As I was carrying my food tray at the cafeteria, I looked at the people and started to recognize several faces in each table. I remembered Doghyun, the tall boy who was my classmate in Statistics. I smiled at him and also he did but his eyes were full of caution.

“Minho!” a girl’s voice yelled at me and when I looked, it was Sooyun. She sat at the end of a full table with several of her friends.

She waved at me from across the room for me to join them. I walked towards them sheepishly, trying very hard to ignore the unknown stares that were being thrown to me.

“Hello Minho, sit here,” Sooyun said then patted a chair next to hers.

I stared at her friends reluctantly, as if I was eager to ask them questions even though I am not. It’s called façade, thank you very much.

“Guys, this is Choi Minho…. He is my classmate in 4 subjects” Sooyun said under her breath.

My attention went to this boy sitting across from me. He has dark brown eyes with dark shadows under them. As if he was suffering from sleepless night or he was just gone through from a long-time grieving and sobbing. Through his nose, his feature was straight, perfect, and angular.

He was glaring the hell out of me as if I was an antagonist from his forgotten nightmare or I was his prey, ready to be slashed through his fangs.

“Well, hi Minho! Nice to meet you” a female voice snapped me out from my reverie.

I looked up to see a cute, baby-faced girl, her pale bronze hair carefully tied into a ponytail, smiling at me in a friendly way. I swear I seen her face this morning.

“Nice to meet you too,” I replied with a smile.

“I’m Hara”

“Well, have we met before?” I struggled, trying to picture her face back from my memory.

“I was the one who helped you earlier about the ‘front office’ issue,” she giggled.

“Since you two already know each other… Hara, can you introduce the other fella out here to him?” Sooyun said, kinda pissed off.

Hara just cleared and looked at the others condescendingly.

“Minho, this is Key… he is your classmate in your chemistry,” she started to a boy who was lean, but muscular, with hair brown straight and his pear-shaped eye were dramatic. Bu just staring at those eyes, he can get lots of praise in a minute.

“Hi Key,” I mumbled.

“Hi Minho”

“Now… this is Eunjim,” Hara continued and this time she was referring to the one who was sitting next to her. A short boy who was pixie-like, thin in extreme with small features. He is the least bulky in the group and probably the weakest in physical attributes. His hair was deep black, cropped short and pointing in every direction.

He smiled at me. “I heard that you want to know the story of your brother, well you can just approach me”

I felt a sudden miss of my heartbeat. “Y-yeah… I am actually eager to know that story,” I said as I was trying hard to make my breath sound even.

“Minho, this is Taemin,” Hara cut Eunjim off before he got a chance to blurt out another word.

“I’m Taemin,” the boy, who was sitting across from me, whispered.

I gulped as he continued to scare me by just him doing this spooky stare to me.

“Hi” I said in a formal tone.

“And lastly, this is Haruhi,” Hara said but my eyes were still pasted on Taemin’s. Is he picking up a fight with me?

“Do you have a problem with Minho, Taemin?” Sooyun intruded, finally noticing the weird stares of Taemin to me.

“Nothing… of course, none,” he whispered as he placed a wicked smile on his lips.

I tried to shrug him out of my mind for the next minutes after that. I sat at the table with the six of them longer than I would have if I’d be sitting alone. We talked about many topics; random, to be specific.

But I was anxious not to be late for my appointment with Jiyeon.

Just then, Hara left the table with the reason that she will have t cram for her assignments.

As our conversation got somehow deeper, even when Taemin’s participation was not that much, I begun to feel a weird rumble on my stomach at the thought of immediately having great friends on my first day here.

At the next moment, a familiar ringtone broke our chitchats and I immediately frozed.

I have heard this ringtone before… yes, I have heard this, when I was on the plane.

“Whose cellphone is it?!” Taemin blurted out as he stood up quickly.

Our neighboring tables also looked at us, with eyes filled with horror.

“It’s m-mine…” Eunjim stuttered as he was showing us his phone. An unknown number was trying to call him.

“It can’t be possible!” Taemin continued to mumble. All of our eyes looked at him, curious and at the same time horrified.

“Why? What’s wrong? Tell me Taemin!” Eunjim shouted.

“Calm down Eunjim,” Haruhi muttered, patting his shoulder but eventually he shrugged her hands off.

“That’s Onew’s cellphone number,” Taemin nearly whispered as he clenched and unclenched his fist.

“Answer it!” he added, looking at Eunjim scornfully.

“I don’t like!” Eunjim uttered voice rough and shaky.

“What should we do?” Sooyun said but her voice was calm, the only exception from this tension-clouded atmosphere.

I felt out of place as I was dumbfounded. I have many questions at the moment… Should I tell them that I heard this ringtone before? Who is Onew? And what’s with the ringtone?! What does it signifies?!

“I’ll be dead soon…” Eunjim whimpered,” I’ll be dead… I’ll be dead!”

He stood up and looked at us frantically. He shoveled off Sooyun’s hand as she was only trying to comfort him.

“Where are you going?” Key finally said. Eunjim walked backwards slowly and faced his back. He ran towards the door in panic.

As the door was being opened, I caught a glimpse of Jiyeon standing outside the cafeteria. She was looking at me with a stray smile on his eyes.

Sooyun, Key, Taemin and Haruhi chased Eunjim but I decided to stay. I was actually staring at Jiyeon, who was now plunging forward to my location, wearing a killer’s smile on her lips.