off to the races (11/?)
off to the races (11/?)
~ 6560 w, r, (krystal/kai) l part i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. vii. viii. ix. x.
Still, the obvious question is why did he hoard very single piece of the girl that she was for himself?
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■this chapter is soooooo long (to write)
He’s not going to try and justify this. He thinks it’s stupid to make up excuses for the part he will play in her death. It’s better for them all to stop wallowing in pending regrets and move forward - think about how to pay their dues when her friends come for them. Which they will, Jongin never doubted it.
They must love her, he thinks (hopes), someone must love Krystal.
-
She keeps her ears open for him; for the soft padding of his feet, for the small creek when he finally gets under the cover, for the long sighs. Krystal sits with her knees folded to her chest, her back to the door joining their rooms.
For what? For what? For what?
Sometimes Krystal feels like nothing has changed at all - like she is back at that house, with so many things to say and no way to say them. She knows that when - if he gets back at all, she won’t be brave enough to cross this threshold. Even if she is, she isn’t sure his rage is something she’s ready to battle tonight.
She tries not to think about that night. It creeps in her dream (more like a nightmare) from time to time; it always feel so real too. She was free from the life she despised; that didn’t mean she ever stopped running from the infallible proof that she had been there. Now she realized what a waste it had been when Jongin made his own private museum out of every bit of it. That would have certainly helped in closing a ‘missing person’ case. Now that Krystal knows that she had been declared dead, she wonders what they ruled her death as - accidental death probably? Jongin had done such a good job in cleaning up all the evidence that she couldn’t how anyone could take her “death” as anything else.
Still, the obvious question is why did he hoard very single piece of the girl that she was for himself? Krystal can’t think of one single reason why he would have kept that summer dress or those worn pair of oxfords, even her ballet championship trophies and middle school’s cross countries medals. It was like a creepy shrine of some dead girl, instead this one was once her. She recalled missing a step and breaking her neck as she rushed to climb from the basement. The space Jongin had created to serve whatever sick pleasure had surrounded her; like standing in the woods with all the identical trees that leave you feeling like an irrational claustrophobic.
It’s going to take a while to take in what she had just seen but now that she knows of his lair, there is no way she’s going to leave it be.
-
Jongin skips first period. Of course, he did.
He woke up so hung over that he was sure he had drank the same amount that Sehun had stashed
away to maintain his alcoholic reputation. He would have been ashamed if the pain wasn’t so distracting. It did, however, increased by ten folds when he realized where exactly he had ended up at. His old house - his grandfather’s townhouse.
It was still unnecessary large; even without the big game tycoons that were his uncles, all the dust covered architecture still made him feel small in comparison. He collected his sock that was hanging off the arm of some gaudy statue grandfather had imported in from Norway and went on his way, pausing for a second to stare up at the spiked gate and praise his last night self for climbing over that without plunging himself in the stomach with one of those ends.
He couldn’t be happier that he didn’t end up taking a detour back to the mansion for a quick shower and a change of clothes. If he did, he would have arrived just in time for the break and the noises would have either made him throw up his entire stomach lining or punch some sophomore right in the face.
“Nice of you to join us this morning, Mister Kim.”
That one almost does it too if he’s going to be honest. Well, what to expect when you walk into second period fifteen minutes late anyway?
Before Jongin can move away from the door, the sound of her laugh makes him want to turn around and go far, far away from hear. History, how could he forget, he had this one with her for up to joyous four classes per week. Krystal’s sitting next to that butthead Ahn Jaehyun; he’s surprised she’s managed to get him into a conversation. Girls loved him and he hated anything that breathes in general.
He takes his usual seat, conveniently right behind hers.
Junhee smiles at him softly, almost as if she had known he would show eventually. “Morning”
“Morning,” he returns, trying to be cordial but the headache is giving him an edge, “What are we doing?”
“We’re looking at a case study,” immediately she slides over a badly photocopied documents, “You weren’t here the day he went through the details so I went through the trouble of making notes for you.”
Impressive, is the word for all the pen marks on the two double sided pages she’s laid down in front of him. Her hand writing is big enough to read but not too big to be child-like, all of it is consistently neat in a straight line. All the long, irrelevant detailing that their teacher surely included in one of his long speeches is ignored and instead, important bits from the textbooks have been perfectly summed up in short but effective dot points. This is what Suho must have meant when he said that Junhee is a model student.
“Thanks,” in the end, that’s all that the wordlessness mess in his head translates to, “I - uh - yeah, thanks…I don’t even know why I bother coming to class.”
She chuckles, her caramel pony tail swinging. “It’s not that good, honestly -“
“This,” Jongin cuts her off, pointing at the document, “This is more useful that anything than we’ve been taught in the last four classes.”
Junhee’s quiet after that, a smile blooming though he can barely tell when she’s ducting her head down behind that ginormous encyclopedia. “Still, you have to come to class Jongin. You’ve missed enough class this year for him to fail you -“
“Junhee,” he stops her from an impending lecture, “Trust me, I know.”
“O - oh,” she stutters, her cheeks turning a bright shade of crimson.
Great, he’s starting to think he might have just pulled a dick move by shutting her down like that.
“Thanks again for the notes, Junhee, I really appreciate it. Hey, uh - if you’re free sometime this week, there’s this place -“
“Junhee, right?”
The legs of Krystal’s chair scrapes against the floor so loudly that it made Mister Lee’s ‘chalk-grinding-across-the-board’ sound like music to the ears. Her arm is casually draped on the back of the chair, her body turned to the side so that she could face the two of them. She isn’t looking at him though. No, she’s smiling like a natural high school head bitch ready to tear the freshman to pieces.
The girl sitting next to him wordlessly nods, her good-natured smile nowhere to be seen.
“I’m Krystal,” she introduces like she wouldn’t have a clue that the word has already spread that there’s a new student to gossip about, “Can we swap seats for a bit? I need Jongin’s help on this question about the eruption of Vesuvius.”
Junhee stares at her for a moment and Jongin briefly wonders if she is trying to decide is Krystal’s
telling the truth or a lie. “I don’t know, changing seats seems kind of extreme, don’t you think?”
Krystal’s gaze hardens at this.
“Why don’t you ask Jaehyun?” Junhee offers in a friendly tone, “He got a really high score last semester, right Jaehyun?”
Jaehyun grunts a reply, which in most case actually means a ‘yes’.
Turning back to Krystal, she continues, “It’s really great to see that he’s warmed up to you so quickly, he really isn’t like that with most people. If you need more help on any other question, you can ask me too. I’m more than happy to help.”
Way to be typical, Jongin smirks, just like everybody else in this school, she judged a book by its cover. Let it be known, Choi Junhee is not to be underestimated.
-
For once, Krystal wasn’t trying to piss Jongin off.
No, this time she’s the pissed off one. Admittedly, after yesterday’s freaky discovery, if she could have gone the next few days (weeks?) avoiding him, she would. Well, that that went down the moment when she had no ride to school, couldn’t leave the house and contracted STDs by planting her ass down on the seat of Baekhyun’s limo.
“Yo, heard you got shut down big time by the Madam President.”
Krystal’s about turn and look who it is then she remembers, she only has one friend: Nam Taehyun. “Morning to you too, Taehyun. “ She smiles thinly, her head caught in the arm of her navy jumper as she tries to wriggle out of it and the lanky brunette standing behind her chuckles, pulling it over her head in one swoop. “Madam President?”
“Shitty nick name to go with shitty people,” Taehyun says dismissively, draping the clothing over her shoulders, “One of which,” He clicks his tongue, one arm grabs onto her shoulder and he shakes hard enough for the rest of the world to do the same, “My source tells me, shut you down so badly that you probably need some ice for that burn.”
“I seriously have no idea who you’re on ab -“Then it dawns on her, “You’re talking about that Junhee bitch, aren’t you?”
