Chapter Text
First day of school
“Have a great day!” The tired-looking office lady tells Woonhak, not an ounce of sincerity on her face. She says it as someone might say, nice weather outside, or I see you got a haircut. Like she doesn't want to talk about it, so she wants you to know she doesn't actually care. And why would she, anyway? Whether Woonhak has a great day or not won't make a difference to her.
Nonetheless, Woonhak smiles and wishes her the same. She doesn't care about his day, but she still got it right: today is a great day. It has been so far, and Woonhak will make sure it keeps up. It's not everyday you start high school.
He leaves the woman, holding his new timetable and locker combination, barely able to contain himself. By all means, nothing that special is going to happen today — he's just going to have a normal school day, just like he has for the past eight years. Even so, he still gets excited about everything. Most of all, since it's a completely new school, he's curious about the teachers and students. But there's also the small stuff — like his locker. He's never had a locker before. When the lady gave him the papers, he was going to check out the locker number and combination right away, but she was right there and he thought he'd freak her out if he got excited about something like this. Now that he's alone, though, it's time to do it.
Except —
“Hey!”
Woonhak jumps, like he was caught doing some really incriminating stuff instead of just checking out a piece of paper. The guy that greeted him looks a bit lost, but mostly cheerful, so Woonhak grips his backpack strap tighter and smiles. This is exciting, he decides — the first student he talks to in this school. This will set the tone of his entire next 4 years.
“Hi,” he says, almost stuttering from nerves. His hands are shaking a bit, which is weird, but hopefully not that noticeable; he still doesn't want to risk it, so he hides his hands behind his back and masks it all under a huge smile.
The guy smiles back and says again, “Hey!”
Woonhak keeps looking at him for a good ten seconds, but the boy doesn't say anything else, so he takes it as a cue to leave. A bit disappointing, but overall not that bad of a first talk. Maybe the next person he'll speak with will be chattier.
“Um, okay,” he says, starting to walk away, but the other boy stops him again:
“Oh, sorry. Man, I'm so lost today, ha-ha,” he chuckles humorlessly, looking towards Woonhak but not really making eye contact. “Uh, what I wanted to say is that I'm having some trouble figuring this stuff out. Could you help me, please? I'm new here, I don't really know anybody.”
“I'm new too, actually,” Woonhak says, but he regrets it when the other gives him a disappointed look. He tries to fix it quickly, saying: “Let me see though, maybe I can figure it out. What’s the problem?”
The boy shows him his papers and says, “I don't know where to find my locker.”
Woonhak tries to very obviously not look at the combination, because that's the single rudest thing anyone could ever do; but he sees that the locker number is in the 600s.
Now, yes, he's new here, that hasn't changed — however, he did visit the school in the summer, when he applied, and he took a short tour with one of the teachers, so he kind of knows his way around. Just a little, there's still much else to learn. But he knows this, though: that the lockers are somewhere in the west wing, either on the 2nd or 3rd floor.
He tells this to the other guy, but the poor boy still looks clueless, so he puts on a smile and says: “Actually, why don't I go with you!”
“You sure?” The boy asks like he doesn't want to be a nuisance, but nobody can deny that he looks a bit happier.
Woonhak nods, “Yeah, sure. My locker number is 553 so it must be somewhere around yours anyway, so…”
“Then thanks!”
Woonhak leads the way and they walk together for a bit, in awkward but bearable silence. Then the boy says, “I'm Jaehyun, by the way.”
“Oh. Woonhak,” Woonhak blurts out, holding out a hand that Jaehyun shakes silently.
“Nice,” Jaehyun says just to say something. “Are you a transfer student too?”
“No, actually, I'm a freshman,” Woonhak says, glancing at Jaehyun. “I'm guessing you're a transfer student?”
“Yup. I'm a senior.”
“Woah. It must suck that you had to change schools in your last year.”
Jaehyun shrugs. “I dunno. My parents used to travel a lot, so I'm used to it. But this year it's different — mom found a great job, so that's the end of all the moving.”
“Then it's exciting, right?”
“Yeah. The people are nice.” He gives Woonhak a big grin, and Woonhak smiles, trying not to get too excited. This is good, they're on the right track — Jaehyun is a cool guy and he's hanging out with Woonhak, of all people. Even if he didn't choose Woonhak specifically, he's telling him that he is nice, and that's coming from him. That's good. Even if this doesn't transform into a friendship (not that Woonhak is low on self-esteem, he knows he's awesome and he knows he's a damn good friend, but there's one thing that would stand in the way: he's way younger than Jaehyun), it's still great news that someone in this whole school thinks Woonhak is nice.
He imagines that being his established image for the next four years: Woonhak, the Nice Guy. Woonhak, the guy you can ask for a pencil. Woonhak, the guy who doesn't tell of you if you don't have your homework. Woonhak, who'll help you understand what the teacher was trying to say when you weren't paying attention. It sounds perfect.
