*

LEE CHAERIN

*

*Yawn*

Waking up early Monday morning from a long, restful sleep, I stretch my limbs to free them of their stiffness all while with a great big smile on my face. I’d had a really, good dream about me and Kris last night. I won’t go into too much detail, but let’s just say that he was in my room just like he was the previous night only, it was only him and I. Bom and Dara weren’t here and instead of conspiring a plan to get Minji and Jongin talking again, we were…

*GASPS*

“Oh my gosh!” I whispered in shock. All of last night’s events suddenly came crashing down on me and I remembered…

Minji and Jongin! They’re still locked up in her room together!

Hastily, I shot off my bed and sped across the room over to Dara’s bed where both she and Bom were still sleeping. Ferociously, I began bouncing on the bed to wake them.

“Bom! Dara! Girls, Wake up! Minji and Jongin are still locked in her room!”

“What?”

“OW!”

“Whoops. Sorry, Dara-ah.”

I rolled my eyes at my two friends. Bom, who had woken up disoriented had accidentally slapped Dara in the face when she turned over while flinging over her arm in the process.

Now awake too, Dara rubbed sleep from her eyes.

“You guys, we have to go unlock the door and let Minji and Jongin out before school starts!” I told them.

Last night, Dara, Bom and I, along with Kris had performed a little prank on both Minji and Jongin in order to force them to talk to each other again after all the drama that had happened over the last month. Believe me when I say that our entire senior class was suffering do to those two and their stubborness to just work together, but then after having worked with Jongin myself for the last couple weeks, I knew from firsthand experience that the reason for a lot of the drama was due to him alone.

He was the reason our senior class was still without a proper student council and the reason we still didn’t have any clubs started even despite being well into the midst or the school year. This was all because Jongin refused to get his lazy up and do anything besides mope and lie around in his chair all day instead of actually doing any work.

This was also part of the reason why the girls and I along with Kris had taken it into our own hands to get Jongin and Minji speaking again. We hoped that maybe if they got the chance to really talk, and hash things out then maybe Jongin would come around and we could finally get student council started before it was too late in the school year to get anything done.

I could tell the senior student body felt the urgency, too. Everyone was getting so antsy about the fact that there were absolutely no clubs or fundraisers, or dances, or activities for the seniors or, anything at all. Our senior year, which was supposed to be the highlight of our youths, was actually looking bleaker with each passing day. And now that I had been elected to take over Minji’s place as female representative of our senior class ever since Jongin had had Minji removed from her position as co-president, my peers were now always bugging me about when our clubs would finally get the green light.

Knowing that I couldn’t rely on Jongin to get anything done I was going to just go ahead and count all the votes myself, but then I had gotten a little preoccupied with other things once Kris had started hanging out with the girls and I more often and in that time we started brainstorming together on how to fix our senior year.

After Kris had come up with the idea for the prank call, I knew we had to do it and that’s when we all came up with the idea to lock Minji and Jongin up together in her room so they could finally have that long, overdue heart-to-heart.

It seemed to work. Or, at least based off the way they sounded when I had called last night it sounded like they were at least cordial. Minji had even joked that they were getting married and I remember hearing Jongin laugh in the background. That had to be a good sign, right?

All I know is that last night Minji had said the two of them were okay now. How okay were they, exactly? Well, it was only one night that they were locked up together and forced to talk, after all. We would have to see how things went after we let them out of that room and if they kept their promise to stop all the fighting. But I didn’t know.

Regardless, it was morning now and we had to let them out. If not, locking two people up together against their wills and confining them to a room for an entire night could have us all possibly be facing kidnapping charges.

“Oh yeah. I forgot they were still locked in there,” Bom said looking far off for a moment. She then looked back at me. “Do we really have to let them out?”

I rolled my eyes at her. “Uh...Yes! Hel-lo?We all still have class in a few hours.”

Bom sighed, reluctantly in response as she got out of Dara’s bed. “Alright.”

“Do you think they actually made up for real last night or do you think they were just faking it?” Dara asked as she got out of bed as well.

I shrugged. “It sounded like it when I called them last night, but there’s only one way to find out.”

Bom and Dara nodded, and with that we all made our way up to the dormroom Bom and Minji shared, casually passing and greeting a few girls who were getting ready early for the school day, along the way.

Once we got to the door on the third floor, from my pants pocket, I pulled out the keys to the new door knob we had swapped and replaced with the old one in order to lock up Minji and Jongin together. Putting it through the keyhole, I turned and unlocked the door.

“Minji,” I called as I opened the door, slowly, not knowing what to expect. “Jongin. You guys we’re here to let you out.”

There was no immediate reply, of course, but as I pushed the door open fully, I was unexpectedly greeted with a rather peculiar sight...

It was Minji. She was fast asleep in the middle of the floor in the strangest position. Her body was hunched over, her legs folded, and tucked underneath her with her knees touching her chest. Her arms were sprawled out behind her, palms facing upward, and her head was turned to the side, but because of the odd position she was practically leaning on the top of her head.

Needless to say, it didn’t look very comfortable, at all and I was wondering how she could possibly sleep like that.

With the door open, the girls and I walked into the room. I went straight over to Minzy’s hunched over body in the middle of the floor and kneeled, stretching out a hand towards her to shake her gently.

“Minji-ah,” I called through a whisper, trying to be gentle as to not startle her awake, but when I received absolutely no response from her I shook her a little harder and called her name a little louder. “Minji!”

