PE had been one of Donghae's favorite classes in Mokpo. But Mokpo was Mokpo. In the school there he had had lots of friends and he had a good time in almost all classes. This was different. Oh yes, this was different. 

Donghae had always liked soccer, in fact there was a time when he even thought about being a professional soccer player when he grew up. But what he was playing now wasn't soccer. No, this was “shoot the ball at the poor guy”. Almost the whole class was about Donghae keeping himself at a good distance from the ball, because if the wrong person had the ball Donghae had to make sure he was far, far away. In the middle of the game, when he was doing nothing but running back and forth on the soccer field, he even thought about going to the teacher and pretend to have hurt his ankle just so he could get away from this. But in the end he didn't because the guys in his class didn't even give Donghae a change to approach the teacher.

He was breathing heavily, his thighs were burning and he could feel – almost hear – his heart beat so clearly he was scared it would explode. Sweat was running down from his forehead and neck and he bend over, hands on each knee, as he tried to catch his breath.

“You okay?” he heard Siwon ask, not even half as tired or half as sweaty as Donghae was. Then again – Siwon didn't have to constantly watch over his shoulder to make sure he wouldn't get a ball in his face.Unable to reply in words Donghae just nodded. 

**

Finally the teacher gave them a break and Donghae's legs were shaking so much he had to support himself on Siwon to walk. 

“I'm never, ever playing soccer here again” he said. “Never, ever, ever, ever.”

Siwon smiled and let go of Donghae as they entered the restroom. “You're doing fine.” he said as both he and Donghae used paper and water to dry their forhead and neck. “I heard the teacher say he was impressed because you were so ambitious.”

Donghae chuckled out loud before throwing the piece of paper in the trash can. “Ambitious...” he repeated and chuckled again. 

Ryeowook and Kibum were having their lunch break now, while Donghae and Siwon still had forty minutes left of their class. They saw Donghae and Siwon sitting in the grass talking and wearing their PE uniforms – white, long shorts and red training jackets – and instead of going to eat the two younger boys decided to keep their hyungs company for a while first.

It was chilly outside and both males were freezing, especially on their lower part of the body and hands, but luckily for them at leat the grass was dry. They sat there for almost twenty minutes, doing nothing but talking about random things till Donghae was about to suggest that maybe Ryeowook and Kibum should get going, or else they wouldn't have time to eat. But he didn't when he saw Ryeowook suddenly freeze and Kibum keeping his gaze on something behind Donghae. He turned his head and realized what had caused the sudden tension – Heechul and his friends were talking towards them. 

“Oh, look at this,” Heechul said as he was standing behind Donghae; the four boys still sitting down on the grass “the four outsiders. Enjoying yourself, boys?” he asked.

Ryeowook glanced over at Kibum, as if Kibum was the type to have a plan for situations like these. But Kibum didn't see it, because he was only thinking about one thing: what the  is Eunhyuk doing there with Heechul? 

Eunhyuk was in the background, not looking at what was happening in front of him but looking somewhere else and Kibum saw his hands shake before he put them in the pocket of his training jacket. 

When Heechul got no reply to his question he placed his foot on Donghae's back, his shoe being dirty with grass and mud, and pushed him a little.

“Stop that.” Siwon who was sitting beside Donghae said as loud as he dared to and Heechul's friends started to laugh. Donghae bit his bottom lip and closed his eyes to not say or do anything he would regret. 

“Let's go.” Kibum said after leaning forward, and he didn't have to convince any of the three more than that before they all stood up. But as soon as Donghae turned his back and as soon as he took the first step to walk away he was being pushed hard – two hands on his back pushing him forward with almost brutal force and Donghae collided with Siwon's back; his nose hitting Siwon's shoulder. Siwon's shoulder must be made out of metal, because the pain in Donghae's nose was intense. His eyes started to water, and he covered his mouth and nose with one hand and he blinked hard once. As his three friends turned around to make sure Donghae was fine Heechul and his friends started laughing even more. 

