“HaYeon? HAYEON?” Jimin raised his voice, his words muffled by the rice stuffed in his mouth.

“Huh?” HaYeon quickly snapped out of her dazed state as she picked up her spoon again and put food in like nothing was wrong.

The boys looked at her suspiciously, “I said, what happened to you?” Jimin questioned, pointing to the bruise on her left cheek.

HaYeon quickly brought her hair over it and smiled while shaking her head, claiming that nothing was wrong and that she just fell on her way to school.

Jimin just let out a sarcastic laugh, “And you expect us to believe that? Come on, just one look at that we know someone had punched you. Tell us who did it.”

This time HaYeon avoided the boys’ eyes. She was not good at lying and trying to make up more excuses was just going to make it seem more suspicious. Instead, she just shook her head again and insisted that what she said was true.

The boys looked at each other knowingly and signalled for each other to just continue eating for now.

“I need to go to the bathroom, you guys go ahead first.” Jimin said on their way back from the cafeteria.

As Jimin left in the opposite direction, TaeHyun quickly cut in front of HaYeon, stopping her in her path. Shocked, her eyes widened as she apologized for nearly bumping into him. “I’m sorry I didn’t see you in front.”

TaeHyung did not say a word, instead he just looked into her eyes, his stare not budging even when her gaze whimpers away after a moment. “Yah, who did this to you?” He finally spoke as the crowd started to clear from the hallways, his gentle deep voice echoed in HaYeon’s mind. For some reason, the more he noticed the bruise on her face, the more unbearable it got. Seeing how she chose to keep silent, he asked again, this time, more sternly. “WHO did this to you?” This time, the urge in him to find out who exactly did it rose.

“I TOLD YOU I FELL OKAY!” HaYeon exploded, bewildered by how much the boys pushed her to this extreme to find out what was going on. She knew that they did it out of concern but after 10 years of keeping her family violence a secret, she did not intend to let these two boys whom she just knew for a few months know about it now. Especially not with how demanding they both sounded.

“Yah,” TaeHyung’s voice suddenly softened again, his eyes drooping as he looked at HaYeon from head to toe, but still not losing his determination to find out what had happened. The bruises she had all over her were definitely from no fall. “Experience tells me this isn’t what you get from a fall. One look and I know you got hit.”

HaYeon remained silent, but tears started to well in her eyes. She did not know why she felt this way. It was not only from anger that TaeHyung kept pushing her, but for unknown reasons, she was tearing up because of happiness. No one apart from Mrs Jung had ever cared for her like this. She was used to people’s look of disdain when they saw bruises all over her limbs and face, but never care or concern. Usually when she lashed out at people like she did to TaeHyung, they would have left and not bothered about her anymore but TaeHyung did not budge.

“Yah-“

But before TaeHyung could continue, Hayeon snapped back, in a soft, but stern voice, determined not to fall for those eyes that were staring at her so earnestly. “Don’t act like you know what is going on. No one hit me. And even if someone did, I am not telling you.” And with that, she walked off without even waiting for TaeHyung.

TaeHyung shook his head as he watched her walk into the distance before disappearing into one of the classrooms. His heart ached for her, that her delicate face was hurt under a fist. He did not understand why she refused to say that she got hit. She need not say who it was but she even went to the extent of not saying she got hit. It did not take much effort for Jimin and TaeHyung to know that that was the doing of abuse and violence. They have had their fair share of it and spotting such signs were nothing to them.

He knew someone did it to HaYeon but he thought that since she refused to even bring it up either means that she did not trust them enough, of it was someone close to HaYeon. TaeH