MY PHONE HOTLINE CAREER 

Minah didn't ask for me to see Kyungsoo again. Which, really, you have no idea how okay with I was. Nothing against Kyungsoo or anything, because he's a really great guy, but I was perfectly fine with not having to see him.

Not to mention, I could no longer watch documentaries about giraffes. And I really like giraffes. And, apparently. I had a lot of free time. 

So it was back to the life of Avery, the college student. 

And, it's a pretty boring life to live. I went back to being socially awkward and wandering around campus. Minah was satisfied with the fact that her boyfriend wasn't cheating on her and went back to her apartment, leaving Chorong and I to study in peace. 

That morning, I was walking back to my room after one of my classes. It was a nice day. Hanyang's a pretty school, although it had its downsides at times (eg. having the weirdest Chinese restaurant in all of Seoul.) But it was days like that which made the school so much more tolerable. Everyone was in a great mood and my hair was behaving normally. Really, it should have been like a national holiday. 

And then my phone rang. 

Actually, my phone ringing wasn't a bad thing. I enjoy the fact that I have friends. It was the fact that it was my brother that was calling me that made it even worse. 

My parents ultimately decided that they wanted to try for another girl after my sister and brother were born and that's how I came into the picture. 

Cara was the eldest one out of us and she was a genuinely nice person. Although slightly vain and sarcastic at times, everyone knew she meant well. Cara was also currently doing well as a model, unlike yours truly she received all the good genes. Light brown hair from our mother, big eyes and tall height from our father and the ridiculous ability to eat crap loads of food and not gain any weight from my dear Grandma. Her views, however, were slightly lacking. Her goals in life were to seduce a millionaire and live life as a trophy wife - her words not mine. But she had a good heart. 

And then there was Luhan. 

There is nothing good to say about Luhan. There will never be anything good to say about Luhan. He was two years older than me and was a complete . He was always meddling in other people's business and was the biggest troublemaker that I knew. So, yes, the fact that he was calling my phone (which was going to cost me a million won because he lived overseas) was nothing for me to smile about. 

"What?" I snapped, holding my phone up to my ear. 

"So, how mad would you be if I did something that was relatively bad?" You see why I hate him? Because he begins conversations like that. 

"Luhan Oppa, what the hell did you do?" I demanded, stopping dead in my tracks. I was done with my classes for the day so it wasn't like I had anywhere else to be. He knew that I only called him 'Oppa' when I was starting to get angry at him. 

"Has anybody called you recently?" 

"Oppa!" 

"Is that a yes or a no?" 

"It's a no," I grumbled, resuming walking again. People had called me, but it was all from numbers that I knew. I had only made it a few steps when I spotted a familiar face amongst the crowd. 

Kyungsoo. It was Kyungsoo. What the hell was he doing on campus? He must have been having lunch with Minah. Or Meth, as she was now known as. He wasn't with her at the moment. Instead, he was just walking peacefully around campus in black slacks, a plain white top and a blue dotted shirt wrapped around his waist. 

Luhan let out a sigh of relief from the other end of the phone. "Good," he breathed. "I was hoping that they would notice that it was an international number and decide not to call." 

"Oppa, really, what the hell are you talking about?" I repeated, trying to duck behind a bush so that Kyungsoo wouldn't see me and try to have another awkward conversation in which I ually harass him. 

"It's nothing. I just may or may not have put your phone number online and said that you were a phone- operator." 

"OPPA!" 

"It wasn't my idea!" He was quick to defend himself. "It was Chen's. I told him hell no because you're my little sister and I can't associate you with like that, but then he did it anyways and you have to admit, Aves, it's actually pretty funny. It's like an April Fool's Day joke, except not in April." 

I was fuming, so fuming that I nearly dropped my books all over the ground. "How," I gritted out, pushing my glasses back up on my nose, "is that even remotely funny to you, Oppa?" Kyungsoo had disappeared from my view so I figured that it was safe for me to go back to my room. Minah didn't live with me, so I didn't have to worry about her being there. 

"How is this not funny to you? It's not like you're going to get grounded, you're a million miles away." For some reason, that didn't make me feel any better. "Besides, it's not even that bad. Remember that time I sang that song at Dad's birthday dinner? The one that was about getting ual. How did the chorus go again? Something about calling and touching." 

I did remember that. It was funny seeing Dad get angry with Luhan for singing an inappropriate song at a family gathering. And even though I couldn't remember what the song was called, I remembered the chorus, and that was good enough for me. "I called her on the phone and she touched her-" 

"Hello!" 

Butternut squash. 

"-self." I squeezed my eyes shut. This just wasn't fair. You can't just sneak up on people like that, Kyungsoo. Especially on girls that are already jumpy without you creeping around. But it wasn't like I could just scream. Even though I was off from Minah duty, it didn't mean that I could just act like an idiot in public. Alright, Avery. That meant that you were going to have to turn around and talk to him. Maybe he didn't even hear you. Yeah, he was probably lost in his own world. I made a quick mental check of my appearance (ripped jeans, striped top, and boots, crazy hair in a bun, no makeup and glasses) before whirling around to face Kyungsoo, a bright smile on my face. "Hi!" I exclaimed, a little too cheerfully. "How are you?" 

If Kyungsoo had heard my conversation, he didn't act like it and for that, I was eternally grateful. Maybe I should tell him that I'm not mentally disabled and that it's okay for him to ignore me like most of the male species did. "I'm fine and how are you?" 

"Super." Squash, what was it with me and that word? I might as well just have branded the word 'FREAK' on my forehead.

 "Yeah, so it was just those douches at some night club that said they owned that sort of business and Chen and I were all like 'yeah, we run one too,' and the guys said that they would call and check it out and we actually gave them a real number but it turns out that the number is the same as your number without the international code in front of it. So if they do actually call you, you don't have to pretend that you're a phone- operator." 

My eyes, which were once shut, were now bulging out of my head. How could I forget that Luhan was still on the line? It was deadly to let him talk for long periods of time. Even though my phone wasn't on speaker, it wasn't hard for people to be able to hear what Luhan had said, even though to others it basically sounded like 'blah blah blah PHONE OPERATOR.' There was no doubt that Kyungsoo had heard that. It would have taken a miracle for him to have not. 

"Th-that's my brother," I stammered to Kyungsoo, who was really trying to hold back his smirk. Miracles were never that common for me, anyways. "My brother that I'm not very close to. He's kind of like a stranger. But not really. Because I've known him all my life." Cool, Avery, because Kyungsoo really wants to know that. "And I'm not a phone operator." I felt that it couldn't hurt to emphasise that point. 

At that, Kyungsoo just let his smirk go sailing across his face as he stood there with his hands jammed into the pocket of his slacks. "You know, I wasn't even going to say anything about that." 

"Just in case. For clarification purposes," I nodded. "I'm not a phone operator." 

"You can stop saying that," Kyungsoo pointed out. 

"Saying what? Phone operator?" 

"Yeah. I think your classmates are getting the wrong idea about you," he snickered, motioning towards the few Hanyang students that gave me brief, horrified looks as they walked past. Unfortunately, I was not the least bit phased by them. 

"I've done worse," I admitted, jamming