Shy Boy (High School AU Backstory 1/2)
Title: Shy Boy 1/2 (Accompaniment fic to Bad Girl)
Author: himawarixxsandz
Pairing: DooSeob
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Yoon Doojoon is something new.
A/N: So...I didn't expect this to happen at all. I intended to write a Junseung remix backstory, as you all know, but it's not working out that great just like the first time I wrote a Junseung backstory--the process is slow and laborious. A lot like Chem homework. Only not as bad. But yeah. I think you should all just look at it this way--I kept promising DooSeob deleted scenes and never got around to them for the latest chapters, so I came up with this instead. And because I've recently fallen in love with Secret's Shy Boy and thought of how it's like the perfect response to Bad Girl. (I'm also going to do a JongKi backstory, I've decided, but I don't know if I should do it with G.NA's Black and White or Girl's Day's Twinkle Twinkle. And I don't know if it'll be from Hongki's POV or Jonghun's). And there's going to be a part two to this DooSeob thing because I can't fit it all in one post and I want to split first year from second year because it makes a nicer break. (And now, hopefully, Yoseob being Yoseob will make a lot more sense in my WFLT-verse because I feel like we know the least about him)
Part 1 // Part 2
Yang Yoseob is cute.
Yang Yoseob is adorable.
Girls always love Yoseob-for as long as he can remember, girls always love him. They always love him, but they are never in love with him. They can never see him protecting them, can never see him as a boy. They just think he’s cute. They think he’s adorable.
Boys love Yoseob, too. Boys love Yoseob because he’s pretty, he’s cute, he’s adorable. Being around Yoseob is like being with a girl, but not, because Yoseob isn’t a girl. There’s no pressure of being with a girl, but at the same time, they can still look at Yoseob and see the pretty, see the cute, see the adorable.
If Yoseob is the darling of his middle school, then Hwang Dongsun is the prince of his middle school. Dongsun is the boy that all the girls always in love with, ever since kindergarten, even through the transition from elementary to middle, they are always in love with him. Dongsun is the boy that all the boys want to be friends with, that some boys hate because all the girls love him, that all the boys have been over to his house at least once because it’s hard not to like him even if they want to hate him.
In seventh grade, Dongsun tells Yoseob he likes him.
Dongsun tells Yoseob that he likes-likes him.
He tells Yoseob behind a bush after school near the gates. Yoseob blinks appraisingly.
Dongsun is good-looking, even during the awkward stage between boy and teenager. His dark hair falls against but not flat on his head and forehead. His eyes always glimmer and glint, and his cheekbones are high, and his lips are curved, and his skin is pale but not paper white, and he’s tall, and his legs are long, and his smile is warm. “So?” Dongsun says, a little nervously, rocking on his feet.
Yoseob blinks again, looking up at him.
“I mean, if you’re weirded out,” Dongsun says, looking like he’s about to turn around and walk away with his cheeks flaming.
“Are we going out then?” Yoseob says, blinking more.
Dongsun stares for a moment, and then he breaks out into a grin and reaches forward to take Yoseob’s hand. “Well-yeah.”
Dongsun takes Yoseob out to parks, to his house to do homework-for sleepovers, he takes Yoseob to pools when it’s warm, takes him to dinner with his family. Dongsun gives Yoseob his first kiss and tells Yoseob that he’s good at soccer, that he’s cute when he plays, that he’s an amazing goalie, that he should go pro when he’s older. He tells Yoseob that he’s smart, that they should be like this forever, that no one understands Dongsun behind the perfection beside Yoseob.
Dongsun does all this with Yoseob under one arm, and a constant stream of girls under his other arm. He brings Yoseob everywhere, and that everywhere is always filled with girls. It’s filled with girls, sometimes it’s even filled with boys, and Dongsun tells all of these things to them, too. He flirts with them for a moment, kisses Yoseob the next, and flirts with them for another moment.
Yoseob breaks up with him three months after Dongsun asked him out. Dongsun deals with it just as Yoseob expects him to. He shouts, he’s upset, he asks Yoseob what he’s done wrong, he tells Yoseob that he isn’t flirting, he tells Yoseob that he’ll stop, he tells Yoseob that he’s the best and nothing is ever better, he asks Yoseob for a second chance-
Yang Yoseob is cute.
Yang Yoseob is adorable.
Yang Yoseob isn’t stupid.
