"Alright, ladies, stretch and get ready for another day in Hell!" the gym teacher commanded. She was a short, stocky woman who looked like she'd eaten the Yeti and Bigfoot for breakfast and had packed up the Loch Ness Monster for lunch.

"," someone grumbled as they all lined up on the track. Tomorrow, they'd be separated into classes, but on the first day of school, they were going to do laps. Fun beyond comparison, right?

"Alright, start... NOW!" Taeyeon heard the woman's monstrous voice command. She groaned as she started to jog, feeling a million feet behind her stomp on the pavement. She quickly fell into the din of average speed runners, who plodded heavily across the track with no spirit to speak of. Yep, that was her.

"Holy , look at her go!" a boy shouted. Taeyeon looked up from the mass of shorts and sneakers to see a figure streaking through the crowd from the back. Taeyeon followed the girl with her eyes, and the head turned to reveal Minjung's smirking face. The girl jogged closer, as Taeyeon nearly tripped over herself trying to get away.

"See you at the finish line, princess," Minjung murmured with that coffee-mint breath. Then, she took off again, slipping between the crowd and coming out on the other side with that arrogant little grin.

"Damn, she's fast... No wonder she's on the track team," someone muttered. Taeyeon looked over and saw two boys immersed in their conversation. Already half-way exhausted, Taeyeon jogged over.

"Is she good at track?" Taeyeon asked, batting her eyelashes to guarantee that she got her answer. She'd always been good at the whole eyelash thing. She'd learned it when she was only ten. The two boys looked at each other, flustered.

"Y-yeah, she's amazing. She could've made regionals, or even nationals, but she kept ditching meets in order to go help out her dad," one of hem replied. He received a sharp elbow in the ribs from his friend.

"I was going to say that," he hissed. Taeyeon left the two to battle amongst themselves while she jogged a little ahead. She saw Minjung turn the corner, already nearly done. Minjung finished her first lap before anyone else was even half done, and she didn't even look tired.

"What'd you think of my performance, princess?" Minjung teased into Taeyeon's ear. The younger girl, who was unaccustomed to seeing someone she despised being so good at something, jumped a little in urprise and looked at Minjung with desperately-surpressed awe.

"Get away from me, you freak!" Taeyeon snapped. Minjung gave Taeyeon a piercing smirk as she sped off again, completing another lap before anyone could comprehend her speed. Taeyeon just looked down at her shoes. She knew every time when Minjung lapped her because shed feel the other's piercing eyes on her face, but she never indulged Minjung by looking up. Never.

Finally, she and the rest of the class headed into the locker rooms. It was then that she broke into a sprint. After all, the first ones into the room would be able to shower, and she was desperate to wash off all of the sweat on her svelte body, because that grime sure as Hell didn't belong there.

"Move it, ladies! I swear, you're slower than my husband in the morning," the gym teacher grumbled, clapping her hands behind the group of exhausted students. Taeyeon panted as she tried to stay awake from the exhaustion of the physical activity.

"I hate running," she muttered to no one in particular as she plodded behind some idiot who smelled like gym shorts and some who dragged her feet and sweated out some liquid with the odor of death.

"Really? I love it," a voice said right by Taeyeon's ear. Taeyeon jumped up at the sound and turned to see Minjung, a smirk on her shining face. Her skin was slicked with a sheen of sweat, but she was grinning ear to ear. Taeyeon scowled.

"Yeah? Well, you're weird," she snapped irritably before charging inside. She managed to dive inside of a shower stall before it was claimed, stripping in the stall and nearly yanking the water dial out of the wall in her desperation to start the water. She tilted her head back with the cool sheet of moisture fell on her heated skin.

She lost track of how long she was in the shower. She stayed inside the stall until the luxurious flow of water had rinsed the peach-scented shampoo from her hair. She let the silky soap slide right off of her pearly skin and sighed as she stopped the water.

"Time for Spanish," she grumbled, reaching outside for her towel. She hated changing in front of other girls. It wasn't that she was insecure. It was because she didn't like seeing other girls . It made her feel... Out of place. Weird. Fuzzy inside.

"Cool, I'm coming with you," a voice said from outside the stall. Taeyeon screamed and jumped back at the sound of Minjung's voice, her hand retracting as if it'd been bitten by a serpent. Minjung's hand reached it, Taeyeon's clothes dangling off of her long, elegant, yet callouses fingers.

"G-get away from me!" Taeyeon demanded, shrinking against the wall. Minjung let out a cruel, soft chuckle as she curled her fingers and uncurled them, Taeyeon's clothes hanging off of their tips.

