It was honestly an accident.

 

Yixing had been stressing over his Korean exam for nearly two weeks, his confidence in the language not nearly high enough to be testing in a class meant for people who were basically fluent before the course even began. He still stumbled along his words every now and then, or forgot some simple vocabulary that would have been a no-brainer in Chinese. The pressure had sky-rocketed when he remembered this test was thirty percent of his final grade in the class, and he’d nearly started crying. Cram study sessions were packed into his schedule at every free moment, and sleep had quickly become obsolete.

 

His friends saw next to nothing of him, calls and texts left unanswered for days on end. They all were well aware of how important passing this exam was for him; this was the third time he’d retaken the class due to a failing grade. It wasn’t everyday conversation the brunette struggled with, he was nearly fluent, but any longer vocabulary words taught a month or more into the course somehow managed to escape his brain every time he tried to grab a hold of them. The first two years he was so so so close to passing, both times getting his hopes up only to be completely crushed by the end of the course exam. The worst part was that the entire test changed from class to class, so he had next to no clues for what to expect.

 

Fast forward to the morning of the exam, a cheap cup of coffee sloshing around in Yixing’s death grip and bag slung over his shoulder and he dragged himself up the steps to the university. He was running on less than three hours of sleep, sacrificing rest for more time to pack his head with foreign adverbs. His mind was jam-packed with idioms, stress, syllables that felt unnatural in his mouth, stress, circles and lines that created different sounds, and stress.

 

Yixing entered the classroom with a bitter taste in his mouth that was from more than just the slightly disgusting coffee he’d just downed, dragging his feet to the furthest row from the front and dropping his shabby bag by his feet. The empty styrofoam cup he’d been holding was quickly forgotten as he shoved it down into the depths of his bag, tempted to just throw it on the ground but not quite tired enough to forget himself completely. He took pride in his unwillingness to be someone careless enough to forget about the environment around them; including both living and non-living surroundings.

 

He settled his chin into both of his hands, elbows resting on the hard wood of his desk and palms cupping his cheeks. He mentally reviewed everything from the previous night in his head, panic starting to clog up his throat when he started to blank out on some of the simpler vocabulary words he hadn’t even bothered to study, already wedged so far into his brain that it had seemed like a waste of time to even think about. Crap.

 

So when the professor had walked in, sadistic grin blanketing her features and arms full of worryingly thick packets of paper, Yixing had a moment of such helpless desperation that he just screamed out a what the hell in his head and clasped his hands together in front of his face, murmuring a prayer to whatever god happened to be listening to his plea to just pass this freaking course already. He decided to throw some Korean in there just for the irony of it, but ended up mumbling so much that it just ended up as a strange concoction of syllables that mixed together to create abstract sentences that Yixing was pretty sure made close to no sense. Oh well.

 

The college student’s moment of weakness was cut off by a loud scraping noise coming from of one of the glass windows near the front of the classroom, a crack that seemed to have appeared out of nowhere now marring the thin glass like a threatening bolt of lightening. Yixing blinked quietly at the nearly broken glass, puzzled as to why no one else in the class seemed to have noticed the interruption. He had half a mind to question his professor when she passed by to drop of the exam, but thought better of it when he saw the sharp glare being sent his way by her. It was understandable; Yixing really didn’t want to sit through her class for a fourth semester either.

 

-

 

This was it.

 

This was the question that was going to doom him for the third semester in a row, and he was going to get stuck in this class again for the fourth time and that was if he didn’t just drop out from frustration.

 

The fine black print loomed in front of him, slowly blurring into a patch of dark ink as he read and reread the question over in his head. It asked that he write a lengthy paragraph describing a novel by some obscure Korean author he’d never even seen the name of before.

 

Not really his strong point.

 

Yixing let his eyes flick up to the clock for the fifth time in the last minute; a headache building when he once again saw the amount of time left dwindling down to less than ten minutes. There were still over five unanswered questions left on the next page, so the brunette forced himself to leave the black lines blank and hope he’d done well enough to be able to lose a few more points.

 

Scribbling down his best guess on the last few questions, the college student let out a deep, resigned sigh as the time finally ran out. He unclenched his fingers from around the wooden pencil, noticing shallow imprints on his fingers left behind from the wood. He watched with unsettled eyes as the professor began to pick up the exam packets from each desk. Yixing didn’t miss the short pause when she passed by him.

 

“Alright everyone,” she said in a considerably cheery voice, “test results will be out on Monday. Enjoy your weekend, don’t stress too much over it. You’re all dismissed.”

 

Yixing immediately stood up, eager to leave the hell that was his foreign language class. The bags under his eyes had grown worryingly dark over the last week and his current plan was to get to his apartment as fast as possible and sleep for roughly forty-eight hours.

 

It was a fleeting thought that the window was no longer marred with a crack when he exited the room.

 

-

 

The bus ride back to his apartment was painfully long, and there were sweaty bodies bumping into him from every direction. Yixing’s bag strap applied an uncomfortable pressure onto his right shoulder; he was beginning to regret shoving in an extra textbook before class in case there was any need for last minute studying. Not to mention the sharp edge of something a the bottom of his bag that had been digging into his knee for the last ten minutes.

 

Yixing eagerly shoved his way to the exit of the bus when his stop was finally called, choosing to ignore the few swear words tossed his way as he wiggled though the crowd. It was with a wave of relief that he slipped through the exit, feeling more exhausted than he had in weeks. A hot shower and warm sheets were gradually becoming more and more appealing.

 

Yixing’s fantasizing was abruptly cut off with the shrill sound of his ringtone, a default song set on his phone when purchased. Yixing cursed when he realized it had been jammed into the bottom of his bag earlier and shuffled over to a nearby bench in order to dig through his belongings and find it. It took him roughly two minutes and three more phone calls to locate it. Upon sliding his thumb across the bottom of the screen to answer, Yixing was greeted with his best friend’s rapid questions.

 

“Xing! How’d it go? Why did it take you so long to answer? Were you still in class? Yixing if you’re still in class and you get caught by your freaking professor I swear—”

 

“Lu,” Yixing cut him off with a chuckle, “I’m not in class. I just couldn’t find my phone for a bit. And it went...well? I think.”

 

“You think?” Luhan’s voice was hysterical, and Yixing had to wonder why his friend was more concerned over his test scores than he was himself. “Xing, you are not taking that freaking class for a fourth time in a row under any circumstances. You have been fluent in Korean since your trip two years ago. Now lay it on me. How. Did. It. Go?”

Even through a crackly phone speaker Luhan was intimidating.

 

“It honestly went pretty well, Lu. Toward the end there were some...slightly more difficult questions that I really had no choice but to skip, but besides that it was better than last year. I think.”

 

Luhan’s exaggerated sigh was clearly audible though the phone. “You know to never leave a question blank! How many times have I told you its better to write complete garbage as an answer instead of leaving it blank! Honestly, how many? Who knows, maybe you’ll get some weird type of partial credit. Just—God, please just don’t come crying to me when you have to retake the class again.”

 

Yixing let out a resigned sigh—that was the fourth one today—and hung up the phone without a goodbye. He knew Luhan was right; it was always smarter to write a word or two to show there was at least an ounce of effort put in. He had been stupid, but the last thing he wanted to do right now was spend another twenty minutes arguing over his future on the phone with the most stubborn person on earth. Luhan was his best friend, but he could really be such a tough person to deal with at times. This was one of those times.

 

On the brighter side of things, a feathery breeze was beginning to dampen the sharp heat that’d been following Yixing around since he’d left school. He was still two blocks away from his apartment, but at least the possibility of sweating to death was no longer too big of a threat.

