“Hayi!” Lalisa called me. I turned around and she was with, surprisingly, Jennie. “Come on, we got to get changed for PE!” she yelled.

Before I make myself to them, I turned to look at Donghyuk. He was about to leave, putting his hands on his pocket and his eyes spoke to me—we still had time to discuss this. I inhaled and finally made myself to Lalisa and Jennie. I wasn’t paying attention to my surroundings, because the thought of B.I was consuming me, but I was conscious enough to realize that Mino was walking to my way from the back of Lalisa and Jennie. His eyes were deathly, I narrowed my eyes on him, because I was surprised, shocked, and clueless on his attitude—he glared at me as he walked. As far as I remembered, he was the one who made mistakes, so i should be the one who set the deathly stare at him.

            He roughly passed the girls and he kept walking, directly to me. His friends were around him, talking, laughing, but his mind was so focused on what he glared at—me. I didn’t stop myself and kept walking as he did. For a second I thought he was going to stop at me, but once the distance was closed between us—he didn’t. He kept his eyes on me for as long as he was able to reach, I too turned my gaze at him until he was gone, blended in with the crowd. None of us greeted each other, none of us started something, it was not so lovey dovey anymore, and I was tired to think of the reason.

            His attitude towards me was illogical, it left me an odd feeling whether I did something wrong, but we hadn’t been in contact ever since the party. Even before the party, he left me nothing but confusion. When I saw him today, for the first time after my heartbreak down, he treated me as if i was the one who made mistakes. Even if I did, I would know, and I would apologize with no prestige. I was confused and I knew both Lalisa and Jennie were too. I broke my gaze on Mino and turned to the girls. They were shocked.

“Hey guys, sorry for the long wait.” I gently said. “I-I got some business with Donghyuk earlier, you know, school stuff” I lied.

 “What was that?” Lalisa asked. “Why didn’t you and Mino say anything?” she continued as she glared at me.

I slowly shook my head. “I-it’s nothing, we just um…”

“Still on a fight?” Lalisa asked.

            I simply nodded—and she understood.

The three of us went straight to the locker room. We were slightly late and the locker room was empty, the other students were already outside stretching themselves while we were just about to get start changing. None of us talked, either it was just me and the scene I made or they were just not on the mood. Jennie had become silent, as if her mind was somewhere else, and Lalisa, she kept stealing glances at me, like she wanted to tell me something and we waited for the right moment.

            The air was tensed up even when there was nothing we talk about. The silence was killing me, but I was even more curious on Jennie, she had been avoiding my eyes and Lalisa’s for whatever reason. So I started a conversation, to find out what was really happening.

“Does anybody have deodorant spray?” I asked them even when I didn’t need it.

            Nobody answered. They were busy settling their stuff into their own lockers, and I waited here as I observed them—something must have happened when I was gone.

“Here” Lalisa handed me hers. I watched Jennie whose locker was across mine, she closed her locker and seated herself as she put on her adidas running shoes.

            I sprayed myself a bit and walked to Lalisa’s locker. I put the spray directly inside her locker which was still opened and whispered to her.

“You have to tell me everything” I whispered. She didn’t look at me but I was certain she understood. I left them in the locker room and went outside—alone.

Something was not right; they weren’t usually like this when we were gathered around. Jennie had been silent for whatever reason, I could hardly recognize her being quiet, she was always the talkative one, being optimistic about things she talked about, but today, not even a word came out of her. When I approached her in the hallway, she smiled at me but it felt strange. When I looked at Lalisa, she was busy giving her concern to me about Mino and Jennie stayed silent in the back of her, looking at Lalisa and me, and her smile faded.

            I walked outside as I kept rewinding the scene. What could have happened? Were they doing some kind of a prank? I thought. It was not even anyone’s birthday, it was unnecessary to play some prank. So what could it be? PE was about to start, the other students were already taking their position and stretched themselves with the instructions from Mr. Park, our PE teacher. He set his eyes on me because I was late, I replied with an apology smile.

“Late again Lee Hayi-ssi” he said. “Where are the others?” he was asking about Jennie and Lalisa.

