The Right Reasons 11/13
Title: The Right Reasons
Pairings: 2U, father!son HoSu, bff!JaeSu
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Yunho is a single father and happy with his stable life together with his four year old son.
Yoochun's life is a mess. But he is good with kids.
“Yoochun, please, tell me. .. was it your father?”
A pained sound left Yoochun’s throat. Yunho couldn’t stop himself and hugged him tightly.
He should have thought of it really. He’d seen cases of child abuse before. He just hadn’t expected.. Yoochun wasn’t a child anymore. But some scars take a lifetime to heal.
“For how long?” he whispered, “how long ago?”
He wanted Yoochun to say that it had just been once, an angry beating or two, nothing more. But he knew that it hadn't been.
Yoochun’s hands came up and clutched at his shirt, just like Junsu did when he was afraid. “He drank himself to death when I was seventeen, the only thing that could stop him,” he said in an almost emotionless voice, a sharp contrast to the way his body was shaking.
Yunho held him even closer. “What.. what about your mother?”
“I’ve never had a mother,” Yoochun said, voice still empty.
And just like that Yunho was thinking about Junsu. Junsu didn’t have a mother. What if he’d been an alcoholic, and an abusive father? Had Yoochun’s father already started to beat him when he was four? Yunho couldn’t begin to imagine it, didn’t want to.
He thought he understood what Yoochun was afraid of now.
Yoochun’s hands slipped from his back and fell to the bed. Yunho snapped out of his thoughts and whispered reassurances against the side of his head even though he’d fallen asleep already.
Yunho was so very glad he’d searched for Yoochun and found him. He carefully lowered him to the bed and walked around the room. He found a key on the floor somewhere.
Then he walked back and lifted Yoochun’s slack body. It was heavy, but lighter than it should have been. Yoochun should eat more. He walked back to his car, pausing in the hallway to lock the door behind him.
It felt a bit like he was kidnapping Yoochun. He’d done that before. Apparently it was a thing he did when he found him drunk somewhere. And he knew that he’d keep doing it forever, but he’d do everything he could to make it unnecessary in the future.
Back home he contemplated waking Yoochun up for a shower, but decided against it.
He’d let him sleep this out, and also, if he’d discover more scars on Yoochun’s body right now, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to hide his worry and anger from Junsu when he got home.
He lay Yoochun in his bed and dimmed the lights in the room.
Junsu was brought home after dinner, happy and sated, so Yunho just ate some noodles, wondering when Yoochun had last eaten some decent food.
He listened to Junsu’s excited stories about everything he and Jaejoong had done after school and hoped that he smiled and nodded in the right places.
After putting Junsu to bed, he sat next to Yoochun.
This time he didn’t feel creepy watching him sleep. He was worried. When Junsu was sick, he sometimes watched over him like this too.
As he sat there he searched his memory for information about Yoochun that he’d not understood before. Yoochun had once said that he didn’t deserve a second chance. Was that really because of what he’d done wrong in the past, or was that about something else?
“Why didn’t you just tell me?” Yunho asked the sleeping man on the bed, “why are you still not telling me everything?”
He knew why. Yoochun was broken, trying to forget and hide his past while that wouldn’t stop it from haunting him. And maybe also because he’d secretly hoped for their relationship to work out and hadn’t really wanted to scare him off.
Yoochun slept on, and Yunho stayed awake for as long as his body let him. He really didn't want to wake up in the morning and find that Yoochun had left again.
When he woke up, Yoochun was still there. In the end Yunho had fallen asleep lying next to him, with an arm over his stomach. He carefully pulled it back and turned around to see what time it was.
His eyes were immediately drawn to the small figure at the door. Junsu was staring at them, wonder all over his face.
“Su-ah..” Yunho stood up. He looked behind him and then back to Junsu. “Yoochun is tired, we’ll let him sleep a little longer.”
Junsu let his father lead him to the kitchen. He didn’t say anything, which meant that he was thinking.
Yunho didn’t talk either, because he had no idea how to begin to explain. He also had no idea how much Junsu was suspecting. Did he know what it meant for two adults to sleep in the same bed?
“Why is Park-sonsaengnim sleeping in your bed?” Junsu eventually asked.
Yunho set the table as he talked. “Because I invited him to stay over again and we don’t have a spare bed.” He suspected Junsu was too clever and persistent to be satisfied with that answer though.
“Why didn’t he sleep on the couch again?”
“Because.. the bed is more comfortable. I wanted to share it with him. ..Park-sonsaengnim and I are really good friends.”
