Sori woke up with a sore headache. She knew she shouldn’t have eaten last because she didn’t sleep until 3am. She could never sleep with a full stomach, which was why she doesn’t like to eat dinner. It was already 8 and homeroom starts at 8:45.  

 

She walked towards her bathroom to wash her face and brush her teeth. She put on her uniform, took her school bag, put on her shoes, and headed out.

 

When she walked into homeroom, she was greeted by the sound of students laughing and loudly chatting. She wondered how people could be so awake in the morning.

 

“Didn’t sleep much last night?” someone asked from behind.

 

She turned around and saw Hansol still half-asleep along with the other 12 boys behind him. Sori shook her head before heading towards her seat.

 

“So you’re the ‘Dae Sori’ who slept through the whole class yesterday,” Hansol said as he took a seat beside hers.

 

“I guess so,” she replied sleepily.

 

“Why didn’t you get much sleep?” Hansol asked.

 

“I can’t sleep if I’m full,” she answered.

 

“Usually people sleep easier when they’re full,” he replied.

 

“I’m unique,” Sori said.

 

“No, you’re just weird,” Hansol teased.

 

Sori put her head down and smiled a little.

 

“You really do have a pretty smile,” he said.

 

“Not now Hansol… It’s too early for your grease,” she joked.

 

“I’ll let you sleep first then missy,” he smiled, patting her head.

 

---

 

“Yah, wake up,” Hansol said as she shook Sori’s sleeping figure.

 

Sori slowly opened her eyes and stretched her back.

 

“Do you know how hard it was to keep you quiet? You were snoring like a crazy person,” he joked, “And you have a bit of drool on your sleeve.”

 

“What time is it?” She asked sleepily.

 

“12 ish… lunch time,” he replied.

 

“ARE YOU SERIOUS?” Sori exclaimed, her eyes wide opened now.

 

“Yup. You slept through 3 classes. Well done,” he said.

 

“Hansol, Sori, let’s get lunch!” Jeonghan said as he approached their desk.

 

Hansol stood up and helped Sori get on her feet before slowly pushing her towards the door where the other guys were waiting.

 

“You look exhausted,” Hoshi said to Sori.

 

“Well she just woke up,” Hansol replied, “I had to cover with my jacket so her snores wouldn’t be heard by the entire class.”

 

The other guys laughed along as they walked towards the cafeteria.

 

“You should’ve woken me up…” Sori said, “But I’m thankful you didn’t and helped me sleep peacefully.”

 

“You’re very welcome,” Hansol smiled.

---

 

Lunch ended quickly as the students headed towards the cooking lab. Sori had food technology for her last 2 periods – something she was finally good at other than dozing off.

 

“Welcome back kids! As you all know, every class has a theme that you have to follow. Today’s theme will be: macaroons.” The teacher announced followed by complaints by the students.

 

“Aren’t those really difficult to make?” One girl asked.

 

“We won’t be able to pass this class if the things we need to make are chef level recipes,” another said.

 

“I know it’s difficult, but you have to challenge yourself at some point of your life. Macaroons aren’t that hard to make once you grasp the concept,” the teacher replied.

 

“Can’t we just make some cake?” Dino asked, making some of the girls’ in the room chuckle.

 

“How about a soufflé? It’s easier than a macaroon,” Mingyu suggested.

 

“Sou- what?” Seungcheol asked.

 

“It’s basically a softer and French version of a cake,” Mingyu answered.

 

Whispers of admiration towards Mingyu could be heard from the girls. In Sori’s opinion, that kind of knowledge isn’t something spectacular, but she’s got to give to him for knowing his pastry terms.

 

“That’s a great idea Mingyu! Then let’s just go with soufflés,” the teacher announced as she started to divide the class into pairs.

 

Sori unknowingly got paired up with a random girl who seemed to be a big fan of Seungcheol. She couldn’t stop blabbering about how great Seungcheol was to Sori. It would be nice if the girl had any cooking skills, but the fact that she thought there were egg whites and egg yolks were two types of eggs made Sori not trust her with any cooking tools.

 

“What are we even making? A shuffle?” The girl asked.

 

“A soufflé.. do you have any idea of what flavor you want the soufflé to be?” Sori replied.

 

“Anything’s fine as long as it taste good, but I just got this really expensive manicure last night and I don’t want to ruin it. I hope you don’t mind working alone on this,” she said.

 

“Can you at least preheat the oven please?” Sori asked, earning a nod from the girl.

 

Sori gave her a quick smile before collecting her ingredients. The girl then left Sori’s station and went to her friends whose station as across from hers.

 

When Sori came back with her ingredients, she overheard her partner whispering to her friends.

 

“So who’s the loser you got paired up with?” The friend asked.

 

“I don’t know… If it wasn’t for her standing beside me, I would’ve been paired up with Seungcheol oppa,” she replied.

