“What the-” Hyerin barely dodged the ball coming towards her at 75 miles per hour. What a way to start my day, she thought, shaking her head.

It was Thursday and P.E. was her first period. Hyerin was peacefully minding her own business, trying to get at a steady running pace at the track when a baseball came flying her way. It was a good thing she dodged it quickly, or else the nurse would have had her first visitor of the day.

“Sorry!” 

She turned around and saw a boy in a red cap coming towards her. He jogging past and took the ball from the ground.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” he huffed as he walked to her. “My teammate is not having the best of days."

“It’s okay...” she trailed off, staring at him wide-eyed once she realized it was one of her targets.

“You were pretty damn fast there. This ball could have hit you straight in the-”

He stopped mid-sentence just when he was a couple of steps away, having a clearer view of the girl. “Huh. You sure you’re okay?” he asked, voice suddenly sultry. He started advancing towards her again. “Just tell me if you’re hurt anywhere, I’ll gladly carry you to the nurse’s office.”

Hyerin frowned at the look he was giving her. “No. I’m perfectly fine,” she icily retorted.

“Oh yeah, you’re fine.” He raised a brow, smiling slyly. “Very fine.”

She didn't bother hiding her grimace.

“Why haven’t I seen you around here before?” His eyes were slightly squinted, his right hand casually tossing the ball in the air while the other was tucked inside his pockets. “Someone like you...I would have noticed you.”

“I don’t know,” she said, folding her arms. “Maybe I wasn't trying to be noticed. This school is big. And it’s not like we’re in the same building.”

“Ah, so that means you know which building I’m in? Well,” he chuckled. “Someone’s been watching from the sidelines.”

Now she was just pissed. Hyerin shook her head in disbelief. "Goodbye," she said, brushing past the baseball player and heading back to the track. Hyerin was not going to deal with him. Not today.

“Yo, Kai! What the hell are you doing!? Come back here!” one of his teammates exclaimed from the field.

“Yeah, just give me a second!” he shouted back, throwing the ball towards the player. He took his cap off and caught up with Hyerin who was already running on the track.

“So are you new here in Yeongnam?” he asked, running next to her in the same pace even though he wasn’t in their class.

“Been here since freshman year.”

“Oh. So, you know me, right? Or you’ve probably heard of me?”

She rolled her eyes and adjusted her ponytail. She kept running. “Yes.” She found it the perfect time to act as douchey as Kris. For once, she didn’t want to be the one chasing—literally—after the boys.

“So you’ve been to a Tiger game?”

“No.”

“Oh.”

“...”

“So do you have-”

“Will you leave me alone!?” she exclaimed. “Don’t you have practice going on or something?”

He bit his lower lip to hold in his laughter and jogged backwards to face her. “Here you are having the chance to talk to someone like me and you’re being so mean.”

“I don’t care. Why are you even here? You’re not in my class!” she hissed. “Hell, you’re not even in my year!”

“Damn, calm down,” he laughed, a charming smile gracing his equally charming face. “At least tell me your name and maybe I’ll stop bugging you.”

Hyerin glared at him. He was being persistent and annoying, and a part of her told her she should take advantage of that to just get her mission over with. The other part though, would rather eat a steaming pile of than entertain the boy's presence.

"No," she said simply.

"No?"

"No," she pressed. "I'm not going to just let you treat me like this. You think you can just walk up to any girl you think is mildly attractive and chat her up even if she's clearly uncomfortable with that? Not everyone wants your goddamn attention." By now she faced him completely, the corners of set in a straight, dissaproving line.

He seemed to sober up to this, his wide smile dissolving into a flustered frown. "I-I guess."

"You guess?"

"Yeah. That didn't work out the way I thought it would."

"No. It really didn't."

"Sorry," he mumbled, rubbing the back of his head. "Didn't mean to come off like I was..."

Hyerin silently accepted his apology. "Like an arrogant son of a ? Like an entitled male hungry for female attention?"

"Both."

Hyerin let a soft chuckle escape her. 

His shoulders sagged and he heaved a huge breath at the sight of her relaxing."Look, I should probably go. Sorry again for...freaking you out."

Hyerin contemplated whether she should just do it or not. Well he’s already here. It would be too troublesome to look for him after school.

“Hey, hold on,” she called out to his retreating figure. He turned around.

 “Changed your mind? Were you going to give your name after all?" he asked, the cockiness slowly coming back.

Hyerin rolled her eyes. “Actually, I do have something to discuss with you,” she started, making her way towards the lad. “You're a good dancer, right?”

“I’m practically good at everything.”

