“I saw what happened to you at the party. I’m sorry I couldn’t help.”

Kai had been there that night. Kyungsoo had forgotten all about him. But what exactly had Kai seen? Had he seen Chanyeol, Tao and Jongdae beating him up? Throwing him in the pool? Locking him in a closet? And like everyone else he had done nothing about it – what stopped him? No one had helped him that night. It wasn’t until Jongin found him that anything was done. This Kai couldn’t have cared that much about Kyungsoo if he saw what had happened and left him defenseless. Kyungsoo crumpled the note, tossing it in the bottom of his locker.

The next few weeks were nothing spectacular. Everything seemed to have become routine. School, school, school, Sehun with Luhan, Luhan and Minseok pretending the other didn’t exist and stealing glances when they thought no one was looking, Kris’ group picking on him but not anything drastic, more school, turning down Sehun’s invitations to go to parties every time one arose. Near the end of October when the weather was, in Kyungsoo’s mind, perfect – the time of year when you could wear just a sweater because it wasn’t warm but it wasn’t freezing yet either – the school began to get “spookified”. Every day Halloween decorations would be put up, the lights would be made to flicker and quiet but creepy music would play in the hallways. It was a custom of the school. On Halloween day the school would be a maze of terror, the place pitch black and everyone using flashlights to attempt to navigate. Some lights would go on and flicker out at random. Ambushes were everywhere. Classes involved watching scary or Halloween-themed movies and eating candy. Everywhere there was screaming and laughing and running around, and it was a very fun day.

Kyungsoo didn’t look forward to it in the least. The thirtieth fell on a Monday and of course Sehun was insistent of getting Kyungsoo a costume that night for the next day. The pair of them, Luhan tagging along, went to a costume store and looked at tons of things but Kyungsoo couldn’t be less interested in it all. He suggested that they get their own costumes, but they already had theirs all planned out. Luhan was to be an undead soccer player – which would just take a bit of makeup and him ripping up and old soccer uniform he had – and Sehun would be a ghost – but not just a sheet-over-the-head ghost; he was going to wear all white and there would be a lot of mystical white-gray powder involved, coating his hair, body, and clothing to make him seem translucent somehow. But Kyungsoo wasn’t one for elaborate things. Eventually Sehun found a black cloak and came up with a brilliant idea for a costume.

“You wear your glasses and we mess up your hair and draw a scar on your forehead, and you can be Harry Potter!”

“I don’t have a wand,” Kyungsoo protested. He really just didn’t want to dress up at all.

“Yeah and you don’t have a hot ginger girlfriend or dead parents either,” Luhan told him. “We’ll make do with what we’ve got. Go find a stick in your backyard or something.”

There was no arguing with the two of them. So they bought the cloak and sent him on his way home, Sehun threatening his life if he didn’t wear the cloak and his glasses tomorrow. Kyungsoo went to bed that night contemplating whether it would be worth it to fake sick tomorrow – lie to his mom and say he’d eaten a candy Sehun gave him that might have been spoiled or something – but he feared the wrath of Sehun. Likely if Kyungsoo didn’t get on the bus tomorrow morning Sehun would get off and drag his to school. He would just have to bear with it, try and lose Sehun at school tomorrow so he could go find somewhere to hide from the craze that would be Halloween day.

Waiting for the bus next morning, it was cold. Somehow overnight the weather had flipped into winter, the ground frozen, the icy wind biting into Kyungsoo’s skin, forcing him to tug his cloak tighter around him. He felt silly. But he was grateful when the bus arrived with the foggy windows telling him that it would be warm inside. He nodded at the bus driver and made his way to the back of the bus where a ghastly pale boy was sitting and smiling at him. Somehow, Sehun had really made himself look like a ghost. That powder he’d told Kyungsoo about really did make him seem like a shimmering mirage, and Kyungsoo wanted to touch him to make sure he was real.

“You look really good Hunnie,” Kyungsoo told him as he sat down. Sehun’s smile cracked his face in two.

“Thanks hyung!” he said cheerfully. “I would hug you but…” He glanced at his powdery clothing. Kyungsoo shrugged. “Here, let me do your scar.” Sehun pulled a red eyeliner pencil out of his bag and pushed Kyungsoo’s hair back off his forehead. Kyungsoo closed his eyes, relaxing his face and trying not to twitch at the tickling feeling of the pencil drawing on his skin. “There. You’re a wizard, Sooie.” Kyungsoo rolled his eyes at Sehun’s bad joke but Sehun was smiling, ruffling his hair to muss it up. “That stuff is waterproof so it’ll stay on whatever you do today.”