“They are changing their shoes, sir. They’ll be here in a moment.” I said, still with a smile attached on my face.

“And Kim Jisoo-ssi?” he asked.

            Right, I completely forgot about her.

“She is absent today.” I leaned closer to him and whispered. “Asthma”

Jisoo often skipped school and she told us whenever she skipped school, we just had to tell the teacher she got asthma—it was the only disease she had so if the teachers did a cross check about it, she had the record and wouldn’t be counted as lying; clever of her.

Today, I hadn’t seen her, so I thought she would be skipping school. Another to do list—I needed to visit her right away. I started to miss her though, she annoyed me the most but she was still my best friend. I wondered where she went this time, maybe smoking in her bedroom or hanging out with her boyfriend’s band in the studio. Her places were too dangerous for me to come into; I never really go to her house or be properly introduced to her boyfriend. I’ve seen him once but she refused to introduce him to me because he didn’t want to. All I knew about her boyfriend was his name, Kang Seungyoon, and that he played guitar in his underground band.

Mr. Park mouthed Oh to me with a surprised face. He believed it and he wrote something on the paper attached to a cardboard he held. “Okay, you may take your place.” He said.

“Thank you, sir” I said, making way to a spot in the back of the crowd.

“Alright, listen up everyone!” Mr. Park instructed.

When I made it the spot, Lalisa approached me and stood beside me. I saw Jennie walking out of the locker room and she didn’t make her way to us, she went to the other side, join the other girls whom I knew had been dying to take our place as Jennie’s best friend. My heart broke when I saw her smiling and talking with them, why didn’t she come here? Why did she choose them instead of us? I turned to Lalisa and she shook her head as she mouthed ‘Don’t’

Then she came closer to me and gently said “I’ll tell you everything later, but right now, all you have to do is smile. Smile as if nothing happen, okay? Use your best charm and don’t make a desperate impression to them.” She talked to me with a wide smile—like we were having a great time.

I wore my best smile and looked at them. Jennie and the girls were talking to each other, and they didn’t notice I was observing. I turned back to Lalisa and said “What happened?” Still with a smile.

“Later” she strictly said, again, with a smile.

“Listen up, kids! Listen up!” Mr. Park said. “Do any of you know what we are going to learn today?” he asked us a typical question of teachers. None of the students answer. “Really?” he waited. “No one?” no answer, he sighed. “Okay, our activity today will be…” he looked at each of us and said. “Baseball”

The students were simultaneously gasping as they complained to each other about how hard Baseball was, this one mostly girls, and the others were cheering because Baseball was their favorite sport—and here I was with my poker face, because I hated sport, no matter what kind of sport it was. I turned to Lalisa and she said, “Don’t forget to smile” so I smiled.

“Yeah, I know, I know, girls. Baseball is hard, the ball is hard, the tools are hard, everything about baseball is hard but you know? It’s just a myth. Baseball is fun! Right, boys?” he asked the boys, and they cheered to him. “Now, I will divide you into groups of six students, consisting three boys and three girls!” he said. He looked at the paper he held earlier and started calling our names to be divided into groups.

“So, we don’t choose our own group, huh?” Lalisa said. “That’s better” she muttered.

“You know, I am extremely confuse here so can you at least tell me the main part of what the heck is happening right now?” I demanded her.

“Only if you tell me what happened between you and your boyfriend” she instructed her eyes to where Mino was, and I saw him. “We both know it’s not just a fight, Hayi” she said.

“Lee Hayi!” Mr. Park called my name.

I looked at Lalisa before leaving her, she looked back at me and soon her name was being called also—we were in the same group and we both cheered for each other. At least, I had someone to talk to, or else, I would be dying, looking at the fact I did not have that much of interest in other girls, and I had no experience in making friends, they usually approached me first, and I thanked Lalisa for doing so when we first met.

            She embraced me and we walked to the said group, far in the other side of the field. We were the last two persons to join the group and as we came closer, I recognized each of their faces, two boys and a girl whom I did not know. When we arrived in our spot, i found Donghyuk happened to be one of the group members I was in, so I came to greet him for the sake of politeness.

