“Welcome!  Welcome to our school!”  Yifan shifts uncomfortably on the leather sofa and nods his thanks as he accepts a dixie cup of steaming mix coffee from the principal.  “How do you find things here so far?”

“Well, I’ve only been here for ten minutes, but so far, it’s nice?  Very nice!”  Yifan shifts his feet so his toes poking out of the too-small guest slippers are hidden under the lacquer table.  The principal nods and smiles kindly. 

“I hope you come to think of our school as your home in the not too far distant future.”

“Uh, yes sir,” Yifan nods again. 

“Please!  Call me Yixing!”  The principal widens his smile until his dimples deepen like chubby fingerprints left in playdough. 

“Sure.”  Yixing ushers Yifan towards the door and whacks his shoulder affectionately with a brochure.  The glossy front cover is stamped with the school motto, “unum sumus”, in large purple letters.

“I’m terribly sorry to kick you out so soon, but I have to transplant the amaryllis bulbs out front before it rains,” Yixing shrugs.  His palms smooth down the lapels of his wrinkled linen suit.

“You garden?  At school?”  In a white suit? he wants to add, but keeps that to himself.

“What’s going to touch a kid’s mind and soul, a beautiful and natural environment or a bunch of paperwork they can’t even read?”  Yixing pulls a pair of grass stained cotton gloves from his pocket.  “Amber showed you where all the supplies and keys were and everything?”

“Yes, uh, Yixing.  I think I’m all set.”  Yifan pats the heavy key ring already clipped to his belt. 

“Perfect!”  Yixing leans forward with a wink and Yifan’s not sure what it’s supposed to signify.  Yixing is a little hard to read, but Yifan doesn’t want to sit on the squeaky pleather couch and sip overly sweetened coffee until the lunch bell, so he just smiles one last time and pulls the door shut behind him. 

He pauses in the empty hallway for a deep breath before rolling his shoulders back and heading for the supply closet.  He should start on the mopping the cafeteria so the floor has a chance to dry before lunch. 

It takes awhile to set all the chairs upside down on the long tables, and it’s a pain to fill the rolling yellow bucket.  The siphon hose has a nozzle that doesn’t screw onto the faucet properly and the splashing makes a mess on the bathroom floor.  The mopping itself doesn’t take too long, though, not with an old Verbal Jint playlist feeding through his earphones.  The dulling rush makes him forget the slow seep of sweat into the gussets of his shirt and the metallic clink of dishes from the kitchen.  The room isn’t that big, which means it’s going to be hell and a headache waiting to happen with 100 tiny bodies packed in, spewing bread crumbs and dribbling chocolate milk and screeching.  Yifan winces at the thought and pauses to turn up the volume.

It’s not that he dislikes kids, he just hasn’t been around them enough to get quite used to them.  Even when he was little he didn’t play with other kids that much.  For one thing, kids do gross, dumb things like turn mud into play dough and eat earthworms, and then call their friends stupid head and chicken when they don’t join in.  For another, kids can be just plain mean. 

Technically, he can eat lunch in the cafeteria with the other teachers, but as he wrings the dirty gray water from the sodden mop head Yifan decides to skip and grab something from the convenience store out front.  Just for today at least, until he meets some other lunchmates besides the principal.  Yifan watches the silt eddying at the bottom of the bucket wash down the drain with a sigh.  Turns out his first day at a new school can be just as awkward at twenty-six as it was when he was three.   

By 10:30 he’s finished squeegeeing the front windows, collected all the trash in the halls, and double checked to make sure the cafeteria floor is well on its way to drying.  That’s more than half of the list Amber in the admin office gave him to cover this week, so Yifan figures it’s safe to pop down to the CU and grab some lunch.  That way when the kids are eating he can get a head start on collecting garbage out of the homerooms. 

Yes.  That sounds like a plan with minimal opportunities for embarrassing himself in front of strangers.  The first three grades (“the babies”, as Amber called them) start lunch at 11:30, so if Yifan gets back by 11:00 he can be on call in case something messy happens in the cafeteria. 

