thank you all for waiting !
🕸
❝ i only have you. ❞
jeno's words struck mark hard, and caused him to think through them for a while. it was sad how genuine he thought mark's words were, it was even sadder that there was no confirmation of them actually finding a way home.
mark never really wanted to go home. he wasn't entirely happy in the orphanage, but at least, he felt like he belonged there.
the next morning, right when he woke up, jeno and him headed towards room where they found the chewing gum, and tried to dig through the other cupboards to find some the caretaker seemed to tell them to eat.
but no matter how deep they dug, there was nothing else besides dusty old boxes and spider webs all over. mark felt guilty for giving false hope when he saw jeno's face fall almost immediately.
" sorry— "
" hyung, do you miss home? "
jeno interrupted his words so casually, as though this was the only time he could blurt such a question out. the two were sat on the wooden tiling of a ground, cross-legged and facing each other.
" ...no. "
mark wanted to lie so that at least, jeno would feel a little better that he had someone who understood him, but not all families were perfect. some were torn apart, some members ran away, some were completely broken.
" why-y not? "
and some, were like mark's.
a painful flashback caused mark to furrow his eyebrows. he heard a sharp sound pierce through his ears, and he held his head as he winced.
" hyung? "
mark was only six when he witnessed the fight of his parents. he was a happy child, he had no worries, but that one day after school, he saw something no kid should.
his father, whom he thought was one of the kindest people on earth, was smashing his fists through the glass display cases. it shattered behind him, all the glass pieces that he had always warned mark not to go close to. his mother was on the ground, it was obvious she was shivering, hair covering her face and fists clenched.
mark stood by the front door hidden, too frozen to even move. it was traumatizing for a six year-old to witness such a fight, especially between the two people who showered him with love.
" h-hyung, are you okay? "
jeno's words were blurry through his ears, and he couldn't really understand why the sharp buzzing hadn't stopped. throughout all that, his breathing became heavy, his eyes were wide, just like the time when jeno fell onto the ground.
" hyung-g, i hear footsteps. "
but mark couldn't hear a thing. he was too caught up in his haunting thought to realize he was even talking. so jeno had to pull him up with all the strength he got. though, there was only that much weight a person could carry.
and then mark realized that it wasn't because of him that his parents threw him out in the end, it was because they themselves, didn't love each other. so of course, they would want him gone.
all he was to them, was an unwanted product of their nonexistent love.
but before jeno could even get to the door, it creaked open, and revealed the expected caretaker, holding up a packet of what-seemed-like gum; the gum mark and him had been searching high and low for.
" looking for these? "
