“,” Yuri called. Donghae sighed and turned around from the floor he was scrubbing to face Yuri; a small tomato has made its way and splattered on his face. “Clean up that tomato please.”

Donghae stopped cleaning the floor and stood up, walking over to the small bathroom to wash his face. He never really did talk back; he wasn’t one for arguments, both verbal and physical.

He scoffed though, as he heard Yoona’s obnoxious laughter followed by a loud high five, but you couldn’t blame him; everyone would’ve laughed.

“Good one!”

These were Donghae’s two step sisters, the two worst candidates you could get for sisters even if you scoured the entire globe.

How had Donghae’s life turned out this bad, you ask?

Well, I shall answer.

It all started when his mother died. Of course, Donghae had been so young at the time that he had no recollection of his mother whatsoever. His father decided to remarry, obviously choosing the wrong person to do it with. Donghae liked to call her the wicked witch of the west, but not out loud of course.

She had two beautiful daughters (but Donghae was so blatantly gay that he couldn’t really give a damn) who had the worst personalities. Not to mention Yoona had a habit of laughing at every lame joke Yuri made, then high fiving her afterwards. That just made it worse. Donghae called them Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum, just female, because sometimes, they even finished each other’s sentences.

Donghae sighed as he washed the last drop of tomato juice in his hair. It was like this daily, though usually it was something easier to clean up.

Donghae usually tried to let everything slide; only letting it out at night, where he cried himself to sleep. He as a rather weak person, and cried often, but didn’t like to. It became harder and harder to cry over the years, and Donghae learned to not cry in front of his step mother, who would only beat him with a cane.

Donghae had always believe in fairytale endings, and believed everyone had them, but he was started to get fed up with the fact that his Cinderella life wasn’t really turning out very well, and maybe, it would never get better.

It was only until this day he believed he had bad luck, but when his step mother burst through the room with a golden envelope in her hand claiming it was for the ball where the prince would choose his bride, he believed everything had turned upside down.

Then he realized that she had said the prince was looking for his bride, and Donghae was kind of male, so that wouldn’t really work out, thus ending up in him continuing to clean the floors.

“Donghae, come here,” His step mother’s shrill voice shrieked across the halls.

Donghae winced visibly at the noise and stood up, setting the bucket and rag aside as he remembered the time Yoona slipped over the rag. That was most definitely one of the best moments of his entire life, since he didn’t even get blamed for it, and even Yuri was laughing. That was the first time he felt like a part of the family.

Chuckling to himself as he remembered the moment, he walked over to his step mother gracefully.

“Yes, step mother?” He replied, bowing slightly, having complete confidence that his Cinderella life was finally getting better.

“We’re going to the ball tomorrow, so make sure everything is completely clean by the time we get back. The invitation is here,” She announced, handing over the golden card to Donghae for him to read.

“Mum, he’ll make it dirty with his filthy fairy dust!” Yuri whined, pointing with one of her horribly manicured fingers at Donghae.

Donghae began to count backwards quickly from three, and nodded his head as Yoona started chortling.

“Good one, Yuri!”

Then followed the loud slap sound of a high five and Donghae sighed. He even knew the timings of when Yoona would start laughing, and when they’d high five, which was a blunt message that he had stayed with them too long.

Of course Donghae was offended by the horrible insults his sisters made, but he was a man, and he was going to keep his composure and show these people he had no reason to cry in front of them, or at least for the time being.

Donghae looked back down to the card and drowned the horrible laughter from the both of his step sisters out into the background as he began to read.

Dearest family,

You’ve been invited to the ball where my son, Lee Hyukjae, will choose his bride. Make sure to be pretty, by the way, he has strange taste. And by strange, I mean really strange.

Sincerely, the King,

P.S. There’s a picture of my son on the back!

P.P.S.  Just call him Eunhyuk. He prefers that, for some reason.

Donghae fought the urge to laugh at the poorly written invitation because he wasn’t rude, and he wasn’t going to laugh at the King’s horrible attempt at making an invitation. Donghae hadn’t actually wanted to go to the ball anyway, so really, he would just wait for the next ball to come around for the next prince charming.

