Newt hadn’t meant to stare. But he did—across the quiet clinic lobby, while pretending to check in on his friend with the sprained wrist. He didn’t even remember what the lad said. Newt just nodded along, eyes flicking across the room. To you.

Calm voice, careful hands, hair pulled back like you always had too much to focus on. He wasn’t sure why it hit him like that today. Maybe it was the quiet. Maybe it was the way you smiled when they thanked you.

Minho was waiting near the curb, half-sitting on the hood of his car, he looked up as Newt approached and raised a brow.

“Punch me.” Newt said.

“What?”

“Just do it. In the face. Not too hard.”

There was a spark of something reckless in his eye—something tired and stupid and aching.

---

You knew something was off the moment he knocked—his knuckles lighter than usual, almost shy. You opened the door to find him standing there with one hand in his jacket pocket and the other loosely cradling his jaw.

“Hi, love.” He said. Just that. Softly. Like nothing was wrong. He gave a half-laugh, then winced.

“Bit of a misunderstanding. Just thought, maybe, if you weren’t busy—”

You were already pulling him inside. He sat at your kitchen table like he’d done it a hundred times. Like he belonged there. You brought the first aid kit without asking. He didn’t flinch when you stood close, when your fingers brushed his skin.

“I didn’t want to. I didn’t want them.”

That made your hands still. His voice was too even, too quiet when you ask him to go to Minho or Thomas or even the nurse office.

You looked at him then—really looked. At the bruises that weren’t deep enough to be real accidents. At the guilt that didn’t quite fit the shape of the injury. You touched his jaw gently, turned his face toward the light, and saw it—the faintest smile at the corner of his mouth. Not because he liked being hurt.

Because he liked being here.

Because this was the only way he knew how to ask for you.