Chapter Text
It bothered him. It bothered him more than he ever let on.
Who wouldn’t be bothered by everyone thinking they’re an airhead? Junhui had seen it so much whenever he searched his name on any fan platform: “airhead”, “weirdo”, “childish”, “strange”. There were his fans, weren’t they? Didn’t fans usually love everything about their idol?
Yet, one of the top posts when he looked up his name was a video of him during a live and the comment “Junhui is a really weird kid. He’s always playing by himself while the others are working. He’s really an airhead, huh?”
While he knew the fans were probably just joking around, Junhui couldn’t help but feel hurt by the comment, and the dozens under it agreeing and laughing.
He grew up hearing it from others. “You’re so fucking weird, Jun,” His friends would laugh, “No one knows what you’re talking about.”
Jun decided it didn’t matter what they said about him; he was going to Korea soon to be a trainee anyways and he’d make better friends. Friends that accepted him the way he was. Friends he didn’t need to impress or act differently for; real friends.
And for the most part, he was right. Despite the language barrier, Jun was able to make really good friends. They were all close, like a little if thirteen can be considered little family. And they even debuted together, becoming an instant success.
_______
Yet, he was unable to escape the painful words.
“Junnie, focus please,” Wonwoo whispered to him as they stood in the back of the group, talking to the fans on vlive, “The fans always talk about how you don’t pay attention during lives.”
Jun bowed his head a little as he muttered out a little “sorry”, letting go of the balloon he had been occupied with. What was the point of him paying attention? It wasn’t like he was gonna be able to talk anyways.
“Anyways, we’re so grateful to our precious Carats! We really do have the best fans,” Seungkwan singsonged, “Does anyone want to say anything before we end the broadcast?” He asked, looking around at the members around him.
A few voices talked over each other as they tried to decide who would talk next, some of the boys fake whining that they didn’t want the broadcast to end. Yet when Junhui accidentally caught Seungkwan’s eyes, he knew nothing good was going to come of it.
“It seems like our Moon Jun has finally tuned back into the real world!” Seungkwan joked, getting a few laughs out of the others, “Why don’t you say something to our Chinese Carats, Jun-hyung?”
Despite feeling himself flush red with embarrassment after being called out, Junhui quickly put a smile on his face and said, “Our Carats, thank you for watching our live, please make sure to take care of yourselves and eat your meals on time! Thank you!”
Satisfied, the members turned to the next person to speak, which was Seokmin. Glad the attention was off of him, Junhui let himself relax and sigh, relieved that no one was looking at him anymore, but still a little embarrassed and hurt from the previous comment. After collecting himself, he looked to Seokmin who was speaking, but not before making eye contact with Jeonghan, who was looking at him with a curious gaze. Silently, Jeonghan was asking if he was okay, he could tell. Not wanting to worry his doting hyung, Junhui shook his head and smiled. This made Jeonghan shrug and focus back on Seokmin, which was a relief to Jun.
He didn’t want to bring it up. It was stupid anyways; he knows they’re kidding, that they don’t mean it. They’re a family, families joke like this all the time. If Seungkwan could take jokes about his looks and Chan could about his age, then why couldn’t Jun?
It was a stupid insecurity. Who cares if people think he’s a stupid child? It didn’t matter, he knows he isn’t and the people who love him don’t think so either, right?
_______
Except they did, didn’t they? That’s why they always said he had a low mental age and called him a prankster.
“Jun-hyung might be one of the oldest, but he’s really like a 5 year-old on the inside!” Mingyu joked during an interview. Chan laughed, agreeing, “ He seems younger than me most of the time! All he does is play pranks!” Whenever he heard these comments, he just laughed along with the members, hiding his face in his arm. The members always assumed he did this because he was shy of his behavior; they didn’t know Jun did it to hide his red face and the held-back tears.
He didn’t want to let it bother him, but he couldn’t help it. He’d always been sensitive when it came to this area, especially since most equated him to just a pretty face.
‘Whatever,’ Junhui thought, collecting himself, ‘We can go back to the dorms now and I can go to sleep.’
“Hey guys, let’s do some rehearsals now, okay? We don’t have a lot of time before Dream Concert, and we have a lot of stages!” Soonyoung said, much to the dismay of the others members who groaned, “I know you guys wanna sleep, but we need to be perfect!”
“Come on guys, just for an hour or two,” Seungcheol tried to persuade, herding the members into the practice room, “You guys can shower and sleep once we’re done.”
“This is gonna take forever!” Seungkwan lamented, “We already had a full schedule today!”
“It won’t, I’ll make sure we’re done before it gets too late.” Joshua said gently.
‘I really hope he means that.’ Junhui thought.
_______
An hour and a half later, the members were all panting, trying to keep in time with the music and not bump into each other. It was clear they were all exhausted and needed rest, but Soonyoung told them they could stop when they got the whole sequence perfectly, which seemed like it was less and less likely. Running on only a few hours of sleep, it wasn’t a surprise when Junhui ran straight into Jihoon for the third time.
