Once Minho entered the building he walked up to the front desk. He pulled out his license and showed it to the woman sitting there. Rudely snatching it, she looked up his name and wrote down a room number. “Down this hall to my left, it should be the 4th room on the right,” she said, slightly peeved.

Not even giving the woman a thanks, he quickly made his way down the bland hallway. Coming to the fourth door, he checked the number on the page and made sure it was correct- thankfully it was. Several pairs of eyes looked up at him when Minho opened the door, only to look away when he stepped completely into the room. The room was completely silent, making him feel even more awkward for being late.

Strolling up to the only adult in the room, the older male glared at him. “Grade?” the man questioned in a gravelly voice.

“Um, 11th,” Minho replied.

Shuffling through the stack of paper in his hands, his tutor, stopped when he found what he needed. Handing the packet to Minho, he instructed, “Do this. You can’t leave until you finish, and no talking.”

Minho was about to walk away when he realized he had nothing to write with. Nervously turning around he looked back at the man. “I need a pencil… I was kind of running late today…”

The man let out a grunt of irritation before grabbing a pencil out of his pocket and handing it to him. Minho let out a small ‘Thanks’ before rushing to an empty seat. There were at least ten kids in the room, leaving a lot of empty chairs, so he decided to sit closer to the back. Beginning on the first page, Minho could already feel a headache coming on. He didn’t know any of this.

When the first person stood up, the man took the paper and a red pen, marking the problems the kid had gotten wrong. Minho’s jaw dropped when he finished and told the kid to come back next week with all of the correct answers. Looking down at his packet, he realized how screwed he was and almost felt like just marking a bunch of random answers. Sighing, Minho pulled out his phone to check the time, only to discover it was dead.

The room’s phone began to ring, causing everyone else’s heads to jerk up. Picking up the phone, the tutor began nodding his head before hanging up. “I’ll be right back,” he informed to everyone in the room. Swiftly walking out the door, closing it right behind him, Minho banged his head on the desk.

“This ,” Minho groaned.

The blonde boy in the seat in front of him turned slightly in his chair. “I know, I was here early,” he said in response to Minho’s whining, “I’m not even halfway done.”

Minho lifted his head to see the person responding to him. “I think I’m about to bs my way through it and just go home. I can finish it another day,” Minho said.

“I don’t know if I have time to correct everything though,” the boy said depressingly.

A girl from the other side of the room turned to shush them. “I think he’s coming back,” she mouthed to both of them.

The blonde boy quickly turned back around in his seat, pretending that he was actually doing something. When the man walked back in he stared at everyone for a moment before taking a seat at the large desk in the front of the room. Several other kids began to line up, handing their papers to him one by one.

Soon enough, even the boy in front of him had finished his work. Minho was the only person left now. He couldn’t help that sometimes he’d start day dreaming- everyone does, right? Deciding he’d been here for way too long, he began circling random answers. Walking up to the tutor, he could feel the eyes staring into his soul, causing shivers to go down his spine.

The man took the paper and began whizzing through it, marking, in Minho’s opinion, way too many problems. When he was finally complete, he handed it back to Minho, waving towards the door as Minho’s signal to leave. Silently leaving the room, he started his way to the parking lot.

Stepping out of the building, though, he saw the same blonde boy that was sitting in front of him earlier. Minho wasn’t going to say anything to him until he saw how bored the boy looked. He was sitting on the edge of the concrete, with a sports bag next to him and a phone in his lap. Sitting down next to him, the boy looked startled.

“I thought you left forever ago,” Minho said, striking up a conversation.

“I wish,” he sighed, “I called my mom when I got out, but she said she was going to be late.”

“Oh, that .”

There was an awkward silence between the two of them, the blonde boy messing around with his phone before it began ringing. He quickly answered it. “Mom, where are you? Eight?! Are you serious?” The boy stopped talking and pulled back his phone to stare at it. “ hung up on me,” he said distastefully.

Minho coughed before asking, “So, what’s your name?”

“My name’s Taemin. Sorry about that, my mom makes me angry sometimes, y’know?”

“It’s fine. I know how parents can be sometimes. My name’s Minho,” Minho began before pausing in thought, ”I normally don’t do this for people I just met, but do you, like, need a ride home or something?”

“I don’t know, I don’t really want to bother you or anything…”

Minho stood up shrugging. “It’s fine, I don’t want you to be here till eight. It’s kinda dangerous, even if you’re in front of this building.”

Standing up as well, Taemin nodded. “Okay, I guess. As long as you don’t drop me off in the middle of nowhere! Alright?”

----

It was pretty awkward in Minho’s car. Other than Taemin giving Minho directions, they hadn’t really talked about anything. While driving, Minho heard Taemin rummaging around in something, peeking over he saw Taemin in one of the side pockets of his gym bag.

