Oh yeah, I forgot to mention this. 

Not that anyone would probably care, but I have put this in normal Asian high schools.

So they only have three years of high school, and their first year of high school actually starts when we North Americans would have grade 10. So even though Kyungmi is a second year in high school, she is 17 and would technically be a junior here.

You don't know how annoying it is for me to go to Taiwan last year and be like "oh I just finished grade 9 I feel so grown up I'm in high school" only to realize in Taiwan I would only be in my last year of MIDDLE SCHOOL. WTF, guys.

~*~

Kyungmi's reaction was instantaneous.

With a loud, mousey squeak, she dropped the envelope like she was burned and shuffled as far away as she could, which wasn't much since her back was to the school building. 

"N-n-now wait a s-second," she stammered breathlessly. "T-that's not, I mean, I-I'm not one of t-those girls, I --"

"Oh, ," L mumbled, his own cheeks starting to heat up when he realized what she assumed. "No, that's not what I meant. Dammit, just ... no. I'm not -- interested -- in you that way. What I meant was, I will help you if you help me."

When Kyungmi realized he wasn't trying to pull a sleazy pick-up line on her (which she was completely uncapable to handle), her heart rate returned to normal and she slowly began to relax. "W-what?"

L frowned in embarrassment, unable to believe he was actually attempting to do this. But this is the one chance I have. I better make the most out of it.

"I can't stand that son of a Saeryun either, so let's make a deal. I beat the ever-living crap out of him, and YOU help me break up with my girlfriend."

Well. That seemed fair enough. Then Kyungmi frowned. "W-why can't you do it yourself?"

L scowled and ran a hand through his hair. This was the exact question he was hoping she wouldn't ask. "Okay, you wanna know why? Because the more I try to pull away, she just clings tighter. I really tried, y'know? I've tried to show as much as possible that we weren't working out and we should split but she just grabs onto me like some sort of, I dunno, leech, and won't let go. And every time I try to bring it up she just starts blubbering and saying I don't care about her and somehow I end up not doing it."

Kyungmi blinked at him. "Well, I'm no relationship expert, but that sounds quite painful."

"It is," L complained, relieved someone understood. "It's like, I don't want to hurt her. She's nice -- sort of -- and she was real sweet in the beginning. But now she's completely crazy. She's talking about marriage, for god's sakes! I'm only seventeen, I'm not even thinking about that! But I just can't bring myself to tell her the normal way, she'll probably kill herself ... or kill me."

"Well, what do you expect me to do about it?" Kyungmi said hesitantly, hunching up her skinny shoulders. "I-I mean, I don't think I can do anything to help you ..."

"Hey, I don't want your money, alright?" L snapped. "I'll ... think of something. Do we have a deal or what?"

Kyungmi bit her lip and hesitated. She didn't want to have to deal with some super-clingy girl. That was definitely OUT of her list of skills. "Can't you just accept my fifty-three dollars and seventy-five cents?" She asked in desperation.

"No." L wondered if he was being too stubborn, but the reactions he got out of this girl was hilarious. "You help me, I help you." He held out his hand, as if to shake on it. 

Kyungmi felt her muscles freeze up and her bones go soft. She bit her lip, clutching her arms around herself tightly, as if to protect herself and provide her with reassurance all at once. L had never seen someone so indecisive or unsure before. She was obviously fighting a war in her mind, and evidently she still wasn't convinced that she could help L at all.

Truthfully, L couldn't see it either. She was just a short, scrawny, mousey girl who happened to be the smartest student in Woollim High. The smartest student who tended to disappear in a crowd.

But I don't want her money.

L sighed and dropped his hand when Kyungmi took too long to decide. He bent down, picked up the envelope she dropped, and gently placed it back into her hand. 

"Come find me when you make your decision," he mumbled, feeling a bit awkward when she still didn't respond. She was so shy and overreacted to anything he said or did, and suddenly she just clammed up and didn't move. What a weirdo.

It was only after L had already left did Kyungmi manage a tiny "Okay".

