The alarm clock goes off exactly at 7.30 a.m., which instantly wakes Sehun up from slumber. He remembers well what day it is today, so he rolls out of bed and goes to the bathroom to take a quick shower, before slipping into his school uniform. He walks into the kitchen to make some toast and milk for breakfast. After he’s done eating the breakfast, he grabs his backpack and put on his shoes.

As he stands right before the door, he takes a deep breath to relieve himself, praying silently to God to let him live the day alive and well, before turning the doorknob and walking out of his house.

Sehun looks around to the surrounding where he lives, catching sight of the newspaper man on the bike, throwing the newspaper from his basket to everyone’s front yard, except for his. He doesn’t subscribe to that newspaper anyway.

When he’s about to walk to school though, he catches a sight of a little something on the ground. He picks it up from the ground, and realizes that it’s a white feather he’s holding in his hand.

Suddenly he’s got a really weird feeling running through his spine, something that feels cold but warm at the same time, which makes him shivering. He doesn’t know what makes him feel like this, but it sure is strange. He passes the feather off as nothing extraordinary as he lets the feather swaying to the ground, slowly but surely, and then he leaves for school.

BAM!!!!!!!

The sound of the closing locker door makes Sehun winces. Before he knows it he’s being shoved next to a trashcan, and he feels pain shots up his back. The odor from the trashcan brings out his senses, and he immediately jolts up, albeit the pain on his back has become sharper than anything. He whimpers in pain when the bullies who pushed him just a few seconds ago crouch down in front of him.

“Hey, kid, you think you can mess with us?”

Sehun dares himself to look up at them through his eyes covered by his bangs. He doesn’t mean to give them a challenging look; this happens all the time, he’s used to it, so it doesn’t mean he holds any grudges with them, but he’s not used to the pain. Not ever. So the look that the bullies can clearly see through his bangs leads to the leader taking him by his collar.

“If only you didn’t make my lunch wasted, you wouldn’t have to go through this.”

“But it was an accident,” Sehun tries to defend himself. He always does when he gets this treatment. He even gets it when he’s only walking pass by them without doing anything. And this time he really didn’t mean running into the bullies who were carrying their lunch to their usual spot. He even apologized earlier before being dragged into the locker room, but they’re just that irritated with Sehun that they really can’t let it go.

The leader raises his fist, ready to punch Sehun square on the face, and Sehun knows it’s the time to close his eyes.

But after waiting for a moment, the blow never comes.

He opens one eye to the ground, where he finds the fist that was aiming to his face earlier is safe on the leader’s side. He breathes a sigh of relief only slightly before realizing a figure standing on the doorway with a straight face and a rather creepy stare.

“Who the hell are you?” The leader lets go of Sehun, immediately focused at the stranger who has just interrupted them. The stranger shows no sign of fear, and he also steps towards him. Sehun notices the tall height the stranger seems to possess.

“Who are you to cause so much pain to the innocent ones?” The stranger speaks in a deep, sharp tone, bringing surprises to pretty much everyone in the room.

“Y-you-what? Innocent?” The leader points at Sehun in a rather unbelieving manner. “He’s at fault! He bumped into me and turned my lunch into a mess! That’s unforgivable, you know!”

The stranger gives him a look that says Are you kidding me? and continues to speak. “You think such trivial things are unforgivable? So you think what you did to him is unforgivable?”

“He needs to pay for my lunch, and being the poor kid he is, he has to pay in this way! So it’s only fair if we did this!” Sehun feels insulted hearing the leader’s words, but he just keeps quiet, he doesn’t bother to fight back, instead, he just clenches his teeth to calm his heart.

“I don’t really get the way you think. It was meant to be an accident and he also apologized already! So you really need to beat him up in a locked-up room with your petty friends who only know how to follow along?”

The leader grits his teeth before throwing his fist to him, before being caught by his very own target. The stare on the stranger intensifies as he moves the fist in his hold and the leader starts feeling his bone inside his hand dislocating. Before the stranger really breaks his fist however, he lets go of the leader’s fist immediately, the latter holds his own fist in a vain attempt to make the pain go away. His henchmen crowds around him, asking if he’s okay.

“Ugh…I’m fine,” the leader forces the answer out of his mouth. Without glancing back, he makes his leave from the room, followed by his henchmen. He finds that the room is still locked. The leader gets a bit spooked but he thinks of another logical possibility to it, and leaves the room after unlocking it. He or his henchmen doesn’t even bother closing it back.

