Archive of Our Own

The boy waded his way through the dense path, avoiding each and every thing the forest had to offer. He was seven years old and instead of being perky and curious like most kids at his age were, he was more of the 'wuss' type. Well, that's the word that was included in all those jeers that he received on the daily at his grade school, when he was afraid to play in the sandpit because he would definitely get the small granules in his shoes, which gave him an incredibly itchy feeling. The same word was used when he refused to play with the moulding clay along with his classmates. His mother had told him that if it dried up on his hands, he would turn into a statue.

In short, BamBam was a pretty scared guy. And just the fact that he was even considering delving into this isolated forest, made him want to pee himself. Admittedly, it was a dare. He would never have thought it up on his own.

It was all Jinyoung's and Jaebum's fault. They were the two "bullies" according to him, even though all they really did to him was call him names for being so terrified of each and every single thing. But that's just the extent that first grade bullying went up to. The duo had thought that it would be absolutely hilarious if BamBam were to go into the Daedanhi Forest by himself, with nothing but his packed lunchbox.

The level of stupidity was one that could only be reached by first graders, who blatantly did not understand that even grown men had never escaped Daedanhi Forest once they'd gone in. But they didn't know that, so being alone with some greenery for about ten minutes didn't sound so bad to Jaebum and Jinyoung.

Additionally, of course, to get BamBam to actually agree to this, they had to threaten him in some way, and the fact that they were seven years old themselves, didn't leave them with much of a choice other than: "We'll tell your mum that you stole Miss Guanxi's banana last month, if you don't go!" And BamBam really didn't want his mum to know about that. Anything but that incident. So, he grudgingly agreed, not before giving the two the biggest glare that he could muster. Another thing that he would need to muster was courage; yeah, he really needed courage in excess right now.

And he was in the forest at this very moment, wanting nothing more than to be back at home, covered in a warm blanket with his mum giving him grapes or something like that. Heck, even doing homework sounded better than being trapped in this defoliated hell. It wasn't even that cold, but he was shivering terribly, teeth chattering and all.

There was something even he, a 'wuss', couldn't deny, though: and that was the scenery. It was certainly beautiful, with sturdy, evergreen trees reaching up to the clouds, all supposedly connected to each other by small vines. It was like a home. BamBam thought that if he was with his parents, he would definitely enjoy this forest. Unfortunately, he wasn't aware of its danger and the fact that nobody in their right minds would think of entering it.

One good thing had come out of all his wussing-around, however. And it was that he was definitely not about to reach out for those almost-glowing apples hanging precariously from each branch of every tree, however juicy they looked and however hungry he was.
BamBam had taught himself to never take food from any stranger, even if that stranger happened to be well-- a tree. Even if the apples were now humming...humming beautiful, resonating tunes with notes that didn't even melodically complement each other but sounded so refreshing. BamBam wondered whether the apples would taste like music too. Maybe if he ate them, just one little nibble...

And he was suddenly perched on a strong, flexible branch that supported his weight just like a sturdy trampoline. The singing apple was so close to him, just two inches out of reach, he could grab it if he jumped a little...

And his hand drooped, as his mind flashed and his eyes widened in sheer horror at the thought that had just passed by.

"What if it has maggots in it...?" he wondered out loud, an innocent lilt to his tone. Maybe that's what initially attracted the spirit to him.

"You'd be right on that account, of course."

The next noise that really left a great first impression was one of BamBam's screams as he fell straight from the branch and into the clump of tall grass that was crowded near the base of the tree.

"What the--? You cannot sneak up on me like that! Who even are you? I need to get back home, I can't do this." His voice was high, panicked, and he was used to it. It was his 'wuss-voice'. It had been named by the oh-so intelligent members of his class, that he really wished he was with right now. It was absurd, he knew, but honestly, he would’ve liked to be anywhere but this forest, even if it meant being at school.

“It’s alright!” the person’s voice sounded quite alarmed now, as if he had no idea what to do in the situation. BamBam, although hiding behind the sleeve of his jumper and unable to see the person, detected the voice of a child. The person couldn’t be much older than him. If so, why was he in the forest by himself? Did he get bullied too? He hadn’t been so curious at first, but now that he was possibly face to face with another kid with the same story, he wanted to be brave enough to look at him.
Just one look BamBam, you can’t be this much of a scaredy-cat!

“I won’t hurt you. You passed the test of the forest!”
BamBam liked passing tests. He liked it a lot, and even though he hadn’t fully been aware that he was being tested, he still felt a small whirpool of pride grow in his chest. However, that statement wasn’t enough to goad him into looking at the stranger. The boy stayed blind behind his sleeve.

“Please look at me! You’re the first person I’ve seen in the forest. I have nobody to play with,” the voice sighed. “And I have no parents. I’m a new spirit, you see, so nobody wants to play with me. They say I’m too tall. And too stupid. I just want a friend but—”

“You’re a spirit?” BamBam’s face was not behind his blue jumper sleeve any longer, as his eyes flashed open, filled with wonder and incredulousness. Seven-year olds, after all, will be seven-year olds, and will pay attention to anybody if they claim that they are a spirit. BamBam was not an outlier on this one.

“Yes, unfortunately.” Now that BamBam had a view of the self-claimed ‘spirit’, he could freely admire his face, which was actually quite pretty, at least for the standards of the boy. He had cropped brown hair, with a messily cut fringe and tufts of hair sticking up, giving him a rowdy kind-of look. Well, that was only if you inspected his hair. The rest of him was the polar opposite of ‘rowdy’.

The so-called spirit had a sort of elfish face shape but bore doe-like brown eyes. He was glowing in BamBam’s eyes, and the human wanted to assume that it was because of his welcoming smile, rather than his powers as a spirit or whatever.

“What’s your name?”

“Yugyeom. Kim Yugyeom, if you want to know my surname. There are loads of Kims in the forest, but nobody will claim me. It’s a bit sad,” Kim Yugyeom sighed (what felt like for the umpteenth time), and looked down at the forest floor, which was covered in dead leaves.

“Well, my name is BamBam and I’m a bit scared of this forest and I kind of need to pee, so can you show me the way out?”

To this request, Yugyeom looked up and smiled at the boy, who seemed to be his height. He genuinely loved talking to people. BamBam had noticed that; upon their meeting, he, himself, had only said three sentences, while Yugyeom had gone on about his entire life. The seven-year old was drawn to him. He’d never really believed in things such as ‘spirits’, and was normally one to scream upon the sheer idea of meeting one. But something about the way Yugyeom smiled, the way Yugyeom talked, dissipated his fear. It had been just fifteen minutes into Daedanhi Forest, but the first-grader felt at ease.

Yugyeom did not stop rambling as he showed his new acquaintance the exit to the forest. The sun was currently dying out for the day, but the two boys’ smiles were as alive as they had never been. Yugyeom was ecstatic that he was finally talking to someone who didn’t scorn him, who didn’t wave him away like he didn’t matter. He wanted to call BamBam his friend but wasn’t sure what the word meant anymore. ‘Acquaintance’ was a nicer word to settle with.

