Dark to Baby: A Changjin Story

Chapter 32

Hyunjin didn't want to do it. No one could make him do it. There had been too much disappointment already in one day. However, obligation won out, and he found himself trudging into chorus hoping Seungmin wasn't there.

They had a little over a week before the fall concert. This was the only class Hyunjin wished he had attended since the beginning of school. He could catch up on math and literature, gradually learning things for the final test, but chorus was different. He couldn't make up the lost rehearsal time as it depended on other people.

Perhaps that would be his weekend activity, considering there was only so much he could do in the living room, and he needed to memorize five pieces in two Tuesdays. He could pull out the old keyboard and plunk out notes. It would be tedious, but it was something. Better than practicing those triangles and whatever complex shapes his math teacher had moved on to in the past two days.

Without seeing Felix, he might even be able to read the play they were studying in world literature. It blew Hyunjin's mind how Changbin kept up with that class, let alone his others. He slept through the class most days this week, but he could answer every question and knew what page to open to automatically. His homework was always complete, although sometimes wrinkled from his standard bus rush. It amused Hyunjin to see the messy handwriting. Changbin had only written a short note in front of him before, but even his slow pace and careful penmanship ended in long lines and jumbled scrawl. He must have been one of those kids the teachers constantly reminded to write neatly or else there was no telling what he wrote.

It seemed like a better fate than Hyunjin's though. His mother had been an advocate for learning cursive extremely early. His elegant series of swirls were misinterpreted as belonging to a girl for as long as he'd been in public school. It wouldn't have been so bad if there wasn't a female Hyunjin at his old school. Their papers kept getting mixed up by this one teacher and this girl somehow managed to get a few points higher on every assignment. It ticked Hyunjin off.

Thankfully, this school had no fellow Hyunjins, and he hadn't been mistaken as a girl as of now. The worst he got was from Seungmin, which was similar to Jeongin plus a bit of snark.

Hyunjin dropped his bag by his chair and removed his choir folder, the aforementioned boy nowhere in sight. Hyunjin glanced up at the board where their rehearsal schedule was written and pulled out the pieces they would need for the day. As he arranged them in order, a chair was placed on either side of him. He rifled through the pieces again, trying to ignore the nerves building in his stomach. However, he couldn't stop his fingers from fidgeting with his lips as he sat down. He glanced in Seungmin's direction, only getting a glimpse of the wavy, brown hair before a loud voice interrupted his worrying.

"Yo, Jinnie!" Hyunjin's attention was drawn to his other side where Chan had placed his seat and proceeded to clap Hyunjin on the back. Hyunjin smiled, slightly confused why Chan decided to change his seat. There was no doubt Seungmin would be pouting about it if he stayed there the entire class.

"Hey, Chan." Chan dropped onto his chair.

"So how's our Lix?" Hyunjin raised an eyebrow, "I know he's out to heal, but I've also heard some other things. Buddy privileges."

"I only know what Changbin's told me. It's probably the same things you know."

"But aren't you looking after him?" 

"Um, well, yeah. I was. It's just... it's embarrassing." Chan hummed.

"Is this about you being grounded?"

"Wait, wait, wait," Seungmin cut us off, "what did you do?"

"I snuck out too many times." Seungmin scoffed.