Jinki and Taemin were chatting animatedly—well actually it was mostly Jinki who did the talking—among other 10^th graders in the science club’s room then they went silent when Jungsoo and few other 11^th graders entered the room.

“Teukie sunbae! Why didn’t you come to the camp last week..? I was looking for you, you know.” Jinki whined and hugged Jungsoo tightly.

“Well sorry Onew-ah, but I was suffering from gastritis so I had to stay at home. Did any senior give you a hard time there?” Jungsoo affectionately ruffled his favorite dongsaeng’s hair.

“Sungmin sunbaenim was very scary, he told me to kiss his sandals thrice.” The boy pouted.

“That’s not a big deal, Jinki. In music club, Kyuhyun sunbaenim made me play guitar for an hour non-stop and he would spray dirty water to my face every time I made mistakes.” Taemin said bitterly.

“Kyuhyun did that to you? Didn’t Heechul do anything to protect you from him?” that was strange, Jungsoo thought. Heechul was always so protective to Taemin. He even said that he would make Taemin sleep in his tent so that no senior would lay a hand on him at night at the camp and had once told Kyuhyun directly to stop picking on Taemin.

“He also didn’t come, sunbae. But well, that’s how the inauguration camp supposed to be, I guess. It’s more surprising that you didn’t come. I think you were the only club president who didn’t attend the camp.” The lanky boy explained.

“Well I told you I was sick so there’s nothing I could do about it.”

“You missed your greatest chance to bully your juniors, what a pity.” Jinki teased then the three of them laughed together.

Jungsoo’s phone vibrated in his pocket then he excused himself from the crowd to pick up the call.

“Yeoboseyo.”

“Yah Park Jungsoo, where are you?! It’s more than half an hour already.” Youngwoon’s voice sounded from the other end.

“Just wait a little longer, will you. Or you guys can go first then I’ll follow after I finished taking care of the club.”

“I’ll wait. Just come here as soon as possible, ok. We’re still in the class.  Bye.” Then the line went dead.

Jungsoo got back inside the room to find Sungmin.

“Hey Minnie,” he poked Sungmin’s shoulder then motioned to follow him outside. “Can you take care of the club for today? I have to do my group project for our next presentation.”

“Ok Teukie, no problem.” The boy smiled. He was the vice-president of science club and actually was pretty close to Jungsoo. The science club members had nicknames to avoid getting confused when there were more than one person with the same name and Sungmin always called Jungsoo by his nickname even outside the club.

“Thanks, Minnie.” Jungsoo gave him a hug then walked back into the room to give an announcement then bid his goodbye to Jinki anad Taemin. After that he went back to his class to meet his friends.

On his way to the class, under the stairway he met Siwon seonsaengnim. “Oh Teukie, why aren’t you in the club room?”

“I’m sorry seonsaengnim, but I have a group project to do with my friends so I told Minnie to take care of the club for today. Will that be okay, seonsaengnim, or must I stay in the club?”

“Oh no, it’s okay. You may go. But oh, Teukie, about our plan for next week, do you still wan to carry it on?”

“Yes seonsaengnim, I’d love to. Thank you for your help, anyway. Now I have to catch up with my friends. See you later, seonsaengnim.”

“Ok, see you later.”

“That was late, Park Jungsoo!” Youngwoon crossed his arms and said accusingly when he saw Jungsoo walked through the classroom door. Hyukjae and Heechul who were chatting while sitting on their desk looked up upon hearing Youngwoon’s voice.

“Sorry. Can we go now?”

“Ok then, see you tomorrow guys.” Heechul stretched and was about to walk out of class.

“Where are you going? Aren’t you coming to Youngwoon’s house too?” Jungsoo asked.

“No, sorry. It’s Hangeng’s birthday so I have to go with them.”

“Oh…” There was suddenly a lump in his throat.

“Don’t worry, I’ll do my share well.”

“Umm wait, Heechul.” Jungsoo grabbed Heechul’s arm as the latter was walking away. “Why didn’t you come to the inauguration camp? And why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because you also didn’t come and you didn’t ask either. Bye hyung.” And then he left.

“Who is this Hangeng, again? I hear him say that name awfully lot of time. And why is his birthday more important than our project work?” Youngwoon complained.

“That’s his best friend’s name, Youngwoon. And of course his birthday is important because their gang always celebrate their members’ birthdays together.” Hyukjae kindly informed.

Youngwoon hummed while Jungsoo swallowed hard. He never liked talking about Heechul’s gang, especially when it concerned certain someone named Hangeng.

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