“I don’t recommend doing that.”

It’s the first thing Youngjae says to me when we see each other again for the first day of Second Year. In my hands is a bag of freshly made candy, and where I am is four paces away from Mark Tuan’s locker. His real one, not the false location I received from Kwon Nari.

“I’m not doing anything.” I shove the candy into the pocket of my navy blazer and dry my clammy hands on my yellow and navy tartan skirt. Bad idea, because now I have confectioner’s sugar all over it.

“Are you seriously going to live up to this Bad Girl reputation of yours?”

Behold, the High School Grapevine has tagged me as a serial flirt, a bad girl, a total heartbreaker for toying with the school’s pride, Fencing Champion Jackson Wang and the school’s rubbish, Rap Monster Kim Namjoon.

“I’m not doing anything.” Other than dust off the stains on my skirt. I start walking to our classroom, 2-B, before anyone else notices I’m lurking around here.

“You don’t go giving candy to a guy not your boyfriend.”

“Youngjae, I don’t have a boyfriend.” I really wanted one, but not from the choices I currently had presented to me. Sure, half the girls wanted Jackson Wang and the other half wanted Kim Namjoon, but I wanted Mark Tuan. Karma, however, wanted to get back at me for a crime I did not commit.

“That’s not what everyone is saying.”

Indeed, the rumours of my polyamory have been greatly exaggerated. Exactly a year ago, I wished for a chance to be propelled out of anonymity. A chance to let the world know who I am so Mark Tuan would spare me a glance. I got more than what I bargained for. More trouble than what I deserve. What happened next was a half a year of strategic avoidance and social discomfort.

You’d think Kim Namjoon would shrug me off, that he would look down on me the way he did when I defended Youngjae and then dismiss me like I didn’t exist. I thought he would, too. I knew from the moment he picked up Mark’s gift life would be over and I would be catapulted head first into my very own customised personal hell. And it was like that, especially during the first few weeks following The Incident. The meaner girls wouldn’t leave me alone. They’d stare me down— there’s a lot of staring in this part of town— and scoff at me and call me names and sometimes they’d push me aside. Relatively speaking, that I could easily survive. Others weren’t so confrontational and would talk about me in the girls room, while others were awed at my balls. I could live with ostracism, and for a while I could live with ridicule. Like everything else in the universe, my situation would only be temporary, and people would get tired of it. Nari and Youngjae were, and still are, quick to come to my defense, and having them around was more than enough. I couldn’t care about what other people thought of me. Not when compared to the  single asive thought of Mark thinking I liked Kim Namjoon. Something I had meant to rectify in the following months, but sadly, Kim Namjoon acted in a manner incongruent to everyone’s expectation.

At first, Kim Namjoon didn’t really do anything. He just picked up the gift, assumed it was for him, gave me a once over, and walked away before I could ask him to give it back. That was the perfect moment to end the whole thing. The End. Over. No more To Be Continued. We would have gone our separate ways, and I would just be another one of those invisible girls to him. I could move on to better goals.

But no. Of course it didn’t end there. Kim Namjoon just had to be spotted wearing the damn thing. Not only that, he’d ask his lackeys to find me so he can make me sit with him during lunch. I never did. What if Mark saw me?

But that was only half of my problem. After Valentine’s Day, news had spread out that I grew tired of Rap Monster and moved on to Jackson Wang. Now, if Jackson had responded differently, life would have been easier. But sadly, this isn’t a world where things happen according to what’s best for me, so of course Jackson just had to like my candy. After that he’d go around calling me his Candy Girl, completely unaware of my unwanted and unfortunate association with Kim Namjoon. Or  anyway, if he was, he didn’t seem to be affected by it.

Once more, the, take note, unwanted, attention I received from Jackson Wang opened up a new world of social ostracism for me. But unlike Kim Namjoon, Jackson defended me. He was very much a gentleman about it, apologising for the trouble he caused me. He would often walk with me along the corridors, wait for me by the school gates, and just generally be nice to me which was a whole new level of worse because Jackson’s open participation meant Mark would never ever see me as fair game.

“This is all your fault.” Youngjae looks at me as if I’ve accused him of the unforgivable. “This is all your fault.”

“How is this my fault!”

Our class is on the second floor, that’s a whole first floor main lobby and a full second floor corridor of shame to walk through. As such, Youngjae and I have developed the habit of using the backstairs to avoid unwanted attention. There seems to be a lot of it these days.

“Well, for one, if you didn’t need saving, I wouldn’t have gotten into this business with Kim Namjoon.”

“Hey! I didn’t ask you to help me out! For your information, I had the situation under control!”

“Sure you did.”

“And why is this my fault! You’re the one who messed up. If you just gave Mark-sunbae the present from the beginning then you wouldn’t even be in this mess.”

“I am in this mess because Kim Namjoon is an idiot!”

Youngjae slaps his hand over my mouth and looks behind him. “Shush! What if someone hears you!”

