University of Wonderland

Chapter Six

I kept going, wiping the sweat from my face. I steadied my ran, following a trail of footsteps through another dense copse of trees. The woods spilled out onto a chipper street with perky houses lining the road. I paused, my heart still raving to its own techno beat. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Sulli sauntering up a driveway into the only house that broke from the cookie-cutter model, to put it mildly. Her house was decorated in swirls to tie-dyed paint, as if someone had turned the exterior into a canvas because he ran out of easels. Cera,ic bunnies lined the lawn in descending-size order.

Weird. At least her house matched her personality.

I crossed the street as Sulli swung open her front door, revealing another entryway and another door, this one painted yelloe. She stepped inside and unearthed a second key from her bag. When she unlocked that one, she stepped into the next entryway and started opening a blue door. Maybe I'd ingested too many pesticide fumes at Samwon Garden, because this couldn't be normal. She certainly had a thing for grand entrances. She fiddled around for the next key and repeated the process through two more doors before finally entering her house. She didn't bother to close any of them, which I took, rather liberally, as an invitation.

I walked to the front door and looked down at the long tunnel of entrances. When I tried to step through the first, it slammed in my face. Even opportunity wouldn't let me knock.

Turning back around, my knee bumped into a small, three-legged table made of solid glass, stationed on her front porch. Raindrop remnants dotted its surface. A small, golden key, much like the one Sehun had handed over in Samwon Garden, rested on top of it. Smiling, I snatched it up and tried it in the first door. Locked.

I jumped down a step at the sound of a car speeding along the street. Had the guy fromt he warehouse followed me here? I darted behind the largest rabbit statue. Good thing, because an evergreen car wobbled into Sulli's driveway. Music sounded from open windows. I crouched as low as possible and tried to balance. I'd have aching thigh muscles tomorrow, but maybe shapely legs would give me an exuse to go her the superhero spandex.

The driver got out of the car and kicked the door shut with his foot, then doubled back to lock it with a key. Oh Sehun. He'd shed his green apron and wore a black-and-white-striped sweater that made him looked kind of cute? At least it wasn't the guy from the warehouse.

I expected him to go straight to the front door, but he disappeared around the corner of the house.

Something was definitely going on here. I stood up from my hiding place and went after him. I was getting really good at spying.

A door slammed somewhere around the corner. I fasten my pace, then came to a stop at the place I would've expected a back entrance to be. Instead, a small, red curtain billowed in the wind by my feet. Sehun was nowhere to be seen. I pushed aside the curtain and uncovered a small door about the size of a notebook wedged into the side of the house.

"These people are totally weird," I muttered, thinking about the rabbits, the ecotage, the doors, and now this tiny, red door. I inserted the golden key. It fit perfectly. "Curiouser and curiouser." Well, a door that size was one way to keep out intruders and stalkers. Like me. I was small but - thankfully - not doll-size. And neither was Sehun - where had he disappeared?

I pressed my eye to the tiny peephole. Flowers bloomed in every variety and color, as if Sulli took sole responsibility for protecting the nation's rainforests. It wasn't a basement; it was a greenhouse.

"It's not pot," a deep voice beside me said. Sehun slipped outside through a door in the aluminum siding that hadn't existed a moment ago.

I jumped so hard I knocked my head into the wall, causing me to fall butt-first onto the gorund. At least hitting my head might explain everything I'd witnessed tonight. Rubbing the spot with my palm, I looked up to see a tower of boy blocking the moon. He carried a clay mug of green liquid. Foam and smoke billowed out of it, reminding me of mad-scientists experiments in movies. A bump was already popping out of my forehead. If I could move the swelling from my face to my chest, I'd really be on to something.

"I - I didn't think -" I rose until I was eye-level with his ribcage.

"You didn't think of a good exuse for your spying?" Sehun shut the door behind him, sealing it back into the exterior. Now that I knew what to look for, I spotted faint cracks in the aluminum siding outlining the door. No knob, so it must only open from the inside. "Wow, we just met and I'm already finishing your sentences," he said.

I shot him my most angelic smile. "Then what am I going to say next?"

"You're going to ask for my name. It's Sehun."

I didn't want to acknowledge I knew more about him than he probably did about me. So I stayed vague. "I go to University of Wonderland."

"Bae Suzy, right?" His lips curled into the kind of killer smile orthodontists and girls like me coul appreciate. "Your picture's on the honor board. Every time I pass by it . . ." His smile faded, and I immediately mourned the loss. "Never mind."

"What?" I waited, wondering if he could see right through me to my secrets, like maybe transparency was a side effect of courage. Aside from a few kids who still remembered my parents' tree-hugging slip-up or my lame petition fiasco, most people at school only knew about me if they cheated off me. Luckily, teenagers and goldfish had about the same memory span. New gossip erased old mistakes daily, the circle of strife.

"Nothing, it's -" He tilted his head to the side and his voice grew more confident with each word. "It's cheesy. I'm embarrassed I even thought it." He stared into his cup, then looked at me from under his lashes. "But you can guess if you want."

"Um . . ." Strange. Why would he want me to guess an answer he was embarrassed about? Maybe he was trying to stall me before the police arrived. I took a step backward. I knew I should probably make a quick exuse and flee, but he studied me with such intensity, as though he was holding his breath for my answer. So I gave him one. "Everytime you pass by the honor board . . . you remember a test you haven't studied for? You wish you had a marker to draw devil horns on my head?"

"That's a good one. Let's go with that." He smiled.

His smile was contagious. Yesterday, his reputation would have scared me off. But now? I was intrigued.

=^_^= . . . =^_^= . . .

Suzy and Sehun had finally speak to each other!

Do you think she has fallen for him already?

At the top/side is a picture of Sehun's outfit and some music to enjoy to read!

I think . . . I should've said that in the beginning . . .