As for BamBam, he was warming up to the guy walking next to him. Yugyeom let off an energy that BamBam had never felt before; one of playing in the sea, toasting marshmallows in front of a fire, climbing trees that reached all the way to heaven. All the things he couldn’t do and hadn’t ever done, all because he was too afraid. It was pretty ironic to him how a creature that should been scaring him the most (according to all those storybooks he'd read about spirits cooking humans in steel cauldrons) was the one that coaxed out BamBam's smile from its hiding place in the most artistic way.

Twilight had just begun as BamBam waved Yugyeom goodbye at the exit. When the school-going boy returned home, he found his mother on the verge of tears as she called up the school, inquiring about her lost son. When the spirit returned home, he found the others at the dinner table in the Pavilion of the forest, giving him strange looks and halfway glares.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was four o’ clock in the afternoon when BamBam came out of school, drenched with what he suspected to be toilet water and freshly out of the sixth grade. It had been a shitty day for him and he wanted to cheer himself up. He clearly knew that it wouldn’t work by dwelling over the day’s events so he tried extremely hard to forget about everything.

This ‘everything’ included: coming into school and actually feeling happy because it was his last day, only to be laughed at for existing ; getting a C minus in Maths and Science, and an actual, real F in Art ; finding a living slug in his food, probably planted in there by Jaebum (who seemed to have a weird fetish for invertebrates being in BamBam’s food) ; and then finally, being drenched by ice-cold toilet fucking water.

BamBam kind of wanted to die.

The “bullying” that he had been through in the first grade seemed to have followed him up to now, and for the same reason: for being a wuss, although now they had replaced it with another, more ‘grown up’ word that really made BamBam’s day every time he heard it. It was awful to be jeered at for being afraid. It wasn’t like he could help it. People got bullied for several other things, like having a bad haircut. You could wear a wig to sort that out, but you couldn’t exactly put a wig on your fears.

And the problem was that the bullying made him even more scared of everything. He couldn’t take a step without getting the feeling that someone had planted a bomb on the floor that he was walking on, to eradicate his fear of bombs. It sounded like a bullshit excuse for his initial confession, but it was true that fellow students would throw food at him from across the cafeteria and then pretend to be doing it for his own good.
“No, Mr Mun, I wasn’t bullying him, I was just trying to make him less scared of flying bananas. Since, you know, he’s so scared of everything.”

Every damn thing made him freak out, and he was aware of it. Being at home was now starting to have a bit too many downsides, such as his mother chiding at him for being “such a foolishly scared boy” and his father telling him to “man up”. He really couldn’t go anywhere without people telling him that he was a pussy.
Well, there was one place that he remembered was safe. It had been five long years, but even after one succinct meeting, he couldn’t bring himself to forget about him. The spirit. Kim Yugyeom-- that had been his name.

In all honesty, BamBam wasn’t sure if this was a good idea; he’d probably forgotten about him by now. It would be surprising if he hadn’t. The now twelve-year old pubescent boy wasn’t betting on getting the kindest greeting from his old friend, not after a whole five years of constantly ignoring the forest.

It had been terribly hard to ignore it. Daedanhi Forest had been the one place where he hadn’t felt quite so scared—at least after he’d met with Yugyeom. The spirit’s whole persona had put him at ease, which was a word BamBam wasn’t very familiar with. His mental vocabulary only consisted of phrases such as: “I’m honestly going to piss myself right now” and “I’m not comfortable”. It was sappy, the boy was aware of that, but whenever he thought of the doe-eyed boy in the forest (which was quite often; the thought was like a safe-haven), a comforting, warm feeling encircled his heart.

The aforementioned heart was fluttering at a pretty fast rate now, as he caught sight of the entrance (or exit—it really depended on what you wanted to achieve with the small gap between the trees). Who knew if Yugyeom still lived there? BamBam recalled each and every word they’d passed five years ago, and if his brain wasn’t lying to him, Yugyeom had expressed how little the other spirits liked him. Maybe he’d left the forest and had found a better place. In which case, BamBam was happy for him.

God, he was really over-thinking this.

He wasn’t quite so scared as he crossed the forest this time round. He knew not to fall for the crimson apples hanging off the trees (still looking as juicy as ever) and their otherworldly humming; that had been the test last time that Yugyeom had been talking about, he’d come to realise. They have maggots in them, they have maggots in them, they have maggots in them, BamBam repeatedly told himself at moments where he found himself leaning towards them.

And he’d reached it. The exact tree which he’d fallen from after hearing Yugyeom’s voice from behind him. It looked exactly the same: tall, brown…BamBam didn’t really know how to describe trees. However it looked, it felt familiar to him, and he started looking around him for the spirit that he’d never forgotten about.
Surprise: he wasn’t there. BamBam wasn’t sure why he’d assumed that Yugyeom would just be waiting there for the rest of eternity. Really, he hadn’t been sure what to expect, and now he was alone and the darkness was creeping in. The boy had no clue what to do.

“I could go further,” he told himself, edging cautiously to the next tree, like this one had been chosen by God to bite him. “He might be deep inside…like with his spirit friends or something.”

BamBam was pretty desperate to find his acquaintance now. He was alright with venturing to this part of the forest, but the thought of going any deeper and potentially stumbling upon killer bats, made him have breathing problems. His watch told him that it was six o’ clock and right now he would have been home, taking a shower. This made him remember that he was still covered in toilet water. No wonder Yugyeom wasn’t here.

Inhaling and exhaling at a paced speed, BamBam realised that if he really wanted to regain the warm heart that he had lost five years ago, he would have to put in his own effort and actually do something. Show that he cared for Yugyeom by finding him, as Yugyeom had found BamBam and had made him smile. He couldn’t just stand around his whole life and expect people to do everything for him. This ended the twelve-year old’s ‘epiphany’ and with shaky hands and an equally shaky heart, he started walking deeper into Daedanhi.

It was all fine and dandy (if fine and dandy included trying not to scream) up until the point where a mosquito decided to bite him. Malaria and dengue were serious issues that required hospitalisation and BamBam wasn’t very keen on staying at a hospital. This was why he decided to thereon use up a shit ton of leg fuel and sprint to wherever he was going. And it felt brilliant—the wind whipping his cherry red cheeks in cold lashes, the sudden twitter of birds from somewhere behind him, adrenaline burning in his veins, circulating through his whole body.

At least it felt that way for around a minute, before he tripped over his own shoe and tumbled onto the prickly grass (the blades were much more lethal in this area of the forest), shouting out in pain as his ankle was slightly mutilated by a branch of thorns.
And strangely, he felt good. He felt amazing, even on the forest floor, as he panted exceedingly fast. Breathing had never felt so real, so authentic. BamBam had finally run without being scared to fall. He had fallen, but that was just missing the point; ‘the biggest pussy of the generation’ had done something useful (even if that 'useful' feat had only consisted of burning a few calories).

This positive energy continued to flow inside of him up until he heard a snarl from in front of him, and realised that standing before him, were three very muscled…people. BamBam guessed that they were spirits (either that or cannibals that had been roaming the forest for decades), the only off-part being that they didn’t emit the same glow that Yugyeom had. Their glares were enough for BamBam to get the message that they didn’t want to befriend him any time soon.

“How’s the weather down there?” one of the brutes cackled, leaning against a tree in the same way Jinyoung leaned against the school bins and tried to look threatening. He was holding a lasso of some type.

