Guitar Boy Comes on Mondays
Guitar Boy Comes on Mondays
Chen♥Lay
2,788 words
Guitar Boy Comes on Mondays.
Guitar boy comes on Mondays. He sits on the fountain steps, hunched over, with his acoustic cradled in his arms, playing songs that make Jongdae want to jump in a sing along.
Jongdae is seated at one of the scattered tables in the courtyard, close enough to hear the music, yet far enough to feel somewhat excluded. (He likes his personal space.)
He listens, sneaking peaks every now and then at the boy with the guitar, wondering if he should just stop pretending to study and move closer to get a better view. A crowd has already formed around the fountains and other musicians have joined in, turning guitar boy’s afternoon practice into an impromptu jam session.
Following the theme, the next song, like all songs previous, is an acoustic version of a current pop song. The song itself, Jongdae doesn’t like-it’s too overplayed-but he listens anyway. Guitar boy and crew’s version is different, more fun and lively with brief intermissions for solos and Jongdae finds himself singing along quietly to himself, making up the parts he doesn’t know.
He tells himself to get closer, to join in and sing along, like most of the crowd is already doing, but he never does and an hour later he has to run off to Comp 102.
Mondays are Good days.
When asked about his freakishly cheery disposition, Jongdae simply replies that he loves Mondays; however he doesn’t think his friends quite buy that. A love for Mondays does not explain the random smiles and sometimes sighs, that far off look that graces his face whenever he thinks no one is looking (but in reality they’re all watching for it), or his sudden inability to sit still and focus for the last half hour of Calc. They wonder where he disappears to during the two hour free block before Comp 102 and why he’s suddenly asking for notes he was busy daydreaming to take down. (Jongdae was usually the one who let others borrow notes from.)
The guys joke about how he’s gone crazy, about how the pressure of taking two math classes in one semester has gotten to him. Sehun’s been formulating a theory that his mind’s been taken over by aliens and Kai agrees, though they’ve recently had a scifi movie marathon and possibly not in their right minds.
Baekhyun and Kyungsoo are responsible for Jongdae’s secret boyfriend. Even though Jongdae won’t tell them the details they’re pretty positive he’s a cross between Kim Bum and Ricky Kim-someone tall and manly because apparently Jongdae looks like the type you want to take care of-who’s hard working and treats Jongdae kindly but has outrageous working hours.
Jongdae mocks them back, but secretly he wishes it were true, though he could think of someone better than a Kim Bum/Ricky Kim crossover.
Chanyeol just wants Jongdae to concentrate more in Comp so he can go back to being the borrower in and not the borrow-ee.
Kris is the worst. Not because he mocks him, Kris never mocks Jongdae, quite the opposite actually. Kris always has on one of his sly, half smiles, and that I-know-something-you-don’t expression on his face when Jongdae’s weird Monday behavior or his nonexistent boyfriend is brought up in conversation. Jongdae ignores it for the most part, but then again, for the most part his thoughts are occupied.
So when asked about his odd Monday behavior, Jongdae replies that he simply likes Mondays-which is not untrue. Mondays are when he spends his afternoon free time in the courtyard by the art department, sitting at his table (he’s officially claimed it) listening to what has been dubbed the Monday Afternoon Jam Session (at least in his head that’s what it’s called). It can’t be helped that his eyes drift towards a certain guitarist whose name Jongdae still doesn’t know, or the fact that he finds the way guitar boy’s fingers glide up and down the neck of the guitar extremely sexy.
Even though he’s not an art major, Jongdae still appreciates the look of total concentration in guitar boy’s expression, those dark mystifying eyes, the way he purses his lips when he plays…
When he opens his mouth, Jongdae is careful to listen to every word-though the lyrics are sometimes thick and heavily accented and Jongdae can’t quite understand what is being sung. Mostly, Jongdae listens just to hear his voice. It’s low, not quite deep, husky and smooth, and always in perfect harmony with his guitar or whatever instrument is currently playing.
During these Jam sessions, Jongdae never joins in, preferring to sit and watch and listen. During particular moments, when it seems like Guitar boy is looking right at him, Jongdae wishes everyday was Monday.
The Revenge of Comp 102
“What?” Jongdae asks, not sure he heard right. “Test?”
Baekhyun nods slowly, “yeah, the test…you know, the one she’s been talking about all last week?” Jongdae shakes his head and slumps into his chair. He hadn’t heard anything about a test. He hadn’t been in class on Wednesday, having gone to the museum with his art history class, and had been sick on Friday. Monday…he just hadn’t been paying attention on Monday. He hadn’t had any time to go over Chanyeol and Baekhyun’s notes over the weekend either, both his physics and Calc professors had made sure of that.
“There there” Baekhyun pats his friend on the back, “There’s still time before class. I’ll help you.”
“Really?”
