note: double update in one chappie 

No, she didn’t remember when or why it started, but she supposed things like this had to happen—things you would rather not happen to you.

2008

For Junhee, the times she spent without Junhong did not count as time at all.

In freshmen year, things always got worse whenever she reacted. She remembered crying a lot, hiding inside restroom stalls, feeling absolutely miserable. Junhee had missed Junhong like mad. It drove her up the wall, knowing she was entirely alone. Junhong had always been– been everything. She couldn’t possibly imagine a life without him.

During their younger days, she was secretly jealous of his classmates; they got to spend more time with him. If she was just a year younger, she might have seen him more often. It didn’t occur to her that they practically lived together, that she got to see him when nobody else could, that at the end of the day, it would always be Junhong and Junhee, the Choi neighbours, anyway.

High school was horrific without him. She couldn’t see him during breaks, and the only thing that kept her going was the knowledge that Junhong would be waiting by the silver gate after school. Junhee longed for the last bells as much as she longed for him. Yes, okay, she did feel ridiculous sometimes, but there wasn’t anything Junhee could do for being this way.

She never dared tell Junhong. Besides, to her, it had always been obvious that she needed him. And perhaps, the girl might’ve felt less pathetic if she knew for certain that Junhong needed her just as much.

Junhee did her best to avoid the reality of it all. The safest place had always been inside her head, and she often found herself there whenever Junhong was not physically around.

For instance, when he hung out with his skate friends, she’d feel left out, even though Junhong would always drag her with him to the park, bribing her with ice cream to make sure she would not run home the moment he turned his back.

Junhee couldn’t understand her best friend no matter how hard she tried, simply because she didn’t need anybody else. She let him do what he needed, even if the idea of Junhong needing more than her made her heart sink. (What hurt Junhee more was that she did not know what to do with herself.)

“Girls,” Junhong said gravely, as he popped out of the bushes where he was ‘not hiding’ but ‘merely avoiding’ whenever he waited for her after school. “They’re creepy here… no wonder you don’t like this place.”

Junhong grabbed her hand, dragging her away from that nightmare of a school.

“What did they do?” she asked, falling into light steps beside him, feeling at ease and safe again.

“They stare, then giggle,” he lowered his head and whispered the last part into her ear, “some of them even wink!”

“Oh?”

“‘Oh’?” Junhong repeated, swinging their entwined hands as they turned a corner.

Junhee glanced at him, and he blinked down at her as if asking, what? She shook her head and turned away. Junhong snorted, and all she knew was the warmth of his skin, the way their shoulders brushed, the twinkles in his eyes when their gazes met… and it suddenly didn’t matter what happened to her at school; Junhee could not bring herself to care; not when Junhong was here now.

2009

Every now and again, Junhee would peek over from Mr. Min’s desk to see what Junhong was up to. A smile tugged at her lips, seeing he’d already finished the sandwich. She felt bad that she didn’t have anymore. Junhee had bribed a freshman (who was, in fact, sitting behind Junhong) for the sandwich when she saw him struggle with his homework fifteen minutes before class.

Carrying Mr. Min’s documents down a flight of stairs, she had heard grumbles bubbled from under her feet. Looking over the rail, she saw a boy sprawled on the floor with his schoolbag rummaged and files scattered all about him.

Junhee hurried to him, thinking he’d gotten in trouble or something. Only when she was a foot away did she realise he had a pencil in his hand, notebook in the other, his literature textbook laid open before him, and a half-finished lunch box by his side.

Her stomach gurgled. The main meal in the lunch box was gone; what remained were only an apple and a neatly wrapped sandwich.

“Need help?”

The boy’s head shot up and stared at her wide-eyed like a deer caught in the headlights. Junhee looked over her shoulder to make sure nobody was around, before dumping Mr. Min’s documents onto the floor, sitting down beside the freshman.

“So…?” asked Junhee. The boy opened his mouth but nothing came. He only stared at her with illy hidden recognition in his eyes. Her heart sank.

“Sorry, but are you— I mean, you’re…”

“Yeah… that’s me,” Junhee said quietly, knowing what he was going to say. “Um, how about I help you with your homework? Then you give me an apple and a sandwich?”

“Really? But–”

“I’m going to help you,” she suddenly decided, glancing at his assignments. “Oh, you’ve got the author’s name spelled backwards,” Junhee said helpfully, extending her hand for the pencil, “May I? Or, you can write. It’s Harper Lee, not Lee Harper.”

The boy blinked twice, then pulling himself together, he erased the heading and corrected it. Junhee craned her neck to scan over the questions.

“Over here, just say, ‘he shut the door too loud and then reopened it to make a joke’…”

“Did he?” The boy asked absently, as he messily scrawled in the answer.

“Yes.”

“Why, though?”

“Because he didn’t mean to slam the door so loudly, I think.”

“Was the joke funny?”

“Not really.”

“All right. Oh, what happened in this section?”

And there it went right until the bell rang, followed by a horrified shriek from the boy. Junhee thought he was adorable, and his presence had an easygoing air to it. He asked a lot of unrelated questions, and she had found it entertaining.

Then, a paper ball flew at her for the second time. Junhee glowered at the desks in the front row. The pretty one, Baekhyun, met her stare and stuck out his tongue childishly. Junhee grimaced and turned away.

There were more paper balls attack, and Junhee tried, with all her might, to keep any irritation from showing on her face, knowing full well that it’d encourage those three to do something nastier. As she swatted another ball away, Junhee wondered what Mr. Min would think if he saw the mess afterwards.

The man in the wheelchair, however, was still lecturing with much enthusiasm despite being temporarily handicapped. Junhee glanced at Junhong; he was whispering heatedly with his deskmate who looked as though she found him utterly intolerable. Junhee had heard about her from Junhong. Apparently, she was very nice. She tried to recall the girl’s name but nothing came.

Some time later, Mr. Min asked her to do ‘The Patrol’ in his place. She heard snickers. The attacks had stopped after only six minutes. Cautiously, Junhee walked by the trio’s desks and saw that they were copying answers off of each other. She frowned but said nothing, then the room went vertigo, before the girl managed to catch herself by grabbing the closest desk.

“Ow–”

“Careful,” coughed the tall one, Chanyeol, before breaking into giggle fits.

She glowered, but ignored him, and muttered a sorry to the ribbon-haired girl whose desk Junhee just grabbed.

And it was not the end of the world, not when Junhong was grumbling over his papers, sometimes shooting Junhee glances that she pretended not to see, and whining to his deskmate who had a fascinating habit of shrugging him off brusquely. Everything should be okay.

Everything was not okay.

A detention waited for Junhong tomorr