“Oh shit,” BamBam muttered. “Uh…listen, this is a misunderstanding, I was just heading back home—”

“You may not know this,” the same dude that was holding a lasso started, “but this garland forces you to tell the truth.” He twirled the lasso around like it was some kind of rhythmic ribbon.
“Garland? You call that a garland?” BamBam couldn’t help laughing. The lowly bit of rope looked more like the tail of a rat than a garland. Spirits were a strange race.

The spirit ignored BamBam as he continued to twirl the so-called garland around at a faster pace. “And if you don’t tell the truth, human…well let’s just say you’ll get a bit choked up.” And with an ominous glint in his eye and the raucous shouts of support from his friends, the spirit lashed the lasso out at the human, wrapping him in its thick, itchy grasp.

BamBam suddenly remembered where he was and who he was. He was currently in Daedanhi forest, the place where even the toughest humans couldn’t survive. He may have passed the apple test long ago, but there was much more to this forest. And he, well he was scared. Very scared, actually.

But the feeling wasn’t alien to him at all. He was used to being so fearful that it felt normal to him. Even though he was literally dying on the inside, he’d learnt how to compose himself on the outside after all these years. The spirits couldn’t tell if he was scared or not. In which case: he had won.

“Tell us your purpose here, human.” Flecks of spit from the spirit’s spiteful mouth landed on BamBam’s face as the human stared him dead in the eye, trying not to piss himself. The spirit pulled him closer, until BamBam could, sadly for him, smell the tyrant's reeking breath which reminded him distinctly of the unique flavour of the cafeteria's infamous couscous.

A haze was sheathing his eyes and the cord wrapped around the base of his neck seemed to have a mind of its own, as it started inching up to just below his Adam's apple. Ten seconds and BamBam knew that he wouldn't be able to feel his hands. He had to act at this instant.

He recalled those adult movies that he had just watched snippets of before his father had thrown him out of the living room. The heroes always had those snappy and bad-ass phrases that always managed to deter the enemy. Boy, did BamBam want to be a hero, even if the only person he could save was himself.

This was the reason he abruptly planted a firm hand on the coarse skin of the rope that was slowly killing him, and said (in an uncharacteristically gruff voice) as a reply to the beast:

“To be fearless.”

No, unfortunately BamBam was not able to do a flip and kick the guy in the balls as he had been planning to do. What he did do, though, was bite the guy’s index finger. Apparently BamBam’s canines didn’t fail him, as the spirit groaned in pain and dropped the rope quickly so that BamBam was free to move. His buddies came bounding up to the boy, ready to attack, but before they could do that, their heads were bashed together.

But not by BamBam. He turned around, trying to spot the attacker, totally oblivious about the lasso dude’s incoming attack from behind him. Thankfully, however, lasso dude was stopped by the same unknown attacker, who kneed him to the ground. His face was shielded from view by a long fringe, the exact same shade as Yugyeom’s.
Was it him?

And then the unknown attacker moved to the side and shook his fringe to the side, enabling BamBam to get a good view of him.
The boy’s insides felt weak. One reason being that he had just engaged in his first actual fight against fucking spirits and the second reason being that he was right now, looking upon the shy smile of his only friend.

He suspected that Yugyeom had been looking forward to more of a happy reunion, but BamBam couldn’t really offer him one, as the twelve-year old human sank onto the floor and started sobbing his lungs out. He really had been through a shit ton of toil today and wasn’t used to fighting guys with magical lassos. Even just building up the courage to come to this part of the forest had taken a massive toll on the weeping boy.

He’s going to laugh at me now, he’s going to run away and leave me here, I shouldn’t have started crying, I just lost a friend, BamBam raced through his thoughts which provoked him to cry even harder. He was so certain that Yugyeom was going to leave him in this state, bawling and afraid, just like everybody else. BamBam didn’t even turn to look as he heard his footsteps walking away.

But no…the noise of his steps was becoming louder. Unless he was stupidly mistaken, Yugyeom was coming closer to him, and BamBam truly did think he was frightfully mistaken. That was until he felt unfamiliarly warm arms wrap around his torso, and a light weight on his back.

Was Yugyeom…was Yugyeom hugging him?

It was such an alien feeling, that meant more to BamBam that anyone could have ever thought. A hug…when was the last time he’d felt appreciated, between someone’s arms? His own mother scorned him for being so lazy and different from the other kids. She’d just wanted a normal son and he couldn’t blame her, but it definitely hurt.

“It’s alright, BamBam, I’m here! I’m here for you,” Yugyeom whispered soothingly, and BamBam could’ve sworn that he saw the sun at that exact moment, though it was nearly dusk. Yugyeom’s words made him feel calm and cared for—two feelings that were rarely experienced by the boy. Sure enough, the same warmth that had embedded itself inside of BamBam’s heart five years ago, returned with intensified feelings. It had been all worth it for this.

It had been all worth it to see Yugyeom once again.

And once BamBam had been consoled and was taking normal breaths again, the pair started walking, huddled close together, headed for the centre of the forest. Frankly, BamBam would have started freaking out by now (once more), but he was calm due to Yugyeom’s radiation of…how do you fit ‘sonorous melodies’, ‘the relieving heat of a warm oven on a bitter winter night’, and ‘the feeling of home’, all into one word?

Whatever that magical word was, it described his spirit friend’s embrace perfectly, according to BamBam. At least, Yugyeom’s hug made him feel those things. BamBam profusely hoped that the actual spirit would be the same, once he got to know him better: warm and comforting. And if he didn’t turn out to be like that…well, BamBam’s heart would fall into a very cold pit.

“How did you learn to fight?” BamBam enquired of the spirit, half because of genuine interest and half because he wanted to distract himself from his overwhelming thoughts.

Yugyeom flashed him a smile that BamBam didn’t think he’d ever get over. “Well, the forest is a dangerous place, whether you’re a human or a spirit. And the case of, uh, ‘people liking me’ hasn’t gotten any better over the last years, so I tend to get into a lot of fights.” The smile on his face had turned a bit lopsided.

“And may I ask, where the hell have you been? You left me for five years? My first actual friend and he goes and just disappears, so I think he’s dead or something.” Yugyeom folded his arms and shot a glare at BamBam that could rival his mum’s ones. It actually made BamBam heat up, blush, and wrack his brain for a good answer.

Or he could just tell him the truth. He could tell him about what he was called by the kids at his school, how he was constantly jeered at everyday just because he was scared. Maybe then, Yugyeom would understand how impossible it had been for him to gather up the courage to actually enter the forest again, after he’d heard all the deadly stories about it.

“Uh, so, it’s actually been a busy few years,” the twelve-year old started, chuckling to try and lighten the atmosphere. Yugyeom didn’t take this excuse lightly, and his lethal glare remained. BamBam was done for. He was going to have to give an actual explanation.

“The truth is that I just couldn’t bring myself to enter it. I’m sort of, uhm, a scared person? And as time went on, I got more and more afraid of everything. Like, I mean everything. It was terrible. I couldn’t even go anywhere without having the feeling that someone was following me, looking to do something to me. And it’s still like that,” the human exhaled, with a heavy heart.

