a/n: hey guys! So another one, though I don't know how many chapters there will be.. still thinking about it. I'm glad to see some familiar readers here :D

_

Irene blew out an idle breath and followed its slow ascent upwards to her bedroom’s ceiling – the ceiling of which every inch was covered by the printed high-def image of the Milky Way galaxy that she, herself, shoot. It took a weekend of camping with her parents in the mountains and a very expensive specialized camera she borrowed from a cousin with an interest in astrophotography.

Bae Joohyun, a senior and an honor student, whose brain doesn’t seem to stop working even when she’s asleep appeared to have been betrayed by the very same brain that couldn’t leak a drop of an idea no matter how hard she’s tried to squeeze it out.

Gods, this is driving me crazy.

She rubbed her eyes with both hands and closed them for a few seconds before settling back on her seat and picked up her phone from her desk. It had been ten minutes since she received Seulgi’s last message – “Be there soonest.”

Wonder where she is now?

Another three minutes later, the door to her room banged open and in came a very distressed-looking Seulgi dragging her large backpack across the wooden floor.

Kang Seulgi, also a senior, also an honor student. Hardworking, loyal to a fault, and doing a lot of tutoring to save up for a dream vacation she wants after graduation.

“Tell me this is some kind of emergency because I still have a tutorial sesh and I’m almost late,” her best friend of more than a decade said, closing the door again and depositing her bag on Irene’s bed then turned to the direction where the other girl is sitting.

Seulgi waited for her to display any kind of reaction but she stayed seated with ramrod stiffness, facing the wall, unblinking.

“Please move or say something before I call your parents, you’re creeping me out.”

Irene continued to stare at the blank wall opposite her study table for a few seconds before finally admitting defeat.

Having a staring contest with inanimate objects is usually part of her process in making sense of the chaos inside her head whenever she’s writing. Though right now, it’s more like because she’s drawing a blank and was hoping for an inspiration to spring up like magic.

“I give up,” she leaned back on her chair and let out a dramatic sigh. “I don’t know what to write for my next blog.”

“Ugh,” Seulgi groaned in part relief and part frustration then let herself fall backwards on Irene’s bed, shaking the thick mattress. “Don’t you have enough workload as it is? You’re on several AP classes, we have ongoing projects, we do volunteer works, etcetera. Do you even sleep at all?”

“I just need to do something not related to school works, as a way to unwind, you know?”

“Unwind? If you want to unwind, we can go for a hike, drive around for a bit and find a cool place to hang out, or just play some video games,” Seulgi paused to breathe and then stared at her. “You know what, why am I even surprised? I’ve known you for forever, you’re always like this.”

Irene raised an eyebrow. “Should I take that as a compliment or should I be offended? I’m prepared for both.”

“Bit of both,” Seulgi laughed and then looked at her wristwatch. “I’m really gonna be late so tell you what, you take a nap – because I don’t know when’s the last time you actually rested – then I’ll search some topic on the net later and send them to you. How’s that sound?”

Irene grinned a megawatt smile at her bestfriend. “Sounds like you’re the best person ever!”

_

“Girls who wear spectacles, am I right?” Park Sooyoung – or most commonly known as Joy – winked at her bandmates slash friends as they chilled after their band practice.

The other members of Neverland were splayed out in the spacious basement-turned-to-a-soundproofed-room especially intended for them at Luke’s house.

Neverland, a band that was formed because Wendy wanted to play music and sing. It started in the very same basement when they were barely teens. The four of them – Wendy, Joy, Luke, and Jade – are childhood friends and living in the same neighborhood, and then Mandy moved to their street a couple of years later.

Wendy Shon is their vocalist who also plays the acoustic guitar. She’s always been interested in music ever since she was a kid though her mom was having doubts about her pursuing it in the beginning.

Joy Park, the band’s keyboardist, pretty and popular, informally titled Queen of Sass and Sarcasm, savage as they come.

Luke Hwang, electric guitarist, also a track athlete in their school.

Jade Song, a quiet boy who likes to stargaze and read comic books, seldom seen without his trusty headphones.

Amanda ‘Mandy’ Lee, bassist, the baby of the group – a year younger than them – complete with eye-smile and dimples but ready to high-five anyone with her bass guitar on their faces if they ever disrespect the band (which, unfortunately, already happened that one time when Neverland was just starting out. They’ve all been grounded for a solid month and their parents had to pay for damages.)

They are all seniors – except for Mandy, a junior – in a large public high school with a population of over two thousand students. The band has earned its reputation at their school – not that hard when the members were already quite popular to begin with. They’ve gotten some recognition in their community to the point of even getting gigs in some local music festivals. And in one of those gigs, a music producer saw their performance and now they’re in talks of signing to a music label.

Wendy’s mom, however, has one condition before the band gets formally signed – they need to graduate from high school first, which the other parents seconded, at least for the older four because Mandy is a year behind.

And in addition, Luke’s mother became their guardian/manager whenever they have gigs to drive them to venues and to keep an eye out should the guitar-on-your-face happen again.

Of course, they didn’t have any choice but to agree to their parents’ terms.

“I don’t know, but there’s really something about girls in glasses,” Joy repeated her sentiment when her friends didn’t offer any reaction to the initial statement.

