“Everyone! This is our new student, Changkyun. Changkyun please introduce yourself to the class”

About twenty pairs of eyes were locked on the brunette standing next to the teacher at the front of the room.

The boy cleared his throat nervously, “A- Annyeonghaseyo, my name is Lim Changkyun. I just moved to Seoul from Gwangju. It’s very nice to meet you all, please take care of me from now on.”

He ended the simple introduction with a deep bow and quickly made his way to the empty seat in the middle of the room that the teacher gestured to.

The teacher smiled as Changkyun got settled at his desk and turned back to the whiteboard, “Thank you, Changkyun. Now! Today we’ll be looking at various influential figures throughout history...”

And so Lim Changkyun’s life at Starship High School began.

Changkyun spent the first day at his new school exactly as he’d expected to: entirely alone.

Changkyun was pretty used to being alone; he hadn’t had many friends at his old school and none that he had been close enough with to spend his free time with. Over the years he’d gotten used to having his iPod as his sole company and yet sometimes he couldn’t help but wish that he had a close group of friends who he could hang out with during lunch hours and after school...

This was the reason that the group of boys sitting across the cafeteria captured Changkyun’s attention.

There were six of them. One he recognized as a boy from his first period; he had spent most of the class barely paying attention to the teacher’s lecture. There were two blondes: one was animatedly telling a story with wild gestures and body movements while the darker blonde seemed to be fast asleep using his arms as a pillow. Two dark haired boys were laughing at the first blonde’s story while a rather muscular boy watched on with a small smile.

As Changkyun observed this interesting group two girls wandered by the table he sat at, chatting idly.

“Ah, Monsta X sure is lively as usual huh?”

Her friend nodded, “Well except for Hyungwon of course.  It’s such a shame he hides his pretty face all day by sleeping like that.”

The first girl sighed wistfully, “I know right? Oh did you hear that Yuri...”

Changkyun tuned out of the conversation at that point, now more intrigued than ever. He now knew that the group was known as Monsta X and that they were pretty popular or at the very least the sleeping boy (whose name he’d now learned was Hyungwon) was. He glanced back over at their table and noticed that the blonde had launched into another tale, this one involving some sort of odd dance routine, which had the other four collapsed in hysterics yet somehow their sleeping sixth was undisturbed.

The brunette sighed mentally as he drank the last of his banana milk, “I wish I had friends like that...”

The rest of Changkyun’s week passed much as his first day had: go to class, study, go to lunch and eat by himself at the corner table, go to more classes and study and then walk home by himself. Once or twice a teacher would pull him aside and ask how he was adjusting, to which he always gave positive answers.

The only bright spots of his days were when he was when he got to see Monsta X at lunch. They were always loud but it was pleasant because the noise was usually lots of laughter and playful banter.

It wasn’t until Thursday that Changkyun finally got to see Hyungwon’s face. Everyday Monsta X always arrived at the cafeteria before Changkyun (his third period teacher had kept him behind on Tuesday and Wednesday to give him extra work to catch up on what he’d missed in the class so far) and by the time he got there Hyungwon was done his lunch and was taking his lunchtime nap.

On Thursday Changkyun’s teacher finally deemed him caught up with the rest of the class and allowed him to go for lunch.

He made his way to the cafeteria immediately after getting his lunchbox from his locker.

After he settled down at his table and opened up his lunchbox, Changkyun stole a glance towards Monsta X’s table.

The kimbap between his chopsticks fell back into the lunchbox.

Hyungwon was awake.

Hyungwon was laughing.

Hyungwon was handsome.

Like really, really handsome.

He had thick lips, warm brown eyes framed by long lashes and his medium length honey blonde hair fell in soft waves away from his face.

Changkyun felt his cheeks grow warm and his stomach began to do odd little flips as he admired the handsome guy across the room.

Suddenly he realized that Hyungwon was looking right back at him and he quickly averted his gaze down to his lunch, embarrassed to have been caught staring.

In his head Changkyun berated himself, “Pabo! That’s what you get for staring at someone like some sort of weirdo. Like such a hot guy would like someone like me anyway...”

And so Changkyun spent the rest of his lunch hour with his eyes firmly locked on his lunchbox, trying desperately to will the blush on his face to disappear and ignoring the butterflies in his stomach every time he thought of Hyungwon.

Across the cafeteria brown eyes watched the small brunette sitting by himself.

