Chapter Text
The bell rang with a finality that sounded more like a sigh than a command—long, tired, echoing down the linoleum corridors that bore the scuff marks of ten thousand adolescent shoes. Autumn sunlight slanted through the narrow windows of classroom 3-B, casting golden beams across the dust-heavy air, catching in the fine mist of chalk still suspended after a frantic geometry lesson.
Jimin sat perfectly upright at the front of the class, his spine a ruler’s edge, hands folded neatly atop his notebook like a prayer. His uniform was immaculate, every button done, blazer lapels flat, and tie aligned with surgical precision. The day’s notes were already underlined in neat blue ink, bullet-pointed with black. The class monitor badge glinted dully on his chest — less an honor and more a responsibility he carried like penance.
He waited, as always, until the rest of the class had filed out, each student sending him nods of acknowledgement or sidelong glances thick with silent admiration. Some bowed. Others said his name like a sigh: Jimin-ah.
He didn’t care for any of it. The praise, the respect — it all felt hollow these days. Perfection was a role he played because someone had to. If he didn’t keep the order, who would?
The last to leave, except him, was Ms. Lee. She lingered by the desk, organizing papers with the haunted efficiency of someone three years past burnout and still crawling toward the end of the semester.
“Park Jimin,” she said finally, not looking up. “Stay back a minute.”
Jimin stilled, worry flaring across his features for a millisecond before smoothing over like glass. He stood and approached the desk, casting only a brief glance at the dusty chalkboard behind her, where today’s lesson had begun to fade in powdery ghosts.
“Yes, Ms. Lee?”
She handed him a small slip of paper. Pale blue. An after-school duty slip. His stomach dropped.
“Cleaning duty. You’ve been assigned with…” She paused, squinting at the slip like she didn’t quite believe it herself. “Jeon Jungkook.”
Jimin blinked. “Excuse me?”
“Don’t ask me. I don’t make the pairings. It’s a new initiative.” She shrugged, dropping the paper into his waiting hand. “Something about building bridges. He’s supposed to meet you in the supply room after final bell.”
“But—”
“Talk to administration if you have a problem.” She waved a tired hand at him, already turning to gather her bag. “And maybe loosen your tie, Jimin. You look like you can’t breathe.”
He watched her leave, the hem of her skirt brushing through the lazy afternoon light, and then stared down at the slip like it was a summons from hell.
Jeon Jungkook.
Even the name felt like an insult when printed next to his own.
Jeon Jungkook arrived late. Of course he did.
Jimin was already halfway through the checklist on the cleaning cabinet, chalkboard sponge in hand, sweeping silent figure-eights across the board as he tried not to inhale the stale scent of forgotten geometry. The sun had dipped lower, shadows stretching long across the wooden desks like grasping fingers. The hallway was silent. The school had begun its nightly transformation — from echoing chaos to empty shrine.
The door banged open.
Not nudged. Not opened with the sheepishness of someone who knows they’re late. Banged.
Jungkook stepped in like a walking contradiction: leather jacket slung over his uniform shirt, top buttons undone, tie looped around his neck like an afterthought. Black hair mussed. A lollipop tucked between his lips. No bag. Just swagger.
He paused in the doorway, glanced around, and then grinned like the devil just got bored and came to school for fun.
“Well, fuck me,” he drawled. “They really paired me with Saint Jimin.”
Jimin didn’t turn around. “You’re late.”
“I know,” Jungkook said, ambling further into the room. “That’s kind of my whole thing.”
Jimin kept wiping the board, trying not to let his grip tighten on the sponge. “There’s a checklist on the door. I already got the cleaning supplies.”
Jungkook flopped into one of the desks in the back, legs spread, leather creaking as he leaned back with the cocky ease of someone who’d never been told ‘no’ in a language he understood. He pulled the lollipop out of his mouth with a soft pop.
“Didn’t peg you for the janitorial type,” he said. “Guess you clean up everything, huh? Even chalk dust.”
