As soon as he made it out the cafeteria doors, Taemin began to run. He didn’t bother to take note of his surroundings and ran until a stitched formed in his side and he had to stop. Looking around, he found himself on the snow dusted lawn behind what he figured what the boys’ dorm. 

Slumping against the wall, he fell to his knees and sat down hard. The gravel was rough even with the light covering of snow and the brick of the wall scratched his back. His head drooped and his eyes closed. 

It felt like an overreaction but after revealing that bit about himself and seeing the sad looks on his new friends’ faces, a sudden urge to run had filled him and he couldn’t help it. His flight or fight reaction had kicked in and he gave into it, it had never served him wrong before and every time he ignored it only led to pain. 

Inhaling sharply, he tried to catch his breath. It caught in his throat as a deep, dark chuckle met his ears. 

“Hey look who it is. Its that pansy looking kid that’s been hanging around your girlfriend.” 

Yunho stepped into Taemin’s line of sight as the younger looked up at the thick build of an older teen. “Kangin, back off.” Yunho’s voice was light, teasing almost as he came and placed a large hand on Kangin’s shoulder. “This kid is mine.”

Taemin tried to stand up but Yunho quickly pushed him back down. A twist of his head and Taemin found himself surrounded. Three other students appeared from around the wall, all large and imposing, their bodies looming over him. 

He felt smaller than ever, and that was saying something considering his bullies back in the States tended towards hulking creatures with overgrown attempts at facial hair

“I saw you had Sulli telling Minho about our little chat.” Yunho glared at Taemin before grabbing his shirt and dragging him to his feet. “Minho is a push over when it comes to that girl. She’ll want me off the team.” His face came closer to Taemin’s. “If that happens, I’ll come after you.”

Taemin found himself slammed against the wall as Yunho held him back with one hand tight on his throat. Coughing and trying to get a breath, Taemin felt it getting hard and harder to breathe. 

“How about I give you a taste of what you’re in for?” Yunho’s smile turned nasty and Taemin felt more fear than typical when faced with this situation.  

He whimpered, trying to turn his face away and scrunch up his eyes in preparation for the pain. He couldn’t move his head more than an inch and he hoped that when Yunho hit him, he wouldn’t break his nose. Broken noses hurt and took forever to heal and Taemin was afraid that the next time his nose wouldn’t set right and it would be left a crooked mess. 

He was regretting leaving the cafeteria now, but hindsight was 20/20 and he was just going to have to live with the consequences of his poor choices. 

The first blow took the breath from his lungs as Yunho’s meaty fist landed on the soft muscles of his stomach. He couldn’t even cry out as the second landed and by the fifth he tasted blood in his mouth and knew he had bit his tongue. 

The hits stopped after the seventh and Taemin was left completely winded. His stomach hurt and his ribs felt like at least one was bruised, thankfully at least nothing felt broken. 

Coughing, Taemin saw flecks of blood mist over the ground. He sniffled, wiping snot from his nose with the back of his shirt. He was always ersely happy when they left his face alone. His stomach hurt like hell but the bruises were easier to hide. 

He dragged himself off the ground and clutching his stomach headed back inside. There was no entrance to the dorms from where he was and he was going to have to go the long way. 

“Taemin! There you are.” Sulli’s voice called out sounding rather far away even though Taemin could see she was only a few feet away. “Are you alright?” He released his hold on himself and cringing turned to see Sulli and Amber walking towards him. He cursed in his mind, wishing that he had made it back to the dorm before they finished eating. 

He wouldn’t have been able to avoid Minho, but knowing that Minho wanted him gone, Taemin didn’t figure that he would pay too much attention when Taemin went in. 

Was he alright? Taemin pondered to himself quickly as Sulli walked closer. “Everyone was worried when you ran off like that.”

So they had caught him running. He swore in his head again. “I’m sorry.” His voice sounded small as he ducked his head and then looked up through his bangs at the girls in front of him. He had to hide the pain he was feeling so that they didn’t find out what had just happened. 