“Ooh bitch!” He whistles, “Wow, getting friendly already! What did she do? Tell her you didn’t arrange your pens in the right color order?”
Krystal’s already agitated at the mere mention of the girl in her history class, though she can’t really say why. “Why do you call her that anyway?”
“Because she’s such a proper young lady that the whole school has already made a collective decision that she’s going to take over your cousin’s oh-so-honorable duty.”
Her feet brake on its own, left one nearly tripping over the right. “She’s going to replace Suho as the school captain?”
“Do you have another cousin who needs to get a life or something?”
She rolls her eyes and keeps walking.
“So what actually happened?”
How to sum it up: girl meets girl, girl wants to rips girl’s face off cause girl can’t stay out of said girl’s business. She’d love to see how this story ends, but for now: “It’s not a big deal. I just asked to change seats with her for a bit and she said no.”
“Like I said - stick up her ass,” Taehyun shakes his head, “Why’d you want to change seats with her anyway?”
A group of girls rush pass, screaming and giggling like wild youth would. Krystal moves back, she
was sure that if she didn’t she’d be on the ground with a scraped knee or a twisted ankle by now. They look like they’re having fun running around, Krystal thinks to herself as she watches them go, but that’s what the high school life is supposed to be about, isn’t it? She would never know.
“Sorry,” Krystal mumbles, returning her attention to the conversation she’s put on pause, “What did you say?”
“I said,” He leans down, then reiterate word by word, “Why. Did. You. Want. To. Change. Seats. With. Her?”
She hides her glare behind her mess of hair. “I had to ask Jongin a question.”
Her response seems to be taking longer to seeps through him than usual - he’s on more weed today then? God, she has to deal with this type of shit back at the M’s house and now even at some posh high school, she’s still hanging with a stoner. What a loser, really.
“No wonder she doesn’t like you.”
Krystal shoots him a questioning look, egging him to go on.
“They’re - you know - friends?”
No, she doesn’t. “What?”
He tries to explain with some gibberish hand gesture that doesn’t make anything clearer. “You know, friends…like buddies - I don’t fucking know how to explain it - li - okay, so like a thing.”
“A thing?” She doesn’t know why they’re leaning closer, no one is even close by, “Like they’re together?”
“No, no,” Taehyun denies as if the mere thought of that is the most disgusting thing in the world, which it kind of is, “There’s something going on between those two. That whole ‘he-likes-her-she-likes-him’ type thing.”
“So they like each other?”
“I’m not wannabe alpha male, Jongin. Just better looking,” Krystal doesn’t know how long she’s going to be able to keep a straight face, “But do you ever see him talking up girls first before they can get to him? Fuck him, just a pretty boy anyway,” He murmurs that last bit under his breath and she has to stop herself from yelling at him to get on with the story already, “They’re always off in their own corner at school events, he’s always sitting next to her in class instead of his class and what you saw today was only a preview of how snooty Princess Junhee is, she looks down her nose at anything that so much as moves.”
She’s done a fair bit of her own observation of how the boys act at school. Sure, they all act different in their own ways but those were small changes of personality: Chanyeol’s less aggressive, Suho’s more enthusiastic - smiles more, talks more, Sehun is exactly the same with his ‘leave-me-the-fuck-alone’ face, Baekhyun is Baekhyun anytime and anywhere but Jongin, she realized he had developed a whole new persona to cater to the masses. Does this go for that girl too? Does he turn his charm on for her? Does he make small talks and incorporate some jokes to make her laugh? Does she think he’s a nice school boy that she can make into her first love? Is that the boy that they want from him?
Krystal wants to ask him: what it’s like, to have everyone but no one at all?
“Oh yeah, I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Taehyun nudges her leg with his foot, how fucking gentleman like of him, “Don’t you have a phone or something?”
She almost laughs, because did those assholes really think no one would notice that a seventeen year old girl is not spending her day texting and snapchatting and tweeting and whatever the internet offer now a days? This is almost too easy.
Krystal releases a well practiced sigh; sad and tired but not angry. “I really don’t want to talk about it, Tae.”
Cue 1…2…3…
“What’s wrong?”
“No, really, I don’t want to burden you with my problems -“
“Christ, Krystal, you’re not going to burden me if I want to know about it,” He sounds worried, she can’t wait to look up from the ground to see if he looks the part too, “We’re friends now, if you’re in some kind of trouble, I want you to tell me so I can go kick whoever’s ass that’s fucked with you.”
Peering up at him with her brown doe eyes, she blinks slowly then averts them. “I - It’s just that - my parents and Suho, they - they’re really protective and they don’t think it’s a good idea to give me a phone.”
His forehead crinkles with concern. “How do you call anyone then?”
“I don’t”
This is men, isn’t it? They will hurt you, bring you down and make you obey if they know you are strong enough to stand on your own two feet but they can be so sweet once you’ve got them fooled. They are so desperate to be your hero, to rescue you from all the monsters lurking at every corner of this man’s world. They’ll never know that the biggest injustice is how she has to cross her ankles when she sits, how she has to laugh at their ‘your mom’s jokes like she’s never heard them before, how too little makeup makes her ugly and too much is no different. But it’s fine, in the end, Krystal’s outsmarted them all before. Thanks to their vanity. Oh men.
“If I ever want to call anyone I have to use Suho’s phone so he can be in the room to listen to the conversation and check that I’m not talking to anyone I’m not supposed to be talking to,” She cups her chin in her hand and sighs once again, licking her lips, “I know they’re only trying to do this for my own good -“
“More like take away all your privacy,” Taehyun yells, outraged as he throws his two arms up in the air, “Your parents - and your cousins, are psychos. They can’t be doing this to you. You have to go talk to them -“
“Do you think I’ve not tried?” She snarls, a bit of anger always hurry things up, “I’ve tried, they never listen to me. They think I’m a weak little girl who isn’t capable of taking care of herself even though she’s seventeen already!”
He stares at her with mouth hang open, bewildered by her outburst. He must think he knows her now, Krystal sniggers, She’s shared such a deep, dark secret to him - she must trust him, he must be special. And he wants to be special. In fact, Krystal bets that’s all Nam Taehyun has ever wanted - to be special to someone.
“Then I guess this is what friends are for.”
She hides masks her smirk with a look of confusion and vulnerability before she swivels around to face him. Taehyun’s got one hand in the pocket of his pants and he watches in triumph when he fetches out a phone.
The sleek black rectangle lies on his open palm and he holds it out to her like an engagement ring. “You can call whoever you want, even international calls but I’m so going to charge you for that shit. I’m not going to be like your nosey cousin and check who you contact and stuff, clear the history if you want to after for all I care.”
Krystal knows what she must be looking like to him; grateful and ready to swoon. “Taehyun - I - thank you, so much.”
“Anytime, babe,” he chuckles, ruffling her hair like one would with a puppy, “All you have to do is ask for it.”
Oh but he doesn’t know; she doesn’t ask for things. She just takes them.
-
“Hey, hyung” Chanyeol whispers after throwing a scrunch up paper at his head - only he’d ever do that.
He enjoys most free period; everyone leaves him the hell alone and it’s the only hour in a school day that he gets any actual work done. Except the ones he shares with Chanyeol, who always seems to have something to talk about.
Jongin puts his ball point pen down, sighing. “Yeah?”
“What do you think about Krystal and all that stuff Sehun’s got planned for her?”
He wishes he could be honest and in most cases he is with Chanyeol. Mostly because he understands, he doesn’t judge, he listens and he offers solace but not too much that he comes off as bias or blinded by his debt to them for taking him in. Chanyeol’s not wise; he won’t give any deep advice that Sehun spews out from time to time but Jongin thinks he understands something that his childhood best friend doesn’t.
