"One student ticket please," Yoojung said, sliding her student ID and 9000 won under the glass window. In no time, a ticket and her student ID were slid back to her under the window. She thanked the booth worker and excitedly walked through the double glass doors to the modern art museum. 

Yoojung liked to visit the museum at least once a month to see the newly updated art exhibits and observe the creativity of the current generation of artists. She may not have been born with the talent to create art, but she liked to think that she was born with the talent to at least appreciate it. Her personal favorite style was neon art. There was something alluring by the way artists used neon lights to accurately capture and depict the feelings contained in certain words and phrases. 

She knew she couldn't explore all six floors in one day, so she settled for just exploring four. Besides, they replaced only the first two floors every month, although she liked to revisit some of the past artwork in the upper floors. Before she knew it, two hours had easily gone by and the soles of her feet were starting to hurt. She took this as her cue to finish up for the day and she made her way to the down escalator. 

Being the impatient person she was, she had always found that escalators were too slow for her taste. She could never get herself to just stand and wait to reach the bottom unless she was exceptionally tired. She walked down the left side of the escalator saying a excuse me every couple of seconds. Near the bottom, a hand reached out to grab her shoulder as she passed by and a voice called out her name.

She immediately turned her head around to see Yixing and three other guys, presumably his friends.

"I had a feeling it was you!" Yixing said as his dimple made an appearance.

Surprised, Yoojung greeted, "Oh hey, Yixing!"

The four of them stepped off the escalator and stepped aside as to not block the walkway.

"Are you on your way out?" Yixing asked.

"Yeah, my eyes want to keep looking around, but my feet are telling me no," Yoojung laughed.

"I know the feeling," Yixing chuckled, "and oh, these are my friends Minseok, Suho, and Luhan!"

"Hi, I'm Yoojung!" Yoojung introduced brightly as each of the guys smiled in acknowledgement. She thought she saw the boy with doe eyes, Luhan, give her a slightly strange look, but it was quickly replaced with a warm smile.

"Well if you're on your way, do you want to go to the cafe nearby?" Yixing suggested.

Yoojung checked her phone for the time, 3:24PM, and replied, "Sure, why not!"

--------------------

Carefully stepping foot outside the laboratory for the first time in eleven days, Kai was met with the light drizzle of rain. Any other day he would have cursed loudly at the prospect of getting wet, but tonight, he welcomed the rain for it was a sign of life outside the laboratory walls. And together with the rain, he began his walk home.

By the time he reached the gate to his house, he was thoroughly drenched. Rather eagerly, he entered the pin code and unlocked the gates. Not wanting to risk a run in with his parents, he decided to go in through the back door. Absentmindedly with a small smile on his face, he walked the familiar path to the back door through the perfectly tended garden, his mother's pride. By the time he noticed the smell of cigarettes and the presence of another person, it was too late. Upon this realization, Kai stood, unmoving, contemplating whether he should attempt to turn around or continue on his way and hope to go unnoticed.

A voice sharply interrupted his thoughts. "Didn't I tell you not to get yourself into trouble?" the man spoke with his back still turned towards Kai.

"What does it matter to you as long as I don't get caught?" Kai said, jaw clenched.

"Right you are," the man finally turned around and walked closer to Kai, "but I've just caught you now, haven't I Jongin?"

Kai scoffed, "Since when were you such an attentive father? Just act like you and mother normally do and pretend I'm not here."

His father took another puff of his cigarette and blew the smoke directly in Kai's face, "This is your last warning. Do as you'd like, but the moment you get caught by a tabloid and ruin my company and my reputation, I will see to the end of you. Don't test me."

"I wouldn't dare to disappoint you, father," Kai replied with a sarcastic smile and turned the last corner to the back door.

Kai woke up with a start. "Is a nice, normal nap too much to ask for?" he muttered as he got out from his bed, made his way to the living room, and plumped himself down on the armchair.

"Did you have a nice nap?" Kris asked without taking his eyes off the television.

"Yeah," Kai replied with an underlying tone of sarcasm, "the best nap of my life."