“So,” Minho said, “what sport do you play?”

“Oh, I play soccer!” Taemin said proudly, a smile spreading across his face at him just mentioning it.

Minho suddenly became more interested in him. “Really? What school do you go to?”

“Davis,” Taemin answered.

He couldn’t help but laugh. “They’re an alright team,” Minho teased.

“Hey!” Taemin had a look of fake hurt on his face. “I’ll have you know the JV team is the best. Turn left at the next stoplight.”

“Right, well, I go to Kennedy,” Minho boasted. Turning on his blinker, they turned down a creepy looking street. The trees looked dead and most of the houses were old and run down. It probably looked better in daylight, but since the sun was already setting it looked just plain bad.

Taemin rolled his eyes and crossed his arms. “No wonder. They have the best soccer team in the entire city,” he huffed. “I’m trying to convince my parents to let me go there next year; I really need to get a good sports scholarship. Being on an ‘alright team’ doesn’t really help…”

“Yeah, I completely understand.” Minho looked around, asking Taemin, “Hey, is it any of these houses?”

“It’s the very last house on this road, the only one with a street light.”

Nodding, Minho sped up a bit. He at least wanted to make it home before it was pitch black outside. Coming to the very last house on the street, he noticed it actually looked pretty new compared to the rest of the houses. It still looked creepy, just not as creepy as the others. Minho had no clue how such a cheery looking person could live in such a place.

Stopping the car, Minho watched as Taemin unbuckled his seat belt and opened the door. “See you next week! Thanks for driving me home,” he said gratefully.

“No problem,” Minho responded. Taemin got out of the car and quickly made his way up to his door. Minho waited until Taemin was inside before driving off. At least next week wouldn’t be as dreadfully bad during tutoring.

----

DJ Krunk by this point was looking more like DJ Flop. Most of the people at the party had at least two drinks before the DJ’s speakers decided to blow out. While waiting for him to get new speakers, everyone killed time by drinking even more. Unfortunately, people were already beginning to disperse, but Minho had decided to sit on the kitchen counter with some of his teammates, drinking his booze. At least he wasn’t as drunk as some of the other teens there. Over half of them were outside puking on the poor lawn or ing themselves over even more by smoking a joint.

Even without music, Minho could barely hear his cell ring. Checking the caller ID he couldn’t help but roll his eyes. “Shhh, it’s my mom,” Minho said loud enough, side slapping Jonghyun who was being the loudest.

“Minho, where’d you go? I didn’t get a chance to talk to you when you got home.”

Minho looked around the kitchen; in all honesty he had no idea whose house he was at. “I’m just hanging out with the guys at Jonghyun’s house. I’ll be home around 2 maybe?” he lied, cupping his hand over his phone, attempting to block out background noise.

“Alright, well just be careful. Okay?” his mother sighed from the other side of the line.

“’Kay mom, bye,” Minho said, hanging up before she got suspicious.

Leaning his head against one of the back cabinets, he took a swig of his of his drink. The girl, who he assumed was throwing the party, began ushering people out the door. Being in the kitchen, they could only see her running up and down the hallways constantly, yelling and dragging drunk kids out the door.

After a few minutes she finally walked into the kitchen. “I want you guys out by the next time I come in here,” she huffed.

Joon, one of his teammates, decided to saunter over to the girl. He moved his hand up and brushed her cheek, leaning in to whisper something in her ear. Leaning away with a blush, she looked back at them and said embarrassedly, “You guys can stay.”

When she turned and left, Jonghyun hopped off the counter and high fived Joon. “Dude, what’d you say to her?” Jonghyun asked, impressed.

“I don’t give away my secrets.” Joon smirked.

Minho rolled his eyes because honestly, the girl wasn’t even all that cute. He wouldn’t her himself, that’s for sure. Getting a headache, he left the kitchen going unnoticed. Right now, he really needed some fresh air. Eventually finding the front door, Minho found a few lingering teens still sipping their beers on the driveway.

Walking towards them he took a small gulp of his own drink. They really had no idea he was there. “Idiots,” he mumbled. “Aren’t you guys suppose to be gone by now?” he asked loud enough for them to hear.

The four, which he now realized were boys, looked at him in alarm. One of the boys quickly stepped past him and said, “Umm, yeah, we were just leaving!” hurriedly, the rest following him. One thing stood out to Minho though, even in the dark. A platinum blonde. Taking a good look at him, Minho was sure it was Taemin, and he was pretty sure Taemin realized it was him too. While the boys got into a car together, Taemin looked back at him for a moment, before ducking his head and slamming the door shut.

