Even though Soonyoung’s been actively denying it for the past 24 hours, it’s true. The loud ringing of his alarm is way too annoying to ignore. Damn, this is when he should come down with an imaginary flu or something to lie in bed until next week or something.

But he still has exams to take and pass, and unlike annoying intelligent people like Lee Seokmin, he actually has to go to class. Hazily, he drags himself out of the house onto the street.

And of course, there’s a cheery Seungkwan. Holding a still-warm piece of bread with a wide smile.

“Cheer up! School’s going to be ending soon. ”

“It’s way too early to be happy. It’s going to be forever until we get another holiday.”

It’s so familiar, Seungkwan trying to make him smile on the first day of school when he’s always feeling grumpy. Normally he’d be pulling some crazy antic or another, but today he’s more careful. Probably still not convinced despite two days of repeating that he was feeling good and there was no great need to send care packages of comfort food, so-bad-they’re-good jokes and anime marathons.  

Seriously, what kind of good things did Kwon Soonyoung do in his past life to deserve Seungkwan as a best friend?

“You’re smiling! School is good, you get to see me everyday!”

“Nobody needs to see you so often.”

And even though those are the words that come out his mouth, seeing his friends everyday is definitely one high point of school. Already he’s looking forward for dance club to resume. There’s some nice songs they were sharing online, some new routines they wanted to learn. And even though the shared clubrooms with loud repetitive rock music annoyed him so much in the first few weeks, now Soonyoung finds himself wanting to listen to Seokmin’s way-too-loud singing again.

He smiles way too much for the first day of school reopening. He can actually feel it.  

Is it because he’s smiling that people are smiling back at him? It’s strange. Normally he’s pretty cheerful on a regular day. Is it his good mood that’s causing him to think that other people seem friendlier?

“Soonyoung! Have you seen the video?” Junhui gives him a solid thump on the back.

“You looked so cool there!” Minghao cheers from behind Junhui, poking him aside. “As expected of the dance club leader!”

“What video?” So maybe it’s true that he tends to ignore what happens in school during the holidays. But he’s pretty sure he didn’t stick any cameras at his face and upload it onto the Internet. The Dance Club got burned once- never again, he swears.

“On the pledisplagiarisers page. Here, watch this one. They uploaded it two days ago or something.” Vernon chimes in, taking his phone out.

Damn, not that kid again. Hasn’t he wrecked the Dance Club once already? Isn’t that already victory enough for him? Must that punk really destroy Soonyoung’s good mood?

LEE JIHOON PLAGIARISING “FREESTYLE DANCE”. Huh, interesting title. He presses the screen.

Ah, the kid was filming at Seungcheol’s party. There’s that comparison screen thing again, showing how similar Jihoon’s moves were to that of the uploaded video.

“It’s nice and all, but why do I look cool I’m just part of the background-”

“Shhh. This is the highlight.” Junhui hisses.

And for comparison, we have a highlight reel of the current Dance Club leader. To show how freestyle is done.

The highlight reel isn’t very long. Around thirty seconds, a nice segment cut out from his entire performance.

“You look so cool.” Minghao gushes.

“And I don’t?” Junhui snips. Soonyoung laughs. He isn’t quite as cool as Minghao would like to make him out to be, but the video is kind of nice. Like the kid wasn’t intent on killing the Dance Club now. Like the kid was trying to clear its name instead.

“Kids, I know it’s the first day but the bell already rang.” Mr. Kye acts all stern, but Vernon and Minghao just laugh on their way out. It’s the first day, even the teachers don’t really want to be back in school.

It doesn’t feel strange to drop his bag next to Seokmin anymore. Feels pretty comfortable, actually.

“Well, even though it’s the first day we still have lab. And even though we don’t use dangerous chemicals or anything keep your hands to yourself. The last time someone got sent to the doctor for paper cuts. Don’t ask how.”

Soonyoung laughs way too loudly. But really, he was almost that kid. Got cut a couple of times, but he heals quickly.

---

Maybe Ms. Han is right when she says Seokmin and Soonyoung are hell-raisers together. Apart from that one time when they tag-teamed Ms. Han and attacked her Literature essay outlines, they’ve always had a streak of rebelliousness.

And the rebelliousness has clearly shown through- when they sit next to each other in the Physics lab.  They made an absolute racket just trying to set up their retort stands. Seokmin somehow toppled his stand onto toppled Soonyoung’s stand and the lab equipment falls to the ground with a loud crash.

The class is staring at them. Whoops. Soonyoung aplogises, and it is really his fault. He’s just glad it’s not Chemistry right now. He might be smelling ammonia, breaking glass beakers and causing explosions.

He’s always been a little careless in the lab, but having Lee Seokmin next to him just amplifies all the problems. It’s a basic pendulum experiment where all you need to do is tie the bob to the string and time it swinging about, but apparently that is too difficult for the Physics top scorers.

The class has taken to giving them an evil eye after Seokmin drops the bob with a sharp thud after the fifth time. Not like Soonyoung is any better, he’s dropped it three. Their lab desk looks like a disaster zone. Help, need Boo Seungkwan evacuation. Except Mr. Kye is staring at them in amusement. So nope, no Boo-get-out-of-jail-free card.

