Chapter Text
Chapter One
Chan felt like his heart was going to pound right out of his chest. His chest felt like it was tight–as if someone was trying to squeeze the life out of him. His ears sounded like there was static buzzing in them, and his vision was blurring a little. He could feel the moisture building in his eyes, but he refused to cry. He wouldn’t give his hyungs the satisfaction–they already thought he was a baby, he didn’t need to prove them correct by doing something as child-like as crying. Needless to say, Chan was not having a very good day.
Chan’s not-so-very-good (awful) day had started when he woke up to Wonwoo scolding him for forgetting to move his clothes from the drying rack the previous evening. He had come home late because he wanted to perfect the new dance routine, and therefore stayed hours after his hyungs and returned home so exhausted that he forgot about the clothes. Chan apologized profusely, and quickly got up to do as he was told. Then he headed to a vocal practice, where he was scolded for clearly not taking care of himself properly because he was currently losing his voice. They had recorded several hours of Going Seventeen content the previous day, and then Chan alone had about two hours of solo interviews for one of their upcoming projects. He had talked so much that his voice had started to go out a little. The “Sometimes I swear they debut you all too young–you’re too immature to understand how to take care of yourself,” sticking in Chan’s head the rest of the day. It stuck in his head so much that he brought it to dance practice with him, allowing it to distract him to the point that he was yelled at and forced to kneel in the front of the room with his arms up for about twenty minutes until he could learn to take things seriously. The looks his hyungs gave him after being scolded by the choreographer were enough to make Chan want to curl in a ball under the covers of his bed and never come out again.
By the time he walked through the front door of the dorm that evening Chan was beginning to think that maybe he wasn’t actually meant to be an idol. His self-esteem was at an all time low and he knew there was only so much that he could take before he lost his head and broke down in sobs or exploded. His hyungs didn’t seem to get this memo and started in on him about the dance practice. It was only half of them home, the rest had an additional schedule and wouldn’t be home for about another hour. It was Seungcheol, Joshua, Soonyoung, Wonwoo, Minghao and Junhui that were home and they were not ready to put the incident in the practice room to rest…
“What in the hell was up with you today, Lee Chan?” Soonyoung scolded as they all walked into the living room. “That behavior was unacceptable.”
“Not now, hyung…please,” Chan begged, making a move to walk to his room–the sooner he was able to go to bed, the sooner his awful day would be over.
“What do you mean ‘not now, hyung?’” Seungcheol interrupted, grabbing on to Chan’s forearm to stop him from walking off. “If your hyung wants to discuss your behavior today, you sure as hell are going to sit here and discuss it. Are you getting a bit too much of an ego? Is that what it is? You are too good for all of us?”
“Hyung–that’s not…” Chan started to protest.
“Do you know how bad that made me look as the performance leader?” Soonyoung cut Chan’s protest off, clearly not willing to listen to what Chan had to say about anything. “I clearly don’t discipline you enough if you think it’s okay to zone out during dance practice and not be mindful of the choreographer’s time. Are you too good to take dance lessons seriously anymore?”
“And what about myself as your general leader?” Seungcheol added on. “It shows that neither of us clearly keep you in line. Do I need to be stricter with you to get you to stop behaving like a child?”
“I didn’t–” Chan tried to defend himself once more–his shoulders drooping as Seungcheol’s words crushed him.
“Stop interrupting your hyungs when they are trying to scold you!” Wonwoo added in. “You are just proving that you don’t take any of their words seriously. That you think you know better than all of us. You don’t even take your chores seriously in this dorm anymore for heaven’s sake!”
Chan suddenly felt like he wanted to throw up. He looked around the room to see if there was anyone on his side, but all he was getting were blank stares–all clearly upset and all clearly of the same mind–Chan was in the wrong. Even Minghao, Joshua, and Junhui seemed to be thinking the same thing, despite not having spoken up yet. Chan was the immature one. Chan had failed his hyungs. Chan was nothing but a child.
He felt like his world was caving in. All these years, and this was what his hyungs thought of him?
“I have never seen you act as immaturely as you did today, just because you are the maknae it doesn’t give you the right to act this way,” Joshua said, putting the final nail in the coffin.
