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There were no "popular" people at our school - all the students were too wealthy to care.
Instead, we judged each other by our companies; the job positions our parents and families held.

HyunJi's father worked for SM and apparently held a rather high position at the entertainment company.
We never stopped hearing about it, HyunJi always bragged about the social events she attended where she saw famous idols, she even claimed that she would one day debut under SM as well.

She had even, at one point, tried to use her father's position to get closer to Exo, but unsuccessfully failed when the boys rejected her attempts and were thankfully uninterested.

There were even rumors that Exo had to file a restraining order against her after she tried to follow one of them into the bathroom... but I hoped that was one of the more outrageous rumors. 

"It's true! That's why she's not in class today!"

My eyes rounded as I casually titled my head, craning my neck to lean it towards the conversation a group of girls were chattering about beside me.

I usually avoided gossip - rumors were constantly in circulation at our school especially due to the fact that we had Korea's top boy band attending it.

Today was different, there was something definitely off - HyunJi wasn't at school today.
That in itself wasn't what was odd, it was the fact that her absence only fueled the rumors of her suspension after the Exo event party last week.

"I heard Hana kicked her in the face," a girl was saying, her eyes wide as more students began to crowd around her. "Apparently HyunJi had to be carried out in a stretcher!"

Loud gasps echoed through the class, the students both horrified and shocked as they glanced uneasily towards each other.

My own gasp softly sounded from my lips, my mind unable to believe what was being said.
Instead of waiting around for further stories to surface, I quickly stood up from my desk and wandered out into the hall to find Hana.

I found her fairly quickly; she was standing in front of her locker, arranging her books for the day.

Opening my mouth to call out her name, I suddenly hesitated - if the rumors were true, she was different than what I initially thought of her to be.

While it was true that Hana wasn't the most bright or sunny person, I still couldn't believe that she would actually harm someone to the extent of having them be sent to the hospital.

I shook my head, convincing myself there were only rumors and slapped a wide smile across my lips. "HANAAAA!~"

She slowly glanced up, her eyes hooded and blinking slowly with laze as she gave me a small wave before turning back to her locker.

Mustering up my courage, I bit my lip before crossing the small distance between us.

I’ll have to approach this delicately… I’ll have to ask this in a way- my mouth opened before my mind could finish processing my thoughts, blurting out what I was most curious about.

"Hana! Is it true that you beat up HyunJi at Exo's party?!"

Hana scoffed, her eyes rolling as she said, "Beat up? I barely touched her. My fist probably took away more damage thanks to her thick skull."

An involuntary sigh of relief escaped my lips as I smiled and nodded - of course they had only been rumors.

If anything, I was almost positive HyunJi was the one to provoke her - Hana didn't seem like the type to purposefully go looking for trouble… Well, at least not really.

"But still," I pestered, slightly amazed. "No one has ever stood up to her-"

My mouth suddenly snapped shut as my cheeks began to rise in a flaming heat.
Hana's brows furrowed at my expression before she turned back to see who had caused me to stop talking.

"H-h-hi Sehun," I stuttered, greeting him with a small bow.

He glanced over at me, giving me a small nod in response before reaching behind him to pull a pair of socks out of his bag.

"You left these at my house, I found them in the same spot you were lying in when you were sleeping next to me."

My eyes widened as he cleared his throat, staring firmly at the pair of socks in his hand while Hana began to cough nervously.

Sleeping next to him?

Hana sighed, obviously uncomfortable as she explained in irritation, "It's not what you think-"

I quickly jumped back as Sehun suddenly gripped Hana's arm and dragged her away, cutting her off from her explanation as she turned back to give me a helpless and apologetic stare.

I stood there in front of her locker for another five minutes pondering what had just happened, and if Sehun and Hana really had... Slept together?

"What are you still doing out here?"

I blinked, raising my head to be met with Xiumin's sharp eyes as he stood inches away from me.

"Class is about to start in less than two minutes," he continued, gently nudging my arm to push me towards our class. "Let's get going."

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My lunch hour started off like it usually did - ever since my best friend had transferred to go study abroad, I had spent my time eating in the cafeteria alone or in the library.

I didn't mind, there were plenty of students who did the same.

In fact, on days where all twelve members were in school - their table was always the most rowdy, loud, and crowded.

One of my hands balanced a small book while the other lazily dragged a fork through a bowl of rice on my lunch tray.

My head suddenly shot up when loud yells carried through from the Exo table, the boys obviously in distress as they shrieked noisily.

"WHAT!"
"So THAT'S were you went off to at lunch Yixing?!"
"ALONE WITH HANA?"
"I KNEW IT! ITS THE QUIET ONES YOU HAVE TO WATCH OUT FOR!"

I wasn't the only who was watching with interest, the whole cafeteria had grown quiet in curiously staring over to see what had riled the Exo members.

They seemed to be directing their shouts towards Lay - which was odd considering he was one of the more quieter members, he rarely spoke out or did anything that would cause them to yell at him like so.

I quickly turned away when Hana's eyes suddenly met mine, casually stuffing my face back into my book as her eyes sharpened and continued to stare.

I could only raise my book higher across my face when I saw Hana stand up, taking long strides as she crossed over to where I was sitting.

Without any other explanation, I gaped as she picked up my tray of food and gestured back to the Exo table.

"You're eating with us."

