In Taemin’s point of view…

Wednesday Morning

The next morning I woke up to the shifting of Kibum in my bed. Why was he getting up so early? I cracked open my eyes to see the sun was barely out yet. I unlocked his phone to see that it was finally Wednesday. The first day of school. But, dad told us not to wake up until 6:30. It’s 5:00.

“Taeminnie baby, are you awake?” Kibummie hyung asked. I sat up on the bed in response. He giggled.

“Come down here on the floor, we’re going to start organizing our school supplies. Also, I have our schedules!” he cheered. I slowly got on the ground next to him. We were in the corner of his room by the heating vent, so we could stay warm.

“Okay, turns out, me and you are in the same class. We only have some different classes. Here you go!” Kibummie handed me my schedule. I looked it over as he read his.

Name: Lee Taemin

Classroom: B-9

Homeroom Teacher: Mr. Wang

I was overall pleased with my schedule. Kibum was finished looking over his whole packet and started explaining things to me. I learned that studio’s is a class that Kibum also takes, and is where you learn on how to make a company for anything. Kibum wants to make a company for fashion (of course) and is excited for this class, and so am I.

I also learned all about how in music, she trains our voices and we learn about k-pop.  And when she does train our voices, we have to sing in front of the class. Alone.

“I hate her teaching style, but it’s okay. You’re favorite teacher is soon to be Mrs. Min anyway. She teaches Studio’s, remember?” I nodded my head eagerly. Now that we knew our classes, we headed towards our book bags and the bags full of supplies we bought from staples. We put most of our things into our bags that almost didn’t zip because they were so full of stuff we needed for school. By this time it was 6:30. We both went into separate rooms to wash up and get ready for school. When I finished taking a shower and washing my face, I headed over to my walk in closet to see a fully dressed Kibum already in there.

“ I don’t want you to walk in there dressed like a fool, so I decided to pick out you’re outfit. Here ya go!” He handed me clothes. I happily put the clothes on in front of him. He started to blush, so when I got finished getting dressed, I went up to him and kissed him on the cheek. He blushed even more.

“Come on, hyung, let’s go eat breakfast!” I exclaimed, dragging him down the stairs as he grabbed both of our book bags.

He reached into the cabinet and grabbed a box of chocolate cereal. I got the milk and poured it into the bowls. Then we sat down and ate it. I like how the milk turned into chocolate milk when it touched the chocolate flavor on the cereal. It really made me smile. It also made the cereal taste better. That made me think that maybe change is good. I started to wonder what Mrs. Cho would be doing at the moment. She is always in her office early in the morning to make sure we are still sleeping. She’s probably doing research on future adoptions. That was what she usually did. I would know because I would always be watching her, Minho next to me. I’m glad we’re friends. I think it would be lonely there without him.

“Taemin, you alive?” Kibum poked my shoulder, waking me up from my day dream. I nodded my head slowly looking back at my milk.

Change is better, change is better, I told myself over and over again.

“So, what are we doing after school?” I asked Kibum after finishing our breakfast.

“Well, I wanted to know if you wanted to go to the shops with me?” He asked. I smiled widely at him. I really do like shopping now, I just hate certain stores. Many certain stores.

“Yes! But, could we go to a food shop???” I asked, putting on a good puppy face. He came over and pinched my cheek, which he’s been doing often.

“Of course! We’ll go to… hmmm… Oh! It’ll be a surprise!” Kibum smiled at me. I really like his smile. Lightens the mood, you know?

We grabbed our book bags and headed outside of the door. I looked around at the crisp autumn scene. There were leaves perfectly everywhere, a nice cool breeze coming slowly towards us as we walked. The trees were the colors of red, orange, and yellow with hints of green. The sun was just coming out as we walked down the path that… I don’t even know where it lead to. We were obviously going to school, but I’ve never been to a public school before. I wonder what it’s like. I took out my phone to ask Minho what it was like.

To Choi Minho:

Um, question. What’s school like? I’ve never been there before…

I waited about for a minute or so and got an answer immediately.

From: Choi Minho

ITS SOOOOOO FUN!!! You get lots of homework though -_- It’s annoying, but your super smart, so maybe you could come over and do mine??? Lol why didn’t you ask you boyfriend? That still cracks me up xD

I blushed at my phone. I hated when he did that… is it that wrong to love your brother like that?

“You told someone?” Kibum asked me, curious written on his forehead. I nodded.

