“Doesn’t it bother you that someone has pulled such a childish prank?”

“The culprit must be lingering somewhere. If I ever pulled a prank, I would stay to see my victims’ epic reactions.”

“The hallway? Gym? This lockers’ room?” Woohyun whispered, anxiety inching in his voice. His eyes wandered around to every cornered space of the lockers room in hopes of finding just about anything that has got to do with the iced-cold water prank. I found it humorous. Woohyun appeared like he was the victim. Me? I had, I couldn’t care less imprinted across my face.

I scoured the place because Woohyun insisted it.

Our eyes were prying for any related materials. Video cameras, any recording devices, or just about anything. Our search returned pure emptiness. Traces of disappointment became evident, as we left the place. Woohyun’s cheeks were pushed in, his eyes met mine. “I’m just afraid. Our conversation back there. I said that I would protect you. If that person was there, he could have heard it.”

“Chicken!” I hissed. “He chickened out. I believe, the person who pranked me must be waiting in gym class. Look, Woohyun. Stop trying to be the knight in shining armor here.”

“You don’t really care, do you?” Woohyun commented. A dejected expression sketched across his sharp-featured face.

“You learned a new thing about Park In-Na today.” I said. My expression remained blank.

He shrugged his shoulders, “I supposed, there are many things about you that needs to be discovered. I need to know more about you, soccer player.”

 

To be honest, I wasn’t able to understand Woohyun and I’ll pretend not to. He has been going on and on about how thrilled he felt, knowing that his dormitory roommate and transferred student for the semester (yours truly) turned out to be what he has assumed it to be. To fight it off, I added in my wit to stop him from rambling like a nagging old hag.

“What is this that I heard about you having a crush on Park In-Na, the school’s soccer player?” I grinned. Woohyun returned a slight pout in response. His eyelids creased into an eye-smile, nudging me in pure embarrassment. I backed away, pretending to be hurt by his act of shoving.

“You’re not going to use that girly act against me, Park Niel!” he mocked, pulling the sleeves up of his school’s uniform. “Myungsoo had it worst. Look at his leg bruises,” he sneered, his eyes, snapped upward, bearing humor. “In-Na could pass off as a dude, huh.”

He was mocking me for the whole underneath the boy-nerd identity façade. Having to unravel the truth, he was using this as a source of entertainment. Or so, I thought.

“What are you going to do now? You should hurry up and get changed for gym. It’s starting in a matter of minutes.”

I gave a light smirk, pulling the hoodie up of my partially wet sweat suit. I ran a hand on my disheveled looking wig, feet settled into returning back to dormitory room 143.

“What about you?” Woohyun finally asked, fixing the wary look on his face. “Are you skipping classes? He plainly accused, panic flashing in his eyes. “You’re not going to catch the culprit?”

“Go ahead. I think that the chicken will be frustrated that I refused to turn up. Nothing hurts more than a prank that backfired,” I stated, walking away from him. I bit my lips in frustration, my mind fixed into cooping myself in the comfort of my bed.

I wonder if it’s possible to keep this secret to myself. Two people knew, excluding that balding patch. The master of this ridiculous plan. I stared at the ceiling, thinking about it – even harder. My state of mind was in a mess. Woohyun knew and he seemed, a little too ecstatic. I didn’t want him to come close. I drew a line against him for there’s this monster in me that trusted little.

I pulled the blanket and that freaking annoying thing just happened.

“Ach-oo. Achoo! .” I groaned, covering my mouth before the unlikely happens. My throat burned, the flu bug has just dispelled itself. I kneaded my fingers together, suppressing the shivers that came streaming in.

“Bummer, this isn't what I expected. It’s just a pail of iced cold water, In-Na. Be a strong girl. You can't be a weakling.” I mentally cursed, covering my listless body in hopes of recovering before my dormitory buddies returns from their classes.

My energy was depleting in every split second. I tried to drift off to sleep, but I couldn’t. I sneezed for the umpteenth time. I have possibly used up three boxes of tissue in two hours. Dreading every minute of this lame flu, I moved my position from the top bunk and sprawled my body on the leather couch. Today was something wide off the mark.

“Niel!”

The dormitory door sprang opened, where an enthusiastic-looking L.Joe came running in. “We found the chicken who did it!” He looked at me, his enthusiastic expression changed to an apprehensive look, seeing that I have cuddled myself up with two blankets and an auburn sweater on the leather couch.

“Not cool, dude. This is my room. Quit pushing, transferred kid!” Sungyeol whined. “I was supposed to be-“ He rubbed his arms where his eyes too, met my fatigue appearance.

“What the heck happened!”

They screamed in unison, tramping their way towards me with panic, heavy footsteps.

“Achoo!” I sneezed, pulling the blanket closer to my skin. “Ach- I dec