Rumor Has It

The thing about Jeon Jungkook was that you didn't even need to be plugged into the campus rumor mill to know all about him. And Namsun wasn't plugged in. Not at all. Even still, she knew all about his reputation as an infamous heartthrob and cocky asshole. Things tended to circulate around the quad about his overly confident demeanor, his various risqué sexual escapades, and his entitled attitude.
All these things combined were more than enough to cinch Namsun's dislike of the guy, but the absolute worst thing was how everyone fawned over him. It was as if no one could resist Jungkook's charms and they caved to every one of his whims and demands, babying him and making excuses for him.
Which was why the second she walked into her film adaptation class on the first day of the new semester and saw him sitting in one of the chairs at the back of the room, Namsun stayed as far away from him as possible. She took a spot at the opposite end of the room, way in the front row, just to hammer home the point that she was nothing like him and wanted nothing to do with him at all.
Her professor, however, did not seem to get the message. The moment he had announced doing a group project in pairs, Namsun's stomach had sunk. She hated group work, but there was just this nagging, tickling inkling she couldn't shake. When her professor called her name out there seemed to be a long, thick pause before he announced her partner as...
"Jeon Jungkook."
Namsun shut her eyes and sighed heavily, dread filling her. She didn't want to work with anyone, let alone Mr. Baseball Star, His Royal Frat Douche, Lord Dickwad Jeon Jungkook.
Professor Kwon drolled on, but it was lost on her. Her whole day had been ruined with the announcement and now she was in a viciously shitty mood. Namsun realized all the pairings had been made already and the work assigned when people began shifting out of their seats to sit beside their assigned partners. She refused to get up, refused to even look around to find Jungkook - though she knew he always sat in the same desk, second from the back against the far wall. He came to her (good, make him work for something at the very least) and the chair scraped as he took a seat in the desk next to hers. Namsun pretended she didn't even notice, as if the boy next to her didn't exist at all, as she scribbled nonsense into her notebook as if it was the most important thing in the universe.
Jungkook fidgeted beside her and chewed his cheek, tapping his pen against the desktop with quick fingers. After a long minute, he broke the silence.
"So, what adaptation do you wanna do?"
"Look," Namsun finally snapped curtly, turning to aim an unflinching stare at him. She wanted to make it very clear from the beginning that she did not want to fuck with him, not even for a moment. "You don't have to worry about the project. I can take care of it and I'll just send it to you when I'm finished so you can review it and be ready to present."
Jungkook's brow twitched, furrowing for a moment over his manipulative deer-in-the-headlights gaze. "That's not fair."
"It's fine, I don't mind."
"We're supposed to work on it together. It's my grade, too."
Namsun rolled her eyes. Fuck, shouldn't he just be grateful he had a partner who was willing to hard carry him to an A? She sighed again and set her chin in her hand.
"Fine," she relented, annoyed. "What adaptation?"
The pen tapping began again and she narrowed her gaze at his fingers. Jungkook bit his lip as he shrugged.
"I mean, it'd be fun to do a more recent adaptation. Like it would be awesome to do something like Lord of the Rings, but-"
"Lord of the Rings is massive and the movies are all super long and we'd be complicating ourselves without reason. No way."
"I know," he said, holding up a hand in apparent surrender. "I was about to say that it's too long, but something fun like that would be more interesting to do."
Namsun consented with a grunt in the back of her throat and turned her attention back down to her notebook where she resumed doodling meaningless spirals disdainfully.
"So what were you thinking?" she asked, not looking up.
She saw him shrug from the corner of her eye. "I mean we have to do three of these right? Maybe a trilogy isn't a bad idea. If you wanted to do something newer and more pop culture we could do something like The Hunger Games. Or maybe you'd rather just do some classics? To Kill A Mockingbird or Psycho?"
Namsun flicked a glance back up at him and studied him a moment, honestly caught off guard by his suggestions. She sucked her cheek for a second before responding.
"The Hunger Games isn't a bad idea. Especially since they changed directors after the first one and the tone sort of changed in the movies. It might be interesting to break that down in comparison to the tone the books have."
Jungkook gave a satisfied smile. "Okay, awesome. So let's do that."
His sudden enthusiasm reminded Namsun that she didn't want him getting too comfortable and she locked her expression down again. "Yeah, well, the first report is due in three weeks, so I guess we can send each other our notes-"
"Shouldn't we at least watch the movies together? I mean, that makes more sense to me," he cut in, chewing his lip again. "That way we can discuss it right after and it's all fresh."
He had a point, but Namsun hated that almost as much as she disliked the thought of having to watch the films with him. She told herself to suck it up and took in a deep breath.
"Fine, so I guess we can finish the book in two weeks and meet two Tuesdays from now to watch the first movie."
"I, um, I actually have practice until late Tuesdays," Jungkook interjected. He gave a sheepish smile. "Sorry."
Yeah, yeah, sure. He was sorry. Right. She barely controlled another eye roll and nodded.
"Fine, Wednesday then?"
He nodded eagerly. "Yeah, Wednesday is good."
Namsun stood brusquely, chair scraping against the floor with the action, and grabbed her things quickly. "Good. Make sure to finish reading by then."
She was out the door before Jungkook could do any more than open his mouth to reply.