Extraordinary

 Youngmin didn’t come back that night.

 “Don’t worry about it,” Kwangmin said to you, opening his notebook and beginning to study the new page of notes he’d made about Jeongmin. “He’s just sulking, he’ll come back in the morning and act like nothing ever happened. That’s what he does.”

 “I don’t even know why he’s sulking,” you said, wishing Kwangmin would at least give you some kind of hint. You peered over his shoulder to spy on his Jeongmin notes. Written down in Kwangmin’s neat handwriting was a painstakingly detailed account of everything you’d told him had happened, plus everything you knew about Jeongmin, which wasn’t much. What interested you was the note in smaller print, right at the bottom: Who is this guy?

 At the back of the notebook you knew Kwangmin had notes about you too. You didn’t know what they said; he wouldn’t let you read those ones, even though you were incredibly curious.

 “You said angels can choose who they help,” you said, watching Kwangmin frown at his notes. “Why did you two choose me?”

 You’d wondered this for a long time. Out of everyone on the planet, why choose an ordinary schoolgirl with a crush? They could have chosen royalty or a celebrity or just someone who’d done a lot of good deeds and deserved to be helped.

 “You were all alone,” Kwangmin murmured, not really paying attention to either you or what he was saying. He was too engrossed in trying to figure out something from his notes.

 “What do you mean?”

 “Just that.”

 You rolled your eyes. He was hopeless when he distracted like this. “I know you hate it when I say this, but I’m just so… ordinary. My life was so boring before I met you, and I haven’t done anything special, and there’s nothing that makes me… you know, worth two angels.”

 Kwangmin was slowly writing something down and barely even listening to you, but he started talking anyway: “I watched you for a long time, coming and going from school every day, sitting on your own at lunch time, too shy to even say hello to people. I’ve always had Youngmin with me… being a twin means you’re never truly on your own. But you were always on your own and you couldn’t end it. Even when you wanted to invite all those people to your birthday party…” he drifted off suddenly.

 You didn’t know what he meant. What birthday party? You’d stopped having birthday parties ever since you were eight, and you’d been too shy to ask anyone in your class to come. Then it dawned on you that that was the birthday party Kwangmin was talking about.

 “You’ve been watching me since I was eight?” you said, jaw dropping.

 “The time passes a lot faster for an angel,” Kwangmin said. “And I had to be sure you were the right one.”

 Suddenly you were replaying your life in your head, thinking about all the embarrassing moments the twins must have seen. You were almost definitely going red.

 “You were so alone,” Kwangmin said dreamily, as if talking to himself. “You needed us.”

 As you watched him writing, you were forced to admit he was right. Life had been so drab and lonely until the two of them had showed up, but they had already changed everything. A smile broke out over your face, and you placed an impulsive kiss on Kwangmin’s cheek. That got him to look up from his notebook, suddenly staring at you with wide eyes.

 “You just kissed me.”

 “Because you’re my guardian angel! You and Youngmin.”

 “You kissed me…” Kwangmin repeated quietly, placing one hand to his cheek. “You kissed…” he trailed off as the notes on the page in front of him seemed to click in his head. “Jeongmin,” he said suddenly. “I know who Jeongmin is.”