And so...
The most unlikely intervention began.
Out of everyone in the studio...
Who would've thought it would be August, Jordan, and Zen who managed to make Jeremiah lower his guard?
"Soooo..." August asked gently, scooting a little closer. "Why are you sad, noona? What's making you sad?"
Jordan and Zen instinctively leaned in as well, looking like little kids waiting for a bedtime story.
Although...
This one came with emotional damage.
For a long moment, Jeremiah simply stared at the floor.
Maybe it was because the studio had almost emptied out.
Maybe it was because the four of them were tucked away in a quiet corner.
Or maybe...
For the first time in a very long while...
He genuinely didn't feel like he'd be judged.
Without realizing it...
He slowly took off the armor he'd been wearing all day.
"...Well."
"If you guys really wanna hear my fu..."
He glanced at the three innocent faces in front of him.
"...messed-up life..."
Zen's phone suddenly spoke.
"You can say 'fuck.'"
Jeremiah blinked.
"We hear it all the time."
"My brother usually says the Filipino version."
Jordan nodded.
"Yeah."
"Eli swears a lot too."
August sheepishly scratched the back of his head.
"Nikola hyung and Kang Ian hyung aren't exactly family-friendly either."
Jeremiah couldn't help letting out a small laugh.
"...I don't know if I should find that funny or deeply concerning."
"It can be both," Jordan answered matter-of-factly.
Another laugh escaped Jeremiah.
Small.
But genuine.
"...Anyway."
He drew in a slow breath.
"It all started when I came out."
"I was in my junior year of high school."
"I was still trying to figure myself out..."
"When this one guy approached me."
His voice subtly hardened.
"He was the star football player."
"No..."
He corrected himself.
"THE star quarterback ."
"I didn't understand why someone like him wanted to talk to me."
"But he told me..."
"...that he admired me."
"He said I was brave."
"That he wished he had the courage to come out too."
Jeremiah smiled bitterly.
"I was an emotionally unstable teenager."
"So..."
"I believed him."
"I empathized with him."
"We started hanging out."
"Secretly."
"One meeting became two."
"Then three."
"Then..."
He looked down at his hands.
"I fell for him."
"Hard."
He laughed quietly at himself.
"Like a fucking idiot."
His eyes instinctively lifted toward the three boys.
He expected discomfort.
Judgment.
Pity.
Instead...
They were simply listening.
No interruptions.
No strange expressions.
Just...
Listening.
It gave him the courage to continue.
"So..."
"One day, we met in the locker room like we always did."
"I don't know."
"I guess I was feeling brave that day."
"So..."
"I kissed him."
Silence.
"He shoved me so hard..."
"...I literally flew across the room."
All three boys frowned at the same time.
It was oddly adorable.
Three angry puppies.
Jeremiah laughed despite himself.
"I don't know why I'm laughing."
"I guess..."
"You guys just have this weird ability to make heavy things feel lighter."
His smile faded.
"He started yelling."
"Calling me slurs."
"Saying how disgusting I was."
"Then his teammates walked in."
"They were all laughing."
Another pause.
"It turned out..."
"There was never a closeted gay guy."
"There never was."
"It was a bet."
His voice became almost frighteningly calm.
"They wanted to see if they could make the gay kid fall in love with the captain of the football team."
"And I did."
"So..."
"They won."
His fingers slowly tightened together.
"After that..."
"School became hell."
"I got shoved into lockers."
"My lunch got thrown at me."
"I got called every slur you could think of."
"Every single day."
Silence settled between them.
"So after that..."
"I stopped trusting people."
"I couldn't..."
"No."
"I wouldn't..."
"Let myself fall in love again."
"Every time someone showed interest in me..."
"I convinced myself they couldn't actually want me."
"It had to be something else."
"Lust."
"Curiosity."
"A joke."
"Anything..."
"...except love."
He swallowed.
"So..."
"I started hooking up."
"Gay."
"Bi."
"Sometimes even straight guys."
"I kept everything physical."
"No emotions."
"No expectations."
"No chance of getting hurt."
His eyes slowly drifted across the room.
"...And then Toma happened."
Another long silence.
"I'm terrified."
He admitted it so quietly that the words almost disappeared.
"I'm terrified of falling for him."
"He was straight."
"At least..."
"...before everything that happened between us."
"And every time he smiles at me..."
"My brain doesn't see Toma."
"It sees that boy."
"It remembers."
"It panics."
"So..."
"I've been pushing him away."
"I've been acting like a bitch."
"Because..."
