On Monday morning, Jonghyun walked into the SM Entertainment building like a zombie – complete with ashen skin, tired eyes and shuffling gait. Yawning widely he pressed the button for the fifth floor and waited for the lift to take him upwards. His expression remained blank throughout the short trip and he only noticed he had reached the correct floor when the lift’s mechanical ding noise snapped him out of his reverie. Shaking his head to clear his blurred thoughts, Jonghyun stepped into the corridor and made his way past the break room to his office.

Sitting down at his desk, not noticing the concerned looks his office mates sent him when he didn’t greet them cheerily as he usually did, Jonghyun logged onto his computer, plugged his headphones into his electric keyboard and began to play a song only he could hear. His office mates each shot looks over his head, trying to work out what was wrong with the youngest person in the room.

Four hours later and Jonghyun was still doing the same thing. Now, he had a music program up on his computer and it was transcribing the notes he was playing but otherwise, his position and actions had barely changed. Usually, by 1pm, the blonde male would be starving and excited to go to lunch with the other employees in the office. However, when Junghee, the only woman in the purchasing department, had invited him to eat with her he had merely shaken his head and carried on playing the piano mournfully.

The other members of the department were getting very worried now. So, retreating to the break room, they planned out what to do over lunch. After much deliberation and several arguments (Sungho had been insistent that a slap would be the perfect solution and Youngchul was vehemently against that) they had decided to inform Sungkyu of his pupil’s state and allow him to deal with it. This was partially a decision determined by the fact that none of the office members particularly wanted to be the one to talk to the boy, not being confident in their skills to improve his mood, but also because Sungkyu knew the boy best and was far more likely to understand the source of this sudden uncharacteristic depression and lethargy.

Hence, an hour later, Jonghyun was called into his mentor’s office for a discussion.

Walking into the office after the older composer, Jonghyun slumped into the chair opposite Sungkyu with a frown on his face. Looking up at the man, he spoke for the first time that day, “Why’d you want to talk to me?”

“Because of this,” Sungkyu said, gesturing to the blonde.

“This?”

Sungkyu nodded, looking concerned. Usually the blonde would have made a comment about Sungkyu’s recent work, or the immaculate state of his desk. Even on his worst days he would give at least a small greeting as he entered. These blunt, short sentences were very uncharacteristic and the man could understand why his coworkers had come to him concerned. “The other people in your office are worried about you. They said you didn’t say a word when you came in this morning and didn’t accept their invitations to lunch.”

“Do I have to?” Jonghyun said loudly, suddenly feeling angry. Leaning forwards in his chair he practically spat his words at the other composer, “Do I always have to greet them and join them in their boring conversations?! They aren’t even composers, it’s basically useless to talk to them.” He scowled, slumping back onto the chair and slipping down further than he was before his sudden anger.

“This is exactly what I’m worried about,” Sungkyu explained, moving his hands in an aborted gesture at the blonde. He realised that gesturing at his employee, even in a placating manner, was likely to rile him up even more. “This isn’t you.”

“Of course it’s me. Who else would it be?” Jonghyun said snarkily, crossing his arms like a petulant child.

“I have known you for four years, Kim Jonghyun, and I have never seen you act like this before. Even when you were in the midst of exam stress you never acted like this,” The composer said, his tone sharp. There may be some deep underlying reason for the man to act like this – and Sungkyu would determine what it was – but he wasn’t about to stand for such behaviour. He wouldn’t accept it when the two were merely student and mentor and he definitely wouldn’t accept it now that he was the blonde’s boss. “Don’t act like I’m out of line with this.”

Jonghyun snorted and muttered something under his breath that Sungkyu didn’t hear clearly.

“I am concerned,” The older man said, ignoring the mutterings and his voice much softer, “I care for you and I want you to be well. Jonghyun, what happened?”

“Nothing,” Jonghyun sniffed, not able to meet his mentor’s eyes.

Sighing, Sungku reclined a little in his seat. “Is it something to do with the job? I know it can be stressful and I know a lot of the people that work here are intense and often cut throat but I thought you were doing ok. Your first solo piece got accepted; I thought you’d be thrilled.”

“I was.” Jonghyun said, “I am. It’s not work, I just…” He trailed off, obviously not intending to finish his statement.

It was clear Jonghyun didn’t want his mentor to know about what was bothering him. Unfortunately, Sungkyu wasn’t one to let people he cared about suffer without knowing why and without being able to help in any way. Jonghyun knew this fact and he knew the man wasn’t going to let it drop, but he was too angry to remember that.

Sungkyu sighed quietly, not loud enough for the blonde to hear, and carried on talking, “Is everyone at home ok? Sodam being a brat? Jiwoong? Is your dad being difficult again, I know he wasn’t so accepting to begin-“

“He’s fine. Home is fine. Everyone is fine.” Jonghyun cut the man off before he could finish and rolling his eyes.

“So it’s something with you?” Sungkyu asked. Jonghyun twitched a little at this, his eyes darting to the side, determinedly not looking at the older composer. Seeing this reaction, Sungkyu continued this line of thought. “I thought you were doing ok. You were excited Friday to have the weekend free. What was it you said? You were going to ‘waste your weekend watching bad TV and reading fan sites’?”