That leaves Sehun slumping back side to side with the locker cold on his currently less-aching back, closing his eyes as he once again sighs in relief. He almost forgets about the stranger who helped him earlier, but by the time he remembers, he’s already gone.

Sehun sighs again, but this time in disappointment. He doesn’t even get to say thanks to the stranger, who seemed to be a student from his school as well. He figures he may just meet him somewhere in the school building to thank him, maybe in the cafeteria later? Since the guy knows about the accident and his apology to those bullies. He decides to just slide it off for now.

When he gets up from the floor though, he notices another small white feather, except this time it floats in the middle of the air before falling on the ground, right on the spot where the stranger once stood there. Sehun doesn’t know what to think about this, but he gets the weird sensation running down his spine, like what he felt this morning when seeing the same object. Or the same looking object. Whatever that is, Sehun shrugs it off again.

Except this time, he mentally notes to himself to keep this matter in the back of his head.

So until school ends, Sehun has been trying to find his savior who possesses a tall height and deep voice that differs from his youthful face, but he’s not succeeding at all. He tries going around cafeteria (at the same time careful not to bump into the bullies again) and around but he still doesn’t find him. When the school ends and he needs to go to work, he notes to himself to find this guy tomorrow.

Part-time job is much more endurable for Sehun, since he’s working on a bubble tea shop, and it just so happens that he likes the drink. Luhan, the full-time worker there often treats him with chocolate milk tea that Sehun really likes so much without telling the manager. But he only does that when it’s reaching dusk though; when their job is close to end.

That afternoon though, he didn’t expect someone with familiar tall height comes walking into the shop. He even grabs a seat and waits for a waiter to serve him; in this case it’s Sehun.

“Yah, Sehun-ah.” Luhan interrupts him from his spacing out activity, and points to the general direction of the new customer. “Go serve the customer over there. Don’t just stare at him as if you’re seeing some kind of monster.”

Sehun heaves a sigh and approaches the customer, trying to put on his friendliest smile to show. He then remembers the whole ordeal in school again, and the smile starts to become more genuine.

“Hello,” he starts, but then he’s at a loss of words. The customer a.k.a. his savior looks up to him with a wide grin and equally wide eyes, drastically different from the hard stare he possessed before, which makes Sehun taken aback. The smile can pass off as creepy, but there’s this kind of weird aura underneath that Sehun feels drawn to. He feels the aura is kind of familiar though.

Trying to snap himself out of the daze, Sehun shakes his head and blinks so many times while his lips (it’s just a habit, really) to gain his composure.

“Well, uhm, I want to say thank you for your help at school…”

“Oh, you only come for that?” The guy sitting in front of him makes an adorable expression when he talks, certainly not matching with his deep voice. “Well, don’t worry about it. I’d always be happy to help if those bullies ever come to you again.”

Sehun doesn’t know what else to say so he nods once and gives the customer the menu. “Tell me what you’d like to order.”

“Oh.” The stranger takes a look at the menu, but as time passes by, he doesn’t seem like he understands what’s written on it. The younger isn’t bothered though. He’s used to people taking a long time to make their order.

When the customer snaps his head from the menu though, the waiter jumps slightly at the sudden move. “Which one that you like out of this?” He points to the menu.

“Does it matter?” he asks in pure curiosity, only to get curious eyes from another. “Well, I like to drink chocolate milk tea, but—”

“Then I’ll order that!” he exclaims while giving the menu back. Sehun nods and gives him a small smile before returning to the counter.

“One chocolate milk tea,” he says, which prompts Luhan to make the order immediately. While making the chocolate milk tea though, the elder keeps seeing his younger co-worker glancing at the table of that customer with the wide grin, and a knowing smile spreads on his face.

Sehun thinks Luhan is acting weird though, with all the smiles he throws on him, but he doesn’t bother with it. He accepts the chocolate milk tea that the guy ordered to be brought to his table.

The guy looks so happy when Sehun comes to serve his drink, and he immediately says, “Thank you, Sehun-ah!”

That instantly stops Sehun, who was about to go back to the counter.

“How did you know my name?” he asks hesitantly.

The guy widens his already-wide eyes, seems a bit panicking, before pointing at the waiter’s nametag. “There. I saw your name over there.”

