Son Ahri thinks Lee Jeno is a thief.

Actually, she knows he is a thief.

When they were four, he stole her favourite swing at the playground in their kindergarten.
Her favourite swing was the only yellow one and yellow was her favourite colour. She had recently learned what having favourites was and realised she had a lot of them.

It was a sunny afternoon and she had dashed to where her swing was as soon as she set foot in the playground, only to find a boy already sitting on it.
She had told him to get up, that it was her swing.

“It is not yours,” the boy had said, “Your name is not on it.”

She had told him to play on another swing. He had told her to do the same.
Seeing no other solution, Ahri had cried. Their respective class teachers got involved but the boy still refused to get up and the girl continued crying.

It was the first time Son Ahri met Lee Jeno, a thief.

xx

The next time Jeno stole from Ahri was in elementary school.

She didn't have a favourite swing at the playground anymore but she her favourite colour was still yellow. She almost always wore a yellow satin ribbon on her ponytail and made sure it never ever came loose.
However, one day, without her knowing, it had.

Just out of her uniform, she had reached up to pull her ponytail loose to find her ribbon gone. She didn't know where she had dropped it. She tried looking for it, in her room, her house and the street outside but to no avail. Her ribbon was gone.

With tears in her eyes, Ahri had gone to her mum and informed her about the grave incident.
Her had mum only chuckled and told her she'd buy her some more the next day. It was not a big deal.
Ahri had accepted that.

That was until the next morning when she found a guilty looking Jeno standing outside her classroom.
They didn't talk much. They were not friends, so Ahri was going to just ignore him. But when she was about to enter the classroom, her eyes landed on what was in the boys hand.
Her ribbon!
Before she could say anything, though, he shoved the little piece of fabric at her and ran off.

Suddenly, it clicked.
The previous day, she had passed by Jeno after school near the gates.
She had been a few feet away when he had called after her.
“What?” she had snapped.

“Nothing,” he had replied.

Lee Jeno had stolen her ribbon but for some reason had decided to return it.
At least that was what ten year old Ahri had deduced.

xx

It was their first year of middle school and Ahri realised that Jeno was on his way to stealing her best friend.

Her best friend, Na Jaemin, had lived next door to her ever since she could remember.
Sadly, he hadn't enrolled in the same elementary school as her but as far as spending time outside of school went, they were quite inseparable.
Her piano lessons and his art classes took place in the same building and even at the same time. They always spent every holiday together as well.

Both of them had been ecstatic when their parents had decided that they would attend the same middle school.
It meant walking to and from school together, it meant eating lunch together, it meant having much more to talk about together.

Not many of Ahri's old elementary school friends were in her class and unfortunately, neither was Jaemin. She would spend lunch time with Jaemin and that was more than enough.
That is until one afternoon, Jaemin showed up to lunch with another boy in tow: Lee Jeno.

Jeno was all smiles as usual as he took a seat across from Ahri while Jaemin slid in next to her.
“Jeno says he knows you,” Jaemin said excitedly.

Ahri's smile was thin as she replied, “Yeah. We know each other.”

That was how their duo became, to Ahri's exasperation, a trio.
The two boys were in the same class and got along like a house on fire and Ahri feared that at some point, she would drift apart from Jaemin.
So, she took precautions.
She started spending more time with the girls from her class and formed solid friendships with a couple of them, especially with a girl called Heo Jinri.
Heo Jinri always wore her PE track pants under her skirt and always had something to add to any conversation. Everything that Ahri didn't say out loud, Jinri said for her.

However, to Ahri's surprise (and relief), the drifting apart never happened.
Jaemin, and even Jeno, for some reason, strongly insisted on eating lunch together, even if it meant eating on the grass outside with Jinri going off about her new favourite idol group.

Ahri had to walk home alone only on days Jaemin was absent. On those days too she'd be accompanied by Jeno for a part of the way home.
When their parents allowed it, the four would even catch movies together.

Jeno stole nothing from Ahri all throughout middle school.
They shared a best friend though and spent a lot of time together.
Maybe, Ahri realised, they were friends too.

xx

In their second year of high school, Jeno went back to his criminal ways.

“Did you guys see the poster?” Huang Renjun asked, more like yelled, as he entered the classroom.
He had moved to Korea from China a little over a year ago, but his Korean vocabulary was almost scarily good.
Ahri thought he made some boys their age sound dumb, but that could be because she was biased. Renjun had become a very good friend very fast, courtesy of Jaemin and Jeno.

Whoever they befriended, Ahri did too, and vice versa, even though Ahri wasn’t as good as the boys at making friends.

“The Duet Song Festival one?” Heo Jinri asked, from her perch on top of her desk. She still wore track pants with her skirt.

“Won't it get our school sued? Copyright... trademarks... something like that?”
Jaemin sounded genuinely concerned.

Ahri snorted, “Like they care about one tiny high school.”

“Its interclass,” Renjun announced, like it held deep meaning.

The other three in a breath.
Their class had suffered a humiliating defeat at the annual sports event, and that too at the hands of the freshmen.
It had been humiliating enough that in high school, they were being subject to things like a ‘sack race’, the fact that Zhong Chenle from Class 1-A was an absolute beast and had annihilated everyone made it worse.

