2. The golden trio

The first time Hyukjae met Donghae was during a hot summer day the same year as they turned five. A heat wave had been lying like a veil over the little town that was located just outside of Seoul for about over two weeks and now it finally was beginning to ease of. This led to that the streets once again was full of life, it had been too hot before to do anything other than just sit inside in front of a fan. On a small street a little boy swished by on a brand new bike. He was shining out of pride beacuse he had just learnt how to maneuver the vehicle without support wheels which of course had resulted in that his bare legs now was full of small wounds and bruises. He hummed happily to himself and greeted everyone he meet whether he knew them or not. It certainly was a lovely day, all residents of the city seemed relieved over the fact that the extreme heat wave had been eased of and it was a wonderful atmosphere in the streets. The boy rode on, he did not know where he was going, only that he wanted to ride as far and as fast as he could. But when he came around the corner in another neighborhood, one where the slightly poorer inhabitants of the city lived, he saw a boy, who looked like he could be around the same age as him, sitting on the grass. He wore a filthy T- shirt which was far too big for his delicate little body. He sat with a small bag of candy in his hand and seemed to be humming to himself as he tucked one sweet after the other in his mouth. Hyukjae's mother used to call him a Cookie Monster because he was incredibly fond of everything that was sweet, and hence it was no surprise that Hyukjae with his small ulcerated legs slowly rode up to the other boy. When the boy noticed that Hyukjae was approaching him, he instinctively took a hard grip on his candy bag and brought it to safetey behind his back.

"Hey!" Hyukjae shouted excitedly as he waved at the guy.

The boy looked around to make sure that it actually was he whom was spoken to and when he found that this indeed was the case, he answered the greeting with an uncertain voice.

"Why are you're shirt so dirty? My mother never lets me get dirty " Hyukjae concluded with a sad pout on his mouth.

The question was not intended to be mean, it was only a child's curiosity, but the other boy seemed to take it as an insult and glanced down at his shirt before he looked at Hyukjaes neat clothing.

”Well, I don’t have a mother so I guess that explains it. Now if you don’t mind I would like to be on my own.”

Hyukjae pretended as if he hadn't heard the last sentence and instead started to talk again .

" What, you don't have a mother? Everyone has a mother! Is that the reason you get to eat candy too? I never get's to do anything fun for my mother. If I wouldn't have a mom, I would use dirty clothes all the time and I would eat exactly what I wanted, only sweets and cakes! And I would stay up as long as I wanted in the evenings, even until nine o'clock!"

The other boy seemed to lighten up a bit and giggled. Hyukjae jumped off his bike and gently put it down before he sat down next to the boy.

"My name is Hyukjae by the way. What's your name?"

The boy seemed to consider if he should answer the question or if he would dismiss the other, but he quickly decided to be polite.

"I'm Donghae. Nice to meet you."

Hyukjae giggled, he had heard the adults talk like that, both in reality and on TV, and he assumed it was where Donghae had learned the nice greeting aswell.

"Why do you have so many wounds on your legs?"

Hyukjae looked down at his legs and then pointed with a broad smile at his bike.

"Because I have just learnt how to ride a bike!"

Donghae looked with wide-eyes at the red bike that glittered in the sun, it was both awe and envy that reflected in the little boys brown eyes.

"Wow, it's really nice! I would also like to have a bike, but my dad says theyr'e way too expensive. "

"Want to try it?"

Hyukjae stood up and pulled the bike off the ground again but Donghae shook his head.

”Why not?”

The boy looked a bit ashamed and picked up his candy bag from the hideaway behind his back instead of answering the question.

”Do you want some?”