I elbow him aside. “So what? Let them hear me!” No, actually. I don’t have a death wish, despite my past behavior. Up, down, and left and right, there are only walls and my yelling echoing about. “Hear that? Kim Namjoon is an idiot!” As I say that, I look up and down just in case. Can’t be too sure when my life has taken on the unexpected.

We emerge from the back stairs and hug the corner wall. Youngjae checks for my bullies while I check for his. “I can’t believe I’ve been reduced to bully-ee.”

His eyes roll to the side. “You know bully-ee isn’t an actual word, right?”

“Shut up.”

When the mass of second years have homogenised into a blur, Youngjae and I ninja our way to our room. Based on experience, the best place to hide is in plain sight so we blend in as much as we can and keep our heads down. It works well enough in a crowd, but it’s a completely different battle once we get inside.

Park Jimin is one of Kim Namjoon’s underlings, also one of Youngjae’s bullies. I’d like to use the term bully lightly, the kind that leaves the bully-ee intact with no lasting damage done, but I can’t say for certain. As soon as I walk into the room, his sights focus on me and he hops off the teachers table to do the one bit of interaction we have since That Incident.

“You.”

I’d rather not answer. Just a noncommittal grunt and a flick of the brows. Something cool, collected, calm. But instead what comes out is, “Park Jimin, I have a name.” One that I’d prefer him use than referring to me a ‘you’. Rude.

Jimin’s eyes move towards Youngjae and he sneers. “You shouldn’t be hanging out with other guys when you’re already with Rap Monster.”

One, I find it absolutely unnecessary and stupid to refer to Kim Namjoon as Rap Monster in any way or form. Isn’t that supposed to be his underground alias? His super secret identity or something? Two, shouldn’t people be more careful with throwing his alias around like that? What if it’s secretly a summoning spell and by uttering those words you magically make him appear?

“That’s none of your business and I’m not with Kim Namjoon, never been, never will be. Goodbye.”

I brush past him and pick a seat by the window. Youngjae sits in front of me and brings out his materials for first period. He looks behind me when our homeroom teacher comes in, and we share a sigh before falling into the clockwork of student life.

Lunch rolls in and it takes both of us calling Nari’s phone nonstop to get her to come over. We push our desks together by the corner, next to the window, away from everyone else.

“I can’t believe you got to pick your seats. We got arranged in alphabetical order,” Nari complains, exchanging her lunch with Youngjae’s. “I am sick of sitting in front. Sick. Of. It.”

Youngjae nods. “This is not your year. First, you’re in Class-F. Next, you’re all sad and alone, what are you going to do without us?”

“Very cute,” Nari shoots back, “If I remember correctly, if it weren’t for me, you’d totes flunk English last year.”

Youngjae narrows his eyes at her, some attempt to make a face. “Well, you would’ve flunked physics without me.”

I’m about to comment on neither of them surviving bullies and pushy clientele without me when my phone rings. It’s an unknown number and dread fills my gut, swirling in dark, thunderclouds about to crack me open from inside. Yongjae and Nari stare at me and at my phone. They make the same quick, unscientific conclusion. The ringing stops only to start all over again. No one says a word.

Nari doesn’t speak out loud but her eyes convey her message loud and clear. “It’s Kim Namjoon, isn’t it?”

Youngjae doesn’t speak either, but he answers with a slight twitch of his lips. “Could be. Don’t answer it.”

My eyes dart between them. I don’t dare say anything out loud either. “What if he comes looking for me?”

Nari’s eyes flit towards the door. “What if they all come here?”

Youngjae nods. “We’re gonna be so dead.” He jerks his chin towards my phone. “Maybe you should answer it.”

I shake my head.

Finally, the ringing stops. We share another meaningful gaze before we burst out laughing. Nari covers her face with her hands and doubles over while Youngjae claps his hands. We receive strange looks from the others in the room, but whatever.

Youngjae is the first to calm down. “Okay, but what if they really come in here?”

Kim Namjoon and his underlings don’t show up at all today. Jimin doesn’t say anything when class resumes after lunch, and before he could even get the chance, Youngjae and I disappear into the crowd as soon as we get dismissed. But of course, it’s not that easy.

“Candy Girl!”

We’re halfway across the main lobby when it happens. Jackson is jogging down the stairs when he sees me. When he grins at me like he’s just won the Olympics, it’s hard not to feel just a little bit special. It’s hard to just ignore him and run away like I would with Kim Namjoon. As always, Mark is with him, but he’s focused on untangling his earphones and probably doesn’t even notice me standing here.

“You know I still blame you,” I tell Nari. We’re sort of glued to the spot, mostly because Jackson already saw us and I guess I’m supposed to say hi after he called me out.

“Why is this my fault?” she answers, keeping her voice low enough for just the three of us to hear. Whenever Jackson is involved, there’s always a group of busybodies nosing around.

“You fed me wrong information.”

She scoffs. “It’s not my fault you can’t read.”

