Request: Can you do 13 with jaebum
13) You find a journal belonging to your bias
Member: Got7′s Jaebum x Y/N
“I’m just going to drop out,” you sighed, plopping on the bench alongside your best friend.
“And abandon me? Negative,” she grumbled, shaking her head. “Thermodynamics can’t be that bad…can it?”
“Did you hear the question you just asked?” you croaked. “How did I even end up in thermodynamics?”
“Well, seeing as it has almost nothing to do with your desired field of study, I have no idea,” she hummed, patting your knee. “You can always drop it?”
“Drop it?” you gasped. “Do you know how much I paid for it?”
“I’m guessing it wasn’t necessarily the cheapest class,” she muttered. “Maybe get a tutor?”
“That’s admitting defeat,” you spat. “I’m just going to soldier through and barely pass and complain about it the entire time.”
“Sounds like a plan,” you friend nodded. “I have a class that is actually IN my curriculum to get to, so make sure to make good decisions while I’m away.”
“I’ll try,” you murmured, letting your face fall into your hands. You took a deep breath as you stared out from your fingers. The student union was busy that day, with flurries of activity in nearly every corner of the open area. Several clubs had tables set up and the student government looked as if they were handing out free food. You lifted your brows and sat up, attempting to examine that situation just as a heavy grunt sounded directly to your left.
Glancing over, you noticed a handsome boy had sat down beside you, slinging his book bag near his feet. He had a bowl full of whatever student government had been passing out and you eyed it curiously.
“I don’t know you and I’m not sharing,” he muttered, shoving noodles into his mouth without looking up.
“I wasn’t asking to, on either counts,” you grumbled, crossing your arms, and looking away. What a prick.
“Sorry,” he sighed. “Well, I mean, I’m not sorry for what I said. I’m just sorry for how it came across.”
“Glad you cared enough to apologize,” you chuckled, lifting your brows. This guy was a trip. “What’s in the bowl anyway?”
“Black bean noodles?” he muttered, pausing his chewing for a moment. He separated himself from the bowl and looked down at it curiously. He scooted his chopsticks within the contents and tilted his head. “I think?”
“Delightful,” you hummed, shaking your head. Maybe you wouldn’t go in for a bowl after all.
“Good talk,” he nodded, finishing up his last bit of noodles before standing. He picked up his bag and swung it over his shoulder. Wiggling his eyebrows at you, he smirked. “Later.”
“Later,” you grumbled, shaking your head. Since you had begun college, the amount of strange interactions you incurred daily seemed to skyrocket. You had seen everything from students in t-rex costumes to full scale 18th century reenactments prepared by the theater department. At this point, boys like the one you had just talked to didn’t even make you bat an eye anymore.
That was until you heard the gentle smack against the concrete.
Looking over, your eyes searched the ground for the source of the noise and immediately found a small, leather-bound journal. You glanced back up to see the retreating body of the boy who had been sitting next to you and his unzipped bag. In that moment, you understood what had happened, and instantly jumped toward the notebook.
“Hey!” you gasped, shouldering your own bag and jogging toward him. “Hey…um…guy!”
Several students walking by looked up curiously, but you needed none of their attention.
“Hey, you! Black bean noodles!” you shouted, navigating through the crowd of people. You glanced down at your phone, noting that it was indeed one of the common times for a class change and groaned.
“Hey!” you cried, at this point annoyed as the boy got further and further away from you. “Idiot!”
Once again, several people turned, but not him.
“Really? You people turn around when I yell idiot?” you cried, finally stopping and letting your shoulders fall. “Ridiculous.”
You had had the mysterious, leather journal for two days and you still hadn’t caught the boy from the bench. Stationing yourself at the same bench, at the same time, had not yielded any results. You hadn’t even seen him in passing.
Pacing around your dorm room, you eyed the notebook that you had positioned on your bed. Upon looking at it closely, you noticed two small letters were imprinted on the cover. JB.
