“What did you do to him?”
 

I blankly blinked at Kai and Kyungsoo, confused as to why they were confronting me after school. They’d never really talk to me unless it had to do with a school assignment or if I accidentally bumped into them in the hall. One time when Kyungsoo and his family went on vacation, he had trusted me with feeding their dog and watering their lawn while they were gone. We all knew of each other pretty well but I wasn’t really on a regular talking basis with them.

“What are you guys talking about? You mean Baekhyun?” They nodded their heads. Of course he was the only plausible reason they would talk to me. “I didn’t do anything… Did something happen?”

I tried remembering if I had done anything offensive to him. After I asked him about Sohee he replied with an “Of course,” before being cut off by Mr. Cho. He called us back inside because he was demonstrating something important to the class. Baekhyun didn’t seem to be all that bothered by the question because he continued to talk to me like he normally did in both Chemistry and Calculus, so I didn’t really understand what could be going wrong.
 

“Well, he walked straight past us without a look in our direction. We even called out to him and followed him but he ignored us and went straight to the bus stop,” Kyungsoo said.
 

“He usually doesn’t go home until the last bus because he said he doesn’t like being at home,” Kai added. “I thought I told you to be careful with him.”
 

A crease formed between my eyebrows. “Why do you guys automatically assume that this is my fault?”
 

“You’re the only one that he avidly talks to besides us and our other friends. And we’re sure we didn’t do anything wrong because he was completely fine at lunch,” Kyungsoo replied.
 

“He tells you guys about me?” I asked, feeling my heart flutter.
 

“No,” Kai said bluntly, crushing my hopes. “He talks to lots of girls. But we notice that you’re the only one that he looks at differently, you know?”
 

No I don’t know, I thought, but I nod my head, taking in the information anyway. “I’ll talk to him,” I said as I notice the guys in the corner of my eyes waiting for me. I gave them a small smile before walking away.
 

“What was that about?” Xiumin asked as I approached them.

“They were just asking about Baekhyun,” I honestly replied.
 

“Is everything alright between you two?” Kris asked tentatively, carefully testing his own theory.
 

No, everything is horrible. “Of course, everything’s fine,” I lied, trying to put on a convincing smile.
 

It seemed like they bought it because everyone’s faces relaxed and Kris quickly changed the subject. “You need to come over later to help me get ready for my date tonight.”
 

“That’s tonight?” I was so enthralled with Baekhyun that I completely forgot about things going on with my friends.
 

“Today is Friday,” Luhan said as a matter of fact.
 

“Of course I can come over,” I said with a smile.
 

* * *
 

“Are you sure that this outfit is okay?” Kris asked uncertainly.
 

“This is the 7^th outfit you’ve tried on. And all of them were perfectly fine and this one is no different,” Lay said, clearly annoyed with Kris’s doubt.
 

“I don’t want to be fine,” Kris hissed back. “I need to be perfect. I really like this girl.”
 

I stood up and placed both hands firmly on his shoulders. “Kris you look perfect. You’re going to be late if you try on another outfit so please just accept the fact that you’re going to be good looking in every outfit you put on and go on your date.”
 

“You think I look good in every outfit?” he asked with a smirk.
 

I removed my hands from his shoulders to slap him in the arm. “Please stop fishing for compliments and leave,” I said pushing him out of his room.
 

“Okay, okay, thanks for everything,” he said grabbing his car keys and walking out the door.
 

We all gathered back in Kris and Tao’s room when Xiumin posed a serious question.
 

“Do you think we’ll all still be friends when high school ends?”

“Of course we will! Why do you ask?” Luhan said.

“Well, you guys are going back to China after we graduate,” Xiumin said with a frown.

“Just because we’ll be in China doesn’t mean that we won’t be friends,” Tao said.

“I just don’t want to lose touch with you guys…”

“We still have a whole school year until we move back, Baozi. Cheer up,” Luhan comfortingly said. “Most of us don’t even know what we’re doing after high school. We might end up studying in Korea for university, who knows?”

I’d never even once given a single thought about what would happen to the 7 of us after high school. I always thought that we would just be friends till we were old and shriveled up. But the sad truth was that we could so easily lose touch after high school.

