Chapter 23

Jonghyun stared at the pale form on the hospital bed.  It was sick, it was disgusting.  Not Taemin’s preferences, but rather the way that his former manager had chosen to react to them…and the way that he had as elected to so as well.  He should have been there to help; he should never have left the room.  He was supposed to protect Taemin, his little brother, but he failed.  And Taemin paid the price.  It was all his fault.  He knew that Taemin wasn’t supposed to be left alone.  But their manager hadn’t raised his head in a while and the studios weren’t supposed to let him in their buildings anymore, so he thought that it would be okay now.  But it wasn’t.  Jonghyun had messed up and Taemin had paid the price, a huge terrible price. 

Lying prone in that small hospital bed, Jonghyun couldn’t help but allow his eyes to gloss over the bruising that welled up over the dancer’s face and body.  They hadn’t even known how bad he was at first because of the heavy make-up the child had applied to hide his injuries during the taping.  Watching the paramedics attempt to clear it away in the ambulance on the way to the hospital was more frightening to the singer than any horror film.  Watching the products clear away to reveal angry bruises over pale skin was horrible to see and scratches and welts along the young man’s flesh was the scariest thing that Jonghyun had ever seen.    

But now, sitting along in a hospital room with the body of someone whom you love like family, but you know will not respond, was the scariest thing of all.  Taemin was not a quiet person, and you always knew when he was around.  The kid even hummed in his sleep sometimes when they were working really hard on recording.  And he could never sit still either.  Not matter what he was supposed to be doing, he was always bouncing a leg or tapping a finger, nodding his head to whatever song was stuck in his head that day.  Now however, Taemin lay unmoving and making no noise in a stark white bed.

That is not to say that the room was silent.  The sound of a hospital room is the worst sound one will ever hear.  First, there is that forced sense of silence that no one wants to break in the hospital, but is found continually interrupted by the incessant beeping of the heart monitor, or the dripping of the IV.  Jonghyun thought of the dancer’s fear of needles and hoped that Taemin didn’t know that he had a needle in his hand right now that wasn’t going to be removed anytime soon.  Taemin also had a small plastic tube rapped around the lower half of his face that went partially up his nose, sending in precious oxygen.  His breath was still shallow and rattled horribly in his chest.  But worst of all was that horrible Darth-Vader sound that came from the ventilator located next to the seventeen-year-old’s bed.  His lungs were clearly not providing the function on their own anymore, but it seemed so wrong to see so much equipment attached to this young, small body, working to keep it alive.  You saw these around a man on his death bed, not around a child who had barely started to understand what it was that he wanted to get out of his life.    

Jonghyun wasn’t kidding himself.  He knew that this was bad, worse than it looked to a laymen like him.  People didn’t keep ventilators as a precaution.  Taemin was in trouble, the sobering thought that Taemin could die had crashed through his system as he watched nurses pull his stretcher away down the hall to the ER.  He vaguely remembered answering questions a nurse asked him about Taemin’s blood type and any allergies that he might have to a nurse who was clearly stationed more to keep him from chasing after his fallen friend as Taemin’s medical records wouldn’t be hard to get from SM. 

How could it have gotten to this point?  Jonghyun hadn’t been happy with Taemin’s announcement, but he would never have done this.  And now he was the one looking after Taemin after a crazy man had unleashed his fury on this innocent child.    

The police had come and taken his story and told him how lucky he was that he wasn’t being charged with assault and battery since he had attacked the man (the monster Jonghyun had added in his head) with no more proof than his gut instinct.  He had explained that they had been having troubles with the man as their manager and SM had fired him and was currently searching for new management.  He told them that they would need to contact SM themselves for the full details. 

They in turn had shown him some of the tapes from the backstage waiting room.  He had watched, stewing in his own misery, as mere minutes after he had left the room, their manager had entered in and started beating the young singer.  He was proud of Taemin as the boy fought back hard against his attacker.  Taemin had transformed into a seething mess of arms and legs, limbs flailing about in an attempt to defend himself from his crazed attacker.  He cheered as Taemin almost made it to the door but cried out in frustration as their manager caught up with him.  He saw Taemin as he recouped, all alone, and saw the boy get up and use make-up to cover up the bruises.  How Taemin had managed to stand at all after that beating, Jonghyun would never be able to know – he didn’t think that he would have been able to handle it himself. 

He dropped heavily into a nearby chair and his hands into his hair, wincing as he pulled just a little too hard.  There was nothing left to do now but wait for the doctors to come around and actually tell him what was going on with Taemin.  He had been wheeled into the room about ten minutes ago and he’d been told that the doctors were looking over the x-rays and the CT scan results to decide where to head from here. 

He hated being here all alone and having to watch on helplessly as Taemin struggled.  He had already contacted Taemin’s family but they had been out of town, much like the rest of SHINee, and everyone had dropped everything to rush back to Seoul.  That was the hardest phone call of his life.  How do you explain to a parent that their child is fighting for their life in a hospital bed?  Or that their child was there because of someone that those same parents had entrusted their child’s safety to? 

He had tried to call Key, knowing that he should know as both Taemin’s boyfriend and pseudo-umma figure, but the call went straight to voicemail.  He wanted to warn Key so he didn’t walk into this blind, but none of the other members could be reached either – they must be traveling through a dead zone. 

