“Hey.” Jinki called out to the two love birds sitting at his lunch table, throwing a carrot stick at the older one with the idiotic brain, Lee Joon.

Joon annoyingly turned his gaze away from his “darling poo,” Mireu, giving him a glare. “What?”

Throwing up his hands in front of him as a sign of defeat, he shook his head. “Just wanted to ask a question.” Jinki swirled around a spoon in his tomato soup, not hungry for once. It was lunch time, and the only thing he had eaten was a piece of toast, yet his stomach was churning.

The younger male, Mireu jumped in his seat slightly, always curious and energetic. “What does our little third wheel want to know?~” The tone of his voice was obviously one of teasing nature. Joon and Mir were his best friends, yet he had always been the third wheel, ever since they had started going out. It had been obvious to him, as the third wheel that they always did have feelings for each other… yet they were both too stupid and simple to realize it. Mir was stuck right onto Joon as if they were inseparable, an arm around his waist and smiling, just happy and close.

Sometimes Jinki was jealous, having someone that close for you to just snuggle whenever you were lonely… or someone to just hold hands with. But… “I just wanted to know… are there a lot of… homoual couples at our school?” Jinki blinked as he felt the growing gaze from the couple, quickly fixing his words. “I mean, I’m not against it or anything, I’m just… curious, you know. I thought you two would know more than me.”

“Well…” Joon met the gaze of his boyfriend, smiling immediately and pulling him closer, taking a moment to think about his best friend’s question. “There aren’t a lot, but the numbers are growing… there are probably a lot more than you think, because some couples haven’t exactly come out, yet.”

Jinki took in his words, thinking over again. It was true though, as time passed, even he had noticed that gay and lesbian couples around their school and just everywhere was growing drastically… “Hm. Well, above all else, you two surely are the best known homoual couple around campus, I can say that much.” The third wheeler joked at them with a snort, immediately being thrown the carrot back at his forehead.

Mir quickly popped in here, gorging over his BLT sandwich like a beast that hadn’t had a meal in seven days. “Whai do chew wont to knoe? Chew gay?” His words were muffled from the ingredients of the sandwich overwhelming his mouth, causing both Joon and Jinki to snort, all at the same time.

“I like s; we’ve been over this…” Jinki gave a slight roll of his eyes, drawing pictures on his lunch tray with the ketchup from the eggs he had bought. “Just curious, you know. Oh, I’m curious.”

With a snicker, Joon met Jinki’s eyes from the other side of the table, playfully serious in his voice of tone. “I was straight too, you know. Well, I thought I was, until I met this gorgeous piece of perfection…” His eyes trailed off to Mir again, causing his boyfriend to playfully start acting girly.

“Oh stop it, baby, you’re going to make me blushu.” Mir placed his fingers onto his own lips, looking down like a shy girl.

Dear Lord, please kill me now. Jinki groaned at his best friends’ exceeding cheesy and gross affection, hiding his eyes from them by shielding them with his hands. “You two are going to make me freaking gag…”

The couple broke out in laughter, always having had too much fun with teasing Jinki. Joon started to eat his salad again, being the health nut he was. “There are many prominent couples around though… Us, for a start. Then there’s Tiffany and Taeyeon… Yunho hyung and Jaejoong, even if their parents are strictly against their love, and also Yongguk and that cute freshman, Zelo.”

“And don’t forget Minho and Kibum! That’s the new couple that’s the hot topic these days… they look so nice together.”

Minho and Kibum? But the boy he had seen underneath the maple tree wasn’t the diva Kibum he knew… no, it really wasn’t. “Minho’s that soccer player, right? The one who scored nine goals this October at the first soccer game?” Jinki blinked, staring at his two friends for the answer. At this time, he realized he wasn’t too interested in the people at his school much… he was also never in with the gossip or what was going on. Mostly because he simply didn’t care or fret too much about anything.

“Yeap.” Mir responded with mayonnaise all over his lips, as Joon used a napkin to wipe it away. “Thanks baby, you’re the best.”

“No, you’re the best.”

“No you!”

“Mir, Joon. I will really throw my left over lunch at you if you two don’t shut up…” Groaning again, Jinki lifted his lunch tray as a threat.

“Alright, alright! Don’t make me throw a lamp at you. You need to lighten up a little.” Mir shrugged with his words, stealing a fry from Jinki’s plate. “Minho’s real popular… always good with both the ladies and the gentlemen. I’m not surprised Kibum quickly swept him away. Although, I’m also surprised that Kibum was willing to go out with him publicly, even with all those rumors surrounding Minho…”

Rumors? Jinki’s eyes shot up at Mir’s, eyes perked up and listening in. “What rumors?”

Joon casted a strange gaze at Jinki, the three of them jumping slightly at the lunch bell ringing. As the students filed out of the cafeteria and walked to their next class, the three boys also did, trashing their left over lunches into the trash can. Walking in a linear line together, with, of course, Joon and Mir next to each other, linking arms, they moved to their next class, gym. “You seem so into gossip already… since when did you come out from your cave to the real world?” Joon joked, stopping in front of the gym.

“Shut up, musclebabo, go to your dance class.” Jinki stuck out his tongue in a playful manner, yet again, rubbing it in his face that he had gym alone with Mir, while Joon was stuck in another class, without Mir.  The musclebabo returned the show of the tongue, giving Mir a final kiss before regretfully moving away from the two of them, down a different hall. Not minding this at all though, the curious soul, Jinki, quickly tugged Mir into the locker room, repeating his question. “Tell me the rumors already!”

Mir chortled, his index finger tapping at his chin, as if what he was about to say acquired extreme thinking. All the while, he started to change into his gym uniform. “Well… you know, that pretty girly boy around the school that no one ever sees, unless he’s with Minho. Choi Taemin. A lot of the guys like him thinking he’s a girl… but they’re too afraid to go up to him, because he’s always so cold to everyone.” Doing his signature snort, Mir crinkled his nose, continuing on with his words as they both walked into the gym floor, sitting in their squad. “Some of the students – even some of the teachers and staff say they’re always… too close with one another, although they’re blood related brothers. A couple of the students have said they even saw them kiss – and not a peck or anything, like a real, French kiss! With tongue and everything. I didn’t know was actually a real thing…”

So that’s what they were… brothers? Although they were just mere rumors – and for sure, Jinki knew from his past experiences not to trust anything said unless you had clear fact in front of you… but… Jinki did have clear fact. He had seen them kiss himself – the rumors weren’t lies for once, they were true. He sat down, moving closer to Mir, not wanting their little conversation overheard by anyone else, even if it was stupid. “Choi Taemin… how come I haven’t seen him around ever, before in my three years of high school life?”

“Because you, mister Jinki, Jinki, ignore everything and anything around you except Beyonce, singing your heart out at karaoke and also, World of Warcraft. Remember that one time in sophomore year, you came to school on a day off?” Mir stated in an as-matter-of-fact sort of tone, pushing his nose into the air.

“That was because no one ever tells me anything!” Jinki sighed, shrugging.

“Pft.” Mir waved him off, shrugging back. “Choi Taemin is in our class though, so you’re extremely unobservant, even if he does skip out a lot of classes…” EHHH?! What?! He had never ever seen this Taemin, though.

“Wait, he’s in our class? Which one?” With his eyes widening at his friend, he leaned in even closer.

“This one, dumbhead! Oh look, there he is over there, in his princess corner.” Mir pointed, as Jinki’s eyes immediately moved in the direction of his finger. There he saw the curly haired beauty again, seated by himself in the corner, not even dressed out for the class, just playing with his hair, as if he was in his own little world.

“Choi Taemin, eh?”