.”
“What were you thinking?” You asked (or rather demanded) as you roughly pulled apart the curtains to Mingyu’s bed, ready to strangle him for not telling you this.
In response Mingyu groaned and covered his eyes with his arms, the harsh lighting of the nurse’s cabin hitting him now that you had pulled away his curtains.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry? Do you even know what you are supposed to be sorry for?” You continued, dropping yourself on to the edge of his bed.
At this he removed his arm slightly so that he could just peer at you, before smiling sheepishly. “Uh, for fainting in class?”
You sighed, shaking your head in disbelief. “Don’t be sorry, Gyu. But why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? It could have been so much worse!”
“Relax, I was just tired. That’s all.” He said dismissively, as though that was supposed to reduce your worry.
You wondered if he too was hiding something like how you were hiding your anxiety.
No way, right? The Mingyu you knew always shared everything with you. But then, so did you… or supposedly.
“Is that all the nurse said?” You asked, still worried. Just how much was he working himself off?
At this he smiled at you. “You can ask her yourself if you still doubt me.”
You huffed. “I don’t doubt you. I’m just… worried.”
“I’m okay. I’m serious.” Mingyu answered, turning towards his side to face you properly. “I am… a bit tired though, to be honest. The nurse said I could sleep here for the next two - three classes till I have the energy to sit through a class.”
“Okay. Rest up then.” You said, making a mental note to get him some banana milk bottles from the canteen.
“Could you close the curtain?”
“Sure.” You got up to pull the curtains close when your eyes fell on the bed next to his, the curtain slightly open towards the head of the bed. You nearly audbi;y gasped when you recognised the face, especially when you saw the bruises on his cheeks and his split lips. Even though he was asleep, you could see his jaw was clenched, the tension in his face very evident.
Shutting the curtain close, you turned back to Mingyu, sitting back down on the bed and leaning towards him so that you could whisper to him.
“What is Jihoon doing here?” You whispered harshly, eyebrows knotted as you tried to think of a reason how he might have ended up in this situation. He didn’t look like someone who took others' lunch money.
Mingyu blinked at him. “Uh, because he is all battered up?”
“I know that!” You hissed. “I meant. How did he end up like this? Did he get into a fight?”
At this, Mingyu looked surprised. “Wait, don’t you know?”
“Don’t I know what?”
“That Jihoon is a popular target of some of the bullies in 3-A? They keep harassing him almost everyday.”
“What?” You felt your head spin with this new information. Jihoon? Getting bullied? But he didn’t look like the type who would let someone bully him. “But why?”
Now Mingyu was the one looking at you confused. “Do you live under a rock or something? How do you not know this about your competitor?”
“Well, probably because I do not care about the wordy affairs of my competitors. I intend to beat them through studies alone.” You said, a bit annoyed by the way Mingyu was acting. What could be such a golden piece of information that you had to know about him?
“Jihoon is one of the scholarship students. There are only two per year. How do you not know them?”
You looked at him in surprisingly, finally understanding a lot of the things he had said and done over the years. No wonder he couldn’t relate to having a separate study room and a bedroom.
Suddenly you felt like an asshole, shame and guilt creeping up your cheeks.
“What’s wrong? Did you do something to him?” Mingyu asked suspiciously.
You snorted. “I’m not that cruel. I would never stoop so low to insult him.”
“Yeah, I know. Now get out of here. I really need to get some sleep. Any Jihoon related question answer can wait.”
Waving him a goodbye, you walked out of the nurse’s cabin, glancing one last time at Jihoon’s bed.
Maybe his life wasn’t that easy as you had thought it was.
You tossed on your bed once again, sleep being the last thing on your mind. What you learnt today was pulling you down, causing your mind to run around restlessly.
Jihoon was so brave.
You knew how terrible rich kids could be and the fact that he had survived it all these years without letting it affect him so much was… admirable.
Was this why he wanted the tutoring to be done in your house only?
But I wouldn’t have made fun of him…
Then again, both of you were always fighting against each other so he probably couldn’t guarantee that you wouldn’t use it against him.
Once again you wondered what it was like to be him.
Since he wasn’t from an elite family that probably meant he never had the pressure of losing face. How nice it must be… to do well just for the sake of doing well and not because your entire family’s reputation was hanging by the thread.
One mistake and suddenly no one wanted to do anything with you.
Letting out a sigh, you finally sat up, feeling unbearably hot from all the tossing and turning you had been doing. Rubbing your eyes, you reached for your phone and opened the app, searching for Jihoon’s name.
But then you froze, fingers over the keyboard.
What do I say?
How are you?
But that would mean you saw him in that state and something told you that Jihoon wouldn’t want you to know this information. At least not in this way.
How about… how is your maths prep?
Your face lit up, and you quickly typed in the message and hit send.
There. That was a good message. Just a casual text with nothing implied at all other than how his study was going.
Suddenly, another thought crossed your mind.
Maybe I should call him? That way… you could even sneak in a
‘how are you doing? you sound tired. did something happen’ in between the conversation.
But as soon as the call went through, your eyes fell on the clock beside your bed and you let out a welp.
2:00 AM.
What were you thinking?
Quickly you cut the call and threw your phone across the bed, your heart hammering loudly in your chest.
Calling your enemy at 2 in the night suddenly felt like the dumbest thing you had done in your life. You felt your cheeks heat up when you realised Jihoon would probably tease you the next day for calling him up at such an odd hour.
What excuse could you give? You couldn’t even have ‘accidentally’ called him at this time.
Suddenly your phone rang, causing you to nearly jump. Reaching for your phone, you checked the caller id and you felt your heart stutter a little.
Lee Jihoon
For a second, you stared at the caller id, surprised that he had called you back at this time before you remembered to pick the call. “He-hello?”
“Hey.” Jihoon’s voice rumbled on the other side of the line, his voice an octave lower indicating that he was sleeping. “What’s wrong?”
“Uhm, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to wake you up-” You began rambling, beginning to regret everything now. Why did you think calling him was a good idea in the first place?
“No, no. It’s fine.” You heard him sigh a little before speaking again. “Is something wrong?”
“N-no? Why would you assume that though?”
There was a pause. “I mean, you called me up at 2 in the night. There must be something bothering you a lot, right?”
“I-” You began, not sure how to tell him exactly what was bothering you when it was him that was bothering you. “I, uh, yeah. I- I couldn’t sleep but I didn’t realise how late it was. I’m so sorry.”
You heard Jihoon chuckle. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t have picked it if it was someone else but I figured there must be something wrong if you called me at this time. So tell me sunshine, what's running in that pretty head of yours?”
Your stomach somersaulted at his sudden use of the nickname, but you managed to ignore it. “How- how are you?”
“Uh, you called me to ask how I am?”
A valid question to which you had no answer.
“Yeah, I was wondering- I was wondering if the maths homework I gave was too burdening for you!” You blurted out the first lie that came to your mind.
“How nice of you to be worried about the huge load of work you mounted on me.” He laughed and slight annoyance creeped into you. How was he this joyful after everything he was going through?
“How can you be this carefree with everything that you are going through?” You suddenly snapped, feeling angry at his non cholent behaviour.
He shouldn’t be this non cholent. He didn’t need to be.
Jihoon stopped laughing, his next few words coming out confused. “What do you mean?”
Shit.
“I- I mean,” you began, racking your head for more excuses. “I meant how can you take the homework I gave so lightly!”
“Oh, pardon me then ma’am.” He said, sounding back to his usual self. Yep, he was too good at covering this up. “I shall undertake my homework with the utmost precision and academic rigor.”
“What’s with the language?” You muttered.
“It’s fun pulling your leg.”
“Oh so you admit to torturing me?”
“Come on it’s not torture if you enjoy it too. Don’t you make fun at my expense?”
Immediately guilt racked you. Had you ever made him feel underprivileged compared to you?
“Well,” you said quietly, “I don’t want to anymore.”
Another pause. “Is everything okay?” Jihoon asked softly.
His voice sounded so soothing, like your heart was the sand and his voice was the gentle waves lapping at it.
Wait, what?
No way you just found comfort in Jihoon’s voice.
“Yeah. Yeah, everything is fine. What about you? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Everything is fine for me too. So no more thoughts ruining your sleep?”
“No.” You sighed, feeling a bit lighter despite not talking about what you actually wanted to. “I think I can get some sleep now.”
“Good. Can’t have you giving up on our rivalry so soon. If you feel like not fighting with me anymore, just talk to me. I’ll rile you up enough.”
You giggled. “Good to know you’re keeping our relationship alive.”
“Anything to see that grumpy side, sunshine.”
“Good night to you too, Jihoon.”
“Earth to Y/N?” Jihoon snapped his fingers in front of your face, causing you to let out a welp as you suddenly grounded yourself to reality.
“Huh?” You asked, smiling nervously as your eyes flicked to the physics book open in front of the two of you to try and figure out what question he might have asked.
But Jihoon caught your eye moment and that bastard just folded his arms over the book, leaning in until you had no choice but to make eye contact with him.
“Am I that handsome that you got lost staring at it?” He smirked.
“Wh- what? What an audacious thing to say!” You spluttered, cheeks heating up. But your eyes once again flicked to his right cheek, where a Mickey Mouse band aid was put on.
“It’s not audacious if it's true. Tell me,” he smirked at you. “Do I look that good?”
“I was looking at your Mickey Mouse band aid! I didn’t expect you to be those kinds of people.” You lied.
Jihoon shrugged. “My little brother gave it to me. So I thought it might look good with my outfit today.”
How did you get hurt? Who hurt you? Is it too much? How are you bearing it all alone?
There were so many questions you wanted to ask, but you were scared to privy into his matters. It was very clear he wasn’t comfortable with most people knowing it considering how you never knew this but you also didn’t want him to feel like you could weaponize this against him.
“That’s cute.”
“You know what’s cuter?” He asked, mischief glinting in his eyes. Oh no. Then leaning in, he said, “You agreeing to everything I was saying because you were distracted by my face.”
You felt your cheeks heat up furiously. “I was not distracted by your face!”
“You know, you have to be more believable than that.”
“Sorry for not being a trained liar.” You spat out, glaring at him.
“You don’t need to be a liar, just convincing enough.” He stated with a smirk.
Oh, like you? Maybe that would wipe that smirk off his face but you didn’t want to play dirty or hurt him.
“You know I know I’ve watched this series…” He suddenly began, looking out of your window. “Where two of the most brilliant students clash because they want the other person to confess first… I feel like we are like them except we are trying to get the other person to admit that they are smarter.”
You looked at him incredulously. “Are you comparing us to… Kaguya-sama?”
Jihoon looked at you surprised. “You watch anime?”
“I, uh,” Truth be told, it was your guilty pleasure. No one knew about this little secret you indulged in other than Mingyu because your parents never liked the idea of reading a bunch of comics instead of ‘real’ books and considered it a waste of time but you had loved reading them ever since you were a teenager. “I- I don’t- I mean, yes. I, uh, read manga and watch anime too.” You mumbled, not sure why you were telling him the truth.
You expected Jihoon to start laughing, call this hobby of your childish or something like that but instead, his face lit up in excitement. “Me too! I love anime so much! What’s your favourite?”
“What?” You looked at him confused. He seemed like the last person on planet earth that you would share a hobby with. “You like- you like anime too?”
“Yeah! Oh, have you watched Oshi No Ko?”
“Can you- can you keep your voice down a bit?” You asked, looking nervously at the door. You couldn’t risk letting the maids hear him. But nonetheless when you turned back to look at him you couldn’t help but smile, the enthusiasm in his eyes infectious.
Jihoon looked so soft and happy right now, a soft halo around his body from the window opposite to him, his eyes almost half moons as he beamed at you. He looked so relaxed right now… like a boy just enjoying his youth.
Not the stressed out, beaten up teenager you had seen the other day. The one fighting to keep his scholarship all these years and pretend like nothing was wrong.
“Sorry, was I too loud?” He asked, still grinning.
It was an odd thing to ask Jihoon to lower his voice because Jihoon was always on the quieter end. Unless the two of you were bickering you had never seen him talk much. “No, but- but, uhm, no one knows I like anime and I would like to keep it a secret.”
“Ah, don’t worry about that. Your secret is safe with me, sunshine.” He winked at you and you felt your heart skip a beat.
What was that?
“Thanks.” You muttered, suddenly feeling hot. You turned away from him and took a sip of your water, hoping your cheeks weren’t as hot as they felt. “I, uh, I did watch Oshi No Ko. But I just say the opening music always stole the spotlight for me.”
“Yes, YOASOBI is unparalleled, I’m afraid. Who knew I would find an anime fan in my rival.” He chuckled.
“Yeah, that’s quite unexpected.” You said, smiling at him a little. “I can’t believe we found another topic to talk about other than who’s going to beat who’s ass next test.”
“Hey, I still love those conversations! They are my real motivation.”
“Whatever.” You roll your eyes, biting your lips to prevent a smile from forming.
“Let’s go to the bookstore together, sometime.”
You turned so fast to face him that you nearly heard your neck snap but Jihoon was busy looking out of the window again.
Did he mean as a date?
Your cheeks heated up at the very thought of it, and you quickly dived down to pull out a notebook from your bag.
“Maybe if Mingyu wants, he could come too.”
Oh.
Feeling like an idiot, you sat up straight and gave him a strained smile, your cheeks on fire even more.
“Yeah sure. We could.”
“And the final answer is A.”
“Oh my god!” You whispered happily, practically stomping your feet in excitement as you drew a slash next to the last question. Glancing through your sheet once more to see if you had missed any circled question, you turned to look at Mingyu.
“I got everything right!” You giggled, just as he too looked at your paper in surprise. His smile grew when he saw all the questions were slashed, looking back at you in equal happiness.
“Congratulations! You scored perfectly in all subjects this time, didn’t you?”
“Yes! Oh my god, I can feel the week’s hard work being rewarded.” You said, feeling happiness surge through your veins. It had been so long since you felt this happy over a test in cram school that it almost felt foreign to you. You had been so stressed out all these days that you had almost forgotten how rewarding and relaxing it felt to score this good.
No wonder Jihoon was always in the mood to tease you.
Suddenly remembering him, you searched the classroom for him. Finally, you saw him sitting in the corner seat and you smirked, thinking of how you would tease him now.
But then you caught his expression and you froze.
Jihoon looked… anxious. And distraught. You could see him biting his thumb as he looked at his paper, legs all jittery.
Lee Jihoon anxious?
Guilt hit you like a truck as you continued watching him, wanting to go over and comfort him.
How many things was he hiding behind that golden boy facade? How much was he bearing all alone?
You wondered if there was anyone he could freely talk to, someone to help him get the grief off his shoulders.
Should I go over and talk to him? But he had also told you that he would rather be dead than caught being seen with you.
Then he turned back and his eyes caught yours, and you froze. But Jihoon smiled at you softly, like he wasn’t on the verge of having an anxiety attack a few seconds ago. You forced a smile for him before looking down at your paper, the win leaving a bitter taste in your mouth.
Was all this struggle really worth the pain?
Laughter and idle chatter filled the air around you, and you could feel your cheeks getting tired with every passing seconds due to the fake smile you had plastered on your face. Mingyu was on the other side of the table, stuck with some older women who were gushing to him about how amazing their daughters were.
Poor Gyu. You thought, feeling glad that your parents were too busy to try setting you up with future marriage prospects.
Of course, had it been someone else’s party they would have still done it. But since they were the hosts and stuck at the head table, they were too occupied to bother what you were doing.
Picking up the glass of juice you had been drinking since the beginning of the evening you let your eyes idly wander the crowd, taking in the guests. You had been spending the evening with some of your school friends and you hadn’t really had the chance to see who your parents had invited for this party.
You heard someone clink the glass at the table near the podium and you turned towards it, only to find your father standing up with a raised glass, clinking it again to get everyone’s attention.
“Good evening everyone.” Your father began, and you got yourself ready for another of his speeches where he subtly praised himself and put everyone else down. “I hope you all know why we are gathered here today. It’s a great pleasure being able to celebrate such an important milestone in my business with everyone present here.”
You forced another smile for your father as everyone politely clapped. You
looked around him to see who had the ‘honour’ of sitting right next to him when your eyes fell on the mother and son sitting beside your mother.
You felt your blood drain off your cheeks as you watched Jihoon smile at your father, leaning in to say something to his mother.
What was he doing here? Who invited him? And why?
His mother laughed at whatever he had said and patted his back gently, and you felt a twinge of jealousy. Your mother would have never looked at you that way, let alone comfort you.
Jihoon’s anxious face flashed across your mind and you wondered how nice it must have been to have someone supportive at home.
He reminded you of how lonely you were at times.
“But taking this opportunity I would also like to mention another thing.” Your father continued, and you turned your attention back to him. You would talk to Jihoon as soon as this speech was over.
“I would like to talk about my amazing daughter, who scored a perfect score in every subject last week, something that was a first in the cram school.”
You felt your heart lurch for the second time that evening.
Oh no. Oh no. What was he doing?
You could feel everyone’s eyes suddenly on you, and you chuckled nervously as you looked around the crowd, grasping your clammy hands underneath the table. When your eyes landed on Jihoon, you made eye contact with him, expecting to see his anxious face once again.
Because you were always in this position and you knew how it felt.
But instead… he looked happy. He smiled at you brightly and nodded, as though he didn’t mind the fact you had taken his first place.
No way. He has to be faking it. I’ll go talk to him after this and explain that I didn’t mean to gloat in front of him.
Suddenly it became clear to you why your parents had invited Jihoon and his mother over.
To show you off in front of him. To put him back in his place.
“... and I am so proud of her.” Your father finally finished, locking eye contact with you and you smiled back at him. You could feel the bile rising up your throat, the urge to throw up getting stronger.
You felt so sick. So, so sick.
Was this always the reason your parents wanted you to do well? Because you were just a trophy meant to be shown off.
“Please enjoy the rest of the night!” Your father concluded, and the hubbub filled the room again. Immediately you got up and bolted towards Jihoon’s table.
“We need to talk.” You whispered urgently even before Jihoon had turned to acknowledge you. He looked at you a bit surprised, but nodded nonetheless.
“Mom, this is Y/N.” He introduced her and you gave her a polite smile. “Hi, ma’am.”
“Hi darling, Jihoon has told me so much about you!” She exclaimed and you laughed nervously. “All good things, I hope?”
“Ah, you won’t believe what he said-”
“Okay mom! I’ll be right back!” Jihoon cut her off as he grabbed your arm and pulled you away from the table.
“Where to?” He asked, finally letting go of your arm but you grabbed his hand instead. It was warm in contrast to your cold, clammy ones.
“Let’s go to the garden.” You said urgently, pulling him behind you.
“Woah, what’s the hurry?” He asked, but you didn’t respond. “Is it because of what my mom said? She didn’t mean anything, I swear-.”
“I’m sorry.” You cut him off, finally facing him as the two of you had reached the gardens. Jihoon looked at you confused. You sucked in a deep breath. “I’m- I’m sorry for tonight. Look, I know about your financial situation. So I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry that you got dragged into this.”
Jihoon frowned. “What do you mean? Why are you sorry?”
“Because- because my parents did this on purpose!” You said, a bit exasperated now. How was he not understanding? “They just want to show off, that’s why they brought you here!”
“Are you… pitying me?” He narrowed his eyes at you. “Do you think just because I’m poor, I think my life is horrible and I cannot take some rich bratty girl’s parents’ insults? Do you think I’m such a hopelessly sad case?”
“I didn’t say that!” You snapped. “I just meant that they were trying to put you down!”
“Well, please don’t think I’m this pathetic.” He yelled, equally angry now. “I wouldn’t have come to this stupid party if I didn’t know what I would be expecting. I can handle you rich brats’ privileges very well now. And I certainly don’t need your sympathy.”
“Fine! Go ahead and do whatever the hell you want to!” You yelled, turning away and walking back to the party.
Hot tears pricked your eyes but you rapidly blinked, trying to not let them fall. As soon as you entered the party hall you made your way to the washroom, hoping no one was there.
Finding it empty, you locked yourself up in a stall, finally sinking on to the ground. You let out a sob as the first tear fell, feeling your heart break as you replayed the events that just happened in your head.
Why did you care so much about him? Why did you care if your parents were trying to put him down? Jihoon was your rival after all. You always wanted to defeat him, no matter what.
But right now you just wanted him to be happy. For him to be able to live freely.
You rubbed your eyes as more tears streamed down your face, wishing you had never fought with him in the first place.
Why did you both need to fight all the time? You really liked whatever you had with him. He always took you so seriously and acknowledged your efforts.
You sniffled, a sudden thought occurring in your head.
Oh my god. I like him.
You felt your head spin at the sudden realisation. You liked him. You liked Lee Jihoon. Your rival. The person you absolutely ‘hated’.
And as if that was a cue to your enlightenment, your phone rang. Wiping away your tears once again you looked at the caller id, and you felt your stomach lurch.
Lee Jihoon.
Clearing your throat so that you didn’t sound like you had been crying, you picked up the call.
“Hello?” Jihoon’s voice came from the other side.
“Hey.” You whispered, hoping your voice didn’t sound too hoarse.
“Can we- can we talk? I think there’s something we- I mean, I need to clear up.”
“Okay.” You mumbled. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the garden still. Where are you?”
“Uh, in the washroom.”
He paused. “Oh god, I’m so sorry I messed up big time. I’ll- I’ll explain when you come over.”
“Okay. Give me… some time.” You said, and cut the call. Letting out a breath, you pulled yourself up and exited the stall. You looked at the mirror, your eyes still watery so you splashed some water on your face before exiting the washroom.
Five minutes later, you managed to sneak out of the hall and made your way to the garden where Jihoon was still standing.
“Hey.” You said, once you were right behind him. He whipped around so fast that he almost stumbled back, but managed to catch himself on time.
“Hi.” He said, scratching his neck awkwardly. “I’m sorry.”
You sighed, closing your eyes. “What are you sorry about?”
“I acted like a complete ass. All you were trying to be was nice and explain that you weren’t a part of this hurtful plan of your parents but I just behaved like an idiot and hurt you instead.”
You opened your eyes to look at him for a while. “You did.”
“Yeah, and I’m sorry for that.” He said, refusing to make eye contact with you anymore. “I just- I just… you probably know about my bullying incident because you were there in the nurse’s room that day- yeah, you and Mingyu talk loudly- so I just got really defensive when you said you knew about my financial condition and that’s why you wanted to apologise.”
You sighed, folding your arm and looking away too. “I didn’t mean it that way. If I wanted to hurt you or look at you in disgust, I could have done it much before itself.”
“Yeah, and I realised that now. I messed up big time. I’m sorry.” He said, finally looking up at you.
“Jihoon, I admire you. You are one of the bravest people I know.” You said, looking back at him. “I would never, never ever hurt you, no matter how deep our rivalry goes. It must have been hard, having so much on the line while studying. Because I can relate to that. Maybe you don’t have your entire family’s dignity on the line but you do have something dragging you down. And I- and I care for you Jihoon.”
“Yeah. My mother sacrificed so much for me I can’t-” He choked on his words, screwing his eyes shut and balling his fists. “I can’t let her sacrifices go to waste like this.”
You didn’t know what came over you but the next thing you knew, you had thrown your arms around his neck, pulling him into an embrace.
“It’s okay.” You whispered into his ear, gently patting his back. “Your mother loves you a lot. No matter what. I could see it in her eyes. She loves you so much Jihoon.”
You heard him sniffle as you felt his arms wrap around your waist.
“Thank you.” He whispered back. “I want you to know that no matter what you do, I’ll always be proud of you too. I’m honoured to have a friend like you and I’ll always be there for you.”
You chuckled at this and pulled back so that the two of you were looking at each other, faces just inches apart.
“Thought you said we weren’t friends?” You asked.
“Did I?” He asked, one corner of his lip turning up. “That’s probably because I’ve always wanted to be more than friends with you, sunshine.”
You froze in his arms, eyes widening at this sudden confession.
Jihoon just smiled at you, though his eyes looked pained. “I know you’ll hate me more now but I’ve always liked everything about you. Your determination, your hard work, your smartness, your dedication-”
And before he could complete the list of things he liked about you, you found yourself crashing your lips into his, the force nearly causing the two of you to stumble back. But Jihoon caught himself almost immediately, kissing you back fervently.
You felt your entire body explode as he soft lips seared against yours, the world around you slowly spinning out of control. You were acutely aware of his hand on your back rubbing circles, and you tighten your arms around his neck to pull him in deeper.
Finally, what felt like hours, the two of you broke apart to catch your breaths, gasping for air.
“I cannot believe you thought riling me up was the best way to talk to me.” You muttered, lips brushing against his. Jihoon laughed, quickly pressing another kiss to your lips.
“Let’s admit it, it was a smart move.”
“It was a dumb move. I could have hated you more. Thank god I’m the smarter one.”
“It wasn’t. And I’m the smarter one. Oh, and all yours, sunshine.”
A/N: Please do tell me what you think about this story!! I worked really hard on it and I would love to know everyone’s thoughts on it~ Comments and reblogs are appreciated!
“BECAUSE I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE MORE THAN FRIENDS WITH YOU, SUNSHINE”
PAIRING || Jihoon x Female Reader
GENRES || Romance, Humour, Enemies To Lovers AU, Academic Rivals To Lovers AU, Rich Kids AU
SUMMARY || Jihoon, school's no. 1 (or no. 2), was nothing but a pain in the ass for you. Sure he was better than you in some subjects but so were you. The two of you were equally good enough for the first place so to increase the competition, he decided to suggest the most scandalous thing you had heard: the two of you tutor each other.
Or, in which, you were the rich kid with your family's dignity on the line and he was the poor kid with his family's sacrifices on the line.
WARNINGS || none
WORD COUNT || 10.6k
A/N || HI EVERYONE! Never thought I would be writing an enemies to lovers of this size but here we are. This is for the Lonely Hearts Cafe Collab by @camandemstudios !! Thank you so much for letting me particpate and do check out all the other authors here. Also moving my taglist to reblogs until tumblr fixes this horrible glitch cus its messing with the aesthetics tbh
Cram school had to be the worst phase in a teenager’s life.
You looked out of the window aimlessly, trying to drown out the teacher’s voice. It was pitch dark outside and you couldn’t really see anything, except for your own reflection staring back at you. Your hair wasn’t out of place at all, neatly brushed and clipped to keep it out of your eyes. Your school uniform was crisp and clean, as though you had decided to come to your cram school straight from home, and not after a long day of school.
But then your eyes met your reflection’s and you felt the tiredness hit you like a truckload. Your eyes looked like you had been awake for a thousand years, your eyes carrying the weight of all your previous generations. Which… wasn’t wrong in a way.
You rapidly blinked at your reflection, trying to get rid of the sleep from your eyes. Sighing, you turned your head back to the board where the teacher was explaining Faraday’s principle of electromagnetic induction, and your eyes flicked up to the clock overhead.
7.55 pm.
Five more minutes until this physics class got over.
You could survive five more minutes, right? Sure physics was the subject you dreadest the most but hey, you could bear a few minutes of it. You were doing this for four years already so five minutes shouldn’t hurt at all.
Then you made the mistake of looking at your best friend’s book, lying next to your blank one.
Kim Mingyu scribbled down furiously the concept the teacher was explaining, adding his own words to it as an indicator that he was understanding everything being taught. You watch him glance up at the board and nod his head in approval to what was being said, before looking back at his book to solve the problem.
Immediately, you felt the familiar feeling wrap around your throat, stopping any air from entering your lungs. Your fingers balled into a fist, nails digging into your palm as you tried to suck in a breath without making any noise.
The last thing you needed was for the entire class to look at you and wonder why you were hyperventilating. Screwing your eyes shut, you began doing the exercise you had looked up on the internet for anxiety attacks.
Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to-
“You okay?” Mingyu’s voice broke the chain of your thoughts, snapping you out of your mantra as you opened your eyes to look at him, trying to cover your distraught look. But no matter how well you had practiced the art of hiding your feelings, there was no secret you couldn’t keep from Mingyu.
He mirrored your expression, widening his eyes in worry as he gently touched your shoulder, edging a bit closer to you.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
You nodded, refusing to make eye contact with him. Embarrassment flooded your cheek at the thought of you getting an anxiety attack just because your best friend was able to understand the class and solve the problem.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just stifled because physics is just so hard.” You lied, hoping he won’t think too much about it.
Mingyu smiled at you softly. “Don’t worry. I know physics is eating you up but hey you aren’t that bad. Not to mention, you’re the maths topper. You can score great marks in the other subjects. One subject won’t pull you down that much.”
You knew Mingyu was lying through his teeth to make you feel better because one subject could pull down your rank because of the amount of competition, but nonetheless you felt at ease at his reassurance. Yeah, you weren’t that bad in maths, and you could try a bit more harder and improve your physics, right?
Right then the bell rang, and the teacher yelled out a few instructions to the class but you were too busy grabbing your pen and book and dumping them in your bag. You scrambled out of the class right behind the teacher, even leaving Mingyu behind as you ran straight to the washroom.
No sooner had you flung the toilet door open you puked, your stomach hurling out your lunch. After what felt like an hour you forced yourself to stop retching, gasping for breath as you clutched your hurting stomach. Your heart was still beating like crazy and a bead of sweat dropped from your forehead.
Slowly getting up, you took in a deep breath to stop your body from trembling too much. You could hear some girls chatting outside the door, and embarrassment creeped into your cheeks.
Had they heard you? No one had seen you, right?
If people found out that you were having a panic attack just because of a physics class…
You waited until the chatter outside died down before opening the door and peaking, making sure the coast was clear. It was empty, indicating that break time too was almost over.
Quitely, you slip out of the washroom and back to your classroom, walking back to your bench. Mingyu was nowhere to be seen, so you assumed he was probably in the canteen, buying some milk for the two of you.
You sat there silently for a while, your breath and heartbeat returning to normal as you took in your surroundings. Your classmates were either playing with crumpled balls of paper or chatting to each other. Your eyes then fell on one particular boy, who was completely absorbed in his book, scribbling away furiously.
Your eyes narrowed at him as you felt a pang of jealousy. Suddenly, he raised his head up and turned to look at you, both of your eyes locking and causing you to freeze in place.
Lee Jihoon smirked at you, twirling the pencil in his hand as though he knew about the little episode you just had.
Why, that asshole-
He got up and started walking in your direction, and you hastily pulled out a book from your bag and opened it to a random page to pretend like you were… well, occupied.
But of course Jihoon had to come and sit down on the bench in front of you, turning to you as he rested his elbow on your book, his palm cradling his face.
“Hey.” He said, that smirk never wavering off his face. God, he was so infuriating-
“What do you want from me?” You asked, yanking the book from his weight.
“Can I not come over and tell hi to my friend?” His cocky voice caused you to look up at him dryly.
“The dictionary definition of friends would beg to differ from what we have.”
“Damn it. I was hoping you would be too high headed to look at a dictionary.”
You scoffed.
“Not as air headed as you though, because you’re clearly wasting break time chatting with me instead of studying. You’ll need every single second to beat me in the test series next week.”
Jihoon smiled at you, his eyes glinting in amusement. I ought to punch those pearly white teeth. “Next week’s? Why not this week’s? Didn’t do so well?”
“Shut up.” You fumed, seething with his rage as he brought up memories from this week’s exams. The anxiety you had felt a few minutes ago was starting to surface up and you were not going to lose in front of him. “I’m still going to beat you in maths.”
“But beating me in math alone won’t give you the first rank.” He beamed, as though already knowing tomorrow’s results. You knew too, to be honest. You were just blatantly lying right now to save your face.
This week had been a particularly hard week, your period cramps paired with the worst chapters in every subject for the exams. While writing the exam itself you knew you were doomed, and the pain had been eating you away ever since you finished writing the test a few hours ago.
Maybe that was the reason you had a panic attack?
“Falling once won’t mean my CAT scores have been thrown out of the window.” You argue back. It was okay to fail, right?
That’s how you always calmed yourself down. There was no learning without failing after all. You had to learn from your mistakes. Next time, you would be even more flawless-
But how many more times did you need to fail to become flawless? How many times did you need to beat Jihoon until your rank was permanently 1 and not fluctuating between first and second place?
“Yeah sure. We’ll see who gets the early admissions to SNU.”
“Look, if you’re here to insult me-” You began but he looked at you hurt. This man should have become an actor instead.
“Insult you? You’re the one who has been keeping me up all night, making sure I’m giving my hundred percent no matter what! I love what we have. I’ll never insult you.” Jihoon mocked, causing you to roll your eyes at him.
“Now that felt like an insult.”
“Why were you in a rush today by the way?” He asked suddenly.
“Wh-what?” You felt your cheeks sink in as you looked at him in horror. No way- There was no way he knew, right?
If Jihoon of all people knew then- No. It couldn’t be.
“After class.” He continued, completely unfazed by your reaction. He tilted his head at you, looking at you even more lazily if anything. “You ran out. It was almost like you were dying-”
“Jihoon.” A familiar voice cut him off and never had you loved your best friend more than right now as you turned back to see a Mingyu looking at Jihoon questioningly, as though urging him to continue saying whatever it was. “What are you doing here?”
“Is it illegal to talk to you both now?” Jihoon asked sarcastically.
“No… but bullying is.”
Jihoon’s face darkened at those words, and he glared at the two of you. “Bullying? I swear you high society kids are so stuck up that even having banter is considered bullying.”
“Well, Y/N doesn’t look like she’s enjoying your… ‘banter’ very much.”
He snorted, and stood up, causing you to breathe a sigh of relief. “Fine then. Suit yourselves. I won’t bully you much if that is what is causing you so much trouble Y/N.” Giving the two of you a weird look, he walked away, going back to his bench and slumping off on his desk.
Inhaling deeply, you looked up at Mingyu and smiled. “Thanks.”
He smiled back at you, before placing a banana milk carton on the desk. “Here, I thought you weren’t feeling well so I brought some banana milk for you from the canteen.”
