ᡣ𐭩ྀིྀི₊ ⊹
Minho didn't want to be there.
He was dressed up in uncomfortable clothes, wearing uncomfortable shoes, sat in an uncomfortable dining chair that probably cost more than all of the furniture in his house combined.
"Honey, can you at least try to smile?" murmured a soft voice in his ear. Minho's grimace grew, and the woman sat beside him skewed her face in concern. "Your dad isn't going to-"
"He's not my dad," interrupted Minho.
This made his mum sigh and give up, like it always did. She sat back in her chair and plastered on her own fake smile. Minho was only vaguely aware of her engaging in falsified conversation with the person sat on the other side of the table and he took her lack of attention on him as a sign that he could leave.
"Where are you going?" This voice was harder, grittier, hissed rather than murmured.
Minho had been standing up from his chair but firm hands on his shoulders pushed him back down. Anyone watching would've seen it as a fatherly gesture, reliant and tender as his hands rested on Minho's collar. Only Minho felt the pressure that curled fingers used to dig into his skin.
"To the bathroom," he grunted under his breath in response.
"No," chided the man. "They're just about to serve food. You can wait."
The man took a seat in the empty chair on the other side of Minho's mother. They were an attractive trio, the picturesque image of a perfect, nuclear family. Minho had always found this interesting; their family could be described as 'nuclear', but so could that horrible bubbling temper that started in the pit of his stomach.
Nuclear. Volatile.
Quelled, if only for a moment, when his mum turned to shift closer to him.
"It'll be nice to eat together. We haven't done this in a while." She spoke quietly, as she always did, and curled her mouth into a watered-down smile. Not like she used to.
She used to smile with her teeth on show, her eyes creasing and folding into crescents and fine lines bunching up around wide cheeks. A beautiful smile, cracked and flawed and real. She was still pretty when she smiled now - pretty, but fake.
"A lovely family meal," Minho muttered, "with around three hundred other people."
They were in a room that Minho could only describe as a banquet hall. It was some sort of gala that the man had been invited to, and that Minho and his mum had been dragged along to. Well, maybe she hadn't been dragged, but Minho had been.
"Minho, it's important to meet the people your father works with. You may be working with them one day, too!" He laughed as he spoke.
The cheery sound was a harsh contrast to the twinge of fingers digging harshly into his arm as the man threw an arm around him.
"Yes, sir," answered Minho through clenched teeth.
He kept his eyes low, averted. When the food came, he ate politely, nodding when anyone mentioned how tender the wagyu was or how the chef had done such a good job on sourcing quality saffron for the accompanying soup.
And then when they finished eating, Minho allowed himself to be dragged to the meeting room. The same 300 people hung around him in small groups, socialising and networking. Minho was desperate to leave. He was about to, when he heard his name from across the room.
"Minho!" The man beckoned him over. His mum smiled weakly at his side. "This is my son, Minho."
He tried to stomach a gag as the man clapped him on the back.
Around him were three men, each with their own simpering, placid wives. Minho offered them all a smile that was little more than bared teeth.
"A pleasure to meet you. What a compassionate son, coming along to galas like these! It's nice to see young people spend time with their family," smiled one of the wives.
"Yes, so true, our Changbin wasn't able to join us today. Such a shame. He dedicated himself to an overnight study session on campus with a few other students," tittered another.
"Oh!" said the third. "Yes, that's where Seungmin is tonight, too! It's a shame they're not here but incredible that they are so focused on their studies."
Minho was still trying to process the names. Changbin? Seungmin? He was sure he'd heard of them before, but he'd always been bad with names...
"Jisung is there as well. I always tell him he works too hard!" The first wife laughed as she spoke.
Jisung. What a fucking surprise. And Changbin and Seungmin, they were too of the prefects he hung around with, right? The two violent ones. Changbin, Seungmin, and... Felix? The little one, with the freckles? Mino tried to stick the names to the faces in his head, determined to commit them to memory.
The man turned a steely gaze to Minho.
"And you, Minho? You must be doing well to not need to study." The stern tone roused Minho from his thoughts.
"As much as I'd rather be anywhere than here, I'm not exactly welcome-"
A guffawed laugh, loud and swelling around the room, stopped him from finishing his sentence. "Oh, you've always been such a joker, even when you were a child!" The man glanced quickly at the others, checking they were laughing along with him.
