It was finally the first day of classes. All of the boys in the flat were still on edge, not really knowing how to interact with one another due to the tension and awkwardness between Key and Onew. 

Taemin, Minho, and Key decided to leave early for their morning classes which all were in part of the building where visual arts and athletics were. This left Jonghyun and Onew eating breakfast at the kitchen table holding their breaths until the younger boys left the flat. Minho and Key bid a supportive goodbye to the nervous Taemin who had to head to the weight room for his first class of his ISAgifted life. Nervous would be quite the understated adjective to describe how Taemin was feeling. 

As Taemin walked into the weight room, down the hall in the other direction of the hallway, Minho and Key heard a loud booming voice. “Lee Taemin! I heard you are a flatmate of Lee Jinki! Let’s hope you did not catch his inability to do any task requiring coordination!” 

Key looked to Minho, worried about Taemin. “That must be Joon hyung. He’s an assistant athletic director and loves new prey and apparently Onew hyung was the first student he ever had that he deemed “unteachable” so I’ve heard. But I’m sure Tae will be fine,” Minho reassured Key as they walked to the elevators to go to the art rooms. Key thanked the lord that Minho was with him in his art classes because he could not handle Hyun Joong by himself. 

The two boys walked into their class room, Art Room #100, finding no one in there but a small, adorable looking girl with a paint covered apron and a paintbrush behind her ear. The art rooms were big and open, the walls were only clear glass windows. It was a very bright room, art desks were placed in pods of four with comfy looking stools at each one. The desks already seemed to have name tags on them. 

The girl finally noticed the two early freshmen. “Omo! You two are early! Key! I’m so happy to see you! And who is this?” Lee Hi had her hands on her hips was probably a foot shorter than Minho. Key smiled and relaxed noticeably due to Lee Hi’s bright personality. “This is my roommate and friend Choi Minho.” Lee Hi stretched her hand out and Minho took it, holding onto his arm and bowing respectfully as he greeted his new teacher. “So Choi Minho. Are you a drawer or is photography more of your cup of tea?” Minho smiled. “Definitely photography.” Key shook his head, agreeing with Minho. “He’s really good at it! Editing too. He knows all about that.” Lee Hi looked in awe at her two new talented students. 

Minho then piped up. “I won’t have to draw will I? I’m terrible.” Lee Hi chuckled. “No not at all. It won’t affect your grade one bit. The point of ISAgifted is to succeed in areas you want to and challenge yourself in other areas. There are going to be collaborations with the drawing students, but you yourself will not need to ever pick up charcoal and draw a flower. We really encourage contemporary mixed media works so if you want, when projects come up, you and Key, for example, can totally work on a visual masterpiece together combining your skills.” 

Key then added, “We are also in the ceramics class right after...Minho did you even get assessed on ceramics? I thought you only had two visual arts assessments, both photography related.” “I told Siwon hyung I wanted a challenge and he thought 3D visual art would be good for me.” Key nodded. “Well anyway...um...so your assistant for the ceramics class...” “Oh you mean Hyun Joong?” Lee Hi asked. Key nodded his head. “Um...well how prominent is he in the class? Lee Hi was confused. “Well...he comes and goes because he teaches other things, but the ceramics room is large and so it’s easier with two people helping out. I guess when he’s here, he’s here to instruct and teach just like me...” 

“Oh,” Key sighed. Minho shifted nervously in his place. Hi picked up on the discomfort in the boys’ faces. “Is there an issue regarding Hyun Joong? Key, Hyun Joong wanted me to recommend you for his advanced class...” Minho then said, “Well you see, Hyun Joong, ever since Key’s assessment, has made Key really uncomfortable and has texted him a lot and so it leaves Key in this position....”

Lee Hi was very concerned. She knew Hyun Joong was a flirt, but had never expected him to creep on a student. “During Hyun Joong’s advanced class on the weekend, I am free. Key, you can come to this art room and I will instruct you with the same curriculum as Hyun Joong. It will still go to your grade in that class and until we sort this out or it stops, you and Minho can sit at that group of desks closest to my desk. If you ever need anything, Key, or you too, Minho, please don’t hesitate to come to me. I will tell Leeteuk if there are any further problems. Sound good?” 

Key and Minho looked at Hi like she was a descending angel. After half a second of letting Lee Hi’s kind, protective words sink in, both boys threw their arms around her making her laugh. 

Key knew he could count on Hi the minute he met her. 