 

“Did you see how plain her face looked? It’s as if she didn’t wear any makeup to school. Such an embarrassment,” another friend added, making the other girls laugh.

 

Sori wanted to so desperately tell them to go themselves, but she knew that would only cause trouble for her. She already got in trouble last time for getting into a verbal fight with another girl for calling her stupid (which Sori won in the end).  She decided to just focus on her cheese soufflé and get it over with.

 

“What’cha makin’?” Hansol asked as he walked towards Sori’s station.

 

“A soufflé,” she replied.

 

“I know that silly. I meant what kind of soufflé,” he said, chuckling to himself.

 

“Cheese,” Sori answered as she whisked the egg whites until stiff peaks.

 

“Oh nice. Seungcheol and I are making, um, strawberry I think? I don’t know.. it’s his idea. I can’t cook at all,” Hansol said.

 

Sori only replied him with a smile before continue on measuring her cheese.

 

“Seungcheol looks like he needs some help, but I’ll be back,” he said before disappearing.

 

After folding in the egg yolk mixture into the egg whites, she buttered and floured her ramekins and poured ½  a cup of batter in each ramekin. Then she placed the 6 ramekins into a tray and filled it with some boiling water. As Sori was about to put the tray into the oven, she saw that it wasn’t preheated yet.

 

That dumb prick she thought to herself before preheating the oven and waiting 15 minutes before putting her ramekins in.

 

Her job wasn’t quite done because she needed to make a cheese sauce to accompany the soufflé. It was a simple job, which took her 10 minutes to make. As she was washing the dishes, she glared at the girl who didn’t help her at all. She was pissed beyond relief, but she couldn’t just erupt in a fit of curses in the middle of class. All Sori could do was hope that karma would bite her in the next time.

 

Sori looked around the room and saw some good soufflés and also some failed ones. She noticed that the boys in her class did a pretty bad job except for Mingyu who was proud of his caramel soufflé.

 

“Are you done yet?” Sori’s partner asked as she walked towards her.

 

“I was just about to take it out of the oven,” Sori replied as she put on her oven mitts and took out the tray.

 

She was pretty good with the results because her soufflé raised at a good height and was golden brown on top.

 

“Sweet Jesus that looks good,” Joshua said from behind.

 

“It smells cheesy,” Wonwoo added.

 

“No dude. It’s a cheese soufflé,” Hansol said, proud of himself for knowing what it was.

 

Sori chuckled at their small conversation before slowly removing the ramekins from the tray. She had to be cautious because there was still some boiling water in the tray and it would be painful if it spilled onto her or anyone’s skin.

 

“Oh, sorry,” Sori’s partner said as she dropped the cleaning tower on the floor.

 

Sori reached her arm down to grab the towel when she suddenly felt a rush of boiling water all over her forearm.

 

“Sori!” Joshua yelled.

 

“Oh my god! I didn’t mean to drop the tray!” Sori’s partner said as she covered .

 

Sori could only shake her arm to let it cool, but the area where the boiling water burned her was already turning bright red. It was painful, but she was too shocked to react.

 

“It’s fine,” she said before grabbing the dropped towel and wiping the water off the floor.

 

“That’s not fine. You literally burned her skin!” Seungkwan said as he helped Sori up.

 

“Woa woa woa, what happened here kids?” The teacher asked as she walked towards the crime scene.

 

Sori rolled her eyes at what a big mess it had become. She knew well enough that her partner did it on purpose.

 

“Minah accidently dropped the tray full of boiling water and it spilled onto um- her arm,” Minah’s friend explained as she pointed at Sori.

 

“It’s Sori by the way,” DK said, fully aware that the girl didn’t know Sori’s name.

 

“It was just an accident so can we not make this a big deal?” Sori asked.

 

“It wasn’t an accident. I saw her pushing the tray off,” Joshua said.

 

“Me too,” Joshua’s partner said.

 

“It was an accident! I really didn’t mean to push the tray off the table,” Minah exclaimed.

 

“So did you drop it or push it off?” Hansol asked.

 

“W-What?” Minah asked, confused.

 

“Before you said you didn’t mean to drop it, but now you’re saying you didn’t mean to push it off. So which one is it? Did you drop it or push it off?” Hansol asked again.

 

This time Minah was speechless. Her friends couldn’t back her up in this because the evidence was pretty strong. The burden of proof was now on her.

 

“I don’t really care if she did it on purpose or on accident. I’m going to be fine so it would be better if we don’t make this a bigger argument, okay?” Sori said.

 

“Class is about to end so let’s just settle it like this: Sori, you go get yourself checked out at the nurse’s office while you, Jang Minah, come with me to get your detention slip.” The teacher said before telling everyone to go back to their work.

 

Sori sighed at the new enemies she just made and headed back towards her station. She took off her apron and hat before leaving the room.