Everyone must be blind. How am I the only one to see this? Sunggyu thought as he gnawed on the lettuce wrap that his friend had made for him. Everyone thinks he’s so great. So sweet. But they don’t notice …Right there! The eyes darted around again, scanning the room for people’s reactions. The corner of the mouth twitched, threatening to fall down into a frown. That’s what happens when you force such a fake smile on your face 24/7. You get tired of it. They don’t notice that he’s giving them what they want. And that’s not who he really is.

I’m not falling for his trap . Sunggyu’s friend poured him a drink and he swallowed it greedily, wiping his mouth of the soju that spilled over. I’ve had enough. I’m done with this. I’m done with Nam Woohyun.

“I’m quitting the club,” Sunggyu declared as he slammed his glass back down onto the table.

“What?!” Sungyeol gasped. “Why?”

Sunggyu brought his hands to his temples, rubbing the sides of his head gingerly. But the throbbing in his head did not yield. Instead it was becoming faster, more intense as the blood boiled in his veins. “Because I’ve had enough,” he slurred. “I’m done.”

“Enough of what?’ Sungyeol asked. Sunggyu ignored him and got up from the table, determined to leave everything behind him. Everything, including his wallet, which his friend picked up before chasing him out of the restaurant. Sungyeol was close behind too. He caught Sunggyu as the elder drunkenly stumbled backwards, almost falling.  “You’ve had enough to drink. That’s for sure,” he grumbled as he pulled his hyung back up onto his feet. “Why did you drink so much?” Sungyeol groaned. Sunggyu had fallen backwards again, and Sungyeol had caught him last minute.

Sunggyu’s arms suddenly flew up, nearly clipping the other’s nose, but he didn’t care. He wanted to show everybody the source of each one of all his problems. Sunggyu pointed straight at Nam Woohyun, who was on the other side of the window, still in the restaurant and unconcerned about all the grief he was causing everyone around him.

“Me? It’s me?” His friend asked, pointing at herself. She pouted. “What did I do?”

“No, Kate, behind you,” Sunggyu slurred, leaning against Sungyeol and nearly passing out on him.

Kate whipped her head around and narrowed her eyes, looking through the window. But once she caught sight of what her friend meant, she groaned, “Ugh! You’re kidding me! Nam Woohyun again !”

Yes, it was Nam Woohyun again. It was always Nam Woohyun. And it all started last year. He was on the bus with Kate, minding his own business, trying to catch some sleep. But then his friend cooed, freaking cooed at 7 o’clock in the morning.

“So cute,” Kate spoke in a high-pitched voice. Sunggyu peeled open one eye and stared at her wordlessly. However, she paid no heed to his burning one-eyed gaze and kept facing forward, smiling warmly. Sunggyu needed both of his eyes open to see what captivated his friend’s attention.

It was a boy, around his age, with bright blonde hair which was almost as bright as the smile that was on his face. Too bright, like florescent lights, and it hurt Sunggyu’s eyes to stare at it too long, both the hair and the smile. They were too fake. But the boy had gotten up from his seat on the bus, offering it to a pregnant lady who had just boarded at the last stop.

Sunggyu directed his gaze back to his friend and smirked. Kate blushed and hugged the bag in her lap tightly to her chest. “Don’t judge,” she warned him.
Sunggyu crossed his arms over his chest and scoffed, “Oh, I’m judging.” But he wasn’t judging his friend. No, not her. He faced forward again and fixed his gaze. Sunggyu was already busy passing judgement on that blonde boy, and the verdict was almost in.

“He just gave his seat to that pregnant lady,” Kate excused herself for having cooed earlier. “It’s sweet.”

