trouvaille : minsung ✓

chapter 11

Bad news

Weeks go by and who would have thought it, our two main characters became even closer. Work didn't stop the two from meeting or talking on the phone as often as possible. (Minho didn't like chatting, he had said it always felt too impersonal). At times, Minho had even been lying on Jisung's bed playing with his old 2DS while he tried to explain the world to customers.

 Although most of the time they met at Minho's home. The reason was that one time his mother had walked right in when Minho wanted to demonstrate to Jisung how to sit on someone's back without it hurting and she thought they were... otherwise preoccupied. 

—

Speaking of Jisung's mother. 

Jisung just came shuffling out of his room, chuckling to himself and still wearing his pajamas. She was looking at him as if he were possessed, but he decided against discussing how "adult" it was to giggle at a picture of Minho blinking at the camera through a crack in his blanket early in the morning. For Jisung it was very adult, or at least normal.

 With his breakfast bowl, he threw himself on the couch and turned on the TV. His mother watched him the whole time with her eyebrows drawn together and a... motherly expression. She nodded to herself and then went to her son. She grabbed the remote and turned the television off again. 

Jisung was about to complain, had already opened his mouth and started, but fell silent when he saw his mother's gaze. With a glance, he gestured for her to join him. Sighing, she did so, her movement causing the milk in his bowl to spill over. "Oh damn..." Jisung set his things down and eyed the stain on his shirt.

 "Jisung!" The boy winced, shrinking down to the size of his sister on the inside. His mother's tone did not bode well. "What's wrong with you?" The woman ran her fingers through her hair, her old fingers unable to curl completely. 

"What do you mean?" He peeped from between his arms.

 "You're acting like a teenager on hormonal overdose."

 "That's bullshit..." he whispered to himself. He studied his mother's face. 

"I wouldn't care if it went on like before. But with Miri...you can't leave so often and then come back late at night."

 Laughter wrinkles had formed around her eyes and mouth. When the woman had last laughed properly was unclear, though. At the moment, it looked more like his mother was collecting dust in her crinkles, her face looking gray and lonely.

 "I know this Minho is a good guy, he's really sympathetic but..." She sighed once more and let herself fall back into the sofa. "I can't do this all by myself anymore." 

Jisung nodded and stroked her arm. She didn't like physical contact.

 "You know, before Corona, where you haven't..." She bit her lips. "Before corona, everything was easier to handle. I can barely keep up with laundry now, everything's going haywire at work, and anyway..." 

Jisung already understood. He knew that his moving in here wasn't just causing problems for him. "I'm sorry..." He said, munching on his soggy breakfast.

 "Don't be sorry Jisung... but it's really hard right now..." He nodded. His mother sounded like she was about to break out in a crying fit. She rarely showed how stressed she was. She always tried to do the best for everyone, and she had been in last place since Jisung was born for herself. 

He felt sorry for her. And he knew what they had to go through, more or less together. 

He scraped out the rest of his food. "Then I'll stay home and help out around the house for now, okay?" He smiled wryly at her. Although his mother gave him a kiss on the cheek in relief and thanked him, Jisung mourned the meetings with Minho. 

—

Of course, the two still talked on the phone, sometimes Minho would come over when no one was in the house and would help Jisung cook, clean up, or the two would lie in his room and rummage through his old CD collection. It wasn't the same though. 

And on top of that, it didn't make the situation in the Han house any more relaxed. Just because it was now tidy and clean didn't mean that Jisung had magically made the problems disappear.

 He knew it was really bad when Jungsoo pulled him aside one Sunday morning. They sat on the patio and Jungsoo lit a cigarette. "So Jisung..." 

Internally, Jisung pleaded to the gods that it wasn't that there was a real issue at stake but that the Man was trying to establish some sort of father-son relationship. Even if he didn't necessarily want that. 

"There's a problem." 

Great. Jisung slumped in his chair. 

"You're grown up enough that I can talk to you about it. Your mother doesn't dare and won't see it but," he took a deep drag from his cigarette. "We have real money problems right now. As you know, rents have gone up, our salary has been cut too, and with four of us, water and heating costs are going up, of course." 

Jisung watched a butterfly settle on a purple flower and flap its pretty wings. 

"I don't want to get rid of you or anything...but you're still in your twenties...still young. Me and your mother are old."

Jisung didn't want to make it harder on the other and roll his eyes, so he nodded instead. What a beautiful butterfly. 

"Maybe you can find a shared apartment that still has a place or something."

 Jisung should get out. No, he needed to get out.

 "I'll look around Jungsoo." Jisung had no right to be bitter. He knew from the start that he would only be in his mother's way when he was here. 

Maybe he reminded her too much of those days. Just like this house reminded Jisung. 

Jungsoo was the only one brave enough to say it. Probably because his mother never told him the whole truth about her last relationship.

 Jisung wasn't angry with him about it. He stood up. "We'll talk later okay?" 

With that, Jisung turned and fled the mild spring weather back to his stuffy room. He lay on his bed. His pillow between his arms in a clinging grip. 

Why does reality always catch up with me when it's at its best...or was? 

ha, idk what am i doing with this-