“I still have to look behind me, in front of me, below me, everywhere, in order to feel okay to carry on. It’s like this whole world is made of traps, and I’m destined to fall into one. But the thing is,” he continued, now looking Yugyeom in his perfect (still doe-like) eyes. “I keep thinking of the feeling of fearlessness that I had when I was previously in this forest. For these past five years, I’ve wanted to feel it again. And it was only today, on the last day of sixth grade, that I actually got the courage to enter it.”

The last part isn’t true at all, BamBam, and you know it. You were ignoring this forest, trying to forget about its existence, because out of all the things you’re terrified of, your biggest fear is abandonment. You’re scared that he’ll leave you.

The first bit of his ‘monologue’ to Yugyeom had actually been true, but even though BamBam wasn’t quite aware of it himself yet, abandonment was something that he feared more than the rest of his nonsensical (at least for others) fears. It was the root cause of all his other phobias. Because, from day one, he had started getting abandoned, whether it was by his elementary friends or even his parents.

Not physically, but mentally. BamBam’s parents had given up hope on him. He wasn’t the ‘shining star’ that he had previously been to them, and all they did for him was provide him with a roof over his head. In BamBam’s point of view, it felt like a semi-abandonment.

He wasn’t ready to express all these thoughts to Yugyeom, though. He didn’t have a concrete reason for it; it was more like a whole bunch of half-reasons and excuses. One of them, he distinctly remembered, was “what if telling him causes him to abandon me?” And he wasn’t ready for that to happen. No way.

BamBam looked towards Yugyeom now, awaiting his response, when he was taken aback by the expression on his face. The spirit was giving him a soft smile, eyelashes fluttering open and closed with each blink. The intensifying breeze was sweeping his hair slightly to the side, and BamBam swore that he could see stars in his eyes. It was the opposite reaction to the one that he usually got when he displayed his fear of one thing or another.

No, Yugyeom didn’t tell him to ‘man up’. Yugyeom didn’t laugh at him or poke fun at the fact that he suffered from a lot of different phobias. Yugyeom simply said: “It’s okay to be scared. It’s alright to feel like this, because one day you’ll finally defeat the fear, and then you can proudly declare that you escaped the trap.”

And the smile that BamBam responded with to those precious sentences, was one which his cheekbones could never quite master again. It was a smile that lit up his entire body with a similar glow that Yugyeom had bore on their first meeting. The boy felt as if he was glowing too.
After displaying the sunlit smile, BamBam started snickering in his own lovely way, resorting back to humour to communicate with his friend.

“When did you become William Shakespeare, dude?” he smirked at Yugyeom, who rolled his eyes at boy’s comment.

“It’s not my fault I’m naturally good with words. Oh, by the way, sorry to interrupt your burst of funniness, but did Ita hurt you in any way?” His face was clouded with worry as he inspected BamBam for any cuts or bruises, when he reached his neck and spotted a prominent red mark going around the back of it as well.

“Oh this?” BamBam perked up, when he saw Yugyeom eyeing it anxiously. “Yeah, he like, tried to choke me. But it’s all good—you may not know this, but I, in fact, am invincible.”

Yugyeom raised an eyebrow but said nothing, and rolled his eyes once more, which seemed to be a habit of his. It kind of reminded BamBam of his old friend's sister, who had been going through some wild stages when he had known her. Namely, putting on thick coatings of eyeliner and wearing all black. BamBam hoped to the good lord that Yugyeom wasn’t going to start screaming suicidal lyrics into his ear.

“Why is my first friend like this? I deserve someone cooler,” Yugyeom sniggered, knowing this would cause an uprising inside of BamBam.
“Says you! Hey wait—” It seemed that BamBam’s attention span was negative five. “If you’re a spirit, can you do special things?” In response to Yugyeom’s confused look, he continued: “like, do you have any special powers? Can you make trees fly?”

Yugyeom shrugged. “Not really. I live in a forest of pretty violent spirits. Like the ones you just, unfortunately, met. You can pursue a skill if you want to; that’s what everyone my age is doing. But the skills they offer are…well you can see for yourself.” And BamBam realised that they had reached an actual building in the forest. He hadn’t even known there were buildings in forests.

-Magic Combat: Materialise weapons, transfigure animals into more dangerous versions of themselves, etc.
-Weapon Building: Making magical weapons, like the garland of truth, arrows of poison etc.
-Animal Training: Training the beasts of the forest obedience.

“The last one sounds a bit…”
“Ominous? Yeah, it is. I would go into the details, but they’re a bit gory. So the main point is, that all these things are meant for villains. People who want to do bad things. I just wanna help people, BamBam.” Yugyeom looked down at floor and continued speaking.
“None of the spirits agree, though. And they still don’t play with me,” he smiled a bit at that. “But I’ve got you! Do you want to stay for dinner?”

BamBam suddenly remembered that he had parents that were probably concerned about his location right now. But then he subsequently remembered how hard his father had slapped him the previous week for not doing the dishes because he’d seen a cockroach in the kitchen and had just fled from the room.

Maybe staying with Yugyeom for dinner didn’t sound so bad after all. It was better than returning to that hell-hole of a house.

By this time the twelve-year old had completely forgotten about the age-old rule: ‘Don’t take food from strangers’. Here he was, entering a dimly-lit room whose space was taken up by a lengthy wooden table that held an assortment of mouth-watering food items. He eyed the table with suspicion but really couldn’t keep up the speculation as the aroma got to him. BamBam wasn’t sure who cooked this spirit food, but they had to bear a rank close to God’s.

Not to say that he wasn’t scared out of his wits. Even though he was hiding behind his friend, BamBam knew that everyone was looking at him, regarding him with strange looks. But when he found the courage to actually look at them, he saw that they were eyeing Yugyeom with even more hate, and he suddenly felt the urge to kick them in the mouth. His friend deserved much better.

The sound of someone clearing their throat very loudly filled the room and the two turned around and found an oddly large man—no, spirit—staring at them with the same loathsome look as the other fools seated in the room were giving them.

“What do we have here?” His voice was literally at 40 Hz and solely consisted of growls. BamBam didn’t think him clearing his throat had helped it out in any way.

“It’s just me, General. Kim Yugyeom,” Yugyeom replied with the slight smile of fake innocence that twelve-year olds usually display, when caught doing something wrong.

“And who’s the…friend?” A low rumble came from the ‘General’s’ mouth. BamBam kind of, no he really wanted to run away at that moment, as the man stared at him probably trying to bore a hole into his forehead with laser eyes. He resorted back to cowering behind his friend’s back, aware that everyone’s eyes were fixated on his slim figure.

“That’s BamBam.”

Disconcerting chuckles sounded from the far end of the table, and BamBam followed them until he saw his previous attackers: Ita, his name had been, and the rest of his beefy friends. He wanted nothing more than to melt into the gravelly stone floor below him.
“BamBam? That’s his name?” one of the shit-sticks cackled, of course receiving a cacophonous bout of laughter in return.

“Yes it is, and if you don’t shut your mouth—”

“That’s enough, Yugyeom.” The General held out a hand in front of the spirit to stop him from doing something stupid that he would regret later. BamBam had started shaking slightly from behind Yugyeom. He should’ve just politely declined his friend’s request. Even though it would be desolate at home, at least he would be safe. A word that he wasn’t sure he could use in this situation.

