Selcouth;
Chapter 3
By: M.S.Jing

'Okay here goes' I thought, taking a deep breath as I looked down the stairs of our studio apartment. It was less than half the flight, the full thing might kill me so I decided on 4 steps. I had already dabbed the dried blood with a little bit of water so it looked fresh and checked to make sure we have medical supplies. I could hear Mingyu's keys jingling in the door and I knew 'now or never'. I heard him pull the keys out of the lock and I let my body go loose, my natural instincts making me land in the same position as before. I even added a small scream for effect even though it didn't hurt as much as last time. I heard him drop whatever he was holding and run over "Jihoon-ah!". I kept hissing in pain, sitting up to lean against the wall while he fretted over me. "This is why you shouldn't wear socks inside, the floor is slippery" he scolded, going to my pants and me letting him. He pulled them down and carefully off the knee, gasping at the wound. Wow, I knew it looked weird but Seungcheol took care of most the loose skin and minimal debris, is he just bad at it? 

    "I'll get the medical kit, sit here" he 'prescribed' getting up and going to the cabinet where we kept cereal and baking ingredients. I mean we can't cook but we try sometimes and something Jeonghan comes over and cooks for us. He came back and started to get to work, he made it hurt a lot less than Seungcheol, I swear he gave me a shot of some sort. "At least you weren't carrying a pot of ramen this time" he scoffed, as he put a piece of fabric dressing over it, pulling a roll of bandage wrap out of the small box. "Don't even mention that... I still blame your sister for that" I pouted, wrapping up my hands on my own, even though they didn't bleed again from the fall. "She was only trying to have fun" he laughed, wrapping the bandage around my knee maybe 6 times. "She scared me" I complained, moving on to playing with the double sided tape I found on the desk that was beside us. "She was 10" he remembered as he finished, putting the stuff away and back where it came from. "How about we sit in bed and you can tell me where you went in fourth black" he basically decided, not really giving me a choice as he lifted me up and started walking up the stairs to where our bed was. He put me down and laid down beside me, staring at me and waiting for me to talk. 

    "I was scared of Seungcheol-ssi, he's my partner in composing and I couldn't face him because at lunch they forced/invited me to eat with them and they thought that I thought that they poinsed the pizza which made them mad". I couldn't help but spill most of the story to him, he's my best friend. "Oh, my god, I'm sorry Jihoonie, If I hadn't signed up to be vice-organizer then I'd had been there to help you" he apologized, taking my hands in his and getting into a sort of bowing position on the bed. "No, no, it wasn't bad, it was weird though. They said they were trying to be my friend" I added, patting his head and making him sit properly on the bed. "I don't like the idea but if they're willing to be nicer then I'll consider it" he thought, turning on his phone as he got a text from someone he named as 'President'.

    "That's good" I muttered under my breath, making sure he didn't hear. I don't really know when my view of them started, it probably started with Seungcheol. I've convinced myself that I'm only trying to make him like them enough for him not to kill them if he ever catches me with Seungcheol. But I genuinely don't like Soonyoung, Seungkwan, Joshua or Vernon. Wonwoo's not too bad he's probably kind of there just because he's Vernon's stepbrother. I don't have anything big against him.

    "Hey, I heard you drop something at the entrance, what was it?" I suddenly remembered, turning onto my side. "Oh ya, close your eyes!" He excitedly shouted, running down the stairs at an alarmingly fast pace. I obliged and listened to his slower and heavier footsteps come back up the fake wooden stairs. I heard some clicking and soft thumping before he spoke again "open your eyes". I opened and my eyes widened. A Yamaha P-255, 88 key digital keyboard!! "Oh my ing God, Kim Mingyu, do you know what you've stolen!?" I yelled out of both excitement and worry. "I didn't steal it," he pouted crossing his arms cockily as he leaned on the railing, making me worry "I got it from the president, his father was buying him a grand piano for his apartment and he wanted to get rid of this so I asked him for it and he gave it to me". 

