I looked at myself in the mirror hanging in my locker, cringing at the sight of my hair, sticking out at odd places where it shouldn't. I ran my hand through my raven black hair, trying to rid of the obnoxious cowlick that has plagued me the entire day. After a good minute or so, I gave up trying to get the little tuft of hair to go down, instead completely messing my slightly long hair into something resembling an organized mess. I looked at my dark brown eyes, small blood vessels streaking across the whites of my eyes, evidence of the late night session the previous night. It was well worth it though, the exam earlier in the day being a breeze. Blinking a few times, I inspected my teeth, making sure there were no scraps of food stuck in between, running my tongue over them once.

"Hey there, Vain Pot." Came the annoying voice from behind my locker door. I didn't need to look to know who it was.

"How many times must I have to tell you Wonpil? I'm not vain, I just care about the image I portray to people." I replied. Giving myself one last glance over in the mirror before closing my locker. "It's called being professional."

"Yeah, as if a photographer like you needs to look good. All you do are take pictures of what catches your interest and look through your gallery all day, or is Mr. Park trying to impress someone?" He quipped, shooting me a smirk.

"No." I deadpanned. "Last I checked I was the only gay kid in school and..." I was rudely cut off when an forcefully bumped into me, sending me flying to the side of the lockers.

"Oops, sorry Park. Oh wait, no I'm not." The jock mocked, walking past me. Mark Tuan, ace of the basketball team and all-around nice guy, except when it came to me. My personal bully if you wanted to call him that. I gave him a blank expression, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of seeing me getting riled up by his antics.

Mark Tuan was the guy in school everyone liked. Handsome as a model like he just came from a photoshoot, he was the envy of guys and the sought-after prize of the girls. He is not the tallest nor the buffest guy in school, yet he has proven himself more than capable of handling himself whenever put in a tricky situation marking him as someone not to mess with by the student body. I let my eyes survey him once, seeing that he was dressed in our school hoodie and a simple pair of jeans, very much like my own outfit. His hoodie however, looked a size smaller for him, the fabric stretching over his lean but muscled physique and his biceps straining against the sleeves.

Awesome athlete, smarter than most of the jock's population as well as a generally talented person in everything that he does, his future is pretty much set. Everyone, including me as much as I hated to admit it, knew he was going to be the captain of the basketball team in our senior year and quite frankly, he deserved it. Bullying me aside, he truly was a good guy.

"Buzz off Mark." Wonpil said, shooting Mark a glare to which the latter responded to by simply putting up his hands and walking away. Mark had nothing against Wonpil, but his constant picking on me made Wonpil kind of blacklist the ace basketball player. "One day I'm gonna hurt him so bad." He threatened, to which I had to laugh. Kim Wonpil, my best and possibly only friend here in Yongsan International School of Seoul, was to say the least, the last person anyone would pick a fight with. He was no fighter. Added to the fact that he never went to a gym once in his life and his idea of physical training was running down to Starbucks to get a vanilla latte.

"You? Please, you can't even win against me in a fight, let alone Mark Tuan." He rolled his eyes, as if what I said wasn't true. I mean, I go to the gym on a regular basisa and although I'm 5'10", I dare say I can hold my ground against people who were bigger than me.

"Why do you put up with him though? After 3 years, most people just lose it." Wonpil asked me, pulling me to our next class.

I just shrugged my shoulders. "Don't care really. It's not like he does anything seriously bad. Showing him it bothers me would only give him the satisfaction and I'm definitely not gonna do that. Besides, I have you and my mom so it's all good."

"It would be better if your dad got on the same wagon though." He replied.

I tensed at his words. I shot him a glare, which made him give me his "I'm sorry" face. He knew better than to bring up my father. After I came out, my father as good as disowned me. He stopped talking to me apart from when absolutely necessary and even then it was mostly one-word replies. If not for my mother, I would have probably been kicked out of the house.

"I still don't get why he picks on you though. I mean, he's practically a saint to everyone else." Wonpil said, shifting the conversation back to Mark.

"Glad you know how to change the subject. And isn't it obvious? He's probably homophobic. That's the only explanation as to why he likes to make my high school life a living hell." I said.

"Well it's not like you're the typical kind of gay guy. You act like a dude, you dress like a dude, yeah you care a little too much about your looks but who cares. It's not like you strut down the halls in flamboyant outfits or whatever, NOT that there's anything wrong with that." Wonpil said. He always get agitated when it came to homophobes, probably because of his protective tendencies towards me. He's more perturbed by it than I was.

"Well I think that's probably why he hates me so much." I stated, to which he gave back a confused stare. "It's because I'm not the stereotypical gay guy that he's intimidated. Male ego if you could say. like that. I don't know, you're the straight one."

"Well whatever it is, he better get his ego in check before I keep it in check for him." Wonpil said, shaking his fist in the air, which only made him look like an angry scarecrow than anything dangerous. I laughed, stopping outside of my next class.

"Okay grumpy, see you after school." He waved goodbye before I disappeared into the classroom. I smiled at the couple of students already seated at their desks chatting amongst themselves, to which they smiled back. I was lucky I guess. Other than Mark, no one else in school really gave me a hard time about being gay. Everyone simply understood and went on with life. Being the only open gay kid in school did have its downsides thoug