Upon hearing the awful scream of his two friends, Donghae ran towards where it was coming from. It’s weird, isn’t Heechul supposed to be in the living room? Why is his sound coming from the guest room at the further end of the corridor? “무슨 (musuen)...?” he hurriedly opened the door to the guest room, only to see the two sitting side by side on the bed, staring intently at each other. He, too, joined in the “staring competition” as he stood with his mouth agape. “Hyung? I thought you were supposed to be sleeping on the living room’s couch? Why are you in the guest room?” He walked towards Heechul and pulled him away from Hani, who remained in the state of shock.

“Hani-ya, did he do anything to you?” Donghae went closer to Hani and pointed sternly at Heechul whole he asked her. “아니, I don’t think anything happened” she looked down and fidgeted with the blanket awkwardly. Who knew it would be such a coincidence that the person she can’t seem to face the most, ended up beside her on the bed? “Look what you’ve done, hyung!” Donghae reprimanded Heechul while pushing him out of the guest room and nagging endlessly. “I didn’t even do anything???” Heechul grabbed Donghae’s hands to stop him from pushing him further away from the room because all he wanted to do now is to go up to Hani, explain things and to talk to her about what LE told him. 

“Why is Hani even at your house?” Heechul pushed Donghae aside and walked towards the direction of the guest room again. “Hyung, don’t you think it’s not a good idea to head back to the room right now? I know you have many questions and things to say to Hani right now, but we should leave her alone until she’s ready to talk” Donghae pulled Heechul to a stop and brought him to the living room to talk. 

“I was looking for her since yesterday afternoon” heechul spoke, “if only I knew she would be here, LE and I wouldn’t have been so worried” he continued as he sipped on the cup of coffee made by Donghae earlier. “What in the actual world did you guys do to upset her? She wasn’t in a very good state when I picked her up yesterday night.  Now that you mentioned about you and LE, is there something going on between the two of you?” Donghae started bombarding the confused Heechul with questions as he was pretty curious about what took place that made the two who used to be close to become this awkward.

Heechul took a breath and sighed. 

“Firstly, there’s absolutely nothing going on between LE and I. Moreover, we aren’t even close to begin with”

“Then how do you explain ‘you and LE’ being worried for Hani?”

“LE asked to meet me to talk about something that happened to Hani”

“But why would she do that?”

“Maybe because I’m close with Hani? That’s not the main point here. The issue here was that Hani might’ve misunderstood LE and I while we were talking in the cafe, just like how you thought there was something between us two”

“And then? What happened after that?”

“The problem is that I don’t even know what made her so upset? The moment she saw the two of us, her expression become solemn and she ran out from the cafe. We kept chasing for her but eventually lost her in the crowd. We tried calling her and look around the dorm area but couldn’t find here. I’ve been thinking very hard about this, but can never come to a conclusion why was her reaction so big”

Donghae’s POV

Hearing from Heechul hyung, it does sound a little weird for Hani to have such an exaggerated reaction to something small like that, but, matching it with what Hani told me yesterday, could it be what I’m thinking that it might be...?

“I’ll talk to her in a while, so you should get going first” I told Heechul hyung as I persuaded him to head back home while I’ll try to sound things out. It wasn’t easy trying to chase him away so that I can finally get to work to find out what’s going on that causing all these unnecessary tension between these people.

*knock knock*

“Hani, it’s me, Donghae oppa, may I come in?”

“네, 오빠 (Ne, oppa)”

“Are you okay? I apologise for whatever that have happened to have cause you stress and worry in the morning” I spoke up first while I took a seat on computer chair beside the bed and looked at her. She seemed to be still in a daze, but definitely looking better than the condition she was in yesterday.

“아니요 (aniyo), please do not apologise to me. I was the one who troubled you to take me in, and on top of that, nothing much happened for you to say something like that, so please do not worry”

“Hani”

“Yes?”

“I have something to ask you, but, you may choose to remain silent if you do not wish to answer. This is just my wild guess and assumption, so, if you really find it uncomfortable, please let me know and I’ll stop probing”

“Mmm” she nodded her head in agreement, looking a little clueless as to what I was about to question.

“Yesterday, you mentioned that there is someone you like and you were upset because you saw this person with LE at a cafe right?”

“Yes”

“Do I know this person?”

Hani kept silent for a moment before nodding her head.

“Is this person in SM?”

Hani nodded her head again, but this time, I could see her brows starting to frown a little while she played with her fingers, avoiding any eye contact with me.

“Hani, is Heechul hyung the one you’re talking about?”

There was nothing but silence for a very, very long time. None of us spoke nor moved an inch from where we were. It felt as though time had stopped for that moment while waiting for an answer.

“It’s okay, like I said earlier on, you do not have to answer if you do-“ 

“Yes” I was abruptly cut off by Hani as she muttered a feeble answer to affirm what I had guessed.

“I see”

“Please don’t tell him, I don’t want our friendship to be ruined like that”

“Sure, you have my promise, but Hani, I think you have misunder-“

“Oppa, I have troubled you long enough, I guess I should make a move. Thank you so much for being there for me, and for lending me a hand when I needed it the most” Hani stood up and walked towards the door before I could even explain anything. Heechul hyung, what should I do?

A/N: did you guys guess the mysterious guy correctly? Now that Donghae knows what going on, what do you think he will do?