Chapter 7

I opened my brand new locker and stuffed some books in it. After spending the last few minutes at the school office getting my schedule and talking to the school principal, I was quite excited to begin school. Mrs. Anderson's petite stature and soothing voice had really eased my nerves and I was suddenly far less intimated about being the new girl. In fact, judging by how much she appeared to love heading our school, it looked like it would be quite fun.

"Hey," a smooth, deep voice said from behind me.

I turned around to find myself staring at the most beautiful man I'd ever seen. His hair was cropped pretty short although he did have a few strands falling across his forehead. He was probably about a foot taller than I was so my face was directly in front of what I was sure was a toned chest.

I'd never experienced this type of sudden increase in heart beats, dry mouth, suddenly sweaty palms caused by the mere proximity to a member of the opposite gender. Dang, I could even smell his masculine musk! Well, I figured that was what all the romance novels referred to as 'masculine musk.' My knees had given way at the sight of Min Ki, but this was an entirely foreign state of being.

"Sougeenow?"

I looked into his bright green eyes and held my breath. Great. The epitome of Adonis-ness was speaking to me and he just had to use an English word I was absolutely unfamiliar with. Maybe I really did need English lessons after all.

I gulped and nodded. "Okay?" I said hoping it was a reasonable response to the question. I didn't quite want to say yes and end up agreeing to something embarrassing.

He crinkled his brows and studied my face. "Okay? You don't know who you are? Aren't you Sougeenow?"

Huh? Sougee…? "Oh, Su Jin Oh?" I giggled in relief. "Yes, I'm Su Jin Oh!" Of course I was Su Jin Oh. I nodded. I really had to get used to saying my name backwards. "How did you know?"

He leaned against my locker and gave me the sexiest smile I'd ever seen in my life. I honestly didn't know that stretched out lips could ever look so appealing.

I shyly looked away from him.

"I didn't think you were Okwudili Nwankwo," he said in an amused tone.

I giggled even though I didn't know if it was a joke. But wait a minute? Why was I giggling shamelessly at him? I averted my eyes and silently began to chant Min Ki's name. Min Ki oppa! Min Ki oppa! Min Ki oppa!

"I'm Jonathan Mendez," he said, stretching his hand out to me.

"Hi," I beamed, accepting it. My skin tingled at his touch and when his hand lingered on mine, I hoped that I wouldn't die from an electrocution. Yeah, extremely cheesy but boy, was it true. Min Ki oppa! Min Ki oppa! Min Ki oppa!

He grinned and looked into my eyes. "You're pretty hot," he said, obviously unaware of the steps I was taking to not be affected by him. "Damn sexy too. And got such a cute, little face. I'm glad you decided to come here."

"Really?" I asked stupidly.

He stepped back so that he could take a better look at me. Then he licked his lips.

Eww. My stomach churned. Why did he have to spoil all that hotness by doing something so nasty?

"So," he said, retracing his steps back to me. "What are you doing tonight? Let's hang out or something," he said, once again licking his lips.

I sighed. So maybe the licking lips thing was something he did involuntarily? And why did he have to have such Won Bin lips?

I tried to look away but for some reason, my eyes insisted on remaining glued on his lips. Min Ki oppa! Min Ki oppa! Min Ki oppa!

"So what do you say?" he asked, nodding in a pleading manner. "Give me your address and I'll pick you up."

"Get lost, Jon. She isn't interested in you," someone said before dragging me by the elbow.



***

I really shouldn't have let strange hands take me away, but I instantly knew they were female and grudgingly acknowledged that it was for my own good. When we were a few feet away from Jonathan, I pushed her hand off me. "What kind of school is this? Do you know me?" Or was it an American thing to touch strangers?

She rolled her eyes and laughed. "You should be thanking me." She glanced back at Jonathan. "You really need to stay away from him. He's the worst kind of player because he just loves to prey on innocent little newbies like you."

I frowned at her then readjusted my school bag on my shoulder. Then I bent over and straightened out my clothes. There was no way I was going to walk around my first day of school looking like a hobo.

"Su Jin Oh?" she suddenly said.

Surprised, I stood up straight and looked at her. "How do you know?'

She pointed behind her. "It's on the notice board. Apparently, we have three new students this year: Mark Williams, Okwusomething Nwanother and Su Jin Oh." She shrugged. "I took a wild guess."

She started walking again so I followed suit. She glanced at me. "You do realize that it's summer, right?"

"So?"

"So, why are you wearing so many layers?"

I looked down at my skirt, tights, knee high socks, blouse, t-shirt and sweater. "It's called fashion," I pointed out. What kind of rude girl was she?

"Fashion, huh? It's a good thing that the air-con is on full blast, otherwise, you'd melt," she sassily.

I smirked at her. "But since the air is on full blast, aren't you freezing?" I looked at her flimsy tank top and shorts. If her shorts were an inch higher, you'd think she was wearing a one piece swimsuit. She was lucky she had a slim, toned body otherwise, she'd have looked like a wh.ore.

She flipped her long dark hair then looked down at her clothes then back at me. She narrowed her light brown eyes. "It's called fashion," she deadpanned.

For a few seconds we both tried to stare the other down till we realized it was futile and burst out laughing.

"Hi, I'm Alison Crawford, but you can call me Ali."

I nodded. "Cool. Hi, Ali."

"Yeah, I think it makes me sound exotic… kinda like, Mohammed Ali or Ali Baba and the forty thieves."

Hmm… okay.

