Chapter Text
Talking flowers are said to be great fortune tellers. Park Jisung's flower was kind enough to tell him his fortune, then fucking die.
Jisung stares at his white rose positively alarmed. Its leaves have wilted, it droops to the side in a pathetic little slump, it is already shriveling and drying despite having perished only moments ago. He shakes his dead flower, upset and unsettled.
"Hey, wait. Don't die on me like this, what the hell—"
Too late. Unfortunately, the flower is very very dead.
He rolls the words the flower had just told him around in his mind, contemplating their meaning. They're simple enough to understand, really: You—bighead! Love awaits in the other dorm. He understands the words with ease for what else could they possibly mean? The flower had, first of all, insulted him (Jisung had never before been called a bighead in his life and finds the moniker to be quite rude actually), and then told him love awaits.
The caveat though—? Love awaits in the...
"Other dorm... like?" Jisung's dismayed eyes dart over to Jaemin who sits directly beside him under the tree whose shade they had taken cover in. Accompanying them is a rather large group—Sungchan and Shotaro are off at the other side of Jisung being disgusting and romantic and gross; Jeno is settled on Jaemin's other end; Donghyuck is opposite of Jisung staring at him like he's an idiot; and Renjun and Yangyang hover, silently judging.
Jaemin pushes Jisung away, voice full of disgust. "Ewh. No. You're like a child."
Jisung frowns. The only people he can recall that occupy his neighboring dorm are Jaemin and Shotaro. Considering he has seen (one of) his best friends (Sungchan) shoving his tongue down Shotaro's throat, he certainly cannot be an option—especially since Jisung would like to think he is not a homewrecker. The other option is Jaemin who now vehemently denies himself as said option, so...
He looks around, "But then... who else could there be?"
His other best friend Donghyuck sighs, exasperated, "Dude, how many times do I have to tell you? It's Shotaro, Jaemin, and Chenle. It used to be Mark, Jaemin, and Chenle, but Mark and Chenle were beefing so Mark and Shotaro switched dorms with each other and—"
Jisung puts a hand up, an open invitation to shut up. "Okay, I do not need to know their life stories, thank you very much..." he trails off nervously. Zhong Chenle? Was he really who the stupid dead flower had implied he would love? The thought's just preposterous. Chenle is conceited, annoying, loud, good at the worst sport known to magickind (also known as flolf, or flying golf for the uneducated), and kind-of somewhat totally maybe hates Jisung.
It's not his fault! It's really Donghyuck's! Jisung wouldn't have done anything if Donghyuck wasn't always provoking him. He's the one who encourages him to be his worst self. And that's besides the point anyway, because the reason Chenle hates him is stupid. It was a tiny prank—so what if his nose went and got swapped with his ass? It was a day. The prank had been meant for Donghyuck anyway. It's really not his fault Sungchan and Chenle became collateral. Like really, they should know better than to handle a bathroom doorknob without proper precautionary measures. Door knobs are the most popular object to spell.
He looks over to Jaemin again, who is now arguing with his talking flower about the proper pronunciation of orange (Jisung had never before known anyone who pronounced orange as oh-rahng, but he supposes there's a first time for everything). He studies Jaemin. He's very good looking... Jisung wouldn't mind falling in love with him, he thinks.
He sighs and settles his back against the tree, eyes wandering, appreciating the warm air and cool breeze of the spring day.
Off at his side, Sungchan and Shotaro are laughing about something. It's a cheerful, unquestionably happy sound that fills his ears—a music so melodic it seems magical. Back to Jaemin his eyes wander... yeah, he definitely wouldn't mind falling in love.
✧─⋄⋆୨♡୧⋆⋄─✧
Jisung's Divination teacher, Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul, congratulates him the following week for successfully coaxing the flower to divine his fate. However, he is not so happy about the fact that the flower he gave him happens to be dead.
"So you went and killed my flower after convincing it to tell you your fate! Excellent, excellent—" Judging by the tone of his voice, it is not excellent— "Tell me now, what did the flower say your fate would be? Now now, no need to make a face. Don't be embarrassed! I have a class to teach and I must make an example of you."
"Uhm, why's that example have to be me?" squeaks Jisung, eyes darting towards Sungchan, mouthing help me out as Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul monologues to the unlistening air.