Jimin turned finally, slow and deliberate, expression unreadable. “You’re not here to talk.”
“Aw, come on.” Jungkook smirked, eyes scanning him shamelessly. “Don’t be like that. We’re gonna be spending a lot of quality time together, Monitor.”
Jimin’s jaw flexed. He crossed the room, dropped a rag in front of Jungkook’s desk. “Make yourself useful.”
Jungkook looked down at the rag like it had personally offended him. “You want me to clean?”
“Yes,” Jimin said curtly. “That’s the point of cleaning duty.”
“I thought that was just a formality,” Jungkook said, lacing his fingers behind his head. “You know, to make us feel guilty for being public nuisances.”
“You’re not a nuisance,” Jimin snapped. “You’re a problem.”
Jungkook laughed. It was low and sharp, cutting through the silence like a blade. “Damn. You really do hate me, huh?”
“I don’t care enough to hate you,” Jimin said, turning back to the board. “But if you’re not going to help, you might as well leave.”
“No can do,” Jungkook said. “Ms. Choi said I’ve got two weeks of this shit. Miss one day and I get suspended.”
“Then maybe don’t get detention in the first place.”
“Maybe don’t kiss ass so hard it bleeds,” Jungkook countered, unwrapping a new lollipop and popping it into his mouth with obnoxious slowness.
Jimin exhaled through his nose. The chalkboard was clean now — spotless, in fact. He turned and began straightening the desks instead, dragging each one a few inches to align with the floor tiles. The repetitive motion was soothing. Necessary. Something to anchor him before he said something he couldn’t take back.
He felt Jungkook’s eyes on him — not like admiration, but assessment. As if Jimin were a puzzle to be solved, or a threat to be neutralized.
“What’s your deal, anyway?” Jungkook asked after a while. “You wake up like this? Or is there some ritual?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The whole perfect act.” Jungkook tilted his head, watching him. “The tie, the smile, the whole ‘sir yes sir’ thing. You ever do anything just because you want to? Or is it always about being the favorite?”
Jimin paused by the window, where the air was cooler and carried the scent of someone smoking nearby. He turned, finally facing him fully. “Is that what you think? That I’m some kind of teacher’s pet?”
Jungkook smiled around his lollipop. “You’re not?”
“No,” Jimin said evenly. “I just don’t fuck around in class and expect life to hand me things because I can smirk and play the rebel.”
That struck something. Not much, but enough for Jungkook to roll his eyes and push out of his chair, stretching with a low groan like a panther uncurling from a nap.
“You really think you’re better than everyone,” he said, almost amused.
“No,” Jimin replied. “Just better than you.”
The words hung in the air, sharp and final.
Jungkook stilled for a beat. Then he reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a slim black cigarette case. Metal. Well-worn. Clicked open with practiced fingers. He slipped one between his lips and lit it with a scratched silver Zippo, the flame catching briefly before the familiar curl of smoke began to wind up into the stale classroom air.
Jimin’s nose wrinkled. “You can’t smoke in here.”
“Then tell someone,” Jungkook said, exhaling a long plume of smoke toward the window. “Oh wait. There’s no one left.”
“You really don’t care, do you?”
“About what?”
“Anything.”
Jungkook leaned against the window, letting the smoke drift lazily between them. “You’d be surprised.”
Jimin didn’t reply. Not because he didn’t have anything to say, but because he suddenly didn’t know which words would matter. And because for a brief, strange moment — just a heartbeat — Jungkook didn’t look like the problem kid. He looked… tired. Or maybe bored. Or maybe just a little lost, the way all of them were, here in this nowhere town, in this too-big school that smelled like chalk and boiled cabbage and wasted potential.
They finished cleaning in silence. The desks were aligned. The floor swept. The board spotless. The checklist ticked off.