Sehun looks over his own nametag, and understandingly nods. But that doesn’t really give this stranger the right to call him in such a friendly manner, right?

“You know my name, but I don’t know yours.”

The stranger smiles apologetically. “I’m sorry about that. My name is Chanyeol.”

“Chanyeol,” Sehun repeats. He takes a few steps back before completely turning around, going back to the counter.

“Who is he?” Luhan asks in interest. Sehun shrugs his shoulder before answering.

“Just a friend from school…” He rethinks it over, just wondering whether it’s appropriate to think of him as a friend, considering he just met him today. He thinks it’s weird that he only met Chanyeol today, because in all of his high school years (he’s currently on the second year) he never saw Chanyeol. Perhaps he’s a freshman? Or maybe a new student who just moved from somewhere?

“Do you like him or what?” The question that Luhan asks is like a bomb to Sehun. He snaps out of his thought and shakes his head fervently. “No, nothing like that! He just… he helped me from those bullies… that’s all…”

“Ah, there are still bullies in your school?” Sehun immediately regrets what he has just revealed to the older boy. He never told anyone about the bullying problem, at least anyone outside from school, since he doesn’t really want to let anyone involved into his own problem.

“Why did you never tell me about bullies though?” Now Luhan seems a bit intimidating to him, with his narrowed eyes and all, so Sehun just laughs it off with another shake on his head.

“Nothing, well they just bully people as a joke,” he lies. He doesn’t even like his own lie since it’s clear they bully people for more than just joking. It irritates him deep inside, but he’s got no choice.

Luhan still looks like he doesn’t buy the younger’s lies, but with the sight of another customer coming in, he beckons the younger to serve them.

Sehun lets out a breath, before heading to the customer’s direction.

It’s already Chanyeol’s sixth chocolate milk tea, and Sehun doesn’t understand why the extremely tall boy doesn’t leave for five hours already, always drinking the same drink. Sure, Sehun likes the drink too, but he still thinks six is too much. Plus, he sometimes notices Chanyeol looking at him, and he becomes really self-conscious throughout his working time.

Suffice to say, Sehun thinks Chanyeol is weird. Extremely weird, in fact.

When it’s near the closing time, he approaches the guy who pretends to look out the window, and he seems surprised to see Sehun coming to him, at last.

“Oh, hi.” He shows the wide grin, which never fails to make Sehun taken aback by the weird aura radiating from him.

“Well, are you still going to sit here?”

Chanyeol seems deep in thought for a moment before shrugging his shoulder. “Why?”

“Because we’re closing for the day?” Sehun didn’t mean to say it as a question, but here he is, adding a questioning tone for stating a fact.

“Oh. I see.” At last, Chanyeol gets up from his seat, and he reaches his pocket for money. “How much for all the drinks?”

Sehun tells him the price, and Chanyeol gives him the money.

“Wait,” Sehun stops Chanyeol, who’s finally about to leave, “You’ll need your change.”

Chanyeol just smiles while shaking his head. “No. Just take them all. Think of it as a tip.” Then he steps out of the shop, leaving Sehun dumbfounded.

He decides to leave the tip to Luhan, though.

When he’s about to go home, he finds another white feather on the ground right in front of the shop.

He gets the weird feeling again, and the cold night breeze is really not helping much.

When the next day begins, Sehun wakes up with a jolt on his back. Apparently the pain from yesterday only subsided for a while before returning on the next morning. He hesitantly walks to get some patches to relieve the pain on his back. Once he’s done he prepares himself for school. Before leaving, he prays for another good day to bestow upon him.

He misses the white feather floating from the sky on his back, landing in front of his door.

It’s time for PE class, so Sehun and his classmates change into PE outfits before going into the sports field.

They’re playing basketball this time, and Sehun is actually quite good at it, with his tall figure and all. Even with his hurt back, he can still manage to put the ball into the ring, even though with each shot he needs to adjust himself to the pain soaring up his back.

He gets a few admiring gazes from the girls, but some of them also looks at him in distaste, being a poor kid and not to mention, orphaned as well.

Some of the bullies are also in the same class as him, and they always give him a menacing stare, especially when the teacher comes to him to give him a complement, while asking him to join the basketball team. He always declines the offer though, because he knows the bullies are in it, and they won’t be happy to have him in the team.

When the class is over, all students go to the locker room to get changed. But when Sehun approaches his locker, he finds it wide open, empty from any trace of uniform.