“You know that we don’t allow humans to enter our forest under any circumstances, don’t you? You’ve seen what happens to the foolish ones that do,” the General stepped closer with every alternate second that passed, until he was just a foot away from the two.
Even grown men don’t survive in that forest, BamBam remembered people from his school saying. He finally understood why. The spirits were actually killing them, putting them through inhumane ‘tests’ that they didn’t seem able to pass.

The boy suddenly felt Yugyeom stiffen in front of him.

“Yes…yes sir.”

And with those three words, BamBam felt himself being dragged away by the spirit, in a hurry, as the disappearing dinner room behind them fell into hubbub of ordinary dinnertime noise. The boy vaguely wondered what he would be having for dinner if he were back home right now. Probably some chicken and, oh, the disappointment of his parents.

Yugyeom turned to face him and let out a sigh and leant against a tree, staring dejectedly at the ground. It was a while before BamBam gained the life to speak again.

"Can you explain to me what the hell that was?" he asked, both nervous and furious at his friend. He already knew what had happened back there; although he was batshit scared, he wasn't braindead. BamBam could tell when something meant bad news, and this forest was practically screaming "GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT" to him.

When Yugyeom didn't reply and only started biting his lip, BamBam lost it.

"I guess I know what you guys do now, huh? You lure humans in with those stupid apples, make them pass these tests, and when they do, you just kill them? Is that what you're planning to do to me, Yugyeom?" he let out a miserable chuckle and tried hard to not let the tears escape. So the spirit really had been pretentious. BamBam wasn't sure if he was imagining this or not.

All of a sudden he heard a noise that subdued his anger in the slightest way: quiet sobbing. And as he turned his head, he saw it in front of him.
Yugyeom's shoulders were wracking with the burden of unshed tears and though it was dark, BamBam could see the tears travel down his pretty cheeks, illuminated by the light seeping through the panes from the lit hall. The boy didn't know if he should feel happy for the tears or sad that his friend was crying. The war inside of him only resulted in his silence.

And then Yugyeom spoke.

"I don't want you to die, BamBam, no!" His voice was shredded by cracks and guttural sobs, not unlike the ones of a trampled twelve-year old. "I didn't want anybody to die. None of the humans deserve it," he wiped a forlorn tear from his cheek. "That's why I don't want a skill. All the s-skills they offer are used to kill humans. That's the purpose of this forest."

BamBam stood rooted to the ground for a few seconds, thinking and thinking and thinking until he thought his brain would explode for sure. Yugyeom watched him with a panicked expression, tear tracks still visible on his youthful face.

"Then I don't think I want to stay here any longer."

He took off at a sprint, swiftly evading the deadly tree roots and ignoring Yugyeom's distressed calls, his purpose being to get the fuck out of the forest before he got stabbed in the eye by a wild spirit. The pervasive darkness and his insides' self-annihilation made this difficult for him, however.

"You're so freaking stupid, BamBam!" he screamed when he bumped face-first into a tree. He was on the verge of having a panic attack right here in the forest, the only self-control he had being the thought of a good night's sleep in his inviting bed. The boy had never been in such a messed-up situation, and was on full distress mode right now; he felt ready to pass out.

And it was then, at that moment, where he let the sobs building up in his gut achieve their freedom. They escaped him graciously and he fell to his knees on the nettle-like grass, wiping off the tears that seemed to never stop coming. BamBam couldn't think straight at all, and he only registered the situation he had been in, once he was back home in the bedroom that he had been craving for.

He wasn't entirely sure how he got out of the forest but it was something he was proud of and would celebrate with a smile, but smiling at a time like this felt ridiculous. The boy felt as if he would never be able to conjure a happy face again after the events that occurred on that day.

BamBam was able to shrug off the ceaseless reprimands of his parents ("Do you know how worried we were, you brat?" No. BamBam didn't know.), but the fact that his, what he had considered to be 'best', friend lived in a forest of spirits that willingly killed humans. The boy that had made his heart beat a pace faster, made it warm, belonged with them.

He'd lost Yugyeom. He'd lost basically everything he had that kept him sane. Now, he was just a lousy twelve-year old freak with an equally freaky amount of phobias, and a heart that was once again cold and fearful.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

And here he was once again. Hiding behind the school garbage dump, sat next to a pile of broken glass bottles (representing the state of my heart, he thought dejectedly), and looking out for the two guys that had been after his ass since the first grade. And apparently they were carrying fucking knives with them this time. It seemed that everybody but them was aware that this wasn't America in the '80's. People in this day and age did not carry around goddamn knives to hunt other students down. BamBam wondered the amount of IQ they both possessed.

"Three?" Jaebum's voice sounded from behind the tired seventeen-year old. Oh, he'd answered BamBam's mental question. So did they share the IQ or did they have three each?

"Yeah. Three shots to the gut and three to the head."

Ah.

BamBam eyed the sea-green glass bottle toppled on the floor next to him. It was still in tact, and if the boy was lucky (which he never seemed to be), he could score some hits for the both of them. Yes, in the last five years, BamBam had unwillingly been forced to learn self-defence so that he wouldn't actually die from the two's attacks.

"Oh hold up," Jinyoung's voice stopped everyone's thoughts. "I smell him."

Now that's just fucking sad, BamBam thought. They've been around me for so long that they can actually smell me.

His legs knew better though, and before he could even stop to think about an escape plan, they carried him away to the other side of the school as fast as they could. He was well aware of the yells coming from behind him, and they encouraged him to sprint faster than he ever had before. It reminded him of an incident that had taken place five years ago that he wasn't ready to address just yet.

"You can't run forever, pussy!" Jaebum's harsh call shook him back into reality, and BamBam, realised that he was currently running on the school roof.

"Yeah, but you can't run for even a solid minute, Beom! Those snacks have been getting to you, my guy!" BamBam yelled from above, and readied himself to jump off the roof into the godforsaken trees, because when you were being chased by irrational lunatics, you would also be chased by irrational thoughts.

He could hear them shuffling onto the roof, and would be able to see them too, besides for the fact that he was trying to focus on getting a safe landing on a branch or something.
"Finally caught up, eh?" Jinyoung let out a sadistic cackle and unsheathed his pen-knife like it was King Arthur's fucking sword or something. BamBam had turned around by now, quietly having accepted the fact that he would die either way.

"You haven't beaten your record though," he pointed out, trying to buy time, his brain about to fuse due to the scatter of thoughts fizzling through it. "I remember in eighth grade you got to me in five minutes thirty-nine seconds," he tutted. "I'm disappointed."

Over time, BamBam had gotten better at speaking to people, so putting up a brave facade when confronted wasn't an issue. The issue right now was surviving the afternoon. And seeing how things were going, it didn't look too possible.

"Are you ready to finally accept the fact that you're going nowhere in life?" Their sinister smirks was not the last thing BamBam wanted to see before his timely death. A potted plant or a dog would've been a good omen for the afterlife, but this scene was just the lowest of them all.
"I've already accepted that. But are you ready to accept the fact that this time, I too, have a weapon?"

