The week passed by quickly after the incident. Hyungwon was dragged into a before-bed exercise routine with Wonho every night (which Kihyun managed to avoid at all costs), and Jooheon managed to refrain from punching anyone else.
The days melted into one another until Friday. Then it seemed as though time stopped.
"No class today," Kihyun reminded them as they woke up.
"Why not?" Wonho asked, having not paid much attention to the idle breakfast table conversation. Although they hadn't been at their normal breakfast table lately, as they'd earned a demerit for Jooheon's outbreak and had lost the right to eat in the cafeteria for a week.
"Family visitation," Kihyun said.
"Oh," Wonho said, blinking and remaining in his pajamas as the other two changed.
"First and third Friday of every month," Kihyun said, finishing with his shirt buttons and proceeding to pull on his pants. He looked over to the tallest boy in the room. "Is your family coming?"
Hyungwon looked up, fumbling with his shirt buttons still. "I- I don't know."
"Do you want them to come?" Kihyun asked.
"I don't know."
Kihyun shrugged, nodding to himself. "That's sort of how it is. I love my mom, because she's my mom I mean, but I also don't want to ever see her again." Kihyun paused. "Or...I do...but...when she's better. She's the one who should be in here." His eyes gently traced the scar marring his left hand before looking up at Wonho. "I guess you don't know if your family's coming, either."
Wonho shrugged, leaning back against the wall. "I'm not sure. I haven't seen them in a year since I left home to get a job at the gym. I don't even know if they know where I am right now."
Trust me, they know, Kihyun thought to himself, but he just nodded along with Wonho. It was always a different story; he'd run away from home or they'd grown apart or they'd moved without him. But none of them were the truth, that Wonho's parents knew where he was an kept up with his condition from outside the institution. They cared about him and loved him, even if they couldn't understand him, even if they couldn't understand why the boy they'd raised from infancy was suddenly a stranger to them and they a stranger to him.
***
They joined up with M-wing in their classroom for breakfast, but since class was cancelled for the day, they were alone in the room without their teacher. Which was fine, since nobody really liked him anyway.
"They'll keep us in here until one of our parents gets here. Then they'll let us go, one by one, and when the first guy gets back, the next guy gets to go. That's how it usually works, at least," Minhyuk explained to Hyungwon, who nodded.
"Did you hear from your mom?" Hyungwon asked softly, knowing it was a touchy topic with Minhyuk, but the latter bobbed his head eagerly.
"She wrote me the other day, saying she was clean and that she'd make it for sure this time," Minhyuk said, grinning and then biting his lip to try to keep himself from grinning, but his smile broke through nonetheless. "She's probably not permanently clean, I mean, maybe just a week, but still, that's progress, right?"
Hyungwon nodded but didn't say anything. It was too late to stop Minhyuk from getting his hopes up at this point. The only thing he could do was hope that Mrs. Lee actually came.
But Minhyuk had mentioned something Hyungwon hadn't been aware of. If she was writing to him, presumably the letters were distributed in class, but then...why was no one writing to Hyungwon?
Had they abandoned him entirely?
The door unlocked and a ward gard hovered in the door frame. "Lee Jooheon, you have a visitor."
Jooheon frowned slightly but stood up. According to Minhyuk, his parents came irregularly, and usually only when they needed to tell him something.
Jooheon left the room, and the door locked behind him.
