New year, new prey. After a messy summer breakup, Kai has no guilt in searching for his new victim in this jungle called high school. He’s a driven cheetah on the search for an innocent doe or a graceful gazelle amidst the tiled hallways. Finding no luck in spotting eye candy, he searches his classrooms intently, a throaty growl of hunger developing as he shoots a small smirk over to the girl sitting near the window, subtly sneaking glances at him. She’s cute, but she poses no fun or challenge when she blushes and hides her nose in her book. Kai continues his peripheral scan of the room for lingering students entering the classroom and checking out assets and listening to laughter, wondering if the trills satisfy him in a musical sense.

He’s interrupted with a clap on the back from his stoner of a friend when he sits down beside Kai at the lab table. Kai and Sehun exchange greetings and mellow summaries of each other’s summer adventures that they have yet to have shared before the teacher shows up and pairs up the tables to permanent groups for the rest of the semester. After reviewing the syllabus and other common lab procedures and rules, he leaves the new groups and partners to become acquainted.

The two boys at the table in front of Kai and Sehun turn around to greet their new partners for the rest of the semester. Introducing themselves as Baekhyun and Kyungsoo, they shake hands and the puppy-faced one, Baekhyun, initiates conversation that flows naturally from then on. Kai notices how large and pretty Kyungsoo’s eyes are and wonders if he’s dated someone who could pass for the boy’s sister in the past, because if Kyungsoo was a girl, he had  admit he’d tap that.

“Yeah, I’ve been trying to work out a bit too, but hapkido can only do so much for your muscles, so I still have to put in extra effort to go to a gym. Luckily, my friend who has membership is allowed to bring in friends, so I don’t end up broke.” Baekhyun carries each sentence naturally to the next.

“Did you also end up not doing anything while in that gym?” Kyungsoo scoffs as he glances over at Baekhyun’s skinny arms, “I see no improvement.”

“Well, I have to accompany the person who has the membership, but said friend would rather do dolphin tricks than any typical treadmill work.” Baekhyun argues.

“So basically, you chickened out because you’re afraid to take off your shirt.” Sehun interprets.

The slap on his arm from a pouting Baekhyun confirms his statement and Kyungsoo chuckles. “I’m not going to go swimming for an hour straight! Think of what it’ll do to my skin…” Baekhyun retorts.

Kyungsoo hides his face in second-hand embarrassment as he brings more chuckles out of Sehun and Kai. It doesn’t look like the year will be too hard to get through this year. Kai is thankful, but he still would prefer to have a piece of to stare at or play with to complete his good start. His mission is accomplished in his mixed-grade literature class, where he finds a cute pastel striped blouse tucked in some tight dark washed skinny jeans that disappear into the leather boots that leave a soft thumping click against the tiles as sophomore struts around to her desk.

This underclassman sits with a perfect posture that leaves her layered brown hair to frame her shoulders beautifully. Kai almost wishes he had gotten a closer up seat so he could get a better look at her face every day, but the view from the back with those tight as unshed snakeskin jeans argues otherwise. Kai decides to play it cool, making it clear to his friends that he has dibs as he waits to make a move on the unsuspecting sophomore.

The day comes on the second week of school, when Kai follows the girl out of the room until they reach her locker and he finally greets her by her name, “Seunghyun.”

Kai’s friends watch from a distance, quietly discussing how long this one would last. She may only be a year younger, but unlike the other shy and easily submissive innocent girls Kai had a tendency to choose, this one as quite a bombshell. Everything from her style, to her walk, to her speech, to her breath clearly spelled out confidence. But in Kai’s optimistic mind, confidence doesn’t spell out experience, and he planned to fully wring out the teenage girl of this particular sophomore.

“She’s hot. There’s no way she hasn’t dated some dude before.” Chen argues, “I think she’ll pose a challenge that Kai will like.”

“He’s shined his headlights on all these deer so far for a reason, he likes how easily they melt into his hands. Once he starts having to chase tail, he’s gonna toss.” Sehun voices his own opinion.

