"Please pay attention, this is really important for the upcoming test!"
The teacher tried her best to get the attention of her students but it was all useless since the lesson had come to an end and they were already distracted. She sighed and, after collecting some books and her bag, she angrily left the classroom, walking towards the next classroom where she was going to have another lesson in.
You were distractedly doodling all over your deskmate notebook, while he was playing some phone game, way too focused in it to even pay attention to what you were drawing, so you wrote a silly 'jisung stupid' and felt pretty proud of your little masterpiece. You poked on his shoulder various times but he didn't even give you an answer, his eyes glued on that small bright screen.
You grumbled and looked away, looking for another classmate to bug before the Literature teacher would arrive and start another boring lesson.
Right when you were going to call one of your friends' name out loud, some seniors entered the classroom, quickly getting the whole class' attention.
The upperclassmen had really bright smiles printed on their faces, and didn't waste any more of their precious time to quickly introduce you to the after school club activities. There were so many various activities to choose among: from cooking to computer science, to acting or even sports.
You've always loved sports so you were definitely going to apply for that club, and you had to admit the club's president was pretty cool too, so that gave it a few more points.
"... So please, make sure to write your name in one of the clubs' fliers! You can find them on the notice boards in the entrance hall, and in the hallways of every floor! Have a great day, kids!"
One of the older students smiled gently at all of you before leaving the classroom, followed by others, and letting the Literature teacher enter, signing the beginning of a tremendous and endless hour of lesson.
Although really slowly, time passed and it was finally lunch time. You wanted to check the notice boards and decide what club activities you wanted to join before heading to the school canteen to relax a bit and talk with your friends without the need to whisper or check if the teacher was going to scold you.
You made sure that your friends would keep a seat for you and you took the opportunity to look around the school a bit. You didn't really go in the upper floors since your classroom was in the ground floor but you somehow felt thrilled to see the older students up there.
You walked up the first stairs flight and saw right away a notice board; some guys were lively chatting in front of it and you were somehow feeling intimidated by their presence.
You took a deep breath and walked closer to the board, examining properly every single flier in front of your eyes. There were already some names written and you quickly took a pen from your bag and wrote your name in the sports club flier. You smiled at yourself and turned, ready to head to the canteen and have lunch with your friends, but your eyes met with dark, chocolate-coloured ones. You gasped and moved right away, leaving some space to the upperclassman that was waiting to write his name, and after looking at him for a couple of seconds, you rushed down the stairs.
That guy wrote his name under the media club leaflet, and although you didn't even know who he was, you couldn't help but keep replaying that scene in your mind.
He did literally nothing, he was probably just minding his own business, waiting for his turn to write his name under the club activity flier he wanted, but there was something in his eyes that lit up a little piece of your mind... Curiosity.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Days passed, and finally club activities started. You've always been really interested in sports, so being able to share such passion with many people from your school made you feel great and excited. You enjoyed every single second of it, from the moment the club president made everyone introduce themselves to the moment where, at the end of the activities, everyone had to collect and put all the balls back in the gym storage room.
You quickly made some new friends, some were second years and others were first years like you, and decided to meet sometime during lunch to continue the conversation you started about what the best volleyball coach would be like.
"See you!"
You smiled brightly at your friends before parting ways with them. Before going home, you wanted to spend some time at the school library to revise a topic you didn't really understand (because you were not paying attention) so you took your bag, letting it lazily hang from one of your shoulders, and walked towards the building.
It was late afternoon and the sun was already leaving the sky, letting some weak, long rays caress every single object they met, projecting long shadows on the ground. You decided to walk next to the soccer field and noticed a group of people reunited right in front of the school's entrance. They were sitting on a bench, some of them sitting on the ground, and each one of them was holding a sheet of paper and a pencil. They were definitely the Media Club students, you heard that students were divided in little groups, and each one of them had to present a project by the end of the school year. You knew your classmate, Jisung, applied for this club saying proudly that he was aiming for the light director spot, and not the actor one. You snorted, thinking about his cocky shot but you heard his loud, bright voice repeating the same exact words he had told you that day during a Maths lesson, while the both of you were too bored to pay attention to whatever the teacher was trying to explain.
