Lee Hongbin is always the nervous type when it comes to getting into a new environment. And by nervous type, I mean nervous to the point his entire body shakes so hard, so embarrassingly three days before the actual event that he feels like hiding in tight places to try not to lose any of his limbs from the vibrations.

He’s doing exactly that now on the bus, on his way to the language school. He’s jammed between the window and a burly, middle-aged man, holding his backpack to his chest. The man glances at him weirdly, probably because Hongbin’s violent trembles run through his body as well, but Hongbin only sees that from the corner of his eye as he lowers his head, hot waves washing over him and tinting his cheeks pink. He’s listening to a song much too dynamic to his liking on full blast through his earphones in an attempt to keep his thoughts about what might go terribly wrong during the first day away, but it fails to muffle them. They’re blaring through his mind louder than the actual music, making him feel like he’s going to puke either into his own or his seat mate’s lap in approximately ten seconds.

He takes a deep breath, and tries to remember where exactly that language school is situated. He’s been there before; twice, to be exact. First, when he walked his friend, Wonshik there, because Wonshik’s mother forced her son to learn a language that will later “help him find a decent job”. (Wonshik did check the courses out, but he never actually entered the language school, lying to his mother about the whole thing and trying to avoid going home from his university dorm 105 miles away from his hometown, keeping the money he’s sent for his studies on his bank account, and when he “accidentally” spends some of it, he tries to earn it back through a number of insidious business, so that when–as he said–, in about 30 years, he has the courage to return to his family, he can confess and give it all back.) For the second time he went there to apply for a beginner English course, because, let’s face it, Korean is not the most popular language on Earth.

He stands up two stops before his, stumbling over the legs of the man beside him, stuttering an apology and almost falling face first on the floor when the driver brakes. He makes it to the handrail eventually, his legs wobbling hard. He even succeeds in walking to the building and checking in, although, when he is asked to show his ID, a bunch of tissues fall out of the pocket of his backpack, scattering around on top of the desk, and even the secretary’s keyboard. The lady hands him back the tissues and checks his ID, directing him towards the staircase, telling him to look for room 44 on the second floor. Hongbin thanks her and quietly panics over the fact that the staircase can lead to an awfully long and/or tortuous corridor, where even people might be lounging around and where he’s not entirely sure he can find room 44 at the first attempt.

Miraculously, the corridor is not that long, and room 44 is right in front of him as he reaches the top of the staircase. The door is closed though, so he lifts his jittery hands to knock on it, not receiving any reply. He decides to open the door and step into the room where about ten other students are sitting at the desks arranged in an incomplete rectangle. He quietly greets the group of boys and girls, men and women, young and older, and finally sits down by the corner closest to the wall, so that he will only have one desk mate right next to him and can be in a reasonable distance from the teacher’s desk.

Hongbin fiddles with his bag, pulling out a notebook and a battered pencil case with all sorts of doodles on the cream coloured fabric: robots and stick men and the tiniest landscapes along with some silly nicknames (multiple occurrences of ₩$ik and RedBean) and abbreviations of bands and singers’ names, anime and song titles filling the spaces between them. He kind of feels a little ashamed as he puts it on the desk, because everyone around him has only one or two pens in front of them, but he loves his pencil case and he has had no intention of getting a new one for the last six years. Also, maybe, probably it makes him feel a little like Wonshik is there with him to be of some support; at least dozing off next to him if not more.

The teacher enters two minutes later, forcing Hongbin to try to put his phone away, but of course he drops it, the phone loudly clattering on the floor. No one seems to care about it, but he still receives a curious look from a fellow student, an elderly woman. The teacher hands each of them a textbook, and goes through the names one by one. Hongbin shyly smiles at her. After they reach the end of the list, the teacher wants them to practise some basic expressions that all of them “might know from songs or movies”. She randomly picks people and helps them come up with expressions.

“What do English people say when they have a strong affection for someone?” she asks, and the class becomes silent.