"Because! Your aura is the most curious one present! I am a Master Diviner! I can sense a fascinating fortune from a far cry away! Of course, do note though, you are not the most fascinating person here—thatwouldbeme—so again, do take care to keep your ego in check! Ahem, but indeed you smell as if—"
As their Divination teacher prattles on, Jisung frantically continues to mouth his request for help, but Sungchan's failure to comprehend endures. He scratches his head and shrugs. What are you saying? he mouths back. Jisung feels a sudden urge to smack him—how could Sungchan possibly have a perfect grade in Phonetics if he couldn't even read his damn lips? He groans inwardly as he spots Jaemin and Jeno in the corner snickering about the eggplant used as the centerpiece of their table. He really doesn't need the whole class to know he's destined to fall in love with that (admittedly very handsome) idiot.
"—and this is why you must tell me your fortune!"
Jisung redirects his gaze upwards to find his Divination teacher with his arms raised high, expectantly looking down on him as he hovers near to his seat.
There is a long pause before he finally responds. "My fortune? Well, the flower said I would fall in love..."
Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul sternly glares. "Anything else?"
Jisung baldly lies— "Nothing else," and in return, receives an even more stern glare.
"Ah well!" Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul claps his hands together. "I suppose then you need not my advice for your fortune. I would have provided you valuable information, but alas... I suppose we won't speak of this then." He skips off, giving Jisung a little wink before departing to interrogate another student.
Sungchan leans over to whisper in Jisung's ear, seemingly having finally understood his mouthed request. "We have a code, man. The bunny ears! Do the bunny ears next time."
✧─⋄⋆୨♡୧⋆⋄─✧
The next class Jisung has is Phonetics, a class that consists of learning how to precisely pronounce various speech sounds. He hates Phonetics for it is extremely boring and not useless. Jisung could forgive his Phonetics class if it were boring and useless, but Phonetics is infact not useless. Phonetics is boring and useful. This means Jisung has to pay attention to a boring thing, and he hates boring things.
Though, there is another reason Jisung hates Phonetics, and that reason manifests itself in his perpetual seatmate—Zhong Chenle, the one person who kind-of somewhat maybe totally hates Jisung.
Zhong Chenle is the subtle sort with his hatred. He insists on correcting Jisung's pronunciation in spite of his own articulation being no good. He always takes extra care to elongate his words when speaking to him, talking slow as if Jisung is too dumb to understand him if he goes any faster. Chenle always insists on chatting with his friends that sit far across the room in the class in another language just to exclude Jisung. And, maybe most frustrating of all, Chenle always brags about the fact that he always gets a better score than Jisung in, well... everything.
Today, the temptation to punch Chenle in the mouth has never been stronger. He's being exceptionally annoying, excruciatingly so, lecturing him on the importance of perfecting his tone when casting.
"You can't just say everything in the same monotone! And you can't change up your tone for every cast! It's gonna bite you in the ass one day! In the Mandarin magic schools I was taught in—you know what they taught us?—they taught us the importance of tone, controlling your pitch. These English schools are so useless. Like seriously, can't you hear it? The inflection in your voice changes every time you open your mouth and you think that's okay?"
Jisung rolls his eyes to the ceiling then straight to the back of his head. "Dude, it doesn't matter, it's like the same. Tomato, tomato—literally the same thing. Now if I said toe-may-toe, toe-mah-toe maybe you'd be—"
He startles as Chenle bangs his fist on the desk. "What are you talking about?! They are not the same thing. Do you hear that? Not, not—you hear it right? They're different! They mean totally different things!"
"It's the same!"
Chenle gapes open mouthed. "The same? The same? Does that sound the same to you, Park? Are you tone deaf?"
Jisung gives him a stink face. "They're the same thing," he insists. "There's literally no difference. Quit bugging me."
Chenle throws his arms to the air—the second time someone has done that towards Jisung today—and exhales a loud noise of exasperation. "There's just no point," he whines. "Why do I bother trying to help such stupid people? It's so pointless." Then, he begins to yap in rapid-fire Mandarin to his friend Minghao who sits across the room.
Jisung grumbles and begins to practice the words on his sheet under his breath. He mumbles them one by one, the sounds swimming and the letters floating out of his mouth, into his ear, and out of his head. It's alphabet and syllable soup. It tastes like shit.
As he reads, his Phonetics professor scolds Chenle, berating him for his disruptive behavior. The latter frowns as the professor patters on, "Professor Suh—I have a question. Tones are important in spell casting, right?"
