The seven of them sat huddled in one cozy corner of the barbecue restaurant as their meals sizzled on the grill in front of them. It was in the evening, a few hours after the radio program ended.

Junhee shifted awkwardly, sitting between Himchan and Jongup. She did her best to stay invisible and not fall prey to any part of the conversation nor the occasional glare Junhong shot in her direction. ‘I don’t belong here. I should’ve left.’ Junhee closed her eyes and imagined herself at her apartment with manager Yoon’s cooked meal, her guitar and music sheets. She tried to recall the smile on her mother’s face in the picture frame by her bedside. The thought of it hurt, and somebody was elbowing her in the ribs.

Her eyes snapped open, immediately meeting Youngjae’s expectant ones from the opposite side of the grill.

“Well?” he urged, and Junhee felt lost.

Helpfully, Jongup leaned in from the left and asked, “Do you drink?”

At this, Youngjae wriggled the bottle of soju in his hand indicatively and the girl’s eyes lighted up with understanding. She bit her lip, looking cornered.

“It’s okay if you don’t,” Himchan said clearly, turning to smile at Junhee. “Screw Korean customs. I don’t drink either.”

Junhee gave him what she hoped was a smile and not a cringe, before turning back to Youngjae. She shook her head feebly and muttered a small sorry.

“That’s great,” Youngjae said graciously, tipping a full shot into his glass and the others’, apart from Himchan’s. “More for us.”

Jongup laughed and it broke the ice around them. Junhee smiled, eyes meeting Yongguk, who winked at her knowingly. She might’ve flushed, for she hadn’t been socially active ever since…then.

Conversations got easier and merrier and Junhee might’ve even laughed once or twice. She would’ve laughed more, talked more, if her heart and mind weren’t so conscious of the cold silent young man sitting between Daehyun and Youngjae. It was as if he was in a different world. Junhong’s expression was stoic and grey; he would let out a grunt or two when he was addressed in a conversation and busied himself with the alcohol. It disturbed Junhee and it hurt her to see him this way. She’d already lost count of how many glasses he had downed. Nobody seemed to notice, or perhaps they did but Junhong’s behaviour was considered normal? Junhee bit her lip hard, trying not to frown as she wondered when it had all went wrong for him.

Daehyun might’ve noticed something odd with the girl’s expression that constantly flitted towards Junhong and the way she grimaced every time the youngest finished another shot.

“Don’t worry about him,” he said loudly, cutting through something Youngjae was saying. Daehyun clapped a hand onto Junhong’s back and Junhee’s eyes widened. “He has high alcohol tolerance. He drinks like this but he almost never gets drunk.”

Yongguk snorted but kept quiet. Nobody seemed to disagree as Juniel’s expression turned painful between embarrassment of being caught worrying and still worrying because he was barely of age. Junhong’s glare snapped up to her and he downed the rest of his drink as if proving a point, shrugging Daehyun’s hand harshly off of his shoulder.

“She’s not worrying,” Junhong hissed at Daehyun who quickly retracted his hand. “Why would she care? A pathetic kid like me?”

“Zelo–” Jongup started as the atmosphere flipped in an instant.

“Shut it,” Junhong snarled and Yongguk stiffened. The oldest’s gaze flashed cautiously between Juniel who was paling by the second and seemed to have shrunk into the seat and Junhong whose frozen heart and just as brittle eyes fully spun from Daehyun to the girl.

The young composer averted from such a deathly gaze, as if the young bassist could gruesomely murder her in ways that nothing or nobody else ever could.

“Zelo-ah,” Yongguk tried to say, while keeping his voice calm yet firm. “You’ve drank enough–”

“What do you know?” his words cut through the air sharply, as it shot to the leader. Everybody stiffened.

“Junhong–”

“I said, shut it!” Junhong spat, turning to glare at Himchan, smacking his empty glass on the table loudly. “What right do you have to call me that?”

Junhee started to fumble with her bag, “Um, I– I should go,” looking down and not meeting anybody’s eyes. Her hands were shaking and so were her legs as she tried to stand. “I’m sorry, could you–” her words to Jongup were cut off.

“You. Sit down,” Junhong ordered, pointing accusingly at the girl. “Who do you think you are?” he spat, “What right do you have to come and go as you please?” he continued raising his voice as Junhee lost strength in her legs and fell back down in her seat, trying to remember to breathe. “You think you can just come barging into my life and then leave? You are foul, you are cruel, you know that?”

“Zelo!” Youngjae said sternly.

Junhong ignored him completely.

His attention was utterly focused on Choi Junhee as if he was that little boy again where this strange girl was his sun, and everything else was irrelevant as his life revolved around only Junhee every second of everyday. It was pathetic and Junhong knew it, but he could not stop; it was a virus, this game he played, and he wanted to share it with her. The pain he went through, the anger, the overwhelming sense of despair and betrayal, of shattered promises that used to keep him awake each night. How it felt to breathe without her, wake up without her.

Foolishly, Junhong had hoped she would come back for him, tell him that she was sorry, that she was as hopeless without him as he had been without her. He pathetically imagined her reaching for his hands like they were her lifeline, wishing he would not pull away, for him to give her at least a kind word or a mere smile.

But none of that ever happened, and here she was all whole, happy and okay without him. Living without him and laughing, smiling as if all was well and Choi Junhong was nothing but memories she would soon rather forget than relive in her waking moments.

For an inspiring second, Junhong wanted to tell her how much he’d hurt; he wanted to scream at how unfair and heartless she was and how– how he hated her for giving him the happiest childhood and then crushing it into absolutely nothing when he no longer meant anything to her. Instead, he watched Junhee with stoic eyes filled with hatred and face absent of his crushing love for her; it showed only his heart—which was as good as dead.

“Let me tell you something,” he said quietly, voice unnervingly low. “You’d like to have someone who would stay with you…grow old with you?” he smirked bitterly. “How? How, when a girl like you don’t even have the heart to grow up!” Junhee flinched at his words and satisfaction filled Junhong because he had hit the nail right on the head. “You think you can just live your life like this? Innocent, happy and heartless?”

He laughed. A sharp dark laugh that he wished could slice he