He clears his throat, trying to keep his cool. “Yeah, so I guess we're on the right floor.”
“You sure?” Jaehyun asks, looking around.
To be honest, not really. Before they got here Woonhak could've sworn they'd find the lockers somewhere around here, but now all they can see is classrooms and students — but no lockers.
He has to make a quick choice: either admit that he doesn't know, and risk Jaehyun leaving to find someone that could actually help him, or bluffing his butt off until something happens. Option two sounds good.
Instead, he says, as honestly as possible: “I'm not so sure anymore.”
Jaehyun laughs, not upset or anything like that, which gives Woonhak some hope.
“That's okay,” Jaehyun says happily, linking arms with Woonhak like they've been best friends since diapers. “Let's keep looking, we'll find them somewhere.”
So they keep looking.
It takes them a while. Thankfully they started their search pretty early, because there's still a few minutes until first class starts when they finally, finally, find the lockers. Jaehyun’s locker is close to the end of the hallway, while Woonhak's is in the opposite direction, near the music room.
Woonhak stays with Jaehyun while he leaves his stuff, and then Jaehyun comes with him so he can do the same, which gives Woonhak a taste of… something. Of how friendships go when you're in high school. Walking around with your friends and waiting on each other and stuff like that. It's funny, he doesn't even remember how things used to be in middle school anymore, but high school is going well so far, so it doesn't matter.
“You know what,” Jaehyun says kindly, “it's actually a good thing we didn't find them right away.”
“You think so?” Woonhak asks, leaving out his English book and notebook for first class.
“Yeah. I mean, at least now we've seen most of the school, right?”
“That's right. Yeah, then it's a good thing, I guess.”
The bell rings at this moment, and Woonhak waits tensely for Jaehyun to say goodbye, and that will be the end of it. They've had a good run — what was it, almost a half hour? — but after all, Jaehyun couldn't possibly want to be friends with Woonhak forever.
He closes his locker, holding his things to his chest, and looks at Jaehyun.
Jaehyun gives him another smile.
“I'm pretty sure I saw the cafeteria.”
Woonhak nods, pretty sure they passed by it, too.
“It says on my timetable that lunch is at one.”
“Yep,” Woonhak says dryly, “same for me.”
Jaehyun nods, looking around the hallway. Woonhak looks around too, noticing how it's pretty empty now, with students all rushing to their classes. Since it's his and Jaehyun’s first day, he guesses they'll be excused if they're a minute or two late.
“So, um,” Jaehyun starts, looking back at Woonhak “I'll see you then?”
Woonhak grins. “Sure! See you then.”
Instead of going straight to class, Woonhak heads to the cafeteria. Don't ask him why, he doesn't know either. He just thinks that this is where he should be right now; it would be useless to try to explain it better.
Surprisingly, when he gets to the cafeteria, he sees that it's not empty. It's actually pretty full, so obviously he's not the only one skipping class, so obviously it's fine. He grabs a tray, gets some food, and sits at an empty table.
All the students around him look either busy doing their own things, or they're whispering to each other, so he feels a little out of place; still, he doesn't leave. He has a feeling that something will happen pretty soon, or, better yet, that there's a reason for him to be here, so he stays seated.
Cafeteria food isn't supposed to be good, but this one looks just fine. It's not like he's hungry, but he doesn't remember eating anything at home today, and he's curious. He reaches for a fork, telling himself he'll have a quick bite and that's all, but just before he can touch it, his hand drops at his side. Maybe not right now. He'll eat later.
“Psst,” someone whispers, close to him.
Woonhak looks around.
“Psst!”
It's someone from the table just next to his, a girl somewhere his age; Woonhak leans closer, and even though it would probably make more sense to just walk over, he stays firmly seated.
“Yeah?”
“Heard you're friends with Myung Jaehyun.”
“I mean, we just met,” Woonhak mumbles. “How do you even know him?”
“Everyone knows him,” someone from another table says; Woonhak looks at the boy, but of course he doesn't recognize him — he doesn't know any of these people. “His parents moved a lot, but they're going to stay here permanently, and he's nervous but excited about starting his senior year.”
“Um — how do you know so much about him?”
“It's basic information,” the first girl says. It doesn't seem so basic to Woonhak, and it's really, really weird that they know it all. As far as he knows, he's the only person who talked to Jaehyun today, and he hasn't breathed a word of their conversation to anyone else.
“I'm so rooting for him and Riwoo,” someone else says.
“Who's Riwoo?” Woonhak asks.
“Come on! Lee Riwoo? There's no way you don't know him.”
Woonhak frowns, trying really, really hard to remember if he's ever met someone named Riwoo. But he hasn't.
