It's only his third week in a Korean high school and his first week with the basketball team, and Guanlin is already injured. He sprains three of his fingers during basketball training, falling and landing badly when he lunged after the ball in an attempt to look cool. Luckily, his glasses didn’t fall off and break. He sulks the whole way to the nurse's office, feeling bad for not being able to finish today’s training (and that he wouldn't be able to attend any trainings until he heals), despite Jonghyun reassuring him with words the way only Jonghyun can.

The team captain drops him off at the clinic, telling him to text him if he needed anything as he still needed to supervise the other team members. Guanlin is left alone with the kind school nurse Jisung, who kept cooing at him like he was a little kid. For some reason it felt like going to a friend's house and being taken care of by a friend's mother. Guanlin found himself relaxing.

His fingers are about to be patched up when the clinic door bursts open. Two schoolboys tumble inside yelling, mostly at each other. Their uniforms are both rather dirty and one of them, the shorter one, even has a tear on one pants leg.

"Jisung hyung!" The taller one calls the school nurse. He's dragging the smaller one with chestnut brown hair, one arm around him. The smaller boy looks up at Jisung, the side of his mouth bruised and his lower lip oozing out fresh blood from the stretch needed in order to grin at him. His left eye is swollen and a dark purple in color. Guanlin can't tell if he was winking at Jisung or just blinking with his good eye.

Jisung screams in horror.

The two boys noticeably flinch at the sound, and Jisung's quickly apologizing to Guanlin for having to do something about this situation as soon as possible, handing him an ice pack to put on his hand for the meantime. "Oh my god, this child," Jisung mutters under his breath repeatedly as the small boy is seated on the hospital bed and he is looking over his injuries.

"I told him he was too damn small to be picking fights with Kang Daniel but he's just really a ," the uninjured boy (or not recently injured, Guanlin could see an almost healed yellow bruise on his right cheek) explains accusingly. He casually pulls a chair to the side of the bed and sits down comfortably, which gives Guanlin the impression that he's in the clinic a lot. The boy had an accent different from what Guanlin is used to hearing from his short stay in Korea.

"Shut up!" the smaller boy yells back at him. Apparently he still had enough energy to be fighting. "I wouldn't have fought them if Ong hadn't made fun of your stupid accent, Woojin!"

"Stop using me as an excuse to pick fights with people so much bigger than you!"

"When will the two of you stop fighting with each other and everyone else around you?" Jisung whines, exasperated. Relieved that the boy had no broken bones, he starts cleaning the wounds on the boy's face, to which he howled in pain as a reaction. "No complaining! You got into this mess yourself, Park Jihoon!"

The boy, who Guanlin now knew as Jihoon, pouts. It's uncharacteristically cute for how he'd been acting this entire time, and Guanlin wonders if it would have been a very cute pout had the boy's face been in better condition.

"And now he's acting cute," Woojin grumbles from his seat. Jihoon tries to kick him, but Jisung slaps his thigh and he winces. "Stop giving Jisung hyung so much work to do!"

"Yeah, I was busy with Guanlin over there." Jisung gestures to Guanlin and the two boys stop their bickering to throw Guanlin a curious look. Once Guanlin looks back at Jihoon though, the boy glares at him.

"The are you lookin' at, huh?" he growls at Guanlin as intimidatingly as he could look with his face all beat up. Instead of feeling fear though, Guanlin feels amused, and the side of his lips threaten to curve up in a smile. It would be a bad idea though, so he tries to keep a straight face. This guy seemed to be easily aggravated. Jisung presses particularly hard on the cotton pad he's holding against the side of Jihoon's mouth, and Jihoon whimpers in pain.

"You looked at him first though," Woojin snickers. He turned to Guanlin with a grin, showing a snaggletooth that made him look friendlier than when he first walked in. "Sorry about him. He just really likes picking fights with people taller than him." Guanlin nods, smiling back.

"You should apologize for pulling me away from taking care of Guanlin too," Jisung scolds Jihoon, whose eyebrows furrow. "Sorry, Guanlin. I'll hurry and finish this and take care of your hand as soon as I can."

"It's okay." Guanlin gets up to try and help Jisung by handing him whatever tools he currently needed, using his good hand while his injured one is limp at his side. It earns him a warm smile and about a dozen genuine thank you's from the school nurse.

"Look at Guanlin helping me out while this other kid with no injuries is just sitting down and picking fights," Jisung says with a sigh. Woojin laughs as if Jisung had told the funniest joke. "Guanlin is a transfer student from Taiwan, a freshman at that, so you two rascals better be nice to him," Jisung says sternly.

"Oh, from Taiwan?" Woojin looks interested. He looks up at Guanlin and the transfer student nods. "So that's why you have an accent. I'm Park Woojin, in second year."

"Stop talking to him, you'll give him a bad impression of Korean people," Jihoon mutters.

