Homeroom | Park Jimin

three

My classmates and I wait for Mr. Park to arrive to open the classroom door. Everyone looked around, switched standing positions ever so often, talked loudly, laughed loudly, until he finally came. He had a stack of papers piled onto his hands and seemed like he needed help as he searched for the key. Everyone seemed to not notice much but a few students.

I step forward to volunteer to help him but, Tiffany got closer to him before I insisted.

"Mr?" She speaks, "let me help you get the papers."

Mr. Park raises his head and says, "Aw! How kind of you!" He gives her the stack of papers and a few pages fall making me instantly react to pick them up. As I pick the last one, I notice it reads 'Math Quiz'. I slowly say 'are you serious' under my breath and hand it to Tiffany with a smile.

I rushed to my seat, unzipped my bag, took out my notebook, and skipped to the lecture notes I wasn't very familiar with.

"When a negative fraction is next to the whole number, I need to to put it over one and root the fraction," I close my eyes while I mutter underneath my breath repeatedly to memorize the equation.

"Pop quiz!" Mr. Park retorts outloud.

The class groans, including me, to his sudden decision to quiz us. 'Why Mr?' and a 'I am not prepared' were said outloud along with the other complaints, making me giggle and look at Mr. Park, as well, laughing at everyone. He runs his fingers through his hair, and playfully begins to whine like the class. "Oh my gosh, it's not the end of the world! In fact, this helps me, and you, where in the section do most students make the most mistakes."

"That makes me feel stupid Mr. Park," the class clown says while raising his hand. He managed to make everyone laugh, including Mr. Park himself. "What if I make that mistake?"

"Then I will fix it," he flips his hair in a self-indulgent way. "That's what I am here for, to teach you all to learn and fix your mistakes. Now, Steph, can you help me pass the quiz?"

For some reason my stomach got butterflies because I felt something weird thats made my blood rush too my cheeks. I listened anyways, and walked towards the front. It took a more than a few steps to get there since I sit second to the last desk of the row he assigned me in. As I am walking, I look down to the floor then came into contact to Mr. Park who handed it towards me. I give me a sly smile, and take it off his grip. Our hands brush slightly too as I fully take grip of the stack.

"I chose you because you had time to study before the others," he tells me and audible enough for the first few classmates to hear around us. They chuckle for some reason, and I roll my eyes.

"Good Luck!" He says afterwards to the class.

***

The bell rings, cutting off Mr. Parks word when he was explaining the next chapter. He stops and doesn't finish it but, tells us all to have a good morning and a good rest of our day. With that everyone began to pack up and begin to rush out the door. Today I felt like taking it slow and begin to pack up everything calmly.

"Mr.," I say as I put my pencils in my cute pencil pouch. "Can you grade my quiz?"

My focus still remained onto my supplies instead of visually seeing Mr. Park but, I heard his footsteps going towards his desk. It's weird how I know that already, its something odd but quite interesting why people instinctively know.

"Sure!" He agrees since it's not my first time asking.

I walk towards his desk and see him mark one wrong. "What!" I shout.

"Four out of five." He gives it back to me with a smile.

"How annoying," I pouted, looking at the wrong question. "Why? I thought it was a function."

"It's okay, Steph. Well, the reason why it is not a function is because if you graph a line that intersects more than once," he replies while drawing and example, "it's not a function."

Suddenly, my brain comprehended with what he explain and replied with a long 'Oh' and an awkward fake laugh. I handed it back to him, and fixed my hair in embarrassment. "I understand. Thank you, Mr. Park."

"That's why I am here." He smiles and gives me a toothy grin.

My arms hug my books harder and excuse myself to head towards second period.