 

The brunette slung his beige bag back over his shoulder and began to trudge forward, motivated by nothing but the slightly crappy air conditioning and hard mattress awaiting him at home. He bumped shoulders with a few people due to his line of sight being constantly directed at the dull, cracked sidewalk, but managed to block out the curses thrown at him with a pair of slightly tangled earbuds plugged into nothing but the lint in the pocket of his sweats. It was surprisingly effective.

 

Yixing nearly skipped inside when he reached his apartment complex fifteen minutes later, relieved to be back inside an air conditioned building. The landlord, who was wandering around the lobby in search of something to do, offered a half-hearted greeting and a slight smile. Yixing returned it, as usual.

 

“Sure is hot today,” The man said in a slightly scratchy voice, absently tapping wrinkled fingers along a nearby counter top. “Surprised you didn’t come straight back when classes ended.”

 

Yixing furrowed his eyebrows, letting an amused smile grace his features. “I came straight here after exams, Sir. I always do, especially in heat like this. Surely you can’t be old enough to get memory loss just yet?” He raised an eyebrow at his landlord and crossed his arms. He honestly just wanted to go up to his apartment and sleep, but he was afraid leaving too soon would translate as rudeness. And although they were close, Yixing relied heavily on his acts of kindness to allow him a bit of wiggle room each month when rent was due. He had a hard enough time feeding himself.

 

A broke college student in it’s truest form.

 

The man rolled his eyes, letting a smile scrunch up his own face. “Nonsense, one of your friends came here to wait for you in your apartment hours ago! He seemed to know exactly where he was going, which was a bit strange considering I’ve never seen you bring any friends but Luhan around, much less ones who are so charming. But really, do tell him to leave his cat at home next time? There is, in fact, a no pets policy around here.”

 

Yixing slowly blinked a few times. “I’m sorry, who exactly did you let into my apartment?”

 

“Your Korean friend! Jongdae, was it?”

 

“Jongdae?” he repeated slowly, “You’re sure that was his name?”

 

The landlord gave a thoughtful expression before nodding. “Yup, that’s what he said. Although, there was a bit of a language barrier, so who knows. Now stop lingering, he’s been waiting for a while! Wouldn’t want to make his trip here a waste, now would you?”

 

Yixing had yet to make a movement, still digging around in his head for a memory of someone named Jongdae. His trip to Korea hadn’t been that long ago, and although his memory tended to fail him every once in a while, he remembered every detail perfectly; including every face and name that he’d encountered while overseas.

 

Jongdae wasn’t one of them.

 

Forcing himself not to panic, he bid the man in front of him goodbye with a forced smile and turned toward the elevator, knuckles turning white from the grip he had on the strap of his bag. He jabbed the button a bit more aggressively than usual, tapping his foot to keep himself distracted. In seconds the metal doors pried themselves open, and Yixing stiffly walked into the small space. He hit the small button with a glowing three in the middle, and took a deep breath. Don’t panic.

 

By the time he’d gotten to his floor, he’d began to rationalize with himself. Really, what were the chances a complete stranger from another country could just happen to know his name and apartment complex? It was a completely ridiculous notion, and it was probably just one of his friends from Korea coming to give a surprise visit and giving a fake name to his landlord to give him a little scare. It was most likely Jongin, now that he thought about it. The dancer had mentioned quite a few times about how he’d been hoping to get into this one studio in China, and there was always a chance his landlord had actually gotten the name wrong. Jongin, Jongdae; they sounded quite similar. He was scaring himself for no reason.

 

Upon reaching his door and fishing the key out of his bag, nearly all the worry had dissipated. A smile was slowly growing on his face in thought of seeing Jongin again; he’d been practicing a new routine that he knew the Korean boy would love.

 

He nudged the door open, glancing around his living room for his friend. Seeing no one in the area, the brunette announced his arrival in understandable, albeit slightly broken sounding, Korean. The only response was a small meow from near his feet.

 

Yixing was allergic to cats.

 

The college student weighed the pros and cons in his head, trying to determine if it was worth it to be sneezing for the rest of the day to give the gray kitty a few pats. He could’ve sworn Jongin had explicitly said he was a dog person, but it wouldn’t be a surprise if the constant studying had altered his memory a bit.

 

He ended up throwing caution to the wind and scratching the cat behind his ears, feeling pleased when a loud purring began to erupt from the small animal. He began to yell Jongin’s name again, telling the Korean boy to come into the living room so Yixing could greet him like a proper friend. It was moments later he heard a grunt in reply, coming from the hall near his bedroom. Not even trying to resist a smile, the brunette pulled away from the kitty and shuffled over to the other side of the apartment.

 

"Jongin! Why didn't you tell me you were stopping by? Also since when did you—"

 

Yixing stopped. 

 

"...own a cat."

 

There were a few things wrong with this situation. The first, most obvious, being that the man in front of him was most definitely not Kim Jongin.

 

The second being that he was about eighty percent sure said stranger was wearing his clothes.

 

The third being, and this might just be the lack of sleep talking, the stranger had a small set of horns on his head.

 

"Hello," the stranger with beautifully high cheekbones said brightly, waving a hand that was partially covered by a sweater Yixing had tossed onto his bed earlier.

 

Now, Yixing had not had many experiences with robbers in the past. In fact, he'd had zero. Not to mention this stranger seemed a bit too friendly to be a robber and possibly had horns on his freaking head. So, the college student took a short moment to analyze the situation.

 

There was someone wearing his clothes, standing in his bedroom with a pair of horns on his head whom he'd never seen before in his life.

 

Okay.

 

Yixing needed a game plan.

 

He decided to start by asking the most obvious question.

 

"Who the hell are you?" The brunette said in a slightly higher pitch than normal, hand slipping inconspicuously into his bag to get a grip on his largest textbook in case he needed a weapon. The stranger raised an eyebrow at him, glancing around as if there was another criminal besides himself Yixing would be addressing. He pointed a finger to himself in question, and Yixing replied with a short, incredulous nod. All he got were a few confused blinks.

 

"Okay. Alright, play stupid. I'm calling the police," the college student said cautiously, not taking his eyes off the boy in front of him. It was honestly a shame to get someone so cute arrested, and truthfully he wanted to keep the cat, but there weren't exactly a lot of options for this situation.

 

"Wait!" The boy said suddenly, holding a timid hand up in protest. The familiar Korean word caught yixing's attention, and he cursed at himself. Of course the stranger wasn't fluent in mandarin. His name was obviously Korean.

 

Switching languages, Yixing tried once more. "Who are you?"

 

The stranger was clearly less confused this time, even going as far as to crack a smile at the evidently strung out brunette. His posture began to relax, smile pulling itself a bit wider before he replied.

 

"You called me here. Zhang Yixing, right?"

 

Yixing, mostly terrified but a bit curious, tersely nodded.

 

"I go by Jongdae where I’m from, but you can call me Chen if it suits your taste better. You called me up earlier today, but I couldn’t manage to get into the room you were in, so I decided to just wait for you here. Sorry about the clothes. I had gotten some when I was still home, but they burned off on the trip up here. Nice to meet you, Yixing. I’m your new demon bud.”

 

There was a short moment of silence before any response was heard, the offered hand of the stranger going unshaken.

 

"You're my what?"

 

"Uh, demon bestie, evil minion, pal from hell, whatever you want to call me. Here to solve your problem. That's the simple way to put it. You really should have done some research before summoning me up, Xingie. Demons are a pain to get rid of if you don't summon them for a specific reason."

 

Another stretch of silence passed.

