Your chair is slightly lurched forward and you bite your lip, squeezing your pencil between your fingers. Ignore him, you tell yourself calmly. He’s just trying to spite you.

You scooch forward in your seat and fix your eyes on the test before you, willing your mind to focus on nothing else but the set of problems yet to be solved. You begin your work on the blank space below the problems.

Take the derivative of that—kick—integrate that—kick—substitute u for x—kick.

You can feel your anger escalating by the second so you peer over your shoulder to shoot a glare at the offender behind you, Jonghoon. Your eyebrows furrow in exasperation when you see him smile at you innocently.

Shaking your head, you turn around and resume your work, trying your best to maintain your composure. You’re able to finish the next set of problems with ease and you’re relieved to know that, despite the jerk he is, Jonghoon has finally decided to leave you and your chair alone.

That is, until you feel your chair being jerked forward with possibly the biggest kick from him yet. Due to the force, your pencil smudges across your scantron right when you’re bubbling in your answer and that’s when you snap.

You slam your pencil down on the desk and whirl around, every single ounce of common sense flying out the window. All you know is that you’re roughly four feet away from strangling him into his demise.

“Can you stop?” you hiss angrily.

The classroom stills, all eyes on you, and you can see Jonghoon struggling to stifle a smirk. All the blood in your body seems to rush to your face and you murmur a nearly-incoherent “sorry” to your class and teacher before awkwardly turning back around.

The rest of the period is you spent with your heart beat resonating through your ears and your face flushed with embarrassment.

“Hey,” your friend Minji nudges your elbow, “that Wonwoo guy’s staring at you.”

You pass it off dismissively, not even bothering to glance over or get your hopes up. “Yeah, and I’m pulling an A in calculus.”

“Why are you always like that?” she frowns. You briefly wonder if she’s referring to your disbelief that Wonwoo could actually be looking at you or your pessimism regarding your math grade (you figure it’s both). “He’s been looking over here for like, ten minutes. It’s starting to creep me out.”

“Maybe he’s looking at you,” you murmur, desperately wanting to change the subject. You poke at your lunch with your chopsticks, heaving a sigh; coincidentally, your appetite has disappeared as well.

“Hmm. Maybe you’re right,” she agrees pensively. “I mean, why would he be looking at you, right?”

You remain quiet and take a sip of your chocolate milk. She’s right; why would he be looking at you? She’s only being realistic and he’s only ever been cold and indifferent towards you.

“Well, at least he’s not Jonghoon.”

“Yeah,” you cap the lid to your lunch, “at least he’s not Jonghoon.”

Unbeknownst to you, those certain pair of eyes have been watching your every move from a few tables away.

“Yo, ______,” you feel your hair being yanked back rather harshly, “what’s the answer to number four?”

You scowl and swat the hand away. “Don’t touch me. And figure it out yourself.”  

Jonghoon scoffs and reaches over your shoulder to snatch your paper from your desk, “Don’t tell me what to do.” Despite your protests, he quickly skims through your answers before tossing it back impudently on your desk. Erasing some of the work on his paper, he mutters, “Your answers better be right.”

You slide your paper to the middle of your desk. “Maybe if you weren’t so stupid, you wouldn’t have to copy off of me all the time.”

“Well maybe if you weren’t so bland and unappealing, guys would actually like you.”

Normally you’re immune to his insults and jabbing words but this one has you biting on your lower lip. You subconsciously glance up and your eyes land on Wonwoo, seated against the wall a few rows away from your seat.

Jonghoon seems to take notice of this and snickers. “Wonwoo, really? You’re in over your head. He’s way out of your league.”

Upon hearing the mention of his name, Wonwoo peers over and your eyes lock for a split second. Your heart leaps in your chest but he breaks eye contact, looking away almost immediately.

“See?” Jonghoon leans back against his chair and folds his arms over his chest smugly. “He can’t even stand looking at you!”

Your eyes sting and before you know it, you’re blinking back tears that are threatening to fall.

Unfortunately, this doesn’t go unnoticed by Jonghoon either. His lips curl up, “Are you really crying?”

“Shut up,” you turn your body away from him and face down so the wisps of your hair can block your face from his view.

The next day comes as a surprise when Jonghoon passes by your chair and merely takes his seat behind you in math class, not even making an effort to insult you like he would any other day. Which is odd, you think — he doesn’t even spare you a glance.

But you can’t help but notice the crimson cut alongside his lower lip. Letting curiosity get the best of you, you turn around and squint your eyes at the wound. “What happened to you?”

His eyes flicker towards yours and then about the room. “Your boyfriend’s crazy,” he mumbles.