Nevertheless, Jongin can’t really explain to him how he might as well have drunk himself into a coma because of the shit Sehun’s cooked up in his brilliant mind. “It’ good, it’s fool proof. If we all do what we’re all supposed to, everything should all go as plan.”
“I know that. When Sehun gets his hands dirty, it always go well unlike when Kyungsoo hyung drafts his own evil plan,” Chanyeol says blandly, “I’m not talkin’ ‘bout that. I’m asking about how you feel about it.”
“What do you mean?
Chanyeol throws his notebook down on the empty chair besides his then props his feet up on the spot where it laid splayed open seconds ago. “Cool, it’s all good for us. Even if it all goes to hell on that night, we get away with it - nothing to lose and we go on fucking shit up the next day but it’s not the same for the hoe.”
Jongin would have said something the ‘hoe’ reference if it isn’t for the afterthought that followed. “So she’ll die and we’ll finally get rid of her like we’ve been wanting to.”
“Yeah but how do you feel about that?”
Like she died all over again.
“I -“
“What the fuck is happening over there?”
He couldn’t tell what Chanyeol was referring to: the senior couple trying to eat each other’s face off behind two book case away from them, the librarian smelling some books like she’s at a wine tasting
“Shit,” Jongin curses loud enough to interrupt all of the what-the-fuckeries mentioned above. He’s up on his feet immediately, his fingers curling into the back of Chanyeol’s patchy white shirt as he drags him along to the small stained window he’s been staring out of earlier, “Shit, that is Sehun.”
-
When Choi Seunghyun’s fist collides with Sehun’s jaw, it’s more of a sound than a bruising attack. To Jongin, it’s like a small pop of a blown up balloon. You knew it was coming but you still hoped it wouldn’t.
Sehun scrambles for balance but the taller boy grabs him by the front of his school jumper, drawing Sehun’s face a few centimeters from his own. Jongin lungs expand for more oxygen, he takes another after another as he runs faster. He doesn’t know what he’s going to do once he’s there, next to Sehun or maybe even in front him. Jongin knows Sehun will say this is his fight or yell ‘fuck off’ until he’s completely bashed up but Jongin’s still got enough of a fight in him left to do something about it.
“You’re not going to get away with it this time, Oh,” Seunhyun shouts, “All of those times your daddy got on his knees, begged my family for loans he couldn’t pay back in the next fifty years even if he tried and he throws them away on a piece of shit like you, sending you to this damn school that he can’t afford.”
Three classrooms away, Sehun spots Chanyeol spitting on the grass. Jongin knows what he wants; for them to leave him take care of it.
“You know what you are? A charity case. They must feel sorry for your war hero ancestors, probably rolling around in their grave that this is what their heirs have amounted to: a worthless, penniless charity case.” Seunghyun laughs, ugly and terrifying. And then he turns his head from Sehun, his grip never loosening as he snarls, “What the fuck are you looking at?”
“Your face,” Chanyeol growls, flexing those rough farmer's son's hands, “And how it will look when I jam my fists into it.”
NO, Jongin yells. Or he only thought of it as he watches, dumb struck as Chanyeol smashes his throws a punch right at Choi Seunghyun’s nose. The blood gushes out and down his throat, staining his shirt and the muscle tee inside. Now he’s nearly as bloodied up as Sehun. But it’s only matter of seconds until Seunghyun finds his footing again and rushes towards Chanyeol, propelling him back into the brick wall. It sets him back long enough for Seunghyun to knee him the gut, earning a loud groan from the younger boy.
There have been other fights, many of them but this time, it has really gone too far.
Jongin thinks about how reckless he’s being when he jumps on Seunghyun, taking him to the ground with him before his foot could collide with Sehun’s stomach, or arms, or legs. He only catches snippets of it as they roll over: the red splattering on the floor, Chanyeol’s hand twitching, Sehun’s sound of pain from his left.
Throwing a punch at the side of Seunghyun’s face, he goes down long enough for Jongin to stable himself on his hands and knees. “Chanyeol,” he shouts, this time aloud he’s sure, “Go. Now.”
He doesn’t get to see the dark haired boy move. His front crash into the hard surface, his cheek forcefully pressed into the floor. The dirt smudges onto his face, smearing away at his skin. His arms flail around desperately trying to grab onto any of Seunghyun’s flesh, to attack, to push him away but he grabs a fistful of his hair and smacking his skull into the concrete, then again, and again -
Inexplicably, the weight is lifted off him. Jongin had to tell himself to keep breathing, to keep his eyes open. Two feet away from him, Sehun calls out something that he couldn’t quite catch, there’s only a loud roar in his ears and everything and anything sounds like it’s been muffled by a pillow.
“Oh come on,” Seunghyun says, tired, “These losers call in some little bitch to help them. Be a doll and go home to your mummy -“
Jongin tries to push onto his feet but the ground slides beneath him. He waits for it to stop but it doesn’t. Then Seunghyun yells out what sounds like ‘little bitch’ before the side of his face hit the wooden bench outside the atrium.
“Don’t worry, I’ll stop by to tell your mummy to pick you up when I’m done with you,” a slender hand bunched up a fistful of Seunghyun’s ash brown hair, slamming his head down on the edge of the seat with a loud ‘bang’, “How her baby boy couldn’t fight off a little bitch like me.”
Jongin watches transfix as the attacker leans down, bringing her chapped lips to his ear. Krystal, he
gasps out a warning she doesn’t need.
Krystal yanks Seunhyun’s head up high enough for him to feel every word she’s saying to him, “I want you to look at little bitch because this little bitch,” she grunts those last two words that were meant to be insults, smashing his face into the surface yet again, “Just beat you to pulp and now you’ll have to live with the fact that this little bitch right here has more balls than you ever will.”
Panting, Krystal smacks his head down hard enough to knock him out before she drops him to the ground, “So the next time you see me, doll, you run the other way,”
The only thing he could see clearly is Seughyun on the ground, curling into his side and clutching his now broken nose. The view is blocked soon enough with Krystal crouching down next to him, her skirt barely covering her thighs when she drops down next to him, her voice is all muddled up but he can still catch most of her words. She’s calling his name now, those hands that have surely given Seunghyun concussion, are lingering on his back and his cheek.
“Jesus, if you can’t walk then can you at least say something.”
Krystal’s leveling her eyes to meet his fuzzy ones; he’s seeing things - she looks worried, scared. He’s never seen her look this scared before, not even when she was carried into his home a dead body.
Licking his lips, Jongin croaks, “Shut up”
-
So she saves him from getting his head bashed in and he has the nerve to tell her to shut up then bosses her around about Sehun (note to self: have to ask about this ‘protect-my-husband-Sehun hysteria). And don’t even start about his trust issue. The guy can’t even put one leg over the bike and demands they get out of school ASAP but won’t let her ride his stinking high grade, imported Yamaha because he was sure she was going to leave him to die somewhere.
What an idiot. If she wanted him dead, wouldn’t it be easier to leave that bonehead to sit on him until he chokes on dust or something?
“Are you still breathing?”
Jongin cranes his neck to the side, the bruise on his forehead is turning an angry purple. He deserves it. “No, I’m dead and in hell.”
“I’m here so you must be.”
He laughs; a little rumbling sound scratching at the back of his throat. It sounds warm; at least that hasn’t changed. “Are you okay?”
After all that he asks, Krystal thinks with a raise brow. “You’re asking me if I’m okay? You’re the one with an incoming black eye, giant bruise on your forehead, a broken tooth in their somewhere. Besides,” she starts, sitting down on the curb next to him, “I’m the hostage - doesn’t matter what happens to me - collateral damage and all.”
Shifting nervously in her spot, Krystal shoves the slushie she got from the convenient sore in his lap,
“Hope you still like red and green jello because no way in hell am I giving up my lemon and Dr. Pepper.”