 

“Okay,” Yixing said quietly, talking more to himself than the boy in front of him. “Alright. I’ve gone insane. I’m currently hallucinating. Okay.”

 

He’d begun to shuffle away from the demon(?), avoiding the confused stare locked on his moving form. A slightly shaking hand reached into his bag as he increased the distance, digging around for a few seconds before settling on his cell phone. Upon getting a good grip on it, he suddenly launched his bag across the room as a distraction and ran backwards, locking himself in the small bathroom ten feet away from his bedroom.

 

Yixing sat down on the cold toilet seat and took a deep breath. Okay, so there was someone in his apartment who thought he was a demon here to serve Yixing like a loyal servant. Okay.

 

First things first, he needed to call Luhan.

 

It took a few moments of fumbling with the small device to find his friend’s contact name due to his slightly shaking hands, but the second he pressed call it was like a lead weight had been lifted off his chest. Luhan would fix this. He would know what to do.

 

Hopefully.

 

“What now,” he heard Luhan’s voice deadpan through the speaker, the sound an immense relief. Yixing took a short moment to pull himself together before blurting his situation into the phone.

 

“There is a Korean man in my house who claims to have come from hell and he has a cat and pets aren’t even allow in these apartments? He won’t get out of my room and I don’t know if he’s a robber or-”

 

“Xing!”

 

“-what?”

 

“Shut up for a second.”

 

“Right.”

 

Luhan loudly sighed, the repercussions of his breath in the receiver causing Yixing to pull away for a moment. “Okay, you need to slow down. So someone’s in your house? Are you sure you don’t know him? I know studying has been making you a bit forgetful and he may be someone you met in Korea trying to pull a prank-”

 

“I don’t know him. I’m sure. I would have remembered someone like that,” Yixing replied in a slightly lower voice, mumbling in more of a whisper toward the end, “He just showed up. Do you happen to know anyone named Jongdae?”

 

“Nope,” was the reply, Luhan popping the ‘p’.

 

“He’s about my height, straight reddish-brown hair, really, um, pretty lips, high cheekbones, sorta cat-like eyes-”

 

“Nope. Not familiar. Sounds a bit like you have the hots for him, though.” Luhan said with a chuckle, obviously less worried about the situation than he should’ve been.

 

“I’m-what?” Yixing scoffed, “No! Luhan, be serious. I could...I could have a murderer in my home! He might be here to assassinate me for all we know!”

 

“I’m not here to assassinate you. Didn’t we just go over this?”

 

Yixing froze, breath catching in his throat.

 

He turned slowly to the right, hands slightly shaking. His eyes slowly lifted from the ground to the (previously) empty bathtub that the voice from moments ago had sounded from, landing on an uncomfortably familiar form bunched in a ball with a angel-like innocence in his expression. Jongdae looked like a wounded puppy, but that didn’t change the fact that he had definitely locked the door.

 

A shriek erupted from Yixing, eyes flying back and forth between the demon and his still closed door. He scrambled off the toilet seat, walking backward to the door and blindly grabbing around for the doorknob. Jongdae looked overwhelmingly offended, and a split second later he was standing less than a foot away from Yixing and staring him down while resting his own hand on top of the brunette’s, effectively stopping him from opening the door.

 

Jongdae stared into the college student’s wide eyes with a small scoff. “What is your probl-”

 

Yixing’s vision had gone black before the other could finish his sentence.

 

-

 

Warm. Everything was warm. Why was everything so warm?

 

Yixing blinked his eyes open, an upcoming complaint about the heat caught in his throat when he realized he couldn’t move. At all. His arms felt hot-glued to his sides, emphasis on the hot, and his neck felt as stiff as a metal pole. He was sweating in places he didn’t even know could sweat, the feeling on his tongue was akin to a mouthful of cotton balls, and the worst part was he wasn’t really sure why.

 

Strange memories began to flood into his head, of purring cats and a cute boy with horns on his head with a knack for teleportation. It was rare for Yixing to have such vivid dreams, and he wondered with a small smile what Luhan would think when he told him about it. His friend always dreamt of the strangest things—maybe it had finally rubbed off on him.

 

Yixing wiggled around a bit more, initial disorientation rubbing off to reveal that he was just wrapped extremely tightly in the comforter from his bed. He squinted at the ceiling a bit more, recognizing it as the one in his living room after a few seconds. He squirmed for a few more moments, wiggling his arms out of the cocoon once it was loose enough. With his arms free he could pry the rest of the blanket off his body, and he sighed in relief when the cool breeze of the fan above his head hit his sweaty skin.

 

“What are you doing!?” A frantic, unfamiliar voice came from behind him. Yixing furrowed his eyebrows, wondering if Luhan had brought one of his friends over to visit him. Then again, why would a friend of Luhan be so concerned over Yixing unwrapping himself from an encasement of blankets? Not even Luhan himself would find it in himself to be concerned over such a thing, really.

 

Yixing stretched his arms above his head, letting out a yawn as he turned around. He kept one eye shut, not having adjusted of the bright lighting of the room yet. “Could you get me a glass of water?” he said sleepily, not yet having looked at the owner of the unfamiliar voice. “My mouth feels like a des-” Yixing stopped when he made eye contact with the boy standing across the room, standing frozen with an extra blanket in his arms. “Oh, god.”

 

Jongdae unfroze upon realizing Yixing was not, in fact, going to have another breakdown from seeing his face. “Actually, I’m from the other guy, but whatever suits your tastes.” He said lightly, advancing toward Yixing until he was close enough to put the blanket he’d been holding at the brunette’s feet.

 

Yixing just stared, completely blank expression on his face.

 

“Do you realize how long it took me to get you in that blanket?” Jongdae continued, unfolding the one he’d just brought in. “All that effort just...poof, gone. I appreciate that lots, Xingie. I even made soup, so if you aren’t better within an hour I’m going to just let you die.” After spreading out the blanket a bit on the ground in front of the sofa Yixing had been sleeping on, he sat himself down on the coffee table a few feet away from it. Like this they were face to face, only a few feet of space separating them.

 

Yixing continued to stare, deciding to just take this as a dream and go along. Because that was obviously what this was. A dream. Right.

 

“Okay,” He began slowly, clearing his throat a bit. He had to think a bit when speaking Korean. “Why did you wrap me in a blanket, exactly?”

 

“Because you’re sick? Obviously,” Jongdae said in a no-nonsense tone, propping one hand up on his hip.

 

“And how...” Yixing said, waving his hands around a bit to get his point across, “did you get that impression?”

 

“Oh. Well, you fainted earlier, I think. So I asked the person in your smartphone what it means when a human faints and she told me it means they’re sick. So then I asked how to help a human stop being sick, and she told me to keep them warm. So then I thought-”

 

“Okay, stop for a minute,” Yixing cut him off abruptly. “Person in my phone? What are you talking about exactly?”

 

“Oh, you know,” Jongdae said casually, pulling Yixing’s cell phone out of the pocket of his sweats and ignoring the glare he was on the receiving end of. “This, um- thing.”

 

Yixing watched curiously as Jongdae tapped around a bit on his phone before smiling widely, turning the screen back toward the brunette to showcase the screen that came up when using Siri.

 

“That’s not-” Yixing sighed. “Never mind. So you’re, um, a demon? Right?” He said carefully, glancing up at the small horns on top of the boy’s head.

 

It’s just a dream. Calm the heck down.

 

“Yep,” Jongdae replied with a smile, flicking his head a bit to get his bangs out of his eyes. “Believe it or not, this is actually my first time coming to the surface. For some reason no one likes to summon me...” he said, trailing off at the end. “But no worries! I’ve been studying for like, a billion years, so I’m not an uneducated animal or anyth- ah!” Jongdae flinched violently, looking down to see the small gray cat from before with it’s teeth locked around his ankle. He rolled his eyes. “What the hell, Minseok!”