He hears a few of the students chuckling and laughing behind his back, and he doesn’t even need to rack his brain to find out who did this to him.

He turns around slowly, and walks towards the bullies who are still laughing. He his lips before turning up the volume to his voice.

“Please tell me where my uniform is.”

They laugh even louder, and Sehun flinches at the volume. He starts to get irritated, until one of them stops laughing, and confronts him.

“That’s for making our leader’s hand almost breaking apart.”

“But—”

“Find it yourself, if you can.” They start laughing again, before walking out of the room, changed into their own uniform already.

Sehun wants to protest really badly, he wasn’t the one who tried to break their leader’s hand, so he doesn’t deserve all this. He doesn’t have enough money to buy a new uniform at this moment, and it’s really close to the next period, which is math, one that he’s particularly weak at. He doesn’t want to get punished for either wearing his PE clothes for math class, or coming late to the class.

So he doesn’t really have any choices. He goes to search for his uniform, even though he doesn’t know where to start, he still has to find it. He’s gone searching through every part of the school building, from the locker room itself, to the corridor, the washroom, kitchen, cafeteria, everywhere, but he really can’t find even the slightest patch of his uniform at all. He even bumped into a freshman who has a lot of books in his hand. The bumping gives a slight impact to his pained back, he decide to help him out first before resuming to search for his uniform.

After a while searching, he decides to go to the rooftop at last, and the first thing he sees over there is the all-too-familiar tall figure standing there, back facing him.

“Chanyeol?” he calls out to the boy and the elder turns back with a wide grin. Sehun notices the neatly folded uniform in the boy’s grip, and his eyes darken at Chanyeol.

“Are you in this?” he asks accusingly, but the taller only shakes his head, and walks to the shorter boy, handing him the uniform.

“No, but I find it hanging up there,” he points to an antenna fixed on the rooftop, “and I saw your name on the uniform, so I guess they got you again this time.”

Sehun nods once, twice. He’s got his eyes fixed on the uniform, and all of the sudden his eyes start to water. He grabs it from Chanyeol nonetheless.

“I guess…thanks,” he mutters before turning back to head downstairs, wiping his eyes from the tears that threaten to fall.

When he’s already downstairs though, he bumps into the same freshman, who still carries a lot of books in his hand. The bumping is harder, so his back takes a stronger impact, but not strong enough to make it break.

“Oh, I’m sorry…for bumping into you. Again,” he says, rubbing his back.

“That’s okay…this is just the first time we bump into each other anyway,” the freshman says with a smile.

First time? Sehun is taken aback by the younger’s words. “What do you mean first time? We just bumped into each other not too long ago.”

“Seriously, Sunbae? This is really the first time we see each other, in fact,” the freshman deadpans, still collecting his books. Sehun looks over the books spread on the floor, and he notices few of them are the ones this freshman has been carrying around when they bumped the first time, if the first time ever exists.

Nevertheless, he helps the freshman anyway, and heads back to the locker room to change into his uniform, and the time he steps into the classroom, is exactly the time when the bell that signifies the next class rings. Sehun sighs in relief. He does notice the bullies in his class looking dumbfounded to see him in the class on time, clad in his uniform.

He occupies his seat, and not too long after, the math teacher comes into the classroom.

When the class only runs for about thirty minutes, he spaces out for a bit, watching the ceiling of the room. There he sees a white feather falling from it. He knits his brows in confusion, is he hallucinating or something?

The feather falls on his desk, and he picks it up, looking at it with slight interest.

All Sehun does when he’s not serving customer at his workplace is to stare at the white feather he brought from the school. He always feels something weird when he looks at this feather, or the ones he saw from yesterday. He feels warm and cold at the same time, and it’s really fascinating to him. He wonders what the feather could mean though.

“Sehun-ah,” Luhan shakes the younger’s shoulder, who looks at him lazily, “Your favorite customer has just arrived.”

Sehun turns his head until he finds Chanyeol sitting by his usual table, spotting him and waving at him with that stupid wide grin. He glares at Luhan (who chuckles in turn, saying “You’re welcome.”) before leaving the counter to serve his school friend.

“Hi,” Chanyeol brightly greets. Before Sehun got the chance to show him the menu, he abruptly says, “I’ll order the usual.”

“The usual?” The waiter his head to one side before nodding several times. “Okay. Do you want me to serve six of them at once?”