“Are you okay?” one of the three asked, Donghae didn't register who because he was too angry. He nodded, not really being sure what he was nodding to, because he suddenly got a flashback. 

He remembered Eunhyuk telling him in that shaking voice that he was scared. 

Heechul was a human being, flesh and blood, just like everybody else. He wasn't worth more because people in the school knew his name, and he wasn't stronger because he had a lot of servants. He was worth more because people let it be like that and he was stronger because no one dared to contradict it. People were having their eyes shut tight and just accepted that Heechul could do whatever he wanted. And Donghae had been one of those.

He slowly turned around; seeing the back of Heechul because they were all walking away. It was around lunch time and the yard was filled with people. “F- you.” Donghae whispered, in a shaking voice; adrenaline rushing through his veins faster than ever. No one heard him, not Heechul, not Eunhyuk, not even Kibum or Siwon who were standing beside him. Donghae took a deep breath and fist his hands to stop them from shaking. 

“ you!” he yelled and Heechul immediately stopped dead short.

Siwon widened his eyes, Kibum's chocked on his saliva and Eunhyuk's heart stopped. Slowly, slowly Heechul turned around; eyebrows high up on his forehead. He looked at Donghae, at Kibum who was coughing and then at his friends behind him.  Before turning his eyes back to Donghae he smirked. “Excuse me?” he said. “Did you say something?”

Siwon was about to open his mouth to answer in Donghae's place but Donghae was faster. “I said ' you'.” he said in a loud voice. “As in 'go to hell', or ' off', whatever you wanna chose.”

Heechul's smirk died and Donghae saw Eunhyuk shaking his head violently, mouthing “What the are you doing?”. But Donghae ignored him and turned his eyes back to Heechul. 

Heechul slowly took one step forward, two, three, four, slowly, slowly – giving Donghae a change to take back what he said or run away. But Donghae didn't. 

“Say that again.” he dared. He wasn't smirking, he wasn't grinning and he wasn't chuckling. He eyes were dead serious, his jaw tensed and his lips shut hard. In the corner of his eye Donghae saw his three friends stare at him, at Heechul, and then back at him, and Donghae didn't have to turn his head to know what their eyes looked like; worried, surprised, supporting, angry, scared. Some curious students who had heard Donghae had stopped walking, talking or whatever it was they were doing and were gathering around them; forming a circle with Heechul and Donghae in the middle. 

Donghae took a deep breath, never breaking the eye contact with the hyung as he parted his lips. “ you.”

They were quiet, no one was even breathing because they were too scared to even move. No one knew what was going on or why this was happening. 

Heechul suddenly smirked. “I see”. Without turning around he opened his hand and that single action made Donghae freeze. “Kangin.” he simply said, and a muscular male – Donghae had seen him before – stepped out of the group behind Heechul. He was holding a baseball bat and Donghae stopped breathing.“Say it again, you piece of .” Heechul said as he slowly closed his hand around the handle. 

He wouldn't do it. People were watching and they were still in school. Heechul couldn't be that stupid.No, he wouldn't do it. With this audience Donghae had his chance to stop this, to stop this ridiculous dictatorship the students had given to Heechul, to show that Heechul wasn't some kind of a supernatural monster but just a spoiled brat. 

“ you,” Donghae said again, eyes looking directly into Heechul's. “you ing .” 

The sentence was finished, it had left his mouth, and then everything went so fast, like a flash. Donghae lost the sense of time when hearing some students gasp and some girls scream. Ryeowook grabbed Kibum to not do anything stupid and Siwon couldn't move. The bat was in the air and the thought of running, ducking, screaming, crying never came to Donghae's mind. He was just standing there, not realizing what was going on till he suddenly heard a desperate “wait”. 

Some students had closed their eyes or turned their head to not see. Hands and legs were shaking and those who hadn't looked away had their eyes wide open. The bat was still in the air and Heechul's eyes were red, almost possessed, but he wasn't looking at Donghae. He was looking at the person in front of Donghae – Eunhyuk. 

