I woke up this morning feeling a bit more groggy than normal. I guess that was to be expected since yesterday was the first time I had gone both to school and to work. My job wasn’t that demanding, but with overactive runts like Jimin at school, it wasn’t surprising that yesterday had taken a bigger toll on my body than any usual one might have. That doesn’t even take into account the fainting spell I had before or the stress that came with coming face-to-face with the one who basically tried to kill me. Who knows – the trauma from almost dying is probably what caused me to faint to begin with. Now, that I think through it, yesterday was pretty eventful. I can’t imagine what today will be like let alone the rest of the year.

Well, this was literally what I signed up for so there was no point in avoiding it. Besides, for some reason, I had a feeling even if I stayed in bed trying to avoid going to school, school would come to me. So it was with a sigh that I got ready to tackle the day donning my normal school uniform and tying my usual ponytail.

Leaving home, I found that my earlier feeling was on point. The aforementioned runt waited for me outside my apartment, and upon hearing my door close, he turned toward me and smiled ever so brightly. “Yoon Mi!” he called up. “I was waiting for you!”

It was a sweet and completely unnecessary gesture. He probably thought since I fainted yesterday and could barely walk that I needed his help or something. As if! “Well, I can’t imagine any other reason for you being outside,” I replied.

I was intentionally being cold, but he laughed. He laughed. He laughed and said, “I guess you’re right!” I don’t understand what he found funny. By then, I had descended the staircases, and we both stood on the same block of cement. “I figured we could make this our normal thing – walking to school together I mean.”

“You don’t think that’s weird?” I asked him as I continued on the path before us.

Even if he denied it, there was definitely going to be something weird about it at least in the mind of everyone who saw us. Normally, students only walked to school together if they were dating unless they were all the same gender in which case people would just assume they were all friends. In our case though rumors would fly around all too quickly, and I wasn’t sure if Jimin was too simple-minded to realize as much or if he knew and didn’t care.

“Weird?” he asked almost nervously. His voice was a bit shakier than it was only seconds before. “Why would it be weird? We’re just friends!” If it wasn’t weird then it seemed he was certainly going to make sure it was.

“If you say so.”

We went on, and he seemed hard pressed to find some way to change the topic of discussion first mentioning the "beautiful weather we were having" then going on some bit about how difficult he thought class would be this year. I didn’t have any particular interest in the conversation so I tried dropping hints by giving him short answers that were hard to reply to. He wasn't picking up what I wasn’t putting down.

Not soon enough, we got to school, found our school slippers, and made our way to class where Jimin would finally shut his mouth. Being as early as we were, there were only a handful of other people in class, and Jimin tried his hand at befriending them all. I couldn’t care less how he spent his time before class started, but I was happy to finally have some air to breathe. Additionally, I found it entertaining to watch girl and guy alike turn him away as he approached them and tried to start a conversation. Somehow they found the words I couldn’t.

In any case, before a half an hour or so, my other classmates had all made their way to school as well. I noticed a number of them eyed me when they came in, but then again I was eyeing them first so I thought nothing of it. Jin-young would soon flock in with a couple of boys I assume were friends of his and a mob of giggling girls around them. He was a lot more popular than I realized, but I wasn’t surprised. He’s the type of guy girls always fall for – handsome, smooth, laidback, the typical “cool” guy type.

Our eyes met after I stared at him for a while, and he grinned at me a lot livelier than he did to the others. It made my cheeks warm. Memory serve me right, I think that’s the sensation you feel when you blush, but it happened so little to me that I wasn’t sure. I turned around and cupped my face with my hands thinking what a strange bodily function it was.

As the bell rang, Mr. Cho came in not far behind the rowdy ones telling everyone to get ready for the pledge of allegiance. A few moments after the bell, our head master went on to lead us in reciting the pledge as he did the day before then made announcements and reminded everyone of student council and class president application sheets. After that, he told us to have a good day, and Mr. Cho went immediately into the classwork for today.