*crickets*

Seriously, she didn’t budge even the slightest. I was actually beginning to feel a little worried especially when Bom bent down beside me to shake Minzy as well only to get the same unresponsive outcome.

“Well, that’s strange,” she said looking at me, confusedly. “Minji has never been a hard sleeper. In fact, she always wakes up way before I do. She’s usually the one yelling at me to wake up.”

“Hey, you guys,” Dara suddenly spoke up for the first time since we entered the room and I looked up at her to see her glancing around the room with a perplexed expression on her face. “Where’s Jongin?”

I furrowed my brows as I glanced around the room and that’s when I realized for the first time since we had all entered the dorm that he wasn’t in the room. Kim Jongin was seriously nowhere to be seen. Which was odd considering we’d all locked both him and Minji in the dorm room last night, so he should’ve been in here as well.

“Um...that’s a very good question,” I said looking back down at my still sleeping friend, wondering what could’ve happened last night, but when I heard Dara gasp above me, I looked up at her, questioningly, only to see her looking across the room at something.

Following her line of sight, my eyes landed on one of the windows to the room. The window was wide open, the white lace curtain around it blowing from the light breeze flowing through. I didn’t know what to make of it, but Dara seemed to have an idea.

“Oh no!” she cried, face twisted in horror, before turning it to face to me. “What if they got into a major fight last night! What if they got into a big ol’ fight and Jongin got so mad that he knocked Minji out cold with a blunt object causing her to pass out in the middle of the floor and then he escaped out the window! Oh Chaerin, I told you it was a bad idea to lock them up together!”

I shook my head, nearly guffawing at the absurdity of her reasoning. “Now hold on just a minute. Let’s not jump to any crazy conclusions without knowing what happened. We just need to think rationally and figure out just what happened between them last night.”

“Uh, hey, you guys might want to see this,” said Bom now, who had moved over to the open window only a second ago to inspect it after Dara had made a fuss about it. She was looking out the window, staring down at something, from what I could see. Dara and I shared a glance before following Bom over to the window to get a look at what she was staring at.

When I peered out the window, my eyes widened, extremely surprised to see none other than the very young man we were all questioning about in regards to his whereabouts just a second ago. But what I was witnessing was a rather odd sight. About as odd as finding my unconscious friend in the middle of the floor in a very uncomfortable-looking sleeping position.

Kim Jongin. He was passed out in the bushes just outside the girls’ dormitory.

“See!” Dara exclaimed, triumphantly. “I told you he had probably hit Minji and then tried to escape out the window.”

I tilted my head to the side in confusion. “I-I...don’t know…None of this makes any sense.”

I really had no clue what he was doing out there sprawled out in the bushes like that, neither did I have any clue as to what could’ve happened the night before. Minzy lying unconscious in the middle of the floor, and Jongin outside, unconscious in the bushes that surround the girls’ dormitory. This was all really weird…

But little did I know, things were about to get much weirder.

“Awe, ...” a voice suddenly grunted, harshly from behind Dara, Bom and I. “My neck!”

Reflexively, Dara screamed, Bom gasped and I jumped at the sound of the voice and all three of us spun around only to see none other than our friend, Minzy, finally stirring awake.

“Minzy!” I gasped before we all rushed over to her. I landed on my knees to be level with her as she started to lift up, but she seemed too stiff to be able to do so, properly.

“OW!” she hollered in pain as she tried to straighten up, but failed. I assumed her pain must have been from the odd sleeping position she had been in for who knows how long. From the looks of it, it seemed she couldn’t turn her head for her neck appeared to be stuck so she could only look in one direction. Her head was stuck facing her left shoulder and in order for her to be able to look at us she had to turn her entire body towards us.

“I’ve got a kink,” she groaned in discomfort. “I’ve got a major kink in my neck.”

“Minji, are you alright?” Dara asked, concerned.

“Yeah, what happened to you?” Bom asked as well.

In response, Miniji gave us all the strangest look, her expression confused. “Minji? What-”

“What happened last night?” I asked, impatiently.

"What do you mean?” she questioned as she began rubbing at her neck trying to loosen the kinks, but then when her fingers caught a few strands of her long blonde hair, she lifted them up and stared at them in complete bafflement.

“What the hell?” she whispered under her breath, perplexedly, as she started to pick up strand after strand of her own hair, yanking and tugging on it like she was surprised to witness that she actually had hair. “What is all this? Since when did I have long hair?”

I lifted an eyebrow in response, flabbergasted by my friend’s actions. With the way she was behaving she was staring at it more like it was ramen noodles growing out of her head rather than hair. Was my friend actually surprised that she had hair?

“Minji…” I began, trying to grab her attention, but my words caught in my throat when all of a sudden she started to grip and gasp at her own chest, lifting and kneading her s all over the place.

At first she had stared at them silently for a moment with big ol’ eyes like she couldn’t believe what she was seeing, and then before I knew it, she was kneading her own s together like she had never seen or felt them before in her entire life.

“I have...s?” she said to herself, still feeling herself up. Cupping each in her hands, she gave her them a couple lifts. “Oh man, am I getting fat? Since when did I start getting man s? ”

I glanced over at Bom and Dara both who looked just as perturbed by Minji’s behavior as I felt and I knew we were all thinking the same thing. Something was definitely off about our friend.

“Um…” I spoke up, trying to ignore her strange behavior. “Minji-ah, what happened last night?”