You didn't really want to get their attention or interrupt them so you just kept walking towards the library, when you heard Jisung calling your name.
You turned and waved at him, even though you kept walking, this time your back facing the building.
"Hey, you're not going home?"
He waved at you with a big, bright smile, and you shook your head, pointing at the library right behind you.
He nodded and understood right away.
"Please send some cute pics of your lovely notes once you finish writing them!"
The two of you laughed, but he promised he would buy you your favourite flavoured milk from the vending machine the following day, so you agreed and, after quickly greeting the other people that were with your friend, you walked to the library, ready to spend some time immersed in books, notes and weird Maths formulas.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Another week passed, and you were once again ready to start the sports club activities with your friends. You entered the school gym after changing into your tracksuit and were carefully listening to the words of the coach and the team captain; that day you were going to practice volleyball and you felt so excited, although you had to endure a quick theory lesson from the coach.
Once the boring part passed, you were ready to practice , when you suddenly noticed a familiar, yet intruder, figure entering the gym. The guy talked to the coach, and he pointed at you, nodding.
You were a bit confused but tried to ignore it and started to practice with a ball against the wall. Your ears getting gradually used to the echoes of the voices of the other students and the sounds of the balls hitting the walls of the big building.
That sort of repetitive beat was suddenly stopped by the loud voice of your deskmate, once again calling your name out loud.
You quickly looked in his direction, forgetting for a second that you could have got hit by the ball you just tossed against the wall and luckily blocked it, keeping it in your hands.
"Hey Jisung, what are you doing here?"
You looked at him, confusion in your eyes. Right behind him was the guy you saw the previous week but you never got to ask him his name. His eyes were relaxed, looking at you and then looking around, as if he was mentally noting some spots or things he noticed.
"We just need some audio files for our project, so of course I thought of you, my best amazing deskmate."
You looked at him and raised an eyebrow, trying to hide the smile that was trying to stay on your lips.
He looked at you with a smirk and then pointed at the guy next to him.
" He's the soundman, Bang Chan. I have nothing to do with that but I wanted to escape from the scary monster for a bit."
You smiled and greeted him with a quick bow, to which he responded with a nod, and you brought back your attentinon to what your friend said, wondering who he was referring to with that term.
"Scary monster? Who are you talking about!"
"Kim Seungmin. He's the screenwriter of our project."
The upperclassman spoke, his voice sounded a bit serious and slightly bored.
"Yeah, I mean he's cool but he just wants me to do too much! C’mon, I’m not even an actor, I’m just the one who checks the lights!"
Jisung shrugged and casually brought both of his hands behind his neck, looking around.
"Okay so, what kind of sounds do you need?"
He looked at his clubmate, who was using some recording device , quickly connecting it to his headphones. He pointed at the bench that were next to you and sat down.
None of them told you exactly what you had to do to help them, so you just looked at them even more confused.
The two guys were not paying attention to you, both focused on the device they were going to use to record whatever sound they needed, and once they prepared it, your friend cleared his throat and looked at you.
"We need the sound of a volley ball hitting the wall, the ground and…"
He looked quickly at his friend, mentally asking him for help since he forgot what else they were supposed to record.
"... Someone getting hit by a ball."
The older guy finished, his eyes still on the recording device that he put on the bench, next to him.
"Yeah exactl- No wait, that's not it!"
You gasped, looking at the two guys, slightly worried.
Chan was trying to hide a little satisfied smile that painted his soft, pink lips, while Jisung was freaking out, telling you not to worry.
"Don't listen to him, his jokes are always like that and he looks so damn serious all the time!"
Jisung sighed, jokingly kicking his friend's leg.
"You ready?"
