1.1 | Desiderium ✓

59|fifty nine

YooChan's lips stung.

He couldn't get rid of the taste of the first kiss the day before. It lingered on, taunting him, mocking him, as if saying, you're the same as your mother. YooChan looked up, three benches across diagonally sat Tae Shin, watching Professor Lee with interest.

Chan pressed his teeth on his lower lip, as if trying to detach it from his mouth. Throw it away, like it was a rotten part of his body he didn't want to see again. Chan glanced up at Shin once more, wondering if he felt the same with JaeHwan as well?

Or did he like it?

Kisses were soft, short lived, and every bit like they were described in stories. But YooChan couldn't let himself enjoy it. He wanted to hate it, to hate MaRoo.

"Student on the last bench?" Professor Lee called. YooChan ignored it, thinking it was for some other last bench student. But the other students in the last benches were already paying attention.

"Yes, Mr. Cat-smuggler. Look up at the board please."

Chan snapped his head up and so did Shin, while 1-A put their hands over their mouths to hide their grins. Even a transient smile hinted at the corners of Professor Lee's lips, but it passed away as quickly as it came.

"Attention here, okay?" He tapped the board with his knuckles once and continued on with explaining the surface volume ratio of a cylinder.

YooChan understood it. And it scared him, the way his mind had changed working. Earlier, equations and formulae would pass over his head and he would sit, gawking at the alien language of math. But looking at the white board and then at his notebook, Chan was effectively solving a majority of questions, like he had never been bad at math at all.

"That's it for the class," Professor Lee turned towards the students and closed his marker, "meet me in the lunch break to discuss any doubts. And Tae Shin," he paused to look at the only boy whose name he knew, "go down to the office to collect the regional olympiad admit card."

Shin murmured a response which YooChan was too distracted to hear.

"For homework, try solving exercise four. We'd discuss it tomorrow so don't panic if you can't solve anything. Class dismissed." Professor Lee finished and the recess bell rang in time, with a few students instantly lining up to Shin's desk with their notebooks.

Chan had done the same before, almost everyday. He was best friends with Shin, and he had the first right over him.

Standing far away, YooChan saw Shin turn back at him and chew his lip, as if silently asking for permission to talk. At first, the whole class had gotten dragged in their strife, but then, 1-A sidelined itself and acted like a buffer, appeasing both Shin and YooChan.

After all, the academic year was already heading towards dusk.

YooChan looked away sharply, and walked out of the classroom. "Stupid gay moron," he muttered under his breath. Chan would have gone down to the canteen for lunch, but his appetite was long gone.

Chan wished he could throw up.

He looked side to side in the hallways filled with boys, some of them pushing and elbowing their way out to the soccer ground, library or canteen and all of a sudden, Chan felt all eyes on him.

As if they knew. As if they had witnessed him allowing himself to be kissed by another boy. YooChan stood there, waiting for them to raise their fingers at him, laugh at him, jeer, mock, taunt him. Waiting for his father to appear in the halls and slap him across his face, waiting for his Uncle to turn his face away and ignore him.