“Someone emailed me and told us to look outside the Galmegi,” Himchan says in an uncharacteristically serious tone. His face is utterly pale. “When we went and checked, you were lying on the sidewalk in these clothes.”

    I look down at myself. I am clad in the shorts I was previously wearing, along with a large white button down shirt that smells of spice and musk. My stomach clenches. It is his. I know it.

    “We were so worried,” Sora breathes, wrapping her arms around me in a hug. “We totally lost contact with you, and then we find you out right here.”

    “It was him,” I growl. “He knew about my mic and earpiece. He’s playing with us.”

    “What happened?”

    “He was my next dance partner, and...,” I swallow. “Zelo, do you remember... my first kill?”

    Zelo stiffens. “Y-Yeah.”

    “He knew the song that was playing during my kill,” I whisper. “Harald’s Dream. We danced to it.”

    “What?!”

    “Yeah. It... and then he ran off, and I chased him into this hallway, and a bunch of guys attacked me. I fought them all off- well, except for this one guy, who was really good at fighting- and then the man came up behind me and then I out.”

    Zelo looks absolutely livid. Through clenched teeth, he snarls, “We’re going to hunt this ing bastard down and kill him.”

    “That’s so ed up,” Sora whispers. “I- oh my god, Hy- Lia. Are you-,”

    “I’m fine,” I say, cutting her off. “Look. We have a lead now. That girl Jina mentioned that BTS holds street fights in Taebaek. If we go there, we can find something.”

    “Uh, I also heard her mention about three other names of our enemies,” Zelo interjects. “If we go there, we’ll be smack in the middle of enemy territory.”

    “But BTS will be there.”

    “So will a hundred other gang members who want your head.”

    “I’ll just fight them all off, then.”

    “Are you ing joking?” Zelo hisses. He slams his fist down on the table. “Can you ing stop, Lia? I know you don’t care, but there are some people who don’t want you to get killed. Stop being so reckless!”

    “Okay, you two!” Himchan shouts, cutting in between us. “We’ll talk about this later, okay? Why don’t you get some rest for now, Lia?”

    “Whatever,” I mutter, stomping away. Sora throws a concerned look at Zelo before she follows me out the door.

    “Hyo-,” she begins, but I cut her off.

    “I don’t want to hear it,” I snarl. “He’s so ing overprotective. It’s not his parents who were killed, okay? He doesn’t understand.”

    “That’s not fair, Hyo,” Sora says quietly as I yank open the door to her car.

    “Whatever.”

    I know she’s right. I know how ing irrational I’m being right now.

    But I am absolutely furious. At everything. I hate how Zelo and Himchan and Sora are so worried. I hate that bastard who called me to the party and played with me like a child’s toy. I hate that I couldn’t knock out the man I was fighting in the hallway. I hate that I keep letting down Joonmyeon, again and again.

    I hate myself for being like this.

    Harald’s Dream won’t leave my mind. It is playing on repeat in my head, looping a million times over and over again.

    I slam my fist into the side of Sora’s car, causing her to jolt in her seat.

    .

 Maybe I should start taking pills again so I can sleep through the nightmares.

I wake up the next morning to a text from Joonmyeon.

    We rescheduled the Student Council meeting so you could make it. 1 PM. Be there.

    He sounds pissed. I groan, burying my head in my hands.

    Back to Square 1.

    “I’m really, really sorry,” I tell Joonmyeon the moment I see him standing outside the Student Council meeting room. “Yesterday I-,”

    “It’s okay,” Joonmyeon says in a tight voice, clearly not okay.

    Oh god. Time for Plan B.

    “Joonmyeon,” I whisper, slowly drawing something out of the gray bag in my hand. “Guess what this is?”

    He stubbornly looks away. “Don’t care.”

    “Really? Even if it’s two tickets to that Lay Fetty Music concert you really wanted to go to?”

    Joonmyeon whips his head back around to face me, his jaw agape. “It’s Le Fetes Musicales, you idiot,” he says, trying to hide the broad smile spreading across his face. “Not Lay Fetty Music. Your pronunciation .”

    “Yeah, but these tickets aren’t,” I grin. “So. How about it?”

    “This doesn’t make me less mad at you,” Joonmyeon grumbles as I tackle him in an enormous hug. “I’m still- hey! Stop!”

    “I wuv you, Joonmyeonnie,” I say, puckering my lips. “My sweet baby-,”

    “Stop!” he shouts, his face red.

