“Wait, so what happened afterward?” Ro asks her best friend, Kim SooMin.

“We-ell . . .” SooMin contemplates, “if I’m not messing up the order, after he tried to get into my pants, I slapped him and then stole his wallet.”

“I thought you stole it already,” Ro says, tipping her head to the side. Her black hair falls in front of her shoulder. SooMin blinks. “Oh, yah,” she says frowning. “Huh . . . Oh! No, yah, so I stole his wallet in the theater and – I forgot this part – after he made a move, I ran out, he came after me, I slapped him, and then stole his phone.”

Ro laughs at the sudden twist in the story. Ro laughs in different ways. It varies from an unabashed bray when she’s with her friends to an airy giggle when she’s nervous. Right now she had snorted a little because the laugh was unexpected. Ro and SooMin hear Ro’s snort and laugh replayed mockingly behind them.

Ro whips around in a second, face starting to get blotchy with irritancy. At the table besides the two friends are three boys; Ro instantly recognizes them from the school year before. They are bastards that always interrupt class with a rude burp or by a scream of the girl whose skirt they tried to flip up. They disgust Ro in every degree possible. Thankfully, Ro only has senior year left with Jae, ChinHo, and Woo.

“Was that you?” Ro snaps. ChinHo snorts again. Ro’s out of her chair before SooMin can stop her. She takes the four steps up to the boys’ table and pushes her face up to ChinHo’s. He shows no fear. “What’s wrong?” he sneers. “Can’t stand to hear your own laugh?”

Ro pulls back her fist – but before she can punch him, another guy comes up next to her and slams him palms down on the table. The three guys jump and their yogurts topple over and the half-melted treat spills. Ro turns her head, stunned by the sudden intrusion. Great, she thinks. Do I have to take care of four guys now? But then she widens her eyes as she catches sight of the two additional guys behind the newcomer. SIX?!

The boy who slammed his hands down stares at ChinHo. Ro has a second to notice his short mohawk before he growls, “Are you making fun of a woman?” Ro raises her brows, standing straight, though her fist stays ready and pulled back by her face. ChinHo's face curls in disgust as he looks at the guy in his breathing space.

“What’s it to you, pretty boy?”

“I don’t approve.” With that, his arms shoot out and grab ChinHo's shirt collar. “Whoa!” he yells. The attacker doesn’t listen. He pulls ChinHo up to his face and hisses, “Get out of here.”

ChinHo gapes at him with disbelief. “This is a public place! You’re just a customer, too; you can’t kick me out.”

“Then I’ll kindly tell the manager that you’re harassing this lady here. Then HE can kick you out.”

Jae and Woo titter. “ChinHo, let’s just go to the McDonald’s down the street,” Jae grunts, glaring at the guy who’s holding ChinHo by the collar. By now Ro’s arms are crossed and she’s watching all this with bold interest. All this for a stranger?

ChinHo makes a disgusted sound. “Yah, whatever.” ‘Pretty boy’ releases him. ChinHo stands up, fixing his shirt and getting in the other boy’s face. The boy doesn’t flinch as ChinHo spits on his shoe and stalks off behind Woo and Jae. The two guys behind the guy that stood up for Ro seem to relax.

One of the – he’s shorter than the other – puts his arm around Mohawk and says lightly, “Yah! BaekHo, please don’t make a habit of that. It’ll give your hyung a heart attack.” The other one smiles. Now THAT’S a ‘pretty boy’. He says, “He did what was right.”

Then they all look at Ro, interested. SooMin has joined Ro and is clutching the hem of her friend’s shirt nervously. Ro her hip. “So,” she says flatly. “Who are you?”

The one with the white-blonde mohawk grins, revealing his eye-smile, bows slightly, and pipes, “I’m Kang DongHo – but please call me BaekHo. I like that name better.”

“I won’t be calling you anything because this is a one-time encounter. And don’t think I owe you anything because of this.”

“Ro!” SooMin whispers, horrified by her friend’s manner. She still can’t get used to Ro’s cold front towards strangers; especially ones that barge into her business. But the mean girl acts like the little girl behind her doesn’t exist.

‘BaekHo’ chuckles merrily. “Don’t worry, I don’t expect anything.” He gets a sparkle in his happy eyes. “Would you still like to know their names?” he asks motioning to his friends. The supposed hyung waves with an open face [GIF OF ARON WAVING WITH BOTH HANDS]. The other one also waves. “Ello!” he says in accented English. Ro just raises her eyebrows. Her expression reads, You’re pitiful and I don’t have time for dunces.

Ro purses her lips. “I need to know the people in my living environment – especially the ones that barge into others business – so yes, their names.”

BaekHo points to the tall one. “MinHyun and” – he points to the other – “Aron Hyung. Your name?”

“You don’t need it,” Ro replies bluntly. This earns her a desperate yank on her shirt. BaekHo tilts his head. “You’re friend’s name?” he tries.

“No. Heck no.”

BaekHo just smiles. Ro grits her teeth. This guy’s optimism is really irritating. “Well, it’s still nice meeting you,” he says pleasantly, putting his hand out. Ro stares at him, not blinking and not acknowledging the hand in any way. Aron whistles lowly at Ro’s iciness. MinHyun perches his elbow on Aron’s shoulder and chuckles quietly. “Wow,” he mutters. “Someone who’s not affected by BaekHo's ridiculous happiness.”

After a second, BaekHo's hand retreats to the back of his head to awkwardly mess with his hair. He grins sheepishly. “^^; I don’t know why I was expecting anything.”

“Yah,” Ro answers with a dry, pursed-lips ‘smile’.

“Bye then!” The BaekHo, MinHyun, and Aron continue their way up the path, peeking back at the two girls frequently before they reach a corner. Then the boys are gone.

SooMin strikes her best friend’s shoulder. “Yah!” Ro exclaims. “You were so rude!” SooMin yells. “They were so kind to help you, especially that BaekHo kid. And you didn’t ever offer a handshake? Shame on you, Choi Ro!”

Ro frowns at the small storm next to her. Ro is taller than SooMin by almost half a foot; SooMin was the unusually short one. It’s sometimes funny to watch her get mad. To have a small thing shout at you from the ground is an amusing spectacle. Ro says, “They didn’t need our names though, right?”

“It would’ve been polite though,” SooMin grumbles, collecting their yogurts so that the two girls could head home. Ro shakes her head, accepting her food, before walking besides SooMin. “No, I have no need for people who are just going to desert me just as fast as they appeared, so why bother with names?”