It was only her second day in school. But already, things were going unexpectedly.

1. She has to share a room with a boy for the next two years. There’s about a thousand important and relevant things to be worried about but she’s only dismayed with the thought of her having to sleep with her bra on from now. And also how she must avoid seeing the boy in his boxers every morning because waking up is probably not the only thing that’s hard for him ( she’s trying to be mature about it but will always gross her out).

2. That boy is Baekhyun, who for now seems friendly and normal but she can’t decide whether it’s because he feels sorry for her for being a loner or he genuinely wants to befriend her.

3. She has 4 foundation subjects which is taught and tested in hangul. She don’t know how she’s ever going to pass them considering that she can barely write her name in hangul and she’s not even a smart student to begin with.

The only thing that seems to be going as she had expected was the fact that she is behaving like a tensed weirdo and she haven’t made any friends, excluding Baekhyun because he’s her roommate and she can’t avoid him.

It’s 7.30am and yes, she’s early today. Yay for no more getting lost!

Reaching her locker, she opened it, and peeped at her schedule for today ( which is in English!) . After memorizing it, she sighed. No singing lesson yet? Urgh.

She grabbed her books and shut her locker. Turning around,

She froze.

The dazzling boy. Infront of her.

She was shocked. So she just stared at him. He stared back, but softly. It was intense. His eyes were even more pretty up-close.

She could also feel a lot of people staring at them right now. Probably thinking why the heck would this guy talk to her.

Finally he spoke first. “Hi.”

“Hi.” Robin held her breath, pointed over her shoulder with her finger. “You weren’t talking to my locker right?”

Confusion flickered over his features. “Why would I do that?”

“I . . .” Robin held her breath again, searched her mind for an excuse to redeem herself from sounding stupid after blabbering out senseless thought. Why would a popular boy, Luhan, talking to her in the hallway?! Does he even know that she exist?!

“I thought that—I mean, maybe you wanted to borrow a book or something.”

He shook his head, stuffed his hands in his pockets. And smiled. “No. I want to talk to you.”

Her eyebrows shot upward. “Me?”

He cleared his throat. “What’s your name?”

Robin’s sure she looked completely befuddled. She felt completely befuddled.

Seeing that she wasn’t replying, Luhan added, “ Let’s be friends”.

“I don’t understand,” Robin replied subconsciously and, because her brain was on befuddlement-autopilot, she asked, “You mean like friends with benefits?”

. . . did I just say that? Or did I think that? Judging by the amused expression on his features Robin guessed that she said it.

 “Friends without benefits. Just friends.” He answered, looking really amused but trying to conceal his laughter to be polite to her. He remembered the joke about taking his ity yesterday.

“ I’d like to think I’m a gentlement.” He added with a soft,friendly smile.

“Of course. I didn’t mean . . .” Robin huffed so that she would stop talking and promptly leaned against her locker weakly. She examined him from behind her lashes; he appeared to be earnest. Nothing in his expression hinted that this was a joke or that he was trying to make a fool of her. Nevertheless, her eyes narrowed with suspicion.

“ Robin,” she said. Then added quickly, “ My name’s Robin.” She wondered if it’s too lame to offer a handshake. Well Baekhyun did offer a handshake. Except the problem now is that she could feel the heat radiating from her face and she knew it means that she’s blushing. She’s also sure that she can’t feel her hands.

Luhan observed how her cheeks were turning into a tint of pink. And he thought it made her look every prettier. He chuckled. “ That’s a nice name.”

“ It’s uni,” she blurted out, without thinking. God. I am retarded.

“ Oh, I know that.” Then he stretched out that forbidden smooth, electrifying handsome hand to her. “I’m Luhan”.

She shook it, and felt that shock running from her hands to the rest of her body. And it sent her heart pounding. She just touched the dazzling boy.

“So, what’s your first class?” He asked, ignoring all the stares from surrounding students.

“ Um,” Robin pretended to think. “ History of Music, I think..”

“ With Mr. Jung?”

“ Yup with Mr.Jung”

He lit up with a smile. “ Good, we’re in the same class again. Let’s walk to class together?” He offered.