~*~

Kyungmi was getting her books for her next class when she suddenly heard someone shriek, "Hey, YOU!"

Kyungmi gave a violent twitch and dropped one of her books. The hallways slowly turned quiet as Kyungmi turned to see a very pretty girl storm her way directly towards her.

"Hyunju told me she saw you mackin' it with my boyfriend at lunch!" She demanded, a look of absolute fury on her face. "Well? Got anything to say? Are you trying to steal my man or what?"

Kyungmi pressed her back as far as she could against her locker without actually falling in, her mind racing with fright. Darn you, L. You never told me SHE was your girlfriend! "I-I didn't do a-anything," she stammered weakly, quickly thinking up an excuse. "I, uh, was just asking him for his homework!"

L's girlfriend was still scowling, but it was slightly softer, and she leant back in puzzlement. "What?"

"Y-yeah!" Kyungmi immediately dived in with her lie. "B-because my f-friend knows him through the S-Student Tutors p-program, so I was hoping I could get his homework for h-him! You know, to do in my spare time?"

Please fall for the lie please fall for the lie please fall for the lie

As if it was just a passing fancy, the stormy look in her eyes disappeared, and she gave a weary laugh. "Is that right? Well, you're a nerd, so I suppose that's probably true." She gently fixed her perfect hair, looking a little sheepish and embarrassed. "Sorry about that, Kyungmi. Man, I've been such a lately, probably post-stress from the midterms. You understand, right?"

Kyungmi, too terrified to do anything else, just nodded.

"Oh, good. Knew I could count on you. That cow Hyunju was probably trying to stir something up; she's been looking at L oppa funny since I first met her."

Then, without another word, she spun on her heels and walked away as though nothing had happened.

Slowly, everyone began to start talking again. Nobody got -slapped or embarrassed, so nothing interesting happened.

It took Kyungmi a full minute to regain her senses, and even then she felt frazzled.

Normally, she could handle strangers yelling at her a bit better -- just a bit. But L's girlfriend, as it turned out, was none other than Son Nara. 

Very pretty, very popular ... and very terrifying; at least, according to Kyungmi, and Kyungmi had a good reason to be terrified of L's girlfriend, because Nara had tormented the nerdy girl for almost her entire elementary school years.

Kyungmi could still remember the mean pranks and disasters Nara pulled on her; filling her shoes with water after PE, flinging dirt or snowballs at her when nobody was looking ... and worse of all, that one time when they were twelve, and Nara spilled red ink all over the seat of Kyungmi's chair, on the day when Kyungmi wore white pants. Needless to say -- a girl with red ink on white pants ... it was a complete disaster.

Of course, that was just childish tormenting, and they would grow out of it at one point. Around middle school, Nara stopped the bullying and pretty much ignored Kyungmi's existence, although ignoring Nara was a little bit harder for Kyungmi at that point. She developed a tiny, timid horror over the girl that she called Naraphobia.

The bell rang, signalling for everyone to quickly get to class, but Kyungmi was still so startled over her sudden face-to-face (and reeeeally up close) meeting with her childhood bully, and she didn't even hear it.

She closed her locker and started to walk away, before a hand gently patted her shoulder.

"Here." She turned to see a cute, softly smiling boy.

"This is yours, isn't it?" He held out the book she had dropped and promptly forgot about.

"O-oh!" Kyungmi felt herself blushing in embarrassment. "T-thanks ..."

"You should probably hurry, you might be late," the boy said. With one last smile at her, he walked away.

Kyungmi stared after him, and her overactive brain immediately thought of a charming, handsome prince riding a white horse to save the damsel in distress at a time of great need.

Then she realized that she WAS going to be late for class and immediately drove all thoughts out of her head as she ran off.

~*~

The rest of the day was torture. Normally, Kyungmi loved chesmitry class, mostly because Sungjong was in it and the two of them could have arguments in the back whether balancing chemical equations or discussing polyatomics were more fun to do. Usually they would do both, since the schoolwork was so easy.