Yifan shucks off the borrowed slippers at his shoe locker by the front entrance, but doesn’t bother with the zippers on his boots.  He only has a block to go.  The school is set at the top of a deceptively steep hill, and the sidewalk leading down to the main road resembles a fractured graham cracker, bits of crumbling pavement pebbled between the larger cracks like loose mortar. 

The sun is hot, having burned through the thin layer of vapor clouding the sky earlier, and Yifan is grateful for the chill of the AC when he pushes through the door of the small shop on the corner.  The attendant slumped behind the counter rises from his stool to greet him with a lazy yawn.  He must be a student from the nearby design university, Yifan guesses, from the look of the permed red hair pushed off his forehead with a tribal headband and the sketchbook smudged with charcoal fingerprints shoved halfway under the register.  Yifan ducks his head in greeting and slips into the chocolate aisle.  He angles his frame to face the drinks fridge in the back so he doesn’t have to think about the cashier watching him shop. 

Yifan bares his teeth and slides the pad of his thumb over his right incisors.  It’s always a tough decision between the salty snacks and the candy bars.  He in a deep breath of cool air through his mouth and suppresses a slight shiver as the cool hiss from the aircon starts to penetrate the haze of warmth from outside still clinging to his shirt. 

He gives up with a sigh and grabs both a box of cheese filled sandwich crackers and a twix.  He skirts around the back to add a roll of kimbap and a can of iced coffee to the pile in his arms and slides everything onto the counter.  The attendant picks up each item and fingers it gingerly, turning it over with a sniff before scanning it and dropping it into a plastic sack. 

Yifan pulls out his wallet to dig for stray coins as he waits.  As the cashier struggles to scan the barcode on the cracker box, the door swings open.  A guy in a checked vest and black skinny jeans charges in with a loud hello and a broad wave. 

“Hey, Tao!” 

The attendant’s drowsy expression melts into a fierce smile and he fumbles the candy bar to the counter before it makes it into the bag.  The new arrival heads straight for the back to pull out a carton of banana milk.  He holds it up with a thick tongued slur of something that has the cashier hunching over the register in laughter as he crams a straw and disposable chopsticks into Yifan’s bag. 

“Hyung,” he croaks between giggles as he sorts Yifan’s change into the till, “your Mandarin is awful, I think you should stick with Spanish.”  He rips the receipt free and hands it over to Yifan, tugging on his stretchy headband. 

“Spanish, huh?” the other customer says.  He sets a melon popsicle and his drink on the counter.  Yifan hastily side steps to let him closer as he folds the receipt into a crowded partition of his cracking leather wallet.  The banana milk guy nods hello and shoots Yifan a curious glance, but Yifan gratefully escapes out the door when his attention is drawn back to the cashier with a question about charcoal sealant.

Yifan trudges back up the hill at a quick pace, hoping to avoid any awkward reunions with the other customer on the sidewalk.  He resists the prickling urge to turn his head for a second glance of the guy through the shop window.  He was quite tall, almost as tall as Yifan probably, and that’s something you don’t see every day.  He was also pretty well built, as far Yifan could tell through his padded vest, although he had none of that intimidating air most larger guys give off whether or not they intend to.  He seemed very friendly, whoever he was.  The kind of personality that melts down any tension in the atmosphere as soon as he enters the room. 

Yifan’s always been a little jealous of people like that.  Not that he lacks charisma, but he has a hard time giving amicable first impressions.  It took his cousin’s dog a good three months to stop growling every time he came over, and back when they were both in high school he’d been over at Henry’s literally every day.

Crossing the front courtyard of the school, Yifan slows his pace to check the pager Amber gave him.  It’s more of a glorified walkie-talkie than current generation pager, the cracked plastic case held together with bands of sticky duct tape.  Nothing exciting appears to have happened in his absence so he retreats to the printing room just down the hall from the admin office. 

The printing room is his office and storage closet, basically.  There’s a collection of tools propped in the corner, garden rakes and dowel rods and a brown rubber plunger Yifan hopes he’s lucky enough to never have to use, overflow from the main supply closet.  In the back of the long narrow room is the copy machine and color printer, parked under the window next to an open box of orange zip ties. 

