"Fear is that little dark room where everything negative lies."

-Michael Pritchard

No one is helping me. Not even you. Of course you won't help me, even after all that we have been through. But it's okay, because I love you. I will stick by your side...forever.

*******

“Kris.”

I turned around to face the bright red Porsche being idled by the sidewalk. On the corner of my right eye, I saw a white cross sitting on the sidewalk and I shivered. I slung my bag over my shoulder and then raised my eyebrow at the man who was sitting inside. The window rolled down and he looked up at me.

“What?” I asked him.

“Be nice, make friends and listen to your teacher,” the man replied.

“Yeah, yeah. Got it, dad.” I blew air at my fringe before giving him a slick wave and then walking past the school gates. I heard the car start up and drive away. I turned back to see if the car was out of sight, before pumping my fist into the air and giving a victorious smile. Hello, freedom.

For me, the school was average sized. It had around almost a hundred rooms. Two libraries; one on each end of the school. A swimming pool in the left wing, along with all the other sports leisure’s like the gym and fitness room. I made a mental note to visit those places regularly. Then, on the other side of the school, on the bottom floor, there were the art rooms. Places like the music rooms and craft classes were down there. The top floor was mostly reserved for the main classes.

All in all, the whole school was around about 200 acres, a bit higher than the average school size. It was pretty impressive and at least the colours they used at the school weren’t a fashion crime.

Then I looked at the map and saw this little square behind the school, which is what I assumed, was the dorm. I had actually thought about using the dorm, but dad disagreed with it a lot. He wanted me to be by his side as much as possible. I was lucky to even be in school in the first place.

“Hi, are you the new student?” a kid asked me. I looked him up and down and categorized him as ‘Good Enough.” I nodded to him and he smiled before pushing his glasses up his nose. I scoffed a bit. His glasses were just slightly too big.

“You can take your glasses off,” I told him and he shook his head.

“I’d rather not,” he replied. Then he stuck his hand out. “My name is Byun Baekhyun. I’m in your homeroom class and also the president of the student council. Nice to meet you, I’ll be showing you around for today.”

“Ah, thanks then. My name’s Yifan, but call me Kris,” I replied and shook his hand. Then he started to walk ahead and I quickly followed him. I studied his posture; slouching, hands in pocket, a bit of a lazy step and he was swinging his head back and forth. It was all very natural. The only natural thing about him, were those glasses. I could tell that he didn’t need them, so why did he keep on persisting to wear them?

“Okay, here is the school office. You come here is you have any inquiries. Just wait here and I’ll get your schedule.” Baekhyun introduced me to a small room. I nodded and watched him walk up to the lady at the counter and started talking to her. While he was talking, I moved on to look at the art décor. It was really impressive. I was sure that one of the paintings there was also in my room as well. Great minds think alike. I came across one painting and smiled. I reached out to touch it, but a hand quickly stopped me. I turned and looked down to see Baekhyun.

“Is there something wrong?” I asked. Baekhyun nodded. He released my hand and I let it drop to my side. Then Baekhyun sighed before shoving his hands back into his pocket and facing the painting.

“That painting belongs to Tao,” Baekhyun told me. I looked at the bottom right hand corner and saw a tiny signature in Chinese. I smiled a bit. “Never touch this painting if you want to live another day.”

“Why?” I asked. Baekhyun shook his head.

“I don’t know,” Baekhyun replied and I was about to ask him something else when he shoved something into my hands. I felt paper. I looked down and saw that I was holding my schedule. It looked pretty boring to me. I pocketed it inside my blazer before looking back at Baekhyun.

“Where now?” I asked him. He shrugged.

“It getting early to school. There’s nothing to do. You can’t go anywhere else either, because the shops are across the road and you saw how busy that road is. You can’t get across it until way after school,” Baekhyun sighed. “So, when all else fails, you go to class. We might as well; you need to meet your classmates.”

We walked to class, mostly in silence. I asked him question about the school, about him. Anything I needed to know if I wanted to survive. He was very informative too.

“Don’t sneak into the girls’ toilets. They have spies in there. Don’t run in the hall, because the teachers have spies there too. Don’t pee all over the boys’ bathroom floor, because they have spies there as well. Don’t talk back to the teachers because then they’ll make you run up and down the stairs ten times and I’m pretty sure you’ve seen the stairs; they’re massive. Also, don’t bully anyone because the majority of students in the student council are martial arts students, so they know lots of ways to torture you,” Baekhyun rattled on.

“Anything else? Avoid kingkas and queenkas?” I asked. Baekhyun gave me a weird look.

“What the heck are kingkas and queenkas?” Baekhyun asked. Hm, maybe I shouldn’t have believed in asian fanfiction.

“Sorry, I meant, the popular kids,” I corrected myself. Baekhyun understood that.

“No, you don’t have to avoid them. They mingle in with everyone else. There is no king and queen of the school. If you’re popular, most likely, there is someone else in school who is just as popular as you,” Baekhyun replied.

“Ok,” I said. “I don’t have to avoid anyone.”

“Ah, there is only one exception-”

That was as far as we got before there was a huge crash. We were only, apparently, a metre away from my classroom when we heard the sound.

“That is your exception,” Baekhyun said and looked towards a classroom a few classrooms down the corridor. Every student seemed to stick their heads out of their classroom to watch that specific classroom making the noise. Then all of a sudden, the door slid open and a tall dark boy was thrown out. The boy rolled himself into a ball and whimpered. I watched with amusement. The boy was so tall, yet seemed so weak. A second later, three boys walked out and crowded around the boy on the floor.