But Sungjong was currently lying at home bandaged head to toe, and probably still feeling too crappy to so much as glance at a math textbook. Kyungmi shuddered -- unable to even read formulas, oh the horror!

And after that was English -- which Kyungmi was terrible at -- and advanced functions, which made her feel much better. She usually made up for her terrible English marks with her math and science ones.

But now, without Sungjong around, it was depressing. Especially since nobody so much as looked her way, and Kyungmi realized exactly how alone she was without her one friend.

Not to mention she was still traumatized over her meeting with Son Nara, and her shock over the prince-on-a-horse moment, AND the fact she didn't eat lunch ...

Kyungmi shook her head violently as she left functions class, hoping to get rid of all these depressing thoughts. Sungjong was always so cheerful and bright, and he still smiled at her and told her not to worry while he was lying injured in bed. She should be more like Sungjong. Not that anyone would notice her change in attitude -- since no one ever did -- but it would be nice ...

"What are you doing?"

Kyungmi jumped in fright and turned around to see L. Students were immediately swerving around him to make room (even though he was standing in the middle of the hallway in everyone's way), and many were noticing Kyungmi for once -- eyeing her curiously, wondering what did she do to bring about the wrath of L.

"Wh-wh ... m-me? I, uh --" Kyungmi babbled incoherently.

"You were shaking your head like a dog. Is there something wrong?"

"N-no! That's, uh ... an ... expirement?"

L stared at her with a raised eyebrow. "Are you serious? Well, whatever. So, have you been thinking about it?"

Kyungmi's first thought was to immediately stall for time. "Uh, about what?"

"The deal, obviously. Is it still on or not?"

"W-well, um ..." Kyungmi scuffed the ground with her worn-out shoes. "I, uh ... I don't think I can ..." Finally, she couldn't stand it and blurted out, "Why didn't you tell me your girlfriend was Son Nara?"

L looked slightly bewildered. "Does it matter?"

"Yes, yes it does! If you really must know, I have Naraphobia."

"You have what?"

"An anxiety disorder defined as a persistent fear of an object or situation in which I must commit great lengths to avoid it happening. In this case, I have an immense fear of Son Nara and I do my very best to avoid her."

L stared. "Did you eat a textbook or something?"

Kyungmi flushed red in embarrassment. "I-I do tend to blurt out information, sometimes."

"But how can you be scared of a person? I mean, yeah, she's pretty y, and she'll definitely try to claw your eyes out if you so much as look at me the wrong way -- I've seen her try -- but she's nothing to be SCARED of."

"Usually phobias are disproportional to the actual danger posed, and are often recognized as irrational fears."

"What?"

"Um ... it means most phobias are stastically more likely to not be a real problem in someone else's eyes ... but to the actual person inflicted with the phobia, it is a very real, very dangerous fear."

"Yeah, but ... fear of a person?"

"People can have fear of chickens, I really don't see what's the deal here."

L frowned, looking incredibly disappointed. "Dammit ... I was really hoping you could help me ... didn't you want Oh Saeryun taken care of?"

Kyungmi hesitated. There it was again -- that bittersweet taste of revenge in . The sickening feeling when a nonviolent person wanted so desperately for someone to suffer for what they've done. And Kyungmi knew it wouldn't go away until she did something about it.

There was a loud laugh somewhere in the distance -- Oh Saeryun and his posse of basketball buddies, judging other people loudly and laughing obnoxiously, just so everyone can hear them.

That made her decision.

She looked up at him, finally able to meet him eye-to-eye. "Do you promise she won't beat me up and scratch my eyes out?"

"Of course," L said in exasperation. "I'll think of a way so she doesn't even know you're involved. Trust me."

"And do you promise to make Oh Saeryun suffer for what he's done to Sungjong?"

"I promise."

Kyungmi slowly held out her hand. L caught the barest hint of a tremble, but the light in her eyes were strong, and was set in a determined grimace.

She's weird ... but I think I can get used to it. L grinned and shook her hand.