Soonyoung is starting to suspect Seokmin got the same treatment by Seungkwan. Poor Boo, he works so hard saving his idiot friends.

And why does Seungkwan even want to be friends with these two wrecks again? Soonyoung doesn’t know, he and Seokmin are equally bad. But Seokmin’s a little worse. Soonyoung has his pride, okay. He only drops the bob three times! Seokmin drops it five, now six!

Well, at least both their bobs are now tied to the stand. Now for the easy part- swing the metal ball around without dropping it. It can’t be that hard.

Except well, Soonyoung pushes the ball a little too hard. It flies upwards, fast. And will you have it, Lee Seokmin does the exact same thing. In his direction.

The bobs crash into each other. They fly backwards and tangle together.

They turn around and stare. There’s a mass of white thread tangled together, tilting their retort stands downwards dangerously. They’d crash into the table if the stands weren’t leaning on each other.

It’s a mess. But a funny mess. Because they’re looking at each other and Soonyoung can’t suppress his laughter. And now they’re both laughing way too hard.

Gosh, Soonyoung can’t explain what’s so funny. It’s really stupid, how can they both be so bad at physics lab? One really would think that Physics top scorers would have some minimum lab skills but no, put them next to each other and they cause enough havoc for the entire class.

“Take the retort stands down and cut the string.” Mr. Kye lets out a resigned sigh. Yep, he’s definitely gotten used to their absolute lack of skills. “ Try not to make a mess when collecting data.”

They clean up the mess quickly, only dropping stuff two or three times. Soonyoung swears the lab makes him clumsy, he can dance perfectly fine and set up the video camera but nope, can’t swing a pendulum. Seokmin isn’t the type of guy to trip over his own feet while walking, so it’s clearly the lab.

Why do they even need to experiment again? What collecting data? Why bother? Just fake some results based on theory, plot a couple of points and draw a nice best-fit line. Perfectly straight, zero anomalies.

Soonyoung considers this perfectly ethical. No one’s grading his (non-existent) lab technique, they only grade what goes on the paper. (Thank heavens. He wont be second place if they did.) He know his theory, he shouldn’t be penalized for clumsiness. So what if he can’t experiment to save his life? His practical worksheet is perfect.

Just like this. After spending three-quarters of the time making and clearing up experimental messes, he’s already on the last bit- the graph. Faked data for life. Kwon Soonyoung swears by it.

There’s resistance against his plastic ruler. Soonyoung pushes it harder, but the object doesn’t give. Why now? He’s just lined up his graph perfectly, all plotted points sitting prettily on the line.

He looks up, only to see Seokmin pushing with his plastic ruler as well. Plotting a line filled with data points sitting dead center on the line.

A like-minded creature who fakes data!

“Zero anomalies?” Soonyoung can’t help but ask. Already smiling.

Seokmin’s eyes crinkle up cutely. “Let’s compare our findings.” He says, mock air of superiority

“Sure. My table has accurately recorded my experimental results.”  

The (faked) numbers are the same. The (faked) plotted points are the same. The (faked) best-fit line is the same.

“Faked data for life?” Seokmin whispers. Soonyoung nods. He hates to admit it, but Seokmin is a creature very much like him.

When the bell rings, they go straight up to Mr. Kye to submit their worksheets. Mr. Kye looks up at the two of them and raises his eyebrows.

“How did you finish on time? You made such a mess earlier.”

He’s asking despite already knowing. Just to prod them a little. There was a time where Soonyoung didn’t even touch the equipment, but Mr. Kye insisted he acted a little.

“I’m very good at displaying my experimental findings.”

Soonyoung turns to face Seokmin who says the same words, just with even more attitude.

Mr. Kye sighs so hard the whole class who’s already out of the door turns back to stare.

“You both are very good at faking results. Run along.”

Seungkwan is giving them both the disapproving stare. Like they’re two naughty kids who got caught playing with fire. Whoops.

“Brats, keep yourselves in line. Why do I take care of you two, tsk.”

“Sorry, Mommy Boo.” Seokmin grovels. With annoyingly sweet voices. Gosh, he looks so cute like this. But nope, Soonyoung must one-up him. As the one who has been friends with Seungkwan for a longer time and therefore better at annoying him.  

“Really sorry, Mommy Boo. You still love me right? You still love Soonyoungie right?” Clinging onto Seungkwan, shifting his arm back and forth like a spoilt child.

“Mommy Boo loves me too right! Seokminnie didn’t mean to get into trouble!” And there’s a frankly oversized Seokmin doing the same thing to Seungkwan’s right arm. Damn, this guy knows how to be pesky too.

"Ignore him, Mommy Boo! Love Soonyoungie!"

"Go away! Mommy Boo loves Seokminnie more!"  

Soonyoung's laughing. School really isn't that bad. 

And despite the overwhelming amount of aegeyo, insincere apologies and a never-ending chorus of “Mommy Boo”, Seungkwan’s pretty happy to see the two of them get along. Even though he'd like it if they'd stop whining so loudly the whole class is (still) staring at them. 

a/n: Happy Lunar New Year to those who celebrate it!! :>>> this was meant to be placed up earlier but ohwells.