It was strangely quiet that night in the Infinite dorms. Sunggyu could understand why Sungyeol would be, given what happened with their CEO, but the others? They should be happy and satiated from their free time. In fact, while Sunggyu, Woohyun, and Sungyeol stayed at the dorms for some much needed rest, the other members went out to who knows where. All Sunggyu noticed was the stark difference when they came back. A large dark cloud hovered over them, creating to Sunggyu’s annoyance, a very unsettling environment for the seven members.

            Sunggyu sipped his herbal tea in thought, his hip leaning against the kitchen counter next to the sink.

“Hey, hyung,” Woohyun whispered, dishes clattering with the movements of his hands.

           “Hmm?” Sunggyu replied, looking at the listless people lounging in the living room. He turned to the dark haired vocalist and held his cup lightly in his hands. “What is it?”

            Woohyun jerked his head behind him, “Don’t you think everyone’s acting…a bit strangely lately?”

            Dongwoo and Myungsoo were staring aimlessly at the television while Hoya was lying on the couch with his headphones on. Sungjong was practically a zombie with his unkempt hair and clothes, disposing of himself on the floor next to Hoya’s head. There was no sign of Sungyeol who after being dropped off at their dorm, promptly locked himself inside his room. Let’s hope he doesn’t forget to unlock it or else Hoya and Sungjong are going to have to find another place to sleep.

“Ugh, I’ve noticed,” Sunggyu sighed and rubbed the sides of his temple in frustration.

            Just then, Sungjong’s head made an appearance outside of the kitchen. Woohyun stiffened considerably and continued to dutifully scrub the dirty plates and mugs, making Sunggyu chuckle. The maknae nodded to his two hyungs before heading over to the bathroom and closing the door silently behind him.

            Woohyun gave Infinite’s leader a questioning look and pulled his arms out of the soapy basin of the sink. He showed Sunggyu his water wrinkled hands and pointed towards the maknae’s direction, “Did you see that? I’m obediently doing the dishes and not once has Sungjong even attempted to make any of his sly comments.”

            Yes, Sunggyu had most definitely noticed, but before Woohyun could start coming up with theories for why everyone seemed to be a little off tonight, Infinite’s leader shook his head and put his now empty mug in the soapy water. “Yah, just finish the dishes Woohyun-ah.”

  “Of course, hyung,” Woohyun replied sarcastically.

            CRASH.

            Sunggyu jumped up, startled by the sudden noise. He reflexively grabbed onto Woohyun’s arm with a tight grip. Woohyun nonchalantly washed the soap away from his hands, wiping it dry on a towel before he gave Infinite’s leader a knowing smirk. Sunggyu removed his hand quickly and clicked his tongue in annoyance. Although he was the leader and was no way afraid of the common ghosts and ghouls that plagued Dongwoo’s nightmares, he was most definitely not fond of surprises.

            Sunggyu glared at his friend in embarrassment while Woohyun continued to flash him a large grin. One of the main reasons why he didn’t get along with Woohyun the first time they met was because of Woohyun’s constant attempts to either embarrass or make fun of him. Infinite’s leader had learned to take his friend’s teasing as signs of Woohyun’s caring nature, but honestly, he had always hated to show weakness, especially to the other members.

  BAM. CRASH.

  Sunggyu whipped his head around and peeked out into the hallway. This time, more alarmed.

            “Sunggyu hyung,” Dongwoo said as he reached Sunggyu’s side, his eyes lighting up with urgency. He sounded breathless as if he sprinted down the hallway. “Hurry…in the…in the bathroom…Sungjong…”

            Before Dongwoo could say anything else, Sunggyu heard the unmistakable rasp of the main dancer’s voice, “Sungjong! Wake up!”

            Sunggyu’s eyes widened as he quickly rushed past Dongwoo and shoved away the other members who were standing frozen in front of the now broken and knocked down bathroom door. Hoya was kneeling on the tiled floor of the bathroom, cradling Sungjong’s head in his lap. The maknae knitted his eyebrows in pain and his body accumulated more sweat than was normal in an air-conditioned dorm. Sungjong’s eyes remained shut, but Hoya could clearly hear a few shallow breaths and a couple of whimpers.

            Infinite’s leader quickly reached out to feel the pulse of Sungjong’s unconscious body and placed the back of his hand on the maknae’s forehead. When Woohyun arrived a couple of seconds later, L held onto his shoulder to stop him from entering the room, wordlessly telling him to give them some air.

 “Hyung, is he going to be okay?” Woohyun asked, his voice a little more panicky than he intended. “What should we do?”

            “What do you mean what should we do? We need to call for an ambulance of course!” Sungyeol said, his hand immediately going for the phone that conveniently was not in is pocket. He reached over to grab the cellphone that he knew would be in Myungsoo’s jeans, already opening the lock on the visual’s phone.

