Fingers paused at their position hovering over the keys of a laptop. A sigh quickly followed as the owner of the fingers found himself drawing a blank as to what he was doing. His carpal tunnel was acting up and he felt the pulsating pains ripple from his shoulder down to his slim digits. The reason was that he had spent hours setting up a bank account; innocent enough if it weren't for the fact that he had faked all the information he had entered. He faked his name, age, gender and location, and though the logical part of him was screaming at him to stop, the defiant part of him ultimately won over him and made him confirm his account.

He sat back and glanced at all the items on his desk. He had been building a fake ATM slot for weeks now, and it was nothing less than perfect. He had gotten everything down to the exact color, the exact bolts, and the exact width and length of where the card was supposed to be inserted. What’s more, on the inside he had a series of wires and chips that were directly connected to the account he had just set up. He knew he should have felt guilty for what he was about to do, but he had his reasons. He picked up his disguise and pocketed his replica slot into the pocket of his hoodie, and set out to install it.

“What do you mean you don’t have enough?” the voice of the youngest member of their group asked in panic. Jonghyun sighed as his friends him when he declared he hadn’t brought enough money to pay for lunch. He had gotten his allowance the day before and because he was in such a good mood, he decided to treat his friends out to a meal. In retrospect, he should have been more careful with his money, seeing as he was now in the predicament of not being able to cover the whole bill.

“I didn’t expect for the tab to come out so high…,” he made a feeble excuse, which none of his friends were buying. They shared his feelings on how he should have been more careful since he was the one who was paying, and he didn’t even need them to vocalize it for him to know how they felt. He saw the eldest of the four of them shift uncomfortably when all eyes turned to him hopefully.

“Jonghyun said he was going to pay, so I didn’t bring any money,” he admitted timidly, making the others groan.

“Really, Jinki? And you’re always the one who’s the most careful!” Jonghyun heard a loud thunk and looked up to see the youngest with his head on the table.

“Come on Taemin, no need to be so dramatic,” the action would have stricken him as cute if it weren’t for the fact that they were now drawing attention. “Hurry up, people are beginning to stare,” Jonghyun quickly said to him while the last boy checked his wallet.

“I only have ten bucks. I don’t know where you’re going to get the other ten though,” he admitted, putting the crumpled up bill on the table. Jonghyun felt so much gratitude towards the younger that he felt tears well up in his eyes. Said boy was giving him a look that warned him not to let them fall, but Jonghyun knew that nothing would happen if he did. He hated the fact that he could be moved to tears so easily, but he blamed that on his passionate personality. Music was often the guilty source of his tears, the lyrics whether they be melancholy or bright, you could bet he’d be there with a faraway look on his face as he let the poetic words wash over him. Too bad it wasn’t music that was making him cry now.  

“Thanks Minho,” Jonghyun said weakly, adding it to the pile of his own money; it still wasn’t enough. He saw Taemin reach into his back pocket and pull out an even worse crumpled up dollar bill. Jonghyun wasn’t sure what difference a dollar would make, but the sentiment was appreciated.

“You know, if Taemin hadn’t ordered those edamames, we would have had enough for the bill,” Minho grumbled, making the youngest shoot up straight in his seat.

“HEY! Why are you putting the blame on me?! YOU’RE the one who ordered the most expensive dish on the menu!” He quickly retorted.

“Guys,--”  Jinki tried to interfere.

“Well, Jonghyun said he was going to pay! Of course I’ll take advantage of the opportunity!”

“Guys!” Jonghyun interrupted, rubbing his temples. The stress and frustration was giving him a headache, not to mention his anxiety was making him feel like crying even more. “I saw an ATM on the way here. I’ll just take some money from the emergency credit card my mom gave me.”

The other three boys quieted down, nodding slowly when realization settled in. They knew as well as Jonghyun did how strict his mom was on that credit card, but this was technically an emergency. Plus, it wasn’t like he was taking out a lot.

“Just...pretend to still be eating. I’ll be right back,” Jonghyun said, looking around to make sure no one was watching, before he walked out the door. The adrenaline that went through his body made him a bit light headed, and he was thankful for the cool evening breeze that hit his warm skin. Approaching the ATM, he didn’t think twice as he took the emergency credit card from his wallet and stuck it in the machine. He waited for the screen to light up with the acceptance of his card, and then punched in the codes. The screen read that the transaction was successful, but he didn’t see the money he took out file out in the slot.

