fairytale hearts 2/3
2min; T; Language, AU, Romance; ~25, 000;
This autumn, Taemin lives through more than one children's story with a pinch of pixie dust.
A/N: Aaaah, finally, I've managed to hit my goal of a 20k word fic! I'm really glad to be able to complete this. Hopefully it's not too bad. (:
Fairytale hearts
Sunglare and rainbow droplets, the days melded into an autumn reel, sepia and grainy films, and everything fit together. After dance or remedial, Minho would be at the gate and they would cross rivers and galaxies to Jinki’s store. Well, at least Taemin did. He wasn’t sure if Minho could see better now, but he never gave up. Sometimes there would be an invisible rabbit bounding past them and Taemin would point it out, yanking on the older boy’s arm.
“How do you see it if it’s invisible?” Minho had asked, and Taemin realised that he had a point.
On days where he had no school, Taemin would find himself on the bleachers, in the second seat from the left, above the entrance. He figured it made blending into the scene easier, not wanting to distract Minho as he watched the older boy running on the grass and lying down in the mud, bumping with other boys and dancing with soccer balls.
During lunch, JongHyun was finally allowed to sit across Key. When the diva was in a good mood, he might just allow JongHyun to ask him about the article he was reading, usually some glitzy fashion magazine. Taemin still felt that Key was a little too sharp, too scathing, but JongHyun always grinned as wide as his mouth could stretch when he got an answer, probably not understanding it at all, so he didn’t say anything.
The saxophonist still couldn’t touch any of Key’s magazines or hands, for that matter, though.
Five of them would be in Jinki’s little store after school, helping out with stock taking, or rearranging the last of his goods before business could open for real. Key would be busy redecorating the place with scrap materials, while JongHyun swept up litter and dust under his command. Minho would do all the manual labour in the back, moving boxes and stacking them up high in the storeroom shelves, a task most definitely precarious for one as careless as Jinki. Taemin had found himself behind the counter with Jinki more often than not, data logging and handling money while Jinki phoned his suppliers and tried to find cheaper bargains.
It would be normal if they ended up slumped on Jinki’s creaking counter near twilight, exhausted but glad, and Jinki would smile and thank them and everything was worth it because he needed the money.
Sometimes Taemin would pay for the balloon, and other times it came from Minho instead. Whenever Taemin went to Jinki’s store to help, he would leave with a balloon, telling Minho of the nebula and the fairies under the stars and the pavement was a plate of moonlight and the older boy would smile, a little more real with every night. The tree held more of their secrets, some deflating and hanging lifeless like rainbow vines and Taemin would tell Minho of how his fairy godmother had listened to them and heard their secrets.
And on days where he waited for Minho, with no school or dance or friends, they would stay in Jinki’s store for awhile, nearly operational, with less and less things to do. Occasionally the store closed earlier for Jinki’s reasons and they would leave, Taemin paying for the ice cream on even days and Minho on odd days. They would sit in the same old oak tree, whispering secrets to a balloon and tying it onto a branch, Minho on even days and Taemin on odd days and just sometimes, when he wanted to tease the older boy, Taemin would declare Sunday as an eight day, just so Minho would give in to him and keep their secrets for them.
Spilling his heart out, Taemin would tell Minho about his passions. How he loved dancing, how he was bullied when he was young, how he disliked useless people that don’t do things that they need to do, how he hated loud noises. Minho would listen wordlessly, hand finding its way to Taemin’s neck when he glanced at the soccer player, checking if he were even paying attention. Occasionally, it would be silent, Taemin relaxed against Minho’s side and bathed under the multi-coloured light of their balloons, it felt like a Polaroid.
And it would be in the afternoon, where the ground was ablaze with autumn leaves and the castle became a pirate ship.
Taemin would scramble with Minho at his heels, fending off navy men and rival pirates and at the end of the adventure, they would be lying in a pile of vermillion leaves, Taemin panting by Minho’s side, grinning almost stupidly at the older boy whom was watching him warily, afraid of another sudden exclamation of a pirate raid. The times when he played a little too much, talked a little too much, Minho would become preoccupied with his thoughts, too distracted to notice Taemin placing leaves on his knee.
“Hyung,” Taemin had asked once, breaking Minho out of his meditation. “Are you reflecting?”
“Maybe.”
He faced Minho then, eyebrows furrowing in displeasure at the vague reply. There were many things Taemin wanted to tell him, but when Minho’s indifference became fissured by that lopsided smile that was so familiar, Taemin knew there was nothing he couldn’t say.
“A dinosaur,” Taemin pointed at a lump of white clouds that drifted by, tracing the shape of the prehistoric animal with his finger.
“Really?” Minho said, leaning back on his arms and Taemin crawled over, leaves crackling underneath him as he rested his head on Minho’s thigh, elbow pushing into the boy’s knee as he moved his arm, making other shapes out of white.
“What do you see?” Taemin looked away from the dolphin, at Minho.
“Clouds.”
He had thrown a fistful of leaves at the boy then, whom scrunched his face up at the assault. There was a moment where Taemin’s fingers enclosed around more leaves when Minho gazed at him amusedly, promptly snapping his head upwards to inspect the sky when Taemin scowled.
Porcelain fell onto hardwood, the jumbling of utensils on the plate louder than the thud of the contact. He kept grilled fish in his vision, his heart was beginning to palpitate, hands starting to turn sweaty. The dragon vociferated, meat opposing its preferences and Taemin knew it was building.
The outrage.
From the sauce, to the burnt bits, to the unequal amounts of green peas and corn, the dragon was insatiable, words growing after words. The lady fought then, weak and uncertain and trembling and Taemin was sick of it.
Attempting to eat her alive, the dragon bellowed, tail whipping its chair aside, crashing into the sink and it was painfully noisy and Taemin wasn’t even prodding his food around anymore. Their words echoed loudly in his ears and every word seemed directed at him, it was clear as glass and blunt like punches.
The lady shrilled back, already defeated with the glistening cheeks and she flung an arm at the door, struggling out of her seat and words spilling forth about how Taemin shouldn’t have to see this and he was pretty certain she didn’t even mean that.
It was powerful, the dragon, and its booming roar drowned out the lady’s piercing voice and it was a jumble and white noise of insults and hurt and grudges. Rocks and plastic breaking fuelled the inferno and it was unbearable for Taemin.
“Then why don’t you go back?!” The lady managed to yell above the dragon’s rampage.
At that moment, Taemin burst out of his seat, tearing up the stairs to his room and he was certain they didn’t even know that.
On Fridays, Taemin was king again, alone in his courts and he realised the kingdom had expanded, wide and far and beyond what he could see. He blamed Minho. It was his entire fault. Before, everything was under his control. At his fingertips was the layout of his city, majestic and strong, but Minho came along and somehow, between hooks and planks, horses and bricks, his kingdom grew immense. The buildings stretched toward the skyline and one person was no longer enough to rule it.
Those days he was granted two wishes, just because Minho wasn’t there, and he would ask for Minho to be able to see.
They didn’t go out every other day, but on some days when they did, where the day was theirs to make, Taemin would bring Minho to town, to the clocktower that stood right in the centre and they would sneak up the churning gears and rusty chains, feet on dusty floor and breaths thrilled. The view of the city from behind the smudged glass was delicate and peaceful and it was there, behind the clockface, that Minho first closed his hands over Taemin’s, standing right behind so he could lean backwards into gentle heat.
The clocktower’s hands never stopped ticking, second after second, minute after minute. But at that moment, then and there, they had forever.
Having a friend that treated you like his own son had its benefits. When Minho had an entire day of training, or when it was so vigorous he had fallen asleep on the leaves, Taemin would visit Key. Even after fatigue drifted Minho off to sleep in the middle of Taemin’s rant, the older boy had wanted to go out the next day with him - Taemin had insisted then, forcing him to rest or spend time with his teammates or he’d be exiled from the kingdom. Which he could never do, in all honesty.
At Key’s house, they would make scrapbooks to build up the diva’s portfolio for fashion school. He had stumbled into JongHyun’s coat, hanging by the door once, and Key had a seizure when Taemin asked if they were dating.
“Are you out of your mind?” The diva had asked, aghast.
“Then why is his coat there?”
“Well, we were walking home, and I had a cold so I forced him to give me his coat.”
“But you were sick two weeks ago.”
Blinking furiously, the diva froze for a moment, before laughing forced and obnoxious, thumping hard on Taemin’s back, ushering them into the kitchen and developing a sudden interest for informing him of what they would be baking that day.
Baking was also something Taemin did at Key’s, and the diva had recipes nobody knew about. Like placing marshmallows above a biscuit disc (which they baked from scratch), dipping the entire thing into melting chocolate which hardened and bound it into ‘magic for obesity’, according to Key.
The third time they made that, Taemin had brought some back for Minho, burning under the scrutiny of Key, or the little song the diva would sing. ‘Frog boy and Taeminnie sitting in a tree,’ and as bashful as it made Taemin feel, there was a small flip in his chest whenever he heard that.
Condensation soaked their hips as they sat under the oak tree, the box of ‘obesity magic’ between them. Minho had picked one up, inspecting it suspiciously and sniffing it as Taemin anticipated.
“You made this?” The older boy asked, checking the bottom of the chocolate ball.
“Yeah,” Taemin lied.
Well, it wasn’t a total lie. He did do the chocolate dipping; that had to count for something. The chocolate cracked when Minho bit down on it, and Taemin could see the soft marshmallow bursting out at the sides and the biscuit crumbling down Minho’s jersey. The older boy looked at him then, chewing fervently and Taemin didn’t even know the grin that spread over his face.
