At first, Nakhun doesn’t realize when Sanghyuk sits down in the chair. It’s only after he sends his text message that he looks up to find Sanghyuk looking awkwardly at the screen, looking at him, but not really at the same time. That distant look in which Sanghyuk engages in is definitely not because of the actual distance between the both of them. 

“Oh, shoot.” The audio comes on with a small crackle. “Hello!”

“Hi, Sir.” Sanghyuk smiles, sincerely wishing that the resolution isn’t good enough for Nakhun to see how the edges of his lips are shaking.

“There you go again, calling everyone Sir.” Nakhun jokingly chides and Sanghyuk still can’t really differentiate. “Told you hyung was fine.”

“Hi, hyung.” Sanghyuk says, but it feels like a medal he doesn’t deserve, a reward he never earned.

Nakhun slides his phone away from sight. “So how are you?”

My body feels like collapsing on itself all the time. “I’m doing okay.”

“Physically and emotionally?”

“Um.” Sanghyuk decides that trying to lie would be too obvious for a person that looks so much of a dead shell as him, so he goes with a half-lie. “I’m… working on it?”

Nakhun gets the hint and doesn’t continue to chase. “You look a lot better, though, so that’s fantastic!”

“Thank you.” Sanghyuk says, but he knows it’s just a polite phrasing for noting that he got a little bit rounder, a little bit fatter. He doesn’t really think about his food intake anymore, but it’s only because he forces his food down half the time before his gag reflex can purge it all out. He thinks about his weight all the time but at least he’s eating so he considers his problem fixed.

“Anyway, I just wanted to invite you to my housewarming.” Sanghyuk can pick up on the caution in the words, the way they just manage to squeeze out through Nakhun’s lips as silently as possible. “How would you feel about that?”

“What’s a house – housewarming?”

Nakhun stuns for a bit at how a fifteen year old boy doesn’t know what a housewarming is but quickly changes his expression before the pixels on the screen can pick up on the micro-expression. He’s glad for the slight lag that Skype always manages and he’s probably the only person who has ever thought that a lag could be positive.

“Um, it’s like a party,” Nakhun says and Sanghyuk doesn’t freak out. Carefully doesn’t freak out, doesn’t let his breathing go out of control. “To celebrate my new house and I guess – being proposed to? It feels kinda weird, saying that. I have a fiancé. Ugh. Weird.”

Parties doesn’t exactly sound like the sort of thing that he would like right now. Sure, as a kid, Christmas parties were great – it meant people came dressed as Santa Claus and gave stuff away to the kids at the Home, but right now he can’t even trust his memories anymore. What if parties were these entirely different things that he can’t handle or can’t learn to deal with, like a lot of other things in his life right now actually, he realizes with a bitter aftertaste. Nakhun keeps rambling.

“It’s just gonna be pizza and snacks and I guess, general... socializing. People are going –" Nakhun looks up and the smile slides off his face. "Oh.”

There is a silence so loud that Sanghyuk almost feels like he’s being reprimanded. He almost stands to leave, almost goes to Hongbin and tell him he can’t do this anymore – can’t keep bothering people like this (You better shut the hell up when I’m working before you make me go over there) –

“I’m sorry, that was stupid.” Nakhun’s voice breaks through the trance. “You’re probably worried about the people aren’t you?”

Sanghyuk physically draws into himself, becomes a little tighter.

“I swear I’m not asking to use it against you.”

“O – Okay,” The words slip out between Sanghyuk’s teeth. It’s more a defensive reaction than an agreement. “Yeah. Yeah.”

Hongbin’s head pops out from his bedroom and he silently mouths an Everything okay? which Sanghyuk doesn’t know how to respond to. A curt nod is all he can get out without feeling like a complete cheat, but it proves to be very unconvincing because Hongbin puts down his files and walks towards him.

“I’m guessing you just told him about the housewarming.”

“Yeah,” Nakhun frowns. “Has he not met the rest yet?”

Hongbin’s face pulls into a careful blend of a cringe and a sheepish smile as he shakes his head. “He has only met Leo hyung and Hakyeon hyung.”

“Not even Si-kyung sunbae?”

Hongbin shakes his head. “He's on honeymoon, remember? He’s not gonna be in Korea until next month.”

“Right.” Nakhun scowls. “Anyway, Sanghyuk -”

Sanghyuk doesn’t look up, hands picking nervously at the loose thread of the seat cushion. “I can go, Sir.”

 “Hyung –” Nakhun corrects, then startles. “What?”

“I… can go.” Sanghyuk looks at him uneasily, shifting his weight. “Hyung.”

“No.” Hongbin shakes his head frantically, but the way his eyes look like they’re a little bit brighter betray him. He’s good at hiding every emotion but true, genuine surprise. “Don’t do things you don’t want, Hyuk-ah. I thought we talked about this.”

Sanghyuk considers his thoughts carefully and nods. “I know we’ve talked about it.”

“And?” Uncomfortably, Hongbin pulls a seat to sit next to Sanghyuk. 

“And I – I want to go.” Sanghyuk says quietly. 

Hongbin looks at Sanghyuk’s face and quickly thanks the heavens for Sanghyuk not making eye contact because his heart is fluttering, because suddenly, out of nowhere, ‘I want to kiss you’ just pops into his head. And his heart would probably give an audible shout of surprise if it could. Admittedly, there have been some odd and strangely endearing thoughts about his roommate going on in his head the past week, but he never thought his heart meant it in… this way, whatever this way means. Hongbin had pushed them to the side, telling himself that he’d deal with them later, when he had time to deal with them, but the universe has a way of getting things done before you can even react.