“Thank you!” You said, feeling a bit cheerful as you peeled off the seal and sipped it, the cold milk cooling you down just like how Mingyu had anticipated.
The door of the classroom opened again as the teacher walked in, and everyone scrambled to get to their places and greet the teacher.
As you stood up, your eyes fell on Jihoon. He looked really glum, like what Mingyu had said really offended him.
You took that as a win.
“L/N Y/N.” You flinched as the teacher spoke out your name, causing you to look up and stop rubbing your thumb finally. Sucking in a deep breath, you plastered a small, confident smile on your face before walking up to her.
Ms. Yun gave you a dry smile before extending the result sheet, and you felt your heart shatter almost immediately. Still, you just smiled back at her and took the sheet, walking back to your desk, not daring to look at your result.
Once seated (and glancing through the class quickly so that no one’s eyes was on you), you let your eyes fall onto the printed piece of paper in your hands.
Your stomach jumped.
2/246
Second place? Again? That would mean that Jihoon was-
Your grip on the paper tightened a little as tears blurred your eyes. No, no, no! I cannot cry here!
You knew it. You knew this would be the result. But still… you had hoped that maybe fate would be kind to you just this once.
You had drowned out your surroundings, staring at the numbers again and again as though if you looked long enough that two would change into one. What were you going to tell your parents?
Oh my god. What am I going to tell them-
“Y/N!”
You jerked at the sound of someone calling your voice, blinking rapidly so that there was no obvious wetness in your eyes. Your vision finally concentrated on a rather familiar face in front of you, and hatred kicked in almost as a self defense.
“Daydreaming much?” Jihoon asked, smirking at you as he tilted his head slightly.
“Not at all.” You said, smiling at him with the most fake smile you could muster. Through the corner of your eyes, you saw that most of your classmates had left, only a few going through their books one final time before leaving for break. “I don’t have that much time in my hand. Unlike you.”
“Oh well, then I must be really talented if I managed to get the first rank while daydreaming so much.” He laughed, the sound causing your heart to accelerate a little. His laughter was so annoying that you were sure you would end up with heart problems one of these days.
“Well, I did say I would beat you next week.” You said, trying not to raise your voice at him.
“You’ve been saying that to me since the beginning of this year.”
“Yeah well if you haven’t forgotten that first place was mine for the last few years.”
“And before that it was mine.”
“One year. In middle school.”
“Anyways,” you glance back at the report card. You had got second place in physics again, but first in maths. Well maybe that would be your saving grace in front of your parents. “Looks like no matter how much you try you cannot beat me in maths though.” You gave him a little smirk, leaning in a bit as though you were about to share a big secret.
“How are you acing in physics after being so bad in maths, huh?”
Now it was Jihoon’s time to scoff. “It’s the second rank. I’m just behind you by a few marks.”
“Sure you are not by hearting physics numericals?”
Jihoon leaned, suddenly catching you off guard by how close both of your faces were. But you didn’t let your expression change. “That seems like something you would do, to be honest.”
You moved away from him, raising your hand in defeat. “Well, I admit I’m, ah, a bit weak in physics. But you don’t want to accept defeat no matter what.”
“Ahahaha, I just want to admit to you. Funny how our weaknesses are complimentary, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, it’s almost like fate wants us to always be able to pit against each other.” You joked, folding away your report card and slipping it into your bag.
“Hmmm.” Jihoon agreed, looking out of the window. You watched him for a few seconds, taking in his features. His hair moved slightly from the light breeze blowing in, and you realised with a jolt just how soft and dreamy he looked right now.
Wait, what-
You banged your elbow against the table to drop your pencil case, immediately diving down to retrieve its contents. You felt like your cheeks were on fire and the last thing you needed was Jihoon to see you like this.
Why were your cheeks heating up in the first place?
Once you collected your (two) pens, you sat under the desk for a few seconds, trying to get rid of the heat on your cheeks. Deep breath, deep breath, deep breath-
“What are you doing?” Suddenly Jihoon appeared, crouching next to you, looking at you in surprise because who took so much time to pick up their pens and pencils?
“Ah!” You yelped, jerking away from him a little before offering him a sheepish smile. “I, uh, I was… just picking up my pencils!”
“Oh?” He looked confused, all cockiness from his face gone as though there was nothing to make fun of in this situation.
“Uh…yeah!” You laughed awkwardly as you showed him the pens, and he too nodded after a few seconds. “Man, you sure are slow even in daily tasks like these.”
There. There was the Lee Jihoon you knew.
“By the way, do you want to tutor each other?” He asked suddenly, sitting down on the floor as he looked at you eagerly.
Now it was your time to be confused. “Huh?”
“You know… I help you with physics and you help me with maths?”
“Huh?” You asked again, not sure you had heard correctly. Helping… each other?
Was it legal to fraternise with the enemy like this? And… tutoring each other in the weak subjects felt diminishing the competition you both had.
But then again… you really needed help with physics. Cram school wasn’t enough for you clearly, and hiring a personal tutor would mean seeing your parents waste even more money on you. You were willing to do anything to save your face. Forget your reputation, the least you could do was swallow your pride and save your family’s reputation.
“Help each other. Let’s put aside our differences and work together… at least for a month?” Jihoon explained again.
“Oh. Sure… sounds good to me.” You said. “Uh, maybe we could start from this Sunday?”
“Sure. But your house.”
“Huh? Why not the study cafe?” You asked, surprised.
“Because I'd rather be dead than be caught studying with you.” He smirked again, as though that should have been self explanatory. You rolled your eyes at him.
“Okay, but you could have been nice and invited me over to your house instead.”
At this he laughed. But when he saw that you weren’t laughing with him and just looking at him confused, he stopped, his face darkening once again. “My parents will be at home and I don’t want them to get the wrong idea.”
Now you nodded, understanding the situation. “I get it. Lucky for us, my parents won’t be home this Sunday so it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Cool then.” He said, before walking away from you, hands in his pocket as though you two hadn’t just decided to set aside your life long differences and help each other out instead.
“That’s it?” You called out, feeling a bit annoyed at how nonchalant he was while you had been overthinking if this deal was worth it.
Jihoon turned back. “What do you want?”
“No goodbyes?”
“Oh please.” He rolled his eyes, before smirking at you, causing your blood to boil once again. “We aren’t friends.”
You heard footsteps before the knock on the door, your stomach already dropping in fear. Your heart raced as you rubbed your thumb repeatedly, the page you were reading going completely blur no matter how much you tried to focus on the words in front of you.
“Y/N?”
Forcing your cheeks up for a smile, you turned on your chair to look at your mother standing by your door.
“You’re back?” You asked, trying for a small talk to calm down your nerves.
Maybe she forgot. Maybe she had a long day at work-
“Where is your report card?”
“Uh, in my- in my bag-”
“Thought I told you to keep it on my table immediately after you return from school?” Your mother said, narrowing her eyes at you. You felt your heart give an anxious squeeze, but you just gave her a small smile in an effort to reduce the tension in the room.
You walked up to your bag and pulled out the report card, biting your lips as your stomach turned. What was she going to say? Would she understand if I told her what actually happened-
“What are you doing!” You heard your mother snap at you and before you could even react you felt her snatch it away from your hand.
“I-” You began but your mother’s eyes widened, face suddenly livid with anger.
“Second? Again?” She screamed, causing you to flinch.
“I- I can explain! I wasn’t feeling well!” You said, even though you could feel your stomach sinking to the depths of hell quite literally.
“Oh, really?” Your mother laughed, the sound causing you to flinch and take a step back as fear wrapped itself around your heart. “And what was the excuse last week? Right, that you were weak in a chapter-”
“Well, I’m not lying!” You exclaimed, your voice rising out of panic. “I’m not lying, I swear!”
“Then when will you get strong, Y/N? Huh?” Suddenly your mother grabbed your shoulders, her fingers digging painfully into your flesh and you tried your best to stop the tears threatening to well your eyes.
When will you get strong? When will you?
“Answer me!” She screamed, shaking you by your shoulders. But now her face wasn’t angry anymore. It was just… hurt and disappointment.
You felt your will completely crumble and the tears rolled down.
“When will you get better?” Your mother’s voice dropped to whisper as she stared at you intensely. “When? Don’t your father and I try hard enough for you? Don’t we give you everything you want? Then why can’t you do this simple thing?”
“I- I’m trying.” You whispered, sniffling as you felt more tears glide down your cheeks.” I swear I’m trying.”
“Then try harder!” She screamed once again, causing you to flinch. “Try till you are out of breath, try till you can’t take it anymore, try till you feel like dying, you worthless piece of-”
“I came first in maths!” You interrupted her, hoping she would see some hope in you.
Suddenly you felt a sharp sting on your cheek as you stumbled to your right by the force of your mother’s slap. Blood rushed to your ears as you slowly lifted your fingers to touch your burning cheek, looking at your mother in horror.
“You disgust me so much.” She whispered, and you felt your world crack. She doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it-
Sighing, your mother walked out of the room and shut the door behind her with a bang.
Your knees gave away almost immediately as you crumbled on to the floor, the first loud sob escaping you. You slapped your hand over your mouth as you cried, the tears coming down fast.
It hurt so much. So much.
You tried so hard to make your parents proud. Not to be a disappointment. They always sacrificed so much for you. Then where were you going wrong? You always worked so hard. Then why couldn’t you be first?
Why couldn’t you be like Jihoon?
Sucking in a huge breath to control your crying, you clutched your heart at the painful thought of him.
Jihoon.
Always at ease, Lee Jihoon.
Studying must be so easy for him, with how smart he was. He didn’t even need to struggle like you. He didn’t need to throw up after every test, lose breath every time he was unable to solve any problem or cry his eyes out because he was a disappointment to his parents and they hated him.
Life must be so easy for him.
You hated him. You hated him so much.
You buried your face in your hands as another sob escaped you and you felt the entire world darken around you.
You were such a failure.
As soon as the doorbell rang, you found yourself sprinting to open the door. (You totally were not sitting in the living room waiting for him.
You opened the door with a rush, and found yourself staring back at a surprised Jihoon.
“Wow, that was quick-” He began but you cut him off to distract him. “Hey!”
Jihoon smiled at you, tilting his head a little like he always did. “Hi.”
“Come in!” You squeaked, not sure why you were feeling so nervous. Actually the fact that Jihoon would come over had you feeling jittery but now that he was actually here, you felt slightly light headed for some reason.
Was the academic tension finally getting to you?
Jihoon stepped into the house, eyes glancing around as though taking in his surroundings.
“Don’t worry.” You said, closing the door behind the two of you. “I don’t have any booby traps hidden here to get rid of you or something.”
“How do I know that?” Jihoon asked, turning to look at you with a smirk. There was his goddamned smirk again. “You might want to get rid of your competition for all I know.”
You rolled your eyes at him. “The study room is this way.” Walking in front of him, you led the way. “Besides, if I needed to get rid of competition, then I would need to blow the whole country.”
“Oh please, I’m your only competition. No one is as intelligent as you.”
The two of you were climbing up the stairs to your study room when you froze, slowly turning to look down at him.
“You- you think I’m intelligent?” You asked, your voice almost sounding hollow.
Jihoon blinked at you, as though that was a stupid question to ask. “You are literally the topper of the school, what are you even talking about?”
You huffed out a breath, not knowing you were holding in your breath. “Forget it.” You mumbled before quickening your pace on the stairs. You heard Jihoon run up the stairs until he was right beside you, and he leaned in slightly towards you.
“Come on, just because I am beating you in the past few tests you cannot think you are unworthy, can you?”
There was no way Lee Jihoon was praising you, right? “I said forget it.” You said, opening the door to your room. Then you turned to him. “And besides, if I was one of the smartest, how come I am so bad at physics? I’m not even a little bad…I’m terribly bad at it.”
Jihoon smiled, his eyes crinkling into half moons. “Which is why I am here! Don’t worry though, you still won’t be able to beat me.”
“How thoughtful of you. You don't need to worry about our competition streak too. You'll never be able to beat me in maths.”
“Good thing we've got that cleared up. Nice room by the way.” Jihoon stated, looking around as he stepped into your study room. “Where is your bed, though? Or do you sleep on your chair because I've always got the vibes that you study during your sleep time too.”
“Ha ha ha. Very funny.” You narrowed your eyes at him, pulling him a chair next to your desk. “This is my study room. Obviously I wouldn't have my bed here. That's in my bedroom.”
He looked at you in disbelief. “You have a study room and a bedroom?”
“Well…” You started, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. Something felt off with the way he had said it. Like he was actually surprised. “You are not supposed to study in the room you sleep in so… I thought- I thought you knew this.”
His face was unreadable but he shrugged. “Guess not all of us have the privilege of knowing such amazing facts.”
What did that mean?
But you chose to ignore it, signalling him to sit down as you sat on your chair. “Enough chit chat. We didn't come here to bond. I was thinking… two hours maths and then two hours physics?”
“Sounds good to me.” he said, sitting down. “You're going to give me homework, aren't you?”
You looked at him surprised. “How did you know that?”
Jihoon laughed lightly, and for some reason you felt your stomach jump a little. “Oh well remember we had reverse classes for a week in eighth grade? You gave us homework for that class and corrected it and even graded it for us.”
“Oh wow… you remember that?” You asked, feeling your cheeks heat up. “To be honest, that was a bit too much for a reverse class-”
“It was.”
You glared at him. “But now since we’re trying to improve our grades I think it would be for the best if we gave each other homework. Would let us know where we stand and how much we improved and just keep in touch with everything.”
“I agree.” he nodded.
“Wow Lee Jihoon agreeing with me? Maybe the sun will rise in the west tomorrow!”
“Very funny. For your information, I never hated your homework. If anything I thought it was cute.”
You looked at him with a horrendous look on your face. Cute? Lee jihoon called some habit of yours cute?
“Please refrain from ruining the actual meanings of words.”
“Fine, you grumpy, friendless woman-”
“Whom are you calling friendless?”
“Oh so you agree you are grumpy?”
“I-” You began, faltering a bit. You were a grumpy person. There was no denying that. But you couldn’t lose in an argument to Jihoon. Nonetheless, he smirked at you at the win, leaning in a bit as he tilted his head at you. “Cat got your tongue, sunshine?”
“No, I just realised there is no point in fighting with you if we want to help each other out.” You lied, quickly turning away to grab some mathematics books. Your face felt like it was on fire and there was no way you were going to let Jihoon see you like this.
“Anyways, I wanted to say that don’t feel stressed teaching me.” Jihoon said. “I might not be as good as you but you are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thanks for transferring the stress over from you to me.” You said dryly, opening the book to the first chapter.
“Yes and if you’re struggling with physics it’s your fault not mine because I’m an even better teacher.”
You gave him a look and he burst out laughing, causing you to shake your head in disbelief.
“No, I’m serious. You are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thank you. Now after two hours I shall let you know if the same can be said about you.”
“It’s a competition. Whoever gets more marks next week in their taught subjects is the winner.” Jihoon’s eyes glinted with mischief and the urge to wipe that smirk off his face grew stronger.
“Deal.” You gritted your teeth, not wanting to back down. “What’s at stake?”
At this Jihoon grinned at you, leaning in until your noses were just inchest apart. Did he always smell this good?
“The loser has to admit that no matter what the fluctuation in our ranks, the winner is the true first rank holder.”
You felt the corner of your lip go up in a smile, feeling the familiar rush of adrenaline every time he challenged you to something rush through your veins. “You’re on.”
“What were you thinking?” You asked (or rather demanded) as you roughly pulled apart the curtains to Mingyu’s bed, ready to strangle him for not telling you this.
In response Mingyu groaned and covered his eyes with his arms, the harsh lighting of the nurse’s cabin hitting him now that you had pulled away his curtains.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry? Do you even know what you are supposed to be sorry for?” You continued, dropping yourself on to the edge of his bed.
At this he removed his arm slightly so that he could just peer at you, before smiling sheepishly. “Uh, for fainting in class?”
You sighed, shaking your head in disbelief. “Don’t be sorry, Gyu. But why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? It could have been so much worse!”
“Relax, I was just tired. That’s all.” He said dismissively, as though that was supposed to reduce your worry.
You wondered if he too was hiding something like how you were hiding your anxiety.
No way, right? The Mingyu you knew always shared everything with you. But then, so did you… or supposedly.
“Is that all the nurse said?” You asked, still worried. Just how much was he working himself off?
At this he smiled at you. “You can ask her yourself if you still doubt me.”
You huffed. “I don’t doubt you. I’m just… worried.”
“I’m okay. I’m serious.” Mingyu answered, turning towards his side to face you properly. “I am… a bit tired though, to be honest. The nurse said I could sleep here for the next two - three classes till I have the energy to sit through a class.”
“Okay. Rest up then.” You said, making a mental note to get him some banana milk bottles from the canteen.
“Could you close the curtain?”
“Sure.” You got up to pull the curtains close when your eyes fell on the bed next to his, the curtain slightly open towards the head of the bed. You nearly audbi;y gasped when you recognised the face, especially when you saw the bruises on his cheeks and his split lips. Even though he was asleep, you could see his jaw was clenched, the tension in his face very evident.
Shutting the curtain close, you turned back to Mingyu, sitting back down on the bed and leaning towards him so that you could whisper to him.
“What is Jihoon doing here?” You whispered harshly, eyebrows knotted as you tried to think of a reason how he might have ended up in this situation. He didn’t look like someone who took others' lunch money.
Mingyu blinked at him. “Uh, because he is all battered up?”
“I know that!” You hissed. “I meant. How did he end up like this? Did he get into a fight?”
At this, Mingyu looked surprised. “Wait, don’t you know?”
“Don’t I know what?”
“That Jihoon is a popular target of some of the bullies in 3-A? They keep harassing him almost everyday.”
“What?” You felt your head spin with this new information. Jihoon? Getting bullied? But he didn’t look like the type who would let someone bully him. “But why?”
Now Mingyu was the one looking at you confused. “Do you live under a rock or something? How do you not know this about your competitor?”
“Well, probably because I do not care about the wordy affairs of my competitors. I intend to beat them through studies alone.” You said, a bit annoyed by the way Mingyu was acting. What could be such a golden piece of information that you had to know about him?
“Jihoon is one of the scholarship students. There are only two per year. How do you not know them?”
You looked at him in surprisingly, finally understanding a lot of the things he had said and done over the years. No wonder he couldn’t relate to having a separate study room and a bedroom.
Suddenly you felt like an asshole, shame and guilt creeping up your cheeks.
“What’s wrong? Did you do something to him?” Mingyu asked suspiciously.
You snorted. “I’m not that cruel. I would never stoop so low to insult him.”
“Yeah, I know. Now get out of here. I really need to get some sleep. Any Jihoon related question answer can wait.”
Waving him a goodbye, you walked out of the nurse’s cabin, glancing one last time at Jihoon’s bed.
Maybe his life wasn’t that easy as you had thought it was.
You tossed on your bed once again, sleep being the last thing on your mind. What you learnt today was pulling you down, causing your mind to run around restlessly.
Jihoon was so brave.
You knew how terrible rich kids could be and the fact that he had survived it all these years without letting it affect him so much was… admirable.
Was this why he wanted the tutoring to be done in your house only?
But I wouldn’t have made fun of him…
Then again, both of you were always fighting against each other so he probably couldn’t guarantee that you wouldn’t use it against him.
Once again you wondered what it was like to be him.
Since he wasn’t from an elite family that probably meant he never had the pressure of losing face. How nice it must be… to do well just for the sake of doing well and not because your entire family’s reputation was hanging by the thread.
One mistake and suddenly no one wanted to do anything with you.
Letting out a sigh, you finally sat up, feeling unbearably hot from all the tossing and turning you had been doing. Rubbing your eyes, you reached for your phone and opened the app, searching for Jihoon’s name.
But then you froze, fingers over the keyboard.
What do I say?
How are you?
But that would mean you saw him in that state and something told you that Jihoon wouldn’t want you to know this information. At least not in this way.
How about… how is your maths prep?
Your face lit up, and you quickly typed in the message and hit send.
There. That was a good message. Just a casual text with nothing implied at all other than how his study was going.
Suddenly, another thought crossed your mind.
Maybe I should call him? That way… you could even sneak in a
‘how are you doing? you sound tired. did something happen’ in between the conversation.
But as soon as the call went through, your eyes fell on the clock beside your bed and you let out a welp.
2:00 AM.
What were you thinking?
Quickly you cut the call and threw your phone across the bed, your heart hammering loudly in your chest.
Calling your enemy at 2 in the night suddenly felt like the dumbest thing you had done in your life. You felt your cheeks heat up when you realised Jihoon would probably tease you the next day for calling him up at such an odd hour.
What excuse could you give? You couldn’t even have ‘accidentally’ called him at this time.
Suddenly your phone rang, causing you to nearly jump. Reaching for your phone, you checked the caller id and you felt your heart stutter a little.
Lee Jihoon
For a second, you stared at the caller id, surprised that he had called you back at this time before you remembered to pick the call. “He-hello?”
“Hey.” Jihoon’s voice rumbled on the other side of the line, his voice an octave lower indicating that he was sleeping. “What’s wrong?”
“Uhm, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to wake you up-” You began rambling, beginning to regret everything now. Why did you think calling him was a good idea in the first place?
“No, no. It’s fine.” You heard him sigh a little before speaking again. “Is something wrong?”
“N-no? Why would you assume that though?”
There was a pause. “I mean, you called me up at 2 in the night. There must be something bothering you a lot, right?”
“I-” You began, not sure how to tell him exactly what was bothering you when it was him that was bothering you. “I, uh, yeah. I- I couldn’t sleep but I didn’t realise how late it was. I’m so sorry.”
You heard Jihoon chuckle. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t have picked it if it was someone else but I figured there must be something wrong if you called me at this time. So tell me sunshine, what's running in that pretty head of yours?”
Your stomach somersaulted at his sudden use of the nickname, but you managed to ignore it. “How- how are you?”
“Uh, you called me to ask how I am?”
A valid question to which you had no answer.
“Yeah, I was wondering- I was wondering if the maths homework I gave was too burdening for you!” You blurted out the first lie that came to your mind.
“How nice of you to be worried about the huge load of work you mounted on me.” He laughed and slight annoyance creeped into you. How was he this joyful after everything he was going through?
“How can you be this carefree with everything that you are going through?” You suddenly snapped, feeling angry at his non cholent behaviour.
He shouldn’t be this non cholent. He didn’t need to be.
Jihoon stopped laughing, his next few words coming out confused. “What do you mean?”
Shit.
“I- I mean,” you began, racking your head for more excuses. “I meant how can you take the homework I gave so lightly!”
“Oh, pardon me then ma’am.” He said, sounding back to his usual self. Yep, he was too good at covering this up. “I shall undertake my homework with the utmost precision and academic rigor.”
“What’s with the language?” You muttered.
“It’s fun pulling your leg.”
“Oh so you admit to torturing me?”
“Come on it’s not torture if you enjoy it too. Don’t you make fun at my expense?”
Immediately guilt racked you. Had you ever made him feel underprivileged compared to you?
“Well,” you said quietly, “I don’t want to anymore.”
Another pause. “Is everything okay?” Jihoon asked softly.
His voice sounded so soothing, like your heart was the sand and his voice was the gentle waves lapping at it.
Wait, what?
No way you just found comfort in Jihoon’s voice.
“Yeah. Yeah, everything is fine. What about you? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Everything is fine for me too. So no more thoughts ruining your sleep?”
“No.” You sighed, feeling a bit lighter despite not talking about what you actually wanted to. “I think I can get some sleep now.”
“Good. Can’t have you giving up on our rivalry so soon. If you feel like not fighting with me anymore, just talk to me. I’ll rile you up enough.”
You giggled. “Good to know you’re keeping our relationship alive.”
“Anything to see that grumpy side, sunshine.”
“Good night to you too, Jihoon.”
“Earth to Y/N?” Jihoon snapped his fingers in front of your face, causing you to let out a welp as you suddenly grounded yourself to reality.
“Huh?” You asked, smiling nervously as your eyes flicked to the physics book open in front of the two of you to try and figure out what question he might have asked.
But Jihoon caught your eye moment and that bastard just folded his arms over the book, leaning in until you had no choice but to make eye contact with him.
“Am I that handsome that you got lost staring at it?” He smirked.
“Wh- what? What an audacious thing to say!” You spluttered, cheeks heating up. But your eyes once again flicked to his right cheek, where a Mickey Mouse band aid was put on.
“It’s not audacious if it's true. Tell me,” he smirked at you. “Do I look that good?”
“I was looking at your Mickey Mouse band aid! I didn’t expect you to be those kinds of people.” You lied.
Jihoon shrugged. “My little brother gave it to me. So I thought it might look good with my outfit today.”
How did you get hurt? Who hurt you? Is it too much? How are you bearing it all alone?
There were so many questions you wanted to ask, but you were scared to privy into his matters. It was very clear he wasn’t comfortable with most people knowing it considering how you never knew this but you also didn’t want him to feel like you could weaponize this against him.
“That’s cute.”
“You know what’s cuter?” He asked, mischief glinting in his eyes. Oh no. Then leaning in, he said, “You agreeing to everything I was saying because you were distracted by my face.”
You felt your cheeks heat up furiously. “I was not distracted by your face!”
“You know, you have to be more believable than that.”
“Sorry for not being a trained liar.” You spat out, glaring at him.
“You don’t need to be a liar, just convincing enough.” He stated with a smirk.
Oh, like you? Maybe that would wipe that smirk off his face but you didn’t want to play dirty or hurt him.
“You know I know I’ve watched this series…” He suddenly began, looking out of your window. “Where two of the most brilliant students clash because they want the other person to confess first… I feel like we are like them except we are trying to get the other person to admit that they are smarter.”
You looked at him incredulously. “Are you comparing us to… Kaguya-sama?”
Jihoon looked at you surprised. “You watch anime?”
“I, uh,” Truth be told, it was your guilty pleasure. No one knew about this little secret you indulged in other than Mingyu because your parents never liked the idea of reading a bunch of comics instead of ‘real’ books and considered it a waste of time but you had loved reading them ever since you were a teenager. “I- I don’t- I mean, yes. I, uh, read manga and watch anime too.” You mumbled, not sure why you were telling him the truth.
You expected Jihoon to start laughing, call this hobby of your childish or something like that but instead, his face lit up in excitement. “Me too! I love anime so much! What’s your favourite?”
“What?” You looked at him confused. He seemed like the last person on planet earth that you would share a hobby with. “You like- you like anime too?”
“Yeah! Oh, have you watched Oshi No Ko?”
“Can you- can you keep your voice down a bit?” You asked, looking nervously at the door. You couldn’t risk letting the maids hear him. But nonetheless when you turned back to look at him you couldn’t help but smile, the enthusiasm in his eyes infectious.
Jihoon looked so soft and happy right now, a soft halo around his body from the window opposite to him, his eyes almost half moons as he beamed at you. He looked so relaxed right now… like a boy just enjoying his youth.
Not the stressed out, beaten up teenager you had seen the other day. The one fighting to keep his scholarship all these years and pretend like nothing was wrong.
“Sorry, was I too loud?” He asked, still grinning.
It was an odd thing to ask Jihoon to lower his voice because Jihoon was always on the quieter end. Unless the two of you were bickering you had never seen him talk much. “No, but- but, uhm, no one knows I like anime and I would like to keep it a secret.”
“Ah, don’t worry about that. Your secret is safe with me, sunshine.” He winked at you and you felt your heart skip a beat.
What was that?
“Thanks.” You muttered, suddenly feeling hot. You turned away from him and took a sip of your water, hoping your cheeks weren’t as hot as they felt. “I, uh, I did watch Oshi No Ko. But I just say the opening music always stole the spotlight for me.”
“Yes, YOASOBI is unparalleled, I’m afraid. Who knew I would find an anime fan in my rival.” He chuckled.
“Yeah, that’s quite unexpected.” You said, smiling at him a little. “I can’t believe we found another topic to talk about other than who’s going to beat who’s ass next test.”
“Hey, I still love those conversations! They are my real motivation.”
“Whatever.” You roll your eyes, biting your lips to prevent a smile from forming.
“Let’s go to the bookstore together, sometime.”
You turned so fast to face him that you nearly heard your neck snap but Jihoon was busy looking out of the window again.
Did he mean as a date?
Your cheeks heated up at the very thought of it, and you quickly dived down to pull out a notebook from your bag.
“Maybe if Mingyu wants, he could come too.”
Oh.
Feeling like an idiot, you sat up straight and gave him a strained smile, your cheeks on fire even more.
“Yeah sure. We could.”
“And the final answer is A.”
“Oh my god!” You whispered happily, practically stomping your feet in excitement as you drew a slash next to the last question. Glancing through your sheet once more to see if you had missed any circled question, you turned to look at Mingyu.
“I got everything right!” You giggled, just as he too looked at your paper in surprise. His smile grew when he saw all the questions were slashed, looking back at you in equal happiness.
“Congratulations! You scored perfectly in all subjects this time, didn’t you?”
“Yes! Oh my god, I can feel the week’s hard work being rewarded.” You said, feeling happiness surge through your veins. It had been so long since you felt this happy over a test in cram school that it almost felt foreign to you. You had been so stressed out all these days that you had almost forgotten how rewarding and relaxing it felt to score this good.
No wonder Jihoon was always in the mood to tease you.
Suddenly remembering him, you searched the classroom for him. Finally, you saw him sitting in the corner seat and you smirked, thinking of how you would tease him now.
But then you caught his expression and you froze.
Jihoon looked… anxious. And distraught. You could see him biting his thumb as he looked at his paper, legs all jittery.
Lee Jihoon anxious?
Guilt hit you like a truck as you continued watching him, wanting to go over and comfort him.
How many things was he hiding behind that golden boy facade? How much was he bearing all alone?
You wondered if there was anyone he could freely talk to, someone to help him get the grief off his shoulders.
Should I go over and talk to him? But he had also told you that he would rather be dead than caught being seen with you.
Then he turned back and his eyes caught yours, and you froze. But Jihoon smiled at you softly, like he wasn’t on the verge of having an anxiety attack a few seconds ago. You forced a smile for him before looking down at your paper, the win leaving a bitter taste in your mouth.
Was all this struggle really worth the pain?
Laughter and idle chatter filled the air around you, and you could feel your cheeks getting tired with every passing seconds due to the fake smile you had plastered on your face. Mingyu was on the other side of the table, stuck with some older women who were gushing to him about how amazing their daughters were.
Poor Gyu. You thought, feeling glad that your parents were too busy to try setting you up with future marriage prospects.
Of course, had it been someone else’s party they would have still done it. But since they were the hosts and stuck at the head table, they were too occupied to bother what you were doing.
Picking up the glass of juice you had been drinking since the beginning of the evening you let your eyes idly wander the crowd, taking in the guests. You had been spending the evening with some of your school friends and you hadn’t really had the chance to see who your parents had invited for this party.
You heard someone clink the glass at the table near the podium and you turned towards it, only to find your father standing up with a raised glass, clinking it again to get everyone’s attention.
“Good evening everyone.” Your father began, and you got yourself ready for another of his speeches where he subtly praised himself and put everyone else down. “I hope you all know why we are gathered here today. It’s a great pleasure being able to celebrate such an important milestone in my business with everyone present here.”
You forced another smile for your father as everyone politely clapped. You
looked around him to see who had the ‘honour’ of sitting right next to him when your eyes fell on the mother and son sitting beside your mother.
You felt your blood drain off your cheeks as you watched Jihoon smile at your father, leaning in to say something to his mother.
What was he doing here? Who invited him? And why?
His mother laughed at whatever he had said and patted his back gently, and you felt a twinge of jealousy. Your mother would have never looked at you that way, let alone comfort you.
Jihoon’s anxious face flashed across your mind and you wondered how nice it must have been to have someone supportive at home.
He reminded you of how lonely you were at times.
“But taking this opportunity I would also like to mention another thing.” Your father continued, and you turned your attention back to him. You would talk to Jihoon as soon as this speech was over.
“I would like to talk about my amazing daughter, who scored a perfect score in every subject last week, something that was a first in the cram school.”
You felt your heart lurch for the second time that evening.
Oh no. Oh no. What was he doing?
You could feel everyone’s eyes suddenly on you, and you chuckled nervously as you looked around the crowd, grasping your clammy hands underneath the table. When your eyes landed on Jihoon, you made eye contact with him, expecting to see his anxious face once again.
Because you were always in this position and you knew how it felt.
But instead… he looked happy. He smiled at you brightly and nodded, as though he didn’t mind the fact you had taken his first place.
No way. He has to be faking it. I’ll go talk to him after this and explain that I didn’t mean to gloat in front of him.
Suddenly it became clear to you why your parents had invited Jihoon and his mother over.
To show you off in front of him. To put him back in his place.
“... and I am so proud of her.” Your father finally finished, locking eye contact with you and you smiled back at him. You could feel the bile rising up your throat, the urge to throw up getting stronger.
You felt so sick. So, so sick.
Was this always the reason your parents wanted you to do well? Because you were just a trophy meant to be shown off.
“Please enjoy the rest of the night!” Your father concluded, and the hubbub filled the room again. Immediately you got up and bolted towards Jihoon’s table.
“We need to talk.” You whispered urgently even before Jihoon had turned to acknowledge you. He looked at you a bit surprised, but nodded nonetheless.
“Mom, this is Y/N.” He introduced her and you gave her a polite smile. “Hi, ma’am.”
“Hi darling, Jihoon has told me so much about you!” She exclaimed and you laughed nervously. “All good things, I hope?”
“Ah, you won’t believe what he said-”
“Okay mom! I’ll be right back!” Jihoon cut her off as he grabbed your arm and pulled you away from the table.
“Where to?” He asked, finally letting go of your arm but you grabbed his hand instead. It was warm in contrast to your cold, clammy ones.
“Let’s go to the garden.” You said urgently, pulling him behind you.
