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"Forty Nine„

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Jaemin's never had the best relationship with his uncle, but before he was sick, they had always made it work. Just the two of them. 

His parents had divorced and his mom had taken his sister while his dad wanted nothing to do with him. His mom couldn't take care of two children at once, so he was sent to his uncle.

It was okay. Well, that was until they discovered that he was chronically ill and had him hospitalized a few years ago, ultimately leading Jaemin to seeking out help from the weird kid in his class: Mark.

Mark was the quiet and definitely lonely kid in their class. There was the one time Jaemin ended up paired with him on a project. In the end, they needed to work on it after school and Mark suggested going to Jaemin's house. 

Of course, Jaemin couldn't go home with Mark, because he lived alone and could barely take care of himself. 

So, Mark took him to his house. Well, 'house' was definitely an understatement. 

Johnny had picked them up from school and driven them to the estate. They said that that's not what it was but Jaemin thought otherwise. 

 A year passed and Jaemin approached Mark and asked him, "Hey, could you help me?"

Mark looked at him curiously, pushing him to explain further. "Well," Jaemin picked at his nails, "my uncle is very sick and I just need... Just a place to stay, if you don't mind... You don't have to- God, this is probably a terrible idea. I'm sorry, I should-"

"Sure."

"Uh, what?"

Mark looked him in the eyes and repeated himself, "Sure. I just need to tell Taeyong."

A week after Jaemin had moved in, he quickly figured out what Mark really did. At first he wasn't sure until Taeyong told him that the people he killed deserved it. 

It had gone against Jaemin's beliefs, but he learned to adopt new ones: most people are deserving of kindness and respect. Some people don't. Simple as that. 

Now, all this rushed through Jaemin's head when he was pulled out of class in the middle of an exam. Everyone stared and watched them. 

"Jaemin," his teacher started with an unknown look in his eyes: soft, unlike when he was in class, "is it true that Song Jooyoung is your uncle?"

He nodded slowly, afraid of the answer he knew he was going to get. His uncle was chronically ill and his condition was not getting better. 

"I'm sorry to tell you this, but he died earlier this morning." Jaemin felt his eyes start to water, a familiar sting in his chest. "Do you want to go home? We can ask your dad to come pick you up?" 

Jaemin's eyes flittered from the class to his teacher, then the floor. "Don't worry about the test. You can finish it some other time."

"M-my dad is out of town," he croaked, trying his best to keep his voice from shaking too badly. "You can call Jeno's dad, though, He can take me home."

His teacher didn't press him any further and nodded. Jaehyun arrived about twenty minutes later and Jaemin didn't hesitate to hug him. 

Jaehyun had only been briefly told about Jaemin's uncle during a conversation with Taeyong. He hugged the younger back until Jaemin was ready to leave. 

Even when the bell rang and students started gathering in the hallway, they wouldn't let go. 

Jeno and Renjun ran up to them, Seungmin yelling at Renjun to not leave him alone (it was Renjun's request of Seungmin to never leave him alone seeing as Donghyuck got himself suspended), to check on Jaemin.