The boy was staring resolutely at his lunch after Hyungwon had caught his eyes, his cheeks still adorably red.

Hyungwon gave him a once-over, admiring the (obviously younger) boy’s fair skin and soft-looking brown hair. He chuckled softly when the boy took a sip of his banana milk and a small pink tongue darted out to catch a drop before it fell from his plush lips.

He waited for a bit, wanting to see if the younger would look up again, but a few minutes passed and the little brunette’s gaze never wavered from his lunch.

“Hyungwon-ah, what are you looking at?”

Startled, he whipped his head to face Kihyun who was looking at him worriedly.

“Ah it’s nothing hyung, just daydreaming.”

The older boy smiled and nodded, turning back to his conversation with Shownu. Across the table Minhyuk and Wonho had taken up posts on either side of Jooheon and were poking his cheeks, trying to make the younger boy do his famous “kukukaka” aegyo.

Hyungwon stretched his arms above his head and let out a yawn, deciding it was time for a nap.

Before he settled down he gave one last look at the boy across the room, his lips curling up at the corners when he saw that the boy was still blushing.

He laid his head down on his arms and felt his thoughts begin to drift off as he slipped into a light doze.

“He’s pretty cute. Maybe I’ll introduce myself to him...”

Changkyun had never been so happy for it to be Friday in all his life.

After being caught staring by Hyungwon at lunch yesterday Changkyun was more than ready for this week to be over.

As he packed up his stuff from first period he resolved to spend his lunch somewhere other than the cafeteria, not wanting to see Hyungwon again and potentially embarrass himself more than he already had.

Just as he was leaving through the back door of the classroom (since it was quicker to get to his second class if he went out that way) the teacher called out to him, “Changkyun! Can you come here for a second?”

He made his way to the front of the room; everyone else had left by this point except for himself, the teacher and the boy he recognized as a member of Monsta X who, for some reason, was standing next to the teacher waiting for him.

“Now Changkyun, you’ve been in our school for almost a week now and I haven’t been able to help but notice that you have yet to make any friends.”

The teacher paused at that point as if expecting Changkyun to protest but when he didn’t he continued on, “I’ve asked Jooheon to introduce you to his friends, I’m sure you’ve seen them around school by now. Jooheon is a year older than you and all of his friends are your seniors as well but they’re a good bunch, even if they can be a little rowdy sometimes. I think you’ll like them.”

With that their teacher grabbed a stack of papers off his desk and began towards the door, “I have lunch duty in the cafeteria today so I expect to see you all sitting together. Jooheon, remember what I told you.”

Changkyun had no idea what the last part meant but whatever it was it made Jooheon grunt lowly in answer.

The teacher seemed to accept that as a positive response and sent them a wave with his free hand as he exited, leaving the two teenagers alone in the classroom.

The awkward silence was almost deafening so Changkyun nervously broke it, “U- Um thank you, Jooheon-ssi but you don’t have to-”

Jooheon cut him off sharply, eyes narrowed, “Look. I told the teacher that I’d introduce you to my friends. That doesn’t mean that I wanna be friends with you, got it?”

Shocked, Changkyun could only nod.

Jooheon huffed and ran a hand through his short brown hair, “I’m sure you know where my friends and I sit by now. Come over at lunch and I’ll introduce you but don’t forget: We’re. Not. Friends.”

Changkyun just nodded again, not wanting to irritate the older boy anymore than he already was.

Jooheon gave one sharp nod and quickly exited the classroom without a single glance back.

Changkyun stood there for a moment in shock, trying to process what had just happened in the past few minutes.

He was going to be sitting with Monsta X at lunch.

He couldn’t help the small smile that broke out on his face.

He was having lunch with Monsta X! (Sure it was probably going to be awkward but still.)

A sudden thought made the grin disappear and caused his face to go pale for a second before turning bright red.

He was going to be sitting at the same table as Hyungwon: the guy who’d caught him staring at him just yesterday.

The same guy who he may or may not have a little bit of a crush on, if the butterflies in his stomach at the mere thought of the older boy were anything to go by.

He groaned out loud and suddenly wished that a hole would open up in the floor and swallow him.

He really wanted this week to be over.

First chapter: good! Chapter 2 will be up anywhere from a few days to a week from now (I'm writing this as I'm going but I've got a full outline of each chapter done already). Hope you liked it, I'd love to hear your thoughts.