I slung my backpack on my right shoulder after tying my shoe lace in front of the main door of my house. On that same morning like how it looked like every day, I threw my gaze to the blue sky. Heaving a sigh, I started walking away from my house, heading towards the school which was just nearby.

“Yah, Baek Hyojin!” I almost halted on my tracks after my ears caught a voice which I surely knew whose it was. Not giving any glance to the voice’s owner, I continued walking on my own.

“Yah, wait for me!” the voice’s owner, a guy named Kim Jongin quickly ran after me. I could tell that he was keeping up with my pace since he sounded dragged and irritated. I didn’t think I need to quicken my steps as it’d only be useless. His steps were 2 times wider than mine because his legs were extremely longer than mine were.

When I turned my head to the right, there he was, with his frowning face and dark brown orbs staring at my scowling face. I saw him holding the straps of his backpack that are slung over his shoulders. He was trying to match our footsteps when my eyes slowly landed on his walking long legs. That was when I finally realized that I was already walking fast.

I turned my eyes back to the front. “What do you want?” I asked absentmindedly.

I heard him chuckling at my question. Why? Did I just say something funny? But I rolled my eyes, not bothering to spend a look at his face.

“What’s with that question? What do I want? Let’s see…” he paused, eyeballs moving up as he was busy thinking.

To be frank, I as freaking not in the mood to listen to his stupid jokes today.

“What do I want? I don’t know. Do you want me to have something that I want from you?”

There it was. He was trying to piss me off by twisting my words as he pleased. But, I was usually unfriendly whenever I was with him so I thought, I’d better just pretend he was a rock than talk to him.

Jongin touched the back of his neck and rubbed it when he got no reaction from me. We reached the bus stop and the usual bus was already there so we quickly stepped into it. I sat at the very back, and so did Jongin as he took the empty seat beside me. As a ‘shield’, my hand rummaged through my backpack to take out earphones. I stuffed them inside my earlobes after connecting them to my cellphone. Jongin was staring at me the entire time but I just didn’t have to waste my time talking to him.

Then the trip was filled with dead silence until we stepped in front of Sekang High School main gate. I abruptly halted on my tracks, causing him to do the same.

When I turned my head to Jongin, our eyes met as he did the same. He looked surprised yet confused, at the same time trying to figure out what I was trying to say to him through my facial expression─sharp.

“Get lost,” those were the words that came out of my mouth. The words which made the guy named Jongin raise his eyebrows looking rather shocked.

“Huh?” I heard his voice sounding confused.

Heaving a sigh, I said to him, “You heard me very clear, didn’t you? Get. Lost. Don’t act stupid. I’ve told you many times, haven’t I?”

I thought I’d get the reaction that would satisfy me, but in fact, no when his eyeballs moved to the left and to the right, then his eyebrows knitted together. He seriously looked like a stupid blur boy.

“What have you told me about?” as soon as the question came out of his mouth, I mentally face palmed myself.

I took a lungful of oxygen, trying to calm my dear self. With one hand on my hip, facing him and staring at him directly in the eyes, I repeated those words which I, myself, almost got tired and bored of saying them to the same guy almost all the time. “Stay away from me. Don’t get near me even an inch and don’t ever get connected to me when we are at school.”

“And why is that?”

I grunted and I was sure that I almost shot profanities towards him. With exasperated tone, I blurted out, “Of course it’s because of you, idiot Jongin─no, Kai! Are you really that stupid to understand or do you purposely act stupid that the fact that you are one of the most popular boys in this school is bothering me? I hate those weird stares everyone in this school gives me every time they see us together. Stop approaching me, Kai. I hate it.” And with that, I completely left him outside the school gate, looking dumbfounded.

I called him Kai out of purpose to emphasize that we were at the school. I wouldn’t call him Jongin unless we were in our neighborhood. And that was because as much as I hated him, I still respected his family. His parents’ kindness just made me have self-conscious every time I had to communicate with them.

As I made my way to my locker, I couldn’t stop cursing Jongin internally. I was really tired of having to deal with him almost every single day. Didn’t he understand that all this time, I really hated him? I hated him to the guts. I often never failed to show my hatred towards him through my actions when he was near me. I always, as in always, tried to displease him every time he approached me at school. And why did he even approach me? Simple. That was because he liked to tease me, and I hated that!

