Chapter Text
The first cigarette of the day was always the most bitter. It scraped against his throat, a harsh, familiar burn that did little to soothe the exhaustion clinging to his bones.
Ahn Suho leaned against the graffiti-stained wall in the alley beside the school, the morning sun barely making way to the narrow passage. He exhaled a plume of smoke, watching it curl and dissolve into the cold air, making patterns he traced with his eyes, the warm caress left on the braces on his teeth still felt foreign, unusual to the cold, metallic cage.
Though his last model gig's photographer had said they gave him a “dangerously charming” look. He highly doubted it.
Stubbing out the cigarette, the action sharp and practiced, he shoved the butt into a hole on the wall. His halmeoni hated the smell, but he couldn't help it now. The thought of her, of the Japchae she’d promised to make for dinner, was the only thing that pulled a genuine, if tired, smile to his face. It was enough of a reason for him to look forward to the day.
He pushed off the wall, slinging his worn backpack over one shoulder, and walked towards the school gates. The yawn that escaped him was so wide it made his jaw ache. All he wanted was to get to his desk, put his head down, and steal twenty minutes of nap before homeroom.
The universe, it seemed, had other plans.
He was barely through the gate, eyes half-lidded and unfocused, when his shoulder connected solidly with someone else’s. The impact was enough to snap him fully awake.
“Hey! Watch where you’re going, asshole!”
Suho blinked, focusing on two third-years he vaguely recognized from the basketball team. The one he’d bumped into, a guy with a buzzcut and a perpetually angry sneer, was rubbing his shoulder dramatically.
“Sorry,” Suho mumbled, the word automatic and heavy with sleep. “wasn’t looking”, managing a slight bow, he took a turn to leave the scene.
Suho made to move around them, but the other one stepped into his path. “Sorry? You think that’s enough? You scuffed my new shoes. Tch, he thinks he's tough.”
Suho’s eyes dropped to the pristine, obnoxiously white sneakers. There was no scuff. He felt the familiar, weary resignation settle in his stomach. This script was so old and worn. They were trying to pick a fight this early in the morning.
“I didn’t touch your shoes,” Suho said, “I bumped his shoulder. I said sorry. Let me pass.”
“Or what?” Buzzcut sneered, getting in his face. “You gonna start something, huh? Everyone knows all about you. Looking for a fight first thing in the morning?”
he?? he was looking for a fight??
Right on cue, Suho rolled his eyes and let out a sigh. The irony was so thick it was suffocating. Suho was looking for a nap, not a fight. His patience was running thin already.
“I said,” Suho repeated, his voice dropping into a low, warning tone he rarely used, “let me pass.”
He didn't want to snap, he had promised his halmeoni that no troubles today. Japchae came with a cost after all.
“Look at his face,” the second guy jeered, pointing at Suho’s braces. “You gonna bite us with your metal teeth, dog?”
When the taller one shoved him, he sighed and tried walking away. But when the shove turned into a grip, when one fist swung too close to his jaw, the decision was made for him. His body moved on instinct, tired, defensive moves he knew too well.
A block. A grab. A twist.
A grunt of pain. When the other one managed a harsh punch at his stomach, he bent down, clutching his abdomen, letting out a whimper. It took him a few seconds to recover from the impact before he delivered one in return just in time, right on that guy's jaw.
It was over in less than two minutes, the two wanna-be heroes scrambling back, one clutching his wrist, the other looking shocked and in agony, both knocked down on the ground. Suho stood there, sweaty, his chest heaving due to the adrenaline, his knuckles split and bleeding from connecting with a jawbone, his abdomen in misery having withstood that hit. The familiar, coppery taste of regret filled his mouth.
Of course, that was enough. Enough for onlookers to see Ahn Suho, blood smeared from split knuckles, standing above two scrambling boys. Enough to feed the whispers. Enough to make the teachers sigh, “Again, Suho?” without ever bothering to hear his side. His reputation always made him an easy scapegoat.
Without another word, he shouldered past them and walked into the school. He took the long way to his classroom. He could already imagine the eyes on his back, see the heads leaning together. “There he goes again. Unhinged. Violent. A problem ”.
---
Suho pushed the door open with his shoulder, a thin line of blood drying near his nail beds, the sharp pain piercing his stomach. The story had spread like wildfire and reached the classroom before he could.
