buy me your love (no returns)

chapter 35 ☆

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"yo, my winkie!" jihoon resisted the urge to cry as he turned around to the source of the cursed call.

"you're the biggest pain in my neck park woojin." wrapping his arm around his best friend, woojin led jihoon out of their shared lecture hall and outside. the other students bustled by at a fast pace but woojin made sure to tread lightly. truth be told, everyone had been treading lightly around jihoon recently.

it'd been 2 weeks.

he hadn't spoken to or even seen jinyoung in 2 weeks. that was 14 days. 336 hours...

ok, maybe he'd been overthinking.

it wasn't as if he had the opportunity to talk to jinyoung anyway. true to their words, seonho and guanlin had gotten the younger boy to block him and stop seeing him. he hadn't set foot in the store since (according to jiwoo and sunwoo, anyway) and hadn't tried to reach out to him at all. in tow, jihoon had stopped walking back through the park after college and/or his job, not wanting to run the risk of running into jinyoung and telling him everything.

it was tragic, yes, but jihoon liked to think everything was ok. he was still the same old park jihoon, just this time without the presence of bae jinyoung in his life. he had no justification to feel bad about not having the happy-go-lucky boy in his life when he was the one who cut him out in the first place.

"... you ok?" woojin asked, voice cautious.

"of course i am!" jihoon laughed, "why wouldn't i be?"

chancing a glance at woojin, he immediately regretted it as said boy shot him a look full of concern and knowing worry. he knew well why he'd be worried (especially with how well woojin knew him) but he didn't dare say any more on the topic.

"..." the snaggletoothed boy tried to find the words to say, "wanna go and eat? the others are waiting for us." his attempts at diverting the subject didn't go unnoticed by jihoon, although he didn't comment on it.

"sure, why not."

as they finally met up with the others, jihoon watched as their gazes softened around him. changbin stopped his conversation mid-sentence with mark to ask him how he was (he was almost 100% certain it was about his crush too), whilst everyone else's attention landed on him.

"how are you today, jihoon?" changbin asked.

"i'm fine...?" well, in the words of kim seokjin, things couldn't get more uncomfortable than this, "just a little tired, i suppose."

sending him a sympathetic smile, mark said, "that's good, that you're feeling fine." an awkward thank you later and the others lapsed back into their usual conversations. changbin had switched topic (from that felix kid, he was certain) to start an argument over some game though jihoon wasn't listening too well.

"-i'm sure ji agrees with me!" woojin suddenly shouted, grinning expectantly at his best friend.

"...huh?" you know that feel when you get called on by the teacher because you've obviously not been listening? the really uncomfortable and guilty feeling you get afterwards: jihoon was feeling that x10.

"fortnite is a better game than PUBG." woojin repeated himself.

"oh...yeah, it is." truth be told, jihoon couldn't remember the last time he'd played any game; he could never be bothered, even if he had spare time.

"see, what did i say?"

"that's bullshit and you know it!" chan shouted back, immediately being backed up by hyeop. it was then the argument became more heated (it was still banter though, of course) and woojin looked just about ready to throw his overly expensive textbook at chan's head. this usually happened within their friendship group and it was funny to watch.

at least, it was meant to be.

for some reason, jihoon was finding it hard to find any laughter in the situation. as much as he wanted to laugh, all of him just screamed to get away and bury his thoughts in something else.

"as much as i hate to weigh in here, i have to," he heard mark state, articulated as ever, "minecraft alone triumphs both games, change my mind." as the group erupted into laughter and more arguing, jihoon found himself just sitting in silence and watching on. once upon a time, he would've been joining in with them. unfortunately, nothing seemed to interest said boy anymore.

something had changed inside of him.

if only he knew what.

☆

ok, maybe that was a lie. jihoon knew perfectly well what had changed, even though he refused to admit it out loud.

whenever he worked shifts, new people would come in and buy whatever they could; he was made to scan a lot of weird shit that reminded him of jinyoung. his mind would always drift to the thought of "this looks like something jinyoung would like."

in fact, everything he did came back to bae jinyoung.

walks through the park made him think of the younger boy always meeting him at their place, watching the people go by and laughing at their day. certain songs reminded him of jinyoung (especially untitled by simple plan, for some godforsaken reason) which instantly landed themselves in the "to be skipped" pile. lying in bed draped in wads of blankets were reminiscent of jinyoung's hug warmth. hell, jihoon couldn't even watch catchphrase without thinking of the younger boy (sorry, stephen mulhern.)

forgetting someone who meant a lot to you was a hard thing to do, especially when you had fallen head over heels for said person. of course, jihoon didn't expect himself to heal overnight and move on.

still, his heart wasn't exactly trying to move on.

a part of him yearned to find the boy loved and tell him exactly how he felt, despite all the consequences that would follow. maybe then it wouldn't make him wonder constantly about how things would've panned out if he'd taken the risk and talked to jinyoung...

things like that were stupid now, he thought to himself. jihoon just had to accept that he was in too deep at this point and actually attempt to stop his feelings, regardless of how difficult it was.