“No, thanks,” the taller boy replies with a hearty chuckle. Sehun goes back to give the order to Luhan.

“Are you sure that guy isn’t crushing on you? He seems so happy to see you,” Luhan remarks while making chocolate milk tea for Chanyeol.

“I don’t think so. No one is crushing on me, since I’m poor and parentless.”

“But you’re handsome.” That remark surely makes Sehun raises a brow, and he looks questioningly to Luhan. The elder puts his hands up as if he were to surrender, and defends himself by saying, “I’m only stating the fact, okay? It doesn’t mean I have a crush on you!”

Sehun feels himself relaxing, all the while looking over to Chanyeol who seems to be focused on something on the table. He turns his head to Luhan, who’s done with the order. The senior co-worker gives him a wink and pumps his fist in the air. “Fighting!”

The waiter just rolls his eyes at his hyung before trudging towards Chanyeol, who looks to be happy again when he sees Sehun comes.

“Here’s your drink,” he says before leaving, but apparently someone holds him back by his wrist.

“Are you going to sit over there observing this shop again?” Chanyeol asks, and Sehun gives him a look, sighs and nods as the response to his question.

“How about we talk over here?” he offers. Sehun was about to refuse, but then he figures he’s got a lot of questions he wants to ask to the taller boy, so he sits down right in front of the said boy, careful not to hurt his back.

“Can I ask you a few questions then?”

Chanyeol nods with a smile.

“What are you doing here?”

“I’m just enjoying my drink.”

“No, I don’t mean that. I mean what are you doing here other than enjoying your drink? Are you going to stay until we’re closed, like yesterday?”

“Well…perhaps I will.”

“But why?”

Chanyeol slowly looks into Sehun’s eyes, and it gives goosebumps to the younger. The feeling is almost the same when he finds those feathers, but this feels more intense.

“I just want to look after you,” the elder cryptically replies.

“Why?” Sehun asks again after a moment of silence.

“Because I’m your guardian angel.”

Sehun is taken aback by his answer, but at the same time he wants to laugh at it as well. He sees a new customer who just arrived at the shop and immediately stands up from his seat, and the pain on his back is, well, back again, visible from his wincing.

Apparently, Chanyeol also gets up from his seat, looking worriedly at the waiter. “Is it still hurting?”

Sehun doesn’t remember telling the other boy about his back’s condition, but he’s quite overwhelmed by the pain that he doesn’t bother asking him about it. “Yeah, well, it will heal in a few days.”

“You should rest instead of working,” Chanyeol protests, but Sehun shakes his head.

“I need to work to survive. It’s nearing pay day anyway.”

With that, Sehun leaves to serve the newly arrived customer.

The next day he wakes up from slumber, he doesn’t screech from any pain. Sehun remembers rather well that he only sticks the patches on his back since yesterday, yet as he tries to arch and twist his back, he doesn’t feel like hurting. He feels rather healthy, in fact. And it’s a weekend. He couldn’t be happier than now, because that means he doesn’t need to meet with the bullies in his school.

A feather floats again from the ceiling as he’s busying himself to make his breakfast.

On the weekend, he works at a bookstore in the morning until afternoon before going to bubble tea shop. Since he couldn’t afford going to private lesson, he uses his part-time job in the bookstore as a chance to learn. They have plenty of knowledge books, and Sehun enjoys reading them. When he gets bored of them, he always has another alternative like novels and manhwas.

That day, when he’s given the task to check the books, he finds a rather peculiar book. It talks about angels, which immediately seizes his attention. On the first page of the book, there’s a poem written in the middle of it.

I am an angel feather,
Sent from God above,
To serve as a reminder
Of His most gracious love.

I’m from your guard—

“Hey!” He hears a familiar deep voice and almost drops the book he’s holding. Surely, it’s Chanyeol who greets him. Sehun thinks it’s almost scary that he always meets him outside of the school for the past few days.

“Are you stalking me or something?” The question is unstoppable, but at the very least, Chanyeol doesn’t seem offended by it.

“No, but I hang around here quite often for the past few days. You can ask the other workers if you want.”

“Really? Then why did I never see you around here?”

“Hmm, I don’t know, maybe because I come here often during weekdays.”

Sehun scoffs as he still feels like he shouldn’t believe everything the boy says, but he doesn’t know him that well, so he thinks he can’t be acting rude even more than this.