If Hwang Dongsun is the prince of their middle school, Choi Kangdae is the nerd of their middle school. Kangdae is the nerd, but he’s the nerd that all the girls love because of his pretty eyes behind the glasses, because of how he’s good at sports even though he can’t play them because he has to study, because of how he’s kind and sweet and all the mothers love him, because he’s tall and good-looking even though he’s always buried behind books.
A month after the end of Yoseob’s three months with Dongsun, Kangdae tells Yoseob that he likes him.
He tells Yoseob that he likes-likes him.
“Hwang Dongsun’s a jerk,” Kangdae says quietly, looking serious and earnest behind his glasses.
“Yeah,” Yoseob says, blinking unaffectedly. “And?”
Kangdae blinks back, surprised. “And-what?”
“What about him?” Yoseob asks because he doesn’t understand what Dongsun has to do with Kangdae confessing.
Or maybe he does, but he likes seeing Kangdae flustered.
The other boy opens his mouth, blankly. “I-I’m not Dongsun.”
“Well, yeah,” Yoseob says. “You’re Choi Kangdae. I’d be worried if you thought you were two people at once. I think that’s a mental disorder.”
Kangdae’s mouth opens and closes again, and Yoseob thinks that maybe all that reading has made his brain a little funny because straight A students shouldn’t make stupid faces like that. “I just-Yoseob, ah,” he says, ears bright scarlet, “I like you.”
“I know,” Yoseob says.
“And I want to go out with you.”
“There we go,” Yoseob grins, because Hwang Dongsun didn’t break Yoseob’s heart without paying for damages. From Dongsun, Yoseob received how to flirt-how to make others want you more than you want them. He knows how to flirt now, so he tosses one arm lightly around Kangdae’s neck, having to tiptoe a little to do it and he can see Kangdae’s cheeks redden because Yoseob knows that the boys think demonstrations of his lack of height is adorable.
Yoseob knows, and that’s important.
Kangdae says that he’s not Dongsun, and he’s not. Kangdae is quieter, is studious, helps Yoseob with his homework, holds Yoseob’s hand, doesn’t kiss him as much as Dongsun, doesn’t take him out as much because Kangdae likes staying indoors more, he likes being alone with Yoseob at either one of their houses, sleeping over, playing soccer together. Kangdae tells Yoseob that he’s never met anyone as serious with school as Yoseob, tells Yoseob that he’s so much smarter and cleverer than Kangdae, tells Yoseob that he’s so lucky to be able to maintain his grades and play soccer at the same time, tells Yoseob that he’s glad someone like Yoseob would want someone like Kangdae.
But Kangdae, however unlike Dongsun he is, still has girls queuing up for him. Girls like Kangdae because he is quiet and reserved, and when he is with Yoseob, when the rare smiles come out and shine, girls want him even more. They want him, and Yoseob thinks that maybe Kangdae is different because he’s not Dongsun and because he chooses to be with Yoseob over the girls because Yoseob is the one who makes Kangdae even more popular with the girls anyhow.
Yoseob is wrong.
Kangdae’s texts are littered with names of the girls in their grade, and some in the grade above. Kangdae starts bringing girls home to do homework with them at Kangdae’s house. Kangdae starts bringing girls to the soccer field to watch him play with Yoseob. Kangdae tells Yoseob that they should go to parks more, that they should invite other people when they go out, that they should see movies in groups. Kangdae starts flirting in his own way, and Yoseob can see the symptoms again.
Two-months and three-quarters after Kangdae confesses, Yoseob breaks up with him.
Kangdae reacts expectedly. He’s distraught, he can’t believe this is happening, he’s so sorry for whatever he’s done wrong, he needs another chance, he’ll never find another boy or a girl as intelligent and amazing as Yoseob, no one will ever understand him as well, he needs to know why he’s upset Yoseob, he wants to know what’s happening, he thought they were so happy together-
Yoseob realizes that despite Kangdae saying he’s not Dongsun, the words that come out of their mouths are uncannily similar.
Kangdae broke Yoseob’s heart before it was even able to heal from Dongsun’s attack, which meant that Kangdae paid appropriate damage control for both. With Dongsun, Yoseob learned how to flirt. With Kangdae, Yoseob learned how to know exactly what your appearance can get you-learned how not to get his heart broken again-learned how not to fall in love-learned that good-looking boys know how good they look more than they should-learned that all they see in Yoseob is his face and after that, no matter what they say, it ends there and once they’re tired of it, they’ll leave without looking back.
