The first time Seulgi met Joohyun was in the classroom, when the day had just started and so did the semester.

Seulgi had just started the first day as high school students, still b with expectations and excitement with how much fun can her days as high school student can give. With a smile, Seulgi walked along the hallways to her appointed classroom excitedly with long, decisive steps as her long black hair bopped along the pace.

Some of the students greeted her, some others bothered themselves to ask how her holiday was and Seulgi replied to every single one of them with a great enthusiasm, the fact that it was still early in the morning didn’t stop her from talking much.

Maybe that’s why she had many acquaintances.

She was known as the easy-going person and easy to talk to by the other students in the school. Even though you weren’t close with her, you can’t help but to like her. Moreover, her features and eye-smile made her feel like someone that must be protected.

Although, she hate how naïve she can be at times. Sometimes she didn’t realize that people used her and take advantages of her, it was only after her close friends told her that, and then she was aware that she indeed was being used.

“You’re not a people-pleaser Seulgi. Stop letting people walked all over yourself.”

And it hurt her when she mistaken people for wanting to genuinely became friends with her. Most of them came only if they want something from her. But she never told this to anyone else, not even her closest friend. Her principle was to treat people the way you want to be treated and she never let her way of thinking wavered.

Her job was to be the cheerful kid, and she won’t let those petty things ruined her.

She’ll make sure that she lived up to that title.

When Seulgi entered the classroom, she noted that not many students have arrived yet as almost half of the seats was unoccupied. Actually, not really. Seulgi realized that there were already bags under the seats, she examined the seats in the room and found out that there were only five seats left, if she wasn’t wrong.

Maybe they’re off to other classrooms where their friends were at. Either way, Seulgi didn’t bother to think much about it. All that she cared was to find the perfect spot for her. To be honest, she favored the seats beside the windows where she can just appreciate the view outside but to her dismay, there wasn’t any seats left on that side of the room.

Seulgi gave a smile to a girl who sleepily greeted her.

“The seats are already mostly occupied, huh?”

“Yup.. too bad you can’t daydream and stares outside the window anymore”

Seulgi laughed good-naturally at that. Mijoo had been her classmate since seventh grade so the fact that Mijoo knew of her infamous habit didn’t surprise her.

There were some new faces in the classroom. Seulgi assumed they were transfer students as she never seen them before during middle school, but one particular individual caught her attention.

Brown doe eyes, as brown as her hair color. Soft pink lips that Seulgi wasn’t sure if it was because of lipstick or it was just her natural color, Seulgi decided to go for the latter. One thing for sure though, the girl can pass as the most beautiful girl her eyes ever laid on in her span of life.

She was just that pretty.

Without her fully realizing, her feet brought her towards her. In the back of her mind, Seulgi decided to settle herself on the unoccupied seat beside the new girl, maybe because the spot was good enough for her to see the blackboard with her not-so-good eyesight or maybe because she wanted to know this girl better.

But it was truly a good spot for her, if she wanted to save seats for her two friends like how they promised.

The girl didn’t take her eyes from staring at her lap until Seulgi was only a few feets away from her. Seulgi smiled politely at her when their eyes met but the girl didn’t reciprocate the gesture, she merely averted her eyes back to her lap.

Seulgi pressed her lips together, confused with the treatment that she didn’t expected to get after trying to be friendly but decided not to say anything about it as she proceeded to sat down.

Maybe the girl sitting to her right didn’t catch her smile, Seulgi thought. It made sense, their eyes only met for a brief second anyway, as the new girl was quick to break the eye contact. Her thoughts were cut-off short when she saw her two friends, Soojung and Sulli, entered the classroom. Her lips quickly formed a big grin as she motioned for them to sit at the two seats near her. One in front of her while the other one in front of where the transfer girl sat.

Seulgi didn’t miss their eyes glancing at the girl beside her for a short moment but they looked back to her as quick as it left.

“Nice seats you save for us here”  

Seulgi beamed happily. She actually wasn’t that close with the two girls but they were the closest to her as friends compared to the other students in her class. Seulgi knew them through her best friend, Seungwan, which was known as Wendy by the others but Seulgi preferred to call her by her real name. It felt more natural in her native tongue rather than calling her by her western name.

Moreover, Seungwan liked the fact that Seulgi called her by her real name. She revealed it when they’ve already spent a long time as close friends and Seulgi was happy when she first heard it.

Anyway, she became close with her Canadian friend because back then they were classmates in their seventh grade. At first Seungwan struggled a lot with Korean language, always stuttering and pausing every sentence so some of their classmates of her gave up and changed their minds on befriending her as they thought that it was just a burden for them to teach her. But Seulgi, being a class representative at that time, decided to help her as best as she could. It was quite hard teaching an overseas person a different language, but Seulgi was patience and Wendy was a hard working person so it was worth the struggle.

As time passed by, they grow fond of each other and they become the closest of friends. Now without a language barrier, Seungwan can talk freely and she gained a lot of friends with her kind and unexpectedly, beagle-like personality.

Unfortunately, they didn’t get to be classmates in this grade. But Seulgi thought that it was okay, they can make new friends too anyway.

Oddly, Seulgi felt that she had to know the new girl beside her. She didn’t know why but there was an urge to do that. Seulgi secretly hope that she can befriend with the girl sitting to her right, just like how she discovered her friendship with Seungwan.

±

The first time Joohyun interacted with her was when she forgot to bring her pen with her. Seulgi knew her name after the class introduction. She introduced herself with ‘Bae Irene’ but in the daily attendance record, there was only ‘Bae Joohyun’ in their class so she decided just to call her Joohyun (although she never really said her name out-loud besides inside her mind).

No, she didn’t purposely check for her name. She was appointed as the secretary of their class anyway so it was her obligation to know each and every student in her classroom.

Right…

It was only after the exam paper was handed to her that she realized she didn’t brought any pen with her. She searched for her pencil box inside her backpack thinking that it was inside of it but her search came to no avail so she put her bag down to the floor.

She scratched her cheek with her index finger, maybe she can borrow it from Sulli? Hopefully she brought more than one so Seulgi can borrow it. Her staring was broken when the teacher clapped her hand.

“Okay class, you got eighty minutes before I collect the paper.” She said before sitting down on the desk chair.

The teacher said that no one can lend anything to others so Seulgi had to be discreet in executing her plan. She waited for a few moment as she observed the teacher and when she got the chance, she raised her hand to pat Sulli’s on the shoulder but before it reach her shoulder, a pen was handed to her from beside her and she quickly glanced at the owner of the hand.

Seulgi was a bit surprised. Nevertheless, she accepted the pen quickly (but not to the point of snatching it) so that the teacher won’t notice the exchanges.

Seulgi glanced cautiously to the teacher only to find the adult reading something-that-she-didn’t-care-about peacefully. After making sure that the teacher didn’t caught that, Seulgi ducked her head, using Sulli’s tall figure to cover herself from the teacher’s view at the same tilted her head to look at Joohyun.

“Thanks” She whispered quietly but enough for Joohyun to hear.

Joohyun didn’t say anything nor did she glance back at Seulgi but a small nod was given.

±

After her act of kindness, Seulgi tried to interact more with the brunette but it will always ended not like what she was expecting. The conversations always died down with Joohyun didn’t say anything back