Author’s Note: This story is set in an alternate universe, in an imaginary town and country, and during an ambiguous time period.

 

Yunho was one of the first students to walk through the door and into his math classroom.

 

 He did not understand why he had to have math first thing in the morning. 

 

Changmin was right next to him and made sure he let the teacher know he was the ‘new student.’ Like the lady was stupid and was not a resident of Green Meadow. Here, everyone knows everyone; plus, her class was too tiny for her to not notice a new, foreign face.

 

She was Ms. Sik. 

 

She let out a bubbling laugh after she said her name and gave an explanation, like he had taken the time out of his day to ask her. He hadn’t. “Sik. Not sick.” 

 

He noticed not a single difference in intonation. But he was going to be respectful and make a good first impression. He nodded and gave her a polite smile.

 

She smelled of coffee and was just as needlessly warm and welcoming as Changmin. It was too much. And Yunho knew he was ed. He would be forced to prostrate in front of all his classes and introduce himself. 

 

!

 

His morning only continued to get worse when a few people he had tried his damndest to forget walked through the class’s door. 

 

Amidst their loud laughter and playful banter, Yunho knew he was spotted when his ex-friend did a double take and made eye contact with him. 

 

He could tell he was expected, just not here in Ms. Sik’s class and not now. Five years was still too soon, it seemed. 

 

Yunho felt his heart dipping. It was slightly painful.

 

He felt as if the ground gave away from under him and he was falling and falling, all the while being set on fire. Yunho felt his pulse would tear though his skin and jump out and run away from the way it pounded. He wondered if he was having a panic attack. He had never had one before, but he assumed it would feel like this.

 

Yunho skillfully averted his gaze. His face felt tight, as if someone was pulling the skin of his face from the back of his head. 

 

Regaining his composure first, he stared at his old friend from the side of his eyes. He couldn't help himself.

 

Jaejoong Kim, his dear best friend from when he was a tween, had quieted down and seemed relatively as awkward as Yunho felt — no, he knew — he looked. 

 

Jaejoong was as seraphic as always. The playfulness amongst the friend group was now gone, and so was Jaejoong’s smile. Pure dread and surprise filled  Jaejoong’s face now. And it filled Yunho with a sick sense of euphoria. 

 

Their eyes almost met then. Yunho quickly looked away.

 

After a few seconds, Yunho peeked at him and his friends again. He couldn’t help himself. He had thought about this moment since the moment his mother sat him down, grabbed his hand, gripped them for dear life, and told him, verbatim, “ have hit the fan, dearest. We need to move back to Green Meadow. You first.” He thought about seeing Jaejoong, how he would react, and most importantly, how he would react at seeing Jaejoong in the flesh after six years of trying everyday to forget about him and that accident.

 

It was not quite what he had daydreamed about, but Jaejoong’s pale face brought him a slither of peace. He could do this.

 

Yunho studied Jaejoong’s entourage. This pretty girl with shiny brown skin as slick as a penny with a slick back ponytail and skillfully laid baby-hairs grabbed his arm, jolting a shaken Jaejoong back to reality. Their eyes almost met then.

 

However, Jaejoong skillfully averted his gaze from lingering in Yunho’s general location and righted his face.

 

Yunho did not know what he expected, honestly.

 

Jaejoong looked the same. Older now, handsome now, but still the same. He still had the same distinctive ridiculous curly lashes that demanded attention. Thinking about it, Jaejoong had been a really cute kid. Now Yunho could see why adults had loved to dote on him.

 

He no longer had the long hair styled into the bowl hair-cut, Yunho remembered how much Jaejoong had hated that hair style, though his mother thought he looked too cute on him to get rid of it. Looked like he finally won. His new hairstyle was a tapercut, it was parted in the middle and slightly wavy. He had piercings now. Two dangling silver crosses hung from his earlobes. He had even developed a sense of style. He was wearing a caramel colored turtleneck sweater and black ripped jeans and boots. 

 

Yunho wanted to laugh a little bit at how run-of-the-mill his style was. It was like he opened Tik-Tok and found his outfit with one scroll. He was still unoriginal and striving to fit in. Be the perfect golden boy of Green Meadow. 