“Woah, what’s the hurry?” He asked, but you didn’t respond. “Is it because of what my mom said? She didn’t mean anything, I swear-.”
“I’m sorry.” You cut him off, finally facing him as the two of you had reached the gardens. Jihoon looked at you confused. You sucked in a deep breath. “I’m- I’m sorry for tonight. Look, I know about your financial situation. So I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry that you got dragged into this.”
Jihoon frowned. “What do you mean? Why are you sorry?”
“Because- because my parents did this on purpose!” You said, a bit exasperated now. How was he not understanding? “They just want to show off, that’s why they brought you here!”
“Are you… pitying me?” He narrowed his eyes at you. “Do you think just because I’m poor, I think my life is horrible and I cannot take some rich bratty girl’s parents’ insults? Do you think I’m such a hopelessly sad case?”
“I didn’t say that!” You snapped. “I just meant that they were trying to put you down!”
“Well, please don’t think I’m this pathetic.” He yelled, equally angry now. “I wouldn’t have come to this stupid party if I didn’t know what I would be expecting. I can handle you rich brats’ privileges very well now. And I certainly don’t need your sympathy.”
“Fine! Go ahead and do whatever the hell you want to!” You yelled, turning away and walking back to the party.
Hot tears pricked your eyes but you rapidly blinked, trying to not let them fall. As soon as you entered the party hall you made your way to the washroom, hoping no one was there.
Finding it empty, you locked yourself up in a stall, finally sinking on to the ground. You let out a sob as the first tear fell, feeling your heart break as you replayed the events that just happened in your head.
Why did you care so much about him? Why did you care if your parents were trying to put him down? Jihoon was your rival after all. You always wanted to defeat him, no matter what.
But right now you just wanted him to be happy. For him to be able to live freely.
You rubbed your eyes as more tears streamed down your face, wishing you had never fought with him in the first place.
Why did you both need to fight all the time? You really liked whatever you had with him. He always took you so seriously and acknowledged your efforts.
You sniffled, a sudden thought occurring in your head.
Oh my god. I like him.
You felt your head spin at the sudden realisation. You liked him. You liked Lee Jihoon. Your rival. The person you absolutely ‘hated’.
And as if that was a cue to your enlightenment, your phone rang. Wiping away your tears once again you looked at the caller id, and you felt your stomach lurch.
Lee Jihoon.
Clearing your throat so that you didn’t sound like you had been crying, you picked up the call.
“Hello?” Jihoon’s voice came from the other side.
“Hey.” You whispered, hoping your voice didn’t sound too hoarse.
“Can we- can we talk? I think there’s something we- I mean, I need to clear up.”
“Okay.” You mumbled. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the garden still. Where are you?”
“Uh, in the washroom.”
He paused. “Oh god, I’m so sorry I messed up big time. I’ll- I’ll explain when you come over.”
“Okay. Give me… some time.” You said, and cut the call. Letting out a breath, you pulled yourself up and exited the stall. You looked at the mirror, your eyes still watery so you splashed some water on your face before exiting the washroom.
Five minutes later, you managed to sneak out of the hall and made your way to the garden where Jihoon was still standing.
“Hey.” You said, once you were right behind him. He whipped around so fast that he almost stumbled back, but managed to catch himself on time.
“Hi.” He said, scratching his neck awkwardly. “I’m sorry.”
You sighed, closing your eyes. “What are you sorry about?”
“I acted like a complete ass. All you were trying to be was nice and explain that you weren’t a part of this hurtful plan of your parents but I just behaved like an idiot and hurt you instead.”
You opened your eyes to look at him for a while. “You did.”
“Yeah, and I’m sorry for that.” He said, refusing to make eye contact with you anymore. “I just- I just… you probably know about my bullying incident because you were there in the nurse’s room that day- yeah, you and Mingyu talk loudly- so I just got really defensive when you said you knew about my financial condition and that’s why you wanted to apologise.”
You sighed, folding your arm and looking away too. “I didn’t mean it that way. If I wanted to hurt you or look at you in disgust, I could have done it much before itself.”
“Yeah, and I realised that now. I messed up big time. I’m sorry.” He said, finally looking up at you.
“Jihoon, I admire you. You are one of the bravest people I know.” You said, looking back at him. “I would never, never ever hurt you, no matter how deep our rivalry goes. It must have been hard, having so much on the line while studying. Because I can relate to that. Maybe you don’t have your entire family’s dignity on the line but you do have something dragging you down. And I- and I care for you Jihoon.”
“Yeah. My mother sacrificed so much for me I can’t-” He choked on his words, screwing his eyes shut and balling his fists. “I can’t let her sacrifices go to waste like this.”
You didn’t know what came over you but the next thing you knew, you had thrown your arms around his neck, pulling him into an embrace.
“It’s okay.” You whispered into his ear, gently patting his back. “Your mother loves you a lot. No matter what. I could see it in her eyes. She loves you so much Jihoon.”
You heard him sniffle as you felt his arms wrap around your waist.
“Thank you.” He whispered back. “I want you to know that no matter what you do, I’ll always be proud of you too. I’m honoured to have a friend like you and I’ll always be there for you.”
You chuckled at this and pulled back so that the two of you were looking at each other, faces just inches apart.
“Thought you said we weren’t friends?” You asked.
“Did I?” He asked, one corner of his lip turning up. “That’s probably because I’ve always wanted to be more than friends with you, sunshine.”
You froze in his arms, eyes widening at this sudden confession.
Jihoon just smiled at you, though his eyes looked pained. “I know you’ll hate me more now but I’ve always liked everything about you. Your determination, your hard work, your smartness, your dedication-”
And before he could complete the list of things he liked about you, you found yourself crashing your lips into his, the force nearly causing the two of you to stumble back. But Jihoon caught himself almost immediately, kissing you back fervently.
You felt your entire body explode as he soft lips seared against yours, the world around you slowly spinning out of control. You were acutely aware of his hand on your back rubbing circles, and you tighten your arms around his neck to pull him in deeper.
Finally, what felt like hours, the two of you broke apart to catch your breaths, gasping for air.
“I cannot believe you thought riling me up was the best way to talk to me.” You muttered, lips brushing against his. Jihoon laughed, quickly pressing another kiss to your lips.
“Let’s admit it, it was a smart move.”
“It was a dumb move. I could have hated you more. Thank god I’m the smarter one.”
“It wasn’t. And I’m the smarter one. Oh, and all yours, sunshine.”
A/N: Please do tell me what you think about this story!! I worked really hard on it and I would love to know everyone’s thoughts on it~ Comments and reblogs are appreciated!
“BECAUSE I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE MORE THAN FRIENDS WITH YOU, SUNSHINE”
PAIRING || Jihoon x Female Reader
GENRES || Romance, Humour, Enemies To Lovers AU, Academic Rivals To Lovers AU, Rich Kids AU
SUMMARY || Jihoon, school's no. 1 (or no. 2), was nothing but a pain in the ass for you. Sure he was better than you in some subjects but so were you. The two of you were equally good enough for the first place so to increase the competition, he decided to suggest the most scandalous thing you had heard: the two of you tutor each other.
Or, in which, you were the rich kid with your family's dignity on the line and he was the poor kid with his family's sacrifices on the line.
WARNINGS || none
WORD COUNT || 10.6k
A/N || HI EVERYONE! Never thought I would be writing an enemies to lovers of this size but here we are. This is for the Lonely Hearts Cafe Collab by @camandemstudios !! Thank you so much for letting me particpate and do check out all the other authors here. Also moving my taglist to reblogs until tumblr fixes this horrible glitch cus its messing with the aesthetics tbh
Cram school had to be the worst phase in a teenager’s life.
You looked out of the window aimlessly, trying to drown out the teacher’s voice. It was pitch dark outside and you couldn’t really see anything, except for your own reflection staring back at you. Your hair wasn’t out of place at all, neatly brushed and clipped to keep it out of your eyes. Your school uniform was crisp and clean, as though you had decided to come to your cram school straight from home, and not after a long day of school.
But then your eyes met your reflection’s and you felt the tiredness hit you like a truckload. Your eyes looked like you had been awake for a thousand years, your eyes carrying the weight of all your previous generations. Which… wasn’t wrong in a way.
You rapidly blinked at your reflection, trying to get rid of the sleep from your eyes. Sighing, you turned your head back to the board where the teacher was explaining Faraday’s principle of electromagnetic induction, and your eyes flicked up to the clock overhead.
7.55 pm.
Five more minutes until this physics class got over.
You could survive five more minutes, right? Sure physics was the subject you dreadest the most but hey, you could bear a few minutes of it. You were doing this for four years already so five minutes shouldn’t hurt at all.
Then you made the mistake of looking at your best friend’s book, lying next to your blank one.
Kim Mingyu scribbled down furiously the concept the teacher was explaining, adding his own words to it as an indicator that he was understanding everything being taught. You watch him glance up at the board and nod his head in approval to what was being said, before looking back at his book to solve the problem.
Immediately, you felt the familiar feeling wrap around your throat, stopping any air from entering your lungs. Your fingers balled into a fist, nails digging into your palm as you tried to suck in a breath without making any noise.
The last thing you needed was for the entire class to look at you and wonder why you were hyperventilating. Screwing your eyes shut, you began doing the exercise you had looked up on the internet for anxiety attacks.
Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to-
“You okay?” Mingyu’s voice broke the chain of your thoughts, snapping you out of your mantra as you opened your eyes to look at him, trying to cover your distraught look. But no matter how well you had practiced the art of hiding your feelings, there was no secret you couldn’t keep from Mingyu.
He mirrored your expression, widening his eyes in worry as he gently touched your shoulder, edging a bit closer to you.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
You nodded, refusing to make eye contact with him. Embarrassment flooded your cheek at the thought of you getting an anxiety attack just because your best friend was able to understand the class and solve the problem.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just stifled because physics is just so hard.” You lied, hoping he won’t think too much about it.
Mingyu smiled at you softly. “Don’t worry. I know physics is eating you up but hey you aren’t that bad. Not to mention, you’re the maths topper. You can score great marks in the other subjects. One subject won’t pull you down that much.”
You knew Mingyu was lying through his teeth to make you feel better because one subject could pull down your rank because of the amount of competition, but nonetheless you felt at ease at his reassurance. Yeah, you weren’t that bad in maths, and you could try a bit more harder and improve your physics, right?
Right then the bell rang, and the teacher yelled out a few instructions to the class but you were too busy grabbing your pen and book and dumping them in your bag. You scrambled out of the class right behind the teacher, even leaving Mingyu behind as you ran straight to the washroom.
No sooner had you flung the toilet door open you puked, your stomach hurling out your lunch. After what felt like an hour you forced yourself to stop retching, gasping for breath as you clutched your hurting stomach. Your heart was still beating like crazy and a bead of sweat dropped from your forehead.
Slowly getting up, you took in a deep breath to stop your body from trembling too much. You could hear some girls chatting outside the door, and embarrassment creeped into your cheeks.
Had they heard you? No one had seen you, right?
If people found out that you were having a panic attack just because of a physics class…
You waited until the chatter outside died down before opening the door and peaking, making sure the coast was clear. It was empty, indicating that break time too was almost over.
Quitely, you slip out of the washroom and back to your classroom, walking back to your bench. Mingyu was nowhere to be seen, so you assumed he was probably in the canteen, buying some milk for the two of you.
You sat there silently for a while, your breath and heartbeat returning to normal as you took in your surroundings. Your classmates were either playing with crumpled balls of paper or chatting to each other. Your eyes then fell on one particular boy, who was completely absorbed in his book, scribbling away furiously.
Your eyes narrowed at him as you felt a pang of jealousy. Suddenly, he raised his head up and turned to look at you, both of your eyes locking and causing you to freeze in place.
Lee Jihoon smirked at you, twirling the pencil in his hand as though he knew about the little episode you just had.
Why, that asshole-
He got up and started walking in your direction, and you hastily pulled out a book from your bag and opened it to a random page to pretend like you were… well, occupied.
But of course Jihoon had to come and sit down on the bench in front of you, turning to you as he rested his elbow on your book, his palm cradling his face.
“Hey.” He said, that smirk never wavering off his face. God, he was so infuriating-
“What do you want from me?” You asked, yanking the book from his weight.
“Can I not come over and tell hi to my friend?” His cocky voice caused you to look up at him dryly.
“The dictionary definition of friends would beg to differ from what we have.”
“Damn it. I was hoping you would be too high headed to look at a dictionary.”
You scoffed.
“Not as air headed as you though, because you’re clearly wasting break time chatting with me instead of studying. You’ll need every single second to beat me in the test series next week.”
Jihoon smiled at you, his eyes glinting in amusement. I ought to punch those pearly white teeth. “Next week’s? Why not this week’s? Didn’t do so well?”
“Shut up.” You fumed, seething with his rage as he brought up memories from this week’s exams. The anxiety you had felt a few minutes ago was starting to surface up and you were not going to lose in front of him. “I’m still going to beat you in maths.”
“But beating me in math alone won’t give you the first rank.” He beamed, as though already knowing tomorrow’s results. You knew too, to be honest. You were just blatantly lying right now to save your face.
This week had been a particularly hard week, your period cramps paired with the worst chapters in every subject for the exams. While writing the exam itself you knew you were doomed, and the pain had been eating you away ever since you finished writing the test a few hours ago.
Maybe that was the reason you had a panic attack?
“Falling once won’t mean my CAT scores have been thrown out of the window.” You argue back. It was okay to fail, right?
That’s how you always calmed yourself down. There was no learning without failing after all. You had to learn from your mistakes. Next time, you would be even more flawless-
But how many more times did you need to fail to become flawless? How many times did you need to beat Jihoon until your rank was permanently 1 and not fluctuating between first and second place?
“Yeah sure. We’ll see who gets the early admissions to SNU.”
“Look, if you’re here to insult me-” You began but he looked at you hurt. This man should have become an actor instead.
“Insult you? You’re the one who has been keeping me up all night, making sure I’m giving my hundred percent no matter what! I love what we have. I’ll never insult you.” Jihoon mocked, causing you to roll your eyes at him.
“Now that felt like an insult.”
“Why were you in a rush today by the way?” He asked suddenly.
“Wh-what?” You felt your cheeks sink in as you looked at him in horror. No way- There was no way he knew, right?
If Jihoon of all people knew then- No. It couldn’t be.
“After class.” He continued, completely unfazed by your reaction. He tilted his head at you, looking at you even more lazily if anything. “You ran out. It was almost like you were dying-”
“Jihoon.” A familiar voice cut him off and never had you loved your best friend more than right now as you turned back to see a Mingyu looking at Jihoon questioningly, as though urging him to continue saying whatever it was. “What are you doing here?”
“Is it illegal to talk to you both now?” Jihoon asked sarcastically.
“No… but bullying is.”
Jihoon’s face darkened at those words, and he glared at the two of you. “Bullying? I swear you high society kids are so stuck up that even having banter is considered bullying.”
“Well, Y/N doesn’t look like she’s enjoying your… ‘banter’ very much.”
He snorted, and stood up, causing you to breathe a sigh of relief. “Fine then. Suit yourselves. I won’t bully you much if that is what is causing you so much trouble Y/N.” Giving the two of you a weird look, he walked away, going back to his bench and slumping off on his desk.
Inhaling deeply, you looked up at Mingyu and smiled. “Thanks.”
He smiled back at you, before placing a banana milk carton on the desk. “Here, I thought you weren’t feeling well so I brought some banana milk for you from the canteen.”
“Thank you!” You said, feeling a bit cheerful as you peeled off the seal and sipped it, the cold milk cooling you down just like how Mingyu had anticipated.
The door of the classroom opened again as the teacher walked in, and everyone scrambled to get to their places and greet the teacher.
As you stood up, your eyes fell on Jihoon. He looked really glum, like what Mingyu had said really offended him.
You took that as a win.
“L/N Y/N.” You flinched as the teacher spoke out your name, causing you to look up and stop rubbing your thumb finally. Sucking in a deep breath, you plastered a small, confident smile on your face before walking up to her.
Ms. Yun gave you a dry smile before extending the result sheet, and you felt your heart shatter almost immediately. Still, you just smiled back at her and took the sheet, walking back to your desk, not daring to look at your result.
Once seated (and glancing through the class quickly so that no one’s eyes was on you), you let your eyes fall onto the printed piece of paper in your hands.
Your stomach jumped.
2/246
Second place? Again? That would mean that Jihoon was-
Your grip on the paper tightened a little as tears blurred your eyes. No, no, no! I cannot cry here!
You knew it. You knew this would be the result. But still… you had hoped that maybe fate would be kind to you just this once.
You had drowned out your surroundings, staring at the numbers again and again as though if you looked long enough that two would change into one. What were you going to tell your parents?
Oh my god. What am I going to tell them-
“Y/N!”
You jerked at the sound of someone calling your voice, blinking rapidly so that there was no obvious wetness in your eyes. Your vision finally concentrated on a rather familiar face in front of you, and hatred kicked in almost as a self defense.
“Daydreaming much?” Jihoon asked, smirking at you as he tilted his head slightly.
“Not at all.” You said, smiling at him with the most fake smile you could muster. Through the corner of your eyes, you saw that most of your classmates had left, only a few going through their books one final time before leaving for break. “I don’t have that much time in my hand. Unlike you.”
“Oh well, then I must be really talented if I managed to get the first rank while daydreaming so much.” He laughed, the sound causing your heart to accelerate a little. His laughter was so annoying that you were sure you would end up with heart problems one of these days.
“Well, I did say I would beat you next week.” You said, trying not to raise your voice at him.
“You’ve been saying that to me since the beginning of this year.”
“Yeah well if you haven’t forgotten that first place was mine for the last few years.”
“And before that it was mine.”
“One year. In middle school.”
“Anyways,” you glance back at the report card. You had got second place in physics again, but first in maths. Well maybe that would be your saving grace in front of your parents. “Looks like no matter how much you try you cannot beat me in maths though.” You gave him a little smirk, leaning in a bit as though you were about to share a big secret.
“How are you acing in physics after being so bad in maths, huh?”
Now it was Jihoon’s time to scoff. “It’s the second rank. I’m just behind you by a few marks.”
“Sure you are not by hearting physics numericals?”
Jihoon leaned, suddenly catching you off guard by how close both of your faces were. But you didn’t let your expression change. “That seems like something you would do, to be honest.”
You moved away from him, raising your hand in defeat. “Well, I admit I’m, ah, a bit weak in physics. But you don’t want to accept defeat no matter what.”
“Ahahaha, I just want to admit to you. Funny how our weaknesses are complimentary, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, it’s almost like fate wants us to always be able to pit against each other.” You joked, folding away your report card and slipping it into your bag.
“Hmmm.” Jihoon agreed, looking out of the window. You watched him for a few seconds, taking in his features. His hair moved slightly from the light breeze blowing in, and you realised with a jolt just how soft and dreamy he looked right now.
Wait, what-
You banged your elbow against the table to drop your pencil case, immediately diving down to retrieve its contents. You felt like your cheeks were on fire and the last thing you needed was Jihoon to see you like this.
Why were your cheeks heating up in the first place?
Once you collected your (two) pens, you sat under the desk for a few seconds, trying to get rid of the heat on your cheeks. Deep breath, deep breath, deep breath-
“What are you doing?” Suddenly Jihoon appeared, crouching next to you, looking at you in surprise because who took so much time to pick up their pens and pencils?
“Ah!” You yelped, jerking away from him a little before offering him a sheepish smile. “I, uh, I was… just picking up my pencils!”
“Oh?” He looked confused, all cockiness from his face gone as though there was nothing to make fun of in this situation.
“Uh…yeah!” You laughed awkwardly as you showed him the pens, and he too nodded after a few seconds. “Man, you sure are slow even in daily tasks like these.”
There. There was the Lee Jihoon you knew.
“By the way, do you want to tutor each other?” He asked suddenly, sitting down on the floor as he looked at you eagerly.
Now it was your time to be confused. “Huh?”
“You know… I help you with physics and you help me with maths?”
“Huh?” You asked again, not sure you had heard correctly. Helping… each other?
Was it legal to fraternise with the enemy like this? And… tutoring each other in the weak subjects felt diminishing the competition you both had.
But then again… you really needed help with physics. Cram school wasn’t enough for you clearly, and hiring a personal tutor would mean seeing your parents waste even more money on you. You were willing to do anything to save your face. Forget your reputation, the least you could do was swallow your pride and save your family’s reputation.
“Help each other. Let’s put aside our differences and work together… at least for a month?” Jihoon explained again.
“Oh. Sure… sounds good to me.” You said. “Uh, maybe we could start from this Sunday?”
“Sure. But your house.”
“Huh? Why not the study cafe?” You asked, surprised.
“Because I'd rather be dead than be caught studying with you.” He smirked again, as though that should have been self explanatory. You rolled your eyes at him.
“Okay, but you could have been nice and invited me over to your house instead.”
At this he laughed. But when he saw that you weren’t laughing with him and just looking at him confused, he stopped, his face darkening once again. “My parents will be at home and I don’t want them to get the wrong idea.”
Now you nodded, understanding the situation. “I get it. Lucky for us, my parents won’t be home this Sunday so it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Cool then.” He said, before walking away from you, hands in his pocket as though you two hadn’t just decided to set aside your life long differences and help each other out instead.
“That’s it?” You called out, feeling a bit annoyed at how nonchalant he was while you had been overthinking if this deal was worth it.
Jihoon turned back. “What do you want?”
“No goodbyes?”
“Oh please.” He rolled his eyes, before smirking at you, causing your blood to boil once again. “We aren’t friends.”
You heard footsteps before the knock on the door, your stomach already dropping in fear. Your heart raced as you rubbed your thumb repeatedly, the page you were reading going completely blur no matter how much you tried to focus on the words in front of you.
“Y/N?”
Forcing your cheeks up for a smile, you turned on your chair to look at your mother standing by your door.
“You’re back?” You asked, trying for a small talk to calm down your nerves.
Maybe she forgot. Maybe she had a long day at work-
“Where is your report card?”
“Uh, in my- in my bag-”
“Thought I told you to keep it on my table immediately after you return from school?” Your mother said, narrowing her eyes at you. You felt your heart give an anxious squeeze, but you just gave her a small smile in an effort to reduce the tension in the room.
You walked up to your bag and pulled out the report card, biting your lips as your stomach turned. What was she going to say? Would she understand if I told her what actually happened-
“What are you doing!” You heard your mother snap at you and before you could even react you felt her snatch it away from your hand.
“I-” You began but your mother’s eyes widened, face suddenly livid with anger.
“Second? Again?” She screamed, causing you to flinch.
“I- I can explain! I wasn’t feeling well!” You said, even though you could feel your stomach sinking to the depths of hell quite literally.
“Oh, really?” Your mother laughed, the sound causing you to flinch and take a step back as fear wrapped itself around your heart. “And what was the excuse last week? Right, that you were weak in a chapter-”
“Well, I’m not lying!” You exclaimed, your voice rising out of panic. “I’m not lying, I swear!”
“Then when will you get strong, Y/N? Huh?” Suddenly your mother grabbed your shoulders, her fingers digging painfully into your flesh and you tried your best to stop the tears threatening to well your eyes.
When will you get strong? When will you?
“Answer me!” She screamed, shaking you by your shoulders. But now her face wasn’t angry anymore. It was just… hurt and disappointment.
You felt your will completely crumble and the tears rolled down.
“When will you get better?” Your mother’s voice dropped to whisper as she stared at you intensely. “When? Don’t your father and I try hard enough for you? Don’t we give you everything you want? Then why can’t you do this simple thing?”
“I- I’m trying.” You whispered, sniffling as you felt more tears glide down your cheeks.” I swear I’m trying.”
“Then try harder!” She screamed once again, causing you to flinch. “Try till you are out of breath, try till you can’t take it anymore, try till you feel like dying, you worthless piece of-”
“I came first in maths!” You interrupted her, hoping she would see some hope in you.
Suddenly you felt a sharp sting on your cheek as you stumbled to your right by the force of your mother’s slap. Blood rushed to your ears as you slowly lifted your fingers to touch your burning cheek, looking at your mother in horror.
“You disgust me so much.” She whispered, and you felt your world crack. She doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it-
Sighing, your mother walked out of the room and shut the door behind her with a bang.
Your knees gave away almost immediately as you crumbled on to the floor, the first loud sob escaping you. You slapped your hand over your mouth as you cried, the tears coming down fast.
It hurt so much. So much.
You tried so hard to make your parents proud. Not to be a disappointment. They always sacrificed so much for you. Then where were you going wrong? You always worked so hard. Then why couldn’t you be first?
Why couldn’t you be like Jihoon?
Sucking in a huge breath to control your crying, you clutched your heart at the painful thought of him.
Jihoon.
Always at ease, Lee Jihoon.
Studying must be so easy for him, with how smart he was. He didn’t even need to struggle like you. He didn’t need to throw up after every test, lose breath every time he was unable to solve any problem or cry his eyes out because he was a disappointment to his parents and they hated him.
Life must be so easy for him.
You hated him. You hated him so much.
You buried your face in your hands as another sob escaped you and you felt the entire world darken around you.
You were such a failure.
As soon as the doorbell rang, you found yourself sprinting to open the door. (You totally were not sitting in the living room waiting for him.
You opened the door with a rush, and found yourself staring back at a surprised Jihoon.
“Wow, that was quick-” He began but you cut him off to distract him. “Hey!”
Jihoon smiled at you, tilting his head a little like he always did. “Hi.”
“Come in!” You squeaked, not sure why you were feeling so nervous. Actually the fact that Jihoon would come over had you feeling jittery but now that he was actually here, you felt slightly light headed for some reason.
Was the academic tension finally getting to you?
Jihoon stepped into the house, eyes glancing around as though taking in his surroundings.
“Don’t worry.” You said, closing the door behind the two of you. “I don’t have any booby traps hidden here to get rid of you or something.”
“How do I know that?” Jihoon asked, turning to look at you with a smirk. There was his goddamned smirk again. “You might want to get rid of your competition for all I know.”
You rolled your eyes at him. “The study room is this way.” Walking in front of him, you led the way. “Besides, if I needed to get rid of competition, then I would need to blow the whole country.”
“Oh please, I’m your only competition. No one is as intelligent as you.”
The two of you were climbing up the stairs to your study room when you froze, slowly turning to look down at him.
“You- you think I’m intelligent?” You asked, your voice almost sounding hollow.
Jihoon blinked at you, as though that was a stupid question to ask. “You are literally the topper of the school, what are you even talking about?”
You huffed out a breath, not knowing you were holding in your breath. “Forget it.” You mumbled before quickening your pace on the stairs. You heard Jihoon run up the stairs until he was right beside you, and he leaned in slightly towards you.
“Come on, just because I am beating you in the past few tests you cannot think you are unworthy, can you?”
There was no way Lee Jihoon was praising you, right? “I said forget it.” You said, opening the door to your room. Then you turned to him. “And besides, if I was one of the smartest, how come I am so bad at physics? I’m not even a little bad…I’m terribly bad at it.”
Jihoon smiled, his eyes crinkling into half moons. “Which is why I am here! Don’t worry though, you still won’t be able to beat me.”
“How thoughtful of you. You don't need to worry about our competition streak too. You'll never be able to beat me in maths.”
“Good thing we've got that cleared up. Nice room by the way.” Jihoon stated, looking around as he stepped into your study room. “Where is your bed, though? Or do you sleep on your chair because I've always got the vibes that you study during your sleep time too.”
“Ha ha ha. Very funny.” You narrowed your eyes at him, pulling him a chair next to your desk. “This is my study room. Obviously I wouldn't have my bed here. That's in my bedroom.”
He looked at you in disbelief. “You have a study room and a bedroom?”
“Well…” You started, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. Something felt off with the way he had said it. Like he was actually surprised. “You are not supposed to study in the room you sleep in so… I thought- I thought you knew this.”
His face was unreadable but he shrugged. “Guess not all of us have the privilege of knowing such amazing facts.”
What did that mean?
But you chose to ignore it, signalling him to sit down as you sat on your chair. “Enough chit chat. We didn't come here to bond. I was thinking… two hours maths and then two hours physics?”
“Sounds good to me.” he said, sitting down. “You're going to give me homework, aren't you?”
You looked at him surprised. “How did you know that?”
Jihoon laughed lightly, and for some reason you felt your stomach jump a little. “Oh well remember we had reverse classes for a week in eighth grade? You gave us homework for that class and corrected it and even graded it for us.”
“Oh wow… you remember that?” You asked, feeling your cheeks heat up. “To be honest, that was a bit too much for a reverse class-”
“It was.”
You glared at him. “But now since we’re trying to improve our grades I think it would be for the best if we gave each other homework. Would let us know where we stand and how much we improved and just keep in touch with everything.”
“I agree.” he nodded.
“Wow Lee Jihoon agreeing with me? Maybe the sun will rise in the west tomorrow!”
“Very funny. For your information, I never hated your homework. If anything I thought it was cute.”
You looked at him with a horrendous look on your face. Cute? Lee jihoon called some habit of yours cute?
“Please refrain from ruining the actual meanings of words.”
“Fine, you grumpy, friendless woman-”
“Whom are you calling friendless?”
“Oh so you agree you are grumpy?”
“I-” You began, faltering a bit. You were a grumpy person. There was no denying that. But you couldn’t lose in an argument to Jihoon. Nonetheless, he smirked at you at the win, leaning in a bit as he tilted his head at you. “Cat got your tongue, sunshine?”
“No, I just realised there is no point in fighting with you if we want to help each other out.” You lied, quickly turning away to grab some mathematics books. Your face felt like it was on fire and there was no way you were going to let Jihoon see you like this.
“Anyways, I wanted to say that don’t feel stressed teaching me.” Jihoon said. “I might not be as good as you but you are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thanks for transferring the stress over from you to me.” You said dryly, opening the book to the first chapter.
“Yes and if you’re struggling with physics it’s your fault not mine because I’m an even better teacher.”
You gave him a look and he burst out laughing, causing you to shake your head in disbelief.
“No, I’m serious. You are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thank you. Now after two hours I shall let you know if the same can be said about you.”
“It’s a competition. Whoever gets more marks next week in their taught subjects is the winner.” Jihoon’s eyes glinted with mischief and the urge to wipe that smirk off his face grew stronger.
“Deal.” You gritted your teeth, not wanting to back down. “What’s at stake?”
At this Jihoon grinned at you, leaning in until your noses were just inchest apart. Did he always smell this good?
“The loser has to admit that no matter what the fluctuation in our ranks, the winner is the true first rank holder.”
You felt the corner of your lip go up in a smile, feeling the familiar rush of adrenaline every time he challenged you to something rush through your veins. “You’re on.”
“What were you thinking?” You asked (or rather demanded) as you roughly pulled apart the curtains to Mingyu’s bed, ready to strangle him for not telling you this.
In response Mingyu groaned and covered his eyes with his arms, the harsh lighting of the nurse’s cabin hitting him now that you had pulled away his curtains.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry? Do you even know what you are supposed to be sorry for?” You continued, dropping yourself on to the edge of his bed.
At this he removed his arm slightly so that he could just peer at you, before smiling sheepishly. “Uh, for fainting in class?”
You sighed, shaking your head in disbelief. “Don’t be sorry, Gyu. But why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? It could have been so much worse!”
“Relax, I was just tired. That’s all.” He said dismissively, as though that was supposed to reduce your worry.
You wondered if he too was hiding something like how you were hiding your anxiety.
No way, right? The Mingyu you knew always shared everything with you. But then, so did you… or supposedly.
“Is that all the nurse said?” You asked, still worried. Just how much was he working himself off?
At this he smiled at you. “You can ask her yourself if you still doubt me.”
You huffed. “I don’t doubt you. I’m just… worried.”
“I’m okay. I’m serious.” Mingyu answered, turning towards his side to face you properly. “I am… a bit tired though, to be honest. The nurse said I could sleep here for the next two - three classes till I have the energy to sit through a class.”
“Okay. Rest up then.” You said, making a mental note to get him some banana milk bottles from the canteen.
“Could you close the curtain?”
“Sure.” You got up to pull the curtains close when your eyes fell on the bed next to his, the curtain slightly open towards the head of the bed. You nearly audbi;y gasped when you recognised the face, especially when you saw the bruises on his cheeks and his split lips. Even though he was asleep, you could see his jaw was clenched, the tension in his face very evident.
Shutting the curtain close, you turned back to Mingyu, sitting back down on the bed and leaning towards him so that you could whisper to him.
“What is Jihoon doing here?” You whispered harshly, eyebrows knotted as you tried to think of a reason how he might have ended up in this situation. He didn’t look like someone who took others' lunch money.
Mingyu blinked at him. “Uh, because he is all battered up?”
“I know that!” You hissed. “I meant. How did he end up like this? Did he get into a fight?”
At this, Mingyu looked surprised. “Wait, don’t you know?”
“Don’t I know what?”
“That Jihoon is a popular target of some of the bullies in 3-A? They keep harassing him almost everyday.”
“What?” You felt your head spin with this new information. Jihoon? Getting bullied? But he didn’t look like the type who would let someone bully him. “But why?”
Now Mingyu was the one looking at you confused. “Do you live under a rock or something? How do you not know this about your competitor?”
“Well, probably because I do not care about the wordy affairs of my competitors. I intend to beat them through studies alone.” You said, a bit annoyed by the way Mingyu was acting. What could be such a golden piece of information that you had to know about him?
“Jihoon is one of the scholarship students. There are only two per year. How do you not know them?”
You looked at him in surprisingly, finally understanding a lot of the things he had said and done over the years. No wonder he couldn’t relate to having a separate study room and a bedroom.
Suddenly you felt like an asshole, shame and guilt creeping up your cheeks.
“What’s wrong? Did you do something to him?” Mingyu asked suspiciously.
You snorted. “I’m not that cruel. I would never stoop so low to insult him.”
“Yeah, I know. Now get out of here. I really need to get some sleep. Any Jihoon related question answer can wait.”