She didn't even wait for me to answer; she just her heels and walked away.
I stared after for a few seconds before helplessly standing up from my seat to follow quickly after her.

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The oddest thing happened in the following months – I didn’t even know what to think when the sight of Sehun suddenly didn’t throw my heart into a series of flutters anymore…

Maybe it was the fact that I noticed quite quickly that his eyes only went to Hana, or maybe it was because I simply realized that I had been fangirling over the wrong boy this entire time.

Lunch was different now, I wasn't even sure if it was still 'lunch' anymore - it was more of what Hana liked to call a stare-fest. If the school had been surprised when Hana befriended Exo, they were STUNNED when I began sitting regularly at the table with them as well.

I had never been the one to attract stares, there was nothing absurdly wild about me - Hana, of course, was the opposite.

Aside from being the only student SA had taken in, she had an aura about her that sort of... Radiated darkness, and - Exo, for some reason that no one could guess, accepted her. 

I quickly learned the reason - though Hana didn't seem to be most bright in personality, she had a charm about her that was incredibly appealing. I envied her for it, she didn't care what people thought and the way she acted was both cute and funny.

Most importantly, she didn't turn into a mess of drools at the sight of Exo... I could easily see why the boys wanted to be her friends, though I wasn't even sure if it was Hana who wanted to be friends with them, she seemed to be more annoyed than friendly any time one of them talked to her.

The only members she wasn’t mean to was Suho and Lay – the rest… well, it was just safe to say they suffered the wrath of the Ultralord (Which is what she liked to call herself.)

“Hey! That was MY piece of bread!”

I glanced up to see Chanyeol steal his food back from Chen as the shorter smirked and stole another away another piece when the tall giant wasn’t looking.

Xiumin caught my eyes as he smiled, shaking his head towards the bickering two before shooting me a knowing look.

Though he and I had grown closer with talking more in class, instead of growing more comfortable with him – it was the opposite.

My cheeks immediately flushed as I glanced back down to my tray of food, only daring to peek back up when I was sure Xiumin had turned away.

To my horror, instead of Xiumin’s teasing eyes, I found Hana’s sharp stare as she darted her gaze from my still red face to Xiumin across the table.

Her brow raised as I quickly shook my head, denying whatever it was she was thinking before she broke out into a wide grin – tilting her head to her side before she cleared and straightened. 

She sent me another look before turning back to her food, a look that told me she knew everything and anything. 

She was, the Ultralord, after all. 

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“Do you want to be my partner?”

My eyes rounded as I glanced behind me, checking to see if there was anyone else Xiumin could possibly be talking to.

He laughed when he saw my expression, nudging my arm with his pen as he clarified, “Hey, I’m talking to you.”

Instead of responding, I gulped nervously, darting my eyes in confusion over to Chen as I watched him pair up with another boy.

“Isn’t he…?” I asked quietly. “… Usually your partner?”

Xiumin glanced over to where I was pointing towards, nodding in response before casually shrugging.

“He is,” He answered. “But I wanted to change partners for today.”

My breath hitched as Xiumin suddenly leaned forward, smiling widely as he paused, hovering his face only inches away from mine. 

“Is that okay with you? Will you be my partner?... Please?”

Whatever piece of sanity I had been clutching on to vanished as my eyes widened into an impossibly large size, quickly averting my gaze away from Xiumin’s as I coughed nervously before nodding.

“Okay,” I managed to squeak. “I will.”

Xiumin’s smile widened even deeper as his eyes twinkled in excitement.

“Alright,” He nodded, already moving his table beside mine. “Let’s see if we have to go to the library for more research.”

Twenty minutes later, our shared assignment was almost done – we had worked fast considering there wasn’t much conversation between us.

Though he had tried to initiate one several times, my mind seemed to turn to jelly and I could only manage to nod at his curious questions.

“I think we’re done,” He mused, glancing through our papers before nodding. “That was the last paragraph… Where did I put it? It’s somewhere in these papers…”

He searched across his desk as I did mine, pushing aside the small mess we had created to find the missing paragraph for our assignment.

“Oh! Here it is... Oh wait, never mind - This is your notebook.”

He didn’t hand it over, however, he simply stared at my doodles of Sehun’s name as he studied it like he had once before.

“Is Sehun still who you like best in our group?”

I gulped nervously at his question, unsure of how to respond as Xiumin smiled and handed me my notes.

“I just thought your opinion would have changed by now…”

He laughed teasingly to show he wasn’t serious as I lightly laughed along – but as his eyes grew sharp to focus on putting our assignment together, I let out a small-relieved sigh before quickly shoving my notebook into my bag.

Thankfully, my notes were open to the page I had scrawled Sehun’s name, but if he had just turned through another couple of pages, he would have seen something new etched all over my notes.

It was something I had doodled absentmindedly, I hadn’t even noticed until the end of class one day.

It was also something Hana would later name us, something that I would always associate fondly to the meaning of what Xiumin and I were.

Minseok/Xiumin

Minah

Min-Min.

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 ➳Author's Note:

Hey guys so I just wanted to clarify that I'll be moving through this side story fairly quickly, I won't be detailed about every encounter so if you haven't read HTMTH, it might be a little confusing. 

Aside from that, let the MIN-MIN ship fly!

Is anyone choking from the fluff in this story? Anyone? Not yet? K we'll get there don't you worryz. 

/Throwing all you endless amounts of glitter and floooof  ♡

Team Min-Min!

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