Jihee didn’t realize she’d zoned out until it was too late. What had Mr. Hwang asked? There was no way to get out of this without looking a fool.

“I’m sorry Mr. Hwang. Could you repeat the question?” Some of her fellow students stifled a laugh.

“The answer to number three in the notes, please.”

“Oh, right!” Thank god Ji Hee had the habit of working ahead. “I got x²+3x-1 with a remainder of 2x+16 over x+3.”

“Very good.” Mr. Hwang moved on with just the slightest hint at disappointment in his voice that Jihee had still gotten the answer right. Jihee, on the other hand, relaxed, thankful that Algebra 2 liked her even though she didn’t really care for it. She caught someone looking at her through her peripheral vision, and when she turned to look at him, he swiveled his head back to face the front. Junhong…?

“Junhong, Hyori. Hyori, Junhong… I mean, he’s the number one guy here, and I’m the number one girl here! Someone explain to me how we aren’t dating.”

Key rolled her eyes and looked back at Jihee before leaning over the table to keep Hyori and her “friends” from hearing what she had to say. “Honey needs to take a step back and reevaluate her life. This ain’t High School Musical.” Jihee laughed. Key was a foreigner who moved to Korea the year before, quickly obtaining some friends and – oops – Hyori’s boyfriend, Jinki. She had more upstairs than most, and so received hateful glares from several girls, but she never let it bother her. In fact, it seemed to only give her more confidence.

Upon hearing Key’s mumbled sass and Jihee’s laugh a table away, Hyori turned to face the two. “You know, foreigner, I’m actually kind of glad I’m not dating Jinki anymore. Now I can focus on what really matters,” She snapped her head to center to look two tables away, where Junhong sat with his friends, “Junhong.” Hyori said his name though a sigh as she let her head tilt to one side.

“I’m glad to hear you say that, Hyori,” Jinki said as he sat down with his tray of food, “because I was thinking the same thing. Now that I’m not dating you, I can focus on what really matters: Key.” Jihee dramatically put a hand to her heart as Key grinned and kissed Jinki’s cheek.

Hyori ignored him. “Oh look! Junhong’s looking this way!” She began to fix her curls and popped her chest out, striking a “cute but natural” pose as she fluttered her eyelashes. Jihee rolled her eyes, but turned around anyway. Junhong was indeed looking in their general direction, but his eyes seemed to land on her.

“Ji, he’s totally checking you out!” Key said, tapping her friend’s arm.

“No he’s not. What have I got to check out?” Hyori looked up and down Jihee and scoffed before turning back to Junhong.

“Gurl,” uh-oh, Jihee thought to herself, here it comes… “how many times have I told you you got that body?”

“So you say, but guys don’t exactly drool when I walk past them like they do for you.”

“Wait, which guys do that? I want names.” Jinki got a fiery glare in his eye, looking intently at Jihee for an answer.

“She was exaggerating, hon; don’t worry about it.” Key said, laying a comforting hand on Jinki’s forearm.

“I want to hear that from Ji.”

“I was exaggerating, hon; don’t worry about it.” Ji mocked, also resting a hand on Jinki’s forearm.

--

Jihee had a whopping two classes with Junhong aside from lunch, and she so happened to also share one with Hyori. With the two combined, it took some of the fun out of acing chemistry. She didn’t mean to get one hundreds across the board, but it just sort of happened. And what came with every Wednesday, it was a lab day.

The labs themselves were alright, but all lab partners were assigned, and Jihee had been paired with none other than Hyori. Said partner did nothing but complain about the partner assignments and how her “ of a friend” got paired with Junhong but she wasn’t. Jihee had tried unsuccessfully to get Hyori to help her with the lab, and so every time Junhong looked up at the two of them, she knew. Hyori would snap straight and whack Jihee’s arm – making her almost spill the solution – and exclaim “He’s looking at me! He’s looking at me!”

“Did you ever think that maybe the reason Junhong hasn’t asked you out is that he doesn’t actually have feelings for you?” Jihee asked as she measured the next ingredient.

“That’s ridiculous. Why wouldn’t he like me?”

“I don’t know, maybe it has something to do with the fact that you act like a tween obsessing over an idol when it comes to him.”

“I do not obsess over him. I just have a healthy addiction to his looks and thoughts about him ing me.”

“Okay that I didn’t need to know.” Jihee made notes on their “shared” lab sheet. If Hyori got a one hundred because of her…

“You’re just jealous because you’re a .”

“For the record, I’m in no hurry to lose said ity. I don’t need to have to feel self-worth.”

“It’s not for self-worth; it’s for the pure enjoyment that is . You know, the enjoyment you’ve never felt and probably won’t ever feel.”

Jihee slammed her pen flat on her paper. “Mrs. Lee, Hyori is distracting me and has not helped whatsoever on this lab despite my repeated attempts at asking for help. May I please be reassigned a partner?”

Being one of Mrs. Lee’s favorite students, she was happy to oblige. “Sure thing! Who would you like?”

The entire class was staring at Jihee then, and she could feel them silently hoping she would pick them, she being the smartest in the class and all. Jihee pretended to look around and consider before rolling her head to look Hyori in the eye and saying, “Junhong.”

Several groans were heard as Junhong made his way to Jihee’s lab table. Hyori glared back at the other as she walked towards her friend, who seemed excited to now be partnered with Hyori. “Okay so let’s get to work!” Junhong said, standing dangerously close to Jihee.

“Let me first get something straight. I don’t actually want to be partners with you; I picked you to smite Hyori, but if you put in some real effort and actually help me, I’ll be more willing to consider you a decent person.”

“Fair enough, but why wouldn’t I be a decent person?”

“I’m not an idiot. I’ve seen the way you act around your friends and I’ve heard the things you say in the hallways. If you could just not be that guy for thirty more minutes, my respect for you might go up.”

“Might?”

“As in it’s a possibility but it’s not definite. Now let’s work.”