“Do you have dreams?” He asked, picking a chocolate ball for himself.
Minho rested his hand on a knee, half-eaten ball in his fingers, mulling over the question. A breeze chilled Taemin’s neck, and some leaves fell in the time that passed.
No children come to the playground because there was a bigger one with swings and monkey bars further down the street. This one was outdated and expired. Occasionally old couples would stroll around here, but they were friendly enough to smile when Taemin waved at them, nudging Minho’s side so the older boy would follow and not just bow silently.
The wind blew continuously, and strawberry blonde skimmed over his cheeks. Taemin wasn’t a very patient person. Moving the box to the other side of his hip, Taemin scooted closer to Minho, jabbing his chin into the older boy’s shoulder. Large eyes regarded him then, and Taemin open and closed his mouth without saying anything, letting his chin dig into Minho’s flesh. The older boy laughed, shying away from Taemin, left hand clasping over his tickled shoulder. His laughter was unfamiliar to Taemin, crystalline and precious, strong, true, yet brittle.
“So?”
“When I was young,” Minho answered, eyes holding some sort of mirth. “I dreamt of buying everything in a game shop.”
“I did too,” A sudden excitement rose inside Taemin. “I wanted the steam trains they put for display, and the kiddy cars and houses and the stuffed bears that were huge!”
Arms outstretched, trying to illustrate the size of the soft toys, Taemin was suddenly aware of the volume of his voice and Minho watching him with a small smile. He quickly kept his hands, realising he got carried away, and then inspiration struck him again and Taemin sat up.
“How about powers?” Taemin asked, hands collecting leaves. “Like have you dreamt of breathing fire, or being psychic?”
Thrusting his arms to the side, Taemin imagined having telekinetic abilities, moving things with his mind. Watching his victims slowly drift to the ground, there was a sudden rustling and cold leaves showered upon him. Hands swinging wildly around, trying to come out of the confusion, Minho’s laughter was clear again, and when everything settled, Taemin glared at Minho.
“I wanted to be batman.”
“But that’s so boring,” Taemin said, put off by the character. “All he has are gadgets. And his car. And Robin.”
“He works for his dream,” Minho said simply, swallowing the last of his food. “It’s realistic.”
He couldn’t understand why Minho just wouldn’t let go and believe in a fairytale for once. Sometimes, you don’t have to take life so seriously, sometimes things just happened for you to be happy.
“Do you still have dreams like that?”
The answer was already apparent in the infuriatingly slow manner Minho reached for his hair, picking the leaves out of it and putting them upright, stalk to tip, stalk to tip, gently pressing them flat together and setting them down on the ground neatly.
“I dream of the team winning,” Minho said, looking at the flattened leaves at his knees. “I dream of making my parents proud.”
“What about you?” There was a cynicism tucked in the older boy’s lips, curving up but not really at the same time. “Don’t you want to fly?”
“It’s good to walk,” Minho answered, facing Taemin and scratching his strawberry blonde head with a gentleness he had trouble figuring out.
A tunnel that was never ending and Taemin was trapped right in the middle of it. Dark and scary, there was no end light or full stop to speak of. When the dragon wasn’t around and it was after seven, the air would be thick like a mattress. The lady was becoming frailer with every passing day and it birthed an anger inside Taemin that was fanned by the timid movements she made, or the times he walked into an empty living room, hearing her sobs from down the hallway.
Cheap and repulsive, was the flowery cologne that would be mixed with the dragon’s spicy one. More than once, lips were imprinted onto his shirt and skin like bloodied flowers, ugly and disgusting and dead.
Fighting was more controlled when the dragon wasn’t bloated. Its talons may knock into furniture or walls but it was not more than that, nothing above hungry roars and chomping of teeth. But when there was an unmistakable rash on the dragon’s neck, itchy and irritated, midway through its skin shedding, rocks were smashed about and it was a nightmare.
“He’s coming back for dinner in a bit,” The lady would assure, more for herself than Taemin, and the clock would tick, tock, tick, down to seven and whatever was left on Taemin’s plate would be whisked away by her, dumping all of it into the trash.
Glared, he had glared at her one evening, smouldering and upset and he kept it on the back of her head until she turned around, noticing Taemin for the first time and she had been taken aback.
“Are you still hungry?” She had asked, with that fake, fake, fake concern.
Taemin never let his gaze down and she knew what he meant. She had thrown the plate she was holding down into the sink, clattering and loud and it made Taemin flinch. He quickly recovered, and she was screaming at him, fist colliding into the cabinets and feet stomping and sweeping everything into the sink, china breaking and her wails incoherent and Taemin had lost it too.
It hurt, stinging like little sparks across his palm when he flung his hands down on the table, getting up so fast his chair crashed backwards. The lady stopped, eyes wide and wet staring at him and Taemin thought his cheeks were damp and what was simmering inside of him came to violent bubbling and he yelled, senselessly, tearing his throat sore, an incomprehensible shout of anguish because he had so many things to say yet he had nothing left to say.
Red, the world became red and he never recalled being as reckless or feral before, shoving the dinner table with so much force it dented the refrigerator and there was a silence that was unlike the lovely one he had in his castle with Minho. This was prickling and suffocating and brimming with frustration. There was another shout that ripped out of his throat and his body began moving, fists flailing and feet kicking and pounding the ground and his ears almost exploded from all of his rage.
That was the last time he ate dinner at home.
“Chicken salad, eggplant and croissants,” JongHyun recited, slipping into his seat with a tray of the aforementioned food choices, causing Taemin to glance up from nursing his swollen elbow.
Key made a noncommittal sound, engrossed in a woman decked scantily in tree branches, looking constipated. He slid the tray towards himself and picked up the croissant, eating it, all the while investigating the dress of wood.
“Ouch,” JongHyun said, jerking his chin at Taemin as he dug Key’s salad with a fork. “Dance?”
Actually, it had bruised when he lost his temper at home. Dance was just an excuse he prepared so nobody would suspect - especially Key.
“I told him,” Key said, flipping the page leisurely. “Don’t use so much strength when you’re throwing your arms back,” The diva proceeded to demonstrate. “He’s always so forceful in his moves.”
Trying to fake a smile, Taemin bit his cupcake, putting his elbow onto the ice pack.
“Kibum, that’s porn,” The saxophonist said, smirking as he ate a forkful of chicken salad.
“It’s not porn,” Key sighed, rolling his eyes and letting it stay up, causing Taemin to snort. “It’s called the Secret of Autumn.”
“There’s no more secret to that,” JongHyun stabbed an eggplant, completely disinterested in the page. “Those tiny little leaves are showing up her ti -“
The diva had held a hand up at that moment, eyes closed, not wanting to hear the end of JongHyun’s sentence. Taemin chewed his cupcake with difficulty as he watched Key picking up his fork and jabbing an eggplant himself. The saxophonist thrust his half-eaten one right into Key’s face, grinning earnestly and revulsion was apparent on the diva. JongHyun nodded encouragingly, bangs flipping up and down and Key seemed to give in, picking the vegetable with two fingers off the fork, eating it.
Not everyone was living in a nightmare.
Time at the castle had become something Taemin wanted desperately. Autumn was chilly, not freezing like winter, but cold enough and Minho was a soft warmth that Taemin needed. Bricks had turned into aluminium and they were in airplanes and helicopters and sometimes in caravans and forests. Minho smiles and chuckles at Taemin’s suggestions but he plays along, jogging behind when Taemin kicked up red and brown leaves, calling him slow and lazy.
It was close to scary when Taemin did that because Minho would explode forward with a sudden spurt of speed and he never could get away. First it was a hold on his shoulder, then it became his arms, and wrists and once, when Taemin went too far and named Minho a fat turtle, long arms had wound around his waist, spinning him around so fast the world was a blur of blue and yellow and squealing when fingers buried themselves into his sides.
A balloon and two ice creams accompanied them, every time they went to the playground and the tree was soon dangling with strings holding deflated rubber, wooden sticks trapped inside each one. They coloured the balding tree shabbily, some tangling and others caught in branches, but it was their secrets, all of it from the first time they did it and it was nice to Taemin.
“Taemin-ah,” Minho had considered once, seated at the royal balcony, their shoe soles flushed against each other, pushing playfully back and forth. “Will anybody say anything about the tree?”
Not knowing if anyone would, Taemin settled for a cheeky grin, stretching forward and undoing Minho’s laces in one movement, scampering down the royal steps while the older boy groaned.
Tuesdays and Thursdays, when Minho wasn’t too exhausted, were the weekdays where Taemin could tell the older boy of all his stories. Jinki closed the store earlier on these days and he was barely scraping through. There were bags under his eyes, and a hidden anxiousness in his movements. When Jinki had to dig for important documents, he would rifle through the counter drawers urgently, accidentally ripping a few in the process. When customers requested for assistance, Jinki had a winning smile, but his arms and legs always found ways to knock over bottles or end up getting caught on the leg of his counter or shelves.
“You’re not making it,” Taemin had overheard Key saying quietly to Jinki once. “Are you?”
Deliberately holding his breath, Taemin stayed motionless, in the aisle next to them. There was hissing and he guessed Key was applying ointment onto a fresh wound the bespectacled adult had acquired.
“N-no,” Jinki’s voice admitted. “I’m not, Kibum-ah. It’s hard.”
A sigh.
“Taemin, come here, I can see you.”
Shit.
