Kai takes extra care to make sure he looks unbelievably gorgeous as he puts his hands in his pockets and casually strolls up to Kyungsoo. The smaller boy is wincing in pain as he cradles his scarf in his arms and sobs a little.

“Morning,” Kai says simply, inwardly patting himself on the back for sounding so cool.

Kyungsoo looks up with his beautiful, glassy eyes and Kai goes weak at the knees. I was doing so well… Why do you do this to me Kyungsoo?

“Need a hand?” Kai bends over and offers Kyungsoo one of his large hands before pulling him up.

“Th-thanks…” Kyungsoo keeps his head low and blushes, refusing to look at Kai. Even if he were to try, he knows that it would only end in his further embarrassment. “What are you doing here?”

“Well,” Kai starts to walk and pulls Kyungsoo along with him, “I had just left the house to walk to school. After a few minutes of walking, I come across this boy stuck in a tree. You see, this boy was reaching out for a scarf that had blown into the tree and he was trying to grab it. I saw him fall to the ground before I could rush in and save the day but, luckily, he had retrieved the scarf.”

“Wait a minute, if you saw me in the tree before I fell, why didn’t you help me?” Kyungsoo looks up and attempts to glare threateningly at him but it doesn’t seem to work as Kai starts laughing at him.

“I didn’t get there fast enough and, in all honesty, it was pretty funny.”

“You’re so cruel.”

“Aw,” Kai coos, “I’m sorry, Kyungie.” Kai pinches Kyungsoo’s cheeks and coos again.

“Kyungie?” Kyungsoo looks horrified at the nickname and nearly walks straight into the middle of the road as cars pass by but Kai pulls him back before anything hits him.

“Yeah. Kyungie. It’s cute, isn’t it?”

Kyungsoo looks left and right of the road and sees a few other cars zooming up along it. “Why are you calling me Kyungie all of a sudden?” It’s not that Kyungsoo dislikes the nickname, in fact he quite likes it, but when someone gives something a nickname, it means that they've become attached to it.

“If Jongdae and Baekhyun can give you a nickname, then I can too.”

“I-I see…”

“New jacket I see.”

“Y-yeah… My mom must have bought it for me.”

When the road is clear of cars, Kyungsoo suddenly clings onto Kai’s arm because he’s afraid of getting hit by one of the evil motorbikes that wiz past them. This action has Kai inwardly screaming as he lets Kyungsoo clutch onto his jacket. However, after they cross the road unharmed, Kyungsoo doesn’t let go. He continues to hold onto Kai’s arm and neither of them seem to mind.

After a minute or two of silence, Kai pretends to clear his throat which successfully catches Kyungsoo’s attention. “Hey, Kyungie, do you want to sit with me and my friends at lunch today?”

Kyungsoo scrunches up his nose at the thought of being surrounded by so many people but relaxes his face and tells himself that he’s doing this for Kai. “Sure.”

Kai’s face lights up. “Great! Don’t worry. I’ll make sure they don’t scare you too much.”

“Uh, th-thanks?”

As the two boys approach the front gates to the school, Kyungsoo lets go of Kai’s arm but is surprised when the latter wraps the arm around his shoulder. Despite this, Kyungsoo doesn’t complain. He just hopes that Kai’s adoring fans won’t try to kill him. Thankfully, instead of negative gossip, Kyungsoo hears words of approval from most of the students.

“Kai-ah!” A girl with extraordinary height and long, black plaited hair runs over to Kai and accidentally bumps Kyungsoo out of the way.

The small boy is about to open his mouth and scream at the girl who dares to crash into him but keeps his mouth shut. After all, if Kai’s around, he’s bound to have an audience. Kyungsoo fiddles with the tassels on his scarf and looks around at a group of girls staring somewhat hopefully at the giant standing with Kai.

“Kai-ah, did you finish copying down my lab notes from yesterday?” She asks with a clear scent of cloyingness in her voice, Kyungsoo notices.

“Yeah, sorry for taking them away from you,” Kai apologises. “I’m sure you are deeply disappointed that you had to miss a whole day of hard studying!”

