High school, it’s a mandatory experience every teenager must survive, you learn a lot here, not  entirely from the lessons but from your peers and experiences. It’s filled with moments that’ll last you a lifetime, the good, the bad, the and stupid . They’ll be a lot of stupid . Oh and hormones.

Welcome to high school.

The thundering sound of chattering students greets Sungjong’s ears as he steps into the bustling hall of his high school alongside his sister.

Sungjong eyes the crowds in swift glances as he passes by. He’s invisible to more than half the school’s population so no-one pays him any attention and just by observing, over the years Sungjong has managed to read into most of the groups dynamics.

There’s the cheerleaders which include Tiffany and Sunny, all of them do about five after school activities each, Sungjong wonders how any of them have time for their actual school work. And wherever the cheerleaders are the jocks are always close by too. Among them are Nichkhun and Taecyeon, who only got so popular among the girls due to their killer abs. A group of girls who also fell for their charms are the pretty girls, Minha, Hyemi, and their friends. Sungjong always gets the feeling those girls don’t like each other very much they just hang around each other for the aesthetic reasons.

Suddenly Changjo runs past, almost slamming into Sungjong but managing to miss him by just a millimeter. Ricky runs past too moments later yelling. “Changjo this isn’t funny! Give me back my phone!”

To which Changjo just replies between bouts of laughter “Is this a pic? Ricky have you been sending these to girls? Oh my god did you actually shave it to make it look bigger?.” The rest of their clique is howling with laughter, Chunji  pretty much tearing up at this point and even Minsoo’s clutching at his stomach. Sungjong just shakes his head, it’s typical that they find most their fun in tormenting Ricky. He then shifts his gaze along to Jiyong and his friends, they should have graduated by now, Sungjong thinks it has something to do with their party going tendencies so they ended up failing a year. Across from them are their female counterparts, the cool stylish seniors, CL, Minzy, Bom and Dara. They’re really close knit, and although each of them have unique personalities they bond over their love of partying and alcohol. Sungjong makes a face at the thought.

He spots Hakyeon then, who would describe his group of friends as ‘alternative’ and ‘artsy’ but in reality they’re just a bunch of weird emo kids. There’s this one frightening kid in their clique, Taekwoon, who always looks pissed off with everyone and everything, but Sungjong remembers talking to him once or twice and he was actually a very sweet person and not as terrifying as he had originally thought. But upon finding out their groups hobbies include voodoo practices he decided to be safe and stay clear of them.

Sungjong looks over to the other side of the bustling crowds of students where he spots Zico and his trouble-maker friends, that Sungjong is surprised haven’t gotten expelled yet with their discipline records. Then their mini-me’s in the freshman year, Taehyung, Hoseok and their friends but instead of being rebels they ended up more like class clowns. Surprisingly Zico’s friends are close with Jinyoung’s friends, sweet choir boys who also run the poetry club, but he’s pretty sure all get high together on the weekends.

With each group he reads into though, there’s a consist feeling that wells up in Sungjong. He felt misplaced, out of tune with the rest. He didn’t fit in.

He’s brought out his distressing thoughts by his sister’s sweet voice. “Sungjong I need to go to the library to print off my assignment I’ll see you later okay?” She’s already walking before Sungjong answers, so he just waves her off, letting out a sigh as she disappears off and blends with the sea of students.

Sungjong buries into himself then, eyes fleeting to the ground, he holds his books close to his chest, wearing them like a protective shield a knight would wear when going into battle. Then he turns on his heel and decides to head to class, he might as well get a head start in setting up he decides.

He thinks he wouldn’t mind being a loner, he doesn’t mind keeping to himself and getting on with his work. Except it wasn’t entirely like that, there was just one certain group that--

Suddenly Sungjong’s foot slips, causing his feet to fumble over each other and his arms to splay out as he desperately attempts to keep himself steady, his books go flying and he looks like an idiot with his limbs spiralling out of control, but he’d rather that than having to faceplant the floor and suffer a large bruise for the rest of the day.

Thankfully he manages to miss the floor, but just his luck, which is none at all, he also manages to stumble right into a group of incoming students. Ones that don’t like to be messed with.

