Taemin’s desk has a broken-off foot. It tilts if he puts any weight on it, tapping its uneven leg against the scuffed linoleum like a blackbird knocking its beak against the window. Tap. Tap.

Taemin doesn’t like things that are off-kilter, so he doesn’t use the desk. Instead he leans back in his chair, folds his sharp elbows tight against his body and gazes out of the window. There is no bird there, of course, only a brittle tree branch that shifts against the glass when the wind blows. The sky is high and white with cloud. The sun is nowhere to be seen and harsh light is diffused everywhere, hurting his eyes and making him want to narrow them. To block out sight. But he controls the impulse, widens his eyes to the hardness of the light.

The class is psychology, an elective filled with those interested in the many breakings of the human mind. The students are here to learn how chemical constructions in the brain work together to push a person towards the brink of insanity - or perhaps to fulfil the literature credits required for them to graduate.

Taemin is here for a different reason.

He is the picture of bored indifference as he slouches in his chair and stares out of the window. He does not write, does not take notes. He doesn’t even really listen. He doesn’t want to give the wrong impression.

But he still hears. His mind is attuned to the subtle music in the teacher’s voice. He takes no notes, and yet he could recite the entire class from beginning to end, word perfect, if he cared to. He used to think it was a gift, this eidetic memory. Now he knows better.

There are some things in life that are best forgotten.

“Perhaps the greatest faculty our minds possess is the ability to deal with pain,” Mr. Park’s voice drifts into Taemin’s ears. “Classic thinking teaches us of the four doors of the mind, which everyone moves through according to their need.”

Taemin does not blink. The reflex is his to control, and he resists it despite the prickling of his eyes. He sees a bird soar high, high, a black dot in the bright white sky, and his eyes sting hot and dry.

He knows of the four doors of the mind. He knows them well.

“First,” says Mr. Park, “is the door of sleep. Sleep offers a retreat from the world and all its pain. Sleep marks passing time, gives distance from the things that have hurt us. When a person is injured they may lose consciousness, and someone who hears traumatic news will sometimes swoon or faint. That is the mind’s way of protecting itself from pain by stepping through the first door.”

For Taemin, the first door is no protection. His eyes are bleak and black with the burning of too many nights spent wide awake, scribbling feverishly in his notebooks and sketchpads while his body cries for rest, because the dream is always watching him, waiting for his guard to slip. Still black lumps on cold black floor, glassy glinting eyes and concrete and cobwebs, and he bursts away into brittle wakefulness again.

“The second is the door of forgetting,” Mr. Park continues, and Taemin’s lips twist sideways involuntarily. That’s right. Forgetting. As if life was a movie, where the lead character gets amnesia after suffering some terrible blow. As if life is ever that simple. If forgetting is so easy, why can’t Taemin do it?

“Third is the door of madness,” and a muscle above Taemin’s eyebrow twitches – a reflex that, unlike blinking, he cannot control. Madness. Words crawl spidery and black inside his head, and his fingers itch with the urge to get them out. But the desk is all wrong and he cannot use it, so he writes the words on the white pages of his mind instead of in his notebook.

Here lies a pile of small and hollow bones, dissembled

And within my hollow skull, God whispers

Shall these bones live? Shall these

Bones live? And the secret hidden

In these bones (which are already dry and bleached) whispers to God

Let the whiteness of these bones atone

And sing to the wind, to the wind only

For only the wind will listen -

Mr. Park is speaking again.

“There are many times when the mind is dealt such a blow that it hides itself in insanity. While this may not seem beneficial, it is. There are times when reality is nothing but pain, and to escape that pain the mind must leave reality behind.”

No. No matter what Mr. Park says, madness can never be a good thing. Taemin refuses to push open that door.

He is afraid of madness.

He stares out of the window and tries to stop hearing, but it is impossible. Even without listening, he cannot stop his ears from hearing. He considers simply standing up and walking out of the class – but he can’t. He is already on shaky ground with his attendance record, and if they send a note home again –

Taemin shies away from that dissonant chord and fixes on the safer music of Mr. Park’s rising-falling voice.

He knows what the last door is before Mr. Park gets to it.

The last door is the door of death. The final resort. Nothing can hurt us after we are dead.

Or so we have been told.

---

The school is poised on the brink of five minutes to one. The air is heavy with the anticipation of hundreds of hungry students. Taemin slips out of psychology and follows the empty corridors towards the outside. Nobody notices him leaving early. He is a shadow, after all, and good at being invisible, but invisibility isn't such a good thing when the hallways are full of people who will crash their loud voices into him, brush their bodies past him, batter him and bruise him. He needs to be behind the cafeteria at this time, safe in the space between the building and the stone wall that encloses the schoolyard. The chaotic floods of humanity that fill the halls at lunchtime are just too much to bear.

Somebody steps around the corner in front of him. Too close to stop in time, they collide, and Taemin finds himself sprawling on the rough concrete. His hand moves to cradle his stinging elbow, but the touch of the other person is worse than the pain. From the places where their bodies connected, black and biting fear wells up and floods sickeningly though him.

“Sorry,” the word comes while Taemin is trying to swallow back his nausea. A hand appears in his vision. A face looms above him. Shaggy black hair, brushed-gold skin, large dark eyes round with concern. For a moment Taemin goes almost blind with shock. He knows those eyes. He knows this face.

“Get off,” He snaps, knocking the offered hand violently aside. He scrambles to his feet and backs away.

“Taemin,” Minho says. He takes a step forward, then stops. His voice is uncertain. Almost afraid.

Taemin scowls, even as a feeling echoes deep inside him. It is a feeling with no origin, but none the less strong for that. It is the feeling of being abandoned. The feeling of being left all alone. Forlorn. Forgotten.

He projects as much venom as he can into his voice. “What are you doing here?”

Usually Taemin doesn’t care how his words make other people feel, so long as it makes them leave him alone. But snapping at Minho feels strangely like kicking a puppy, and his heart gives an unwelcome twinge.

“My school burned down last week. They transferred hal