“Yeah, it’s still my favorite,” He holds up the cup, this is probably she’ll get to a thank you, “I haven’t had one since…”
And the silence that follows says it all: since she disappeared.
“Well…” Krystal trails off, rocking back and forth on the ball of her feet, her eyes glued to the dried blood on her brand new school shoes. She really does like them, they’re kind of Lolita chic, “This is weird…I, the enemy,” She makes a point to shoot him a look, then continues, “Helped you defeat an evil senior year kid who was going to butcher to Sehun, not that I blame him. And you and that Blood-thirsty-yeol tried to rescue the day, except it didn’t work - at all. Don’t call it Stockholm syndrome or anything. I haven’t even been kidnapped for a month yet.”
Jongin snorts but she ignores it. “Then I literally have to carry one of you evil dicks onto a bike that he won’t let me take the lead though he insists so strongly that and I quote “hurry the fuck out of here” then proceed to talk mumbo jumbo about the other two evil dicks’ safety. Now I’m sitting here, drinking slurpees with him in a surprisingly small town outside of Seoul.”
His tongue is green when he starts to talk, “Do you want me to throw you some compliments or just a thank you would do?”
“I have a feeling I’m only going to get a thank you out of you,” she tries to hold in a smile and fails miserably, “Oh and an explanation as a bonus for not ditching your body in the Han river. And I did fork out my own money to buy you that disgusting thing you’re gulping down.”
When they little, Krystal once told him how yucky she thought the combination of cherry and lime green slushy is. That particular opinion of hers has stayed pretty much the same.
Jongin’s staring into the distance, watching a truck drive by at a painfully low speed. She’s convinced that this exchange of pleasantries is over between them when he says, “Thank you for what you did, even though it would have been more beneficial for you to leave Seunghyun to finish us off.”
He’s right and she would have - she nearly did. Krystal had been standing right there, in the corridor outside the art classrooms. If Jongin didn’t jump into help at the last minute and ran the other way, she would have left Sehun to fend for himself (he wouldn’t last). Hell, she would have enjoyed watching every minute of it. She had been making excuses on their way out of Seoul and she’d come up with plenty; she’ll tell them all if she has to. But she’ll know the truth. It wasn’t an impulse; not a survival instinct that she often associates with the familiar feeling of a ‘zap’ that begins in her skull and finishes at her feet, kicking her body into a ‘run-for-your-life’ mode. In her heart, Krystal knows that she didn’t ever want to see him pain. And it felt good punching that wannabe mafia in the face.
“It’s not Sehun that owes him money, it’s his pathetic excuse of a father,” Jongin spits, crashing her train of thought. The cut near his hair line is beginning to bleed again; she’s wasted way too many tissues on that one small injury already, “This business provides him with enough money to pay for the rest of the tuition he owes to the school. He doesn’t need money from his family. They - they are the ones who need money from him.”
She had put the pieces together and came to the conclusion that the Oh’s were in some kind of money trouble. It wasn’t entirely uncommon for the rich to fall victim to gambling and throwing money away on a failing business. But for the successor to remain in such a prestige school, it was basically unheard of. No matter how much money these boys were making off their motor “trade” business, it couldn’t possibly be enough to pay off a year’s worth of schooling at Daemoon.
As if reading her mind, Jongin provides an entirely reasonable answer, “He’s on a partial scholarship; mostly because of his family’s name.”
Krystal snorts. “Does he live a double life I don’t know about? Loner student by day, Korean idol by night kind of thing?”
“His great-grand fathers were war heroes,” He says, ignoring her mocking remark, “His family survives on that fact alone. If it wasn’t for that, they’d be kicked out of society a long time ago.”
“Ah…” She grimaces, taking a long sip of her cool drink, “So nothing has changed even after all these years. Respect is earned by name and status. Is that why those money worshipping shitheads at the school like you so much?”
It’s only when it’s too late and the words having flown from her mouth that Krystal hears herself. To her, it sounds so spiteful like she was accusing him for slaughtering a lamb. Being rich and young isn’t a crime - it just feels like that sometimes.
“I didn’t mean that in a bad way -“
Lifting up his hand to shush her, he says quietly, “You don’t have to, S - Krystal.”
He might think she missed the trip up with the name but she didn’t; he was about to call her Soojung. It wouldn’t have gone down well if he did.
“It - it’s just that everyone seems to think that you’re this - this mega cool dude,” Krystal explains bitterly, looking down at her hands in her lap, toying with each other, “You’re so chill, all ‘whatever’ with your boys, sitting there and joking ‘round like you know they’re going to find it hilarious no matter what you say or do. And the girls,” She tries not to cringe at the memories of the boy talk she overheard in the changing room two days ago, “They think you’re sooooo boyfriend material - gross, but yeah.”
Jongin scoffs, a melancholic smile faltering upon his face. He keeps staring across the road even though there’s nothing worth the look. She’s convinced that they’re hanging around a desolate town; there’s only one dude (a creepy one) working the register in the convenient store. And the only thing that’s budging in that playground she’s parked his bike at is the swing, and that’s only due to the breeze.
“Do you think I’m that guy you’ve described?”
No. “I don’t know,” she shrugs.
“It’s good that they like that guy,” Jongin begins, stretching his legs out further from the foot path, “Those shitheads - as you so kindly refer to them as,” he shoots her an oddly playful look and she feels the corner of her lips pulling up, “Will one day become the most powerful people in our nation. They’re useless now but give it a few years and they’ll be resourceful, successful, full of connections.”
“Wow, look at you,” she muses, “Talking like a true future ruthless millionaire. You will have them eating out of your hands when you’re sixty and living alone in penthouse with a gold digger wife.”
He rolls his eyes, mumbles, “They’re eating out of your hands now.”
Thanks to that, she’s choking on the Dr. Pepper side of her slurpee. In between her coughs, she tries to talk, “Are you kidding me?!”
“What?” Jongin appears to be shocked by her outburst.
“They hate me; the only reason I can think of that they would want to talk to me is because I’m the perfect prefect’s cousin.”
Staring at her like her whole head just twisted around, he asks in exasperation, “I don’t understand. You even got along with Ahn Jaehyun, even the teachers can’t make him talk -“
“He doesn’t count. He has a dick so he automatically wants to talk to me.”
Jongin cocks his head.
“It’s true,” Krystal says flippantly.
“Isn’t that what girls want…anyway?” He asks, sighing tiredly and scratching his swelling head,
“Attention from guys and other girls’ jealousy?”
“No!” She would have smacked him in the head if he wasn’t already in considerable pain, “Who cares if boys think I’m hot or cute or fun? Who cares what they think when it’s only going to last five seconds until they find someone else to ‘ooh’ and ‘ah’s over? I want friends - girl friends who sit you down and spoon feed you those fucking ice creams when you’re sad, who marathons Gossip Girl with you even if the show fucked itself in the asshole in the foot since season 3. Those girl friends who sit in a circle before class so you can bitch about other girls who don’t roll with you or how cute that senior guy on the swim team is. That’s what girls want.”
Jongin's eyes are locked with hers and he sighs before turning away from her. She hates when he does that, even back when they she was too short to reach him without standing on her tip toes. He makes her feel like that girl again.
“Is that what you want, Krystal?” He asks meaningfully, “Do you want to hang out with friends after class and complain about how boring all of it was? Do you want to go to underage parties and dance all night with jocks? Do you want to cram for exams at three in the morning just to forget most of it when you’re about to go in? Do you want a boy to walk you home from school then to the next?”
Yes, Krystal holds back, she wants that more than anything and she’s never going to get it. Because she’s not a girl - not even a person. She’s a ghost.
Jongin’s expression soften when he looks at her again, dry blood at the corner of his cracked lips when he reminds her, “No one knows how much time you have left at Daemoon, but it’s the closest you’re ever going to get to being a normal, teenage girl.”