After that, Key had enforced operation ‘Popularize Jinki’s Store’. He began designing posters and handouts and most of them were pink in colour but Jinki probably felt bad enough already to comment. Taemin had tried mentioning the excessive amounts of pink but Key had shushed him with a death glare. And with just the five of them, they began working late into the night when Jinki could stay.
JongHyun would be out in the street, passing flyers and yelling out Jinki’s store to promote it. ‘Shampoo, cooking oil, tissue paper and even rose-shaped nail buffers are available down the street and left!’ was what he had to shout and when Taemin was free he would help Key pass JongHyun a bottle of honeyed lemon. The immense grin and renewed vigour from the saxophonist was worth the walk up the street and back for Taemin.
The store’s phone rang without a break throughout the day and Key would snatch it up, pen stuck behind an ear, lips thin. It was the first time Taemin had seen Key speak nicely, sealing deals and insulting the person on the other side with masked venom when the conversation didn’t go well. He was finding advertisers.
“Hyung,” Taemin had asked once after Key put it across gently to the person on the phone that he was probably ugly and dim-witted. “Isn’t bad to make enemies? Especially now, when Jinki’s store needs friends.”
“Taemin,” Key had explained, already flipping through the phone directory. “Just because we’re small, it doesn’t mean that we let people step all over us.”
Jinki’s store became published in a small local newspaper by a week.
When goods had to be shifted, or taken down, Minho would immediately, albeit silently, take the initiative. He had even fixed the chipped paint at the front of the door when they were all busy with their own devices. Key had named him the ‘labour man’, getting him to finish paint jobs and manual work, and when there was nothing for him to do, made him stand in the cold with JongHyun, passing out flyers. Taemin did stock counting, while Jinki bargained more voraciously with suppliers. Minho disallowed him from joining them in giving out flyers.
“Why?” Taemin whined when they were debriefing for the day, seated around the counter, tired and sore.
“What if you stepped into a geyser?” Minho had countered and Taemin found his face heating up.
Key paid their conversation no mind, while JongHyun went “Geyser? What geyser?” and Jinki smiled at them, full of gratitude. When they ate dinner together, out of a box of fried chicken, there would be chatter and laughter. Key would be snide with JongHyun and the latter would do funny things and Jinki would be careless and already drunk on mirth everything would be hilarious and with Minho’s hand on his thigh as Taemin displayed his teeth for the world to see, he realised one thing.
He didn’t have to face his nightmare alone.
It hadn’t always been like this. It hadn’t always been anger and frustration in the place that changes. There used to be laughter and gentle warmth. Taemin used to be able to cross the living room feeling free and safe and burdened by homework. But now, homework was nothing compared to the weight of unspoken words that nestled within all of their souls.
The door creaked open ominously, a silver SUV parked in their garage and it was unfamiliar and strange to Taemin. He had stopped in the doorway, the sight before him unnatural and weird and he couldn’t respond.
Sleeping, the dragon was sprawled on the couch, the lady dabbing its snout with a cold cloth. She looked up then, sad and unhappy and Taemin instantly hated the sight.
“Won’t you come over?” She asked, soaking the cloth back into the pail of ice.
“Won’t you do something?” Taemin tried to be furious, tried to be hateful.
Nothing came as she slumped in the couch, wringing the cloth and dabbing the sleeping monster’s face. No emotions from before - Taemin was simply exhausted.
The click of his room’s lock broke the silence in the house.
On a cloudy Wednesday, Taemin was tying their secrets onto a new branch, past whispers now falling in front of their faces and hanging around them like streamers. Minho’s feet were playing with Taemin’s right foot, juggling it back and forth like a soccer ball and that made his imagination take to the skies.
“Hyung,” Taemin began, finishing a sloppy knot for today’s secrets. “What if the castle was a magic carpet today?”
“That’s fine,” His shoe was being pried off by Minho’s cleats.
“What about a floating castle?” Taemin asked, there was something pleasant about being humoured by Minho.
His shoe popped past his heel, dropping to the ground with a thud and his socked toes were cold. Taemin pushed Minho, the older boy laughing as he stared at the sneaker laying forlornly among the leaves. Minho shifted, pulling his feet up, about to climb down for Taemin’s sneaker. Then it was like realising something for the first time and Taemin saw.
Minho had dreams for other people. For his parents and for his team, never for himself, and odd feelings coalesced in Taemin’s chest.
Reflexively, Taemin gripped the older boy’s wrist, feeling unexplainably desperate. There was a widening of eyes on Minho’s part and Taemin had to let him know. It was okay to dream for yourself. You have to - or you stop seeing. You stop seeing everything that was precious.
“I believe that,” His words were hesitant, mind reeling from how to make this stupid, stupid boy understand. “People become similar to their dreams.”
Eyebrows came closer together as Minho settled back into his spot, trying to comprehend his sentence.
“You become similar,” Minho said slowly. “But you don’t become it. That won’t happen.”
“What...” Taemin said, hold on Minho’s wrist tightening. “What do you think about working for it?”
“It’s not easy,” Minho frowned. “Long. Tiring.”
“And we can forget ourselves.”
Minho nodded, but Taemin wasn’t sure if he understood.
“You’re similar to your dreams.”
That sentence had caused him to tilt his head in question, the older boy’s crisis temporarily taking second priority after his curiosity.
“Just like a kid.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” He huffed, swiping at Minho’s arm.
“But I think,” The older boy said after his laughing died down, looking out at the empty playground. “That our dreams are beautiful. They are worth fighting for.”
“So I’m beautiful?”
Triumph swelled inside him. He was certain this was one of those rare moments where his wit had managed to catch up with Minho. The older boy had stared at him intently, under the rainbow lights their balloons cast, obviously caught in his own words, brain probably working overtime in coming up with some smartass line that wouldn’t surface.
Before Taemin could celebrate his victory, Minho’s eyes were downcast and suddenly near, and he registered freshly pressed clothes and a cosy living room, maybe pine, and their lips brushed. Minho was gentle but his chapped lips were rough and possibly, the branch gave way underneath them and they were falling in an endless plunge because Taemin’s feet were tingling and his body threatened to turn slack.
Thoughts whirled in his head but one thing was clear and Taemin found himself fumbling. When pine pulled away, after a second where their mouths touched, did Taemin realise his eyes were closed. The older boy still held that stare on him. His cheeks were the warmest they’ve ever been and the breeze on his neck was colder than usual.
“That’s what you helped me to see.”
Coming back to the place that changes, it was so abnormal Taemin’s skin crawled. Calling out his name as he attempted to bluster past the kitchen, Taemin had no chance to escape from being led into his seat under the dragon’s command.
Three plates of food were set neatly above the chequered table cloth and there was this flimsy air of mock normalcy that had long dissolved two years ago. The dragon took its place at the end of the table, opposite Taemin, while the lady watched him by the side. The screech of his chair was loud in the unnatural quiet and he could feel the dragon sizing him up hungrily.
Potato tasted like salt and the fillet was like pepper in Taemin’s mouth as the dragon and the lady staged a play for their own amusement, throwing out conversations and questions that all three of them knew the answer to. It was like watching a painful rendition of an old movie - mindless, overdone, unoriginal.
The dragon spoke to him and his answers that came after a moment of deliberate silence were robotic and automatic. It might have been the longest hour in his life and he’d even skipped dessert. This peace was tilting over at the edge of the cliff as it is, and Taemin refused to hope for once.
It was more realistic this way.
Minho doesn’t believe it when Taemin tells him about the old man on the moon.
He doesn’t believe it when Taemin tells him every one of us has our own fairy godmother. He doesn’t believe it when Taemin tells him Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast and Snow White were all true, doesn’t believe that every star is alive.
But Taemin knew he believed in their story, when clumsy fingers become caught in his hair during lazy autumn afternoons. Taemin knew Minho believed when his eyes sparkled at Taemin’s tales. He knew Minho believed when they sat together in the tree, their secrets casting daydream sunrays, holding him close and checking if he were cold. And he definitely knew Minho believed, when they were close and the rustling was their only music, and he bends down, grazing his lips on Taemin’s forehead.
“Is it really that hard?” Taemin had asked once, after escaping from brigands and slavers, unable to overlook Minho’s inability to see.
Not understanding Taemin, Minho cocked an eyebrow, crossing his legs on the ground. He had been chasing Taemin for the past half an hour. Exasperated, Taemin sat in front of Minho, bringing two fistfuls of crimson leaves to the older boy’s face.
“The leaves,” Taemin said, wanting Minho to see. “They’re like pixie dust.”
“Really?” The older boy mused, and Taemin frowned.”What does pixie dust do?”
“It doesn’t need to do anything,” His tone clearly displaying annoyance. “It’s just pixie dust.”
Minho chuckled, and Taemin guessed the older boy was laughing at him. Large hands twisted his shoulders around before he could retort, easing him carefully into gentle warmth while long legs stretched by his sides.
“Alright,” Deep baritone rumbled behind his head, calloused thumbs grazing the under of his arms. “They’re pixie dust.”
Autumn was turning frigid and Taemin found himself thinking of how lucky he was to have Minho intruding upon his castle and how implausible their story was. How the older boy always listened to him when nobody else would, trying to see the worlds that he painted, humouring him, and Taemin couldn’t stop the overwhelming contentment that slipped past his mouth.
“You’re just like a fairytale.”
Soft, like the whisper of dying leaves, but Taemin was sure Minho heard it because then, long fingers crawled between his smaller ones and his hands were completely covered by the older boy’s, holding fast.
