Sehun likes to talk in equations.

“Sehun + food = Happy Sehun.”

He believes that equations show relationships, therefore, he explains his relationships with equations.

“Sehun + Kai = Playful Sehun.”

“Sehun + Kyungsoo = Puppy Sehun.”

“Sehun + Tao = Confused Sehun.” (He doesn’t understand the Chinese boy, and the Chinese boy doesn’t understand him.)

A new kid arrives at their daycare, and the teacher tells them to be nice to him. Sehun thinks that he’s pretty. Even his name sounds pretty—but it doesn’t sound Korean.

“Luhan,” Tao calls, waving his chubby arm in the air. He starts to talk in his mother tongue and Luhan replies happily, albeit a little shy at first.

Sehun watches from the corner. He’s in the middle of coloring his Pororo picture when Kai sits down beside him and asks if he can borrow his blue crayon.

“Blue,” Kai tells him, pointing at the maknae’s crayon. “Hyung wants it.” He likes to use the hyung card around Sehun, since Kai’s the youngest at home and almost the youngest in the kindergarten.

Sehun gives him his typical face. “No.”

“But-“ Kai stops and his lower lip starts to tremble. He turns his teary eyes towards Sehun and Sehun frowns.

“No.”

“But-“

“Yah!” Luhan runs over to Sehun’s corner and pulls Kai behind him. He’s small and skinny, frail and absolutely delicate-looking. He frowns his eyebrows at Sehun. “What are you doing?” he asks in broken Korean.

Unfortunately, Sehun doesn’t understand, so he makes some (unintentionally racist) Chinese sounds. Luhan reddens (maybe it wasn’t gibberish?) and starts yelling out in more broken Korean. Tao, on the other hand, walks over and hits Sehun on the head after speaking to Luhan.

Luhan shouts again and Sehun is nearly in tears because Tao hits hard and Kai looks like he’s having the time of his life while Tao looks like he’s about to piss his pants because the teacher is scolding the four of them and Kai stops laughing—and everything is simply chaotic.

“Sehun, sharing is caring and please don’t make up any words that sound Chinese—you might offend some of our friends,” she says to him. She turns to Kai and opens , but she doesn’t say anything since she didn’t catch him participating in the fight. She turns to Luhan instead and says, “I’m happy that you stood up for Kai. Also, I think your Korean is really good.” Lastly, she turns to Tao, whom shrinks underneath her gaze. “Huang Zitao, violence does not solve anything.”

“Understand?” she asks the three of them. When the three boys nodded (Kai is hiding behind their teacher), she says, “Okay. Now let’s all apologize!”

“But recess—“ Sehun starts.

“You three will be skipping that so the all of you can get to know each other,” their teacher says happily. She sternly looks at the three boys and they all hesitantly nod; she smiles and ushers the other kids out of the room, saying that she’ll be back in a few minutes.

None of them say anything for the first three minutes. Sehun continues to color his Pororo, a stubborn look on his face. Tao looks sadly at his hand, sitting on the empty seat on the side of the table while Luhan bites the inside of his cheek and sits on the empty seat on the other side of the table. So much for his first day.

“Sorry,” says Sehun, ignoring their presences as he picks up a yellow crayon.

“Me too,” Tao mutters.

“I’m sorry too,” Luhan says. He leans on his elbows and puts his chin on his palms while watching Sehun. They continue to sit in silence until the teacher pops in and tells them that Tao’s dad is picking him up. The little Chinese boy shoots up from his seat and gathers his things before hurriedly rushing out of the room.

“Can we go to recess?” Sehun asks the teacher.

Their teacher shakes her head. “Tomorrow, you can.” With that, she slips out of the room.

Sehun sighs loudly, trying to make it blatant that he doesn’t enjoy being with Luhan (even though, he kindof does). “This is boring,” he tells the Chinese boy. Luhan nods, not completely comprehending what Sehun said.

He reaches over and takes some paper. He targets a pair of safety scissors and Sehun gasps.

“What are you doing?” he asks in surprise.

“Cutting species (jong-e),” Luhan replies. Sehun furrows his eyebrows.

“You mean paper (jong-i)?” Sehun asks. Luhan stares at him in annoyance and nods his head. Sehun smiles to himself. He has this weird feeling to keep bullying his Chinese “friend.” Well, that’s too harsh . . . it’s more like an urge to annoy Luhan.

They resume with their tasks; Sehun coloring Pororo’s hat and Luhan making an animal that resembled a cross between a horse and a lion. Sehun is too distracted with his own work to take notice of Luhan’s.

“Give me fire (bul).”

Sehun sharply looks up at Luhan. “What?”

“Give me fire.”

“I can’t give you that,” Sehun replies slowly. “But I can give you glue (pul).”

“That’s what I meant!”

Sehun snorts and chucks a glue at him. Luhan glares at him and the younger one finds it oddly cute. So he smiles devilishly and the older one scowls some more.

“Sehun ah!”

“You’re so stupid (babo).”

“I’m not a bomber (bameo)!”

Sehun sighs and shakes his head, deciding to just finish his Pororo to show his hyung later. Maybe they can watch it later if his hyung doesn’t have much homework. It would be nice—he’ll tell him about Luhan too.

“Sehun + Luhan = Smart Sehun.”

“What was that?”

“Nothing (mu).”

“Department (bu)?”