Hongbin feels his stomach drop. He was chosen to give the answer, and even though he knows it, it’s way too awkward to tell the teacher. He convinces himself to do so in the end, because he can’t give up right at the beginning.

“I love you,” Hongbin mutters, blinking at his notebook.

A girl starts giggling, but when she realizes no one laughs with her, she stops.

“That’s right. What do they say in return?” the teacher asks next, scanning the list of names. “Han Sanghyuk?”

Hongbin peeks at the boy almost opposite him. He has a bright smile as he looks first at Hongbin, and then at the teacher, saying: “I love you, too.”

And Hongbin dies.

Well, not quite, but he feels like he might would, because Sanghyuk looks at him again, seemingly trying to contain his laughter, his lips quivering as a small grin makes its way onto his face, his eyes turning into shiny little crescents behind his glasses, making him look like a mischievous goblin. He’s grinning at Hongbin, actually, and along with him other students are as well, so Hongbin shoots him a glare, but it’s half-hearted and comes with a tiny smile; Sanghyuk looks pretty charming, actually, with the fringe of his lightly coloured brown hair hanging over the black plastic frame of his glasses and his nose that looks too fleshy compared to his bony facial structure. He looks cute, to tell the truth, the kind of cute you think your little brother, or a puppy is.

Probably.

Sanghyuk quickly becomes embarrassing to be around, although, it’s not entirely his fault.

When Hongbin goes downstairs to the lounge during the half hour break between the two classes, he stands in the doorway for a few seconds, looking around the people getting to know each other while stirring their coffee and reuniting while munching on their sandwiches. He stands there a second too long, because someone bumps into his back, making him drop to his knees. People hiss and someone shouts in surprise, and Hongbin’s ears are ablaze. He tries to get up, but before he could, a hand is reached out to him. He looks up at the hand’s owner who turns out to be Sanghyuk.

“Sorry, oh my God, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, man, I wasn’t looking and–“

“Shut up, hyung.”

Hongbin looks up at Sanghyuk and another guy behind him, someone who looks a little older. Sanghyuk is the one who tries to silence him, but the guy is still blurting out apologies, reaching his arm out to Hongbin too, and so there comes a huge dilemma: whose hand to take? Hongbin grabs Sanghyuk’s in the end, mumbling his thanks to him, and Sanghyuk smiles softly.

“Can I, like, buy you something?” the stranger asks. “A coffee, maybe?”

“I’m fine,” Hongbin replies, giving a small nod while smiling at him awkwardly, and leaves the two of them for the vending machines.

Hongbin waits in line in front of them, telling himself to loosen up a bit, and when his turn comes, and he wants to push some coins through the slit, he realizes that he doesn’t have enough change.

“Need some?”

Hongbin turns his head towards the voice to see a palm in front of him, coins on the top of it and Sanghyuk looking at him questioningly.

“No, it’s okay,” Hongbin says, and wants to run away, but steps aside instead.

“Oh, come on,” Sanghyuk rolls his eyes at him which slightly annoys Hongbin, but he has no chance to voice his displeasure, because Sanghyuk occupies the now empty spot in front of the machine and inserts some coins. “So what would you like?”

“It’s really not that important.”

“But it is to me.”

“And why should I care about what’s important to you?”

Hongbin’s question would come out rude if his lips weren’t stretched into an amused smile. Sanghyuk turns around and fakes offence, his brow furrowed in mock indignation.

“You just told me you loved me!”

Sanghyuk tries to keep a straight face yet again, but is unable to do so. He grins widely; his teeth are round and snow white behind his cherry red lips. Hongbin blushes when he finds his gaze lingering on Sanghyuk’s mouth, but then he notices that he himself is grinning too.

“I didn’t tell you that, I told…” Hongbin stops, because what he wants to say is not something that should really be uttered.

But Sanghyuk does utter it when he finishes the sentence for him: “…the teacher, which is about ten times weirder. Anyway, I’m going to ask you one more time: what would you like?”