The group of students happen to be the popular crowd of the academy, and everyone either wants to be one of them or wants to be with one of them, there’s no inbetween. That unless you’re Sungjong, who actively tries to avoid confrontation with them, seeing as though they’ve taken a keen liking to picking on him ever since day one.

And right now they don’t look so pleased with the unexpected greeting that Sungjong just gave them, especially Sunggyu whose foot he definitely just stood on in the tumble.

Sungjong retracts his own foot quickly, and begins to fumble for excuses.“Ah- hi guys...um- s-sorry, I’ll just be on my way now. I’m just going to…ah…  leave you alone and… h-haha…” An awkward laugh escapes his throat as he bends down slowly with each word, “Let me get my stuff real quick…” Then he madly scrambles to gather up his dropped textbooks. He reaches for his homework sheet and tugs, but it doesn’t budge, he tries again, his gaze locating the source of the problem, which just so happens to be an expensive looking designer shoe it was trapped under, which he then follows up all the way to meet Hoya’s fixated gaze.

Just go Sungjong, just go before they do something worse than what the floor was going to do to you two minutes ago. Sungjong’s telling himself but he’s frozen in spot, feeling like a small prey to a huge gang of predators.

Hoya’s blank face suddenly turns into one with a devilish smirk, and Sungjong can only swallow nervously and stare up at him.

“Oh no, but you so nicely greeted us, shouldn’t we have at least stop for a chit-chat.” Woohyun speaks friendly, but his voice is laced with mischief.

“B-but you must be so- so busy-- surely you have people to see, classes to go to, homework to do.” Sungjong tries to wave off the confrontation, pulling on the piece of paper every so often to see if he can unjam it.

Hoya scoffs. “More like, classes to skip, homework to ignore and people to do.” Sungjong winces at their vulgarity. “But, we can spare some time for our favourite fool.” He continues, tightly grabbing Sungjong’s frail upper arm and then yanking him harshly to his feet.

Sungjong fidgets feeling incredibly intimidated, he can barely keep eye contact with them. “That’s awfully nice of you guys but I j-just need to pick up my p-paper.”

“Your what? Oh this thing?” Hoya asks, picking the sheet up from under his foot. Sungjong doesn’t trust his voice not to crack so all he does is nod helplessly. Surprisingly Hoya offers the sheet back and as Sungjong timidly reaches out to grab it, Sunggyu quickly swipes it before he can latch onto it.

“Don’t you I think I’m owed some compensation for sustaining an injury from your incompetence?” He asks in a fierce tone, scanning the writing on the paper and then peering over it to look at Sungjong. “This isn’t half as much as it’s worth to get these shoes cleaned and my foot checked over, but since you’re our favourite, I’m willing to let it go in the small price of letting us copy your homework.” He smirks. “Plus it’s only fair since I’ll be missing my physical education classes now too.” Sungjong doubts there’d much much of an injury, Sunggyu was just being a drama queen, he probably also wanted an excuse to skip an hour of pointless exercise so really he should be thanking the younger.

“So can I have it back when you’re done?” Sungjong asks hopefully. But that just makes the bunch of them burst into laughter.

“Sure you have have it back.” Sunggyu replies nonchalantly then, his tone completely changing, and passes the homework over to Myungsoo, who snaps a picture of it before holding it back out for Sungjong. Sungjong has a feeling he’s missing something here, even so he reaches out to collect it. This time his fingers manage to grip on, but then it’s yanked from his clutches with so much force that it rips down the middle.

Sungjong can only stare in shock as he locks eyes with Sungyeol who has the other half in his clutch. There seems to be a glint in his eyes of remorse but it’s gone too soon and then Sungyeol continues to shred the paper into smaller pieces, letting them litter the floor in a flurry of white fragments. “I didn’t say what condition it was going to be in though.” Sunggyu adds.

Sungjong crumbles to his knees, desperately trying to catch each piece, but he knows it’d be impossible to fit back together before class.

“Pathetic.” Myungsoo remarks and the rest burst into roars of laughter.

“Can’t wait to hear what excuse you have for your homework this week.” Dongwoo remarks with a hum. “The dog ate your homework one is getting kind of old now…”

“The ones about your grandma are losing their appeal too.” Hoya explains and they all burst out laughing again, Yadong snapping a highfive.