“JB…should I open it?” you murmured, continuing your pacing. “No, that’s an invasion of privacy…
…but what if his full name is in it? What if he left behind a phone number? So if someone were to find it…they could contact him….to return it?”
You heaved a sigh, but continued to walk. Crossing your arms, you finally paused, and picked it up. “Is that still an invasion of privacy? Maybe if I just…”
Dropping the notebook from your hands, it landed on it’s spine and instantly parted it’s pages. You chuckled to yourself as you leaned down, crouching on all fours above it to study the open pages.
“See, it fell open,” you whispered. “I didn’t intentionally open it. It just happened.”
You glanced over the pages, and gulped. Secretly, you had hoped for a few To Do lists, maybe a shopping list or two, but no, you felt as if you had stumbled into something much deeper…
A complete stranger’s inner thoughts.
10/4/16
It’s hard to accomplish anything on campus when music is so demanding. It’s not that I don’t enjoy being a musician, I just wish I had more of a chance to enjoy being a student. The dating ban has been lifted, but I’ve never felt less at ease around people. I wouldn’t know how to be romantic if I tried. It’s amazing what flows from my pen, but not from my mouth. I can be harsh and cold. I just want to be a better me. I feel like school just reminds me of what I should be doing at my age…and is working really it?
“A musician,” you hummed, tilting your head. He looked vaguely familiar, but you were unsure of where you had seen him and didn’t know how you would ever place his visage. You weren’t necessarily the most pop culture savvy now that school dominated your life (specifically thermodynamics) and it wasn’t like he had ever been in any of your classes.
You looked over the page, trying to keep your eyes from scanning over more words, but it was difficult. Smiling as you noted each margin doodle or random line that didn’t quite belong, an inner voice in your head pressured you to read more.
“I can’t,” you whispered. At least not tonight.
But just like that, you were hooked.
You took the journal everywhere with you; classes, mealtimes, out on the weekend. If you were to go anywhere, the notebook would be tucked firmly within your bag or under your arm. It was like a novel you couldn’t put down. Eventually it had become a bit of a secret for you, something you would reward yourself with on especially bad days.
Particularly after your Thermodynamics class.
You nestled up on one of the lounge chairs in the corner of the library and pulled your knees to sit below your chin. Cracking open the journal you took a deep breath as you flipped through a few pages.
9/7/17
Tomorrow is a very important day. Yet again, I get to expose my soul to millions of people to receive criticism or acclaim. This is one of the first real times I’ve written something so deep and overwhelming. It was just Jinyoung and I for this and it will be just us in the end getting the feedback. I know our members support us, yet I still feel a great amount of anxiety. It was us in the beginning as well. I’m glad to be able to rely on my friend.
“What’s up?” a familiar voice chirped, dislodging you from your thoughts. Your best friend snatched at the journal in your hands and looked it over casually. “What are you reading?”
“Ah, give that back,” you groaned, launching from your seat and reaching toward her. She snaked away from your grasp and continued to read.
“Are you…keeping a journal?” she muttered, scanning over the sentences. “But this…this isn’t your handwriting.”
“Come on,” you whined. “Please give it to me.”
“This is someone’s journal, Y/N,” she gasped. “This is someone’s journal who is not you!”
“Keep your voice down,” you shushed. “Do you want the whole library to hear you?”
“Who does this belong to?” she whisper-shouted.
“I don’t know,” you whisper-shouted back.
“How do you not know?” she grumbled. “You’ve been reading about this person’s life for….”
“Two weeks,” you cringed.
“TWO WEEKS?” she hissed. “What the hell? Why are you being such a creep?”
“I didn’t mean to be a creep,” you groaned. “It fell open and-”
“Oh, it “fell” open,” she muttered. “Likely story.”
“Okay, so I was nosey!” you argued. “Tell me you wouldn’t have done the same!”
“This isn’t about me!” she murmured.