 

Yixing watched the feline growl a bit before unhinging it’s jaw from Jongdae’s foot, briskly walking away with a few flicks of it’s tail. He aggressively ignored the fact that Jongdae spoke to the animal like a human friend. He managed to last a good twenty seconds before letting out a loud sneeze.

 

“See!” Jongdae said with raised eyebrows, motioning toward Yixing, “You are still sick! Now get back under the blankets and-”

 

“I’m allergic to cats,” Yixing deadpanned, rubbing at his nose absently.

 

The demon’s eyes widened. “Oh.” he glanced behind himself, trying to spot the kitty. “Minseok! He’s allergic!” Jongdae yelled across the house. Yixing rose one eyebrow. “Minseok!”

 

“Give me minute, you little brat! I’m putting clothes on!”

 

Just a dream. This is just a dream.

 

“So...” Yixing said casually, eyes glued in the direction the new voice had come from, “Who was that?” He was proud of himself for keeping the tremors out of his voice, considering he was on the verge of throwing up out of fear.

 

“Hm?” Jongdae voiced, turning back toward the brunette. “That was Minseok, silly. I’ve said his name like five times now. If I’d known you were allergic to cats I would’ve told him to change earlier, sorry ‘bout that. He’s what you might call...my bodyguard? Yes, that seems like a good term for it,” Jongdae finished, nodding a bit to himself.

 

A second later another man walked into the room, once again in Yixing’s clothing. He was a bit shorter than Jongdae, a bit more muscular, and far more intimidating. A scowl adorned his otherwise adorable features.

 

“Bodyguard?” he spit out, acid in his tone. “I’m assuming you meant baby sitter, little brat.”

 

Minseok rolled his shoulders with a grimace. The muscle tee he’d chosen to throw on was one of Yixing’s tighter fitting items, and the student was much more lanky, resulting in an almost laughable picture. It was quite a sight paired with the old pair of pants Yixing had cut to an uncomfortably short length for a halloween costume a few years back. Minseok squinted his eyes at Jongdae, who was very obviously restraining a smile. “Are you laughing at me right now?”

 

Jongdae’s smile dropped a bit, but it was quickly replaced with a mischievous smirk. “I’m not the one dressed like a stripper, Minseok,” he countered in a matter-of-fact tone, and Yixing shrunk back into his seat a bit more.

 

Minseok cracked his knuckles.

 

“You little-”

 

The end of his sentence was left a mystery, cut off abruptly by the slam of the front door of Yixing’s apartment. The loud bang was followed by the sight of a slightly rugged looking boy with blond, ruffled hair and labored breathing standing in the now open doorway. He was dressed in a mix of pajamas and casual clothes, sporting soccer ball covered pants and a ratty black t-shirt. On one foot was adorned with an untied white converse shoe, the other covered in nothing but a neon green sock, but the expression on his face was enough of a distraction to draw attention away from his clothing choices.

 

He looked positively murderous.

 

“Yixing,” he said slowly, speaking between labored breaths. “I just took two separate taxis and ran three blocks to get here under the impression you’d been viciously murdered. You better give me a damn good excuse for why I’m not looking at your dead body right now after that phone call earlier.”

 

Yixing stared at his friend in silence, swallowing heavily. This was a worryingly realistic dream.

 

“Who’re you,” Minseok spoke flatly, scanning the newcomer with his eyes a few times. He was completely tensed up, as if the blond could actually pose as a threat to anyone in the room. The fact that he still hadn’t caught his breath was enough of an indication he wasn’t at optimum fitness.

 

“Who’s asking?” The blond replied, raising an eyebrow in challenge.

 

“Luhan,” Yixing interrupted, glancing at Minseok out of the corner of his eye. “Hold on. Why are you here?”

 

“Why am I here?” Luhan mockingly repeated. “Oh, sorry, was your phone call earlier informing me that there was a stranger in your house that knew your name and may be here to kill you not an indication that I should show up?”

 

Yixing scrunched his eyebrows. “But-”

 

“Oh, and should I add the fact that shortly after telling me he may assassinate you the call abruptly ended with a scream and a crash? Sorry if I read the situation wrong, I’ll just go wait outside so you can entertain your guests some more.”

 

“Luhan, wait,” Yixing said quickly, rising from his spot on the sofa and pushing past a confused Jongdae to follow his friend out the door. He was stopped by a sturdy hand on his wrist, which was quickly shaken off with a sharp jerk of his arm. Jongdae made a small noise of disapproval at the action, but made no further attempts to stop him.

 

“Luhan,” he repeated, shutting the door behind him and following the blond down the hallway. “Look, just listen-”

 

Luhan turned toward the brunette abruptly, crossing his arms with an irritated expression on his face. “Okay, I’m listening. Tell me exactly what happened.”

 

Yixing gulped.

 

“Right. Uh,” he started unsurely, trying to decide on the most plausible excuse he could give his friend. “He’s a student?”

 

Luhan squinted. “A student?”

 

“Yes!” Yixing nodded enthusiastically. “From abroad! I applied to have him stay with me a few months ago, didn’t I tell you?”

 

“No, you didn’t,” Luhan replied suspiciously, still less than convinced.

 

“It had just completely slipped my mind earlier, to be honest. Like you said, the exam has been stressing me out and messing with my memory. That’s why I was so panicked when I called you. Yeah,” Yixing nodded while he spoke, as if reassuring himself that the story was completely plausible.

 

“Xing, you said he had horns.”

 

Yixing froze. “Yes! Um, he was trying to...be funny! Wearing fake horns when he met me! Haha, sure got me there, didn’t he?” the brunette continued, voice shaking slightly. “Anyway, no need to worry, I’ve got everything under control. Completely,” he finished, slowly beginning to nudge his friend towards the elevator at the end of the hall. He had slightly bigger problems to deal with at the moment.

 

“Wait,” Luhan spoke suddenly, stopping in his tracks. “If Jongdae is the student you’re housing, then who was the other guy?”

 

Yixing looked at his friend with wide eyes. “Oh, Minseok? He’s obviously Jongdae’s, uh,” he swallowed. “His cousin! He lives in the area, so he wanted to help Jongdae move in. Yeah.”

 

Luhan’s eyebrows furrowed. “Then why isn’t Jongdae staying with-”

 

“Ah!” Yixing cut his friend off abruptly. “I just remembered that I have a pizza in the oven that’s going to burn! I better get back to that. Seeya later, Lu!”

 

With that Yixing gave the blond a final shove into the elevator, jabbing the close-door button with his thumb and giving a friendly wave. Luhan responded with string of sentences full of colorful vocabulary.

 

The confirming sound of the two metal doors meeting each other in the middle finally allowed Yixing to release the breath he’d been holding. He was rather impressed with himself for how well he’d handled the situation, considering how smart his friend was. Luhan was known for his ability to see through lies like a they were polished piece of glass.

 

After a few more deep breaths to calm himself down, Yixing turned back toward the menacing sight of his closed apartment door. The urge to just nail a few wooden boards over the exit and make a run for it was overwhelming, but Yixing managed to convince himself to choose the more logical choice, which was apparently to go back inside the room housing two demons that were handicapped in the usage of technology. What an exciting notion.

 

He walked back toward the door with measured steps, counting a total of eighteen paces before he was back in front of the menacing piece of wood. Yixing’s shaking hand reached toward the doorknob, the student feeling like one of the stupid actors in a horror movie that just couldn’t mind their own business in order to live. He flinched. What a comforting thought.