After Kangdae, the names go on for a mile and Yoseob can’t even remember all of them. It’s one after the other in rapid fire succession, but Yoseob doesn’t get his heart broken once. They are all the cream of the crop, whether from Yoseob’s school, from the high school adjacent, from other middle schools, from other high schools, they are all the princes, the captains, the presidents of their classes. They are all ridiculously attractive and funny and witty and kind and tell Yoseob that they’ve never met anyone like him and now that they have, they’ll never want anyone else.
Half of them spend the entire time they are dating Yoseob flirting with the surrounding girls and boys that come with their ridiculous attractiveness and princely-captaincy-presidential status. The other half cheat on Yoseob outright and whether he catches them himself, has someone else tell him, or finds direct evidence, he breaks up with them on the spot. The half that flirts, he breaks up after a month, give or take a few weeks.
But with everyone, Yoseob learns more and more and he feels his heart safer and safer. With every heartbreaker he dates, the sense of security he has grows more and more.
He has more kisses through seventh grade, and the physical part of it gets heavier and heavier and deeper and deeper until right before graduation. It gets heavy and deep but Yoseob never has sex with any of them because then he would have to have sex with all of them. He doesn’t want to make one think he’s more special than the others because none of them are. They are all the same and they always will be.
His parents change their business headquarters when Yoseob is about to make the transition to high school. They move houses and so Yoseob transfers schools for high school. All of the boys he’s ever dated in the area send him letters, send him messages, send him food, tell him they’ll miss him, tell him that they still wish he was theirs, tell him that they hope he’ll still remember all of them.
Yoseob recycles the letters because it’s good for the environment, deletes the messages from his phone because he doesn’t want to clog up his cell, and shares the food with his family and older sister because it’s pretty good-there’s French cake and chocolates and one of them even sends wine for his parents.
Yoseob dyes his hair before high school. He dyes it bright, white blond, cuts it, and heads off to his first day of high school just like that.
This school is bigger than Yoseob’s, so it’s a little hard for him to see who’s the on the top rung of the ladder. During the orientation, all of the first years are still in disarray-some with friends from the middle school, but plenty more new like Yoseob and still a little lost-so Yoseob goes off to find his first class alone since birth because Yoseob is usually always surrounded by girls or his boyfriend but more often both because his boyfriends always have girls.
His first class is Biology Honors with a young, female teacher who introduces herself as Lee Hyori and who Yoseob thinks is ridiculously attractive and badass at the same time. He gets there a few minutes before the bell rings and takes a seat at an empty table-they are lab tables and they are paired in seats of two to a table. He turns around and starts talking to the girls behind him-they smile and laugh with him and they are more than eager to have someone to talk to about the hard beginning of getting settled into high school.
The bell rings then, and Hyori gets started on introducing the course and herself and asking the names of the students in the class.
Hyori finishes talking about the supplies they’ll need and is about to start taking role when a boy bursts through the door, looking clearly rushed and aware of how late he is. Everyone stares and Hyori simply introduces herself, smiles reassuringly, makes a joking remark of how he’s forgiven because all the girls will probably be mad if she gives someone as cute as him detention just from orientation, and the boy quickly bows and takes a seat next to Yoseob.
The boy’s name turns out to be Yoon Doojoon, and he went to the middle school correspondent to this high school.
After Hyori finishes with the rounds, she goes in the back and lets the class talk until the bell rings. Yoseob is about to sneak out his cell phone and try to see if he can get enough signal to watch a game, when Doojoon swivels around completely in seat to face Yoseob. He hears a casual, “Hi,” and looks up at the other boy.
And bursts into laughter.
“What?” Doojoon says, bewildered, except Yoseob can’t even really hear him because he’s laughing that hard
Because Hyori was right-Doojoon really is good-looking except that his hair is spiked up in a faux-hawk-esque type thing and it’s not that it looks terrible, it just strikes Yoseob as hilarious for some reason and before he can stop himself at the look of further comic on Doojoon’s face, Yoseob blurts out, “Your hair is so stupid.”