Dinner at the playground was simple, but better than at the place that changes. Taemin would snack on sandwiches or microwaved pizza bought from Jinki’s store, and it would be a grand feast, delicious with an amazing spread. However, he disapproved of what Minho ate - cranberries and chicken omelettes for every meal in their castle and he would force the older boy into nibbling his pasta or hamburger.
A diet or something and Taemin would cringe from imagining how sick he would be, consuming the same food every night for half a year. Minho told him that he was breaking a rule by nibbling his pizza, but Taemin told him there were no rules in his castle. Not anymore.
Contrasting with the day, dread ensnared and fettered faith at night as he returned to the glass house. The cycle refused to stop, but the feelings never dulled - if anything, they grew. Before seven, Taemin was obliged to give the dragon a hug, shared between people whom actually love each other, and it was slimy and disgusting and it was difficult to resist the urge to bolt for the bathroom, stripping off and soaking for a few hours.
Perfumes, two different kinds, were always mixing around the dragon in a rancid blend and it stung Taemin’s nose. On good days there were no mouths growing out of its scales, but on bad days they grew in multitudes, sprouting all over its scales in a horrific picture of a thousand speaking lips. He was helpless every time talons enclosed around his thin frame and desperate, he would throw a glance at the lady.
She wasn’t his fairy godmother, of course. He should’ve learnt that by now. Watching them under the pretence of being back to before, she never said anything.
Not even once, not even when Taemin couldn’t go out with Minho, where he was at home and the dragon flies in with his car, calling for him from downstairs.
“Aren’t you going to greet your father?” The dragon would demand and Taemin would give it to him, reluctantly, peeking at the lady to do something, do something - say something. The lady never did. She loved this little lie of theirs and Taemin could see her nose growing longer and longer as she lied to herself.
Not even when there was the beep of the dragon’s SUV in the dead of the night, flying away back to the artist, the one that paints him a thousand mouths. When it was particularly quiet, Taemin thought he could hear her crying, and he wanted to scream at her to shut up.
And when she finally did say anything, she was too soft. Too weak to fight with the dragon. Rendering Taemin’s sleep with a mighty crash, he had scrambled out of bed, anxious and scared and the lady drew her sword for once.
He didn’t know how it began but the lady was shrilling about the artist and the dragon roared back menacingly. There was a cacophony of shouting, random breaking of glass and dull thudding when one of them hit the wall in anger. Suddenly, his name was mentioned and Taemin wasn’t even aware of holding his breath. They were both liars. The lady used Taemin as her sword while the dragon had work commitments as his talons and it strangled Taemin short of breath.
It could drag on and on and time would cease to exist in that terrifying night and every time something shattered, his hands would instinctively cover his ears, tucked safely into the corner of his bed. And like always, always, the lady’s sword would melt and bend in the wind as her voice wavered and soon she would be crying and a loud slam of the door would follow. The dragon was no longer in the glass house and Taemin would find a soft cotton soaking up his damp cheeks, cold sweat and salt, and when he inhaled, there was pine and freshly pressed clothes and sleep came easier in the deathly peace.
Taemin had felt like he was in the belly of something monstrous and he couldn’t exactly pin-point when it all happened, but when his family started breaking apart, he had been certain of one thing: both his parents had stopped dreaming for themselves. Life had blinded them with achievements and glory and responsibilities, and the lady had begun dreaming for the club she was in. The dragon’s dream turned into one for his company, for money, not for himself anymore.
And when people stopped dreaming for themselves, they forget about those that make up who they are. Family, friends, those dear to you. And before you could grasp the edges of your shattering life, the world slips away.
Ever since the first time Minho told Taemin about his diet, and the rules he was breaking by eating his pizza, he had realised that all this while, in his fantasy and Utopia, there was so little he knew about Minho.
Thus, began the unquenchable digging of Minho’s history by Taemin. He would ask about Minho’s life back in his town, everything from school to leisure to his hangouts. And it was like standing behind a fence, staring out at cows grazing on a plot of land that Taemin had never set foot on before.
He learnt that Minho was an attacker on the soccer team. The older boy never said anything more than his position, or when Taemin asked, his difficulty in adapting to the left side of the field when strategies changed. He never said anything more than training being ‘tough’, or ‘okay’, but Taemin could hear the heaviness in his voice when he spoke. Taemin could pick up the reluctance in the pause before his answers, as if he would rather not talk about soccer in their castle.
Minho’s father was a lawyer and his mother a banker. They wanted him to be a doctor, that was why he had textbooks piled on his clothes in his luggage. He said he did ‘okay’ in school, but Taemin suspected that he probably placed in the top positions.
Basketball, soccer, kayaking, abseiling. Taemin threw out what little knowledge he had of normal sports which slowly graduated towards extreme ones when Minho kept nodding, having done those. The older boy enjoyed most of them, save for sky diving and bungee jumping because there was no chance to try. The tiredness crept in only when training came along with soccer. Minho spoke about the game excitedly when Taemin asked about what he does with his friends.
For Taemin, he was close to hopeless at sports. He danced until his muscles ached and his bones became swollen, until injuries became inflamed and the beat of the music thumped through his veins. That was exercise enough for him.
Even the things they ate were different. Taemin had an affinity with junk food. He liked sweets and chocolates and chips and pizza and coke. Minho was boring. He liked chicken and bread and vegetables and watermelon juice. Taemin was mildly horrified at Minho’s preferences - all stale, tasteless healthy food, but the older boy had laughed, adding, “And the things you make.”
So, Taemin thought the older boy wasn’t completely hopeless at food after all.
Both of them had different ideas about dreams. Taemin believed that everyone on earth had a dream that would come true, in little ways they wouldn’t notice until it all adds up. Minho had listened to him with an amused smile and when he shoved Minho, hard, the older boy cracked up, buried sideways into leaves.
“It’s not funny,” Taemin complained, collapsing onto Minho as he turned on his back, eyes crinkled at the sides.
“Sorry, Taemin-ah,” Minho apologised, but he was still smiling. You can’t apologise while smiling, right?
“What do you think, then?” He challenged, glaring down at the boy teasing him. “About dreams.”
The older boy was quiet for a moment, large eyes never leaving Taemin’s as he pondered, and it made his face burn a little.
“You make them,” He began and Taemin paid rapt attention. “You make your own dreams.”
“But sometimes they just come true,” Taemin protested, fingers tight around Minho’s jersey, damp with sweat from training.
“How will that happen?” The older boy questioned gently.
“I don’t know,” He was scrunching his face up, upset at being outwitted by Minho yet again. “It just does!”
Minho chuckled and Taemin was about to tell him off for not being serious, but then the older boy had pulled up on his elbows to kiss his nose.
He decides to let it slide then.
Their language of love also differed.
Taemin was bold and upfront. He took Minho’s hands when they stepped out of school together. He pressed his side into Minho when they were on the oak. And whenever he could, Taemin told Minho they were something special.
Minho was subtle and sparse. It was close to unnoticeable, but Taemin could see, barely. Minho’s language translated into sweeping his bangs away when they were exhausted on the leaves. Pushing fatigue away to spend time together in their castle. Staying up late to return the hours meant for studying spent in clocktowers and streets with Taemin. He had learnt about that after bugging the older boy over phone messaging, asking if he were resting yet.
Worlds apart. They were worlds apart and once, with him drowsy against Minho’s chest in the pleasant afternoon heat and autumn chill, Taemin had thought aloud.
“This is magic, isn’t it?”
Nobody could tell when or what the glass house changes into, but Taemin had found that it oscillated between brittle ice and nightmarish shadows. Just when he was becoming used to the mechanics, after developing strategies to keep safe, the glass house draws an entire new deck of cards.
It was also this new deck that Taemin began.
He had parted with gentle warmth and the night air was biting on his ears. The road was winding and rocky and it seemed more ominous with red funnel clouds sinking into the glass house. The premonition came in shivers down his arms but he dismissed it to the cold breeze.
However, as he approached the glass house, there were sounds. Loud and violent and his heart started to race. Muffled shouting, definitely and he was suddenly glancing at his watch.
7:15 PM.
It was one of the bravest decisions he had made, turning the knob and lashing the door open. Taemin had wanted to bolt, returning after the storm has calmed down, but it was ripping out the walls and cracks were appearing on the glass house and even the dragon’s roars were more ferocious than usual - and the lady’s sword was never strong enough.
The dragon had reached back for a vase and the lady was crying in fear and Taemin was rooted for a second. It was a terrifying thing to watch and in that moment where the dragon whipped around, fangs bared, Taemin realised that his fairy godmother wasn’t about to materialise in a shower of sparkles.
Taemin’s lungs seared with his constricted breathing and the only thing he heard was the blood pumping in his ears as he tore through the living room, hands ramming into the side of the dragon. Its head reared and snapped at him. His vision was shaky. His fist swung on its own and there was a breaking somewhere on his right. The dragon shrieked at him terribly and Taemin’s own tiny voice fought back with everything he had been keeping secret. His shoulders jumped backwards as he pushed the dragon again, and every part of his body was on fire and there was wailing in the distance. The dragon’s talon connected with his cheek and Taemin’s elbow bruised against the ground. He couldn’t sit up. His face was on the side. Everything across the floor was undefined and wavy and he realised he was crying.
Big, ugly dragon feet moved in his peripheral vision. A loud thud and there was an equally deafening collapse of something heavy and Taemin knew the legs of the living room drawer had finally given way. Obscenities screamed into his ears and the universe ripped into half with the colliding of wood on wood.
Soft sobbing was somewhere behind him and Taemin could finally will himself to stand up and he was shivering, head aching and bones cracking.
