《stray together》

The Hands Life Dealt

Over the course of the last few days, everyone had been doing their best to make money quickly. Jeongin had been gambling nearly nonstop, only a few hours of sleep here and there in between. He had pulled Beomgyu in to help him, to get him food, drinks, and whatever else he needed while he was planted at the tables. The locked briefcases were filling up one by one. It was definitely their best source of income.

Changbin had been doing system hacking jobs for a little extra cash, but that wasn't a high demand market, as it mainly consisted of rich university students who wanted test answers. So, while Lino made more cocaine, Changbin accompanied Han to the drug deals, to make their drug business more efficient. The wall with the stock of drugs had nearly tripled in size with the new arrangement. However, they had more cocaine than they had people who wanted it.

Walking into Chan's surprisingly neat office, a stark comparison to what it had looked like in recent times, Lino had his hands in his pockets. "Hey." he spoke, causing Chan to look up from his laptop. Their tension was easing bit by bit, but there was still some awkwardness.

"Oh, hey." Chan was definitely surprised to see it was Lino visiting his office. While it was still fairly new, the latest medication TK had the leader try had cleared his head. He felt like he could organize things a bit better, and he could also recognize the flimsy relationship he and Lino had after everything. In fact, everything about Lino felt flimsy, in his healing process. At least, to Chan it did.

"I–, I um," Lino pointed with his thumb behind him, towards the main room, "I've got a, uh– pretty decent overflow made up." He cleared his throat, trying to calm down, as his heart was beating rapidly from anxiety, "I was wondering if– uh, if I could do a solo?"

For a moment, Chan considered asking Lino why he was acting as if he was being held at gunpoint, until he remembered that Lino had Han to work through his struggles with, and all the other times he had asked, things had not ended well. With genuine consideration for Lino's well-being, "I don't want you to dissociate and be alone."

"I won't if it's– if it's not... related." Lino kept his eyes to the floor, not wanting to see Chan's.

Trying to trust that Lino could handle it, Chan thought through all of the things he had to do, and figured there was one thing Lino could take care of that wouldn't be related. "Want to take on a hit?"

Lifting his head in interest, Lino's brows scrunched, "Who?"

"One of the guys who Sheon used to work with, he won't stop harassing her. It's getting really bad, and he has been warned more times than he deserves." Chan started clicking and typing on the laptop to send the information to Lino. "Think you could get rid of him?"

"Yeah, yeah," Lino nodded, "that's fine."  His hands felt clammy, wiping them on his jeans.

A small smile couldn't help but grow on Chan's face. "Alright, just let me know if you need anything, mkay?"

There was something in that sentence that really got to Lino. A realization that Chan actually cared. He had felt that to some extent when he first joined the group, but this was different. Because Chan knew more about him now than before, had been mad at him, and yet he still cared about him. "Okay." Was all Lino could say or else he would get choked up.

"Well, that's new- seeing you on this side of the car." Keeho chuckled lightly as he shuffled toward the rolled down passenger window, finding Changbin.

"Yeah, we're trying a few different things." Changbin simply shrugged, not making a big deal out of their recently changing dynamics.

When Keeho got next to the window, he saw Han in the drivers seat and flashed him a smile. "Wassup, Han?" His voice cheerful.