His voice cracked.
"If I make him hate me now..."
He forced out a weak laugh.
"...maybe it'll hurt less..."
"...when he leaves me later."
The studio fell silent.
Not because nobody knew what to say.
But because, for the first time...
Everyone understood why Jeremiah had been hurting all along.
****
Silence settled over the four of them.
Not an awkward silence.
Just...
The kind where everyone quietly lets the weight of someone else's pain sink in.
After what felt like forever, August finally spoke.
"Uhhh..."
He scratched his cheek.
"Noona..."
Jeremiah looked up.
"...Do you happen to know where that guy lives?"
Jeremiah blinked.
"...Huh?"
"Why?"
August answered with complete sincerity.
"I was thinking of making a bonfire."
"I need firewood, you know?"
He turned toward Jordan and Zen with an expression that practically screamed,
"You guys see the vision, right?"
Immediately...
They nodded.
"I very much approve."
Zen's phone declared.
"I'll bring the lighter."
Jordan nodded enthusiastically.
"I'll bring marshmallows!"
"We can sing Kumbaya around the fire."
"I've always wanted to do that."
Jeremiah stared.
"...Guys."
"I really don't want you three ending up on tomorrow morning's news."
For the first time that day...
He laughed.
A real laugh.
The three immediately exchanged victorious looks.
Mission accomplished.
It wasn't that they'd erased Jeremiah's pain.
No one could do that.
But...
They'd managed to pull him back from the edge before he disappeared into those memories again.
Sometimes...
That was enough.
Once the laughter settled, August spoke again.
"You know..."
"I think I understand."
Jeremiah tilted his head.
"The part about being scared to trust people again."
August smiled softly.
"I really do."
"I don't know if you already knew this..."
"But before LEAVEN..."
"Me, Ahn Jae hyung, Kang Ian hyung, and Silas hyung were all part of another survival show."
"The Genesis Project."
"I was just... happy to be there."
"I wanted everyone to get along."
"So..."
"I didn't realize someone was taking advantage of me."
"There was this one hyung..."
"And the people around him."
"They kept piling work onto me."
"And I kept saying yes."
"I thought..."
"If I worked harder..."
"They'd like me."
His smile never disappeared.
But it became quieter.
"In the finale..."
"I pushed myself too far."
"I collapsed."
"I ended up in the hospital with pneumonia."
Jeremiah's expression slowly changed.
"He..."
"...wanted you to get that sick?"
August simply nodded.
"When I woke up..."
"The first thing I saw..."
"...was eomma and appa crying."
"They kept apologizing."
"As if any of it was their fault."
He shook his head.
"It wasn't."
A warm smile returned to his face.
"Then Sir Foca found me."
"He offered me another chance."
"And..."
"I decided I'd try trusting people again."
He looked fondly toward the rehearsal room.
"Now..."
"I get to debut with LEAVEN."
"With people who genuinely care about me."
"Especially Ahn Jae hyung."
"He looked after me the whole time."
"So..."
"I realized something."
"There are awful people in this world."
"But..."
"There are also wonderful ones."
"And I decided..."
"...I'd rather spend my life trusting the people who've already proven they care."
Jeremiah quietly lowered his gaze.
"...That's..."
"...actually really nice."
August brightened.
"Oh!"
"And that evil hyung eventually went to prison."
"So..."
"I guess karma really kicked him in the butt."
Zen's phone immediately chimed in.
"I hope he drops the soap."
Zen himself wore the most terrifyingly calm expression imaginable.
The face of someone wishing for maximum cosmic retribution.
August tilted his head.
"...Why?"
"Why would dropping the soap be bad?"
Jordan blinked.
"...Wait."
Jeremiah's eyes widened.
"Oh no..."
He immediately reached toward Zen's phone.
"I don't think we should explai..."
Too late.
Zen's phone had already begun speaking in its perfectly flat mechanical voice.
"While researching for my thesis, I encountered a fictional prison story in which an inmate dropped his soap during shower time. The story implied that this left him vulnerable to sexual assault by other prisoners."
Silence.
Jordan's face turned bright red.
He lunged at Zen's phone.
"NOPE!"
Smack!
Unfortunately...
He hit the wrong button.
The speaker glitched.
"...sexual assault..."
"...sexual assault..."
"...sexual assault..."
"Aaaaaah!"
Jordan frantically mashed random buttons.
"MAKE IT STOP!"
He buried his face in his hands, wishing the earth would kindly open up and swallow him whole.
Meanwhile...
August tilted his head even further.
