Mingyu found it hard to believe Wonwoo's shameless attitude. He had the audacity to kiss him – without consent, that too – in the bathrooms last week, and then ghost him for an entire week, leaving Mingyu hanging just like that. It was utterly disgusting, he thought, he needed to have a talk with Wonwoo.
Hence, early on Monday morning, after an entire week of waiting for Wonwoo to show up, Mingyu spotted him subtly make his way to a classroom – which happened to be Mingyu's first one too. Before anyone could notice his presence, he entered the classroom as well, and made sure to lock the door behind him. Wonwoo looked at him – who looked like he'd known what to expect already.
"Speak." Wonwoo said, not meeting Mingyu's eyes.
"I'm supposed to speak?"
"I guess not," And he picked his bag to go to the back of the class. Mingyu grabbed him tightly by the wrist, demanding him to stay put. Wonwoo showed no signs of stopping, making Mingyu grip tighter on his wrist.
He winced, grunting in annoyance when Mingyu's grip tightened, and immediately pulled his hand back, softly palming it. "You've played victim enough, Jeon."
Mingyu didn't expect tears forming in the boy's eyes as he said that. He felt bad instantly, for he realised he might have done something to actually hurt him. Jeon Wonwoo wasn't one to cry – at least not in front of Mingyu.
He noticed Wonwoo still clutching his wrist; Mingyu's eyes narrowed. Just to be sure if his suspicions were right, he suddenly poked at Wonwoo's wrist again. "Can you fucking stop!" Wonwoo screamed.
Mingyu froze at the sudden loudness of Wonwoo's voice. It was agonising. Like Wonwoo was being put through hell, and wanted an escape from a million things nudging at him every second.
"Let me see your hand." Mingyu offered, voice as feather-light as he could manage. He'd always had good intuition, but he hoped he was terribly wrong this time.
"Why?"
"Please,"
"No."
Without waiting another second, Mingyu pulled the hem of Wonwoo's blazer, and gently took his wrists in his hands, rolling the sleeves up. He was horrified at what he saw; Wonwoo had several deep cuts with dried blood smeared around them. "What have you been doing?" Mingyu slowly thumbed around the gashes, risking treading near Wonwoo's state.
Anger flared in Wonwoo's eyes, but he remained quiet despite looking like he had too much to say.
"Why?"
"I don't know. I just felt like it."
"Nobody feels like this,"
"Well, I do,"
"This is serious, Wonwoo."
Another shock of the day was when Wonwoo actually started crying. He tried to turn his head away, but Mingyu didn't let him.
"Look, I'm sorry for what I did last week, but please let me go." Wonwoo begged, shook his hands out of Mingyu's, and ran outside the classroom.
He didn't return even after the professor entered and began teaching.
Mingyu was restless about the interaction in the morning throughout the day, especially when he hadn't seen Wonwoo ever since. At lunch, Chaeyeon asked him what was wrong, but Mingyu didn't have the heart to speak about it. "I- I have to go, I'll see you later," Mingyu finally mustered, while getting off his chair and leaving Chaeyeon confused.
While walking in the sparsely populated hallway, Mingyu typed in a text to Wonwoo — which on the exterior seemed like a normal 'Are we doing Calculus today?', but he was sure Wonwoo understood what he meant when he saw an 'Okay' appear on his screen.
--
"Hey,"
Mingyu said softly, when his eyes landed on Wonwoo already sitting at their usual table. The boy clearly hadn't expected to be greeted, but he acknowledged Mingyu with a small nod anyway.
"How are you doing?"
"Stop pretending that you care, and just get on with this," Wonwoo whispered, pointing to the books on the table.
After the events in the morning, Mingyu almost forgot Wonwoo could be this insufferable at times. Yet he chose to remain silent. "It's just- It seems things are pretty bad, if you do that." Mingyu nodded towards his hands, making Wonwoo subconsciously hide them under the table, although they were covered.
"Why do you care?"
"It's not healthy, Wonwoo,"
"I'm aware,"
"I'm being serious, and I hope you wouldn't take this lightly either,"
"It doesn't matter, I'm used to this,"
Mingyu gulped, not knowing what to make of that statement. He stared dumbly at Wonwoo for quite a while, until he snapped Mingyu out of his haywire thoughts, bringing his attention to the books and papers strewn on the table in front of them.
"We're here to do Calculus, in case you forgot,"
"Right,"
It dawned upon Mingyu a bit late that Wonwoo might not want to talk about it. Several minutes passed by in silence, until Wonwoo accidentally banged his hand against the edge of the table, and his pained groan was what got Mingyu's attention. "The fuck-"
His eyes flickered towards the red seeping through the sleeve of Wonwoo's white shirt, probably the result of the hit with the table. Wonwoo didn't seem to care the least bit, shrugging and returning to his work.
Mingyu, on the other hand, couldn't bear to watch the blood take over his hand. "Wonwoo your hand-"
"I can see that," he mumbled, head still buried in the book his eyes flitted over.
"That needs to get cleaned up,"
"It stops a while later,"
"Are you stupid?"
"No."
"Get up."
"No."
Pulling him by the shoulder, Mingyu left all their things at the table and dragged Wonwoo outside the library, towards the bathrooms.
"Roll your sleeves up." Mingyu asked him, once they were in front of the row of sinks.
"Let me go-"
"I don't have all day."
"I wouldn't want to be the one wasting your precious time," Wonwoo deadpanned, shrugging Mingyu's hand off.
Mingyu huffed, and forcefully rolled Wonwoo's sleeves up, turning the sink tap, and placing Wonwoo's bleeding wrists under the running water. "See, I have no clue about what I'm supposed to do, but I'm doing what I can," Mingyu muttered, most of it for himself, eyes fixated on the bloody water that flowed from Wonwoo's wrists.
He turned around to get several sheets of tissues from the dispenser, and wrapped thick layers around the trickles of blood on Wonwoo's wet wrists, until the tissues were caked onto his hands.
"I think that should do it, no?"
And for the first time ever, he saw a slight, yet genuine, smile make its way to Wonwoo's lips, as the boy stared at his wrists.
