Haneul had a feeling, but she didn’t know that that feeling was actually right.

She just stared at Irene, taken by surprise. “Don’t look at me like that,” Irene pleaded with her. The black haired shook her head like she was just pulled out of a stupor with those words. “I’m sorry,” she apologized, leaning against the counter top, breathing out a long breath. “I didn’t know you felt that way.” Irene snorted. “Please, as if you haven’t noticed. I know you did.” Haneul tilted her head in surprise. “You know, I’m not body language blind.” Staring at the red haired for a moment, Haneul let out a disbelieving chuckle. “So… you like him?” A small smile found its way onto Irene’s face as she leaned against the counter across from Haneul. “A lot,” she admitted. Haneul smiled. “Then go for it.” Suddenly, Irene stood upright again, wildly waving her hands in front of her. “Oh hell no, I can’t do that.” At first, Haneul stared at Irene again before she burst into a small fit of giggles. “Just do it,” the black haired encouraged the other female. “Love would be the only beautiful thing in a world like this by now.” She gave the female one last, honest smile before leaving the kitchen.

“So just tell Jongin.”

“Stop right there!” The group of people approaching the big house stopped short when Kyungsoo stepped out on the porch with a shotgun in hand. The rest of the group stumbled out of the house behind him. “Please don’t shoot!” the one in the front pleaded with his hands in the air. The other strangers followed suit. “We just need shelter! Please!” When the voice of the man became desperate, Jongin and Kyungsoo exchanged a look. Chanyeol furrowed his brows. Haneul bit her bottom lip, conflicted. They would have enough space for all six of them – but could they trust them? Who were they to say they wouldn’t stab all of them in their sleep?

These were hard times.

These were terrible times.

“Please, I beg you,” the man in the front went down on his knees, laying his head down into the mud. The others followed suit again. “I promise you we won’t be any burden to you! Please just let us stay with you for a while!” Surprised, the small group on the porch looked at each other, not believing they actually went down on their knees. Everyone stared at Jongin expectantly. His eyes widened. “Why are you all looking at me?” he pointed a finger at his face. “Because you’re the one who usually calls the deals,” Jongdae answered for everyone. Jongin opened his mouth to say something, but closed it again, seemingly thinking about something. Meanwhile, the strangers have lifted their heads up, sitting in the mud, to look at them expectantly. Jongin sighed. “Come in.” With cheers, the strangers jumped up, firstly hugging each other then proceeding to hug everyone else. Especially Kyungsoo and Haneul had seemed to feel weirded out.

Haneul concluded that that group of people was very weird.

Weirder than Chanyeol, Jongin and Jongdae could be sometimes. And that meant something. One of the guys called Dongwoo told them that he’d advise them to “Never put a sock in a toaster.” Haneul believed that everyone had the same thought at that time – you wouldn’t do that if you still had common sense. Why would anyone ever even try that? Not like they could waste a lot of electricity. It wasn’t even working anymore. It felt like they reversed back to Stone Age. So there was no room for them to even try that out – not like anybody wanted to. “Anyway, where do you guys plan on going?” Haneul changed the topic, making the group of guys look sad all of a sudden. “Find our friend,” one of them – if Haneul remembered correctly, his name was Sungyeol – answered her with a small, sad smile. “You lost your friend?” she questioned and only after asking did she realized how stupid that sounded. She almost face-palmed herself.

“Yes, we lost him quite some time ago. I just really hope he’s still alive.” Most of the boys looked down. They had lost almost all hope that he was still alive but they clung onto that uncertainty. It would only pull them down. “I hope Sunggyu is okay,” someone Haneul remembered to be Sungjong voiced out, still having that little glimmer of hope in his voice. Everyone in the room stiffened up at the mentioning of the name. Myungsoo seemed to have picked up on it. “What is it?” he inquired, standing up, turning to the one closest to him – Jongin. “What’s with that reaction? Have you met him?” he kept on asking until Jongin felt like he was too close for comfort. He gulped. “Sunggyu… We did meet him…” The other boys on the floor all got up once they heard that, standing around Jongin, cornering him. It made him really uncomfortable. Most of the boys asked questions at the same time, nobody understanding a single one of them. “He’s dead.” Haneul’s information made the room go quiet right away.

These boys bawled their eyes out once they understood. It hurt Haneul to see that. It was like time was reversed back to many months ago when they firstly lost Minseok and then Baekhyun.

She almost cried with them.

“Please, Haneul…” Jongin coughed. “Don’t let me turn into one of them. I don’t want to…” He coughed again. “I don’t want to be one of them.” Tears welled up in Haneul’s eyes, furiously shaking her head.

This couldn’t be real.

This couldn’t be real.

This just couldn’t be real.

Not again.

“Jongin, why… why did you do that?” she let the tears fall as she crawled up to him, cupping his face with her bloodied hands. “Because I couldn’t let him bite you,” Jongin weakly smiled, caressing Haneul’s face with one of his hands. Haneul let out a loud sob. “You ing idiot!” she punched his shoulder, making him firstly wince then smile again. “Only for you.” Haneul bit her lip so hard she could swear she tasted blood. But she didn’t want any more sobs to escape her lips. “The fight a few weeks back… Do you remember that?” he weakly asked, his voice just loud enough for her to understand. “Why are you asking about that now! You’re dying, you idiot!” She felt like punching him again. “It was about you,” Jongin admitted, making Haneul stare at him in surprise. “Please do me one favor, Haneul,” he grabbed for her hand, squeezing so tightly it almost hurt. “Let me die a human.” Haneul couldn’t hold in the sob that escaped her next. She put a hand over with her free hand. She let Jongin hold the other one. The male smiled at her.

“I love you, Haneul. You were my sky.”

Disbelieving, Haneul snorted a little. It came out with a sob, making her end up making a weird sound as she let her upper body fall forward, laying her head on Jongin’s chest. “I love you, so please grant my last wish.” He caressed her back. Haneul took in a deep breath before sitting upright again, looking at Jongin for a few agonizing seconds. She only broke the eye contact to look at the gun in Jongin’s open palm, too weak to even lift it up himself as he was leaning against the stump of a tree. She let out a shaky breath as she took the gun out of his hand. Her hand shook so violently that she might as well miss the shot even if she pointed the gun right between his eyes. Biting down hard on her bottom lip, she almost didn’t see the last smile Jongin gave her. It was a grateful one. “Thank you for always staying by my side, Haneul.” He only made it harder for her. “I love you so much…” Haneul let out a sob.

“Jongin, you mean so much to me,” she answered him, taking one last look at his face.

He looked peaceful but his eyes seemed to say something else. She let out one last sob before she pulled the trigger.

But you don’t love me back – but that’s okay, his eyes had seemed to tell her.

quote prompt #27: Never put a sock in a toaster. - Eddie Izzard

Two more chapters to go... and six hours left. Let's do this!