“She’s an underclassman. I don’t think she’d offer much of a chase if she’s got a hot junior guy on her arm. She’d rather show him off, I’m sure.” Kris comments as they see Seunghyun giggle as Kai leans against the lockers and slides along his back closer to her with a flirty smirk on his face.

Not a minute later, Kai is back and when the boys look up at him expectantly and Kris and Chen hit his arms continuously, Kai utters out, “She wasn’t interested.” As if it was the newest thing on the planet to be rejected. Then again, on Kai’s planet, rejection was probably a foreign concept.

“Wait, what?” Kris stops, his hands on Kai’s shoulder and wrist dropping to let the boy go. “Was she really?”

“She asked if I was more interested in being her friend.” Kai blinks at the ground, still in shock.

“Does she like someone else or is she just straight up not into you?” Sehun asks.

“I don’t know.  But I’m genuinely surprised that I took it so well.” Kai continues to blink away his daze. “What do I do now?”

“What else can you do? Find someone else.” Kris offers the most obvious solution.

“But it just makes me want her all that much more now.” Kai admits.

“Ha! See, Kai does like chasing tail.” Chen laughs in Sehun’s face.

“It’s only ‘cus she’s hot.” Sehun rolls his eyes.

“Dude, she looked totally into you though. She was leaning against the locker and giving you flirty gazes and she was probably laughing at your lame jokes, this is such a surprise.” Kris comments.

“She probably has a boyfriend.” Chen rationalizes.

“She doesn’t.” Kai shakes his head with a sigh as they make their way out of the school, “I asked.”

As they walk together to Kai’s black GT-R, the boy starts recounting the new experience, “She was so chill about it. Should I have asked for her number anyway? She literally said something like ‘If you’re interested in becoming my friend, I’ll still give you my number.’ Like, how did she do that?”

“Did you say yes?” Chen asks.

“No! I tried playing it cool, so I said ‘I don’t think it’d be a good idea because you’ll probably be running through my mind a lot’ or some like that.” And for the first time in a while, Kai covers his face in his hands, in embarrassment. Kai is embarrassed. This is a great day, think his friends.

From that day on, everything about Yoon Seunghyun puts Kai on edge. From her tight jeans and leggings underneath her shorts, to her rambunctious laugh, to her luscious brown hair that she still manages to style up in many ways despite having so many choppy layers, to the way she simply walks or sits down. Kai can’t do anything but stare and he doesn’t even look away when Seunghyun turns around and catches him. He doesn’t wave, nor smile. He just waits for her to smile at him and wave to him quickly before quickly turning back to her other classmates or the lesson. The fact that Kai can’t make her even slightly uncomfortable or nervous isn’t irksome to him, just slightly confusing. Can’t she even think of him as creepy or anything? Must she be so cool about it? It only makes her intentions that much clearer and that only makes Kai want more, and more, and more.

It’s clear that three months into the semester, Kai can’t bring his eyes to anyone else and his friends are impressed that he hasn’t pounced on someone else already. He had finally given in and asked her for her number, promising nothing but friendly intentions, and he was only half lying. He would still harbor the unrequited feelings but he wouldn’t act upon them. It was hard, since he was so used to getting what he wanted for the longest time, but a break back to playing chaser again was okay too. They’ve worked on their essays with each other and sat together under the shade of the tree of Kai’s backyard with their literature novels. When Seunghyun had to clear up that she was just a classmate studying with Kai, rather than a girlfriend, even his mother was surprised.

It seemed that Kai’s playboy mode was shut off for the most part whenever he was around Seunghyun. Of course he would subtly throw in a random comment relative to the situation into the conversation that made his unwavering feelings clear to her. Seunghyun was nice about it, usually joking about it or playfully apologizing if not just ignoring him. He doesn’t know if makes him more frustrated or sadder, but all Kai knows is that he just grows to like her more and more. He takes it all like the good sport he is, chuckling and putting his hands up in surrender, but it doesn’t change the fact that he’s pursuing an unattainable prize.

