Rewind (I): Baekhyun
 

Baekhyun was not pleased when he marched into class with Chanyeol, late, standing under the condescending gaze of his homeroom teacher like he had committed some terrible sin. He was also pretty sure that just about all the class was staring at him and Chanyeol, and he wasn’t a huge fan of attention from strangers. So many things had gone wrong in the hour and a half that he had woken up that he was ready to curl up in a ball and stay there until the storm passed… or maybe even after that. Being expelled (along with Jongin) out of his school was enough, and his glowering homeroom teacher was just about the last straw.

Then there was also the girl. Baekhyun had noticed her before everyone else -- or more like, she had stood out from the crowd. And it wasn’t really because she was pretty or cute or really that attractive -- it was more because of the glare she had directed towards him. Her eyes, squinted at him, mouth pressed in a tight line, like he had done something offensive. And as much as Baekhyun normally excelled in messing things up, even he couldn’t piss off someone in about thirty seconds, especially when he hadn’t even spoken to the person. So why did this girl look like she was planning on placing him on her hit list?

“Park Chanyeol and Byun Baekhyun?” the teacher asked suddenly -- Baekhyun didn’t exactly care enough to remember his name -- breaking the silence, making him jump. Before he or Chanyeol could say anything, the teacher continued on, in a considerably monotone, annoyed voice. “You’re late. Go find a seat.”

Baekhyun tried to give his best annoyed look at the girl, and she turned away, before scanning the class for a seat.

There was one in the back of the classroom, and one next to the girl. The Girl was what he was going to call her, he decided. He was never the best with names anyways, and the built-up resentment of having to change schools in his senior year -- senior year, for god's sake -- was making him grouchy with every mere movement someone made in front of him. Before he could sit down, however the teacher (he could call the teacher “The Teacher” too, he thought halfheartedly) frowned at him and Chanyeol again. "Boys?” he asked, looking pretty much done with everything. Baekhyun felt the same. “Sit down. The tall one can go sit beside Miss…” he jabbed a finger at The Girl, and she seemed to cringe back into her seat like she wanted to disappear. He saw her averting her gaze to her hands.

"Iseul," she croaked in a dry voice, not looking up, and Baekhyun decided that he was going to continue calling her The Girl. At least he didn’t have to sit next to her -- he was pretty sure that if he did, he was just going to piss her off even more and he wouldn’t be surprised if she was the quiet type that was secretly plotting his death. It was the quiet ones one had to watch out for.

"Miss Iseul,” The Teacher drawled. “The shorter one can go sit in the back seat. Hurry, you're already late."

Baekhyun really didn’t need a reminder of that.

***

The second time (after the… conflict he had had with her on the first day of school) Baekhyun talked to The Girl was when she tried to kill him. He had been right after all; she had been placing him on her hit list. It was the quiet ones he had to watch out for.

Jongin had always been more of a daredevil than him, so when the younger boy dragged him (dragged, Jongin prefered. More like kidnapped) him out of the detention hall, he knew he was screwed. Baekhyun hadn’t even memorized how to get out of the school properly without Chanyeol’s help, and Jongin was even more directionally challenged than him. Which frankly proved an issue.

And then they crashed into The Girl.

It was somewhat his fault, really, for having a bad fear of spiders, but ever since he had been once pranked with something that involved those small horrors, he never had been the same around spiders. Eight legs and eight eyes -- no. He could not deal with them. So when he demanded at Jongin whether or not he had killed the spider, he definitely wasn’t expecting someone to attack him and demand if he had killed a person.

In fact, all Baekhyun wanted to do was to get the hell out of the stupid school and go home and eat ramen and go on his phone -- and out of the list of things he wanted to do, getting clubbed over the head (or almost) with a horrifyingly thick textbook was not on his to-do list.

Needless to say, when she leapt out from behind one of the hallway walls with a textbook raised and ready to hit his head, he screamed.

