Meant To Be » 𝐉𝐀𝐊𝐄

» XXIV «

They finally pulled away from each other and started laughing at one another. Jake grinned widely as he wiped away his tears, keeping his eyes on Youngjae.

“It's good to see you again, Jake,” a guy walked to him and greeted him.

“Same goes to you, Youngbin,” Jake replied and I immediately widened my eyes.

Heeseung nudged at my shoulder, “I forgot to mention that Youngbin's death was also planned.”

I turned to him in surprise, “How so?”

He shrugged, “Ask him yourself.”

“Who is it that you have brought along, Jake?” A woman who resembles the features of Heeseung spoke up while eyeing me.

“Oh, yes,” Jake stood close to me and swung his arm around my shoulders, introducing me proudly, “Everyone, meet my one in a billion, Emma Jones. She's also from Australia, and quite tall as well.”

They all exclaimed as they nodded their heads, “No wonder, she's towering over almost all of us.” Heeseung smugly stood tall beside me, making me sneer at him a bit.

Youngbin poked Youngjae's shoulder continuously, “You should ask her for some growing tips,” he teased.

Youngjae slapped the latter's hand away, “160cm isn't bad.”

“Correction, it's 159cm,” Heeseung butted in, making his partner roll her eyes.

I chuckled nervously, “It's nice to meet you all.”

“We've been looking forward to meet you in person. Heeseung happened to talk about you a lot ever since he encountered you,” Youngbin smiled.

“Is that so? That's surprising,” I uttered with a timid smile.

“She was wondering how you ended up here,” Heeseung spoke up.

Youngbin laughed, “Really? So, I believe you also know me?”

I merely nodded and he mirrored my actions, “Well, the night my mother and I verbally fought, she kind of mentioned about the deal regarding you know who. Then she told me everything about it and I begged her to take me there. She said that I couldn't just go missing just after they were announced dead because it would be suspicious. So, we came up with a solution and faked my death so that people could assume whatever they want.”

“Oh, so, are you...” I trailed off and he nodded with a grin, “I have no choice but to stay here for the rest of my life because I'm known as deceased out there, so, turning into one of them was the only option if I didn't want to end up as their meal.”

“But isn't that a lot riskier for you? I mean, I heard it earlier from Heeseung about how complicated your blood intakes are.”

“It is, but I recently found a special someone in here too, so I'll be fine,” he grinned.

“Ah, good for you,” I exclaimed while nodding.

Jake smiled as he watched me, “So, then you must know what's waiting for you in the future.”

I turned to him with my face flushed, “What do you mean? We're not—”

“Huh?”

“Nothing,” I pressed my lips together while he stared at me strangely.

Youngjae looked here and there before changing the topic, “Gosh, I was so surprised when I heard Jake was not a human. He hid it so well.”

Sunoo nodded in agreement, “I never saw him acting strange or anything. As for Heeseung, he was so mysterious.”

“For real,” Youngjae snickered, “I don't understand.”

Heeseung pursed his lips, “Jake's obviously used to living around normal people so he'll know better than I do.”

“You've mentioned before that you had times when you lost control over yourself and your mother was the only person to calm you down. Nothing similar happened to Jake,” Youngjae stated.

“I'm pretty sure Jake would've experienced that too. It's like hitting puberty, I'm a year older so he'll go through the same thing a little later. Did you, Jake?”

Jake merely hummed while nodding, “It started this year for me. I consider myself quite lucky.”

“You should, being like that is like your body's telling you that you're one step closer to dying,” Heeseung's mother spoke, “I'm unlucky to have lost my husband early so I'm just waiting for death to pick me up.”

“Can't you use another person's blood?” I involuntarily asked.

“It's actually forbidden for us to do that. But humans are an exception, but again, we don't want to cause trouble unlike those beasts out there,” she answered.

“Oh, by the way, Jake mentioned that there are different types of bites. I just want to make sure if that's true.”

“It is. There's one for just one's own pleasure which can and cannot turn the bitten victim and can leave a mark. Another one is commonly known as a love bite, pleasure for both, cannot turn the victim and no marks,” Heeseung answered fluently.

After hours of asking and clearing my doubts, I was finally out of questions and it felt like I had known everything related to their kind. They expressed the soulmates part a lot but it was hard for me to take it seriously because I was not a believer.

Jake escorted me into his place as soon as we left Heeseung's because I didn't feel like going back to my room just yet, and I knew he had something he wanted to talk about.

“Is there something wrong, Emma?” He suddenly asked.

“No, why?”

“Nothing, it's just that your reaction back there got me curious. Don't you think I'm the one for you?”

“You never know, Jake. I don't believe in soulmates and anything else related to it. So there's a high possibility that we're not going to end up together.”

“Just because you don't believe it doesn't mean it's not true.”

“And just because you believe it doesn't mean that it's true. Who knows? You might suddenly end up with Youngjae again now that you've reunited with her.”

“Why would I when I have you?”

“Because things such as soulmates don't exist? Plus I saw how you two looked at each other. I could just know it from the way she talks to you too, with her calling you with that name, "Jaeyun".”

“That's how she normally calls me. Please, you don't think this is not it just because of the way we looked at each other? She's my best friend and I haven't seen her for months. Why are you jealous about this?”

“Bold of you to assume I'm jealous. I just want the best for you and I think you should get back with Youngjae.”

“She's already happy being with Heeseung. Emma, I don't understand, you're not making any sense right now.”

“Well, so are you. You don't even know that I'm the one for you.”

“I know and I am a hundred percent sure.”

“How so? You've never felt it when I bled.”

“That's because I just bit you today.”

“So you don't know.”

“I know— this is useless.”

“Should I make myself bleed so that we can come to a conclusion?”

“No, Emma. We don't need—” He abruptly stopped me from searching for an object I could use, firmly holding onto my waist.

“Let me go. We want proof, so let's make this quick and give ourselves one.”

“Emma, please.”

“Let go of me—” The front door suddenly opened and we both turned her heads in unison to see who it was.

“Well well well, look who's here.”

© 2023 -JAKISM