Chan could either break down and cry, or he could explode. Since breaking down and crying would leave him much too vulnerable…well, he exploded.
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” Chan yelled out, yanking his arm out of Seungcheol’s hold. “You won’t even hear what I have to say! I don’t think I’m better than anyone. I know I suck at this job, and I know that I need to work even harder to prove myself. I was mad at myself during the dance practice and I let the vocal teacher’s words get stuck in my head. That’s why I was distracted! She knows I suck, too. I’m sorry I’m not working hard enough, but I don’t know what else I can do! I–I’m so fucking tired. I can’t change how old I am, no matter how much I would love to! You don’t need to tell me how awful I am, I already know! So fuck off!”
Not even allowing a moment for his hyungs to process the words that he had said, Chan turned on his heel and ran out the front door, slamming it behind him. He got down the stairwell and halfway down the block before he realized he wasn’t even wearing shoes. Luckily it was a nice warm spring day, and therefore his feet wouldn’t freeze, but that did leave him with a bit of a predicament. He didn’t know where he could go. All restaurants and cafes were out of the question–they wouldn’t let him in without his shoes. He knew he had very little time before his hyungs would come bursting out the front door as well to give him the scolding of a lifetime for how disrespectful Chan had just been–which Chan was 0% in any sort of headspace to receive.
Allowing instinct to guide him, the next thing Chan knew he was in front of a very familiar front door. He knocked rapidly and impatiently on it, praying that his friend was at least there. The door opened after a moment to reveal a very confused Han Jisung.
“Chan sunbaenmin, are you okay?” Jisung asked in confused panic, turning behind him to look at his other members who had gathered in the living room to see what was going on.
“Chan-ah, what’s going on?” Changbin asked, stepping forward towards his friend the moment he realized who was in the doorway.
Chan collapsed into Changbin’s arms finally letting out the tears that he had been holding on to.
– – – – – –
Seungcheol and Joshua had run after Chan the moment they processed what was happening. They slid on their shoes and sprinted out to follow him, but the maknae was much too fast for them. By the time they got down to the street, the youngest member of the group was nowhere to be found.
“I’m going to drag him by his ear back to the dorm and give him the spanking of a lifetime,” Seungcheol growled, his cheeks turning a little red with his anger. “How dare he tell us to fuck off. If I told my hyung those very words, I would be lucky if I could sit comfortably again in a month!”
Joshua sighed, and reached out to grab Seungcheol’s arm to pull him to a stop. They were heading back to the dorm to regroup and try to come up with some ideas as to where Chan might have headed. It wouldn’t do any good to wander around Seoul aimlessly looking for him–and quite frankly would be potentially too suspicious to any wandering Dispatch workers or sasaengs.
“Seungcheol-ah, I understand why you are upset with the tone that he took and some of the words that he said,” Joshua appeased, before adding. “But I don’t think that was the important part of what Chan just yelled at us. I–I think we just let our anger cloud our judgment. There is clearly much more going on than we realized.”
“But he–!” Seungcheol tried to protest.
“We didn’t give him the chance to even defend himself,” Joshua pointed out. “And those were some pretty self-deprecating things that he just admitted to us.”
“He is incredibly talented, he has no right to think that way,” Seungcheol grumbled, still allowing his anger to be at the forefront. “And just because he is upset, it doesn’t mean he can speak to us with no respect.”
Joshua sighed, seeing that he wasn’t getting anywhere at the moment. Seungcheol was still too upset. He would need time to cool down and clear his head.
“We need to inform the rest of the members what happened,” Joshua pointed out, changing trajectory of the conversation. “Seungkwan might be the best person to figure out where Chan went.”
Before Seungcheol could say another word, the phone in his back pocket started ringing.
“Hello?” Seungcheol asked, not even bothering to see who was calling him.
“Why am I getting a phone call from Bang Chan informing me that our incredibly distraught maknae just showed up at his door without any shoes on and crying so hard he was worried he would pass out from lack of oxygen?” Mingyu’s voice rang out, sounding like he was ready to chew Seungcheol’s head clean off.
