Hey everyone! 

Here's the latest chapter! I apologize that it has been a while since I updated, but I've been spending most of my time on "End of the World." Please check it out if you haven't yet! 

Nevertheless, here it is. Enjoy!

Chapter 5

All of EXO, aside from Luhan, sat in a large circle in the small living room, with Elise sandwiched between Kyungsoo and Yixing. It was safe to say that she felt the most comfortable around the quiet boy who introduced her to everyone earlier, and she couldn’t be more thankful for his patience and kindness.

In the meantime, Joonmyun had quieted the entire troupe down. “Elise, we were wondering, is it okay if we ask about yourself first?”

Her stiff nod came right afterwards. Joonmyun didn’t know what to think. “We were wondering, you’re only… 22? How come you already have a job as a writer?”

Elise nodded and looked to the floor, contemplating how to answer the question. The rest of the eleven boys looked to her in curiosity. “I didn’t go to college, and the company happened to like my writing.”

“But didn’t we ask for an educated person?” Chanyeol blurted out.

“Yeol, don’t be rude,” came Kris’s stern voice.

Elise shook her head. “You’re right, I’m not completely educated in the well-rounded, state-certified sense. I’m just a writer,” she spoke.

“Elise?” Jongdae raised his hand.

“Mm?”

“You said you know Ms. Lee’s niece?” Elise nodded. “Do you work together?” Another nod. At this point, Jongdae was getting intimidated. “Then you both are writers?”

Elise shook her head this time. “Kate works in sales.”

Kris looked at her with a calm gaze as he absorbed all this information. “Elise, then how come you’re educated if you didn’t go to college?”

She nodded, as if expecting this question. “I’m self-educated.”

Kyungsoo and Baekhyun’s eyes widened. “Really?” She nodded once again. “Without going to college? And you landed a writing job?” Elise nodded, her face shifting into something like a smile.

“Wow…” Tao’s mouth was wide open.

“Tao, shut your mouth,” Jongin snickered.

“My mouth wasn’t wide open,” the martial artist countered.

Joonmyun chuckled. “Anyway, Elise, so you mean… you taught yourself?”

“Yes.”

“How did you do it?”

“I just went into the bookstore and read what I could.”

Yixing spoke next. “But doesn’t writing involve practice?”

Elise nodded. “It does…”

“How did you practice?”

At this question, she hesitated, not sure if she wanted to divulge this part of her life to them. If anything, this part wasn’t pleasant.

Jongin caught her hesitating. “You don’t want to tell us? Not like we’ll steal your tactics or anything.”

Elise looked up in alarm, afraid she offended another one of the boys. “Oh no, it’s just… that time was hard,” she murmured.

“Hard?” Jongin asked. She nodded. “No offense, Elise, but do you know what hard is?”

Elise was silent, before she nodded, her sharp eyes boring into his. “Yes. I do.”

The rest of the room was silent as they kept their attention on Elise and Jongin. “How hard was your life then?” Jongin asked, one brow raised.

Elise took a deep breath. “Harder than any of you would expect.”

“Oh yeah?”

One more nod.

“Tell me something then. Were you ever caught by gangs?”

Elise shuddered, and broke her gaze. “Well?” came Jongin’s prodding question, his hard eyes boring onto her entire figure. She closed her eyes, as if trying to rid her mind of the memories.

“I think that’s enough, Jongin,” Kyungsoo stated, and Yixing rubbed her back. “You’re scaring her.”

“She needs to know what hard is. I know she’s smart and self-taught and , but we’re the ones on the brink of being thrown aside for dirt here,” Jongin retorted.

“What if she had a hard life too, but doesn’t want to tell us yet? She doesn’t know us well enough,” Chanyeol spoke up, his hyper self temporarily disappearing.

“How’d ya know that?” Jongin asked, his tone bordering dangerous and his gaze tearing from Elise and focusing on Chanyeol’s.

“She’s ing shaking! Ya can’t tell me she doesn’t know hard!” Chanyeol shouted as he shot her a concerned gaze.

After the tall boy’s outburst, she stopped shaking. Elise shook her head, gently pushed Yixing’s hand off her back, and glared at the two boys. “Enough.”

Jongin looked at her in disapproval, and Chanyeol gazed at her in worry. “Who’re you to say enough?” the younger boy spat.

Elise balled her fists, trying not to explode in frustration. “Stop fighting over what I did or did not tell you. I’ve lived a hard life before I earned my job. You don’t know what I had to go through…”

“Then, miss,” Jongin stared at her, long and hard, “how hard was it?”

Elise bore her own black orbs into his. “Let’s just say that I don’t know my exact birthday, I don’t have parents, I’ve shot someone before, and I’ve spent some time of my childhood in a box. Does that help?”

The entire room fell into silence. None of the boys thought that a pale-skinned, rather attractive writer would have lived on the streets in the past. Even Jongin was surprised, for no words came out of his mouth.

Elise cleared , uncomfortable with the amount she has spoken and the attention she brought upon herself. “Questions?”

Joonmyun shook his head before shooting the guilt-stricken Jongin a stern look. “I think we’re good. Sorry, Elise.”

Elise nodded. “It’s okay. Anyway, is there anything I can do? I am your volunteer.”

Kris decided to speak for the group. “For now, we figured that we need someone to teach more than half of us how to read and write, so we can be, I guess, somewhat more educated.”

“Can’t read or write?” she tilted her head.

“Yup.”

She looked at the circle of boys. “Could I ask who?”

“Everyone here except Kris and Joonmyun,” Yixing answered.

Elise nodded and glanced at her watch. “Well, I have time today. We could get started now, if you want to.”

Murmurs of agreement sounded through the group. “Basics?” she asked.

