From: Heuk-yeon hyung

Kong! Vogue had good things to say about you. Wanna come down on Sunday for a meeting? My dad is going to be there~~~

Hongbin likes Hakyeon’s father. He’s easy-going and has the same kind of humor as Hakyeon.

To: Heuk-yeon hyung  

I can’t, company dinner. My mom is going to be there~~

From: Heuk-yeon hyung

Oh man, are you going to be okay? >__<

To: Heuk-yeon hyung

Hope so! Don’t worry.

She sent me a whole package brief about it.

            From: Heuk-yeon hyung

                    Our house is open if you need some place to crash, ok?

Hongbin thinks of the previous dinner and how he, after being beaten by his mother (at 20 years old it’s more humiliating than anything else), had found himself outside Hakyeon’s house, crying, because he couldn’t go back to his own apartment; back to the silence, and the loneliness, and the self-hatred, and the sharp objects.

Taekwoon had spread a blanket over him as he lay on the couch for the night, shivering from the shock of his past haunting him after a whole two years of independence. In the morning, Hakyeon and Taekwoon make sure to wake up early. They say it was to make him breakfast, but Hongbin notices how the stationary holder no longer had scissors. 

            To: Heuk-yeon hyung

                        Can Sanghyuk hang out with you on Sunday while I’m at the dinner?

            From: Heuk-yeon hyung

                        Is that even something you need to ask??? Silly

                        How is our Sanghyuk?

            To: Heuk-yeon hyung

                        He’s very… silent. But I think he’s okay. He just has stuff on his mind.

            From: Heuk-yeon hyung

                        Poor baby~~~ :( Leo and I will take care of him on Sunday!! For sure

Hongbin tucks his phone into the front pocket of his jeans with an exasperated smile and unlocks the front door.

As the lock in the front door turns and opens with a click, Sanghyuk flinches where he’s stirring a pot of seaweed soup, although Hongbin texted him ahead.

Recently, he’s so painfully caught up in his own mind that even microwave timers (that he set himself) freak him out when they go off.

When he looks in the mirror to tie up his hair, he sees there Jaehwan – staring back, smirking, taunting. When he blinks, the betrayal of the mirror disappears. But throughout the day he still obsessively makes sure that his hair is neat; doesn’t allow strands of hair to fall about his face. He thinks he just might fall straight through into the mirror and become Jaehwan if he’s not careful.

Hongbin pushes the door open. “I’m home!”

Sanghyuk’s stomach just curls a tiny bit with how easy the word ‘home’ rolls off his hyung’s tongue. He stuffs the post-it note into the pocket of his track pants. At the start of every day he writes down the list of things to do because deciding what to do as he goes about his day usually takes up so much focus that by the time he decides to do something, he no longer has energy to do it. Without his stack of post-its, there’s also no saying how many times he’ll bathe in a day or how many times he makes food but forgets to eat it.

“Hi, hyung.” Sanghyuk smiles shyly, rushing to help him with his documents and bags.

Hongbin tries to hand over his camera bag, but in doing so, he brushes against Sanghyuk’s stomach. Beneath the baggy sweater, Hongbin can feel the shape of a concaved stomach and of ribs.

Hongbin realizes just how little he has been home.

He and Minki have been trying their hardest to settle things behind the scenes, just so they don’t have to involve Sanghyuk more than they need to. But the process, still, seems terribly long – longer and more complex than Hongbin expected it to be. The people they’re trying to put on trial are the people that are the top 1% of South Korea; the people that, despite what they’ve done, will probably always have lawyers good enough to take them out of and funds large enough to ensure they never even get into .

Hongbin’s mom is part of that 1% and with a sickening fear in his stomach over the past few months, Hongbin now knows why every legal case his mom gets in, she emerges victorious in no time. Because she never had to get through all that red tape that even Minki is now having trouble cutting through. Minki pushes all his other cases off to other lawyers just because of the sheer energy and research this case requires. They spend endless days in the law firm going over past cases and background information. Most times, they walk out of the building stunned by the moon hanging high in the sky, and then they both laugh in a desperate attempt to give themselves something to hope for.

He had been so caught up with court proceedings, between that communicating with Daewon about the contract, that he hasn’t been paying attention to the very person at the center of this busy whirlwind – Sanghyuk.

But Sanghyuk just grabs his camera bag and the file in his hand – not thinking too much about the contact; walking to put Hongbin’s things away.

“I made seaweed soup, hyung.” He says casually. “Would you like some?”

Hongbin is not a good actor. But he dampens down his expression of shock and pushes out a smile anyway. “Join me?”

Sanghyuk agrees easily and Hongbin lets his muscles un-tense in relief. Perhaps its fear of the unknown, perhaps its selfishness, but Hongbin doesn’t like confronting Sanghyuk. Sometimes he looks at the teenager that Sanghyuk is, the occasional outbreak of pimples, and he sees there his younger self. He knows what it’s like to be confronted about his self-harm and there’s nothing he detests more.

When his friends found out, all they wanted to do was ask him if he was okay. They never wanted to gossip anymore, or talk about mindless things like gaming. Every “are you okay?” was a grenade, planted beneath words, threatening secret meanings and things unsaid. At the end of the day, “am I okay?” is all he’s thinking about. There are some days the answer is yes and he still wants to die and that makes him loathe himself more than ever.

Bit by bit, people start to look like firing squads. Bit by bit, Hongbin started to withdraw from everyone else.

He doesn’t want to do that to Sanghyuk, doesn’t want to make him feel like an outsider. So if Sanghyuk can handle it by himself, can – for at least this meal eat with Hongbin at the dinner table, Hongbin is willing to let himself have some trust, even if its self-indulgent.  

So Hongbin makes white rice (Sanghyuk measures the water for him, so technically all Hongbin did was really just turning the rice cooker on) and when its done, Sanghyuk fills two bowls to the brim. They bring the soup and the rice and the side dishes to the dinner table. Hongbin waits for Sanghyuk to pick up his spoon but he doesn’t.

Hongbin is re-considering his previous notions of not pushing Sanghyuk.

But instead of refusing all food, the boy says, “I want to sign the contract.”