Chan suddenly looked at you, ignoring your friend's comment, and you flinched, nodding slightly.
His instructions were pretty clear and he was able to get the audio files the two guys needed, getting even some extra ones just in case the scary monster Kim Seungmin wasn’t satisfied.
The two guys thanked you, and before leaving, Jisung told you to meet after club activities so they could offer you a drink from the vending machine.
You took a quick refreshing shower after practice ended and you left the dressing room, fixing the buttons of your white shirt under the dark grey blazer of your uniform.
After collecting your bag and making sure you forgot nothing in that room, you left the school gym, walking towards the little schoolyard.
A couple of minutes passed before you saw Jisung and Chan walking out of the school building.
You greeted them with a lazy wave and Jisung smiled at you.
"I guess you're never late when it comes to me offering you food, huh?"
He looked at you and you laughed, sticking your tongue out at him, joining the two of them while you walked towards the little space where the various vending machines were.
You really wanted to drink something fresh since you just had a pretty tough practice so you stood up in front of the machine, checking all the available drinks.
"Uh… Which one should I get?"
You thought out loud, while distractedly tapping your chin with your fingers.
"Get the most expensive one."
Chan answered while taking some coins from his wallet.
"Hey, don't!"
Jisung looked at his friend, and started messing with him by trying to make him drop the money he just took.
"Great idea!"
You uttered with a giggle, while checking the various drinks that were offered by the vending machine.
"Not you too!"
Jisung jokingly attacked you from behind, ruffling your hair with a hand.
"And since you're older, shouldn't you offer drinks to the younger ones?"
He quickly looked at Chan, who was now kneeling down to collect the coins Jisung successfully made him drop.
"Never heard of that."
"Yeah, me neither."
You quickly agreed with him, looking at Jisung with a serious expression before bursting out laughing. He sighed, defeated, and put some money in the machine, letting you get whatever you wanted to drink.
"The two of you are so annoying! "
He whined leaning on the broken vending machine next to the one you were using.
You knelt down to get the fresh plastic bottle containing strawberry flavoured milk and opened it right away, taking a sip after thanking Jisung for the drink. He nodded and got the banana flavoured one and sat on a bench nearby, looking distractedly at the soccer field, while enjoying his fresh drink. Chan got some juice and sat next to his friend, followed by you.
The three of you were just enjoying the end of the day while tasting the sweetness of the drinks you got, while the light breeze of that late afternoon was gently caressing your faces, moving lightly the locks of your hair.
The day just ended, but it felt like something was starting. Right there, in those afternoons spent at the after school clubs, with new friends, new experiences. And him.
You exchanged a few words, but it seemed like Chan and Jisung were pretty much close friends and although he was often quiet, he was a really good presence to have around.
His little comments were always so funny and fitting, and even funnier whenever he said a joke while keeping a straight face. He looked like he had so much to say but his intimidating aura always blocked him a bit.
You looked at the sun as it was slowly setting, and shyly moved your gaze on your right and got startled for a second, as if it was impossible for your body to move. As if your mind wanted to capture every single detail of the scene you were witnessing.
The warm, orange rays of the sun were gently touching Chan's face, as they were illuminating his dark eyes, making it seem like sunset was happening in them. His dark, curly locks were tickling his forehead, slightly moving because of the breeze.
And that's when you felt that again, something inside of you started to flow and grow. You wanted to know him, you wanted to spend hours talking to him, admiring his figure. But you barely knew him, so you tried your best to lock those thoughts in the back of your mind and tried to distract yourself from that by taking another sip of that sweet drink. At the same exact time, Chan took another sip from the small carton of juice he was holding, and you looked at him quickly, noticing his cheeks gradually getting painted in a light red colour, and that made you smile a bit.
You brought back your gaze on the sun and took a deep breath, closing your eyes, feeling relaxed and glad that you were able to savour such a calm moment with the two guys with you.
And once again, that little part of your mind lit up, more than it had ever done.