    "Can I give him a hug?" I asked dreamily, eyes still on the masterpiece of a keyboard. "He's not really the hugging type" Mingyu laughed, bending down to plug it into the wall, having to unplug the computer while he was down there to make room. "I don't care" I hummed, sliding across the bed to sit in front of it. My heart was beating fast and I felt a tingling in my hands as I set them on the surface of the keys. I felt a certain power shoot through me as it lit up with power and I started playing. It was beautiful.

    I know it sounds a little overboard but when you make an average of 300,000 won a week a 1,000,000 won keyboard was a mere dream. I started playing Schubert's Ave Marie as Mingyu came over and sat beside me on the bed, swaying along to the slower beat. It reminded me of when Seungcheol and I were in class and he made me play to 'show my skills' on the first day. Then our song came to mind, with his occasional yelling and 'direction' we had made the main piano line. And before I knew I had transitioned smoothly to our song and had Mingyu still swaying. 

    When it ended he looked at me and smiled, "that was amazing, you and Schubert are real genius' aren't you, how'd you come up with that". "It just happened" I smiled, thinking of Seungcheol's smile when we finished it, he wasn't mad and he wasn't yelling any more he was happy. "Let's get some sleep and tomorrow morning I'll change the bandages on your wound" he yawned, pushing the keyboard into the corner and crawling under the covers. I didn't disagree, I was tired and I needed sleep.

    When I woke up to an empty bed I assumed Mingyu was taking a shower, not trying to sound proof our walk-in closet. How the do we get this place for 1,000,000 a month. He had empty egg cartons and foam in piles as he hung them onto the wall "Mingyu-hyung, what in god's name are you doing?" I hissed, still grumpy from just waking up to the sound of him swearing at the wall. "I'm sound proofing the room so you can play piano whenever you want" he beamed, continuing to tape them onto the wall. "Mingyu-hyung, egg cartons don't work, that's just a myth, and we can't afford the foam so I'll just play in the day time". He stopped and collapsed into the pile, pulling some of the stuff down with him. I scoffed as I left to take a shower and get ready for school.

What. The. Actual. .

    “Jihoonie” the teasing voice called from the back corner of the room. I stood, frozen, in the doorway, my legs as heavy as lead. “What are you doing here?” I hissed, dashing up the stairs to stand beside him and finally be taller than him. “I transferred” he smirked, leaning back in his seat and putting his new shoes on the wooden desk. "What, why!" I cried, sitting down next to him and slamming my books down on the desk, making the guys in front of us jump. "Soonie wanted to keep tabs on you and I volunteered to be your stalker" he explained, giving me a half-assed smile as the teacher entered the room and he put his feet on the desk.

    "Okay kids, there's a new transfer student, Choi Seungcheol" Mr. Hunt announced, gesturing towards Seungcheol as the all interested gazes turned to us. "Now, now, don't stare, we have numbers to cover today" he interrupted the excited whispered among the class, making everyone give him their attention. As he started, going on about how the English numbers work and , I started interrogating Seungcheol. 

    "Why does Soonyoung want to keep tabs on me?" I murmured organizing my desk space so I could take notes. "He tried to trust you yesterday and it didn't really work now did it?" he snickered taking out his laptop to write notes in his 'English 12' document. "That doesn't mean I'm going to beat him up any time soon" I scoffed writing down the pronunciation for each number. "Well he's just bored these days, he may not like you but he doesn't hate you either" Seungcheol smirked, typing the same thing, only making them look more sophisticated than mine. "Is that supposed to be some hidden code?" I wondered, secretly copying some numbers I missed. "Maybe" he hummed, the teacher continuing onto how to address others. 

    88 minutes later, after a round of very short introductions for the first years, simple conversations for the second years and a full on conversation between the third years.