Waving him a goodbye, you walked out of the nurse’s cabin, glancing one last time at Jihoon’s bed.
Maybe his life wasn’t that easy as you had thought it was.
You tossed on your bed once again, sleep being the last thing on your mind. What you learnt today was pulling you down, causing your mind to run around restlessly.
Jihoon was so brave.
You knew how terrible rich kids could be and the fact that he had survived it all these years without letting it affect him so much was… admirable.
Was this why he wanted the tutoring to be done in your house only?
But I wouldn’t have made fun of him…
Then again, both of you were always fighting against each other so he probably couldn’t guarantee that you wouldn’t use it against him.
Once again you wondered what it was like to be him.
Since he wasn’t from an elite family that probably meant he never had the pressure of losing face. How nice it must be… to do well just for the sake of doing well and not because your entire family’s reputation was hanging by the thread.
One mistake and suddenly no one wanted to do anything with you.
Letting out a sigh, you finally sat up, feeling unbearably hot from all the tossing and turning you had been doing. Rubbing your eyes, you reached for your phone and opened the app, searching for Jihoon’s name.
But then you froze, fingers over the keyboard.
What do I say?
How are you?
But that would mean you saw him in that state and something told you that Jihoon wouldn’t want you to know this information. At least not in this way.
How about… how is your maths prep?
Your face lit up, and you quickly typed in the message and hit send.
There. That was a good message. Just a casual text with nothing implied at all other than how his study was going.
Suddenly, another thought crossed your mind.
Maybe I should call him? That way… you could even sneak in a
‘how are you doing? you sound tired. did something happen’ in between the conversation.
But as soon as the call went through, your eyes fell on the clock beside your bed and you let out a welp.
2:00 AM.
What were you thinking?
Quickly you cut the call and threw your phone across the bed, your heart hammering loudly in your chest.
Calling your enemy at 2 in the night suddenly felt like the dumbest thing you had done in your life. You felt your cheeks heat up when you realised Jihoon would probably tease you the next day for calling him up at such an odd hour.
What excuse could you give? You couldn’t even have ‘accidentally’ called him at this time.
Suddenly your phone rang, causing you to nearly jump. Reaching for your phone, you checked the caller id and you felt your heart stutter a little.
Lee Jihoon
For a second, you stared at the caller id, surprised that he had called you back at this time before you remembered to pick the call. “He-hello?”
“Hey.” Jihoon’s voice rumbled on the other side of the line, his voice an octave lower indicating that he was sleeping. “What’s wrong?”
“Uhm, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to wake you up-” You began rambling, beginning to regret everything now. Why did you think calling him was a good idea in the first place?
“No, no. It’s fine.” You heard him sigh a little before speaking again. “Is something wrong?”
“N-no? Why would you assume that though?”
There was a pause. “I mean, you called me up at 2 in the night. There must be something bothering you a lot, right?”
“I-” You began, not sure how to tell him exactly what was bothering you when it was him that was bothering you. “I, uh, yeah. I- I couldn’t sleep but I didn’t realise how late it was. I’m so sorry.”
You heard Jihoon chuckle. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t have picked it if it was someone else but I figured there must be something wrong if you called me at this time. So tell me sunshine, what's running in that pretty head of yours?”
Your stomach somersaulted at his sudden use of the nickname, but you managed to ignore it. “How- how are you?”
“Uh, you called me to ask how I am?”
A valid question to which you had no answer.
“Yeah, I was wondering- I was wondering if the maths homework I gave was too burdening for you!” You blurted out the first lie that came to your mind.
“How nice of you to be worried about the huge load of work you mounted on me.” He laughed and slight annoyance creeped into you. How was he this joyful after everything he was going through?
“How can you be this carefree with everything that you are going through?” You suddenly snapped, feeling angry at his non cholent behaviour.
He shouldn’t be this non cholent. He didn’t need to be.
Jihoon stopped laughing, his next few words coming out confused. “What do you mean?”
Shit.
“I- I mean,” you began, racking your head for more excuses. “I meant how can you take the homework I gave so lightly!”
“Oh, pardon me then ma’am.” He said, sounding back to his usual self. Yep, he was too good at covering this up. “I shall undertake my homework with the utmost precision and academic rigor.”
“What’s with the language?” You muttered.
“It’s fun pulling your leg.”
“Oh so you admit to torturing me?”
“Come on it’s not torture if you enjoy it too. Don’t you make fun at my expense?”
Immediately guilt racked you. Had you ever made him feel underprivileged compared to you?
“Well,” you said quietly, “I don’t want to anymore.”
Another pause. “Is everything okay?” Jihoon asked softly.
His voice sounded so soothing, like your heart was the sand and his voice was the gentle waves lapping at it.
Wait, what?
No way you just found comfort in Jihoon’s voice.
“Yeah. Yeah, everything is fine. What about you? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Everything is fine for me too. So no more thoughts ruining your sleep?”
“No.” You sighed, feeling a bit lighter despite not talking about what you actually wanted to. “I think I can get some sleep now.”
“Good. Can’t have you giving up on our rivalry so soon. If you feel like not fighting with me anymore, just talk to me. I’ll rile you up enough.”
You giggled. “Good to know you’re keeping our relationship alive.”
“Anything to see that grumpy side, sunshine.”
“Good night to you too, Jihoon.”
“Earth to Y/N?” Jihoon snapped his fingers in front of your face, causing you to let out a welp as you suddenly grounded yourself to reality.
“Huh?” You asked, smiling nervously as your eyes flicked to the physics book open in front of the two of you to try and figure out what question he might have asked.
But Jihoon caught your eye moment and that bastard just folded his arms over the book, leaning in until you had no choice but to make eye contact with him.
“Am I that handsome that you got lost staring at it?” He smirked.
“Wh- what? What an audacious thing to say!” You spluttered, cheeks heating up. But your eyes once again flicked to his right cheek, where a Mickey Mouse band aid was put on.
“It’s not audacious if it's true. Tell me,” he smirked at you. “Do I look that good?”
“I was looking at your Mickey Mouse band aid! I didn’t expect you to be those kinds of people.” You lied.
Jihoon shrugged. “My little brother gave it to me. So I thought it might look good with my outfit today.”
How did you get hurt? Who hurt you? Is it too much? How are you bearing it all alone?
There were so many questions you wanted to ask, but you were scared to privy into his matters. It was very clear he wasn’t comfortable with most people knowing it considering how you never knew this but you also didn’t want him to feel like you could weaponize this against him.
“That’s cute.”
“You know what’s cuter?” He asked, mischief glinting in his eyes. Oh no. Then leaning in, he said, “You agreeing to everything I was saying because you were distracted by my face.”
You felt your cheeks heat up furiously. “I was not distracted by your face!”
“You know, you have to be more believable than that.”
“Sorry for not being a trained liar.” You spat out, glaring at him.
“You don’t need to be a liar, just convincing enough.” He stated with a smirk.
Oh, like you? Maybe that would wipe that smirk off his face but you didn’t want to play dirty or hurt him.
“You know I know I’ve watched this series…” He suddenly began, looking out of your window. “Where two of the most brilliant students clash because they want the other person to confess first… I feel like we are like them except we are trying to get the other person to admit that they are smarter.”
You looked at him incredulously. “Are you comparing us to… Kaguya-sama?”
Jihoon looked at you surprised. “You watch anime?”
“I, uh,” Truth be told, it was your guilty pleasure. No one knew about this little secret you indulged in other than Mingyu because your parents never liked the idea of reading a bunch of comics instead of ‘real’ books and considered it a waste of time but you had loved reading them ever since you were a teenager. “I- I don’t- I mean, yes. I, uh, read manga and watch anime too.” You mumbled, not sure why you were telling him the truth.
You expected Jihoon to start laughing, call this hobby of your childish or something like that but instead, his face lit up in excitement. “Me too! I love anime so much! What’s your favourite?”
“What?” You looked at him confused. He seemed like the last person on planet earth that you would share a hobby with. “You like- you like anime too?”
“Yeah! Oh, have you watched Oshi No Ko?”
“Can you- can you keep your voice down a bit?” You asked, looking nervously at the door. You couldn’t risk letting the maids hear him. But nonetheless when you turned back to look at him you couldn’t help but smile, the enthusiasm in his eyes infectious.
Jihoon looked so soft and happy right now, a soft halo around his body from the window opposite to him, his eyes almost half moons as he beamed at you. He looked so relaxed right now… like a boy just enjoying his youth.
Not the stressed out, beaten up teenager you had seen the other day. The one fighting to keep his scholarship all these years and pretend like nothing was wrong.
“Sorry, was I too loud?” He asked, still grinning.
It was an odd thing to ask Jihoon to lower his voice because Jihoon was always on the quieter end. Unless the two of you were bickering you had never seen him talk much. “No, but- but, uhm, no one knows I like anime and I would like to keep it a secret.”
“Ah, don’t worry about that. Your secret is safe with me, sunshine.” He winked at you and you felt your heart skip a beat.
What was that?
“Thanks.” You muttered, suddenly feeling hot. You turned away from him and took a sip of your water, hoping your cheeks weren’t as hot as they felt. “I, uh, I did watch Oshi No Ko. But I just say the opening music always stole the spotlight for me.”
“Yes, YOASOBI is unparalleled, I’m afraid. Who knew I would find an anime fan in my rival.” He chuckled.
“Yeah, that’s quite unexpected.” You said, smiling at him a little. “I can’t believe we found another topic to talk about other than who’s going to beat who’s ass next test.”
“Hey, I still love those conversations! They are my real motivation.”
“Whatever.” You roll your eyes, biting your lips to prevent a smile from forming.
“Let’s go to the bookstore together, sometime.”
You turned so fast to face him that you nearly heard your neck snap but Jihoon was busy looking out of the window again.
Did he mean as a date?
Your cheeks heated up at the very thought of it, and you quickly dived down to pull out a notebook from your bag.
“Maybe if Mingyu wants, he could come too.”
Oh.
Feeling like an idiot, you sat up straight and gave him a strained smile, your cheeks on fire even more.
“Yeah sure. We could.”
“And the final answer is A.”
“Oh my god!” You whispered happily, practically stomping your feet in excitement as you drew a slash next to the last question. Glancing through your sheet once more to see if you had missed any circled question, you turned to look at Mingyu.
“I got everything right!” You giggled, just as he too looked at your paper in surprise. His smile grew when he saw all the questions were slashed, looking back at you in equal happiness.
“Congratulations! You scored perfectly in all subjects this time, didn’t you?”
“Yes! Oh my god, I can feel the week’s hard work being rewarded.” You said, feeling happiness surge through your veins. It had been so long since you felt this happy over a test in cram school that it almost felt foreign to you. You had been so stressed out all these days that you had almost forgotten how rewarding and relaxing it felt to score this good.
No wonder Jihoon was always in the mood to tease you.
Suddenly remembering him, you searched the classroom for him. Finally, you saw him sitting in the corner seat and you smirked, thinking of how you would tease him now.
But then you caught his expression and you froze.
Jihoon looked… anxious. And distraught. You could see him biting his thumb as he looked at his paper, legs all jittery.
Lee Jihoon anxious?
Guilt hit you like a truck as you continued watching him, wanting to go over and comfort him.
How many things was he hiding behind that golden boy facade? How much was he bearing all alone?
You wondered if there was anyone he could freely talk to, someone to help him get the grief off his shoulders.
Should I go over and talk to him? But he had also told you that he would rather be dead than caught being seen with you.
Then he turned back and his eyes caught yours, and you froze. But Jihoon smiled at you softly, like he wasn’t on the verge of having an anxiety attack a few seconds ago. You forced a smile for him before looking down at your paper, the win leaving a bitter taste in your mouth.
Was all this struggle really worth the pain?
Laughter and idle chatter filled the air around you, and you could feel your cheeks getting tired with every passing seconds due to the fake smile you had plastered on your face. Mingyu was on the other side of the table, stuck with some older women who were gushing to him about how amazing their daughters were.
Poor Gyu. You thought, feeling glad that your parents were too busy to try setting you up with future marriage prospects.
Of course, had it been someone else’s party they would have still done it. But since they were the hosts and stuck at the head table, they were too occupied to bother what you were doing.
Picking up the glass of juice you had been drinking since the beginning of the evening you let your eyes idly wander the crowd, taking in the guests. You had been spending the evening with some of your school friends and you hadn’t really had the chance to see who your parents had invited for this party.
You heard someone clink the glass at the table near the podium and you turned towards it, only to find your father standing up with a raised glass, clinking it again to get everyone’s attention.
“Good evening everyone.” Your father began, and you got yourself ready for another of his speeches where he subtly praised himself and put everyone else down. “I hope you all know why we are gathered here today. It’s a great pleasure being able to celebrate such an important milestone in my business with everyone present here.”
You forced another smile for your father as everyone politely clapped. You
looked around him to see who had the ‘honour’ of sitting right next to him when your eyes fell on the mother and son sitting beside your mother.
You felt your blood drain off your cheeks as you watched Jihoon smile at your father, leaning in to say something to his mother.
What was he doing here? Who invited him? And why?
His mother laughed at whatever he had said and patted his back gently, and you felt a twinge of jealousy. Your mother would have never looked at you that way, let alone comfort you.
Jihoon’s anxious face flashed across your mind and you wondered how nice it must have been to have someone supportive at home.
He reminded you of how lonely you were at times.
“But taking this opportunity I would also like to mention another thing.” Your father continued, and you turned your attention back to him. You would talk to Jihoon as soon as this speech was over.
“I would like to talk about my amazing daughter, who scored a perfect score in every subject last week, something that was a first in the cram school.”
You felt your heart lurch for the second time that evening.
Oh no. Oh no. What was he doing?
You could feel everyone’s eyes suddenly on you, and you chuckled nervously as you looked around the crowd, grasping your clammy hands underneath the table. When your eyes landed on Jihoon, you made eye contact with him, expecting to see his anxious face once again.
Because you were always in this position and you knew how it felt.
But instead… he looked happy. He smiled at you brightly and nodded, as though he didn’t mind the fact you had taken his first place.
No way. He has to be faking it. I’ll go talk to him after this and explain that I didn’t mean to gloat in front of him.
Suddenly it became clear to you why your parents had invited Jihoon and his mother over.
To show you off in front of him. To put him back in his place.
“... and I am so proud of her.” Your father finally finished, locking eye contact with you and you smiled back at him. You could feel the bile rising up your throat, the urge to throw up getting stronger.
You felt so sick. So, so sick.
Was this always the reason your parents wanted you to do well? Because you were just a trophy meant to be shown off.
“Please enjoy the rest of the night!” Your father concluded, and the hubbub filled the room again. Immediately you got up and bolted towards Jihoon’s table.
“We need to talk.” You whispered urgently even before Jihoon had turned to acknowledge you. He looked at you a bit surprised, but nodded nonetheless.
“Mom, this is Y/N.” He introduced her and you gave her a polite smile. “Hi, ma’am.”
“Hi darling, Jihoon has told me so much about you!” She exclaimed and you laughed nervously. “All good things, I hope?”
“Ah, you won’t believe what he said-”
“Okay mom! I’ll be right back!” Jihoon cut her off as he grabbed your arm and pulled you away from the table.
“Where to?” He asked, finally letting go of your arm but you grabbed his hand instead. It was warm in contrast to your cold, clammy ones.
“Let’s go to the garden.” You said urgently, pulling him behind you.
“Woah, what’s the hurry?” He asked, but you didn’t respond. “Is it because of what my mom said? She didn’t mean anything, I swear-.”
“I’m sorry.” You cut him off, finally facing him as the two of you had reached the gardens. Jihoon looked at you confused. You sucked in a deep breath. “I’m- I’m sorry for tonight. Look, I know about your financial situation. So I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry that you got dragged into this.”
Jihoon frowned. “What do you mean? Why are you sorry?”
“Because- because my parents did this on purpose!” You said, a bit exasperated now. How was he not understanding? “They just want to show off, that’s why they brought you here!”
“Are you… pitying me?” He narrowed his eyes at you. “Do you think just because I’m poor, I think my life is horrible and I cannot take some rich bratty girl’s parents’ insults? Do you think I’m such a hopelessly sad case?”
“I didn’t say that!” You snapped. “I just meant that they were trying to put you down!”
“Well, please don’t think I’m this pathetic.” He yelled, equally angry now. “I wouldn’t have come to this stupid party if I didn’t know what I would be expecting. I can handle you rich brats’ privileges very well now. And I certainly don’t need your sympathy.”
“Fine! Go ahead and do whatever the hell you want to!” You yelled, turning away and walking back to the party.
Hot tears pricked your eyes but you rapidly blinked, trying to not let them fall. As soon as you entered the party hall you made your way to the washroom, hoping no one was there.
Finding it empty, you locked yourself up in a stall, finally sinking on to the ground. You let out a sob as the first tear fell, feeling your heart break as you replayed the events that just happened in your head.
Why did you care so much about him? Why did you care if your parents were trying to put him down? Jihoon was your rival after all. You always wanted to defeat him, no matter what.
But right now you just wanted him to be happy. For him to be able to live freely.
You rubbed your eyes as more tears streamed down your face, wishing you had never fought with him in the first place.
Why did you both need to fight all the time? You really liked whatever you had with him. He always took you so seriously and acknowledged your efforts.
You sniffled, a sudden thought occurring in your head.
Oh my god. I like him.
You felt your head spin at the sudden realisation. You liked him. You liked Lee Jihoon. Your rival. The person you absolutely ‘hated’.
And as if that was a cue to your enlightenment, your phone rang. Wiping away your tears once again you looked at the caller id, and you felt your stomach lurch.
Lee Jihoon.
Clearing your throat so that you didn’t sound like you had been crying, you picked up the call.
“Hello?” Jihoon’s voice came from the other side.
“Hey.” You whispered, hoping your voice didn’t sound too hoarse.
“Can we- can we talk? I think there’s something we- I mean, I need to clear up.”
“Okay.” You mumbled. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the garden still. Where are you?”
“Uh, in the washroom.”
He paused. “Oh god, I’m so sorry I messed up big time. I’ll- I’ll explain when you come over.”
“Okay. Give me… some time.” You said, and cut the call. Letting out a breath, you pulled yourself up and exited the stall. You looked at the mirror, your eyes still watery so you splashed some water on your face before exiting the washroom.
Five minutes later, you managed to sneak out of the hall and made your way to the garden where Jihoon was still standing.
“Hey.” You said, once you were right behind him. He whipped around so fast that he almost stumbled back, but managed to catch himself on time.
“Hi.” He said, scratching his neck awkwardly. “I’m sorry.”
You sighed, closing your eyes. “What are you sorry about?”
“I acted like a complete ass. All you were trying to be was nice and explain that you weren’t a part of this hurtful plan of your parents but I just behaved like an idiot and hurt you instead.”
You opened your eyes to look at him for a while. “You did.”
“Yeah, and I’m sorry for that.” He said, refusing to make eye contact with you anymore. “I just- I just… you probably know about my bullying incident because you were there in the nurse’s room that day- yeah, you and Mingyu talk loudly- so I just got really defensive when you said you knew about my financial condition and that’s why you wanted to apologise.”
You sighed, folding your arm and looking away too. “I didn’t mean it that way. If I wanted to hurt you or look at you in disgust, I could have done it much before itself.”
“Yeah, and I realised that now. I messed up big time. I’m sorry.” He said, finally looking up at you.
“Jihoon, I admire you. You are one of the bravest people I know.” You said, looking back at him. “I would never, never ever hurt you, no matter how deep our rivalry goes. It must have been hard, having so much on the line while studying. Because I can relate to that. Maybe you don’t have your entire family’s dignity on the line but you do have something dragging you down. And I- and I care for you Jihoon.”
“Yeah. My mother sacrificed so much for me I can’t-” He choked on his words, screwing his eyes shut and balling his fists. “I can’t let her sacrifices go to waste like this.”
You didn’t know what came over you but the next thing you knew, you had thrown your arms around his neck, pulling him into an embrace.
“It’s okay.” You whispered into his ear, gently patting his back. “Your mother loves you a lot. No matter what. I could see it in her eyes. She loves you so much Jihoon.”
You heard him sniffle as you felt his arms wrap around your waist.
“Thank you.” He whispered back. “I want you to know that no matter what you do, I’ll always be proud of you too. I’m honoured to have a friend like you and I’ll always be there for you.”
You chuckled at this and pulled back so that the two of you were looking at each other, faces just inches apart.
“Thought you said we weren’t friends?” You asked.
“Did I?” He asked, one corner of his lip turning up. “That’s probably because I’ve always wanted to be more than friends with you, sunshine.”
You froze in his arms, eyes widening at this sudden confession.
Jihoon just smiled at you, though his eyes looked pained. “I know you’ll hate me more now but I’ve always liked everything about you. Your determination, your hard work, your smartness, your dedication-”
And before he could complete the list of things he liked about you, you found yourself crashing your lips into his, the force nearly causing the two of you to stumble back. But Jihoon caught himself almost immediately, kissing you back fervently.
You felt your entire body explode as he soft lips seared against yours, the world around you slowly spinning out of control. You were acutely aware of his hand on your back rubbing circles, and you tighten your arms around his neck to pull him in deeper.
Finally, what felt like hours, the two of you broke apart to catch your breaths, gasping for air.
“I cannot believe you thought riling me up was the best way to talk to me.” You muttered, lips brushing against his. Jihoon laughed, quickly pressing another kiss to your lips.
“Let’s admit it, it was a smart move.”
“It was a dumb move. I could have hated you more. Thank god I’m the smarter one.”
“It wasn’t. And I’m the smarter one. Oh, and all yours, sunshine.”
A/N: Please do tell me what you think about this story!! I worked really hard on it and I would love to know everyone’s thoughts on it~ Comments and reblogs are appreciated!
“BECAUSE I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE MORE THAN FRIENDS WITH YOU, SUNSHINE”
PAIRING || Jihoon x Female Reader
GENRES || Romance, Humour, Enemies To Lovers AU, Academic Rivals To Lovers AU, Rich Kids AU
SUMMARY || Jihoon, school's no. 1 (or no. 2), was nothing but a pain in the ass for you. Sure he was better than you in some subjects but so were you. The two of you were equally good enough for the first place so to increase the competition, he decided to suggest the most scandalous thing you had heard: the two of you tutor each other.
Or, in which, you were the rich kid with your family's dignity on the line and he was the poor kid with his family's sacrifices on the line.
WARNINGS || none
WORD COUNT || 10.6k
A/N || HI EVERYONE! Never thought I would be writing an enemies to lovers of this size but here we are. This is for the Lonely Hearts Cafe Collab by @camandemstudios !! Thank you so much for letting me particpate and do check out all the other authors here. Also moving my taglist to reblogs until tumblr fixes this horrible glitch cus its messing with the aesthetics tbh
Cram school had to be the worst phase in a teenager’s life.
You looked out of the window aimlessly, trying to drown out the teacher’s voice. It was pitch dark outside and you couldn’t really see anything, except for your own reflection staring back at you. Your hair wasn’t out of place at all, neatly brushed and clipped to keep it out of your eyes. Your school uniform was crisp and clean, as though you had decided to come to your cram school straight from home, and not after a long day of school.
But then your eyes met your reflection’s and you felt the tiredness hit you like a truckload. Your eyes looked like you had been awake for a thousand years, your eyes carrying the weight of all your previous generations. Which… wasn’t wrong in a way.
You rapidly blinked at your reflection, trying to get rid of the sleep from your eyes. Sighing, you turned your head back to the board where the teacher was explaining Faraday’s principle of electromagnetic induction, and your eyes flicked up to the clock overhead.
7.55 pm.
Five more minutes until this physics class got over.
You could survive five more minutes, right? Sure physics was the subject you dreadest the most but hey, you could bear a few minutes of it. You were doing this for four years already so five minutes shouldn’t hurt at all.
Then you made the mistake of looking at your best friend’s book, lying next to your blank one.
Kim Mingyu scribbled down furiously the concept the teacher was explaining, adding his own words to it as an indicator that he was understanding everything being taught. You watch him glance up at the board and nod his head in approval to what was being said, before looking back at his book to solve the problem.
Immediately, you felt the familiar feeling wrap around your throat, stopping any air from entering your lungs. Your fingers balled into a fist, nails digging into your palm as you tried to suck in a breath without making any noise.
The last thing you needed was for the entire class to look at you and wonder why you were hyperventilating. Screwing your eyes shut, you began doing the exercise you had looked up on the internet for anxiety attacks.
Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to-
“You okay?” Mingyu’s voice broke the chain of your thoughts, snapping you out of your mantra as you opened your eyes to look at him, trying to cover your distraught look. But no matter how well you had practiced the art of hiding your feelings, there was no secret you couldn’t keep from Mingyu.
He mirrored your expression, widening his eyes in worry as he gently touched your shoulder, edging a bit closer to you.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
You nodded, refusing to make eye contact with him. Embarrassment flooded your cheek at the thought of you getting an anxiety attack just because your best friend was able to understand the class and solve the problem.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just stifled because physics is just so hard.” You lied, hoping he won’t think too much about it.
Mingyu smiled at you softly. “Don’t worry. I know physics is eating you up but hey you aren’t that bad. Not to mention, you’re the maths topper. You can score great marks in the other subjects. One subject won’t pull you down that much.”
You knew Mingyu was lying through his teeth to make you feel better because one subject could pull down your rank because of the amount of competition, but nonetheless you felt at ease at his reassurance. Yeah, you weren’t that bad in maths, and you could try a bit more harder and improve your physics, right?
Right then the bell rang, and the teacher yelled out a few instructions to the class but you were too busy grabbing your pen and book and dumping them in your bag. You scrambled out of the class right behind the teacher, even leaving Mingyu behind as you ran straight to the washroom.
No sooner had you flung the toilet door open you puked, your stomach hurling out your lunch. After what felt like an hour you forced yourself to stop retching, gasping for breath as you clutched your hurting stomach. Your heart was still beating like crazy and a bead of sweat dropped from your forehead.
Slowly getting up, you took in a deep breath to stop your body from trembling too much. You could hear some girls chatting outside the door, and embarrassment creeped into your cheeks.
Had they heard you? No one had seen you, right?
If people found out that you were having a panic attack just because of a physics class…
You waited until the chatter outside died down before opening the door and peaking, making sure the coast was clear. It was empty, indicating that break time too was almost over.
Quitely, you slip out of the washroom and back to your classroom, walking back to your bench. Mingyu was nowhere to be seen, so you assumed he was probably in the canteen, buying some milk for the two of you.
You sat there silently for a while, your breath and heartbeat returning to normal as you took in your surroundings. Your classmates were either playing with crumpled balls of paper or chatting to each other. Your eyes then fell on one particular boy, who was completely absorbed in his book, scribbling away furiously.
Your eyes narrowed at him as you felt a pang of jealousy. Suddenly, he raised his head up and turned to look at you, both of your eyes locking and causing you to freeze in place.
Lee Jihoon smirked at you, twirling the pencil in his hand as though he knew about the little episode you just had.
Why, that asshole-
He got up and started walking in your direction, and you hastily pulled out a book from your bag and opened it to a random page to pretend like you were… well, occupied.
But of course Jihoon had to come and sit down on the bench in front of you, turning to you as he rested his elbow on your book, his palm cradling his face.
“Hey.” He said, that smirk never wavering off his face. God, he was so infuriating-
“What do you want from me?” You asked, yanking the book from his weight.
“Can I not come over and tell hi to my friend?” His cocky voice caused you to look up at him dryly.
“The dictionary definition of friends would beg to differ from what we have.”
“Damn it. I was hoping you would be too high headed to look at a dictionary.”
You scoffed.
“Not as air headed as you though, because you’re clearly wasting break time chatting with me instead of studying. You’ll need every single second to beat me in the test series next week.”
Jihoon smiled at you, his eyes glinting in amusement. I ought to punch those pearly white teeth. “Next week’s? Why not this week’s? Didn’t do so well?”
“Shut up.” You fumed, seething with his rage as he brought up memories from this week’s exams. The anxiety you had felt a few minutes ago was starting to surface up and you were not going to lose in front of him. “I’m still going to beat you in maths.”
“But beating me in math alone won’t give you the first rank.” He beamed, as though already knowing tomorrow’s results. You knew too, to be honest. You were just blatantly lying right now to save your face.
This week had been a particularly hard week, your period cramps paired with the worst chapters in every subject for the exams. While writing the exam itself you knew you were doomed, and the pain had been eating you away ever since you finished writing the test a few hours ago.
Maybe that was the reason you had a panic attack?
“Falling once won’t mean my CAT scores have been thrown out of the window.” You argue back. It was okay to fail, right?
That’s how you always calmed yourself down. There was no learning without failing after all. You had to learn from your mistakes. Next time, you would be even more flawless-
But how many more times did you need to fail to become flawless? How many times did you need to beat Jihoon until your rank was permanently 1 and not fluctuating between first and second place?
“Yeah sure. We’ll see who gets the early admissions to SNU.”
“Look, if you’re here to insult me-” You began but he looked at you hurt. This man should have become an actor instead.
“Insult you? You’re the one who has been keeping me up all night, making sure I’m giving my hundred percent no matter what! I love what we have. I’ll never insult you.” Jihoon mocked, causing you to roll your eyes at him.
“Now that felt like an insult.”
“Why were you in a rush today by the way?” He asked suddenly.
“Wh-what?” You felt your cheeks sink in as you looked at him in horror. No way- There was no way he knew, right?
If Jihoon of all people knew then- No. It couldn’t be.
“After class.” He continued, completely unfazed by your reaction. He tilted his head at you, looking at you even more lazily if anything. “You ran out. It was almost like you were dying-”
“Jihoon.” A familiar voice cut him off and never had you loved your best friend more than right now as you turned back to see a Mingyu looking at Jihoon questioningly, as though urging him to continue saying whatever it was. “What are you doing here?”
“Is it illegal to talk to you both now?” Jihoon asked sarcastically.
“No… but bullying is.”
Jihoon’s face darkened at those words, and he glared at the two of you. “Bullying? I swear you high society kids are so stuck up that even having banter is considered bullying.”
“Well, Y/N doesn’t look like she’s enjoying your… ‘banter’ very much.”
He snorted, and stood up, causing you to breathe a sigh of relief. “Fine then. Suit yourselves. I won’t bully you much if that is what is causing you so much trouble Y/N.” Giving the two of you a weird look, he walked away, going back to his bench and slumping off on his desk.
Inhaling deeply, you looked up at Mingyu and smiled. “Thanks.”
He smiled back at you, before placing a banana milk carton on the desk. “Here, I thought you weren’t feeling well so I brought some banana milk for you from the canteen.”
“Thank you!” You said, feeling a bit cheerful as you peeled off the seal and sipped it, the cold milk cooling you down just like how Mingyu had anticipated.
The door of the classroom opened again as the teacher walked in, and everyone scrambled to get to their places and greet the teacher.
As you stood up, your eyes fell on Jihoon. He looked really glum, like what Mingyu had said really offended him.
You took that as a win.
“L/N Y/N.” You flinched as the teacher spoke out your name, causing you to look up and stop rubbing your thumb finally. Sucking in a deep breath, you plastered a small, confident smile on your face before walking up to her.
Ms. Yun gave you a dry smile before extending the result sheet, and you felt your heart shatter almost immediately. Still, you just smiled back at her and took the sheet, walking back to your desk, not daring to look at your result.
Once seated (and glancing through the class quickly so that no one’s eyes was on you), you let your eyes fall onto the printed piece of paper in your hands.
Your stomach jumped.
2/246
Second place? Again? That would mean that Jihoon was-
Your grip on the paper tightened a little as tears blurred your eyes. No, no, no! I cannot cry here!
You knew it. You knew this would be the result. But still… you had hoped that maybe fate would be kind to you just this once.
You had drowned out your surroundings, staring at the numbers again and again as though if you looked long enough that two would change into one. What were you going to tell your parents?
Oh my god. What am I going to tell them-
“Y/N!”
You jerked at the sound of someone calling your voice, blinking rapidly so that there was no obvious wetness in your eyes. Your vision finally concentrated on a rather familiar face in front of you, and hatred kicked in almost as a self defense.
“Daydreaming much?” Jihoon asked, smirking at you as he tilted his head slightly.
“Not at all.” You said, smiling at him with the most fake smile you could muster. Through the corner of your eyes, you saw that most of your classmates had left, only a few going through their books one final time before leaving for break. “I don’t have that much time in my hand. Unlike you.”
“Oh well, then I must be really talented if I managed to get the first rank while daydreaming so much.” He laughed, the sound causing your heart to accelerate a little. His laughter was so annoying that you were sure you would end up with heart problems one of these days.
“Well, I did say I would beat you next week.” You said, trying not to raise your voice at him.
“You’ve been saying that to me since the beginning of this year.”
“Yeah well if you haven’t forgotten that first place was mine for the last few years.”
“And before that it was mine.”
“One year. In middle school.”
“Anyways,” you glance back at the report card. You had got second place in physics again, but first in maths. Well maybe that would be your saving grace in front of your parents. “Looks like no matter how much you try you cannot beat me in maths though.” You gave him a little smirk, leaning in a bit as though you were about to share a big secret.
“How are you acing in physics after being so bad in maths, huh?”
Now it was Jihoon’s time to scoff. “It’s the second rank. I’m just behind you by a few marks.”
“Sure you are not by hearting physics numericals?”
Jihoon leaned, suddenly catching you off guard by how close both of your faces were. But you didn’t let your expression change. “That seems like something you would do, to be honest.”
You moved away from him, raising your hand in defeat. “Well, I admit I’m, ah, a bit weak in physics. But you don’t want to accept defeat no matter what.”
“Ahahaha, I just want to admit to you. Funny how our weaknesses are complimentary, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, it’s almost like fate wants us to always be able to pit against each other.” You joked, folding away your report card and slipping it into your bag.