Suh pauses, then sighs. "Zhong, we are in an English school. We cast in Latin. The only worry you should have for tones here is the one you are using to speak to me with."
Chenle frowns and crosses his arms, defiant. "Aren't you teaching phonetics? How could you be licensed for teaching and still saying this? My professor back in China would have schooled your ass ab—"
Suh waves a hand, wordless, and Chenle goes quiet, opening and closing his mouth to no avail for no sounds come out. "I welcome your old professor to school me anytime. You, however—" he considers the silently fuming boy— "Detention." He waves his hand again to release Chenle from the spell and points to another student with their hand up to hear out their question.
Jisung sticks his tongue out—suck it.
"Fuck you."
✧─⋄⋆୨♡୧⋆⋄─✧
Sungchan scratches his head; Jisung scratches his nose; Donghyuck scratches his ass.
"So... tell me exactly..." says the former of the three, "What about this is a good idea?"
Jisung and Donghyuck roll their eyes. Sungchan never sees their vision.
"Look! Don't question it—all you gotta do is cast the spell and we'll be on our merry way."
Sungchan furrows his brows together, narrowing his eyes. "Oh yeah, because the last brilliant plan you guys connived me into worked out so well."
"Hey! You got a boyfriend out of it! Love of your life even! Nothing went wrong."
"Yeah," he snips, "And nothing went right."
"Oh whatever, that's all just semantics," insists Donghyuck.
"Semantics," agrees Jisung.
Before the three of them, a pasty pink potion bubbles and froths—oddly reminiscent of the time months ago when another pink liquid that had once boiled caused the ire Sungchan references. Strangely enough, the potion reminds the three of skin and flesh. It's rather unsettling.
"This is above my friendship-grade," declares Sungchan as he makes his way to the door opposite of the one they had entered through. He places a hand on the knob and turns, holding it there as he utters his departing words. "I'm going to hang out with Shotaro now. Bye." And then he opens and promptly closes the door, disappearing behind it.
Donghyuck whines to no one in particular (the only person there is Jisung). "Oh come on! What higher friendship-grade is there than best friend?"
Darkly, Jisung voices what they're both thinking. "Boyfriend."
Donghyuck hisses, recoiling away from the word as if it burned him. "Shotaro... he ruined him, I swear. Made him a better—" he spits the word out aggressively— "person than he already is." He stares longingly at the closed door and, with fake sobs, begins to lament, "He doesn't need us anymore. We're being left for another man."
Jisung wipes away his own fake tears, screwing his face up into an ugly smile. "He's all grown up now. He's gonna move out soon and it'll just be us—me and you—abandoned."
They huff air, faking sobs and moans they know are loud enough for Sungchan to hear, wailing about how miserable their lives would be without him.
From beyond the door, someone calls. "Sungchan said he will always and forever love you two but to please shut up—he will help tomorrow..." There's a pause, "Also, he just whispered to me that he loves me more."
There's the sound of a smack, small in the distance— "Oi! Don't say that part out loud!"
"Abandoned," they rue.
Together, they drop to the floor, encircling the potion with their bodies, boredly watching bubbles form on the surface and pop shortly after. The bathroom that connects their dorms had seen a great many potions of questionable intention and shoddy spellwork, but the current is certainly one of the more innocuous ones amongst them. It is merely a one-use truth potion—one completely honest answer for one question. That's it! That's all! If the question is innocent—which Donghyuck knows it is—then really, what's the harm? All he wants to know is if Renjun really likes him.
Unfortunately, they're worse spellcasters than they are potion makers, and to complete the potion, they need to finish it with a spell. But, extra unfortunately, dick-whipped star student Sungchan is too busy canoodling with his boyfriend to cast it for them.
Donghyuck kicks the tiles on the floor. "Whatever. What'd you wanna do now?... Wanna spell all the mirrors in the school to reflect upside down again?"
Jisung considers it. Hmm... "Yeah, sure—" he shrugs, "Let's go."
But before they can go, Zhong Chenle bursts into the bathroom, rant at the ready.
"For fuck's sake! Park, I just got back from detention and you're already out here starting more shit in my life. Stop casting your stupid spells and brewing your stupid potions in our shared bathroom! You know—? Me and Jaemin had to abandon this stupid room after your dumb nose prank—" Donghyuck snickers— "but honestly, you can't even keep your stupid spells confined to this stupid room anymore, so why'd we even bother?"
