“Maybe coming to this school was a bad idea after all,” my ears twitched as the familiar voice rang in my ears.

“Don’t say that Liyin, it’s just—“

“No Yunho oppa, I’m right and you know it. I’ve only been here for a day, and look what has happened,” she sighed tiredly. It was obvious that she wanted to get out of here; out of this school, out of this place.

There was a long, ear-piercing silence.

“We warned them, Liyin. It’s their fault,” Yunho replied, a tint of annoyance emitting from his voice. “If they’d just listen—“

“But you knew they weren’t going to regardless of whatever warning you and the others gave,” Liyin mumbled quietly.

I was having a mental debate to whether I should already leave and quit eavesdropping before I get myself into a serious mess or to continue and let my nosy side take over me—after all, I am still curious about her and the gods. Damn, why do I always catch myself in these situations? This is the second time today.

“I want you to stay. I want you to go to school, and have a proper education, Liyin. That’s all I’ll ever ask from you. Just please stay,” Yunho begged.

This kind of Yunho was so new to me I can’t get myself to believe that he was actually begging.

But wait. What does he mean proper education?

“You make homeschooling sound so horrible,” I heard her whine. “It’s not as bad as you think.”

Homeschool?

“Homeschool is like…a school in a home.” I rolled my eyes. Well, duh. “You’re already home and you still get lectured. It’s like you’re bringing the school to your house.”

She giggled lightly, “no, it’s just like homework, that’s all.”

“Well I don’t like it.”

“Well I do. Plus, you know I hate being the center of attention, and that’s all what the school has done to me already. With the incident earlier, everyone’s eyes will be on me, thanks to you,” she complains cutely. I can imagine her pouting towards him.

I heard Yunho sigh heavily before chuckling softly, “please stay. And no I’m not asking you because you have the ability to calm the insane temper from Junsu, or stop the childish fights from Yoochun and Changmin, or deal with Jaejoong’s knaggy side, or even make me feel better—“

“Okay, okay. I get it,” she laughs amusingly. “A month. I’ll stay for a month. If I like it, then I’ll stay until the end of the school year. If I don’t…then I’m going back to grandpa.”

I eyebrows knitted in confusion as I took the chance to peek at them.

“So you’ll stay?” Yunho jerks upward from his slouching position.

“For a month,” Liyin clarified.

“But you’ll stay?”

“For a month, oppa,” she smiles. “How fast is your mind processing?” She took a step forward and knocks on Yunho’s forehead gently.

I stared wide-eyed as I saw Yunho suddenly carried her and spun her around happily making her squeal and laugh. It’s as if they were…together. But I thought Junsu—

“Hey! What’s with this happy atmosphere?! You can’t have fun without us!” Yoochun suddenly enters the picture along with Jaejoong and Changmin.

“Yunho put her down! That’s unhealthy for her!” Jaejoong scolds, receiving a frown from Yunho in return.

“She said she’ll stay Jae!” Yunho threw his hands up in air once he put her down.

“For a month, if it gets better by then I’ll stay until the end of the school year,” Liyin once again clarifies before dusting her school uniform.

“No Liyin, you have to stay here for more than that, I can’t stand Yoochun hyung,” Changmin points at his hyung in disgust.

“Ah, that’s because I’ve been winning with our arguments,” Yoochun pokes the maknae’s forehead. “I’m getting wittier, meaning better than Changmin’s smart comebacks!” He cheers loudly.

“You are so not!” Changmin denies, trying to get a grip on Yoochun’s collar only to miss as Yoochun ran away from him.

“Junsu!” I hid myself again behind the pillar as I saw him approach Liyin and the others. If it was something I knew about DBSK, it was Junsu having the eyes of a hawk.

“Where have you been?” I hear Yoochun pant from running. “Composing again?”

“No, just took care of some business,” Junsu answers without much of a care.

I peeked slowly again, and frowned as I saw him drape an arm around Liyin.

So I was right, Junsu is the boyfriend—

“Business? It doesn’t have to do anything with Taeyeon-sshi right?” Liyin tilts her head towards him, giving a look of disapproval.

He looks at her for a second before burying his face into her hair, “of course not. I promised I won’t do anything, remember?”

“Anyway,” Yoochun coughs. “Yinyin will stay for a month, she says if nothing happens by then, she’ll stay, if it does, then she’ll go back to grandpa.”

Junsu frowns upon hearing this, “a month? What are you talking about, she’s not going anywhere, right hyung?” He turns to Yunho, his arms still around his girl, hugging her protectively.

