Hitting the gravel wasn't the most painful part. In the end, not even the slicing pain on Taerim's left side as she rolled in the wake of the bus was the most painful part. The most painful part was now speeding away on the bus, laughing.

The most painful part was seeing Jongin watching Jonghyun hurt her. Not interfering, not taking part, just watching without expression.

Eventually, she couldn't just keep lying in the road like this. Slowly, she moved her left arm out from beneath her body. She'd thought it was dislocated at first, but it wasn't. The pain when she moved it brought tears to her eyes. It wouldn't support her weight, so she used her right arm to raise herself so she could stand up.

She couldn't remember ever being in so much pain.

On the outside, she only looked dirty. Using her right arm, she brushed as much of the dust as she could off of her jacket. She had walked further than this to the bus stop every weekend since she'd arrived in Korea, but never had it been this hard to walk such a short distance. She didn't dare to sit down when she got there, afraid that she wouldn't be able to get up again.

The bus took an eternity to arrive. She leaned against a light pole on her right shoulder with her head down, willing herself to stay up long enough to get back to school. When the bus rumbled up to the stop, it looked like a chariot to heaven.

Taerim wasn't balanced enough to stand on the bus, so she slowly sat on the very edge of one of the seats, careful not to let her back or left arm to touch any part of it. The bus was about half full, and she caught a woman seated across from her looking at her curiously a few times. She didn't know what she looked like, but she'd put her hood up because she'd realized that there was a cut on the back of her head that had bled a little. Maybe she looked suspicious. She didn't know. Honestly, she didn't care. It was all she could do to sit up straight like a normal person.

When the bus reached her stop, she started to feel dizzy. With every care, she stood up and took baby steps off the bus, fearful that any sudden movements would send her crashing to the ground. It was these same steps that took her through the gates to the school with a nod to the guardsman, past the gym and the office building, and finally to the dorms. She could have cried when she pushed through the front doors, turned into her hallway, and saw the door to her room ahead of her on the left. But she could cry later. Right now she just had to get through that door.

She was halfway across the room before she realized that Minho was lying on his bed, reading a sports magazine like he'd been waiting for her.

“Yah, Taemin,” he said. “Late.”

“Mm,” she said, trying to act normally even with horror blossoming in her chest. “Shower.”

He looked like he'd just come out of the shower. He nodded and went back to his magazine, not noticing anything.

She could do this. She grabbed some sweats, a long-sleeved shirt, and a pair of boxer briefs off of a pile on her bed, not caring whether they were clean or not. She just had to get to the shower. Not until the door had closed behind her did she dare allow herself to relax.

Minho hadn't been listening to music or anything, which meant she had to be quiet. It was time to assess the damage, but she was so exhausted that she could hardly bring herself to shrug out of her jacket. When it came away from her back, she stifled a yelp. Something had bled on her back, she was sure, and whatever blood there was had soaked through to her jacket and dried. When she pulled the jacket away, the stiff fabric pulled at skin that was already unbearably tender.

In the end, the jacket was all she was able to manage. No matter how she tried, at whatever angle, there was no way for her to pull off her shirt without using her left arm, which was so stiff and painful she could hardly move it, or twisting her torso too far in some way, which made her see stars.

She leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes, wishing there was another way. Some way to keep him out of this. Then, gathering all her strength, she opened the shower door.

He was listening to music after all. At first he didn't see her, engrossed in his magazine with headphone cords snaking from his ears, but when she took a step forward he looked up. For the first time, he realized that something was wrong.

“왜?” he said, pulling out his earbuds.

“도와줘요,” was all she could think to say.

He sat up, his eyebrows pulling together in concern. “괜찮냐?”

“Help me.” She was too tired to think of anything else. “I'm hurt,” she said. “On the... on the bus. 버스. 빠졌어요.”

In a moment, he was on his feet. He put his hands on her shoulders. “Hurt?” he said. “Where?”

She tried not to show how much just the weight of his hand on her left shoulder hurt her. She pointed over her shoulder with her right hand. “Here,” she said. “My back.”

He was quiet for a few moments. “I can... see?” he asked.

She looked down. Nodded. When she turned and pulled up her shirt as much as her left arm would allow, she couldn't look at him.

Minho's breath hissed through his teeth, and he muttered something under his breath.

“양호실 가야되,” he said bluntly.

“No!” Of all the things that could happen, going to the infirmary was one of the worst. That would really be the end... the end of everything. “I can't. We... we can't.”

“Yes!” he said insistently. “Now! 가자!” He grabbed her hand, ready to pull her there if he had to.

The left hand. She gasped and pressed her lips together, unable to stop the cry that was trying to push out of her like it had a life of its own. He let go of her like she had burned him. “No!” she said. “I can't. Please,” she begged, sinking to her knees. She meant to bow, to fold her hands in supplication, but all she could do was hold her right hand in a fist against her chest, waiting for him to pull her up again and force her to go to the end of everything no matter the destruction it would cause. This was the last stand, the last thing she could do. She had never begged for anything in her life, but this, she could beg for. “제발.”

