Our World | SeongJoong

2

Quietly walking throughout the house, Hongjoong made his way to his room, hoping to go unnoticed by his mom.

It wasn't that he hated her or anything. It was actually the exact opposite, but she could be a bit overbearing at times.

He safely made it up the stairs and into his room, where he breathed a sigh of relief. He hadn't seen San, which meant that he was either out partying or in his room.   

San was....complicated, to say the least. Hongjoong knew that his stepbrother cared about him to an extent, but as soon as his friends were around, he would act like a complete asshole, and he couldn't blame him.

From an outsider's perspective, it looked like Hongjoong had mild autism: he'd occasionally mumble to himself, had a hard time making eye contact, and found it difficult to make friends and keep relationships.

But the mumbling was really a result of him dissociating, the inability to make eye contact was a result of his horrible anxiety, and his stand-offish demeanor was really just because he had a hard time trusting people.

To be fair, only his mom and Yunho knew about his DID, and that was it.

Yunho had been trying to get him to tell Wooyoung and Yeosang, while his mother had been trying to get him to tell her husband and San, and Hongjoong didn't want to do either. In fact, he just wanted to sit in his studio and either make videos for his channel or make music.

He flopped onto his bed and opened his laptop, logging into his account on YouTube.

The channel really had grown a lot over the past two years - at first, it had just been a place for him to rant and talk about DID, but it'd gotten extremely popular and influential over time. It was at the point where he had a number of other YouTubers reach out to him in hopes of a collaboration, but he turned them all down because his privacy was the most important thing to him.

He'd only accepted one offer, and that was for an interview done by a channel designed to lessen the stigma around mental illness. Hongjoong had worn his signature LED purge mask and typed out his answers as the questions were asked. His anxiety had gone into overdrive, worrying that the host of the channel found it too troublesome, but it hadn't been like that at all. He was patient and made sure to respect Hongjoong's privacy, not asking any questions about the trauma that he went through or even the name of his little.

He had, though, asked a question about his selective mutism and why he felt comfortable speaking on camera, which was something the brunette had never thought about before.

I guess it's easier for me to talk on camera because it feels like somewhere I can just talk about my thoughts and experiences without anyone explicitly telling me I'm a freak, he'd said.

And it was true. Talking to the camera seemed to have a therapeutic effect - or at least, up until his attempt. Sometimes it still did, but he felt like producing was more effective nowadays.

"Hongjoong-ah, dinner's ready!" His mother poked her head into his room.

Hongjoong shook himself from his thoughts and got up from the bed. "Alright, I'll be down soon."

"Why didn't you tell me you were home?" She pouted. "Did you not want to see me that bad?"

He felt a pang of guilt at the sight of his mom's face even though he knew she was joking. "Mom, I only got back 10 minutes ago!"

"I'm just messing with you. Come on, looks like it's just us two tonight. Sannie is out with his friends, and your stepfather is still at work."

Hongjoong's face brightened once he heard that it was only him and his mom for dinner. His family was okay, but it still felt awkward when they all ate dinner together even though it'd been four years since his mom remarried.