"As you wish," Minjung sang out, and before Taeyeon could stop her, she had dropped Taeyeon's new clothes onto the shower floor. Taeyeon gathered them up, but they were already soaked. She could feel frustrated tears rising to her eyes, burning her soft cheeks as she wiped them away. Minjung was going to ruin her year. She just knew it.

She managed to dry her clothes a little with the dryer in the wall and get to class on time. The teacher was still assigning seats when she walked in. Minjung, her last name starting with "C," was already fast asleep at her new desk. Taeyeon frowned as she stood in the line, waiting to be seated.

"Lee, Taeyeon?" the teacher asked. The girl raised her hand and stepped out of the crowd, her damp socks feeling cold on her shins. Her blood felt equally as cold when she saw where she'd be sitting. Right next to Minjung. Always near Minjung. For the love of everything good and decent, why did destiny hate her?

"Poor Taeyeon," she heard the crowd mutter as Taeyeon took her seat. Minjung opened one eye, her gaze bleary as she saw Taeyeon sitting down. Taeyeon bit her lip, expecting some monstrous comment, but Minjung just picked her head up, turned it towards the window, and kept sleeping.

She's like an animal. A big, lazy, stupid cow, Taeyeon thought bitterly as she opened her book. She could still feel how wet her bra was, and her underpants. She was never going to forgive Minjung for this. Never, never, never.

~

"... And then she just dropped my clothes on the floor! Just like that! Look at my skirt!" Taeyeon shrieked, holding out the slightly wrinkled fabric for her boyfriend to see as she sat in the passenger's seat of his car.

"It's not that bad," Jinki said reasonably. In all honesty, he could see why Minjung would have a grudge against his girlfriend. If he remembered correctly, Minjung and her friends had always been a hop and a skip away from being convicts, while Taeyeon had always been a chariot and a knight from being a princess. Minjung wasn't evil, and Taeyeon wasn't... Well, okay, she was spoiled... And a brat... But she wasn't bad. The two were just oil and water. Incompatible.

"It's ruined!" Taeyeon sobbed shrilly, the tears pouring out of her eyes. It wasn't the skirt that bothered her. It was the fact that Minjung seemed more vicious than ever before. She seemed so determined to ruin Taeyeon's life this year, when everything was finally going to be perfect.

"Listen, I'll buy you a new one, okay? We can go shopping this weekend, okay?" Jinki said with a smile. Taeyeon sniffed, wiping her eyes as Jinki finally started the car. He liked Taeyeon. He really did. What he liked most was how easy it was to make her smile, and when she smiled, she looked radiant.

"We'll go to the mall on Route 12, right? I love that mall," she said with sparkling eyes. Jinki chuckled as he kissed her cheek before pressing on the gas.

And the car didn't move.

"What?" he muttered as he slammed his foot on the gas pedal. The car sputtered before everything shut down. All the lights flickered off, and the engine seemed to just go dead. Jinki got out, looking at his ride with confusion. Taeyeon felt like crying again.

"Worst first day ever," she muttered as Jinki kicked his tire. He didn't understand what could've gone wrong, nor did he have the knowledge to figure it out. He just kicked the tire again, hoping for a miracle.

"Stuck?" a voice asked. A voice that sent shivers down Taeyeon's spine. She looked out of her window in fear, and sure enough, here came Minjung, her worn-out messenger bag hanging from her shoulder.

"Yeah, my car won't start up," Jinki snarled as he aimed a foot at his tire again. Minjung hummed as she opened the driver's seat door. Taeyeon squeaked and shrank away, imagining Minjung grabbing her by the throat, but Minjung just popped the trunk and took out the keys. She didn't even look at Taeyeon as she moved to the front of the car, leaning down and running her fingers over the metal parts.

"Your spark plugs are shot," Minjung told Jinki, straightening up again when she'd founding source of the problem.. "I can fix it, though," she assured. She smiled a little, and Jinki offered her a huge grin.

"Can you? That'd be great! How much do I owe you?" he asked as Minjung reached down and fiddled withthe spark plugs again. She knew that shot spark plugs were supposed to be replaced if they were being handled by a kid her age, but she was one of those grease monkey babies who felt it in her hands when she had a piece of machinery fixed.

"It's fine. Pro bono, man," she said with a smile as she felt the tingle in her hand that told her that she was done. She pulled away and lowered the hood. "Alright, start the car and see if I made this kitty purr."

"Sounds like a plan," Jinki laughed. He got into the car and, ignoring Taeyeon's pout, started up the vehicle. He grinned and stepped out, shaking Minjung's hand. "You're a total life saver."

