HakYeon’s phone charger was always plugged into the wall. JaeHwan came to expect HakYeon to be there, and when he wasn’t, WonShik was calling HakYeon’s phone immediately. TaekWoon’s family filtered in and out, and maybe, eventually, HyeJung started to get used to the idea that HakYeon would always be there. HakYeon learned how to sleep in a chair every night without permanently twisting his spine out of place, waking up with TaekWoon’s palm resting along the long column of his neck.

 It took time before TaekWoon’s breathing went back to being long and slow, before he could speak in more than fragmented sentences without losing his breath, before he could manage to sit up for a little bit with help. It was enough that he was sick of the hospital – and maybe of JaeHwan – that he started to convince them that he wanted to go home.

“If you’re so bent on it, you obviously have to come back home,” SeJung retorted. “As in our house. Not your apartment.”

HakYeon silently agreed. That day, TaekWoon didn’t sit up for long before he started to get dizzy and had to lay down again. His right arm was thrown over his eyes as he tried to make the feeling go away.

“You child,” his mother quipped. “What do you think you’re gonna be able to do in an apartment all by yourself, huh? Who’s gonna help you if you pass out and hit your head, huh? You live on the eighth floor! You haven’t even been able to stand up yet!”

TaekWoon pulled his arm down with a sigh. HakYeon had surrendered his customary chair to the mother, and he and SeJung were positioned at the foot of the bed. Even if he wasn’t physically in the middle of it, he felt a bit awkward having to listen to the family squawk back and forth about the issue. He caught TaekWoon’s gaze, reading some sort of desperate look in his eyes.

He coughed. “Erm… Omonim, I could help TaekWoon. It’s no trouble to me.”

The mother shot a look at HakYeon, and then she turned back to her son, delivering a quick smack on his wrist to which he quickly reacted with a hiss as he yanked his hand back. “You brat! Don’t think I didn’t see that! Who do you think you are?! Do you think HakYeon is only there to wait on you, hand and foot?!”

HakYeon quickly jumped forward, trying to appease her. “A-ah! No, really! There’s no trouble for me at all!”

She rounded on him, and he flinched backwards into SeJung. “Says who?! How long have you skipped work to sleep over here?! Have you even paid your rent to your own apartment yet?!”

“I have! And I already told my boss about everything, and he’s fine with it!”

Mother scoffed at him, muttering under her breath about how nice it must be to be so young and ignorant. TaekWoon seemed to have recovered enough, waving away the sting on his hand with a huff.

“Er… Either way,” HakYeon said diplomatically, “we can at least agree that TaekWoon still isn’t in a state to where he can be discharged just yet. So at least for now, we can still work out the arrangements for when that time comes.”

However, JaeHwan – for all the nosiness (no pun intended) that he was worth – skipped into the room during his rounds later that day to inform them TaekWoon’s department wouldn’t pay for compensation much longer, so the prospective future held either hospital bills or house arrest. HakYeon helped SeJung hold back her fuming mother from JaeHwan (because JaeHwan wasn’t responsible so why was she yelling at him?) and tried to redirect her focus to what her decision for TaekWoon would be.

“Do as you please, then, you brats!” she screeched, the kids cowering behind the hospital bed. She was already on the phone with her husband as she stormed out the door.

So began JaeHwan’s ultimate crash course which covered everything from physical therapy through the various prescription medications up to basic caretaking of an invalid – to which TaekWoon chucked the closest physical object at JaeHwan; he missed, his non-dominant right hand’s aim regretfully a bit off center. JaeHwan spoke so quickly that HakYeon’s head began to hurt from everything he was saying.

“This one, you definitely need to make sure he takes all of it in a timely manner, and make sure he finishes it! Don’t slack! This one, though, only if he really needs it! If he takes too much, he’ll become an idiot, and I don’t want to deal with that. As for this one, keep applying this especially to the more hot spots, mainly his upper arm and neck. Let me know if you run out. Now, we’ve barely started on getting him to stand because the muscle tissue in his leg where he got shot is still repairing itself. You don’t want to try that just yet, at least, not for a couple of weeks. Hollow points are ridiculous.”

“Wait, what are hollow points?”

“Don’t worry about it.” HakYeon’s phone was somehow in JaeHwan’s hands. “I’ll put myself on speed dial in case you need me. Call me every now and then so we can make WonShikkie jealous.”

“What.”

HakYeon had no clue what he’d gotten himself into. Could he really manage all of this? Sure, SeJung and other family members said they would help, as well, but HakYeon was the one who’d jumped up and volunteered himself. He caught TaekWoon staring at him once as he shuffled through the papers JaeHwan had given him, growing doubtful of his own capabilities with each page he read. TaekWoon was staring at him with some sort of vexed expression on his face, and when HakYeon asked him about it, he just shook his head and looked up to the ceiling, quiet and blank.

Finally, about a week and a half later, came the day of moving. The Jung family moved in fast forward all around them, driving back and forth trying to get everything ready, moving items from the hospital room up to the apartment. All the while, with help from JaeHwan and some nurses, HakYeon slowly transitioned TaekWoon from being an immobile in-patient to being a partially handicapped civilian. Still getting accustomed to all of the motion, TaekWoon held his head in his right hand to fend off the vertigo as they unhurriedly rolled him in a wheelchair to the elevator. HakYeon didn’t even have the time to fret over him since JaeHwan was stuffing more information into his ears.

It seemed like everything leaked out of his brain during the car ride to TaekWoon’s apartment.

If it wasn’t for the massive collection of flowers, balloons, and stuffed animals set everywhere with messages and cards wishing TaekWoon to get well soon, the apartment would’ve been sparse and minimalistic. HakYeon saw maybe a living room table, a loveseat, and a small lamp. However, he was a little preoccupied with helping TaekWoon’s father navigate one-able-legged TaekWoon through the narrow space to his bedroom; of course the wheelchair wouldn’t fit through the doorway.

For a while, everyone was fussing about again. TaekWoon’s father left to return the wheelchair to the hospital, the mother lingered to make sure everything from the kitchen to the closet was stocked and readily available, the sisters whirled about as they gave HakYeon a tutorial of everything in the apartment.

“I didn’t even know he had an apartment,” HakYeon had admitted, embarrassed.

But SeJung just chuckled. “He got it about a month after he moved back up here, but he spends half of his time here and half of his time at home. Mom tells him he may as well just stay at home if he’s gonna do that, and then that’s when he sleeps here.”

Even after the Jung family finally filtered out after a long time of bustling around, HakYeon was still padding swiftly through the space, making sure everything was in order, arranging and rearranging everything, never stopping to sit down. It seemed TaekWoon finally got sick of it as he grabbed on to HakYeon’s sleeve when he got close enough and pulled him down. He had a futon – not a western-style bed – so HakYeon floundered a bit, thrown off balance, and tried to not land on TaekWoon as he knelt.

“What is it? Do you need something?”

Of course, he didn’t reply, but he held on to HakYeon’s sleeve. For the most part, after they had dropped him to the futon upon arrival, TaekWoon had laid back to catch his breath while everyone blurred around him. He still looked drowsy, and briefly, HakYeon wondered if it was yet time for the first round of meds he’d have to administer. He chose instead to rearrange his sitting position so that he could comfortably perch on the floor next to the futon, his sleeve still in TaekWoon’s grasp. He gently pushed long bangs from TaekWoon’s eyes, passing his fingers through his hair a little longer than necessary. TaekWoon didn’t protest, letting his eyelids flutter closed.

A/N: Two updates in a week because I can.