That was the first time his fairy godmother lost her reality.
Parts l | lll
This autumn, Taemin lives through more than one children's story with a pinch of pixie dust.
A/N: Aaaah, finally, I've managed to hit my goal of a 20k word fic! I'm really glad to be able to complete this. Hopefully it's not too bad. (:
Fairytale hearts
Sunglare and rainbow droplets, the days melded into an autumn reel, sepia and grainy films, and everything fit together. After dance or remedial, Minho would be at the gate and they would cross rivers and galaxies to Jinki’s store. Well, at least Taemin did. He wasn’t sure if Minho could see better now, but he never gave up. Sometimes there would be an invisible rabbit bounding past them and Taemin would point it out, yanking on the older boy’s arm.
“How do you see it if it’s invisible?” Minho had asked, and Taemin realised that he had a point.
On days where he had no school, Taemin would find himself on the bleachers, in the second seat from the left, above the entrance. He figured it made blending into the scene easier, not wanting to distract Minho as he watched the older boy running on the grass and lying down in the mud, bumping with other boys and dancing with soccer balls.
During lunch, JongHyun was finally allowed to sit across Key. When the diva was in a good mood, he might just allow JongHyun to ask him about the article he was reading, usually some glitzy fashion magazine. Taemin still felt that Key was a little too sharp, too scathing, but JongHyun always grinned as wide as his mouth could stretch when he got an answer, probably not understanding it at all, so he didn’t say anything.
The saxophonist still couldn’t touch any of Key’s magazines or hands, for that matter, though.
Five of them would be in Jinki’s little store after school, helping out with stock taking, or rearranging the last of his goods before business could open for real. Key would be busy redecorating the place with scrap materials, while JongHyun swept up litter and dust under his command. Minho would do all the manual labour in the back, moving boxes and stacking them up high in the storeroom shelves, a task most definitely precarious for one as careless as Jinki. Taemin had found himself behind the counter with Jinki more often than not, data logging and handling money while Jinki phoned his suppliers and tried to find cheaper bargains.
It would be normal if they ended up slumped on Jinki’s creaking counter near twilight, exhausted but glad, and Jinki would smile and thank them and everything was worth it because he needed the money.
Sometimes Taemin would pay for the balloon, and other times it came from Minho instead. Whenever Taemin went to Jinki’s store to help, he would leave with a balloon, telling Minho of the nebula and the fairies under the stars and the pavement was a plate of moonlight and the older boy would smile, a little more real with every night. The tree held more of their secrets, some deflating and hanging lifeless like rainbow vines and Taemin would tell Minho of how his fairy godmother had listened to them and heard their secrets.
And on days where he waited for Minho, with no school or dance or friends, they would stay in Jinki’s store for awhile, nearly operational, with less and less things to do. Occasionally the store closed earlier for Jinki’s reasons and they would leave, Taemin paying for the ice cream on even days and Minho on odd days. They would sit in the same old oak tree, whispering secrets to a balloon and tying it onto a branch, Minho on even days and Taemin on odd days and just sometimes, when he wanted to tease the older boy, Taemin would declare Sunday as an eight day, just so Minho would give in to him and keep their secrets for them.
Spilling his heart out, Taemin would tell Minho about his passions. How he loved dancing, how he was bullied when he was young, how he disliked useless people that don’t do things that they need to do, how he hated loud noises. Minho would listen wordlessly, hand finding its way to Taemin’s neck when he glanced at the soccer player, checking if he were even paying attention. Occasionally, it would be silent, Taemin relaxed against Minho’s side and bathed under the multi-coloured light of their balloons, it felt like a Polaroid.
And it would be in the afternoon, where the ground was ablaze with autumn leaves and the castle became a pirate ship.
Taemin would scramble with Minho at his heels, fending off navy men and rival pirates and at the end of the adventure, they would be lying in a pile of vermillion leaves, Taemin panting by Minho’s side, grinning almost stupidly at the older boy whom was watching him warily, afraid of another sudden exclamation of a pirate raid. The times when he played a little too much, talked a little too much, Minho would become preoccupied with his thoughts, too distracted to notice Taemin placing leaves on his knee.
“Hyung,” Taemin had asked once, breaking Minho out of his meditation. “Are you reflecting?”
“Maybe.”
He faced Minho then, eyebrows furrowing in displeasure at the vague reply. There were many things Taemin wanted to tell him, but when Minho’s indifference became fissured by that lopsided smile that was so familiar, Taemin knew there was nothing he couldn’t say.
“A dinosaur,” Taemin pointed at a lump of white clouds that drifted by, tracing the shape of the prehistoric animal with his finger.
“Really?” Minho said, leaning back on his arms and Taemin crawled over, leaves crackling underneath him as he rested his head on Minho’s thigh, elbow pushing into the boy’s knee as he moved his arm, making other shapes out of white.
“What do you see?” Taemin looked away from the dolphin, at Minho.
“Clouds.”
He had thrown a fistful of leaves at the boy then, whom scrunched his face up at the assault. There was a moment where Taemin’s fingers enclosed around more leaves when Minho gazed at him amusedly, promptly snapping his head upwards to inspect the sky when Taemin scowled.
Porcelain fell onto hardwood, the jumbling of utensils on the plate louder than the thud of the contact. He kept grilled fish in his vision, his heart was beginning to palpitate, hands starting to turn sweaty. The dragon vociferated, meat opposing its preferences and Taemin knew it was building.
The outrage.
From the sauce, to the burnt bits, to the unequal amounts of green peas and corn, the dragon was insatiable, words growing after words. The lady fought then, weak and uncertain and trembling and Taemin was sick of it.
Attempting to eat her alive, the dragon bellowed, tail whipping its chair aside, crashing into the sink and it was painfully noisy and Taemin wasn’t even prodding his food around anymore. Their words echoed loudly in his ears and every word seemed directed at him, it was clear as glass and blunt like punches.
The lady shrilled back, already defeated with the glistening cheeks and she flung an arm at the door, struggling out of her seat and words spilling forth about how Taemin shouldn’t have to see this and he was pretty certain she didn’t even mean that.
It was powerful, the dragon, and its booming roar drowned out the lady’s piercing voice and it was a jumble and white noise of insults and hurt and grudges. Rocks and plastic breaking fuelled the inferno and it was unbearable for Taemin.
“Then why don’t you go back?!” The lady managed to yell above the dragon’s rampage.
At that moment, Taemin burst out of his seat, tearing up the stairs to his room and he was certain they didn’t even know that.
On Fridays, Taemin was king again, alone in his courts and he realised the kingdom had expanded, wide and far and beyond what he could see. He blamed Minho. It was his entire fault. Before, everything was under his control. At his fingertips was the layout of his city, majestic and strong, but Minho came along and somehow, between hooks and planks, horses and bricks, his kingdom grew immense. The buildings stretched toward the skyline and one person was no longer enough to rule it.
Those days he was granted two wishes, just because Minho wasn’t there, and he would ask for Minho to be able to see.
They didn’t go out every other day, but on some days when they did, where the day was theirs to make, Taemin would bring Minho to town, to the clocktower that stood right in the centre and they would sneak up the churning gears and rusty chains, feet on dusty floor and breaths thrilled. The view of the city from behind the smudged glass was delicate and peaceful and it was there, behind the clockface, that Minho first closed his hands over Taemin’s, standing right behind so he could lean backwards into gentle heat.
The clocktower’s hands never stopped ticking, second after second, minute after minute. But at that moment, then and there, they had forever.
Having a friend that treated you like his own son had its benefits. When Minho had an entire day of training, or when it was so vigorous he had fallen asleep on the leaves, Taemin would visit Key. Even after fatigue drifted Minho off to sleep in the middle of Taemin’s rant, the older boy had wanted to go out the next day with him - Taemin had insisted then, forcing him to rest or spend time with his teammates or he’d be exiled from the kingdom. Which he could never do, in all honesty.
At Key’s house, they would make scrapbooks to build up the diva’s portfolio for fashion school. He had stumbled into JongHyun’s coat, hanging by the door once, and Key had a seizure when Taemin asked if they were dating.
“Are you out of your mind?” The diva had asked, aghast.
“Then why is his coat there?”
“Well, we were walking home, and I had a cold so I forced him to give me his coat.”
“But you were sick two weeks ago.”
Blinking furiously, the diva froze for a moment, before laughing forced and obnoxious, thumping hard on Taemin’s back, ushering them into the kitchen and developing a sudden interest for informing him of what they would be baking that day.
Baking was also something Taemin did at Key’s, and the diva had recipes nobody knew about. Like placing marshmallows above a biscuit disc (which they baked from scratch), dipping the entire thing into melting chocolate which hardened and bound it into ‘magic for obesity’, according to Key.
The third time they made that, Taemin had brought some back for Minho, burning under the scrutiny of Key, or the little song the diva would sing. ‘Frog boy and Taeminnie sitting in a tree,’ and as bashful as it made Taemin feel, there was a small flip in his chest whenever he heard that.
Condensation soaked their hips as they sat under the oak tree, the box of ‘obesity magic’ between them. Minho had picked one up, inspecting it suspiciously and sniffing it as Taemin anticipated.
“You made this?” The older boy asked, checking the bottom of the chocolate ball.
“Yeah,” Taemin lied.
Well, it wasn’t a total lie. He did do the chocolate dipping; that had to count for something. The chocolate cracked when Minho bit down on it, and Taemin could see the soft marshmallow bursting out at the sides and the biscuit crumbling down Minho’s jersey. The older boy looked at him then, chewing fervently and Taemin didn’t even know the grin that spread over his face.