“Huh, must be broken,” he mumbled, taking his card out and inspected it. He tried the machine next to it, his heartbeat quickening again when he saw that his balance read ‘$0.00.’ The last time Jonghyun checked, he had almost $400 saved for pure emergencies only. He knew that for a fact, because it took him a whole year after he stupidly purged his original balance back in middle school to restore the money. His mother grounded him for an entire month because of that, thus the hesitation to use the card in the first place. Giving him the credit card was a bit of a shocker to him anyway since they were tight on money, but she insisted that he needed to have it in case anything happened. The fact that the machine was telling him that he didn’t have any money sent his heart plummeting to his stomach, and there was no doubt about it that he had just been scammed. He prayed to whatever there was out there that the machines were lying to him.

Knowing that he couldn’t go back to restaurant empty handed, he quickly called up a friend of his that lived nearby to come bring him the cash. He bowed and thanked his friend for several minutes when he came by with the money, promising to repay him as soon as he could before sprinting to the restaurant before his friends thought he ditched them.

After paying, the boys left the place with exhausted expressions.

“All those in favor of never letting Jonghyun pay for food again, say ‘aye’,” Minho spoke up from the silence as they trudged through the neighborhood they all knew by heart.

“Aye,” they said in unison, including Jonghyun. He knew that sometime in the future he’d had to pay for their meals, but that wouldn’t be for another long while.

“Guys, what am I going to do? How am I going to explain to my mom that all the money in the card is gone? Do you know how long I’m going to be grounded for this? Might as well kiss me goodbye now, because this is probably the last time you’ll see me,” Jonghyun whined, falling behind the group.

“Maybe the machine was just broken? ATMs are never reliable, so the money is probably still there,” Jinki made an attempt at making the younger boy feel better.

“I don’t think so, if the machine said the first time that the transaction was successful, then someone must have put a false card slot with a scanner in it. You just got scammed,” Taemin said nonchalantly as he kicked a rock in his path, making the other three boys look at him with annoyance. He simply shrugged his shoulders and held his palms up in a defensive manner. “What? I’m right.”

“We’ll all come with you to tell your mom. She can’t yell at you that badly if all of us are there,” Jinki said, putting a hand on Jonghyun’s shoulder. The latter turned to them with tears in his eyes, his face already scrunching up as he let the hot liquid go.

“I love you guys,” he said, his voice cracking as he grabbed his hyung into a hug in one arm, pulling Minho with the other into it, who then pulled Taemin along with him.

“Yah, people are looking, you can let go of us,” Minho chuckled, lightly pulling them all away.

They all stood at Jonghyun’s doorstep, taking a deep breath as they braced themselves for the storm that was brewing inside.

When Jonghyun opened the door, he was surprised to see that his mother wasn’t standing there with her arms crossed, a frown on her face and her cheeks red from anger with some indication that she had found out about the credit card. Instead, she was in the kitchen frying some noodles for dinner.

“Jonghyun-ah, you’re home!” she greeted, turning around to look at him. Though she was relatively young, fine lines decorated the areas around her eyes and mouth. Noticing the other boys, she smiled and bowed slightly, which they then returned.

“Hi mom,” he greeted quietly. Usually he was very lively when he greeted her, and the action definitely did not go unnoticed. She only pursed her lips and didn't say anything else. Jonghyun decided not to tell her and the trio bowed and followed their host to his room.

When they got there, it was as if everyone went to their designated spot. Taemin plopped down on the bed, Minho sat on one of the bean bag chairs on the floor, Jinki joined him on the other one, and Jonghyun sat in the rolling chair at his desk.

“Not. A word,” he threatened, his head thrown back with his eyes closed. The three shared an amused look. They had known the small woman their whole lives and knew how scary she could get when upset. It was a hilarious thought that their best friend who was constantly pegged as the ‘manly’ one at school was deathly afraid of his mother.

“Of course not, hyung,” Minho said, but he was snickering silently.

“It could have gone way worse, she could have caught you right then and there. You weren’t exactly your usual self,” Taemin joined in with a grin, making the other two nod in agreement.

“Yeah, but she’s not dumb, she’s going to catch me sooner or later. How am I going to make up $400 before she notices?” Jonghyun whined, feeling hopeless. There was only $200 at the time when he lost it the first time, and it took him almost a whole year to make it up. Now how long would he be in debt for?

“Why don’t you take up tutoring?” the eldest suggested. “I get paid well for helping kids with their homework after school. And parents pay more when it’s private.”

“I don’t know,” Jonghyun admitted, pushing his chestnut hair from his face. “What would I even teach?”

“You’re good at English aren’t you?” Minho asked.

“Not good enough to teach someone else,” he replied grimly. He was perfectly average in all subjects with the exception of math. He was really bad at math.

The friends sat in silence as they racked their brains together to try to come up with a solution.

“What about music? You could do vocal classes,” Taemin suggested. Jonghyun’s ears turned red, an immediate indicator of his fluster, and turned away to avoid his eyes.