Sighing, Soonyoung turned off the music while the others helped Jun and Jihoon up off the sweaty floor. “Okay guys, take a ten minute break. It’s obvious you guys can’t focus,” he said, eyeing Jun. Junhui just kept his eyes trained to the floor, not saying anything. Slowly, he made his way over to his water bottle, crashing down and taking little sips from it. He refused to look up, afraid to see everyone glaring at him for messing up so many times and delaying the end of their practice. He knew they were all exhausted, which just fed the guilt crawling up his throat.
Suddenly, a pair of sneakers made their way into Junhui’s field of vision. Slowly, Jun looked up to see Minghao, looking at him wearily. “What’s up with you? You don’t usually mess up this much,” he said, seeming concerned but annoyed, “We can’t go home until you fix this, so try a little harder, will you?”
“I-I am trying, Hao.” Jun tried to explain weakly.
“You could try harder,” Wonwoo cut in, having heard their conversation, “You’re the only one messing up, can’t you see that we’re all tired and we’re here now just because of you?” Wonwoo said, irritation clear in his voice. Jun knew, they were all so drained, they would never say things like this if they weren’t, but it didn’t stop Wonwoo’s words from cutting into Jun’s heart.
“I-I’m sorry guys, I really am,” Junhui said softly, the lump in his throat growing, “You guys can go, I can just stay here and practice by myself?” He tried, wanting to find a solution.
“We’re a team, so we can’t leave until we look perfect. So can you just get your shit together so we can go home?!” Soonyoung suddenly bit out, causing Jun’s eyes to widen. Before he could stutter anything out, Soonyoung continued, “You’re always doing this, spacing out when we’re working, trying to play and joke while the rest of us are getting stuff done! A few of us stayed yesterday to fix any mistakes we made on the choreography, where were you? You always have your head in the clouds, not paying attention to what you should be doing. Stop acting like a child, Jun, you’re not just a pretty face, are you?” Soonyoung spat.
“Soonyoung! That’s enough! Where do you get off saying things like that?” Seungcheol demanded. It was clear he, as well as the others, were shocked by Soonyoung’s harsh words. However, when Jun looked at the other members, he wasn’t sure that they didn’t agree with him. ‘They all really think I’m a deadweight’ Junhui thought.
Soonyoung continued to argue with Seungcheol, spitting out more harsh and hurtful words. It was clear he was fed up and couldn’t contain his anger anymore.
“It’s not like it isn’t true! Everyone says the same thing! ‘Jun, can you please focus? Jun, can you pay attention? Jun, please stop running around.’ He’s always acting so childish, like he has no cares, while the rest of us are working! It isn’t like everyone else isn’t thinking what I’m saying!” Soonyoung exclaimed, not seeing why Seungcheol wasn’t understanding him. Slowly, Jun looked around the room, and could see in a few of their eyes; they agreed with Soonyoung. They thought he wasn’t pulling his weight in the group either.
All of a sudden, it became too much. Everyone was talking around him, some angrier than others. Some arguing that Soonyoung was being unfair, that Jun tried just as hard as the rest of them. Others, mumbling that it didn’t seem that way. A few of them just stood there, unsure as to what they should say or do.
Jun stood there, quietly breaking down in his head.
‘They think you’re useless. Your own family,’ Jun thought numbly, ‘You’ve disappointed them. They were never joking when they said those things, they really meant it.’
The weight of his own thoughts falling down on him, Junhui’s breath started to quicken, feeling panicked all of a sudden. ‘Oh god, what have you done? Now they’re all fighting because of you. You really are too much for other people, aren’t you?’ His thoughts began to run wild, increasing his panic and state of distress. ‘They hate you. You’re ruining what they have. Why can’t you just be normal?’
Overwhelmed with his own mind, Junhui didn’t notice the others turning to look at him after hearing labored breathing coming from him. As the seconds passed, they continued watching Jun, who was starting to hyperventilate. “Jun-ah? Are you okay?” Jeonghan tried, softly, laying a gentle hand on Jun’s arm.
However, the soft words and touch only spurred Junhui on, scaring him and causing him to flinch backwards into the mirror. He began to breathe wildly, his negative thoughts winning and causing him to have panic in his eyes as he looked around wildly. ‘I need to get out of here,’ Jun thought, ‘I can’t do this, not here, not in front of all of them.’
“Jun? Are you okay? Hey, talk to us.” Seungcheol tried, but it was pointless. Jun had already made up his mind; he needed to leave and calm down on his own. They couldn’t see him like this, they would get so upset and he didn’t want to bother them any more than he had already. Jun clambered over towards the door, ignoring the other’s calling of his name, worry and panic in their voices. Even Soonyoung had gotten over his anger and was concerned for his Chinese member.
Jun basically sprinted down the corridor, barreling into the bathroom and locking the door so the others couldn’t follow him in. He needed to be alone, he just needed to calm down by himself. He had bad thoughts like this all the time, it was fine. He would be fine.
However, he was usually able to convince himself that his negativity was false; that those thoughts were untrue. What was he supposed to do now that they were proven? That it had been his members who said those things?
‘It was not going to be okay,’ Junhui realized.
It was never going to be okay.