After about a moment of silence, she raised her brow and asked, "Anna?"

Confused, I shook my head. "No. Su Jin."

She rolled her eyes. "I know that. I'm asking if you're Ana… as in, anorexic? You know, the girls who starve themselves to look like toothpicks?"

I shook my head vehemently. "Of course not. I'm naturally like this – I take after my father." Goodness. Couldn't a girl be skinny in peace?

She looked at me skeptically. "I guess it could be true. Your skin looks healthy and even though you're bony, you're not exactly flat-chested." She nodded. "Alright, I'm convinced. I'm about to go to my math class but let's eat lunch together. Bye!"





***



About ten minutes into lunch, I figured out how Ali managed to keep her trim figure – she spent her entire lunch break talking! Not that I minded because I got up to speed on all the gossip about people I didn't know from the back of my hand.

"But I really don't know how Lisa is going to cope when she returns after spending her entire summer at a convent in Switzerland."

I shrugged. "Maybe she didn't mind it?" The entire tale seemed a bit farfetched.

"She didn't mind it? How would you like being shipped out of the country to stay with nuns just because you're pregnant?" She sighed. "I'd absolutely hate it," she said, playing with her fingernails. "When I go to Switzerland, I don't go to spend my whole day saying the rosary."

"Maybe it was a fun convent like in 'The Sound of Music'?" I offered.

She groaned. "Su Ji—"

"Hey," Jonathan's silky voice interrupted. "So, Miss Su Jin Oh, have you thought about what—"

Why did I like the way he said my name? Min Ki oppa! Before I could refuse his offer, Ali banged the table with enough force to lift my fork off my plate of uneaten oily pizza.


"Jon, are you deaf? Just get lost!"

Jonathan shook his head and smirked at her. "Get over it, Alison and don't let your jealousy kill you." After sending her a few more irritated looks, he changed his demeanor then smiled at me. "See you later, Su Jin," he said way too sexily.



***



Since there was obviously bad blood between Alison and Jonathan, I tried to force myself into eating some sweet corn while she ranted about how much of a monster he was. Plus it didn't help that every other sentence was a warning for me to stay away from him. Even if I didn't already have Min Ki in my life, I wouldn't have wanted to get in between whatever was going on between them.

"She's right," a male voice said out of nowhere. Alison and I turned to its direction to find a lanky Asian boy frowning at us. "Jonathan Mendez is no good and I wouldn't want any of my sisters to fall victim to him like she did," he said, looking at Alison and chuckling.

"Drop dead," she said before stuffing some pizza in her mouth.

"Su Jin Oh?" the guy asked before sitting next to me.

I groaned. "Does everyone visit this notice board?" My plans for blending in unnoticed had obviously been thwarted by that blasted thing.

Alison took a sip of her diet coke and nodded. "Yep. It's the best thing ever and it always has the juiciest gossip. But you have to make sure you check it out first thing in the morning before one of the annoying teachers takes down all the good stuff. Right now, I'm sure you'll only find school related stuff but this morning, I saw a list of all the couples that broke up over the summer," she said gleefully. She rubbed her hands together. "I can't believe Ranjit and Amina broke up. I thought they'd at least last till college!"

I squinted at her. Should gossip excite one person so much? "Interesting," was all I could come up with. I spun my head from her to find the boy staring at me. "What?"

"Fawb?" he asked after a few moments.

"Huh? What's 'fawb'?"

He laughed. "Not pub. A pub is where Irish people go to get drunk. Fob starts with an 'f' and not a 'p'. As in F.O.B…."

I still wasn't getting it. "Meaning…?"

He nodded. "I guess that would be a yes. I mean, you do sound like one. It's someone who's only just arrived in the United States. F.O.B = Fresh of the boat."

I frowned. That didn't sound like a compliment. "What's that supposed to mean? I flew here. I certainly didn't take a boat," I pointed out before I paused and thought about it some more. "Did you just insult me?"

He shook his head. "No. Forget about it," he dismissed before reaching into his bag and pulling out a camcorder. He turned it on then directly at me. "Okay, fob, tell me about your first day at Brighton Academy. Good? Bad? Did it live up to your expectations? Did you at least make one sensible friend?"

Before I could tell him that I wasn't interested in his camera, Alison shoved him so hard he fell off the bench. "Stop bugging my friend!"

He got back up, shoved her lightly then smiled at me. "Let's do this again," he said before taking a deep breath. "Sorry for being rude. Where are my manners?" He stretched his hand out to me. "My name is Drake… no, Chase. No, Stone? How about Brandon?"

I eyed him. Was this guy completely insane?

"Still not impressed?" he asked disappointedly. "What name will make agree to participate in my documentary?"

What the hell was going on?

"Ali, is something wrong with him?"

She shrugged. "Just ignore him like the rest of us do and hopefully, one of these days, he'll realize that he's not Stephen Spielberg and throw that cheap camera away."

"Ali, this camera cost a lot," he said before mentioning all its attributes. "Grow up and stop being a hater," he said as he sat back next to her. He blew some nonexistent dust off his seemingly prized possession then trained it back on me. "What about Preston? Jake? Bruce? Enrique…," he continued, apparently attempting to spout out all the male names he probably crammed from a baby naming book.

I watched him with a mixture of amusement and confusion. What a weirdo. I laughed. I had so much to tell Min Ki oppa.

"…Brody, Keagan, Zander…."

"Ryan!" Alison screamed. "LEAVE MY FRIEND ALONE!"