In the amount of time it would've taken a hummingbird to breathe, BamBam struck Jinyoung with the green glass bottle, hard, and watched the consciousness that kept him standing, leave his eyes. His body collapsed onto the stony floor of the roof and the pen-knife slid out of his grasp and landed at BamBam's foot.

Shit. Was luck actually on his side that day?

The seventeen-year old took hold of the pen-knife and twirled it in his fingers like he knew what he was doing. Then he looked up at Jaebum with the most threatening look he could conjure, and the boy actually started to back away.

With the click-clack of his heeled boots striking against the roof's surface, he walked to where the ladder that conveniently lead down to the actual earth, was placed, knife pointed at Jaebum's white face for the whole time. And accompanied by a "get the fuck out of here," meant for the aforementioned conscious bully, he hopped off the ladder with a heart that wouldn't stop screaming inside of him.

And when he was a safe distance away from Jaebum, he let out a strangled yell that shook his entire body. It had been this way ever since he'd left the spirit's side five years ago. Yugyeom...the name he'd tried so hard to forget, that still haunted his mind to this day. He wanted, so badly, to hate him for what he had done, but whenever BamBam really thought about it, he hadn't done a single bad thing. Which made it even worse for the boy.

He was the one who had abandoned Yugyeom; the spirit himself had done nothing wrong. Every passing day, BamBam kept on replaying the moments he'd shared with him, right from the very beginning.
Falling off the coaxing apple tree, getting to see his exhilarating laugh for the first time, walking and joking with him, fighting with him, being hugged by him, smiling with him, and eventually deserting him.

All BamBam yearned for was to feel that same heart-warming, butterfly-creating feeling once again. He wanted to be wrapped in the sound of Yugyeom's laughs again, he wanted to witness that charming smile, he wanted to be with his friend again. It had been his own fault all along, he realised. If he hadn't been so utterly stupid and ran away from his only source of happiness, he wouldn't be covered in cuts and scars that wouldn't leave even if he tried to remove them.

BamBam found it funny how the negative things such as the painful bruises littered all over his body never left him, but the things that he valued such as friends, family, and Yugyeom did.

Or maybe it was his mistake. Maybe he was the one who constantly hurt himself, unknowingly. Was it really Jinyoung and Jaebum's fault that he was in pain for more than half of the time he had been alive? Or was it just him, feeding their inner killing machines and encouraging them to destroy him even more? Or maybe he was just overthinking this on a large scale.

Abandonment. It was his greatest fear. He'd acknowledged it. However, he had abandoned someone himself, five years ago. And as BamBam resumed walking along the gravel that was the pavement, he realised that there was an apology that he needed to make to that someone.

---

"Oh shit," he groaned as he stubbed his toe right against the foot of a very familiar tree. His very own apple tree, that had tried to lure him into eating one of the singing fruits, which he had never fallen for.
They have maggots in them, he thought with a smile.

This time, they didn't seem to be humming to him or trying to coax him into eating one of the still juicy-looking fruits. Maybe the forest had given up on him by now.
Strangely enough, he was scared in the slightest. He wasn't too sure why. BamBam even knew what lay before him this time: a very bloody death, which he had just narrowly escaped from on the school rooftop. He should have been running in the opposite direction by now, but the only thing he could focus on was the apology he had to make to Yugyeom. Nothing, not even the age-old fear of death, was diverting him from his tracks.

Nothing had changed in the forest, once again. The trees were as green and as sturdy as ever, and the air was still partly humid and partly screaming at him to run away. BamBam was experienced with this journey by now, though, and wasn't going to be deterred just because the air was yelling at him.

The human now stood in front of the skill-shack, having made it all the way here in an astonishing amount of time. He guessed that long legs gave him an advantage now. BamBam had aged well, having developed cheekbones, gained height, and redder cheeks (but he assumed that that characteristic came from all the running away he'd had to do and not through puberty).
Quiet sounds of talking could be heard coming from inside the shack, and BamBam suddenly realised that he would have to interact with somebody other than Yugyeom, to ask for his location. He wasn't expecting the spirit to just pop out of a bush like he always did.

The boy slowly stepped inside and everyone's eyes travelled to his thin frame, staring at him with a frown. He experienced the feeling of wanting to sink into the ground once again, just like he had half a decade ago, buried in Yugyeom's back.
"It's a human," a small girl whispered into her mother's ear, eyeing him like a hawk would do to its prey. "Why is he here?"
BamBam figured that he should grow some balls and open his mouth, so he did just that, asking his question in stutters and weird noises.
"D-do you know where Kim Yugyeom is? I'm looking for him."

The mother's frown deepened as she regarded the boy. "Kim Yugyeom? Who's that?"
BamBam glanced worriedly at the cashier, whom he strangely recognised. He had been at the dinner, the one at which BamBam had gotten the pleasure to meet with the so-called 'General'.

"Kim Yugyeom...that little spirit with no skill?"
BamBam nodded hesitantly, heart ready to burst inside his chest. He was about to meet him after five years of no communication. Shit, shit, shit--
"He left the forest last year."

And now BamBam's heart deflated, sinking right into the interior of his gut. So much for getting my hopes up, he thought darkly.

"What?" he said, breathless and unable to comprehend what he had been told. "Do you know where he went?" His fingers were crossed behind his back. Please let me find him.

"I remember he said something about the city...Hampton City, I think it was. Wait," he stopped, locking his eyes onto BamBam's. "You're not supposed to be here. We're supposed to be killing you! Call the guards!"

The boy gave the man a slick smile and ran his way out of the shack, and right out of the forest, remembering the way off by heart, having a little too much experience with running out of it over his whole lifetime.
"Hampton City...that's like a twenty minute drive from my house?" he wondered out loud, successfully wading his way through the lethal step-like tree roots. It had been hard running with these shitty boots on but he'd mastered it.

There was a slight problem, however. BamBam hadn't gotten his driver's license yet, and there was no way in hell that his father was going to drive him out to Hampton City when he could rather be ingesting beers and watching re-runs of crappy 90's shows. His mother was out of the question; she'd disowned her son long ago.

He was just going to have to learn driving the hard way.

---

Stealing the car keys had been simple enough, and so had starting the engine, but now that BamBam was actually out on the road he felt nervousness creep into his movements. To compose himself, he turned on the radio and tried to concentrate on the path ahead of him.
And then it dawned on him: he didn't even know the way to Hampton City. He could recognise some turns and roundabouts but actually transporting himself there with perfect directions was out of the question. He would just have to ask some pedestrians.

And hope to God that he wouldn't crash the car.

---

Good news: BamBam, the generation wuss, had made it to the city with virtually no cuts or bruises.
Bad news: The car, unfortunately, hadn't.

It still looked like a car and worked like a car, just for the fact that it had a gaping hole on its back, accompanied by a few scratches so that the hole wouldn't be lonely. At least, that's how BamBam liked to look at it. He hoped that they had insurance or he'd be having some serious issues at home.
But it wasn't the time to worry about damaged cars, it was time to find Kim Yugyeom and preferably never let him go. There was just one tiny problem that BamBam had overlooked on his disastrous journey: Hampton City was huge. He had no ways of tracing Yugyeom other than calling out his name and hoping for the best.