A guy at the front desk stiffened, suddenly very interested in his phone. The atmosphere grew heavy with hushed accusations and fear. It was a sensation he knew intimately, a cold blanket that smothered him every single day.
The conversations halted, then fractured into small, sharp whispers. Desks scraped back subtly, as though he were some wild animal that had wandered into their clean, bright territory. His chest tightened. It always did when he saw those fearful glances bordering on disgust, or the subtle shrinking away. The hole inside him grew, creating an uneasy tension in his chest, though he told himself he didn’t care.
He caught the murmurs in the almost quiet room,
“He fought again? Probably gang stuff.”
“Look at his hands… i mean he gives off that vibe”
He dropped into his seat at the back corner with a sigh, resting his bruised knuckles against the desk. He didn’t try to explain anymore. No one believed him, no matter how hard he tried to explain. The effort was exhausting. Easier to let them think what they wanted.
He closed his eyes, wishing for the bell to ring, for the teacher to come, for anything to break this awful, isolating tension.
But then—his eyes had accidentally caught another classmate's rather unusual ones— sharp and unflinching, big moist eyes mirroring those of an angry deer. That blank, almost irritated look on his face, the way his eyes drifted to Suho's bloody knuckles before fixing them back on his notebook. His face was calm now, if a little tired, eyes distant, like he lived in a world parallel to theirs.
Even after the staring contest was over, Suho couldn't take his eyes off this classmate of his now. Suho, to say the least, was as mesmerized as intrigued.
The boy, however, had gone back to his notes like absolutely nothing had happened, as if the entire social earthquake of Suho’s entrance had registered less than a faint tremor on his personal Richter scale. And that indifference, oddly enough, was the first kindness Suho had felt in a long, long time.
In the chaotic, judgmental atmosphere of the classroom, Suho found this anomaly as an island of perfect, calm indifference.
The bell rang and the teacher walked in. The usual classroom noise subsided into a dull roar. Suho was never the one to pay attention, he was okay with barely passing now, so he usually slept through the classes.
But today? Suho was awake, however, he still heard none of it. His entire world had narrowed to the two rows of space between him and this pretty-eyed boy.
The teacher began calling the roll. Suho didn’t hear a single name until—
“Yeon Sieun.”
A quiet, low “Here” from the seat Suho couldn't drift his eyes from. The voice was as calm and composed as his posture.
Sieun, Suho repeated silently in his mind. Yeon Sieun. Tasted the sound of it multiple times, mouthing it, contemplating exactly how he should call him to get his attention.
Suho found himself observing, captivated. The boy had dark, soft hair that fell across his forehead, the curve of his pale neck as he leaned down. His shoulders were slumped in a posture of unwavering concentration over the open notebook.
Suho watched the way his brow furrowed slightly during a complex problem, his lips pressing into a faint, almost pouty frown of concentration. It was the most expression Suho had seen on him yet. Cute.
As if on cue, a small smile spreads on Suho's face.
Suho watched and noticed how the boy would bring a pen to his lips in thought. When he gets a hold of the solution, he'd tap his pen exactly twice against the paper before neatly penning it, his frown slowly disappearing.
He stared at the way Sieun’s head tilted slightly as he listened to the lecture. Suho spent the entire period like a man possessed, cataloging every minute detail. The way Sieun’s eyelashes cast shadows on his cheeks when he looked down. The way he would occasionally tuck a stray strand behind his ear with a finger.
The day blurred after that. Suho couldn’t remember the equations on the blackboard or the teacher’s scolding when his eyes shut mid-class. The bell rang, so loud it woke Suho up from his trance. Lunch break.
He didn't want to move from his seat, because Sieun hadn't either, then he saw Sieun grip his pencil case, his knuckles whitening for just a second when a group of students laughed too loudly at something, before he reached into his bag with a sigh of clear irritation and pulled out a pair of black headphones.
Only after Sieun had put it on, there was that pleasant look back on his face. Suho decides, for him, that's the best look on Sieun so far, the indifferent but calm expression.
And maybe that was it. Maybe that was what pulled Suho in. Yeon Sieun didn’t give a damn about him—or about anyone for that matter. He was a constant in his own, a stone in the middle of a river that all the currents swirled around but failed to erode.
Not too long after, the bell rang again, indicating lunch was over. Suho himself was shocked, a boy like him who couldn't survive a few hours without food had skipped lunch????!!
Tch, the things those pretty eyes are making him do now..