She suddenly stopped kneading her as she faced me with a perplexed expression. “Wait, why do you keep calling me Minji?”

And for the second time that morning I was at a loss for words. It took me a moment to respond.

I shrugged. “Um...because that’s your name…” Or, at least I had thought it was, but with the way she was looking at me in that moment I wasn’t so sure, so my response sounded more like a question.

Minji’s face twisted, looking highly displeased. “No, it’s not.”

Both my brows lifted high. “Uh...since when?”

Minji looked between Bom, Dara and I in silence for a moment before finally exploding on us. “Okay, would you all please stop playing around, now? Didn’t you guys prank me and Minji enough last night－not cool, by the way－and where’s Kris? I still have to kick his for being apart of this whole -plan of locking Minji and me up together.”

I blinked, taken aback by Minji’s change in tone. Her entire demeanor was different than what I was use to. Minji was always calm, cool and collected. But now… well, for one, I wasn’t used to hearing her curse so much. Not only that but the way she talked sounded different. Her voice sounded...gruffer, practically like a dudes.

And why was she saying she wasn’t herself? That was a whole other level of weird. If she wasn’t Minji then who was she?

I scratched the back of my neck uncomfortably as I answered, “Uh…Kris went back to his dorm last night. You...are you feeling okay?”

Minji’s eyes narrowed at me as she fixed me with the iciest expresion. “Am I feeling okay? Of course not! You guys all locked me and Minji in her room all night! Then I wake up only to find out that I apparently slept on the floor all night in the worst position so now my neck is stuck! It’s Monday and I still have to get ready for class even though I feel like ! And now you guys are all in my face calling me by the wrong name. Where is Minji, by the way?”

She started turning in all directions looking all around the room, looking for her ownself. My lip twitched as I suddenly felt the urge to laugh. Ok, this was just weird.

“Uh…I’ve got a better question,” Bom interjected from behind me. “If you’re not Minji, who do you think you are?”

Minji’s entire face fell as she stared at each of us with a dead expression. “Are you guys ing with me right now?”

A cold front suddenly swept over the room in that instant.

Okay, woah. I was taken aback by the coldness of her tone. Yeah, this definitely was not the Minji we all grew up with. We all shook our heads simultaneously.

Finally, she rolled her eyes and answered. “I’m Kim Jongin! I’ve been going to this same academy with you all since the start of the school year. Why are you all acting so weird?”

“Jongin,” I repeated in shock. “You think you’re the headmaster’s son?”

Minji rolled her eyes in annoyance. “No, I don’t think I’m the headmaster’s son. I am the headmaster’s son.”

This got me scratching the back of my head in confusion. Well, this was uncomfortable.

“Um...a-are you sure?” I asked in disbelief, staring back at the girl who although physically looked like the friend I had known for the last four years was apparently someone else, entirely.

“Yes I’m sure!” she replied, looking at me like I was crazy. “What the hell kind of question is that?!”

I clicked my tongue before pointing towards Minji’s closet where her mirror hung on the door.

“I-I think maybe you should check a mirror.”

“Kim Jongin’s” eyes narrowed as he sneered at me. “Why?”

"Because you’re gonna be surprised to see who's staring back at you,” I replied, warily.

Minji, or “Jongin” sat staring at us for a moment like we were complete wackos before finally turning away and looking for the mirror which was fastened to the door of Minji’s closet from the inside. “He” stalked over to it all while grumbling to himself about us being crazy.

“Seriously, I have no idea－what the...” My friend who was apparently actually Kim Jongin had begun scolding us at first, but once he caught sight of his own reflection staring back at him in Minji’s mirror, he jumped, nearly out of his skin.

His face (or Minji’s face) was in a state of shock, horror, and disbelief at the sight. Seeming not to believe what his eyes were seeing, he turned and did a quick glance check behind him before facing the mirror again as if to try to figure out if Minji were actually standing behind him or if he was actually seeing her face in place of his own reflection.

But once he seemed to realize that it was her own face in place of his own, he slowly walked closer to the door-length mirror all while staring at his reflection in complete shock and gripped the edges of the mirror’s door frame. Moving Minji’s head around in all directions, he studied his new appearance before slowly looking back to Dara, Bom and I who all stood on the opposite side of the room in silence.

In a gravely, low whisper, he mouthed, “Why－the hell－am I－in Minji’s－body?!”

I gulped, frozen in shock not knowing the answer. “That is a very good question.”

*

I watched on as Jongin paced all around the room with the madness of a man whose feet were on fire. He was seriously starting to make me dizzy.

“Oh my gosh!” He had suddenly caught his reflection in the mirror again, causing him to stop for a second and stare in horror. “OH MY GOSH!”

He then looked down at his new hands, and his new body, staring in bewilderment before screaming. “AH!” He then gripped his new chest. “AHHH!” Then he tugged on his new long hair. “AHHHHHHHH!” His whole body was shaking now.

I, on the other hand, flinched and cringed at his reaction. He seemed to be nearing a mental breakdown, which if considering what he had just told us about him actually being Kim Jongin was true and he actually was in Minji’s body right now, I couldn’t blame him if he did.

His breathing became sporadic as he started to hyperventilate.

“I don’t understand h-how this could’ve...*gasp*...happened,” he said in a panic. “Everything was...f-fine just last night.”

"Easy breaths," I encouraged him as I began inching closer to him, carefully. “Jongin, I need you to tell mejust what did happen last night?”

