to jaemin's greatest pleasure, donghyuck had disappeared from his life.

it had been three days since their last argument.

three days of peace.

but it wouldn't last long...

jaemin pulled his maths copybook out of his bag while chatting with mina.

she was a kind girl, and jaemin was very happy to call her his friend.

she seemed to be happy to be jaemin's friend too.

"hello everybody. please close your copybooks, we're having a test." their teacher said, making sure her skirt didn't lift too much while she sat at her desk.

a general groan was heard.

she often surprised them with tests.

perhaps because she was too lazy to do actual classes?

she was a kind person, there was no doubt. but she wasn't a good teacher.

jaemin placed his copybook back in his bag, chuckling at mina's curse.

she wasn't that good at maths.

she hated the surprise tests.

jaemin was one of the bests.

he didn't care about those tests.

he succeeded every time.

the teacher gave the tests to a student so that he could hand them out, which he did very slowly.

the teacher hushed the whole classroom, signalling them that they had half an hour to fill the test and give it back to her.

with those words, the classroom fell silent, and all the students started to calculate.

jaemin filled the different lines of the test easily, as if those maths formulas were something natural for him.

however, they didn't seem to be for the girl next to him.

jaemin frowned, seeing a panicked look on mina's face.

she hadn't written anything, and it had already been 15 minutes.

jaemin swears he saw tears threatening to fall from her eyes.

that's what pushed him to do what he was about to do...

he used his feet to kick hers lightly, catching her attention.

jaemin's heart missed a beat at the desperate look she gave him when she saw jaemin pushing his filled-in test towards her.

"oh... you're not going to cheat, jaemin... are you?"

jaemin's eyes looked around the room after he heard this annoying voice resonating in his head.

he saw donghyuck, standing at the board, just next to their teacher, with his usual smirk.

jaemin internally groaned.

he hadn't missed this demon one bit.

"no cheating jaemin..." he spoke, knowing that jaemin was the only one that could see and hear him.

jaemin's jaw tightened, as he glared at the demon at the board.

he couldn't let him waste his life.

"i'm going to need to..." donghyuck lifted his hand, his fingers twirling in the air. "...prevent you to cheat..."

before jaemin could even complain, his test flew across the classroom, leaving his desk where mina was recopying the many calculi.

many students lifted their heads at the sudden movement while jaemin just glared at the demon who was snickering.

"what's happening?" the teacher asked out loud, furrowing her brows at the agitation in the classroom.

"i'm sorry, the wind made my test fly away." jaemin excused, ready to stand up and pick his test from the floor to give it back to mina.

however, it magically – but jaemin knew exactly who was behind this – flew towards the teacher's desk, allowing the woman to catch it.

"oh, you're done already?" she exclaimed, looking at the piece of paper.

"no- "

"continue your exercises then. you'll have a bonus for the speed." she added, placing jaemin's test in her cardboard sleeve.

jaemin gave mina a sorry look before glaring at the demon who was having the laugh of his life, right behind the teacher.

𝙽𝙰

jaemin was heading back home after a long and rough day.

he was already pissed at the demon, and hearing people of his class talking about the frequent murders that were happening in the poorest districts of the city made it even worse.

he tried thinking about something else, maybe the beautiful sound of the birds chirping, or the phone call some elderly lade was having with one of her grandchildren, maybe mina's chuckle... he just needed to think about something appeasing...

jaemin had never really thought about that matter before, but now that he had plenty of time, in the thursday afternoon traffic, his thoughts wandered to his desk mate.

mina.

she was a very kind girl. she was always here to make jaemin's day better, to make him forget about his shitty life.

she would chuckle, she would laugh, she would talk to him, she would smile to him...

she did all those things that made jaemin's heart flutter.

flutter?!

well... yeah...

jaemin had never experienced any kind of love relationship.

his many family and background issued had made him reticent at the idea of getting a significant other to whom he would need to tell all those things.

plus, he was fine on his own.

no one was there to distract him.

no one was there to know about his violent phases.

but... recently... it's true that he had given more attention to mina.

he had cheated on his maths test to help her.

that was something he wouldn't have done.

cheating...

jaemin followed rules. he would never go against them – quite ironic if you knew that this boy was the serial killer that ravaged seoul's poor district.

but later that day, he doesn't know what happened.

seeing mina's eyes getting watery... seeing her bottom lip poking out... seeing her trembling hands... seeing her panicking because of the difficulty of the exercise...

all this had made jaemin soft.

did that mean he liked mina?

that could be a possibility.

she was a likable person.

jaemin was stopped in his reflexion by a harsh break the bus made, causing him to almost fall from his seat.

he lifted his head, looking at the chauffeur who was concentrated on the road, before catching a glimpse of a figure he wished he would never see again.

"you've been thinking about that girl, huh...?" the demon asked, taking a sit just next to the human.

jaemin rolled his eyes.

he couldn't say everything out loud, and knowing that he couldn't even think about the things he wanted without getting made fun of by his stupid demon infuriated him.

"she's pretty, you're right." donghyuck approved. "but she's too stupid for you."

jaemin glared at the demon.

"don't call her stupid."

"aw... how cute... you are defending her..."

"i am not. now leave me alone."

the demon didn't move.

he kept looking at jaemin with his glowing red eyes.

"have you thought about my proposition?" he asked with a smile.

"i didn't, and i will never." jaemin replied, looking into the boy's eyes.

the only sight of these two red orbs made jaemin sick in the stomach.

he felt his blood boil.

he felt his fists clenching.

he felt his eyebrows furrowing.

he hated those eyes, and he hated the person wearing them.

he hated every single demon.

"i'll need to be harsher then..." the demon shrugged, snapping his fingers.

to jaemin's biggest pleasure, nothing happened.

"remember to call me when you'll have enough of the hell you are living."

"never." jaemin said through gritted teeth, trying to ignore the smirking demon that was disappearing.

the period of calm before the storm seemed to stop soon as the bus driver slammed on the brakes – or at least that's what the people inside felt – and stopped the bus.

"ladies and gentlemen, i am sorry to announce that the buses of the company are having a technical problem. no more buses will be on circulation tonight. please take a taxi to come back home. sorry."

jaemin groaned, covering his ears not to hear the loud noise of people's discontent.

it was all donghyuck's faut.

he knew that jaemin would need an hour to go back home by feet.

but this shitty demon didn't care...