Yifan checks his phone, double checks the pager thing just in case, then settles down on the broken office chair.  The rolling chair is shoved behind the stack of empty crates that serves as his desk slash coffee table.  On a warping plywood bookshelf behind his chair is a conference phone, same as the ones in the teachers’ office.  He wonders briefly if he should check the messages on that too, but Amber hadn’t said anything about how to use it and Yifan’s not sure it’s even plugged into the jack. 

Yifan perches on the edge of his seat  as he digs in his bag for the plastic straw and shoves it in his coffee.  It’s too early to eat yet, but he should finish his drink it before it gets warm.  He’s just figured out a semi-comfortable arrangement for his knees and elbows in the crowded space when the door bangs open and the tall guy with the checked vest trips in. 

“Oh!  Hey!”

Yifan is so startled by the intrusion he sprays iced coffee all down the front of his white shirt, a rain of droplets sprinkling across the top of his makeshift table. 

“Oh god, sorry!  I didn’t mean to startle you!”  Tall Guy flashes a toothy smile and punches the power button on the copier. 

“Hello,” Yifan answers in Korean, gently shaking the excess wetness from his dripping fingers and looking around for something that could serve as a napkin. 

“So you’re the new guy?  Kris-Wu-Ivan-something-or-other, right?”  The Tall Guy glances over his shoulder as he keys in the copy code and sets the toner levels. 

“Um, yes,” Yifan answers, surreptitiously wiping the worst of the moisture off on the plastic bag.  “You can just call me Yifan, I guess.  It’s nice to meet you.”  He bends forward in an awkward bow; there’s not really enough space in the close quarters for a proper one.  They almost crack heads as Tall Guy lunges forward, waving a hankie pulled from his pocket. 

“Oh !  Sorry, here!”  He shoves the crumpled blue square into Yifan’s hands before he can protest.  “I’m Park Chanyeol.  I’m the art teacher.”  He waits patiently for Yifan to dry his palms before grabbing Yifan’s right hand between both of his for an enthusiastic handshake.  It jars Yifan’s arm all the way to his shoulder socket. 

“I’m the janitor slash printer technician, officially.  It’s nice to meet you.”

“It’s so great to meet you!  We’re all thrilled to have a full time janitor again.  This summer was crazy after Yunho up and quit and moved to Bolivia, you don’t even know!”

“Bolivia?” Yifan repeats, sliding his hands into his back pockets. 

“Yeah, everyone really misses him even though he loves his new job at the orphanage.  Oh, but don’t get me wrong, I’m sure you’re really cool, too!  Besides your garbage eliminating skills, I mean!”  Chanyeol winks and it’s even more bewildering than Yixing’s, Yifan decides. 

“Thanks,” Yifan says, self consciously straightening his shoulders.  “Likewise.”

The copy machine gives a whirring clunk and Chanyeol spins around on his heel as it starts to emit a rapid series of high pitched beeps.  Oh .  Technical catastrophe on Day One, and Yifan is completely blanking on how to fix it.  Having Chanyeol’s distractingly tall presence in the room to complicate things isn’t helping any. 

“It’s ok!  It’s all under control!” Chanyeol says as he presses buttons all over the control panel before stooping to check on a pullout drawer.  “No paper jam, we’re just out of A4 sheets.  Can you hand me a ream?  Second shelf on the bookcase behind you.”

Yifan cranes around to pull out the requested item.  “Here you go...sir.”

“Thanks man!”  Chanyeol grabs the paper and rips into the wrapper.  “And please!  Just Chanyeol is fine, or Yeol, if you prefer.  I’m sure Yixing’s already given you the whole welcome spiel, but we don’t really stand on ceremony here.”

“Yeah, I kind of got that impression,” Yifan admits, clearing his throat, “what with the welcome hug and all.”  Chanyeol laughs, his shoulders caving forward and his right elbow banging into the open paper refill drawer. 

“You’re funny!” he declares, turning his head again to wink at Yifan.  Or maybe that was just a lot of involuntary eye smile, Yifan’s can’t really tell. 

Chanyeol pulls himself up by the ledge of a dusty filing cabinet.  He wipes his palms on the back pockets of his jeans as the machine starts to spit out copies again.  

