i.

She stops short when she sees Donghae leaning against his locker- his shoulders slumped, his hands dropped down and his eyes staring at the ground aimlessly. Yoona ponders for a moment before taking small steps towards him. Donghae’s head snaps up when he senses her approach and she stands rooted to the spot, her eyes blink at him.

“I..just... well... I.” Yoona trips and falls all over her words and yet fails miserably to put her thoughts into appropriate words.

He blinks in surprise, wondering since when she even cared.

“Are you alright?” She asks, concerned. Her hand reaches for his. There is a lingering moment when she squeezes his hand until Donghae softly pulls away.

He crouches down, pulling his bag up to his shoulders and gives Yoona a tight smile.

“I’m alright.”

Donghae isn’t sure he needs the sympathy she’s offering him. He’s been alone for so long that he isn’t sure another person in his life can really make a change. He is an aloner. Always have been, always will be. He trudges down the long hallway, not letting her get the better of him. He doesn’t turn around once (but if he did, he would see her eyes following him).

ii.

There’s this time where he gets punched right in the face. Eveything in high school can go from bad to worse. Donghae doesn’t even remember doing anything wrong. He was going for world history- his next class when he accidentally ran into someone else. And being the way he simply is, he doesn’t bother giving that other person a glance or a muffled apology.

It happens way too fast after that. The other guy’s fist lands on his face and he falls to the ground. For a short moment, everything around seems to spin around. And then he feels himself starting to black out.

//

Yoona offers to help him carry his bag when he is about to get out of class after the bell has announced the end of their period. He stares at her as if a terrible joke just went flying out of . Donghae’s doing perfectly fine on his own. Just because he got injured doesn’t mean he needs someone to take care of him. She rolls her eyes and runs after him, falling in steps with him after a while. He stops abruptly, emphasizing the words loud and clear.

“Leave me alone, please.”

(He pretends that he didn’t see the way her eyes glisten.)

iii.

It’s one of those silly school projects again. This time, though, students get to choose their partners. The noice of chairs scratching on the ground, students moving from this chair to another and stiffled voices fill the air. He knows he’s pretty much on his own with this one and drags out the books from his bag.

The chair next to Donghae shuffles and (somehow) it isn’t a surprise to see her settling down on it. Yoona flashes him a grin, pulling her books out as well. He thinks it’s nice to have someone caring about you but then again, he isn’t used to it.

He grabs his books and moves to another table. Right then, another girl approaches Yoona and offers to be her partner. She hesitates first, shifting her gaze from the girl to him.

“Sure.” Yoona says finally, offering the girl in front of her a small smile.

(She avoids him a whole week. They fall into their usual pattern after that. The maybe-just maybe we’re pretty close to friends pattern.)

iv.

Donghae’s sitting on a bench in the school yard, a notebook haphazardly open in front of him and his ipod blaring music into his ears. There are footsteps catiously approaching and he doesn’t need to turn around to see who it is. She sits down next to him almost immediately, stretching out her legs and flashing him a smile.

There might be a slight upturn of his lips but he stamps down the urge before it can be palpable. He stops the grin right in its track.

Yoona pulls out a book and starts to read it. They stay like that for a while- her reading her book, him stealing glances and humming along to whatever song is playing on his ipod.Donghae doesn’t leave like all the other times but he’s still the first one to stand up and walk away. He thinks it’s something he’s used to, something he’s good at even. So it’s probably not so hard to understand why he runs.

(She doesn’t look up once to see him leave. This time it’s him who turns around and spares her a glance.)

v.

Donghae’s the run-away-before-things-get-complicated guy. He’s the kind of guy who doesn’t like others to be attached to him and the other way round. He has a friend- his only friend at school who’s basically a nerd and doesn’t care to the least about the rumours around. He’s tried. Tried so hard to push her away (and himself away from her) but she keeps coming back and somewhere down the line he just stopped trying.

Yoona’s his friend (or just maybe, or it’s just his assumption) an it’s a great to have someone other than his genius friend to talk to. Things go like this: sometimes she would eat lunch with him in the cafeteria but she’d mostly be sitting with her friends, sometimes when they happen to share a class she’d sit right next to him, sometimes they’d see each other in the hall and exchange pleasantries. She’s slowly becoming his friend. And that is something no one would have ever guessed.

