Byungsoo couldn’t tell if he was drinking hot chocolate through his mouth or his nose, his brain went into overdrive as he looked at Maru. Some kid he met for the first time in his life was buying him hot chocolate for no reason. In the past, he would’ve drank it happily with no worries at all, but right now he was trying to figure out why he was being given this drink. He didn’t like how far he was thinking into this, but that didn’t change the fact that this was what he was thinking right now.

“I ended up hearing your phone call a moment ago.”

“......”

Embarrassment washed over him immediately, to think that the fact that he was a horrible son got exposed in school….

“Do the others bully you a lot?”

“...N-no. They don’t.”

Byungsoo felt a chill run down his neck. Maybe the delinquents sent this guy to test him? Changhu could easily do that to him, he closed his lips tightly and smiled. At the same time, Byungsoo curled up his toes from the sheer amount of shame he felt.

“Saying yes is always difficult.”

“W-what are you talking about? They’re all nice people. You’re not even from my class. You don’t know what my class is like. They’re all… Good people.”

He started saying all sorts of stuff to cover for himself. The only thing he got better at after entering high school, it looked like, was lying. Much unlike his grades, unfortunately. His mind an utter mess, Byungsoo continued speaking good things about his friends with as much passion as he could gather. Funny thing was, talking like this was...