“What are you doing here? Don’t you have private lesson?”

“I can ask the same question to you.”

Sehun is taken aback for so many times because of this tall, almost giant-like boy, and he actually wants to lash out at him, as if the boy in front of him doesn’t know he’s poor as hell and he still needs to survive even during weekends and works here for extra cash than he could get from working at bubble tea shop, but the smile Chanyeol gives him, it’s so peculiar, and before he thought it’s creepy, but it’s actually really surreal, it feels almost as if an angel smiling down at him. It makes him forget about anything he wanted to say earlier.

“Hey, are you okay? You look…stoned,” Chanyeol says matter-of-factly, but with a worried expression etched on to his face.

Sehun snaps himself out of daze. He thinks it’s weird since he doesn’t space out quite often until about lately. “I’m fine. Don’t worry too much.”

“What about your back?”

The younger freezes before replying, “Yeah, it’s fine too. In fact, it doesn’t hurt anymore since this morning.”

“Good then.” Chanyeol smiles in relief, and starts searching through the mounts of books on the shelves. Sehun finally remembers the book about the angel still in his hand, and he’s behind his work, so he decides to put it back to the shelves, but he’s going to buy it later.

He keeps on working till the books located in the highest shelves, that he needs to use a ladder to reach for them. When he’s done with them, he climbs down the ladder, but his foot slips from a step and ruins his balance. Before he knows it he feels his hand gripping loosely on the ladder, and soon he’s completely out of it. His whole body falls back and he can’t register anything to his brain, and he still can’t when he’s landing softly on someone’s hold either.

“Don’t you think you should be more careful? Have you been always this clumsy?” The familiar deep voice is so close to his ears that he feels the weird cool heat rushing through his whole body that he can’t even register the questions Chanyeol threw at him.

He lets himself go from the other boy’s hold, and repeatedly bows to him, hiding the reddening of his cheeks. “Thank you for catching me.”

“I’ll always catch you, don’t worry.” Chanyeol lets out a chuckle. Before his cheeks can get anymore redder, Sehun picks up the notebook he uses for his work from the ground and mutters an “Excuse me” to go to another area.

When he thinks he’s safe from Chanyeol’s reach, he starts nursing his thumping heart.

Did the shock from the fall make his heart beat really fast like this?

When his head is still questioning about it, a single white feather is seen flowing above his head. He’s pretty sure there’s something up with this feather.

At bubble tea shop though, when he’s not busy serving the customers, Sehun is busy reading the book about the angels. He agreed to pay for the book using his salary for today, so his boss let him have the book albeit not getting paid for his work.

He seems to learn something about the white feather that constantly makes its appearance around him.

Luhan looks over the younger boy, who’s still concentrated in reading, and taps him lightly on his shoulder.

“You seem so infested in that book,” Luhan simply remarks. “What is it about?”

“Hyung,” Sehun calls, ignoring the elder’s question. “Do you believe in angels?”

“Angels? Well…I kind of believe in them. Why?”

“Then do you know the story about angel’s feather?”

“Well…yeah. The angel’s feather signifies the presence of an angel. If you see it, then that means an angel is near.”

“Have you ever seen it, Hyung?”

“No, but I heard it just falls from the ceiling or something like that? Sometimes from the sky too…”

Sehun seems to be deep in thought after listening to Luhan’s answer. The elder gives him a curious look, and then asks, “Have you seen it, Sehun-ah?”

The said boy has a wide gaze shifted on Luhan, and honestly, the full time worker didn’t think the younger really have seen the feather.

“You’ve seen it?” Luhan asks in surprise.

Sehun blinks a few times, his lips while muttering, “Sort of.”

“Wow. Where did you see it?”

“W-well, at some places,” Sehun hesitantly replies.

“Whoa. Does that mean you’ve seen it more than once?”

The younger gives him a nervous smile, not trying to clarify the answer to the question. He’s being saved by the entrance of a customer, and he instantly leaps from his seat to serve the customer.

Curiously, Luhan takes the book into his hand. He checks the first page of the book, and the poem that Sehun read earlier comes into his sight.

I am an angel feather,
Sent from God above,
To serve as a reminder
Of His most gracious love.

I’m from your guardian angel
That God assigned to you,
I fell out in the struggle
As your angel guarded you.

Each time you almost stumble,
Each time you nearly fall,
Thank God and all His angels
For answering your call.

