royalmilktae (ao3)
The four times Jeon Jeongguk ordered coffee and the one time Kim Taehyung did but not really
or the one where Jeon Jeongguk is a spoiled rich kid who finally met his match in the name of Kim Taehyung.
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ONE
"Caramel macchiato, venti, skim, extra shot, extra-hot, extra-whip, sugar-free." Jeon Jeongguk didn't look up from his phone as he rattled off his order. He'd been texting his father all morning, furious that the college wouldn't change his room when his next-door neighbor kept playing the same song on repeat. I'm sure he's selling drugs, he typed in. They can't want a drug dealer in the dorm. Can't you mention that?
Only drugs could explain liking Nickelback that much.
"Name for the cup?"
"Huh?" Jeongguk looked up at that and the barista frowned back at him. He had the cup in his hand and the worst hairstyle Jeongguk had ever seen. Who even wears mullets as hairstyles nowadays? he thought.
"Name for the cup," the barista said again with strained patience.
"Don't you know who I am?" Jeongguk asked, momentarily stupefied. He was in here at least three times a week. Usually, the staff called him by name and asked how he was. This barista, however, just tipped his head forward and twisted his mouth into what was probably supposed to be a customer service smile. It wasn't.
"I'm afraid not." The barista replied.
"Jeon Jeongguk."
The barista scrawled something nearly illegible on the cup and Jeongguk went back to texting his father. I shouldn't have to live next to drug dealers, he typed, hitting the letters with extra force as though that could convey how very, very upset he was by all of this. I can't study.
Then I suggest you find another place to do your work, the phone replied. Jeongguk resisted the urge to throw the thing against the wall. What was the point of having a school board for a father if he wouldn't fix things?
When he picked up is drink, mullet-haired barista had spelled his name wrong.
JUNCOCK, it said.
Great. Just fucking great.
TWO
"Iced half-calf ristretto, venti, 4-pump, cinnamon, dolce soy skinny latte." Jeongguk pulled out his book out of his bag and tried to find where he'd stopped reading as he waited for bad-hair coffee boy to run his card. He didn't know what possessed him to sign up for a class about critical theory and romance novels, but he'd been regretting it since he'd seen the syllabus. What sort of insane professor expected people to read two books a week? And he had to do it. If his grades fall, he'd hear about it all summer long. You have an obligation to your family, his mother would say. If you are screwing around in college, it makes me look bad, his father would say.
Had either of them ever had to read Pride and Prejudice and Mansfield Park in the same week? He didn't think so.
"Name for the cup?"
Seriously?
"Jeongguk," he said. "J-E-O-N-G-G-U-K. I was here yesterday."
The barista shrugged. "All you trust-fund boys look the same to me."
"You wrote my name on the cup." Jeongguk said, ignoring that the barista spelt it wrong. "Did you forget already?"
The barista put his hand over his name tag and smiled at him. The expression made him clever and a little bit mean. It made him look more attractive and that was wrong. "What's my name?" the barista asked.