“Hmmm.” Jihoon agreed, looking out of the window. You watched him for a few seconds, taking in his features. His hair moved slightly from the light breeze blowing in, and you realised with a jolt just how soft and dreamy he looked right now.
Wait, what-
You banged your elbow against the table to drop your pencil case, immediately diving down to retrieve its contents. You felt like your cheeks were on fire and the last thing you needed was Jihoon to see you like this.
Why were your cheeks heating up in the first place?
Once you collected your (two) pens, you sat under the desk for a few seconds, trying to get rid of the heat on your cheeks. Deep breath, deep breath, deep breath-
“What are you doing?” Suddenly Jihoon appeared, crouching next to you, looking at you in surprise because who took so much time to pick up their pens and pencils?
“Ah!” You yelped, jerking away from him a little before offering him a sheepish smile. “I, uh, I was… just picking up my pencils!”
“Oh?” He looked confused, all cockiness from his face gone as though there was nothing to make fun of in this situation.
“Uh…yeah!” You laughed awkwardly as you showed him the pens, and he too nodded after a few seconds. “Man, you sure are slow even in daily tasks like these.”
There. There was the Lee Jihoon you knew.
“By the way, do you want to tutor each other?” He asked suddenly, sitting down on the floor as he looked at you eagerly.
Now it was your time to be confused. “Huh?”
“You know… I help you with physics and you help me with maths?”
“Huh?” You asked again, not sure you had heard correctly. Helping… each other?
Was it legal to fraternise with the enemy like this? And… tutoring each other in the weak subjects felt diminishing the competition you both had.
But then again… you really needed help with physics. Cram school wasn’t enough for you clearly, and hiring a personal tutor would mean seeing your parents waste even more money on you. You were willing to do anything to save your face. Forget your reputation, the least you could do was swallow your pride and save your family’s reputation.
“Help each other. Let’s put aside our differences and work together… at least for a month?” Jihoon explained again.
“Oh. Sure… sounds good to me.” You said. “Uh, maybe we could start from this Sunday?”
“Sure. But your house.”
“Huh? Why not the study cafe?” You asked, surprised.
“Because I'd rather be dead than be caught studying with you.” He smirked again, as though that should have been self explanatory. You rolled your eyes at him.
“Okay, but you could have been nice and invited me over to your house instead.”
At this he laughed. But when he saw that you weren’t laughing with him and just looking at him confused, he stopped, his face darkening once again. “My parents will be at home and I don’t want them to get the wrong idea.”
Now you nodded, understanding the situation. “I get it. Lucky for us, my parents won’t be home this Sunday so it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Cool then.” He said, before walking away from you, hands in his pocket as though you two hadn’t just decided to set aside your life long differences and help each other out instead.
“That’s it?” You called out, feeling a bit annoyed at how nonchalant he was while you had been overthinking if this deal was worth it.
Jihoon turned back. “What do you want?”
“No goodbyes?”
“Oh please.” He rolled his eyes, before smirking at you, causing your blood to boil once again. “We aren’t friends.”
You heard footsteps before the knock on the door, your stomach already dropping in fear. Your heart raced as you rubbed your thumb repeatedly, the page you were reading going completely blur no matter how much you tried to focus on the words in front of you.
“Y/N?”
Forcing your cheeks up for a smile, you turned on your chair to look at your mother standing by your door.
“You’re back?” You asked, trying for a small talk to calm down your nerves.
Maybe she forgot. Maybe she had a long day at work-
“Where is your report card?”
“Uh, in my- in my bag-”
“Thought I told you to keep it on my table immediately after you return from school?” Your mother said, narrowing her eyes at you. You felt your heart give an anxious squeeze, but you just gave her a small smile in an effort to reduce the tension in the room.
You walked up to your bag and pulled out the report card, biting your lips as your stomach turned. What was she going to say? Would she understand if I told her what actually happened-
“What are you doing!” You heard your mother snap at you and before you could even react you felt her snatch it away from your hand.
“I-” You began but your mother’s eyes widened, face suddenly livid with anger.
“Second? Again?” She screamed, causing you to flinch.
“I- I can explain! I wasn’t feeling well!” You said, even though you could feel your stomach sinking to the depths of hell quite literally.
“Oh, really?” Your mother laughed, the sound causing you to flinch and take a step back as fear wrapped itself around your heart. “And what was the excuse last week? Right, that you were weak in a chapter-”
“Well, I’m not lying!” You exclaimed, your voice rising out of panic. “I’m not lying, I swear!”
“Then when will you get strong, Y/N? Huh?” Suddenly your mother grabbed your shoulders, her fingers digging painfully into your flesh and you tried your best to stop the tears threatening to well your eyes.
When will you get strong? When will you?
“Answer me!” She screamed, shaking you by your shoulders. But now her face wasn’t angry anymore. It was just… hurt and disappointment.
You felt your will completely crumble and the tears rolled down.
“When will you get better?” Your mother’s voice dropped to whisper as she stared at you intensely. “When? Don’t your father and I try hard enough for you? Don’t we give you everything you want? Then why can’t you do this simple thing?”
“I- I’m trying.” You whispered, sniffling as you felt more tears glide down your cheeks.” I swear I’m trying.”
“Then try harder!” She screamed once again, causing you to flinch. “Try till you are out of breath, try till you can’t take it anymore, try till you feel like dying, you worthless piece of-”
“I came first in maths!” You interrupted her, hoping she would see some hope in you.
Suddenly you felt a sharp sting on your cheek as you stumbled to your right by the force of your mother’s slap. Blood rushed to your ears as you slowly lifted your fingers to touch your burning cheek, looking at your mother in horror.
“You disgust me so much.” She whispered, and you felt your world crack. She doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it-
Sighing, your mother walked out of the room and shut the door behind her with a bang.
Your knees gave away almost immediately as you crumbled on to the floor, the first loud sob escaping you. You slapped your hand over your mouth as you cried, the tears coming down fast.
It hurt so much. So much.
You tried so hard to make your parents proud. Not to be a disappointment. They always sacrificed so much for you. Then where were you going wrong? You always worked so hard. Then why couldn’t you be first?
Why couldn’t you be like Jihoon?
Sucking in a huge breath to control your crying, you clutched your heart at the painful thought of him.
Jihoon.
Always at ease, Lee Jihoon.
Studying must be so easy for him, with how smart he was. He didn’t even need to struggle like you. He didn’t need to throw up after every test, lose breath every time he was unable to solve any problem or cry his eyes out because he was a disappointment to his parents and they hated him.
Life must be so easy for him.
You hated him. You hated him so much.
You buried your face in your hands as another sob escaped you and you felt the entire world darken around you.
You were such a failure.
As soon as the doorbell rang, you found yourself sprinting to open the door. (You totally were not sitting in the living room waiting for him.
You opened the door with a rush, and found yourself staring back at a surprised Jihoon.
“Wow, that was quick-” He began but you cut him off to distract him. “Hey!”
Jihoon smiled at you, tilting his head a little like he always did. “Hi.”
“Come in!” You squeaked, not sure why you were feeling so nervous. Actually the fact that Jihoon would come over had you feeling jittery but now that he was actually here, you felt slightly light headed for some reason.
Was the academic tension finally getting to you?
Jihoon stepped into the house, eyes glancing around as though taking in his surroundings.
“Don’t worry.” You said, closing the door behind the two of you. “I don’t have any booby traps hidden here to get rid of you or something.”
“How do I know that?” Jihoon asked, turning to look at you with a smirk. There was his goddamned smirk again. “You might want to get rid of your competition for all I know.”
You rolled your eyes at him. “The study room is this way.” Walking in front of him, you led the way. “Besides, if I needed to get rid of competition, then I would need to blow the whole country.”
“Oh please, I’m your only competition. No one is as intelligent as you.”
The two of you were climbing up the stairs to your study room when you froze, slowly turning to look down at him.
“You- you think I’m intelligent?” You asked, your voice almost sounding hollow.
Jihoon blinked at you, as though that was a stupid question to ask. “You are literally the topper of the school, what are you even talking about?”
You huffed out a breath, not knowing you were holding in your breath. “Forget it.” You mumbled before quickening your pace on the stairs. You heard Jihoon run up the stairs until he was right beside you, and he leaned in slightly towards you.
“Come on, just because I am beating you in the past few tests you cannot think you are unworthy, can you?”
There was no way Lee Jihoon was praising you, right? “I said forget it.” You said, opening the door to your room. Then you turned to him. “And besides, if I was one of the smartest, how come I am so bad at physics? I’m not even a little bad…I’m terribly bad at it.”
Jihoon smiled, his eyes crinkling into half moons. “Which is why I am here! Don’t worry though, you still won’t be able to beat me.”
“How thoughtful of you. You don't need to worry about our competition streak too. You'll never be able to beat me in maths.”
“Good thing we've got that cleared up. Nice room by the way.” Jihoon stated, looking around as he stepped into your study room. “Where is your bed, though? Or do you sleep on your chair because I've always got the vibes that you study during your sleep time too.”
“Ha ha ha. Very funny.” You narrowed your eyes at him, pulling him a chair next to your desk. “This is my study room. Obviously I wouldn't have my bed here. That's in my bedroom.”
He looked at you in disbelief. “You have a study room and a bedroom?”
“Well…” You started, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. Something felt off with the way he had said it. Like he was actually surprised. “You are not supposed to study in the room you sleep in so… I thought- I thought you knew this.”
His face was unreadable but he shrugged. “Guess not all of us have the privilege of knowing such amazing facts.”
What did that mean?
But you chose to ignore it, signalling him to sit down as you sat on your chair. “Enough chit chat. We didn't come here to bond. I was thinking… two hours maths and then two hours physics?”
“Sounds good to me.” he said, sitting down. “You're going to give me homework, aren't you?”
You looked at him surprised. “How did you know that?”
Jihoon laughed lightly, and for some reason you felt your stomach jump a little. “Oh well remember we had reverse classes for a week in eighth grade? You gave us homework for that class and corrected it and even graded it for us.”
“Oh wow… you remember that?” You asked, feeling your cheeks heat up. “To be honest, that was a bit too much for a reverse class-”
“It was.”
You glared at him. “But now since we’re trying to improve our grades I think it would be for the best if we gave each other homework. Would let us know where we stand and how much we improved and just keep in touch with everything.”
“I agree.” he nodded.
“Wow Lee Jihoon agreeing with me? Maybe the sun will rise in the west tomorrow!”
“Very funny. For your information, I never hated your homework. If anything I thought it was cute.”
You looked at him with a horrendous look on your face. Cute? Lee jihoon called some habit of yours cute?
“Please refrain from ruining the actual meanings of words.”
“Fine, you grumpy, friendless woman-”
“Whom are you calling friendless?”
“Oh so you agree you are grumpy?”
“I-” You began, faltering a bit. You were a grumpy person. There was no denying that. But you couldn’t lose in an argument to Jihoon. Nonetheless, he smirked at you at the win, leaning in a bit as he tilted his head at you. “Cat got your tongue, sunshine?”
“No, I just realised there is no point in fighting with you if we want to help each other out.” You lied, quickly turning away to grab some mathematics books. Your face felt like it was on fire and there was no way you were going to let Jihoon see you like this.
“Anyways, I wanted to say that don’t feel stressed teaching me.” Jihoon said. “I might not be as good as you but you are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thanks for transferring the stress over from you to me.” You said dryly, opening the book to the first chapter.
“Yes and if you’re struggling with physics it’s your fault not mine because I’m an even better teacher.”
You gave him a look and he burst out laughing, causing you to shake your head in disbelief.
“No, I’m serious. You are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thank you. Now after two hours I shall let you know if the same can be said about you.”
“It’s a competition. Whoever gets more marks next week in their taught subjects is the winner.” Jihoon’s eyes glinted with mischief and the urge to wipe that smirk off his face grew stronger.
“Deal.” You gritted your teeth, not wanting to back down. “What’s at stake?”
At this Jihoon grinned at you, leaning in until your noses were just inchest apart. Did he always smell this good?
“The loser has to admit that no matter what the fluctuation in our ranks, the winner is the true first rank holder.”
You felt the corner of your lip go up in a smile, feeling the familiar rush of adrenaline every time he challenged you to something rush through your veins. “You’re on.”
“What were you thinking?” You asked (or rather demanded) as you roughly pulled apart the curtains to Mingyu’s bed, ready to strangle him for not telling you this.
In response Mingyu groaned and covered his eyes with his arms, the harsh lighting of the nurse’s cabin hitting him now that you had pulled away his curtains.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry? Do you even know what you are supposed to be sorry for?” You continued, dropping yourself on to the edge of his bed.
At this he removed his arm slightly so that he could just peer at you, before smiling sheepishly. “Uh, for fainting in class?”
You sighed, shaking your head in disbelief. “Don’t be sorry, Gyu. But why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? It could have been so much worse!”
“Relax, I was just tired. That’s all.” He said dismissively, as though that was supposed to reduce your worry.
You wondered if he too was hiding something like how you were hiding your anxiety.
No way, right? The Mingyu you knew always shared everything with you. But then, so did you… or supposedly.
“Is that all the nurse said?” You asked, still worried. Just how much was he working himself off?
At this he smiled at you. “You can ask her yourself if you still doubt me.”
You huffed. “I don’t doubt you. I’m just… worried.”
“I’m okay. I’m serious.” Mingyu answered, turning towards his side to face you properly. “I am… a bit tired though, to be honest. The nurse said I could sleep here for the next two - three classes till I have the energy to sit through a class.”
“Okay. Rest up then.” You said, making a mental note to get him some banana milk bottles from the canteen.
“Could you close the curtain?”
“Sure.” You got up to pull the curtains close when your eyes fell on the bed next to his, the curtain slightly open towards the head of the bed. You nearly audbi;y gasped when you recognised the face, especially when you saw the bruises on his cheeks and his split lips. Even though he was asleep, you could see his jaw was clenched, the tension in his face very evident.
Shutting the curtain close, you turned back to Mingyu, sitting back down on the bed and leaning towards him so that you could whisper to him.
“What is Jihoon doing here?” You whispered harshly, eyebrows knotted as you tried to think of a reason how he might have ended up in this situation. He didn’t look like someone who took others' lunch money.
Mingyu blinked at him. “Uh, because he is all battered up?”
“I know that!” You hissed. “I meant. How did he end up like this? Did he get into a fight?”
At this, Mingyu looked surprised. “Wait, don’t you know?”
“Don’t I know what?”
“That Jihoon is a popular target of some of the bullies in 3-A? They keep harassing him almost everyday.”
“What?” You felt your head spin with this new information. Jihoon? Getting bullied? But he didn’t look like the type who would let someone bully him. “But why?”
Now Mingyu was the one looking at you confused. “Do you live under a rock or something? How do you not know this about your competitor?”
“Well, probably because I do not care about the wordy affairs of my competitors. I intend to beat them through studies alone.” You said, a bit annoyed by the way Mingyu was acting. What could be such a golden piece of information that you had to know about him?
“Jihoon is one of the scholarship students. There are only two per year. How do you not know them?”
You looked at him in surprisingly, finally understanding a lot of the things he had said and done over the years. No wonder he couldn’t relate to having a separate study room and a bedroom.
Suddenly you felt like an asshole, shame and guilt creeping up your cheeks.
“What’s wrong? Did you do something to him?” Mingyu asked suspiciously.
You snorted. “I’m not that cruel. I would never stoop so low to insult him.”
“Yeah, I know. Now get out of here. I really need to get some sleep. Any Jihoon related question answer can wait.”
Waving him a goodbye, you walked out of the nurse’s cabin, glancing one last time at Jihoon’s bed.
Maybe his life wasn’t that easy as you had thought it was.
You tossed on your bed once again, sleep being the last thing on your mind. What you learnt today was pulling you down, causing your mind to run around restlessly.
Jihoon was so brave.
You knew how terrible rich kids could be and the fact that he had survived it all these years without letting it affect him so much was… admirable.
Was this why he wanted the tutoring to be done in your house only?
But I wouldn’t have made fun of him…
Then again, both of you were always fighting against each other so he probably couldn’t guarantee that you wouldn’t use it against him.
Once again you wondered what it was like to be him.
Since he wasn’t from an elite family that probably meant he never had the pressure of losing face. How nice it must be… to do well just for the sake of doing well and not because your entire family’s reputation was hanging by the thread.
One mistake and suddenly no one wanted to do anything with you.
Letting out a sigh, you finally sat up, feeling unbearably hot from all the tossing and turning you had been doing. Rubbing your eyes, you reached for your phone and opened the app, searching for Jihoon’s name.
But then you froze, fingers over the keyboard.
What do I say?
How are you?
But that would mean you saw him in that state and something told you that Jihoon wouldn’t want you to know this information. At least not in this way.
How about… how is your maths prep?
Your face lit up, and you quickly typed in the message and hit send.
There. That was a good message. Just a casual text with nothing implied at all other than how his study was going.
Suddenly, another thought crossed your mind.
Maybe I should call him? That way… you could even sneak in a
‘how are you doing? you sound tired. did something happen’ in between the conversation.
But as soon as the call went through, your eyes fell on the clock beside your bed and you let out a welp.
2:00 AM.
What were you thinking?
Quickly you cut the call and threw your phone across the bed, your heart hammering loudly in your chest.
Calling your enemy at 2 in the night suddenly felt like the dumbest thing you had done in your life. You felt your cheeks heat up when you realised Jihoon would probably tease you the next day for calling him up at such an odd hour.
What excuse could you give? You couldn’t even have ‘accidentally’ called him at this time.
Suddenly your phone rang, causing you to nearly jump. Reaching for your phone, you checked the caller id and you felt your heart stutter a little.
Lee Jihoon
For a second, you stared at the caller id, surprised that he had called you back at this time before you remembered to pick the call. “He-hello?”
“Hey.” Jihoon’s voice rumbled on the other side of the line, his voice an octave lower indicating that he was sleeping. “What’s wrong?”
“Uhm, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to wake you up-” You began rambling, beginning to regret everything now. Why did you think calling him was a good idea in the first place?
“No, no. It’s fine.” You heard him sigh a little before speaking again. “Is something wrong?”
“N-no? Why would you assume that though?”
There was a pause. “I mean, you called me up at 2 in the night. There must be something bothering you a lot, right?”
“I-” You began, not sure how to tell him exactly what was bothering you when it was him that was bothering you. “I, uh, yeah. I- I couldn’t sleep but I didn’t realise how late it was. I’m so sorry.”
You heard Jihoon chuckle. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t have picked it if it was someone else but I figured there must be something wrong if you called me at this time. So tell me sunshine, what's running in that pretty head of yours?”
Your stomach somersaulted at his sudden use of the nickname, but you managed to ignore it. “How- how are you?”
“Uh, you called me to ask how I am?”
A valid question to which you had no answer.
“Yeah, I was wondering- I was wondering if the maths homework I gave was too burdening for you!” You blurted out the first lie that came to your mind.
“How nice of you to be worried about the huge load of work you mounted on me.” He laughed and slight annoyance creeped into you. How was he this joyful after everything he was going through?
“How can you be this carefree with everything that you are going through?” You suddenly snapped, feeling angry at his non cholent behaviour.
He shouldn’t be this non cholent. He didn’t need to be.
Jihoon stopped laughing, his next few words coming out confused. “What do you mean?”
Shit.
“I- I mean,” you began, racking your head for more excuses. “I meant how can you take the homework I gave so lightly!”
“Oh, pardon me then ma’am.” He said, sounding back to his usual self. Yep, he was too good at covering this up. “I shall undertake my homework with the utmost precision and academic rigor.”
“What’s with the language?” You muttered.
“It’s fun pulling your leg.”
“Oh so you admit to torturing me?”
“Come on it’s not torture if you enjoy it too. Don’t you make fun at my expense?”
Immediately guilt racked you. Had you ever made him feel underprivileged compared to you?
“Well,” you said quietly, “I don’t want to anymore.”
Another pause. “Is everything okay?” Jihoon asked softly.
His voice sounded so soothing, like your heart was the sand and his voice was the gentle waves lapping at it.
Wait, what?
No way you just found comfort in Jihoon’s voice.
“Yeah. Yeah, everything is fine. What about you? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Everything is fine for me too. So no more thoughts ruining your sleep?”
“No.” You sighed, feeling a bit lighter despite not talking about what you actually wanted to. “I think I can get some sleep now.”
“Good. Can’t have you giving up on our rivalry so soon. If you feel like not fighting with me anymore, just talk to me. I’ll rile you up enough.”
You giggled. “Good to know you’re keeping our relationship alive.”
“Anything to see that grumpy side, sunshine.”
“Good night to you too, Jihoon.”
“Earth to Y/N?” Jihoon snapped his fingers in front of your face, causing you to let out a welp as you suddenly grounded yourself to reality.
“Huh?” You asked, smiling nervously as your eyes flicked to the physics book open in front of the two of you to try and figure out what question he might have asked.
But Jihoon caught your eye moment and that bastard just folded his arms over the book, leaning in until you had no choice but to make eye contact with him.
“Am I that handsome that you got lost staring at it?” He smirked.
“Wh- what? What an audacious thing to say!” You spluttered, cheeks heating up. But your eyes once again flicked to his right cheek, where a Mickey Mouse band aid was put on.
“It’s not audacious if it's true. Tell me,” he smirked at you. “Do I look that good?”
“I was looking at your Mickey Mouse band aid! I didn’t expect you to be those kinds of people.” You lied.
Jihoon shrugged. “My little brother gave it to me. So I thought it might look good with my outfit today.”
How did you get hurt? Who hurt you? Is it too much? How are you bearing it all alone?
There were so many questions you wanted to ask, but you were scared to privy into his matters. It was very clear he wasn’t comfortable with most people knowing it considering how you never knew this but you also didn’t want him to feel like you could weaponize this against him.
“That’s cute.”
“You know what’s cuter?” He asked, mischief glinting in his eyes. Oh no. Then leaning in, he said, “You agreeing to everything I was saying because you were distracted by my face.”
You felt your cheeks heat up furiously. “I was not distracted by your face!”
“You know, you have to be more believable than that.”
“Sorry for not being a trained liar.” You spat out, glaring at him.
“You don’t need to be a liar, just convincing enough.” He stated with a smirk.
Oh, like you? Maybe that would wipe that smirk off his face but you didn’t want to play dirty or hurt him.
“You know I know I’ve watched this series…” He suddenly began, looking out of your window. “Where two of the most brilliant students clash because they want the other person to confess first… I feel like we are like them except we are trying to get the other person to admit that they are smarter.”
You looked at him incredulously. “Are you comparing us to… Kaguya-sama?”
Jihoon looked at you surprised. “You watch anime?”
“I, uh,” Truth be told, it was your guilty pleasure. No one knew about this little secret you indulged in other than Mingyu because your parents never liked the idea of reading a bunch of comics instead of ‘real’ books and considered it a waste of time but you had loved reading them ever since you were a teenager. “I- I don’t- I mean, yes. I, uh, read manga and watch anime too.” You mumbled, not sure why you were telling him the truth.
You expected Jihoon to start laughing, call this hobby of your childish or something like that but instead, his face lit up in excitement. “Me too! I love anime so much! What’s your favourite?”
“What?” You looked at him confused. He seemed like the last person on planet earth that you would share a hobby with. “You like- you like anime too?”
“Yeah! Oh, have you watched Oshi No Ko?”
“Can you- can you keep your voice down a bit?” You asked, looking nervously at the door. You couldn’t risk letting the maids hear him. But nonetheless when you turned back to look at him you couldn’t help but smile, the enthusiasm in his eyes infectious.
Jihoon looked so soft and happy right now, a soft halo around his body from the window opposite to him, his eyes almost half moons as he beamed at you. He looked so relaxed right now… like a boy just enjoying his youth.
Not the stressed out, beaten up teenager you had seen the other day. The one fighting to keep his scholarship all these years and pretend like nothing was wrong.
“Sorry, was I too loud?” He asked, still grinning.
It was an odd thing to ask Jihoon to lower his voice because Jihoon was always on the quieter end. Unless the two of you were bickering you had never seen him talk much. “No, but- but, uhm, no one knows I like anime and I would like to keep it a secret.”
“Ah, don’t worry about that. Your secret is safe with me, sunshine.” He winked at you and you felt your heart skip a beat.
What was that?
“Thanks.” You muttered, suddenly feeling hot. You turned away from him and took a sip of your water, hoping your cheeks weren’t as hot as they felt. “I, uh, I did watch Oshi No Ko. But I just say the opening music always stole the spotlight for me.”
“Yes, YOASOBI is unparalleled, I’m afraid. Who knew I would find an anime fan in my rival.” He chuckled.
“Yeah, that’s quite unexpected.” You said, smiling at him a little. “I can’t believe we found another topic to talk about other than who’s going to beat who’s ass next test.”
“Hey, I still love those conversations! They are my real motivation.”
“Whatever.” You roll your eyes, biting your lips to prevent a smile from forming.
“Let’s go to the bookstore together, sometime.”
You turned so fast to face him that you nearly heard your neck snap but Jihoon was busy looking out of the window again.
Did he mean as a date?
Your cheeks heated up at the very thought of it, and you quickly dived down to pull out a notebook from your bag.
“Maybe if Mingyu wants, he could come too.”
Oh.
Feeling like an idiot, you sat up straight and gave him a strained smile, your cheeks on fire even more.
“Yeah sure. We could.”
“And the final answer is A.”
“Oh my god!” You whispered happily, practically stomping your feet in excitement as you drew a slash next to the last question. Glancing through your sheet once more to see if you had missed any circled question, you turned to look at Mingyu.
“I got everything right!” You giggled, just as he too looked at your paper in surprise. His smile grew when he saw all the questions were slashed, looking back at you in equal happiness.
“Congratulations! You scored perfectly in all subjects this time, didn’t you?”
“Yes! Oh my god, I can feel the week’s hard work being rewarded.” You said, feeling happiness surge through your veins. It had been so long since you felt this happy over a test in cram school that it almost felt foreign to you. You had been so stressed out all these days that you had almost forgotten how rewarding and relaxing it felt to score this good.
No wonder Jihoon was always in the mood to tease you.
Suddenly remembering him, you searched the classroom for him. Finally, you saw him sitting in the corner seat and you smirked, thinking of how you would tease him now.
But then you caught his expression and you froze.
Jihoon looked… anxious. And distraught. You could see him biting his thumb as he looked at his paper, legs all jittery.
Lee Jihoon anxious?
Guilt hit you like a truck as you continued watching him, wanting to go over and comfort him.
How many things was he hiding behind that golden boy facade? How much was he bearing all alone?
You wondered if there was anyone he could freely talk to, someone to help him get the grief off his shoulders.
Should I go over and talk to him? But he had also told you that he would rather be dead than caught being seen with you.
Then he turned back and his eyes caught yours, and you froze. But Jihoon smiled at you softly, like he wasn’t on the verge of having an anxiety attack a few seconds ago. You forced a smile for him before looking down at your paper, the win leaving a bitter taste in your mouth.
Was all this struggle really worth the pain?
Laughter and idle chatter filled the air around you, and you could feel your cheeks getting tired with every passing seconds due to the fake smile you had plastered on your face. Mingyu was on the other side of the table, stuck with some older women who were gushing to him about how amazing their daughters were.
Poor Gyu. You thought, feeling glad that your parents were too busy to try setting you up with future marriage prospects.
Of course, had it been someone else’s party they would have still done it. But since they were the hosts and stuck at the head table, they were too occupied to bother what you were doing.
Picking up the glass of juice you had been drinking since the beginning of the evening you let your eyes idly wander the crowd, taking in the guests. You had been spending the evening with some of your school friends and you hadn’t really had the chance to see who your parents had invited for this party.
You heard someone clink the glass at the table near the podium and you turned towards it, only to find your father standing up with a raised glass, clinking it again to get everyone’s attention.
“Good evening everyone.” Your father began, and you got yourself ready for another of his speeches where he subtly praised himself and put everyone else down. “I hope you all know why we are gathered here today. It’s a great pleasure being able to celebrate such an important milestone in my business with everyone present here.”
You forced another smile for your father as everyone politely clapped. You
looked around him to see who had the ‘honour’ of sitting right next to him when your eyes fell on the mother and son sitting beside your mother.
You felt your blood drain off your cheeks as you watched Jihoon smile at your father, leaning in to say something to his mother.
What was he doing here? Who invited him? And why?
His mother laughed at whatever he had said and patted his back gently, and you felt a twinge of jealousy. Your mother would have never looked at you that way, let alone comfort you.
Jihoon’s anxious face flashed across your mind and you wondered how nice it must have been to have someone supportive at home.
He reminded you of how lonely you were at times.
“But taking this opportunity I would also like to mention another thing.” Your father continued, and you turned your attention back to him. You would talk to Jihoon as soon as this speech was over.
“I would like to talk about my amazing daughter, who scored a perfect score in every subject last week, something that was a first in the cram school.”
You felt your heart lurch for the second time that evening.
Oh no. Oh no. What was he doing?
You could feel everyone’s eyes suddenly on you, and you chuckled nervously as you looked around the crowd, grasping your clammy hands underneath the table. When your eyes landed on Jihoon, you made eye contact with him, expecting to see his anxious face once again.
Because you were always in this position and you knew how it felt.
But instead… he looked happy. He smiled at you brightly and nodded, as though he didn’t mind the fact you had taken his first place.
No way. He has to be faking it. I’ll go talk to him after this and explain that I didn’t mean to gloat in front of him.
Suddenly it became clear to you why your parents had invited Jihoon and his mother over.
To show you off in front of him. To put him back in his place.
“... and I am so proud of her.” Your father finally finished, locking eye contact with you and you smiled back at him. You could feel the bile rising up your throat, the urge to throw up getting stronger.
You felt so sick. So, so sick.
Was this always the reason your parents wanted you to do well? Because you were just a trophy meant to be shown off.
“Please enjoy the rest of the night!” Your father concluded, and the hubbub filled the room again. Immediately you got up and bolted towards Jihoon’s table.
“We need to talk.” You whispered urgently even before Jihoon had turned to acknowledge you. He looked at you a bit surprised, but nodded nonetheless.
“Mom, this is Y/N.” He introduced her and you gave her a polite smile. “Hi, ma’am.”
“Hi darling, Jihoon has told me so much about you!” She exclaimed and you laughed nervously. “All good things, I hope?”
“Ah, you won’t believe what he said-”
“Okay mom! I’ll be right back!” Jihoon cut her off as he grabbed your arm and pulled you away from the table.
“Where to?” He asked, finally letting go of your arm but you grabbed his hand instead. It was warm in contrast to your cold, clammy ones.
“Let’s go to the garden.” You said urgently, pulling him behind you.
“Woah, what’s the hurry?” He asked, but you didn’t respond. “Is it because of what my mom said? She didn’t mean anything, I swear-.”
“I’m sorry.” You cut him off, finally facing him as the two of you had reached the gardens. Jihoon looked at you confused. You sucked in a deep breath. “I’m- I’m sorry for tonight. Look, I know about your financial situation. So I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry that you got dragged into this.”
Jihoon frowned. “What do you mean? Why are you sorry?”
“Because- because my parents did this on purpose!” You said, a bit exasperated now. How was he not understanding? “They just want to show off, that’s why they brought you here!”
“Are you… pitying me?” He narrowed his eyes at you. “Do you think just because I’m poor, I think my life is horrible and I cannot take some rich bratty girl’s parents’ insults? Do you think I’m such a hopelessly sad case?”
“I didn’t say that!” You snapped. “I just meant that they were trying to put you down!”
“Well, please don’t think I’m this pathetic.” He yelled, equally angry now. “I wouldn’t have come to this stupid party if I didn’t know what I would be expecting. I can handle you rich brats’ privileges very well now. And I certainly don’t need your sympathy.”
“Fine! Go ahead and do whatever the hell you want to!” You yelled, turning away and walking back to the party.
Hot tears pricked your eyes but you rapidly blinked, trying to not let them fall. As soon as you entered the party hall you made your way to the washroom, hoping no one was there.
Finding it empty, you locked yourself up in a stall, finally sinking on to the ground. You let out a sob as the first tear fell, feeling your heart break as you replayed the events that just happened in your head.
Why did you care so much about him? Why did you care if your parents were trying to put him down? Jihoon was your rival after all. You always wanted to defeat him, no matter what.
But right now you just wanted him to be happy. For him to be able to live freely.
You rubbed your eyes as more tears streamed down your face, wishing you had never fought with him in the first place.
Why did you both need to fight all the time? You really liked whatever you had with him. He always took you so seriously and acknowledged your efforts.
You sniffled, a sudden thought occurring in your head.
Oh my god. I like him.
You felt your head spin at the sudden realisation. You liked him. You liked Lee Jihoon. Your rival. The person you absolutely ‘hated’.
And as if that was a cue to your enlightenment, your phone rang. Wiping away your tears once again you looked at the caller id, and you felt your stomach lurch.
Lee Jihoon.
Clearing your throat so that you didn’t sound like you had been crying, you picked up the call.
“Hello?” Jihoon’s voice came from the other side.
“Hey.” You whispered, hoping your voice didn’t sound too hoarse.
“Can we- can we talk? I think there’s something we- I mean, I need to clear up.”
“Okay.” You mumbled. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the garden still. Where are you?”
“Uh, in the washroom.”
He paused. “Oh god, I’m so sorry I messed up big time. I’ll- I’ll explain when you come over.”
“Okay. Give me… some time.” You said, and cut the call. Letting out a breath, you pulled yourself up and exited the stall. You looked at the mirror, your eyes still watery so you splashed some water on your face before exiting the washroom.
Five minutes later, you managed to sneak out of the hall and made your way to the garden where Jihoon was still standing.
“Hey.” You said, once you were right behind him. He whipped around so fast that he almost stumbled back, but managed to catch himself on time.
“Hi.” He said, scratching his neck awkwardly. “I’m sorry.”
You sighed, closing your eyes. “What are you sorry about?”