I still don’t buy into Nari’s version of the story. According to her, her information is always accurate and so the fault must have been mine for being unable to properly make sense of the note she passed me during last year’s Math class. Youngjae’s contribution is something along the lines of having read it correctly but being swayed by my preconceived notion of which one is Mark’s actual locker because Mark and Jackson at that point were interchangeable by nature of being inseparable.

“What are you gonna do?” Youngjae asks. Jackson and Mark are closing in, and I have about three seconds to not embarrass myself.

I don’t know why, but I reach inside my pocket, and as soon as Jackson is close enough, I hand him the candy meant for Mark. It happens in slow motion. Like an out of body experience, I watch myself present the candy with both hands. Jackson says something, but it doesn’t register. All I see is him grinning, happy as always. He says something else. Then he laughs. It’s not the kind of moment that you get caught in, rather than that, it’s the kind of moment you can’t quite classify because it’s beyond definition in a manner that’s foreign to you. A part of me thinks it’s guilt. As the events unfold before me, all that’s in my mind is Mark and the way he’s looking away towards something more interesting than me.

I am reeled back to reality with both Nari and Youngjae tugging my arms on each side. “What?”

“I said I’ll see you after practice?” The sports teams are the only ones with after class activities on the first week of school and maybe he realises this because he then says, “You have study period, right?”

I look at Mark, and knowing he’ll be around I say, “Okay.”

“Okay. I’ll see you later.” He waves goodbye and goes his way.

With Youngjae and Nari, I separate from the crowd to escape to my secret spot. My sister taught me a secret before she left for university. According to her, there are several ways to make it across campus without being detected. It works for sneaking around, cutting class, and just generally avoiding people when you don’t want to be found. It also works for stealthy pursuit, for sneaking glances, and admiring certain people from a safe distance. I wouldn’t call it stalking, though Youngjae likes to say otherwise. Nari calls it strategic logistics.

From the fire escape, I get an unobstructed view of the empty strip of concrete behind the main sports building. This is where Mark practices his skateboard tricks while waiting for the required club hour to end. I lean against the concrete balustrade and take the moment in.

“That went well…I think.” Youngjae pulls out three juice boxes from his bag and hands me a strawberry flavoured milk drink.

Nari gets melon milk, as usual. “Could have gone worse.”

“What exactly did I agree to?”

“Not much,” Youngjae answers, poking his straw into his banana milk. “Just a walk back home. Maybe he’s making sure Rap Monster won’t bother you. That’s really decent of him.”

Mark starts with going back and forth the strip doing nothing but cruise around. I don’t even turn towards Youngjae to answer. “We do not refer to Kim Namjoon as Rap Monster. It’s stupid.”

“Why did you say yes?” Nari asks. “Because if it’s because of Mark, that’s not cool. That’s like, not cool at all.”

I sigh as I rest my cheeks between my palms. “I don’t know. I just…I couldn’t think straight and I didn’t want to, I guess, make him feel bad and I wouldn’t know what to say and what was I supposed to do?”

“You could have said something.”

Sometimes Im Jaebeom joins Mark and the two of them have these mini competitions. But this afternoon, it’s just Mark and his ollies. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“You know you’re gonna have to do something eventually, right?” Youngjae says. “You know. Choose.”

It’s not even a choice because from the very start there’s always just been The One. I sigh again, and it’s big and dramatic and utterly girl-in-love. I try, but I can’t seem to make myself think of anything else but Mark Tuan. He pushes off again, and this time as he glides down, he closes his eyes and raises his face to catch the slowly fading afternoon. It’s like the First Time all over again, and when he smiles I go under.

Youngjae and Nari wave their hands in front of my face. “Hello?”

I swat them away. “Go away, can’t you see I’m suffering an emotional collapse right now?”

They both look down. “Sunbae! You’re biggest fan is right here!”

“Sunbae! Notice me!”

I am going to kill Youngjae and Nari. I grab them both and tackle them to the ground. Between fits of laughter, I hold them down and peer over the balustrade. Mark looks behind him, ahead of him, and left and right. Thank goodness no one ever thinks about looking up.

But he does laugh to himself.

In that moment, I know what I have to do.

“I’ve decided,” I announce, still pinning my so-called friends down. “I am going to confess to Mark Tuan.”

Nari pushes me off first. “You already said that last year.”

“I’m serious.”

“And you weren’t last year?” Youngjae adds, dusting off his uniform.

“This is Mark-sunbae’s last year and this is my last chance. I’m going to confess to him.”

Youngjae and Nari exchange a mental conversation through near imperceptible twitches of their eyebrows. I must have missed out on something because I can’t follow the conversation occurring right in front of me.

“Guys, I have to do this.” I don’t know why I’m convincing them. I’ve made up my mind. “I really will confess to him. Before the school year ends, Mark Tuan will know about my feelings.”

Okay, so maybe I want to convince them because it’s not like I can do this alone. “Guys?”

Youngjae scratches the back of his head and Nari rolls her eyes.

“You are hopeless.”

“I hope you’re ready for another year of morning chores.”

So maybe I’ll kill them after they outlive their usefulness.