too early to be Innocent ~

"He is such a grumpy jerk—who does he think he is?"Siju muttered the words under his breath, his heels clicking sharply against the cold tile of the apartment corridor.

The frustration burned hot in his chest, yet as he turned the key to his own front door, a sudden wave of quiet washed over him.

The anger began to soften, replaced by a lingering image that he could not shake. Although he was a little angry, he repeatedly remembered the man’s beauty.

In the dim, silver glow filtering through the hallway window, Jungkook’s face seemed etched from marble.

Siju closed his eyes for a fraction of a second, picturing the way the sharp angles of the man's jawline caught the stray beams of moonlight. He looked ethereal, almost untouchable, standing there in the quiet dark.

"Get a grip," Siju whispered to the empty room, shaking his head to clear the thought. "Well, I should go to my room now."

He kicked off his shoes and walked down the short hallway, the heavy silence of the new apartment pressing in on him. He kept thinking about this all the way until he reaches his room.

Collapsing onto the edge of his unmade bed, Siju let out a long, ragged exhale. The sheer exhaustion of moving into a new city was finally catching up to him, making his limbs feel like lead.

"Ooh, I’m really tired," he groaned, casting a look toward the kitchen counter where his takeout container sat. "I would eat it all in one sitting."

He dragged himself back up, unwrapping the food with practiced hunger. Then he starts eating his food comfortably, savoring the familiar flavors in an unfamiliar place.

The quiet was almost peaceful—until a sharp, heavy thud reverberated through the wall, followed by a muffled, scraping sound.

Siju froze, a piece of food halfway to his mouth. While eating, he suddenly hears a voice from the adjacent apartment. It was low, strained, and entirely chaotic.

That room belongs to Jungkook, and Siju knows this. "What was that noise?? Is he ok?" Siju's heart hammered against his ribs.

It was his first night in the city, and this sound frightened him. The unfamiliarity of the building amplified every shadow, turning the strange crash into something ominous. He stared at the shared wall, torn between self-preservation and an annoying, persistent sense of worry.

"I don't care what he does," Siju lied to himself, setting his food down with trembling fingers. "He's not even nice enough for me to go and talk to him."

The silence that followed the crash was louder than the noise itself.

Minutes ticked by.

Still, after suppressing all the fear, he musters courage to open the gate of his apartment and starts moving towards Jungkook's gate.The hallway felt longer this time, swallowed by a heavy, breathless stillness.

He walks up to his gate, his hand hovering over the cold metal handle of Jungkook's door. He pauses in the hush of the moment—the world outside fading into absolute nothingness.

And then, with a quiet longing he didn't care to admit, he lets his knuckles whisper against the door.

At first, there was no sound; then, a short while later, the gate opened.

The heavy door swung backward, and as the gate opens, he finds himself face to face with someone breathtaking—even more radiant under the hush of the night.

Jungkook stood in the threshold, framed by the dim amber light of his living room. Soft strands of hair fall across his eyes, swaying gently as a tender breeze passes by from an open window down the hall.

Their eyes meet—for a brief two seconds, yet long enough to stir something unspoken between them. The tension in the air was thick, a volatile mix of defensive pride and a sudden, magnetic gravity.

Jungkook crossed his arms, his eyes narrowing as he took in the sight of his new neighbor."What are you doing here food store boy?"

Jungkook’s voice was a low, gravelly rasp that cut through the silence. "Have I stolen anything from you, have I stolen anything to eat?"

Hearing all this, he is taken aback for a moment and begins to stare at the man. Siju’s jaw tightened. The blatant hostility hit him like a cold splash of water, washing away the fleeting romance of the moonlight.

After a few seconds of heavy, suffocating silence, Siju found his voice."Have you truly lost your mind—or did the morning slip so easily from your sight?"

Siju stepped closer, refusing to let the man intimidate him. "I was there, in the quiet hours, carrying pieces of my life into those walls—right beside yours. I'm not a stranger... I'm the one who moved in next door."

Jungkook listens—yet wears the mask of indifference, as if none of it reaches him. His expression remained a flawless, icy slate, completely detached from Siju's indignation.

Before he can finish, jungkook cuts in with his own words, cool and distant—pretending he has no desire to know him, no interest at all.

"Whoever you are, why have you come to my door? Will you tell the truth now?"

Jungkook leaned against the doorframe, a mocking tilt to his head. "And on top of that, you stole my drink—and now you're standing at my gate. Who knows what you're up to?"

Hearing all this, he gets extremely annoyed and asserts, his voice rising in pitch. "I paid for this drink, and I was the first one to lay my hands on it! And most importantly—I didn't come here just to look at your face—the one that all the girls swoon over."Siju threw his hands up in exasperation.

"I came here because I heard a noise coming from your room in the apartment. And I got scared. Now, tell me: what was that sound?"

Jungkook's expression darkened. Without answering, jungkook grab his gate to close it. "I have no desire to explain where those sounds came from—this is my room, my space; we can do as we please here,"

Jungkook snapped, his voice dropping into a harsh, warning register. "And you... you're free to leave."

Both of them get very annoyed with each other and start moving towards their respective rooms. The heavy click of their respective doors locking shut echoed like a final declaration of war.

Safe inside his own space, Siju paced the floor, his face burning with a mix of anger and embarrassment."What a total jerk! I have no idea why I even came here. I just hope I never have to see his face again..." But even as the curse left his lips, his mind betrayed him.

"His face..." Siju leaned his head against the cool glass of his bedroom window, staring out at the jagged skyline. "I don’t know why my eyes refuse to leave it. What is it about him? He’s so rude—and yet,

somehow... so impossibly beautiful."

"Oh no, forget it, what are you thinking?" Siju scolded himself out loud, burying his face in his hands to hide a blush that no one was there to see.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the wall, Jungkook stood in the center of his dark apartment. The silence here felt suffocating now, heavy with an unsettling energy that made his skin crawl."Ahh, I feel... strange," Jungkook muttered to the empty room.

The air felt thick, the remnants of the strange noise still lingering like a foul odor. "Maybe I should step outside for a while."

With that, he pulls up his hoodie—the dark fabric obscuring his face—and slips past the gate, as if the night might quiet what he cannot name. He stepped out into the cool midnight air, seeking the solace of the shadows to calm the storm brewing in his chest.

...----------------...

Half an hour after he leaves the house, the wail of police sirens begins to rise—echoing from the direction of the forest, cutting through the silence of the night.

The sharp, rhythmic shrieks tore the midnight peace to shreds, waking birds from the canopy and sending a chill down the spine of anyone listening.

In that forest, a cold wind drifted through—like the eerie calm before a storm breaks. The trees groaned under the sudden gust, their leaves whispering secrets of what had just transpired beneath their branches.

Everything lay scattered, disturbed, at the place where the police arrived. High-powered flashlights cut through the dense thicket, illuminating crushed brush, torn fabric, and deep, uneven tracks in the mud. The atmosphere was thick with dread.

Then one of the officers spoke, low and certain, his flashlight beam locking onto a fresh, definitive footprint that led away into the dark.

"Sir... someone was here before us."

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