She kept her head bowed, waiting for him to refuse. She heard him sigh.

“Okay,” he said. Nothing more. He knelt in front of her, taking her right hand this time to help her stand up. “앉아.” She sat on the corner of his bed, and he went to the shower to get a towel wet in warm water. When he returned, he sat behind her. He touched a long slit in the back of her shirt. “이게 뭐야?” he asked.

She couldn't turn enough to see it, but she could guess. “Glass,” she said. He wouldn't know the word, and she didn't know it either. “병,” she amended.

She couldn't see his face, and he didn't reply. “셔츠?” he asked instead.

She nodded, taking the hem of her shirt again and pulling it up as much as she could without unbearable pain in her arm and shoulder. She paused, and after a moment Minho's hands were there, pushing the shirt up. She pulled her right arm out of one sleeve, and he pushed the shirt over her head so she could pull it off her left arm with all the care she could muster. She was so engrossed in getting the shirt off with as little pain as possible that she hadn't spared a thought for the shame of needing Minho's help in getting undressed. It had been almost two months since he'd found out her secret, and she almost fancied that he'd forgotten it. He hadn't once changed how he acted towards her since then. But here it was – underneath her shirt she was, like always, wearing the thick band that kept her flat-chested. If he'd forgotten, or tried to forget, here was a reminder he couldn't ignore.

“씨발,” he said forcefully, and she squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for him to refuse to help her after all. But he didn't. She listed to him breathe for a few heartbeats, wondering what he would do. She felt like sinking into the ground and never coming out again.

Finally he spoke. “이게...” he paused. “Off. This too. Okay?”

She could feel the blush warm her face and wondered if he could see it. There wasn't any expression in his voice, and she knew that it had to be done. Finally, she nodded slowly. She couldn't reach behind her far enough to take it off herself, so Minho's hands were there again, warm and steady, pulling out the four hooks that kept the band tight. She took a deep breath when they came loose, something she couldn't do often, and pressed her dirty shirt to her chest as the band fell away.

Even though she had asked him to do this, to help her, she couldn't suppress her shame when he said nothing, simply taking the warm towel and beginning to wipe down her back carefully. After everything, after trying to hide and being exposed anyway, and now this, nothing was further from what she had hoped for than going to Minho for help, not even able to take care of her own problems. He didn't complain, even when he was the one who had to mop the blood from her back while she sat here, wretched, weak, from the waist up.

Everything was going wrong. She couldn't even stop herself from flinching when the towel passed over the cut that the glass had made.

“미안,” he apologized, his voice low.

“괜찮아요,” she replied hastily.

He sighed. “Wait here.” He stood up and left without another word.

She relaxed, leaning against the wall carefully. She made sure that the shirt she had clutched to her chest was covering her well, glancing back to look at the towel that Minho had dropped on the floor. She stared, realizing that the blood that had soaked the tan fabric to an ugly dark pink was all hers. The same blood was on the shirt she had pressed to her chest, and on the band that was now lying on the floor, ripped and smeared.

It suddenly occurred to her that Minho could be going to get the school nurse, a man named Binsung who was both OCD and germophobic – he was responsible for putting hand sanitizer in every classroom, which she was fairly sure no one ever used. Panic gripped her – Minho wouldn't do that to her, would he? On the one hand, he might just be trying to help, but if Binsung found out she was a girl, that would be the end of her stay here. It could even mean that she would have to return to jail.

She couldn't let that happen. She slid off the bed, standing still for a moment to let the dizziness pass, and shuffled quickly across the room. She would find her other chest band, and a shirt, and if she got out of here now, she could just wait until Minho gave up and BinSung was gone, and maybe she wouldn't have to leave after all. As long as Minho didn't try to find some kind of proof to present to BinSung, maybe everything would be all right.

The door opened, and she almost fell down right there. She dove into her closet, landing on a cushion of dirty laundry. For a second, her vision out completely, and it was all she could do not to groan aloud. She didn't know who was at the door – whether it was Minho or BinSung or someone else who stayed behind from the trip, it didn't matter; she had to stay hidden. She wasn't here.

“Taemin?” someone said. She squeezed her eyes shut. How was Jongin here? She fended off the betrayal she'd felt earlier today when he'd let the others push her off the bus, and clutched her shirt more securely to her bare chest. She wasn't here.

More footsteps. “Oh, hyung,” she heard Jongin say. The rest of his words were muffled, but she could tell he was asking about her.

“여기 없어,” Minho replied, and she sighed with relief. Jongin said something else, but left soon after.

Quiet. Several moments passed, then the door to her closet creaked open. Minho looked down at her.

She realized that she was crying. Stupid. She blinked away the tears quickly, ashamed of them. She thought Minho would say something about it, but “You bleed,” was all he said. “일어서.” He helped her stand, but he was careful not to touch her left arm and still allow her to hold the shirt over her chest. When he let got of her, she thought he meant for her to walk back to the bed on her own, so she began to shuffle towards it.

