“Stop limping” I shouted. It hurt my heart seeing him like that. He shouted in pain “Come here.” I guided him to a tree to lean on. I saw his wounds. “Fine. You can hypnotize me.” I offered. “no I don’t want to” he answered back. “What the ? I gave you my jacket.” Hearing that he took off my jacket but I stopped him. “Don’t! hey hey hey.. keep the jacket. I want you to. So how about it?” I whispered to his ear. “Well there’s nowhere..” I said that the truck might be a good place to hang out. It was a serious heater to keep us warm from the winter.

“that’s better” I told myself. I tried to focus the heater to him to keep him warm. “I just placed a good speaker. What kind of music do you like?” I searched my cd rack “jazz” he answered. What a weird choice of music. “You want some burbon?” I offered him but he didn’t want to. But he still took it and took a sip. “Come one mr. Houdini. Hypnotize me” I said.

“Eyes close. Body relax.” I said. “ok so eyes close. Body relax and start counting to 100 backwards.” I pretended to sleep which made us be awkward. we both felt the awkwardness. I started to count backwards until I suddenly stopped. I guess the hypnosis worked.  “Kangin. I wasn’t really honest to you. When I told you I was in a hurry to go back home.. it was a lie. I was actually preparing to kill myself.” I didn’t answer. He just leaned on me.

I could feel his tears. I opened my eyes and held his hand. It was cold. “Im sorry. Im sorry I didn’t reply to your confession last month. Im sorry for not answering back when you told me you were being bullied.” I didn’t want to look into his eyes. “It’s ok. You’re here now.” He whispered.

“Leeteuk. I was there.” I was scared. “where?” he whispered. “here. I didn’t mean what I said. I was here. I watched what happened. I don’t know why I didn’t help you.” Leeteuk pushed me away. “Im sorry! You can hurt me back.” I tried to plead. “You could’ve helped me!” he pushed me away. “Here is the bottle! You can hit me with this. I want you to. Please!”

he didn’t answer back but he suddenly kissed me. I kissed him back. When we were done, we only sat there. I just drove and didn’t say anything and neither did he.  The next few days, I didn’t see him at school.  I went to his house to check up on him and I found out he tried to kill himself.

I saw him in the hospital. I cried while I knelt beside his bed. He looked at me with cold eyes. I knew he was gone. He hated me. Everyday I still visit him. He changed schools but I still go to his house on weekends. I got to know his family. His family accepted me but he didn’t. I got to go in the house but never in his room. He never talked to me. I tried to but he didn’t.

His family asked questions about what happened to school but I felt guilty on being part of this. My friends are angry with me being a changed man. I stopped bullying people. I stopped hanging around with them. I am now alone. Just like Leeteuk.

A month has passed and I still made no progress with Leeteuk. Well I did finally got in his room. But we only looked at each other. He didn’t talk to me and I didn’t talk to him either. We just stayed beside each other.

“ah~” I heard a loud sound upstairs. I was chatting with his mother when we both heard the loud thud. When I got to the room, I saw Leeteuk unconscious on the floor. I drove to the hospital and carried him to the emergency room. The doctors told us that it wasn’t that serious. He just triggered a memory about the incident which caused his body to remember the pain.

For the next few weeks I helped him with his everyday life. I got to be with him before and after school. Everynight he had this nightmares about the night. I stayed with him. My grades went down and my parents got angry. I wasn’t allowed to go back to him.

Suddenly a knock on my door. “who is it?” I opened it and saw Leeteuk. My heart beated faster than normal. I didn’t know what was happening. He just hugged me. “you didn’t go back” he whispered. I cried and he cried. Finally. “You went back for me that night but you didn’t go back to me this time.” He whispered.

THE END