“Hey, I have to print a lot of stuff for projects, so I’ll probably be in and out of here a lot.  Hope that doesn’t bother you.”

“Oh no, by all means!” Yifan smiles again.  Something about talking to Chanyeol makes it feel natural to smile at the end of every sentence.  “It’s not like there’s anything exciting going on in here to disturb.”

“Oh really?”  Chanyeol raises an eyebrow and squints at him through his dark-framed glasses, then smiles to himself.  “Well don’t feel like you have to stay cooped up in here.  Amber showed you the break room, right?”  Yifan nods.  “Or you could get out and explore, the night is young!”  Chanyeol gestures to the hot slant of sunlight cutting in through the open window to exalt the copier with a halo of golden light. 

“Sure.”

“I mean, suit yourself, but campus isn’t so big.  I don’t think you’ll get too lost.”  Chanyeol turns to gather the stack of finished copies, propping them against the lid horizontally, then vertically, to to align them neatly. 

“Well, if all else fails,” Yifan holds up the clunky pager and dangles it by the antenna.  He’s pretty sure he remembers how to page Amber in case of emergency.  Chanyeol laughs again, a bright burst of sound that splatters across Yifan’s chest like a warm rain before sinking in through his pores. 

“Oh god, the ‘mac pack’?  Good luck with that thing!  I turned mine into a pencil sharpener after my first week here.”

“A…pencil sharpener?”  Yifan frowns at the blinking green light of the pager. 

“Yup.”  Chanyeol tugs at the collar of his vest and heads for the door.  “Don’t be a stranger!” he says, turning back at the threshold to offer one last smile, and then he’s gone, the slap of his Nike slip-on sandals echoing down the empty hall. 

Yifan swivels on his chair to stare at the copy machine, which is still humming softly by the window where Chanyeol forgot to close the lid and power it off, and smiles.  It’s not til he crumples the empty paper wrapper and tosses it in the trash that he realizes Chanyeol forgot his crumpled blue hankie, too.

It doesn’t take long to collect the rest of the trash during lunch hour.  There are only nine homerooms, one each for the second through sixth grades, and two for kindergarten and first.  There are separate classrooms for art, music, PE, and cooking lab (the kindergarten curriculum is Montessori based, Yixing was very proud to inform Yifan during his extensive private tour), but Amber warned him to clean those after school hours in case the teachers have materials or activity stations set up during the day. 

By midday day it’s getting stuffy in his office, even with the window propped open, so Yifan decides to take his kimbap for a walk and find a nice tree or something to picnic under.  Behind the school is an open field leading down to a shallow burn, the clearing fringed in a ring of oak trees.  Yifan can see a wooden bench set under a stand of pines in a sweet spot of shade, but when he makes it down there he finds the wooden boards damp with last night’s rain and a puddle of dirty water pooled in the center of each horizontal slat. 

He sighs and crosses the meadow, stopping to watch a sparrow flit through the trees just ahead before settling under an oak tree close to the back parking lot.  The earth up at the top of the hill is quite dry, the mulch spread over the tree roots months old and faded.  It’s a perfect substitute for a picnic blanket today, but Yifan makes a mental note to remulch before it starts freezing at night.

The students’ lunch hour is nearly over, and one of the younger grades is out on the playground from the sound of the muted shouts and squeals and the creaky grind of swingset chains he can hear around the corner.  Built on the edge of the city on donated land, the school has quite a bit of green space for the kids to run free. 

Yifan snaps his chopsticks apart and peels back the greasy plastic film from his kimbap roll.  The top of the wrapper that tears off clings to his fingers and it takes a few tries to get the thin plastic to stay in the bag with the other trash.  He weights one handle of the bag with a pebble, lest the soft breeze turn him into a litterbug on the grounds he’s responsible for, and leans back against the tree trunk.  His shoulders feel a little sore from the enthusiastic mopping he did earlier, as are his lower abs, to be honest.  Not that he’s never worked hard before, but the side effects of repetitive motion like that really creep up on you.

