pt. 5
3:37am(Kyungil POV)
...
You get home from the gym and you hear someone coughing, the sound bouncing down the hallway. You shift into what your bandmates call 'leader-mode' (though it feels more like 'panic-mode') following the signs of trouble to his studio. You open the door, he turns around, smiling like he knew it was you before he even looked. "You ready to record some more?"
"You're sick, recording can wait." He sneezes, trying to stifle it. "I'm not sick," he adds with a sniffle. "Oh really?" You walk closer, put your hand on his forehead, feel the warmth radiating from his cheeks. "Is that why you have a fever? And why you're coughing like a chain smoker and your nose is running?" He wipes his nose with the back of his hand. "I'm just tired, I'm fine."
"Remind me what my job is again?" He sighs. "Leading?" You nod. "And taking care of you guys, because if you wind up dead, it'll be on my conscience and that is not something I have time for. Turn off your computer and get in bed. I'll make you some soup." He squawks, "It's just a cold!" as you leave the room, but you ignore him.
Dokyun's sitting at the kitchen table and he shoots you a look, but you ignore him and bang around in the cupboards looking for ingredients for soup. You put some water on to boil so you can make him some tea. You're actually kind of grateful because you felt like you needed to run around and overreact and take care of someone today and he's giving you the perfect opportunity.
You think he might still be slaving away, but he's followed your instructions for once and he's laying on his bed on his phone. You set down a tray across him and he sits up and picks up the teacup. "What is this?" he asks. "Just drink it." He does, making disgusted faces the whole time. Childish, you think disapprovingly. (But you actually mean cute.) "Put on a movie so you don't fall asleep before the soup's ready. On second thought, you at staying awake for movies. Read a book or something." He rolls his eyes and you return to the kitchen.
"What's the prognosis, Doctor?" Jaeho calls from the living room. "You have a 60% chance of survival if you. Shut. Up." He cackles, returning to his video games. You finish up the soup and pour half of it into a bowl, store the rest in the fridge. When you walk back into his room, he's finished all the tea and he goes to work on the soup, smiling. "What?" you ask. "It's really good."
"Make sure you eat all of it, then." He nods. You leave for the bathroom to gather some cold medicines and Sihyoung is there fixing his hair to go out. "I don't want to hear it, so whatever you were gonna say, keep it to yourself." He chuckles deeply, combing through his hair while you carry an armful of medicine out of the room.
"I'm not dying, it's a stupid cold," he says when he sees you. "I'm just not sure which ones you prefer to take," you reply, setting down the bottles on his tray. He grabs one bottle and motions for you to take the rest away. You set the tray on his dresser, provide him with a glass of water to take his pills. "I'm forgetting something," you say as he takes two pills and lays back down, "I know I am... oh yeah." You flop in his bed next to him, reach for the remote. "I'll get you sick," he complains. What he doesn't know is that you already had this cold and you're probably the one that gave it to him, so you're definitely obligated to take care of him. "It's too late to worry about that, now it's time for a movie and eight solid hours of sleep."
"You don't have to do this, treat me like a baby and take care of me. I'm not a baby." You shake your head. "It's my job and you are a baby. Remember? Always a baby for me." He sighs. "You know I didn't mean it like that, I meant... not like I'm an actual helpless human that can't do anything for myself."
"I know you're not," you say, turning on a movie. "I worry. It's what I do, I'm supposed to take care of you four and I worry." He raises an eyebrow at you. "When Jaeho had the flu, you threw a pillow at his head and told him to stop whining." You laugh. "Come on, we were all thinking it."
"When Dokyun had laryngitis, you told him if he'd ever shut up for five minutes he'd still be able to record," he reminds you. "Again, he was being annoying, about his voice instead of letting it heal. See? I was looking out for him." He closes his eyes, curls into his blanket. "I'm barely even sick and you're treating me like I'm on death's doorstep."
"Well, you're not Jaeho or Dokyun, are you? It's different." He nods. "I know... I just don't know if it's a good idea." You reach for his hand. "I'm just doing my job." He quirks an eyebrow. "Okay, maybe a little bit more attentively than usual, but let's face it, you're way more important to this band than the rest of us."
"That's not..." You cut him off, squeeze his hand. "Don't deny it, it's the truth. You need to get better for all of our sakes and who better than to force you to stay in bed than me?" He opens his eyes, rolls them at you, closes them again. "I guess you have a point," he says, finally starting to doze off. "Like I would say it if I didn't," you scoff.
He falls asleep and you lay on your back, staring at the ceiling, trying not to look at him. He has to learn how to take care of himself, he won't always want you there to do it for him. (You shouldn't be willing to.) You hate it when he's sick because it feels like you've failed somehow, failed to protect him, failed to fulfill your obligations. This time, maybe you're overreacting, but you have your reasons. (You're good at justifying things to yourself.)
It's not like he's never taken care of you, either. It's what friends do, they take care of each other. Once, you were being a little too ambitious with a new choreography and you messed up your knee pretty badly. It wasn't the first time, but you were out of commission for about a week. Even though he still had training and classes every day, he still found a way to make sure you had everything you needed, checked in on you all day long, used the staff members cell phones to text you since he didn't have his own.