“I’m not that good, you know,” he mumbled, making Taemin shake his head.

“No hyung, you’re really good! Even Mrs. Park said that you sound like a professional!” the youngest went on. Mrs. Park was the school’s music teacher, and a personal favorite of Jonghyun. She treasured him as a student and he treasured her as a mentor.

“I don’t know how to teach someone how to sing,” he went on, rubbing his temples.

“You could...baby sit? Or walk dogs?” Jinki listed, running out of ideas pretty quickly. Jonghyun was old enough to get a job at a restaurant or convenience store, but knowing his friend's laziness, it wasn't an option. Jonghyun groaned, pouting as he sat straight in his chair.

“I guess I’ll do the tutoring,” he said. “English is just vocabulary anyway, and if I can teach someone younger I can give them all my old notes. I’m pretty sure they give them the same words every year.”

So for the rest of the evening, they spent it huddled around Jonghyun’s laptop trying to design a flyer. On Monday at school, the team split up to hang them up wherever they could. Jinki and Jonghyun were seniors while Minho and Taemin were juniors, but they handed them out to everyone they saw. The poster didn’t say anything special except that Kim Jonghyun was offering English tutoring services for $20 an hour, and then his number written on the bottom.

“Don’t you think 20 bucks is a bit outrageous for tutoring?” Taemin asked as they sat down for lunch. All the posters were successfully distributed, and ever since then Jonghyun had his eyes glued to his phone, awaiting a call or a text from a potential client. So far, he only got calls from girls hoping to get a date in with the excuse that they ‘didn’t know this was his number.’

“I think it’s cheap,” Minho pointed it out as he took a bite of his salad. “Most tutors charge like 30. 60 if they’re professional.” They all shrugged, eating their lunches in silence after that.

The young man sat back at his desk, a grin of accomplishment plastered on his face. The carpal tunnel was worth it; he had just scored $400.

The rest of the day went on as normally as it usually did, only Jonghyun wouldn’t stop compulsively checking his phone every three seconds. They agreed to hang out a Jinki’s place that day since his parents had made extra food for dinner, knowing that the friends alternated in whose house to hang out in. His apartment was slightly bigger than Jonghyun’s in the sense that the living room and kitchen were bigger. Otherwise, it was your typical two bedroom, two bathroom home.

Jinki was warming up the leftovers with Taemin while Minho and Jonghyun went ahead to Jinki’s room. Unlike the shorter male’s cluttered up small space, Jinki’s room was very organized. He had a small bed with a nightstand, a desk with many papers and extra plastic drawers on each side, and a small dresser. He had a few shelves adorned with trophies he had won in both academics and sports, but otherwise, his room was as simple as could be. Even the walls were still the standard eggshell white.

“No one is going to call,” Jonghyun groaned, already feeling like this idea was stupid. He wasn’t even confident in his tutoring abilities.

“What about all the calls you’ve been getting all day?” Minho asked draping himself over the rolling chair at Jinki’s desk.

“They weren’t for the tutoring,” he muttered, giving up and tossing his phone on the bed.

“Come on hyung, no one is going to respond right away,” the younger assured him, giving him a friendly pat on the shoulder. “Give it a day or two.”

Jonghyun figured it was best to listen to him. Besides, if it didn’t work out, walking dogs didn’t sound all that bad anymore. He left his phone in the room as they went to the kitchen when Jinki called for them, and then later spent several hours playing video games and eating snacks in the living room. Time passed really quickly when he was with his friends, which he struck him as amazing since they never got tired of each other.

When they got bored of playing, they all went back into Jinki’s bedroom. One of the great things about their friendship was that they didn’t have to talk to each other to hang out, and it wouldn’t be awkward. Minho and Taemin laid down on Jinki’s carpet to watch some anime Taemin was currently obsessing over, while Jinki sat at his desk and pulled out his laptop. Jonghyun sat on the bed with his phone, scrolling through Instagram mindlessly, until he noticed he had gotten a text message.

Seeing as it was an unknown number, he quickly got excited. He pulled down the notification bar to read the message, which said: “hi i saw your poster and i’d like to take up tutoring with you.”

“Guys, someone texted,” he broke the silence, sitting up. The boys lazily turned around to look at him with mild interest.

“Cool, text them back,” Taemin yawned, turning his attention back to his phone. Jonghyun rolled his eyes and bit his bottom lip. Would it make him look desperate if he texted back too fast? Would it throw the person off? What if they lost interest? Maybe he should wait a few minutes. But what if he waited too long and they suddenly decided that they didn’t want to be tutored anymore?

