(no) Strings Attached

Where It Breaks

Seonghwa didn't flinch when Hongjoong raised his voice. He only blinked, slow and empty, as if sound reached him with delay. The words weren't cruel—Hongjoong never meant them to be. But intention didn't dull the way they lodged in Seonghwa's chest, right beside the memories of voices that had shaped him long before Hongjoong ever came into his life.

Voices that said try harder, do better, not like that, not enough.

It wasn't Hongjoong's fault. Seonghwa knew that. He was just desperate—pushing forward with the weight of the world on his shoulders and no time to spare for softness. But desperation sounded too much like disappointment, and Seonghwa had been trained to hear that tone as failure.

He was tired. Not the kind of tired that sleep could fix, but the kind that settled in his bones and made even breathing feel like effort. His body moved because it had to. His heart beat because he hadn't given it permission to stop. There was no room for weakness. No room for mistakes. No room to break when the mission needed him whole.

He told himself he could take it. He always did. Every time Hongjoong looked at him with frustration sparking behind his eyes, Seonghwa tucked away the sting and pretended it didn't hurt. Pretended it wasn't confirmation of what he'd always feared—that no matter how hard he tried, he would never meet the standards expected of him.

Not his parents'.
Not Hongjoong's.
Not even his own.

But still, he kept going. Because to stop would be to fail. And failure... failure was something he was never allowed to survive.

There was a moment—small, fleeting—when Hongjoong's voice cracked with urgency, and Seonghwa almost mistook it for care.

Almost.

But the words still landed sharp, and somewhere behind his ribs, something recoiled. It wasn't fear. It wasn't surprise. Just that familiar ache, old and practiced, the kind that came from disappointing someone without even trying.

He didn't cry. He didn't even react. He'd learned that stillness was safer than explanation, that silence gave him fewer things to be wrong about.

He always made things worse when he spoke.

Hongjoong didn't mean to be cruel. Seonghwa knew that. He wasn't his parents—not with their cold smiles and measuring eyes, not with their suffocating standards wrapped in the disguise of love. But still... when Hongjoong snapped, when desperation pushed him into raised voices and clipped words, it carved out the same hollow feeling.

He wanted to be enough for him. Not just useful. Not just necessary. But enough.

And yet every misstep, every hesitation, every time Hongjoong's expression twisted with frustration—it felt like proof. Proof that Seonghwa wasn't doing it right. That he wasn't built for this, for being by his side, for being worth anything at all.

The exhaustion was starting to seep in now, quiet and relentless. His limbs felt heavy, like they were filled with wet sand instead of blood.

Every breath felt earned. Every second awake was a choice—one he made for the sake of not failing, because failure would mean his end.

And Seonghwa didn't know what was waiting at the end of failure. Just that his parents' voices had always promised it would be worse.

So he kept moving. Even when his knees shook. Even when his vision blurred at the edges. Even when Hongjoong looked at him like he was on the verge of saying something sharp again.

He just kept going.
Because if he stopped—
If he let the weight settle—

He didn't know if he'd ever get back up.