He looked around the square he was in until he finally decided on one store to start with: Hettie's Diner. It looked safe, but the word safe didn't really mean much to BamBam anymore. He'd thought that he'd been safe at home once upon a time, which was clearly a lie, he found out as he grew up.

The click-clacking of his boots didn't help in killing his nervous jitters and he entered the diner in a state of near panic.
"Hello!" a teenage girl waved at him, nicely. BamBam smiled back at her, or so he tried, before just declaring his purpose there.
"Uh hi. Have you seen anyone called Kim Yugyeom around town?" he motioned to the square, like that was the expanse of Hampton City. "Brown hair, weirdly tall, smiles a lot, and he's kind of pretty?"

BamBam didn't know what he had been expecting when he received the "no, sorry," from the lady along with that special kind of frown that they reserve for strangers. He nodded and left after saying thank you, although there was no reason for him to do so.

---

Cupcakes Galore.

Kretinos.

Painless Window Panes.

Strawberry Milkshakes.

Even a store called Johnny's Pepsi-Based Makeovers.

He'd asked them all if they knew where Kim Yugyeom was, and each and every one of them had replied with a "no, sorry," and that same old eyebrow-knotted frown. BamBam was beginning to think that Yugyeom lived in the city's sewers and only came out at night to smoke weed or something. It seemed pretty plausible to the boy, for the state he was in.

The real answer was a bit simpler than that and BamBam only realised it later, as he sat dejectedly on a gum-laden bench, sipping on a drink that tasted so artificial that he doubted 'Strawberry Milkshake' used any natural products.
He was tired, weary-hearted, and desperate to find Yugyeom. And the thing was, he didn't know why he craved to see him so badly.

Before this day, it had just been sleepless nights and noisy thoughts that had kept him thinking about the spirit. He'd always regretted what had happened to their friendship, and it was true that he never did smile the same way again, but he'd never felt so needy of Yugyeom until today. BamBam didn't know what had started this love-crazed frenzy inside of him.

And as he pondered over these trivial things, BamBam noticed pained shouts and relentless taunts arise from the small alleyway in front of him. He looked up alerted, not missing the drink that lay below him much anyway, and took note of the situation. A few thugs were picking on some poor, abnormally tall kid who wore a grey hoodie.

BamBam wasn't usually one to get involved in people's fights or play the hero, because most of the time he was the victim. After getting chased around for ten whole years, he'd gotten used to the cat and mouse stereotypes; he was meant to be victim, not the attacker. He couldn't interfere.

That's what he stubbornly kept as his mindset until he heard the grey-hood speak.
"Give it back."
Three words that shouldn't have made a difference to BamBam at all, but did, because of the tone of the user's voice. It was steely but not rough, soft but not too soft. It met every limit and defied the expectations of what a victim's voice should be. It was a tone that BamBam had only heard being used once in his life; he knew it, he was ready to cling onto it, but then it slipped out of his grasp.

The boy's interest was diverted from his shitty drink to the grey-hood, who was now emitting a glow that BamBam was sure that only he could see, as he gathered from the thugs' unimpressed looks. But then he saw a movement that affirmed his hunch. It all happened in a second: the offender in the centre was on the floor, howling in pain. He had been kneed down by grey-hood.

BamBam flung his drink onto an unsuspecting pigeon and brought out his pen-knife, his mind clear of all doubt. Running as stealthily as he had taught himself, he joined the scene in haste, copying grey-hood's movements but throwing a bit of variety into the move, by kicking Thug Two's side hard, and subsequently kneeing him down. He held the pen-knife tightly next to Thug Two's neck and glared at the third one in such a threatening way that the both of understood the message just fine.

They scrammed from the scene as fast as they could, not before picking the Centre Thug™ up and supporting him and his sprained ankle, that had swollen up and had attained brilliant colours of violet and blue.

Now that the climax was over, BamBam was afraid that he would have to undergo a second one. His heart was practically beating out of his chest, a bird trying to escape a metal cage. He didn't want to look at him, he couldn't turn his head, no way--

Cold, padded fingers brushed against the side of his face, and without warning, grasped it in their clutches, turning it around slowly and slowly...until eventually, BamBam was looking into a chocolatey whirlpool of an eye. Which belonged to no other than the person that he'd been hunting down for this whole day.

The cheek that had previously been moved so lazily to the side, was now met with a sudden punch that could've knocked over a set of people like dominoes. BamBam was met with the grainy stone floor and a cherry-red face. Not necessary to add, the sensation of his jaw nearly breaking.

"That was for not letting me explain myself. For abandoning me for another five years, during which I was punished every single day for leading you into the forest. For making me lose the only friend I've ever had," he growled, his voice pure metal. "Why the fuck do you let it become a five-year gap, BamBam?"

BamBam made a face. "That's purely coincidental. And oh, I forgive you for punching me."

"I didn't ask for your forgiveness, bitch. You can rot with that dead jaw for all I care," Yugyeom bit back, turning to side, trying to keep the oncoming sobs locked in. BamBam could sense the effort, however, and before the other could blink, wrapped him in the tightest hug that he could manage. He couldn't think properly right now and he had a feeling that it didn't have to do with the blow Yugyeom had just delivered.

No, it was because of the delicate butterflies that dominated his whole abdomen once Yugyeom took the hood off and allowed BamBam to truly see him, leaving no shadows to cover his face.

Yugyeom was beautiful. He was just downright gorgeous, with a dainty beauty spot placed under his left eye by a messenger of god (whose fingers were probably coated in stardust after touching Yugyeom), naturally curled eyelashes, angelic highlights, and pretty pink lips, which could rival those of Snow White any day. But what BamBam admired most about him was the childlike look that he still held and balanced so perfectly with a more mature one. His eyes were exactly the same, his nose was still soft but slightly pointy, and when BamBam got the chance to witness his shy smile later on in the day, he practically melted on the inside.

"You look really...really fucking beautiful right now."

"Ah, well, it, uh, happens at times," he chuckled, clearly flustered and enjoying the love he was receiving from his best friend. "You don't look too bad yourself. I mean you look really hot, but I kinda just don't wanna admit it."

BamBam smirked, feeling more and more courageous with each passing second. It was the relieving feeling of being with him again. By this time, BamBam had figured out that it wasn't just Yugyeom's hugs or Yugyeom's smiles that made him feel warm and safe, but the whole him. Yugyeom's presence itself put BamBam at ease more than anything else ever had.

There was a lot more to catch up on this time, and BamBam didn't want to hold anything back at all. He'd found Yugyeom and he wasn't going to give him up so easily, if that was what the spirit wanted too.

When he was asked about what shitty things BamBam had caused him to go through with the other spirits (the elder boy apologised profusely for his inexcusable actions), Yugyeom said: "It was actually downright terrible. They first of all, took all my belongings from me--not that I had too many anyway--and burnt them, which wasn't too healthy for the environment. Then they made me work for the animal trainer, who's a tyrant that just whips the forest animals and used to tell me to pile up their dead bodies. I nearly puked up my dinner every night, doing that," he added with a sad smile.

"And then they started fucking lecturing me, like forcing me to collect animal corpses wasn't enough. They preached how 'spirits and humans were never meant to interact' and that's complete bullshit because if the two helped each other, they could be so powerful together. And that was the last straw. I packed my bags and left, told like five people where I was headed off to, and got a job here as a pizza delivery guy."

