Sticking Together (Us v. Them)
The Wonder Kid"SAAAAARRRRAAAA! WAKE UP IT'S THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!" Sara stirred under her comforter as she heard Hodong's voice in her downstairs living room. "SARAAAAAA!"
"DONGIE GO AWAY!"
"C'MON IT'S THE FIRST DAY OF MIDDLE SCHOOL!" Sara buried her face under her pillows and shut her eyes tight. She did not want to go back to school. It's not that Sara didn't like studying, she was relatively smart and well rounded when it came to academics. It's the kids at school that annoyed her. Now that they were in middle school the already mean kids would probably feel more entitled to mess with her and HoDong. Being thirteen only made them crueler. It was strange though; Ho Dong was always so happy to go to school even though they mocked him more than they did Sara.
Sara didn't know that Ho Dong hated school too, but he put up with it because it meant he could spend all day with her and as long as he had his best friend the other kids didn't matter. Plus all of his exercising and sports was leading him to wanting to be a police officer, and he had to study hard if he wanted to go to police academy.
Sara heard HoDong's footsteps up the staircase and soon after the opening of her bedroom door. Suddenly she felt the weight of the little but heavy boy on top of her and she cried out in aggrevation. "LEE HO DONG GET OFF OF ME RIGHT NOW!" She shoved him off and got off the bed. "Don't you know it's rude to come in without knocking and to a girls room! Get out I need to change! Get out!" She shoved a laughing HoDong out of her room and put on her uniform. After a few minutes she came downstairs to eat breakfast. Ho Dong was sitting at the table with a piece of toast hanging from his mouth.
Mae Ri came down behind SaRa and shoved her aside, "Move it pip squeak, oh hey Ho Dong seems like you practically live here. Way to make our mom spend more on food and utilities." She sat down next to him. If being 13 made SaRa's classmates meaner then being 18 made Mae Ri the meanest of the bunch.
"Mae Ri!" their mother screamed, "How many times have I told you to be nice to Ho Dong and your siblings."
"Fine, fine, but hey mom can I go to Yoon Jae's house later today? We have a study date."
"Yeah, because you totally study miss barely-passing-all-my-classes." Joon stuffed some more rice into his mouth and Mae Ri pinched his cheek, hard.
"And that's why I need a tutor. Yoon Jae is really smart and he offered to help me."
"More like make out with you, besides he's not smart, he's a jerk. He's the kid that beat up hyung before!" Mae Ri's grasp on Joon's cheek tightened.
"ENOUGH! Both of you eat your breakfast and stop fighting and Mae Mae you can't go anywhere today it's your day to do chores." Their mother sighed in frustration. She looked at Ho Dong apologetically. "Dongie, i'm sorry. I'm sure breakfast at your house is a lot calmer than this."
"More like breakfast at my house is a lot more boring. I like eating here! My brothers are all really calm."
"Weirdo." Mae Ri whispered. "Alright i'll be leaving first then. Hey pip squeak, try to make friends this year okay. It's getting really hard to explain why my little sister hangs out with the sports and police fanatic all the time. Even Joon is more popular than you in elementary school."
"Like I care what those kids think." Sara rolled her eyes.
"Whatever. Bye family, and family tag a long." She left and the table sighed in relief.
"Don't worry noona, all my friends think you and hyung are the coolest of all the middle schoolers. I told them how you can hit a homerun all the way out of the field and they said they don't know any girl that can do that."
The two 13 year olds smiled, "Thanks Joonie." Sara kissed his head and then grabbed her bag to walk to school. Ho Dong followed suit with a high five for Joon. Once the front door was closed Ho Dong instinctively took Sara's hand in his own and led the way to school. They had received their homeroom assignments in the mail and luckily they were assigned to the same room. When they got to the classroom they looked around for empty seats were sad to find that the only free seats were singles and not pairs. They separated to different ends of the room and sat awkwardly in the empty seats.
It didn't take long for some of the girls to open up to Sara and vice versa after all Sara was very sociable but sticking up for Ho Dong often made her an outcast. They talked about pop music and some of the popular shows and then one of the girls brought up an up and comedian that her dad showed them that morning. "His name is Ho Dong. He's really funny. He does all this dumb stuff and makes his face look all ugly. Even the name sounds a little funny when you say it Ho~ Do~ng." She made a face and the other girls started laughing.
"I don't think it's a funny name." Sara spoke up. "Lot's of people have that name."
"It is funny. You know I saw that on our class list there's a boy named Ho Dong too, he must be a dork like the comedian." Sara tightened her fists under the table. "Let's check who it is!" The girl stood up on her chair and yelled out "HEY DO GONG!"
Immediately the unsuspecting boy turned and answered to his name. Immediately the class erupted in laughter and the boys next to him asked "Is your name really Ho Dong?? Like that weird guy on t.v.?" The class continued to laugh until the teacher came in and the school day began. When break time came the kids were more than ready to go outside.
"Hey Sara!" The girl from before, Jin ri, called out. "Do you wanna go with us? We're gonna go do our nails in the grass."
"Huh, oh umm.." Sara looked at the beautiful colored nail polishes that Jin ri held in her hand.
"Sara c'mon I got us a basketball, you can work on your jump shot" Ho Dong came running back into the room to take Sara to the court.
"YOU play basketball, and with HIM?" The girls snickered. Sara just about had enough of all their laughter and took the ball from Ho Dong's hands.
"Yes, I play basketball with him and it's ten times more fun than sitting in the grass waiting for paint to dry on my nails. You prissy princesses can just go and breath in all those fumes." She took Ho Dong's arm and went to the basketball court.
"Sara!" Ho Dong cried out as she pulled him along, "What was that all about?"
"Nothing. Those girls were just being stupid. I didn't want to be their friend anyway."
"Sara wait will you?" She stopped abruptly and he pumped into her back. "Hey, c'mon don't get mad. Like you said those girls were just being stupid, don't let their words get to you. Whatever they said to you don't even give it a second thought. No matter what happens, even if everyone is against us, we wont be alone. It'll be us against all of them and that's all we need.
She gave him a small smile and a nod before continuing on to the basketball court. Later that night, she walked into her bathroom and took her sister's nail polish remover. Looking at the purple tint on her nails she scoffed and rubbed them until there wasn't a speck of color left. Sara decided that she was done worrying about what others thought of her. Like Ho Dong said, all they needed was each other.
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