Chapter Text
San had always been an energetic child. It wasn’t something uncommon for any peer of his at the ripe age of 5.
He was the type of child that would make any parent or caretaker beg for a power off button. His energy was endless. He couldn’t sit still, even if it meant midday naps or waiting for his turn to speak. When it would be playtime, San would be the one kid running laps around the playgrounds, his friends trying to catch up. Always so close, but never enough to reach him.
However, there is one thing that can change a child drastically.
“Do you like it here?” His mom had once asked him.
“Yes.”
“That’s good. How do you think about you, mommy and daddy moving here? We found a school that we think that you will like and make a lot of new friends.”
San found very early the feeling of losing all flooring, of losing what he knew was supposed to be constant in his life.
He couldn’t focus anymore on how he was in the midst of summer, how his birthday was in a week, how he was on vacation with his parents. That was all forgotten, thoughts too occupied with missing his friends all of a sudden.
He hadn’t even gotten the chance to say goodbye to his friends. What if they were forever, tirelessly waiting for him to come back to school? How would they even know that San was never going to come back? He hadn’t have the chance to tell them. And that thought quickly terrorized his brain, obscuring his sunny summer with a dark cloud until the autumn rains could hide some of the sadness.
San looks back at this moment as a probable reason as to why he feels so protective of those he loves the most. Even if he tries to hide it, he knows it’s always there; the fear that, one day, his normal life, his friends, they will all be taken away from him as easily as his parents did without knowing. He is constantly scared of losing his friends without having the chance of saying goodbye. His mantra is that he can’t lose them if he has an eye on them 24/7.
~~~
8 makes 1 braincell
San:
Calling all pirates to the ship.
As everyone might be aware, it is time for our MONTHLY meetup.
You know the rules.
Everyone has to go. Doesn’t matter if you fought, if you’re sick, if you’re late. Monthly meet up doesn’t give a fuck about your stupid excuses. You appear.
I hope we are clear :)
Wooyoung:
This is… a very passive aggressive way of reminding us of the rules?
Did something happen?
San:
Don’t worry about it, just be sure you go
Wooyoung:
Don’t worry, no one from this dysfunctional household would allow me to miss it.
Yunho:
Saying that as if we didn’t threaten to dragging you to the bbq.
Wooyoung:
UNRELATED
Seonghwa:
It is completely related.
Mingi:
“Unrelated,” dude you didn’t leave your bed for a full week, I thought you had grown root into it.
Wooyoung:
dude
Hongjoong:
Wooyoung?
You:
Did something happen?
San:
I don’t know, did something happen that you also want to share?
Jongho:
Stop it.
Wooyoung:
… did something happen between you three?
~~~
black cat
:
Spit it.
You:
Spit what, exactly?
:
What happened to Jongho.
You:
Please free me from another pain in my ass. San is enough. I would rather not have two.
:
So you did something.
You:
Yes, Sherlock.
I was on Jongho duty. That’s all you’re getting.
Nosy bitch.
~~~
He felt a bit out of place. It was lunch time, and this was the first time that he didn’t know what to do at the playground. Because he was alone.
Sure, there were a bunch of kids running around, and, looking at them, San also wanted to run with them, he just didn’t have the courage to go up to them and ask to join them. They were definitely having fun without him, he didn’t need to go and interrupt them. For what? To join them? It didn't seem worth it. It looked cruel for San.
That’s why he stuck to the corner, observing the other play in front of him, ignoring his existence. He could still enjoy playtime by watching it… right?
“Why are you here? Are you grounded?” It was a kid from his class, San figured. He tried to puzzle through his mind around all the faces he saw today to match the one in front of him, but he kept drawing a blank.
“Hmm? Oh, no?”
“Then why are you here? I thought you were grounded.”
San shrugged, resuming his new (favorite?) show of watching friends that he could be with if he just had the courage to go up to them and started talking. The kid next to him seems to catch onto him. He must know that being the new kid is hard.
“Well, I’m waiting for Seonghwa to come back from lunch, so we can play together, if you want. He can join us when he is done.”
“Okay… I’m San.”
The kid gave him a smile. If he already knew San’s name, he didn’t let it transpire, just happy to be helping the new students integrate. “Hi San. I’m Hongjoong. What do you want to play?”
~~~
“Sangie, are you ready?”
“No.”
Confrontation. There wasn’t one thing that Yeosang despised more than confrontation. Those types of situations always led him to overthink them over and over, and feel completely bad about whatever he had done (even if sometimes it was an honest mistake). The idea of talking one on one about a topic that he was uncomfortable with dreaded him.
He didn’t want to talk about what had happened last week in the apartment. Living here was already enough to relive the whole situation. He could barely text Jongho without feeling like he was at fault for what had happened, and now he was supposed to see the Chois in person? San full on protective mode, mad at him? That’s a ticket straight to hell, in Yeosang’s eyes.