Sungkyu definitely got a reaction that time, Jonghyuns hands visibly flexed from where they were resting on the arms of the chair, releasing their white-knuckle grip before slamming closed once more. The blonde’s jaw clenched noticeably and he looked down at his lap, using his hair as a shield to avoid looking at the older man. “And it was great. Best weekend ever,” Jonghyun bit out, his tone and body language the complete opposite of his words.

Seeing that the younger man wasn’t going to speak any time soon, Sungkyu decided to change the subject. Turning to his computer, he hit play on the most recent song he was working on. He was currently working on an upbeat dance track for an all-male group and had hit a road block along the way, he hoped that Jonghyun could help him and in the process allow Sungkyu to help the blonde in return. “What do you think? Something isn’t quite right.”

Jonghyun took to the topic change like he was desperate and instantly his entire demeanor lit up. However, it was clear his change in mood was only skin deep as the dull look still remained in his eyes. It was also clear that he knew exactly what the other man was doing and knew that he hadn’t let the matter drop. The side glances he shot at the composer, looking suspicious, clearly showed his unease. Pointing at the screen he said, “See this part here, where it goes” he sang a few notes, getting a nod of understanding from Sungkyu, “I think it would sound better if it went down instead of up. Like,” he sang the part again, changing the last few notes to his preference. “See what I mean?”

Sungkyu nodded, changing the notes in the music program, “Yes, I’ll have to try it out with the rest of the backing track but that might help.” He turned back to the screen, seemingly not paying attention to the blonde still sat opposite his desk and began making a few edits to his score. The blonde had actually given him an idea that he could possibly use, “Maybe if I add this, then change this,” He muttered, as he worked, “then this bar would be a copy of this and there would need to be a rest in here…” he worked methodically, determining what each change would sound like when coupled with everything else.

However, he only payed half a mind to his work, the other half was still with his student. The blonde was still sat, hunched in his chair, his eyes once more hidden behind a blonde screen. His hands were not as tightly clenched now but their grip periodically tightened, as if the man remembered something occasionally.

Sungkyu tried to observe his employee without making it obvious he was observing him. He wasn’t sure he succeeded but the blonde was distracted enough with his own thoughts that it probably didn’t matter even if he was obvious. What he saw only reinforced all his worries and made him certain that calling him in here for this chat was the right course of action.

Finally, after what felt like hours but was probably only a few minutes, Jonghyun spoke up, “I lost my safe place.”

Sungkyu looked up from his work, not sure he heard the boy’s quiet words. “What was that?”

“My safe place, you know the SHINee fan site I like to visit? I can’t go there anymore.”

Sungkyu did know, Jonghyun was very open with his mentor about everything in his life, possibly because he had revealed the most embarrassing fact about himself – in his mind, at least – to the man on their first meeting and hadn’t been judged for it. On those initial meetings he had revealed exactly how deeply he cared for SHINee, in more ways than one – Sungkyu was many things, but oblivious was not one of them. Thus, he had apparently felt comfortable divulging more about himself. Things that were often left untold, to friends and family alike, Sungkyu knew the details of. Some things he wished he didn’t know but he also knew that the man needed it. His father, although more accepting than he had been, was not exactly the wealth of support and strength that the blonde needed. Sungkyu had realized years ago that, in some ways, he functioned as Jonghyun’s father in areas where the blonde’s own father was lacking. It wasn’t everything, the man was still, after all, Jonghyun’s father, but there were those few things about his son that the man clearly found difficult to understand. So Sungkyu didn’t mind picking up the slack. Jonghyun needed him to do so, even if he didn’t realise he needed it.

“Why can’t you?”

Jonghyun looked down at his hands, his fingers fidgeting in his lap. “They found out.”

“What did they find out?” Sungkyu asked, softly. He was finally getting to the bottom of this issue and he didn’t want to spook the younger composer now. If he did there was a chance he would never find out what happened – not from the boy himself, at least.

“Who I am. What I am. They told everyone. They all hate me. Hate BlingBling”

It took a second for Sungkyu to understand but when he did he felt a wave of anger wash over him. He wasn’t usually an angry man, his whole life he had been passive and calm, never saying boo to a goose. Yet, right now, with the boy he thought of as a son of sorts looking so small and hurt in front of him, he wanted to hurt someone. To make them realize what their actions did to people.

Jonghyun had confessed to him once, in one of their many email conversations when the boy was stressed and worried he couldn’t do this composition thing, that he was scared to be known as himself online. Sungkyu had already known about the boy’s online presence, since the day of the documentary filming when the younger had blurted it out to his idols, however, he hadn’t known about the details. The boy had confessed that sometimes, it felt really nice to be able to discuss his favourite things with other people without judgment. This forum place allowed that and the boy had finally, after years of struggling with himself, had begun to be more open about his loves in real life as well. Sungkyu knew that his friends from college knew, as well as his sister and he had even overheard the boy mention SHINee being an inspiration to one of the other office workers one lunch break.

However, he was worried all that progress would now be lost due to a few stupid little girls and their stupid little prejudices. Oh, he didn’t yet know the details, but he would find out and he would get his revenge, though in a less violent way than he had originally planned.

Sending the boy out, instructing him to go home for the day – it was already the afternoon and the boy clearly wasn’t getting any work done any time soon – Sungkyu got to work, he had people to contact. He would fix this.

 

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CHAPTER NOTES: I feel bad doing this to Jjong. But sometimes such things are necessary :c

Also, I took a look at the stats for this fic. Chapter 4 has far less views than the chapters around it. I wonder why that is.