JULY 7

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   Chan watched as Minho sat alone, arms around his shins, and staring blankly at the fire fizzling out, wearing that foggy expression of his.

   There is a fine line between a relaxed face— one that is merely resting, void of expression, while the mind behind it is more or less empty— and a mask that's worn to hide restlessness and turmoil within— held straight and tight, unblinking, fighting the shaking pupils inside cloudy, overcast eyes. Only a few could tell the difference. Fewer still paid enough attention to notice it.

   On the other hand, Jisung sat next to Chan, with Felix having at some point drifted away, seeming listless and out of it, as he'd been doing off-and-on all day long.

   Chan was watching them both, eyebrows furrowed, head tilting slightly as he glanced back and forth. Across to the other side of the fire and back. Minho. Jisung.

   Now, he wasn't exactly up-to-date on the goings-on between the two of them, but he had been told (and had picked up on by himself), that Jisung had become someone that Minho could lean on. The only one that Minho could lean on. Chan had witnessed the electric current between them himself. But what was he doing right now?

   It bothered Chan, that Jisung— who he'd known to be observant and almost endlessly caring and compassionate—  just seemed so indifferent. For the past several months, whenever he'd been awake enough to notice, Chan had seen Jisung gradually get Minho accustomed to being close to him. Almost like, one night at a time, Jisung would pull him down into his arms more and more. Until they could all get together for a movie night and Minho could fall asleep cuddled up to him, and he would have to threaten the other boys to keep them from taking pictures, because Minho would be genuinely upset by that. 

   But then came Jisung's strange disappearance. 

   And now it seemed to be reversed. They started drifting further and further apart over the past few days, hadn't they? But Chan hadn't really noticed Minho seeming this visibly disturbed until now, and now was when it struck him that Jisung was nowhere near Minho— now that he noticed, the fact that Jisung and he were seated totally opposite each other was quite significant. (If Chan recalled correctly, the two of them had ridden separate from each other on the ride here, too.) And in this moment it seemed that, for once, Jisung wasn't even paying a scrap of attention to Minho.

   It was all very weird. What was going on? What was with Jisung?

   He pondered it all for a while, but eventually, seeking answers, Chan reached out and tapped Jisung's arm. Jisung seemed to have woken up from a deep, yet open-eyed sleep at the contact. Jolting awake, he looked back at Chan.

   Chan flicked his head and his gaze toward Minho as an answer. "Look at him," he mouthed.

   Jisung did look. He looked at right Minho, silently struggling across from him, and breathed a deep, quiet sigh. But he did nothing.

   Chan leaned over to whisper, "Jisung, what's going on with you two?"

   Jisung gave a hushed, nervous chuckle. "Can we talk about it somewhere else?"

   Chan nodded and one after another they got up and headed down the shore. As Jisung moved, Minho finally perked up and focused on something that wasn't the floor. He watched them with questioning eyes as they left.

   They walked side-by-side, high tide erasing their footsteps behind them, until the glow of the fire was distant and they were far, far out of earshot. And finally, a sea breeze carried the sound of Jisung's voice, fragile and unsure, over the crash of the waves.

   "Hyung, I'm being an idiot. But I don't know what else to do."

   "...What do you mean?"

   "Minho is... He's still not entirely comfortable around the rest of the guys, but I've seen him. He's... only just now developing his actual personality, I think. He only really shows it to me. But it's there." Chan heard a bit of a proud smile in his voice, and saw a glimpse of it too, when he turned his head as Jisung paused.  "Hyung, I've never had a friend group before— nothing like this— so once I finally felt like things were good— I mean... once Minho started to have an actual personality instead of just sort of... embodying trauma, we were finally able to be friends. Actual friends." Jisung took a deep breath, kicking the sand. "But as soon as that started, I started to like him. ...Not as a friend." 

   Silently, Chan turned toward Jisung as the boy stopped in his place; shoulders falling heavily. He stared at his feet; at the foam tumbling over them. "It's so disappointing. I waited so long to be friends with him. And now that I have the chance..." He sighed. "Anyway, I've been trying to get over him before it really has the chance to get bad. It's only a little crush, right now. But I figure, maybe I can kill it off now, if I stay away for a while." 

   "You're right. You are being an idiot." Chan gave a short, tense chuckle. "I get it— and I see why you would choose to do that, because that honestly must suck. But can't you see the effect it's having on him?"

