Hoya waits a couple seconds after his knock before he opens the door this time. When he enters, Dongwoo is still sleeping, but Mr. Jang is sitting upright and awake on the couch.

            “Good morning, Howon,” he says.

            “Good morning, Mr. Jang,” Hoya says, bowing at the waist.

            Hoya draws his stool next to Dongwoo’s bed and the two sit in silence, waiting for Dongwoo to awake. After a couple of minutes, Mr. Jang excuses himself and enters the bathroom with a change of clothes tucked under his arm. A couple minutes later, Dongwoo’s eyes open into tiny slits. He slowly looks around the room, as if he doesn’t remember the place he fell asleep in last night.

            “Hey, Hoya,” he croaks.

            “Hey, Dongwoo.”

            A couple more minutes pass as Dongwoo wakes himself up, his eyes slowly blinking wider.  When he yawns, his mouth seems to take up his whole face, teeth and gums all exposed, before quickly shrinking back to its usual size. Dongwoo turns his head towards the window and sees that it’s a soft pink, tinted by the rising sun.

            He tries to sit up and Hoya quickly helps him, easing his back. Dongwoo stares out into the sky, his eyes reflecting the cloudless pink expanse. He stares at it for a long time, barely noticing when his father soundlessly exits the bathroom and sits in his usual armchair. The sky slowly brightens to a brighter peach as the sunlight begins to filter through the window, softly illuminating Dongwoo’s face and warming his pale cheeks. Dongwoo pulls his hands out from under the covers, laying them on his lap. He then sits perfectly still, simply absorbing the sunrise until, 10 minutes later, the sun sits fully atop the horizon.

            Hoya touches Dongwoo’s arm, warm from the sunlight.

            “You ready to walk?” he asks.

            Dongwoo drags his eyes away from the sunrise and looks down at his legs hidden under layers of covers. He slowly begins to ease them towards the side of the bed with his hands, but he takes a sharp inhale of breath and pauses. He slowly lets go of his legs and lays himself back down into the bed.

            “I’m sorry. Not today.”

            Hoya feels the quick swell of panic that rises in his throat and hears the rush of water in his ears. He pushes it away.

            “That’s fine,” he says, patting Dongwoo’s shoulder, hating the phrase’s lameness.

            It’s about 4 o’clock. Infinite’s in the van, coming back from a fansigning when the manager gets a call from Dongwoo’s mom. Their trajectory is immediately shifted.

            None of the members say anything. Mrs. Jang’s voice on the phone had been low and carefully measured, the occasional exhausted sigh drawing itself out from the earpiece. Although her words had been muffled against the manager’s ears, they had heard enough.

            “Too soon,” Hoya thinks.

            Dongwoo was supposed to have at least a week left. That’s what Dongwoo had said, that’s what the doctor had said, that was the agreement. Seven days had been hard enough to swallow, but that’s all that Hoya had asked for, had expected.

            Time, though, waits for no one.

            So Hoya sits quietly in the back of the van, his eyes closed, letting the icy rush of fear flow in around him, and focusing on keeping at least his head above the water.

            When they arrive at the hospital, they file in with their faces carefully composed. They can’t help, though, that their steps accelerate as they approach the elevator. They watch the numbers above the elevator door slowly slide downward. 9…8…7… Sungyeol is the first to make a break for the stairs, and he’s immediately followed by the other members, their careful line breaking into a pack as they take the stairs 2 and 3 at a time. The blood pumping in their ears overpowers the noise of their soles slapping on the ground.      

            Hoya is the first to reach the fifth floor, and he throws open the stairwell door. The other members stream through it before it closes, and they sprint down the hallway. Hoya grabs the door handle to Dongwoo’s room, but right before he turns it, he stops. He closes his eyes, taking a couple deep breaths. He hears the footsteps of the other members clatter to a halt behind him, and he hears the shaky quieting of breath, the calming of a beast which had momentarily taken over.

            Hoya opens the door and walks in, followed by the rest of Infinite.

            Dongwoo’s family is packed tightly around his bed. His mother and father stand next to his head on either side of him, his mother holding one of his hands. His sisters stand by the sides of his bed, and one of their backs shudder as she brings her hand to . The other sister puts her hand on her sister’s hip, slowly guiding her to the side, making enough space for one other person.

            Sungjong goes first, and the members of the Jang family reform around him like a protective cocoon as he talks to Dongwoo quietly. The members hear a sudden hiccupping sob as Sungjong leans down to hug Dongwoo, but it’s quickly muffled in Dongwoo’s shoulder. Sungjong finally lets go and steps away, staring fixedly at the ground.

