The dim light shone over the faded oak desk, flickering every few seconds and signaling that it was near its death.

“Come on, don’t die on me now. I still have two pages to write.” SangHyuk pleaded, tapping on the tiny bulb a couple times. As if fighting on its last will, it went out for a quick second before flicking back on.

“Thank you.” He said. In the silence of the room, Hyuk stretched his arms to the ceiling with a yawn. “Man, I’m beat…. This History paper is killing me.”

He put his arms back down onto his lap, leaning back in his chair to rest his body for a minute before he went back to work. There was a shuffling to the left of him, causing him to look over at HongBin as he shifted in his bed. The younger had finished his paper early, and needed to catch up on sleep, so he had gone to bed early that night.

“Lucky….” Hyuk hissed beneath his breath. He let out another yawn before sitting back up in his seat and hunching over his paper. He had barely begun to pick up his pen when he heard voices coming from the living room.

“You’re not even listening to me!” The words were slurred together in a way that SangHyuk immediately recognized as a drunken JaeHwan. With worry in his eyes, he instinctively looked over to HongBin; the youngest shifted in his sleep, but showed no signs of consciousness, which sent a wave of relief over Hyuk.

Curiosity and the unwillingness to go on with his homework got the better of him, and silently he crept over to the door.

“You’re being ridiculous.” Came Leo’s faint voice.

“How am I being ridiculous!?” JaeHwan’s outburst made Hyuk jump, his arm hitting the door and making Leo look over. Immediately, Hyuk sunk back into the shadows as to not be caught spying on the argument; for a long moment he thought the Leo was going to say something to make Hyuk come out and face punishment for being sneaky like that. But TaekWoon never came over and caught him, and instead the conversation went on.

“I’m such a bad person!” JaeHwan continued. “I have no right to keep this from her, and yet here I am! Lying to the woman I care for! Hell, maybe even I love her! Maybe I want to get married to her!”

“Jaehwan, I think you’ve had enough to drink.”

Hyuk’s confusion continued to grow more and more. He could hear JaeHwan getting more worked up by the second, his voice raising in a way that only did when he was drunk.

“What the hell is going on…?” Hyuk asked himself.

“You don’t have to worry anymore, TaekWoonie! I’m going to tell her! You don’t have to keep this a secret anymore! Isn’t that what you wanted to hear?!”

Hyuk’s confusion now turned to shock at these words. What the Hell was JaeHwan talking about? He’s keeping a secret? A secret from whom? And when did Leo find out about it?

He listened in silence until the argument came to an end, where Leo eventually shot fires back at the drunk man. Then he heard the older leave, slamming the door behind him in the process, and suddenly the house was silent again. The teenager wait for a response, a reaction from JaeHwan who had been left alone in the living room, but he received none. Instead, he could only hear the shuffling of feet and pants legs rubbing against each other as Ken moved across the room and disappeared into his bedroom.

Hyuk eventually found his legs moving him across his bedroom and over to his desk before he sunk down in his chair once again. His head was spinning in confusion and shock of what he had just witnessed. So many questions were running through his head, but the first one that came to mind was what he kept asking himself.

“They’re lying to Lucca...?”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“Yah, stop you’re crying!” The taller boy yelled down. “You don’t have to be such a crybaby about everything you know!”

Hyuk cringed away, trying to hide his face as the small group of boys continued coming closer to him. He couldn’t help the tears that were falling, and now it was getting him in trouble. He tried to keep from doing anything back to the group, knowing it wouldn’t help, and instead tried to just protect himself.

“Stop your crying! You little baby, what do you even have to cry about?” The boy that had yelled before was yelling again, this time accompanying his words with dirt kicked up from the ground into Hyuk’s face. “You don’t have anything to cry about!”

“Not yet anyways!” Another one of the boys sneered at him, also kicking some of the loose dirt up at Hyuk.

Whining slightly, Hyuk tried to back up away from the boys, only backing himself against a wall. The school building suddenly become an evil cage that was keeping him there for the torture. The tears were starting to burn as the kids started to kick dirt up into his face. The dirt was getting into his eyes and mouth, and he was breathing it in, making him cough and sob even more.

“Stop…!” He tried to call out, but it seemed that the more he cried out, the more they started laughing.

The boy who seemed to be the leader of this group just kept getting closer with his foot, nearly kicking Hyuk in the face more than once. Hyuk was sobbing even harder, just trying to get his bearings together as he tried to avoid the hits.

Right before he could actually get hit though, the boy that was leading the group suddenly let out a loud yelp of pain.

“Yah, HanSung!! Go somewhere else, leave him alone! And take your friends with you!” A different voice ordered, making all of the kids look up to see what was going on.

