EX // Minsung

42. The plan

The boys were gathered in Lewis and Jisung's dorm. All of them. Besides the obvious four, Chris, Felix, Sky, and Innie were there too.

Just to make sure, they had asked Chris and Sky if their girlfriends had anything to do with the situation. When it was confirmed that they knew nothing, it was time to come up with a plan. If it hadn't been Mai and Sungyoung, it had to be Yeonwoo.

"What if it isn't Yeonwoo, though?" Felix asked the group.

"If it isn't..." Jisung thought about Yeonwoo and Minho's past together. "Well, then this is just payback for what he did to Minho."

The group went silent for a moment, and some guys were giving each other confused looks. Jisung just exposed something to the group that no one besides Lewis, Sam, and him knew.
Jisung froze and turned to Minho to apologise, but before he could do anything, Minho grabbed Jisung's hand and spoke first.

"I guess I should share a little of my background with all of you too." Throughout the entire story, Minho held Jisung's hand tightly. Even when their palms started sweating, he did not let go. And Jisung knew Minho needed it.

"I can't believe someone would do something like that to you!" Innie gasped after Minho got through the worst of the story.

"He's done it in the past, I don't think he's above exposing me again." Minho sighed deeply and pulled Jisung closer to him.

The others agreed. "We have to make him pay, I'm definitely not below revenge. We have to stop Yeonwoo." Sky admitted.

"We have to stop them both." Minho didn't look at the group when he said it. Neither when he said the next thing. "My father too."

"Minho, are you..." Lewis started but trailed off. The yellow lights in their dorm seemed even more pasty than before. Their cans of soda on the table had stopped sizzling, and you could hear a needle drop with the silence covered the room.

Minho just nodded. And everybody knew. Getting rid of Yeonwoo or silencing him wouldn't be the end of the abuse. Even with Yeonwoo no longer in the picture, Minho's safety wasn't guaranteed. Someone else might snitch on him or his dad would find out again somehow. And it would be trouble.
To get rid of the problem was to get rid of Minho's dad.

"So... how do we do it?" Sam finally asked. Everybody's head shot Sam's way but he just shrugged. "If we're going to save Minho, I would like to know how exactly we would do it."

"I'm with Sam on this one." Sky nodded. "We have to think about everything. Because one mistake and Minho's dad might pull him right out of here to get an online degree, and we will never see him again."

They agreed to start with the basics and note down all the current information they had.
Yeonwoo couldn't really do anything without Minho's dad. Yes, Yeonwoo was evil, but he wasn't the type of person to get his hands dirty. Plus, Minho could easily take Yeonwoo in a fight.
So essentially, his dad was the source of the hurt and you have to take out the source to stop the problem.
But then again, if they make one wrong move, Minho could be taken away from them.

"Can't we just go to Child Protective Services or something? Turn him in." Innie muttered to himself.

"That'd be great if I was a minor. But since I'm a legal adult, I doubt they will do anything." Minho frowned. "And I still need him to pay for my housing and tuition."

Jisung had never stopped to think about how their friends got into this college or how they were paying for it, but what Minho just said made him realise how different they were once again. Jisung had come on a scholarship. Always being on top of his classes and getting a recommendation letter from his previous school is what landed him this scholarship.

"I can't think of a solution where he both pays for you but is also out of the way though." Chris sighed.

"Then what solution are you thinking about?" Minho asked.

And as if they were reading each other's minds, Jisung and Chris both said at the same time, "Jail."

The group fell silent and all carefully looked at Minho, hoping he hadn't taken it the wrong way.
Minho stayed quiet for a moment too, making the silence more ear deafening for the other boys.

But then Minho said, "that might work."

"You're not seriously thinking about sending your dad to jail, are you?" Innie blurted out.

Minho nodded, "I think we should try it." He sighed. "I mean, I won't have money, but it's fine, I can work for it."

"But how should we do it?" Lewis asked in all seriousness.

"And what if he gets out early and beats you even worse?" Felix asked the question Jisung hadn't dared to think about yet.

"Restraining order." Minho shrugged as if it was a very normal thing to get a restraining order against your own dad, who you are also trying to send to prison.

"How do you plan on doing it though?" Felix asked.

"I guess that is what we have to figure out now." Minho said.

For the rest of the evening they brainstormed on how to get rid of Minho's dad and for Minho to be safe. If they managed to get it to court, someone would have to pay for a lawyer.

"You said Yeonwoo wouldn't be above exposing you again right?" Lewis finally said after having been silent the entire brainstorm session.

Minho nodded, "he'd definitely do it again if he gets the opportunity."

"So let's create an opportunity." Lewis clapped his hands together when he exposed his idea.

"You mean putting Minho in a dangerous situation on purpose?" Jisung grabbed Minho's hand and angrily glared at Lewis. "I don't want him to get hurt."

"Look, it's not the best idea, but it's an idea and it could work." Lewis shushed them and explained his plan.

"No! You're just going to hurt Minho, I can't let you do that!" Jisung protectively put his hand in front of his boyfriend.

Minho slowly moved Jisung's arm down and grabbed his hand again. "Jisung, it's a good plan, we'll have evidence, it will work."

"But you're going to get beat up again!" Jisung protested.

"I've been beaten up before, you know I can handle it." Minho tried to brush Jisung's hair but Jisung smacked his hand away.

"We can't explain this to the hospital as an on campus fight like the last time your dad beat you and we had to call an ambulance." Jisung stood up, wanting to walk away from this ridiculous plan.

"This time we won't need to." Minho stood up too and wrapped his arms around Jisung. "I'll be fine, I promise."

Jisung sighed into Minho's shoulder. "Okay then... BUT I'm going to be with you the entire time!"

"Jisung, no. I can't let you do that, what if you get hurt too?" Minho said.

But Jisung didn't care, all he wanted was for Minho to be safe. Even though the entire plan was to make it as unsafe as possible. Jisung just wanted to be there and take care of Minho.

"If he hits me too, well... then there is just more evidence!"

Even though all of the boys were against Jisung participating, they knew they had to let him be there. They knew that if Jisung got left out, he would just try to jeopardise their mission and maybe he would get even more hurt.