            Myungsoo bites his lip as he takes Sungjong’s place. The other members see his hard swallows in profile, but he keeps his composure and, after hugging Dongwoo, leaves him with a soft smile

            Sungyeol hangs in the back of the group, so Woohyun walks forward next. The tears are already streaming down his cheeks, and Dongwoo chuckles drily at him as he rubs his arm, and the other members hear him say, “Ah, what is this? Are you trying to make me cry too?” Woohyun laughs sadly and talks to Dongwoo earnestly, as if his words are able to mask his tears.

            Sunggyu nudges Sungyeol forward and he trippingly approaches Dongwoo’s bed.  He stands by Dongwoo, struggling to maintain his composure, his eyes so narrowed in concentration that he accidentally squeezes out his own tears. Dongwoo laughs softly at him too, smacking his arm lightly with his palm. Sungyeol wipes his tear away, laughing at himself too and kneels by Dongwoo’s bed, talking to him softly before brushing Dongwoo’s hair with his palm and walking away, hiding his lowered face beneath a hand cupped over his brow.

            Sunggyu glances at Hoya, who still waits, and finally takes his place at Dongwoo’s side. He takes Dongwoo’s hand and holds it for a while, speaking formally as if he’s giving a speech (a eulogy?), staring intently at Dongwoo’s hands, rearranging the fingers around his own. When he’s finished, he looks at Dongwoo’s face, and smiles a little as he suddenly grips his hands in a tight shake. Hoya manages to make out his lips forming the words, “How am I going to take care of these kids without you?” Dongwoo laughs and pulls him into a hug. Hoya sees Sunggyu’s back rise and fall in one long breath, but when he walks away from Dongwoo’s bed he’s poised, head level and eyes dry. His gaze seems to be somewhere else, far away from this hospital room.

            Hoya enters the fold of the Jang family and sees that they are all wrapped up in their own worlds, each looking at Dongwoo’s face as if they are trying to imprint it in their minds. Within that human wall, Hoya almost feels that he’s alone with Dongwoo.

            He touches Dongwoo’s hand, and the white fluorescent lights around him dim to a dull gray. His surroundings fade, and he feels the familiar tug of cold water around his knees.

            He strides forward, intuitively sensing the right direction. Gradually, a subtle change in the sound of the water registers and a large circular edge enters his view, barely perceptible against the flat glassy surface of the stream. The water silently glides over its rim into some depth deep below. Moving towards it, Hoya spots a small pale figure sitting at its edge.

            Dongwoo is submerged up to his chest in the stream, his white hospital gown floating around his body. His hair is a couple wisps, bleached and grayed, and his eyebrows have faded into light pencil-thin lines. His thin legs dangle over the edge of the hole. The flat light smooths the angles of his face and softens the hollows, and in a body which has lost the masculine swells of musculature he looks like a child.

            He looks up and smiles. It’s a subdued smile, where his gums don’t show and his eyes stay open, but still warm as ever.

            “You came! I’ve been waiting,” he says. He glances at the spot next to him. “Here, sit down.”

            Hoya slowly submerges himself, first sitting on his knees. A shock runs through his body as the cold water hits his stomach and quickly chills the rest of his body. He pauses, and then slowly unfolds his legs out from under him, and dangling them over the edge, beside Dongwoo’s. The curvature of his calves contrast against Dongwoo’s painfully straight ones, but the water has made both of their legs pale.

            Although Hoya’s weight solidly roots him on the edge, his hands skitter across the silty riverbed, searching for some kind of handhold. There is none. He looks behind him, fearful of a sudden swell in the river that will send him hurtling downward, but the water is flat as far as the eye can see. It occurs to Hoya that this must be what it feels like to sit on the edge of Death.

            They sit in silence. Dongwoo does not seem worried about their precarious perch, but Hoya struggles to keep his nervous heart in check, steadying its rapid beats and trying not to think about the hole in front of him

            “How can you stand it?” he asks.

            The water around them shifts a little, creeping up Hoya’s chest for a second before, with a firm look, Dongwoo calms it.

            “I don’t know,” he says. “I didn’t think I could and now I don’t really have a choice, do I? I’m here now, and it’s almost become as matter of fact as living.”

            Hoya nods and they sit together, looking at the gray sky all around them. The sky, though, slowly begins to change in color, and Hoya realizes that there’s a dim orb of light above them, more like a moon than a sun, which has begun to set. It projects dark reds and purples against the gray, subtly coloring the dark sky. The moon’s rim touches the watery horizon, sending reflections of its light wavering through its surface.

            “Do you know what I was thinking of this morning?” Dongwoo asks.

            Hoya thinks of Dongwoo looking out the window. “That you wanted to be the sun, burning the sky with your brilliance every time you rose.”

            Dongwoo chuckles, the sound more breath than voice.