 

The sight that greeted him on the other side of the door was also less than comforting. Jongdae had shifted over next to Minseok, the former wearing a pout on his face. Minseok looked vaguely confused and vaguely irritated.

 

Yixing cleared his throat loudly, immediately catching the attention of his guests. If you could call them that.

 

“So,” he spoke unsurely. “I think I deserve an explanation. I mean, I honestly need to be actually convinced this isn’t a dream first, but I’ll...deal with that later. So. Who’s gonna talk first.”

 

Jongdae stood completely still, staring at Yixing with a flat expression on his face that had been present since the latter had reentered the room. A split second later his entire face lit up, a plethora of thoughts written across his face. “I remember this! I learned this in my first year of training!”

 

Minseok eyed him warily. “What are you talking about exactly?”

 

“How to convince someone they aren’t in a dream, of course. Hold on Xingie, I got this. You know humans can’t feel anything while dreaming, right?”

 

Yixing furrowed his eyebrows. “Um. Sure, I guess. Wait, why are you coming closer-”

 

Seconds too late Minseok let out a sort of screech, reaching out a hand to stop the young demon, widening his eyes when he realized what was happening, but only the tips of his fingertips grazed the other’s arm. “Dammit, Jongdae! No!”

 

Those words became the only warning Yixing was given before he was suddenly less than a foot away from Jongdae and there was a hot, searing pain bolting like lightening down his left arm.

 

“Agh!” Yixing shrieked, pulled away from the tight grip Jongdae had secured on his wrist. His vision began to cloud as he looked down at his arm, instantly seeing a ring of red, burnt skin circling his hand. The heat Yixing felt was overwhelming, and he was tempted to sprint across his apartment to soak his entire body in a bucket of ice water. He probably would have if the scorching pain in his arm wasn’t rendering him immobile. “What the hell!”

 

Minseok grabbed Jongdae by the shoulders and pulled with enough force to make the boy stumble back and nearly lose his balance. His face had gone completely blank again, the only giveaways of his inner-emotions being the blankness to his eyes and the unmoving gaze he had directed toward his own hand. Jongdae swallowed deeply as he clenched and unclenched his fingers, furrowing his eyebrows as his eyes flickered between a whimpering Yixing clutching his arm and his own that caused the damage.

 

“We need to bandage your wrist, Yixing,” Minseok said calmly, his foreign accent butchering the Chinese boy’s name slightly as he reached toward the brunette’s hand. His reaction to the situation disturbed a still shaking Yixing, who almost heard...annoyance in his voice. Not an ounce a worry, really.

 

Jongdae, on the other hand, was on the verge of a meltdown.

 

His lower lip quivered slightly as he desperately tried to explain himself, sputtering out his words in half-sentences. “I didn’t mean- I wasn’t trying to-”

 

“Jongdae,” Minseok cut him off with a flat voice, hands still busy trying to wrap Yixing’s wrist. “He’s human. Something as small as a pinch from you could break his arm. Did you really think a using even a low level voltage combined with your strength wouldn’t effect him?”

 

Jongdae pouted. “It’s just supposed to be a small shock though! How could I have known he’d be so delicate-”

 

That’s just it, though,” Minseok interrupted again. “You need to know these things. Why do you think it took so long for you to be put on the list of the summonable? You’re irresponsible, you may have passed the tests but clearly the information wasn’t retained.”

 

Yixing stayed silent throughout the exchange, feeling as though he were intruding on a private moment. The pain in his arm had disappeared rapidly, now just feeling like a bruise that got a bit too warm.

 

-

 

The room was silent except for the quiet voices coming from the TV. Yixing sat on a chair in the kitchen, glancing up to look at Jongdae accusingly every now and then before returning to nursing his hand. Minseok had gotten frustrated with them and become a cat yet again, curled into a ball at the demon’s feet and causing yixing to hold in a sneeze every now and then. Jongdae was just pouting, staring at the floor with his lower lip jutted out the tiniest bit.

 

"Hey," Yixing spoke quietly, breaking the tension of the room just barely. "How long is this going to last? This whole- um- demon, thing. Like, do you need to crash here for a night or two then return back to the mental hospital you came from or like, are we talking more than a week?"

 

Jongdae looked up at him, face a bit brighter due to the fact Yixing was actually acknowledging him again. He didn’t reply immediately, stopping to think for a few moments about what to say. "I can't leave," he finally replied, paired with a small nod.

 

"Okay," Yixing said through gritted teeth. "Care to elaborate?"

 

"I told you earlier," Jongdae sighed. "You have to call me for...a specific reason. There has to be something for me to solve. An accidental summoning is almost unheard of, that's why this is rarely a problem. Honestly, I still don't understand how you could accidentally summon anything. But I'll trust your word."

 

Minseok stretched out at the demon’s feet, a deep purr sounding from the feline. Yixing looked at the cat with disgust in his eyes, covering his nose with one hand before looking back to Jongdae.

 

"Okay, so you're stuck. I got that. Do you necessarily have to stay with- well, me? Is that some part of the weird demon code thing?"

 

Jongdae rolled his eyes. "Of course not. I don't have to stay in your house. I just can't get more than a mile away from you at any time, or...well, we'll know when it happens, I guess."

 

"That doesn't make sense," Yixing replied with furrowed eyebrows. "You came here after I...um, ‘summoned’ you during my test, and this apartment is over three miles away from the college. Is this some kind of sick joke to you?"

 

Jongdae rolled his eyes, taking a deep breath before replying, “That’s because we hadn’t come in contact yet. There are a lot more rules to this than you realize. I can explain them all if you’d like.”

 

Yixing squinted at the demon doubtfully, shaking his head before returning his eyes to his injured hand. He wanted to comfort himself by continuing to see this as a dream, but couldn’t bring himself to ignore the glaringly obvious pain in his wrist.

 

“Alright,” the brunette finally spoke after a long moment, “I think this is a situation where the less I know the better, so I’ll pass you up on the list of rules. You can stay. But we’ll have to make this even. If you have rules that I have to follow, then I get to set rules that you have to follow.”

 

Jongdae brightened immediately, connecting his thumb and second finger to create an “OK” sign with his hand. Minseok growled.

 

The demon watched as the human began to jot down said rules on a piece of paper, resignation in the student’s eyes. He let one side of his mouth lift into a sly smile, narrowed eyes twinkling.

 

“I can live with a few rules.”

 

-

 

 

 

Jongdae slid down the wall of the kitchen, head in his hands and wet plate in his lap, the dirty dishrag he’d been clutching onto teetering dangerously off the edge of the counter. The shards of a glass cup were scattered around his feet, the third one to break from his hands that week.

 

Minseok sat at the dinner table with a raised eyebrow, forcing back the chuckle that was tickling his throat.

 

“I can’t do this. Minseok, I really, really can’t–”

 

“Jongdae, no offense, but it up. It’s been three weeks and all you’ve had to do is wash dishes. If I were in the kid’s place you’d already have been kicked out to the streets three weeks ago. If you really hate it here, you could always just go back home-”

 

“Minseok! Be quiet! What if he’s right next to the door?” The young demon cut him off, glancing around nervously. “And no,” he spoke in a whisper, “I- I need experience. What would Joonmyun say if I came back so quickly? He’d think I’d failed and given up, and then I’d never get to leave that horrid place again-”

 

“Jongdae,” Minseok placed a light hand on his shoulder, “The plan was two weeks. You told me you wouldn’t get attached.”

