Chapter 8

            Heading To Destruction

‘Have you ever wondered what it would have been like if we lived 100 years ago?’

I turned my head to look at my youngest brother. My, now, only brother. We’d huddled up together under the moth eaten blankets, the cold brick of the broken house against my back. He’d wrapped himself around me, the way he always did when he was scared. I didn’t have the words to say at that moment so instead I soothed back the unruly, dirty blond hair. Out of all the family the two of us looked the most similar. If it weren’t for the we probably would have been called twins.

‘Why?’

My youngest brother had never been one to grow; in my eyes it was a good thing. Maybe, if it continued this way, he wouldn’t be dragged off to fight. He had a smart mind, took after our father in that aspect but I still worried. I worried that one day he would have a growth spurt and suddenly be standing tall at 6 foot, like my father, and I’d lose him too.

He shrugged against my body, snuggling in for extra warmth, ‘I wish we’d been able to go to school.’

A smile tugged at my lips, ‘you would have failed anyway,’

For a moment a small wrestle erupted between us before we fell silent again, giggle softly. ‘School probably would have .’

‘Yea,’ I agreed. Silence fell, but if we were honest with each other we both knew we really wished we could have gone to school. To see each other dressed in a uniform that wasn’t army related. To protect the small boy from bullies in the schoolyard and to come home complaining about homework. To team up against out parents to get off school ‘sick.’ It would have been better than paradise.

‘I love you, Nea,’ he whispered, sandy hair greasy and eyes as green as the forest. A fist closed around my heart as I looked down at him. My beautiful little brother. So different from the loud, funny older one I’d just lost.

‘I love you too, baby,’ I whispered, squeezing my eyes shut to stop the tears, ‘no matter what happens,’

-

Hot coffee. Chocolate cupcakes. A closed in house and a used up bubble bath. Woohyun had tried almost everything to make me feel comfortable. Myungsoo told me, with the biggest grin I’d ever seen, that after I fainted on the beach both Faye and Woohyun had suddenly snapped into reality and were fretting over me.

Apparently Faye had gone so far as to call Woohyun an, ‘undisciplined mule who’d never be able to properly look after a dog let alone a woman.’ I knew there was a reason I loved that girl.

The room was pilled with cushions and blankets, brought from Myungsoo and Faye’s side of the house and pulled out of secret closest Woohyun had introduced to me. Despite the situation somehow the three of them were smiling, making jokes and teasing my blank expressions. I put it down to years of practice. If they’d had nightmares, just like me, they obviously hadn’t let anyone else know.

So, while they walked around, grabbing more candy and sweet food I tried to comprehend how they could be so calm about it all. Woohyun took his seat beside me, pulling my hand into his and gently entwining our fingers together.

‘You ok?’ he whispered in my ear, encouraging me to rest my head on the strong shoulders I knew would support me. How old, I thought it was, that we’d become so close so quickly. Whether he saw it as romantically as I did I wasn’t sure but I wasn’t about to dwell on matters of love. I had bigger things running through my mind.

So I forced a semi-smile, nodded half-heartedly and whispered, ‘Yea. I think so.’

He didn’t respond but instead rubbed a hand comfortably along my back and my thoughts fading into peace. Woohyun was a bit like a shelter, and a little too much like alcohol. Being around him made it hard to focus on life and easier to focus on the enjoyment of the moment.

My eyes rose to meet Faye’s. She smiled, briefly, at me but her eyes remained slightly sad. As if she knew she didn’t really have to hide things from me but didn’t exactly want to be know how hard it had been on her either.

Faye’s dreams, what were they like? Did she have a family in them? And Myungsoo? Did he watch himself as if he was seeing past memories played out in his body but with a different mind? Most importantly Woohyun… not once had I ever noticed him waking up from nightmares.

Wait.

Now that I think about it when he’d woken up from my restlessness he’d always been ridiculously sweaty, as if it wasn’t near the beginning of winter, but the middle of summer. Was that, in some way, because of nightmares? Had he grown so accustom to them that he didn’t wake up screaming or was it like mine? Some were worse then others and some were as if a small part of me had been returned.

‘So… you’ve all had nightmares as well?’

My friends gave each other looks, almost like they didn’t exactly want to talk about it. Neverthelesss, with a slight squeeze of reassurance from Myungsoo, Faye nodded, ‘In one sense or another,’ she whispered.

‘What are they like?’ I guess I should have treaded lighter on the issue but it makes it hard for me to control my emotions when plausible answer lay right in front of me.

Faye looked incredibly uncomfortable when she started, ‘Ours are all pretty similar. For me… my nightmares are always the same. Blurry faces waving goodbye, an explosion and then red. It’s always a mix of the same blurred faces; voices calling my name and what sounds like a radio report. I can never make sense of it, it’s twisted and muddled.’

