So Nyuh High: Club Week

Sorry Seems To Be the Hardest Word

Jessica sat down in a huff. She huffed and puffed her fringe up in frustration.

“Trying to get those punks organized for our recruitment is impossible!” she grumbled to Taeyeon and Tiffany. They nodded in agreement. All the guys in her Taekwondo club were totally swooned by her and were fighting over who got to be vice-president of the club.

“It’s a decision that only you, the president can make Sica,” said Taeyeon wisely, “Why don’t you spar them and find a candidate who is suitable to be your vice-president?”

“Spar them?” she scoffed. “None of them can beat me anyway.”

“I know they can’t beat you, but you can pick the best loser to be your vice-pres., can’t you?” Tiffany chipped in her two cents.

“The best loser? Now that’s a thought. Ah! Thanks you girls!” She smiled again, her problem solved.

She saw Taeyeon waving at someone and looked to see who it was. It was the new girl. She remembered their weekend encounter and images of her hopping flooded her mind again. She grinned at the thought.

Tiffany nudged her and raised her eyebrows. Not wanting to share her story with Tiffany, she shook her head and shrugged.

“Did you find your way to class alright this time?” Taeyeon was asking Sunny. She smiled brightly and nodded.

“That’s great! I’m a good guide when it comes to this school. Hey, do you want to join us for lunch today?”

Sunny looked hesitantly at Jessica immediately. Taeyeon, who followed her line of vision and smiled knowingly, and said, “Don’t worry, Sunny. Sica is all bark and no bite. She won’t mind if you join us for lunch.” Turning to Jessica, she said, “I’m sure you wouldn’t mind Sunny joining us for lunch, will you.”

Jessica glared at Taeyeon for a spilt second. Then she shrugged and looked away nonchalantly.

“That’s a yes from Sica! Now, is there anything else you’re worried about?” Taeyeon asked Sunny.

Sunny smiled and said, “I just didn’t want to intrude on anything. I know that you guys are pretty close and you might not want to hang out with a stranger like me.”

“That’s bull. Me and Fany, we’re friendly! Sica… is Sica. You don’t have to mind her. She’s actually alright. So it’s set then! The three of us always sit at a table for four anyway. There’s room for one more!” Taeyeon flashed Sunny a charming smile.
 

•°★°••°★°••°★°•

Lessons commenced and soon they were doing some Math problems. As it was their senior year, the level of difficulty of the questions had gone up considerably and many people were struggling with Math in class.

Mr. Choi looked at his class with a smile. His eyes sparkled whenever there was a challenge like the question they were tackling right then.

“Is there anyone who can solve this?” asked Mr. Choi, as he looked at Jessica. She looked straight into his eyes and shrugged nonchalantly but he decided to look for someone else this time. And that’s when he spotted Sunny dozing off. She had cleverly put a hood over her head and rested her cheek on her fist. Her long fringe had fallen across her eyes which had hidden her eyes from clear view but upon closer inspection, it was evident that she was asleep from the slight nods of her head.

“SUNNY!” roared Mr. Choi. He had reached her table before Taeyeon could warn her. He rapped her table hard. “WAKE UP!”

Her head slipped off her fist and she sat up straight in shock. She knew that she was potentially in a lot of trouble from the look on Mr. Choi’s face. She bit her lower lip and stood up to apologize to him as her classmates froze. Everyone knew that Mr. Choi was not to be taken lightly.

“If you dare to sleep in my class, I daresay you would know how to do this question. Sunny, show us the solution on the board,” said Mr. Choi in his stern voice, his finger pointing at the starred question in the book. He then walked back to the front and held out a marker pen for her.

Taeyeon looked at her worriedly and whispered, “If you can’t solve this, you’re gonna get detention and miss lunch with us today! Try your best okay?”

Sunny shook her head to clear her foggy mind. She smiled at Taeyeon and mouthed “Thanks!” before walking up to the board with her book in hand. She looked at the question for the first time and frowned.

Mr. Choi looked at her and said, “If you can do that, I’ll let you off detention.”

The class gasped. He was known to make deals like that only when the problem was way too difficult for them to solve. Low whispers broke out all over the class at once about her impending detention. Taeyeon gave Jessica a worried look but the only reaction she got from the other girl was a nonchalant shrug.

Sunny read the question a few times, even though she had figured out how to solve it after reading it the first time. But she didn’t want to draw attention to herself by solving it too quickly. As it was, she was contemplating if she should get the answer wrong on purpose and go for detention or get it right and go for lunch with her three new friends.

A couple minutes had passed and Sunny still hadn’t written anything on the board. Mr. Choi spoke up, “Looks like it’s detention for Ms. Lee over here.”

And something about the way he said it displeased her. Making her decision, she held her hand up. “Wait,” she said quietly and started writing.

She took her time to write the solution step by step. Not wanting to appear too brilliant, she pretended to think about each step, carefully deliberating if she was being too obvious about it.

In her heart, she fervently thanked her best friend, Hyomin, for teaching her all of the Math she knew. Hyomin was a Math genius who did not hesitate to share her solutions and discuss them with Sunny without reserve ever since they were in elementary school. Sunny would be lost half of the time but Hyomin would patiently explain it to her whenever they studied at Sunny’s house.