But one day, Kai discovers the reason for his futile attempts. He’s with his chemistry group in the library during lunch working on their lab report when Yoon Seunghyun prances into the room towards their table, calling, “Baekhyun oppa.”

Baekhyun oppa.

Baekhyun oppa.

“Seunghyun-ah.” Baekhyun sits up with a bright smile.

Kai’s grip tightens around his pencil and his jaw clenches. Sehun notices.

“Hey, Kai.” She greets the boy sitting across the table from Baekhyun and he manages a weak ‘Hi’ in return. He’s not sure whether he’s happy or not over the fact that she pays him no mind after that because her attention is on the boy across from him. “Your parents out for the weekend?”

“Yeah. Yours?” Baekhyun returns the question.

“Until late Sunday night. Come to my house and eat dinner with me.” She shakes his forearm in a bit of a whiny flirt that Kai’s seen enough to know well in his lifetime. Seunghyun even adds in a tiny pout that makes Kai want to pull at his hair just a bit.

“I have some projects to finish up, but… yeah. Yeah, I could do that.” Baekhyun nods after a moment of contemplation and schedule review.

“Great.” The smile that stretches across Seunghyun’s face is enough to make Kai drop his pencil in fear of snapping it in half. He pulls cover in rolling his wrist around, feigning stretching it after working so hard on the half a paragraph he’s written. “I’ll see you then.” Are the last words that come out of before the girl says goodbye to the rest of the group and exits the library.

When Baekhyun casually goes back to his work again, Kai watches incredulously before he hisses out in frustration. Hearing the sounds of distress, Baekhyun and Kyungsoo look up, “Something wrong?” Baekhyun asks.

“Seunghyun likes you?” Kai accuses immediately.

“What?” Baekhyun utters out an instinctive response before he can say anything else, “Seunghyun? Yeah, we’ve been friends since middle school.”

“But she likes you more than a friend.” Kai states matter-of-factly.

That’s when Baekhyun’s expression grows only the slightest bit uneasy, “Well, I mean, she did confess to me a while ago, but I wasn’t interested. Luckily, we’re still friends though.”

“How long ago is a while?” Kai interrogates.

“Like… last year during winter break.” Baekhyun tilts his head and absentmindedly looks around the room in search of his memories, “Yeah, I remember because we were eating Christmas cookies at her house.” He nods. “Why do you ask, Holmes?” he chuckles at Kai.

Kai lets out a groan as his hand comes up to drag from his forehead down his face. “Because I like her.” He confesses as an explanation.

“You’re kidding.” Baekhyun’s smile grows as he starts laughing, “Well don’t let me stand in the way, go for it, bro. As her friend, you have my permission since you seem like a nice guy.”

Sehun scoffs at Kai’s side but is ignored by the guy next to him, “Don’t you think that I would have already? She already told me she wasn’t interested either.”

“Seriously?” Baekhyun asks, genuine surprise appearing on his face before it’s replaced by a slightly guilty expression, “Well, I can’t do anything about that, but all I’ll say is that I’m not stopping you. If you like her enough, then I’m sure she would warm up to you if you work hard enough.”

Sehun breaks out in laughter and when Kai sends him a glare, the laughing boy answers Baekhyun and Kyungsoo’s confused expressions, “Kai’s never had to work for anything he wanted since ever. I can say that he’s probably out of practice.”

“It’s never too hard to woo a girl. Stick to the small, simple things and surprise her with something bigger every now and then.” Kyungsoo suggests.

“There you go.” Baekhyun smiles in agreement, “Don’t worry, dude. You have plenty of time to worry about that later. Let’s just finish this first so we have less to do on the weekend.”

“And more time for you to eat cookies at Seunghyun’s house?” Kai says bitterly before resting his chin in his palm and picking his pencil up again.

More laughter erupts from Sehun, but this time he’s joined by the other two boys sitting across from him. Kai scowls.