Doojoon’s mouth falls open-he doesn’t look indignant or irritated, just kind of blank which furthers the stupidity and makes Yoseob laugh again even though he’s sure that this isn’t something you’re supposed to do on first meeting because it can give a bit of a not-so-great-or-polite impression. He looks like he’s finally about to say something, when he jerks and whips around to look at the girl Yoseob was talking to just minutes ago.
“I don’t think it’s stupid,” she says, smiling because Yoseob has already figured out that Doojoon is a Dongsun and this is what happens with Dongsuns.
Dongsuns always have girls there to kiss things and make boo-boos all better whenever they need, but even though they always go back to that comfort zone, they always want Yoseob first because unlike girls, he can get away with saying things like, “Really? I think it’s completely stupid. He has sideburns and it’s pointy in the back and yeah-it’s just stupid.”
Yoseob turns to Doojoon to gauge his expression, expecting a witty, flirting line to come with it.
All that really happens is Yoon Doojoon petting his sideburns and looking comically offended.
Yoseob laughs again and this time he does it for so long and loud that his stomach hurts for the next five minutes afterward.
Doojoon is friends with other Dongsuns. He brings Yoseob to them during lunch, and they all look like Dongsuns-they all think Yoseob is adorable and they are all ridiculously attractive with girls at their heels wherever they go. They all play sports, they are all smart, and Yoseob would have continued to write all of them off as Hwang Dongsuns, except they aren’t.
They aren’t, and it surprises him.
It surprises him, but he’s glad they aren’t.
He’s glad they aren’t, because even though he’s used to handling Hwang Dongsuns, it gets a bit tiring after a while, and someone’s heart can only go through so much before it starts to get sore.
“Aw, that’s so cute,” Yoseob grins, one day when he and Doojoon are the only ones left after soccer practice. Jaebum made them run extra laps at the end for being late, and it’s also their turn to clean up the equipment.
“Shut up,” Doojoon snorts and picks up another plastic dodging obstacle from the field.
“You’ve only had one girlfriend-that’s so cute,” Yoseob continues to tease mercilessly and carries off another cone off the field. Doojoon shoves him to the side and snatches the next cone that Yoseob was about to get.
Doojoon gathers a few more white plastic obstacles into his arms. “How many have you had then, Seonsangnim?” he retorts sarcastically.
“I have boyfriends, not girlfriends,” Yoseob points out.
“Well, how many?”
Yoseob stops mid-step, and Doojoon stops too to turn around and look at him. Yoseob tries to run through the names in his mind as fast as he can, and comes up with a number that sounds about right-give or take a few. “I think seventeen,” Yoseob says. “But I don’t remember.”
Doojoon stares.
And stares.
And stares.
And then snorts.
“Right,” Doojoon says, “of course you did.”
Yoseob laughs and bumps his shoulder against the older boy’s. “You think I’m lying? Aren’t I adorable enough to have seventeen boyfriends?”
“You’re not adorable,” Doojoon says, dumping another armful of white obstacles onto the side of the field and then jogging back to gather more. “You’re evil and terrible-haven’t we already gone over this?”
Yoseob pretends to think, one finger pressed to his lips. “Nope,” he says after a moment and ducks quickly when Doojoon makes to lunge at him again. He laughs. “Now we have though.”
Doojoon rolls his eyes and grins. He reaches out and hits Yoseob lightly in the stomach with the back of his hand. “Go on and shower,” he says, gesturing towards the locker rooms. “I’ll finish up.”
Yoseob blinks.
At least half of the field is still covered in cones and white obstacles and they haven’t even started on cleaning the dirt that’s gathered on the edges of the goals-it’s darkening and if Yoseob stops now, Doojoon’s going to be here well into the night. “You’re never going to finish alone,” Yoseob says, somewhat confused. “And we have tons of Bio homework, so I can’t just leave-“
“Yoseob-ah,” Doojoon says, still grinning, teasingly, utterly relaxed, “it’s fine. ‘Sides, it always takes you longer to do Bio anyway. Be thankful I’m letting you get a head start against my genius.”
Yoseob smiles over his confusion and clasps hands with Doojoon briskly. “Thanks, hyung,” he says because his mind is a little in too much chaos to think of something witty to say back.
His mind is in a little bit of a whirlwind right now, as he jogs to the locker rooms, because while those seventeen Dongsuns never failed to buy Yoseob whatever he wanted, to tell Yoseob continuously about his perfection, there wasn’t one Dongsun amongst those seventeen that offered to stay up until late hours covering for Yoseob and not expect anything in return.
