༄ ABOUT two weeks later, things had calmed down.

Everyone seemed to be doing okay. The tense conversations about the fire had faded and people were, luckily, no longer bothering Sam with questions.

She watched Minho at practices and basketball games, and sometimes they made time for a walk after school, but other than that, they hadn't been able to plan actual dates or anything close it.

Mostly because they weren't allowed to go outside after nine PM, and in the weekends, her mother was very tight with schedules. After all, the woman hadn't done whatever Sahil had told her—after finding out about the isolating drama—for longer than three weeks.

Now, it was a casual Thursday night. Sam was studying after she had watched the indoor basketball game. Etril unfortunately lost, but because the game had been against the team Stan used to be in, no one complained and they all congratulated the opponents.

When her phone rang, she flinched from sudden surprise, and glared on the screen.

Minho.

"Hey." She held the thing against her ear. "Everything alright?"

"No." A deep inhale. "No— no, I'm not alright. I'm sorry- oh my god, Sammy, I'm so sorry I—."

Her breathing glitched. "Calm." But the panic rose in her own chest. "Just breathe and then try to tell me what's going on."

She didn't have to guess what was going on.

Panicked, shorts breaths on the other side of the phone. An audible cry and something falling. "I did it again— I'm sorry I know you said— know you told me to talk to someone before I did it but I couldn't stop myself and- and I don't know why I'm calling you now but—."

She steadied her own breaths and stress. What if he went too deep? What if he'd get worse again? What if she couldn't help him? What if, what if, what if... "Are you in your dorm?"

"Yeah," he breathed, then sniffed. "Sammy..?"

As she was already putting her shoes on, she hummed, "Hm?"

"Could you please come over? I don't know if— I don't really want to... to clean this up myself— I'm sorry."

"It's alright. I'm on my way. Nothing's going to happen. No one's angry."

More heavy breaths on his side of the phone as Sam rushed outside with the device still in her hands, attempting to get in his dorm as fast as she could.

She bumped into a few people, got yelled to go to her own school building, and almost got noticed by a teacher, yet she didn't care and only stopped when she arrived in front of Minho's dorm, knowing his roommates, Jeff and Alby, couldn't have been there. Otherwise, he would've never done this.

She knocked. "Can I come in?"

"—yeah."

With the sweetest smile she had while she felt her heart ripping apart, she opened the door to the vision of Minho sitting at his desk, his hand clasped around his arm and his glossy eyes desperately staring at her.

"Hey," soft voice. She sat down in front of him. "Clean up or talk first?"

He only moved his wrist closer, which was enough for her to know. Her stomach made flips while she inspected how deep Minho had cut. Her jaw tightened, and she forced herself not to cry too.

"Water or the disinfection?" She whispered, and gave him another poor smile. "You didn't go too deep. That's good, Min. Disinfecting will hurt less now."

"The disinfection then, please," he muttered, head lowered and eyes averted.

Nodding, Sam let a cotton pad absorb the liquid and then moved closer to his wrist, which she now held tighter. This was gonna hurt. The story would've been different if maybe he used a cleaner tool, but by the looks of it... the sharpener hadn't been very sanitary.

"Ready?"

He nodded. And hissed when she carefully pressed the cotton pad down. "Shit," he cursed as she disinfected his wrist. His body relaxed after she rested a warm towel on it.

"You okay?" She checked, eyebrows raised. He nodded. "Bandages, please?"

He handed them so she could put them on, gentle and with some love she didn't speak of out loud. "There you go."

Minho didn't reply. He stared the ground, slowly pulling his wrist back while he covered it with his sleeve again.

Sam forced herself to look somewhere else for a while, and instead of bugging him, just left him. Maybe he wanted her to leave, maybe he wanted to cuddle, maybe he wanted to stay like this, maybe that.

"Do you want to talk about it?" She asked after a few good minutes of sitting in silence. It felt like her insides were eating themselves.

"No. I don't, honestly," he whispered.

"That's alright," she assured. More silence. It wasn't awkward, but it hurt her. Not because he wouldn't talk, but just the fact she was sitting here. Here in front of him, where he broke his record of not harming himself for over three weeks. Of course it was already amazing he got that far, but it still hurt that now... it was kind of, well, gone.

"I should've never called you," he said slowly.

"It was good you called me. I can help, remember? And I'm proud you called—"

"I'm destroying you," he spat.

Sam froze for a second. She blinked, thinking it through. "What do you mean?"

"Mentally— I shouldn't be calling you to come solve my problems and I should've prevented all of this from happening. You're constantly working and worrying and doing everything you can to help, which I really appreciate, but it also makes me realize it's ruining you."

"Nothing is ruining me, Minho. Trust me, if I would notice I'm getting bad, I'd tell you. Also, I was actually happy. Because once again, I'm still proud of you."

He buried his head in his hands, then ran them through his hair. "Why can't we have one months that's not shitty?"

She smiled poorly. "Because life sucks. A lot. And most adults are stupid and don't want to help."

"Can agree with that," he mumbled.

Sam took a deeper breath. "Minho, look... it's gonna sound stupid and I doubt you will agree," a short pause, "but my dad is really the kind of guy to help. He said he wanted to help before, after he noticed something was wrong. And if you're not comfortable with me helping you all the time, we could... you know, ask him."

He was silenced as he looked up, frowning.

"He's nothing like my mom, I promise. He won't call you anything or judge or tell others about your business. I think it might actually be very handy."

He swallowed. "I'm not sure."

"Could I talk to him about it? I won't say anything that's been going on yet. Just that you're struggling and we, as he once said, are barely adults. We don't have to solve everything by ourselves."

The boy rubbed his chin. "Fine," he mumbled. "If he agrees, I'd like to try."

A soft smile grew on her face.

If they kept going like this, everything would be fine in the end.

"Okay. Awesome." She took his hand. "Now... I shall hug you to a good night of sleep. Come on."

Smiling lightly, he allowed her to lead him to the bed, and lie him down. She followed after removing her shoes, and wrapped her arms around him.

"I promise," he started solemnly, "that once I'm... healed, or whatever, I'll be just as cool as your book men."

She hummed. "You're already better than all of them."

"Because once I'm 'healed'," he continued, pretending he hadn't heard her, "I can spend all my time spoiling and pleasing you."

Her stomach did a thing at that, and her jaw tightened. "Well... that was a mood change," she blurted out.

"And then I'll be better than your book men," he finished, whispering with a voice that still sounded broken, but also strained. "My new dream... be better than Sammy's book men. My new quote when I don't want to talk to adults... be better than Sammy's book men."

"How're you gonna be like all of them at once, though?"

"They're basically dirty-mouthed, big guys who protect their women at all costs and please her perfectly. It's not that hard. They're all the same."

She chuckled. "Good luck, then."

❤︎︎

A/n: This chapter is shitty so we'll call it a filler

Can't wait for Minho to "be better than Sammy's book men" wowie

(No that does not mean we're just gonna forget about the SH in a second... that'd be unrealistic)

I'm already working on chapters in Minho's POV :)

x Vera