Hongbin blinks. But, still, later, Hongbin. Get yourself together.

“Do you mean it?” Nakhun says.

“Yeah. Um. Do you mean it?” Hongbin repeats like an idiot to try and hide the utter chaos happening in his head.

“Yes.” Sanghyuk says softly. “I want to go. I can’t… can’t stay in this… bubble forever.”

Hongbin looks at Nakhun.

“But could I – um – have the list of people going?”

They both laugh. 

***

The Skype call ends after a few more topics Nakhun brings up because Sanghyuk can’t manage to keep his feet on the ground. Maybe it’s the prospect of going to the party that’s causing him to freak out, maybe not. But the hands of a horrible past manage to claw their way into his consciousness anyway despite no trigger at all and he has to close his eyes for the waves of pain to subside. His brain simply will not turn off. His thoughts are always tangled and there is a constant buzz of memories playing in an incessant loop. Sometimes his thoughts are going so quickly that it feels like a pen ripping paper as it drags viciously over the page.

Its pain brought over and over to the surface. No matter how hard he tries to suppress them they never leave him alone – like the oil matting a bird’s feathers.

Sanghyuk brings his knees up to his chest and drops his forehead onto the table.

“Sorry, I just –” Sanghyuk gasps out.  

“Take your time, Hyuk-ah.” Hongbin says gently. “Please take your time.”

His muscles are quaking so hard that they hurt but his body involuntarily tries to hide itself from a pain so huge and tangible that it feels almost external. His hands move unconsciously to the back of his neck, to claw away the fear sticking to his skin.

Hongbin tries not to move to touch Sanghyuk just because he’s panicked, but the area he’s scratching is only a few more nail tracks away before blood shows. He grabs Sanghyuk’s wrist in mid-air and the boy stops moving, just keeps shaking like he’s in sub-zero temperature.

“It’s me, Hongbin.” He says, trying to keep as little force as possible on Sanghyuk’s wrist. “It’s me. You're gonna be okay but you’re hurting yourself, Hyuk-ah.”

Sanghyuk isn’t completely out of it yet, so he can tell its Hongbin by the smell of the detergent they use stuck to his clothes. He can tell by the way fingers are circling softly around his wrist, not a whole fist with a force that could crush his bones. He can tell by –

“S – Sorry.” He says, and he means it, because he doesn’t know how to stop these things from happening. "Just give me a second, I promise I'll be okay."

Hongbin’s stomach hurts like he needs to puke. Sanghyuk continues to gasp and sounds of distress push their way out of his throat.

“Don’t be, don’t be.” Hongbin says and his voice is starting to become clearer. “You’re safe, you’re safe…”

It takes a couple more minutes before Sanghyuk manages to climb his way up and out of the rut that he’s in. Hongbin doesn’t shout at him at all.  

***

Sanghyuk tries to do the dishes but his ability to even walk without support is questionable at best. He tries to stand up and quite nearly lands on his face.

So he has to sling his arm around Hongbin’s shoulder (or more like Hongbin forces him to) as he stumbles into his room to sleep all the tension in his muscles off. His eyes are heavy and his body feels sluggish, but not in the way that feels like it’s not part of him and he's just dragging his body around like a dead limb. It’s in the way of so much energy pinging around in his veins that it feels unreal, and Sanghyuk guesses he should be grateful for that, in a way, because he has hardly ever felt so… alive.

As Hongbin helps Sanghyuk lie down onto the bed, arranges his blankets for him, he tries his hardest to ignore the low, inappropriate churning in his belly and the weird thumping of his heart. But he can’t stop himself for lingering at the light switch to look at Sanghyuk for a little while more.

Sanghyuk’s eyes are heavy and he doubts he can keep them open much longer but he looks at Hongbin leaning against the door frame and there is such an obvious show of affection on Hongbin’s face that he has to shyly look away after a few seconds.

 “Why are you looking at me like that?” Sanghyuk says, tongue too heavy to enunciate his words but he can’t remember the last time he didn’t stutter in a sentence. Or didn’t have to remind himself to not call the other half of the conversation, Sir.

There is a brief silence and Sanghyuk is still being stared at. His bones feel like embers emitting heat. That’s another emotion to add to the list of today.

“Because I’m proud of you, Hyuk-ah” Hongbin grins. “What you did tonight with accepting the Skype call, and what you said during the Skype call, and how you handled the attack after, and just the whole day in general – I’m so, so proud.”

“Hyung, it’s going to be –” Sanghyuk stops to choose his words. “Har – Hard for me.”

Hongbin knows what he's trying to say, but it’s not every night that he gets so many words out of the boy. Might as well take advantage of it. “What will?”

Softly he says, almost a whisper that just manages to travel across the room like even sound waves are helping them, “Talking to people.”

“Of course it will,” Hongbin says, smiling, evenly distributing his sympathy for and faith in Sanghyuk. “But I know you’re not the type to want to keep running away from things.”

Sanghyuk lets out a shaky breath. “Yeah?”  

“Yeah.” Hongbin doesn’t skip a beat and the corners of his mouth quirk sharply upwards. “You’ve had such a long day, Hyuk-ah. Get some rest now. Sleep tight.”