It hurts…

Someone help me…

I’m drowning…

When will I get out…?

…Will I be able to get out…?

“Hey! Myungsoo!”

I jolted when I heard someone calling my name.

“Kim Myungsoo!”

I turned towards the one who’s calling me, though a little too quickly because I definitely heard a crack on my neck. But I was more surprised with the face an inch closer to mine, so I automatically shuffled backwards. The only problem is…I forgot I was sitting on a chair. And so, the inevitable happened. I stumbled and fell…hard…and a very embarrassing way at that.

“MYUNGSOO!”

A hand automatically made its way to help me. But I was very embarrassed so I ignored his hand and coolly stands up on my own, patting the invisible dirt on my school uniform. “S-Sunggyu-hyung… When did you get here?”

“When? You’re asking when?! I’ve been here for almost an hour!”

“Oh…” I didn’t notice… Is that even possible?

“You’re always absentminded these past few days! What happened to you?! And did you skip class?!”

I must be really distracted… How can I possibly not notice his presence…? “Last subject…”

“What? Why?”

“I don’t like the subject…and…”

“And?”

I became silent. But his face is full of anticipation so I continued anyway. “…and I want to be the first one to be here…” I wasn’t looking at him when I said that so when I took a peek, the look on his face is pure astonishment. “W-What…? Is that a problem?” Then I heard an edible sigh.

“Look. I was used to always come here first. That’s why I was surprised when I saw you here, in our clubroom, alone, preoccupied with God knows whatever you’re thinking about!”

He sighed again when I just stared at him.

“I called out to you a couple of times so when I thought, ‘Ah, the brat’s daydreaming again.’ I sat on the sofa, then read a book. But what? After an hour, you’re still there, beside the window, still with the same position. And guess what? I thought you’re not breathing!” He slammed the table to emphasize his words.

“Huh?”

“Damn! Scared the hell out of me!”

“…I’m alive you know.”

He scowled so I can’t help but to flinch a little. “What are you thinking about anyway?”

“Nothing special. Just things like…the end of the world or something.”

“Tsk. You’re reading too much manga.”

He didn’t say anything else and made his way to the sofa, but I can still hear him mumbling, ‘Brats!’ then start reading his book again.”

I also sat on my chair beside the open window, but since I was awakened from my earlier daydreaming, I became fully aware of the silence so I started a conversation.

“Uhm…where are the others?”

He didn’t even look up from the book. “Dongwoo said he have to go home early because of some things he have to do. I saw Woohyun and Hoya on the way here. Woohyun said he have to go on a date with his girlfriend and Hoya needs to pick up his brother from school. I don’t know about the others.”

“Sungjong said he have to go today on his cram school…”

“Hn. Okay.” I saw him looked at me for a moment then back to the book. “Looks like the two of us and Sungyeol will be the only ones here today. Where is he anyway?”

“I don’t know…”

 Again, I became fully aware of the silence…and…the distance between us, since I’m sitting from this side and him from the other side, near the door.

The room is quite big for a clubroom. It has a meeting area with long table and 8 chairs, a living room set with a four-seater, corner configuration sofa, a coffee table, and a 45” flat screen tv, a large bookshelf that can house hundreds of books and manuals, a kitchenette with mini-refrigerator, coffee maker and microwave, and has its own restroom.

Our high school may be a private school but no other clubrooms are as big (and furnished) as this one. The reason behind that (based from Dongwoo’s story) is because, the founder and president of our club —the Cultural Studies— Kim Sung Gyu is the only son of our school director, so he have certain privileges. During his first year in high school, he’s the only member of the club. It’s not like no one wants to join in. In fact, a lot of people (especially girls) wanted to but he announced on the Presentation of Clubs Ceremony that he won’t accept any new member and that it’s only an “invite-to-join” club. But throughout the year, he didn’t invite anyone. And so the following year, other clubs protested, saying it’s unfair that he has special privileges since he’s the director’s son. The clubs’ manual stated that a club will have to dissolve if it doesn’t have 5 or more members. So to ease the dissatisfaction of other clubs, that year (on his second year), he invited his classmate Jang Dong Woo, 3 freshmen from different classes: Nam Woo Hyun, Lee Ho Won a.k.a Hoya and Lee Sung Yeol to make it a five member club. Dongwoo-hyung said they were so confused why they were invited because they were not really close at that time. Even him as his classmate, they rarely talk to each other because Sunggyu-hyung is the leader of the class while he is the jokester and the ‘love-to-laugh’ guy of the class. They also have different circle of friends. So when he was suddenly asked to join, he was really surprised and took quite long to answer his invitation. He was wondering why Sunggyu-hyung will invite him instead of his friends who’s always clinging at him. When Dongwoo-hyung asked him why he wants him to join, he said, “Because you don’t belong to any club.” So he just laughed and finally accepted. The same goes for the others. They didn’t even know Sunggyu-hyung except for he’s the son of their school director. When asked what his reason is, he said the same thing to them, which is they still don’t belong to any club. They were bemused, but still accepted the invitation (mostly because of the clubroom).

This year, me and my classmate Lee Sung Jong were invited. We have the same reactions as the three hyungs: Woohyun, Hoya and Sungyeol. We were also given the same reason as to why he wanted us to join. Also, like them, we were lured by the state of the clubroom and accepted without second thoughts. When we joined and became a seven member club, a weird rumor started to circulate throughout the school. They said, Sunggyu-hyung only invites good-looking, smart and talented students to join. The six of us were shocked of course. Because we were not thinking of that when the seven of us were together. And when we asked our president, he only said, “I also didn’t think of that. I just thought it’ll be fun if I asked you kids to join.” So we did not ask anymore and the rumor automatically died down, but we heard a fan-club for us started and most of us were not happy about it (except for Woohyun-hyung).

Now that I think about it, the club is not doing anything special. The members are free to come or not to come during club-hours. We are free to do whatever we want inside the clubroom. The only rule is that, “Once you join in, you cannot quit”. So it’s like, the members are just a bunch of people who are easy-going and only comes on the clubroom when bored and hungry.

But as for me, I have a different reason why I always come here after school…

…

…

(Sorry for the crappy writing. This is my first time posting here so please forgive me. TT^TT But I hope you like it. And so sorry if it’s slow-paced. I wanted it to be a multi-chapter so I wrote it like this. See you next chapter~)