Boy across the street (KSM/HHJ)

five

Hyunjin PoV

Seungmin didn't show up in school lately

A few days passed and he just wasn't there.

As I made my way through the empty school halls, after my dance class, our school offerd, I couldn't shake the feeling of anxiety that had been growing inside me.

My mind kept going back to Seungmin, and how he hadn't shown up to school in a while. I wanted to talk to him, to clear up any misunderstandings, if there were any, and to put his mind at ease. But as the minutes ticked by, my anxiety only continued to grow.

Where was he? 

What was stopping him from coming to school? 

What if something bad happened?

Did he blame me for what happened? No why would he. But what if he did?

The questions kept swirling in my mind, and I didn't know what to do. And yet, I felt like I couldn't move forward without knowing what had happened to him and why he hadn't shown up to school. I needed to find him, to talk to him and figure things out.

It seemed like he hadn't been home for a while. The lights were never on, nobody came or went out of the house. It was weird.

Suddenly, I heard Minho's angry voice calling my name. My heart sank as I turned to face him, and I saw a look of pure rage in his eyes. In that moment, I knew that Ha-Joon had twisted the truth because he hated me, and that Minho had bought into his lies. 

Before I could even say a word, Minho started berating me, his words filled with spite and accusations. I couldn't believe what was happening, and I felt myself growing more and more anxious with every passing second.

I was right. Ha-Joon told him lies. He had told him that I had beaten up Seungmin, which I would never do, and Minho believed that. And Minho is not a person you want to mess with.

I tried to calm him down which was a little difficult. His furious eyes scared me. He had been looking at me the whole time in the practice room as if he wanted to murder me.

And that let run shivers down my spine. "Minho, listen to me. I didn't do anything to Seungmin-" but before I could continue, he cut me off through clenched teeth, "Don't say his name!"

 "First of all, listen to me! And secondly, you can't stop me from saying his name, who do you think you are?" I sighed loudly. "Ha-Joon bullied him, I helped Seungmin-" 

"Then tell me why he's not at school?!" 

"I don't fucking know! you should know that! You're his best friend," I yelled, getting annoyed at the way he was talking to me.

Minho glared at me, folded his arms and provocatively posed in front of me as I started to walk away. "Come on Minho, do you really believe Ha-Joon? The biggest homophobic bully at our school?" 

"Like you're not homophobic," he said and then laughed like he couldn't believe what just came out of my mouth.

I thought it was easier for queer people to recognize other queer people.

And isn't it obvious?

Apparently not for him.

I sighed again: "I'm not homophobic Minho, now would you please let me go home?" 

"I'm keeping an eye on you," he replied, taking a step to the side and watching me walk out of the school building.

I slowly strolled home. I didn't take the detour that Seungmin always made because I couldn't watch him anymore.

I was worried.

What happened?

I stopped for a moment and rummaged in my bag for my headphones. I tried to find them without looking in the bag but I just couldn't feel them. So I had to look inside and kept rummaging around. "Where are they?!" I whispered under my breath. I just couldn't find them. After a short time I gave up the search and went on a little angry.

 I hated walking around without music, but listening to music loud, alone, would be weird with people walking by. I dangled my hand next to me and wished I had someone to take a walk with right now. And talk to them, joke with them, like real friends would.

 I liked being alone, but I hated it at the same time

I almost dragged my legs behind me, my energy was gone. I wanted to teleport myself home. A loud sigh escaped my lips, it was strange hearing everything that was happening around me. Luckily I didn't live far from school and didn't have to use public transport. It would have been louder there. 

After some time I could see my house so I walked faster. But my attention quickly went to the house across the street. A few people were gathered there. All dressed in black. 

Did a relative of Seungmin died? 

"Oh no," I murmured when I spotted the younger one in the crowd. He looked like he had hardly slept and often cried. That didn't look good at all. I would have loved to go and hug him. He looked so damn done with everything. I didn't realize I stopped and stared at him. He looked at me, our eyes met and I couldn't help but look at him with a really worried face. 

It was as if time had stood still, as if everything around us had stopped except for us. As if the cars wouldn't drive, the many people wouldn't speak and as if no birds were chirping. Just because we looked into each other's eyes for a long time. 

The younger one blinked so he broke the eye contact and scooted away but I could see him blinking away tears.

I wanted to run after him. But all the people would only judge me if I went there. So I just decided to go to my house, I unlocked it but when I took a step inside I had a queasy feeling in my gut. 

I slowly closed the door and took off my shoes. With quiet and slow steps I went into the living room where my parents were sitting on the sofa and looked at me as if I had done something wrong.

"W-What's going on?" I asked but I didn't know why I stuttered. My gaze wandered to the coffee table where a notebook was lying. I didn't realize at first what this book was, but as I took a closer look my heart started racing. 

It was my diary.

I wrote everything in this notebook for years, simply because I couldn't tell anyone about my problems or anything else. It was actually already full, but I kept adding paper from another notebook because I didn't want to part with it. 

So it was a thick diary. 

But if my parents found and read that, it would mean they knew everything. 

About my sexuality, about Seungmin, just everything. 

And my parents are homophobic.

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