A:N/ Sorry it took until today for me to put this up...I spent 3 hours going over the story yesterday (cough cough avoiding an assignment) but as you may or may not know, it's spring here right now and yesterday was...well...kind of extremely hot... My house was still warm at 10:00 last night...and because of the heat and the extended use and whatever, my laptop overheated and refused to acknowledge anything I put in the USB slots (so no USB to transfer the file, and no mobile internet) but it recovered today, so I was able to get my story! Thank you so much for all the subscribing and the commenting and the anticpiation and excitement, you literally made me soooo happy yesterday/ this morning, not even kidding!!!!! Enjoy the first chapter!!!!

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Chunji could barely suppress the groan of frustration, threatening to burst forth from his throat, as he surveyed the other members of his group. The situation was the same as it had been 5 minutes earlier, when their teacher had first given them their task. He looked past them at the relaxed form of his closest friend, glaring daggers at his unseeing body.

It was all CAP's fault that he was here, anyway.

The only reason he'd agreed to take this class, was because of the other boy. On and on, CAP had pestered him, begging not to be left alone in the unit. All over the break, he'd given one justification after another, trying to convince Chunji to join him in the class, adamant that he'd fail the subject without him.

Chunji didn't doubt that for a second. Even with Chunji there, CAP was so lazy about his university work. If it weren't for him; lending him his notes, helping him revise for tests, reminding him about assignments, explaining the homework, CAP would do nothing. It was no surprise that the boy flunked almost every class he took, without Chunji. He practically stalked him on campus, just to ensure that he'd make it through his degree.

But all Chunji got in exchange from the arrangement was aggravation.

There were times like this, where he didn't even know why he bothered. The moment they'd been told to arrange themselves into groups, CAP had taken off, happily reclining in a seat over the other side of the classroom, leaving Chunji all alone. Though he couldn't say he was surprised at the behaviour; one of the things that people needed to learn, when they got to know CAP is that he was pretty selfish and irresponsible.

He'd known CAP for years, and still he allowed himself to get taken in by the other boy's complaints. He really had no one to blame for the situation but himself, and yet he knew he'd probably continue to blame CAP for the mess. It was much easier, and it wouldn't really change anything.

CAP was dozing in his seat, arms folded neatly across his chest. Chunji shook his head slightly, never having been able to pry from the other boy's closed lips, what he did all night that made him so tired during the day. But Chunji suspected that it had something to do with his x-box. Or Niel.

He sighed, as his focus returned to the group surrounding him. Once again, the responsibility would fall to his shoulders to save the day. He was starting to wonder if he was the only person there that actually cared about their grades. He'd tried to tell himself that he wouldn't be so controlling about stuff like this, now that he was a university student, but he couldn't help the rising feeling of alarm at the thought of what might happen if he didn't step in now.

From what he could tell of their conversation, 2 of the people hadn't done this week's readings. Another person had done half of the assigned readings, and was in the process of explaining the general gist of what that reading was about to the first two. That only left him, and one other boy. He already knew that he'd done both readings, so he turned his attention to the other boy.

Now that he was actually looking at him, he realised that his face looked kind of familiar. He supposed that it could have been due to the fact that he'd seen him in the lectures, and tutorials ever since they'd started this subject 3 weeks earlier, but Chunji suspected that wasn't why the boy looked familiar. He wondered, vaguely whether they had ever had classes together in the past, and he just hadn't really realised it before now. He shrugged off the thought disinterestedly, for the moment, his only focus being an assessment of his final group mate's knowledge of the work.

The boy kept his gaze down, towards his book, fiddling distractedly with his pens. Chunji couldn't recall the boy's name and so he was unable to get his attention right away. He'd kind of been hoping that the other boy would look up when he got that feeling that he was being looked at. But if anything, the other boy only pushed his chin closer to his chest, as though he hoped that he could make himself invisible to the other students through that one, simple act.

Chunji supposed, that in a way, it was working. No one else at the table seemed to have acknowledged his existence ever since he sat down, and Chunji himself couldn't place just how many classes they'd had together. He had to frown at himself, feeling a little disappointed at his own ignorance. Chunji was usually pretty good at remembering other people's names and faces. He felt bad at the thought that he couldn't even remember the other boy's name despite his being a classmate, from possibly numerous subjects.

Still, the way his teacher started circling the room, made him wary. He couldn't really afford to waste anymore time considering things like that. He needed to find out how much L. Joe knew, so that he could get their group under control. He hadn't wanted to take the reins, but clearly, the group wasn't going to function, unless he stepped up and took on the responsibility. He didn't want to risk being scolded by their teacher for their poor performance that day. “Hey?” he called, staring intently at the other boy's brown hair, hoping that the boy would realise that Chunji was trying to attract his attention.