“You'll meet him soon, don't worry,” the first girl says, smiling, like all of this isn't absolutely creepy.
“Yeah, I mean, you're Jaehyun’s best friend. You'll probably hear him talk about Riwoo, at least,” someone says from the same table that the girl is sitting at.
“But I thought Jaehyun doesn't know anyone here.”
“They'll meet soon,” the guy says. “It will be very romantic. They'll look at each other and it will be like they've known each other their whole lives.”
“How do you even —” Woonhak starts, but his words die out, and out of the corner of his eye he sees Jaehyun entering the cafeteria.
Everyone else returns to their own conversations, leaving Woonhak alone at last. Jaehyun sits next to Woonhak, and Woonhak gives him a smile, like nothing ever happened.
“How were your classes so far?” He asks, starting to eat his food. It doesn't taste as good as it looks.
After school, Jaehyun and Woonhak meet again by the exit. Jaehyun has his own car, and Woonhak isn't rushing anywhere, so he starts to walk with him to the parking lot. This time, Woonhak doesn't have to prompt him to talk about his day; once Jaehyun opens his mouth he doesn't stop babbling about classes and teachers and all the other students he's come across.
“... and anyway, what's that teacher's deal? It's like she never had a new student in her whole life. I mean, at first it wasn't that bad because she just made me introduce myself — still, though, that was like the fifth time I had introduced myself to class, so I'm pretty sure everyone was sick of me at that point — but then for the rest of the class, whenever she had a question, she made me answer!”
“Maybe she wanted to see how much you know?”
“Yeah but still, you know, at some point it just gets to you. I was about to give her stupid answers just so she left me alone, but I didn't want to go that far on the first day. Then for science the teacher told us we can't change deskmates, so now I'm paired up with some guy that never even told me his name…”
“Could be just shy,” Woonhak says, doing his best to give advice and kind words even though he doesn't know any of the people Jaehyun is talking about. His day was boring — not that Jaehyun asked — because after lunch, he walked around a bit, and then he went straight to the exit to wait for Jaehyun.
“We'll see,” Jaehyun pouts. “The worst part of the day was meeting this dude in my maths class. Apparently he was school president last year, and I mentioned that that sounds fun, but it's not like I even said I'll go for it or something, you know? And then he just started being mean to me the whole day — again, for no reason. I don't know what his deal is.”
“Hey, I mean, this was just the first day, maybe tomorrow —”
He's interrupted for the third time today, as someone runs into both him and Jaehyun, almost sending them to the ground. Jaehyun stumbles, grabbing onto Woonhak, and Woonhak barely catches himself from falling.
“What a…” Jaehyun starts to mumble, only he stops, because the guy turns around.
He's a short, blond guy, with soft features and sharp eyes; and he looks so sorry when he sees them that Woonhak just can't be mad at him.
He lifts both his hands and says, “I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to, I'm late to the bus and I didn't notice you…”
Jaehyun doesn't answer, and the guy stops too, and at this point they're both kind of staring at each other. Not at Woonhak, who was involved in the bumping too; they're pretty much acting like he isn't here at all. The one thing he hates with his whole heart is third wheeling.
“It's okay,” he says, just to have them spare him a look too. The blond guy turns to him. Somehow, that makes him even more awkward, so he elbows Jaehyun to help him out of it.
Jaehyun clears his throat and stutters something or other, embarrassing himself even more.
“Well, I'm late for the bus…” the guy says. Jaehyun nods, and Woonhak says a quiet goodbye, although he knows pretty well by now that the boy doesn't care about him. “Okay. Um, bye!”
“Yeah, bye bye!” Jaehyun shouts and waves after him, then drops his hand, all red in the face.
Woonhak waits until the guy is out of sight, then asks Jaehyun, “Dude, what's wrong with you?”
Jaehyun stops looking after the buses, and turns to Woonhak, still blushing but now with a small smile on his face, too. “Nothing,” he says. Then, like he feels he should explain: “Er, yeah, that was my lab partner.”
“Him?” Woonhak asks, watching as one of the buses drives off. And then he surprises himself, because remember, he doesn't know the guy. He's new here too, he doesn't know anyone besides Jaehyun, he spent the whole day pretty much on his own, and he only heard the name today. But the words still come out of his mouth: “That's Lee Riwoo! Cheer up, I heard he's awesome.”
Jaehyun kind of smiles, not moving for a full minute; and even though that is definitely weird, him just standing here, everyone just keeps walking past him like it's all okay and normal. Woonhak feels like he and Jaehyun are in a world separate from the rest, a nice world, where cringe stuff can be overlooked like it never even happened.
Before he starts to walk again, Jaehyun smiles, not looking at Woonhak but somewhere far off. Almost in a whisper, he says, “Riwoo, huh?”