“So, you’re attracted to people with eye problems?” Luke replied, chuckling as he brought snacks from upstairs.

“Shut up, Luke,” Joy rolled her eyes at him, then scooted over to Wendy on the other end of the couch and shoved her phone right in front of the singer’s face. “She’s cute. She kinda resembles the girl who scrawled her number on your arm from our last gig, no?”

“All I can see are pixels when you hold it that close,” Wendy replied, moving away from Joy’s phone.

The latter narrowed her eyes and stared at her; she has this knack of telling exactly how Wendy feels at the moment. “You’re irate, why?”

Wendy sighed and grabbed her water bottle to take a sip. “I forgot to do the homework for World Lit last night, and Mrs. Warner said that I need to get my act straight if I want to pass her class.”

“But didn’t you say you were gonna do it when you went home?”

“I was going to! But I was also trying to compose for this song I’ve been writing. Time passed by and before I knew it, it was like four in the morning.”

“Your time management is impeccable as always.”

Wendy scowled at her. “Stop it.”

“Look, babe,” Joy’s voice softened, seeing her friend looking genuinely in misery. “You’re also failing, what, two other classes? How about you let me find a solution for this?”

“Are you gonna rob a bank and bribe the teachers?” Luke called from the other side of the room where he’s playing Switch with Mandy.

“Of course not, I don’t own a gun.”

“Are you gonna do my homeworks, then?” Wendy asked, interested.

“Heck no,” Joy looked absolutely horrified with the idea. “I can barely keep up with my own. No, I’m gonna find someone else who will.”

“It’s a little risky, though.” Mandy offered an advice. “At least get a person trustworthy to do it. People will sell you out faster than you can say clout.”

_

All of Irene’s phone notification when she woke up from her nap were from Seulgi. There was a lot of links for a variety of topics Seulgi thinks she’d be interested in, and one of them, yes, caught her attention.

Seulgi picked up her call on the third ring.

“What’s this thing you sent me?”

“You gotta be more specific which one because I sent you like a hundred,” Seulgi replied. Irene could hear soft music playing on the background in Seulgi’s end of the line, she’s probably driving right now because it’s from one of her road playlists.

“Wait, lemme read the title,” she paused to put the call on speaker and pulled up the link. “36 Questions To Fall In Love.”

“Huh,” there was a subdued tone of surprise in Seulgi’s voice. “I didn’t expect you to pick that one. It was just something random that I saw.”

“Well, I didn’t really pick…” Irene trailed off, thoughtful. “I was just curious, that’s all.”

“Curious?”

“Curious if it’s really possible to cultivate genuine feelings for someone in a matter of hours.”

Seulgi hummed neutrally. “I didn’t really read it in depth so I can’t really offer any insights on this, but if you’re really curious, why don’t you test it out?”

“Like an experiment?”

“Exactly,” her friend said. “And then draw your conclusion from there. How hard can it be?”

“I need someone to try it on,” Irene tapped her fingers on the bed, considering the idea. “Preferably a stranger or someone I don’t know.”

“Hold up, that part can be tricky. We can’t just pick a stranger from the streets because that’s risky. People are dangerous.”

Irene frowned and laid back on her pillows. “I can’t choose a student from our school either. The kids in there fall in love, like, every two weeks.”

“Fair point,” Seulgi agreed. “Okay then, let’s find a person suitable for this. I’m sure we can come up with someone before the week ends.”

_

Two days later…

“Have you found anyone to do the thing yet?” Wendy asked Joy when their classes ended that afternoon. She was shoving books to her locker while Luke was getting his shoes for the track practice he has later and Joy busy on her phone.

“Don’t you worry, I’ll find one,” Joy waved her hand offhandedly, still glued on her phone, probably browsing photos of girls wearing glasses or something.

“Hi Wendy!” a very pretty girl who Joy recognized as Savannah Liu – one of the bets for prom queen this year – approached them. “Do you have a sec?”

Wendy’s demeanor did a whole 180° shift; eyes turned sultry as she looked at the girl and worked her signature player smile. “For you I’ve got an hour… and maybe the whole night.”

“Oh gods, seriously,” Joy groaned loudly at the not-so-subtle flirting scene in front of her and gestured to Luke. “Let’s go.”

The hallway was packed with students but as usual – and Luke is almost sure that their keyboardist has already mastered this particular skill – Joy managed to march through the crowd with at least two feet of space on either side of her. However, a very familiar but unwelcomed face blocked them before they could escape that part of the building.

Chloe, a writer for the school’s very unofficial gossip ‘zine XOXO – gossip girl, much? – that everyone pretends to dislike but actually reads in secret.

“Sooyoung Park,” Chloe said, pen poised and ready to touch the surface of her trusty notepad. “I have a question for you.”

“I’m not interested.” Joy was curt and didn’t make any effort to hide her irritation. “Can you please step aside?”

“Just one question,” Chloe insisted. “What’s your preference?”

Joy’s eyebrow shot up at that. “My what?”

“Your.. uh, preference…” Chloe didn’t seem so sure now, her eyes wandered to the group of students behind Joy who were watching the exchange with different facial expressions. “It’s just… there’s a rumor going around that you went on a date with the c