Our classes felt like they went by quickly (probably because again we spent more time reviewing than we should have rather than learning new material), and before I knew it, the lunch bell was ringing. I had a feeling Jimin was planning to eat together like we did yesterday, but the smell radiating from his lunch and the thought of having to converse with him had me following our teacher out the door. I was sure he’d be able to find some other way to entertain himself.

It wasn’t abnormal to eat outside the classroom, but this would be my first time doing it so I had no idea where I would go. I could go to the bathroom like a lot of kids did in the states, but that wasn’t the most appetizing place to eat anything. Maybe, I could go eat on the roof like characters in manga often do. No matter where I went, I couldn’t keep wandering the halls or I wouldn’t eat at all.

While mulling over my options, someone called out to me from down the hall specifically by my name. “Lee Hyojin!” It was strange considering I hadn’t introduced myself to very many people, but when I turned around I immediately recognized it was none other than Amber running to meet me.

When she had gotten close enough to where I didn’t need to yell, I answered her call. “Yes?”

“Have you seen Victoria around?” she asked casually looking around and over me obviously still in search of the "Victoria" she’d mentioned moments ago.

Given I had only just come out of my classroom, odds were the few people that passed me weren’t who she was looking for. Then again, I didn’t even know what the girl looked like. “Who?” I questioned.

“Nevermind, I see her!” Amber shouted lightly shoving me out of the way so she could wave excitedly down the hall. The Victoria girl was stunning! And Asian! I expected with a name like that she would be from the West. “And did you just say ‘who?’”

“I did,” and I meant it. What was so shocking about that, I don’t know, but I know she’s about to tell me.

Amber laughed at my ignorance. “You really are new!” she exclaimed. What was so funny about that, I don’t know, but her laughing in my face annoyed me. “Let me put you in the loop,” she went on. “The girl you’re looking at now is none other than the future president of Yookwon’s second year students, Song Qian. A and B student, star tennis player, and all around awesome person in general – she is more commonly known as Victoria as in Queen Victoria of England because of her elegance and regality.”

Victoria playfully whacked at Amber with her hand saying, “Stop that! You know how I feel about people calling me a queen!” She certainly looked the part so I didn’t see the problem.

“My sincerest apologies, your majesty,” Amber continued to tease. Victoria whacked her arm again before turning her attention to me and formally introducing herself. We both bowed and went on with the conventional exchange before I asked her what I should call her since she obviously wasn’t a fan of the name her schoolmates had given her.

“Victoria,” she replied. I was confused after the display she put on and the bit about how she didn’t like being treated like royalty. So, I asked her why she would agree to answer to that name or even go out of her way to tell people to call her that, and she said, “I don’t think it matters so much what you or anyone else calls me as long as I know who I am.”

I couldn’t understand her reasoning. If she didn’t like people calling her that, she could have told them not to and yet…it was confusing to me. Amber quickly retook control over the conversation. “You told me you were knew, but I never thought you would be so clueless.”

There wasn’t any way I could think to respond to that especially if I was trying to be nice. I liked Amber so I wasn’t going to bite her head off just yet so I just kept quiet. Hopefully, I would be able to find a friend in her eventually. “Maybe, we should show her around then,” Victoria suggested sweetly.

“Yeah!” Amber interjected. “Show her the ropes and all that! Good idea! Let’s go kid!”

“I’m not a kid,” I mumbled trying my best not to sound so perturbed. She could probably still tell I was displeased by the way the words hissed when they left my mouth, but she didn’t seem to mind so I guess it doesn’t matter.

She continued to smile wide as she wrapped her arm around the back my neck taking me along so I could be “shown all the ropes” while Victoria walked at the other side of me smiling prettily. For the first time I could remember, I felt jealous of another’s girls looks, but there was no way I was going to let anyone know that.

The three of us went down the hall. I don’t remember saying much during that time, but Amber was quick to start pointing out people and labeling them as this or that. For example, we were first passed by a group of four girls. They weren’t particularly tall, and they looked more like middle schoolers. What really stuck out though was that they all had a little flair of red attached to them. Amber said that everyone in school called them "Red Velvet" because of that. Apparently, they had been friends for a long time and weren’t open to anyone outside of each other. It was the opposite of what I expected from their bright smiles, but I just took her word for it.

