Sanghyuk wakes up at 6am the next morning – like he always does. Nakhun hyung has been offering him a lot of advice over text and he's right. The routine really is helping him. He wakes up, washes up, cleans up the house, does breakfast, and maybe reads a bit if he has the time. It has been this routine for the past week or two and the lack of disruption really gives him peace. It’s good to know that no one is going to attack him all of the sudden in the morning to cause him hurt. It’s good to know that he’s in control of his own life and that he’s learning to let himself belong to himself.

Things have been looking up lately and today feels like a day of soft orange so he picks out a shirt that reminds him of that exact color. He pads out of his room and takes a deep breath.

It’s going to be a good day. He’s going to make it a good day.

They finally managed to finish off all of Hongbin’s microwavable breakfast last week so he’s only just really starting to cook again this week. He’s not great at cooking, but spend enough time being beaten for messing up and you learn how to make edible breakfast. It’s easier to eat the things he cooks, knowing what’s in it and what’s not. Besides, Sanghyuk found a couple of cookbooks in Hongbin’s cabinets and it’s fun to follow the instructions. It’s distracting – takes his mind off of having to take charge of his thoughts all the time but mostly, it chases away the dirty feelings that settle on his bones from the bad dreams of the night before. Today, he’s lucky that his nightmares weren’t bad enough to make his hands shake.  

Hongbin stumbles out of the room just as he sets the table, looking paler than Sanghyuk has ever seen before. The bandages wrapped around his entire forearm stands out like an eyesore but Hongbin groggily grabs a jacket off the coat hanger and puts it on before Sanghyuk can get a good look at it. Sanghyuk obviously doesn’t say it but – Hongbin still looks put together – just… a little bit looser this morning, yet tighter at the same time. It looks almost like he got split down the middle and stitched back together but everything that had fallen out couldn’t be stuffed back in properly. Hongbin, for once, doesn’t look as tall and sturdy as mountains.

Sanghyuk is scared of what that might mean.          

But he still tries, because he really cannot afford to be scared of Hongbin. He’s the only person he’s got left.

“…Good morning, hyung.”

Hongbin gives a small smile. “Good morning, kiddo.”

It’s both risky and scary for Sanghyuk to fall into a deep sleep anymore so of course he heard Hongbin in the toilet last night, and of course he notices the disinfectant on the sink and the bandage packet sprawled across the medicine cabinet in the morning.

Hongbin isn’t that sort of person – isn’t that sort of person to leave things out of their original position. It’s probably because he was hurt bad, Sanghyuk figures. Probably cut himself on furniture last night. Should I ask him if he’s okay? No. It’s not – None of my business. He could – get – mad.

Every morning, Hongbin makes sure he asks Sanghyuk if he slept well, or if he feels like doing anything today. The answer is always almost the same (I slept well, hyung, I feel better today or I’m just going to finish reading). But today Hongbin just grabs a plate and starts to dig in after saying thank you. He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t ask any questions, doesn’t tell Sanghyuk what he’s doing today or what he wants Sanghyuk to do and it’s so… out of norm. Sanghyuk feels like he’s stepping on ice, air dry and frigid. He’s – Hongbin is just having a bad day. Yeah. He just – he’s going to be okay, he’s not going to be hurt. Hongbin wouldn’t do that. If Hongbin hurts him – no. This is Hongbin. Hongbin. Remember.

Sanghyuk watches as he slowly snaps out of his trance and ask if he wants to come along with him to work, food only half finished, all the while staring at nothing. It’s the first time Sanghyuk hasn’t seen him holding his tablet at the breakfast table and if Sanghyuk sees Moonhyuk instead of the kind man in front of him for the first half of breakfast, no one needs to know.

“I have a couple of shoots today then we can come home. Probably a couple of hours.” Hongbin finally, finally looks up at him and Sanghyuk thinks this is the first time he actually wants to be seen. “Sounds okay?”

“Y – Y – Yeah, okay, S – hyung.” Sanghyuk is starting to shake, can feel the little tremors rippling down his arm with the fear that something is off, that something bad might happen today.

But Sanghyuk says yes because the scariest thing is being left alone. He would much rather go out into a place with a million people together with Hongbin than have his mind as his only companion. Not when he can’t even put a leash on his own thoughts. He can feel himself kind of losing it and that’s only because Hongbin is a little out of character. Who knows what will happen if he isn’t even with Hongbin.

Besides, the people at the office are nice. Hakyeon hyung is nice even if he’s more than a little loud, Niel hyung is very nice to talk to, and Taekwoon hyung is nice in the small, miniscule ways that he thinks Sanghyuk doesn’t know. He handled the housewarming party, he can do it again. (Right?)

But the stutter wakes Hongbin up, makes him come back to himself. Sanghyuk hasn’t stuttered in a while, not with him. And the mixing up of Sir and hyung? Definitely hasn’t happened in a while.

Sanghyuk’s eyes are stuck between unfocused and trying his damn hardest to stay here. His hands are slack on the table, twitching ever so often that shows a loss of control over his own body.

“Hey, hey,” Hongbin says softly, moving his hand towards Sanghyuk’s arm, making sure that the boy can see whatever he’s doing. It took a long time for them to even reach this point, for Hongbin to even touch him without surprise. “Calm down. You’re fine, you’re fine. You’re safe here, alright?”

Sanghyuk looks at Hongbin, desperately wants to shout, but you’re not fine but he’s so scared of disobeying, so scared of being hurt that – no.

There is nobody coming to tell him that he’s not doing well enough on his own, that someone needs to come and retrain him, to take him into hand. There’s nobody here to beat him into doing whatever they say, or take him apart until he can’t recognize his own skin.

He can feel Hongbin’s hand on his. This touch doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t – Nothing hurts.

He’s okay. He’s fine.

----

It takes only 10 minutes for Sanghyuk to get ahold on himself (pretty much record time) and for Hongbin to believe that he’s fine (sometimes Sanghyuk thinks amusingly that it takes more time to convince Hongbin he’s okay than to convince himself that he’s okay. Hongbin is all “maybe we should stay at home today, I’ll cancel my shoots” “are you sure?” “really?” and Sanghyuk sometimes feels angry at how much Hongbin refuses to let go).

But as Sanghyuk manages to pick up the broken pieces of himself, he remembers what he was thinking off before he checked out. Except this time, his head is clear and he knows that he’s going to still be okay even if he speaks out of turn. This time, he doesn’t just want to shut up and be content, be happy that his knees are not tingling with the intense pain of kneeling too long and that his stomach is full. He wants something else, something more than just being alright.

So as they get ready to leave the house, Sanghyuk tugs lightly at the sleeve of Hongbin’s jacket, and Hongbin glances up at his face (Sanghyuk pretty much gains an extra 5cm in a few weeks – if it’s because the boy is eating more or if the boy is standing up straighter, Hongbin still doesn’t know) , his face that looks much more… free than he has ever seen.

“It will be okay.” His voice is tiny, tiny and small, but definitely here in the present, on the doorstep of this warm house.

Hongbin swallows, suddenly painfully aware that Sanghyuk knows. Not everything of course, but he knows that something is killing Hongbin from the inside out, and it bothers him. He never wanted to not be strong for Sanghyuk. Something that vaguely reminds him of a knife twists sharply in his chest, and the house suddenly becomes too small, like the walls are closing in.

Hongbin plasters a smile on his face, like he has so many times in his life. “I know. I’m okay, don’t worry. Let’s go.”

[A/N] Brownie points for people who spot the foreshadowing. I am scared of what I will be doing to you guys over the next few chapters.