 

Jongdae pouted, looking offended. “I’m not getting attached! It’s just a bit nice to have a friend to-”

 

“I’m home!”

 

Jongdae’s mouth immediately shut, head snapping toward the door with excitement painted across his features. Minseok rolled his eyes, standing up and walking to his own room. He liked the student, he really did, but Jongdae needed to snap out of it. This wasn’t their world.

 

“Xingie!” Jongdae yelled across the house, leaping up from his spot on the ground to greet the student.

Yixing had been gone for less than an hour, dropping by the store down the block to pick up groceries for dinner, but with the boy usually around 24/7 Jongdae felt his absence within minutes of hearing the door shut. The student had decided shortly after taking the two demons into his home that it was much easier to just watch their every move rather than spend the entire day outside and worrying about it. Recently, he’d begun to trust Minseok a bit more, enough to let him spend small amounts of time alone in the small apartment. Jongdae, on the other hand, still caused him to flinch whenever the young demon picked up a glass.

 

Over the thirty-one days that the duo had spent together (Minseok rarely spoke to either of them; he preferred to spend his days in cat form stretched across a window sill) an unspoken deal seemed to have undeniably formed. If Jongdae stopped mentioning the fact that he was...not exactly human, Yixing would be significantly more tolerant, which in turn meant less threatening to call the police on the redhead. It’d gotten Jongdae into the habit of stealing the brunette’s beanies to cover up his horns, although he also thought they were quite fashionable. They’d grown to have a twisted sort of friendship through it, the student’s willingness to hold conversations leading him to learn that Jongdae hadn’t been aware that about eighty percent of human technology existed yet, which quickly had become a major source of entertainment. The material he had studied back in hell was a bit...outdated.

 

 

 

 

It had begun five days after the initial accidental summoning crisis. Yixing had woken up early for once in his life, and felt a burst of inspiration to choose a healthy breakfast alternative. He grabbed every fruit he could find in the small apartment (three bananas, five strawberries, and an overripe orange), chopped them all into bite size pieces, and threw them into a blender. During the process, a certain redhead had appeared behind him, silently watching every movement of the student with utmost concentration. His face had scrunched up in confusion when the blender came into play though, and he tapped the brunette lightly on the back when the ingredients along with a handful of ice were poured into it.

 

“Ice? Do you prefer to eat cold food?” Jongdae had questioned innocently, “And don’t humans usually eat fruit out of bowls?”

 

Yixing’s movements halted for a moment at the question, a nearly soundless chuckle falling from his lips before he placed one hand on top of the blender and used the other one to press the ON button–

 

The effect had been instantaneous.

 

The demon let out a noise akin to a screech, jumping behind the brunette with urgency and digging both hands into his shoulders to insure his shield stayed in place. His eyes were blown wide, watching the appliance with dangerous intensity. Yixing’s eye twitched at the pain in his shoulders but he tolerated it because the whole situation was making him want to burst out laughing. He kept the machine on for a ten more long seconds just for his own amusement before switching it off and turning around to face the boy behind him who was nearly shaking.

 

“You okay, there?” Yixing had whispered with a smile, one hand absently rubbing at the nail indentations left on his shoulders. He’d think of them as battle scars.

 

“I- yeah. Yeah, I’m good,” the demon had replied casually, straightening his posture and stalking out of the room with one eye twitching slightly.

 

 

 

 

Since the event Yixing had introduced the red-head to devices such as microwaves, toasters, mixers (the demon nearly started crying), and several other similar kitchen appliances. They’d learned to tolerate each other quite well through the experiences, and could spend long amounts of time in the same room as each other by the time the two week mark had passed. It was progress.

 

So when Jongdae came sprinting across the house daily to greet his beloved human at the door, Yixing barely batted an eye at him, offering a teasing smile because of how eager the demon was to see him, and then aggressively denying the notion that he expressed any form of friendliness when questioned by Minseok hours later. It was a routine the two rehearsed constantly, and they had it down to an art at this point. They hated each other as long as they weren’t in the same room–

 

Except today was different. And Jongdae didn’t appreciate that very much.

 

He’d rushed up to Yixing’s side with fervor as he had every day before, an affectionate greeting on his lips when he saw that his human had brought someone home. Jongdae straightened his posture, remembering the etiquette Yixing had taught him, and looked the stranger up and down. He looked oddly familiar.

 

“Jongdae,” Yixing said in a cautious voice, ripping the demon’s attention away from the strange man in their apartment, “This is Luhan. You’ve briefly, um, met before. Say hi.”

 

“Hello,” spoke the stranger, raising an eyebrow.

 

Jongdae jutted out his chin, squinting slightly at the boy. He made a small noise of distaste before turning toward the student again. “I’ve met him?” he asked with irritation in his tone, switching from Mandarin to Korean.

 

Yixing took a deep breath.

 

“Yes, Jongdae, you have. Remember the first day you came here and Luhan mistook you as a robber? But I later cleared it up for him and informed him that you were just a student from Korea studying abroad. Remember now?”

 

Jongdae’s eyes widened. “Oh! You’re the one who wore the ugly socks! I know you,” he said cheerfully, stretching out a hand for Luhan to shake.

 

Luhan looked at the offered hand with slight distaste, grasping it lightly and shaking it once before pulling his arm back. Jongdae scoffed.

 

"Minseok!" Yixing yelled across the apartment, "Come meet someone!"

 

The three stood in silence for a few moments, waiting for a reply that wasn't coming. The brunette forced a laugh.

 

"I'll go get him," he said awkwardly, "Lu, please be nice. I'll be right back."

 

Luhan raised an eyebrow at Jongdae, eyeing the beanie on his head for a few moments before crossing his arms. Jongdae faltered under the piercing look he was on the receiving end of.

 

"So you're a student?" The blond said lightly as he crossed his arms, voice just barely hinting at his distaste. He was better dressed today, wearing tight jeans and an oversized black sweatshirt. His hair was once again quite tousled, but unlike their last meeting, it was on purpose. Jongdae looked down at the boy's feet, smirk on his face as he remembered the neon green socks he'd been wearing before. Today he wore slightly scuffed sneakers.

 

"Yes, that's right," Jongdae finally replied, mimicking the blond's pose. "I'm a student."

 

His eyes flicked toward the direction of Minseok's room, silently begging his human to come back. Yixing had told him the story they were sticking with about the demon merely staying in China abroad, but it'd been weeks ago. Jongdae was blanking out.

 

"So what's your major?" Luhan countered, squinting. Something was off here.

 

“Ah, yes, my major,” Jongdae said slowly, nodding. “My major! Haha, yes, my major. That, um. Hm.”

 

“Yes,” Luhan said with a twisted smile, “What is it exactly?”

 

“My major?”

 

“Yes, Jongdae. Your major. What is your major?”

 

“Ah, good question. Well. My major is-”

 

“Music!” Came a scream from the next room over, Yixing entering seconds later with Minseok being dragged in by the arm. “He’s a music major, Lu.”

 

Jongdae nodded with a smile, observing the tiny beads of sweat dotting the student’s forehead. Minseok must have been in a bad mood today.

 

“Hm. Okay, that’s cool. I know some people in the music department,” Luhan spoke casually, turning away from the redhead and towards the new arrival, who still had steam coming out of his ears. “And who’s this?”

 

“Luhan, Minseok. Minseok, Luhan.” Yixing said dramatically, pushing the moody demon towards his friend. Luhan smirked, looking him up and down.

 

“Minseok, huh? Well, Minseok, you are very cute. Are you a fan of soccer?”

 

Minseok froze, turning toward Yixing who was standing behind the blond. Yixing nodded rapidly, mouthing words to him.

