Chapter Text
Although Seonho was skilled, it wasn’t enough to completely hide his existence on the school grounds from the two seniors he wanted to avoid the most. For the brief few seconds that it took him to fully take on Yanan’s appearance, both Jinho and Hui caught wind of the nearby cupid presence. They couldn’t identify who it was exactly but they could tell the cupid had used a lot of power and was close by. On alert, Hui woke up from his nap only to be met with the sight of Hyojong staring at him with big glossy eyes. Startled, he immediately sat up from the bench but ended up hitting his forehead on Hyojong’s along the way.
“What the hell are you doing?” Hui scowled. He wasn’t particularly surprised that it was Hyojong but he was bothered by the fact that the kid must have been hovering right above his face in order for their foreheads to clash in such a manner. Hui knew that he had technically invaded Hyojong’s special greenhouse and made it his own napping station because of how isolated and quiet it was. But he really did not care.
“I was thinking of waking you up but you looked so peaceful sleeping so I couldn’t do it...and then you woke up so suddenly…” Hyojong said as he got off the ground, his honesty weirding Hui out. He then reached his hand out to touch Hui’s reddened forehead, “Are you okay? Did you wake up from a nightmare or something?”
Hui was a bit stunned by how genuinely worried Hyojong sounded so there was a small pause before he proceeded to brush Hyojong’s hand away, “I’m living my nightmare as we speak so don’t worry about it.” Hui frowned, realising that the cupid presence had completely ‘disappeared’. They might still be on the school grounds... Usually it wouldn’t be of any concern to him but the amount of power that was used was alarmingly high. Especially on a school campus, Cupids rarely had to use a lot of power for field work so the whole thing smelt like trouble.
It took Hui a bit too long to actually notice that Hyojong had additional injuries that were clearly not from their forehead collision earlier on. His left cheek was slightly bruised with a purplish hue and there was a small cut on his bottom lip. His uniform was also unusually dishevelled and unkempt, even for someone so clumsy.
“What happened to you?” Hui questioned, his eyes clearly poking at Hyojong’s other injuries. The rapid transition of Hyojong’s eyes widening from fear to a forced eye smile didn’t escape Hui.
“It’s nothing. I just fell a bit earlier! You know how I am.” Hyojong chuckled as he straightened out his blazer and fixed his tie.
Hui crossed his arms and tilted his head back. Does this human think I’m an idiot? He was more offended than anything. He may not know where exactly these wounds came from but they were definitely not from simply falling down as the human claimed. However, there was no time to be fixated on how Hyojong got his injuries. The Cupid let out a long heavy sigh and got up from the bench.
Hyojong looked at Hui doe-eyed as he walked past, “Where are you going?”
“Getting the first-aid kit, you fool.”
~
Seonho strolled out of the bathroom with his hands tucked away in his pockets. He had a firm resolve to find the human named Changgu and confess whilst disguised as Yanan - a feat much easier said than done. Not knowing where to look in such a large school campus was going to be his first problem. Knowing both Hui and Jinho were wandering around was his second problem. It meant Seonho had to use all of his powers to keep up his immaculate high-level disguise whilst simultaneously suppressing his Cupid presence to that of a regular human. Using his powers for anything else such as locating Changgu would cause his disguise to slip up and alert Hui and Jinho and he definitely did not want that to happen. Not after being sternly warned by Jinho.
Luck seemed to be on his side though because he hadn’t even walked down more than 3 corridors on the same floor when he was able to locate Changgu looking all prim and proper with his neat appearance, walking out of a classroom.
“Yeo Changgu!” Seonho yelled out, glad that his voice had also changed to Yanan’s quite perfectly. He excitedly ran towards Changgu who seemed to be rather confused as to why Yanan was looking at him so enthusiastically. He didn’t hate it obviously but it was...out of character?
“Changgu! I have something I need to tell you.” Seonho reached out for Changgu’s hands and tightly held them. Changgu panicked at the sudden skinship between them, looking back and forth from their intertwined hands to Yanan’s exasperated face. He had definitely dreamt of something like this happening before but experiencing it was a whole different story.
“I..um…” Seonho gulped and could feel his own smile faltering. You’d think a Cupid would know a lot about how to confess love but that’s not always the case, especially for an inexperienced Cupid like Seonho. Cupids are responsible for the linkage between two humans through the arrows and nothing else. The humans themselves are the ones who cultivate the feeling of love into something more through display of affection, verbal confession and prolonging of romantic relationships.
Wait, do I say ‘I like you’ or ‘I love you’ in this scenario? And then what? Do I hug him? Oh oh oh! Seonho, you idiot, you’ve studied this in those Korean dramas! The guy KISSES first and THEN he confesses.
Desperate to break the awkward air between them, Changgu speaks up, “Oh, before I forget, I have your pants in my bag. I'll give them to you later in…”
From Changgu’s point of view, Yanan suddenly interrupted him by caressing his soft reddening cheeks and then slowly leaning forward with his eyes closed. And Changgu was pretty much going into full panic mode by this development. Time seemed to slow down for Changgu as he watched Yanan’s face get closer and closer and it’s a beautiful sight for sure but he was also very very confused. Should I...just close my eyes too?
Changgu could hear the sound of hurried footsteps getting louder from behind him and before he knew it, Shinwon had stuck his face out of nowhere in between them, thoroughly amused by Changgu’s shocked expression, and pushed Yanan's face back. Seonho realised his lips were met not with Changgu's soft lips but with Shinwon's palm a bit too late and immediately pulled back to vigorously wipe his lips in horror. This insolent human!
“I hope I wasn’t interrupting anything.” Shinwon exclaimed with a smug look on his face. Oh, he knew exactly what he had interrupted. Without saying a word, Changgu bolted down the corridor at godspeed and Seonho was about to chase after him when Shinwon yanked him back by his collar and put him into a firm headlock as he usually did with Yanan.
“Let go of me!” Seonho growled, unable to escape the strong arm around his neck.
“Not until you tell me what the hell were you doing with that nerd, Yanan.”
“Let go! I need to Changgu I love him, human.” Seonho blurted out angrily.
“You need to what ?” This was news to Shinwon. Not the fact that Yanan loves Changgu. It was the sudden need to confess that had Shinwon dumbfounded.
Once the arm around his neck was loosened, Seonho came face to face with the human he recognised as Ko Shinwon and gulped. It’s him. It’s Ko Shinwon.
Shinwon narrowed his eyes with suspicion at his friend. Something was off. There was no doubt that it was Yanan standing in front of him but at the same time, it didn't feel like it was him. “Yanan, are you feeling ill?”
“Look I’m sorry, I don’t have time for this, Mr Ko,” Seonho warned before running off after Changgu. Shinwon attempted to pull Seonho back once again but quickly retracted his arm back at the last second. He was a bit confused by the empty feeling he felt inside as he watched Yanan run down the corridor to chase after Changgu. He felt compelled to stop his friend even though he had always been supportive of Yanan and his silly crush on Changgu. Or maybe that was actually never the case at all.