I became accustomed to it. My new life.

I woke up every day, with no purpose whatsoever.

I woke up bored.

Lazy.

Lost.

 Junsu hyung and I would just lay in our bed and stare at each other, sometimes we’d chat about stupid things like the tattoos on our neighboring cell’s back and sometimes we’d stay quiet for a whole day. Junsu hyung mentioned his past a lot. He mentioned his rebel of a fiancée who he met on an oprah show. He told me about his father who works in a factory but was ffired

I had decided long ago not to look at the pictures I had of my family because everytime I did look at them, I started to care again. And whenever I started to care again, I started to hurt as well.

“Shim Changmin!” yelled one of the gaurds as the doors to the cell I shared with Junsu hyung was flung open.

“Yes?” I replied, lazily sitting up in my bed.

The two uniformed men walked heavy steps towards me and I tilteld my head. Just for a second though, a tingle of hope was ignited in my heart.

Could it be…that my parents came to visit me?

The gaurds however, sneaked up behind me and one of them held my wrists together as the other handcuffed me. And the little hope disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.

“Where are you taking him?” Junsu questioned loudly but neither gave him an answer and instead one of them punched me in my stomache.

I was taken inside a mirrored room.

“Why--“ my body was thrown against the wall. When I looked up I thought the mirrored wall broke but I realized it didn’t but my nose probably did.

Not sparing me a second, they launched on me. With their hands and feet, they hit me. They punched me. Not even caring about my internal organ.  pain, pure raw pain rushed into me and for the first time ever, I realized that physical pain is stronger than mental one. I started to cry, not because of my stupid life. Screw my life, I cried because it was painful, because I started to throw up. Because they didn’t even stop when my minut meal was leaving through my mouth. Because they continued to hit me until my face fell in my own puke. Because as if that wasn’t enough, they started spitting and hitting. And spitting. And hitting. I would have given up anything to be spared.

As the raw pain continued to wash through me, I wished that I didn’t exist. I wished that these two stupid guard didn’t exisist. I wished…for the first time ever, I wished that Yoona did not exist so I wouldn’t have killed that stupid Hani for her.

At one point, I fell unconscious but not too long after, I woke up again and found myself still getting kicked. and my pride suddenly vanished.

“please, I beg you, let me go,” I pleaded the two men and grabbed the foot of one of them.

“Please, I beg you,” I continued to chant until finally they stopped.

When I was thrown into the cell once again, Junsu hyung rushed to my side and steadied me on my bed. He volunteered his bottle of water and washed my injuries.

“It was awful,” I told Junsu, as tears began to descened down my cheecks. Junsu hyung didn’t reply or maybe he did, but I don’t recall what he might have said because I fell asleep.

When I woke up, it was in the dawn of the following day. No, I didn’t know it was dawn because of the sun because the cell was completely locked but I knew it was dawn because of the clock mr.Lee presented us with on Christmas.

Junsu hyung walked me into the bathroom and to the dining hall even though I told the gaurds I don’t want breakfast.

When we got back, Mr.Lee assured me that I won’t get beaten up again.

“Your name was mistakingly put under DNP but now we got everything fixed, don’t you worry,” he said. While that should’ve made me happy, it didn’t. because that meant junsu hyung will be taken soon.

Because really, how far is J from C?

About two weeks later, the same two men barged into the cell while we were sleeping.

“Kim Junsu,” they announced. They didn’t wait for hyung to identify himself because they knew me and they knew I was Changmin.

I didn’t get up to say last words. Instead, I just pretended that I was asleep so that I didn’t have to face hyung.

Once the door was locked, I sat up and waited and waited.

Almost an hour later, the door was opened again, the men threw hyung but I caught him before he touched the ground.

He was drowing in blood. I couldn’t even see his face clearly.

I layed him on the bed while he sobbed loudly. I decided not to cry. I washed as much of his body as I can with my bottle of water and fed him his.

But hyung was still shaking, shivering.

He was dying.

“water…” he mumbled that afternoon. I helped him take sips.

“Thank you,” he muttered.

“You’re welcome,” I said, somewhat calm.

Junsu shook his head and with much struggle held my wrist, “No, thank you.”

I looked at him, weak and almost dead.

“For everything.”

Just like that, Junsu hyung closed his eyes as a tear descended down his check. I didn’t move from my place, I just threw my body on the bed and cried and cried.

Turns out, Junsu hyung and I were wrong.

He woke up the next day feeling better. Days went by and he gained all his strength back.

Junsu hyung and I always remembered that day, and with the dark sense of humor we acquired during our stay, we even made fun of it.

“Thank you,” I would say, with my hand clasping my chest, “for everything.”

“Come on! I wasn’t that sissy!” hyung would argue, laughing nonetheless.

We both abandoned the idea of leaving this place. We lost complete hope until…

“Shim Changmin,” called an officer one afternoon.

I panicked.

“I’m not under the DNP list, please check,” I explained nervously.

“You have a guest,” said the officer.

There must be a mistake.

Defiently.

Don’t get your hopes too high.

Once I entered the meeting hall, I started looking around for the familiar faces of my family but none of them were there.

“Voldy!” a young man ran towards me, bring me in his embrace.

That voice belonged to my bestfriend Cho Kyuhyun.

“Oh my god, Kyuyun-ah! How are you?” I asked.

“Good, I’m in my second year of law school. I’ve been studying in England for the past years that’s why I didn’t get to visit you,” Kyuhyun said.

I nodded. Secretly comforting myself for not being able to live the dream my friend is living.

“How are you?” Kyuhyun questioned with a warm pitiful smile.

“Oh  If only you know what they do to us! They—they give us rotten food, they don’t let us shower kyuhyun. They make us walk barefoot in the dirty bathrooms and they—they don’t let us clean them. They hit us, embarrass us, and harass us. It’s hell in there,” I found myself crying to him. Afraid of being abandoned again. Afraid that he would leave and forget all about me.

“I’m sorry to hear that Voldy, I wish there was something for me to do now,” said Kyuhyun, helping me to a chair then sitting across from me, “I’m really sorry.”

“Please don’t leave me, Kyuhyun. I’m begging you, don’t leave me, I want to get out of this place,” I pleaded.

We stayed there, silent. Was I really the same Shim Changmin? The one who was once too prideful, too strong to need anyone? Now I was shamelessly begging.

“Do you remember why your punishment was extreme?” Kyuhyun broke the silence, not really looking for an answer, “Because you refused to tell us why you killed Hani. If only you would tell me why you did it, we’ll be able to reopen the case and possibly free you.”

When Kyuhyun mentioned Hani’s name, rage filled me.

“He deserved to die,” I told Kyuhyun, “I would kill him all over again if I could.”

“Why?” Kyuhyun asked, “Why did you kill him.”

“Because he hurt someone very special to me,” I answered darkly. I remembered my Yoona, sobbing her eyes out in that car.

“That’s all I can say.”