Donghae stared at the mismatched balloons and banners. They meant to make him happy but what he felt was miles from it. Tears were slowly b in the corner of his eyes but he didn’t wipe them away. There’s more to come, he thought. So, what’s the point? Just when he thought that he was finally done with all the crying and self-pity, another stretch of bad luck hit him. Just when he thought it couldn’t get worse, it did.

The hyungs have left him alone after they explained everything to him, including Donghwa hyung who managed to maintain a very calm structure even though his voice was thick for all the piled up emotions. It was as if, he expected all of these to happen. Heechul and Leeteuk, on the other hand, shed more tears than words.

Oxycontin, the painkiller he used to kill himself, is a time-release oral oxycodone. Ingesting it crushed or dissolved (in water) is extremely fatal because the high dosage of morphine, diacetylmorphine and codeine are released prematurely instead of being absorbed by the body in strategic timely intervals. The doctors have done everything in their power to reverse the possible damage but the harm was beyond their control. To say it mildly, yes, his heart was irreversibly damaged and “…soon will stop beating altogether” As how Donghwa hyung calmly put it.

The sad part was, no one knows exactly when will his heart stop functioning. It could take days or a week. No warnings, no cautions. He will just drop dead anytime.

Donghae succeeded and lose at the same time. And I could have died right then. And considering how things went, I really should have, he thought.

--

During the night, however, Donghae began to feel afraid. It was one thing to die quickly after taking some pills; it was quite another to wait for days for death to come, when he had already been through so much.

He had always spent his life waiting for something: for his father to come back from work, for agency calls after being casted, for the end-of-year exams, for the bus, the train, the phone call, the holiday, the end of holidays. Now he was going to have to wait for death, which had made an appointment with him.

He wanted a perfect ending. The one that’s in his own terms. The one that will end his agony. Now he learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. You can’t always get what you want.

"Nothing is sadder than going through the end of your life than realizing you didn't do it right..." he sighed weakly. His eyes still travelling through the decorations that filled up the room.

"Maybe that's why it didn't end..." Donghae turned his head and sure enough, he came face to face with Hyukjae. He did not know that it was possible for his heart to sank a bit lower: Hyukkie looked so dejected, it was heartbreaking.

“So I could have another shot at it? Do it right this time?”

“Yeah—what? I mean no. Please don’t do it again. Please, Donghae.” Eunhyuk begged. His voice was tainted with a hint of panic, anger and sadness. He was so desperate, his sincerity was almost tangible.

“I’m not sure I can,” Donghae grumbled after a long pause. “I was far too broken Hyukjae. I became hollow. At some point I will explode and I would like to minimize the casualties.” He explained evenly. He tried to explain that in a way Yesung hyung would utter those words: calm, serene and compose. Donghae thought that it would lessen the hurt even for a little bit. “I don’t want to hurt anyone, especially you.”

“I know Hae, I know. That’s what best friends do, they notice things.” Eunhyuk sobbed. His glassy eyes were almost shut and his voice were slurred, almost inaudible. “I know what you’re trying to do: you’re pushing everybody away. You thought that that will make us hurt less, but you’re wrong. When you tried to kill yourself, you think you’re ending the pain, but all you did was pass it on to those you left behind.”

Donghae had thought of that. That was why he chose a manner of death where he wouldn’t leave much damage. That part was evitable, the death part isn’t. Whichever way he tried to look at it, he would have still ended his life, one way or another.

“’You lost your father…You lost your father’. That’s what you always say, right?” Eunhyuk said after Donghae failed to answer. “What you’re forgetting is that he lost you too. We lost you. You weren’t Donghae anymore…” he trailed off and sobbed harder, his whole body was shaking. He took one deep long calming breath. “Please, I want my best friend back.”

I really feel bad hurting Hyukjae like this :(