Trigger warning in this chapter. Although I didn’t put the whole story under trigger warning, this chapter is in that category. I know people wanted fluff in the comments but I was in a really angsty mood, I couldn’t help myself.

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JiYong
 
I hadn’t seen Seungri in months, literally. Every time we were in Korea at the same time, we had different things to do, different people to see and in the end, we had given up on trying to make time for each other. But now I had finally come back from America and we had arranged to meet up at his apartment. He had been in Japan and I had heard that he hadn’t been very happy; I was here to cheer him up.
 
The moment I opened the door, a bundle hit me full force. “Hyung!” the bundle shouted and I soon recognized the expensive cologne that Seungri always wore. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and hugged him back tightly.
 
“Hey Ri!” I shouted back “I literally haven’t seen you in months” I breathed in his shoulder. He let go of me after a few seconds.
 
“You changed your hair- I mean, I’ve seen pictures but – I, um yeah” he stumbled over his words and I found it adorable so I pulled him into a hug again.
 
“Hey, so” I didn’t really know how to put it “Youngbae said that you’ve been feeling a little down recently” he pulled out of the hug and froze slightly. His face changed slightly and he fumbled nervously with the ends of the sweater he was wearing.
 
“I’m fine, honestly” he mumbled. I sighed and gave up on asking him, he obviously didn’t want to talk about it. I grabbed his arm and pulled him through to the kitchen.
 
“Don’t worry then” I muttered and put the kettle on. He sat down at the table and fidgeted with the end of his sweater again. I made some tea and sat down with him at the table. He wrapped his hands around the cup and lowered his eyes to the table. “Hey, I thought you’d be a little bit happier to see me” I teased. He smiled and looked up.
 
“Of course I’m happy” he laughed “What do you wanna do whilst you’re here, watch a movie?” I pursed my lips and thought about it.
 
“Sure” I smiled. I grabbed my tea and stood up before taking his hand and going to his room. It was a mess and I jumped over a pile of dirty clothes before falling onto his bed. “Laptop?” I questioned. He pulled the battered device from under a pile of books and tossed it onto the bed. He got under the duvet and laid his head against the pillow, closing his eyes briefly before looking over to see what I was doing

"Disney it is then" he smiled, plugging the charger into his laptop before snuggling further down into the blankets. I slid under the sheets with him and cuddled up before pressing play on The Little Mermaid. 

It had been better in my memory and half way through the film I looked down at Seungri and saw that his eyes were closed as he snuggled, fast asleep against my chest. I smiled and laid back so he was more comfortable. 

His phone started ringing a few minutes later and I scooped it off of the bed before answering it. "Seungri?" a male voice asked.

"Who is speaking?" I questioned, fighting back a yawn. 

"Uh Jonghoon" he replied uncertainly. 

"Uh omo, it's Jiyong" I said, not wanting to be rude to one of Seungri’s close friends. 

"Uh sunbaenim" he said surprised. 

"Seungri is asleep right now but I can tell him that you called." I said hesitantly. 

"Oh ani, it's fine. I was just checking to see if he was alright"

"What do you mean, alright?" I sat up slightly. 

"Uh nothing" he seemed slightly panicked and said a rushed goodbye before hanging up. I shrugged confused and put his phone away before carefully getting out of bed without waking Seungri. 

After taking a quick shower, I investigated the contents of his fridge before searching up some recipes to make with the ingredients. I was an awful cook but I wanted to make a kind gesture towards Seungri as he hadn't seen me in so long. 

The stew was bland and I looked everywhere for the salt but to no avail. The smell must have been awful because a sleepy looking Seungri shuffled in through the doorway a few minutes later. I looked around apologetically at his kitchen and smiled sheepishly. 

"I was trying to cook" I smiled; he snorted and walked into his messy kitchen. 

"More like a science experiment." he was joking and could tell so I laughed slightly. He dipped his finger into the salt and winced. "Not enough salt" he commented. I watched him as he reached up to the shelf above the cooker and got the salt down. After he had put a hefty amount in, he reached up to put it back but the arm of his sweater dropped to the elbow. 

"Your arm" I gushed. He saw what had happened and swore before harshly yanking the arm of his sweater back down. I let go of the wooden spoon I was holding and stormed over to him. A look of fear crossed his face. 