"Did you have the dream again," D.O. asked sympathetically, noticing Kai's less than happy tone.

"No," Kai said curtly, "It wasn't that one this time, but it was equally unpleasant. Just... don't ask."

D.O. opened his mouth to add words of comfort, but decided against it and turned his attention back to the show they were watching.

--------------------

"So, are you a high school student?" Minseok asked before taking a sip of his coffee.

"Yeah, I'm a senior at Haesun High." Yoojung replied.

"She goes to the same school as Chanyeol, Jongdae, and Sehun!" Yixing added.

"Oh, you guys all know each other?" Yoojung asked with a tone of surprise, wondering exactly how big their friend circle was.

"Yeah, we all moved here together," Minseok replied in a matter-of-fact way.

She couldn't say that it didn't strike her as odd that eight boys (and counting, who knew how many more there were?) all moved to town at the same exact time.

Probably picking up on Yoojung's confusion, Luhan jumped in to explain, "You see, it's always been a dream of ours to all move to Seoul and get a house together when we got old enough. Most of us are attending university here in Seoul, so we just brought Chanyeol, Jongdae, and Sehun with us even if they're still in high school."

"And their parents were just okay with them moving to Seoul during high school on their own?" Yoojung inquired with a raised eyebrow.

Stumped, Luhan looked to Suho who said calmly, "Chanyeol, Jongdae, and Sehun's parents are... free-spirited should I say? They aren't very involved in their children's lives, unfortunately."

Upon hearing the background story, Yoojung felt embarrassed for prying, "Sorry if I made you uncomfortable! It wasn't my place to ask about their parents."

"Don't worry about it," Luhan smiled. She decided Luhan had a very warm smile that made her smile sheepishly in return.

"What about you?" Minseok asked, "When did you move here?"

"My dad and I moved here from America when I was 13 years old."

The boys got the hint that her mother was probably not in the picture anymore and didn't ask for further details.

"Cool! So does that mean you're fluent in both English & Korean?" Yixing changed the topic.

"I am indeed!" Yoojung replied in English, hoping they knew that much.

To her surprise, Minseok replied with perfect English pronunciation, "Same here!"

"Woah!" Yoojung replied in Korean this time, "How is your English so good?"

"It was 20% because we had a very good English teacher back in high school, but the other 80% was because I'm a genius," he joked.

"Of course, of course," Yoojung played along, "Where do you guys go to university?"

"Well we're gap yearing, but we'll be applying this year!" Suho replied this time.

"Well it was nice meeting you guys, but I actually have some errands to run before dinner so I think I have to go," Yoojung said rather regrettably while getting up from her seat. 

"Nice to meet you too!" the boys waved, except Yixing, who had already met her before.

He replied instead with, "Nice seeing you today!"

As soon as Yoojung left their sight, Luhan turned to the rest of the boys with a puzzled expression, "Guys, I can't read her." 

"What do you mean you can't read her?" Minseok asked, just as confused.

"I mean that I couldn't read her at all. I stared directly into her eyes but couldn't pick up a single thing she was thinking."

"But that's not possible. She can't be immune to your power unless she's one of us or she regularly-" Suho rambled.

"Exactly," Luhan confirmed what Suho was implying, "It's one of the two. There are no other answers."

"How would she even have access to it? We burned it all years ago," Minseok tried to reason.

"I don't know, but no matter how strong someone's mentality is, I can pick up at least a few thoughts here and there. Her mind was like a brick wall." Luhan said worriedly.

"What kind of girl exactly are you, Lee Yoojung?" Yixing wondered outloud.

{A/N} I know it's been a really long time since I last updated, right? I don't know how many of you actually read the author's note but I wanted to apologize for the delay. Hopefully the end of this chapter has gotten you thinking a lot. I hope you decide that my story is interesting enough to stick with the irregular updates T__T Thank you so much for letting me hit 100 subscribers. If you like the story/chapter, I hope you'll leave a comment below telling me what you think or what the boys were implying at the end!  xoxo -- JS ♡