 Hoya heard some indistinct mumbling from the maknae and placed his ear closer to Sungjong’s mouth.

            “Please…no…they can’t…Hoya-hyung…” Sungjong murmured faintly so only the main dancer could hear. Hoya’s mind was whirling away, remembering what happened to the maknae earlier today. He knew the youngest member was in some serious pain and they needed to get him to a hospital, so why in the world did Sungjong want to keep his suffering a secret?

            “They can’t know…please…” Sungjong tried again, his voice sounding more distressed at the beeping sounds coming from Myungsoo’s phone.

            Hoya let out a calming breath, clamping down on his emotions for what he was most certainly hoping he was not going to regret.

“No. Sungyeol, don’t.” Hoya said firmly, the serious tone of his voice stopping Sungyeol’s hand from dialing 911 (or 119).

“What? Why?” Sunggyu asked surprised, ready to call for an ambulance himself.

            “Please. Just don’t.” Hoya said again, his hand reaching out to secretly tug onto Sunggyu’s sleeve as he gazed straight into his leader’s eyes.

            Sunggyu was a little perplexed by Hoya’s strange request. Sungjong just collapsed on the floor and the main dancer didn’t want to get him to a hospital? Everyone knew Hoya had a soft spot for the maknae, so it was very out of character to see him so composed with dealing with Sungjong’s plight.

            And, as much as Sunggyu would like to refuse Hoya’s unusual demand, there was something about the way Hoya looked at him that made him want to trust the main dancer. Hoya always knew what to do at the right time. Once during their drive home from a radio show, Hoya stopped the car and ran into a convenience store to get a bee-stung Dongwoo some sanitizing wipes and tweezers to pull out the stinger. It was a very educational experience as Hoya patiently instructed the other members—and their managers and stylists—how to properly and efficiently handle a bee sting.  

            In fact, now that Sunggyu thought about it, he deeply respected the main dancer and had he not already been the leader, he would not protest in having Hoya take over his position. Sunggyu eyes crinkled slightly. That was a reassurance that he secretly needed.

            And, it also helped that he knew there was something going on that Hoya was most definitely hiding from them—the tug on his sleeve was an indication of that.

            Infinite’s leader turned to glance at the other members in the hallway. They each wore similar worried and anxious faces. Remembering the dejected and sad emotions that captured them just a couple hours ago, he knew no one was anywhere near ready to face another stressful obstacle. Sunggyu nodded his head to Hoya and focused his eyes onto the second eldest member.

“Dongwoo, get the kids out of here. Hoya and I will take care of Sungjong.”

“But, what?” the main rapper exclaimed in protest. “Hyung, we need to—”

“Go get some food and wait somewhere in town. Don’t come back into the dorm until we call you. Okay?”

            “But…” he started again, but judging by the way his hyung was absently curling his hand into a fist in his attempt to control his conflicting emotions, Dongwoo knew it was not a good idea to be going against Sunggyu’s wishes right now.

            “Alright,” Dongwoo conceded finally and pried the others from the bathroom door. “Come on guys, let’s give Sungjong some space, okay? Chicken and beer on me.”

            Sunggyu and Hoya heard the main rapper’s soothing voice as it disappeared with the click of their apartment lock. As soon as they left, Hoya lightly shook Sungjong’s shoulders.

           “Sungjong? Can you hear me?” The main dancer whispered quietly, his voice echoing in the eerily silent room. Sungjong didn’t respond, his breathing becoming shallower. Hoya grimaced and wiped some sweat off the maknae’s face. He watched Sunggyu shift side to side as the main vocal lightly held onto Sungjong’s clammy hand.

           “Hyung, can you hold onto him first?” Hoya asked, placing the maknae in Sunggyu’s arms. He hurried off to the kitchen and grabbed a few painkillers, a towel, and a glass of water. Then, running back, he gently grasped Sungjong’s head and tilted the painkillers and water down his throat.

           Sungjong choked a little from the sudden inhalation of water and coughed a couple of times. He reflexively squeezed his leader’s hand and slightly opened his eyes. His head was throbbing as he tried to pull himself up from his arms. Almost falling to the ground, Sungjong felt himself being pulled onto a muscular back and carried off somewhere else, to his room most likely. And, in a blink of an eye, he was cleaned, changed, and warm in bed, falling to sleep almost immediately.

           Hoya dabbed the remaining sweat from the maknae’s face and arms, sitting on the bed. Sunggyu sat in a chair next to the two other Infinite members, watching in relief as the maknae’s breathing normalized and his body relaxed. He absently swept Sungjong’s bangs from his face.