“Oh,” Victoria spoke up suddenly. She leaned in close and pointed to four boys roughhousing with each other as she whispered, “And watch out for them. They act like they're a gang, but they’re just a bunch of immature wannabes.”

“They call themselves Bangtan,” Amber added. “’Bulletproof Boy Scouts who can’t get taken down by anyone.’ Psh! If they were face-to-face with a real gang, they would be scared for their life.” Well, the girls were right about one thing: they definitely couldn’t be a gang of three. One thing was for certain though: those boys didn’t belong here acting like that. I questioned how they were accepted if this school was all that it claimed to be.

Around then, a small group of girls passed by us. They reeked of lilac and roasted nuts – must be some fancy perfume or something. Each of them wore smiles that lit up the hallway more than the lights. Their uniforms were trimmed with extra glittery, shimmering linings, and the bows tied at their necks were a bright magenta in contrast to the burgundy ties and skirts girls were required to wear. I questioned why they were accepted if they obviously didn’t give thought to the dress code.

“And who were they?” I asked once confident they wouldn’t be able to hear my voice.

“Who? Them?” Amber said quickly glancing back at the girls that passed by. “They’re the daughters of school board members.”

“Well, that explains why they can get away with breaking dress code,” I replied.

“Yeah, everyone calls them APink – straight ‘A’ students who wear pink bows.” Not very clever. “It’s not very clever!” she repeated as if having heard my thought. “But I think it fits them well.”

I felt it was petty and immature to give everyone in the school a classification and was ready to say as much until I thought of how easy it made it to identify them. Of course, with all these classifications, it would be easy to stereotype everyone in a category, but what was that to me? Although it did make me wonder: what would they call me? The odd girl out. The loner. That weird girl. All applicable really – I didn’t really belong to any of the other social groups, and I never would. It didn’t matter to me that I would never be good enough for them though. As long as I was good enough for me.

After spacing out a bit, it surprised me when Amber nudged me saying as she pointed out a group of guys we passed by, “Those are the jocks! Most of them seem cool, but the others I wouldn’t trust as far as I could throw ‘em.”

The boys didn’t seem to hear a single word of what she said even though we weren’t talking very low and we were but a few feet away from them. I guess they probably heard and just didn’t care. What concerned me more was how some of the boys in the group were considered jocks with how scrawny and short they were, but I suppose any guy who was really into sports could be a jock.

“And as you already know,” Amber continued calling back my attention. “Those girls are Soshi.”

When I looked up, it was just as she said. The girl from before, Jessica, and the cheerleader troop around her circled up with each other and seemed be discussing something or another. One of them caught eye of me and whispered something to Jessica I couldn’t catch prompting her to turn around. We stared each other down for a moment as I passed by then she scoffed at me almost playfully and rolled her eyes causing her sister and the other seven to laugh hysterically.

I didn’t understand what was so funny which only made it more annoying. “My advice,” Victoria said. “Keep your distance. Those Jung Sisters are bad news.”

“Don’t worry,” I replied casting my eyes forward so I could see where I was going. “I didn’t intend to try to get close to them anyways. Those girls are too immature and unworthy of the time and effort that would require.”

Amber cackled happily. “I agree!”

My mind had gone elsewhere while we walked. I wondered what it took to make a girl like Jessica the way she was and what she had against me. That giggle of hers echoed in my ears and her sneering smirk was draped like a curtain in my eyes. I was annoyed by it, but I couldn’t get it off my mind. Soon I found myself once again wakened by Amber’s voice. We had wandered to a room with a couple other people - a number of them in the grades above me.

I didn’t remember the journey, but now that I was paying attention I could gather from the conversation that these were students running for class president. I scanned the room briefly so I could memorize their faces, and then my eyes met a familiar face – Park Jin-young. Was he really going to run for class president? He smiled at me when I finally saw him, and I felt myself smile back a little. It didn’t mean anything.

