A  knock on the door. Just in time! You thought as you look at the array of cookies you’ve spent the last half an hour arranging. You’re going to study together with Junhong today, and it’s about time for him to arrive.

“Coming!” you call out, checking yourself on a mirror before opening the door, “Good morning, Junhong.”

“Morning!” Junhong replies, smiling brightly, “I brought some cakes,” he says as he holds up a box, probably from a bakery somewhere.

“Thank you,” you accept the box gratefully. “Come inside. My brother’s not here at the moment.”

“Sorry for intruding~” Junhong says in a singsong voice.

He stands around as you prepare the snacks for studying, unsure of what to do. You then lead the way to your room upstairs, snacks in hand.

“Wow,” is his first impression of your room.

“What?” you put down the snacks on a low table and sit down on the carpet below it, “Let’s start now.”

“Hmm...” Junhong mumbles as he checks out the rack of CDs beside the door, “Lots of interesting stuff here...”

“Junhong, stop looking at other’s--” you stop midsentence. You just realized something. How could you be so stupid as to let a guy come into your bedroom?? Your neck heats up.

“Hey!” he exclaims, grabbing one of the CDs that caught his attention, “I didn’t know you listen to hiphop!”

“Well... I need to broaden my view on all kinds of music,” you explain as calmly as you can, which is not easy.

“Hahaha music of the streets, huh? This sure does remind me of the old times.”

“Old times?”

“Yeah. Didn’t you know?” Junhong turns to you, “I hang out a lot in middle school. Mostly on the streets, too. I have brothers everywhere. I even had a nickname back then. Zelo, from the god Zelus. It was fun, being all thug and everything.”

“Zelo,” you repeated, your throat dry, “What happened, then?”

“Let’s see... I decided that it’d be ugly if I spend too much time doing nothing. Basketball is my passion, afterall. I’d rather concentrate on that. And I’m done with disappointing my parents,” Junhong lets out a little giggle, “But I still like to rap, like in middle school.”

“You rap?”

“Yeah. Wanna hear?” before you could answer, he turns on the CD player, putting in an Eminem CD. He forwards through the tracks until he finds the one he likes.

“Watch.”

And with that, he start spitting English from his mouth. 

Listening to Junhong’s raps feels weird, in a good way. He seems to omit a whole different aura. This is not the Junhong who wreaks havoc everywhere he goes. This is not Junhong who, despite bringing glory to the school’s basketball team, still gets hit by Yongguk songsaenim for being late.

This is a different Junhong, a Junhong who has total command over himself, and probably the people around him. This is a Junhong who has power and knows about it well.

Or should you say, this is Zelo.

Proceed to [16]