 

“Ah, yes. I love soccer!” Minseok said enthusiastically, plastering a smile onto his face.

 

“Oh, my god. Seriously? Xing, you didn’t tell me your friends were soccer fans!” Luhan said with excitement, voice gradually getting louder as he inched toward the clueless demon.

 

Minseok’s expression faltered slightly when he saw Yixing aggressively shaking his head, putting his thumb and forefinger an inch or so apart to show a small amount. “Wait, no,” He spoke suddenly, causing Luhan’s face to fall.

 

“What do you mean, no?”

 

“I, um, like soccer. Not love. I am a medium level soccer fan,” Minseok improvised, panicking slightly. What the hell was soccer? He could’ve sworn he’d heard the word before.

 

Luhan squinted at him. “Okay, weirdo. What’s your favorite team?”

 

Minseok blinked at him. Team. There are teams? It must be a sport. I’ve heard of sports. There must be balls, most sports have balls. I can do this. Just act natural-

 

“Is it Manchester United?” Luhan continued, “It must be. You’re too cute not to like them. I’m right, aren’t I?”

 

Minseok nodded slowly, ignoring Yixing who was mouthing intelligible phrases behind the blond.

 

Luhan’s face lit up like a child on Christmas morning.

 

“Perfect! The game’s on right now but Xing here is a boring old fart who refuses to watch with me. Go sit down, I’ll make popcorn!”

 

Minseok’s face went blank as Luhan began to push him toward the living room, desperately looking back at Yixing for help. The brunette just shrugged, knowing he was powerless at this point. Luhan had already chosen his target.

 

Jongdae, who’d been silent through the exchange, let out a sigh.

 

“I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

 

-

 

“Hey, cutie. Are you okay?” Luhan asked ten minutes into the game, beginning to get suspicious of the other’s behavior. Minseok had pushed his entire body into the corner of the couch, pulling his legs up to his chest and rubbing the back of his hand against his mouth every few minutes. Not a single word had come out of his mouth, even when Luhan nearly had a heart attack the first time the ball was stolen from his favorite player. The blond was getting, dare he say it, concerned.

 

Minseok paused in his fidgeting and looked toward the other boy, raising his eyebrows. Had he been acting strange? Maybe it was because he hadn’t eaten any of the snacks the human brought yet. He wracked his brain for the lessons on human behavior that had been jam-packed into his memories years before. He came up empty handed, and decided it must be that he hadn’t eaten.

 

“Yes, I’m fine,” he replied, cautiously reaching toward the bowl of popcorn on the table. He took a large handful, trying to ignoring the stare boring a hole into the side of his face. Leaning back against the couch, Minseok brought his hand to his mouth, stuffing every last kernel in and storing what he couldn’t swallow in his cheeks. Luhan squealed.

 

“Oh my god, you are so adorable!” he yelled, launching himself at the unsuspecting demon. Moments later Minseok found himself laying back against the couch, arms pinned by his sides and another face hovering worryingly close to his own. He blinked blankly, not understanding what he’d done to cause this reaction. Was the food not meant to be eaten?

 

“Hey, guys, what do you want for-” Yixing voice came from the kitchen, becoming louder with each of his steps before cutting off completely once he caught sight of the two. “Oh. Um, this is awkward. Well I’m making spaghetti. Have fun with- uh, that.”

 

“Wait!” Minseok screeched, wiggling out from the blond boy half-heartedly. Luhan’s eyes hadn’t budged from his face. “I want butter on my noodles, not red sauce!” The demon continued, remembering the italian food night the three had cooked the week before. The sauce was too rich for taste buds that only ate actually food once every few years.

 

“Minseok,” Luhan deadpanned, capturing the wrist that had wriggled out of his grasp and pushing it back against the couch. “Go on a date with me.”

 

Minseok choked on air.

 

“I’m- Excuse me?”

 

“I’m cute, you’re cute, I like soccer, you like soccer, we’re a match made in heaven. So go on a date with me. Hm?”

 

“I met you fifteen minutes ago!” Minseok sputtered incredibly.

 

“Your point?” The blond asked, raising an eyebrow. When he got no response but a desperate expression he smiled. “Xing, me and cutie are going to the coffee shop down the street. Be back in an hour!”

 

Yixing and Jongdae watched silently as Minseok was forcefully pulled out of the apartment by the blond, choked noises coming out of his mouth as the door shut behind them. Jongdae looked between the door and his human a few times, disguising a chuckle as a cough and walking back into the kitchen.

 

“Jongdae?” Yixing said, trailing after the demon into the kitchen. “What about the one mile rule?”

 

“Hm?” the demon answered, pausing his fiddling with the utensils left on the counter. “The what?”

 

“The whole, like, you can’t get more than a mile away from me thing. The coffee shop is three miles away, won’t it be a problem?”

 

Jongdae stopped moving completely, turning around to face the student. “O-Oh, that. Yeah, since he’s just here to watch me it doesn’t, um, apply. So it’s fine. Yeah.”

 

“There’s something you’re not telling me, isn’t there?” Yixing inquired, coming closer. Jongdae’s eyes stayed on the floor. He didn’t reply. “I’ve been noticing things. Like when I tell you I’m going down the street and then I drive to the Luhan’s place, which is further away than my college, and nothing happens.” He’d cornered Jongdae against the counter, putting an arm on both sides of the boy so there wasn’t any avoiding him. “Yet when I tell you I’m going somewhere even slightly far, you put in every effort to stop me. Something’s been...off, for quite a while and-”

 

“Do you not want me anymore?” Jongdae butted in, voice barely above a whisper. “That’s why you’re saying this, isn’t it?”

 

“I’m not- w-what the hell are you talking about?” Yixing stuttered, alarmed. “I’m not your owner, Jongdae. You’re talking as if you’re a dog!”

 

“But you really are, aren’t you?” the demon replied, lifting his head to look Yixing in the eyes. Their faces were inches away from each other. “I live in your house, I’m fed by you, I have to try every day to not screw up because if you lose interest in me then I have to go back there. I can’t go back, Yixing, I really can’t.”

 

“Stop. No one owns you, Jongdae, stop thinking like that. And even if I did get sick of you it doesn’t matter! You can’t leave if you wanted because this was all an accident!” The student’s voice had gotten progressively louder as he spoke, and he’d come even closer to the demon in the process. Their noses were centimeters away from each other.

 

“Yeah, I guess that’s why you kept me around. ‘Cause you couldn’t get rid of me if you tried. If you knew, I’d have been gone by the second day, wouldn’t I?”

 

Yixing froze, eyes falling from the redhead’s eyes to his mouth, then back up again. “What are you talking about?”

 

“I really should tell you, shouldn’t I? I’ve been really selfish these past few weeks. This is where it stops, then.”

 

Yixing was beginning to panic. He pulled back a few inches, but kept his hands in place on the sides of the demon. “Jongdae, I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.”

 

“I’ve been really, really selfish Xingie. I’m sorry,” he whispered, looking blankly at a spot on Yixing shirt. “I lied about it. All of it. I could go back whenever I want, theres no stupid ‘one mile’ rule, it doesn’t even matter if you call a demon for a reason or not- In fact, I could go back right now if I wanted to! Nothings stopping me, is it? I hate it here anyway, with all you delicate humans and delicate dishes and delicate feelings and- ”

 

“Okay,” Yixing cut him off, breathing heavily. “Stop, please. I need to- to go think. Somewhere. I’m not-” he cleared his throat, blinking a wetness out of his eyes. “Sorry.”

