Emergence

IX

          Looking up at the wall of a young man that I had crashed into, I found myself at a loss of words. Sure, the right words should be 'yeah, I'm totally fine. No biggie!' but that's the furthest sentence from my mind right now. Rather, I find myself too enamored with eyeing up this gorgeous man in a gray jumpsuit that's peering down at me with a look of concern. His movements seemed so slow as his hand made its way toward me as I continued sitting on the filthy floor of the school, my senses slowly coming back to me.

          "How hard did you two collide? She looks super out of it." My eyes didn't need move away to recognize the voice that spoke. With a blink I promptly pick myself up, unable to accept his help as running into him was enough physical contact to leave me content for a year.

          "I-I'm s-sorr-y," hallelujah, madame stutters is back! Before he could say anything else, I scurried away with my head down, eyes glued to the ground as my feet quickly led me away. Of course, I couldn't help but to listen as closely as possible to their brief exchange of words as I fled.

          "Jace," I could hear the lightest dip in his voice which made my heart plummet, dropping into the pit of my stomach like a rock to the bottom of a pond, "Did I do something wrong?"

          "I think she's just shy, don't worry too much about it."

          Making my way to the canteen, I glanced at my phone. Only ten minutes left to get something to eat, lucky me. Don't get me wrong, there's more than ten minutes left for lunch, it's just that I want to get back to class quickly to avoid running into anyone else or be questioned by my beloved Minseok. Scampering over, I plucked up some ramen for myself. Again with the ramen? Yeah, again. It's empty calories but it tastes good.

          With my ramen ready to eat, I made my way as quickly to my usual spot. As I thought, Minseok and Iseul were sitting there gossiping away, Jin-Ae ignoring them as she scrolled through social media. Slipping into my usual spot, I began quietly slurping my noodles while lowkey listening to the gossip. Most of it was nothing new and even less interesting than the first few times they'd talked about it. Sometimes something would pique my interest, but it was things everyone was curious about.

          "When do you think Vin will finally take off his glasses?" Iseul has always been adamant about wanting to see Vin without the glasses. I find it amusing because she wants to see, but is far too nervous to even approach him. Maybe it's because she thinks he'll bully her. She isn't the prettiest girl but she's not ugly either.

          "Hard saying, he's pretty dead set on keeping them on at all times." Minseok popped a glob of rice into his mouth, sighing dramatically, "What I want to know is why he's got such a stick up his ass. I mean, he acts all high and mighty but always gets his ass handed to him in fights yet keeps picking fights."

          "Hey, hey! Keep it down, he might hear you!" Isuel hushed him, leading me to snicker at the two as I kept the flow of noodles going. This tiny sound somehow drew their attention to me, "Hey, _Y/N_. I didn't realize you finally slunk in. It's not like you to be so late for lunch."

          "Yeah, I was here earlier but got distracted with something shiny." Yes, this is how I choose to play it off. The shiny game.

          "Oh please, was the shiny thing called Vas-" I sent a small glare at Minseok that sent his arms flying up defensively, an action that was accompanied by a sly chuckle, "Sorry, sorry. I won't bring him up again. But really, what was this shiny thing?"

          I hummed lightly, slurping in more noodles to buy my time to find a new fib to tell him. Holding up a finger, I chewed as slowly as I possibly could. I couldn't tell him I was with the petty quartet, otherwise he'd probably make the situation worse than it is. Knowing how the girls are in this school, if I were to mess up, they would spread the secret like a wildfire in a three years parched forest.

          "I decided to follow one of the groups of girls to see if they had any juicy gossip. I know how much you like gossip." Minseok's eyes lit up as he scooted toward the table, the legs of his chair scraping against the floor in that usual annoying manner. With a chuckle, I gave him a pout, "Sadly they didn't do anything interesting. Just went out to the bleachers to smoke without getting caught."

          Minseok scoffed, rolling his eyes in annoyance, "Well that's boring."

          "Supposedly one of the girls likes spreading her legs," once again, his eyes lit up, waiting for the next part, to which he would become disappointed, "Sadly I don't know which one though. I didn't get a good look at them. You know how all the bitchy girls end up looking alike with faces all caked with the same clown look."

          As predicted, Minseok was very disappointed. Iseul on the other hand piped up, "Yeah, but even clowns look different. Maybe you can find them again later so we can go find out for ourselves who's getting di-"

          "Hey!" I knew what she was going to say, but I can't allow it, "I've said it before: not in front of my ramen. It's innocent, you don't need to taint it with such filthy language."

          Iseul rolled her eyes at me, "You do realize you said bitch in front of your ramen, right?"

          "Totally different." a small grin found its way to my face as I finished my last bite and quickly chugged down the salty broth, "One small curse versus talking about dicking people are exponentially different."

          Before she could make a retort I picked up myself and my belongings and fled. I could hear her faintly cursing in the background as Minseok laughed at her. To her, there was no difference, and in all honesty I could care less. It's just fun to say and it frustrates the poor girl. Tossing the trash in its rightful bin, I carefully scurried away down the hall, careful and alert of my surrounding as I made my way back to class with less than five minutes before the bell to resume the rest of the day's learning. With a little luck, the rest of the day can go absolutely swimmingly.