Sungjong fumbles for words curling his hands into fists, scrunching the paper in his palm. “I-I-” He doesn’t have any snarky comebacks, and he assumes the gang had gotten bored of him since he can see them turning on their heels and walking away, leaving Sungjong in a sad heap.

High school, it . Sungjong concludes.

“Seriously miss, I’m telling the truth, Aliens really did abduct my homework… they threatened me and said that if I didn’t give it to them I’d be terminated!” Sungjong exclaims to a disinterested teacher who then just raises her brow in confusion at the statement. Sungjong can hear a snicker of concealed laughter from behind him, and he knows this is the worst excuse he’s ever spouted but he’s been watching way too many horror movies lately so it was the first thing that came to mind.

“Right… we’ll discuss this after class Sungjong… I’ll be reporting this to your guardians… remind me to add a note about getting your head checked out too.” She replies, dismissing him back to his desk and Sungjong has to force himself not to groan audibly at the questions his grandma will most probably badger him with later tonight.

He retreated his way back to his desk, slumping into his seat at the front of the classroom. He folds his arms and buries his face into the desk determined to just sink into the table and disappear. But suddenly he feels something hard hit the back of his head and thus lifts it to look around and find the source. It just so happens to be Dongwoo and Myungsoo having a sword fight with their pens and pencils but Myungsoo managed to knock Dongwoo’s right out his hands, much to Dongwoo’s dismay. Sungjong already knows his luck is extraordinarily bad, so he doesn’t even question how it managed to hit him perfectly square on the head, but at least on the brightside he has a pen to use now.  

“Alright class.” The teacher suddenly yells, banging on the board with a rular to gather the classes attention. “I’m about to give you your assignments so listen carefully.” She explains, and a collective groan escapes everyone.

“Always great to see such enthusiasm." She counters sarcastically. "Anyway, it’ll be a partnered task.” There’s a gasp of hope then. “But I’ll be assigning you your partner.” Quickly returned into another groan of disappointment. Sungjong lets out an especially loud one, having always prepared working independently for obvious reasons.

Not phased by the classes moans of protest, the teacher begins listing off names and partnering everyone soon after, and Sungjong listens half heartedly, he couldn’t really care less who he was paired with, unless it was---

“Lee Sungyeol and Lee Sungjong.” She announces, and Sungjong’s eyes widen. He glances over to the direction of the elder male who ends up meeting his gaze for the second time that day. But Sungjong doesn’t keep contact for long, resulting to slumping back against the desk with defeat.

“The project will be due towards the end of semester, it’ll be about anything you like, so that leaves no excuses.” She looks at Sungjong sternly when she says this and he hears another set of snickers. “It’ll contribute to your end of year grade so no slacking, and good luck.” The teacher reels on about the project, but Sungjong is just cursing his existence at this point.

Of all the people to be paired with it had to be one of the guys Sungjong actively tries to avoid on a daily basis, but now they had a whole excruciatingly, uncomfortable, three months together lined up. Sungjong’s already dreading it. Nothing good can come out of this.

“Alright now go join your partner and get some planning done for the rest of the lesson.” The teacher claps her hands to try and gather some enthusiasm, but everyone is about as enthusiastic as a slug, slowly crawling their way over to their partner at a snail's pace.

Sungjong debates going over to Sungyeol first, but before he comes up with a decision, the sound of Sungyeol clearing his throat brings him from his inner dispute, it seems the other had already managed to pull up a chair next to Sungjong in the time it took for him to decide.

“So… um, you got any ideas?” Sungjong asks awkwardly.

“Aliens?” One corner of Sungyeol’s lips quirk up playfully whereas the corners of Sungjong’s lips quirk the opposite way at the suggestion. “I’m just kidding with you.” Sungyeol jokes with a scoff, and then fishes in his pocket for his phone. “I don’t know.” He mumbles, and suddenly becomes absorbed in scrolling through his phone.

“Oh okay…” Sungjong replies, fiddling with the pen in his hand. The one that had hit him earlier. Sungjong felt incredibly awkward, what was he suppose to do now?

