Everything starts with a beginning, and ends with an end. The emotions involved are what differentiates each beginning from each end. Well, my beginning started a long way back. So long that I forgot almost every other event... but our first meeting would always be etched in memory...

Because it was the first time I ever felt something so confusingly different. 

3rd January 2003

My family just moved into a new neighbourhood not long after I was in kindergarten. At a tender age of five, moving away from what I was comfortable with was a great deal. Leaving a place which I once called home; leaving the friends I once called my family. The prospect of meeting new people in the city and the idea of living in a new environment with strangers scared the hell out of me. How was I supposed to live like this? I was young and powerless and hence the only way I could protest was to cry my eyes out which was obviously absolutely ineffective. It was a school day the next day and I dreaded the idea of going to school immensely. A new friend? Its the second year of kindergarten already. Everyone would fit in with each other, and I would be the one left out, obviously. The only way to be safe from all the bullying would be to keep quiet; and I did exactly that.

The next day, Mum woke me up at 7.30 sharp and prepared my favourite egg sandwich. Despite the usual morning routine, it felt uncomfortable. The butterflies in my tummy seemed extraordinarily active. My eyes were exceptionally watery. My nose was exceptionally red. I was exceptionally different because I was crying. I was crying from despair.

"Come on dearie, don't worry." Dad tried to cajole me but to no avail. I was literally crying my heart out at 7 in the morning and my tears formed a never ending stream on my cheeks.

"YOU ALL DON'T UNDERSTAND!!" I continued to wail and Dad could only helplessly sit beside me on the bed. 

"YAH MINHEE GET OFF THE BED RIGHT NOW!" Mum's blood was boiling and that meant one more thing - She was going to drag me to school that instant.

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I got dragged to school that day for obvious reasons and was forced to do a self-introduction, which I did as timidly as possible of course. The teacher was a kind lady in her twenties and she assigned me to sit with a group of three students. There were currently two boys and a girl in the group. Focusing my sight on my two feet, I dragged myself to my seat and settled down as quietly as possible. Fearing my new classmates, all I did for the rest of the period was just fiddling with my thumbs and learnt nothing from the lessons so far. My eyelids started drooping a few minutes later. Blink... blink......blink.........

I officially fell asleep in my first class ever.

"Can Minhee answer this question please?" A nudge from the side jolted me awake. In a blink of an eye, the whole classroom was just staring at me. Heat rushed to my cheeks as I desperately thought of an answer. But at that moment, nothing seemed to be able to escape from my already dry mouth and tears threatened to fall from my already wet eyes.

Narrator

Minhee stood frozen in her spot. No one was there for her - not because they were unhelpful, it was because nobody knew her. That just meant one thing, which was getting scolded on the first day.

At the opposite corner of the table, a little boy had witnessed the whole scene. Adjusting his bangs, he sneakily tore a jagged edge from his tattered notebook and noisily scribbled on it. Jongin was never the kind of boy who helped a damsel in distress. No, he was a devil. All the little girls hated the boy who teased them relentlessly, insulted their dolls and made them cry. Something about Minhee made him pity her. Perhaps it was the way her cheeks flushed in anxiety; maybe it was the way the wind had relentlessly messed up her hair; it could be the way her tears threatened to fall. He was going to help her out. Just this once.

As the minute ticked by, a crumpled paper ball made its way to Minhee. Out of curiosity, Minhee uncrumpled the paper.

 Just read this now: The three little pigs built a home made of straw, wood and bricks. The strongest home was made of bricks.

Minhee

I nearly got the second heart attack within a minute when a paper ball hit me squarely on the back. The teacher was starting to get impatient. Her brows were furrowed and she was obviously frustrated. Silently, I unravelled the paper ball and did as I was told.

"Uhm, Ms Park, the three little pigs built a home made of straw, wood and then bricks. The strongest home was made of bricks." I hesitantly read from the piece of paper. 

Ms Park nodded her head and ordered me to sit down before warning the class to pay attention, which embarrassed me further and was of no help to my already red cheeks.

Who was that? Why did he decide to help me? My thoughts wandered as I scrutinised the boy sitting diagonally opposite me. His sleek black bangs was combed neatly to the side. He was chewing on his pencil and carelessly flipping his notebook. 

ah... he must be a really nice guy. I should thank him later right? But... how? I don't even know his name... okay he shall be Mr Nice Guy for now.

Later on during lunch, I made friends with the girl who was sitting next to me, whose name was Sooyeon. Sooyeon was a really shy girl with short hair and a button nose. She only spoke to people she was closer to and by the end of lunch hour, we were already really good friends. Well, making friends wasn't that hard after all...

During art class, we were required to colour a girl cartoon character and decorate it as if it were ourselves. After colouring my work, I handed it in to the teacher, while Sooyeon continued with her work. 

"Minhee! The peach coloured pencil is broken! I can't colour my arms and legs!" Sooyeon panicked

"How about colouring it yellow? I think the teacher said we could." I hesitantly replied.

Sooyeon immediately went on with her colouring, and in the end her final work had beige skin on the face, with yellow arms and legs. Just as Sooyeon was about to hand in her work, Mr Nice Guy came by and snorted.

"Eyyy... who's here? Oh, I almost forgot, its crybaby Soooooooo~~"

"Whoa, what's that? An alien? What's his name? Oh... Its Sooyeon!" 

His fellow guy friend whose name I think was Chanyeol or something laughed so hard he choked on his spit. This joke was proven to be too much when Sooyeon burst into tears and screamed for the teacher after that. I guess Mr Nice Guy wasn't that nice after all... Do all the people living in this city have split personalities?

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When we were moving on to the next lesson, our teacher ordered us to stand in two rows and hold each other's hands before moving off to the next venue. Out of nowhere, a hand popped out in front of my face, and the hand belonged to none other than Mr Nice Guy. 

"Hi Minhee! I'm Jongin!" He flashed a toothless grin as he grabbed my hand to put it in his. I was extremely stunned by his open behaviour at that moment but snapped out of it when he started dragging me along the corridors to the next venue.

"Hi Jongin..."

"Hey don't be shy! We are going to my favourite lesson right now!"

"What lesson is it..?"

"Dancing! Dancing! You know what dancing is right? Right, right, left, left, everybody step, step!"

And that was our first conversation ever. The first time we held hands, the first time when I felt extremely jumpy with butterflies in my stomach. Jongin never knew how elated I was to be his friend. He never knew how much I admired him, he never knew about the secret smiles I had when he called my name. He was the best dancer I had ever met. But I never knew how he knew my name. I never knew how he could make me feel excited. I never knew how he could play such a big role in my life. I never expected him to be such a huge bully. I never knew I would befriend such a devil. He was the only thing in my life then which did not make sense. 

But despite all his bullying, he never once bullied me. To me, he was a friendly giant. For a moment, I thought he wanted to be my friend. For the rest of the year, I started smiling when I heard his name, I loved the way the right corner of his lips always lifted a little higher than the left when he smiled, the way he combed his bangs with his fingers, the way he teased all the other girls. For one thing I was sure about, I was grateful for his company, for this really good deal of friendship. But I never expected everything to come crashing down when we both had to leave for elementary school the next year. We were in different schools, and we never got to meet each other.

Just like this, I lost my favourite friend . To be honest, I never knew what type of relationship or feelings we had for each other. I only knew that I lost someone special a year later after I cried my eyes out during my first day of Primary School. I stepped into a cold empty classroom without my daily dose of sunshine named Kim Jongin.