“Seyoon!”

‘Here we go again,’ Seyoon thought when she heard a familiar voice in a very expected morning. It was not something new though she admitted that she kind of looking for that voice for days. But more than that, it was still irritating as ever.

“Seyoon!” Luhan repeated. This time, opening his arms wide as if expecting Seyoon to reciprocate him with a hug but she just walked past by him, covering her face with her hand.

“Hey! Do you think I don’t see you?” said Luhan as he walked backwards, facing Seyoon. “I miss you even if it was just a day that passed. For me, it’s like years,” he said, forming his face lips into a pout. Somehow, Seyoon didn’t know the definition of being cute anymore. If she was one of his fangirls, his facial expression would definitely be defined as cute but for Seyoon, it’s…annoyingly cute.

“Ah, Chanyeol!” Seyoon greeted but Chanyeol didn’t seem to notice her as he continued to walk past by her.

“I don’t think he heard you,” Luhan said to him.

“It’s your fault!” she said.

“Why?! I didn’t do anything,” Luhan pouted.

“You’re blocking my view. Go away,” she said as she hurriedly walked past by him. Suddenly, he heard Luhan screamed. Not her name, but he screamed in pain. She turned around and saw Luhan massaging the back of his head.

“Why? What happened?” she concernedly asked, hoping that this was not some kind of drama that Luhan staged to get her attention.

Luhan looked behind him and saw a rolling tennis ball which he picked up. “This ball hit me,” he said as he looked left and right to find the perpetrator who threw it but no seemed suspicious enough.

“Who would throw that to you? You? Luhan? The man with many fangirls who are ready to kill anyone who would say anything bad about him or hurt him? No way. Did you just made that up? Aish!” Seyoon said, swaying her head in disappointment and totally leaving behind.

“But it’s true. By the way, where’s Kai?” Luhan asked.

“He left earlier today but I really don’t know the reason why. He’s gone when I woke up and I just found a note stuck on the fridge. Why are you looking for him anyway?”

“Nothing,” Luhan replied. Although he felt motivated when Kai said to him that he shouldn’t give up on Seyoon, Luhan sensed something weird in Kai’s tone. The sincerity was seen in his eyes but his voice told him otherwise, like Kai was just forcing himself to say those words to Luhan. But Luhan shook that thought and knew that Kai was sincere enough knowing that he had a girlfriend named Krystal and that his feelings should be directed towards her and no one else, not to Seyoon.

---

When Seyoon entered their room, Chanyeol was happily telling something to Sehun, his seatmate.

“Chanyeol, I saw you earlier but I don’t think you noticed me. Anyway, good morning,” she greeted them. But unlike Chanyeol’s usual half-faced grin spreading happy virus to their world, he just replied with a nod and lips curved that Seyoon thought was something between the border of smiling and not. She replied with a smile as she returned to her seat still thinking that there was something wrong with Chanyeol today or maybe she was just thinking too much.

“Hi!” Lay greeted her. “Would you—”

“Would you believe that Luhan seemed different yesterday? He joined us yesterday for dinner and ate more than he used to. Not only that. Suddenly he was into treating us for midnight snacks. He was really different as if some angel was sent to change him in an instant,” Xiumin said happily.

“I think he said it all,” said Lay.

“That’s great then,” said Kyungsoo as he looked at Seyoon, smiling. Seyoon nodded to him and smiled too, knowing what Kyungsoo had in mind.

“I’m glad he’s okay,” said Sehun. “By the way, about our project, do you already have anyone in mind to work with?”

“Wow, is it really unusual that Sehun started initiating the conversation? Bravo!” said Xiumin.

“I only speak when I needed to,” Sehun said to him.

“Well, as usual, Chanyeol and I—”

“Uhm, I think I’ll be working with Sehun,” said Chanyeol, cutting what Seyoon was supposed to say. Kyungsoo and Sehun looked at him, shocked. It was the first time that Chanyeol turned down Seyoon’s help. Ever since Baekhyun was put in another homeroom class, Chanyeol was always working with Seyoon in terms of pair work.

“Okay…” Seyoon replied awkwardly.

“Do you want to work with me?” Lay asked her.

“Sure,” Seyoon replied but with a tone half-questioning, half-unsure.

“Are you sure? It sounds like you’re not—”

“It’s okay. Let’s do our best,” she replied with a smile hoping that Lay would take it this time. Though she still wanted Chanyeol to be her partner for a lot of reasons and one of them she knew was because she felt utmost comfortable with Chanyeol. Even if she compared it to Kai, Seyoon admitted that Chanyeol’s company was more comfortable.

---

During lunch, Chanyeol excused himself saying that there was something he needed to do so the others just went ahead without him.

“Where’s Chanyeol?” Baekhyun asked them.

“He said that there’s something he needs to do,” Kyungsoo replied.

“Something…I wonder what is that something,” Baekhyun thought.

“Woah, am I seeing what I am seeing? Is that a vacant seat beside Seyoon?” Luhan asked, his smile was stretching beyond normal. He sat immediately beside Seyoon. “Where’s the tall guy?” he asked.

“Chanyeol. Call him Chanyeol. He has some things to do,” Seyoon said to him.

After lunch, Kyungsoo and Seyoon went to their lockers to get some of their things.

“Lunch is a little bit less noisy without Chanyeol,” said Kyungsoo, chuckling.

Seyoon replied with a slight smile, “Yeah right. Do you think there’s something odd with Chanyeol?”

“Hmm, none that I know of except on what happened earlier, you know, when he chose Sehun to be his pair. That’s unusual.”

“But I guess there’s nothing wrong with it. I mean there’s nothing wrong to change your partner once in a while. It’s our choice anyway.”

“If you’re worried about him because of that, don’t think too much about it. And you’re right. Changing project partner is not wrong. It’s challenging but that what’s fun about it.”

“That’s right. I guess I am just not used to it. By the way, are you working with Xiumin?”

“Yes. Luckily, we’re in the same dorm.”

“That’s odd,” said Seyoon.

“What’s odd? Xiumin living in the same dorm as us?” Kyungsoo asked curiously.

“No. One of my books is gone. I just left it here yesterday.”

“Maybe it’s under your desk.”

Seyoon thought carefully. She remembered clearly that she put the back inside her locker yesterday. She even made sure that all of her books were there before he talked to Luhan.

“Maybe you’re right. I’ll just check it out,” she said before looking at her locker for the last time and then locked it.

---

In the end, Seyoon wasn’t able to participate in their class discussion because her book was nowhere to be found. Lay insisted to lend her his book but she was just too shy to accept his offer. Besides, there were a lot of Chinese scribbles in it that made her eyes dizzy just by looking at it.

She was too preoccupied with that book that she didn’t notice Chanyeol just passed by her after class without saying goodbye. She didn’t even realize that Chanyeol never talked to her in class, in fact, the whole day. Maybe she wouldn’t realize because once she opened her locker, her mind was preoccupied with the note inserted in the book that she thought was missing. When she opened the note, she didn’t expect what she would have read.

“You don’t deserve him,” it said.