On Track | MINSUNG

57

It was hard to separate people from their actions. It wasn't exactly a revelatory thought, but Minho couldn't stop thinking about everything his grandparents had done.

They'd always been there for him growing up. Minho and his mum had spent more time at his grandparents' than they had at home in the final years of his parents' marriage, when Yoonchun became harder and harder to tolerate. But they'd also turned a blind eye to the way Yoonchun had treated Minho and his mum. His grandparents had begged his mum to stay with Yoonchun for the sake of keeping peace and honour in the family. They'd defended Yoonchun in the divorce. And now they rang Minho every year on his birthday, to ask him to come back and live with Yoonchun, telling him how much they missed him.

It was why Minho never saw them. Because if he saw his grandparents, they'd take him to see Yoonchun. Because his grandparents couldn't see the wrong in anything Yoonchun did. Maybe it was generational, Minho's granddad abusing his grandma so they thought Yoonchun abusing Minho's mum was normal.

Minho had worried as a child that he'd grow up to be abusive himself. Maybe that was why he'd gone out of his way to treat Yoonbum extra nicely, and why he felt the need to make it up to Jisung every time he did something slightly wrong. While Minho understood now that having grown up with a dad like Yoonchun didn't inherently mean he was going to turn out like him, Minho still didn't quite believe he wouldn't turn into Yoonchun. It was why he'd decided at such a young age to never get married or have kids. Not that it would be much of an issue, considering he didn't like kids and gay marriage was illegal.

But God, Minho wished he could separate his grandparents and their actions. Because he'd grown up loving his grandparents, being taken to parks and museums, animal shelters and doing the rounds of visiting family. While living with Yoonchun had been unbearable sometimes, going to his grandparents' had been a safe haven, where he'd been allowed to be a child.

Minho still missed them sometimes. But it was hard to properly miss someone who was okay with you being abused.

'How was your talk with Father Seunghyun?' Minho's granddad asked.

Minho blinked. Hadn't there been enough interrogation today? Hadn't he been humiliated enough already? But he wasn't surprised Yoonchun had told his grandparents about him talking to Father Seunghyun.

'Fine,' he grumbled.

'Has he helped you sort through your struggles?' his grandma asked sweetly.

She'd always been Minho's favourite, from how lenient and slow to anger she was. Even now, she only meant well. But her well wishes meant nothing when her views were the same as Yoonchun's, the same as Father Seunghyun's, the same as everyone else's in that wretched church.

Minho shrugged. I'm not struggling with anything other than surviving being with Yoonchun.

'Well, Minho?' Yoonchun cut in, pulling into a parking space in a multistorey. 'Did Father Seunghyun teach you something useful? How to be a man, maybe?'

Yoonchun stopped the engine, twisting around to glare at Minho. Instinctively, Minho leaned back, pressing himself into the leather seat, his heart hammering in his chest. He didn't know what to say. How had he been so blasé back at the church about Yoonchun's reaction?

'Well?' Yoonchun repeated.

'I--I--'

'Fucking answer me.'

'He--he just said that--that there are, um, steps to--to recovery and--and one session isn't enough,' Minho squeaked.

Yoonchun sat back in his seat, then got out, walking around the car to open Nayeon's door. She giggled at him, taking his hand, and Minho had never wished himself dead so much.