“I acted like a complete ass. All you were trying to be was nice and explain that you weren’t a part of this hurtful plan of your parents but I just behaved like an idiot and hurt you instead.”
You opened your eyes to look at him for a while. “You did.”
“Yeah, and I’m sorry for that.” He said, refusing to make eye contact with you anymore. “I just- I just… you probably know about my bullying incident because you were there in the nurse’s room that day- yeah, you and Mingyu talk loudly- so I just got really defensive when you said you knew about my financial condition and that’s why you wanted to apologise.”
You sighed, folding your arm and looking away too. “I didn’t mean it that way. If I wanted to hurt you or look at you in disgust, I could have done it much before itself.”
“Yeah, and I realised that now. I messed up big time. I’m sorry.” He said, finally looking up at you.
“Jihoon, I admire you. You are one of the bravest people I know.” You said, looking back at him. “I would never, never ever hurt you, no matter how deep our rivalry goes. It must have been hard, having so much on the line while studying. Because I can relate to that. Maybe you don’t have your entire family’s dignity on the line but you do have something dragging you down. And I- and I care for you Jihoon.”
“Yeah. My mother sacrificed so much for me I can’t-” He choked on his words, screwing his eyes shut and balling his fists. “I can’t let her sacrifices go to waste like this.”
You didn’t know what came over you but the next thing you knew, you had thrown your arms around his neck, pulling him into an embrace.
“It’s okay.” You whispered into his ear, gently patting his back. “Your mother loves you a lot. No matter what. I could see it in her eyes. She loves you so much Jihoon.”
You heard him sniffle as you felt his arms wrap around your waist.
“Thank you.” He whispered back. “I want you to know that no matter what you do, I’ll always be proud of you too. I’m honoured to have a friend like you and I’ll always be there for you.”
You chuckled at this and pulled back so that the two of you were looking at each other, faces just inches apart.
“Thought you said we weren’t friends?” You asked.
“Did I?” He asked, one corner of his lip turning up. “That’s probably because I’ve always wanted to be more than friends with you, sunshine.”
You froze in his arms, eyes widening at this sudden confession.
Jihoon just smiled at you, though his eyes looked pained. “I know you’ll hate me more now but I’ve always liked everything about you. Your determination, your hard work, your smartness, your dedication-”
And before he could complete the list of things he liked about you, you found yourself crashing your lips into his, the force nearly causing the two of you to stumble back. But Jihoon caught himself almost immediately, kissing you back fervently.
You felt your entire body explode as he soft lips seared against yours, the world around you slowly spinning out of control. You were acutely aware of his hand on your back rubbing circles, and you tighten your arms around his neck to pull him in deeper.
Finally, what felt like hours, the two of you broke apart to catch your breaths, gasping for air.
“I cannot believe you thought riling me up was the best way to talk to me.” You muttered, lips brushing against his. Jihoon laughed, quickly pressing another kiss to your lips.
“Let’s admit it, it was a smart move.”
“It was a dumb move. I could have hated you more. Thank god I’m the smarter one.”
“It wasn’t. And I’m the smarter one. Oh, and all yours, sunshine.”
A/N: Please do tell me what you think about this story!! I worked really hard on it and I would love to know everyone’s thoughts on it~ Comments and reblogs are appreciated!
“BECAUSE I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE MORE THAN FRIENDS WITH YOU, SUNSHINE”
PAIRING || Jihoon x Female Reader
GENRES || Romance, Humour, Enemies To Lovers AU, Academic Rivals To Lovers AU, Rich Kids AU
SUMMARY || Jihoon, school's no. 1 (or no. 2), was nothing but a pain in the ass for you. Sure he was better than you in some subjects but so were you. The two of you were equally good enough for the first place so to increase the competition, he decided to suggest the most scandalous thing you had heard: the two of you tutor each other.
Or, in which, you were the rich kid with your family's dignity on the line and he was the poor kid with his family's sacrifices on the line.
WARNINGS || none
WORD COUNT || 10.6k
A/N || HI EVERYONE! Never thought I would be writing an enemies to lovers of this size but here we are. This is for the Lonely Hearts Cafe Collab by @camandemstudios !! Thank you so much for letting me particpate and do check out all the other authors here. Also moving my taglist to reblogs until tumblr fixes this horrible glitch cus its messing with the aesthetics tbh
Cram school had to be the worst phase in a teenager’s life.
You looked out of the window aimlessly, trying to drown out the teacher’s voice. It was pitch dark outside and you couldn’t really see anything, except for your own reflection staring back at you. Your hair wasn’t out of place at all, neatly brushed and clipped to keep it out of your eyes. Your school uniform was crisp and clean, as though you had decided to come to your cram school straight from home, and not after a long day of school.
But then your eyes met your reflection’s and you felt the tiredness hit you like a truckload. Your eyes looked like you had been awake for a thousand years, your eyes carrying the weight of all your previous generations. Which… wasn’t wrong in a way.
You rapidly blinked at your reflection, trying to get rid of the sleep from your eyes. Sighing, you turned your head back to the board where the teacher was explaining Faraday’s principle of electromagnetic induction, and your eyes flicked up to the clock overhead.
7.55 pm.
Five more minutes until this physics class got over.
You could survive five more minutes, right? Sure physics was the subject you dreadest the most but hey, you could bear a few minutes of it. You were doing this for four years already so five minutes shouldn’t hurt at all.
Then you made the mistake of looking at your best friend’s book, lying next to your blank one.
Kim Mingyu scribbled down furiously the concept the teacher was explaining, adding his own words to it as an indicator that he was understanding everything being taught. You watch him glance up at the board and nod his head in approval to what was being said, before looking back at his book to solve the problem.
Immediately, you felt the familiar feeling wrap around your throat, stopping any air from entering your lungs. Your fingers balled into a fist, nails digging into your palm as you tried to suck in a breath without making any noise.
The last thing you needed was for the entire class to look at you and wonder why you were hyperventilating. Screwing your eyes shut, you began doing the exercise you had looked up on the internet for anxiety attacks.
Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to-
“You okay?” Mingyu’s voice broke the chain of your thoughts, snapping you out of your mantra as you opened your eyes to look at him, trying to cover your distraught look. But no matter how well you had practiced the art of hiding your feelings, there was no secret you couldn’t keep from Mingyu.
He mirrored your expression, widening his eyes in worry as he gently touched your shoulder, edging a bit closer to you.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
You nodded, refusing to make eye contact with him. Embarrassment flooded your cheek at the thought of you getting an anxiety attack just because your best friend was able to understand the class and solve the problem.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just stifled because physics is just so hard.” You lied, hoping he won’t think too much about it.
Mingyu smiled at you softly. “Don’t worry. I know physics is eating you up but hey you aren’t that bad. Not to mention, you’re the maths topper. You can score great marks in the other subjects. One subject won’t pull you down that much.”
You knew Mingyu was lying through his teeth to make you feel better because one subject could pull down your rank because of the amount of competition, but nonetheless you felt at ease at his reassurance. Yeah, you weren’t that bad in maths, and you could try a bit more harder and improve your physics, right?
Right then the bell rang, and the teacher yelled out a few instructions to the class but you were too busy grabbing your pen and book and dumping them in your bag. You scrambled out of the class right behind the teacher, even leaving Mingyu behind as you ran straight to the washroom.
No sooner had you flung the toilet door open you puked, your stomach hurling out your lunch. After what felt like an hour you forced yourself to stop retching, gasping for breath as you clutched your hurting stomach. Your heart was still beating like crazy and a bead of sweat dropped from your forehead.
Slowly getting up, you took in a deep breath to stop your body from trembling too much. You could hear some girls chatting outside the door, and embarrassment creeped into your cheeks.
Had they heard you? No one had seen you, right?
If people found out that you were having a panic attack just because of a physics class…
You waited until the chatter outside died down before opening the door and peaking, making sure the coast was clear. It was empty, indicating that break time too was almost over.
Quitely, you slip out of the washroom and back to your classroom, walking back to your bench. Mingyu was nowhere to be seen, so you assumed he was probably in the canteen, buying some milk for the two of you.
You sat there silently for a while, your breath and heartbeat returning to normal as you took in your surroundings. Your classmates were either playing with crumpled balls of paper or chatting to each other. Your eyes then fell on one particular boy, who was completely absorbed in his book, scribbling away furiously.
Your eyes narrowed at him as you felt a pang of jealousy. Suddenly, he raised his head up and turned to look at you, both of your eyes locking and causing you to freeze in place.
Lee Jihoon smirked at you, twirling the pencil in his hand as though he knew about the little episode you just had.
Why, that asshole-
He got up and started walking in your direction, and you hastily pulled out a book from your bag and opened it to a random page to pretend like you were… well, occupied.
But of course Jihoon had to come and sit down on the bench in front of you, turning to you as he rested his elbow on your book, his palm cradling his face.
“Hey.” He said, that smirk never wavering off his face. God, he was so infuriating-
“What do you want from me?” You asked, yanking the book from his weight.
“Can I not come over and tell hi to my friend?” His cocky voice caused you to look up at him dryly.
“The dictionary definition of friends would beg to differ from what we have.”
“Damn it. I was hoping you would be too high headed to look at a dictionary.”
You scoffed.
“Not as air headed as you though, because you’re clearly wasting break time chatting with me instead of studying. You’ll need every single second to beat me in the test series next week.”
Jihoon smiled at you, his eyes glinting in amusement. I ought to punch those pearly white teeth. “Next week’s? Why not this week’s? Didn’t do so well?”
“Shut up.” You fumed, seething with his rage as he brought up memories from this week’s exams. The anxiety you had felt a few minutes ago was starting to surface up and you were not going to lose in front of him. “I’m still going to beat you in maths.”
“But beating me in math alone won’t give you the first rank.” He beamed, as though already knowing tomorrow’s results. You knew too, to be honest. You were just blatantly lying right now to save your face.
This week had been a particularly hard week, your period cramps paired with the worst chapters in every subject for the exams. While writing the exam itself you knew you were doomed, and the pain had been eating you away ever since you finished writing the test a few hours ago.
Maybe that was the reason you had a panic attack?
“Falling once won’t mean my CAT scores have been thrown out of the window.” You argue back. It was okay to fail, right?
That’s how you always calmed yourself down. There was no learning without failing after all. You had to learn from your mistakes. Next time, you would be even more flawless-
But how many more times did you need to fail to become flawless? How many times did you need to beat Jihoon until your rank was permanently 1 and not fluctuating between first and second place?
“Yeah sure. We’ll see who gets the early admissions to SNU.”
“Look, if you’re here to insult me-” You began but he looked at you hurt. This man should have become an actor instead.
“Insult you? You’re the one who has been keeping me up all night, making sure I’m giving my hundred percent no matter what! I love what we have. I’ll never insult you.” Jihoon mocked, causing you to roll your eyes at him.
“Now that felt like an insult.”
“Why were you in a rush today by the way?” He asked suddenly.
“Wh-what?” You felt your cheeks sink in as you looked at him in horror. No way- There was no way he knew, right?
If Jihoon of all people knew then- No. It couldn’t be.
“After class.” He continued, completely unfazed by your reaction. He tilted his head at you, looking at you even more lazily if anything. “You ran out. It was almost like you were dying-”
“Jihoon.” A familiar voice cut him off and never had you loved your best friend more than right now as you turned back to see a Mingyu looking at Jihoon questioningly, as though urging him to continue saying whatever it was. “What are you doing here?”
“Is it illegal to talk to you both now?” Jihoon asked sarcastically.
“No… but bullying is.”
Jihoon’s face darkened at those words, and he glared at the two of you. “Bullying? I swear you high society kids are so stuck up that even having banter is considered bullying.”
“Well, Y/N doesn’t look like she’s enjoying your… ‘banter’ very much.”
He snorted, and stood up, causing you to breathe a sigh of relief. “Fine then. Suit yourselves. I won’t bully you much if that is what is causing you so much trouble Y/N.” Giving the two of you a weird look, he walked away, going back to his bench and slumping off on his desk.
Inhaling deeply, you looked up at Mingyu and smiled. “Thanks.”
He smiled back at you, before placing a banana milk carton on the desk. “Here, I thought you weren’t feeling well so I brought some banana milk for you from the canteen.”
“Thank you!” You said, feeling a bit cheerful as you peeled off the seal and sipped it, the cold milk cooling you down just like how Mingyu had anticipated.
The door of the classroom opened again as the teacher walked in, and everyone scrambled to get to their places and greet the teacher.
As you stood up, your eyes fell on Jihoon. He looked really glum, like what Mingyu had said really offended him.
You took that as a win.
“L/N Y/N.” You flinched as the teacher spoke out your name, causing you to look up and stop rubbing your thumb finally. Sucking in a deep breath, you plastered a small, confident smile on your face before walking up to her.
Ms. Yun gave you a dry smile before extending the result sheet, and you felt your heart shatter almost immediately. Still, you just smiled back at her and took the sheet, walking back to your desk, not daring to look at your result.
Once seated (and glancing through the class quickly so that no one’s eyes was on you), you let your eyes fall onto the printed piece of paper in your hands.
Your stomach jumped.
2/246
Second place? Again? That would mean that Jihoon was-
Your grip on the paper tightened a little as tears blurred your eyes. No, no, no! I cannot cry here!
You knew it. You knew this would be the result. But still… you had hoped that maybe fate would be kind to you just this once.
You had drowned out your surroundings, staring at the numbers again and again as though if you looked long enough that two would change into one. What were you going to tell your parents?
Oh my god. What am I going to tell them-
“Y/N!”
You jerked at the sound of someone calling your voice, blinking rapidly so that there was no obvious wetness in your eyes. Your vision finally concentrated on a rather familiar face in front of you, and hatred kicked in almost as a self defense.
“Daydreaming much?” Jihoon asked, smirking at you as he tilted his head slightly.
“Not at all.” You said, smiling at him with the most fake smile you could muster. Through the corner of your eyes, you saw that most of your classmates had left, only a few going through their books one final time before leaving for break. “I don’t have that much time in my hand. Unlike you.”
“Oh well, then I must be really talented if I managed to get the first rank while daydreaming so much.” He laughed, the sound causing your heart to accelerate a little. His laughter was so annoying that you were sure you would end up with heart problems one of these days.
“Well, I did say I would beat you next week.” You said, trying not to raise your voice at him.
“You’ve been saying that to me since the beginning of this year.”
“Yeah well if you haven’t forgotten that first place was mine for the last few years.”
“And before that it was mine.”
“One year. In middle school.”
“Anyways,” you glance back at the report card. You had got second place in physics again, but first in maths. Well maybe that would be your saving grace in front of your parents. “Looks like no matter how much you try you cannot beat me in maths though.” You gave him a little smirk, leaning in a bit as though you were about to share a big secret.
“How are you acing in physics after being so bad in maths, huh?”
Now it was Jihoon’s time to scoff. “It’s the second rank. I’m just behind you by a few marks.”
“Sure you are not by hearting physics numericals?”
Jihoon leaned, suddenly catching you off guard by how close both of your faces were. But you didn’t let your expression change. “That seems like something you would do, to be honest.”
You moved away from him, raising your hand in defeat. “Well, I admit I’m, ah, a bit weak in physics. But you don’t want to accept defeat no matter what.”
“Ahahaha, I just want to admit to you. Funny how our weaknesses are complimentary, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, it’s almost like fate wants us to always be able to pit against each other.” You joked, folding away your report card and slipping it into your bag.
“Hmmm.” Jihoon agreed, looking out of the window. You watched him for a few seconds, taking in his features. His hair moved slightly from the light breeze blowing in, and you realised with a jolt just how soft and dreamy he looked right now.
Wait, what-
You banged your elbow against the table to drop your pencil case, immediately diving down to retrieve its contents. You felt like your cheeks were on fire and the last thing you needed was Jihoon to see you like this.
Why were your cheeks heating up in the first place?
Once you collected your (two) pens, you sat under the desk for a few seconds, trying to get rid of the heat on your cheeks. Deep breath, deep breath, deep breath-
“What are you doing?” Suddenly Jihoon appeared, crouching next to you, looking at you in surprise because who took so much time to pick up their pens and pencils?
“Ah!” You yelped, jerking away from him a little before offering him a sheepish smile. “I, uh, I was… just picking up my pencils!”
“Oh?” He looked confused, all cockiness from his face gone as though there was nothing to make fun of in this situation.
“Uh…yeah!” You laughed awkwardly as you showed him the pens, and he too nodded after a few seconds. “Man, you sure are slow even in daily tasks like these.”
There. There was the Lee Jihoon you knew.
“By the way, do you want to tutor each other?” He asked suddenly, sitting down on the floor as he looked at you eagerly.
Now it was your time to be confused. “Huh?”
“You know… I help you with physics and you help me with maths?”
“Huh?” You asked again, not sure you had heard correctly. Helping… each other?
Was it legal to fraternise with the enemy like this? And… tutoring each other in the weak subjects felt diminishing the competition you both had.
But then again… you really needed help with physics. Cram school wasn’t enough for you clearly, and hiring a personal tutor would mean seeing your parents waste even more money on you. You were willing to do anything to save your face. Forget your reputation, the least you could do was swallow your pride and save your family’s reputation.
“Help each other. Let’s put aside our differences and work together… at least for a month?” Jihoon explained again.
“Oh. Sure… sounds good to me.” You said. “Uh, maybe we could start from this Sunday?”
“Sure. But your house.”
“Huh? Why not the study cafe?” You asked, surprised.
“Because I'd rather be dead than be caught studying with you.” He smirked again, as though that should have been self explanatory. You rolled your eyes at him.
“Okay, but you could have been nice and invited me over to your house instead.”
At this he laughed. But when he saw that you weren’t laughing with him and just looking at him confused, he stopped, his face darkening once again. “My parents will be at home and I don’t want them to get the wrong idea.”
Now you nodded, understanding the situation. “I get it. Lucky for us, my parents won’t be home this Sunday so it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Cool then.” He said, before walking away from you, hands in his pocket as though you two hadn’t just decided to set aside your life long differences and help each other out instead.
“That’s it?” You called out, feeling a bit annoyed at how nonchalant he was while you had been overthinking if this deal was worth it.
Jihoon turned back. “What do you want?”
“No goodbyes?”
“Oh please.” He rolled his eyes, before smirking at you, causing your blood to boil once again. “We aren’t friends.”
You heard footsteps before the knock on the door, your stomach already dropping in fear. Your heart raced as you rubbed your thumb repeatedly, the page you were reading going completely blur no matter how much you tried to focus on the words in front of you.
“Y/N?”
Forcing your cheeks up for a smile, you turned on your chair to look at your mother standing by your door.
“You’re back?” You asked, trying for a small talk to calm down your nerves.
Maybe she forgot. Maybe she had a long day at work-
“Where is your report card?”
“Uh, in my- in my bag-”
“Thought I told you to keep it on my table immediately after you return from school?” Your mother said, narrowing her eyes at you. You felt your heart give an anxious squeeze, but you just gave her a small smile in an effort to reduce the tension in the room.
You walked up to your bag and pulled out the report card, biting your lips as your stomach turned. What was she going to say? Would she understand if I told her what actually happened-
“What are you doing!” You heard your mother snap at you and before you could even react you felt her snatch it away from your hand.
“I-” You began but your mother’s eyes widened, face suddenly livid with anger.
“Second? Again?” She screamed, causing you to flinch.
“I- I can explain! I wasn’t feeling well!” You said, even though you could feel your stomach sinking to the depths of hell quite literally.
“Oh, really?” Your mother laughed, the sound causing you to flinch and take a step back as fear wrapped itself around your heart. “And what was the excuse last week? Right, that you were weak in a chapter-”
“Well, I’m not lying!” You exclaimed, your voice rising out of panic. “I’m not lying, I swear!”
“Then when will you get strong, Y/N? Huh?” Suddenly your mother grabbed your shoulders, her fingers digging painfully into your flesh and you tried your best to stop the tears threatening to well your eyes.
When will you get strong? When will you?
“Answer me!” She screamed, shaking you by your shoulders. But now her face wasn’t angry anymore. It was just… hurt and disappointment.
You felt your will completely crumble and the tears rolled down.
“When will you get better?” Your mother’s voice dropped to whisper as she stared at you intensely. “When? Don’t your father and I try hard enough for you? Don’t we give you everything you want? Then why can’t you do this simple thing?”
“I- I’m trying.” You whispered, sniffling as you felt more tears glide down your cheeks.” I swear I’m trying.”
“Then try harder!” She screamed once again, causing you to flinch. “Try till you are out of breath, try till you can’t take it anymore, try till you feel like dying, you worthless piece of-”
“I came first in maths!” You interrupted her, hoping she would see some hope in you.
Suddenly you felt a sharp sting on your cheek as you stumbled to your right by the force of your mother’s slap. Blood rushed to your ears as you slowly lifted your fingers to touch your burning cheek, looking at your mother in horror.
“You disgust me so much.” She whispered, and you felt your world crack. She doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it-
Sighing, your mother walked out of the room and shut the door behind her with a bang.
Your knees gave away almost immediately as you crumbled on to the floor, the first loud sob escaping you. You slapped your hand over your mouth as you cried, the tears coming down fast.
It hurt so much. So much.
You tried so hard to make your parents proud. Not to be a disappointment. They always sacrificed so much for you. Then where were you going wrong? You always worked so hard. Then why couldn’t you be first?
Why couldn’t you be like Jihoon?
Sucking in a huge breath to control your crying, you clutched your heart at the painful thought of him.
Jihoon.
Always at ease, Lee Jihoon.
Studying must be so easy for him, with how smart he was. He didn’t even need to struggle like you. He didn’t need to throw up after every test, lose breath every time he was unable to solve any problem or cry his eyes out because he was a disappointment to his parents and they hated him.
Life must be so easy for him.
You hated him. You hated him so much.
You buried your face in your hands as another sob escaped you and you felt the entire world darken around you.
You were such a failure.
As soon as the doorbell rang, you found yourself sprinting to open the door. (You totally were not sitting in the living room waiting for him.
You opened the door with a rush, and found yourself staring back at a surprised Jihoon.
“Wow, that was quick-” He began but you cut him off to distract him. “Hey!”
Jihoon smiled at you, tilting his head a little like he always did. “Hi.”
“Come in!” You squeaked, not sure why you were feeling so nervous. Actually the fact that Jihoon would come over had you feeling jittery but now that he was actually here, you felt slightly light headed for some reason.
Was the academic tension finally getting to you?
Jihoon stepped into the house, eyes glancing around as though taking in his surroundings.
“Don’t worry.” You said, closing the door behind the two of you. “I don’t have any booby traps hidden here to get rid of you or something.”
“How do I know that?” Jihoon asked, turning to look at you with a smirk. There was his goddamned smirk again. “You might want to get rid of your competition for all I know.”
You rolled your eyes at him. “The study room is this way.” Walking in front of him, you led the way. “Besides, if I needed to get rid of competition, then I would need to blow the whole country.”
“Oh please, I’m your only competition. No one is as intelligent as you.”
The two of you were climbing up the stairs to your study room when you froze, slowly turning to look down at him.
“You- you think I’m intelligent?” You asked, your voice almost sounding hollow.
Jihoon blinked at you, as though that was a stupid question to ask. “You are literally the topper of the school, what are you even talking about?”
You huffed out a breath, not knowing you were holding in your breath. “Forget it.” You mumbled before quickening your pace on the stairs. You heard Jihoon run up the stairs until he was right beside you, and he leaned in slightly towards you.
“Come on, just because I am beating you in the past few tests you cannot think you are unworthy, can you?”
There was no way Lee Jihoon was praising you, right? “I said forget it.” You said, opening the door to your room. Then you turned to him. “And besides, if I was one of the smartest, how come I am so bad at physics? I’m not even a little bad…I’m terribly bad at it.”
Jihoon smiled, his eyes crinkling into half moons. “Which is why I am here! Don’t worry though, you still won’t be able to beat me.”
“How thoughtful of you. You don't need to worry about our competition streak too. You'll never be able to beat me in maths.”
“Good thing we've got that cleared up. Nice room by the way.” Jihoon stated, looking around as he stepped into your study room. “Where is your bed, though? Or do you sleep on your chair because I've always got the vibes that you study during your sleep time too.”
“Ha ha ha. Very funny.” You narrowed your eyes at him, pulling him a chair next to your desk. “This is my study room. Obviously I wouldn't have my bed here. That's in my bedroom.”
He looked at you in disbelief. “You have a study room and a bedroom?”
“Well…” You started, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. Something felt off with the way he had said it. Like he was actually surprised. “You are not supposed to study in the room you sleep in so… I thought- I thought you knew this.”
His face was unreadable but he shrugged. “Guess not all of us have the privilege of knowing such amazing facts.”
What did that mean?
But you chose to ignore it, signalling him to sit down as you sat on your chair. “Enough chit chat. We didn't come here to bond. I was thinking… two hours maths and then two hours physics?”
“Sounds good to me.” he said, sitting down. “You're going to give me homework, aren't you?”
You looked at him surprised. “How did you know that?”
Jihoon laughed lightly, and for some reason you felt your stomach jump a little. “Oh well remember we had reverse classes for a week in eighth grade? You gave us homework for that class and corrected it and even graded it for us.”
“Oh wow… you remember that?” You asked, feeling your cheeks heat up. “To be honest, that was a bit too much for a reverse class-”
“It was.”
You glared at him. “But now since we’re trying to improve our grades I think it would be for the best if we gave each other homework. Would let us know where we stand and how much we improved and just keep in touch with everything.”
“I agree.” he nodded.
“Wow Lee Jihoon agreeing with me? Maybe the sun will rise in the west tomorrow!”
“Very funny. For your information, I never hated your homework. If anything I thought it was cute.”
You looked at him with a horrendous look on your face. Cute? Lee jihoon called some habit of yours cute?
“Please refrain from ruining the actual meanings of words.”
“Fine, you grumpy, friendless woman-”
“Whom are you calling friendless?”
“Oh so you agree you are grumpy?”
“I-” You began, faltering a bit. You were a grumpy person. There was no denying that. But you couldn’t lose in an argument to Jihoon. Nonetheless, he smirked at you at the win, leaning in a bit as he tilted his head at you. “Cat got your tongue, sunshine?”
“No, I just realised there is no point in fighting with you if we want to help each other out.” You lied, quickly turning away to grab some mathematics books. Your face felt like it was on fire and there was no way you were going to let Jihoon see you like this.
“Anyways, I wanted to say that don’t feel stressed teaching me.” Jihoon said. “I might not be as good as you but you are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thanks for transferring the stress over from you to me.” You said dryly, opening the book to the first chapter.
“Yes and if you’re struggling with physics it’s your fault not mine because I’m an even better teacher.”
You gave him a look and he burst out laughing, causing you to shake your head in disbelief.
“No, I’m serious. You are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thank you. Now after two hours I shall let you know if the same can be said about you.”
“It’s a competition. Whoever gets more marks next week in their taught subjects is the winner.” Jihoon’s eyes glinted with mischief and the urge to wipe that smirk off his face grew stronger.
“Deal.” You gritted your teeth, not wanting to back down. “What’s at stake?”
At this Jihoon grinned at you, leaning in until your noses were just inchest apart. Did he always smell this good?
“The loser has to admit that no matter what the fluctuation in our ranks, the winner is the true first rank holder.”
You felt the corner of your lip go up in a smile, feeling the familiar rush of adrenaline every time he challenged you to something rush through your veins. “You’re on.”
“What were you thinking?” You asked (or rather demanded) as you roughly pulled apart the curtains to Mingyu’s bed, ready to strangle him for not telling you this.
In response Mingyu groaned and covered his eyes with his arms, the harsh lighting of the nurse’s cabin hitting him now that you had pulled away his curtains.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry? Do you even know what you are supposed to be sorry for?” You continued, dropping yourself on to the edge of his bed.
At this he removed his arm slightly so that he could just peer at you, before smiling sheepishly. “Uh, for fainting in class?”
You sighed, shaking your head in disbelief. “Don’t be sorry, Gyu. But why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? It could have been so much worse!”
“Relax, I was just tired. That’s all.” He said dismissively, as though that was supposed to reduce your worry.
You wondered if he too was hiding something like how you were hiding your anxiety.
No way, right? The Mingyu you knew always shared everything with you. But then, so did you… or supposedly.
“Is that all the nurse said?” You asked, still worried. Just how much was he working himself off?
At this he smiled at you. “You can ask her yourself if you still doubt me.”
You huffed. “I don’t doubt you. I’m just… worried.”
“I’m okay. I’m serious.” Mingyu answered, turning towards his side to face you properly. “I am… a bit tired though, to be honest. The nurse said I could sleep here for the next two - three classes till I have the energy to sit through a class.”
“Okay. Rest up then.” You said, making a mental note to get him some banana milk bottles from the canteen.
“Could you close the curtain?”
“Sure.” You got up to pull the curtains close when your eyes fell on the bed next to his, the curtain slightly open towards the head of the bed. You nearly audbi;y gasped when you recognised the face, especially when you saw the bruises on his cheeks and his split lips. Even though he was asleep, you could see his jaw was clenched, the tension in his face very evident.
Shutting the curtain close, you turned back to Mingyu, sitting back down on the bed and leaning towards him so that you could whisper to him.
“What is Jihoon doing here?” You whispered harshly, eyebrows knotted as you tried to think of a reason how he might have ended up in this situation. He didn’t look like someone who took others' lunch money.
Mingyu blinked at him. “Uh, because he is all battered up?”
“I know that!” You hissed. “I meant. How did he end up like this? Did he get into a fight?”
At this, Mingyu looked surprised. “Wait, don’t you know?”
“Don’t I know what?”
“That Jihoon is a popular target of some of the bullies in 3-A? They keep harassing him almost everyday.”
“What?” You felt your head spin with this new information. Jihoon? Getting bullied? But he didn’t look like the type who would let someone bully him. “But why?”
Now Mingyu was the one looking at you confused. “Do you live under a rock or something? How do you not know this about your competitor?”
“Well, probably because I do not care about the wordy affairs of my competitors. I intend to beat them through studies alone.” You said, a bit annoyed by the way Mingyu was acting. What could be such a golden piece of information that you had to know about him?
“Jihoon is one of the scholarship students. There are only two per year. How do you not know them?”
You looked at him in surprisingly, finally understanding a lot of the things he had said and done over the years. No wonder he couldn’t relate to having a separate study room and a bedroom.
Suddenly you felt like an asshole, shame and guilt creeping up your cheeks.
“What’s wrong? Did you do something to him?” Mingyu asked suspiciously.
You snorted. “I’m not that cruel. I would never stoop so low to insult him.”
“Yeah, I know. Now get out of here. I really need to get some sleep. Any Jihoon related question answer can wait.”
Waving him a goodbye, you walked out of the nurse’s cabin, glancing one last time at Jihoon’s bed.
Maybe his life wasn’t that easy as you had thought it was.
You tossed on your bed once again, sleep being the last thing on your mind. What you learnt today was pulling you down, causing your mind to run around restlessly.
Jihoon was so brave.
You knew how terrible rich kids could be and the fact that he had survived it all these years without letting it affect him so much was… admirable.
Was this why he wanted the tutoring to be done in your house only?
But I wouldn’t have made fun of him…
Then again, both of you were always fighting against each other so he probably couldn’t guarantee that you wouldn’t use it against him.
Once again you wondered what it was like to be him.
Since he wasn’t from an elite family that probably meant he never had the pressure of losing face. How nice it must be… to do well just for the sake of doing well and not because your entire family’s reputation was hanging by the thread.
One mistake and suddenly no one wanted to do anything with you.
Letting out a sigh, you finally sat up, feeling unbearably hot from all the tossing and turning you had been doing. Rubbing your eyes, you reached for your phone and opened the app, searching for Jihoon’s name.
But then you froze, fingers over the keyboard.
What do I say?
How are you?
But that would mean you saw him in that state and something told you that Jihoon wouldn’t want you to know this information. At least not in this way.
How about… how is your maths prep?
Your face lit up, and you quickly typed in the message and hit send.
There. That was a good message. Just a casual text with nothing implied at all other than how his study was going.
Suddenly, another thought crossed your mind.
Maybe I should call him? That way… you could even sneak in a
‘how are you doing? you sound tired. did something happen’ in between the conversation.
But as soon as the call went through, your eyes fell on the clock beside your bed and you let out a welp.
2:00 AM.
What were you thinking?
Quickly you cut the call and threw your phone across the bed, your heart hammering loudly in your chest.
Calling your enemy at 2 in the night suddenly felt like the dumbest thing you had done in your life. You felt your cheeks heat up when you realised Jihoon would probably tease you the next day for calling him up at such an odd hour.
What excuse could you give? You couldn’t even have ‘accidentally’ called him at this time.
Suddenly your phone rang, causing you to nearly jump. Reaching for your phone, you checked the caller id and you felt your heart stutter a little.
Lee Jihoon
For a second, you stared at the caller id, surprised that he had called you back at this time before you remembered to pick the call. “He-hello?”
“Hey.” Jihoon’s voice rumbled on the other side of the line, his voice an octave lower indicating that he was sleeping. “What’s wrong?”
“Uhm, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to wake you up-” You began rambling, beginning to regret everything now. Why did you think calling him was a good idea in the first place?
“No, no. It’s fine.” You heard him sigh a little before speaking again. “Is something wrong?”
“N-no? Why would you assume that though?”
There was a pause. “I mean, you called me up at 2 in the night. There must be something bothering you a lot, right?”
“I-” You began, not sure how to tell him exactly what was bothering you when it was him that was bothering you. “I, uh, yeah. I- I couldn’t sleep but I didn’t realise how late it was. I’m so sorry.”
You heard Jihoon chuckle. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t have picked it if it was someone else but I figured there must be something wrong if you called me at this time. So tell me sunshine, what's running in that pretty head of yours?”
Your stomach somersaulted at his sudden use of the nickname, but you managed to ignore it. “How- how are you?”
“Uh, you called me to ask how I am?”