“Donghyuk!” I said. He turned to me.

“Lee Hayi? You’re in my group?” he was shocked.

Lalisa joined in and said, “Your group?” she chuckled, “Chill out, sir, chill out”

“Well, they chose me to be the group leader” he simply said.

“But we’re just joining in, how if we don’t want you to be the leader?” Lalisa said, leaning closer to Donghyuk.

“Then how about you take my place as the leader? What do you say about that?” he said.

I came in between and arbitrate them, avoiding them from a further argument. “Okay! Guys, let’s just play the game!” I said in a cheerful way. They both ignored me and stepped closer to each other.

“No.” she paused. “I want him to be the leader” Lalisa said as she nodded her head towards a boy who just came back in with the Baseball equipment he was carrying that he took a moment before we arrived from the equipment shack.

His back was facing us, I couldn’t see his face, but after he was alarmed on what Lalisa said, he turned to us and I gasped. My heart felt like dropping, I know him, I recognized his face, his whole figure, only I was surprised to find him here, with everybody—B.I, in the same group as I, and I had to spend the rest of the day with him playing Baseball, as a team.  

“What?” he asked as he looked at both Lalisa and Donghyuk. Then, his eyes stopped at me. He too was as surprised as I was—his eyes were widening, and so were my mine.

“Him?” Donghyuk asked as he stole glances at me—I knew what he meant, I just hoped he could save me by not speaking anything about it.

“Yeah, him” Lalisa nodded. “I want you to be the group leader, are you okay with that? You can play Baseball, right?” she continued, turning to B.I.

B.I dropped the equipment on the ground and slowly nodded. No, don’t I whispered to him through my mind even when I knew he couldn’t hear it, I just wished he would understand what I was thinking. I kept staring at him and he nodded, he agreed to Lalisa.

“Yeah, I can do that” he agreed.

Lalisa smiled in victory at Donghyuk and said, “Great! Let’s begin!”

Mr. Park instructed us about the first lesson—throwing. Girls and boys practiced dividedly, each of us had to wear the gloves and throw the ball to one another. Girls had a softer ball than the boys under Mr. Park’s mercy. I was glad because i was a little bit frightened of getting hit by a hard ball and so were the rest of the girls.

 After he finished instructing us about the proper way to throw and catch the ball, we began our own practice.  The ball started from me and I threw it to the girl whose name I did not know. She failed to catch it because I threw the ball too far from what I expected.

“Sorry!” I said to her, and to be polite, I asked her name, “What’s your name?” I asked.

She ran back to us after getting the ball that fell far from us and said, “Park Chaeyoung!” and she threw the ball perfectly to Lalisa—she caught it well.

“My name is Lee Hayi!” I said.

“Yeah, I know who you are” she smiled

I was looking at Chaeyoung when I sensed a ball was coming right at me and bam! I fell to the ground—hardly. In front of my eyes now were the grasses and my right arm was hurt a bit, but I knew exactly I was fine. I tried to get up but before I did, two hands were grabbing me and helping me stand up. Those were Lalisa and Chaeyoung.

“Oh my god, are you alright?” Chaeyoung asked.

“Y-yeah, I’m good” I said as I stood up.

“I’m sorry, Hayi-ah” Lalisa said.

“No, it’s okay” I smiled. “Really, it was me. I lost my focus and-…”

“Will somebody please teach her how to throw and catch a ball?” Mr. Park was referring to me, he yelled to the whole field.

I was cleaning up my clothes when I heard a voice said, “I will, sir!” a boy’s voice. That turned out to be—B.I’s voice. I lifted my gaze at him who was walking towards me.

“You’re the leader of her group?” Mr. Park asked.

“Yes, sir!” B.I replied.

“Good, teach her something!” Mr. Park yelled. He nodded.