About this morning, don’t you ever think that we always go to the school together. I usually succeeded in avoiding him, but not this morning. It was just today I woke up quite late that we happened to step out of our houses at the same time. Do you think when he sees me, he’ll just let me walk by myself and decide to just walk past me without trying to piss me off? No.

That was the Jongin I knew and I thought you should know. 

My mind and actions were interrupted by a sudden shoulder hug of a warm hand─warm enough to give me comfort. A very likeable warmth to me. My hands that were busy putting the books that I needed for today subjects into my backpack automatically paused as I lifted my gaze to meet the most beautiful face in this school─Luhan. My face that was frowning and my eyes that were filled with fire just now automatically softened as soon as the guy gave me the sweetest smile he had.

“Hey,” his soft voice greeted me, unknowingly making my heart flutter even though I heard the voice every day.

“Hi,” I greeted him back and continued putting the books into my backpack. I was actually trying to hide my pink shaded cheeks.

“Are you okay? You seemed so… pissed off,” Luhan voiced out.

“Oh I am. Just… this morning. A dog was trying to pee at me,” I lied. Luhan seemed like he was buying it anyway. His facial expression showed it all.

“Quick, let’s go to class together,” he said which made me nod at that.

As soon as I locked my locker, he pulled me along with him towards the class.

"You know what?" Luhan voiced out, earning my attention as my eyes were only focused on his while he was still holding my shoulder. "You looked like you just stepped on a dog's poop," he commented and that made me mentally gasped and my jaw literally dropped onto the floor.

But in fact, I just smiled at his comment. My face must be so terrible then, I thought. All because of that Kim freaking Jongin duh. 

I laughed. "Haha yeah! A poop. A biiig poop!" I added, turning my head to the front back.

Luhan chuckled, saying, "Now I wonder just how big it was."

With that, my head turned back to him. Our faces were close, like always, it made me flutter. 

"Not big. A huuuge poop!" I added more to earn his laughter, which was contagious as it made me laugh too. I didn't think my joke was funny though.

Many eyes were watching me and Luhan as we were making our way to class but I couldn’t care more. They had already known me and Luhan as close best friends so whenever we were together, they wouldn’t question that much. It was just that we were often asked if we ever grew any special feeling towards each other. As much as I respected Luhan’s privacy, my answer would always come out with a no.

When we reached class, my eyes darted to a particular girl sitting at the front table near the teacher’s table. Son Naeun. I couldn’t decipher the meaning of her stare at that time as my mind was still occupied with the Kai thing. Any soon, that annoying guy would come into the class and I just had to ignore him like he was a rock. Yes, a rock─I repeated the mantra to myself.

Before Luhan and I parted our ways to sit at our own seats, I could see Naeun looking away from me, looking down to her notebook. That was how she got to become a top student in this school. As far as I knew her, I never saw her once not focusing on the lessons and whenever a teacher was not in the class, she would always occupy her time with reading or doing revision.

That is so good of you, Naeun, but… I’ll always be keeping an eye on you─every single thing you do whenever there is Luhan. I thought to myself.

Why? Because I knew her feelings for Luhan, my best friend. She liked him too, very clearly and too much for my liking. It displeased me.

“Hey, Hyojin!” my seatmate, Jieun beamed a smile as soon as my reached the seat. I returned the smile and raised a hand to greet her.

Not long after, from my peripheral view, I caught a tall guy with messy hair who had just stepped into the class, staring at me before heading towards his own seat behind Naeun’s. I didn’t really have to look at him as I already knew who it was. When I was sure that I was ‘safe’ I tried to throw a glance at his direction every second.

He was happily chatting with Naeun who happened to be his best friend─just like how me and Luhan were. Naeun who was facing the front before had already turned her chair and faced him, not forgetting to bring her notebook together with her and placed it on his desk. They looked so comfortable talking with each other with that close proximity that even I could feel jealousy hitting me.

Hadn’t they ever felt “awkward” while being together? Hadn’t they ever felt like suddenly having butterflies in their stomachs, hearts fluttering, bodies trembling for no definite reason while they were alone? Just like how… I had.

I never realized that teacher Lee had already stepped into our class un