Everyday. At the school exit, Changmin was there. Patiently, with one book or just an old CD Walkman, he was waiting next to the gate, his back leaned against the light orange wall bricks. He often came alone... Sometimes, Yunho, the one Juhyun thought was the kindestn was there as well. He was the one who already had a girlfriend and who never wanted to give Jessica his number - though she had tried very hard, despite the fact she was dating Jae Joong until her departure, or until she came back to San Francisco, better. Juhyun has not seen one or the other since then... Just Yunho but he never stayed. As soon as she crossed the gate, he was saying Changmin goodbye, greeted her with a quick nod and immediately left.

Everyday, like this, they both were talking in front of the gate when Juhyun had no lessons and should be back home right after school. Changmin only asked her news : how was she feeling, how has been her day. Yoona stayed too sometimes, curious to see what they both had to say to each other but out of this, she never talked about that with Juhyun. It was strange for her to see her best friend, so shy, getting to know a boy and being at ease with him. She was less reserved and though it all, she had more troubles with it so in a certain kind of way, Yoona was impressed by her friend for that.

When Juhyun had her piano lessons, Changmin and her would always leave together and walk together on the way to her music school. While this ten minutes journey, they were talking about anything... It could be what they liked to eat or the last dramas on television, not forgetting the subjects they hated the most in class. It was all happening naturally and never forced.

He had finally told her about his parents and Juhyun immediately raised objections. He was not an orphan... He was too old for that. Since his age was pretty close from the legal age, no one had threw him in an orphenage, oppositely to Jae Joong who have lived a short part of his life out there. Besides he have been proposed to leave to settle with an aunt. But he would have to move on, to change his school and his city... Changmin has chose to get independent, too bad if it was closing doors at his face, because he didn't like to be relying on the others, or to be a weight form them, neither.

He has also confessed her he was working in an hotel, at the restaurant and the room service. On her side, Juhyun has confessed she had tried to get her parents' agreement for a little job. One friend of the family owned a clothes store and needed someone to do the alterations... Her parents never accepted. Her whole schedules were about studies. She was left very little occasions to practice what she liked so Juhyun made the occasions herself. It would not stop her from working very hard. Sometimes, she would have her dinner in her bedroom in order not to be bothered or interrupted in her homeworks.

The ten minutes of strolling with Changmin were her fresh aire bowl. With him, she could behave as the true Juhyun... Not the working hard very disciplined student they were all expecting her to be. Just, herself. Head in the clouds but smiling, a little secretive but her mind open about the world.

It was a sensation she had barely knew until then. It was bracing and it made her feel light, in a good mood... but it only lasted for ten minutes. Then, she was sent back to keep on living her life. Working with relentlessness in a determined goal. It was a chance she really liked playing piano to relax, though her teacher sometimes was severe with her. She was not the best student but she had talent... Her daydreams were the only able to waste her efforts from time to time.

For him, those ten minutes spent together were different. He was feeling very at ease with her too but his life was not a properly defined stranglehold. To work was not what the others were expecting from him but what he was demanding from himself. He was not working to satisfy any desires, Changmin was working to live. The stakes were not the same. The ten minutes spent with Juhyun was like being some regular teenager again. As if there had been no changes in his life. She didn't seem to realize how good the feeling was for him to know he could be the person he always have been.

Just like the fools they surely were, none would realize what was seemingly happening. Who were they one for another? Juhyun's highschool's girls, when they were seeing Changmin waiting for the young girl and they were looking at them getting away together, they were clearly thinking the shy Seo student has found a boyfriend. But they did not realize what their closeness seem to be showing. Besides, none of both were asking themselves questions about the true meaning of their relationship. Only glad to be together, mutually enjoying their companies, she like he tried to ignore what seemed to be blooming between them.

Why was he on her mind all the time? Why the only fact of replaying their last conversation would make his whole day? They were acting as if they didn't see anything and didn't sense anything. As if this situation would fit them eternally...

This day was nothing different from any other days... As usually, Changmin has been waiting for Juhyun next to the gate, leaned against the wall. As usually, they exchanged salutations before leaving to Juhyun's piano lessons and as usually, the girls from her class has been watching them leave, whispering behind her back. In class, none of those girls were talking to Juhyun. But they were chatting a lot between them, on the other hand, and since the young highschool boy was waiting for her everyday to greet her or to accompany her, she was feeding plenty of conversations. They were wondering... How did she get a boyfriend when she looked so unfamiliar to boys?

Questions the others were asking, they didn't seem to have a clue about it. They were living their relationship peacefully not really wondering what it was made of. Yet one like the other knew it, one day they would have to talk about it, to make it clear... But they were putting off this day as much as possible because to be honest, for now, it fitted them both perfectly. Surely because it was easier and less restrictive.

