Into The Shadows

Nineteen

 Yugyeom turned the doorknob and we stepped into the room together. There we saw Suga, lying there, on the floor, gripping his head in pain with the look of a absolute shock. I felt exasperated. I gave him one set of instructions- to stay quiet and stay put, and he couldn't even follow those.

"Yugyeom this is Suga" I waved at him lamely,

"I've been taking care of him for a while. He used to be a trainee"

Half truths. General and convincing enough to be true, Yugyeom would fill in the blanks with his imagination, I didn't need to do much.

He extended his hand to Suga, attempting an apprehensive but friendly handshake, to which Suga responded with nothing. He sat, shocked and presumably frightened by another person's presence, his mouth closed and opened in rapid succession. I had to make a quick recovery.

"He has social anxiety, he probably won't be comfortable shaking your hand" it was a bit weak of an excuse, but it would do. Now that Yugyeom knew he was here I certainly couldn't just close the door over again, so I'd had no choice but to invite him along.

"Suga, join us for dinner, Yugyeom is paying for Chinese takeout." I stated nonchalantly, and motioned for him to follow me before turning around and walking back into the hallway.

After sitting together at the round table a game of figurative chess began. Yugyeom made a move to know more about Suga and we would answer in turns, each answer approved by me.

But first, Yugyeom concluded our previous conversation about work. Parallel was set to debut in November, much to his dismay, and I signed the remaining paperwork; the boys were growing impatient.

"Can we stop talking about work now?" I chuckled, completely disregarding the tense atmosphere, even though it was probably evident.

The doorbell rang, and I rose to answer it. I was uneasy about leaving Suga to answer questions, but I would have him brief me on his answers later, and it was my job as the host to retrieve the food.

I made my way to the front door and paid with the money Yugyeom had given me, straining to hear bits of the conversation, and from what I could tell, Suga's answers were short. This was good, I wasn't missing much, and I could fill in the blanks myself.

We ate our meal quietly with minimal conversation- It was mainly about how good the food was, before making our way to the living room. I wanted nothing more than an excuse so that Yugyeom was forced to leave, and I think Suga knew that when he excused himself to the washroom. After a few minutes passed I told Yugyeom I was going to go check on the boy since "he usually doesn't take this long." I walked into the bedroom and sat on his bed while I waited for him to come out of the bathroom.

A few seconds later he walked through the door and I quickly rose to meet him before he could speak. Covering his mouth with my hand I told him to stay in the room, I was going to tell Yugyeom he was getting sick to make him leave. Suga nodded in understanding and I released my grip on him, he made his way back into the bathroom and I went back to the living room where Yugyeom was still seated.

"It must have been cheap takeout, Suga's been throwing up, and I have to look after him. Thanks for coming over. I'll see you tomorrow." the man nodded, taking the hint.

He was finally gone and Suga and finally resumed our peaceful evening of movie watching.