 

Jongdae watched in silence as the brunette left, pulling back from the demon slowly before running out of the front door of the apartment. The redhead chuckled as he felt a wetness on his cheeks. “Pull yourself together,” he scolded himself as he slid down the counter onto the floor. “Stop crying,” he tried again. It didn’t work.

 

 

 

-

 

 

It was awkward.

 

Two days had passed since the confrontation, and the silence of the apartment was stifling. Jongdae had locked himself away in his room, not bothering to eat anything considering it wasn’t even required to keep him alive. He just laid in bed, burrowed into one of Yixing’s sweatshirts, and stared at a spot on the wall, ignoring the hesitant knocking on his door every few hours, commonly paired with a quiet mutter of his name. He hated to admit it, but he was scared. Scared the second he let himself out and faced the situation he’d be forced to go back. Back to that prison. Back home.

 

Yixing wasn’t much better. He got up every few hours to make himself snacks, but he hadn’t left the apartment once since returning on the night of their fall out. Minseok had initiated conversation every time he caught sight of the brunette, explaining that Jongdae hadn’t meant any harm, but was always met with silence.

 

The two were in a competition of sorts, and whoever hid themselves away to avoid repercussions longer won first prize. They could’ve gone on for weeks, months even, if it had been a different time of year. But winter was rolling in, and winter was the season of storms.

 

Towards the beginning of the third day was when Yixing first looked out the window and saw the clouds rolling in. He wasn't surprised, and went back to his room not thinking much of it. There was a thunder storm coming, one to signify the beginning of the wet months. It inevitably happened every year.

 

By mid-afternoon the clouds were centered in the sky, and rain had begun sprinkling the houses will a fine layer of mist. The temperature has dropped a few degrees, and the student, who was very sensitive to cold, already had a sweatshirt on and a blanket over his shoulders. He was nursing a hot mug of chamomile tea in his hands when he glanced at the redhead's room for the first time. He forced his eyes away though, and thought no more of it.

 

The sun had just set when the first rumble of thunder was heard. 

 

Yixing was cooped up in his room at the time, three blankets on his legs and a laptop in his hands. The heater in the apartment had been broken for months, resulting in the brunette hoarding all the blankets to himself. He almost felt bad for Jongdae, almost, but decided to ignore the guilt in favor of taking another sip of tea. It was when the first flash of lightening lit up Yixing’s room that he looked towards the demon’s room a second time.

 

The storm worsened as hours passed, rain progressively getting harder and thunder getting louder. The gusts of wind came every so often, rattling the windows and making the walls creak. Ropes of rain fell from the sky, banging watery fists against the ceiling of the apartment relentlessly. When the windows rattled for a fifth time, Yixing finally left his room with the excuse of putting his mug away.

 

Th kitchen was dark, the only lighting in the room being from the flashing lightening from outside. It was then that Yixing looked at Jongdae’s door a third time, and didn’t stop himself from walking toward it. He padded over to the room silently, hands stuffed in the pockets of his sweats. He stopped inches from the door, pressing an ear lightly against the wood. It was quiet.

 

“Jongdae?” he said softly, knowing that the demon heard him. He always heard him.

 

The only response was a muffled whimper, the sound clearly made from under a blanket. Yixing swore under his breath, wiggling the handle of the locked door desperately.

 

“Jongdae, let me in. Come on,” he pleaded, twisting the handle as far as it would go. The door wasn’t budging. “Please.”

 

There was hopeless silence for a long moment, long enough that Yixing had begun to take a step back from the door. He was preparing to leave when the handle made a quiet click, turning in a full circle and allowing the door to crack open. The brunette immediately took the chance, shoving the door all the way open and barging into the room. It was pitch black inside. He rapidly blinked his eyes, waiting for his sight to adjust to the darkness. Just when general shapes were beginning to materialize, a familiar form flung itself at him, arms wrapping tight around his waist and a face burrowing itself into his shoulder.

 

“Hey,” he spoke quietly, gently returning the embrace. Jongdae’s body shook slightly as another boom of thunder echoed in the room. “It’s okay. It’s just a storm, Jongdae.”

 

The demon didn’t reply, only tightening his grip around his human with a whimper. Yixing noticed his body was shaking, probably from the cold. He instantly felt a wave of guilt, seeing a single blanket left crumpled in the middle of the demon’s bed. He pulled away the hug, rubbing his hands up and down Jongdae’s arms to provide a little warmth. Upon getting no reaction, he slid his hands all the way down until they met the redhead’s chilly fingers, wrapping a hand around Jongdae’s and tugging him out of the room.

 

“I have more blankets in my room,” he clarified as they crossed the apartment, Jongdae flinching when another strike of lightening lit up the living room. He gave a small nod as reassurance that he was listening. When they reached the door Yixing tugged the demon in front of him by the hand, nudging him inside. The dim light of his laptop screen gave the room a warm atmosphere, the piles of blankets on his bed looking cozier by the second. Jongdae’s face lit up at the sight, the demon pulling his hand free from the brunette’s and diving under the pile in search of warmth and isolation from the sound of pounding rain. Yixing watched with a fond smile, hopping onto the bed himself and tugging the blankets over himself. Jongdae’s head peeked out from under the covers, the demon pausing for a moment before scooting towards the brunette and wrapping his body around his human. Icy fingers wiggled their way under Yixing’s shirt and settled his stomach, stealing the pleasant warmth of his skin. Yixing flinched at the shock of temperature but didn’t pull away.

 

“Sorry,” Jongdae said eventually, breaking the silence with a lethargic whisper. Yixing felt the redhead’s hands curl into fists against his skin. “Please don’t hate me.”

 

Yixing shushed him, shifting onto his side so he could look the demon in the eye. “Don’t say that. You know I could never hate you.”

 

He lifted a cautious hand as he spoke, eventually resting it on Jongdae’s cheek. The demon lifted his eyes to meet the human’s, instinctively pushing his face into the warm palm. Neither of them spoke.

 

“There’s something else I lied about,” Jongdae finally said, breaking the silence. He’d finally stopped shaking.

 

“Hm?”

 

“Remember when I said I hated it here?” the demon asked. His eyes were focused on the lower half of the student’s face. He brought his own hand up to cup Yixing’s face, eyes unmoving. “I lied.”

 

The next second any words that might have been used as a response were long gone, a soft, innocent press of lips turning both brains to mush. Jongdae’s hand had shifted up to the brunette’s head, thin fingers latching onto the silky brown strands and holding on for dear life. He didn’t dare let himself breath for fear that he might ruin the moment.

 

Yixing was first to pull away, eyes searching Jongdae’s face for something he hadn’t realized he’d been looking for. Finding it, he pulled the redhead into his arms, tangling their legs together and pressing his lips against the demon’s forehead. Jongdae fully accepted the hug, enjoying the affection when a paralyzing thought hit him and he stiffened.

 

“I still have to leave, don’t I?” he mumbled into Yixing’s chest, holding onto the material of his human’s sweatshirt with tight fists.

 

Yixing pulled him in tighter, resting a hand on the demon’s back. He pretended to be in thought for a few moments, rubbing his thumb in circles against Jongdae’s spine.

 

“I think I’d be okay with you sticking around for a while. Besides, don’t you want to see your bodyguard’s relationship bloom? I don’t think I’ve ever seen Lu so infatuated with someone he’s known less than a week.”

 

Jongdae relaxed, chuckling as he pressed a feather-light peck to Yixing’s neck. “Yeah, I guess thats a chance I shouldn’t pass up. Besides, I should probably be around to help you plan out our wedding, shouldn’t I?”

 

“Jongdae.”

 

“Hm?”

 

“Don’t push it.”

 

“Whatever you say, babe.”