Their bus slowly filled with boys in costumes. Pirates, zombies, a lion, a guy in a banana outfit. Yixing looked like he was a vampire, which Sehun whispered to Kyungsoo was supposed to be the theme in Kris’ group this year although not everyone had gone along with it. Tao decided to be a ninja and Kris didn’t argue it; Chanyeol and Jongdae had Baekhyun and Minseok dressed up as prisoners, with the striped outfits and handcuffs and everything. But the rest of them were vampires with popped-collared cloaks and tight-fitted pants, leather boots and fanged incisors and even blood-red contacts. It was their group theme, and no one else was allowed to be vampires at their school. And no one would dare in fear of becoming a Halloween decoration.

From the outside of the school the place appeared quite ordinary. There were a couple tacky decorations on the exterior walls, images of black cats and witches with cauldrons and some pumpkins with spooky faces carved into them, leering at passing-by students. But every time a door was opened a cloud of tainted-black smoke billowed out, and Kyungsoo groaned internally, knowing the indoors of the school would be far more dramatic than the outside looked.

Luhan was waiting for them at the front doors and Sehun hurried up to him, chastising him about standing out in the cold like that. He shrugged, reminding his boyfriend that he was “undead”, gesturing to his outfit – all ripped and tattered and smeared with dirt and fake blood. His skin was tinged a pale bluey-green and he was covered in fake gashes and crusty blood. His pretty blond hair was matted with blood that dripped down his neck and a very realistic scar cut through his face, which was almost unrecognizable. His eyes were sunken in, black, his skin looking frail, his cheekbones more prominent. He admitted that his mom had helped him with a lot of it, but Sehun was in awe. And Luhan’s makeup was waterproof too so he promised he wouldn’t hold back on having lots of fun.

“You look so cute, Kyungsoo-yah,” Luhan said, taking his hand and squeezing it warmly. “You’ll have fun today too right?” Kyungsoo nodded half-heartedly, not willing to disagree. “We can stick together, see who can scare Hunnie more, yeah?”

“Hey, I heard that!” Sehun pouted. Kyungsoo gave a weak smile. He couldn’t deny that he would enjoy laughing at his easily-terrified friend. But he still wasn’t looking forward to this day. “Come on guys, it’s freezing out here and all the fun is inside!” And then Kyungsoo was being dragged along by his ghostly friend and his undead boyfriend into a mess of costumes and smoke and terror.

The light of the outdoors couldn’t penetrate the smoky darkness inside but the chill still ran through the air. The school went all out. They kept walking into people, into cobwebs, into the path of motion-sensor traps that would scream or attack or try to scare them. Sehun was such an easy target, and Luhan laughed at his boyfriend’s bone-breaking grip on his hand. After ten minutes of wandering through things they decided to go to the cafeteria, where there would be lots of spooky and interesting foods and a bit less terror. It was the only part of Halloween Kyungsoo liked – the food – and he had skipped breakfast in anticipation of getting to eat. But walking into the room, he immediately wanted to turn around and walk right back out.

The first person he saw was Kris and the tall shadow beside him that was Tao. Kris was probably the iest vampire to have ever happened – with knee-high clunking leather boots, pants almost as tight as Tao’s ninja outfit and entirely revealing, and the golden expanse of his chest and abdomen bare under a swooping cloak. His eyeliner was thick but not thick enough to look cheesy, and his eyes almost glowed red. His fangs grazed his lower lip and were his face serious he would look deadly. But he was smiling, talking playfully to his assassin-looking friend and the flock of cloaked boys around him. Two of the vampire boys had smaller boys in striped one-piece outfits, and Kyungsoo could see that Jongdae was playing his part, his arms wrapped around Minseok, teeth sinking into his neck. Minseok’s neck already looked abused, red marking it up clearly even from across the room.