“I-I…” Jongin looked into blank space as he tried to recall his memories of the night before. “W-well, after you guys called and revealed you guys were the ones who locked us up together in her room, we talked things out for a long time and that’s when Minji said we should call a truce to end all the fighting so we did and even shared a celebratory drink to make it official. Then she went into her closet to change clothes or something while I waited out here and that’s when…”

“That’s when what?” I urged him to continue.

“I passed out,” he finally revealed, still looking off into space. “Everything suddenly got really blurry, and it felt like the ground was shaking underneath me. I got really dizzy and passed out. Minzy had to wake me up by slapping me and when I got up I felt really sick so I decided to go back to my dorm by climbing out the window...”

“Then what?”

He shook his head. “I-I don’t remember what happened after that.”

“That must be why Jongin’s body is in the bushes outside,” Bom said.

“WHAT!” Jongin turned, his neck snapping in the process. “OW!” The kink must have finally snapped. He rubbed his neck as he faced us. “What are you talking about?”

“Oh, your body is currently sprawled out in the bushes outside the girls’ dorm,” Bom said pointing at the window.

“WHAT?!” Jongin sprinted over to the open window to look outside. “That’s my body!” He exclaimed before he started to yell out the window. “HEY! HEY!”

I assumed he was trying to get a response from his body currently lying on the ground outside, by yelling at it but, of course, that didn't work. That's when he then turned and suddenly sprinted for the door.

“Wait, where are you going?!” I yelled, following after him.

“To get my body back!”

On a quest to retrieve his body, Jongin ran through the semi-crowded halls of the girl’s dormitory like a madman all while bumping into and knocking girls over left and right, earning him lots of death glares in the process. As I followed him with Bom and Dara close behind, I apologized to the girls on his behalf. After all, they had no clue what was going on. Heck, I didn’t even know what was going on.

Once we got outside, Jongin rounded the corner to where his body was at. Jongin gasped at sight of his own frame sprawled in a bush like he had been tossed and left there. He bent down, staring at his body in shock and slowly reached a hand out to touch.

“Minji,” he hissed harshly under his breath, shaking his own body to wake up, but nothing happened so he called again, harsher this time while shaking his body. “Minji!”

“Wait a minute,” I said trying to process everything I had just witnessed so far. “ You think Minji-ah is in there?” I pointed to his body.

“Well, obviously,” he said looking up at me. “If I’m stuck in her body then she has to be in mine.”

I shook my head trying to gather all the info he was telling me. “That would mean...are you trying to tell me that you and my best friend somehow...swapped bodies last night?”

Jongin glared at me before glancing back down at his own frame. “I think we did…”

I paused in silence considering the possibility for a moment before finally exploding.

“Well that’s just crazy!” I roared. “You actually expect me to believe all this? Minji-ah, are you pretending to be Jongin, right now? I know you and him were really angry that we played that prank on you two last night. Did you guys come up with this plan to get back at us? To fake switching bodies just so you can prank us back or something?”

Suddenly, red hot, iron rod eyes zeroed in on me making me gulp.

“You think I’m making this up, Chaerin?!” He suddenly jumped up to his feet and started stalking towards me as he yelled with each step causing me to step back. “I wish I was! This isn’t for fun for me! I’m freaking the the out right now! And I don’t even know how the hell this happened or if it’s permanent or why Minji won’t wake up! OR what’s going to happen to my body, or-or...” He suddenly punched the wall in anger causing Minji’s fist to blister and bleed. “Damn it!”

I had backed all the way into a table that had been two feet away by the time Jongin was finished. It was weird being yelled at and feeling threatened by a face I had known for so long, especially considering how gentle Minji generally was. She never lost it quite like this.

“Okay, okay, chill out.” I was really seeing it now and was beginning to truly believe him. Minji never cursed this much and she certainly didn’t punch walls. That was completely different behavior for her. And after having taken drama class with Minji once in which she had bombed multiple performances I had learned she definitely wasn’t much of an actor to pull off this charade so convincingly.

“Uh...let me think for a minute,” I said turning away. That’s when it hit me. Kris! He knew Jongin better than I did. He would be able to figure out if this was really his friend in Minji’s body. Pulling out my phone, I turned to walk away. “I’m gonna call Kris.”

Jongin rolled his eyes and returned his attention back to his body, trying to wake it up.

“Watch him,” I instructed both Bom and Dara, who nodded. “I’m gonna give Kris a call to see if he can help us.”

“Good call,” Bom agreed before following Jongin.

I dialed Kris, tapping my fingers impatiently as the phone rang a few times before the line finally picked up after the fourth ring. Kris’ deep voice came through the speakers.

“Hey, wassup Chae-”

“Kris, we have a problem,” I cut him off. He had started off sounding rather nonchalant, but once he heard the urgency of my tone, he responded seriously.

“Oh no. What is it?” he prompted. “Jongin didn’t do anything stupid when you guys unlocked the door to let him and Minji out this morning, did he? I swear if he did something to Minji, or any of you girls, I’ll-”

“No. It’s nothing like that. It’s…” I trailed off not knowing how to explain the current situation. I glanced back over at the body who although looked like my best friend, Gong Minji, on the outside, apparently had her arch nemesis, Kim Jongin, living inside of it. He was still prodding at his own body currently laid out in the bushes trying to get a response but was seeming to get fed up from the lack of. If what he was saying was true, and Minji was in his body just as he was in hers, I wondered if she would wake up on her own just like he did.