"JiYong I-" without letting him finish, I grabbed hold of his arm and ignored the yelp of pain as I yanked the fabric of his sweater up. 

"What is this?" I hissed. Small red lines adorned the surfaces of his arms. Some had faded to white but most were still red. "Seungri" I said in a low voice "explain to me right now what this is" he yanked his arm out of my grip and cradled it to his chest like a precious possession. 

"Please don't do this JiYong" he pleaded, tears in his eyes. My heart broke at the sight but I had to be stern.

"Do what, I'm not doing anything. I asked you a simple question, Seunghyun" The tears that had been building up behind his eyes poured down his cheeks and he quietly lifted a hand to his face to hold in his sobs.

Then, without warning, he spin on his heel and ran back to his bedroom, slamming the door after him. I ran after him shouting and when I got to his bedroom, I realized that that he was in the bathroom. It was locked. 

"Seungri, open the ing door!" I screamed. This had meant to be a relaxed reunion, movies, dinner chatting and it had turned into this. 

I found myself repeating the phrase "He doesn't hurt himself" in my head like a mantra. He was the happiest person on earth; he wouldn't do that to himself. He was self obsessed, why would he?

"Please" I begged through the door. I could hear his sobs from the other side of the door and I weirdly felt relieved, at least I knew that he was alive. "Seungri" I sank to the floor of the bedroom and leant against the door. "You don't have to go through it alone, you know" I sighed, this was a big deal for me. "Remember when I called you because I wanted to commit suicide" I breathed shakily. "Remember, I know you do because you helped me. I know I've never been depressed, just stressed. And I know you are probably just going through a rough patch, right" a tear pooled in my eye. "But you have to understand that hurting yourself is not the way to get through it" 

"I-it helps hyung" he sobbed through the door. "It takes away the pain" I furrowed my eyebrows. 

"What do you mean?" I asked softly. 

"The physical pain is better, it's better than the mental. I just- I can't stand the mental pain" M heart broke at his words and I started properly crying. 

"Open the door, please" I begged. I rested my cheek against the wood and pressed my palm against the frame. A sniffle came from inside before I heard shuffling and the door was opened. 

I leapt to my feet and stared at Seungri. He looked slightly unwell and his eyes were red and puffy from crying. I gently lifted his arm and rolled down the sleeve. He didn't protest. The scars were thin and precisely laid on his creamy skin. The contrast of the red against the White made me shiver. I lifted a trembling hand and thumbed across each of the cuts.  

One, two, three, four...I stopped counting when it got to ten. Seungri just stood there looking down at the tiles on the floor but his head jerked up in shock when I kissed each of his scars. I reached the last one before pulling him in for a hug. 

"Never do it again, promise me" I begged. 

"I can't promise" he whispered back "you know I can't"

"When did you first do it?" I murmured into his neck. 

"In Japan...I felt lonely and sad and I needed some release. I cut myself shaving but it didn't hurt, it felt good and I thought about it. It really helped and it became the thing I looked forward to every day" 

"T-the best thing of your day was hurting yourself?" I said in upset disbelief. He nodded in answer and I pulled him closer. “It will get better, Ri, it will get better.”

…

It didn’t get better – well I thought it was for a few weeks, he was his old happy self and I was so relieved. I would probably have gone on thinking he was fine if I hadn’t gone to his house that night.

- It was eleven thirty and I had forgotten my key again. Seungri had the spare one which meant that I would have to trek all the way to Seungri’s house to get it. I decided to go in and out and text him later that I had the key seeing as he would probably be asleep after our long day of schedules. I parked my car in the car park under his apartment complex and took the lift up to the sixth floor where he lived.

His house was one of those fancy ones with a code – I seriously considered investing in one, then I wouldn’t have this kafuffle every time I forgot my key, which was a lot. The hall way was dark, as was the kitchen and I decided to go check on him. His bedroom was dark but I could clearly see that he wasn’t in his bed due to the bed being made. A small streak of light came from under the bathroom door and I guessed he was cleaning his teeth or something so I went up to the door.

Crying. I could hear sobs through the door and with a slight hesitation; I opened the door and looked inside. The sight that met my eyes was one I never wanted to see again. Seungri was curled up on the tiles next to the bath, a razor in one hand – blood pooling on the floor next to him.