It would seem to be that way. But being a man, Sunggyu knew a thing or two about his own gender that Kate would not. For example, some men are nothing but wolves in sheeps’ clothing. Especially this one. He looked cute and gentle with that fluffy, light-colored hair, but even in his smile, he couldn’t hide his wolfish nature. His protruding canines were showing. Now, he was talking to a pretty girl, who struck up a conversation with him after he gave his seat up. Of course, girls like nothing more than a guy who seems sympathetic and sensitive. But Sunggyu looked down to the pregnant woman. She was subtly plugging her nose, trying to be polite, but the man sitting next to her looked as if he hadn’t bathed in days. And judging by the woman’s reaction, he smelt like it too. And so the cute boy escaped the horrid stench while looking like a gentleman and catching the attention of a pretty, young woman. Sunggyu looked back at his friend and sneered, “Yea I’m sure he did that with no ulterior motive.”

Kate rolled her eyes. “It’s way too early for your cynicism,” she remarked. She then gestured over to the blonde boy. “He seems like a sweet guy, whereas you are giving me absolutely no legroom.” Kate dropped her gaze to their legs. Sunggyu had his spread widely, pushing Kate’s legs up against the bus’ wall. “Move!” Kate demanded as she wiggled and tried to move Sunggyu’s legs over. But he was stubborn, as always. “Move.”

The only reason why his legs moved was to get off the bus once they reached their stop.

It just so happened to be the wolf’s stop too (which really shouldn’t be much of a surprise because it was a line that went to the University). But Sunggyu still watched him carefully. As soon as the wolf stepped off from the bus, the corners of his mouth dropped, and he was frowning deeply. Right, this is how you really are . Sunggyu didn’t say those words out loud, but he felt like he had when the wolf’s head suddenly snapped around and their gazes me. Sunggyu stayed rooted where he was and held the gaze. He wasn’t afraid. He wouldn’t let himself fall prey to the wolf either. The blonde boy’s gaze faltered, and he walked away. But not before the corner of his mouth twitched.

“I caught you,” Sunggyu muttered below his breath as he watched the other walk away. “Umph!” The air escaped out of his lungs when someone ran into his back.

“Come on,” Kate said as she walked around from his back to his front. “There’s someone that I want you to meet.” She then spun on her heels and walked ahead, expecting Sunggyu to follow her, which he did. He didn’t know where else to go. It was his first day at the University.

Sunggyu had spent the last two years completing his service in the army. After finishing high school, he felt like his life lack directed and so he deferred his acceptance to the University. He thought that he would gain perspective and life experience after serving his time, but all he got was more confused about what he wanted in life and a new set of curse words. Luckily, Kate was there to guide him around the University. He and Kate met when they were children. Her family had immigrated to Korea when her father took a job at the same company as Sunggyu’s own father. Sunggyu’s parents sort of pressed upon him to become friends with the foreigner so that she’d feel “more at home.” It wasn’t so hard. Kate was nice enough and easy-going. But he didn’t like how after all of these year, in spite of her being a year younger, she never used formal speech with him or called him “Oppa.” She cited that it was because she was an American, and age didn’t matter over there. But she’d been in Korea for over a decade, and Sunggyu had heard to talk formally and respectfully to other people, even calling some men “oppa.” But never him. Even now she was talking to him like that: “Yah! Kim Sunggyu! Hurry up!”

Kate waved at Sunggyu to quickly come to her side. She was at the foot of some stairs and standing next to a rather tall, lanky guy, who was also waving to Sunggyu (but with a confused look in his eyes, as if he didn’t know why he was waving). Sunggyu jogged up to them, and when he reached them, Kate point to the tree-like man. “Meet my lackey!” She announced.

“Hi, I’m Kim Sunggyu,” he introduced himself and stretched out his hand for the other to take. “What’s your name?”

“Lackey!” Kate interrupted just as the tree man opened his mouth.

“I have a real name,” her lackey whined, but there was still a wide grin on his face. The poor guy must be used to her teasing after a year.

Kate stuck out her tongue. “Don’t care,” she retorted and she ran up the stairs.

Once she was out of sight, Sunggyu turned to the other. “So…”

“My name is Lee Sungyeol,” he was finally able to say. He took Sunggyu’s hand and shook it.

“Nice to meet you, Sungyeol.” Sunggyu pulled back his hand and looked the other up and down. It was strange. Besides himself, Kate rarely had male friends, and now she had gotten herself a male slave (her own words, not his). And now meeting her slave for the first time, Sungyeol hardly seemed like a pushover. “How did you become Kate’s lackey?” He asked.