“Okay..” She agreed weakly, because she didn’t know what else to do. She felt overwhelmed by him, his request, the gentleness of his voice, the sincerity of his words, the entire situation. 

Then in a micro second, he took a step towards her, they were so close that she thought he was going to kiss her. Then she heard a clicking sound. It was the locker. He took a step back.

“ You didn’t close your locker properly,” he said casually. Then he made a gesture with his hand to usher her forward. She mentally slapped herself for even thinking that he was going to kiss her.

“ Shall we?” Luhan smiled.

“Okay” she said. Panic caused by his proximity was enough to spur Robin into action. She started walking, very fast. It was an abrupt movement. Luhan chuckled as he took a few quick steps to pace up to her.

Because she was literally speed walking as Luhan tried to keep up with her,it looked almost like he was chasing her down the corridor. And it must be quite amusing to watch because she saw a lot of eyes trailing them. Gosh. Are they going to gossip about him? She hope not.

“ Hey, do you know where the class is?” Luhan asked, looking at her with a smile.

“ Um yeah, sure.” She lied, and returned a nervous, slightly cramped smile. She was walking really fast, she realized.

Then suddenly he put an arm around her shoulder, and directed her body to the right as they made a sharp turn into a classroom door just as she was about to overshot it.

“ But you were going the wrong way, just so you know,” he teased and put his arms down after only a few seconds later. They were now in the classroom. Thankfully there were only a couple of student hanging around, talking to each other and generally not noticing that they just entered.

Baekhyun looked up from where he sat. Then his eyes darted from the spot on Robin’s shoulder where Luhan swiftly took his hands away from a second earlier, then moved to Robin’s cramped face. She caught his eyes. And attempted a smile.

Baekhyun raised a questioning eyebrow at her.

“ What?” Robin said softly and defensively as she walked towards his table.

Baekhyun’s mouth curled into a smirk. “ Nothing, just wondering why Luhan’s hands were on your shoulders?”

Robin took a seat beside Baekhyun then saw Luhan glancing at her from where he was standing with his friends. She couldn’t tell what was his expression because she turned too quickly. She looked at Baekhyun.

He was reading a music sheet, but looked like he was still waiting for her answer.

“ Oh it’s nothing, we just walked to class together and I was going out of the way so he pulled me in,” she explained.

“ Good because I was about to tell you-“

“ Tell me what?”, Robin blurted out impatiently. Did luhan said something about her? What was it? Did he like her?

She stared at Baekhyun, not blinking. And a look of mischief spread on his face. “ Now that I see how much you wanna know, I don’t wanna tell you anymore.”

“ What do you mean you don’t wanna tell me? Just pretend that I didn’t say anything!”

“ Nope. No way”, he went back to his music sheets.

Robin snatched his sheets away, promting him to look at her. Were they already friends of this closeness that she could easily just snatched his things away? She was shocked herself.

“ Tell me!”, she demanded. But Baekhyun just seems more amused each time she whined. Because his chin was now resting on his hand, as he studied her.

“ And miss the chance to see you so annoyed? No way.” He smiled playfully again.

“ Urgh! You’re so annoying!”, she grunted and settled her bags on the table, taking out its content.

“ That’s what makes me cute,” he replied, and subconsciously bit his lip playfully. Robin heart skipped a little when she saw it. Did he do it on purpose?

She hate to admit it, it is kinda cute. Kinda. But before she could argue anything else back, she heard a high-pitched, almost shrieking exciting voice calling out, “ Baekhyun!”

They both turned, then Baekhyun smiled. “ Got to go, catch you later!”, he said and flashed her another mischievous grin.

Robin observed from where she sat. Baekhyun had walked to the right corner of the class and took a seat on what looked like his usual seats. There was a bunch of people gathering around him, infact, a huge bunch. And then she see how he was making jokes, telling stories and how people, mostly girls were just sitting around, laughing and hitting his arms whenever he spoke. They looked so smitten. Gosh, disgusting. She heard herself mumbled under her breath as she rolled her eyes to the side and then realized she was now looking back at Luhan, who was also looking back at her. Her heart skipped a beat.