"You give him a bad impression! Didn't you just come steal the school nurse and also basically tell him to off?"

"I did not tell him to off! I asked him what he was looking at!"

"That's Park Jihoon," Woojin tells Guanlin, ignoring his friend. "He likes getting beat up and looking like ."

"Hey, you, I won! That Ong Seungwoo won't be talking about anyone for a while," Jihoon brags. "And Daniel… Well, I got a few good punches in, didn't I?" He looks really proud of himself and Guanlin wants to giggle.

"Does he look like he won, Jisung hyung?"

"If I have to do this much work, then this is obviously the losing team," Jisung huffs. He finishes cleaning and covering up the injuries on Jihoon's face and knuckles, and now he's instructing Jihoon to take off his uniform so he can check for other injuries. Jihoon's face reddens as he tells Guanlin and Woojin to get the out before he gives them the same injuries that he has.

"Sorry Jihoon's stupid," Woojin simply tells Guanlin at the bench at the hallway outside. "If I knew some medical I'd fix you up myself, but I don't. Tell me if anyone gives you any trouble for being new and foreign though, I'll get him."

Guanlin nods, smiling. Even if Woojin was pretty much a delinquent, he seems to be a nice enough person, and Guanlin was always happy to make new friends. He keeps in mind to brag to Seonho that he made a delinquent hyung friend today. "Is he okay though?" he asks after a while. Jihon’s injuries looked pretty bad.

"Hm? Jihoon?" Woojin's fumbling with his uniform's inner pocket. Guanlin thinks the older might start smoking any time soon, but Woojin comes up with two pieces of candy instead, giving one to him and eating the other. "He's okay, he's used to it. That ’s always getting into trouble."

Woojin asks him a lot of getting-to-know-each-other questions, like how old he was and what he liked to do in his free time and why was his hand injured, who did he punch. He looks a little disappointed when Guanlin tells him he was just injured because of basketball, but he gives Guanlin more candy anyway. Guanlin wants to ask him more about Jihoon, but he figured it would make him look nosy when they've just met today.

The door to the clinic opens and Jihoon steps out, looking slightly mummified with all his bandages.

"What'd he say? Are you finally dying?" Woojin asks him excitedly. He stands up to get a closer look at Jihoon's injuries before slinging an arm around him.

Jihoon slaps his stomach rather hard. " off, what he said was that I need to eat ice cream so my busted lip feels better. You should buy me some," he says, grinning. He turns to Guanlin. "Jisung hyung is calling you in."

"Oh, okay," Guanlin says dumbly. He scrambles to his feet, giving the two boys a small bow before walking towards the clinic.

"Sorry for the trouble and see you around," Woojin calls after him, waving. Guanlin thinks he made a friend today.

-

"Sorry about that," Jisung says for the millionth time today.

"It's fine," Guanlin assures him with a grin. He holds up his hand for Jisung to finally get his hand treated, it's been feeling numb since he used the ice pack but it starts hurting again when Jisung  gets to work.

"But I'm really worried about that kid. He's always here with new injuries, but they've been getting worse lately." Jisung sighs again, looking absentmindedly into space while holding on to Guanlin's injured hand. "He's really a good kid deep inside though, that Park Jihoon. He yells and curses a lot but he's always polite to me and he's a great friend to Woojin. He was a child actor when he was little and he was bullied for it, so he developed a complex about wanting to appear tough, and now he picks fights with stronger-looking kids." Jisung realizes he's talked too much, and clamps a hand to his mouth with the hand not holding Guanlin's. "Don't tell him I told you though."

Guanlin gets up and thanks him for taking care of him. He goes home curious about Park Jihoon.

-

"You made a delinquent hyung friend?" Seonho looks a little impressed, but he is trying to keep it in because Seonho likes collecting hyungs and he isn't about to be one-upped by Guanlin.

Guanlin grins at him. "His name is Park Woojin and he says I can ask him to beat people up so you better be nice," he taunts playfully.

"Hmph, whatever, I have a delinquent hyung too!"

The Kang Dongho guy that Seonho drags him to meet at the cafeteria at lunch definitely looks like a delinquent: hair shaved at the sides, broad shoulders, and a menacing scowl on his face as he chewed his lunch alone.

"Hyung!" Seonho apparently has a death wish and is hugging Dongho now, arms wrapped around his shoulders and nuzzling at Dongho's stubbly chin. "You must know Guanlin hyung's delinquent friend since you're a delinquent too, right? And you'll beat up people who are mean to me too, right? Right?"

Guanlin shrinks back as Dongho starts rubbing at his temples. Should he escape now? Seonho got into this mess himself and he didn't want to get beaten into a pulp.

"For the last time, Yoo Seonho: I am not a delinquent!"

Dongho ends up being a pretty nice guy. He was just eating alone today because his friends were active in whatever school clubs they joined and had actual activities to attend to. Dongho was just the only loser who couldn’t be bothered to join any clubs.

