Of course, the bus wasn’t a usual bus. They were from SM Boarding School, after all. The bus they would take was huge, clean and had incredible comfortable seats. Donghae was the only one who got impressed and got totally excited of just the thought of being in that bus. The other students were still complaining. 

Siwon didn’t like this tent idea either. He had never slept in a tent before and he had no interest in doing so either. But he didn’t complain since he was Donghae’s friend. 

Earlier, when they had told Kibum and Ryeowook what their class would be doing this weekend Ryeowook gasped – the thought of sleeping in a tent was, to him, terrifying – and Kibum just laughed.

Siwon and Donghae went through the checklist together: pajamas, toothbrush, pocket money, snacks to eat on the bus and clothes, since their teacher had been kind enough to allow them to use their ordinary clothes instead of their uniform.

Day one

Donghae got the seat beside the window, since Eunhyuk apparently didn’t like that seat, but Donghae didn’t complain. They didn’t say a word to each other during the whole trip. Eunhyuk was talking to the persons sitting behind them, in front of them and even far away. He wasn’t sitting properly and when the teacher told them to calm down they did, for like five minutes, till everything started again. Donghae got a headache, not only because they were so noisy but also because he barely slept the night before. He felt like a living dead, staring emptily at the floor in front of him without thinking about anything at all. Even Eunhyuk noticed that something was wrong with him. Now and then he glanced over at him, without Donghae noticing. Of course, Eunhyuk didn’t say anything about it and he didn’t ask what was wrong. Instead he kept talking and laughing with the other students.

Two hours passed quickly to Eunhyuk. Two hours felt like two thousand years to Donghae. After two hours the students got tired and calmed down for real and Eunhyuk was finally sitting properly on his seat. Donghae turned his face to look outside the window and made it just in time to see the sunset. He rested his head against the window and gave his mind some rest. The sky, painted in blue, red and purple was beautiful and even though he was tired and wasn’t feeling very well he smiled. He let his mind go back to Mokpo, when his father woke him up early in the morning to see the sunrise and let him stay up till late to see the sunset, over the sea. Donghae’s love for the sea and the sun was something he got from his father.

He woke up from his nostalgia when something landed on his right shoulder and lap, and he felt a smell of perfume that didn’t belong to him. When he turned his head he met with brown hair that tickled his face and neck. He realized that Eunhyuk was lying with his head on his shoulder and his hand resting over Donghae’s lap. He must be sleeping since he would never, ever be consciously this close to Donghae. Donghae awkwardly turned his head to see if someone was watching them, but the people sitting opposite them were also sleeping. Then he glanced at Eunhyuk’s head again and wasn’t sure if he should wake the older up or not. But Donghae got a feeling that Eunhyuk would hate him even more if he woke him up, both because he probably wanted to sleep and also because he would get embarrassed. So Donghae turned too looked outside the window again and tried his hardest to not think about that soft hand and that magical scent. He had a hard time concentrating. 

They arrived safely when the bus stopped in an unknown place, beside a huge forest. The students started to complain again when the bus driver helped them to get their bags out and their teacher told them that they would walk to where they would set up their tents. He told them to go with the person they had been paired up with and together carry their own bags, the tent and their sleeping bags. Because Donghae’s wrist was still wrapped in bandage Eunhyuk had to carry the tent and bags by himself. He gave Donghae his death glare and Donghae tried his hardest to not smirk.

When walking for almost fifteen minutes they finally arrived to a glade. The students were tired, as if they had been working for a whole day, and kept complaining. The teacher just sighed, slightly starting to regret having brought thisclass with him. The sun was still on its way down and they had to hurry to set up the tent, since it would be almost impossible setting it up when it would be dark. Setting up the tent was the only task their teacher gave them for today.

Donghae carefully pulled everything out, the tools for the tent, with one hand to not hurt his wrist even more. Eunhyuk had made himself comfortable on the ground, his back against a tree, and watched him. When noticing that Eunhyuk didn’t have any plans of wanting to cooperate Donghae turned to look at him and raised his eyebrows. He didn’t have to say anything, since Eunhyuk understood what his look meant.

“I’m so not doing this.” he simply said. 

“Am I supposed to do this alone?” Eunhyuk didn’t answer, but just looked arrogantly at him. “With my hand?” Donghae added and held up his hurt wrist so Eunhyuk could see it. 

Eunhyuk raised himself, but Donghae doubted that it was to help him. And just as Donghae predicted Eunhyuk just walked passed him and said “I don’t care. Do it yourself.” before walking away, over to where his friends were sitting. This time, Donghae was the one glaring at him. 


