Wandering In The Deep Fog, I'm Star Lost

One Step At A Time

Trigger Warnings : feeling of being overwhelmed, crying, arguments, mention of break-up.

His phone buzzes.

He tries to ignore it but after several ones, he has enough and takes it. It's the group chat that's coming back to life, but he also sees a few texts sent to him by an unknown number.

From : Unknown

Hey it's Changbin

I was just checking up on you

Are you alright ?

Chan huffs and turns off the phone. He knows he's being petty and childish but he's really tired and he just wants everyone to leave him alone right now.

He just wants to move on Youngsoo.

But then someone knocks at his door and he stops the urge to groan in annoyance, "Yes ?" his voice is hoarse from crying but he doesn't care anymore.

Someone opens the door but he doesn't bother to look at who.

"Oh, she went rough on you, didn't she ?"

It's Lucas.

He puckers his lips, "More than rough," he answers as Lucas sits at the edge of his bed, "she's mean."

Lucas snorts and Chan frowns, "Don't make fun of me."

"I wasn't," he tells him, Chan turns himself to stare at the ceiling, "so ? What did she do ?"

Chan's gaze falters, "She... she just told me the truth," he sighs, "and I'm not ready to hear that."

Lucas hums, "She's always been blunt like this, it's like ripping off the band-aid, it hurts in the beginning but it needed to happen, and after that, the pain ebbs away fast enough."

Chan stares at the ceiling, "It still hurts."

His younger brother nods in empathy, "Yeah, but it would've hurt nonetheless if she would have gone slower."

Chan sits, backing until he's pressed against the head of the bed, "I'll still need time to get over him," he glances at him, a silence settling for a few seconds. "Is it really weird if he's more than twenty years old than me ?"

Lucas winces, "Depends on the situation I guess, but here it's clearly not well seen," he answers, "the limit's usually ten years apart," he looks at him, "but for you it's different, he's kidnapped you."

"Maybe, but he's been really nice."

"Nice or not, you never know someone fully, simple proof, you didn't know you were in an experiment."

Chan huffs, hating how right he is. He rubs his eyelids, "It's not like we had sex when I was a kid, he waited for me to be an adult."

"You got lucky on that," Lucas tells him, "most of them don't wait, others force them even if they're a minor or not, it's all a question of point of view."

The older stares at him longly, guilt resting on his belly, "I... didn't know that."

Lucas smiles, "There's a lot of things you don't know about the world, you're like a newborn taking his first steps," he adds gently, "you'll have to learn to trust the good people and to listen to your instinct, to trust yourself, because most of the time, you'll be right."

Chan nods at his words, feeling bad for talking like this with Hannah. She's been right and worried and he just didn't listen to her. He's still bitter about their argument but he's the oldest here.