Seungcheol’s stomach dropped at those words and he felt like ice water had been poured over his head. He had done that. He had made his maknae THAT distraught. Fuck. His anger entirely dissipated and he was left with one thought: he was the worst leader ever.
Seungcheol almost dropped his phone. Joshua quickly grabbed it from his hand, and lifted it to his ear to ask what was going on. Mingyu quickly caught Joshua up on what was happening.
“We will be back at the dorm in 5 minutes, hyung,” Mingyu explained. “We can all talk then. From the sounds of it, it might be for the best if we let Chan have some time at the Stray Kids dorm to gather himself. I don’t know what really happened, but we should give him a little bit of space for now.”
Joshua agreed wholeheartedly and informed Mingyu that he and Seungcheol would be back at the dorm in a few minutes as well. He then proceeded to hang up and look at the leader next to him, who was now very clearly trapped in his own head.
“Seungcheol-ah, whatever you are thinking is not true,” Joshua reassured. “You are not a bad leader, you are a human who is bound to make mistakes. All six of us that were just in that living room with Chan are equally as guilty. We all let our own frustrations cloud our judgment and didn’t let him tell his side of the story. He doesn’t need a leader that is beating himself up. He needs us to admit our mistakes and get to the bottom of what is going on.”
Seungcheol nodded in determination, and followed after Joshua. He was still feeling like shit, but it was nice to have a bit of a game plan.
It should have come as no surprise when they walked into the dorm that Seungkwan looked like he was ready to murder half the group. He and Chan may fight the most and pretend like they despise each other, but they weren’t fooling anyone. That was Seungkwan’s precious dongsaeng that they had upset and he was livid. If looks could kill, Seungcheol would be six feet under ground.
“Yelling at Seungcheol isn’t going to be conducive in getting to the bottom of what’s going on with Chan,” Jeonghan said softly to Seungkwan, gathering the boy in his arms and dragging him over to the couch.
“Someone, who is not overly emotional, can you please tell us what happened,” Jihoon spoke up from his spot on the armchair in the corner of the room.
Minghao and Junhui took that as their cue to explain, and gave them all a brief overview of everything that had transpired from them leaving the company to Seungcheol and Joshua walking back through the door. The six members that hadn’t been present all looked disheartened to hear what Chan had said about himself, and all a little bit angry and disappointed at what the six members had done to their maknae--or in the case of Junhui and Minghao, what they had not done for their maknae.
“Does anyone know why he was so upset during dance practice?” Mingyu asked, looking around at his other members to see if anyone had an answer.
“Well, I don’t know about that but I scolded him this morning,” Wonwoo sheepishly admitted. “He had promised me that he would take his clothes off of the drying rack last night, but I woke up this morning to them still sitting there.”
“Hyung, he didn’t get home until about 3:30 in the morning,” Vernon spoke up. “I got up, got a glass of water and heard him come in. He looked exhausted. He said he was going over the new dance until he got it perfect. I’m sure he genuinely just forgot.”
There was complete silence in the room for a moment at Vernon’s statement.
“He–he went over the dance for THAT long?” Soonyoung asked, his eyes bulging in surprise. “And–and I accused him of not taking dance seriously enough.”
“Lee Chan? Not taking dance seriously enough?” Seungkwan asked, narrowing his eyes at Soonyoung in accusation. “You have got to be joking. Surely even you aren’t that dense.”
Jeonghan slapped Seungkwan on the upper thigh and gave him an unimpressed look.
“You being rude to Soonyoung doesn’t help the situation,” Jeonghan scolded, but then turned to Soonyoung. “Kwanie does have a point, though. I thought we all understood that Chan usually is much too hard on himself when it comes to dance.”
“I–I honestly wasn’t really even thinking about that,” Soonyoung sheepishly admitted. “I was just upset that I might look bad in the eyes of choreographer-nim, and well…I, I didn’t let Chan explain.”
“And was Chan rude this morning when you scolded him about the clothes?” Jeonghan asked, turning towards Wonwoo.
“No, he–he apologized profusely and immediately went and did it,” Wonwoo admitted, feeling decidedly sick to his stomach. “And I still threw it back in his face during our argument. I told him he wasn’t even taking his chores seriously.”
