Chapter 4: The One with the Competition

The rain was still pouring as the bus approaches its last stop. The driver glanced at his mirror and saw that his last passengers were both students - a girl and a boy. The girl was sleeping looking at peace on the boy’s shoulder, while the latter seemed rather preoccupied. The driver smiled as he saw the loading and unloading station and scurried to put the bus in neutral mode.

He breathes a sigh of relief, probably too tired from having to drive the entire day, he moved the mic towards his lips and said, “Last stop, Donamdong.” His gaze went over to his mirror once again to observe the two. “Hold on,” The boy said, while the driver only smiled and nodded back in return.

“Nayoung,” He tapped her shoulder, “We’re here.” The said girl opened her puffy eyes, that was due to her incessant crying, she looked at her surroundings. “What are you still doing here? You missed your stop…”

Kyungsoo smiled and looked straight into her eyes. “Don’t worry, silly. One of my priorities for tonight is to send you home safely... Besides I can always call someone to pick me up.” He ruffled her hair. “Now let’s go! The driver is waiting for us.” He stood up and took his bag along with hers and the umbrella.

Once they were near the exit of the bus, Kyungsoo bowed to the driver and said ‘thanks’. He quickly opened the umbrella and faced Nayoung. “Let’s go?” Nayoung nodded and weakly smiled back in return.

The walk to her house was quiet. It was not the type of silence that is needed to be broken, it was comfortable to them both. In fact, among the 5 friends of Sehun, Kyungsoo was one of her closest and they had met first before she got to know Sehun. Their meeting was coincidental, to say the least, they met during an interclass math competition where Nayoung was chosen to represent her class.

“Here take this and show them what you got.” A boy handed a girl a warm can of Korean ginseng. The girl took it and bowed muttering ‘thanks’. She took a closer look at his nameplate that says ‘Do Kyungsoo’. Upon noticing, the suspect, Do Kyungsoo, cleared his throat, “Pardon me! I haven’t really introduced myself, yet here I am offering you a drink.“ He smiled showing off his infamous heart-shaped smile. “I’m Do Kyungsoo the president of the math club. It’s a pleasure to finally get to meet you Shim Nayoung. I heard a lot about you.”

“Hello,” she bowed once more and looked at him embarrassed, “I hope it was good.” She nervously laughed.

“Oh, don’t be nervous! Everything was good! It’s really a pleasure for me to finally see you in a competition.” He