            “I guess that’s one way of thinking about it.” He watches the moon-sun thoughtfully. “I wasn’t really looking at the sun, actually. Bad for the eyes and all. I think we always thought that, in order to be Infinite, we had to be like the sun, all burning brilliance, dominating the sky, but this time I was looking at the sky. I was thinking… if there really is anything Infinite, that’s it. The sun will burn out, but the sky is everything, a window to the universe that is forever. This morning, when I looked at it… I felt like I was being drawn into it, and I wanted to be; I didn’t want to stand over it, I wished that I could be part of that Infinite.”

            The sun-moon is half below the horizon.

            “We have to look at what part we do have and accept it in all its limitations and possibility. We have to be able to move forward.” 

            Dongwoo looks over at Hoya

            “We’ve had five years together. It’s not much, literally zero if you take it over infinity. It’s not zero, though. It’s five years, it has a quantity, it exists.”

            The sun-moon is now only a sliver above the water, and the purple and red dyed ray is fading to black.

            “Let’s go,” Dongwoo says.

            Hoya stands up slowly, trying to disturb the water as little as possible. The stream slips from his body, leaving it perfectly dry as he exits the water. Dongwoo sits sill in the water and Hoya quickly bends over and pulls him up.

            They stand on the edge of death, holding each other’s forearms tightly as the water swirls around their knees, becoming more urgent, pushing them towards that hole. Dongwoo smiles at Hoya, tilting his head.

            “You’ve always pulled me up, Hoya. Thank you.”

            Hoya just stares at Dongwoo, not knowing how to respond, bewildered as to why he was being thanked and taking in Dongwoo’s face, wiling himself to remember it, because he’ll be gone too soon. When he thinks that, there’s not the usual terror, but a deep feeling of sadness. He feels like crying, but he keeps his face composed, for Dongwoo’s sake.

            Of course, Dongwoo can read Hoya like an open book.

            “It’s okay,” Dongwoo says. He pulls Hoya into a hug, surprisingly strong for someone so frail. “It’s okay.”

            Hoya holds onto Dongwoo and cries quietly. Dongwoo cries quietly too, squeezing his tears into Hoya’s shoulder.

            They slowly come apart, their hands moving back to each other’s forearms, their faces red and burning against the damp air, a last blaze in the cold.

            “Dongwoo…” Hoya’s hates the weakness in his voice, the way it wobbles unsteadily, and he takes a couple more gulps of air. His mind races and stumbles as it tries to piece together the perfect expression of what he feels. “I’m supposed to be the one comforting you, but you’re the one… I’m a real .  I have no idea why you didn’t give up on me-”

            Dongwoo can’t help but to laugh through the messy streaks of tears on his face.

            “Hoya, how could I give up when I love you?”

            And, so easily, so honestly, Dongwoo just says it. And Hoya understands.

            They walk forward, letting the water push them along to the edge, until they can see their own reflections in the smooth water lying at the bottom of the abyss. The water is perfectly clear, but it seems to stretch down forever, no bottom in sight.

            “What do you think is down there?” Hoya asks.

            “I have no idea,” Dongwoo says.

            Hoya crouches down to one knee, and Dongwoo clambers over the side, until he is suspended over the deep by Hoya’s arms.

            “You’ll be okay, right?” Dongwoo asks.

            “I think so,” Hoya answers.

            “You ready?” Dongwoo smiles wryly up at him, and Hoya’s breath hitches in his throat because he knows what he should say, but he can’t he can’t he can’t.  The breath comes through though and Hoya smiles softly sadly at Dongwoo.

            “Always.”

            Dongwoo lets go of Hoya’s arms.

            His thin arms slip through Hoya’s grasp and for a moment, his wrists catch on Hoya’s fingers and suddenly a million thoughts burst in Hoya’s head.

            Dongwoo. The one person Hoya could count on, the one friendship he knew he couldn’t up. Even if Infinite had failed, Hoya had always believed that he and Dongwoo would make it together. The one person who had loved him and he had finally let himself love, only in time to lose him.

            He is Dongwoo’s last link to life, and in a split second he entertains fantasies of both hauling Dongwoo up and carrying him back to life, and of sliding forward into the depths with Dongwoo.

            He knows, though, that he can’t do either of those things.

            “We have to look at what part we do have and accept it in all its limitations and possibility. We have to be able to move forward.” 

            Hoya is not Dongwoo’s last link to life, he is a ball and chain. Interwoven in that concept of the Infinite is that of Love. Dongwoo is ready to die, he has to die, but the question is: Is Hoya ready for Dongwoo to die? There’s so much left undone, so much he hasn’t said.

            I don’t really have a choice, do I?

            This is all that I can say.

            “I love you, Dongwoo.” Hoya says, and lets go.

            Dongwoo enters the glassy surface without a sound. There’s a final flicker of light as the sun-moon fully sets, and in that flicker Hoya sees Dongwoo’s form disappear beneath the surface of the pool, the hospital gown blooming around him like a water lily, right before the world goes black.