CW: Transphobia

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Maybe it was because Hongjoong hardly visited Seoul or maybe it was because he was meeting Insoo after a few weeks of things ending the way it did, but once he got off the train he felt nervous, there were crowds of people and he wasn't exactly sure where he was supposed to go.

He wandered around a little but eventually found someone who led him to the entrance of the station and there he found both Mr.Hwan and Mrs.Hwan, he was a little nervous that Insoo would pop up suddenly but luckily it didn't seem like he accompanied them.

"Welcome Hongjoong" Mrs.Hwan said with a big smile, and hugged him, same goes for Insoo's father he warmly welcomed Hongjoong and helped him place his luggage in the car.

They didn't speak much, maybe it was because they knew Hongjoong was nervous about everything but they decided to give him some time to think and adjust a little.

"Hongjoong, we will drop you off at our house first so you can get settled in, our daughter will be returning from thailand today as well for the gallery event, and Insoo will be joining us for dinner since his sister is back" Mrs.Hwan said with a big smile, Hongjoong could tell she had everything planned so he felt a little more at ease about the day.

When they arrived at the Hwan household the three headed inside, Insoo's father helped Hongjoong move his luggage inside and to their guest room, before the two had to leave for work again, with the gallery event around the corner it was quite a busy time.

Hongjoong knew that when the two returned they would bring along Insoo's older sister, he couldn't help but be curious about her, Insoo spoke about his siblings a little, and he seemed quite fond of his sister, as he wandered about the house he hoped to find some clue about the trio of siblings.

"Hmm" Hongjoong said when he spotted a walled filled with photos of the Hwan family, at first he saw a photo of a child with a toddler, he noticed that neither were Insoo so he realised that it was actually Soo's siblings, he smiled a little but was also a little confused, his older brother seemed like such a nice person in the photos but as he glanced over more of the photos and the siblings grew up it seemed like he changed quite a bit especially around the time Insoo was born it seemed like the brother changed the most, he wore what almost seemed like a glare whenever he looked at Insoo and Hongjoong couldn't help but feel slightly uncomfortable at the hostile aura of the photo.

The more he looked at the photos he noticed something though… Insoo's sister really liked matching her brothers, she had short hair a good majority of the time and wore the same style of clothes that her brothers wore, he found it quite cute that she wanted to match with her brothers.

After wandering around a little he headed back to his room and unpacked and ran through his whole plan to speak to Insoo. He wanted to be sure of what he wanted to say so he didn't mess anything up when trying to get the boy out of his dark state.

Eventually he decided that taking a nap would be a good idea seeing as he had been up quite late and got up quite early to head to Seoul, plus he was quite nervous which meant time was crawling by and the more he had to wait the longer it felt.

***

Night came around eventually, Hongjoong almost fell over his own feet with how fast he was rushing downstairs to see Insoo when he saw Mr.Hwan's car pull into the driveway, he waited nervously for them to get into the house but was slightly disappointed when he noticed that Insoo wasn't getting out of the car with them.

He tried his best to smile when they entered the house but his disappointment was quite noticeable.

"Sorry Joong, Soo will be over later, his meeting is running a little late" Mrs.Hwan said when she got in the house, Hongjoong just shook his head and smiled.

"That's okay" he said, he then spotted Insoo's sister, "Ah Hello, I'm Hongjoong '' he greeted her with a warm smile, he had to at least make some good impressions on Insoo's family.

"I heard you would be here, thank you for coming all this way to get my little brother out of his slump" she said with a big smile, "I'm Jiwoo by the way" she introduced herself.

Jiwoo went to help Mrs.Hwan with dinner and Hongjoong wanted to help as well but Mr.Hwan asked Hongjoong to help move Jiwoo's things to her room and then help set the table for dinner.

It wasn't long and soon dinner began, Hongjoong couldn't help but feel a little worried since Insoo still hadn't come home, but he tried not to show his worry since his parents didn't seem all that worried about it, maybe it was a bit normal that Insoo got home late.

Halfway through dinner they heard the front door open, and Hongjoong was so excited he found himself jumping up from his seat and running towards the door - but he was stopped in his tracks when he saw someone that was clearly not Insoo, though he did bare some resemblance to Insoo - that's when it struck him…. It was Insoo's brother.

