Cars rushed by Minho, letting out waves of exhaust in their wake. His bag weighed heavily on his shoulders as he made the uphill trek to his apartment. The sun was going down, casting warm pools of light on the sidewalk. Play practice had gone on a bit long that day. It was strange how for once, the part of the day Minho dreaded the most was going home. He’d done moderately well in school from sheer intellect as opposed to studying, but his intelligence was only a saving grace since he’d never found school to be that important.

Jonghyun had always been trying to convince him to come to school more (even though he was one for slacking off on homework and studying out of laziness rather than apathy) since skipping would blacken his personal record more than good grades would brighten it. Because of his friend’s prompting he’d started showing up more, but now since he’d started the play Minho had been at school every day for the past week and a half.

That certainly pleased Jonghyun, but other people were starting to take notice of him as well. He’d found himself having a conversation with Onew in the lunch line and a few days ago Lay had approached him looking vaguely confused as to who he was. One of the doe-eyed actors, who Minho thought was named Luhan, greeted him in the hall and Kris had approached him with a panda-eyed boy at his side to show him one of his drawings. It was an egg, or so he said. He seemed so proud that Minho decided to just admire it without argument.

As well as that, Taemin seemed to find him in the hall at the most random of times just to say hi. That was probably the reason he was coming to school more, the one he wouldn’t admit to himself but knew to be true. Minho still found the schoolwork and classes tedious and time consuming, since most of the knowledge was nothing he would ever use. But he found the amount of trepidation he woke up with every morning lessening.

Minho passed an alleyway, wondering whether the house would be empty or not. He’d tried telling his mother about the play a few days ago but she hadn’t seemed to care. In fact, she only cared when he did something bad, like skipping class. The house was so increasingly empty nowadays that Minho was convinced that his parents only came home to yell at him or each other. Coming home smelling of smoke at midnight was the only way they’d take notice, and because of that a miniscule part of Minho regretted joining the play and missing out on tagging along with the local gang.

As if the thought had conjured them up, Minho heard his name being called from the alleyway. Recognizing one of the members of the gang, he first tried to pretend he didn’t hear but was forced to direct his attention in the general area while trying to look as casual as possible.

“Where’ve you been lately?”

“I’ve just been busy with stuff.”

Minho watched as he took a step closer from the shadows of the alleway. The familiar smell of  smoke wafted towards him. Minho had never actually minded the smell, he’d actually grown accustomed to it. His only worry was second hand smoke affecting his lungs, an event that had probably already transpired.

“Don’t tell me you’re ditching on us!” The voice held a threatening note, and Minho's shoulder throbbed. He’d only been in a few fights and had come out of top because of his superior height and intimidation tactics. He didn’t like fighting though. Never had.

“Minho?”

At the second sound of his name, Minho turned and saw, to his surprise, Taemin and Key heading towards him. They were wearing the same clothes they had in school, and he wondered if they walked this route home every day. How hadn’t he noticed?

“Do you live around here?” Taemin asked, coming up beside Minho and twisting his head to look into the alleyway. Minho was preparing to pull him back but the gang member had turned his back at the sight of people and retreated farther down. He released a breath, glad that Taemin and Key had arrived when they did.

Remembering that Taemin had asked him a question, Minho hastened to reply. “Yeah, my apartment isn’t far from here- what about you? I haven’t seen you walk this way before.”

“Our house is farther down.” Taemin replied. That was when everything snapped together, that Taemin and Key lived together, which explained the whole Key-umma thing. (Even though Key did have mother like tendencies anyway). It had never come up in conversation, but now Minho knew for a fact that somehow those two were living together on their own.

“We take the bus usually, but Key wanted to shop.” he continued, smiling, and Minho couldn’t tell if it was exasperatedly or fondly- possibly both. Turning towards the aforementioned person, Minho noticed for the first time the shopping bags he was holding.

Key shrugged, looking unabashed. “They were having a sale.”

They continued walking, in and out of the shadows, and while Minho tried to articulate a thank you (thank you for giving me a convenient excuse to leave and scaring away one of my “friends”?) Taemin turned towards him and asked brightly, “Hey, do you want to come over for dinner?”

The question was sudden, but that seemed like Taemin and Minho found himself jumping to accept. He didn’t know what waited for him at home but he knew his parents probably wouldn’t care either way if they were around. However, he cast a tentative glance at Key to see his reaction.

Contrary to what  Minho had expected, Key only commented mildly, “All we have is instant ramen, so it’s not much of a dinner.”

At that Taemin latched onto Key’s arm, casting him a begging look and turning on every cute persuasion tactic he had. “Come on, that’s not good enough, we can make kimchi, can’t we? C’mon Key-umma, let’s make kimchi, please?”

Minho could visibly see Key melt at Taemin’s begging and he found it quite amusing. He hadn’t gotten many chances to talk to Key but he seemed like someone who wouldn’t take crap from anybody- but apparently he had an enormous weakness in the shape of Taemin.

“All right.” Key finally replied. Taemin smiled brightly at that, and Minho honestly couldn’t tell if he was being manipulative or if he had legitimately meant everything he said. Taemin confused him so much sometimes. “But you have to help make it.”

A/N: I'm assuming you all have heard about the possibility of Kris from Exo, leaving the band because he filed a lawsuit. I don't know how much of the rumors are true, since they haven't released specific details yet, but I sincerely hope that everyone will continue to support him. I love Kris and I don't want him to leave but I also want him to be happy and if leaving makes him happy, well...I won't be one to stop him. #WeBeliveInYouKris

This is Fire, beautiful's sister. Sorry for taking so long with this next chapter! Given how it's pre-written, it probably shouldn't take so long...but I appreciate all the nice comments and the follows. Thank you! I do enjoy writing Key-umma, Taeminnie, and Minho with his obvious-and-enormous crush. In a response to the note above, well, you may have noticed how I like making fun of Kris and his...less than stellar art skills. But I do love Kris, so, like it says above, please support him.

"We fall asleep only in hopes of dreaming that everything will be like it was before."