Kyungsoo looked to Luhan to see if he had seen – and Luhan was gone, along with Sehun. Where Kyungsoo had paused timidly at the sight of the vampires, the other two had continued on and were now lost somewhere in the crowd, likely off to find something to eat. Lowering his head Kyungsoo made his way to one of the tables where stacks of artistically decorated cupcakes awaited. He gently picked up a green one that looked like a cat eye, admiring the beauty of it before scooping off some icing with his fingertip. He continued moving through the room, but he was uneasy about the vampire boys and eventually just settled on a cup of scarlet fruit punch that had eyeballs and fingers floating in it and his cupcake. He started for the corner of the room, hoping to have a better lookout for his lost friends there, when he felt someone tap his shoulder.

“Kyungsoo-yah! You’re so adorable!” Kyungsoo turned to see Minseok smiling at him before throwing his linked arms over Kyungsoo’s head and hugging him. Kyungsoo squeezed his arms in, not wanting his cupcake to end up on either of them.

“Thanks,” Kyungsoo mumbled as Minseok let him go. His heart calmed down; he hadn’t been sure who had come up behind him, but Minseok was safe. “You too.”

“I’m a prisoner,” Minseok said cheerily. “Jongdae’s. But I escaped!” His eyes were shining brightly, and Kyungsoo couldn’t help but smile at his playful hyung. “I’ll be in trouble if he finds me. Can I hide with you for a while?”

“Sure hyung.” It wouldn’t hurt to play along. But then, if Jongdae found Minseok with him he’d likely go tell Kris, and who knows what would happen then. He didn’t want them bothering him today.

They didn’t get far before Jongdae did find them though. He grabbed the older and threw his cloak over him, and Kyungsoo heard Minseok giggling.

“C’mon hyung, don’t waste your time with this kid,” Kyungsoo heard Jongdae saying, and Minseok’s eyes glanced towards Kyungsoo.

“See you later, Soo.” He looked like he wanted to say more, or maybe hug him or kiss him in traditional Minseok style, but Jongdae was pulling him away before he was allowed to and then Kyungsoo was left alone with the growing fear that Kris would find him. He really wanted to find Sehun and Luhan. Or Joonmyun. Kyungsoo hadn’t seen Joonmyun yet but he didn’t even know what to look for. He wished he had his phone but he still hadn’t replaced the one that had been destroyed in the pool at Jongin’s party. He’d been telling himself there was no rush to get a new one and now he was kicking himself. Was it too early to go home yet?

Don’t’ be a child, Kyungsoo. What are you so scared of? Sure, Kris and his friends could be . They could beat him up every day for the rest of his time at school. So what? He’d already faced them more than once and he’d made it out just fine. All this worrying was going to give him an ulcer, which would just be annoying and inconvenient. And it was distracting him from finding his friends. If he hadn’t been thinking about Kris he would’ve seen that Sehun and Luhan were right there, twenty feet away from him, although they didn’t see him.

And they didn’t see Kris and Yixing coming up behind Kyungsoo, taking his cup and pitching it in a garbage can then firmly grabbing his wrists and taking him along against his will.

“Hey, Kyungsoo,” Kris said in his ear. “I heard you were here but you were hiding. That’s not true is it? You wouldn’t hide from us, would you Kyungsoo?”

“Why on earth would I do that?” Kyungsoo shot, earning a pinch on his wrist.

“I really don’t like your attitude, you know,” Kris told him. “Too bad. If you weren’t such an towards me, I would love to hang out with you. You’re a scary little brat when you want to be – not to me but… you’d fit in with us.”

“I wouldn’t want to hang out with you,” Kyungsoo hissed. “Contrary to your egotistical belief, you’re not everyone’s wet dream. A lot of people don’t like y-”

“Shut up, kid. You talk too much.” They stopped at a barrel where the rest of Kris’ gang was already waiting. Baekhyun was leaned over the barrel, hands cuffed behind his back – bobbing for apples. As they watched he leaned too far and lost his balance, diving into the water, and they all erupted into laughter. Then Chanyeol was there, pulling on his shoulders and heaving him out of the water. Baekhyun emerged dripping, but Chanyeol turned him around and he had a red apple in his mouth. Chanyeol took it in his mouth, fangs sinking into the apple’s flesh and Baekhyun bit off a piece before grinning.

“Got it!” he laughed. Chanyeol took the apple out of his mouth and tossed it aside, leaning in to give his soaked Baekhyun an apple-flavored kiss. Chanyeol murmured something across the smaller boy’s lips, something that sounded like Be careful, hyung, and Baekhyun gave him a reassuring smile, standing on his toes to kiss the boy again. Everyone lost interest, looking for the next person to go.