As a result, Sunny had topped her school in Math during her final year in elementary school. In fact, Sunny had learnt so much from Hyomin that Math was a breeze to her all throughout her four years in America.

Ever since she came back from America, they had resumed their gathering on weekends that Sunny wasn’t working on to study and play together. Well, not so much of playing, now that they were both seventeen going on eighteen, but more of simply doing girly stuff together.

“There. I think I’ve solved it,” said Sunny, as she finished up her last step. She wrote her answer and returned the marker pen to Mr. Choi who was trying not to gape. She merely smiled at him and walked back to her seat.

The class erupted in applause when they saw the incredulous look on Mr. Choi’s face. It was the first time anyone had won the deal off Mr. Choi. So as she walked back to her seat, a few people high-fived her. When she got back to her seat, she glanced at her lunch group. Tiffany was beaming from ear to ear and Taeyeon was practically hopping in her seat but Jessica sat still with a poker face.

“Wow, she really is the Ice Princess,” thought Sunny, “so calm and still. Doesn’t anything rock her boat at all?”

•°★°••°★°••°★°•

Contrary to what Sunny was thinking, Jessica was actually most impressed by her. She had seen through her play-acting. She knew that Sunny had pretended to be baffled by the question. Sunny’s confident eyes had given the game away right from the beginning. Also, the steps that she supposedly got wrong and had to think about were rather obviously senseless steps.

In short, Sunny was good at Math but not so good at pretending to be bad at it. And the whole episode intrigued her to no end.
 

•°★°••°★°••°★°•

The news spread like wild fire and by lunch time, the entire school was abuzz with the gossip.

“I heard that she’s a Math genius.”

“I heard that she was the top Math student in America!”

“Didn’t you hear?! She beat Mr. Choi at his own game!”

Random people actually walked up to her high-fiving her, patting her on her back, giving her the thumbs-up and even winking at her.

She was starting to feel awkward and pulled her hood up to hide her face from view.

Taeyeon laughed and said, “They still know it’s you, Sunny. Here’s a few more coming over.”

Jessica looked at Sunny and thought that she looked really uncomfortable with the attention she was getting. And with a burst of anger that came from nowhere, she slammed her palms on the table and stood up.

“Nobody is allowed to come to our table from now on! We want to eat our lunch in peace!” she roared. Everyone in the cafeteria looked at her and saw her dark, frowning face. The people who were approaching their table retreated back to their seats and nobody else tried to approach them anymore after that.

She sat down and continued to eat her naengmyeon. Sunny looked at her in shock but managed to murmur a soft word of thanks. However, she merely shrugged without even looking at Sunny and her eyes never leaving her naengmyeon.

Taeyeon chuckled and said, “Naengmyeon is Sica’s favourite dish. Nobody can disturb her when she’s eating naengmyeon.”

“Oh…” went Sunny.

Tiffany giggled and nodded her head in agreement. She put her arm around Jessica’s shoulders and laid her head down on her shoulder, making Jessica jerk her shoulders violently in protest. Tiffany pouted at Sunny and said, “See? She won’t even let me put my head on her shoulder when she’s eating naengmyeon!” Jessica shot Tiffany a death glare but did not stop eating and chewing. She was wondering why she had helped Sunny. Was it really the naengmyeon?

Sunny nodded, indicating her understanding and the three of them giggled, ignoring Jessica’s icy cold glares at the three of them. She smiled happily, looking at her three new friends and thought that she was one very blessed girl.

“Sunny, are you joining anything in school?” asked Tiffany.

“I’m gonna try out for the musical drama club.”

“REALLY? YAY! Me and Taeng are in that club!” she squealed.

“That’s great! Then I’ll have you girls for support when I try out!”

“What position are you trying out for? I’m the production manager, P.M. for short. I’m basically the nanny who takes care of everything from the wardrobe to lighting to sound and even the finances of our club. It’s a crazy job I’m telling you.”

Sunny giggled at her cuteness and replied, “I’m trying out for a vocalist position.”

“OH?” Tiffany’s eyes opened wide, “Have we got ourselves another singer? Taeng’s our lead singer! She’s so good; she’ll blow your brains out with her vocals.”

“I can’t wait to hear her sing then,” said Sunny excitedly, “Is Sica in the musical drama club too?”

“She’s not. She’s president of the Taekwondo club. She’s so good at it. Virtually unbeatable,” said Tiffany. She was going to say more but Jessica had shot her a stiff glare again so she stopped.

“Oh, so what Taeng told me was true. I had thought that she was joking when she told me that Sica has a black belt in Taekwondo.” said Sunny.

Jessica looked up from her bowl of noodles with questioning eyes directed at Taeyeon. Taeyeon saw her look and explained immediately, “It was all because of you, Sica.”

She raised her eyebrows even higher.

“Yes, I told her that because you bruised her arm when you grabbed it that day.”

Taeyeon turned to Sunny and pushed up her left sleeve, revealing a rather ugly bruise that had taken on several shades of blue and purple.