Their class had only one medal, because of Jeno winning the high jump event, and that was it.
No one had bothered to even find out what rank their class was on, they had simply, sadly walked home.

The four collectively came to a realisation: this was a chance at redemption.

Renjun’s eyes lit up.
The boy could sing, and everyone knew.

“It’s a duet festival though,” Jinri reminded the boy, and his shoulders visibly sagged.

That small technicality didn’t completely bring him down however. One could tell by the way his eyes wandered the classroom, going from one face to another.
After some internal contemplation, he spoke, “Guys, does anyone want to participate in the duet song thing?”

The class was almost full but the responses were few, all of them negative.
Morale was at an all time low in Class 2-E after the sports day.

“Good then, me and Ahri will represent our class.”

Ahri let out a strangled protest and stood up from her seat. But soon after, Jeno entered the room, announcing that the teacher was on her way.
Everyone went back to their seats, Renjun with an especially satisfied smirk on his face, leaving a shocked Ahri the only one on her feet.
Jeno raised his eyebrows at her as he walked over to his seat which happened to be the one right in front of her.
Ahri couldn’t help the pout that appeared on her lips as she gestured to Renjun. As he sat down, Ahri thought she saw Jeno’s ever-present smile fall.

x

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Never.”

“But you will.”

Na Jaemin rolled his eyes. Heo Jinri was scrolling through her phone while Lee Jeno was silently gulping down food, his eyes not leaving the lunch box even once. The back and forth between Ahri and Renjun had been going on for almost five minutes. The other three were growing annoyed.

“I cannot sing on stage!” Ahri said hoarsely.

Renjun looked unconvinced, “Oh, please. I know you did piano recitals since you were like eight or something.”

Ahri opened but said nothing, taken aback by the fact that Renjun knew something she had never told him about. In a second though, she gained her composure and threw a glare at Jaemin. No one else could have told Renjun.
Turning to the latter, she spoke, “We started the chapter on Correlation yesterday in Maths class. Weren't you paying attention?”

Renjun only smirked, “I didn't know you were smart enough to understand Maths.”

Positively fuming now, Ahri turned a shade of pink. Jeno finally looked up from his food.

“How is insulting me helping you, Huang Renjun?” the girl asked.

Said boy's shoulders sagged.
“I'm sorry,” he said, his voice now soft, “But I really need you to sing with me. You're good and we have a chance.”

Ahri blinked a few times.
Renjun sounded almost desperate.
“I’m not good and you haven't ever heard me sing a full song.”

“Then sing for us right now,” Jinri suggested with a shrug.

“Yeah, that’s a good idea!” Jaemin said, enthusiastic for some reason.

Ahri would save a good punch or two for each of them. The only one who wasn't adding fuel to the flames was Jeno, and she was grateful. She turned to Renjun, who looked close to tears. Did this competition mean that much to him?
She let out a sigh.
“Can you guys at least not look at me?”

Renjun's face lit up.
“Sure!”
The boy hurriedly turned his back to her. The others followed silently, Jaemin shooting her a dirty look for giving them extra exercise.

Ahri cleared and then let out a deep breath. She chose to sing a song she was most comfortable with. Eyes trained on the floor, she sang a verse and the first chorus.
As soon as she was done, Renjun all but spun around on his to face her. He started clapping and she'd never seen him smile so brightly. The others turned around and joined the applause, their clapping not as enthusiastic. There were smiles on their faces nonetheless.

“We can win, Ahri,” Renjun grabbed her arm and lightly shook her.

Ahri couldn't help but crack a smile, “We can't be so sure. Other classes have really good singers too.”

“Doesn't matter,” Renjun said dismissively, “we’ll practice hard.”

“We'll have to choose a song first,” Ahri pointed out and then turned to the rest of their friends. “You guys will help us out, right?”

“Sure,” Jinri said with a shrug.

Jaemin nodded, smiling widely.

“I'll play guitar for you guys,” Jeno suddenly blurted, speaking for the first time since they had started eating. His eyes travelled to Renjun and then to Ahri. Voice much softer, he spoke again, “I mean, can I?”

“Of course! I heard live instruments are preferred.”
Renjun held his hand out for a high five which Jeno met halfway.
Jinri looked like she was biting back a smirk.

“It's settled, then,” Ahri said, mostly to herself.

Jaemin raised his arms over his head and looked at the sky dramatically. “Finally!”

x

It didn’t take them too long to choose a song.
Two days after Ahri had agreed to the duet, they had shortlisted three songs with help from Jinri.
‘Some’ was rejected on grounds that there were probably five other teams that were singing it.
‘Give Love’ was rejected because Renjun refused to even try to rap, which was, in hindsight, wise on his part.
That meant they ended up with ‘Garosugil at Dawn’, which both Ahri and Renjun were fairly pleased about.

“Who broke your heart, little boy?” Jinri had asked when Renjun had shown a bit too much love for the song.
To be fair, the boy had looked a little too wistful, staring into the distance with a smile on his face for five seconds straight.

