I always start off writing a chapter thinking oh my God, this chapter is going to be so short T_T But they always end up being as long as I like them :P

Did you guys know it's Myungsoo's birthday in Korea? Happy Birthday, Myungsoo ! (oh it's also Eli from u-kiss' birthday ^^)

Have a great day/night all :)

Woohyun’s eyes spoke so much sorrow that they pulled on my heart. I could see them begging and pleading for me to comply with his wish. His wish that was so hard to fulfill. Out of all the things he could have asked for, it was my bad luck that he wanted this.

I never thought that I would be given a dying man’s wish to fulfill. Nobody around me had ever died. I barely knew what death was. I only knew how to see and smell living things.

Maybe I was being a bit gullible living with a mindset that nobody in the hospital could possibly die. I walked in everyday thinking that they would continue living forever without a single worry. Even if somebody were to die, I always assumed it would be from some other room or a whole other level. I lived for illusion.

I broke off eye contact and looked to the soccer field that glistened under the moon. I had completely forgotten soccer after that night. I didn’t watch the games on TV anymore and I didn’t watch the older guys play either. When we played soccer at school in gym class, I would pretend like I had a stomach ache and my teacher would let me sit down. I avoided it at all costs and soon, soccer became a fading memory.

But here Woohyun was asking me to bring that memory back into my life. Here he was asking me to relive that memory. I worked so hard to cover up that part of my past. I worked so hard to get my Father out of my life and all of a sudden, he was getting back together with my Mother and Woohyun wanted me to play soccer.

My life was turning for the worse. I wasn’t ready for it and I didn’t want it to go that way. I wanted to continue living forward and forget everything in the past. And I knew that was the cowardly thing to do. But being cowardly didn’t hurt and wasn’t hard.

“Sehun,” Woohyun said. “You’re going to play soccer for me, right?”

There he went again, talking about soccer. Dying or not, I didn’t want to play the game. I didn’t want to even be on that soccer field. And the fact that Woohyun once played soccer made me want to get away from him.

I simply couldn’t play.

“You must be tired. Let’s go back,” I said, ignoring his questions and his pleading eyes.

○●○●○

“Oppa!” Sun Hi said as she ran up to me when I opened the door to the room. Woohyun trailed in behind me and went grabbed his hospital clothes. Without saying anything, he left again to get changed and see the nurse. I walked to Sunggyu’s bed to get all of Sun Hi’s stuff and packed her bag while she followed me everywhere. All eyes were on me but I didn’t bother saying anything.

“Oppa,” Sun Hi said again.

“Hm?”

“Did you eat yummy food?”

I looked down at her innocent self and shook my head. She nodded her head before looking up at me again, “Let’s get some yummy food then. We should bring some for Oppas and Unnie.”

I looked around the room and everyone just smiled at Sun Hi, “We’ll bring food for everybody next time. I’m sure you guys already ate dinner and we have to go now, Sun Hi.”

“Okay,” Sun Hi said while skipping to the door. She waved at everybody before opening up the door.

“Bye, Sehun” I heard the guys say. I walked out while waving at everybody, too emotionally drained to bother speaking. Sun Hi held onto my right hand as I called my Father using my left hand. I hadn’t seen Woohyun but neither did I want to.

“Daddy!” Sun Hi yelled as she ran to our Father’s car. She threw her arms around him and he lifted her up. He was leaning against the door as he stood under a streetlamp.

I didn’t bother greeting him and just got into the backseat. After Sun Hi talked to my Father outside for a bit, she came in the car as well and we went home.

○●○●○

“You’re coming in?” Sun Hi asked as my Father took off his seatbelt when we arrived at our home. He looked back at us and nodded his head, a small smile on his face. I grabbed our things and got out of the car and unlocked the door, leaving it open.

“Hi, honey!” My Mother called from the kitchen.

“Hi, Mom,” I said as I put Sun Hi’s bag on the kitchen counter. My Mother took out her lunch box and anything else unnecessary—there were many unnecessary things in Sun Hi’s bags.

“Mommy, that’s my colouring book, it’s very important!” Sun Hi exclaimed as my Mother took it out of her bag.

“It’s just a book,” My Father said.

Sun Hi turned around and crossed her arms over her chest with a not-so-happy look on her face, “That’s the colouring book that Princess Sunggyu and I use. It’s very important!”

I sighed, “Sun Hi, I told you to stop calling him a princess. He’s a man!”

“Lalala!” Sun Hi said as she plugged her fingers into her ear and ran around, ignoring everything I was saying. I was too tired to deal with Sun Hi’s childhood antics and just rubbed my forehead with my fingers.

