“So you see, this is why you should use the Present Perfect here, not the Present Continuous” said Yisun, taping the exercise sheet with her finger, to point out the mistake. “…Yoongi?”

Yisun looked up to see that Yoongi’s concentration was not on his exercise sheet, but on the wooden pencil he was trying to balance above his upper lip.

“Min Yoongi!!” Yisun let out a rather large groan that caused his pencil to drop to the floor.

“Yes! What? Oh yes! Present Continuous, right…” blurted Yoongi, quickly, as if he had been paying attention all along.

“No, NOT Present Continuous…” sighed Yisun. “see, you always make the same mistake here…”

Yisun went on with her explanations, now that she knew she had her lost cause’s attention for the next twelve seconds, but it was useless; 5 minutes later, she caught him staring at the empty space as she was – again – trying to point out that Present Continuous and Present Perfect were two different things.

“Yoongi…” this time it was a tired sigh.

“Huh? Oh, sorry…” apologized the messy-haired boy, stifling a yawn.

Yisun shook her head and got up from her chair. “Let’s take a break”, she added, not even turning around to look at him as she headed for the bathroom.

Yoongi shrugged and went to light a cigarette by the window.

When Yisun returned, 5 minutes later, neither of them looked refreshed or any less tired as they went on with the last half-hour of their study-session.

***

“Aww… it’s so annoying, I don’t know what to do!” whined Yisun to Jang-mi as they moved their trays along the line in the cafeteria.

“Well at least he’s stopped giving you a hard time and not showing up…” pointed out Jang-mi, grabbing a carton of milk and putting it on her tray.

“Ooh, I’m not sure which one was worse, if you ask me…” she frowned, “I mean, we’re seeing basics here! Crap we’ve seen in middle school that EVERYONE knows and he can’t even keep focused for more than 5 minutes!”

“Not everyone, Sunnie…” replied Jang-mi with a light frown, “maybe you don’t realize it but you’re better than most people at English and all that…”

“Alright, alright… but my point is” said Yisun, fussing in her pocket to pay the lunch-lady, “he’s not trying” she finished her sentence as they headed for the nearest table.

“I mean, it’s been nearly 2 weeks” she added, sitting down.

“Well, you’re the one that signed up for it” replied Jang-mi.

Yisun frowned; it was not what she wanted to hear. “I know…”

“Oh, cheer up… I mean, even he can’t be that slow… he’ll catch on eventually…” suggested Jang-mi with a smirk on her face.

“I hope so…”

***

Later on, after English class, Ms. Jenkins pulled Yisun aside to talk to her.

“So,” she asked the teenage girl, resting against the tip of her desk, once everyone had left, “how are things going?”

“Huh… you mean the tutoring?” asked Yisun, knowing full well this was the only thing she could be talking about. “Well, he’s stopped ditching” she answered, plainly.

Ms. Jenkins chuckled, “yes, I imagine that’s a big help, but still not quite what I meant…”

“Well,” Yisun hesitated, “to tell you the truth…  I'm having a hard time. It's like, he doesn't even understand the simplest things I try to help him with, and I can't keep his attention focused on one thing for more than 10 minutes before he spaces out.”

“Yes, well, that’s exactly the reason why you’re there to help him. He doesn’t understand those things, and you do.” answered Ms. Jenkins simply.

“No, I get that, it’s just that, how am I supposed to teach him anything if he’s always spacing out? He doesn’t want to be there; he’s just there cuz everyone’s making him and…” Yisun left her sentence hanging in the air and sighed.

Ms. Jenkins smiled and asked “what does he like?”

“Huh?”

“What does he like?” she repeated, “If you could find something he likes and incorporate that to your lesson, perhaps he wouldn’t fall asleep so quickly.” she added, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Like the way you sometimes show us episodes from The Simpson's and stuff?” asked Yisun.

“Exactly like that” smiled Ms. Jenkins, “but with something he’ll like.”

***

“Something he likes, eh?” repeated Jang-mi as they were walking around the shopping arcade on Saturday afternoon.

“Yeah, like I’m supposed to know what freaks like him enjoy…” whined Yisun.

Once again, Ms. Jenkins’ idea had sounded wonderful upon first hearing it, but didn’t sound so great now that she was discussing it with Jang-mi.

“Oh, that’s easy: smoking, drinking, harassing girls, beating on people, and more drinking!” exclaimed Jang-mi, laughing at the same time.

“Not funny, Mi” retorted Yisun, who was laughing anyways.

“Okay, okay… well, I don’t know… promise him something” suggested Jang-mi with a shrug.

“Huh?”

“Yeah, something he wants in exchange for a good grade, you know? My parents do that with my little bro; like now, he’s got this big exam coming up and they promised to get him this new PS4 game he’s been wanting if he gets a grade above 85%. Motivation, you know?”

“What, I’m supposed to buy Yoongi videogames now?” retorted Yisun, none too thrilled at the idea.

“No… that was an example… just… I dunno, say you’ll take him see that or something… he’s a guy, they all like sports, no?” replied Jang-mi, pointing at a faded poster announcing the FIFA world cup.

Yisun paused to look at the advertisement and then a smile grew on her face. “Mi, you’re brilliant!”

“I am?” retorted her best-friend, cluelessly.