Hyukjae and his friends left, not caring about the tent at all. Donghae still tried to do it, but couldn’t do very much with only one hand. Things fell down, blew away and when he tried with both his hands it hurt too much. He sighed.

“Where’s Hyukjae?” someone behind him suddenly asked.

He didn’t have to turn around to know who it was, but he did it anyway to be polite. “He left.” Donghae answered honestly. 
Their teacher sighed, just like Donghae had done previously, before crouching down to help his student.

“That boy is hopeless.” he mumbled, and Donghae didn’t know if he said it to him or to himself. Either way, Donghae couldn’t agree more.

The teacher sure liked to talk so while setting up the tent they chatted about a little of everything. He asked Donghae about Mokpo and his family, Donghae not mentioning his father at all, and he told him about his secret love for nature, especially trees. He was a little weird – how the heck can you find trees interesting? – but Donghae liked him even more. When being almost done the man suddenly went silent and Donghae recognized that moment. Donghae was also good in talking and every time he suddenly stopped it was because he wanted to bring up a serious or/and important subject.

“Donghae shi.” the teacher suddenly said, when Donghae was sitting down on the ground and taking out his sleeping bag. “Is it just me or do you and Hyukjae don’t get along very well?” 

The question was the most comical thing Donghae had ever heard. “We don’t know each other.” he answered.

“I understand he hangs out with the wrong people.”

Donghae shrugged his shoulders, not really understanding the point his teacher had by asking him this kinds of questions. Did Siwon have anything to do with this?

“To be honest, I talked to Siwon shi”. Oh, you don’t say. “He said they randomly say mean things to you”. The teacher was obviously waiting for Donghae to reply, since he made a pause for Donghae to talk. But Donghae didn’t answer since he didn’t know if he would regret it later. So he stayed quiet and their teacher took that as a ‘yes, they do’. “Do they hurt you physically?” 

Except from Eunhyuk burning his thighs with tea? Except from them pushing Donghae in the corridors, sometimes so hard that Donghae got bruises? Except from beating him up a Friday night? “No.” Donghae answered. “They don’t.”

The teacher nodded, not noticing anything weird or suspicious about Donghae’s answer. “Do you want me to help you talk about this with the principal?”

Donghae didn’t think twice and was quick with shaking his head. “It’s not that bad”. The older man looked at him with worried eyes but didn’t try to convince Donghae since he though Donghae was old enough to make his own decisions.


The tent was finished and the teacher looked at it with a satisfied smile, his hands on his waist. The tent was blue and small – was it only for one person? – and Donghae couldn’t even imagine the look on Eunhyuk’s face when he would see this. 

“Thank you.” Donghae said politely, still sitting on the ground.The teacher nodded and raised his hand, instead of saying that it was okay. 

Donghae was standing in front of the tent and the teacher behind it, so the man walked over to him and Donghae got the feeling that he still was thinking about this Eunhyuk-thing. “Lee Hyukjae isn’t a bad person.” he suddenly said. “Actually, he was a very good student his first years here”. Donghae raised his eyebrows and looked up at his teacher. Were they talking about the same person? “I think the seniors are the ones to blame. Hyukjae is just an immature boy that tries to fit in.”

Honestly, Donghae had always had that thought in the back of his mind. When he first saw Eunhyuk he thought that there was something cute and almost angelic with him. He had a hard time seeing it now though.

“Tell me if anything gets wrong.” was the last thing their teacher said and he waited for Donghae to nod before walking over to some other students. 


Donghae made the tent ready inside. He placed the sleeping bags and pulled his own and Eunhyuk’s bag inside. He got outside only to make sure he hadn’t forgotten anything and before he returned inside he saw Eunhyuk walking towards him.

“Is this a tent?!” he asked, his eyes being huge, when seeing the size of it.

“No.” Donghae replied with a very serious tone. “It’s a UFO. It just landed here some seconds ago”. Eunhyuk didn’t find Donghae’s joke funny at all and decided to just ignore it, since he wasn’t in the mood to even glare at him. He crouched down to open the tent and looked inside. “I’m still waiting for a ‘thank you’.” Donghae said, considering the fact that Eunhyuk hadn’t helped with anything at all. 

“Keep waiting, idiot.” was the respond, half of Eunhyuk’s body being inside the tent. “Ah, seriously...” he muttered to himself. He took out his head and looked at Donghae, almost pleadingly and Donghae just shrug his shoulders. He understood his pain.