Jungkook didn’t offer to help with any of it until the very end, when he finally flicked the cigarette butt out the open window and crossed the room to collect the mop. He didn’t say anything as he passed Jimin, but there was a flicker of something — not quite respect, not quite defiance. A glance that lingered a second too long.
When the clock struck five, they stood at opposite ends of the now-spotless room, staring at each other like adversaries forced to pause in the middle of a war.
Jungkook reached for the door first. “See you tomorrow, Monitor.”
Jimin didn’t respond.
He waited until the door clicked shut behind him, until the scent of smoke finally faded from the room, before sitting down at the nearest desk and burying his face in his hands.
Tomorrow couldn’t come fast enough.
જ⁀➴
The following day bled into itself, gray skies draped over the school like a worn blanket, dulling the edges of everything. The weather matched Jimin’s mood: muted, stretched thin, barely keeping form. By the time the last bell rang again, echoing down the corridor like a final breath, he found himself walking toward classroom 3-B with the slow, reluctant steps of someone marching toward a second date with disaster.
It wasn’t that Jeon Jungkook had gotten under his skin. That would imply some level of impact, and Jimin wasn’t willing to give him that. No — it was more like static. An ambient hum of irritation that clung to him even after Jungkook had left, a cigarette-stained aftertaste that lingered in his mouth even though he hadn’t smoked.
Jimin arrived exactly on time, opened the supply closet, and began gathering the cleaning materials. He wasn’t surprised when Jungkook was late again. Five minutes. Ten. Fourteen.
At sixteen minutes past the hour, the door creaked open, and in came the devil — same leather jacket, same devil-may-care grin, but this time with a half-empty bottle of soda in hand and earbuds in his ears, the thrum of bass-heavy music audible even from across the room.
He didn’t offer an apology. He never would.
Jimin looked up from the broom, eyes hard. “You’re late.”
Jungkook plucked an earbud out and grinned. “Still on that, huh?”
“I’m going to start logging the time.”
“Do it,” Jungkook said. “Let’s see who cares.”
Jimin turned away. There was no point in starting the fire when he knew exactly how hot it would burn. He’d been raised to pick battles strategically. Jungkook, clearly, had been raised to set everything on fire just to see what turned to ash.
They began the cleaning in silence.
This time, though, Jungkook picked up the rag without being told. Dragged it lazily across a row of desks, not really cleaning — more like smearing the day’s fingerprints into abstract smudges — but it was something. Jimin watched him from the corner of his eye, watched the way Jungkook moved like the world owed him space, like he was too big for the room and didn’t care if anyone else noticed. His sleeves were rolled up, exposing a tattooed band curling beneath his left forearm — not school-sanctioned, clearly. A glimpse of rebellion permanently inked into skin that had probably been bruised a thousand times in a hundred ways.
“Is that real?” Jimin asked before he could stop himself.
Jungkook glanced down, eyebrows raised. “The tattoo?”
“No, the attitude.”
That earned a grin. “Both. But thanks for noticing.”
Jimin sighed, moving to the window, pushing it open a few inches to let the stagnant air out. A breeze pushed through the room, carrying the faint scent of wet leaves and far-off traffic. The streets below were quiet, most students already gone home or off to cram schools and part-time jobs. He wondered, briefly, what Jungkook did after school before these cleaning duties. Vandalism? Loitering? Motorcycle races in back alleys?
“Why are you always in detention?” Jimin asked, not unkindly.
Jungkook didn’t answer at first. He dragged the rag across another desk, slower this time, then shrugged.
“Bored, mostly.”
“That’s not a reason.”
“It is when everything else is worse.”
Jimin looked at him, really looked. There was something hollow behind his voice, something that didn’t match the swagger he wore like armor.
“Why do you care?” Jungkook added after a beat, tilting his head. “You’ve never said more than two words to me in four years.”
“You’ve never given anyone a reason to,” Jimin replied.
“That’s the point.”
They stared at each other for a moment — two opposite ends of a spectrum forced to share the same line. Jimin’s polished exterior, Jungkook’s deliberate mess. Light and shadow, pressed together by circumstance.
