2.

He was reading 'Mysteries of the night', his late mother's favorite book for maybe the one hundredth time when a shadow was cast over him and the book got pulled out of his hands.

"Did you make a new friend!" the bully

exclaimed while pointing to the trash container.

"It makes sense for trash to belong together!" the boy said before aiming the book towards the bin.

"No! Please! That book isn't mine!" Namjoon pleaded getting up in an attempt to get his mother's book back.

By that time, the boy's other friends had showed up. "What ? You mean this ugly book?" the bully said with a wicked smile before tearing off a handful of pages.

"Nooo! Please Nooo!!" Namjoon yelled as one of the boys pushed him down. He looked, defenseless, as his mother's book was being torn to shreds and thrown into the garbage bin.

He tried to fight off the tears, but he quickly ended up sobbing loudly as the kids mocked and bullied him. Laughing to their hearts content and until their stomachs began to ache.

Once the last bits of the book were turned into itty-bitty shreds, the leader leaned forward to grab Namjoon by the collar.

"Now there's just one last bit of trash left to throw out!" the bully said before pulling Namjoon towards the bin.

The boy's friends laughed and started helping him immobilize Namjoon who was begging and struggling to be freed.

"Stop it please!" he begged as the little group managed to lift him of the ground with the clear intent of throwing him in the trash.

Just as he was hovering above the bin, one of the boys let out a high pitch yell and Namjoon fell to the ground.

One of the boys was clenching the back of his head and a bloody stone, about the size of a big orange, rested on the ground behind him as a girl about their age came running.

"Did you stupid girl throw a rock at him?!" the leader asked in a panic while his friend was holding his head and sobbing in pain.

"Leave he alone!" the girl warned, a thick accent showing through her Korean, clearly it wasn't her mother tongue.

Namjoon was so shocked by the scene unfolding before him that he had stopped crying on the spot.

"Don't you know who my father is?" the leader scoffed and came towards the girl before slapping her hard across the face.

With one swift motion the girl grabbed hold of his extended arm, twisted it behind his back and forced the bully onto the ground face first.

"If you snitching, you got hurt!" the girl threatened in less than mediocre Korean as the leader whimpered underneath her form the pressure she was putting on his arm.

"Please! Let me go! My arm's gonna break! I'm sorry! Let me go! I won't tell I swear!" the bully pleaded in a high-pitched squeal, his previous confidence completely dissipated.

As soon as the girl let go of his arm, the boy scrambled to his feet and darted away with his friends.

The girl's bottom lip was lightly split from the leader's smack and a line of blood was running down her chin. Her long dark brown hair was escaping what might have once been a ponytail and her clothes were baggy and boyish; the complete opposite of the well-groomed girls Namjoon was used to seeing at this fancy rich school.

She smiled down at Namjoon, her wide grin revealing a missing front tooth that somehow managed to make her look even scruffier, as she extended her hand down to him.

"No hurt right?" she said while helping the boy up. Namjoon shook his head "no" while wiping his eyes dry.

"No cry now, me protect you. Me Hye-Jin, what your name?" the girl said in her ever so broken dialect.

Namjoon looked up at Hye-Jin; her messy hair, her goofy smile, her dark piercing eyes and cute nose. Almost instantly, something clicked in him. Through his eyes, the tomboyish girl looked like an angel.

"Namjoon..." he said in a shaky whimper.

"Nam-Joon..." She repeated, in an attempt to memorize the name as she dug through her pocket to pull out a piece of black fabric covered with little cartoon foxes.

"Be friends?" the girl asked, as she cutely handed Namjoon the handkerchief.

When a dimpled grin formed on his face, he was surprised he still remembered how to smile.

"Yeah, let's be friends!" the boy replied while accepting her gift. Namjoon's life had been nothing but darkness up to this point and that day he swore to himself that he would forever stay by Hye-Jin's side.

...Now that he had found her, he could never let go of his light....

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