~ 6560 w, r, (krystal/kai) l part i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. vii. viii. ix. x.
Still, the obvious question is why did he hoard very single piece of the girl that she was for himself?
■ fanmix/soundtrack
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■this chapter is soooooo long (to write)
He’s not going to try and justify this. He thinks it’s stupid to make up excuses for the part he will play in her death. It’s better for them all to stop wallowing in pending regrets and move forward - think about how to pay their dues when her friends come for them. Which they will, Jongin never doubted it.
They must love her, he thinks (hopes), someone must love Krystal.
-
She keeps her ears open for him; for the soft padding of his feet, for the small creek when he finally gets under the cover, for the long sighs. Krystal sits with her knees folded to her chest, her back to the door joining their rooms.
For what? For what? For what?
Sometimes Krystal feels like nothing has changed at all - like she is back at that house, with so many things to say and no way to say them. She knows that when - if he gets back at all, she won’t be brave enough to cross this threshold. Even if she is, she isn’t sure his rage is something she’s ready to battle tonight.
She tries not to think about that night. It creeps in her dream (more like a nightmare) from time to time; it always feel so real too. She was free from the life she despised; that didn’t mean she ever stopped running from the infallible proof that she had been there. Now she realized what a waste it had been when Jongin made his own private museum out of every bit of it. That would have certainly helped in closing a ‘missing person’ case. Now that Krystal knows that she had been declared dead, she wonders what they ruled her death as - accidental death probably? Jongin had done such a good job in cleaning up all the evidence that she couldn’t how anyone could take her “death” as anything else.
Still, the obvious question is why did he hoard very single piece of the girl that she was for himself? Krystal can’t think of one single reason why he would have kept that summer dress or those worn pair of oxfords, even her ballet championship trophies and middle school’s cross countries medals. It was like a creepy shrine of some dead girl, instead this one was once her. She recalled missing a step and breaking her neck as she rushed to climb from the basement. The space Jongin had created to serve whatever sick pleasure had surrounded her; like standing in the woods with all the identical trees that leave you feeling like an irrational claustrophobic.
It’s going to take a while to take in what she had just seen but now that she knows of his lair, there is no way she’s going to leave it be.
-
Jongin skips first period. Of course, he did.
He woke up so hung over that he was sure he had drank the same amount that Sehun had stashed
away to maintain his alcoholic reputation. He would have been ashamed if the pain wasn’t so distracting. It did, however, increased by ten folds when he realized where exactly he had ended up at. His old house - his grandfather’s townhouse.
It was still unnecessary large; even without the big game tycoons that were his uncles, all the dust covered architecture still made him feel small in comparison. He collected his sock that was hanging off the arm of some gaudy statue grandfather had imported in from Norway and went on his way, pausing for a second to stare up at the spiked gate and praise his last night self for climbing over that without plunging himself in the stomach with one of those ends.
He couldn’t be happier that he didn’t end up taking a detour back to the mansion for a quick shower and a change of clothes. If he did, he would have arrived just in time for the break and the noises would have either made him throw up his entire stomach lining or punch some sophomore right in the face.
“Nice of you to join us this morning, Mister Kim.”
That one almost does it too if he’s going to be honest. Well, what to expect when you walk into second period fifteen minutes late anyway?
Before Jongin can move away from the door, the sound of her laugh makes him want to turn around and go far, far away from hear. History, how could he forget, he had this one with her for up to joyous four classes per week. Krystal’s sitting next to that butthead Ahn Jaehyun; he’s surprised she’s managed to get him into a conversation. Girls loved him and he hated anything that breathes in general.
He takes his usual seat, conveniently right behind hers.
Junhee smiles at him softly, almost as if she had known he would show eventually. “Morning”
“Morning,” he returns, trying to be cordial but the headache is giving him an edge, “What are we doing?”
“We’re looking at a case study,” immediately she slides over a badly photocopied documents, “You weren’t here the day he went through the details so I went through the trouble of making notes for you.”
Impressive, is the word for all the pen marks on the two double sided pages she’s laid down in front of him. Her hand writing is big enough to read but not too big to be child-like, all of it is consistently neat in a straight line. All the long, irrelevant detailing that their teacher surely included in one of his long speeches is ignored and instead, important bits from the textbooks have been perfectly summed up in short but effective dot points. This is what Suho must have meant when he said that Junhee is a model student.
“Thanks,” in the end, that’s all that the wordlessness mess in his head translates to, “I - uh - yeah, thanks…I don’t even know why I bother coming to class.”
She chuckles, her caramel pony tail swinging. “It’s not that good, honestly -“
“This,” Jongin cuts her off, pointing at the document, “This is more useful that anything than we’ve been taught in the last four classes.”
Junhee’s quiet after that, a smile blooming though he can barely tell when she’s ducting her head down behind that ginormous encyclopedia. “Still, you have to come to class Jongin. You’ve missed enough class this year for him to fail you -“
“Junhee,” he stops her from an impending lecture, “Trust me, I know.”
“O - oh,” she stutters, her cheeks turning a bright shade of crimson.
Great, he’s starting to think he might have just pulled a dick move by shutting her down like that.
“Thanks again for the notes, Junhee, I really appreciate it. Hey, uh - if you’re free sometime this week, there’s this place -“
“Junhee, right?”
The legs of Krystal’s chair scrapes against the floor so loudly that it made Mister Lee’s ‘chalk-grinding-across-the-board’ sound like music to the ears. Her arm is casually draped on the back of the chair, her body turned to the side so that she could face the two of them. She isn’t looking at him though. No, she’s smiling like a natural high school head bitch ready to tear the freshman to pieces.
The girl sitting next to him wordlessly nods, her good-natured smile nowhere to be seen.
“I’m Krystal,” she introduces like she wouldn’t have a clue that the word has already spread that there’s a new student to gossip about, “Can we swap seats for a bit? I need Jongin’s help on this question about the eruption of Vesuvius.”
Junhee stares at her for a moment and Jongin briefly wonders if she is trying to decide is Krystal’s
telling the truth or a lie. “I don’t know, changing seats seems kind of extreme, don’t you think?”
Krystal’s gaze hardens at this.
“Why don’t you ask Jaehyun?” Junhee offers in a friendly tone, “He got a really high score last semester, right Jaehyun?”
Jaehyun grunts a reply, which in most case actually means a ‘yes’.
Turning back to Krystal, she continues, “It’s really great to see that he’s warmed up to you so quickly, he really isn’t like that with most people. If you need more help on any other question, you can ask me too. I’m more than happy to help.”
Way to be typical, Jongin smirks, just like everybody else in this school, she judged a book by its cover. Let it be known, Choi Junhee is not to be underestimated.
-
For once, Krystal wasn’t trying to piss Jongin off.
No, this time she’s the pissed off one. Admittedly, after yesterday’s freaky discovery, if she could have gone the next few days (weeks?) avoiding him, she would. Well, that that went down the moment when she had no ride to school, couldn’t leave the house and contracted STDs by planting her ass down on the seat of Baekhyun’s limo.
“Yo, heard you got shut down big time by the Madam President.”
Krystal’s about turn and look who it is then she remembers, she only has one friend: Nam Taehyun. “Morning to you too, Taehyun. “ She smiles thinly, her head caught in the arm of her navy jumper as she tries to wriggle out of it and the lanky brunette standing behind her chuckles, pulling it over her head in one swoop. “Madam President?”
“Shitty nick name to go with shitty people,” Taehyun says dismissively, draping the clothing over her shoulders, “One of which,” He clicks his tongue, one arm grabs onto her shoulder and he shakes hard enough for the rest of the world to do the same, “My source tells me, shut you down so badly that you probably need some ice for that burn.”
“I seriously have no idea who you’re on ab -“Then it dawns on her, “You’re talking about that Junhee bitch, aren’t you?”