The girls were much more observant than anyone he had been around after a beating before and the last thing that he wanted was for them to find out what happened. 

“Did you run away because of Minho or because…” Amber’s voice trailed off but Taemin understood what she wasn’t saying. 

“Can we not?” Taemin asked, hoping that he wasn’t going to offend them. 

“You said you’ve had worse?” Sulli said, tugging Taemin’s backpack from him and turning them towards the boys’ dorm. 

“Just what I said.” Taemin winced as his ribs twinged. “Why did you come this way?”

“Minho went to your room to see if you went there and Key and Jonghyun went to check classes and bathrooms.” She set her hand lightly on Taemin’s arm. “I know we’ve only known each other for a while, but when we all become friends with someone it happens quick. Key is the best judge of character and for him to adopt you as his pseudo son it says a lot.” There was something that she wasn’t saying but Taemin wasn’t ready to pry. 

He did flinch at the light contact before calming down and relaxing to her touch. 

“I’m sorry.” She said, moving her hand before Taemin had settled.

Taemin grabbed it without thinking, “Its okay.” He whispered turning his head to look at her. “I’m just not use to people touching me nicely.” He sighed as he turned to look at her. 

Amber’s gaze was pointed straight out, not looking at him, almost as if she knew he didn’t want anyone watching him as he spoke to Sulli.

“It’s nothing really. I only had one friend back home and he wasn’t exactly the best of friends and he really wasn’t the touchy kind.” Back home sounded like a weird concept to him and he didn’t know why he referred to the US as home. It never really felt like home with that overwhelming sense of safety and warmth, left over from a long forgotten memory. 

The reached the entrance to his dorm and Sulli said. “Sometimes Minho has to remind me that not everyone likes being touched. Key is worse than me though.” Her lips twitched in a half smile. 

Taemin nodded, trying not to wince at the pain shooting through his abdomen. 

“Are you okay?” Sulli noticed the quick flash of pain that moved across his features. 

“Yes.” He said quickly. “Stitch in my side from running.” He had had a stitch, it was why he stopped running, so it wasn’t exactly a lie. If the girls knew the truth, they’d tell the guys and Taemin didn’t want to cause any more trouble than he already had. With any luck, Yunho would be satisfied with the day’s beating for a while and would give Taemin a little time to heal before going off on him again.

 He missed the look that Amber gave him, telling volumes in the fact that she didn’t believe him. 

“I text the guys to tell them we found you,” Amber began, “so I’m sure they’re back in your room waiting. We’ve got a ton of work from our own English class today so this is where we leave you.” She patted his shoulder. 

Taemin nodded. “Thank you for looking out for me. I’ll try to be a better friend.”

“You’re a great friend!” Sulli said, throwing her arms around Taemin and squeezing him so tight that he cried out. She jumped back. “Right the touching, we’ll work on that.” She smiled brightly and either ignored or didn’t notice the look of pain in Taemin’s eyes. 

Amber did and she made a mental note to watch out for Taemin more. Something had clearly happened in the 15 minutes Taemin had been alone and she didn’t put it past Yunho and his cronies. She hadn’t seen them in the cafeteria because she knew they usually ate later, so they were more than able to gang up on Taemin without her little group noticing. 

“Let’s go Sulli.” Amber said, grabbing her friend’s hand. “I’ll do your English if you do my math.”

“Done!” Sulli said happily, linking her fingers with Ambers. “Bye Taemin. See you tomorrow!” Tugging Amber away, the girls set off for their own dorm and Taemin watched until they were out of sight. 

Rubbing his sore middle, he took a deep breath and steeled himself into walking into the dorm hall. If the girls were right and the guys were waiting for him, he had to put on a hell of a show. 

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Hey guys! If you're new to this story or re-reading it, you'll probably notice that I'm re-writting it to better suit my current writing style and to fix up some things that I can't remember where they were going and have become odd inconsistency. The next chapter is a bit of a mess I think so please bear with me until I can finish it. 

For the most part the story is the same, so nothing will really be changed but just be warned!

Loves to you all!!

Kat