hongjoong walked into the house, moving stiffly and placing his car keys down slowly. he'd just taken jongho to a mental institution (which they were planning on bringing mingi there before he went missing), which was a place for kids who were going through horrible times or were self harming. neither of the parents wanted to bring him there, but they found out he'd still been self harming even after his talk with seonghwa. so they decided that was their only option.
when he faced seonghwa, who was sitting in the kitchen, seonghwa began talking.
"no new news. mingi's still gone without a trace. yunho's going to have to do the dance recital with neither of his brothers, and wooyoung has only left his room for school, because he's so upset about his injury. and now jongho went to the mental institution.."
seonghwa sighed. "joong, i'm stuck. we're stuck. i don't know what to do, everything seems to be going wrong.." he said. hongjoong leaned against the kitchen table, glancing at a few of the kids watching TV.
he hated to see them look so down and numb. they didn't even have neutral faces. they looked sad, and it made hongjoong feel horrible.
"yeah, you're right. we're kind of stuck. i guess we'll just figure out what we have to do as we go along."
hongjoong closed his eyes and straightened his back, then opened an eye as he watched seonghwa bury his face in his hands and take a shaky deep breath. hongjoong could feel that something was about to go wrong, so he found himself staring at seonghwa.
just then, proving the younger parents' feelings correct, seonghwa's breathing rapidly sped up.
he let out a small cry, kind of queueing the start of a panic attack. the kids in the living room turned their heads and watched him with worried expressions.
seonghwa, eventually, got to the point where he was crying out loud, looking as if he was about to rip out his own hair. hongjoong rushes to his side, rubbing his back and trying to calm him down. seonghwa stood up, and the father took the opportunity to lead him into their bedroom for some calming down time.
the kids all watched silently, their minds blanking about what to do. they could slightly hear seonghwa crying, and it made them more worried and uncomfortable.
'hey, beomseok!' yeosang signed eagerly, with a wide smile on his face. beomseok smiled and outstretched his arms as he approached, pulling yeosang into a big hug. they stayed there for a pretty long time.
'i have art club starting in a few minutes, are you staying after?' yeosang asked. "yeah, i have baseball practice until pretty late. are you staying that late?"
'yes, i asked my parents and they told me it was okay. i'm gonna sit and watch you guys, maybe do some homework, or other stuff. so on your break, we can hand out.' "alright." beomseok replied to yeosang's explanation, then holding yeosang's hands.
"hey jisung, where's yeosang? i saw you and him talking earlier during practice." beomseok asked his older brother happily.
jisung smirked, and muttered "don't worry about him, i took care of him."
beomseok didn't really react to his words, but he definitely heard what he said. but he was too distracted by glancing around to look for his boyfriend to react at all to jisung's suspiciousness.
"seriously, did he leave? where did he go?" beomseok started getting anxious. jisung shrugged and walked away, leaving the younger to find yeosang himself.
he walked around inside the school building, not seeing yeosang anywhere.
when he started looking around outside, someone from yeosang's class, who knew beomseok, came running desperately to him, surprising beomseok.