“It is now! Quit being a turd!” you spat. “Alright, so I’m reading some guy’s journal. Now what?”
“It’s a guy?” she hummed. “Like…a cute guy?”
“That’s not the point,” you whined.
“Why can’t it be the point? I like this point,” your friend muttered.
“What am I supposed to do with the damn journal?” you groaned.
“Well…you tried to find the guy?” she asked, beginning to pace.
“Of course I tried to find the guy,” you hissed. “I lived in the student union for like three days after he dropped it.”
“And you haven’t seen him on campus?” she continued.
“Oh yeah, I did,” you spat sarcastically. “He told me to keep it. I had a few more chapters to finish.”
“So…take it to the lost and found,” she said simply with a small shrug. “If you can’t find him, maybe he can find it himself.”
“The…the lost and found,” you whispered, your eyes wide. “I uh…I totally thought of that too.”
“Right,” she nodded. “Of course you did.”
“If…If I wanted to put it in the lost and found,” you hummed, now your turn to pace. “Where…uh…where exactly would that be?”
Your friend grinned and shook her head, trying to keep a laugh from falling from her lips. “Come on.”
Your best friend navigated you back toward the union and into one of the adjoining buildings you were familiar with seeing student government members disappear into. She gave you quick directions to the reception area, which also doubled as home base for the campus lost and found. Grinning, she swiftly abandoned you to grab a scantron before her class.
For some reason, you were oddly nervous as you pulled open the door to the small reception office, taking much too much time to shuffle toward the desk. You ran your fingers along the familiar leather of the journal as you walked, and released a sigh.
“Goodbye friend,” you whispered as you finally reached the desk, looking over the edge to the attendant sitting behind it.
“How can I help - oh, hey,” the familiar face of the man you had been looking for all along smirked. “What’s up?”
You stared at him for a moment, incapable of making any move or sound. You knew almost all of his deepest thoughts and biggest life milestones up until this point…
…well, up until September because that was as far as you had gotten in his journal.
And he knew absolutely nothing about you.
The feeling sent a shiver down your spine.
“I…um…I found this,” you whispered, sliding the journal across the desk’s surface. You looked at the small initials on the front cover. “You’re uh…you’re JB?”
“Jaebum,” he nodded, eying the item curiously. He took it into his hands and flipped it over. “And this…this is mine.”
“I tried to find you,” you continued quietly, incapable of making eye contact. He was incredibly attractive which made the situation about ten times more uncomfortable.
“You read it,” he deadpanned. His expression was unamused as he stared at you. It wasn’t an accusation, but a simple fact, a statement you both knew to be true.
“I read it,” you squeaked, feeling extremely small.
“Of course you read it,” he sighed, his cheeks growing brighter by the moment.
“Why wouldn’t I read it?” you whispered with a wince.
“Because it didn’t belong to you?” he muttered.
“You’d find my contact information and return it, casually reading excerpts of my life by accident?” he asked, lifting his brows. “Isn’t that kind of cliche?”
“Would you believe it if I told you that it fell off my desk to an open page?” you croaked.
Jaebum groaned and tilted his head backwards, running his long fingers over his face. “This is perfect.”
“Well, um…” you hummed. “I’m happy…that I could return it for you?”
He lowered his chin and stared at you, an expression void of emotion on his face. You were unsure if he would begin shouting at you or start smiling. Feeling a heat begin to rise on your neck, you were deep within the throws of embaressment as you locked eyes. Luckily for you, he was blushing as well.
“Look,” he sighed, searching your face. “I’m not going to lie, I’m annoyed. But you’re cute, so I’ll let you make it up to me over a cup of coffee. Then you can tell me all about myself.”
“To be fair…” you whispered. “I haven’t caught up on the past month.”
JB let out a loud laugh. You could tell he was attempting to keep it from turning into a groan. “Then I guess I’ll have to get you up to speed.”
