"He... likes me?"

Lynn blanked out from class for the rest of the day. She didn't even notice when the bell rung or when her teacher called out her name. During lunch, she would try to act normal but after what Xiumin told her in the morning, she couldn't concentrate on the silly stories her friends told. She was hanging out with Chanyeol, Kai, Amber, Luhan, Chen, and that Bao Zi at lunch. Tao wasn't feeling so well so he went home before lunch even began. According to Luhan, Kris was too busy with Tiffany that they haven't really spoken to each other nor hung out for a couple of weeks. And weeks eventually led to months. It seemed almost as if Kris Wu had disappeared from his brothers' lives. 

"Ugh I hate functions. Do we really need this when we're done high school?" Amber complained, flipping through the pages in her grade eleven math functions textbook. "Why can't we just... you know... not take math?"

"For your information, Joseph, you need three mathematics credits to graduate. Just it up for the rest of this school year and next year, you're free from it." 

"Wise choice, Irene. Wise choice indeed. Why are you so smart? You should give me some smartness in your brain so that I won't be flunking the course. It's university functions for goodness' sake!" 

"Why thank you, Joseph." Chen stood up to bow in a gentleman manner. Ever since the seven of them hung out more often, Chen has been calling Amber Joseph and Amber gave Chen the female name "Irene". Since Amber's middle name is Josephine, Chen was just being lazy and shortened it to Joseph. It was just how the two rolled. 

"I really don't understand why you two can't stick with your own name. I mean, Jongdae sounds nice already and Amber sounds nice too. Just stick with your name already or else I'm going to call myself Lulu. It reminds me of a ballerina and I've always liked watching ballet. Those girls are so..." People just have this tendency to tune out on Luhan whenever he talks with hand gestures. Poor guy.

Chanyeol glanced at Lynn who sat quite far from them. She didn't touch her sandwich and only drank a little from her bottle of iced tea. He wasn't happy with what he was seeing. She propped her knees against her chest with her back leaned against the wall, her legs were crossed and she had her head nuzzled in her pretzel arms. It looked as if she was asleep. Chanyeol, who originally sat next to Luhan, scooted his over until he was sitting right next to his best friend.

"It has been a long time, hasn't it?" Lynn slowly looked up from her 'nap'. "It's been a while since we've talked... Just the two of us. Mind telling your best friend what's wrong?"

"Channie..." Confusion crossed her eyes and Chanyeol easily picked it up. He knew she was lost in a maze and couldn't find a way out. Chanyeol patted his right shoulder; his behaviour told Lynn that he will always be there for her to lean on.

"It's okay... Meet me after school, okay?" She nodded like a little five year old.

The last two periods gone by a little bit quicker than the morning half of the school day. Lynn was feeling tired, both mentally and physically. She couldn't help but to think what she should do if Kim Jongin really did like her. Should she be happy? Would he ask her to be his girlfriend? Would she say yes? She just didn't know what to do. I need Channie right now...

Even though Chanyeol and Kai were her best friends, she felt much closer with Chanyeol in regards to expressing her thoughts. He was like a blood brother to her, similar to Kyungsoo. 

The bell for last period finally rung. All students rushed out of their respective classroom and headed home, while some lingered around inside the class or in the hallways reuniting with their friends. Chanyeol sneaked out of class a few minutes early (luckily he didn't get caught and serve detention for being such a rebellious teenage boy) and travelled to room 143 to pick up his best friend. Like an older brother going to pick up his baby sister from kindergarten, Chanyeol waited until the students from that class left. He saw Lynn slowly packing up her bag, placing her light books into her Jansport bag and holding onto the heavier ones against her chest. 

"Lynnie!" He called from outside the room. There was a fine line between the hallway and the classroom, and to Chanyeol, it was respectful to the teacher if he waited patiently for his friend outside the classroom and behind that fine line. He believed that it was wrongful to interrupt a teacher's class (even if the school has ended) because they may still be teaching or talking to students after class. Chanyeol is such a good student.

"Park Chanyeol, you can come in and maybe help out Lynn with some of those heavy textbooks. You're welcomed any time, got it?" The teacher, Miss Wong, walked to the door and smiled at the young boy. She turned her head around and saw Lynn walking towards them. "Have a great weekend."

Right, I forgot to mention. It was Friday, and following its tradition, a smirk appeared on Chanyeol's face. But before he could open his mouth and utter a single word, Lynn cautioned him, "Don't. You. Dare. Park."

Hinting the annoyance, Chanyeol quickly shut his mouth. "But you know it's a good song!" 

"Last time you sang it, my ear wouldn't stop buzzing." He was about to open his mouth again when Lynn interrupted him the second time. "Suho." 

And that was all it took for Chanyeol to close his mouth again.

