(Continued)

—Ryeowook’s POV—

The moment Kyuhyun regained consciousness, I felt that something was off. The first person he paid attention to was Seohyun. He didn’t notice us, not at all. It was only when she told him about the accident did he realise our presence in the room. How he looked at us wasn’t normal. He was distant somewhat, as if he didn’t recognise us.

The worst part was when Sungmin hyung came into the room. It was obvious that he was on the verge of tears, and then Kyuhyun asked the question. The question that crushed Sungmin hyung and me: “Who are they?”

I never thought that it would be so hard for even me to hear those words come out of Kyuhyun’s mouth. I had a feeling that something wasn’t quite right, but I didn’t expect my intuition to be right. What I didn’t expect was that Kyuhyun forgot us. All of us.

Sungmin hyung’s legs failed to support him and he dropped onto the floor, looking up at Kyuhyun in hurt. Kyuhyun didn’t even seem to have any recollection of us at all. It was even worse than Donghae hyung’s selective amnesia from before. This time, Kyuhyun doesn’t remember anything.

 “Joohyun, get them away from me. I don’t know them.”

When Seohyun told him that we were his friends, he looked at us for a brief moment before shaking his head. Seohyun had protested, of course.

“But they’re your best friends! Sungmin oppa is your boyfriend!” Seohyun exclaimed, pointing at Sungmin hyung. For a moment, Sungmin hyung looked hopeful. We all thought that maybe, just maybe, Seohyun’s words could trigger Kyuhyun’s memory. But what he said wasn’t expected at all. And to top it all off, Kyuhyun said the one thing that I knew Sungmin hyung would never forget.

“What are you talking about? Joohyun, I’m not gay, you know that. We’re a couple! How could I be gay with that guy?” Kyuhyun questioned incredulously. I could almost imagine Sungmin hyung’s heart shattering. There was a thump on the floor and I turned to see Sungmin hyung unconscious.

Youngwoon hyung hurriedly brought Sungmin hyung back to his room, followed by Teukie umma. Heechul hyung walked in and eyed Kyuhyun who was holding onto Seohyun’s arm like a little kid. Seohyun merely stood there awkwardly, not knowing what to do.

“Kyuhyun, you really don’t remember?” Heechul hyung asked softly. Kyuhyun scanned Heechul hyung’s face and shook his head. Heechul hyung sighed and walked out without saying another word. Shindong hyung was the next to ask Kyuhyun the same thing, and he got the same reply.

Siwon walked up to Kyuhyun. “I hope you get better soon, Kyuhyun,” he said simply.

“Try to remember Sungmin hyung. He’s the person you care about most,” Kibum told Kyuhyun, most likely trying to get him to remember something. Kyuhyun furrowed his brows and waved Kibum off, saying that he would think about it. Siwon and Kibum then left the room as well.

I looked at Sungie, Eunhyuk hyung and Donghae hyung, as well as Zhoumi hyung and Henry. They all looked just as helpless as I was. None of us knew how to help Sungmin hyung and Kyuhyun. If Kyuhyun really doesn’t recall the past three months at all, what would we do?

“Kyu oppa, can you let go of my arm?” Seohyun asked. Kyuhyun shook his head childishly and held onto Seohyun’s arm tighter. I almost gagged at that action. Kyuhyun was so different, too different. The Kyuhyun we knew was the mature one in the relationship while Sungmin hyung was the childish one. This was a cute and childish side of Kyuhyun that I never wanted to see ever again.

“This isn’t good,” Donghae hyung muttered. He looked at Kyuhyun holding onto Seohyun in disgust. I never expected to see Donghae hyung like that, but I guess that the situation was really unbelievable. Just a week ago, Kyuhyun wouldn’t even have looked at another girl, yet now he’s holding onto one and calling her his girlfriend.

Henry seemed to have thought of something since he went to stand by Kyuhyun’s bedside, glancing at how he was still clutching onto Seohyun’s arm. I almost thought that Henry was going to shout at Kyuhyun for being an idiot. Instead, he asked Kyuhyun one simple question.

“Kyuhyun… how old are you?”

“I just turned sixteen a few weeks ago.”

-----------------------

The six of us were gathered in the doctor’s office. His nametag read ‘Park Sungjae’. We greeted him before Eunhyuk hyung and Sungie sat down. The rest of us stood as Eunhyuk hyung explained the situation to the doctor.

The doctor frowned, looking through his reports for Kyuhyun’s file. When he finally found it, he looked at us morosely. I gulped nervously. The tension in the air was so thick that you could slice it with a knife if you wanted to. All of us looked to Dr. Park, waiting for his diagnosis of the problem.

“Kyuhyun-sshi said that he was sixteen?” Dr. Park asked, looking at all of us.

“Yes,” Zhoumi hyung confirmed. Dr. Park let out a long sigh.

“As you all should know by now, Kyuhyun-sshi has amnesia. He’s forgotten the past five years of his life. Usually, patients don’t take long to recover their memory. But for cases where the patient only forgets a certain few years of their life, we won’t know how long he will take to remember. And Kyuhyun-sshi got this from an accident. It’s highly likely that the haemorrhaging in his brain led to this, as well as the impact on his skull. It could be a day, weeks, months, or even years before he remembers everything. You’re lucky that he already regained consciousness,” Dr. Park told us.

“Is it possible that he’ll never remember?” Sungie asked. Dr. Park nodded sadly.

We thanked the doctor and left his office, already heading towards Sungmin hyung’s room. It was a good thing that he was still knocked out for the moment. If he had to hear the news that we had… I don’t even want to know how Sungmin hyung would react.

