It's a Monday, which should have been Jeongguk's first clue that the day was going to go anything but swimmingly.
"You're late!" Is the first thing Jeongguk hears when he's startled awake, the loud slap of a hand waking him up as his father smacks the back of his thigh. Jeongguk groans and rubs his leg gently, eyes still crusted over with rheum and sleep.
"Why do you do that," he grumbles, pulling himself out of bed. With a quick check of his phone, Jeongguk finds out that he is, in fact, late, and hurries to get dressed so he makes it to class on time. It's the first day of senior year, he doesn't want to make the teachers hate him already.
Dressed in a pair of dirty jeans and a wrinkled shirt, Jeongguk makes his way to the kitchen, where his mom is throwing together lunch for his little sister. Hani is sitting at the island, a bottle of nail varnish in front of her as she carefully colors her fingers pink. Jeongguk reaches for a piece of bacon on her plate, only to be stopped when the dog, some ugly, mangy thing Hani picked up off the side of the road, bites his leg.
"Get off me, stupid mutt." Jeongguk says, jerking his leg in an attempt to dislodge the dog from his pant leg. Hani gasps and nearly drops her brush, covered in polish, into her breakfast. She immediately ducks down and pulls the dog up by it's collar — diamond studded, fancier than anything Jeongguk has received his whole life — and squishes its cheek against her own.
"Do not talk to Moose like that. You'll hurt his feelings." Hani says, and Jeongguk rolls his eyes before grabbing the bacon off Hani's plate while the beast is preoccupied. Jeongguk turns to his mother, who looks at him a little sadly before her face morphs back into the stoic look she always has – unless she's at the beach, then she'll smile and look a little wistful, as if remembering time gone by.
"You're going to be late, Jeongguk. Better head out — and no disruptions!" His mother calls after him, as Jeongguk walks towards the front door. Jeongguk looks at her and winks, flipping his keys around his pointer finger.
"No disruptions."
—
"This is a prime example of a disruption, Jeongguk." His mother says as they sit in the waiting area of the main office. Jeongguk is slumped over in his chair, holding an icepack to his eye while his father talks to the principal and the parents of the boy Jeongguk punched.
"It's not my fault." Jeongguk grumbles, staring out the window. Outside the sky is cloudy and overcast, strange weather for San Diego this time of year. Normally it's sunny and blistering hot without hope of shade, but the clouds are rolling quickly across the sky, as if there's an impending thunderstorm. "He started it."
"Are you in fifth grade? I swear, sometimes Hani shows more maturity than you, Jeongguk. Punching someone over a place in the lunch line? It's juvenile, Jeongguk, that's what it is. I thought you were better than that."
"Call it want you want, Mom, but it's the principle – bullying a freshman, knowing that, as a bulky, meat-headed," Jeongguk is interrupted when his mother softly scolds, Jeongguk!, but he continues, "senior, that he has no chance is what I call juvenile. I was just standing up for the kid."
"My Jeonggukie," his mother says softly, resting a palm on the side of Jeongguk's face, "always standing up for the underdog. It's honorable, and selfless, but sometimes I wish you'd think about yourself more. About your education more."
Jeongguk blushes, probably because his mother hasn't called him Jeonggukie since he was seven. An air of comfortability and peace falls over them, like a warm blanket or nice hug, but the moment is ruined as soon as his father steps out of the principal's office, jaw clenched so hard Jeongguk can see his incisors through his skin.
