Shinae’s small hands glided across the trackpad, and her whole body leaned forward so she could apply as much pressure as she needed to to click on articles. She felt almost embarrassed by how many articles she had truly read in these past few hours-turns out, being so small turned typing on a keyboard into a horrid workout. She found herself having to take breaks here and there just to catch her breath and massage her aching body. 

She knew being small has its challenges but this was ridiculous. She knew it wasn’t a big deal that she hadn’t found much but she felt a heavy pit of shame open up in her stomach at the lack of information she found. She frowned and sighed as she scrolled past yet another pointless article talking about how you stop growing at this age or that it’s purely based on genetics. Once again, she had turned up empty handed and that reality weighed heavy on her.

She had no clue how long she would be this size, and a deeper, much darker part of her worried she’d never return to normal. She didn’t want to linger on that thought, after all, it had only been a couple of days since her transformation. But the longer she was this size, and the less information she was able to find the bigger that small worry became, because what if she genuinely never changed back?

She couldn’t stay with Baekhyun the whole time. She also couldn’t go back to her father, the man was a hopeless drunk and a danger to himself, let alone her. Maybe she could stay with Luhan or Yixing, but even that thought was short-lived. She couldn’t burden them with her size. She was helpless. What was she going to do if things didn’t change? 

She frowned, her hands stopped scrolling and she sat back once more. She couldn’t continue to look for information. It was making her feel worse by the second and this was doing nothing for her situation. So she leaned forward and moved the mouse slowly to exit out of the Google search screen when she felt and heard the front door open and close. 

A moment passes before she feels the tell-tale vibrations of Baekhyun nearing the room. It takes a minute or so before the door to the room whips open and Baekhyun appears. He swiftly ignores her though and walks straight to his bed. His body plops down as he drops his bag on the floor, and sighs. 

His dark and tired eyes landed on her, “ did you find anything?”

She startles and struggles to find her thoughts before stating, “Nothing but some yoga poses meant to, maybe, help you get taller.”

She didn’t know what she expected Baekhyun to respond with but a small snort and a smirk was not it. His eyes twinkled for a moment before he parted his lips and said, “Could you teach me those yoga poses?”

Shinae’s jaw dropped in horror before she collected herself and snapped it shut. Baekhyun was never considered tall by normal standards, but neither was Shinae. She still had to tilt her head up to meet Baekhyun’s eyes when she was normal, but now thinking of Baekhyun getting taller at her current stature was a nightmare come true.

“I think you’re tall enough,” she said a little too softly. Baekhyun’s dark brows shot up behind his bangs and she could’ve sworn his lips almost twitched into a little bemused grin. But he didn’t say anything more, just shrugged.

He reached over and quickly scratched at his right hand and yawned wide. Shinae tried to ignore his yawn, not wanting to think about how cavernous his mouth looked from here, and focus more on his hand. Her stomach twisted, and she found herself frowning again. She felt guilt swell up in her, knowing it was her fault his hand was so irritated. She sighed and turned her head back around to face the black computer screen. 

Her reflection was something she hadn’t seen in a moment. She looked bedraggled and torn up. Her arms were black and blue, her face slightly bruised as well and her legs were a hodgepodge of cool dark colors. She rubbed at her arms and frowned, he had helped her with her injuries. He’d given her a warm little bowl of water full of scented Epsom salt. The least she could do was take his splinters out…or at least try. 

She breathed deeply and closed her eyes, “How’s your hand?” 

It wasn’t what she meant to ask but it was the only thing that spilled out of her. She snapped her eyes open and whipped around to look at him, his eyes widened once more. His expression was almost comical, and she felt heat flood her face at his reaction. But his gaze dropped to the palm of his hurt hand, his brows now furrowed in concentration before he shrugged and met her gaze again.

“It’s itchy and hot, but Seulgi tried helping me get some of the splinters out. But I think she made it worse.” He said it plainly like she was supposed to know who Seulgi was, because who the was Seulgi?

“Uh…whose Seulgi?” She couldn’t help the way one of her brows lifted and her head tilted in curiosity. She swore she hadn’t seen Baekhyun have a solid conversation with a girl at their school in ages. His popularity kept everyone at a specified distance for his own safety and his friends' safety too. So the mention of a girl was…startling to say the least.

This time however Baekhyun took a moment to respond. She could’ve sworn she saw pink tinge the apples of his cheeks for just a moment before he schooled his expression once more. So she definitely was not ‘just a girl’ then. 