We trudged into the room solemnly, and I was already tearing up at the thought of Kyuhyun never remembering us – of him never remembering Sungmin hyung. If only Sooyoung didn’t do this. If only she directed her attacks at me, instead of at my friends. I sniffled and tried my best to blink the tears away. Crying wouldn’t help, not now.

“So?” Hankyung hyung asked anxiously. It didn’t seem like Hankyung hyung was the type to show his concern often, but it was easy to see that he was really worried for Kyuhyun.

“Min won’t be waking up yet, right?” Eunhyuk hyung asked hesitantly, eyeing the unconscious male on the bed. Teukie umma shook his head and Eunhyuk hyung heaved a sigh of relief, which made everyone except those who were in the doctor’s office look at him weirdly.

“What’s wrong?” Youngwoon hyung demanded.

“The doctor said that Kyuhyun might never recover his memory. He forgot everything that happened in the past five years of his life. They have no way to tell when he’ll remember us,” Eunhyuk hyung said softly, constantly ensuring that Sungmin hyung wasn’t awake.

There were a few gasps here and there and Heechul hyung looked like he was going to cry. I never expected to see Heechul hyung like that. He always seemed so sure of himself, so confident about what he does, and I never thought that I would see his weak side.

“And then what?”

We turned to look at Teukie umma who was smiling sadly. “He doesn’t remember us. And then? Are we going to abandon Kyuhyun like that, simply because he doesn’t remember?”

All of us shook our heads quickly and Teukie umma stood up, a determined expression on his face.

“Why don’t we create new memories with Kyuhyun? Does it matter if he doesn’t remember us?” Teukie umma asked. The way he said it was convincing, I had to admit that. But the person most affected by Kyuhyun’s amnesia wasn’t us. It was Sungmin hyung.

“But Sungmin hyung…” I trailed off, hoping that they would understand what I meant. So what if we created new memories with Kyuhyun? The important moments were those that he spent with Sungmin hyung. How they got together, the previous accident, their time spent together. How would anybody ever replicate those memories?

Teukie umma sighed in defeat, acknowledging the truth. “Ryeowook’s right. We have to make Kyuhyun remember. Min would be so crushed if Kyuhyun never remembers their time together.”

With that, Teukie umma gained a new goal, as did we.

We had to make Kyuhyun remember, no matter how long it takes.

----------------------

I stared at the entrance of Sungmin hyung’s house, wondering how exactly he was that rich. His house was beyond amazing, although slightly smaller than Teukie umma’s. His front porch was covered in flowers of all sorts, and the shrubs were cut in the shape of bunnies. I couldn’t help but let out a laugh at that, even if the situation was pretty dire.

Why were we at Sungmin hyung’s house? Apparently, Kyuhyun had spent quite some time there before and we wanted to bring some stuff over to Kyuhyun. Maybe that would trigger a memory, maybe it wouldn’t. There wasn’t any harm in trying though.

Sungmin hyung’s maid let us into the house and Donghae hyung led us to Sungmin hyung’s room. I couldn’t believe how much pink there was in there. It was impossible to think that Kyuhyun could have withstood that much pink in one room. The sheets were pink, walls were pink, floor was pink, and even all his stuffed toys were pink with the exception of one.

I curiously went to pick the blue stuffed wolf up, wondering why it was there in the midst of all the pink. My queries were answered when I saw the word ‘Kyu’ sewed onto the chest of the wolf, rather messily too. I immediately put the stuffed wolf into my bag walked to the others.

“What did you get?” I asked, peeking over Sungie’s shoulder.

“Min’s laptop and a picture of them together,” he replied. “You?”

I pulled the stuffed wolf out of my bag and the other three nodded.

“I’m planning to find some pumpkin pie… There it is!” Eunhyuk hyung exclaimed, digging into a drawer to retrieve a pumpkin pie keychain. Donghae hyung showed us the custom-made couple tee which he had found in the closet.

“Back to the hospital?” Eunhyuk hyung suggested. I told him to wait and took a picture of the room before leaving. The maids told us to take care of Sungmin hyung well, clearly worried about him too. We assured them that we would before returning to the hospital.

When we walked back into Kyuhyun’s room, he was asleep. Seohyun looked at us helplessly, gesturing towards Kyuhyun and her intertwined hands. “He refused to let go,” she told us. “I told him that I was already engaged. That was what caused our breakup in the first place. To be honest, I haven’t felt anything for oppa even before we broke up. But he took it a little badly…”

“Can we wake him up?” Donghae hyung asked. Seohyun nodded right away. She was probably eager for Kyuhyun to let go of her hand. I would understand how she felt since Sooyoung had been constantly clinging onto me at the start too.

After we woke Kyuhyun up, much to his displeasure, we started showing him the items that we had gotten from Sungmin hyung’s house. We were so disappointed when he showed no recollection of anything, not even the stuffed wolf that he had sewn on.

“I told you, I’m not gay,” Kyuhyun insisted.

“Rest well,” Sungie said, completely ignoring Kyuhyun’s statement. If we protested against what he said, he might not even want to be friends with us again. But it wasn’t like we could agree with him, since we didn’t exactly want to erase his relationship with Sungmin hyung.

We left Kyuhyun’s room shortly after, heading back to Sungmin hyung’s room. Teukie umma and Heechul hyung had looked at us hopefully. Their mood went back down once we told them that no, Kyuhyun didn’t remember anything.

To be honest, I had never felt that demoralised.

I could only pray that, by some miracle, Kyuhyun remembers.

I always never know how to end chapters and things turn out like this ._. Ah well~

Poor Kyu and poor Minnie. Once again, please blame my cousin for putting this idea into my head *pushes her in front of me again*

Still, I hope you guys enjoyed this becoming-more-and-more-angsty-chapter and it'll probably get somewhat more angsty ><

Look forward to the next (angsty) chapter! Annyeong~! ^-^