“But no one knows what he was told during the vocal lesson?” Joshua asked, remembering that Chan had alluded to those words being what distracted him during the dance lesson.
“I had a vocal lesson after him, and I can tell you that the vocal instructor was not in a very good mood,” Seokmin said when it appeared that no one else had any information. “I was able to joke and get her into a better place (she really does have a soft spot for me) when she finally admitted that she and her long-term boyfriend had just broken up. Right as we ended she said she would need to apologize to Chan for being a little harsh on him during his lesson. I didn’t really think much of it. Chan usually has such thick skin that I figured he was fine…”
Seungkwan groaned and shook his head in exasperation, getting confused looks from the rest of his hyungs.
“When are you idiots going to realize that 95% of the time when Chan says he is fine, he’s really not,” Seungkwan exclaimed.
“Why doesn’t he tell us he isn’t fine, then?” Seungcheol asked in exasperation. “How can we know if he won’t be honest with us?”
“I would hope by this point you have all come to realize that Chan is terrified of being viewed as nothing but ‘the maknae,’” Seungkwan explained, his tone indicating that he felt like he was speaking to a bunch of little kids who knew nothing. “Surely you’ve figured out by now that he doesn’t like to be babied. He’s afraid the moment he allows himself to act even the slightest bit immature, that it’s all we will see him as. He already has enough ‘fans’ that say the only position he has in the group is being the maknae. He is terrified his hyungs will think the same.”
“That’s ridiculous! He is insanely talented, I would never think of him as ‘just the maknae’!” Junhui exclaimed in shock.
“Yeah, well we probably all need to do a better job of telling him that,” Seungkwan replied with a shrug. “You have to admit that we’ve taken things too far sometimes when it comes to him…he is an easy punching bag for our stress, and he isn’t one that is going to admit that his feelings have been hurt.”
Joshua let out a heavy sigh and spoke up the words that they were all thinking.
“We fucked up.”
– – – – – – –
Changbin had taken Chan into his room and closed the door behind them so they could get a little bit of privacy. Based on a shared look with his own leader Bang Chan, Changbin knew he was going to contact Chan’s hyungs. Changbin just had to worry about his distressed friend in his arms.
Changbin wouldn’t say he was the best with emotions. Bang Chan tended to be much better at those mature emotion-packed conversations. Chan was his friend, though, so he was going to do his best given the situation.
It had taken about fifteen minutes, but Chan’s tears finally abated to a level that Changbin felt like maybe he could start to get some answers as to what was going on. He assumed that it had something to do with the other Seventeen members, which was why Chan ran to Changbin and not one of his own members. He couldn’t figure out what would make the boy this distressed, though.
“Hey, Channie,” Changbin said softly. “Do you think you can tell me what’s going on? I can’t really provide any help while I’m still in the dark.”
“My–my hyungs think that all I am is a spoiled ungrateful maknae,” Chan choked out, sounding like his sobs were likely to return at any moment. “I’m a failure to my team. I never should have debuted.”
Changbin bit back a protest, knowing that refuting those words wouldn’t do any good. That had to come from Chan’s hyungs.
“My thoughts on the validity of that statement aside,” Changbin said delicately. “Do you mind telling me why you think so?”
It took Chan a couple moments, but he finally launched into the story of everything that had happened that day. Changbin felt anger on Chan’s behalf at what had happened. It really sounded like there were a lot of misunderstandings, and it sounded like Chan’s hyungs were taking their stress out on the poor boy. There was one thing that Chan kept repeating that Changbin couldn’t fully understand, though: “I try so hard not to be just the maknae!” Changbin had no understanding of being the youngest member of a kpop group. In fact, he wasn’t even in the youngest half of his own group. He always thought being the maknae must be kind of nice. Surely it was much less responsibility, right? It left Chan more able to hone his skills and focus on his talents…right? He wasn’t stupid enough to say this aloud, though. He could tell it wouldn’t be received well, and well to be honest, Changbin had to admit that maybe there was something crucial that he wasn’t understanding.
