Mingyu had hoped the shitty conversation about switching up Wonwoo's coffee could have been enough to distract him from his raging thoughts. He'd thought Wonwoo wouldn't catch on as quickly. But his motive had backfired terribly, and Mingyu couldn't even talk about it. Wonwoo had noticed, only for Mingyu to cut him off and pass his day alone.
It still scared Mingyu how and why the article was published. He was missing, for heaven's sake! Although, amidst this mess, he was weirdly intuitive it wasn't his mother's doing this time.
He'd seen it coming when he got cornered by Chaeyeon during the day, which made him arrive late to one of his classes. Chaeyeon, unlike the previous times they'd talked about this, seemed strangely collected about a whole fucking article. When he'd asked how, she simply replied with a 'that's none of your business', and walked away.
As Mingyu took to cooling off in the library that noon, a few pieces of information clashed in his brain, which made way for a daunting suspicion. He didn't want it to be proven correct; it would shatter him, and Wonwoo. Ever since he'd been sent off to China last year, up till two months ago, the most fishy-looking ordeals had one factor in common – and that apparently happened to be Lee Chaeyeon.
From his mother finding out about Mingyu having spent a whole day at Wonwoo's dorm some time last year, to the time Wonwoo had confirmed something about his parents questioning him about their tutoring sessions, it had been Chaeyeon in the middle of it all along. Maybe she'd been feeding information to both sides all this while.
But why would she pull a stunt like this? And how in the world did she manage to discreetly be in touch with Wonwoo's parents?
That was exactly what Mingyu was determined to extract from Chaeyeon the next day. Starting out as the only friend he had after Minghao and Soonyoung had to leave, his friendship didn't turn out quite as expected. But Mingyu could only interrogate her if he got a break from the tornado that had been whirling in his mind all day. He'd even messed up on his first day of work.
Knocking on the door to Wonwoo's room was out of the question at the moment. He could understand; the boy had probably misinterpreted all of it. Mingyu could only give him space, and hoped he would come around soon enough.
So that night, Mingyu slept in the mess his neglected room had become in the past weeks. An unmade, dishevelled bed welcomed him, with the slight yet unmistakable musty smell infiltrating the room.
His stuff was scattered around on one end of the floor – right in front of the room's entrance – making him hopscotch his way till the bed and its uncomfortable, sheetless mattress. The day couldn't get any more shittier.
As Mingyu tried to shuffle in on his bed, he pondered over how he'd thought life would get a lot lighter after running away from his house. It had been, initially, but everything had been rolling downhill ever since Wonwoo had come back sobbing and trembling that one night.
--
"Chaeyeon, get in here,"
Mingyu grunted, pulling Chaeyeon aside inside an empty classroom, the next day. She thrashed around, but remained strangely silent. With a new kind of hardness to his voice, Mingyu began speaking, determined to find out whatever crap the girl had been doing for the past year. He refrained from being too harsh, as he spat "I need you to tell me everything. Every. Fucking. Thing."
He scoffed at Chaeyeon's audacity to still play dumb as she shrugged, but he didn't miss to notice the way her hands hid themselves behind her back, and the way her head hung dangerously low.
"Chaeyeon, I've figured you've been up to something for a while, and you have to be the one to spill it all. I don't like people going around playing with my life,"
"I haven't been doing anything!" Chaeyeon shrieked, her foot stomping frustratedly on the flooring. Her body language spoke volumes, contradictory to her words.
"Please, stop lying. Your sudden sourness towards me was a huge giveaway,"
The sudden changes in Chaeyeon's attitude confused Mingyu even further. Just seconds ago, she had been holding back from relieving all her pent-up fury. But then she seemed to shrink into herself, and her low-hanging head didn't seem so off-putting anymore. "You're my only friend," she mumbled.
"That isn't relevant here. Don't play victim,"
"It is relevant. That's what made me do whatever I did,"
"Why is this turning on me?!" Mingyu grunts, pulling at his hair to prevent slamming something around.
"It- It's a long story..."
"I have all day,"
"You have classes,"
"Classes can go fuck themselves,"
"Let's leave the classroom, there might be a class here soon.,
"Library it is then, lead the way,"
Chaeyeon nodded meekly, and began walking, with Mingyu behind her. As they exited the classroom, Wonwoo – who had been standing in front of the locker rooms – happened to have his eyes fixated on both of them – just the thing Mingyu needed to mess his day up even more. Nonetheless, he couldn't help but send a look Wonwoo's way, something that could clear up the boy's misunderstanding, if he had any.
When he stopped at the library, he nonchalantly took a seat on the nearest chair he could find, and instructed Chaeyeon to do the same. As she began speaking, Mingyu felt the ground disappearing beneath him. The fog that had covered most of his previous year, suddenly cleared up as Chaeyeon revealed everything he wanted to hear.
"Mingyu uh, I don't know where to begin, I-" she halted, gulping. "So um, last year I found out a lot I probably shouldn't have. You know how I've always said my mum's a menace, well I think she has a reason behind it all-"
"Get to the fucking point," Mingyu interrupted, rather rudely. If Chaeyeon caught it, he wasn't sorry.
"I am. My parents... Well, they're not my real parents,"
A huge weight seemed to have lifted off of Chaeyeon, as she looked a tad bit relieved after admitting. The only issue was that the very weight landed on Mingyu, messing with his brain, after all it had been through.
