Rain pinged against the car roof and bounced high off of the road.  Yesung loved the rain.  He closed his eyes to listen to the strange symphony set to the beat of the windshield wipers.  In the dark of the night, it was easier to ignore everything else.  His eyes snapped open as the car lurched…

                Someone was kneeling in front of him.  Their eyes met level with his only because he was sitting on the couch.  The older, kneeling boy asked with concerned eyes:  “You okay?”  Yesung nodded, but Heechul didn’t look convinced.  He turned away from the younger boy and turned off the TV.

                “So maybe that wasn’t the best movie, huh?  Were you thinking about the crash?”

                Yesung didn’t answer, blinking steadily as he looked around the pretty little room.  Their foster parents had promised them this would be their house soon.  He couldn’t actually fathom that this could all be permanent.  It didn’t seem possible.  He thought that you only got the chance to have one home in your life and if you lost it you weren’t allowed to have another.  Heechul had told him that he was being silly and that a promise was a promise and their foster parents actually meant they were going to adopt them. 

Still, despite Heechul’s fervent reassurance playing in his mind, they both jumped a little at the sound of the door opening. 

                “Let’s play hide and seek,” Heechul said quickly, pulling a still uneasy Yesung off of the couch and ushering him toward the stairs.  They always played hide and seek at this time of day.  “Go on,” Heechul encouraged him, giving him a little push toward the stairs. “I’ll count down here and then you go ahead and hide somewhere in our room.”

                Standing on the second step, Yesung was almost at eye level with Heechul.  The older boy’s eyes were not focused on him though.  He had twisted around to look over his shoulder.  The way his sweatshirt pulled revealed a purpling spot on his shoulder.  Yesung frowned and Heechul turned back around

                “I’ll be right up to find you in a minute, okay?  Don’t come out until I come get you.”

                He smiled encouragingly, but still threw another quick look over his shoulder toward the door. . .

                Yesung opened the bedroom door a crack, peering out into the hallway.  He’d been hiding for what felt like ages.  He wondered if Heechul had forgotten about him.  It didn’t seem possible since they always played hide and seek right around the time their foster dad would come home from work.  He pulled the door shut quickly as he heard fast footsteps coming up the stairs followed by much heavier ones.

                “What the heck is wrong with you, huh?” He heard Heechul’s voice floating from under the door. He sounded pissed.  He got into these kinds of moods a lot, though, so Yesung wasn’t surprised.

                He heard their foster dad saying something back but he couldn’t understand what he was saying.

                “What are you talking about,” Heechul sounded exasperated.  Yesung could tell by the way his voice was louder that he was moving closer to their room.  “There is no war.  You’re in the middle of Seoul in the new millennium.  Get your head out of the freaking war, already!  You don’t even know who I am, do you?” 

There was the sounds of a slight scuffle and then Heechul’s voice returned, yelling now, “And I don’t care what your problems are.  I don’t care about you.  I tell you every day what you do but you don’t listen!  Look at this, huh?  How can you not remember doing that?”

                Curious, Yesung opened the door and peeked out into the hallway.  Heechul’s back was to him and he was pulling the collar of his shirt to the side.  There was a blank look in the normally smiling eyes of their foster dad.  Yesung scrunched his face curiously.  Heechul said that he got a blank look in his eyes sometimes too.  He wondered if it was the same thing. 

                “I hate you.” Heechul said, dropping his arm back to his side.  He wasn’t screaming anymore but he sounded even more vicious and bitter.  “I don’t care how nice you are.  I don’t care that you make all these promises and say we’re going to be a family.  I don’t want it if you’re just going to do this twice a week, once a week.  It doesn’t matter.  I’m done pretending that you care.  If you cared you would believe me when I told you that you forget things.”  He pushed their foster dad and even though the man was twice his size, he actually stumbled back a step, the same blank look in his eyes.

                “Hyung?”

                Heechul spun his angry face in Yesung’s direction and the small question. “Get back in the room and shut the door, Yesung,” he ordered.  Yesung cringed slightly and quickly snapped the door shut.  Heechul had never used that tone on him.

                Everything went quiet for a moment.  Breathing as softly as possible with his heart pounding, Yesung pressed his ear to the door, jumping back when something collided against the door with a thud . . . 