“Ooh bitch!” He whistles, “Wow, getting friendly already! What did she do? Tell her you didn’t arrange your pens in the right color order?”
Krystal’s already agitated at the mere mention of the girl in her history class, though she can’t really say why. “Why do you call her that anyway?”
“Because she’s such a proper young lady that the whole school has already made a collective decision that she’s going to take over your cousin’s oh-so-honorable duty.”
Her feet brake on its own, left one nearly tripping over the right. “She’s going to replace Suho as the school captain?”
“Do you have another cousin who needs to get a life or something?”
She rolls her eyes and keeps walking.
“So what actually happened?”
How to sum it up: girl meets girl, girl wants to rips girl’s face off cause girl can’t stay out of said girl’s business. She’d love to see how this story ends, but for now: “It’s not a big deal. I just asked to change seats with her for a bit and she said no.”
“Like I said - stick up her ass,” Taehyun shakes his head, “Why’d you want to change seats with her anyway?”
A group of girls rush pass, screaming and giggling like wild youth would. Krystal moves back, she
was sure that if she didn’t she’d be on the ground with a scraped knee or a twisted ankle by now. They look like they’re having fun running around, Krystal thinks to herself as she watches them go, but that’s what the high school life is supposed to be about, isn’t it? She would never know.
“Sorry,” Krystal mumbles, returning her attention to the conversation she’s put on pause, “What did you say?”
“I said,” He leans down, then reiterate word by word, “Why. Did. You. Want. To. Change. Seats. With. Her?”
She hides her glare behind her mess of hair. “I had to ask Jongin a question.”
Her response seems to be taking longer to seeps through him than usual - he’s on more weed today then? God, she has to deal with this type of shit back at the M’s house and now even at some posh high school, she’s still hanging with a stoner. What a loser, really.
“No wonder she doesn’t like you.”
Krystal shoots him a questioning look, egging him to go on.
“They’re - you know - friends?”
No, she doesn’t. “What?”
He tries to explain with some gibberish hand gesture that doesn’t make anything clearer. “You know, friends…like buddies - I don’t fucking know how to explain it - li - okay, so like a thing.”
“A thing?” She doesn’t know why they’re leaning closer, no one is even close by, “Like they’re together?”
“No, no,” Taehyun denies as if the mere thought of that is the most disgusting thing in the world, which it kind of is, “There’s something going on between those two. That whole ‘he-likes-her-she-likes-him’ type thing.”
“So they like each other?”
“I’m not wannabe alpha male, Jongin. Just better looking,” Krystal doesn’t know how long she’s going to be able to keep a straight face, “But do you ever see him talking up girls first before they can get to him? Fuck him, just a pretty boy anyway,” He murmurs that last bit under his breath and she has to stop herself from yelling at him to get on with the story already, “They’re always off in their own corner at school events, he’s always sitting next to her in class instead of his class and what you saw today was only a preview of how snooty Princess Junhee is, she looks down her nose at anything that so much as moves.”
She’s done a fair bit of her own observation of how the boys act at school. Sure, they all act different in their own ways but those were small changes of personality: Chanyeol’s less aggressive, Suho’s more enthusiastic - smiles more, talks more, Sehun is exactly the same with his ‘leave-me-the-fuck-alone’ face, Baekhyun is Baekhyun anytime and anywhere but Jongin, she realized he had developed a whole new persona to cater to the masses. Does this go for that girl too? Does he turn his charm on for her? Does he make small talks and incorporate some jokes to make her laugh? Does she think he’s a nice school boy that she can make into her first love? Is that the boy that they want from him?
Krystal wants to ask him: what it’s like, to have everyone but no one at all?
“Oh yeah, I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Taehyun nudges her leg with his foot, how fucking gentleman like of him, “Don’t you have a phone or something?”
She almost laughs, because did those assholes really think no one would notice that a seventeen year old girl is not spending her day texting and snapchatting and tweeting and whatever the internet offer now a days? This is almost too easy.
Krystal releases a well practiced sigh; sad and tired but not angry. “I really don’t want to talk about it, Tae.”
Cue 1…2…3…
“What’s wrong?”
“No, really, I don’t want to burden you with my problems -“
“Christ, Krystal, you’re not going to burden me if I want to know about it,” He sounds worried, she can’t wait to look up from the ground to see if he looks the part too, “We’re friends now, if you’re in some kind of trouble, I want you to tell me so I can go kick whoever’s ass that’s fucked with you.”
Peering up at him with her brown doe eyes, she blinks slowly then averts them. “I - It’s just that - my parents and Suho, they - they’re really protective and they don’t think it’s a good idea to give me a phone.”
His forehead crinkles with concern. “How do you call anyone then?”
“I don’t”
This is men, isn’t it? They will hurt you, bring you down and make you obey if they know you are strong enough to stand on your own two feet but they can be so sweet once you’ve got them fooled. They are so desperate to be your hero, to rescue you from all the monsters lurking at every corner of this man’s world. They’ll never know that the biggest injustice is how she has to cross her ankles when she sits, how she has to laugh at their ‘your mom’s jokes like she’s never heard them before, how too little makeup makes her ugly and too much is no different. But it’s fine, in the end, Krystal’s outsmarted them all before. Thanks to their vanity. Oh men.
“If I ever want to call anyone I have to use Suho’s phone so he can be in the room to listen to the conversation and check that I’m not talking to anyone I’m not supposed to be talking to,” She cups her chin in her hand and sighs once again, licking her lips, “I know they’re only trying to do this for my own good -“
“More like take away all your privacy,” Taehyun yells, outraged as he throws his two arms up in the air, “Your parents - and your cousins, are psychos. They can’t be doing this to you. You have to go talk to them -“
“Do you think I’ve not tried?” She snarls, a bit of anger always hurry things up, “I’ve tried, they never listen to me. They think I’m a weak little girl who isn’t capable of taking care of herself even though she’s seventeen already!”
He stares at her with mouth hang open, bewildered by her outburst. He must think he knows her now, Krystal sniggers, She’s shared such a deep, dark secret to him - she must trust him, he must be special. And he wants to be special. In fact, Krystal bets that’s all Nam Taehyun has ever wanted - to be special to someone.
“Then I guess this is what friends are for.”
She hides masks her smirk with a look of confusion and vulnerability before she swivels around to face him. Taehyun’s got one hand in the pocket of his pants and he watches in triumph when he fetches out a phone.
The sleek black rectangle lies on his open palm and he holds it out to her like an engagement ring. “You can call whoever you want, even international calls but I’m so going to charge you for that shit. I’m not going to be like your nosey cousin and check who you contact and stuff, clear the history if you want to after for all I care.”
Krystal knows what she must be looking like to him; grateful and ready to swoon. “Taehyun - I - thank you, so much.”
“Anytime, babe,” he chuckles, ruffling her hair like one would with a puppy, “All you have to do is ask for it.”
Oh but he doesn’t know; she doesn’t ask for things. She just takes them.
-
“Hey, hyung” Chanyeol whispers after throwing a scrunch up paper at his head - only he’d ever do that.
He enjoys most free period; everyone leaves him the hell alone and it’s the only hour in a school day that he gets any actual work done. Except the ones he shares with Chanyeol, who always seems to have something to talk about.
Jongin puts his ball point pen down, sighing. “Yeah?”
“What do you think about Krystal and all that stuff Sehun’s got planned for her?”
He wishes he could be honest and in most cases he is with Chanyeol. Mostly because he understands, he doesn’t judge, he listens and he offers solace but not too much that he comes off as bias or blinded by his debt to them for taking him in. Chanyeol’s not wise; he won’t give any deep advice that Sehun spews out from time to time but Jongin thinks he understands something that his childhood best friend doesn’t.