 

He was the same little boy he left behind years ago. Just older. He was still a jock. Just a jock without his bowl-haircut and a girlfriend. A pretty girlfriend.

 

Yunho tried to not look over at Jaejoong. He didn’t want to start any rumors. He could feel the tension in the classroom as everyone tried to act like they weren’t waiting for the two to meet and talk or throw it down. Yunho refused to fulfill any of their peers' deranged desires. 

 

He already vowed to ignore Jaejoong till he left this small town, but he double vowed. It was self protection at this point. 

 

The funny thing about memories was that, the harder you tried to suppress them, the more you remembered them. You never try to forget the mundane things, you always try to get rid of the ones that hold significance. It was always the ones you knew you’ll never truly get over or forget you want to relieve yourself of. Jaejoong was that. He was one of those memories.

 

Even though he had already introduced himself to Ms. Sik, she still forced him to introduce himself to the whole class. Even making him stand up at his desk and say his name and give his history. He stumbled through it. What was he supposed to say exactly? 

 

Ms. Sik looked so expectant as she stood in front of the classroom, leaning on her desk, arms crossed and eyes bright.

 

“Come on now, Yunho, you must have more to share? You got to live in such a big city?”

 

He shrugged, squeezing his fingers to not give in to the need to survey the class; to see if Jaejoong’s was staring, no, gawking at him like the rest were.

 

“No. I am only sixteen, miss, I just went to school and home.” He shrugged again.

 

“No sports?”

 

He used to play soccer and then hockey because someone whined till he gave in, but when he moved away with his mom, he stopped all sports. He stopped all extracurricular activities at school. 

 

He shook his head.

 

“Alright then. You must share with us what you missed the most about Green Meadow and what you’ll miss the most about your old city?”

 

“Nothing. And...nothing.”

 

The class laughed. He wasn’t trying to be a comedian.

 

However, she got the memo then. Cocking her head to the side before she straightened herself, pushed her body off her desk. Clapping her hands, she said, “We welcome you to our school and class, Yunho. Very glad to have you back in Green Meadow. You can take a seat. Let’s get to work, class!”

 

As he went down, his eyes caught Changmin who was twisted in his chair from the very front row and gave him two thumbs up and a large smile.

 

He didn’t like that kid.

 

Yunho hoped and prayed that his math class would be the only class he shared with Jaejoong.

 

----

 

Lunch was wretched. 

His momma had made him a lunchbox. It had floored him when he stepped in the kitchen that morning and he had found his breakfast laid on the table and a lunch bag on the kitchen counter. The feeling was the result of feeling  as if he was too old for such a gesture. Nonetheless, he was thankful.

 

Finding an empty table towards the back of the cafeteria, he sat down and took his lunch out. With his earbuds in, listening to music he scrolled through his social media on his phone and he mindlessly ate his food.

 

“Hey, we have the same lunch!” He looked up, startled. He silently watched as Changmin slid his tray and lunchbox on the table and sat down across from him.

 

“Wha—” He sat up, too stunned to return Changmin’s smile. 

 

Yunho was hoping he could have some alone time. Every class since his first one had been filled with him introducing himself and getting loads of uncomfortable questions. He was tired. His social battery was dead.

 

He missed being invisible. He missed his old schools and home. He never thought he would be this homesick.

 

“What’s up,” a short girl with spacebunds said, dropping down next to Changmin and pushing her tray up next to his. She flashed Yunho a smile and a boy and a girl sat down after her and nodded at Yunho, too.

 

He was  flummoxed.

 

All three looked at him as if they expected him to say or do something.

 

Yunho decided to turn into stones and glare at Changmin instead.

 

Changmin had no shame. He flashed his entourage a large smile and said in a blooming newscaster’s voice, “Guys, meet Yunho.”

 

“It’s not really meeting,” the girl with the space buns said, giving him her hand to shake. 

