“Class, we will be having a new student joining us starting from today,” the lecturer states as soon as the class had settled down. Jihun didn’t mind much about the information. They are all the same, he thought. Jihun couldn’t find it in him to bother with anything regarding the student body welfare. All the students end up hating on him after their first encounter anyway.

“Annyeonghaseyo, my name is Park Seungjun and I will be your new classmate. I hope we would be able to get along well together!”.

Jihun’s ears perked up at the familiar voice. It was the same voice that had been haunting him all morning. He glanced up and saw the statuesque beauty and was once again mesmerised. His cheeks began to heat up as the events from that fateful morning replayed in his mind. Jihun hoped that his new classmate wouldn’t be able to recognize him. He was sure that he had kept his face well-hidden throughout the entire first meeting.

“Seungjun, you will be sitting next to Kim Jihun. He’s the one sitting right at the back. I hope you will be able to adjust well here in our university,” the lecture said while pointing towards Jihun. Seungjun was placed next to Jihun on purpose, just as planned by Mrs Kim. JIhun felt his heart lurch. He didn’t have a seating partner for so long as all his ex-partners have requested to change their seating after having to deal with Jihun’s behaviour. Jihun could feel the thumping of his heart against his chest.  He was nervous. He swallowed pools of saliva as he could see the tall man walking towards him.

“Hello, I’m Park Seungjun! Let’s be friends!” Seungjun exclaimed as soon as he had plopped down on his seat. Jihun could hear the other students snickering as Seungjun offered his hand.

“I-I’m Kim Ji-Jihun,” Jihun stammered. He stared at the hand as if it was a foreign object before shaking it nervously. He was secretly relieved that Seungjun didn’t recognize him. it would have been embarrassing if he did, especially after he had ran away without much of a sincere thank you.

“Ahh…so that’s the name of the person in the rain this morning. I recognised you from your outfit,” Seungjun laughingly said while throwing a cheeky smile.

Jihun froze. He could feel blood draining from his face as his tongue went numb. He didn’t expect the guy to have noticed his clothes. His mind went on overdrive, coming up with excuses to explain his weird behaviour this morning. He didn’t want to come off as obnoxious to this guy. Jihun fidgets nervously in his seat. He could hear Seungjun chuckling to himself next to him as he prepared his books. That’s it, he thinks I’m weird, Jihun grimaced.

“So cute.”.

…Huh?

Did Jihun hear him correctly? Did Seungjun just called him cute? Weird, crazy, anti-social, are some of the things that he was used to being called but never have he been called cute before. No, it couldn’t be. Jihun kept on reminding himself that it’s impossible. Nobody would ever find him likeable. It repeated like a mantra in his head.

“Since I’m new here…do you think you can give me a school tour after class?” Seungjun whispered in Jihun’s ear to avoid disrupting the lesson going on. Jihun is having yet another mental breakdown. There goes the deep voice entering his head again. He could feel yet another blush coming right up.

“Su-sure,” Jihun barely managed to splutter out his answer.

“Alright class, don’t forget to research on your mid-term project submission and I’ll see you next week.”. Class has finally ended for the day and students were all busy packing up their staffs to head home. It was a very mentally challenging lesson and all that Jihun wanted to do was to go home, and enjoy the silence of his house. But of course, fate has different plans stored for him.

“You didn’t forget about the tour, did you?”.

Of course. The tour. How could he forget? That was the only thing that surrounds his thinking process throughout the entire lesson. Nobody has ever requested for a school tour by Jihun. He was probably the worst person to ask for a school tour from. Jihun nodded his head before asking Seungjun to follow him. He honestly didn’t know how he was going to get through this. Jihun decided that he should get started with the important places first. He started showing Seungjun around the cafeterias, the library and other common locations. To be completely honest, Jihun didn’t frequent these places much himself. He avoids staying back after school hours. He rather spent time on his own, away from the rest of the student body. He even had lunch by himself on the school rooftop.

Seungjun was dead tired after the tour came to an end. He didn’t expect for the school grounds to be this huge. The taller however, did spent most of the tour observing Jihun. He observed the way Jihun would behave every time someone passes by them. Jihun would always immediately lower his head down to cover his face. It seems as if he was too afraid to pick himself up in front of others. Seungjun remembered the story that Mrs Kim had told him about Jihun’s upbringing, and felt a pang of sadness. Just how much did the boy suffered that he is absolutely frightened of society?

“Thanks for taking me around. I’ll send you home as a payback” Seungjun told the younger as they walked to the entrance. He found himself unwilling to depart from Jihun when they had just met. I just wanted to observe him more, he convinced himself.  

“N-no thanks. I can manage going home by myself,” Jihun felt that he has spent enough time interacting today. He didn’t know how he was going to continue spending time with Seungjun any longer.  They reached the entrance just to