They spent their next hours sitting as far away as possible from each other – Donghae reading a book with the help of a torch and Eunhyuk drinking strawberry milk with a small straw from a small, pink box.


**


“Move!” 

“How can I possibly move anymore?”

“I don’t care. Just move. You’re too close.”

“Are you deaf?! Move yourself!” 

It was late, past 11p.m, and their teacher had told them to go and sleep one hour ago. Eunhyuk and Donghae were the only ones making any sounds, whispering and hissing to each other.

Eunhyuk sat up and sighed heavily, loudly and irritatingly. Donghae closed his eyes and just pretended that Eunhyuk wasn’t there. But after a while curiously took over and Donghae opened one eye to look at what Eunhyuk was doing. He was drinking yet another strawberry milk and reading Donghae’s book.

“Is that all you brought with you?” Donghae asked and opened both his eyes. Eunhyuk didn’t answer. “Are you hungry?” Still no answer. Donghae sat up and opened his handbag where he still had some snacks left, cookies and chips. He placed it in front of Eunhyuk and Eunhyuk looked at him in surprise before looking suspiciously at the things inside in bag. “I haven’t poisoned them or anything”. Eunhyuk chuckled.

Donghae was tired and to his surprise he easily fell asleep. The last thing he saw was Eunhyuk still reading his book before everything went black. Soon he wasn’t in his tent anymore but outside his house, in Mokpo. And he wasn’t there with Eunhyuk but alone. It was dark and all he could see was a brown door, the opening to his small house. People were screaming inside and he froze when he recognized the voices. It was them – his mother and his brother, screaming in pain. Donghae couldn’t move. He tried to walk, but his feet were like glued to the ground. Move! was the only thing he could think. MOVE!. He could hear his mother scream louder, screaming for help and calling for her older son – Donghae’s brother. MOVE, DAMNIT!. She screamed louder, this time calling for Donghae and asking him why he didn’t help them. Why he was just standing there and not doing anything.


“Hey!” 

That was the sixth time calling and Donghae finally opened his eyes wide. He sat up, eyes watering and breathing heavily – sweating as if he had been running a marathon. He saw someone’s silhouette and he panicked. But the other person had fast reflexes and was fast enough to muffle Donghae’s scream with his hand. “It’s just me.” he whispered.

Who? Kibum? Siwon? Donghwa?  

Donghae looked at the person, terrified, since it was too dark for him to see the other’s face.

“It’s just me. Calm down.” the other whispered again.

Donghae nodded, slowly calming down and remembering where he was and with who. Eunhyuk slowly removed his hand from his mouth. 

“Y-you scared me...” Donghae breathed out, his voice shaking but not because he was scared but because he was on the edge of crying. “D-don’t do that again...” 

He exhaled, pulled up his knees and hugged them; burying his face and biting his bottom lip, trying with all his might to hold back the tears. His heart was starting to calm down.

“Are you crying?” Eunhyuk suddenly asked. Donghae shook his head, not caring if Eunhyuk saw it or not.


After a while he dared to look up again, without having to worry about crying. He sighed and dried his sweat in his forehead and neck with his uninjured hand. “I-I need to take some fresh air.” he said, mostly to himself than to Eunhyuk before opening the tent and crawled out.

Eunhyuk and Donghae were not the only ones being awake, because Eunhyuk received a text message only seconds after Donghae left the tent. He left the tent, right? Let’s go and have some fun. 


Donghae was sitting on a stump, his hands covering his face and didn’t notice the three same aged boys watching him from behind.

“What's he doing?” Sungmin whispered. Eunhyuk had an idea of what he was doing.

“We shouldn’t do this.” he said instead of answering, knowing that Donghae in all probability was still vulnerable because of his nightmare. 

“Why not? It’ll be fun.” Shindong said. Eunhyuk wasn’t convinced at all and his friends didn’t fail to notice. “Come on, it’s not like we will hurt him. We’ll just scare him.”

“He’ll tell on us.” Eunhyuk said and pretended like that was the only thing that was stopping him.  

“No, he won’t.” Sungmin said.

“Stop being such a wimp.” Shindong added. 

Eunhyuk turned his head and looked behind them, hoping with the bottom of his heart that anybody – preferably the teacher – would see them. But he didn’t get surprised at all when no one came to his rescue – no wonder, it was almost 2a.m.

