Chapter Text
Tine’s walks throughout the library twice before he finds an empty spot. The library is jampacked since finals are just around the corner for most faculties. He already saw two medical students crying at the entrance over books bigger than his ambitions.
Tine is usually more of a study the night before the exam kind of guy, but his grades in his previous assignments had forced him to reconsider. He had planned to group study with his friends Ohm and Fong, both of whom had prominently ditched him. Assholes. He really needs new friends.
The spot he found is in the perfect place. It's at the end of the library, between shelves, hiding him from the rest of the room. The only problem is the bag placed on the chair and the brooding boy that sits across from it. He looks like he’s had a less than stellar day and just might punch the next person that attempts to talk to him. Tine usually likes to avoid all kinds of unnecessary conversation with intimidating looking people, but doesn’t really have an option here. He steps forward and approaches the boy.
"Is this seat taken?" he points at the bag. The boy barely spares a glance towards Tine and moves his bag.
Tine sits down and makes himself comfortable. He removes his books and places them on the table. He stretches his hands- Okay, let's do this.
The assistant teacher had taken a look at his grades and advised him to make his own notes, rather than just l reading from the text-book, and that is just what he's going to do.... as soon as he finds a pencil.
Which he doesn't have.
He looks up at the sulking boy, who's now glaring at the text-book like it has personally offended him.
"Hey," he waves his hand in front of the guy's face to get his attention. "Can I borrow a pencil?"
The boy seemed startled, almost like he'd forgotten Tine was there. He grabs a pencil from underneath his book and hands it over to Tine.
"Thanks," Tine smiles at him. A pointless effort considering the boy had already gone back to his reading.
Whatever. Tine starts writing his notes, only to make a spelling mistake in the heading itself.
"Hey, can I borrow an eraser?" He asks the boy again.
The boy looks at him now, his frown gets impossibly deeper, "Do I look like a convenience store to you?"
Before Tine can ever form a sentence, he throws an eraser in Tine’s direction, nearly hitting his face. Tine purses his lips, what an asshole.
It takes Tine another 20 minutes to finally get bored of studying. He looks back at the boy and notices that he’s quite attractive. His dark hair matches his jet-black eyes, and his sharp cheekbones must have girls slobbering all over him.
There’s a university ID on the table. One peek at it lets Tine know, his name is Sarawat. He tries to stretch across the table a little more so he can look at the faculty Sarawat belongs to when Sarawat asks, “Did you forget your ID too?”
He’s looking at Tine, but this time he looks amused. His mouth curves at the end slowly.
“No,” Tine answers, feeling his cheeks heat up. “What faculty are you from?”
“Political science. You?”
“Law”
Sarawat nods his acknowledgment and turns his attention to his phone. Tine’s a little bit offended by how fast he got bored of this conversation. He decides to ignore him and places his head on the table to take a nap.
-
He feels someone gently shake his shoulder and finally opens his eyes.
“Wake up, nuisance. The library is about to close,” Sarawat says gently.
Tine immediately sits up straight. “What? I was just asleep for 5 minutes.” He looks at the clock on the wall. Its 11:15 pm.
“5 minutes my ass. Listen man, if you’re just coming here for the free AC, then go to a café. Some people actually want to study here and your snoring doesn’t let them,” he rudely informs Tine before walking away.
“I don’t snore!” Tine hisses after him.
The only thing he gets in response is a wave.
-
Tine goes back to the library the next day. With a cup of coffee and an apology. He narrated the story to his friends, only to be informed that he had acted like an asshole and that he did in fact snore.
He was glad to find Sarawat sitting in the same spot as yesterday, and shuffles towards him.
“Hey.” he places the coffee in front of Sarawat.
“What’s this?” Sarawat inquires. He eyes Tine suspiciously.
“A peace offering,” Tine says as he sits on his chair. “I’m sorry for disturbing you yesterday.”
He pulls out a bag full of stationery and wriggles his eyebrows at Sarawat, “I got everything I need today.”
Sarawat just huffs, but Tine can see the amused shine in his eyes. “I’m Tine,” he introduces himself.
“Sarawat.” Wat takes a sip of his coffee and makes a surprised noise. “It’s an Americano. How did you know?”
“All sad, gloomy people usually drink that.”
“As opposed to the diabetes inducing Frappuccino’s you drink?”
“I don’t like coffee.” Tine informed.
“That’s worse.”
Tine notices a Guitar bag next to Sarawat. He points to the it, “Oh, you play the guitar?”
“No, I just roam around with it to look cool” Sarawat replies.
“Really?”
“No, nuisance. Any more dumb questions?” The amused look on his face is back. It encourages Tine to keep talking.
“Can you play any Scrubb songs?
“The band?”
“Yeah. They’re my favorite band. I know the lyrics to every song,” Tine can hear the excitement in his voice. Scrubb has been a constant part of his life. He’s laughed and cried to their songs. They’ve both him comfort when no one else could.
