In Another Summer || Mark Lee/NCT DREAM

Special Chapter. Bloom

When February came, I didn't know I would be having a new friend.

I wasn't really expecting anything when Mark apologized to me about the incident, and I wasn't about to expect anything as well when Donghyuck and the others kept telling me that he and I will become friends eventually.

It's not like he'd actually want to be friends with me.

But that's what happened. Mark and I did become friends.

Of course, it wasn't instant. We went through the process of getting to know each other, which consisted of unexpectedly crossing paths in unexpected places, at unexpected times.

When he visited me at the hospital to apologize, he gave me a Cadbury milk chocolate, which surprised me because it's my favorite chocolate.

He said that Donghyuck told him about my fondness for chocolate, but then I never told Donghyuck that Cadbury was my favorite. Perhaps it was a lucky guess.

On the week of our last exams for the school year, Mark and I weren't exactly talking. Just some small and friendly exchanges. But on the night of the end-of-school party I found him in front of my house, staring at the wall lights outside.

I wasn't exactly sure why he was staring, but he seemed almost in awe of the sight.

I have to admit, he looked cute staring like that. Big doe eyes, an innocent expression on his face, his mouth slightly agape.

It was so rare to see him so... tranquil.

Like he isn't just the kid who bullied me a lot, like he didn't have any problems in his life or he isn't running away from something. Like he's just at peace with his mind.

When I asked him what he was doing in front of my house, he told me that he was on his way home. But he didn't go home just yet.

Instead, we both found ourselves at the ice cream parlor, eating ice creams at 9 in the evening.

That was the first time we ever talked so normally. He would occasionally tease me, but not to the point of bullying. He found out about my bike accident when I was six, and he told me about his bike accident when he was seven.

When I got a closer look of his brown doe eyes, it reminded me of this little boy from my past that used to appear in my dreams. But I just shrugged it off as we talked about ourselves, thinking that it might just be coincidence.

For the time being, I just let myself enjoy the ice cream and the conversation Mark and I were having because for the first time since I met him, I found out that he wasn't so bad after all.

And that proved to be true when he and I became classmates on our make-up classes. He had low grades that he had to make up for while I got into classes way too late, so we were both stuck at school during vacation.

But school was fun and never boring because of him.

I think we officially became friends on the first day of our make-up classes, because he and I went home together and we were finally on the same track.

He was finally smiling and laughing at me, and I was finally getting used to him. It was the most pleasant day I've spent with Mark Lee.