The cold wind blew hard, racing dead leaves and paper cups over the pavement. Changmin wrapped his tan overcoat around himself more firmly in a vain attempt to shield himself from the cold, grumbling all the while. It was bad enough that that he was already late for his class at the university because of his roommate Yunho (who had conveniently forgotten to turn on the alarm for this morning), without the nature gods deciding to add their own dose of mischief by making it exceptionally cold and windy that morning. Changmin was a great stickler for punctuality, and thus absolutely hated being late for class. Catching sight of the bus stop, he moved faster, hoping against hope he hadn’t missed the bus.

Evidently today was not one of his days.

The bus stop was empty, a clear sign that the bus had already left. “I can’t believe how much today . I’m going to make Yunho-hyung do the dishes for a whole month for this,” Changmin muttered to himself as he attempted to kick the lamppost in front of the bus stop angrily but stopped just in time. There was no sense in adding a bruised foot to the rest of his troubles after all. He looked up and down the street, hoping to catch sight of a taxi, but except for a stranger in black fixing his motorbike on the other side of the road, the street was completely deserted. Changmin hefted his heavy bag grimly and started walking towards his university. At this rate he was going to miss more than one class by the time he reached his university and Yunho was going to pay very dearly for it.
“Hey!” an unfamiliar voice broke into Changmin’s daydreams about making Yunho scrub out every single floor tile in their shared apartment as a punishment for not setting the alarm. He turned around to find the source of the voice to see the stranger with the motorbike next to him. “I noticed you missed your bus today. Do you want a ride?”

Changmin shook his head in a quick negative and began to walk faster. Apparently his day didn’t already enough, because the heavens had decided to further torment him with the possibility of a daylight mugging. The stranger began to laugh, the sound filled with little mirth. “Suit yourself. I was on my way to the university myself, so just thought I’d help a fellow student in need.”

Changmin turned back at those words. “You’re a student at the university?” “Yes, as a matter of fact, I am,” said the stranger as he took off his helmet. Changmin had to bite back an exclamation as he saw the stranger’s face. Pale, pale skin that was decorated by a black tattoo along one side of his neck. Large, beautiful doe eyes that would be any girl’s pride, crowned by straight brows, one which seemed to have a piercing through it, and a  beautiful pouty mouth twisted into a smirk. “Like what you see, do you?” said the stranger with a smirk. Changmin started and fumbled, staring at the ground in embarrassment. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude. It’s just you don’t look-“ “-I don’t look the way you’d expect me to look. I know. Now how about that ride? Are you coming or not?”
Changmin made a quick decision. He really did need to get to his class on time, and this stranger seemed to be perfectly willing to get him there. Despite his misgivings about whether the stranger was actually a student at his university, Changmin decided to throw caution to the winds and nodded his assent. “Good. Get on then. And hold on tight.”

Changmin climbed on to seat behind the stranger and tried to find a safe place to put his hands. “You’ve ridden on a motorbike with someone, have you?” said the stranger with an amused look over his shoulder. “Put your arms around me unless you want to get blown off into the wind when I speed up.” Changmin hesitantly put his arms around the stranger’s waist and immediately tightened them as the motorbike gained speed. Changmin hunched behind the shorter male in front of him trying to shield himself from the cold wind that was most certainly going to freeze his nose right off his face, but the stranger seemed quite exhilarated by the cold, laughing as he drove into the teeth of the wind.

A short ten freezing minutes later, they arrived at the gates of the university. “There you go,   all in time for your first class.”
“Thank you” Changmin managed to whisper, as he attempted to detach himself from the motorbike. His hands and feet felt like they’d frozen solid.

“Don’t mention it”

“Can I know your name?”

“Why, are you going to write about me in your diary tonight?”

Changmin flushed with a mixture of anger and embarrassment. “No, I just thought it would be nice to know the name of the person who helped me.”

The stranger laughed. “My name is Jaejoong…Kim Jaejoong,” he called out as he rode his bike away to a different part of the campus.

Changmin watched him ride away and continued to stare into the distance for long time, his thoughts still scrambled from his mixed up emotions. Maybe he’d run into Jaejoong again sometime. Maybe if he missed the bus again deliberately. He didn’t even know why he wanted to meet Jaejoong again. He just knew he did.

Changmin was extremely late to his class that morning for the very first time. What was even more surprising is that he didn’t seem to care about how late he was at all.