Sunggyu’s teeth clenched tightly as he tried to control his emotions, “Hoya, what the hell is going on?”

            He probably only slept for maybe an hour or two before he felt the pressure of a wet towel on his forehead. His eyes opened wide this time as he stared at two other pairs on his face.

“Sungjong,” Hoya spoke up first, removing the cloth from the maknae’s face, “How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay now, hyung,” he replied and put up a brave smile that hid the still throbbing, though dulling pain in his lower back.

            “Really?” Sunggyu’s eyebrows rose slightly, unconvinced. He just heard from the main dancer about how Sungjong collapsed in practice that morning and had an impulse to berate the maknae for not saying anything earlier. But, Hoya had already repressed Sunggyu’s anger and promised the leader that this was something that Sungjong wanted to handle himself and most likely had his own reasons for not telling anyone.

            “Sungjong,” Hoya patted the maknae’s head lightly, “we know you’re lying. Please… we don’t want to see you in pain. Tell us why we can’t get you to a hospital.”

 “…I…”

            “We won’t tell the others if you don’t want us to,” Hoya continued, eyeing Sunggyu for his approval. “But we might want to tell at least manager Seo—“

            “No! That would be even worse!” Sungjong exclaimed and lifted himself up from the bed. “No, not the managers…they can’t know either.”

The elder two Infinite members looked at each other curiously.

“Well, why not?” Hoya asked.

            Sungjong ignored the question and pleaded with his hyungs, “I’ll go to the hospital, but please just wait for another week, after the fan meeting when we don’t have any big schedules for a while.”

            “You want us to wait for a week? We know you’re hurting Sungjong!” Hoya shouted, standing abruptly from his position on the bed. The memory of Seong Im’s beautiful laugh was ringing in his mind.

            The maknae’s eyes flashed sadly. He settled back into the bed, feeling the pangs of guilt in his heart, “I’m sorry, hyung. Please, please just a week, please wait until then.”

            Sungjong felt tears well up in his eyes when his hyungs didn’t respond. He knew he should tell them his reasons behind hiding his condition, but…no, this is for the better. He turned his head slightly towards the wall to hide the tears that threatened to streak down his face.

“Fine.”

“Hyung!”

           “W-what?” Sungjong asked surprised, turning his head to look at Sunggyu. He almost cried just then when he saw the small smile plastered on his leader’s face. It was too much for Sungjong to handle…the way his leader looked at him…there was more than understanding and love in his leader’s eyes. Sungjong saw a trust that he knew he most certainly didn’t earn.

“Just one week. No one else will know. After the fan meeting, we are going straight to the hospital, okay?”

           The maknae nodded as Sunggyu pulled the covers more over his supine form. Sunggyu continued, “Go to sleep now. I’m going to let Dongwoo know they can come back home.”

           When Sunggyu and Hoya lightly closed the door after the resting maknae, the main dancer glared at his leader, his lips were pursed together.

           “Are you crazy? How could you let this go?” Hoya questioned even more perplexed than before. When he retold what happened to the maknae earlier, he was quite sure Sunggyu was going to drag Sungjong to the hospital himself if he was able to. But, now? Since when did their leader put anything above their health?

            Sunggyu kept his face as unreadable as possible. His eyes shined with something unsettling that Hoya had not seen in a long time. “Well, why not? Didn’t you stop Sungyeol from calling the hospital in the first place?”

            “That was different,” Hoya tried to reason, his brain scrambling for an answer. Stopping Sungyeol from rashly calling for an ambulance was one thing, but leaving Sungjong to fight the pain by himself for another week? He certainly wasn’t hinting for Sunggyu to let the maknae hide his suffering from everyone else any longer. “I didn’t mean for us to keep this a secret—“

             “You were right, Hoya. You made the right decision. If Sungyeol called the ambulance tonight, I’m sure there would paparazzi everywhere and Sungjong would feel a lot more guilty.”

  “Yeah, but that was before, why can’t we—“

  “I trust Sungjong,” Sunggyu replied, his voice full of warmth. “And, I trust you. Maybe…maybe even a bit more.”  

  “Hyung,” Hoya started, a feeling of fear and foreboding settling into the pit of his belly. “What are you…?”

             Sunggyu hastily pulled out his phone and dialed Dongwoo’s number. Hoya heard a faint ringing on the phone as Infinite’s leader placed it to his ear.

             After a moment’s pause, Sunggyu hesitantly stretched out a hand and ruffled Hoya’s hair, an action that no one in their right mind would do to probably the most serious member of Infinite. Sunggyu smiled sincerely, but he could not hide the small signs of sadness that were present in his eyes, “You would be a good leader someday, Hoya.”

            Before Hoya could ask him to explain what he was talking about, Sunggyu had already turned around and was walking away from him.