I stood in front of my locker, tapping my feet impatiently and glancing nervously at the clock once in a while. I pull out my phone, once again, and send my friend another text.

To Wendy:

If you’re not here within two minutes, I’m not going to forgive you.

I get the reply almost immediately.

From Wendy:

One minute. Coming.

I let out a sigh and sneak another peak at the huge clock on the wall. Two minutes left. I had my History class in two minutes. My best friend, Wendy, had borrowed my textbook a couple of days back and still hadn’t returned it. For the first time in my life, I got yelled at yesterday for not bringing my books to a class. It’s certainly not expected of one of the top scoring students of the school. And it’s all the more degrading when in addition to that, you’re the class president and Joint-Secretary of the student council. Being an ideal student was not always a smooth ride.

Wendy came running to my side when there were mere sixty seconds left for my class to begin. Fortunately for me, and fortunately for her, on time.

“Here,” she said handing over the damned book with an apologetic face. “I’m so sorry, Chaewon. For yesterday as well.”

I shook my head, feeling bad for her. “It’s alright. Don’t worry about it.”

She nodded with a small pout. I smiled and waved at her before running off in the direction of my class. “See you later!”

                                                                *************************

I ran as fast as I could hoping that I wasn’t late lest I got reprimanded in front of the entire class once again. I could see the passage that led to my class. I just had to take one right turn and the first door to my right was the classroom. I was so focused on just reaching the class that I failed to notice the person walking from the other side of the hallway. I bumped into someone and the next second, I was on the ground with books scattered all around me.

Damn!

I looked up to see the person I ran into only to find a pair of dark brown eyes burning into mine.

Damn damn damn!

I opened my mouth to apologize but no words came out. My eyes fell on the nearest book and I immediately deduced that it wasn’t mine. That obviously meant it belonged to the brown haired boy who stood before me. The most notorious badass of Seungli High School, Min Yoongi. I meekly picked the book up and offered it to him. He stared at me for a few seconds before taking the book from my hands.

I heard familiar voices coming from behind and only then realized that I was still sitting on the floor. I tried to stand up before Mr Jo, our History teacher reached us. As I scrambled on my hands and knees, the boy extended his hand forward in order to help me up. To say I was surprised would be an understatement. I was stunned beyond words.

Is he being nice to me?

Personally, I did not know him. Sure, we had most of our classes together. But that was just about it. I had spoken to him once though, and it was not a pleasant experience. From what I had heard about him, Min Yoongi was the embodiment of the devil. He was callous, ruthless and vicious. Nice wasn’t one of his traits. There were a lot of rumours about his family too. None of them were noble or upright. And I never paid attention to such balderdash. Also, the family that I come from, it was not tolerable for us to associate ourselves with people like him. One of the detriments of being born in an affluent, regal household was that we had to be cautious about the people we chose to befriend. A result of which, I did not have a lot of friends. Thankfully, I did have a few and it is safe to say that they were the best friends anyone could ever have. But this boy was...different. Of course, I had no intention of befriending him. That would be utterly farcical.

I just sat there staring at his hand when I heard Mr Jo’s voice next to me.

“What’s going on here?”

Yoongi immediately withdrew his hand and walked inside the classroom casually, leaving me on the ground. I quickly stood up dusting my clothes and turned to look at Mr Jo humbly. “I’m sorry, Mr Jo. I just slipped and fell.”

He nodded curtly. “Pick your books up and get inside,” he said before entering the classroom.

“Yes, Sir,” I answered before scooping my books off the ground and following him.

                                                **************************

History class went by effortlessly and I was more than happy when Mr Nam, our English teacher entered the class. It was my favourite subject and Mr Nam was my favourite teacher. Unlike the old and grouchy Mr Jo, Mr Nam was young and affable. English was always fun and I would gladly sit through his classes all day long. I respected him a lot; as a teacher and as a person as well. I paid utmost attention to every word he said and by the end of the class, I would be happy and gratified. That was the case every day. Every single day, except today.

As Mr Nam was walking around the class explaining a chapter, I felt the need to turn around and look at him which was a huge mistake. I inadvertently made eye contact with the person sitting at the left corner in the back of the classroom. Yoongi was staring at me intently while playing with a pen in his hand. I was flustered but for some reason, I held his gaze. I was expecting him to look away and when he did not, I felt my cheeks turning red and immediately turned around to face the front. I bit my lips, thinking of how I almost did something stupid.

Stay away from him, Chaewon.

I nodded as I took a deep breath. I steered my focus on the class instead and that helped get rid of all the unsolicited questions about a certain boy. As soon as the class got over, I packed my stuffs and ran out of the class without sparing him a second glance.

                                                ********************************

I scanned the crowd as I entered the cafeteria. It had only been ten minutes since the lunch break began and the room was already packed. I spotted Wendy sitting at our usual table in the corner. I walked up to her with a smile.

“Hey,” I called out as I sat in front of her.

She looked up from her phone and smiled brightly. “Hey! How was class?”

“It’s always good, you know,” I answered honestly.

 “Except for yesterday,” she replied with a frown. “It was my fault. I am really sorry about that, Chaewon. I completely forgot that I had your book.”

She looked so rueful that I genuinely felt bad for her. In some ways, I even felt guilty that she was sad because of me.

I should have reminded her twice to return my book.

“Hey c’mon. I told you its fine. Students ge