"It's just what?” Kris’ voice suddenly prodded over the phone, bringing me back. I shook my head as I remembered why I had called him in the first place.

“You need to come down here...to the girl’s dorm,” I told him. “You wouldn’t believe the me if I were to tell you over the phone. You have to come see and hear it for yourself.”

“Chaerin, is everything alright?”

“No. Not at all. Kris...I think Jongin and Minji somehow...may have...possibly...under some weird, unexplainable, supernatural event...switched bodies…”

The line went dead silent on Kris’ end for a moment before he finally responded with an emphatic “WHAT?”

After that I explained to him everything that had happened since I had woken up that morning up until this very moment. All while, Kris stayed silently listening from the other line.

“And you actually believe all that?” he clapped back in disbelief. “What if they conspired against us? What if it’s all a prank?”

“That’s what I originally thought, but I don’t know...Minji isn’t that great an actor to pull off acting like your friend so convincingly. If it is a prank and Minji is still herself, then that means my friend just punched a wall out of frustration and made her own knuckles bleed all just she could pull off pretending to be Jongin. Does that sound like something Minji would do to you?”

Kris didn’t say anything but hummed over the phone, in thought.

"Kris, you really have to see for yourself,” I told him.

“Alright, hold on,” he said. “I’ll be there in a second. Don’t let Minji, or, uh...Jongin, out of your sight.”

I nodded even though he couldn’t see and after that, the line went dead.

I hung up before spinning on my heel to go back to my friends and Jongin, but when I did I noticed them lifting Jongin’s body out of the bushes.

“Hey!” I yelled going back over to them. “What are you guys doing? Why are you moving the body?”

“You mean my body,” Jongin said with an attitude as he situated the body over his shoulder while Bom did the same on the opposite side and Dara helped steady Jongin’s body from the back.. “I’m taking my body back inside.”

“Inside the girl’s dorm?” I said, in a panic. That didn’t sound like a good idea. “Right now! With all the girls running around and getting ready for classes and our dorm advisor monitoring the building?! I don’t think that’s such a good idea. We’ll never sneak you in now with everyone inside awake.”

“Well, I’m not going to just leave my body in the bushes, Chaerin,” Jongin argued back. “If I leave it out here, eventually everyone is going to see it when they come outside.”

“But-”

“Come on, Chaerin,” Bom said now. “We have to help, Minji-ah might be in here.” She picked up the arm to Jongin’s body and waved it to make a point.

I thought about what Kris had said about not letting the body or Jongin out of my sight. That meant I would have to follow through with this plan.

“Okay, but let’s just bring the body into the lounge room. We can sit him on the couch until Kris gets here and then-”

“Kris is coming?” Jongin cut me off. “Good. I still wanna kick his scrawny for being part of the reason I’m in this mess right now.”

I rolled my eyes. I was starting to feel a familiar annoying twitch at the back of my ear that only ever seemed to appear whenever I was in Jongin’s presence. This was the umpteenth time he had threatened to kick Kris’ since he’d woken up. Not that I truly believed his threat but it was still irritating anyway.

It’s moments like these that made me think that Jongin really was in my best friend’s body because Minji had never brought on this irritating twitch I was feeling right now which just further proved that what he was saying about swapping bodies with her was true.

“Fine, let’s go,” I muttered.

Of course, we couldn't all just waltz into the senior lounge with the headmaster's son unconscious and drooping over our shoulders (that would surely start some rumors) so I went in first to check to see that the coast was clear for us to sneak in.

Hardly anyone was ever in the lounge this early in the morning, and surely enough when I took a peek inside not a single soul lingered in the lounge so I knew we were good to go in. I signaled my friends and Jongin to bring his body in while I held the door open and they started coming.

Jongin’s body looked kind of heavy based from what I could see since the three of them appeared to be struggling a little, but I assumed that was probably because the body was dead weight. When they brought him inside I noticed his shoes were all scuffed up from his feet dragging on the ground while they all dragged him inside. Once in the lounge, they sat him down on one of the couches like I had instructed earlier.

Afterwards, we all stayed still for a moment just watching Jongin’s unconscious body lie there on the couch. Even despite being practically comatose, I had to say this was the most peaceful I had ever seen him look which I actually kind of liked. It would be perfect if he were always this way and if only my best friend wasn’t currently stuck in that body.

“What now?” Bom asked finally.

“Kris is coming,” I said. “In the meantime we can start thinking of what we're going to tell the dorm advisors once they start asking why Jongin is sleeping instead of getting ready for class.”

“We'll just tell them I'm not feeling well and that I'm resting,” Jongin said as if it were the most logical option.

“But the dorm advisors are going to want to do check ups on you and may even want to take you to the nurse,” I said thinking ahead. “What are they gonna think when you don't even wake up to respond?”

“Right,” he withdrew, shoulders slumped.

“Why don't we just put his body back in his dorm room?” Bom offered.

“No, once I'm declared absent from class that's the first place the guys’ dorm advisor will check,” Jongin responded. “Besides, who knows when Minji is going to wake up. I can't leave her to wake up all on her own not only in a body that's not hers but in an unfamiliar room in the guy's dorm.”

“Why don't we just put your body in her room then?” Dara said. “At least she'll be somewhere familiar and that's the last place your dorm advisor will look for you.”

