Hongbin

We descended down the stairs, making the incident awhile ago with all the weird atmosphere like it never happened. When I saw Ken, it scared me. What if he still thinks about her? That was the last thing I wanted things to happen. I looked at Seomin. She was in a daze. Does she remember? I remembered my conversation with her aunt this morning.

"Hongbin-ah?" her aunt asked as I walked in the kitchen, seeing her drink her coffee. I had my notebook with me. I sat on a chair.

"Auntie, I wanna talk about something." I asked in a serious tone. Hearing my tone, she sat upright.

"What is it?"

"Is Han Seomin really her?" I said in a hushed yet serious tone. I laid out my notebook in front of her. Two pictures were together side by side. One was the stolen picture of Seomin when we were in the park. The other was the group picture with Ken hyung, her and I which was taken years ago when we were kids. She laughed lightly like she was missing the old days.

"Yeah. It's her. The same Han Seomin."

"Auntie... why did you lie?" I softly pleaded. I closed the notebook and put it beside me. "Why didn't you say she survived the accident?"

"It was requested by her family. My brother didn't like my niece interacting someone like Ken." she sighed. Someone like Ken? What did she mean?

"You do know Ken will be in the same college as the both of us, right?" I eyed her.

"I really don't know, Hongbin. Her father, who's also my brother, probably didn't know." she looked stressed. Probably because of Seomin's father. "Yah. Why are you calling Ken, Ken? He's older than you."

"I lost all respect for him that day." I looked away. "But... is it possible for Seomin to remember everything?"

"Nothing is impossible, Hongbin."

I poked Hongbin for the nth time. He dazed out, which was usually my thing.

We were both walking in silence when we were going down the stairs. But not the comfortable silence. It's the I'm-thinking-about-lots-of-things-I-can't-talk-right-now silence. He halted when we reached the end of the stairs. I poked him. He didn't respond.

"Hongbin?" I poked him again but harder. He flinched.

"Yeah?"

"It's almost time. You were dazing for a long time which is my thing." I pointed at a nearby clock. "First period is done already, by the way."

"Sorry about that," he smiled. "Let's go?" I nodded and we both stopped by at each other's lockers to get what was needed for the next class.

My next class was Musical Instruments. Hongbin and I parted ways, and I started walking to my class. The bell rung just in time and students were flooding out of their classrooms, trying also to get to their next class. I walked in and sat at the back again. People slowly filled the room.

"Seomin!" two voices called out to me. I saw Ravi and Haneul looking strangely at each other before approaching me and sat beside me. A guy teacher walked in and wrote "Mr. No" on the blackboard. He smiled at all of us and introduced himself. After discussing, our first assignment was to pair up and perform a duet with one playing an instrument and one singing. Everyone groaned.

"It doesn't have to be a complicated piece. Just a simple one. I just wanna see your talents in this class." Mr. No said.

"Seomin, let's be pairs!" Ravi excitingly said. I nodded since the look on his face was too hard to deny to. After that, Mr. No discussed even more about the history of instruments and those stuff. Then we were dismissed.

Ravi waited for me outside and asked, "Wanna discuss our homework later when school ends?" I nodded since I wanna give a good impression to our teacher. He gave me a thumbs up and left.

The whole day was like that -- boring classes -- and I didn't see anyone I know in any of my classes. During break, I just stayed in the school's library.

I sat in a table with a book I grabbed somewhere and started reading. It was about world history. Wrong book. I thought. So I returned it and went into an aisle of books.

"Ouch." I stumbled backwards.

"I'm so-- Seomin?" I looked at the person. Those eyes.

"Ken-ssi?" He chuckled a bit and he motioned me to sit in a table. We both sat in front of each other.

"Call me Ken." he smiled, obviously forgetting the incident this morning. I mouthed the word Ken and I smiled. He sat down on a table and asked me to join him.

"We really don't know anything about each other and apparently, the others know you pretty well already. Wanna play 20 questions?" I remember playing this with my maids when I was young and have no one to talk to because my parents were both busy building up the company. I nodded.

"What's your favorite food?" I asked first.

"I like hemburjerl!" We both laughed at his engrish and we continued our game. We both asked the basic things and laughed at Ken's epic english that the librarian had to hush us. I was starting to be comfortabel with him as I am with Hongbin.

It was Ken's last question for me and I was expecting something basic or silly again but then--

"Do you remember me, the things we did together and everything? Or did you purposely try to forget me?"

I feel so lazy. u n u And I'm supposed to make a thesis statement. Ugh. Anywaaays~ Story update~! Woot woot. This is a boring chapter. I have to agree with you but I have to make up for the weeks I didn't update because I'm a horrible author.

MarryM hepi burtday gurl. o u o This will be my gift for you. Thanks for reading!

Byeeee.

Zoe. :)