Maybe that’s why it becomes a hot issue, something students talk about all the time. They talk about it like it has something to do with their own lives. The talking doesn’t stop and there comes a point where he overhears one conversation even.

//

He stops seeing Yoona, stops smiling at her, stops being her friend or whatever they were. Everytime they bump into each other he only quickens his steps and moves past her.

(She seems to understand what he’s trying to do. She doesn’t approach him anymore. He doesn’t feel the way he expected.)

vi.

Yoona gets it. It’s been going on for a couple few days and when she finally confronts one of her best friends she gets her answer.      

“Just because of that?” She asks in a whispertone, her voice shivering dangerously.

“Just because of that.” Her friend confirms coldly. “You can’t be going around with people like that. You can’t just hang out with anyone you want.”

“Oh god.” Yoona shouts, throwing both hands up in the air. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with you. I thought we were best friends. Best friends certainly don’t do that to each other. It’d have been fine for someone else to spread the rumours but you?” She shoots a glare to the other girl’s direction.

“Can you please stop? You’re being the drama queen here.” The girl rolls her eyes, apparently annoyed at the way she reacted. “We’ve told you that he’s off limits, that there’s no way you-.”

Yoona runs off before the other girl can finish her sentence. She’s done listening to what others have to say and she’s completely sick of doing what others tell her to do.

//

Her best friends turn into sworn enemies, ing around everytime she gets near them, taking every possibility to turn her into a joke, saying bad things about her behind her back and looking at her like she’s some stranger they just met.

She’s survived a whole week, putting on those brave faces and fake smiles. Her face is hurting from all the effort. She skips lunch because the cafeteria has turned into her anti-fan club. She doesn’t want to eat lunch in a place where they talk with their mouths covered, giggling here and there. They watch her every move and that’s probably the worst part of all.

Yoona only has one get-away which can save her from all the trouble: the exit area with those friendly staircase. There are no back-stabbers who have been pretending to be her friends for all these years, no classmates who turn their backs on her just because they like the version of her fake friends’ story better and Donghae won’t definitely be there.

 Her heart tightens a little and her breath is caught in as she slowly walks to her little hide-away place. Tears start to trickle down her cheeks as her hand circles around the door knob, ready to push the door open. This whole thing is suffocating her and it’s a miracle she’s still managing to breathe.

//

She’s the only one who noticed him when no one else would even give him the time of the day. And he won’t lie, there is definitely something there, lying just below the surface no matter how many times he tried to deny it. Seeing her so broken these past few days has taken a toll on him. Donghae was torn between going over, beating the hell out of those gossip girls, being there for her the way she was for him and being the selfish person he was used to being. At the end of the day, he still stood there- watching her and she still looked broken.

Donghae’s found himself a place where no one can bother him, where he can gather his thoughts together and on top of that no one seems to be aware of it. He heaves a loud sigh, hearing the sound then reverberating through the empty empty area.

Just then, the door cracks open and she stumbles inside. Her face is strained with tears and they both freeze as their eyes locked in the same moment.

//

There’s anger boiling up inside of her as she sees him sitting at the bottom of the stairs staring right back at her. Life is unfair and Donghae is the last person she wants to see. Plus, tears are still uncontrollably running down her face. Yoona’s literally in a state that no one should ever see her in.

Yoona turns on her heels without hesitation or second thoughts. She’s already taken a few steps when his voice finally breaks the unbearable silence.

“Stay. You can stay if you want.” His voice is pleading her and a part of her is tempted to turn round and see it in his eyes.

“I don’t want to.” She snaps, her back still facing him. She reaches out to push the door open as he leans in closer and grabs her by the wrist, pulling her back so that she’s facing him.

“Stay.” He repeats decisively, his eyes never leaving hers.

They both settle down on the stairs in complete silence. She starts crying again. This time they’re just silent tears, soft whimpers.He takes her hand and she doesn’t pull away. This time he doesn’t leave her and that’s not going to be the only time.

(He walks her home in the afternoon, and the day after that and the day after after that...)

Author's Note: Thank you for all the subscribing and commenting. All the support is appreciated. Reviews are lovely and always tend to make my day.