Around that time, Jessica stormed in with her sister running about how she wanted her campaign to go. When all eyes were on her, she pretended to be surprised anyone else was in the room, but it was obvious she was just full of it. I glared at her and when she took notice of me she received a real shock then grinned at me with that sneering smirk I mentioned before. She then took it upon herself to apologize for (purposely) causing a disturbance and formally announce to the room her plans to run for class president. Attention-seeking. I hoped nothing except for her to lose. I didn’t care to whom as long she lost so I could laugh in her broken-hearted face.

At that point, everyone took note of all the people there who were planning to run as well. Taking Jessica’s lead, Jin-young rose his hand and stood up to announce, “I, Jr., will also be running for president of the first year class!” Jessica cut a sort of dark look at him. It was hard to read her, but that look gave me the feeling that she was neither approving nor disapproving of him.

With that, everyone else of course felt the need to stand and announce themselves as candidates for their respective classes just as those two had. A Sim Changmin stood and introduced himself as the future third year class president inciting the spite of fellow candidate Kwon Boa, and after she introduced herself as the "real third year class president," the two dueled playfully with the daggers in their eyes. Following them of course were the candidates for Yookwon’s second year class, Victoria glanced across the room and her eyes met with the handsome guy at the other side of it. The both of them sprouted up like little saplings exclaiming that they would be the second year’s class president. Victoria stated her given name, and the handsome one called himself Ok Taecyeon. So this confirmed it; this year would be a gender battle for the presidencies.

After everyone had spoken up and eyed each other a good while, the student council’s president and the advisor cut a bit of the tension with their pre-set authority. The advisor told everyone he had made note of those who showed interest in president-ing their respective class, and the president asked for secondary nominations for all those who had just showed interest. Amber stood in support of Victoria of course while a Kim Kibum stood to show support to Taecyeon. Two handsome guys? I would be surprised if Victoria actually won. Meanwhile, Jessica’s support would obviously be Krystal whom happily raised her hand to show as much, and Changmin was supported by Jung Yun-ho. Boa had the support of a pretty boy named Kim Ryeowook; he smiled confidently at her as he stood.

When all was said and done, the only person without a third-party nominating them was none other than Park Jin-young. By the look on his face, he had realized it about the same time that I had, and he was completely confounded as to what to do about it. “If you don’t have a vice,” the advisor bellowed commandingly. “Then your self-nomination for president will be voided.”

If he wasn’t flustered before, he certainly was now. Jin-young frantically looked around fidgety probably hoping someone would appear out of thin air and support his campaign. I genuinely felt bad for him, but there was nothing I could do. It was just like guys like him to come unprepared. I averted my eyes as his ship crashed and burned then caught sight of the Jung sisters who snickered at his misfortune. How rude! And annoying! Not that my ignoring him in his time of need was any better, but they were outright making a joke out of it. I couldn’t stand for it.

Or maybe I could. “I’ll support Jin-young’s presidential campaign,” I exclaimed demanding the attention of everyone in the room and earning a sharp glare from Jessica. Sneaking a glance out the corner of my eye, I could see Jin-young was especially surprised by my speaking up on his behalf.

The advisor seemed a bit taken aback as well, but went on to acknowledge my nomination saying, “Alright,” and scribbling something on a notepad. “Now that we have all the candidates for class president in order, I’ll run this list by Principal Baniszewski, and you all will be free to advertise yourselves and run your campaigns however you’d like as long as you mind the school handbook of course.”

Followed by the student council president stating, “Alright, you all can leave now.”

By this time, I had realized that my nominating Jin-young meant that I would be helping him with this whole process. While I regretted the decision immediately since I didn’t have the time to help anyone campaign for anything, something in me looked forward to working with him. My heart pounded suddenly at the thought.

I wanted to confront Jin-young right then and tell him I wouldn’t be able to help him with this whole class president deal, but Amber and Victoria intercepted me. Victoria showed genuine interest in my sudden support of Jin-young and said, “I hope I can count on your support with my campaign too!” I would’ve been fine helping her if she asked, but this sudden sense of pressure she was putting on me was starting make me change my mind.