“Oh, what do you think you’ll do?” HanSung, the boy that had been leading the group, snapped, his hand rubbing a spot that was obviously in pain.

“I’ll chase you down with rocks again if you want.”

Hyuk looked up slightly, hardly able to see past his tears and the dirt. What he did see though, was a girl standing with a rock in her hand, pulling it back and getting ready to throw it at HanSung. When the boy didn’t start to leave, the rock launched, nailing him in the shoulder but still making him yelp. Turning, the group of boys started tripping over each other to try and get away, the group that had come up chasing after them.

One of them stayed behind though; the girl that had threatened HanSung. She watched for a moment to make sure they were gone, then went to Hyuk. Kneeling down, she looked up at him, waving her hand slightly.

“Don’t worry~ I’m here to help you…” She stated, gently reaching up and brushing away Hyuk’s tears. The rivers that were flowing from his face though were leaving streaks in the dirt on his face. “You poor thing….” She pouted as she carefully wiped his eyes. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”

Looking up at the girl, Hyuk knew she had to be in the grade above him. He had seen her around a few times, but had never once interacted with her. As she continued wiping off his face though, he realized that he was starting to calm down. There was something about her, and he could feel the tears slowly stopping.

“See, there we go.” She smiled slightly at him as she finished brushing off his face. “You shouldn’t come over here and cry. Be happy~”

Hyuk took a deep breath to calm down, his eyes meeting her’s even though they were still burning slightly. “Thank you…” He nodded, trying to blink the rest of the dirt out of his eyes. He was still crying slightly from the burning in his eyes, but he tried to not start fully crying again. “Really, thank you….”

“Don’t worry about it.” She sat down on the ground in front of Hyuk, smiling slightly. “I’m Lucca, by the way.” She introduced herself.

“I’m Hyuk.” He nodded, smiling slightly back at her even though his entire face was still burning.

“Great, you should be my friend.” Lucca stated happily, pushing herself up and then holding her hand out for Hyuk. “You should get cleaned off though.” She teased slightly, laughing a little as she looked down at him.

Reaching up, Hyuk took Lucca’s hand, laughing slightly himself. Pulling himself up, he couldn’t help but laugh a bit more when she started dusting his shirt off for him.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The pencil dropped to the desk as SangHyuk sighed in victory.

“Finally, this paper is done.” He let out a yawn and stretch, looking over at the clock and seeing that is was already nearly five in the morning. He let out another sigh, dreading the fact that he had to get up and get ready for school in two hours. He glanced over at HongBin again, who was still sleeping in his bed like a log.

“If you claim to to be tired tomorrow morning, I’m going to kick you in the head.” He threatened only half jokingly.

The house had been completely silent since Leo had stormed out just hours before. As Hyuk stepped out into the living room, he noticed that Ravi’s shoes weren’t by the front door, signaling that he hadn’t bothered to come home.

HakYeon hyung’s not going to be happy with him. Hyuk thought to himself. Then he caught sight of Ken in the corner of his eye, looking over to find him laying on the couch and completely passed out, the bottle of soju still in his hand.

The teenager simply stood and stared at the sleeping hyung, wondering what the hell he was supposed to do. HakYeon would be getting up in about thirty minutes to start opening up the daycare, and HongBin in and hour to take a shower and start getting ready for school - seeing JaeHwan passed out on the sofa is the last thing any of them needed to see.

Hyuk let out a heavy sigh before he took his first step and moved over to Ken. The first thing he did was clean up all of the evidence that he had been drinking, taking the bottle of soju and stashing it back in the cupboard. Moving back out to the living room, he was quickly at Ken’s side and throwing his arm over his shoulder.

“Come on, hyung. Let’s go to your room.”

The older merely grunted in his sleep, barely stirring as SangHyuk stood him up from the couch.

The younger couldn’t help but let out a long groan. “Why are you so heavy, hyung? Maybe it’s all that restaurant food you have been eating recently.”

They struggled for a good few minutes before Hyuk had managed to maneuver the intoxicated JaeHwan into his room and plop him down onto his bed. He tucked him in beneath his covers and began to leave the room. As Ken turned over in his sleep, however, SangHyuk found himself turning back and staring down into the face of the older.

You don’t have to worry anymore, TaekWoonie! I’m going to tell her! You don’t have to keep this a secret anymore!

Hyuk couldn’t stop these words from repeating over and over in his head as he observed the features of his sleeping hyung. They played over and over in his head, and he found that the longer he dwelled on the subject, the greater and greater the urge became for him to find out just what it was that they were hiding….