“You know,” Jungkook said, voice quieter now, “you should try letting go sometime. Crack the perfect image. I bet it’d feel good.”
“I’m fine as I am.”
“Sure,” Jungkook said, licking his bottom lip. “You’re like a wind-up doll. Precise. Predictable. And probably close to breaking.”
Jimin turned sharply. “And you’re a disaster waiting to happen. You think people admire you because you’re fearless, but all I see is someone who doesn’t care what happens to himself. That’s not bravery. That’s just pathetic.”
For a moment, the room held its breath.
Jungkook’s expression didn’t falter, but the smile thinned into something sharper. “You don’t know me, Park Jimin.”
“And you don’t know me either,” Jimin shot back. “But at least I’m not pretending to be someone I’m not.”
Silence again. Thick. Charged.
Then, Jungkook turned away, walked toward the window, and fished another cigarette from his jacket. He didn’t light it right away. Just rolled it between his fingers, contemplative.
“You think you’re better because you’ve got your life together?” he murmured.
“I don’t think I’m better. I have to have my life together.”
“Why?”
“Because if I don’t…” Jimin trailed off, hands clenching around the edge of the desk he stood beside. He didn’t finish the sentence. He didn’t need to.
Because someone’s counting on me. Because if I slip, everything breaks. Because I’ve been perfect for so long, I don’t know what else I’d be.
He closed his eyes for a second. Then exhaled.
Jungkook lit the cigarette. Took a slow drag. The flame flared, then dimmed. Smoke drifted out of his mouth like secrets he didn’t want to tell.
“I don’t smoke to look cool,” he said suddenly. “I just like the quiet.”
Jimin blinked. “What?”
“When I smoke,” Jungkook said, not looking at him, “it’s quiet. No one talks. No one asks me anything. It’s like this little space where everything else shuts up. Even my own head.”
Jimin didn’t know what to say to that. So he said nothing. Just watched him lean against the windowsill, the fading light slanting across his features, turning his black hair a deep russet and making the smoke glow like fire.
“Do you ever get tired of pretending?” Jungkook asked softly, almost like he didn’t expect an answer.
“I’m not pretending.”
“Everyone’s pretending. Some of us are just better at it.”
Jimin looked down at his hands, fingers calloused from hours of violin practice, nails trimmed to regulation length, palms dry from chalk dust. He wondered when he last did something just because it made him happy. When he last chose something for himself instead of what looked good on a college application.
Maybe Jungkook wasn’t pretending. Maybe he was just a version of honesty that the world didn’t know how to handle.
Or maybe he was a liar who told the truth by accident.
Either way, it was unsettling. Jimin didn’t like being unsettled. He liked clean lines. Measurable expectations. A plan.
This didn’t fit in the plan.
“I don’t like smoking,” he said finally.
Jungkook laughed. “No shit. I wasn’t offering.”
They worked the rest of the hour in silence again, but something had shifted. It wasn’t comfortable — not yet. But it wasn’t war anymore, either. The tension had softened into something less combative, more… curious. Like they were both trying to figure out what the hell this thing between them was.
When five o’clock rolled around, Jungkook stubbed out the cigarette in an empty soda can and slung his jacket over one shoulder.
“Same time tomorrow?”
Jimin nodded. “Try being on time.”
“No promises.”
And just like that, he was gone.
That night, Jimin lay in bed staring at the ceiling, textbooks stacked beside him, the soft glow of his desk lamp painting long shadows across his bedroom wall. He should’ve been thinking about exams. College interviews. Tomorrow’s math quiz.
But all he could see was the arc of smoke curling past Jungkook’s lips. All he could hear was that voice — insolent, but laced with something heavier. Like he was trying to tell Jimin something, without ever saying it.
“You ever get tired of pretending?”
It echoed.
And for the first time in a long time, Jimin didn’t know the answer.