 

It was weird, but out of a hardwired habit, he actually reached out and shook her hand. She had small, soft, squishy hands. Gripping his hand firmly, she said through her smile, “We went to the same middle school. Of course, you would not remember me —  didn’t yet have this killer sense of style and this fabulous rainbow hair — but I remembered you.” She let him go right before he let out his wince. He swore he could see a bruise forming.

 

Her friends all giggled as if she had just shared an inside joke.

 

Changmin filled him in. “Soel here--”

 

“Soelya Do,” she said, throwing a grape at Changmin. He caught it in his mouth. She rolled her big, oval shaped brown eyes. 

 

“Soel here had a humongous crush on you in the sixth grade.” He grinned devilishly at her. “She’s probably living her best life right now sitting at the same table as you during lunch.”

 

She rolled her eyes again. “How could I not?” She said, staring right in Yunho’s eye. He could not keep up with them, and he had just met them. Truthfully. 

 

She opened her carton of chocolate milk, but didn’t take a sip. Instead, she said, “You were just too cute. You were the cutest boy in the sixth grade, you know?” She shrugged. “You would have been the cutest in seventh and eighth, but you moved.” She gave Changmin a pointed look. He gave her a cheeky grin. Their two silent friends sighed loudly, grabbing Yunho’s attention. They looked bored. It was like they were viewing a movie they have seen over a hundred times.

 

Tapping her forefinger on Changmin’s forehead, her long black painted nail digging in his skin, Soel said, “He has dimples and you have pimples.”

 

“Look at you learning how to rhyme,” Changmin said, reaching over to pat Soel smooth, round rosey cheeks. She leaned back. “Eww. I do not know where those hands have been.”

 

“Just here,” Chanmin said, giggling like an overjoyed child.

 

“Please ignore them,” the silent girl said. “That’s how they bond.”

 

“I can’t believe you two are still dating,” the guy next to her said around the large bite he took out of his hamburger.

 

“We the fire of our love by bantering.” Changmin winked at them.

 

Soel broke out into laughter at Changmin’s response.

 

Yunho was momentarily mute. He did not know what to say. He did not even understand what was happening here. And this was only his first day.

 

“Let me finish the introduction,” Changmin said loudly with a faux authoritative tone to his voice. “Here is Kevin and over there is Kim.”

 

“Kimberly. Stop giving people nicknames,” the girl, Kimberli, said with a glare. But she smiled at Yunho. “Nice to formally meet you. Again.”

 

He gave a jerky nod.

 

“We broke him,” Kevin said, chugging down some of his milk.

 

“I am…I am… I mean, I am fine. Nice to meet you all,” Yunho finally managed to say.

 

“I am sorry about all of that,” Soel said. “I didn’t mean to harass you. I just have a weird sense of humor. It’s an acquired taste.”

 

“No,” he swiftly cut her off. “No. I mean, you didn’t. You were joking.”

 

“No, they weren’t,” Kevin said. “She liked you. Like, really liked you. That’s how Changmin here and all of his ugliness won her over. You moved and she was vulnerable.”

 

Yunho felt himself shutting down again. He did not know these kids and here they were acting like he was dating this girl before he moved.

 

She was a cute girl, really pretty, but there was never a chance. He was gay. Compeltely, a hundred percent gay.

 

They blinked at his blank expression and doubled over with laughter. He felt his cheeks heating up.

 

His knee-jerk desire was to get up and walk, no, run away from all four of them.

 

“He really shut down this time,” Kevin pointed out, dipping his curly fry in ketchup.

 

“I am so, so sorry,” Kimberli said through her laughter. “I am not laughing at you,” she reassured, after catching her breath, “just at this hilarious situation. Do not hate us. We’re not super crazy.”

 

“The long explanation makes it seem like we are.” Changmin laughed.

 

They were so bizarre, Yunho thought in exasperation. 

 

“Stop it, guys,” Soel said. She gave him a sweet smile. “It’s great to meet you, and I am so happy you’re back home.”

 

He did not know what to say, so he said what any other person would. “Thank you.” 

 

They all nodded at him, their smile still in place.

 

He stupidly added, “To clarify, I do not have dimples.”

