pretty pretense (chaennie)

VII.

...

Jennie could only guess but with the way Chaeyoung is holding her hand right now feels like she finally agreed to the plan. The senior never spoke a word after their heated confrontation inside the car.

Now they're facing the reality of their relationship as they walk pass through hallways of scandalous whispers. Both were hand in hand while making sure that what they had was believable. An exchange of brief glances, tedious smirks, and intertwining fingers was all the target audience needed to believe such rumor.

Yet unbeknownst to everyone, the sophomore has never been more agitated. She felt like her cold feet was already freezing the floor, however, her hands which were entangled with the senior's own was oddly warm. Like an almost melting feeling. She doesn't know if it was just the senior's weird body heat or it was her own reaction from the close contact.

"Hey." Chaeyoung's voice made Jennie snap out from her lingering thoughts, but the warmth of the senior's voice remained, which gave a pinch of relief. She even felt Chaeng gripping her tighter by the minute. "Krystal's asking you a question." The senior added.

Krystal who was obviously reluctant and avoiding Chaeyoung's eyes persisted, "You know I don't want any bad blood with anyone here so I hope we're through with the drama."

Jennie couldn't care less about the loquacious senior because she just dug the hole deeper anyway. "I hope you'll stop accusing every girl that they're dating your boyfriend." She felt she needed to address that somehow.

"Excuse me. It's future fiance! And whatever, I don't want to recall anything now. Just take this!" Krystal suddenly pulls out a small boxed gift and hands it out to Jennie. The sophomore blinked once and was in shock. "It's my congratulatory gift."

Jennie quickly opens the small box and found diamond earrings. "Wait. But for what?" Now she's perplexed.

The latter crumpled her face. "어머! Well what else do you think?! It's for your new rank! You are in second place now."

The clueless couple looked at each other, both surprised. They quickly rushed to the end of the hallway, revealing the big LED dashboard before them. Their names were stacked on each other shining with high percentages. Chaeyoung's statistics were all on 95 percent while Jennie were on the high 80s.

"Hm. Well you look at that." The senior smirks, Jennie raises her head to look at her. "You got them to like you so easily."

"Isn't that a good thing?" The brunette questions. Jennie can't believe her one white lie has resulted into a cathartic pretense that she's going to live on for awhile. The nouveau riche dating the elite princess of Korea. She has never felt so powerful than this.

"We'll find out, sophomore." The senior suddenly grabs her hand and pulls her out of the hallway, "Follow me."

...

"So..." A bewildered Jinyoung stood in front of the couple. "This is really happening, isn't it? The Park Chaeyoung is finally taken. How long has this been going on?"

An awkward stare was shared between Jongin who was sitting at a corner and Jennie who's being timid beside Chaeng. The last thing they wanted was to be in the same room together. But here they are in the business club meeting room with Chaeyoung trying to address their plan.

Jongin rolls his eyes, "You do know that you already lost the auction because of this right? You really fucking wrecked our whole plan, Chaeng. You just lost the Seoul ring over to that cheap Itaewon elite. It's ridiculous!"

Jennie wanted to bat an eye but she knows the jock's temper was too childish. And Chaeyoung wouldn't want that.

The blonde nods in response, "That's right, I lost the auction but that doesn't mean I am going to lose my place as ring leader. I have a plan."