The minute Jaejin stepped into the oh-so-familiar cram school classroom later that evening, a loud, drawled-out "yaaah" could be heard out in the farthest corner. Unsurprisingly, Key sat in the very area the "yaaah" came from. He princess-waved in Jaejin's direction, and Jaejin pursed his lips. 

"Looks like our wittle baby is still in a bad mood," Key murmured mockingly as Jaejin threw his rear-end into the desk adjacent to his aggravating friend's. When Key caught Jaejin rolling his eyes, he pinched his cheek a little.

"So I was thinking," Key said, leaning toward Jaejin's desk, "blue or orange?"

"For what?"

"For my hair, duh."

"Are you kidding me right now? Again? Didn't you just dye your hair like, a month ago?"

Key rolled his eyes. "Obviously, Jaejin. And now it's time to redye it. Get your mind out of the gutter."

Jaejin shook his head scornfully. He was surprised that, with the frequency that Key damaged his hair, his entire scalp hadn't fallen off by now.

"I was also thinking about maybe dying the whole thing dark purple, but I thought that'd be too much like my hair as it is now--"

"I think this is what you need to do," Jaejin interjected, sneaking in closer to Key. "Dye the front dark purple, dye the back of your head orange, then dye the sides of your head electric blue. Then, get white streaks in everywhere. Oh, and always wear a spiked headband."

Key shook his head as if in disbelief of Jaejin's superior genius, and slapped his desk. "Jaejin, you are a certified genius."

"I know, I know."

"No really, I think you've discovered your life's dream. This is a breakthrough."

"So you'll do it?"

Key deadpanned. "Are you stupid? Get out of here," Jaejin giggled in his face until he got shoved away, then continued to giggle uncontrollably to himself for awhile longer. He couldn't understand why he was laughing so hard since it wasn't really that funny in the first place, but nonetheless, Key's occasional sideways glare sent him into an even bigger fit of crazed laughter. And laughing felt good. Really good. After that afternoon's troubling escapade, Jaejin really needed this. 

Of course, remembering the episode from that afternoon put an abrupt stop to Jaejin's giggling. In fact, the strange transition from giggly Jaejin to grumpy Jaejin was quite fantastic. It had only been three days since his first-ever personal interaction with Jonghun, and Jaejin was already beyond exhausted. Thoughts of the aggravating yet unfortunately handsome Jonghun paraded through, stomped around, and burned holes in his mind. Somewhere in Korea, Jonghun was cackling nearly every waking second of the day at Jaejin's misfortune. Cackling with his moppy black hair, and his big fat nose, and his stupid toothy smile. True, Jaejin used to think about him some when he first encountered him, but never to this caliber. This whole situation was causing him to toss and turn at night for hours on end. Jaejin was almost sure his symptoms were the onset of insanity. In fact, he was nearly 100% convinced. He looked it up on the internet, and the internet is always right.

"Hey! Mr. President!" Key called almost excitedly, averting his attention from his fingernails and Jaejin from his self-pity. A sort of dorky, squishy-looking fellow with mono-lidded eyes and a flat, wide nose maneuvered awkwardly through the desks and plopped his rear into the desk behind Key's. 

"Stop calling me that," the squishy-looking fellow said with an unintentionally obvious flair of pride as he rubbed the back of his neck. You could hear the blushing in his voice. Jaejin could tell by the sound of it that it was Onew, the well-liked, goody-two-shoes senior class president, and made no attempt to escape his domineering grumpiness and say hello. They were acquainted, but not really good friends or anything. Key certainly sounded interested, though. Key was always interested in Onew's affairs and joking around with him for whatever reason. He didn't understand why, though. Onew didn't seem like the kind of guy Key would ever give the time of day to and vice versa, but by some miracle it seemed to work, and Jaejin couldn't complain.

"Why not?" Key asked.

"Just call me Onew! Hearing Mr. President makes me feel all superior and queasy."

Both Jaejin and Key let out an accidental snicker at "queasy". Jaejin liked Onew, but he was so dorky that it was hilarious. Jaejin whipped out his iPhone and started scrolling through his messages aimlessly, pretending to tune out Key's and Onew's conversation. Key asked Onew about what hair color he should get, and predictably, Onew said to keep it black. Key said it wasn't "adventurous enough", and Onew said sarcastically, "how much adventure do you need?", to which Key snickered and said, "more than what I'm getting now". Jaejin could practically feel the smiles radiating from them. Somehow, it made Jaejin feel a little less frustrated. But not enough to intervene in the conversation. Admittingly, his thoughts had slowly began to drift more in favor of Jonghun and Jaejin's awful plight.

Finally, Onew decided on dark purple from Key's options, mentioning that it was the least intimidating color. Then this whole joke started up about Onew thinking that Key was an intimidating person, and they laughed and bantered with each other, and Jaejin swore that every word Key let slip from his mouth was coated and dripping with a flirtacious flavor. He could've sworn that Key was in love with the guy. 