“She’s just a new student and friend,” he said simply. Swiftly shutting the door on that topic, she gladly moved on-she didn’t want to know more about this Seulgi character. What she wanted to do was help to right one of her many wrongs.

“Uh,” she croaked, “anyways, I could-um I could look at your hand…if you’d like.” She scolded herself for the way her voice shook. She was half-hoping and praying he would say no and they both could forget she asked in the first place. 

But despite Baekhyun’s obvious shock, she watched as he clearly thought about his answer. She felt dread kick up in her lungs, “Why?”

Her body relaxed slightly because she knew her response to this, “I, just, you helped me with my injuries so I thought I could try to help out with yours. Plus, my hands are small and I don’t know-maybe I’ll have better luck at getting the splinters out.”

Baekhyun stared at her, and she felt her chest shrivel under his stare. It wasn’t a cruel one, it was just intense. She was used to his cruel looks, or hard glares-this was something different. Like he was trying to see through her but eventually he nodded his head in agreement. 

“I’m fine with that, just let me wash my hands first.” She sighed, and stood up getting ready to try and climb down from the desk but nearly lost her balance as a soft tremor shook the desk. Her head snapped up and to her horror realized Baekhyun was walking over with his hand laid out flat for her. 

She felt her stomach drop and the color drains from her face. She knew she’d been up close and personal with him mere hours ago to prove she wasn’t scared of him. But that was an act. She was terrified of him. But a moment later his tanned palm was laid out in front of her and she had no choice but to take a shaky step onto the padded surface. She braced herself as he moved back to his bed and slowly lowered her down to the duvet, her heart was in as she rushed off his hand. 

Her foot got caught almost instantly on a huge wrinkle and she felt embarrassment burn up the back of as she flew forward and slammed face-first into the duvet. Baekhyun showed great restraint by not mocking her the second she fell. Instead, all she heard was a soft chortle before he muttered that he’d be right back.

Shinae forced herself back up into a sitting position and rubbed at her face. She cringed and felt her whole body light up with shame. Why had she bothered offering to help him at all? She still wasn’t super comfortable being so close to him and now she was just making an idiot of herself. But she took a deep breath and exhaled, they needed to get along and if she could get through this unscathed maybe it was just one more step in the right direction.

+++

Baekhyun walked out of the room, the palm of his good hand tingling slightly after the way Shinae’s small form tickled it. He never really paid attention to the way it truly felt to hold her in his hand, it was still a massive shock to the system that he could even hold her in the palm of his hand. But she was feather light, her movements were small, measured, and they tickled. His fingers gently rubbed at his now bare palm and he found the corners of his lips quirking up into a lopsided small grin.

He wasn’t sure why, but something about her presence physically tickling was amusing. He walked into the kitchen and started to wash his hands. He had noticed upon walking out of his room how still the apartment was, which was weird in itself but the fact that the living room and dining area were empty as well as even weirder. Baekhyun swallowed hard and furrowed his brows applying more pressure than was necessary into scrubbing his injured palm clean.

He had a growing sense of dread as he worked. He knew what was coming, this was the calm before the storm, and just in time he heard one of the doors down the hall open followed by a barrage of heavy steps. A moment later, he looked up across the countertop to come face to face with the concerned expressions of his three best friends.

He couldn’t control the way his eyes narrowed or the groan that slipped past his lips. But Sehun, who stood directly across from him, made a point of crossing his arms and glaring at Baekhyun’s right hand. Junmyeon ignored the hand altogether and frowned at Baekhyun, Chanyeol however, followed Sehun’s gaze as well and cringed at the sight of Baekhyun’s inflamed palm.

Baekhyun quickly shut the faucet off and grabbed a paper towel and started dabbing at his palm in an effort to get them to stop looking at it. It didn’t work. The silence that followed was charged and tense, Junmyeon clearing his throat the only thing to disturb it before he spoke up:

“Baekhyun, we’re concerned about you.”

“Oh, come on,” Baekhyun’s response was quick and almost whiny. But his eyes rolled before they settled a glare on Junmyeon. He knew they were just being good friends, but this concern was completely unwarranted. He opened his mouth to say just that but Chanyeol jumped in this time.

“Dude, look, we’ve all heard you shouting late into the night and gone to check in on you only to find you studying.” 

Sehun added, “The late-night excursions to cool off.”

Then Junmyeon tacked on more, “The dark circles in the morning and,” he pointed at Baekhyun’s hand, “now you have splinters in your hand from what? Breaking a pencil in half?” 