“Me and Chanyeol were going to go to the library to study anyway.” Baekhyun shrugged. Prof. Han’s tests are killer and they aren’t all top students like Jongdae is (was?).
True to his word, Baekhyun helps Jongdae study. He’s made flash cards of all the terms and goes over the notes section by section with Jongdae. With the help of Baekhyun and Chanyeol, it doesn’t take long for Jongdae to learn most of the material. He’s still iffy on semantics and syntax, but he doesn’t think there will be that many questions relating to those two on the test.
They spend the whole two hours in the library, immersed in their studying and it’s only after Prof. Han calls time and collects tests that he remembers its Monday. It’s the first time he’s missed MAJS.
At first he’s pissed off at himself but this whole thing was his fault. He’s the one who didn’t pay attention in class and he’s the one who forgot about the test, so he goes through the rest of the day in a sullen mood, silently cursing the class. He hated literature and would be glad when the semester finally ended so he could take something more interesting, like World Music.
Kris to the rescue?
“Hyung, I don’t wanna go.” Jongdae puffs his cheeks out and glares at Kris. It’s Tuesday morning and Jongdae and Kris are at the café down the street waiting for Kyungsoo, Kai and Sehun. Chanyeol and Baekhyun had a club meeting to go to.
Jongdae has his arms crossed on the table, his head buried in them. Kris is trying to get him to go to this forum the Chinese club hosts on Tuesdays but he doesn’t want to. Still disappointed about not getting to go to MAJS the day before, Jongdae doesn’t feel like doing much of anything. It doesn’t seem like Kris got the message.
“Come on. It’ll be fun and you might meet someone new.” Jongdae doubts that. He isn’t very good at the whole meeting new people business. He either embarrasses himself and babbles on or just doesn’t talk at all, but Kris won’t care either way so he opts to approach this argument from a different angle.
“Don’t you have to speak Chinese there?”
“Well yeah, but you’ll do fine.”
“Hyung, I’m in Chinese one. I don’t know anything! I can barely keep up in that class.” He isn’t a native speaker like Kris. He can’t speak that well and half the time he doesn’t even know what his professor is talking about. Shim Laoshi was one of those teachers who believe in complete emersion. She only speaks in Chinese to her students, whether they are in Chinese one or four (and then gets irritated when they don’t understand what she was saying).
“Don’t you have a good grade in that class?”
“…” Kris rolled his eyes.
“Besides this’ll improve you Chinese. You’ll probably be able to finally beat the one girl-what’s her name?”
“Sun Young-”
“Yeah, her. And be the top of the class.”
“…” Beating Sun Young does sound tempting, but the whole meeting new people thing pushes him away from it all.
“Jongdae” Kris sighs. He takes Jongdae’s arms and unfolds them; holding on to his hands, and says “at least do it for me? It won’t be that bad and I promise you’re going to like it.”
Jongdae purses his lips. He really doesn’t want to go, but Kris…
“It’ll be fun?”
“…”
“And I’ll by your side the whole time.”
“…fine.”
The forum is bigger than Jongdae expects. He knows there are a lot of native Chinese people at the university, but he doesn’t expect there to be enough to fill up the entire auditorium. There are also non-Chinese people he kind-of-sort-of recognizes from class and around the campus. The whole forum takes place in the auditorium and the square outside of the building. It’s kind of like a party; there’s loud music, dancing, socializing and obligatory plastic red cups.
Jongdae also never noticed how popular Kris is. There are always people coming up to him, either to ask him questions or just to talk. It shouldn’t be surprising because Kris was nice and easy to talk to. He also knows pretty much everyone (something Jongdae constantly forgets).
The forum isn’t as bad as he thought it was going to be. He can’t understand everything that’s said but he does catch little phrases and words. The people aren’t that bad. Some of the ones he talks to (all friends of Kris) are patient with him and even teach him a couple new phrases. As much as he hates to admit: Kris is right; he is having fun.
Everything was going well until Kris leaves him. There’s something happening inside the auditorium (Jongdae and Kris have drifted outside, into the square) and Jongdae can tell Kris wants to see it, whatever it is. It’s cute watching Kris fidget beside him, but in the end Jongdae decides to let Kris go. He knows he won’t be interested in whatever’s happening inside but doesn’t want Kris, who is clearly interested, to miss out on it. When Kris protests Jongdae tells him that he’ll be fine and that he doesn’t need his gege by his side all the time. He isn’t scare, he says, even though that’s a lie. He doesn’t want to be left alone in a sea of people he doesn’t know.
“” Kris asks one last time.
“” Before I change my mind. Jongdae pushes him in the general direction of the auditorium. Kris leaves, promising to be back as soon as it’s over.
