femboy ꒱ nohyuck

꒰ thirty two ꒱

To no one's surprise, Donghyuck didn't go back to school the next day.

It seemed like the school administration was moderately panicked over his situation, probably mostly because of the worry that they could be sued or lose money for allowing such a viscous post on their school's general discussion board. The school counselor emailed Donghyuck personally, just to check in on him and offering him her services, and thankfully his teachers also were gracious enough to send Donghyuck his schoolwork online so that he wasn't required to come to campus in person. The administrators also reached out to him, promising that the post was taken down and that they're doing everything they can to resolve the situation and find out who had posted it, but Donghyuck had ignored that email. It was clear to him who had done it, and the last thing he wanted was for the school's staff members to rub more salt into the wound.

Chenle had graciously lent Donghyuck his laptop, since he had accidentally left his back at his house and currently had no interest in going back there anytime soon, and the blonde boy spent the day working on random schoolwork and trying his hardest to not think about his current situation.

"Hyuck, oh my god! Have you seen this?" Chenle shouted, suddenly bursting into the guest room Donghyuck was working in with zero warning and causing the blonde boy to nearly jump out of his skin.

"Jesus, Chenle, you scared the shit out of me," He scowled, placing a steadying hand over his chest as he shut his laptop to give his friend his full attention, "what are you making a fuss about?"

"I was stalking the social media of some of the kids from your school, and I saw this video circling around," Chenle said, shoving his phone into his friend's hands. Donghyuck peeked at the thumbnail, and immediately saw him laying in the middle of that damn circle, with everyone's hands on him trying to pull off his clothing. He shuddered, trying to push away the memory as he attempted to hand the phone back to Chenle.

"I don't want to watch this again, Le... it was bad enough having to live through it."

"No, Donghyuck, that's only the beginning of the video... you need to see what happened after you ran away," Chenle insisted, pressing play on the video for him before the blonde boy could come up with another excuse.

Immediately he could hear all the jeering and laughter from the boys as they attempted to pull his clothing off, and he squeezed his eyes shut as his whole body stiffened. Chenle came up behind him and massaged his shoulders, trying to comfort him, and the blonde only dared to open his eyes after he heard Jeno's familiar voice booming through the phone speakers. He watched himself run away off screen, looking nothing short of frantic, and cringed a little. I wonder if everyone is making fun of me right now for how I reacted, like a coward.

He was so caught up in his own thoughts that he almost didn't notice the fist flying through the air on the other side of the screen, but he blinked and then suddenly the leader of his former soccer "friend group" was on the floor with a bloody nose. In shock, he glanced up and saw Jeno standing over him, absolutely seething with rage as he then proceeded to throw a harsh punch at one of the other boys. He couldn't help but cover his mouth, wincing every time one of the boys on screen landed a hit, and soon enough the altercation had broken out into a full on fist fight. Donghyuck only managed to catch another glimpse of Jeno once a group of teachers came and pulled the boys off of each other, and what he saw made his heart sink in his chest. He looked terrible, covered in blood and bruises, but he still looked as determined and angry as he had when the video had started. The footage stopped there, and the two friends sat in silence for a long moment as Donghyuck processed everything he had just seen.

"He... why did he..." he started, slowly bringing his shaking hand away from his mouth as he looked up at Chenle.

"I don't know," Chenle responded honestly, giving Donghyuck's shoulders another reassuring squeeze, "I hate to say this, but Hyuck... to me, that didn't look like someone who intentionally outed you in order to hurt you."

Donghyuck pursed his lips, his fists clenching tightly in his lap. As much as he hated to admit it, Chenle was right... there was no logical reason why Jeno would have gone to all that trouble and gotten himself beaten to a pulp to defend someone he allegedly hated. He had absolutely no incentive to fight the boys that had been doing exactly what the author of that post wanted them to do, so what the hell did this all mean?

"I don't know, Le. I genuinely, seriously cannot think of anyone else that could have accessed the information in that post. Sure, I know there's plenty of people who want to ruin my life, but how the hell did they find out all of that?"

"I don't know either, but I don't think it was Jeno," Chenle said softly, leaning down and hugging his friend from behind, "I know you're hurt, I know you feel betrayed, and you have every right to be... but can't you just give him a chance? A chance to explain himself, to prove himself to you."

"What if he hurts me again, though?" Donghyuck whispered quietly, tensing up in Chenle's embrace.

"If he hurts you again, me and Renjun will beat his ass," Chenle said seriously, causing Donghyuck to chuckle quietly, "I'm not joking, I don't care how big and strong he is. It'll be two against one."

"Shut up. Did you see him in that video? He held his own against the majority of the varsity soccer team, you and Renjun don't stand a chance," Donghyuck laughed, his voice still a little watery. Chenle just laughed back, looking relieved that Donghyuck's spirits seemed to be lifted slightly.

Later that evening, Donghyuck decided to take a leap of faith, pulling out his phone and messaging Jeno.