All the way home, Leo just leaned against one of the poles in the train, earning himself several annoyed looks when people wanted to hold onto it, but he didn’t care. He focused on the windows turned mirrors from the darkness of the tunnel they were passing through. It was interesting how the only way to see his reflection was when the window was dark; if there was any sort of light, there was no chance of seeing his own face. He turned away, preferring not to think about what that meant.

]The train pulled to a stop with a groan at his station and he plodded aboveground and turned in the direction of home. It was starting to rain slightly and he concentrated on the dots of water appearing on the ground. He amused himself for a moment trying to step around as many as he could and not stepping on any. This became too difficult when the rain got heavier, effectively wetting the ground completely.

He was still a block away from home, but he didn’t make any effort to speed up. On the contrary, he slowed down to maximize the amount of time he was spending outside. It wasn’t like outside in the rain was any worse than inside with the other boys. Within a minute, he was soaked through, his hair plastered to his face, his uniform shirt now transparent, and the water squishing inside his shoes.

When he opened the front door, he found himself in the middle of chaos. He heard yelling coming from upstairs and most of the boys who had been downstairs were running up the stairs to see what was going on. Leo left his shoes by the door and followed little Ryeowook and Hyukjae, who were asking Doojoon breathlessly what was going on. Apparently Doojoon was just as clueless because Leo saw him shake his head.

That sounds like N.

Leo followed them up the stairs and didn’t even stop in his room to drop off his bag or change his clothes. He joined the rest of the boys who were crowding around the bathroom where N was screaming at Hongbin, waving a bottle of what looked like ibuprofen at the younger boy. Hongbin looked sullen rather than close to tears, which seemed to be his default setting these days.

“What on earth did you think would happen Hongbin?!” N’s face was almost as red as his hair. He shook the bottle in Hongbin’s face. “These are here to take pain away, not bring more on the rest of us! You need to get yourself together because I never, ever want to see you even thinking about taking your own life again, do you hear me?”

By this time, Ahjumma had been drawn to the argument and she had pushed her way through the crowd to snatch the bottle of pills out of N’s hand, stopping him mid-rant, and turn to stare at Hongbin. She turned to the rest of them and banished them from the doorway, pushing N out as well and slamming the door.

“What’re you all looking at?” N growled as several of the other boys glanced at him warily. He pushed Donghae and Kiseop aside so hard as he passed them that they were knocked into Leo, who stumbled, nearly sending all three of them to the floor. Just because you’re upset doesn’t mean you can push around kids half your size. He made sure they were steady and followed N into their room.

When Leo entered the room, he found N sitting on the floor under the window just staring into space and still looking angry. Oddly enough, Ken wasn’t in the room, trying to distract N with a funny story or something and Leo shrugged his absence off. Ravi, who was getting his books out of his backpack by the desk, kept glancing at N. When Leo came in, he glanced at the door and quickly looked away, busily grabbing a pencil and sitting down to start his work.

Leo ignored him and dropped his bag by his bed to go and sit next to N. He rested his back against the wall, lifted one knee up, and waited for N to talk. The minutes crawled by, the silence in the room broken only by Ravi’s distracted mumblings as he worked through a math problem and the clicking of his fingers on his calculator. N was determinedly ignoring Leo’s presence beside him but Leo knew he would explain. N wouldn’t ever refuse the urge to talk.

“I found him in the washroom when I got home from school.” N finally said tonelessly. Leo didn’t turn to face him, but continued staring at Ravi, who had paused in his work to listen as well. “He was sitting on the floor holding the bottle. It was open. He was about to put a bunch of pills into his mouth before I caught him.” N put his head in his hands and groaned, “my G-d, how did I not see this before? It’s so obvious now.” Hindsight usually works like that.

Leo scooted a little closer to N and, feeling slightly uncomfortable, put his arm slowly around his shoulders. N lifted his head and looked at Leo, who tried to communicate with just his eyes. None of us noticed. It’s not your fault. He didn’t know if N understood or not, but he nodded, so Leo considered this a job completed. He removed his arm and N looked at him with his full attention for the first time.

“Why are you all wet?”

Leo glanced down at himself and remembered that he had just come in from the rain. Oh right. Water.

N rolled his eyes and pulled Leo to his feet, muttering something about them all going out like bums if it weren’t for him. Leo grabbed a change of clothing and made to go to the washroom to change, but Ken came running in, nearly smacking right into him. Watch where you’re going!

"I just overheard Ahjumma talking to someone and she said something about suicide. What’s going on?”

If Leo wasn’t mistaken, he thought he might have caught a bit of eagerness in Ken’s tone. He shook his head and retreated into a corner to change his clothing. Ken was way too interested in drama in his opinion.

