Baekbeom scooted into his desk. He pushed his sleek black glasses up on the bridge of his nose. His fingers dug through the mess of papers scattered across it, "where is it?"

All the white printed sheets looked the same.

He was graduating middle school soon, and had spent the past year writing a detailed end of the year essay. Without it his life would be over. His prestigious business school professor would not accept excuses. He'd fail the class, and he'd be ruined. He chewed on his lip and continued to search, turning each paper over, scanning the words.

Baekbeom ran nervous hands through his hair, "Where is it!?"

A knock sounded on his door.

"Come in!" He called over his shoulder, now looking underneath his desk, and around the floor.

The door swung open.

"Hyung!" A boy with big almond eyes and round cheeks stood there with his arms outstretched, careful not to move his fingers formed into a perfect ball. He was still wearing his school uniform with bright yellow shorts and a baby blue polo. Grass stains had formed on his socks and yellow shoes. There was dirt smeared on his cheek.

"I'm busy," Baekbeom said, moving to the folders inside his filing cabinets.

"Hyung!" the younger boy hopped inside anyway.

"I'm busy, Baekhyun," Baekbeom groaned.

Baekhyun stopped beside his brother, shoving his balled hands in front of the older boy's face.

"Go away, I don't have time for this," Baekbeom swatted his hands away and continued his search.

"Just look for a second!" Baekhyun begged, "Pleease?"

"Get out," Baekbeom ordered, pushing his brother away, "move."

The younger boy stumbled back a few steps. Something moved within his grasp.

"Oh!" His eyes widened at his hands and he bounced up and down with excitement. 

Slowly he opened his hands, unlacing his fingers one by one. 

The creature inside unfurled its blue-grey wings. They were large, and perfectly straight. Ridges streaked down the elegant aerial limbs, connecting to one another like the veins on a leaf. A layer of short folicles covered its white peanut body, leading up to black disco ball eyes. Its leg were as thin as hair, all six of them. A long tube grew from the center of its face, and curled elegantly at the end. The creature fidgeted ons the boy's hands, moving its wings almost robotically.

"It's a fairy!" Baekhyun squealed with joy, refraining from jumping up and down as to not scare the precious creature.

"Get that ugly thing out of here."

"It's not ugly!"

"I said get out!" Baekbeom snarled.

The creature startled and flurried out of Baekhyun's hands. It danced across the ceiling, flashing blue then grey then blue then grey, a code in a language the brothers couldn't understand. 

It came to land softly atop the eldest brother's mountain of papers then began to rub its hair-like legs together.

Baekbeom slapped his hands over the creature, catching it tightly. Baekhyun gasped and clawed at his brothers arms.

"Stop it!" he cried, tears forming in his big eyes, "Stop it you'll kill it!"

Baekbeom stood, feeling the feather-soft struggle of the creature in his hands, "I'm taking this outside."

"You're killing it!" the first grader cried, tugging at his brother's sleeve, "Don't hold it like that!"

"It's just a dumb bug," Baekbeom said. He left the room and trotted down the stairs, his small brother following closely behind.

He kicked open the door to the garden and opened his hands.

The once perfectly straight blue-grey wings were now mangled, small lesions had formed across the cloth like appendages. Its once elegant long tongue had been bent at an unearthly angle, along with two of its legs. It lay on its side and still and cold as a statue.

"You killed it!" Baekhyun screamed. He darted forward to scoop the butterfly out of his brothers hands, tears dripping from his jaw, "I told you," he whimpered, "I told you not to hold it like that!"

"It died becuase of you," he croaked, holding the precious creature to his chest.

Baekbeom stared down at the greying butterfly. Discomfort tingled through his body, bile rose in his throat.

He leaned in suddenly and slapped the creature out of the younger boy's hands, "It's just a dumb bug! It was gonna die soon anyway!"

Baekhyun scrambled to rescue the creature, and Baekbeom rushed inside and slammed the door behind him. He raced up the stairs and into the bathroom. Feverishly he washed his hands, as if he could rub the sin away. His face in the mirror was shadowed with disgust, fear, and a tinge of guilt. "It's just a dumb bug," he reminded himself. Though he felt he had become a murderer.

In the garden Baekhyun picked up the butterfly. He held it to his chest, crying for the precious life that had been lost. Other creatures flitted from flower to flower around the garden peacefully as that one once had. The colors of the assortment of flowers blurred into a rainbow as Baekhyun ran through the garden. He stumbled on unsure footing but continued, darting past the petunias and the marigolds.

He stopped cold in front of the large pond that stretched out from the edge of the oasis. Panting, he shifted the butterfly gingerly into one hand. With the other he plucked a leaf from a rose bush. He slid the corpse onto the leaf and set it on the grass, plucking sunshine colored petals off of a dandelion and arranging them around it. The water rippled as the leaf met its surface, carrying the greying butterfly. Baekhyun leaned in and blew. The leaf shot forward across the water then slowed, as if realizing it wasn't in that much of a hurry. It floated slowly on its journey across the pond. Baekhyun sobbed and then forced himself to breathe, wiping away the torrent of tears that had covered his face. He stood up and waved a chubby hand.