“What?”

Jonghoon slumps into his chair and lays his head on the desk.

_ _ _

“It’s weird,” you say, tapping your fingers against the cafeteria table, “he didn’t even bother me today. No snarky comments, no chair kicks. Nothing.”

Minji makes a face and points her chopsticks at you. “You know, I heard he got into a fight after school yesterday.”

Fight? “Well, he did have a busted lip today in class,” you say, more to yourself than her. “But he mentioned something about me having a boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend?” Minji her head to the side.

“Yeah,” you confirm, face mirroring hers, painted with confusion. “He must still be out of it from that punch.”

When chemistry arrives, things just start to get even weirder.

You’re pouring hydrogen phosphate into an empty flask for your lab when you hear footsteps padding towards your table. You catch Jonghoon’s approaching figure in your peripheral vision and look up.

Once again, he uncharacteristically avoids your presence and picks up a few unused beakers from your table before clearing his throat awkwardly and turning back around. But something makes him stop dead in his tracks.

“I’m not gonna do anything!” Jonghoon says defensively. You follow his line of sight and your eyes fall on a vigilant-looking Wonwoo. “Relax! I was just getting some materials!” And then he’s scampering back towards his own lab station, all the while under his scrutiny.

Even behind the safety goggles covering his face, you can still make out a burning intensity lingering behind his gaze.

What is going on? you think, eyebrows knitting together. You’re so lost in thought that you nearly spill the solution all over yourself but you catch yourself right when it’s up to the brim. You heave a sigh of relief and set the flask down, looking up to only find Wonwoo staring right at you this time.

It’s not until he quickly looks away do you realize that you have to get to the bottom of this.

When class (and school) finally ends, you make sure to keep an eye on Wonwoo to ensure he doesn’t leave your sight. You see him out the door and hastily swing your backpack over your shoulder and scurry out of the classroom.

“Wonwoo!” you call, shouldering past a few students who are crowding the hallway. You see him stop and turn around as you rush over to his side. He spots you and quickly turns his face away from yours and you frown. “Hey, I need to talk to you.”

His pace quickens and you struggle to keep by his side. “What is it?”

“What happened between you and Jonghoon?”

He refuses to meet your eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Realizing that prodding on will get no where, you quicken your steps and stop right in front of him, forcing him to come to a halt. Now that you’re in front of him, you can see his face more clearly. “Um, yes there is something to talk about,” you cross your arms and study his face; there’s a livid bruise tainting his left eye. “What happened to your eye?”

“Fell off my bike,” he murmurs, attempting to brush past you. But you step in front of him once again, blocking his path.

“And what, landed right on Jonghoon’s fist?”

Wonwoo lets out a sigh of defeat. “He was bothering you, right?” You nod wordlessly and he continues, “He won’t anymore.”

Your lips press together in a straight line. “So you fought him? Since when did you care about me?”

Wonwoo frowns. “I actually care about you a lot.”

You pause, face crimsoning, and despite the chatter amongst the students passing by in the hallways, you feel as if the silence that hangs among the two of you is tangible.

“Did I… say that out loud?”

"Yeah,” you cough out awkwardly, and Wonwoo’s ears turn a light shade of pink. You toe the ground with the tip of your shoe.

He seems to be undergoing inner conflict until he gives a sigh. “I couldn’t stand watching him mess with you everyday,” he confesses sheepishly. “So I stopped him. It was worth the punch.”

You’re rendered speechless; all that for you? Without thinking, you reach up and lightly brush the pad of your thumb against the bruise beneath his eye, frowning when he winces from your touch. “You’re unbelievable.”

“I guess you could say that,” Wonwoo looks you in the eye and your breath nearly hitches at the sincerity in his gaze. “I’m sorry. I should’ve confessed to you earlier.”

“I thought you hated me,” you bring your hand back down but Wonwoo catches it before you can, face flushing when he realizes what he just did.

He squeezes your hand lightly. “Tell that to the black eye.”

You’re certain that your heart’s about to explode any second now; your head’s spinning and Wonwoo’s holding your hand and oh god do you have to tell Minji all about this.

So what do you do? You act on instinct. You get on your tip toes and dot a kiss on his cheek.

When you pull away and descend back onto the heels of your feet, you can’t bring yourself to even look at his face.

“I… have to go,” you blurt out, blinking rapidly. Before he can say anything, you spin on your heel and take off in the opposite direction, nearly bumping into a locker in the midst of your frantic haste.

Your house is the other way but all you can think about is how light-headed you’re feeling and how his skin is so soft.