By this stage, if the other boy didn't look up, he might seriously have to consider throwing the contents of his pencil case at him, one by one until he got the other boy's attention. Almost as though the other boy had heard Chunji's mental threat, the other boy's head shot up, his eyes blinking quickly in his confusion. Chunji suddenly found himself staring into the flustered face, of his classmate, and despite himself, he found the lost look on the other boy's face rather endearing. “I'm sorry. Were you speaking to me?” the other boy questioned, pointing towards himself, unconsciously as he spoke.

Chunji could see the look of recognition in the other boy's eyes when he looked at him, and he knew that the other boy did indeed know who he was. He felt a small trickle of guilt at the knowledge that he couldn't say the same in return, but he pushed the feeling aside. “Yeah. Have you done the reading?”

The other boy shook his head from side to side, an almost panicked shine to his eyes, though he tried to keep his features carefully blank. The hand that had previously pointed to himself, was now shuffling on the open page of his book, trying to cover it from Chunji's line of sight. The action made Chunji suspicious. “Oh no... Well, I mean I did... But I didn't really understand any of it... I really... Have no clue about this, maybe you should ask the others...” he commented, apologetically, fumbling and stalling with his words.

Chunji couldn't help wondering to himself why the other boy talked so deliberately. He sounded so awkward and stilted, like he wasn't used to talking to other people. Was that because Chunji had caught him off guard by speaking to him in class, or did he rarely talk outside of class as well? Still, he pushed aside the questions, certain that he'd never get answers to them, anyway. “Now, I'm sure that's not true. What have you got there?” Chunji asked, reaching over for the other boy's notebook, hoping to uncover whatever the other boy was trying to keep secret from him.

He was really going to have to get a name for this other boy.

L. Joe's arms tensed, as though he hoped to try and keep Chunji from taking his possession, but he made no real attempt to keep it out of Chunji's nimble fingers. Within seconds, he'd inched the book out from beneath the weight of the other boy's arms, revealing words on the page. They were upside down, so it took him a moment to recognise what they said. Immediately his eyes darted back over to the whiteboard a the front of the classroom, to confirm his thoughts.

“Well, well, well. It seems someone was lying to me.” he stated, knowingly, unable to resist the small, amused smile that drifted onto his lips, at the sight of the other boy's reaction to his gentle teasing. His gaze drifted back down to his page, as he tried to shake his head in disagreement, his fringe flopping down into his eyes into the process. Apparently the action had caught him off guard, and a couple of the strands had managed to poke him in the eye, because the next second he was rubbing at his right eye, with his sleeve.

In his distracted state, Chunji was able to turn the notebook to face him, more and he got a better look at what the other boy had started writing on his page. He nodded his head, absent-mindedly biting his thumb as he perused the other boy's neat handwriting. This boy had made quite a few good points in answer to their question, and Chunji found himself very impressed.

He'd been beginning to think that he was the only diligent student in the classroom.

But a humble one, as well? That certainly caught him by surprised. He wasn't used to humility. Here the other boy had all the answers, right there, but he tried to act as though he didn't know anything. He didn't want anyone to know what he thought; that he'd done the work and understood it. All of his friends tended to blurt out whatever stupid thing popped into their brain, only to be quickly and loudly corrected by the others who tortured them mercilessly for their slip ups. He was used to arrogant levels of overconfidence.

Compared to that, modesty and shyness, was kind of sweet. The fact that he'd managed to find 3 things endearing about this other boy within the span of 5 minutes, only made him feel guiltier about the fact that he didn't know his name. “Why'd you say that you didn't know? Your answers are really good.” Chunji murmured, glancing over them again, puzzled at the other boy's response.

All he got was a subtle shift of the shoulders, in response. He surreptitiously flipped back to the front cover of the book, but frowned realising that there was nothing written their to indicate who owned the book. Darn. He handed the notebook back over, with a sigh of defeat noticing the way the other boy half pounced on it, right eye now weeping due to the harsh rub he'd given it a moment earlier.

Chunji wondered if that was how he'd look when he cried. But he doubted that little frown would be there if he were.

Usually he didn't tend to get so intrigued by his classmates, but that was because they were boring. They were either goody two shoes know it alls, or they were airheads that knew nothing. They were all far too loud for his liking, or else they never said a word, staring blankly off into space, or sneaking glances at their phones. But this boy, he was something else. He seemed different. That made him interesting.