He stood there frozen in his spot for a bit, but eventually he felt his rage boil over, just who did this guy think he is? Showing up after ruining Insoo's happiness like that?

"Inwoo, I don't remember telling you that you can stay here" Mrs. Hwan said in a slightly annoyed tone.

"Mom this is my home afterall why wouldn't I be welcomed here" Inwoo countered with a slight smirk.

"After everything you did to Insoo you think you're welcome here?" Jiwoo joined the conversation and it didn't take long for Mr.Hwan to join them.

"What, so you're all ganging up on me? You even have a complete stranger in my home and I'm the one that's not welcome?" he said, glancing from his family to Hongjoong.

"Well seeing as he is your brother… well your brother's friend I believe he should be welcomed into OUR home" Mr.Hwan said, placing an emphasis on OUR, since Inwoo kept referring to it as his home.

Inwoo stood there and laughed a little, "Yeah whatever, the loser can't even do his job now you want to tell me he has a friend?" Hongjoong could feel his blood boiling from the way Inwoo talked about Insoo, he tried his best to keep calm.

"Inwoo you have no right to speak to him that way" Jiwoo said as she rolled her eyes, she was quite annoyed with her older brother and his ego.

"Jiwoo? Or should I say Jiwoon, what? you think you change your gender and leave, now you think you have some right to speak up about family matters?" Inwoo yelled, Hongjoong's anger kept worsening, he couldn't take it, and although he kept staying quiet and keeping his anger inside, but he couldn't keep it down any longer.

He pounched on Inwoo and started hitting him, he didn't fully register what he was doing he could only see black and kept hitting Inwoo, who didn't just lay down and take it he got in a few hits as well, but Hongjoong couldn't feel anything.

"You think you are some great person, but I have news for you, you are nothing but a human trash can and you don't deserve Jiwoo noona or Insoo in your life, you don't deserve to call them your family" Hongjoong yelled through his punches.

The Hwan parents were still in shock that their son could say those things and Jiwoo just didn't feel like breaking up the fight as she believed Inwoo truly deserved getting his handed to him and she was quite happy that it was Hongjoong who was doing it.

"WHATS GOING ON HERE?" a voice suddenly yelled, maybe it was because it was loud or maybe it was because it was familiar but it snapped Hongjoong out of his anger and when he looked up he froze to see Insoo standing right in front of him.

"S-Soo" Hongjoong stuttered out nervously, Inwoo took the chance of Hongjoong being distracted and threw a punch, hitting Hongjoong off of him - and getting up and then glared at his parents.

"What? So you are just letting this total stranger hit your son and you just stand there and watch" he asked, a bit annoyed that his parents did absolutely nothing.

"Well Inwoo, from the comment you made I don't think I have a son like you… I just have two children from the moment you started abusing your brother mentally and said all those transphobic things about your sister" Mr.Hwan said then looked at MrsHwan, "Thoughts honey?"

"I don't remember giving birth to a bigoted piece of so no I don't think this is my son" she said angrily, "get out of this house right now" she ordered.

Inwoo just stood there with his mouth slightly ajar, looked at Jiwoo whose gaze resembled their Mothers and Inwoo just laughed and turned around and took his bag, and left.

When the front door slammed close there was silence that filled the air, Hongjoong couldn't look at Insoo or at the rest of Insoo's family, he felt a little ashamed that he let his anger win, but honestly he felt quite good for hitting Inwoo, he had been wanting to do it since he heard from Insoo how Inwoo treated him.

"Joong? Why are you here? And why were you hitting Inwoo?" Insoo asked, still shocked about the scene he walked into.

"W-Well" Hongjoong couldn't say anything, there was no way to justify his actions and he just didn't know if he could actually face Insoo.

"Soo don't be mad at Hongjoong, Inwoo really deserved it" Jiwoo said hoping her brother wasn't too upset with his friend.

"I'm not mad, I want to know what happened for the always calm Kim Hongjoong to get his hands dirty by punching a piece of , like look at you Joong, your hands are bruised and you even broke skin… your hands are too precious to hurt like this Joong" Insoo said as he walked over to Hongjoong and crouched down in front of him, taking Hongjoongs hands in his.