"Oh, who cares? It's not like anyone's ever gotten hurt."
"I don't care if no one's gotten hurt! Don't you get it? You're just so damn annoying! Don't you see? This shit effects me. Like, how are you saying this when you somehow managed to wrangle Shotaro of all people into one of your stupid spells before? How hard—"
Jisung stands, fists balled at his side, ears turning red. "Shut up, shut up, shut up," he shouts.
"—is it to at least keep it to—"
"Shut up. Oh my god. Do you ever shut up? You're so fucking loud all the time."
"—yourself? You're sooo fucking inconsiderate and you're a dumbass all the time and—"
"Uh, guys," interjects Donghyuck, trying to make himself heard above their pointless bickering. He eyes the truth potion on the floor, wary. The concoction that once bubbled and frothed at an unhurried pace a pleasant pink color now begins to simmer and boil red. "I think you're making our truth potion upset... hey... guys?"
"—you're such a cheeky fucking asshole, always got that stupid grin on your face. Fucking—"
"And you're conceited! I don't know how you manage being such a cocky fucking prick all the time! It's like everything that comes out of your mouth is just shit from your ass!"
"Uhh, guys? Are we just gonna... okay, you know what? Nevermind, I'm just gonna..." and then, like his non-squabbling best friend, Donghyuck slips around the door and promptly disappears behind it. It clicks closed.
"—hell, you're so thoughtless! I don't understand why you're so irresponsible! You're so fucking stupid, it's no wonder you fail every class, you're a god damn—"
"JUST SHUT UP ALREADY, I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT!"
And then, the poor stressed truth potion explodes as it listens to (one of) its parents (creators) arguing.
Jisung and Chenle are blasted backwards through the door that leads to the latter's room—the former crashing into the carpeted floor, Chenle falling on top of him, coincidentally using his body as a cushion. Dazed, they lay one upon the other as the aggravated magic whizzes around them, settling in their bodies. Shotaro and Sungchan startle at the room's sudden commotion, both sitting up, arms wrapped inextricably around each other as they inspect the two newcomers.
"I wonder if that's what I looked like when you guys potioned me," wonders Shotaro aloud, head cocked slightly sideways.
Having visually inspected the two for signs of life and finding maybe much too much, Sungchan shrugs and pulls Shotaro back down into their shared bed. Nothing will interrupt their snuggle session.
Chenle groans, removes himself slowly from Jisung as he rubs a particularly painful portion of his back that is sure to bruise. He frowns, scanning the room with a scrunched up look and rubbing his throat, making obnoxious sounds all the while.
Jisung lifts himself up, sits up on his ass, legs stretched outwards and a glare sent the (even for him) unusually loud Chenle's way. The ungodly noises are reminiscent of something a bit like a whale, horse, and rooster—all wrapped up in one. Jisung promptly tells him to shut up.
At least, he tries to.
"HEY! CAN ANYONE HEAR ME?" hollers Chenle, eyes wide with panic.
Shotaro answers, "We definitely can."
Well. Chenle seems not to hear him. "HEY! PARK, WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO?" He turns to look at Jisung only to find his mouth frantically moving, not a sound coming out. "PARK, WHAT ARE YOU SAYING? WRITE IT DOWN."
Irritation clear in his voice, Sungchan speaks now. "Jisung hasn't said anything. God, he's right—you're so loud."
Panic builds in his chest, bubbling through his throat, trapped inside his muted mouth. Jisung bangs on the floor with a fist, punches Chenle in the arm for good measure as he mouths slowly and carefully to him. Debatably cowardly, decidedly dandy Donghyuck finally decides to join the motley crew, cautiously examining the situation before him.
"Uh oh..."
"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU SAYING? JUST WRITE IT DOWN. I THINK I'VE GONE DEAF OR SOMETHING, I CAN'T HEAR SHIT."
Furiously, Jisung searches the floor for his wand, finds it a meter away. He reaches out for it, attempts to scribble in the air only to realize moments later he can't. He's never been any good at mute magic.
I can't talk! he wails silently, waving his wand wildly as he tries to enunciate his predicament. He turns to Donghyuck—I can't talk! He turns back to Chenle—I can't fucking talk!
"WHAT ARE YOU SAYING? I SAID, WRITE IT DOWN."
Donghyuck buries his face in his hands. It's gonna be a long night.