    “What? You can tease me but I can’t tease you?” A devilish grin appears on my face. “Aww, are you embarrassed?”

“Cut it-,”

“Okay, as cute as this is, we should really start the meeting,” an amused voice says. Kyungsoo, Seolhyun, and Yuna are staring at the two of us. Joonmyeon and I immediately jerk away from each other, blushing.

“Jesus,” Kyungsoo snorts. “Could you two keep that in the bedroom?”

“Shut up!” Joonmyeon and I exclaim simultaneously.

“Yo. Let’s get started.” Seolhyun slaps a crumpled piece of paper on the table. “You guys see this? Do you see it?”

“Obviously,” Yuna mutters.

“I found this on the grass! We have a littering problem!”

As Seolhyun rambles on about being “environmentally friendly” and “disciplining these bastards”, I zone out, my mind focused on one person: Zelo. It seems like the moment I make up with Zelo, Joonmyeon gets mad at me, and vice versa. I am stuck in this neverending loop where one of my best friends is mad at me at any given point in time. He isn’t picking up my calls or answering my texts- I’ll go see him in person-

“Hyo!”

I look up, startled. Joonmyeon, Kyungsoo, Seolhyun, and Yuna are staring at me.

“S-Sorry,” I stammer. “Uh, yeah. I agree with Joonmyeon.”

Joonmyeon’s face splits into a grin. “Thanks, Hyo.”

“You’re an idiot, Hyo,” Yuna sighs.

    “We were talking about how you and Joonmyeon have to go to the Condu tonight for that alumni recognition ceremony,” Kyungsoo tells me.

    I narrow my eyes. “Condu? What’s that?”

“A fancy schmancy French restaurant,” Joonmyeon grins. “The school’s paying for our food. We can order all the dessert we want.”

“Awesome.”

Joonmyeon and I continue discussing the Condu as we walk out of our student council meeting. I have the restaurant menu pulled up on my phone, and we are poring over the “Pastas” section when I hear someone say, “Hyo?”

Joonmyeon and I turn. Park Jimin is standing behind me, flanked by Kim Namjoon and Min Yoongi, who are giving me strange looks. There is a red folder in Jimin’s hands.

“You dropped this,” he smiles.

“Oh!” I take the folder from him, beaming. “Thanks, Jimin.”

“You also dropped this, this, and this.” He places my wallet, my planner, and my econ notebook in my hands.

My jaw drops. “Wha- how-,”

“Your bag’s open. Might be kind of important.”

“Oh, god!” I hastily scramble for the zipper of my bag- oh, no, it is open- and violently yank it closed. Jimin is quietly chuckling at my embarrassment.

“Stop laughing,” I scowl.

“Sorry! I can’t help it.”

Suddenly, Yoongi clears his throat. “Hey, Joonmyeon,” he says.

Joonmyeon nods at him. “Hey.”

Jimin tears his gaze away from me and looks at Joonmyeon, an embarrassed look on his face. “Sorry, dude. I totally forgot to say hi.”

Joonmyeon shrugs. “No problem.”

Yoongi and Namjoon begin conversing with Joonmyeon as I continue talking to Jimin.

“Are you going to be going to the gym tonight?” he asks. “I can spot you.”

“Sorry, but I can’t,” I say apologetically. “Joonmyeon and I have to go to this student council thing.”

“Oh. .”

“Not entirely. The school’s paying for our meal, so we’re going to go nuts on the menu.” I elbow Joonmyeon in the side. “Right?”

“Huh?” Joonmyeon asks confusedly.

“Menu! We’re going to go nuts on the-,”

“Oh! Oh, yeah. I’m prepared to order $200 of food.”

“$200? Amateur levels.”

“Yeah, yeah. Says the girl who couldn’t even finish that mega-bowl of pho last week. If you’d finished the whole thing, it would’ve been free.”

“Hey, I finished way more than you did-,”

“No, you didn’t-,”

“Okay,” Namjoon says, clapping his hand on Jimin’s shoulder. “We’re going to go. Take care, Joonmyeon.” He looks at me with an impassive expression. “Hyolin.”

I tip my head. “Bye.”

Do Namjoon and Yoongi have some kind of problem with me? Wait- maybe they found out about what happened on Halloween. But in that case, shouldn’t they be acting nicer? Jimin’s pretty cool. So why do those two- along with their other friends- seem so... hostile?

Whatever. I’ve never talked to Namjoon or them in my life. They don’t even know me.

It’s probably all in my head.