 

And they all broke out laughing again.

 

“See, I always told Soel she was in love with an image of you that she constructed in her head. And here I am, being proven correct!” Changmin cheered.

 

“Lovebug, shut up,” Soel added too sweetly, throwing a grape that landed on Changmin’s cheek.

 

It was time to go.

 

Grabbing his half eaten lunch, Yunho made to get up as he shoved his stuff inside his lunch bag. “Great to meet y’all. I am done, so see you guys around.”

 

“Lunch just started.”

 

Yunho paused. “Yes, and I just remembered I—” His words dried out when Jaejoong and his posse walked in the canteen. His heart dropped. He felt as if the ground had crumbled underneath him and he had just realized that he was about to fall to his death. He could not explain his visceral reaction to the teen.

 

He quickly looked away and decided it was best if he sat down and finished his lunch. Even if it would be in the company of four boisterous personalities. This was Green Meadow after all — a small town with big, big personalities.

 

“I just remembered that I had papers I needed to…” he shook his head, rubbing his lips together. “But, never mind. I’ll do it later.” He gave them a smile. They returned it. He quietly sat down, hoping his hands were not quivering.

 

This was ridiculous. It was just Jaejoong, for goodness sake!

 

“Sorry if we made you uncomfortable,” Kimberli said, sensing the mood. Soel nodded, eyes apologetic. “We’re just such a rowdy bunch,” mixing her salad, she added to Kimberli’s apology.

 

“I knew he could take it,” Kevin said, pointing his fork at him. “Out of all of them, he always seemed the nicest.”

 

“Huh?” And there they went, losing him again. 

 

“Back then,” Kevin added, as if that was enough information to fill in the dots.

 

“So, you’re not hanging out with the same crowd anymore?” Kimberli said, not applying any tact.

 

“Sorry?”

 

“Today is his first day back, guys. Relax.” 

 

He gave Changmin a confused look. What were they on?

 

“Them,” Kimberli said, turning around to point to the tables by the glass wall. There sat Jaejoong and a bunch of other kids that looked like jocks.

 

“I was never hanging out with them?”

 

“Back then,” Kevin said.

 

“When?”

 

“Middle school. Wait, have you really forgotten everything? I thought you were just acting?” Kimberli said, tossing a box braid that was dangerously close to dipping in her yogurt over her shoulder. 

He gave Changmin a look. He shrugged. “You're a hot topic, you know?” As if that was an adequate excuse.

 

“Right. I bet there will be loads of posts of you on Meadows Secret,” Kimberli said.

 

“What?”

 

“Dude, you’re sitting with the correct people. We have so much to fill you in to get you ready to interact with the wild creatures that call GM High their high school.”

 

“What?” He was completely and utterly confused. They were such a perplexing bunch. He just kept on getting more and more confused as they talked and interacted with him.

 

He left lunch knowing that back in elementary and middle school, he was well liked. A lot of the girls had crushes on him. Meadows Secret was actually written as MeadowSecret, a tumblr blog that was created by Changmin their freshman year. Everyone went there to spill beans and to learn about all the dirty little secrets that plague their teenage existence. It was rubbish and useless. Yunho never shared that opinion with them. He smiled kindly and nodded, all the while dying inside.

 

What he feared most had been exactly what he thought it was. There had been a rumor about him running away. But it was never blown to the extent he thought it would have. He was happy about that.

 

His tablemates went to great pains to let him know that they never believed the rumors created about him. They knew it was because he had a fall out with his so-called best friend Jaejoong and he was the evil one.

 

They really liked him. And he still did not even know why.

 

By the time lunch was over, he had all their phone numbers and had been encouraged to join the Yearbook club, the Photography club, and the Art club (he had nice hands, an artist’s hand, so Kimberli had said in a serious tone); Yunho left lunch deciding it would not be too bad to know some people around this hellhole he called Green Meadows High school and that this high school was more cliquey and gossipy than he already dreaded it would be. They really spin people’s lives into drama because they were bored and had nothing better to do in this small town.

 

He hated it.