“Well…we kind of made a deal.”

“She’s stubborn, as always, so I’m taking that the deal was the only way to make her stay,” Jaejoong sighs before grabbing Liyin’s wrist and gently pulls her towards him and away from Junsu. Geez, I thought he already left; he’s literally popping out of nowhere. “Learn how to share.”

“Hyung~!” Junsu whines.

Liyin laughs at their childishness as I tilt an eyebrow upwards.

These guys aren’t DBSK...it’s impossible.

“Yeah Junsu, learn how to share,” Yoochun mocks.

And they argued and argued until Yunho shuts both of them up before placing his arm around Liyin.

“Taking her to class, you guys should go to yours too,” he waves before walking away with her.

“Yunho!” The rest yelled annoyingly as he dragged her away from them.

I sighed and leaned back against the pillar as they left. I need to tell Ara what I just saw and get her to tell me what the hell is going on.

~~~

“You know if they ever find about you eavesdropping on them you’re going to be hung right?” Ara points her chopsticks towards me and I smacked them away from me.

Why she not even surprised that I told her what I heard?! I dragged her all the way here to the café away from the ears of the immortal beings and this is what she tells me? God.

“Shut up, Ara! I’m being serious here!” I growled. “How could you care less about what I said and think of how I’ll die instead!”

“I could care less because I know the relationship between the six of them,” she states in a matter of fact tone, increasing my annoyance. She pauses and looks at me weirdly, “why are you so concerned? Since when did you take interest? You never even looked at the gods before Liyin-sshi came.”

I remained quiet as I processed her words into my head. She was right in one way or another.

“I’m just curious,” I muttered.

She chuckles at me amusingly, “okay fine, I’ll tell you.”

“Tell me about what?” I eyed her, still annoyed.

“Tell you about Liyin and the gods.”

I leaned in immediately, curiosity getting the best of me. I’ve been dying to hear what she knows since…whenever.

“Let’s start with Yunho. Jung Yunho. He’s her brother—“

“Yeah, I kind of figured that out—“

“Adoptive brother,” she interrupts before rolling her eyes.

 “Huh?”

“He’s her adoptive brother. Liyin had parents who adopted Yunho while they were traveling everywhere.”

“What’s with the past tense?”

“Shortly after Yunho was adopted and arrived in China—“

“China? So…wait, Liyin is Chinese?” I asked in disbelief.

Ara gave me a flat look, “where the hell have you been? Of course she is, duh. If your eyesight was better you would have known that she doesn’t look Korean.”

“Okay whatever, go on,” I waved her off. That subject will have to be discussed later.

“Anyway, after he went to China, her parents got into a plane crash during one of their travels, I think. Some old guy from our country adopted both Liyin and Yunho when he went to China for charity. Originally he wanted to adopt Liyin, but she always clung onto Yunho and would cry when she was away from him.”

I nodded, taking whatever that came out from into my head. This is way too interesting.

“Been living here for a while now, so Liyin has adapted to the language; Yunho is like any other protective brother, you mess with his baby sister, you get a few beatings and maybe permanent injuries,” she shrugged.

“What about Jaejoong?”

“Shh, I’m getting there,” she points a finger at me. “Jaejoong. Kim Jaejoong. He was a street kid I think. His parents never cared for him so when he ran away they were probably rejoicing. Met Liyin while she was out grocery shopping with the old man; if I remember correctly she secretly brought him into their house because she felt sorry for him and Yunho found out. Weird thing is, the two got along well and old man decided to keep him…for the sake of Liyin of course. So her two oppas, Jaejoong and Yunho, are protective like hell. They vowed to protect Liyin-sshi, you know. Kinda weird,” she laughed.

“What unusual stories between those two, Yunho and Jaejoong,” I sighed as I leaned back.

“If they’re weird, then you can say Yoochun’s and Changmin’s are pretty normal. I think they got their stories mixed, I always thought Yunho and Jaejoong had the normal backgrounds while Yoochun and Changmin had the screwed up and stupid ones.”

“And what would theirs be?”

“Yoochun and Changmin grew up together since diaper days. Well, while Changmin was in diapers and Yoochun was in training diapers,” she paused. “Anyway. They argue a lot. It was Changmin who met Liyin first, then Yoochun. Liyin was seven years old when she met them, Yoochun being ten and Changmin eight. They attended the same school, all five of them. But Yoochun was in the same grade as Yunho and Jaejoong, and little Liyin was in the late primary level, along with Changmin who just started elementary. Changmin was a loner surprisingly, Liyin was the one who came up to him first and asked to be friends. Yoochun met her right after when he childishly argued about how Changmin was his best friend and not her’s. And this is when he had his first punch in the face by Yunho.”

