WRONG NUMBER | NIKI

21 - The Things I Almost Tell Him

HANA'S POV

Exam week changes the atmosphere of the entire school in a way I have never quite understood. It isn't simply that everyone studies more; it feels as though the building itself becomes quieter, as if even the walls know better than to interrupt anyone. The usual chaos in the hallways disappears beneath the weight of open textbooks and whispered formulas, conversations reduced to fragments of things like Did you understand chapter seven? and What did you get for number twelve? 

People walk with notebooks pressed against their chests, flashcards tucked into their pockets, pens permanently caught between their fingers. The library is full before the first bell even rings, classrooms remain occupied during breaks, and even the cafeteria seems strangely subdued, filled with students eating while simultaneously highlighting paragraphs or comparing answers. 

Of course, there are always exceptions—the people who don't give a damn about exams because their parents have already secured their university places, their internships, their futures, every door they might ever need opened before they've even had the chance to knock. They laugh loudly in the corridors, complain about being bored, make plans for the weekend while everyone else is memorizing formulas, and somehow still manage to look completely unbothered when the rest of us are one incorrect answer away from a nervous breakdown. 

I've never envied them. Maybe because I know that if I want something, I have to earn it myself. My parents could probably make a few phone calls and arrange opportunities most people would spend years trying to get, but they don't. They never have. For all their expectations, for all the university brochures and carefully worded suggestions and conversations about what would be best for my future, they've always made one thing very clear: if I want the grades, I have to get them. If I want the university, I have to earn the acceptance. If I fail, no one is going to quietly move the pieces around the board until I win anyway. 

And perhaps that's why I study the way I do, because there is something terrifyingly comforting about knowing that the result belongs entirely to me.

By the middle of the week, I have stopped measuring time in hours and started measuring it in subjects. Two chapters of biology before lunch. Three calculus problems before dinner. Chemistry review before bed. Sleep somewhere between midnight and five, if I'm lucky. My notebook fills with increasingly cramped handwriting as the days pass, and I begin carrying so many books around that my shoulders ache by the end of every afternoon. 

I barely see Niki or Jungwon anymore except at lunch, which is probably for the best because somehow both of them have become distractions in completely different ways. Jungwon is usually surrounded by his friends, laughing about something one of them said, and whenever his eyes happen to find mine across the cafeteria, he gives me that small, familiar smile that makes me smile back before I can stop myself. It's easy with him. Familiar. Safe. I don't have to wonder what every glance means because I've known him long enough to understand the language of his expressions. 

Niki is different. He doesn't smile. Not anymore. At least not at me. Sometimes I'll be sitting with Minji, trying to eat while reviewing a list of equations, and I'll feel it before I see it, the weight of his eyes from somewhere across the room. When I look up, he's already watching me. And there is no teasing grin, no raised eyebrow, no sarcastic comment waiting to follow. He simply looks at me. Quietly. Steadily. As if whatever happened in the library hasn't changed the fact that he still sees me. 

Somehow, that is worse than if he'd smiled. Or perhaps better. I haven't decided. There's something in his expression that feels almost like understanding, as though he knows I'm avoiding him and has decided not to make me explain why. I hate how much I appreciate that.