Hyukjae completely forgot his bike and dropped it hard to the ground, if his mother had seen it, he probably would have gotten a lot of scolding for it. They sat and munched on the sticky candy for a while, even if the heat wave had disappeared, it was still warm and sweets are notoriously not best friends with the heat. They didn't care about that though beacuse the taste was still the same and it tasted lovely! When there were no longer any sweets left in the bag and both felt sick of all the sticky candy, they laid down on the ground and looked up at the clouds. They began to have a small fuss about what shapes they saw, Donghae claimed that the large cloud obviously was a dinosaur while Hyukjae argued that it was a big magician. Hyukjae liked the little boy a lot even though he seemed to be a bit sad. It was a strange feeling, he had a few playmates who his mother used to pair him up with, but if he'd be perfectly honest, he was not particularly fond of anyone of them. It was usually when she was going out with the other kid's moms to either dine at some fine restuarante or when they would go shopping at the mall that Hyukjae was forced to play with the other children. Changmin was one of them, but he was whiny and even mean sometimes. One time when they had been on a playground Changmin had shoved Hyukjae so hard that he had dropped to the ground and when Hyukjae shoved back the other boy had run crying to his mother. Hyukjae had been given a really bad scolding from both his own mother and from Changmin's and the other boy had been standing behind his mother with with a sneer on his face. He had tried to argue that it was Changmin who had started the fight but it had not helped, they had just got even angrier for "Changmin was such a good boy." Hyukjae had been so mad. Another of his playmates was a girl named Sunny. She was the same age as him and pretty cute actually, but Hyukjae thought she was clingy and every time they met she always tried to kiss him, and if there was something Hyukjae was terrified of it was girl-germs! Another "friend" was Minho, but he just wanted to play football all the time and Hyukjae was not good at all at the sport. Because of these reasons Hyukjae felt so happy when he finally had met a boy in the same age as him that seemed to be quite like him. They were laying on the ground and laughed so hard they almost couldn't breathe when they made up one wacky shape after the other. They talked about their favorite characters in Pokémon, which proved to be both of their favorite program.

"Do you eat candy often? " Hyukjae asked suddenly .

Donghae thought for a while.

"It depends. Daddy usually comes home with a bag of sweets when he have been acting strange the night before. He usually drinks something that makes him talk weird and sometimes it even makes him vomit. He often says he gives me candy because he fells ashamed... I don't really know what it means but I think he means that he wants to make me happy."

Hyukjae did not really understand what Donghae meant, but he noted what was known in his world, and that was that his father wanted to make him happy.

"Your father must be really kind!"

Donghae looked sad.

"Yes, but he is often sad. I try to cheer him up, it works sometimes but when it doesn't, he usually drinks that strange water. It smells funny and he gets so weird from drinking it. I don't like when he gets like that at all."

Hyukjae felt sorry for Donghae and decided to give him a hug. The second boy flinched at first but then seemed to be happy about the nice gesture. He got in a better mood after that and they decided to play instead, they had after all consumed a large amount of candy and the suger rush was a fact. Donghae had even dared to test Hyukjaes cycle, although it had required a certain amont of persuasion from Hyukjae. Hyukjae had been holding the the cycle while Donghae eagerly had paddled on. When they had played for some hours and noon was approaching, Hyukjae had to go home again. They said goodbye and decided that they would meet at the same place the following day. Hyukjae was so happy when he got home that the scolding he received from his mother (she was mad because her son had gotten dirt all over his brand new clothes) didn't affect him. That evening he picked out the finest sweater he could find in his wardrobe so he could give it to Donghae the next day. It would suit him better than the baggy, dirty T- shirt he had worn during the day and in addition it had Pikachu as motive which was Donghaes favorite Pokémon.