When he was young, Baekhyun had loved singing. In fact, he still did, but he rarely did it, since the happiness it brought him wasn’t capable of just bringing happiness anymore -- there was more pain than not. However, he was still able to scream extremely high -- higher than any girl, anyways, and Baekhyun had the habit of screaming whenever he was surprised (it was a bad habit, Jongin told him -- apparently, he already looked feminine enough and screaming wasn’t doing anything to help that fact).

Jongin was quicker than him, having once practiced some form of martial arts (he wasn’t sure which. Was it taekwondo?) -- he grabbed the girl by her neck and caught her in a quick headlock, just as the textbook slammed against Baekhyun’s left shoulder. His body responded immediately, left arm collapsing from pain. He could barely support himself, shoulder flaring in agony from the abrupt attack. The Girl was shouting something, and so was Jongin, but Baekhyun could only concentrate on his shoulder. It hurt like hell.

Finally, after what was probably thirty seconds or so, she stopped struggling and they ended up in a considerably awkward position -- Jongin holding her to his chest, in headlock, and Baekhyun with one hand over . Which was ironic, because his scream had probably been the highest and loudest.

He glared at her, ignoring his shoulder, and she stared back with wide eyes. Jongin was mouthing something at him, but Baekhyun had no idea what. Finally, the taller boy sighed. “If we take that hand away, you’re not going to scream, are you?” he asked, and Baekhyun thought it was incredulous how Jongin could sound that calm.

“If you do,” he muttered, withdrawing his hand. “I’m going to bash your head out with the textbook. Or at least, your shoulder.” Now that his hand was free, he went to grasp his injured shoulder, and her eyes followed his movements. She didn’t look very sorry at all, and that made Baekhyun mad. First she had attempted to call the police on him and his friends, and now she was going around hitting him with textbooks.

The moment she seemed to recover from the surprise, questions began to spill out. “Who are you?” she demanded, and Baekhyun wanted to hit his head against something. “Who did you kill? Who are you running from? Why are you-”

Today, he realized. Was going to be a long day. Goodbye, he thought solemnly. Goodbye ramen. I guess I won’t be having any today.

***

When Baekhyun woke up with a killer headache and blurry vision, he wasn’t too surprised. He had had hangovers before; the discomfort was nothing new. However, when he tried to roll over on Chanyeol’s bed and promptly tumbled off onto the floor, he was rather confused. Chanyeol’s bed that he sometimes slept on was a queen sized one; even Baekhyun rarely fell off it. And then he tried to lift himself from the ground, only to result in slamming his head against a tea table, his still sleepy brain decided something wasn’t right. And when had Chanyeol’s house become so cold?

The guest bedroom in Chanyeol’s house, where Baekhyun had crashed in too many times to count, did not have a tea table. To think of it, in fact, Chanyeol’s house didn’t have a tea table. So what the hell was a tea table doing here, now? He blinked, trying to get the sleep out his eyes and scanned his surroundings.

He came to a final conclusion.

This was not Chanyeol’s house.

Baekhyun had known Chanyeol for at least fifteen years, and the taller boy had never moved once. Baekhyun could recognize his best friend’s house better than his own, and this was not it. Neither was it Jongin’s, or Kyungsoo’s.

Then he realized that he wasn’t wearing his own clothing -- his or Chanyeol’s. Or even Jongin’s. And the blanket that he had somehow managed to entangle himself in in the course of the night had an unfamiliar smell to it (not a bad one, necessarily)-- and then he saw the photo frames that hung around the perimeter of the room.

There were four photos in all, and nothing was out of the ordinary with them all -- until his eyes landed on the fourth one. Baekhyun did a double take at the girl in the photo; there was no doubt that it was The Girl. And even if his head hurt like hell and he wanted to collapse onto the ground and stay there, he could still put the pieces together -- he was at her house. The thought itself was horrifying in itself, and then he looked down at his clothing and decided that right now was the perfect moment to scream.

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