“Lemon tea,” Hongbin sighs eventually.

So he gets a cup of lemon tea. He thanks Sanghyuk, and tries to slink away, but not really, because then he will be alone, so he only stands next to the machine.

“Sorry about Jaehwan,” Sanghyuk says, taking a sip of his coffee, scrunching his nose, either because it’s too hot or because it’s bad. “He’s kind of silly.”

“I’d say dangerous,” replies Hongbin, gulping down some of the tea which is surprisingly not the worst he has ever tasted.

“He’s only dangerous if you’re sensitive to people talking an awful lot.”

Hongbin smiles, and then another stranger comes up to Sanghyuk, winding an arm around his shoulder at which Sanghyuk winces, and then tilts his head to the other side with a tormented expression and a sigh.

“Hyuk-ah,” the guy singsongs, beaming at Sanghyuk, “I just heard you got yourself a boyfriend! Is he the one?”

Hongbin all but spits his tea out when the black haired, cheerful-looking guy looks at him.

“Cha Hakyeon,” he says, holding out a hand for Hongbin to shake.

But Hongbin can’t do that, because his cheeks become warm as something close to humiliation washes over him.

“I’m not– I-I’m not his boyfriend I–“

“He knows that very well,” Sanghyuk says, taking Cha Hakyeon’s arm off his shoulder and glaring at him. “Did Jaehwan-hyung tell you?”

“You know he can’t pass up a funny story,” Hakyeon replies, smirking. “But now that I see you two together I get the feeling that this wasn’t only a funny story.”

Hongbin shuts his eyes for a moment, trying to become invisible, but when he looks at his hands again, he can still see them. What a pity.

“Ah, seriously,” Sanghyuk grumbles.

“Leave the lovers alone, hyung,” Jaehwan yells from the background, and Hakyeon skips to him.

Hongbin covers his face with his free hand. This wasn’t among the things he thought about while pondering what might go wrong on the first day, but he thinks it’s time to put it on the list.

Fingers curl around his wrist and he feels his arm being tugged at. He lowers his hand and Sanghyuk releases him.

“Sorry about that too,” he shakes his head resignedly. “I know what you’re thinking.”

“I don’t think so…”

“You think I only have obnoxious friends, huh?” Sanghyuk downs the rest of his possibly awful coffee and throws the cup into the trash can. “You have every right to think so, because… yeah, I only have these too, and they’re pretty overwhelming at times.”

“Overwhelming,” Hongbin repeats, tasting the word, trying to decide whether it’s an accurate expression for the two people who just ruined him.

“Maybe that isn’t the most precise word,” Sanghyuk chuckles as if he can read Hongbin’s mind. “Annoying is probably more fit. But they’re cool.”

“Then why don’t you… um…” Hongbin looks down at the now empty cup in his hands, “…why don’t you go over there?”

“Because you look lonely.” Hongbin blinks up at Sanghyuk, seeing a sheepish smile that soon turns into a more puckish one. “And I’d hate to see the person I just confessed to standing awkwardly in a corner.”

“This is seriously not funny,” Hongbin says, fiddling idly with the cup.

“I think it is.”

“You have a ty sense of humour, then.”

“Been told that.”

Suddenly, someone rushes past them, whispering way too loudly to Sanghyuk “He’s cute!”, and Hongbin watches Sanghyuk show his middle finger to Jaehwan and a giggling Hakyeon.

“As I said, they’re nice people.”

“They are, aren’t they,” Hongbin mumbles.

“I hope you’re not angry or something?” Sanghyuk peers when Hongbin averts his eyes.

“No, I’m not,” Hongbin replies, smiling reassuringly when he sees the worry on Sanghyuk’s face. “As long as you promise that you’ll stop talking about that thing, I’ll be fine.”

“I can’t promise you that.”

And Sanghyuk grins with true amusement in his eyes.