Chapter Text
“He thinks I’m a loser.”
It’s with an unnecessary level of force that Jingxiang falls into the booth next to Sungmin, arms splayed out with annoyance as he complains.
Sungmin looks up, eyes already weary, before accepting his fate.
“Who does?” he asks, pushing forward his shake.
“Ricky,” Jingxiang scowls, before taking an angry sip.
“Ah, of course, only the very boy that you’ve been talking about non-stop for the past month. How could I forget,” Sungmin responds dryly.
Ignoring the blatant sarcasm laced in the elder’s statement, Jingxiang pushes forward.
“It’s just, he always looks at me with these disdainful eyes, you know? Like he’s looking down on me or something. And when I was talking to Hiroto hyung earlier about getting a date for the upcoming society party, he actually raised his eyebrow, as if was entirely impossible or something. I mean, the audacity! I’m perfectly good-looking, you know? I could get anybody I wanted to!”
Sungmin only stares back, unamused.
He then pulls his shake back.
“Uh, that’s definitely not what happened. You’re just overthinking it,” comes a voice from next to them, and they turn to see Hiroto dropping his bag onto the opposite booth and taking a seat himself.
Sungmin greets him with a tired smile, before being unwillingly pulled back into the taller’s dilemma.
“No, he definitely has something out for me,” Jingxiang groans, before putting his head in his hands. The other two share a pointed look at that.
“I mean, are you sure? Everyone says that he’s really nice,” Sungmin asks.
He then pauses.
“Actually, I’ve spoken to him before. He is nice.”
At that, Jingxiang shoots him a dirty look.
“I mean, have you even tried talking to the guy? Like properly?” Hiroto asks, seemingly unbothered as he takes Sungmin’s shake. Jingxiang frowns at that.
“No, why would I? He would only have more power over me,” he shakes his head.
“Well if you don’t even talk to each other, why are you so bothered by him?” the other raises an eyebrow.
“Because he’s always around! We’re part of the same society, so I literally can’t escape him,” Jingxiang snaps back, to which Hiroto replies with a mere shrug.
“So what’re you going to do, then?” Sungmin asks, folding his arms together.
Jingxiang sits up a little straighter, as if gathering himself.
“Well if he thinks I’m such a loser, I’m gonna get a date for the party— the hottest person on campus— and prove him so wrong that he slinks away with his tail between his legs,” he scowls with conviction.
“Really,” Hiroto replies in amusement.
Jingxiang glares at him.
“I mean, I don’t know where you’re gonna find that since Ricky’s pretty much the best looking person on campus, and the pool of attractive people that go here are abysmally small, but good luck,” the other snorts, before glancing at his watch.
“Shoot, I gotta go now. Mom says I have to watch Takuto tonight,” Hiroto says, before drinking the last of Sungmin’s shake and sliding out of the booth.
“Fine, see you traitor,” Jingxiang replies, throwing a fry at him.
The other catches it with ease, and makes a show of eating it deliciously.
As soon as he’s out of sight, Jingxiang buries his head in his hands.
“He’s right, I’m screwed.”
**
He doesn’t know why it means so much to him— fulfilling his quest to show up a guy that barely knew he existed.
But since he had already claimed— very publicly no less— that he would bring a date to the party, he couldn’t exactly back out without the blonde judging him even further.
It was one thing showing up to an event alone; it was another thing entirely to publicly announce bringing a date, only to arrive empty-handed, either looking like a liar or somebody who had just been dumped.
Neither of those things would be very helpful to Jingxiang in showing the other up.
But after a week passes with no results, he finds that Hiroto is depressingly correct.
Because Ricky really is the most attractive person on campus by far, as much as it pains him to admit. And for all that Jingxiang had admirers, there was something about his intense personality that seemed to drive people away when asked upfront about their intentions.
He really doesn’t know what to do about it.
He doesn’t even make it another week before he sees Ricky again, standing in line at the campus food court, blonde hair looking infuriatingly soft and well-kept despite the other probably dyeing it for years on end, like a total asshole.
Truthfully, he wants to flee as soon as he sees the other standing there, but his stomach can’t help but rumble, caving in after going an entire morning without food, and he internally curses.
Just why did the other have to be at the only good Chinese takeout place on campus?
Wasn't he supposed to be rich and have his own chefs take care of that kind of thing for him?
He resolves to keep his head down, hoping that the blond would simply just receive his food and move on without looking back.
There was at least another person in front of him— surely that would offer him enough protection?
“So I heard you’re still going to the party this weekend, huh?”
He barely makes it to the front of the line and places his order, when he hears the other’s dreadful drawl next to him. He looks up with a scowl.
Did the other really wait to the side just to ask him that?
It seemed that things weren’t going in his favour today.
“I am,” he decides to respond curtly.
He doesn’t really want to entertain this.
Not today.
“And you’re still bringing a date?” the blonde asks, raising an eyebrow.
The question is perfectly harmless— or would be, coming from anybody else. But the slight glint in the other’s eyes, paired with his seemingly neutral expression, riles up something in Jingxiang.
“Yeah. Stalk me much?” he shoots back.
At that, the blonde blinks, before he shrugs.
“I can’t help it if you proclaimed it so publicly. Anyone would be curious.”
“What do you want then, to take me there?” Jingxiang asks, tone nasty.
“Why, I don’t think I would be good enough for your majesty,” Ricky responds back, even-toned.
Jingxiang blinks back at the response, caught off guard for a few moments, before his scowl deepens again.
“Yeah, well I guess you couldn’t fulfil my only qualification of “not an asshole”,” he shoots back, before finally taking his food and stalking off.
It doesn’t register until weeks later that he hadn’t paid for his meal that day— with only some faint memory of a black card being offered forth in the midst of his fury.
But it was official— he hated Shen Ricky, through and through.