It’s a wonder though, that Chanyeol doesn’t come to the bubble tea shop. Luhan suggests whether he’s on a private lesson, but Sehun knows better, that the giant-like boy isn’t on that kind of lesson. He didn’t see Chanyeol since the other boy saved him from falling back then.

“I miss him already,” Luhan says as they’re closing up the shop for the day.

“Are you sure you’re not the one who likes him?” Sehun asks in a playful manner, while slurping his chocolate milk tea, another treat from Luhan to end the day.

“No way, I just want to see you talking to him like the other day.”

Sehun glares at Luhan, who laughs loudly as his reaction. “Come on, how come you don’t like him? He’s so nice to you.”

“It’s not like I don’t like him…” Sehun mumbles silently. Actually, Sehun does like Chanyeol, but he’s not sure how much he likes the other boy. Chanyeol has been so helpful to him these past few days, but there’s something off about him, he thinks. Like the way he stares at him, it feels like he can see him through his soul, almost the same feeling he felt when seeing the feathers. Not to mention he claims himself to be Sehun’s guardian angel. He thinks it’s kind of silly, but at the same time, it unnerves him to his bone.

But…could it be that he was telling him the truth though? Would that explain the feathers and the weird cool but warm aura he feels when the other boy is around?

“Sehun-ah.” Luhan taps him by his shoulder once they’re ready to leave. “See you tomorrow.”

“Yeah, see you tomorrow, Hyung.” They part ways, since their houses are on different directions.

He worked a little later today since he doesn’t have a school day tomorrow, but the roads are still kind of crowded anyway, so he doesn’t really worry about anything. But when he goes to the alley where he usually goes through to get to his house, he’s being stopped by two bulky guys.

“You’re trespassing our area,” one of them says matter-of-factly.

“Trespassing? But I always go through this alley to go home!” Sehun protests.

“Not during this time,” the other replies.

“I just want to go home, so please,” he starts to beg them.

“Not until you pay for this.”

Pay? What to pay? Money? His pay day is on Monday and he has given up his salary from his bookstore job for a book (that he sort of regrets for buying it now).

“I-I’m sorry, b-but I don’t have my money right now—”

“Bull!” One of them looks at his friend. “Call them out!”

Sehun feels himself shivering from the guy’s strong voice. It looks like he’s in a really deep trouble right now.

Not too long after, he’s being surrounded by a bunch of scary faces. Sehun keeps stepping backward, trying to get away from them, but they block the way he came from. One of them throws a punch on his face, and another on his stomach, his arms, he gets punched everywhere. He tries to put up a fight but the rapid blow he receives stops him from doing so.

But all of the sudden, their punches stop. The poor boy his lips as he closes his eyes, feeling rather exhausted and aching all over his body, but he tries hard to open his eyes. He sees a blur figure coming to take a stance in front of him, confronting those scary guys.

“I will not forgive anyone who hurts Sehunnie!” The deep-toned words ring clearly in his ears.

He then sees the figure going to them, and everything is becoming more and more blurry to him, as he gets more and more exhausted. He lets his head fall on the cement, eyes on a verge to completely close, but before it happens, he sees a small white feather landing in front of his eyes.

With that, his eyes come to a close.

The next time he opens his eyes, he meets eyes with a familiar ceiling. He realizes then that it’s the ceiling to his own house, and belatedly recognizes the soft feeling of his own bed. The sun already rises apparently, and Sehun didn’t even have the chance to grab a supper, since now his stomach is grumbling crazily.

He jolts awake at the sound of his stomach. The last thing he realizes is the fact that he’s still alive, breathing, and hungry.

“Are you okay now?” His head whips to the source of the voice, the boy with wide eyes but not with his usual wide grin; he seems to be really worried that a smile can’t form on his face, and a frown takes its place instead.

“You.” Sehun wants to ask how Chanyeol knows where his house is, how he entered the house if he doesn’t tell him where he puts his spare keys, but the worried expression on Chanyeol’s face and the recalling of last night’s events put him to a halt.

He runs to the mirror, only to find his own reflection free from cuts and bruises. He thinks that if he did really get those punches, there would be at least those expected cuts and bruises all over his face and limbs and other parts of his body. But he can’t find any of those.

He looks over to Chanyeol, who approaches him a little bit, and he sees a white feather flowing behind his back before touching the ground. It all makes sense now.