“We have to stay friends,” I added. “Mostly because we don’t really have any other friends,” I said with a chuckle.

We were all just sitting in the room watching four of the guys play FIFA when suddenly I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket. It was a text from Kris. No, it was a picture from Kris.

Apparently Baekhyun was out on a date with another girl that night. Her back was facing the camera, so I couldn’t exactly tell who she was, but I assumed that the girl was probably Sohee. It couldn’t have been his mother because her attire wasn’t exactly mother-like.

“Whoa, Baekhyun’s on a date? With someone that’s not you?” Luhan said after peering at my phone. “I thought you said everything was alright between you two?”

“Everything is fine,” I said, exiting the photo. “It’s not like we’re dating. He can do what he wants.”

“Are you okay though?” Chen carefully asked.

Okay? Was I okay? I found out Baekhyun actually has heart cancer and that he’s getting back with his ex girlfriend. “Of course I’m okay,” I said when I felt my phone vibrate again.

“He’s with Jiyeon,” the text said. I thought I’d feel better that he wasn’t with Sohee, but I was just left feeling confused. Jiyeon? Not that I knew personally, but from what I’ve seen, it seemed as though they’d never even talked to each other before. Well, that was what I thought.

“Thanks for letting me know. You can tell me about it later. Get back to your date!” I replied.

I could never really understand any of Baekhyun’s actions. He took me out a on a date. He told me he liked me. And then he tells me he’s getting back with his ex-girlfriend. And then he’s out on a date with Jiyeon? I had no other desire than to figure out why Baekhyun even did any of these things. Up until a few days ago, all he was to me was a mysterious city boy. But now he was an even more mysterious city boy. The more I knew about him, the less I actually knew about him—if that even made sense. But it wasn’t like he made complete sense either.

* * *

“How was your date?” we all asked when Kris was back home.

“It was good. Luckily for my wallet, she wasn’t an expensive eater,” he said plopping down onto his bed. “We already have a second date planned for tomorrow.”

“Wow, look at you. My baby’s all grown up!” Tao said pinching his cheeks before Kris quickly slapped his hand away.

“I’m older than you,” Kris said, glaring at Tao, causing laughter amongst the 7 of us. After a long story of how the date went, Kris brought up something I wasn’t necessarily ready to hear about. “Anyways, Jiyeon was totally all over Baekhyun, but he seemed to be indifferent. Maybe was he forced to go on a date with her because he definitely wasn’t enjoying his dinner.”

Baekhyun didn’t seem like the type to go on a date because he was forced to. Who could have forced him to go on a date with her? His friends would have mentioned something about it earlier if it was them. I sighed, wondering what Baekhyun could possibly be doing now.

When the weekend quickly ended and Monday came around, Jiyeon was practically prancing around with Baekhyun dangling on her arm announcing to the whole school that they were officially a couple. Baekhyun didn’t seem like he hated it, but he didn’t exactly look like he was ecstatic either.

Being the small town we were, the news spread like wild fire throughout the entire school. There hadn’t been much to gossip about lately, so obviously this was huge news to everyone. After so many years, someone was finally able to charm the city boy to be theirs.

“Jiyeon? Seriously, what the hell. I mean, yeah sure she’s pretty, but I would think that Baekhyun would be into smarter girls than her…” Seungyeon said while we were in homeroom. “Do you think he’s just using her to get in her pants? You know since he is dying and all…” she said in a whisper.

“He wouldn’t do that…” Would he? I was in the same bed as him and he didn’t have any bad intentions at all.

“Well if he does, we’ll find out because Jiyeon isn’t really quiet about sleeping with other guys.”

She was right. Jiyeon didn’t announce to the whole school about she was sleeping with. But she would purposely spread it around amongst her friends and they would pass it on to their friends. Probably even nerdy little Ahyoung knew about the guys she was sleeping with.

I inwardly sighed. Was that what he was looking for? A girl to sleep with? Did I not meet his expectations? I was quickly feeling inferior to all the other girls in the school. I didn’t really consider myself as ugly, but my features weren’t all that great. I was a rather plain girl. I didn’t stand out in the crowd. I was merely just a face in the crowd: A face that Baekhyun quickly overlooked.