The mushrooms in his rice seemed to have arranged themselves in a frowny face, and Kyungsoo quickly mixed his rice again to scramble it. Ever since the day he vouched for Jongin, an uncomfortable feeling stuck to him, and he couldn't shake it off. Two things kept poking at hm. The first was that he didn't understand why Jongin hadn't told Teacher Hei that he was getting tutoring himself. Kyungsoo had stepped in and said it.

Why? Was he embarrassed and didn't want anyone to know? Even if his grade and student record were on the line? Teacher Zhang had said that Jongin had an idea of respect that people could see as arrogant. Was this a part of that? Did Jongin respect him so little that he wasn't even willing to use Kyungsoo's name to save his situation?

That truly could have been the case since he so easily said Jongdae's name when Teacher Hei asked if he had had any other tutors. Plus, when they were talking out in the hallway, he had said Jongdae's name without honorifics. JUST his first name. Going through his interactions with him, Kyungsoo couldn't remember any instance where Jongin even said his name, with or without honorifics.

The welt that hit him the hardest though was the last words Jongin had said. Kyungsoo knew that he was right. He had known from the very beginning. He could see it in their smirks and sneers. He could hear it in their upturned toned, in the emphatic stresses of those same specific words. Second. Just. So that he can. Fake. Most of the time the words weren't inherently insults, but as soon as they sought him as their target, they sharpened into blades, densified into battering clubs, stretched into venomous snakes. Their weapons, so carefully crafted and so carefreely used, were coated in laughter and disdain—how could Kyungsoo not already know that they delighted at his expense?

He knew, but that didn't mean he had any power to stop them. The only power he had was keeping it a secret from his friends. If Jongin could see how they reveled in his pain, then he could see how Kyungsoo was aware of it. Kyungsoo wouldn't tell him. They were only tutor-tutee anyway. That's how their relationship had been for the past month, and that's how it seemed to be staying whenever they met for tutoring. Sometimes he felt that Seulgi and her imperviousness to awkwardness was the only thing saving their ability to be in the same room with each other.

"Kyung. Soo."

He looked to his right and found a pouty Jongdae.

"Yeah, Jongdae?"

"Did you hear me?"

"Honestly, no. I was thinking about stuff."

"Hey. Wait, what kind of stuff?"

"Just stuff."

"Does it involve Kim Jongin?" Yuwon asked.

Kyungsoo hurried to nibble on a mushroom so that she wouldn't see how he was freaking out at her accuracy.

"Why would you think that?"

"Just a guess. You and Jongdae keep mentioning him at some point during our lunch, so I'm guessing that he's not just a regular tutee."

Even her guesses were uncannily accurate.

"Oh, yeah. How is tutoring him, Kyungsoo? Thanks for taking him under your wing, by the way."

"Yeah, yeah. It's been fine."

"Just fine?"

"What else can I say?" Kyungsoo thought about it for a minute though. "He's improving a lot. He still needs help with direction, but his computation skills are good. He's slow at calculating, but that's better than rushing."

Jongdae beamed at him and pulled out his phone, tapping something out. He didn't show Kyungsoo or Yuwon, so Kyungsoo guessed that it was for another one of his weird lists in his phone memos. He remembered that he had lists like 'Things To Try' and 'Souvenirs To Bring Home,' but the items were pretty ordinary things, like 'French fries' and 'bumper cars' and 'cat fur' and 'hummus.' When he asked Jongdae why in the polar coordinate system he wanted cat fur as a souvenir, he only laughed at how Kyungsoo had said 'why in the polar coordinate system.'

"Is he giving you trouble? Because if he is, you can just introduce him to m