Between Truths ║Dahkook║K.DH J.JK

dinner and promises

CHAPTER XVI

'DINNER?'

He was being pitiful. Had accepted Yein's invitation expecting it to be just the two of them. Instead, he had walked in to this—boys in a row, and girls opposite. The last to arrive, he had been the one to complete the pair of five. 

A group dating.

He swore he would never find himself here; would never let himself be a face compared against many, or for his worth to be weighed so precisely. He did not make a fool of himself.

'Except he was already hers.'

Yein knew it too. She must also know he hated this, but she put him here still, wielding him as she pleased. She was being foul, but she was never this pernicious.

He angled his head to watch her from his end of the table. She was chattering animatedly, comfortable in the midst her own familiar crowd.

He had wanted to leave since her lukewarm greeting, but he kept to his seat. His promise made it impossible to walk away; cursed decency bid him to stay and tide this over with the girl Yein had paired him with. 'Soojin,' she said her name was. She knew Yein from sharing her classes. 'Not even her close friend? Was that how passable he was?'

He frowned.

Pulling up a number, he texted. 'Call me?'

He straightened on his chair after he sent it. Not to Yein. She was his least favourite person presently.

               'She'd call.' He lit the screen.

              'No, she wouldn't.' He turned it dark.

             'Wouldn't she?' His finger lingered on the power button.

He could not be sure of what Dahyun would do. Exactly because he was not looking for certainty, he finds for her. She was a dice he threw. Because Jungkook wanted his odds. Wanted to float on vague waters between walking away and staying. Between acting on his emotions despite his promise to Yein, and keeping things as they always had been. Because he was not ready to decide on something as tremendous as burning bridges or swallowing fire.

So he waited, a game he was no stranger to, stealing glances at the phone in his lap. It never got easier, and Dahyun did not call. Until hours bled away with his guardedness, and he stopped waiting altogether. He caved and drank and ate and laughed. When acquiescence with the situation wrapped his heart, his phone hummed with an incoming call.

He picked up despite himself.

"It's Dahyun."

"I know."

"I'm here, now."

"And I'm already dead," Fury surged, burning the cloak of helplessness he felt earlier. But he was courting favours from someone who owed him nothing—not courtesy or kindness. They both knew he was overstepping a line. She did not draw them—he had.

"You're angry. And it's not at me." 

"You were late."

"And you didn't save my number. You might still yet to do it."

"That's not true." But it was true. He knew that of course. He pulled back nonetheless to prove himself mistaken; to see her name on his screen. It did not matter. His honesty or him not saving her number. She did not expect them. That did not matter either because there was no way he would not know those numbers when they already weaved a lasting pattern in his head, impossible to forget.