“Minho is my best friend. He won’t tell anyone, he promised me.” I smiled at him. He nodded and continued texting his cousin on his phone. Well, the only cousin he actually liked enough to text. I still haven’t met him yet, but after me and Kibum got together, I heard a lot about him. His name is Lee Jinki, and I find that name cool. Funny, but cool. It’s like one of a kind. If I were to make him a nickname, it would be another cool and original one, like Onew. I just like the way it sounds. Onew hyung, Onew hyung. He lives in China though… lucky kid. I would ki-

“We’re here.” Kibum announced as we approached a gate. It hasn’t changed since the first time I came here. He took off his book bag and un zipped it, searching deep in the biggest pocket for something obviously important. He finally pulled out his wallet. Why his wallet? We need to get in the gates! We can’t shop now!

“What are you doing?” I asked. He now started a search through his wallet, which didn’t take as long as the first search. He pulled out a plastic card. It looked a lot like the card dad used to pay with at Ikea. Dad had explained it was a credit card, which you can buy things off of. What sick person made it possible to buy things off of a piece of plastic? It’s cool, just stupid. Couldn’t they of made it cloth? Metal? Even cardboard? Anything but bendy plastic. How cool though. Dad said we could get something like credit card called gift cards. I really want one! It would be so cool to show Minho my plastic!

“This,” he started to explain, “is an ID card. You put it in the card slot on the gate and it unlocks. I’ll come with you to get yours.” He demonstrated putting the card in the slot, resulting in a click sound. He opened the gate and closed it behind us, hearing another click sound to know it was locked. We walked down the hill to the school, when I saw a familiar face. I can spot that prince hair from anywhere.

“HYUNG!” I shouted, running towards him. He turned around, running back to me, as we both smashed into each other hugging one another. We finally let go of each other and I dragged him to Kibum.

“H-h-hi K-k-kibum-ah” Minho stuttered scared. Kibum smiled and laughed it off. I smiled at that. We could all be good friends!

“ No need to be scared now, we could be friends!” Kibum held out his hand, Minho slowly shaking it. Aigoo, that boy is too quiet at times!

We all walked as a group up to the front doors, where we met Jonghyun. This being my first time seeing him, he looks like a… dinosaur.

“Woah! Kibum, you didn’t tell me your best friend was a dinosaur!” I exclaimed laughing, earning glares from both Kibum and Jonghyun.

“And you didn’t tell me that your best friend was a frog” Kibum retorted, making Jonghyun laugh. Minho was too scared and nervous to even take the insult in offense, so only I glared.

“So this is your brother? He’s cute.” Jonghyun observed me, I wonder if he was using his 5 senses…

“Yah. You know he’s mine only!” Kibum said, rapping and arm around my waist. So he told someone too? How cute.

“Sorry, sorry!” Jonghyun held up his arms in surrender. We continued walking into the doors of the school. Again, nothing had changed since the last time I was here. Seriously, they need an upgrade.

 Minho, on my right side, whispered to me, “Did you use your 5 senses on this place?” I smiled at that question. Because I know I’m not alone on using my 5 senses.

“Yes. When we came to visit you before I got adopted.” He nodded understandingly.

“So did I,” he explained, “But it didn’t feel okay at first. Like calming…” That’s funny, that’s what I thought.

“That’s what it felt like to me. Busy but calming. I think I like it here already” I told him. While we talked more about the school, we let Jonghyun and Key talk to each other as we all headed to the office to get my ID card. Kibum had to stop talking to Jonghyun, him being my brother he had to help me. He pretty much talked for me- except my name and stuff. Just the address and emergency number, since I knew none of that. They gave me the card, and I shoved it in my pocket. We bowed and left, as I grabbed  onto Kibum’s shirt. Usually he puts an arm around me, but this time, he groaned. I looked up, confused.

“Taemin, must you?” He asked in his sassy diva mode. He almost never uses that mode on me, unless I touch his stuff, his shirt not included in “stuff”. I let go, and walked over to Minho. Kibum had a hurt face first, but then snapped out of it and continued talking to Jonghyun. It took a while to get to the fifth grade hallway, but it was also an interesting walk. People would constantly shout out Kibum or Jonghyun’s name, and they would come up to them as well. They gave Minho dirty looks, which I didn’t like, but then they would stare at me curiously, so I would just smile instead of yelling at them. One kid even asked Kibum who I was, and even suggested that I was his boyfriend (which don’t forget, I am), But instead, he said “Just my brother”. I mean, what he said is the truth, but he couldn’t admit to his friends yet? Maybe he’s being shy? Pshh, who am I kidding? Kibum, shy? Never. Was I worried? Hurt? Upset? Confused? Yes. Yes to all of those. But I it up. I glanced at him giving me an apologetic smile. I smiled a fake smile back and walked on, clinging to Minho.

Is this what I signed up for?