lovesick idiots, anonymous // jujae

letter 66

the morning of the trip went exactly as hyunjae had expected it to. juyeon had turned up at his door so that they could walk together, the younger was later than he should've been but still early enough for breakfast.

as they ate, hyunjae's mom desperately searched around the house for a bag strong enough to maintain the weight of the 4 bottles of sparkling water juyeon had brought with him. the older thought that he should've known better than to doubt the fact that juyeon would actually bring it along after finding out that it would help the trees grow taller.

thankfully, the walk to school from hyunjae's house only took them a few minutes even as juyeon struggled under the weight of his suitcase and the duffel bag full of sparkling water. the older spent most of the time laughing at his best friend as he whined about how he'd made a mistake and he should've just bought the water while he was there.

when they finally arrived, they were greeted by an excited looking changmin stood next to a comparatively tired looking chanhee. the dancer was rambling at a million miles an hour about how he and chanhee had been there early enough to reserve the best patch of land to plant their trees on. chanhee didn't seem too excited over this, however, as he rolled his eyes albeit fondly at changmin's words.

"should we go and reserve our place?" juyeon asked hyunjae after a minute when they finally finished talking to the other two boys. hyunjae just nodded in response and they made their way to the coach door where their teachers were standing with copious clipboards and folders.

"hi mrs kim," hyunjae greeted kindly as the school's deputy head teacher turned to face him with a smile.

"hello, are you here to reserve your spot?" she asked before flicking through some pages when juyeon answered her question with a nod.

when they were handed the sheet, both boys instantly understood what changmin had meant when he said that he and chanhee had reserved the best spot. their names had been proudly written upon the sheet right next to the refreshments station. unsurprisingly, sunwoo, haknyeon and their third wheel eric were stationed in the spot next to them and second closest to the refreshments while every other spot that was even within 400 metres of the station was taken up.

juyeon sighed deeply upon seeing this, "we're gonna die of thirst," he complained causing hyunjae to snort.

"don't you have 8 litres of sparkling water in that bag?" the older questioned in response.

"you think i'm gonna drink that? that's pure electricity in a bottle," juyeon pouted causing his best friend to snort once more.

"i'll tell you what, put us in the closest one that's left and if we need refreshments i'll walk and get them," the older offered and juyeon instantly seemed happy with that idea before writing their names down for a spot that was just under 500 metres away.

once they finished up, the two boys loaded their bags on to the coach and juyeon bid a sad 'see you later' to his sparkling water before they headed on to the coach. they took their seats towards the back with sunwoo and haknyeon sat to their left and eric spread across two seats in front of them.

unusually, as soon as they set off, rather than joining in the group game of i spy that eric had begun even before the coach had even moved, juyeon pulled out his phone and put his earphones in. hyunjae chose not to question it at first, instead simply assuming that juyeon was tired from his early practice the previous day yet after they had been on the move for an hour and a half and juyeon still hadn't looked away from the window, the older boy began to suspect that there was something wrong.

hyunjae nudged juyeon lightly first but the younger didn't respond much, only moving his arm to the side slightly so that hyunjae now had sole use of the arm rest between them. when juyeon still didn't turn around, hyunjae tapped him on the shoulder which finally seemed to get his attention.