    "You have Writing next, right?" the older questioned, standing up and starting to pack up his laptop. "Yea, why" I mumbled, putting my pencils in the adorable panda pencil case Seokmin gave me for back to school, I mean... Black and white pencil case I bought my self. Eh, who am I kidding, it has rounded ears, big sparkling oval eyes and a little bear nose. I sighed out loud after having the thought. "Jihoonie are you listening to me?" He called, waving a hand in front of my face.

    "Oh, sorry, I out there" I laughed nervously, finishing organizing my backpack. "It's okay, I just asked you if Joshua was in your class" he chuckled latching onto my back in a hug as the bell rang. "No, he might be in Nonfiction writing, I'm in Fiction Writing" I assessed, thinking about what other writing classes there were when another thought came to my head as we left the room. "Did you seriously mess with your major just to stalk me?". "No, I had English in 3rd before I just switched it with my Chemistry, I like the teacher better anyway," he explained, almost skipping as we walked towards the Writing branch of the school, "are you worried about my future?". 

    I felt my face turn red as I started walking a bit faster, getting a little ahead of him, "am not". "It's okay Jihoonie, you're not the first to fall for my charming good looks" he sneered, catching up and wrapping an arm around my shoulder. Suddenly I felt like I was in that movie 'Clueless' as I swatted his arm away and squeaked out an "as If". "Aw, my Hoonie is embarrassed" he cooed as I stopped in front of the open door to my classroom. "Oh shut up" I disagreed, stepping on his foot as I disappeared into the class, finding Mingyu stifling laughter.

    "What's so funny?" I wondered, sitting down next to him, making him stop for a split second before commencing his hyena laughter. "I was telling him how I asked Wonjin how to say 'you look very handsome' in korean and he taught me how to say 'you are y as man'" Junhui explained, face red as a tomato and embrasses written everywhere. "Who'd you say it to?" I wondered, trying to not laugh myself, "Yoon Jeonghan".

    At that moment both Mingyu and I burst, laughing like chickens on drugs, which I have looked up, making our classmate look over concerned. "What'd he say" Minghao wondered, almost sounding concerned for the embarrassed boy "he said 'thank you' very hesitantly". "Okay class, time to start with verbs".

    At lunch we met up with the three boys and sat on the third floor where no one usually goes. "Oh my god, guess what happened to me in first" Jeonghan gasped making Mingyu and I raise an eyebrow in fake interest. "Wen Junhui told you that you look y?" I 'guessed' making him give me a very surprised look Mingyu giggling. "Yea, how'd you- he told you" he assessed, looking disappointed like he wanted to be the one to tell us. "He thought he was telling you that you very handsome, Wonjin tricked him" Mingyu excused the foreign boy who was probably telling his own friends about his embarrassing encounter. "Well tell him thank you" the pretty boy sighed as he leaned against the wall again. 

    Gym was weirdly boring, the teacher never showed up so Mingyu and I left to walk around the school and ended up going down to composing to hang out. The teacher didn't seem to mind as long as we didn't have any food. At this point I'm not even sure if he went to college, he's like a teenager. I let Mingyu listen to our track and he recognized the song from last night almost immediately. We talked about work and his trip among other things before the bell rang. "Well I'll get going to my rap class" he said sarcastically, packing up his pencils and books from doodling. Suddenly the door burst open and Seungcheol was standing in the doorway looking very annoyed and mad "get out". "Seungcheol-ssi, what-" I gasped, amazed by the hostile act as Mingyu silenced me "it's okay, I was just leaving". Seungcheol held the door open before slamming it on Mingyu's and falling into his chair.

    "What's your problem!" I hissed, angry that he basically kicked out my best friend. "He was sitting in my seat" he fully explained, logging in by pressing the keys pretty hard. "It's not yours" I pointed out doing the same on my desktop as he scoffed "I don't like him". "He's basically a ing fairy what are you talking about" I groaned sitting back at it took ages to actually log in. "He doesn't seem like the nice type to me" Seungcheol admitted, still sounding fake as as he also sat back. "He brought home a 1,000,000 won keyboard last night for me" I countered, only half wanting to punch his face in myself, the other half kick and a tiny sliver of wonder "So what". "That takes me a full month to make and only 20% of it goes to myself" I growled, crossing my legs on the chair as he gave me that 'really' look. "I don't need to know about your poor affairs" he bragged, I am literally one comment away from punching him. "But I heard from a little bride you work at Chocolate Snow cafe". That's it.