   Jisung gulped, pressing his lips together, his head still hanging. "...Yeah. I think so. He's starting to go back into his shell... isn't he?"

   Chan huffed out a brief, frustrated sigh. Jisung didn't know the half of it. And observant as he was, he certainly would have known if he'd just been there.

   Minho was crying himself to sleep most nights (if he even did fall asleep— Chan didn't know). Chan could hear bits of his muffled sobs— his sharp, gasping breaths— through the wall sometimes, when it was far too late and everyone else was asleep, so it was otherwise dead quiet. And during the day, he was starting to act more and more like the Minho Chan had known in high school, when they'd first met. That shy, zipped-mouth, lonely kid in the back of the classroom.

   Suddenly, turning to face Jisung, he asked, "You know why he got so sick right in the middle of summer?"

   Jisung waited, wordless, meeting Chan's eyes with guilt written all over his face; pooling in his eyes and etched into the downward curve of his lips.

   "He hasn't been sleeping, Jisung. He's hardly eating. You of all people know how much he keeps inside. It's gotta be bad if I can visibly see that something's going on with him. I don't know everything but I do know that you keeping your distance from him has ripped open a freshly closed wound... and that his insecurities are eating him alive."

And... honestly, Ji, I think it's kind of especially cruel to treat like him like this, when you were the one that finally got him to open up... even if you don't have bad intentions. It's just not fair."

   Jisung nodded slowly, letting the harsh but entirely true words soak in. "You're right. I— I know all that. I try not to think about it, 'cause it hurts so much, but I know." He swallowed hard. "Hyung, please, just take care of him until this blows over. I just... just need a second."

   "He needs you, Jisung."

   Desperate, Jisung broke out with: "He just needs someone to be there for him. Please."

   The aftermath of Jisung's outburst, a tense silence, crept between them. Jisung rubbed his eyes while Chan thought through his next words. 

   "Look, I know this is hard for you. But you need to talk to him about what's going on. I would've expected you to do that pretty much right away. Maybe he feels the same way about you."

    "And... if he doesn't feel the same? Think about what that would do to him. I'm the only one he actually feels comfortable around. I'm his first ever close friend. He thinks of me as his safe place— which is something he's never had before. What do you expect me to do, sweep that out from under him as soon as he's gotten used to it by telling him I think I love him? It's not like I haven't thought about this, hyung." Jisung threw his hands limply. The power trickled out of his voice, leaving it weak and despondent as he continued, "We could say we'll just stay friends, but we all know how that goes. He especially wouldn't know how to deal with it."

   "But..." Chan struggled to form a response.

   Jisung, on the other hand, had more yet to say. "And if it turns out he really loves me too, then what? Do you honestly think he's ready for a relationship?"

   Chan was quiet. The breeze began to pick up, kicking the waves up higher onto their legs, splashing up to their torsos.

   "I don't think so. He's barely even able to accept the fact that he wants to be loved. He doesn't really know who he is yet, and he's constantly one step away from a self-loathing spiral. He can't communicate; he's co-dependent— he kind of checks all the boxes for 'not ready for a relationship'! So what do you expect me to do, just say 'sorry, we can't date 'cause you're too messed up'? I don't even think I can handle a relationship right now. I don't want to be in love!"

   Jisung's last words came as a shaky sob that preceded a distant rumble of thunder. His breaths were heavy as he turned his head to see lightning strike far out over the ocean. Chan saw a tear roll down his cheek as he bit his lips.

    His voice was thick with tears as he concluded, "I promise you the last thing I want is to act cold to him, but every time I see him I get scared of things changing. And maybe I don't want anything to change right now! I'm scared, hyung; I'm fucking stressed out. Things have been overwhelming as shit recently."

   Jisung was a bit suprised when Chan put an arm around his shoulder. The rain was starting to trickle down.

   "Let's head back," was all Chan said. Softly.

    Jisung let him turn them both around to start back toward the beach house. With his head low, he pressed close to Chan, sniffling every so often.

   Unsurprisingly, the fire was put out and deserted as they passed. When they were finally walking up the steps to get inside, half-drenched from the downpour, they split, and Jisung stopped at the door, turning around with one last thing to say: "Hyung. I'll talk to him, I promise."

   Well, at least that was one load off his mind. Maybe Chan would feel relieved enough to sleep tonight.

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oh hooray something's finally happening