“Do you have dreams?” He asked, picking a chocolate ball for himself.
Minho rested his hand on a knee, half-eaten ball in his fingers, mulling over the question. A breeze chilled Taemin’s neck, and some leaves fell in the time that passed.
No children come to the playground because there was a bigger one with swings and monkey bars further down the street. This one was outdated and expired. Occasionally old couples would stroll around here, but they were friendly enough to smile when Taemin waved at them, nudging Minho’s side so the older boy would follow and not just bow silently.
The wind blew continuously, and strawberry blonde skimmed over his cheeks. Taemin wasn’t a very patient person. Moving the box to the other side of his hip, Taemin scooted closer to Minho, jabbing his chin into the older boy’s shoulder. Large eyes regarded him then, and Taemin open and closed his mouth without saying anything, letting his chin dig into Minho’s flesh. The older boy laughed, shying away from Taemin, left hand clasping over his tickled shoulder. His laughter was unfamiliar to Taemin, crystalline and precious, strong, true, yet brittle.
“So?”
“When I was young,” Minho answered, eyes holding some sort of mirth. “I dreamt of buying everything in a game shop.”
“I did too,” A sudden excitement rose inside Taemin. “I wanted the steam trains they put for display, and the kiddy cars and houses and the stuffed bears that were huge!”
Arms outstretched, trying to illustrate the size of the soft toys, Taemin was suddenly aware of the volume of his voice and Minho watching him with a small smile. He quickly kept his hands, realising he got carried away, and then inspiration struck him again and Taemin sat up.
“How about powers?” Taemin asked, hands collecting leaves. “Like have you dreamt of breathing fire, or being psychic?”
Thrusting his arms to the side, Taemin imagined having telekinetic abilities, moving things with his mind. Watching his victims slowly drift to the ground, there was a sudden rustling and cold leaves showered upon him. Hands swinging wildly around, trying to come out of the confusion, Minho’s laughter was clear again, and when everything settled, Taemin glared at Minho.
“I wanted to be batman.”
“But that’s so boring,” Taemin said, put off by the character. “All he has are gadgets. And his car. And Robin.”
“He works for his dream,” Minho said simply, swallowing the last of his food. “It’s realistic.”
He couldn’t understand why Minho just wouldn’t let go and believe in a fairytale for once. Sometimes, you don’t have to take life so seriously, sometimes things just happened for you to be happy.
“Do you still have dreams like that?”
The answer was already apparent in the infuriatingly slow manner Minho reached for his hair, picking the leaves out of it and putting them upright, stalk to tip, stalk to tip, gently pressing them flat together and setting them down on the ground neatly.
“I dream of the team winning,” Minho said, looking at the flattened leaves at his knees. “I dream of making my parents proud.”
“What about you?” There was a cynicism tucked in the older boy’s lips, curving up but not really at the same time. “Don’t you want to fly?”
“It’s good to walk,” Minho answered, facing Taemin and scratching his strawberry blonde head with a gentleness he had trouble figuring out.
A tunnel that was never ending and Taemin was trapped right in the middle of it. Dark and scary, there was no end light or full stop to speak of. When the dragon wasn’t around and it was after seven, the air would be thick like a mattress. The lady was becoming frailer with every passing day and it birthed an anger inside Taemin that was fanned by the timid movements she made, or the times he walked into an empty living room, hearing her sobs from down the hallway.
Cheap and repulsive, was the flowery cologne that would be mixed with the dragon’s spicy one. More than once, lips were imprinted onto his shirt and skin like bloodied flowers, ugly and disgusting and dead.
Fighting was more controlled when the dragon wasn’t bloated. Its talons may knock into furniture or walls but it was not more than that, nothing above hungry roars and chomping of teeth. But when there was an unmistakable rash on the dragon’s neck, itchy and irritated, midway through its skin shedding, rocks were smashed about and it was a nightmare.
“He’s coming back for dinner in a bit,” The lady would assure, more for herself than Taemin, and the clock would tick, tock, tick, down to seven and whatever was left on Taemin’s plate would be whisked away by her, dumping all of it into the trash.
Glared, he had glared at her one evening, smouldering and upset and he kept it on the back of her head until she turned around, noticing Taemin for the first time and she had been taken aback.
“Are you still hungry?” She had asked, with that fake, fake, fake concern.
Taemin never let his gaze down and she knew what he meant. She had thrown the plate she was holding down into the sink, clattering and loud and it made Taemin flinch. He quickly recovered, and she was screaming at him, fist colliding into the cabinets and feet stomping and sweeping everything into the sink, china breaking and her wails incoherent and Taemin had lost it too.
It hurt, stinging like little sparks across his palm when he flung his hands down on the table, getting up so fast his chair crashed backwards. The lady stopped, eyes wide and wet staring at him and Taemin thought his cheeks were damp and what was simmering inside of him came to violent bubbling and he yelled, senselessly, tearing his throat sore, an incomprehensible shout of anguish because he had so many things to say yet he had nothing left to say.
Red, the world became red and he never recalled being as reckless or feral before, shoving the dinner table with so much force it dented the refrigerator and there was a silence that was unlike the lovely one he had in his castle with Minho. This was prickling and suffocating and brimming with frustration. There was another shout that ripped out of his throat and his body began moving, fists flailing and feet kicking and pounding the ground and his ears almost exploded from all of his rage.
That was the last time he ate dinner at home.
“Chicken salad, eggplant and croissants,” JongHyun recited, slipping into his seat with a tray of the aforementioned food choices, causing Taemin to glance up from nursing his swollen elbow.
Key made a noncommittal sound, engrossed in a woman decked scantily in tree branches, looking constipated. He slid the tray towards himself and picked up the croissant, eating it, all the while investigating the dress of wood.
“Ouch,” JongHyun said, jerking his chin at Taemin as he dug Key’s salad with a fork. “Dance?”
Actually, it had bruised when he lost his temper at home. Dance was just an excuse he prepared so nobody would suspect - especially Key.
“I told him,” Key said, flipping the page leisurely. “Don’t use so much strength when you’re throwing your arms back,” The diva proceeded to demonstrate. “He’s always so forceful in his moves.”
Trying to fake a smile, Taemin bit his cupcake, putting his elbow onto the ice pack.
“Kibum, that’s porn,” The saxophonist said, smirking as he ate a forkful of chicken salad.
“It’s not porn,” Key sighed, rolling his eyes and letting it stay up, causing Taemin to snort. “It’s called the Secret of Autumn.”
“There’s no more secret to that,” JongHyun stabbed an eggplant, completely disinterested in the page. “Those tiny little leaves are showing up her ti -“
The diva had held a hand up at that moment, eyes closed, not wanting to hear the end of JongHyun’s sentence. Taemin chewed his cupcake with difficulty as he watched Key picking up his fork and jabbing an eggplant himself. The saxophonist thrust his half-eaten one right into Key’s face, grinning earnestly and revulsion was apparent on the diva. JongHyun nodded encouragingly, bangs flipping up and down and Key seemed to give in, picking the vegetable with two fingers off the fork, eating it.
Not everyone was living in a nightmare.
Time at the castle had become something Taemin wanted desperately. Autumn was chilly, not freezing like winter, but cold enough and Minho was a soft warmth that Taemin needed. Bricks had turned into aluminium and they were in airplanes and helicopters and sometimes in caravans and forests. Minho smiles and chuckles at Taemin’s suggestions but he plays along, jogging behind when Taemin kicked up red and brown leaves, calling him slow and lazy.
It was close to scary when Taemin did that because Minho would explode forward with a sudden spurt of speed and he never could get away. First it was a hold on his shoulder, then it became his arms, and wrists and once, when Taemin went too far and named Minho a fat turtle, long arms had wound around his waist, spinning him around so fast the world was a blur of blue and yellow and squealing when fingers buried themselves into his sides.
A balloon and two ice creams accompanied them, every time they went to the playground and the tree was soon dangling with strings holding deflated rubber, wooden sticks trapped inside each one. They coloured the balding tree shabbily, some tangling and others caught in branches, but it was their secrets, all of it from the first time they did it and it was nice to Taemin.
“Taemin-ah,” Minho had considered once, seated at the royal balcony, their shoe soles flushed against each other, pushing playfully back and forth. “Will anybody say anything about the tree?”
Not knowing if anyone would, Taemin settled for a cheeky grin, stretching forward and undoing Minho’s laces in one movement, scampering down the royal steps while the older boy groaned.
Tuesdays and Thursdays, when Minho wasn’t too exhausted, were the weekdays where Taemin could tell the older boy of all his stories. Jinki closed the store earlier on these days and he was barely scraping through. There were bags under his eyes, and a hidden anxiousness in his movements. When Jinki had to dig for important documents, he would rifle through the counter drawers urgently, accidentally ripping a few in the process. When customers requested for assistance, Jinki had a winning smile, but his arms and legs always found ways to knock over bottles or end up getting caught on the leg of his counter or shelves.
“You’re not making it,” Taemin had overheard Key saying quietly to Jinki once. “Are you?”
Deliberately holding his breath, Taemin stayed motionless, in the aisle next to them. There was hissing and he guessed Key was applying ointment onto a fresh wound the bespectacled adult had acquired.
“N-no,” Jinki’s voice admitted. “I’m not, Kibum-ah. It’s hard.”
A sigh.
“Taemin, come here, I can see you.”
Shit.
