Lie 001

“Telling someone you aren’t the one.”

The girl sat on the side of the classroom close to the outside world, eyes boring her wooden desk. Her right foot lightly tapped the floor in an arrhythmic pattern. Her small, stubby fingers held onto a black ballpoint pen, twirling it at a slow pace. Her eyes frantically flickered back and forth, trying firmly to concentrate on the sheets of paper sprawled in front of her. They were inked with black and red as the yellow highlights emphasized the key points made during discussion.

A plastic, red wristwatch wrapped around her tan skin. 6:56am. 4 minutes left before the teacher of authority shows up. A mention of a pop quiz will erupt out of his mouth. In a span of every two Fridays there was always a one-sided piece of paper testing if we knew the recent calculus unit. It so happened to be open-response, the worst option of them all if you were a lost fish at sea. The word ‘pop’ lost its true meaning in the essence of the first two months. She stickered all the Fridays that there would be a quiz in her floral agenda, but not everyone knew about it. A whiny high-pitched complaint came from a skinny, tall girl on the opposite perimeter of the room. She’s screwed.

The girl’s stomach had acid crashing on her walls harshly trying to maintain homeostasis. She felt queasy and nauseous this morning. Why? She studied meticulously on all the formulas that would most likely be on the quiz. Three godly hours were spent studying the materials yesterday night. The confidence to pass with flying colors was instilled in her system, so why?

“Did you see that picture with Baekhyun?” The girl whipped her eyes to the girl who asked that question to her group of friends and swiftly looked back at her integration formula sheet.

She had a worse case of the stomach bug every time a sentence comes out talking about a rumour ー an unknown girl sitting side by side with prince Baekhyun.

Her eyes would bat her curled eyelashes and move on, but she had no ounce of courage in her to do so. Fear ー an emotion she despised. No matter how much confidence she held for academics, none was spared to deal with that rumour. Not when Jieun was the newfound celebrity of the day every student was trying to decipher. At least no one would suspect it’s me.

Slander and insults, she heard every single one within her radius. The light, tiny hairs on her back would stand up as she felt a chill, picturing other girls gossiping. The school girls were like beasts, blood thirsty and will pounce at any obstacles unfavorable for them. They were the worse when it involved their six princes. And it happened that she hit the unlucky jackpot meeting up with the number two prince.

Her palm laid on the side of her puffy cheek, suppressing the urge to bite her fingernails. Her tongue poked and circled her inner check. The intense pain she was never accustomed to made her cringe as she recalled all the negative words aimed indirectly at her.

Jieun was captured and stuck in a sticky web of gossip, experiencing a tragic drama. She has never felt investigated and bare that a small gust of air would increase her heart rate. Who is she to combat the rumour and stand up to a large student body and say, “I’m the girl, the one in the dark picture.” Calculating the possible predictions in her head, she would most likely lose an ear and lots of strands of hair in the matter of seconds. The other option less physical would result in less acute pain and blood would be losing her dignity for spouting unrealistic lies and becoming a laughing stock. Contradicting when it was solely their imaginative mind creating non-viable scenarios based off a blurry dark photo that could be any girl in a baggy sweatshirt. Thank goodness.

She had taken a simple glance of the flyer passing through the hallway. Her side profile was hidden, however, the locks of black hair deducted the gender to be the opposite of him. Baekhyun was visibly clear in the photo as his brown strands of hair and frontal view of his face staring into the girl’s profile. No option was possible to take without being detested upon with unwanted attention. The only reasonable solution that she can use was based on the Red-Queen hypothesis to gain upper hand ー ignore and allow it to die over the weekend with a new rumour to circulate through the hallways. She wouldn’t gain anything, but she technically wouldn't be at a loss. Like a fire that ignites, the flames eventually will fade.

The girl’s throat constantly itched as the cool gush of water down the cavern proved of no use. She stared at her half-filled water bottle she downed in the first hour in this classroom, her forehead crinkling in disappointment. felt dry, and all she wanted was the loud chatter resounding the walls to quiet down before a migraine she barely experiences occur. on the other hand wanted to ask him if he was okay.

Did he even hear about the rumour going around? What did he even think of it? The chances of him remembering her face covered by the hood of her black sweatshirt and mask was likely two-fifths of a chance. He must be immune to the attention that surrounded him and his circle of friends. A rough sigh under her breath murmured, “Wish I had that immunity.”

Jieun recollected the time two and a half months ago when her senior year had just started, but the hollers and screams for the handsome princes were worse. One of his fans snapped a picture of him gulping down a water bottle in a supposedly y posture. The way they described that little stream of water down his chin to be ‘hot’ was disturbing. The girl claimed that the empty bottle with little remnants of water grasped in her very hands was the same one he drank from. Crazy ー the perfect descriptive word for over the top scary fans. They shoved each other to touch the open rim of a plastic, recyclable bottle that his lips touched. Scary as to the detail.

Her skirt managed to go over her knees as she sat in her metal chair, back slightly hunched a couple inches more than usual. 60% of her brain was spared to pray for the day to be over with. Mr. Lee came in and announced that the pop quiz will commence in two minutes.

Finally.

J