“Good evening, sir.”

Four maids stood by the door as he steps in. “I’m not having dinner.” He informs them briefly before walking upstairs. “How’s your day?” His sister-in-law, Soyeon, who’s standing right by the stairs on the second floor asks. “Nothing special.” He replies as he arrives right in front of her. She was holding her baby, Baekhyun’s nephew, Sunwoo. “Hi, tiny bastard.” Baekhyun greets while brushing his fingertips lightly on the baby’s chin before walking off. First thing he usually does after arriving home is to go to his mother’s office. “She left a while ago, she said there’s an emergency meeting in the office.” Soyeon informs him before he could open the door. “Oh, okay.” Baekhyun nonchalantly replies while rubbing the back of his neck, feeling exhausted. “She also told me to tell you to leave your report card on her desk.” She adds while rocking the baby in her arms.

Baekhyun clears his throat before looking back at her. “Uh, I haven’t gotten it yet.” He replies earning a chuckle from the older woman. “She called the school, it was given two days ago. Why, did you get a low average?” Soyeon asks while walking over to him in concern. “No, it’s just one point lower than my previous one. I’ve been busy, she’s going to freak out. I just don’t have time for that right now, I’m always tired. Can she just scold me about my low average after the foundation week? Ugh.” Baekhyun groans before walking to his bedroom. Soyeon watches him while shaking her head. “Aigoo, your previous average was so high, one point less is still high, silly. When I was your age, your whole average for just one semester was my whole average for the whole school year.” She muffles before going downstairs. Arriving in his room, Baekhyun collapsed on his bed right away.

Unlike his image in school, he’s usually quiet when he’s home.

This is where Byun Baekhyun loses all his confidence and control over things that he usually has whenever he’s in school.

However, the pressure he puts himself into is still the same.

He turns his body to face the ceiling. “Oh.” He gets up abruptly remembering that he has something to do. He walks to his desk and turns his laptop on. On his tab was a browser and their student council and campus website. Before starting his research homework, he checks his notifications on the open student council board. He usually gets the most messages, either for complaints, feedbacks, questions about the campus from transferees, some are literally just questions from his classmates asking about the assignment and lastly, some girls use the student council board as their way to confess to Baekhyun – it’s anyone’s only contact of him that he can never block nor avoid.

68 messages. He got that much messages in just a day.

He massages his temples before opening each of them carefully in case there’s some important messages in there. He automatically presses delete on all of the confession messages not even giving them a single glance. Fortunately, for today, most of the messages were good feedbacks from the students, simply giving the whole student council messages of support and gratitude. No one really has the guts to put on complaints because they can’t do it anonymously, they can only use their identification number for the account and so there was no way they could trash the student council through messages. He nods in satisfaction before closing the tab.

Just as he was about to start with the homework, there was a knock on his door.

“Come in.” He speaks while rubbing his sore neck.

It was his sister-in-law again. “I baked some cookies this afternoon. Here, have some while you’re doing your homework.” Soyeon, still carrying Sunwoo with one arm, holds a plate of cookies on her free hand. She places the plate on Baekhyun’s desk before peeking at his laptop. “Is that a website for your school? Wah, we didn’t have websites back in high school. We didn’t even have those Cyworld or whatever you call it that’s so popular nowadays. Do you have that?” She grins before sitting on the edge of Baekhyun’s table. He simply shook his head before speaking. “What do you need, did you and Hyung fight again or something?” He asks, knowing her well enough to read her actions. “What’s coming this week?” Soyeon asks while giving Baekhyun a meaningful look. “Your birthday, what?” Baekhyun simply replies with no hesitation.

“Ugh, see. Even you know, your brother has a business trip on that day.”

“No, he knows. He even told me to take you out that day.” Baekhyun explains while blinking. Soyeon’s frown got bigger as she glances at Sunwoo who’s now asleep in her arms. “After having Sunwoo, I thought things would get better and eventually become more real between us but it’s still not.” She muffles, anxiety evident in her tone. “You got closer though, I think. He barely even talked to you before Sunwoo came. Noona, don’t expect too much from a fixed marriage.” Baekhyun blurts out unfiltered before facing his laptop again. Soyeon lets out a sigh before looking at the young boy again.

“Baekhyun, we’ve known each other since middle school and—”

“—also knowing you’ll end up with each other.”

What he said made the woman look away again while flicking her tongue. “Can you not rub it on my face, I’m asking for comfort here. . .” She complains softly, afraid to wake her son up. “I don’t know how to help you, noona. I’ll eventually end up in the same situation so what’s the point of being soft about it.” Baekhyun admits while typing. “Don’t you want to fall in love? Choose whoever you want to love instead of waiting for your mother to open up another business with some big company? I mean. . . in time, I learned how to care for your brother and it’s mostly because he’s the father of my child but still. . . isn’t it depressing thinking that we wouldn’t have all this if not for a business thing?” Soyeon asks while pouting.

Baekhyun rolls his eyes before turning his chair to face his sister-in-law.

“Okay, seriously. I don’t know where this is going. I’m tired and I’m busy. I appreciate the cookies but I already told you, I don’t know. I don’t understand your situation yet, okay?” He blurts out with a worn-out expression. Soyeon shook her head while tapping the boy’s lap. “You’re still young when this happened but you know your brother had a girlfriend when we were fixed, right? The girl committed suicide because of this whole thing and up until now, I carry the guilt. Do you want to experience that?” She asks with a solemn tone. “I won’t experience that because I don’t have a girlfriend.” Baekhyun replies immediately while messing his hair up, not knowing how to shoo her off.

“What if you do? Sooner or later? What if you fall in love?”

“Oh god—noona, please. It’s already 7:30 and I should have finished this if not because of you.”

Finally, Soyeon stands up. “Fine. You’re so grumpy. You know, you’re too young to be this haggard, have some fun, will you? Try dating or something, your mood will be better. You’re only nineteen for god’s sake.” She advises, even ruffling Baekhyun’s hair, before walking out of the room. “Jesus Christ.” Baekhyun groans while fixing his hair again.

It took him about an hour and a half to finish the whole research and as soon as he did, he went to take a shower. He changed into his pajamas before walking out of his room to leave his report card in his mother’s office. Just as he was going to, his mother came. “Good evening, eomma.” He bows politely before following her into the office. “Where’s your card?” She asks as she walks over to her table. Baekhyun gulps hard as he hesitantly places the card on the table. His mother gave him a brief gaze before grabbing it.

“Oh. What happened.”

Baekhyun puts both of his hands behind him. “I was really busy for the foundation week coming next month and also, I missed one quiz when something came up in the office. I think that’s basically why. I-it’s just one point.” He explains as clears as he could. “So are you telling me your average will get lower and lower during this month because you’re busy?” Mrs. Byun asks while placing the card down her table. “No, it won’t. I promise I’ll maintain it as much as I could.” Baekhyun assures while bowing. “U-uh. . .” he clears his throat while putting on a smile. “By the way, the student council was chosen to hold an audition? We’re going to have an open band competition for the whole town, it’s pretty cool. The student council will be going to different schools. I heard a lot of schools have heard of it because Kangwon High School has been getting a lot of recognition, the principal said it was because of my leadership.” He tries to tell her a story.

“Well, it should be.”

Forcing a chuckle, Baekhyun nods before bowing. “Thank you. I’ll keep it up, eomma.” He bows for the third time before walking out o