JIAH POV
The broom is heavier than it looks.
Not in a dramatic way. Just in a wow, this is annoying and I hate every adult involved in this decision way.
The bristles scrape against the dirt field with a dry, ugly sound, like nails on a chalkboard's uglier cousin.
Dust lifts into the air and immediately sticks to my sweat-damp skin because of course it does.
The universe loves commitment.
After-school punishment. One month.
Sweeping the school field.
With Yu Enhyeok.
I drag the broom forward and glare at the ground like it personally snitched on me to the principal.
The sun is already dipping low, throwing long shadows across the field, making everything look fake and cinematic, which feels unfair because nothing about this deserves aesthetics.
A few meters away, Enhyeok sweeps.
Calm. Steady. Efficient.
Like he's doing a normal chore and not court-ordered humiliation.
His movements are precise, controlled. The dirt actually listens to him. His side of the field is already noticeably cleaner, which pisses me off more than it should.
He doesn't look hot doing it. I refuse that narrative. He looks… irritatingly decent. Sleeves rolled just enough to be annoying. Posture straight. Expression blank.
I shove my broom harder.
It does nothing except send dust back into my face.
Perfect.
"Bro," I say, because if I don't speak now I might actually commit a crime. "Do we really need to study together?"
He doesn't look at me. The broom moves again, smooth and silent.
"It's already late," I add, voice sharp with exhaustion and leftover adrenaline. "When are we even supposed to study after this shit?"
This time, he stops.
Just pauses, broom resting against the ground, like I hit some internal checkpoint.
He turns his head slowly, eyes landing on me with that flat, unreadable stare that always makes me feel like I accidentally walked into the wrong exam.
"I don't want to study with you," he says calmly.
No bite. No attitude.
Just fact.
Something in my chest reacts before my brain does, which is annoying and rude. I scoff immediately, because absolutely not.
"Oh?" I say, eyebrows lifting. "You're talking like I want to."
I plant the broom against my hip and face him fully now, sweat sticking my shirt to my back, hair frizzing like I lost a fight with humidity. "Let me be real. I don't like being with you either."
There it is.
Clean. Honest. Mutual dislike. The way things should be.
For a second, he just looks at me.
Not annoyed. Not bored.
Just… looking.
And there's something there. Not soft. Not kind.
Something sharp and unreadable, like he's thinking three steps ahead in a game I don't remember agreeing to play.
It makes my skin prickle in a way I absolutely do not appreciate.
I frown. "What."
"Wait in the library after this," he says.
Then he turns away.
Just like that.
No explanation. No argument. No acknowledgment of the fact that I did not agree to anything.
He adjusts his grip on the broom and goes back to sweeping like he didn't just drop a sentence that feels suspiciously like an order.
I stare at his back.
Hard.
The audacity of this man. The actual nerve. He says he doesn't want to study with me and then immediately assigns me a location like I'm a forgotten bag he plans to retrieve later.
"Excuse you?" I mutter, but he's already out of conversational range, broom dragging calmly across the dirt like he's immune to human irritation.
I go back to sweeping because apparently today is about doing things I don't want to do.
The sky darkens slowly. The field empties. The school buildings glow with that after-hours loneliness that always makes everything feel a little unreal.
My arms start to ache. Sweat trickles down my spine. Every sweep feels heavier than the last, and my brain, traitor that it is, starts wandering.
Library.
After this.
With him.
Fuck.
I tell myself it won't be awkward.
I tell myself we've literally stayed together one night before, so this shouldn't matter.
Then my brain immediately goes, why did you phrase it like that, and I nearly trip over my own broom.
I shake my head hard. No. Stop. I am not unpacking that. Not now. Not ever. That night lives in a sealed box in the back of my brain labeled Do Not Touch Unless You Want to Suffer.
Still.
Library.
Quiet. Small tables. Shared air.
Fuck.
I hate being told what to do.
Not in a cute rebellious way. In a deep, personal, I-will-ruin-my-own-life-to-avoid-this kind of way.
Ever since I was a kid, the fastest way to make me do the opposite of something was to say do this.
Personal tutors. Schedules. Adults hovering behind my shoulder breathing expectations into my neck.
Which is exactly why I studied like my life depended on it for that math test.
Ms. Park had said it so casually too. Smile polite. Voice sweet. If you fail, Yu Enhyeok will tutor you.
Humiliation in sentence form.
I remember going home that day and staring at my math book like it personally threatened my bloodline.
I studied out of pure spite. Highlighted. Rewrote formulas. Did practice problems until my brain felt fried.
Passed the test. Passed it clean. No tutor.
No Enhyeok hovering over me with that calm, superior air like he's explaining gravity to an idiot.
I won. Fair and square.
And now look at me.
Sweeping dirt like a disgraced cartoon character while the universe laughs directly in my face.