After that, Key had enforced operation ‘Popularize Jinki’s Store’. He began designing posters and handouts and most of them were pink in colour but Jinki probably felt bad enough already to comment. Taemin had tried mentioning the excessive amounts of pink but Key had shushed him with a death glare. And with just the five of them, they began working late into the night when Jinki could stay.
JongHyun would be out in the street, passing flyers and yelling out Jinki’s store to promote it. ‘Shampoo, cooking oil, tissue paper and even rose-shaped nail buffers are available down the street and left!’ was what he had to shout and when Taemin was free he would help Key pass JongHyun a bottle of honeyed lemon. The immense grin and renewed vigour from the saxophonist was worth the walk up the street and back for Taemin.
The store’s phone rang without a break throughout the day and Key would snatch it up, pen stuck behind an ear, lips thin. It was the first time Taemin had seen Key speak nicely, sealing deals and insulting the person on the other side with masked venom when the conversation didn’t go well. He was finding advertisers.
“Hyung,” Taemin had asked once after Key put it across gently to the person on the phone that he was probably ugly and dim-witted. “Isn’t bad to make enemies? Especially now, when Jinki’s store needs friends.”
“Taemin,” Key had explained, already flipping through the phone directory. “Just because we’re small, it doesn’t mean that we let people step all over us.”
Jinki’s store became published in a small local newspaper by a week.
When goods had to be shifted, or taken down, Minho would immediately, albeit silently, take the initiative. He had even fixed the chipped paint at the front of the door when they were all busy with their own devices. Key had named him the ‘labour man’, getting him to finish paint jobs and manual work, and when there was nothing for him to do, made him stand in the cold with JongHyun, passing out flyers. Taemin did stock counting, while Jinki bargained more voraciously with suppliers. Minho disallowed him from joining them in giving out flyers.
“Why?” Taemin whined when they were debriefing for the day, seated around the counter, tired and sore.
“What if you stepped into a geyser?” Minho had countered and Taemin found his face heating up.
Key paid their conversation no mind, while JongHyun went “Geyser? What geyser?” and Jinki smiled at them, full of gratitude. When they ate dinner together, out of a box of fried chicken, there would be chatter and laughter. Key would be snide with JongHyun and the latter would do funny things and Jinki would be careless and already drunk on mirth everything would be hilarious and with Minho’s hand on his thigh as Taemin displayed his teeth for the world to see, he realised one thing.
He didn’t have to face his nightmare alone.
It hadn’t always been like this. It hadn’t always been anger and frustration in the place that changes. There used to be laughter and gentle warmth. Taemin used to be able to cross the living room feeling free and safe and burdened by homework. But now, homework was nothing compared to the weight of unspoken words that nestled within all of their souls.
The door creaked open ominously, a silver SUV parked in their garage and it was unfamiliar and strange to Taemin. He had stopped in the doorway, the sight before him unnatural and weird and he couldn’t respond.
Sleeping, the dragon was sprawled on the couch, the lady dabbing its snout with a cold cloth. She looked up then, sad and unhappy and Taemin instantly hated the sight.
“Won’t you come over?” She asked, soaking the cloth back into the pail of ice.
“Won’t you do something?” Taemin tried to be furious, tried to be hateful.
Nothing came as she slumped in the couch, wringing the cloth and dabbing the sleeping monster’s face. No emotions from before - Taemin was simply exhausted.
The click of his room’s lock broke the silence in the house.
On a cloudy Wednesday, Taemin was tying their secrets onto a new branch, past whispers now falling in front of their faces and hanging around them like streamers. Minho’s feet were playing with Taemin’s right foot, juggling it back and forth like a soccer ball and that made his imagination take to the skies.
“Hyung,” Taemin began, finishing a sloppy knot for today’s secrets. “What if the castle was a magic carpet today?”
“That’s fine,” His shoe was being pried off by Minho’s cleats.
“What about a floating castle?” Taemin asked, there was something pleasant about being humoured by Minho.
His shoe popped past his heel, dropping to the ground with a thud and his socked toes were cold. Taemin pushed Minho, the older boy laughing as he stared at the sneaker laying forlornly among the leaves. Minho shifted, pulling his feet up, about to climb down for Taemin’s sneaker. Then it was like realising something for the first time and Taemin saw.
Minho had dreams for other people. For his parents and for his team, never for himself, and odd feelings coalesced in Taemin’s chest.
Reflexively, Taemin gripped the older boy’s wrist, feeling unexplainably desperate. There was a widening of eyes on Minho’s part and Taemin had to let him know. It was okay to dream for yourself. You have to - or you stop seeing. You stop seeing everything that was precious.
“I believe that,” His words were hesitant, mind reeling from how to make this stupid, stupid boy understand. “People become similar to their dreams.”
Eyebrows came closer together as Minho settled back into his spot, trying to comprehend his sentence.
“You become similar,” Minho said slowly. “But you don’t become it. That won’t happen.”
“What...” Taemin said, hold on Minho’s wrist tightening. “What do you think about working for it?”
“It’s not easy,” Minho frowned. “Long. Tiring.”
“And we can forget ourselves.”
Minho nodded, but Taemin wasn’t sure if he understood.
“You’re similar to your dreams.”
That sentence had caused him to tilt his head in question, the older boy’s crisis temporarily taking second priority after his curiosity.
“Just like a kid.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” He huffed, swiping at Minho’s arm.
“But I think,” The older boy said after his laughing died down, looking out at the empty playground. “That our dreams are beautiful. They are worth fighting for.”
“So I’m beautiful?”
Triumph swelled inside him. He was certain this was one of those rare moments where his wit had managed to catch up with Minho. The older boy had stared at him intently, under the rainbow lights their balloons cast, obviously caught in his own words, brain probably working overtime in coming up with some smartass line that wouldn’t surface.
Before Taemin could celebrate his victory, Minho’s eyes were downcast and suddenly near, and he registered freshly pressed clothes and a cosy living room, maybe pine, and their lips brushed. Minho was gentle but his chapped lips were rough and possibly, the branch gave way underneath them and they were falling in an endless plunge because Taemin’s feet were tingling and his body threatened to turn slack.
Thoughts whirled in his head but one thing was clear and Taemin found himself fumbling. When pine pulled away, after a second where their mouths touched, did Taemin realise his eyes were closed. The older boy still held that stare on him. His cheeks were the warmest they’ve ever been and the breeze on his neck was colder than usual.
“That’s what you helped me to see.”
Coming back to the place that changes, it was so abnormal Taemin’s skin crawled. Calling out his name as he attempted to bluster past the kitchen, Taemin had no chance to escape from being led into his seat under the dragon’s command.
Three plates of food were set neatly above the chequered table cloth and there was this flimsy air of mock normalcy that had long dissolved two years ago. The dragon took its place at the end of the table, opposite Taemin, while the lady watched him by the side. The screech of his chair was loud in the unnatural quiet and he could feel the dragon sizing him up hungrily.
Potato tasted like salt and the fillet was like pepper in Taemin’s mouth as the dragon and the lady staged a play for their own amusement, throwing out conversations and questions that all three of them knew the answer to. It was like watching a painful rendition of an old movie - mindless, overdone, unoriginal.
The dragon spoke to him and his answers that came after a moment of deliberate silence were robotic and automatic. It might have been the longest hour in his life and he’d even skipped dessert. This peace was tilting over at the edge of the cliff as it is, and Taemin refused to hope for once.
It was more realistic this way.
Minho doesn’t believe it when Taemin tells him about the old man on the moon.
He doesn’t believe it when Taemin tells him every one of us has our own fairy godmother. He doesn’t believe it when Taemin tells him Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast and Snow White were all true, doesn’t believe that every star is alive.
But Taemin knew he believed in their story, when clumsy fingers become caught in his hair during lazy autumn afternoons. Taemin knew Minho believed when his eyes sparkled at Taemin’s tales. He knew Minho believed when they sat together in the tree, their secrets casting daydream sunrays, holding him close and checking if he were cold. And he definitely knew Minho believed, when they were close and the rustling was their only music, and he bends down, grazing his lips on Taemin’s forehead.
“Is it really that hard?” Taemin had asked once, after escaping from brigands and slavers, unable to overlook Minho’s inability to see.
Not understanding Taemin, Minho cocked an eyebrow, crossing his legs on the ground. He had been chasing Taemin for the past half an hour. Exasperated, Taemin sat in front of Minho, bringing two fistfuls of crimson leaves to the older boy’s face.
“The leaves,” Taemin said, wanting Minho to see. “They’re like pixie dust.”
“Really?” The older boy mused, and Taemin frowned.”What does pixie dust do?”
“It doesn’t need to do anything,” His tone clearly displaying annoyance. “It’s just pixie dust.”
Minho chuckled, and Taemin guessed the older boy was laughing at him. Large hands twisted his shoulders around before he could retort, easing him carefully into gentle warmth while long legs stretched by his sides.
“Alright,” Deep baritone rumbled behind his head, calloused thumbs grazing the under of his arms. “They’re pixie dust.”
Autumn was turning frigid and Taemin found himself thinking of how lucky he was to have Minho intruding upon his castle and how implausible their story was. How the older boy always listened to him when nobody else would, trying to see the worlds that he painted, humouring him, and Taemin couldn’t stop the overwhelming contentment that slipped past his mouth.
“You’re just like a fairytale.”
Soft, like the whisper of dying leaves, but Taemin was sure Minho heard it because then, long fingers crawled between his smaller ones and his hands were completely covered by the older boy’s, holding fast.
