Minho gave up on subtelty. “What's going on?” he asked. “Taemin?”

Taemin shook her head. “Make him leave.”

Minho looked down at her tennis jersey. It was bloody on one side. “You said you had piano,” he said. “What happened?”

Jongin stood slowly, never looking away from Taemin. “I don't understand,” he said.

“What happened?” Minho repeated, insistent. “Why are you bleeding?”

“Jonghyun,” Jongin said, still not looking away from Taemin. “In the locker room at tennis.”

Minho dropped his bag and hurried to Taemin, forgetting about Jongin. “Jonghyun?” he asked. “Why didn't you tell me you had tennis? What did he do? Did he hit you?” He made to pull up her shirt to look at the cut, but Taemin shook her head jerkily, still holding the hem.

“Jongin saw,” she rasped under her breath. “He saw. Make him leave.”

Minho's heart sank. He'd suspected as much, but now that he knew it was true, things seemed much more complicated. He didn't trust Jongin to keep his mouth shut, but he couldn't leave Taemin just now either. There was too much blood – her cut must have reopened violently. It could even be infected. He half-turned to look back at Jongin.

“Yah,” he said. “You. Bring me that first-aid kit.” When Jongin grabbed the little tin box from the bedside table and handed it to him, Minho opened it and took out a bottle of peroxide. “Wet towel,” he said. Jongin fetched it. While he was in the washroom, Minho leaned closer to Taemin, praying that she understood everything he had to say. “I can't make him leave,” he said quietly. “He knows too much, and he could tell everyone. Just let me fix you up, and then I'll deal with Jongin.”

“Deal... deal with Jongin?”

“He's part of this now.”

Taemin looked down and took a deep, shuddering breath. “Okay,” she said. “. Okay.”

Jongin came out of the washroom with a wet towel and handed it to Minho. He was starting to look sick again.

“I should go,” he said quickly.

“Like hell you should.” Minho didn't look up as he firmly pulled Taemin's hands away from the hem of her jersey. “Shut up and hand me that peroxide.”

It was the lower part of her cut that had reopened. Minho carefully peeled away the pieces of the broken butterfly band-aids and cleaned around the cut, acutely aware of Jongin hovering in the background, looking but trying not to look. Acutely aware that Taemin looked more like a girl to him than she ever had before now, now that someone else was looking at her. Acutely aware of her slender waist, the way her ribs expanded with every shallow breath. The way her skin was soft as satin.

Minho glanced sideways at Jongin. He was looking.

He put it out of his mind and kept working. Taemin closed her eyes and looked away when he poured peroxide onto the cut, hissing quietly through her teeth when the liquid bubbled on contact. This time, he put on the butterfly band-aids and taped a gauze bandage over that to keep down the bleeding.

He was satisfied with his work. “Try not to twist around,” he said, making the movement so she'd understand. “You should get changed.” He glanced at Jongin again. “We'll be outside.”

She looked apprehensive, but he stood up anyway, grabbed Jongin's sleeve, and pulled him out the door. When it was closed behind them, he looked around to be sure that no one was in earshot.

“Listen, Jongin,” he said in a low voice. “You can't say anything about this.”

“I don't understand,” Jongin said, too loudly. “I just don't understand any of this. How is that... how is he...” words failed him.

“Help me out here, Jongin,” Minho said. “I know you know why she's hiding out here, so can't you have a little sympathy?”

Jongin looked at him like he was crazy. “Sympathy...? I haven't gotten there yet. I'm still... Please tell me this is a joke, hyung. A really bad joke.”

“Keep your voice down,” Minho said. “This isn't a joke. You know me.”

Jongin closed his eyes. “It's been months.”

“She's pretty good at hiding.”

“This changes everything.”

“Not really.”

Jongin opened his eyes. “What do you mean? How long have you known?”

Minho shrugged. “Couple of months.”

Jongin gaped at him. “Couple of months?”

“She's good at hiding, but we do live in the same room.”

Jongin leaned against the wall. “And you never said anything to me about it?”

“At first, I just assumed you knew, since you and her were so close.”

Jongin shook his head. “I had no idea. Not even a clue. But I did wonder how she was hiding...” He stopped and glanced at Minho. “It kind of makes sense now,” he said. “I get why she would do that.”

Minho forced himself not to ask the question burning in his mind. “We should really keep it down,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“She's in hiding. She wishes nobody knew. So we should... I don't know, we should just keep it down low. Not talk about it all the time. She wants to feel comfortable here.”

Jongin nodded absently, looking down the hallway to make sure no one was coming. “Of course. I just... this is ridiculous. After everything that's happened...”

Minho pushed Jongin against the wall. “Listen to me, Jongin,” he said. “I don't care what your problem with her is – I don't care about her goddamned secrets. All I know is that she's a scared girl.”

Jongin looked at him. “I know,” he said. “But do you really think she can keep this up?”

“If we help,” Minho said. “You'll help, won't you?”

“Well, yeah,” Jongin said. He paused for a moment too long. “Taemin is my friend.”

There was nothing Minho wanted to do more than shove Jongin into the wall and walk away, and never let him near Taemin again. But he paused to calm himself and let go of Jongin's shirt.

"You don't have to stick around," he said, wiping his palms on his shirt like touching Jongin had dirtied them. "But I swear to God, if you let this get out there is no limit to how far I will go to make your life hell. Get it?"

He'd struck the proper chord. Jongin gulped and nodded. "I get it."

Minho let a joyless smile curl up the corners of his mouth. "I'm glad we understand each other."