A garbled scream from the doorway pulled him back to reality and he rose and turned to the door where Taemin’s parents and older brother stood in shock at the state of their son and brother.  His mother practically threw herself at the bed and Jonghyun quickly backed away to make room.  He didn’t know what to say, or how to say it.  How did you tell a mother that her son was in a hospital bed, fighting for his life, because you ed up and didn’t look after him like you were supposed to?  That he was beat up because you failed to protect him?    

He fought back tears watching as Taesun, Taemin’s brother, moved to the far side of the bed and tenderly ran his fingertips across the top of Taemin’s forehead – one of the few visible patches of skin that was undisturbed by trauma or hospital equipment.  The man was crying.  Seeing his brother is such a state must be horrible.

“What happened?”  The dancer’s father croaked out, looking at Jonghyun with lost eyes.  “How did this happen to our son?”

Jonghyun looked away, unable to keep up that powerful, desperate stare.  His mouth trembled as he tried to push something past the lump that had taken up residence in his throat.  “He…I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.  I’m so sorry!”  He repeated over and over, collapsing against the wall and clutching his arms around his knees, hugging himself tightly, mumbling over and over again that he was sorry. 

What he hadn’t expected was to feel the warmth of Taemin’s mother wrapping him up in her surprisingly strong arms.  She guided Jonghyun’s head to her shoulder and tried to show him comfort and he was glad for it.  But he felt so guilty accepting it from the mother of someone who was so badly hurt because of him.  He couldn’t help but blame himself for Taemin’s condition; if he had only been there!

He stood up and removed himself from her embrace, “I don’t deserve it.  I’ve been horrible; I don’t deserve to be comforted by you, not by his mother…”

He’d been intending to go further, explain how he had been horrible, but his voice came to a stop when he realized that he didn’t know if their families knew – if Taemin or Key had told their families about being gay, or about being in a relationship at all, let alone one with another male. 

“Son,” When had Taemin’s dad walked up to him?! “You know who did this to my boy, please tell me what happened?” He pleaded. 

Jonghyun felt lost somehow.  He shouldn’t be here, shouldn’t be the one handling this.  That’s why they had Onew, this was Onew’s job, he was the leader, why did Jonghyun have to do this?!  Jonghyun glanced up at the man and was floored by the pain there, outpouring from the man’s eyes.  But Onew wasn’t here, and Jonghyun was, this was his responsibility now. 

Jonghyun took a breath but before he could even begin, Taesun spoke up from his perch near Taemin’s bed.  Eye’s never leaving his younger brother, he merely said, “It’s because he’s gay isn’t it?”  And before Jonghyun could stop himself he had nodded. 

There was silence in the room, when for a moment Jonghyun thought he didn’t have to out Taemin since they already knew, but that was quickly abashed when the dancer’s mother whispered, “He’s what?!”     

“He’s gay.” Taesun said quietly, finally looking at his parents.  “He realized it about a year ago.  He told me because he didn’t think that he could handle it alone.”  He gently patted his brother’s head and finally sat down in the chair next to the bed.  “He’d gotten involved with someone recently, he didn’t tell me who, but he wanted to tell you guys soon and introduce you.”  Tears were falling down his face, “He was so happy when he told me.  He called me up at two in the morning when they had said ‘I love you’ the first time.  It was so sweet.” 

“You knew about this for a year and you didn’t tell us?”  Their mother said with an odd edge to her voice.

“It wasn’t my secret to tell.  I’m his big brother, I’m supposed to give him advice and help him make it through his life, not deride the way that he has chosen to live it.”

“But, he’s…we’re Christian…” His father said, though it sounded hollow to all of those in the room. 

“Yes, and?  Look at him dad.  I know the Church teaches against homouality, but did he deserve this!  Your son, your seventeen-year-old son is on a respirator because someone decided that it was wrong for him to be gay.  I’ll tell you now; I’m with Taemin on this.  If you shun him for this, I will shun you.  He is going to have enough to go through just building his life back up from these injuries without you guys trying to ‘correct’ him.”  Taesun’s mouth had taken on a hard line; he would not argue any more this was it. 

Jonghyun felt like a sick voyeur watching this unfold but he couldn’t bring himself to leave.  If Taemin’s family could forgive their son, perhaps his would forgive him for what he would have to do…

So here is the next chapter - and in the next chapter you'll find out what all exactly is wrong with our little dancer.

I know you've been getting a chapter a day for like the whole week, but I'm running out of completed chapters so you might need to wait some for the next chapters.  I have chapter 24 done, but only sketches on the other ones so yea...I apologize.

I've also come up with a sequel of sorts to this.  I've always wanted to try the 100 prompts challenge (It's more of a Harry Potter fandome thing but I could never write out all 100 prompts for Harry Potter fanfiction so I thought that I would use it here).  It would be like a collection of one-shots, and I think that I would have it be using this version of the couple.  Some of the stories you wouldn't need to know anything about The Showdown but others would be dependent on it.  Anyway, would you guys be interested in reading that if I actually go ahead with it and do it?  Please let me know in the comments!