Chanyeol took the lightest textbook out of Lynn's arms and hugged it against his own chest. They were walking towards Lynn's locker to retrieve some things when she spoke up, "So where are we heading? Is it just the two of us?"

The young boy grinned. "It's a surprise! Hurry up and get your stuff so we could go!" He gently pushed Lynn forward to speed up her pace, pretending he was using all his strength to move a sturdy rock.

"You dummy, I hate surprises." 

What Park Chanyeol meant by surprises was to treat Lynn to something sweet yet yummy in their tummy. They were sitting outside Sweetie's Cafe, enjoying the warmness of the season. Chanyeol sat across Lynn and was pleased to see his best friend's reaction.

"Channie!" Lynn was dumbfounded after running up and down a flight of staircases and being dragged left and right, and across the roads (they were jaywalking so they were at fault) when the pedestrian lights were red. "You know I don't like chocolate, candies, cakes or anything that can cause a cavity to grow in our mouth!" The teen bellowed.

Sitting directly in front of her was a plate filled with various sweets. There were glazed donuts, chocolate and strawberry cheesecake, chocolate dips, chocolate chip cookie, a blueberry muffin, cream-cheesed bagel (for Chanyeol), a vanilla cupcake with blue icing and a cherry on top, and a bunch of candies (marshmallows, jelly beans, fuzzy peaches, gummies) that created a pretty tall tower. Next to the plate sat an enormous bowl of ice cream sundae (perfect for the warm weather outside). Chanyeol planned to share the sundae with his best friend. 

"But sweets can make you happy!" He reasoned.

"But-" 

"No more buts, alright? I paid for that-" Chanyeol pointed at the delicious amount of food, "-with my own hard-working money. Don't waste my efforts, alright?" Then out of habit, Chanyeol leaned over the round table and ruffled Lynn's hair.

She pouted, throwing a small tantrum at her best friend. "You can have it all. I don't want it." With arms crossed, she harrumphed and looked away from the plate of deliciousness. Chanyeol decided to a little bit. Even though Lynn doesn't like eating sweets (she doesn't want to get cavities and then having to go to the dentist to get them filled) she ends up eating it since she doesn't want to waste food.

Her eyes kept glancing at Chanyeol, and seeing how there was an unknowing smile creeping up on his face, she couldn't help but keep in her laughter at his facial expression. "What, you want some?" The young boy teased, picking up the vanilla cupcake with blue icing and a cherry on top, and then taking a bite out of it. Without his realization, some of the creamy icing placed itself on his nose.

Lynn saw that and burst into laughter. Grabbing a napkin that Chanyeol took from the countertop, she leaned over the table and wiped the icing off her nose. "You looked funny." 

Chanyeol was happy just hearing his best friend's laughter. It sounded a little evil to him but thought it was much cuter than those girly giggles. He hated those types of fake laughter, having to hear it come out of many girls' mouth countless times. Chanyeol preferred real laughter rather than those fake ones.

"It's good to see you smiling again, best friend."

After Lynn's laughter slowly faded, she took a fuzzy peach and popped it into . Chanyeol caught her red-handed and joked with her. "Hey, I thought you said you didn't want these!" He frowned on purpose.

"You said not to waste your effort. Since you paid for this which is quite rare, of course I have to enjoy this opportunity!" 

"You, Lynn, are so sly..." 

"Love you too, best friend." 

And once they were finished eating and enjoying their best friend time, with just the two of them and no one else, they left the venue. Chanyeol suggested they head over to Lynn's house and hang out especially since it's a Friday and there won't be school until next Monday. The two best friends agreed on that and hung out in Lynn's room, her telling him all about her dilemma.

"I don't know, Channie... Kai is a really good friend and I want to keep it that way. Then there's Kris. I still like him...  I don't know what to do."

It didn't seem like the candies and cupcakes lasted for the day. The two best friends were sitting on Lynn's bed with a pillow in their arms. As it turned out, Lynn ended up sobbing into her pillow.

"I feel like I'm trapped in a very complicated maze game with only two exit choices. The walls are built so high that I can't see which path I'm walking on. I-I... I'm so lost. It's like Kai is on one end and Kris on the other. If I take one wrong step forward, I can't go back. I'm scared, Channie... What should I do?"

Chanyeol was speechless. He couldn't give any advice to his best friend, afraid that one wrong word could potentially hurt her. He doesn't want to see her so (heart) 0broken like this. 

"Channie..."

He pulled her into embrace and soothed the young girl. "Don't be afraid. Just listen to your heart." It was the only thing he could say to her.

"My heart?"

"Yes. Listen to your heart." 

Silence. One could easily hear the other's breathing pattern - slow and steady.

"Well, Lynnie... you know what we should do? Let's bake some cookies!"

"YAH! Enough sweets for today, you idiot!" 

And the atmosphere went back to normal.