                Yesung sat in a crumpled heap at the bottom of the stairs holding his arm.  He knew he’d been sitting there for a long time because he’d stopped crying and the tears had turned into salty streaks on his face.  The sound of footsteps reached his ears but he didn’t react to them.  He didn’t care about anything anymore. 

                “Ye—”  Heechul’s voice trailed off. 

Suddenly the older boy was crouching next to him.  “What happened?” 

Yesung just looked up at the stairs as an answer.  He knew their foster dad hadn’t meant for him to fall.  He hadn’t been in his right mind.  He had flashbacks.  He knew he shouldn’t be angry at him since he had them too, but he was mad anyway.

                Heechul went dead silent for a moment as he looked from Yesung’s blank, tear-streaked face to the stairwell, to the way the younger boy was gingerly holding onto his arm.  “That’s it,” he growled.  “I’m done.” 

He left for a moment and then Yesung heard him talking on the phone.  When he finally came back, Heechul helped pull him up and walked with him toward the door. 

                “We’re going to wait outside, okay?”

                Yesung nodded, moving stiffly and still holding onto his wrist which was bruised and probably broken.

                “I’m sorry,” Heechul suddenly said in a much different voice.  “I was selfish.  I should have been home.” 

                Yesung looked up at the older boy but didn’t say anything as they walked out the door.  He could hear the sounds of sirens. . .

                The rain continued falling, but this time on the underside of the car.  The sound of the drops occasionally pinging off of the broken glass that littered the pavement floated through Yesung’s mind and he vaguely wondered if he should open his eyes.  He could hear the sounds of a siren and it was really close.  Red lights pulsed beyond his eyelids. 

                Very slowly, experimentally even, he opened his eyes.  An upside down man in a fireman’s uniform suddenly appeared looking through the window next to him.  Except, he knew the fireman wasn’t the one who was upside down.  Yesung’s seatbelt was pressing against him weirdly and he understood that he was the one upside down. 

                “Jesus,” the fireman breathed.  His voice grew fainter as he disappeared from the window and called out something.  Then his face reappeared and Yesung looked at him with half open eyes. 

                “You’re going to be okay, Kid,” he promised…

                “It’ll be okay,” the kind old nurse told him with a smile.  “It’s just a little fracture.  The Doctor will put a really cool cast on it and it can be any color you want.” 

                Yesung gave her a shy smile in return but his attention was drawn to Heechul.  A few moments ago he had flat out demanded a phone and now he was talking sternly to someone on the other line. 

                “Yes, you heard me.  We’re not going back to that house.  Why?  Because he’s a psychopath and broke Yesung’s wrist.   Yes, I mean the kid who was staying with me.  God, don’t you even know his name?” 

                The nurse moved, unintentionally blocking Heechul from Yesung’s sight, but he still heard his voice as Heechul said, “We’re at the hospital now.  Send someone to get us and I’ll give you all the proof you need.”

                Again the nurse moved and Yesung saw Heechul hang up the phone before coming and sitting in the chair next to bed.  The bed was really tall and Yesung’s legs dangled over the side. He kicked them against the bed deliberately, liking the sound of pinging metal. 

                “I’m sorry,” Heechul said to him, trying to sound more mature than his thirteen years.“ I know better than to gamble with other people’s wellbeing.  I was willing to hope that things would turn around, but I never should have been willing to put you in harm’s way too.” 

                Yesung noticed the nurse had gone over to a row of cabinets and seemed very intent on something there, but her ear was turned toward the conversation.

                “It’s okay,” Yesung said, because it was the thing you said.  He really didn’t fully understand what Heechul meant.  “Does this mean we’re not going to be a family?” 

                Trying to hide how crushed he was, Heechul apologized, “I’m afraid so.” 

                “That’s okay,” he tried to assure the older boy.  “I know you didn’t mean to lie.” 

                Some indescribably look crossed Heechul’s face and he leant back against the chair, closing his eyes. . .

                Yesung’s eyes moved in the darkness behind his eyelids before he finally pushed past his exhaustion to open them.  Feeling strangely calm, he blinked up at the florescent hospital lights.  A long exhale escaped him as he moved his foot, feeling the weight of the sheet over him.  He twitched his fingers and became aware of an IV running into his arm.  Suddenly connecting this to his surroundings, he began thinking about why he was in a hospital.  His senses zeroed in on a vague discomfort in his side.  Not finding it a priority to know what the dull pain was, he didn’t even bother to lift his head to look.  Instead, he turned his head to the side for no particular reason, and as the room titled, he saw Heechul sitting in a chair next to the hospital bed, staring at him evenly.  Yesung wrinkled his nose slightly in vague curiosity

                “You should know better than to keep me waiting,” Heechul joked.