“Miss President,” Amber interrupted tossing her arm over Victoria. “I think we should talk strategy while we still have lunch free.” Victoria nodded and the two of them waved me goodbye. Amber’s statement reminded me that it was indeed lunchtime, and I had only been carrying mine around this whole time. It wasn’t my fault that I was completely distracted by them though. Not that I cared – I wasn’t very hungry anyways.

However, it would be a waste if I didn’t at least try to eat some of what I cooked. That thought in mind, I figured I would head to the drink machines to grab a water bottle or something to help me wash down the food as quick as I possibly could in the ten minutes I had left to eat.

As expected, the courtyard was packed with everyone wanting to eat in this oh so perfect weather. Every table was taken, and even the ground was dotted by groups of students who had brought blankets to eat on with their friends. Even then, no one seemed interested in the drink machines outside though there were a total of four in school including this one. Then again I guess the dank and dampness of being awkwardly placed under a stone stairway leading to the courtyard, the acrid pungency of perhaps a long dead creature that wasn’t removed, combined with the increased volume of all the voices creeping in and bouncing annoyingly into your ears would turn anyone off.

On second thought, the drinks were still safely kept inside of a machine so really there was no reason not to use it. After putting my money in, I realized the real reason people preferred not to use this machine. For whatever reason, it was designed to make watching your drink dispense a real experience. Rather than just dropping the drink, there was an intricate pattern of arms and slides and holes that made buying a drink not only a waste of money but a waste of time too. And what an awful place to waste time.

“Hey!” I looked away from the show to find Jin-young was the one had called out to me. He approached me smiling brightly as per usual. “Thanks for saving my back there!” he exclaimed. “If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t even be considered in the running.”

I sighed and turned my attention back to the drink machine. “I didn’t do it for you,” I stated. “I just didn’t want Jessica to be class president – nothing more and nothing less. You shouldn’t look too deep into things.”

As soon as those words left my mouth, I watched my bottle of water get stuck just as it was about to be within my grasp. I growled at the sight and rose to try fixing the issue myself. Suddenly, I felt Jin-young’s hand on my shoulder sitting me back down on the bench. “And you really shouldn’t lie to yourself,” he replied in some kind of arrogance.

I couldn’t help, but glare at him while he went to the drink machine. “What exactly makes you think I’m lying?” He tried his best to shake up the drink machine, but it was nearly twice his size. With all the mechanics inside making it even heavier, he could barely budge the thing.

I could hear him breathe deeply obviously exhausted from trying to move a huge machine much larger than he was. He would never let me see him that way of course. He kept his back to me I assumed because he wanted to catch his breath. “I don’t think you’re lying,” he spoke up just above the breath he had just taken. “I know you are.”

He kicked the machine causing the bottle to shake just enough to fall. A sudden chuckle made it obvious he got a kick out of his random success, too. He turned to smile at me with the bottle in hand, but I wasn’t amused. Did he think that he had some power over girls? That he was just completely irresistible and any girl who denied it was delusional? As if! He was just full of it.

“You don’t know anything,” I told him as I held out my hand.

While I expected him to hand me the bottle, he ended up giving me the runaround while walking in a circle around the bench on which I was seated. “Ya know, you don’t have to be so cold all the time,” he said pretending to be hurt. “I bet if you were to let people get close to you, you’d find it’s a lot more fun than being alone all the time.”

I couldn’t deny that he had a point and was a bit choked up in trying to admit as much, but around the time of my realizing that, he slid the ice cold bottle of water across my cheek. Quite the shock it was especially with how warm this day turned out to be. The sensation reminded me exactly why I never got close to people. What if they were cold inside like me? I would just end up hurt, and all the time I spent with them would have been a waste.

Twisting almost completely around, my hope was to stare daggers into him, but something about that smile of his. It melted even my cold heart. “Sometimes,” I began. “It’s just better to be alone.” I reached out again for the water bottle.