Nevertheless, Jongin can’t really explain to him how he might as well have drunk himself into a coma because of the shit Sehun’s cooked up in his brilliant mind. “It’ good, it’s fool proof. If we all do what we’re all supposed to, everything should all go as plan.”
“I know that. When Sehun gets his hands dirty, it always go well unlike when Kyungsoo hyung drafts his own evil plan,” Chanyeol says blandly, “I’m not talkin’ ‘bout that. I’m asking about how you feel about it.”
“What do you mean?
Chanyeol throws his notebook down on the empty chair besides his then props his feet up on the spot where it laid splayed open seconds ago. “Cool, it’s all good for us. Even if it all goes to hell on that night, we get away with it - nothing to lose and we go on fucking shit up the next day but it’s not the same for the hoe.”
Jongin would have said something the ‘hoe’ reference if it isn’t for the afterthought that followed. “So she’ll die and we’ll finally get rid of her like we’ve been wanting to.”
“Yeah but how do you feel about that?”
Like she died all over again.
“I -“
“What the fuck is happening over there?”
He couldn’t tell what Chanyeol was referring to: the senior couple trying to eat each other’s face off behind two book case away from them, the librarian smelling some books like she’s at a wine tasting
“Shit,” Jongin curses loud enough to interrupt all of the what-the-fuckeries mentioned above. He’s up on his feet immediately, his fingers curling into the back of Chanyeol’s patchy white shirt as he drags him along to the small stained window he’s been staring out of earlier, “Shit, that is Sehun.”
-
When Choi Seunghyun’s fist collides with Sehun’s jaw, it’s more of a sound than a bruising attack. To Jongin, it’s like a small pop of a blown up balloon. You knew it was coming but you still hoped it wouldn’t.
Sehun scrambles for balance but the taller boy grabs him by the front of his school jumper, drawing Sehun’s face a few centimeters from his own. Jongin lungs expand for more oxygen, he takes another after another as he runs faster. He doesn’t know what he’s going to do once he’s there, next to Sehun or maybe even in front him. Jongin knows Sehun will say this is his fight or yell ‘fuck off’ until he’s completely bashed up but Jongin’s still got enough of a fight in him left to do something about it.
“You’re not going to get away with it this time, Oh,” Seunhyun shouts, “All of those times your daddy got on his knees, begged my family for loans he couldn’t pay back in the next fifty years even if he tried and he throws them away on a piece of shit like you, sending you to this damn school that he can’t afford.”
Three classrooms away, Sehun spots Chanyeol spitting on the grass. Jongin knows what he wants; for them to leave him take care of it.
“You know what you are? A charity case. They must feel sorry for your war hero ancestors, probably rolling around in their grave that this is what their heirs have amounted to: a worthless, penniless charity case.” Seunghyun laughs, ugly and terrifying. And then he turns his head from Sehun, his grip never loosening as he snarls, “What the fuck are you looking at?”
“Your face,” Chanyeol growls, flexing those rough farmer's son's hands, “And how it will look when I jam my fists into it.”
NO, Jongin yells. Or he only thought of it as he watches, dumb struck as Chanyeol smashes his throws a punch right at Choi Seunghyun’s nose. The blood gushes out and down his throat, staining his shirt and the muscle tee inside. Now he’s nearly as bloodied up as Sehun. But it’s only matter of seconds until Seunghyun finds his footing again and rushes towards Chanyeol, propelling him back into the brick wall. It sets him back long enough for Seunghyun to knee him the gut, earning a loud groan from the younger boy.
There have been other fights, many of them but this time, it has really gone too far.
Jongin thinks about how reckless he’s being when he jumps on Seunghyun, taking him to the ground with him before his foot could collide with Sehun’s stomach, or arms, or legs. He only catches snippets of it as they roll over: the red splattering on the floor, Chanyeol’s hand twitching, Sehun’s sound of pain from his left.
Throwing a punch at the side of Seunghyun’s face, he goes down long enough for Jongin to stable himself on his hands and knees. “Chanyeol,” he shouts, this time aloud he’s sure, “Go. Now.”
He doesn’t get to see the dark haired boy move. His front crash into the hard surface, his cheek forcefully pressed into the floor. The dirt smudges onto his face, smearing away at his skin. His arms flail around desperately trying to grab onto any of Seunghyun’s flesh, to attack, to push him away but he grabs a fistful of his hair and smacking his skull into the concrete, then again, and again -
Inexplicably, the weight is lifted off him. Jongin had to tell himself to keep breathing, to keep his eyes open. Two feet away from him, Sehun calls out something that he couldn’t quite catch, there’s only a loud roar in his ears and everything and anything sounds like it’s been muffled by a pillow.
“Oh come on,” Seunghyun says, tired, “These losers call in some little bitch to help them. Be a doll and go home to your mummy -“
Jongin tries to push onto his feet but the ground slides beneath him. He waits for it to stop but it doesn’t. Then Seunghyun yells out what sounds like ‘little bitch’ before the side of his face hit the wooden bench outside the atrium.
“Don’t worry, I’ll stop by to tell your mummy to pick you up when I’m done with you,” a slender hand bunched up a fistful of Seunghyun’s ash brown hair, slamming his head down on the edge of the seat with a loud ‘bang’, “How her baby boy couldn’t fight off a little bitch like me.”
Jongin watches transfix as the attacker leans down, bringing her chapped lips to his ear. Krystal, he
gasps out a warning she doesn’t need.
Krystal yanks Seunhyun’s head up high enough for him to feel every word she’s saying to him, “I want you to look at little bitch because this little bitch,” she grunts those last two words that were meant to be insults, smashing his face into the surface yet again, “Just beat you to pulp and now you’ll have to live with the fact that this little bitch right here has more balls than you ever will.”
Panting, Krystal smacks his head down hard enough to knock him out before she drops him to the ground, “So the next time you see me, doll, you run the other way,”
The only thing he could see clearly is Seughyun on the ground, curling into his side and clutching his now broken nose. The view is blocked soon enough with Krystal crouching down next to him, her skirt barely covering her thighs when she drops down next to him, her voice is all muddled up but he can still catch most of her words. She’s calling his name now, those hands that have surely given Seunghyun concussion, are lingering on his back and his cheek.
“Jesus, if you can’t walk then can you at least say something.”
Krystal’s leveling her eyes to meet his fuzzy ones; he’s seeing things - she looks worried, scared. He’s never seen her look this scared before, not even when she was carried into his home a dead body.
Licking his lips, Jongin croaks, “Shut up”
-
So she saves him from getting his head bashed in and he has the nerve to tell her to shut up then bosses her around about Sehun (note to self: have to ask about this ‘protect-my-husband-Sehun hysteria). And don’t even start about his trust issue. The guy can’t even put one leg over the bike and demands they get out of school ASAP but won’t let her ride his stinking high grade, imported Yamaha because he was sure she was going to leave him to die somewhere.
What an idiot. If she wanted him dead, wouldn’t it be easier to leave that bonehead to sit on him until he chokes on dust or something?
“Are you still breathing?”
Jongin cranes his neck to the side, the bruise on his forehead is turning an angry purple. He deserves it. “No, I’m dead and in hell.”
“I’m here so you must be.”
He laughs; a little rumbling sound scratching at the back of his throat. It sounds warm; at least that hasn’t changed. “Are you okay?”
After all that he asks, Krystal thinks with a raise brow. “You’re asking me if I’m okay? You’re the one with an incoming black eye, giant bruise on your forehead, a broken tooth in their somewhere. Besides,” she starts, sitting down on the curb next to him, “I’m the hostage - doesn’t matter what happens to me - collateral damage and all.”
Shifting nervously in her spot, Krystal shoves the slushie she got from the convenient sore in his lap,
“Hope you still like red and green jello because no way in hell am I giving up my lemon and Dr. Pepper.”