“Oh, Park Woojin? Isn’t he that little kid who hangs out with the even smaller kid that picks fights?” Dongho asks as he munched on chips from a bag that he shared with Seonho and Guanlin. “His friend tried to challenge me to a fistfight, but I just pushed him and the Woojin kid apologized and brought him away. The other kid was pretty feisty though.” Dongho shrugs, like small delinquents trying to fight him was something he had to deal with everyday.

Seonho’s jaw drops, his eyes wide open. “See, hyung, you’re a delinquent! You fought him!”

“I am not. He tried to punch me and I’m not about to be punched by a little kid.” Dongho hides the potato chip bag behind his back when Seonho tries to get more chips, and Seonho whines that he’s hungry. Guanlin laughs at Seonho’s suffering and Dongho turns to him. “What is this about though? Did he give you any trouble, Guanlin?” He looks concerned and ready to fight whoever gives the young boy trouble.

Guanlin shakes his head. “I just met them at the clinic when Park Jihoon hyung was injured in a fight. Woojin hyung is really nice though, he even gave me candy.”

Seonho successfully charms Dongho into giving him more chips, and Guanlin can immediately tell what he’s thinking when he says: “Introduce me!” A delinquent hyung who gives candy would definitely be a variety of hyung that Seonho would want in his collection.

-

Since he couldn’t play basketball, Guanlin decides he would spend his free time after school studying alone at the library. It’s quiet like all libraries are, but it was a relaxing quiet instead of the oppressive silence that most libraries had. He doesn’t have to talk much while he’s playing basketball, but it’s a little hard for him to make friends at class with his limited Korean vocabulary. Most of the time he couldn’t even keep up with class discussions, and he felt stupid at subjects he normally did well at back when he was in Taiwan. But ultimately it was the loneliness that made him determined to learn more.

He sits at his usual spot at the section furthest away from the library entrance. People rarely stayed there, as it was where the old, unnumbered books were kept. Guanlin likes it there, finding it easier to focus without other people.

“Oh.”

Guanlin looks up from his workbook to see the definition of a flower boy (Guanlin learned the term from watching dramas) standing near the row of desks, holding a stack of thick, hardbound books in his arms.

“You’re that kid from the clinic,” the boy continues as he walked toward the row of desks. He sits at a desk one seat away from Guanlin, setting his books on top of it. “Woojin’s new friend.”

Ohh. Guanlin smiles at him in realization. He didn’t recognize him at first, but from the chestnut brown hair and the upturned eyes (only one of which Guanlin had seen in actual working condition), he knew it was Park Jihoon.  “I’m Lai Guanlin, nice to meet you.”

“Oh. Guanlin.” Jihoon looks at him curiously, and Guanlin can see a yellowish stain on his eye that had been a dark purple a week ago. “You didn’t strike me as the studious type. Weren’t you on a sports team?”

“Yes. Basketball.” Guanlin peeks at the stack of books on Jihoon’s desk. They seemed to be about science from what Guanlin can tell from the covers. He looks back at the boy’s face. He really was handsome; Guanlin couldn’t understand why he would risk getting his face punched.“Hyung doesn’t seem like the studious type either.”

The tips of Jihoon’s ears redden. “Because I’m not?” he says sheepishly, scratching one cheek in a display of embarrassment. “That’s why you shouldn’t hang out with Woojin, his stupidity is contagious! So I’m not hanging out with him right now.”

Guanlin laughs a little too loud for someone inside a library environment at that.

“What about you?”  Jihoon asks, he cranes his neck to look at Guanlin’s desk and Guanlin holds up his workbook to show him.

“Learning Korean.” Guanlin smiles shyly. “I’m still bad at it and it’s hard to make friends, so I’m working hard.”

“Oh.”

Guanlin thinks the older is staring into space to procrastinate studying and he smiles to himself as he goes back to his workbook, trying to find what question he was on. He looks up when he hears chairs being moved, and sees Jihoon move to the seat beside him.

“I’ll teach you,” Jihoon says softly, his eyes earnest and the edges of his lips turning up in a smile. “I’m not good at studying, but I at least know how to read and write.”

“Huh? Didn’t you come here to study though, hyung?” Guanlin asks him. This was a different Jihoon from the screaming, cursing boy from the clinic.

Jihoon shakes his head a little violently and his hair fluffs up at the action. “You’ll learn faster if someone helps you.” Gently pulling the workbook from Guanlin’s hands, he adds: “Then you can make more friends.”

There’s a warm feeling rising in Guanlin’s chest now, and it’s manifesting on his face as the happiest smile he’s smiled in a while. It’s almost hurting his cheeks, and he’s pretty sure all his gums could be seen now, but he couldn’t care less. “You’re kind, Jihoon hyung.”

Guanlin discovers that Park Jihoon’s face reddens easily, and he somehow learns more new words in an afternoon with a delinquent than he’s learned by himself the past few months.