                There was nothing Yesung could think to say in response.  He blinked once.

                Heechul shifted in the seat and continued nonchalantly, “I know déjà vu, but don’t worry, you are not experiencing time travel, we are, indeed, in the future.  Different hospital, different place, different time.” 

                Heechul smiled, and Yesung blinked.

                As he watched Heechul continue to smile, Yesung saw the slight falter that told him the look was forced.  He would have told anyone who’d cared to ask that Heechul was his closest friend, but that was only because he was currently his only friend, and even that, he knew, was more of a pity thing.

                “And to think, Leeteuk’s currently running all over the hospital for you.” 

                Finally, Yesung’s curiosity forced him to speak up in a slightly worn voice, “Why?”  His throat was dry.

                Heechul proudly explained, “He’s being chased by a nurse who, thanks to me, thinks he’s an escaped mental patient.”

                Yesung’s mouth twitched uncertainly in a smile. 

                “I’d say I did it to buy us some time to chat,” Heechul carried on, holding back his laughter, “but there were a hundred different things I could have done to get myself in here… but man, this is definitely the funniest thing I could think of.” 

                As Heechul’s laughter subsided, he suddenly looked Yesung dead in the eyes and asked, “So, what happened?” 

                The question seemed rather odd to Yesung, until he remembered the discomfort in his side.  Returning his attention to it, he moved a little until a sharper stab of pain caused him to hiss and discouraged him from continuing.

                “Okay?” Heechul wondered.

                Although he wasn’t really sure, Yesung nodded.  He tried to remember the context of anything that was happening right now.  “How did I get here?”

                “You were outside our apartment, remember?” Heechul prompted without any defining emotion.  “Leeteuk said he found you.” 

                Yesung rolled his head back up to look at the ceiling as he pondered this, trying to place it in his memory.  His mind bounced around the past week of events, finally finding a smirk and a knife.  Reflexively, he jammed his eyes shut to cut off the memory as a fresh wave of pain ran through him.

                “Where were you when it happened?”  Heechul wondered in an unassuming voice.  Yesung knew he had noticed his reaction, but was doing him the favor of not mentioning it.  “You weren’t at the warehouse, obviously, you never would have made it to our place.” 

                “I was already going to your apartment,” Yesung found himself explaining before he had a chance to think and realize it was true.  It made sense to him now that he’d said it. 

                “What happened?” Heechul pushed slightly, leaning forward.

                “I was followed,” Yesung said simply, turning his head to look at Heechul again. 

                The older was managing to look quite serious despite the sequined turquois—there really wasn’t anyway around it—blouse he was wearing.  “Was it the client you told me you were having trouble with earlier?”

                “No, but it could have been someone he sent.”  

Yesung said ‘could have been,’ but he knew for a fact that it was that potential client he’d refused to help.  He hadn’t liked the look he’d been given when he’s said he couldn’t take the job.     

                “I’m sorry I didn’t trust your judgment more when you—”

                “I know you believed me,” Yesung assured confidently.  “You were just trying to be reassuring and I stormed out,” without pausing he asked, “Did you come here from work?”

                “Yeah,” Heechul answered, not even needing to look down at his clothes this time. 

                “Sorry to be an inconvenience again.” 

                “You aren’t,” Heechul dismissed, adding lightly, “never were.”

                “Well, that’s not completely true.” 

                Looking down to examine his fingernails, Heechul asked conversationally, “Have you ever heard of a guy called Siwon?”

                Scrunching his nose in confusion, Yesung answered, “No.  Why?”

                “Don’t worry about it now.  How are you feeling?”

                Taking a moment to formulate a good response, Yesung tried to figure out the answer.  His brain felt a little fuzzy.  He could feel a strange dull pain in his side, but it was very vague and didn’t really bother him.

                “Okay,” he finally responded lamely. 

                Heechul half-laughed.  “That’s the morphine talking.”

                “I just feel sleepy.”  Yesung closed his eyes as if to confirm this. 

                He could hear the small laugh in Heechul’s words as he said, “Get some sleep okay?  One of us will be here whenever you wake up.”