Junsu’s face lit up. “Like Joongie and I!”
Yunho sincerely hoped it wasn't exactly the same, not for at the very least ten more years for Junsu. “A bit like that, yes. Enough talking, eat your breakfast.”
When Junsu was eating he checked up on Yoochun again. Then he called Jaejoong’s mother and lied that he wasn’t feeling well, asking if she could maybe bring Junsu to school, if it wasn’t too much trouble.
She agreed immediately and spent the next five minutes lecturing him, telling him not to overwork himself and to eat healthy. It made him smile.
Next he called the firm. He felt bad about running off on Friday, being distracted yesterday, and calling in sick today. But until now he’d always worked hard - which was also thanks to Junsu for hardly ever getting sick - so he figured it would be okay.
Jaejoong’s mother rang the doorbell and he hurried to pack Junsu’s bag. Staying up for most of the past night had caused him to look pale and tired, so he didn’t even have to act much.
She acted just as worried as she had over the phone and handed him a food container. It was still warm.
“It’s porridge. I didn’t have much time to make it, but I think it turned out okay. You need to eat to get your strength back. Yunho stared at the bowl in his hands and nodded, bowing slightly in thanks.
She smiled down at Junsu and took his hand. “Come, Jae is waiting in the car.” She pulled Junsu into the hallway. Before Yunho closed the door, he saw him look over his shoulder and their eyes met.
There was a frown on Junsu’s face, but it was one of confusion rather than concern. Yunho smiled at him, a silent reassurance. He’d work this out and explain afterwards.
He walked back to the bedroom, placed the porridge on his nightstand, and sat on the edge of the bed.
Yoochun felt the movement of the mattress this time. His eyes opened.
He immediately closed them again and groaned, turning and burying his face in the pillow.
“Do you want me to get something against the headache?” Yunho asked carefully.
Yoochun opened one eye. Yunho smiled and leaned over. He stroked hair out of Yoochun’s face so he could see him better. “Are you okay?”
Yoochun gave him a weak smile in return. But it only lasted until he visibly remembered what had happened.
His eyes widened and he sat up, too quickly, and he hissed and grabbed his head.
“I’d apologise for kidnapping you,” Yunho said, “but I love having you here too much, so I’m not really sorry.” And then he tried to lighten the mood more with: “Also, you hadn’t returned my clothes yet so I came to get them, but I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to take them off your body or not.”
Yoochun didn’t return his smile. There was a look of panic in his eyes that Yunho didn’t like at all. Sure enough, a breakdown followed.
Yoochun moved back on the bed, away from him. His hands were shaking.
“I shouldn’t be here, you shouldn’t let me.. I..” He buried his hands in his hair. “I drank!”
Yunho moved forward. “Please, Yoochun, please tell me what’s going on inside your head,” he pleaded, and then, very carefully, “is this about your father?”
Yoochun covered his face with his hands and Yunho was afraid that it was to hide his tears. He moved further forward until he could wrap his arms around Yoochun’s shaking shoulders.
“I’m so scared I’ll.. I’ll become like him,” Yoochun choked out, “I already am.”
Yunho had guessed as much, but it felt like a step forward to actually hear Yoochun say it.
“You’re nothing like him, Yoochun.”
Yoochun tried to free himself from his embrace, Yunho wouldn’t let him go. “You don’t know! I swore I’d never drink... never..”
“Everyone resorts to alcohol sometimes. I do too. That doesn’t make you a bad person. You just have to make sure it doesn't happen too often. I can help you with that. And you’re not a bad drunk either, Yoochun, you get very emotional, but not in a violent way at all. The opposite actually.”
His words didn’t seem to register. Yoochun kept struggling. “I didn’t mean to steal anything, I didn’t! But no one believed me. They all said it, and if they didn’t they were thinking it. Like father like son, they were right! I-”
Yunho grabbed Yoochun’s wrists and used enough force until they stopped moving. “Yoochun!”
Yoochun’s shocked, slightly swollen eyes focused on him. Yunho stared into them.
“Could you hurt Junsu, would you do that?”
Yoochun’s eyes went impossibly wide. “Never! Never, I’d never-” His voice stocked, like he thought that defending himself was hopeless anyway.
Yunho shot him a reassuring smile and said, voice firm: “I believe you."
Yoochun stared at him.
"I believe that you wouldn’t harm Junsu. I would leave him in your care without a single worry. And believe me, I’m one of the most protective fathers out there.”