The tree trunk isn’t exactly comfortable, sharp bits of bark pressing into his shoulder blades through his thin shirt and dry bits of flaky mulch shifting beneath his every time he readjusts position, but the slivers of sunlight winking through the leaves above him are warm on his shoulders.  Only four more hours, and he’ll be on his way home to his soft, squishy mattress and plushie collection with nothing on his agenda but sleep.  And maybe a soak in a hot bath.

Yifan sends a snapchat of his pathetic picnic spread to Henry before he swallows the rest of his food down and crumples the trash inside the black bag into a tight wad.  The playground still sounds noisily occupied, but he heads in that direction anyway.  The side door is closer to the supply closet and he needs to find some extra large rubber gloves. 

Yifan yawns as he steps into the sun, the bright heat sparking a slow burn behind his nostrils for a sneeze.  Well, it’s either the bright sun, or the oak trees.  He stops just outside the ring of light encircling the playground to fumble in his pocket.  Yifan pulls out Chanyeol’s hankie and watches the kids as he wipes his nose.  There’s ten or twelve of them scattered across the spacious, rubber padded area.  A woman in a belted canvas dress and sunglasses is stationed at the other end of the fenced in yard, glancing between the kids and her phone as she keeps an eye out for trouble.

One of the shortest kids takes off across the yard, whooping as chases a boy in a green striped shirt with a dead tree branch.  Yifan’s sinuses finally erupt in a violent sneeze and the kid stops short at the sound, his jaw slack with surprise and fingers loosening their hold until the broken stick drops at his feet. 

“Hi!” he calls, tentatively reaching out his fingers to Yifan. 

“Hello,” Yifan answers, waving back.  The kid’s stark expression dissolves into a great smile, his eyes almost disappearing into the soft curves of his face and his lips drawing back from his small white teeth.  He’s missing the top one on the left.  The boy trots over to hook his stubby fingers through the chain link fence and pushes up on tippy toe, craning his neck up to gape at Yifan. 

“Hey, what’s your name?” 

“Me?”  Yifan glances around warily and points to his chest in surprise. 

“Of course you!  I’m Baekhyun.”  He releases his grip on the fence with one hand to smear a thin line of snot from his nose. 

“Baekhyun,” Yifan repeats and waves again, trying to deflect his gaze from the wet stripe of mucus glistening on the back of Baekhyun’s wrist.  “My name is Yifan.”

“Fan?”

“Yi-fan,” he says, slowing down so he can distinguish the tones clearly.  All the students have immersion classes in Mandarin and English in addition to Korean, so Yixing encouraged him to avoid using Korean with the kids whenever possible. 

“Yifan,” Baekhyun says, mimicking the tones pretty well this time, to Yifan’s surprise.  He nods and gives the kid a thumbs up.  Baekhyun grins again and bounces on his toes, making the fence jingle faintly.  “I’m six and I like pizza.”  

“Pizza?”  Yifan squeezes the tip of his nose with Chanyeol’s hankie and wishes he had a fresh one for Baekhyun.  “Cool.  Me too.”

“Lie!” Baekhyun yells with his head thrown back before pulling himself up for a laugh.  “Haha, tricked you!  Atch’lly, I love pizza.”

“Pizza is good stuff,” Yifan agrees, not quite sure what to say. 

“How old are you?  Fifty?” 

“What?  No!  I’m twenty-six.”  Baekhyun sinks his teeth into his lower lip, squinting up at Yifan skeptically. 

“But you look fifty.  My dad’s fifty, I think.”

“Really.”  Yifan’s not sure exactly how old his own parents are, but they can’t be much more than that.

“Yup!  My dad knows everything.”  Baekhyun rocks back on his heels with a satisfied smirk and hooks the fingers of his free hand through his belt loop.  The fabric of his T-shirt is thin and stretched out and hangs off his slight frame, but his denim cutoffs look a little tight.  Yifan smiles to himself at the observation.  Silly brat probably dressed himself in his favorite outfit this morning and refused to wear what his amazing dad told him to. 

“Baekhyun-ah!  Baek, you stupid head!”  The kid in the green striped shirt is perched at the top of the slide now, waving both of his arms over his head. 

“That your friend?” Yifan asks, pointing. 

“Jongdae’s a chicken ,” Baekhyun sighs with a weary shake of his head.  “Just ignore him.”