"He said things about you and Jiwoo noona and I just… you told me how precious Jiwoo noona was to you so when I heard the comments he made it just… I just" Hongjoong said softly.

"Thank you for standing up for us" Insoo whispered and smiled a little when Hongjoong looked up, but soon it was replaced with a frown, "You're bleeding" Insoo muttered, he looked over to his parents, "I'm taking him to clean these up, we can all have a nice talk later about everything that's going on" he said and then pulled Hongjoong to feet and then pulled him to his room.

He sat Hongjoong on his bed and went to get the first aid kit, it was silent as Insoo cleaned up the wounds and placed bandaids over them.

"Joong, why are you here?" Insoo asked curiously.

"You just left Soo… I couldn't let you just leave but I also couldn't just show up in front of you, but your mom called me and I took the chance to come here and see you" Hongjoong said with a small smile as he watched Insoo.

"Hmm, but why Joong, you have classes to teach and things to do… you're happy there so why are you here?" Insoo asked, trying to figure out why Hongjoong would come all this way for him when he was just a friend to him.

"Well… After you left it wasn't worth being there anymore, I hardly had the studio open since you left and I just don't see the point of being there and be happy when the person who has my heart is here and is having a hard time" Hongjoong told him.

Insoo was a little taken aback, and looked at Joong trying to not let his heart get ahead of itself.

"Soo, when I met you… it felt like I was meeting spring itself, you came and brought new life to my barren heart, you made me feel a lot of things again and then you just left me and I felt quite lost and confused and most of all I was upset that I never got to tell you just how much I fell for you" Hongjoong said in a sweet tone, Insoo couldn't help but feel a little surprised.

"You like me?" he asked softly and Joong nodded a bit, Insoo smiled. "I like you too" Insoo said softly, too scared to say it out loud in fear of it breaking their bubble of feelings.

"I'd kiss you but Inwoo did quite a number on your poor face," Insoo said, still slightly annoyed about the whole fiasco.

"Well then my face heals up I will need double the kisses" Hongjoong teased - little did he know how determined Insoo was about making sure it happened.

Eventually the two went downstairs again and joined the rest of the family, dinner was cold and everyone was hungry so they ended up ordering something, Mrs.Hwan gave Hongjoong some medication for pain in case he had any and then they slowly started filling Insoo in on everything that had happened and finally it was time for the whole reason Mrs. Hwan invited Hongjoong and Jiwoo.

"Insoo mom has a proposal to make" Mrs.Hwan said with a smile, Insoo intently looked at her waiting for her to tell him what exactly she had planned.

"I know you are happier when you are with Hongjoong, I also know you aren't happy to be here, so… I talked to Jiwoo and she will be taking over the gallery and you will be moved to our studio branch that is run by Hongjoong '' she told him, Insoo was a little surprised.

"Huh?" That was all he got out, he was confused.

"I own Illusion studio, Hongjoong manages it and you will be working with him, mom knows you don't want the gallery and mom really just wants you to be happy so you can go be with Hongjooong and be happy" she told him, he looked at Jiwoo and she nodded a bit.

"I want this Soo, don't worry your pretty little head over me, I want to comeback and live with mom and dad, now that Inwoo won't be around I will be fine" she said and Insoo nodded a little and he then glanced to Hongjoong who was smiling brightly, he was so happy to have Insoo with him and hearing that Insoo could return with him.

"Joong, would it be okay if I came to work with you?" Insoo asked and Hongjoong instantly nodded.

"I'd be very happy, we can go to work together, go on dates together and then go home together … sounds pretty good to me" Hongjoong said like an excited child.

Insoo agreed after hearing that and so the two spent most of their night planning everything for when Insoo would return to where Insoo would stay and Hongjoong's room was long forgotten as the two eventually fell asleep in Insoo's room, holding one another tightly almost as if when they would let one another go that they would disappear into thin air.

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A/N:

and that's the end for now I think - I really want to write a short epilogue for this but I'm also not sure if I should or if I should just leave it as is.

But regardless of everything, thank you for reading, voting and supporting this, it has gave me quite a lot of strength to keep writing  as I have been facing multiple and almost endless writers blocks lately.