This was when Yunho realised that trusting Yoochun had never been an irrational thing to do. To everyone else it might have, they might have told him he was blinded by love.
But even if it sounded silly. Yunho believed that he, as a protective parent, had to have some instinct that only allowed him to fall in love with someone trustworthy enough. Which turned blinded by love around and made it a good thing.
Yoochun had stopped protesting, stopped shaking and stopped crying. For a moment Yunho worried that he’d even stopped breathing. He moved a hand to the back of his head and pulled him against his chest.
“I tried to warn you,” Yoochun said, muffled against his shoulder. “Our first date, I mentioned the stealing and the drinking and the debts. I did want a chance, but at the same time I wanted you to run from me, and you did, but then you didn’t.”
Yunho would ask about the debts later. But for now he smiled. “I will never run from you again, I refuse to.”
Yoochun buried his face closer against his shoulder.
“And you,” Yunho said, “don’t ever run away again. Even if you want to, please explain first. I was so confused Saturday.”
Yoochun’s arms came up and hugged him back. He was still hiding his face. “You promised Junsu you’d always keep him safe, and then you said.. my back.. that it wasn’t important..”
Yunho’s heart clenched. “I didn’t know.”
“I know.”
Yunho stared at the wall for a while, thinking.
“You became a teacher also because you wanted to learn to be a good father.”
“I wanted.. I wanted to be a good father to all the children who didn’t have one. I thought I was.. and the children's love helped me grow strong myself..”
“.. what happened?”
Yoochun’s shoulders shook. “I suddenly lost my job.. and I drank.. and I shouldn’t have.. and-”
Yunho shushed him. He didn’t want him to start crying again.
“You healed me,” he said, “let me heal you. Even if that sounds impossible to you, give me a chance. Trust me, what you did to me, I would have thought it more than impossible just two months ago.”
Yoochun turned his head, but his breath still warmed Yunho's shoulder as he spoke. “What did I do?”
“You made me fall in love again.”
Part 12: Providing Comfort
Part 10: Healed and Broken
Part 9: Dream Night
Part 8: Dating Teachers
Part 7: Family Sleepover
Part 6: Driving and Searching
Part 5: An Answer in Trust
Part 4: Drunk Denial
Part 3: Emptiness and Replacement
Part 2: Tulips in February
Part 1: Valentine's Flowers
Pairings: 2U, father!son HoSu, bff!JaeSu
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Yunho is a single father and happy with his stable life together with his four year old son.
Yoochun's life is a mess. But he is good with kids.
“Yoochun, please, tell me. .. was it your father?”
A pained sound left Yoochun’s throat. Yunho couldn’t stop himself and hugged him tightly.
He should have thought of it really. He’d seen cases of child abuse before. He just hadn’t expected.. Yoochun wasn’t a child anymore. But some scars take a lifetime to heal.
“For how long?” he whispered, “how long ago?”
He wanted Yoochun to say that it had just been once, an angry beating or two, nothing more. But he knew that it hadn't been.
Yoochun’s hands came up and clutched at his shirt, just like Junsu did when he was afraid. “He drank himself to death when I was seventeen, the only thing that could stop him,” he said in an almost emotionless voice, a sharp contrast to the way his body was shaking.
Yunho held him even closer. “What.. what about your mother?”
“I’ve never had a mother,” Yoochun said, voice still empty.
And just like that Yunho was thinking about Junsu. Junsu didn’t have a mother. What if he’d been an alcoholic, and an abusive father? Had Yoochun’s father already started to beat him when he was four? Yunho couldn’t begin to imagine it, didn’t want to.
He thought he understood what Yoochun was afraid of now.
Yoochun’s hands slipped from his back and fell to the bed. Yunho snapped out of his thoughts and whispered reassurances against the side of his head even though he’d fallen asleep already.
Yunho was so very glad he’d searched for Yoochun and found him. He carefully lowered him to the bed and walked around the room. He found a key on the floor somewhere.
Then he walked back and lifted Yoochun’s slack body. It was heavy, but lighter than it should have been. Yoochun should eat more. He walked back to his car, pausing in the hallway to lock the door behind him.
It felt a bit like he was kidnapping Yoochun. He’d done that before. Apparently it was a thing he did when he found him drunk somewhere. And he knew that he’d keep doing it forever, but he’d do everything he could to make it unnecessary in the future.
Back home he contemplated waking Yoochun up for a shower, but decided against it.
He’d let him sleep this out, and also, if he’d discover more scars on Yoochun’s body right now, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to hide his worry and anger from Junsu when he got home.