A board-approved study plan. Two students per group. Seatmates. Like this wasn't specifically designed to torture me.
Like they didn't sit in a room and go, hmm, how do we make Seo Jiah's life worse but legally.
Why isn't he studying with Areum.
That thought hits me out of nowhere and immediately pisses me off.
Because obviously that's what makes sense.
Same vibe. Same quiet. Same neat handwriting energy. Very touchy. Very whispering over notes. Very accidentally brushing hands and pretending it didn't happen.
I physically cringe.
Absolutely not. I do not want that image in my brain. Delete. Remove. Burn the file.
My grip tightens on the broom and I start sweeping harder than necessary, dragging it across the ground like I'm mad at the field for existing.
Dust flies up again. My arms ache. My shoulders burn. Good. At least this part makes sense.
I sneak a glance at Enhyeok.
He's still calm. Still unbothered. Sweeping like this is just another task to complete and move on from.
Like I'm not internally spiraling about libraries and commands and the sheer audacity of this whole situation.
I turn my eyes back to the ground and shove the broom forward.
Fine.
I'll sweep faster.
Get this over with.
But I swear to god, if he tells me anything else to do today, I might actually lose my mind.
------------
The library at this hour feels illegal.
Not closed, technically, but definitely abandoned. The overhead lights are dimmed to that sad yellow setting schools use when they want to remind you it's time to leave.
Rows of shelves stretch out too neatly, too quietly, like they're waiting for something bad to happen. The air smells like paper and dust and that weird cold-clean scent that makes your skin feel dry.
We sweep for two hours.
Two. Full. Hours.
By the time we get here, my arms feel like rubber bands that've been stretched one time too many. My shirt is damp at the collar.
My legs ache in that dull, irritated way that doesn't even feel productive. I drop into a chair harder than necessary, the sound echoing way louder than it should in the empty space.
Enhyeok sits across from me.
Of course he does.
Same calm movements. Same straight posture. He sets his bag down, pulls out his notebook, places it perfectly parallel to the table like the universe might tilt if he doesn't.
The chair barely makes a sound when he sits. I hate that. I hate how controlled everything about him is.
The silence settles.
It's not normal silence. It's long. Heavy. The kind that presses against your ears until you're hyper-aware of every tiny noise.
The faint hum of the lights. The distant click of a radiator. My own breathing, which I suddenly don't know how to do naturally anymore.
I shift in my seat and glare at the table like it wronged me.
"This is creepy," I mutter.
He doesn't respond.
He flips open his notebook, checks the time on his phone once, then looks up at me with that flat, assessing stare that makes me feel like I'm being graded.
"Maths first," he says.
I snap my head up. "Absolutely not."
Of course he'd say that. Of course. Math is his thing. His playground. His stupid little kingdom where numbers behave and people don't talk back.
For me, math is stress in printed form. It's symbols that look like threats. It's tests that ruin your mood before you even sit down.
I glare at him. Hard.
"Of course you'd pick math," I say. "You enjoy this kind of torture."
He doesn't rise to it. Doesn't smirk. Doesn't argue. He just opens his pencil case, takes out a pen, and starts writing something down like my opinion is background noise.
The pen scratches softly against the paper.
It's infuriating.
I yank my math book out of my bag and slap it onto the table, a little louder than necessary.
The sound echoes again, bouncing off shelves like the library itself is judging me. I flip it open aggressively, pages rustling.
"Just so you know," I say, teeth clenched, "if this is some kind of power play—"
"You said you hate me, right?" he asks, suddenly.
The words cut clean through the air.
I stop flipping pages.
Slowly, I look up at him.
"What," I say flatly.
He meets my eyes. Calm. Too calm. There's something in his expression that makes my stomach tighten, not fear exactly, but suspicion.
Like he's setting up a chessboard and I don't see half the pieces yet.
"You said it earlier," he continues. "That you don't like being with me."
I narrow my eyes. "Yeah. And?"
He nods once, like he's confirming something for himself. Then he finishes writing, closes his notebook, and slides it across the table toward me.
The notebook stops right in front of my hands.
I look down.
It's a math problem.
No. It's not a math problem. It's a whole situation. Symbols stacked on symbols.
Fractions inside brackets inside something that looks like it wants to ruin my GPA.
It takes up almost the entire page. Neat. Clean. Precise. Like it was designed to hurt me specifically.
I stare at it.
Then I look back up at him. "What is this."
"A problem," he says.
"That's not a problem," I snap. "That's a hate crime."
His mouth twitches. Just barely. If I blinked, I'd miss it.
"Solve it," he says evenly.
I scoff. "Or what."
He leans back slightly in his chair, folding his arms. His gaze doesn't leave my face, and for the first time since we sat down, the silence feels intentional. Weaponized.
"If you get the answer wrong," he says, voice calm and precise, "you have to call me 'Your Grace.'"
What the!?