    I felt my body move and before I knew it I was inches away from him, knee on the chair, arm right beside his head, showing I missed and other arm caught in his hand. "You missed anyway" he mumbled, using his left hand to grab my collar and make me make eye contact with him. "I just started liking you and you go back to being the hateful you probably always were" I spat, trying to pull back only to have him hold me in position. "Well guess what, cutie, you played right into my trap" he smirked, bringing me as close as our noses touching. "At least I don't rely on Daddy's money even when I live apart from them" I fumed, trying to hit him where it hurts only to have him throw me back into my chair. I landed with a thump, it knocking the breath out of my lungs only a little bit. 

    I caught my breath only to open my eyes to him hovering over me. He had move my chair back one foot to be against the wall so he could lean against it. His breath was way too minty for my taste and way too close for comfort. "Don't go thinking I'm some spoiled rich kid that doesn't do , I have a job, I pay most bills. So learn a lesson today Jihoonie, not all people can be read by their impressions". He huffed and continued to go back down in his chair. "Then answer me this, why the do you act like one?" I began to interrogate, rolling my chair tonne right beside his. He just typed some stuff in before pulling out his headphones. "Choi Seungcheol" I called again, leaning closer to his ear to try and get his attention before he put his noise blocking headphones on. 

“Seungcheol-ssi! Yah! Seungcheol-ah, please, listen to me” I begged, residing to using informalities as I left over the side of his chair. If I was a girl, I’d be showing my cleavage about now. That’s when it hit me, maybe I’ll act like a girl. Am I really going to do that just so I can argue with him some more? Am I really that petty? Yes, yes I am. I pulled really hard at his chair and made him turn a little, but not enough to distract him. I sighed and took a deep breath, It felt like I was going to jump off the stairs again.

And just the same as then I hopped up onto the armrest of the chair and leaned back a bit, trying to get in his face. This time I got a glance of ‘I want to ask what the you’re doing but I’m doing something’ look. I even started to wonder myself what I was doing, just now thinking I could’ve just unplugged the system. Is it too late? I tried hopping up, but seeing as my feet don’t touch the ground i ended up having physics betray me and fall backwards. 

I rolled up in a ball and waited to be thrown to the floor by the man I was landing on. But it never came. I opened my eyes and looked up at the man. His face wasn’t at all mad, in fact he was smiling to his ears, headphones off. His arm was around my back and the other across my stomach. “Are you that desperate to talk to me?”. I blushed like a tomato and tried getting up, only to sit up straight with my knees over the armrest. 

    “Hey, don’t move so much, you’re hurting my thighs” he whined, grabbing my hips and making me sit still. I pouted, but stayed still “help me up”. “I don’t want to” he hummed, shaking his head and wrapping his arms around my waist. I started panicking, trying to get up again. “Jihoon-ah, you’re my partner, this is our studio, no boyfriends allowed” he muttered, holding me closer and smiling happily. I stared at him surprisingly, hand on his arm “you’re the possessive type aren't you?”. 

    He just winked as he turned the chair to let me up and back into my own chair. “We’re almost done the tune and rhythm, do you want to start writing lyrics?” - I opened my mouth to respond, only to be cut off - “no, I need to verify your skills first, you’re a vocal right?”. Before he could interrupt me again I spoke up “Yes, and you’re a rapper”. “Bring a sample of your vocals, and skills, I'll listen tomorrow and we'll start on lyrics”. I thought about which song I should bring, hesitating when I thought of the multiple tracks I could bring. All of them disappointed me. I spent the rest of the class spacing out and coming up with a new beat for the song I decided I was going to create. Seungcheol didn't seem to care, when I apologized for not helping he just smiled and shook his head.