A half empty bottle of vodka sat next to him on the tiles as I watched him viciously slice at his own arm. He didn’t realize that I was there and I stood there – frozen in complete shock horror. It was only when I let out an estranged cry that he halted his razor above his wrist. His eyes looked up – wide and terrified as he saw that I was standing in the doorway.

He stammered some unknown words and dropped the razor, realising that it was too late to hide his arm. I stood there for a good minute, frozen in shock. “H-Hyung” he stammered. I watched the blood pour from his arm and on to the floor. My hand trembled as I walked over and picked the bloody razor up from the floor next to him.

He shuffled away instinctively as I approached him. I rinsed the razor under the tap and put it into my back pocket – he wasn’t getting it back. “No- please hyung, don’t take it away?” he wailed.

“Where are the others?” I asked in a low voice.

“I-I don’t have any others” he whimpered. Ignoring him, I opened the drawers to the cabinet up and shuffled my hand through his things. I went behind the sink to again find nothing; finally I looked behind the picture frame that sat on the worktop next to the bath. A small plastic bag was taped to the back of the picture frame. He had tried so hard to hide this from us. Three razors sat in the bag and I put it into the same pocket as last time.

He was blubbering in the place where I had found him and I crouched down next to him. He flinched away from me but I grabbed hold of his side and kept him in place. No words came out of my mouth as I slipped the blood stained t-shirt over his head. He kept muttering my name and other inaudible things. When I had put the bloody shirt in the bin, I ran the shower in the bath and gently placed his arm over the side.

He hissed in pain as the cuts were hit by the water but I was gentle and rubbed his back soothingly to help with the pain. Once the blood had been washed away, I examined how many cuts there were. Too many. Was what I thought as my eyes scanned over the wounds.

I had no idea how to treat wounds so I ended up pressing loo roll to the heavily bleeding ones and trying to make sure they didn’t bleed more. His first aid kit was under the sink and I brought out some bandages from the pocket of the pack.

Seungri gasped as I put disinfectant cream on his arm and started blubbing again when I wrapped his arm up in the linen bandages. When the blood on the floor had been mopped up with more toilet rolls, Seungri finally spoke clearly.

“Please – at least speak to me! Don’t me angry…” he begged. I looked at him for a second before carrying on with cleaning up the small space. When the room was finally tidy and wore no sign of what had just happened, I turned to the terrified Seungri and pulled him into a tight hug. His whole body tensed up and he shook slightly in my arms.

“I’m not angry at you baby, I promise I’m not. I was just shocked” he nodded feebly into my shoulder. I hugged him tightly for a few more minutes before letting go of his body and standing up. “Let’s get you dressed, ey?” he numbly agreed and I pulled him into his bedroom where I pulled a t-shirt from the chest-of-drawers. When he was dressed, I sat him down on the bed and looked at him, meaning to have a serious talk with him.

“Why did you do it this time?” I questioned. He shied away from the question and hung his head low. I received a mumbled answer in reply. “Speak up” I said gently, nudging his arm.

“I guess when I pretend to be happy for too long, it makes me more depressed later on…” he still couldn’t meet my eyes and I desperately tried to justify him doing this to himself.

“You were pretending?” I gulped. I knew it, his smile hadn’t reached his eyes and his laugh was just a little too much.

“Yeah, I guess” he said simply. “Can I go to sleep, hyung. I’m really tired.” I knew that it was an excuse because he didn’t want to talk about it but I let him get away with it.

“Yeah…sure Maknae, sure” Seungri stood up and walked round to the left side of the bed.

“Are you staying?” he asked. I snorted in return like he didn’t already know the answer. I followed him round and got into the bed beside him. He rolled over away from me and promptly muttered goodnight before falling asleep. I lay there for an hour, awake – listening to the sounds of his breathing.

After a while, he shuffled round and faced me. His eyes were shut and his mouth hung slightly open whilst he slept. I watched as his chest rose and fell in comparison with his breathing and I found it weirdly calming- he was alive. His hand was bunched around the pillow as he pressed his cheek into it whilst his legs had curled up into an almost fetal shape. I watched him sleep like a weirdo for another few minutes before slowly reaching over and sliding my hand into his. He seemed to like it and shuffled closer to me before flinging his arm over my chest, knocking the breath out of me. I circled my arm around his waist and entangled our legs together before closing my eyes slowly and falling asleep into the rhythm of his breathing.

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