God, she wanted to punch him. “Yes, yes,” she sighed. “Well, some friends of mine are actually going to this underground dance battle on Sunday, and they said it’s really, really exclusive. The winner, actually, has this grand cash prize and will battle it up against other cities," she said, satisfied with herself when she got his full attention. “The judges seem pretty promising, too. I don’t know who they are, but from the way they described them they sounded really cool.” She shrugged. “I just thought that, you know, you would want to register for the contest.”

He gave a noncommital shrug. "I would've know if there was an event like that happening."

"It's exclusive for a reason. Spread through word of mouth," she lied smoothly.

Kai seemed to consider it.

“Well? Are you interested?” she asked, folding her arms. “My friends have connections in the contest and might get you a registration form or something. It would be a great opportunity to flaunt your skills since you seem to like doing that.”

He sighed, pulling down his hat. “And if I don’t want to?”

“This is a once in a lifetime chance! Maybe through this you’ll be some famous guy in the future – an idol maybe.”

He gave her a look. “Are you serious? I’d rather die than be an idol.”

“Okay, fine. But don’t you like doing this? It doesn’t hurt to try. I mean, I’m pretty sure you’ve been to these kind of events before.”

Kai gave her that look again, and it was starting to unnerve her. Why can’t these boys just say yes and stop being so damn hard to get? Hyerin tapped her foot on the ground impatiently, glaring at the boy.

“If I do enter the competition,” he started, making her straighten up and listen carefully. “There are conditions.”

“What hell are you talking about? This is for your own good!”

“It’s not like I want to. You’re the one who’s trying to make me join.” He rolled his eyes. “Now the conditions?”

She scratched the top of her head. “What is it?”

Kai grinned. “You’ll have to do something for me.”

“Don’t fu-”

“I’m not done yet,” he teased. His playfulness was in full swing now. “You’re going to have to be there at the event. You have to watch me while I perform.”

She scoffed, disbelief etched on her face. “And why would I do that?”

“Well, obviously you aren’t completely smitten by the awesomeness that is yours truly. A little I guess, but not that smitten.”

"If trying my hardest to be rid of your presence is what you call smitten then you're clearly getting the wrong idea."

"We all have our own different ways of showing affection."

"Don't start with me again."

Kai sighed, holding up his hands in defense. "We started off in the wrong foot. I was being a douchebag, you were being a...well, you got angry. I just want us to start all over again."

Hyerin knew she could snap his neck in the span of 2 seconds but she brought it up anyway. "How do I know you're not planning to do anything shady?"

At this, he looked genuinely taken aback. "I admit I'm a bit on the flirty side, maybe sometimes going too far, but not like that," he said, looking serious for once. "I would never."

Hyerin knew he was telling the truth, but she was feeling troubled by something else. Here she was, lying to this guy she barely knew, and now she was going to promise something that wasn’t going to happen? In fact, she had been doing this for the past few days, and it only dawned on her now that she was doing something that was not right. All for the sake of this stupid M-LX organization crap.

She shunned the though away and turned to Kai who was waiting for an answer. Hyerin rubbed her palms against her gym shorts and sighed. “Fine. I’ll be there.”

He was about to start again when she stopped him. “Don’t. Shut up or I’ll smack you,” she threatened. Kai tried hard not to laugh.

“We’ll meet at this place so we can fill up your registration form.” She handed the address. “On Friday. Eight thirty. Got it?”

Kai took the paper and kept his eyes on her.

She warily stared back. “The hell are you looking at?”

He shook his head, a hint of a smile on his face.

“Okay, that’s it. I don’t trust you. How do I know you’re really going?”

Kai snorted. “I don’t ditch dates.”

“It's not a date. And as if that will drive away my suspicions.”

“Fine.” 

He stepped closer to the girl until they were practically inches apart. He crouched down a little, placing his hands on his knees. “Then let’s make a deal. If I don’t show up, you can beat the crap out of me for all I care,” he grinned as if he wasn’t taking her seriously, “but if I do show up, you’ll have to do something for me.”

She squinted at him. “What is it?”

“It’s a secret,” he cooed.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she groaned.

“It’s a deal then!” he chirped without waiting for an answer from the girl. “I’ll see you Friday!”

Hyerin held back the string of profanities she was about to throw at the mischievous lad. At least now she finally got him to go. Well, kind of. “Ugh. Do whatever you want. As long as I don't get to see your face around here anymore."

- - - - -

Luhan’s light brown eyes stared down at the half-finished artwork, scrutinizing the small details in which he was not the least bit satisfied with. As a matter of fact, he was never the kind of person to be content with whatever he did; he always noticed the flaws first.

Sighing, he grabbed the canvas and stood up, about to throw the uncompleted painting away. Another unsuccessful one.