He was not ready to leave the house and see San face-to-face.
“Avoiding it won’t make it better,” Hongjoong reminds him, because Hongjoong always tries to be the rational in Yeosang’s life the same way Yeosang is the calm in Hongjoong’s life.
“You’re saying that as if seeing him will make it better.”
He had been walking around his room for a while, biting at his nails and stressing himself more over the idea of seeing the other party. Everyone knew that San was protective and that he had his reasons for it. What happened to Jongho was something that Yeosang should’ve stopped. But since he didn’t, he was, temporarily (maybe), in San’s black list. He was in an uncomfortable spot.
“Look, I can’t promise you that it will be easy. We both know how San is in these types of situations–”
“Tell me about it.”
“–but we can’t miss the hangout. You know the rules. Just go and let’s pretend that everything is fine. If he starts getting on you too much, or annoys you, I assure that me or Jongho will immediately be there to stop him. Just, please.”
~~~
“Who is the new friend?”
“Seonghwa!” At the sound of his friend’s voice, Hongjoong is quick to abandone the insect retrieving zone to hug him. “This is San.”
“Hi San, I’m Seonghwa. What are you guys doing?”
“Catching insects,” San responds in concentration. The activity seems to peak Seonghwa’s interest, as he, accompanied by Hongjoong, both look over the new student’s shoulder, just in time to see him catch a small lizard. “Guys look!”
Seonghwa lets a high pitched screech leave his mouth as Hongjoong pushes him to get a closer look at the insect. The poor thing tried really hard to run away, but San’s hold on it was strong enough to keep him in place.
“Wow. Are you going to keep it?” Hongjoong questions, respect written all over his face as Seonghwa hides cowardly behind him.
“No. My parents will be mad at me.” San retreats a bit to release the lizard back to its home, “bye bye, little friend.”
~~~
“Wooyoung, we’re leaving,” Yunho’s voice, with a tired undertone, reverbs through the house, making one last round call to the whole household.
“Just a minute! I’m missing my shoes!”
“Make that thirty seconds, please.”
Wooyoung quickly runs to the shoe area, picking the first pair that seems to match his whole fit, because he knows that Yunho is not joking about leaving without him. All of his friends are looking at him put on his shoes, so he mentally curses himself and his neediness of wanting to look normal (even if Seonghwa is staring daggers at Yunho). He was still recovering from a low, and, as much as a soft, warm sweater would be a better option for his current state of mind, he didn’t want to go out like that. So he might have gone overdressed a little bit for the occasion.
It was just their favourite Korean Barbeque restaurant, he surely could have chosen a more comfortable outfit. Seonghwa was going with a sweater, but, unlike him, he needed the illusion of stability to make it reality. He had the feeling that if he chose to go ‘laid down,’ it would bring his demeanour back to base zero, and he needed it to stay where it was, even if it was in base one.
“Did you catch on what they were talking about?” Seonghwa asks, concern in his voice as he picks the house keys and his car keys.
“My guesses are on; Jongho might have relapsed while Yeosang was supposed to keep an eye out on him and now San is upset.”
“Oh, you’re ready. Let’s go?”
The house had a weird ambience. It was fully revested of eggs, and one wrong move would make the whole structure go down. If Jongho had been in a bad mood days before the incident, after it was a full emotional imbalance, getting worse by the minute as San lashed out on Yeosang. Jongho thanked how most of the interactions between the two had, recently, been through the phone. The fight didn’t reach irreversible levels…
…yet.
That’s what he feared the most. The idea of going out as a group without having this resolved bothered Jongho. He knew that it was going to be talked about over lunch, despite all the deflection that he could do. And it would generate more innerfights.
He didn’t want to go. He really didn’t want to go. And he hoped that Hongjoong would allow Yeosang to skip this meetup as well.
The hangouts followed very simple rules. They had to be planned with a month of antecedence, that way they could avoid people not going, and, after years of friendship, they never had anyone miss it. Wooyoung had once appeared whilst being sick, even if San had (uselessly) insisted that the rules could be bent this one time. Yunho and Hongjoong had once appeared after they had a misunderstanding over Seonghwa’s well-being during a rough patch. It had been an awkward hangout, but they had (hopefully) made up by the end of it.
Being there was important.
These weren’t just monthly meetups, this is where you would show how devoted you were to the friendship. If everything was well, you would catch up, if someone had a problem, or had a fight, it would be talked about to be worked over.
The meetups are rituals to them, missing one is like betraying each other.
Yet, Jongho didn’t want Yeosang there. For everyone’s sake.
“Can you be nice to him this time?”
San’s face closed.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I don’t want this to be talked about over lunch. Even less another fight breaking out. Not in front of everyone. Let him be.”
“Say that to your arm.”
“I did this to myself!”
“And he was supposed to avoid that. Now let’s go.”