“거기서!” Minho said. He looked angry, like she'd done something wrong without knowing it. She stopped in her tracks, confused. Minho stepped towards her and reached out a hand to lift the shirt away from her stomach. She shied away instinctively, but he didn't touch her. When she looked down, she realized that the kick Jonghyun had given her this morning had caused a sickly-looking purplish bruise on her abdomen.

His face could have been cast in stone. “Who...” he began, shook his head, and started again. “누가 이랬어?”

She shook her head vigorously. “No one. 아무도 없어요! 진짜!”

He met her eyes. He didn't believe her, of course. He pointed at the door. “Jongin?”

She shook her head again. “Not Jongin. It's nothing, I promise. 걱정하지마요.” She sat down on the bed with her back to him again, hoping he would just let it go. She wanted to be done with this. She wished she had just bitten the bullet and done this all herself, and not gotten Minho involved at all. And, for now, he seemed to let it pass, busying himself with a small tin box he'd brought with him that had a red cross on the lid. She knew this wasn't the last of it.

Minho got out a few packs of butterfly band-aids and started to clean and close up the gash she'd gotten from landing on the glass. From what she could feel, it seemed like the cut started just under her armpit and ran diagonally down her side, stopping on her back just above her last rib, a length of eight or more inches.

She must have hit it sliding.

Most of her upper back, save where her chest band had been, was red and raw from being thrown onto the gravel, and there wasn't much that Minho could do for it, besides spread antiseptic cream over it and tape square gauze bandages over two places where there were tears in her skin that were still bleeding. He cleaned the cut on the back of her head as well, but it wasn't serious and didn't need any kind of bandage. He moved his hands to her ribs and pressed them carefully. “아파?” he asked.

“조금.”

He moved his hands slightly, and pressed again. “아파?” he repeated. She nodded, pointing to the left side.

“많이?”

“No.”

He pressed harder. She flinched. Apparently her reaction satisfied him, because he took his hands away. “깨져 있지,” he said, putting away the contents of the tin box.

She didn't know how to ask. “Can I... 입어요?”

He looked up at her. “어.”

With a little difficulty, she stood up and went back to her closet. She picked up one of her undershirts and wondered what the best way was to go about putting it on. She had her back to Minho, who hadn't offered to help her, probably for her sake, but she knew that he was watching her. She dropped the shirt she'd been holding to her chest and carefully slid her left arm into the undershirt, using her right arm to pull it up and over her head. There was a small sense of victory when she was able to push her right arm through the correct hole in the shirt and pull it down without too much pain.

She was too tired to feel much triumph, though, and she sank down to sit on her own bed, feeling the effects of the day in her whole body.

“Something you need?”

She looked up at Minho. “나 물 좀.”

“네.” He filled a cup at the tap and brought it to her. “Here,” he said, dropping a couple of pills into her hand.

“Thanks.” She popped the pills into and drank the entire cup, realizing how thirsty she'd been. Minho smiled a little, then went back to refill the cup for her. After she'd gotten halfway through that cup, he held out his hand. “팔.”

She held out her left arm, which besides having a few scratches didn't have much outward injury. Minho took it carefully, holding her wrist firmly in one hand and her elbow in the other. He slowly raised her arm straight out from her side, watching her face carefully until the pain made her flinch away from him. He'd only pulled it out about forty-five degrees. He slowly moved her arm in circles where it was, eventually figuring out her range of movement and where the damage was.

“여기,” he said finally, pressing his hands to the back of her shoulder just above her armpit, where she'd landed when she first fell out of the bus. “이것...” he said. “Muscle. Not bad.”

She nodded, hardly able to sit up any longer, so when Minho said “누워,” she couldn't refuse. With the most care, she laid back on her bed, trying to ignore the burning pain in her back as it pressed against the mattress. But she couldn't remember a time when lying down had felt as much of a relief as it did now. She closed her eyes and sighed. If she could sleep, she thought, maybe things would seem better in the morning.

“배는?” Minho asked, still kneeling beside her bed.

She opened her eyes. “What?”

“배,” he repeated. “Su..tu...” he gave up and pointed to her abdomen.

“Oh,” she said. She'd felt nauseous since it had happened, but it wasn't as bad now, and she almost wanted to wave it off as nothing, but she knew Minho wouldn't let her. She shrugged. “Hurts a little. I want to throw up.” She thought about it for a few moments. “토하고싶어,” she explained.

“Can I?” Minho said. She nodded and he pulled up her shirt high enough to see the bruise on her abdomen that was gradually getting uglier. She stared at it, remembering how only this morning she had been congratulating herself on having a six-pack after months of working out her arms and abs to appear more male. Now, it was just ugly.

“아프면 말해,” he said, putting his hands to her stomach and pressing much more gently than he had on her ribs or shoulder. She laid her head back and tried to relax, realizing that Minho was touching her for what must be the first time since she had ever come to school. Even though his hands were causing her discomfort, they were strong and warm and soothing, and before she knew it she had fallen asleep.