you're not sure whether to laugh or to cry. you're holding him in your arms, on the bathroom floor of the dorm, blood gushing through your finger tips, and all that you can think is -

i'm losing him. i'm losing the most important thing, my world, and god -

why didn't you stop him?

why didn't you pull him aside, force him to stay?

why are you such a ty friend?

(self-depreciating has been a word to describe you lately. worn out and torn, and yet all that you can think about is yourself. why can't you stop being so selfish for once?
why can't you be the person that you were two years ago, so full of light and innocence that nothing could shatter you? why can't you just it up, live it up, like you're supposed to?

oh, that's right. life gets in the way. things don't happen the way that you want them to, people get in the way, and this - this is what happens.

you just never thought that it would happen to yourself.)

you call the paramedics, watch as they take him away. wait until the other boys get home.

you cacoon yourself in your room, and you don't come out.

~

a week later, and it's almost as if nothing has happened. you're laughing and talking, watching as he shimmies his way into his tattered skinny jeans, throwing an oversized v-neck over his head.

his hair is blonde again, crisp and light from just being dyed the night previous.

you can still see the scars, little white slits, as he traces them with his other hand, seeming to have forgotten about them in the short span of time that they've been there.

(how do you forget about them? how does someone, who went through so much pain, just forget what they inflicted on themselves? no, he hasn't forgotten.)

maybe you take things too seriously. maybe he's fine, maybe this is all something that can work out by itself. maybe you don't have to be the strong one here.

(you want so badly to just pull him into your arms, lace your body with his, and keep him there for all of eternity. and in any other universe that isn't this one, you could've done just that.)

or well, you can in this universe, too. you can when the cameras are away, you can when the other boys are gone, you can when it's late in the dorm and you can feel his thoughts bouncing off of him like they are your own. you can when he's sober. you can when he's too tired to respond to any kind of affection, on the jusitifaction that sleep is one of the most useful things in this mixed up life that you both lead.

so you can, but you can't. not nearly as often as you want to, anyway.

you're off to some sort of interview, something that all seven of you are attending, and you can hear bambam and jinyoung in the hallway talking about something - can hear jaebum and youngjae laughing about a talkshow, you presume, and you can hear yugyeom join in the conversation, talking to his hyungs in a familar and comforting way.

that's what life is at the moment. familar and comforting.

now, only if it'll stay that way.

it probably won't, but you can hope, right?

you all leave the dorm shortly after, and it feels like you can properly breathe for the first time in months.

~

you're right.

it doesn't stay familar and comforting for very long, after that night.

nothing big happens; just a slip of the tongue, a patch of skin too exposed, but it catches the public's attention.

enough for it go viral in the kpop world the next day.

your manager isn't happy. the members aren't happy. mark certainly isn't happy, but nonetheless, there was nothing that he could do about what was already done.

(that's a concept that you've been sinking in and out of a lot lately. you want to fix what's been done, what could've been saved, what could've been helped before it was too far gone. but alas, this isn't a fairytale, and you certainly are not a princess in need of a prince.)

got7's twitter is blowing up, multiple people asking about what was seen, what was heard, but you can't bring yourself to actually answer any of the questions asked. none of you can, for that matter.

the other members shy away from the situation, not sure how to respond to the bad publicity that you've gotten lately. your manager says to not respond at all, that it'll blow over in a matter of days, but you doubt that when a week later, there are still questions and theories rolling around the internet.

you've read ideas ranging from the band disbanding soon, to got7 crashing and burning when they've just made it to the top, to this being a publicity stunt to see how the public would react, to mark -

you don't want to think about it.

yet you continue to scroll through twitter, through your fan cafe, and you can't help but think that you're just asking to be hurt, you're just asking to be driven insane by your own actions, and you can't find yourself to disagree with your thoughts.

you lock your phone, throwing it somewhere out of your sight, and decide that that's enough social media for the time being.

~

"i need help," is what he approaches you with one day, exactly a month from the last accident.

his voice is soft, pleading, almost, and you can smell mint forming in the air between you two - so different from the usual stale and bitter that you're used to.

of course, you're happy that you came to you about this. it doesn't seem like he's been spiraling down lately, but you know that people and desires can change like the flick of a switch.

you'll be damned if you watch him switch back into what he's became to be.

he's not a saint. and he never will be. but if you can help him with this, just once, then that's the least that you can do.

he made the decision, and it can only go up from there.

you pull him into your arms, exactly like you wanted to so many times before, forgetting that you're in the main room of the dorm, and that the others can walk in on the two of you at any moment.

you don't want to think about that.

you want to think about all of the good things that will come from this, from what you've just heard.

so you do.

you nod, breathe in his scent; still something that reminds you of home, even after all of this time.

you lace your arms around him, he laces his around you. you pull your hands through his hair, feeling his heartbeat against yours, radiating something of hope, and joy -

from then on, you know that things will be okay.

~

he gets admitted to the local hospital in seoul three weeks later. it takes a bit of arguing with managment, a lot of planning on how the hell got7 is going to go on for a few months before mark - one of their main vocalists - returns, some talking about how they're going to 'tell' the public where mark suddenly went off to.

('lie' is basically what their management told them to do, on the last issue mentioned above. and you hate lying to the fans, all seven of you do, not matter what the issue, but some things are better off not known. if they can pull off getting mark to the hospital discreetly, then that's all that they have to do. the clinic will take it from there).

you're so happy that you can cry. but you won't, because you're in a room full of people, and you want to keep your diginity somewhat. or well, as much as you still can, anyway.

so you meerily keep your happiness to yourself, but you're sure that the others can tell how elated you are that mark finally asked for help rather than being forced to get help like all of you thought this was going to result into.

you're all elated. the room is the lightest that it's been in a while, with the current six of you together, and you're ridiculously thankful that the group is still in tact.

and you know that relapse is a thing that happens eventually more often than not, and that he won't come back just magically 'fixed', nor will he come back exactly as he was before this all started.

you know that the group won't immediately make up, no matter how well you're getting along at the moment. things like this aren't forgiven immediately, it takes time.

(you feel like you have all the time in the world).