three is the perfect number || jaenoren (norenmin)

douze

Renjun felt like lying down and falling asleep, right there in the hallway. Jeno had promised him some of his mother's home-brewed coffee the night before, so he'd skipped his usual morning cup. He was regretting it. Jeno was all but half an hour late. No, not to class, but he usually got to school an hour before it began, because of his stupid bus. Said stupid bus had obviously gotten stuck in some stupid traffic.

He made small talk with the equally tired girl putting away her books next to him, but soon even her girlfriend arrived and whisked her away. Renjun put on some very loud music and let it make ripples in his mind, but had to turn it off when it began to spark a headache. Oh, good god. Where was Jeno? He shut his eyes and leaned against his locker, making a half-assed promise to himself to head to class in five minutes.

"Injun? Jun? Please, stay with me, we can't have you passing away just yet. You have to help me study." His eyes shot open. A stranger was patting his cheek. A beautiful silver-haired stranger was patting him on the cheek and talking to him. His fight or flight reflexes activated, then deactivated just as fast. His eyes widened and he straightened almost painfully.

"Jeno?"

Renjun offically couldn't focus. He was all over the place.

It had taken all of five minutes for him to completely lose himself. Since that moment at the lockers, with Jeno grinning at him and patting his own hair, asking how it looked, Renjun had been seeing stars. The vague concept of a breakthrough had been throwing ropes around his mind, but he never let it lead him anywhere. And yet, his mind was still stuck on Jeno. Why? That was just weird. Annoyed, he'd had to verbally tell himself to please stop thinking, and had gotten a note from his teacher for disrupting class. 

Thankfully, the day was a half-day. He said goodbye to Jeno and Jaemin via text and jogged home. By the time he'd stumbled into his driveway, it was obvious to him he had two choices: either he could expend all his energy silencing what his mind was trying to tell him, or he could do the right thing for his mental health and sit himself down, consider the names floating around his mind. 

He entered the empty house, his keys cold in his hands. He could do this. He went up to his room and dropped his bag on the ground, falling into his desk. He could do this. He pulled a blank sheet of paper out of his drawer and cleared his throat, a blue pen in hand. 

In loopy writing, he wrote two names. 

The very fact that he was confused about two people confused him. It was disorientating. 

He decided to take it one step at a time. First, he circled Na Jaemin.  

His brows drew together in concentration. He blinked, and his mind was suddenly a collage of kind, mischievious smiles and a thousand shades of violet. Hazel brown eyes and heart-stopping touches. Na Jaemin, he circled again. I like him. Too much. Would declare my love for him a hundred times over. His thoughts fell apart into scribbles. Pretty. Funny. Thoughtful. Generous. Perfect. All the lovely things in the world. 

He'd filled half the page. This was half an idea. So here came the difficult part. How did Renjun feel about Jeno?  Right away, he circled the name and wrote HOME under it in block capitals. Seeing Jeno always felt like coming home. His mind split itself across the page in blue ink. Playgrounds. Empathy. Chocolate ice-cream Many, many eye-smiles. An arm around his shoulder. The promise of forever.

The pen fell from his hands, leaving a tiny streak on the page. He was afraid to write down what he felt, like there was no going back from the admission. His heart was weighing itself against the guilt in his chest. He didn't want to ruin anything. What he and Jeno had was perfect.