Suho realised his heart was doing something strange. It wasn’t clenching in pain anymore. It was beating slightly faster, a curious, thrumming rhythm against his ribs. The bitter exhaustion from his late-night shift—it all receded, fading into a irrelevant background hum.
As the realisation hit him, feeling overwhelmed Suho scrambles to turn his head away from Sieun and tries to drift off to sleep. The exhaustion serves a purpose, and he does fall asleep very soon.
____
Students erupted in screams indicating the classes were over for the day, the noise of chairs scraping jerked Suho from his nap. Suho's eyes automatically chased a now familiar figure, he stared as Sieun calmly closed his book, removed his headphones, and began packing his bag with an unhurried efficiency. He didn’t look around or glance back.
But Suho did. He watched Sieun’s retreating back as he left the classroom. He felt that feeling crawl back up again, clogging his throat too hard to gulp it down.
There was someone in this school who didn’t see a bully when they looked at him. They saw nothing at all.
And to Suho, who was treated as either a monster or a ghost, being seen as nothing felt an awful lot like peace. And he found himself desperately, overwhelmingly, wanting to get closer to it.
____
The walk home was usually drag of limbs for Suho, a final, exhausting leg of a marathon he ran every day. But today, Suho’s steps felt lighter. The usual weight on his shoulders, the heavy cloak of isolation, seemed to have shifted. It wasn’t gone, but it had been somwhat… rearranged. A small, curious space had been carved out inside him, and it was filled with the image of him. He replayed the moments in his head, like a short film on a loop. The way Yeon Sieun hadn’t flinched.
To be looked at and not seen as a problem—it was a novelty so profound it was dizzying. A small, unconscious smile touched Suho’s lips. It felt strange on his face, these muscles unused to the motion without the context of his halmeoni and food.
Reaching his neighbourhood, he stopped by the usual street vendor, the one his halmeoni loved. The ajumma knew him well. “For your halmeoni? ” she asked with a warm smile, already packing a box of hot, sugary hotteok.
“yes,” Suho said, his voice softer than usual. He paid and walked along the familiar path, the sweet, cinnamon scent wafted up, mixing with the air. It was a good smell.
He turned the corner onto his street, a narrow lane of modest, older homes. His smile widened instinctively as he saw the known, warmly lit window of their ground-floor. The curtain was pushed aside slightly, a tell-tale sign that his halmeoni had been watching for his arrival. The moment he pushed the door open, the rich, savory aroma of sesame oil, garlic, and soy sauce washed over him.
“Suho-yah? Is that you?” his grandmother’s voice called from the kitchen, warm and slightly raspy.
“It’s me, Halmeoni,” he called back, toeing off his shoes and lining them up neatly.
She emerged from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron. Her eyes, crinkled with a lifetime of smiles, immediately found his. They did their usual quick scan—checking for new bruises, for the tension in his shoulders. Her gaze lingered for a half-second on his scraped knuckles, a flicker of worry in her eyes, but she didn’t comment. She never did anymore. She just opened her arms.
Suho walked into her hug, letting himself slump against her for just a moment. He was so much bigger than her now, but in her arms, he still felt like that small boy he had always been for her.
“Long day?” she murmured, patting his back. “The usual,” he mumbled into her shoulder, his voice muffled. He pulled back and held up the paper bag. “I brought you hotteok.”
Her face lit up, the worry lines smoothing away. “Aigoo, my sweet boy. Always thinking of your halmeoni. Come, come! The japchae is ready. I made a lot extra, just for you.”
He followed her into the small, steam-filled kitchen. The table was already set for two. In the center was a large, heaping plate of japchae—the glass noodles shimmering, studded with colorful strips of beef, carrots, spinach, and mushrooms.
As they sat down to eat, he told her about his work for the next day, and how he had taken a day off from the delivery part time for today. When asked, he added the details about his day, left out the fight, of course. He told her about the last model gig money coming through. He made her laugh with something he said, her laughter sounded like the windchime on his window, making him forget whatever faint pain he had left in his abdomen and knuckles.
And he thought about Sieun. how would his laugh sound?
His smile, which had been small on the street, was now wide and unreserved, transforming his tired face into something bright and youthful. The metal of his braces didn’t feel like a cage here; they just were a part of his smile that his halmeoni so dearly cherished.
Later, after the dishes were washed and his halmeoni was dozing in her armchair with a drama playing quietly on the TV, Suho stood by the window, looking out at the darkening street. He looked forward to next school day now.