Juhyun was walking as always, talking about anything possible, as usually. She was always smiling and in a good mood feeling when she was walking with Changmin, trying to ignore the things her heart was telling her and which she was not sure she knew the true meaning, unless she pretending not to be sure of what it was to postpone the moment. He liked to watch her as she was talking byt he did not realize she was doing the same when he was the one speaking. Her eyes were shining in a special light and he, foolishly, was thinking it surely was nothing but a simple optical illusion.

Suddenly, in the middle of the conversation, Changmin saw Juhyun freeze. He opened his eyes wide while looking at her running to the edge of the road, a little farther ahead. What was happening? Slowly he stepped closer and quickly understood. There, between Juhyun's hands, was a tiny cat with a white fur, but sprinkled with mud tasks at some spots, that she was lifting with delicacy, getting the animal closer to her face, and he welcomed her gesture with adorable high meows and by moving his tiny paws to the direction of her nose.

"He's so cute, look... He wants to play with me." She added lifting up the cat a little higher to look under his belly. "Oh, it's a male.... Nice little cat. Do you want Juhyun to bring you home?"

Tenderly, Changmin smiled. He watched her holding the cat in her arms and sitting on the sidewalk to him. If she was too slow, he knew it, she was going to be late ar her class but it seemed like nothing mattered anymore for Juhyun except this little fury thing, abandoned on the verge of a road. He sat beside her and reached out his hand to the neckpit of the small feline who already has started to purr.

"He is so adorable, isn't he? How I would like to bring him home..."

"Why don't you do it so? Look, he already have adopted you."

"That would be great but.... I know my mother would never agree. She hates animals so much I can't eve, get some poor little goldfish. How pity... I like him so!"

It always has been this way. Since she was a little girl, Juhyun wanted to have a little dog. Her mother has always refused, using the excuse of being allergic to the canine's hairs. When she had brought home a young bird whose wing was broken one night, her mother has forced her to set him free and to bring him back where she has found him. Fortunately, Yoona's parents have accepted her to keep the animal until he recovered. When it came to rodents, it was her father who was saying they would bring diseases in the house and her mother followed, naturally, not so disposed to get her own point of view about things or just to express it out loud. Finally, about fishes... Their excuses were that they were useless and that changing the bowl's water was too restrictive. Even insisting about how taking care of an animal would help her getting responsible didn't make Juhyun able to have them giving in to her. She kenw it, there were fewer chances for them to accept to take care of that poor tiny abandoned cat.

Changmin was able to see how quickly she has turned fond of the animal and how much she would be sad to let him alone. In his building, animals were forbidden or else he would not hesitate at all and would have proposed her to keep him with him. It was impossible but however he had a plan... If she agreed for being a bit late at her lessons so he could do something...

"Let's build him a little house out there. And when you have your piano lessons, we would come here to get him milk and biscuits."

"That would be a great idea! I am going to tell my piano teacher I have been held back in school... But first, got to get him a name."

A name... Changmin has never been good for that. While still the cat, who was in Juhyun's arms, he tried to think... before proposing the first thing which came on his mind and which was not, to be frank, that original.

"Let's call him snow flakes..."

"It's nothing special, come on!" She said with a little laugh, half-mocking, half-tender.

"Do you have a better idea?"

"Why not Jumin? You know... Like Juhyun and Changmin... And it's not so bad for a male..."

From his point of view, Changmin would thing this would fit better for a female but she seemed like being fond of that contraction of their both names so he agreed to please her. And, it would be nothing good if she was too late because of a name. Busily, they started to look for anything they could to build a nice crib for the baby cat who was now theirs.

He haven't realized it... But their closeness shared while the tiny fury animal has created an echo in Juhyun's heart. Her emotions seemed like strongly increased as he was sitting by her side, giving affection to the baby cat. To know he was so close, to see his hands giving those sweet gestures, she has realized how much she would like him to be as tender with her. Obviously, for Juhyun, Changmin was more than a friend with who she liked to spend little times. She had small clues about it until then, yes... But now her clues were sure things. She wanted to be more than a friend for him.

But how could she let him know? She has never really been in love before and never has been close to a boy so much she would have felt feelings growing inside of her. She didn't know at all how she could make to show him she wanted more than just strolling around together. It might be way for her to get more attention from Changmin...

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Sorry for the long update, it has been pretty hard for me to write that part. But now this moment has passed, I'm feeling more confident about the story and I think I will be able to update more often. Anyway, thanks for reading, subscribing and commenting! ♥