They sneaked up on the lonely boy – Donghae still not noticing anything. Sungmin had to cover his mouth with his hands to not laugh and Shindong grabbed a small stone and threw it at Donghae’s direction. As soon as the small thing hit Donghae’s back Donghae immediately raised himself and looked behind him. He didn’t see anyone there. “I-I-Is someone there?” he asked.

Eunhyuk wanted to hug him. He looked so lost and lonely, like a puppy without a home or anyone to protect it. He remembered their hug in the nurse’s room, when Eunhyuk was the one who gave him the protection and comfort he needed at that moment. He felt like an . A total bastard.

Shindong whispered something in Sungmin’s ear and Sungmin smirked. Eunhyuk got a bad feeling. Sungmin took a silent deep breath before screaming, using a high pitched voice while Shindong started to shake the bush they were hiding behind. A scream. And Donghae couldn’t move. His heart felt like it stopped. But this wasn’t a dream, Donghae knew that, so he did the only thing he could – he ran.

“H-he’s running away!” Sungmin yelled, terrified. This was not in their plans. “What if he gets lost?!” Sungmin didn’t have time to finish the last part before Eunhyuk already was on his way – running at the same direction and not caring about Sungmin and Shindong calling for him.


Donghae ran with all his might. The fact that he had no idea where he was and couldn’t see anything didn’t stop him. What did stop him were the roots from the trees that he didn’t see, and he tripped. He fell on his hurt hand and screamed and cried in pain, tears running down his eyes like waterfalls. His body started to shake from the pain.

He heard steps running towards him and had no idea if he should get relived or even more scared. Even when he saw that it was Eunhyuk he wasn’t sure what to feel. It didn’t matter anyway – the only thing he could feel right now was pain. “It hurts...” he cried, when Eunhyuk was helping him up. “Oh, God, it hurts...” 

“I know, it’s okay.” Eunhyuk said, even though he had no idea what was hurting. Then he noticed Donghae’s right hand holding his left wrist in a loose grip, both his hands shaking, and he could imagine what had happened.

“I-It hurts...” Donghae repeated again. “It hurts...” 

For every time he said that he cried even more and his knees started to shake, so Eunhyuk had to hold him up. 

“It’s okay.” Eunhyuk couldn’t think of another thing to say. “We’ll go back to the tent, okay?” 

Donghae didn’t reply that, but kept repeating himself; crying over and over again in a broken voice that it hurt, and Eunhyuk wasn’t sure if Donghae could hear what he was saying. 

Eunhyuk called Sungmin, one hand holding his phone and the other holding Donghae by his waist to help him walk, since he had hurt his ankle when falling and was limping. Sungmin helped him find the way back to where the tents were. Both of them were freezing since they were dressed only in their pajamas.


“Does it still hurt?” Eunhyuk asked after some seconds of silence. They were sitting beside each other in the tent, Eunhyuk looking at Donghae and Donghae having his eyes closed hard. He nodded, his hand still holding his wrist and rocking his body back and forth, as if that would alleviate the pain, crying silently.

Minutes passed and it was almost 3a.m when Donghae sobbed for the last time and laid down, inside his sleeping bag. His face was wet, his nose running and his eyes swollen. He didn’t know who to thank a thousand times that it was too dark for Eunhyuk to see him.

Eunhyuk had been saying random things all the time, every now and then, like commenting the weather and other unnecessary things. He was drinking yet another strawberry milk. Donghae could imagine that was his drug and that he drank that every time he was happy, upset, depressed and nervous. Better then cigarettes and alcohol I guess, Donghae thought. Eunhyuk wasn’t really saying anything important or anything that made any sense, but Donghae had an idea of why he was acting like that.

“Are you starting to like me?” he interrupted and turned to face Eunhyuk.

“What?”

“You have a bad conscience, don’t you?” 

To Donghae’s surprise the question didn’t upset Eunhyuk but instead, he just answered honestly. “It was a stupid prank.”

“Everything you’ve ever done to me since I arrived here has been stupid pranks. But now suddenly you care. That's why I'm asking, are you starting to like me?”

Eunhyuk frowned, even though Donghae couldn’t see it – which he thought was bad, since he would have liked if Donghae saw it. “Don’t get too confident, stupid.” He laid down too, as far away as possible from Donghae – just like before, his back facing Donghae’s back. 

Minutes of silence passed when Eunhyuk suddenly said something that made Donghae widened his eyes in surprise and almost make his heart skip a beat. “I’m sorry” he said in a low voice, almost in a whisper. “about earlier.” 

Donghae smiled, happy with the knowledge that Eunhyuk couldn’t see it. “It’s okay.”

Posted on: 2nd September. 2011.