Sungyeol shook his head and muttered, “I don’t even know.”

But later Sunggyu did know why. It became increasingly obvious that Lee Sungyeol was , in fact, a major pushover. Whether it was holding her bookbag as she rummaged through her locker...

Kate asked, “Can you hold this?” only after dropping her heavy bookbag into her slave’s arms.

...or finding a book on the highest shelf at the library…

Kate had tried to get it herself while jumping up and down (but she just scarcely reached the shelf right above her head). Sungyeol was already reaching for the book when she finally asked in an exasperated voice, “Can you get that?”

...or lending her a pen when hers had run out of ink…

It was more like the pen was stolen right out of his hands. Kate was hastily taking notes during a lecture, and when her pen had died on her, she grabbed Sungyeol’s pen right out of his hand and then asked, “Can I use this?”

...or letting her eat his food…

While they were sitting in the cafeteria, Kate kept pilfering french fries from her slave and only after the third fry was stuffed into did she ask, “Can I eat this?” Sungyeol nodded.

...in each and every case, Sungyeol would give into Kate. Why?

Kate smiled brightly and tapped the other gently on the arm. “Thank you,” she said in a soft voice. And that, Sunggyu assumed was the reason. Sungyeol wasn’t just a pushover, he was whipped.

But back to the matter at hand: why did Sunggyu have a problem with Nam Woohyun. Well, like Kate had “enslaved” her poor friend Sungyeol, Woohyun seemed to have enslaved the entire campus. They all seemed to bend to his will, and they would do anything for that smile of his. At least Kate was a good and kind “master.” She would often help Sungyeol with his studies, she would go along with Sungyeol on his “adventures” (or that’s what he called them), and she seemed to genuinely care about him. Sunggyu couldn’t say the same for Woohyun. He was cold, calculating. Sunggyu once overheard him saying “why should I be grateful when I never asked for this in the first place?” He took others and their kindness for granted, and that’s what bothered Sunggyu the most.

What also bothered him was the chilling look on Woohyun’s face when the smile fell from it. The change was too drastic, going from a sunshine-like grin to a visage as dark as the other side of the moon. It was scary. That coldness, that was who he really was in Sunggyu’s mind. Yet everyone acted like he was a gentle little lamb that needed to be protected from the harsh world.

Bull . Sunggyu saw how Woohyun played others with his very own eyes. In fact, he tried to play Sunggyu once. In the end, Woohyun’s ploy worked, but not to his desired effect. Why? Because Sunggyu made sure to reveal his true character in the process.

It was the first time Sunggyu had ever interacted with Woohyun, and it was already on uneasy terms. They were in a class about managerial strategies, and they had to make a group presentation. Fantastic. Sunggyu was already busting his , trying to readapt to the life of a student and wanting to prove to people that his two year hiatus wasn’t due to lack of smarts. And now he had to carry an entire team on his back. His groupmates were already looking at him to take the lead on the project as he was the oldest and most diligent, especially Nam Woohyun. In fact, Woohyun was the one who started chanting “Leader Kim” and disrupting the whole class. That was Woohyun’s first appeal. His second appeal came in the form of cluelessness. Sunggyu had to explain the project to him in full detail before Woohyun finally seemed to understand it. Then he kept asking Sunggyu where to look for sources for research, if he could translate the English for him, and he even pretended to be a tech dummy, fumbling to put a simple charger into his computer. It was all a rouse to look hopeless so that someone else would shoulder his part of the presentation. And it worked. Sunggyu got fed up and told Woohyun not to even bother, he’d do the slides himself. He even held a group meeting and didn’t invite Woohyun. They didn’t need him.

When the other member of their group (Hodong? Howon? Ho-something) asked where Woohyun was, Sunggyu said, “Oh I must’ve forgotten.”

“I’ll message him then,” Ho-something responded, much to Sunggyu’s chagrin. How could no one else see that Woohyun had no intention of doing any work for this presentation? “Oh,” Hojong mumbled moments later. “He’s out drinking.”

