Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Ni-ki felt his heart clench at the scene he was witnessing in front of him. Jay and Sunghoon had placed themselves on either side of Jungwon, and they had begun tickling the boy, who was currently having a rough time picking up the choreo. 

“Cheer up Wonie,” Jay exclaimed, fingers rapidly moving over the boy’s side, trying to make him smile.

“Yeah Jay’s right, baby. You’ll get the choreo eventually! Don’t be too hard on yourself,” Sunghoon said affectionately, moving his hands from Jungwon’s side to pat the younger’s head.

“I know hyung, it’s just normally it doesn’t take me this long,” Jungwon sniffled, trying to fight the tears threatening to spill from his eyes. He was supposed to be everyone’s leader for fucks sake. Why was he failing so hard?

Ni-ki felt all the voices around him disappear as he became fixated on the trio, specifically on his two older hyungs that surrounded the younger

You see, Ni-ki wasn’t stupid. He knew that his members didn’t view him as the youngest, nor did they view him as the cutest. They saw him as a teenager who hated being coddled or doted on. But, Ni-ki couldn’t blame them. He could be found pushing away his hyungs on multiple occasions, ignoring their hugs and head pats on the daily; however, something about Jungwon being comforted and held when he was struggling made him feel real, well, how could he phrase it? 

Bad? No, that isn’t it.

Sad? No, that isn’t quite right either.

Mad? No, why would he be mad right now?

Ni-ki scolded himself for even trying to be mad at Jungwon for needing a little comfort at the moment. Whatever he felt started to make him feel a little nauseous inside. He needed to get some fresh air. 

“Guys, I’m going to go on a quick walk. I’ll be back before the break is over,” Ni-ki said to no one in particular, not failing to notice how none of his hyungs even spared him a glace. 

Ouch

Ni-ki gathered his phone, and pushed the practice room door open. He walked into one of the individual practice rooms on the floor, and locked the door behind him. He needed to find something to distract him from the gross feeling settled in the pit of his stomach.

He opened youtube and began scrolling through his recommended feed. Nothing really stood out to him; there were a couple of soccer highlights, a new video game trailer, and some mukbang videos. 

Ugh, this won’t do.

Ni-ki scrolled to the top and clicked the search bar. He typed in ‘Enhypen Fan Edits,” hoping to find something funny to take his mind off of things. When the webpage loaded, Ni-ki froze in his seat.

‘Jungwon being the REAL maknae of Enhypen,” Glared back at him as the first search result. 

The first search result, out of millions of clips and videos, was one denouncing him of his title…

In the span of 3 days, the video had been viewed over 1.9 millions times. Ni-ki’s throat tightened as the feeling in his tummy grew tenfold. He knew he was bad at being a maknae, he was terrible at the role if he was being honest, but is this how everyone saw him? Someone who underperformed his role to the extent in which he didn’t deserve his title anymore?

Ni-ki didn’t realize he was crying until the shakiness of his hands made his phone drop on the floor with an audible clang.

Why had everyone replaced him? No one wiped his tears when he cried, or told him everything was going to be okay when he was going through a hard time, nor did they even pretend like they wanted to spend time with him. Everytime he wanted to go bowling or play soccer outside, his hyungs made it clear to him they didn’t have any time to waste on him. But here was a 15 minute video of his hyungs choosing Jungwon over him. They called him cute, and they wiped his eyes when he cried, and they always were taking him to do things.

It wasn’t fair! 

Ni-ki angrily wiped his tears. This was all his fault. Maybe if he didn’t try to act so tough, his hyungs would like him the way they liked Jungwon. 

He picked up his phone, and his eyes glanced over the time. Their break had ended 15 minutes ago, but no one even bothered looking for him. How didn’t they even notice his absence?

Ni-ki didn’t feel like practicing, but he knew he would be in serious trouble if he didn’t return to the practice room. Dragging his feet, he made his way to the door, not before checking his appearance in the reflection of the glass. He didn’t want anyone to notice he was crying, but if today was any proof, his hyungs didn’t care enough to pay attention to him anyways. 

When Ni-ki stepped inside the room, he was met with complete silence. The audio system had been turned off, as were the lights. Everyone had taken their belongings and left.

What the hell?? Where is everyone?!

Ni-ki unlocked his phone and went to ring Sunoo. Out of everyone, he figured he would have at least noticed Ni-ki wasn’t with them.

The other line rang six times before Sunoo picked up.

“Ya Nishimura Riki, at least tell us next time you leave early! We all stayed back to comfort Wonie, and you just left!” Sunoo scolded, voices of the other members peaking out in the back. “We are on our way home now. Be happy we aren’t excluding you from movie night,” Sunoo reprimanded. Ni-ki could fully picture his hyung’s eyes rolling as he scolded him through the phone.

 His grip tightened on the phone as he realized his members left him for Jungwon once again. What does he have that makes everyone love him more than they love Ni-ki?

“I’m sorry hyung, it won’t happen again,” Ni-ki said forcefully through gritted teeth. He didn’t even know why HE was apologizing when his hyungs forgot about HIM.

“It better not. We were very disappointed to see you left when one of your team members is struggling. We’ll see you at the dorm,” Sunoo said curtly, hanging up the phone even before Ni-ki could say get a word out.

The words Sunoo said so casually hung heavy from his ears. Disappointing someone was leagues worse than making someone mad. 

His hyungs were disappointed in him. They wanted nothing to do with him. He had failed them…

Ni-ki fought the new wave of tears that were threatening to break from the dam behind his eyes. No wonder they didn’t like him anymore. All he ever did was displease them. He couldn’t remember when was the last time they had gone out of their way to compliment him, tell him he did a good job. No wonder they preferred Jungwon as a maknae; he is hardworking and ambitious, always trying to do right by everyone. Ni-ki on the other hand was a burden. A burden who added extra weight and responsibilities on to his members.

Before anyone saw him about to have a breakdown. Ni-ki grabbed his stuff, exited the room, and made his way outside to start his walk to the dorm. The managers were already driving the others, and the last thing Ni-ki wanted was to burden them too. The long walk was probably a good thing though. It would allow him to exercise, whilst also giving his hyungs some time to stop being as mad at him. 

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When Ni-ki reached the door, he noticed all the lights were off. When he entered, he stumbled upon the entire group in a massive cuddle pile, with Jungwon in the middle. Just enough space was set aside for every member. Well, every member but him. Ni-ki felt all the stress from today push up in his body, and he quickly shuffled into his shared bedroom. He couldn't bear to see everyone so happy without him. 

The typically rowdy and loud room was filled with silent whimpers and sniffles that Ni-ki couldn’t contain, as the mental image of his members snuggled up against each other refused to leave his head. He didn’t deserve to cry or pity himself. I mean, he got what he wanted, right? They all saw him as grown enough to not deserve cuddles anymore. 

He quickly changed out of his practice clothes, and threw his blanket over his head. This was going to be a long and cold night he thought to himself, as his tears took over his body, leaving a sad and lonely boy to his thoughts.