"Rest in peace," he murmured.

"I gave it a funeral."

The words came nearly inaudible through the crack in Baekbeom's door.

"Gave what a funeral?" Baekbeom asked, tapping his papers against the desk. Perhaps if he was better organized he could find the paper, after all it had to be here somewhere. He'd clean the entire desk if it meant he could find it.

"The fairy."

Baekbeom groaned and swiveled his chair around, "Oh stop it. How old are you? You know its not a fairy!"

"I'm seven," Baekhyun stated, then dropped his eyes, "It is a fairy," he mumbled, his face only half visible from behind the door. 

"Fairies don't exist, you know that!" Baekbeom barked, "grow up!"

"There's a lot of fairies in the garden," Baekhyun continued, shuffling his feet, "but I liked that one the most."

"They're butterflies, Baekhyun. It was just an ugly grey butterfly! There's tons of them in the world!" Baekbeom shut his mouth and took a deep breath to cool his anger, then turned to the younger boy, "I'm sorry about your bug, Baekhyun. But I'm busy."

The child nodded. A bug. He bit back the tears and swallowed his anger. Baekbeom fumbled around the desk furiously.

"...What are you looking for?" Baekhyun peeked inside.

"My essay, it's missing," Baekbeom opened the top drawer in the desk, moving the keys and pencil inside loudly.

"What does it look like?"

"There's a lot of writing, and pages," He scratched his neck, and motioned at the desk, "it was here just yesterday!"

"Your shelf," Baekhyun whispered.

"What?"

"You always put stuff there."

Baekbeom stood and pushed his glasses up his nose. He went to the shelf above his bed and got on his toes, pulling a few books out and dropping them with a whump on the bed below. A crinkling sound rang in his ears as his fingers passed over something. He moved his hand back to the place of the noise and felt around. There it was again. 

"Here!" He wrapped his fingers around the papers and tugged them out, "They were here all along!"

The older boy scanned the title carefully, sure enough, it was all the pages of his final essay, typed cleanly and stapled together just as he had left them.

He turned over his shoulder with a bright smile, "Thank--"

Baekhyun was gone.

"--You."

Baekbeom rubbed his tired eyes. His face in the car mirror had purple sunken eyes. Hospital work was pressing, and he hadn't slept in days while he was an intern for the ER.

The sleek car slid into the driveway and stopped. He climbed out and made the short hike to the house. The sun was still up, and it was barely noon on a Saturday, but for Baekbeom it felt like three in the morning. Slinking quietly into the house, he shut the door behind him. 

"Hyung."

Baekhyun stood in the center of the living room, wide eyed. He blinked once, "you're home."

Baekbeom waved lightly and nodded, then slumped past his brother towards the stairs.

Baekhyun flipped around with a bright smile, "Hyung guess wh--!"

"--Not now, Baekhyun," Baekbeom said, "tell me later. Later."

The younger boy's smile melted into a blank expression, "S-sure, okay...Are you tired?"

The older man nodded.

"Do you want me to bring you something to eat?"

"No, it's fine."

Baekhyun bit his lower lip, still unconvinced, "are you sure?"

"I don't need anything, Baekhyun."

Baekhyun looked ready to say something else, but he nodded obediently. The old boy went upstairs to bed. Baekhyun leaned over the papers on the glass table in front of him and dropped back onto the couch. He loosened the tie of his stuffy high school uniform.

The door opened again, and again Baekhyun stood quickly and stiffly.

"Baekhyun-ah!" His drunken mother cooed. The smell of alcohol stung Baekhyun's nose.

He furrowed his eyebrows, then smiled with realization at his opportunity, "Mom, guess wha--"

"-More drinks!" his mother boomed, "Drinks for everyone! Bring your workaholic brother down here!" She tripped in her high heels and nearly fell over, "I have something to say to him!"

"Mom!" He barked, rushing over to hold her up, "How much did you drink?

"Not tooooo much," she giggled and tapped her clutchbag on Baekhyun's chest, "bring me another drink darling."

"I'm bringing you to bed," Baekhyun scolded, and began tugging her towards her bedroom.

"What's all that?" she slurred, motioning at the papers.

"It's nothing," he mumbled, opening his mother's bedroom door, "go lie down. I'll bring you water."

"My precious son," his mother giggled, "My beautiful son!" and collapsed onto her bed.

Baekhyun turned and went into the kitchen, opening a clean white cupboard to pluck out a glass. Carefully he followed the instructions in his mother's favorite cookbook. Each time she got drunk, she begged for her favorite hangover soup, he figured he would just make it pre-nagging this time. The strong smell of meat and spice rose to his nose with the steam. He tugged at his white sleeves that kept falling down. From the bedroom around the corner he could hear his mother's loud snores, along with an occasional random shout.

"Baekhyun-ah!" his mother whined loudly just as the soup reached a boil, "Soup!"

"I'm making it, Omma!" he called back.

"Good boy!" the woman giggled.

Finally he stuck his wooden spoon into the broth and then brought it to his lips. He flinched at the heat, then let the taste soak into his tongue. Perfect. He dumped the soup into a bowl, grabbed a water bottle from the fridge, and headed to his mother's room. He stopped before entering and looked over his shoulder with a sigh at the papers on the table. The final exams.