“Yeah, it’s still my favorite,” He holds up the cup, this is probably she’ll get to a thank you, “I haven’t had one since…”
And the silence that follows says it all: since she disappeared.
“Well…” Krystal trails off, rocking back and forth on the ball of her feet, her eyes glued to the dried blood on her brand new school shoes. She really does like them, they’re kind of Lolita chic, “This is weird…I, the enemy,” She makes a point to shoot him a look, then continues, “Helped you defeat an evil senior year kid who was going to butcher to Sehun, not that I blame him. And you and that Blood-thirsty-yeol tried to rescue the day, except it didn’t work - at all. Don’t call it Stockholm syndrome or anything. I haven’t even been kidnapped for a month yet.”
Jongin snorts but she ignores it. “Then I literally have to carry one of you evil dicks onto a bike that he won’t let me take the lead though he insists so strongly that and I quote “hurry the fuck out of here” then proceed to talk mumbo jumbo about the other two evil dicks’ safety. Now I’m sitting here, drinking slurpees with him in a surprisingly small town outside of Seoul.”
His tongue is green when he starts to talk, “Do you want me to throw you some compliments or just a thank you would do?”
“I have a feeling I’m only going to get a thank you out of you,” she tries to hold in a smile and fails miserably, “Oh and an explanation as a bonus for not ditching your body in the Han river. And I did fork out my own money to buy you that disgusting thing you’re gulping down.”
When they little, Krystal once told him how yucky she thought the combination of cherry and lime green slushy is. That particular opinion of hers has stayed pretty much the same.
Jongin’s staring into the distance, watching a truck drive by at a painfully low speed. She’s convinced that this exchange of pleasantries is over between them when he says, “Thank you for what you did, even though it would have been more beneficial for you to leave Seunghyun to finish us off.”
He’s right and she would have - she nearly did. Krystal had been standing right there, in the corridor outside the art classrooms. If Jongin didn’t jump into help at the last minute and ran the other way, she would have left Sehun to fend for himself (he wouldn’t last). Hell, she would have enjoyed watching every minute of it. She had been making excuses on their way out of Seoul and she’d come up with plenty; she’ll tell them all if she has to. But she’ll know the truth. It wasn’t an impulse; not a survival instinct that she often associates with the familiar feeling of a ‘zap’ that begins in her skull and finishes at her feet, kicking her body into a ‘run-for-your-life’ mode. In her heart, Krystal knows that she didn’t ever want to see him pain. And it felt good punching that wannabe mafia in the face.
“It’s not Sehun that owes him money, it’s his pathetic excuse of a father,” Jongin spits, crashing her train of thought. The cut near his hair line is beginning to bleed again; she’s wasted way too many tissues on that one small injury already, “This business provides him with enough money to pay for the rest of the tuition he owes to the school. He doesn’t need money from his family. They - they are the ones who need money from him.”
She had put the pieces together and came to the conclusion that the Oh’s were in some kind of money trouble. It wasn’t entirely uncommon for the rich to fall victim to gambling and throwing money away on a failing business. But for the successor to remain in such a prestige school, it was basically unheard of. No matter how much money these boys were making off their motor “trade” business, it couldn’t possibly be enough to pay off a year’s worth of schooling at Daemoon.
As if reading her mind, Jongin provides an entirely reasonable answer, “He’s on a partial scholarship; mostly because of his family’s name.”
Krystal snorts. “Does he live a double life I don’t know about? Loner student by day, Korean idol by night kind of thing?”
“His great-grand fathers were war heroes,” He says, ignoring her mocking remark, “His family survives on that fact alone. If it wasn’t for that, they’d be kicked out of society a long time ago.”
“Ah…” She grimaces, taking a long sip of her cool drink, “So nothing has changed even after all these years. Respect is earned by name and status. Is that why those money worshipping shitheads at the school like you so much?”
It’s only when it’s too late and the words having flown from her mouth that Krystal hears herself. To her, it sounds so spiteful like she was accusing him for slaughtering a lamb. Being rich and young isn’t a crime - it just feels like that sometimes.
“I didn’t mean that in a bad way -“
Lifting up his hand to shush her, he says quietly, “You don’t have to, S - Krystal.”
He might think she missed the trip up with the name but she didn’t; he was about to call her Soojung. It wouldn’t have gone down well if he did.
“It - it’s just that everyone seems to think that you’re this - this mega cool dude,” Krystal explains bitterly, looking down at her hands in her lap, toying with each other, “You’re so chill, all ‘whatever’ with your boys, sitting there and joking ‘round like you know they’re going to find it hilarious no matter what you say or do. And the girls,” She tries not to cringe at the memories of the boy talk she overheard in the changing room two days ago, “They think you’re sooooo boyfriend material - gross, but yeah.”
Jongin scoffs, a melancholic smile faltering upon his face. He keeps staring across the road even though there’s nothing worth the look. She’s convinced that they’re hanging around a desolate town; there’s only one dude (a creepy one) working the register in the convenient store. And the only thing that’s budging in that playground she’s parked his bike at is the swing, and that’s only due to the breeze.
“Do you think I’m that guy you’ve described?”
No. “I don’t know,” she shrugs.
“It’s good that they like that guy,” Jongin begins, stretching his legs out further from the foot path, “Those shitheads - as you so kindly refer to them as,” he shoots her an oddly playful look and she feels the corner of her lips pulling up, “Will one day become the most powerful people in our nation. They’re useless now but give it a few years and they’ll be resourceful, successful, full of connections.”
“Wow, look at you,” she muses, “Talking like a true future ruthless millionaire. You will have them eating out of your hands when you’re sixty and living alone in penthouse with a gold digger wife.”
He rolls his eyes, mumbles, “They’re eating out of your hands now.”
Thanks to that, she’s choking on the Dr. Pepper side of her slurpee. In between her coughs, she tries to talk, “Are you kidding me?!”
“What?” Jongin appears to be shocked by her outburst.
“They hate me; the only reason I can think of that they would want to talk to me is because I’m the perfect prefect’s cousin.”
Staring at her like her whole head just twisted around, he asks in exasperation, “I don’t understand. You even got along with Ahn Jaehyun, even the teachers can’t make him talk -“
“He doesn’t count. He has a dick so he automatically wants to talk to me.”
Jongin cocks his head.
“It’s true,” Krystal says flippantly.
“Isn’t that what girls want…anyway?” He asks, sighing tiredly and scratching his swelling head,
“Attention from guys and other girls’ jealousy?”
“No!” She would have smacked him in the head if he wasn’t already in considerable pain, “Who cares if boys think I’m hot or cute or fun? Who cares what they think when it’s only going to last five seconds until they find someone else to ‘ooh’ and ‘ah’s over? I want friends - girl friends who sit you down and spoon feed you those fucking ice creams when you’re sad, who marathons Gossip Girl with you even if the show fucked itself in the asshole in the foot since season 3. Those girl friends who sit in a circle before class so you can bitch about other girls who don’t roll with you or how cute that senior guy on the swim team is. That’s what girls want.”
Jongin's eyes are locked with hers and he sighs before turning away from her. She hates when he does that, even back when they she was too short to reach him without standing on her tip toes. He makes her feel like that girl again.
“Is that what you want, Krystal?” He asks meaningfully, “Do you want to hang out with friends after class and complain about how boring all of it was? Do you want to go to underage parties and dance all night with jocks? Do you want to cram for exams at three in the morning just to forget most of it when you’re about to go in? Do you want a boy to walk you home from school then to the next?”
Yes, Krystal holds back, she wants that more than anything and she’s never going to get it. Because she’s not a girl - not even a person. She’s a ghost.
Jongin’s expression soften when he looks at her again, dry blood at the corner of his cracked lips when he reminds her, “No one knows how much time you have left at Daemoon, but it’s the closest you’re ever going to get to being a normal, teenage girl.”