He lay Yoochun in his bed and dimmed the lights in the room.
Junsu was brought home after dinner, happy and sated, so Yunho just ate some noodles, wondering when Yoochun had last eaten some decent food.
He listened to Junsu’s excited stories about everything he and Jaejoong had done after school and hoped that he smiled and nodded in the right places.
After putting Junsu to bed, he sat next to Yoochun.
This time he didn’t feel creepy watching him sleep. He was worried. When Junsu was sick, he sometimes watched over him like this too.
As he sat there he searched his memory for information about Yoochun that he’d not understood before. Yoochun had once said that he didn’t deserve a second chance. Was that really because of what he’d done wrong in the past, or was that about something else?
“Why didn’t you just tell me?” Yunho asked the sleeping man on the bed, “why are you still not telling me everything?”
He knew why. Yoochun was broken, trying to forget and hide his past while that wouldn’t stop it from haunting him. And maybe also because he’d secretly hoped for their relationship to work out and hadn’t really wanted to scare him off.
Yoochun slept on, and Yunho stayed awake for as long as his body let him. He really didn't want to wake up in the morning and find that Yoochun had left again.
When he woke up, Yoochun was still there. In the end Yunho had fallen asleep lying next to him, with an arm over his stomach. He carefully pulled it back and turned around to see what time it was.
His eyes were immediately drawn to the small figure at the door. Junsu was staring at them, wonder all over his face.
“Su-ah..” Yunho stood up. He looked behind him and then back to Junsu. “Yoochun is tired, we’ll let him sleep a little longer.”
Junsu let his father lead him to the kitchen. He didn’t say anything, which meant that he was thinking.
Yunho didn’t talk either, because he had no idea how to begin to explain. He also had no idea how much Junsu was suspecting. Did he know what it meant for two adults to sleep in the same bed?
“Why is Park-sonsaengnim sleeping in your bed?” Junsu eventually asked.
Yunho set the table as he talked. “Because I invited him to stay over again and we don’t have a spare bed.” He suspected Junsu was too clever and persistent to be satisfied with that answer though.
“Why didn’t he sleep on the couch again?”
“Because.. the bed is more comfortable. I wanted to share it with him. ..Park-sonsaengnim and I are really good friends.”
Junsu’s face lit up. “Like Joongie and I!”
Yunho sincerely hoped it wasn't exactly the same, not for at the very least ten more years for Junsu. “A bit like that, yes. Enough talking, eat your breakfast.”
When Junsu was eating he checked up on Yoochun again. Then he called Jaejoong’s mother and lied that he wasn’t feeling well, asking if she could maybe bring Junsu to school, if it wasn’t too much trouble.
She agreed immediately and spent the next five minutes lecturing him, telling him not to overwork himself and to eat healthy. It made him smile.
Next he called the firm. He felt bad about running off on Friday, being distracted yesterday, and calling in sick today. But until now he’d always worked hard - which was also thanks to Junsu for hardly ever getting sick - so he figured it would be okay.
Jaejoong’s mother rang the doorbell and he hurried to pack Junsu’s bag. Staying up for most of the past night had caused him to look pale and tired, so he didn’t even have to act much.
She acted just as worried as she had over the phone and handed him a food container. It was still warm.
“It’s porridge. I didn’t have much time to make it, but I think it turned out okay. You need to eat to get your strength back. Yunho stared at the bowl in his hands and nodded, bowing slightly in thanks.
She smiled down at Junsu and took his hand. “Come, Jae is waiting in the car.” She pulled Junsu into the hallway. Before Yunho closed the door, he saw him look over his shoulder and their eyes met.
There was a frown on Junsu’s face, but it was one of confusion rather than concern. Yunho smiled at him, a silent reassurance. He’d work this out and explain afterwards.
He walked back to the bedroom, placed the porridge on his nightstand, and sat on the edge of the bed.
Yoochun felt the movement of the mattress this time. His eyes opened.
He immediately closed them again and groaned, turning and burying his face in the pillow.
“Do you want me to get something against the headache?” Yunho asked carefully.
Yoochun opened one eye. Yunho smiled and leaned over. He stroked hair out of Yoochun’s face so he could see him better. “Are you okay?”
Yoochun gave him a weak smile in return. But it only lasted until he visibly remembered what had happened.
His eyes widened and he sat up, too quickly, and he hissed and grabbed his head.
“I’d apologise for kidnapping you,” Yunho said, “but I love having you here too much, so I’m not really sorry.” And then he tried to lighten the mood more with: “Also, you hadn’t returned my clothes yet so I came to get them, but I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to take them off your body or not.”