Shrugging, Minho decided to go back inside. Fresh air obviously caused more of a problem than he had anticipated.

----

The next Saturday, Minho made sure to make it to tutoring early. The problem was, he made it too early, the tutor wasn’t even there yet by the time Minho arrived. Minho had let his coach know why he had to leave practice early and luckily, coach Jung was pleased and allowed him to do so.

He was already draped on the two person desk, it was actually pretty comfy. Hearing the sound of footsteps, Minho lazily looked up, quickly noticing the blonde walk in. “Oh, hey, Taemin,” Minho greeted, sitting up slightly.

“Hey, you’re early.” Taemin made his way to the back of the room where Minho sat. Sitting in the seat next to Minho, he stretched his arms out in front of him and childishly pushed the other boy’s arms to his side of the desk. “You don’t mind if I sit here do you?” Taemin asked, smiling cheekily.

Minho shook his head, amused. “Nah, you’re good.”

Pulling a folder out from his bag, Taemin got out the packet they received the week before. “Did you do it?” he asked out of curiosity.

“Yeah,” Minho said, pulling out the folded sheets from his pocket, “I just looked it all up online, though.”

“Me too,” Taemin laughed, “I don’t have time to go through everything in my entire textbook!”

They both continued talking, not realizing the tutor had walked into the room until he said, “Having fun there?”

Startled, the two stopped. Taemin gave a fake cough, acting like he wasn’t doing anything at all. The man shook his head and turned away. Both of the boys silently laughed to themselves, elbowing each other. Soon the rest of the students entered the room and settled down. Then the tutor, who they now found out wanted to be called ‘Mr. Kim’, began telling a small summary of his life.

After Mr. Kim told everyone about how he was 25, had 4 cats, and how he loved Hello Kitty (Minho was sure now that this guy was, indeed, crazy), he began reviewing history. Throughout the few hours they were stuck there, Minho and Taemin passed notes to each other.

The notes weren’t that important at first, just little jokes about Mr. Kim or they played hangman. But then Minho remembered he saw Taemin after the party was over last week. Stealing another sheet of paper from Taemin, he jotted down, ’Do you go to parties a lot?’.

Taemin shrugged before replying, ’Yeah, sometimes, why?’

’I just remembered seeing you last Saturday… didn’t know if you went to them all the time. I thought I would’ve seen you before.’

’I don’t know….’ and with that, the subject was dropped.

Three hours were up and they were finally dismissed. Minho was the first one to jump up and rush out of the room, Taemin closely following behind. “You didn’t wait for me!” Taemin complained.

“Heh, sorry, I thought you could keep up.” Minho said, turning around with a smirk.

Taemin frowned and kicked Minho right in the . Minho let out a surprised yell, taken aback by the kick, holding his in agony . Acting as if nothing happened, Taemin walked right past him. Minho, on the other hand, came up right behind Taemin and snatched the younger’s sports bag before running out the building. In the parking lot, he turned to see a determined Taemin coming up behind him. Smiling, he held out the bag for him.

“That’s not fair! You’re way faster than I am,” Taemin panted, grabbing his bag back.

Minho laughed, patting Taemin on the head. The younger griped something about how his hair was now messed up. A car suddenly honked, catching them both off guard. Looking up, Taemin said, “Oh! That’s my mom. Guess I have to go now, bye.”

When Taemin began walking away, Minho stopped him. “Wait; give me your cell phone number first.”

Both pulling out their cell phones, they quickly exchanged them and punched their numbers in. Finishing up, the phones were returned and Taemin waved goodbye as he got into the awaiting car. Slowly Minho made his way to his own car, but then noticed Taemin’s car come closer with the window rolled down.

From the window Taemin’s mom asked, “Taemin said you’re the boy who took him home last week. Correct?”

Stopping in his tracks, Minho turned to her and nodded, praying she wouldn’t be upset. “Yes ma’am.”

“Well, I’d just like to thank you! I had an emergency meeting come up,” she said. Taemin was in the seat next to her, looking down. Situations like these were always awkward, and Minho himself wished she would just drive off already but he was relieved she was alright with it.

“It’s not a problem. I didn’t mind at all.”

“I guess I’ll let you go then, have a good day!” she said before rolling back up the window and driving out of the parking lot.

Getting into his own car, his phone began vibrating in his pocket. Surprisingly it was from Taemin, opening the text message it read, ’Don’t tell my mom about the party.’

----

I'd like to apologize for the delay of this chapter... issues in real life have prevented me from being able to edit this chapter.

This chapter Taemin and Minho have finally met! The next chapter will be longer, I promise 8)

Thank you to subits@lj and gaymin@aff for betaing this chapter~