Let's Kill Her (Book #1)

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Sejeong walks one step ahead of me into the cafeteria, which looks like it was modeled after a royal banquet hall. There are three tables. The one at the front fo room seats about twenty and is arranged on a raise platform. And two long tables, seating at least fifty each, run perpendicular to it. All the tables have navy velvet chairs in neat rows and crisp white tablecloths that are super impractical for a herd of teenagers. There are centerpieces made form sprigs and spruce and white flowers, and from the ceiling hang wrought-iron chandeliers with real candles.

Teachers take their seats at the elevated table and the students politely and quietly finding theirs. There is a low buzz of conversation, but nothing like the chaos of my cafeteria.

I follow Sejeong down the middle of the tables. Each place is set with china plates and silverware that looks freshly polished, something I thought belonged exclusively to movies. As I'm gawking at the fancy place settings, I hear my name. I look up and find Rose smiling at me from across the table.

"Sit, sit," Rose says, and Jimin pulls out a chair.

"Sejeong," I say. "Do you want to -"

"No," she says, and keeps walking.

I watch Sejeong's back as she gets farther away from me.

"Don't worry so much. Sejeong worries enough for all of us," Rose says.

I accept the chair Jimin pulled out for me. Although I can't help but feel weird that I didn't follow Sejeong, even though I'm pretty sure we could use a minute apart.

"Thanks," I say to Jimin, who sits down next to me.

"You're quite the hot topic around here." Rose pushes bowls of bibimbap and kimchi in my direction, and I gladly accept them. "Not that anyone will tell you that."

A girl with mid-length silver hair with bangs turns and looks at Rose.

"What?" Rose says. "Problem?"

The girl shakes her head and return her eyes to her meal, but she doesn't seem the least bit put off. In fact, if I had to guess, I would say she and Rose are friends. Interesting that Rose, who's obviously bold and fluid, who have one friend who's so reserved and another who's so stiff.

Jimin pours me a glass of water, and now that I'm so close to him, I notice a faded clean scar, like a cut from a knife or a sword. And by the way it's faded, it looks like he had it for a long time. Did someone really slice him in the face when he was a kid?

"It's funny," I say, "barely anyone here has even looked in my direction, much less spoken to me."

"We're not the most open friendly bunch," Jimin says, like he prefers it that way.

"Speak for yourself," Rose says. "I'm a hoot."

He raises his right brow. "I bet most of this room would disagree."

"Says the gloomy person from the moors of grey and rainy," she says with her mouth full, which makes me think Jimin's Busan accent is real even if Rose's isn't.

He gives her a warning look.

"Okay, okay," she says in a dramatic surrendering voice. "You're not gloomy. Barrels of laughs, you are. No one can stop when they're around you. You must take after your -"

"Rose," he says in a sharper tone, and his back straightens further.

She laughs. "You should really see your face, mate."

I look back and forth between them as I grab another bite of bibimbap. This school might be seriously questionable, but the food is outrageously good.