@kae-22  you're on proofreading duty <3

JUNE 4

.

all i want a simple answer. whose fault was it?

but it's such a mess now that i really can't tell. and i'm clearly not going to be able to figure it out while i'm still here, in this suffocating place, mulling over it alone. it's only getting more muddled the harder i try... and  i suppose it's no wonder, because you can't think straight when you're suffocating. 

so... even if it really was all me being dramatic and playing for attention, even if i brought it all on myself for sympathy— even if i don't deserve to be happy now, still... maybe i can just go. 

...well that's what i would've thought, until jisung got to me.

    A steady thump filled Minho's ears as he woke this morning— Jisung's heartbeat. He woke to Jisung's hands in his hair; Jisung's body wrapped around his. So he kept his eyes closed a little longer; his cheek pressed against Jisung's chest. Warm and serene.

   It wasn't until Jisung's hand went still, no longer carding through thick, dark hair, that he peeled tired eyes open. Drowsily tilting his head up, Minho met Jisung's half-lidded eyes... and suddenly the touch of the fingertips on his back felt like flames. Pulsing with heat.

   Minho began to slowly pull away, rising to a sitting position. Something was off. Something was different. But was it bad? ...No? Probably?

   Jisung propped himself up on an elbow, bedhead on full display as he took a good look at Minho— one that felt weighty. "Morning," he began, voice surprisingly deep and throaty. "Feel okay?"

   Minho shrugged, his eyes falling down to the bedsheets (though not without taking a pit stop at the patch of exposed skin where Jisung's shirt had twisted and ridden up as he moved). "Alright, I guess." How would he know? He felt ransacked with emotions leftover from last night (and perhaps some that were added on just now, this morning) to the point that he couldn't seem to identify any of them. Really, the only thing he knew for sure was that his heart was thumping with unusual fervor for about nine-thirty in the morning. 

   "Do you want help today?" Jisung yawned, starting to sink back into his pillow.

   That had two meanings. Jisung was asking if Minho would like help packing and moving, but he was also asking if Minho would like to have him there for emotional support. Because... yeah. Somehow. Jisung convinced him. 

   Last night they had moved from the porch swing to the bed after Jisung had dropped that bomb of a suggestion on Minho. Thinking about it again now, Minho could feel the fear strike his heart like lightning. The same fear that had ushered in refusal the very moment Jisung had said "I think you should talk to your family."

   Jisung had lost hope for an answer rather quickly when he saw what that did to Minho. That's why he'd just stood up and led Minho by the hand to his room. And when they sat side by side on the bed he'd done nothing but wait for Minho to put his hand wherever it needed to go.

   It was the silence that did Minho in. Convinced him. Perhaps because he'd always known he should. That no matter how much he wanted to believe they would, his problems wouldn't all go away just because he'd escaped. He had some sneaking suspicion that refusing to talk to them and just continuing to play this game would be the most childish thing of all.

   Even then, he said nothing, only took Jisung's hand, put it over his shoulder, and tapped it once. Within the next hour he was asleep on Jisung's chest. And now he was here, shaking his head slowly, saying: "You can go back to sleep. I... I'll pick you up after I'm done and we can go over together... okay?

   "Mm, okay." Jisung started to close his eyes again as Minho stood up, ignoring the growing urge to lay back down; take his spot back. He'd much rather continue resting his head on Jisung's chest and ignoring his problems... but it was now or never. And it couldn't be never.

   But before Minho got to the door he heard the sheets rustle; Jisung sat up again. "Hey, Minho?"

   He turned, catching one more glimpse of a messy-haired Jisung, glowing with the bits of morning sun that crept in through the window, his gentle eyes suddenly wide open and piercing, shining with fierce tenacity alongside his ardent concern.

    "No matter what they say to you, please, I'm begging you... remember that what you went through is valid."

   Was it lying to say he would if he'd never truly, wholly believed that in the first place?

.

   Minho returned to his half-packed mess of a room, evidence of his indecision strewn across the floor. Signs of his mental breakdown in the twisted, crumpled sheets on his bed. Of course, they were only evidence and signs to him— no one else would've known, even though Minho's paranoia caused him to doubt that. He wondered how it would've looked to his family, if one of them happened to uncharacteristically wander into the room while he'd been gone. More than that, though, he wondered what it'd look like to them when the room was stripped bare again; what message it would leave.

ah fuck it. forget the messages. forget hints and clues. i'm saying it all, anyway. forget this fucked up little game.