A valid question to which you had no answer.
“Yeah, I was wondering- I was wondering if the maths homework I gave was too burdening for you!” You blurted out the first lie that came to your mind.
“How nice of you to be worried about the huge load of work you mounted on me.” He laughed and slight annoyance creeped into you. How was he this joyful after everything he was going through?
“How can you be this carefree with everything that you are going through?” You suddenly snapped, feeling angry at his non cholent behaviour.
He shouldn’t be this non cholent. He didn’t need to be.
Jihoon stopped laughing, his next few words coming out confused. “What do you mean?”
Shit.
“I- I mean,” you began, racking your head for more excuses. “I meant how can you take the homework I gave so lightly!”
“Oh, pardon me then ma’am.” He said, sounding back to his usual self. Yep, he was too good at covering this up. “I shall undertake my homework with the utmost precision and academic rigor.”
“What’s with the language?” You muttered.
“It’s fun pulling your leg.”
“Oh so you admit to torturing me?”
“Come on it’s not torture if you enjoy it too. Don’t you make fun at my expense?”
Immediately guilt racked you. Had you ever made him feel underprivileged compared to you?
“Well,” you said quietly, “I don’t want to anymore.”
Another pause. “Is everything okay?” Jihoon asked softly.
His voice sounded so soothing, like your heart was the sand and his voice was the gentle waves lapping at it.
Wait, what?
No way you just found comfort in Jihoon’s voice.
“Yeah. Yeah, everything is fine. What about you? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Everything is fine for me too. So no more thoughts ruining your sleep?”
“No.” You sighed, feeling a bit lighter despite not talking about what you actually wanted to. “I think I can get some sleep now.”
“Good. Can’t have you giving up on our rivalry so soon. If you feel like not fighting with me anymore, just talk to me. I’ll rile you up enough.”
You giggled. “Good to know you’re keeping our relationship alive.”
“Anything to see that grumpy side, sunshine.”
“Good night to you too, Jihoon.”
“Earth to Y/N?” Jihoon snapped his fingers in front of your face, causing you to let out a welp as you suddenly grounded yourself to reality.
“Huh?” You asked, smiling nervously as your eyes flicked to the physics book open in front of the two of you to try and figure out what question he might have asked.
But Jihoon caught your eye moment and that bastard just folded his arms over the book, leaning in until you had no choice but to make eye contact with him.
“Am I that handsome that you got lost staring at it?” He smirked.
“Wh- what? What an audacious thing to say!” You spluttered, cheeks heating up. But your eyes once again flicked to his right cheek, where a Mickey Mouse band aid was put on.
“It’s not audacious if it's true. Tell me,” he smirked at you. “Do I look that good?”
“I was looking at your Mickey Mouse band aid! I didn’t expect you to be those kinds of people.” You lied.
Jihoon shrugged. “My little brother gave it to me. So I thought it might look good with my outfit today.”
How did you get hurt? Who hurt you? Is it too much? How are you bearing it all alone?
There were so many questions you wanted to ask, but you were scared to privy into his matters. It was very clear he wasn’t comfortable with most people knowing it considering how you never knew this but you also didn’t want him to feel like you could weaponize this against him.
“That’s cute.”
“You know what’s cuter?” He asked, mischief glinting in his eyes. Oh no. Then leaning in, he said, “You agreeing to everything I was saying because you were distracted by my face.”
You felt your cheeks heat up furiously. “I was not distracted by your face!”
“You know, you have to be more believable than that.”
“Sorry for not being a trained liar.” You spat out, glaring at him.
“You don’t need to be a liar, just convincing enough.” He stated with a smirk.
Oh, like you? Maybe that would wipe that smirk off his face but you didn’t want to play dirty or hurt him.
“You know I know I’ve watched this series…” He suddenly began, looking out of your window. “Where two of the most brilliant students clash because they want the other person to confess first… I feel like we are like them except we are trying to get the other person to admit that they are smarter.”
You looked at him incredulously. “Are you comparing us to… Kaguya-sama?”
Jihoon looked at you surprised. “You watch anime?”
“I, uh,” Truth be told, it was your guilty pleasure. No one knew about this little secret you indulged in other than Mingyu because your parents never liked the idea of reading a bunch of comics instead of ‘real’ books and considered it a waste of time but you had loved reading them ever since you were a teenager. “I- I don’t- I mean, yes. I, uh, read manga and watch anime too.” You mumbled, not sure why you were telling him the truth.
You expected Jihoon to start laughing, call this hobby of your childish or something like that but instead, his face lit up in excitement. “Me too! I love anime so much! What’s your favourite?”
“What?” You looked at him confused. He seemed like the last person on planet earth that you would share a hobby with. “You like- you like anime too?”
“Yeah! Oh, have you watched Oshi No Ko?”
“Can you- can you keep your voice down a bit?” You asked, looking nervously at the door. You couldn’t risk letting the maids hear him. But nonetheless when you turned back to look at him you couldn’t help but smile, the enthusiasm in his eyes infectious.
Jihoon looked so soft and happy right now, a soft halo around his body from the window opposite to him, his eyes almost half moons as he beamed at you. He looked so relaxed right now… like a boy just enjoying his youth.
Not the stressed out, beaten up teenager you had seen the other day. The one fighting to keep his scholarship all these years and pretend like nothing was wrong.
“Sorry, was I too loud?” He asked, still grinning.
It was an odd thing to ask Jihoon to lower his voice because Jihoon was always on the quieter end. Unless the two of you were bickering you had never seen him talk much. “No, but- but, uhm, no one knows I like anime and I would like to keep it a secret.”
“Ah, don’t worry about that. Your secret is safe with me, sunshine.” He winked at you and you felt your heart skip a beat.
What was that?
“Thanks.” You muttered, suddenly feeling hot. You turned away from him and took a sip of your water, hoping your cheeks weren’t as hot as they felt. “I, uh, I did watch Oshi No Ko. But I just say the opening music always stole the spotlight for me.”
“Yes, YOASOBI is unparalleled, I’m afraid. Who knew I would find an anime fan in my rival.” He chuckled.
“Yeah, that’s quite unexpected.” You said, smiling at him a little. “I can’t believe we found another topic to talk about other than who’s going to beat who’s ass next test.”
“Hey, I still love those conversations! They are my real motivation.”
“Whatever.” You roll your eyes, biting your lips to prevent a smile from forming.
“Let’s go to the bookstore together, sometime.”
You turned so fast to face him that you nearly heard your neck snap but Jihoon was busy looking out of the window again.
Did he mean as a date?
Your cheeks heated up at the very thought of it, and you quickly dived down to pull out a notebook from your bag.
“Maybe if Mingyu wants, he could come too.”
Oh.
Feeling like an idiot, you sat up straight and gave him a strained smile, your cheeks on fire even more.
“Yeah sure. We could.”
“And the final answer is A.”
“Oh my god!” You whispered happily, practically stomping your feet in excitement as you drew a slash next to the last question. Glancing through your sheet once more to see if you had missed any circled question, you turned to look at Mingyu.
“I got everything right!” You giggled, just as he too looked at your paper in surprise. His smile grew when he saw all the questions were slashed, looking back at you in equal happiness.
“Congratulations! You scored perfectly in all subjects this time, didn’t you?”
“Yes! Oh my god, I can feel the week’s hard work being rewarded.” You said, feeling happiness surge through your veins. It had been so long since you felt this happy over a test in cram school that it almost felt foreign to you. You had been so stressed out all these days that you had almost forgotten how rewarding and relaxing it felt to score this good.
No wonder Jihoon was always in the mood to tease you.
Suddenly remembering him, you searched the classroom for him. Finally, you saw him sitting in the corner seat and you smirked, thinking of how you would tease him now.
But then you caught his expression and you froze.
Jihoon looked… anxious. And distraught. You could see him biting his thumb as he looked at his paper, legs all jittery.
Lee Jihoon anxious?
Guilt hit you like a truck as you continued watching him, wanting to go over and comfort him.
How many things was he hiding behind that golden boy facade? How much was he bearing all alone?
You wondered if there was anyone he could freely talk to, someone to help him get the grief off his shoulders.
Should I go over and talk to him? But he had also told you that he would rather be dead than caught being seen with you.
Then he turned back and his eyes caught yours, and you froze. But Jihoon smiled at you softly, like he wasn’t on the verge of having an anxiety attack a few seconds ago. You forced a smile for him before looking down at your paper, the win leaving a bitter taste in your mouth.
Was all this struggle really worth the pain?
Laughter and idle chatter filled the air around you, and you could feel your cheeks getting tired with every passing seconds due to the fake smile you had plastered on your face. Mingyu was on the other side of the table, stuck with some older women who were gushing to him about how amazing their daughters were.
Poor Gyu. You thought, feeling glad that your parents were too busy to try setting you up with future marriage prospects.
Of course, had it been someone else’s party they would have still done it. But since they were the hosts and stuck at the head table, they were too occupied to bother what you were doing.
Picking up the glass of juice you had been drinking since the beginning of the evening you let your eyes idly wander the crowd, taking in the guests. You had been spending the evening with some of your school friends and you hadn’t really had the chance to see who your parents had invited for this party.
You heard someone clink the glass at the table near the podium and you turned towards it, only to find your father standing up with a raised glass, clinking it again to get everyone’s attention.
“Good evening everyone.” Your father began, and you got yourself ready for another of his speeches where he subtly praised himself and put everyone else down. “I hope you all know why we are gathered here today. It’s a great pleasure being able to celebrate such an important milestone in my business with everyone present here.”
You forced another smile for your father as everyone politely clapped. You
looked around him to see who had the ‘honour’ of sitting right next to him when your eyes fell on the mother and son sitting beside your mother.
You felt your blood drain off your cheeks as you watched Jihoon smile at your father, leaning in to say something to his mother.
What was he doing here? Who invited him? And why?
His mother laughed at whatever he had said and patted his back gently, and you felt a twinge of jealousy. Your mother would have never looked at you that way, let alone comfort you.
Jihoon’s anxious face flashed across your mind and you wondered how nice it must have been to have someone supportive at home.
He reminded you of how lonely you were at times.
“But taking this opportunity I would also like to mention another thing.” Your father continued, and you turned your attention back to him. You would talk to Jihoon as soon as this speech was over.
“I would like to talk about my amazing daughter, who scored a perfect score in every subject last week, something that was a first in the cram school.”
You felt your heart lurch for the second time that evening.
Oh no. Oh no. What was he doing?
You could feel everyone’s eyes suddenly on you, and you chuckled nervously as you looked around the crowd, grasping your clammy hands underneath the table. When your eyes landed on Jihoon, you made eye contact with him, expecting to see his anxious face once again.
Because you were always in this position and you knew how it felt.
But instead… he looked happy. He smiled at you brightly and nodded, as though he didn’t mind the fact you had taken his first place.
No way. He has to be faking it. I’ll go talk to him after this and explain that I didn’t mean to gloat in front of him.
Suddenly it became clear to you why your parents had invited Jihoon and his mother over.
To show you off in front of him. To put him back in his place.
“... and I am so proud of her.” Your father finally finished, locking eye contact with you and you smiled back at him. You could feel the bile rising up your throat, the urge to throw up getting stronger.
You felt so sick. So, so sick.
Was this always the reason your parents wanted you to do well? Because you were just a trophy meant to be shown off.
“Please enjoy the rest of the night!” Your father concluded, and the hubbub filled the room again. Immediately you got up and bolted towards Jihoon’s table.
“We need to talk.” You whispered urgently even before Jihoon had turned to acknowledge you. He looked at you a bit surprised, but nodded nonetheless.
“Mom, this is Y/N.” He introduced her and you gave her a polite smile. “Hi, ma’am.”
“Hi darling, Jihoon has told me so much about you!” She exclaimed and you laughed nervously. “All good things, I hope?”
“Ah, you won’t believe what he said-”
“Okay mom! I’ll be right back!” Jihoon cut her off as he grabbed your arm and pulled you away from the table.
“Where to?” He asked, finally letting go of your arm but you grabbed his hand instead. It was warm in contrast to your cold, clammy ones.
“Let’s go to the garden.” You said urgently, pulling him behind you.
“Woah, what’s the hurry?” He asked, but you didn’t respond. “Is it because of what my mom said? She didn’t mean anything, I swear-.”
“I’m sorry.” You cut him off, finally facing him as the two of you had reached the gardens. Jihoon looked at you confused. You sucked in a deep breath. “I’m- I’m sorry for tonight. Look, I know about your financial situation. So I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry that you got dragged into this.”
Jihoon frowned. “What do you mean? Why are you sorry?”
“Because- because my parents did this on purpose!” You said, a bit exasperated now. How was he not understanding? “They just want to show off, that’s why they brought you here!”
“Are you… pitying me?” He narrowed his eyes at you. “Do you think just because I’m poor, I think my life is horrible and I cannot take some rich bratty girl’s parents’ insults? Do you think I’m such a hopelessly sad case?”
“I didn’t say that!” You snapped. “I just meant that they were trying to put you down!”
“Well, please don’t think I’m this pathetic.” He yelled, equally angry now. “I wouldn’t have come to this stupid party if I didn’t know what I would be expecting. I can handle you rich brats’ privileges very well now. And I certainly don’t need your sympathy.”
“Fine! Go ahead and do whatever the hell you want to!” You yelled, turning away and walking back to the party.
Hot tears pricked your eyes but you rapidly blinked, trying to not let them fall. As soon as you entered the party hall you made your way to the washroom, hoping no one was there.
Finding it empty, you locked yourself up in a stall, finally sinking on to the ground. You let out a sob as the first tear fell, feeling your heart break as you replayed the events that just happened in your head.
Why did you care so much about him? Why did you care if your parents were trying to put him down? Jihoon was your rival after all. You always wanted to defeat him, no matter what.
But right now you just wanted him to be happy. For him to be able to live freely.
You rubbed your eyes as more tears streamed down your face, wishing you had never fought with him in the first place.
Why did you both need to fight all the time? You really liked whatever you had with him. He always took you so seriously and acknowledged your efforts.
You sniffled, a sudden thought occurring in your head.
Oh my god. I like him.
You felt your head spin at the sudden realisation. You liked him. You liked Lee Jihoon. Your rival. The person you absolutely ‘hated’.
And as if that was a cue to your enlightenment, your phone rang. Wiping away your tears once again you looked at the caller id, and you felt your stomach lurch.
Lee Jihoon.
Clearing your throat so that you didn’t sound like you had been crying, you picked up the call.
“Hello?” Jihoon’s voice came from the other side.
“Hey.” You whispered, hoping your voice didn’t sound too hoarse.
“Can we- can we talk? I think there’s something we- I mean, I need to clear up.”
“Okay.” You mumbled. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the garden still. Where are you?”
“Uh, in the washroom.”
He paused. “Oh god, I’m so sorry I messed up big time. I’ll- I’ll explain when you come over.”
“Okay. Give me… some time.” You said, and cut the call. Letting out a breath, you pulled yourself up and exited the stall. You looked at the mirror, your eyes still watery so you splashed some water on your face before exiting the washroom.
Five minutes later, you managed to sneak out of the hall and made your way to the garden where Jihoon was still standing.
“Hey.” You said, once you were right behind him. He whipped around so fast that he almost stumbled back, but managed to catch himself on time.
“Hi.” He said, scratching his neck awkwardly. “I’m sorry.”
You sighed, closing your eyes. “What are you sorry about?”
“I acted like a complete ass. All you were trying to be was nice and explain that you weren’t a part of this hurtful plan of your parents but I just behaved like an idiot and hurt you instead.”
You opened your eyes to look at him for a while. “You did.”
“Yeah, and I’m sorry for that.” He said, refusing to make eye contact with you anymore. “I just- I just… you probably know about my bullying incident because you were there in the nurse’s room that day- yeah, you and Mingyu talk loudly- so I just got really defensive when you said you knew about my financial condition and that’s why you wanted to apologise.”
You sighed, folding your arm and looking away too. “I didn’t mean it that way. If I wanted to hurt you or look at you in disgust, I could have done it much before itself.”
“Yeah, and I realised that now. I messed up big time. I’m sorry.” He said, finally looking up at you.
“Jihoon, I admire you. You are one of the bravest people I know.” You said, looking back at him. “I would never, never ever hurt you, no matter how deep our rivalry goes. It must have been hard, having so much on the line while studying. Because I can relate to that. Maybe you don’t have your entire family’s dignity on the line but you do have something dragging you down. And I- and I care for you Jihoon.”
“Yeah. My mother sacrificed so much for me I can’t-” He choked on his words, screwing his eyes shut and balling his fists. “I can’t let her sacrifices go to waste like this.”
You didn’t know what came over you but the next thing you knew, you had thrown your arms around his neck, pulling him into an embrace.
“It’s okay.” You whispered into his ear, gently patting his back. “Your mother loves you a lot. No matter what. I could see it in her eyes. She loves you so much Jihoon.”
You heard him sniffle as you felt his arms wrap around your waist.
“Thank you.” He whispered back. “I want you to know that no matter what you do, I’ll always be proud of you too. I’m honoured to have a friend like you and I’ll always be there for you.”
You chuckled at this and pulled back so that the two of you were looking at each other, faces just inches apart.
“Thought you said we weren’t friends?” You asked.
“Did I?” He asked, one corner of his lip turning up. “That’s probably because I’ve always wanted to be more than friends with you, sunshine.”
You froze in his arms, eyes widening at this sudden confession.
Jihoon just smiled at you, though his eyes looked pained. “I know you’ll hate me more now but I’ve always liked everything about you. Your determination, your hard work, your smartness, your dedication-”
And before he could complete the list of things he liked about you, you found yourself crashing your lips into his, the force nearly causing the two of you to stumble back. But Jihoon caught himself almost immediately, kissing you back fervently.
You felt your entire body explode as he soft lips seared against yours, the world around you slowly spinning out of control. You were acutely aware of his hand on your back rubbing circles, and you tighten your arms around his neck to pull him in deeper.
Finally, what felt like hours, the two of you broke apart to catch your breaths, gasping for air.
“I cannot believe you thought riling me up was the best way to talk to me.” You muttered, lips brushing against his. Jihoon laughed, quickly pressing another kiss to your lips.
“Let’s admit it, it was a smart move.”
“It was a dumb move. I could have hated you more. Thank god I’m the smarter one.”
“It wasn’t. And I’m the smarter one. Oh, and all yours, sunshine.”
A/N: Please do tell me what you think about this story!! I worked really hard on it and I would love to know everyone’s thoughts on it~ Comments and reblogs are appreciated!
“BECAUSE I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE MORE THAN FRIENDS WITH YOU, SUNSHINE”
PAIRING || Jihoon x Female Reader
GENRES || Romance, Humour, Enemies To Lovers AU, Academic Rivals To Lovers AU, Rich Kids AU
SUMMARY || Jihoon, school's no. 1 (or no. 2), was nothing but a pain in the ass for you. Sure he was better than you in some subjects but so were you. The two of you were equally good enough for the first place so to increase the competition, he decided to suggest the most scandalous thing you had heard: the two of you tutor each other.
Or, in which, you were the rich kid with your family's dignity on the line and he was the poor kid with his family's sacrifices on the line.
WARNINGS || swearing
WORD COUNT || 10.6k
A/N || HI EVERYONE! Never thought I would be writing an enemies to lovers of this size but here we are. This is for the Lonely Hearts Cafe Collab by @camandemstudios !! Thank you so much for letting me particpate and do check out all the other authors here. Also moving my taglist to reblogs until tumblr fixes this horrible glitch cus its messing with the aesthetics tbh
Cram school had to be the worst phase in a teenager’s life.
You looked out of the window aimlessly, trying to drown out the teacher’s voice. It was pitch dark outside and you couldn’t really see anything, except for your own reflection staring back at you. Your hair wasn’t out of place at all, neatly brushed and clipped to keep it out of your eyes. Your school uniform was crisp and clean, as though you had decided to come to your cram school straight from home, and not after a long day of school.
But then your eyes met your reflection’s and you felt the tiredness hit you like a truckload. Your eyes looked like you had been awake for a thousand years, your eyes carrying the weight of all your previous generations. Which… wasn’t wrong in a way.
You rapidly blinked at your reflection, trying to get rid of the sleep from your eyes. Sighing, you turned your head back to the board where the teacher was explaining Faraday’s principle of electromagnetic induction, and your eyes flicked up to the clock overhead.
7.55 pm.
Five more minutes until this physics class got over.
You could survive five more minutes, right? Sure physics was the subject you dreadest the most but hey, you could bear a few minutes of it. You were doing this for four years already so five minutes shouldn’t hurt at all.
Then you made the mistake of looking at your best friend’s book, lying next to your blank one.
Kim Mingyu scribbled down furiously the concept the teacher was explaining, adding his own words to it as an indicator that he was understanding everything being taught. You watch him glance up at the board and nod his head in approval to what was being said, before looking back at his book to solve the problem.
Immediately, you felt the familiar feeling wrap around your throat, stopping any air from entering your lungs. Your fingers balled into a fist, nails digging into your palm as you tried to suck in a breath without making any noise.
The last thing you needed was for the entire class to look at you and wonder why you were hyperventilating. Screwing your eyes shut, you began doing the exercise you had looked up on the internet for anxiety attacks.
Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to 1. Count from 10 to-
“You okay?” Mingyu’s voice broke the chain of your thoughts, snapping you out of your mantra as you opened your eyes to look at him, trying to cover your distraught look. But no matter how well you had practiced the art of hiding your feelings, there was no secret you couldn’t keep from Mingyu.
He mirrored your expression, widening his eyes in worry as he gently touched your shoulder, edging a bit closer to you.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
You nodded, refusing to make eye contact with him. Embarrassment flooded your cheek at the thought of you getting an anxiety attack just because your best friend was able to understand the class and solve the problem.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just stifled because physics is just so hard.” You lied, hoping he won’t think too much about it.
Mingyu smiled at you softly. “Don’t worry. I know physics is eating you up but hey you aren’t that bad. Not to mention, you’re the maths topper. You can score great marks in the other subjects. One subject won’t pull you down that much.”
You knew Mingyu was lying through his teeth to make you feel better because one subject could pull down your rank because of the amount of competition, but nonetheless you felt at ease at his reassurance. Yeah, you weren’t that bad in maths, and you could try a bit more harder and improve your physics, right?
Right then the bell rang, and the teacher yelled out a few instructions to the class but you were too busy grabbing your pen and book and dumping them in your bag. You scrambled out of the class right behind the teacher, even leaving Mingyu behind as you ran straight to the washroom.
No sooner had you flung the toilet door open you puked, your stomach hurling out your lunch. After what felt like an hour you forced yourself to stop retching, gasping for breath as you clutched your hurting stomach. Your heart was still beating like crazy and a bead of sweat dropped from your forehead.
Slowly getting up, you took in a deep breath to stop your body from trembling too much. You could hear some girls chatting outside the door, and embarrassment creeped into your cheeks.
Had they heard you? No one had seen you, right?
If people found out that you were having a panic attack just because of a physics class…
You waited until the chatter outside died down before opening the door and peaking, making sure the coast was clear. It was empty, indicating that break time too was almost over.
Quitely, you slip out of the washroom and back to your classroom, walking back to your bench. Mingyu was nowhere to be seen, so you assumed he was probably in the canteen, buying some milk for the two of you.
You sat there silently for a while, your breath and heartbeat returning to normal as you took in your surroundings. Your classmates were either playing with crumpled balls of paper or chatting to each other. Your eyes then fell on one particular boy, who was completely absorbed in his book, scribbling away furiously.
Your eyes narrowed at him as you felt a pang of jealousy. Suddenly, he raised his head up and turned to look at you, both of your eyes locking and causing you to freeze in place.
Lee Jihoon smirked at you, twirling the pencil in his hand as though he knew about the little episode you just had.
Why, that asshole-
He got up and started walking in your direction, and you hastily pulled out a book from your bag and opened it to a random page to pretend like you were… well, occupied.
But of course Jihoon had to come and sit down on the bench in front of you, turning to you as he rested his elbow on your book, his palm cradling his face.
“Hey.” He said, that smirk never wavering off his face. God, he was so infuriating-
“What do you want from me?” You asked, yanking the book from his weight.
“Can I not come over and tell hi to my friend?” His cocky voice caused you to look up at him dryly.
“The dictionary definition of friends would beg to differ from what we have.”
“Damn it. I was hoping you would be too high headed to look at a dictionary.”
You scoffed.
“Not as air headed as you though, because you’re clearly wasting break time chatting with me instead of studying. You’ll need every single second to beat me in the test series next week.”
Jihoon smiled at you, his eyes glinting in amusement. I ought to punch those pearly white teeth. “Next week’s? Why not this week’s? Didn’t do so well?”
“Shut up.” You fumed, seething with his rage as he brought up memories from this week’s exams. The anxiety you had felt a few minutes ago was starting to surface up and you were not going to lose in front of him. “I’m still going to beat you in maths.”
“But beating me in math alone won’t give you the first rank.” He beamed, as though already knowing tomorrow’s results. You knew too, to be honest. You were just blatantly lying right now to save your face.
This week had been a particularly hard week, your period cramps paired with the worst chapters in every subject for the exams. While writing the exam itself you knew you were doomed, and the pain had been eating you away ever since you finished writing the test a few hours ago.
Maybe that was the reason you had a panic attack?
“Falling once won’t mean my CAT scores have been thrown out of the window.” You argue back. It was okay to fail, right?
That’s how you always calmed yourself down. There was no learning without failing after all. You had to learn from your mistakes. Next time, you would be even more flawless-
But how many more times did you need to fail to become flawless? How many times did you need to beat Jihoon until your rank was permanently 1 and not fluctuating between first and second place?
“Yeah sure. We’ll see who gets the early admissions to SNU.”
“Look, if you’re here to insult me-” You began but he looked at you hurt. This man should have become an actor instead.
“Insult you? You’re the one who has been keeping me up all night, making sure I’m giving my hundred percent no matter what! I love what we have. I’ll never insult you.” Jihoon mocked, causing you to roll your eyes at him.
“Now that felt like an insult.”
“Why were you in a rush today by the way?” He asked suddenly.
“Wh-what?” You felt your cheeks sink in as you looked at him in horror. No way- There was no way he knew, right?
If Jihoon of all people knew then- No. It couldn’t be.
“After class.” He continued, completely unfazed by your reaction. He tilted his head at you, looking at you even more lazily if anything. “You ran out. It was almost like you were dying-”
“Jihoon.” A familiar voice cut him off and never had you loved your best friend more than right now as you turned back to see a Mingyu looking at Jihoon questioningly, as though urging him to continue saying whatever it was. “What are you doing here?”
“Is it illegal to talk to you both now?” Jihoon asked sarcastically.
“No… but bullying is.”
Jihoon’s face darkened at those words, and he glared at the two of you. “Bullying? I swear you high society kids are so stuck up that even having banter is considered bullying.”
“Well, Y/N doesn’t look like she’s enjoying your… ‘banter’ very much.”
He snorted, and stood up, causing you to breathe a sigh of relief. “Fine then. Suit yourselves. I won’t bully you much if that is what is causing you so much trouble Y/N.” Giving the two of you a weird look, he walked away, going back to his bench and slumping off on his desk.
Inhaling deeply, you looked up at Mingyu and smiled. “Thanks.”
He smiled back at you, before placing a banana milk carton on the desk. “Here, I thought you weren’t feeling well so I brought some banana milk for you from the canteen.”
“Thank you!” You said, feeling a bit cheerful as you peeled off the seal and sipped it, the cold milk cooling you down just like how Mingyu had anticipated.
The door of the classroom opened again as the teacher walked in, and everyone scrambled to get to their places and greet the teacher.
As you stood up, your eyes fell on Jihoon. He looked really glum, like what Mingyu had said really offended him.
You took that as a win.
“L/N Y/N.” You flinched as the teacher spoke out your name, causing you to look up and stop rubbing your thumb finally. Sucking in a deep breath, you plastered a small, confident smile on your face before walking up to her.
Ms. Yun gave you a dry smile before extending the result sheet, and you felt your heart shatter almost immediately. Still, you just smiled back at her and took the sheet, walking back to your desk, not daring to look at your result.
Once seated (and glancing through the class quickly so that no one’s eyes was on you), you let your eyes fall onto the printed piece of paper in your hands.
Your stomach jumped.
2/246
Second place? Again? That would mean that Jihoon was-
Your grip on the paper tightened a little as tears blurred your eyes. No, no, no! I cannot cry here!
You knew it. You knew this would be the result. But still… you had hoped that maybe fate would be kind to you just this once.
You had drowned out your surroundings, staring at the numbers again and again as though if you looked long enough that two would change into one. What were you going to tell your parents?
Oh my god. What am I going to tell them-
“Y/N!”
You jerked at the sound of someone calling your voice, blinking rapidly so that there was no obvious wetness in your eyes. Your vision finally concentrated on a rather familiar face in front of you, and hatred kicked in almost as a self defense.
“Daydreaming much?” Jihoon asked, smirking at you as he tilted his head slightly.
“Not at all.” You said, smiling at him with the most fake smile you could muster. Through the corner of your eyes, you saw that most of your classmates had left, only a few going through their books one final time before leaving for break. “I don’t have that much time in my hand. Unlike you.”
“Oh well, then I must be really talented if I managed to get the first rank while daydreaming so much.” He laughed, the sound causing your heart to accelerate a little. His laughter was so annoying that you were sure you would end up with heart problems one of these days.
“Well, I did say I would beat you next week.” You said, trying not to raise your voice at him.
“You’ve been saying that to me since the beginning of this year.”
“Yeah well if you haven’t forgotten that first place was mine for the last few years.”
“And before that it was mine.”
“One year. In middle school.”
“Anyways,” you glance back at the report card. You had got second place in physics again, but first in maths. Well maybe that would be your saving grace in front of your parents. “Looks like no matter how much you try you cannot beat me in maths though.” You gave him a little smirk, leaning in a bit as though you were about to share a big secret.
“How are you acing in physics after being so bad in maths, huh?”
Now it was Jihoon’s time to scoff. “It’s the second rank. I’m just behind you by a few marks.”
“Sure you are not by hearting physics numericals?”
Jihoon leaned, suddenly catching you off guard by how close both of your faces were. But you didn’t let your expression change. “That seems like something you would do, to be honest.”
You moved away from him, raising your hand in defeat. “Well, I admit I’m, ah, a bit weak in physics. But you don’t want to accept defeat no matter what.”
“Ahahaha, I just want to admit to you. Funny how our weaknesses are complimentary, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, it’s almost like fate wants us to always be able to pit against each other.” You joked, folding away your report card and slipping it into your bag.
“Hmmm.” Jihoon agreed, looking out of the window. You watched him for a few seconds, taking in his features. His hair moved slightly from the light breeze blowing in, and you realised with a jolt just how soft and dreamy he looked right now.
Wait, what-
You banged your elbow against the table to drop your pencil case, immediately diving down to retrieve its contents. You felt like your cheeks were on fire and the last thing you needed was Jihoon to see you like this.
Why were your cheeks heating up in the first place?
Once you collected your (two) pens, you sat under the desk for a few seconds, trying to get rid of the heat on your cheeks. Deep breath, deep breath, deep breath-
“What are you doing?” Suddenly Jihoon appeared, crouching next to you, looking at you in surprise because who took so much time to pick up their pens and pencils?
“Ah!” You yelped, jerking away from him a little before offering him a sheepish smile. “I, uh, I was… just picking up my pencils!”
“Oh?” He looked confused, all cockiness from his face gone as though there was nothing to make fun of in this situation.
“Uh…yeah!” You laughed awkwardly as you showed him the pens, and he too nodded after a few seconds. “Man, you sure are slow even in daily tasks like these.”
There. There was the Lee Jihoon you knew.
“By the way, do you want to tutor each other?” He asked suddenly, sitting down on the floor as he looked at you eagerly.
Now it was your time to be confused. “Huh?”
“You know… I help you with physics and you help me with maths?”
“Huh?” You asked again, not sure you had heard correctly. Helping… each other?
Was it legal to fraternise with the enemy like this? And… tutoring each other in the weak subjects felt diminishing the competition you both had.
But then again… you really needed help with physics. Cram school wasn’t enough for you clearly, and hiring a personal tutor would mean seeing your parents waste even more money on you. You were willing to do anything to save your face. Forget your reputation, the least you could do was swallow your pride and save your family’s reputation.
“Help each other. Let’s put aside our differences and work together… at least for a month?” Jihoon explained again.
“Oh. Sure… sounds good to me.” You said. “Uh, maybe we could start from this Sunday?”
“Sure. But your house.”
“Huh? Why not the study cafe?” You asked, surprised.
“Because I'd rather be dead than be caught studying with you.” He smirked again, as though that should have been self explanatory. You rolled your eyes at him.
“Okay, but you could have been nice and invited me over to your house instead.”
At this he laughed. But when he saw that you weren’t laughing with him and just looking at him confused, he stopped, his face darkening once again. “My parents will be at home and I don’t want them to get the wrong idea.”
Now you nodded, understanding the situation. “I get it. Lucky for us, my parents won’t be home this Sunday so it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Cool then.” He said, before walking away from you, hands in his pocket as though you two hadn’t just decided to set aside your life long differences and help each other out instead.
“That’s it?” You called out, feeling a bit annoyed at how nonchalant he was while you had been overthinking if this deal was worth it.
Jihoon turned back. “What do you want?”
“No goodbyes?”
“Oh please.” He rolled his eyes, before smirking at you, causing your blood to boil once again. “We aren’t friends.”
You heard footsteps before the knock on the door, your stomach already dropping in fear. Your heart raced as you rubbed your thumb repeatedly, the page you were reading going completely blur no matter how much you tried to focus on the words in front of you.
“Y/N?”
Forcing your cheeks up for a smile, you turned on your chair to look at your mother standing by your door.
“You’re back?” You asked, trying for a small talk to calm down your nerves.
