Have you ever lost the sparkle to live?

~*~*~

Minhyun is running, he doesn’t know for how long he has been running but he knows that he will continue to run until he reaches the Hannam Bridge.

He turns around the corner. He doesn’t care that he almost is bumping into an old lady, who is walking with three or four plastic bags in her hands. They must be heavy and Minhyun wouldn’t be surprised if she actually wanted him to help her carry the bags. But Minhyun couldn’t and he wouldn’t offer her his help now.

There was only one thing Minhyun had on his mind right now.

He couldn’t be late.

~*~*~

Seoul is a city that never goes to sleep. Minki now knew it.

He was standing on the Hannam Bridge, looking at the lights of the city being reflected in the probably ice-cold and dark water.

People were passing Minki by; they probably wondered why he, an idol, was standing there all by himself and just staring into the water that was running along with the wind.

Minki could hear the cars running over the bridge in an incredible speed; everyone was busy with their own things, handling their own troubles. How could they notice Minki, who just wanted some time to reflect over everything that has happened?

Minki closed his eyes and remembered that one special day in middle-school; Minki didn’t have any friends not until the day, just a few weeks before his own thirteenth birthday, when a tall boy with crow-black hair and milky white skin took a seat in the bench next to him and introduced himself as Hwang Minhyun.

Minhyun made a cake for Minki on Minki’s birthday and since that day did they walk in each other footsteps.

They went on an audition for Pledis Entertainment together, they passed it together and they got paired up in the same group together.

You could call them best friends, Nu’Est’s two pretty Busan-boys.

So why did Minki start treating Minhyun so coldly?

~*~*~

“I’m halfway there. I don’t know what I will do when I’m there, I just know I have to get there” Minhyun explained to the leader Jonghyun through his black iPhone.

“Okay, but please make sure that he comes back home.  I miss him so much” Jonghyun said and hung up.

Minhyuk let out a loud sigh, the phone-call with Jonghyun had helped him to catch his breath and regain some energy but also lose a lot of time for finding Minki before it was too late.

Minhyun hung up and once again began to run as fast as he could. He couldn’t help but wonder why Minki would disappear like his.

~*~*~

Nu’Est’s dorm was a total chaos; the three remaining members were trying to come up with a plan to their manager when he came back to them.

“We can’t say that Minhyun ran away to stop Minki from committing suicide” Aron said and sighed.

The sky outside their window was grey and dark. It was like one of those days you see in the movies when they hit the sad parts.

“But how do we explain that they both are gone?” Dongho said, his eyes were following Jonghyun, who was walking back and forth on the floor in the living room.

Jonghyun’s eyes were glassy because of the tears. He knew something that the other didn’t know. He knew about the letter Minki had given to Minhyun, which also was the reason why Minhyun felt the desire to find Minki as soon as possible

None of the men could rest. This would become one of the longest nights in their lives.

~*~*~

Minki didn’t know when it actually happened, but he began to slowly develop feelings for Minhyun. But it was right after their debut with “Face”. Minhyun had always been treating Minki so nicely and Minki couldn’t resist it. The way Minhyun touched Minki made Minki’s body spin and Minki always got so happy because of it.

Minki had never seen himself as gay, but for Minhyun, he could be anything.

It was one time, during their promotion-period of “Action” when Minki accidently overheard Minhyun and Aron speaking. Minhyun had told Aron that he had feelings for someone that he shouldn’t have feelings for. Minki listened carefully on Minhyun’s description of the person Minhyun had feelings for and Minki couldn’t help but believe that it was a description of him.

Because it was that way Minhyun always described Minki on interviews. Minki couldn’t describe the happiness he felt was being built up in his body. Until he heard the same of the person that Minhyun was in love with;

Krystal Jung from f(x).

Minki had never felt this heartbroken in his whole life; he wished to disappear from the surface of the earth. It was not like Minki felt embarrassed, he felt so stupid to believe that Minhyun actually could feel the way Minki was feeling.

This was when Minki began to treat Minhyun all coldly.

He could not stand having so much skinship with Minhyun any longer.

~*~*~

Minhyun had always had feelings for Minki, back in their school-days; Minki was the adorable boy everyone wanted to be close to but no one dared. Minhyun was the only one and that was a big triumph for Minhyun.

Minhyun tried once to tell Aron about his feelings for Minki, but once he began the confession he felt so embarrassed and changed Minki’s name to Krystal Jung from f(x) since they are pretty similar.

It was the same day that Minki began to ignore Minhyun. Whenever Minhyun tried to hug Minki, Minhyun would get pushed away. It was only who was being treated that way.

Minki let Jonghyun hug him as much as he wanted, Minki let Dongho do anything with the blonde maknae and he didn’t argue about it and Aron didn’t hug Minki that much as the other two but when he did it Minki would always allow him to do whatever he wanted to do.

So, Minhyun stopped caring about Minki. He would never smile by Minhyun’s side anyway.

~*~*~

There was one day when Jonghyun confessed for Minki. Minki, who felt that he would do anything to forget about Minhyun, said that he didn’t have any other kinds of feelings than friendship-feelings for the leader but they could see where still all could go if they began to have a more “beneficial” relationship with each other.

Friends with benefits. That was what they become, no feelings involved, just plain .

Minki felt dirty. His ity was lost to a person he didn’t love. The thing he had saved for so many years for Minhyun was now gone. It didn’t help to shower if all off either, the dirty feeling was always there on his skin.

Whenever Minki saw Minhyun, he felt guilt and dirt flush over him. He wanted to run away, he wished that he never had started all this. But it was too late now.

White scars began to fill Minki’s arms. He began to cut himself. It hurt but somehow, the ace in his heart was bigger.

Minki didn’t know why he was being so depressed over all that, but he was. Dirt was filling him up and he felt like he was growing away from Minhyun.

That was when he decided: he did not deserve to live on this earth any longer.

Minki wrote a letter to Minhyun, a letter only Minhyun would see. A letter that was saying good-bye to his old and loved friend.

~*~*~

‘Dear Minhyun.

I’m sorry to say this. But this is how I’m feeling.

I hate being “just your friend”; I honestly wish that we could be something more than that.

I love you.

From the bottom of my heart, I do love you.

Whatever I’m doing with Jonghyun… I will stop it, just if you want to be my lover.

But, I know that you never will love me.

You like Krystal.

I should stop if all from here.

My pain will now disappear. Don’t look after me.

You won’t miss me.

Love,

Choi Minki

~*~*~

Minhyun knew that the letter was meant for him and him only. But it didn’t turn out that way, Jonghyun saw it as well.

Jonghyun did everything it took to find Minki, and they came to the conclusion that Minki planned to jump from the Hannam Bridge.

Minhyun couldn’t lose one minute and began to run as fast as he could, without the other members were able to stop him.

~*~*~

Minhyun was close now. He was really close and he knew it. He began to run faster, he had no idea that he was this good at running.

Minhyun could see all the people and cars on the bridge. He could also see Minki standing by the railing and looking down into the water.

Minhyun stopped running and began to walk the last meters, to catch his breath.

He now knew that he wasn’t late.