Dinner at the playground was simple, but better than at the place that changes. Taemin would snack on sandwiches or microwaved pizza bought from Jinki’s store, and it would be a grand feast, delicious with an amazing spread. However, he disapproved of what Minho ate - cranberries and chicken omelettes for every meal in their castle and he would force the older boy into nibbling his pasta or hamburger.
A diet or something and Taemin would cringe from imagining how sick he would be, consuming the same food every night for half a year. Minho told him that he was breaking a rule by nibbling his pizza, but Taemin told him there were no rules in his castle. Not anymore.
Contrasting with the day, dread ensnared and fettered faith at night as he returned to the glass house. The cycle refused to stop, but the feelings never dulled - if anything, they grew. Before seven, Taemin was obliged to give the dragon a hug, shared between people whom actually love each other, and it was slimy and disgusting and it was difficult to resist the urge to bolt for the bathroom, stripping off and soaking for a few hours.
Perfumes, two different kinds, were always mixing around the dragon in a rancid blend and it stung Taemin’s nose. On good days there were no mouths growing out of its scales, but on bad days they grew in multitudes, sprouting all over its scales in a horrific picture of a thousand speaking lips. He was helpless every time talons enclosed around his thin frame and desperate, he would throw a glance at the lady.
She wasn’t his fairy godmother, of course. He should’ve learnt that by now. Watching them under the pretence of being back to before, she never said anything.
Not even once, not even when Taemin couldn’t go out with Minho, where he was at home and the dragon flies in with his car, calling for him from downstairs.
“Aren’t you going to greet your father?” The dragon would demand and Taemin would give it to him, reluctantly, peeking at the lady to do something, do something - say something. The lady never did. She loved this little lie of theirs and Taemin could see her nose growing longer and longer as she lied to herself.
Not even when there was the beep of the dragon’s SUV in the dead of the night, flying away back to the artist, the one that paints him a thousand mouths. When it was particularly quiet, Taemin thought he could hear her crying, and he wanted to scream at her to shut up.
And when she finally did say anything, she was too soft. Too weak to fight with the dragon. Rendering Taemin’s sleep with a mighty crash, he had scrambled out of bed, anxious and scared and the lady drew her sword for once.
He didn’t know how it began but the lady was shrilling about the artist and the dragon roared back menacingly. There was a cacophony of shouting, random breaking of glass and dull thudding when one of them hit the wall in anger. Suddenly, his name was mentioned and Taemin wasn’t even aware of holding his breath. They were both liars. The lady used Taemin as her sword while the dragon had work commitments as his talons and it strangled Taemin short of breath.
It could drag on and on and time would cease to exist in that terrifying night and every time something shattered, his hands would instinctively cover his ears, tucked safely into the corner of his bed. And like always, always, the lady’s sword would melt and bend in the wind as her voice wavered and soon she would be crying and a loud slam of the door would follow. The dragon was no longer in the glass house and Taemin would find a soft cotton soaking up his damp cheeks, cold sweat and salt, and when he inhaled, there was pine and freshly pressed clothes and sleep came easier in the deathly peace.
Taemin had felt like he was in the belly of something monstrous and he couldn’t exactly pin-point when it all happened, but when his family started breaking apart, he had been certain of one thing: both his parents had stopped dreaming for themselves. Life had blinded them with achievements and glory and responsibilities, and the lady had begun dreaming for the club she was in. The dragon’s dream turned into one for his company, for money, not for himself anymore.
And when people stopped dreaming for themselves, they forget about those that make up who they are. Family, friends, those dear to you. And before you could grasp the edges of your shattering life, the world slips away.
Ever since the first time Minho told Taemin about his diet, and the rules he was breaking by eating his pizza, he had realised that all this while, in his fantasy and Utopia, there was so little he knew about Minho.
Thus, began the unquenchable digging of Minho’s history by Taemin. He would ask about Minho’s life back in his town, everything from school to leisure to his hangouts. And it was like standing behind a fence, staring out at cows grazing on a plot of land that Taemin had never set foot on before.
He learnt that Minho was an attacker on the soccer team. The older boy never said anything more than his position, or when Taemin asked, his difficulty in adapting to the left side of the field when strategies changed. He never said anything more than training being ‘tough’, or ‘okay’, but Taemin could hear the heaviness in his voice when he spoke. Taemin could pick up the reluctance in the pause before his answers, as if he would rather not talk about soccer in their castle.
Minho’s father was a lawyer and his mother a banker. They wanted him to be a doctor, that was why he had textbooks piled on his clothes in his luggage. He said he did ‘okay’ in school, but Taemin suspected that he probably placed in the top positions.
Basketball, soccer, kayaking, abseiling. Taemin threw out what little knowledge he had of normal sports which slowly graduated towards extreme ones when Minho kept nodding, having done those. The older boy enjoyed most of them, save for sky diving and bungee jumping because there was no chance to try. The tiredness crept in only when training came along with soccer. Minho spoke about the game excitedly when Taemin asked about what he does with his friends.
For Taemin, he was close to hopeless at sports. He danced until his muscles ached and his bones became swollen, until injuries became inflamed and the beat of the music thumped through his veins. That was exercise enough for him.
Even the things they ate were different. Taemin had an affinity with junk food. He liked sweets and chocolates and chips and pizza and coke. Minho was boring. He liked chicken and bread and vegetables and watermelon juice. Taemin was mildly horrified at Minho’s preferences - all stale, tasteless healthy food, but the older boy had laughed, adding, “And the things you make.”
So, Taemin thought the older boy wasn’t completely hopeless at food after all.
Both of them had different ideas about dreams. Taemin believed that everyone on earth had a dream that would come true, in little ways they wouldn’t notice until it all adds up. Minho had listened to him with an amused smile and when he shoved Minho, hard, the older boy cracked up, buried sideways into leaves.
“It’s not funny,” Taemin complained, collapsing onto Minho as he turned on his back, eyes crinkled at the sides.
“Sorry, Taemin-ah,” Minho apologised, but he was still smiling. You can’t apologise while smiling, right?
“What do you think, then?” He challenged, glaring down at the boy teasing him. “About dreams.”
The older boy was quiet for a moment, large eyes never leaving Taemin’s as he pondered, and it made his face burn a little.
“You make them,” He began and Taemin paid rapt attention. “You make your own dreams.”
“But sometimes they just come true,” Taemin protested, fingers tight around Minho’s jersey, damp with sweat from training.
“How will that happen?” The older boy questioned gently.
“I don’t know,” He was scrunching his face up, upset at being outwitted by Minho yet again. “It just does!”
Minho chuckled and Taemin was about to tell him off for not being serious, but then the older boy had pulled up on his elbows to kiss his nose.
He decides to let it slide then.
Their language of love also differed.
Taemin was bold and upfront. He took Minho’s hands when they stepped out of school together. He pressed his side into Minho when they were on the oak. And whenever he could, Taemin told Minho they were something special.
Minho was subtle and sparse. It was close to unnoticeable, but Taemin could see, barely. Minho’s language translated into sweeping his bangs away when they were exhausted on the leaves. Pushing fatigue away to spend time together in their castle. Staying up late to return the hours meant for studying spent in clocktowers and streets with Taemin. He had learnt about that after bugging the older boy over phone messaging, asking if he were resting yet.
Worlds apart. They were worlds apart and once, with him drowsy against Minho’s chest in the pleasant afternoon heat and autumn chill, Taemin had thought aloud.
“This is magic, isn’t it?”
Nobody could tell when or what the glass house changes into, but Taemin had found that it oscillated between brittle ice and nightmarish shadows. Just when he was becoming used to the mechanics, after developing strategies to keep safe, the glass house draws an entire new deck of cards.
It was also this new deck that Taemin began.
He had parted with gentle warmth and the night air was biting on his ears. The road was winding and rocky and it seemed more ominous with red funnel clouds sinking into the glass house. The premonition came in shivers down his arms but he dismissed it to the cold breeze.
However, as he approached the glass house, there were sounds. Loud and violent and his heart started to race. Muffled shouting, definitely and he was suddenly glancing at his watch.
7:15 PM.
It was one of the bravest decisions he had made, turning the knob and lashing the door open. Taemin had wanted to bolt, returning after the storm has calmed down, but it was ripping out the walls and cracks were appearing on the glass house and even the dragon’s roars were more ferocious than usual - and the lady’s sword was never strong enough.
The dragon had reached back for a vase and the lady was crying in fear and Taemin was rooted for a second. It was a terrifying thing to watch and in that moment where the dragon whipped around, fangs bared, Taemin realised that his fairy godmother wasn’t about to materialise in a shower of sparkles.
Taemin’s lungs seared with his constricted breathing and the only thing he heard was the blood pumping in his ears as he tore through the living room, hands ramming into the side of the dragon. Its head reared and snapped at him. His vision was shaky. His fist swung on its own and there was a breaking somewhere on his right. The dragon shrieked at him terribly and Taemin’s own tiny voice fought back with everything he had been keeping secret. His shoulders jumped backwards as he pushed the dragon again, and every part of his body was on fire and there was wailing in the distance. The dragon’s talon connected with his cheek and Taemin’s elbow bruised against the ground. He couldn’t sit up. His face was on the side. Everything across the floor was undefined and wavy and he realised he was crying.
Big, ugly dragon feet moved in his peripheral vision. A loud thud and there was an equally deafening collapse of something heavy and Taemin knew the legs of the living room drawer had finally given way. Obscenities screamed into his ears and the universe ripped into half with the colliding of wood on wood.
Soft sobbing was somewhere behind him and Taemin could finally will himself to stand up and he was shivering, head aching and bones cracking.
That was the first time his fairy godmother lost her reality.
Parts l | lll