It’s just a little boggling is all.
Author: himawarixxsandz
Pairing: DooSeob
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Yoon Doojoon is something new.
A/N: So...I didn't expect this to happen at all. I intended to write a Junseung remix backstory, as you all know, but it's not working out that great just like the first time I wrote a Junseung backstory--the process is slow and laborious. A lot like Chem homework. Only not as bad. But yeah. I think you should all just look at it this way--I kept promising DooSeob deleted scenes and never got around to them for the latest chapters, so I came up with this instead. And because I've recently fallen in love with Secret's Shy Boy and thought of how it's like the perfect response to Bad Girl. (I'm also going to do a JongKi backstory, I've decided, but I don't know if I should do it with G.NA's Black and White or Girl's Day's Twinkle Twinkle. And I don't know if it'll be from Hongki's POV or Jonghun's). And there's going to be a part two to this DooSeob thing because I can't fit it all in one post and I want to split first year from second year because it makes a nicer break. (And now, hopefully, Yoseob being Yoseob will make a lot more sense in my WFLT-verse because I feel like we know the least about him)
Part 1 // Part 2
Yang Yoseob is cute.
Yang Yoseob is adorable.
Girls always love Yoseob-for as long as he can remember, girls always love him. They always love him, but they are never in love with him. They can never see him protecting them, can never see him as a boy. They just think he’s cute. They think he’s adorable.
Boys love Yoseob, too. Boys love Yoseob because he’s pretty, he’s cute, he’s adorable. Being around Yoseob is like being with a girl, but not, because Yoseob isn’t a girl. There’s no pressure of being with a girl, but at the same time, they can still look at Yoseob and see the pretty, see the cute, see the adorable.
If Yoseob is the darling of his middle school, then Hwang Dongsun is the prince of his middle school. Dongsun is the boy that all the girls always in love with, ever since kindergarten, even through the transition from elementary to middle, they are always in love with him. Dongsun is the boy that all the boys want to be friends with, that some boys hate because all the girls love him, that all the boys have been over to his house at least once because it’s hard not to like him even if they want to hate him.
In seventh grade, Dongsun tells Yoseob he likes him.
Dongsun tells Yoseob that he likes-likes him.
He tells Yoseob behind a bush after school near the gates. Yoseob blinks appraisingly.
Dongsun is good-looking, even during the awkward stage between boy and teenager. His dark hair falls against but not flat on his head and forehead. His eyes always glimmer and glint, and his cheekbones are high, and his lips are curved, and his skin is pale but not paper white, and he’s tall, and his legs are long, and his smile is warm. “So?” Dongsun says, a little nervously, rocking on his feet.
Yoseob blinks again, looking up at him.
“I mean, if you’re weirded out,” Dongsun says, looking like he’s about to turn around and walk away with his cheeks flaming.
“Are we going out then?” Yoseob says, blinking more.
Dongsun stares for a moment, and then he breaks out into a grin and reaches forward to take Yoseob’s hand. “Well-yeah.”
Dongsun takes Yoseob out to parks, to his house to do homework-for sleepovers, he takes Yoseob to pools when it’s warm, takes him to dinner with his family. Dongsun gives Yoseob his first kiss and tells Yoseob that he’s good at soccer, that he’s cute when he plays, that he’s an amazing goalie, that he should go pro when he’s older. He tells Yoseob that he’s smart, that they should be like this forever, that no one understands Dongsun behind the perfection beside Yoseob.
Dongsun does all this with Yoseob under one arm, and a constant stream of girls under his other arm. He brings Yoseob everywhere, and that everywhere is always filled with girls. It’s filled with girls, sometimes it’s even filled with boys, and Dongsun tells all of these things to them, too. He flirts with them for a moment, kisses Yoseob the next, and flirts with them for another moment.
Yoseob breaks up with him three months after Dongsun asked him out. Dongsun deals with it just as Yoseob expects him to. He shouts, he’s upset, he asks Yoseob what he’s done wrong, he tells Yoseob that he isn’t flirting, he tells Yoseob that he’ll stop, he tells Yoseob that he’s the best and nothing is ever better, he asks Yoseob for a second chance-
Yang Yoseob is cute.
Yang Yoseob is adorable.
Yang Yoseob isn’t stupid.