Without Kris and his friends Jongdae feels awkward. He just stands there, looking around at all the people talking and laughing, and doesn’t know what to do with himself. He wonders around for a couple minutes, not sure if he should leave, or follow Kris. In the end he decides to take a seat at the circular bench under Willow, a tall tree planted in the middle of the square.
Jongdae looks around and sort of plays with his hands and thinks of how lame he’s being right now. He puts his hands on his lap and wills them to stay there, but his will is pretty weak, once he starts looking around he becomes awkward and lame again.
He starts to hum, a nervous habit he’s developed over the years (and something he only does when he’s alone). He doesn’t know what song it is until he gets to the chorus and smiles because it’s a song Guitar boy played a couple Mondays back. Jongdae had liked the song, and had looked up the lyrics afterwards. Though that was pretty long ago, he wonders if he still remembers…
He sings quietly to himself. The words come to his lips as he sings.
“…Even if I can’t have you, even when my heart
Is blocked in the end by the wall of sad connection
I…I-I…”
What came next? Jongdae can’t remember. He spends another few seconds trying to figure out the lyrics when sometime makes him jump.
“…I love you, if it’s a place, where I can just watch you
Because you’re my everything.”
He peaks around Willow and sees someone scooting towards him. He’s mortified at first. He didn’t think anyone was there. Most of the forum go-ers were concentrated near the auditorium and scattered from there. He can’t believe someone actually heard him sing! Jongdae feels his face turn warm and he wants to run away. When he sees who it is, he wants to sprint out of there, but it feels like he’s glued down. For a second it seems like he’s forgotten how to breathe.
“” The seconds tick away as his mind processes what was just said. All he understands is “that” and “rest” and “song” and it seems like an appropriate response so he just nods and stares and earns a smile.
“” Guitar boy scoots closer until they’re sitting side by side and Jongdae can’t help noticing how good he smells. From close up Jongdae can see how amazing his eyes are, those lips! That smirk! And how hadn’t he noticed those dimples before?
“”
“What?” he squeaks out. Jongdae feels his face go red hot. He curses under his breath and part of him dies inside because he knows that things will get a much worse. He’s going to screw this up.
“”
“”
“oh.” Guitar boy’s smiles and Jongdae has to tell himself to focus. “Shim Laoshi’s class?”
“Yeah…” how had he known? There were two Chinese professors at the school. Lucky guess?
Guitar boy shrugs.
“Lucky guess.” He says like he can read Jongdae’s mind. Jongdae lets out a small laugh and smiles back. He’s not quite sure what to say next so he says:
“yeah…I actually came with a friend, Kris.”
“Kris?” Confusion flashes on Guitar boy’s face, “oh, Wu Fan-ge?”
“Wu fa-? Oh yeah. You know Kris?” A nod and a shrug.
“We have a couple classes together. He’s pretty cool.” Jongdae nods. So Kris hyung does know everyone…
There’s an awkward silence in which the two of them don’t really know what to say next and then Guitar boy says:
“So, you don’t go to the yard anymore?”
“What?”
“The yard? By the art building…the one with the unicorn fountain?” When Jongdae doesn’t say anything Guitar boy goes on. A blush is creeping up his neck and it looks like he’s nervous, “I see you there some times, I think. On Mondays…” he looks away, “You’re always studying or something, I don’t know…” He trails off.
A hundred thoughts run through Jongdae’s mind, but what comes out is: “you’ve seen me?” Without looking at him, Guitar boy nods.
“Around, yeah…”
What was he suppose to say now? That he’s seen him around too? Or that the only reason he even goes by the yard is to watch him play? That he’s kind of secretly…maybe…quite possibly…probably definitely in love with him? Jongdae is saved from having to respond when Guitar boy speaks again.
“We-me and a couple of my friends, hang around there sometimes and play a couple songs.”
“I know…” Jongdae says quietly.
“Well, you should maybe join us sometimes? I mean you sing really well…”
“Okay.”
“And maybe we could hang out…sometime?” His voice goes soft and quiet at the end and Jongdae thinks that he sounds a little hopeful. Jongdae bites his tongue and nods.
“Okay.” He repeats, looking anywhere but at the boy beside him. He blushes harder, if that is possible. Was this really happening? Was Guitar boy actually asking him out or…no not out, to hang out. But he noticed Jongdae too…and noticed when he wasn’t there yesterday. And all those times Jongdae thought Guitar boy was looking at him…Did this mean he liked Jongdae?
“I’m Zhang Yi Xing by the way.”
“…Kim Jongdae.”
Jongdae doesn’t think he saw Kris for the rest of the evening.
Sequel: He's Not my Boyfriend!
**idk about how SK Unis work so yeah =_=;;
also not my usual style. I kept forgetting and having to change it from past tense to present tense.
the lyrics are also random but 10 points to anyone who can guess what song it's from.
I tried but I really can't resist unicorn jokes but in my defense, it's an art building, there're bound to have weird statures and stuff.