“YAH!” one boy shouted and the boy on the floor whimpered even louder. “Did you take my stuff?!”

“I-I-I d-d-didn-”

“This kid…” the boy laughed. “Speak louder, retard!”

“What’s happening?” I asked Baekhyun.

“The boy who’s yelling is Chanyeol. It’s okay, you don’t have to avoid him. He’s scared of everyone apart from the guy on the floor,” Baekhyun explained.

“What about the other two?” I asked. Baekhyun pointed over at another tall boy.

“That kid over there is Sehun. Don’t worry about him either. He’s the trailer,” Baekhyun said. “He’s the one who just follows because he just can.”

“And the short one?” I asked.

“The last boy is D.O. I don’t know his real name,” Baekhyun shrugged. “He was never in my class and everyone who was never said his real name.”

“Ah, so do they just go around together. They seem like an odd trio,” I stated. Baekhyun nodded along.

“They’re outcasts who bully the outer outcasts,” Baekhyun smirked.

“So…who is the exception?” I asked. Baekhyun pointed to the boy on the ground.

“Whatever you do, don’t go near him,” Baekhyun said. “Not because he’ll degrade your social status, but because you’ll only hurt him.” Then he pushed his glasses back up before tugging on my shirt and taking me into my classroom. I glanced one more time in at the boy on the ground before scoffing. He’s so weak. Just get up and defend yourself.

*******

I love you, I’ll never leave your side. I’ll keep you safe.

Okay…keep me safe.

*******

“Hi,” I waved lazily to my new class and they all stared back at me with dead eyes. Such a creepy classroom. “I’m Kris.”

“Welcome, Kris,” the teacher, Mr. Kim, said. He then looked around and saw a spare seat in the middle of class. Baekhyun already had a seat buddy. I walked over slowly and sat in the spare seat. The boy sitting next to me turned to face me and looked me up and down before smiling.

“I’m Luhan,” he said. I glanced at him and nodded. “Let’s be friends.”

I practically slept through class. I had already learnt everything last year. Thankfully, the teacher didn’t give me anything. I didn’t know why, but he just didn’t. Then I realized that my dad must’ve messed around a bit and I silently thanked him, yet cursed him for meddling with my life.

The bell rang and I quickly picked up my stuff and started to leave. Baekhyun quickly caught up to me and Luhan followed afterwards.

“Kris! Wait up!” Luhan cried and grabbed my shoulder. Baekhyun appeared on my other side and scoffed a bit.

“Calm down, Luhan,” Baekhyun rolled his eyes. “Kris isn’t a lollipop.”

At that moment, Luhan suddenly stopped walking and on instinct, we did too. Luhan seemed frozen, just staring straight ahead. We followed his gaze and our eyes landed on a tall boy in front of us. His head was down and was avoiding eye contact.

“Hi…Tao…” Luhan whispered. I quickly shot my head round to look at this ‘Tao.’ The owner of the beautiful painting in by the school office was standing before my eyes.

“Oh…ah, hey, um, can I like-” I walked towards him and Tao took a huge step back. I looked at Baekhyun and he shook his head. I still persisted. “Look, Tao, I’d like to-” I reached out for him and he screamed before running away. I gave my friends a weird look.

“I told you to stay away from him, you giant douche bag…haha, double meaning there,” Baekhyun said.

“What’s up with him?” I asked them.

“He’s scared of people talking to him…or just people,” Luhan explained.

“Ah…a phobia?” I asked and they nodded their heads. “They why the hell is he in school?”

“We don’t know,” Baekhyun replied. “There is something that we’re missing out on, but we don’t know what and we don’t intend to find out anyway. It’s not really our business. Come on, Kris. To our next class!”

“Math…” I whispered as I stood in front of the classroom. “We meet again.”

“Kris, enough with the dramatic reunion and get your Chinese into the classroom,” Baekhyun called out. I rolled my eyes before walking in. Despite Math being my most hated subject, the air in the classroom seemed nice.

“You’ll like our math’s teacher,” Luhan assured me.

“Why?” I asked.

At that moment, there was a shout from outside and a kid walked over to the window and opened it. Then someone suddenly jumped through, shocking the hell out of me.

“Good morning, class! Today, we are going to revise over our areas!” the man shouted to the whole class. We were all quiet, it was so awkward. Then his eyes landed on me and he smiled. “Welcome to my maths class, Yifan! I’m Mr. Park!”

“Uh sur-” I tried to say.

“Sh! Don’t talk, young mathematician!” Mr. Park interrupted. “It’s learning time! Okay, kids! Get out your books!”

“That was torture,” I said the moment we got out of there. My friends were playing this shoving game behind me and I quickly walked ahead to the cafeteria. It was just like how Baekhyun had described. Everyone was scattered everywhere. There were no direct groups. You could honestly just walk in and join anyone and they would welcome you.

Then I looked into the corner of the cafeteria. There were lots of spare tables. All these tables were surrounding a table in the middle, which there was only one person seated; Tao.

Must’ve been lonely.

Oh well, it wasn’t my problem.

*******

Stay here, don’t go to anyone else. If you do, I’ll take you with me.

Hi everyone! Thanks for all my first subscribers! I hope you enjoy this! 

Also, sherilyntheeurasian, yeah, I'm pretty scared of mirrors. Everytime I see one and if here is a light behind me, I'm like, 'MOTHER OF GOD, MUST CALM DOWN! NOTHING BAD WILL HAPPEN! WHY AM I TAKING SO LONG?! JUST WASH YOUR HANDS AND GET THE HELL AWAY FROM THIS MIRROR, BISH!!'