They had quickly decided on a practice schedule: every other day after school at 5 in one of the music rooms; they decided to give themselves rest on the weekdays. The contest was almost two months away, they didn’t need that much practice, not now at least.

Ahri would be lying if she said that Renjun’s enthusiasm wasn’t rubbing off on her. Instead of dreading having to sing with him, she was starting to almost look forward to it. She liked her song and her partner. Things weren’t as bad as she thought they would be when Renjun had first suggested it. But then again, they hadn’t started practicing. Things could get bad then.

Abruptly, she stopped in the middle of the hallway and shook her head. A student or two gave her annoyed looks.
Stopping abruptly in a crowded hallway after school wasn’t the best idea.

“What’s wrong?” a familiar voice asked from behind her.

Startled, she turned to see Jeno looking down at her.
“Nothing,” she answered, without much thought.

“Why did you stop walking suddenly then?”

Her best friend’s best friend seemed to have a lot of questions today.
“Were you following me?” she teased.

Jeno, to her surprise, look uncharacteristically annoyed.
“This is a hallway. I was just walking behind you.”

“Cool,” Ahri said dismissively as she glanced behind him, “where’s Jaemin?”
They didn’t have the same subjects, so despite being in the same homeroom, they changed classes quite a lot.

“Club meeting. They’re planning a trip to an old age home.”

The girl nodded in understanding, a pout on her lips. “So it’s just us today.”

To her surprise, Jeno looked bothered. She hadn’t intended for that to happen.
“Is that so bad?” he asked.

“No!” Ahri was surprised at how defensive she sounded.
Since when had she cared about Jeno assuming she didn’t like him?
“It’s just that I’ll be alone for the rest of the way.”

“I can walk you home, if you want,” he offered.

Not knowing what to say, she looked up at him with eyes a fraction wider than usual.
This was new. Jeno had never offered to walk her home before, and there had been many opportunities over the years.

Somehow she mustered up a few words to say, “No need. It’s too much trouble for you.”

“Tell me if you change your mind.”

The girl could only nod.
This was odd.
She started walking silently when Jeno motioned for her to lead the way.
Their walk from school to the bus stop was spent in awkward silence. It hadn’t been awkward between them in years.

Ahri didn’t know when Jeno had gone from being the boy she had hoped and prayed would stop hanging out with them, to the boy whose company she kind of enjoyed. Sometimes, when he was absent from school for over two days, she missed his presence.
Of course, she was never going to admit that. Not even to Jaemin.

Ahri didn’t like this strange silence, so once they were on the bus, she decided to break it.
“We chose the song, by the way.”

“Which one?”

“Garosugil at Dawn.”
She could feel his gaze on her but she kept her eyes trained on the bland scenery outside. Jeno was behaving strangely and she was afraid to meet his eyes. Maybe she’d see strange things in them.

“I can manage that.”

Deciding Jeno’s response sounded fairly normal, Ahri decided to turn to him.
That was a mistake. He was looking down at her, unsmiling.
Was he in a bad mood?
She wished she could say something that could make him smile till his eyes disappeared. She liked smiley Jeno.

“Will you be playing the piano too?”

It took Ahri a second or two longer than usual to reply, “I guess.”

“Then we’ll have to practice playing together too,” Jeno said, finally breaking eye contact and fishing his phone out of his pocket.

Ahri let out a breath she didn’t know she had been holding. She felt like she could speak better now.
“About that. We’ll be practicing in the music rooms after study hall every other day. You don’t have to come every day if you can’t.”

“It’s okay,” he turned to her again, but this time with a smile, “I’ll try to make it.”

“Thanks for offering to play for us,” the girl managed a smile, “that was nice of you.”

“That’s what friends are for right?”
For some reason, the boy took a deep breath after speaking.
Not knowing what to say, Ahri allowed a silence to settle between them, this one a little less awkward than the one before.

When they got off the bus, Ahri was aware of the fact that Jeno was side-eying her, probably wanting to know if she’d changed her mind about him walking her home. She didn’t know what she wanted.
They walked in silence till they came to where they had to separate.
It was a fifteen minute walk to her house and she had taken the path alone so many times.
It was his fault for making her feel like she needed him to walk with her.
What was Lee Jeno up to?

“You’ll go alone?” the boy asked, sounding strange.

It made Ahri look up at him. His eyes looked darker than usual and his jaw was clenched. Ten minutes ago, he had smiled at her. What had gotten into him now?
“Yeah,” the girl tried to give him a carefree smile, “I’ll be fine.”
The boy merely nodded, gave her tiny wave and walked away.

Ahri sighed (out of relief or disappointment, she did not know) and continued on her way.

x

Thankfully, Jeno had returned to his normal self the next day. He wasn’t sitting in his place. He was at the front of the class discussing something with a group of other boys that apparently was hilarious. When he caught Ahri looking at him, his eyes didn’t grow dark, and his smile remained on his face.

Mood swings, much?

His behaviour the previous day had left her confused and irritated and she didn’t know what she would do if he had continued to behave that way. She didn’t know what had caused that behaviour, she just hoped it wouldn’t happen again. She liked smiley Jeno.

Breaking eye contact, Ahr