“Please?” Baekhyun asked.

“Of course. Have paper and pen?”

~~~~~~

Unbeknownst to the individuals in the living room, Luhan heard the entire conversation as he sat on the bed he shared with Sehun. He shook his head in frustration at himself, and groaned at his own stupidity.

Kris and Joonmyun allowed themselves into the bedroom, since they didn’t need lessons on the alphabet. Kris glanced at Luhan as the shorter leader rummaged around the drawers for paper and pens. “You okay?”

Luhan shook his head. “No.”

“Is it about earlier?”

“Yeah.”

“Wanna talk?”

Luhan sighed. “So she had it bad too, huh?”

Kris chuckled. “Yeah. She also can’t seem to express herself that well.”

“Found it,” Joonmyun muttered as he pulled out a wad of paper and a pen. “I’m going to head out to work. Be back soon. Also, Luhan, you may want to join them. You want to learn to read and write too, right? Anyway, see y’all later,” he said as he left the bedroom.

Luhan nodded at him as he heard the door click shut. Kris watched the baby-faced boy as he hit the bed in frustration. “You should go apologize.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Luhan didn’t speak as he stared into space. “What do I say?”

“Say what you think you should say,” Kris said. “Anyway, I gotta go to the market. We have a few hours before Kyungsoo needs to cook stuff.”

“See ya,” Luhan muttered as he watches Kris grab his bag and leave the room. He pushed himself off the bed and ran a hand through his hair. “What to do…” After what seemed like hours of contemplation, he decided to leave the bedroom and join the rest of the troupe.

~~~~~~

Elise was surprised when Luhan later joined the group to learn the alphabet. She gave him a quick gaze before returning to the alphabet she wrote on the paper. “So, do you guys want to repeat after me? One by one?”

Chanyeol raised his hand. “Can I?” She nodded. “A, B, C, D…” he continued, and soon became the first person in the room the finish the entire alphabet.

“Aish, Chanyeol, who asked you to get so good at memorizing this?” Baekhyun complained.

The lanky boy stuck his tongue out at the other boy. “I watch as Kris reads all the mail every day. It became familiar!”

Baekhyun muttered about how he should do the same, when Elise interrupted his train of thought. “Baekhyun?” He looked at her, with an asking expression. “It’s okay. Just takes time. Be patient, ‘kay?”

He saw that even though Elise doesn’t smile, her eyes showed complete sincerity. He gave her a pleasant eye smile. “’Kay. Thanks, El. Cal I call you that?”

She nodded. “Sure.”

Luhan looked as if he wanted to say something, and Elise turned her gaze to him. He froze, which is completely different from how he was like just a few hours ago. “Yes?”

He took a breath. “Could I join you guys?”

Elise nodded again. “Course. Sit over here…” Luhan silently moved over, and made sure to focus on what she was teaching. Thus, the rest of the afternoon was spent with letters, and shouts and murmurs of accomplishment echoed the apartment when all of the boys in the room could each write their own name.

~~~~~~

Although Kyungsoo insisted that she stay for dinner, Elise excused herself so she could head home. After buying some vegetables and fruit from the market close to her apartment, she decided to head to the stationery store. If she was to be a teacher, she might as well be a good one.

Elise entered the small store, which was filled with notebooks of all different sizes and pens and pencils of all different types. After rummaging through several stands and shelves, she collected a total of twelve notebooks, a small dry-erase board, and twelve ballpoint pens for the boys. Satisfied with her purchase, Elise headed home, arms loaded with bags.

As she was nearing her apartment complex, however, she heard footsteps trailing behind her. Fear arose in her as she quickened her steps, and instead of entering the complex, she rounded the corner into an alley, taking a deep breath as she heard the stalker come around the corner as well.

A haughty chuckle echoed through the alley. “So, Elise, I didn’t fancy seein’ you ‘round.”

Elise sighed as she set her bags down. “Didn’t think I’d see you either, Lin.” She turned around, and saw one hefty guy standing a few feet from her.

Big, broad, and muscular, Lin was the head of the gang occupying the area surrounding Elise’s complex. It was only complete luck that she hadn’t run into him in the last two years.

He pointed to her bags. “What’re those for?”

“Me.”

“Ah,” he drawled. “Food and paper. What a nice collection for a high-up employee, huh?”

She shrugged. “Far from it, I’d say.”

He charged up to her, but she didn’t flinch. “You listen, young missy,” Lin poked her chest, and Elise fought down the urge to swing a punch at him,” you stay outta my sight. Or, I might just call in trouble for ya. Don’t think that you could leave that easy two years ago, ya hear me?”

Elise sighed, as if mocking him. “Not like I asked for you to follow me here, mister.”

Lin grabbed her shirt and pulled her closer. “No use talkin’ to me like that, .”

She couldn’t take it anymore as she punched him in the nose. Blood spurted out as he lost his grip on her shirt and stumbled back. But it wasn’t long before he regained his footing and charged at her.

After what seemed like hours into the fight, thought only a few minutes passed, both were battered, bloody, and bruised. “Im’ma get you for this, Joo. This ain’t over,” Lin spat before he escaped from the alley, hobbling at every step due to his twisted ankle.

After watching him leave, Elise also spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva before slowly standing up and picking up her bags. When she arrived at the front gate, the guard stared at her bloody clothes in suspicion before realizing that she was the silent girl who passed by every day, and let her in.

Sehun hid in a corner as he watched the entire scene unfold, and only walked into the streets after he saw that she was safely inside the apartment complex. “So she knows Lin… and she can fight. Huh.” He sighed as he visualized her bloody state, and slowly made his way towards the most famous bar in town.

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xoxo shadowonsapphire