Then he smiled at her, it was soft and gentle. She nodded back with a shy smile, then quickly looked down at her books which she couldn’t read a single word.

Turns out it wasn’t such a good class afterall because their teacher had given them a surprise test, on the basis that this was an elite school and he had expected that everyone must have already read through the first chapter of their book. He also wanted to assess the level of understanding of the class. Needless to say, Robin was clueless and for this she felt miserable. She’s dreading the next class where she gets back her paper because it’s probably going to be a fail.

As the bell rings for the lunch period and everyone started pouring into the cafeteria,  Robin found herself yet again, in the dreadful and awkward situation. Here she was, standing in the middle of the cafeteria, with no one to seat with. If only she could locate Leah, maybe she should find a seat and then text Leah and..

“ Boo!”

Robin jumped. Luckily she didn’t drop her plate. She turned to her side and gasped.

“ Baekhyun!”

He laughed. “ What were you thinking about?” he teased.

There’s no doubt that this was Leah’s cousin. Just something about them and scarying, playing pranks on people and then laughing and smiling in such a way that makes it impossible to be angry with them.

“ Nothing, just thinking about where to seat..” she answered, looking around for a table. “ And where’s your harem of girls?”

“ You jelly?”, he grinned.

" Jelly?" She raised an eyebrow.

" It means jealous," he grinned.

“ What? No!” she snapped at him but found him looking straight ahead, she followed his gaze. She saw Luhan walking, towards their direction, quite possible towards her. Stop! She wanted to scream. Don’t come any nearer! I’m not ready! I need to run away and prepare and come back again!

But of course that couldn’t happen because her feet won’t stop walking forward and Luhan’s feet won’t stop walking towards her as well. At this rate, they were going to collide pretty soon. In a second Luhan was infront of her. He turned and gave a ‘hey’ nod and Baekhyun, the sort of things guys do to each other to say hi and Baekhyun returned the gesture.

“ Where are you seating?” Luhan asked, and she saw how his eyes naturally spark.

“ Uh. I’m not really sure I haven’t found a seat,” she replied cautiously. Thank goodness she’s not trembling like this morning.

“ You haven’t got a fixed table already have you?” He asked again. But her face showed her confusion.

“ Fixed table?”

He laughed. “ Ah. That means you haven’t got one. Good,” he said, then took her plate from her hands. opened, trying to protest but nothing came out. She followed him forward. She turned around to find Baekhyun but found that he already had begun walking forward. Her feet felt heavy as she walked forward because about half of the cafeteria were looking at her.

“ If you don’t mind, just sit here from now” he said, dropping her plate gently on a table. She looked up to see about 10-12 people looking at her and noticed that all, like ALL of them were so good-looking, the sort that have glorious air flowing behind them as they walk and have light shining out of their butts. It’s like the all-star team of the looks department. Then Luhan had began walking away, making a turn at the far end of the table then back to sit opposite her. There were in the middle, as she realized. She probably would have remained stunned and standing up if not for a familiar chuckled and a light push on her shoulder to sit down.

“ Leah!”, Robin gasped and smiled.

“ Well hello you! Lots of explaining to do you know, last night you said you have a crush on Luhan and now he’s dragging you to sit with him everyday during lunch?!” she hissed which made Robin laugh.

“But first you’ve got more explaining to do because I am so confused!”

“ Okay, what do you need me to explain?”

“ Okay so what is it about fixed table that luhan was talking about? And why is half of the world staring at me?!” Robin resisted the urge to pull Leah to a corner and talk as loud as she can.

Leah laughed. “ Oh that. Everyone here has a fixed table so you can’t really just sit anywhere you like it’s really terrible but it’s a way of life here. It defines your social class. And bear with me when I say this because I can’t stand myself for sounding so obnoxious when I say that this is sort of the popular table that most people fight and try to sit in. That’s probably why everyone is staring at you. And it’s also partly because Luhan was the one who invited you here, it’ll turn the girls crazy.By the end of the day everyone in this school will find out your name,your favourite ice cream flavour, your social security number and everything about you.” Leah finished. Robin looks more shocked than ever.

“What?” she only managed out.