“Kyungsoo here wants to play!” Kris said and everyone noticed the small boy then, tussling to get out of Kris and Yixing’s grip, and laughed. Before anything could happen though, two voices yelled out in unison.

“Hey!”

Kyungsoo looked over his shoulder and saw that, gratefully, Sehun had found him at last, Luhan lingering behind him. Out of Kris’ group, Minseok had broken forward as he realized what was happening.

“You wanna join us?” Chanyeol asked Sehun threateningly. Sehun didn’t take his eyes off of Kyungsoo.

“We’ll just take Kyungsoo and go, thanks.” It was Luhan who spoke up and despite his generally feminine appearance – hidden for now under his zombie makeup – his power held over them as their elder. He stared Kris down (or rather, up) fearlessly and patiently. He didn’t look menacing nor did he try to. He just waited. And after a moment Kris told Yixing to let go of the small boy between them and pushed Kyungsoo towards Sehun and Luhan, scowling. Kyungsoo stumbled forwards and Sehun caught him, holding him protectively. Meanwhile Kris turned away like nothing had ever happened and everyone else quickly followed suit. But Minseok stood there staring at Kyungsoo, guilt burning in his eyes.

“I’m sorry Kyungsoo, I didn’t see them-”

“Well maybe if you weren’t being Jongdae’s for five seconds,” Luhan said coolly. “You might have.”

Minseok’s eyes looked to him, surprised that Luhan was speaking to him for once. His face was conflicted with emotions but venom bit into the agony, perhaps before Luhan noticed the stinging effect his words had. “You’re one to talk.” He glared at Sehun briefly then returned his cold look to his ex-best friend. “Jongdae’s making me happy. He knows how to do that – he’s good.” There was an underlying meaning in his words that Luhan didn’t miss.

“So what, is he jacking you off now?”

Minseok had never looked so fierce to Kyungsoo and his next words were daggers that sliced through the air and their target. “Yeah, he is actually.”

It was Luhan’s turn to hide the pain in his eyes, caught somewhere between jealousy and defeat. “Yeah, well… don’t forget who showed you first.”

There was no way that could mean anything but exactly what Kyungsoo thought it meant and he suddenly became very aware of the fact that Sehun was hearing all this too. Kyungsoo didn’t have to glance up at his best friend to see the shock of Luhan’s words going through him but worse, when Luhan began to walk off Sehun was too stunned to even move. But it wasn’t over.

“He’s shown me a lot more than that, you know!”

Luhan froze. Kyungsoo could almost imagine Minseok with a sword, having stabbed his best friend right through his heart. But those words… That was just twisting the blade. Kyungsoo was amazed Luhan didn’t drop right there. Instead he slowly turned to face Minseok again.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked, his voice having lost all its potency. “What, you’re sleeping with him? Are you kidding me?”

But Minseok was almost smirking now and Kyungsoo hadn’t even known this side of the boy existed. “Don’t act like you’re better,” Minseok said with a scowl. “Everyone knows you’re screwing Sehun. You don’t exactly try to hide it. Jongdae loves me, we’ll do whatever we want.”

There was silence between them, and Luhan looked amazed. Minseok had won. Out of the corner of Luhan’s eyes slipped out a tear and his next words came out broken.

“He – he loves you.” Kyungsoo almost couldn’t hear what he’d said but the disbelief was clear in his voice. “You’re stupid Minseok. You’re so ing stupid.”

And then he was gone. Sehun stared after him as he hurried off, breaking out of his daze long enough to give Minseok a deathly stare.

“Stay away from him!” he shot at the older boy. “Do you see what you do to him? You just make him miserable! Stop messing up his life just because he’s happy without you!”

“Sehun!”

Sehun pushed Kyungsoo away from him, less than gentle. “It’s true!” he cried and then he ran after Luhan. Kyungsoo turned to Minseok, still trying to take everything in that had just happened.

“Minseok, listen, he’s-”

Minseok had become a shell of whatever bold person he’d been a moment earlier. Kyungsoo saw tears falling onto his cheeks and he just whispered, “He’s right.”