Jonghyun anxiously drummed his fingers on his knees as he stared at the time on his phone. He decided he would wait five minutes. Five minutes was reasonable! He could appear mildly busy, but not busy enough to not reply. When the time finally came, he quickly texted back, “hey! :D thank you for taking an interest! we can start as soon you’d like. can i get your name?”

He mentally hit himself after he hit send without proofreading his message. What if it sounded too childish? He groaned, falling back on the bed as he waited for a response.

Five minutes turned to ten, then twenty, and finally an hour with nothing. And by nothing, he meant nothing from that same number. More people called and texted, but they were only to get his attention. He ignored all of them and waited for his ‘client,’ but by then, Jonghyun had begun to worry that he really scared them away with his dumb over-enthusiastic typing style. He even sulked on the way home after biding his friends goodbye.

He tossed his phone on his bed, deciding it was for the best that he didn’t worry about it. Someone else was bound to answer his poster, maybe they were just shy. He accompanied his sister to the grocery store while she picked up some stuff, then helped his mom make dinner. He forgot all about checking his phone for a few hours while he occupied himself with other things.

He took a shower and played some videogames, then tried to study for a bit, before he got bored of that. It was nearing midnight but to him it might as well have been 8:00. He went on Facebook on his laptop, typing comments on photos here, occasionally poking someone back, switching tabs to check on his music. His eyes began to burn around 2 in the morning, and he decided that maybe he should try to sleep.

He got himself comfortable in bed, and plugged his phone into it’s charger, then woke the screen up to check its notifications. The several group chats he was in were the first lined up, but their messages had stopped sending hours ago--probably because they all went to sleep. He skimmed through them quickly, sending his answers as if he wasn’t just 5 hours late to the conversation. An unread message from the unknown number from before caught his eyes, and he felt his heartbeat quicken.

It was sent maybe 4 hours ago, but Jonghyun wasn’t on his phone then. The message was short and it sort of made him irritated. One of the things he hated was short replies, especially when he was trying to get information.

“Cool. my name is kibum. i dont really care when we start.”

Jonghyun rolled his eyes, typing back, “we can meet in the library after school if that’s okay. we don’t have to start working right away, i just want to meet you.” If that sounded creepy or not, he didn’t care because his eyes were begging him to close them. He saved the number onto his phone and then scrolled through other notifications despite his eyes’ disapproval. They were mostly just likes and comments on his Instagram photos. He went on Tumblr for a little to see what he missed, replied to a few people and reblogged one or two aesthetic photos, before this so called Kibum’s name came up again.  

“thats fine with me. but why aren’t you sleeping? its almost 3 in the morning.”

That caught him off guard. Why would someone who didn’t even know him want to know why he was up so late?

“i don’t sleep.” He bit his lip, rolling the plump skin around his tongue as he waited for a few minutes, wondering if he’d get another text.

“ya i got that but why?”

“idk. my thoughts keep me up sometimes.”

“that lol.”

The lack of empathy really made Jonghyun annoyed. It’s not like he needed anyone’s pity, his insomnia wasn’t really a big deal, but the least this guy could do was act like he cared. He was about to leave it at that, when another text came in.

“what do you think about?”

“life, school, disappointments, insecurities. the usual.”

Maybe it was because it was late and his brain wasn’t at it’s 100% alertness, but he wasn’t sure why he was telling him all this. They didn’t know each other, and he doubted the other boy really cared to know either.

“oh wow lol. deep.”

“why aren’t YOU asleep?”

“i was working on something but im done now so im actually gonna head to bed.”

“oh okay i won’t keep you. goodnight! can’t wait to meet you tomorrow :D”

“lol you too.”

Jonghyun put his phone back face down on the table, staring at the ceiling. He wondered what this Kibum would look like. He was actually a bit nervous, since he never had to meet someone like this before. It felt like he was going on a blind date except this wasn’t for romantic purposes plus the guy sounded kind of lame. Jonghyun let the fantasy of their confrontation lull him to sleep, two hours before he was supposed to wake up. It wasn’t a surprise to him when he woke up with a headache the following day.

ta-dah!!! :D i promised it wouldn't be gone for long and it isnt! here is the new and improved chapter 1. you're probably thinking, what did you change? well i'll tell you: chapters 1-4 ish i think? anyway they were combined in one long chapter. so hurray! second, more detail and the chapters are acutally going to be named instead of just chapter 1 2 3 etc...

i was battling with myself on whether to just take everything down and start over but then i don't want to lose all the kind comments i have received from you guys. i prooooobably should have thought about that before >.> also for those of you who have already read the previous version, not much has changed so if you just want to wait until chapter 8 is up, thats when all the new stuff is. (but if you want to read it again thats cool too) anyway thank you again for your support and please give me advice on what i should do T_T please read on to see what happens next<3

edited ^^