The last day of term before Christmas was, oddly enough, on a Tuesday. At my old school we had received at least one week before Christmas off but it seemed that was not the case here. It had already taken Baekhyun three attempts to try get the required grades in maths - none of which had ended successfully - but on that Tuesday lunchtime he came skipping into the canteen waving a sheet of paper above his head and called out, gaining the attention of a lot of other students.

“I totally nailed that,” he triumphantly declared as he smacked the sheet down in front of Chanyeol, Kai and I for us to inspect as if all his other failed attempts had never occurred. If nothing else, Baekhyun was perpetually proud of himself.

I looked down at the sheet, noting that it mark was only one above the grade he needed to pass– not exactly an overwhelming success, but it was enough. Of course, I wouldn’t actually bring this up to him. Who was I to crush his efforts?

“Well done!” Chanyeol congratulated as he handed him a half-finished carton of chocolate milk as if it was some sort of big prize.

Kai also smiled fondly at his friend; it reached and lifted his eyes in a way that made him seem a lot younger suddenly. “Dude, you did it!” He looked almost as excited as Baekhyun as he said this. For some reason, he also handed Baekhyun a half-eaten chicken sandwich. Maybe I was missing something, but it seemed to be a customary procedure to give someone who had just passed an exam after a fourth attempt half of a piece of food or drink. Maybe if he had scored higher they would have bought him a whole item.

Having said that, Baekhyun seemed more than happy with his newly acquired snacks as he happily slurped at the straw and munched the sandwich, a wide grin plaster to his face the entire time.

“See? I knew you could do it,” I added, watching him slurp away at the milk whilst absentmindedly picking away at me own lunch.

Baekhyun stuck out his tongue happily and posed cutely as if we were taking his picture. “Yep! I’m totally awesome!” He settled down beside Chanyeol on the bench and looked out at me, his face becoming a little more serious – but only marginally so. “Thanks for all your help. I couldn’t have done it without you and Sehun.”

I nodded in acknowledgement. “It’s ok.” And then everyone resumed talking, me still picking away at my food.

My arm was nudged from my left side. Looking around, I saw Kai staring at me with an almost confused look plastered all over his face.

“Hmm?” I asked, blinking stupidly at him.

“Aren’t you eating?” he asked, eyes darting quickly to the sandwich in my hands. I too looked at the sandwich and realised all I had achieved this lunchtime was to pick the crusts off it before ripping them up into almost inedible sized pieces. I hadn’t even realised that I was doing it.

“Oh,” I dumbly replied, lifting my fingers away from my food as if it was the source of the problem.

“Not hungry?” he asked, taking a bite into the apple he held in his hand.

I shrugged lightly, still staring at the broken up sandwich. “Guess not.”

It seemed that both Baekhyun and Chanyeol had become aware of our conversation now. “What’s wrong?” Chanyeol asked, a frown puckering between his brows.

Letting out a small sigh, I shook my head. “Nothing, I’m fine.”

Baekhyun still had a mouthful of food when he spoke, “Are you sure?”

Nodding, I stood up. “I’m going to go to the loo before class, ok?”

It was true that there was a feeling of general glumness about me today, but I didn’t really want to talk to them about it. It’s not like I didn’t like or trust them, it’s just that I didn’t really want them to know that I was supposed to be spending Christmas with Sehun and his family in less than four days. The very thought of how it had occured still churned my stomach a little.

Yesterday, like he had said he would be, Sehun was in school and we did indeed see one another. But one thing was certain, he wasn’t his usual self. It’s sort of hard to describe, but he was just sort of off. He was perhaps a little quieter than normal, a little more reserved, and maybe even a little more self-conscious. And I don’t think it takes a genius to know the reason: he didn’t want me to spend Christmas with his family.

Of course I hated this - maybe even more than he did. After all it was my fault he was in such an uncomfortable position in the first place, and there was very little I could do it remedy the situation. If I could have, I would just scurry off back to my old house and spent Christmas there on my own. But unfortunately the world never quite worked out the nicely for me - or at least it wasn't lately.

When we had been sitting in class yesterday before the final bell of the day, Sehun turned to me and muttered, quietly enough so that Baekhyun couldn’t hear, “My father said you can come.” And that’s all that was said on the matter, although the reluctance it was said with played on my mind a little. Sehun wasn't on school today, so I didn't even get the chance to be awkward around him.

When I exited the toilets I was almost aghast to see the model-like figure of Kim Yunseo strutting towards me like some sort of mobster with his vicious posse right on her heals and ready to attack on her command. Unfortunately for me, I was the only one in their sights.

One of the girls with long bleached blonde hair nudged Yunseo as if she hadn’t seen me already. I saw the two of them exchange a few hissed whispers as I moved to the edge of the corridor to avoid having to move right through the centre of their pack.

It was to my dismay when I noticed them veering towards me with seeming force. I cringed into the wall in a vain attempt to make myself smaller but all that seemed to result in was getting myself encircled even quicker.

“Look who it is,” Yunseo began as if we had bumped into one another by accident and she had not just intentionally boxed me into the wall. “Little Mira.” We were about the same height, maybe she was a little taller so really that didn’t even make much sense.

One of the girls beside her snorted, “I didn’t even recognise her when she’s not leeching onto Sehun.”

“Or Baekhyun,” another girl piped in, clearly a fan of the man in question.

Yunseo nodded with a sickeningly impressed look on her face at the abuse her minions were dishing out. “Don’t you girls think that she should actually try to get through a single school day without bugging any of them? What a nuisance she must be . . .”

I wasn’t sure whether she wanted me to say anything in response to this, but as it happened I couldn’t think of any clever or potentially witty remarks to make so decided to just keep my trap shut.

“I heard that she forces Sehun to walk home with her every single day.”

“No, it’s not just that. She makes him do all her homework as well, and she uses him to cheat off in tests. That’s why she sticks to him like that.”

“But because Sehun’s so nice he doesn’t say anything about it, isn’t he great?” After their slagging-Mira-off session right in front of my face there was a mutual hum of agreement that Sehun was generally the most perfect human to ever waltz into existence.

Although none of what they were saying about my cheating off Sehun and forcing him to walk home with me was true, I could see how they arrived at their conclusions. Sehun and I did spend a lot of time together. On the average day we met one another either first thing in the morning at around seven-thirty when we walked to school together, or as soon as we entered our classroom. We would then spend the rest of the day sitting next to one another and also lunch and interval together. Once the day was over we would – surprise, surprise – walk home together again. Sometimes we ate together in the evening, sometimes we didn’t. I suppose it just depended how cranky we were feeling towards one another. Really then, on the average day, we would spend about ten hours with one another. To be honest it was a miracle that neither of us had killed the other one in that time – yet.

Before they could provide me with any more slander, another figure appeared in the corridor which caught Haewon’s beady attention as well. Just emerging from the bathroom was the oblivious figure of Park Soohyun, the girl I had helped straightened desks with a while ago. Her eyes widened in horror at the sight that greeted her on the other side.

“Well, well, looks like we caught two rats in our trap today, girls,” Yunseo smirked maliciously glancing between the two of us. Several of the girls around me dissipated to form another circle around Soohyun. Honestly, these girls had the whole hunting thing down to a tee.

With very little effort, Soohyun was forced up against the wall a little away from where I was. Haewon wasted no time in moving over to her, bearing down on her despite – once again – the lack of height difference. “How’s your mum?” Haewon asked insincerely.

Soohyun trembled a little. It s