“W-wait” Eunhyuk heard himself say again, his both hands in front of him; his voice begging Heechul to stop. 

The ones having their eyes closed immediately opened them, students started whispering and Donghae was surprised – but of course not as surprised as his friends and the rest of the students were. Heechul slowly let down the bat. 

“For what?” Heechul hissed. 

“D-don't do it.” Rather than sounding heroic Eunhyuk sounded pathetic, as if he wasn't quiet sure what he had said or was about to say. He knew exactly what he wanted yet he sounded so insecure it was laughable.

“And why not?” Heechul hissed, his voice and eyes scaring Eunhyuk more than the bat in his hand. 

Eunhyuk swallowed, feeling like he was swallowing his own heart back in place, before opening his mouth. “B-because I won't let you.” he said. “ you.”

Eunhyuk never saw Heechul raise the baseball bat again. He just suddenly couldn't breathe, his both arms clutching his stomach. He tried inhaling, but couldn't, his voice wouldn't come out and he was on his knees on the grass. Had Heechul hit him? 

He raised his head just in time to see the next bang, the bat flying towards him, and in second his forehead was bleeding, thin red lines running down to his temple, eye, cheek. The world was spinning faster than it ever had, and his whole throat tensed because he felt like vomiting. 

His friends were telling him to stop, that it was enough, but Heechul wouldn't listen. How dare that motherer embarrass him in front of everyone? He swung the baseball bat again and again and again, not caring where he was hitting. It didn't matter if they were his friends or not, if it was Eunhyuk or not, because Heechul deserved respect. When his friends kept telling him to stop, some guys even grabbing his arms, Heechul turned his anger towards them – who did they think they were? – and even hit another male in his rage. The ones trying to stop him immediately back off as Heechul started to kick the dongsaeng on the grass.

Heechul's friends saw a side of Heechul they thought they were safe from. But when realizing that not even that mattered, Eunhyuk supposedly was a friend, a few of them backed off and slowly walked away; not wanting to have anything to do with this, Heechul, Eunhyuk, no one. 

Donghae was screaming and crying and shaking, but people were holding him, preventing him from interfering. He didn't know who it was, he just knew he couldn't get close. He didn't hear what he was screaming, just that his throat was painfully dry and it hurt, was he screaming for Eunhyuk? Or was he screaming to let go off him? 

Sungmin was there too, not realizing it was Eunhyuk in the middle till he head someone beside him say it. But there were too many off them for him to get through. He was yelling at people desperately with tears running down his eyes, to move the away but people were too scared, curious and shocked to even mind him. 

They were seeing it all. They saw Donghae crying for Eunhyuk, they saw Eunhyuk – Heechul's little favorite dongsaeng – lying bloody on the grass. There was nothing else to say, nothing else to do, because all secrets that these boys had were exposed completely to everyone there. 


Suddenly the whole world changed to Eunhyuk. It was going slowly, so painfully slowly. He saw bodies moving but didn't know what was going on. The sun almost made him blind, but he shifted between sometimes seeing blurred faces and trees and sometimes just seeing darkness. He wondered if it was himself who caused it – was he trying to cover his face? – or if it was him being on the edge of collapsing that caused it. He heard some people yell, scream, cry but he couldn't recognize the voices. He didn't hear Donghae or Sungmin or Leeteuk, he just heard people. Were they even there? 

He stopped feeling pain for a split second, only seeing flashes of a bat covered with blood when he moved his head to a certain direction. He didn't know how long he had been lying there, how long unknown voices had been screaming, how long all these faces had been standing there or how many times Heechul had hit him. He just knew that he couldn't move, talk, breathe. He knew he shouldn't close his eyes, but keep them open – tense all the muscles he could, use all his willpower – no matter what. Because if he shut them he wasn't sure he would ever open them again.

Posted on: 12th May, 2012. Saturday.