When I was little, my mother used to tell me that confiding everything to a single boy was a bad idea.

I couldn’t understand where her logic had come from.

But now, maybe I do.

Scratch off the maybe part, I really do understand what she means by that.

“Please Yehwa,” I can see the desperation embedded in Namjoon’s features as he begs for me to lend him a copy of my homework, just because he does not understand the simple concept of French Grammar and had totally ignored the homework given by the teacher yesterday just before the bell rang, his desire to go skate getting the best of him. And now, he’s on the brink of breaking into a sweat, either that or having a panic attack. It’s understandable, considering that the French Teacher is a real and doesn’t give any second chances.

Where Namjoon’s concerned, he’s already on her blacklist.

It’s not like he’s always struggling like this in all his classes. To be fair, he gets along quite well with Maths, Physics, and all the other subjects that require logical thinking and critical perspective. But French is the one thing that I can gloat about in his face, for although he has the brain of a mastermind that can solve literally anything —and I’m not joking when I say literally everything— it seems like his ability to learn new languages is almost as weak as a red goldfish’s.

I push his restraining arm away with a roll of my eyes, “That’s what you get for not listening in class.”

“Come on, It’ll be the last time. I promise.” He cups his face with his hands as he slides his elbows onto the table and sends me that look, that look he always does when he knows he’s wrong but tries to convince me to help him anyway. “Hm?”

I sigh, and with a reluctant hand, hand him over my assignment in defeat. He’s never going to let me off the hook if I don’t show a bit of compliance. And who am I to kid anyway? He would’ve gotten someone to help him either way, even if I didn’t help him.

He grins and ruffles my hair, “You’re the best, you know that?”

I huff, “Of course I know.”

It would’ve been a normal day, like any other. The bell had rung for fifth period—French— and Namjoon managed not to get his head chopped off by the French Teacher once more, and school ended as per usual. I remember standing there, waiting for him to come out of the classroom because we always walked home together. It was an unspoken rule between us ever since we became friends — best friends— and really it had just become part of my routine.

And then I remember.

I remember that it had been raining that day.

The rain was what started it all.

I watch the droplets fall to the ground, plummeting onto the sidewalk in an echo of soothing symphonies  like pebbles rolling along a river, before fetching my umbrella from my backpack. It’s not like I dislike the rain, but when I have to walk all the way back home it gets kind of annoying to have water sloshing in your shoes and water making your hair stick to the sides of your face like you’d just taken an involuntarily bath. Now I know how dogs feel like whenever they had their shower times.

“You’re kidding me,” the familiar alto belonging to the owner I’m waiting for rings behind me, and I turn with a scowl to ask him, “Why are you so late?”

“Sorry, I got caught up talking to the guys.” he rubs the side of his head, an act that he only does when he’s slightly guilty, and my heart softens a little.

I punch his arm jokingly when he comes closer, “Please tell me you have an umbrella.”