SUGAR KISS [YEONBIN] ✓

three

I am still on fire when I finally crest the stairs and get my room assignment from the woman I assaulted with my suitcase earlier. She looks a little pinched when she hands it to me, but not flat-out resentful, which is probably the best I can ask for, foot injuries considered.

I fold the sheet of paper, neat and symmetrically creased, and slide it into my back pocket, then wrestle my bag over the soft carpet down the hall. Room 209. I knock softly just in case, then push the door open. There’s someone in there already, back turned to me, and he has claimed the bed by the window. Fine by me; no sun streaming into my face in the morning.

“Hi,” I say, and he turns around, mouth ticking up into a smile.

“Hey. How’s that arm?”

I laugh, half-embarrassed. “I’ll survive. I’m Soobin. Looks like we’re rooming together?”

“Taehyun,” he says. “What’s your specialty, Soobin?”

“I’m a skillet kind of boy. Despite what my injury might tell you.”

“Oh good,” he says. “Should be a while before we have to be at each other’s throats then. I am sugar and spice and everything . . . baking. I bake, mostly. And am clearly a poet.”

“Clearly.”

He laughs and goes back to trying to fluff the pillows on his little bed, which seems like a pretty fruitless endeavor to me. These pillows are pancakes and nothing can be done to force them to rise.

Then I turn to my side and start the slow, painful process of unpacking as the sun sets. It’s vibrant down here, bright pink and blue. It makes the Spanish moss outside look like something out of a fairytale.

I sigh. And hang everything up one by one. The sooner this is done, the sooner I can sleep. Taehyun is friendly but not a chatterer, which means that in an hour, I can crawl into bed and embrace the quiet and try to get rid of the headache that has been building behind my eyes since I was brutally betrayed by an arrogant boy and a package of provolone.

🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂

Morning comes early. It comes particularly early because Taehyun wakes up practically at sunrise, and he does it to the Avengers theme song, which is both unexpected and very, very loud. I go with his suggestion—embracing the mop of insanity on my head—because it allows me to lie around a little longer. Just a little mousse and brush my teeth, then throw a T-shirt on over my sleep shorts, and I’m padding down the stairs in my socks.

Breakfast starts in five minutes and hell if I was going to take the extra time away from sleep to dress like a human. I follow a group of four boys in front of me who seem to have bonded really quickly, and Taehyun and I just walk quietly together. These boys look like they know where they’re going, and I am certain that I do not. We pass the common room, which is filled with old books and framed by the ancient, dual curved staircases that lead to the dorms, and through a little hallway with bathrooms and mystery rooms on either side. Then the hallway opens up into a tiny cafeteria. Everything in here is tiny. Old. Intimate. I think I like it, until I spot Yeonjun across the way sitting at a filled four-person round table. A sour taste fills my mouth when I realize I just thought the words Yeonjun and intimate in the same minute, and the scowl on my face is vicious enough to make Taehyun say, “Wow, you haven’t even tried the food yet. It’s probably decent; this is a cooking school.”

“Not the food,” I say, and I can’t tear my eyes off him. He’s just sitting there in these loose plaid pajama pants and an old T-shirt stretched tight over his chest, mouth tilted in this way that has everyone at his table scrambling for his attention. He’s amused, but not really invested, and it’s killing all of them. I hate him and his stupid blue bedhead and his stupid provolone.