“Ok,” Yifan says, trying not to laugh at his dramatics. 

“Yah!  Baekhyun-ah!”  Jongdae leaps off the slide halfway down the ladder and sprints towards Baekhyun.  “Baek!  You--!”  He stops in his tracks to gape when he sees who his friend is talking to.  Jongdae fists the hem of his shirt, flashing Yifan with the band of his navy blue briefs before dropping his hands and lifting his chin.  “Hey,” he says, marching up to wrangle a skinny wrist between the diamonds of heavy fence wire.  “This is Kim Jongdae, it’s your pleasure!”

“It’s my pleasure,” Yifan corrects his English automatically, reaching down to grab his outstretched fingers. 

“Huh?”  Both boys stare at him with blank faces. 

“Just...nevermind,” he sighs in Korean.  “I’m Yifan.”  Jongdae nods and grabs his hand more firmly for a proper shake.  Yifan’s palm comes away sticky. 

“He’s old like my dad, so be polite,” Baekhyun tells Jongdae in a loud whisper punctuated with a shoulder nudge.  Jongdae pushes back before turning to face Yifan.

“Do you like food?”

“Yes?”  Yifan didn’t realize that was a question worth asking, but okay.  Food is really important, especially when you’re six (or twenty-six). 

“Here.”  Jongdae stretches out his left hand that was stuffed in his pocket.  He’s holding M & M’s and he transfers three to his right palm, which is polka dotted in a pastel rainbow from the candy pieces. 

“Go on, don’t be shy!” Baekhyun urges. 

“...thanks.”  Yifan’s voice cracks as he delicately lifts the red candy between his thumb and forefinger. 

“Enjoy!” Jongdae yells, the other two pieces off his palm with a slobbery tongue while Baekhyun tries to raid his pockets for his own share.  Cracking a tight smile at the two round faces grinning up at him expectantly, Yifan slowly raises the candy towards his lips, slick with a slimy sheen of he-doesn’t-want-to-know-what.  Here goes...

“Excuse me!” a shrill voice cuts across the space.  “What are you doing!”  The lady who was over by the merry-go-round a moment ago is stalking over in wedge converse with a look of death on her face.  Oh geez.  “Boys!  Don’t eat that!”  She swoops between the boys to knock the remaining M and M’s out of Baekhyun’s hands.  He lets out a sharp wail as they skitter across the cushy rubber flooring. 

“But Teacher--!”

“Over on the bench!  Now!”  They both turn to obey, Jongdae’s upper lip trembling slightly.  Their teacher swivels on a tall heel to face Yifan, hands on her hips.  “You need to leave now, or I’m calling the police!”  She shakes her phone at him.  It’s in a blinged out case sporting floppy gel bunny ears.

“Sorry, ma’am, I--”

“Don’t argue!  Please leave.”

“But I--”

“I saw you giving candy to students.  This is a grade school!  You can’t just waltz in here and do that without permission!  Actually, I need to report you.  Stay right where you are.”  She flicks through her contacts with a sparkly purple nail and hits dial, keeping her eyes trained on Yifan the whole time.  Yifan’s not sure if he should try to page Amber or just stay still.  It is not on his bucket list to get arrested on his first day on the new job. 

“Maybe--”

“Amber?  Red alert!” the teacher shrieks into her phone in Mandarin.  “We have an intruder on the playground and--”

“Good afternoon, friends!  Is something the matter?”  Yifan startles at the press of a warm hand into his shoulderblade. 

“Yixing!”  The teacher lets out a frustrated sob of relief as she and Yifan turn at the same time to see the principal, a paper sack of mica chips balanced on his shoulder. 

“Ah, Song Qian!  I see you’ve met the new caretaker!  Yifan, this is one of our lovely kindergarten homeroom teachers.”

“Nice to meet you,” Yifan says with a shallow bow since he’s right up against the fence, and tries to ignore the traces of melted chocolate between his fingers. 

“The new what?”  Song Qian’s still glaring, but with a shadow of uncertainty between her brows. 

“He just started this morning!  I had Amber send out a notice on the school messenger, but I’m sure you haven’t had a chance to check it yet this busy morning.”