“Thank you,” Yesung mumbled as his breathing evened out.

As soon as he was certain Yesung was asleep, Heechul leant back in his chair and pulled his phone out of his pocket, playing with it between his hands but not really looking at it.  He jumped and dropped it into his lap as it vibrated.  He looked down at the lit screen and saw the word “Belle” flashing on the screen.

Flipping the phone open, he looked at the text for Leeteuk:

            In the closet. 3^rd Floor.  Come. Get. Me.

 Taking a moment to laugh to himself, he texted back:

            Only by accepting who you are can you truly be out of the closet.

He eagerly waited for the phone to light up once more and then smiled excitedly as it finally sparked into life.

             Heechul, I will kill you. 

He chuckled as he formulated his response and pressed the send button with exaggerated flare.

             Good thing we’re in the hospital then. 

 Leeteuk’s texts started coming in rapid fire.

            I swear to God you will regret this, Heechul.

            Let’s see how funny you think this is when I stop feeding you.

            Do you even know how to turn on the stove?

            You will RUE THE DAY.

Eyes widening, Heechul quickly texted back:

            If I leave Yesung’s room I might not be able to get back in!!!!  Just come down here.

He held his breath as he waited.  A long time passed and then finally he got his response: 

              If you don’t see me in 5 minutes, I’ve been caught and then you COME FIND ME.

He shot back a quick:  “K”and then settled back into the chair, stretching out over it.  He looked up and studied the sleeping Yesung.  He was an odd guy, but he was resilient.  In all honesty, up until that point Yesung had been leading a more successful and well-adjusted life than him.  It occurred to him now that everything Yesung had built for himself would become obsolete over the next few hours.  He couldn’t go back to working again, they weren’t going to let him. 

Heechul felt guilty in some ways, that he and his new family would be pressing the reset button on the kid’s life and taking away everything he’d built the last two years, but he was also happy that they were crumbling the foundation of the empire he was on the verge of creating.  Heechul knew he had a bit of an imagination, but he didn’t feel he was exaggerating as he imagined how this would have played out without them:  Yesung gets spooked, hires some local thugs to protect him, his business expands, he branches out into new fields, soon enough he’s got himself firmly rooted in the underworld of the city.  He didn’t want that for him.  He owed Yesung multiple favors, now.  Yesung seemed to have the crazy idea that it was the other way around, but he was wrong.  Heechul owed Yesung a lot of things:  a family was one of them.

                Heechul hadn’t really understood family back when it had mattered.  He’d wanted the labels.  Everyone else got to use those real, legal labels:  Mom and Dad and Brother and Sister.  He got it now that it really wasn’t about the labels, and if he’d realized that sooner, maybe he and Yesung would have been something more like family. 

                His mind drawing to the only real family he’d ever known, Heechul pulled out his phone again.  His fingers hovered over the keys for a second.  The fervent desire to say something gnawed at him.  He had something important he had to tell them, but he just didn’t know what it was.

                Experimentally, he typed:  Thank you. 

                Shaking his head, he erased it and put the phone back in his pocket.  They knew. 

                He looked up at the sound of the door opening.  He clenched his muscles, preparing to jump up and make a break for it when a harried looking blonde slipped into the room and shut the door. 

                He turned his wild gaze on Heechul and started to say:  “You owe me, SO MU—”

                Heechul shushed him lightly and gave him a look, jerking his head toward Yesung.

                “Light sleeper,” he mouthed.

                His anger vanishing as he looked over at the young man in the bed, Leeteuk nodded in understanding and careful carried a chair over to place next to Heechul’s. 

“How’s he doing?”

                “Good.  He bounces back fast.  Sorry I made that nurse chase you all over the hospital.”

                “It’s fine,” Leeteuk shrugged, “it was actually kind of fun.”  Heechul turned and saw Leeteuk was looking at the sleeping Yesung. 

                “Did he tell you what happened?” The slightly older male asked in a whisper as he absentmindedly smoothed down his hair.

                “Nope.  And he won’t, but hey, not everyone needs to talk it out.”

                “Well, one of us will stay with him until he can come home, anyway.” 

                Heechul raised his eyebrows in pretend surprise, acting like he didn’t already know this was going to happen.  “Home?  You think things have changed enough for him to want to stay with us?” 

