"I'm calling, I'm calling out."

I wish I could stay there. In the soft blackness, folded in, safe. This time, the dreams didn't find me. For however long I was gone, I was free. Maybe that's what death feels like. Nothing. Or maybe, because I had obeyed them, they left me alone. They gave me peace, as my reward for the stinging in my cheek, for the stiff hand that held the knife- Three months and three days before they left me behind. 

But what I wish is always opposite of what really happens. So I wake, with a strange man leaning over me, and I cannot hide my terror, the overwhelming wave of pain that makes my eyes go weak and my heart studder. But by the time my eyes clear and I can see the truth again, Byunghee's gone, and I am left with an empty shell of a heart. What kind of person am I, who forgets the faces of his own member? Who am I? 

No one, I guess. 

Not anymore.

~~~

I don't know. I don't know what to do. All I know is that Mir might be gone, forever. And what are we going to do? Will we just stay here, in this lonely house with the sea pulling the Earth away forever? With Mir silent, distant, struggling, but we couldn't do anything? I'm angry. I'm angry at the doctors, who gave us this impossible task. I'm angry at those people, whoever they were, that took our Mir, my Mir, always from us. I'm angry at myself, for not knowing what to do. I'm angry at Mir, for being so scared of only me, for locking himself away, for hurting himself, and I know I have no right to be. But I can't help it. 

I just miss him. I just really miss him.

~~~

Byunghee hyung returned from Mir. He slumped over to the table and sat, pulling in a chair, joining us all who sat, silent. His head was hanging, his eyes sad. He looked like he had lost hope, just a little more. We all still had hope; hope for Mir to talk, to become Mir again, for us to become MBLAQ again. It was just slowly, sadly, disappearing, like mist in a summer morning. 

We just sat there. When we were MBLAQ, we would always have something to talk about, always be entertained and comfortable in each other's presence. Now, though, we just sat here. Too much on our minds, too many bricks cemented between us. 

Joon hyung doesn't look sad anymore. His face is carefully blank, devoid of any emotion, which I knew only happened when he was trying to hide something. What was he hiding? I knew that of all of us in MBLAQ, Joon hyung had always been more quick to lash out, more unbalanced with his feelings. He has always been someone who doesn't realize the consequences of a sharp tongue until after the damage is done.

I hope he doesn't do something he'll regret. I hope he checks his words before spitting them out. I hope he is careful, with a broken stranger so close. 

~~~

"Who are you?"

The man, the one with the onion breath, slids over a chair, releasing a breath, and I regret the question. I should've kept my mouth shut, should've just suffered through. But it was too late now. 

"I... I am a man who was once a star," the man settles in the chair and starts, with a long-suffering tone.

"Just like you, my Mir," the man coos suddenly, leaning over to my chair and slapping a heavy hand on my shoulder. I am still strong; I can still breathe when the men speak.

"But... I wasn't perfect, not like you, Mir. I wasn't what they wanted, so instead they choose someone else. And I could have been fine with that. I could've just walked away, but... No. That someone else had to shove it in my face, taunt me, show off what he could do and I couldn't." 

At this point the man's big fists were curled, his face slightly purple, and the hand that was still on my shoulder was digging its fingernails into my back and collarbone, but I fought to keep the expression of pain off my face. 

"So... I got rid of him," the man said, his tone light, like he was talking about what he had for lunch, not the possible murder of his competition, and it made the cold throughout my body settle to my middle, so every time my heart thumped in my chest, a jet of ice shot through me with my hot blood.

The man must've read my expression that I was desperately trying to hide, and he slid his other hand, the one that wasn't squeezing my shoulder, to my cheek, my skin, with the crusty, half healed scar, his fingers stained with dirt and his fingernails clogged with dust. 

With the motion came a sound from the man; a pur, vibrating his thin lips and coming from his chest, somehow making me edgy, even more desperate for him to leave, for all of them to leave me.

"Oh, don't worry, my Mir. I won't kill you. You are too precious to me," the man stopped puring to say, and lightly ran his thumb over the cut on my cheek once, twice, and then suddenly, with a jolt, jammed his thumb into the edge of the cut, closer to my eyes, and I let out a strangled groan of pain. 

"Oh, my Mir," the man said, standing up and kicking his chair back so it clattered across the floorboards and crashed into the nearby wall, standing stunned for a milli-second before dropping to the floor.

"See you tomorrow." 

I let out a guttural noise, from the back of my rusty throat, like it could drown out the voices in my head. I wished, suddenly, that I was in the kitchen, with them. I think that they could make the light a little brighter, chase the demons always for just another night, but I am scared.

So I just curl up, the crack of light from the door a little bit of comfort, but not much. I force my eyes closed, and they stay that way for 47 seconds.

But then the door creaked open, I snapped my eyes wide, and a hand wrapped around the open door. Dirt stained fingers, with black and grey pushed up behind the nails. No face showed, nothing but that single hand. But that was all I needed to see. 

I snapped open my mouth, and screamed. Loud and pitched and horrible, a sound the hunted makes before the lion rips out the throat, it carried on, splitting the air like wood, never ending. 

People rushed in, chasing him away, but I kept screaming. He was here. He was here. He was here, and I wasn't safe. 

I could stop when arms wrapped around me, warm and solid, and I collapsed against them, whoever they were, because they weren't them. And when I stopped, I could speak. 

~~~

"He's here," he kept saying, repeating over and over, with a slight twist in his pronunciation, his throat rough, but his words clear and tortured. 

"He's here," he says.