I assumed my Father sensed my distress because he grabbed Sun Hi and lifted her over his shoulders. He told her it was time for bed and took the screaming girl up the stairs. Silence finally took over and I couldn’t be more thankful to my Father in that moment.

“See, he’s not so bad,” My Mother said with a smile on her face.

“He’s tolerable,” I commented. “But why’s he here?”

“We have a special announcement to make,” My Mother smiled.

“If you two are having another wedding then I’m moving out,” I announced as I took an apple from the fridge. My Mother laughed and shook her head, telling me that wasn’t it. I nodded my head before collapsing on the couch. I was tired form the entire week of school but most importantly, from Woohyun.

My mind began wandering back to what Woohyun said and I could feel the emotion build up within me again. That was when my Father interrupted my thoughts by throwing a baseball at me. He chuckled when I caught it.

“What’s the announcement? I’m sleepy,” I stated as I was very tired.

“Well, as I’m sure your Mother told you, we’re going at another try,” My Father began.

“Mmhmm.”

“Well, we thought we should try to live like a normal family. So…” My Mother trailed off as she looked at my Father. He smiled at her and nodded his head.

“We’re moving out!” She exclaimed.

I stopped chewing the sour green apple and looked up at her. Her excited face was met with my judging looks. Where exactly were we moving?

“You’re going to move in with me,” My Father explained.

“Why?”

“We want to live like an actually family now, Sehun,” My Mother came up to me and sat down on the other side of the couch.

“But we’re perfectly fine here. Why don’t you come and live with us,” I asked my Father. “Or we can live separately,” I added quietly.

“Let’s give this a try, huh? We’ll go back to the house tomorrow morning and you guys can pick out your rooms. Do you want the room you had as a child? It’s still the same,” my Father said.

“I’ll see,” I stood up and walked away, throwing the leftover apple in the waste bin.

I hadn’t gone to my Father’s house ever since the night I found out about his dirty play. We lived there for as long as I could remember but moved out into an apartment that very week. My room was right next to my Mothers and a room was in the process of being decorated for Sun Hi who was just a baby at the time. Thoughts of how much I didn’t want to go flooded my mind as I fell into a deep slumber.

○●○●○

Despite not wanting to go, I found myself standing in front of the house I hadn’t’ seen in years again. Sun Hi, who had never even seen the house, was intrigued by its largeness and ran in behind my Father. My Mother walked in slowly leaving me standing there with my thoughts.

After taking a deep breath, I walked up the steps that I had once memorized. I entered through the right door; it had always been the one I preferred. I noticed that the door no longer squeaked like it did before. The foyer was still as big as ever and to the left were the stairs. I walked to the right and entered the spacious living room. My Father changed the sofas and the TV but the pictures were still there.

I walked to the fireplace and saw my many soccer cups placed on top of it. Amongst the collection, the one that I won for the final match stood out. Pictures of us were hung up from beforehand and I wondered why he never bothered to take them down.

I walked up a couple of steps into the kitchen which was duller than I had remembered. Nothing big had been done to it aside from the stools which had been added to go around the island. I closed my eyes and remembered my Mother baking cookies for me. I would sit on the island and watch her put the cookies in the oven. Then I would sit there and wait for them to be made. I even fell asleep on that island sometimes.

Connected to the kitchen was the dining room. It had a long brown dinner table that could fit ten chairs. A light brown table cloth ran through the middle with candles placed on it. The room had pictures hung up on the walls and a large chandelier that hung proudly. The room looked very unused.

That was how I ended up back in the foyer and in front of the stairs. I looked up the stairs to see a glimpse of the hallways I used to run through as a child. Taking a deep breath, I walked up each step slowly, remembering my childhood.

I ended up in the square-shaped hallway. All the doors to bedrooms were closed but I very well knew the one that contained my stuff. I turned to the left and stood in front of the door with the big S on it. After taking a deep breath, I opened the door and was greeted with a picture of everything I left behind.

Soccer.

The first thing I saw was the soccer ball shaped beanbag chair on the floor. I walked up to it before falling into the seat and looking at the rest of my room. My car shaped bed remained there with my aliens bed sheet. Posters of different soccer players covered the walls. I noticed the small dent on my closet door that I made when I was playing with my soccer ball one day.

I looked to the wall behind me which had always been left empty but was surprised to see a collage. It was a collage of pictures; pictures of me. Different pictures of me when I played soccer filled the wall. Pictures from my first soccer practise to the last. Some pictures even had my Mother or my Father in it. I noticed one with Sun Hi who was in my arms. Beside the collage was my jersey hung up perfectly in a frame.

Number seventy seven.

I ran my hand over the glass as I thought about why my Father did this. I knew he did it as I had never seen this before. And without even knowing it, tears fell down my face.