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CALL her ridiculous, but Nam Seonhwa is going to blame the coffee. Or the stupid council meeting at held ungodly hours of the day. Or the couple in the house next door that were going at it, loudly, until three in the morning. Or maybe even Bang Chan himself. Either way, Seonhwa doesn't think that she deserves the blame for this one. Definitely not.
And if anyone happens to disagree, she'll argue her own defence to her very last breath.
Besides, she thinks, whose stupid idea was it to hold a student council meeting at seven o'clock in the morning? It would have been far more convenient for all parties involved if the meeting had been scheduled for after school, instead of making Seonhwa wake up an additional hour and half earlier than normal, just so she could make herself look somewhat presentable. As the Head Girl of the Gangnam Academy for Young Ladies, she's expected to look professional at all times when representing her school.
The Academy booked out a large and fancy function hall half way across town for the meeting, and if Seonhwa had to take a guess, she'd assume they only did it to show off the wealth and prestige of the school and all it's students. As if their fancy uniforms and school name alone didn't do that already. The public schools in the area are fully aware of just how much money the Academy has under it's belt, because the tuition fees are no joke, and scholarships are few and far in between. They don't need fancy functions halls to remind everyone of their self proclaimed superiority.
Seonhwa zones out when the principal for the Gangnam Institute begins to speak, his voice droning on with absolutely no change in tone. She's grown to expect this, as Seonhwa's been on the student council every year since she started high school, and now she's mastered the art of zoning out while looking as if she's paying up uttermost attention to the man. He never has anything interesting to say, anyway.
In fact, no one ever has anything interesting to say at any of these meetings, and Seonhwa always spends her time trying to master the art of sleeping with her eyes open. She's been to enough of these council meetings by now to know that they consists of a number of passive aggressive statements aimed between all the schools, and all the not-very-subtle one-upping that occurs when the teachers start to brag about recent achievements. She never gets anything important out of these meetings, so she's stopped listening with her uttermost attention. Her younger self would be disappointed.
She's not really paying attention when the meeting finally comes to a close, and it takes Yoon Shinjin, the student council treasurer, elbowing her in the ribs to snap her out of her daydreaming. The girl doesn't seem to have been paying much attention, either, Seonhwa notes, given the number of doodles in the margins of her notebook.
Seonhwa reaches to take a sip of the lukewarm liquid in her coffee cup and grimaces. She's never really been a fan of coffee, but one of the other council members shoved it in her hand when she walked in the building, and she took it, if only for the caffeine to keep her awake. The cup is still mostly full, because Seonhwa really can't drink it in large amounts without wanting to spit it back out.
She stands, shaking the liquid in her cup lightly, as if that will magically make it taste better even though she knows that's unlikely.
And that's when disaster strikes.
Just to clarify, Seonhwa did not mean to do it. She was just slightly disoriented from the girl who pushed her chair in harshly just as Seonhwa stood up, and managed to clip her elbow in the process, leaving her to bite her lip to prevent any expletives from escaping as the younger girl apologised profusely. Seonhwa has a reputation to uphold, she can't go around swearing at people, no matter how much she might want to.
Maybe if she hadn't been so focused on the pain in her elbow she might have noticed the boy who was moving in her direction in a haste to get to the door, and she might have noticed that she wasn't gripping her coffee cup as tightly as she thought she was. But she doesn't, and a rough shove sends Seonhwa stumbling forward, coffee cup falling from between her fingers.
And unfortunately for Seonhwa, luck never seems to be on her side. Of course, the coffee cup couldn't have just fallen to the ground and spilled its contents on the black school shoes of the several other rich private school kids standing around her. Of course not. Instead, another body gets caught in the crossfire, and now there's a large brown stain of lukewarm coffee that's beginning to seep into his crisp white school shirt.
She thinks that it might not have been so bad, if not for the fact that almost everyone has stopped what they're doing to watch the disastrous interaction between the Head Boy and Girl. Seonhwa can hear a distinctly male snort come from across the room, and there are several younger students all looking down in an attempt to hide the smiles that are spreading across their faces.
She really has the worst luck.
"I'm so sorry," says Seonhwa, staring in horror at the now ruined shirt that hangs on Bang Chan's frame.
Out of all people in the entire vicinity, it just had to be the Head Boy of the Gangnam Institute that Seonhwa ran into. She's met him on several occasions (all organised by their schools), and it's safe to say that the pair do not get along as well as they might pretend to. If anyone else had spilt coffee down his shirt, Seonhwa's sure it would be fine. But unfortunately, Seonhwa isn't "anybody else", and Chan looks none too pleased.
He looks annoyed (not that Seonhwa can blame him, since she'd be pretty annoyed if someone spilled coffee on her), and Seonhwa can't help but notice how intimidating it makes him appear. He always walks around with a natural air of confidence and superiority (which Seonhwa personally thinks borderlines on arrogance), but she doesn't think she wants to get on his bad side.
"It's fine," he snaps, not sounding fine at all, as he grabs the napkin that Seonhwa holds out to him before brushing past her and out the door after the rest of the male council members from his school, leaving Seonhwa to wallow in her embarrassment.
"I mean, at least the coffee wasn't hot?" says Eom Saemi, the student council secretary in a week attempt to make Seonhwa feel better, having witnessed the entire thing.
It doesn't really offer Seonhwa any comfort at all.
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IT'S YOU / bang chan. linosaurs [ OCTOBER 3, 2019 ]