“

The schoolyard looked abandoned. Classes were out for the summer and the students had all dispersed to enjoy their vacation time. But echoing across the pavement was the sound of laughter and the bounce of a basketball. Two boys were running, one dribbling the ball, the larger trying to block the small brunet from shooting. But he still launched the ball towards the net – and missed by a mile.

The larger boy laughed as the basketball rolled away. “What was that hyung? I know you’re bad but c’mon, that was just-” He turned to see the smaller boy’s face, knowing he would undoubtedly be sticking his tongue out but instead he was on his knees, doubled over and clutching his side. “Hyung!”

The taller bounded over and dropped beside the boy. The petit brunet was panting, his eyes watering, but he met the other boy’s eyes and forced a smile. “I’m fine, ‘Yeol,” he chuckled lightly. “I think I pulled a muscle, that’s all.”

Chanyeol hovered, still worried about the older. “Really, ‘Yeol,” Baekhyun insisted. “I’m not any good at basketball anyway, it’s probably just a sign that I shouldn’t play.” At this, Chanyeol cracked a smile.

“I don’t know how you manage to injure yourself so much Baek,” he sighed. Baekhyun gave a quiet laugh, rolling over to rest his head in Chanyeol’s lap. He rubbed his fingers along the side of his ribs, feeling the bump there, desperately longing for it to go away.

He’d noticed it at the beginning of summer but not really thought anything of it. It didn’t really hurt and he figured it was just another weird injury he’d gotten from nowhere. He was pretty careless, so he got those a lot. Yes, this was likely just one of those. But a few days later it made itself known when he’d gone swimming and felt a screaming pain in his side as he did a backstroke. Fortunately Chanyeol had been nearby or he might have drowned. Even then, Baekhyun had hidden it from his best friend. And that was before he knew what he was hiding. He forgot about it again until about two weeks later when he woke up in agony because of it. His mother had taken him to the hospital. Now, a month having passed, he hadn’t said anything about it to Chanyeol. Maybe he hoped if his best friend didn’t know he could pretend it wasn’t there.

“Honestly, at this rate I don’t even know if you’ll make it through the year. Then who will I go to graduation with? I’ll have to make a new best friend in high school.”

Baekhyun felt like crying.

“

The rest of Halloween was miserable for Kyungsoo. When he caught up with Sehun and Luhan, Luhan was in tears and Sehun was doing his best to comfort him. Although Sehun eventually managed to calm his boyfriend down, Luhan was less of his cheerful self afterwards which of course made Sehun miserable. Kyungsoo ended up ditching the two of them and hiding in an unused classroom, reading a book by flashlight. And that afternoon though Kyungsoo wasn’t really surprised, Sehun wasn’t on the bus.

“

“Cute costume yesterday. You look good with your glasses.”

Kyungsoo crumpled Kai’s newest note. He didn’t have time for him.

“

Sehun wasn’t at their lunch table anymore. He went to Luhan’s soccer practices, likely looking out for him, making sure Minseok didn’t say anything else to him. But Minseok avoided Luhan and they both seemed fine with that. Kyungsoo didn’t wait around for his best friend at lunch but would go to the library as soon as he was done eating and sit tucked away between bookshelves, nose in a book. Sehun became a bit less of the bubbly boy Kyungsoo had always known him to be, which was scary. He spent all his time worrying about Luhan. But it would pass. In a week or two they would return to themselves. That’s how these things worked.

But, like everything else lately, Kyungsoo doubted himself on this. He wanted to believe he knew his best friend well enough – that he’d been like this in cases before (although maybe not quite to this extent) and it would all resolve itself in no time and he would have his annoying Hunnie back – but he just… didn’t know anymore. He didn’t know what it was, but it was as if a thread had been pulled loose and he was very, very slowly unraveling. Falling apart.

A/n: The first of my interludes has arrived! This story isn’t just a Kaisoo story, there’s a few side ships and areas that I want to elaborate on, which I’ll be doing through small interludes. I hope you enjoy the back-stories of the characters, because they really help make sense of why people act the way they do. There’s only two pairings I’ll be writing these interludes for and, yes, Baekyeol is one of them. The Baekyeol ones will explain not only their relationship but also things about Kris and maybe other characters as well. So I hope you don’t mind that I’ve got this side-stuff going, I just like faceted stories with minor focuses instead of just one major focus. :) Thank you for reading, and I hope you aren’t disappointed! Saranghaeyo :)