“Channie, I hear what you are saying and I have to admit that maybe I am not the one that you need to be having this conversation with,” Changbin said softly after Chan had gone silent. “Are you okay if I get Innie? I just think maybe you need another maknae’s perspective, and maybe my Chan hyung, too. He is very good at these kinds of things.”
Chan looked like he was going to protest for a moment, but ultimately the boy nodded his head. Changbin hurriedly made his way out of the room and into the living room where the rest of his group was gathered--all clearly eager to get an update as to what was going on.
“Jeongin-ah, would you please come with me?” Changbin asked. “So much of this comes down to him being the maknae, and I must admit that I’m a little out of my league on that one. Chan hyung, I would like you to join us as well.”
His members quickly nodded and followed Changbin back to his room. Chan was wiping at the remaining tears that were sliding down his cheeks, clearly trying to make himself a little bit more presentable. Bang Chan wanted nothing more than to pull the poor boy into his arms, but didn’t know how that would be received. He forced himself to sit on the bed across from the boy, with Jeongin sitting down next to him and Changbin returning to his spot with Chan.
Changbin quickly recapped the situation while Chan sat staring at the floor, clearly listening to what was being said but refusing eye contact–most likely out of embarrassment.
“God, that is the worst thing they could possibly say!” Jeongin exclaimed after Changbin had finished recapping. “That’s such a stupidly easy way out.”
Bang Chan and Changbin looked at their own maknae in surprise.
“Why does everything have to come back to age? You’re upset? Oh, you are just being the maknae. You don’t agree with something? Oh, you aren’t mature enough to know how things should really be done!” Jeongin exclaimed. “It’s the literal worst, Chan sunbaenim. I totally get it! It’s like everything you are and everything you do comes back to one thing, and one thing only: you’re the youngest.”
“Innie, we had no idea you felt that way,” Bang Chan said in clear surprise.
“That’s because you all aren’t really too bad about it,” Jeongin replied with a shrug. “But I do hear it a lot from staff members, and some online comments can get pretty mean. It’s also really annoying when that is what you are known for in the group–when it’s the first thing people associate with your name. At least as a leader, you are known for being in a position of responsibility. Being a maknae literally just means you are the youngest, and often comes with the stereotype of being immature or whiny.”
“I will be the first to admit that I really hadn’t ever thought much of it,” Changbin sheepishly admitted. “I thought it was just all privilege and less responsibility…not that I think you are not responsible, Innie…I just–”
“You just aren’t in a position you had to think about it,” Jeongin finished for him. “People pair your name with ‘rapper’, a talent that you can be proud of. Being a maknae isn’t a talent.”
“I have to admit, it’s a bit of a relief to hear you say all this,” Chan said softly, giving Jeongin a small smile. “It’s nice to hear I’m not alone in feeling this way.”
“Oh sunbaenim, I’m sorry your hyungs made you feel this way,” Jeongin sympathized.
“Call me hyung, please,” Chan said with a small laugh. “Sunbaenim feels way too formal, especially after you’ve witnessed me have a breakdown on one of your hyungs.”
Jeongin smiled and enthusiastically nodded--happy to have another hyung.
“Channie, I can’t help but ask,” Changbin cut in, breaking the jovial mood a little. “Have you explained all this to your hyungs?”
“Er–not in so many words, no,” Chan replied. “But I feel like they should know.”
“I’m gonna be honest and admit that neither Changbin or I had any clue that Jeongin felt this way,” Bang Chan admitted. “And Jeongin tends to be fairly open about his feelings most of the time, so if we didn’t know, well…I can only imagine most of your hyungs might have been in the dark about your feelings as well.”
Chan took a moment to think of the Stray Kids’ leader’s words. Maybe he was right, maybe his hyungs didn’t actually know how he felt about being the youngest…
“I–you’re probably right,” Chan admitted with a sigh. “I try not to burden them with my feelings too much, though. I know how much pressure they are all under, I don’t need to add to it.”
“Lee Chan! Don’t you dare ever think your feelings are a burden to us!”
Chan startled and turned towards the doorway at the sound of the familiar scolding voice. Standing in the doorway were two very familiar figures...guess his hyungs had found him.