If he squinted he could make out the large red marks on the top corner of each one. A+, A+, A+.

And under all of them, the Highest Scoring Student certificate. 

"Baekhyun!" Sun ran across the courtyard, dodging the soccer balls the male students were playing with. Her dyed light red hair was put into a high side ponytail, tied together by an outrageously gaudy bedazzled ribbon. Why in the world did she think they were friends? He groaned inwardly. All of the other kids just let him be, why couldn't she?

The girl stopped in front of him panting, "Made it, heehee" she stuck her tongue out and made a peace sign over her eye, giggling like a toddler.

"Go away, Kim Sun."

"Wow!" she trotted up the bleachers to sit beside him, he looked up and down at her mismatching knee high socks that had fallen in bunches to her ankles around neon colored sneakers, "You even know my name!"

"You thought I didn't?" He said emotionlessly. How could he not? Every day was the same: "I'm Sun! Remember? Kim sun! My name is Sun!"

"You don't seem to interested in other people," she explained, folding her arms, "So I thought you forgot again."

"I'm not interested. I'm busy. Go."

"Busy?" Sun laughed, "Doing what? Brooding alone on the bleachers?"

Baekhyun cleared his throat.

"Did you even bring a lunch?"

Baekhyun wanted to laugh out loud. A lunch? He never ate lunch. The other kids had colorful boxes filled with food made lovingly by their mothers each morning. He'd never once seen his mother cook. He doubted she even could.

"No."

"That's okay!" Sun whipped out her own version of the lunch boxes, "Tada! I'll share!"

She opened the plastic lid with a pop. Delicious smells immediately came to Baekhyun's nose. The food was in all shapes in sizes. Little sausages next to yellow egg wraps, sweet rice next to kimbap, the whole thing was a tiny resteraunt storage.

"Looks good, doesn't it?" Sun elbowed him, snapping him back to reality. It didn't look that good, Baekhyun thought grudgingly.

"Did your mother make this?" he dared to ask, avoiding her eyes and looking past at the classrooms.

"Mhm!" Sun nodded, "she makes them every morning for me and my sisters! I really wish I had a brother, it'd be nice having a boy in the family, you know? Do you have any siblings? Probably not, huh? You seem like the single child type--"

Sun went on and on as she always did. Baekhyun watched the movement of her chopsticks as she put each piece into . Her mother made them for her and all her sisters. Every morning. Every day. Every week. Every year. Anger sparked in his stomach. Why? What was so special about the annoying girl? All she did was talk and talk and talk. He was sure even her mother must get fed up with it. So why?

And most of all, why not him?

Baekhyun stood up. His legs forced him before he could think, his arm propelled forward without him willing it. The lunchbox spilled onto the bleachers and the dirt below. It flew out of her hands as he slapped it away. A fury he couldn't control, a jealousy he wish he didn't have controlled him. 

"What are you doing?" Sun looked up with wide eyes, tears began to form in the corners. hung ajaw in shock at his action, bits of egg were caught in her hair. 

The face struck a note in him, pulled a chord that hadn't been tugged in years. Like his brother, he had slapped it away. Like the butterfly. He once had the joy his sibling didn't, and so like his brother had, Baekhyun took it away. Why can she have what he can't? It's not fair.

"Jerk!" Sun stood up, and before Baekhyun could flinch her palm met his cheek. "How could you?" She snapped, then looked around at the mess of her lunch, "Mom spent all night...No wonder you have no friends!" she barked at him, the tears now smearing her thick eyeliner. "Die alone then! Idiot!" she threw a piece of egg from her hair at him, then ran down the bleachers, back across the field, and out of his view. 

He wiped off his pants, and plucked the egg off his cheek. He could hear a chorus of whispers coming from the soccer field where the boys now gathered together, pointing and mumbling.

"Did you see that?"

"Were they dating or something?"

"."

"How could he do that to a girl?"

"Poor Sun."

Baekhyun bit his lip and set his hand on his still stinging cheek. It was warm from the friction. With a sigh he dropped back down and looked into the distance, squinting his eyes in the sunlight, but he couldn't find her. There was no trace of her blue uniform skirt, or her gaudy ribbon, not even a single strand of bright red hair. A part of him sunk. He was a jerk, an . He lowered his head and through the two metal rows of bleachers he could see below him a roll of kimbap all white and orange and yellow. It probably tasted good.

In his mind he could see a tall woman like Sun with wrinkled around her eyes, little daughters tugging at her from all angles. On she went, cutting the carrots for the kimbap her precious daughter would eat. 

And he wouldn't even have the chance to apologize.

She was the first and last friend he had ever had.

Hello readers! This chapter is ever so slightly shorter than the other ones. It's more like an insert chapter because I wanted you to see and understand Baekhyun's life and why he is what he is. It took me an hour to write the first butterfly scene and I really loved it, but then something happened and the entire thing got deleted! I was so so upset, but I went back to work and took another hour to write it entirely over again. It's not as good as the first time, but I hope you enjoy it anyway! 

Stay tuned for the next chapter!

~Violet