If Hwang Dongsun is the prince of their middle school, Choi Kangdae is the nerd of their middle school. Kangdae is the nerd, but he’s the nerd that all the girls love because of his pretty eyes behind the glasses, because of how he’s good at sports even though he can’t play them because he has to study, because of how he’s kind and sweet and all the mothers love him, because he’s tall and good-looking even though he’s always buried behind books.
A month after the end of Yoseob’s three months with Dongsun, Kangdae tells Yoseob that he likes him.
He tells Yoseob that he likes-likes him.
“Hwang Dongsun’s a jerk,” Kangdae says quietly, looking serious and earnest behind his glasses.
“Yeah,” Yoseob says, blinking unaffectedly. “And?”
Kangdae blinks back, surprised. “And-what?”
“What about him?” Yoseob asks because he doesn’t understand what Dongsun has to do with Kangdae confessing.
Or maybe he does, but he likes seeing Kangdae flustered.
The other boy opens his mouth, blankly. “I-I’m not Dongsun.”
“Well, yeah,” Yoseob says. “You’re Choi Kangdae. I’d be worried if you thought you were two people at once. I think that’s a mental disorder.”
Kangdae’s mouth opens and closes again, and Yoseob thinks that maybe all that reading has made his brain a little funny because straight A students shouldn’t make stupid faces like that. “I just-Yoseob, ah,” he says, ears bright scarlet, “I like you.”
“I know,” Yoseob says.
“And I want to go out with you.”
“There we go,” Yoseob grins, because Hwang Dongsun didn’t break Yoseob’s heart without paying for damages. From Dongsun, Yoseob received how to flirt-how to make others want you more than you want them. He knows how to flirt now, so he tosses one arm lightly around Kangdae’s neck, having to tiptoe a little to do it and he can see Kangdae’s cheeks redden because Yoseob knows that the boys think demonstrations of his lack of height is adorable.
Yoseob knows, and that’s important.
Kangdae says that he’s not Dongsun, and he’s not. Kangdae is quieter, is studious, helps Yoseob with his homework, holds Yoseob’s hand, doesn’t kiss him as much as Dongsun, doesn’t take him out as much because Kangdae likes staying indoors more, he likes being alone with Yoseob at either one of their houses, sleeping over, playing soccer together. Kangdae tells Yoseob that he’s never met anyone as serious with school as Yoseob, tells Yoseob that he’s so much smarter and cleverer than Kangdae, tells Yoseob that he’s so lucky to be able to maintain his grades and play soccer at the same time, tells Yoseob that he’s glad someone like Yoseob would want someone like Kangdae.
But Kangdae, however unlike Dongsun he is, still has girls queuing up for him. Girls like Kangdae because he is quiet and reserved, and when he is with Yoseob, when the rare smiles come out and shine, girls want him even more. They want him, and Yoseob thinks that maybe Kangdae is different because he’s not Dongsun and because he chooses to be with Yoseob over the girls because Yoseob is the one who makes Kangdae even more popular with the girls anyhow.
Yoseob is wrong.
Kangdae’s texts are littered with names of the girls in their grade, and some in the grade above. Kangdae starts bringing girls home to do homework with them at Kangdae’s house. Kangdae starts bringing girls to the soccer field to watch him play with Yoseob. Kangdae tells Yoseob that they should go to parks more, that they should invite other people when they go out, that they should see movies in groups. Kangdae starts flirting in his own way, and Yoseob can see the symptoms again.
Two-months and three-quarters after Kangdae confesses, Yoseob breaks up with him.
Kangdae reacts expectedly. He’s distraught, he can’t believe this is happening, he’s so sorry for whatever he’s done wrong, he needs another chance, he’ll never find another boy or a girl as intelligent and amazing as Yoseob, no one will ever understand him as well, he needs to know why he’s upset Yoseob, he wants to know what’s happening, he thought they were so happy together-
Yoseob realizes that despite Kangdae saying he’s not Dongsun, the words that come out of their mouths are uncannily similar.
Kangdae broke Yoseob’s heart before it was even able to heal from Dongsun’s attack, which meant that Kangdae paid appropriate damage control for both. With Dongsun, Yoseob learned how to flirt. With Kangdae, Yoseob learned how to know exactly what your appearance can get you-learned how not to get his heart broken again-learned how not to fall in love-learned that good-looking boys know how good they look more than they should-learned that all they see in Yoseob is his face and after that, no matter what they say, it ends there and once they’re tired of it, they’ll leave without looking back.