Still, Chunji didn't allow himself to dwell on the matter, as the teacher stepped closer to their group.”So what have you come up with?” the woman asked, patiently, her gaze clearly revealing that she thought they had done nothing. In all fairness, she was technically right. So it came as no surprise to Chunji when his group mates, began stuttering half-heartedly, trying to convey ideas about the text, that they didn't possess. Their gazes swivelled around to everyone else, almost frantically, pleading for someone else to take over.

Chunji knew he should take that as his cue to step in and save the day. “Well, we decided that we disagreed with the statement, based on the readings for several reasons. Firstly, because the argument in the first reading made several points about why it wasn't true, that the second reading failed to discuss. But after a little more thought, about the points raised by the second reading, we found their claims to be unsubstantiated. Though the author cites numerous examples, as evidence, none of those examples is documented through citations. As such, we have no way of verifying the points the author made, whereas the first author carefully cites everything, making them more believable.” he stated, carefully. He kept his gaze fixed on the teacher, struggling to suppress a grin at the look of shock on her face.

Undoubtedly, he would've seen a similar look on the faces of the rest of the people in their group, if he'd bothered to look in their direction as he spoke. “Who noticed the use of citations in the two works could be used as a point?” the teacher asked, intrigued, looking from one student to another, in the group trying to hazard a guess as to where that idea might have sprung from. Chunji immediately looked over at the other boy, unable to name him, but still wanting the teacher to know who had the idea.

Her gaze was shocked as she looked at the other boy, whose chin had been almost surgically attached to his chest since she stepped over to their little group. “You came up with it?” she questioned, uncertain whether she would need to prod the other boy, to get him to realise that she was speaking to him. Without even looking up, again the other boy nodded his head, a short bobbing movement that sent his hair splaying from one direction to the other a second later.

“What's your name?” she asked, a bewildered look in her eyes, as she scanned the roll in her arms, up and down, trying to see if she could work out who he was by elimination. “Lee Byunghun.” the other boy answered, his voice hushed, and his cheeks clearly flaming at the knowledge that his teacher had no idea who he was. Chunji repeated the name over and over in his mind, trying to fix the name to the image of the timid boy beside him. He didn't want to forget his name again. Ever.

The teacher nodded to herself, clearly scribbling something next to his name, as she mumbled a distracted, “Good work.” to the group, before moving over to the next group. Chunji reclined, relaxing into his seat, as his group mates released a sigh of relief at the teacher's retreat. Immediately their conversations shifted back to questions of other classes, and fun pastimes, and Chunji could only shake his head at them, a pleased smile making its way onto his lips.

“Thank you, Chanhee.” Byunghun mumbled, fiddling with his fingers in an attempt to calm his racing heart. The knowledge that Byunghun had even known his name only made him that much more disappointed with himself, but he decided that as long as he remembered Byunghun's name from now on, he could pretend that he'd never forgotten him. “Any time.” Chunji responded happily, curious why the other boy would be grateful to him, when all he did was reveal what Byunghun had thought to their teacher, but Byunghun made no attempts to explain himself. Chunji assumed that the other boy must not want to talk to him anymore, as he remained silent.

One look at Byunghun told him that the other boy was shy, but they'd already been having a conversation, it wouldn't have taken much to continue it, if Byunghun had wanted their conversation to keep going. He'd figured that maybe Byunghun would want to talk to him, but he supposed that he was just being arrogant, thinking that. There was no such thing as popular people, now that they were at university. Everybody stuck to their own little groups, or else they went it alone. He just happened to be part of a group. But because his friends were pretty loud, and spirited he'd always sort of assumed that other people knew who they were, and wanted to be a part of it all.

That was probably just because they didn't realise how hard it was looking after people like that. People who acted before they really considered the consequences. There was always some mess that needed cleaning up, and if the person couldn't conceal it, and take care of it by themselves, they tended to come to him.

He knew it was kind of stuck up to assume that Byunghun would feel grateful that he was talking to him. He didn't even know why he paid it as much attention as he had. Plenty of people didn't talk to him, and he didn't pay the matter any mind. But there was just something about Byunghun that felt different. A nice sort of different. He had kind of liked the thought that he might get to make friends with someone different; someone special. He'd felt like they might have a bit in common; he reminded Chunji of himself back when he was in high school.

Still, if Byunghun didn't want to make friends then that was fine by him. He had enough friends as it was, anyway. He wouldn't pay the matter any more thought.

The bell signalling the end of class, rang and Chunji quickly shoved everything in his bag, getting up and smacking CAP on the back of the head, to get him to wake up. The boy would have slept straight through the bell, if he didn't come and wake him up, at the end of every class. He chuckled at the slight pout on his face, before he stood, stretching and the two boys walked out of the classroom, Chunji complaining about how CAP just up and left him for the group work, and CAP tuning out what he was saying.