nightfall || minsung

Chapter 1

the story begins.... probably not the way you expected.

**If you remember the first part from Jisung's epilogue in daybreak, feel free to skip and scroll to the second part — it's new**

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I stared down at the food in front of me. It was a bagel. Why couldn't bagels just be toast? Why make them round? And with a hole in the middle. It's impossible to eat the absence of something — not that I would be eating it anyway.

Till next time, brothers, Felix thought, giving each of us a wink. He stood and walked away, emptied his tray into the garbage can and left the cafeteria. He had to get to his class early; every day he sliced a little more off one of the legs of each chair in his classroom, and then watched, giggling, as the other students wobbled slightly for an hour.

Dr. Bang's kids.

I looked up when I heard Chan's name. It was a reflex — one I hadn't kicked, though I'd been alive like this for around a century. I could hear everyone's thoughts, all the time, and it was exactly as grinding and awkward and useful as one would think.

Jessica Stanley was the one who thought it — across the room, sitting at her usual table. I looked up at her for a second before my eyes flitted to the boy next to her. The new one, the one everybody was thinking about.

Minho Lee.

Our eyes met, but I looked away — fast.

His face stayed with me as I pretended to consider the cracks in the walls. Dark eyes, pouty lips, golden brown hair. Harrumph. He was beautiful. More beautiful than I liked anybody who didn't have the vampire excuse to be. The jealousy that leaked into my mind was not surprising. The seven deadly sins were a to-do list for me.

I turned my attention to Minho's thoughts. For newcomers (not that there were many — Forks was like dead water) thinking about us and our alienness was natural.

But I couldn't hear anything. I heard Jessica next to him, Mike on his other side, the rest of the people at the table, the rest of the students in the cafeteria, the rest of the residents of Forks — but not him. Why not him? Why?!

It was a moment before I remembered I could hear their real-world conversation — distracted as I was. I didn't often have to stoop to eavesdropping. I shook my head and focussed.

"They don't look related," Minho said. His voice was a quiet tenor.

"No," Jessica replied. "They're foster children, because the doctor and his... you know." She widened her eyes, lips folded into her mouth. I didn't know quite what to do with that.

Minho didn't reply — he was staring at us again. Examining us. I looked up and met his eyes. My head tilted without my permission. I knew I must have seemed very curious to him, because I was.

Then he smiled, and it was like the corners of his mouth were attached to mine; I smiled back without thought.

He looked down, the tops of his ears pink. I heard him ask, "Who's the one with black hair? Um, the one in the flannel?"

"That's Jisung," Jessica answered him. "He never speaks to anyone — except his brothers. Never dates, either, so too bad for the girls here, I guess."

Jessica's cluelessness made me smile.

I knew he was looking at me, but I didn't meet his eyes. His very, very, very pretty eyes. I stared at my dumb bagel and wondered what he was thinking.

Seungmin kicked the leg of my chair.

Dude, stop making cow eyes, he thought.

I wanted to bluster, but I kept my mouth shut.