Chapter Text
“If you fail this next calc midterm, your scholarship’s in danger. I’m not kidding, Heeseung.”
Coach Park’s voice cut through the humid afternoon air, sharp but not cruel — more like a slap on the back from someone who didn’t know their own strength. Still, it left Heeseung reeling as he stepped out of the athletics building, duffel bag slung over one shoulder, his cleats clacking against the pavement with every frustrated step.
He could outrun defenders, break personal bests, survive conditioning drills in 30-degree heat — but put a limit or derivative in front of him and suddenly his brain melted like cheap chocolate in the sun.
The library loomed in the distance like a judgmental older sibling.
He sat down heavily on the bench out front, resting his head back and letting the late afternoon sun wash over his face. Maybe if he closed his eyes long enough, his responsibilities would disappear — the looming exams, the weight of expectations, the fear of losing the one thing keeping him afloat.
Instead, someone cleared their throat.
“Um… you dropped this.”
Heeseung cracked one eye open and turned his head.
There he was.
Sim Jaeyun.
Wire-frame glasses perched precariously on the bridge of his nose, curls falling haphazardly into his eyes, oversized hoodie with The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus printed boldly down the sleeve (seriously?). He was holding out a pencil, cautiously, like it might bite.
“Oh.” Heeseung sat up straighter, pushing his frustration down. “Thanks.”
“I think we’re in the same 9 a.m. lecture?” Jake offered, tucking the pencil into Heeseung’s hand before quickly pulling his own back, as if embarrassed to have reached out.
Heeseung forced a small smile, grateful for the distraction. “You looked kind of... lost last class.”
That was a polite way to say you stared at the integral sign like it personally offended you. Heeseung gave a sheepish laugh. “I’m pretty sure I was.”
Jake shifted his weight, glancing around like he wasn’t sure if anyone was watching. “I tutor. Sometimes. For calc. If you’re, uh... interested?”
Heeseung blinked, caught off guard. He hadn’t expected that.
“You tutor?” he repeated, genuinely surprised.
Jake gave the tiniest nod, eyes flicking away shyly. “I mean, I like helping. You just—look like you’d rather be anywhere else during lecture.”
“You’re not wrong,” Heeseung muttered, feeling a flicker of honesty in the stranger’s words. “So what’s the catch?”
“No catch,” Jake said, voice steady but quiet. “Unless you count making you pass.”
A beat of silence stretched between them — the kind that settles when two people realize they might need each other more than they thought.
Then Heeseung grinned, the tension cracking just a little. “I’ll take that deal.”
Jake’s smile was small but genuine, a lifeline in the storm of equations and pressure.
“Cool,” Jake said, nodding like it was settled business. “Same place, same time tomorrow?”
Heeseung hoisted his duffel bag back over his shoulder, feeling something shift inside — maybe hope, or maybe just relief that he wasn’t facing the battle alone.
“Yeah,” he said, stepping off the bench. “I’ll be there.”
As they parted ways, Heeseung stole one last glance at Jake’s retreating figure — awkward, earnest, somehow exactly what he needed right now.
The library no longer felt like an enemy.
They started the next evening.
They met on the third floor of the library, in a tucked-away corner that smelled like printer ink and forgotten deadlines. Jake was already waiting, with a whiteboard marker in one hand and a stack of colour-coded notes in the other. His backpack was slumped beside him, textbooks peeking out like quiet witnesses to his tutoring efforts.
Heeseung was late by five minutes. He held up two boba cups as a peace offering. “One mango. One taro. I didn’t know which you liked.”
Jake looked genuinely surprised. “You got me a drink?”
“I’m not gonna show up empty-handed to someone saving my academic life,” Heeseung said, sliding the mango one toward him. “Guess right?”
Jake gave a small, grateful smile. “Actually, yeah.”
Something flickered in Heeseung’s chest — a warmth that wasn’t just from the mango boba.
“Let’s start with limits,” Jake said, snapping open his notebook with a quiet enthusiasm. “You understand the concept?”
“Barely,” Heeseung admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. “The professor keeps talking about epsilon and delta like they’re people I should already know.”
Jake gave a soft laugh. “They kind of are. Like... abstract gremlins.”
Heeseung snorted. “That’s not reassuring.”
Jake adjusted his glasses and leaned forward, voice dropping to a more patient tone. “Okay. Let’s break it down.”
He pulled a fresh sheet of paper from his notebook and drew a simple graph — a curve approaching a line.
“Imagine you’re running a race,” Jake started, “and you want to get as close as possible to the finish line, but never cross it before the right moment. Epsilon and delta are just fancy ways to say: ‘How close is close enough?’”
Heeseung squinted at the sketch, trying to picture himself sprinting along the curve. “So epsilon is... like my allowed margin of error?”
“Exactly. And delta is how far you have to be from the starting point to guarantee you stay within that margin.”
Jake’s voice was steady, soothing even, and Heeseung felt the knot in his chest loosen a bit.
“Alright,” Heeseung said, “so if I keep my distance small enough — delta — I can make sure my function’s value doesn’t stray beyond epsilon?”
Jake nodded, his eyes lighting up behind those glasses. “You’ve got it.”
