[CONTENTID1]

sixteen: the first conversation[/CONTENTID1][CONTENTID2]

["Sehun … do you develop a lisp when you're embarrassed?"] [/CONTENTID2][CONTENTID3]

When Juyeon woke up, she was staring at the baby blue sky.

Groaning, she felt her forehead. There was a welt the size of a grape forming. The entire area was sore and most likely bruised.

"Are you going to start screaming again?"

Juyeon turned her head a bit and saw Sehun was sitting on the grass next to her, staring firmly straight ahead and scowling.

"How long was I out?" The question came as a hoarse whisper, and Juyeon had to clear and try again. Everything hurt.

"Not long. Maybe five minutes." Sehun tossed something at her and Juyeon flinched. A can of peach juice landed perfectly right in front of her nose. "Here."

Juyeon sat up and eyed the can warily. Since when did Sehun buy her a drink? In the end, she opened it (with difficulty; her fingers felt boneless and limp) and drank. The juice was sweet and the flavour exploded along her tongue, clearing up the fog in her mind and just leaving the headache.

"Did you have to hit me this hard?" She muttered, and could have sworn there was a satisfied little grin on Sehun's face. "It was completely necessary," he assured her.

Juyeon drank some more and saw that Sehun must have carried her to an empty spot of grass, under the shade of a tree. There was a gentle breeze, and Juyeon wondered why Sehun was letting her enjoy the wind.

"So, why were you crying?" Sehun asked bluntly. Juyeon frowned at him. "Why do you care?"

"Because you got my shirt wet. Because you freaked me out when you ran into me hyperventilating. And because I don't like it when girls cry. Trust me; you looked so pathetic there was nothing else I could do. It was like … what's that normal phrase? Watching a puppy get kicked or skinned or something like that?"

Juyeon looked away with a snort. "Something like that," she said, highly doubting they would even care if a puppy was kicked in front of them. She already knew their stand against frogs. "So, you're more than happy to let the wind drop me in the Pacific Ocean but you can't handle a girl having a panic attack? Nice."

Sehun narrowed his eyes at her. "We may be crazy, but we're not evil."

"You're the one who told me you were monsters," Juyeon pointed out. The two of them glared at each other for a little while before looking away.

Juyeon observed the small but sturdy tree covering her from the bright sun. "Was there a tree here? I don't remember."

"D.O hyung made it when I dropped you there. Said you probably wouldn't like getting tanned. He didn't want to stay, though."

Juyeon briefly remembered the look on his face when she snapped. "I think I scared him."

There was a long silence, and Juyeon realized that this was the first time she's had a sort-of real conversation with Sehun―no, with any of the Exo. The atmosphere wasn't tense; it was warm, lazy, and soothing.

"Are you going to have another panic attack?" Sehun asked. Juyeon shook her head, noticing how calm she felt. That was strange, and very nice in a way. "No, I think I tired myself out. I'm not really the kind of person to cry over nothing."

Sehun shrugged his lanky shoulders and said in a dry voice, "Didn't look like it was nothing."

Juyeon finished the can of juice in no time at all and began picking at the grass, trying not to look at the boy beside her. "Remember when I told Kai I hadn't fully accepted the existence of Problem Children? Well, I kind of did, in-between getting upset over something else."

"What was the 'something else'?" Sehun asked, sounding insistent, almost impatient. Juyeon turned to look at him and found herself staring into an icy dark abyss. Sehun was looking at her with such a startling intensity she completely forgot what they were talking about. "Eh, um … I can't r