The new year crept up on the pair to Joonmyun’s despair and Kris’ delight who continued to hover around Joonmyun, appearing at the most inconvenient and ill-conceived times.

But one term into the school year was all that Joonmyun could handle and something within him uncharacteristically snapped.

“Seriously grow up and leave me alone! Why do you keep annoying me? Just don’t appear in front of me for no apparent reason because I don’t need people like you in my life. We, we’re not even acquainted and I hope that we never will be!”  The still petite sixteen year-old yelled up at the taller of the two, voice cracking slightly from misuse, eyes filled with anger, hands gripped tight around his tattered books, knuckles white and face red.

It was the first time that Joonmyun spoke directly to Kris and the first time Kris heard him raise his voice any decibel above a shy whisper.

The unexpected retaliation shocked him to the core and Kris stood blinking as Joonmyun brushed roughly past him and stormed off into the refuge of Jongdae’s arms and admiration.

“Because you’ve been mine since your first day…”  Kris whispered, his eyes directed towards Joonmyun's receding form and his conscience feeling the gravity of remorse for all the wrongs he made against the boy in the past two years.

A month passed; a long month of avoiding each other’s gaze, ignoring each other’s presence.

And Joonmyun had been counting each one of those thirty days without Kris. Every morning toll of the school bell made his smiles grow more apparent and genuine, his steps feel lighter and easier with each step forward, his laughter chime louder and brighter.

But Kris had been counting every second, watching the clock above the teacher’s head tick away and regretting every movement of that slender hand as it swept continuously over twelve numbers. 

He didn't know what drew him towards the younger but there was something about him that made him grow possessive, almost as if Joonmyun was a sick obsession he had to satisfy. But one month without Joonmyun was all that he could take.

“Tutor me,”

The first day of the following month, that dreaded baritone voice sliced through the serenity of the library.

Colour drained from Joonmyun’s already pale complexion, tainting it with a sickly green, as Kris settled into a chair beside him.

Jongdae visibly tensed at the sudden intrusion, protectively flanking Joonmyun's other side.

And Joonmyun blatantly chose to ignore Kris, praying to the gods for mercy, eyes still directed at his neat scrawl of chemistry notes, face apathetic and mouth clamped tightly shut.

Uncomfortable silence prevailed until Joonmyun found his legs trapped on the cushion of his narrow seat between Kris’ lean arms.

“Please…” Kris' hushed voice sounded in his ear, his mint scented breath brushing hot against his cheek as Joonmyun let out a strangled whimper of surprise.

Crimson bloomed on Joonmyun’s cheeks, his heart beat quickened as a nervous lump formed in his throat but that was all it took.

Truthfully, there was no reason for Joonmyun to lose his resolve. There was no reason for him to comply. But upon Kris' one word, all reasons seemed irrelevant and all rationality escaped Joonmyun.

He pushed his nagging thoughts (namely Jongdae) aside as he flipped their textbooks open to page one, and as Kris hoped a fresh start.

The pair began to count the remaining school days together with a majority of them spent hunched over shabby textbooks and nibs scratching across lined paper.

Perhaps the ferocity he found when he had pushed Kris away in the first term was weakening. But as he stared at Kris' sleeping face and proceeded to wake him up by poking his cheek with a pen leaving behind marks of blue, he found himself thinking, "Perhaps he isn't so bad. Perhaps he has changed. Perhaps he can be forgiven."