Finally, Onew made a gesture toward Jaejin. "Wouldn't you agree, Jaejin?"

"Huh? About what?"

"About Key being intimidating."

"Key would still be intimidating if he was bald."

"Excuse me?" Key questioned. Onew snickered.

Mr. President pointed at Jaejin's iPhone. "So Jaejin, who're you texting?"

"Uh." Jaejin's mind ran a mile a minute. The names of the people he had messages from began to blur together. "Jonghu-- uh, Jong..." 

.

"Huh? Jonghu?" Key asked, confused. Onew grinned in amusement. "Get your head out of the clouds, boy."

Jaejin scowled mockingly at Key just as the cram school teacher released her blusterous voice upon the class, indicating the beginning of the lesson. Key leaned over and flicked Jaejin in the arm before returning his attention to the front, causing Jaejin to squeal a bit. 

The only thing Jaejin could think of was how close Key had gotten to getting a very pivotal hint in discovering Jaejin's secret.

The teacher began rambling on about calculus and integrals and derivatives and that mole under her nose was so damn distracting, Jaejin had to look away. Words became strings of mumbled sound, and the words on the whiteboard clouded together, and Jaejin steadily lost control of his eyelids. 

Soon, it was snowing.

Jaejin was standing in a field in the middle of nowhere. Snow coated everything. From the trees miles away to the hills across the horizon, there was nothing but snow. Pure and untouched. There wasn't even a trail of footsteps behind hiim. Jaejin thought of heaven.

At the risk of tainting the perfection anymore than he already had with his presence in the new-fallen snow, Jaejin didn't move. If he did, he would scar and ruin the perfection, and Jaejin would've hated that. Jaejin watched tiny, surreal snowflakes descend to the ground, still and unmoving. 

Jaejin soon noticed a presence at his side. Jonghun was staring into the snow with him. He was still wearing the clothes Jaejin had seen him in earlier that day. He was murmuring to himself: "snow seems so fragile, you know, like touching it just ruins everything". His words flowed and glided and floated like silk in the wind, echoing and resonating. It snowed harder. 

Jonghun turned to him.

"You're really cute, you know that?"

Jonghun's image inched toward Jaejin through the falling snow, and pressed his lips against the corner of Jaejin's. An almost-kiss. Jonghun felt strange and warm. Jaejin remained still.

"I like you."

Snow fell like rain now, and Jaejin couldn't see anything. His fingers and lips were numb. Just before Jonghun pulled away, Jaejin fell backward. He kept on falling, falling, never-ending, the snow seeming to ascend above him. He fell into nothing.

The shriek Jaejin emitted after his dream was the class' favorite and most controversial topic for weeks.

"So what was it? What was the dream?!" Key nearly screamed. The two were walking home after cram school later that night to get to the subway. 

"Nothing! JUST NOTHING!" Jaejin yelled back. 

Key laughed. "You do not understand how angry I am that I didn't have a camera to record that, that was honestly the greatest--"

"Please shut up, I do not want to think about it."

", so funny."

"More like creepy as hell," Jaejin added curtly.

"What? The dream?"

"Yeah! Because in it, this-- no, never mind."

Key once again glared at his friend. Jaejin didn't even blink. Glaring used to get anything Key could ever want out of Jaejin, but nowadays, Jaejin was immune. Key threw his hands against his thighs and groaned. "C'mon, just tell me what's up!"

Jaejin could feel the curse of embarrassment taking over his complexion. "I can't. Like I really can't."

"Why not? Is there something going on at home, Jaejin? Does it have to do with that what-if question you asked me the other day? Seriously, what's wrong? I'm your friend, not a radio broadcast, c'mon."

Jaejin paused for a moment. Key stopped with him. A moment of silence settled over the two friends. "I..." he started. Jaejin thought hard. Very hard. He tried to think about why it was bad to tell Key, and why it was bad not to tell him. Then, Jonghun's sneering grin filled his mind. In a display symbolic of a teapot screaming, Jaejin exploded in a spontaneous fit of screaming rage.

Needless to say, Key laughed hard enough to make his sides sore, and Jaejin ran the entire way to the subway. 

"I'm gonna figure out what's up, Jaejin! You can't hide from me! I'm your best friend!" Key yelled at Jaejin's receding image.

Jonghun was ruining his life. He was going crazy. Insane. Clinically. Jaejin was ready to check himself in. But he knew he couldn't do that. He had no justification for his situation. Plus, it'd look bad on his college applications. He couldn't file a restraining order -- Jonghun wasn't really doing anything overly creepy. He had nothing.

As usual, Jaejin tossed and turned in his bed for hours that night, Jonghun's words and face echoing repeatedly in his mind.

He had to come up with a plan on how to deal with Jonghun, and fast. The outcome of his well-being counted on it.