Her eyes opened wider than they ever had but she remained silent.

‘It’s alright really,” said Sunny, hastily pushing her sleeve back down, “I’m sure Sica didn’t mean to grab me that hard. Besides, it’s not painful now.”

Jessica cocked an eyebrow at that statement. She knew better. It was definitely still hurting now. Although she may not look the part, but her many years of training in Taekwondo had strengthen her and given her a body of steel. She was not in a good mood that day and she had probably grabbed Sunny’s arm with an ironclad grip. And she could remember how Sunny winced and struggled to get her arm out when she grabbed it.

She realized that she was feeling sorry for hurting Sunny. However, feeling sorry was not an emotion that she was well-acquainted with since she hardly ever had the chance to feel sorry for anything or anyone.

Feeling uneasy about feeling sorry, she stood up abruptly and marched out of the cafeteria. Her three friends looked up in surprise but did not call for her. Taeyeon and Tiffany knew her too well while Sunny was just too clueless.

“She feels sorry for causing that bruise,” Taeyeon saw Sunny’s clueless face and explained.

Tiffany nodded in agreement and said, “She doesn’t like to feel sorry so she’s going to work out and get rid of that feeling.”

“Yeah, she’s most definitely headed to her Taekwondo club at this very moment,” said Taeyeon.

Sunny cocked her head to the side and said, “Sica is so hard to read.”

But Taeyeon and Tiffany only laughed.
 

•°★°••°★°••°★°•

After lunch, Taeyeon brought Sunny to the school’s arts hub and showed her the concert hall that the school used for concerts, plays and musicals. Tiffany had headed off to speak to the school management as she was in charge of setting up the auditions for the club.

After looking around the concert hall, Taeyeon slipped her hand into Sunny’s and intertwined their fingers. “Let’s go! You’ll love our club room. It has everything and we love to hang out in that room,” she said while leading Sunny out of the hall.

Sunny looked down at their handhold. It reminded her of how she used to hold hands with Yuri, her best friend, back in America and she smiled at the memory and the warm, fuzzy feeling that Taeyeon was giving her.

“We put up a couple musicals a year. That way, we can give more people a chance to play the lead. I was the lead of last year’s musical “Midnight Sun”. I played Kaoru. I had to learn the guitar for that role! Oh my poor, poor fingers,” she said with a pretend sob and pout.

“Here we are!” exclaimed Taeyeon suddenly, as she swung the door open to reveal a large, spacious room with a long white table in the middle meant for meetings and discussions. To the sides were recreational spaces like couches and a huge home theatre projection screen covering the entire wall on the right.

Taeyeon stepped behind Sunny and pushed her into the room, her hands on her shoulders. Propping her head on Sunny’s shoulder, she asked, “What do you think?”

Sunny turned slightly and saw Taeyeon’s face dangerously close to hers. “Her eyes are so beautiful,” she thought.

“I can see now why people have told me that So Nyuh High is the richest school in South Korea. This is truly luxurious!”

Taeyeon giggled and nodded. She leaned forward towards Sunny’s ear and whispered, “Wanna check out my private space?”

Sunny cocked an eyebrow. “PRIVATE space?” she thought, her heart pumping faster all of a sudden.

“U-u-uh… w-what p-private space?” she stammered nervously.

Taeyeon laughed and clapped her on her back. “What are you thinking of? It’s nothing actually. They built an extension to our club room last year to make some rooms for us to crash in whenever rehearsals end too late. Sometimes, we end up sleeping here on school days as well. I share a small room with Tiffany!”

“Oh... I see.”

Sunny cleared in an attempt to dispel the awkwardness and berated herself silently for thinking about some other spaces on Taeyeon. Am I some kind of ert?

A sudden slap on her and jumped. “Oww!” she yelped, “Why did you do that?”

“To punish you for being so cute, that’s why,” giggled Taeyeon.
 

•°★°••°★°••°★°•

Jessica stormed out of the cafeteria and marched towards the campus’s medical supplies store. She headed for the shelf that carried the Arnica cream which she was knew so well. Learning Taekwondo while growing up meant that she suffered many bruises from hits and falls. Her coach had given her that cream one day and said, “A spunky cream for a spunky girl.” The phrase had stuck with her and Arnica cream became her favourite cream for bruises after that. She paid for it and walked back to the cafeteria only to find that they had already left so she decided to leave the cream on Sunny’s desk in class.

“There! Now I can stop feeling sorry,” she thought as she placed the box on Sunny’s desk. A satisfied smirk formed on her face as she left the room.
 

•°★°••°★°••°★°•

Hmm? What’s this on my desk… Arnica cream? Who put it here?

I read the description on the box.

For strains, sprains and bruises. It must be for my bruise then. But who…

Taeyeon?

Her name was the first to pop up.

Taeyeon. It must be her. She’s so nice and caring.

I smiled at that thought and a sensation of warmth spread through my body. Taeyeon definitely made me feel good.

It’s a little different from what I felt with Sungmin but this feels even better than that.

So I opened the box and rubbed the cream on my bruise, humming a happy tune.