“True,” I agreed. “But we'd still have to sneak his body in without anyone seeing it.”

Bom released an over exaggerated sigh. “Gosh, this is so exhausting! Is this how it’s going to be until Mini wakes up? Sneaking around, making up lies trying not to get caught?”

I turned my attention back on Jongin’s body, still lying peacefully on the couch and frowned. “I wonder why she hasn't woken up yet? You woke up literally minutes after we found you, Jongin. It didn't take you this long.”

“That's what's worrying me,” he said, agreeing with me. “I don't know how this happened or why and the only other person involved who could possibly help me understand is…” he paused, his eyes on his sleeping body. “...practically in a coma.”

“You really have no clue about what could have caused this?” I asked him.

Jongin shook his head “No, not really. Unless Kris…” But before he could finish the doors to the lounge opened and in walked none other than that very person looking left and right until he spotted us and came charging in.

My eyes widened, relieved to see him. “Kris!”

“Hey! There you guys are!" He said as he marched up to us. "Okay, what the hell hap-oof!”

My relief quickly switched to horror once the sound of a loud crack filled the room.

Jongin had punched Kris square in the jaw, seething with anger.

“Jongin!” I scolded before dropping down to Kris now on the floor at the same time Bom went to restrain Jongin.

“Aish! What the hell, Jongin?” she admonished him. “Would you please stop messing up Minji’s hand by punching things all the damn time?! Look at what you’re doing to her knuckles!” Bom picked up the hand, which was Minji’s hand that Jongin had used to punch Kris. They were all red and inflamed now.

Meanwhile, Kris gripped his jaw muttering “ow” under his breath but ushered me off, ensuring he was fine.

Jongin ignored Bom’s chastising, still seething like a bull. “Well if it wasn’t for ing Kristina, here, we wouldn’t even be in this ing mess right now!”

Kris’ eyes suddenly widened like saucers, staring at Jongin like he had just grown a second head. I looked back and forth between them questioningly.

“Kris, what’s wrong?” I asked.

He gulped before answering, “There’s only one person on this entire campus who has ever called me Kristina.” He looked like he was in a trance as he continued to stare, bug-eyed, at the frame of Minji’s body that currently held his friend in it. “Oh my gosh. Kai! Is that really you in there, man?”

Jongin rolled his eyes, before hissing back through his teeth, “Yes, it’s me you ing dip-”

Suddenly, Bom covered Jongin’s mouth with her hand. “Okay, look. As long as you’re in our Minij-ah’s body your gonna have to stop talking like that. Dang, you cuss a lot, boy!”

Kris got up from the floor, still staring in awe at Jongin in Minji’s body. “H-How can this be?”

“You tell me!” Jongin shot back.

“Wait, you think I did this?” Kris said pointing to himself.

“Well, who else?!” Jongin completely exploded on him. “I’ll bet you did this to get back at me for socking you the other day, huh? Or, maybe this was all part of some secret plan of yours just to keep Minji for yourself. Admit it, you’re that desperate to keep Minji and I apart, aren’t you? You don’t really want to see me and Minji together, do you?”

“I’m the one who’s desperate to keep Minji to himself?” Kris questioned, angrily. “I think you’ve gotten me mistaken with you! You’re the one who wouldn’t even let me and Minji be friends always following us around, spying and sabotaging us anytime we were alone together. We couldn’t even do a simple school project without you butting in.”

“That’s only because I was trying to keep you and your greasy hands off her-”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Dara stopped everyone. “Pause and rewind! Jongin, do you...like our Minji-ah?” Tilting her head to the side, her lips spread into devious smirk like she just stumbled upon some juicy dark secret. “Like, you like-like her?”

Jongin’s face went white as a ghost. “What? No!”

“Really?” Bom said not convinced. “Because If I didn’t know any better based off what you just said it sounds like you do.”

Kris leaned towards me and whispered. “See, I told you he’s madly in love with her.”

My mouth fell open in shock. I had heard Kris say it and had doubted him but now that I was seeing it right in front of my very own eyes it made it real and boy was it amazing to see! Jongin really was in love with my best friend, wasn’t he?

Looking uncomfortable, Jongin pushed his way past us all and went back over to his body. “Look! Are we going to sit here and talk about my feelings for Minji or are we going to focus on what’s more important right now like WHY AM I IN MINJI”S BODY OR WHY SHE WON’T WAKE UP?”

"So you admit that you do have feelings for her?” I asked, purposely ignoring everything else he said, refusing to let him run away from this.

Jongin looked at us all like we were crazy. “D-Do you guys hear anything I’m saying, right now?” He pointed to his mouth.

“Oh, I hear you,” I said. “But I want you to admit your feelings first before we help you.”

Jongin clenched his jaw like he was holding something back. “You always like to make things difficult for me don’t you, Chaerin?”

I nodded, grinning wickedly. We all stood there in silence for about a few seconds before Jongin finally gave up.

“ing hell,” he muttered under his breath before finally saying what we all wanted to hear. “Alright, fine! I admit it! I like her, okay! I. LIKE. MIN-JI!” After he confessed a look of surprise suddenly dawned on his face like he’d had a moment of realization and that made me realize that this must have been the first time he had ever said those words out loud.

He gulped before finally adding at the end, “I like her a lot...”