“ What can I say?” Leah shrugged apologetically. “Welcome to the club,”

Robin found back her voice. “ Oh and I sort of left Baekhyun there and just followed Luhan here. Do you think he’ll be angry with me? It was kinda mean of me because he sat with me yesterday when I was supposingly a loser and now.. now that.. ah forget it. I probably should find him right now and apologise anyway I don’t belong here “ Robin mumbled as Leah pat her on the back to calm her down.

“ What’re you talking about? He’s sitting right there,” Leah said, pointing her attention forward. Opposite Robin, was Luhan. And sitting two persons away from Luhan, at the corner of this table was Baekhyun.

Bloody Baekhyun, eating his food and laughing happily at whatever the rest of the boys were joking about. And here she was, feeling guilty for ditching him to eat by himself in a small corner. She should have seen this coming.

“ Let me introduce you to everyone!” Luhan said, getting everyone’s attention. “ Hey guys, this is Robin, she’s new and I hope you don’t mind her joining us from now? She’s Leah’s childhood bestfriend,”. At once, everyone turned to her and started bombarding her with their mind blowing smiles and "hi", "hey".

She was too shy to look anywhere else so she settled with smiling at everyone, but totally avoiding their gaze.

“ This is Kai, Sehun, Kris and over there is my roommate D.O, and xiumin..” Luhan went on but Robin was too nervous to listen.

--

“ I didn't know you were part of the A boys?.... ”, Robin asked cautiously that night when they were back in their dorm. She wondered if she was sounding too angsty like he had said earlier.

He chuckled.

“ You couldn’t tell?”, he joked. “Ah, you probably wondered how I got there with this average look and small eyes right?,” he asked, looking over at Robin.

Robin immediately replied, “ No!.. that’s not what I meant..”

“ So you meant that I’m cute that’s why I’m there?” he teased.

“No!” she snapped.

“ Okay I’m just playing with you relax.” He laughed. “ I do admit my lacking in the physical appearance department, but in my defense, I’m funny. And as it turns out everyone likes the funny guy so..” he grinned, and do that cute biting lip thing again which made Robin turned away from his gaze immediately, afraid that she might blush.

“ I see..” she trailed off. Then suddenly remembered yesterday when he said that he had come over to sit with her because his friends wanted to talk to her. And now that she knew who his friends were.. could that be Luhan? Her heart pounded.

“ Hey you know when you said yesterday that you came over and sit with me because your friends wanted to know me? Who was it?” she asked, pretending to sound casual.

Baekhyun immediately responded, “ Forget it, I’m not telling you. They already know you now anyway..”

“ No come on but I still wanna know!” she insisted.

“ Don’t bother, they don’t like girls with a boy’s name,” he pretened to sound nonchalant, hoping Robin wouldn’t detect the lie in his voice. Because that friend was non existence.

“ Really? Baekhyun really?” Robin mocked him.

Baekhyun heard her saying his name, and unexpectedly felt a tug in his heart.

“ You’re gonna say that to me when you have a male friend named Kris?” she scoffed. “ Like that’s totally not a girl’s name”

" Okay you know what The voice has started and I wanna watch it so stop grilling me." Baekhyun said, " and as a peace offering i'm willing to change my name to Betty".

Robin burst out laughing. " What?! Is that the best you've got? You should have at least gone with Bella,"

He smiled, " Only if you change yours to Edward,"

Robin pretended to roll her eyes and turned her attention back to her homework.

" You're not gonna watch tv?" Baekhyun asked from his bed as he laid against his pillow and flickered between different channels.

Robin flipped onto the next hangul-filled page of her textbook as she shook her head silently. " Nope. As it is I already don't have enough time to complete my homework". This was so tiring. While baekhyun had finished his homework much earlier, she has been stuck here just because she had to use the dictionary to translate everything back to English. Her eyes were drying up and she's beginning to lose hope in passing these exams. By the time she was done with her homework, which she wasn't even sure were written correctly, it was well almost midnight. As she climbed into bed she caught a sight of the snoring Baekhyun on his bed and felt a pang of jealousy. How good would it be if she could just read hangul like drinking water. She wondered how long more would it take for her to be proficient in korean and fit in this place.