You and Me, Guinea Pigs

Sehun couldn't remember a time when he had not been flat broke. Growing up with four smaller siblings had always took its toll on his parents monetary household; Sehun himself had been quite lucky with his position as the eldest of five children—his hand-down clothes had only been worn...well once or twice before he inherited them from his mother's better situated pals' sons—while the youngest of his brothers had to bear the questionable honor of wearing a pair of roughly ten-year-old jeans.

At age twenty, two years into his state-sponsored scholarship at Hongik University, Sehun had learned how to hide the fact that he wasn't exactly a Bill Gates kind-of-guy. He was brillant—yes, at least to a certain extent—but he didn't manage to radiate off this ungraspable feel of old money.

His friends didn't know about his background—or, in the best case, they didn't seem to care. At least Kim Jongin, who had quickly become Sehun's best friend from the second he stomped into Accounting ten minutes late on the first day of University, falling down with an exasperated sigh next to the tall boy with the thin frame, didn't do it. Care.

Not a single gaze was wasted on Sehun's washed-out blue jeans, or the fact how thin the cloth of his shirt had become in the wake of Sehun setting the washing machine a few levels too high for his clothes' good, (after all he wanted to save money). No, Jongin had only cared about the fact how intent the taller boy's eyes had studied him and how he had managed to crack a small, thin smile at Jongin's panting and frantic fanning of himself with the list of attendance.

From this day on, Jongin and Sehun were inseparable. Their bond of friendship only deepened when they discovered that both of them had an insatiable love for dancing—and while Sehun had only theoretically lived up to his secret passion, Jongin had been taking dance classes since the day he could walk. He even gave off the impression of having learnt dancing before walking—for there was a certain kind of unreal elegance to his steps.

At first, Sehun had been insanely jealous; even more so after Jongin had taken him to one of his dance practices one day—and Sehun was forced to watch from the literal bleachers as Jongin performed one perfect pirouette after the other.

It simply wasn't fair. Jongin didn't deserve the joys of dancing more than he did; yet there he was—giving in into the music's movements like a god. And he, Sehun, could only watch in awe.

Jongin, who had noticed Sehun's discontent with both of their situations, had not wasted time and talked to his teacher—a friendly, yet incredibly short man with the name of Kim Minseok, who had been teaching and tutoring Jongin for the longest time. Minnie, how Jongin would call the thirty-year old Korean when the shorter man wasn't near, obliged to both of the boys' pleading wishes to take Sehun in. He was willing to do this to a much lower admission fee as usual, but Sehun would not let Jongin pay the discounted rest. In his stubborn and proud mindset, his best friend was already offering him all kinds of charity and he would not bear to live with this shame.

From this day on, Sehun took every job opportunity he could get his hands on, from washing dishes in the university's canteen, to handing out leaflets and pamphlets for the student association, over to committing his body to the ever hungry needs of science.

He participated in every scientific or sociological experiment the university had to offer; and he was soon known as the "eager boy from Accounting". The sociologists and biologists loved the tall and boney boy as soon as he had stumbled into their laboratories for the first time, with a torn-off flyer in his hand and even though Sehun studied the "dull and boring matter that is economy" he was taken in as one of them very, very quickly.

Especially Kim Junmyeon, the leader of the sociologist division at Hongik University, had taken him faster into his heart than Sehun would have thought it to be possible. He allowed Sehun the unfair advantage of enrolling first into new experiments by sending him the information and credentials hours before they would be posted on their website.