After Kangdae, the names go on for a mile and Yoseob can’t even remember all of them. It’s one after the other in rapid fire succession, but Yoseob doesn’t get his heart broken once. They are all the cream of the crop, whether from Yoseob’s school, from the high school adjacent, from other middle schools, from other high schools, they are all the princes, the captains, the presidents of their classes. They are all ridiculously attractive and funny and witty and kind and tell Yoseob that they’ve never met anyone like him and now that they have, they’ll never want anyone else.
Half of them spend the entire time they are dating Yoseob flirting with the surrounding girls and boys that come with their ridiculous attractiveness and princely-captaincy-presidential status. The other half cheat on Yoseob outright and whether he catches them himself, has someone else tell him, or finds direct evidence, he breaks up with them on the spot. The half that flirts, he breaks up after a month, give or take a few weeks.
But with everyone, Yoseob learns more and more and he feels his heart safer and safer. With every heartbreaker he dates, the sense of security he has grows more and more.
He has more kisses through seventh grade, and the physical part of it gets heavier and heavier and deeper and deeper until right before graduation. It gets heavy and deep but Yoseob never has sex with any of them because then he would have to have sex with all of them. He doesn’t want to make one think he’s more special than the others because none of them are. They are all the same and they always will be.
His parents change their business headquarters when Yoseob is about to make the transition to high school. They move houses and so Yoseob transfers schools for high school. All of the boys he’s ever dated in the area send him letters, send him messages, send him food, tell him they’ll miss him, tell him that they still wish he was theirs, tell him that they hope he’ll still remember all of them.
Yoseob recycles the letters because it’s good for the environment, deletes the messages from his phone because he doesn’t want to clog up his cell, and shares the food with his family and older sister because it’s pretty good-there’s French cake and chocolates and one of them even sends wine for his parents.
Yoseob dyes his hair before high school. He dyes it bright, white blond, cuts it, and heads off to his first day of high school just like that.
This school is bigger than Yoseob’s, so it’s a little hard for him to see who’s the on the top rung of the ladder. During the orientation, all of the first years are still in disarray-some with friends from the middle school, but plenty more new like Yoseob and still a little lost-so Yoseob goes off to find his first class alone since birth because Yoseob is usually always surrounded by girls or his boyfriend but more often both because his boyfriends always have girls.
His first class is Biology Honors with a young, female teacher who introduces herself as Lee Hyori and who Yoseob thinks is ridiculously attractive and badass at the same time. He gets there a few minutes before the bell rings and takes a seat at an empty table-they are lab tables and they are paired in seats of two to a table. He turns around and starts talking to the girls behind him-they smile and laugh with him and they are more than eager to have someone to talk to about the hard beginning of getting settled into high school.
The bell rings then, and Hyori gets started on introducing the course and herself and asking the names of the students in the class.
Hyori finishes talking about the supplies they’ll need and is about to start taking role when a boy bursts through the door, looking clearly rushed and aware of how late he is. Everyone stares and Hyori simply introduces herself, smiles reassuringly, makes a joking remark of how he’s forgiven because all the girls will probably be mad if she gives someone as cute as him detention just from orientation, and the boy quickly bows and takes a seat next to Yoseob.
The boy’s name turns out to be Yoon Doojoon, and he went to the middle school correspondent to this high school.
After Hyori finishes with the rounds, she goes in the back and lets the class talk until the bell rings. Yoseob is about to sneak out his cell phone and try to see if he can get enough signal to watch a game, when Doojoon swivels around completely in seat to face Yoseob. He hears a casual, “Hi,” and looks up at the other boy.
And bursts into laughter.
“What?” Doojoon says, bewildered, except Yoseob can’t even really hear him because he’s laughing that hard
Because Hyori was right-Doojoon really is good-looking except that his hair is spiked up in a faux-hawk-esque type thing and it’s not that it looks terrible, it just strikes Yoseob as hilarious for some reason and before he can stop himself at the look of further comic on Doojoon’s face, Yoseob blurts out, “Your hair is so stupid.”
Doojoon’s mouth falls open-he doesn’t look indignant or irritated, just kind of blank which furthers the stupidity and makes Yoseob laugh again even though he’s sure that this isn’t something you’re supposed to do on first meeting because it can give a bit of a not-so-great-or-polite impression. He looks like he’s finally about to say something, when he jerks and whips around to look at the girl Yoseob was talking to just minutes ago.