They spent the next hour unraveling definitions and drawing diagrams, Jake patiently translating abstract concepts into everyday stories — limits as races, derivatives as instantaneous speed, integrals as filling up a swimming pool drop by drop.
At one point, Jake reached for the taro boba, and their fingers brushed. Heeseung blinked, heart skipping.
Jake cleared his throat, glancing away. “Uh, sorry. I guess I’m more of a taro guy.”
Heeseung grinned, “Looks like I got both right.”
The library around them faded into the background — only the two of them, equations and laughter mingling like a quiet promise that maybe, just maybe, they could get through this together.
Heeseung didn’t expect time to pass quickly. But somehow, an hour turned into two. Jake explained things differently — not like a teacher, but like someone who genuinely wanted him to get it. He used food metaphors, pop culture references, and once compared a function’s behaviour to a romantic situationship.
“That’s toxic,” Heeseung said, pointing to a particularly messy graph. “This function’s ghosting the limit.”
Jake’s shoulders shook with quiet laughter. “Exactly.”
They settled into a rhythm. When Heeseung struggled, Jake didn’t get frustrated; he just found a new way to explain it. Sometimes he’d sketch silly cartoons beside the math to make a point, or quote lines from a movie neither of them had seen but could pretend they did.
And then, when Heeseung finally solved a practice problem without help, Jake smiled at him like he’d just scored the game-winning touchdown.
It made his stomach twist, and not in a bad way.
For a moment, Heeseung caught himself watching Jake’s face—soft eyes behind those glasses, the way his lips curved just so when he was pleased. The room felt quieter, warmer, like it was wrapped in the hush of something unspoken but real.
Jake cleared his throat, breaking the silence. “You’re getting better. Like, a lot better.”
Heeseung felt a flush rise up his neck. “Yeah... I guess having a good tutor helps.”
“Good tutor,” Jake echoed, the corners of his mouth twitching upward. “I’ll take that.”
Heeseung glanced down at the messy notes sprawled between them. “So... same time tomorrow?”
Jake nodded, packing up his things slowly, as if reluctant to leave. “Definitely.”
Heeseung stood, the boba cups long forgotten, and suddenly the thought of walking away from this felt heavier than any calculus problem.
Outside the library, the sky had deepened to a soft twilight. The campus buzzed faintly with the distant footsteps of other students, but for a few seconds, Heeseung’s world shrank to the small bubble of shared smiles and unfinished equations.
And maybe, just maybe, that was enough to keep him coming back.
They walked out together into the cool evening air, their steps falling into an easy rhythm. The campus was quieter now, shadows stretching across the quad like ink spills. Heeseung glanced sideways at Jake, wondering if maybe, just maybe, this tutoring thing was about more than just calculus after all.
Jake cleared his throat. “So… what’s your secret? How do you always pick the right boba?”
Heeseung smirked. “Years of rigorous scientific research.” He nudged Jake lightly. “Or maybe just good luck.”
Jake laughed, the sound soft but genuine. “I might need you to be my personal drink psychic, then.”
“Deal,” Heeseung said, feeling a warmth bloom inside him that had nothing to do with the boba in his hands.
They reached the edge of campus, where the streetlights flickered on one by one, casting pools of golden light on the pavement. Neither of them wanted to say goodbye just yet.
“So,” Jake began, “besides torturing me with calculus, what do you do for fun?”
Heeseung thought for a moment. “Honestly? Not much these days. Rugby takes up most of my time.”
Jake nodded. “Makes sense. Must be intense.”
“It is. But I like it.” Heeseung looked up at the sky, now a deep navy. “What about you? Besides being a secret math genius?”
Jake’s cheeks tinted pink. “I read a lot. Play some guitar. Not very exciting.”
“Sounds pretty cool,” Heeseung said.
There was a pause, the kind that wasn’t awkward but full of possibility. Jake shifted his bag on his shoulder, then met Heeseung’s eyes.
“Hey,” Jake said softly, “thanks for today. And for the boba. Looking forward to Thursday.”
Heeseung smiled, heart ticking a little faster. “Me too.”
They said goodnight, walking off in opposite directions under the quiet glow of the campus lights — both wondering if this was the start of something new.
Heeseung tossed and turned, the ceiling fan humming above doing little to soothe the restless storm in his mind. He stared at the ceiling, replaying every moment from the tutoring session like a highlight reel that refused to pause.
That quick brush of skin against skin—simple, accidental, yet loaded with a strange electricity. His heart had jumped then, a sudden rhythm that didn’t belong to any workout or sprint he’d ever done.
He thought about Jake’s smile again—how genuine it was when he looked at him, not like a tutor talking down to a struggling student, but like someone who actually believed in him.
The math problems that had once felt like insurmountable walls now seemed more like puzzles waiting to be solved—because Jake had made them feel that way.
Heeseung’s fingers itched as if he wanted to reach out and text Jake, but the phone stayed stubbornly silent on his nightstand.
Was it just the stress of the midterm? Or something else entirely? The question lingered, as persistent as the unfinished calculus problems on his desk.
Sleep finally came in thin, fleeting waves — but even then, his dreams tangled equations with Jake’s laughter, and the line between tutor and something more blurred into something Heeseung wasn’t quite ready to name yet.