Studio art passed by so fast because the two were enjoying it that much. Editing, drawing, erasing, laughing, eating hard candy, Lee Hi was pretty much awesome. In addition, Hyun Joong didn’t come to ceramics class. It was a pretty good start to the day. 

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“Lee! I do believe I told you to do pushups, NOT pretend to be a table with broken legs!!!” 

Taemin tried to explain 100 times to Joon that he was a dancer, not someone with tons of muscle mass. Joon’s answer to Taemin’s explanation was that he needed to learn how to play and perform in actual sports. It seemed that no matter how fast Taemin ran or how many crunches he tried to do, Joon yelled at him and told him not to be like Onew. 

After the class was over, Taemin didn’t have anything to do, so he took his sweet time showering, changing, doing his hair...etc. When he came out of the locker room, wincing at his still-burning abdomen and thinking about how much he hated Joon, Joon was waiting for him. 

“Listen Taemin, I heard that you might be the best dancers out there and I was asked by Hyukjae, who was your dance supervisor for the assessment, to work you hard so you can be even more powerful.” 

Taemin chuckled. Maybe Joon isn’t as bad as he thought....

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“Welcome! This is advanced placement senior music where you will cherish your vocal chords, improve your performance by leaps and bounds, convey deep emotion, and get personal with your music. I hope each of you seniors...and Jonghyun....are ready for an intense year in the vocal arts. I want each of you, by the end of the year, to sing such an emotional song that you have an ocean trench-deep connection to, that you cry in class and have to leave the room to collect yourself. This is how hard I want you to try in this class.” 

While everyone else’s jaws hit the floor on Krystal’s direct introduction to the class. Jonghyun flirtatiously smiled at Krystal, who rolled her eyes. Jonghyun knew this would be his favorite class this year. 

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“See class? Can anyone tell me why Jinki and Jungah’s demo was the one I picked as an example? 

The class looked questioningly at Leeteuk who was pacing back and forth in front of the sound board while the students sat in chairs and on the floor in front of him. Onew was on the other side of the glass, sitting in the soundproof recording room while Jungah was at the sound board turning off the volume. 

No one answered Leeteuk. “Fine I’ll tell you,” Leeteuk beamed at the pair. “My assignment for you for the first day was to create a 30 second potential demo track based on the photographs I gave to all the groups. Jinki and Jungah received a photo of a black and white photo of a transparent umbrella against a tree in the rain. There is a bit of sun peeking out in the corner of the photo over the clouds. In their description of the song, they say Jinki’s desperate and saddening, and purposefully breathy heart-string pulling vocals symbolizes the worst and harshest part of the storm, and at the same time represents the see-through umbrella. The sound mixing leaves Jinki very exposed, which is perfect, in my opinion. At the end of the track, the low-fi crackling adds a feeling of an old-time movie just beginning and the lift from minor to major symbolizes the hopeful sun peeking out of the clouds at the end of the storm. This is picturesque and very symbolic. Well done, you two!” 

Onew couldn’t hear at all, but from the thumbs up from both Jungah and Leeteuk, he knew he did something right. This boosted his mood a bit and he was determined to get things patched up with Key and come to a state of understanding. 

After class, Onew took a long nap in his break and figured he’d start getting Key to forgive him by going to his dance class that ended at three and walk around with him a bit if he didn’t have assignments. Onew walked to the where Key’s dance class was. It was a bit of a hike from the flat, but he didn’t mind, it was generally nice outside, just a bit windy. 

When Onew arrived at the lobby to the dance building, he tried remembering what level dance Key was in so he could find the room and maybe catch the last bit of the class in hopes of them doing a routine already. He had heard Key was a beast when it came to dancing. Onew excitedly was walking down the hall, looking into dance rooms to see if he could catch a glimpse of perfect blonde hair.

Just then Onew heard frantic running steps and echoing cries coming from far behind him. To his surprise it was Taemin running frantically towards him. 

“No.” Onew thought. 

“This can’t be good.” Onew panicked. 

Taemin reached Onew panting. Now that Taemin was closer to him, Onew noticed an angry red patch on Taemin’s face, a scratch on his forehead, and a bit of a forming bruise on his knuckles. “! ONEW HYUNG JESUS CHRIST THANK GOD YOU’RE HERE! IT’S KEY! C’MON!” 

Onew was speechless, hands on either side of Taemin’s red face to try to calm him down. “What’s going on, Tae?” Taemin swallowed his panting and winced at the growing pains on his face and arm. 

“Hyun Joong...he...” 

A/N: An update! Yay~ hope you enjoy!