“I don’t think it’s stupid,” she says, smiling because Yoseob has already figured out that Doojoon is a Dongsun and this is what happens with Dongsuns.
Dongsuns always have girls there to kiss things and make boo-boos all better whenever they need, but even though they always go back to that comfort zone, they always want Yoseob first because unlike girls, he can get away with saying things like, “Really? I think it’s completely stupid. He has sideburns and it’s pointy in the back and yeah-it’s just stupid.”
Yoseob turns to Doojoon to gauge his expression, expecting a witty, flirting line to come with it.
All that really happens is Yoon Doojoon petting his sideburns and looking comically offended.
Yoseob laughs again and this time he does it for so long and loud that his stomach hurts for the next five minutes afterward.
Doojoon is friends with other Dongsuns. He brings Yoseob to them during lunch, and they all look like Dongsuns-they all think Yoseob is adorable and they are all ridiculously attractive with girls at their heels wherever they go. They all play sports, they are all smart, and Yoseob would have continued to write all of them off as Hwang Dongsuns, except they aren’t.
They aren’t, and it surprises him.
It surprises him, but he’s glad they aren’t.
He’s glad they aren’t, because even though he’s used to handling Hwang Dongsuns, it gets a bit tiring after a while, and someone’s heart can only go through so much before it starts to get sore.
“Aw, that’s so cute,” Yoseob grins, one day when he and Doojoon are the only ones left after soccer practice. Jaebum made them run extra laps at the end for being late, and it’s also their turn to clean up the equipment.
“Shut up,” Doojoon snorts and picks up another plastic dodging obstacle from the field.
“You’ve only had one girlfriend-that’s so cute,” Yoseob continues to tease mercilessly and carries off another cone off the field. Doojoon shoves him to the side and snatches the next cone that Yoseob was about to get.
Doojoon gathers a few more white plastic obstacles into his arms. “How many have you had then, Seonsangnim?” he retorts sarcastically.
“I have boyfriends, not girlfriends,” Yoseob points out.
“Well, how many?”
Yoseob stops mid-step, and Doojoon stops too to turn around and look at him. Yoseob tries to run through the names in his mind as fast as he can, and comes up with a number that sounds about right-give or take a few. “I think seventeen,” Yoseob says. “But I don’t remember.”
Doojoon stares.
And stares.
And stares.
And then snorts.
“Right,” Doojoon says, “of course you did.”
Yoseob laughs and bumps his shoulder against the older boy’s. “You think I’m lying? Aren’t I adorable enough to have seventeen boyfriends?”
“You’re not adorable,” Doojoon says, dumping another armful of white obstacles onto the side of the field and then jogging back to gather more. “You’re evil and terrible-haven’t we already gone over this?”
Yoseob pretends to think, one finger pressed to his lips. “Nope,” he says after a moment and ducks quickly when Doojoon makes to lunge at him again. He laughs. “Now we have though.”
Doojoon rolls his eyes and grins. He reaches out and hits Yoseob lightly in the stomach with the back of his hand. “Go on and shower,” he says, gesturing towards the locker rooms. “I’ll finish up.”
Yoseob blinks.
At least half of the field is still covered in cones and white obstacles and they haven’t even started on cleaning the dirt that’s gathered on the edges of the goals-it’s darkening and if Yoseob stops now, Doojoon’s going to be here well into the night. “You’re never going to finish alone,” Yoseob says, somewhat confused. “And we have tons of Bio homework, so I can’t just leave-“
“Yoseob-ah,” Doojoon says, still grinning, teasingly, utterly relaxed, “it’s fine. ‘Sides, it always takes you longer to do Bio anyway. Be thankful I’m letting you get a head start against my genius.”
Yoseob smiles over his confusion and clasps hands with Doojoon briskly. “Thanks, hyung,” he says because his mind is a little in too much chaos to think of something witty to say back.
His mind is in a little bit of a whirlwind right now, as he jogs to the locker rooms, because while those seventeen Dongsuns never failed to buy Yoseob whatever he wanted, to tell Yoseob continuously about his perfection, there wasn’t one Dongsun amongst those seventeen that offered to stay up until late hours covering for Yoseob and not expect anything in return.
It’s just a little boggling is all.