   With trembling hands, Minho threw socks and cat treats and books and pairs of pants into boxes. It didn't really matter to him what went were, since he would only be driving it all of fifteen minutes away before unpacking again. All that mattered was that he got everything now so that he wouldn't have to come back. He wouldn't take the bed frame, or the dresser, or the bookshelves. He'd live out of his boxes if he had to. Taking his old furniture would only remind him of this place anyway.

   In his mind, there were two possibilities for how it would go down. There was a slight chance that there would only be realization: shocked faces and apologies— putting it all down to nothing but oblivion and misunderstandings. More likely, though, there would be denial and dismissal: fiery eyes, indignant scoffing and shouting. 

   Either way, the masks were coming off. And on one hand that sounded like exactly what he wanted. It should've been exactly what he wanted. But somehow, something in him wanted anything but to take them off. Why?

maybe i'm really just worried that if i tell them, and it turns out that they had no clue this was going on, then they'll start trying to fix things... and i don't want them to. maybe because if they fix things, then i won't have excuses anymore— i won't have any reasons why my life has just been so hard and im a poor little baby deserving of everyone's sympathy.

but i don't really want everyone's sympathy, do i? i don't want to be pitied or fawned over or babied— ew, especially not that. maybe i did in the beginning, but not anymore. so now what do i have to gain by keeping the mask? what do i want?

what is it that i fucking want?

   Minho felt himself unraveling again, teetering on the edge of another breakdown. He knew by now that letting himself continue in introspection would be like knocking over a domino— he'd send himself straight into another spiral, and Jisung would have to fish him out and they'd start over again.

   So he stood and walked away from his boxes for a moment, scooping up a cat, pressing his face into fur, breathing deeply with his eyes closed. Distraction.

forget all that. i want to be happy.

  He put the cat down and resumed his packing. He'd just have to hope for the shouting. Honestly, he wanted it, badly. He was ready to be called an ungrateful, disrespectful, spoiled bitch. After years of simply intuiting (and therefore believing with all his heart) that everyone thought that's what he was, and of obsessively repeating such things to himself in his own mind, it'd be refreshing to hear it come straight out of someone's mouth for once. There had never been bold-faced insults in Minho's house. Only slander behind the back and hostile glances, or (very occasionally) passive-aggressive comments or complaints. 

   All he wanted now was to hear them come out and say it. I hate you. I wish you were never born. What he'd known for years.

   As soon as he got this over with, whether they were screaming at him or not, he would go. That thought was what got him to power through.

  Suddenly there was only one more trip to make. Backpack on, cat carrier in one hand, and keys in the other, Minho was ready. With a churning stomach he plowed downstairs, no longer trying to keep his volume down or avoiding being seen. Whereas before he'd taken the other stairway to avoid passing through it, this time, he went through the kitchen, where he could hear signs of life. Footsteps, running water, the like.

   His mother. A sister. Each going about their weekday business. (But honestly, since when were they not at work at this time during the week?) They stared at him and his luggage, furrowing their eyebrows. He froze in the middle of the room.

   He cleared his throat with shuddering breaths, feeling his chest compressed with the weight of their eyes on him. 

   People are always saying that things are 'easier said than done'. Well that's a fucking lie, Minho found, because it was so much harder to tell these people he was leaving because of what they did to him than to just head for the door and slam it behind him.

   Wait a minute, how was he even supposed to do this? Where should he begin? How much should he say? Shouldn't he say it to everyone at once? Well, not everyone was here. And what was he supposed to do? Gather everyone up for a fuckin' family meeting just to say "You guys suck!" and run?

   Air wasn't coming in anymore and his throat was closing up. He was losing his moment— his perfect chance to do this and go. This was supposed to be the end of the endless game... and if the endgame was upon them, then Minho was going to have the first move by initiating it the conversation that would bring it about. That's what he had imagined, anyway, when he was alone in his room... but now all he wanted was to crawl into a hole and die. Terrified.

   "Where are you going?" His sister asked, bewildered. Sounding judgmental than interested.

   And just like that, instinct kicked in and he couldn't control himself. His posture straightened; his expression went blanker than blank, wiped clean like a dry erase board.

   "Leaving for the summer," he stated, his eyes just as emotionless as his tone. "Bye."

   He had nothing more to say to them.

   .

ugh we'll have to wait ONE MORE chapter for the real action cuz this was getting long