"...What's sexual assault?"
Jeremiah covered his face.
"Honey..."
He was trying very, very hard not to laugh.
"...I think that's a conversation for when you're a little older."
August simply nodded.
"...Okay."
For some reason...
That innocent little response broke whatever remained of Jeremiah's emotional wall.
He laughed.
Really laughed.
Not because anything that had happened to him was funny.
It wasn't.
But because, somehow...
After finally letting someone see the parts of himself he'd buried for years...
He didn't feel nearly as alone anymore.
And for Jeremiah...
That feeling was almost as frightening...
As it was comforting.
****
After finally managing to silence Zen's possessed phone...
Peace, at last, returned to the studio.
For about three seconds.
Then Jordan spoke.
"It's not just August who understands."
He smiled softly.
"I do too."
Jeremiah looked toward him.
"Back when my mom and I still lived in China..."
"People called me all kinds of slurs because I'm on the spectrum."
He paused.
"Even my own father."
Jeremiah's expression fell.
"He couldn't accept that I wasn't going to be his perfect little child."
Jordan's voice remained calm.
Almost matter-of-fact.
"It's hard to trust people when your own flesh and blood struggles to accept you."
"But..."
He smiled.
"My mom never let me become bitter."
"She always told me that there were still people in this world worth trusting."
"And..."
"I'm really glad I believed her."
"Because if I hadn't..."
"I never would've met my best friends."
He looked around the room as if he could already picture them.
"Or the family I've found here."
A faint blush slowly crept onto his cheeks.
"And..."
"I wouldn't have met Eli."
His smile grew impossibly gentle.
"He cares about me so much..."
"He makes me feel like I'm okay."
"Like I'm not broken."
"Like I'm just..."
"...me."
"And that..."
His eyes shimmered.
"...I'm worth loving."
Jeremiah quietly lowered his head.
"So yes."
Jordan smiled warmly.
"We really do understand."
Then he looked toward Zen.
"Your turn."
Zen immediately began typing.
His fingers flew across the screen before the familiar mechanical voice filled the room.
"Unlike these two..."
"I'm still learning how to trust."
"There was once someone who told me he wanted to be my friend."
"I believed him."
"One day..."
"He pushed me down a flight of stairs."
"He said it was an accident."
"That everyone had just been playing."
"I woke up unable to speak."
Jeremiah's chest tightened.
"I wanted to."
"I really did."
"But..."
"I couldn't."
"The only person I could still speak to..."
"...was my twin brother."
"Yen."
"My parents couldn't understand why I could speak to him..."
"...but not to them."
"Eventually..."
"The doctors explained that I had developed selective mutism because of the trauma."
Zen paused to type again.
"I eventually realized something."
"I can only speak to people..."
"...when I truly trust them."
"That realization broke my heart."
"Because it meant..."
"...the only person I completely trusted..."
"...was Yen."
"I couldn't even fully trust my own parents."
"It hurt them."
"But..."
"They never blamed me."
"They never stopped loving me."
"They simply kept trying."
"Little by little..."
"They earned my trust."
Another pause.
"I can speak to them now."
"The smiles on their faces..."
"...made me want to keep trying."
"I don't want to rely on my phone forever."
"I don't want Yen speaking for me forever."
"So..."
"I've decided..."
"Little by little..."
"I'll keep trusting the people my heart tells me are safe."
The room fell quiet.
Then...
Something happened that nobody expected.
Zen slowly reached out.
His hand gently covered Jeremiah's.
Everyone froze.
Zen looked directly into Jeremiah's eyes.
"So..."
His lips parted.
Not his phone.
His lips.
"I think..."
His voice was barely above a whisper.
"...it's worth trusting people again."
Silence.
Absolute silence.
August's eyes grew wide.
Jordan forgot how to breathe.
Jeremiah simply stared.
"...Y-you..."
His voice trembled.
"...You spoke to me."
Zen nodded.
A tiny smile appeared on his face.
"My heart..."
He whispered.
"...decided you were worth trusting."
"Because..."
"...you trusted us."
Something inside Jeremiah shattered.
Not painfully.
Relievingly.
Years of fear.
Years of pretending.
Years of building walls so high that nobody could climb over them...
Finally gave way.
The tears came before he even realized he was crying.
August immediately grabbed one of his hands.
Jordan quietly held the other.
Zen gently rubbed his back.
None of them rushed him.
None of them told him to stop crying.
They simply stayed.
And somehow...
That simple act of staying...
Was exactly what Jeremiah had needed all along.