Illegal - Minsung

0.2. A New Family

"Hello Minho, I am here to inform you that tomorrow you will be sent away with your new family, this will consist of your new parents and your younger brother called Felix, he went through this procedure too so you won't be alone" a doctor smiled kindly. Minho had been awake for two weeks at this point and everything about the rehabilitation centre seemed almost too perfect. Sure, he'd made new friends with the other patients and the doctors and learned to do new things like dance, he wondered whether he was a dancer before as it all felt so natural, yet he couldn't shake that feeling that something wasn't right.

He loved the energy of the centre but getting a new family felt like the icing on the cake. Despite the nagging feeling that something was wrong, Minho would describe his life as mostly happy. The doctors in the centre had changed his life which he was eternally grateful for. It had all been explained to him, how bad he had been acting before the procedure and how he could move on with his life now.

The doctor continued to explain things to him and he took the information willingly, "so Felix had the same procedure and he should be able to guide you through everything, we thought it would be good to put you with someone in the same circumstance as we believe you are a patient at high risk of relapsing into your old life, ways to prevent this are things like not believing the rumours that circulate about the treatment, you know why it happened so you don't need to believe anything otherwise and finally never trust someone who says that they are telling you things about your old life," Minho nodded as he took in all of the information. He had already decided that rules simply weren't for him, he didn't understand why his entire body was telling him not to trust the doctors but he trusted his instinct more than people he didn't know and who hadn't been in his situation.

He brushed off the feeling and smiled falsely at the doctor, "thank you."

"Anything you need before I leave?" She asked him.

"Could you tell me my family name?" Minho asked out of curiosity.

"Your family name is Lee," she spoke, "anything else?"

Minho shook his head.

"Okay, rest well Minho."

"And you," He replied.

After a few minutes, the boy already found himself deep in thought. He hated the feeling of nothingness in his mind that had become more prevalent throughout the day. The idea of not knowing what happened to him or who loved him in his old life and missed him now was horrifying. For the first time he could remember, Minho cried.

He cried over the thought of what he could've lost, he cried over the unknown, he cried over the nagging feeling that he had broken a promise. Before sleep took him over, a word came into his head, "squirrel," he spoke out into the silence.

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The new morning brought new prospects and Minho felt excited when he awoke. Meeting the people that his new life was going to centre around was definitely exciting and out of all of them he was most happy about having Felix who he already felt like he would be able to relate to.

"Lee Minho," the doctor poked her head around the door of his room just as he was pulling his last bag onto his shoulder. Every patient got to go 'shopping' in the centre's clothes shop before their release and Minho had walked in with a 'go big or go home' mentality. It was, however, a bad move considering he now had to carry six large and heavy bags.

"Before we leave, to make sure everything had gone how it should have, I have to ask you is there anything that you have remembered? Any words that have to come to mind?" she asked him and Minho didn't know why but his mind was screaming at him to say no. He listened to himself.