Being Heejin’s best friend, Minjoon slowly but surely gets used to a lot of weird stuff.

And by weird stuff, he mostly means Heejin’s new friends.

He still doesn’t know – and doesn’t understand – how the whole thing with Heejin and them happened. They were like the Cullen siblings in their school. They were utterly intimidating, especially if they were all together, and minded their own business, and seemed to have the weight of the world on their shoulders, and did weird things. Suspicious stuff.

And then, suddenly, Heejin started talking to them. At first there were nods and glances and then there was bringing them snacks to school and then there was Suho.

Suho, who is now going out with Heejin. Suho, the blonde dude that looks like he could be a sugar daddy (which is ironic, considering Heejin has diabetes) and is a year older and very handsome and also happens to be a part of the Cullens.

“Stop calling them that,” Heejin says to him one day, biting into her sandwich. The opens again, mumbling awfully, “You know them. You know Tao. They’re all nice.”

Tao. Tao is a new development. Minjoon hasn’t really made up his mind about the kid just yet. He’s the only member of the Cullen pack that hasn’t left their school yet, seeing as he’s a year younger than the rest, and he’s been spending a lot of time with Minjoon and Heejin these days. He’s fun, Minjoon has to admit. But he’s also weird.

Minjoon just—really has mixed emotions about him, okay? Him and the rest of the Cullens. They are weird. They are the epitome of weird.

“You’re weird too,” Heejin counters.

“Yeah, but my weirdness involves super heroes and shipping, theirs involves—I don’t even know what it involves. Mafia? Spies? Illegal organ trafficking? Drug use?”

Heejin slaps his arm and Minjoon almost falls off his chair.

“I’m just saying!” Minjoon defends. “Only yesterday I walked into Tao smoking weed in the boys' toilet. That’s already suspenseful! And stupid! Who smokes in the school toilet?!”

“You know that the teachers don’t go into the toilets,” Heejin replies, frowning, still busy with her sandwich and her phone. She’s scrolling on the facebook page but Minjoon knows she’s listening to him because she doesn’t stop for a single article.

“He panicked and told me he’ll share with me if I don’t tell anyone,” Minjoon deadpans.

Heejin sighs, puts her phone down and looks at him.

“What’s your point?”

Minjoon smirks. That’s her curious face.

“Oh, you little cupcake, you,” he coos. “I knew you still feel the same way about them. I knew it!”

“What way?” she asks, confused.

“Curious!” Minjoon exclaims, throwing his arms in the air. “Remember when we used to spy on them just for fun? How many confusing things had we heard back then?” he growls a little in frustration.

“‘Quick, catch that cat, it stole my wallet’,” Heejin quotes, a grin splitting her face. That was Dal shouting that time and Baekhyun did take off to run after that cat.

“‘Do we, by any chance, have any silver chains?’,” Minjoon counters. “I remember one of the guys breaking into a song right after Dal asked that.”

“What are you guys talking about?”

They both jump at the sound of Tao’s voice and when they look up, he has his angry child face game going on. They send him mutual, innocent grins.

“Nothing,” Heejin says. Tao watches them carefully for a moment, considering, and finally plops down onto the chair by their table. He looks at Heejin in hope. The girl smiles and pulls out a bag of chocolate donuts from her backpack.

*

It’s Minjoon’s turn to clean the toilets in McDonald’s and he’s deeply unhappy.

His manager sends him a pointed look – for the fourth time in the past five minutes – and Minjoon pretends not to see it. Also for the fourth time in the past five minutes. He eagerly mops the floors, eyes stopping on the Happy Meal toys for a moment, when sudden commotion outside the building gets his attention.

He snaps his eyes up at the glass wall to see two guys he doesn’t know run by, followed by Baekhyun, out of all people, and freezes in his spot. He turns his head a little in hopes of seeing where they’re going, but someone slaps the back of his head.

“Toilet, now!” his manager scolds and thank God that he’s Minjoon’s mom’s high school friend because wow, Minjoon should’ve been fired on the day he accidentally dropped all the fries from the oil and onto the floor.

He sulks a little, but goes to the toilets nevertheless.

He stops in his tracks once he enters, though, because there’s a guy dangling halfway out of an air vent. And staring at Minjoon.

He pales and drops his mop. And then he realizes that it’s Kyungsoo.

It’s not like he knows Kyungsoo. He’s been introduced to the whole Cullen family – including the scary cop – but it’s not like he knows any of them. He just knows that Kyungsoo really likes to cook and that his resting murder face is actually the result of his genes making his eyes scary, and that’s only because Heejin tells him a lot of stuff about them all. As if Minjoon aspires to be a walking Cullen encyclopedia.