Surprisingly Sarawat doesn’t mock him for it. Instead he nods like he understands and maybe he does. He’s a musician after all.
“They’re a good band” he says. “Do you mind if we study now?”
-
It becomes their thing after that, every day after classes they meet at the back of the library. Tine brings them both drinks. Sarawat’s constant comments feel less snippy and more endearing. Tine’s glad he’s made a new friend at the university. He’s never made friends with anyone outside his department, and Sarawat is unlike anyone he’s met before.
Under the stoic exterior is a funny, perceptive guy. After hearing Tine's constant complaints about the freezing cold in the library, he starts bringing his jacket for him. He also grudgingly listen to all the songs Tine recommends him and always shares his opinion on them when they meet. Despite all that, their personalities are too different and clash quiet often. It leads to hilarious arguments that neither of them takes seriously.
“Everything you said in that sentence was so wrong it’s making my ears bleed.”
“Stop over-reacting. Cats make better pets and you know it.” Tine huffs.
“You can’t compare cats to dogs. They’re on different levels. Not that you would even know. I don’t think anyone would ever trust you with the care of a living creature” Sarawat’s says smirking. Tine can’t stand his that look on his face.
“Just because I’ve never had a pet, doesn’t mean I can’t judge-”
“Aha! I knew it.” Sarawat slams his hand on the table.
A girl passing by glares at them both and they immediately shut up.
“Wow, this is all your fault.” Sarawat informs him.
“My fault? I wasn’t the one yelling!” Tine objects.
“tsk tsk.. own up to your mistakes, Tine. That’s the only way you’ll grow” Sarawat says and starts packing his stuff.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“Home. I waste all this time arguing with you, I need to study at some point.” He waves at Tine as he leaves.
-
“I’ve haven’t even opened the textbook” Ohm says. They’ve come to eat at the engineering canteen for their lunch break.
“Neither have I,” Tine informs. He really needs to start studying, exams begin at the end of this week.
“What do you mean?” Fong points his spoon accusingly at Tine. “You’re holed up in the library all day.”
“Yeah” Ohm agrees. “You must be revising by now.”
“No, I told you the annoying political science guy never lets me study!” Tine explains. “I barely get any reading done there.”
“That sounds like bullshit. If anything, you’re probably the one who’s not letting him study.” Phuak adds. He has such shitty friends. He really needs new ones.
He’s about to say something when he his eyes catch an awfully familiar face and before he can stop himself, he’s already yelling, “Wat!”
Sarawat, along with 2 other boys standing at the food counter turn to look at him. He waves when he see’s Tine.
“Wait. Is that your library guy?” Fong asks, eyeing Sarawat. “Isn’t that Sarawat Guntithanon?”
“Yes, he is. You didn’t tell us, you were meeting the campus heart-throb, Tine.” Ohm says. All three of them look at Tine for an explanation.
“What? I had no idea he was such a- “
“Oi nuisance!” Sarawat appears in front of him. He places a book on the table, “You forgot this yesterday.” It’s one of his law text book. Tine can feel the sudden change in the canteen. Almost everyone had stopped doing what they were doing and are staring at Tine and Sarawat.
“Um… Thanks,” Tine murmurs, sliding the book towards himself.
“Are you okay? You look pale.” He proceeds to place his hand on Tine’s forehead to check his temperature.
“I’m fine. I’m fine!” Tine quickly moves his hand away. Sarawat looks unconvinced, his places his drink on Tine’s table.
“Drink this, it’s lemon. It should make you feel better.”
Tine thanks him for the drink, but avoids eye contact. Sarawat leaves in a minute later after bidding him goodbye and nodding to his friends.
His friends pounce on him the second he leaves.
“You two seem… close,” Phuak remarks.
“We just met a while ago,” Tine feels uncomfortable with the tone of this conversation. He’s not sure why he’s trying to hide how much he enjoys spending time with Sarawat.
“You know he has a bad reputation among the boys in the campus, right? He’s known for stealing people’s girlfriends. The architecture students especially hate him, after their sports captains lost his girlfriend to him,” Fong tells him in a serious tone.
That doesn’t sound like the Sarawat he knows. The one he knows seems to be disinterested in people in general. He hardly ever talks about girls, only rolls his eyes and informs Tine 'they're out of his league' when he points out pretty students at the library.
“Trust me, man. You don’t want to be associated with him,” Fong tells him.
“Yeah! Or they’ll turn against you too!” Phuak adds.
He only nods, he can’t really bring himself to form a response. His friends aren’t the kind of people who judge others without reason. He knows they’re only looking out for him.
Ohm sits quietly, he seems to notice Tine’s discomfort and changes the topic. He’s his oldest friend. They’ve been together since kindergarten, which is why he keeps avoiding the knowing look in his eyes.
-
Tine doesn’t go to the library that day. Or the days following that.
He's never felt like such a coward before.