“Oh--oh,” she stammers, the indignant blush concentrated in the apple of her cheeks diffusing to an embarrassed pink.  “Pleasure to meet you,” she says stiffly, hands still forked on her hips but with an hesitant dip to her elbows now.

“Yo!  Victoria!”  Yifan turns again to see Chanyeol and Amber heading out of the main building towards the playground.  “Resting face is not a crime you know!” Chanyeol says with a laugh and then a nod to Yifan as they draw closer.  Yifan knows Chanyeol’s amusement isn’t directed at him, but he still feels a rush of defensive heat flush the back of his neck.

“Park Chanyeol!  Innocent ears!” Song Qian shrieks, clapping her palms over the nearest child’s ears. 

“Oops sorry?” Chanyeol grins.  She kicks at the chain link fence in his direction with a glare.

“Now, now,” Yixing starts with a placating smile, “the point is Yifan didn’t do anything wrong, this was all just a misunderstanding.”  Amber nods in silent agreement, scuffing the toe of her slipper in the dry turf. 

“Well I--!”  Song Qian pauses, opening and closing as her sharp glare darts between Chanyeol and Yixing before coming to rest on Yifan.  “Well please try to look more friendly in the future!”

Chanyeol bursts out laughing and Baekhyun echoes him, bracing his hands on his stomach in a mirror image of Chanyeol. 

“Come on, let’s get the kiddos inside!  It’s time to finger paint, guys!”  Chanyeol unhooks the gate to the playground and ruffles Baekhyun’s hair as he, Jongdae, and a girl with long pigtails and a short pink skirt race by towards the front steps.  Amber and Song Qian herd the rest of them forward while Chanyeol holds the gate. 

“You should introduce yourself on Monday at the staff meeting!”  Yixing thumps Yifan on the back hard enough to throw him off balance.  Yifan coughs, tugging on the thick rubber antenna of his pager. 

“But I’m not a faculty member.”  Yifan hates group introductions.  His mouth dries out all the way to his sinuses and he can’t remember anybody’s name the next day because he was so focused on not fainting.   

“Didn’t I tell you?” Yixing tsks with a slow shake of his head.  “We’re all family here.”  He puckers his lips and pushes his wavy hair back from his forehead.  He gives Yifan one last shoulder thwack and follows Song Qian and Amber inside.  

“Come on, Soo-yah!  Don’t dawdle!” Chanyeol calls, hanging halfway over the top of the gate.  Yifan looks back to see a boy in plaid shorts and a thin black tank top crouched by the slide, struggling to tie his shoe lace.  “Don’t you want to come paint with us?” Chanyeol calls.

“No.”  The boy doesn’t look up, grunting under his breath as his little fingers fumble with the stiff laces of his sneaker.

“Here.”  Chanyeol hands off gate duty to Yifan and jogs over to the slide to kneel next to the little boy on the rubber matting.  “Let me help you, Kyungsoo!”  The boy drops the frustrating strings with a sigh and leans back on his hands while Chanyeol tackles his shoe laces.  “What are you going to paint today?” 

“Nothing.  I don’t like finger painting.”  Kyungsoo doesn’t whine like Jongdae did earlier, it’s just a simple statement of fact. 

“Why?” Chanyeol asks with an incredulous laugh. 

“Fingernails get dirty,” Kyungsoo expounds with a scowl. 

“Well,” Chanyeol says, giving the lopsided bow he just tied one last tug to straighten it, “I’m sure we can find you a paint brush!  How does that sound?”

“Ok,” Kyungsoo nods, hopping to his feet. 

“Good man!”  Chanyeol doesn’t ruffle Kyungsoo’s hair like he did with Baekhyun, but he leans down to take his small hand in his, the tips of Kyungsoo’s stubby pink fingers curling around the edge of Chanyeol’s sleeve.  “Thanks dude,” he says to Yifan, clapping him on the shoulder as Yifan stoops to latch the gate. 

“Sure.”

“Say goodbye to Mr. Wu, Soo!”

Kyungsoo turns to stare at Yifan, directly meeting his gaze for the first time.  His eyes are round and bright but also startlingly flat.  Yifan has no idea what the kid’s thinking right now, but somehow he feels judged and he’s suddenly nervous about the opinion of a five-year-old. 

