Ch 52 full summary

Still pretty upset about this chapter, but I took a breather and read out the chapter entirely and it ended up being pretty sad for both Sooyoung and Minhyuk (doesn't excuse the latter's actions tho). I also misinterpreted some dialogue when I initially skimmed the chapter so I added a comment at the end addressing that assumption.

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Continues from where the last chapter left off with Minhyuk hovering on top of Sooyoung after feeding him the medicine. He tells SY that he almost died this time and that he hates seeing his pretty face beat up and hurt, and SY responds that he's sorry he got hurt. MH asks him why and SY responds that he promised him that he wouldn't get hurt. That's when MH realizes SY is half asleep and thinks MH is Taeseung again.

MH's inner thoughts after this is him thinking that he would forgive SY if he didn't say anything (probably bc he doesn't want to hear him call out TS again), and also that SY appears to be asking for forgiveness by the way he's eagerly sucking on MH's thumb. He muses if this is what their 'promise' involved.

Now Minhyuk thinks that he needs to stop, not do things that he'll regret again, but can't resist the fact that SY is sucking his thumb so eagerly like a reward, even if SY thinks it's TS. MH finally tells SY that they should stop here, and that SY is sick and they can play tomorrow. BUT THEN Sooyoung flips them over and says "Because I'm sorry...don't stop..." (remember he thinks he's with TS, not MH) and MH's resolve is gone and he thinks that it's ridiculous for him to feel so angry and upset that SY thinks he's someone else, and that sex is just going to be like holding hands. He then expresses that he feels like he's not supposed to do this, but tells SY to relax anyway and puts it in.

MH tells SY that strangely he keeps feeling angry -- angry that SY keeps getting hurt, angry that SY can be so naive, and especially angry that SY only sees TS in front of him. He then notices SY is crying and asks him why he's crying -- and thinks back to the times he's had sex and would imagine SY's crying face and decided that he doesn't actually like it now that he's seeing it in person (note: I mistranslated this in an earlier comment thinking MH actually LIKED his crying face so I apologize for the inaccurate statement). MH then rambles that he didn't want to do this, that this isn't how he wanted to do this, and that he's just so angry at SY. He tells SY to stop crying and that he shouldn't be crying when MH didn't do anything wrong. MH then repeatedly tells SY that it's going to be okay, that SY is good at forgetting things anyway and won't remember this and finally tells SY to go to sleep and not to worry about anything else.

Cut back to TS questioning the senator — he's saying things like "you crazy thugs do you think you can get away with this? do you know who I am?" and we end with a blank expression from TS that pretty much seals the senator's fate to die next chapter.

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So in an earlier comment I had skimmed the chapters without analyzing the dialogue as much and mistakenly jumped to the conclusion that Minhyuk was a sadist and enjoyed the rape the entire time, but in fact he did not. Still doesn't excuse what he did AT ALL, but it's very sad that he was finally presented the chance to have sex with SY, but it was under the same circumstances as his first attempt and he could only feel angry and ashamed and had to deflect his guilt of raping SY by blaming SY for making him do this. I don't know if he can redeem himself after this, though, especially when he thinks he'll get away with it again because SY won't remember anything. And of course you have TS on the other end with a million thoughts in his head about SY and probably on the brink of a homicidal rage trying to figure out where he is. Really curious about the next chapter (hopefully in 10 days).