his cigarettes | minsung

16

—16—

jisung had finally decided it was time for him to go back to school. he felt a lot better than he had a few days ago. he was grateful for chan and seungmin, who'd made sure to visit him every day and checked up on him.

"jisung!" he heard felix call for him from the other side of the hall and within seconds he'd been tackled in a tight hug.

he could only smile at the other's enthusiasm, a warm feeling spreading in his chest.

"how are you?" felix asked once he'd let go of him. "better", was all jisung said and felix thought he should leave it at that. he was just glad jisung was back. they started walking to class together.

with jisung being at home and his friends skipping constantly, felix found himself hanging out more with seungmin and actually attending class. he'd also managed to talk to chan a few times, and he felt the other was starting to tolerate him better.

"i can't believe you stayed home for so long, we were getting really lonely!" felix pouted as he pulled on the sleeves of his sweater. "especially since minho, hyunjin and changbin haven't been coming to school a lot either."

jisung halted in his step.

"minho's been skipping?"

"i mean, are you surprised?" felix laughed, jisung shrugging his shoulders at that.

"but it's been a lot more than usual. what's worse is that hyunjin's with him the whole time, i don't see him that often anymore", felix said and the sadness was evident his voice.

"when was the last time you saw him?" jisung said as he wrapped a comforting arm around felix.

"last friday. they've been skipping every day since then."

hearing that made jisung frown. it reminded him of how minho was supposed to come over on thursday, but he never did. jisung had stayed up a few hours waiting for minho but he'd eventually fallen asleep.

when he woke up the next morning, he'd received multiple texts from minho apologizing but he hadn't been in the mood to respond. he figured he should reach out to him again. jisung hoped minho wasn't mad at him for not responding for a few days.

little did jisung know, minho wasn't mad whatsoever. he was having the time of his life, drowning himself in different types of substances with hyunjin.

they'd invited changbin but the other had been keeping to himself for a bit since the incident with jisung.

he was confused and irritated by the whole situation. not to mention he felt like his friends were blaming him for what happened with jisung.

they weren't, it was just his mind convincing him of the worst.

he started distancing himself a bit and it ended with him not showing up to school for days either. unlike minho and hyunjin, changbin preferred drinking when he was feeling down.

felix noticed the change in his behavior and how he'd smelled a lot more like liquor the last few times he'd seen him.

the younger didn't know what to do. he was unsure of what was happening with minho and hyunjin, but taking a look at changbin and how he wasn't taking care of his body, he could assume they were in a similar state. he wanted them, especially hyunjin to talk to him, but they wouldn't let felix reach out to them.

"have you at least talked to him since then?"

felix shook his. "not really. when we do talk, it's only over text and he's dismissive. his answers seem like.. he's not quite there."

a worried expression took over jisung's face but felix quickly waved him off. it was jisung's first day back, felix didn't want to unnecessarily stress him out.

"i'm sure everything's fine. these kind of things happen from time to time. once they cool off, everything usually just goes back to normal", felix reassured with a painfully forced smile.

to be fair he wasn't lying. something like this had happened before, just not to the extent where everything was starting to fall apart. felix wasn't sure if he'd said that to ease jisung's mind or his own.

nonetheless, his words almost managed to convince jisung. almost.

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a/n: just a filler chapter tbh.
we're close to 1k reads ty !!