They’re rather silent for the rest of the lesson. Every time Sungjong tries to speak up with a idea, Sungyeol gives him a disinterested look and goes back to being absorbed with his cell, only letting out a soft snort if he see’s something funny on the device. Sungjong wants to know what it is, but doesn’t ask. If the teacher passes them, Sungyeol pretends to write and Sungjong pretends to look genuinely interested in the blank piece of paper they have in front of them, nodding his head like Sungyeol is writing down inspirational shakespearean quotes.

But Sungjong’s finds out  it’s easier to deal with Sungyeol when he’s on his own and not with his group. He wasn’t as pestering or rude, or mean and he wasn’t making any attempts to rip up this piece of paper like he had done just previously.

The class is coming to an end and the only thing they’ve written on their sheet is their names and ‘project’ in over the top swirly cursive writing, with a couple doodles Sungyeol graffitied their paper with earlier. Sungjong had given up trying to communicate eventually, he’d never been good with words and he’s even worse when he’s trying to talk to someone who clearly dislikes him. He supposes he doesn’t have much hope for his grade at the end of the year.  

Just then Sungyeol speaks out. “I think we should meet up after school tomorrow or something, and figure out what we’re going to do. The sooner we get this started, the sooner we get this done, and the less I’ll have to suffer. Give me your number.” Sungyeol insists and Sungjong rolls his eyes at the forwardness but scribbles his contact details onto his notebook, afterwards ripping the sheet out and handing it to Sungyeol anyway, not wanting to go against him. The younger mutters a swift thanks then grabs Sungjong’s arm before he can retract it, making the younger freeze out of fear, especially when Sungyeol tries to fish around his pockets for something.

But turns out that something was just a harmless black sharpie to Sungjong’s relief. Sungyeol bites the lid off and scrawls his own number on the back of Sungjong’s hand. The bell finally rings as Sungyeol is returning it to his pocket, so afterwards he stands up. “Alright sounds good. Call me tonight yeah?” He insists before walking off to join his friends who have already rushed out the class in record speed Sunggyu trailing a second behind.

Sungjong nods shyly watching as Sungyeol goes. All in all, the encounter wasn’t as bad as he thought it was going to be.  

Unless he ends up getting ink poisoning from this sharpie. This is going to be a God damn pain to wash off.

“No way, you were partnered with Sungyeol?” His sister exclaims loudly on their way home that evening.

“Yes way. And I was just wondering if you could tell me more about him.” Sungjong replies pressing a finger to his lips trying to signal his sister to keep quiet just incase Sungyeol and his friends were nearby. He’d rather not have another confrontation especially since he was tired after a full days work. “Since you’re dating Woohyun and all, do you have any inside information, mostly for my own protection?” Sungjong didn’t really understand what she saw in him exactly, but that was just his biased opinion.

She knits her brows together. “Did they do something again today Sungjong? If they did I’ll tell Woohyun not to do it again.” She insists crossing her arms and puffing out her cheeks trying to look fierce, but Sungjong dismisses it. He doesn’t want to cause a lovers quarrel, he’s happy for his sister.

“Nothing, nothing, just… tell me about Sungyeol.” He reminds her and she makes a face of realisation.

“Hmmm. Well I could tell you all about the others, especially my Woohubby.” She coo’s. “But Sungyeol…” She hums in thought, pressing a well manicured finger to her chin, her soft curls bouncing as they walk along the pavement. “Truthfully, I don’t know all that much about him, he always seems a little... distant, I suppose.” She shrugs. “He plays around on his phone a lot… I think maybe he’s got a girlfriend… he’s probably texting her all the time!” She giggles at the thought.

Sungjong thinks it’s a little weird though…Sungyeol acted the exact same way around him as he apparently did with his best friends. It made him curious… there must be a personality in there somewhere… right?

“Three months though are you sure you can handle that?” His sister seems concerned, knowing that her boyfriend’s friends are hard on her brother, but probably not to the full extent. But Sungjong shakes it off once again. He’s been dealing with this for years, he can handle three months more.

“Alright alright. Maybe you might enjoy it, who knows!" She tries to give a reassuring smile and then she’s bursting with energy suddenly. “Guess what Woohyunnie said to me today though? He was so sweet!”

Sungjong just replies with a noncommittal hum, pretending to listen to her chat animately about her boyfriend, but really he loses himself to his thoughts. Pondering the wonders of distant Lee Sungyeol.