                “Oh, he doesn’t have a choice,” Leeteuk said with a self-effacing laugh.  “I don’t want him going back to that warehouse.  I mean,” he leaned across the armrest of the chair toward Heechul and said in a low voice, “What if whoever did this finds out he’s alive?  If he goes back to the warehouse, they could just pick him off.” 

                “You do realize what you’re saying, then?” Heechul completely agreed with Leeteuk, he just was impressed that Leeteuk had come up with this line of thinking on his own.  Wondering how far he’d actually thought this through, Heechul asked, “You do know what this could bring to us, though?  If it’s not, you know, ‘seedy underworld folk,’ then it could just be police attention.”

                “Heechul,” Leeteuk began confidently, “you know better than anyone there’s no stopping me when I’ve set my mind to something.”

                “I was just making sure,” Heechul pacified happily. “Kangin okay with it, too?”

                “You kidding me? He’s setting up the guest bedroom.” 

                “One of three,” Heechul pointed out with amusement.

                “Oh!” Leeteuk suddenly stood up, his hand subconsciously resting against his pocket and his phone, “Speaking of which, I have to call him and give him an update.  I’ll be right back.” 

                Leeteuk got up and tiptoed out the door, leaving Heechul to contemplate his hands in the silence.

                Closing the door as quietly as he could, Leeteuk pressed the already ringing phone to his ear. 

                “What’s the news?” Kangin asked in his low voice as he picked up. 

                “Good.  Heechul talked to him and he’s sleeping now.” 

                “Are you guys staying there or are you coming home?”

                “Staying, for now.”

                “I’ll come switch with you sometime, ya?”

                Leeteuk fumbled as he started to say ‘no,’ but then corrected himself.  “Okay.”

                “Oh, and I threw out the cold groceries and kept the rest.  That okay?”

                “Makes sense.”

                “Donghae saw the blood.”

                Leeteuk gripped the phone tighter and looked off down the hallway.  “That’s just sitting on the sidewalk still?”

                “It was when we first got home, I saw a city crew outside about a half hour ago, though, taking care of it.”

                “And?  What…”

                “Well, he had a lot of questions.  I hadn’t told him what happened so after that I sort of had to, but he didn’t react badly.”

                “No weird reactions?”

                “Nope.” 

                 Leeteuk took a long moment to contemplate this news.  “What do you think that means?” 

                “I think we should just take it as a good thing for now.”

                Leeteuk nodded with the phone to his ear, not really thinking about the fact that Kangin couldn’t see him nodding.  He guessed he was right, it was kind of a good thing…but it was strange too.  With all of their theories about Donghae, his lack of a reaction didn’t seem to meld.   

                “Well, I guess I’ll talk to you later,” Leeteuk finally continued.  “Make sure Donghae does his homework and…yeah,” he trailed off, realizing that he sounded like his mother pre-emotional meltdown. 

                “Well, I figured he and I would just have ice cream for dinner and run around with the kitchen knives playing tag before having a few beers and watching R rated movies.” 

                “We don’t have any R-Rated movies.”

                “See you later, Leeteuk.”

A/N  And another bad ending it is!  I'm sorry I lied to you about how fast I would be updating.  I mean, I still intend to update super fast, but this chapter kicked me in the face and was like NOPE you're going to spend a whole week trying to make this work!  I actually wanted to end this a little later on but I promised you guys an update and it's been too long and time zones mean some of you have probably already gone to bed and I have work in the morning and I'm a mess. XD  So the ending I had intended for this will be the start of the next chapter and then there will end up being a weird jump but whatever. XD <3

I'm also hoping that this explains stuff and isn't just more confusing.  If it's not clear, italicized passages are flashbacks occurig in Yesung's head while he's sleeping.  Also, I want nothing more to do with flashbacks that occur outside of the storyline. <3 XD  My friend Sebastian Apples pointed out that I had started writing a fanfiction of my fanfiction XD because I wrote myself into a corner by writing all of these hints and stuff I had no intention of explaining or getting into the backstories and then I just...made a mess. XD SO I hope this is satisfactory and I'm sorry for being a douche waffle author and ...I love you all.  Haha! 

Um...Okay XD  I might edit this author's note later but I have to run for now.

So just thank you all so much as always for being awesome.  I know that there's someone who care about me. <3 (<--That's for you exotics) XD  <3 Subscribe Comment, get a face tattoo, ask me questions and  Peace!!!