“Your eyebrows are weird,” Kyungsoo says finally, and tugs on Chanyeol’s hand to go in.  Chanyeol fails miserably at trying to contain his shriek of laughter, snorts of it spiraling out through his nostrils as he almost trips on a rock.  Yifan rolls his eyes and follows them in, turning left at the first corridor in search of the utility sink.  He really needs to wash his hands. 

******

By the time Friday night rolls around, Yifan is more tired than he’s felt in a long time, even if he only worked three full days this week.  The physical labor wears on him, sure, but it’s also refreshing in a way.  Yifan’s spent fifteen years of his life with his too long legs crammed behind a desk studying, and not enough hours on the basketball court to blow off the steam.  Going about his day with stretches of time to think about whatever he wants--or to think about absolutely nothing at all--is not boring, no matter what Henry’s opinion is on the matter. 

Mostly, it’s the noise that exhausts him.  He still can’t get over the lung capacity some of these kids have.  The school probably has no need of the state-of-the-art smoke alarm system Yixing is so proud of (“flashing sensors, Yifan, flashing gold and purple sensors!”).  In case of emergency, Yifan’s quite sure every kid under the age of eight would be shrieking and screaming loud enough to fracture the tempered safety glass windows, mostly for the fun of it than out of actual fear.  Baekhyun, for one, seems literally afraid of nothing; Song Qian caught him trying to swallow a live sweat bee yesterday after lunch and he probably would have succeeded had if Soojung, the skinny kid with the long pigtails, hadn’t punched his hand away from his mouth.

In other words, school is a strange and clamorous place, and Yifan just wants a mental break for a while.  Which is why he’s a little resentful when Henry interrupts his Princess Diaries marathon two hours and three beers into peaceful oblivion and pressures Yifan to articulate reassuring anecdotes.    

“How are you liking the job?  About ready to murder the brats with a toilet plunger?”

“God, no!”  Yifan chokes on a crumb of sweet potato.  He steamed them last night but forgot to put a lid on the bowl so they’re already getting dry.  “If I was really gonna murder someone, don’t you think I could come up with a more sanitary way of dispensing them?”

“Sanitary?” Henry chortles.  “Nevermind, I take it back!  Sounds like you’re perfect for the position.  Good job me on recommending you to Yixing.” 

“Yes, thank you once again, even though I’ve already thanked you in every conversation since you first suggested it,” Yifan rolls his eyes, groaning as he stretches to reach the napkin propped between the salt and pepper shakers.  The edges of one side are stained orange with spicy ramen broth from last night’s dinner, but he’s too lazy to get up for a fresh paper towel.  

“Yeah, well, I’m still waiting for a shipment of thank you pepero,” Henry says, and Yifan sighs. 

“Didn’t you say you could buy those on campus now?”  Yifan wipes a curl of purple potato peel off on his napkin.

“Does it matter if you owe me?” Henry sniffs.  “Oh!  That reminds me, I heard you met Amber.”

“What does that have to do with pepero,” Yifan moans and slides his beer over to pillow his cheek on the laminate counter.

“Nothing,” Henry sing songs in the tone he always uses on Yifan’s mom when he wants a fifth serving of honey pork.  “Except maybe she hinted she wouldn’t mind if you remembered her on Pepero Day.” 

“Henry,” Yifan sighs, crumpling his napkin around the remaining bits of potato peel.  “Office romance, I don’t know.”

“Dude, you don’t even share the same office.”

“Is there anything important you wanted to say?  I want to finish my movie and my now-warm beer and fall asleep in bed with my plushies instead of at the kitchen counter talking to you.”

“Nevermind,” Henry huffs, “I take it back.  You are way too lame for Amber.  But for your own good, I hope you find someone equally as lame to share the love with so I don’t have to listen to your pitiful on Friday nights.”

“Excuse me, but who called who?”  Yifan flicks at his beer can with a chipped fingernail.  It’s Kirin tonight, he was getting tired of Cass.

“You, dear cousin, are hopeless.  You should think about coming home.”

“Goodnight, Henry,” Yifan says, and ends the call.