Or so he thought.

Donghae turned over the card, only slightly curious as to what the prince looked like. Immediately, his mouth flew open. That was when Donghae decided he had to go to the ball, even if it was just to sneak a few glances at the prince (or most likely more), because sweet holy mother was he y.

He had blonde hair and was wearing sunglasses, only wearing a black tank top and jeans. It wasn’t a very formal picture -in fact, it was the complete opposite- but Donghae was happy with it either way, because Eunhyuk’s arms were just so godly, and he just looked amazing.

Donghae gulped slightly before handing the invitation back to his step mother.

His step mother smirked slightly, seeing Donghae’s clearly frustrated state, and cleared , making it her job to ruin Donghae’s life as much as possible, like step mothers do in fairytales.

“You can’t go, so don’t get your hopes up.”

That killed Donghae, just like she expected. She nodded, obviously content with her part as a step mother.

“You’ll be staying here cleaning.”

Donghae just nodded solemnly, walking back to the bucket and rag he had been cleaning the floor with before. He didn’t want to talk back and make it less likely for him to go, but either way; he doubted he could go, even if a magical fairy god mother came.

The front door closed loudly just after Yoona declared they were all going out to get dresses, and Donghae felt lonelier than ever.

He dipped the rag into the bucket of soapy water and began to scrub the floor a lot harder than he really needed too, and hot tears began to well up in his eyes. He rubbed them with his arm as he continued to work, but the warm, fresh tears just kept flowing out, and sooner or later, Donghae was in a fetal position in the middle of the hallway crying his heart out.

What he had finally believed was the gateway, the small light of hope that could let him have a good life was stomped on by the only family he still had left.

This, Donghae decided, was definitely not his day.

What made him stop crying though was the faint tinkling music in the background which gave him an odd sense of hope; something beyond Donghae’s own imagination.

Donghae wiped his tears and smiled at the cleaned floor, then moving to the kitchen where he would then cook a nice, healthy dinner.

After a very uneventful dinner and some more chores, Donghae ran into his room up in the attic and sighed, just to escape his two step sisters waltzing around the house in their new dresses, stomping on all of his hopes (and the freshly cleaned floor, ugh). Donghae had to admit, both dresses looked rather horrible on them, both being the same shade of bubble gum pink and really, really puffy.

It was a horrible reminder that he couldn’t go to the ball where the prince would find his princess and they would dance until to sun came up. This was only part of Donghae’s imagination, though he fell asleep dreaming, and for once, he had a rather peaceful sleep while just thinking about the prince he knew nothing about.

The sound of light clinkering woke up Donghae. It was his homemade alarm. Some spoons taped above the bed that would tinkle every time the wind blew.

Donghae woke up slowly with a yawn, rubbing his eyes slowly, the getting up slowly to take down all the spoons so the clinkering wouldn’t go on all day.

Donghae grabbed the piece of paper next to him which had all his chores listed, and gaped. This was almost double the amount of chores he usually received, even if they had cut out dinner, which usually took up most of the evening.

The tinkling music had gone on for the whole day until he had finished half of his chores, and he was thankful for that since it really did help him lift his spirits up higher, but what decided to crush his spirits more was his sisters who had decided to waltz around in their cotton candy dresses right after lunch.

“Yoona, Yuri, you just ate lunch. Maybe that’s not such a good idea,” Donghae began only out of pure worry (mostly for himself and how he’d be able to not cry), but only stopped when Yoona turned to glare at him. “Never mind then, just throw up all over the prince.”

Donghae sighed as he walked towards the toilet, grabbing the mop and bucket, getting ready to clean the entire house. He started in the dining room, which was definitely one of the quietest rooms that Donghae enjoyed cleaning.

The walls were soundproof too, so he could sing all he liked, and hum all he liked, and that’s exactly what Donghae did as he was cleaning.

He waltzed around, humming in harmony with the tinkling music he had been hearing and before he knew it, it was night time, and time for his sisters to go to the ball.

“Donghae, we’re leaving,” His step mother cried. “Make sure you finish all the chores, otherwise you’ll have to finish them tomorrow on top of your normal ones!”

Donghae