“Yunho punched Yoochun?”

“He made her cry, so the protectiveness in him just…activated. Yoochun apologized, and soon enough became close friends with Liyin. That punch must’ve knocked some sense into him,” she chuckled amusingly.

“I’m starting to get it.”

“Well good, I’m not going to explain again.”

“Then…Junsu?”

Her expression suddenly turned serious as she placed a hand over her chin, as if she was in deep thought.

“Junsu. He’s quite a mystery, actually. I really don’t know much about him. His background is kind of shady, so many missing pieces to the puzzle. All I know is he met Liyin during middle school. He liked her a lot back then; he would talk to her when he had a chance. He was a love sick puppy. I don’t know when they got together, looks like it’s been a while. His family background, I have no clue of. Only Liyin and the others know about Junsu. He was never really open to begin with, so finding any information about him was almost impossible.”

“With you telling me all these, I can’t believe they turned out what they are now. I mean Junsu, Yunho and Jaejoong are understandable, being cold to the students and such, but Yoochun and Changmin? They could have been normal guys,” I stated.

She laughs at me stupidly, “Now that’s where you’re wrong.”

“What do you mean?

“Everyone has a secret, don’t they? All of the gods have a dark and bitter secret within them, not surprisingly, Junsu especially. They can be playful and happy, but at the end of the day they have to think about that one secret that makes act like who they are at school,” she lays a finger on her chin. “I guess you could say Liyin-sshi is their cure. If what you told me is true, that you saw them being all happy with Liyin, then there you go. She’s the one that reminds them the positive sides of life. Ugh, I sound stupid explaining it, but you get what I’m saying?”

I nodded, “I think so.”

“So anyway. She’s just so lucky, to have all those guys around her,” Ara daydreamed.

I sat there thinking over what Ara just told me. Junsu’s story isn’t enough for me, it’s too limited. I sighed, it’s not like I care anyway. If it’s not meant to be found out, then it’s not…but still. God, I can’t be serious.

“Oh, and speaking about Liyin,” she pauses. “I haven’t told you about her either.”

“Go on,” I urged.

“Well, let’s see. She came from a very musical family; her parents being both violinists. She plays violin of course, oh and can sing really well. As I said her parents travel a lot for violin performances and such, most of the time Liyin stayed at home learning the violin with her neighbor. She’s very well behaved, maybe that’s why the old man wanted to adopt her. She has a fear of airplanes since her parents died in one. She attended public school until the middle of junior high, when she supposedly ‘disappeared,’” she quoted. “The only reason she did was because she wanted to be homeschooled, since the old man couldn’t pay for all the tuition fees for Yunho, Jaejoong, and her.”

Oh. Then that explains the home school thing Yunho was talking about.

“Wait, but didn’t you say Junsu met her during middle school?”

“Right. Oh yeah. Thing is, after Liyin left, Junsu was lost and miserable. It’s like he couldn’t do things without her. Ah, young love, it’s so cute!” She squealed. “Anyway. Shortly after Liyin left he did also. No one knew what happened to him until he reappeared again in high school, but with the rest of the gang. Everyone thought he was dead.”

“Well that’s rude.”

“No it’s not, if I were him I would have said the same thing. I mean, if you left without a trace and no one knew where you were, I’d totally say you were dead,” she pointed.

I gave her a flat look, “Yeah, okay, whatever.”

“So there you go. Zhang Liyin, all you need to know.”

“Are you sure? Nothing more to say? Her story seems to be a bit short.”

“Positive.”

I sighed heavily and leaned back, “Ara, how do you know all this?”

“I told you I’m Go Ara, I know everything.”

“Seriously. Tell me,” I convinced.

“I have sources.”

“Oh come on! What if all the things you said aren’t even true?”

“Excuse me, what I know is legit. It’s your choice to believe it.”

“Aish, Ara. You’re driving me crazy,” I muttered, frustrated.

“Don’t I always?”

I waved her off, “I’m going home, thanks for the info. Makes more sense now.”

“Yeah whatever, miss I’m-DBSK-crazy-now-that-it’s-needed-for-me-to-know-about-them,” she mocks, laughing at me.

“I am not DBSK crazy, thank you very much. I was just curious. God Ara, whatever. I’m leaving.”

“If you say so. See you tomorrow!”

I’m not DBSK crazy…I’m not. It’s all about being curious…

Right?