| Through The Glass | MINCHAN/BANGINHO

|CHAPTER ONE|

Chapter 1

"...I because I am just through the glass."

CHAN'S BODY laid unmoving on his mattress, eyes trained up to the ceiling of his worn down apartment as he tried his best to ignore the loud noises coming from the couple in the apartment next to him. He pressed the edges of his pillow up against his ears, a whimper escaping past his lips as a headache creeped up to his temples. The couple just wouldn't stop. They had been doing this for hours and Chan swore he saw light peeking over the horizon. So, with an angry huff, he grabbed the closest item he could find and slammed it against the wall, the couple silencing for a split second.

For a second, Chan thought they were going to stop and let him get a few hours before he had to go to Uni in the morning. But no. They only got louder and more obnoxious. Chan let out a screech, roughly getting out of bed and escaping into his bathroom, his body freezing when he caught sight of himself in the mirror. Chan was wearing nothing but a pair of oversized boxers and an equally oversized t-shirt, most of his body exposed to the cool air and any sort of eyes that could have potentially been there.

Chan looked like a mess, dark, puffy red eyes, sickly pale skin and obvious lack of sleep and nutrience apparent on his skinny, drowsy body. Chan rubbed at his face in pure and utter exhaustion, both his mind and body practically whimpering for some sort of sleep. Chan debated falling asleep in the bathroom, curling up in the bathtub as it was the room that muffled the sounds coming from the apartment over. His fingers grazed the mirror, his reflection moving with him perfectly. Sometimes, Chan wished he had another, that the person he stared at in the mirror had been another person instead of himself.

But no. Chan was alone. He was alone in a country he barely knew and didn't have anywhere else to go. His parents died at a young age and he was placed in the system, his foster parents taking him in and moving him all the way to Korea, only to kick him out the moment he turned 18 and force him into the cruel, evil world without another thought. It hadn't helped that in school, he was made fun of for not knowing the language very well, but this had actually given him the motivation and now he can speak Korean fluently.

However, Chan still struggled, much like everyone else living around him. He barely had enough money to scrape by with a full meal most days, his little paying job and occasional busking at the shop a few blocks down bringing in very little money, college debts not helping at all. Chan wished he could escape into an odd reality from time to time, where stress was rare and people learned to co exist with each other. But he was stuck here.

The boy felt like he could cry, his palm pressing flat against the dirty reflection as tears began to pool in his eyes. He sniffled once, a singular tear escaping his left eye and Chan decided that that had been enough for the night. He took deep, quick breaths, rubbing at his cheeks to keep the wetness at bay along with his emotions. Suddenly, that cold tub sounded pretty nice. Chan stepped inside without hesitation, laying down and curling up into a fetal position as his breath left in choked sobs and whimpers. Eventually, Chan fell asleep to the sound of his own heart beat and the muffled sound of his neighbors.