He shivered slightly, ‘Mines pretty much the same except different images. I’m saying goodbye to someone, a radio report, an earthquake. Red. Always red.’

My eyes ran over to Myungsoo. He smiled grimly, ‘I’m not so different either, sorry. But I’m in a room; people I can’t see are hitting me, torturing me. I have some specific faces that appear but something tells me they were dead before I got into that room.’

The three of them looked at each other, before letting their eyes trail over to me, curiosity and a little bit of fear clouding their faces.

‘What are yours like?’ Faye asked quietly.

I couldn’t meet their eyes knowing that my dreams were so different. ‘They’re never the same…’ I whispered, barely audible. I didn’t want to make eye contact with any of them. I was scared. My heart ached for them and my mind was riddle with questions. No one said anything though, instead a warm hand slipped into mind and squeezed gently. I didn’t have to look to know it was Woohyun. Next to him I always felt safe. ‘Sometimes it’s like a memory, sometimes like I’ve never been there before and am just watching a movie.’

I bowed my head, almost ashamed that I wasn’t, not really, like them. Ashamed that I wasn’t what they expected, or not what I thought they expected.

‘Let’s not think about it anymore,’ Woohyun said. Standing up from the bed he grabbed my hand and lifted me up as well, ‘Let’s just get something to eat and come back to it later. We all need to get our heads on straight anyway.’

Myungsoo just nodded, childishly hugging Faye from behind while indicating, with his eyes, for us to bring the food back to the room.

Next thing I knew I was in the open air again, heading slowly to the cafeteria. Maybe I hadn’t noticed it before, or maybe I’d just been too caught up in my own self-pity and mentally ill state but there was a vast majority of the population who were of the female variety. Not to sound ist or overly feminist but it seemed that males were also held in a higher regard than the females in the camp as well.

‘Woohyun, why does every house hold except ours have only 1 male?’

He didn’t respond for a moment, simply linked his fingers skillfully into mine. I looked up at him but he wasn’t looking at me, only a small, shy smile lite up his face. ‘We don’t know.’ I was certain by ‘we’ he meant Myungsoo, Faye and himself.

What? ‘How come no one seems to know anything, except what’s been passed down?’ I said, trying to be casual.

‘It’s just the way it is, babe.’

I blinked, had he just called me by a pet name? My hand tightened in his, ‘What if nothing here is real?’  A dark question, even for me, but I had to ask him.

Woohyun’s eyes shot to mine, then frantically looked around to see who was near us, as if fearing someone would hear something they shouldn’t. Bending low he gripped my face in his large hands, holding me steady. He wasn’t angry; if anything his eyes were clouded with fear.

‘Be careful,’ he whispered, ‘you never know who can hear you.’ With that he pressed his lips to mine, as if to hide the fact that he’d been saying anything important to me or maybe to distract my mind. Either way, it worked. But I couldn’t help the sinking feeling in my stomach. 

I'm sorry for the extremely late update. I've been struggling with this chapter and been updating a new story called 'A Beautiful Exchange' also staring Infinite. Warning, if you want to check it out, it is about vampires and is a bit more of a 'mature' kind of story. But go crazy~ 

Onebrightstar;
Love may have something to do with it, haha. Oh, go crazy. Part of my writting pleasure is seeing what my readers think haha. I'm glad you're enjoying the story! You're support is such a lift to my spirits. Oh gosh! I didn't even realize! I must have done it when I was photoshoping and not noticed when I wrote his name underneath. T__T I'm so ashamed, Hoya's consistently trying to ruin my bias list. Yea haha, I'm an oldie. Don't feel like a noob! There really arn't many people who've been into kpop for very long. 

Oh my gosh! I love feel so bad! It grew on my heaps in the past couple weeks and I'm addicted to it. It kind of reminds me of Tic Tok, it has that sort of fairy tale[ish] feel to it. Only tears is gorgeous, I've been learning it on the piano because I love it so much haha. I love Hoya's voice, its so *sigh* fangirl moment. Forgive me hahaha, Dongwoo's a cutie. 2 triple threats in one group - good gosh~

I know the feeling about Sungjong but seeing him on variety shows, he's still the the little boy I remember from before hahaha. Oh gosh, imagine how sick to the stomach Myungsoo felt afterwards! Haha, poor puppy.  Thanks for commenting~! You stay healthy too! I'd be upset if you got sick. 

inspirit95;
Haha, thank you so much! I hope your presentation went well O.O i wouldn't want to be the cause of any bad marks or anything haha. I'm so glad you like the story! And of couse it motivates me! Not many people comment on any of my stories  so each one feels like I've won a medal. It makes my day completely! Oh sorry T__T and I've made you wait so long for an update I'm so sorry~! 

Thanks so much for commenting and even reading! I hope you stay healthy and I'll try and update as soon as I can~ I have a test soon - haha linguistics. I kind of slept in half my lectures [My lecturer was hella monotone] so I have heaps to catch up on.