N was clearly thinking along the same lines, but he didn’t say anything about Hongbin yet. “Were you eavesdropping again?” He asked exasperatedly. Leo was pleased to hear the usual note of mischief in his tone. Having dried off and changed, he stooped back to the floor to grab his mp3, which he’d left in his bag. He pulled it toward him and began to rummage, listening with half his mind to N and Ken’s bickering behind him.

“No!” Ken defended himself. “It’s not my fault that they were talking loudly.”

"Of course it isn’t.” N sounded annoyed but slightly amused.

“He was eavesdropping.” Ravi said unexpectedly from the desk where he hadn’t looked up from his book. “You’re too nosy for your own good, Ken-hyung.”

“Hey! Take that back!” Ken called over to him. N snickered and Ravi shook his head. “You’re just jealous that I get all the information first.”

“Jealous?” N snorted. “Not this time.”

Ken stopped at that and looked at him. “Why? What happened?”

Now Ravi turned. “N went postal at Hongbin.”

Ken gaped at N, who was studiously looking away. “What?”

Leo stopped listening and continued to rummage, growing frustrated that his mp3 was nowhere to be found. He took his hand out of the bag and glared at it. It took him a moment to realize that he was searching in the wrong bag. His backpack was still on top of his bed; this one was Hyuks.

This realization made him freeze and look cautiously around at the other three, who were now discussing Hongbin quite seriously, all traces of humor gone from their faces. He turned back to the bag and started looking through it more carefully, unsure if he really should, or if he really wanted to. Regardless of if he wanted to, he felt like he had to. Hyuk would probably kill me for this.

Most of the things in the bag were school related; his fingers found two textbooks, a bunch of loose papers, a few folders, a five-subject notebook, and in a side pocket, a small switchblade. Leo brought it out gingerly. Why on earth did he have this? He didn’t really want to think about that, so he slipped it into his pocket and reached into the bag again.

This time, he found a small, spiral-bound notebook. He pulled it out curiously and looked at it. It looked like something you could buy at a regular convenience store (where most of their things came from anyway), with a decorative cover of blue and green stripes and a small strap holding it closed. He ran a finger under the strap and removed it, flipping through the pages quickly, seeing Hyuk’s handwriting through about a third of the notebook. He closed it quickly and sat back on his heels, taking deep breaths.

I didn’t even know Hyuk kept a journal. He didn’t know if he could stand to look at it. Maybe it was an assignment for school? He didn’t believe that even as he thought it. He set it carefully on his bed and just sat and stared at it for a few minutes. Luckily the others were still arguing behind him and weren’t paying any attention to his side of the room at the moment. Should I read it? It might tell him things he never knew about Hyuk, though the thought of him not knowing something about Hyuk was scary; he was supposed to be the closest to him. While he kept his thoughts and emotions close to himself, Hyuk never did.

Before he could make a decision, the door banged open and Ahjumma stomped in, Hongbin slinking in quietly at her heels. She pushed him in front of her and he walked toward his bed without looking at any of them.

“Hongbin is going to bed now.” Ahjumma snapped, sounding stressed and angry. “I suggest you do the same.” Her tone dared them to refuse. She made sure they were doing as she ordered and went back into the hallway. Before the door closed, they could hear snickers from the other boys in the hall as the five oldest hyungs in the home were forced into bed. They stopped laughing pretty quickly when Ahjumma slammed the door and ordered them into bed as well. The protests started on cue, but Ahjumma was not cutting anyone any slack tonight apparently.

Once they were alone, they all looked at Hongbin, who was studiously getting his pajamas from under his pillow and ignoring all of them. He still looked rather sulky, as if he was sorry N had found him in the bathroom. Do you hate your life that much, Hongbin?

Feeling upset for more than one reason, Leo placed Hyuk’s journal tenderly inside his own backpack, resolving to read it tomorrow. He can’t stop me anyway. No point in ignoring it. Well aware that he was trying to convince himself and thoroughly annoyed as a result, Leo threw on his pajamas and got into bed, ignoring the mumbled grumblings of the other boys. Ravi turned out the light and they all went silent. Leo kept his eyes open, even as he heard the breathing of the others go from irregular to deep and rhythmic, with the occasional snore coming from Ravi’s bed. He couldn’t make himself go to sleep; the thought of the notebook waiting for him inside the backpack was enough to drive sleep right out of his mind.

Each time he managed to close his eyes, he jerked awake only a little bit later, breathing hard. His mind was torturing him with speculations of what might be written in Hyuk’s journal, and no matter how hard he tried to distract his thoughts, he just couldn’t get it out of his head.

Only the creaking of Hongbin’s bed above him alerted him to the fact that he wasn’t the only one having a sleepless night.

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Yay, another update! So yeah, a little surprise about Hongbin there, sorry about that. Anyway, hope you enjoyed this chapter and Hyuk's journal will be along soon.