On The Line | Chensung

A Comforting Cold

Jisung scratched his head, sighing to himself as he stared at his blank page, trying to form words amongst his clouded brain. It was hard to work knowing that the main person who could tolerate his existence didn't even want to see him. He pouted, resting his head in hand as the teacher made his rounds.

Chaeryeong tapped his shoulder, the young boy slowly turning his head up with sad dead eyes in acknowledgement, "what happened, dude?"
He waved her off as he mumbled that it was nothing. It really should be nothing, but he hated being ignored. He brought his knees up on the chair, curling into a little ball of sadness as he typed random letters on his laptop, trying to make it seem like he was being productive. Chaeryeong frowned at her friend, calling the teacher over to try and let him check up on him, the sound fading into the static of Jisung's gloomy brain.

Mr Seo approached the table, crouching down and ruffling the kid's hair. "What's wrong, Jisung?"
Jisung took a deep slow sigh, shaking his head, "nothing's wrong, sir."
"Jisungie," Johnny asked quietly, "please tell hyung what's wrong."
The young boy frowned deeply, turning to look at the teacher, his lip slightly quivering, "Jeno hyung's not talking to me."
Johnny furrowed his brows, "why? That's not like him."
"I know, but he thinks I did something wrong," he spoke quietly in response, letting his head fall to the table. Seems this was upsetting him more than he thought. Jaemin probably just had that happy-go-lucky aura that made everyone happy, that's why he didn't feel it earlier. But now he was feeling it, the dramatic abandonment he had been the victim of.
"He won't listen either?" Johnny tilted his head, trying to read the boy's face. Jisung simply nodded against the wood of the desk. The teacher frowned to himself as he thought, "you want me to talk to Taeyong or something about it?" Jisung shook his head at the mention of Jeno's older brother, covering his head with his arms.

Johnny sighed, "I can't just let you sit here and not do work, Jisungie, you know that." Jisung nodded, Johnny sighing in sympathy as the boy's brain shut out every other noise. He couldn't blame him either, Jeno had been with him since they were tiny, glued to the hip. Jeno was Jisung's protective older brother who adored him to bits, being with him through thick and thin. It was only right he would react this way when he was casted to the side.

As Jisung silently sobbed dry tears in his seat, the rest of the class buzzed around his seat, everyone running around for supplies, students muttering and yelling suggestions at their partners all eagerly typing their essays. A bunch of white noise, mutedly whirring around the slumped boy. Chaeryeong couldn't sit there either, being pulled by her group so they could finally solidify part of their strange project, leaving Jisung a dejected pile of clothes by himself.

A jolt caused him to look up slowly, only to see Chenle had moved Chaeryeong's desk next to his and was sitting in her place. He blinked at him with droopy eyes, Chenle staring back at him through his glasses. He sighed, resting his head back down as he looked off to the side, past Chenle's body. "You know, Renjun hyung doesn't wear glasses."
"Renjun's not cool like me," Chenle spoke in a flat tone, smiling slightly at him. It wasn't sinister or something that suggested he had a bad intent, and in any other situation Jisung would be over the moon. Yet, he couldn't even bring himself to smile back. It still felt as if he were hit by a car.

Chenle sighed, Jisung seeing him furrow his eyebrows at him in his peripheral vision. He carefully took his glasses off, setting them down on the table and looking back at him, startling Jisung as he was greeted with warm dark eyes staring back at him in concern. The elder boy cautiously reached up, placing his hand on Jisung's head, the shock of the contact causing Jisung to jerk up in fear. Chenle quickly picked his hand back up, weary of his movements. As the younger boy blinked back at him with an unreadable expression, Chenle slowly put his hand back on his head, rubbing it slightly to comfort him.

Jisung stared at him, not knowing what to feel as Chenle looked back at him in concern. First time seeing a kind emotion in the boy's eyes and it was both comforting and unsettling. He knew that he had no other intent and that he was probably just confused as to why he wasn't pestering him with a ton of random mindless questions. It was out of character for him. Just like it was out of character for Jeno to leave him.

Jisung sank back down, letting Chenle rub his head, simply giving into the cold comfort that he provided. He was always too warm anyway.
"What happened?" Chenle asked, Jisung noticing the effort he was putting to make his voice sound more sincere. The younger boy smiled softly to himself, grateful for the gesture.
"Jeno found out Renjun's a glorified bat," Jisung spoke with a dead voice, sounding more like Chenle than Chenle was.
Chenle nodded, muttering an "oh" as he ran his fingers through Jisung's hair, "I'm sorry."
"It's not your fault," Jisung sighed, shutting his eyes and letting the darkness consume him like he had been wishing for.
"He'll come around," Chenle tried to reason, "maybe you need to just talk to him."
Jisung nodded, unconsciously nuzzling into Chenle's hand. Luckily for him, the elder boy didn't move away, so he guessed it was okay. "Wanna come with me, Renjun hyung and Jaemin hyung to try and talk to him. Cause I miss him."
Chenle chuckled lightly, "sure." He continued to simply gaze at Jisung's soft sad form as he ran his hand through his hair. Jisung opened one of his eyes a bit, met with Chenle smiling fondly as he took care of him, the young boy flushing slightly under his gaze. At least he had a Chenle.

"Wait what do you mean Jaemin," Chenle's tone dropped back to neutrality as he asked.
Jisung grunted as he sat up, the bell sounding through the school, "oh he knows, turns out mans has known multiple folklore creatures in his time." he said as picked up his books.
Chenle stood up, pulling the table back to its original position as he swung his black book bag over his head. He slid his glasses back on as he looked up to Jisung, "he's a weird one."
"Yeah no shit," Jisung scoffed, pushing his chair in with his hip. He looked Chenle up and down, "you can relate of course."
Chenle sighed, shaking his head. And for the first time, he smiled at him after his clear disappointment.