“You really are my guardian angel, aren’t you?” Sehun asks in astonishment. At last, Chanyeol’s lips curl into a smile, and Sehun swears that he’s practically glowing. The rush of cool heat is coming back to him again.

“I told you already, didn’t I?”

Chanyeol informs him that he’s healed all the injuries that Sehun received last night, and he’s really grateful to his, err, guardian angel for being so considerate to him. He also reveals plenty other things, like how he turns back the time just for Sehun when he was searching for his missing uniform (so he understands now why the freshman was acting really weird) and how he’s been watching him but sometimes he just makes himself invisible.

“Invisible? But…you’re always monitoring me?”

“Of course. That’s my job as your guardian angel.”

Sehun actually feels rather weird having breakfast with the wide-eyed angel watching him but he thinks he can get used to it, what with the cool heat that radiates from Chanyeol. It makes sense actually, Chanyeol’s name literally means ‘cool heat’ and he was named after that aura he gives off to people.

“So…those feathers…do they belong to you?”

Chanyeol curtly nods with a smile. “I let them fall, to serve you as a reminder.”

“Of what?”

Of His most gracious love.

“You’re not alone in this world, Oh Sehun, because you still have me.”

Those words make Sehun smiles while munching his bacon. Yes, he does feel that he’s not alone anymore.

That night, Sehun comes back from work earlier from yesterday since tomorrow is the day his school starts again. He finds Chanyeol sitting on his sofa with his legs pulled up, but he gasps seeing the particular sight in front of him. A pair of white wings spread gracefully on the angel’s back, illuminated by the moonlight seeping through the window. They seem like glowing, and really, Sehun can’t help it but to let his jaw dropped by the beauty of the angel.

Chanyeol looks up to him and gives him a welcoming smile. “Welcome home, Sehun-ah.”

Sehun can’t stop the smile for spreading on his face as well. The angel’s smile is too contagious.

“Y-you’re beautiful,” Sehun tells the angel through his amazement. Chanyeol looks taken aback, something the younger wouldn’t think he could, and pouts in a really cute manner.

“Are you sure you’re not kidding me? Up there they always say I’m the ugliest one.”

“No way you’re the ugliest,” Sehun defends him, “You’re too beautiful for words— I don’t even know how to—”

The angel puts a finger to his lips, and as Sehun his lips out of habit, Chanyeol approaches him with really soft eyes. The cool heat is enveloping the human and it’s more intense once the angel wraps both his arms around the younger.

“You’re the only one who ever think of me as beautiful,” Chanyeol speaks in a low volume. “Thank you.”

Hesitantly, Sehun returns the hug, all the while trying to get used to Chanyeol’s distracting but comfortable aura. “You’re welcome.”

Sehun sends a prayer of gratefulness to God, for the guardian angel he’s gifted with, for everything he can really thank for. He starts drifting off to sleep once he’s done with his prayer. Little does he know that next to his bed, his very own guardian angel is watching him.

Chanyeol crouches down beside the bed, looking at the younger’s sleeping figure with soft gazes in their own admiration.

 “You know what, Sehun-ah.” He reaches out to sweep his bangs off his forehead. “I think you’re beautiful as well, if not more. You’re more dazzling than Michael to me.”

A little smile forms on his lips, as he grazes Sehun’s cheek with his fingertips.

“As your guardian angel, I want to protect you always, so you won't ever have to suffer. I really hate seeing you hurting. I want to be the one who wipes your tears away and gives you your own happiness.”

He leans in slowly, and plants a kiss on Sehun’s forehead.

After a moment, he pulls back as slowly as before. “I love you since the day you were born. I love you now, and I love you forever. And I hope you’ll love me, too.”

He gets up from his spot, and steps back into the darkness.

A small white feather from his wings accidentally falls in the process, landing softly on the bed.

Then a smile appears on the face of the sleeping boy, dreaming of a happy day with the one he loves.

*********************************

So, there are some things to explain. Firstly, the poem is not mine, I find it from here when I went for a little bit research. And also, I found out that Chanyeol's name can literally mean 'cool heat' in Korean. 'Chan' means cold, and 'Yeol' means heat. No wonder there's a fansite for him called CoolHeat... Hahaha, that's all I want to say actually. I'm deeply sorry if this is not much of a satisfactory. Thanks for reading, subscribing, and commenting ^^