At the end of his story, the lean spirit sat smiling, but dejected. BamBam hated himself for having to put him through so much. He needed to make it up to him, he needed to pay him back for everything he'd put Yugyeom through. He also felt that he owed the spirit at times like this, for making him feel so unbelievably happy, even if for the last ten years he had been ceaselessly tormented. It was all worth it for times like these.

His first way of paying Yugyeom back was by placing his hand on top of the spirit's, and intertwining them where they were placed, that is on the sitting boundary of a wishing fountain. Yugyeom noticed the small action and looked over to BamBam with a soft smile that made the seventeen-year old want to kiss him until they both couldn't breathe.

And just like Yugyeom had recounted his tale, BamBam started telling him his story, right from the first grade. He told Yugyeom about all the times he'd thought of giving up, but then had remembered the one light in his existence that saved him from ending it (but he didn't mention what or who the light was). However depressing and gruesome his story was, BamBam recounted it, watching Yugyeom's expressive face, nervous to see the reactions on it.

When he was done with it, he sat silent, eagerly waiting for Yugyeom's reply.

"BamBam, you are just about the bravest person I know."

It was the opposite of what he'd been expecting. He had been under the impression that Yugyeom would sugar-coat his words, maybe try to make him feel a bit better about himself, while secretly thinking, "Wow, what a loser."
But when BamBam looked at Yugyeom for confirmation, he saw the same look of innocence and earnestness that he had fallen for since day one. Yugyeom truly meant what he said and that shocked BamBam more than anything.

"H-How? How could you say that when I, myself, abandoned you just to save myself? I put you through so much torture and you say stuff like that so leniently?"

Smiling effortlessly, Yugyeom put a slim finger to BamBam's lips, silencing him.

"If it weren't for your bravery, you wouldn't have come back for me. You wouldn't have even started looking for me, intervened in that dumbass fight. You don't realise how much courage you have, BamBam. At the age of twelve, when you were so scared of the forest because of the truthful rumours that circulated about it, you put your fears as your second priority, and coming back as your first.

"If there's anyone who's the 'wuss' in this situation, it's me. I didn't try look for you at all, though I easily could have. You faced all these terrible things yourself and fought through them. The guys who've been hurting you all this time, Jaebum and Jinyoung, are scared of you! You did that, Bammie! You're the brave one."

Something clicked into place inside of BamBam. It was like the last piece of the seventeen-years incomplete jigsaw puzzle had at last been fitted in, right where BamBam's heart lay. Because as it was fixed into its position, BamBam felt his blood turn into a golden elixir, his leaking tears morph from something to be ashamed of into something to be proud of.

He looked up at Yugyeom with a look that surprised the younger. It was gratitude. Plain, thorough gratitude with a whole bounty of unconditional love surging afterwards. The brave seventeen-year old moved closer and closer to the spirit and caught his chin with suddenly stable fingers, leaning towards him until their lips met.

Yugyeom was the least bit startled at the beginning of the kiss, but when he came to his senses, he deepened it, hands circling around to the back of BamBam's neck. The spirit kissed with passion, honesty, everything that made Kim Yugyeom, Kim Yugyeom. The contact was sealed with unsaid promises of care and affection, two things that BamBam had never even considered opening himself up to.

Out of breath, the two parted, a string of saliva connecting their lips which they broke, as BamBam's face lit up with indisputable joy.

"Thank you, Yugyeom. Thank you so much."

__________________________________________________________________________

"And you can use the skill for good as well, babe. It doesn't necessarily have to be used for evil. Just look at the amount of lives you could save by designing a machine like that," BamBam, now nineteen, proffered to Yugyeom, intertwining their hands the same way he'd done two years ago.

"I guess you're right. It would be useful too," Yugyeom considered, thoroughly scanning the leaflet of the spirit skill that appealed to him the most.

Yugyeom wanted to be a magical engineer, but his main priority (other than his boyfriend, of course) was helping people. He wanted to create something that would save people and not harm them, like the all of the other skills he had looked over seemed to do. Yugyeom was not too intent on being as violent as the other spirits in his forest had been. He wanted to do something worthwhile and good.

"I think I'll go for this course," he told the receptionist, who smiled and nodded at him.
"Excellent! Classes start from next Monday. We can't wait to see you there!"

The two left the skill centre (which, thankfully, wasn't a shack anymore) and made their way to the rented flat that they shared. BamBam had asked for the consent of his parents, but since they were unbudging on their opinion and also too incompetent to look after him any longer, he had taken matters into his own hands.

He had decided to take a gap year before starting University, in which he would do a variety of different jobs to earn money for the two of them. Yugyeom was focusing on restarting his education as a spirit, by finally deciding to learn a skill which could be used by him later in life. Spirits were often allowed to live in the human world without having to face any drawbacks, and it wasn't as if they looked any different to humans as it was.

On opening the front door, Yugyeom leaped straight onto the flaky brown couch that was practically the only furniture they owned apart from a second-hand double bed and a cupboard which was so old it would probably collapse in the next twenty minutes. But BamBam preferred to live in the present.

"Now that was tiring," the spirit sighed, getting comfortable on the couch, only to be crushed by his boyfriend, as BamBam buried his head in the crook of Yugyeom's shoulder.
"And I'm going to be even more tired soon. Youngjae just called me up and asked me to do a night shift."

"You should probably just rest for a while then," Yugyeom said softly, playing with BamBam's newly dyed hair affectionately. "Do you want me to take you to bed?"

"Can I just sleep on you?"

"Not to be mean, but you're sweaty. No thanks. Go sleep in your own bed." The nineteen-year old spirit lifted his boyfriend up effortlessly, and carried him to his bedroom. BamBam groaned at the feeling of being thrown down on the mattress, however gently Yugyeom had done it, and closed his eyes.

And as Yugyeom watched his lover drowse off into the pleasant mode of slumber, he smiled in a way that he could never forget. Or maybe it was the feeling that came along with the smile that he couldn't forget; a feeling that didn't have a word to describe it.

It was a feeling of sonorous melodies, the relieving heat of a warm oven on a bitter winter night, and of home.

After nearly twelve years of knowing one another, Yugyeom was sure of something. And as BamBam's breathing slowed down and he felt as if he was on the verge of sleep, he realised something too.

Yugyeom finally realised that BamBam was his 'home'. His family. He made Yugyeom feel loved, peaceful, warm. He encouraged Yugyeom to pursue his dreams, he allowed Yugyeom to look at the world in another perspective. When BamBam was around, Yugyeom would never feel the way he'd felt in the forest. He would never feel isolated, desolate, worthless. He would feel pure, saccharine happiness.

And BamBam? BamBam realised that when he was with Yugyeom, he could achieve anything. The greatest of feats, like climbing mountains, swimming in the sea, even making friends with Jinyoung and Jaebum (which he did eventually). With Yugyeom, along with the feeling of love and care, came the feeling of bravery. Yugyeom made BamBam fearless.

Yugyeom retreated into his room in turn, on a lover's high, ready to sleep off his tiredness as well. As he remembered the way BamBam had kissed him when they had met again two years ago, he closed his eyes and let slumber dominate him.

The two slept peacefully, and in love.