Yoochun didn’t return his smile. There was a look of panic in his eyes that Yunho didn’t like at all. Sure enough, a breakdown followed.
Yoochun moved back on the bed, away from him. His hands were shaking.
“I shouldn’t be here, you shouldn’t let me.. I..” He buried his hands in his hair. “I drank!”
Yunho moved forward. “Please, Yoochun, please tell me what’s going on inside your head,” he pleaded, and then, very carefully, “is this about your father?”
Yoochun covered his face with his hands and Yunho was afraid that it was to hide his tears. He moved further forward until he could wrap his arms around Yoochun’s shaking shoulders.
“I’m so scared I’ll.. I’ll become like him,” Yoochun choked out, “I already am.”
Yunho had guessed as much, but it felt like a step forward to actually hear Yoochun say it.
“You’re nothing like him, Yoochun.”
Yoochun tried to free himself from his embrace, Yunho wouldn’t let him go. “You don’t know! I swore I’d never drink... never..”
“Everyone resorts to alcohol sometimes. I do too. That doesn’t make you a bad person. You just have to make sure it doesn't happen too often. I can help you with that. And you’re not a bad drunk either, Yoochun, you get very emotional, but not in a violent way at all. The opposite actually.”
His words didn’t seem to register. Yoochun kept struggling. “I didn’t mean to steal anything, I didn’t! But no one believed me. They all said it, and if they didn’t they were thinking it. Like father like son, they were right! I-”
Yunho grabbed Yoochun’s wrists and used enough force until they stopped moving. “Yoochun!”
Yoochun’s shocked, slightly swollen eyes focused on him. Yunho stared into them.
“Could you hurt Junsu, would you do that?”
Yoochun’s eyes went impossibly wide. “Never! Never, I’d never-” His voice stocked, like he thought that defending himself was hopeless anyway.
Yunho shot him a reassuring smile and said, voice firm: “I believe you."
Yoochun stared at him.
"I believe that you wouldn’t harm Junsu. I would leave him in your care without a single worry. And believe me, I’m one of the most protective fathers out there.”
This was when Yunho realised that trusting Yoochun had never been an irrational thing to do. To everyone else it might have, they might have told him he was blinded by love.
But even if it sounded silly. Yunho believed that he, as a protective parent, had to have some instinct that only allowed him to fall in love with someone trustworthy enough. Which turned blinded by love around and made it a good thing.
Yoochun had stopped protesting, stopped shaking and stopped crying. For a moment Yunho worried that he’d even stopped breathing. He moved a hand to the back of his head and pulled him against his chest.
“I tried to warn you,” Yoochun said, muffled against his shoulder. “Our first date, I mentioned the stealing and the drinking and the debts. I did want a chance, but at the same time I wanted you to run from me, and you did, but then you didn’t.”
Yunho would ask about the debts later. But for now he smiled. “I will never run from you again, I refuse to.”
Yoochun buried his face closer against his shoulder.
“And you,” Yunho said, “don’t ever run away again. Even if you want to, please explain first. I was so confused Saturday.”
Yoochun’s arms came up and hugged him back. He was still hiding his face. “You promised Junsu you’d always keep him safe, and then you said.. my back.. that it wasn’t important..”
Yunho’s heart clenched. “I didn’t know.”
“I know.”
Yunho stared at the wall for a while, thinking.
“You became a teacher also because you wanted to learn to be a good father.”
“I wanted.. I wanted to be a good father to all the children who didn’t have one. I thought I was.. and the children's love helped me grow strong myself..”
“.. what happened?”
Yoochun’s shoulders shook. “I suddenly lost my job.. and I drank.. and I shouldn’t have.. and-”
Yunho shushed him. He didn’t want him to start crying again.
“You healed me,” he said, “let me heal you. Even if that sounds impossible to you, give me a chance. Trust me, what you did to me, I would have thought it more than impossible just two months ago.”
Yoochun turned his head, but his breath still warmed Yunho's shoulder as he spoke. “What did I do?”
“You made me fall in love again.”
Part 12: Providing Comfort
Part 10: Healed and Broken
Part 9: Dream Night
Part 8: Dating Teachers
Part 7: Family Sleepover
Part 6: Driving and Searching
Part 5: An Answer in Trust
Part 4: Drunk Denial
Part 3: Emptiness and Replacement
Part 2: Tulips in February
Part 1: Valentine's Flowers