He cooked for you one night, back when everyone about being the type of person who could burn water, and it was possibly the best meal you had ever tasted not because it was perfect or complicated, but because he cared and he sacrificed time he could have spent sleeping for you, to take care of you, without being asked, even though it wasn't his job. (You should have known, right then and there, that this was a recipe for disaster.)
It was almost... endearing how he'd snap at you when you tried to push yourself too hard, threaten you with horror stories of injuries that never healed because patients failed to follow their doctor's instructions, order you to sit down and let him do things for you, sheepishly request your help when he discovered he couldn't reach something you asked for.
He'd made himself sick worrying about you, so when you got the all-clear from your doctor, he was relieved enough to tell you that he was scared you'd have to leave him the band, that he'd the band would never see you again, that he'd they'd never be able to succeed without you. You laughed it off, called him a worry wart, said it would take more than a bruised knee to take you out, but on the inside, you were kind of worried about having to leave him the band too. (He grew on you so fast, you should have known it would turn into something more.)
You weren't intending to fall asleep next to him, but when you wake up at half past 7, you're still in his bed and he's snoring quietly because he's sick and you kiss his forehead to check if he still has a fever (not because you wanted to kiss him) and he wakes up slowly, smiling up at you. "You look like you're feeling better," you whisper. "It's just a cold," he whispers back. "No, no, you only think that because I'm such a good cook."
"You are a pretty good nurse," he teases and you only let him get away with it because he's got a cold. "I should take a shower. We have work to do." He climbs out of bed, grabs his robe, takes his phone off the dresser and walks out.
You were only going to close your eyes for a second, but you're still there, almost asleep when he comes back from the shower. "Don't tell me you're getting sick now," he says, towel drying his hair. "You're just an exhausting patient," you mumble, sitting up and stretching. You're not that grumpy, but it all fades when he hands you a giant coffee mug, made just the way you like it. I love you, you think, take a sip of coffee so you don't say it out loud, justify it to yourself. That's just the way I am, you rationalize, I love anyone who brings me coffee in the morning. (Because you've never said it when he wasn't supplying you with caffeine.)
"Sorry," he says, "I really do appreciate it." You nod. "I'm kidding, you know how I get when I'm tired." He knows how you are when you're upset too, and hungry and angry, and happy and stressed out and worried. Not that it means anything. (Not that you'd ever admit that it does.) "You don't have to worry about me so much, I'm okay. Everybody gets sick sometimes, it's just a fact."
As his words sink in, you nod and remember the first time he got sick, the first time after you met, not too long after he started training. He insisted on working through it, kept his worsening condition from everyone, from you, passed out on the floor during dance rehearsal. You don't really remember how you convinced your manager to let you accompany the two of them to the hospital, but you did.
You do remember the relief when the doctor said he just needed a couple days of rest and some IV fluids, that it was nothing serious. You remember sitting next to him all night, even though you should have been sleeping, and you know you didn't have to, but he was so much younger then and you didn't know him that well yet and he looked so pale and so small and fragile and alone in the emergency room bed, needles poking into his veins, and you didn't examine it any further, you stayed up all night and stared at him, like nothing bad could happen to him if you were watching the whole time. (Why have you always believed you can protect him?)
You remember trying to work yourself up to being angry with him, but when he finally woke up, forgetting to be surprised that you were sitting next to him, apologies tumbling out of his mouth, his lips dry and trembling, his eyes swollen and baggy, his hands fidgeting in nervousness, you couldn't muster even an ounce of anger. (You remember feeling like you might cry.)
You've tried to forget, but you still remember grabbing his hand with both of yours, purely by instinct, telling him that it's not his fault, that everyone gets sick sometimes, that if he ever lies to you and jeopardizes his health again, then he'll have something to apologize for. Did he feel something for you, even back then? you wonder. (Did you feel something for him, even if you didn't realize it?)
The two of you got closer after that night in the hospital, and everyone noticed, but you shrugged it off as something you'd do for anyone in your band, your responsibility as a leader. He'd gone from being quiet and wary of you to asking you questions about dance moves, asking your opinion on his voice, sitting closer to you during breaks and meals, following you to the gym and passing out the couch next to you on movie night.
If that hadn't happened, if he hadn't gotten so sick and you hadn't gotten so worried, would you be in this mess right now? Would you still be feeling... something toward him, something dangerous and risky and probably wrong?
"You should shower too," he tells you, digging through his clothes for an outfit. "Meet me when you're done. I need a second opinion on a new project." You nod. "Only if you promise to quit early and sleep off the rest of your cold. I don't want to have to drag your to the E.R. again." He looks at you and you know he's been remembering that night too, and you're wondering if that really was the moment this all started, at least for him. It's not like you didn't know that he went a little too far, looked at you a little too much, sat a little too close to be just coworkers, but maybe it's your fault after all. Maybe he would have gotten over it if you hadn't cared so much. (Maybe you were the first one to cross the line.)
"Okay, I'll quit early," he promises. "You better not be lying," you caution ominously, you hope. "I don't lie to you. I haven't since we were trainees. I keep my promises, remember?" His words feel heavy somehow, laced with meaning and gravity that you don't want to consider, so you don't.
(He takes off his robe to get dressed and he smiles at you over his shoulder and his hair is fluffy and falling in his eyes and his nose is red because of his cold and you know you were screwed from the start and you must have gone temporarily blind for it to take you this long to realize it.)
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