The library again.
It was becoming a rhythm — unspoken, but consistent.
Same window table. Same low hum of silence between them. Only now, something had shifted. Something small. Not a storm. Not yet.
But maybe thunder… watching from a distance.
Jisoo was early , as usual. Hoodie up. Headphones on.
Sera didn't look at him right away.
Instead, she'd scribble in the margins of her notebook — little stars, circles, and one line of a sentence that didn't yet know what it wanted to be.
He always sat across from her , but said nothing.
Three minutes passed.
Then—
"Are you mad?" he asked.
Sera blinked. "Why would I be?"
He gave her a look.
She sighed. "Okay. just wondering."
"Because I made it worse in the cafeteria?"
"No. Because you acted like you were the one hurt."
She paused. "But I guess… you were."
Jisoo tapped his pen against the table.
"I don't like people bringing up things they don't understand."
Sera looked at him. "Same."
Their eyes met — steady this time. No flinching. No hiding.
Then he looked away. " The project?"
She slid a page toward him. "Already started."
He took it. Read quietly.
Then, in the faintest voice she'd ever heard from him—
"This part's good."
Sera blinked. "You think so?"
Jisoo nodded. "You write like you're bleeding into the paper."
She laughed, caught off guard. "That sounds painful."
"Most honest things are."
Two Days Later – Sports Day
The school's main field was chaos.
Banners everywhere. Water bottles flying. Students in color-coded T-shirts shrieking like war had begun. It didn't rain today. Seoul's sunshine burned down over the track, a little hot and golden, like something out of a movie.
Sera hated sports day.
She wasn't bad at running — she just didn't like eyes on her.
Minjeong was thriving, of course — yelling instructions as team captain, dragging people by the wrist.
"You're up next!" she shouted at Sera, passing her a baton. "Relay race. You got this!"
"I literally do not got this," Sera muttered.
She stepped into the lineup anyway.
On the opposite side of the field, Jisoo was sitting on a bench, hoodie still on, sipping from a juice box like he wasn't surrounded by screaming teens.
"Sera!" someone yelled. "Go!"
She ran.
Hard.
The track blurred beneath her feet. The wind was loud. Her heart louder.
And just when she passed the halfway mark—
Boom.
A crash. A loud gasp. Screaming.
She turned her head mid-run.
And saw Jisoo.
Flat on the ground.
Two other boys from their class standing near him, one holding a dodgeball, faces blank with the kind of guilt that comes from pretending it was an accident.
Jisoo surprisingly, didn't retaliate.
Sera didn't think.
She dropped the baton and ran toward him.
Faster than she'd ever run in her life.
Minjeong screamed behind her. Teachers started yelling.
But all Sera could see was the way Jisoo's hoodie had come off his head—
And the blood trickling from a fresh cut above his eyebrow.