Baekhyun groaned, he knew the reason behind all of those instances was Shinae. She was the reason he was shouting at night, she was the reason he needed to take a walk to cool off, and she was the reason he couldn’t sleep, and now his injured hand was also her fault. The result of her incessant pestering and prodding. She knew how to get under his skin, but he couldn’t tell them that either. For all they knew, Shinae was home, laid out in her bed, sick. 

“It’s not what you think it is,” Baekhyun tried but was quickly shut down. His teeth ground down hard, he could’ve sworn he heard a tooth chip.

“Baek, you were hospitalized last year and this was everything that led up to it last time.” Junmyeon’s gaze this time was solemn, his voice deadly still. 

“We’re just worried that this is already happening so early in the year,” Chanyeol spoke as though the trio’s minds were connected. They all seemed to be having the same thoughts or, maybe, this was rehearsed. Sehun had clearly gone and done exactly what Baehkyun feared he would do. Drag the others into this. 

“We don’t want a repeat, for your own safety,” Sehun tacked on. His voice was the softest of them, as though he knew Baekhyun’s frustration was mainly aimed at him. But Baekhyun’s insides twisted, this wasn’t Sehun’s fault it was Shinae’s fault.

“It’s not like what happened last year,” he ground the words out. The journey of them from his mind to his mouth felt like dragging each word over ground glass. He couldn’t mention Shinae, he could not mention Shinae or blame her right now. He had promised to keep her a secret but now he was facing the brunt of that secret. 

Everything he was doing now was very reminiscent of that horrible time last year, and nothing he could think of could justify his actions, except for coming clean about Shinae. But what would that look like for her and him? 

She’d loathe him. Yeah, they had gone years hating each other, but they had just made a step in the right direction and revealing her to his roommates-who were debatably taller than him was not the right step. She'd be terrified and the small amount of trust they’d built today would be destroyed. He swallowed hard and opened his mouth to respond but was interrupted once more.

“Really? How is this NOT like last year?” Chanyeol’s words were accusatory and something about the tone caused Baekhyun to trip up his words and explanation.

“Shin-,” he chewed down on the word to stop himself from finishing that thought, horror draining the color from his face. He watched as the start of the name registered with his friends. In unison they all raised their eyebrows, eyes widening before they all exchanged an equally confused look. It would’ve been comical if it wasn’t so nerve-wracking. He almost ratted her out. 

“Did,” Junmyeon shook his head as if trying to make sense of what Baekhyun had almost said. “Did you almost say Shinae?”

This time Baekhyun couldn’t function properly. He had almost said her name. He couldn’t deny it, why else would he have said Shin? His shins were perfectly fine, and he was not bothered by other people’s shins. The thought of trying to act like he was only saying shins was ridiculous and despite his friends not being top of class or grade, he knew they were smart enough to see through that bull. 

So he settled on him saying Shinae and leaned into that excuse. 

“Yeah, I mean, that Senior project is a huge portion of our grade and she’s been sick. I can’t even get a hold of her so naturally I’m a little on edge,” he felt his body sag with relief. The reason was top-notch and believable. “I need to get more work done on the project and I can’t move forward without having her here to help.”

He knew the irony of the statement internally, because Shinae was, in fact, here. But he also knew deep down that by next week his partner would be Seulgi, not Shinae. This concern he had about the project, wasn’t an actual concern but he tried his best to make it seem like one.

“You know, it’s a little concerning,” Chanyeol started this time, his eyes scanning the faces of his friends. “I went to the cafe she works at today and her co-worker, with alarmingly large eyes, said that he hadn’t heard from her this whole time. She hasn’t called off or let him know she won’t be showing up to work. Nothing.”

Baekhyun’s stomach dropped. . 

Sehun and Junmyeon’s eyes widened and their mouths dropped in shock, “She had a job?” Sehun’s question seemed silly at the moment. But then Baekhyun realized nobody really knew Shinae had a job, and realized belatedly that he also was supposed to not know. He tried his best to feign ignorance and surprise. 

“Yeah, and it’s a little weird she hasn’t contacted him at all about not showing up to work.” Chanyeol sighed, his brows turned upwards in worry.

This time Junmyeon shifted, his fingers resting beneath his chin as his own eyes seemed to hone in on a random point. He was deep in thought before he added to Baekhyun’s growing fears and the others’ worries.

“You know, it’s also kind of weird how her own friends are concerned as well,” he continued. “I mean Yixing seems to be brushing it off but anytime we hook up for school he seems a lit