Sunggyu glanced up at the clock and scoffed. It was just barely an appropriate time for drinking. And their presentation was in two days. He really didn’t seem to plan on working for it.  “It’s okay. We don’t need him,” Sunggyu declared. “We’re almost done.”

“He’s on his way. He’s nearby,” Hosoo commented. “Should I tell him not to come?”

Sunggyu sighed as he put the final touches on the slides. “It’s too late now. Let him come. I need to give him his script anyway.” He sighed again as he closed out of the program. “Woohyun will get an A on this project without doing any of the work, isn’t that something?”

“It is,” his partner agreed.

A few moments later, the doors to the study room burst open, and there was Woohyun looking bleary-eyed and frazzled. “Why didn’t you tell me you were meeting?” He asked, out-of-breath. Sunggyu looked him up and down. Woohyun didn’t even have his laptop with him, or anything else to do work with.

“It’s finished,” Sunggyu ignored the question. He was packing up his things as he continued, “I emailed you the script for the presentation. Just memorize that for Monday, and we’ll be fine.” He zipped up his bag and slung it over his shoulder. “See you in class.”

But before he closed the door behind him, he heard Hosung say to Woohyun, “You’re getting a free ride. Be grateful.” Sunggyu fist pumped to himself. He finally convinced someone to see his side.

But what he heard next ripped out all of the joy from him: “Why should I be grateful when I never asked for this in the first place?”

Right. Why did I even expect a ‘thank you’? Sunggyu thought. He doesn’t care about anybody but himself.

Things had only gotten worse from that point. Yes, they all received A’s on the presentation, but Woohyun took credit and was praised for Sunggyu’s hard work. Sunggyu hadn’t quite sullied Woohyun’s reputation like he had planned. His script must’ve been too good, and Woohyun’s performance was spectacular. In the end, Sunggyu only managed to convince Hoyang of Woohyun’s devilish side. Woohyun, on the other hand, managed to ruin Sunggyu’s standing.

The teacher was handing back their assignments, but she skipped over Sunggyu. At the end of class, Sunggyu had asked where his paper was. “I never received it,” Professor Kang simply answered. “So you got a zero.”

“What?!” Sunggyu exclaimed. “I handed it in! Are you sure that you don’t have it?”

Professor Kang glared up at the student. “Are you implying that I lost it?”

“Ah no,” Sunggyu quickly denied. “I know that I handed it in. I remember giving it to…” And that’s when he remembered: the student who collected their papers that day was none other than Nam Woohyun. “...that bastard.”

“Excuse me?”

“Ah sorry,” Sunggyu gathered himself again. “I have the document still on my computer. It’ll have the date of when I last made changes to it.”

“Alright,” the professor yielded. “I normally don’t accept late assignments. But since you were my top student, I’ll make an exception. Send it to me.”

“Thank you! Thank you,” Sunggyu repeated as he sat back down at the desk and began pulling out his laptop to send the document to her. “If you don’t mind me asking,” he began as he waited for his computer to warm up. “You said I was your top student. Did that change?”

“Eung,” Professor Kang answered as she gathered up her things. “With the most recent assignment, Nam Woohyun had the highest grade.”

“Huh?” Sunggyu stopped typing and looked up from his screen, but his teacher already left the room.

He slammed his fist on the table. “That bastard took my paper!”

Those were the two worst instances when Sunggyu was wronged by Nam Woohyun, but there were others. Like when Nam Woohyun made him stub his toe when he “accidentally” ran into him. Yea right, nothing about Nam Woohyun was accidental. It was all purposeful and planned. However, whenever he would bring up the evilness that was Nam Woohyun to Kate, she would dismiss it. She swore that Sunggyu was falsely attributing things to Nam Woohyun and had a “confirmation bias” (why was he friends with a Psych major who liked to diagnose him now?).

“You can’t fault Nam Woohyun for being cute,” she argued. To her (like to everyone else), that’s all Nam Woohyun was. He was cute, he was friendly, and he had a dorky side. In their eyes, he was like a Corgi that had turned into a human so that even when he bites, he was always easily forgiven.