Maybe she forgot. Maybe she had a long day at work-
“Where is your report card?”
“Uh, in my- in my bag-”
“Thought I told you to keep it on my table immediately after you return from school?” Your mother said, narrowing her eyes at you. You felt your heart give an anxious squeeze, but you just gave her a small smile in an effort to reduce the tension in the room.
You walked up to your bag and pulled out the report card, biting your lips as your stomach turned. What was she going to say? Would she understand if I told her what actually happened-
“What are you doing!” You heard your mother snap at you and before you could even react you felt her snatch it away from your hand.
“I-” You began but your mother’s eyes widened, face suddenly livid with anger.
“Second? Again?” She screamed, causing you to flinch.
“I- I can explain! I wasn’t feeling well!” You said, even though you could feel your stomach sinking to the depths of hell quite literally.
“Oh, really?” Your mother laughed, the sound causing you to flinch and take a step back as fear wrapped itself around your heart. “And what was the excuse last week? Right, that you were weak in a chapter-”
“Well, I’m not lying!” You exclaimed, your voice rising out of panic. “I’m not lying, I swear!”
“Then when will you get strong, Y/N? Huh?” Suddenly your mother grabbed your shoulders, her fingers digging painfully into your flesh and you tried your best to stop the tears threatening to well your eyes.
When will you get strong? When will you?
“Answer me!” She screamed, shaking you by your shoulders. But now her face wasn’t angry anymore. It was just… hurt and disappointment.
You felt your will completely crumble and the tears rolled down.
“When will you get better?” Your mother’s voice dropped to whisper as she stared at you intensely. “When? Don’t your father and I try hard enough for you? Don’t we give you everything you want? Then why can’t you do this simple thing?”
“I- I’m trying.” You whispered, sniffling as you felt more tears glide down your cheeks.” I swear I’m trying.”
“Then try harder!” She screamed once again, causing you to flinch. “Try till you are out of breath, try till you can’t take it anymore, try till you feel like dying, you worthless piece of-”
“I came first in maths!” You interrupted her, hoping she would see some hope in you.
Suddenly you felt a sharp sting on your cheek as you stumbled to your right by the force of your mother’s slap. Blood rushed to your ears as you slowly lifted your fingers to touch your burning cheek, looking at your mother in horror.
“You disgust me so much.” She whispered, and you felt your world crack. She doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it, she doesn’t mean it-
Sighing, your mother walked out of the room and shut the door behind her with a bang.
Your knees gave away almost immediately as you crumbled on to the floor, the first loud sob escaping you. You slapped your hand over your mouth as you cried, the tears coming down fast.
It hurt so much. So much.
You tried so hard to make your parents proud. Not to be a disappointment. They always sacrificed so much for you. Then where were you going wrong? You always worked so hard. Then why couldn’t you be first?
Why couldn’t you be like Jihoon?
Sucking in a huge breath to control your crying, you clutched your heart at the painful thought of him.
Jihoon.
Always at ease, Lee Jihoon.
Studying must be so easy for him, with how smart he was. He didn’t even need to struggle like you. He didn’t need to throw up after every test, lose breath every time he was unable to solve any problem or cry his eyes out because he was a disappointment to his parents and they hated him.
Life must be so easy for him.
You hated him. You hated him so much.
You buried your face in your hands as another sob escaped you and you felt the entire world darken around you.
You were such a failure.
As soon as the doorbell rang, you found yourself sprinting to open the door. (You totally were not sitting in the living room waiting for him.
You opened the door with a rush, and found yourself staring back at a surprised Jihoon.
“Wow, that was quick-” He began but you cut him off to distract him. “Hey!”
Jihoon smiled at you, tilting his head a little like he always did. “Hi.”
“Come in!” You squeaked, not sure why you were feeling so nervous. Actually the fact that Jihoon would come over had you feeling jittery but now that he was actually here, you felt slightly light headed for some reason.
Was the academic tension finally getting to you?
Jihoon stepped into the house, eyes glancing around as though taking in his surroundings.
“Don’t worry.” You said, closing the door behind the two of you. “I don’t have any booby traps hidden here to get rid of you or something.”
“How do I know that?” Jihoon asked, turning to look at you with a smirk. There was his goddamned smirk again. “You might want to get rid of your competition for all I know.”
You rolled your eyes at him. “The study room is this way.” Walking in front of him, you led the way. “Besides, if I needed to get rid of competition, then I would need to blow the whole country.”
“Oh please, I’m your only competition. No one is as intelligent as you.”
The two of you were climbing up the stairs to your study room when you froze, slowly turning to look down at him.
“You- you think I’m intelligent?” You asked, your voice almost sounding hollow.
Jihoon blinked at you, as though that was a stupid question to ask. “You are literally the topper of the school, what are you even talking about?”
You huffed out a breath, not knowing you were holding in your breath. “Forget it.” You mumbled before quickening your pace on the stairs. You heard Jihoon run up the stairs until he was right beside you, and he leaned in slightly towards you.
“Come on, just because I am beating you in the past few tests you cannot think you are unworthy, can you?”
There was no way Lee Jihoon was praising you, right? “I said forget it.” You said, opening the door to your room. Then you turned to him. “And besides, if I was one of the smartest, how come I am so bad at physics? I’m not even a little bad…I’m terribly bad at it.”
Jihoon smiled, his eyes crinkling into half moons. “Which is why I am here! Don’t worry though, you still won’t be able to beat me.”
“How thoughtful of you. You don't need to worry about our competition streak too. You'll never be able to beat me in maths.”
“Good thing we've got that cleared up. Nice room by the way.” Jihoon stated, looking around as he stepped into your study room. “Where is your bed, though? Or do you sleep on your chair because I've always got the vibes that you study during your sleep time too.”
“Ha ha ha. Very funny.” You narrowed your eyes at him, pulling him a chair next to your desk. “This is my study room. Obviously I wouldn't have my bed here. That's in my bedroom.”
He looked at you in disbelief. “You have a study room and a bedroom?”
“Well…” You started, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. Something felt off with the way he had said it. Like he was actually surprised. “You are not supposed to study in the room you sleep in so… I thought- I thought you knew this.”
His face was unreadable but he shrugged. “Guess not all of us have the privilege of knowing such amazing facts.”
What did that mean?
But you chose to ignore it, signalling him to sit down as you sat on your chair. “Enough chit chat. We didn't come here to bond. I was thinking… two hours maths and then two hours physics?”
“Sounds good to me.” he said, sitting down. “You're going to give me homework, aren't you?”
You looked at him surprised. “How did you know that?”
Jihoon laughed lightly, and for some reason you felt your stomach jump a little. “Oh well remember we had reverse classes for a week in eighth grade? You gave us homework for that class and corrected it and even graded it for us.”
“Oh wow… you remember that?” You asked, feeling your cheeks heat up. “To be honest, that was a bit too much for a reverse class-”
“It was.”
You glared at him. “But now since we’re trying to improve our grades I think it would be for the best if we gave each other homework. Would let us know where we stand and how much we improved and just keep in touch with everything.”
“I agree.” he nodded.
“Wow Lee Jihoon agreeing with me? Maybe the sun will rise in the west tomorrow!”
“Very funny. For your information, I never hated your homework. If anything I thought it was cute.”
You looked at him with a horrendous look on your face. Cute? Lee jihoon called some habit of yours cute?
“Please refrain from ruining the actual meanings of words.”
“Fine, you grumpy, friendless woman-”
“Whom are you calling friendless?”
“Oh so you agree you are grumpy?”
“I-” You began, faltering a bit. You were a grumpy person. There was no denying that. But you couldn’t lose in an argument to Jihoon. Nonetheless, he smirked at you at the win, leaning in a bit as he tilted his head at you. “Cat got your tongue, sunshine?”
“No, I just realised there is no point in fighting with you if we want to help each other out.” You lied, quickly turning away to grab some mathematics books. Your face felt like it was on fire and there was no way you were going to let Jihoon see you like this.
“Anyways, I wanted to say that don’t feel stressed teaching me.” Jihoon said. “I might not be as good as you but you are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thanks for transferring the stress over from you to me.” You said dryly, opening the book to the first chapter.
“Yes and if you’re struggling with physics it’s your fault not mine because I’m an even better teacher.”
You gave him a look and he burst out laughing, causing you to shake your head in disbelief.
“No, I’m serious. You are a wonderful teacher.”
“Thank you. Now after two hours I shall let you know if the same can be said about you.”
“It’s a competition. Whoever gets more marks next week in their taught subjects is the winner.” Jihoon’s eyes glinted with mischief and the urge to wipe that smirk off his face grew stronger.
“Deal.” You gritted your teeth, not wanting to back down. “What’s at stake?”
At this Jihoon grinned at you, leaning in until your noses were just inchest apart. Did he always smell this good?
“The loser has to admit that no matter what the fluctuation in our ranks, the winner is the true first rank holder.”
You felt the corner of your lip go up in a smile, feeling the familiar rush of adrenaline every time he challenged you to something rush through your veins. “You’re on.”
“What were you thinking?” You asked (or rather demanded) as you roughly pulled apart the curtains to Mingyu’s bed, ready to strangle him for not telling you this.
In response Mingyu groaned and covered his eyes with his arms, the harsh lighting of the nurse’s cabin hitting him now that you had pulled away his curtains.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? You’re sorry? Do you even know what you are supposed to be sorry for?” You continued, dropping yourself on to the edge of his bed.
At this he removed his arm slightly so that he could just peer at you, before smiling sheepishly. “Uh, for fainting in class?”
You sighed, shaking your head in disbelief. “Don’t be sorry, Gyu. But why didn’t you tell me you weren’t feeling well? It could have been so much worse!”
“Relax, I was just tired. That’s all.” He said dismissively, as though that was supposed to reduce your worry.
You wondered if he too was hiding something like how you were hiding your anxiety.
No way, right? The Mingyu you knew always shared everything with you. But then, so did you… or supposedly.
“Is that all the nurse said?” You asked, still worried. Just how much was he working himself off?
At this he smiled at you. “You can ask her yourself if you still doubt me.”
You huffed. “I don’t doubt you. I’m just… worried.”
“I’m okay. I’m serious.” Mingyu answered, turning towards his side to face you properly. “I am… a bit tired though, to be honest. The nurse said I could sleep here for the next two - three classes till I have the energy to sit through a class.”
“Okay. Rest up then.” You said, making a mental note to get him some banana milk bottles from the canteen.
“Could you close the curtain?”
“Sure.” You got up to pull the curtains close when your eyes fell on the bed next to his, the curtain slightly open towards the head of the bed. You nearly audbi;y gasped when you recognised the face, especially when you saw the bruises on his cheeks and his split lips. Even though he was asleep, you could see his jaw was clenched, the tension in his face very evident.
Shutting the curtain close, you turned back to Mingyu, sitting back down on the bed and leaning towards him so that you could whisper to him.
“What is Jihoon doing here?” You whispered harshly, eyebrows knotted as you tried to think of a reason how he might have ended up in this situation. He didn’t look like someone who took others' lunch money.
Mingyu blinked at him. “Uh, because he is all battered up?”
“I know that!” You hissed. “I meant. How did he end up like this? Did he get into a fight?”
At this, Mingyu looked surprised. “Wait, don’t you know?”
“Don’t I know what?”
“That Jihoon is a popular target of some of the bullies in 3-A? They keep harassing him almost everyday.”
“What?” You felt your head spin with this new information. Jihoon? Getting bullied? But he didn’t look like the type who would let someone bully him. “But why?”
Now Mingyu was the one looking at you confused. “Do you live under a rock or something? How do you not know this about your competitor?”
“Well, probably because I do not care about the wordy affairs of my competitors. I intend to beat them through studies alone.” You said, a bit annoyed by the way Mingyu was acting. What could be such a golden piece of information that you had to know about him?
“Jihoon is one of the scholarship students. There are only two per year. How do you not know them?”
You looked at him in surprisingly, finally understanding a lot of the things he had said and done over the years. No wonder he couldn’t relate to having a separate study room and a bedroom.
Suddenly you felt like an asshole, shame and guilt creeping up your cheeks.
“What’s wrong? Did you do something to him?” Mingyu asked suspiciously.
You snorted. “I’m not that cruel. I would never stoop so low to insult him.”
“Yeah, I know. Now get out of here. I really need to get some sleep. Any Jihoon related question answer can wait.”
Waving him a goodbye, you walked out of the nurse’s cabin, glancing one last time at Jihoon’s bed.
Maybe his life wasn’t that easy as you had thought it was.
You tossed on your bed once again, sleep being the last thing on your mind. What you learnt today was pulling you down, causing your mind to run around restlessly.
Jihoon was so brave.
You knew how terrible rich kids could be and the fact that he had survived it all these years without letting it affect him so much was… admirable.
Was this why he wanted the tutoring to be done in your house only?
But I wouldn’t have made fun of him…
Then again, both of you were always fighting against each other so he probably couldn’t guarantee that you wouldn’t use it against him.
Once again you wondered what it was like to be him.
Since he wasn’t from an elite family that probably meant he never had the pressure of losing face. How nice it must be… to do well just for the sake of doing well and not because your entire family’s reputation was hanging by the thread.
One mistake and suddenly no one wanted to do anything with you.
Letting out a sigh, you finally sat up, feeling unbearably hot from all the tossing and turning you had been doing. Rubbing your eyes, you reached for your phone and opened the app, searching for Jihoon’s name.
But then you froze, fingers over the keyboard.
What do I say?
How are you?
But that would mean you saw him in that state and something told you that Jihoon wouldn’t want you to know this information. At least not in this way.
How about… how is your maths prep?
Your face lit up, and you quickly typed in the message and hit send.
There. That was a good message. Just a casual text with nothing implied at all other than how his study was going.
Suddenly, another thought crossed your mind.
Maybe I should call him? That way… you could even sneak in a
‘how are you doing? you sound tired. did something happen’ in between the conversation.
But as soon as the call went through, your eyes fell on the clock beside your bed and you let out a welp.
2:00 AM.
What were you thinking?
Quickly you cut the call and threw your phone across the bed, your heart hammering loudly in your chest.
Calling your enemy at 2 in the night suddenly felt like the dumbest thing you had done in your life. You felt your cheeks heat up when you realised Jihoon would probably tease you the next day for calling him up at such an odd hour.
What excuse could you give? You couldn’t even have ‘accidentally’ called him at this time.
Suddenly your phone rang, causing you to nearly jump. Reaching for your phone, you checked the caller id and you felt your heart stutter a little.
Lee Jihoon
For a second, you stared at the caller id, surprised that he had called you back at this time before you remembered to pick the call. “He-hello?”
“Hey.” Jihoon’s voice rumbled on the other side of the line, his voice an octave lower indicating that he was sleeping. “What’s wrong?”
“Uhm, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to wake you up-” You began rambling, beginning to regret everything now. Why did you think calling him was a good idea in the first place?
“No, no. It’s fine.” You heard him sigh a little before speaking again. “Is something wrong?”
“N-no? Why would you assume that though?”
There was a pause. “I mean, you called me up at 2 in the night. There must be something bothering you a lot, right?”
“I-” You began, not sure how to tell him exactly what was bothering you when it was him that was bothering you. “I, uh, yeah. I- I couldn’t sleep but I didn’t realise how late it was. I’m so sorry.”
You heard Jihoon chuckle. “It’s okay. I wouldn’t have picked it if it was someone else but I figured there must be something wrong if you called me at this time. So tell me sunshine, what's running in that pretty head of yours?”
Your stomach somersaulted at his sudden use of the nickname, but you managed to ignore it. “How- how are you?”
“Uh, you called me to ask how I am?”
A valid question to which you had no answer.
“Yeah, I was wondering- I was wondering if the maths homework I gave was too burdening for you!” You blurted out the first lie that came to your mind.
“How nice of you to be worried about the huge load of work you mounted on me.” He laughed and slight annoyance creeped into you. How was he this joyful after everything he was going through?
“How can you be this carefree with everything that you are going through?” You suddenly snapped, feeling angry at his non cholent behaviour.
He shouldn’t be this non cholent. He didn’t need to be.
Jihoon stopped laughing, his next few words coming out confused. “What do you mean?”
Shit.
“I- I mean,” you began, racking your head for more excuses. “I meant how can you take the homework I gave so lightly!”
“Oh, pardon me then ma’am.” He said, sounding back to his usual self. Yep, he was too good at covering this up. “I shall undertake my homework with the utmost precision and academic rigor.”
“What’s with the language?” You muttered.
“It’s fun pulling your leg.”
“Oh so you admit to torturing me?”
“Come on it’s not torture if you enjoy it too. Don’t you make fun at my expense?”
Immediately guilt racked you. Had you ever made him feel underprivileged compared to you?
“Well,” you said quietly, “I don’t want to anymore.”
Another pause. “Is everything okay?” Jihoon asked softly.
His voice sounded so soothing, like your heart was the sand and his voice was the gentle waves lapping at it.
Wait, what?
No way you just found comfort in Jihoon’s voice.
“Yeah. Yeah, everything is fine. What about you? Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Everything is fine for me too. So no more thoughts ruining your sleep?”
“No.” You sighed, feeling a bit lighter despite not talking about what you actually wanted to. “I think I can get some sleep now.”
“Good. Can’t have you giving up on our rivalry so soon. If you feel like not fighting with me anymore, just talk to me. I’ll rile you up enough.”
You giggled. “Good to know you’re keeping our relationship alive.”
“Anything to see that grumpy side, sunshine.”
“Good night to you too, Jihoon.”
“Earth to Y/N?” Jihoon snapped his fingers in front of your face, causing you to let out a welp as you suddenly grounded yourself to reality.
“Huh?” You asked, smiling nervously as your eyes flicked to the physics book open in front of the two of you to try and figure out what question he might have asked.
But Jihoon caught your eye moment and that bastard just folded his arms over the book, leaning in until you had no choice but to make eye contact with him.
“Am I that handsome that you got lost staring at it?” He smirked.
“Wh- what? What an audacious thing to say!” You spluttered, cheeks heating up. But your eyes once again flicked to his right cheek, where a Mickey Mouse band aid was put on.
“It’s not audacious if it's true. Tell me,” he smirked at you. “Do I look that good?”
“I was looking at your Mickey Mouse band aid! I didn’t expect you to be those kinds of people.” You lied.
Jihoon shrugged. “My little brother gave it to me. So I thought it might look good with my outfit today.”
How did you get hurt? Who hurt you? Is it too much? How are you bearing it all alone?
There were so many questions you wanted to ask, but you were scared to privy into his matters. It was very clear he wasn’t comfortable with most people knowing it considering how you never knew this but you also didn’t want him to feel like you could weaponize this against him.
“That’s cute.”
“You know what’s cuter?” He asked, mischief glinting in his eyes. Oh no. Then leaning in, he said, “You agreeing to everything I was saying because you were distracted by my face.”
You felt your cheeks heat up furiously. “I was not distracted by your face!”
“You know, you have to be more believable than that.”
“Sorry for not being a trained liar.” You spat out, glaring at him.
“You don’t need to be a liar, just convincing enough.” He stated with a smirk.
Oh, like you? Maybe that would wipe that smirk off his face but you didn’t want to play dirty or hurt him.
“You know I know I’ve watched this series…” He suddenly began, looking out of your window. “Where two of the most brilliant students clash because they want the other person to confess first… I feel like we are like them except we are trying to get the other person to admit that they are smarter.”
You looked at him incredulously. “Are you comparing us to… Kaguya-sama?”
Jihoon looked at you surprised. “You watch anime?”
“I, uh,” Truth be told, it was your guilty pleasure. No one knew about this little secret you indulged in other than Mingyu because your parents never liked the idea of reading a bunch of comics instead of ‘real’ books and considered it a waste of time but you had loved reading them ever since you were a teenager. “I- I don’t- I mean, yes. I, uh, read manga and watch anime too.” You mumbled, not sure why you were telling him the truth.
You expected Jihoon to start laughing, call this hobby of your childish or something like that but instead, his face lit up in excitement. “Me too! I love anime so much! What’s your favourite?”
“What?” You looked at him confused. He seemed like the last person on planet earth that you would share a hobby with. “You like- you like anime too?”
“Yeah! Oh, have you watched Oshi No Ko?”
“Can you- can you keep your voice down a bit?” You asked, looking nervously at the door. You couldn’t risk letting the maids hear him. But nonetheless when you turned back to look at him you couldn’t help but smile, the enthusiasm in his eyes infectious.
Jihoon looked so soft and happy right now, a soft halo around his body from the window opposite to him, his eyes almost half moons as he beamed at you. He looked so relaxed right now… like a boy just enjoying his youth.
Not the stressed out, beaten up teenager you had seen the other day. The one fighting to keep his scholarship all these years and pretend like nothing was wrong.
“Sorry, was I too loud?” He asked, still grinning.
It was an odd thing to ask Jihoon to lower his voice because Jihoon was always on the quieter end. Unless the two of you were bickering you had never seen him talk much. “No, but- but, uhm, no one knows I like anime and I would like to keep it a secret.”
“Ah, don’t worry about that. Your secret is safe with me, sunshine.” He winked at you and you felt your heart skip a beat.
What was that?
“Thanks.” You muttered, suddenly feeling hot. You turned away from him and took a sip of your water, hoping your cheeks weren’t as hot as they felt. “I, uh, I did watch Oshi No Ko. But I just say the opening music always stole the spotlight for me.”
“Yes, YOASOBI is unparalleled, I’m afraid. Who knew I would find an anime fan in my rival.” He chuckled.
“Yeah, that’s quite unexpected.” You said, smiling at him a little. “I can’t believe we found another topic to talk about other than who’s going to beat who’s ass next test.”
“Hey, I still love those conversations! They are my real motivation.”
“Whatever.” You roll your eyes, biting your lips to prevent a smile from forming.
“Let’s go to the bookstore together, sometime.”
You turned so fast to face him that you nearly heard your neck snap but Jihoon was busy looking out of the window again.
Did he mean as a date?
Your cheeks heated up at the very thought of it, and you quickly dived down to pull out a notebook from your bag.
“Maybe if Mingyu wants, he could come too.”
Oh.
Feeling like an idiot, you sat up straight and gave him a strained smile, your cheeks on fire even more.
“Yeah sure. We could.”
“And the final answer is A.”
“Oh my god!” You whispered happily, practically stomping your feet in excitement as you drew a slash next to the last question. Glancing through your sheet once more to see if you had missed any circled question, you turned to look at Mingyu.
“I got everything right!” You giggled, just as he too looked at your paper in surprise. His smile grew when he saw all the questions were slashed, looking back at you in equal happiness.
“Congratulations! You scored perfectly in all subjects this time, didn’t you?”
“Yes! Oh my god, I can feel the week’s hard work being rewarded.” You said, feeling happiness surge through your veins. It had been so long since you felt this happy over a test in cram school that it almost felt foreign to you. You had been so stressed out all these days that you had almost forgotten how rewarding and relaxing it felt to score this good.
No wonder Jihoon was always in the mood to tease you.
Suddenly remembering him, you searched the classroom for him. Finally, you saw him sitting in the corner seat and you smirked, thinking of how you would tease him now.
But then you caught his expression and you froze.
Jihoon looked… anxious. And distraught. You could see him biting his thumb as he looked at his paper, legs all jittery.
Lee Jihoon anxious?
Guilt hit you like a truck as you continued watching him, wanting to go over and comfort him.
How many things was he hiding behind that golden boy facade? How much was he bearing all alone?
You wondered if there was anyone he could freely talk to, someone to help him get the grief off his shoulders.
Should I go over and talk to him? But he had also told you that he would rather be dead than caught being seen with you.
Then he turned back and his eyes caught yours, and you froze. But Jihoon smiled at you softly, like he wasn’t on the verge of having an anxiety attack a few seconds ago. You forced a smile for him before looking down at your paper, the win leaving a bitter taste in your mouth.
Was all this struggle really worth the pain?
Laughter and idle chatter filled the air around you, and you could feel your cheeks getting tired with every passing seconds due to the fake smile you had plastered on your face. Mingyu was on the other side of the table, stuck with some older women who were gushing to him about how amazing their daughters were.
Poor Gyu. You thought, feeling glad that your parents were too busy to try setting you up with future marriage prospects.
Of course, had it been someone else’s party they would have still done it. But since they were the hosts and stuck at the head table, they were too occupied to bother what you were doing.
Picking up the glass of juice you had been drinking since the beginning of the evening you let your eyes idly wander the crowd, taking in the guests. You had been spending the evening with some of your school friends and you hadn’t really had the chance to see who your parents had invited for this party.
You heard someone clink the glass at the table near the podium and you turned towards it, only to find your father standing up with a raised glass, clinking it again to get everyone’s attention.
“Good evening everyone.” Your father began, and you got yourself ready for another of his speeches where he subtly praised himself and put everyone else down. “I hope you all know why we are gathered here today. It’s a great pleasure being able to celebrate such an important milestone in my business with everyone present here.”
You forced another smile for your father as everyone politely clapped. You
looked around him to see who had the ‘honour’ of sitting right next to him when your eyes fell on the mother and son sitting beside your mother.
You felt your blood drain off your cheeks as you watched Jihoon smile at your father, leaning in to say something to his mother.
What was he doing here? Who invited him? And why?
His mother laughed at whatever he had said and patted his back gently, and you felt a twinge of jealousy. Your mother would have never looked at you that way, let alone comfort you.
Jihoon’s anxious face flashed across your mind and you wondered how nice it must have been to have someone supportive at home.
He reminded you of how lonely you were at times.
“But taking this opportunity I would also like to mention another thing.” Your father continued, and you turned your attention back to him. You would talk to Jihoon as soon as this speech was over.
“I would like to talk about my amazing daughter, who scored a perfect score in every subject last week, something that was a first in the cram school.”
You felt your heart lurch for the second time that evening.
Oh no. Oh no. What was he doing?
You could feel everyone’s eyes suddenly on you, and you chuckled nervously as you looked around the crowd, grasping your clammy hands underneath the table. When your eyes landed on Jihoon, you made eye contact with him, expecting to see his anxious face once again.
Because you were always in this position and you knew how it felt.
But instead… he looked happy. He smiled at you brightly and nodded, as though he didn’t mind the fact you had taken his first place.
No way. He has to be faking it. I’ll go talk to him after this and explain that I didn’t mean to gloat in front of him.
Suddenly it became clear to you why your parents had invited Jihoon and his mother over.
To show you off in front of him. To put him back in his place.
“... and I am so proud of her.” Your father finally finished, locking eye contact with you and you smiled back at him. You could feel the bile rising up your throat, the urge to throw up getting stronger.
You felt so sick. So, so sick.
Was this always the reason your parents wanted you to do well? Because you were just a trophy meant to be shown off.
“Please enjoy the rest of the night!” Your father concluded, and the hubbub filled the room again. Immediately you got up and bolted towards Jihoon’s table.
“We need to talk.” You whispered urgently even before Jihoon had turned to acknowledge you. He looked at you a bit surprised, but nodded nonetheless.
“Mom, this is Y/N.” He introduced her and you gave her a polite smile. “Hi, ma’am.”
“Hi darling, Jihoon has told me so much about you!” She exclaimed and you laughed nervously. “All good things, I hope?”
“Ah, you won’t believe what he said-”
“Okay mom! I’ll be right back!” Jihoon cut her off as he grabbed your arm and pulled you away from the table.
“Where to?” He asked, finally letting go of your arm but you grabbed his hand instead. It was warm in contrast to your cold, clammy ones.
“Let’s go to the garden.” You said urgently, pulling him behind you.
“Woah, what’s the hurry?” He asked, but you didn’t respond. “Is it because of what my mom said? She didn’t mean anything, I swear-.”
“I’m sorry.” You cut him off, finally facing him as the two of you had reached the gardens. Jihoon looked at you confused. You sucked in a deep breath. “I’m- I’m sorry for tonight. Look, I know about your financial situation. So I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry that you got dragged into this.”
Jihoon frowned. “What do you mean? Why are you sorry?”
“Because- because my parents did this on purpose!” You said, a bit exasperated now. How was he not understanding? “They just want to show off, that’s why they brought you here!”
“Are you… pitying me?” He narrowed his eyes at you. “Do you think just because I’m poor, I think my life is horrible and I cannot take some rich bratty girl’s parents’ insults? Do you think I’m such a hopelessly sad case?”
“I didn’t say that!” You snapped. “I just meant that they were trying to put you down!”
“Well, please don’t think I’m this pathetic.” He yelled, equally angry now. “I wouldn’t have come to this stupid party if I didn’t know what I would be expecting. I can handle you rich brats’ privileges very well now. And I certainly don’t need your sympathy.”
“Fine! Go ahead and do whatever the hell you want to!” You yelled, turning away and walking back to the party.
Hot tears pricked your eyes but you rapidly blinked, trying to not let them fall. As soon as you entered the party hall you made your way to the washroom, hoping no one was there.
Finding it empty, you locked yourself up in a stall, finally sinking on to the ground. You let out a sob as the first tear fell, feeling your heart break as you replayed the events that just happened in your head.
Why did you care so much about him? Why did you care if your parents were trying to put him down? Jihoon was your rival after all. You always wanted to defeat him, no matter what.
But right now you just wanted him to be happy. For him to be able to live freely.
You rubbed your eyes as more tears streamed down your face, wishing you had never fought with him in the first place.
Why did you both need to fight all the time? You really liked whatever you had with him. He always took you so seriously and acknowledged your efforts.
You sniffled, a sudden thought occurring in your head.
Oh my god. I like him.
You felt your head spin at the sudden realisation. You liked him. You liked Lee Jihoon. Your rival. The person you absolutely ‘hated’.
And as if that was a cue to your enlightenment, your phone rang. Wiping away your tears once again you looked at the caller id, and you felt your stomach lurch.
Lee Jihoon.
Clearing your throat so that you didn’t sound like you had been crying, you picked up the call.
“Hello?” Jihoon’s voice came from the other side.
“Hey.” You whispered, hoping your voice didn’t sound too hoarse.
“Can we- can we talk? I think there’s something we- I mean, I need to clear up.”
“Okay.” You mumbled. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the garden still. Where are you?”
“Uh, in the washroom.”
He paused. “Oh god, I’m so sorry I messed up big time. I’ll- I’ll explain when you come over.”
“Okay. Give me… some time.” You said, and cut the call. Letting out a breath, you pulled yourself up and exited the stall. You looked at the mirror, your eyes still watery so you splashed some water on your face before exiting the washroom.
Five minutes later, you managed to sneak out of the hall and made your way to the garden where Jihoon was still standing.
“Hey.” You said, once you were right behind him. He whipped around so fast that he almost stumbled back, but managed to catch himself on time.
“Hi.” He said, scratching his neck awkwardly. “I’m sorry.”
You sighed, closing your eyes. “What are you sorry about?”
“I acted like a complete ass. All you were trying to be was nice and explain that you weren’t a part of this hurtful plan of your parents but I just behaved like an idiot and hurt you instead.”
You opened your eyes to look at him for a while. “You did.”
“Yeah, and I’m sorry for that.” He said, refusing to make eye contact with you anymore. “I just- I just… you probably know about my bullying incident because you were there in the nurse’s room that day- yeah, you and Mingyu talk loudly- so I just got really defensive when you said you knew about my financial condition and that’s why you wanted to apologise.”
You sighed, folding your arm and looking away too. “I didn’t mean it that way. If I wanted to hurt you or look at you in disgust, I could have done it much before itself.”
“Yeah, and I realised that now. I messed up big time. I’m sorry.” He said, finally looking up at you.
“Jihoon, I admire you. You are one of the bravest people I know.” You said, looking back at him. “I would never, never ever hurt you, no matter how deep our rivalry goes. It must have been hard, having so much on the line while studying. Because I can relate to that. Maybe you don’t have your entire family’s dignity on the line but you do have something dragging you down. And I- and I care for you Jihoon.”
“Yeah. My mother sacrificed so much for me I can’t-” He choked on his words, screwing his eyes shut and balling his fists. “I can’t let her sacrifices go to waste like this.”
You didn’t know what came over you but the next thing you knew, you had thrown your arms around his neck, pulling him into an embrace.
“It’s okay.” You whispered into his ear, gently patting his back. “Your mother loves you a lot. No matter what. I could see it in her eyes. She loves you so much Jihoon.”
You heard him sniffle as you felt his arms wrap around your waist.
“Thank you.” He whispered back. “I want you to know that no matter what you do, I’ll always be proud of you too. I’m honoured to have a friend like you and I’ll always be there for you.”
You chuckled at this and pulled back so that the two of you were looking at each other, faces just inches apart.
“Thought you said we weren’t friends?” You asked.
“Did I?” He asked, one corner of his lip turning up. “That’s probably because I’ve always wanted to be more than friends with you, sunshine.”
You froze in his arms, eyes widening at this sudden confession.
Jihoon just smiled at you, though his eyes looked pained. “I know you’ll hate me more now but I’ve always liked everything about you. Your determination, your hard work, your smartness, your dedication-”
And before he could complete the list of things he liked about you, you found yourself crashing your lips into his, the force nearly causing the two of you to stumble back. But Jihoon caught himself almost immediately, kissing you back fervently.
You felt your entire body explode as he soft lips seared against yours, the world around you slowly spinning out of control. You were acutely aware of his hand on your back rubbing circles, and you tighten your arms around his neck to pull him in deeper.
Finally, what felt like hours, the two of you broke apart to catch your breaths, gasping for air.
“I cannot believe you thought riling me up was the best way to talk to me.” You muttered, lips brushing against his. Jihoon laughed, quickly pressing another kiss to your lips.
“Let’s admit it, it was a smart move.”
“It was a dumb move. I could have hated you more. Thank god I’m the smarter one.”
“It wasn’t. And I’m the smarter one. Oh, and all yours, sunshine.”
A/N: Please do tell me what you think about this story!! I worked really hard on it and I would love to know everyone’s thoughts on it~ Comments and reblogs are appreciated!