Just when he was going to dump the canvas inside the trashcan, a knock outside stopped him from going forth with his actions. His brows furrowed in confusion; no one ever came inside the art classroom during lunch except for him.

After a moment, the door creaked open, and a shiny black shoe came into sight. It was followed by another until the person was completely inside. Luhan looked up to see who it was, only to be met with an unfamiliar face.

Hyerin shut the door behind her and looked towards the boy. “Hi,” she greeted, offering a small smile. Luhan, in return, bowed slightly.

“Yes? Do you need anything?” he asked.

“Oh, yeah. I do. My name is Kim Hyerin, a sophomore-” Her eyes widened suddenly, approaching the lad. “That’s beautiful. Did you make it?”

He didn’t understand what she was referring to until he realized he was still holding the canvas. He lowered his arm to at least give her a hint that he didn’t want her seeing it.

“Yes.”

“That’s amazing,” she said, still peeking at the artwork. “I bet it would look prettier with all the colors filled in and stuff. You should finish it,” she said, grinning. He was one of the quietest targets she had, so it was refreshing and less troublesome for her.

“Thank you. But I don’t think it would look as nice as you think it would,” he said quietly. Luhan internally cringed at himself for saying too much. It wasn’t her business, but here he was spouting nonsense.

 “Really? It looks well done. Hm. Maybe an onlooker’s eye for stuff is different from an artist’s,” she chuckled. “But I still think it’s very pretty.”

She was sincere, he thought, but it wasn’t like her comment was different from the usual critiques; she was just like any other person. He was slightly puzzled though, when just a moment ago he wanted to trash the painting but now, he was actually having second thoughts.

“Thank you.” He smiled at her kindly, tucking the canvas under his arm as he made his way back to his work place.

“No problem,” She wanted take the ‘slowly but surely’ approach with this guy. She really didn’t want to hear another one of them refusing. She was going to lose her mind if that happens again. Knock on wood, it won’t.

“I didn’t quite catch your name?” she said, even though she knew it anyway.

“Just Luhan,” he murmured, putting the caps back on his paint tubes. “If I may ask, what brings you here, Ms. Hyerin?” he asked.

Here we go. Hyerin said the exact same thing she told Kai earlier that day, explaining that they needed more contestants to make the competition tighter. Of course, she didn’t forget to insert a couple of compliments here and there.

This time it went on more smoothly. She was proud of herself and her newfound acting skills. She was definitely getting the hang of lying, despite the guilt weighing on her. But in order to accomplish her mission, it was the only way.

She ended her explanation with a simple smile, but she never expected the reaction she got from the boy.

Luhan was frozen in his chair, brushes and tubes of paint falling to the ground from his hands. He didn’t turn around nor said anything.

“Are you okay-”

“How did you know about that?” 

She was struck by his cold voice. “What? About you, dancing?” she asked. “Am I not supposed to know?”

“Who told you?” he said in a harsh tone, finally facing her. The look of dread and animosity in his face was frightening.

“No one. I just know.”

“You can’t just know. Who told you? No one knows about that!”

“Well sorry to say I do, okay? Now can you just relax? You’re overreacting!”

“You don’t know how important this matter is to me.” He made his way towards her. She backed away slightly. “No one knows about that and no one will. All this time it's been a secret,” he said heatedly. “Now tell me—who told you about this? Did you say anything to anyone?”

Hyerin’s face twisted in scorn. “No. I didn’t. And how many times do I have to tell you? Nobody told me! Is it so wrong to just know?” she retorted. “What’s your deal anyway? I don’t understand why you’re so angry about this.”

“You don’t have to understand anything, just leave me alone,” he said, straightening up.

“What about the dance battle?”

“I don’t know. I don’t care. Just go.”

“Think about it first-”

“Go!” he exclaimed, taking her wrist and pulling her out of the room. Hyerin didn’t struggle, but her patience was running low. She had enough of this.

Once they were out, he headed back inside, closing the door. Before it clicked shut though, she managed to slip her foot in the crack between. Forcefully, she kicked the door open, successfully making Luhan back away.

She pulled him by the collar. If he was allowed to shove her out, she was allowed to shove him around, too. “Listen, you rude . I don’t know what your deal is, or why you’re being so ing defensive about this , but I’m trying to offer you something that could probably save you from being…being like this!” she hissed, pointing at him. “You have some serious issues. And you might just overcome that by joining that contest.” She let go of his now crinkled uniform, not breaking the eye contact.

“Think about it,” she whispered, patting his shoulder. Her arm lowered, dropping the paper with the address of the café inside his blazer pocket without him noticing.