"Nah, I'm not. You should take that to the mechanic. You need to get those things replaced," Minjung said with a small smile. Jinki nodded and shook Minjung's hand again before getting back into the car. In the window, Taeyeon could see Minjung turn and walk away.

Mixed in with the relief was a sense of emptiness. Neglect. How could Minjung interact so much with Jinki and not even look at Taeyeon? Or was it just because outside of school, Taeyeon was no longer interesting? Taeyeon had lost something?

"Am I different outside of school?" Taeyeon asked as Jinki got into the car. The boy thought for a moment before shaking his head and smiling at what he thought was the right answer.

"No, not really. Hey, Minjung's cool, huh?" he asked, wanting to change YHE topic. He didn't know that Minjung being cool was what was bothering Taeyeon at the moment.

Why is she so nice to Jinki? Why is she only tormenting me?

~

"So, how was school?" Minjung's father asked as he tossed the back of cement to the side. Immediately, ten other heads went up from the crowd of dusty, overworked, underpaid drudges digging the foundation for the new house they'd been assigned to. Minjung groaned as she plopped down at the work bench to begin homework.

"Boring," she muttered. She fasted her teeth into the cap of a pen and popped the writing utensil out. She only had Spanish homework, which had been put on her cheek while she slept. Easy.

"Well, did you see that pretty girl today?" one of the other men asked, wiping a dirty forearm against his sweaty brow. Minjung looked up, confused as she paused in the middle of translating a sentence.

"Pretty girl? What pretty girl?" she said with a confused tone, but she figured it out as soon as she said the sentence. "Yeah, Taeyeon was there."

"Well, what happened?" Mr. Choi asked his daughter eagerly, leaning on his shovel. Minjung rolled her eyes as she bowed her head again to continue with her work.

"Nothing, dad. Absolutely nothing," Minjung muttered. She wished that the men would just leave her alone so that she could get to reading the packet about El Cid, but they were incessant. For a bunch of burly construction workers, they sure were interested in the adventures of a high-school girl.

"Did you talk to her?"

"Did you annoy her like usual?"

"Didn't you like her when you were a kid? What happened?"

"Doesn't she have a boyfriend?"

"¡Cállate!" Minjung shouted, and the crowd fell silent on her command. She glared at all of them before closing her book with a huff. "Okay, she and I hate each other, okay? We are not talking. At all. And yes, I tormented her a little, but just for fun."

"She's in love!" the men all shouted triumphantly. Minjung groaned and let her head fall on the work bench next to a hammer and a screwdriver. Sometimes, she wondered if those yellow hardhats were doing their jobs right.

"I'm not in love with her! I don't even like her! She's a little with a helpless idiot for a boyfriend and she's so spoiled and..." Minjung trailed off with a loud groan.

"You know, the more you think you hate someone, the more you—" One of the men, Mr. Kim, was cut off by the sound of a bulldozer breaking down. Minjung leapt up and immediately raced over, jumping up onto the hood.

"Alright, finally some excitement!" she said as she swung from the mirror onto the top of the hood and opened it up. She held her breath and closed her eyes as a waft of smoke flew into her face. When it was gone, she peeked and saw the problem.

"I don't know what happened! The ing piece of junk just broke down," the bulldozer driver snarled, kicking the caterpillar tires with a disgruntled huff. Mr. Choi puffed up like a bullfrog.

"Hey, watch you language around my daughter!" he shouted, raising his shovel as if about to smash it into the man's skull. The rest of the gathered workers roared with laughter.

"Choi, your daughter's sleeping with strangers from clubs every other weekend. I don't think a little cursing's going to corrupt her," they pointed out raucously.

"Yeah, well as long as she's safe and comes home, I can accept that, but I can't accept someone trying to dirty my daughter's ears with that foul language!" Mr. Choi shouted. The sound of the bulldozer coming to life distracted the gathered audience.

"Got it! One of the gears was loose," Minjung said with a bright smile. She was happiest working on the vehicles littering the construction site, or helping the men move heavy lumber and dirt around. Since her mother's death when she was three, this rowdy bunch was her family. Every single one of them.

"There goes our 'Magic-Hands' Minjung!" the men cheered as Minjung hopped down and gave a high-five to the driver. The man hopped back onto the vehicle and started working again, winking at Minjung as the girl rushed back to her dad.

"Good job," he murmured, patting her back. Minjung nodded and smiled. Sometimes, it was enough to just look at her in order to know how happy she was. She didn't need words. Her eyes said enough, even saying things that she didn't know herself yet.

After all, that was how the men knew that she was in love.

A/N—I miss you, life ;~;

But I got a 2320 on my SATs :D And now time for subject SATs...

More to come, comments are love!!!