Although he was yelling at first, his voice had become increasingly soft by the end of his confession. Thanks to Minji’s pale skin we could physically see the proof of his feelings expressed through his now red cheeks (something we would’ve never have seen on Jongin’s deeply tanned complexion had he been in his own body). His cheeks went red like a little boy confessing to a first crush.

When he looked back up at us, he seemed to remember where he was at. He straightened his back up and his face turned hard again. “There! I said it, okay! Everyone satisfied?”

Bom and Dara squealed beside me and I sent Kris a knowing look which he reciprocated back to me. I nodded turning back to Jongin. “Yes, very satisfied. Now,” I said getting back to business. “We have to figure out what the hell happened to cause you two to switch bodies and what we’re gonna do until Minji wakes up.”

“One of us should stay with her until she does,” Kris said. “Someone’s got to explain what happened to her when she wakes up and since we don’t know when that will be, it’ll be good if one of us is with her to watch over her. At the very least she’ll have a familiar face around.”

“I can do it,” Jongin offered.

“And have both the senior president and the former co-senior president suddenly absent from school?” I said. “I think that’ll look too suspicious. No, you should go to class in Minji’s place just to keep things looking normal.”

“I’ll stay with her,” Bom offered. “I’ll just say that I’m feeling sick so I can stay here in the dorms. This way we can hide Jongin’s body in our room so we don’t have to worry about either of our dorm advisors. I can cover for us.”

“And I’ll cover for Jongin if the guy’s dorm advisor asks anything,” Kris said. “I’ll let Sehun know to cover for you, too since he’s your roommate.”

“Not a bad idea,” I said, nodding. “After school is over we can meet up and brainstorm to figure out just what caused the body switch. Bom, you can text any of us if she wakes up or if anything happens.”

Bom nodded.

Dara raised a finger. “But just one thing. How are we going to sneak Jongin’s body upstairs and into Bom’s room without anyone noticing?”

We were all silent. There was no way we could sneak him in right now. The girl’s dorm halls were busy with everyone getting ready for school this Monday.

I turned to Jongin. “We may have to hide your body somewhere for the time being until the dorm is empty and everyone has gone to class.”

With a roll of his eyes, Jongin sighed. “Alright, fine. But I’m trusting you, Bom! Please, guard my body with your life! It’s too precious. I don’t want to come back to find my body with bruises and scratches or anything else.”

Bom held her hands up and reassured him that his body was in careful hands. “No worries. Your body is in safe hands. After all, my friend is in this body. I’ll take good care of it.”

“But still, where to hide him for the time being?” Dara queried and we all began to glance around the lounge for a good hiding place.

That’s when each of our eyes landed on the door of the only uni bathroom of the lounge. It was actually a good hiding place considering it was the type that was for one person, only, and had a lock on the door.

“Bingo!” I said with a snap of my fingers.

We helped lift Jongin’s body off the couch while Bom grabbed one of the wheely chairs from a table and seated Jongin’s body in it. She then used it to push his body to the uni bathroom of the lounge. “We’ll just be hiding in the bathroom until the dorm is empty.”

With that Bom disappeared with Jongin’s body into the uni bathroom of the lounge.

I turned to Jongin. “Now you’re coming with us.”

“What?” he asked, unsure. “Why? Where?”

“You really think I’m going to leave you to get ready in Minji’s body all by yourself!” I snapped at him. “I have to protect my friend’s decency! Not only that, but there’s no way you can use the girl’s showers. So Dara and I will have to bathe you.”

“WHAT?!” Jongin screamed as Dara and I began to drag him along. He looked back to Kris for help, but Kris just smiled and waved.

*

“So how did whole bathing with Kai, thing go?” Kris asked when we were in art class.

I put my sketch pencil down as I recalled everything that happened earlier this morning. “Well, at first, he refused to let us wash him. Then when I threatened that he would have to stink all day in front of everyone and that the smell would only get worse as the days went by if he never let us wash him, he finally let us. After that, he just sort of shivered kind of like a little puppy being given a bath for the first time in its life. It was kind of cute actually.”

I chuckled at the memory.

“So, what do you think, you know, about everything?”

“I don’t know,” Kris said with a shrug. “When I think about it, it all seems so far-fetched, but after what I witnessed this morning, I believe him. I just wonder what could’ve caused something like this to happen, or who could’ve done something like this them.”

“Who?” I repeated, curiously. “You think someone might have done something to make them swap bodies?”

He nodded. “I mean, it’s possible. Jongin has done more than enough damage to others in the past to gain quite a few enemies. Maybe someone could’ve done this to him out of revenge.”

I rubbed my chin in thought. “We should make a list of all the people who hate Jongin enough to put a hex or a curse on him to switch bodies, then.”

“Does Minji have any enemies?” Kris asked.

My face immediately scrunched up at the thought. It was highly unlikely. “Minji’s the nicest girl on the planet. In fact, I actually think it’s one of her character flaws. She doesn't make enemies. Well, that is until she met Jongin, of course.”

This got Kris to laugh and my heart to thump at the sound of it. Damn it.

I sighed. “To think. All we tried to do was help them out and now things are even worse than they were before.”

“Yeah, but we’ll figure it all out,” Kris said. “Everything will be okay.”

He returned to his drawing while I turned back to my own. I sure hoped he was right.

*

Since art class was our last class of the day, today, Kris and I walked together after school was over. The entire school day had gone by and Bom hadn’t texted us with any news in regards to Minji waking up. That meant that she still had to be asleep in Jongin’s body. Or, at least I hoped she was in his body. What if she actually wasn’t in his body and that was the reason why Jongin’s physical body was still incapacitated? Then what would we do?

