Chapter Text
Jeno is walking with Mark in the desolate school hallways after basketball practice when he hears it.
The most beautiful voice he’s ever heard.
The melody sweeps over him like a wave and he stops in his tracks, frozen in awe. Mark stops three steps later, looking back questioningly.
Jeno feels his eyebrows draw together as he frowns, focusing on the sound.
Mark walks back slowly. “What is it?”
Jeno turns to look at the door to the school’s theatre. He just points. He doesn’t want to speak to disturb the already faint song coming through the door.
“They have choir in there right now. Donghyuck’s there,” Mark informs him.
Jeno gestures at Mark to be quiet. He steps toward the door, almost pressing his ear against it.
He only has a few seconds of bliss as the song finishes soon after, the voice fading away and being replaced by a round of applause.
Jeno actually pouts. Longing surges through him and he almost barges into the room to find out whose voice that was but Mark yanks him away by his collar quickly.
“Dude, what’s wrong with you?” Mark frowns at his awestruck friend.
“Didn’t you hear that?” Jeno blurts.
“Yeah, someone was singing,” Mark deadpans. “That’s what they do in choir on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. You know this.”
He does. He’s best friends with Mark who’s best friends with—now dating—Donghyuck. That makes him best friends with Donghyuck by association. So he knows that Tuesday and Thursday were the two days of the week that Mark didn’t get to walk Donghyuck home because the younger has choir which finishes an hour and a half after school (and Mark whines a lot when he’s lonely). This school year, though, Mark had signed up for basketball along with Jeno and basketball practice happens to be at the same time as choir. Mark pretends his decision wasn’t influenced by the opportunity to walk home with Donghyuck every day. Jeno knows better.
So yes, Jeno is aware that there’s choir on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons but that isn’t the point.
He says as much. “The point is that there’s got to be someone new in choir because I’ve never heard that voice before at any shitty school function where the choir performs. I would’ve noticed.”
“Excuse you, anything that Donghyuck performs in is automatically not shitty,” Mark objects.
Jeno rolls his eyes. “Right, yeah, sorry, Lover Boy.”
Mark scoffs. “Do you really think you should be calling me ‘Lover Boy’ right now? You’re literally crushing on a voice.”
“I am not. Didn’t you notice Donghyuck because his voice is, and I quote, ‘so unique and glorious that I want to give him an award while crying my eyes out’.”
Mark’s cheeks turn red but he glares at Jeno. “I told you never to mention that. It was a soft moment, okay? And I didn’t fall in love with Donghyuck because of his voice, that just added to it. I only heard him sing after we met.”
“Yeah right, you were so whipped for him that day I thought you were gonna propose.”
Mark gets even redder. “Can we n – “
The door suddenly opens, making Jeno jump and push Mark to the side. About twenty teenagers pour out of the room, chatting amongst themselves. Jeno scans all of their faces as they rush by but he only thinks he sees three or four new kids. Jeno knows he’s a bit oblivious on a regular day, so he doesn’t trust his judgement on who’s new and who isn’t.
Mark calls for Donghyuck as he passes by, not noticing the two boys pressed behind the door. Donghyuck’s newly dyed auburn hair flicks to the side as he looks back at the origin of his boyfriend’s voice. Eyebrows jumping up, he halts and turns to them with a smile.
“Hey,” he greets as Mark and Jeno unfreeze and walk towards him.
Jeno grunts in response but Mark, love-struck as he is, smiles giddily and intertwines their fingers.
Jeno would usually pretend to gag at this point, but his mind is preoccupied. As they leave the school together, he asks, “Hey, Donghyuck, do you remember who was the person singing, like, right before you guys finished?”
Donghyuck squints into the sun. “Uh...Renjun?”
“Renjun?” Jeno echoes. Pretty name.
“Yeah, I think so,” Donghyuck says. “He’s new, he transferred this year. Said he’s from China but his Korean is pretty good. All the new members sang one of their favourite songs today as part of their introduction.”
Jeno mentally saves all of this information. He’s fascinated by the idea of this transfer student already. Now he just needs to find out who, exactly, he is and inconspicuously get closer to him. Naturally, Mark blows it for him.
“When we were passing by the room, Jeno literally fell in love with this guy’s voice. He stopped and put his ear to the door and everything. He was shook.”
Jeno punches his best friend in the arm. “Mark Lee, you do not want to play dirty,” he growls.
Donghyuck laughs. “Aw, that’s cute!”
“No, it isn’t!” Jeno exclaims. Jeno prefers to be seen as cool and revokes any association with the adjective ‘cute’.
“Yeah, it is,” Donghyuck insists. “Do you want me to introduce him to you? I’ll be your wingman.”
Jeno scrunches his nose in disgust at the idea of Donghyuck being his wing man but then he remembers that he needs a way to get close to Renjun.
“Okay, but do not call yourself my wing man.”
Donghyuck smirks.