My mother owned a chicken.

Okay. So maybe that wasn't the most interesting fact about her, and perhaps none of the human population would honestly care.

However, it was causing me tragedy at a little past five in the morning, when the sun had barely woken up from its rest and was still tucked under the heavy blanket of the dark blue tinted sky.

"Bora! Nugget is missing. You need to help me find her!"

Those were my mother's first greetings to me this day, the moment I held my door open, tired of rolling back and forth on my bed in hopes to ignore her desperate knocks on my door.

In a baby pink hoodie and white denim shorts, here I was, wandering around our neighborhood. It was an aimless walk with my half-lidded milky eyes, and I knew for a fact that it was a stupid idea.

"Aish. Wake up, wake up!" I slapped on my cheek, shaking myself awake.

A sigh escaped my lips and I frowned. I should still be under my blankets, snuggled in the warmth of my bed at this hour.

I did not need an eventful morning—specifically of this kind—on the first day of my last year in high school. But if this was a setback for something greater ahead, then I'd gladly embrace it with arms wide open.

"Nugget, please choose a more suitable time to run away. Like maybe in the afternoon instead of at five on a Monday morning," I ranted in a croaky voice and cupped my elbows.

I let my head fall back, staring at the sky still adorned with a few stars.

"Dad, you got to go home. I think mom misses you too much she adopted an abandoned chicken, and now she's making me look for it," I cried and ran a hand through my hair frustratedly.

A couple of minutes had then passed, the sun had fully shone, beads of sweat had debuted on my forehead, yet Nugget was still nowhere to be found.

Fortunately, I lived in a friendly neighborhood and people were less judgmental about my appearance. More so, they didn't find me a lunatic.

It wasn't everyday that you see someone who seemed like they had just barged out of their house the moment they blinked their eyes open and ask you-

"Hey, have you seen my mother's white chicken roaming around?"

The area was rather wide, and my lazy steps had taken me about more than an hour to scan around, with much of what my efforts could reach—which basically included climbing up the huge oak tree in the middle of the neighborhood for a better view.

Giving up, I shifted on my heel, ready to head back home. I'd just have to explain to my mother that she needs to let go of Nugget. But then she'd probably whine over it so then I should tell her that we'd search for it in the afternoon since I had to prepare for school.

If all else fails, we could commemorate the loss with a bucket of chicken nuggets to make her feel better.

I nodded to myself, proud of my solution.

"Yah! Look, it's escaping."

"RUUUUUN!"

My steps came into a halt when I spotted two kids screaming some lines from an action movie, running around with a stressed chicken cackling its poor life out. It sure was distressed with the ruckus going on, yet my eyes gleamed with delight and bliss at the sight.

"Nugget!" I cheered, extending my arms and jogged over as if I were about to be reunited with a long lost relative.

↠

"Am I reading right or did the summer break debilitate my ability to do so? Bora, I can't find your name here."

"That's because my name's here," I told her, pointing at the list next to the one she was looking at.

"Wait, what?" Sun Hyeri, my best friend, shot me an incredulous look and scanned the list herself. "How come I get to be with In Ho and not you? This is unfair."

"You make it sound like it's alright if I were the one separated." In Ho made a face.

"Because it is," Hyeri nonchalantly said.

"You can't be like that to someone who's been kind enough to be your friend since pre-school," whined In Ho.

"I've been seeing your face for the past fifteen years now. I need a change of view," Hyeri pointed out, shooting her eyebrows up in emphasis.

In Ho did not argue back anymore—probably too used with this side of Hyeri already.

We distanced ourselves from the announcement board to give other students space to check their class, and stood by the lockers, taking in the bustling atmosphere. It was the typical first day of school: Students greeting one another swarmed the hallways; the incoherent mesh of excited chatters filled the air. Nothing new nor unusual.

"Take care of yourself and be a good girl, alright?" Hyeri patted my head in a motherly manner. "Make friends, but don't replace me, alright?"

"Bora has other friends in our year anyway," In Ho piped in.

"Well, that's true." Hyeri pursed her lips and nodded to herself. "Everyone in our year likes you, and basically everyone in our school. Yi Bora, the social butterfly," mused Hyeri. "Ahhh, they're gonna take you away from me now. On the second thought, don't make friends."

A chuckle escaped my lips at her change of mind. I was about to speak and tell her she was exaggerating, when a boisterous laughter cut me off, instantly taking the smile off my face.

Needless to say, we all knew who it belonged to. The source stood a couple of meters away with his two friends beside him. Then there were students whispering with each other whilst throwing glances at them.

Kim Taehyung casually greeted the students with a cheerful expression and a hand wave as if he were a candidate for an upcoming election.

"Someone's having a great day," commented In Ho, nudging me on the side.

"That guy seriously needs a packing tape on his mouth sometimes. His smile is of a shape of a box anyway."

Hyeri snorted, shaking her head at me in amusement. "You need to let the guy live."

I threw her a disapproving look. Her suggestion wasn't much appealing to me.

"But don't you think it's kind of an odd trio?" I raised a brow, signaling for her to continue. "Taehyung's like this really sociable person, and then there's Jungkook who doesn't really mingle much with other people so some of them find him intimidating. Then, Jimin is like the thin line between the two. Don't you think their friendship is interesting?"

I cupped my elbows and side-glanced at In Ho, who then only gave me a shrug. Turning back to the three, Taehyung waved his hand at me when our eyes met and I simply ignored him.

Hyeri was right though. And it wasn't really clear to me either how the three of them got along, but it obviously showed that they had this rather tight bond.

To say the least, they were comparable to cogs of different sizes that worked together to make a system function properly. Maybe they clicked just like that.

"Well, I do agree with that one," I told Hyeri and looked at my wristwatch. "But anyway, we better get going before the warning bell goes off."

Hyeri caught up to me and linked her arms with mine while In Ho silently followed us.

"By the way, two of them are in the same class with you. Did you see?" Hyeri questioned, interest evident in her tone.

"Not really..." My name had always been on the bottom of the list, so I found it immediately and didn't bother to check the other names since Hyeri had already found hers.

"One is Jimin, guess who's the other one."

"Taehyung?" I noncommittally asked. The idea was highly unlikely.

"No, not him," answered Hyeri and smiled at me weirdly before the name flowed out of her mouth. "Jeon Jungkook."

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:)