And really, what’s with the Cullen name? Why did that stick? Kai always reminded Minjoon of Jacob anyways. What was Jacob’s surname again?

He’s staring at Kyungsoo and Kyungsoo is staring back, both of them frozen. Then Minjoon opens his mouth, a question forming and dying on his lips. So he closes his mouth with a clack of teeth. Kyungsoo’s eyes are wide, arms raised – as much as he can raise them when he’s lying horizontally in an air vent – and scared.

Minjoon finally finds his voice again. “Do I even want to know what you’re doing.”

Kyungsoo blinks at that. Thank God, because he looked freaking creepy.

“Uh,” he says eloquently, “no.”

Minjoon stares some more. Then nods slowly.

“Okay,” he says, and leaves the toilet.

He hears some weird noises and when he comes in a minute later, Kyungsoo is gone. And so is Minjoon’s sanity.

*

Two days later he’s walking home from school and fixing the strap of his backpack when he sees two familiar figures walking towards him. It’s Sehun and Dal; Sehun is frowning, clearly confused and also a little pissed at something, wherein Dal is focused on her phone’s screen.

Minjoon tries not to stare or listen into their conversation, but just as his elbows almost touches Sehun’s, the older boy asks Dal a question.

“So why did I have to punch that guy?”

Minjoon lets out a low squeak, bites his clenched fist and picks up the pace.

*

Okay, so Minjoon must really have some bad luck. Or the universe just really wants him to be friends with the Cullens. Whichever reason it is, he starts seeing them everywhere. And none of the situations make him re-think his previous opinion about them being weird.

The next time he sees the members of the Adams family, he’s determined to grab some coffee before going to school (because he’s practically a zombie at this point) and is just turning the corner when he hears Dal’s voice.

“Please put me down,” she cries. “It’s just a sprained ankle. It’ll heal.”

“It will heal askew if we don’t stiffen it,” another voice replies, Kai’s, judging by the gruffness. “So have to be quick. And we can’t be quick if you decide to hobble all the way to the loft.”

Just as he finishes the sentence, Kai runs right in front Minjoon, carrying Dal – bridal style, mind you – in quite a hurry, down the busy, morning street of the town.

Now, Minjoon should probably wonder how she’s sprained her ankle, but he wonders why they’re not going to the hospital instead, and why such hurry. He squints at them both as they run down the alley.

*

It’s one of those weird nights when nothing goes according to plan and Minjoon is left sulking in a corner, completely abandoned as the third wheel.

It was supposed to be his and Heejin’s movie night. But then Suho happens.

Minjoon is disappointed. A bit weirded out, too, since it’s almost 2 am. Weird.

“I’m just dropping by,” Suho announced half an hour ago. “I have to go soon. I promise I’ll make it quick and then you can go back to watching the movie.”

If he weren’t that polite, Minjoon would have given him a piece of his mind.

(Who is he kidding again?)

So he leaves Heejin’s room for a moment to give them some space (and to not accidentally see them making out because gross) and goes out to stretch his limbs on the balcony. It’s a cold night and he really enjoys looking at the city lights shining below.

Then he hears Suho’s voice from the living room filtering through the half-open balcony doors and turns to look at the guy. He’s talking on the phone, a delicate and kinda innocent frown visible on his face.

“And why exactly do you need chloroform at 2 am?” he asks like he’s asking for salt.

And that’s it. Minjoon is done.

*

 

“Look at this,” Tao says, nudging his elbow. Minjoon peeks over his shoulder as Tao shows him a vine of a little goat. He’s stifling his laugh during the whole five-second video and Minjoon smiles down at the cuteness.

And then, just when the vine ends, a little round picture of Dal shows up in the right corner of the screen, the Messenger coming to life. Minjoon raises his brows at the message, sputtering a little.

Tao drops his phone in a scramble to lock the screen and then stumbles as he tries to get off the bench, almost face-planting on the floor and leaving Minjoon shell-shocked.

“That’s, uh,” Tao says, balancing himself on his feet and shaking his phone at Minjoon in a completely unsuspicious way, “just…uh…about that gaming community of ours, you know.”

Minjoon squints at him. The air gets tense all of a sudden.

Then Minjoon decides that something is off. And this time he’s not gonna stand there and watch as they do weird .

“I’m onto you,” he hisses, stands up and promptly leaves the cafeteria.

Tao gapes. For minutes. Not even Heejin, waving croissants in front of his face, helps.