“Hey, Chaerin!” I heard someone call my name from the side of me, ripping me away from my thoughts. I turned to see a couple girls from our grade coming up to Kris and I. “Hey, Mr. and Ms. Vice-President.”

I greeted them with a smile. “Hi Bora. Hi Dasom. What can I do for you?”

“We were just wondering if you still planned on announcing those of us voted for the positions in student council and for the senior clubs,” Bora said. “Remember, last week you said you would have all the votes counted and would reveal the winners over the intercom by this Friday?”

Whoops.

I paused, taken aback by the question. Then, I remembered. I had made that promise to them just earlier last week.

This is exactly what I had been talking about earlier when I said my peers were always pestering me on the daily about our senior activities which they had every right to do, it’s just that I hated telling them the truth which was that student council didn’t have anything ready yet.

Needless to say, I hadn’t finished counting the votes since I was busy planning the entire weekend with the girls and Kris, and I didn’t think I would ever finish getting the remaining votes counted all by myself within the span of 4 days especially when I still needed to be studying for midterms.

I mean, it could be done but it would drive me absolutely crazy to do all by myself. After all, the task included more than just getting the votes counted. They would have to be recounted at least twice to make sure there were no mistakes for each club. Then I would have to get an official list together of all the votes with the winners and meet up with each of them to make sure they were still interested in the job and would have to get signatures. Then I would have to get that down to the headmaster to approve so that it could be announced by Friday morning. It was a lot to do.

Then there was also still the fact that we didn’t even have student council all together yet, but I couldn’t tell them that. And now that we had an even more important issue to fix with the bizarre “switcheroo” mess between Minji and Jongin it looked like it was going to be an especially long time before we could even begin to work on senior activities.

“Oh, right…” I trailed off not knowing where to begin. What the hell was I gonna tell them?

“You didn’t forget, did you?” Dasom asked, looking at me with big, worried puppy eyes. Oh . “We’re already so late into the school year without any proper clubs going! What are we going to do-”

“No, no. It’s fine,” I tried to reassure them even though everything was most definitely not fine. “I didn’t forget, Jongin and I just had to make some...rearrangements, that’s all. But we may have to postpone the announcements for a couple of weeks, or so…”

“Oh no!” she erupted, emphatically. “Another couple of weeks?! Really? We’re going to miss out on everything! We already have vacation for the holidays coming up in a few weeks and then by the time we come back it’ll be the new year already! That’s more than half-way into the school year and we still don’t have clubs! I really need to know if I got the position as head-”

“Hey, hey, girls, look it’s fine,” Kris interrupted, waving his hands to get the girls’ attention. For a moment, I had forgotten he was still standing beside me. “Everything is going to be just fine,” he told them sounding a little too reassuring considering it wasn’t true. “Look, the votes are already counted and we promise to reveal the new senior club leaders during the morning announcements by the end of the week. I promise.”

I turned to him, dumbfounded. “We will?”

“Yes, we will,” he said giving me an urging look to just “go with it” before turning back to the girls. “Once the results are in and after all the clubs have had their initial club meetings student council can schedule to have our first official meeting with all of the clubs. There you all can address any concerns or ask questions you have regarding each of your clubs and its members, respectively, sound good?”

The girls looked at Kris, dumbstruck, just as much as I did.

“Oh,” Dasom replied blankly before a smile broke out on her face. “Oh, okay! Great! That sounds great.”

“Good,” Kris said. “Spread the word. Tell everyone so that they know what’s coming up this week.”

“Cool,” the girls waved, and skidded off. “Thanks VPs!”

I watched them head off before turning on Kris. “Uh...Kris, why the hell did you make all those promises? How the hell am I supposed to have all that planned and scheduled by the end of this week?! Do you have any idea what it’s going to take to get all that done? I’m gonna have to bend over backwards just to-”

“You’ve been working mostly by yourself since you were assigned to work with Kai in Minji’s place, right?” Kris asked, cutting me off.

I grimaced at the thought, shrugging in response.

“Well, that’s the only reason why it was taking so long to get anything done,” Kris said. “But now that Kai is a bit, uh...preoccupied right now since he’s got bigger problems to figure out at the moment, I think it’s about time I step up as the vice-president and take place as leader to help you out.” He then slung an arm around my shoulders and started to walk us through the campus again. “With you and I working together, we can get this done. You don’t have to do it all alone. In fact, we can even have our friends help us if we need to. After all, they’re all supposed to be apart of student council, too.”

I chewed my lip in thought. “That’s not a bad idea.”

“Stick with me Chaerin,” he said. “I got your back.”

I smirked at him liking the sound of that. Even though everything was completely nuts right now with so much drama going on it would make your head spin, I liked his ability to remain calm and how he always had a plan even during the worst of times.

“Thanks, Kris,” I said, bashfully, causing the corner of his mouth to turn up slowly in the most smug, but cutest grin I had ever seen. I averted my eyes, quickly, turning my attention ahead of us. “Now let’s go try to figure out how our two hard-headed friends got their bodies switched.”

Kris laughed and nodded as he followed. “Both our friends are so lucky to have us.”

I nodded. They sure were.

*

Uh...hey. Long time no see, eh? There are no excuses for being this damn late in updating. I just wanted to put this up for anybody reading that still cares.

Anyways, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!