“Yes, I can,” Sunggyu retorted. What does Kate know? She’s not from around here. She doesn’t know how two-faced people can be .

Kate rolled her eyes. “That’s just a part of who he is. That’s his nature to be the most adorable being on the planet,” she fought back. Sunggyu scoffed at that. Kate sighed and shook her head. “Just like it’s your nature to be the crankiest. But look, I still hang out with you,” she pointed out.

“Thank you for that sacrifice,” Sunggyu said, voice dripping with sarcasm.

But it was all lost on the foreigner. “You’re welcome!” She chirped, before dashing towards her favorite “tree” on campus. “Hey Sungyeol,” she called out to her slave. “There’s something that I wanted to ask you.”

“Yes,” Sungyeol responded expectantly. But all his hopes were dashed when Kate pulled out a book from her bag.

“Do you know how to solve this problem?” she asked as she flipped to a page in the book. She showed it to the other while pouting. “I’m stuck.”

Sungyeol barely glanced at the page. “Nope,” he answered and walked away. Kate stood there, speechless at her slave’s defiance. But the slave’s rebellion didn’t last for long. He came back to his master with a cheeky grin on his face. He took the book from her hands. “But I can try,” he offered.

“Thank you,” she said as she usually did.

Sunggyu sighed as he watched the two walk over to a table to solve the problem together. Trying to reveal the wolf’s true nature was as useless as Sungyeol’s rebellion. Sungyeol would always come back to his master, and everyone would always see Woohyun as being harmless.

But he won’t fall for the trap.

The last straw came that night, when Sunggyu became obscenely drunk. Ever since Woohyun joined their Conversational English Club (which was more like a dinner club than anything else), the people around Sunggyu seemed to become more enamored with him. He even felt like Kate and Sungyeol were falling prey to him. But no one was bigger prey for Nam Woohyun than Kim Sunggyu.

That night, there was a girl named Inha who was stuck to Woohyun’s side for most of the night. Then, Woohyun leaned over and whispered something into her ear. Sunggyu noted how his canines practically glistened at that moment in the dim lighting. He was on the prowl. Inha mouthed “Really?” to Woohyun, and he nodded adamantly, pointing over in Sunggyu’s direction.

“See, he’s watching you now,” Woohyun spoke loudly.

Inha’s chair fell to the floor as she quickly got up and asked Kate (who was sitting to Sunggyu) if they could switch seats. Kate tried to get up, but Sunggyu had pulled her back down. He had heard stories about Inha from his seniors. She was a girl who developed obsessive crushes in a blink of an eye. Normally, they were short but intense, like a bolt of lightning burning whatever it touches to a crisp. And Sunggyu was in no mood to be fried by Inha’s fiery passion. Why did Woohyun essentially attach a lightning rod to his back?

Luckily, Kate got the hint and sat back down. “Sorry,” she apologized to Inha. “I don’t get to see this friend very often. We have a lot of catching up to do,”she lied.

“That’s okay,” Inha said as she walked over to the end of the table. She pulled a chair from the table next to them and placed it on the other side of Sunggyu. Inha sat down and placed both elbows on the table, cupping her cheeks cutely with her hands. “I never get to see this friend. We have a whole ton of catching up to do.” She giggled. “Hi, Sunggyu-ssi.”

Sunggyu groaned and pushed his empty cup towards Kate, silently asking for a refill. Once she did, he chugged it down while glaring at Nam Woohyun. “I’m quitting the club!” He announced, slamming the cup back down onto the table. He’d had enough of Nam Woohyun and his antics.

Quitting school just to avoid one person would be a bit dramatic, but he could quit the club to avoid seeing the wolf during his free time. He just wanted a moment’s reprieve from Nam Woohyun and his loyal followers. He just wanted to be free. And now Sunggyu felt like he was as he was stumbling back home drunkenly with the help of Sungyeol. He had escaped from the wolf’s den alive, and after this semester, he may never see the beast again.