The girl giggles and slaps Kai’s arm in a playful manner after receiving her bundle of lab notes from Kai. She returns to her friends who all squeal in a girly manner around her and turns around to wink at Kai. Kyungsoo releases a silent chuckle when Kai winks back because he notices the latter blink with his right eye while trying to wink with his left. Ultimately, blinking instead of winking.

Kai looks at Kyungsoo who is totally absorbed into looking at his watch.

“Kyungie, what’s wrong?”

“My watch… It seems as if the time is incorrect on my watch.” He sounds heartbroken. “I set the time to the same as my mom’s pocket watch. I was sure that it was a quarter-to-eight when I left.”

“It was quarter-past-seven when we started walking together. Your watch must be half an hour fast.” Kai takes Kyungsoo’s wrist and rolls up his sleeve so he can check the time on Kyungsoo’s watch. Then he compares it with the time on his own watch. “Yeah, your watch tells the wrong time.”

Kyungsoo groans. “But I rushed because I thought I was late…”

“Isn’t it a relief?” Kai lets go of Kyungsoo’s wrist which flops down to its owner’s side. “You’re-- We’re not late.”

“No, but it’s inconvenient.”

“How so?” Kai leans his weight on one leg and taps the other leg’s foot impatiently against the crumbling gravel.

“I have nothing to do for the next half-an-hour. It is half-past-seven, right?”

“Yeah, it’s half-past-seven. You can talk to your friends, can’t you?” Seeing Kyungsoo’s change in expression, he swings a generous arm around his shoulders and taps his index finger gently on the fabric of his new jacket.

Kyungsoo flushes at the cheeks and begins to mumble, “Well, Jongdae is in your homeroom and I’m, uh, too afraid to go there. Baekhyun doesn’t arrive at school until late and Junmyeon…”He trails off into deep thought and doesn’t notice Kai sneakily dragging him along into the school building. “Junmyeon is always doing something or another to do with studying of some sort. He tells me, ‘I’d love to talk to you, Kyungsoo, but I’m studying’.”

Kai frowns. “I thought you two were friends.”

“We are friends.”

“Then what’s with the cold attitude?”

“Junmyeon is always cold. Well... he is around everyone else. Whenever me, Jongdae and Baekhyun are around, he has a certain caring smile. He doesn’t really like noise, which is why I think he’s fond of me, but he enjoys Jongdae and Baekhyun’s bickering.” Kyungsoo turns to his side to smile invitingly at Kai who smiles back. “Baekhyun has been very, how I put it, enamoured by Junmyeon ever since he found out that Junmyeon was his hyung.”

“I thought Junmyeon hated him because he was friends with Jongdae.”

“I don’t really know what has happened with the two of them since they made up but they’ve certainly been hanging out with each other a lot quite recently.”

“Interesting,” Kai says pathetically. He looks away which is a clear indicator to Kyungsoo that he doesn’t care in the slightest. “So, do you want to spend the next half hour with me?”

Kyungsoo blushes and loosens his scarf. “Do you plan on being with me the whole day?”

“Yes. There are plenty of other people I can see so you should be grateful that I want to spend all of my time with you.” They stop outside of Kyungsoo’s homeroom and Kai leans against the door to prevent Kyungsoo from going inside.

“Kai, you’re in my way. I want to go in.”

“Then I’ll go in with you.”

“No you won’t,” Kyungsoo says sternly as he tries to push Kai out of the way but to no avail.

Suddenly, Kai cups Kyungsoo’s cheeks and stares intimately down at his lips. Kyungsoo freezes and stares wide eyed up at Kai who smirks at him. He leans down so there is only a small distance between them and pauses just as he reaches a few millimetres from the other’s lips.

“Then I’ll see you later, Kyungie,” He whispers before pulling himself away from Kyungsoo and lets go of the boy completely. Taking a few steps back, he smirks knowingly at Kyungsoo. In a brief moment, Kai swiftly bounds away and leaves Kyungsoo on the edge of fainting.

Kyungsoo stands immobile in front of the door to his homeroom as he still tries to recover from the extreme closeness he and Kai just shared. Kai was so close to him. His lips were so close to touching his own but nothing more happened. Was he anticipating the kiss that never came or was he just flustered? Was it excitement or fear that he was feeling? The one thing Kyungsoo knows for sure is that Kai is trying to mess with him and, unfortunately, he is succeeding.