B.I came to me and he instructed Donghyuk and the other boy to practice on their own, he did the same to Lalisa and Chaeyoung. He looked different than what I saw up in the music room, he was different in a good way, and I somehow liked it. He looked commanding, like a true leader and I could not help it, looking at him being just how the other normal kids were being, but he did it so well. I kept staring at him as he approached me with a soft ball on his hand and he did not realize i was observing him.

“You don’t have to do it” I said. “I can do it myself” I demanded.

He stopped and looked at me. “I have to” he handed me the ball, “it’s an order” he said.

“No, seriously you don’t…-“ Before I could finish, he grabbed my hand and put the ball inside of it that left me to surprised.

“What?” he looked deeply into my eyes. “You’re scared people will talk about you getting close to someone unpopular?” he asked, I was unable to answer. “You’re scared your sick boyfriend will dump you because you’re holding hand with another guy?” he was killing me. “You’re scared your perfect world will fall apart?”

“Stop it! Please!” I yelled at him as I closed my eyes.

“Well, guess what?” he closed my fingers so that I wrapped the ball inside my hand, and he let go of it “I just don’t want you to hurt yourself anymore”

He walked around me and stood behind. His head was close to my shoulder and he said, “Now listen, the way you hold the ball is right but it’s not proper. You should grab the ball like this…” he wrapped my hand inside of his and he showed me how to grab the ball properly.

I was stunned but i tried hard to keep listening, now the ball was inside my hand and it felt better than before. “See? It feels better, right?” I nodded. “Now, to throw the ball, you need to measure the distance between you and the catcher. If it’s far from you, you should…-“

“Why are you doing this?” I stopped him and asked. “You don’t like this place, you hate it.” He didn’t answer. “People don’t matter to you, so why…-“

“Don’t you realize?” he asked.

“What?” I felt like crying, but I did not know the reason “What is it that I haven’t realized yet?” I asked desperately.

It took a long pause for him before he spoke, “I am always here.” He said. “I am always down here, but you” he paused, “you never realize I was here all along”

His arm was covering my whole arm as he led my arm to where Mino was as if he was about to throw the ball to him “You’re always busy giving your whole attention to him” a tear was coming down to my cheek. “The person who never really loves you. He was there for you only because you have a high prestige, your family, and your friends. It was all a matter of imagery.” He paused. “And then her…” he led my arm to where Jennie was, “Jennie Kim, you know why she wants to be friends with you?” I didn’t answer. “Because you are more than her, she wanted to climb the popularity rank, didn’t you see it? That’s why she chose you” another tear came down.  “Because you were on top of it”

“Whatever you’re doing, please stop it” I begged him desperately.

Then he swung my arm to the back from the top of my head. “This is how you throw if your catcher is further” then he swung my arm to the back from the bottom. “And this is how you throw if your catcher is closer” Then he walked a few steps in front of me and stopped. “Now, throw the ball!” he commanded.

I glared at him as I was angry for what he said to me. I threw the ball as how he taught me and surprisingly it landed perfectly inside his glove—and he smiled. “Perfect!” he said. And little did he know, I smiled a little as I looked at him. I could finally throw properly I thought.

He went back to me and gave me the ball. “It’s perfect, you actually can do it perfectly” he said.

I hesitantly took the ball from him and said, “Oh shut up, B.I”

“What?” he was shocked. “What did you just call me?”

“B.I?” I said. “It’s how people call you, right?” I guessed?

He laughed as he bowed. “Oh no” he looked a bit disappointed for whatever reason, then he stood up, “You got my name from that president guy, didn’t you?” he poked his head to Donghyuk.

“We-well…-“ I stuttered.

“Lee Hayi” he gently said, “It’s not my name. It’s just something I made up”

For God’s sake, this guy was seriously making me sick. Why would he make up a name? Why couldn’t he just say his real name? It would be so much easier. “Then what is your name? Seriously!” I growled. I was embarrassed for calling him that as if I was sure it was his name. This was one of many things that I regret, such a shame!

But he stopped laughing and he looked at me. He simply smiled and it left me dying. He offered his hand for a handshake and said,

“Lee Hayi” he paused.

“My name is Kim Hanbin”

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