Instead I found my hand grabbed by his. He pulled my arm down to the bench twisting me almost all the way around to face him as he bended further and further down, closer and closer to me. “Then let’s be alone together,” he said at this point so close I could feel his breath drift across my face.

What was I supposed to do now? I had never been in a situation like this. My heart took off like a plane fresh off the runway speeding through the sky, and in moments, he stole a precious first of mine. He kissed me smack dab on the mouth. All I could remember thinking was how warm his lips were. I was taken in the moment. At first the kiss was small, but then it grew bigger and more intense. It was one of the most intense kisses I had ever experienced. The only kiss I had ever experienced. Thoughtlessly, I raised my hand to his well-toned body – his abs, his chest up to that jawline and back down.

Then Jin-young started to play along. I could hear the sound of the water bottle falling to the ground as he hooked his hand behind my lifted my leg so slightly as he his body again and again against mine. Things were escalating quickly, and my heart accelerated to meet the nerviness of this moment as his hand crept slowly but surely up the back of my leg. My hand slid back up passed all the natural ridges and curves of his body toward his chest. He pressed against me harder and harder, and I grabbed onto his chest afraid that we were going a little too far much too fast.

It couldn’t have been a second after I made the observation that I felt the sensation that I was falling. It wasn’t a second after I made that observation that I realized I was falling, and a moment after that, with a loud thud, the both of us fell to the ground. Which would make sense, we were on a bench after all.

Just like that, the kiss was over. Suddenly, I became very aware of my surroundings. It wouldn’t be long before some odd number of people came to investigate the sound, and I wasn’t going to let myself be caught alone lying with a boy I only just met. Not exactly the reputation I needed. Pushing Jin-young to the side, I struggled up to my feet then remembered to grab my water bottle. I was a bit flustered and couldn’t help showing it, but again I wasn’t going to let an unsavory reputation come to life.

“I have to go,” I said stepping over him then turning back nervously as the space between us widened. Suddenly feeling the need to give him a reason why, I continued, “It’ll be bad for my grade if I’m late for class.”

Jin-young smirked at me as he continued to lay on the ground. “It sure will.”

There was no time to be annoyed with him. Turning on my heels, I was practically sprinting out toward the classroom when just then I stopped at the bottom of the steps as I came upon another realization. My fingers just barely brushed across my lips – my lips, the ones that he kissed. I couldn’t believe it; someone kissed me!

About that moment, the school bell so tolled and brought me back from my daydreaming. I was reminded that there were more important things than some brief high school romance, and I made my way up the stairs before the entire school scarce a few students tried to push their way inside all at once. Even with that thought in the back of my head, I couldn’t get that kiss off my mind. It wasn’t as if we were doing anything special in class anyways so it didn’t hurt to space out a bit, but it was still so unlike me that it kinda put me off.

Before I could consider myself having thought about it too much, the day was over. I could hardly remember anything after lunch because I was so busy thinking about other things. Even on my way back home with Jimin, I paid no mind to his long-winded tale about how great his day went because I was too focused on how great mine was. And why? Because of a boy? Because of one kiss? This isn’t some romantic fantasy so why am I so caught up in this? Why?

I was so tired when I went in to work that evening and felt almost as light-headed as yesterday. Luckily, I was only working the register today. I had the liberty of allowing my mind to drift when there wasn’t a customer to attend to, and I didn’t have to worry about fainting in the middle of the store because I was sitting the whole time. Even so, there was some greater part of me that only wanted for a good night’s rest.

When my shift was over, I was practically staggering over my own feet – an accident waiting to happen. It was a miracle that I even made it to my apartment without incident. I took a shower and while being baked by the steam I realized that I hadn’t even given thought to any of my homework. I was ashamed of myself for letting my mind wander so much as to neglect my responsibilities as a student, but at the same time, I just didn’t care. Before too long, I was in my bed without a thought, without a single worry, without a care. That night, after the end of a long day, I slept more soundly than I ever had before.