that boy | hwang hyunjin | ✔

Chapter 1

"Felix, I swear to God. You don't have to point at every single guy that passes by in the hallways."

I sigh in exasperation as I walk side by side with my best friend, making our way to the next class. It's a habit of him; trying his best to make me say something positive about at least one boy, to make me give them a chance.

The point is, I'm simply not interested.

"But Chaelin," Felix protests, eying me with almost desperate eyes. "School girls need to chase boys."

I snort out a laugh. "So you're telling me that I'm not a school girl? Mind me, I'm a girl and I'm attending school. I thought that was enough to qualify myself as a school girl?"

Meet Lee Felix, my best friend since as far as my memories go back. He's the best, let me tell you that. He's funny, friendly, loyal and reliable. But sometimes, just sometimes, he looks like an overdramatic dad trying to find a suitable partner for his beloved daughter.

"Yes, but-"

"What if I don't swing that way?" I shrug and Felix almost chokes on his saliva at my remark, his eyes wide as he coughs a few times.

"You what?" he hisses, the shock clearly written in his still widened brown eyes.

"Yeah, you have no idea," I continue with a serious expression, dragging out the joke a little longer. "For all you know I might even be asexual. I don't even know myself."

Felix' freckles are bold against his now pale skin. All the color is drained from his face and I can see him thinking, what did I miss?

I'm a master at keeping straight faces. It's hard to tell when I'm joking and when I'm not. Even Felix has his difficulties with it and he has known me for over ten years now.

"I'm just kidding, Felix," I chuckle, poking his cheek. "For all that I know I'm perfectly straight."

"Not that I would mind if you weren't," my friend mutters, his gaze cast down at his feet in clear discomfort.

I let out a breathy laugh as we enter the classroom. We are the first one to enter and the teacher greets us with a smile as we take our seat.

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Choi," I greet our English teacher. Today's classes end with English, probably my worst subject of all. This language has always been a major struggle for me and I have a hard time to keep up with the study material.

Luckily there's Felix, who lived in Australia for a while and is fluent in English -including his cute Australian accent. He helps me out a lot and it's thanks to him that my grades are average instead of bad.

Mrs. Choi neatly stacks some documents on her desk, waiting for the rest of the students to enter the classroom. Soon, the room is filled with loud chatter and as our last classmate has entered, our teacher leaves the chair and stands in front of the chalkboard, magically silencing the room.

"Hello class," she greets us, the first wrinkles showing as she smiles at us. "I have an announcement for you all."

All the students collectively hold their breath, waiting for Mrs. Choi's announcement full of anticipation. It could be literally everything, from an unexpected test or assignment to an exciting field trip to wherever the school wants.

Mrs. Choi grabs a document from her desk and carefully reads it over before glancing around the class once.

"A new student will be joining us as from tomorrow," she states. "I don't know any details but Mr. Jeon will tell you tomorrow during his class."

Excited whispers fill the classroom and I let out a disappointed sigh. I would've preferred a nice field trip or something like that. I don't like new students. They always mess up the relationships between a class and I hate changes.

"Stop sulking like that," Felix chimes, grinning like a madman as he pushes my glasses up the bridge of my nose. "Maybe it's a cute boy and you will finally meet your perfect match."

"Maybe it's a cute girl and you finally find someone else to bother," I retort as I duck away, and my friend fakes a pout.

"We'll find out soon enough," I deadpan as I take out my textbook. "But mind you, Felix. Not even the most handsome boy on earth will change my mind."

"I won't be so sure about that, Chae," Felix smirks. "There must be a boy somewhere even you cannot resist."

I just let out a huff before focussing my attention back on Mrs. Choi, who is patiently waiting for the excited class to calm down again.

"Mr. Jeon kindly requested me to tell you this beforehand," she explains with a smile as the chatter has finally come to an end. "He has a strong disliking towards the chaos a bunch of surprised teenagers cause."

Several students laugh a bit, knowing this counts for them. Our class is known for being extremely loud, probably one of the loudest at this school. Felix and I are not a part of that. We've gained the reputation of being the only normal ones among this club of noisy ass teenagers.

Sometimes, I feel like I'm back in nursery school with a bunch of whining toddlers. But then I remind myself that high school isn't much different from nursery school, only that the whining toddlers are now whining teenagers.

"If you don't mind, I would like to start the lecture now," Mrs. Choi states a moment later, clapping her hands a few times.

Within one attempt, she manages to silence the entire class. This middle-aged woman has a level of power over this class other teachers would die for.

Then our teacher switches to fluent English and this is the moment I officially check out. I rest my chin on my arms as I let out a small huff. I halfheartedly listen to the words Mrs. Choi is saying but to me, it doesn't mean anything. It just doesn't make sense at all. She could talk in Spanish, Chinese, German, or whatever and it would've made as much sense as... this.

So I allow myself to slack off. Felix will repeat everything later in a way that would make more sense to me. Paying attention now is pointless.

--

Yes, they share the same family name. But they aren't related ^^.

Mr. Jeon isn't Jungkook from BTS, he's the grumpy old History teacher ☻