After that day, the boys were impossible to separate. At first they had continued to meet at the small grass platelet where they first had became friends, but when the autumn approached and the cold came, they spent most of their time at Hyukjae's home. Donghae had become fascinated by the luxurious house and Hyukjaes large room. Hyukjaes mother and father had been so proud of their son because he had taken a boy with lower benefits than him under his wings. They said it indicated on a great character, what that was supposed to mean Hyukjae had no idea of. All he knew was that Donghae was his favorite person in the whole wide world. It would take until the winter before Hyukjae had the chance to visit Donghae's home. The other boy had avoided all his questions about him visiting Donghae and eventually Hyukjae took it into his own hands. Donghae had first paniced, he began to cry and said that Hyukjae would never want to play with him again. Hyukjae did not really understand what he meant because even though their house was small Hyukjae thought that it was quite cozy. Donghae had calmed down and when his father came home he had happily greeted his son's new friend. Donghae had presented him as "the boy with so many wounds on his legs" and his father had chuckled heartily at them. He had put on a movie for the kids to watch on their old TV and even though it wasn't as big and fancy as Hyukjaes it still was charming in it's own way.  Donghaes dad made some toasted sandwiches and hot chocolate for them to munch on along the movie. He was a very warm and caring man and he really tried his best to be a good father. Donghae had once explained to Hyukjae what was wrong with him.

 "He said that his heart is broken, that mom took some pieces of it when she left us for another life. I don't really know what it means but I still think I understand what he goes through because sometimes when he gets sad, it feels as if some pieces of my heart falls out from my chest to."

A year passed, and when the fall finally came back, it was time for the two boys to begin school. Hyukjae's mother had purchased a handsome uniform to her son and after much persuasion she even had gotten the permission to finance Donghae's aswell. Donghae's dad had been grateful but it was noticeable that he was not entirely satisfied with that his son got so many clothes from the Lee family. He wanted to be able to care for his son on his own.

It was on the first day of school they met Taeyeon. She had taken a set next to Donghae on the first break and Hyukjae had been boiling out of jealousy.

"Hello! What's your name? I'm Taeyeon. You're cute, do you want to be my boyfriend? "

Donghae had blushed like a tomato and seemed to have wished that he could be an ostrich so he could stick his head in the ground and avoid the awkward situation. Hyukjae, however, who sat on the other side of the embarrassed boy was very annoyed.

"This is Donghae and he is mine, so back off."

Taeyeon shrugged as she laughed.

"What is your name then, Mr. Owner of Donghae? Can I hang out with you guys, the rest of the class seems to be a herd of dumbwits. Have you seen that Changmin-guy?"

Hyukjae decided right at that moment to befriend Taeyeon as it turned out that they had a common enemy. Changmin had unfortunately fallen into the same class as them and had already proclaimed himself as the king of the class. They sat on the bench while the sun casted its rays on them and joked about the snobbish boy. It turned out that Taeyeon lived quite near Changmin and therefore she also had a lot of stories about him. When the bell rang and it was time to return to the classroom Taeyeon bounced up on her feet.

"Oh, I'm so happy I found you! Shall we become best friends? "

They had all three agreed to be part of a secret friendclub, and a week later they stood under a large tree near the small river that ran through the city. They were there to carry out a ritual, a ritual that would mean that they would forever be each other's best friends. They had dug a small hole near the tree where they was supposed to put their favorite gadgets. Donghae had brought an action figure, namely a Batman doll, that was to be his contribution, Hyukjae had brought a pink bow tie (he had cheated, he hated that fly and saw this as a great opportunity to get rid of it once and for all, his mother would never be able to force it on him again) and Taeyeon had put a my little pony in the pit. They had also brought some of their favorite cuddly toy of the purpose for them to act as witnesses to the event. They were now lined up on the other side of the pit and Taeyeon cleared to get the attention from the pretend animals.

"We have gathered today to witness the great bond of friendship between Donghae, Hyukjae and me, Taeyeon . We have all brought with us something that we hold very dear" she paused at those words and sent Hyukjae a dirty look before she resumed her speach " to sacrifice in favor of our friends."

Hyukjae grabbed the shovel and filled the pit with soil when Taeyeon had finished her speach. All three then helped to flatten the ground and push over some grass so that no one would be able to see that there recently had been a hole at the place. They then stood up and hugged each other, all three together.

"We will forever be the best of friends!" Donghae said in the embrace.

"Amen to that," Hyukjae and Taeyeon replyed in unison.

When the ceremony was over, they played for a while before they went on to their own homes. And so the golden trio had been created.