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chapter 50: ▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄▄
"dude, that's so messed up! she better be expelled already. i'm swinging if i see her in school tomorrow," mingi huffs as they all walk towards treasure cafe together. jongho nods in agreement, mumbling about wanting to break her bones or something, which terrified the boys a bit, knowing how capable he is of something like that.
"jealousy really does bring out the worst in people. i can't believe she did tha–" wooyoung stops walking, which causes jongho to bump into his back. "dude, what the hell! why'd you stop?"
the older bends down, picking up a familiar looking teddy keychain from the ground. he turns around to face his friends, a look of worry etched onto his face and his eyes widened. the boys looked at him in confusion, eyeing the keychain in his hand.
"i'll get you a teddy keychain if you want one. throw that one away, you don't know if people have stepped on it," yunho says, trying to grab the keychain from the shorter's hand but he pulls his hand away.
"guys! this is jihyun's keychain!" he exclaims when he sees that the boys still hadn't caught on. mingi gasps, inspecting the keychain before turning to the boys. "it really is hers. i remember hers has a little metal keychain attached to it which has her initials carved onto it."
"okay, so? why are we still standing here? let's just go to the cafe. you can just give that back to her tomorrow. simple as that." jongho states, as he attempts to continue walking but fails when mingi grabs him by his backpack and smacks him on the head. jongho turns back, glaring at the older.
"are you stupid? what if something happened to her? i know that keychain is usually attached to her bag in school but whenever she's walking out of school, she's always holding onto that teddy keychain because she says it feels nice to hold on to. i'm pretty sure she'd realise if she dropped it as she walked," mingi explains to jongho, as well as the other two boys.
"are you saying something bad happened to her?" wooyoung asks worriedly. "don't be ridiculous. things like that don't happen anymore. jihyun noona is smart enough to avoid something like that if it were to happen." jongho states, attempting to walk ahead for the second time, yet again failing when yunho grabs him by his backpack this time.
"can you guys not abuse my backpack, please? fine, i'll listen but let's talk at the cafe because i really don't want to continue standing here blocking the way." he says, finally being able to walk ahead without being pulled back.
the boys settle down at the cafe, looking outside at how busy the streets are as people rush to get home from work or school. it was almost dark outside, about two hours after school had ended.
they left school late because wooyoung had taken too long to explain to a teacher about the incident but thankfully it didn't go to waste when the teacher said he was definitely going to do something about it.
yunho comes back with their drinks and they immediately grabbed them, drinking as if they haven't done so in years.
"so uh you guys really think something happened to jihyun noona?" jongho asks. "i mean, she told me that keychain meant a lot to her, and i'm pretty sure she would've ran all the way back there to get it if she realised she had dropped it." mingi replies him.
"are we being too paranoid? but lik–" wooyoung was cut off when his ringtone sounded. he took out his phone from his pocket, looking at his friends in confusion when he shows them that seonghwa is calling.
"hel–" "wooyoung, where are you?" wooyoung notes how frantic seonghwa sounds, before answering the older. "i–i'm at treasure cafe with yunho, mingi and jongho. why, hyung?"
"shit." seonghwa says, confusing wooyoung even more. "why, why, what's going on?" he asks the older. "it's jihyun. my cousin called saying she hasn't returned home yet. i thought maybe she was with you guys or something since i called yeosang and san and they said they weren't with her. she never comes home later than usual without texting first. my cousin told me she texted him saying she'd be home straight from school but it's been like two hours already and she's not back at youngmin hyung's place yet. i'm getting really worried," wooyoung frowns at this. he wanted to tell seonghwa to not worry and maybe jihyun just forgot but he couldn't because he, too, was worried.
"okay, so here's the thing hyung. so like i was walking down the street with the boys and um, how do i tell you this uh," wooyoung pauses, not wanting to tell seonghwa as he doesn't want seonghwa to get even more worried but he knows he has to. "what is it, wooyoung? tell me!" the older sounds impatient and wooyoung decides to just tell him.
"we uh, we found her teddy keychain just like, on the ground. like i don't know if she dropped it and didn't realise or–"
"dropped it?! there's no way she didn't realise it if she did! she always goes home with that teddy keychain in her hand! she says that it's very special to her and she would never go anywhere if she didn't have that keychain either in her hands or attached to her bag!" the older sounds even more panicked now than he did when he first spoke. the boys look at wooyoung expectantly, wanting an explanation about the serious conversation he seems to be having with seonghwa.
"so...what are you saying, hyung?" wooyoung cautiously asks the older, not wanting to hear what he thinks the older is going to tell him.