Most of them were. One of them wasn't - instead, he wore a crooked smile, eyes narrowed slightly. The one stood with the woman who had mentioned Seungmin. Minho assumed it was his father.
"Not assimilating at your new school, Minho?" His gaze was critical.
"Ignore him, of course he is. He's made lots of friends, and got some great grades, too," defended the man.
Another contrast. Sweet, silky words, but the flick of his eyes towards Minho after he said it was sour, sharp.
"Yes. I'm so lucky to be enrolled at such a prestigious school." His jaw was so tense when he spoke that Minho's mouth barely moved. The man smiled at him proudly.
"A great school, truly. However I've heard rumours that it may be going downhill," added in one of the other men in the group. Changbin's father, if Minho remembered correctly.
Minho noticed that the woman who mentioned Jisung and the man beside her exchanged cautious glances.
"You're talking about...?" started Seungmin's mother,
"The violence, yes," answered Changbin's father.
"Now, everyone," interrupted Jisung's mother with a forced laugh. "This is all just rumour. We would know if our children were subject to violence, or anything of the sort. I saw Jisung recently and he told me he loves being at school."
This rung a few times in Minho's head. Seen Jisung recently? Loves being at school? A liar, on two accounts. Three, really. It was her son who had been subject to the 'violence'. The person who'd hit him was standing merely three feet away from her.
And not to mention the violence from Jisung, either.
"Although they have been letting in a lot of students from... Less well-off areas," commented one of the women, glancing to one side as she said it as though checking for people listening in to their conversation.
Minho felt the man beside him bristle.
"Let's not discuss this in front of a student." He laughed as he said it, but his tone was easy to read: Stop talking.
"Perhaps that should be my cue to leave," eased Minho. His voice made his mum flinch almost unnoticeably.
"No, Minho, it's fine. We would love to learn more about you. Do you know of our sons? I mean, I assume you must, given their status," laughed Changbin's mother.
"I've heard of them." Minho figured a non-committal truthful answer was easier than trying to lie.
"Of course, I'm sure once they find out who your father is, they will be eager to be friends with you. You'd make quite the group! Han Jisung, Kim Seungmin, Seo Changbin and Lee Minho. Future rulers of the world."
It was Changbin's father who had spoke, and Changbin's father received a questioning look from Minho.
A name was missing. Lee Felix?
Before he could ask, the man beside him did. "I'm sure Minho would be honoured to be their friend."
"Tch."
It slipped out before he had a chance to reign it in, and as much as Minho tried to disguise the noise of disgust as a cough, his efforts were too late.
The sharp smack against his back turned his faked cough into a choking fit.
"Minho, you should excuse yourself if you're feeling unwell." To anyone else, the man's voice sounded thick with concern.
Minho knew otherwise.
The parents had each exchanged different glances. One simple, parental concern for a choking kid, yet two that were harder to read. They hadn't believed Minho's act.
"Nice to- Meet you all. So- sorry," he choked, excusing himself. His mum went to follow him.
"Don't," ordered the man.
She didn't.
Minho was lost in the large stately home, but he managed to make it out onto the front lawn after some searching. He had no clue where he was, and his phone was screaming that it was almost out of battery.
He walked for a while, aimless and lost in a stream of a million thoughts and a million different things. It started to rain in his head, and every new raindrop made the stream rise higher and higher up the banks. A light shower became a downpour. A downpour became a monsoon.
When the stream flooded, he was thankfully far enough away from the house, on a grand street where each home had acres of land between each other.
This meant there was very slim chance that anyone would hear him scream.
The first one wasn't enough, little more than the weak cry of an exasperated little boy. He tried another and forced his voice to swell and grow. Not enough.
Minho felt frustrated, annoyed at how much his life had changed. He had been forced to come to a new school, move away from his friends, made to change everything about himself and become isolated completely because of some stupid fucking rich man.
Another scream, still not enough.
Minho was frustrated.
What else was he supposed to do?
ᡣ𐭩ྀིྀི₊ ⊹
next chapter.... if ur just here for plot maybe dont read it >:)
this chapter was solely for the plot and im so sorry ur getting this after i neglected this book for like four days. pls forgive me <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 kisses and hugs !